Robbing Peter to pay Paul

INDIANAPOLIS--The last thing Ruben Amaro and the Phillies want to do here at the Winter Meetings is to go out and do something like make a trade. The way things stand now, Amaro likes the way his team looks. Oh sure, there are pieces to add here and there--big pieces, in fact. But as far as the core base of the club, the Phillies look good.

Nevertheless, Amaro and the Phillies are here looking for pitching. They want a couple of relievers and a starter to hold down the No. 4 or No. 5 spot of the rotation.

Ideally, Amaro wants those additions to come through free agency.

Since the team needs pitching and other teams want pitchers, it would be kind of silly for the Phillies to trade pitchers for pitchers...

Right?

"It's kind of like robbing Peter to pay Paul," Ruben said before adding the caveat that it really gets down to whether Peter is a better player than Paul.

Still, Amaro was pretty good at finding the guys the Phillies needed at the right time last season. Raul Ibanez was a pretty good pickup last winter and he's hoping that Placido Polanco at third base can be the same type of coup this year.

The only thing the Phillies had to give up to get either player was a first-round draft pick because Ibanez was a Type A free agent. Interestingly, the GM said if Polanco was a Type A guy the Phillies would have been reluctant to have gone after him, and he does not see the team going after any other players that would result in the Phillies giving up some type of compensation.

Third baseman Chone Figgins was a Type A free agent while Mark DeRosa, Adrian Beltre and Melvin Mora were Type B guys.

"I would not do it unless it was a guy who could make a huge impact, and frankly, those guys aren't out there right now," he said.

But John Smoltz is out there. So too is Randy Wolf, Jarrod Washburn, Jason Schmidt, Ben Sheets, Mark Prior, Brad Penny, Rich Harden, Jon Garland, Jose Contreras, Bartolo Colon, and Erik Bedard amongst the starters.

J.J. Putz and Chad Cordero are a couple of the relievers out there that would not require the Phillies to give up anything other than a paycheck.

In other words, if Ruben and the Phillies want to get this done on the cheap, it's doable. All it will take is a little bit of creativity. Certainly that was on display last July when Pedro Martinez was added for the playoff push.

But don't look for Pedro to be added back into the fold any time soon. Oh sure, he started three of the Phillies' last 10 postseason games, including two during the World Series. However, if Pedro returns to Philadelphia it will be after everything else is taken care of or there are not too many other options.

Just like last season, inking Pedro is something that will "develop later."

Nevertheless, Pedro has expressed an interest in another dance with the Phils and Ruben has stashed that info away for now. Still, from friends that have talked to him Pedro is preparing to pitch a full season if the right team will have him. In the short term, one of his friends says Pedro is back in the Dominican preparing for his celebrity golf tournament featuring the likes of David Ortiz and Ryan Howard.

We would have chatted a little longer with Ruben on Monday, but he had to run off to his second trade meeting of the afternoon...

Anyone want to guess if Peter, Paul and Joe Blanton's names come up?

Trolling the lobby

INDIANAPOLIS—Just did my first serious troll through the veritable Star Trek convention that is the Baseball Winter Meetings, and to describe the scene by paraphrasing a line from Bill Hader in the marvelous opening scene in the epic film, Pineapple Express, "One: lots of dudes... "

Truth be told, I've quoted that movie twice already this morning by using the always versatile phrase, "What happened to your eye?"

Regardless, the first trip proved to be quite fruitful when the rumor du jour involved ex-Phillie Pat Burrell. According to the reports, tweets and scuttlebutt, Burrell was said to be involved in a threeway deal.

Yeah, too easy...

The report was the Rays were going to trade Burrell to the Cubs for Milton Bradley and then the Cubs would turnaround and send Pat The Bat to the Mets.

Wouldn't it be awesome to see Burrell 18 times a season in a Mets' uniform? Just think about how much fun that would be aside from it underscoring the mercenary nature of baseball. Ah, but to be a wet blanket -- according to the terms of his contract, the Rays would have to pay Burrell cash if he were to be traded. Sure, the Rays got to the World Series in 2008 and are no longer the doormats of the American League, but that doesn't mean they are so flush with cash that they can go around making trades and signing free agents.

Leslie Gudel sent a message to Burrell on whether or not he heard about the rumor and (not surprisingly) he had not. Burrell wasn't known to follow the hot stove back when he was playing for the Phillies and he, said back then, he didn't even own a computer. Chances are he hasn't changed his media diet all that much in the year since he has been gone.

But when asked by Tim Brown of Yahoo!, a Rays' representative dropped the ol', "That's news to us," line on Brown.

In other words, the Burrell to the Cubs and Mets rumor was too good to be true.

Another good one had ex-Phillie Brett Myers headed to either Houston or Texas...

Yes, there is a joke somewhere in there, too. Go ahead and make up your own about Brett Myers, Texas, his penchant for going to the gun range, Ed Wade, and, of course, Brett Myers in the state of Texas.

Meanwhile, the Phillies didn't appear to be too busy on the first day of the Winter Meetings here at the Downtown Marriott. At one point, key front-office types Charley Kerfeld, Gordon Lakey and Howie Freiling were all in the lobby mingling with the scribes. While this was going on, Ruben Amaro Jr. and a bunch of the rest of the Phillies' brass were standing along the railing overlooking the lobby where they were undoubtedly making wise cracks about the show down below.

Like shooting fish in a barrel.

For what it's worth, the Phillies are said not to be willing to part with the money in order to get Brandon Lyon. Last season for the Tigers, the reliever earned $4.25 million and is in line for a raise this year. Still, he is the type of player the Phillies are looking to add before spring training.

Perhaps this is the off-season where the economy of the U.S. really comes into play.

Little pink houses...

INDIANAPOLIS—Why don’t we just roll up our sleeves and go ahead and get the rudimentary crap out of the way now…

For the news and analysis stuff from here at the baseball Winter Meetings, go to our site, CSNPhilly.com. That’s where Leslie Gudel, Rob Kuestner, and our new guy, Jim Salisbury, will drop the comings and goings of the week here from the Marriott in downtown Indianapolis.
 
Yes, I know… another Marriott.

This place, this so-called, “Food,” is for the little ancillary things. You know, kind of like the DVD extras. For instance, walking to the winter meetings this morning I happened across a historical marker that chronicled a rather Draconian time in Indiana state history.

And no, it had nothing to do with Larry Bird or Scott Rolen.

So why don’t we just get started already?

Here’s what we have… there’s a lobby full of agents, managers, front-office types and baseball writers. Oh yes, it’s a geek fest. Additionally, a large (or as they say, “Venti”) coffee costs $2.85 in the lobby Starbucks. When Leslie complained that her skinny vanilla latte cost $20, she was told that it was because there is a 10 percent sales tax in downtown Indy.

 “It’s kind of like being in an airport,” the barista said.

Anyway, this just might be the first mass Twitter-ed baseball winter meetings. Last year in Las Vegas Twitter hadn’t bore itself into the middle ear of the consciousness of the baseball world. If I can remember correctly, I’m pretty sure I dropped a whole bunch of stuff onto my Twitter feed last year in Vegas, but back then it was kind of like a dorky conversation with a bunch of people who actually knew what I looked like.

To be honest, it was much more fun back then.

Oh, the old days… sigh!

Ya want some rumors? Try these out: Pat Burrell might get traded to the Mets; Little Sarge Matthews might get traded; and Roy Halladay will get traded. and

Meanwhile, the Phillies are looking at a whole bunch of pitchers. One of those guys in the lobby gave me some names: Fernando Rodney, J.J. Putz, Brandon Lyon. That’s it so far.

As far as the Phillies go, it might be a quiet week. Last year the Phillies left Vegas with Ronny Paulino, Raul Ibanez and were almost finished with signing Chan Ho Park. Plus, Charlie Manuel got a contract extension in between sessions where a whole lotta tires got kicked.

Regardless, you can’t go to Indianapolis and leave empty handed, right? Expect Ruben Amaro to do something or at least talk a whole lot about something.

A whole lotta talkin' going on

INDIANAPOLIS—If you’re like me, you have the tendency to talk a lot of trash. There’s probably a more apt phrase to use in the place of “trash,” but since I’ve been away from the baseball folk for about a month, we’ll keep it clean for another 12 hours or so.

Like the people who work for the traveling carnival, sailors, or those who root through the bags here at the airport, baseball folk live a hard life. Oh, it’s completely by choice, mind you. As stated previously, baseball folks act like they have some sort of link to history or Americana, but the truth is you wouldn’t let any of them hold your car keys.

But none of this has anything to do with my boastful countenance. In fact, I don’t even need a reason to let loose with the trash talk. Hey, think I’m gonna let someone bust up my party? No way, man. Put me in a room with the baseball carnys and I’ll keep a hand on my wallet and keep them off guard with a little yapping.

It’s all I got.

