Hey there, Gabbers. Confession time: I started the Franchise project at a bit of a complicated time. My girlfriend just got back from 6 months in Brazil. I ran down to Akron, Ohio on Thursday to see family for a day, then I had to shoot up to the Cleveland area to get to the airport to see her in. I didn’t get to play romantic though, because she managed to catch an earlier flight and catch me off guard. So no time for flowers or anything like that. I was more impressed I made it from Akron to Painesville in an hour with the 60 mph highways here. Beeze, I don’t know how you put up with it.

Anyways, being on the road I try to check in while I can and I figured I’d take this opportunity to fill folks in. We’ve got some great responses to the post so far. I’d like to thank Beeze for throwing it on our Facebook group, as that thought didn’t cross my mind. I’m going to provide a link to the discussion, but you can still find it in the MLB tab.

http://www.yougabsports.com/pt/Faces-of-the-Franchise/blog.htm#comment9CF1FC9C-6637-43B2-B9F5-720234D5BCCC

Just to sum things up, here’s the positions we’ve kinda locked in. As I’ve said before, if you don’t like what we’ve done, just let us know who you’d prefer to see for your team. Leave us some reasons or maybe some numbers.  Here’s what we have so far:

Atlanta Braves: Hank Aar4on OF/1B (nominated by B-Dub)

Boston Red Sox: Ted Williams OF (nominated by Fragnoli)

Cleveland Indians: Bob Feller SP (nominated by The Beeze)

Colorado Rockies: Todd Helton 1B (nominated by Norm)

New York Yankees: Babe Ruth OF (nominated by ScottyJax)

Oakland Athletics: Rickey Henderson (nominated by BOB) with the best reasoning we’ve come up with thus far…

Pittsburgh Pirates: Roberto Clemente OF (nominated by The Beeze)

San Diego Padres: Tony Gwynn OF (nominated by Norm and BOB)

San Francisco Giants: Willie Mays OF (nominated by BOB)

Seattle Mariners: Ken Griffey Jr. OF (nominated by B-Dub and ScottyJax)

Texas Rangers: Nolan Ryan SP (nominated by B-Dub and ScottyJax)

Here’s our close races. It’s no surprise we have as many. The guys we have already are a who’s who, but some teams are just hard to nail down to one player. I didn’t figure we’d have as much trouble with the Astros, but we’ve had three names brought up. Here’s what we’ve got:

Arizona Diamondbacks: Craig Counsill, Luis Gonzalez, Randy Johnson

Baltimore Orioles: Brooks Robinson, Cal Ripken Jr., Jim Palmer, Earl Weaver, Boog Powell

Chicago Cubs: Ryan Sandberg, Ernie Banks

Chicago White Sox: Frank Thomas, Harold Baines

Cincinnati Reds: Johnny Bench, Pete Rose

Detroit Tigers: Willie Horton, Al Kaline, Ty Cobb, Hank Greenberg

Houston Astros: Craig Biggio (he’s pretty much got it wrapped up), Jeff Bagwell, J. R. Richards

Los Angeles Dodgers: Jackie Robinson, Sandy Koufax

Marlins: Edgar Renteria, Jack McKeon, Kevin Brown, Jeff Conine

Milwaukee Brewers: Robin Yount, Paul Molitor

Minnesotas Twins: Harmon Killebrew, Kirby Puckett, Rod Carew, Kent Hrbeck, Joe Mauer

St. Louis Cardinals: Stan Musial, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock

Tampa Bay Rays: Carlos Pena, Evan Longoria, David Price, James Shields

Toronto Blue Jays: Joe Carter, George Bell, Jack Morris

Washington Nationals/Expos: Gary Carter, Andre Johnson, Vladimir Guerro, Andre Dawson, Tim Rains, Dennis Martinez, the Alou family

This is by no means finished, so feel free to throw out extra names. Now, there’s a few that have more or less been narrowed or have only really received one name. Some should already be posted, but as I said at the start, I’ve been a little busy. Here they are:

Kansas City Royals: George Brett

Los Angeles Angels: We haven’t had any nominations here… Darin Erstad, Tim Salmon, Troy Glaus, Jered Weaver

New York Mets: Tom Seaver

We have a little narrowing to do, but we’ve put in a nice list here.

