Like I am sure many of you do, each and every day I take a moment to think about the Rally Unicorn. You can imagine my surprise when I learned this morning that the Rally Unicorn is still alive.

I can't even begin to imagine how he ended up in Montana (why would someone leave San Diego for Montana?), but that's apparently where he is.

You can catch up with the Rally Unicorn here.

I hope some Pad Squadders are already on their way to Montana to talk the Rally Unicorn into coming back to help the Padres.

First of all, I'm not advocating this. I'm just sharing what I found buried in the current issues of Sports Weekly: Bob Nightengale said this in a feature story about the winter meetings:

We'll soon find out whether the White Sox can trump everyone by pulling off a trade with the Yankees for Alex Rodriguez by dangling third baseman Joe Crede and any of their six starting pitchers.

Is this for real or is Nightengale just filling space?

Dr. F insightfully pointed out that Pokey Reese has been missing from Marlins camp for the past two days. Even the Marlins don't know where he is.

EDIT: In a very similar story, posted just minutes after the original one, SI.com notes that Reese has informed his agent (who has in turn told the Marlins) that Reese is safe. No word, as far as I can tell, about when Reese is expected back or what the issue is.

Reese has had a tough year, as he's dealt with surgery and rehab; he didn't play at all last year. As most folks know, Reese has also overcome a lot in life - both as a youngster and now as an adult.

It's been an unusual week in spring camps. Zach Greinke left Royals camp, for unknown reasons (but he did tell the team he was leaving). More recently, Eric Gagne left Dodgers camp for "personal reasons". Now Pokey Reese, who was/is expected to play a significant role for the Marlins as a middle infielder this season, is flat out missing. He didn't tell the club where he was going and apparently no one knows where he is.

Hopefully whatever is happening now isn't serious. Here's hoping that Reese is ok and returns to Marlins camp shortly.

Saturday Update: Per the Herald, don't expect Pokey back in camp anytime soon. His career with the Marlins may be over just as soon as it started.

The Marlins agreed to terms with Miguel Cabrera today, or at least that's what I'm telling myself. In all likelihood, the Marlins (as is their right) unilaterally imposed a new contract on Cabrera. He will be paid $472,000 this season.

Yes, for us regular folks, that's a lot of money. But keep in mind that the major league minimum this season is $327,000. Last year, an average major leaguer earned nearly $2.5 million. Unfortunately for Mr. Cabrera, he is below average in service time, despite being well above average in playing ability. In major league baseball, you'd rather have the reverse of those two things (at least if you like a fat wallet).

To add further insult to the situation:

I'm going to assume that's standard language for a contract. I also don't even want to think about what circumstances might cause the Marlins to put Cabrera in the minors; that's a terrifying thought.

Cabrera has been very quiet (at least publicly) on the salary issue. His agent has been very decent too. Per the Herald this morning, they were only "looking" for $450,000 for this season. Granted, that's surely not what Cabrera or his agent think he's worth, but it's what they thought they could get.

Still, I can't help but think that today's contract puts Cabrera one step closer to finding a home elsewhere just as soon as he's eligible for free agency in a few years. For a frame of reference (and it's tough to find a good one, given Cabrera's excellence in the field and mid-year callup in 2003), Albert Pujols was rewarded wtih a $900,000 contract for the 2003 season, after stellar campaigns in 2001 and 2002. Without accounting for inflation, it seems that the Marlins (after two and a half years of Cabrera's services) value Cabrera about half as much as the Cardinals did way back when. Yes, I know that's not a "fair" comparison. But there really isn't a fair comparison to make. My point here is that the Marlins are abusing this system which allows them to decide the salaries of their less experienced players.

Miguel's day will come. Just don't expect to see him in a Marlins uniform when he's enjoying his first big money contract.

