Fan News

Another Oscar night filled with people who are completely useless to society explaining their thoughts and ideals to it while holding a golden naked man has passed, but the quest for a different trophy has begun.

And I, another useless person to society, would like to explain my thoughts and ideas of what each team needs to do to hold the Commissioner's Trophy at the end of the 2010 MLB season.

With spring training beginning, now is the perfect time to get your arguing shoes laced up for another year of baseball.

And what better way to prepare one's arguing than with some predictions that w

According to Yahoo! Sports, All-Star closer Francisco Rodriguez returned to New York Mets camp on Monday after being hampered by conjunctivitis for more than two weeks.

Rodriguez had been told to stay away from the team until the pink eye cleared, but the contagious infection took longer than expected to improve.

He was sick when he reported to New York’s spring facility, but his eye went undiagnosed until just before full-squad workouts began on Feb. 25.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE: FANTASY BASEBALL INSIDERS

One common myth about spring training is that it actually matters. Now don’t get me wrong, the live game action provides valuable experience for young prospects and is useful to players as they battle back from injury. Even the grizzled veterans need time each spring to get back into the groove.

“If my uniform doesn’t get dirty, I haven’t done anything in the baseball game.”

Players who live by this Ricky Henderson quote play the game like nobody else.

Players who live by this quote hustle every play of the game like it’s the only one they’ll ever make.

And that’s why I love players who play the game that way.

Joe Nathan has a torn ulnar collateral ligament.

At best, it’s partially torn, and he’ll be able to avoid surgery and pitch through the pain this season, albeit with a seriously diminished skill-set due to the injury.

For anyone who enjoys watching young players develop and stars bloom in the majors, Pittsburgh is the place to be the next few years. An organization that seemed hell bent on losing and destroying talent for almost two decades now has something it has not had in many years.

Young talent...and lots of it.

From Low A to the Majors, the Pirates have young players worth watching.

Let's meet five of those players and take a look at what we can expect from them in 2010.

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First base is stacked with sluggers, there's no arguing that. But not all sluggers are created equal. From Barton to Youkilis, there's quite a difference in the caliber of play one gathers from the position. By my admittedly fuzzy research, there are at the very least 4 tiers of players at the position.

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After finishing their first year in Washington with a .500 record, fans and players alike hoped the Nationals would have a breakout season in 2006.

The key was to get off to a fast start.

It didn’t happen.

Third baseman Hank Blalock has signed a minor league contract with the Tampa Bay Rays worth $925,000, plus an extra $400,000 in incentives, reports Jon Heyman .

Blalock's contract is worth approximately $6 million less than what he was earning with the Texas Rangers last season. 

I try not to get too carried away with spring training stats. Usually at least one veteran will slump heavily only to perform as expected in the regular season, and at least one minor leaguer will get hot only to be assigned to a farm club where he fails to impress.

But that doesn't mean I ignore spring stats—I'm a stats geek at heart.

Today—as usual—I checked up on the Tigers box score to see who's hot and who's not down in Lakeland.