Yankees Chatter on the Radio… Can't Wait!

I'm an avid listener to New York sports radio.

And let me tell ya, bro: I'm plenty sick of hearing about the Jets mess.

Really, bro. Can we move on?

Well, of course not.

From misfirings (Mark Sanchez all season) to firings (General Manager Mike Tannenbaum at season's end), the dysfunctional Jets are radio ratings gold.

Still, I can't wait for the days when Jets news has flown off into the wild, blue yonder and those airwaves are again filled with Yankees talk, and even Mets fans missing R.A. Dickey.

Be patient, I tell myself. It won't be long now.

Pitchers and catchers report to spring training in mid-February. There will be meaningless (for most of us) spring training games throughout March. I always look forward to those, but after a few days, I hardly pay attention, barely glancing at a box score here and there to see how the prospects are progressing.

Did Sanchez get a hit? He got two. Great!

What? A split squad game tomorrow? I hate those! What's for dinner?

This year, we fans of the Yankees will have our eyes on Austin Romine, both at the plate and behind it.

Brian Cashman already has said he expects the young catcher to begin the season at Triple A, but you certainly can expect plenty of calls to sports radio urging the Yankees' general manager to keep Romine on the big club's opening day roster, particularly if he plays well in March, handling the pitching staff adequately, smashing the snot out of the ball.

Because who else you got?

Francisco Cervelli and Chris Stewart, that's who.

Last year, Cervilli's WAR stat was… Hah, I got ya. You thought I was going to go all baseball stats geek on you, didn't you? No way, bro!

Speaking of stats, how often will the Yankees' awful, I mean god-awful, postseason batting numbers be discussed over the airwaves in late February and throughout March?

It'll be a number rivaling Alex Rodriquez's total failures in the clutch, I'm guessing.

And speaking of A-Rod, how about his contract? "We're paying this guy to strike out twice a game for five more years, Mike," will no doubt ring from the vocal cords of more than one frustrated caller.

And the pitching staff. Is CC going to hold up this year? Is he starting to break down? Did he lay off the Cocoa Puffs this offseason?

And what about Andy Pettitte? Can he stay healthy? Can he find a time machine and reverse his age?

And let's not forget about the Phil Hughes trade proposals offering the righty and a couple of prospects – hot minor league prospects are as plentiful as pennies, ya know – to the Angels for Mike Trout.

You think no one's dumb ignorant enough to make that call? Just listen.

All that talk is still a few weeks away, though. Right now, if we tune in to sports radio talk, we have to put up with ramblings about Rex Ryan's and Woody Johnson's ineptitude.

But soon, soon my Yankee friends, when the days begin to get brighter and warmer, when the snow melts away and the green grass is exposed, there will be baseball talk over the airwaves and someone named Sal will call for Jeter to be traded to the Marlins for Giancarlo Stanton if our long-loved short stop gets off to a slow start in the spring.

"They would love Jeter in Florida, Mike. He's got a house down there."

Just wait.

I can't wait, bro!

Hamilton, Seattle and Caffeine

Can you see Josh Hamilton playing for the Seattle Mariners?

Better question: Can you imagine the Mariners paying Hamilton the money the slugger is said to be demanding?

Either way, there are reports out there stating the Mariners and Hamilton's reps are talking about a deal.

What interests me most is, if Hamilton does play in Seattle in 2013, gets on a hot streak and then cools off late season, what will be his excuse?

You can see where I'm going with this, right?

Yeah, I'm sure that in mid-August, when Hamilton's numbers dip a bit, a Seattle reporter will ask why and Hamilton will no doubt spout off some sorry excuse about he got hooked on Starbucks coffee and is now either drinking way too much or is trying to quit.

Either circumstance will yield reasoning to why the outfielder is suddenly not hitting home runs, striking out a bunch and missing routine fly balls.

I Am Not an Artist

I wrote earlier about me spending hours a few nights ago looking through some old baseball cards and subsequently relishing those uber cool cartoons that once inhabited the backs of many of the older cards.

One I found particularly fun was the 'toon on the back of my 1958 Topps card Pee Wee Reese.

I began to do a little research when I found a Jim Caple ESPN.com column on the cartoon topic from last summer. Caple's column is a great read, and it contains a handful of card-toons about modern-day players fabricated by ESPN illustrators.

Caple mentions a few of the artists by name and provides a few details about their work and pay and such, but I'd like to do a little more research on some of those artists. And I'd really like to know who drew the cartoons for the 1958 Topps set. So if anyone knows, send me a note.

