George Kell is in the hospital recovering after an auto accident.

Baseball Hall of Famer George Kell is hospitalized and will need some physical therapy after breaking his left leg and left arm in a car crash, his wife said Friday.

Carolyn Kell said her 82-year-old husband was "doing very well" but remained hospitalized following a crash Tuesday with a tractor-trailer.

Not a fun way to spend new year's eve. Here's hoping for a speedy recovery. In case you're not up on George Kell, here's a account of the 1949 AL Batting Race, where Kell beat out Ted Williams on the last day of the season. Notice that even without an internet and cell phones, information found it's way to the right people. :-)

As mentioned last night, it looks like the Yankees and Diamondbacks have completed the deal for Randy Johnson.

But for all intents and purposes, the most-anticipated trade of the offseason is complete. The Bombers will send Vazquez, Brad Halsey, Dioner Navarro and the $9 million, which will be paid out in increments over the next couple of years, to the D-Backs in exchange for the five-time Cy Young winner that George Steinbrenner has coveted for years.

The inclusion of Navarro, a 20-year-old catcher, was critical since the D-Backs -- who already have a premier catching prospect in Koyie Hill -- also are looking to trade for Dodgers slugger Shawn Green. Navarro was a player the Dodgers specifically requested when they got involved in three-way talks with the Yanks and Arizona last week, ultimately backing out at the 11th hour of the blockbuster exchange that included Green, Brad Penny, Vazquez and Johnson.

The big difference (as far as the Yankees are concerned) is that Brad Halsey is going instead of Eric Duncan. I really don't like it when the Yankees trade young lefties with good strikeout rates. I didn't like the Al Leiter deal, I didn't like the Ted Lilly deal. But the Yankees are no longer in the mode of the early 1990's where they are willing to sit back and let their prospects develop. They want to win today. And with Johnson, they have a pitcher capable of dominating any opponent. The Yankees could wind up 15 to 20 games over .500 when Johnson pitches this season; it's fairly easy to make the playoffs when you just have to be a bit over .500 in 80% of your games.

The Yankees and Johnson will negotiate a two-year extension; does that mean he'll get this year and another year, or two more years on the existing contract? I know the Big Unit is great, but that's a lot of money for a 40+ year old.

And it appears the DBacks will turn Vazquez and Navarro around, so the trade will end up looking a lot like the original deal with the exception of Vazquez ending up on the east coast. Until those deals are complete, it's difficult to judge this trade for Arizona.

But the value of this trade for the Yankees hinges on Johnson's health. If they win the World Series this season, it will go a long way toward justifying the deal. If they get a couple of more good seasons out of Randy, then it's fine. But if Johnson breaks down and Halsey is solid, it will have been a colossal waste of money and talent.

Monday April 4 is the Yankees home opener vs. the Red Sox. Schilling probably won't be ready. So it looks like the weekend of May 27th is the earliest they can face each other. And since the clubs not only open, but close the season against each other what could be better than Johnson and Schilling on the last day of the season for a playoff spot? It's going to be another fun year on the I-95 corridor.

It's been rumored for a while and talked about for days, but it looks like the Yankees have finally done it. Tino Martinez is returning to the Bronx. I love the opening of the article:

The Yankees won four titles with Tino Martinez manning first base from 1996-2001. They haven't won a ring, however, since Martinez left the Bronx after the 2001 season.

Interestingly enough, Tino's best year was 1997, the year the Yankees got eliminated in the first round of the playoffs. He was a solid player for NY, but he hasn't had a 20 win share season since he left the big apple. He's also showing the classic sign of aging; his walks are going up as he tries to compensate for lack of bat speed by being more selective. It won't be long before pitchers realize what's going on and start taking advantage of it.

If the Yankees are hiring him as a late inning defensive replacement/part time first baseman, that's fine. If they believe he can contribute a lot as an everyday player, I doubt it. For the life of me, I can't understand why every team in the majors doesn't have a young big bopper at first in AAA just for these situations. I'd much rather pay a 22-year-old $300,000 to be below average than $2 million to an old vet.

Oh, and by the way, it looks like the Randy Johnson deal will get done, also. :-)

The Talk Arena links with news that the Cardinals have reached an agreement with Robbie Alomar. As reported earlier, Robbie's back has been bothering him so much he couldn't play winter ball. Still, Jeff Gordon thinks it's a good signing. He lists Alomar's problems, then compares him to Larry Walker.

On the other hand, we heard that Walker was on the decline before his arrival in St. Louis. We heard he could no longer get around on the fastball.

We heard that Walker was incapable or unwilling to stay in the lineup. We saw how eager Colorado was to unload him, eating a big chunk of his remaining contract to finalize a trade with the Cards.

The Rockies just didn’t give Walker away, they paid the Cards to take Larry off their hands.

And you saw what happened. Given a happy home ahead of Albert Pujols in the batting order, Walker regained his All-Star form.

Last year, I thought the DBacks got a steal signing him for $1 million. But Avkash in the comments got it right.

Having seen him up close the past two seasons, its clear to me that he is absolutely overmatched at the plate. He can no longer turn anything over 90 MPH into a basehit, and he can't turn anything into an extra base hit. If he's hitting right handed, be happy he only makes one out, and doesn't ground into a double play or something.

There are better ways to spend $500,000.

I just noticed the Sidney Ponson story this morning. It appears to be a combination of "Here come de judge," and "Sock it to me!" that has landed Sir Sidney in jail.

According to police reports, Ponson was confronted on the beach Saturday by a group of people who asserted he had harassed them by recklessly operating his personal watercraft. In the ensuing altercation, Ponson allegedly struck a man in the face, then fled the scene. The alleged victim, who turned out to be a local judge named W. Noordhuizen, was hospitalized, and Ponson was later taken into police custody.

Ponson was/is an island hero. My guess is he'd be very easy to recognize. And hitting a judge just isn't a good idea. They tend to be friends with judges who might hear your case.

In his defense, it's not clear who threw the first punch.

"The people on the beach apparently told him, 'Come here,' " Lejuez said. "They invited him to discuss the matter. So he went to the beach to discuss the matter. He did not go to the beach to fight. But once he was on the beach, the fight started. . . . One of them tried to hit him, and that's when the fight started."

Once the fight began, two people described by Lejuez as friends of Ponson's came to his defense. Lejuez said he has seen their statements to police, and they are "very similar" to Ponson's statement.

While hitting a judge is mistake, my guess is Sidney didn't know at whom he was swinging. But hitting a professional athlete is just plain stupid. I wonder if Sidney took Crash's advice and used his left hand to throw the punch?

It was a bad year on the field for Ponson and it's ending as a bad year off the field, too. Are there undubbings?

Congratulations to Trevor Hoffman, this year's winner of the Hutch Award.

Hoffman, the 40th winner of the Hutch Award, was recognized for returning last season and recording 41 saves after missing almost all of the 2003 season following two rounds of shoulder surgery as well as his involvement in the community.

Hoffman didn't miss a beat as he struck out nearly a batter an inning and was stingier than usual in issuing walks. He's just 7 saves away from 400 and will be just the third pitcher to reach that plateau. With two good seasons, he'll set the all-time save mark.

People were reporting a problem with viewing this blog in FireFox. Thanks to Josh and Steve, that problem has been resolved. Please let me know if there are any other browser issues.

I had a long post written on Eric Milton and the Reds, but my browser crashed. I'll try to do a shorter version of the same post.

Milton chose the Reds because of the player moves they've made. They obviously want to win.

The Reds traded for starter Ramon Ortiz Dec. 14, signed right-handed relievers Ben Weber and David Weathers the next day, signed left-handed reliever Kent Mercker Dec. 20 and third baseman Joe Randa Dec. 21.

If that flurry of activity hadn't happened, Milton wouldn't have considered the Reds.

"Obviously that's what you want to see," he said. "They were in first place a lot of last year. Then they tried to improve."

So the moves that impressed him were four old guys and Ramon Ortiz, who isn't young. Only Mercker has been great recently, and that's after a long stretch of poor pitching. Ortiz gives up too many HR, Randa doesn't hit enough of them. Weber was demoted to triple A last season, and Weathers has had one good three-year stretch in an otherwise long and uneventful career.

Signing Carlos Beltran is wanting to win. Signing these aging players is hoping for a good year on the cheap. Both Ortiz and Milton have a tendancy to allow HR, and so far Great American Ballpark has favored HR hitters. My guess is that the Reds didn't have as much competition for Milton as they thought. They gave him a good deal and he took it. The Reds moves are a nice excuse, but if Milton really wanted to win, he would have taken less money from the Yankees.

The Yankees got the bill for their share of the luxury tax yesterday, and it's a whopper.

According to figures obtained by The Associated Press, the Yankees, whose payroll was a record $187.9 million, must pay $25,062,352 in luxury tax. The Yankees also estimate a $60 million revenue-sharing payment they must send to the commissioner's office by the end of next month.

The Red Sox and Angels will add another $4 million to the luxury tax pool. According to this summary of the CBA:

Luxury tax money to be used for player benefits, the industry growth fund, or player development in countries lacking organized high school baseball. The owners had originally demanded a 50% luxury tax on payrolls over $98 million.

That's a good chunk of money to promote baseball. I bet if the money had gone to clubs at the lowest end of the payroll spectrum, the Boss would be less willing to pay the tax.

The $60 million revenue sharing payment will go to other clubs, but I'm not sure how much. What I don't know is if that includes shared local revenue as well as Central Fund Revenue sharing. But it looks like clubs at the lower end of the financial ladder will be receiving a few million dollars each, enough to keep a few good youngsters around.

I'm testing out a couple of new blog services. Art.com has an affiliates program. If you click on the Art.com ad and buy something, this site will get a commission. They have a large number of baseball related prints.

Jittery.com is testing a new auction system for blogs. Since I have no merchandise to sell, I thought I'd try something different. You can bid on a dedication to appear in a post on this blog. Unlike dedicating a song on a radio station, this is something that will be around a long time (since I plan to write this blog until the keyboard is pryed from my cold, dead hands). A great gift for your favorite baseball fan!

Scroll down the sidebar if you're interested in either of these items. And thanks in advance.

Soxblog does some research to show why he thinks Pedro Martinez won't have that much of an effect on Mets attendance. I disagree with James on this one. When the Mets are good, they'll draw between 33,000 and 36,000 fans a game. If Pedro is as good as I suspect he'll be a Shea, he should boost the Mets W-L record. If it's enough of a boost to put the Mets into contention for the wild card, then fans will come out to all the games the Mets are playing.

But the Mets have to win. There seems to be a two year lag in the Mets performance and their attendance increasing/decreasing. They started winning in 1997, and had a big jump in 1999. They returned to being mediocre in 2001, and the attendance fell in 2003. Attendance will be up if the Mets win, but Pedro could be the catalyst that brings the big jump sooner.

I just wanted to say thanks for the donation over the weekend. It's a nice Christmas present. Donations are always welcome; you can use PayPal or the Amazon Honor System. Just scroll down; the links are on the sidebar.

In yesterday's post about the Puerto Rican Winter Leagues, I noticed this item (emphasis added).

Bithorn Stadium, just 10 minutes south of San Juan, has struggled to draw even nominal attendance despite a renovated stadium and the presence of Crabbers infielders Alomar and Carlos Baerga (who doubles as team president). A recent injury to Alomar has helped curtail interest, but ardent fans say the team's problems — as well as the league's and, by extension, Puerto Rico's — run much deeper.

I couldn't find anything about it on the web, so I contacted Edwin Rodriguez who runs the web page for the winter league. He filled in some details:

Alomar started the season in Puerto Rico already under treatment for his lower back. At least once a week he was flying to the states (don't know where) to get treatment. After the second week of the season it was too much for him, his back wasn't in good shape.

That much I can tell you, I was asking the same when he left but nobody knew the specifics.

This is the same back injury that kept him out of action most of September. I was wondering why there's been so little interest in him, and I guess this was the reason. Could his career be over?

It would be sad if that were so, with Robbie only 276 hits from 3000. That's just two decent seasons. But his production has been way off from his career averages the last three seasons, and now he seems to have a bad back on top of it all. If a team does sign him, he'll have to play cheap.

If his career is over, does he go into the Hall of Fame? His baseball reference web page shows 2 of the 4 HOF indicators having him elected. It also shows him most comparable to Craig Biggio and Lou Whitaker, very good players who arent' going to make the Hall.

The other question worth asking; is he the greatest player from Puerto Rico? He compares very favorable to Clemente; Roberto C. had 377 win shares in 18 seasons; Robbie A. had 375 in 17 seasons, about 1 more win share per season. It's hard to believe that Alomar could replace Clemente in the Island's heart, due to Clemente's heroic and tragic death. But he may very well be the best player the island has produced.

If anyone has more information on Alomar's back, please let me know.

Update: Fixed broken link.

Baseball Evolution is a new group website on the grand old game. Check out their article on overpaying pitchers. Keith Glab posits two theories on why pitchers seem to be getting so much money this year. Let me posit a third. Pitching is catching up to hitting. There are a numerous reasons for the surge in offense since 1993. But one of them could be economic. It always seemed to me that you could make a lot more money in this game as an okay hitter than as an okay pitcher. So, if you're 18, the best athlete on your high school team (the best hitter and the best pitcher), which way are you going to go? To make the most money, I'd go as a hitter. So let's say for a while, hitters were overpaid. How do you bring the game back into balance? You give the young athletes a reason to take the pitching track. You end up overpaying the pitchers.

This really should happen naturally. When everyone is a good hitter, the supply is plentiful so the price should drop. The value of a good pitcher in this environment should go way up. I never quite understood why we didn't see contracts on the order of Manny and A-Rod for pitchers. Randy Johnson has been making $13 million to $16 million over the past four seasons compared to Manny Ramirez making $13 to $22 million over the last four. Except for 2003, when Johnson was injured, their season have been comparable in win shares (Johnson did better in 2001 and 2002, Manny better in 2004). Why the big difference is salary? I'm sure part of it is the injury factor, but plenty of hitters fall by the wayside that way also (look at Giambi).

Good pitching is still scarce. That scarcity should be driving up the salaries for those who can throw. We shouldn't be that surprised that some are getting overpaid.

A rather humerous 10 top list was written in the comments to this post.

The Washington Times looks at the declining interest in baseball in Puerto Rico. Some blame the Expos.

Puerto Rico has long been known as a baseball-mad country with an enduring legacy that runs from Orlando Cepeda and Clemente — an icon on the island — through Roberto Alomar and Bernie Williams and on to Carlos Beltran and Nationals second baseman Jose Vidro. That legacy, however, has languished in recent years, with other sports growing in popularity and the overall level of baseball declining.

Bringing the Expos to San Juan seemed the perfect remedy for that lagging interest, as well as an opportunity for Major League Baseball to showcase its Latin fan base. But rather than resuscitating the sport there, the Expos left a baseball vacuum in their wake.

"It has had a devastating effect," Puerto Rican Winter League president Joaquin Monserrate said of the Expos' two-year stay. "Major League Baseball deflated this market without any kind of warning or cooperation with the Winter League."

Others blame the winter league itself.

