Clem Fandango

The sensible route would have been to have gone with "Marlon Turd." Touché

They just signed Edwin Bellorin to a minor league deal... I'm not sure if that's the stopgap they're looking for, but yeah.

Marlon Byrd? More like Marlon Barf... amirite?

If you put faith in UZR, Adrian Gonzalez is not a bad pick, but not the best. Lee wins in that regard. He was only one-tenth of a point behind Gonzalez in UZR, but 1.3 points higher than him in UZR/150. But yeah Gonzalez and Lee were the best 1B this year, and Gonzalez winning is not a disservice to the award. It could've gone either way

Does he still think Rich Hill is gonna strike out 746 batters?

He's been an excellent contact hitter his whole minor league career, the power he showed last year was kind of out of the ordinary. I don't think he was ever pegged as a anything more than a contact guy... but he's been a top organizational prospect with both the Angels and DBacks. Who knows, maybe under the tutelage of Jaramillo he could produce for more power, but yeah this is definitely a case of the Royals trying to capitalize off a big year from him. I like him as a player, I think he will be a solid second basemen, just not anything overly spectacular. If he could consistently produce like that in the bottom half of the lineup that'd be perfectly fine by me, but I'd imagine the Royals might be trying to get more than what he's worth. If he could be had for Hill I'd do it in a heartbeat (he won't be, Hill is turrible offensively). Callaspo's upside would be nice, as he's still got some experience to gain, IMO... but yeah, if he can be had for the right price, I'd get him.

Let's not forget that if he were to be traded to the Cubs, he wouldn't be playing in one of the most pitcher friendly parks in the majors. His career home/road splits: Home: .261/.334/.451/.785 128 XBH's Road: .284/.353/.516/.869 156 XBH's He also has an extreme home/road split in BABIP. Home: .303 Road: .340 However production against lefties is very discouraging. I like Granderson a lot, but at the right price. Every trade proposal idea has been discussed already ad nauseum so I won't waste my time reiterating what everyone else has basically agreed upon, that he should be had for mid level guys and maybe someone like Theriot, but nothing more, and definitely not a top prospect

This is the last year of Dusty's contract. I'm sure they'll let him play it out or replace him midway through the season if there's no results. I wouldn't fault Jockety at all for much. He was dealt a crappy hand. They hired Dusty before they hired him, I'm sure he probably would've preferred someone different.

This. People are being blinded by his stellar first half of 2009, but ignoring the rest of his career? He had an ERA of 5.07 and a WHIP of 1.53 in the second half, which is much more in line with his career 4.66 ERA and 1.51 WHIP. Edwin Jackson shouldn't cost anyone more than a a couple fringe MLB prospects. He's not special, we have plenty of guys who can produce similar, if not better, numbers.

Brandon Phillips NL road OPS since he's been with the Reds: 06 - .701 07 - .821 08 - .699 09 - .713 07 was when he went 30-30, his best year in his career thus far, a monumental year in which he achieved a career high .331 OBP and an OPS+ of 105. Since he's been a regular with the Reds is OPS+ is 97 His defense has also gradually gotten significantly worse each year since 2007 No thanks to Brandon Phillips

Where are the big names?

Rob Neyer made a blog about why the awards are mssed up... said he thought Pedroia should've gotten 2B, Youkilis should've gotten 1B, and Andrus should've gotten SS. 1) Youkilis only played 70 something games at 1B so that's dumb, although his defense at 1B was far superior to Tex so he was half justified in thinking he should get it. According to UZR, if you put faith in it, Kendry Morales led the AL with a 5.0 UZR compared to Tex's -4.1 UZR 2) Pedroia vs. Polanco is sort of a wash 3) Andrus was far better than Jeter, though Jeter actually wasn't that bad this year, surprisingly (probably because of Tex at 1b). But none of that matters, what matters are the comments from mongoloid Yankee homers in his blog...

Sam Fuld out OPS'd Jermaine Dye this year. I know I know, sample size.

I'm not following the irony. Maybe "irony" wasn't the right word to use, but it's very unusual for somebody to play for someone they were once traded for.Unusual, coincidental maybe...but I wouldn't say ironic. Alanis Morissette begs to differ

Wasn't there news of Rickets discussing the possibility of a Lee extension this offseason anyways?

Rotoworld...

Johnny Damon has the sweetest ass in the league, a priceless statistic. He will not come cheap

Plus you have to figure Dayan Viciedo will fit in there somewhere at some point. Last I heard Viciedo can't fit into much of anything. Truth, that guy is fatter than the fattest person to ever fat.

The Cardinals are gonna need a new left fielder :)

Very exciting. I'm pleased with our new owner thus far :)

Except that Kyle Blanks is just not an outfielder. They should trade Gonzalez to Boston for however much young talent they can get and give Blanks the job at 1b. Seems like the most logical thing to do. Epstein has a buddy in the NL that he can help, but can also help him now too. If you can get three good prospects for him, move Blanks to 1st, and then sign a big FA with that money they would be much better off. I don't know San Diego, but Gonzalez doesn't come across as being a guy any fan would be very attached too. Gonzalez grew up in Chula Vista, which is just 10 minutes from Petco Park, so he was somewhat of a hometown hero before he became the overall #1 pick in the draft. That they got him and Chris Young for a little more than a handful of dirt makes his popularity even stronger. The team that won the little league world series this year actually has a member of the team that lives in the house that Gonzalez grew up in, which was another interesting storyline that got plenty of air time for San Diego. A Gonzalez trade would not be popular with the fans, by any means. But, it's rather pointless to pay him an 8 digit salary for a team that isn't going anywhere, anytime soon. Besides, San Diego Padres fans are used to getting their hearts stomped. In fact, from some that I have spoken to, they can almost set their watch to it. But with the kind of haul they can get for Gonzalez from a team like the Red Sox, wouldn't that keep the Padres' fan collective at peace? I would imagine if he went to the Red Sox that Bucholz would be the centerpiece of that deal, and they'd get a couple more really good prospects?

I have a feeling that Adrian Gonzalez isn't going to be the big HR slugger on that team next year... Kyle Blanks will. That's just me though

All I saw was "Finklestein" and it took me about 3.7 milliseconds to think of Ace Ventura

Well I think that's how MLBTR started out... just a blogspot site posting message board rumor fodder. Then he got wise, got a strategy, and started posting info from news articles across the country. If anything, MLBTR is one of the most valuable websites on the net for baseball news and information. It's a massive compilation site of the nations news articles pertaining to specific teams and players. And yeah, he's not really giving hard hitting analysis. Just pointing out basic info regarding their future. IIRC Dierkes is a die hard Cub fan, so I'm sure if he wanted to he could go on for a while with an in depth analysis, but he needs to keep the site neutral

Where was this? Blue Jays park....can't remember which town....Dunedin? I think it is Dunedin, just north of Clearwater. I haven't been there but it sounds like the same situation the Red Sox were in here in Ft. Myers. City of Palms Park is in the middle of the city with not much parking and it's an older facility. They are getting new digs in South Ft. Myers similar to the setup the Twins have here at the Lee County Sports Complex. The Cubs are looking for 120-130 acres and a state of the art facility would be built. Depending on the property they buy it should be close to the inter-state and no problems with parking. It's like that in Bradenton with the Pirates spring training facility as well. That was built in the early 90's, very limited on site parking, most people park in adjacent parking lots and streets. Unless that's changed... I haven't been to a ST game in my hometown in nearly 15 years.