The GM meetings are what the Winter Meetings used to be: a chance for the sport's illuminati to gather, mingle, gossip, booze and, if the voyeurs snooping on their little party are lucky, make a trade or two. <\/p>\n
Starting Wednesday, baseball's 30 general managers and plenty of their confederates will gather in Indian Wells, Calif., for three days of the above, along with procedural meetings of more substance and consequence than usual. <\/p>\n
In between all of that, they will fish around for who might be available or could be traded or would be desired or may head somewhere. This is all a game, remember, and this is where teams advance their pawns with the idea of striking soon thereafter. They've all got their eyes on the king, of course, and this offseason <\/p>\n
Josh Hamilton batted .285 this season 43 home runs and 128 RBI. (AP) <\/p>\n
1. Josh Hamilton wears the crown. Because no matter how absurd or ill-conceived it may seem, there is a reality about his hunt for one of the longest and most lucrative contracts in sports history: Someone is going to give it to him. <\/p>\n
Lest we forget, heading into free agency last season, the popular favorite for Albert Pujols was the St. Louis Cardinals and Prince Fielder had nowhere to go. Los Angeles Angels owner Arte Moreno hated long-term deals and the Detroit Tigers already wore a pair of $20 million-a-year players in Miguel Cabrera and Justin Verlander. And what happened? What always happens: This sport is crazy, beyond-every-whit-of-reality rich, and the very rich people who own teams have a hankering to spend those riches on players, all the way from No. 1 to 175. <\/p>\n
Think of it this way. Put 30 people together in a room. At least one of those people is scared of extraterrestrials. At least one of those people thinks the moon landing was faked. At least one of those people believes free agency this offseason is moot because the Mayans are right. <\/p>\n
[Yahoo! Sports Radio: Jeff Passan on Giants, award front-runners and free agency] <\/p>\n
The smart money among executives is on the <\/p>\n
2. Los Angeles Dodgers because, well, they're spending like that person who believes the Armageddon is right. And, more than that, they're creating a new economy in the game. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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\n10 Degrees: GM meetings open door for plenty of gamesmanship, ludicrous contracts<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"