So, Prince Fielder won the home run derby. A lot of folks in Detroit were excited. I was exactly the opposite. With the offensive slumps the Tigers have had as a club, the last thing we need is for Prince to jack up his swing in the derby. The guy always puts on a show in the derby, but winning it is a lot like the Madden Curse. It should be awesome to win it. It gets the fans that can still stand Chris Berman jacked up. The fact that most of the previous winners or participants have fallen off afterwards is still a bit concerning.

Said jink didn’t affect last year’s winner: Robinson Cano. Cano came into the break with 15 Hr and hitting .296. After the break, he got 13 Hr and brought his average up to .309. He also had a nice post season with 2 Hr, 9 RBIs and a .318 avg. Hopefully, Prince talks to Robby about keeping his swing.

That’s it for this week. Hope you folks enjoy the game tonight. I’ll be running around Port Clinton, OH for a little. It’s a neat place if you’ve never been. I’ll also be enjoying the cool down. I never thought I’d be so happy with 80 degrees. Have a great weeks and thanks for stopping by.

With 162 regular season games and now four rounds of playoffs spreading across seven months of the calendar year, the Major League Baseball season is the most arduous marathon in existence. For that very reason, it is rather fruitless for fans to jump to any conclusions after just six games into the 2012 campaign. Still, there are diehard fans and pundits alike that will read into every last grain of information available. And as one of those diehard fans, one of those questions has been chewing at my mind over the last week and a half:

Where is Albert Pujols?

You’d think after a 1-5 start, the Red Sox would be my first priority, but I’m realistic enough to not have the highest of expectations for the boys in Boston this year. However, I can name 254 million reasons why despite only six games being played, Albert Pujols is already a disappointment in Anaheim.

10-year, $254 million contracts are not handed out every day (although they seem to be for first baseman), so when they are, fans expect the players who carry them to explode like gang-busters out of the gate. When they don’t, you begin to question if the player can step up to the pressure that accompanies such a deal. 5 hits in his first 23 at-bats with Anaheim and only a pair of RBI to his name thus far. And does the most dangerous hitter in baseball frighten the opposing pitchers with a .304 slugging percentage that screams more of Nyjer Morgan than it does Babe Ruth?

Prince Fielder scored a similar deal, yet slightly smaller deal, with Detroit. He has responded by hitting .333 with a pair of home runs, 4 RBI, and 5 runs scored. Granted, those two home runs were rung out against the unimpressive and aforementioned Red Sox pitching staff, but he has returned to his home roots in Detroit and ignited the team, fans, and city around him.

Pujols hasn’t done anything of the sort. The Angels take the field and they look beatable. They squander six-run leads in the latter innings of a game against the light-hitting Twins line-up. They drop 2 of 3 against the upstart Royals in their home-opening series. This isn’t a team rallying around the beacon of light brought in to win them a championship.

What was more telling was how Fielder came to Detroit under a last minute windfall and proclaimed that it was always his dream to follow his father’s footsteps and wear the Tigers uniform. On the other foot, the first proclamation from Pujols was that he didn’t like the billboards placed around town. Sure, that was supposedly because he still pays homage to Stan Musial, but that’s more understandable in the Cardinals uniform, when you are identifying with your home town fans.

Like it or not Albert, you are now El Hombre in that clubhouse. You are the leader that this team is looking to. Albert, you are the guy that needs to take this weekend series in New York and put on a hitting exhibition in a ballpark built for your power. The expectations that come with the money the Angels gave you aren’t going to go away, so it is better to step up now and just take over.

The Angels aren’t paying for a brooding, slow-starting Pujols. They are paying for the home runs, the hits, the RBI’s. They made a 10-year commitment because they want the 3000 hits and they want the 763 or more career home runs.  That investment relies on a certain investment of fortitude on your part too, Albert. You have to want it to make it happen. They are paying for the best hitter in baseball, and only six-games or not, it is time to start producing like it.

Otherwise they can start hanging billboards with the nickname “Albertross” strewn across them.

