LET THE SILLINESS BEGIN

Yesterday, teams begin making qualifying offers to their players heading into free agency. The amount this year is $15.3 million. If a player accepts, it's a one year deal at that price, if not, he's a free agent. Teams can negotiate bigger and/or longer deals even if the qualifying offer is made. Then it becomes a crap shoot for the player. Accept the offer and pass up a chance at more money or a long time deal - or - reject it and take your chances on the open market. For some players, the Q. offer is better than they could get on the open market, but some will want a long-term deal or a lot more money, so they roll the dice. There were players who rejected the offers and ended up siting out there a long time and ended up accepting less money. The kicker for those opting for free agency is that the original team will get a first round draft pick for any team that signs them and teams are very reluctant to give up the draft picks.
Here's a short list of players who have been given qualifying offers.
Max Scherzer
Hanley Ramirez
James Shields
Pablo Sandoval
Francisco Liriano
Russell Martin
Ervin Santana
Victor Martinez
David Robertson
Melky Cabrera
Nelson Cruz
Big names all, but some are worth it, some are not. Some players would be crazy not to accept the offers, since it's probably more than they could get on the open market. This will be verrrry interesting. Players have a week to decide.

Hmmm...
Okay, it's official. Joe Maddon is the new Cubs manager. There is a problem: The Tampa Bay Rays are toying with the idea of charging the Cubs with tampering. Seems negotiations between Maddon & Tampa were moving right along when Maddon suddenly broke off the talks. Two days later, his contract ran out and four days later, it was pretty much decided that Maddon was the next Cubs manager. The timing is very suspicious.

From Brad Dickson's Bottom Ten:
5. Troy (1-8): The marching band is spelling out “BLEAK” at halftime.
9. New Mexico State (2-7): The Aggies were defeated by Texas State, a team that I’ve frankly never heard of.

Well that didn't take long
Alex Rodriquez's suspension ended when the World Series ended last Wednesday. Up to now, the A-Rod hot line has been completely silent. Bingo! Investigations have revealed that A-Rod paid his cousin almost $1 million to keep silent about Alex's involvement with drugs. I guess things are back to normal.

Things can't be that tough
I read about that Denver Bronco's fan who left the stadium and disappeared until he showed up in a parking lot in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I've been to a ball game in Denver and parking is a problem there, but this is ridiculous.


***THEY SAID IT***
"Why should we have to go to class if we came here to play FOOTBALL, we ain’t come to play SCHOOL …"  --  Ohio State QB Cardale Jones in 2012
"Anyone find it ironic that with all that facial hair among the Royals and Giants, a World Series sponsor was Gillette?"  -- Jim Kozlowski
"For Halloween, some Purdue fans wanted to dress as a Boilermaker but were stymied when even they didn’t know what that was."  -- Brad Dickson
"Breaking news, a Kenyan has won the New York City Marathon” Wouldn’t it be more news if a Kenyan DIDN’T win the New York City Marathon?"  -- Janice Hough
"The new movie Ouija is about people trying to get in touch with the dead. Picture N.Y. Jets coach Rex Ryan giving a pre-game speech."  -- RJ Currie
"Ex-slugger Jose Canseco accidentally shot one of his fingers off while cleaning his gun: "On the bright side, he's taken so much human growth hormone that the finger grew right back."  -- Craig Ferguson
"How do the Philadelphia 76ers mark the end of Daylight Saving Time? They set their clock back one hour, and then some other team comes and cleans it."  -- Dwight Perry.

CP-