Here's Carlos Delgado in Mets camp yesterday. Note how he's laughing at Carlos Beltran's funny helmet:

Oh no - what's happened to Carlos? He's wearing the funny looking helmet now too:

Apparently the Mets acquired helmets from the future in addition to assembling the 2003 MLB All-Star team this offseason. If that's what the helmets of the future look like, I'm disappointed. Somewhere though, Jim Mandich (and Michigan alums everywhere) is happy. It looks like the Wolverine football helmet spent the offseason mating with baseball helmets.

Will the Marlins be subjecting us to a teal and black ensemble? Who's seen the helmets at Roger Dean this year?

Does anyone know of a fast, easy, painless, and inexpensive way to have a tattoo removed?

I'll try to explain the situation as well as I can (although I'll admit right now that most of the details are foggy)...

As some of you know, I was out of town this past weekend. Needless to say, things got a little crazy. I woke up yesterday (Sunday) morning on the floor of an apartment just a few miles south of Ocala. How I ended up near Ocala, I'm not sure. Actually, I'm not even sure who lived in the apartment I was in or how I got there. There wasn't anyone in the apartment when I woke up either. There clearly had been recently -- it looked like there'd been a party there the previous night (Saturday) and the Sunday paper was partially read on the kitchen table. They'd also left a note taped to the television that said something like, "Mike - We went out for some breakfast..." Then it was signed with an illegible name.

Had the name been legible, I might have stayed. Since it wasn't and I didn't know where I was, I thought I should get out of there. Fortunately my car was there, so I was able to get myself out of there.

Just as soon as I left though I noticed a tattoo on my left arm. It's a heart with an arrow through it. Above the arrow it says "Mandy" and below the arrow it says "Mike".

Now I've never known anyone named Mandy in my life. And I'm pretty sure that the name on the note was not Mandy.

Needless to say, I want the tattoo gone and I don't want to remember anything about this past weekend. Not that I remember much anyway.

See it here.

The roster isn't as sexy as you might have thought it could be.

I heard a rumor (can't remember where) today that ARod.com might play SS in the classic. Keep in mind that guys aren't likely to play full games. In a scenario where ARod.com plays SS, Michael Young would probably play some 2B.

Maybe Wiggins can ask ARod.com for some insight when they're on the phone later.

Ok - so who's got something good cooking for Valentine's Day? I'm sure that someone around here does.

Yes, Fishfan, I'm looking at you. If you go out and get engaged tonight we expect to hear about it.

Then we'll try to talk you out of it. And then we'll try to get invited to the bachelor party.

I'm sure that I could Google this, but I'm also sure that some of our more enterprising music types might know the best solution. Here's my situation...

My new car can play MP3s in the CD changer. I know I'm the last person on Earth to learn this, but that means that I can get more songs onto each CD by making them MP3s... so I tried to take advantage of that by burning MP3 CDs in iTunes. But there were only about three songs in my whole iTunes library (mostly made up of CDs that I have owned for a long time) that could be burned as MP3s.

How can I make MP3 CDs? If possible, I'd prefer a free/freeware solution?

(Is there still such a thing as freeware or did I just date myself?)

In case you haven't heard about this yet, Nike is doing some sort of a promotional thing where an athlete will call you with a pre-recorded message at a time you specify. So it's like a wake-up call, but from someone cool, or decidely uncool -- depending on your perspective.

This little promotion is nice, but there are holes in it. For instance, it would be easy to ask Nike to have ARod.com call your friend, or your enemy at, say, 4:30 in the morning. You could even have ARod.com make that call for ten consecutive days. I, of course, would never do anything like that -- but I just wanted to point out the possibility to you before you think of signing up for this service (it's free!).

If you're hesitant to sign up without a testimonial from someone who has used the service, I would recommend that you ask Wiggins. I believe he is familiar with the program.

After my experience over the summer with Jeff Conine and his singing "abilities", I'm afraid to dig too deep into the musical genius that is Ben Broussard (Ben had a track on "Oh Say Can You Sing" too).

But I figured that some of our more musically inclined friends might enjoy Ben's stylings. You can even listen to some cuts from his album without actually having to shell out money for the thing.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are pleased to introduce tonight's starting lineup for your 2005 Florida Marlins non-Florida Marlins...

