Why We Hate the Associated Press, submission 4709-3027

Report: Parcells to Couch Dallas Cowboys
10 minutes ago
By STEPHEN HAWKINS, AP Sports Writer


We all hope that the Cowboys can be couched, and couched well.

This Just In...

New York Yankees Signing

The New York Yankess have announced a press conference for 2 pm EST. The press conference is rumored to be an announcement of the signing of $175 million dollars. The deal is rumored to be in the neighborhood of one year for $240 million dollars with incentives and a signing bonus of Roger Clemens.


The $175 million dollars was 0-0 last year and had an OBP 0f .000.


George Steinbrenner took time away from paddling the asses of his front office personell to comment on the deal. "I think it's great in this day and age that I can spend money while other people have to work for money and have some sort of asinine value associated with it. What it's worth to me is to see that my name is in the papers as much as possible so that I can win friends and infleuence people. Plus, I plan on never dying, just to get back at all of my enemies. I also like to perfom for Bud Selig and this makes him look good while I have my lawyers gut his CBA that he got all that good publicity for back in September. Please excuse me I have a meeting to attend over there."


George Steinbrenner's ego was unavailable for comment as it was in a circle with several other Republicans making some sort of repetitive collective hand gestures over a pile of cowering $10 and $20 bills.

Rewind

MLB's Oakland A's site has a year in review with a sleu of links.


We're going to re-watch the "There's an 'A' in STREAK" this weekend to see what exactly we saw.

Quiet

Too Quiet

With Texas sigining every over-priced and ready to fall off arm in the western hemisphere it's about time we start looking around the AL West to see what is going on.


The Anaheim Angels just won the World Series. To celebrate, they have decided to crawl under a blanket, in a cave, down a mine shaft. Apparently, the Angels are scared that if they make a peep somebody will take away their trophy.


The Angels non-tendered Brad Fulmer and Al Levine, though they hope to re-sign both. They released Sal Fasano. They signed Benji Gil and grabbed Wilbert Nieves off of waivers.


The question is; why did Disney approve a $22 million dollar boost to the payroll if they are trying to add on the cheap? Disney is trying to sell the team and would like to do it soon. By publically saying they are incresing payroll, without adding any players, it gives the impression that the Angels are financially more well off than it seems. Hey, inflating profits and expenditures. Sounds great. Call Arthur Anderson and Enron to get some ideas from them.


The Mouse is bleeding and more crappy animated movies are not the answer.


Still, if the Angels stand pat, they are at worst a .500 baseball team. Not too shabby.


Seattle has made several moves, but none seem to have broken the wave of near silence. They got Randy Winn for Lou Pinella and Antonio Perez. They are competing with Arizona for the oldest roster moves signing Edgar Martinez, John Olerud, Dan Wilson, Jamie Moyer, Norm Charlton and Shigetoshi Hasegawa. The snatched Steve Kent off waivers and dumped James Baldwin, Doug Creek and Paul Abbott.


Seattle's front office (located somewhre in Japan) has basically tried to keep itself in tact rather than make waves. After all, if you have the same team as last year, you should do as well as last year, right? Or close to the year before, right? Right?


The Ranegrs are still making a mockery of the United States currency system. Value is to worth as coffee is to...


The Rangers grabbed Einar Diaz and Ryan Drese for Travis Hafner and Aaron Myette. A boderline catcher and a fifth starter for a possible 1B/DH stud and a number two or three starter. Is it any wonder John Hart screwed the Cleveland Indians into the turf so far, so fast?


The Rangers picked up Doug Glanville, Ugueth Urbina and Esteban Yan. We have no idea why. They also resigned Danny Kolb and Todd Greene.


It must be nice to spend other people's money.


The Rangers did something right by not doing anything at all. They let Hideki Irabu and John Rocker go as well as Juan Alvarez. Irabu and Rocker should start a PR firm together.


We're not sure if any team actually improved from all of these deals and transactions. Seattle may have just staved off collapse for one more year and Texas just bloated the pan-handle for no apparent reason. Anaheim, well, we'll tell you when they do something.

