Holidays
This is a tragedy. That's 10,000 people, think about that.

Merry Christmas.

I spent it in Antigua at the best hotel I have ever stayed at - ever. And to think it is inside of Guatemala. Crazy. It's called Casa Santo Domingo, if you ever go to Guatemala you HAVE to go to Antigua and you should check out this hotel. Go have dinner there, you'll be floored.

Billy Beane
On why he had to make the trades he's made:
"As a general manager, you have to have a better line for your owner than just, 'give me more money,' " Beane said. "I'm obligated to give (Steve Schott) business advice as well as baseball advice, and it would be one-sided and self-serving of me if all I did was ask for more money."


this is why I love Billy Beane.

Baseball
And now the As trade Mark Mulder too! Damn! If this works out for Oakland, then you HAVE to give Beane the GM of the year award next year. I hope Juan Cruz somehow breaks into the rotation and isn't sent to the bullpen again.

WORLD
Check out this article, it reminded me of Catch-22, and how they kept pushing up the amount of missions the soldiers needed to fly before they could go home.

It's still so unbelievable to me that even though the US is paying for this war, pardoning 80% of Iraqi debt, suffering through a terrible economy, that the president is still so gung-ho about cutting taxes. Where is the money going to come from?

TRADE
Did you hear about this Randy Johnson trade? Here are the parameters, and let me just say - I am shocked.

Yankees get:
- Randy Johnson (from Diamondbacks)

Dodgers get:
- Eric Duncan (Yankee prospect)
- Dioner Navarro (Yankee prospect)
- Javier Vasquez (Yankee)

Diamondbacks get:
- Shawn Green (from Dodgers)
- Yhency Brazoban (from Dodgers)
- Brad Penny (From Dodgers)

Ummm the Dodgers got FLEECED! What the hell is going on here? The Dodgers give up a major league, top of the rotation starter, a premium setup man that makes the minimum salary, and an established first baseman/right fielder. What do they get? A proven major-league pitcher who is young (but makes a lot of money and had a bad season last year - still, I like Vazquez), and two of the Yankees' overhyped prospects. That's it?? Unbelievable. Clearly the Yankees and Diamondbacks came away as the winners in this. The Diamondbacks especially. They get rid of a 41-year old pitcher who did not want to play for them anyway (although he was the best pitcher in the National League last year), and they get three proven, all-star caliber major leaguers in return. Nice job.

Baseball Salaries
Boras is a shrewd guy, and I hope GMs aren't fooled by him...again. It's pretty clear that HUGE salaries for star players don't work. AROD? Had to be traded. Even Manny Ramirez, who played like an MVP last season (the season after he was put on irrevocable waivers) is trying to be traded. Why is that? Too much money put on one guy reduces flexibility. I hope Jim Hendry realizes this and doesn't give in to Boras' demands for Carlos Beltran. Players are so ignorant of all the business aspects. Beltran says he wants all negotiations to go through his agent. Doesn't he see how that hurts him? If he does end up with a 10 year, 200 mil deal, it won't be with the team he wants to play for. It'll be for the Yankees.

God and the founding fathers
Saw something on Fox News last night, a little town hall type thing where they were debating about whether or not the founding fathers intended the USA to be Christian or if God belonged in it. First of all, the thing was obviously being held in Texas or Missouri or some other evagelist stronghold. My lord what fucking baised audience.

On the other hand, who fucking cares? Are you telling me that a person that is an Atheist or Muslim isn't as "good" an American as a Christian? Please. That's just ridiculous. Who cares what they said? The way these god-zealots are reading it is that this should be a christian country because they believed in God. Come on people, how dumb can you get?

Some woman was saying how, in her school, students were forced to study Islam and even pray to Mecca and dress in Muslim attire. Which I think is dumb. What the hell are they doing teaching that shit in a school? But the reaction of the crowd to this was disturbing: you would have thought they were teaching their kids how to crash planes into buildings and to burn American flags. 9/11 is making the USA even dumber than it was because of this ignorant, misplaced patriotism.

It never ends.

Cubs
So they have Nomar and Walker up the middle now. Blanco is the backup instead of Bako. What's left? Figuring out if Sosa will stay or not. And a left fielder. My opinion? Save money, use your system. Try Jason DuBois in left, with Hollandsworth backing up, or even give Kelton a shot. Go to spring training with those three vying for the spot. If you trade Sosa get Floyd back. But if you ABSOLUTELY MUST go out and get an outfielder, don't go nuts, sign JD Drew. Simple. Left handed power hitter that will hit .300 and have an OBP over .400. We need that. Plus he's got a cannon of an arm. That's if you MUST.

DFW
Here is a great review of David Foster Wallace's last book, Oblivion.

Baseball Salaries
Here are two players and their average numbers over the past fours seasons in the major leagues, take a good look at them:

Player A: -Player B:
AVG .300 - .288
HR 25 - 29
OBP .411 -.366
R 109 -111
RBI 100 -103
2B 45 -32
SB 32 -37
BB 112 -72

Assists 10 -12
Errors 6 -6

Granted, player A may be one of the biggest bargains out there at 10.6 million dollars, but take a look at those numbers. Who is better? That depends. My opinion? I'd rather have Player A, even though he is 30 and player B is 27. Why? Because Player B will cost you twice as much. That's right, for around the same performance (A having a slight edge), player B's agent wants twice the money. Salaries are already out of control and if someone actually pays that - they're dumb (go yankees!).

I'm sick of all this Beltran crap (he's player B), yes he's the best free agent out there today (umm, isn't Pedro Martinez, the greatest pitcher we've ever witnessed besides Nolan Ryan and Greg Maddux out there too) position player-wise, but that doesn't mean he's the greatest player in the world. Lets be serious for a minute. This is all getting out of control again and I thought that it was correcting itself. Last year the salaries were down (they didn't increase) and it seems that now teams are ready to get stupid again. Idiots. Beane (Oakland's GM) said that he could win it all if he had twice the payroll he has. Of course he could, he's a smart GM, not a rich one.

Anyway, the whole point was to show that Beltran - while great - isn't that great. He is no ARod or Babe Ruth or Willie Mays or any of that crap, he isn't even a Bobby Abreu (player A).