2008 preview: NL West

ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS

In general

There is only one certainty in the NL West this year: The Giants will not win the division. And they probably will finish last. After that, this group is a tossup. Arizona, Colorado, Los Angeles and San Diego can each win this thing, and each could finish anywhere from second to fourth. We could see all four within five games of one another at the end. Or we could see one or two of them crash and burn and fall a dozen games or more off the pace.

I don't feel good about this one, but I'm going with Arizona because I like their balance. If Randy Johnson is healthy and can win 12 games -- he needs 16 to get to 300 -- that's not a bad fourth starter, and a fourth starter is probably what you have to consider him to be now. Putting him behind Brandon Webb, Dan Haren and (my choice) Micah Owings gives the D-backs a deep rotation, and Doug Davis as a fifth starter is more than a lot of teams have. In the 'pen, tabbing Brandon Lyon as the closer soon after Jose Valverde was traded was a move questioned by some -- OK, maybe mostly fantasy folk -- but if he can hold the job, it makes the relief corps that much deeper, because it keeps hard-throwing Tony Pena in a setup role. But if the two are switched, they might not see that much of a dropoff. They've also got Chad Qualls, acquired in the Valverde deal.

Arizona's West title in 2007 was a bit of an anomaly. The D-backs went 90-72, but gave up more runs than they scored -- scoring, on average, 4.40 runs per game but yielding 4.52. Baseball Prospectus put their expected record with that run differential at 79-83. In 2006, the Padres allowed more runs than they scored in winning the division, but in '07, they collapsed down the stretch and gave up the Wild Card spot to the Rockies. But the young lineup Arizona enters 2008 with is similar to the one it finished '07 with, meaning these young guys have a year under their belts and should see some improvement. They've experienced first place, a pennant race and two playoff rounds. Eric Byrnes, Chris Young and Justin Upton may be the finest young outfield in baseball and Stephen Drew will soon emerge into an infield leader as Orlando Hudson passes the torch. Mark Reynolds and Conor Jackson at the corners still have a little to prove over the course of a full season, but this does have the makings of a strong young infield. If Chad Tracy can recover from his injuries, he's a viable backup or replacement at either third or first base.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

The Big Unit is the lynchpin. If he's healthy and can fill out the rotation -- pushing Edgar Gonzalez or whoever back into the bullpen -- they're better off. I'd like to see him get to 300 wins, but 16 this year is asking a lot. How will Haren handle the change from one of baseball's best pitcher's parks to one that's not so forgiving? Can Lyon hold onto the closer's job? Is Chris Young a 30-30 guy in his second season? Just how good will Upton be? And do the D-backs have a budding rivalry with the Rockies that will provide plenty of great moments for years to come?

COLORADO ROCKIES

In general

I love this club and I wanted to put them first, but with three-fifths of their starting rotation still having a lot to prove and the nature of their playoff appearance last year -- winning 20 out of 21 in September and October will not happen in 2008 -- I have to bump them down a notch. I'm tempted, in fact, to put them third, but I'm not going to; I'll explain when I get to that third-place team.

I love the Rockies because they have two of the best hitters in the division. Matt Holliday is the top player out West and Troy Tulowitzki may soon battle him for that title. Tulo is 6'3", 205 pounds -- the same height and 20 pounds lighter (currently) than another former young shortstop star who began his career in the Pacific time zone. That would be Alex Rodriguez, and while I'm not saying Tulo is going to go on to hit 700 home runs over his career (as everyone can pretty much agree A-Rod will, I think), to me there are a lot of similarities between the two. Tulo is just as good a defender at short as A-Rod was, and in his first season he developed into a threat at the plate and a leader on the field and in the clubhouse, prompting the Rockies to come forward with the biggest contract for a player with such little experience in Major League history. Like the American League was in the 90s, the NL is now stocked with young star shortstops. With Tulo, Drew, Jose Reyes, Hanley Ramirez and Jimmy Rollins, at least two deserving players will soon be left out of most All-Star Games.

