MEANGREENMAN!

Mariners rejected the Yanks offer and the Bombers are walking away. Rangers and Reds are now supposed front runners with the Rangers willing to trade Smoak and the Reds going "all out" to acquire Lee.

The Yankees are very close to a deal for Lee giving up C Jesus Montero, 2B David Adams and another prospect.

The Heat will be great this year until they are bounced in the conference finals when Dwight Howard drops 80 against the center they are paying 6.50 an hour.

Yes, I got too excited about ripping AJ Burnett and Pettitte slipped my mind. The concern I have about Hughes is not playoff experience, but innings limits. The Yanks are going to skip starts for him along the way to try to keep him fresh which could alter his rhythm. Burnett and Vasquez have a 4.75 and 4.81 ERA respectively hardly making them a part of a HUGE advantage. The drive behind my post was that the two teams are comparable. I don't think CJ and Colby are markably worse than Pettitte or Hughes and adding Cliff Lee would make it a winnable series. I love Tommy, but he is really a regular season pitcher. He pounds the zone and doesn't miss enough bats to face a playoff caliber lineup. That being said his curveball is filthy.

What is there not to like about this team? The bullpen is deep, the defense is solid (save third), the lineup stacks up against any in the league, and our starters have pitched well. The thing this team needs is an ace (and maybe a LOOGY). Compare this staff to the Yankees with Lee in the mix. Lee vs sabathia lee is ahead. Colby vs Hughes probably Hughes, but he is still a young pitcher in a playoff atmosphere. CJ vs who? AJ can't get out of the fourth inning Burnett? This team stacks up well and I think Lee makes them legit.

The Rangers cannot stand pat and win the World Series. The division, yes, but not the main prize. Lee puts the Rangers into the picture as legitimate title contenders and we are going to let a love affair with prospects stop that? Yes, Smoak has enormous upside, but is he going to be that much better than stretch run Chris Davis (much different from early season CD)? Is having a starter who you can count on to give your team 9 strong innings at the drop of a hat much better than staring wistfully at Justin Smoak's BABIP looking toward the future? I don't care that Lee is a rental player. If you rent him for half a year, make a strong push to the playoffs, maybe you win maybe you don't, then you take your two picks when Lee signs with the Yankees and try again next year. And if it requires Smoak and ticking timebomb Tanner Scheppers (along with other lower level prospects) then so be it. 2010 is what JD told us to look forward to for about 3 years now. Let's not let winning later stop us from winning now.

In all seriousness.

http://video.adultswim.com/robot-chicken/its-the-law-asshole.html?cid=vplayer_robot-chicken_its-the-law-asshole

Don't get me wrong I think Brett is a great writer, but I don't see how this has anything to do with him.

I say "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley. The song works for two reasons: 1. All North Texas fans who attend games are obviously gluttons for punishment and will never give this team up. 2. Rick rolling the other team will totally throw them off of their game. Have you ever been rick rolled? It sucks. You keep thinking how stupid was I to think that this was actually going to be a Mickey Rooney nip slip, you second guess yourself, you go back through your entire life trying to figure out where things went wrong. Could you try to take down Lance Dunbar with that kind of pressure on your head. I think not. I'm not sayin' I'm just sayin'. GMG.

He is only 3 games from breaking Al Oliver's record for the Rangers' longest home hitting streak though.

I like the addition of Molina, but the details of the Cliff Lee deal intrigue me. I am hearing that the Rangers can get Lee without adding money by including Harden in the deal. Because the Mariners aren't shedding cash the prospects in the deal would have to be top of the line. It would probably involve 1 sure thing prospect (the Smoak, Feliz, Holland variety) and then 2 or 3 of the highly touted prospects (Scheppers, Ogando, Perez, Beavan, Moreland). Just interesting to think about. Oh and this just in, Vlad strokes.

Better than Ubadlo Himenez and Jim Lincucum?

Scenarios for US advance.

The lack of ability to spell SCHEPPERS or PURKE immediately nullifies any argument you have.

The easiest argument to make would be for the Nationals' rep is NL save leader Matt Capps. With the expansion of the ASG roster I would love to see Strasburg get picked for the team, but I feel that the players and managers who would have to vote him in will tend to side with veteran players. Ol' Bud should do everything in his power to get Strasburg into this game because it would add a "must watch" tag to a game that is just a beating to watch. I am totally for Strasburg to pitch so I can watch SS without actually having to see Nationals play.

Dan Haren has been horrible this year. He is giving up a ton of homeruns and taking this struggling pitcher who always falters in the second half of the season from the NL to the AL in the most hitter friendly ballpark in the league is going to resolve those problems? I think not.

Young was negotiating for one of the girls to give him a Wonderlic.

Good news for the Titans, he obviously no longer has the "run first" mentality.

Yes, I think he will be a superstar right now. I had my doubts about the entire weight of a franchise being placed upon a 21 year old kid, but, for now, those doubts have been lifted. He will get some starts skipped and innings limits will keep him from winning as many games as he should, but after seeing him pitch so effectively and efficiently I believe this will be the Summer of Doc 2.0.

Whoever wants to flex their World Cup knowledge muscles should go here. Free for a chance at $1000 sounds pretty sweet, but GMG bragging rights are more than any monetary value. Go USA!

Strasburg will go 5 innings, be great against a horrid Pirate line-up, and Matt Capps will blow yet another save causing his ostracization from D.C.. Strasburg will be phenomenal, but his pitch limits will prevent him from being a superstar this year. Stanton, on the other hand, though he is touted as one of the best hitting prospects in baseball and as a second coming of Miguel Cabrera for the Marlins, is, as Seth Everett described, a run of the mill elite prospect. Because Stanton was called up the same year as freaks like Heyward and Strasburg he will always be compared with them, but his ceiling simply isn't as high. Stanton has also struck out 53 times in 190 at bats in AA and last year struggled with a jump in talent level when he went from hitting .311 in A ball to .231 when promoted to AA Jacksonville. He will be good, but I just don't think he will show anything but flashes this year.

The Fort Worth Star Telegram says that Holland threw without any pain today. A major rotation shake up could be on the horizon.

Something tells me we might be watching slightly differently.

I just threw up in my mouth. And then out of my mouth all over everything. Still, good luck Collin!