National Fantasy Championship Mania Commences

by Norm Kent

A few weeks into the return of the National Fantasy Baseball Championship leagues online and I have already witnessed manic behavior. It is still snowing in Wisconsin, tarps cover every spring training field, and the Super Bowl is not until this weekend, but the NFBC has already trotted out onto the field 31 slow draft leagues with approximately 450 participants.

The NFBC Administrators probably thought they would get about 10 or 15 leagues, but by the time the season starts there will probably be over 50 at three different price ranges, $150, $375, and $1000. The participants in these leagues, myself included, are either addicted warriors, gypsy fortune tellers, or true men of courage. Here you are, in the winter, rostering a permanent team to win a fantasy crown before a single major league player has showed up at a spring camp and put his jock strap on.

The slow draft phenomenon requires the contestant to choose 50 players that will comprise your team for the entire season. You may be able to move players up and down within your own rostered selections, from active to inactive, but there is no trading and no free agency. What you pick is what you get. You may grab a top flight pick in a top round and find out you are out of the race before the season even starts if the dude blows an Achilles or pops a shoulder in the spring. As an attorney, I represent psychics, but I am not one. How do you call whether a guy is going to go Buster Posey on you? Who is the next five- star athlete that is going to lose a third of a season for testing positive on steroids, relapsing on alcohol, or driving drunk into a tree?

The exciting part of entering a couple of these drafts so far is not only the number of enthusiastic owners, it is their unadulterated enthusiasm. The fantasy buffs might as well be in rehab clinics. They are ‘jonesing’ for baseball. The drafts have started, but they are just not going fast enough for everyone to be happy. Too many of the ‘slow drafts,’ with owners residing on the west and east coast, are going ‘too slow,’ and the owners are complaining on the NFBC message boards about other owners who “lack draft etiquette.”

In one league I am in, an ER doctor who works as a thoracic surgeon found himself defensively explaining to the league why it might take him a few hours in the middle of the afternoon to make some picks. He thought the patient rather than the pick came first. Shame on you, Dr. Sheppherd.

“Pathetic,” one owner referenced my delay on Friday afternoon, while I was in Federal District Court representing a man facing 25 years in jail- mind you, a court where lawyers are not even allowed to carry in cell phones. I will be sure to let a judge in the United States District Court of Appeals know that his tardiness held up my fantasy baseball pick.

Whew, these NFBC’ers are a tough crowd. They remind me of the humorist Dave Barry’s hilarious line that a “woman, given a chance to catch a fly ball or save her infant son’s life, will invariably choose the child without even considering that runners are on base in scoring position.”

The NFBC administrators know how the world of fantasy has gone from a passing fancy to a cult industry. They sponsor everything from one hundred dollar online satellite leagues to the ‘Main Event,’ national auctions every spring in Vegas and five other cities around the nation. It’s our own ‘Thriller in Manila,’ and you can just hear Howard Cossell announcing, from his grave, “Down Goes Posey. Down Goes Posey.” And with those words, your catching slot is left without hits, runs, and rbi’s for four months.

In order to appease the zealous, indeed ravenous, appetite of our participants, NFBC administrators have now launched a ‘Fast Slow Draft,’ so all 50 rounds can be done in one 8 hour window. That sold out, and another will begin soon. The slow draft provides you with an 8 hour window to make your selection, but with options available to queue up your selections, and even limit those to one round, owners who do not do so are still getting berated and abused on their draft message boards. I think they are sent to a Fantasy Flogging Camp. It’s run by a sadist named Berger of Fullerton, who says if you do not make your pick within his mandated minute, you will be severely beaten or lose your first born.

Today, some chat on the NFBC Board is calling for the administrator to create the ‘slow’ drafts based on east or west coast residencies so the time zones are aligned and the picks will be made more quickly. There is no time for leisure with this fast-paced crowd. They want the season to start tomorrow.

I will offer one suggestion if you opt in and your time is limited. The NFBC, using the snake draft concept, offers its owners an opportunity to claim a drafting position. If you are saddled with multiple other responsibilities, a swing slot position might be best for you, so that you can quickly make two choices and have a long break in between. Go for an early or late round slot, so while maybe you get a number 13 or 14 pick, your wrap around time for another choice is limited only by the 14^th or 15^th player. First, you won’t have to keep other owners waiting as long, and the chances are you will have queued up and been able to secure your back to back selections pretty rapidly.

The irony of these slow drafts is that for all the prognosticators picking optimistically in January, there is going to be a player on a major league roster in the middle of 2012 who will become this year’s Ryan Vogelsong- an all-star probably not listed on a single NFBC roster. Maybe I should take Manny Ramirez in Round 25. Wait, let me see, maybe Ken Oberkfell is making a comeback too. There is always an unknown joker in the deck.

The conceptual purpose of a slow draft was to allow us to watch emerging trends and gain insight into average draft positions as the 2012 season unfolds. I thought it would provide some guidance on hot athletes going early, injured athletes moving down the charts, or how NFBC vets would look at veterans. Sure enough, there is a lot to be learned, and some significant points are worth recording. Here are a couple of things that I have preliminarily noticed, and let me wrap up this column talking about the draft instead of the drafters.

First, it’s the riskiest position on the board, but in league after league, star catchers are getting called up early, even though their overall stats don’t warrant it. Teams just want to lock up the category rather than lose it altogether. There is a desperate need to have at least one Matt Wieters on your team and not wind up with Rod Barajas.

Second, there are very few players putting up 40 or more steals, and speedsters, though punch and judy hitters, are getting tapped sooner rather than later. No one wants to make Brett Gardner a 6^th round pick, but if you need to put 50 steals on the board and wait any longer, you have no guarantees. So rookies like Dee Gordon are soaring in their average draft positions, (adp) and if you wait too long, you will have waited… too long.

Third, guys that are veterans are being totally dissed in ADPs, whether it is Ichiro after one ‘bad’ season at age 38, or Chipper, who in a typical injury-riddled year, posted 18 homers, 75 rbis, and a .275 average at the coveted third base slot. With the number of corner guys that got hurt last year and the number of second sackers, like Kipnis and Ackley, emerging, there has been a seismic shift in drafting priorities by NFBC members. No one is panicking if they don’t wind up with a Cano or Pedroia. There are other places to go in the middle infield. It was a point made by NFBC founder Greg Ambrosius in a Baseball HQ column not too long ago, and I think owners are taking it to heart.

Fourth, while no one seems to think Ryan Howard is going to come back strong from his Achilles blow out, people are not discounting Josh Johnson, Ryan Braun, or David Wright. Risking an early pick on players with real questions may be deemed gutsy or foolish, especially this early in January, but teams are rolling the dice on the real rewards a resurgent star might bring, whether it is the guys above or a Jason Heyward who was supposed to become Bo Jackson.

Fifth, as these leagues move into the later rounds, the most sophisticated owners are going to emerge. This is clearly the kind of league where you not only have to know a team’s depth, you had best know not only their prospective lineups, but likely callups and backups. Your team is in a marathon, and because your selections are finite and irreplaceable, I have to believe teams reaching for the stars rather than relying on the veterans are going to hurt more and score less. For every Pablo Sandoval rocking a corner slot, there are ten more Andy Martes that did not. You know that Mark Buehrle is going to throw 150 innings and get a dozen wins. You can’t really say that about most late round starters.

I am already in two slow drafts and about to enter a third ‘fast slow’ draft that will make all our picks on Sunday, February 19, for a team that is going to play through October 1. I represent fortune tellers, but I am not one. Maybe I can use one to be a co-owner, because if I was sure today of what was going to be tomorrow, I would probably be buying Facebook stock instead of stocking up on fantasy players.

10 Make Believe Rules You Need to Win Your Fantasy Draft

It has been a while since I have blogged about fantasy ball, but I find myself freshening up on players and rules as I plan for the National Fantasy Baseball Championship in Vegas this March, along with my own leagues. Looking at things I have written, leagues I have won, and many that I have lost, I have made a list of my own guidelines to share.

