Just for jamiegeist! It's the OAO MLB Off-season thread! Surprisingly, last year's offseason thread got more traffic and replies than last year's in-season thread.

Anyways, to start us off:

AL Rookie of the Year: Evan Longoria
NL Rookie of the Year: Geovany Soto

Matt "Hammerhands" Holliday is reportedly heading to Oakland for a one-year appearance.

...and Nate McLouth won a Gold Glove!

NL Cy Young goes to Tim Lincecum.

Man, is that a bad name. Also, LA is dealing with somewhere around 19 Free Agents. That's insane.

Ergh, Twins lose Pat Neshek for next year with Tommy John Surgery...fuck.

One bonus to Tommy John surgery is that, oftentimes, they come back throwing harder than before.

NL Manager of the year: Lou Piniella
Seems like a bad pick, in retrospect. But votes were taken before the playoffs and you can't deny that the Cubs had a pretty darn good regular season.

AL Manager of the year: Joe Maddon
No surprise or controversy here. He had the thing won by the All-Star break.

The Orioles have somewhat new uniforms. They now have "Baltimore" written across the front of their roadies.

Hrmmm.. Did not know that they were running road uni's with the city name. They've probably had "Baltimore"on thier jerseys in the past, right? Traditionally, that's usually been the way to do it: home uni's have the team name, road uni's have the city name.

Oh, and to the surprise on one person in Missouri, Cliff Lee wins the Cy Young. Going 22-3 will do that to a guy.

Also, the Yankees seemed convinved that CC Sabbathia is their newest savior and are going after him. After the way CC pitched for Milwaukee last year, it's hard to argue that. CC definitely pulled his weight for the Brew Crew. Considering CC's size, that' saying a lot.

Oh yeah, they've had Baltimore on the road uni's in the past, but "Orioles" were on the road uniforms during the Angelos reign of terror.

Dustin Pedroia AL MVP.


Seriously?

About two months ago, I was looking to replace my VISA card and signed up for MLB's Colorado Rockies "Extra Bases" card. Instead of the usual beach towel or duffle bag, they mailed me an autographed mini-helmet of Matt Holliday. Finally arrived, yesterday...about a month after Holliday had been sent to the Oakland A's.

Still glad to get it, because of all the Rockies over the past 4 years, his autograph has been impossible to get. He never signs at games and is only at store signings...where he charges $125 for his autograph. He's a Scott Boras client, so there ya' go. I still have the ball from the third homerun he ever hit. I took it to countless games, hoping to get him to sign it, but no luck.

Anyways, got some spam for World Baseball Classic tickets. They're offering travel packages. The games that really intrigues me are the first round match-ups in Toronto on March 7-11. I don't really give a shit about the games themselves, but it'd be cool to visit Toronto for a few days, see ONE game, and see if they have any special events around the city.

They're at least trying to make it somewhat important, this time around. Last time, MLB players approached it with all the importance of the Pro Bowl. Guys didn't give a shit, some didn't want to fly across country, and other general laziness.

Francisco "K-Rod" Rodriguez signs with the Mets and says: "we're the team to beat". That's 100% accurate. They usually do get beat.

No closer is worth what he's paid. And really, the save is the most overrated stat in baseball and his record was really contrived last year. He was a very protected pitcher and I think the Mets aren't smart enough to use him to his full effectiveness.

Randy Johnson, 45, needs five victories to reach 300. So he signs with the Giants.

Gazing into the future; from the Dec 2009 Newswire:
Randy Johnson, 46, needs two victories to reach 300. So he signs with the Rangers.

The Reds signed Taveras and that disgusts me they'd sign a guy to be a lead off hitter that can't get on base. They should've learned more from the failed Patterson experiment.

Saw that the new "MLB Network" premiered, last week. For the past few months I didn't bother getting excited about it, because I figured Comcast would add it as part of their ridiculous "Digital Sports Tier" for an additional premium.Like NFL Network and NBA TV. But...I'll be go to South Philly... it's part of REGULAR CABLE!!

They repeat almost all of their programming, but that's fine. I'd rather they run daily repeats than 8 hours of infomercials over the nighttime hours. Ken Burns' 185 part "Baseball" series is on there.

I was pretty sure I was not going to subscribe to MLB Extra Innings this year, so this kinda' confirms my decision. Unless the Pirates are in first place at the All-Star break...then I'm re-upping with Extra Innings for the pennant stretch. Riiiiiiight.

Orioles signed Mark Hendrickson, and got a pitcher from Japan. Let's hope he doesn't turn into another Hideki Irabu, or flame out like Kaz Ishii, or whoever that one guy the Dodgers signed years ago.

The next non-gimmicked Minor League game I go to will be the FIRST....

Strangely enough...Randal Simon has been invited to training camp by the Brewers. Running Sausages beware!

Saw that Ken Griffey's new contract with the Mariners includes incentives based on fan attendance. Kinda' interesting... I don't know how common that is.

And is it too early to re-christen MLB Network the "Harold Reynolds Channel"? Guy gives his random useless thoughts on ANY subject.