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Very Occasionally, I Am Wrong

Just last week I saddled and mounted my high horse in order to mock El Ang's pickup of Coco Crisp in our fantasy league. My rationale at the time was:

Coco's BAs by month since coming to Boston, starting with the most recent (and counting only those months with more than 100 PA):

.235/.224/.235/.241/.243/.278

Over that length of time, suck tends to find its own level. At this point, "forever" translates roughly to "as soon as we think the bigs won't cripple the psyche of Jacoby Ellsbury".

Compelling stuff. But how did Coco respond? By throwing up a line of .433/.456/.750, including three dingers in the recent series in Atlanta, since Ang plucked him off the scrap heap.

As I mentioned before, the guys at SoSH have done yeoman's work in this thread breaking down some changes Coco has made to his stance recently. Either those changes are working like ganagbusters, or we need to sign whichever Gold Club dancer has managed to put the Electric back in Coco's Slide. Perhaps Mystique and Aura have a place on the Red Sox after all.

Transactions Analysis: Inanity Edition

We've got a whole potpourri of bullshit here today ladies and gents; we've got thoughts from myself, Teddy, Pancho Villa and John Madden. Also, insightful analysis on some of the most inane transactions you'll ever see. (El Angelo)

I am anxiously awaiting whatever flimsy justification Ang has in mind for running the Famke Janssen picture at left. Early money is on some sort of tenuous perceived link to Casey Janssen, but I've been wrong before. (Teddy)

b. mcbeef goldthwait

• Signed Nick Punto, 2B, Minnesota; Released Ryan Thierot, 2B, Chicago (NL) [6/9]


• Released Richie Sexson, 1B, Seattle [6/12]

The whateverness of the 2B-swap aside, Richie Sexson illustrates a quandary of a middling cornerman in this league; he doesn't stink (though his OBP is approaching the Mariano Duncan Line), but he's not really good enough to start for you and he's not keeper material. Color me surprised that somebody hasn't picked him up yet; he's good enough to be backup on a contender, though there's a small chance he could go full-fledged Mo Vaughn on you. (El Angelo)

Sexson is pretty well summed up by the following from the Seattle Times:

Sexson is about whether his numbers are there at year's end. That means surpassing 30 home runs, collecting 100 or more runs batted in. (Link)

Two big problems there: (1) Safeco is a terrible HR park; and (2) Seattle is a terrible OBP team, meaning fewer RBI opportunities for the mid-order guys. Sexson seems to have responded to those problems by guessing more and swinging harder to try to keep up his power stats. The result has been a drop in his already-shaky OBP down towards the aforementioned Duncan Line. (Teddy)

Ed Rooney's Office

Signed Brian Bannister, SP, Kansas City; Released Tony Pena, RP, Arizona [6/13]

Well shit, after a guy beats up the hapless Devil Rays and Cardinals to halve his ERA, he's gotta be worth a pickup right?

Um, no. Teddy, I watched a lot of Met games last year. And I watched Brian Bannister more than a few times. Unless you're trying to prove a point, he won't be on your roster come mid-July. He's a homeless man's Jake Westbrook. (El Angelo)

Hey, the Devil Rays can actually hit this year. Point taken on the Cards, though. Anyway, Bannister is just here until some of my parade of injured arms come off the DL. The extra arm theoretically gives me the flexibility to spot start some of the guys in the bottom half of my rotation instead of just running the same 5 guys out there every week regardless of matchup. I feel like it's going to make the difference between me finishing in 7th or finishing in 6th.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to finish polishing up the shuffleboard pucks on the Titanic. (Teddy)

Evil Empire

• Signed Casey Janssen, RP, Toronto and Ivan Rodriguez, Steroid Abuser, Detroit; Released Corey Patterson, OF, Baltimore [6/10]


• Signed Raul Ibanez, OF, Seattle; Released Nomah!, 1B, Los Angeles [6/12]

You just know someone was picking up Raul Ibanez after his flurry of HRs the other day, so it's not a terrible snag by the Steingrabbers to go after a useful if uninteresting outfielder, and he's certainly not the worst idea to fill out the back of a roster.

While it's not a shocker to see Patterson hit the waiver wire, you have to marvel at the fact that he can't keep his shit together long enough to stay on fantasy squads long enough to establish himself as a fixture because he can't get on base. There's no reason he should have a worse career than Juan Pierre; yet, against all odds, he just is. Felix Pie fans, be warned.

