EVIL~! alkeiper

And before that he was absolutely dominant in Seattle. Except for his awful 2004, Rhodes allows very few home runs. His control is good and he struck out nearly a batter an inning last year. I see no red flags on his performance. Rhodes pitched nearly 70 innings a year in Seattle with no apparent ill effects. He missed about half of 2004 with injury. I'd be a bit worried about Betancourt. He was nailed for steroids last year. The Phillies could probably get more back for Michaels, but what do they need really? I don't think teams are willing to move a solid starter for him, and the Phils are stocked with position players. This is probably the best move Gillick could make.

Thanks Matt. I just picked up this game myself. The $30 price tag was too much to resist. I was worried it would lack local teams, but the game includes Villanova, Bucknell, Penn State, Lehigh and Lafayette. That'll keep me satisfied for a while.

The Phils add bullpen depth with Arthur Rhodes, who experienced an excellent season in Cleveland. That allows them to move Ryan Madson to the rotation. Losing Michaels may be a small blow, but Aaron Rowand and Shane Victorino will fill the void in the outfield. Peter Bergeron, Chris Roberson and Shawn Garrett will all compete for the fifth outfielder's job.

Sure he has value, but he's not overwhelmingly better than a mid-level free agent. A .345 OBP isn't that special. Neither is 15 steals in 21 attempts. Crisp's comp list is nice, but I really think Andy Marte is a better prospect. It'll be harder to find a bat at third base than at left field in the future. As for position depth, the Indians have Franklin Gutierrez who could possibly make a run, although he had a weak 2005. What the Indians could conceivably do is promote Ryan Garko and play him at first base, and slide Ben Broussard to left field. That's kind of a circular argument. But I think it's pretty straightforward. The Braves couldn't move Chipper Jones off the hot corner, and the Red Sox were loaded there as well.

You're missing something big from that evaluation. Let me run more numbers for you Player A: .260/.314/.386, 1 HR, 4 steals, 84 OPS+ Player B: .271/.313/.368, 6 HRs, 25 steals, 74 OPS+ Player C: .289/.348/.484, 22 HRs, 22 steals, 125 OPS+ Players A and B are Crisp and Damon again, except at age 22. Player C is Grady Sizemore. Given a choice between Crisp and Sizemore, which is your cornerstone center fielder? I think it's obviously Sizemore. Crisp is a fine ballplayer, but he's about average as a left fielder. The Indians are flipping him for Andy Marte, a guy who produced in the International League at 21. This is a good trade for both clubs. They took areas of depth and traded them to shore up weak areas.

Bowe and Tyson is an interesting comparison. I hesitate to use Holyfield as the sole measure of comparison because styles make fights. In 1973, George Foreman beat Joe Frazier, who had beaten Muhammad Ali. Did that mean Foreman could whup Ali? Of course not. I drew up a list of common opponents. There's a big one besides Holyfield, and that's Andrew Golota. Riddick Bowe was outclassed by Golota in two fights while walking away with DQ victories. Mike Tyson knocked out Golota, but that was changed to a No Contest when Tyson tested positive for marajuana. That comparison favors Tyson. After Golota and Holyfield, you have nine other fighters with the main difference being what round they tasted the canvas. Bowe's no contest against Buster Mathis might be a concern, as Tyson defeated Mathis cleanly. Ultimately, it's up to the reader. I was unsure of where to place Bowe, and I made a gut call. I think Bowe's record of victories is unimpressive. Tyson's late '90s comeback wins against Frans Botha and the like put him over the top.

Preliminary rosters are out, and apparently Danny Haren, Mark Mulder and Shea Hillenbrand are Dutch. Add Sidney Ponson to the mix, and 3/5ths of the Cardinals rotation is representing the Netherlands.

Thanks for letting me know. I've needed a sports fix. This seems as good a place as any to comment. Late PWI publisher Stanley Weston is being inducted into boxing's Hall of Fame this year.

