David Trezeguet's move to River Plate shows money does not rule all | Amy Lawrence

The former Chelsea striker Nicolas Anelka might have benefited from a chat with his Argentina-bound compatriot before signing for Shanghai Shenhua

Nicolas Anelka has always come across as happily nonconformist, so it is unlikely that he would have consulted with one of his oldest footballing allies before leaving Chelsea for Shanghai Shenhua. But a word in the ear of David Trezeguet might have given an interesting perspective on departing European football for a distant, if lucrative outpost. Evidently it is not always the most rewarding decision.

Back in August, Trezeguet signed up for what appeared to be an easy stroll in the sunshine, backed up with a handsome payday, in the United Arab Emirates. He agreed a one-year deal with Baniyas SC, the club with the camel on its badge who are based in Abu Dhabi. But Trezeguet's stay lasted only three months. Injuries, which limited him to fewer than a handful of appearances, were cited as the official reason as the player terminated his contract. The club even praised his honesty, thanking him for not wanting to pick up a fat cheque when he felt he couldn't contribute.

But come the January transfer window, it seems matters of the heart convinced Trezeguet to wave an early farewell to Abu Dhabi. A call to arms from his boyhood club, River Plate in Argentina ? his parents are Argentinian ? proved irresistible. Trezeguet's injury concerns have miraculously disappeared, and the 34-year-old striker has fulfilled a lifetime ambition by signing a three-year deal. He is so spellbound he felt compelled to compare the act of joining River to winning the World Cup with France or collecting titles with Juventus and Monaco. "For me football is passion and I wasn't getting that in Arabian football ? What better place to experience that than here?" he enthused. "Being here is a unique feeling, motivated by everything that River represents."

Trezeguet is the latest player with Argentinian roots who has cut short a career overseas to join the cause of the River revival. Fernando Cavenaghi, who had won the league with Bordeaux, and Alejandro Dom�nguez, who earned titles with Zenit St Petersburg and Rubin Kazan in Russia, also mounted metaphorical white horses to ride all the way back to Buenos Aires. Another, Leonardo Ponzio, will join this month from Real Zaragoza.

River are on a mission to recover from the horror of last season's relegation. They are currently second in Argentina's Primera B Nacional, and the arrival of experienced players who know what it takes to be in a winning team is a fantastic boost when River need it most. At a time when most players haggle over this many thousands and that many millions to finalise moves, thank goodness for the few who turn their back on the bucks to chase rewards of a purer kind.

Trezeguet is a particularly influential person to bring into this situation as he went through the decline and renaissance of Juventus, the Serie A club where he spent a decade. Notably, players such as Gianluigi Buffon, Pavel Nedved and Alessandro Del Piero all stuck around when Juve were demoted to Serie B, and their guidance was crucial in helping along the young players who came into a strange situation. "Our shirt represents a history and the Juventus youngsters understood that," Trezeguet said. "River are going through a very difficult time ? I want to be part of the history [of their recovery]."

Although Trezeguet may be known for his achievements in the blue shirt of France, with whom he won the 1998 World Cup and cracked in the goal to claim the 2000 European Championship, he has always maintained a strong connection with his Argentinian roots. He was born in Rouen, where his father, Jorge, played for three seasons in the 1970s. But Trezeguet spent most of his youth in Argentina, before heading back to France in his teens to further his career.

It was there that he struck up a friendship with fellow strikers with whom he would grow up at the Clairefontaine academy, Thierry Henry, and the kid from the year below, Anelka. This month they are all on the move, probably for the last time. Trezeguet has followed his heart to River, Henry is following his back to Arsenal. We can only wait and see how much love Anelka generates for his new life in China.

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Amy Lawrence

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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jan/05/david-trezeguet-river-plate

Eugenio Velez Dayan Viciedo Omar Vizquel Joey Votto

Happy Birthday Boy! Remembering Early Wynn

On occasion, Big League Stew honors a birthday boy per week by taking a longer look at his career. Please join us in lighting the candles.

Early "Gus" Wynn, who died in 1999, would've celebrated his 92nd birthday today. He's one of only two pitchers to finish his career with exactly 300 wins, sharing that distinction with the great Lefty Grove.

