Tag Archives: Toronto Blue Jays

Non-Waiver Trade Deadline Coming. Who’s Staying and Who’s Going?

Posted on July 20, 2011 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Major League Baseball’s non-waiver trade deadline is just 10 days away and that means the teams that believe they have a chance to reach the post-season will try to get better while those that have thrown in the towel will try to get better next year – or sometime in the next decade.

Already this month, the Toronto Blue Jays have moved expensive veteran Juan Rivera to the Los Angeles Dodgers for future considerations and the New York Mets have dealt closer Francisco Rodriguez to the Milwaukee Brewers for two players to be named later.

There is definitely more to come. The question is: Which teams are real contenders and therefore real buyers and which teams will start dumping as many veterans as they can possibly unload?

Most teams, it would appear, are like Cleveland — cautious. A surprisingly good team, the Indians are battling Detroit for first place in the AL Central. However, it’s unlikely they’ll do anything to shake up a good thing even though manager Manny Acta has told www.cleveleand.com that his team “desperately” needs to make a deal.

After all, on Tuesday night in Minnesota, he had to use backup second baseman Luis Valbuena in leftfield (the first time he’d ever played the position) because of injuries to Grady Sizemore and Shin-Soo Choo. Velbuena misplayed a fly ball in the ninth inning that probably cost Cleveland the game and as a result, don’t be surprised if the Indians take a look at St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Ryan Ludwick or Oakland’s Josh Willingham — as long it doesn’t cost them too much.

Meanwhile, other teams that could try to improve by adding a veteran or two are Philadelphia, the Yankees, Boston, the White Sox, Texas, the Angels and Atlanta. The Brewers, meanwhile, might not be done making moves while both the Giants and Arizona could be interested.

On the other hand, watch for Toronto, Baltimore, the Mets and Houston to start ridding themselves of older players.

Here’s a list of 10 legitimate trade rumours. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if some of these rumours actually came to fruition:

1) Florida Marlins: It has been reported in a number of news outlets that there’s “a good chance” closer Leo Nunez will be traded before the July 31 non-waiver deadline. The Miami Herald pointed out that Nunez has one more season of arbitration eligibility, but it’s extremely unlikely the Marlins will want to absorb “an expected salary increase from his current $3.65 million yearly salary.”

2) Arizona Diamondbacks: The D-Backs are expected to try to make a deal for a veteran reliever. Now that Rodriguez has been dealt to the Brewers, Arizona is looking at the Mets’ Jason Isringhausen and the Cubs’ Kerry Wood. Trouble with the Wood rumour is that he has a no-trade clause. The Arizona Republic is reporting that the D-Backs have talked to Toronto about any one of Frank Francisco, Shaun Camp, Jon Rauch, Jason Frasor and Octavio Dotel.

3) Toronto Blue Jays: It’s very likely the Jays will trade a reliever or two. Octavio Dotel is almost certainly going to be traded. Meanwhile, the Jays will try to move Edwin Encarnacion, but they are also talking to St. Louis about acquiring outfielder Colby Rasmus.

4) Baltimore Orioles: The O’s were supposed to be so much better this year and now, as they fade into oblivion, expect a handful of these guys to be trad bait. It’s actually possible (although not likely) that J. J. Hardy, Mark Reynolds, Jeremy Guthrie, Derek Lee, Luke Scott, Nick Markakis and Adam Jones could all be moved by July 31.

5) Houston Astros: This is a team ready to sell — sell it all, in fact. Word out of Houston is that young pitchers Bud Norris, 26, Mark Melancon, 26, and Jordan Lyles, 20, are the only players the Astros would NOT consider trading.

6) New York Mets: Carlos Beltran will be traded. The only questions are: when, to whom and for how much? As well, don’t be surprised if the Mets try to make a deal for Jose Reyes. He’s in the final year of his contract, the Mets are virtually broke and he’ll command a load of prospects. It’s not as far-fetched as it sounds.

7) Atlanta Braves: The Braves believe they have a shot at Philly and also a shot at the Wild Card and they’ll try to add veteran help. Dodgers SS Rafael Furcal will likely be available and the Braves would like to add a veteran at that position (trading away Yunel Escobar was not smart). The Braves also have a couple of decent prospects at Triple A ready to go and they could use Derek Lowe as trade bait.

icon cool Non Waiver Trade Deadline Coming. Whos Staying and Whos Going? Detroit Tigers: The Tigers might be interested in Beltran as a leftfielder if the price is right. However, Detroit really wants a veteran starter. Manager Jim Leyland doesn’t really believe that Charlie Furbush is the answer and there has been some talk that the Tigers would make an offer for Hiroki Kuroda if the Dodgers wanted to deal.

9) San Diego Padres: Closer Heath Bell is a wanted man. In fact, he’s told the L.A. Times already that he figures he’ll end up in the uniform of the Angels, Yankees, Cardinals, Rangers or Phillies. Apparently the Rays are also interested.