Year	Team	G	AB	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	BB	K	OBP	SLG	AVG
2000	OAK	138	584	104	168	34	18	80	43	77	.366	.452	.288
2001	OAK	162	629	90	178	37	12	85	52	103	.335	.412	.283
2002	OAK	162	587	71	141	32	16	67	48	96	.298	.390	.240

Terrence Long, Age 26



Chris Singleton, Age 30

Year	Team	G	AB	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	BB	K	OBP	SLG	AVG
2000	CWS	147	511	83	130	22	11	62	35	85	.301	.382	.254
2001	CWS	140	392	57	117	21	7	45	20	61	.331	.431	.298
2002	BAL	136	466	67	122	30	9	50	21	83	.296	.410	.262

There seems to be a bit of confusion. This is where numbers don't make sense. We could throw up defensive statistics, but we don't think it would help matters. They are argumentative and sometimes misleading. Except for in Terrence's case in 2002. He sucked. Sucked so bad it was argumentative that he could have gotten an error even if Art Howe stuck him at DH.

Let's focus on the mental side for the rest of the week.

Chris Singleton has the problem of being with two organizations in the last three years that were on the verge of canibalizing themselves. You really have to sit back and wonder how a player like Singleton would have handled the atmosphere in each locale. Further, you have to question the coaching he received as a bit player and fourth outfielder.

How many times do you see a player get a rather meaningless at-bat in a game and try and swing for the fences? Singleton's numbers might actually be a bit more compelling if we take that into account.

Then, again, we're not here to white wash anything. It's called tough love, get used to it.

T Long's struggles have been written about in this space before. We don't care about him having to move to centerfield out of AAA. We don't care about him having to move to left field with the arrival of Johnny Damon. We don't care about him moving back to center.

Are you trying to tell us an "athlete" as good as Long never played centerfield before? How professional do you have to be to bring your attitude about defensive placement to the dish when you're at-bat? If you're lucky enough to be in a MLB line-up, you better lick the pine tar rag in gratitude that they let you put on the uniform no matter where the put you in the field.

Can't Score From the Bench

Singleton actually has a bit of empathy from us in his on-base percentage. Singleton may very well have been fighting for a roster spot the last 18 months. Kind of a fight or flight sequence where you just do whatever the batting coach tells you to do.

Swing at a 3-1 count? Sure thing, coach.


Slap the ball into the turf and Ichiro it to first? You got it, coach.


Shift butt cheeks in the top half of the odd numbered innings to avoid hemorrhoids? Thanks for the tip, skip.


With Long, you have to wonder what the hell he was doing most of the time at the plate. Some hitters are able to set up pitchers. Some are able to see the ball and hit the ball. Others just flail at the ball hoping to make contact. T Long looked like he was waving a rhythmic gymnast's flag pole thingy. Honestly, it appeared Long was more interested in how he looked swinging the bat than his production at the plate.

That being said, Long would show two or three consecutive at-bats of being a brilliant hitter. Working counts. Turning on balls on the inner half of the plate. Then, he would look like a AA jackass trying to pull balls on the outer half and hit them within a hailed cab's distance of Fairfield an at-bat later.

Moving Terrence Long to left field is something that we'll need to come back to again and again in 2003. Is it worth it to appease a less than mediocre player and his replacement in center at $1.4 million rather than just stick Eric Brynes out there and let him win the spot?

We all lay our hopes in the infinite wisdom of Billy Beane and hope he isn't pulling a three Mikes on us. If you recall, last year, in the off season, Beane grabbed Mike Holtz as a free agent and paid him $1 million plus. He kept aging bullpen has-been Mike Magnante on the roster, not to mention Mike Venafro-who never seems to be on the same page as his left arm. A few months into the season and Holtz was packing his non-Oakland Atheltic bag out of town, Magnante was out of work, period and Venafro was pouting in Sacramento.

Beane grabbed three left-handers and just hoped one would make things work. By the trading dealine Beane had to go and grab Ricardo Rincon. Great deal, but it was done under the black cloud that Beane had put himself in.

Ugh, Huh?

Billy Beane just threw us a poser right in the middle of our prep for the annual 'Christmas Story' marathon.


