On Sunday morning, Tom Cheek lost his long struggle with cancer.

(As in Junior Griffey and Jason Giambi)

When we asked a while back, Bauxites said the winners of the AL and NL Comeback Players of the Year would be Jason Giambi (53%) and Ken Griffey Jr. (73%).

Kudos, everyone. The Batter's Box Interactive Magazine community was right on both counts.

That didn't take long. The second managerial change of the day takes place in Los Angeles.

The offseason managerial axe has fallen for the first time, less than 24 hours into that selfsame offseason: The Detroit Tigers have fired Alan Trammell, one of the great players in the team's history.

Which begs the following questions:

Sadly, there's very little that most of us can do. But I recommend that rather than do nothing, you can make a donation to the American Red Cross as I did. (Please be patient; the link may take some time to load because they are very busy). They are on the ground directly helping victims and are best able to bring their resources to bear on the problem.

Other suggestions are most welcome.

According to Mike Wilner on the Fan 590, the Blue Jays announced about 15 minutes ago that Halladay's broken leg has not healed as well as they had hoped, so they're shutting him down for the season to recover.

According to TSN, the Jays have called up Guillermo Quiroz and designated Ken Huckaby for assignment. Was this Huck's final tour as a Blue Jay? How's Quiroz's health? Does this mean that Gregg Zaun can sleep in one or two days next week?

According to a news flash e-mail from the great Jamey Newberg, the Rangers have called up LHP Justin Thompson, former Tiger All-Star and 15-game winner, and the supposed centerpiece of the Juan Gonzalez trade that also netted the Rangers Coco Cordero and Frank Catalanotto.

Thompson has not appeared in a big league game since 1999. Which [willy insists] prompts the question ... given that he has not pitched in this millenium, if he has sustained success in Detroit, would Thompson be the greatest comeback story in baseball history?

Post your nominations in this category (hint: Jim Bouton with the Braves and Minnie Minoso in his 50s were sideshows, not comebacks) and your memories of both successful and failed comebacks in the Great Game ...

Actually, it's looking more like Trade Fringe right now. JP Ricciardi has all but said there'll be no deals involving the Blue Jays by tonight's no-waivers deadline, and despite all the talk of mammoth three-team extravaganzas, it seems the Red Sox are holding on to Manny Ramirez. So what is happening? Well, er, the White Sox traded for Geoff Blum. So it's looking pretty quiet so far, but in the event some big swaps do happen, or anyone wants to discuss the deals that do take place, here's your thread. Please attach links or references to any reported trades.

A news release from Sean Forman, the man behind BaseballReference.com, the second-best baseball site on the Web.

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