MarlinsFans46

Thanks everybody!

Happy Birthday!

I was not allowed to create a topic, but I was wondering are there signature limits? I feel like lately they are WAY to big and half the page is scrolling through signatures for one line responses... We used to have specific guidelines (I like 400 pixels and two lines of text, or something along those lines...) but I can't find them at the moment. You're right though - it would be nice if people were courteous and kept them managable. If you want to skip them altogether, you can select the "Games" skin at the bottom of the page, if that helps. EDIT: I also split the topic so it has its own thread. :thumbup

Oh the differences in organizations...where Gregg is a low cost option to them, he'd be one of our higher paid players (if my memory is accurate). Probably - his $2.5 million salary this year was the highest on the team (except for Lo Duca's $5 million but I don't think we paid more than 2.5).

ahahahah I found out he changed his name from Cocobelli to Coco what a bad childhood he mus of had His name is Covelli.

Are Yankee fans as embarrassed by The Boss's little boy as they should be? Yes.

why did my message sent 2 times? :confused Fixed now. :thumbup

The story is here.

So much for holding him back to stop his arbitration clock... but with an injury it seems necessary anyways.

Restko was traded in the offseason. I believe to the Rangers Right - he's with the Bakersfield Blaze.

A bloated program only gets worse.

Welcome!

Leading Off for the Yankees ... Billy Crystal Mar 13, 10:32 AM (ET) TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -No joke: Billy Crystal is leading off for the New York Yankees. The comedian was put in the top spot for Thursday's exhibition game, listed as the designated hitter against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Wearing No. 60, Crystal got his chance a day before his 60th birthday. A lifelong Yankees fan, the righty was set to face Pirates left-hander Paul Maholm. Derek Jeter followed Crystal in the lineup, with Alex Rodriguez, Bobby Abreu and Robinson Cano among the other regulars also playing. Johnny Damon was scheduled to take over the DH job from Crystal later in the game. Damon was in the spirit, saying it was fine that he sat at the start in place of Crystal. "He's been around longer," Damon said. "He's got credibility." http://sports.excite.com/news/03132008/v8895.html

This time, it's the groin: http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20...sp&c_id=mlb

:|

By DAVE CAMPBELL MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -Right-hander Livan Hernandez and the Minnesota Twins agreed Tuesday to a $5 million, one-year contract that could earn him an additional $2 million in performance bonuses. The Twins are short on experience in their rotation, after trading Johan Santana and losing Carlos Silva as a free agent this winter. Hernandez will join a handful of young starting pitching candidates, including Francisco Liriano, Scott Baker, Boof Bonser, Kevin Slowey, Nick Blackburn, and Phil Humber, when batterymen have their first official spring training workout Monday at Fort Myers, Fla. Last season, Hernandez made $7 million while going 11-11 with a 4.93 ERA in 33 starts for Arizona. He pitched for the Diamondbacks in the NL championship series. Hernandez, a native of Cuba, has been quite durable over 10-plus years in the majors, logging at least 199 innings each season since 1998. As a rookie in 1997, he won a World Series with the Florida Marlins. Source: http://sports.excite.com/news/02122008/v2950.html

I'm glad the Yankees signed him long term - he has a few holes (patience at the plate and his defense is questionable at times), but there is no doubting his talent. :thumbup

