Steinbrenner: Sabathia has deadline to accept Yankees’ offer

“No comment until the time limit is up” ...(I wonder if Bet-a-$137.5 Million Butler can hold out!) “No comment until the time limit is up"..."No comment until the time limit is up"…

CC Sabathia will have a deadline to accept the New York Yankees’ contract proposal.

“We’ve made him an offer. It’s not going to be there forever,” Hal Steinbrenner said Thursday after he was approved as the team’s new controlling owner during a meeting at Major League Baseball headquarters.

New York offered a six-year contract to the pitcher last Friday, the first day teams were allowed to start talking money with free agents. The proposal exceeds Johan Santana’s $137.5 million, six-year contract with the New York Mets both in total and average, a baseball official familiar with the negotiations said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to divulge details.

Greg Genske, Sabathia’s agent, did not return a telephone message seeking comment.

Jon Weisman: James Loney: Try to Remember the Kind of September

On September 2, 2007, James Loney had an OPS of .824 (.361 on-base percentage, .463 slugging percentage). He OPSed 1.141 the rest of the way and finished the season at .919.

On September 2, 2008, James Loney had an OPS of .820 (.361 on-base percentage, .459 slugging percentage). He OPSed .472 the rest of the way and finished the season at .772.

What Kryptonited our September Superman? For one thing, Loney wasn’t as lucky in the final month of 2008. His batting average on balls in play was .227, compared to .393 in September 2007. But Loney’s bad September wasn’t just about balls not finding holes. Loney had four extra base hits in September 2008, compared to 17 (including nine home runs) in September 2007. He had three walks in September 2008 compared to nine in September 2007. His power and plate discipline just seemed to vanish.

Between these extremes lies the present-day James Loney, the one who has a career .833 OPS (114 OPS+) in more than 1,000 plate appearances before his 25th birthday. Like many hitters, he’s streaky, and there’s no doubt that 2008 overall ended up being a step back for him. His slugging percentage dropped more than 100 points, his homers dropped despite nearly 300 extra plate appearances, and his rate of grounding into double plays more than doubled (particularly early in the season: 18 of his 25 GIDP in 2008 came by the end of June).

I don’t have a magic bullet – not for lack of searching - to kill the uncertainty over what went wrong. His line-drive, groundball and flyball percentages remained fairly consistent from year to year, as did his ratio of plate appearances vs. right-handed pitching. I don’t know what pitches he was having trouble with. All I know is that for the first five months of 2008, despite playing every day in the major leagues for the first time in his career, Loney was pretty much as productive as he had been in the same period the year before. Each of the past two Septembers were aberrations.

Given his youth, his reputedly high marks for work ethic and an offseason to reflect on the previous year, I’m betting Loney resumes an upward trajectory in 2009.

CBS: Miller: Hall spot for Moose? Era, as much as ERA, may help sway

Wow! I think I booked Lil’ Scotty Miller and the Still Bristles at KNUP’S ("We Took A Bite Out Of The Big Apple And Spit It In Jersey") one over-guzzled night.

Certainly, Mussina’s case isn’t airtight. No Cy Youngs, and he finished as high as second only once (1999). And I still bristle at the lack of complete games produced by today’s starters. Mussina finished with only 57 (in 536 career starts), as compared to Feller’s 279 (484 career starts), Marichal’s 244 (457 career starts) and Bunning’s 151 (519 career starts).

But it’s a different era—and not simply because of the modern bullpen. No, when it comes time to consider Mussina’s Hall of Fame candidacy five years from now, two key facets must be considered:

1. He pitched in the Steroid Era, facing who-knows-how-many batters who were juiced. And while I’m skeptical of much of what I’ve seen over the past 10 years, I believe Mussina was clean. There was never any noticeable change in his body.

Selig: MLB will enact rules to ban weather-shortened postseason games

NEW YORK—There has never been a rain-shortened game in the postseason, and now there never will be.

Baseball commissioner Bud Selig announced the sport will enact a rules change stating that postseason games cannot be shortened because of bad weather.

“All postseason games, All-Star games and that, will be full-length affairs, and the rule will be so written,” Selig said Thursday following an owners’ meeting.

Selig said the change also will apply to tiebreaker games that decide division titles and wild-card berths.

“Any game that has significance for the postseason,” he said. “It will be very clear now. Everybody will know exactly.”

