Kevin Millar

Back in the day, Kevin Millar coined the term "Manny being Manny." Today, Millar is a host on Intentional Talk on MLBTV (porn without nudity for the guilty pleasure baseball lover of the world), and Manny is sitting on the sidelines, probably based out of his mind (at least without the worry of failing a drug test), waiting for the Dodgers to send him another $8.33 million of deferred money by the end of the month (he'll get another check for the same amount next year - gotta love $20million contracts - you get paid even when you don't play!). If you're Manny, it sure beats sitting out for a second steroids bust, but you have to do what you have to do.
If you're Millar, it means that you've got a job where you're getting paid to act like the class clown / team leader who keeps the team all loosey goosey together and having fun, doing your job, and making life good. MLBTV has been playing a lot of best of montages from the show. It's good stuff.
But when it comes to the money that Manny is owed and the need to get it to him pronto tonto... this is just another blow to the Dodgers who are racing the Mets to the poorhouse in all of the things that you shouldn't do to run a baseball team, but nevertheless, such is the life of a baseball team. Sometimes, you're up. Sometimes, you're down. It's like Minnesota. You can win a World Series or 2. You can get threatened by Bud Selig with being contracted (but not before you give up Chuck Knoblauch to the Yankees). You can win some playoff games. Joe Nathan can phone in reliever duties and send you home without a ring. Joe Mauer can come to your team as the great catcher of the future. Joe Mauer can get injured and return great and get injured again. You can find your team in last place as your former player and Hall of Famer dies of cancer. It's an endless cycle, but if you're the Baseball Project (or just Craig Finn, the lead singer of the Hold Steady who is doing a guess appearance with you), you can sing a really great song about how much you love them all the same (just don't call them Twinkies).
For the Dodgers, all things not Matt Kemp pretty much suck this year. He's 11 for 23 with 4 moonshots and 8 RBIs in the last week. He's .332 for the season (20 home runs, 56 RBIs, and 15 steals - he's killing it fantasy style - especially because they don't include the 62 strikeouts - imagine what this guy could do if  he made contact about 10% more!). He doesn't have Rihanna dragging him down. yeah... life is good except for wondering if his bosses can pay him for working and that whole day to day thing.
But life isn't all bad... It's not all good either. Especially f you're Derek Jeter. You're 6 hits show of 3,000, but you're on the cusp of being out of action for injury. Nevertheless, in this time of need for Jeter's supporters, Ian O' Connor really lays the love on thick for Derek Jeter today, but you know what? It's a great article. Sure, it's a puff piece, but it explains why I can hate the Jeter3000 Love Fest (registered trademark), and still grudingly and in conflict with all I am as a Yankee hater, I still respect the man.
And with that, there are times where you win, and there are times where you lose, but at least you get up and play it again.
What else are you going to do?