From MLB.com: http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20...7&fext=.jsp Tribe, Julio agree to Minor League dealFormer closer invited to camp, will battle for bullpen spot By Anthony Castrovince / MLB.com CLEVELAND -- An Indians team that appeared to be heading into Spring Training with its bullpen all but set has a new and intriguing name to add to the mix. The Tribe reached an agreement on Thursday with veteran reliever Jorge Julio on a one-year Minor League contract with an invitation to Spring Training camp. Julio began the 2007 season with the Marlins before becoming an important cog in the Rockies' bullpen down the stretch. Consider Julio, 28, a candidate for the final spot in the Indians bullpen. The first six spots are expected to be filled by closer Joe Borowski, setup men Rafael Betancourt, Rafael Perez and Masahide Kobayashi, right-hander Jensen Lewis and left-hander Aaron Fultz. Tom Mastny, who has pitched out of the Tribe 'pen the past two seasons, was the early favorite to land the last spot, but Julio's invite gives him a chance to make an impact this spring. Three other non-roster invitees -- right-handers Rick Bauer, Matt Ginter and Jeff Harris -- also have big league bullpen experience. When last we saw Julio, he was giving up a two-run homer to the Padres' Jerry Hairston in the top of the 13th inning of the National League Wild Card tiebreaker. That homer looked as if it would cost the Rockies a playoff berth, but they managed to rally in their final at-bat. The Rockies ended up leaving Julio off their roster for the postseason, citing his sore neck. Indians general manager Mark Shapiro said Julio will be fully healthy when pitchers and catchers report to camp in Winter Haven, Fla., in two weeks. "This gives us more competition," Shapiro said of the Julio signing. "Competition is always a positive thing. Anytime you have the ability to bring in additional guys who have pitched in meaningful roles in the big leagues, the team will benefit from that." Before the late-season neck problems and the meltdown against the Padres, Julio was a stabilizer in the Colorado 'pen. In his first 24 appearances with the team after his May acquisition from the Marlins, he posted a 2.38 ERA and limited opponents to a .213 average. For the '07 season, Julio, a native of Venezuela, went 0-5 with a 5.23 ERA in 68 games. He was tough on left-handers, holding them to a .227 average with no homers. In his seven-year career, which began with the Orioles and has included stints with the Mets and Diamondbacks, Julio is 13-33 with a 4.35 ERA and 99 saves. His best season came in 2003, when he saved 36 games for Baltimore. Anthony Castrovince is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