Under baseball’s rules, games are official as soon as the trailing team has made 15 outs.

Driveline Mechanics does not like Strasburg

Strasburg reminds me a lot of Mark Prior - a truly dominant right-handed college pitcher with troubling mechanics: Bad arm action combined with slow tempo. I predict a steady loss of velocity over the first few years of his career leading to him dropping his arm slot and then a major shoulder injury.

MLB: Crisp sets sights on 40 steals

I once set my sights on seeing every Tom Graeff film...but that ain’t happening.

Give this to Coco Crisp: He’s got confidence in his ability. One day into his transfer to the Royals, and he’s talking about stealing 40 bases. That would be something different. No Royals player has swiped that many in a season since Carlos Beltran pilfered 41 in 2003. Before that, Johnny Damon had a league-leading 46 in 2000.

Bold talk, perhaps, from Crisp, who has never stolen 40 even in the Minor Leagues and has a Major League best of 28, for Boston in 2007.

“I’ve always been underrated as a speed demon, primarily I guess because I don’t steal a lot of bases,” Crisp said from his Rancho Mirage, Calif., home.

“That’s never been like my prime focus. When I was young, I’d just run. Now I have an idea of when and how to steal bases—when it’s appropriate for the situation and when we might need a spark. If I pick those times to go, I think I can easily steal 40. And whatever above that is uncharted territory for me, but without a doubt, 40 is something I can just close my eyes and do.”

Topps Rookie All-Star team named

These guys get a neat trophy in the bottom corner of their rookie card!

C Geovony Soto, Chicago Cubs
1B Joey Votto, Cincinnati
2B Alexei Ramirez, Chicago White Sox
3B Evan Longoria, Tampa Bay
SS Mike Aviles, Kansas City
OF Jay Bruce, Cincinnati
OF Denard Span, Minnesota
OF David Murphy, Texas
SP John Lannan, Washington
RP Brad Ziegler, Oakland

Mental Floss: 4 Heartbreaking (or Miraculous) Moments in Gambling History

Game Five of the 1999 National League Championship Series between the Atlanta Braves and the New York Mets felt like it might never end. The game was tied 2-2 in the top of the 15th inning before Mets reliever Octavio Dotel gave up a run to stake the Braves to a 3-2 lead. In the bottom of the 15th, though, the Mets managed to tie the game at 3-3 when catcher Todd Pratt drew a bases-loaded walk. The next batter, Robin Ventura, clubbed a pitch over the Shea Stadium fence for a walk-off grand slam. The Mets were going to win the game 7-3. Only there was a holdup: when Ventura got between first and second base, his teammates mobbed him in a raucous celebration. He never got to finish his home run trot or even touch second base. Since Ventura only touched first, the official scorer didn’t give him a home run and the four RBIs he had coming from the slam. Instead, Ventura got credit for a single and one RBI.

The “grand slam single” was obviously enough to give the Mets the 4-3 win, but it caused a sticky situation in Vegas. The over/under (combined number of runs scored by both teams) on which bettors had wagered was 7.5. If the Mets had gotten all four runs Ventura’s slam should have scored, the total number of runs would have been 10, and bettors who took the over would have won. Instead, the 4-3 final score resulted in the under bettors winning. Unfortunately for the sports books, it wasn’t immediately clear that the Mets weren’t going to get those three extra runs, so NBC posted the score as 7-3 on its broadcast. According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal some casinos started paying out on “over” bets when the 7-3 score was initially posted and didn’t stop until NBC announcer Bob Costas told viewers the correct score five minutes or so later. As a result, if you were quick enough, this game did the seemingly impossible: it paid out for both the over and the under.

The Grand Slam Single lives on in the nightmares of bookies everywhere. And, yes Bud, people did and still do bet on Baseball in Vegas.

Nick James’ Rangers Prospect List

Camden Depot looks like they are expanding.  Rangers look good.  It will be nice to see how other prospects ranked so we can figure out how to compare his list to others.

We begin our Minor League review with perhaps the deepest and most talented farm system in baseball. The Rangers boast a stunning mixture of high-ceiling arms and impact position players in both the low- and high-minors. In addition to the wave of talent brought in last summer in the Mark Teixeira trade, Texas has commited sizeable resources to both the draft and the international market, making waves on both fronts. The talent level in the system is reaching the point where Texas will be able to start dealing high-end redundancies (such as young catchers) in order to fill any holes, or to simply upgraded thinner positions.

