EVIL~! alkeiper

Good news Cubs fans! Reports are the Cubbies have re-signed Neifi Perez to a two year contract.

The problem this offseason is because of the ESPN television deal, the XM Radio contract, and other assorted incomes, it seems every team has $10-20 Million to spend this offseason. If teams don't overspend, they will miss out. We'll likely see some crazy contracts handed out.

XM I think has a 24/7 Hockey channel.

Yeah, I flipped on Sportscenter this morning, heard that song, and shut it off. I can eat my eggs in silence if need be.

Generally sports radio doesn't like to talk about anything unless it includes the phrase "nfl" or "Terrell Owens."

Just once I'd like to hear a GM say "we're going to downgrade our outfield and probably grab some scrubs for our bullpen." I'd get a kick out of that. Speaking of Bernie, I was surprised to learn today that he's logged more seasons as the Yankees' primary center fielder than any other player, including Mantle and Dimaggio.

Nothing says healthy eating like pepperoni and fluid pills!

Crew members of planes should be allowed to carry guns in case pirates try to board the plane mid-flight?

Considering Cruz did not play center at all in Los Angeles, even while J.D. Drew and Milton Bradley were both out, I doubt he's holding center at all.

I don't argue everything he says. We agree quite often, and $8.5mill is the amount Jones' agent said he would be looking for. Comparing him to what Cruz Jr makes (which I thought I read will be $3.75mill) if it is the $8.5mill he wants, makes me believe you'll get better value. I wouldn't be surprised if Cruz Jr only plays a third of the season with his back and hamstring problems and at the same time his days of being a real offensive threat are over. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> You're making way too many assumptions regarding Cruz's injuries. Cruz did not miss significant time after a rough April, and clearly did not lose production. Too much has been made of them if he has not been on the DL since April and he can clearly play. Perhaps his injuries will flare up again, but I'm sure the Dodgers did not make this deal without a physical. And I should add that I see no reports of a bad hamstring from Cruz in several years. And the unspoken advantage is that if Cruz is injured, his replacement will still be better than Jacque Jones. Frankly, Jones is worthless as an everyday player if he's not playing center field. I doubt it. Speed flurished in the game in the days of artificial turf. I would also note that Justin Morneau, who stole 0 bases all season, grounded into fewer double plays.

$8.5 Million for a player with a .249 batting average? Are you serious? Jones is a pathetic hitter. He grounded into 17 double plays this year despite being a fast runner on a team that produces few baserunners. He is without question the WORST hitting player against lefties in the majors, as his career .227/.277/.339 mark can attest. Maybe sometimes we take took much stock in statistics. But once in awhile statistics can help us avoid looking like idiots. And for the record, Cruz's contract is for $2.9 Million next year.

Did you happen to look at the Game Logs and see which teams he was beating up on? The Rockies, Arizona, Pittsburgh, SF, and SD. He sure did face the cream of the crop there~ You can use stats but if that's all you use then you're going to be TSM Depodesta. You have to use common sense as well. You're better than this and you know Jose Cruz Jr is not the best CF on the FA list. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> If you're going by that logic, Johnny Damon fattened up with good marks against Baltimore and Tampa Bay. I'm not claiming Cruz is the best FA center fielder on the market. I merely noted that of all the free agent center fielders, Cruz had the best season at the plate. Take that for what you will. He hits at or around the league average every year, and exploded in Los Angeles. Like I said, his days playing center field are numbered. But when you're looking at the free agent market, you want to locate bargains. Some team is going to overpay for a Johnny Damon and regret it in year four. If you can find equal production at a bargain price, particularly short term, it can provide a tremendous advantage to your organization.

Enter Sandman. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> how very unoriginal <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yeah, but what do you expect from a Virginian redneck anyway?

What technology is needed for such an endeavour exactly?

Enter Sandman.

Its a misleading stat then, because Jose Cruz Jr is not the best CFer out on the market. Not with his back and hamstring problems along with deteriorating skills. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> 1. The statistic is not a predicator of future performance, just an evaluation of past performance. 2. Just because a statistic does not jive with your preconceptions does not make it invalid. The fact is that after Jose Cruz was traded to the Dodgers, he knocked the living snot out of the baseball. The only flaw with Cruz is that his range factors were poor at center field in Arizona and he probably needs to play in a corner.

OPS+ compares a player's OPS (adjusted for park factors) to the league average, and produces a percentage. 100 is average. 118 would be 18% above the league average.

Great move. No free agent center fielder had a better year at the plate than Jose Cruz. Look it up. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I hope to god that's sarcasm. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> It's not. Cruz collected a 118 OPS+ last year. Compare that to Johnny Damon (113), Bernie Williams (81), Kenny Lofton (107), and Preston Wilson (103).