No two leagues are the same, but the following rules will work whether you are going into the draft just for a fill-up to finish off your team or looking to stock an entire squad.

After years and tears with good drafts and bad, I have concluded there are some fundamental rules of rotisserie baseball that must be followed to have a successful season. Some have nothing to do with baseball, but all have to do with winning.

Here they are.

First, make believe you are joining the Boy Scouts. Be prepared. There are now owners going into drafts with laptops armed with statistical histories of all the major leaguers and prospective minor leagues. Do not make the mistake of drafting from the seat of your pants. Have in your mind a grocery list. You don’t want to spend all your money before you get to the third aisle in the supermarket. And you don’t want to be the guy who is being laughed at in the last rounds of the draft scouring through the fantasy baseball guides struggling to find a player to nominate.

Second, make believe you are flying the plane. Be rested and fresh. I am stunned at how many people coming into fantasy drafts that do not realize it is mentally taxing and physically draining. If you are sitting in a chair, selecting players to put on your squad for the next six months, you don’t want to be drafting with a hangover. You do want to be alert, so eat light, hydrate yourself, and find some stretching exercises to do. An auction draft for a new team can easily take as much as 6 to 8 hours without much of a break, as long as it would take to fly to Europe. You are the pilot and your eyes have to remain open.

Third, make believe you are homeless. If you want to win, draft the best player, not necessarily one from your hometown. At the end of the day, the only numbers that count are the statistics an athlete produces, whether he does so for the overlooked Royals or the heralded Yankees. Don’t wear your fan loyalty on your sleeve in an auction, and announce to everyone at the start of the draft you are going to get Miguel Cabrera at any cost. You will. The Melky Cabreras of the world may surprise you too.

Fourth, make believe you are buying a car. Don’t underestimate reliable veterans, do not overspend on rookies, or draft too early on proteges. Go to the top 10 list of any fantasy baseball guide from 10 years ago and for every Evan Longoria you will find 10 Andy Martes. I know everyone wants to discover the next superstar, but Chipper Jones is still limping to the finish line with a good batting average, a high on base percentage and decent numbers at a thin position. I wish I had a dime for every player who overpaid for a guy they claim "they just had a feeling about" only to find out fortune telling is for carnivals.

Fifth, make believe you joined a gym. Select players who tend to stay healthy. There are only so many risks you can take on your premiere stars. Stay away from the injury prone. Spend your first picks or higher salaries on players you can count on taking the field. The fantasy baseball field graveyard is populated by hundreds of players who year after year kept on taking Mark Prior in the top rounds, or ‘took a shot’ on some guy that had a strong September.

Sixth, make believe you have a lease. Select players who have jobs at secure positions. This is why everyone is leary of closers. It is a volatile position, where the lead dog is replaced often. But when drafting, you also must be aware of whether the players you pick are likely to hold that role over the course of the season. If they are overpaid players at the end of a contract, not likely to be re-signed, or playing for a non-competitive team, your starter today could be moved to a bench role on a contender by the All Star break. You have to think about that in April when you draft.

Seventh, make believe you are abandoned on a desert island. Position scarcity matters, but there are limits. While there are only so many premier catchers or closers, don’t sell the farm for them. Whether your league allows trading or not, remember that replacing scarce positions from free agency lists or in deals is tough once the season starts. But stats are stats. If you already have five 30 home run hitters on your team, you can afford to pass on the one catcher who hits 25 homers.

Eighth, make believe you have studied for a final exam. Know your league’s scoring system. Most leagues use collective batting averages and earned run averages for scoring, so too many at bats or too many innings from a bad player can hurt you more than help you. Because those are categories which are averaged, unlike raw statistics, they are more difficult to adjust during the season. Certain power hitters will destroy your obp. If you are in a 4 by 4 league as compared to a 7 by 7, you can’t just ‘punt’ categories. You have to know your game.

Ninth, make believe you are poor. Feast on the left overs. At the end of your auction or draft, teams will get up and walk away, ignoring one dollar players and reserve picks who are a phone call, injury, or trade away from making a difference and impact that season. Having them on your reserve squad enhances your regular team’s ability to deal with injuries and move up a stud prospect into a starting role. Know your league’s rules and prepare as much for the reserve list on draft day as your starting lineup.

Tenth, make believe you are in a marathon, not a sprint. This is the most important rule of all. Stay the course. Watch, guide and caress your team as you would a puppy. Leagues are won not only on draft day but in the middle of the summer when everyone else goes on vacation, or in September when the non-contenders lose interest. When your league’s title is being decided in the ninth inning of the last game of the year, you don’t want to be kicking yourself because you forgot to move a player off the DL for two weeks and lost his homers.

If you want the trophy for real in the Fall, you have to make believe in the Spring.

The Duke of Flatbush

This is the best column I have read on the life of The Duke, and I wanted to share it with others before I post my own. NK

The Duke of Flatbush, Revered and Remembered

by Tim Dahlberg

He was one of the greats of one of baseball's greatest eras, when the game was America's only real pastime and a trio of players who would later be memorialized in song patrolled center field in New York's iconic ballparks.

Duke Snider died on Sunday, a day before baseball's newest whiz kid got his first official at bat in an exhibition game in Florida. Bryce Harper will probably never have a song written about him, but the 18-year-old's debut for the Washington Nationals was a reminder that even as baseball looks to its past there's always a prospect for the future.

The Duke of Flatbush never really got his due, largely because at the same time he slugged home runs for the Brooklyn Dodgers, Willie Mays was in center field for the New York Giants and Mickey Mantle played for the Yankees. He always seemed to end up third in his own town, and that didn't change when the 1980s song "Talkin' Baseball" paid homage to "Willie, Mickey, and the Duke."

Snider hit at least 40 home runs in five straight seasons, played in six World Series and was an eight-time All-Star. But he never won an MVP, and it took 11 years after he was eligible before he was finally elected into the Hall of Fame.

But it wasn't his stats that endeared him so much to the people of Brooklyn. It was that he was a part of his adopted community in a way that ballplayers of today can never be.

In all the tributes that came pouring in on the news of Snider's death, one from White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf stood out.

"Along with hundreds of thousands of other kids growing up in Brooklyn, Duke Snider was one of my idols. He really was one of us," Reinsdorf said. "As a 21-year-old rookie, he lived on my block and often would join us in games of stickball on his way home from his day job as the Dodgers center fielder."

To understand how big that was is to understand the 1950s, a time before the NFL hit its stride and baseball was everything to a nation. New York was the epicenter of it all with three teams that always seemed to be battling each other either for a pennant or the World Series.

It was a time when winning the MVP award got you a new suit at the local tailor instead of a $500,000 bonus, a time when players worked other jobs in the offseason and Mays and Giants teammate Monte Irvin owned a liquor store to bring in some extra money. Players lived near where they worked, often sharing apartments in the same working-class buildings as their fans.

"I was born in Los Angeles," Snider once said. "Baseball-wise, I was born in Brooklyn. We lived with Brooklyn. We died with Brooklyn."

When Snider hit four home runs in the 1955 World Series to help the Dodgers finally beat the hated Yankees and win their first title, the borough of Brooklyn celebrated like there was no tomorrow - not knowing that just in a few years there wouldn't be when the Dodgers left town.

The year before, the Giants and Dodgers were battling for the pennant in the dog days of summer and both Snider and Mays hit home runs in a Sunday afternoon game at Ebbets Field the Dodgers won 9-4 to complete a three-game sweep and move to within a half game of first. A New York Daily News photo from that game shows Mays leaping high in the air in front of the exit gate in right center field to grab a Snider blast, as the fans behind him stand in excitement.

Look closely and you'll see people dressed in their Sunday best for the game. Look even closer and you'll see that many of them were black, a demographic of fans that baseball has somehow lost over the years as many top athletes gravitate toward football and basketball.