My favorite Rangers prospect:

3. Derek Holland | Stats | Depot Grade: A-
6-2 / 185 | Age - 21 | LHP | B/T - L/L | Drafted - 2006 (R25) | Wallace St. CC (TX)
Floor: Bullpen | Ceiling: Front-end Starter | Projection: #2 Starter

Notes: Though his stuff is not quite as electric as Feliz’s, Holland was every bit as effective this year and is closer to a finished product. His fastball has solid boring action and ranges from the low- to mid-90s. His second best pitch is a hard sweeping slider that he can dial-up to the low-80s, and he shows good fade and solid depth on his changeup. Holland blew through three levels, pounding both sides of the plate with his fastball and showing command over his arsenal to the tune of a 3.9 SO/BB ratio. He gives Texas another legit potential #1 starter.

MLB: A’s examine Furcal’s medical reports

Get out of the Dr. Paul Lochner Medical Center and watch some games!

Having set club records for use of the disabled list in each of the past two seasons, the A’s are leaving nothing to chance in their pursuit for free-agent shortstop Rafael Furcal, who missed all but 36 games of the 2008 regular season with a back injury.

Paul Kinzer, Furcal’s agent, confirmed for MLB.com on Thursday morning that the A’s, who have used the DL 47 times since 2006, have examined Furcal’s medical reports.

Kinzer did not say if the A’s have presented a formal contract offer for Furcal, who batted .357 with a .439 on-base percentage, five home runs and 16 RBIs with the Dodgers this season—the first time since 2001 that he played fewer than 138 games.

Star-Ledger: Price: Hal Steinbrenner takes over control of Yankees

Whew! Non-blinding stuff from Ed Price.

Major League Baseball owners have approved Hal Steinbrenner as the Yankees’ designated control person, taking over from his father.

Hal and older brother Hank began taking over operations of the team last year. Hal got involved first and is in charge of financial matters, which makes it no surprise he is the “control person.”

The team issued a statement through spokesman Howard J. Rubenstein:

“At the MLB meetings today, the clubs approved Hal Steinbrenner as the control person for the New York Yankees. This is consistent with George Steinbrenner’s desire and commitment to have his sons assume the day-to-day responsibility of operating the club. George Steinbrenner will remain as Chairman of the New York Yankees, Hal and Hank Steinbrenner will continue as Co-Chairmen.

“Hal was designated as the control person because he is responsible for the overall business and financial operations of the Yankees. Hank will continue to oversee the club’s Baseball Operations.”

Rosenthal: Where will Teixeira mark his turf?

And other Anti-Icky-Poop from Robothal…

Ibanez, 36, is drawing significant interest from a number of clubs, and compares favorably to the other free-agent sluggers in at least two categories.

His 338 RBIs over the past three seasons are more than the totals posted by Teixeira (336), Ramirez (311), Dunn (298) and Pat Burrell (278). Ryan Howard led the majors during that time with 431 RBIs.

Sabermetricians generally dismiss “counting” stats such as RBIs, but Ibanez played for sub-.500 Mariners teams in two of those seasons, and his home games were at pitcher-friendly Safeco Field.

Ibanez also batted .331 with runners in scoring position during that three-year period, tied with Teixeira and ahead of Ramirez (.317), Burrell (.237) and Dunn (.234). Mike Young led the majors with a .359 average over that span, according to STATS LLC.

Is Ibanez better than Ramirez or Teixeria? Of course not. He’s also five years older than Burrell and seven years older than Dunn, and hits for less power. Still, teams love Ibanez’s professionalism, and one general manager predicts he will receive a three-year deal for between $8 million and $12 million per season.

Zolecki: Utley to Have Hip Surgery, Out 4 to 6 Months

The release said, “Based on the diagnostic studies and examinations, it has been recommended that Utley have surgery on his right hip, which is scheduled for next week. The procedure will be an arthroscopic evaluation with treatment of any labral or bony injury. The recovery will allow for the initiation of baseball activities between three and four months, however, the total recovery time may require four to six months.”

Four to six months means Utley could be back as early as the beginning of the season and as late as June.