So we’re off to Indianapolis for the annual baseball Winter Meetings. Last year they held the event in Las Vegas, which was like putting the Star Trek Convention at Cannes. Watching the writer types mill around the high-roller room at the Bellagio with their lanyards and name tags all in place and those Dockers fitted just right, was disturbing and clearly ruined the vibe of the entire town. Some establishments decided to take preventative measures by turning off all the glittering lights and boarded up the windows as if a hurricane was on the way. Baseball scribes in Las Vegas? Yeah, imagine Estelle Getty in the Victoria’s Secret runway show.

Needless to say, the Vegas Chamber of Commerce and/or convention bureau won’t be drawing up a petition to have the gang back.

Indianapolis seems like the appropriate place to hold the baseball Winter Meetings. Actually, Branson, Missouri is probably the most perfect place, but both the Charlie Daniels’ Band AND The Osmond’s are performing this week. Why ruin the buzz of the hot stove?

Whether or not that stove will be hissing and burning on the Phillies side of the convention center remains to be seen. GM Ruben Amaro Jr. already took care of the biggest need of the off-season when he inked Placido Polanco to play third base, Brian Schneider to be the backup catcher, and Juan Castro to fill the role previously held by Eric Bruntlett.

That’s the brunt of the holiday shopping right there for the Phillies.

But it’s not Santa riding into town with a sleigh full of the big-ticket items. And needless to say we shouldn’t be listening for the pitter-patter of hooves on the roof this year. Oh sure, there still is a chance Pedro Martinez could return to the fold, which truly is the gift that keeps on giving. Oh sure, sometimes predicting the results on the mound from Pedro are a bit of a crapshoot (yes, we already miss Vegas), however, to ball scribes he’s like a three-day weekend in the middle of July. One time when I was looking for something to write about I walked over to Pedro in the clubhouse and said (essentially), “Hey Pedro, can you just talk and I’ll go to my computer and write it all down.”

Pedro filled it up.

My promise is that if Pedro returns I will write lyric poems about him. Hell, why not a feature on the Louis Vuitton man-purse he carries around.

Outside of Pedro, it seems as if the Phillies will target current Mets flop, J.J. Putz as the addition to the bullpen…

Hey, sorry about that flop crack. That wasn’t fair considering Putz was injured and it was the fault of one man for the Mets’ suckitude in 2009. That was a total team effort from the front office on down. The truth is Putz would be a big-time “get” for Ruben, the Phillies, and smart-alecky types that enjoy making fun of other people’s surnames.

I don’t like the last group of people I mentioned.

When he pitched for the Mets, Putz wasn’t very good. However, in 2007 he saved 40 games for the Mariners and posted a 1.38 ERA. Needless to say, that’s the guy the Phillies want to get.

Anyway, whether its Vegas or Indianapolis, I’m not going to be the only person talking trash this week. The truth is it will be piled high and deep in the lobby of some very nice hotel filthy with baseball types. Wear a cup.

Anyone know if Mellencamp is in town?

Tuning in for the re-runs with A.I.

Every night on several channels on the dial, one can watch repeats of Seinfeld and The Simpsons or any other TV show that reached its glory in the 1990s. It’s a wonderful thing, and it works for everyone involved.

For the broadcaster, the old standbys are not only ratings winners, but very attractive to the advertisers. The advertisers, of course, spend the money that makes the world go round and keeps those repeats of Everybody Loves Raymond coming. Meanwhile, the folks at home know that if they need a little chuckle or a chance to unwind with some mindless humor/background noise, just dial it up.

In fact, shows in syndication are so popular that sometimes even the start times of live events like baseball playoffs are pushed back a bit in order to air that one sold episode of Friends.

See, it’s a win-win for everyone.

But according to the 76ers’ general manager Ed Stefanski, his team is not airing this latest repeat for the money or the ratings. Oh sure, the show aspect of it is compelling enough, and when one looks at the attendance numbers for the Sixers this season—the team is next-to-last in average attendance—it’s obvious that something is missing. Whether it’s the bad economy and the holidays approaching or the hangover from back-to-back World Series trips by the Phillies and playoff runs by the Eagles and Flyers, folks haven’t connected with the Sixers.

Of course the current seven-game losing streak and spate of key injuries don’t help either.

So rather than dig up some old I Love Lucy episode to play on the Fan-a-vision above the arena, Stefanski and the Sixers opted to sign Allen Iverson to a non-guaranteed contract. That means if the team doesn’t think it’s working out with Iverson, they can just let him go. You know, kind of like what the Memphis Grizzlies did last week.

Buh-by, A.I.

And like any other re-run we all know how it’s going to end with Iverson. We’ve all seen this show before. In 2006 when Iverson was still with the Sixers, we walked out on the team and coach Maurice Cheeks, failed to show up for practice (Practice?!), and was suspended until the team could find a place to trade him.

Iverson ended up first in Denver where he and Carmelo Anthony couldn’t figure out a way to share the ball. When Detroit came calling with Chauncey Billups offered, it was a too good of a deal for Denver to pass up.

You know how it goes from here. Iverson was relegated to bench duty, a tantrum followed, and then he quit on Detroit and Memphis. No, as far as ungraceful exits go it’s not quite Willie Mays tripping in the outfield with the New York Mets or Johnny Unitas wearing that gaudy San Diego Chargers uniform, but it was perfectly clichéd nonetheless.

If there is earth to be scorched or bridges to burn, Iverson is your man.

But that’s not why the Sixers dialed up Iverson. That would be way too easy for even the most cynical of us to scoff at. No, this time the non-guaranteed contract and the relative bottom-basement $650,000 salary if the team chooses to keep Iverson for the rest of the season is way too convenient to pass up.

“We made a basketball decision here when we found out that Lou Williams will be out close to eight weeks, which is 30-plus games,” Stefanski said.

“Allen was the best free agent out there for what we need right now.”

In other words, chances are the Sixers wouldn’t even give Iverson a second look had Williams not been hurt. Sure, Iverson still puts the fannies in the seats (in this town) and as far as soap operas go there has never been anything like him in the history of Philly sports. So when thinking about this move look no further than at the Phillies and their mid-season signing of Pedro Martinez last summer. In need of a dependable, No. 5 starter, the general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. took a flier on the three-time Cy Young Award winner and one of the best right-handed pitchers in a generation with the caveat that if it didn’t work out, the team could waive him.

No fuss, no muss.

As it turned out, Pedro ended up pitching a couple of gems during the regular season and one in the NLCS before taking two starts in the World Series. Obviously, that move worked out.

Don’t expect the Sixers to get to the NBA Finals (or even the playoffs) just because they signed Iverson. After all, he couldn’t start for the lowly Memphis Grizzlies and even the New York Knicks didn’t want any part of Iverson. But as a stop-gap, ahem answer, Iverson might just be good enough.

Nope, this is the perfect scenario for Iverson and the Sixers. This is a repeat with some DVD extras in that it can be sold as a farewell tour of sorts. It can be billed as the extended swan song of a career that, statistically-speaking, is more than Hall-of-Fame worthy.

So break out the old “Practice” video and the dizzying step-over on Tyronn Lue because Iverson is back. No, he’s no longer the answer, but he sure is a lot more entertaining than anything else that’s on.

Murder and weather is the only news

We live in a weird world.

Yeah, just let that one stand there for a moment. It’s not exactly the deepest bit of breaking news out there, but really, what else is there to say about the events of the past weekend?

Besides, I don’t know what type font to use for a slow, eye roll or headshake.

Indeed, it’s a weird world we live in. Think about it for a second—here in the U.S., we are in the midst of two different wars, we have an economy that is a mess with no real easy fix. Worse, though some say the country is showing some signs of economic recovery, the unemployment rate is in double-digits with any job that can be outsourced somewhere cheaper, gone in the blink of an eye.

In other words, to steal from Bob Dylan, “Money doesn’t talk, it swears.”

Speaking of swearing, there is a healthcare bill ready for debate in the Senate very shortly. Whether the bill becomes a law or not does not supercede the historical significance that an actual bill that would grant millions of uninsured Americans proper health care made it this far.

It would be like if the Eagles won the Super Bowl or something… you know, something that has never happened.

Americans have so little regard for anything it seems. Sure, we’re told to be moral and just and all of that stuff, but out of the other side of the mouth comes the advice that if you can stick it to the other guy, get him before he gets you.

Since the world is a rat race it’s OK to be a rat.

We revel in failure. Just look at what the trendy television shows are—any type of live action, reality thing where we can sit in the safety of out over financed home with goods purchased on credit that are a couple of missed payments away from a visit from the repo man, and judge along with the “celebrity” judges. American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, Jon & Kate—you name it. As long as the someone making asses out of themselves is someone else, dial it up.

The worst part about this isn't that it's the crap we get fed... it's that the powers believe we like it. Because of that they get to treat hard-working, regular folks like they are idiots all because something as stupid as "Survivor" got good ratings.

Frankly, that's just mean.

So should it comes as a big surprise that at a time where real, sobering news should be delivered with all the proper nuance, we were treated to stories about White House gatecrashers and Tiger Woods’ mishap with an SUV and a fire hydrant as if they were just another Thanksgiving leftover.

