With Junior Griffey’s retirement midway through the 2010 season, we are left with an interesting question: if baseball ended today, who would be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame?  I’d like to ignore the steroids issue for this conversation and simply try to see which players have had Hall of Fame careers up until today.  I realize this is a little pie-in-the-sky because the steroids issue has been the issue in baseball over the past couple of years, but maybe you can humor me for a few minutes.

So when it comes down to it, who has had a Hall of Fame career so far?  I don’t mean players who are on there way to Hall of Fame careers, I mean guys who could finish playing baseball today and eventually be inducted in Cooperstown.  I checked out a couple of the basic statistics that so many baseball writers use to build the foundation of their votes and I’ve come up with a list of eleven guarantees:

Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Ivan Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, Jim Thome, Omar Vizquel, Vladimir Guerrero, Manny Ramirez, Ichiro Suzuki, Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman.

Three other players just missed my list: Andy Pettitte, Chipper Jones and Jamie Moyer.

I think Moyer will miss out because his statistics are simply based on longevity, which hasn’t worked out yet for Bert Blyleven so why should it work for Moyer?

Pettitte is an interesting figure, as his career record is currently 240-137 and no pitcher who is 100-games over .500 in his career is sitting outside of Cooperstown.  Pettitte also owns the record for the most career postseason wins and that has to count for something.

Jones could potentially have made the list of 11 a list of 12, but injuries have really hurt the latter years of his career and he is still well short of two major Hall of Fame barometers (he’s currently 510 hits short of 3,000 and 64 home runs shy of 500).

The one thing that surprised me right away is that there were no starting pitchers on the list of 11 and the only relief pitchers are arguably the greatest closers of all time.  Again, this is not a list of people I think will make the Hall of Fame when their careers are eventually over; it’s who could make it if their careers ended today.  Things are looking good for C.C. Sabathia, Ryan Howard and Joe Mauer.  Heck, even Johnny Damon might reach 3,000 hits and begin the conversation of whether he is the worst player ever to reach that milestone.  Roy Halladay, Adam Wainwright and Tim Lincecum might get their call one day too.  But as of right now, we’re left with only ten players who could expect to hear their names called at Cooperstown if baseball ended today.

Theoretically Bud Light could become the Official Beer of Fantasy Football by ESPN.com or even NFL.com, both big players in the fantasy football universe.

What’s next, Coors Light becoming the Official Beer of Checking Your Fantasy Team Constantly on Sundays?

**UPDATE** Miller Lite is apparently also a proud sponsor of Fantasy Draft Week on ESPN.com

Before I go any further, I must state that I am a Cablevision customer.  I’ve tried a number of times to switch to a phone company offering (my only option is AT&T’s UVerse) but because of a lack of certain sports channels and the higher cost, I’ve stuck with Cablevision.  I’ve been a subscriber for almost three years and have had a difficult time finding good things to say about the company.

I used to get cable television (with DVR) and high-speed internet for $143.50 per month.  I don’t have access to my bills back that far, so unfortunately I can’t break down the specific costs.  However, I received a phone call one day to try to sell me their Triple Play package (I would simply have to add phone service) and my bill would be cut dramatically.  With no need for a phone line, I was hesitant, but if it lowered my bill why wouldn’t I do it?  So I did.  And how much did I save per month?  $11.64.  That’s almost $140 per year of savings, so I was pretty happy.  I won’t get into the fact that the phone number they assigned me was already assigned to a massage and nail salon close to where I live and now I get calls all the time to set up appointments…

What really bothers me about the entire Cablevision anti-FiOS campaign is how much they slam them for having “up to $20 in taxes and fees on top of it.”

Here is how my monthly bill breaks down:

So let’s see here. $39.95 for cable + $9.95 for DVR + $29.95 for internet access + $29.95 for phone service = $109.80. That leaves me with $22.06 in taxes and fees, even though they seem to list only $6.66 for that figure, as if “Additional Outlet” and charging me for my cable boxes and remotes are not fees.  So looking at this, I should be saving a few dollars in taxes and fees if I switch to the phone company.

Cablevision has me locked in because they are cheaper than the phone company and they have one channel that AT&T UVerse cannot offer me where I live; but enough with the implications that they are fee and tax free.

So, since my previous strategies clearly have not worked, I figured I would just make all of my picks now, halfway through the preseason.  I will also make picks throughout the season and if my preseason choices are better than my in-season picks, then I’ll do preseason choices from now on.