Snider was the last living member of the Dodger starting lineup that day, the last survivor of a box score that included future Hall of Famers Jackie Robinson, Pee Wee Reese and Roy Campanella. For the people of Brooklyn, they were their Boys of Summer long before Roger Kahn immortalized them as that in his book.

Baseball can never recapture those times, much as Bud Selig and company try to sell the nostalgia of the game. Fans today are more cynical, and it's hard to blame them after having being exposed to the money grabbing, amphetamine taking, steroid ingesting players of today's era.

But spring is just around the corner once again and, as always, there's a new awakening in every fan's inner soul. The problems of the game are put aside, at least temporarily, as players take to pristine fields of green grass in Florida and Arizona.

Soon Vin Scully will get back behind the microphone, just like he was 60 years ago when Snider was just beginning to make a name for himself in Brooklyn. And young players like Harper - who struck out twice on seven pitches in his debut - will take their first steps toward becoming the legends of the future.

It's an annual rite that is ingrained in the fabric of our society.

As one era passes, another spring of hope starts anew.

----

Tim Dahlberg is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at tdahlberg(at)ap.org

The Associated Press

Forever a Boy of Summer

By RALPH BRANCA

I’ll never forget the winter of 1947. Because of the Dodgers’ plan to sign Jackie Robinson as the first African-American in the majors, we avoided Florida and spent training camp in Havana. This was the great postwar Brooklyn team of Pee Wee Reese, Dixie Walker, Pete Reiser and Hugh Casey. Our manager was the indomitable Leo Durocher.

Gil Hodges was back from a long stint in the Marines. He was our second-string catcher. (We were a year away from recruiting Roy Campanella.) It was Gil who introduced me to a rookie from Compton, Calif.

“Ralphie,” Gil said, “meet Duke Snider.”

His handshake was firm and his eyes were clear. He had a smile and an irresistibly upbeat spirit. We were both 21 and eager to make it in the big leagues.

We began talking baseball, but, typical of Duke, he didn’t discuss himself. He wanted to tell me how, back in Los Angeles, he had seen Jackie excel at football, baseball, basketball and track. He trumpeted Jackie’s athleticism and was thrilled at the prospect of playing with him. Duke never even hinted at his own skills.

That winter, we played exhibition games in the Caribbean against the Montreal Royals, the Dodgers farm club to whom Jackie was signed. As it became clear that Branch Rickey, our general manager, was going to make Jackie a Dodger come opening day, a few veterans circulated a petition arguing that an African-American had no place on our team. Duke was outraged and perplexed.

“Are they crazy?” he said to me. “Besides being a great guy, he’s the best thing that’s ever happened to this team.”

Like most of us, Durocher supported Jackie and the petition wound up in the garbage, where it belonged.

In 1948, Duke’s sophomore year, Campy came on board with pitchers Carl Erskine and Preacher Roe. In 1949, when Don Newcombe became a Dodger, Duke came into his own. He hit .292 and had 23 home runs. He commanded center field and was crowned the Duke of Flatbush, a title he will hold forever.

Along with Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays, Duke formed New York’s golden center-field threesome. I’m prejudiced, but of the three, Duke was the most nimble fielder and possessed the most accurate arm.

From 1947 to 1957, the Dodgers won six pennants and one World Series, finally besting the Yankees in 1955 as Duke hit four homers and drove in seven runs. Without Duke, who holds the franchise career records of 1,271 runs batted in and 389 homers, the Brooklyn Dodgers would not be the Brooklyn Dodgers.

On a team of extraordinary individuals, Duke stood out. He had intelligence, integrity and wit. He played hard, and superbly, day in and day out. His long career is a model of athletic excellence.

In 1980 at his Hall of Fame induction, I was there with many of his teammates to cheer him on. We weren’t surprised when he talked about how great we were and failed to mention his own remarkable accomplishments.

The Brooklyn brotherhood never died. We kept up over the years. We would have dinner when, as the broadcaster for the Montreal Expos, Duke came to New York. His knowledge of the game grew over the years. I loved talking baseball with Duke. He had his opinions without being opinionated. He genuinely wanted to hear what you had to say.

In the end, when he was living in a nursing home, we continued to talk. In the last weeks, when I learned he was failing, I contacted his beloved wife, Bev, who was by his side. I wanted to tell Duke just how much I admired him. I wanted him to know what a privilege it was to call him my friend. At that point, all Bev could do was put the phone to his ear. He died last Sunday at 84.

I still see Duke as a young man. I see him out there in center field, racing past the ads for Van Heusen shirts and Gem razors, while executing a brilliant running catch. I see him at the plate, crushing Robin Roberts’s fastball and sending it soaring high over that crazy right-field wall at Ebbets Field. I see him rounding the bases. I see him smiling. I feel the joy of his sweet, happy soul.

Ralph Branca, a right-hander, pitched for the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1944 to 1953, and in 1956.

Fantasy For Farmer

Modest Farmer, Managing Mogul

By DAN FOST

The National Fantasy Baseball Championship, a contest paying a top prize of $100,000, draws an elite collection of contestants: computer geniuses, deep-pocketed stockbrokers and money managers, maybe a young man or woman looking to be the next Billy Beane or Theo Epstein.

But the contest over the years has produced only one two-time champion, Lindy Hinkelman, a 59-year-old pig farmer from Greencreek, Idaho.

Hinkelman, who has won two of the last three titles in one of the country’s most highly regarded contests, does not have a perfect answer for how he has been able to do it, but he is happy to offer his gut take on it all.

“Raising pigs and this baseball thing really go together,” he said. “There are certain things in farming: keeping track of productivity, indexes for your sows, the genetic lines there. To do well, you’ve got to be pretty proficient in numbers. Math has always been my strong suit. I can see things with the numbers.”

He cautioned with modesty: “That’s just my theory. I have no proof.”

What he does have is in excess of $300,000 in prize money earned over the last three years.

Some fantasy football leagues offer bigger prizes, but the National Fantasy Baseball Championship says its payout is tops in fantasy baseball, and the Fantasy Sports Trade Association, which represents more than 100 member companies in the fantasy sports industry, said it was unlikely that anyone had won more prize money than Hinkelman.

Hinkelman, however, is not looking to, oh, get involved in fixing the Baltimore Orioles.

“These guys working in front offices know so much more about this than I would ever dream of,” he said. “These guys grew up in the game. I have no ambitions of doing that.”

Fantasy baseball got its start around 1980 with the development of Rotisserie League Baseball, named for a New York restaurant where a group of people, led by the longtime journalist Daniel Okrent, first played it. In the game, participants draft actual players and follow them throughout a season, earning points based on how those players perform in major league games.

The games exploded in popularity with the rise of the Internet. And although fantasy football has eclipsed baseball in popularity, the fantasy sports association said, roughly 13 million people play fantasy baseball.

Hinkelman looks for undervalued players, as does Beane, the Oakland Athletics general manager, who was played by Brad Pitt in the movie “Moneyball.” Hinkelman volunteered to draft 14th in his 15-team league this year, and he focused on three players who ended up doing significantly better in 2011 than in 2010: Matt Kemp of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Justin Verlander of the Detroit Tigers andCurtis Granderson of the Yankees.

His faith was rewarded; Kemp and Granderson turned in seasons worthy of the Most Valuable Player award and Verlander should be a lock for the American League Cy Young Award.

“Those three guys really made up my team there,” Hinkelman said. He had Kemp and Verlander on his 2009 prizewinner, giving him a personal connection of sorts, even though he has never met any of the players. “These guys are like personal friends to you, even though you don’t know them.”

He also got top performances from late-round picks like Cleveland shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera and Tampa Bay relief pitcher Kyle Farnsworth.

But the 2011 season still came down to the final game for Hinkelman, who battled K. J. Duke, a San Diego investment portfolio manager, for most of the season. Duke, who played in a different league, also had Kemp and Verlander, along with Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers, a contender for the Cy Young Award in the National League. But an off-year by his first-round pick, the Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez, held him back.

