It's November, and Baseball is Still Relevant
Odd, even though no more games will be played this year, there are still a bunch of good stories out there.

* Red Sox win second World Series in four years (with nearly an entirely new team).

* Yankees hire Joe Giradi as the team's manager.

No real surprise here. Here did a good job with a terrible Marlins roster and still should be there.

* Dodgers to announce the firing of former Sox manager Grady Little and the hiring of Joe Torre, whom will bring Mattingly with him to LA.

The Dodgers were project to win the World Series this year, and early on, it looked like they would at least win their division. Problems in the clubhouse led to the team playing poorly down the stretch and they ended up 82-80 for the season. They've got some great young players in James Loney and Chad Billiningsly, and some quality players who are past their prime, but still good options. Joe is gonna make this team a winner.

* Braves trade Edgar Renteria to Detroit

This deal confuses me for a couple of reasons. The Tigers already had a shortstop in Carlos Guillen (.296, 20HR, 13SB, 102RBI). He started playing 1B towards the end of last season, so he probably will shift there. Renteria (.332, 12HR, 11SB, 57RBI) played well in Atlanta this season, as you can see he had a great batting average, but in his short stint in the AL with the Red Sox, this guy sucked and was run out of town (they still don't have a good SS).

* ARod Opts Out of Record Breaking Deal

I'm not sure what he or his agent is thinking, but they believe they can do better than his current deal. If they took a look at the market after they signed the 250 Million contract, FA contracts have gone up, but FAs are typically overvalued since that point and nobody has come close to signing anything similar to ARod's old deal. ARod can only go to a few teams, Boston (do they even want him?), Angels, Dodgers, Seattle (rumored to be interested, but do they have the money and does he want to go there?), and Texas. He also hurts himself by taking out the team with the most money in the Yankees. I honestly hope he is forced to sign for less than what he previously made. Decent player in the regular season, but the biggest choke in the playoffs, and I think that's going to be a factor when teams make an offer to him. If the Sox lose Lowell, then you pretty much have to entertain signing him, but he is a risk.

Baseball is always relevant.

THE RESPONSES!


* Red Sox win second World Series in four years (with nearly an entirely new team).

I know. They rock. It's dynasty time. Fo' reals.

* Yankees hire Joe Giradi as the team's manager.

Remember the Yankees in the 80's?

* Dodgers to announce the firing of former Sox manager Grady Little and the hiring of Joe Torre, whom will bring Mattingly with him to LA.

Yeah, This will work out well. A team who refuses to give playing time to their young talent is bringing another manager who can't handle young talent.

* Braves trade Edgar Renteria to Detroit

The Braves could have gotten more for him. This was too soon.

Good trade for the Tigers. Renteria's year in Boston was a) an abberation and b) the result of him being a bad fit for the team/town. Guillen wasn't going to last much longer at SS and his bat is good enough to still be a plus at 1B. And as I said above, they really didn't give up much of anything. And on top of it all Renteria comes relatively cheap as Boston is still paying a huge chunk of his contract.

* ARod Opts Out of Record Breaking Deal

It's likely to be worth it. The only reason his record breaking deal hasn't been shattered so far is that no player anywhere near his quality has come on the market these last 2 years. For Christs sake, Vernon Wells got nearly $20 million per year. Vernon Wells! And if worst comes to worst Boras will get some team (the Angels?) to bid against themselves. It might not be the 8 year $240 million he's putting out there, but noway in hell is it going to end up with less than the 3 years $75 he was owed.

You know, looking at it. The Angels are absolutely the perfect fit. Except for the whole 'what they really need is a guy who can hit in the postseason' thing. Let's call it 7 years at $200 million total value. Or something. Who knows.

I'd also point out here, that I'm not all that against him coming to Boston. I know you were understating by calling him 'decent' in the regular season, but let's be clear: He's the most valuable player in all of baseball (during the regular season), and it's not that close anymore. Further note: the difference between his regular season and post season numbers isn't statistically relevant (i.e. it's pretty small at this sample size) and he actually has come through in the clutch. I've seen it. His 'weakness' is 90% just fans not liking his public persona.

*other stuff!

The New York papers are talking about the Yankees trading for Miguel Cabrera to replace ARod. Obviously it would take quite a bit to pry him away (like, Cano and Joba to start). If they give up Cano and Joba I'm absolutely all for it, because that's an undervalue of Cano at this point. Cano is still getting better and Cabrera's aweful defense at 3B is probably nearly enough of a negative to make the value between just the two of them not extraordinary. Important note: this deal has exactly 0% of chance to get done if the Yankees don't include Cano. Though their farm system is actually pretty great at this point, it is made up nearly entirely of RHP. Tabata is their only real position prospect and he's still a good 3 years away.

Of course if the Marlins actually make him available, the Yankees won't be the only team bidding on Manny Ramirez 2.0. The Red Sox would likely offer the farm (or atleast Jon Lester, Coco and cash , and some combination of AAA SS/3B/2B Jed Lowrie, AA Derek Lowe/Brandon Webb clone Justin Masterson and young AA power RHSP Michael Bowden). Basically, if he's made available, Mike Lowell will be waiting on the winner to see where he signs (though, I'd like to make public that as much as I love Lowell, I'm completely against signing him for more than 2 years no matter what happens.)

I'd like to point out here that Miggy has been my dream replacement for Manny in LF for... well, since he came up. He'd be a great fit for the Red Sox (and I'm overstating, because he's really a great fir for any team in the league) because they could lessen his defensive suckage impact by sticking him in Fenway's cozy LF after next year. Also, he's like... Manny's clone. In every way. So they'll know what to do with him, I guess.