I tend to think it would be great fun to be an artist who developed some of those 'toons, but after reading Caple's article you learn that perhaps there wasn’t a lot of fun involved.

Still, I'm fascinated by the process and the product.

Now, I'm no artist, as you can see below, but I wanted to sit down and quickly sketch a card cartoon. I had to come up with a quirky idea, and all I could think of at the time was the stories of Hideki Matsui's massive pornography collection. Yeah, that was the best I could do.

Anyway, here's the result of my quick work. Please, all you serious artists out there, don't think I'm trying to pass this off with any hint of seriousness.

Here's a Story Where a Nationals Fan Says the Braves Signing B.J. Upton is Bad News

B.J. Upton

I keep reading the contract agreement the Atlanta Braves struck with outfielder B.J. Upton today is a sweet deal for the Braves, but I'm not really seeing it that way. Sure Upton has some power and provides a right-handed bat in the Braves' lineup chock full of lefties, but the center fielder's numbers are a bit sporadic.

Old-school stat guys might yell tommyrot at a .246 hitter – that's what the 28-year old hit last season in Tampa – getting a contract worth $75 million over five years. And I tend to agree.

Upton hasn't hit .300 since 2007 – he hit exactly that number that year – and he hasn't come close to sniffing that mark sense. Upton's on-base percentage is nothing great, but his OPS remains strong.

You can also argue that Upton is a good stolen base guy, and you'd be right. He swiped 31 this season, but that number has steadily declined each year from 44 in 2008, to 42 each in 2009 and 2010, to 36 in 2011.

And what about Upton's plate discipline? His walks fell to 45 this season from 71 in 2011. That's the second time he has had a drastic drop in walks. Upton fell from 97 in 2008 to 57 in 2009. But, to be fair, you can also note the Virginia native walks jumped from that 57 mark to 67 in 2010 and to 71 in 2011.

On ESPN's Sweetspot blog today, David Schoenfield notes Upton is swinging at a lot more balls outside the strike zone, from 17 percent in 2008 to 30 percent in 2012.

See what I mean? Bossman Junior is a bit sporatic!

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As I finished writing the above post, I noticed a tweet from MLB Network saying it is carrying live the Braves' press conference announcing the Upton signing. Pish posh. (What is it with me and these old school words today?)

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Speaking of the Braves, is there anything more annoying than that stupid tomahawk chop? Yes, yes, I know. I'm a Nationals fan.

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Happy birthday to Vin Scully, who turns 85 today. I could listen to Vin talk about bowel movements, but I'd prefer he didn't. But at his age, bowel movements may be trending pretty high on the list of his daily thoughts and conversations. Heck, I'm 41 and I talk about… never mind.

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I was looking through some old baseball cards the other day and, as I looked at the back of my '58 Topps Pee Wee Reese card, was reminded of the greatness of those old cartoons that once appeared on the backs of ball cards. After doing a little research, I found Jim Caple had written about the subject. Caple's column was published in the summer of 2011, so you may have already read it. But if you're slow getting to things like I can be, here's the link.

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I wrote yesterday in favor of Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens being inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame while at the same time thinking there's no way those two will be going to Cooperstown anytime soon. We've been hearing for years the baseball writers will not vote in Bonds and Clemens with all the suspicions of their performance enhancement drug use. However, it seems a lot of other people, perhaps thinking a little clearer with PEDs not so fresh on our minds, are learning toward inducting the two super star players.

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I was listening to Mike and Mike do a SportsCenter update as I was parking my car at work this morning. At the end of the update, Mike Greenberg mentioned two baseball stories; one was the Upton signing and I forget the other. But it struck me the negativity in which he mentioned those two stories. That seems to happen a lot on ESPN Radio. God forbid there be baseball news in the middle of yet another conversation about elite quarterbacks. Just stick with your Colin Kaepernick / Alex Smith debate, guys. We can find our baseball news elsewhere without hints of disgust.

Let me just say this: I love Mike and Mike. They have an excellent show, but the football talk, and I really like football, tends to be a little over done.

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On the positive side of the talk radio spectrum, I tuned in to WFAN this morning and, here at the end of November, caught a little baseball conversation. That'll happen a lot on WFAN, particularly overnights. Sure, it can be a lot of David Wright contract talk, but it's still baseball talk, and a good alternative when you need a break from ranking the elite QBs.

Bonds and Clemens? Yes! Aaron Sele? No!

Would you vote Barry Bonds into the baseball Hall of Fame?

How about Roger Clemens?