As in “Moneyball,” in which little-known Scott Hatteberg hits a dramatic game-winning home run, a relative unknown cinched Hinkelman’s victory.

Hinkelman plucked the St. Louis Cardinals’ Allen Craig off the waiver wire late in the season, and when outfielder Matt Holliday went down with an injury, Craig stepped in and went on an offensive tear. In the final game of the season, an 8-0 Cardinals victory over the Houston Astros, Craig hit a ninth-inning solo home run.

“For that baseball game, it was a meaningless hit,” Duke said, “but it cost me $80,000.”

The National Fantasy Baseball Championship attracted 390 players last year, each paying a $1,400 entry fee. Players can enter more than one team. Players have included the film director Nick Cassavetes, the television actor James Roday and the entertainer Meat Loaf.

There were 26 leagues of 15 teams each, and in March, drafts were held in Las Vegas, St. Louis, New York and Atlantic City and online. Each league had a prize of $5,600, and the leaders in each league compete against one another for the overall prize.

In 2009, Hinkelman raked in an astonishing $241,300 in prize money. He won the $100,000 contest, and another for $40,000. The N.F.B.C. had said anyone who could win both would get a $75,000 bonus, which it had insured — and he took that home as well.

In 2011, he paid $8,750 in entry fees for his various teams and took home $116,750 in prizes, according to Greg Ambrosius, who runs the N.F.B.C. as the general manager of consumer fantasy games for Stats LLC.

“You can’t do this twice in three years and have it be luck,” said Paul Charchian, the president of the trade association. “This is somebody who is extremely skilled at what he’s doing.”

Hinkelman’s business suits his fantasy baseball hobby, even though the hobby has eclipsed farming in earnings the past three years. He typically has about 500 pigs on his farm, and he now sells most of them to youths participating in 4-H programs. The pigs are typically born in February and March, and he sells them in April and May so the youngsters can raise them for fairs in August and September.

That means that for most of the summer — baseball season — Hinkelman does not have many pigs on his farm, and he can spend four to six hours a day watching baseball via his package of major league games on DirecTV. He has no employees and only a 300-yard walk to work.

He has four grown children and a wife who does not know much about baseball, although she has learned who Justin Verlander is.

Hinkelman grew up on the farm in Greencreek, population 211, three hours southeast of Spokane, Wash., by car. His father raised cattle and pigs, and his brother still grows wheat on the farm. His youngest son, Gabe, 29, helps him with the team.

He played high school basketball, helping to lead his team to the Idaho state tournament, and sat on the bench at the University of Idaho as a 6-foot guard. He played some slow-pitch softball after that, and now bowls two or three times a week.

He did not play baseball growing up. “There was a Little League in a bigger town,” he said. “None of the farm kids played baseball. I never did.”

At night, he could hear the broadcasts of Vin Scully calling Dodgers games, carrying tales of Maury Wills and Sandy Koufax across the wide-open West. He remains a Dodgers fan to this day, and said he thought the addition of Davey Lopes as a base-running coach would help Kemp realize his potential in 2011.

Hinkelman got on the Internet in the 1990s to feed his fantasy baseball habit, but says he is not too obsessed with technology. At the annual draft in Las Vegas, he said, half the participants have laptops.

“I go down with three pieces of paper, is all I go with,” he added. “I’ve got everything ranked.

“I’m not proficient at computers. I don’t have a smartphone where you can look up stats or anything like that. I just have a cellphone for calls. A lot of people have smartphones so they can look up box scores instantaneously. I’m not at that stage yet. I don’t know if I want to be. You can get married to that stuff.”

Two years ago, he bought a tractor and a livestock trailer with his winnings, and put new windows on the house, paid off a lot of debt and gave some money to his children. “This year, we’ll probably do some remodeling on our house,” he said.

He joked to the N.F.B.C. that he might buy “a boar for my sows,” and the organization put it online, which surprised him. “It makes me sound like a hick, which is O.K.,” he said. It keeps his competitors from taking him too seriously, he said.

“They say: ‘How’s this guy win? All he is is a pig farmer,’ ” Hinkelman said. “I don’t mind that at all.”

The Boss is Gone

TBS will celebrate the life of George Steinbrenner with a full week of classic Seinfeld episodes featuring Larry David as the legendary New York Yankees owner. The 10-episode collection will air Monday, July 19 – Friday, July 23, at 7 and 7:30 p.m. (ET/PT). The week will kick off with “The Opposite,” the fifth-season finale in which George Costanza (Jason Alexander) lands a job with the Yankees. The tribute will close out with “The Muffin Tops” episode, in which George loses his job when Steinbrenner trades him for new chicken concessions at Yankee Stadium.

Schedule:
Monday, July 19
7 p.m. - “The Opposite” – George convinces Steinbrenner to give him a job.
7:30 p.m. - “The Secretary” – George finds out Steinbrenner’s secretary makes more than he does.

Tuesday, July 20
7 p.m. - “The Race” – George heads to Cuba to recruit baseball players for Steinbrenner.
7:30 p.m. - “The Wink” – Steinbrenner lists all the people he’s fired over the years.

Wednesday, July 21
7 p.m. - “The Hot Tub” – Steinbrenner convinces George that a hot tub is the perfect way to relieve stress.
7:30 p.m. - “The Caddy” – George’s father (Jerry Stiller) confronts Steinbrenner about a traded player.

Thursday, July 22
7 p.m. - “The Calzone” – Steinbrenner gets the idea to put Yankees clothes in a pizza oven.
7:30 p.m. - “The Nap” – George’s napping habits at work lead Steinbrenner to think he has ESP.
Friday, July 23
7 p.m. - “The Millennium” – George does everything he can to get fired, but Steinbrenner loves what he does.
7:30 p.m. - “The Muffin Tops” – George’s relationship with the Yankees finally ends when Steinbrenner trades him

He played to win, and at all costs.

He did not care whose what it took to get there.

He just wanted to be in the winner's circle.

For years, his own arrogance denied him the very things he sought.

More than anything else, I supposed he learned in life money can't buy you everything you wanted. Power did not guarantee you victory. Somewhere along the journey to a destination I think he learned the destination is in the journey.

Five Rules for the Offseason in Keeper Leagues

As one baseball season comes to an end, the Rotisserie Hot Stove League kicks in big time. And you have to make some early decisions in your keeper leagues. Each is different and the guidelines affect your thinking, but here is what I have been tossing around so far.

Say you play in a keeper league with a $260 salary cap and a $350 in season salary maximum for all your players, which includes 10 reserves.

You spent the season trying to win your league’s pennant, and you traded away star rookie prospects like a Cameron Maybin or Travis Snider, whose salary was a buck, for a Josh Beckett or an AJ Burnett, who went for up to $25. The season has ended, and now your team’s total salary is at $349. You are sitting with guys like Vladimir and Jason Bay and Lance Berkman at 35 bucks plus. No way can you keep or protect all these guys.

What do you do?

Rule Number one: Dump Salary.

If your league’s trading season is open, you had better start biting the bullet and dealing your high priced sluggers and starters for something. Of course, it depends on the number of keepers your league has. If it is a small keeper league, then those guys are horsemeat anyway. But if you play in a deep keeper league and the team in 19th place needs a slugging bat, maybe you can deal a disappointing and high priced Lance Berkman for Carlos Gomez, and the potential of steals he brings to Milwaukee.

Rule Number two: Trade Down.

Every team needs a solid ace in its core of nine or ten pitchers, someone who can stabilize your pitching corps with consistently good outings. I do not mean a Jon Garland. I mean a Dan Haren, some guy you may have to pay 30 bucks for and who will dutifully post a strikeout an inning. I think you go for the strongest arm with the least injury history when it comes to betting the farm on a pitcher. Every pitch is a toss away from TJ surgery, but it seems sensible that if you have to bet, a guy like Josh Beckett, who never misses a start, is a good risk. But if you traded during the season so as to land Beckett and Burnett, and both are 28 bucks each, you had better deal one of them.