Finally, the only Janssen that I give a shit about is Famke, so let's just leave poor Casey where he is. (El Angelo)

Called it! Holy shit, we need to stop co-authoring things for a while. We're about three more columns away from being common-law married in Vermont. (Teddy)

Hand Banana

• Signed Casey Kotchman, 1B, Anaheim; Released Elijah Dukes, OF, Tampa Bay; Played with the hearts and minds of Craig Monroe, OF, Detroit and Dmitri Young, 1B, Washington [6/8]
  
• Signed Jeff Francis, SP, Colorado; Released Daniel Cabrera, SP, Baltimore [6/12]

Casey Kotchman was still available a mere 9 days ago? Shit, that's a fuck-up by the rest of us. Invariably, this team's best asset year in and year out is scouring the freely available talent pool for guys that have the right amount of upside and productivity and translating them into helping in necessary categories. Well done, sir. By contrast, Daniel Cabrera sucks. (El Angelo)

I strongly disagree with the dumping of Elijah Dukes. Like all those who make too much money to smoke crack, I believe the children are the future. Elijah is clearly with me on this.

After all, he's apparently already fathered 5 kids with 4 women, and has further proven his devotion to the youth of America by knocking up a 17 year-old with his next baby. I don't know what kind of OB(GYN)% 6-for-5 works out to, but it has to be pretty valuable. Let's see Kotchman beat that. (Teddy)

Le Dupont Torkies

• Signed Chad Billingsley, SP, Los Angeles; Released Jeff Bedpan, SP, Milwaukee [6/6]


• Released Braden Looper, SP, St. Louis [6/9]


• Signed Andy Sonnenstine, SP, Tampa Bay; Kerry Wood, SP, Chicago (NL) and Salomon Torres, RP, Pittsburgh; Released Chris Duncan, OF, St. Louis and Dan Johnson, 1B, Oakland [6/12]

Ladies and gentlemen, let's load up the disabled list! Wood & Torres sounds like a law firm that advertises on the F train and encompasses a ton of potential for saves on the comeback circuit. It's not a bad bit of planning for August that the Defending Champs are engaged in, but query whether it'll be anything more than window-dressing at the end of the day. Still, the cost were the crappy Duncan & Johnson, neither of which brought anything useful to the fantasy table. As a top-tier announcer would say, when you've got 2 disabled list spots, you should use them for 2 disabled players.

And finally, it was only a matter of time before Senor Bedpan hit the unemployment circuit. I still can't believe that fucker turned into Whitey Ford in last year's postseason. The only postseason performance less likely than that was Bobby Jones' unfathomable 1-hitter in 2000. (El Angelo)

Was the one-hitter by Bad Bobby Jones or Really Bad Bobby Jones? I could never keep them straight. Wood joins Dick Harden on the A's bench in a move that will wrap up the 2003 ERA title for the Torkies. At this point, if they ever both get into a game on the same day it will represent a pretty severe crossing of the streams. Nobody loves total protonic reversal. (Teddy)

Lefty's Revenge

• Signed Xavier Nady, OF, Pittsburgh [6/15]

Jon hasn't made a transaction for 6 weeks and suddenly pops out of his hole for...Xavier Nady? He's actually having a year solid enough that he probably deserves a spot on somebody's roster, but he's really not a long-term solution or keeper material, and I feel like one of the top contenders should have picked him up for a rotating spot in the OF, not a team that's clearly a bit behind the 8-ball for this year's competition. (El Angelo)

Never mind that--the real issue here is that Lefty is running Julio Lugo out at 3B on an everyday basis despite Lugo's sweet .273 OBP so far this season. In other news, the team recently announced that it has hired Doc Rivers as a special advisor to the GM. (Teddy)

M*ke

• Signed Luis Castillo, 2B, Minnesota; Released Jamie Moyer, SP, Philly [6/7]

I was initially gong to blast this transaction as silly because there had to be half a dozen 2B's better than Castillo in my mind. Then, your humble narrator decided that this may in fact be baseless, and instead decided to call up and rank all 2B-eligible players, because the position seems somewhat weak to me.