Jeff Francis will finish his career as, by far, the best pitcher ever to wear the purple and black and aside from the aforementioned sluggers, perhaps the best draft pick in the organization's history. Yes, better than Todd Helton. But behind Francis and Aaron Cook, the Rox will be turning to Ubaldo Jimenez and two of these three: Franklin Morales, Mark Redman and Josh Towers. So that's two youngsters and two veterans who don't raise too much excitment in any fan. In relief, the emergence of Manny Corpas as the closer allowed three-time All-Star Brian Fuentes to become a setup man. Taylor Buchholz has had a strong spring, and Ryan Speier, Jose Cappellan and Luis Vizcaino help to make up a solid stock of reserve arms.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Tulo, Tulo, Tulo. Love that guy. Plus, how does this team follow up last year? And how do opponents react? I can tell you that no one in the New York City area expected Colorado to sweep the Mets and Yankees out of Coors. In recent years, I'd looked at the Mets' annual Denver trip as a chance to win two out of three or three out of four, with the ERAs taking a hit but the averages getting a boost. Now, it's not such an easy W.

LOS ANGELES DODGERS

In general

Joe Torre switches coasts and takes on a new challenge. I wanted to put the Dodgers second just because of him. I considered them for the top spot as well, but I'm scared off by all the innings they want to give to Esteban Loaiza, Chad Billingsley and the unknown in Hiroki Kuroda. I don't like all the at-bats they have tied into Jeff Kent, Nomar Garciaparra and Juan Pierre, either. We want to see the kids play -- James Loney (he will), Andre Ethier and Matt Kemp. Takashi Saito, despite the 1.40 ERA in '07, is considered shaky at 38 and no one ever praised Torre's handling of the bullpen those last few years in the Bronx. Scott Proctor must've felt a slight sense of dread when the Dodgers signed Torre, figuring he had escaped him last year in the Wilson Betemit trade. Hopefully Torre doesn't overuse Jonathan Broxton and ruin him for all of us.

That said, Torre pretty much did it all with the Yankees. He won when he had everything he needed and was able to coast through a season and he managed against injuries and adversity to recover from early deficits to reach the postseason. I'd like to think he can come to L.A. and be a quick fix, but he clearly doesn't have the personnel he did when he arrived in New York.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Saturday's exhibition game against the Red Sox at the L.A. Coliseum. I love the historical nod to kick off the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the team's move west. Also, can Torre make this a memorable anniversary? Does Andruw Jones bounce back after a tough final season in Atlanta? Do Nomar and Kent have anything left? Can the rotation veterans -- Brad Penny, Derek Lowe and Loaiza -- put together a full season? Penny's had second-half issues in the past and Lowe's in a contract year at 35 (on June 1) after going 12-14 last year, albeit with a decent 3.88 ERA.

SAN DIEGO PADRES

In general

When the minor leaguers show they're ready for the Majors, yet the organization insists on sending them down to start the season, it frustrates us as fans. Imagine what it does to the players. We saw it with B.J. Upton in Tampa, and a bit with Delmon Young, too. Young spoke out about it and Upton took three years to finally stick -- and thrive. So it's maddening to see Chase Headley sent to Triple-A in favor of Jody Gerut in left field in San Diego. It's understandable that the Padres want to see him gain more experience in the outfield (they have Kevin Kouzmanoff at third base, Headley's natural position), but for a team that could use a strong outfield bat, it's a tough decision. San Diego's starting outfield -- Jim Edmonds (when he's in there, and he probably won't be to start the season), Brian Giles and Gerut -- should probably be batting sixth, seventh and eighth in the lineup. It remains to be seen if they actually will, so if they don't, that may not be a good sign. Particularly if Giles is the leadoff batter.

There's more to like in the infield, where Kouzmanoff, shortstop Khalil Green and first baseman Adrian Gonzalez are all capable of 20-30 home runs (or more, in Gonzalez's case) and 90-100 RBIs. Second baseman Tadahito Iguchi brings a little speed and a contact bat to the equation.