So in a league with deep keepers, dealing Josh Beckett at $28 bucks may be worth acquiring Jon Niese, a Met strikeout artist in the minors, at $1. Maybe the last place team is sitting on a $1 dollar 14 game winner in Ric Porcello, who won’t give you strikeouts, but may give you era, whip, and victories. You gotta’ go for it. It may aggravate fellow league owners, but you were going to lose Beckett in the draft, and now you are acquiring a likely starter..

Rule Number Three: Give Up More than You Get.

Another way to play the game in the offseason is to overwhelm your competitor with an offer which in fact helps him and seemingly hurts you. If you need to get down protecting say 15 players at $200, it will not help you having a dozen quality players at $20 bucks each. So don’t be afraid to do a giveaway which benefits your opponent if it gets you a low priced bat. Say you are sitting on a corner bat like Mike Lowell at 15 and Josh Beckett at 28 and there is no way you can pay both $43. Offer them and a rookie to a lower echelon team for a $5 Andy La Roche in the hope he emerges. Is that fair value? Of course not. Still, in a league based on salaries, you have to do that. Would a rebuilding team bite? Only if they need an ace. But you take your shot.

In one league I am in, we do not use salaries, but we really limit the guys you can protect, and we play with a small roster. One dude saw his team was out of the money and he finished last in the league but first in trading. His ingenious method was to steadily improve other teams in trades by offering multiple talents to acquire their best player, hoping to lock them away as part of a protected cast for the following year.

So here, he said, take Brian Roberts, Nate McClouth, and Justin Morneau. Just give me Albert Pujols. Take Roy Halladay, Mark Texeira, Jimmy Rollins. Just give me at all costs Chase Utley.

The season ends and he gets to protect six players next year, and each are the best at their position. Not to mention, he has the first draft pick. Thus, in a keeper league, a two year plan is not out of the question. This guy has a formidable team going into next year’s draft. We only play 17 players in a 16 team league, and his top 6 are in the top 15 in baseball.

Rule Number Four. Score A Solid Veteran

The most fun is being the guy to take the next rookie at 1 buck who delivers 19 dollars worth for you, and becomes a star. So no one wants the 38 year old Casey Blakes and Mike Lowells whose numbers are consistent season after season, but are heartbreaking injury risks. Chances are they will be excellent and cheap late round selections next season. If your league uses toppers, a certain number of guys you get to keep if you bid a buck higher than anyone else, why not trade for one of them as a safety valve for your draft next Spring?

How many teams and owners let Aaron Hill in Toronto escape their eagle eye last season? He was off to a running start in 2008 when he went down with a season ending injury so he was off everyone’s radar, and wound up putting up huge numbers in 09. Trust in medicine. Based on how he started off in 09, you have got to believe a healthy Rickey Weeks can put up the numbers he started to put on the board last April. Remember that an owner seeking to dump a New York Yankees hurler named Wang may be tossing a guy who won 38 games in two seasons.

Rule Number Five. Grab Some Guys in Limbo

A week ago, no one knew if Carlos Gomez had a job. Now he may start in Milwaukee. His value has just soared.

Jeremy Hermida may be a fourth outfielder, but in the Boston lineup with that short rightfield porch and a DH slot available, the guy could blossom in Boston. At Fenway, his value has just soared.

As the season ends, Garrett Atkins has no job, and a team may dump him. Imagine how his value would soar if he was inserted into the Phillies lineup to replace Feliz? Look around for those guys who owners are nervous about keeping and may fool everyone. The Dodgers grabbed George Sherill as an 8th inning guy for their stretch run but no owner may want to pay his salary if he is not a closer. What happens if LA does not keep him and he winds up as a closer in another city? Look for that type of player, like a Hideki Matsui. He is going to hit 25 homers somewhere, but right now you are in a good bargaining position to grab him as the Yankees ponder whether to go with youth or re-sign the World Series Hero. Maybe his value soars if he signs anew and his roster spot gets locked in.

As I said, these rules are not etched in stone because there are numerous variants based on your league’s requirements and salaries and keeper provisions. But it helps to get through the next four months when the only excitement is Rotoworld’s posting of who gets untendered, busted, or traded.

The Artful Dodger: Vin Scully

That Artful Dodgers Voice -- A great story by a writer for the
By MARK YOST
Los Angeles

The Major League Baseball playoffs begin tonight, and with them will come justifiable criticism of some of the abysmal sports commentary that regularly trudges across the airwaves. For a refreshing change, I would direct listeners to the smooth tenor voice and pithy commentary of Vin Scully. This is Mr. Scully's 60th year in the Los Angeles Dodgers broadcast booth, and he is nothing short of the best play-by-play man working in sports today.

The pregame banter for the first of three recent Rockies-Dodgers games was filled with information you could have gleaned from the morning paper or a blog. The Dodgers needed just one win to clinch the National League West (which they did Saturday night); a Phillies loss helped the Dodgers secure the best record in the National League. When Mr. Scully finally took the mike, he distinguished himself in just one sentence.

"It's a very pleasant Friday night here in Los Angeles," he said, telling radio listeners from Petaluma to Panama City something they couldn't possibly have known unless they were here at the game. More important, Mr. Scully, who's 81, wasn't just setting the atmosphere but building a rapport with his audience. "I don't announce," he told me in an interview before Saturday's game. "I have a conversation."

But once the game starts, Mr. Scully is all business. From the first pitch, you need the skills of a court stenographer to keep up with the facts and figures—all interesting and relevant—that he weaves effortlessly into a dialogue that's nothing short of poetic.

For instance, he noted that the Colorado Rockies had been 15½ games back in June and red hot coming into this series. He then reminded listeners that the Rockies were batting a paltry .168 against left-handed pitchers, like Dodgers starter Randy Wolf. Those aren't off-the-cuff remarks, but indicative of the preparation Mr. Scully puts into every broadcast.

Unlike many of today's commentators, he understands that what has happened is more important than what might happen. Thus, when Ryan Spilborghs came up to bat in the first inning, Mr. Scully said: "Rockies with runners at second and third. Torrealba, the butter-and-egg man, just delivered a double to drive in two runs. Wolf has made 30 pitches so far in the first inning and the Rockies lead two to nothing."

Mr. Scully didn't come out of the womb delivering such eloquent and informative commentary. He was tutored by legendary broadcaster Red Barber. In 1950, when he was only 23, Mr. Scully joined his mentor in the Brooklyn Dodgers broadcast booth and learned to never root for the home team, not to socialize with the ballplayers, not to listen to other broadcasters, and to know when to shut up. "Sometimes, nothing says it better than the roar of the crowd," Mr. Scully said.

Although he spent just four years at Mr. Barber's elbow, they were formative years. "In many ways, I was the son he never had," Mr. Scully recalled fondly.

In 1954, Mr. Scully became the sole Dodgers broadcaster. When the team moved to L.A. in 1958, the native New Yorker went with them. It was in Los Angeles that he forever put his imprint on this team and this city.
Mr. Scully credits the transistor radio with his early popularity. In fact, fans from the era told me that so many people brought radios with them to the team's first West Coast home, the cavernous Los Angeles Coliseum, that broadcast engineers were vexed by feedback from Mr. Scully's own voice.

Ross Miller, a 55-year-old Los Angeles pediatrician and Dodgers season-ticket holder, was one of those fans who grew up with Mr. Scully in his ear. "What's amazing, what really speaks to Vinny's talent, is the fact that he was describing a game we were watching with our own eyes, yet his words painted the picture so much better." Indeed, sitting in the Dodgers press box, I found myself averting my eyes from the field, preferring to let Mr. Scully describe the action.

The broadcaster insists that he never comes to the ballpark with any prepared lines, which makes some of his legendary calls all the more remarkable. In 1956, when Don Larsen went into the last inning of the only perfect game in World Series history, Mr. Scully said: "Let's all take a deep breath as we go to the most dramatic ninth inning in the history of baseball." In 1974, when Hank Aaron stepped to the plate to break Babe Ruth's home run record, Mr. Scully noted: "A black man is getting a standing ovation in the Deep South for breaking a record of an all-time baseball idol." In 1988, when Kirk Gibson hit a walk-off home run to win the first game of the World Series, the broadcaster said: "In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened."