Once we find out why Beane signed a player with an On-Base percentage below .300 (Chris Singleton was at .298 last year) we'll fill you in.


One EIO Staff memebr mentioned, "It looks like they just acquired a light hitting Terrence Long with a little more power...brain power."


Our main question is; why throw $1.4 million at a guy when Eric Byrnes probably wins the spot in spring training, anyway. Hopefully the A's can unload Long or Singleton come mid-June.


Albatros! Get it on a stick!

SOLO GIG

The Strummer man ain't got it tonight.


Done gone and finished the deal, he did.


Joe Strummer, R.I.P.

Turn Me Loose

Robert Fick was not offered a contract by the Detroit Tigers. For a back-up catcher and corner outfielder, you could do a lot worse than Fick. Think of him as Scott Hatteberg with a shorter last name.


There are a few other non-signees that are going to start hitting the bricks for the last two weeks of 2002. We'll see if any of them strike our fancy and make sure to note it for you.

Pockets: Burned Holes

Jose Cruz, JR is now a free agent after being dumped by the Toronto Blue Jays. Cliff Floyd denied the Red Sox offer of arbittration. Jose Hernandez is out there. Ismael Valdes is a steal for a swing-man (if you can put up with his attitude). David Justice hasn't officially retired.


None of this really impacts the A's. We doubt Billy Beane would spend more than $1.5-$2 million on a free agent. David Justice is a 250 AB guy and at full price, is out of the A's realm of consideration. Although, he would make some team a good coach down the line.


We plan on watching the last few free agnets fall into place and we'll finish our season ticket adventure over the Christmas break-New Year's day bowls. We plan on scanning a few items that we were sent from the A's ticket offices, just so you can see we're not lying.


The Twins Geek is interviewing folks from the Twins' front office. Needless to say, JB is so cool.

Let the Games Commence

Since we are unlike most under 30'ish North Americans we don't have a clue. About video games, that is. We don't have a Game Cube. We don't have an X Box. We don't have PS2. One of us owns a PlayStation, but doesn't remember who borrowed it. One of us has a XXX Play Station, but that's a Blog for another time.


What are the better basbeall video games out there?


Quite frankly, it starts with SNK basbeall on the old school Nintendo. That game rocked. We can still recall the heated battles between the Rockport Fish and the Toledo Mud Hens at the Fish Bowl. The heated duels between Keith Loberman and Ken Jarvis. BACCADEE's classic swing and the ability to check swing homeruns down the foul lines.


Recently we purchased Baseball Mogul 2003 (which you can download a demo version from download.com or Sports Mogul). It's listed at $9.99 right now at amazon.com. We had some experience with the Football Mogul game a few years ago when it was first introduced. It's all numbers. It's GREAT.


You play GM and owner. You manipulate the roster. With the football game, the players were given fictitious names. But, their first and last initials corresponded with the actual names or sometimes they would go one up or one down the alphabet. Jerry Ridge of the Minnesota Vikings was John Randle...you get the idea.


Baseball Mogul 2003 actually uses most of the real MLB player's names with a few exceptions. Even some of the AAA players are represented.


We can get lost in a Baseball Mogul fix for about a week each before we start to lose all perspective. Sitting back and wondering how much would have to be given up to trade the office lackey and some cash for that girl who works in Finance isn't exactly productive at work. Neither is wondering if you shuold develop a new centerfielder or just grab a free agent.


We haven't played too many others, but, Baseball Mogul 2003 is a great game for PC users to pass a few minutes, hours and even days.


Send in your thoughts on baseball games and we'll try to sort out the best few for each system.

Beyond Santa Claus

Tell this man what you are looking for and he can probably make it happen for you. Don't look too closely at how the deal is done, becuase he probably picked your pocket in the process. You won't really, mind, though, because you're too busy patting yourself on the back for getting what you wanted. Nine months from now, when you're struggling to keep above .500 with a bloated payroll look across the way. Billy Beane will be sitting there at around $45 million, wondering how to keep a team leading a pennant race getting better, from top to bottom, without adding payroll.

Oh, Yah?!

