Kris Versteeg Traded to Toronto

As we all count down the final minutes of waiting until we have to wait another week before finding out what LeBron and company are doing, there's yet another Blackhawks trade to report.

Kris Versteeg is on his way to Toronto.

ESPN's Pierre LeBrun tweeted the deal just minutes ago. Versteeg and the rights to winger Bill Sweatt are off to the land of The Basketball Jones and G20 riots for forwards Viktor Stalberg, Chris DiDomenico and Philippe Paradis.

Not exactly the Chicago-Toronto trade people were hoping for today.

Kenny Williams Eyes Adam Dunn

One of the things I love about Kenny Williams is that when he sees something he wants, he doesn't waste any time going after it.  A few weeks ago he was getting ready to dismantle his White Sox roster, but a whole lot of wins later, and Kenny's shifted into buy mode once again.

His first target?  Apparently it's Nationals slugger Adam Dunn.

Ever since the winter when Williams and Ozzie Guillen disagreed about the fate of Jim Thome's White Sox career, it's been apparent that Williams really wanted a power-hitting lefty in the middle of his lineup, and odds are he had Adam Dunn in mind even then.

Edwin Rodriguez Will Finish Season As Marlins Skipper

So much for Bobby Valentine being named the next manager of the Florida Marlins.

Now that Valentine is out of the running for the Marlins job, it seems the team isn't much in the mood to pursue anybody else at the moment, and Jeffrey Loria informed the team before Tuesday night's game that manager Edwin Rodriguez will be running the show for the rest of the season. The Marlins will then re-evaluate their manager position this winter...

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Thumb Injury Will Keep Jason Heyward Out of All-Star Game

It appears that the deep bone bruise in Jason Heyward's left thumb isn't only going to keep the young stud out of the Braves' lineup for the next few weeks, but also the All-Star game. Heyward is currently the second leading vote getter amongst NL outfielders, currently trailing only Albert Pujols, Chase Utley and Ryan Braun in votes in the National League, so the odds seem pretty good that Heyward will be voted in.

Unfortunately, even though Heyward is scheduled to come off of the disabled list the Monday before the All-Star break, he doesn't have any plans on playing in the game. Preferring to give the thumb a few more days to heal...

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Hit And Run: Big Z A Big Headache

Carlos Zambrano has been temperamental throughout his career in Chicago. His blowup directed at teammates on Friday was just another in a long line of incidents involving the mercurial pitcher and his short fuse. For the first few years Big Z was going nuts in Chicago, it was OK.

His anger was a big part of what made him what he was, and had a lot to do with the five-year $91.5 million contract extension Zambrano signed in August 2007. The difference between then and now, of course, is that Zambrano was a good pitcher then. When things are going well, you can look the other way when things happen.

When you're 3-6 with a 5.66 ERA, however, well then your temper will get you suspended indefinitely, and possibly a ticket on the first bus out of town....

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LeBron And Bosh Are Coming! LeBron And Bosh Are Coming!

I am maintaining my steadfast approach of not buying into the rumors and speculation that LeBron James along with Chris Bosh will be coming to Chicago this summer, but damn it, nobody else is.  If you listen to sports radio in this town for fifteen minutes, I guarantee you that somebody is going to bring up LeBron James and the chances he's coming to Chicago.

They'll have four different people call in and tell you the same damn thing too.  They have no real source on this, other than the fact that in their eyes Chicago is the best destination, so therefore, it has to be LeBron's top choice too.

I'm doing my best not to pay attention to it, or buy into the hype.  But every damn day there's another story about it.  Like the one from the New York Times this weekend.

LeBron's totally coming for sure!  And he's bringing Chris Bosh with him too!

Report: Marlins To Offer Valentine a Four-Year Deal

It appears that the Florida Marlins won't be without a manager for long, as only a few days after firing Fredi Gonzalez, it appears they've already found their new manager. ESPN's Tim Kurkjian is reporting that Bobby Valentine has confirmed he is flying to Florida on Friday night to meet with Jeffrey Loria and other Marlins executives.

Once there it's believed the team will offer him a four-year contract to become the Marlins new manager. When he'll take over the team, though, remains to be decided...

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Here's Hoping Things Don't Backfire On The Bulls

When I heard the news today that the Bulls had traded -- or agreed to trade him in two weeks -- Kirk Hinrich and their first round pick tonight to the Wizards for....well...cap space and something nobody knows yet, I wasn't that shocked.  The rumors about a trade of Luol Deng to the Clippers yesterday made it clear that the team was in complete free agency mode.

