I came across this yesterday on the Bostonist and then Steve forwarded me a link from Red Sox Chick about Bronson Arroyo wanting to return to the Red Sox.

Arroyo performed a cover of Augustana’s “Boston” and changed the lyrics about coming back to the Red Sox.

I said
I think I’ll go to Boston
I think I need to come back
I think I need a ballpark
Where all the fans are there
I gotta get out of Cincinnati
I’m tired of the summer
I think I need the Olde Town
To fill my heart again
Ah yeah

And here is the video of his performance of the song.

[googlevideo]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6732328266441465611&hl=en[/googlevideo]

Even Peter Gammons, who also performed, got into the act writing a song about the Mitchell Report.

[googlevideo]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1008695642587328723[/googlevideo]

to Cyn over at Red Sox Chick for the lyrics to Bronson’s song and videos.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY announced today that Rich “Goose” Gossage has been elected to the Hall of Fame after receiving 85.8% (466) of the 543 BBWAA votes. He will be inducted into the Hall on July 27th.

Goosage will be joined by Dick Wiliams, who was elected by the Veterans Committee. The Veterans Committee also picked Walter O’Malley, Barney Dreyfuss, Bowie Kuhn and Billy Southworth, all of whom have passed away. The late Boston Globe writer Larry Whiteside will be honored with J.G. Taylor Spink Award for baseball writing.

With 543 ballots cast, a player needed 408 votes (75%) to gain election to the Hall. Former Red Sox great Jim Rice fell just short with 392 (72.2%). Rice will have one more year to be elected by the writers as he will be on his 15th and final ballot. If he’s not elected next year, he will be eligible to be voted in by the Veteran’s Committee. Any player who has gotten over 70% has been voted into the Hall of Fame so this bodes well for Rice.

Here is a look at the vote totals:

Rich “Goose” Gossage 466 (85.8%), Jim Rice 392 (72.2%), Andre Dawson 358 (65.9%), Bert Blyleven 336 (61.9%), Lee Smith 235 (43.3%), Jack Morris 233 (42.9%), Tommy John 158 (29.1%), Tim Raines 132 (24.3%), Mark McGwire 128 (23.6%), Alan Trammell 99 (18.2%), Dave Concepcion 88 (16.2%), Don Mattingly 86 (15.8%), Dave Parker 82 (15.1%), Dale Murphy 75 (13.8%), Harold Baines 28 (5.2%), Rod Beck 2 (0.4%), Travis Fryman 2 (0.4%), Robb Nen 2 (0.4%), Shawon Dunston 1 (0.2%), Chuck Finley 1 (0.2%), David Justice 1 (0.2%), Chuck Knoblauch 1 (0.2%), Todd Stottlemyre 1 (0.2%), Brady Anderson 0, Jose Rijo 0.

Of the 11 newcomers on the ballot, only Tim Raines received over 5% of the ballots to stay on the ballot. Dave Concepcion was in his 15th ballot this year and will be taken off the ballot for next year.

Well you can add another trophy to the case. New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady won the AP Offensive Player of the Year Award this afternoon. It’s the third award for a Patriots player or coach in the last week as Brady won the NFL MVP and head coach Bill Belichick won the NFL Coach of the Year.

I’m not going to rehash the story of Tom Terrific’s year (sorry Mr. Seaver but I think you’ve been supplanted for that name) as we’ve all heard it before.

Brady accumulated 35 1/2 votes of the 50 cast. Teammate Randy Moss got 12 1/2 votes and finished second, another Patriot WR Wes Welker got one vote as did Green Bay QB Brett Favre. He is the first Patriot to win he award and the fourth winner in a row to win the both the Offensive Player of the Year and the MVP in the same season joining LaDainian Tomlinson, Shawn Alexander and Peyton Manning.

Brady, Moss and Welker are the first teammates to finish 1-2-3 in the voting.

Hall of Fame coach Joe Gibbs has resigned as President/Head Coach of the Washington Redskins this morning. This was Gibbs second go-around as the Redskins head coach, this term lasting four seasons. Gibbs came back for the 2004 season when he signed a five-year contract to coach again. His teams made the playoffs in 2005 and 2007.

Gibbs, who won three Super Bowls with Washington the first time around, is also the owner of the NASCAR’s Joe Gibbs Racing. Gibbs is widely credited with keeping the team together this season after the murder of safety Sean Taylor.

Gibbs who had one year left on his contract had said recently he was open to talking about a contract extension but sometime in the last few days he changed his mind and resigned this morning.

While the Redskins will most likely search for a candidate they already have two in house in offensive coordinator Al Saunders and defensive coordinator Gregg Williams. Williams has a contract provision that calls for a buyout if he isn’t named Gibbs successor.

Gibbs is expected to remain as an adviser to Washington owner Dan Snyder.

none other than my mother, Sue, who has correctly picked 19 out of the 32 games to take home the prize for the second straight year. What did she win you ask? She has won the great opportunity of being a guest blogger for a post.

If you are wondering what she wrote about last year, you can check it out by clicking here.

Here is a look at the full standings:

Sue 19-13
BenA 18-14
Ladd 18-14
Steve 18-14
Sam 17-15
Chip 17-15
Keith 17-15
Al 17-15
Burney 16-16
Jason 16-16
Boomer 15-17
Ian 14-18
Bryan 13-19

A big thank you to everyone for participating and once again, congratulations to Sue for winning and putting the boys to shame once again.

Just one day after appearing on 60 Minutes and filing a defamation suit against his former trainer Brian McNamee, Roger Clemens held a press conference in Houston today.