Just pile it on deeper and deeper. We’ll get back on the nourishing, healthy program later.

Then again none of this should come as a surprise. We’ve already trashed real news and turned it into a press release or marketing ploy to a degree that somewhere Nietzsche and Darwin are trading high-fives. After all, two attention-starved jackasses are getting exactly what they wanted from a national press too vapid to see the irony in the reportage.

I’d go into deeper detail about the Secret Service/White House foul-up, but I think I’m going to go punch myself in the face first.

There… better.

The oddest story of the weekend belonged to Tiger Woods, which is kind of news, but not really. See, when the No. 1 golfer on the planet wrecks his car into a tree and fire hydrant at 2:25 a.m. the morning after Thanksgiving, is found with scratches and bruises on his face while lying on his back unconscious next to the vehicle, which just so happened to have the back windows bashed out by his wife with a long iron, well yeah, that’s a news story. In fact, it’s a pretty big story.

But because there was no drugs involved—legal or otherwise—the story ends as soon as Tiger finishes his next 18 holes. If he can play golf and did not commit a crime, the rest of the story is no one’s bleeping business.

Seriously, get a life. It’s not that difficult. Tiger has one, but you can’t have it. Really, go get your own.

But that would be too difficult. So too would be digging into the issues of healthcare, economics or tribal wars in unfamiliar continents. Why count on people to think when they can get some eye candy? Why nourish when it’s the junk food that delivers the big bucks.

Hey, if the world is a rat race maybe we have no other choice than to be rats.

So as we hop on that spinning wheel so we can run in place and hope someone drops us another unfulfilling pellet, we might as well have some fun with it, right?

Try this theory out for size—the reason why “celebrity” stories and tell-all journalism is forced down our throats and controversy is created where it shouldn’t exist is because newsmen and women did the right thing back in the old days.

In sports, how many dust-ups did Mickey Mantle and Billy Martin get into during the average year? How many times did Mickey show up at the ballpark still hung over from a night at Toots Shor’s? Or what about Frank, Sammy and Dean-O? You know those guys were out having a good time running around the strip in Vegas—come on, we all heard Dean Martin at the Sands or Frank doing his thing at the Desert Inn.

And we know there was no way in hell that liquid in those rocks glasses wasn’t iced tea.

Oh yes, ballplayers, crooners, stars, starlets, politicians and presidents went out, got into trouble and didn’t have to worry about reading about it the next day on TMZ because there was something different going on back then…

People had their own lives and didn’t need to borrow Frank Sinatra’s. They didn’t go crashing some party they weren’t invited to because that would be classless. Worse, it’s tacky.

Nevertheless, murder and weather now have a partner on the nightly news and it’s called the celebrity minute. Only this time it lasts longer than a minute—it’s all they give us.

Iverson remains true to himself

So the word from somewhere is that Allen Iverson is retired from the NBA. Jut like that, without so much as a Farewell Tour that the true greats like Kareem and Doc had, the self-proclaimed "The Answer" is off to kick back on the back porch or terrorize hourly-wage casino workers at a riverboat near you.

Then again, was there ever a better way for Iverson to go out? A simple word-of-mouth--or in this case, word-of-blog--and it was finished. No sloppy ending, no tears, no more practice.

And that's a good thing. Unlike most athletes, Iverson always called the tune. He didn't want to come off the bench, adjust his game or mentor younger players with the last-place Memphis Grizzlies, so rather than sulk and pout, a talent as deadly as his crossover once was, Iverson just quit.

Good for him.

Maybe he heard about Willie Mays falling on the ground during the 1973 World Series while finishing up his career back in New York for the Mets. Certainly he remembered how silly Michael Jordan looked in that Washington Wizards uniform in his last two seasons.

Why put himself through that?

No, Iverson claimed he was a starting player. He was MVP of the All-Star Game twice and MVP of the league in 2001. He won the scoring title four times and until the Pistons and Grizzlies cut his minutes during the last two seasons, he averaged close to 30 points per game for his career. Why should he change? Why should he admit that he's just the same as everyone else? Time, that great equalizer, finally caught up to Iverson just as it did for all of the NBA greats. It happened to Larry Bird in his early 30s just like it happened to Jordan, Wilt Chamberlain and every other NBA player with a lot of miles and games on the legs.

Iverson is 34 and that's the magic age for NBA players. That's the age when players have to figure out how to adjust or go home.

Iverson decided to go home.

It's certainly nothing to be ashamed of though the word leaking out is that Iverson still regards himself as a top-level player. Apparently the fact that he had just one taker during a summer of free agency and not even the hapless New York Knicks wanted him when the last-place Grizzlies placed Iverson on waivers.

Sometimes the end comes faster one last drive to the hoop. At least it seems as if Iverson  gets that even if reluctantly.

*
So how will we remember Iverson? Certainly in Philadelphia it will be as the most controversial and polarizing athlete to hit town.

At the same time he very well might have been the most exciting and electrifying Philly ballplayer. Every night was a highlight film waiting to happen even if they didn't all result in wins or championships.

Oftentimes it was the little things that were most impressive about Iverson. Like the time when he played 41 minutes and scored 29 points with a separated shoulder against Golden State in 2001. Or that week in 2002 when he had a triple-double in one game and 58 points in another. Nevertheless, in a pile of superlatives, Iverson's best game was Game 1 of the 2001 NBA Finals in Los Angeles.

That was the one that culminated with this:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grXws5m11SA&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

So if it's over for Iverson, it sure was fun. Still, it's not difficult to wonder if it could have ended a little better (or happier) for everyone.

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Enjoy your holiday, folks. We have big plans here... we're going to enjoy a big meal with family and friends and then we're going to take a nap until the manager of the Sizzler kicks us out.

So check back later tonight or tomorrow morning for all the leftovers and updates on the best holiday there is.

Albert makes it easy

If there is one thing we do well in the sports world, it’s our ability to complain. Oh, we whine, too. It doesn’t matter the motive or motivation—there are very few things sports folks do better than complain.

That’s especially the case amongst my brethren in the media. If something isn’t just so, get ready for an earful. Hey, I’m as guilty as the next guy even though when one breaks it down we are paid to travel around, see the country, watch ballgames and write about what we see.

What are we complaining about?

Nevertheless, there is always something. Lately I’ve had a bit of a beef with the voting results from the Baseball Writers Association of America. I thought J.A. Happ should have been the Rookie of the Year and Charlie Manuel probably should have finished a little higher in the balloting than sixth place.

Additionally, the two guys who did not include Chris Carpenter on their Cy Young Award ballot and replaced them with Javier Vazquez (what?) and Dan Haren (really?) should be forced to a Dr. Strangelove-type of torture in which their eyes are held open by metal prongs as the VORP of every player in the Majors passes on a projector.

The guy who gave a first-place vote to Miguel Cabrera for MVP can join them.

Still, the bottom line is I just don’t like the BBWAA. I’m just not into omnipotent secret societies with no oversight, and too much arrogance, but that’s me. Hey, I wouldn’t join the Elks, Moose Lodge, the Birch Society, KKK, Triple-A, Skull and Bones or Augusta National, either. Hey, I’m just not a joiner. But worse, I don’t like that the players’ union, MLB or the Hall of Fame hands them the responsibility of selecting the players who can make the most money.

Which is what they do.

I’m not for getting rid of the awards. Heck, I even like them even though there is something of an Academy Awards feel to them. How can they give a best actor award to guys who didn’t play the same part?

There is a way to do it properly, which is to have Commissioner Costas form a voting taskforce of the best baseball minds from all facets of the media. Just make sure they have a good attendance record at ball games during the summer. How about 110 games during the regular season? That’s two-thirds of the season… good number, right?

Or not. Whatever. It’s just baseball.

Baseball, however, does not seem to be what Albert Pujols is playing. Fact is, he’s playing a different game entirely and was justly bestowed his third MVP Award on Tuesday in an even more just unanimous vote.

In other words, this one was pretty difficult to mess up.

Credit Pujols for being so great. In fact, dig through the archives of this site and there are probably three or four posts about how Albert Pujols is the best hitter I’ve ever seen (hey, they’re my eyes) and probably the best right-handed hitter ever. I tried to get Charlie Manuel to admit as much last spring when the two of us just shot the breeze in his office in Clearwater with the CNBC ticking off the trading day on the TV above our heads. Charlie wasn’t biting but that’s because it probably wasn’t politically correct to call an active player the best ever. That’s especially the case if the guy is in the same league, too.

Baseball people are weird about hyperbole. It’s no fun.

But what Charlie said was, “He’s up there. He can be whatever you want him to be.”

That’s not a knock of any sort – far from it. After all, we were talking about a player that truly is an once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon. In fact, Charlie said Pujols and Manny Ramirez were the two best right-handed hitters out there right now, which might be out of some sort of loyalty to his former pupil.

Come on… Pujols is clearly in a different league than Ramirez.

“Home runs, ribbies, slugging, average, he can do whatever you want,” the Charlie said. “He can be whatever you want him to be.”