What surprised me more than anything is that the Wizards would want Hinrich.  I guess the plan is to have him mentor John Wall after they make him the first pick tonight, but to me Hinrich is a much better fit on a contending team than he is the Wizards.

Still, maybe their plans are to move him somewhere else.

Whatever the case is, his days as a Chicago Bull are numbered and the Bulls seem to be pretty confident that they're going to get two of the big free agents this summer.  Personally, I'd like to think they're right, but I'm cautiously optimistic about things.

Duncan Keith Has Teeth And A Norris Trophy

While there are many reasons to be upset about having no electricity, one of my biggest disappointments tonight was that I wouldn't be able to watch the NHL Awards, as I was pretty sure that Duncan Keith was going to be taking home the Norris Trophy.

Well, I didn't get to watch it, but at least Keith got what he deserved, as he did in fact win the Norris Trophy for the NHL's Best Defenseman.

"It really is an honor to be up here getting this award, thinking about all the great defenseman we have in this league and all the great defenseman who have won this award before me," Keith said in his speech. "It truly is a privilege and an honor to be here in getting this award."

So it was a pretty nice year for Keith, as he won a Gold Medal in the Olympics, a Stanley Cup and now was recognized as the best player at his position.  The only thing that went wrong for him tonight was that they cut off his speech before he had time to thank Brent Seabrook.

Well, that and the whole losing seven teeth thing, but Dunc did have some temporaries in place for tonight.

Keith and Patrick Kane were also named as First Team All Stars.

You can check out NHL.com to see who took home the rest of the awards tonight.

Bulls In Talks With Clippers About Luol Deng?

I'm currently sitting in the dark of my bedroom without power thanks to the latest "Storm of the Century" to hit Chicago this week. Did you think that could keep me from blogging?

You fool! I have no power! What the hell else am I going to do? I'm literally writing this post on my iPhone.

Why? Because I read that the Bulls are in talks with the Clippers about a possible trade for Luol Deng, and anytime I hear news that Deng may be getting shipped out of town, I get excited.

Excited enough to write a blog post on my phone.

Anyway, the deal would send Deng and the Bulls first round pick (#17) and Deng to the Clippers for their first round pick (#8). What this would essentially mean, if it's true, and if it happens, is that the Bulls would have around $30 million in cap space.

In other words, enough to sign both LeBron and Bosh.

Will it happen? I doubt it. Just seems too good to be true, but at the same time there were also rumors today that Vinny Del Negro is being considered for the Clippers head coaching vacancy.

So if they'd consider one person who failed in Chicago, then why not two?

Blackhawks Send Dustin Byfuglien, Ben Eager and Brent Sopel to Atlanta

Well, we all knew it was going to happen, whether we wanted to admit it to ourselves or not, but the odds of Dustin Byfuglien returning to Chicago next season were slim to none.  All thanks to a salary cap in the NHL that is hell bent on making sure young teams don't have a chance to grow together and dominate the league for a decade.

Which is great when your team sucks, but pretty much blows when that team is the one you call your own.

Still, with Big Buff, Ben Eager and Brent Sopel all heading down to the ATL for a first and second round pick in this week's draft, prospect Jeremy Morin and Marty Reasoner, while they may be missed, this is actually a pretty good deal for the Hawks from what I can see.

Vuvuzelas May Have Cost Marlins a Game

If you've been watching any of the World Cup in South Africa this month, you know what they are. They're called vuvuzelas, and they're a horn that is constantly being blown by fans in attendance throughout each match, making you think that at any moment a giant swarm of genetically-enhanced killer bees is going to to swoop down on the field and kill everything in their way.

Make no mistake about it, they are loud, and they are very, very annoying.

And on Saturday night, they may have cost the Florida Marlins a chance to win a game....

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Jose Valverde and Miguel Montero Engage In Verbal Warfare

Something tells me that Detroit Tigers closer Jose Valverde and Arizona Diamondbacks catcher Miguel Montero won't be getting together for a beer anytime soon. A few days after Montero fired the first shots at Valverde regarding his theatrics on the mound while pitching, calling him unprofessional amongst other things, Valverde returned fire on Sunday morning.

"Tell Montero he's a freaking rookie and I can do whatever I want to," Valverde told The Arizona Republic. "Tell him that. Put it in the papers. If he wants to do something, tell him to come to my locker and let me know...

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Ron Santo Cutting Back His Travel

I'm not a Cubs fan, but I make a point to listen to Cubs games on the radio as much as I can when I'm in the car.  Partially because I want to keep abreast of what's going on with the other baseball team in Chicago, but mostly because I enjoy listening to Ron Santo during a game.

