Some random notes for a quiet Saturday

I can't believe I forgot about this yesterday but the San Francisco Giants and Tim Lincecum avoided arbitration. He signed a 2 year deal for 23 million. It would of been really interesting to see what would of happened in arbitration and coming out of it. It is good they settled though for him and the team. The Yankees apparently have targeted a cuban defector as the successor to Derek Jeter at shortstop. Here is the story from George King of the New York Post. The Yankees have gone down this road before with El Duque who had great success with the Yankees. They also had Jose Contreras who was not as good as they thought and Juan Miranda who has been good in the minors but has not made it to the majors regularly yet. They also bombed out with Adrian Hernandez and Andy Morales. We will see what happens but usually if the Yankees want someone they will get him. Scott Richmond of the Toronto Blue Jays suffered a shoulder injury while preparing for spring training. He was hoping to make the rotation, he will now be behind the other pitchers due to this injury. The Washington Nationals have interest in veteran right hander Kris Benson. He hasn't pitched a full season since 2006 when he was with the Orioles. His wife is the more famous one, Anna Benson who once said that if she caught him cheating she would sleep with the whole team he was on. His agent is saying he is now 100 percent healthy and had a good workout in front of several teams. This will probably be the extent of the blogging today as it is really quiet. We will get heated up though starting on Wednesday with pitchers and catchers. Everyone take a deep breath and relax and then lets get going with the Baseball season finally. I hope everyone will comment and start discussions on here as we go through spring training and then the season. I welcome any and all suggestions even if they are against me or a criticism. Just remember to keep it clean and I will get back to everyone. I almost forgot to I had a article published on www.numberonebaseball.com this morning. It is a 2010 season preview for the Yankees. I also did one for the New York Mets but I am not sure when that will be published. Please check it out and also read me on that website and keep coming back here for more news and insight, I thank you for all the support and continued support.

5 days until Pitchers and Catchers

This is the worst time of the year, there isn't much going on and pitchers and catchers are about to report. It feels like 5 days is 5 months and it can't come soon enough. Pitchers and catchers is just a symbolic thing and then they work out for about a week or so before the other players show up. There still won't be any actual games until the first week of March but still it is something, baseball is back. Here is some baseball news to hold you over until next week. It looks like the Johnny Damon saga could be ending soon. It appears it is down to the Tigers and White Sox. I would guess he ends up with Detroit by Monday or Tuesday. Brian Cashman was speaking at a university yesterday and had some interesting things to say. He said he told Scott Boras and Johnny Damon he wouldn't fight for a contract to Hal Steinbrenner unless he knew they would sign it. He then said that he was expecting Johnny to get a Bobby Abreu type contract and if he didn't he should of been a Yankee and that isn't the Yankees fault. A really interesting thing Cashman said is prior to one of the World Series games he was talking to the Tigers GM. This is where the root of the Granderson trade came from, Dave Dombrowski was like dude you have a game at 8 and Cash said yeah but my work is done I have to start thinking about next season. Mark Feinsand of the NY Daily News is already down in Tampa and has been blogging about the workouts at the minor leage complex. He wrote in his blog today that Brett Gardner has shown up and has long hair, at least for him. Joba Chamberlain, Francisco Cervelli, Boone Logan, Dave Robertson, Alfredo Aceves and some minor leaguers are all there.