That’s Charlie-speak meaning Pujols can do whatever it is the situation calls for.

That doesn’t begin to describe Pujols’ greatness though. In taking the MVP Award for the third time in five years (he probably should have four of them), there isn’t much Pujols hasn’t accomplished in nine seasons in the league. He has all the awards, gotten the big hits and, most importantly, won the World Series.

And get this, he’s nine years into his career and hasn’t even turned 30 yet.

Can we put him in the Hall of Fame already? Why deal with the formality of a vote? Who would be the guy who didn’t vote for Pujols?

Put simply, if the second nine seasons of Pujols’ career are anything like the first nine years, we’re looking at the first player in history to have more than 700 homers and 3,000 hits as well as the fourth guy to get 500 homers with more than 3,000 hits.

That’s unreasonable either. Actually, with nine straight seasons of 100-plus RBIs and only four seasons where he failed to hit at least 41 homers he’s well on his way. Considering Pujols is just now entering his prime, the numbers could pile up.

Or maybe not. As Barry Bonds described a few years back after a game in Philly during his chase for Babe Ruth’s home run mark, there might come a time when teams simply decide not to pitch to him any more.

“Albert’s going to have to deal with a lot of walks,” Bonds said. “He’s going to get walked a lot, unfortunately. He’s that good. Unfortunately, he plays in the National League, and when you’ve got pitchers coming up, and in a different league, it’s a little bit different. If he was in the American League, we might be saying something different, but in the National League, if he keeps going the way he’s going, he’s going to be walked a ton.”

Yeah, we might be getting to that point now. Pujols got 44 intentional walks last season, plus three in three games during the playoffs.

So was Pujols the MVP this year? Yeah, but why not just give him the award in perpetuity and tell him to give it back when he’s finished.

Programming update

So, a guy designs a new web site, changes platforms and then takes off?

Well, yeah, something like that.

Actually, I've been a little busy catching up on some things that were neglected during the baseball season (as well as some other, more fun projects), which explains the dearth of posts lately. But fret not, there will be two new ones coming this week, including a look at the 2009 MLB/BBWAA award season, which, as always, has been farcetastic!

Over the next few weeks, we also have the baseball winter meetings planned. Last year as long-time readers of this site remember, the winter meetings were in Las Vegas... this year, Indianapolis.

Yeah.

Needless to say we'll dive right into the fray in Indiana in December.

In the meantime, feel free to peruse the rest of the world wide web. We'll be back tomorrow.

The handball, the LSD no-no, and an elbow to the head

The great thing about the Internet is that there is space for everyone. It truly is the great equalizer in that if someone writes a great story for a small newspaper or a blog, or takes a great photo, it will be read, viewed, scrutinized and ruminated upon as if it were posted by some of the biggest media conglomerates in the world.

In other words, these days everyone has the same circulation.

At least that’s the righteous, unicorns-and-rainbows view of things.

Nevertheless, it doesn’t have to be just the written word to make things equal. Thanks to the Internets we can watch local TV commercials from Mobile, Ala. or a high school marching band in Stockton, Calif. as if they were in our hometown. However, when a web site assumes that I want to see its video and launches its player pre-emptively, I run the other way.

Click. Buh-bye.

Be this as it might, there were three videos o the interwebs the past two weeks that were—as they say in the biz—“viral.” That is, these little snippets of video transcended their place in the media stratosphere and became part of the cultural wallpaper. Better yet, they all filled a proper spot in what drives the sports landscape. One was quite outrageous in a newsworthy way, another outrageous in a funny way, and the third one was outrageous in the “WTF?” way.

Internet, man, we do jargon.

Anyway, the first one came from a sporting event that probably would have caused a small ripple if it hadn’t been for our digital world. And because of this, national governments have become galvanized for action more so than the mere, corruptible sporting agencies.

Yes, it very well could have been the handball heard ‘round the world that enabled France to forge a tie in a World Cup qualifier match and disqualify Ireland from next summer in South Africa.

Here’s the controversial play:

Soccer, of course, is like football times a zillion in the rest of the world. In fact, they ignore our homegrown sports like baseball and football, choosing instead to mock our penchant for gun ownership and all-you-can-eat buffets. They also seem to laugh at our sports zealotry by superseding our quaint little tailgate partying with bona fide hooliganism and felonious crime.

So when a national football team is blatantly wronged in such an important match, it’s not just players, coaches and fans that lash out. Oh no, the Justice Minister of Ireland weighed in.

“If that result remains, it reinforces the view that if you cheat you will win,” Irish Justice Minister Dermot Ahern told The Associated Press, adding that two French players appeared offside from a free kick that preceded the goal. “Millions of people worldwide saw it was a blatant double hand ball, not to mention a double offside. We should put the powers that be in the cozy world of FIFA on the spot and demand a replay.”

It’s not just Irish football fans that are worked up, either. No, when a call so bad that even Major League umpires chuckle to themselves goes viral, the entire world demands justice. Facebook groups get formed, and international organizations draw up petitions.

Even Bono was outraged...

OK, I don’t know for a fact if Bono was outraged by the outcome of the game, but I bet he was even though a Google search turned up nothing.

Despite calls for the game to replayed, those always-looking-on-the-sunny-side-of-the-street Irish are a depressed lot. They believe it was no surprise that France, a World Cup finalist in 2006, somehow managed to thwart Ireland’s chances.

Even though the injustice has spread across the world one megabyte after the other, the Irish cannot find hope. The minister of justice said he does not believe FIFA will demand a replay.

“They probably won’t grant it as we are minnows in world football,” Ahern said. “But let’s put them on the spot anyway.”

Yes, the Irish are poetic even in defeat.

*
From the crazy department, a fellow by the name of James Blagden developed one of the more interesting and entertaining bits of baseball history with an animated short called, “Dock Ellis and the L.S.D. No-No.” Mixed with pop-inspired art work (Blagden’s entire body of work is tremendous), an old interview with the Pirates pitcher in which he describes his L.S.D.-fueled no-hitter for the Pirates in 1970, as well as some trippy sound effects, I’m not ashamed to put Blagden’s short right up there with Ken Burns’ nine-part documentary for PBS called, creatively, “Baseball.”

In fact, “Dock Ellis and the L.S.D. No-No,” might be more accurate.

Takes a look:

So crazy, but all true. And not too bad for the typical eight-walk, six-strikeout no-no from a guy best known for serving up Reggie Jackson’s epic home run in the 1971 All-Star Game at Tiger Stadium, over the two World Series appearances and 138 big-league wins.

Ellis died of liver disease last December at age 63, but thankfully there are plenty of interviews out there so we can get a gauge of who he was. Better yet, Ellis proves my argument that there was no better time for baseball than the 1970s when everyone seemed to be just a little crazy.

But, you know, in a good way.

Imagine if Bill Lee, Mark Fidrych or Dock Ellis came along with the conformists in the game these days. You see how everyone goes crazy of Chad Ochocinco? Hell, he would have blended in 30 years ago.

Here’s Dock shortly before he died.

And how can we count out Miss Elizabeth Lambert, the soccer player for the women’s team at the University of New Mexico, who, shall we say, got a little over-zealous in trying to win one for her school.

[yahoo id=16564453 vid=6387542 w=512 h=322 thumburl=http://l.yimg.com/a/i/us/sch/cn/video02/6387542_rnd68821639_19.jpg]

Just when it looked like she couldn’t top the pony-tail yank or the right-cross to the spine, she went out and topped it with a elbow-to-the-head/takedown combo.

Fierce.

Better yet, Miss Lambert, a soon-to-be 21-year-old junior, brought back the sexist notion that women are not allowed to play sports aggressively. This comes on the heels of Serena Williams’ web-enhanced tirade in the U.S. Open when a poor call by a line judge cost her in a crucial point of the match.

So how come it’s OK when Johnny McEnroe or any other male athlete throws tantrums on the playing field, but Serena can’t?

Hmmmmm? Answers?

Lambert apologized for her behavior, but pointed out that if a man had behaved the same way, it would not have been as big of a deal. After all, guys like Charles Barkley, Rick Mahorn and others made careers on over-the-top aggressive play.

“I definitely feel because I am a female it did bring about a lot more attention than if a male were to do it,” Lambert said. “It's more expected for men to go out there and be rough. The female, we're still looked at as, Oh, we kick the ball around and score a goal. But it's not. We train very hard to reach the highest level we can get to. The physical aspect has maybe increased over the years. I'm not saying it's for the bad or it's been too overly aggressive. It's a game. Sports are physical.”

Yes indeed.

Ready for action

The new site is up!

Actually, it's just new (and more functional) to me and the folks who count and measure things. To you the changes will be subtle at first and then slowly more features will be added.

In the upcoming months, we will mix in video- and podcasts with the regular features of this dog-and-pony show. We might even get some new graphics, interactive thingys (yes, thingys) and whatever else the market research says we should be doing.

Or whatever.

We'll just keep trying to tell interesting and fun stories. Bells and whistles are nice if there is substance behind them...