Without further ado…

Week 1: Tennessee Titans at home vs. Oakland Raiders

Week 2: Carolina Panthers at home vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Week 3: New England Patriots at home vs. Buffalo Bills

Week 4: Green Bay Packers at home vs. Detroit Lions

Week 5: Baltimore Ravens at home vs. Denver Broncos

Week 6: Pittsburgh Steelers at home vs. Cleveland Browns

Week 7: New Orleans Saints at home vs. Cleveland Browns

Week 8: Dallas Cowboys at home vs. Jacksonville Jaguars

Week 9: Minnesota Vikings at home vs. Arizona Cardinals

Week 10: San Francisco 49ers at home vs. St. Louis Rams

Week 11: Cincinnati Bengals at home vs. Buffalo Bills

Week 12: Denver Broncos at home vs. St. Louis Rams

Week 13: San Diego Chargers at home vs. Oakland Raiders

Week 14: Washington Redskins at home vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Week 15: Indianapolis Colts at home vs. Jacksonville Jaguars

Week 16: Miami Dolphins at home vs. Detroit Lions

Week 17: New York Jets at home vs. Buffalo Bills

There you have it.  As you can tell by my picks, I do not have high expectations for the Raiders, Lions, Bills, Browns Jaguars, Rams or Buccaneers.  I’m sure one of these teams will be this year’s sleeper team (there are already a plethora of articles about how the Raiders or Lions will be good this year) and win ten games, but luckily I can always fall back on the “how should I have known? It was still the preseason when I made these picks” argument if these go horribly wrong.

Over six seasons: 16 games, 3,852 passing yards, 26 touchdowns and 13 interceptions

To give you some perspective, Kyle Orton of the Denver Broncos threw for 3,802 yards, 21 touchdowns and 12 interceptions during the 2009 season.

Orton wasn’t a bad quarterback last season, but his statistics can hardly be considered elite.  So whose career averages are similar to Orton’s 2009 season after removing his best and worst seasons?

Scroll down to find out…

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That’s right, none other than New England Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady.

And the seasons that were removed:

I didn’t think it would be fair to include his rookie year when he barely played in the regular season and 2008 when he was hurt on the first drive of the season, so technically four seasons were removed.

Either way, it’s something to consider before he becomes one of the richest players in the NFL. I understand he has been incredible over his career, but it’s interesting to think that he is about to become one of the highest paid players in the NFL when the better part of his career is likely behind him. Does anyone realistically believe that he will lead the Patriots to four more Super Bowls over the next six to eight years that he has left? If not, why does he deserve the payday now?

**UPDATE** For those who are curious, Peyton Manning has averaged 4,183 passing yards, 29 touchdowns and 14 interceptions over his career after removing his rookie season in 1998 and his 49 touchdown season in 2004.

Eric Gordon and Stephen Curry also made the final team over Rondo thanks to their ability to shoot the basketball outside of 12 feet, something Rondo is unable to do.  Head coach Mike Krzyzewski commented on how different the international game is from the NBA, which is a standard reason for other players having tough times helping Team USA in the past such as Stephon Marbury and Richard Jefferson.

Look, Rondo is a great NBA player.  But when he can’t make a team as the point guard when Chris Paul, Deron Williams and Jason Kidd are already taking the summer off, don’t we need to start second guessing the wild comments that everyone made when he was “leading” the Celtics in the playoffs (while playing with three future Hall of Famers).

With Rondo quitting the team this year because he wasn’t going to make it anyway, there is no doubt that he will be no where near the team in 2012 when the best players in this country will represent the red, white and blue in the Olympic Games in London.  So again, maybe it’s time to start rethinking the “Rajon Rondo is the best point guard in the NBA” argument.

Yes, I am calling him overrated.

After finishing second in the NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year voting last season (an outrage that I have written about before), Revis is now looking to become the highest paid player at his position, a spot currently held by Nnamdi Asomugha of the Oakland Raiders, who last year signed a three year, $45.3 million contract, which included $28.5 million in guaranteed money.  New York Jets’ head coach Rex Ryan has publicly stated that he thinks Revis deserves to be the highest paid player at his position and thanks to the Asomugha contract, we know what the floor is for such a deal.