Wynn wasn't exactly a late bloomer, as he had a great year when he was 23, but between World War II and his own inconsistency, he didn't get established as one of the best pitchers in the American League until he was 30. And then he became one of the greatest old pitchers of all time. He won the 1959 Cy Young Award with the pennant-winning Chicago White Sox at age 39. The only older pitchers to capture the award were 40-year old Gaylord Perry in 1978 and 42-year old Roger Clemens in 2004.

Unfortunately, while Wynn played on two great teams, the early-to-mid-1950's Cleveland Indians and the late-'50s White Sox, he never won a World Series title. He arrived in Cleveland exactly a year after their 1948 championship, and he played in losing efforts in the 1954 World Series with the Indians and in 1959 with the White Sox. (The White Sox, of course, went from 1917 to 2005 without winning a championship. The Indians still haven't won one since 1948. Fortunately, no one in either city tried to write a specious article about the "Curse of Early Wynn.")

Best Year: 1956: 20-9, 2.72 ERA, 277 2/3 IP, 3.16 FIP, 1.17 WHIP, 1.74 K/BB, 8.2 WAR
Wynn became known early on in his career for a big fastball, but he was never much of a strikeout pitcher. Then again, few people were in those days. He finally led the league in strikeouts for the first time in 1957, when he was 37, with a modest 184 in 263 innings, just 6.3 per nine innings. He also walked more than his share of people, another good reason for his up-and-down results.

Wynn was apparently miffed that he didn't get into the Hall of Fame on his first try. He had to wait until 1972, nine years after he retired and four years into his eligibility. But the voters may have been right to hesitate. His career numbers certainly aren't bad by any means, but his 3.54 ERA and career 107 ERA+ indicates that when you took in consideration his whole career, all his good years and all his bad years, he was more solid than spectacular.

Even his 1959 Cy Young Award wasn't exactly deserved. Wynn won it over Toothpick Sam Jones, who finished with a much lower ERA, pitched in far more games because he was both the Giants' closer and ace starter, and was only one win behind Wynn's AL-leading total. Jones finished the year with 5.9 Wins Above Replacement, compared to Wynn's 2.7, and it seems hard for us to understand how voters justified awarding Wynn. But Wynn was 39, his team was playoff-bound, and he had never won before. And, though this is a far worse reason, it can't have hurt that Wynn's 22-10 record looked better than Jones's 21-15 record, though Jones had four saves and pitched in 15 games as a reliever in addition to his 15 starts.

Then again, Wynn should have won in 1956, when he probably was the best pitcher in baseball, but he couldn't get a single vote. So it all evened out in the end.

Worst Year: 1948: 8-19, 5.82 ERA, 198 IP, 4.78 FIP, 1.67 WHIP, 0.52 K/BB, -1.6 WAR
You couldn't always count on Wynn for consistency, but you could almost always count on him for innings. The reason that Wynn took so long to get established is that he had a year like this in his late 20s. Arguably, he was even worse in 1942, when he posted a 5.12 ERA in 28 starts at the age of 22, but it's understandable for a young pitcher to struggle. In 1948, he was a 28-year old army veteran who had been an All-Star the previous season and who was in his eighth major league campaign. He probably should have known better.

As it happened, though, that was the absolute nadir for his career. From his first cup of coffee in 1939 through 1948, he was 72-87 with a 3.94 ERA. After that, from 1949 to 1963, he was 228-157 with a 3.39 ERA.

1948 was the absolute nadir, though his end-of-career quest for 300 was a little embarrassing. He was winless and stuck on 299 for nearly a year, from Sept. 9 of 1962 to July 12 of 1963. He finished the 1962 season with a 4.46 ERA and a 7-15 record, and by that point he didn't have much of a fastball left so he increasingly used a knuckleball he'd developed. The 42-year old looked done to every team in baseball, so he opened 1963 without an employer. April, May, and the first half of June all passed before the Indians finally took pity on him and signed him. It was the only year of his career in which he was mostly used him in the bullpen, making 15 relief appearances and only five starts.

But he was effective, finishing the year with a 2.28 ERA, and he deserved the win a week earlier ?�his 300th win came on a day when he allowed four runs in five innings, but he had received a no-decision in his previous start, when he had pitched six scoreless, and had actually taken a loss in his first start, when he pitched a nine-inning complete game allowing just two runs. So karma was finally on his side.