Clemens lawyer, Rusty Hardin, opened up the press conference with some opening statements offering a timeline of the events that led up to the press conference today. You can see them in the video below.

After that a tape of an alleged conversation between Clemens and McNamee was played that you can listen to in the video below.

Clemens then answered questions until he got so pissed off, he walked out and left, which can be seen in this video.

Did the tape of the alleged conversation change anything? Personally, I don’t think the tape did anything to help either side. McNamee obviously didn’t know that he was being taped. It is legal to tape a conversation in the state of Texas if you have consent of one person. The person that consented was of course Clemens.

Clemens did say that he will testify in front of Congress next Wednesday. So it will be interesting to see what happens. As for me, I still haven’t decided either way. I said back in the beginning if your name is in the Mitchell Report, either come out and deny it or take legal recourse to clear your name. Obviously Clemens has done this, so I will reserve my judgment for now.

Seven-time Cy Young award winner Roger Clemens filed a defamation and libel lawsuit Sunday night against his former trainer Brian McNamee.  The suit claims that 15 statements made by McNamee in the Mitchell report are “absolutely false and defamatory”. 

Clemens also claims in the suit that McNamee was pressured and bullied, contrary to a statement by McNamee’s attorney, into a statement. It was after this, in  which McNamee was threatened with jail time, that on his second interogation he gave information on Clemens after intially saying Clemens was clean. 

For those of you who are anxious to see what Roger Clemens had to say during his interview with Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes, look no further. However if you want to watch the interview and do not want to know what happens, stop reading. If not, please continue on.

[Editors note: This post was published before the interview aired]

Here is the full transcript of the interview courtesy of CBS via the Boston Globe. And here is a link to the video.

STUDIO OPEN: WITH 354 WINS, ROGER CLEMENS IS ONE OF THE BEST PITCHERS IN THE HISTORY OF BASEBALL. NO QUESTION ABOUT IT. BUT THERE ARE QUESTIONS NOW ABOUT WHETHER ROGER CLEMENS CHEATED TO ENHANCE HIS RECORD AND PROLONG HIS CAREER. ONE OF HIS FORMER TRAINERS, BRIAN MCNAMEE SAYS THAT HE HIMSELF INJECTED CLEMENS WITH STEROIDS AND HUMAN GROWTH HORMONE. MCNAMEE’S ACCUSATIONS WERE THE BIGGEST REVELATIONS IN GEORGE MITCHELL’S REPORT ON STEROID ABUSE FOR MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL. BUT CLEMENS INSISTS THE CHARGES ARE PHONY–THAT HE NEVER USED STEROIDS OR ANY OTHER BANNED SUBSTANCE. CLEMENS AGREED TO ANSWER OUR QUESTIONS AT HIS HOME OUTSIDE HOUSTON WHERE WE FOUND HIM TO BE FRUSTRATED, EVEN FURIOUS, THAT SO MANY PEOPLE HAVE BEEN SO QUICK TO BELIEVE HE CHEATED.

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In a video that was released before the 60 Minutes piece tonight, Roger Clemens admits to using steroids.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJhu74yBPlQ[/youtube]

Ok so it’s a joke. But still a pretty funny one.

Clay Buchholz, Devern Hansack, Michael Bowden, Hunter Jones, Justin Masterson, Dustin Richardson, Dusty Brown, Aaron Bates, Jed Lowrie, Bubby Bell, Chris Carter and Jonathan Van Every are all in town for the annual Boston Red Sox rookie development program.

“Last January, Ellsbury was at our rookie development program, so he was hearing from our trainers and our coaching staff and our manager and me and [catcher] Jason Varitek and [pitcher] Curt Schilling about the expectations of playing winning baseball in Boston and trying to hammer those lessons home,” Epstein said during the 2007 World Series. “He’s obviously taken those right to the field and then some. To be the organization we want to be, we have to develop players who can adjust quickly and thrive in Boston. Otherwise, we’re not going to be as effective.”

The players will be busy from Sunday to January 18th working on strength and conditioning as well as attending seminars about life in Major League Baseball. The speakers include Larry Lucchino, Theo Epstein, Craig Shipley, Terry Francona, John Farrell, Dave Magadan, Dustin Pedroia former Sox lefty Bruce Hurst, UConn men’s basketball coach Jim Calhoun and ESPN reporter Peter Gammons. Quite an experienced crew to say the least.

Something I missed in the news & notes yesterday was something that I saw over at the Bradford Files, Rob Bradford’s blog over at the Boston Herald.

Baseball America announced in an online chat today that the Red Sox’ farm system has been ranked second-best in all of baseball. It is the highest finish for the organization since the current regime took over. In 2002 the Red Sox placed 28th, ‘03: 27th, ‘04: 23rd; ‘05: 21th; ‘06: 8th; ‘07: 9th.

This is the reason why the Red Sox could afford to lose players like Justin Masterson and Jed Lowrie in a Johan Santana deal. In years past, the Red Sox would trade away the one or two top prospects they have. Now they have one of the best minor league systems thanks to Theo and his crew.

Baseball America also released it’s Top 10 Boston Red Sox prospects and Clay Buchholz and Jacoby Ellsbury headline the list. The top 10 is as follows:

1. Clay Buchholz, rhp
2. Jacoby Ellsbury, of
3. Lars Anderson, 1b
4. Justin Masterson, rhp
5. Jed Lowrie, ss
6. Ryan Kalish, of
7. Michael Bowden, rhp
8. Nick Hagadone, lhp
9. Oscar Tejeda, ss
10. Josh Reddick, of

A full look of Baseball America’s Red Sox rankings will be listed after the jump.

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