But pitching is this team's strength, as it should be in the hurler-friendly confines of Petco Park. A defending Cy Young winner leads the rotation (Jake Peavy), a potential one follows (Chris Young) and a former one is third in the rotation (Greg Maddux). Fourth starter Randy Wolf is now entering his second season after Tommy John surgery (always a benchmark). If Mark Prior reaches the Majors this year -- and stays there -- then what a steal. San Diego is also home to one of the best bullpens in the game, so if you manage to knock out the starter, you're going to have to deal with career saves leader Trevor Hoffman, setup men Heath Bell and Cla Meredith and a group of other reliable arms.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Does Headley come up to stay? Ever since I heard a minor league report mentioning Gregg Jefferies on a Mets postgame show in 1987, I love watching careers bloom. Does Young win 20? Been a fan of his since 2002, when he pitched for the Hickory Crawdads in the South Atlantic League and a road trip to Lakewood, N.J., just happened to come on the weekend of Princeton's graduation, which meant Young got to attend the ceremonies with his class. Does Hoffman still have it? His struggles in the final week of the 2007 season cost the Padres the Wild Card. They had it sewn up with a win on the final Saturday, but Tony Gwynn Jr. doomed his dad's former team with a triple off Hoffman. And then T-Hoff couldn't keep the Rockies off the board in the Wild Card playoff (whether or not Holliday has yet to touch the plate).

SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS

In general

Bye-bye, Barry. No one is sorry to see him go, including, I suspect, team brass. They may be out a few million in revenue from an empty ballpark with a last-place team, but even with the stadium payments to make, they may prefer at least one season of quiet despite the financial issues. Plus, they get to finally see what the future holds as they weed out the past-their-usefulness ("prime" has long passed some of these guys by) holdovers like Ray Durham and Omar Vizquel. Another one of those, Rich Aurilia, is penciled in as the third baseman; Dave Roberts takes up left field with OK speed but little else; and Randy Winn is in right. Bonds' departure brought the team's average age down a bit, but not by much. Oh, and they overpaid for Aaron Rowand, who most certainly was bouyed in 2007 by the extremely favorable conditions of hitting in Citizens Bank Park in a contract year.

There's more to like on the mound, at least after you get past Barry Zito. OK, that's not fair -- it was just one year in San Francisco. But AT&T Park isn't that much more of a hitter's park than Oakland's Coliseum, and he didn't have to face the DH anymore. He shouldn't have been that bad last year. This was also a team on which Matt Cain went 7-16 with a 3.65 ERA -- with Barry Bonds. Now, Bengie Molina is hitting cleanup. Coming off a season with 19 home runs. Yeah.

What I'm looking forward to seeing

Mainly, do they make a trade for a third baseman? That speculation would be more exciting than some of the Giants' games. And the club is high on outfielder Rajai Davis, so does he wrestle a starting gig from someone? After Zito, Cain and Lincecum, I have little interest in the rotation, but with each five-run outing, I'm happier and happier that the Giants opened the bank and scared off the Mets. If Zito was in New York now, Johan Santana wouldn't be. And does Brian Wilson keep the closer's job? I only care for fantasy purposes.

Time to choose a bandwagon

OK, it's been two weeks since the season ended, since the Mets' collapse was complete. Time heals all wounds, and while they may not yet be healed, they are at least sufficiently scabbed over so as not to cause wincing upon being touched.

Throughout those 17 days of September, we kept reminding ourselves that the Cardinals and Tigers struggled last September, yet they ended up in the World Series. "We just have to get there," we thought.

Not so easy.

The Mets choked; they simply gave up and gave away the NL East. Instead of setting up their postseason rotation during the final week of the season against the Marlins and Nationals, they were still trying to get into the postseason. The never got there.

It wouldn't have mattered.

