FanHouse Lenny DiNardo

For a number of major league teams Mondays and Thursdays are travel days. Every Wednesday and Sunday, Fantasy Fill-Ins finds guys who should be widely available on the waiver wire and can step in for the day, helping you gain ground or hold off the pack.

There are only seven games on Thursday, meaning over half of the major-league teams are off. Finding five fill-in players wasn't easy, but if it was everyone would do it.

Chris Coghlan, Marlins - Whispers around baseball have Coghlan as a dark-horse candidate for the National League Rookie of the Year award. I'm not sure there's enough name recognition for him to take home the hardware, but there's no reason why he shouldn't be helping your fantasy baseball team. He's batting .359 over the last month and .379 during the last week. He's only owned in 41% of leagues so grab him to fill in on Thursday and keep him around afterward. He's just that good.

On Tuesday it was announced that Oakland's Rich Harden would be skipping his scheduled start that night due to a strained muscle in his throwing arm. The Athletics were originally hoping that Harden would skip the Tuesday start, and then be ready to pitch again on Saturday against Cleveland. The problem with this line of thinking is that we're dealing with Rich Harden, who gets injured almost as often as people in Boston chant "Yankees Suck," and there's no way in hell he's going to recover in time for Saturday.

Harden played catch before Wednesday's game and didn't feel comfortable enough for a bullpen session. Unless he comes in feeling well enough for a bullpen session today, he probably won't go Saturday at Cleveland. The A's have shown extra caution with all injuries this season, so even if Harden feels good today, there's a good chance he wouldn't work this weekend.

"I don't know if it's too likely I'm starting Saturday," Harden said before batting practice. "We'll see."

A giant anvil then fell from the sky and crushed Harden, breaking every single bone in his body.

The plan in Oakland as of now is to have Lenny DiNardo start in Rich's place on Saturday, but if the team needs him out of the bullpen today or on Friday, they plan on calling up Dallas Braden from Sacramento to fill in. There's also a very realistic possibility that Harden will be placed on the 15-day disabled list, which I guess is a step in the right direction. I mean, it's not the 60-day DL, right?

LEAST SURPRISING UPDATE EVER: Harden has officially been placed on the DL. In other news, the sun is supposed to set sometime this evening.

The Athletics and Red Sox finished up their two-game series in Japan earlier this morning (Sleep through it? Find out what you missed in Nick's liveblog from this morning.) Right now they're on a plane somewhere over the Pacific ocean returning to the states, and you can bet they're bringing back some of Japan with them.

Particularly a couple members of the Athletics who found a couple souvenirs that will help them remember their trip for a lifetime.

Pitcher Dallas Braden is planning to get his name tattooed on the back of his neck in Japanese characters today. Reliever Lenny DiNardo bought a guitar that has a back made of sea-turtle shell. And Rich Harden, who started the game, bought an ancient samurai sword, fully authenticated.

"I nearly bought some armor, too," Harden said. "Maybe next time."

Now if I'm the Athletics I might take that sword away from Harden as soon as possible. With the frequency he gets injured, it's only a matter of time before he falls on it or chops off his own arm. I don't care if he's been collecting the things since he was a small boy in Canada.

I'm also intrigued by DiNardo's shellback guitar. It sounds pretty cool, though DiNardo admits he's feeling a little guilty about the purchase. Sea turtles are an endangered species, but the guitar collecting DiNardo says since the guitar was made over 20 years ago, he's not feeling too guilty, but there's still a little pain there.

"I don't condone it," DiNardo said. "Turtles are like my favorite animal, too."

On Deck is FanHouse's look at the day's most intriguing baseball matchups

Minnesota Twins (46-43) vs. Oakland Athletics (44-45)-8:10PM Est.

There's really no point in the Athletics even showing up to the Metrodome tonight. It's after the All-Star break, and Johan Santana is on the mound. In case you weren't aware of it, in the last three seasons Santana is 32-3 after the All-Star break. It's pretty obvious that Johan could smell it coming over the last few weeks, because in his last four starts he's 4-0 with a 1.29 ERA. Lenny DiNardo makes the start for the Athletics, who much like the Twins, are a second half team. Of course, right now the A's sit farther out of first place or the Wild Card to start the second half than they have since 1998. Keep in mind though, that Johan Santana hadn't lost a game at the Metrodome since like 1937 before the A's beat him in Game 1 of the ALDS last season, so they know how to do it. If they are going to make their annual run, a win against Santana would be a nice way to get it started.

Moneyball aficionados rejoice! Oakland A's owner and managing partner Lew Wolff has extended team president Michael Crowley and General Manager Billy Beane's contracts through the 2014 season. Of course, an extension for Beane was hardly a pressing matter -- his old contract had him locked up through 2012 -- but simply finding Jack Cust off the scrap heap earlier this year was probably worth a couple of years itself.

Beane's trademark is making a lot out of a little, and that's continued so far this year. Case in point? Finding Cust; having the foresight to sign Alan Embree, who's held the bullpen together as the interim closer in place of the injured Huston Street; and inking Lenny DiNardo, who's pitched even better in three starts (0.52 ERA) than he has in relief (1.83 ERA), just to name a few.

The A's currently sit in third place in the AL West, which is misleading considering they're also five games above .500 and have won eight of their last 10. They're still operating on a shoestring budget, though hopefully that will change before the end of Beane's contract whenever the team moves into the eventually-to-be constructed Cisco Field. Can you imagine what this guy could do if he hand the financial freedom to routinely make $40 million mistakes like Brian Cashman can?

Update: Some sites are reporting this as a "seven-year extension" for Beane. That's flat-out wrong -- his current deal wasn't going to expire at the end of this year, but rather in 2012 as part of an extension he first signed when Wolff first took control of the team in 2005.