Right?

Anyway, here's the new Finger Food... same as the old Finger Food.

Time for Brian Westbrook to hang 'em up

Take a perfect Jell-o mold and place it in a bowl of your choosing. It could be Tupperware or Pyrex or whatever. Just make sure there is some space at the top for a lid and the mold is as pristine as possible.

Now, shake it the container and watch what happens to the Jell-o.

Pretty weird, huh? The mold shakes and bumps all over and usually goes back to the way it was. However, every so often pieces of the Jell-o break off and float around adjacent to the main body. Other parts develop fissures and cracks.

And even if the shape holds, the shaking loosens the foundation in a way that future shake-ups just might cause things to fall apart.

That Jell-o, friends, is what happens to a brain when it has a concussion. It bangs up against the walls of the skull with what little room is available. Usually, it bounces back and leaves one with nothing more than a really honey of a headache and some dizziness for a day or two. Other times the brain gets bruised and beat and it takes a little longer for it bounce back.

But always, not matter how mild or severe the concussion, the stage has been set for more damage in the future. After the first concussion, it’s so much easier for a person to get another one. After two, it gets even easier still.

In other words, it’s a vicious cycle in the worst way. Brain damage, disease, and even death are the side effects of future concussions.

And that’s why Brian Westbrook should sit down with the people who really love him (as opposed to those who love him as a football player) and contemplate his future in professional football. Having suffered two concussions in 21 days, Westbrook should give serious consideration to hanging ‘em up for good.

So far the Eagles aren’t saying much about Westbrook’s latest concussion aside from the basics. Andy Reid gave his typical lip service and claimed the team will “evaluate it.” But what else could he say?

“I don't know," Reid said, when asked if he thought if it would be wise for Westbrook to call it a season or even a career. “It's too early right now. I'm not that kind of person who's going to stand up here and tell you that without knowing the information. I don't know that. We're going to do everything the right way, that's the approach, and take every precautionary measure we possibly can to make sure Brian's OK. In these types of situations, football is secondary. We've got to look out for this kid and for his future and make sure everything’s OK for him before he gets back out there.”

Why are they even thinking about Westbrook getting back out there? Sure, that’s coach/jock-speak, but slow down and think for a second—two concussions in 21 days? That’s scary.

Others, like LeSean McCoy, said Westbrook will return because he’s a tough guy.

Really? The ol’ “tough guy” argument?

“I don't think it was that bad. I think he'll be back,” McCoy told reporters after the loss to the Chargers on Sunday. “I'm not sure exactly what happened, I was so involved in the game. I know he's a tough guy. He'll be ready to battle back from it.”

That’s the problem. Concussions don’t care how tough a person is or how hard a guy will “battle back from it.” That’s just stupid. But that’s how athletes think. All it takes is hard work and consistent training to return from a broken bone or a torn ligament, why can’t it be the same for a bump on the head?

For one thing, the brain is not a muscle, bone or ligament. Sometimes rest isn’t enough—for ex-athletes like Troy Aikman or Keith Primeau, post-concussion syndrome is a way of life. They live with the after-effects of too many concussions every day. For others like ex-Steelers’ star Mike Webster and former Eagle Andre Waters, the affects concussions led to an early death. At 50, homeless and suffering from depression, amnesia and dementia, Webster had a heart attack and died.

Waters committed suicide at age 44 because, according to neuropathologist Dr.Benet Omalu, his brain tissue had degenerated into that of an 85-year-old man with similar characteristics to those of early-stage Alzheimer's victims.

The cause? Concussions.

There doesn’t appear to be a real treatment from multiple concussions, either. Former Flyers’ captain Keith Primeau tried for two years to return to sports from several concussions—the first suffered in 2000 in a playoff game in Pittsburgh one game after his game-winning goal in the fifth OT—before deciding to retire.

Since then, Primeau has made concussions his cause. Last April Primeau announced that when he dies, he will donate his brain to science.

 “We owe it to the kids playing sports,” Primeau said.

Primeau says his first recorded concussion from that game in 2000 (he told me he probably had several concussions when he was young, just like any sports-crazed kid, but just waited for the dizziness to go away and jumped back into the game), was the beginning of the end.

“I think the beginning of my demise goes back to the playoff situation back in 2000,” Primeau said in April. “I got laid out at center ice and got carried off on a stretcher. I stayed overnight in a Pittsburgh hospital, only to return two nights later against New Jersey. And that was ultimately the beginning of my demise.”

Is this the beginning of the end for Westbrook? Only time will tell. However, if he continues to subject himself to more hits and head trauma, there might not be much left in the Jell-o bowl to shake up.

Don't fake the funk... go ahead and dunk

In high school we were obsessed with dunking a basketball. Actually, let’s rephrase that… In high school, those of us who could not properly dunk a basketball were obsessed with the act of leaping high enough to force the ball down over the lip of the rim.

And we did everything to be able to do it. In fact, as one of the few guys on the high school basketball team for the perennial power house McCaskey Red Tornadoes whose vertical leap was a bit “challenged” my strong-willed penchant toward proving Newton’s Laws were a source of amusement.

Everybody on the team could dunk except for Tom Levering, Julio Garcia and Oswaldo Cora. I’m not sure what Tom’s problem was, and I very well might be overstating the facts there, but Julio and Oswaldo couldn’t dunk because they were both about 5-foot-9 in basketball sneakers.

My problem was bad genes. Hey, it's not really the case, but who's going to know? That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Still, at a shade below 6-foot-1, I had no excuse. Oh sure, I was hell on the rim with a nerf football, tennis ball, bowler hat and on a good day, a volley ball.

But a basketball… why was it so hard?

It wasn’t for a lack of trying, though. I jumped rope, ran, built up my calves and fast-twitch muscles but still couldn’t throw one down. Get me 25-feet from the hoop with my back turned and it was like a layup. But that last half-inch from the rim was the bane of my existence.

It still is to some degree. The apex of my sports participation are thus:

• Get a hole in one in golf and walk to the hole, retrieve the ball, leave the clubs, shoes and whatever else right there on the green, and walk away. If that were to happen I’d never touch a club again. Bye-bye stupid golf, you fickle mistress.

• Dunk a basketball, wait for the requisite roar from the crowd (or friends on the sidelines) and then just keep on going. Don’t ever look back. Better yet, never lay eyes on a basketball game again. “Yeah, I see you Dwight Howard with your fancy two points, but you know what? I can do that too…”

• Run a 2:29 marathon. And then never even break into a trot again. Someone stole my wallet? Hell, I’m not chasing him. Let him go.

The dunk obsession that still bubbles way down deep was perked up a bit ever-so slightly over the past day when I read (with great interest) two stories about the dunk. One was from The 700 Level to properly commemorate the 30th anniversary of Darryl Dawkins shattering a backboard on a dunk at Kemper Arena against the Kansas City Kings.

As far as dunks go, Dawkins’ first smashed backboard was like the shot-heard-‘round-the-world in dunkdom. And as any proper citizen of Lovetron would, Chocolate Thunder properly celebrated the moment with what in 1979 was called a “poem” to apply a name to the dunk.

These days he would have gone into the studio and cut an MP3.

“The Chocolate-Thunder-Flying, Robinzine-Crying, Teeth-Shaking, Glass-Breaking, Rump-Roasting, Bun-Toasting, Wham-Bam, Glass-Breaker-I-Am-Jam.”

So what’s Thunder doing to celebrate his Bobby Thomson moment? Well, according to the great basketball writer,Dennis Deitch (sweet jumpin’ Jesus does the Phillies beat ever miss him… seriously), Double D will be at the South Philly Best Buy Sunday at 1:30 p.m. Deitch didn’t say what Dawkins will be doing there other than just showing up to be Darryl from Lovetron.

Hey, when you come from Lovetron, movements about town are significant.

Nevertheless, as an encore, Dawkins smashed up a backboard at the Spectrum three weeks later. As a result, former Kennedy insider and NBA commissioner Lawrence O’Brien forced a rule change that anyone caught shattering a backboard again would be ejected, fined and hit with a technical foul. In that order, too. In fact, that rule is still on the books, though in the years since the NBA installed retractable rims to keep the Plexiglas from looking like a spider web.

Oh, but we can go on about Darryl Dawkins all day. Even when he wasn’t terrorizing the arena’s physical plant, he seemed like a fun time. Unfortunately, I only caught his act at the end when the Sixers trained up the block at Franklin & Marshall where I was the resident gym rat.

Good times. Good times.

The second story almost caused bona fide outrage… or at least some good old indignantion. In Thursday’s New York Times, there was a story about Sixers’ forward Jason Kapono, who even though he was a 6-foot-8 forward in the NBA, does not dunk the ball.

Yeah, let that sink in for a second… He does not dunk!

It’s not that Kapono can’t dunk the ball. He can do it easily and probably with all sorts of flourish, panache and whatnot. But here’s the thing that got me—Kapono can dunk but he won’t. It just doesn’t come up, he says.