Edwin Rodriguez, however, places the blame at the feet of Winter League officials. Rodriguez, a former Carolina general manager, runs www.hitboricua.com, the league's unofficial Web site. He said the problem is not with the Expos' departure but with a league that operates only five months a year and has not done enough to showcase players.

"Saying the Expos are the reason for the poor attendance — that's not true," Rodriguez said. "People who say that are looking for an excuse."

For years, any notion baseball could lose its foothold on the island was unthinkable. Puerto Rico dominated the Caribbean World Series — played among the top teams from Puerto Rico, Mexico, Venezuela and the Dominican Republic — in the 1950s, won four titles in the 1970s and took three of four from 1992 through 1995. The World Series was not played in the 1960s.

That background led many to believe that, although the Winter League had been in decline since the mid-1990s, Puerto Ricans would rally behind the Expos and draw baseball back into the national consciousness.

It hasn't happened.

Others go on to blame a growing interest in basketball, the ability to watch big league teams on cable TV and a growing list of activities for youngsters for the decline. All are probably right in one way or another. It's a problem the US minor leagues have had for years. How do you draw fans to an inferior product when the superior one is so easily available?

From my family to yours, have a very merry Christmas!

(Click picture for a larger image.) Jason Varitek is Melinda's favorite player. She's very happy he's staying with the Red Sox. Phoebe the schnoodle doesn't have a favorite player, but loves chasing whiffle balls in the back yard. Thanks to my lovely wife Marilyn for the photography! The three of them always make my Christmas a happy one.

Jason Varitek got a very nice Christmas present from the Boston Red Sox. Not only was he given a $40 million, 4 year contract, but he was also made captain of the team.

The Red Sox named Varitek their third captain since 1923 today after giving their longtime catcher a four-year deal. Varitek didn't know of the honor until he was presented with home and road jerseys bearing a red "C" on Friday to formalize the leadership role he has grown into since joining the team in 1997.

"It's not every day you're lucky enough to sign a player who embodies everything you want your franchise to be," general manager Theo Epstein said. "When you have that player, you don't let him get away."

I suppose we'll be hearing "Make it so" a lot from Jason over the next four seasons. :-)

The Sox and Varitek were two years and $15 million apart on the contract, but the sides came up with a creative no-trade clause that was able to close the distance. Each side gave the other a year, and Varitek brought the price down in exchange for a no-trade clause after he reaches 8 ML seasons with the Red Sox. Of course, no one else was bidding on Varitek, so that gave the Red Sox some leverage. Still I found this interesting:

Varitek, who turns 33 April 11, will be 38 by the end of his new deal. Historically, catchers have declined in offensive production in their 30s, but Boras generated a detailed analysis that argued persuasively that Varitek's career path mirrors that of the exceptions, like Fisk, who at age 37 in 1985 posted career bests of 37 home runs and 107 RBIs for the White Sox.

I wonder who the other exceptions were? One big difference between Fisk and Varitek is that Fisk reached the majors at a much younger age. Varitek got his first cup of coffee at age 25; Fisk was having his 2nd very productive season at that point. Great youngsters tend to have better careers than players who make it in their mid-20's. One thing they have in common (and what the other exceptions may have in common) is two seasons in their 20's with low games played. It could be that lack of wear and tear early on pays off in the long run. We'll keep our eyes on Varitek over the life to the contract to see if the projection holds up.

Johnny Oates succumbed to brain cancer today at the age of 58. It must be a very sad holiday in the Oates family. My sympathies go out to his family and friends.

Ken Rosenthal remember Oates this way:

Johnny Oates was only supposed to live one year after being diagnosed with a brain tumor.

He lived three.

Oates' brave fight was a testament to the power of his faith. Rangers manager Buck Showalter has called Oates the most ethical and moral man he has ever met. I would echo that sentiment, and so would virtually everyone else who knew him.

One of my commentors had David Eckstein fitting in with the Cardinals, and he was right. The little engine who could signed a three year deal with St. Louis for a couple of million more than OC is getting in the OC. The ESPN article has David playing shortstop; I tend to think he would be better playing 2nd base because his arm is simply not that strong. But his real value will be as a table setter for the Cardinals power lineup. However, he's had two years in a row of sub-par performance at getting on base. At age 30, I don't believe his best years are ahead of him. The Cardinals haven't spent much money, but they may not be getting much of a table setter either.

A Devil Rays fan writes:

I just read on ESPN.com that the D-Rays are considering signing free agent SS Alex Gonzalez. TO PLAY 3B! Am I missing something. His OBP/SLG are .302 and .392 respectively for his career. And he'll be 32 in April. Could you please comment on this and also why the D-Rays will never be good under the current regime?

I didn't see the ESPN article, but here's one from the St. Petersburg Times talking mainly about the Josh Phelps signing.

Phelps is one of several free agents the Rays plan to add. Current talks seem to be focusing on veteran infielder Alex Gonzalez, whom they would use at third base, and outfielder Danny Bautista.

Gonzalez, 31, averaged 18 homers and 66 RBIs from 2000-03 as the starting shortstop for the Jays and Cubs before missing half of last season with injury, bouncing from the Cubs to the Expos and Padres. Bautista, 32, hit .286 with 11 homers and 65 RBIs as Arizona's starting rightfielder.

Other possibilities include infielders Tony Batista, Mark Grudzielanek and David Eckstein, and outfielders Juan Gonzalez, Dustan Mohr and Ruben Sierra.

In other words, nobody really good. The problem is that the Devil Rays are going after washed up veterans or players like Mohr and Phelps who have a mixed track record. They also appear to never have heard of OBA.

I hold out some hope for Phelps; he's still young and he'll help the team if he can get his OBA back in the .350-.360 range. For the price they're paying, he has a huge upside. But they should be trying that at all their holes; sign young players for under a million and see if they perform. I'd rather see that than Juan Gonzalez playing out the string at DH for messing up in right field.

Chuck Gitles has a new Cubs blog called Ivy Chat. Check out his post on the Sandy Krum lawsuit.

It looks like Moises Alou will be reuntied with his dad as there are reports the younger Alou will sign with the Giants. Younger is a relative term, as it appears the Giants will be chasing fly balls with these:

Bonds' seasonal age will be 40 for 2005, Grissom 38 and Alou 38. I'm sorry, that's an old outfield. Slow grounders in the gap are going for doubles next year. :-) On top of that, the Giants signed Vizquel (38 in 2005) and Mike Matheny (34 in 2005). The youngest projected position player is Alfonzo at 31! The Giants are really testing the theory that veterans play better than youngsters. :-) There's a real possibility that a number of these players hit the wall at the same time and this ends up the worst team in the NL West.

As for Alou, I wouldn't expect him to help Bonds IBB total go down much. Pacific Bell Park has a huge negative impact on right-handed home runs. Over the last three seasons, right-handers have hit 218 HR in Pac Bell, but 291 in Giants road games. According to The Bill James Handbook 2005, it's the worst park for home runs by right-handed hitters in the NL. With a right-hander on the mound, given a choice between Bonds and Alou, most managers are going to pitch to Moises. The only thing that will bring Barry's IBB totals down is a decline in Barry's ability to hit.

Pati Grady, a loyal reader of this site, sends along the latest from the Cooperstown Cookie Company.

Our small firm, the Cooperstown Cookie Company makes awesome Classic Baseball Shortbread cookies in regulation baseball size with stitches (that allow you to break the cookie and share it with a friend). No one has ever done this before - we're unique!

Our cookies are baked by hand in small quantities by nearby Pathfinder Village which is a residential community for children and adults who have Down syndrome. We share a portion of our profits with Pathfinder Village. Our shortbread is rich and buttery and is made from the finest ingredients, including 100% butter with no additives or preservatives. Please visit our website: www.CooperstownCookieCompany.com for more details.

I can't wait to try them. Sounds like a great gift for the baseball and biscuit lover in your life. You'll be helping a worthy cause as well.

The Book of Mike has an anonymous source (so take it for what it's worth) that says DePodesta was responsible for the trade debacle.

Our source, a professional sports agent, spoke to The Book of Mike on the condition of anonymity, tells us that DePodesta originally leaked details of the trade to Ken Rosenthal of The Sporting News. Interestingly enough, part of DePodesta's statements yesterday include comments about the media over-playing the likelihood of the trade. As it turns out, this was actually Paul's own doing.

It also appears that DePodesta tried to back out of the Marlins trade for Lo Duca at the last minute.

If true, it's possible that Paul is now serving as a living example of the Peter Principle:

The original principle states that in a hierarchically structured administration, people tend to be promoted up to their "level of incompetence".

Paul's forte may be crunching the numbers and devising plans. He may not be that good at executing. Beane and DePodesta may have been Torre and Zimmer; Zimmer is a lousy manager of people, but knows baseball. Torre is a poor strategist, but players will go to war for him. Together, they're a really good manager.

Together, Beane and DePodesta were a really great GM. Paul, it looks like, doesn't have Billy's skills in dealing with others on these trades. He's a smart guy, so maybe he can develop those skills. If he does fail in this job, some smart GM will be glad to have him crunching numbers for his organization.

The best thing the Diamondbacks could do for themselves right now is get another bidder interested in Randy Johnson. Of course, they need to convince Johnson to go somewhere other than the Yankees. Chris Lynch at A Large Regular has a deal that would probably work for the DBacks; Johnson to Boston for Arroyo and Millar.

The Diamondbacks would have received Green, starter Brad Penny and reliever Yhency Brazoban. The way I look at it - the Red Sox could offer Bronson Arroyo instead of Penny (that's pretty even), a top prospect instead of Brazoban (that's pretty even depending on the prospect) and Kevin Millar instead of Shawn Green.

In other words, the Red Sox have the type of players Arizona wants. (This of course, pre-supposes that the Red Sox would make such a deal.) If Randy wants out of Arizona so badly, why is he only interested in the Yankees? What's wrong with Boston? For that matter, what's wrong with any number of clubs? Imagine what an impact Johnson would have on Cleveland, for example.

Maybe it's time for Arizona's management to say to Randy that if he wants to leave, he'll have to give them flexibility. Otherwise, they'll just keep him and let him play out the contract. Arizona blinked a week ago on these discussions. I believe their best bet now is to call off all trade talks, and let Johnson or the Yankees come to them. And of course, they have to be willing to eat Johnson's contract if nothing happens.

The Baseball Crank takes a detailed look at the pitchers who have been signed, traded or thought to be traded this off season.

MLB.com is reporting that the Dodgers have reached an agreement with J.D. Drew.

Drew was the ultimate prize the Dodgers were pursuing with the money that would have been freed by the aborted trade, which would have moved Shawn Green, Brad Penny, Kazuhisa Ishii and Yhency Brazoban off the payroll.

Dodgers general manager Paul DePodesta was so far along with the Drew negotiations he apparently felt the club could handle that acquisition and still fill the two remaining holes in the starting rotation.

Drew brings the ability to get on base and good power to the Dodgers. He has a career .391 OBA and a .513 slugging percentage. He's also a good base stealer to boot, swiping at a 76.3% clip for his career. Drew's main problem has been injuries. He'll take the field as a 29 year-old in 2005, but he's never played 150 games in a season. His 145 games in 2004 was a career high, and before that J.D. had never played more than 135 games.

The give the Dodgers an outfield of walk machine Jayson Werth in left, Milton "Boy, Did I Blow My Endorsement Opportunities" Bradley in cneter and J.D. Drew in right. Not bad.

The Dodgers have withdrawn from the three-way deal that would have brought Randy Johnson to the NY Yankees. It looks like Javier Vazquez was the monkey wrench in the works.

Newsday reported on its Web site Tuesday night that Javier Vazquez did not want to play for the Dodgers and refused to travel to Los Angeles for a physical. The paper, citing a source involved in the discussions, cited that as the "primary reason" for the deal's collapse.

I don't understand why Javier wouldn't want to pitch in LA. It's a great park for someone like him. I can't believe he really wants to pitch in the Bronx again.

Maybe it's time the Yankees and Diamondbacks stepped back and tried to simplify the deal. If it's true that the Johnson will only allow a trade to New York, the Yankees are in the drivers seat. Why not simply say, "Here's what we're willing to offer for Randy. If you don't like it, let's forget about the deal." It's awfully difficult for the Diamondbacks to get much from the Yankees when there's no one bidding against them.

Paul Oberjuerge of the SB Sun doesn't like the way David Eckstein was replaced in Anaheim.

David Eckstein, guttiest, grittiest little gamer in modern baseball history ... nicest, politest guy in any major-league clubhouse ... kid who helped the Angels win the 2002 World Series and the 2004 American League West title ...

Dumped by the Angels.

Tossed out like a piece of rotten meat.

Kicked to the side of the road like a dead dog. And just in time for Christmas. Thanks for the memories, Eck, and the unemployment office is in Santa Ana.

And why? So the Angels could commit $32 million over four years to a guy whose career batting average is .268 to Eckstein's .278.

Whose career on-base percentage is .316 to Eckstein's .347.

Who in the past four seasons has hit into 65 double plays to Eckstein's 38.

Who is older than Eckstein and who hasn't made a single contribution to the Angels' breakthrough success of the past three seasons.

Good luck, Orlando Cabrera. You're going to be as popular in Anaheim as Georgia Frontiere.

Paul goes on to point out that the Angels could have kept David for a couple of million dollars. Is this a good deal? Let's look at the win shares.

Total Win Shares for SS, 2004, Min 100 Games at SS

First Name	Last Name	Games at SS	Total WinShares
Miguel	Tejada	162	30
Derek	Jeter	154	26
Cesar	Izturis	159	25
Jimmy	Rollins	154	25
Michael	Young	158	25
Carlos	Guillen	135	24
Jack	Wilson	156	23
Rafael	Furcal	131	21
Julio	Lugo	143	21
Khalil	Greene	136	20
Omar	Vizquel	147	17
Edgar	Renteria	149	17
Alex	Gonzalez	158	15
Cristian	Guzman	145	15
Jose	Valentin	122	14
Kazuo	Matsui	110	14
Bobby	Crosby	151	13
Deivi	Cruz	104	12
Craig	Counsell	129	11
Royce	Clayton	144	11
Orlando	Cabrera	159	11
Angel	Berroa	133	10
David	Eckstein	139	9
Alex	Cintron	133	8

Total Win Shares for SS, 2001-2004, Min 250 Games at SS

First Name	Last Name	Games at SS	Total WinShares
Alex	Rodriguez	322	97
Miguel	Tejada	486	87
Derek	Jeter	428	68
Edgar	Renteria	454	68
Rafael	Furcal	436	66
Nomar	Garciaparra	389	64
Jimmy	Rollins	460	60
Jose	Valentin	315	48
Carlos	Guillen	341	48
Jack	Wilson	448	46
Orlando	Cabrera	474	45
Julio	Lugo	366	44
Omar	Vizquel	361	43
Cristian	Guzman	432	41
David	Eckstein	402	40
Cesar	Izturis	445	40
Alex	Gonzalez	350	38
Juan	Uribe	267	37
Alex	Gonzalez	373	34
Rich	Aurilia	333	32
Deivi	Cruz	398	29
Barry	Larkin	279	27
Angel	Berroa	311	27
Royce	Clayton	394	26
Adam	Everett	261	24
Neifi	Perez	260	21

Both SS were poor in 2004. Over the previous three seasons, Orlando put up five more win shares in 70 more games. Oberjuerge is right; there's nothing you're getting from Cabrerra that you wouldn't get from Eckstein. And now the Angels are paying a whole lot more money for it.