I'm not enthusiastic about Byrd, but I just can't argue with results. Maybe he can't take a punch, but he's only been knocked out once. The Vitali fight was a stroke of luck, but he did win. And beating Tua is no small feat. There just isn't a lower boxer who can produce a comparable resume. I'm more of a Tyson apologist than most people. I think Tyson was a hell of a fighter. He may very well have been better than Holyfield, especially in his prime. But I can't justify placing Tyson ahead when the in ring results are contradictory. The vast majority of analysts thought Tyson would slaughter Holyfield in that first fight. He may of been washed up, but that's only apparent in hindsight. You can rank them the other way though, and you may be right.

I am giving the 49-1 mark as an indication of where Tucker stood as far as reputation at one point in his career. The problem is that most of Tucker's good years occured before many of us can remember. Honestly, how many Tucker fights have we seen from his prime? One resource I wish I had were Ring Magazine's Top Ten lists. In the absense of those, I'm guessing Tucker was the second best heavyweight in boxing from 1986-89. As for Holmes, both he and Tucker fought Mike Tyson. Tucker went the distance, Holmes was turfed in the fourth round. I don't think that's an unreasonable assessment of their respective abilities. Every fighter is an example of that, except perhaps Louis Monaco (he's got a real fun career). Nielsen was blatant once the 49-0 mark was in sight. Because it seems to me that otherwise, a fighter gets extra credit for retiring. Many fighters would have lost more fights had they kept fighting at age 36 and beyond. It doesn't make Tucker less of a fighter in his prime. And Bruce Seldon and Akinwande were at least paper champions near that time. Mike Weaver was 48, Bonecrusher Smith was 46, and both had 16 losses on their record at that point. Tons of journeymen could beat those two. It doesn't make them top fighters. Every judge gave Holyfield at least eight rounds in that fight. The McCall fight is a point in Holmes' favor, but since Tucker did beat McCall, I can hardly use that as justification to rank Holmes higher. And I saw the Maurice Harris fight. Holmes was schooled by a fighter with a 9-8 record. That is not something to point to. As far as the Whitaker analogy, Julio Cesar Chavez is hardly Oliver McCall. Taking Chavez to a draw is an accomplishment in itself, let alone it being a bad decision. Had I taken the list further, Holmes would probably slot around 21-23. It was a struggle to choose the last few guys, and Holmes just missed the cut, in my view.

The Coors effect doesn't work for everyone. Juan Pierre hit 3 home runs in two and a half seasons in Colorado, for example (and all three were on the road). Willie Harris is one of the least powerful hitters in the major leagues. Coors Field won't give him enough of a boost to reach the wall. Small ball players like Harris are not as prone to park effects, and are more useful in scarcer run scoring environments.

If beating John Ruiz merited a ranking, I'd have to put ten more slots on the list. What is the argument for Holyfield over Lennox Lewis, or Tyson for that matter? Honestly, ranking Lewis at #1 was the easiest move of the list. Floyd Patterson's record in that time frame is fairly mediocre. Of course, if you compare any decade's heavyweights to the '70s, you're going to draw the same conclusion. You would draw a much less favorable comparison if you did say, 1910-30. That's what's amazing about this period. For what's a supposively weak group of heavyweights, we had some great fights. Douglas-Tyson, Holyfield-Foreman, Bowe-Holyfield I, Holyfield-Bowe II, Foreman-Moorer, Holyfield-Tyson I, Tyson-Ruddock II, etc.

None of Holmes' wins was really impressive outside of Mercer. Ferguson was essentially a professional opponent, and Weaver and Smith were beyond washed up. And most of Tucker's losses came because he fought too far past his prime. As for Brian Nielsen, he was 49-0 as I recall. He lost his next fight to a tomato can. Nielsen hardly fought anyone capable as he reached Marciano's mark in fear of losing it. Heck, victim #47 was Peter McNeely.

