Jennifer R. Richmond's Boston Red Sox friend's fan blogs

You may have noticed the small icons at the bottom of your blog posts linking to MySpace, Facebook, Digg, Stumble Upon and other social media websites.  These icons allow you to quickly link your blog post to these sites.  You should be using these links a lot.  Submitting to social media sites is free and easy and can really increase the traffic to your blog.  Consistently using them is the easiest way to build a following and increase your traffic.
Using the Facebook and MySpace links:
Assuming you have an account on MySpace or Facebook (it's free to join so if you don't sign up now) click on the icon below your blog post for the site you want to submit to.  It will take you to a submission page where you simply put in a brief description about your blog post.  Then, a link to your blog post will appear on your Facebook or MySpace profile. It's that easy.  If you have a large following on either of these sites it's an easy way to get people to your sports blog.  So make sure you submit links to your best sports blog posts.

Continue reading "How to use social media websites (MySpace, Facebook, Digg, StumbleUpon) to promote your blog posts"

Been a while since I posted, in part because I was out of town last week at a trade show in San Diego. Not a bad place to go for a working vacation, and a week ago we got to take in a game between the Padres and the D-backs. My dad's a rabid D-backs fan, beside which my fandom (or fanhood, as the ESPN ads call it) seems rather small. He brought his own logo-coordinated Arizona hat and shirt, having overcome his anger at their change in colors and logo, which seemed to him (correctly) to be an effort to boost merchandising sales.

He brought a hat for me, and we ended up with great seats just above the aisle behind the visiting dugout, so that nearly every Arizona fan who walked by expressed their out-of-towner support. It's a cool feeling to have that solidarity, and there are plenty of AZ fans in San Diego, with Phoenix only six hours away and the Padres down in the dumps. Plus, Brandon Webb was going for his twentieth win, so even more fans were there than usual, I'd bet.

Continue reading "A Night at PETCO"

We've added some additional functionality to our " Headline Widget" so that our bloggers can now promote their blog posts through the widget.  Simply go the "Headline Widget" page, type in your username in the appropriate blank, and copy the HTML to any webpages (i.e. your MySpace profile page or your personal blog) where you want your blog posts to appear.
 
The " Headline Widget" can be customized to display in any color and it comes in a variety of shapes and sizes. 
 
Important: The widget is geared towards displaying headlines and blog posts for a particular sport or team, so if you want the widget to display all of your blog posts no matter what the subject of the blog post is, be sure to choose "All Sports Headlines" for the first customization option.

Continue reading "Headlines Widget updated to include your blog posts"

Two bits of news from former Seattle players, one surprising, but the other one, not so much.

Easy one first: the Yankees designated Richie Sexson for assignment yesterday, in a roster shakeup that included demoting starting center fielder Melky Cabrera. Sexson had hit .250 in 28 at-bats, with a grand slam and six RBis. Ever the all-or-nothing guy, Sexson had one or two big hits, and a whole lot of hits and weak groundouts. Yankees GM Brian Cashman was gracious about Sexson, saying he was an everyday player, not a bunch guy, and that was the problem.

Those of us who saw the Big Un-Sexy everyday know what hokum that is. With even the desperate Yanks giving up on the strikeout-prone power hitter, we've likely seen the last of Sexson this season. Next year, it's possible he'll be in someone's spring training, trying to make the roster, and best of luck to him--and the team who takes him. Let's just hope that team's not Seattle.

Continue reading "Ex-Mariner News"

To add to yesterday's post, neither Ibanez nor Washburn was dealt after they were claimed on waivers. According to the Post-Intelligencer, the Twins put in claims on both, and their waiver number was higher for Jarrod, while the Tigers claim was highest for Ibanez.

The Twins were actually willing to swallow Jarrod's monster $10M+ salary for next year, but didn't want to also part with a major-league level pitcher, too. They also placed their claim, in part, to block the claim of the division-rival White Sox, so it's possible they didn't really want to work out a deal. But the Mariners should have, since the next steps are either to waive Washburn again, meaning that the claiming team merely has to eat his salary, or hang on to him and either try and trade him in the offseason, or simply eat his Bavasi-esque salary themselves next year. 

