By JIMMY D / Will baseball deadline be a quiet day for GMs | Jimmy's archive

Hockey does Deadline Day proud every year. There are always dozens of last-minute deals to keep puckheads in a what-does-it-mean-for-my-roster lather all day long.

Baseball likes to get its deadline deals out of the way ahead of the deadline.
Once again, the biggest ‘deadline’ deals have already gone down and full two weeks before the first MLB trade deadline on July 31. Another one on the weekend shuffled 2B Ray Durham out of San Francisco and into Milwaukee, where the Brewers have been buying after years of selling.

And the Yankees got into the act (go figure) signing Richie Sexson after Seattle cut him. He was popular in one Seattle bar, but not because of his hitting prowess. The bar set its beer price at Sexson’s batting average, meaning it started at $1.45 a pint. Jimmy figures every hit was booed by the beer crowd who ended up paying $2.18.

Before that, the CC Sabathia and Rich Harden deals (to Milwaukee and the Cubs respectively) set the bar for trade value. On Friday, the slumping Phillies acquired Joe Blanton from Oakland for minor leaguers. He has given up too many runs and too many hits, so he should feel right at home with the Philly staff.
Among other injury or promotion tidbits that may affect your baseball roster this week:

Off the DL

JJ Putz in Seattle. The linebacker-sized closer went on the list June 11 with elbow problems.

Bobby Jenks in Chicago. White Sox closer ready to resume role.

Magglio Ordonez in Detroit. Slugger activated late last week to add more bite to Tiger order.

Brett Myers in Philly. Messed up pitcher pledges to return from minor strong against the Mets today. We’ll see.

On the DL

Takashi Saito in Los Angeles. Reliable closer has elbow problems, hard-throwing Jonathan Broxton (as in 100-mph-hard) was called up to get some save chances.

RHP Roy Oswalt with a strained left hip abductor. He is eligible to come off July 27.

Cash-ional Hockey League in Russia

The new Russian Hockey League (called the Continental Hockey League) is making it clear they will poach players and they will offer big-money contracts to populate its teams.

Why should fantasy hockey gurus care? Well, unless you have a fantasy roster with teams from Moscow and St. Petersburg, players like Ray Emery, Jaromir Jagr and Alexander Radulov are now off your fantasy depth charts for good.
The owners of the league – and many of the club owners – have deep pockets.

It harks back to the WHA days where there was a legitimate alternative to accepting an NHL contract. Young players earning less than marquee paycheques and older players whose name value is often better than their on-ice value will see some interesting offers tabled.

It might just get Jimmy motivated to create a CHL fantasy league. Especially if the league expands – as is hoped – to include some of the top teams in Sweden and other countries. When the CHL is a true European pro league with teams in most major nations, the NHL will have a real fight on its hands.

Better that they find a way to play nice now or be forced to play dirty later on when the new kid on the international hockey block grows up.

All-Star contest disaster

OK, so Jimmy is no expert when it comes to fantasy baseball at the All-Star Game. Jimmy finished 14th in his own contest at www.FanJack.com and as promised, he is listing everyone who finished ahead of him in the standings.

Congrats to winner Tequilacat along with jallison, brian, rexann, redsfan32, keithsfan, juanrd, dave04, Cseitl, nathanielsmith, unusualbear, tazmania2121, rvenegas, NyGhT WiZaRd.

It seemed nothing worked with Jimmy’s picks, from taking Josh Hamilton to win the homer derby (he lost to Canuck Justin Morneau) to picking the AL to win by two or more runs (they won 4-3).

Jimmy D

jpoole@herald.ca