The fact is though that Holyfield beat Foreman, and Foreman never beat a fighter of Holyfield's quality during his comeback. After Foreman pulled off the Moorer upset, he picked his opponents VERY carefully. It's tricky to measure fighters, because each fighter has a loss or two that can be held against him. Holmes was on the cusp, but he didn't really beat an impressive opponent besides Mercer. He lost to Michael Spinks, Mike Tyson, Brian Nielsen and Oliver McCall. Not at all, besides building a possible future case for James Toney.

The one real problem with Oklahoma City is that they were going to receive a boost in attendance simply because the NBA is a new, fresh attraction in their city. All expansion/relocated teams see boosts in their attendance the first few years. The question is whether it is sustainable.

Ok, I'm ready to take the heat for this. 1. Lennox Lewis Knockout wins against Vitali Klitschko, Mike Tyson, Hasim Rahman, Frans Botha, Michael Grant, Shannon Briggs, Andrew Golota, Oliver McCall, Tony Tucker, Frank Bruno, Tommy Morrison, Razor Ruddock, and Mike Weaver. Lewis also won decision victories over Evander Holyfield and David Tua. Lewis lost twice, avenging both losses via knockout. Lewis beat numbers two and three on this list, and might have beaten Riddick Bowe had Bowe fought him. Lewis did beat Bowe to win a gold medal at the 1988 Olympics. 2. Evander Holyfield Holyfield fought too long and lost many fights at the end of his career. That should not diminish his prime accomplishments. Holyfield beat Mike Tyson (twice), Buster Douglas, Riddick Bowe, George Foreman, Michael Moorer, Larry Holmes, Dwight Muhammad Qawi, and Ray Mercer. Before the Lennox Lewis fight, Holyfield had beaten both fighters (Moorer and Bowe) he lost to. What's impressive about Holyfield is that he rose up from cruiserweight. Quite a few observers didn't think he was big enough to compete at heavyweight. 3. Mike Tyson Tyson cleaned out the heavyweight division from 1985-89. Tyson does not have many top flight fighters on his victory list, but several second tier fighters. Until the Douglas fight, Tyson looked invincible. The last several years have diminished Tyson's reputation, but they do not represent Tyson's prime ability, in my opinion. 4. Riddick Bowe Ranking Lewis, Holyfield and Tyson is easy. Riddick Bowe presented a challenge as to whether to slot him here, or second ahead of Holyfield. Bowe defeated Holyfield in two of their three fights, once by knockout. Holyfield is still the only fighter to defeat Bowe. The problem is that Bowe's quality of opposition is probably worse than Tyson's. Besides Holyfield, the best fighter Bowe beat is Andrew Golota, and those were hardly emphatic victories. Since Bowe dropped the WBC title rather than fight Lewis, I'm not inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. 5. Ike Ibeabuchi Here the ratings become difficult. Ibeabuchi is incarcerated for rape and his boxing career is over. Ike compiled a 20-0 record with 15 KOs. Ibeabuchi won a unanimous decision over David Tua, and a fifth round KO of Chris Byrd. Ibeabuchi is still the only fighter to knock out the elusive Byrd. Perhaps he would have lost his next fight to some journeyman. We'll never know. 6. Chris Byrd Byrd's last four fights have been very unimpressive, although he hasn't lost. I am inclined to say he lost a step at this age. Byrd was perhaps the best pure boxer of the division the last 20 years. Byrd owns wins over Evander Holyfield, Vitali Klitschko and David Tua. The only fighters to beat Byrd are Klitschko and Ibeabuchi, both ranked on this list. 7. Michael Moorer Like Holyfield, few remember that Moorer began his career as a light heavyweight. Moorer knocked out his first 26 opponents and knocked down #27 three times before winning a unanimous decision. Moorer was 35-0 after he beat Holyfield for the title. He led on points before George Foreman knocked him out. He rebounded with wins over Axel Schulz, Frans Botha and Vaughn Bean before the losing the second Holyfield fight. Some time around the first Holyfield fight, Moorer lost his killer instinct. He was a hell of a fighter. 