Precious Roy

Two of Boston's top pitching prospects and a solid young OF is a bad deal? People think Lester is a future ace and Hansen will be a top of the line closer. Atlanta's biggest problem is pitching and they're not winning anything until they fix that. I would take the deal if I was Boston because Manny-Ortiz-Jones would be SICK, but I'm not surprised that they didn't, Lester and Hansen are basically untouchable.

I don't think that Scheurholz is that stupid It was supposedly Crisp, Hansen and Lester for Jones, Boston shot it down. Do you really think that's a bad deal for Atlanta?

They're going to get rid of their young closer because a guy who's only pitching for them for three months told them to? Not likely. Lidge is 29 I don't know what Houston should do with him. A year ago he was considered one of the top 3 or 4 closers in the game, and now he's just a mess. His strikeout rate is still excellent, but walks are up, longballs are up, so it seems to be just a confidence/control issue rather than a loss of stuff. Getting owned by the Cardinals last year seems to have really messed him up. Maybe he just needs a change of scenery and the 'Stros should trade him while he still has value, I don't know. Replacing him with Linebrink wouldn't be horrible. He's not as good as peak Lidge but he's the same age and has been very consistent the last couple years, and he doesn't have all this baggage that Lidge is bringing with him.

The rumour is Lidge for Blalock and then Ensberg and Everett to San Diego for Khalil Greene and Scott Linebrink That's not bad for Houston, but I don't see how it really improves their team

I kind of assumed that Washington would match on Jared Jeffries, but the more I read about it it's looking kind of 50/50. It would put Washington very close to the luxury tax, the first year salary is pretty high, and there's a big trade kicker written in. They have Arenas, Jamison, Butler, Thomas and Daniels all locked up to sizable deals already. Butler and Jamison can both play the 3, and they've been flirting with signing Deshawn Stevenson who'll probably come cheaper than Jeffries. Plus, Jeffries agent is saying that he doesn't want to play for Washington and they should just let him walk. The signing is a little surprising to me, I thought James Dolan had put the clampdown on adding more contracts, and because they're over the luxury tax they have to pay double the contract. That's $12 mil a year for a role player. Crazy. Jeffries is a nice player, hustles, plays D, unselfish, he'll improve our team, but they're definitely overpaying for his services. But what else is new. I guess Isiah figures he might be gone after this year anyway. I like a lineup of Curry-Frye-Jeffries-Francis-Marbury with Crawford, Robinson, Lee, Balkman, Mardy Collins and Q-Rich off the bench. There's a lot of youth and athleticism there, though not a whole lot of depth at the bigs. Taylor and Rose are in the last year of their deals and hopefully can be traded before the season for a young big or two, because having guys who know they're going to be traded by February in the rotation will undermine the development of the team. I like Jalen Rose, but there just isn't room for him.

I love how a guy being calm and collected becomes "lazy" in the eyes of some armchair QBs. As long as he gets on base, steals a couple, and plays well in the field the fans will love him. The slugging is gravy, and I think we'll see a little power surge from him anyway. I'm ok with Giambi playing first, I think his lack of defense is a little overstated. He doesn't have any range but at least he hustles and he knows how to play the position. There was a time when he was an above average defender. And Andy Phillips' poor offense was really canceling out the defensive upgrade he gave us. That font of wisdom John Kruk suggested they convert Sheffield to first base. Theoretically it's not a horrible idea, he started out as a SS/3B and I think he could play the position well enough with some practice, but something tells me Sheff wouldn't exactly be on board with that idea, and he's got enough on his plate coming back from injury to be learning a new position. Honestly, I'm not that worried about Sheff. Some people have suggested he'll dog it, but he's in a contract year, I think if he does come back he'll make every AB count. He might be surly about losing playing time, but oh well, he's almost always surly about something. And really, I'm not convinced that Sheff will even be back, or if he is that he'll be the same player. I'm a lot more confident about Matsui. The biggest point of contention with Yankee fans seems to be Melky losing time, which I think is silly. Yes, he's played above expectations this year, but ideally he should be a bench or platoon player on this team. He's 22, he should be in pinstripes for a long time, it doesn't hurt to let him be a role player right now. Some people have gone so far as to suggest this is a bad trade because it will put Melky on the bench, which is just nonsense. We have so much more flexibility now, having Cabrera and Bernie available off the bench in the playoffs could be huge. And one of Joe Torre's strengths over the years has been juggling deep lineups, getting a lot of guys ABs, and generally keeping everyone happy. If anyone can deal with this "problem" it's him.

Ideally I'd like to see Damon-Jeter-Abreu-Rodriguez-Giambi as the top 5, but something tells me Torre won't disrupt the top of his lineup just yet

Why the hell would Houston trade Oswalt to get Tejada? That's nonsense, I don't believe it was ever close to happening

My guess is Abreu hits 5th

Cardinals traded Hector Luna to Cleveland for Ronnie Belliard. Good deal, especially if they can re-sign him.

The Astros bullpen is fucking awful. Clemens gives them 7 great innings, they're up 5-1, and the bullpen immediately blows the lead. Pathetic.

Henry isn't nothing. But the idea looks to be to dump the contracts with a clean break. They probably got slightly better offers prospect wise from other teams, but would have had to pick up too much of the money. Seems reasonable to me. But I'm horribly biased.

Haha, I thought Scott Proctor was the centerpiece of the deal. This is even better!

Rotoworld is saying Gourriel and Eduardo Paret may have defected to Columbia, but nothing about MLB deals for either one.

That would be awesome, but where the hell would they play him? As far as trades go, Cashman was on with Francesa the other day and the vibe I got is that he has no interest in trading any of the young players or any top prospects. I seriously doubt we see a deal for Abreu or Soriano or anyone like that, but it won't stop people from talking about it constantly all weekend

Troy Murphy has 5 years, $50 mil left on his deal. A nice player to have, but at that price? Not when you already have Joe Johnson making the max and a bunch of dudes coming up for extensions in the next couple years.

The reason I don't like the Lee deal for Milwaukee is that they gave up the best prospect involved, one of the top prospects in their organization. Does that make sense to anyone? Cruz is 26, but he's got a hell of a lot more upside than Nix. A few years ago I thought Nix might be a player but he hasn't really done anything in the bigs. Showalter is already saying they're bringing Cruz to the show, and plans to start him tommorow. I'm not sure about Cordero. He's been real iffy this year and has always let more baserunners on then you're comfortable with late in the game. I think it's 50/50 he rebounds. Mench is an average player. Julian Cordero is in single A, so who knows what his deal is. I agree with those who say if they held out they could have had a more favorable deal.

What, better than the courtroom episode with "OH NO, BEAR IS DRIVING!!! How can that be?!?" You may have a point. "TAKE THE CASE!"

Devil's advocate....aren't OBP and BA directly affected by the guys surrounding a hitter in the lineup? And isn't slugging affected by parks? I'm sure there are crazy stats out there that take park factors and lineup protection and the opposing pitchers and other shit into account as well though

The Last Starfighter/Bad News Bears/Temple of Doom spoof is easily the best episode

Really? That sounds good to me. The Clerks animated series was massively underrated

*dp* *atm*

Smith's production company/merchandising machine/website/etc.

RISP OPS is probably a better indicator

He swore that J&SB would be the end of those characters He swore for YEARS that he would never make a Clerks sequel He's constantly acting like a douche, and constantly ripping and poking fun at his 'fanboys' I just want to see him for once try and stretch himself and do something outside of the View Askew/Jersey universe, challenge himself as an artist