10) Colorado Rockies: On the surface, it’s crazy talk. The Rockies are apparently considering trading their ace, Ubaldo Jimenez. The Rockies are, evidently, concerned that Jimenez might be out of their price range when contract negotiations come up next season, so why not deal him now and get something exceptional for him in return. Certainly, the Yankees are interested. I doubt Rockies GM Dan O’Dowd will make a move, but then again, I didn’t think anyone would trade for Vernon Wells and we all know that the Angels pulled the trigger on a guy who is currently making $23 million this season and is hitting .218 with 14 homers and 35 RBI.

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What a Saturday! One of Those Days You Don’t Forget.

Posted on May 8, 2011 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Donna Chief is one of those people who is hard to forget. Saturday night, I finished the day talking to Donna Chief. People who know her today, know her as  the vice-principal at Seven Generations Education Institute in Northwestern Ontario. But 27 years ago, she was an enthusiastic young woman from Wabigoon Lake Ojibway Nation who gathered the courage to call Roy and Evelyne Holenski and ask if they could use another pitcher on their Smitty’s women’s fast pitch team.

Saturday night, she was inducted into the Manitoba Softball Hall of Fame along with a team called McKay United — nine Metis brothers from Crane River, Man., who made up a national championship team.

“This is a really big deal,” Chief said, just before the official Hall of Fame induction ceremony at the Canad Inns Polo Park in Winnipeg on Saturday. “It’s a big deal because I didn’t realize I had a career.

“Then, when I sat down and kind of put together everything I’d done, it occurred to me that I did have a career. I was 19 and playing for me team from Dryden-Fort Frances and we were playing a tournament that Smitty’s was playing in. I was pitching and we beat the Kern-Hill Jays and I kind of thought that maybe I was good enough to play for Smitty’s.

“So I worked up the courage and called the Holenskis and they said they had room for me. I was so excited. I pitched for them for two years and then something amazing happened. Evelyne got a call from Susan Schultz, the coach at Mayville State University, who asked, ‘Is there anyone on your team who is good and isn’t doing much with their lives,’ and Evelyne said, ‘Yes, Donna.’ Well, I thought I was doing a lot with my life, but it turned out to be the greatest thing that ever happened.’ I pitched in a tournament in Fargo a couple of weeks later and Susan offered me a full scholarship at Mayville.

“I went down there and stayed for 12 years. I also got my degree and became a teacher and now I’m a vice-principal. None of that would have happened without softball and without the Holenskis.”

Talking with Donna was a great way to finish a spectacular Saturday, a Saturday that might be hard to forget:

1. Detroit Tigers righthander Justin Verlander threw a no-hitter at the Toronto Blue Jays. It was a masterpiece: One walk erased by a double-play. 27 Up, 27 Down.

It was Verlander’s second career no-hitter and one senses there will be more. People are already talking Hall of Fame. If he doesn’t blow his arm, there is little doubt.

2. A 20-1 longshot named Animal Kingdom (boy, were the Disney people ever happy with this winner) won the 137th running of the Kentucky Derby. Paid $43. John Velasquez, who was supposed to ride Uncle Mo until he was scratched, gave Animal Kingdom a sensational ride, proving jockeys can win races with courage and skill.

The jocks who ride at the Derby are the big league ballplayers of the horsey crowd. Saturday afternoon, Velasquez proved how good they can be.

3. Manny Pacquiao is now 53-3-2 in his illustrious career after winning a lopsided 12-round decision over Sugar Shane Mosley at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.

Pacquiao dropped Mosley with a left hook in the third round and the challenger was never a factor in the fight again. With the easy win, Pacquiao retained his WBO Welterweight title, but more importantly, he also maintained the title of “the best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet.”

4. The Cleveland Indians won again. This time 5-4 at the Big A in Anaheim. The Indians are now 22-10, tied with the Fightin’ Phillies for the best record in baseball. After falling behind 2-0, the Tribe came back to win thanks to big hits by Shin-Soo Choo, who is hitting .226, and Carlos Santana (the greatest name ever for a guy playing in the home of the Rock ‘N Roll Hall of Fame) who is batting .217.

I still don’t believe they will keep this up. But it sure is fun watching no names, has-beens and never-weres eat up Major League Baseball.

5. Speaking of no-names, has-beens and never-weres, how about the Nashville Predators? Sure, the Preds aren’t out of the woods yet, they still trail the Canucks 3-2, but on Saturday night, for the first time in franchise history, they won an elimination game (they were 0-5 heading in).

With a pair of third-period goals by Joel Ward (who?), the Preds beat the Canucks 4-3 in Vancouver and extended the Western Conference semifinal to a Game 6 in Nashville on Monday night.

If Barry Trotz pulls this one off, there will be absolutely no doubt that pound-for-pound, Trotz is the best coach in the NHL.

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Our Fearless MLB Predictions for 2011

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

I will be the first to admit, these predictions aren’t that fearless. I mean, really. When you select the Boston Red Sox to meet the Philadelphia Phillies in the 2011 World Series, you ain’t goin’ too far out onto the limb.