Yankees Possible Free Agent Signings

3) [A.J.] Burnett came out of the Marlins organization in the early 2000’s, a very bad omen for a lot of pitchers. Some of the others who were in those rotations with him include:

* Ryan Dempster, who struggled through injuries and ineffectiveness for five years before this season, which may yet prove to have been a fluke

* Josh Beckett, who’s had one good year in three since leaving Florida for Boston

* Brad Penny, who’s logged 200+ innings once since 2001, and spent half of 2008 on the DL

* Carl Pavano: Unmitigated disaster. 9-8, 5.00 ERA in 146 total innings during the 4-year, $40 million contract the Yankees gave him.

* Dontrelle Willis, erstwhile 22 game winner who logged only 24 MLB innings this year, and was sent down to Single-A(!) to straighten himself out.

And those are the success stories! Remember when all of those guys, plus Claudio Vargas, Blaine Neal, Wes Anderson and Geoff Goetz were supposed to become stars? Remember Nate Bump and Hansel Izquierdo? Yeah, neither does anybody else.

Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not saying the Yankees shouldn’t sign Burnett. All I’m saying is:

PLEASE, PLEASE, PRETTYPLEASEWITHMONEYONTOP DO NOT SIGN A.J. BURNETT AT ANY COST!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously.

N.Y. Observer: Megdal: Time to Bid Fond Farewell to Pedro

No, this has nothing to do with a Mantle/Ramos footrace. It’s Martinez, silly.

But it is the combination of faint hope and Martinez reputation that would pose the biggest problem. In all likelihood, a one-year contract for very little money or a non-guaranteed spring training invite won’t be enough to entice Martinez to return to the Mets.

Not only will that mean guaranteeing too much money and possibly years to a pitcher who in all likelihood has pitched his last effective season, it would likely mean that Martinez would not be quickly dispatched should his ineffectiveness become obvious early in the season. Because he is Pedro Martinez, he’d get more of a chance to prove himself sound. Even moving him to the bullpen wouldn’t be a viable option—he struggles to get loose and in the first inning, remember?

The Mets would then be left with the ugly choice of carrying a washed-up fifth starter, or unceremoniously dumping an inner-circle Hall of Famer whose signing kick-started the franchise’s recent return to respectability.

Would it be heartbreaking for Mets fans to see Martinez sign elsewhere and find a last bit of the magic that made him beloved in New York? Absolutely. But the odds are the Mets will be much better off cutting their losses now than betting on a long shot.

Baseball With Nunchucks?

Japan has given the world some pretty good baseball players …

Ichiro, Wally Kaname Yonamine, Hideki Matsui, Kosuke Fukudome (jury’s still out) and the legendary Sadaharu Oh (and his World Record 868 Home Runs - suck it Barry) come to mind.

But none of them did anything as cool as this guy …

Watch as this martial arts master shows some incredible baseball skill by hitting a baseball with a pair of nunchaku.

If at first you don’t suceed, submit a post of a guy hitting baseballs with a nunchaku again! This is proof that Ninjas are good ballplayers, by the way, further making us fortunate that Japan will be called “Samurai Japan” and not “Ninja Japan” during the WBC.

Major League Baseball likely to change, not ban, maple bats

For those who have condemned the use of maple wood and blamed it for the epidemic of broken bats, it might be time to rethink their position.
Brian Hillerich, the great-grandson of Bud Hillerich, the founder of the company Hillerich & Bradsby, which makes the Louisville Slugger, said Major League Baseball is not likely to issue a ban of maple bats but it is going to explore specification changes to the models of bats being used.

“We’ve been told that they probably won’t ban maple, that they will come up with some recommendations for changing what we do now,” said Hillerich, professional bat production manager for the company, which has a 60% share of the MLB market.

One of the remedies to reduce the number of broken bats is to change the difference between the length and weight of a bat. According to MLB rules, bats can be no more than minus-3.5, which means the difference between the length in inches and weight in ounces cannot be greater than 3.5.

“A 34-inch, 30.5-ounce bat is waiting to be broken in half,” Hillerich said.

If I had a blog about Baseball Bats, I’d name it “Sons of Pete Browning”.

Thiel: Mariners’ talent search was well handled

The game, as always, is about talent. So while Wednesday was about introducing Wakamatsu, the more impressive figure was Zduriencik, the talent finder. Partly it was because he had actually done something—even if he had swatted a fly, it would have been more exciting contact than Mariners hitters managed last season—but mostly it was about how he did his thing.