Other Fragments:

-          I questioned the Minnesota Twins decision to let Michael Cuddyer go and replace him with what I viewed as a step down in Josh Willingham. So far in 2012, I’m eating those thoughts, as Willingham is perhaps the hottest hitter in the game, posting a .409 batting average with 4 home runs and 7 RBI. Granted, this is a hitter that has never batted higher than .277 or struck out less than 104 times in a full major league season. However, if he can put that .277 average up this season  and accompany it with 25-30 home runs, the Twins could be a surprise contender in 2012, especially if they can manage to keep Mauer, Morneau, or both healthy all season.

-          Speaking of Albert Pujols, is anyone shocked that the Cardinals don’t appear to miss him on bit? At 5-2, they appear to be fully capable of making another run at the World Series, and they can thank World Series MVP David Freese for that.  Freese is tied with Andre Ethier for the Major League lead with 10 RBI on the young season and looks more than ready to pick up where he left off, even if it means picking up the Pujols slack.

-          Everyone was worried about Roy Halladay coming out of Spring Training. Doc had lost velocity and he was struggling mightily. All he’s done is be the Halladay of old, throwing 15.0 innings across two starts with a 0.62 ERA. Granted, the competition has been the light hitting Pirates and Marlins, but he has surrendered just 7 hits on the season. I think we can put those worries aside.

P.S.

I want to apologize to the other great writers on this site. I have not been around to comment much lately. My job has been extremely stressful of late and when I've been able to manage to get online, the energy just hasn't been there. I've also been trying to get my own side-project, The Baseball Big Brother Project, up and going, so I've been doing a lot more writing than commenting. Anything I have posted there, I have tried to post here if it made sense to do so. Beeze and our newest member, JawsRecliner, have been huge in helping me get that off the ground also. My promise to you all, as it is only fair of me, that I will be more present with my comments in the coming weeks, as things start to settle down with the project I am working on at my "real life" job.

Prince’s deal, Tebow hanging with the girls, Super Bowl fun, all this in my weekly edition of:

What a way to cool down!!

I just got ticket to see my first lacrosse game. On February 19, 2012, Everbank Field in Jacksonville, Fl will be hosting the Lacrosse Classic. It will pit #5 Denver versus Ohio State and then Jacksonville University versus Navy. I got great seats for only $20.

Then if I can hold out, I will make a mad dash to Buffalo Wild Wings to see the WWE’s Extreme Rules PPV. I got to get my wrestling fix.

Here is a breakdown of Prince Fielder’s 9-year, $214 million contract:

Fielder will earn $23 million in each of his first two years with Detroit, then will make $24 million annually in the final seven seasons of his $214 million, nine-year contract, according the Associated Press. His contract also includes loads of incentives:

$500,000 if he's the AL MVP, $200,000 if he's second through fifth ,$100,000 if he's sixth through 10th.

$1 million for each MVP

$100,000 if he's an All-Star starter, $50,000 if he's a reserve,

$100,000 if he's a Baseball America or Sporting News postseason All-Star.

$100,000 for a Gold Glove,

$100,000 for a Silver Slugger,

$100,000 for the Hank Aaron Award

$150,000 for league championship series MVP

$200,000 for World Series MVP

Glad the weekend is over. Now its Super Bowl time. I know there are a lot of Patriot fans on this website. But, I'm proud, I’ll admit it, I am a Giant fan. There, I said it.

Go G-Men!!

Okay, my Giants are in the Super Bowl and I have to make a prediction. I think the Giants will beat New England, 28-24. The G-Men will have multiple weapons to choice from, while the Patriots will rely on a passing game that might not get them too far. I do expect it to be a high scoring game.

Did anyone watch the winter x-games. I didn’t think so.

Here’s a Tebow tibit that went under the radar:

On January 18, 2012, Tim Tebow shared a hotel with one of the world’s largest porn conventions while in Las Vegas. He was in the Hard Rock Hotel just outside Las Vegas when this occurred. The Adult Video News (AVN) awards were being held at the Hard Rock. Rumor has it that Tebow spent most of the time in his penthouse suite.

Some parts of this were taken from Fox Sports.

This is the only feel-good story this Super Bowl weekend. It’s about New York Giants LB Mark Herzlich who fought cancer and won.

The 24-year-old tweeted the following when he debarked from the Giants airplane after it landed in Indianapolis:

“2 yrs ago I was told I might never walk again. Just WALKED off plane in Indy to play in The #SuperBowl. #TakeThatSh*tCancer.”