However, I do believe the Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins will challenge the BoSox, I believe the Orioles will finally get to .500 and the Colorado Rockies and Atlanta Braves will bettle it out for the National League Wild Card.

So without further adieu — after all, the first pitch is in about two hours — here are our annual Fearless Predictions for 2011.

THE AMERICAN LEAGUE

EAST

1)  Boston Red Sox – If the Red Sox stay healthy, this is the best team in the American League. Offensively, they have Carl Crawford, Jacoby Ellsbury, Adrian Gonzalez, J.D. Drew, Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis and David Ortiz. On the mound, it’s Clay Buchholz, Jon Lester, John Lackey, Diasuke Matsuzaka and Josh Beckett. Easily No. 1 in the East.

2) New York Yankees – We only pick the Yanks in two spot because they are the Yanks. After C.C. Sabathia, the pitching staff is a big question mark. A-Rod was sensational in the spring, Derek Jeter will be better than last year, Robinson Cano might be MVP and they will hit, but will they stop anybody else from hitting? Ivan Nova and Freddy Garcia are the fourth and fifth starters.

3) Baltimore Orioles – This team finished 34-23 down the stretch last season and improved big time in the off-season bringing in Valdimir Guerrero, Mark Reynolds, J.J. Hardy and Derrek Lee. If the young pitchers mature, the Orioles will challenge the Yanks for second. Buck Showalter might be the best manager in the game.

4) Tampa Bay Rays – If Manny Ramirez grows up and Johnny Damon stays healthy, the Rays will have some lineup help for Evan Longoria. For this team, it’s all about the pitching. If James Shields, David Price, Wade Davis and Jeff Niemann. That’s a lot of ‘ifs.’

5) Toronto Blue Jays – If Jose Bautista hits 54 home runs again, I’ll eat the Rogers Centre. Getting better, but just not good enough.

CENTRAL

1) Detroit Tigers – So much for a DUI ruining Miguel Cabrera’s career. He has been lights out this spring, hitting .357 with a .714 slugging percentage, six doubles, three homers and a team-high 12 RBI. With Magglio Ordonez hitting in front of him and Victor Martinez behind him, it will be a big year in Detroit.

2) Minnesota Twins – Justin Morneau is getting healthy and Joe Mauer is already back to form. Throw in a solid pitching staff and Minnesota and Detroit will battle for 1-2 in the Central.

3. Chicago White Sox – The Sox added Adam Dunn’s bat to a lineup that includes Paul Konerko, A.J. Pierzynski and Alexei Ramirez. But do they have enough pitching?

4. Kansas City Royals – The Royals might have the best farm system in the game but it won’t matter this year. Kansas City will hurt the contenders occasionally, but not often.

5. Cleveland Indians – Manager Manny Acta said if his young players show what they’re made of, the Indians will have a good team. They will eventually, I suppose, but it won’t be this year. I was told in Florida by someone who follows the Indians closely: “Anyone who thinks the Indians have a hope suffers from D & D – a case of dumb and delusional.”

WEST

1) Texas Rangers – These guys hit a ton as Josh Hamilton, Elvis Andrus, Nelson Cruz, David Murphy and Ian Kinsler lead the way. It certainly won’t hurt if Adrian Beltre gets healthy, too. The pitching will suffer without Cliff Lee, but that won’t stop the Rangers from repeating in the West.

2) Los Angeles Angels – Dan Haren, Jared Weaver, Scott Kazmir and Ervin Santana give the Angels a great rotation. The addition of Vernon Wells will help the order. L.A. will challenge Texas.

3) Oakland A’s – Can Hideki Matsui find happiness in Oakland? Can the A’s finish better than third? Look out for starter Trevor Cahill: 18-8 with 2.97 ERA last year.

4) Seattle Mariners – How can a team with Ichiro Suzuki and Cy Young winner Felix Hernandez go 61-101? That’s what they did last year and it’s hard to imagine the Ms will be any better this year.

NATIONAL LEAGUE

EAST

1) Philadelphia Phillies – With a rotation that goes like this: Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Roy Oswalt, Cole Hamels and Joe Blanton, it doesn‘t matter if they hit. However, if they can’t replace the injured Chase Utley and the gone Jayson Werth, there is a chance even the Phils won’t hit enough.

2) Atlanta Braves – If Chipper can still play (and stay healthy all year) and manager Fredi Gonzalez is as good a manager as we think, the Braves might threaten in the anemic East. Craig Kimbrel and Jonny Venters will share the closer’s duties and it’s hard not to like a lineup that includes Brian McCann, Martin Prado, Jason Heyward and big Freddie Freeman.

3) Florida Marlins – This is a typical Florida Marlins team: Young, promising and cheap. Rookie Mike Stanton is the player to watch.

4) New York Mets – All questions, not enough answers. Will Jason Bay adjust to Citi Field? Will Carlos Beltran get healthy? Will Johan Santana return to form? Will they be sold? If the answers are positive, this team could threaten.