Claim to Fame: As his Hall of Fame page notes, "Early Wynn was also a switch-hitter who tallied 90 pinch-hit appearances, including a grand slam, making him one of five Major League pitchers to attain that feat." Wynn was actually a pretty decent hitter as pitchers go, amassing 6.3 WAR as a hitter to go with his 52 WAR as a pitcher. He also had two hits in the World Series, one in 1954 and one in 1959 ?�both doubles. (His hitting was more notable than his pitching, as he managed a 4.95 ERA in four World Series starts.)

But his true claim to fame will always be his time in the Indians rotation. Bob Feller and Bob Lemon both had more consistent peaks and shorter careers than Wynn; they were mostly done by their mid-30s while Wynn had a half-decade more excellent baseball left in him. Ultimately, he was third-best of the three. But there's no dishonor in that. It was arguably the best one-two-three punch in history ?�the only competition is Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, and John Smoltz, and that was 40 years later and a very different era.

Happy birthday, Gus.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/big-league-stew/happy-birthday-boy-remembering-early-wynn-164922701.html

Michael Cuddyer Chris Davis Ike Davis Adam Dunn

Michael Young: Situation With Rangers 'Less Than Ideal'

by FanHouse Newswire

Filed under: Rangers, Spring Training

SURPRISE, Ariz. (AP) - Michael Young reported to spring training on time Saturday for the Texas Rangers, saying he was ready to play and try to make the best of "a situation that is less than ideal'' after the team was unable to fulfill his request for a trade.

Young, the longest-tenured Rangers player going into his 11th season, arrived at camp a day before the first full-squad workout for the AL champions.

"I have nothing to hide. I have nothing to be ashamed of. There's not a thing I would change. So I'm not uncomfortable,'' Young said. "If I had a horrible relationship with guys in that room or my manager, I would be uncomfortable, but I don't. I love my teammates. I love my manager.''

Two-time Gold Glove third baseman Adrian Beltre was signed this winter, supplanting Young at third base. The Rangers plan for Young to be their primary designated hitter and have him fill in at every infield position. It is the third time in eight springs Young's role with the team has changed.

 

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Source: http://mlb.fanhouse.com/2011/02/20/michael-young-situation-with-rangers-less-than-ideal/

Hanley Ramírez Cody Ransom Édgar Rentería José Reyes

Cliff Lee's Return to Phillies Highlights Unpredictable Offseason

by John Hickey

Filed under: Angels, Brewers, Mariners, Nationals, Phillies, Red Sox, Yankees, MLB Free Agency

All this week, the FanHouse staff will look back at the most significant baseball storylines of 2010.

Cliff Lee to the Phillies.

Jayson Werth to the Nationals.

Zack Greinke to the Brewers.

Carl Crawford to the Red Sox.

What do these offseason moves by the baseball establishment have in common?

Just that the baseball establishment thought each of those players would wind up somewhere else.

 

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Source: http://mlb.fanhouse.com/2010/12/28/cliff-lees-return-to-phillies-highlights-unpredictable-offseaso/

Ty Wigginton Jack Wilson Josh Wilson Brandon Wood

Musical Cards fan adapts ?American Pie? for Albert Pujols

Head into any bar late on a Saturday night and there's a 63 percent chance that a group of overserved patrons will be belting out Don McLean's "American Pie." The other 37 percent will be singing Billy Joel's "Piano Man." These are proven facts.

One keyboard-wielding St. Louis Cardinals fan, however, changed things up a bit this weekend and adapted the lyrics of "American Pie" to fit the trauma of losing Albert Pujols to the Los Angeles Angels. It's not the best song in the world ? what barroom bellowing backed by Budweiser ever is? ? but it's undoubtedly better than most of the typical jersey-burning responses that St. Louisans produced in the wake of Pujols' departure. Enjoy.

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Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/Musical-Cards-fan-adapts-American-Pie-for-Alb?urn=mlb-wp28509

Garrett Jones Kila Ka aihue Don Kelly Howie Kendrick

What would a move to San Jose mean for Billy Beane?

Oakland Athletics fans weren't too happy after pitcher Gio Gonzalez was dealt to the Washington Nationals last Thursday.

That followed another trade which sent Trevor Cahill to the Arizona Diamondbacks and presumably prefaces a possible future move in which �closer Andrew Bailey is traded to a contender looking for bullpen help.