Also, looking over the transaction page of Espn.com, the Red Sox re-signed Mike Timlin to a one year deal.

I'm wary of the Yankees' coaching situation. They seem to have adopted their roster strategy of big names for their coaching staff, now with Guidry, Larry Bowa, Tony Pena, and Lee Mazzilli now on board. A great player does not necessarily make a great coach. Great move. No free agent center fielder had a better year at the plate than Jose Cruz. Look it up.

Let me address this out of order... There are less upsets in the NBA system because upsets are rarer, and the disparity between the best and worst teams is greater. In MLB this season, one team won 100 games (the St. Louis Cardinals), good for a .617 winning percentage. Six NBA teams bested that mark last season. The greatest mismatch in the MLB playoffs saw a .617 team face a .506 team. In the NBA, we saw a first round match between a .720 team and a .512 team. As for the rest of your comments, the fundamental problem is that the Braves DID have that front-line talent. Going through their playoff losses, their pitching staffs measured three-deep or so, ignoring the entire staff, routinely outmatched those of their opponents. Greg Maddux, John Smoltz and Tom Glavine are as good a front three as has ever been produced and maintained. At least two are going to the Hall of Fame. At least until Smoltz missed a season, their pitching staff was never outmatched. They lacked a dominant closer, but they had deep bullpens and their failure was never due to their pitching. The problem with the Braves was that their hitting collapsed in the postseason. I wouldn't go as far as saying the playoffs are a COMPLETE crapshoot. But when you have four teams in the playoffs that haven't put ten games between one another in the span of 162, how likely are you to have an upset? Now, it may seem like sacrilige to suggest that pure talent does not win games. But think about what you see in the span of a baseball game. Brad Ausmus's homer maybe misses the line, Kyle Farnsworth gets the next out, and all of the sudden you have game five. Games are won and loss because batters connected an inch too high on a ball that given another ten feet of distance, becomes a three-run homer. I would like to see the divisional series abolished, because it really adds nothing to the excitement. Talking heads loved to point out how the wild card added exciting races to the regular season. What it gave us is a Red Sox/Yankees game that tied the teams at the end of the regular season, and added nothing. With the old format, we would have had the Yankees, Red Sox and Indians virtually tied the last weekend, and the Braves and Astros neck and neck in the National League. That would have given us ONE game to decide the Sox and Yankees, allowing pure excitement and the ability to get one of them out of the way, and into a more interesting series with the White Sox. The regular season gains more significance, and becomes more marketable. The problem now is that there is NO effort to add importance to the final days of the regular season. Fox's baseball contract is specifically structured so that a Fox affiliate can only show one game that final Saturday. That's bollocks. There have been exciting regular season finishes that have captivated the sports world. But that is all a pipe dream. The best we can do is expand the divisional series to seven games. Any more than seven becomes a drawn out affair that bores fans the first few games. Let me also state that ideas to make it harder for a wild card team to advance, say by adding a second wild card with a one-game playoff, would be disasterous. Eventually the FIFTH best team would win a pennant, and we don't want that. One possible solution is to eliminate divisions, and simply group teams one through four in the league. This would create disinterest in the overall race for first, but creat less opportunities for the Padres of the world to sneak into the playoffs. Another idea I would like, but fat chance, is have the Trade Deadline occur EARLIER in the season. Fans love mid-season trades to boost their club, but by and large the teams in the playoffs should be teams that played together all year. Not teams of hired mercenaries. I think much of the overall problem might be fixed if MLB and its broadcast partners simply made a better effort to market teams outside of certain large markets.

Those are all good points, and I intend to respond in more detail tomorrow or Saturday.

you're biased against him though. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> 1. I like Jackson strictly as a player. 2. There are perfectly good valid reasons to dislike Jackson. 3. If you're going to argue against the point, you need to do a lot more than to point out my biases. On an unrelated note, in defense of the "playoffs are a crapshoot" theory. I made a passing study of the National League since the league adopted division play. When the league used the East/West playoff format, 52.5% (13 of 25) of the time, the team with the better record won the pennant. Since switching to the wild card format, four out of eleven times (36.3%) the team with the best record advanced to the World Series. That's about what we would see if we just flipped coins to decide winners. That's what frustrates me about the postseason these days. When we read reports of falling ratings, no one mentions that we haven't had a World Series without a Wild Card since 2001. How are we supposed to sell a championship series featuring a team that finished 11 games out of first place?

Well again, I blame the process and not the voters themselves.

Shame we never got Al as a guest.