The Nephews of Jody Reed Draft Day Revue

Auction drafts can propel you to the heights of bargain-hunting ecstasy, or cast you down to the doldrums of ripped off ignominy. In many cases, all managers achieve these highs and lows, but the one that has the best overall draft typically performs the best over the course of the season, right?

Jody Reed and his mustache were renewed for just $300,000 for the 1990 season: BARGAIN.

Well, I ran the numbers to determine just that. Click below for a complete analysis of team draft performance, the top bargains, and the most shameful busts from the 2011 fantasy baseball season.

Thoughts from the Blight of Season's End

There's nothing to say really. I could make a really whiny post, or cheer myself up by making fun of John Lackey some more, but it wouldn't change the fact that my blood is boiling with the heat of a thousand suns and I can't sleep. I'm just going to look forward to next year as everyone heals up and trains their asses off to make things right. Go Sox.

Bruce Chen and the Path to the Promised Land

Never has a back-end of the rotation starter created such a stir as Bruce Chen has in 2011. He potentially embodies the key to victory not only in fantasy baseball, but in the actual game itself.

My 89 mph fastball will save you...

Ken Rosenthal reports that the Red Sox are looking to acquire Chen for what would be a legendary tie-breaking start against the Rays should both teams remain tied following today's games.

Just last year, Bruce Chen was going about his business, pitching for a small market team and living the quiet life without a care in the world. Now he could be thrown into the most dramatic game of the 2011 season as the potential savior of Red Sox Nation. Not since an emergency trade for Doug Mirabelli in 2006 would a Red Sox trade be made with such urgency and melodrama.

Speaking as both a Red Sox homer and Bruce Chen mark, I hope Theo Epstein pulls the trigger. Even the most violent haters of His Bruce-ness have to admit that he's a better option than John Lackey, Kyle Weiland, or even my main man Tim Wakefield.

His ERA is 6.41. Instead of eating innings he's clearly been eating Taco Bell and cheesecake.

The downside of this trade would be for Chen's owners in fantasy land. They're depending on him to make his start tonight and beat the lowly Minnesota Twins to secure fantasy baseball championships across America.

The hopes of so many people now depend on one guy. But what a guy.

Hard Knocks with Rocks

It was a tough trivia question this week for the less geologically inclined: both responses were for the mineral rated a 7 on the Mohs Hardness Scale: quartz. Number 6, however, is feldspar.

It's a pretty boring mineral really. Quartz is way more exciting with its variety of colors and satisfying crystalline structure, but they can't all be winners. Talc... don't even get me started.

As for this week, I'm dialing it back on the bizarre hobbies and going mainstream with some movie trivia. In honor of Moneyball being in theaters, this week's question is the following:

Which of the following actors has NOT starred in a movie about baseball?

• Robert Redford
• Tom Hanks
• Kiefer Sutherland
• Charlie Sheen 
• Kevin Costner

Movie summary: Scott Hatteberg = OBP. OBP = wins. Scott Hatteberg = wins.*

 *Regular season wins only.

Revisionist History: The 2011 TDZ Emmy Awards

I'm going to make a brief departure from the sports world. I'm going to ignore such topics as the Red Sox's inability to win a freaking game, or the early demise of my fantasy football team thanks to a torn ACL for Jamaal Charles. Instead of acknowledging such cruel realities, I've chosen to avoid my first world problems altogether and escape as so many do into the wonderful world of TV.

They just don't make TV shows like they used to.

The 2011 Emmy Awards were held this past Sunday, and I'm going to wield my considerable powers of analysis/highfalutin opinions on the subject to crown my own winners of the small screen. Here's a sneak preview: Two and a Half Men is not "winning."

Jamie Moyer is rehabbing - Bruce Chen is Jamie Moyering

Great news for all Jamie Moyer fans out there: the 48 year old is rehabbing at the Phillies' facility in Clearwater, FL and is on the warpath to a triumphant 2012 return. He's an easy favorite for Comeback Player of the Year, beating out the likes of Stephen Strasburg, Brandon Webb, Johan Santana, and any other joker who tries to come back harder than Ol' One Mississippi, Two Mississippi.

Who says old bastards don't know how to party?

Even if the unthinkable happens and no team signs Jamie Moyer, we might have another pitcher replacing him on baseball's (career twilit) horizon: the one and only Bruce Chen.

Yeah, I just get assigned a random number with every team I play for, wanna fight about it?

