my people we don't know defeat we crush the strong and
percolate the weak daily (everyday) we make our moves to
improve our groove because we love to rule where we
lay yo!..(Yo!) work and play we started at the bottom and
now we're leading the way and yea!..(yea!) I'm havin a fit kickin it
at the top because I'm too legit to quit…sang!…

Man, I've missed a lot of shit. Not as much as Hammer, but an intimidating amount. But hell, let's go back and hit a bunch of it anyway. In no particular order:

D'Angelo Jimenez to the Rangers
The Texas Rangers have signed D'Angelo Jimenez to a minor-league contract with an invitation to spring training. So I guess the Pirates aren't getting him after all.

I'm not usually one of the people harping on Dan O'Brien for not selling players at their peak. If you always get rid of everyone who's good now to gamble on people who might be good in the future, the future never comes. But in the case of D'Lo….damn.

Reds Offer Aurilia Arbitration
The Reds bought themselves some more time to negotiate with Rich Aurilia by offering him arbitration. JD links to Ken Rosenthal saying that the Reds offered arbitration on the condition that he would decline. The rationale here being that the Reds would expect someone else to sign him and then receive a draft pick in return.

That doesn't make sense to me. I can understand the Reds offering arbitration with the expectation that Aurilia would decline, but on the condition that he would and not continue negotiating? Why would Aurilia agree to that? He gets no benefit.

Also, manager Jerry Narron's in love with Aurilia. If he has anything to say about it, Aurilia will be a Red in 2006. I wouldn't hate it either.

Griffey Will Wear #3 Next Season
Yay.

The Need for Speed
Joel wrote a genuinely funny fake news story about Tony Womack's cinematic inspiration. I highly recommend it.

It's What's on the Inside That Counts
I don't know if it's just how it displays on my Mac or whether Shawn's blog really is oddly formatted, but he always does have some very interesting things to say if you know to scroll down far enough to read them. This time, he's talking about what he learned from The Hardball Times Annual. A lot of the conclusions he's sharing are sort of unexpected.

Still Bored?
Bellyscratcher is playing Scrabble.

Jacob Cruz Returning to Reds Organization
Jacob Cruz was giving the impression that he wasn't going to come back to the Reds without a major league contract, but backed down at the last minute and signed a minor league contract.

I don't think that the Reds have gotten the credit they deserve for correctly handling this situation. It's not a huge deal, I guess, but they've made smaller bad decisions that people have jumped all over them for. They were prepared to let one hell of a guy walk away, with genuine regret it seemed, but prepared nonetheless. And it all worked out OK in the end.

Randy Keisler Released
You kinda think maybe he'll be back anyway?

Red Hot Mama Mentioned on the Wastecast
Funnyball was promoted on the most recent Dro Kulix's Wastecast. Sure, it was pretty much a postscript, but he's pretty cool, so I'm lucky to be there at all. He's so cool, in fact, that he thinks inexplicable things, like that Mink Car sucked.

Casey Wears His Heart on his Tongue
If you haven't been over to Marc's blog to read the soliloquy from Sean Casey about how he felt about Cincinnati and leaving it, I think it's worth a look. I cried.

Felipe Lopez is Real Boring
Shadows of Anthony Castrovince, former MLB writer for The Official Reds Site and current MLB writer for The Official Indians Site, remain on the Reds site in the form of an interview with Felipe Lopez. It's a snooze-fest. Check it out.

Speaking of MLB writers, I'm very excited to say that Mark Sheldon, our new MLB writer at the official site, says that someone mentioned my blog to him before I sent a link-whoring email message. It was probably just Castrovince, and probably in the context of “watch out for that link-whoring, Bat-Girl wannabe,” but I'll take it!

'Cause it makes me legit, right?

PITTSBURGH, PA -- After trading for Cincinnati Reds' first baseman Sean Casey and courting former Red Joe Randa, Pirates' general manager Dave Littlefield revealed plans today to sign the entire Cincinnati 2005 opening day infield.

“Don't you remember the Reds' opening series last year?” Littlefield responded when asked about his plan. “I want to bring that kind of excitement to the great city of Pittsburgh.”

Littlefield and Reds' general manager Dan O'Brien are in talks to trade Reds' catcher Jason LaRue for the Pirates' shortstop, Jack Wilson.

“I'm hoping this move will make the Womack trade look better by comparison,” explained O'Brien. “Besides, we can't go into spring training without someone to start ahead of [Felipe] Lopez.”

Negotiations with shortstop Rich Aurilia are moving quickly. “I want to play every day,” said Aurilia. “I haven't displaced a younger, faster, better shortstop in almost a year now, and I'm getting kind of anxious.”

