Minor Leaguer traded for 10 bats

"They just wanted some bats, good bats -- maple bats," Broncos general manager Jose Melendez said.



NICE MOLE, UGLY!!!!!!

My new favorite AL Team

I'm a National League fan, and I always have been. I hate the DH, and my favorite player of all time was excellent both on the mound and at the plate. Moreover, due to proximity (the Braves) and inheritance (the Dodgers, my father's favorite team), I've consistently had two National League teams to support. I always have trouble picking teams in the American League, though. There are teams that I hate (The Yankees, of course, and the Rangers because they are from Texas), but no team that I've ever truly loved.

Back when Ken Griffey was a Mariner, I was a stalwart for Seattle... but times changed, and 2001 (the year that, under the leadership of Ichiro Suzuki, they won 116 games but lost the ALCS to the dumb post-9/11 Yankees) was the end of my love affair with the Sea-faring compass boys.

After that, I started to pay attention to the AL Central, mostly because that division was considered to be the worst in baseball (boy how things have changed!) and I have a soft-spot for underdogs. I liked the early-decade Twins, but I must admit that because of hard feelings left over from this incident - which still ranks in my mind as the worst moment in all of baseball history - I couldn't ever fully embrace Minnesota. My real AL Central loyalties belonged to the Detroit Tigers, mostly because they were one of the teams being threatened with Contraction (in the NL, I became an Expos fan during this period as well. I seriously considered an Expos tattoo for a while). My love for the Tigers intensified during their 2003 season, when they lost more games than the '01 Mariners won. It was supremely validating when the Tigers made it to the Series in '06 under the helm of Jim Leyland (who is still cool with me because his early-90s Pirates always LOST to the Braves when it counted), but the 5-game loss to the Cardinals took the wind out of my sails, and since then it hasn't been the same... This isn't because I'm a "fair-weather" fan or anything, it's just that the magic seems gone. (Yeah I know that Dontrelle Willis is my favorite current pitcher, but Gary Sheffield kind of cancels out all of his good vibes.)

So anyway... I didn't have an AL team going into this year. I've given it some thought, though, and I've decided that I'm with Dunstone: I'm putting my weight behind the Tampa Bay Rays! After ten years of losing, losing, losing, the Rays have blossomed this year as one of those young-whippersnappery "small market" teams that surprises the shit out of you in May by competing with the Red Sox and Yankees of the world. First place! In the AL East!!!! The best record in the AL! This, my friends, is something to be celebrated:



Even the Yankees are on-board the Rays bandwagon, displaying a strange humility heretofor unseen in the Bronx. Yet the Rays are still having some attendance issues. Unfortunately, I don't think that I'll ever make it to St. Petersburg (nor would I ever really want to make it to St. Petersburg, let's be honest), so I don't think I'll get to help them out. Nevertheless, my heart and soul will be at the Trop' every night for the rest of this season, even though the Rays will be playing elsewhere for about half of the remaining games.



Post-script:

Apparently, this was a big internet phenom a couple of years ago. I didn't see it then, but I just found it as I was doing "research" for this "piece." All I can see is: which team was able to deflate this mighty mascot? None other than the Rays. You could say that the Banana got STUNG:

Bill Dunstone

I'm posting this youtube video in honor of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, who vaulted into First Place in the AL East last night with a victory over the Yankees.

Terry McAuliffe had this to say:

"Bill Dunstone, if he were sitting here today -- nothing's impossible! Wade Boggs, if they were with us today, they're probably both in heaven right now, probably having a scotch, looking down saying, you know what: this fight goes on. It's good for the American League. Millions of people coming out to see the games, it's exciting."

The ball keeps hitting this guy on the head!