Batting first and playing centerfield, Juan Pierre...

Batting second and playing second base, Luis Castillo...

Batting third and playing first base, Carlos Delgado...

Batting fourth and playing third base, Mike Lowell...

Batting fifth and playing right field, Juan Encarnacion...

Batting sixth and playing left field, Jeff Conine...

Batting seventh and catching, Paul LoDuca...

Batting eighth and playing shortstop, Alex Gonzalez...

Batting ninth and making his final warmup up tosses in the bullpen, tonight's starting pitcher, Josh Beckett...

If you got all the way to the end without being sick, you are a better fan than me.

Dontrelle Willis's love life has been the Marlins top gossip story since Carl Pavano took his high profile love life--headlined by a relationship with Alissa Milano--to the Yankees.

Around the time of the 2003 World Series, it was rumored that Dontrelle was interested in one of the Williams sisters of tennis fame (I think it was Serena, but I can't find a link to that, so maybe I'm not remembering it correctly). Then there was talk of a long time girlfriend from back home. Then we were told that Dontrelle pitched wearing a rosary given to him by his fiance's mother (I also can't find a link to a story about that - just the image, but I am sure it's true--I think it was in the Herald). Then we heard about a girl from Oakland who was playing college volleyball in Idaho who was allegedly Dontrelle's love interest.

Now we hear again that Dontrelle is engaged (yes, there was confusion about this before, but now there's a new name in the mix). Apparently they'll get married after the season. I wonder if that means October or November to Dontrelle. Good luck to Mr. Willis and Ms. Vitagliano.

Go at it.

There's been some talk lately (apparently the commissioner's office is taking the matter "under consideration") of retiring Roberto Clemente's #21 throughout all of MLB. This would be similar to what baseball did with Jackie Robinson's #42 in 1997.

Robinson's number was retired in honor of him breaking baseball's color line. He was not only the first to do so, but he was also a great player and a great man.

Clemente was a great player and a great man in his own right. He was, and is, an inspiration to Hispanic athletes--and as more than just a ballplayer. His on and off field accomplishments in no way take a back seat to Robinson's. However, those who oppose retiring Clemente's number throughout the league state that the difference between the two is that Robinson was the first to break the color line and that he paved the way for Clemente and hundreds of others since.

What do you think - should MLB retire Clemente's number for all teams?

I don't think they should. Clemente was a great player and a great man. I don't want to say that he wasn't. It seems like a slippery slope though. Clemente's case isn't a questionable one. But by retiring his number, you open the door to others. Where would the line be drawn? By drawing the line at Robinson, it's pretty clear. Jackie Robinson broke the color line. To do that successfully, he not only had to be a great ballplayer, but he also had to be a courageous man (if you don't understand that, read a book about Robinson). If the line is drawn somewhere beyond Robinson, we may run the risk of having ten or fifteen numbers retired one day.

Also, there's nothing to stop teams from retiring 21 on a club-by-club basis. The Pirates, obviously, already have that number retired (as Clemente was a Pirate). Other teams which feel they have been strongly influenced by Clemente could retire his number as well. This would be similar to what the Miami Heat have done by retiring Dan Marino and Michael Jordan's numbers. Neither Jordan nor Marino played for the Heat (Marino didn't even play the same sport).

Another option would be to hand out #21 only to deserving players. There are currently post-season awards, like the Hank Aaron award (which goes to the best hitter in each league). Maybe a Roberto Clemente award could be given each year to a player on each team (regardless of ethnicity) who represents what Roberto Clemente stood for - both as a player and as a person. The winning player would receive the right to wear #21 in the upcoming season.

I think that would be popular. There are a number of Hispanic players who wear #21 today (most notably, Sammy Sosa). Many of those players likely wear that number in honor of Clemente. If those players were only able to wear the number if they were selected to do so, I am sure that they would take even more pride in wearing it.

Thoughts?

I know that I wrote earlier this week about how Buck Martinez must hate America (because Alois Leiter is on the USA's provisional roster), but this WBC has the potential to be a heck of a tournament. Well, it could be great if they were going to play each game to win (no pitch counts, no extensive subbing, etc.).

