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My best buy low candidate for 2014 is Ted Williams. He is likely to come very cheap in drafts, but as cryogenic technology continues to mature, each year Williams has a growing chance of returning to life, returning to the majors, and returning to the top of the leaderboards. Especially the OBP leaderboard (Overall Brain Percentage), because I think it’s only his head that was frozen, right?

If you want to take a chance on a player who might truly be a difference-maker, I think you have no choice but to draft Williams. His revival will not only make a difference to your fantasy team’s statistics, but also to the entirety of mankind. And only a small number of fantasy teams can ever aspire to make a lasting difference to the world. So why not dream?

It is of course sensible to be a little skeptical that Williams could ever emerge from cryogenic preservation to again become the hitter that he once was — after all, he was 83 years old when he died, and hadn’t played a major league game in over 40 years. To that I say that sometimes the psychological element of baseball is often ignored by the stats. Think about how scared a pitcher would be to throw the ball to an unfrozen Ted Williams. I think this anxiety, confusion, and puzzlement might overwhelm any small age-related decline that Williams might have experienced. I think pitchers would have significantly decreased control, and if Williams can walk, he will end up walking a lot. Contributing, of course, to his league-leading OBP (the regular kind).

I understand why people would want to be frozen, if money is no object and you would otherwise just toss $200K plus a monthly maintenance fee into the trash. Why not? What’s the worst that can happen, aside from your soul being in a permanent state of limbo and not being allowed to enter the afterlife?

So after striking out with my buy low candidates from 2011 (Cal Ripken, Jr.), 2012 (Cal Ripken, Sr.), and 2013 (Derek Jeter), I am confident that Ted Williams will make your 2014 teams much more… something.

Scene: Helicopter shot of Los Angeles, zoom in on a flashy red convertible, driving erratically down Wilshire Boulevard. In the rearview mirror, we see a car pursuing them. The suspect in the passenger seat looks back, and we follow his gaze to a jet black muscle car, driven by Adrian Gonzalez. Gonzalez’s partner, Hanley Ramirez, leans out the passenger window and tries to shoot out the tires of fleeing convertible.

Hanley: Get me closer!

Adrian: This is as close as you’re going to get.

Hanley: I don’t care how, but you’ve got to get alongside them.

Adrian: I’ll try.

Cut to Yasiel Puig, badge hanging from a chain around his neck, borrowing a bulldozer from a construction site a few blocks away.

Cut back to Gonzalez, who steps on the gas. As the convertible swerves right, he pulls up next to it. Ramirez shoots out the tires, but the car keeps going as the driver struggles to maintain control. A third passenger, from the back seat, leans out of the car with a shotgun and points it at Ramirez. Over the radio, we hear a voice:

Yasiel: Don’t worry guys; I got this.

Yasiel Puig pulls out in front of the convertible in the bulldozer, and leaps clear at the last second. There is a spectacular collision, and the car explodes. Rattled, Gonzalez loses control of his car and hits a palm tree. Ramirez is severely injured.

Adrian: Hanley! Hanley! Talk to me buddy!

Fade out.

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Certain Cardinals were piqued by things the Dodgers did last night that did not involve the Dodgers having more runs than them at the end of nine innings. One such comment by a Cardinal was expertly rebutted by the accused Dodger. Observe:

Adam Wainwright: “I saw Adrian doing some Mickey Mouse stuff at second, but I didn’t see Puig.”

Adrian Gonzalez: “I did what I always do, but we are in L.A., so Mickey Mouse is only an hour away”

Ka-chow! This appears to be a succulent comeback! Bravo, Adrian Gonzalez! The exchange reminded me of the 1990 point-and-click graphic adventure game The Secret of Monkey Island, wherein protagonist Guybrush Threepwood must swordfight pirates by hurling scathing insults and parrying lurid slurs with quickly conceived repartees. When one pirate might offer a jibe such as, “I’ve spoken with apes more polite than you,” one would receive a list of options with which to riposte. Voila:

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The St. Louis coaching staff has a reputation for being well-prepared. Manager Mike Matheny and his coaches spend plenty of time doing their homework before each series — and it’s paid off, as their team finds itself two wins away from a pennant.

But when it came to the most important series of their year so far, they took preparedness to a whole new level.

