The Hot Stove is Heating Up!

The Red Sox apparently offered the Seibu Lions $51.1 million (or 85000 Playstation 3s) for the rights to talk to Japanese superstar pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka. They now have 30 days to work out a deal with Scott Boras (who went to McGeorge Law School, a noted T4 institution). I think this is a dumb move for Boston, not because Matsuzaka isn't a good player, but because I will be forced to beat up every Red Sox fan I hear butchering his name for the next four years. Also everyone in Boston is racist.

Another story that's not getting any press at all is the Pirates' attempt to land Cuban defector Yuslan Herrera. You may remember Herrera as the star of the Cuban Olympic team that won the gold medal in Athens. I know I do. I remember calling my dad after the gold-medal game and pondering how great it would be if Herrera would defect to the Dominican Republic in two years and if we could possibly sign him to bolster our rotation now that we don't have Oli Perez.

Signing Herrera would be a brilliant move for GM Dave Littlefield, even though Herrera hasn't pitched competitively in more than a year. Apparently Littlefield saw him pitching off a mound in abandoned sandlot after he had gotten lost going back to his hotel in Santo Domingo, and was really impressed. I would be willing to put money on Herrera winning Rookie of the Year for the Pirates, while Matsuzaka goes back to Japan disgraced in July after getting into a bar fight with a drunk Southie.