Is there a more amazing story in sports right now than the Colorado Rockies? This is the autumn of upstarts, where South Florida is No. 2 in the AP and BCS rankings, where Kansas is among the final handful of undefeated teams, where Arizona State is the Pac-10 team that finds itself in the "controlling its own destiny" position for a BCS berth. Yet the Rockies may be the most amazing story of all.

After a last-place finish in 2006, the Rockies weren't expected to contend until next year at the earliest, but they tore through September, compiling a 10-game winning streak and winning 13 of their last 14 to force a tie with the Padres for the NL Wild Card. Getting the one-game playoff at home, Colorado came back to defeat Trevor Hoffman in extra innings -- whether or not Matt Holliday touched the plate didn't matter when the umpire signaled that he was safe -- and entered the NLDS on a roll.

That train continued to steamroll the Phillies and the Diamondbacks -- the team with the NL's best record, and one that finished a mere game (after the Rockies' extra win in their playoff with the Padres) ahead of Colorado -- in seven straight.

Now Denver will host its first World Series, on the last weekend of October. If the NL had home-field advantage in a Series that goes seven games, the Rockies would've been playing at Coors Field in November. Frankly, I'm pulling for snow -- or maybe just a blizzard from the Rockies on an off-day.

Should the Indians win one more game against the Red Sox, they'll enter the Fall Classic as the likely favorite, with a chance to win their first championship since 1948. You can expect to see Bob Feller at Jacobs Field for Game 1 on Oct. 24. But no matter the matchup, I can find reasons to pull for any of these teams. Can Colorado keep up its insane pace? Will the Tribe break its title drought? Can the Red Sox pull of yet another ALCS comeback and then win their second title in three years after going 0-for-86?

In a you-had-to-see-it-to-believe-it year like this one, it's fitting that those are the options we're left with.

Hawk and Jackson are just gone

In watching baseball at work, I have the privilege -- or the chore -- of listening to all of the various broadcasting teams around the country. The Dodgers' Vin Scully remains the cream of the crop and the last of the legends. There will never be another like him. Ever. Scully continues to fly solo, calling the game as a one-way conversation with the fans, no partner necessary.

Others I am fond of for their alertness and knowledge (the Mets' team of Gary Cohen and Ron Darling) or their wackiness and insanity, at least in blowouts (Boston's Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy). WGN's Len Kasper and Bob Brenly are solid, though not spectacular, and Arizona's Daron Sutton and Mark Grace are just nuts.

But the ones I can't stand are the extreme homers, the announcers who bleed the team's colors and make no effort to be impartial. Actually, forget impartial, because these days, fans want their announcers to be favorable toward their teams, and it's not all that bad if they skew a little toward the home team. Honesty would be nice, though. What I can't stand are the broadcast teams that argue on the air that a close play that went against their team should have gone in favor of it, but then when replays clearly show the call to be correct, they make no effort to correct themselves and basically ignore the video evidence in front of them -- and in front of the millions of fans watching.

Among those that are tough to listen to, in ascending order of pain are the Marlins' Rich Waltz and Tommy Hutton, the Nationals' Bob Carpenter and Don Sutton and the White Sox duo of Ken "Hawk" Harrelson and Darrin Jackson.

Harrelson and Jackson clinched the title on Sunday.

Check out the video clip "Guillen gets ejected" at the top of the White Sox game story. It's four minutes and 20 seconds long, but in the first 10 seconds or so, you can see the play develop and understand what is going to happen and what the call should be. Feel free to watch it yourself before reading further. See if you can spot what Harrelson and Jackson refused to see.

In the final four minutes of the clip, Harrelson and Jackson don't even come close to grasping what has happened, don't notice through their black-and-white rage that the umpires are correct, or make an effort to glance at their replay monitors which, if the guys in the truck were doing their jobs, would show them the play over again. Though Comcast SportsNet shows several replays during the clip, none of them show the runner rounding second. Had they done that, perhaps the announcers -- OK, at least the fans -- would've seen the play and understood why there was a reversal.