The Astros are beyond rumored to have signed Jeff Kent. If they signed him for any more than $7 million a year they gambled. Though, Kent is a nice fit for Houston. If Kent can play third and occasionally spot at second and first, the Astros might have a utility player who plays 150 games and has an OPS of around .950 for the next two years.


Not Bad. Especially if Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio's stats start to show signs of age.


The Houston Juice Box should be splashy this summer.


The signing officailly un-earmarks a few million dollars the Giants had floating around. Are we still crazy enough to think the Giants might make a run at Greg Maddux? Oh, yah, we love spending other people's money.

Missing Limb

Are the San Francisco Giants going to sign Greg Maddux? With the trade of Russ Ortiz to Atlanta for Damian Moss and the constant Livan Hernandez talk. Maybe. If the Giants could unload Hernandez they would have enough cash to throw at Maddux. Maddux would like to pitch in a 'pitcher's' park. It would seem a decent fit for Maddux as the golf courses in the area are superb and the Giants are at worst a .500 team. The Giants have to do something if they aren't going to grab an outfielder worth $1 million a year.


The A's traded Jose Flores to San Diego for their Rule 5 pick up Buddy Hernandez. The A's would have to keep all three of their Rule 5 pickups on their roster for the entire season or offer them back to their parent club for $25,000.


Hernandez is 23 years old and was 4-0 with a 1.22 ERA in 40 appearances for Greenville, the Braves AA team. Hernandez struck out 81 and walked 23. Hernandez held opponents to a .176 batting average.


Billy Beane has stated that he does not expect all three to stay on the roster, but all are decent players that can become players to be named later or even decent throw away picks after a few months in the A's organization.


John Sickels has more stuff to say.

Damn These Erasers

The A's shipped minor leaguers Neal Cotts and Daylan Holt to the Chicago White Sox to complete the Foulk/Koch deal. Cotts (LHP) went 12-6 with a 4.12 in Modesto last year, stirking out 178 in 138 innings. He also issued 87 walks. Cotts is 22 years old with a fastball that rarely breaks 90. His upside is limited, but he can be a useful lefty swing-man or deep reliever.


Daylan Holt came out of Texas A&M and his junior season slump carried into his first year of professional baseball. Holt managed .286/20/88 in Modesto in 2002. Nothing to sneeze at, but for a guy who hit 34 homeruns in his sophomore college season, it was a little less than what was expected of him at this stage in his career. Holt looks to be a corner outfielder/DH. Holt didn't walk enough and struck out too much for the A's wishes (125 K's /44 walks).


The A's released Mike Fhyrie. Fhyrie is going to be a decent organizational warrior for a team in 2003. Fhyrie was good in AAA 7-2, 2.33 ERA and close to horrible in Oakland 2-4, 4.44 ERA. Fhyrie lucked out a few times in getting big leads in his starts and also threw a lot of gas on the fire when asked to come in for long relief.


Fhyrie will find a home with somebody, Tampa and Texas could do a lot worse.

What’s New Pussycat?

Apparently it took 36 hours to explain exactly how old Theo Epstein is, what the Expo situation merits and why Nashville, TN was a better choice for the Winter Meetings than Las Vegas, NV. But, once those minor things on the GM’s short laundry list had been taken care of, the wheeling and/or dealing began.

Busy Beane

Billy Beane has been busy and the layers of his progress are multi-fold.


The trade to acquire Erubiel Durazo (eventually) from Arizona took three years, several stupid rumors and uncovered Beane’s backup plan. Beane had been jostling with Philadelphia to reacquire the Giambi who would not slide. We hope Beane was gregarious enough to mention something in passing to the Phils about Pat Burrell, as well, before getting on to other business.


The meat of the Durazo deal is this:
The A’s send a player to be named later to Toronto.
The Toronto Blue Jays send Shortstop Felipe Lopez to the Cincinnati Reds.
The Reds send Elmer Dessens to the Arizona Diamondbacks.
The D-backs send Durazo to the A’s and Arizona grabs $333,000 each from Cincinnati, Oakland and Toronto. One of the few trades in which Billy Beane has ever sent cash for a player.