5) Washington Nationals – Better than last year with Jayson Werth in the lineup to protect Ryan Zimmerman, but still an afterthought.

CENTRAL

1) Cincinnati Reds – With MVP Joey Votto and loads of offence, the Reds will score. A lot depends on the rotation of Edinson Volquez, Homer Bailey, Bronson Arroyo, Travis Wood and Mike Leake. Dusty Baker will keep them in the race.

2) Milwaukee Brewers – The addition of pitchers Zach Greinke and Shaun Marcum will make the Brewers better. They’ll win a lot more than 77 games (2010). Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun and Corey Hart give the Brewers a solid middle of the lineup.

3) St. Louis Cardinals – If Albert Pujols just goes nuts with his free-agent winter coming up, he could lead the Cards into the playoffs himself. However, with Adam Wainwright out for the season, the pitching staff suffers mightily. Pujols is clearly the player to watch in the Majors this year.

4) Chicago Cubs – Well, it’s “next year,” again. This is a team likely to win about 82 games and yet again, fail to win a title.

5) Houston Astros – This is a team that finished strongly in 2010 and then just didn’t get better. No threat. If Hunter Pence and Carlos Lee blow up, they could finish ahead of the Cubs.

6) Pittsburgh Pirates – This is a Triple A franchise. They scored only 587 runs last year while giving up 866. If they win 50 games it will be a miracle. Although I do love Andrew McCutchon.

WEST

1) San Francisco Giants – The Giants have enough pitching to prove the 2010 World Series was not a one-hit wonder. Tim Lincecum, Barry Zito, Jonathan Sanchez and Matt Cain will be fine. The only question is: Do the Giants have enough offence after Pablo (Kung Fu Panda) Sandoval.

2) Colorado Rockies – The Dodgers, Rockies and Giants will battle for No. 1 in the West all season long. With Dexter Fowler, Troy Tulowitzki, Todd Helton and Carlos Gonzalez, this team will score a lot of runs. Can Ubaldo Jimenez carry the worst pitching staff of the Top 3 teams in the West? I love them as the NL Wild Card team.

3) Los Angeles Dodgers – The pitching should be good enough, but players such as Juan Uribe, Andre Ethier and James Loney have to get more done over the long haul. Will new manager Don Mattingly do more with this bunch than Joe Torre?

4) San Diego Padres – Should have enough pitching, won’t have near enough hitting with the loss of Adrian Gonzalez to Boston.

5) Arizona Diamondbacks – Justin Upton and nobody else. Will be young and will be out of the race by June 1.

Playoff Teams:  AL — Boston, Detroit, Minnesota, Texas; NL — Philadelphia, Cincinnati, San Francisco and either Atlanta or Colorado.

AL Champions: Boston Red Sox

NL Champions: Philadelphia Phillies

World Series: Phillies over Boston in six games.

 

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The Response to A-Rod’s 600th Homer Has Me in a Quandary

Posted on August 4, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Watching Yankee fans and the Yankee announcers on the YES Network  this afternoon, made me wonder whatever happened to the American baseball media’s mob war against steroid users?

Both the fans and the announcers fawned all over Alex Rodriguez as he hit his 600th career home run against the Toronto Blue Jays. Indeed, A-Rod has hit 600 in his career, one of only seven to do so, and the fans had every right to be part of the celebration.

However, as the media honored Rodriguez today — as they certainly should have — I had to question why the feat is wonderful for Rodriguez, an admitted steroid user, but 600 homers wasn’t so wonderful for Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa? Remember, A-Rod is an admitted steroid user. In the meantime, the U.S. federal government has been trying to build a case against Bonds for almost a decade and yet they still have nothing. Sosa has said publicly that he as never used steroids. Still, both have been convicted by the American mainstream media mob as steroids abusers, even though there is no proof, only conjecture, rumour and innuendo.

So while Bonds and Sosa continue to be villified, Rodriguez, an admitted steroid user, is hailed as one of the sport’s all-time greats.

I’m in a quandary. Were steroids good for some heroes and not good for others? Is it because A-Rod is a Yankee and all things Yankee seem to be cheered in the U.S.? This is a strange one.

Personally? Good for A-Rod. 600 home runs at a time when there were as many pitchers (maybe more) on the juice as hitters, is quite an accomplishment.

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More Stuff: Ricciardi Treats Halladay like Meat. Why Does the Local Media Perpetuate the Myth that Canwest Park Was Built for the 1999 Pan Am Games?

Posted on July 26, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

The things that are banging around in my head today…

1) Roy Halladay is a professional athlete and as a professional athlete he makes a very large amount of money. He certainly makes enough money to put up with all the crap that is flung in his direction and as a result, no one should feel sorry for him.

However, far too often we look at the professional athlete as the bad guy in those potential blockbuster deals that may or may not benefit our favourite teams. We often ask questions like: Did the jerk stand in the way of the deal? Why did he have a no-trade clause? Why did they give him a no-trade clause?