Casey described Littlefield's plan as “awesome,” though rumor has it that he is holding up talks with second baseman D'Angelo Jimenez.

“He's just mean,” said Casey.

Littlefield says he has a backup plan in case he cannot come to an agreement with Jimenez.

“Barry Larkin's still in good shape, right?” said Littlefield.

If Littlefield can succeed in his goal of emulating the 2005 Reds, he may well pull off the most exciting start to a Pirate's season in recent memory. Of course, the wide-eyed enthusiasm will fizzle immediately after the first series, leaving the fan base completely dejected by the middle of June and finishing the season in fifth place in the division.

“But that's one place higher than we ended last year,” said Littlefield. “A step in the right direction.”

HOLLYWOOD, CA -- Colorado Rockies' reliever Ray King made his silver screen debut today with the release of the much anticipated remake of King Kong.

King, who plays the title simian, says he can identify with the beast. “In some ways, I'm like King Kong,” said King. “People say I'm too big, or that I'm too dangerous. It's true that I'm strong and powerful, but really I'm just a big softy.”

King joins such baseball players as Drake Hogestyn (Days of Our Lives) in making the switch to acting. King said it was a natural transition.

“All those extras in the street yelling and jeering at me when I was up on the building,” explained King. “It was just like being on the mound.”

King Kong is expected to gross King's 2005 salary of $1,850,000 in about 15 minutes, and promises to pave the way for future cross-media opportunities for other athletes.

In related news, the Cincinnati Reds' Adam Dunn has just signed a lucrative deal with Nintendo to re-release one of their most popular and recognizable titles. Donkey Kong: Get Dunn-ky is expected in stores for Christmas 2006.

Now, I'm not the biggest Dunn fan in the world. I'm pretty much bored by home runs, and I've always been mystified when women say he's good looking.

However, in preparation for a fake news story that I'm hoping will drop this very night, I spent a couple hours today looking through a whole lot of pictures of Mr. Dunn, some of them quite old, and I'll be damned if he didn't used to be hot back in the day.

Dunn fanciers of the world, I stand corrected.

For the sake of his game, for the sake of his health, for the sake of beauty and art and poetry, somebody please get this guy a haircut, a shave, and a serious stint on The Program that worked out so well for Kearnsy last season.

It's just too much of a waste that this is what we're missing out on.

Over at Red Reporter, JD has decreed that there are no adequate sports blogging awards and has taken it upon himself to set up a sports blog contest. He's requesting nominations to current categories, as well as additional categories in which to award prizes.

Red Hot Mama, of course, hasn't got a chance in any of the current categories. I almost suggested a category for Best Blog Written By A Woman Who Doesn't Necessarily Know Much About The Sport But Who Occasionally Writes Some Decent Fake News, but then I realized that Joel would just end up beating me. Again. So I let it slide.

Though the weary Reds fans travelled long and far, following the shining wishbone C glinting on the horizon, alas, there is no room at the inn for Reds merchandise. Fans of Cincinnati baseball must take shelter in the stables, for our team's marketing bites hard.

Target has 9″ figurines of Mark McGwire and Cal Ripkin, Jr. (which have been hanging on the same rack in the back of the toy aisle for at least a year). The Hallmark store is sold out of Albert Pujols Christmas tree ornaments. The calendar kiosk in the mall features calendars of the Cubs, Cardinals, Red Sox, Yankees, and one devoted entirely to Derek Jeter. The sporting goods store is drenched in Colts blue without so much as a drop of Cincinnati Red. The airbrushed shirt stand was overflowing with “Tampa Bay Will Have It's Day!” t-shirts.

OK, I made that last one up, but the rest are real. Here in east-central Indiana, where Cincinnati is but a mere 2 1/2 hour jaunt compared to the 5 hours to Chicago or St. Louis, I visited countless stores in three different malls, plus several department stores and saw exactly one piece of Reds merchandise.

The single, solitary piece of Reds merchandise that I saw in all of my travels was at the kiosk with the giant tins of popcorn. Team logos screamed to passers by at eye-level from the tins stacked high in the middle of the floor, but the one displaying Mr. Baseball, less than half the size of the others, was crammed out-of-the-way and out-of-reach on the roof of the kiosk, as if the proprietor hadn't actually meant to bring it with him to the mall and was just looking for a place to stick it until he could find an appropriately cruddy dumpster to deposit it in.

Complain about Dan O'Brien if you like. Say that the ownership has fostered a cheapskate culture where pinching pennies is more important than winning. Bitch about the players, the dedication, the conditioning. All of these concerns are legitimate to some degree.

