http://www.cbc.ca/cp/business/050213/b021328.html
Peter Widdrington died; COMN. Haven't we had enough of this yet?

On Valentine's Day, all you need is love. And that we never have enough of.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1108249810907&call_pageid=969907739730&col=970081600908
I just posted this in Saturday's thread, but it probably belongs here:

Richard Griffin finally speaks COMN

This is part of a story written in 1985 posted on Athletic's Nation (when Canseco was playing in AAA). Seems pretty clear when he started on the juice.....

Canseco had hit a combined 31 home runs during his first three years in the Minor Leagues, but now, in just one season, he's hit 36. The former 15th-round draft pick out of Coral Park High in Miami, who back in 1982 was a slender 6-feet-2-inches and only 170 pounds, had transformed himself. Only three years later, Canseco had grown an inch and now sported 230 pounds of rock-hard muscle. It seemed as though his bulging arms were going to burst out of his uniform

Ooh, Mike Green, good idea ... here's a quick first whack at an All-Valentine's Day Hall of Names team. That's just off the top of my head ... surely we can do better! Who's missing? No limiting rules this time -- first names and nicknames are OK here.

MGR Bobby Valentine
RHP Candy Cummings
LHP Slim Love
RHP Tom Lovett
LHP Vance Lovelace
LHP Wes Flowers

C Hub Hart
1B Pete Rose
2B Bo Hart
SS Angel Berroa
3B Jim Ray Hart
OF Candy Maldonado
OF Angel Mangual
OF Ellis Valentine

Now that the NHL has finalized the digging of their grave, I will be interested to see fan turnout minus the Maple Leafs factor/excuse this season. Will attendance increase with no Leafs to watch? Will it be significant?

It doesn't really matter when Canseco started juicing, but here's his complete major and minor league record. He hit 2 homers in 57 ABs in rookie ball in 1982, then 11 homers in 197 ABs in low-A ball in 1983, and then 15 homers in 410 ABs in high A ball in 1984. I'd say that he was a power hitter from the get-go.

When he was drafted in 1984, he was a month shy of his 18th birthday. A good part of the weight gain (and all of the height gain) would be perfectly normal.

RHP Ron Darling
OF Darryl Strawberry

2B- Cupid Childs

Backup C- Honey Barnes

There are no chocolates in MLB history, but lots of coco- Pasqual, Laboy and Crisp. Coco Crisp and Coco Laboy both have a nice Valentine's sound to them.

Good ones, guys ... the team already has a couple of HOFers and several other All-Stars ... we're getting near a full roster, though a backup C and some additional pitching would be nice, and I'm sure that lineup can be better

MGR Bobby Valentine

ROTATION
RHP Candy Cummings
LHP Slim Love
RHP Ron Darling
RHP Tom Lovett

BULLPEN
LHP Vance Lovelace
LHP Wes Flowers

LINEUP
C Hub Hart
1B Pete Rose
2B Cupid Childs
SS Angel Berroa
3B Jim Ray Hart
OF Candy Maldonado
OF Darryl Strawberry
OF Ellis Valentine

BENCH
OF Angel Mangual
IF Bo Hart

Beat me to the punch, Mike ... now we have a backup C and some bench options, and Crisp might give Candy M. a run for a starting job, especially because he could play CF.

Mike Koplove is another possibility for the bullpen.

Need pitching? How bout Bill Kissinger.

Utility - Ed Hug.

Well, when certain people forget Valentine's Day, they spend the night on the Couch. Besides, who wouldn't want a relief pitcher from the 1920s who walked more than he struck out?

Oh, and Carlos Feb(ruary)les might make the team. Can we get a ruling on that?

You know, five years ago I could never tell the difference between Carlos Febles and Carlos Beltran.

And another backup catcher (who I actually remember)- Rick Sweet.

Ooh, yeah, let's go with Rick and Hub so we have a Sweet-Hart of a backstop combo!

I think the backup catcher has to be either Paul or Raul Casanova. Paul was better but Raul was more recent.

Good idea, Matthew, especially since we have two other Harts on the team already (and presumably John Hart would be the GM). We'll go with Paul since I remember having his baseball card as a kid <-- random tie-breaker alert.

OF- Moonlight Graham

Romantic enough?

Any room for Lee Lacy on the team? Bobby Wine?

The sabermetrician for our Valentines Day club has got to be tango. Modern Love indeed.

I thought about Wine, but didn't want to open this up to our whole original All-Food team from waybackwhen. (His son Robbie would be another backup C, incidentally).

I guess Moonlight Graham only as a defensive replacement, huh? Until he gets over the winking-at-the-pitcher problem.

The following has no scientific basis whatsoever, but does anyone feel that Canseco could actually be overstating the role steroids played in his success to better besmirch the reputation of any number of players not deemed pariahs by both organized baseball and fandom in general?

He seems to have decided that there is more upside to harming the reputation of others than there is downside to worsening his own. Such is the conviction of his vendetta, I guess. And the fastest path to a dollar.

Now, whether he is telling the truth, merely exaggerating or lying outright, well, that's another matter altogether.

What about Ted Lilly? I'm not sure. Maybe he'd be more of an Easter guy.

I would hope that Richie Sexson would be on everyones Valentine's day team.

I dunno DeMarco, parsing Sexson makes me think sort of incestuously (no, I have no children). Maybe Jimmy Sexton? Or the immortal Elmer Sexauer?

The twins just signed Santana to a 4 year deal. They haven't released the terms yet.

Hijacking the thread...

Anybody else out there wonder what happened to those free agents of last year that outpriced themselves of a job? I'm specifically thinking of those guys that unofficially retired, without announcing retirement. Chuck Finley, Chuck Knoblauch come to mind, I think there were a few others.

It seemed they were unwilling to play for less than $1M, and teams were unwilling to pay the $5M+ they had been used to...so they ended up not playing at all. Strange...

Who else was in this situation? And does anybody have updates?

Hi all,

This is just a note to let you know that we're closing down Batter's Box for about a week for an upgrade and relaunch. Threads will be shut down and comments disabled during that time, to make the transition from the old Box to the new Box easier. We tentatively project a relaunch date of Saturday, February 19. For more information, please refer to the front-page story "Batter's Box is Relaunching." Thanks!

Jordan

Who else was in this situation?

Jose Canseco. Rickey Henderson.

So I guess this is the most recent roundup...

Apparantly a news article in Wednesday's Star suggested that J.P. Riccardi is looking into acquiring VAZQUEZZZZZ.