Its Show Time!!!

IT's BA-A-A-A-CK!!!

Ahhhh.....a LONG, cold winter of no BLOGGING, so many pent up stories just itching to get out!!!  However, this isn't one of them.   

No, this is just a little "dip my toe in the water" to remember how freaking cold it has been and a reminder that the season is JUST around the corner!!!  We are now eight short days away from the draft.  I don't know about the rest of you, but if you told me that it had been 195 days between the end of the season and the draft I would have said you were crazy!  It felt more like 595 days!

In a hockey mad town wrapped in a hockey mad province surrounded by a hockey mad country, baseball finds itself trapped in a 3-season long hibernation waiting for the big day.  The draft. 

For hockey nuts the draft is just another semi-social occasion to get out, see people, shake hands and have a pint.  However, for those of us, the few, the proud, the freezing cold;  the draft is our Ground Hog day.  And I don't mean the Bill Murray Ground Hog day either.  No, this is the day we stretch, take a peek outside and remind ourselves that its 23 days until summer.  For the rest of Canada summer starts on June 21st.  For us however; it starts with strike one.

I'll have a draft analysis later, but leading to the draft all I have are questions!!!  And of course, questions need to be accompanied with a meaningless nonsensical answer. 

Questions:

Can The Wild 3-peat?
     *     I wouldn't put it past them.
Will Roddy, Bo, James or Mike have a co-captain sophomore jinx?
     *     Sadly, I think they'll do fine.  Dammit.
Will the Banshees have more than 7 jugs?
     *     If they draft Doyle, they'll pass that number on draft day!
Has Doug Matson recovered from the Piero "home run"?
     *     Doubtful. 
Has Steve Brooks recovered from the "nearly" home run?
     *     Steve is blessed with a short memory.  He needs GPS to get home from work.
Will Dave Polny's new jersey arrive dirty in anticipation of what's coming?
     *     Does the pope wear a funny hat?
Has my torn rib cage healed?
     *     If by healed you mean, "no longer in excruciating pain", I'm 100%
Has Col. Murray Saunders ankle healed?
     *     I saw him heaving 50lb sacks of potatoes, I think he's good.
Has The Batman repaired his cowl?
     *     ???
Has Scott Peters completed his anger management counselling?
     *     I hope so!  Seeing him in the green shirt of the Dusty Cleats last year brought back images of The Incredible Hulk!
Has Cal Steeves new shipment of shorts and socks come in yet?
     *     Apparently stuck at customs with stock from Victoria's Secret; but should be good for opening day. 
Is Bob Legault still sleeping in the garage because his head is to swollen to get inside the house?
     *     Hey, at least people know your name now, Tom.
Has the Kahuna's foot healed?
     *     He's been surfing in Hawaii, so I have to assume he's good to go. 
Has Stike's liver healed?
     *     Oh sure, and I'm going to lead the league in home runs.
Has Bundy's knee recovered?
     *     Yes and no.  He's well on the road to recovery but is aiming for a return in the 2012 season.
Do we really have to wait another 27 years for the Kennedy archives to be released?
     *     Yes and I'm not happy about it. 
Have McCarron's ligaments slid back into place?
     *     Robbie seems to be back to his no-shoes, feet shuffling self.
Is Tito still svelte?
     *     He might be with Kahuna...you know those Beeton boys.  No idea.
Is Chris Ross faster and stronger now that he's not president?
     *     Picture Bo Jackson in his prime.  That's the opposite of Chris. 
Will Rob Farah start looking his age (37) now that he doesn't have the daily pressure of finding subs?
     *     He's already looking under 70, so he's heading in the right direction!
Who will be this years version of the Dodge City Rounders, coming out of nowhere to make the finals?

SOOOO many questions as we prep for this year's draft!  These and many other questions will be answered (properly) as the year unfolds. 

This is a primer...just to get ready, its not a forecast.  The draft can't really be forecasted anyway. The draft is blind, so the captains picking isn't really relevant. The players are ranked so who you pick; or what order you pick in isn't really relevant either. At the end of the draft every team will have their allotment of rookies, a P1, and one of every ranking from 1-12. Essentially, every team will be even.  And so begins another season. 

At roughly 3pm on April 9th every team will have a full rosters.  They will all be tied for first place with nothing but optimism and blue skies in front of them.

In the next BLOG, which will be out on the day before the draft (8th) I'll have a surprise announcement.  It may seem a little early for both surprises and announcements, but this one NEEDS to happen! 

A few days after the draft, I'll start to dissect the teams (a little bit) and make some pre-season picks. Expect those to be as valuable and accurate as last years pick of the Banshees to win the league or maybe as good as the prediction of the Rusty Rebels winning the playoffs! (Banshees were 5th and the Rebels didn't see the semi's).  My predictions are the equivalent of the Sports Illustrated jinx, so apologies in advance if your team gets picked.  As a little window into my predictions, I'm going to go out on a limb this year and project everyone as a potential playoff team!  If the Leafs had enough guys over 35 years old, even they could get a playoff spot in our league!  Well....maybe not.