“I don’t really get to the hoop,” Kapono told the Times. “The only chance I get to dunk would be in a breakaway, and that is probably slim to none. Probably none. So, I never really have a chance to.”

It’s just not fair. If I could dunk, I'd never attempt any other type of shot. What's the point of a layup when you can slam it through?

It's like if I can't have the whole gallon, I don't want a drop.

But it cinches it: a guy who takes dunking for granted officially makes him my least-favorite player in the NBA.

Oh, but there is justice. According to the story, the last time Kapono dunked his teammates treated him the same way my McCaskey teammates treated me for not being able to dunk.

“The whole practice stopped,” Kapono said in the Times story. “Guys were falling down, like, ‘Oh my God, J. K. dunked!’”

It reminds me of the time after a practice when I got a good running start, hurdled myself up at the rim and wrapped a couple of fingers over the brim. On the way down I heard that tinny noise of bone striking wrought iron and thought maybe I should get a ball and try it again.

That is until I heard my coach yell out the loudest insult:

"Holy [bleep] Finger! Don't rip it down!"

Nope, couldn't do that--I'm not from Lovetron.

Yeah, well it could have been worse. Old high school football teammate Tyke Jones was like me in that all he wanted to do was dunk a basketball and then he could properly end his hoops career like Jordan crossing over on Byron Russell to hit the winning shot, or Ted Williams hitting one out in his last at-bat. Better yet, Tyke actually did it.

And no one was happy for him…

No one saw it happen.

The reason for that was everyone grew so tired of watching failed attempt after failed attempt that they all left. Rather than waste an afternoon watching Tyke miss dunk after dunk, they left him there by himself. So when Tyke finally did it (so he says and wrote) there was no one around to see it.

But like any wise man who witnessed a historical moment, Tyke did the proper thing:

He wrote about it.

Here’s what he wrote, reprinted from the April 28, 1989 edition of the McCaskey High paper, The Vidette. 

Lord’s Will Supplies Power for High-Flying Slam Dunk

By Warren “Tyke” Jones

It was early in my basketball career when, oddly enough, I celebrated my first slam dunk. The way I floated and sliced through the oncoming rush of wind would have undoubtedly guaranteed me 10s on all three of the judges score cards.

But not this time around, for the judges (my friends) had left an hour ago, disappointed after watching a series of 20 unsuccessful tries.

So I sat there alone, stunned by my achievement, but hushed by the deafening silence around me.

“It’s not fair!” I shouted.

And to me it wasn’t. There were no reporters or passersby to observe or record my post-achievement glamour—just a couple of stray dogs who obviously didn’t care to join in the festivities. So like so many other sports greats, I took the time to thank all of my teammates who made this moment possible.

“If it wasn’t for, ummmm, Tyke down loe in da paint scoring all them buckets at da end, I don’t think I’d be up here getting’ this here trophy today. I also wanna thank the good Lord who gave me the strength to come out and perform the way I did.”

Following our hero’s long and tedious speech, which included additional thanks-yous for everyone from his grandmom to Zeus, the game ball was awarded to some lucky old lady from Tucson, who had spent the last of her pension check for a seat in the Appalachian section of the arena.

Now it was the commentator’s turn to highlight and replay the game-winning dunk about 40 times more than necessary. But we watch anyway, hoping to see something spectacular we might have missed during the first 39 replays.

And thus it ends with the old familiar scene: Our hero with a basketball, walking off into the sunset, taking an occasional dribble, exhaustion showing on his face…

“My friends are never gonna believe me!”

***

If that was Tyke’s crowning athletic achievement, it would be one thing. Instead, Tyke was the guy who scooped up that fumble in the backfield against Cedar Cliff in the District 3 championship game at Hershey Park Stadium and ran it 60-yards for a touchdown.

Kyle Brady had no chance of catching him on that one.

If only he had dunked the ball over the crossbar when he got to the end zone.

We're moving!

My dearest readers,So here's the deal: I'm in the process of picking up this entire web site and dropping it in a new server/platform. As you can tell from looking at the archives, it's quite heavy.

Needless to say, while we move there just might be a few interruptions in the normal service. Don't worry... they are just temporary.

However, in the meantime go ahead and check out Finger Food at http://fingerfood.typepad.com. Within the next day or two the original domain, http://johnfinger.com will be back up and working so there will be no need to adjust your bookmarks after the weekend.

Plus, there will be all the typical updates on Twitter and Facebook, so it won't be like we're going anywhere at all.

Anyway, there will be a bunch of new features coming at the new place, so just relax for a day or two and we'll dive right back in.

xoxoxoxoxxo, jrf

Breakout! The GM Meetings end without incident

From the outside it seemed like a blur of three days. All of the general managers of all of the Major League Baseball teams holed up in a hotel near the airport in Chicago very much like Hunter Thompson on the Vegas strip, only many more lawyers and fewer grapefruits. There, in the heavily fortified compound off the Interstate with free parking, a pool, wireless, a complimentary breakfast, and a quick route to the busiest airport in the country, it sounds like the GMs just had a gabfest. Oh, there surely was plenty of baseball talk, maybe over hand of Texas Hold ‘Em in Epstein’s room where he filled up the tub with ice and loaded it up with a couple of cases of Pabst pounders. Eddie Wade ordered some pizzas. Ruben? Yeah, Ruben was there, too.

He was the quiet one like Ray Liotta in that breakfast scene in Goodfellas, where Scorsese’s mom says, “Whatsa matter Henry, you don’t talk so much.”

Hey, these are baseball men. They live the good life. The really are the Goodfellas.

But aside from a nice hangout at the Hilton with wireless in every room (standard usage fees apply), the GMs really didn’t do all that much in the annual chin wag. Actually, they may have reflected the state of the economy by following up a week at a resort in sunny Dana Point, Calif. by hanging at the Midwest’s version of Northern Jersey. Otherwise, they might have set the table—you know, a handshake here, a the ol’ business card exchange—for the real work that begins once the free agency period opens in earnest next week.

Then it’s off to Indianapolis for the Winter Meetings.

No doubt all the GMs and their staffs will get together to sing this song:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXsYQs1GKIk&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Song completed they’ll go out and spend the working incomes of 10 middle-class families for a guy to pitch the seventh inning.

Hey, these are baseball men. They live the good life. The really are the Goodfellas.

Oh, but that doesn’t mean they came away from Chicago with nothing to show for it. Nope, not at all. Old Ruben sitting quietly in the corner got to present the team’s wants and needs, which are, in order, third base; relief pitching; and a bench piece or two.

He also got to debunk a few rumors as is his wont at such things. In fact, he’s really good at it. Last year at the Winter Meetings at Las Vegas, I had a player tell me point blank and like I was a six-year-old so I could easily understand what he was saying, that he did, in fact, just exit a meeting with management types from the Phillies and was set up to have another one later. When asked how the meeting with the player went, we were told that he did not meet with that player.

It made me feel dumb (well, dumber than usual) until I quickly realized (in the course of 1.5 seconds) what was going on. Technically, no, Ruben did not meet with the player and the term “Phillies” was ambiguous. It was a smoke screen, because really, who cares who Chuck LaMarr talks to?

I grew up around lawyers and know a few of them quite well and they will tell you Ruben was using one of their old lawyering tricks without a J.D.

As an aside, my lawyer friend’s dad (also a lawyer) told me a joke recently:

“What does a lawyer use for birth control?”

Give up…

“His personality.”

But there was a chance for those li’l newshounds out there to chase down so-called rumors that really weren’t rumors to begin with. It was more like a game of whisper down the lane torn from the pages of Hunter Thompson. It’s the stuff we love because if it sticks even for a millisecond, it really doesn’t matter how long it takes to slither down the wall. People like to talk about baseball. This is one of those givens like taxes, death and leaf raking in November.

People really like to talk about baseball.

Only most GMs would prefer it if you didn’t talk about the baseball as it relates to them. They’re funny that way. Kind of ha-ha funny, too.

Though not for the lack of trying, there was some news that came out of the GM meetings from the United Airlines Terminal. For instance, the Gold Glove Awards were announced, which always stirs a debate and gets people worked up over one the more meaningless awards in a veritable trophy shop filled with meaningless awards. People seemed most hot and bothered that MLB coaches and players gave Gold Gloves to Derek Jeter, but not to Chase Utley. That’s fair, I suppose. After all, the best shortstop in the American League plays third base for the New York Yankees, and people in Philadelphia like that Chase Utley dives to catch balls that smoother fielders can scoop up routinely or he falls down to the grass like a inadvertent slip when he has to make a particularly tough throw.

But no one really seems worked up over the fact that the name TULOWITZKI can’t fit on the little plaque beneath the gold painted glove. Or no one cares that the new trendy stat called UZR, used to reflect defensive prowess, is flawed just like every other baseball stat.

All except for home runs. That one is easy to quantify.

Elsewhere, the GMs decided to table the idea of instant replay because they don’t want to be a sport known for its access reliance on progress, digitalized information or computers.