Gerrit Cole

The draft is just what it is - unless we're talking about coming up unlucky with conscription, but all the same, Gerrit Cole has to be happy. His doubters look at his losing record and laugh, but as anyone with half a brain knows, wins and losses don't mean anything. Just because you're on a team with a crappy offense or because you have to apply for non-support doesn't mean that you're a bad player. It just means that you're unfortunate. That said, at least he'll be used to non support when he plays for the Pirates (although this year, they are a little better as they flirt with .500 at various points a few months into the season and they are only 2 games under at this point in time (28-30)).
We laugh at who goes first and second in pro sports. We laughed when the Houston Texans selected Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, but there were issues of who could afford Reggie Bush. A complete bust of a non-Kardashian career later, Bush is the guy who cost USC the National Championship (though in his defense, asking 18-24 year olds not to earn money JUST BECAUSE you've given them a full ride is asinine. If their parents are rich, they can give them beer and date money. If they're kids from the streets, well... suffer little children as you get caught for taking money and cars and jewelry and tattoos from rich donors everywhere (we feel your pain Ohio State).
And we can't blame Pittsburgh for what they can't afford or don't want to deal with heartache over. It's not like Pedro Alvarez and Scott Boras came through with an ability to match their holdout. Instead, they've got a guy hitting .208 and on the DL. One man can't change the culture of a team. At least not in MLB. Maybe in the NBA (and even then, Lebron isn't enough by himself - though he can make money at the gate). But for the Pirates scouting, they have 2 picks that had marginal talent in the Bonds-less past: Andrew McCutchen and Jason Kendall. Sure, McCutchen is touted as the 2nd coming, but he's not tearing up my fantasy league or the pros all that much. Jason Kendall is good and played for a while, but yeah... it's not like people are investing in his rookie card.
Looking at can't miss picks from number one of all of those who have played and had some degree of success, we have to look at the potential of our boy Stephen Strasburg (get well soon). We then find A-Rod, who despite hating his guts, we have to say that minus the steroids, he was the best can't miss prospect out of the league. Ken Griffey Jr. could have been great, but there were the injuries in the second half of his career. Joe Mauer could be be great as well, but he's injured so much that we don't really care what he can't do on MLB video games. Adrian Gonzalez has some upside, and we appreciate that - especially because he's finally earning his Boston Red Sox money. Josh Hamilton has a lot of upside as well - save the injuries, the smack, and the dalliances with drunken women who aren't his wife. Chipper Jones was really good too, but I never thought of him as the answer to the greatest player ever. He's a great player from an age who deserves to be remembered as being good in his age and being good for a great team during his age, but will he or should he be remembered longer than Dale Murphy was from his age?

And what of the ancients? Bob Horner? Harold Baines? Rick Monday? Tim Foli? Besides dressing up as Foli when I was a kid, there is no joy in Tim Foli land save a small town Pennsylvania Halloween parade. Baines is loved by the White Sox. Horner is pretty much forgotten outside Atlanta. Rick Monday saved the flag (we wrote about that). There are some 2 year wonders, and there is last generations Josh Hamilton (Darryl Strawberry) who always managed to blow his chances, but such is life. We can't all be perfect and this isn't about casting shame on those who aren't, but is there a possibility from number one. Can David Price continue to excel or will he end up being Floyd Bannister?
So many questions to wonder, but for now, we'll wish him and the class of 2011 the best and hope that they all end up great (same for Bryce Harper), but yeah... the minors aren't college ball, and they definitely aren't the majors. Keep working, though. The future will soon be here.

Carlos Quentin

By this point in the season, Albert Pujols should be flirting with .400 - not sitting below .300 with a gap (.033) between the magic mark and where he's at. He shouldn't be breaking a 100+ (105 at bats and 119 plate appearance) at bat streak without a home run. Is it really the year of the pitcher, or are we ushering in a new crop of offense?
Matt Joyce is currently leading the major leagues in batting average with a .367 mark. If I wouldn't be looking at him in his Rays uniform, I would have no idea who he was, but he seems to be part of the new Tampa Bay outlook and his 8 home runs attests that he's not all singles either.
This is not diminishing Jose Bautista, who is still hitting at a .340 clip with 19 home runs (guess I was really wrong on not believing in his salary bonus), but other than that, there are people with about 10-12 home runs, and they're the usual suspects, but there aren't many big time boppers - save Curtis Granderson and his 16 jacks (and 45 strikeouts in 178 at bats).
Matt Holliday has also been solid with his .349 average and 6 home runs, but for the most part, the bats have been silent this year. Big boppers like Adam Dunn who came to new teams with hope for power are striking out a lot more (60) than they are connecting (5). Mad Mark Reynolds is drifting into worse obscurity (.191) as he racks up his usual misses (49) and falls short on his connections (5). It's an ugly affair really.
So when Carlos Quentin hooks me up fantasy style with 3 jacks and 5 RBIs for my 2nd place fantasy team (the Ephrata Green Dragons), I have to give props (that said, I like the acquisition of Jair Jurrjens as well since he's always been good for me and last night, his 4 Ks and 7.2 scoreless innings brought a much needed win to my team, which has been decimated by injuries to Joe Mauer and Josh Hamilton).
Now that Quentin opened up, he's tied for 3rd place with Ryan Braun, Mark Teixera, and Jay Bruce. Yeah... that Jay Bruce, but that's fantasy points as well, so we can live with that. Looking at the home run leaders... you really wouldn't guess many of them. The same could be said for the free swinging strikeout leaders.
And as I heard it said the other day, it's not 1.12 in 1968, but it's a step away from the steroids era home run boppers of years past.