The New York Daily News is reporting that the Jets and Revis’ agents are now $40 million away from reaching a deal.  Revis continues to ask for a specific figure of guaranteed money, while the Jets are adamant about agreeing on a total compensation amount before discussing any type of guaranteed payout.  This, unfortunately for Jets fans, is ridiculous.  Guaranteed money is the most important part of the contract for professional football players because of the fact that teams can cut players at any moment with almost no notice.  The Jets have reportedly offered Revis a ten-year, $120 million contract, but with no specifics about guaranteed money.  Revis’ agent explains why this seemingly generous offer is not:

“If the Jets had offered a two-year, $1 billion contract with $1 million this year and $999 million next year, that is not guaranteed. The contract is only worth $1 million.  But it would be reported that Revis was offered a two-year, $1 billion deal.”

Again, guaranteed money is the key here.  With uncertainty about whether the next NFL season will be in 2011 or 2012, many players are trying to lock in as much money as possible as quickly as possible.  While players like Peyton Manning and Tom Brady continue to negotiate for their deals, 2009 NFL sack leader Elvis Dumervil of the Denver Broncos has already inked his extension; and that deal is probably why the Jets are hesitating to lock up Revis.

Dumervil signed a six-year, $63 million extension with the Broncos last month, which included almost $43 million in guaranteed money.  Unfortunately for Dumervil, and possibly more so for the Broncos, Dumervil tore his pectoral muscle in training camp and could potentially miss the entire 2010 season.  Dumervil must be thrilled that he signed his contract in time, but many teams around the League were immediately reminded why giving away tens of millions of dollars of guaranteed money is so risky.

Football is an amazingly dangerous sport that is constantly filled with injuries, which is why players are always looking for their biggest payday right now.  However, it is also the reason why teams are so hesitant to give exorbitant amounts of money to players who could theoretically have career-ending injuries at any moment.  Sure, insurance helps teams pay for some, if not most, of a player’s salary (and maybe bonuses), but ultimately it’s a far greater cost to pay out this guaranteed money and then lose a player to injury.  While this probably isn’t the reason why the Jets are hesitating to give Revis the raise that he, and many others, feels he deserves, it has to be part of the equation.

The story going around now is that the Jets and Revis are $40 million apart on their negotiations, which I would argue is not quite accurate.  The Jets’ offer of ten years and $120 million averages out to $12 million per season, whereas Revis is looking for an amount closer to $16 million; at ten years, that’s $160 million in total, hence the difference of $40 million.  However, Revis has not publicly stated that he wants or needs ten years on his contract; all he is looking for is a boatload of guaranteed money.  If the Jets want to give him a $120 million contract, I’m sure he’d gladly take it as long as it included somewhere around $40 million in guaranteed money.  Instead of saying the team and the player are $40 million off in negotiations, let’s be clear that Revis continues to demand more guaranteed money while the Jets are still talking about total compensation.  I guess it’s not easy to negotiate when you’re not negotiating about the same thing.

The NFL Draft is always a tough time for NFL veterans because they see unproven rookies grab enormous contracts despite never playing a down in the League.  The St. Louis Rams recently gave former Oklahoma Sooner quarterback Sam Bradford $50 million in guaranteed money; now, Darrelle Revis wants his payday and he most certainly thinks he deserves more than Bradford.  Unfortunately for the Jets, two other important players are looking for their own paydays.

Linebacker David Harris and center Nick Mangold are at the end of their contracts and are looking to lock in their own amount of guaranteed money.  Revis has three years left, while the other two have one year each; how do you think they will feel if Revis gets his money before they do?  It could be a very very sticky year for the Jets.

My final point on all of this: Jets fans want the team to just give Revis his money.  When was the last time a player held out and had the full support of the fan base?  This is an incredibly powerful situation that Revis is now in, which is why I think he’ll end up with somewhere around $35 million guaranteed based on a $100+ million contract.  Hopefully it’s before training camp ends…

The first story that caught my eye was about a report called the Capgemini 2010 U.S. Metro Wealth Index which “monitors populations of high net worth individuals within the top ten United States metropolitan statistical areas.”  New York City topped the list with the most high net worth individuals (defined as “those having investable assets of $1 million or more, excluding primary residence, collectibles, consumables, and consumer durables,” or essentially “millionaires”), which wasn’t overly surprising to me.  It is the biggest city in the country and is a world financial marketplace, so seeing New York at the top of the list was expected.  The next nine cities were Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit, Houston and San Jose (for those of you that are surprised about San Jose, you might be even more surprised that it is the tenth largest city in the United States).

