The Dodger's were, perhaps along with the Red and Yankees, the biggest winners at the trading deadline this year. Ned Colletti managed to really help the team without giving up very much at all. Here are the trades:
1. The Dodgers get Elmer Desens from Kansas City for Odalis Perez, and two Class A prospects.
This was the Dodgers getting rid of (1) an unproductive player and, (2) a disruptive player. Perez probably wouldn't have gotten picked up in front of my house with a "free" sign on him. If Perez thought things were bad for him with the Dodgers he'll be a basket case in the baseball purgatory that is the Glass Family KC Royals. Desens has already demonstrated that he is a useful addition to the Dodger bullpen. Desens is a bullpen guy and only an occasional spot starter and this Dodger coaching staff will understand that as opposed to the previous group.
2. The Dodgers get Wilson Betemit for Danys Baez and Willy Aybar.
Baez was a bust, there is just no getting around it. He lost his closing job even after Gagne was gone and he wasn't doing that great as a set up guy. Aybar is a prospect whom the Dodgers really didn't need. He's an above average hitter and plays a lot of positions, but none of them very well. Betemit (who went 3 for 4 in his first game) is an above average hitter and fielder, who was never going to get a chance at 3rd in Atlanta. Third base is his for a while anyway.
3. The Dodgers get Greg Maddux and $2million cash for Caesar Izturis.
This is an excellent trade. The Dodgers come out on the plus side in money and only have to give up a player who no longer fit into their plans. He didn't have a position to play with the Dodgers and he will always be a fair hitting (no power) great glove guy. Not sure how he fits with the Cubs. Maddux comes and give the Dodgers rotation help. Pitching friendly Dodger stadium is much better suited to Maddux and he will also have a good clubhouse presence and a good "coach." I expect the Dodgers to resign him for next year.
4. The Dodgers get Julio Lugo for Joel Guzman and a Singe A player.
This trade makes me think that either Jeff Kent or Nomar Garciapara is more seriously injured than the team has let on (if that's the case my guess is that it's Kent). Lugo is an upgrade with the bat and no loss with the glove. I assume he'll play 2nd base, which will give the Dodgers a very, very good fielding infield. Guzman may wind up being the Roberto Clemente of 2006 (for those who don't know, the Dodgers had Roberto Clemente in their minor league system and instead of bringing him up to Brooklyn they tried to hide him one year in their farm system, but Branch Rickey, who had been the Dodgers GM and was now at Pittsburgh knew Clemente and got him in one of the draft deals that existed in the 1950's) or not. He was really the only prospect that they brought up this year who didn't do much.
All in all, the Dodgers gave up none of their "core" prospects and probably helped their chances to win the division more than any other team in the west.
Here's a nice story on the Fox News Page, entitled Man Finds 188-Year-Old Bible in Dump Bin. The story explains how an electrician by the name of Michael Hoskins found several boxes of old books at the dump near Danville, VA. Upon looking through he found an old Bible, a King James Bible dated from 1818 and belonged to the Issac Enoch Family (having various family notations on the inside pages, a very common practice for family Bibles).
The story explains that he is now getting offers in the $900 range for the Bible. The story quotes Hoskins as saying his research shows that it was printed in Pittsburgh and that there are less than "a half dozen" of this Bible in existence. The Bible has some level of damage from water and some fire damage. Hoskins adds this ephemeral statement that, "I was always told a Bible wouldn't burn and have seen it before in other church and house fires."
Hoskins is determined to hold onto the Bible for a better price. "No, this Bible has made it through a lot. I am going to hold on to it for now. I will sell for the right price, but $900 is not realistic, not with only six of them left in existence."
Well, as a librarian these kinds of stories always peak my interest. It is a cute story with a little human interest, but it would have been nice if the reporter (obviously a very novice AP reporter, the story is not very well written or researched) had included some useful information or perhaps gotten some expert information to include. First of all to say that Hoskins' research has shown anything is only valid if he has some expertise in old rare Bibles (which he obviously doesn't). To say that there are only six or so left in existence, makes it sound like there are only 6 or so King James Bibles that old left in existence. If that's the case I have all the others in my library!