But perhaps his greatest call of all time came during Sandy Koufax's perfect game: "Three times in his sensational career has Sandy Koufax walked out to the mound to pitch a fateful ninth where he turned in a no-hitter. But tonight, September the ninth, nineteen-hundred and sixty-five, he made the toughest walk of his career, I'm sure, because through eight innings he has pitched a perfect game."

Later in the inning, he said, "there's twenty-nine thousand people in the ballpark and a million butterflies." And when Mr. Koufax struck out Harvey Kuenn to end the game, Mr. Scully simply said, "Swung on and missed, a perfect game," then let the crowd speak for 38 seconds. I can't imagine a broadcaster today shutting up for three seconds, much less 38.

The Dodgers host the Cardinals tonight to start the National League Division Series. The game will be broadcast nationally using the latest high-definition television technology. But I'd argue that the clearest picture of the game will come via radio and, as has been the case for the past six decades, it will come from Mr. Scully.

—Mr. Yost is a writer in Chicago.

Living and Dying By the Sword

Not this time for World Series Hero Jon Papelbon

Francona and Tracy: Live and Die by the Sword

by Norm Kent

Terry Francona is a World Series winner.

Jim Tracy took the Rockies to the mountaintop this season.

Both managers were on the verge of elimination in a key playoff game in the Division Series.

Each team, down at home in the bottom of the 8th, rose to the occasion and saw their team take the lead.

How does not matter, really, does it? Bottom line is that home in the cold Yorvit Torrealba, Mr. Rocktober, drove a shot to the wall that gave the Rockies a 4-2 lead in the bottom of the 8th inning of a decisive game, which led to Tracy handing the ball to Huston Street in the 9th. Huston, 35 of 37 saves, Street. Game in the bag?

At Fenway, a few days before, a similar scene. Faced with elimination and extinction, the Sox rise from the ashes in the home 8th. They go to the 9th and Papelbon is on the mound to protect a two run lead. Game in the bag?

In both instances, one thinks of course. But this is October. This is the playoffs. And this is never say die for all the money. And these are guys who know no defeat. Who will not quit. Who will not yield.

Not even with two strikes two outs and the game on the line in 25 degree Colorado cold. Then Rollins singles. Utley walks. Howard ropes a rocket off the wall. And Werth follows with a game breaker, all off Street.

Two days before, Paps on the mound. Two outs. Two strikes, a pitch away from victory. Aybar slaps one to center. Figgins works a 3-2 pitch walk. Abreu raps it off the left field wall. Hunter is walked. Guerrero lines a game winner to center, all off Paps.

And I am thinking, watching both games, how both closers were off the mark, struggling, not finding home plate. Both outside and high on close pitches they needed to win. As a fan, you said: "God, get that guy out of the game. He is blowing it." But I am the fan and the manager has his guy on the mound and he shall not be moved.

But you got the feeling they were not going to get the last out; that the Angels were too good to be denied, and the Phils were defending World Champs for a reason. What a lineup. Rollins, Victorino, Utley, Howard, Ibanez, and Werth. Not an easy out anywhere. No reason to give up. And Street was clearly on the wrong intersection. Paps was wild high.

The Angelos started their year with their entire pitching staff on the DL, and one dies in an auto accident. On July 4, they lose Guerrero, Hunter, and Rivera for a month and proceed to win 18 of 20. These teams were just not going to lose. And they did not.

Ironically, in each instance, Francona and Tracy did not budge. They did not remove their ace reliever, though the options were many in the bullpen. Guys like Okajima or Marquis. Loyalty to a fault? What do you think?

Both defeats saw the home team lose leads in the top of the ninth and fail to come back in the bottom half. Both defeats saw crowds lifted into 8th inning ecstasy only to be doomed by 9th inning agony. Only to see their ace closers aced.

Of this, baseball legends and stories are made. Monday morning quarterbacking? Of course. Why not? On the subway home, I am sure that is what all the Rockies fans and Red Sox fans were thinking.

Why did we not make the switch? This was not 2007 anymore. This was a new year. Move with the tide. The managers did not, and the waters sucked them underneath. The Rockies and Red Sox went down to defeat, and so it goes. So it goes.

Back to the Division series. Will the Phils top LA again, to go back to the World Series? Will the Yanks make their first season at their new stadium a World Series endeavor? Can they top the Angels who seem to jinx them? Will their be a first ever Angels-Dodgers crosstown World Series?

Lots of questions, no answers, just some fun baseball ahead.

2002 WS Champs Angels vs 2000 WS Champs Yankees

2008 WS Champs Phillies vs wow its been awhile Dodgers

12 Year Old Homers Off Howard

Well this story sure has generated controversy but there is no doubt in my mind that young Jennifer got wrongfully taken by the Phillies and the result is just and correct and proper. I will comment some more later, but for now interviews with CNN, NPR, and a few others are taking up the day.

Fantasy Furor: Did I Do Wrong or Right

The issue today is whether by doing right by me I did wrong by my league.

Here goes.

Pissing Off Your League's Owners

Did I do the right thing, that is the question....

There are 20 teams in a daily league where the stats come down to the last day, the last inning, the last at bat.

Four teams are fighting for second to fifth place.

Myself, I am in a five way battle to finish between seventh and eleventh place.

For the first five teams, their whip is at 1.34 and CBS Sports can only find a winner by carrying it out to not a hundredth of a point, but a thousandth. The winner could be by 1.345 to 1.347 to 1.348. Thus, a walk, a hit, a bunt single can shift the standings. Can decide who gets $500 for finishing second, or $50 for finishing fifth.

That is how tight the league is. My race is over. I am going to finish 8th, 9th or 10th, out of the money. The others can win or lose hundreds of bucks, depending on how some of my players perform in the one game playoff between Minny and Motown. A SB there, a HR here, can move other teams final stats.

The season ends and after a really bad week, I drop from 7th to 9th by a half point. I want to stay there. In the one game playoff, the only guy I have starting is Orlando Cabrera. I would just as soon not play him as add him into a roster, and use his stats, because there is a league loophole I want to take advantage of.

After the season ends, you cannot add or drop. But you can have up to five disabled players. So those teams that have extra disabled players on their team get to keep them and carry them into the offseason, giving them extra players to trade and deal. I do not.

But since the one game playoff for the title counts towards the standings, you can still add and drop players. However, if your lineup is not legal, the league rule is you get no stats for the day. So obviously no one wants illegal lineups. But what have I got to lose from just one player on one day? If I can pick up three rookie prospects for the entire offseason if I do not drop anyone, I would rather be illegal for one day since I am losing the at bats from one sole player. And yet I snare three rookies to deal or reserve, who may or may not pan out.

I could care less about the stats for that day. Again, all I have to sacrifice is the stats from O Cab. He is the only guy I have playing that day, and I would rather have an illegal lineup but pick up three guys to hold over the winter and see how they do in the spring.

The teams from second to fifth are livid. Some other owners too. They say I am altering the league results by having an illegal lineup. They are insisting I make O Cab active and my lineup legit arguing my greed is changing the end results of the league. What if O Cab goes 0 for 4 and I don’t use him, that stat could push me down a fraction in b.a., and that could change the final standings by a thousandth of a point for the third place team. So I should play the guy, everyone argues. And give up my three extra players. I say Why?

I thought I was playing for my team, not others. Should I care how the others finish? Some of these guys are calling me every name in the book and I did not really want to hurt anyone. I just wanted to help myself.

Do I have an obligation to play with a legal lineup when only one or two players is affected? I mean, I could reserve them to begin with.


The point is am I under an obligation to abide by a legal lineup? I am getting penalized for not doing so; I am losing stats for a day. But really, since it is only one player, why should I care? Does my decision impact the others, or the final standings? Who is to say? The league policy does frown on illegal lineups, but on this the last day of the season, isn't it worth the sanction to score the extra players?

