Jermaine Dye

With slugging first baseman Lance Berkman sidelined until at least Opening Day, the Houston Astros are in serious danger of a second straight anemic season at the plate.

In 2009, the Astros finished 14th in the National League in runs scored, 12th in home runs, and 15th in walks.

Much of the problem stemmed from Berkman's inability to stay healthy. In 136 games (his fewest since 2005), Berkman had only 562 plate appearances (his fewest since 2000).

Nick Johnson returned to the Yankees lineup today as the DH and went 0-for-2 with a walk and told reporters after the game that “Things feel fine. No grabbing. No nothing. I loosened up before. Felt nothing.”

That’s good news for the Yankees, who no doubt cringed when they heard that he tweaked his back last week.

A source in the Tampa Bay Rays organization says that outfielder Jermaine Dye is backing off his demand for a contract that promises he’ll get a starting job. The Rays are the only team making that promise, so Dye’s agent Bob Bry is reportedly looking elsewhere and might have contacted the San Francisco Giants.

Dye, 36—yeas old, hit  .302 with 20 home runs for the White Sox in the first half of 2009. When he became the topic of trade talks every single day, he fell to .179 with just seven homers in the second half.

Here we sit in the first week of 2010, and the Atlanta Braves still, seemingly, have a hole to fill in the outfield.

With a starting group currently composed of Cabrera-McLouth-Diaz (the Braves will probably end up taking the Hanson route with Heyward), you can kind of see why.

With that in mind, though, you have to think that the Braves aren't going to be looking to break the bank (sorry, no Matt Holliday ) since they could go to war with that group and be okay.

I've done numerous stories on the Yankees' need for a left fielder.

From Jason Bay, Matt Holliday, Johnny Damon, Mark DeRosa and Xavier Nady, they've all been mentioned and in some way linked to the Yankees.

There is another name to add to the mix for the Yankees: Jermaine Dye.

Now, there are multiple sources with different stories to the Yankees' interest in Dye.

Jon Heyman from Sports Illustrated has said that he doesn't see the Yankees as a strong suitor to land Dye and sees teams like the Braves, Giants and Rangers more likely to land Dye.

The arbitration deadline has come and gone and now is the time for the rumors to start to fly even more than they were before.

For some teams, adding a veteran pitcher to the rotation or bullpen is priority No. 1. For others, adding some offense to go with a quality pitching staff will take up most of the front office's time.

The San Francisco Giants have only one thing to upgrade—it's terrible offense. General manager Brian Sabean will be searching the market, minus Jason Bay and Matt Holliday, for the "second- tier" bats his is trying to find.

This has to be my favorite time of year. The beautiful leaves have fallen. The air is getting much cooler. Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Gone is summer—the long days, the starry nights.

College Football Bowl season is so close we can taste it, NCAA Basketball holiday tournaments are getting ready to begin, and Hot Stove League baseball is in hyper mode.

The latter of that trio is one of my favorite aspects of the great sport of baseball. That time where everyone is 0-0. Every team has a shot.

On Friday morning, the Chicago White Sox continued moving their roster pieces around before free agency begins by buying out right fielder Jermaine Dye .

Should Chicago's other team consider adding the 2005 World Series MVP?

The Cubs are in an awkward situation with their outfield right now. They have Kosuke Fukduome, and Alfonso Soriano likely to be back, and Milton Bradley under contract but on the chopping block.

Now that the baseball season is winding to a close and the races are essentially over, it's time to look back and evaluate what went on in 2009.

The Sox were picked to finish in third place by most publications and that is exactly where they are right now. Though they were in the race for the division most of the year, they never built enough momentum to take a lead and fell out of the race in late August.

After reading one too many articles about trade ideas for the "desperate" Atlanta Braves, I figured it's time we took a journey back into franchise history and remembered the types of moves we've made in similar situations.

For every McGriff deal, there's been a Teixeira.

The deal may sound good at the time (finally!