The conclusion? Trust your initial instinct: this is a shitty move. Castillo by any rational analysis is about the 8th-best 2B available, and he's not even a category specialist anymore. Isn't either Thieriot or Matsui a better call, since they actually still steal bases? (El Angelo)

June 16th, 2007: The historic day on which El Angelo advocated the pickup of Kaz Matsui. Fuck the Wood/Harden scenario; this plunges us directly into a countdown to the End Days. A little free advice to the GRBG readership: if you hear trumpets, go grab your swimsuit and SPF 4,000 ASAP. (Teddy)

Nigerian Gentlemen

• Signed Chuck James, SP, Atlanta; Released Pat Neshek, RP, Minnesota [6/6]
  
• Released James and Paul Lo Duca, C, New York (NL); Signed Mike Napoli, C, Los Angeles and Heath Bell, RP, San Diego [6/7]
  
• Re-signed Neshek for 1 minute; Released Neshek thereafter; Signed Bengie Molina, C, Anaheim [6/10]
  
• Waived Molina; Re-signed....Neshek! [6/11]
• Released Jack Cust, OF, Oakland and....Neshek!; Re-signed Bell and Eddie Guardado, RP, Cincy [6/15]

There are two parts to what amounts to a ton of bluster over players that hopefully don't make the difference between 2nd and 8th place in this league. Dumping Paul Lo Duca isn't a bad idea because the lad's been slumping, which lead to the classic Willie Randolph quote on Friday afternoon: "We've had a tough go of it at the plate. Even Lo Duca's struggling!" Some combination of Napoli and Molina should be at worst an approximation of Lo Duca's best productions, and plus, you keep the same number of Vowels on the roster.

And then there's the relief pitcher shuffling. Jake, if you're trying to guarantee Pat Neshek the Pewter Parachute award single-handedly, I should warn you that it's given to the player on the most teams throughout the year, not the guy involved in the most transactions. Because yes, Neshek would have clinched it with this series of moves. (El Angelo)

Are we sure that Neshek isn't secretly an owner in this league? Has anyone seen him and Mike in the same place at the same time?

In the meantime, let's all take a moment to pour some out for Jack Cust. While the move to cut Cust makes sense based on the numbers, it overlooks the fact that Cust never fails: he simply sometimes succeeds in a way that we mortals cannot observe with our primitive Earth instruments. Still, though, not sure how valuable that is for fantasy purposes. (Teddy)

President Skroob

• Signed Josh Fields, 3B, Chicago (AL) and Coco Crisp, OF, Boston; Released Ryan Shealy, 1B, Kansas City and Shaun Marcum, SP, Toronto [6/12]
  
• Released Fields; Signed Matt Kemp, OF, Los Angeles [6/13]

Parts of this are examples of why you need to actually look past scouting reports when making a transaction. When I heard Joe Crede was out indefinitely, I immediately decided to pick up Fields, because hey, he's a top prospect! Then the next day I saw that despite being a top prospect, he blows. Hence, dumping him for Kemp.

I'm dying to see what Teddy's criticism of dumping a stuff without speed for a stiff with speed is. I mean, Coco Crisp can't hit .220 forever, can he? (El Angelo)

Coco's BAs by month since coming to Boston, starting with the most recent (and counting only those months with more than 100 PA):

.235/.224/.235/.241/.243/.278

Over that length of time, suck tends to find its own level. At this point, "forever" translates roughly to "as soon as we think the bigs won't cripple the psyche of Jacoby Ellsbury". That said, the eagle-eyed guys at SoSH have noted that Crisp has altered his batting stance to good effect over the past week. So maybe there's hope there after all. Ish. (Teddy)

The Sex Cannons

• Signed Paul Byrd, SP, Cleveland; Released Jeremy Hermida, OF, Florida [6/5]


• Released Byrd; Signed Santiago Casilla, RP, Oakland [6/7]


• Signed Felix Pie, OF, Chicago (NL) and Sean Marshall, SP, Chicago (NL); Released Casilla and John Danks, SP, Chicago (AL) [6/9]


• Signed Lenny DiNardo, SP, Oakland; Released Shawn Hill, SP, Washington [6/10]

The swap-out of Hermida for Pie is an interesting bit of gamesmanship by the current leaders in the clubhouse; obviously both are highly regarded, and Hermida has been on everyone's breakout list for about 3 years running.

Trouble is, he's about as sturdy as Eric Davis, and hasn't really turned out to be more than a poor man's Austin Kearns. Yeah, there's the keep-and-hold strategy for a guy like that, but if you're in first place, you should be using your OF more aggressively, though really, I'm not sure if Pie is the answer for that; someone like the aforementioned Sexson would seem to be a better fit short-term.

On the pitching front, I didn't know Lenny DiNahdo was off the BoSox until about a week ago; when did this happen? (El Angelo)

Lenny shut down Boston last week in one of the luckiest revenge games on record, a 6 BB/0 K "masterpiece" that violated almost every known law of baseball physics. Based on his recent shellacking at the hands of the Cardinals, it might be time for Lenny to rejoin Karl and Homer in the break room of the power plant. (Teddy)

The Spam Avengers

• Signed Brandon Inge, 3B, Detroit [6/7]

"Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something."

