Cheech Tremendous

As an aside, it should be noted that Backlund was 100% dead as a performer and draw by the time he lost the belt, at least according to Meltzer and those in the know (I wasn't quite old enough to remember this time period). He didn't even get a look from the NWA or AWA after being WWF champion for more than five years. That's gotta be tough to do.

Milwaukee and Cleveland are the two teams no one is talking about and probably should be.

Wow, things are really getting done around here.

Or they could even trade him. Bill Hall is now a fantastic bargain at $6 million a year and he has the most value as a SS. That could degrade if they move him to the outfield where his bat won't be as special.

You know what would be great? If we had a catch-all thread for comments like this that didn't warrant an entire discussion. Wait a second...

A soon to be 34-year old 1B that's still on the hook for 5 years and has played most of his career at Coors Field is/will be the best option? I sincerely doubt it. I'd much rather give the money to a 26-27 year old guy whose best years are to come instead of him. As would I, but name me one 26-27 year old 1B who is going to be available in the next year or two. How much money is he going to cost? I think Teixeira is a FA next year, but he's going to get Soriano money and Boston can't afford that. I'm not sold on Helton, but I'm not against the idea if the money/risk is right. Before last year he hit just as well on the road as he did at home. Helton definitely took advantage of Coors, but he was a great hitter no matter where he was playing. And to Al, yes the Rockies do not have any need for Lowell. It's just a caveat of the deal they would have to accept if they want to move Helton to the Sox. Boston is playing with all the chips right now because Colorado is desperate to move Helton and he has said he's not going anywhere but Boston (well, technically he approved St. Louis and Atlanta as well, but neither team would ever take a look at him).

Committing the same money for five years to a declining 1B is better? I guess it would depend on how pronounced the team feels his decline is going to be. He is not the hitter that he was from 2000-2004, but really who is? He hit well last year except of a stretch during the middle of summer when he had some sort of stomach/abdominal problems. If he's stil able to put a .900 OPS with top notch defense, that's worth $9 million a year. I'm bothered by the five years thing (especially with a no-trade clause) but I'm not immediately scared off either. How much money/years/talent will it cost them when they go 1B shopping during free agency next summer? There's a possibility that Helton is the best option out there.

I'm surprised at how well it's doing as I don't know a single person who has seen it. It's like the least hyped $200 million movie ever.

I like Mike Lowell. He was robbed of the gold glove last season (along with Alex Gonzales) and he wasn't too shabby offensively. He also very rarely missed time during a season when the rest of the team was on the DL. Wasn't too shabby offensively? He had an OPS of .739 during the second half. He slugged under .400 for most of the summer. In fact, if you removed his April and May numbers, he was just about the worst hitter on the team. His April and May were phenomenal but he was just a blackhole in that lineup for ther rest of the year. Consiering how bad he was in 2005, I think that's the real Mike Lowell and not the doubles machine we got early in the year. He is good defensively, if just a little overrated because he doesn't make errors. As far as not missing time last year, that might be more of a negative than a positive. Traditionally in his career he's been a player that has broken down over the course of the year. Like Mark Loretta last year, he would have been better served taking some time off here and there to preserve himself for the stretch run. But I guess that's more of a managerial call than anything else. Seeing as though Lowell is set to make $9 million this year, and they have a better, cheaper option on the squad already, I'd love to move to Lowell for whatever they can get. There are still too many existing holes to commit that type of money to an average 3B.

I don't care how old he is. I'd rather watch Flair than 95% of the current roster.

When was that? Was it recently? Clemens does lots of golf tournaments, so I'm not sure of when this one was, but I hadn't heard any comments where he said that he'd only play in Houston if at all. If he did say that, YEAH BOY-EEEEEEEE!!!!!!! Dear god no. If that happens the baseball thread will be unreadable all summer. If he said that, we might as well book it since Clemens' word is gold.

I don't think we've heard the last of the Helton deal. He's now gone on record saying that if this deal doesn't get done he will veto all future trades for the next five years. Colorado has to move him if they want to compete any time soon. There's too much money tied up in his contract (~33% of team payroll). If the Sox can get him for the original offer of Lowell+Tavarez+B Prospect (Pauley, Gabbard, Martinez) for Helton+$50 million, you make that deal every day of the week. Tavarez is nice starter insurance, but Lowell is terrible and they need to move him so that they can get Youks back at his natural position. Helton at $9 mil per for five years is somewhat risky, but reasonable given the lack of 1B in the system or coming to the FA market in the next couple of years. Schilling will get his extension. I think the holdup (and Curt even hinted at this last week) is that the Red Sox have that money already earmarked for something else in 2008 and so they'll have to rearrange the budget to make the deal work. That might take a couple of weeks, but since they have a ST deadline, there's plenty of time to do something.

Ben Roethlisberger was worst last year. How soon we forget.

You are sort of correct. It's always been said that Vince wanted to turn Backlund heel for a program with Hogan, but I think this was going to occur after Hogan had already gotten the belt from Sheik.

I wouldn't call any of those names particularly interesting. I'm sure all of the pitchers will catch on somewhere by the time spring training rolls around. As for the others, we'll see.

Wow, I'm surprised how hard people are coming down on Grossman (well not surprised because he was getting shit all year). He didn't play well, but he wasn't going to make a difference because nothing was clicking yesterday for the Bears. The defense was horrible. Sure they weren't giving up big plays, but the Colts were picking up yards in bunches (Addai should not have ten catches). Grossman didn't really start looking bad until the two picks, one of which was entirely his fault and the other being just a hail mary type play when the game was already out of hand. Horrible execuation all around.

Here's a poll from ESPN's website. I heard that the FJM guys encourages all their readers to vote and totally skewed the results of the poll. Kind of funny actually.

By the way, I mentioned earlier that I think Carmelo was a snub. However, if he fails to make the team, I don't think he can really argue about being cheated out of it. This is NOT a character issue. It's an ON THE COURT issue. If you miss 15 games, you are working from an automatic disadvantage, regardless of what you do in the other 25 games.

It's not PC bullshit. It's the fact that Carmelo got into a fight and was suspended for 15 games. Not only did he set his team back big time, he took himself off the court for almost half of the season. Why should he be rewarded for that?

A was David Carr, Favre was B and Rex Grossman was C. I was curious to see reactions to the players without having a name attached.

Who would you want QBing your team? Player A: 11 TD, 12 INT, 2,767 yds, 7 lost fumbles Player B: 18 TD, 18 INT, 3,885 yds, 5 lost fumbles Player C: 23 TD, 20 INT, 3,193 yds, 5 lost fumbles

He also missed half the season for fighting. He shouldn't be an All-Star.

Coons. Or actually he called them "coon ass."

I think you missed the point. Green Bay might look at David Carr to back-up Favre.

It's funny to see TSM's priorities. When Saban chose to leave Miami he was ripped in post after post for a good solid week. He calls people from Louisiana "coons" and no one makes a peep.