I've been trying to figure out where to take The BLOG over the winter.  I was considering retiring it when the season closed, but that consideration didn't last very long.  The public outcry (from 4 people, thanks Roddy, Paul, Karen and Vito from Woodbridge) was too much for me to resist (sure it was!!!).  Once I have a team / league schedule I will publish a timetable of when you expect to see BLOGS and outline the content, for now the schedule is just about a month out and can be found here ===> SCHED

Meanwhile, The BLOG has continued to evolve, at least a little bit.  You'll notice that there is now a Twitter feed tab that you can get to from the main page.  I will be putting the odd nonsensical thing in there, but I will also also be putting scoring updates of games that I make it to as well as final scores as they come in.  You will have to either go to the page periodically to check it out or follow my Twitter account. I'm kinda put off by the whole "following" someone on twitter vernacular, but honestly, I had a blast updating the last captains meeting on it!  I'm not so sure that everyone in the room was as thrilled as me, but I had some feedback from those following along at home that thought it was pretty cool.  That's good enough for me!

So instead of following the Twitter stuff,  you are completely free to think that its another one of my stupid ideas and do nothing.  That too is acceptable.  The cool part for me is that I can update this from anywhere on Blackberry:  no computer, no passwords, nothing.  Simply type a thought and it appears.  This could end badly.  We'll see.

Had you been following along, you would have known on Wednesday night that the league has expanded by one team this year!  This of course leads to questions like:  1) are we watering down the product in order to secure a TV deal?  2)  are we catering to a US audience that really doesn't understand baseball?  3)  Why stick another team in Tottenham when Winnipeg and Quebec City are so deserving?

Paul Piellusch and Steve Ross ponied up the money for the team and are the captains for TOTs newest franchise.  They're 99% sure that the team will be called the Beer Bros.  Cool name.  But I had a few suggestions (I've been known to ride a horse 'til its dead):

1. The Starsky and Hutchenson's
2. The Huggy Bears
3. The Captain Dobey's
4. The Zebra-3's
5. The Striped Tomatos

With God as my witness, I think #2 & #3 could work!

Also, You will also notice a poll at the top asking if people are still interested in the lyrics with Grisslie Game BLOGs.  I'm good to go, either way, but will go with the majority on that one.  I put a little BLOG (unannounced) a week or so ago that some people discovered and there has been some early voting.  Currently the lyrics are ahead by and 8-2 score, but that could change. 

You will see a tab for The Batman again as the hunt continues and I've changed the format for the Donini three stars; now it counts!  Well, not really, but its still fun.

Finally there is an "events by request" page.  If you are having a party, know of a concert or any kind of event that you'd like to share with other members of the league and their friends and family - I can post it here.  The only restriction that I can think of right now is that it needs to be appropriate for children to read and see.  Not that they would necessarily be invited to your event, but this site is not secure and anyone can get to it - including our kids. (yadda yadda yadda)     

That's enough house keeping.

So back to the draft; aside from the debate of Penddlebury Vs. Peters in centerfield, Cragg Vs. Dickson at short or Del Greco Vs. (Down Town) Billy Brown catching, and; everyone wanting their favourite players or friends to be on their team - there are a few trends to watch for at the draft.  There are some people who seem to be magnets for winning.  It could be because they're good players or good team mates or maybe their just lucky.  You can judge.  This might give you a little bit of a leg up if you were fortunate enough to be on the same team as them. 

Jens Lepa - Has been on the team that won the regular season two years running.
Kevin Moon - Has been to the finals the last two years.
Kevin Nicholl - Has been to the final two years in a row.

Of course, Ed Vonda and Tony Mrasek have won it all two consecutive years, but you have to be drafted BY them to have some of their good fortune rub off. 

Baring being drafted by The Wild, finding yourself on the same bench as Jens, his brother Kevin or his other brother Kevin might be the surest ticket to a winning year!  While we're on the topic...there might be a little mojo with this whole 'Kevin' thing as Kevin Boston and Kevin Youngs have each made a finals appearances over the last two years.  Hmmmm  ....  Look for ANY Kevin on your roster.  If you don't have one, consider changing the name on your shirt to Kevin.  Kev, Kevvie, Special K, The Kev-in-ator, Kev-a-rama, Kev-a-toga, Kev-ster, The Kev-meister, Kev-a-topia, Kev-a-chameleon, Kev-a-tronic and Kev-o-lucci are all acceptable shirt names as well. 

Now everyone can officially abandon the Leafs march toward adequacy, LETS GET ON WITH THE DRAFT!!!