Some random thoughts

Carl Yastrzemski, whose grandson is now playing in the majors, had an interesting career. He was a first-ballot Hall of Famer, and rightly so. Take a look at his numbers. He was phenomenal in the '60s. Won a Triple Crown, along with two other batting titles, and there's a ton of black ink all over his stats from that era. But Yaz played until he was 43 -- and played REGULARLY until he was 43 -- but had his last really good year at age 30, in 1970. I was born in 1971, and am therefore old enough to remember Yaz's last few years (he retired after the 1983 season). But I never saw CARL YASTRZEMSKI. I saw a decent player by that name, but not the player he once was.

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MLB hasn't expanded since 1998, with the Rays and Diamondbacks. And both of those teams have won at least one pennant. Of course, the Backs won it all in their fourth year of existence, in a thriller against the Yankees. I don't really have a point, except that it's been a long time since any team has been able to use expansion as a legitimate excuse. Of course, in the NFL, our Browns tried to use that as an excuse after, like, 15 years of existence. Seems like if you've been around longer than most players' careers, you can't say, "Oh, but we're so new."

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When does the Mayfield Bake-off start?

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My 7-year-old daughter and my 6-year-old niece just played "rock paper scissors" over whether to fall asleep to "The Grinch" or "Open Season." My niece won the first throw, so of course my daughter had to go best-two-out-of-three. She won the next two throws, and my niece got mad and stormed off. I mean, she did win the first throw and thought she was home free. And she's never seen "Open Season," so she figures it probably sucks, or she'd have seen it. So my daughter caved and turned on "The Grinch." I don't have a point here, I just thought it was funny.