Breaking down the A’s portion:
The player to be named later is rumored to be Jason Arnold, the pitcher acquired by the A’s in the Jeff Weaver/Ted Lilly deal late last year. Arnold is more or less expendable due to the A’s bevy (bevy?) of pitching prospects in AA. We’d say plethora of pitching prospects, but El Guapo might be angry with us.


Anyway. John Sickels writes stuff.


The A’s are rumored to be sending John Ford-Griffin (great assassin’s name, by the way) the outfielder the A’s acquired in the same deal to Toronto as well. Sort of the player to be named sooner in a soon to be announced deal. Our mouth is watering because it is rumored by several sources, including the San Francisco Chronicle, that Adam Dunn of the Reds is being mentioned in trade talks.


Durazo was much sought after by Billy Beane and a few ‘good’ things happened in Arizona last season into this off-season that allowed Durazo to become expendable. First, he has been injury prone. Not a huge deal, but it does knock a player’s value down. Second, Mark Grace is a name that Arizona likes to have associated with firstbase at BankOne Ballpark. Also, the D-Backs have a prospect, Lyle Overbay, five days short of being two years younger than Durazo in AAA. Third, and most important, the Arizona brain trust at GM constantly runs around like a water boy with a leaky bucket. The only focus Arizona seems to have is trying to be the oldest team in baseball. We know that there are a lot of retirees in Arizona, but that doesn’t mean you have to put them on your 40 man roster.


The other rumor that went around this weekend was a stupid ploy by ESPN to make it look like they were doing something when the knew (read: their journalists had not picked up a scent of any deals despite all of the apparent activity taking place) nothing. Harold Reynolds and Tim Kukjian went in front of the camera and supposed a True or False game in which the ESPN anchor (who knows who this jabbermouth was) lobbed possible rumors at them. The rumor was a Miguel Tejada for Durazo/Byung Hyun-Kim. Kurkjian shot is down as asinine. Reynolds took the bait and added that Miguel Tejada was looking for $160 million as a free agent. $160 million? How stupid is that? Giambi was let go over less than $120 million and Tejada has possibly aged two years in the last two months. $160 million? Harold Reynolds might be the stupidest upright human since...no, Harold Reynolds is the stupidest human being ever. Call the anthropologists, we found the missing link.

Back at the Ranch

The Giants singed Edgardo Alfonzo and are possibly looking to acquire the remains of Pee Wee Reese. If the Giants sign Jeff Kent there won’t be any room on the infield when the team takes infield practice.


The Giants have offered Kent arbitration, though, it looks as though they are just going through the motions. The Giants have let it be known they know that Kent’s camp knows that they know that Kent is looking for a multi-year deal. The Giants are making it known they will not have a padded door available to hit Kent in the ass on the way out. The Giants are playing hardball with Kent, which is what you do in arbitration. But, could this be repurcushions of the truck wahing incident form the spring emerging?


The Mets signed Jeff Stanton to a three year deal worth about $9 million. The Mets are without a left side of the infield and need to grab some people in a hurry. It would not surprise us is the Mets were in the lead for the Montreal Expos lottery and grabbed the deal breaker, Fernando Tatis, from the Expos and got Tony Armas, Jr or Javier Vasquez with only a minor conscession in the form of a AAA or AA player.

Rule 5 Draft Notice

The Rule 5 Draft results;


Round One
Player, New Organization/Old Organization
Enrique Cruz, IF Milwaukee NY Mets
Hector Luna, SS Tampa Bay Cleveland
Carl Hernandez, RHP San Diego Atlanta
Wilfredo Ledezma, LHP Detroit Boston
Derek Thompson, LHP Chicago (NL) Cleveland
Daniel Carrasco, RHP Kansas City Pittsburgh
Matthew Roney, RHP Pittsburgh Colorado
Victor Hall, OF Colorado Arizona
Marshall McDougall, 3B Texas Cleveland
Travis Chapman, 3B Cleveland Philadelphia
Kenneth Prokopec, RHP Cincinnati Los Angeles
Aquilino Lopez, RHP Toronto Seattle
Javier Lopez, LHP Boston Arizona
Luis Ayala, RHP Montreal Arizona
Jose Morban, SS Minnesota Texas
Michael Neu, RHP Oakland St. Louis
Christopher Spurling, RHP Atlanta Pittsburgh