That's not going to happen. Pitch counts are going to make this "Classic" more of an exhibition than anything else. But if this was being played like a playoff game/series, it would be great to see the US take on the Dominican Republic (maybe I'm being a bit of a jingoist, but I think those are the two consensus favorites).

Check out the potential lineups these teams will feature:

USA
Position Players
C - Jason Varitek (BOS)
1B - Derrek Lee (CHC) or Mark Teixeira (TEX)
2B - Chase Utley (PHI)
3B - ARod.com (NYY)
SS - Derek Jeter (NYY) or Jimmy Rollins (PHI)
LF - Chipper Jones (ATL)
CF - Johnny Damon (BOS)
RF - Lance Berkman (HOU)
DH - Barry Bonds (SF)

Pitchers
S1 - Roger Clemens (HOU)
S2 - Dontrelle Willis (FLA)
S3 - Jake Peavy (SD)
S4 - Tim Hudson (ATL)
S5 - Andy Pettitte (HOU)
R1 - Billy Wagner (NYM)
R2 - Todd Jones (DET)
R3 - Huston Street (OAK)
R4 - Brad Lidge (HOU)
R5 - Ben Sheets (MIL)

Dominican Republic
Position Players
C - Miguel Olivo (FLA)
1B - Albert Pujols (STL)
2B - Luis Castillo (MIN) or Alfonso Soriano (WAS)
3B - Aramis Ramirez (CHC) or Adrian Beltre (SEA)
SS - Miguel Tejada (BAL) or Rafael Furcal (LAD)
LF - Manny Ramirez (BOS)
CF - Wily Taveras (HOU)
RF - Vladimir Guerrero (LAA)
DH - David Ortiz (BOS)

Pitchers
S1 - Pedro Martinez (BOS)
S2 - Bartolo Colon (LAA)
S3 - Daniel Cabrera (BAL)
S4 - Miguel Batista (ARI)
S5 - Jorge Sosa (ATL)
R1 - Armando Benitez (SF)
R2 - Yhency Brazoban (LAD)
R3 - Francisco Liriano (MIN)
R4 - Francisco Cordero (TEX)
R5 - Felix Rodriguez (NYY)

There's still room for plenty of bench players. Each active roster will include 30 players (selected from these lists).

Granted, there's a lot to be determined between now and when the games start in early March. There are a lot of things we don't know:

Can Bonds do more than DH? If he can, that will help to fill in some holes in the US's OF. At least from my view, it looks like there's a log jam at the infield corners. If Bonds can only DH, he has to DH, but if he can play the field, that frees up another big bat for the lineup.

Somewhat related to the previous point, what is the US outfield going to look like? I might not have any of the three OF starters correct.

What will the US's bench look like? From hearing Buck Martinez on XM each morning, I suspect that we may see the likes of Bill Hall and Craig Counsell on the bench, instead of people like Jimmy Rollins or Eric Chavez. Buck seems to be extolling the versatility of some of the lesser known guys.

Overall, I love the Dominican's offense. Even if you had the whole world to pick from, it would be hard to put togehter a more fearsome lineup. But the US more than makes up for what it lacks (at least relative to the DR) offensively with pitching depth. In a seven game series (which we're not going to get) and in a series where pitch counts are king (what we are getting) that has to be important. Going up against Clemens for three innings, Ben Sheets for two, and then facing Street, Wagner, Jones, and Lidge for an inning a piece is pretty daunting.

I hope that we get to see it. There's a lot of potential for some great baseball.

Where am I off with the lineups? Who do you think will win?

Poll

Who will win the World Baseball Classic?

