CRL
News
February 9, 2009
CHANGE!
It’s something I like to get back when I pay for
something. It’s also something a
politician promised me. Whether I agreed
with him or not, or voted for him or not (and I didn’t), he promised me change
this year.
Maybe he’s a prophet.
As most of you know, after 22 years, my employer
decided they no longer needed my services.
After 48 years of having my closet all to myself, my walk-in has been
reduced to a couple of feet on one rack.
(And the shoes?!?!?!?!?!?!?!)
That’s right, I’m getting a
new career (I don’t know what it is yet) and a new life (marriage) all in the
same year. In short, everything in my
life is changing. Except
one thing – this league.
Before I get to the fun stuff, we do have some 2008
remembrances to cover.
We tragically lost a charter member, Steve Kerr,
midway through the season. I need to
pass along Sharon Kerr’s thanks for everything the league did. She was extremely grateful when we returned
Steve’s league fees and was almost speechless when I told her she was getting
the winner’s share of $2600+ on a unanimous vote of the league owners. She said it was going to their two daughters
– specifically to the equestrian pursuits that Steve instilled in them. I am also getting a small, classy (I’m
thinking clear Lucite, something for the mantelpiece) memento to Sharon from
the league in Steve’s memory. Mike
Stanley’s Cup is also being renamed in honor of Steve. (No, I haven’t figured
out a name for it yet – all suggestions are appreciated.)
Now, back to our regularly scheduled program …
But first, one last look
back to 2008. Charter CRL owner Steve Farabee, along with his relatively new partner, Bill McCausland, took home the 2008 title. Farabee, who has
been around since the Old Testament days (that means pre-Internet, Bill) of CRL
history, actually got to the promised land. Some of us never thought we’d ever live that
long. Steve used to be a “good
owner.” Our founder and Commissioner for
Life, Ken Alexander, said “Good
Owners” were always in (we’ve had some
that weren’t – remember the South African guy who didn’t draft any black
players and dropped out half-way through the season?), always pay, and are
never a threat. You gotta
love those guys.
Editorial aside – I’m watching college basketball on
ESPN as I’m typing this and they are having a field day with A-Rod admitting he
used steroids. Count me in the “I don’t
give a shit” category – he wasn’t in the NL, anyway, and I want my guys doing
whatever it takes to make their numbers better.
I owned Barry Bonds for a lot of years.
And it wasn’t because I liked his personality.
Scattershooting
(thank you , Blackie Sherrod) before I get to the info
that brought you here (OK, I’m drinking and want to ramble a bit). If you don’t care about my (mostly
self-serving) comments, you can skip the next four paragraphs.
All of you are invited to the wedding. Check your mailboxes for invites – I screwed
up and didn’t verify that they be sent first class, so they went out “Standard
Mail,” whatever that means – all I know is it took a week to get to Austin (it
would have been faster via pony express) and I have no idea how long it will
take to get to those of you who live outside of Texas. Please let me know if you need additional
info.
To those of you who may have been taken aback by the
news that I’m unemployed, don’t worry about me – I got a great severance
package from my former employer – three weeks pay per year of employment,
resume and job search help, and the first three months of COBRA at my employee
contribution rate – which is why we are getting married before the end of
March, meaning I’m on her insurance. I’m
actually going to start looking after the wedding.
I’ve been so damn busy combining households,
planning the wedding, combining households, working on upgrading the house,
combining households, taking care of deferred maintenance on my house,
combining households, consolidating finances, combining households, finding
places for shoes and combing households that I’ve let some stuff slide –
getting this update out is just one example.
Of course, I have the best intentions but no
schedule – I REALLY want to do all this stuff.
But I have a future brother-in-law (I like the guy) who is a fireman –
read 24 hours on, 48 hour off – that has a knack for calling me on the way home
from his shift, commenting on the weather and saying that it would it would be
great day for a round golf. I, of
course, immediately forget about all the stuff I’m supposed to do and go hit
the links (for those of you in the frozen hinterlands, the average high the
past couple of weeks has been around 70).
I’d have accomplished a whole lot more, except for these distractions …
he drug me kicking and screaming … I drove.
Obligations?
What obligations?
For those of you who skipped the last four
paragraphs (Fore!), and those of you who did not, it’s time for the really
important stuff you came here for:
TIMELINE:
2/23 (Mon) – You must report the players you intend
to save between the guys you have tied together. If you have guys on reserve tied to active
players, you have to choose one from each tied pair to keep. A list of players by team is included at the
end of this newsletter,
3/1 (Wed) – Your initial payment of $250 is due to
Glenn. His address is:
8561 LaSalle St
# 53
Cypress, CA
90630
3/16
(Mon) – Roster Freeze Day – Roster Freezes due.
No trades from this point until after the draft.
3/27
(Fri) – Draft ~ 10am.
I’ve
already updated the rosters on the All-Star Stats site. That means all players who played out their
option or contract have been dropped from the rosters. All S2s became S1s, all Long-term contract
guys have had the number behind the L reduced by one. Any player with a contract of “O” indicates a
player entering his option year. You can
do three things with those players – you can drop them, leave them at the same
salary to play out their option, or sign them to a Long-Term Contract. For a refresher on Long-Term Contracts, go
here:
http://www.c-r-l.org/rules/crlconst.htm#XVI
When
you look at the All-Star Stats site, you notice that Steve Spencer is now the
owner of Team 6. To keep everyone with
the same team number, I traded the entire rosters of teams 6 and 13 (I talked
to Spence about it already) and then deleted Team 13, dumping the players back
into the pool. We are now a 12-team
league again.
Some
housekeeping notes:
Jim
Fraser will be joining us by speakerphone.
Veneeta, Jim’s wife, is undergoing chemo and
has her final treatment the week of the draft.
There is no way he can leave her home by herself to come out and join
us.
On
Roster Freeze Day (3/16), if you keep anyone on your reserve or farm roster,
you will owe $5 activation fees/farm retention fees per player you keep to the
prize pool.
Here’s
how many players each team can keep:
Team
5 – 12
Team
6 – 13
Team
10 – 14
Everyone
else can keep 15 players. Players
retained on your farm roster do not count against the total number of players
who can be kept.
Now,
as promised, here is the list of players tied together. Players listed first in each pair are
currently on the active roster. Please
get back with me by Monday, 2/23 and let me know who you want to keep from each
pair. Keeping them at this time, does
not require you to keep them on Roster Freeze Day.
Team
1: None
Team
2: None
Team
3: Greg Norton-Dan Ortmeier, Kyle McClellan-John
Smoltz, Josh Johnson-Orlando Hernandez, Tyler Walker-Matt Clement
Team
4: Jason LaRue-Michael Barrett, Dmitri Young-Andruw Jones
Team
5: None
Team
6: None
Team
7: Geoff Blum-Moises Alou, Tim Redding-Noah Lowry
Team
8: Jolbert Cabrera-Mark Teixeira, Chris Gomez-Carlos
Lee, Blaine Boyer-Peter Moylan
Team
9: Casey Blake-Wily Mo Pena, Damion Easley-Rafael Furcal, Matt Capps-Eddie Kunz
Team
10: Nick Evans-Jason Bay, Chris Volstad-Tom Gordon, Brian
Mohler-Claudio Vargas
Team
11: Martin Prado-Nick Johnson, Mat Gamel-Brandon
Phillips, Jeff Samardzija-Mark Mulder,
Anibal Sanchez-Chad Cordero
Team
12: Taylor Buchholz-Brad Penny, Joe Blanton-Rafael Soriano
Jim