(Pancho Villa/El Angelo)

“Whether you are completely remodeling your home or using some of the readily available low-cost adaptive products, creating a safe, comfortable and accessible environment is not planning for disability - it's planning for continued independence.”

(Bob Vila/Teddy)

Hubris In Action (or, Why Matt Damon Should Be Encouraged to Shut the F@#$ Up)

For those who may have missed it, on June 5th Matt Damon appeared on Letterman in full Red Sox regalia and proceeded to taunt the dynamite monkey that is the New York Yankees:



For those who can't view the above, here's a link.

In many ways, that's a pretty genius two minutes of comedy. I think it's safe to say that Damon didn't co-write that material with Ben "Aspiring .Sully" Affleck. I especially enjoy the part where Damon notes that if the Yankees beat the Sox ten more times, they'd still be in second place.

However.

Jesus, Matt, couldn't you just let it be? Couldn't you just limit yourself to checking espn.com's standings page in the morning and basking in its warming glow? Couldn't you occupy yourself by heading over to NYY Fans and giggling at the masses clamoring for A-Rod's head? Because since you decided to give in to temptation and let the Yankees have it with both barrels, the A.L. East standings have gone from this:

1st Boston............37 20 --
4th NY Yankees ...24 31 11.5

to this:

1st Boston............41 24 --
2nd NY Yankees ..33 31 7.5

I mean, seriously, Matt, cut the shit. That's 9 wins in a row for New York, their longest such streak since 2005.

I want to make it clear that we here at the GRBG do not believe in curses, whether theoretically applied by an all-time baseball great, or by the star of such motion pictures as Stuck on You. Purported curses have been used to excuse all manner of incompentence and bigotry over the course of the years, and we want no part of perpetuating the myth of their existence.

However.

The ancient Greeks used the term hubris to denote the concept of a mortal who oversteps by thinking himself to be above his station. For example, it would probably be an act of hubris on my part not to defer to my close personal friend Aristotle's explanation of the concept and its dangers:

[Hubris is] to cause shame to the victim, not in order that anything may happen to you, nor because anything has happened to you, but merely for your own gratification. . . . As for the pleasure in hubris, its cause is this: men think that by ill-treating others they make their own superiority the greater. (per Wikipedia)

That's good stuff, there. Fucking Affleck didn't get anywhere near that shit, either. And it's a dead-on description of Damon's rant.
.

So, what happens to those who anger the gods through an act of hubris. Well, the classic example is Icarus, son of Daedelus, who crafted working wings out of feathers and wax. Icarus took the wings made by Daedelus, but got overconfident and flew too close to the sun which melted the wax and caused him to do a fatal Quintuple Lindy into the sea.

Now, I'm not suggesting that either Matt Damon or the 2007 Red Sox are about to plunge into the sea (though if Julio Lugo and his .587 OPS want to take a hop off the Zakim Bridge, we won't stop him). They have plenty of pitching, and the perverse advantage of having two glaring lineup holes (Lugo and Coco Crisp) that they can try to plug going forward (it's actually easier to fix big, isolated problems than it is to improve a team being held back by slight across-the-board underpeformance. This is why the stars and scrubs strategy works well in fantasy leagues.) Also, it's unlikely that the Yankees will continue winning every game they play.

.

However.

However...

The GRBG Interview: Julian Tavarez

One of the more unlikely developments of this season has been Julian Tavarez's emergence as a clubhouse "glue guy" for the Red Sox. Tavarez seems to have foresaken his past wall-punching, spring-training-brawl-starting persona in favor of a kinder, gentler, crazy-but-fun uncle approach. We here at the GRBG were of course intrigued by Tavarez's transformation, and were thrilled when he agreed to sit down with us for an interview.

Unfortunately, as with past interviewee Milton Bradley, Julian ended up backing out of the interview at the 11th hour. However, we at the GRBG have never been ones to let the mere absence of an interviewee derail an interview. So we've forged ahead by just asking Mr. Tavarez questions to which he has already given answers elsewhere. Substantiating links are provided.

Gowanus Rotisserie Baseball Gazette: Julian, thanks very much for agreeing to meet with us today.

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Julian Tavarez: "I feel like the president out here. I think this is the most attention I've ever gotten in my career." (Boston Globe)

GRBG: Yes, that's a common reaction to a GRBG interview. After all, it's not often that the web's foremost roto strategy/horse racing/Larry Bird weed-smoking blog comes calling.