0%

China

0 votes

0%

Cuba

0 votes

38%

Dominican Republic

18 votes

0%

Japan

0 votes

0%

Korea

0 votes

0%

Mexico

0 votes

4%

Puerto Rico

2 votes

46%

United State

22 votes

6%

Venezuela

3 votes

4%

Field (Australia, Canada, Chinese Tapei, Italy, Netherlands, Panama, South Africa)

2 votes

47 votes | Poll has closed

Dontrelle Willis is invincible. If you don't believe me, check out this picture:

That's the car that Willis was driving one day early in 2003. In case you can't tell, that was a Ford Mustang. Dontrelle was driving when the car rolled over on the freeway.

He walked away from the accident unharmed.

Later that year he made his major league debut. Shortly after that, he won the Rookie of the Year award and played a large role in the Marlins winning the World Series.

Thus, the evidence clearly indicates that Dontrelle Willis, whether you call him the D-Train or the A-Train, is invincible.

Granted, that example of Mr. Willis is true. But what I'm hoping to do here today is to have some fun by creating some "facts" about Willis' greatness, which may or may not be true. Inspired both by facts about Chuck Norris (which, by the way, Norris approves of) and a thread over at White Sox Insider about Kenny Williams (the White Sox GM, for those of you who missed the World Series), I thought it would be fun to make up a list of "facts" about our own Dontrelle Willis. If you want, you can use another Marlin, but Willis (along with Cabrera) is about all that we've got right now.

In case you're not familiar with this, here are some of my favorites about Kenny Williams:

And here are a few about Chuck Norris:

I'll add some about Dontrelle:

• When the umpire says, "Play ball", Dontrelle Willis says, "Say please."
  
• There are two kinds of major league pitchers: those that suck and Dontrelle Willis.
  
• Dontrelle Willis never uses doors. The thunderous might of his fists can reduce any wall to rubble, yet he strikes with such precision that only a Dontrelle Willis-sized hole is smashed through the wall. Anything else would be excessive.

Feel free to add your own in the comments.

The provisional rosters are out for the World Baseball Classic. Inexplicably, Alois Leiter is included on the USA's roster.

Alois must have some really incriminating pictures of a whole bunch of people somewhere. Capable pitchers, like Ben Sheets, are not on the roster.

Current rosters

Details about Buck's crime against humanity. Fortunately the other guys don't suck as much as Alois.

I'm not sure if this is Jeremy Hermida's official website, but given the URL, it sure seems like it could be. Thanks to our good friends over at Fish Chunks (who found the site courtesy of our friend at Deep Fried Fish), I found Jeremy Hermida.com earlier today.

Check out the site. It proclaims Hermida as the future 2006 Rookie of the Year. Better than that, Hermida's 2006 line is even projected on the front page:

Those numbers, particularly considering the "protection" he's likely to get this season, certainly don't suck.

When you visit Hermida's site, you can even participate in their forums, which include thrilling topics like "Hermida = LOCK FOR ROY". I hope they're right (whoever these people are that run the site), but they sure are optimistic.

Miguel Cabrera's agent responded to the talk about the alleged fight Cabrera was involved in at a Venezuelean night club recently. The agent denies any wrongdoing on Cabrera's part.

Unfortunately for us, this article seems to have been written in English, so it's a less entertaining read than the original story.

This quote throws me a little though:

If Miguel is so worried about contributing to his winter league team's playoff push, maybe he shouldn't be out a club until five in the morning. Just a thought. Wiggins can tell you how that burning the candle at both ends strategy works out in the long run.

Is this just me, or do other XM listeners dislike the Rob Dibble/Kevin Kennedy show? I made it through 15 minutes of today's show before I turned it off.

Today's show is essentially a repeat of yesterday's show, which consisted of Rob and Kevin ripping on baseball writers for how they filled out their Hall of Fame ballots. While they're right that the voting process is flawed, they don't get how to fix it any more than the writers do. Then Rob and Kevin repeat themselves (and parrot each other) for three full hours. Each day.

At least it's a little better than when Kevin is falling all over himself to remind everyone about how many superstars and legends of the game he knows personally, particularly those that he's friends with.

I'm a huge XM fan, particularly of XM 175 (the 24-7 baseball channel). But the Dibble/Kennedy show is unlistenable. If they have to keep it on the air, they should just record it for 20 minutes and then play it on a loop for the full three hours. There's no point in wasting the guys' time saying the same thing over and over.

