The only way the WBC will really work is if MLB restructures the major league season like soccer. The Premier league soccer season in England has international, European matches mixed in with regular matches, and it works pretty well.
I read Halberstam's Summer of '49 a few years ago, and that was really good. I loved the way he described it: an epic battle royale between Joe Dimaggio's Yankees and Ted Williams' Red Sox.
You know what you guys need to read is Johnny Damon's book, Idiot. Quality reading, am I right?! And it's not like he's a bad guy or he duped anybody or anything...
I guess that really goes back to the question of what makes a hall of famer. How much do you count personality with statistics? It's a tough call for me partly because he hasn't been here that long. But if he did get #45 retired, I think I would be fine with it.
That's because we're always ready to pounce on personalities in sports that we don't like, like T.O. and Barry Bonds. We just have to remember that steroids aren't just for bad guys.
So if the Marlins could just move to a town where they could thrive, maybe there wouldn't even be a contraction issue. Maybe the Marlins could lend some guys to the D-rays to show them how to win too.
Yeah, I was gonna say maybe they could cut down the number of games in a season and incorporate the WBC somehow during the season but uh.....way too much of a pain in the ass. We'll stick with the way it is now!
I think Ozzie might disagree with you there though. In SI, he also said that he doesn't think any mangers are good. He basically said the managers are only as good as the players they have.