he has had such little presence lately that I've started to consider him outside the giant bomb dudes proper. In my mind now it's Jeff, Ryan, Brad, and Patrick and then you have Dave, Drew, Alexis, Vinny who occasionally pop up and it's cool when they do but they're not on the starting line up. Like he was sent back to the minors or something.
Define "lately"... He was in a ton of quick looks before the GOTY work started and, aside from one short podcast, he's been on there, as usual, and playing lots of stuff.
I don't think your comments can be backed up with actual examples.