There are no shortage of puns when it comes to Yu Darvish's posting. Darvish, who is believed to be going to the Toronto Blue Jays or Texas Rangers, was the subject of possibly the best/worst pun I've ever seen in an online baseball-related article. You know what? I'm going to go with best on that one. Two time OTM Podcast guest and blogmaster* for The Score Dustin Parkes asks the mortal question, Yu Spin Me Right Round Darvish, Right Round. Which immediately puts that stupid song into my head. (Seriously, check that video out. It's just... wow.) Anyway, as the Mr. Parkes' article notes, we don't know who won the rights to negotiate a contract with the soon to be immortal Yu Darvish. All we know is who didn't win. We know the Red Sox didn't win, at least in part because they didn't try. That has a tendency to prevent success. We think the Yankees didn't win either. As Mr. Parkes somewhat excitedly notes, we think the Blue Jays may have won. Maybe. If you believe Jim Bowden. So that's something until, you know, we actually find out.
*I just made that title up. Pretty rad, huh?
You love prospects, I love prospects, well all love prospects. Prospects are hope for the future, and as an added bonus, they aren't yet tainted by any failure at the major league level as they've yet to show up on the scene. In celebration (or because they couldn't think of anything better to write) the folks over at Bullpen Banter are running down their top ten prospect lists. They recently covered the Red Sox. There are, in fact, two lists on the site, and a third (based solely on ceiling) in the comments by the two authors. It's interesting to compare their lists to that of Sox Prospects. If you do that, you'll see some major differences. I can't speak to the reasons behind those differences, but if nothing else, it's just more proof that prospects are hard to figure.
Speaking of prospects being hard to figure, Yoenis Cespedes, the Cuban free agent teams have been drooling over has another video out extolling his virtues. It's not quite as strange as the first video, but it's still pretty weird. For one, it's a scouting video that is 28 minutes long. For another, it features... well, just take a gander for your self. Baseball Prospectus's Kevin Goldstein, who covered the first video, has some irreverent commentary on this as well. The video is at the end of the article, which is free. Yay.
Marc posted this below, but on the off chance you missed it, Brian MacPherson's piece for the Providence Journal on the Red Sox payroll situation going forward is a must read.
In actual baseball news, or as close as we seem to get to actual baseball news this time of year, the Red Sox are rumored to be looking at Royals closer Joakim Soria. This would, if nothing else, have the effect of forcing me to learn how to correctly spell 'Joakim." The fact that the Red Sox would inquire with the Royals about Soria shouldn't surprise anyone. Hell, the only closer I'd expect the Sox haven't inquired on this winter is Mariano Rivera. Which is good. The team should do it's due diligence. Maybe something will come of it soon or, more likely, down the road. But don't expect Soria to don a Sox uniform next year. Meaning I can go back to calling him Yokim or Jokem, or Jokey McJokerson. Whatever.
Finally, over at ESPN's Sweet Spot, David Schoenfield correctly notes that, even with Albert Pujols in the center of it, the Angles lineup shouldn't scare anyone. That is unless they're really robots which can strike at any time and when they grab you with those metal claws you can't break free because they're made of metal and robots are strong. Happy Monday.