But the days of watching good players develop and investing emotions in their success, only to see them eventually shipped elsewhere when they become too expensive, may soon be over.

That's because, as the storyline goes, salvation may await GM Billy Beane and the A's in San Jose.

Over the holiday weekend, USA Today's Bob Nightengale reported via Twitter that the A's will be granted permission to move to San Jose by February. That would seem to run contrary to Ken Rosenthal's report that the San Francisco Giants still refuse to give up their territorial rights to San Jose. Yet A's owner Lew Wolff remains�"very confident" that MLB will allow the team to move, presumably based on discussions he's had with commissioner Bud Selig.

Without a move, the A's will continue to lose money (reports had the team losing at least $1 million, despite receiving upwards of $30 million in revenue sharing), leaving them unable to compete with the Texas Rangers and Los Angeles Angels in the AL West.

That gives Beane no other choice than to keep selling off the team's established young players in exchange for�low-cost, high-ceiling prospects. (Or, in the case of outfielder Josh Willingham, simply let him go because there's no money to pay him.)�While those players could develop into talents that help the A's contend, Beane would eventually have to repeat the process and sell them off, too.

It's a soul-crushing cycle, one that might make Beane wonder in his more contemplative moments if he should've taken the GM job with the Boston Red Sox when he had the chance in 2002.

At the time, Beane said, "I love Oakland, I love this franchise, I love the people I work with" when turning down the Red Sox. (Being 3,000 miles away from his daughter also factored heavily into the decision.)

But when were the Oakland A's going to love Beane back? Not from a financial standpoint. Beane has a contract through 2014, along with a small ownership stake in the team. But when would this grind of constant rebuilding ? watching players develop, only to let them go ?�finally yield some reward?

As "Moneyball" author Michael Lewis said in a September New York Times profile of Beane, maintaining the status quo would eventually force Beane to make a difficult choice.

"There are two avenues of escape, once you recognize the predicament that you're basically doomed if you're Oakland," Lewis says. "One is to become the San Jose A's ? to try and go from a small-market team to a big-market team. The second avenue of escape is to find another industry where those kind of inefficiencies still exist."

Moving to San Jose, and the revenue generated by a new ballpark, would allow the A's to compete with their division rivals (or rejoin the major leagues, if you want to be snarky about it) and likely prevent Beane from scratching the soccer itch he's developed in recent years.

We know what Beane can do with a small payroll. But what could he accomplish with a larger payroll backed by the revenue streams of a new ballpark in a wealthier area? We almost found out nine years ago when the Red Sox GM job was his if he wanted it.

Now, Beane could find that prosperity on his own terms, which is seemingly what he's always wanted.

Follow Ian on Twitter ?�@iancass ? and engage the Stew�on Facebook

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/What-would-a-move-to-San-Jose-mean-for-Billy-Bea?urn=mlb-wp29074

Adam Rosales Brendan Ryan Angel Sánchez Ramón Santiago

Happy Birthday Boy! Roy White turns 68 today

On occasion, Big League Stew honors a birthday boy per week by taking a longer look at his career. Please join us in lighting the candles.

These days, probably the most famous thing about Roy White is a single sentence Bill James wrote in 2001: "I may be the only person who rates Roy White ahead of Jim Rice, George Foster, Joe Carter, and several Hall of Famers."

For the younger readers among us, White was a two-time All-Star who played 15 years for the Yankees and hit 160 homers with 758 RBIs. James wrote that in his New Historical Abstract, eight years before Rice's election to the Hall of Fame (and one year before James was hired by Rice's former employers, the Boston Red Sox), and it brought White the most publicity he'd had in years ?�perhaps ever.

Roy White grew up in Compton, California, an understated man who won championships with the two biggest baseball teams in the world, in the World Series with the New York Yankees and in the Japan Series with the Yomiuri Giants. So why is he not remembered that well? It's because the things he was good at were things that you wouldn't necessarily notice. He walked a lot. He played good defense in left field in Yankee Stadium, which was so deep that it was known at the time as "Death Valley" ?�and, as a switch-hitter, White himself saw a lot of potential home runs turn into noisy outs in Death Valley. James highlighted White as an example of the extreme influence that home field can have in baseball: Jim Rice's inflated offense was partly due to Fenway Park, a bandbox which turned every hitter into a star, while White's relatively unimpressive offense was partly due to Yankee Stadium, which was death on right-handed sluggers.

