9/4/10

CUTNPASTE: - Rod Barajas, Omar Minaya, MaxiPreps, Robin Ventura... and Lucas Duda,

Rod Barajas:



link  - Lastly, there's the Dodgers' addition of Rod Barajas. Maybe it was a matter of timing, but they would have been better off just sticking with A.J. Ellis, considering their infinitesimal shot at the playoffs. Not that Ellis is a top prospect, but why not play him in Russell Martin's absence, to see if he's next year's first choice for the club's caddy?



Omar Minaya:


link  - So I'm settling into my seat on a VERY inexpensive Jetblue flight to Chicago to see the Mets in Wrigley when I notice the flight attendant having a hard time closing the overhead compartment because of someone's bag. After she sheepishly looks around for the culprit—he identifies himself. Since everyone was already seated and ready to fly, the apparently inconsiderate passenger was on stage for all to see. It was none other than Omar Minaya himself. What I didn't say before is that this flight is CRAWLING with Mets fans making the pligramage to Wrigely. At once the plane is abuzz. One young man in 18A shouts out "I woulda traded frenchy three months ago" another says "Better live it up, this is probably your last flight to chicago as GM". Delighted by the impromptu celebrity roast I chimed in with "I bet they flew Mike Jacobs in business class, at least". We all laughed in unison—he sat down and put his headphones on, a defeated man.



MaxiPreps:


link  - , the high school sports source for CBSSports.com and one of the fastest growing sports sites on the Internet, today announced they have extended their reach in local communities by covering Junior Varsity and Freshman high school sports teams. The expanded coverage will include schedules, scores, statistics, video, photos, and editorial articles for thousands of Junior Varsity and Freshman teams. Additionally, MaxPreps.com has added national coverage of six new sports, including boys and girls soccer and softball. MaxPreps.com covered over 1.1 million high school games during the 2009-10 school year and with the expansion of coverage, that number will increase to over 2.5 million games during the upcoming school year. In total MaxPreps.com will track over 250,000 teams and 2.5 million athletes during the 2010-2011 school year.

Robin Ventura:


link  - As a broadcaster for ESPN, College Baseball Hall of Famer and former MLB third baseman Robin Ventura understands the importance of down-to-the-wire endings. In his new role as an advisor for the Capital One Cup, a newly created award to honor school’s cumulative excellence in a number of college sports each year, Ventura couldn’t hide his excitement about the dramatic endings the award could add to the College World Series. “The College World Series is the last event of the year, so competition for the cup could come down right until the series,” Ventura explained. “For example, if this award had existed last season, Florida would have been neck and neck with Stanford heading into the CWS, and if they had only gone farther in the series then they did, they would have won that year’s Cup.”



Lucas Duda:


link  - Thoughts on Future: For Duda to be a regular in New York, it means he either supplants Ike Davis at first base (unlikely), or one of Jason Bay or Duda has to play right field. Which is scary in its own right. But if the Mets could make it work, it’s looking more and more like they might have found quite the sleeper in Duda. He never fulfilled his power potential at USC, but is enjoying a breakout season in that regard with 23 home runs to date. Like Alonso, I’m still a bit of a skeptic, both about his ultimate power projection, and his future as a possible platoon player. But he’s patient, and he’s worked hard on making better contact, and all credit is due to the Mets player development (and scouting) staff.

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