8. Tony Tucker At one point in his career, Tucker's record stood at 49-0 with 40 knockouts. Tucker won a decision over Oliver McCall and knocked out Buster Douglas. Before losing to Bruce Seldon, Tucker had only lost to Mike Tyson and Lennox Lewis. Tucker hung on too long and lost several fights. 9. David Tua Our generation's most potent puncher. Tua knocked out Michael Moorer, Fres Oquendo, Danell Nicholson, Obed Sullivan, Hasim Rahman, Oleg Maskaev, David Izon, and Johnny Ruiz. All three of Tua's losses came to fighters higher on this list. 10. George Foreman Foreman is ranked low because this list only considers his comeback. The problem with Foreman is that other than Michael Moorer, he didn't really defeat any impressive fighters. Foreman lost to Shannon Briggs, Evander Holyfield and Tommy Morrison. 11. Wladimir Klitschko Wladimir is rated higher than brother Vitali because he defeated more impressive boxers. Before the Lewis-Vitali fight, Wladimir was considered the superior fighter. Wladimir knocked out Frans Botha, Jameel McCline and Ray Mercer in three successive fights. Klitschko is also one of the only fighters to defeat Chris Byrd. The problem with Wladimir is those three KO losses to subpar fighters. It seems like some bad stretches. At this point, there aren't too many fighters who don't have embarrassing losses of some sort. 12. Buster Douglas Douglas pulled the greatest upset of all time when he knocked out Mike Tyson. That's an indication of Douglas at his best. Then Douglas added 15 pounds and lost an embarassing fight to Evander Holyfield. Douglas defeated Oliver McCall right before the Tyson fight. 13. Oliver McCall McCall mixed some quality wins with tough losses in his prime. McCall defeated Francesco Daimani, Larry Holmes and Lennox Lewis at his peak. He also lost to Orlin Norris, Tony Tucker, Lewis, Frank Bruno, and Davarryl Williamson. The Lewis loss was one of several embarrasing boxing moments in the 1990s. 14. Johnny Ruiz I loate Ruiz more than any other fighter today. Ruiz has lost four title fights and yet somehow keeps finding himself rated #1 by the WBA. Unfortunately, Ruiz has beaten Evander Holyfield, Kirk Johnson, Hasim Rahman, Fres Oquendo and Andrew Golota. Before long, you can't justify ranking more fighters ahead of him. 15. Ray Mercer The epitome of blown opportunities. Mercer was on his way to a heavyweight title shot against Evander Holyfield before dropping a decision to Larry Holmes. Mercer worked his way back up, and lost another title shot to Jesse Ferguson. Mercer later dropped consecutive fights to Evander Holyfield and Lennox Lewis. Mercer never did receive a title shot. He did however defeat Tim Witherspoon, Tommy Morrison and Francesco Daimani. Charges that he attempted to bribe Ferguson into dropping the fight dogged him for a time. 16. Tommy Morrison How much of Morrison was ability and how much hype? Morrison was KO'ed by Ray Mercer, the first fighter he faced with a great record. Morrison's win over George Foreman won him some points, as did his KO victory over Razor Ruddock. I originally ranked Morrison higher, but I couldn't justify placing him above Mercer. 17. Vitali Klitschko Vitali lacks big names on his resume. Klitschko did however take the measure of Lennox Lewis before dropping the fight on cuts. From Lewis's retirement to his own, Vitali was the best fighter in the division. 18. Hasim Rahman Rahman lost a surprising number of big fights. However, Rahman was highly regarded for a time, and he once held the undisputed championship thanks to his stunning knockout of Lennox Lewis. 19. Andrew Golota Golota made his reputation on two terrific performances against Riddick Bowe, although he was disqualified in both fights. Golota won a decision against Tim Witherspoon as well. Golota lost most of his big fights, and this rating is more indicative of his ability than his results. 20. Tim Witherspoon Witherspoon's record would look much better had he the good sense to retire after the Mercer loss. Witherspoon nearly beat Larry Holmes (yeah, it was '83) and beat Frank Bruno. As Snuffbox noted, he was a good fighter for a long time.

