A variety of items out there that are noteworthy, but I didn't want to do individual posts/fanshots on...
Rany Jazayerli thinks Trey Hillman handled Gil Meche terribly, and is going to be fired soon. I will be curious to see if all those voices in the D/FW media who were demanding Hillman be hired back in 2007, then were convinced Hillman would have been a better hire than Washington the first couple of years Wash was manager, will be advocating having Hillman take the reins as manager here, once he's no longer a Royal.
The other day, Rob Johnson made the final out in a one run loss for the Mariners. I couldn't understand why he wasn't pinch hit for. According to this story, Ken Griffey, Jr., couldn't be used as a pinch hitter at that point because he was sleeping in the clubhouse as the game finished up.
I missed Jeff Wilson's mailbag piece last week -- you can check it out here.
I also missed Evan Grant's newsletter last week -- you can check it out here.
Hardball Talk has new Power Rankings up -- the Rangers are 9th.
Brett Perryman has a prospect update piece up at the ESPN Dallas blog.
Darren O'Day has his weekly diary update also up at the ESPN Dallas blog.
Craig Calcaterra suggests that MLB seizing the Rangers will result in everything going into bankruptcy court, and will be a "lose-lose" for baseball, because banks won't want to lend MLB teams money in the future. Given the unique circumstances here, though, and given that the only creditor who is supposedly not playing ball is Monarch, who isn't a lender in the traditional sense and won't be lending money to MLB teams in the future anyway, I have to think this is a minor concern.
Also, if the spread really is only $30 million between what the creditors want and what they are getting, I think if push came to shove, MLB would cover that amount (or a portion of it) rather than allow a bankruptcy court to force MLB to accept Jim Crane, or, for that matter, allow the franchise's books to be exposed to an extensive discovery process.
And for those who ask why Tom Hicks doesn't just cover the $30 million himself...why would he? I mean, seriously, what motivation does he have to do that?