Colleague Rick Maese, our man in the D.R., says on his latest blog post that Jim Duquette is the highest-ranking Orioles front-office person to visit the country, and that he got there fast. In light of what's going on, that says a lot about Duquette, a little about Mike Flanagan (this makes his addition of Duquette seem even more sound, which reflects well on him) - and nothing good about Peter Angelos. The man pulled strings that maybe shouldn't even have been pulled to bring the Cuban baseball team here several years ago, but he can't catch a flight to the D.R. to talk his best player out of a trade demand? Nothing wrong with leaving baseball decisions up to the baseball people, but if ever there was a time for ownership intervention, this would seem to be it. Has he even broken off a phone call to Tejada? Emailed him? Sent a telegram? Smoke signals? A note tied to a pigeon's leg? Hired a local kid to throw a brick through his window with a message tied to it?

Once again - can someone around here say, definitely, that the Orioles want Tejada here?

In not-exactly-related news, Brian Billick is bringing Jim Fassel back, presuming he doesn't get a head-coaching job. This is good. Fassel shouldn't be blamed for the offensive stinking like this. In fact, the way it's played the last two games looks susupiciously similar to how he was drawing it up in a media classroom session (the coordinators broke down the new offensive and defensive schemes for us commoners) last summer. Problem is, it would be better if Fassel did get a head-coaching job, if only to prove that this season hasn't tainted him.