To check out Wakamatsu, he upgraded the vetting to include not just past employers, but his former teammates from 25 years ago at Arizona State University. He also called up clubhouse men at his earlier employment stops.

Like college guys, the clubhouse workers see all aspects of personalities, including the dark side’s back stabbing, undercutting, fighting, sloth, avarice and the remaining deadly sins, plus fresh ones. If they give a thumbs up to a candidate, it’s far more valuable than scuttlebutt offered by five scouts and 25 sportswriters.

To put it more directly: If Bill Bavasi had made one call to an Orioles clubhouse guy, Erik Bedard never would have been a Mariner.

As my old biz-guru “Harry the Spitoon” Yingling used to say (in between bootshots of Jameson Irish)..."Those dollar-an-hour countermen will kill you every time.”

Dewan: Michael Young, Gold Glove shortstop?

Michael Young, Armour Plating short term?

Three years ago he was one of the worst shortstops in baseball. Has he improved to the point where he’s the best in the American League?

Well, he is better. But frankly, that’s not saying much. His 2003 and 2004 plus/minus figures were -34 and -39. He has “improved” to -10, -15, and -7 over the last three years. And he still had problems going to his left.

...One of the key reasons Young won the American League award was lack of competition. In the voting for the Fielding Bible Awards, eight of the top ten shortstops in baseball were from the National League. Young, in fact, came in 11th in the voting. But the guy that should have beaten him for the AL Gold Glove came in fourth in the Fielding Bible Awards voting (the other American Leaguer was White Sox shortstop Orlando Cabrera, who came in sixth). The fourth place finisher was Erick Aybar of the Los Angeles Angels. The key reason that Aybar didn’t win a Gold Glove is that he only played in 98 games. Nevertheless, his plus/minus was +7 and he turned in more Good Fielding Plays than Young (55 to 51) and had fewer Defensive Misplays (35 to Young’s 41).

AP: Appeals court to hear case dealing with seizure of players’ samples

Internal Revenue Service agents, acting on a search warrant, seized computer files containing the test results during raids of labs involved in Major League Baseball’s survey drug tests in 2003, which the union and management had agreed would remain anonymous.

The investigators had search warrants for 11 players, but ended up seizing the samples of every big league player from Quest Diagnostics of Teterboro, N.J., and Comprehensive Drug Testing of Long Beach, Calif. The government argued that it seized everything because the 11 names it wanted were mixed with the other names on computer hard drives.

then:

Lawyers from the Major League Baseball Players Association sued and claimed allowing the government to use the seized medical records without previous evidence of a crime would create a dangerous precedent

Gestapo tactics by the Feds or legal search and seizure? Discuss.

SNY: Berg: Prices could drop on free-agent relievers with time

Thumbing through his handy Tesla patents booklet...the latest Wireless Calling from Berg.

It’s a buyer’s market. Plenty of teams need closers, but none of them has the cash the Mets do. Smart money says they’ll end up with K-Rod or Fuentes, but if they’re smart with their money, they shouldn’t shell it out anytime soon.

Sports agents are shrewd. They’ll do whatever they can to see that their clients get the most money possible. No reasonable agent would allow the closer he represents to sign anywhere without giving the Mets the chance to beat the offer, so it behooves the team to lay back for a while and wait to see if the prices start dropping.

Because though having an offseason plan is important for a GM, it’s not as important as the ability to read the ebb and flow of the free-agent and trade markets and adjust the plan accordingly. Last season, Kyle Lohse slipped through the cracks and the Cardinals were able to scoop him up on the cheap.

None of the best free-agent closers will plummet in price the way Lohse did, but in a struggling economy and without a ton of teams eager to spend the type of green K-Rod and Fuentes are looking for, the Mets could land a relative bargain if they play their cards right.

Primer Dugout 11-20-08

Happy Birthday CLark Griffith and Kenesaw Mountain Landis

THT: Brattain: White Flag?

Tolkien once wrote that “celler door” are the most beautiful sounding words ever spoken. I don’t believe he ever heard “Ricciardi debellatio”.

There are rumblings that the Toronto Blue Jays may simply punt on 2009. With the injuries to Dustin McGowan and Shaun Marcum and the likely departure of A.J. Burnett it may be that absent a significant infusion of cash, there is no way the Jays feel they can compete with the still rising (and current AL champion) Tampa Bay Rays, the wealthy and organizationally solid Boston Red Sox and the major reloading of the New York Yankees.

