Gil Meche is better than Barry Zito

I started live-blogging last night thinking there was a decent chance the game could go 18. I even resisted typing, "This could be a great win for the Royals" when they had the go-ahead run on third with one out in the 14th, but my attempt at not jinxing them didn't matter. As it happened, it was a disheartening defeat, in which Gil Meche lost a 3-0, then 4-1 lead, and the bullpen couldn't hold a 6-4 advantage, with heretofore perfect closer Octavio Dotel blowing the save in the 9th. The offense couldn't cobble together enough runs against rejects Todd Wellemeyer, who started, and Kip Wells, who finished. Oh, and Ryan f'ing Ludwick delivered the coup d'etat.

So now what? Now we take the off-day to get out of baseball a bit, check out Tony's Kansas City (more exciting than your Kansas City, probably), the famous dramatic chipmunk in the "best five-second video on the Internet" and this squirrel catapult. Most of the time you can't go wrong with the Onion, either, especially if it's about Pac-Man Jones.

Not to get completely away from baseball: Scott Elarton is DLed, so let the debate begin over who to make an emergency start. Your candidates:

Tyler Lumsden, AAA (5.40 ERA)
Billy Bucker, AAA (4.15 ERA)
Luke Hochevar, AA (4.63 ERA)
Carlos Rosa, AA (5.76 ERA)
Danny Christensen (5.57 ERA)

Speaking of pitchers, there's always room to discuss Lord of 'em All, The Meche. Royals Authority has charted Meche's performance against that of other free agent pitchers from last year's class. The short answer: he compares very well. The slightly longer one:

So far, signing Gil Meche has been the absolute best move made by Dayton Moore and the Royals. Ted Lilly has given the Cubs roughly ‘Meche-like’ numbers, but he is three years older. Jeff Suppan has logged the innings, but will never be more than a number three starter. It is also likely that Barry Zito’s numbers will improve and that monster seven year deal will work out for the Giants, but the Royals never even got a call back from Zito. As for the rest, Meche has clearly outperformed them all.

Meche may not be as skillful on the guitar, and I don't think he's ever written a feature for ESPN The Magazine like Zito, but when it comes to baseball, he's proven so far the superior.