But when you can't even buy your kid a Ken Griffey, Jr. action figure with kung fu grip, well, that's just blasphemy.

CINCINNATI, OH -- Reds center fielder Ken Griffey, Jr. announced today that he will no longer wear number 30 for the Cincinnati Reds.

Instead, Griffey's 2006 jersey will bear the number three. Three is the number of children Griffey has, as well as the number all of his children wear on their own jerseys.

“My children are the most important thing in my life,” said Griffey. “I want to recognize them in any way that I can.”

Griffey had chosen the number 30 when he arrived in Cincinnati to honor his father, who had also worn that number with the Reds. “I had hoped to continue that tradition,” Griffey said. “I wanted to recognize three generations of Griffeys with one number. But Melissa says she's not up for 27 more.”

Teammate Adam Dunn was inspired by Griffey's gesture, and expressed an interest in also displaying his number of children on his chest.

“I guess I'd better get started,” said Dunn, eyeing his 44.

Marc (and surely about everyone else in the world by now) says:

DALLAS -- Officially, the Reds have acquired Tony Womack from the Yankees for minor leaguers Kevin Howard and Ben Himes. The Reds will also get $900,000 from New York, which will take out a good chunk of the $2 million due to Womack in 2006.

Readers of Red Hot Mama know that I have not been a baseball fan very long, and I don't make a secret of the fact that I don't know much. There are many things about this sport that I don't understand.

This signing is one of them.

OK, after almost 24 hours, I'm finally in a place where I can talk about this. I'm very sensitive, you know.

As you've probably heard by now, the deal to send Reds' first baseman Sean Casey to the Pittsburgh Pirates in exchange for 26-year old left-handed starter Dave Williams is all but complete. In completing this trade, the Pirates bring a home-town boy in to help out at first and the Reds do a little something to improve their woeful rotation.

Losing Casey stings just about all Reds fans, regardless of whether they admit it. It's not that losing him will be a huge hit to the offense: ironically, our first baseman was one of the light power hitters in this line-up. In fact, he provided so few of the fireworks that it seems like sort of a strange move for the Reds who didn't deal from their strength. Plus, if the Reds don't make any further moves and just replace Casey with Wily Mo Peña, they're definitely downgrading the defense, at least in the short term. Not only that, but Casey is the leadership of this team and the shining face of the organization.

On the other hand, perhaps this team could use a change in leadership. They haven't exactly been on fire these last few years. And the buddy-buddy culture of the Reds' clubhouse, which might explain why so much losing has been acceptable for so long, can almost certainly be traced back to the amiable Mr. Casey. Perhaps an opportunity for him to play the role of “new talent” instead of “voice of experience” will be a good thing for everyone involved.

The more I think about it, the less I mourn the end of an era and the more I look forward to the next one: who will step up for the Reds now? Will Casey bounce back before the friendly faces of his home town? For what it's worth, I think he will. Plus, it'll give us all a reason to go to those games when the Reds host the Pirates, (above and beyond the cynicism that says they're the only games the Reds can win).

I think the one person for whom you can't explain all this away and make it better will be “Ben,” the little brother that Casey talks about having adopted with his wife, Mandi, through the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program.

From what I've seen in Internet Redsland, people are not super-psyched about Mr. Dave Williams, whom we'll see in return. But I think that's because he's average. And though Casey has also been average lately, he doesn't feel average. He feels special. Ideally, the Reds would have gotten some big name in exchange for Casey, but that just isn't realistic. At least we can be happy to know that they've dumped some payroll and somewhat improved the starting pitching. I mean, he can't be as bad as what we had last year, can he?

Oh crap, now I've jinxed it. Everyone knock on wood in hopes that GABP doesn't suck all the quality out of young Williams like it has out of so many other pitching hopefuls.

One thing that is interesting about Williams is that he contributed 10 of the Pirates 67 wins last season. His ERA away from home is also encouraging. I wonder how Williams lost the games he lost. Was he the victim of a lack of run support? Because the Reds can give him that, should they be so inspired. Or did he hand out one homerun after another? Or even one hit after another? With the defense dropping even further in quality, that could be a pretty big issue.

I could look up the answers to these questions, but instead I think I'll go see if I can convince some Pirates bloggers to come over here and tell me the answers. In the spirit of starting up conversations with strangers. That's what Casey would have wanted.

To wrap up, I hope we see more trades. This one hurts, but it doesn't feel this pain alone will provide all the gain we need. However, a couple more like this, and we may be getting somewhere.

I'll miss Casey, though.