On top of the yawing gap in the middle of the starting rotation there is no bona fide DH to speak of (too early to know if Travis Snider is ready to be a full time masher); the middle infield is uncertain while Aaron Hill continues to recover and the shortstop position still undecided; the infield corners could be excellent defensively and competent offensively or they could fall off a cliff; and while Rod Barajas occasionally wields a hot stick, nobody would consider Toronto catching to be upper-echelon.

...It’ll be depressing if the Jays pass on 2009 but after last season, I hope Ricciardi will not be the man making the big decisions in 2010-11 otherwise that window will close while he worries about the Jays in 2016.

Sherman: MUSSINA: COOPERSTOWN VOTE WILL BE A HALLUVA DECISION (RR)

You mean it’s NOT because “Camden Yards is a bandbox!” (turns off Waldling tape loop...resumes tepid sexual thoughts concerning Hal Reniff)

I will not play naive here. The AL, because of the presence of the DH, was over-inflated in this period with illegal performance enhancers and runaway offense. Muscles swelled and so did ERAs. To further increase the degree of difficulty, the unbalanced schedule returned in 2001, so pitchers were forced to see divisional monsters over and over again.

Most pitchers cracked under that assault. Mussina won 270 games. But would he have won more if the game were clean? Would he have won 20 a few times? I don’t think it is coincidence that he finally won 20 in what is perceived as the cleanest season in years despite his now pedestrian 87-mph fastball. What if the sport were cleaner when he was throwing 93-mph darts?

I am thinking about that now. I am a tough voter who for a long time saw Mussina as just shy of the Hall borderline. Then he went out and had a season that he didn’t even see coming in spring, which got me contemplating the steroid issue. And now - enjoy retirement, Mike - I have five years to weigh what that all means to me.

The Juice Blog: Carroll: Who?

As the great floating head of Watson Pritchard once said..."They’re coming for me now… and then they’ll come for you!”

But inside the industry, there are a lot of people I do know. Mostly, it’s because I’ve done radio with them in either direction. I’ve met them at the Winter Meetings, at least a lot of the beat writers. They’re actually considering BP for membership in the BBWAA this year, which should be interesting. I don’t think we’ll get in, but it’s nice to at least get a foot in the door. With newspapers collapsing, I wonder where the BBWAA will be in ten years. Someone I really respect and admire talked with me on the phone today about whether there might be a fit for him at BP. I wish I could hire the guy, because he’s the top in the field, but I don’t have that kind of influence at BP and he won’t come cheap. In this economy, it could be anyone. Murray Chass isn’t at the Times, Gordon Edes isn’t at the Globe, and who knows who’s next.

There’s a lot of great writers out there, solid writers and thinkers and hard workers. In a crowd like this, you probably wouldn’t say “who?” if I mentioned Alex Belth, Matthew Leach, Aaron Gleeman, Eric Seidman, or Sam Mellinger. But is anyone the next Peter Gammons, or is that like asking who the next Sandy Koufax is? The next Tracy Ringolsby? The next Michael Lewis? (I have an idea about that ...) And moreover, where will they be writing?

Who will I say “who?” about next? And who am I missing?

Murray Chass On Baseball: N.L. M.V.P. Needs a Revote, Not a Recount

Murray Chass says OPS!  Cyano group meeting at Primer offices tomorrow! Come One - Leave None!

Many non-voters mistake the m.v.p. for player of the year. There’s a difference in the two distinctions. If the award were for player of the year, the voters would simply look at the statistics and see which player drove in the most runs and hit for the highest average or had the highest OPS.

Oops, there I’ve said it. OPS. It’s a relatively recent term that still has to be explained because most fans over 35 probably don’t know what it means. It happens to be one of the acceptable new statistics because it easily demonstrates a player’s offensive value.

But it’s not really a new statistic. It’s just a new name. Some of us have been adding on-base percentage and slugging percentage for years; we just didn’t call it by a particular name. Now we have one: OPS.

But I digress. Writers voting for m.v.p. consider a player’s OPS, but they don’t automatically give the award to the player with the highest four-digit, one-decimal-point number. That’s because the award goes to the player who was most valuable, not the player with the best statistics.

