Though, admittedly, the higher end of my expectations. I wasn’t sure why people weren’t as high on him as I was.

It’s been Boggs that’s come out of nowhere for me. And Young making my expectations of a serious decline year look downright crazy.

click the picture icon and put in the URL of the picture. (and you should preview it)

the map!

assuming that just because ESPN had updated one page for his last AB, it had also updated the other. Yeah: .314/.367/.599

I know we usually complain about baseball tonight and ESPN in general, but I used to love watching the show. John Kruk is a moron, but at least the show used to be entertaining instead of just droll. The list of spare ex-players they run in there makes me want to strangle myself, and I never ever ever ever ever want to hear from an analyst who isn’t Tim Kirkjian or Peter Gammons, and I sometimes don’t even want to hear from them. The rest of their guys are awful.

In fact, while I’m on the ESPN rant: All their anchors are terrible these days. Stupid assed Scott Van Pelt’s “useful shot that” on every golf highlight since the beginning of time is far worse than anything Steve Berthiaume barfs out his mouth. I miss the days when Kenny Mayne, Dan Patrick, and Rich Eisen had good catchphrases, and had more than one for every single thing that ever happens in the sports world. I hate what ESPN has become.

It starts with a mammoth douchebag named Judson Burch….he is a Coordinating Producer of Sportscenter now, came up as a PA, AP, Highlight Supervisor, Producer of BBTN, and then CP of BBTN, then CP of SC. He’s famous for “inventing” Web Gems back in the day and also for being one of the biggest nerds to ever exert a major influence over the world’s biggest sports television network. He’s just a huge prick, he went to Penn State but never attended a Football game, and he’s obsessed w/ the Phillies to the point that if they win he leaves the newsroom to go to his car and listen to “Oh Happy Day” which is the song they play in the ballpark there in Philly. He’s obsessed with umpires and inspired the “Fantasy Umpire League” that you’ll here people reference from time to time….to his credit Jud is really smart but has the especially douchey tendency of “pulling the string” on you when he’s done with a conversation….seriously, he makes an animated strikeout call on you as if he were an umpire!!! You literally have to meet him to fully appreciate what I’m talking about but here is Scott Van Pelt’s take on Judson:

“I don’t know what he’s into…I hope it’s Asians or Assholes or something…..just as long as it isn’t kids.”

So anyway Jud is a fixture there like I said….he’d be really respectable if he knew at all how to deal w/ people. One day Stevie B. was like, “Jud, give me the craziest home run call you can think of…” to which Jud came up with “Fill Thine Horn With Oil and Go” which I believe is an Old Testament quote from Samuel…just sounds ridiculous but you’ll notice that it’s usually only busted out on Phillie games (“Phil” thine horn with oil…..though usage is expanding)....the huge lesson of it all is that Jud Burch sucks….he’s also the inspiration behind Jon Buccigross’ “Normally good” which is a Mike and the Mad Dog reference (Mad Dog said “Karl Ravech…..normally good, but…”).....Jud actually keeps a written file of all the things Booch has referred to as “Normally good….” on air…..it’s all fun for that cliquey crew but annoying to everybody else, just like the Ump Fantasy League….

What’s crazy is that Hamilton is still very young in terms of experience. What if he improves in the coming years?

i uh.. loved the trade at the time…

hehe.

i think i was a little disappointed we couldnt ian kennedy from the yanks or something.