Anyway, As a Red Sox fan, I really appreciate all you've done for the team this season. Your enthusiam for the game has been reminiscent of Ernie "Let's play two" Banks.
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JT: "I don't know who Ernie Banks is, but I hope he was a good guy. I'm like him, I hope." (Hartford Courant)

"I'm just here to help the team do whatever." (mlb.com)
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GRBG: Eloquently put. If you don't mind, we'd like to start with a question that has nagged at us for quite some time: how to correctly pronunce of your name. We've always heard it produced JOO-lee-an, as in the douchebaggy son of John Lennon, rather than HOOL-yan, as one might expect with a guy from the Dominican Republic. Do you have a preference for either pronunciation?

JT: "I really don't care. They can call me whatever they want. They can call me [expletive] Tavarez, it doesn't matter." (Boston Herald)

GRBG: Will do. So, [expletive], as a child in the Dominican Republic, did you always want to be a baseball player when you grew up?

JT: If I couldn't be a baseball player, I thought I might have a future as an adult movie star. (Boston Globe)

GRBG: Huh. We won't lie--we're a little dubious about that. There is, after all, such a thing as being too ugly for porn.

We'd better try to verify your, um, qualifications with someone who would know. Hey, Doug Mientkiewicz, you've seen [expletive]'s [expletive] in the shower, right? How about it?

Doug Mientkiewicz: "[Julian] has a lot of movement on his balls." (BlogSox)

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GRBG: Well, there you have it. Given Minky's history, [expletive] should probably thank his lucky star that Mientkiewicz didn't try to walk off with such high-profile balls.

Skipping lightly over any potential follow-up questions on that issue, how have you enjoyed your time in Boston?

JT: "This is a place you want to play. The fans? I won't say they're the best, but they show up every night." (Boston Globe via Baseball Prospectus)

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GRBG: Well, [expletive], that's a pretty [expletive] answer. Points for honesty, though. How do the Boston fans compare to fans in other cities? If I recall correctly, you've had your differences with fans in NL cities, especially San Francisco.

JT: "[Giants fans] are a bunch of a-holes and faggots." (Outsports.com)
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GRBG: Easy, big guy--you could blow out your arm tomorrow, and you don't want to get yourself banned from the gay porn industry before you even start.

Prior to this season, your reputation in Boston was rather questionable. A lot was made of your preseason alleyjacking of Joey Gathright following a non-collision at the plate. Since we here at the GRBG are nothing if not paragons of journalistic fairness, we'd like to give you this opportunity to give your side of that incident.

JT: "I'm not a fighting guy. I get along with my teammates and everybody. When you're on the field, things happen. People say 'you're a bad guy, a very emotional guy.' They don't see what kind of person you are, they see the reaction. I'm a very calm person, but when we're on the field, little things like that get big." (ThinkExist)

GRBG: That makes a certain amount of sense. While we at the GRBG have operated at the very highest levels of fantasy sports for nearly two centuries now, we can't pretend to know what it's like to get in there and mix it up in a preseason game played in front of 1,300 people on the outskirts of Ocala, FL. That's worth throwing down for, no doubt.

One final question, [expletive]. There have been some in Red Sox Nation who have speculated that your improved behavior of late has more to do with the imminent arrival of Jon Lester as a rotation candidate than it does with any sort of spiritual conversion on your part. How do you intend to deal with the rotation battle that will likely result from Lester's arrival in Boston?
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JT: "You hear about whoever throws the first punch gets the win." (ThinkExist)
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GRBG: We think that might be going a bit far. We here at the GRBG would find it tough to support anyone taking a swing at a cancer survivor, especially if the person taking the swing had the option of just gracefully transitioning into a career in porn. Plus, the team would probably trade you if you tried something like that.
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JT: "If I get traded from here, hey I've been chicken [expletive]." (Boston Globe via Baseball Prospectus).

"I'm done with the media. No mas." (ThinkExist)

GRBG: We can't argue with either of those propositions. Thanks for your time, [expletive]. We'll be rooting for you, so long as you don't cold-cock any leukemia victims. In the meantime, readers, please feel free to submit your nominations for our next interview candidate.