Don't get me wrong, he's not exactly good at his job, but damn if it isn't entertaining to listen to him moan and groan all the time. (I also enjoy the amount of Cubs fans I know who can't stand Hawk Harrelson and his "homerism" but love Ron Santo.  Go figure.)

Well, unfortunately it looks like none of us will get to listen to Santo on the radio as much in the future, as his health will restrict his travel for the rest of this season, and next year.

The White Sox Are A .500 Baseball Team

Now there's a headline I didn't think I'd have any chance of writing anytime this season, but it's true.  Following their 6-3 win over the Washington Nationals today, the White Sox are at .500 for the first time since April 7th.

They were 1-1 then.

They're now 34-34 after winning 11 of their last 13 games.  Which is something you would think would make me a lot more excited than I actually am.  The truth is, while I've been very impressed with what I've seen from the Sox over the last few weeks -- particularly the pitching -- I'm also wary of what's going on.

The Sox have reached the point in their schedule in which they always play well: interleague play.

Ryan Franklin Plans On Retiring After the 2011 Season

When the Cardinals signed Ryan Franklin to a one-year $1 million contract in 2007, he was supposed to be a fallback plan for the team's starting rotation. Without ever starting a game for St. Louis, Franklin was then moved to the bullpen in a setup role for then closer Jason Isringhausen.

It's a role Franklin then took over for himself in 2008, and has been pretty good at since, earning a place on the National League All Star team in 2009 before finishing the season with 38 saves. He's having another successful season in St. Louis after signing a two-year contract extension last summer, but even if he continues to pitch well, once that contract ends after 2011, Franklin says he plans on hanging up his spikes...

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Rick Porcello Optioned to Triple-A

In a somewhat surprising move, the Detroit Tigers announced on Sunday morning that they had optioned Rick Porcello to Triple-A Toledo. No corresponding move has been announced at the time.

Porcello, the reigning AL Rookie of the Year, has been going through quite the sophomore slump this season with the Tigers. Through thirteen starts, Porcello is 4-7 with a 6.14 ERA and a WHIP of 1.69. Porcello seemed to have turned things around in May, when he went 2-3 but also had an ERA of 3.13 in five starts...

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Jerry Jones Is Still Crazy

So it seems that the raging inferno that was supposed to be college football expansion/demolition (depending on your perspective) was just a harmless kitchen fire that burnt some things and changed the way some of your appliances looked, but for the most part, has burned out.  After news that Utah is likely going to become the Pac-10's twelfth team, there doesn't seem to be too much else on the forefront.

Unless your Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, anyway.

That crazy sumbitch has a crazy idea to help get the Big 12 back to actually having 12 teams.  He wants the conference to add two more teams.  First and foremost he'd like his alma mater, Arkansas, to rejoin their old SWC rivals Texas and Texas A&M.  Then, after he's done doing that, he wants the Big 12 to add, wait for it...

Notre Dame.

Aaron Heilman Is Arizona's New Closer

Through the first two and a half months of the 2010 season, Aaron Heilman has been the only consistently reliable arm out of the Arizona Diamondbacks bullpen. Which is something his manager, A.J. Hinch, has obviously taken notice of, because on Tuesday Hinch announced that Heilman will now be serving as the team's closer.

"I'm going to try a few different things," Hinch said on Tuesday afternoon. "I let [Chad] Qualls know today that he won't close tonight and probably won't close tomorrow night and we'll go from there. I'm going to mix things up a little bit...

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Hit And Run: Blue Jays Should Take a Page From College Football

If you've been paying attention to the sports the last few weeks, then you've probably heard about all the conference realignment in college sports. The Pac-10 and Big Ten conferences are basically spending their days picking apart the Big 12 as Colorado and Nebraska have both officially left the Big 12, and by the time you're done reading this, up to four more schools may have joined the mass exodus.

Of course, all of this shuffling conferences has nothing to do with baseball, where we don't have conferences, but instead leagues and divisions. No team can up and leave it's current situation without MLB being the driving force behind the decision.

But what if they could?

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A Weird Night At Wrigley

I don't know how it played out on television while watching from your home, but I have to say, from my seats in Aisle 218 last night, that was the lamest double no-hitter I've ever seen. Of course, that could be because, like my girlfriend said during the game, it wasn't so much there were two no-hitters going on as it was there were no hitters playing.

The other reason was, had Lilly or Floyd or both finished their no-hitters, I'm not sure anybody at the park would have cared. At least, not until a member of the Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks told them it was okay.