And on and on it goes.

In Halladay’s case, we might be witnessing one of the rare times when the athlete is the good guy and the people running the baseball franchise are little more than loud-mouthed buffoons.

According to ESPN, the Blue Jays turned own another offer for Halladay yesterday. the best pitcher on Toronto’s staff did not ask for a trade, but two weeks ago Ricciardi made it clear that he was going to shop around his ace and see what he might get in return.

Then, a week later, Ricciardi said the team might not get a deal for Halladay and he could stay with the club although Ricciardi also made it clear he wants to deal Halladay because the pitcher will “probably” test the free-agent market after his contract expires.

What a jerk. For one thing, Halladay has never even hinted he won’t re-sign in Toronto.You an go ahead an assume it might happen but don’t go public a year in advance and suggest that he’ll probably leave the team. That Ricciardi remark was made for Ricciardi’s benefit. It was made to make Halladay look like the bad guy and it’s wrong.

It was a stupid statement by a guy who has failed to make the Jays anything better than a fourth-place team in the AL East.

The fact is this: Ricciardi went public with his desire to trade Halladay. Ricciardi tried to make Halladay look like the villain. Ricciardi is the bad guy, not Halladay.

All Halladay has done is say nothing and pitch two gems since he was put on the trade block.

Halladay is the good guy.

2) Originally, Junior Moar’s plan was to fight a non-title “keep-busy” bout in September and then defend his Canadian Boxing Federation light-heavyweight crown in December.

But in boxing, like no other sport, things can change dramatically in a very short time.

Last week, during an exclusive interview with Grassroots News, Moar revealed that he will now defend his belt against Regina brawler Michael (Flash) Walchuk on Sept. 17, at the Red Robinson Theatre in Port Coquitlam, B.C. He signed the contract for the fight this past Friday night.

Check out the latest issue of Grassroots News (available Tuesday) for Junior Moar’s story. It’s one of the greatest stories in all of sports today.

3) I hate reading a newspaper and seeing something passed off as fact that is, at worst, a lie and, at best, a myth.

But that’s what happened on Sunday when the Winnipeg Free Press claimed — once again — that Winnipeg’s Canwest Park was built for the 1999 Pan Am Games.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The baseball park was built for the Winnipeg Goldeyes of the Northern Baseball League by the team’s owner Sam Katz. The city of Winnipeg wanted nothing to do with the construction of the ballpark and that is reflected in the fact that the city’s commitment to the building was less than $1 million.

The Goldeyes had been playing at Canwest Global Park (now Canwest Park) for more than two months when the Pan Am Games arrived. The Pan Am Games organization paid rent to use the building while the Goldeyes played an extended road trip.

The Mayor at the time, Susan Thompson, did everything humanly possible to stop construction of the stadium. She even publicly backed away from a pledge to make the ball park happen by telling the Pan Am Games organizers to play in Stonewall. If the Pan Am Games baseball tournament had been played in Stonewall, Winnipeg would have been the laughing stock of the baseball world. At the time, there were considerably  better facilities in Grand Forks, N.D., than in Stonewall, Man.

As it was, the Pan Am Games executives rented Katz’s ballpark and the tournament was sensational. But the ballpark was NOT built for the Pan Am Games.The Pan Am Games had absolutely nothing to do withe building’s construction. Nothing. Those who contend it did — like the folks in Winnipeg’s mainstream media — are nothing more than revisionist historians.

(NOTE: Want the truth? Just go to www.winnipegmen.com and buy a copy of my book Home Run: A History of the Winnipeg Goldeyes and Canwest Global Park. The true story — much of it from the pages of the Winnipeg Free Press in 1999 — is much more fun than the one the paper likes to sell to its readers today)

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Things that make you go “Hmmmmm…”

Posted on May 4, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Stuff that’s interesting, crazy, muddled, odd or just downright frightening:

1) Everyone out here in the West is just thrilled that B.C. product Scott Richmond is doing so well with the Toronto Blue Jays this season. It’s a tribute to both Richmond’s determination and the Jays decision to take a big chance on a guy who came out of the independent Northern League.

But while, Richmond has gone 4-0 with a splendid, Cy Young-like 2.67 earned run average and a brilliant 1.22 WHIP,  those who remember Richmond in his final season in the Northern League, are shaking their heads in disbelief most nights.

He went 10-9 that season with the Edmonton Cracker-Cats with a 4.26 ERA. Not bad, not great. But he was pounded by the Winnipeg Goldeyes. In fact he went 1-3 with two no-decisions in six starts against Winnipeg . He gave up seven home runs all season, three to Winnipeg.

Obviously, you can reach the big leagues through the Northern League. However, Scott Richmond makes it appears as if the Northern League is a lot tougher than the bigs.

2) There there is this report, just out in New York City yesterday: New York Islanders owner Charles Wang has lost $283 million in the nine years since he purchased the franchise. 