Why are the other owners so angry? Do they have a right to be? Am I being unfair to the integrity of the league? It is a competition. I don't want to risk losing the place I am in or the extra players I am socking away

Would you ? Do you think I have a greater moral duty to the league?

You make the call. I chose to keep the players and have an illegal lineup, doing what was right for me and not what others say was good for the league. I don't think it mattered either way, but was I right? Was I wrong?

Was I being unfair to others by being too fair to myself?

Barmes' Catch Lifts Rockies

If you haven't seen it yet, Clint Barmes' catch Sunday afternoon seemed to be one of those things that makes September baseball great. It was a fantastic catch that preserved a slim lead, keeping the Rockies 2 1/2 games up in the NL wild-card race and preventing the Dodgers from clinching the NL West. The play came at such a dramatic juncture that T.J. Simers' column in the Los Angeles Times hinges on it.

The only problem is that Barmes may not have actually caught the ball. On The Denver Post's Rockies blog today, Nick Groke publishes a picture taken by a Post photographer which shows the ball popping out of Barmes' glove as the second baseman falls to the ground and another picture which makes it appear as if the ball is on the ground.

Watching the replay closely, it's almost impossible to tell if Barmes holds on to the ball or if he scoops it off the ground in one motion as he rolls over. I haven't seen a better angle replay, though if one exists I doubt the Rockies or Major League Baseball would be all that eager to let the public see it. Well, with the Braves losing to the Marlins on Wednesday, and Ianetta launching a late inning HR last nite, it looks like the Rockies are back in the playoffs anyway. Not bad for a team that everyone thought was a one trick pony in 2007.

How could Clint Hurdle have been so bad this year and Jim Tracy so good? Whatever, Tracy now will go against his old team, the Dodgers, in the playoffs.

The Triple Play by Bruntlett

Baseball sweet Baseball.

Bruntlett screws up two plays in a row and is all set to be a goat.

Then this.

A Game Becomes A Classic

It was an instant classic, a historic deadlock where time had no jurisdiction over the game's greatest rivalry and pitching reigned supreme, littering zeroes across the scoreboard well past the midnight hour.
The spotlight of a pennant race never gets much brighter than when the Yankees and the Red Sox share a ballfield, and on Friday, it couldn't have been much better. Alex Rodriguez's two-run homer ended an epic 15-inning contest as the Yankees defeated the Red Sox, 2-0.
"It was a big game at the beginning, and it just kept getting bigger and bigger," Rodriguez said. "You don't want to play 15 innings and use up great pitching performances from both sides. We knew the game was very important, and it was good that we won."
Five hours and 33 minutes after A.J. Burnett threw the game's first pitch, Rodriguez launched the final one into the left-center-field bullpen off Boston's Junichi Tazawa, driving in the only runs of the night and lifting New York to its 10th walk-off win of the season.
The good-night rocket allowed the Yankees to expand their lead in the American League East to 4 1/2 games over their blood rivals. For Rodriguez, it snapped a career-high 72-at-bat homerless streak with career shot No. 573, tying Harmon Killebrew for ninth place on baseball's all-time list.

It also authored a final chapter to a contest that -- through seven innings -- featured an epic duel between A.J. Burnett and Josh Beckett. The former Florida Marlins teammates were outstanding, successfully making a pleasant August evening feel an awful lot like October.
"Unbelievable win," Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. "This was really amazing. There were opportunities, but there weren't a whole lot of hits. Beckett and A.J. pitched great, and everyone in the bullpen pitched well for both teams. We were fortunate to come out on top."
Derek Jeter was on the bases for Rodriguez's blast and could not believe so much of the sellout crowd of 48,262 had remained for the final act, roaring and trying to will a victory in the first Yankees-Red Sox game to progress scorelessly through 14 innings.
"They were outstanding," Jeter said. "I was surprised there were so many fans left there at the end. When I was on first, somebody was yelling at me to steal the base. I was still lucky I was still standing up."
The Yankees' early-morning push brought bleary-eyed relief only after they had their hearts twisted once again in the 14th inning.
Eric Hinske had entered the game in the eighth and was already enjoying his third at-bat when, with two men aboard, he blasted a deep drive to right field, drawing great cries of anticipation.
Red Sox right fielder J.D. Drew used every ounce of his remaining energy to flag the ball with a sensational running grab. Pinch-runner Ramiro Pena ran back to second base, and Hinske was left in disbelief.
In the storied history of the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry, the franchises have played 15 or more innings 13 times. Friday night's nail-biter was the longest game between the two teams since
"I was hoping it was going to fall in, for sure," Hinske said. "I took my helmet off and I was like, 'No way, this is unbelievable.' It's just one of those crazy games that's going to go down in Yankees-Red Sox history."
The most clutch Yankee, Melky Cabrera, then spiked emotions with a bid for what would have been his fourth walk-off hit of the year, drilling a Tawaza offering into right field and galloping down the baseline. It, too, was premature.
The sinking liner smacked turf just a few inches outside the chalk, and first-base umpire Jim Joyce emphatically waved it foul. Cabrera was sent back to strike out swinging, the game went to the 15th inning, and some Yankees looked to the skies in frustration.
"At that point, you figure this game's never going to end," Jeter said. "That's pretty much it. That's one of those long ones. Our pitching staff deserves a lot of credit; theirs as well. We were just fortunate to come up with that home run."
Jeter had been hitless in six trips before singling off Tawaza in the 15th, a run of frustration that included stranding runners in scoring position in the third, fifth and 10th innings. He wasn't alone. The clubs combined to go a staggering 0-for-19 with runners in scoring position.
"It seems like it was a game of missed opportunities on both sides," Jeter said. "I'm sure we feel a lot better over here because we were able to win it."
Rodriguez spent most of his postgame media session deflecting attention to the starting pitchers, and with good reason -- it was the only time, A-Rod said, he had seen that many swings and misses in a single contest.
"It was a great game on both sides," Rodriguez said. "For me, the story of the day is Beckett and Burnett just throwing darts, and both bullpens were pretty much incredible."
Seeking his elusive first victory over the Red Sox since signing a five-year deal with the Yankees, Burnett allowed a single to the first batter he faced, then ensured that was it for Boston.
Snarling behind a bursting fastball and a biting slider, Burnett clamped the Red Sox quiet with 7 2/3 innings of scoreless ball, turning in what arguably plays as his signature performance thus far in pinstripes. After his 118th and final pitch, Burnett walked off the field to a lusty standing ovation.
"It was big for us," Burnett said. "I think I battled early but never got too upset with myself. I had quite a few walks there, four-pitch walks, but we were able to make pitches when I needed to, and luckily I got hold of that curveball late in the game."
Beckett also refused to give. The steely-eyed right-hander showcased his sharpest stuff, limiting the Yankees to four hits in a 115-pitch performance that surprised no one.
"He seems like he's always pitching good against us," Jeter said. "When you get guys on base, that's when he's at his toughest. You figure runs are going to be hard to come by."
Burnett's exit sequenced into the bullpen's hour to shine. Phil Hughes got a big out, Mariano Rivera worked the ninth inning against the heart of the Red Sox's lineup, and Alfredo Aceves was summoned to hurl three scoreless innings that would go rather unheralded in the grander picture.
Red Sox manager Terry Francona got just as much production out of the blacked-out names on his lineup card. All the while, Beckett and Burnett retained their seats, staring across the diamond at the drama playing out.
"We were running out of pitching, so we had to do it pretty quick," Girardi said. "[We had] nobody left. It just shows you the importance of the game and what the game means to everyone involved here."
Brian Bruney recorded six outs, some of them loud, and Phil Coke hurled a hitless 15th to set up Rodriguez's heroics. That sent Burnett dashing back on to the field, carrying with him a whipped cream pie destined for the left side of Rodriguez's face.
Rodriguez briefly allowed himself to taste the mess before toweling it off, and the exhilarating victory must have been indeed as sweet as he'd hoped. It certainly beat the alternative.
"Most of all, it's exhausting," Rodriguez said. "I think we were so excited that the ball went over the fence, not just because we won, but because we had a chance to go home and get some sleep."
Bryan Hoch is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

One Fantasy Player You Won't Draft Right Away

DAYTON, Ohio -- A judge has convicted a Minor League pitcher of injuring a fan when he threw a baseball during an on-field melee in Dayton last year.