Even at the time, White's talents and unflashy demeanor seemed to leave him in the background. On his blog The Flagrant Fan, William Tasker writes: "Roy White wasn't fuzzy. His typical countenance was impassive. He never pumped his fist." In his 1974 Topps baseball card blog, wobs notes, "In over ten years of late '60s and early '70s cards and Yankee yearbooks, I don't think I ever saw a Roy White smile." Bruce Markusen puts it simply: "Few Yankee fans seemed to have much of an appreciation for Roy White."

But his teammates did. As noted by SABR writer James Lincoln Ray, Mickey Mantle wrote an article in 1970 for Sport magazine that left no doubt as to what he thought of him. "People ask me: What happened to all the Yankee stars? I tell them that Roy White is as good a player as any of the old players we used to have."

Best Year: 1970: .296/.387/.473, 22 HRs, 94 RBIs, 24 SBs, 10 CS, 95 BB/66 K, 7.5 WAR
White picked a bad time to be on the Yankees. For most of his career, the biggest starts were Thurman Munson and Bobby Murcer; Reggie Jackson, Ron Guidry and Catfish Hunter arrived later and helped lead the Yankees to two world championships in 1978 and 1979, at the end of White's career. White began his career like Don Mattingly, during a playoff desert for the Yankees: from 1965 to 1975, the Yankees never made the playoffs, and unfortunately, those were the years when he was at his best.

He was never better than in 1970, when his 26-year-old self played left field, batted third and cleanup, and set personal bests with 22 homers, 94 RBI, and a .296 batting average ? it was the only time he ever hit more than 19 or drove in more than 84. As personal bests go, those look pretty anemic now, but remember, the late '60s were a pitching-dominant era, and the 1970s were nowhere near the offensive peak of the 1930s, 1950s, 1990s, or 2000s. For his efforts, White was named to his second straight All-Star team. But he didn't get into the game. He had that kind of career.

Worst Year: 1973: .246/.329/.374, 18 HRs, 60 RBIs, 16 SBs, 9 CS, 78 BB/81 K, 2.3 WAR
It's hard to pick a "worst year" for White. Statistically, his worst seasons were the ones in which he played the least, at the very beginning and very end of his career, and that hardly seems fair. His career tailed off quickly, as he was basically done as a productive everyday player by age 34, but in every year in which he played at least 120 games, he was an above-average player, thanks in large part to his fine defense.

His production in 1973 was certainly off his personal averages, but it was still basically league-average production, as the average hitter in the American League hit .259/.328/.381. The following year, his walks and batting average rebounded, but his home run total plummeted to just seven, and he hit 12 the following year. His low home run totals and inability to hit .300 marked him as an unsexy player, but he certainly wasn't a bad one. He was probably better than several Hall of Famers.

Including, possibly, Jim Rice.

Claim to Fame: As Tasker notes later in his blog post on Roy White:

He is known for two big things: First, he was on base when Bucky Dent hit the most famous home run of his career. Second, he hit an insane number of sacrifice flies. In 1971, White led the league with 17 of them. They made up 20 percent of White's 84 RBIs that year.

White is actually known for a third thing, too: he hit with a unique "pigeon-toed" batting stance. Writes Markusen:

From the Yankees' perspective, no one had a more distinctive stance than Roy White. Hitting out of a pronounced crouch, White tucked the knob of his bat toward his back hip, all while pointing each of his feet inward?toward the other.

White's name was often bandied about during the discussions of Jim Rice for the Hall of Fame. White himself didn't receive a single Hall of Fame vote. Now that Rice is in, not many people write about the old Yankee left fielder that the Red Sox analyst thought was better. But it's his birthday. He deserves it.

Off the Field: White played in Japan for three years, including the Giants' title season in 1981. He was a Yankee coach for a number of years after that, serving as the team's hitting coach from 1983 to 1986, and most recently as first base coach in 2004 and 2005. He was the highest-profile American player ever to sign a multiyear deal in Japan. He now works with his Roy White Foundation, an organization which seeks to provide financial assistance for students to attend college.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/Happy-Birthday-Boy-Roy-White-turns-68-today?urn=mlb-wp28643

Danny Worth David Wright Kevin Youkilis Delwyn Young