We could have told him it was a bad investment. So, too, could have the guy from whom he bought the team, re-insurer Steven Gluckstern. Gluckstern was a partner of Dr. Richard Burke. He and Burke bought the Winnipeg Jets from Barry Shenkarow and moved them to Phoenix where they just kept losing more money.

Gluckstern, a very nice man who loved hockey, eventually went off and bought the Islanders. It’s hard to imagine one good businessman could be sucked into owning the teams in Phoenix and Long Island, but re-insurance is a lucrative business. Hockey is not. Some say that between the Coyote sand the Islanders, Gluckstern lost more than half his personal wealth.

So now Charles Wang (Computer Associates) owns the team and while no one will have a tag day for Wang, one has to wonder how stupid these really smart people can be.

The NHL is a lousy investment, so unless you’re just a philanthropist who gets a charge out of making millionaires out of otherwise non-descript Canadian twenty-somethings, buying a National Hockey League franchise in the United States is a pretty stupid way to flush your cash down the toilet.

See Charles Wang. Or Steven Gluckstern. Or Jerry Moyes. Or Dr. Richard Burke. Or Alan Cohen in Miami. Or those poor suckers in Atlanta and Nashville.  

3) At 11:30 p.m. on May 3, 2009, the Winnipeg weather office predicted that on Monday, May 4, we would have gusting winds up to 50-kilometres and rain. 

When I got up this morning, it was perfect. By 6 a.m., the same donkeys who were predicting cold rain were now predicting sun and 20-degree C temperatures.

Of course, at 6 a.m., they didn’t have to do much predicting. All they had to do was walk outside.

We have many problems in this world from an economy that was simply one giant Enron to a mainstream media that preys on fear and ignorance to a national weather office that couldn’t properly predict what’s going to happen to the skies in the next seven minutes let alone the next seven days.

When I was giving ballpark tours at Canwest Park on Saturday, I asked our baseball fans to do me one favour this year: Do not believe a word a TV or radio weather person tells you about the upcoming weather. Not one word. The weather office is as useless as teets on a bull and the more it predicts, the dumber it gets. For a baseball team like the Winnipeg Goldeyes, these wild, stupid predictions of constant bad weather that turn out to be dead wrong do so much harm, it can’t be quantified.

Environment Canada hurts Canadian business. These morons tell people the weather is going to be lousy when it’s not going to be lousy and they seem to do it for laughs. They are bad for the economy and bad for anyone who does business outdoors in Canada.

Along with greedy Harvard MBA grads, we’d all be better off without them.

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No Booze at Bomber Game in Toronto This Summer.

Posted on April 5, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

Hey Bomber fans, we know how much you love the Appleton’s Rum Shack at Canada Inns Stadium. We know how much the East Side revels in its ability to drink more and cheer louder than any other gathering of fans in the CFL.

 

Well, if you’re among “The Proud, The Many, The Drunks,” at Bomber games, you’ll probably want to avoid the airplane to Toronto on Aug. 1. 

 

Winnipeg fans love to head to T.O. every summer to watch the Bombers face their arch-rivals, the Toronto Argos. It’s a nice weekend and it’s always loads of fun. This year, however, there will be no beer at the ball yard.  

 

In a statement issued on Friday night, Rogers Centre officials admitted that provincial liquor licensing inspectors, citing “drinking infractions at several unnamed past events,” will close down liquor sales at three sporting events this year.

The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario advised the Rogers Centre’s Food and Beverage Dept., last week that it would suspend liquor licences for the April 7th game between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Detroit Tigers, the Jays’ April 21st game with the Texas Rangers and the Argo-Bomber game on Aug. 1.

So, Bomber fans, ahh, wear a big coat and BYOB?

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Thinkin’ baseball… Koskie calls it quits. World Baseball Classic still great to watch. Can the Blue Jays lose 120 games? Who is Stephen Strasburg?

Posted on March 22, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 2 Comments

ORLANDO — Four more things rattling around in my cranium…

1) My friend Corey Koskie officially hung ‘em up on Saturday. No wonder.

 

After spending last Sunday in hospital getting treatment for his 6-year-old son Joshua, who had hit his head and suffered a concussion, Koskie was reminded of his own 2 1/2 years in a fog.

 

So on Saturday, three days after he pulled himself from a game complaining of lightheadedness, Koskie decided to call it quits.

 

“The risks just outweigh the rewards,” Koskie told me, not long after he ended his comeback attempt with the Chicago Cubs. “The way I felt on Wednesday, well, it just wasn’t worth it.”

Koskie, 35, dove for for a ground ball in a spring training game in Arizona on Wednesday and said “I felt really weird.” He knew, at that moment, that he couldn’t play big league baseball again.

“I kind of decided, do I really want to be looking over my shoulder and asking, ‘How do I feel? Is it OK?’ after every single play,” Koskie said. “After everything I’ve gone through over the past 2 1/2 years, I know I don’t want to go back into the fog again.”