Fat Squirrel Keeps Killing the Mets

For the umpteenth time yesterday, the Mets fell victim not to a good baseball player, but to the bat of Pat Fricking Burrell, or as lovingly called by my co-author, Fat Squirrel. This continues to befuddle all Mets fans, especially your humble author. For starters, Burrell sucks. Here's his 10 comparables from baseballreference.com:

1. Glenn Davis (941)
2. Cliff Johnson (934)
3. Glenallen Hill (933)
4. Richard Hidalgo (927)
5. Henry Rodriguez (924)
6. Paul Sorrento (920)
7. Preston Wilson (919)
8. Jim Lemon (911)
9. Tony Conigliaro (909)
10. Leon Durham (909)

That, boys and girls, is a collection of stiff outfielders and never-weres. (All it's missing is Hard Hittin' Mark Whiten.) Sure, Conigliaro wasn't awful, and Glenn Davis was good for about two years before being traded for Curt Schilling & Pete Harnisch, and Preston Wilson had his moments. Which is about what you can say for Fat Squirrel: he's had his moments. Amazingly, ALL of them have come against the Mets.

Burrell vs. Mets:
519 PA, 37 HR, 66 R, 94 RBI, .255 AVG, .366 OBP, .558 SLG

Burrell vs. the Rest of Baseball:
3844 PA, 158 HR, 461 R, 576 RBI, .257 AVG, .356 OBP, .465 SLG

The OBP and SLG differences are insanely enormous. And while the average difference actually doesn't help the argument, the remaining stats, when done by rates, look even more ridiculous. Burrell averages a HR every 14 PA's against the Mets, versus every 24 PA's against every other team. He's good for an RBI every 5.5 PA's against the Mets, while it's one for every 6.6 PA's against the rest of the league. Hell, even one of his five steals came against the Mets.

The last player I can remember killing the Mets this badly was Juan Samuel, who the Mets could not for the life of them ever get out. Rectifying that problem, the Mets traded Lenny Dykstra and Roger McDowell for Juan Samuel, whereupon he proceeded to kill them even more by sucking royally for the rest of the year, to the tune of .228/.299/.300, an almost unfathomable AVG/OBP/SLG line. He was then dealt at the end of the year for the immortal Alejandro Pena, who was the 1990 version of Danny Kolb.

The solution? Offer the Phillies something, ANYTHING for Fat Squirrel. Give them Milledge. Give them Pelfrey. Hell, give them a luxury box at the new stadium. But get him off the Phillies and either into a Met uniform or into a retirement facility. Offer him $50 million to never play again. (They gave that to Mo Vaughn, for crissakes.) Omar, for the sake of all Met fans I implore you: cure our Achilles Heel. Get rid of the bastard.

Transactions Analysis: Avignon Edition

On this date 702 years ago, Bertrand de Goth was elected Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church after a 1+ year interregnum with no Pope because of a dispute between the rival French and Italian Cardinals. Despite being neither Italian nor a Cardinal, Monsieur de Goth became Pope regardless by allying himself with powerful King Phillip IV of France. Upon learning of his election, he took the name Clement V, and demanded that he be coronated at Lyon, whereupon he elevated 9 French priests to the position of Cardinal. Within 5 years, not only was the Papal throne relocated to Avignon for the so-called "Babylonian Captivity", but Clement V took the sensible step of rounding up the Knights Templar and finding them guilty of heresy and sodomy, capital crimes under the Church. (They were later exonerated.) Clement V died in 1314, and while his body was lying in repose for viewing, a lighting bolt struck the church holding his corpse. According to the Inferno, he has been damned to the 8th ring of hell, somewhere between Brutus and Denny McLain.

And what, pray tell, does this have to do with the Wankdorf league? Well, outside of the fact this is probably more interesting and useful than a single thing to follow below, it's worth bearing in mind that name-calling from a faux seat is a precarious position. Just because a bunch of Francs decided that Bertrand de Goth was the heir to the Papal throne for kicks in the early 14th century didn't give him the right to start naming the honorable Knights Templar sodomites and heretics. So if my apartment is struck by lighting this week and my bearded collie is incinerated on the spot, I'll stop doing TA's. Until then though, the glorious reign continues. (El Angelo)

One of the downsides to taking the brakeman position in a TA is an occasional utter inability to come up with a way to segue out of my worthy colleague's lead-in. This week's edition finds that particular downside in full flower. I'll settle for simply noting that if Denny McLain came to rest in the 8th circle of hell, Ty Cobb must have ended up as a toilet plunger at Hitler's place in the 9th circle. (Teddy)

Ed Rooney's Office

• Signed Brad Hawpe, OF, Colorado; Released Adam Lind, OF, Toronto [7/1]

Wow, I have to start off with this crap? The Nose-Picking Principals swap the 39th best OF for the 40th best OF. That'll carry the day boys! (El Angelo)