Because, make no mistake about it, they were the story last night. They were the show. Walking up to Wrigley, and then looking around once inside, there were a lot more Blackhawks jerseys and t-shirts being worn than Cubs and Sox gear combined.

CBC's Toast To The Playoffs

Thanks to Second City Hockey for finding this and tweeting it.  And like they said in the tweet, try to watch that thing and not get goosebumps.

Thoughts On The Champions

I wanted to write about the Blackhawks winning the Stanley Cup -- so fun to type that, I'll do it again -- the Blackhawks winning the Stanley Cup last night, but the fact was that I just couldn't. The moment hadn't really sunk in yet, and I felt like this was something I wanted to give its proper due.

The truth is, nearly a day later, it still hasn't sunk in.

One Goal

ACCOMPLISHED

Conferences Gather To Pick The Rotting Flesh Of The Big 12

I've felt for a while now that all these rumors of the Big Ten and other BCS conferences expanding in the near future weren't exactly true -- as in the stories that were being reported -- but that they were correct.  To me the writing has been on the wall for a while.

There's a lot of money to be made in college sports, and every conference is going to do everything it can to make as much of that money as they can.  Still, given all the rumors going around this winter and spring, I figured the Big Ten would be the first to strike.

Turns out it could be the Pac-10.

Jim Joyce Is Bad At His Job

This was the last out of a perfect game by Armando Galarraga against the Indians on Wednesday night.  It's too bad Jim Joyce called Jason Donald safe at first.

Though at least Joyce was able to admit his mistake afterward and take responsibility for costing Galarraga the perfect game.  A lot of umps wouldn't do that.

BP Scaling Back Promotion of Chicago's 'Crosstown Cup'

If you were to ask a group of Cubs or White Sox fans what they thought of their teams' respective seasons so far, odds are a word that would come up on a regular basis would be disaster. Neither team appears to be destined for the playoffs this season, so when they meet up for the first of six games between each other next Friday at Wrigley Field, it'll basically be the World Series of Chicago.

Still, at least there will be some corporate synergy when the "Crosstown Cup" begins, because, for the first time ever, the annual series has itself a sponsor. British Petroleum. Perhaps you've heard of them? They're better known by the moniker of BP and they've got that whole disaster of their own down in the Gulf of Mexico...

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Jeremy Roenick Gets Down With 'Funky Cold Medina'

Jeremy Roenick stuck around Chicago since Versus has the next two games in the Stanley Cup Final, so he won't have to work again until Game 5 which is back in Chicago.  At least, that's what he's using as his excuse.

The real reason he stayed in the city was because he had to get to Stanley's to sing "Funky Cold Medina."



Thanks to Puck Daddy for unearthing this one.

I Know Where Ben Eager Can Get His Puck

There's been a lot of talk the last few days about Chris Pronger taking the puck that Ben Eager wanted from Game 2 and throwing it out, and while most of us can agree that what Pronger did was a dick move, we should probably all remember that that's precisely the type of person Chris Pronger is.

A dick.

You know who isn't a dick, though?  Whoever put up this ad on Craigslist.

White Sox Reportedly Have Interest In Mike Lowell

I wrote about what I feel is the best path for the White Sox to undertake at FanHouse yesterday, and that path is to sell, sell, sell.  It's not that I want to see the Sox get rid of either Paul Konerko, A.J. Pierzynski, Bobby Jenks or Mark Buehrle, it's that I feel it's the smartest move to make for this team to get back to the postseason quickly.

Those four players all hold a special place in my heart for their contributions to that World Series title in 2005, and for their entire careers in Chicago, but I just feel it's time to move on.

I was also hoping that Kenny Williams was of the same opinion, but according to a report coming out of Boston, that may not be the case.  It seems the White Sox have contacted the Red Sox about Mike Lowell.

Hit And Run: Great Chicago Fire Sale

It's generally understood throughout baseball that when the calendar turns to June, you know what you're going to get from a struggling baseball team. There will be no turnaround.

Sure, there are always exceptions to this rule, like the Rockies in 2007, and the Rockies again in 2009, but unless you're the Colorado Rockies, your chances of turning the ship around and overpowering your division the rest of the way are slim at best.

Which is why the Chicago White Sox are looking down the barrel of the end of an "era." As things currently sit, the White Sox are 22-28 and trail the Minnesota Twins by eight games in the AL Central. Plagued by inconsistency all season, the eight-game deficit may as well be 16, because the White Sox are not a team that can get things together fast enough to catch the Twins in time.

Especially when they're overseen by a general manager always itching to pull the trigger on a trade...

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