At the 8- or 9-second mark, you can see the Cubs runner rounding second, Angel Pagan, come in contact with the White Sox shortstop, Juan Uribe. The umpire in the foreground, the third-base ump, raises his arms and points toward second base. He's calling obstruction on Uribe. Perhaps he should have been more forceful with his call, making more noise and stopping the play dead. Instead, the White Sox play it out, the Cubs get caught in several rundowns -- "pickles" as Harrelson insists on calling them, like he's watching a bunch of 8-year-olds in Lincoln Park -- and two outs are made. Or seem to be made.

Immediately after the play is over, crew chief Joe West, the second-base umpire, calls the umpires together to discuss what happened. When they start putting Cubs back on the bases, Harrelson and Jackson begin to grow outraged. It's hilarious, really. Harrelson calls it "B.S." several times; Jackson tries to say the umpires didn't adhere to their individual responsibilities and someone missed the call. The whole time, like in a movie, those of us who noticed the obstruction can only laugh at their homerism or frown at their stupidity.

The Chicago Tribune's Teddy Greenstein was on top of it, too. In fact, at the end of the column, Greenstein quotes Harrelson after he'd finally noticed a replay, a comment that came after the clip on MLB.com ended: "Anytime I've ever seen an obstruction play, they call a dead ball. A dead ball means that everything stops right there." That may be true, Hawk, and that may be on the fault of the third-base umpire for not screaming the play dead immediately. And it may be in part because Pagan and Felix Pie, who was tagged out at home, are rookies and likely more prone to running the play out without a more forceful call from the men in blue.

At the 2:28 mark, Jackson says that if there was ever a case for instant replay in baseball, this play would be a good example of the need for it. Unfortunately for them and other White Sox fans, in this case, instant replay would've showed the umpires got it right in the end, which should be all that matters, no?

At the end of the clip, Jackson says, "I just don't know what they could have been looking at. It was really a straightfoward, simple play."

It certainly was -- and you guys got it wrong.

Baseball in The District

Washington will be a great big-league city, and it won't be long.

It's just not quite there yet.

At roughly 7:06 p.m. on April 14, 2005, the first pitch in the first official Major League Baseball game in 34 years was thrown by Livan Hernandez of the new Washington Nationals. Leadoff hitter Craig Counsell of the Arizona Diamondbacks took the pitch, a called strike down the middle that brought a roar from the crowd.

Only the crowd was on its collective asses. The fans stood and cheered for pregame introductions, for the ceremonial first pitch by the ass of a president, and as the team took the field. And yet, the majority of the 45,000 in attendance settled into their seats as Hernandez toed the rubber and Counsell stepped into the batter's box. "The first pitch in 34 years, and they're sitting down?" I asked Matt, one of whose two season tickets I used to come to the game. I've been to the last six Mets home openers, and not once have the 55,000 fans at Shea sat down for the first pitch of a new season, even last Monday when the team and its $119 million center fielder came home from the opening road trip 1-5. The Nationals were in first place, and their fans were sitting.

After the game, Brad, who was sitting a level below us, out of sight, said that his section stood, but from what I could see, that wasn't the case in about 90 percent of the sections around RFK Stadium. I suppose Matt and I were at fault, in part, sitting down in our front-row seats of the upper deck. But I was a visitor, so I didn't see it as my place to tell the fans of Washington how to start their first season in three decades. (Clearly, I have no problem doing so after the fact.) I was also filming the one pitch with my digital camera (I have the express, written consent from Major League Baseball around here somewhere), and I wasn't in a position to have to debate sitting vs. standing with the fans behind me. To our credit, however, we were the last people to sit down. I stood long enough to make sure everyone behind me really thought about what they were doing and whether or not is was how they truly wanted to welcome baseball back to the District.