The National Baseball Writer's Association of American released today its 2013 Hall of Fame ballot and Bonds and Clemens are among this year's new candidates. Among the many names, new and leftover candidates, joining the scandal-plagued duo are Aaron Sele, Rondell White and Todd Walker.

Seriously!

Nothing against those guys. They each had stellar careers, but not what I would consider Hall of Fame worthy.

I'm not a big Hall of Fame guy, but when considering whom I might vote for, if I had a vote, I like employing the wife test. It's a good indicator, but definitely not the exclusive, end-all text. If my wife doesn't know a player, that's a strike against them.

My wife has no idea who Todd Walker is. I barely remember him.

But she does know Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens.

Those guys, despite the alleged performance enhancing drug use, belong in Cooperstown.

I know it’s a tired argument to say they both had HOF numbers before they turned, we suppose, to PEDs, but it's true.

And, yes, you can say they cheated the game, particularly Bonds and his destroying the all-time home run record.

But the truth Bonds and Clemens were outstanding, all-world baseball players. They both dominated in their sport.

Say what you will about the ethics of the performance enhancing drug use. Should that be considered in the voting? On some level, I guess it should.

However, Bonds and Clemens, PED use or not, where great ballplayers who deserve to be recognized with baseball's highest honor.

Damn you, Angel Pagan

Because of you, I'm hooked on Taco Bell's Doritos Locos Tacos. 

You remember Free Taco Tuesday, right? 

Taco Bell ran a promotion during the World Series stating if any player stole a base during the series, the restaurant would give away a free Doritos Loco Taco. 

Sure enough, Pagan swiped second in Game 2, and I loaded my wife and kids and into the car and drove straight to Taco Bell on giveaway day. We weren't expecting much, but those things were/are delicious. Taco Bell gave away the regular Doritos Locos Tacos, but I recommend upgrading to the supreme. 

Should Taco Bell send me a check for this advertisement? Yes. Yes, it should.

Today's Lineup

…or nine stories from around the Majors you may have missed today.

Interested in each MLB team's TV deals? Fangraphs has it covered. Speaking of TV deals the Nationals talks with MASN is on a flight to nowhere.

River Avenue Blues examines the Yankees infield defense over the past decade.

While I'm sitting here, typing, waiting for either QPR or Sunderland to score, the Braves are waiting by the phone – so are the Phillies – for B.J. Upton to call.

Former MLB union chief Marvin Miller has died at age 95.

Coyotes are starting an early line for Cubs tickets.

The White Sox have promoted former Bristol Sox manager Bobby Thingpen – he's done a few other things, too – to be the big club's bullpen coach.

The Oakland A's are donating one full player playoff share to charity.

Jonathan Broxton and the Reds may be nearing a multi-year deal.

Is Rafael Soriano talking with the Tigers?

That QPR – Sunderland match was dreadful. Both teams desperately needed a win. The game ended 0-0. #comeonfulham

Start Spreading the News… No, Wait!

Well, did they or didn't they?

If you're like me, you keep a keen eye tuned to the goings on in baseball no matter the time of the year.

As we near the end of November and approach December and the baseball winter meetings, it's particularly important – you know, if you're a baseball nut – to watch the news and Twitter and such for free agent signings.

This morning a report surfaced from Japan stating the Yankees had re-signed free agent outfielder Ichiro Suzuki to a one year, $5 million contract.

However, according Newsday beat reporter Eric Boland, no deal has been made.

So now, we wait… again.

I'm guessing, even if a contract has not been signed, the Yankees will re-ink Ichiro, who hit .322 in 67 games after being traded from Seattle to New York this past season.

Smells Like Yankee Spirit

This smells a bit funky.

New York Yankees super closer Mariano Rivera, battling his way back from a torn ligament in his right knee, tossed his first pitches from a mound recently while, get this, filming a commercial for his new fragrance.

Did that process? While filming a commercial for cologne!

Rivera reportedly threw 25 pitches from the mound, all knuckleballs (ok, I made that up) while filming the spot for a product that is part of the Yankees official fragrance collection.

Check out the black and white video below and see the all-time saves leader toss a slow motion pitch on a snow-covered field.

Why was their snow? Just curious.

One a side note: It seems something funky happens when the bat hits the ball, but I can't figure it out. It looks a little weird.

Oh yeah, I got. It's rare a bat hits a ball thrown by Mariano Rivera.

(That's just dumb.)

Royals Bring Guthrie Back

Click quickly.

The #Royals are trending on Twitter.