This deal also makes clear why the Red Sox spent the money on Renteria. The market was such that they couldn't sign Cabrerra cheaply; now they have someone who is better, and they have to hope 2004 was just a random bad year.

As for David Eckstein, I bet there are a few teams that could use a player with a .347 OBA. Don't the Twins need a shortstop?

John Bonnes at TwinsGeek.com notices how the entire AL Central has been pretty much shut out of the free agent market.

The Twins took some heat last week (justifiably) for losing Corey Koskie. I suspect they will take some heat this week (not justifiably) for non-tendering Jacque Jones. But the migration of top level player towards big money teams this offseason - the Yankees, Red Sox, Braves, etc. - has affected the Twins' AL Central brethren just as much. The difference in those towns is that the criticism isn't about who they have lost, but who they haven't gained.

When the Indians got close to the AL Central title last season I expected them to make a deal. None happened. I expected them to make a deal this winter to try to push the team over the edge. Again, nothing. Was it the money, or did deals just move faster than these teams thought they would?

Mike's Baseball Rants does not like the moves Billy Beane has made this off season.

My verdict is that Beane has jumped the shark, at least that’s how it looks so far.

I don't agree, but time will certainly tell.

The Baseball Savant has a very well researched column on the recent ( and not so recent) moves by the Athletics.

I didn't realize how void of veterans the Rockies were going to be in 2005.

Now it's youth's turn with the Colorado Rockies.

If the Rocks cannot trade Preston Wilson, he and perennial All-Star first baseman Todd Helton will be the only two players in the lineup with more than one year and 27 days of service time in the majors, and the average major league experience of the eight position players would come to little more than two years.

Chance are, Colorado will start four rookies: catcher J.D. Closser, shortstop Clint Barmes, third baseman Garrett Atkins and right fielder Brad Hawpe.

The problem is they they're not that young. Closser and Atkins will have a seasonal age of 25 in 2005, while Barmes and Hawpe will be 26. As I've said before, old rookies do not impress me.

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Home of the Braves is a new blog about the Atlanta Braves by Steven West. Stop by and say hi.

Audio version of this post.

Although the winter meetings ended early in the week, the action continued fast and furious as GMs signed free agents and constructed trades for both the present and the future.

Some big names moved this week starting with the top pitcher available, Pedro Martinez. The Mets became his sugar daddy agreeing to pay the fragile hurler more than $50 million over the next four years. There is speculation about the health of Martinez's shoulder, but for the 16 games he starts at Shea this season, I suspect the park will be brimming to capacity. Fannies in the seats means dollars in the Mets pockets.

The Red Sox countered by paying the rent; shortstop Edgar Renteria, that is. The NL star gets $10 million a year coming off a poor season. Why the Sox think he's that much better than Cabrera, I'm not sure. I guess they needed a shortstop real bad. They also picked up Matt Clement, one of the better starters on the market this season. Looks to me like they saved about $10 million dollars per year vs. signing Nomar last season and Pedro this off-season.

The Mariners opened up the vault as well, signing Richie Sexson to enough money to enjoy the champagne room for a long time. More importantly, they landed what I feel is the free agent of the off-season, Adrian Beltre. The Dodger third baseman had a breakout season at age 25, leading the majors in home runs. The Mariners are getting him right in his prime, and if 2004 was any indication, they're getting a great deal.

It's pretty clear that there is a change in the way the clubs view free agents this season. The worry about insurance companies only covering three years has vanished as four seasons seems to be the term of choice this off season. And the money is there. While there hasn't been anything like a Manny Ramirez or Alex Rodriguez contract yet, prices are definitely up this winter. And with Carlos Beltran lurking in the mist, we still don't know how the high clubs will go this round. Clearly, though, with a year of good attendance and the interest the Red Sox generated with their World Series win, the owners appear very confident about the state of baseball finances.

Plenty of players were changing teams via trades, too. The Brewers started the week off getting Carlos Lee from the White Sox. It's my opinion that Milwaukee made out well in this trade, as the White Sox got Scott Podsednik, who's best days are being him, and Luis Vizcaino, a pitcher prone to the gopher ball. US Cellular is a good park for long ball hitters. The Brewers are making good moves this off-season.

The Yankees, Dodgers and DBacks are in the middle of putting together one of the biggest deals I've ever seen. Ten players are involved to bring Randy Johnson to the Yankees. The deal has been sent to Bud Selig, so we'll hear in a day or so if it really goes through. Once again, however, the Yankees are trading what little future they have for a win this season.

The trades of the week, however, go to the master himself, Billy Beane. Beane had been quiet the last couple of seasons; he did pick up Jose Guillen at the trade deadline in 2003 and sent his catcher to the Padres last winter. This week, however, he made everyone take notice as he sent two of his three aces to the NL and gathered six talented youngsters.

Tim Hudson joins the Braves and will anchor the rotation along with bullpen refugee John Smoltz. Mark Mulder will look for the truth in St. Louis. In return, Beane gets two fireballing relievers, two young starters with great minor league stats, a super 19-year-old catching prospect and a great defensive outfielder who may turn out to be a pretty good hitter. As a reader commented, Beane appears to be stock-piling catchers. Since good offensive catchers are hard to find, it's not a bad idea. In the future, the Athletics will have the backstops to sell to fill their holes. It's great to see the master at work again.

Al's Ramblings gets an aspect of Billy Beane's tenure dead wrong in this post praising the Mulder deal.

Mr. Beane doesn't care if he wins 69 games in 2005, or if they miss the playoffs by one game, like they did last year.

Beane does care if they win. By winning, he brings in fans that build revenue that lets him better compete with the big boys. From page 122 of Moneyball:

He told the Blue Ribbon Panel that the Oakland A's inability to afford famous stars meant that no matter how well the team performed, the fans stayed away -- which was the opposite of the truth. All the A's marketing studies showed that the main thing the fans cared about was winning. Win with nobodies and the fans showed up, and the nobodies became stars; lose with stars and the fans stayed home, and the stars became nobodies. Assembling nobodies into a ruthlessly efficient machine for winning baseball games, and watching them become stars was one of the pleasures of running a poor baseball team.

A 69 win season would be looked at as a failure by Beane and the A's. They may be retooling for the 2006, but they want to be competitive in 2005.

John Perricone takes note of all the money that being thrown around and wonders why the Giants aren't spending much of it.

Arizona was on the verge of bankruptcy. They put out some feelers, got a bunch of investors to pony up, and boom. Instead of being $100 million in the hole, they "find" $260 million dollars.

...

A bigger question for Giants fans, (particularly as they watch game-breaking free agents sign everywhere but here), is how come the Giants can't pull something like this off? What is preventing Magowan's partners from either getting some new investors to pony up a little scratch, or doing the ponying up themselves? Anybody got an answer to that one?

The Giants value, (according to this 2002 Forbes piece), was $333 million, and had risen 40% in the previous year. In this year's Forbes piece, we see that the Giants value has risen to $368 million dollars, an increase of over 10% in just over two seasons, and that their revenue stream has risen from $138 million to $153 million. Also noteworthy is that the team's debt/value (which includes stadium debt, a finite aspect that will end in 15 years) has dropped from 59% to 46%.

The SF Giants were purchased for $100 million dollars back in 1992. Here's the Forbes' 2004 Giants' page. That's a difference of $268 million dollars, from what Magowan & company paid for the team, and what it's worth today. If the D'backs could scrape up $260 million to land the players they feel can carry them into contention, why can't the Giants?

When A-Rod signed for $25 million a year, I told people that in a few years that would seem cheap. I was wrong about that. For the first time in the history of free agency, the market took a step backward. It hit bottom last year, but is clearly on the way up again.

And franchise value has a lot to do with it. Every so often someone writes about how the Yankees must be near the point where they can't spend any more money. Baloney. Steinbrenner's original group bought that franchise for $20 million. It's worth a billion now. The Yankees have cash flow, and they have equity. George could walk into any bank tomorrow and get a loan for $400,000,000 and no financier would blink an eye. He could turn around and sign Beltran, Delgado and trade for the Big Unit with money in the bank.

I suspect the Giants have pretty good cash flow numbers, also. They fill their park and Giants jersey's and hats have always been popular. With interest rates low, I suspect they've greatly reduced their debt service over the last few seasons. San Francisco has never had a world championship in baseball, and the franchise has not won a title in 50 years. The new Red Sox ownership knew they had an obligation to their fans to deliver a trophy to the town; the Giants, Indians, White Sox and Cubs have that same obligation to their long suffering fans. It's a good time for the Magowen and company to take out that home equity loan.

As everyone eagerly awaits the big trade of Brad Penny to the Diamondbacks, it appears the three sides have figured out the details of the ten player deal and have submitted the paperwork to the commissioner. In the end, this trade could involve five teams as reports have Vazquez eventually going to the White Sox and Ishii ending up with the Mets.

What was the big 3 is now a Z-1. The Athletics traded another 1/3 of their famous trio, sending Mark Mulder to the Cardinals for three players.

Kiko Calero is the oldest of the group at 30. Kiko strikes out better than a batter an inning and walks one every three. He's a nice addition to the bullpen.

Danny Haren is 24 and has not performed well in the majors. His minor league numbers, however, are great; nearly a K per inning and 1.6 walks per 9. The Athletics are going to hope he matures into that kind of ML pitcher.

Daric Barton hasn't turned 20 yet. He's played two minor league seasons and his OBA has been over .400 in both seasons. Barton, a catcher will be in line when Kendall's contract is up in three seasons, or if the A's decide they want Kendall's offense at a different position.

Meanwhile, the Cardinals are getting a bit of a mystery in Mulder. His ability to strikeout batter disappeared in the 2nd half of the season as his ERA went from 3.21 before the all-star break to 6.13 after. Was he injured? Was it an aberation? The truth is out there.

It's a typical Billy Beane deal. All three have abilities the A's like. And if Mulder's 2nd half was an aberation, the Cardinals have found a fitting replacement for Woody Williams.

The Randy Johnson deal keeps growing. Now there are ten players involved, up from seven the last time I checked. The Yankees would also get Kaz Ishii. Kaz had a big falloff in strikeouts last year, which may be the reason LA is willing to part with him.

He's one letter off from Roger Clemens, and now it looks like Matt Clement will be joining the Red Sox.

Clement made a jump when he joined the Cubs, raising his K per 9 from a good 7.1 to a great 8.8. His ERA took a big dip with this jump. He's not Pedro, but with the offense the Red Sox offer, I expect he'll finally have a season with a winning percentage well over .500. Red Sox fans should be very happy with this deal.

Sodo Oh No, a blog about the Mariners, is almost entirely podcast now.

Always willing to try new things, I'm exploring the world of podcasting. A couple of weeks ago, I tried my hand at a news of the week recording. It's something I plan to do more often. In the meantime, I met Ted Gilchrist at a blogger party in Cambridge, and mentioned that what I really need is a way to convert each entry into speech so they could be podcast without my spending time recording. Ted, as it turns out, has a tool for that and is now creating text-to-speech podcats of Baseball Musings.

So now it's possible to download the posts from this blog to your MP3 player while you're getting ready for work in the morning, and listen in the car on the way to work! You can download software at ipodder.org (it's free). Then, subscribe to two feeds. My own RSS 2.0 feed will have my recorded audio files. Ted's feed will have the text-to-voice version of the posts (and it does sound robotic).

If anyone subscribes to these feeds, please feel free to send any suggestions for improvements. Enjoy!

Update: Ted Gilchrist sent me a very creative MP3 file that explains what went on at the party.

SethSpeaks has an interview with the Twins' Dutch prospect, Alexander Smit.

I'd like to expand on a couple of ideas that are floating through the comments on the Beltre signing and the Randy Johnson trade. The first is that the Beltre's career is inconsistent with his 2004 season. While that's true, as I said in this post,

His jump in statistics at age 25 is more likely to be real than someone who puts their first great year at 29 or 30.

But more telling, I believe, is that DePodesta offered six years guaranteed, although at a lower yearly rate (how much lower isn't clear). That DePodesta made that kind of offer tells me Paul believes there's a lot of future value in Beltre.

The second idea is that it's okay for the Yankees to trade Eric Duncan because A-Rod is blocking him at third. This reminds me of the Red Sox trading Jeff Bagwell because Scott Cooper was blocking him at third. Remember the defensive spectrum:

<-- Increasing need for defense
P  C  SS  2B  CF  3B  RF  LF  1B  DH
Increasing need for offense -->

A good offensive player who is blocked at third has plenty of room to move right on this spectrum. And a great defensive third baseman can actually move left to 2nd or even short. Remember Cal Ripken? I don't know enough about Duncan to say where he could be moved, but the idea that he couldn't play on the Yankees because of A-Rod is incorrect.

Update: ESPN is saying that the Johnson deal is not as close as reported last night.

My friend Mike Wechsler sends me this story:

Avi, age 9 , maimonides school, brookline was asked by his teacher, Rabbi Reisman, to give a dvar torah , a word about the torah, relating to Chanukah, for the school bulletin. This is what he came up with.

Chanukah is a holiday of miracles. One of the miracles is that the oil lasted 8 days. The rabbis explain that the miracle of the oil is that when the Maccabbes came into the temple to light the menorah, they used all the oil at once to light. They did not try to save some of the oil for later. The miracle is that the oil lasted 8 days. The rabbis explain that we learn from this that when you do a mitzvah, you have to put in all your effort at the time of the mitzvah. This is a little like the Red Sox. They were losing the ALCS, but in game 4, 5, 6 and 7 they went on to win the playoffs and the World Series. In Game 4, they gave it their all-they did not try to reserve some of their energy and strength for later. They played with all their might. Just like the Maccabees lit the Menorah with all the oil, the Red Sox understood that if they wanted to win they had to give it their all. So we learn, that when doing a mitzvah, or doing anything at all, we need to try our best and put our best efforts into it. Go Sox and have a happy Chanukah

I asked Sig Mejdal, who wrote the injury prediction section of The Bill James Handbook 2005 to comment on the probabilities of injuries in 2005 for Sexson and Martinez.

Sexson is #231 as far as any injury. that's moderate and is a .149 chance.

He is the 37th highest risk for shoulder injury. Yes, he had one last year, but he didnt have any in the last 2 years and for his career, he has been quite healthy. All those things are looked at. Still, he has a .036 chance of a major shoulder injury next year according to the regression. That is good for #37 on the list.