That's the thing. The heavyweight division in the '90s was as competitive as any decade in history, save the 1970s. The top fighters may not match Ali, Louis or Marciano, but the second tier contenders were better than in other eras. The last 3-5 years however have been legitimately awful. Preliminarily, I think Tyson's top four along with Lewis, Bowe and Holyfield. After that top tier, there's some drop off. Foreman would usually rate among them, but this list ignores the first half of his career.

I'm working on creating a list of the top 20 heavyweight boxers from the last twenty years. I'm using twenty years because that starts off with Mike Tyson and it's a pretty good starting point to work with. I was going to create the list and throw it open, but rather than do that right away, I'm going to throw this open to discussion first. Here's your shot to influence my opinion. Here's a starting list of boxers under consideration, in alphabetical order. This is not a list of everyone who is going to be on the final list. Just boxers who (perhaps) deserve a second look. I worry I may miss a journeyman in the 11-20 range, so any suggestions on others are much appreciated. Francois Botha, Riddick Bowe, Shannon Briggs, Frank Bruno, Chris Byrd, Bert Cooper, Michael Dokes, James "Buster" Douglas, George Foreman, Andrew Golota, Michael Grant, Larry Holmes, Evander Holyfield, Ike Ibeabuchi, Vitali Klitschko, Wladimir Klitschko, Lennox Lewis, Oliver McCall, Ray Mercer, Michael Moorer, Tommy Morrison, Hasim Rahman, Donovan "Razor" Ruddock, John Ruiz, Axel Schulz, Bruce Seldon, David Tua, Tony Tucker, Mike Tyson.

Tony Womack? Womack had three win shares actually.

I hesitate to use projections. Besides, then you need to account for playing time and various other things. Win Shares is useful here because of its simplicity.

Embree had only one game where he surrendered more than two hits. His peripherals weren't awful, so I think a combination of poor luck and the poor Yankee defense hurt his performance. The other problem is that he was cast into a LOOGY role, which doesn't give a pitcher much opportunity to rack up innings. Not that I'm saying Embree was good. He wasn't. But he was not horrible. He figured directly in two losses. One he gave up the go-ahead run to the Devil Rays, and the other was a 2-1 loss to the White Sox. When you score one run, it's not your pitchers' fault. Otherwise, he didn't hurt the Yankees.

The Hardball Times uses negative win shares, but Bill James does not. It's a debate both on the theory, and whether or not you can create a workable system. To calculate negatives you need to have an idea of "replacement level." That's a nebulous term, and it is hard to pinpoint. Personally, I am more comfortable with the system working from a base of zero. It doesn't make much of a difference in any case. If you use Win Shares from the Hardball Times, only 28 players fared worse than -1. Alan Embree was not one of them. I don't think negative numbers are necessary. Win shares are pulled directly from a team's win total. If a team fails to win a game because of poor performance, they lose win shares. This may be a surprise, but the Yankees were 16-8 in games when Embree pitched. Embree gave up many hits, but he didn't walk many and he got his fair share of outs. He didn't earn many win shares, but he didn't pitch so badly that he was a negative. Tim Redding on the other hand...

They're serious contenders.

Out of curosity, I decided to score some other famous firesales. The 1914-15 Philadelphia A's scored -101. Connie Mack, rather than compete with the Federal League, sold off his best players including Eddie Plank, Eddie Collins, Chief Bender and Wally Schang. The 1919-20 Boston Red Sox score just -33. They sold and traded many players, but did so gradually. This offseason just saw Ruth's sale. The 1898-99 Cleveland Spiders score -141. That's right. The Florida Marlins' firesale beats out the development of the worst team of all time. The reason is that the Spiders picked up some minimal MLB pitchers, while the Marlins are using AA prospects. The Marlins' prospects are probably better than the sorry lot the Spiders picked up, but that's how it works.

Yes.