He had Ewing’s sarcoma, a rare bone cancer. The cancer surrounded his entire left femur. If it had spread there would have been a 10 percent survival rate. The doctor at the time said football was over. During chemotherapy Herzlich lifted weights, did cardio and kept himself in shape. When it was time to operate and remove the femur, he said no.

“I had the chemo for two months and then I was supposed to have surgery to remove my femur and take out above and below where the tumor was,” he said. “That’s where — I don’t have a percentage but most people do that. I decided that would give me zero shot at ever playing again, so I wanted to go with the — I wouldn’t say more risky because there’s no data, but the path less traveled — and went with radiation, which is not usually done."

“And I’ve had three or four doctors I saw who said they would absolutely not do radiation on me and not put a rod through my femur because the cancer would spread and I would die within six months,” he said. “I had to trust my doctors and go with my gut. I knew in order to actually be the person I wanted to be again I had to be able to do things like run around and play with my kids in the backyard or play football.”

He a chance and survived.

Til Next time

The end of an era?? A ref gets my nod?? Braun tells it like it is?? Fielder not on a team?? Giants, 49ers and more in this edition of Random Thoughts.

Did you expect to see a women every week??

 College football lost one of the greatest coaches of all-time with the passing of Joe Paterno, the longtime Penn State coach who won more games than anyone in major college football but was fired amid a child sex abuse scandal that scarred his reputation for winning with integrity, died Sunday. He was 85.

His family released a statement Sunday morning to announce his death: "His loss leaves a void in our lives that will never be filled. He died as he lived. He fought hard until the end, stayed positive, thought only of others and constantly reminded everyone of how blessed his life had been. His ambitions were far reaching, but he never believed he had to leave this Happy Valley to achieve them. He was a man devoted to his family, his university, his players and his community."

Paterno built his program on the credo "Success with Honor," and he found both. The man known as "JoePa" won 409 games and took the Nittany Lions to 37 bowl games, winning 24, and two national championships. More than 250 of the players he coached went on to the NFL.

He never mention testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug, but National League MVP, Ryan Braun, in a public appearance, to accept his award told a packed room that "everything I have done in my career has been done with respect and appreciation for the game of baseball. You know, sometimes in life, we all deal with challenges we never expected to endure. We have an opportunity to look at those challenges and view them either as obstacles or as opportunities, and I've chosen to view every challenge I've ever faced as an opportunity and this will be no different. I have always believed that a person's character is revealed through the way they deal with those moments of adversity."

Ryan had a stellar season, won the NL MVP in his fifth season, batting .332 with 32 home runs and 111 RBIs, 109 runs scored and 33 stolen bases. He also led the league in slugging percentage (.597).

In a story by ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” Braun tested positive for an elevated level of testosterone in a urine test taken in October. But there are conflicting reports about what caused the positive result, and the New York Times quoted a source as saying a later test showed Braun to have normal testosterone levels.

Before Saturday night, Braun had not spoken publicly about the failed test, but a spokesman for Braun confirmed the result and issued the following statement: "There are highly unusual circumstances surrounding this case which will support Ryan's complete innocence and demonstrate there was absolutely no intentional violation of the program. While Ryan has impeccable character and no previous history, unfortunately, because of the process we have to maintain confidentiality and are not able to discuss it any further, but we are confident he will ultimately be exonerated."

Braun is appealing the result but faces a 50-game suspension at the start of the 2012 season under Major League Baseball's drug policy if the test is upheld. According to The Associated Press, Braun's appeal began on Thursday before MLB arbitrator Shyam Das. If it is unsuccessful, Braun would not be eligible to play again until May 31 and would miss the first 57 days of the regular season, resulting in a loss of approximately $1.87 million of his $6 million salary.

Ironically, MLB commissioner Bud Selig has, on more than one occasion, cited Braun as a clean player and an example of the effectiveness of baseball's drug-testing policy. Braun said he had never been tempted to try them.

"I would never do it,'' he said in an interview with MLB.com, "because if I took steroids, I would hit 60 or 70 home runs."

I guess we can say, to be continued….

Probably the best two Championship games in NFL history happened this past Sunday.

