ESPN.com – MLB – MLB Rumor Central! I love it! This may be my favorite part of the baseball season (an exciting playoff series or opening day are the other favorites – and the mid-season trade deadline is like a mini-off-season). Winter Meetings (all the GMs together in one hotel) are in full swing and every team is making deals. The amount of speculation is incredible, there are 33 rumors just from today on the MLB Rumor Central page and there will probably be even more as the day goes on. Part of the reason I love it is that there is so much hope that our favorite teams will pick up that one player that will really make a difference next season. Hope springs eternal, but when you can read about it and get 24/7 news updates, hope is a freakin geyser.

It’s Quite a Day When This Tommy Rips Dodgers – Los Angeles Times

Great quotes from an ex-dodger about the f’d up situation in the Dodger front office. It’s sad to see such storied institutions/corporations have such messed up internals. Talk to me in person and I’ll give you a few firsthand examples.

News Story

Eh, whatever. We’ll see how this goes, I don’t really have my hopes up. Assistant GM from SF, I’ll go chat with some former Bay area peeps and see if this is anything to be excited about. It is good to have the search over and hopefully the team can move on and have a worthwhile off-season. My enthusiasm about the Dodgers is pretty low right now. Thankfully, there’s still Vin Scully! I would listen to him call a game of pigeon four-square or talk about source control management for hours. The man is a living legend. I wonder what Dodger Thoughts will have to say.

update — Here’s my answer to what Dodger Thoughts will say! Dodger Thoughts is an awesome blog and my favorite source of Dodger opinion.

I awoke today to discover that Google has released Google Analytics, free tracking and data analysis for all your site traffic. For someone who has sites and blogs, this is very exciting. Also, I check on MLB Rumor Central and there are more and new rumors that Theo Epstein may be the next Dodger GM! I’m still frustrated that Paul DePodesta was fired (and how it happened), but having Theo as GM would be awesome. It would also be cool if the job went to Kim Ng, which would make her the first female GM in baseball (president can’t be far behind). Anyway, what a great start to the day! Um, and to follow the analogy, if the internet is christmas, google is santa (or aunt and uncle who always deliver the goods with sweet presents) and bloglines my stocking!

Well, it’s totally just a rumor (from ESPN Insider MLB Rumor Central). But if it happens, I will be very happy. Why? Well, for one, there’s no longer a curse in Beantown, and for two, Epstein is a yalie! Not a cantab loser like DePodesta (still lots of love for DePo even though he went to Harvard). Could this put the old blue back back into the old blue?

WTF! I just read news that Paul DePodesta was fired as GM of the Dodgers. The new ownership was already on shaky ground when they bought the team in part with a loan from News Corp (who they bought they team from!) (ok, I’d like to buy your car but I’ll need 10 grand to buy it from you, can you spare me 10 grand? wtf!) – then Frank McCourt (the owner) made his wife the president of the team! (WTF! I don’t care if she’s the best corporate exec evar (which she isn’t) – this is just too incestuous). But, they did hire Paul DePodesta — and they were letting him do his magic — until today. This team is in trouble. The owners never had the money it takes to build a winning baseball team — now it is blatantly obvious that they don’t have the brains!

Well, I guess I can follow my fan allegiances to wherever Paul DePo ends up – or maybe wherever Theo Epstein ends up — or maybe the Angels (there’s a good owner! albeit a bit crazy with the team renaming thing) — or maybe even back to the Yankees (god forbid). (just so you know, I grew up nowhere close to any MLB team and didn’t really get into the sport until college. So, I have no strong childhood allegiances to any team, and I started following the Dodgers when I moved to LA (local team, right, makes sense, plus they too had left the east coast for LA). so, maybe I’ll just move somewhere that has a better run local team).

UGH. Well, we’ll see what happens. I do LOVE the MLB offseason, and this is certainly already turning out to be an exciting one!

I’ll check back later and see if my ire has calmed. Too bad

Links to people who know much more about this:
Dodger Thoughts (my favorite)
Baseball Analysts (another blog)
ESPN News Item
Good ESPN Article

Oh, and it will be interesting to see if the idiot sports writers at the LA Times say good things about this. They’ve always been dogging DePodesta. I can’t stand some of the articles they write.