I think this organization has a soft spot for Matty T. I know I do... As do I - he is the last Marlin to come through the Portland Sea Dogs when they were the Marlins' AA team (meaning I got to see him play back then). Strangely enough, the number of former managers outweighs the number of former players on the team - both Fredi Gonzalez and Carlos Tosca were former Sea Dogs managers.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20...sp&c_id=mlb Selig's term extended through 2012 Three-year extension ratified at Thursday's owner's meetingBy Barry M. Bloom / MLB.com Bud Selig is entering his 16th full season as Commissioner. (Aude Guerrucci) SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Commissioner Bud Selig's contract has been extended by Major League Baseball's 30 owners for three years, taking him through the 2012 season. The decision was made in an executive council meeting on Wednesday and was ratified by the owners on Thursday, making the new deal the most significant news that came out of this year's first quarterly meetings. But the ground began to swell for an extension after the previous owners meetings this past November in Naples, Fla. Lew Wolff, owner of the Oakland A's and a frat buddy of Selig's when both attended the University of Wisconsin, said he sent an e-mail to Selig last month professing those feelings in a six-word statement: "You can't retire until I expire." "I looked at that about four times a day," Selig said on Thursday. "And actually began to take it quite seriously." So did the collective owners who asked Selig to step out of both sessions as they briefly debated the merits of the extension. When the doors swung open, Selig returned to loud standing ovations. "I spent a lot of time agonizing over it, mainly with myself," Selig said about agreeing to the consensus growing among the owners. "I had to make a decision. But they really convinced me." The owners again endorsed Selig, who replaced the deposed Fay Vincent on an interim basis on Sept. 9, 1992, on the heels of the release last month of the Mitchell Report, the result of an investigation into the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. At Tuesday's four-hour Congressional hearing on Capitol Hill, the Commissioner was commended by a number of elected officials for having the foresight to seek former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell to spearhead the investigation. "This was well-deserved, well-earned," said Ken Kendrick, who replaced Jerry Colangelo as managing general partner of the Diamondbacks in 2004. "I'm relatively new at this, but he's done an outstanding job for all of us." Selig, 73, just finished his 15th full season as Commissioner. As a business, the sport has never done better, setting records last season in gross revenue ($6.1 billion) and total attendance (79.5 million). Projections right now are for attendance to easily soar over the 80 million ticket mark and revenue to surpass $6.5 billion in 2008. The sky's the limit, Selig said about the future of the sport. "I will make this prediction to you," he said. "By the time I leave, you won't recognize this sport. It's going to be that much more popular and we'll have branched out into so many other things. This sport is poised right now, really poised to take a quantum leap into the future." When Selig will leave is certainly a matter of conjecture. At the end of his extended term he'll have been in office 20 years, second only to the 24-year run of Kenesaw Mountain Landis, baseball's first Commissioner, who was hired in 1920 in the wake of the Black Sox scandal and died in office in 1944. Selig had said a few years ago that he would retire at the end of his current term, which was set to expire after the 2009 season, saying during a conference early last year that, "Even in Monopoly, you get a 'Get Out Of Jail Free' card, and I'm going to use mine." But at the same time he backed off that assessment a bit, saying, "You never say never about anything." Similarly, in 2003 he also mused that he would probably retire at the end of his term, but on Aug. 17, 2004, the owners extended him through 2009. On Thursday, though, Selig declined to leave his tenure open-ended. "Look, when this is over I'm going to be 78 years old," he said. "And I know what people will be saying at that point. But I can say this without equivocation: at age 78, my wife better come and grab me out of here. I'm very comfortable telling you that." Selig, who once owned the Milwaukee Brewers, was given the job as Commissioner permanently on July 7, 1998, and since then has presided over unparalleled labor peace and an economic sea change in a sport that was barely generating more than $1 billion a year in revenue at the time he took over as baseball's ninth Commissioner. Under his watch, Selig fought for and won approval for Interleague Play, the consolidation of the American League and National League under one office, the three-division format and a Wild Card berth in each league, the unbalanced schedule, worldwide recognition of the sport, steroids testing of Major League players beginning in 2003 and home-field advantage in the World Series for the winning league in the All-Star Game. For the third time, MLB is slated to open its regular season in Japan, with the A's set to match the defending World Series champion Red Sox in March at Tokyo Dome. Also in March, the Padres and Dodgers are projected to play exhibition games in Beijing, the first time Major League games will be played in China. Selig said he plans to be at both events. And in 2009, the second World Baseball Classic is scheduled to be played, capitalizing on its popular inaugural in 2006. All this and more are the reasons why the owners want to keep him in place. "I just want to make it clear that this has all been coming from the clubs who were unanimous in their desire to not only compliment the Commissioner on his leadership, but also to insure stability for a few more years moving forward," said Tom Werner, the chairman of the Red Sox who was the majority owner of the Padres in 1992 when Selig took over. "I know the Commissioner wrestled with the decision to remain, but his devotion to the game during his tenure has been stellar." To be sure, it hasn't always been sugar and roses. Early on Selig's watch, MLB was fractured by the 1994 player strike that abruptly ended that season, led to the cancellation of the World Series and delayed the start of the 1995 season. But it was the last event of its kind. In 2002, the owners and players avoided the ninth consecutive work stoppage over three decades when they signed a four-year Basic Agreement that distributed revenue more liberally from the big-revenue clubs to the smaller ones. Likewise in 2006, the two sides extended the agreement for six years, assuring labor peace through 2012, which coincidentally coincides with the expiration of the Commissioner's latest contract. Until then, Selig, well-known for his indefatigable energy, said he plans to continue at the same pace. "I love the job," he said. "I don't plan to change a thing." :banghead :banghead :banghead

Happy Birthday!

He was just elected with 86% of the vote.

The only thing I have against the Goose is that likely he would go in as a Yankee

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Pretty soon Bonds and McGwire are gonna come out and say they only did it once or twice. It's hard to say, but in both Roberts' and Pettitte's case the accusations were that they only took them a couple times. That's not inconsistent with the report.