Montgomery County Common Pleas Court Judge Connie Price found Julio Castillo guilty Tuesday of felonious assault causing serious physical injury. He was acquitted on a second charge of felonious assault with a deadly weapon.

Twenty-two-year-old Castillo, of the Dominican Republic, was pitching for the Peoria Chiefs, a Chicago Cubs Class A affiliate, against the Dayton Dragons when the bench-clearing brawl broke out. Castillo threw a ball that gave a fan a concussion.

During last month's trial, Castillo testified that he threw the ball downward toward a dugout to try to keep opposing players from rushing the field. He says he was not aiming at anyone.

Castillo is on the roster of the Boise Hawks, another Class A affiliate of the Cubs, but was not allowed to play. The Cubs were awaiting the outcome of the trial to determine whether his status will change.

Thirtyballparks.com

http://thirtyballparks.com/

So here is a real cool tour that you might want to put on your calendar; thirty ballparks in the space of thirty or so days for a summer vacation

My Dream Game

http://www.goldpanners.com/MidnightSunGame/index.html

More than anything else, this is a place I want to go.

Here is a place I want to be.

I wanted to do it last year. I could not arrange it for this year. But for next year, somehow, someway, I would like to schedule things to be in Fairbanks, Alaska. I just did not think having just recovered from a bout of pneumonia that this was the appropriate course of action for me to take in June of 2009. But maybe next year. That's what the Cubs fans always say, right? Maybe next year. And now that I am healthier, maybe a lot more blogging. But at least a trip to the California coast. To the beaches of Laguna, La Jolla, San Diego, and of course, Black's Beach.

Lou Gehrig's 'Bad Break'

The Iron Man of Baseball passed away on June 2, 1941; almost 70 years ago today. This was a ceremony in his honor on July 4, 1939 I believe. In the face of a career ending injury which would lead to his passing, he gave all of us a perspective on life, noting that his baseball career and life's experience made him 'the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.' I think about those words often when I get taken ill, or have a bad break. He stood up in the face of adversity as so must we all.

Doubt that he was ever suspended under a drug policy for 50 games. One of my heroes, with a legacy of grace and guts and he was so young. I saw that Casey Kotchman this week was out three or four days with a 'contusion.' How many times in his streak of 2,130 games in an era when the fields were not well tended, when the gloves were not as strong, when the medicines not as healing, did Lou Gehrig play with a contusion on his knee?

I think Conor Jackson and Casey Kotchman have a ways to go. Here are some astounding facts of that streak, which ironically also began on June 2, 1925, 84 years ago today.

Yankee manager Miller Huggins started Gehrig in place of regular first baseman Wally Pipp. Pipp was in a slump, as were the Yankees as a team, so Huggins made several lineup changes to boost their performance. Fourteen years later, Gehrig had played 2,130 consecutive games. In a few instances, Gehrig managed to keep the streak intact through pinch hitting appearances and fortuitous timing; in others, the streak continued despite injuries. Locked into the American athletes' professional vernacular today is the phrase, don't get 'Pipped,' aka don't call in sick, you may never get your job back.

AS for Lou, look what he endured:

On April 23, 1933, an errant pitch by Washington Senators hurler struck Gehrig in the head. Although almost knocked unconscious, Gehrig recovered and remained in the game.

On June 14, 1933, Gehrig was ejected from a game, along with manager Joe McCarthy, but he had already been at bat, so he got credit for playing the game. On July 13, 1934, Gehrig suffered a "lumbago attack" and had to be assisted off the field. In th

e next day's away game, he was listed in the lineup as "shortstop", batting lead-off. In his first and only plate appearance, he singled and was promptly replaced by a pinch runner to rest his throbbing back, never taking the field. A&E's Biography speculated that this illness, which he also described as "a cold in his back", might have been the first symptom of his debilitating disease.

In addition, X-rays taken late in his life disclosed that Gehrig had sustained several fractures during his playing career, although he remained in the lineup despite those previously undisclosed injuries.

Gehrig's record of 2,130 consecutive games played stood until September 6, 1995, when Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken, Jr. broke it.

I would like to think somewhere in a small ballfield somewhere else in America today, maybe even in Latin America or Japan, some young kid is saying 'I can do that'; and long after this blog and myself are gone, some other blogger will be writing about the guy who surpassed Cal Ripken. It is the way of sport. Records are made today only to be broken tomorrow.

S Rod and Brandon May Be Bashing Wood in LA Soon

It could be Sean Rodriguez, not Brandon Wood.

Second baseman might get the nod over teammate at triple-A Salt Lake if the Angels promote someone to take over for a slumping Howie Kendrick.

Mike DiGiovanna of the LA Times writes today that "Imagine the uproar among Angels fans and bloggers if second baseman Howie Kendrick continues to struggle at the plate, the team makes a move to replace him, and it isn't to call up slugging prospect Brandon Wood.It could happen.

Wood, who is batting .289 with 10 home runs and 21 runs batted in for triple-A Salt Lake, is the player most prominently mentioned when talk turns to in-house options to bolster the offense.Because Wood plays third base and shortstop, his promotion would prompt a move of Chone Figgins from third base to second.But if Kendrick, who is batting .229 with four homers and 20 RBIs, is demoted, Wood isn't the most worthy replacement candidate.Sean Rodriguez is.Fans remember Rodriguez as the slick-fielding but light-hitting second baseman who provided superb defense in place of the injured Kendrick and Maicer Izturis in five stints, and 59 games, with the Angels last season."

But Rodriguez, who also plays shortstop, third and the outfield, has become a legitimate two-way threat. He is batting .280 with 17 homers and 50 RBIs in 46 games for Salt Lake, and don't be surprised if he gets the call before Wood if a move is made."He's really picked it up," Manager Mike Scioscia said. "He's someone we're paying a lot of attention to. The way he's driving the ball, playing all-around, has been very impressive.

As for Kendrick, Scioscia said, "We're not contemplating a move at this point, but it's something we're watching very closely."Kendrick seemed to find his stroke during a six-game stretch from May 18 to 23, when he was eight for 23 with three RBIs, raising his average from .230 to .247.But Kendrick went hitless in his next 11 at-bats and did not start Saturday night against Seattle."At times, he looks like he's getting comfortable in the box, at times he looks a little frustrated, like he's trying to do too much," Scioscia said. "If a couple hits fall in, I think this guy will start to relax and be productive."

The bottom line is that Brandon Wood has been Fantasy's Babe Ruth for four years now, ever since an astounding minor league season, which has never materialized in the majors. Some take years to develop and get a chance. Some just get passed over. Some like Adrian Gonzales, go through Texas and Florida as the number one draft choice in 2000, only to shine in San Diego nearly 8 or 9 years later. But we live in an age and era of hype, and the Angels have fed into that machine, with Dallas McPherson, Kendry Morales, Casey Kotchman, Brandon Wood, and Sean Rodriguez. If only minor league stats counted, these guys would have been a fantasy delight.

So a shrewd fantasy owner may rush to the waiver wire and find Sean Rodriguez on it. He may replace Kendrick. He may or may not do well. Or he may just find time passed him by. The truth is that none of us know for sure whether this is the year the Wood gets to the plate, or S Rod becomes a dominant force. One thing is for certain, if you are in a fantasy pennant race, the time to deal Wood or S Rod is right now. Their value will never be higher. All because fantasy owners are starting to, like Mike Scosia, look at Howie Kendrick's actual numbers and not the hype.