The Winter Meetings Logo is Stupid; Also, Phillies News

What the hell is this?  I realize they’re in Indianapolis, but what’s with the checkered flag?  Do they think this is a race? It’s not even a sport.  It’s a bunch of meetings, as indicated right there on the logo. Did the person behind this assume that “Baseball Winter Meetings” meant a bunch of brass suits, running around a race track swinging briefcases at each other?  Because I look at this and I hear engines revving, people screaming, and generations of highly unbiblical sex filling a stadium to watch brightly colored cars go in a circle.

But I hear those things all the time, too, so maybe it’s not so bad.

With an estimated $130 million out of $140 million being used up, Ruben Amaro and team are tasked with building a bullpen.  Amaro claims that free agents will be the solution, but if he wants to “get creative” with a trade, he will.  If that means abducting players from their homes and forcing them to pitch for us, then, you know.  Good.

Brian Giles is being tossed around as another piece of the bench, but it’s a long way from official, and his agent claims he’d want more playing time than Phils current outfield would allow.  Have you ever seen Shane Victorino being removed from a baseball game?  Sneak up on a rottweiler while it’s eating and kick the food bowl away.

With their current bullpen, Clay Condrey, Chad Durbin, Chan Ho Park, and “Team Elbow Surgery” (Brad Lidge and J.C. Romero) Amaro just keeps giving “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t!” answers to any inquiries about arbitration, playability, and the like.  He, like us, is waiting to see what happens.

We Get a Trophy for This, Right?  And a Banner?

You know, a lot of people would tell you that the best team in baseball is the one holding the World Series trophy.

But, with the Phillies being voted “Organization of the Year,” you might say that’s arguable.  You might say it’s better than a World Series trophy.

It isn’t, but you could say it.  The words could come out of your mouth, if you wanted them to.

Not knowing such an award existed until this morning, I’ve got to say I’m honored that this club has been given the prestigious honor.  The article opens with a description of the Phils in ’98; J.D. Drew nowhere to be found, Scott Rolen pissing his pants, half the roster somehow contracting the Bubonic Plague and filling the dugout with an unholy volume of bodily fluids.

*Sigh* Those weren’t the days.

The turnaround they speak of is immense and admirable, and I especially like the part where Ruben Amaro takes some general managing advice from a busboy in a restaurant.

Tigers to Phillies:  “Damn it.”

I don’t know if the “Miguel Cabrera Got Drunk at a Hotel Bar” storyline has any merit outside of allowing Ozzie Guillen a chance to swear in public, but they’re dragging it back out into the open.

Now Ozzie’s being accused of joining Cabrera in his drunkening, to which he politely responded, “I wish Miguel was with me, ’cause if he had been with me, none of this (bad stuff) (Haha!  There it is!–Ed.) would have happened.”

Yeah, uh… right.  He means much worse “bad stuff” would have happened, right?  Yeah.  He does.

Anyways, that pointless saga allowed for a segue into the arbitration-less Placido Polanco, who is now a Phillie.  The Tigers are saying they would have offered arbitration if they had known he’d be signed, and Ruben Amaro says they probably wouldn’t have signed him if he’d been offered arbitration.  Then he looked behind him at a busboy and gave him a thumbs up.  The gesture was returned to him.

“If we’d have known he was going to get that deal, of course we would have (offered arbitration). But we didn’t have that certainty,” said Dave Dombrowski, Tigers GM and president.

This just in:  Detroit Tigers GM cannot predict the future.  This is The Detroit News, reporting.  Good night.

STRAY BULLETS

• Brandon Lyon refused to be arbitrationized.  He wants a multi-year deal, and the Tigers, with their pockets inside out and shrugging, are not hasty to give it to him.
• There were just a mind-shattering amount of penalties in the Packers game last night.
• Text to Roommate after Sixers loss:  “Iverson Blows Game, Season:  City of Philadelphia Burns to the Ground.”
• His response:  “I’ve been pouring gasoline for the last 45 minutes.”