Going To Oakland

I fly to Oakland today for day 1 of the Mancation! Me and a couple friends (and one of my friends sons) is going to the Raiders game tonight, touring San Francisco tomorrow and finally an Oakland A's game Friday night. We come home early on Saturday. I have to send a thanks to Littlkins who got us the Raiders tickets. I will be blogging from my phone as I am not going to take my computer for the trip.

Fantasy Baseball Update

I can't remember the last update I had for my baseball team. But, here is the story for the last couple months. I was in first place for quite a while. Then I lost first and almost fell to second. I was down to the first place team by 10 to 14 for a while. I had to make some trades. I traded Kevin Youkilis for Brain Roberts and Yovanni Gallardo. That is trading a top 20 hitter for a top 10 pitcher and top 30 hitter. Not a bad deal. I also traded the injured Jose Reyes for Stephen Drew (a top 40 hitter when healthy - and a big 2nd half guy) as well as the DH for the Orioles (Luke Scott) who is having a pretty good year. Hopefully he keeps it up.

Just a couple days ago I went back into first place. My hitters are all 1st, 2nd, or 4rd place in all their categories. If my pitching could pull it together I would be dominating. I hope to pick up the pace with my pitching (I have a good staff) so I can dominate. Right now my lead is pretty perilous.

I Am Crushing

Festering Sores (my fantasy baseball team) is now up 9 points for the season. I know it is early, but if you know anything about fantasy baseball getting out to a quick lead is the beset thing you can do. You have to quickly demoralize the other teams so they stop playing. It is early, but I am encouraged.

Fantasy Baseball

Good times this summer. My fantasy team should rock, I had a great day yesterday - and I have CC Sabathia who had a horrible day. Things are good right now. I expect a big year - and I have Ichiro on the DL, Joe Mauer injured and Scott Baker (Minnesota pitcher, he is good, I swear) on the DL. Once my lineup gets to full speed I will/should dominate. I have a couple small holes at 2B. I only have one second baseman, I need another, but my bench is full of injured guys right now. I will just have to wait. Hopefully not too long though. I currently sit in second place, and I do not know how the first place guy is in first, but it is only the second day of the season. Here is my team from top to bottom:
C: Joe Mauer (injured, currently using Bengie Molina)
1B: Mark Texiera
2B: Freddi Sanchez
3B: Kevin Youkilis
SS: Jose Reyes
CI: Justin Morneau
MI: Johnny Peralta
LF: Conor Jackson
CF: Matt Kemp
RF: Ichiro (injured, currently using Jayson Werth)
OF: Justin Upton
OF: Adam Lind
DH: Travis Hafner
SP: CC Sabathia
SP: Kevin Slowey
SP: Carlos Zambrano
SP: Gil Meche
SP: Erik Bedard
SP: Johan Santana
SP: Scott Baker (injured)
RP: Matt Capps
RP: Heath Bell
RP: Brian Wilson
RP: Tony Pena
RP: Jason Motte (blew a Save big-time yesterday, it will get better)

Feel free to congratulate me on my great team!

Fantasy Sports Update

I had a lot of problems with fantasy basketball this year. In all reality, my team just sucked. I took 7th out of 10th place in the regular season. We are now in the playoffs and last week I beat the team ahead of me (6th place). I am now going against the 5th place team to become the champion of the losers bracket. It is a very close week so far (we go until the end of the season). I plan on winning to make the season worth it. I say if you can't win the real thing, win the losers bracket I say.

I start baseball at the end of this week and I hope I can do a better job in the draft. I am not much of a fantasy baseball player (I have never won baseball). One day I will, hopefully it starts now.

Boys Fight Too

Just to make sure I get all the good sports fights this week:

This is a really good fight for a baseball game. There was real punches in this one.

Fantasy Baseball Update

I haven't let you know about my fantasy baseball team lately. Probably because of how much I suck. I hit a rough patch of injuries and then an even rougher patch where none of my guys could hit. I have started to come back a little the past couple weeks, and I have beaten some of the leading teams, only to get crushed by the loser teams. I guess I am one of those loser teams. Hopefully the team can pick things up and I can get a winning streak going.

Below is this weeks match, I am beating the best team (once again). Hopefully it sticks.

Bees Lose

I must be bad luck. The Bees are one of the best triple A teams, and the two times I have attended a game this year they have lost. The Padres lost 2 of 3 games that I watched while at Catalyst. I do not know what to do about it. I wish I could help the teams I go to see win. I guess I need to send out more "good vibes" while I am at the game.

UPDATE: Here is a picture from the game.

Take Me Out To The Ball Game

Just sang Take Me Out To The Ball Game during the seventh inning stretch. I would have to say I sounded pretty good. The rest of the family was a little so-so.

At the Bees game

Gert is standing next to me honking my nose and pulling on my ear. The Bees are losing (don't they always when I go to the game) 2-1. The second run was scored on an error. There has not been much more action. The Bee came up to the suite and we got some pictures, I will post them later. It is the top of the 7th inning, I will keep you updated.

More baseball

Went to another game tonight. 37th row this time - not the third deck (that was yesterday). Here is a picture from tonights game.

The Padres lost tonight. They had some good offense in the first couple innings and then it died. No more runs, hardly any hits. Not a lot from that point on. The game was fun. It was a good night for baseball. This will be the last game I will get to on this trip.