That's just one more reason why I can't wait until games start up again in the afternoon.

Barry Jackson reports that the Marlins are still looking to acquire Joey Gathright from the Devil Rays:

The Marlins clearly value speed, so in that sense, it's not a surprise that they're interested in Gathright, who may be the fastest player in baseball. But giving up pitching prospects for him sounds pretty rich to me. We all know that the Marlins aren't going to contend for a playoff spot this season. In the coming years, when they are in the hunt, they're going to need pitching. Given the Marlins recent ability to develop young pitchers, I'd hate to give up on a premium arm (let alone multiple) in order to add some speed and stolen bases to the 2006 lineup.

That said, adding a grown man named Joey to the lineup would be a welcome addition to the colorful assortment of first names on this ballclub (including Dontrelle, Pokey, Anibal, Logan, Yusmeiro, Renyel, Alfredo, and Reggie).

While most folks won't remember Andre Dawson as a Marlin (I suspect that people think of him as either an Expo or a Cub), The Hawk nearly earned induction into the Hall of Fame today. He received 61% of the vote (to be enshrined, you need 75% of the vote).

Bruce Sutter is the only player who will be enshrined this year (at least based on the media's vote). While Sutter is deserving of the honor, I had thought that Bert Blyleven and Dawson would be joining Sutter in Cooperstown come July.

I always remember thinking that Dawson made the bat he held look small. Dawson brought power to the plate, speed to the basepaths, and a rifle of an arm to the outfield. For those of you who are too young to remember his exploits, in many ways, he was like Vladimir Guerrero.

Dawson is one of four major leaguers to accumulate 300 homers and 300 stolen bases in his career.

While The Hawk played only briefly with the Fish, he has been in the Marlins front office since his retirement. Dawson's title is "Special Assistant to the President." I guess that means he works pretty closely with David Samson. Putting up with that has to be worth at least a couple votes--or something else significant. I'll leave it at that.

This year isn't the year, but maybe some time soon Dawson will go into the Hall. If he does, he'll likely be (depending on when it happens) the first player with a Marlins' connection to be enshrined.

As even more of connection to Florida and Miami, Dawson was born in Miami, attended FAMU, and played his last game (at which time he was a Marlin) at JRS.

Like OMG, I love fast Noles.

Just kidding. I hope Wiggins is happy.

Apparently I didn't have a wild enough (at least by Wiggins' standards) of a New Year's Eve (although I did have a really good one) as I was pretty coherent yesterday. I was even able to get up and about some -- as early as mid-afternoon.

I kid you not, but at one point during the day I found myself at Office Depot (or some store like that -- they all have different names, but I can never tell them apart). For whatever reason I had convinced myself that I needed to buy labels, "good" paper clips, and index cards. It took me awhile (after much searching for other signs of life in the store) to be sure that the store was actually open. For a few minutes I was worried that I'd broken into the store by accident. I'd pretty much taken a full lap around the store before I found another living soul (a store employee). The place was eerily quiet and flat out empty.

Anyways, there is a baseball tie in to this little story... while I was there, shopping away, I came across a 2006 Florida Marlins calendar. The cover alone struck me as funny, as three of the four pictured players are no longer members of the team. On the back cover, you can see the players who grace the calendar each month. Other than Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera, Brian "Return to Prominence" Moehler is the only other current member of the team who is on the calendar. Don't get me wrong, I know that we here at FishStripes love Big Moe. It still just strikes me as odd/funny that there are about as many Red Sox and Mets in the Marlins calendar as there are Marlins. This has been quite an offseason.

I'm done stating the obvious for now. I'll go back into Bolivia.

And so ends my not-funny story about spending New Year's Day in an Office Depot looking for "good" paper clips, while only finding a "Marlins" calendar.