Koskie finished his career as Manitoba’s greatest baseball player (no, Russell Ford was not really a Manitoban, but a Minnesotan), a .275 lifetime hitter with 124 home runs. His best year came with the Minnesota Twins in 2001 when he hit 26 homers, stole 27 bases and drove in 103 runs and became the first third baseman in baseball history to hit at least 25 homers, steal 25 bases and drive in 100 runs in one season. 

Officially, the record will say, his career ended as a member of the Milwaukee Brewers on July 5, 2006, when he fell backward and suffered a concussion while trying to catch a pop fly off the bat of Felipe Lopez.

2) I’ve watched every World Baseball Classic game that I can watch and I’ve loved every minute of it. This is a great event and should be played every two years, not every four as planned.

As a Canadian, nothing beats international sport, and this event has been so much fun to watch. It’s simply great to be watching baseball in March and have it mean something.

For me, spring training has lost its edge. To pay up to $40 to watch a Grapefruit League game in which the best players play no more than three innings is simply a rip-off. If you’re a fan of one particular team and you want to watch Single A players who could not make the Goldeyes but might make your favourite team someday, then spring training is for you. But frankly, I’ll take the World Baseball Classic every time.

Granted, it’s an event the mainstream media hates because the mainstream media hates being in Florida on the company’s ticket watching Single A players at spring training who won’t make the big team for five more years. And the mainstream media members who aren’t in Florida just like to follow the mob and rip things they know nothing about. It’s a bad habit, but like Barry Bonds, the hypocritical steroid issue and the Duke Lacrosse case, it’s something we’ve learned to live with.

Frankly, nothing beats a great international tournament at a time when baseball is charging $25-$40 a ticket to watch freakin’ practice.

Long live the WBC.

3) Here in sunny Florida, the outlook for the Toronto Blue Jays is not so sunny.

Insiders say that after Roy Halladay, the Jays have marginal pitching, at best, and the team’s hitting simply won’t be good enough to score the seven or eight runs a game they’ll need to win more often than they lose.

In fact, one highly respected seamhead down here in Florida has suggested that the Jays could lose 120 games this season.

Do you think that will get J.P. Ricciardi fired?

4) Remember the name Stephen Strasburg. Most major league scouts believe Strasburg will be, and I’m quoting here, “The greatest pitcher in baseball history.”

There are even seamheads here in Florida this spring who are drafting Strasburg in Fantasy Keeper Pools because they believe he is going to be great for a long, long time.

Strasburg is a junior at San Diego State who is 6-foot-4, 220-pounds and is the No. 1-ranked player in the upcoming Major League draft. He played on the 2008 U.S. Olympic team and is already called “flawless.” He has a 102-mile-per-hour fastball and an almost unhittable 80-mile-per-hour 12-6 hammer curveball  that he often throws after setting up a hitter with two straight unhittable fastballs. 

This season he is 10-0 at SDSU with 75 strikeouts in 34.1 innings, He has an 8-1 strikeout-walk ratio.

The last-place (2008) Washington Nationals have won the Strasburg Sweepstakes. If the kid stays healthy, he will be the next great big league ace.   

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NHL GMs Spend Hours Talking About Fighting in the NHL. Newspapers dying faster than we thought.

Posted on March 15, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

TAMPA — I love all the angst over the National Hockey League’s fighting issue for a number of reasons. 

 

Those reasons include, but aren’t limited to, the old mainstream media’s attempt to deal with the issue on a “Letters to the Editor” basis. You know what that looks like: “Our readers have had it with fighting,” the headlines blare. 

 

Yeah, sure they have. The people who write letters to the editor are generally the people who haven’t paid for a hockey ticket in more than a decade. These are the people who haven’t watched a game and haven’t even looked at the standings since the Jets left Winnipeg. Of course they have an opinion on fighting.

 

It’s like that donkey host of The Reporters on ESPN (his name escapes me). He hasn’t paid any attention to hockey since the day Versus got the U.S. rights to live telecasts, but he sure had an opinion about fighting in the NHL on Sunday. He couldn’t tell the difference between a hockey puck and a curling stone but that didn’t deter him from telling the rest of us what’s best for the NHL. He’s a typical New York TV commentator and he’s the biggest problem the NHL has. That’s because he’s the guy the New York-based NHL is trying to tailor its game toward: A guy who has never been to an NHL game and will never go.

 

Fact: No hockey fan has ever left an arena when the fight started. 

 

Sure, it’s possible to find a way to get fighting out of the game, but why in heaven’s name would we want to do that?

 

One simply has to look at the numbers, to see why the general managers spent so much time discussing fighting at their winter meetings in Naples, Fla., last week. Coming out of the lockout, in 2005-06, there were fewer fights in the NHL than at any time in the previous 30 years. Then a year later, the Anaheim Ducks took part in the highest number of fights in the game and they won the Cup. Now, fights are growing at a pace not seen since the late 1980s when teams (in 1987-88) averaged 2.1 fights per game. 

