John Fay hits you with this one:

There’s been a lot of speculation nationally about the possibility of former St. Louis GM Walt Jocketty ending up with the Reds, given the that Reds CEO Bob Castellini was once a limited partner in St. Louis and he’s known to admire the work Jocketty did with the Cardinals.But it’s not going to happen.

“Wayne Krivsky is our GM. Period,” Castellini said Monday through a spokesman.

Krivsky has one year remaining on his contract. The Reds are 152-172 in his two years as GM.

Jocketty was dismissed after the season by the Cardinals.

I read the quote to my Crack Technical Staff, who responded:

Do you love me? Question mark. Please, please. Exclamation point. I want to hold you in parentheses.

When you look at the sentence, it’s just a statement of fact followed by a statement of punctuation. It doesn’t say anything about what the fact will be tomorrow.

Hope never dies.

The Phillies were the second team swept out of contention this weekend when the Rockies beat them 1-2. The team of the 10,000 losses just keeps on marching.

I’m pleased to see the Rockies win, but MLB and TBS have to be hating these short series. Don’t these teams know anything about advertising??

My favorite quote from the Phillies game wrap:

“It’s crazy, man,” added Romero. “I know I executed my pitches, but … that one out of the reach of Jayson, and [the hit past] Chase — I tip my hat. They put enough wood on the [ball]. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s unfortunate that we came up short. We showed a lot of character, and now we have to go home and watch the [Rockies] continue to play.”

It’s my favorite because of the words in square brackets, indicating that those words weren’t actually part of the quote. What did Romero call the team if not [Rockies]? Probably [them], but my imagination likes to wander.

The Cubs are officially eliminated from the post season now, having lost their third in a row to the Arizona Diamonbacks. I certainly didn’t expect the Cubs to go all the way, but I didn’t expect them to go out in three games. That was really a sad showing. I feel bad for Cubs fans tonight, and that’s coming from a Reds fan.

With regard to Piniella’s decision to pull Carlos “the Moose” Zambrano from game 1 after 85 pitches with the game tied, I have to wonder whether that still seems like a good decision now that he doesn’t need to be fresh for game 4.

In other news, the Rockies are looking to subject the Phillies to the same fate. The CTS just told me that the Rockies starter was 2 years old when the Phillies’ starter broke the majors. If the Rockies win tonight, will major league managers everywhere suddenly come to appreciate the value of youth, even in the face of experience? Yeah, probably not.

Congratulations to Bruce. It’s an award he never would have won if he’d been in the majors.

ST. LOUIS — Reds outfielder Jay Bruce has been selected as Sporting News’ 2007 Minor League Player of the Year. Bruce, the 12th overall pick in the 2005 draft, was slated to have a two-stop summer: first, show he could hit high-Class A pitching in Sarasota, then settle in at Class AA in Chattanooga. But his hot bat – and an injury one level up – opened a door at Class AAA Louisville, and Bruce never looked back.After compiling a stat line of a .319 batting average, 26 home runs, 46 doubles, 87 runs and 89 RBIs in 133 games at three levels, it’s evident Bruce, 20, will be swinging his lumber in Cincinnati before too long.

Sporting News, covering baseball since 1886, has been handing out the Minor League Player of the Year award since 1936.

Press release out of Cardinal country:

ST. LOUIS — Bill DeWitt Jr., chairman of the board and general partner of the St. Louis Cardinals, today announced that the team is parting ways with senior vice president and general manager Walt Jocketty.”Walt will be remembered as the Cardinals’ GM during one of the most successful and memorable periods in team history, and we will always be extremely grateful for his contributions to our many triumphs over the past 13 seasons,” DeWitt said. “It is now time to move forward with an undivided vision and purpose that is consistent with the St. Louis Cardinals philosophy of building and operating the best top-to-bottom organization in baseball.”

DeWitt today named John Mozeliak as interim general manager. Mozeliak recently completed his fifth season as the Cardinals assistant general manager.

The Cardinals will immediately conduct a search for the club’s new general manager and honor the remaining terms of their contract with Jocketty, who was hired by the Cardinals in October 1994. Jocketty helped build Cardinals teams that won seven division titles, two National League crowns and the 2006 World Series championship.

“The Cardinals and Walt Jocketty are turning the page today with mutual admiration and appreciation for each other,” DeWitt said. “Today’s news does not come without disappointment and regret. But it also comes with great opportunity, and with that we will immediately begin our search for the new general manager of the St. Louis Cardinals.”

Tough crowd: did they expect him to win the World Series every year? I wonder how this will affect Tony LaRussa’s decision to stay with the team. I wonder how it will affect Bob Castellini’s criteria on what makes a good GM.