No, not those Royals. I'm talking (writing, actually) about the Royals who play baseball in Kansas City.

I'm guessing this rare surge in trendiness for the Royals has something – ok, everything – to do with the Kansas City ballclub re-signing free agent pitcher Jeremy Guthrie Tuesday morning.

The righty's new deal will pay him $25 million for the next three seasons.

Kansas City acquired the 33-year-old pitched from Colorado back in July in exchange for lefty pitcher Jonathan Sanchez. Guthrie was 5-2 with a 3.16 ERA with the Royals.

Before being traded, Guthrie was making a mess of things in Colorado – is that fair to say? – with a 3-9 record accompanied by an oh-my-god-hide-the-women-and-children earned run average of 6.35. To be fair, the entire Rockies season was terrible, operating with a 35-56 record when they shipped Guthrie to Kansas City.

Guthrie will be paired in the Royals rotation with Ervin Santana, who the club picked up from the Los Angeles Angels via a trade for minor leaguer Brandon Sisk.

Following the Tuesday morning contract announcement, Guthrie expressed his excitement and gratitude on Twitter:

3 more years in Kansas City! I couldn't be more pleased & excited! Thanks to the Royals & all the great fans for your support.👑
— Jeremy Guthrie (@TheRealJGuts) November 20, 2012

Blue Jays Are Melking It, Baby!

Don't take my word for this, but trending right now on Twitter is a rumor the Toronto Blue Jays are working to bring Babe Ruth back from the dead to hit clean up, maybe pitch a little, for the 2013 season.

It's not enough, is it, you greedier-than-Trump Blue Jays, that you took advantage of Jeffrey Loria's bat-$#!t crazy ways of running a baseball franchise to secure a trade for nearly all of the Miami Marlins' good players?

Sorry about that. I must have been channeling my inner Brian Cashman.

Ok, where was I?

Who knows at this point if this is a good move or not, but Canada's only team today has reportedly signed Melky Cabrera to a two-year deal with $16 million.

This past season in San Francisco, Cabrera was tearing it up – he was hitting .346 – and was well on his way to securing a lucrative free agent contract. But then, as you know, Cabrera, the All-Star Game's MVP who helped secure home-field advantage for the Giants, was suspended for 50 games after testing positive in August for performance enhancing drugs.

Now, Cabrera is back, but will he have the same motivation to light it up with his bat the way he did in his contract walk year?

We'll see.

In the meantime, ESPN's Buster Olney, after the news of Cabrera's signing broke, Tweeted the Blue Jays' possible lineup for 2013.

Possible Jays' lineup: SS Reyes LF Cabrera RF Bautista DH Encarnacion 3B Lawrie 1B Lind C Arencibia CF Rasmus 2B Izturis/Bonifacio. Speed.
— Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) November 16, 2012

Olney's lineup does not account for the possibility of the Blue Jays resurrecting Ruth.

Sweating the Relatively Small Stuff In Derek Jeter's Contract

If you're still not convinced the New York Yankees are hell bent on getting on a budget, perhaps doing a Dave Ramsey-style total money makeover, then take into consideration the Yanks reportedly are relieved by the fact Derek Jeter did not finish in the top 6 of the American League MVP voting.

Had Jeter been voted as high as sixth, the short stop's contract would ignite incentives that would have paid him an extra $2 million on his 2014 player option year.

2014?

Yep, that's the year the Yankees have targeted for getting their payroll down to at least $189 million ($170 million?) to avoid those expensive-as-hell luxury taxes.

That's right, the Yankees brass, which in the past were willing to spend whatever it took to get a top free agent ballplayer, reportedly were sweating having to pay Jeter an extra 2 million bucks in 2014. That's a bunch of No. 2, right?

Hey, every million counts.

So how close did Jeter get toward collecting that 2 mill in 2014?

One place spot.

He finished seventh behind the Orioles' Adam Jones. But in reality, the voting wasn’t close. Jones secured 120 votes to Jeter's 77.

For those of you who tend to overvalue Triple Crown category numbers – was that a bit snarky? – Jeter hit .316 with 15 home runs and had 59 RBIs. He had .362 on base percentage and a .429 slugging percentage for a .791 OPS.

Bottom of the Sixth and a Topless Mae West

"Bottom of the Sixth"

How steaming mad would your wife be if each year, a super hot movie star, let's say Scarlett Johansson in this instance, offered up to you her best holiday wishes via a Christmas card that included a photo of her, you know, totally buck naked?

My wife would pop me with the sweet spot of a Louisville Slugger.