Scanning the list, I have no problems with it; it seems about right.  I am not necessarily sure there are any cities that I would think belonged ahead of them, so that’s fine.  But naturally that isn’t the part of the list that surprised me.  It was the number of millionaires that each city has.  I asked a diverse group of friends how many millionaires they thought New York City had.  The highest guess was 250,000, with the lowest around 1,000; the correct figure, according to Capgemini is 667,200.  667,200! That is more than the populations of Boston, Seattle, Baltimore, Denver, Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, Atlanta, Milwaukee, Miami, Cleveland, Oakland, Minneapolis, St. Louis, New Orleans, Tampa, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh.  That’s right, there are more millionaires in New York City than there are people in Boston.

Below are the 2010 figures from Capgemini (in a rather helpful map):

I am not quite sure how to react to all of this.  To think that there are this many people with net assets in excess of $1,000,000 is a somewhat staggering realization.  I mean, I always knew there were lots of rich people in this country, but had no idea there were this many.  And yet when you look at it the other way, these millionaires account for less than 2% of the total population in this country.  So how much does everyone else have?  Obviously much less on an individual level.

Well, those who are less fortunate are surely to be helped shortly by the super rich.  The other wealth story that recently got my attention was news of The Giving Pledge, which is a group of American billionaires who have publicly declared that they will donate at least half of their fortunes to charity when they die.  The Pledge was started by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett (pictured below with rapper Ludacris, which seems just that), who have long championed for rich families to donate more money to charity.  While Gates and Buffett are certainly big names on the list, other donors include Michael Bloomberg, George Lucas, Larry Ellison, Paul Allen, T. Boone Pickens and Ted Turner, to name a few.

Now in all honesty, I am not quite sure what to do with these two bits of information.  On one hand, there are many more millionaires than I ever dreamed of and I still can’t really get a hold of how it’s possible.  However, it does explain why there are so many million dollar apartments.

On the other hand, many of these millionaires are spending their money on apartments instead of pledging half of their fortunes to charity (and let’s be honest here, a million dollars is a fortune to a vast majority of the people in this country).  Not to say that those previously named billionaires are living in two-bedrooms shacks…except maybe Buffett.

So where does this leave us?  I actually have no idea, but I thought it would be interesting news to pass along.

“Isiah Thomas brings unique experience as a Hall of Fame player, coach, executive and owner, and we believe having him as part of our organization will be extremely beneficial to the team’s success,” Madison Square Garden chairman James Dolan and team president Donnie Walsh announced jointly in a statement.

Let’s not confuse ourselves here.  Thomas is a Hall of Fame player, yes.  But to mention his front office positions immediately after the “Hall of Fame” phrase is embarrassing to us all.  Under Thomas, the Knicks wasted away with the largest payroll in the NBA while never winning a single playoff game.  And, oh by the way, he cost his employer $11.6 million after being found guilty of sexual harassment in the workplace.  Despite this, he was able to maintain an amazingly close friendship with James Dolan, the man in charge of Madison Square Garden, Inc., which owns the Knicks, not to mention current Knicks’ president Donnie Walsh, who was hired for the sole purpose of undoing everything that Isiah Thomas had done.

While the team has said that Thomas’ role will be as a consultant, it’s very clear that the role will be expanded as soon as Dolan wants it done.  During the LeBron James courtship last month, Dolan sent Thomas to Ohio to try to get in a last word with James to push for the Knicks before he made his decision.  Not only did Thomas not meet with James, but the latter ended up in Miami.

The biggest issue here is that Knicks fans were moving on.  They had endured one of the worst spells in franchise history (literally known as the “Isiah Years”) but the hiring of Walsh and the cleansing of the roster was something that made the future just a little bit brighter; we were removing ourselves from what Thomas had done.  We could look at Amar’e Stoudemire and Ray Felton and Anthony Randolph and say “yes, we’re getting better.  No more Jerome James, Jamal Crawford, Maurice Taylor.  Goodbye to the memories of Steve Francis, Renaldo Balkman, Jared Jeffries and Mardy Collins.  And a big farewell to the Stephon Marbury days.”  Because we had moved on from the Isiah Thomas era, we could joke about it.  ”Remember how awful Jerome James was and how much we paid him to just sit there and do nothing?  How about the fact that Eddy Curry and Zach Randolph could never play together and yet we had both…which was almost as bad as putting Francis and Marbury together!”  Now, we’re the joke.