Hey, just as long as someone closes the retractable roof and shuts down the 10-story HD scoreboard before we leave.

*** As a final note, I’d like to send out my condolences to the Miller Family, particularly Ben, Allison, Gretchen and Chip. You see, Mrs. Cheryl Miller, the matriarch of the Miller clan on Wheatland Ave. here in Lancaster, Pa., passed away on Tuesday.

I grew up down the street from the Millers and often turned their home into an annex of mine. So did the rest of the kids from the neighborhood where we would take over to watch the big game, fight, movie or just hangout or whatever. Frankly, it says a lot about a family if everyone from the ‘hood wants to hang out at their home. For one it means they probably had a pretty good sense of humor about having a veritable bee hive of kids running in and out, and for another, it means people felt welcomed.

Undoubtedly Mrs. Miller fostered that atmosphere. She loved having her kids around and if they brought their friends or the rest of the block along, too, all the better. Now that I’m damn-near an old man and have my own kids, I’m hoping to one day copy off Mrs. Miller and open up my home and family to whomever my kids drag in from the outside.

Mrs. Miller sure had the kindness and the generosity market cornered in these parts. That's a trait anyone should want to copy.

So in times like these it’s very difficult not to think about how much fun we had with certain people and feel sad that those we shared those great times with are no longer among us. Mrs. Miller was a tremendous lady who raised some pretty damn good kids, including my friend Ben (probably has been the subject of earlier posts on this site), who just so happens to be the best Phillies fan I know.

I’m not smart enough to know much about praying, religion, philosophy or the afterlife, but I’m going to take a little solace knowing that somewhere Mrs. Miller is surrounded by a whole bunch of people having a really good time.

As in heaven just as on earth, of course.

Breakout! The GM Meetings end without incident

From the outside it seemed like a blur of three days. All of the general managers of all of the Major League Baseball teams holed up in a hotel near the airport in Chicago very much like Hunter Thompson on the Vegas strip, only many more lawyers and fewer grapefruits.

There, in the heavily fortified compound off the Interstate with free parking, a pool, wireless, a complimentary breakfast, and a quick route to the busiest airport in the country, it sounds like the GMs just had a gabfest. Oh, there surely was plenty of baseball talk, maybe over hand of Texas Hold ‘Em in Epstein’s room where he filled up the tub with ice and loaded it up with a couple of cases of Pabst pounders. Eddie Wade ordered some pizzas. Ruben? Yeah, Ruben was there, too.

He was the quiet one like Ray Liotta in that breakfast scene in Goodfellas, where Scorsese’s mom says, “Whatsa matter Henry, you don’t talk so much.”

Hey, these are baseball men. They live the good life. The really are the Goodfellas.

But aside from a nice hangout at the Hilton with wireless in every room (standard usage fees apply), the GMs really didn’t do all that much in the annual chin wag. Actually, they may have reflected the state of the economy by following up a week at a resort in sunny Dana Point, Calif. by hanging at the Midwest’s version of Northern Jersey. Otherwise, they might have set the table—you know, a handshake here, a the ol’ business card exchange—for the real work that begins once the free agency period opens in earnest next week.

Then it’s off to Indianapolis for the Winter Meetings.

No doubt all the GMs and their staffs will get together to sing this song:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXsYQs1GKIk&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Song completed they’ll go out and spend the working incomes of 10 middle-class families for a guy to pitch the seventh inning.

Hey, these are baseball men. They live the good life. The really are the Goodfellas.

Oh, but that doesn’t mean they came away from Chicago with nothing to show for it. Nope, not at all. Old Ruben sitting quietly in the corner got to present the team’s wants and needs, which are, in order, third base; relief pitching; and a bench piece or two.

He also got to debunk a few rumors as is his wont at such things. In fact, he’s really good at it. Last year at the Winter Meetings at Las Vegas, I had a player tell me point blank and like I was a six-year-old so I could easily understand what he was saying, that he did, in fact, just exit a meeting with management types from the Phillies and was set up to have another one later. When asked how the meeting with the player went, we were told that he did not meet with that player.

It made me feel dumb (well, dumber than usual) until I quickly realized (in the course of 1.5 seconds) what was going on. Technically, no, Ruben did not meet with the player and the term “Phillies” was ambiguous. It was a smoke screen, because really, who cares who Chuck LaMarr talks to?

I grew up around lawyers and know a few of them quite well and they will tell you Ruben was using one of their old lawyering tricks without a J.D.

As an aside, my lawyer friend’s dad (also a lawyer) told me a joke recently:

“What does a lawyer use for birth control?”

Give up…

“His personality.”

But there was a chance for those li’l newshounds out there to chase down so-called rumors that really weren’t rumors to begin with. It was more like a game of whisper down the lane torn from the pages of Hunter Thompson. It’s the stuff we love because if it sticks even for a millisecond, it really doesn’t matter how long it takes to slither down the wall. People like to talk about baseball. This is one of those givens like taxes, death and leaf raking in November.

People really like to talk about baseball.

Only most GMs would prefer it if you didn’t talk about the baseball as it relates to them. They’re funny that way. Kind of ha-ha funny, too.

Though not for the lack of trying, there was some news that came out of the GM meetings from the United Airlines Terminal. For instance, the Gold Glove Awards were announced, which always stirs a debate and gets people worked up over one the more meaningless awards in a veritable trophy shop filled with meaningless awards. People seemed most hot and bothered that MLB coaches and players gave Gold Gloves to Derek Jeter, but not to Chase Utley. That’s fair, I suppose. After all, the best shortstop in the American League plays third base for the New York Yankees, and people in Philadelphia like that Chase Utley dives to catch balls that smoother fielders can scoop up routinely or he falls down to the grass like a inadvertent slip when he has to make a particularly tough throw.

But no one really seems worked up over the fact that the name TULOWITZKI can’t fit on the little plaque beneath the gold painted glove. Or no one cares that the new trendy stat called UZR, used to reflect defensive prowess, is flawed just like every other baseball stat.

All except for home runs. That one is easy to quantify.

Elsewhere, the GMs decided to table the idea of instant replay because they don’t want to be a sport known for its access reliance on progress, digitalized information or computers.

Hey, just as long as someone closes the retractable roof and shuts down the 10-story HD scoreboard before we leave.

As in heaven just as on earth, of course

As a final note, I’d like to send out my condolences to the Miller Family, particularly Ben, Allison, Gretchen and Chip. You see, Mrs. Cheryl Miller, the matriarch of the Miller clan on Wheatland Ave. here in Lancaster, Pa., passed away on Tuesday.

I grew up down the street from the Millers and often turned their home into an annex of mine. So did the rest of the kids from the neighborhood where we would take over to watch the big game, fight, movie or just hangout or whatever. Frankly, it says a lot about a family if everyone from the ‘hood wants to hang out at their home. For one it means they probably had a pretty good sense of humor about having a veritable bee hive of kids running in and out, and for another, it means people felt welcomed.

Undoubtedly Mrs. Miller fostered that atmosphere. She loved having her kids around and if they brought their friends or the rest of the block along, too, all the better. Now that I’m damn-near an old man and have my own kids, I’m hoping to one day copy off Mrs. Miller and open up my home and family to whomever my kids drag in from the outside.

Mrs. Miller sure had the kindness and the generosity market cornered in these parts. That's a trait anyone should want to copy.

So in times like these it’s very difficult not to think about how much fun we had with certain people and feel sad that those we shared those great times with are no longer among us. Mrs. Miller was a tremendous lady who raised some pretty damn good kids, including my friend Ben (probably has been the subject of earlier posts on this site), who just so happens to be the best Phillies fan I know.

I’m not smart enough to know much about praying, and I’m not, by any means a subscriber of any particular religion, philosophy or the afterlife, but I’m going to take a little solace knowing that somewhere Mrs. Miller is surrounded by a whole bunch of people having a really good time.

As in heaven just as on earth, of course.

Iverson not ready to age gracefully

Getting old isn’t easy. Things that didn’t hurt now hurt for no logical reason. Moving around in the morning is difficult, again, for no logical reason. Worse, the ol’ recovery and bounce back time is impossible to pinpoint. Basically, your body gets a mind of its own. The worst part about this is your body has bleep for brains.

Oh, there are a few folks out there who have aged gracefully. Just look at Dara Torres, or Jamie Moyer. Torres is 42 and set an American record in the 50-meter freestyle at the Beijing Olympics when she was 41. Moyer, as we know, has kept one step ahead of the clock for at least a decade. Over the last three seasons, the soon-to-be 47-year-old lefty has won more games than any other Phillies pitcher.

Better yet, Moyer still has the fire to compete. He didn’t have the best season in ’09, but he fought like hell even when he was bumped from the rotation. Out of the bullpen, Moyer gave up four runs in five appearances and helped solidify an inconsistent corps of pitchers.

A couple of years ago Moyer told me that he can still do the same things he always did, only slower and with more breaks.

Perhaps the secret to Moyer’s ability to avoid the pitfalls of age is the page stolen from Satchel Paige. You know, “Don’t look back because someone might be gaining on you.”