Cal Ripken Jr.

In light of Jorge Posada playing himself out of New York, and let's be honest... the New York Post said it the best; he's pretty much done like a charbroiled steak, let's talk about aging stars and what to do with people when they're past their prime, but they're still loved.
Take the biggest love fest in history - Cal Ripken Jr... this man is truly slobbered over in Baltimore except when it comes to people wanting to pony up $100 to buy my 1982 Topps Traded Set complete with PSA8.5 Cal Ripken rookie. It's like Harvey Keitel said in Pulp Fiction... only people have already started and there's no stopping...
Ripken's biggest claim to fame is that he played 2,632 consecutive games. This went from May 30, 1982, to September 20, 1998. During this time, he played 8,243 consecutive innings from June 5, 1982 to September 14, 1987. During this time, he also hit roughly .300 and pounded out more than 25 homers a year during a period in time where the average short stop was Ozzie Smith.
However, in 1991, Cal Ripken had his last great line in baseball: .323, 34, 114. After that, everything was above pedestrian, BUT it wasn't super wonderful mega fantastic. SURE... he was playing every game. Yet he was still playing every game for 7 full years. The Orioles may have moved him from short to third, but there was no future contingency, and they came to suffer for it years later.
Nobody thought about that when they were winning (shades of New York, anyone?). In 1983, the Orioles won the World Series. Until 1996, they weren't in the playoffs again. However, thanks to Jeffrey Maier, they lost in 96 and in 97, they lost to a Cleveland team that was one at bat to Edgar Renteria from winning the World Series. For Baltimore, that was it. The Yankees got dominant, and the future was cast in stone. Thank God for the Devil Rays to keep them out of the cellar most years.
When it was all said and done, Ripken went from the man who broke the streak of Lou Gehrig (a streak Gehrig only stopped because of life-ending injury and pride in being complimented for pedestrian accomplishments) in 1995, resurrecting baseball with a happy moment after the strike, and eventually gave it up to just as much tremendous fanfare. Thus, he was forever enshrined as an institution in the Chesapeake Bay (in no small part because he was born there and stayed there to be dominant - that generation's Joe Mauer).
So who knew that the man who had no business being at the 2001 All Star Game (at least until he hit a home run and got to play short stop as Alex Rodriguez stepped aside to make the old man feel at home again with an MVP award) was involved in a vicious rumor that he pummeled the tar out of Kevin Costner for hooking up with his wife? Interestingly enough, now I do, and now many people on the web do. It's a BS rumor dispelled by Costner, Ripken, and Snopes, but yeah... you've gotta love the Internet where EVERYTHING is true.
So for what I've learned, be it Ken Griffey Jr., Derek Jeter, David Ortiz, Willie Mays, or a constantly banged up Chipper Jones, there comes a point where a player has to call it a day and know when to say when.
They can go the easy way like Andy Pettite and don't go in a decline. They can be forced out like Griffey. They can change from Big Papi, the hero of the Red Sox dynasty years to Big Sluggi, the steroids mirage who doesn't show up to play until May, or they can just keep hoping that this year will be the year that they turn it around - maybe one last time like a hobbling Kirk Gibson in a World Series moment for the ages.
Sadly, we know which way it's more likely to be.

