The Arizona Diamondbacks surprised a lot of people with their first place finish in the NL West last year.  This season they should again be in good position to take the division over the Dodgers and the Padres.

Time to put up or shut up:
http://www.tangotiger.net/clutch/

I'm looking for the guy you want with the game on the line, compared to his TEAMMATES, not necessarily compared to himself in non-clutch situations.

The other day, we had a "Reader Challenge" here on Da Box asking everyone to name their Top 10 Favorite Players. Dozens of individual ballplayers earned mention -- yes, you all love Doc Halladay -- with many people commenting on what a fun exercise it was.

This followup is spurred by a comment from Dave Till, who wrote that one of my own Top 10 favorites, Bill Gullickson, was solidly on his "all-time worst list." We both had legitimate and defensible reasons -- such is the greatness of "baseball favorite" discussions.

So let's try to build the opposite list -- um, not "the opposite of fun," but rather "the opposite of favorite" -- for each of us here. In other words, answer this question ...

It's time to play.

The 2007 season was disappointing for the A's, they entered the season expecting to contend but injuries to key players caused them to fall short of expectations.  Rich Harden, Eric Chavez, Chad Gaudin, Bobby Crosby, Houston Street and Travis Buck each spent time in sick bay, many with significant injuries.  The A's are now in rebuilding mode and should not be a challenger in the 2008 AL West.

Ever since I was a kid, one of my favourite things to do has been to rank stuff using arbitrary statistics that I make up. It is in this spirit that I present you with the Batter's Box Bonanza.

Most serious baseball fans usually end up with a short list of players who are their "favorites" for one inexplicable reason or another. Maybe it's a Hall of Famer, maybe it's a cuppajoe guy who tossed you a ball at a minor league game.

My personal list includes one HOFer, some All-Stars, a couple of 20-win guys who were neither All-Stars nor HOFers, and a couple of guys many of you will never have heard of, I suspect. Glance over my list and provide your own ... and of course, feel free to tell us why, or if you prefer, leave a little mystery to the whole deal. Here we go ...

The Jays claimed Bill Murphy from the Diamondbacks and added him to the 40 man roster.

Casey Janssen was moved to the 60 day DL to make room.

As promised, the American League!

I must confess - most of the recent action on this front, with teams struggling to reach .500 all-time, has occurred in the National League (Astros, Diamondbacks, Braves in particular.) We reprint the original team write-ups and update the AL numbers for the sake of completeness.

Way back in June 2006, I got interested in all-time franchise records. As I wrote at the time:

...here's a review of all-time franchise records, and if they're currently above .500, I want to find the moment when they climbed that mountain for keeps. And vice versa. There is the problem of franchises that have moved - I'm going to saddle them with their entire history.

I did a bit of research, had a lot of fun, and posted what I learned for the National League and the American League. And I provided an update after the 2006 season. And because there are a few teams hovering near the .500 mark even as we speak, I thought it was time to do it all again. Maybe it'll become an annual thing!

Another one of those little rites of Spring; the Vegas Over/Under lines for the year.

Hey, we're not the only ones remembering Cito...

I came across the following over at the Tao of Stieb:

We've written about Baseball Withdrawal here before, a grim topic to be sure. The first week of March, however, represents the tantalizing near-end of the anticipation, the sun's teasing peak from behind the cloud, that here-comes-the-waiter-and-I-think-that's-my-Reuben-sandwich-he's-carrying feeling. This is the post-adjustment, pre-resolution stage of Baseball Withdrawal Syndrome. I freakin' love this part.

This an exercise we went through last spring. This is last year's Predictions Thread! Not this Year's

Anyway, how did we do?

Spring Training nears and roster-filling moves start to come around the majors; just in the last day ...

• The Marlins signed LF Luis Gonzalez and 3B Dallas McPherson;
• The Mariners signed OF-1B Brad Wilkerson.

And in the "minor league contract, with an invitation to spring training" category ...

• The Yankees signed 3B Morgan Ensberg;
• The Indians signed P Jorge Julio.

A few thoughts ...