In a delightful and heartwarming article on Fan Graphs, Bruce Chen states that he believes he can replicate some of the "success" Jamie has had, relying on pitching smarts rather than pure stuff to significantly prolong his career. Though just 34 years old, he already has a suitably low K/9 of 5.86 while still managing a rather low BABIP of .282, which is quite odd given how easily players make contact with his pitches. Maybe he can do this!

If he does pull it off, my ballad will have to morph into an epic poem to do justice to his lengthy list of illustrious back-end-of-rotation deeds. I think I speak for all the TDZ regulars when I say good luck to both of them!

Vacation 2012, and the return of TRIVIA

Only two from my legion of TDZ acolytes responded to this week's poll, but the decision for my next vacation remains simple as both votes were cast for the great country of... Japan.

I eagerly anticipate attending sumo matches and ninja-style Nippon league baseball games, eating unhealthy quantities of raw fish and rice, having my insides squeezed out trying to use the subway trains, and witnessing some incredible landscapes and architecture, as depicted above.

I'm thinking mid-May will be a good time as temperatures will be in the 70's and baseball and sumo will be going on. Traveling compadres are welcome, as are suggestions of what to do/see, because I'm overwhelmed by the options at the moment.

For this week's trivia question we turn to the wild world of rocks. I've been a fan of rocks since I started a collection in 5th grade, and while certain minerals rock harder than others (below), there's a specific 10-point scale that characterizes the actual hardness of a given mineral.

I want to live in a bismuth house. And install elevators.

The question: which of the following minerals is classified as 6 on the Mohs hardness scale?

• Quartz
• Apatite
• Fluorite
• Feldspar
• Gold

Good luck.

Wake

*This post was written in late July, but 1.5 months and 18 runs of support later, its time is finally here.

Tim Wakefield is a master craftsman of the highest order. Countless fireballers have erupted onto the big league scene during Wake's career only to be extinguished by injury or ineffectiveness. Through it all, Timmay has trotted out to the mound like the consummate athlete he is, tossing knuckler after dancing knuckler, befuddling his foes. After two decades of slow-pitch dominance, Tim Wakefield is a 200 game winner.

Truly, this is a player worthy of a TDZ career retrospective.

Airing It Out - TDZ's NFL Kickoff 2011

As of last night the NFL season is officially underway, and no one is more excited than fantasy football fanatics. Numerous players changed teams and training camp was shortened due to the lockout, so there are a lot of questions about who will surprisingly ascend to the ethers as a fantasy star (The Miles Austin Awards), and who will descend like a flaming doomsday meteor and pulverize their team's chances (The Randy Moss Awards).

Moss'D

For the sake of traditional fandom, I'll also give my preliminary power rankings. **Spoiler Alert** - The Bengals are bad.

On to my football smorgasbord!

Northern Hemisphere Pwnage

This week's trivia question was not a simple one. Obviously the northern part of the globe has more than 50% of the Earth's population, but how many of the soon-to-be 7 billion people live south of the equator?

You may be surprised to learn that estimates say that 90% of the world's population lives in the northern hemisphere. More precise measures have that percentage at 88% (2000 data). Anyone else find it weird that the population is so lop-sided in favor of one hemisphere? I guess it's due to water covering so much of the planet, but given a random sample of similar planets you'd expect a balance over all hemispheres.

And "north" seems so arbitrary anyways. You could flip the solar system upside down and say Antarctica is the "northern" part of the planet. It kind of irks me how in space battles in movies the ships are all practically on the same plane and "right-side-up." I don't know where I'm going with this.

Genetically enhanced super-humans done in by a lack of 3-dimensional thinking - it can happen to them, it can happen to YOU.

Anyways, this week's trivia question is not trivia, but in fact a poll: where should I go on vacation next summer? I just got back from 11 days in Turkey and am thinking ahead to what I should do next year.  Below are the options, and feel free to comment on the pros and cons you see.

• Japan
• Pros: baseball, sumo, sushi, anime, twisted TV game shows.
• Cons: the language barrier could be insurmountable, freaking crowded.
• Brazil
• Pros: land of soccer, great beaches, totally different country/culture, Brazilian babes.
• Cons: crime, not nice to white gringos like me, could be entirely under construction for the World Cup ('14) and Olympics ('16).
• East Germany
• Pros: know some German, never made it to Berlin last time, lots of revamped post-Cold War areas, beer.
• Cons: Already been to Germany.
• Somewhere in the USA
• Pros: plenty of options, less of a travel hassle, no language/cultural barriers, keep $$ in 'merica.
• Cons: potentially less of a "wow" factor.

Thanks - real trivia next week, I promise. Plus I hope to be posting more now that I'm back.