Colby Rasmus

I'm really going to do it this year - not like last year when I quit in futility. This will be my fifth year taking part in fantasy leagues, which is as much of a commitment as this website is. It requires patience and dedication to a 162-game schedule. Attention issues aside, a good draft and no injuries will keep the fires stoked until September 28th. It requires serious "research" to do determine who is coming up in the world of rookies, and it requires getting rid of injured players so that statistics aren’t jeopardized. Many people will start, but few will finish. I'm living proof. Having a quick blast of energy at the beginning is essential to having a chance, but it’s not everything.
All in all, it’s as much a part of the game as the game itself, but it involves divorcing oneself from loyalties on the field. Where once I wouldn’t draft Yankees due to my hatred of the team, I have had four of them over the years (Rivera, Matsui, Gardner, and Jeter), which means that while I won’t be rooting for them, I’ll take their statistics in the same way that I will take other player’s great games.
This year, I started off with an option to get Robinson Cano, probably the best second baseman in the game, if I got pick 6 as the 6th picker; however, someone else grabbed him first, so I ended up with Roy Halladay and took the 7th pick (a league of 6 people - I didn't want to play with also rans more than I had to this year) of Joey Votto. All in all, I also got Josh Hamilton, Cliff Lee, Joe Mauer, Dan Uggla, Michael Young, and Mike Stanton for a rather solid looking team.
Already, my competition wants Colby Rasmus - for Raul Ibanez of all people. Let's be honest... I may have a couple of Phillies on my team and be from PA, but a rapidly aging mid power outfielder in decline already... nah. Perhaps, he should have offered Jason Heyward, but that's most likely asking way too much.
Granted, Rasmus has an upside... 23 homers and .276 batting average with 12 steals, and 148 whiffs, BUT he hates Tony Larussa, and that says a lot to me. Sure, he wanted off the team last year and Phat Albert thought he should have been jettisoned, but considered that Ryan Ludwick had already left for San Diego (dumb, dumb, dumb), Colby wasn't moving. And if he moves this year, he may have a bounce year in a non-Larussa burg. And if he doesn't, he could get even better than he already is. After all, he's only 2 years in the bigs...
So in the words of Hayden Panettiere, “bring it on. It’s all or nothing.”
Let the fantasy season begin!

Kirby Puckett

Spring has sprung. Life is good.
The Hold Steady have always been an incredible band. Sometimes, you'll hear them referred to as the best bar band in America. Last year's Heaven is Wherever was a fantastic CD that was even better than the previous effort Stay Positive, which was on constant rotation as were their previous album Almost Killed Me. Separation Sunday and Boys and Girls in America were really good, too. "Hurricane J" "Barely Breathing," and "The Weekenders" stood out on one of the best discs of the year or any year in ways that would make "Killer Parties," "Your Little Hoodrat Friend," and "Stuck Between Stations" proud.
This month, their lead singer Craig Finn is back with the Baseball Project, a combination of artists from a lot of 1980s alternative bands like Steve Wynn, Scott McGaughy, Peter Buck, and Linda Pittmon. Six songs into the disc (Volume 2: High and Inside) and his song "Don't Call Them Twinkies" not only stands out as the best song on the album, but it stands as one of the best tunes of the year.
Like most songs that he sings, he gets all home state proud for teams he never knew personally (the Harmon Killebrew era) to the modern team with Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau via the Kirby Puckett era and that great Jack Morris game 7 (we'll be saving that for another day).
In 12 years, Puckett did a lot to earn his reputation that took him to Cooperstown. He batted .318 and led his team to World Series victories in 1987 (against St. Louis) and 1991 (against Atlanta). He was a home run hitter when he needed to be and solid at the bat at all times. He was beloved to the point where he was mourned for both contracting glaucoma (a disease he went on to fight in charitable ways) and in early death as an enlarged version of his once athletic frame. Somewhere in between, he was charged with sexual assault and it was hard for Twins Nation to see him in that way and to see him as the great baseball player that he was.
So we never remember him for the other history - even if Sports Illustrated covered it thoroughly.
And that's probably for the best. Who wants to think of our heroes as womanizing and abusive scum on the outside? It's better to see them for the fact that they can hit game and World Series saving home runs in game 6 of 1991. And he did it in extra innings to prevent the complete 180 degree turn around that was the 1991 Braves dynasty ignition.
And for the fact that Finn can sing memories that bring us back to the good ol' days of a team that was almost removed from the league altogether in the 1990s (but not before New York could extract Chuck Knoblauch and his soon to be unreliable arm from them), we have something really good.
Sitting 4 songs into a CD that features several songs about the Red Sox, the Giants, Ichiro, Pete Rose, and Reggie Jackson, you'll find "Don't Call Them Twinkies." Pick it up, download it, and enjoy it as the final days before the baseball season begins.