Pedro is #152 as far as pitchers for Any Injury. He has a .166 chance in 2005. He is #61 for a shoulder injury. He has a few years on him, and although he has not had a shoulder injury in the last 2 years (which the regression really looks at), he has had quite a few cat4&5 seasons in his youth, and that is an indicator of future shoulder injuries (although an interaction analysis between the number of cat4&5 and age, I didnt do, but would be interesting to see). That's why he scores fairly high on a shoulder injury even though he has been relatively free of the major injuries (i.e. those that keep you out for a month or more). He is #126 for an elbow injury (.067), and is #408 (.005) for an arm injury. Remember, those are all injuries that keep you out for 30 consecutive days.

Thanks, Sig.

The Onion weighs in on stopping steroid abuse. My favorite:

Finally doing away with American League's much-debated "designated pisser" rule.

NY Newsday is reporting that the Yankees have reached a deal for Randy Johnson in a three-way deal involving the Dodgers. Scrabble champ Javier Vazquez and former slugger Shawn Green are moving as well.

Vazquez is going to the Dodgers with two minor league prospects. (LA is becoming the dumping ground for pitchers who can't handle NY.) Dioner Navarro is a young catcher (21 in 2005) who gets a decent amount of walks. I don't know how good he is as a catcher. Lots of upside potential here. Eric Duncan, a third baseman is a year younger, and also has a decent minor league OBA. He hasn't been above A ball yet.

The Diamondbacks get Brad Penny and the best name in baseball, Yhency Brazoban (a former Yankees prospect). Yhency's another pitcher with a great K per 9 rate.

So the Yankees staff gets even older, but probably a lot better. Johnson, Mussina and Pavano is a nice 1-2-3. They get rid of a headache in Vazquez, but lose two good prospects. They are definitely falling into the old trap of selling the future for success today. It will eventually fall apart for them as it did in the early 90's.

The DBacks get a good starter in Penny, but the Shawn Green deal is interesting. Some people feel Glaus can't play third anymore and will move to first. The Dodgers seemed to like Green more at first than in right last year. Arizona may end up loaded at first base. That's a poor situation to be in, since the only place you can move a player from first is DH, and those aren't used much in the NL. :-)

The Dodgers take a risk in Vazquez, but a worthwhile one. I suspect Navarro will be their long term replacement for Lo Duca. A good Moneyball trade for the Dodgers.

Update: ESPN is saying that the Johnson deal is not as close as reported last night.

The Athletics and Braves pulled off a major deal today as Tim Hudson heads east for three young players.

Beane said he "needed to do something bold," but it still wasn't an easy decision.

"This was the most difficult phone call I've ever had with a player about a trade or a departure," Beane said. "I spent a lot of time on the phone with him. It was very difficult. We're going to miss him, there's no question. I don't think the expectation is that we'll be able to replace his personality and exactly what he brought to this franchise the last five years."

Given Leo Mazzone's success with broken down and bad pitchers, imagine what he'll do with someone good. Hudson may throw 300 innings this year and win 30. :-) But it's really a facsinating trade. Oakland gets Charles Thomas for the outfield. The 25-year-old started strongly for the Braves but faded every month. He's not as good as he showed in July and not as bad as he played in September. At his age, I don't consider him a prospect; he's more of a good throw in.

Juan Cruz is a pitcher with the ability to strike out 8 to 9 batters per 9 IP. His walks aren't bad, and his HR allowed are okay. He'll fit in fine on the A's staff.

Dan Meyer is the real prize. The 23 year old has struck out 381 batters in 350 minor league innings while walking only 87. His ERAs have been consistently under 3.00 in his three minor league seasons. In Meyer, the A's get a new six-year window in which they hope to have an inexpensive all-star hurler. It's a typical A's move. They let a star go and fill in with a player or players with good skills at a much cheaper price.

The Braves have effectively replaced Russ Ortiz with Tim Hudson. I like that move. If Smoltz stays healthy, they have a much better rotation than they did last year. Schuerholz shows once again that he's the master of slowly making over a team, patching every weakness as it appears. The Braves are once again in position to win the NL East.

This looks like a trade that will help both clubs. It's fun to watch the masters at work.

The Seattle Mariners spent even more money today, signing NL home run champ Adrian Beltre to a huge five-year contract. Beltre was just behind Scott Rolen in win shares last year, and had the most defensive win shares of any NL third baseman.

This may be the best free agent signing of the year. A leading indicator of baseball greatness is reaching the majors at an early age. Beltre came up when he was 19, and has been a starter ever since. His jump in statistics at age 25 is more likely to be real than someone who puts their first great year at 29 or 30. Beltre is the rare free agent (like Roberto Alomar and Alex Rodriguez) who hits the market on the way up. A great job by the Mariners to acquire this youngster.

Will Carroll hits the big time with an op-ed in the NY Times! Sorry I missed it earlier, and congratulations to Will.

With the Mets signing Pedro Martinez and the Mariners signing Richie Sexson, Mo Vaughn comparisons are coming to mind. Jayson Stark puts it this way.

The Red Sox were never going to guarantee this man four years. They weren't particularly excited about guaranteeing him three years.

They know -- everybody knows -- Martinez has a tear in his labrum that's practically as wide as the San Andreas Fault. One informed estimate put that tear as 90 percent full.

So there is a stupendous chance that one of these days, Pedro will go from being Omar Minaya's most famous acquisition straight to being the Mets' next Mo Vaughn.

Minus the insurance, that is.

And that's an important point. Pedro passed his physical yesterday and did have an MRI. Will that be good enough to get the Mets a policy?

Of course, the person who started the whole Mo fiasco was none other than Bill Bavasi.

But Bavasi landed his other target, Red Sox first baseman Mo Vaughn. Bavasi impressed Vaughn with a letter written personally, imploring Vaughn to pick up his East Coast roots and move west. And it didn't hurt that Bavasi offered Vaughn $80 million over six years. Vaughn signed with the Angels, who believed they were in position to get over the top and reach the playoffs for the first time since 1986.

On opening night in 1999 a sellout crowd came to Anaheim's Edison Field to see Vaughn and the Angels play the Cleveland Indians. But in the top of the first inning, the second batter of the game, Omar Vizquel, hit a foul popup near the Indians' first-base dugout. Vaughn drifted over near the dugout, looking into the sky, then fell into the dugout, landing hard on his left ankle.

Vaughn shook it off and stayed in the game. But when he fell to the ground while batting later in the game, it was obvious the injury was worse that first imagined. Vaughn came out of the game and was diagnosed with a severe high-ankle sprain.

Bill gave a lot of money to another first baseman yesterday.

The Seattle Mariners added power to one of the weakest lineups in baseball Wednesday, agreeing to a $50 million, four-year contract with free agent first baseman Richie Sexson.

Sexson will be playing left field, meaning that the Mariners believe they can sign another first baseman, probably Delgado.

I don't like the Sexson deal for two reasons.

1. It's a lot of money for a 30 year old who has only two 20+ win shares seasons under his belt. Seattle is the worst hitters park in the AL. Sexson's number may not look so good there.


2. Sexson is a first baseman for a reason. You don't take a good outfielder and put him at first. You take someone who's not a good outfielder and put him at first to hide his defensive deficiencies.

So the Mariners are going to pay a lot of money to players in their 30's who are at the poor end of the defensive spectrum. They are forcing a square peg into a round hole. I suspect Sexson will wind up at DH, and $10 million a year is a lot of money for a DH.

Update: The Mets just had a new conference introducing Pedro. Omar Minaya said something interesting. He claims that Pedro's transcends wins and losses. That having Pedro sign with the Mets will make other players want to be Mets. He says he's already getting calls from free agents saying "I want to be a Met." He hopes that this will help him find the next Pedro.

That kid that we don't know about, that Pedro Martinez that you don't know about, I don't know about, okay, that might be in the marketplace down in the Dominican Republic or Venezuela. That kid's father, or that kid, you know what he wants to be today? He wants to be a Met.

Will the Mets have enough money to sign that youngster?

In choosing between the two shortstops, I have no doubt the Red Sox made the right choice. Renteria is a year younger than Cabrera, and has a much better track record. Cabrera having one good year at age 28 doesn't impress me. Given that Cabrera is now looking for $7 million a year, it seems much saner to spend the money on Renteria. Someone is going to get stuck with paying a lot of money to Orlando, and they won't get much in return.

Baseball Musings fan Monica Bay has started a new blog, The Common Scold. It's not about baseball, but you might want to stop by and say hello.

I'd like to extend my thanks to the Harvard Club of Philadelphia for being such gracious hosts yesterday. Thanks especially to Art Kyriazis, who arranged the visit and was kind enough to shuttle me back and forth to the airport. (The Mather Moose lives!) Thanks for receiving the talk so warmly and for the challenging questions.

It was also great to see my former roommate and super Mets fan Levon Nazarian again. Levon was one of the people to get me involved in playing Strat-o-Matic baseball. We played two great extra-inning games against each other. In the first, J.R. Richard pitched a complete game of at least 15 innings (it was very low scoring; the final was 2-1 or 1-0) for the Naz Mets. The other demonstrates how seriously we took the game. It was late in the season, and Levon had wrapped up the National League title. But I had the Pinto Hatchbacks in contention for the AL title against Steve Fine and Jim Storer. Levon and I played a four game series that started late. The fourth game went into extra innings. Steve and Jim were up watching us roll the dice to see how it affected the pennant race. The game goes into extra-innings. Lots of substitutions. It's 2 o'clock in the morning, Steve and Jim want to go to bed, but they just can't draw themselves away from the action.

In the bottom of the penultimate inning, my 3-4-5 hitters go down in order. Steve and Jim (who are rooting for me to lose) say, "That's it, he won't win now." They think about going to bed, but can't draw themselves away. The Mets don't score in the top of the inning, and the 1979 Butch Hobson leads off the Hatchbacks half of the frame. The dice roll is 3-5; it's a good roll, but a split roll. If I pull a 1 or a 2 from the split deck of cards, HR and the Hatchbacks win. 3-20 Puts Hobson on 2nd with a double. Steve says, "Watch him pull a two."

Now, there are subtleties to playing strat. For example, if you're bunting, you want to roll the dice softly. If you're going for the HR, you throw them with a full motion across the table. :-) And of course, if you are picking a split card in a tense situation, you add all the drama you can to the moment. You grasp the card with your fingers, hold it face down for a few seconds to build the tension, then with great flair turn it over to reveal the result.

It was a two, sending my league opponents groaning off to bed.

Edgar Renteria appears to have signed a four-year deal with the Boston Red Sox. He'll be getting $10 million a year.

A reader mailed and asked if I thought the price was high. Given that the best shortstops make at least $15 million a year, I guess not. Edgar had a big falloff in 2004 after a great 2003. Three of his last five years have been very good. The Red Sox must be thinking they'll get at least a couple of very good years out of the shortstop.

His defense last year was not outstanding as rated by win shares. Given that the Red Sox were after defense during the middle of the season, they may be taking a step back here, especially when Wells is pitching (lots of balls in play against Boomer).

Sometimes, however, you just need a shortstop.

At Elaine's apartment.

Robert: Hahaha, why'd you start that fight with me?

Elaine: Well I figured that's what couples do.

Robert: You almost convinced me we were a couple.

Elaine: Well it was easy. Really.

Robert: Well good night, I'll call you tomorrow.

Elaine: Oh, uh, wait a second. Would you like to come, upstairs?

Robert: Upstairs?

Elaine: Yeah. Upstairs?

Robert: Elaine...

Elaine: I was hoping you know, that you might be interested in... changing teams?

Robert: Changing teams?

Elaine: Have you ever thought about it?

Robert: But I'm a starting shortstop.

Elaine: Robert, we need a shortstop. *Real bad*.

In this case, the Red Sox went for the best one available, and in a bidding war with the Cardinals, the price went up. If the good Renteria shows up, it will be worth it. If, at age 29, Edgar keeps declining, it will be a bad signing.

Eric McErlain at Off Wing Opinion has the story on stadium financing bill passed last night in DC. The bill calls for 50% private financing. MLB will not like that and can walk away from the District.

While I know this is a blow to fans who would like a team inside Washington proper, I say good for the Council. Taxpayers should not be responsible for these stadiums outside of infrastructure improvements to the surrounding area. As more and more cities take this position, teams will be less able to use the threat of relocation to get what they want.

Update: I'm back from Philadelphia. Thanks for all the great comments on this issue! An excellent discussion.

I'll be traveling tomorrow, so blogging will be light. I'm presenting a talk at the Harvard Club of Philadelphia on baseball statistics.

Dan Lewis asks five questions about the Mets signing Pedro at Armchair GM. He's also trying to make money off steroids. :-)

Curt Schilling is going to miss the start of the regular season.

"I'm going to be late, I think, starting the season," Schilling told WEEI-AM on Tuesday.

Schilling said he had a cast removed from the ankle over the weekend and learned for the first time that he wouldn't be able to rotate his ankle for four to five weeks. That means he won't be able to resume throwing when he had planned.

"So I'm looking at least another month before I start throwing, which puts me a month behind," he said.

David Wells on opening day, anyone?

From the mind of Travis Nelson.

Shawn Bernard sends this story about a nice gesture by what's left of the Montreal Expos.

Quinnipiac University has released a poll showing high support for banning players who have used steroids.

By a 61 - 33 percent margin, American baseball fans say Major League players who test positive for steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs should be banned from baseball, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

Steroid/drug use is a "major problem," 65 percent of fans tell the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll.

Fans oppose 57 - 36 percent the idea of expunging all baseball records of players who use steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs. But fans say 52 - 42 percent that steroid/drug users should be banned from the Baseball Hall of Fame.

I'm not sure what "banned" means here; banned for life, banned for a season or some other time frame. Here's the exact question asked:

Should major league baseball players who test positive for steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs be banned from baseball, or not?

I'd love to see people given a choice of time periods on this question. Still, an interesting result. Fans seem to be coming to the conclusion that if you take away time from players with a ban, you even out the record book. For example, if Bonds were banned for a year now, he probably doesn't break Aaron's record. This is sure to figure into the drug testing negotiations going on now between MLB and the MLBPA.

The White Sox and Brewers pulled off a significant trade Monday.

The Milwaukee Brewers filled their most pressing need Monday when they closed the winter meetings by acquiring right-handed slugger Carlos Lee from the Chicago White Sox in exchange for center fielder Scott Podsednik, reliever Luis Vizcaino and a player to be named later.

This strikes me as a very good deal for the Brewers. Carlos Lee earned 24 win shares last season; the most any member of the 2004 Brewers earned was 21. Podseknik and Vizcaino combined for 21 win shares. So there's a win right there for the Brewers. Both outfielders are 29, but there's no doubt in my mind that Lee has the better future. There's a reason Podseknik didn't have his rookie season until he was 27. He just wasn't that good.

Luis Vizcaino is interesting. He has great strikeout numbers, but he allows a ton of HR. If you look at his career, his one great year (2002) was the one in which he kept his HR down. The bad news for Luis, however, is that US Cellular Field has the highest HR index of any AL park over the last three seasons. (See the Bill James Handbook, 2005.)

So the Brewers get a good, slugging outfielder. The White Sox get a center fielder whose best days are probably behind him, and a reliever whose weakness will be accentuated by his home park. The player to be named better be pretty good.

The Brewers are not without problems due to their dealings, however.