“I always felt that I had a burning desire to play,” Moyer said last summer. “In those years I always thought that you’re going to have to strip the uniform off my back. I’ve been released a couple of times, but all that did was fuel the fire for me a little more.”

Then there is Bernard Hopkins, who will fight Enrique Ornelas next month just a few weeks shy of his 45^th birthday. And, of course, there’s always the ageless wonder himself, Don Wildman.

Wildman and his Malibu Mafia make everyone look old.

The truth is there is no correlation between age and athletic performance. The difference in why the older athletes struggle so much is desire, changing priorities, wear-and-tear and lack of fitness.

Maybe that’s where Allen Iverson fits in.

Iverson is not old by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, he’s just 34, which is younger than Steve Nash, Ray Allen, Anthony Parker, Ben Wallace, Derek Fisher, Grant Hill, Jason Kidd and Shaquille O’Neal. The difference between Iverson and those players is that they all made adjustments in their game and training regimens, while coming to terms with their age, while Iverson has not.

Iverson, apparently, hasn’t learned that he is 34. He hasn’t figured out that 14 years into the league he needs to hone different skills and can’t just go running into a brick wall every time down the court.

Oh yes indeed, we’re still talkin’ ‘bout practice.

To say Iverson is at a crossroads doesn’t begin to explain it. In fact, Iverson is about to be wiped off the map so completely that he’ll need a GPS to find his way. In his first season playing for the Memphis Grizzlies—his third team since being traded from the Sixers in 2006—Iverson has left the team after playing in just three games.

The reason? He doesn’t want to come off the bench. Worse, he doesn’t want to be a wise, mentoring veteran on a team with seven players in their first or second years in the NBA, and 10 players with no more than three years of experience. It’s kind of ironic that the oldest guy on the team is also the biggest baby.

When one of his younger teammates apparently didn’t see that Iverson was wide open during an overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings, Iverson lashed out at the inability to get him the ball and his reduced role on the team.

“I’m not a reserve basketball player,” Iverson said. “I’ve never been a reserve all my life and I’m not going to start looking at myself as a reserve.”

Nope, Iverson wants to get his. Otherwise he’ll just go home.

That quote from Moyer in which adversity and professional slights only served to make him work harder, make smarter moves and change his tactics is completely lost on Iverson. The only thing fueling the fire within Iverson is his massive ego.

And so he’s gone home.

Worse, he sounds like a cranky old man. In an interview with Yahoo! Sports, Iverson complained that no team aside from Memphis wanted him during his summer of free agency. In fact, he’s so disillusioned that no one wanted him and the only team that made a bid last summer sees him as a reserve, that retirement seems like a real possibility.

That’s too bad. It’s too bad because Iverson is a tremendous talent and was one of the few players in the NBA that was worth the high-price of a ticket. But in the NBA, there just aren’t too many players who can do at 34 what they did at 29 or 30. Oh sure, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar continued to be an effective ballplayer through his mid-30s, but Michael Jordan retired for the second time when he was 34. Even Wilt Chamberlain was primarily a role player when he turned 34.

Then again maybe Iverson gets it. Maybe we can save the psycho-babble and simply chalk up Iverson to being a grouchy old man who sees a bunch of kids running past him? But rather than thinking up new ways to keep up, he'd prefer to snatch the ball when it gets kicked into his yard with the loud, sad bellow:

"Get off my lawn!"

As for aging gracefully, well, that doesn’t seem too likely with Iverson. Plus, if he returns to the Grizzlies, coach Lionel Hollins (an ex-Sixers guard like Iverson) says there are some lines that must be toed.

The Answer must abide.

“Allen has his own interpretation of things. I know the truth. He knows the truth,” Hollins told the AP. “What I would like to do is let Allen handle his (personal) issues, make a decision on whether he’s coming back or not and concentrate on what we have to do as a team, both if he’s not here and if he is here.”

Yes, it’s a hard thing getting old. Especially when it takes much more practice.

Iverson not ready to age gracefully

Getting old isn’t easy. Things that didn’t hurt now hurt for no logical reason. Moving around in the morning is difficult, again, for no logical reason. Worse, the ol’ recovery and bounce back time is impossible to pinpoint.

Basically, your body gets a mind of its own. The worst part about this is your body has bleep for brains.

Oh, there are a few folks out there who have aged gracefully. Just look at Dara Torres, or Jamie Moyer. Torres is 42 and set an American record in the 50-meter freestyle at the Beijing Olympics when she was 41. Moyer, as we know, has kept one step ahead of the clock for at least a decade. Over the last three seasons, the soon-to-be 47-year-old lefty has won more games than any other Phillies pitcher.

Better yet, Moyer still has the fire to compete. He didn’t have the best season in ’09, but he fought like hell even when he was bumped from the rotation. Out of the bullpen, Moyer gave up four runs in five appearances and helped solidify an inconsistent corps of pitchers.

A couple of years ago Moyer told me that he can still do the same things he always did, only slower and with more breaks.

Perhaps the secret to Moyer’s ability to avoid the pitfalls of age is the page stolen from Satchel Paige. You know, “Don’t look back because someone might be gaining on you.”

“I always felt that I had a burning desire to play,” Moyer said last summer. “In those years I always thought that you’re going to have to strip the uniform off my back. I’ve been released a couple of times, but all that did was fuel the fire for me a little more.”

Then there is Bernard Hopkins, who will fight Enrique Ornelas next month just a few weeks shy of his 45^th birthday. And, of course, there’s always the ageless wonder himself, Don Wildman.

Wildman and his Malibu Mafia make everyone look old.

The truth is there is no correlation between age and athletic performance. The difference in why the older athletes struggle so much is desire, changing priorities, wear-and-tear and lack of fitness.

Maybe that’s where Allen Iverson fits in.

Iverson is not old by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, he’s just 34, which is younger than Steve Nash, Ray Allen, Anthony Parker, Ben Wallace, Derek Fisher, Grant Hill, Jason Kidd and Shaquille O’Neal. The difference between Iverson and those players is that they all made adjustments in their game and training regimens, while coming to terms with their age, while Iverson has not.

Iverson, apparently, hasn’t learned that he is 34. He hasn’t figured out that 14 years into the league he needs to hone different skills and can’t just go running into a brick wall every time down the court.

Oh yes indeed, we’re still talkin’ ‘bout practice.

To say Iverson is at a crossroads doesn’t begin to explain it. In fact, Iverson is about to be wiped off the map so completely that he’ll need a GPS to find his way. In his first season playing for the Memphis Grizzlies—his third team since being traded from the Sixers in 2006—Iverson has left the team after playing in just three games.

The reason? He doesn’t want to come off the bench. Worse, he doesn’t want to be a wise, mentoring veteran on a team with seven players in their first or second years in the NBA, and 10 players with no more than three years of experience. It’s kind of ironic that the oldest guy on the team is also the biggest baby.

When one of his younger teammates apparently didn’t see that Iverson was wide open during an overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings, Iverson lashed out at the inability to get him the ball and his reduced role on the team.

“I’m not a reserve basketball player,” Iverson said. “I’ve never been a reserve all my life and I’m not going to start looking at myself as a reserve.”

Nope, Iverson wants to get his. Otherwise he’ll just go home.

That quote from Moyer in which adversity and professional slights only served to make him work harder, make smarter moves and change his tactics is completely lost on Iverson. The only thing fueling the fire within Iverson is his massive ego.

And so he’s gone home.

Worse, he sounds like a cranky old man. In an interview with Yahoo! Sports, Iverson complained that no team aside from Memphis wanted him during his summer of free agency. In fact, he’s so disillusioned that no one wanted him and the only team that made a bid last summer sees him as a reserve, that retirement seems like a real possibility.

That’s too bad. It’s too bad because Iverson is a tremendous talent and was one of the few players in the NBA that was worth the high-price of a ticket. But in the NBA, there just aren’t too many players who can do at 34 what they did at 29 or 30. Oh sure, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar continued to be an effective ballplayer through his mid-30s, but Michael Jordan retired for the second time when he was 34. Even Wilt Chamberlain was primarily a role player when he turned 34.

Then again maybe Iverson gets it. Maybe we can save the psycho-babble and simply chalk up Iverson to being a grouchy old man who sees a bunch of kids running past him? But rather than thinking up new ways to keep up, he'd prefer to snatch the ball when it gets kicked into his yard with the loud, sad bellow:

"Get off my lawn!"

As for aging gracefully, well, that doesn’t seem too likely with Iverson. Plus, if he returns to the Grizzlies, coach Lionel Hollins (an ex-Sixers guard like Iverson) says there are some lines that must be toed.

The Answer must abide.

“Allen has his own interpretation of things. I know the truth. He knows the truth,” Hollins told the AP. “What I would like to do is let Allen handle his (personal) issues, make a decision on whether he’s coming back or not and concentrate on what we have to do as a team, both if he’s not here and if he is here.”

Yes, it’s a hard thing getting old. Especially when it takes much more practice.