Round Two
Player, New Organization/Old Organization
Matthew Ford, LHP Milwaukee Toronto
Shane Victorino, OF San Diego Los Angeles
Ronny Paulino, C Kansas City Pittsburgh
John Koronka, LHP Texas Cincinnati
Blake Williams, RHP Cincinnati St. Louis
Gary Majewski, RHP Toronto Chicago (AL)
Matt White, LHP Boston Cleveland
Rontrez Johnson, OF Oakland Texas

Absolution

We admit it. Many things piss us off. Very few things make us sick. The Pete Rose situation makes us sick.


Travis Nelson was nice enough to mention us at Boy of Summer regarding the Only Baseball Matters piece we wrote on Rose.


ESPN.COM is feeding the fire by having several articles on its MLB page. The problem is, they are siding the issue. You can look at all the pro-Pete Rose crap you want for free, but if you want to read why Rose should be kept out, you have to pay and be an ESPN.COM INSIDER.


Plus, we're getting sick of those Miller Lite pop-ups on EVERY SINGLE ESPN.COM page.


The fact remains that Pete Rose agreed to his lifetime ban from baseball. Essentially he pled no lo contendre. Pete Rose is a guilty man and a horrible human being who made millions off of his persona non grata attitude. Now, he's going to be given carte blanche to return to baseball as long as he 'admits wrongdoing'.

Our STAFF wants to admit wrongdoing, too. One of us took the SAT's hungover and got a 1410; we feel we should get a better score and be allowed into an Ivy League school and be given a six-figure job right out of graduate school. One of us basically plagerized a paper in college by failing to cite a source and lifting a sentence or two and re-working them from a textbook to help with the finer points; we feel we should get a three book deal with Pendant Publishing and be granted post valledictorian. One of us cheated on our girlfiends a long time ago; we fell we should be able to sleep with our ex-girlfirend anytime we want, now. We have admitted our wrongdoing.


If you want the best analogy for the Pete Rose issue, here it is; a guy cheats on his girlfriend by sleeping with his wife, if he aplogizes all will be forgotten...including the spousal abuse, the rape and battery, the DUI, the stealing of her grandmother's social security checks and the night he spent in jail for exposing himself in public. He can even go back to boozing it up, snorting coke of his girlfriend's rack and beating the crap out of her and the kids.


Meanwhile the wife sits at home waiting for the other shoe to hit her in the head. Hey, it's what the wife and girlfriend want in the end that really counts, right? He's paid his dues with that night in prison and the community service. People should get off of his back. He's an American Hero.

Never-Never Land

Somewhere, deep in the dark of a federal penitentiary, several confessed and convicted felons are having a round table discussion. They are debating about the ethical and moral dilemma of lying. You see, these criminals are worried. Sure lying, thieving and being generally crooked is what got them there in the first place. But, this is different. Claiming to be sorry for their crimes and weeping in front of their parole board might have dire consequences. Should they play the part of the born-again and be denied parole, they could be the backstop of every member and his bitch on cell block D.


Worse, yet, they could be released. Back on the streets, they would have a few months of freedom before receiving their edited mail back in a prison cell. The parole board isn't going to take kindly to a criminal that played them for fools. It might take three or four attempts at perfecting their craft this time.


They need to convince a parole board that they spent a long time in a horrible place with a great cable TV package. They need to develop a lie through self-delusion that actually seems credible. They can't simply lie this time, they actually have to be generally sorry for lying. About the previous lie. Not this one. This one doesn't count.


When they are picked up, again, they would need a Costanza caliber lie to be paroled a third time. A lie so seeped into other lies that there are layers upon layers of lies. Even if one lie is found out, other lies take its place, creating a perpetual lie, as it were.


On a related note; Pete Rose.

We Get Free Pub!

David Pinto, of BASEBALL MUSINGS, mentions our piece we whipped out for John Perricone's ONLY BASEBALL MATTERS.


We like seeing our name in print.


Admitting guilt doesn't absolve you from the punishment, no matter what the Catholic Church says.