It all started, according to the skipper, when assistant hitting coach Bengie Molina revealed that he had an extensive collection of nineteenth-century British novels.

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So, CBS Sports reports that the Tigers may be shopping Max Scherzer this winter, apparently confused about the goal of baseball being to win games. But why stop there? Yes, Scherzer’s going to get expensive. But so are Rick Porcello, Austin Jackson, Nick Castellanos, Drew Smyly, and, uh, anyone else who is at one point young and then gets good. Yep, it’s those young, good, about-to-get-expensive players that are every team’s problem. Not the old guys you spent a lot of money on. Nope, those guys are great, up until they turn 60 or so, and their contracts end. You need more of them, and fewer guys like Scherzer, entering their prime and actually having the potential to earn back the money you need to pay to keep them.

IMAGE: Scherzer, in the uniform of his new team, the Accurate Accountants (that’s the “A”), who understand when you sign players to contracts and when you don’t.*

*I actually don’t mean to yell too loudly at the Tigers, because recent past decisions have not been particularly grotesque.

In a new strategy, indicating a move away from spending money on players and toward spending on priceless artifacts from around the world, the Yankees are expected to bid big on a Japanese pitcher this offseason.

This particular pitcher is from the Kamakura period (1185-1333) and was used in traditional Buddhist rituals. Made of bronze, and 7 cm tall, it is compact, functional, and elegant.

The pitcher is expected to be their second-most-expensive offseason purchase, after a hand-carved vintage canoe, still functioning quite well but likely to become a bit of an albatross sometime short of, say, a decade or so from now.

Did I say canoe? Wait….

This week’s episode of Back In the Game is called “Play hard or go home.” I wish I could have that choice. Instead, I stayed home today thanks to my disease vector of a son. And while I could  say that this stupid show made me sick, slowly sapping me of my will to fight on against life’s many injustices, that would be a lie. And I cannot abide a lie that doesn’t benefit me in some way. Plus, Carson gets cross if we don’t post, and it disturbs me to see such a gentle hipster stirred to anger and making threats he can’t follow through on from across the ocean.

So what do we have this week? As the rookie coach and as the girl, Terry is tasked with running the Little League’s dreaded annual fund raising campaign by the misogynist douchebag league president whose name I can never remember (which can’t be a good sign for this show since he’s one of the four main characters). Simultaneously, she is trying to find a date for The Cannon, who has seemingly turned extra mean because he’s not getting any. Meanwhile, Danny is trying to make inroads with the 10 year old Baseball Annie, Vanessa, who has temporarily broken up with her asshole boyfriend.

Terry sends the kids out in a parking lot full of ladies to find a date for The Cannon, and they return with Night Court veteran Markie Post, who is way too good for this show. The Cannon, to teach his daughter a lesson about meddling in his love life, steals the Little League money and hires a barfly to hang around the house and annoy everybody. Then he goes out with Markie Post anyway and Terry sells The Cannon’s TV to get the candy money back. Great, now none of them get to watch TV anymore. On the bright side, they won’t have to watch the desperate celebration of humanity’s core awfulness that is this show. So kudos to them.

Also, congratulations to Danny for somehow stealing Vanessa’s iced tea, putting a love note (that somehow stays dry) under the bottle cap, and slipping it back into her lunch. When she reads it, she smiles, probably to cover up how disturbed she is that he broke into her locker, stole her drink, and broke the seal that’s supposed to reassure you your beverage hasn’t been poisoned. Here’s the stupid episode in all of what passes for glory in this worthless age:

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The Pirates are done. The Rays are done. The A’s are done. Baseball, officially, is stupid.

Jose Molina said it best without saying anything:

Look at the box from yesterday’s series-clinching Cardinals win, and you might think that it was Adam Wainwright’s night.

Watch the highlights, and you might point to sluggers David Freese or Matt Adams.

But ask anyone who was there. Ask anyone in the champagne-soaked St. Louis clubhouse. Ask anyone, in fact, who bleeds Cardinal red. They’ll tell you who the real hero was. And in the end, who else could it have been? What Hollywood screenwriter could have penned a more fitting climax to this run of October dreams than the one written for us — the script starring one Daniel William Descalso?

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