Moving Vizcaino, who was 4-4 with a 3.75 ERA in 75 appearances last season, creates a second hole in the bullpen. The right-hander was the primary set-up man last season for closer Dan Kolb, who was traded to Atlanta Saturday for rookie right-hander Jose Capellan and minor league pitcher Alex Zumwalt - whom the Brewers assigned to their Class AAA team Monday.

That leaves right-hander Mike Adams as the leading closer candidate after just one season in the majors.

"Now we have to go out and find some relief pitching," Melvin said. "We already have a long list (of candidates) on our board. It's a new challenge for us."

If they keep making trades like this, the Brewers should be up to the challenge.

The Diamondback have tried to restart trade talks with the Yankees.

Jeff Moorad, the Diamondbacks' incoming chief executive officer, called Yankees president Randy Levine, a baseball official said on condition of anonymity.

Moorad asked if anything was new on Johnson but did not make a new proposal, and the discussion ended there, the official said.

Johnson can veto any trade, and it appears he wants to go to the Yankees. If Arizona really wants to trade in for a smaller unit, all the Yankees have to do is sit back and wait for the price to come down.

Jeff Quinton is on the Sosa watch. I find it amusing that the article to which he links describes the Braves as "financially strapped."

The word is Pedro is going to sign with the Mets. More later.

Update: Here's the story from Boston.com. I'm wondering if Pedro is trying to get Boston to budge on the fourth year. Pedro has a much better chance of going to the playoffs with the Red Sox than the Mets. Is he trying to drive the Red Sox price up, or does he really want that fourth year? We'll wait and see.

Of course, this is a good signing for the Mets. Shea is a great park in which to pitch, and I suspect Martinez will have success there. It's also probably a good thing that he'll have Rick Peterson as his pitching coach; he may help prevent future breakdowns.

Of course, this leaves Boston in an interesting position.

Short of making a splash in the Randy Johnson negotiations, Boston’s pitching staff for 2005 is going to be significantly weaker. As it stands now, it’s Schilling-Wells-Arroyo-Wakefield-Kim. Oh, and ticket prices went up too. Good thing they sold those seats over the weekend, eh?

David Wells is your No. 2 starter. Even worse, Byung Hyun Kim is in the rotation.

Given the mediocre moves the Yankees have made, for the first time in a long time, the AL East could be wide open.

Congratulations to the Baseball Crank on winning the 2004 Weblogs Awards for best sports blog. Thanks to all who voted for Baseball Musings, and thanks to the Crank for the kind words.

Jim Storer and I were just having talking about signing free agent pitchers. Which of these pitchers would you rather have?

Career	Pitcher 1	Pitcher 2
K/9	7.7	5.9
HR/9	1.2	0.9
BB/9	2.5	2.6
ERA	4.26	4.21

The age difference is about 6 months. I'd rather have pitcher 1, just because his strikeouts per 9 are higher. Otherwise they're very close. Have you guessed who they are? That's right, pitcher 1 is Javier Vazquez and pitcher 2 is Carl Pavano.

Update: Rooftop Report has more thoughts and comparisons.

Dave Isaacs has found the AOL chat room for general managers. Who knew that all the trades and signings were going on there? Check out GM Chat.

Corey Koskie has agreed to sign with the Blue Jays, accepting a contract worth about $5.7 million dollars per year. It seems like a good price to plug a hole at third base. Koskie beat Hinske in offsensive win shares by about 7 last season, and Hinske played about 30 more games.

Hinske has to be a huge disappointment to the Blue Jays after getting off to such a good start in 2002 as Rookie of the Year. He was an old rookie, getting his first ML experience at 24. But instead of getting better as he entered his prime, his OBA and Slugging have deteriorated to the point where he'd make a bad offensive shortstop. That's why this made me laugh:

In Toronto, Koskie will take over at third base for Eric Hinske, the 2002 AL Rookie of the Year. Toronto either will move Hinske to first base or trade him.

Eric can't hit like a first baseman should. I would be very surprised to see Hinske on the Blue Jays next year, unless he can turn around his batting. He's still owed 3 years of a $15 million contract, so moving the money shouldn't be a problem. Maybe he needs a good hitting coach.

Peter Gammons has won the annual Spink award for

meritorious contributions to baseball writing.

One of my great pleasures in my years at Harvard was reading the Peter Gammons Sunday column in the globe. I consider myself lucky to have worked with Peter for 10 years at ESPN, and have him mention my work a number of times in his columns. He's a good colleague and a better friend. Congratulations, Peter!

Carl Pavano has announced his intentions of signing with the Yankees. It appears that Joe Torre made the difference.

But on Saturday morning, from his off-season home in the woods near

Montreal, Pavano told his agent to negotiate a deal with the Yankees. The sides were closing in on a four-year contract for just under $40 million, pending a physical, and Manager Joe Torre made the difference. "His conversations with Joe Torre, who spoke with him again by phone in the last couple of days, really were impactful," Pavano's agent, Scott Shapiro, said. "Carl told me point-blank that he would go to war for the man. You can't say anything bad about the decision of wanting to play for Joe Torre."

Taking away the clubhouse from George Steinbrenner is Torre's great accomplishment as manager of the Yankees. In the past, no matter who sat in the manager's office, the whole team belonged to the Boss. Now Joe is the guard on the bridge that keeps the two sides separate. The players and Steinbrenner both respect Torre for that. That's why he has the 2nd longest tenure among ML managers in a clubhouse that had a revolving door for 20 years.

There seems to be some question as to Pavano's worth. Based on 2004, $10 million a year is a good price. Carl put up 20 win shares last season, tied with Roger Clemens for 3rd in the NL. Only Randy Johnson and Ben Sheets were better. But this was a big jump for Pavano. In six season prior to 2004, Carl had earned just 29 win shares total. He doesn't strikeout many batters, 5.6 per 9. With the Yankees defense, that's always a worry. His walks and his HRs are good, however. The Yankees will be banking on Pavano being a late bloomer.

The Indians traded Matt Lawton to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Arthur Rhodes yesterday. The Pirates get a player who is a good leadoff man when healthy. The Indians get a set up man who was great in 2001-2002, but mediocre to bad in 2003-2004. On the surface, I'd say the Pirates got the better of this deal. Of course, if you look at this trade as Kendall for Redman and Lawton, it's probably just okay.

I'm not sure what's going on with the Indians. Shapiro is putting Coco Crisp in the leadoff spot.

"Coco's on-base percentage went up every month last season," Shapiro said.

Shapiro is putting a lot of stock about 200 plate apperances of good OBA. I hope he's right; we need ballplayers with names like Coco Crisp in the majors. But the Indians need good pitching, and I don't know where it's coming from. Looking at their AA stats from last season, I don't see any impressive starters. And Kyle Denney appears to be the only AAA starter with a good combination of K, BB and HR. His cup of coffee with the Indians was less than impressive, however.

The Indians have a terrific offense. They need to find another starter and another good reliever to carry the team to post season. I don't believe Rhodes is that reliever. It's time to spend a little money now to bring the fans back and try to break the 56-year championship drought.

John Smoltz is headed back to the Braves starting rotation.

SportsTicker has learned that the Braves have traded prized pitching prospect Jose Capellan to the Milwaukee Brewers for All-Star reliever Danny Kolb. Sources close to both sides confirmed the deal.

Earlier Saturday, Braves manager Bobby Cox was pointed in his comments that Smoltz was headed back to the rotation, likely aware that the deal was close to being finalized.

I thought the whole point of moving Smoltz to the bullpen was to save his arm after he missed all of 2000 and part of 2001. With elbow surgery before the 2004 season, the Braves must believe he can withstand a full season of starting. Cox and Mazzone are miracle workers when it comes to that staff.

In looking at Kolb's record, however, I'd rather have Smoltz in the bullpen. What happened to his strikeouts in 2004? He was great in 2003, striking out 39 in 41 1/3 innings; but last year he only K'd 21 in 57 1/3. Smoltz had better than a K an inning his last three seasons as a closer. Mazzone might have to work a miracle with Kolb as well.

The Red Sox add a large lefty to the rotation:

The Red Sox have come to terms with 41-year-old left-hander David Wells. The deal guarantees $8 million for one year, but if he makes 31 starts he would be guaranteed $13 million. The two-year contract could be worth $16 to $18 million.

Under the terms of the agreement, Wells would receive a $3 million signing bonus and have a base salary of $2.5 million in 2005 and 2006, The Boston Globe reported. He also would have the opportunity to earn an additional $5 million in performance bonuses in each year of the contract. The deal will not be official until Wells passes a physical, reportedly scheduled for Tuesday.

This doesn't sound good for Derek Lowe. I would think the Red Sox would be more interested in resigning Pedro, which would give them a rotation of Martinez, Schilling, Wells, Wakefield and Arroyo. That rotation would certainly celebrate a diversity of pitches.

Wells is no longer a strikeout pitcher, so like Lowe, he'll need a good defense behind him. David has compensated for the loss of his strikeouts by cutting down on walks as well. He has a career K per BB of 3.07, but each of the last two years it's been 5.05.

2004 Was the year of the old pitcher. It seems to be showing up in their paychecks as well.

And I love this:

To end their championship drought, the Red Sox turned the clubhouse over to free spirits like Johnny Damon, David Ortiz and Kevin Millar -- an unshaven and unkempt bunch that foiled the strait-laced Yankees and won an unprecedented eight consecutive games after spotting New York a three-game lead in the AL Championship Series.

Wells would fit right in.

The boisterous lefty missed three starts in late May and early June -- costing himself $1 million in incentives -- after tripping over a bar stool at home, knocking a bottle of wine onto the floor and landing on it and a glass he was holding. He severed a tendon in his right wrist, requiring surgery, and cut his left palm.

I wonder why he tripped? :-)

Asked Friday if he was concerned that Wells' carousing might upset the chemistry in the Boston clubhouse, general manager Theo Epstein said sarcastically, "No, we don't have any guys like that."

I thought that there was a good chance of Boston taking a breather; letting their free agents go, gathering some draft picks, building up the farm system and squirreling away some cash to create a future dynasty. But the signing of Wells indicates they want to repeat. At this point, I would expect them to make a push to bring back Pedro and Varitek. They're not resting on their laurels.

Red Sox Nation has a delightful interview with Chaz Scoggins, long time official scorer for the Boston Red Sox. It's an excellent mix of information, history and anecdotes. There are so many great stories I wouldn't know where to begin to quote. Your perceptions of Clemens and Rice will definitely be more positive after reading the article.

Due to personal experience I found this interesting.

RSN: Do official scorers keep a scorecard like fans in the stands, or is it different? And how have computers affected how you do your job?

CS: I use the same scorebook most baseball writers use to monitor the progress of a game. There is an official scoring form that must be filled out by hand after the game and submitted to the MLB office. It usually takes 30-45 minutes to fill out. The minor leagues are using laptops with special software now, but the majors still use old-fashioned paper. We've been told we could be using laptops in 2005, which could be a mixed blessing. While the official report would be available instantly at the end of a game, I know there are still bugs in the software that can't handle unusual scoring decisions and drive minor-league scorers crazy. I would rather MLB do it the old way until the software has been perfected.

As someone who has written scoring software, I've seen this kind of thing first hand. I was in the press box at Fenway in the early 1990s scoring a game for STATS, Inc. Scoggins was the OS. Chuck Finley was pitching for Anaheim, and let loose what appeared to be a wild pitch. He threw the ball so hard, however, that it hit the wall behind home plate and bounded back to the catcher. He tossed the ball to Finley covering the plate, and the runner trying to score from third was out.

I wasn't quite sure how to score the play on my laptop. Some of the reporters around me thought it was a caught stealing, but I disagreed. My main concern was should a WP be charged. After a short time, Scoggins announced that the runner was out on a fielder's choice. To clarify, he announced that there was no wild pitch and no caught stealing. The call made sense to me, and I entered the play as "Out Advancing."

STATS supplied box scores to the AP at the time (and may still do) so we were supposed to transmit the game within five minutes of it ending. But one thing we had to do was make sure our box agreed with the MLB box. MLB used a system supplied by IBM at the time. Someone in the pressbox scored the game on that system, immediately printed out the box and distributed it to the press. When I got the box for that game, there was a caught stealing on the potential wild pitch! I went over to Chaz and pointed out the CS. Clearly annoyed, Chaz turned around to the IBM scorer and told him there was no CS in the game. I don't remember if the IBM was able to handle the play or not. My guess is that it couldn't be fixed until a database person received the account. I think Scoggins will be sticking to paper for a while.

Stephen at Horsefeathers isn't upset by the steroids scandal. I love the closing quote.

Horsefeathers will, however, continue to enjoy the game, not expecting ballplayers to be noble role models for the youth of America, and recalling what Casey Stengel once said of Bobby Richardson, a virtuous man: "Look at him- he doesn't drink, he doesn't smoke, he doesn't chew, he doesn't stay out late, and he still can't hit."

The Diamondback continue to retool, signing pitcher Russ Ortiz to a four year contract. Ortiz will get a little over $8 million per year.

I get the impression that the Diamondbacks are buying Russ' wins, not his ability. This deal reminds me of the time the Royals signed Storm Davis. Davis had gone 16-7 and 19-7 in the two years before he became a free agent. But he did that on a very good team, and his ERA was 4.36 in his 19-7 year. The Royals thought his wins came with him. His ERA went up to 4.76, and he went 7-10 for a bad Royals club.

Ortiz's ERA has gone up 3 years in a row. The Diamondbacks are not a good team. Ortiz is a good, not great pitcher. He could easily be .500 or worse with the DBacks unless the rest of the team gets better.

Darren Viola sends a link to this article about a project to record all Negro League boxscores in a computerized database.

The work, a three-year, first-of-its-kind project funded with a $250,000 grant from Major League Baseball, used thousands of newspaper box scores to identify and compile statistics on more than 3,000 men who played in often-forgotten black baseball leagues from 1920 to 1948.

The 5,000-page volume - which shows more conclusively that the quality of Negro Leagues play equaled white baseball at the time - is more in-depth than past statistical studies on black players prior to integration.

The research will be given later this month to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Eventually, it will become part of the hall's statistical and narrative history of black baseball since the Civil War.

This is pain-staking work. The people sifting through the tiny print of the boxscores need to be commended. Their work will provide us with an invaluable research tool for the future.

Reports are that Steve Finley has signed a deal with the Anaheim Angels. I'm not sure what this means. Are the Angels going to play Finley in right and go after Beltran, or do they see Finley as the everyday CF?

According to the LA Times, it takes them out of the Beltran race. If that's true, this is a bad signing and my admiration for the Angels front office and ownership just went down.

The deal, believed to guarantee the 39-year-old Finley between $15 million and $20 million over two years, will go a long way toward filling the power void left by the departures of left fielder Jose Guillen and third baseman Troy Glaus and should give the Angels one of baseball's most formidable outfields, with Vladimir Guerrero, the American League most valuable player, in right and Garret Anderson in left.

"I think it's a better outfield than we had last year," said Tim Salmon, the Angel veteran who will sit out most of 2005 while recovering from knee and shoulder surgery. "Garret did an admirable job in center, but I think his natural position is left. And offensively, [Finley] gives us one more good solid bat. He still has some sock."