Live! From Petco Park

Hello. I made it safely to San Diego. I spent the day managing the temps and getting some logistic items set for the conference. It was a busy day. Once I get back to the hotel I will post some pictures from today.
Game update: middle of the third, Tigers lead 1-0. Granderson hit a home run on the second pitch of the game. Maddux is pitching and the Tigers are hitting him pretty hard. He is lucky we are in San Diego or a couple long flyouts would have been homeruns.
Watch for more later.

Links for today

What will the next iPhone bring? I do not know, Steve Jobs does not talk to me personally. There are some major problems and hopefully they can be fixed. If the battery could be replaced easily and there was enterprise support I would consider an iPhone, but I still love my Curve.

Bill Gates was talking about the new version of Windows and what MS learned from Vista, this is what he said, "Based on compatibility -- we're going to do better. The way you see the user interface and security -- we're going to better. The way we help move you onto the new version, we're going to do better on that. So it's a ton of things. We have a culture that's very much about `we need to do better'. Vista has given us more opportunities…." The columnist says the last line was drowned out by laughter. "We Need To Do Better" that is a great tagline for Microsoft and Windows.

I do not use FireFox, but some people I know do. Version 3 will come out soon. I will take a look and give it a chance, but I think I am an Internet Explorer guy.

Looking for a new laptop? Read this first so you can get the info that you will need to get the right one.

Baseball is going to lose some love for this. Why can't the kids have the name of the team for their uniform and an official MLB hat to wear. Kids want to pretend they are on a pro-team. This is just disgusting. I guess a couple billion a year is not enough for these guys.

I do not like Rachel Ray, but it is a freaking scarf people, calm down!

Fantasy Baseball Update

I have not let you know where I am in baseball lately (my team sucks). I want to be truthful with all of you so I will tell you that I am in 4th place. My team is below .500 and I get blown out most weeks I play a good team. You can see below that the 3rd place team is way in front of me and I am barely ahead of the 5th place team.

This week has started out well though. I am playing the 2nd place team and I am winning. Hopefully this keeps up and I can win. Monkey is my arch-rival. Him and I almost always are near the top when we play. He refuses to trade with me unless he is a clear favorite.

I sent Monkey a trade for baseball earlier in the season and he sent back a response that said. "This seems fair for everyone and I should do it. But I am not going to." I was like, you are crazy. It helps both teams equally and he will not do it because he is not winning the trade, make the trade, but he wouldn't. I moved on though and beat him in our only meeting so far this year. I MUST beat him again this week to show him that he should have made the trade.

Fantasy Baseball Update

So here I am thinking about what to post and then I think that I have not given you enough info on my fantasy baseball team this year. I am currently in third place and I hope to move up. My team is OK, but not great. I am great some weeks though, which is frustrating. Baseball is a long season though. Here are the standing. I am Big Big Stars (the highlighted team).

I have pretty good hitting and OK pitching. Here are my hitters:

And the pitchers:

Pretty good team, right? I just do not think they can win the whole thing.

Money, Money, Money

Rebate checks are coming early. The President is freaking out so he decided to get the economic stimulus checks out early. He, of course, does nothing as oil prices double/triple from when he took office (all his buddies are oil guys). But now that his time in office is running out, he decided that he wants people to have good thoughts about him. At least this time I don't have to pay back the money. This truly is free money this time. An advance of a tax cut for next year. Now we just have to decide how to spend/save of the rebate.

Don't you just love Microsoft. They release a new version of their software (Vista). Everyone hates it. Businesses will not use it. Most people would rather just use XP, because it just works. No funny business like you get with Vista. Microsoft has announced that they are extending the life of XP, which they wanted to kill a year ago, because there would be a riot if it was actually pulled.

The Bees win again. They are now 19-1. The one loss coming the night I went to a game. I guess it is all me. Maybe I will have to go to another game soon just to see if it is me or not. Anyways, I guess these guys are good.

Yesterday's Lost was pretty good. Read the recap from MSN and let me know what you think. I would rate last nights episode a 4 out of 5. This season on Lost there has not been an episode that has rated under 4. This is by far the best TV show on right now.

Bees Game - Final

Bees lost 11-9. Pretty valiant comeback, except for the week 9th inning, went down 1-2-3, with the guy flailing at a wild pitch for strike 3. I don't know how many more Bees games I will get to this year, but this one was fun. The kids were a little crazy and didn't pay attention to the game, but I got to watch enough of it. Good times for (almost) free tickets.

Below are pictures from the game. Below: Tyler, Chloe, Jordan, and Gavin

Bees Update

Top of the 8th, Beavers up 8-5. Missed the first Bees home run. Had to get the kids treats. Typical.

Blogging from the Bees game

The Bees, the local triple A affiliate of the Angels had their home opener tonight. I got an email yesterday about FREE tickets, so I got some. Actually I got 6. I let the kids each pick a friend and I am here by myself. I have taken some pictures with my phone and I will post them later. It is thw bottom of the second inning and the Bees are down 3-0. The Beavers hit a 2-run home run in the 2nd as well as a beoken bat single. The Bees are supposed to be good. We will see if they can come back from this. Update later.