Thomas has always been given credit for his ability to evaluate talent.  He knows it when we sees it.  He’s given credit for drafting Damon Stoudemire, Tracy McGrady and Danilo Gallinari (he was apparently sent to Italy to scout the latter for Donnie Walsh).  But let’s not forget his amazing misses such as with Jeffries, Jerome James, Balkman and Collins.  And while he is given credit for drafting Wilson Chandler, who has surprised quite a few people with his basketball skills, we seem to overlook the fact that Thomas used a first round pick, #23 overall, for a player who many believed would not even scratch the second round.  Who was drafted after Chandler?  How about Rudy Fernandez (24), Aaron Brooks (26), Aaron Afflalo (27), Tiago Splitter (28), Carl Landry (31), Glen Big Baby Davis (35), and Marc Gasol (48)?

You know what makes this worse?  Looking at the 2006 NBA Draft when the Knicks got Balkman and Collins.  Here is how this one broke down:

20. Renaldo Balkman
21. Rajon Rondo
22. Marcus Williams
23. Josh Boone
24. Kyle Lowry
25. Shannon Brown
26. Jordan Farmar
27. Sergio Rodriguez
28. Maurice Ager
29. Mardy Collins

and moving on…

42. Daniel Gibson
47. Paul Millsap
49. Leon Powe

So while we give credit to Thomas being able to find talent, he is equally as bad at figuring out when to Draft these players.  It literally hurts too much to start dropping salary figures for the free agents he overspent on, so I will simply leave their names previously mentioned and finish up.

Knicks fans were moving on.  We had something to look forward to with this year’s crop of new players.  Though we didn’t land LeBron James, we got better.  We got the sense that the playoffs weren’t that far off.  No, we don’t have a championship contender, but making the playoffs at this point is a clear sign that we were moving on…and up.  But with the hiring of Isiah Thomas, we will now constantly have the thought in the back of our minds that we could be saddled with the next Eddy Curry or Jerome James or Jared Jeffries at any second.  No matter who it is, if the Knicks bring in any other player we’re going to start thinking “was this Isiah’s idea?”  And that’s not good for fans.

Five different people emailed me or texted me within 20 minutes of the news coming out that Isiah was being rehired by the Knicks.  My immediate response was that it was “a slap in the face to Knicks fans.”  A day later, I realize it’s actually worse than that.  The Knicks, or maybe it’s just Dolan, proved that they still have absolutely no idea what Isiah Thomas did to the very people who support the organization…the people who grew up watching Earl Monroe or Clyde Frazier or Bernard King or Patrick Ewing.  They don’t care what we think or how we feel.  As long as we keep buying tickets and hats and t-shirts and jerseys, they are going to do whatever they want to do.  And if that means hiring back Isiah Thomas, so be it.

The message to the fans: F@#% YOU! – (slap)

So, when do the Nets move to Brooklyn?

Before yesterday’s moves, my team looked like this:

C: Buster Posey
1B: Adam Dunn
2B: Brandon Phillips
3B: Alex Rodriguez
SS: Hanley Ramirez
OF: Ichiro Suzuki
OF: Matt Holliday
OF: Jason Heyward
Util: Alfonso Soriano
Bench: Johnny Damon
Bench: Matt Wieters

SP: Adam Wainwright
SP: Ubaldo Jimenez
SP: Mat Latos
RP: Leo Nunez
RP: Kevin Gregg
P: Juan Gutierrez
P: Chad Qualls
P: R.A. Dickey
Bench: Ted Lilly
Bench: Barry Zito
Bench: Joe Blanton

A quick side note: I traded Stephen Drew, Francisco Liriano and Cole Hamels for Hanley Ramirez and Ted Lilly on May 16th and then Phil Hughes for Kevin Gregg on July 30th.

Yesterday was the beginning of the roster overhaul. Here’s how it broke down:

- Dropped Juan Gutierrez for Aaron Heilman after the former was placed on the disabled list.

- Dropped Chad Qualls for Hong-Chih Kuo

- Dropped Hong-Chih Kuo for J.A. Happ (Happ was available because he’s been hurt for so long)

- Dropped Joe Blanton for Carlos Zambrano (he’s returning to the starters role and I thought he might be worth the risk due to his high strikeout rate this year)

- Dropped Johnny Damon for Mike Lowell (another injured player who was still available, but should be getting some playing time thanks to the injury to Kevin Youkilis)

But then the real action started.  While I was making these moves, I was presented with the following trade proposal:

Derrek Lee and Tim Lincecum for Alex Rodriguez and Adam Dunn

While the guy in my league wouldn’t know this, I absolutely hate Derrek Lee in fantasy baseball.  I’ve had him once before and he just ruined my team, plus I always feel that his owners always think he is better than he is.  Look, I know he hit .335 with 46 HRs and 107 RBI in 2005 and I also know he’ll never do it again.  No thanks.