The deal also leaves the Angels in good financial position to pursue such top-notch free-agent pitchers as Carl Pavano, Matt Clement, Russ Ortiz and possibly Pedro Martinez, and to possibly make another run at Arizona ace Randy Johnson, whom the Angels tried to acquire in July.

That's a lot of money for a 2005 forty year old. And the idea that Finley is a power threat doesn't really jibe with his career. His career high in home runs is 36, and he hit that last year. (In light of the recent steroid scandal, it makes you wonder.) His career slugging percentage is .450 and his career OBA is .337; those number just don't impress me.

On the other hand, I thought he was done after his 1998 season with the Padres (.301 OBA, .401 Slugging). But here he is being a very well paid aging player. Still, I bet $15 million a year for three years for Beltran would be a much better investment. This could really go down as one of the memorably bad free agent signings.

Correction: My brain wasn't working when I wrote the first paragraph. Somehow I have Guillen in right field in my mind. The Angels just needed a new CF so they could move Anderson back to left.

Doug Melvin is thinking about an interesting strategy for the winter meetings.

Melvin said one tactic might be to sit back and see which teams dive into the top-tier free-agent market for players such as Carlos Beltran and Adrian Beltre, and then investigate if those teams are looking to free up money to pay for their new players by trading established players on their rosters. That could solve the position-player issue.

Let teams overspend, then Milwaukee could act as a safety valve. Not an aggressive strategy, but one that might be okay. Especially if the Brewers are aiming for next year.

Melvin thinks he might be able to address the offense via trade and the pitching through free agency. He figures the cream of the Brewers' minor league crop - offensive-minded players such as Prince Fielder and Rickie Weeks - is still a year away. But J.J. Hardy, who is playing in Mexico this winter, will be given every chance to win the job at shortstop during spring training.

I don't know if they both need another year. Weeks and Fielder both have good OBAs in the minor leagues. If they come out hitting like gangbusters this spring, bring them up. It will be exciting for the fans, and a sign that the two will have long, productive careers.

By the way, why is Prince Fielder trying to steal bases? It pretty obvious he's not good at it (16 for 28 in his career). Why risk an injury of a future star player and decrease your run production at the same time?

Update: It's Doug, not Bob Melvin.

Willie Henderson describes the Royals Caravan visit to Maryville.

The Royals Caravan is an annual promotion where Royals players, announcers, Royals legends and team mascot Sluggerrr climb in a small bus and visit over 30 midwestern cities, covering more than 2,000 miles across five states. Cynics will say it is an effort to win back fans who feel disenfranchised by the present state of the national pastime.

True fans, like Matt McClarnon, Shambaugh, Iowa, see it differently.

"It's great that the players will come to a town like Maryville," McClarnon said. "It gives us a chance to see them up close."

I have to agree with Mr. McClarnon. Providing a personal connection to players is a great way to develop a fan base. There are going to be a lot of David DeJesus fans after this trip.

Houston has lost one piece of its Wild Card team, and may soon lose another. Jeff Kent signed today with the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers got a pretty good deal, as home town native Kent signed for $17 million over two years.

On the surface, 2nd base doesn't appear to be a problem for LA. In 2004, LA pivot men had an .813 OPS, third in the NL. But that was based on exceptional seasons from Alex Cora and Jose Hernandez, both have OBA's way above their norms. DePodesta likely doesn't trust those numbers, so he's filling a hole that's likely to develop.

The other piece of the puzzle that may go missing is Roger Clemens, who is thinking of retiring again.

"If I had to decide today, I'd say I'm not playing," Clemens said Thursday. "But I'm not saying that. My wife and family want me to wait until after I take a vacation before I make a decision."

"Three of my sons say there's no way they want me to come back and one of them wants me to. But I think he just likes the buffets they have at the games. So we'll have to see," he said.

There's a young man after my own heart. :-) Clemens' departure would leave a hole in the rotation, but it would also free more money to sign Carlos Beltran.

The White Sox have inked Jermaine Dye to a two year contract. The good news is that he's not costing a lot, $10 million over the two years. The bad news is that he's not going to fill Magglio Ordonez's shoes.

Ordonez and Dye have exactly the same birthday, 1/28/1974. And apart from playing the outfield, that's about all they have in common.

Career	Dye	Ordonez
Seasons	9	8
150 Game Seasons	3	5
OBA	.343	.364
Seasons	.463	.525

Ordonez just has a better overall game than Dye, and he's been more durable to boot. The White Sox just purchased a cheap veteran to replace him. It's not a move to improve the team, it's a move to save money.

How that money will now be spent is the question. As I often wonder in these situations, why don't the White Sox have a 22 year old in the minors who can step in and hit as well as Dye? That would give Ken Williams another $10 million to put to good use. It seems better long term planning would have the Sox in that position.

Troy Glaus is now a Diamondback.

The 6-foot-5, 245-pound Glaus, 28, will be given a $4 million signing bonus and a salary of $8.25 million this season. He'll make $9.25 million in 2006, $10.75 million in 2007 and $12.75 million in 2008.

None of the money will be deferred.

I'm a big Troy Glaus fan. When healthy, he has a great eye for the strike zone and terrific power. His seasonal age in 2005 will be 28, still near the prime of his career. But that's a lot of money to pay someone who hasn't had a great season since 2001. Glaus found himself late in 2002 (8 HR in 82 AB in September), helping the Angels to the Wild Card and then the World Series title (WS MVP).

Still the Diamondbacks are putting a lot of stock in their medical reports.

As for Glaus, Diamondbacks physicians gave him an extensive physical in the Valley on Monday, and reportedly everything checked out fine with his shoulder.

It wasn't immediately known whether any of his salary is to be based on games-played or at-bat provisions, as were all previous offers made by the club to Sexson.

I'm happy for Troy nonetheless, and I'll be rooting for him to have a fine season. After all, Troy's worst years would still be above average for an NL third baseman.

I'm very surprised the Blue Jays did not offer salary arbitration to Carlos Delgado. Carlos is a great hitter and a sought after free-agent. I wouldn't think, given the low-ball offer the Blue Jays made to Delgado, that Carlos would even think of coming back to Toronto. Ricciardi must have seen a risk that he didn't want to take.

I'll venture that Ricciardi believes that the offers for Delgado's services will be lower than Carlos wants. In that case, he may be better off with an arbitrator. He can argue from his $19 million salary of last year, and end up with much more than the $6 million the Blue Jays are offering. I guess the draft picks just aren't worth that risk.

Update: Rich in the comments suggests that there is minimum amount teams have to offer in arbitration, 80% of the previous year's salary. However, page 67 of the CBA says that doesn't apply to free agent arbitration.

If the Player accepts the offer to arbitrate, he shall be a signed player for the next season and the parties will conduct a salary arbitration proceeding under Article VI, provided, however, that the rules concerning maximum salary reduction set forth in Article VI shall be inapplicable and the parties shall be required to exchange figures on the last day established for the exchange of salary arbitration figures under Article VI.

The Phillies are puming up John Lieber's pocketbook, signing him to a three-year, $21 million dollar contract. The Phillies seem to be going with an age movement, bringing in Kenny Lofton and Rheal Cormier in addition to Lieber. They're also talking about Chris Hammond for the bullpen.

I don't believe Lieber is a bad signing. Seven million a year is a reasonable amount of money for a pitcher, and Lieber does one thing extremely well; he doesn't walk batters. He would have pitched the Yankees into the World Series if it hadn't been for one great AB by Jason Varitek.

Still the Phillies seem headed in the wrong direction. They're adding expensive old players, instead of developing young, inexpensive talent that can be signed cheaply for the long term.

Al Leiter returns home to play for the Marlins again. Al has had an increase in walks and a falloff in strikeouts the last two years. His strength in 2004 was that when batters made contact, nothing much happened. He allowed a paltry .218 BA to opponent batters in 2004.

He's not going to be the ace of the staff, but the Marlins don't really need an ace. He'll be a good fourth starter for them, and I wouldn't be surprised if he taught Dontrelle Willis a few tricks. It's a good signing.

The Baseball Desert explains why.

I don't know how many of you are fans of the cartoon Daria, but this story made me think of one of my favorite bits:

(in English class)

Jamie - (slowly and flatly) "For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her... Romeo."

Daria - Thank you, Joey, Jeffy or Jamie. Laurence Olivier, in his present state, couldn't have done better.

Jamie - Cool!

Jeffy - What does "woe" mean?

Daria - It like the feeling you'd get if the Super Bowl were preempted by Antiques Roadshow.

Joey - Whoa!

Daria - See?

That's the feeling I get when I see that the Yankees have signed Tony Womack to play second base. The Sporting News headline is even worse; Yankees acquire new leadoff man. This is a player with a career .319 OBA, who had his best year getting on base at age 34. I would think the Yankees are smart enough to bat Womack ninth, but you never know.

This deal really makes me start to believe the Yankees streak of dominance is over. If they are trying to save money, a minor league 2nd bagger could play as well as Womack at a fraction of the cost. The Yankees need to get younger. They need to start bring along fresh young talent as they did in the mid-90's. If I'm a fan of Baltimore or Toronto, I'm very pleased with this signing. If I'm rooting for the Red Sox, I'm estatic. The Yankees may have returned to their losing ways of the 1980's, signing washed up players based on their reputations. It just shows that nothing lasts forever.

One caveat; this deal has not been officially announced by the team.

Gwen Knapp totally misses what an amazing statement Donald Fehr made regarding drug testing.

Don Fehr made his big announcement as if he were reading a casserole recipe. The executive director of the baseball players' union has never been a particularly lyrical speaker, but Tuesday his delivery broke records for deliberate dullness. He doused a lot of other people's flaming rhetoric with a big, slowly poured pail of water.

"The Players Association and the commissioner's office have been engaged in discussions with respect to potential amendments to the steroid-testing provisions of the basic agreement,'' he read from a formal statement. "At its meeting today, the executive board received a full report and, after discussion, authorized us to attempt to conclude an agreement consistent with those discussions.''

Still awake?

Awake? I nearly jumped out of my seat! The players have convinced Fehr to do two things that go against what he stands for as a labor lawyer:

1. Allow his members civil rights to be further violated.


2. Reopen a completed negotiation.

This is a bombshell. The union has always been about protecting the richest of its members by driving up free agent prices. That was fine as long as the payoff appeared to be related to talent. But now the rank and file see steroids as taking money out of their pockets. The playing field is no longer level in their perception, and they want to go back to competing on talent, not drugs.

It's an amazing development. The owners, over the last 30 years have tried lockouts, scabs and collusion in an attempt to gain concessions from a strong union. For the most part, they've failed. It took players cheating against each other to bring about this change.

How this bodes for future negotiations is anyone's guess. By acting now, Fehr is likely heading off dissention that would weaken his hand in the next collective bargaining round. He'll likely have a united union behind him once again.

But it's an extraordinary opportunity for the owners as well. I hope they see this a chance to build a partnership with the players, rather than as a way to extract blood from them (figurative blood, that is). Building a level of trust here will go a long way to avoiding a work stoppage at the end of the current contract.

I'm hoping this is a defining moment in player-owner relations. Given their histories, it's not a big hope.

Paul Wilson has re-signed with the Cincinnati Reds.

Wilson signed with the Reds as a free agent after he went 6-12 for Tampa Bay in 2002. He has prospered at Great American Ball Park, where the tall infield grass helps ground-ball pitchers.

That's an understatement where Wilson is concerned. Last season, he had a 3.32 ERA in Cincinnati, 5.77 on the road. The hits get through away from Great American Ballpark. He allowed 7.8 hits per 9 at home in 2004, 11.5 on the road. I wonder if the Reds will once again engineer the rotation to get Wilson most of his starts at home?

Nomar Garciaparra has signed a one-year deal with the Chicago Cubs.

The five-time All-Star shortstop hit .308 with nine homers and 41 RBIs with Boston and Chicago last season. Garciaparra said at the end of the season that he'd consider coming back to the Cubs, but he wanted to test the free agent market for the first time in his career.

It seems to me that Nomar didn't find the free agent market to his liking. I suspect that he hopes he'll have a healthy, productive season that will raise his value for next year's market.

The Red Sox have offered a number of players arbitration, some with an interesting caveat:

By offering arbitration, the Red Sox would receive amateur draft picks as compensation for losing top free agents.

"Some of them were offered arbitration with the understanding they won't accept arbitration," general manager Theo Epstein said.

He refused to say whether Martinez was in that group but said the mere offer gives the team and the players more time to gather information that could affect the decision.

"That simply extends our window," Epstein said. "Sometimes making good decisions takes time."

I wonder what the players who agree not to accept arbitration get in return? Some minimum guarantee that they'll have a contract if no one else is interested in them? If nothing else, the Sox will be well compensated with draft picks if they lose a number of these players.

Jeff Kallman presents a history of cheating in baseball. It makes you wonder if the game ever had integrity.

I just received The Ultimate Washington Baseball Trivia Book in the mail today. David Elfin is a veteran sports writer for the Washington Times and a fan of the late expansion Senators. He uses triva, photos and brief player biographies to tell the history of major league baseball in the nation's capitol. Each trivia page has 9 questions (one for each inning) around a theme such as Three Baggers or The Presidents. Did you know that Jimmy Carter is the only president from Taft on not to throw out a first pitch anywhere?

It's a fun book to learn about the history of the city's teams with the Expos moving to DC in 2005. However, the book does look hastily published; there are a number of typos in the prose. But this inexpensive paperback would make a great stocking stuffer for the young Washington fan unfamilar with his city's baseball heritage.

Enjoy!

Denny Neagle's contract has been terminated by the Rockies after his 2nd bout of legal trouble in a year.

The Rockies terminated the oft-injured pitcher's contract Monday, three days after he was cited for solicitation.

"This decision is about an organization and the fans that support it," Rockies chairman Charles Monfort said. "Denny's pattern of behavior has not been consistent with what our organization represents."

Neagle, who has not pitched in more than a year because of injuries, was pulled over Friday in suburban Lakewood for allegedly speeding. Police said a woman in his car told them he had paid her $40 for oral sex.

Neagle's agent, Barry Meister, declined comment. The players' association could file a grievance to overturn the team's decision and get Neagle the remaining money owed under the contract.

I'm quite shocked that a baseball player would use a prostitute! I'm sure that's never happened before, and certainly not by a member of the the Rockies. :-) Of course, I don't know if Neagle was really in their plans for 2005. You have to wonder if the Rockies would react the same way if, for example, it was Todd Helton in trouble with the law.

David Gertsman send this article by John Lott and Sonya Jones of the American Enterprise Institute. They don't see the problem with steroids. They echo some of the arguments made on this blog.

But even if baseball players ended up crippled after their playing days as football players do, why isn't it their choice? What's next? Will government regulators protect white-collar workers from risking heart attacks when they pull all-nighters trying to meet deadlines?

The greatest risk to athletes may be the drugs' very prohibition. Getting the drugs in secret and not having the proper supervision may result in complications that could otherwise be easily avoided.

