The Futility Infielder

The following post was written Monday morning but could not be published until my return to New York City.

As I sit here at LAX, mooching wireless and recharging my gadget batteries even while my own are considerably run down, there isn't a hell of a lot to add to the coda of my last report. Sunday night at the Winter Meetings was especially slow as news goes, that Kevin Cash blockbuster generating even more of a ripple than a deal for a catcher with a .180 EQA deserves. Perhaps its amplification was to distract Blue Jay followers away from the overly generous deal J. P. Ricciardi bestowed on Corey Koskie earlier in the day.

But the day was not without its highlights, at least for me. The dearth of news cued an early dinner at the hotel's steakhouse, where I dined in a private room with Joe Sheehan, Will Carroll, Tom Gorman, Chaim Bloom, and Rob Assalino (Tom's partner in blogging crime at Fogball as well as an assistant to an agency working on some interesting arbitration cases). The stark contrast to the rest of the weekend's less than stellar fare had us slapping our foreheads that such good cuisine had been underfoot while we scrambled for worse. Kind of like settling for Cristian Guzman when we could have had Nomar Garciaparra -- pricey, yes, but infinitely better.

After dinner I got something I'd sought all weekend, an introduction to writer Alan Schwarz, whose book, The Numbers Game, I reviewed favorably this past summer. To my surprise, Schwarz had seen the review, and we talked fondly of its unique characters such as F. C. Lane, Earnshaw Cook, the Mills Brothers, and the team that assembled the first MacMillan Baseball Encyclopedia. Our conversation turned to Schwarz's recent work at the New York Times, column called "Keeping Score" in which he checks in on more modern metrics, often with the Baseball Prospectus cast making appearances.

As Schwarz left to buttonhole Atlanta GM John Schuerholz, I gained an introduction to a pair of Mets statistical analysts including Ben Baumer. Baumer's job opening was one of the prizes sought at last winter's gathering. I was pleasantly surprised to find him, if not overly candid, than at least willing to talk about his work with the team. Like Voros McCracken with the Red Sox, Baumer was quick to concede that he had no real idea how much impact his work had on the upper reaches of the front office, nor did he know exactly what GM Omar Minaya had up his sleeve [including, as it turns out, the eventual dalliances with Manny Ramirez and Pedro Martinez, with the latter looking as though he's all but signed to play in Shea].

With little news to go on and few big writers to chase, the night devolved into our little clique milling around the lobby (biiiiig surprise) sizing up immense Padres scout Charlie Kerfeld and taking turns complaining about the lobby's acoustic guitar player running through the same set as the previous two nights. Padres manager Bruce Bochy, kicking back to enjoy a cold one or two, only encouraged the likes of "Sundown" and the worst Stevie Ray Vaughan imitation you've ever heard by rocking out from his chair, drumming his fingers and nodding his head to the tunes. Tom Gorman's facetious request for John Fogerty's "Centerfield" was rebuffed, leading us to conclude that the "entertainment" hadn't been procured especially for the occasion. As the evening wound down, Baseball America's Kevin Goldstein and BP's Will Carroll had us in stitches as they took turns imitating the Cubs' broadcasters, with Goldstein lampooning the homoeroticism of Pat Hughes' descriptions of bulging calves and pectorals and Carroll shrieking, "Oh, NOOOO!" Ron Santo-style. Carroll also told us about some of the more angry phone messages left on his machine, including one which had Dusty Baker using twelve-letter curses by the second word. My ribs were hurting by the time we went back to the hotel.

By the time we packed it in, there still no Tim Hudson trade, no Big Unit trade, no deals for Adrian Beltre, Edgar Renteria, Carlos Beltran, or any of the winter's other prizes. Murmurs of Richie Sexson to Seattle (for five years?) and of the Giants locking up Mike Matheny began to percolate after the bar closed, but that was about it. Monday morning would bring the Rule V draft -- teams vulturing in on each other's unprotected minor-leaguers -- but for this reporter, the winter journey had reached its end, and so I said my goodbyes.

All in all, it was a hell of a weekend, and I thank the cast of characters who populated these reports over the last few days, particularly my peers at Prospectus and All-Baseball. There's something extremely comforting about walking up to the same circle of people for the dozenth time in one evening, knowing you can join the chatter seamlessly and without apologizing for any social awkwardness. We're bound together by our love of the game, one that portends a happy return to next December's meetings in Dallas. See ya then, pals, if not sooner.