New England Patriots beat the Baltimore Ravens 23-20. Goat was Billy Cundiff, who missed a field goal to tie the game. Or was he? With 23 seconds left in the game, Lee Evans had a potential game-winning catch in his hands, but was stripped by Sterling Moore with 23 seconds left in the game.

Here is the catch that wasn’t for the Ravens:

Here is the missed field goal:

In an old school NFL classic, the New York Giants beat the San Francisco 49ers in over-time 20-17. The goat in this game was Kyle Williams who fumbled which was recovered by Devin Thomas inside the 30 yard line and the Giants recovered. The G-Men ran a couple of plays and then kicked the game-winning field goal to send them to the Super Bowl.

Here is the Fumble:

For the record:

Let's get off the fuck Billy Cundiff bandwagon. Sure he missed a field goal to TIE the game.

It was Lee Evans who cost the Ravens a chance for the Super Bowl when he caught a pass in the end zone just to have it knocked out of his hands. Did anyone remember that?? It happened 22 seconds before the missed field goal to TIE the game where Evans catch would have WON the game

What went unnoticed during the 49ers/Giants game was the way referee Ed Hochuli handled the game. Sure there was several calls that were questionable like Vernon Davis foot on the line and Ahmad Bradshaw’s forward progress, but what he did was call the game with authority. He also kept football fans informed with what happened and why the call was made on replay calls. Well done ref!!

Does Prince Fielder have bad breath, or body odor?? Why hasn’t anyone signed him by now?? He is in his prime, at 28 years of age (in May), .282 average, 230 homeruns, 656 RBI’s.

Just as I was typing the above, when this came in….

Prince signs a 9 year deal worth $214 million. WOW. I guess this makes the Tigers the favorites to win the World Series.

Is there a misprint in the sport section of my newspaper, The Florida-Times Union? Seem to me it says the Philadelphia 76ers are 11-5 and the Boston Celtics are 7-9. It that true?

Til Next Time

Scott

According to CBS Sports, and several other sports outlets I'm not going to look up because I'm lazy (The only reason I'm even mentioning CBS Sports is because they sent me the email alert -- so they get the props.), the Tigers have agreed to terms with free agent 1B Prince Fielder for a contract reportedly worth $214M over 9 years. (Detroit restaurant owners collectively are pleased with this development.)

I don't know how much truth is in the amount of money and/or years, or if Fielder even signed with Detroit at all -- after all, CBS did report that JoePa was dead when he wasn't dead -- but since other news sources are talking about it and it's all over the place on Twitter, it must be true. (And about Twitter: Does everyone really have to tweet every fucking thing at the same time? My God, there's no need for 15 updates at one time on one news event people. It's okay if all of you don't re-tweet everything that happens during the day.)

Congrats to the Tigers and to our resident Detroit membership here at The Gab -- The Brothers Patton and Stormin' Norman -- for landing the second biggest fish in the pond (Metaphorically speaking, anyway. If we're being literal, then you got the biggest fucker out there. Congrats.)

I'm glad that Fielder is going to a team not named the Yankees or Red Sox (not that they need him anyway) and the Braves fan in me is glad that he's not going to the Natinals. The NL East is going to be tough enough as it is, so we don't need the Natinals to have one more player that gets them closer to contention.

In all seriousness, this is a great move for Detroit so long as they can figure out a way to have both Fielder and Cabrera on the field at the same time. My theory is that they will probably just move Cabrera back to 3B, which will work out great in balancing out the weight transfer on the field from the added poundage that Fielder is going to bring to the right side of the infield. 

Really though, this move does make sense for Detroit, who were struggling to find a sufficient replacement in the offense for Victor Martinez who is slated to miss most of -- if not all of -- the 2012 season after suffering a torn ACL while working out in preparation for Spring Training. The Tigers not only replaced V-Mart, but they got someone who's much better than what they had. Good for them. My prediction is that this signing will help the Tigers continue their domination of the AL Central division, and will give them an upper hand in representing the AL in the World Series over the next 5 years, until Prince gains about 100 lbs. and can't do anything but swing the bat at fastballs anymore.

If it comes out that this signing was indeed a hoax, I'll retract this report after I say about fifteen Fuck CBS's and mutter something about why the hell I wasted my time with this story in the first place, but until then it appears that Detroit needs to double up their food supply before big boy makes it into town.