Update: Via Instapundit, the last paragraph of this article should be noted.

Karl Marx famously called religion the opiate of the masses. Today, he might point out that hysteria has become the heroin of talking heads.

Upate: Andrew Sullivan captures the feelings I've been trying to put in words for days.

The notion that there is some "pure" human being out there - unaffected by the technology that now enhances our lives in so many ways - is fiction. Why are sports the only arena in which this fiction is maintained? And why would it be so bad to aknowledge reality and celebrate the new frontiers that human science and human performance can now breach? I'm not that comfortable with that idea; but I'm having a hard time coming up with good arguments as to why I shouldn't be.

Today's the deadline for offering free agents arbitration. I'm not sure why this elaborate dance is still in place. A team has to decide to offer a player arbitration. The player then has a couple of weeks to decide if he wants to accept. If the player accepts, he's on the team and the two sides work out a contract or they go to an arbitrator. If the player declines, the player is a free agent, and can sign with anybody, but the team losing a player gets a draft pick or two. He also can't sign with his own club after Jan. 8th. I know the compensation is a big deal; the Athletics use this wisely. They're happy to let most free agents go so they can keep restocking the farm system. That gives them a pool of cheap talent at their disposal. And I know the owners believe it lowers free agent costs, but do they really factor in the cost of the loss of draft picks?

It seems to me that it would be better for all parties if there was a real free market in these players. It would mean more bidding (good for the players), but it would also mean that rebuilding teams could sign people short term to keep the team interesting while they're rebuilding, and not have to worry about draft picks.

A perfect example is Richie Sexon. The Diamondbacks are going to offer Sexson arbitration, mostly becuase they know he won't accept it. Whoever ends up signing Richie will lose a first round pick. I keep hearing the Mariners want Sexson, but they're an old team that can ill afford to give up draft picks. The draft pick inclusion will hurt Sexson by driving down his price, and hurt the Mariners by driving up the overall cost of the deal. Sexson can't be a stop gap for them; they have to hope he revitalizes the franchise.

Voting continues at the 2004 Weblog Awards. You can vote for the best sports blog here. And now with no cheating! Be sure to check all the categories and vote for your favorites in each.

This is a new feature I'm adding to Baseball Musings, an audio summary of the week's news that can be downloaded to your MP3 player via my RSS 2.0 feed and your aggregator.

Audio version.

The big news, of course, was steroids. I was one who had held out hope that the use of these drugs was not as widespread as was thought. I was wrong. Leaked grand jury testimony showed that Jason Giambi, Barry Bonds and others were on the juice. It's a sad day for baseball, but it also is an opportunity. For two long, the owners and players have been at odds over labor issues. But there appears to be a consensus among both the owners and the rank and file to deal with this issue. A partnership of trust between the two parties would help the game tremendously. Here's an opportunity to build that link. Let's have the owners and players (through the Union) sit down and hammer out an agreement on this issue.

There were other aspects to this story as well. The one that hasn't been touched on much by the press is the sleezy way Greg Anderson found clients. He would use his relationship with Barry Bonds to meet players, then ask them for a blood sample to test for mineral deficiencies. Somehow, he'd also test for illegal steroids. When he found those (as he did in the Giambi brothers) Anderson would then offer the dupes his undetectable drugs.

And it just shows the stupidity of some of these players. Here's a guy who looks for steroids in your blood without telling you, and you're going to trust him with your life? It seems most of the time the abusers didn't ask what drug they were given! No questions about side effects, long term damage, nothing. Just take the pills and get stronger.

Right up there on the sleeze meter are the people who leaked the testimony. This was to be confidential, like the major league drug testing. The leaks make this look more like a witch hunt against the players (especially Bonds) instead of a prosecution of the suppliers. I doubt the players will ever cooperate with a grand jury again.

What will happen to the cheaters? It doesn't appear there's any way to punish them by the league. Maybe teams can void contracts; but it looks like it's up to the fans. I wonder if anyone will bid on the balls if Barry Bonds passes Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron?

Until next week, this is David Pinto for Baseball Musings.

Carol Slezak finds a victim in the steroids scandal, Frank Thomas.

You remember 2000, the season the White Sox had the best record in the AL. Thomas hit .328 with 43 home runs and 143 RBI that season. But Giambi, then playing for the Oakland Athletics, beat out Thomas for the award by a narrow margin. I didn't understand it then. I certainly don't get it now.

Giambi hit a trace higher than Thomas, .333. But he had the same number of homers and drove in 137 runs, six fewer than Thomas.

Those are the numbers. They presented a compelling case for Thomas then. They present an even more compelling case now. Because Thomas might be many things, including mercurial, stubborn and weak-armed, but he is not a cheater. Anyone who is sickened by the thought of rampant steroid use in baseball -- and let's not kid ourselves that the problem is not widespread -- should have renewed respect for Thomas today.

Actually, Giambi had a superior season to Thomas in 2000, earning 38 win shares to Thomas' 34. And while Giambi hasn't admitted to steroid use during 2000, he's no longer getting the benefit of the doubt. How much did this hurt Frank? As this article points out:

As guys like McGwire, Bonds, Sosa and Giambi emerged as elite hitters, Thomas faded into the pack. He won a batting title in 1997 but turned in subpar performances the next two seasons.

He suffered the insult of having the White Sox invoke a "diminished-skills" clause in his contract after 2002, remaining with them only through a reworked deal.

If Thomas had won the MVP award in 2000, when he carried the White Sox to 95 wins with a vintage performance (.328-43-143), the diminished-skills clause would not have applied in 2001 and 2002.

That means he would have earned about $5 million more in '03 and could have earned $4 million more in '04, assuming the clause was not invoked after '03, when he delivered 42 homers and drove in 105 runs.

Yes, we should appreciate Thomas more (no pun intended). Maybe if Frank has a great season in 2005 baseball can use him as an example of what you can accomplish while you're clean.

I just noticed that I had my 1,000,000th unique visit today. Thanks to all the readers that have come by over the last three seasons. You've made this blog more successful than I could have imagined.

In the previous post, Peter Gammons is quoted:

Certainly as the Bash Brothers ushered in the Home Run Era -- now known as the Juiced Era -- the people who run baseball encouraged everything powerful.

One of the sad things is that it would have been the home run era without drugs. For a long time, the belief in baseball circles that too much weight training was bad for you. Here's a paragraph from Jack Aker's Baseball Fundamentals Handbook:

Players up to age 12 shouldn't worry about staying in shape, as (hopefully) their normal daily activities give them plenty of exercise. There are exercises and drills that a player who wants to improve coordination and skill can do, however concentrating on physical conditioning is not necessary until about age 13. Many of today's amateur coaches are pushing their young players to pump iron, but this is, at the least, ILL-ADVISED, and can be DANGEROUS for young players. Baseball players need to be lean, loose and flexible, not muscle-bound. The greatest players of all time did NOT lift weights, and the players whose careers last the longest are those who keep their bodies
limber -- not bulked up. The players who do too much weight training are the ones who suffer the most injuries.

Actually, it's been known for a long time that weight training is very good for you. At some point, baseball players started to realize this, and started building their muscles the old fashioned way. The big boppers discovered they could hit more HR with bigger muscles. The skinny shortstops discovered they were better fielders with bigger muscles, and a few more HR came along as a bonus. Smaller parks, higher altitudes and a better manufactured (but still legal) baseball helped, too. But basically, ballplayers as a whole realized that the stronger you were, the better you hit, and the more money you made. It wasn't difficult to take the next step in building those muscles.

I'd still love to know how much of a difference these drugs make. The scientist in me would love someone to do a blind placebo study to see how much stronger people get when they are taking these drugs vs. when they think they are taking the drugs. My guess is that the HR records could have been broken without the juice. Maybe the next generation can prove me right.

Peter Gammons is at his best when his writing springs from his love of the game. He takes on the steroid scandal is this brilliant ESPN column. There's plenty of blame to go around. Money as the root of all evil.

This is an American story. It's about money, obscene amounts of it. Did, as Canseco alleges, teams have a pretty good idea what was going on? Maybe. Certainly as the Bash Brothers ushered in the Home Run Era -- now known as the Juiced Era -- the people who run baseball encouraged everything powerful. There is no question that, after Cal Ripken and the dignity of the Joe Torre championship Yankees, what took baseball out of its recession and back into the high life (again) was the Mark McGwire/Sammy Sosa Summer of '98, and how it took all of us in, from grandparents to children. It was all about what one would do to get rich, be it look the other way or chemically recreate one's body.

A union leadership that did not listen to its employers.

What is absurd here is that in the summer of 2002, when Canseco and Caminiti issued their original allegations, several players began speaking out. USA Today released a poll in which 78 percent of major league players said they were for serious testing, and more than 50 percent said they felt the pressure to use steroids or performance-enhancing drugs because of peer pressure. At the All-Star Game, Mike Sweeney told ESPN, "I want strong testing because I don't think it's fair for someone to have an illegal advantage over me." Lance Berkman said, "I want the testing because I don't think I should have to have anyone question how I hit my home runs."

But Fehr and Orza always believed that any form of drug-testing was un-American in that it forced an individual to prove his innocence. However, by adamantly sticking to that civil libertarian line, they in fact have led players to a point where, because of this BALCO scandal, every player who hits more than 40 home runs is subject to having to prove himself innocent.

And the war between the players and the owners.

Much of this can be laid to 30-something years of cold war politics between the Players Association and owners, with its resulting distrust and contempt. But the union lawyers have always considered themselves civil rights and labor lawyers. They are not. This isn't Edward Bennett Williams defending John Connelly, or Sacco-Vanzetti. They're not civil rights lawyers, they are entertainment lawyers.

The players these lawyers represent are the product that the owners and the industry present to the public, the consumers. And because they have stonewalled and litigated and arbitrated and filibustered so masterfully, the product they represent is tainted. As a result, the consumers have lost the trust that the players need, all because of a minute minority.

Finally, Gammons puts the resolution of this scandal on the players.

The dirty little secret is a major scandal. It is not going away. Curt Schilling has long said that we can't love the game as much as the players because we don't play, and now is the time that no one can do as much to restore the game they love as the players themselves.

So what can the players do? Mea Culpas would be the first order of business, I would think. How about a news conference from Jason Giambi saying that he lied to the press. Jason, say you're sorry, ask for forgiveness, and promise you won't do it again. Barry Bonds, how about giving back some of your salary of the last four years? Donate $20 million to rehabilitation clinics or whatever charity you like. How about some names that haven't been mentioned coming forward? How about a team getting together and pledging to stay clean? And then working together to stay clean?

I hope you'll read the entire article.

I now have an RSS 2.0 feed. If you've been using the .rdf feed, you may wish to switch over. The URL is http://www.baseballmusings.com/index.xml.

The Seattle Mariners have hired a full time scout for Japan. I thought this bit was interesting.

Yamamoto, who starts his new job Jan. 1, will scout both pros and amateurs in Japan.

So it looks like the Mariners might go after young Japanese players, not just established veterans who have done their time in the Japanese major leagues. If the US majors start picking off the best Japanese youngsters, this could really hurt the level of play in Japan, or drive the price of ballplayers way up in that country. Of course, it could also lead to more people from all over the world playing in Japan, which would help improve their game. (Free trade among athletes. We get to bid on the best young Japanese players, they get to bid on ours.) It may not be long before there can be competitive World Series between the Japanese Leagues and the U.S.

The first sentence in the Dernell Stenson case has been handed down.

A Chicago-area man caught with the stolen car of a murdered baseball player was sentenced to 8¾ years in prison Friday.

Kevin Riddle waived his right to a jury trial and was found guilty of auto theft, hindering prosecution, and attempted hindering prosecution by Judge Karen L. O'Connor of Maricopa County Superior Court on Oct. 22.

Riddle is not out of the woods, and can still be charged in the murder of Stenson.

I'll be watching the Conte interview in a minute. I'll be posting my thoughts here. Feel free to post yours in the comments.

Update: Victor Conte must feel he's going to be convicted or at least has a plea bargain in place. He's basically admitting to illegally supplying drugs.

Update: He's also trying to sell us that he was trying to help the players by giving them the drugs properly. I don't see a Dr. in front of his name, and given Giambi's testimony, I sounds like he wasn't doing a good job of that.

Update: This report is focusing on Marion Jones. I guess that's what you get when a British journalist does the interview. Jones may be a more famous athlete world wide than any baseball or football player, but I doubt most people in this country care about track.

Update: I love this stuff. They show a picture of Tim Montgomery in 1997, then a picture in 2002. Look at the difference! No one could go from skinny to muscular in five years!

Update: Now we're getting to baseball.

Update: He's saying that more than 50% of players are taking anabolic steroids. He's also pointing out that 80% of players are taking stimulants before games.

Update: Conte says he gave clear and cream to Greg Anderson for Anderson's own use. Conte says he doesn't know if Anderson passed them on to the players.

Update: Wow. Not much on baseball at all. This is all about track. Disappointing.

Update: Conte thinks he should be in charge of the anti-doping agency. It may not be a bad idea. Like hiring hackers to fight hackers. Maybe when he gets out of jail. :-) He also keeps saying that if everyone is cheating, it's not cheating. Sorry Victor, cheating is cheating. Maybe if you told anti-doping agencies how to fight this five years ago, you would have been a hero. For now, you're just a criminal.

In the post-script to the interview, Martin Bashir brings up the idea of legalizing the drugs and having the athletes take them under a physician's care. I'm all for that.

I've been having a problem with comment spam. To deal with this, I'm using a new piece of software that closes comments once a post is three weeks old. I'd rather leave comments open indefinitely, but deleting hundreds of spam every morning is getting old. If you come across an old post that you'd like to comment on, drop an e-mail and I'll try to accomodate your thoughts.

The owners approved the move of the Expos to Washington today.

Approval was "subject to all conditions set forth in the Baseball Stadium Agreement" signed on Sept. 29 by the Expos and Washington Mayor Anthony A. Williams. That agreement called for the District of Columbia government to enact by Dec. 31 funding for a new ballpark for the team, which would be renamed the Nationals.

The D.C. Council voted earlier this week to approve funding, put placed a $630 million cap on the project -- $195 million above the estimate contained in the September agreement. For the funding to become law, the Council must approve the measure again, and it must be signed by Williams, who favors the project.

What I find interesting is that this is one of the few votes in Selig's tenure which was not unanimous.

Owners approved the move during a telephone conference call. The vote was 29-1, with the Baltimore Orioles dissenting, a baseball official said on condition of anonymity.

I've never quite understood why Selig doesn't like public dissent. I wonder if all the compromising he must do to get total agreement doesn't hurt more than help. How many good ideas went by the boards because he could not four or five owners to say yes?

Baseball Musings has been nominated for Best Sports Blog at 2004 Weblog Awards. Thanks to whomever submitted the nomination! It's an honor just to be listed with the fine writers on the poll.

Talking Baseball disagrees with Tim Kurkjian's claim that Pete Rose's transgression was worse than Barry Bonds'.