That was really my only criticism of Washington's fans, however. They were loud and enthusiastic. Quaint, almost, in the way they booed any mention of opposing players. Certainly, they're happy to have baseball back in town, but they'll have to endure three seasons of an aging, no-frills stadium until they get a new one a few blocks away. I wonder how they'll respond to a one-run deficit in the ninth in August, when they're 15 games out of first place. They jumped and rocked the place -- literally, we could feel the upper deck shaking after Vinny Castilla's home run -- when the Nats scored, but will they be the kind of crowd that cheers to fire up the team when its backs are against the wall?

They know when pitchers are throwing at hitters, though. When Castilla came up in the eighth needing just a single for the cycle, Lance Cormier drilled him with the first pitch. The umpire gave both teams a warning as Castilla walked to first, and the crowd responded with a chorus of boos generally reserved for Alex Rodriguez in Boston. The boos continued after the inning ended and Cormier walked to the dugout and again after the game as the losing pitcher was announced (see? quaint). This last one, though, begged the question, which I posed to Matt: Why boo the losing pitcher? He sucked enough to let your team win -- doesn't he get some cheers? Even the Boston fans are smart enough to realize that, what with Mariano Rivera's effectiveness against the Sox recently.

After the game, Matt, Brad and I walked back from the stadium all the way to Union Station as part of a horde of red-clad Nationals fans. The first few blocks were spent debating what action should have been taken against Cormier for his intentional beaning. Brad said he should've been tossed immediately, and I disagreed. Part of me would like to see the old style of baseball when pitchers pitched inside and used brushback pitches to reclaim the outside half of the plate and beanballs were returned when the offending pitcher -- or at least the other team's best hitter -- came up to bat. Bob Gibson would have a 4.80 ERA -- or worse -- if he had to pitch today, where one inside pitch can get you a warning from the umpire. I think, in general, baseball is too soft. Granted, Arizona manager Bob Melvin's intentions were clear when Castilla came to bat, but there have been games where the first HBP brings a warning from the ump, who then tosses the next pitcher to nip a batter with a curve ball. Despite what most fans believe, a warning does not mean an automatic ejection for the next pitcher to hit a batter. The umpire still has discretion as to whether or not he felt the pitcher was intentionally throwing at the batter. Yet sometimes, they'll still toss a hurler for grazing a guy with a curve or losing his grip on a changeup that sails up and in.

Still, I think baseball will thrive in Washington, and I expect to return for numerous games these next few summers. I should try to get there for some Mets games, at least, since Brad proposed a bet before the season began. For each Nationals win against the Mets, I pay him $3; for each Mets win, he gives me $2. At the end of the season, we expect one of us to be buying the other a beer.

Baseball's cranky old man

We have a neighbor we call the Cranky Old Man. He's a thin, little man who shuffles around his driveway and front yard and is always giving advice to children playing too close to the street, or to Casey and me about parking our cars in our shared driveway or mixing recyclables with the regular trash. He's a stickler for the town laws, reminding us not to shovel snow into the road when the plow has already come by, yet he'll put his trash out before 6 p.m. the night before pickup and -- while this technically follows the law, it's still annoying -- fires up his lawn mower at the stroke of 8 a.m. on Saturdays.

In baseball, it's clear who's become the Cranky Old Man. Randy Johnson has been complaining about the losing in Arizona the way retirees in the surrounding Paradise Valley complain about the snow in Chicago before buying that second home in the desert. To his credit, he hasn't been tanking his starts to force a trade -- and don't believe he doesn't have it in him. Look at his stats in Seattle in 1998 before the trade to Houston, then look at his numbers as an Astro. It's not like he's holding the Diamondbacks hostage, but he's sure not making things pleasant around the clubhouse. This week's story in Sports Illustrated compares the team's locker room to a dentist's office, only more quiet. Johnson's agent reportedly told Arizona GM Joe Garagiola Jr. that if he didn't trade the Big Unit, he'd have one unhappy pitcher on his team. Garagiola responded along the lines of, "How is that different than what we have now?"