Baseball America: Cleveland Indians Top 10 Prospects

1. Carlos Santana, c

2. Matt LaPorta, of

3. Nick Weglarz, of

4. Adam Miller, rhp

5. Beau Mills, 1b

6. Lonnie Chisenhall, ss

7. Kelvin de la Cruz, lhp

8. David Huff, lhp

9. Michael Brantley, of/1b

10. Carlos Rivero, ss

Chisenhall’s not going to stay on SS. That doesn’t affect his positioning on the list, in my view. I’d have flip-flopped Mills and Miller; I have my doubts that Miller is ever going to be healthy enough to contribute. Brantley has no business being in the top 10 ahead of Rondon and Hodges.

SNY: Boorstein: How the Yankees can solve their third-base problem

Uhh...De-seed Rich McKinney’s hair (and drop it), roll it up (and drop it), and pass it around (and drop it again)?

Think about how selfish Rodriguez is. When he came over from Texas in the 2004 trade, he insisted on moving to a new position to prove he could be more than the best shortstop ever. It was Rodriguez that insisted that Jeter keep his position at shortstop. That was all part of his master plan to watch Jeter atrophy into the worst fielder in baseball and make Rodriguez look better by association.

For the next five years, they know they are going to get elite-level offense and above-average defense barring an injury. And he’s durable. But that’s too much certainty. The Yankees need someone who will middle along for most of the season, get one big hit the whole summer but can provide the intangibles that help teams win. Those are more important than 45 home runs.

If the Yankees don’t win next season, Rodriguez should shoulder all the blame. None of it should go to the aging offense around him that is no longer near its peak, much less at it. It’s not Jeter’s fault he’s turned into a singles hitter or Hideki Matsui’s fault that he can’t run down to first base without having his knee drained. A-Rod caused that and more. The young pitchers have developed a losing mentality simply from sharing a clubhouse with Rodriguez. Until he’s gone, there is no hope for this franchise.

S.I.: Posnanski: Life of Boswell

And with a whimper, not a bang, Boswell faded quickly from public view and press scrutiny…

Only, you know what? It isn’t. It is, when you think about it, a horrifying premise—I cannot believe that Tom Boswell, my hero, really believes that. Common sense says that the universe revolves around the earth. Common sense says that thunder clapping means God’s angry. Common sense says that when your car is sliding you want to turn your wheel away from the skid. Common sense says that a fast guy with no power who might or might not get on base is the perfect guy to put in the leadoff spot. Common sense that the queen of spades is the middle card. Common sense says that if you put Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg together, you will get an entertaining movie. Common sense says that the best way to hit a golf ball far is to swing harder. Common sense says a lot of incredibly stupid things and if you are going to automatically choose common sense over, you know stats and facts and results, well, that’s a good way to crash into trees and lose your shirt in a card game and get stuck with Omar Moreno.

But, forget that for a moment. There’s a larger point ... so let’s remember the line: When stats WILDLY contradict common sense, always doubt the stats. Boz was using this line to point out that the gulf of a difference in VORP (Value Over Replacement Player) between Pujols (96.8) and Howard (35.3) is so massive that it simply cannot be right, it bends common sense. I mean, that says Pujols is, what, 61 VORPies better than Howard, that just seems wrong, wrong, wrong. And based on the Rule of Boswell you have to doubt the veracity of VORP.

Leitch: The Unfortunate Legacy of Pedro Martinez

Mahow have times changed…

And about the wisdom of all these signings: Pedro’s early “success” fooled the Mets into thinking big-name players were all it took to become champions. (Or become the Yankees — whatever.) Thus: Beltran, solid; Wagner, destroyed by injuries; Delgado, initially effective and then a mess until the second half of last season; Santana, outstanding — for now, just like Pedro in his first season — and with five more years to go; and Castillo, horrific, and with three more years to go. The team spent a ton of money with no World Series to show for it. Once those contracts end, odds are that the Mets will breathe the same sighs of relief that they are now with Pedro leaving.

It’s something to remember as the Mets enter free agency. They’re eyeing Derek Lowe, saves leader Francisco Rodriguez, and even — heavens — Manny Ramirez. If the Mets sign any of these gentlemen to extended contracts, fans will cheer, and everyone will praise Minaya for recognizing that, after two awful Septembers, he needed to shake things up. People might even say the pick-ups help legitimize a flagging franchise.