Baseball

Last year Colorado’s Carlos Gonzalez and Ubaldo Jimenez went from future stars to MVP and Cy Young candidates respectively. To stay ahead of the game, let’s look at some of last year’s future stars that could follow the Rockies duo’s path and become household names.


Pedro Alvarez, 3B, Pittsburgh Pirates

Mets new general manager Sandy Alderson is well respected across Major League Baseball. He's supposed to be smart, and is known for building some good teams.

When the Mariners traded Cliff Lee to Texas last July, the focus was on having Justin Smoak as part of that package.

Unfortunately, much of the talk from that trade has not been the potential of Smoak, but the issues that come with one of he other pieces of that deal.

Josh Lueke.

After a year of trying, the Washington Nationals have finally succeeded in trading outfielder Josh Willingham. As of early this afternoon, the 32-year-old was officially an Oakland Athletic.

Coming East are pitcher Henry Rodriguez and center fielder Corey Brown.

We'll talk about Rodriguez another day. Let's focus on Brown for now.

Baseball and America lost a legend on Wednesday when Hall of Fame pitcher and World War II hero Bob Feller passed away. Feller was 92 years old.

Feller, who played all 18 years of his Major League career with the Cleveland Indians, won 226 games, struck out 2,581 and had a 3.25 ERA. His numbers would have been even better if he didn’t serve his country in World War II in the prime of his career. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1962.

Trolling around a sports memorabilia shop during the Christmas rush, I stumbled across this photo of Ted Williams, at bat at Fitton Field on the campus of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. Fenwick Hall, the school’s flagship building, can be seen in the distance.

The photo caption was entitled: The Dawning of a Legend.

A.J. Burnett is fuming, steaming and most likely darn-right mad.

He's mad at ESPN voice on the radio, Colin Cowherd.

This one's a doozie.

Seems the guy with the strange name—that would be Mr. Cowherd—said something on his show about the New York Yankees pitcher that he might, at this moment, want to take back.

Ah, but such is the beauty of our modern day sports talk radio. Once you say it, it's ON the record. No misquotes, no pleading, no back-peddling.

MLB Trade Rumors are swirling following some of the big moves the past few weeks.

The Adrian Gonzalez deal was a game-changer for the Boston Red Sox. And now that Cliff Lee has somewhat unexpectedly signed with the Philadelphia Phillies, there are going to be serious reproductions for the team's who missed out on landing an ace starter.

So who out there is most likely to make a deal?

Inside we'll power rank the top 20 team most likely to trade, either to improve their team for next season, avoid impending free agency, or prepare for the future.

The Minnesota Twins are near finalizing a contract with second baseman Tsuyoshi Nishioka, formerly of the Japanese League's Chiba Lotte Marines, according to reports. Nishioka becomes the overwhelming favorite to start at second base for Minnesota in 2011, and his arrival likely signals the end of Orlando Hudson's brief tenure in the Twin Cities.

You know how people say a picture paints a thousand words? Well when you're talking about Bob Feller, a thousands words is not nearly enough.

Robert "Bob" Feller was born in Van Meter, Iowa on November 3, 1918. He was never the smartest or most athletic but what he did have was a hard-working, farm-boy mentality, and his father who taught him everything in "life lessons." In 1931 his father built him a baseball field in which Feller called "Field of Dreams," and credits where he first learned to play baseball.