BASEBALL ARCHIVE 9
	World Series Recap 10.31.02 Well, it?s over and done with.  My World Series prediction was wrong, and I?ve never been happier.  I weighed how much I hated the Rally Monkey with how much I hate Barry Bonds, and I decided that I hate Barry Bonds more, so I rooted for the Angels.  Of course, that didn?t stop me from predicting a Giants victory on this page, but like I said, I?ve never been happier to be wrong. Anyway, anyone that claims that they predicted an Angels World Series victory at the beginning of the season is a complete liar.  Even Angels fans would have thought such a prediction was ludicrous at the time.  In a way, that makes it kind of cool.  The Giants vs. Angels World Series was somewhat refreshing in that it didn?t include any of the usual suspects.  On the other hand, it would have been more interesting if I had strong feelings about either team. So, now that the World Series is over, the casual baseball fan will forget about baseball until next March.  The casual baseball fan, however, will miss out on some very interesting proceedings this off season.  There are many questions to be answered, including: Where will the Expos play next year?  We will also get to see if the Braves will hold on to both Glavine and Maddux (who are free agents), or if they will restructure their pitching staff around younger guys.  I personally think that it would be crazy to sign these guys to long term contracts, but I?m sure someone will.  The smart move would be to sign Greg Maddux as a player/coach for a team with a young pitching staff.  The Braves should explore this option, although they still have the autistic Mazzone as pitching coach.  Imagine if the Marlins opened up the checkbook for Maddux and he could counsel guys like Brad Penny, AJ Burnett, and Josh Beckett as they matured.  But alas, that would require intelligence and forethought from a worthless franchise owned by Jeffrey Loria. I recently read that Mike Sirotka signed a minor league deal with the Cubs.  Remember that Sirotka was the centerpiece in the deal that sent David Wells to the White Sox from Toronto.  At the time Toronto wanted to re-do the deal because they believed that Sirotka was injured before the trade.   With the production that the White Sox got out of Wells, they?d probably be happy to undo the trade now.  For some reason, Wells only produces when he?s in pinstripes.  I?m surprised that Toronto let Sirotka go.  That makes that trade a complete waste.  Why would they wait until he?s finally getting healthy to let him go?  Maybe they know something about his recovery from injury that the Cubs don?t know.  Although for a minor league contract, I?d probably be willing to give him a shot. Doesn?t it seem like every year someone gets injured in an on-field celebration after winning a playoff series or the World Series?  There?s always one guy that gets jumped on or stepped on, or something and then misses the next series or has to have off-season surgery.  I haven?t heard of anyone getting hurt this year, but I fully expected David Eckstein to get smothered at the bottom of a pile-on.  Did you see when they threw him in a trash can during the celebration after the first round of the playoffs?  That had to be a little embarrassing.  Here?s a guy that fought his whole life to prove that his size didn?t matter and that he could play with the big boys and then, during the greatest moment of his baseball career to that point, the guys dump him in a trash can.  I thought it was great.  He?s probably been thrown in trash cans his whole life though, so it probably was just like grade school/high school/college/minor leagues.
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