From a fan's perspective, it's frustrating to have a player like Johnson dictate which team he will or won't play for. He's certainly not the only one doing it this season -- Steve Finley apparently will only accept a trade to one of the teams near his Southern California home: San Diego, Anaheim or L.A. Carlos Delgado has told Toronto that he won't waive his no-trade clause, which likely would have landed him in L.A. Last year, Rafael Palmeiro didn't want to leave the heat and the losing in Texas to go to a contender (I forget which one now) and Juan Gonzalez -- perhaps the biggest (literally and figuratively) softie in the game today -- wouldn't let the Rangers trade him to Kansas City or the NL. So in the offseason he signed with the Royals. And he's currently hurt again.

The economics of the game and the owners' willingness to hand out no-trade clauses like bobblehead dolls before a game against the Expos has taken the fun and excitement out of the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline. The speculation still provides some enjoyment, but with trade talks more limited, the sources used by the likes of Gammons, Stark, Verducci, et. al. have less to share, and even the speculation is diluted.

But when you have someone like Randy Johnson -- the sexiest of possible trade pieces -- wanting out, yet limiting it to a team guaranteed to "win," you're getting awfully close to the inmates running the asylum. (Granted, it seems whoever's calling the shots in the sport fits that description.) Randy doesn't want to be the piece that hopefully gets a team into the postseason, he wants to join a postseason-ready rotation. He wants to be a part of the gluttony. As much as it pains me to admit it, the Yankees have a need for Johnson. Were the team to acquire Bret Boone or Jeff Kent to play second, that would be gluttony -- all-stars at every position, a lineup better than many fantasy teams, a top-of-the-line replacement for a second baseman (Miguel Cairo) who has played -- and hit at -- the position more than adequately. But while Johnson would only make the rotation older, the Yankees have no healthy reliable starters. Mike Mussina and Kevin Brown, both of whom can be counted on for quality starts every time out, are on the DL. Jon Lieber and Jose Contreras are far from reliable and Orlando Hernandez is coming off of injury and inactivity and tweaked his hamstring in his last start. Throw out what's happened in the regular season, and in a playoff series, the Red Sox have the edge in starting pitching in a matchup against the Yankees. And considering New York's bullpen overuse, Boston could have the edge there with a healthy Scott Williamson.

But Randy will only accept a trade to the Yankees. He won't go to Boston, he won't go to Anaheim (the team with the best prospects to offer Arizona), he won't go to Chicago. He apparently wouldn't even go to St. Louis, which now has a bigger lead in its division than the Yankees. But the Cardinals were dropped from the discussion early, probably because the team is getting along just fine with its current starters and didn't want to take on the $22 million Randy will make the rest of this season and next. I even heard Peter Gammons talking this morning about a potential three-way deal that would've landed Randy in Oakland, but the A's backed out of those discussions. But Johnson no doubt would've vetoed that change of address, even though the A's are the best second-half club in the game and just took over the division lead from Texas with yesterday's win.

True, it's tough to sit here and criticize a guy for not wanting to leave his home and his family. Arizona is Johnson's home, and the Diamondbacks' spring training site in Tucson keeps him close to home through March too. A trade to the east would put him in Florida in mid-February next year. There aren't many careers that allow employees to be bought and sold and traded like professional sports.

Yet, that's part of the job description. Athletes know that's part of the game -- the business -- when they sign their first multimillion dollar contract. But by their second, they seem to have forgotten it. Randy Johnson is set for life. He's set to make almost more between now and the end of next season than Ricky Williams earned in his weird, five-year career (cited at $27 million). He gets three and a half full months off every year -- just like teachers, even more than most, who make in a year what Johnson does in a start -- and when he retires, after next season or whenever, he'll have every waking moment of every day to spend with his wife and four kids.

Randy says it's all about "wanting to win." I see it as wanting to win on his terms.

It looks like he'll at least get to sleep in his own bed every night.