But you know whose wife, or so she claimed, did not get ticked off?

Beans Reardon's wife, Eugenia, that's who.

I've been researching through a bit of baseball history recently and came across Beans, a National League umpire from 1926 to 1949. He was known for his beer drinking (not on the diamond, I hope) and strong language (you bet that happened on the diamond). He was behind the plate when Babe Ruth hit his 714th and final home run.

Scarlett Johansson, not Mae West

From what I gather from a little research, the Boston native – yeah, tha's how he got the nickname Beans – lived a spectacular life.

You may not know the name Beans Reardon, but you've seen him.

You remember the Norman Rockwell 1949 Saturday Evening Post cover and paiting "Bottom of the Sixth" featuring three umpires standing together under a slight rain? Beans, with his face all scrunched up, is the umpire in the middle.

In addition to appearing in Rockwell paintings, Beans owned an Anheuser-Busch beer distribution business – he later sold it to Frank Sinatra – and he appeared in several movies.

That brings us back to Mae West.

Beans and West were friends, and according to rumors or whatever, West was said to have sent nude photos of herself to Beans each year at Christmas.

Reading about Bean's life, all of his accomplishments and what not, this is the item that piqued my curiosity, as you can imagine.  

So I dug a little deeper and found an interesting Los Angeles Times story from way back in 1988 about Bean's wife, Eugenia, who in the interview confirms Mae West annually sent nude photos of herself, or as Eugenia suggest in the article, the same photo each year, to her husband.

Mae West

And apparently, Beans enlarged the photo and hung it on his den wall.

The last paragraph of the aforementioned L.A. Times story places Eugenia in the den, describing the room's contents"

"And Beans, who also was an actor, can be seen with Gary Cooper and other movie stars on a wall dominated by a large nude picture of Mae West. 'She always sent him a copy of that picture every Christmas,' Eugenia said. 'No, I was never jealous.'"

Frame it: GIF is Your Word of the Year!

Associated Press

As far as the English language is concerned, the word – or acronym, really – GIF is extremely young.

Having been coined in 1987, the term is used to describe a file for looping images to create a short, simple animation. GIFs have gotten so popular on the Internet recently that Oxford University Press on Monday named "GIF" its Word of the Year for 2012.

"The GIF has evolved from a medium for pop-cultural memes into a tool with serious applications including research and journalism, and its lexical identity is transforming to keep pace,” said Katherine Martin, head of the US Dictionaries Program at Oxford University Press USA in a press statement.

GIFS certainly have been popular on baseball blogs and websites the past several months. How many times did you watch the GIF of Hunter Pence's broken bat "triple-double" from the National League Championship Series?

Addicting, isn't it?

Well, here's something else to latch your eyes to: Ben Lindbergh at Baseball Prospectus has written an excellent article, complete with eye-popping GIFS, demonstrating Jose Molina's extraordinary knack for framing pitches. Those framings, some of which on pitches that were more than a foot and a half outside the strike zone and still called strikes, led to the catcher, according to a Baseball Prospectus statistic, saving a total of 50 runs for the Rays this season.

Now, that's value.

The lengthy article and the GIFS, which must have taken a lot of time and patience to construct, are well worth your time. It's the type of brilliant baseball nerdery I love reading, but never in a million years could ever write.

Nate's Take on the AL MVP Race

I can't imagine what the political junkies are thinking today.

Baseball talk on the FiveThirtyEight blog?

Blasphemous!

If you have a few extra minutes today, check out Nate Silver's lengthy article on the New York Times' website – it's on the FiveThirtyEight politics blog – explaining why Mike Trout, not Triple Crown winner Miguel Cabrera, should win this year's American League Most Valuable Player honor.

If you're familiar with his work, both in baseball and politics, it'll come as no surprise to you the "statistically-minded" Silver picks the Los Angeles Angels star.

Many of those supporting Cabrera point to his hitting numbers, a .330 average with 44 home runs and 139 RBI, but Silver looks at the all-around performance of each player, including their performances in the field and on the base paths.

"Between his defense and his base running, therefore, Trout was about 35 runs more valuable to the Angels than Cabrera was to the Tigers," Silver writes.

The article is a must-read if you're still on the fence between the two candidates.

And let's be honest, why try to argue with a guy who, through a ton of numbers crunching and analysis, correctly predicted the outcome of all 50 states in the presidential election?

The American League and National League MVPs, voted on at the end of the regular season by members of the Baseball Writers Association of America, will be announced Thursday on a MLB Network hour-long special, which airs at 6 p.m.