MONTREAL - "The Rock" summed it up best. Cheap Custom Astros Jersey . "It feels like I havent left," said Tim Raines, the former long-time Expo, current Blue Jays roving instructor and should-be Hall-of-Famer, just moments after stepping onto the turf at Olympic Stadium. While Raines was referring to the memories that came flooding back, he may have meant it literally. Nothing much has changed about the Big O. Its the same ride to the Pie IX stop on the famous Montreal Metro. The walk from the station to the stadiums dimly lit concourse is no different. Then, you emerge through one of the section corridors into a time capsule. The yellow seats, so often empty in the Expos final years, serve as a reminder of days gone by when fans would rap them up and down to make a clanging sound. The scoreboard, which still sits above the centerfield batters eye, hasnt been updated. Its not high definition or LCD or anything else that resembles what fans enjoy in the stadia of today. The players are different. Well, for the most part, if you consider that Blue Jays utility infielder Maicer Izturis made his major league debut in a Montreal uniform on August 27, 2004. Everything else is the same. "I was joking if they wanted me to do any fan mail," said Blue Jays general manager Alex Anthopoulos, a Montreal native whose internship with the Expos, which included the responsibility of answering fan mail, launched his career in baseball. "I was getting ready to go." There was little chatter around the stadium of the 1994 players strike, which happened at a time when the Expos were 74-40, good enough for the National Leagues best record. The resurgent New York Yankees were the talk of the American League that year. What a contrast, those two organizations, in the two decades since. The Expos are gone, the proverbial stick of dynamite given to that 94 team by an uncommitted ownership, the 1995 club a shell of its former self. The Yankees have missed the playoffs only twice since. It took 10 years after the strike for the Expos, which experienced a kind of walking dead status once the likes of Larry Walker, Pedro Martinez, Moises Alou and others left town, to die off. The fans, descendants of the people who watched Jackie Robinson play in their city before he broke Major League Baseballs colour barrier in 1947, were subjected to annual speculation about their franchises relocation. Finally it happened in 2005 with the city of Washington, D.C. receiving a third crack at getting baseball right (the Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers each descend from failed Washington Senators clubs.) "I think the issues were, and its no knock against the stadium, but the location of the stadium, the fact it wasnt a retractable roof," said Anthopoulos. "Growing up in this city, like you would in Toronto but its a lot colder here in the winter, the winters are long and any bit of summer you can get you want to be outdoors. Its a tough sell to go all the way to the east end and be indoors for a ballgame." This is a 48-hour period for the Blue Jays and Mets to work out the final kinks before the start of the regular season. Just as importantly, its a chance for Montrealers to experience what once was and to pay a posthumous tribute to their beloved Gary Carter, which they did on Friday night. On Saturday, its the 94 Expos turn to feel the love. Larry Walker, Moises Alou and future Hall-of-Famer Pedro Martinez will be among those on hand. One can only hope this weekend serves to exorcise the demon just a little bit. Luis Rivera, the Blue Jays third base coach who played his first three big league seasons with the Expos from 1986-88, doesnt forget. "The crowds, they were loud and there was a lot of whistling, which I do a lot," he said. "It was about sometimes 20-thousand, 30-thousand, 40-thousand. I remember when Pasqual Perez used to pitch it was a packed house." Tim Raines, The Rock, he remembers too. "Its a very good baseball town," said Raines. "My first 10 years here we averaged two million fans a year. They dont just leave. I think ownership back in the day, right at the tail end, played a big part of the lack of success that they had here." Warren Cromartie, the former Expos great, has said the exhibition weekend is the first step toward the return of Major League Baseball to Montreal. Maybe hes right and one day well be able to say, "Les Expos sont la!" Maybe hes wrong and this is nothing more than a pipe dream. For the moment, its just nice to be back at Olympic Stadium. Collin McHugh Jersey . "Youre not really spending time to sit back and analyze what your competitions doing and things like that," Anthopoulos said. "Youre so focused on what were trying to get done." Ultimately, while the landscape around them changed with trades both major and minor, the Blue Jays did nothing before Thursdays non-waiver deadline. Joaquin Andujar Jersey . Re-signed by the club to a one-year, two-way (NHL/AHL) contract on July 5, Bass appeared in three preseason games with Columbus prior to breaking a bone in his hand on Sept. http://www.customastrosjersey.com/custom-randy-johnson-jersey-large-836y.html . -- The Florida Gators are first yet again this season.ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. -- Chris Kirk knew he was doing enough right Sunday at Sea Island to win a tournament that means so much to him. He just didnt realize it would take something that went so wrong for Briny Baird. Tied for the lead in the McGladrey Classic, Kirk was on the other side of the 18th fairway trying to envision an approach that would cover the flag and set up a birdie chance for the win. Those plans changed when Baird, with the ball below his feet in a fairway bunker, topped a 4-iron and watched his ball roll 90 yards and into a hazard. Kirk played for par, closed with a 4-under 66 for a one-shot victory, and became the first player from Sea Island to win the McGladrey Classic -- even if the 28-year-old moved to Atlanta a few months ago after six years in this tiny slice of paradise. He received the trophy from tournament host Davis Love III, his hero when he first took the game seriously. "To come here to Sea Island, which is a place that I love and cherish so much, and Daviss tournament, it just an unbelievable thing," Kirk said. "Davis was kind of my guy when I was 12 and 13, really starting to play golf. He was my favourite player, and hes turned from being my idol to sort of a mentor and good friend. So Im a very lucky person to be in that situation, and to win his tournament really means a lot to me." The victory sends Kirk to the Masters for the first time, a tournament that means even more. His joy was tempered slightly by the way the tournament finished. "It hurt to do what I did on the last hole," Baird said. Baird is now 0-for-365 in his PGA Tour career, and it looked for the longest time that he finally would win. Baird went from a two-shot deficit to a one-shot lead in two holes on the back nine, and he was on the verge of seizing control on the par-5 15th. Baird hit his approach to 40 feet for a chance at eagle. Kirk was between clubs and pulled his hybrid into the water left of the green, and then he slammed his wedge into the turf when he chipped weakly, leaving him a long putt for par. It looked as if Baird would lead by two shots, maybe three, with three holes to play. Instead, he ran his eagle putt 4 feet by the cup and three-putted for par, and Kirk holed his 20-foot par putt to stay only one shot behind. "That kept me in it," Kirk said. He caught Baird with a 15-foot birdie putt on the 17th hole, setting up one last surprise on a back nine filled with them. Tim Clark closed with a 62 and was on the practice range, holding out slim hope for a playoff if Kirk and Baird made bogey on the 18th. Only one of them falterred, and it was shocking. Ivan Rodriguez Jersey. Baird had a tough lie in the sand, and he felt his left foot slip. Even so, he felt he should have been able to pull off the shot. It wasnt even close. Baird struggled with his swing most of the day, and he told his caddie he didnt feel comfortable with it going down the 18th. "You mix that with nerves, and its a recipe for disaster," Baird said. Kirk finished at 14-under 266, and his last tournament of 2013 came with plenty of perks -- the biggest a trip to Augusta National, which he only has played when Georgia alumni used to invited the golf team over once a year. He also gets into the Tournament of Champions at Kapalua to start 2014. And his parents get a new photo for their mantle. The one they have is from a decade ago, when Kirk finished his sophomore year in high school and played in the Canon Cup north of Chicago. It was the first time he met Love, and his parents still have a photo of their son with sideburns and braces. "Its a pretty funny picture now," Kirk said. Now he can give them a photo of Kirk and Love posing with the trophy on the 18th green of the Seaside course at Sea Island, where Kirk had lived for the last six years until moving back to Atlanta because his wife is due next month with their second child. He still has his home at Sea Island, and it felt like the home with a large gallery waiting for him around the 18th green. It was the first time Kirk could recall such a large gallery cheering for him. If there was any consolation for Baird, it was money, of all things. The 41-year-old from Miami has said for years that he would rather have a season full of strong finishes that gets him into the Tour Championship than one win and nothing else. Even this week, he said tournament golf is as much about money than trophies. He earned $484,000 for his tie for second, and the 25-foot bogey putt was worth $220,000. Baird was playing this year on a major medical extension from having surgery on both shoulders in 2012, and the money he earned Sunday was enough for him to keep his card for the rest of the season. It was a small consolation. "Its not all about winning," Baird said Sunday. "Ive said that, but this hurts. This really does. This is very disappointing." Divots: This was the sixth time Baird has been runner-up. He has gone the longest without winning among players who have their PGA Tour cards. ... All four tournaments since the McGladrey Classic began in 2010 have been decided by no more than one shot. ... The fall portion of the PGA Tour season ends next week in Mexico. ' ' '