I simply do not agree with this assessment. What Rose did was wrong; he broke the rules, and he suffered the consequences. But he didn't cheat. What Bonds, Giambi, Sheffield, and countless other ballplayers have done is cheat. They broke the laws; they cheated. It's as simple as that. But baseball has a problem: Their collective bargaining agreements do not stipulate a punishment for this kind of action. While they have a clear policy against betting for fear that it would lead to cheating, when it comes to body-altering and performance-enhancing drugs, baseball has no policy.

Is this why Tim Kurkjian thought it was worse that Pete Rose bet for his own team? I am in no way excusing Pete Rose's behavior. But what these men have done over the past few years is much worse than betting. They used drugs, illegal ones at that, to cheat and gain an edge. That is, in my mind, all there is to it.

Will this trump the 1919 Black Sox scandal as baseball's darkest hour? Obviously, only time will tell. We might find out sooner rather than later as this evening at 10 p.m., Victor Conte will go on ABC's 20/20 ostensibly to name more names about steroid users. But until we have a historical perspective on this developing scandal, it's hard for me to see how betting on baseball could be worse than outright cheating especially when those who have bet on baseball like Pete Rose did were betting for their team to win.

Betting on your own team to win is a form of cheating, because Pete didn't bet on his team in every game. So he sent a message to gamblers on days he didn't bet on the Reds that the Reds were going to lose. He also very well may have managed differently with money on the game or not. It's not a victimless crime.

Right now I tend to agree with Tim. There's been plenty of drug abuse by players over the years. How much did greenies help players during the 60's and 70's? How much did cocaine help players in the 1980's? And who knows what else they were taking?

I want to throw out a hypothetical here. What if a surgeon invented a way to make you stronger with muscle implants? We already harvest hearts and lungs and corneas and livers for transplant. What if there was a way to graft more muscle onto your thighs? Is it different than laser surgery on your eyes so you see as well as Ted Williams? Is it different than getting a new arm through surgery to repair a blown tendon? Hypothetically, the effect would be the same as steroids; a stronger body hitting the ball farther. Would this be okay? Where do we draw the line and why do steroids seem to cross it?

We want to watch big guys hit home runs. That sells baseball. That helps our teams win. That's exciting. Why do we care so much about how they sculpt their bodies to become those hitters?

Afterall, we don't see to care so much about actors and actresses having plastic surgery. We go see them in movies because they look good, and when they stop being beautiful, we stop watching. Should there be a rule that only "natural" actors be allowed to make movies? Should Hollywood ban everyone who gets a face lift or tummy tuck?

Of course not. Becuase these people are hurting no one but themselves. And the same is true of baseball players. They're not hurting me. I've found baseball very enjoyable the last few years. Are they hurting the players of the past? Is Aaron going to be less popular because 755 isn't the pinnacle of home run power anymore? I don't remember Ruth's popularity dropping when Hank hit homer 715. He's as popular as ever today. (Note the authors name. Hey Moe!) The assault on Aaron's record will just bring Hank back into the spotlight so a whole new generation of fans will know the story of Hammerin' Hank. It's the best thing that can happen to Aaron. So who are they hurting?

As for the integrity of the game, baloney. Ruth and Mantle and all the other drunks who ever missed a game due to their drug of choice hurt the integrity of the game. The jar of greenies in clubhouse hurt the integrity of the game. They allowed players to function when they otherwise couldn't. Playing high on cocaine or narcotics hurt the integrity of the game.

So do we want ballplayers who go to bed on time, eat well and exercise regularly or do we want big guys who can hit the ball a mile?

A manager betting on baseball games hurts the whole team. It can force him to make decisions not in the best interests of the club or the players, but his own pocketbook. Steroid users hurt themselves long term for short term monetary gain. Make it legal under a doctor's supervision. Make sure they know the tradeoffs. Make sure they make an informed decision. And make sure their use is public knowledge. Then, let the fans vote with their cash on whether this is good or bad for the game.

Update: Some of the comments below suggest that I'm saying two or more wrongs make a right. I would prefer the clean living athletes myself. But this scandal is no different than any other that has plagued baseball in its history. Sixty years ago it was race. Ninety years ago it was gambling. One hundred years from now it will be electronic implants that enhance a player's ability. This scanal, too, will pass.

Signifying Nothing links to the next shoe to drop, Barry Bonds' testimony.

Bonds testified that he had received and used clear and cream substances from his personal strength trainer, Greg Anderson, during the 2003 baseball season but was told they were the nutritional supplement flaxseed oil and a rubbing balm for arthritis, according to a transcript of his testimony reviewed by The Chronicle.

Federal prosecutors confronted Bonds during his testimony on Dec. 4, 2003, with documents indicating he had used steroids and human growth hormone during a three-year assault on baseball's home run record, but the Giants star denied the allegations.

You should read the whole article. It's an interesting insight into Barry Bonds thought processes. It's very clear that he likes Greg Anderson, but it's also clear that Barry's not willing to make Anderson rich.

"Greg is a good guy, you know, this kid is a great kid. He has a child," Bonds said. At another point, he told the grand jury:

"Greg has nothing, man. ... Guy lives in his car half the time. He lives with his girlfriend, rents a room so he can be with his kid, you know?

"... This is the same guy that goes over to our friend's mom's house and massages her leg because she has cancer, and she swells up every night for months. Spends time next to my dad, rubbing his feet every night."

Bonds told the grand jurors that he had given Anderson a $20,000 bonus and bought him a ring after the 73-home run season. He also bought the trainer a ring to commemorate the Giants' 2002 World Series appearance. When a juror asked why the wealthy ballplayer hadn't bought "a mansion" for his trainer to live in, Bonds answered:

"One, I'm black, and I'm keeping my money. And there's not too many rich black people in this world. There's more wealthy Asian people and Caucasian and white. And I ain't giving my money up."

Which brings me back to the con game aspect of this story. Anderson is training Bonds and getting good results. So he then gets players refered to him. He says he's going to test them for mineral deficiencies, but tests them for steroids. When he finds a positive, he knows he has a player he can exploit. He doesn't need to have Barry on steroids for this to work, he just needs Barry to be successful.

So do I believe Bonds? Not really. Bonds probably has plausible deniability.

"I never asked Greg" about what the products contained, Bonds testified. "When he said it was flaxseed oil, I just said, 'Whatever.'

It's flaxseed oil, nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more say no more. It's like saying that you don't know that McDonald's coffee is hot.

One point where I am on Bonds side, however, is the witch hunt aspect of this case.

Bonds' attorney, Michael Rains, said he was upset, though not entirely surprised, his client's secret testimony had been revealed. He said he had no proof but suspected the government was the source of the leak, insisting it had been out to get Bonds from the beginning.

"My view has always been this case has been the U.S. vs. Bonds, and I think the government has moved in certain ways in a concerted effort to indict my client," Rains said. "And I think their failure to indict him has resulted in their attempts to smear him publicly."

Playboylooked at the Balco Case. (Link is to my post, the article is no longer on-line). The gist was that IRS agent Jeff Novitzky wanted to get Bonds because he didn't like Barry. It wasn't "steroids are doing damage to the game I love, let's do something to clean it up" or "this is going to hurt our children if we don't stop it." It was driven by out and out hate. And that is wrong.

Bonds isn't the only name mentioned in the article, but he is the biggest. What happens next is anyone's idea. Will Selig have the guts to ban Barry? Should he ban Barry and Giambi and Sheffield? If you suspend Bonds for a year, you pretty much finish his chance at Aaron's record. If you ban him for life, you also prevent him from breaking Babe Ruth's record for a left-hander (somehow, I think Bonds wants to pass Ruth more than he wants to pass Aaron) and you keep him out of the Hall of Fame. Does the BBWAA revoke his last three MVPs? This story is far from over.

Here's an interesting article on baseball scheduling. The company that has been making out the itenerary for the last 24 years lost its bid this year to continue. As a programmer, I would find the task of writing the software a challenge. You'd want to accomodate specific dates teams wish to be home. You'd want to minimize travel distances as much as possible. I would think you'd want to try to schedule division play late in the season. It will be fun to compare this schedule to last year's and see if there are real differences.

One other aspect of the Giambi testimony struck me as interesting. Greg Anderson had a pretty good con going.

Giambi said Anderson had suggested getting his blood tested for mineral deficiencies and taking supplements to counter those shortages; it was a snapshot description of the legitimate business BALCO performed for athletes.

Giambi called Anderson upon returning to the States, then flew to the Bay Area in late November or early December 2002 and met him in Burlingame at a gym down the street from BALCO, he told the grand jury. From there, the two men went to a hospital for Giambi to provide blood and urine samples, which were taken to BALCO, Giambi testified.

Either during that meeting or in a phone conversation shortly thereafter, Giambi said, Anderson began discussing various performance-enhancing drugs he could provide the ballplayer. Also, when Anderson received the results of Giambi's blood and urine tests, Anderson told him he had tested positive for Deca Durabolin, the steroid Giambi said he had obtained at the Las Vegas gym. Giambi said Anderson had warned him to stop using it, saying it could stay in his system a long time.

At the time, baseball was implementing its first-ever steroids-testing program at the major-league level, during the 2003 season. It is illegal to obtain steroids or human growth hormone without a doctor's prescription.

So Anderson would use the excuse of testing for "mineral deficiencies" to really test for steroids. Probably, once he knew that an athlete was already taking the drugs, he would tell them to stop the ones they were on and take his. I'd like to know what happened if the player came back negative; did Anderson not take those players on assuming he couldn't sell them the expensive illegal drugs?

Sorry I'm late with this. My dad had eye surgery this morning. He's doing fine.

Eric McErlain has a linked filled post on the revelations of the Giambi brothers steroid use. The SF Chronicle article is here.

I must say I'm very disappointed, both at Giambi's stupidity and his dishonesty. First the stupidity:

Nedrow also asked Giambi about several different-colored pills Anderson provided; they were denoted on calendars as "Y" for yellow, "W" for white and "O" for orange, according to the ballplayer. Giambi testified that he didn't know what the pills were, though he thought the white one might have been Clomid, a female fertility drug that can enhance the effectiveness of testosterone. His use of the drug was reflected on a calendar, the prosecutor said.

"I don't know what they were," Giambi testified. "He didn't really explain them. He just had told me to take them. And it had -- he explained it has something to do with the system. ... He just said to take it in conjunction with all the stuff."

It's too bad Anderson's not a doctor; then Giambi could sue him for malpractice. Next, the dishonesty.

Giambi, a five-time All-Star, played his first seven seasons in Oakland, emerging as one of the game's top stars. After the 2001 season, the 6-foot-3-inch, 235-pound slugger signed a seven-year, $120 million contract with the Yankees. Two months after testifying before the grand jury, Giambi reported to spring training this year looking considerably thinner, though he insisted he had lost just four pounds.

There was speculation that the weight loss stemmed from Giambi's stopping the use of steroids. Asked by reporters during spring training whether he ever used performance-enhancing drugs, Giambi said, "Are you talking about steroids? No."

Don't these people know how not to answer a question? How about no comment or I'm not going to talk about that? The coverup is always worse than the crime.

What should happen next? Giambi was taking the steroids during 2003, the year the steroid ban went into effect in baseball.

Anderson kept him supplied with drugs through the All-Star break in July 2003, Giambi said. He said he had received a second and final batch of testosterone in July but opted not to use it because he had a knee injury and "didn't want to do any more damage."

Can the commissioner's office take action? A judge Landis like Black Sox ban? Probably not, since the procedures for dealing with cheaters are built into the basic agreement. But things have changed. The basic agreement was designed to protect the privacy of the players. The results were to be secret, and would only come to light if the ballplayers continued abuse and were suspended. It seems a ban is out of the question.

Can the Yankees do anything? It will be interesting to see if they can nullify the contract based on Giambi's 2003 usage. What will be more interesting is if Giambi can no longer play, will the insurance pay off on the contract? I wonder if they wrote the policy to exclude problems from illegal drugs?

Can some good come out of this. I hope players read this testimony and think, "I don't want to be that much of an idiot." My guess is that the lure of big bucks from big muscles will keep athletes shooting up.

Which brings me back to a point I've made before; let athletes take these under a doctor's care. Do you think a physician would have given a player female fertility pills? We're not going to stop steroid use by banning it. But maybe we can control the bad side effects controling the use.

It will be interesting to see Conte's interview. I expect this will get a lot worse.

One final thought. I'm disappointed as well that the transcript of the grand jury was leaked.

Anderson has denied wrongdoing in the BALCO case. His attorney, J. Tony Serra, declined comment, citing a court order aimed at preserving the secrecy of grand jury proceedings.

So in the future, players are going to be less willing to testify about people like Anderson. They'll go to court and take the fifth amendment, and the Greg Andersons of this world will keep on pushing their drugs. I'm sure the Chronicle is happy they got a big scoop, but I doubt there will be any cooperation with grand juries in the future.

Update: Jeff Quinton is keeping track of other bloggers commenting the subject.

Update: James Joyner has more.

The San Francisco Giants have signed closer Armando Benitez to a 3-year contract.

With some creative financing, Sabean and assistant Ned Colletti hooked a 6-foot-4, 229-pound Marlin. It was a done deal because Benítez and agent Mike Powers, like Vizquel, backloaded the contract to give the Giants payroll flexibility.

"The contract is spread over five years, including the signing bonus," Colletti explained. "The 2005 season is the lowest point of the contract."

Negotiations progressed swiftly, accelerated by Hermanson's contract demands for a two-year deal in the $6 million range. Apparently realizing a solid closer was the missing link this season, the Giants didn't take the easy way out.

"It was pretty obvious why we went in this direction," Sabean said, calling Benítez "a dominant force." With Vizquel and Benítez in the fold, Sabean said the team "can address what we need in the outfield and lineup."

I'm not a big Benitez fan. I still remember the game at Yankee Stadium where he hit Tino Martinez after giving up a HR to Bernie Williams. The Orioles were in the process of blowing a 5-1 lead. It was 5-4 with two men on in the bottom of the 8th when Armando came in to try to get Bernie Williams. Bernie took him deep for a 7-5 lead. That was bad pitching. But then he shows his utter stupidity by plunking Martinez! I just wouldn't want someone with that type of judgement as my closer. It doesn't seem to bother the Giants, however.

Benítez comes with a modicum of risk. He was on the disabled list in August with a sore elbow and had to pass a physical examination Tuesday in Florida before his signing was official. And, despite a career 2.85 ERA, his past has been spotty.

Benítez blew key games with the Mets in 2003 and virtually was booed out of New York. He also pitched with the Yankees and Seattle Mariners before signing with Florida as a free agent. He also has had problems during the postseason, posting four saves in 10 chances and a 3.56 ERA in 28 games.

"He was more comfortable in the Florida atmosphere," Sabean said, explaining Benítez's career season. "I think he'll have the same atmosphere here, in a pitcher's ballpark. I'm not going to hold his past against him.

Well, Shea is a pitcher's park and he wasn't comfortable there. Maybe Sabean should hold his past against him a litte bit. Especially his recent past which has seen a drop in Benitez's K per 9 two years in a row. He still strikes out more than enough batters to be effective. If the slide continues, however, I wonder if he'll still be effective through the length of the contract.