Baseball natterings

So, one of the biggest days in the Hot Stove League has passed.

And the Mets got Kaz! Yay! After last year's bust with two other Japanese players fucking around with them it was nice to finally get someone good signed.

I was surprised that Tejada got an arbitration offer from the A's. They pretty much told him that they couldn't afford him. If he accepts arbitration, he could shaft their salary for the year. Mind you, he wants a long-term contract to settle his family down, but one year is a risk he might be willing to take.

I'm disappointed that the Braves didn't offer anything to Maddux. Yeah, he's past his prime. And yeah, I hate the Braves, but when you've got a Hall of Famer, it would be nice to work something out to let him finish his career in Atlanta (and I'd never count him out -- he still won 16 games last year with a better ERA than, say, Andy Pettite)

As for Pudge leaving Florida, more proof that Scott Boras is the worst thing to happen to baseball since Chick Gandil and Sport Sullivan. I hope he ends up having to take a DH contract at about half what he was looking for.

I was happy to see Shannon Stewart re-signed (as I was afraid the Twins would completely dismantle, what with the talk of them trading Jones, too).

I was also happy to see that Robin Ventura is still employed, although one of the classier players in the game deserves a better organization than the Dodgers.

And look, everybody! Rey Ordonez is a free agent! Numfar, do the Dance of Whiny, Overrated Shortstops!

Axis and Allies, revised edition?

http://www.avalonhill.com/default.asp?x=articles/gen/aapressrelease20031003

Grrr

So every third asshole on the road has an American flag on their car (because it's so much easier than actually showing real interest in what your country is doing), and people bitch about Canadians doing the same thing (but without, presumably, cutting across three lanes of traffic, yakking on a cell phone, and forgetting that they have a nifty turn signal lever)?

Sheesh.

What's the anime that won't cop out when there's danger all about?

It's Geneshaft. Can you dig it?

I mentioned this in passing a few days back, but I've gotten rather addicted to this anime during its run on TechTV. And since that's the dubbed version, I'd imagine that the uncut, subbed version is even better.

I missed the first four or five episodes, so had to piece some stuff together (and if anyone could explain the deal with the programming taskmaster/ventriloquist's dummy slapstick stuff that sucks valuable life out of the plot, I'd love to know), but there've been some pretty impressive moments, including more heroic deaths than I'd have expected (at least three major characters so far), and an interesting genetic manipulation background (think Gattica), combined with some interesting gender theory (male ship captains have "monitors" assigned to them to theoretically keep their violent tendencies in check, although they seem pretty useless so far).

The major problem, so far, is that the closest thing to a main character, Mika, is also the blandest character (not counting the stereotyped bratty kid (Tiki) and the aforementioned dummy). But there are enough interesting characters around (even if a bunch of them are now dead) to keep me watching. Which is rare, since I'm damned picky about anime.