Incremental progress, my boy. Adam Lind appears en route to nailing down the Erubiel Durazo Award, given annually to BP's most over-hyped AAA call-up, so I had to send him away to a farm in the countryside where he can run free and be happy (honestly, Timmy). The real news for me this week is that I reduced my store of DL's players from 6 to 3. Again, incremental progress. (Teddy)

Hand Banana

• Released Sammy! Sosa, OF, Texas [5/30]


• Signed Brad Hennessey, RP, San Fran; Released Henry Owens, RP, Florida and Bronson Arroyo, SP, Cincy [6/1]
  
• Signed Dustin Pedroia, 2B, Boston; Released Salomon Torres, RP, Pittsburgh [5/3]

I was almost going to write an Ode to Armando Benitez after his balk-a-rific finale as Giants' closer last week (which was possibly my favorite baseball sequence in the last 3 years), then they cut his useless ass and beat me to the punch. Do you realize he's given up EIGHT postseason home runs, and has blown FIVE postseason save opportunities? He's nothing shy of abominable, and outside of the brief stint he had as O's setup man in '96, has never been good enough to warrant a starring role. And he has a fine propensity to implode at the absolute worst fucking times. (No, I'm not bitter about Game 1 in 2000.) Good riddance, Armando. Hennessey, do better. It won't be hard. (El Angelo)

I love Dustin Pedroia more than Josh Hancock loved the sight of an ice-cold beer nestled snugly in a cup-holder. Pedroia gives hope to slow, short guys everywhere. Given that, and given my admittedly imperfect knowledge of the physiognomic makeup of the league's owners, I'm suprised it took this long for someone to grab DP. He's recently been bumped up to the #2 slot in the batting order in Boston, so he should score a ton of runs from here on out hitting in front of Papi and Manny. This is a nice complementary pickup of the type that HB has specialized over the past few years.

As for the Benitez balkaplooza, well, that pretty much made my month. Keep in mind that a balk is, in essence, a failure to stand still correctly. The fact that a professional athlete was unable to stand still on command twice in a five-minute period is staggering. Even Pedroia has sufficient physical gifts to stand still, for chrissakes.

And, lastly, regarding Bronson Arroyo: I called it. We will, for these purposes, overlook the fifteen other predictions I made in that article that have already been misproven by June. (Teddy)

It's Enrico Palazzo

• Signed Fernando Rodney, RP, Detroit; Released Kevin Millwood, SP, Texas and Jose Vidro, 2B, Seattle [6/3]

Remember Teddy's shock and surprise last week at Mark DeRosa being on someone's roster? I have roughly the same reaction here: Jose Vidro? WTF? He's got an aight OBP, he actually has scored a few runs in that middling Seattle lineup this year, but he contributes NOTHING in the other 3 categories whatsoever. So what the hell was the reason for having him at all? Oh wait, he qualifies at first base too. That must've been it. (El Angelo)

I have nothing to add here except the fact that the folks at USS Mariner have christened Vidro "Turbo" for his utter lack of footspeed and propensity to liberally lace his scoreline with GIDPs. I do like the Fernando Rodney pickup in the wake of the continued decay of Todd Jones, whose A.L. championship ring should be available on eBay any day now. (Teddy)

Le Dupont Torkies

• Signed Kevin Slowey, SP, Minnesota and Orlando Cabrera, SS, Anaheim; Released Bobby Crosby, SS, Oakland and Carlos Ruiz, C, Philly [6/1]

A double-punch that's nothing shy of fantastic for the Defending Champs; sneaking in Kevin Slowey before the rest of us caught on was a tremendous call and great turn of foot (hand? fingers?) demonstrated by a guy who obviously needs an extra starter. I actually like the Cabrera/Crosby swap even better; Cabrera, I would wager, is probably squarely on the line of Replacement Level for a fantasy shortstop, and he can actually steal bases. Crosby, by contrast, don't do shit. The only real "downside" here is that Carlos Ruiz is now filing for unemployment. I say that not because I feel bad for Ruiz, but because we're now actually staring at a team without an active catcher, which I suppose isn't illegal, but is kinda screwy. (El Angelo)

It was interesting to see the entire league stare at OCab's quick start and talk themselves out of going after him. I still maintain that he can't and won't keep this up, but for an FA pickup it's certainly worth a shot. Heck, in past years in this league somebody would have picked up OCab on April 25th or so, and started shopping him around to other teams by May in a package deal with Eric Hinske.

