Top News:
Leitch / Deadspin:
Here's Your Ex: See, Now This Is Just Being Mean — Imagine you're facing one of the most important moments of your career, a moment in which you must be on top of your game and perform at your peak capacity. Everyone is counting on you; the whole world is watching. Concentration is paramount.
RELATED:
ESPN:
Game 5 starts: Beckett for Sox, his ex for anthem — Teams have been known to go to extraordinary lengths to get an edge. But the Cleveland Indians swear Thursday night's choice of pre-game singer is not a piece of gamesmanship. — Danielle Peck, a country music singer who also happened …
Discussion:
Catbird in the Nosebleed Seats, Hot Stove New York, 6-4-2, Mostly Mets and American Legends
Jeff Goldberg / Hartford Courant:
Red Sox Downplay Report That Beckett Is Hurt — CLEVELAND - The great debate over whether Josh Beckett should have pitched Game 4 on three days' rest took an unexpected turn Tuesday night. — Ken Rosenthal, working the Fox broadcast, reported that Red Sox sources indicated Beckett …
Discussion:
Baseball Musings
Tim Brown / Yahoo! Sports:The Manny diaries — CLEVELAND - If this American League …
Discussion:
Blogging Baseball
George King / New York Post:
TORRE LANDS IN TAMPA — NEW DEAL IMMINENT? — Joe Torre just landed here, in what could be the surest sign that a new deal with the Yankees brass is imminent. — Torre, wearing a dress shirt with sleeves rolled up, departed from Westchester this morning and landed here in a private jet …
RELATED:
Sports Illustrated:
Torre turns down Yankees — Longtime manager declines one-year, $5 million offer — Joe Torre turned down a deal to return as Yankees manager for a 13th season on Thursday. — In a conference call, Yankees president Randy Levine said the club offered him a $5 million contract for 2008 …
Ed Price / New Jersey Online:
Torre rejects $5M Yankees deal — Joe Torre has turned down the Yankees' offer of a one-year contract with a vesting option to continue managing the team, team president Randy Levine said this afternoon. — "We respect his decision," Levine said in a conference call. "We appreciate everything he has done.
John Harper / NY Daily News:
Indecision on Joe Torre makes clear that Boss Era is over — CLEVELAND - So the newly formed Yankee hierarchy hasn't made a decision on Joe Torre after two days around a conference table in Tampa, not to mention the week the various bigwigs had to consider their positions?
Discussion:
New York Times, New York Post, Camden Chat, NJ.com, The LoHud Yankees Blog and Bronx Banter
George King / New York Post:
OPT IN THE AIR — YANKEES 'WILL NOT PARTICIPATE' IF A-ROD CHOOSES FREE AGENCY — TAMPA, Fla. - The Yankees ended two long days and a lot of cholesterol intake at the Capital Grille yesterday without deciding Joe Torre's fate, but they did emerge with a warning to Alex Rodriguez: Opt out and your Yankees career is over.
Discussion:
MLB Trade Rumors
Marty Noble / MLB.com:
Mets' collapse weighs heavily on Green — Missed opportunity at playoffs continues to haunt right fielder — NEW YORK — Survivor's guilt it isn't. The Mets don't qualify as survivors. It is a full-fledged guilt, a guilt that weighs on Shawn Green these days, a heavy and unsettling sense …
Paul Lukas / ESPN:
Long live the bullpen car — The notion is absurd on its face: professional athletes needing a motorized vehicle to bring them approximately 100 yards. And yet that was once the norm in Major League Baseball, where that quaintest of innovations, the bullpen buggy (or car, or cart, or motorcycle), held sway for nearly half a century.
La Velle / Twins Insider:
It's still early in the offseason..... I click on this blog and the drool pours out of my monitor as I read all these cries for information. I understand that Twins Nation is hungry for news, but there's nothing earth-shattering going on right now. But there are a few tidbits....
RELATED:
Scot Gregor / Associated Press:
White Sox sitting pretty with Garland, Contreras as trade bait — The stove isn't hot yet. As a matter of fact, it hasn't even been turned on. — That will soon change. Not long after the Cleveland Indians finish cooling off the Colorado Rockies and celebrate their first World Series …
Nate Silver / Baseball Prospectus:
Ryan Braun's Defense — I've made several snide remarks about Ryan Braun's third base defense in recent weeks, most recently in my review of the 50 most valuable players in baseball. I don't have anything against Ryan Braun; it would be hard for someone with the last name Silver to root against the Hebrew Hammer.
Discussion:
Brew Crew Ball
Nate Silver / Baseball Prospectus:
Offseason Plans, AL West — This is the third of a six-part preview of the impending offseason. Today, we cover the AL West, because it's kind enough to have only four teams, none of whom remain in the playoffs. — Part I: AL Central — Part II: NL Central — 2007 Record: 94-68, first place
Discussion:
Lone Star Ball
Maury Brown / The Biz of Baseball:
Interview - Eric Fisher - Sports Business Journal — If you're interest lies in anything that has to do with sports outside the lines, then the trade magazine the Sports Business Journal and it's counterpart, the Sports Business Daily are indispensable resources for keeping up with all manner of sports business.