As you old-timers now, during the 2005 season we had the first ever FishStripes.com road trip (to Shea Stadium), where we watched the Marlins take on the Mets as we took over Suite 36. It was a great opportunity for some FishStripers to get to know each other and to spend the day (and more!) together in New York. Some of us even saw 4th of July fireworks, well others... had an otherwise great time in the Big Apple (hey - it's not everyday that A.J. Burnett calls you Big Daddy).

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'd like to do something similar again this summer. No promises about lining up a suite again, or anything like that, but we could all still get together and have a good time.

We probably should have two trips this year: one to an NL East rival and a second to Tampa/St. Pete for the Devil Rays series. Fishfan and I were in Tampa last year for the Rays series, but didn't end up catching up with each other. While there aren't a lot of us in Florida, there are enough to make a Rays trip worthwhile.

For the NL East rival trip, my first choice would be DC (and not just because it would keep Wiggins from whining). The only problem with that is (unbelievably) that the Marlins don't face the Nats in DC on a weekend in 2006. For those of us coming from out of town, a weekend trip would be highly preferable.

Since we did the Mets thing last year (and Wiggins almost died because of it -- we'll have to link to the stories later for you newbies), that pretty much leaves Philly and Atlanta. Any preferences? Here are the dates of the relevant weekend series.

(excluding April because it would just be too cold)
July 28 - 31 at Philly
Sept 15 - 17 at Atlanta
Sept 22 - 24 at Philly

That's really it for NL East road weekend series. If anything else looks appealing, suggest it.

Please post your thoughts below (including if you're even just a little bit interested). You don't have to commit yourself yet (particularly as we don't yet know if we'll be able to line up the services of Chief Noc-a-homa or the Phillie Phanatic like we did with Mr. Met last season).

This was probably discussed while I was away, but in case it hasn't been: what would you do if you were Joe Girardi right now?

Do you think the team he's going to have on opening day is the one he thought he'd have when he signed his contract? If it is, why did he pick the Marlins over the Devil Rays (or somewhere else), where it seems they're going to try to be more competitive in the short term?

Some clever fellow (it's not me, I swear) has started up a site dedicated to everyone's favorite Marlins' owner, Jeffrey Loria.

Check it out here.

I am very disappointed that no one has taken the initiative to do something similar for David Samson.

The Marlins had the courage (that's not the word I want to use, but it's more positive than anything else I can think of) to hold a holiday party last night for season ticket holders (yes, there are still a few left -- although some showed up to the party to ask for their money back).

The Herald recaps the event, and if you tune into South Florida's sports talk radio, I'm sure you'll catch even more on the event.

What offends me most about Mr. Samson's comments is that he alluded to the fact that the team has considered an initial public offering, but that the financials didn't make sense. A quote of this is in the print edition of today's Herald. But miraculously it has been removed from the online edition (I will add the exact quote to this story tonight when I have the print edition in front of me again).

For those of you who have difficulty translating the words that come off of Mr. Samson's split tongue (about the possibility of an IPO/taking the team public), what he is really saying is: "We considered taking the ballclub public and issuing stock. But we realized that by doing so we would be forced to make our financials public and that the numbers would have to be audited and real. Since that would expose us as liars (as we aren't really losing tens of millions of dollars - heck, we aren't rich enough to afford that), we cannot pursue an IPO. Even though an IPO would make us even more wealthy and make it possible to keep the Marlins in South Florida."

Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, and Happy Holidays Marlins fans!

Where's Rod Tidwell when you need him?

I didn't figure there'd be this much hot stove activity already. And I didn't think so much of it would involve the Marlins. I figured we'd be digging for things to talk about (and I was ready, with stuff like this: the past four World Series champs (White Sox, Red Sox, Marlins, and Angels) have worn only one game hat. This is, of course, opposed to teams like the Mets (home, road, and alternate) and Tigers (home and road) which wear multiple hats. You can almost count the teams that wear only one hat (not counting BP hats) on one hand. So I'm picking one of them to win the World Series next season. I just have to wait for the firesale to be over to pick my favorite).

