Pittsburgh Pirates

The Washington Nationals have hired former Seattle Mariners manager John McLaren as bench coach, Jim Lett as bullpen coach and Dan Radison as first-base coach. The team also announced Friday that hitting coach Rick Eckstein, pitching coach Steve McCatty and third-base coach Pat Listach will keep their jobs on manager Jim Riggleman's staff in 2010. Riggleman was McLaren's bench coach with Seattle at the start of 2008, then replaced him as the team's skipper when McLaren was fired during the season.  

Pitcher John Grabow became the first of the 171 free agents to reach agreement on a new deal, getting a $7.5 million, two-year contract yesterday from the Chicago Cubs. Grabow, a 31-year-old left-hander, combined to go 3-0 with a 3.36 ERA last season in a career-high 75 relief appearances with the Pittsburgh Pirates and Cubs. He pitched 30 games and had a 3.24 ERA for the Cubs after he was acquired on July 30 along with left-hander Tom Gorzelanny from the Pittsburgh Pirates for pitchers Jose ...

Austin is a special offensive player…   -Billy Godwin

 

Omar Vizquel and Ozzie Guillen each wear No. 13 as a tribute to another slick-fielding shortstop from Venezuela, Dave Concepcion. One of them will have to change his number next season if the Chicago White Sox follow through on their plans to sign Vizquel as a reserve infielder and unite him with Guillen, their tempestuous manager, to form one of the more intriguing pairings in baseball. Guillen and Vizquel, born three years apart, are longtime friends and grew up not far from each other near Caracas.

I pretty much let everyone know before I left there that I wanted to come back   -John Grabow

 

The Mariners set their 40-man roster on Friday and a familiar name was not on it. Right-handed reliever Chris Jakubauskas was placed on waivers in the morning and claimed by the Pirates. Major League teams faced a 9 pm PT deadline for setting their 40-man roster heading into the Winter Meetings next month, and Jakubauskas was removed to make room for someone else to be protected from the Rule 5 Draft held on the final day of the annual Winter Meetings next month.  

Signed as a non-drafted free agent by Pittsburgh on 7/19/05 from the Dominican Republic. Played at three different levels in 2009 and posted a 2-4 record, four saves and a 3.86 ERA (84.0ip/36er) in 39 games (three starts) with West Virginia (A), Lynchburg (A) and Altoona (AA). Went 4-for-4 in his save opportunities - all coming with Altoona.Spent the entire 2008 season pitching with State College in the New York-Penn League.  

The late comedian Joe Lewis once said, "rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for U.S. Steel." Nowadays, it's more like rooting for Vladimir Putin, but U.S. Steel was also pretty unlovable back in the day. Hating the Yankees is something that will never go out of fashion.  

After working an unfulfilling job upon his 1973 graduation with a political science degree from Duquesne University, where he helped to manage the club football team, Jon Neiderer decided it was time to get into professional sports. "He actually got a job selling pots and pans, and he hated it," said John Neiderer III, whose father, born John Jr. on Sept. 12, 1951, in Hanover, Pa., dropped the "h" long ago. " There, down a hallway at Three Rivers Stadium, began an improbable life's journey.  

The Los Angeles Angels could have crumbled when pitcher Nick Adenhart was killed in a car accident in April, overcome by waves of grief and sadness. Mike Scioscia kept them moving forward. "There wasn't one defining moment," he said.

What we're talking about this afternoon, it's probably as flattering an experience as I've come to realize during the course of my professional career in athletics   -Jim Tracy

 

The pool of possibilities is about to become a free-for-all. Thursday marks the final day that teams have exclusive negotiating privileges with its own free-agent players. Then, beginning at midnight, it's fair game for all.

Organizations make mistakes when they spend money just to spend money   -Neal Huntington