Continue reading "Waiver Update"

According to Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports, teams have claimed both Jarrod Washburn and Raul Ibanez, contradicting earlier reports I'd heard that Washburn had passed through waivers. This happened on Tuesday, meaning that Seattle has until today to work out a trade with the claiming team or simply allow the players to be claimed. If the Mariners pull them back from waivers, it means that if Seattle tries to waive them again, it's irrevocable, and the claiming team can simply take the players (and their salaries) without compensation to Seattle.

At this point--since the deadline has now passed for a deal--I'm going to assume that no news is no trade news. We may find out differently in the next few hours, but waiver claims and deals are tricky things, involving gamesmanship by other teams as well as merely wanting a player. The Yankees often claim players (like Jose Canseco) off waivers just to ensure that divisional rivals don't get them. Even if a deal can't be worked out (as happened when the Sox claimed Brian Giles) that player can't be waived again, at least not without the threat of losing him without compensation.

Continue reading "More Waiver News"

A big thanks to everyone who participated in the "Inbound Link Contest".  We have a winner!  A big congratulations go out to Marija.  Thank you for all your hard work on this.  While we had a lot of people participate, Marija was able to win with only 4 links!  So it wouldn't have taken a lot to win this contest!  We'll be having another contest soon so stay tuned.

The whole purpose of this contest was to get our bloggers networking with other webmasters and to start to build up their inbound links which will help their traffic.  Even a few links can help you with the search engines as they will see you as more of an authority on your topic the more inbound links you have.

To learn more about marketing your blog check out this post: http://www.nbabasketballonline.com/sports_content-rev_share_faq.html#my_faq_2971

Continue reading "Inbound link contest winner announced!"

Arizona has just traded for Adam Dunn, reports Baseball Digest Daily, bolstering their outfield to offset injuries to Eric Byrnes and Justin Upton, as well as to counteract the Dodgers' recent acquisition of Manny Ramirez. That Dunn passed through waivers is both an indication of his big salary for the year, as well as his undervalued status among GMs.

Dunn, like the Oakland A's Jack Cust, is a member of the Three True Outcomes (TTO) club. That is, each plate appearance typically ends either in a walk, a strikeout, or a home run. Only the whiffs really hurt a team, but the result of this marks him as a low-BA guy, and shows the limitation of this antiquated statistic.  But it also shows his all-or-nothing philosophy at the plate, a guy who doesn't know how to cut down on his swing with two strikes and hit the ball softly the other way.

Continue reading "Arizona Dunn-Backs"

Even if it ended badly for the Mariners, and for Willie Bloomquist in particular, last night's game against first-place Tampa Bay showed that the Mariners still have some fight in them. Though they blew a four-run lead on errors by Jose Lopez and failed to drive home a run in what should have been an easy game-winning situation, Seattle provided some excitement and refused to give up, even with an utterly depleted bench that had them giving up the DH in order to have enough position players. And we got another glimpse of the Mariners' future, at least on the mound.

Ryan Rowland-Smith had been sent down to stretch out his arm as a starter, a wise decision on a team without a strong rotation--and, if Washburn is traded as expected, even weaker--and for a pitcher who'd done well as a reliever. He'd logged a 2-1 record this year, with two saves, in 46.1 IP, putting up 39 strikeouts against 21 BBs. That last number is the only glaring mark against his 3.30 ERA, and part of what he'd gone down to the minors to work on. In Tacoma, he did a little better, with 12 Ks against 7 BBs in 18.2 IP, with a 2-0 record and a 2.89 ERA. 

Continue reading "Rollicking Ride Against the Rays"

The Mariners announced today that Jarrod Washburn has cleared waivers, meaning he can now be freely traded to whatever team wants to take on his massive salary. There's no real surprise here, as it's doubtful any other team would want to take on his bloated $9.85M salary. So the failure of Seattle to deal him before the deadline isn't so awful, except that his value seemed to have peaked at that point for a couple of reasons: (1) he'd pitched really well to that point (4 ER in 19.2 IP in the three starts before the deadline, (2) his value diminishes with each day that passes, since that means less time he can spend with a contending team (e.g., the Yanks) starved for starters, which leads to (3) the team in question being more likely to go in another direction.

The first point seems particularly relevant, as Wishy-Washburn has reverted to his more typical high-ERA ways. In the two starts since the deadline, he's 0-2, giving up 9 ER in 10.2 IP. For a moment there, either because he was buoyed by the thought of playing for a contending team, or because of the ups and downs of statistics, he was pitching pretty well. Now he doesn't look even like the average innings-eater he's always been.

Continue reading "Washburn is ready to move"