The no-catcher approach is intruiging. Given that there's only one rate stat on the offensive side, a guy has to be pretty bad before you'd sacrifice whatever marginal counting stats he could give you in the other four categories. Query whether it's worth it over even the medium-haul. (Teddy)

Nigerian Gentlemen

• Signed Pat Neshek, RP, Minnesota; Released Clay Hensley, SP, San Diego [6/2]

It's getting to the point with Neshek that I should just have autotype for his strengths and weaknesses, as he's destined to become this year's Guillermo Mota by hitting everyone's roster by Bastille Day. In fairness, perhaps we've been underrating relievers in these TAs, as they do have increased value in a daily rosters system, unlike one with weekly changes, where they just sucked away spots from your starters. Still, can Neshek be anything resembling the difference between 3rd and 6th for this team? It's not like he's in line to close anytime soon. (El Angelo)

We've had 7 post-draft TA's so far this year, and Neshek has now appeared in 6 of them. He's the runaway leader for the Pewter Parachute, which I don't think anyone saw coming back in April.

At left: Half of you have signed this man.

In some ways, Neshek is the converse of the Torkies' no-catcher plan. Neshek essentially only provides value in the rate stats, and little or no value in the counting stats. However, because there are two rate stats for pitchers, and because most pitchers only contribute to 2 of the 3 counting stat categories (it's almost impossible to get lots of Wins and lots of Saves), the move is more defensible.

The real problem is that middle relief performance is so variable from week to week that these types of guys almost always wear out their welcome pretty quickly. Thus the Mota-ization of Neshek, and the concomitant fact that at this rate the GRBG will have added "Neshek" to "Gowanus + Baseball" and "Torkies" in its stash of bizarrely high Google listings. To which I note that Ang's Preakness Preview nosed its way on to the front page of Google results for Preakness + preview. Mazeltov! (Teddy)

President Skroob

• Signed Shawn Marcum, SP, Toronto [5/30]


• Signed Akinori Otsuka, RP, Texas and Edwin Encarnacion, 3B, Cincy; Released Mark Reynolds, 3B, Arizona and Brandon McCarthy, SP, Texas [6/1]

It's fair to say that the Brandon McCarthy gambit has worked out about as well for me as it did for Jon Daniels---he stinks. By contrast, Aki Otsuka at least has a passable shot at closing at some point in time and racking up garbage stats, either for trade bait again (a la Kevin Gregggg) or for '08 as a 12th man closer/keeper. Also, while I despise the Yankees, I note that whatever form of bubonic plague or dengue fever they're carrying around is spreading; Marcum goes out and pitches a gem against their lineup, and is immediately injured. Thanks, fucksticks. (El Angelo)


Edwin Encarncaion for Mark Reynolds sure seems like an upgrade at 3B as well. If Cincy ever left that kid alone he'd turn out just fine, especially playing half his games in that bandbox. Those young Toronto pitchers seem like good ideas, but going forward I think you have to assume that there will be three elite offensive teams in the same division. Combine that with the SkyDome park factor, and you have to be pretty damn good before you're worth playing (let alone keeping) as a Toronto SP. Gustavo Chacin looms as a cautionary tale--and let's not even mention Josh Towers.

The Sex Cannons

• Signed Jason Varitek, C, Boston; Released Johnny Estrada, C, Milwaukee [5/29]


• Released Jarrod Washburn, SP, Seattle [5/31]


• Signed Kenny Rogers, SP, Detroit and Matt Morris, SP, San Fran; Released Touchdown Tim Wakefield, SP, Boston [6/2]


• Claimed Mark Reynolds, 3B, Arizona off waivers; Released Ryan Doutmit, C, Pittsburgh [6/4]

My mistake is Elders' reward, as I was a tad hasty on the trigger finger with Reynolds, and The Commish rights a wrong. I still don't think he's going to keep it up for particularly long, but we've seen worse gambles at the hot corner this year, including but not limited to a Chris Sabo reference. The pitchers are all fungible messes around the edges, so I'll pose the question to our fearless leader: if you know that Teddy will have every worthwhile fringe-level BoSock out there that's worth keeping, why bother with 'Tek? (El Angelo)

Ah, but you're forgetting that I already have VMart at catcher. Otherwise I'd have been all over Tek. After a terrible April, he's kicked the shit out of the ball for a month. He, along with Pedroia, sort of got hidden in the Yahoo rankings because of their slow starts, but over the past 5 weeks or so they've been incredibly valuable. Tek's a guy you're going to want to bail out on sooner than later--35 y/o catchers figure not to fare well at the tail end of a long season--but as a short-term plug it's a great move. (Teddy)