The trade rumor that just won’t seem to die is the potential exchange of Colorado Rockies All-Star shortstop Troy Tulowitzki to the Mets for either Zack Wheeler or Noah Syndergaard or perhaps even both in an expanded deal.
Frankly I can’t understand why the Mets would even contemplate this deal. I have a lot of respect for what Troy Tulowitzki has accomplished in his career but he is injury prone and he has a long term contract that comes with an obligation that is north of $100 million. That figure alone should have team CEO Fred Wilpon ending any thoughts about seeing him in a Mets uniform.
Aside from the economics there is the old baseball adage that you can never have enough pitching. No one can predict the futures of either Zack Wheeler or Noah Syndergaard (who has yet to throw a pitch in the majors) but I would be very leery of trading them for a big name whose best days may be in the past. 43 years ago the Mets traded a young pitcher named Nolan Ryan to the Angels for veteran infielder Jim Fregosi who had been a perennial American League All-Star. All teams make bad trades from time to time but that one stands out as a cautionary tale of lopsided exchanges between baseball teams.
You can’t tell the Yankees without a scorecard after all of the moves their general manager Brian Cashman has made since the season ended starting with the acquisition of shortstop Didi Gregorius from the Diamondbacks as the replacement for the guy who had the long farewell tour this past season.
Cashman understandably didn’t want to hand back the third baseman’s job to 40 year-old Alex Rodriguez who missed the entire 2014 season serving a Major League Baseball-imposed suspension for using performance enhancing drugs so he wisely re-signed Chase Headley whom he acquired from the Padres last August.
Last week Cashman made his most intriguing trade of 2014 as he sent pitcher David Phelps and second baseman Martin Pardo to the Miami Marlins for pitcher Nathan Eovaldi and first baseman Garrett Jones. Eovaldi was a highly regarded pitching prospect in the Dodgers’ system not that long ago while Jones gives the Yankees some insurance in case Mark Teixeira doesn’t reverse his declining production.
While all of us know Sports Illustrated as the weekly magazine that covers the world of athletics it has expanded over the years into the book business. Among its recent releases are a pair of coffee table books “NFL QB” and “Basketball’s Greatest” which showcase the work of SI’s legendary photographers, as well as its annual compendium of facts and trivia, “The 2015 Sports Illustrated Almanac.” Any of these make for a good last minute gift for any sports fans that you know.
Some of the industry’s biggest bold-faced names such as NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, former NBC Sports CEO Dick Ebersol, former ESPN chairman George Bodenheimer, CBS Sports head Sean McManus, and American Athletic Conference commissioner Mike Aresco turned out last Tuesday for the eighth annual Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame induction ceremonies.
Among those honored were the late sportscaster Chris Schenkel who was both the face of bowling on television for most baby boomers; recently retired NBA Commissioner David Stern; NFL Network chief Steve Bornstein; and the perennial life of any party, former Fox Sports chairman David Hill. Fox Sports took out a full page ad in the evening’s program showing Hill posed behind a giant glass of scotch. The late Dean Martin would have been proud of David keeping his act alive.
Longtime NFL Fox Sports sideline reporter Pam Oliver is profiled in the current issue of TV Guide. Oliver is giving up the Sunday afternoon beat in order to become a senior sports correspondent for the network.
Epix, a premium cable network that competes with HBO, Showtime, and Starz, continues to delve into sports as it’s in the midst of a four-part “The Road To The NHL Winter Classic” miniseries that is shown on Tuesday evenings. This year’s New Year’s Day outdoor game will pit the Chicago Black Hawks against the Washington Capitals at Nationals Park in DC.
The Yankees are putting all of their media muscle into their new Major League Soccer team, the New York City Football Club, that will begin playing at Yankee Stadium in March. It was announced that both the Yankees’ main TV outlet, the YES Network, and their former radio home, WCBS-AM (they moved to sister CBS Radio station, WFAN, in 2014) will be broadcasting NYCFC games.
If you are off for the upcoming holiday week and want to go to someplace warm without breaking your budget, my advice is to forget Florida. The entire tourism industry of the Sunshine State knows the New York City public school calendar inside and out and prices accordingly.
On the other hand, San Diego, California offers great bang for the buck and is frequently warmer than Miami in late December and all of January. Despite this, the winter is surprisingly considered off-season in San Diego and most of Southern California. The Hyatt Regency La Jolla in the northeast Queens-like neighborhood of University Town Center, the Grande Colonial Hotel which is akin to the Waldorf-Astoria and located in the tony village of La Jolla, and the West Inn & Suites situated in the northern San Diego County town of Carlsbad, all offer great deals this time of year.
Queens’ own JetBlue offers twice daily air service between JFK and San Diego’s Lindbergh Airport.