I countered with Alfonso Soriano for Tim Lincecum hoping that his glut of pitchers would allow him to do this (he also owns Roy Halladay, David Price, C.C. Sabathia and Matt Cain, to name a few).  My offer was firmly rebuffed, as expected.

His counter was an interesting one, offering me Carlos Pena and Tim Lincecum for Alex Rodriguez.  It was a pretty fair offer, but I had no interest in adding Pena’s .212 batting average despite his homerun numbers.  My other problem at this point was that if I traded Rodriguez (who hit his 600th career homerun as we were negotiating), I would be empty at third base, clearly not an ideal position.  It was at this time that I tried to see if Evan Longoria might be available.

I emailed the guy who had Longoria and asked him if he’d be interested in one of my pitchers, assuming he’d be most interested in Ubaldo Jimenez or Adam Wainwright.  While he’s been awesome this year, I was hoping that Jimenez would be the one he liked more, but alas, he wanted Wainwright.

While I thought it might come down to it, I wasn’t thrilled about trading Wainwright for Longoria.  The former was the #4 ranked player overall in our league and while I don’t really like to rely on rankings, it’s a tough thing to ignore when it’s a top-five player.  Luckily for me, my potential trading partner hinted that he might be interested in a combination of Mat Latos and a hitter for Longoria; now we’re getting closer.

I offered up Latos and either Heyward or Holliday, neither of which I really wanted to trade, but might be willing to give up for Longoria.  I naturally preferred to give up Heyward, he wanted Holliday, which I eventually balked at.  However, he decided to roll with the young guys and agreed to trade me Longoria for Latos and Heyward.

Separately, I was IMing with another guy in our league who was talking about how Jacoby Ellsbury was returning soon but that he was so frustrated with his injuries that he wanted him gone.  I offered him Barry Zito and the deal was accepted.  Just like that.  It couldn’t have been easier and I think it was a good move for both of us (which is my way of saying that it will help my team and I don’t care what happens to his team).

Back to the A-Rod deal.  Our negotiations kept going back and forth, with me looking for a closer in addition to Lincecum.  While I like Lincecum a lot, I didn’t think trading him straight up for Rodriguez was a good deal; luckily, my trading partner felt the same.  I told him I was looking for a closer and he offered me either Carlos Marmol, Huston Street or Bobby Jenks; I jumped at Marmol and proposed Marmol and Lincecum for Rodriguez.  At that point, we were close, but not quite there.

“How about adding Wieters?” he asked.  With Buster Posey playing most days and filling my catcher position, I was more than willing to give Wieters up.  And with that, we had agreed to exchange Alex Rodriguez and Matt Wieters for Tim Lincecum and Carlos Marmol.

With the other moves I made earlier in the day, my team now looks dramatically different than it did a few days ago:

C: Buster Posey
1B: Adam Dunn
2B: Brandon Phillips
3B: Evan Longoria (previously Alex Rodriguez)
SS: Hanley Ramirez
OF: Matt Holliday
OF: Ichiro Suzuki
OF: Jacoby Ellsbury (previously Jason Heyward)
UTIL: Alfonso Soriano
Bench: Mike Lowell (previously Johnny Damon)
Bench: Open (previously Matt Wieters)

SP: Adam Wainwright
SP: Ubaldo Jimenez
SP: Tim Lincecum (previously Mat Latos)
RP: Leo Nunez
RP: Kevin Gregg
P: Aaron Heilman (previously Juan Gutierrez)
P: Carlos Marmol (previously Chad Qualls)
P: R.A. Dickey
Bench: Ted Lilly
Bench: J.A Happ (previously Barry Zito)
Bench: Carlos Zambrano (previously Joe Blanton)

Will it win me a championship?  I sure hope so.  A pitching staff anchored by Wainwright, Jimenez and Lincecum seems liks it should be solid enough and with three legitimate closers,one more than most teams in the league, I should be able to jump in that category.  If this were a keeper league, obviously the moves would most likely not have happened, but since it’s only a one-year league, it’s much easier to roll the dice.

Things seem to already be moving, as the guy formerly in second place dropped three points last night and combined with my 1.5 point gain, I am not firmly in second place only eight points back of first.