The truth is there are probably more like 6,000 in existence just from the year 1818. Bibles were produced in rather large numbers in that era in America and virtually every family had at least one. Now it may be that there are only six or so left from that particular publisher (the publisher is not named), but I'm not sure how that could possibly be determined with any certainty. Old family Bibles are quite numerous and are generally not very valuable to collectors or book dealers. The way they obtain monetary value would be (1) it belonged to an important or significant family; (2) there are notations in the Bible from the owners that would be of historical interest; (3) sometimes the printing will make the value increase, for instance if there hand colored engravings (drawings or maps) or the engravings are otherwise rare and noteworthy; or (4) if the printer was a noted individual or if the process itself (type of paper, cover, gilding, etc.) was particularly noteworthy. If there are valuable engravings or colored work, the pages are often just be removed and sold individually.
Mr. Hoskins did find a descendant of Issac Enoch, made copies of the family information in the and sent it along. This apparently helped fill in some family history for them and that was a nice thing to do. But if Mr. Hoskins expects to make a financial killing on his find, I fear he will be rather disappointed.
Today must be a full moon or something. Some of the news stories are really strange today. Some are just odd and some are just further examples of stupidity.
Let's start with everyone's favorite NFL wide receiver, Terrell Owens. In this story, Owen's claims he was misquoted. Now, if you know Owen's interesting history and relations with the press, this claim would not seem to be that surprising. However, he's claiming he was misquoted in his own autobiography! This should serve as a notice to Cowboy owner Jimmy Jones and coach Bill Parcels what they can expect this season with Owens.
On a more serious note, the US Senate today defeated an ammendment to a appropriations bill that would have funded the construction of a fence on the US-Mexico Border. Of course this is the same fence that the same Senate approved building a few months ago. This is perhaps one of the reasons people are so entirely distrustful of politics and politicians. The public favors a strong border that people can't just walk across by an overwhelming majority. Politicians know that, but don't want to do it, but also don't want voters to think they don't care. Answer: Vote in a large majority to construct the fence, have press releases, photo-ops and make speeches; but then when it comes right down to it, undo the vote when no one is looking by failing to allocate any money to actually do the construction.
Back to sports. My favorite team, the Dodgers, have historically, not done too well with signing pitchers to long term contracts (I think back to Dave Goltz and Don Stanhouse in 1980 to Kevin Brown and Darren Driefort more recently). Right now the Dodgers are saddled with hopefully the last of these really bad signings. Odalis Perez is in the second year of a 3 year $24 million contract (this means that he makes roughly $150k PER WEEK!). Since signing this contract he has been ineffective (when he hasn't been hurt). This year he is 4-4 with an ERA of 6.79. After giving up the winning home run in the game last night he complained not that his pitching was bad and he was hurting the team, but that the Dodgers were treating him like trash. Perez has almost no trade value, so the Dodgers almost certainly will just designate him for assignment. Which means he can keep collecting his $150k PER WEEK and not do any work for about another year and a half. Most people would not equate that salary to being "treated like trash."
Now to something really serious (only the response by some is absurd). In the growing war between Israel and Hezbollah and Hamas, the Hezbollah terrorists used an unmanned drone with explosives to attack an Israeli naval vessel. That Hezbollah has this level of technology certainly demonstrates that Iran and/or Syria have supplied their surrogates with some significant weaponry. That anyone evaluating the situation rationally thinks that Iran and the nut-cases running that country are people that can be negotiated with is an exercise in complete denial of reality. The radical Arab countries have been using Hamas and Hezbollah (among others) to keep Israel bleeding for years. It looks like (1) Israel has come to a determination that this has to stop and that (2) President Bush is inclined to let Israel do what it has to do to survive.
Israel is an ally and the United States, I think, needs to become more actively involved in this war. The moderate nations like Egypt and Saudi Arabia can't help, but they can't and won't object. Neither wants Iran to expand its influence any further and none of them (and Turkey to the north) have any use for Syria. Syria, like North Korea and Cuba, is simply a relic regime left over from the old Soviet Union days. It is little more than a national terrorist base for everyone who stands to overthrow democracy. Syria and Iran detest anything smacking of a pluralistic democracy. They hate the idea of Iraq being a pluralistic democracy; they hate Israel for the same reasons (although they use religion and "support for the Palestinians" as a pretext) and look what these countries have done to keep Lebanon from returning to a democracy. Turkey, I think, realizes that their own pluralistic society would be the next target of the radicals should they continue unstopped and certainly Egypt knows exactly how popular their government is in Iran and Syria.