So the regular MLB season hasn't started yet and I am already at my first big decision of this fantasy baseball season.
Since this is my first post about my fantasy keeper league here is some background information:
12 Team Roto keeper league;
Batting Categories: SB, OBP, SLG, Runs, RBI;
Pitching Categories: Wins, Saves, Ks, ERA, WHIP;
10 players are kept before all players return to the draft pool in March;
The league is in its fourth season;
Last year the league expanded from 10 to 12 teams;
I was an expansion franchise;
There will be more of a history lesson later but on to my current dilemma...
My first big trade offer of the year involves the gem of my young expansion franchise - Grady Sizemore, centerfielder for the Cleveland Indians. The Indians signed Grady to a big contract last week; he's a great five category contributor and he's only 23 on opening day. The proposed trade sends Sizemore, Barry Zito, and Eddie Guardado for Mark Prior, Brad Lidge, and Tori Hunter. I counter offered and asked the other team to throw in the rights to Justin Upton without him going for it.
I hesitate to go forward with the 3 for 3 deal only because of Prior's current health record. His potential to be the best is undeniable, but his injuries are becoming a pattern. It looks like now his injuries may be a symptom of his delivery. Who knows if his stuff will remain as good once he starts to try and change his approach to the plate?
So far I am holding the line to see if he comes around to throw in Upton... Putting stock in how bad he actually wants Grady. This guy is typically known to negotiate against himself so holding off here might be prudent.
UPDATE
So I held out and instead of coming around to Upton he added a 3rd round pick in next years draft for my 7th round pick. It still hurt to send Grady away but the price was definitely right here.
Having a bit of free time with little to do while waiting for things to happen in Kuwait I picked up my first John Grisham book, The King of Torts. It was quite a page turner and I was hooked. I managed to get through three of his others, The Summons, The Brethren, and The Last Juror, all while still deployed. I took a short break but decided to check out a few of Grisham's other books. Starting this past week with A Painted House.
So I was going to spend this post reviewing the book in some way, but what fun would that be? In summary its a decent book that I didn't want to end, and when it did end it was abrupt and without resolution. Needless to say I was left wanting.
But while I was reading A Painted House on my airplane ride from Baltimore to Louisville a guy sitting next to me, seeing that I was reading it, chimed in with how great the book it is. "Its my favorite Grisham... yada yada yada."
So this got me thinking... Why do people find it appropriate to talk about and judge what other people are reading on an airplane? This isn't an activity people normally engage in in other locations. I guess the need for small talk is too overwhelming for some people at 20000 feet. I've caught myself doing this to someone else before with a Harry Potter book; like a complete stranger needs me to give him that boost so he can get through the novel. In my most abrasive of these encounters, I was reading The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, when I was on a trip as a new Lieutenant, when I happen to sit next to somebody reading the Dali Lama. I still want to punch that guy in the face...
On Friday a jury in Nashville, Tennessee decided that the title song of the Notorious B.I.G.'s debut album Ready to Die sampled from an Ohio Players tune and awarded 4.2 million dollars in damages to the two record labels with the rights to the Ohio players music. More substantially, the judge halted the sale of Ready to Die.
The true injustice to Christopher Wallace's legacy is though the title track "Ready to Die" brings the album together it is not one of the best on the album. "Big Poppa", "Warning", "Gimme the Loot", "Juicy", and "Me & My B!tch" are all better examples of Wallace's wit and talent. Now these greats will be taken off the shelf as well, no doubt to be rereleased in a few years by Sean Combs mixing Biggie's music with whatever chump rapper of the day that pops up on his radar. These subsequent perversions only further water down his legacy. Whenever I hear one I just can't help but wonder if the "chump of the day" has more of a connection to Wallace than I do (and that would be zero).
Sean Combs and Bad Boy records admitted defeat in this case long ago in my mind. As Combs continued to sample and rerelease Christopher Wallace's work over the nine year since his death, I don't recall him ever using pieces of "Ready to Die". Though Combs has stumbled through the management of Wallace's musical estate, this is truly his biggest mistake. Surely he could have settled out of court for less than the 4.2 million. Even if it was more it would have been worth it to keep his friend's music in the stores.
Ready to Die is the only pure Notorious B.I.G. album, selling over 8 million records. Now Bad Boy Records has embarassingly fumbled away one of the best CDs of all time.
As a belated birthday gift my mother took me to Atlantic City yesterday for a day of fun in the casino. Although I have been to many casinos and AC once as a child, this was my first trip to an AC casino while of gambling age.
The good for starters:
I definitely recommend the lunch buffet at Wild West Virginia City; it was excellent.
The bad:
Didn't win a dime, in fact lost a few. I was playing a bunch of stuff I normally wouldn't play so I could play with mom and Aunt Jojo. This kept my Black Jack time from the normal 3+hrs to under an hour.
The ugly:
So I am at a 10 dollar Black Jack table sitting next to a 40something guy who is blowing smoke in my face, when a young couple sits down next to me. They start playing a typical style of play for a new players - never bust regardless of the dealers cards. I personally have no problem with a person playing their Black Jack however they want, its their money, and I am playing at a 10 dollar table. The 40something guy didn't it see it that way and started dropping the f-bomb on the couple multiple times. I'd had enough of his mouth (I found out today after having left that he was f-bombing my mom the entire time we were there and she didn't mention it) and left the table. I did notice that as I was leaving they upped the minimum to 15 dollars. Next we switched casinos, mostly for the Wild West Virginia City buffet but we wanted a change of scenery. After lunch I saw that there was one 10 Black Jack table in casino and this same 40something guy was at this new table. So, to sum up, this guy is on the strip searching for the cheapest Black Jack tables and then cursing and the newbies when they don't play "by the book". If this guy wants to play with "better playing" company he ought to move up to a 25 dollar table, and leave the newbs and people who don't mind playing with them the lower limit tables. Just my opinion though.
So this is my first post on my blog. Though this will obviously be of no value to any of you reading this, it will help me set up my blog as I like.
Look for me to post for real in the upcoming days.
