Hot Stove League Is Burning Fans

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[NOTE: AQB's editors apologize to Gregg for not publishing his story sooner.
However, while Gregg's examples may be dated, his point still rings true.]

Hot Stove Burns Fans
Reporters Making Lots Of Errors With Trade Rumors

By Gregg Henglein

NEW YORK (AQB)--Just a few years ago, no one particularly cared about baseball's off-season. Actually, not many, it seemed, cared about the season itself. After the strike in 1994, a season that did not culminate in a World Series, few thought baseball would recover.

However, Cal Ripken's shattering of Lou Gehrig's consecutive games streak served as the bait to hook fans enough the generate interest again. The Yankees becoming champions - a foregone conclusion for ages - started reeling fans in. Finally, 1998s magical season of not only the Yankees, but also Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa, netted fans and pulled them into the boat.

Sorry … Fox's Bass Fishing special got the better of me. The point is, baseball has survived yet another self-inflicted gunshot wound, and there is a strange phenomenon taking place at office water coolers once again: Hot Stove baseball.

Have you noticed it in your workplace? The chatter, the speculation, the smoke-churning of the rumor mill. "We're getting Griffey!" "We're getting Hampton!" This radio station said this deal is in the works. ESPN said this trade is almost done. The paper said we're dealing so-and-so for whoever's on first.

And, as much fun as those conversations are, have you noticed the funniest part of it all? So many of those rumors, those little morsels left out for fanatics to chow down like AQB's NFL Guru at a 'Skins tailgate party, are complete and utter b.s.

On ESPN.com on Nov. 3, the esteemed Peter Gammons said the Padres would make one of two "blockbusters." Andy Ashby and Dan Miceli to the Indians for Jaret Wright, Russell Branyan, and Alex Ramirez; or catcher Ben Davis to Arizona for Travis Lee. Keep in mind, Gammons didn't treat these as rumor, he treated them, one or the other, as a definite occurrence. "The Padres will make" one of these deals, he said.

So what happened? Days later, Andy Ashby went to the Phillies, Dan Miceli went to the Marlins, and Gammons was a Rey Ordonez-like 0-for-2, missing by a wider mark than a Chuck Knoblauch throw to first.

An unofficial Mets Web site, Metsonline.net, cited Gammons reporting that the Astros would ask the Mets for Bobby Jones, Masato Yoshii, minor league prospect Mo Bruce, and utility fly swatter Luis Lopez, to obtain Mike Hampton. Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci, on WFAN in New York, said Hampton is not even on the table.

Which is it? Anybody's guess, though a trade of two middle of the road guys, a non-top prospect, and a guy whose best hit this year was a right hook to Rey Ordonez, seems like a video game trade: pile up enough mediocrity and receive gold. Real life doesn't work that way.

What eventually happened? The Mets traded Roger Cedeno, Octavio Dotel and minor leaguer Kyle Kessel to the Astros for Hampton and Derek Bell. Not even close to either of the above.

This is by no means meant to single out Gammons. He simply happens to be the most prominent perpetrator. Look on television, listen to the radio, read the papers, and count how many deals you hear could happen, according to the infamous "sources" (I swear that sources guy gets around).

Hot rumors came out of the November meetings about the Mets acquiring David Wells and Carlos Delgado from the Blue Jays. It was called, by some, a done deal. Shortly after the rumor took over New York newspapers and airwaves, Gord Ash called the players mentioned in the "near done" deal, "not even close." Not even close? That's not exactly, "well, it's this player not that player." Where did this information come from?

Remember all the discussion about the Braves trading Bret Boone for Barry Larkin. A Cincinnati Post article in mid-November said the rationale for the deal would have been to free up salary for the Griffey deal. In the same article, Reds GM Jim Bowden is quoted as saying the deal was never discussed, and that it wouldn't open up much money, surely not enough to make or break the Griffey deal.

By the way, Boone went to the Padres with Ryan Klesko for Quilvio Veras and Reggie Sanders. If the basis for trading Boone was to bring a shortstop back, a need for the Braves, Veras will not fit that bill.

It seems like clockwork: Every time somebody guarantees that the Cincinnati Reds are going to get Ken Griffey, Bowden pulls out of the race. Is it near done or not even close? Varied sources said the Reds were close to getting Junior. Bowden said they had "not moved an inch" in weeks.

More recently, on Jan. 5, The Associated Press inferred that the teams talking to Juan Guzman were the Colorado Rockies, Mariners, Cardinals and Mets. He signed this week, a matter of days after the AP story, with the Devil Rays.

None of the above examples are just slight misses. These are off by a Kenny Rogers World Series ball four. I can appreciate the need to fill newspaper space or air time. But at some point, doesn't the goal of reporting news and not fabrication need to take hold. Doesn't the objective, to report, need to be of the utmost importance. At least Metsonline.net says it's for entertainment purposes. But the other examples, people we turn to for news of substance, news that holds a dose of reality, misleading the public seems counterproductive.

But who will hold them accountable? Most times, fans (read fanatics) are so wired up about the stud coming to their squad, or the jewel they're giving up for a song, that the feeling of relief or angst after the done deal that wasn't obliterates the memory of the deception that got you so wound up in the first place.

As a New Yorker, this has been written with a somewhat blatant geocentric perspective. Somehow though, I doubt this a New York-only phenomenon. When sprint training gets nearer, the rumors will start kicking again. The media have a responsibility to report, not create; to discern between fact and speculation. Don't give us information that is without the substance you say it is. Because, frankly, I'm sick of changing the damn water cooler.

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