 

Obviously, if games are called tightly and the officials stop allowing the weasels (not the goons, the weasels) to skate around elbowing people in the head (Todd Fedoruk, Darcy Tucker, Steve Ott, the old Sean Avery), then fights won’t be as necessary as they are today.

 

But because the media (and a few fans) whined about all the power-plays during that “New NHL” season (the one after the lockout), the league obviously told the officials to stop calling it so closely. With that, the weasels took over the game and the only way to stop the weasels is to send the goons out after ‘em.

 

The NHL could stop fighting with the same rule change instituted by college hockey: Fight and you’re suspended. But why take fighting out of the game when the fighters do more to maintain control than the officials? 

 

And also, despite all the stupid polls, dimwitted New York TV commentators and letter-writing campaigns, fighting sells tickets.

 

* * *

 

THE SLOW DEATH OF AN ICON 

 

ORLANDO — Along with the news that FP Newspapers Limited Partnership (publishers of the Winnipeg Free Press, the Brandon Sun and the Canstar papers) lost $500,000 in the fourth quarter of 2008 after making $4.6 million in 2007, comes word that more and more American newspapers are going under.

 

The San Francisco Chronicle and Seattle Post-Intelligencer could go  down any day. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune and Chicago Tribune are in bankruptcy protection. The Rocky Mountain News has ceased to publish.

 

The death of printed newspapers will be a slow death, but it will still be a death. Sadly, the people who ran the business in the 90s and early 2000s didn’t see it coming. They were either dishonest (that would cover the ones I worked for), ignorant or just plain unaware. Newspapers have been treading water for years and now they’re about to sink. It’s sad, but inevitable. When the vast majority of your readers are over 60, death is as certain as taxes.

 

On Saturday in Lakeland, as the Detroit Tigers played host to the Toronto Blue Jays at Joker Marchant Stadium, the press box was about half full. There was a time when you couldn’t get a seat in the press box at Joker Marchant, especially if the Blue Jays were in town, but fewer and fewer sports journalists are traveling to spring training these days — mainly because there are fewer and fewer sports journalists around — so if you have a spring training media pass this year, you can sit anywhere you want. 

 

After Saturday’s game (a game that was pretty dull considering that the Blue Jays didn’t bring any big names to Lakeland while the five best Tigers are playing in the World Baseball Classic), we got back to the hotel in Orlando and as I stopped to get a coffee at the Starbucks in the lobby, I noticed that the old Orlando Sentinel racks were filled with scarves, on display with a hand-written note on top,  telling prospective buyers that the scarves were 30 per cent off. 

 

Like so many papers, the Sentinel no longer fills the hotel racks outside downtown Orlando. Way out here in Lake Buena Vista, the hotel gives away internet access, as well as about five different ESPNs, and as a result the newspaper has become obsolete.

 

There is simply no need to read the sports page anymore. Almost all the news in it has already been telecast on ESPN (TSN in Canada) — more than 12 hours earlier — and anything else a reader would need, is on the internet, often days in advance.

 

Daily newspapers got old, tired, dull and pretentious. News was replaced with inanity. A newspaper mob formed and that led to horrible journalistic decisions such as the U.S. rush to war in Iraq, the Duke lacrosse case and the Barry Bonds witch hunt. Most of the people who wrote about these issues had no first hand knowledge of any of it, but they kept plugging away at it anyway. 

 

Small, local magazines and weekly or bi-weekly niche newspapers will survive and prosper. Big dailies with huge buildings, hundreds of employees, fleets of cars and trucks and overpaid editors are just about toast.

 

It’s sad, but in recent years, all newspapers have been able to do well is hurt people. That’s another reason why there won’t be that many people missing newspaper when they go.  

 

In the meantime, someone still has to figure out a way to turn a profit off an internet information site. If that ever happens, the recession will be over.

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Koskie signs with the Chicago Cubs

Posted on March 1, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Anola, Manitoba’s Corey Koskie is a member of the Chicago Cubs.  This weekend, the latest member of Canada’s national baseball team in the World Baseball Classic, signed a minor league deal with the Cubs. He’ll join the Cubs at spring training in Arizona after the World Baseball Classic. If he doesn’t make the Cubs opening day roster, he has agreed to go to Triple A Iowa.  

This is a story that gets better all the time. Koskie, 35, who suffered post-concussion syndrome in 2006 and hasn’t played a game of baseball in 2 1/2 years, wasn’t even on Team Canada’s provisional roster in January. Although he’d been working out at the Minnesota Twins spring training complex in Fort Myers, Fla., he didn’t face live pitching until last week.

 

Now, he’s in Dunedin, Fla., playing with Team Canada and when the tournament is over, he has a contract with the Cubs.

 

“As you know, back in early January, I wanted to play with Team Canada and then finish my career,” said, who played nine years in the majors with Minnesota, Toronto and Milwaukee. “My wife and I thought it would be a great way to finish up.

 

“Now I have a chance to play again. I even had a choice of teams to sign with. I’m excited about this.”

 

He has every right to be excited. If he just makes the Cubs, he’s comeback player of the year. 

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