It's not even Thanksgiving and we've already seen two key contributors to the 2003 World Series run find homes elsewhere (Lowell and Beckett). We've even seen the first star who replaced a star from the 2003 team traded away (Delgado).

I have a lot of thoughts on the issues that the Marlins are facing right now. But I haven't had a chance to think them all through or develop them. So I'll give you some half baked thoughts:

• Show me the money: apparently all of the threats of moving, needing to shave payroll and the like stem from the "fact" that the team is losing money. To Mr. Samson and Mr. Loria, I say, "prove it." Forbes and economists like Andrew Zimbalist think it's unlikely that the Marlins are losing hard cash. Samson has offered to show wire transfer receipts of Mr. Loria's. While those would indicate how much money Mr. Loria is putting into his business, it would tell us nothing about what he is taking out of it. Until someone independent of the team, and qualified to interpret their financials, unequivocally states that the team has lost, and is losing money, I refuse to believe it. The Marlins losses are likely paper (i.e. depreciation and the like) losses. Those are great for tax purposes, but don't actually cost you any money.
  
• Dan LeBatard has gone from saying that Miamians are the worst fans in baseball and don't deserve the team they have to saying that the lack of a new stadium is really what doomed the franchise. Which is it? Yes, those two things are related. But what sense is there in building a new, expensive ballpark in South Florida if the horrible fans aren't going to buy tickets to watch games in it? Spending money for something that no one is going to support is only going to make the situation worse.
  
• What was the business plan that the Samson and Loria team were working under here? What level of attendance did they need to have to make money? Between the first year of their ownership (2002) and last season (2005), attendance is up nearly 13,000 people per game. Since the 2003 World Series win, attendance is up over 6,000 folks. Take 6,000 or 13,000 extra people per game x 81 x ticket revenue + concession revenue + parking revenue and you have a lot more money coming in. If you conservatively (due to the bad lease and other arrangements) assume that each of those fans is worth $10 each (ticket, parking, concessions, etc.) to the Marlins, that's an extra $4.9 million to $10.5 million that the Marlins were generating over year one. Apparently it wasn't enough though. What did they need? How realistic was it to expect to get to whatever numbers they needed? Sure, the lease agreement that the team has with Mr. Huizenga's stadium is unfavorable. But would the Marlins be in this same position if they were drawing 30,000 or 40,000 fans per game?
  
• The necessity of trading Delgado because the stadium plan isn't in place is a joke. The mainstream media are presenting the issue as that the team can't afford Delgado in 2006 because his salary escalates and that the team was depending on the revenue streams from the new stadium to pay Delgado. Newsflash: even if a stadium deal had been reached, the new revenue streams wouldn't have been supporting the team in 2006.
  
• Newsflash two: even if a stadium deal was in place, many of the new revenue streams were already pledged to pay off the team's debt. Per Miami's City Manager, personal seat licenses, stadium signage, broadcasting rights fees and other substantial revenue streams would have been obligated to the city/county to help offset their investment in the new ballpark. Think about that! Pledging that kind of money means that there wasn't going to be much left to invest in the payroll. Samson and Loria said as much. With the new stadium, the Marlins hoped to be able to maintain a $50-$60 million payroll. The Marlins weren't going to become the Yankees, or even the Giants, with a new ballpark. If you want to know what their financial situation would have looked like, check out Pittsburgh or Milwaukee. Both teams have sparkling new ballparks and exciting young players, but that's about it. We have that now in Miami -- just without the sparkling new ballpark part. It's cheaper this way.
  
• Why are Loria and Samson getting a free pass on the destruction they caused in Montreal? All the talk is about how these are good guys with good intentions who did their best to build a winner. The blame is being placed on the fans in Florida and various government agencies (which couldn't scape up enough millions to appease the millionaires). Loria and Samson have a track record that deserves closer inspection.
  
• Back to Delgado: Samson pledged as recently as September that fans shouldn't worry about Delgado being traded as Delgado's 2006 salary was slated to escalate at the same time that Mike Hampton's salary came off the books. What changed, Mr. Samson?

There's a lot more, but that's all I've got for now.