ESPN is awash in news today of several pitchers changing teams. In the past 24 hours or so, the following transactions have materialized:
- The Milwaukee Brewers committed $37 million to Randy Wolf and LaTroy Hawkins, which connected with a bigger news story: Michael Jackson is alive and he’s got a new job as their free-spending general manager. I’m looking at the man in the mirror and asking him to change his ways, his overpaying-for-aging-crappy-pitchers ways.
- Not to be outdone, the St. Louis Cardinals gave a $7.5 million one-year deal to Brad Penny, which must have been left over from the Jeff Weaver Fund, after that signing crashed and burned.
- In probably the smartest move, thus far, of the baseball off-season, the Texas Rangers paid the Baltimore Orioles to take Kevin Millwood off their hands.
- In a less savvy move, the Rangers are said to be looking at Rich Harden as a replacement for Millwood. Harden has always struck me as overrated. If he were a basketball player, he’d be Kevin Martin of the Sacramento Kings, someone with definite talent but also a lock, pretty much every year to come down injured.
- The Cubs, for their part, are looking at J.J. Putz who’s coming off an injury-beset, disappointing year with the New York Mets. Putz. The name says it all.
- Meanwhile, Andy Pettitte quieted resigned with the New York Yankees.
Such an unfettered barrage of mediocrity can boggle a sports fan’s mind. Somewhere, there’s a Washington Nationals uniform waiting for each of these guys.