There isn't a whole lot of baseball news these days besides all the young stat-oriented GM's (Epstein and DePodesta) resigning or getting fired. I can't understand the DePo firing at all. The Dodgers make the playoffs in his first year, then they are absolutely decimated by injuries his 2nd year (Drew, Gagne, Dreifort, Bradley, Valentin, Perez, etc.) and....he gets canned?? The Dodgers' farm system is incredibly good, and they are positioned to do very well in the NL West for the next 5+ years at least, with no bad contracts (only Drew, Kent, and Perez are signed to long-term deals, I think). Whoever replaces DePo is going to get a lot of credit that they don't deserve, because the Dodgers are in great shape, and have money to spend.

Scott Barzilla has several excellent articles up at AstrosDaily: one on the catching situation this offseason, and one on the shortstop situation. Criticizing Ausmus and Everett is dangerous but correct; many people believe these are defense-first positions, but you need to take each player's offensive and defensive contributions. And, frankly, you don't get many offensive contributions from either of those guys (yeah, Ausmus had a .350+ OBP this year - anyone want to bet that he'll do that next year?). I say look elsewhere if at all possible. I'll let Andy talk about Johnny Estrada, but I will be so freakin' happy if the Astros trade for him and platoon him and Quintero. So very very happy.

Gotta run. I got my 2nd-ever hole-in-one in frisbee golf this weekend. It was awesome.