The Futility Infielder

It's a banner day for me at Baseball Prospectus Radio -- literally. The new BPR banner which I designed late last year has finally been put in place, and two recent episodes of the show with spots by yours truly are archived for your listening pleasure.

The first episode dates back to December 16, just after the Winter Meetings in Anaheim. I discussed the atmosphere of the meetings, the Dodger moves that took place around that time (such as the signing of Jeff Kent and the rumors about Adrian Beltre and Tim Hudson), and the Yankee moves (such as the Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright signings) as well. My spot starts around 19:50 and runs about 10 minutes; also on the episode are Rich Lederer and Neil DeMause.

The second spot was recorded last Thursday and was focused on the Hall of Fame voting results -- the election of Wade Boggs and Ryne Sandberg, the failures of the writers to recognize the brilliance of Bert Blyleven and Rich Gossage, the guys at the bottom of the ballot, and, off the topic of the Hall, the pending Carlos Beltran and Randy Johnson deals. I've got the leadoff spot on this one, 2:45 into the episode, and my conversation with host Will Carroll runs nearly eight minutes, with MLB.com writer Kevin Czerwinski and Football Outsiders' Aaron Schatz following me on the air.

Other than a few too many "uhhs" and "you know's" here and there, I'm pretty happy with both performances. I kept things moving reasonably well and didn't commit any major gaffes or trip over my words too badly. It's a lot easier to go one-on-one with Will than occasionally struggling to get a word in edgewise during the roundtables I've done. Set your browser and your MP3 player to Baseball Prospectus Radio to check the episodes out.