From the Windup is Matt Snyder's extended look at some aspect of America's pastime each Thursday.
With the non-waiver trade deadline looming just eight days away, it seemed like the perfect time to warn teams about the dangers of a deadline deal. There are plenty of good trades on the books. Then again, it's the swaps that blow up in the face of a team that seem to stick with us. That's nothing new. We know the famous, ill-fated John Smoltz and Jeff Bagwell deals, but for now let's look at recent history by ranking the 10 worst deadline deals of the 2000s.
Somebody call Tommy Lee Jones and tell him he can stop searching every warehouse, farmhouse, henhouse, outhouse and doghouse in the Chicagoland area for missing White Sox pitcher Bartolo Colon has been found. Of course, had he started his search at a Waffle House it probably wouldn't have taken nearly as long to find him.
Colon is scheduled to start in Charlotte for the White Sox' Triple-A affiliate on Thursday but was nowhere to be found this week as the White Sox tried in vain to reach him. Where Colon was I'm not quite sure, but at least Ozzie Guillen was nice enough to explain why he was so hard to find for us.
Placing Bartolo Colon on the disabled list led to the White Sox calling up pitching prospect Aaron Poreda. Although it wasn't on the mound, he did announce his presence with authority.
On Poreda's Facebook page came the following status update shortly after he heard the news.
"This is the biggest day of my life... I'm goin to Chicago, the big leagues, and I ain't never goin back!!!!!"
"I talked to him and made it real clear, 'If you don't pitch well, you're going to have O'Hare Airport next to you pretty soon,' '' Guillen explained. "I said, 'Did you arrive at Midway or O'Hare?' He said, 'O'Hare.' I said, ''Well, on the way back, Midway is closer.'
Whether this was Guillen's way of scaring the young hurler straight or just his normal pep talk, the truth is that Poreda might not have long to prove his worth.
After the White Sox dropped the first game of a doubleheader against the Detroit Tigers on Monday afternoon Ozzie Guillen laid into his team. It was Guillen's first real outburst of the season, and during his tirade he said that changes would be coming pretty soon. Well, some of those changes came earlier than Guillen figured, because in the nightcap Jose Contreras turned into a major league pitcher and Scott Podsednik broke out the big boy bat with a home run and the Sox actually won a game.
Of course those weren't the changes Guillen was talking about. The amateur draft is tonight and it seems the Sox want to promote their latest first round picks. After the Sox called up their first-round pick from last year, Gordon Beckham, last week, they went ahead and called up their first-round pick from 2007. Aaron Poreda will be joining the team in time for Tuesday's game.
MLB Power Rankings:Where MLB FanHouse's editors, writers and bloggers team up to break down the who's who and the what's what in the baseball world.
What a zany week for a pair of pitchers with amazing stories: Zack Greinke is America's favorite story right now, somehow managing to be hotter than Twitter. (And if Oprah starts doing him too, I'm just quitting. And I mean everything.) Meanwhile, Rick Ankiel (you may hear word of this "podcast" we're doing about him, but that's because I'm shameless like that), a former star on the mound as well, nearly decapitates himself running into an outfield wall. And yet, life goes on. Just like our Power Rankings.
There are a plethora of two-start pitchers hurling in week five (Monday, May 4th - Sunday May 10th) of the fantasy baseball season. There are 58 total this week and you late sleepers are luck that all of the Monday games are night games. You won't need to set you lineups until 7:05 PM ET.
[Update: 7:48 AM ET] : Two games were rained out yesterday. The Mets and Phillies did not play and the Angels and Yankees were rained out as well. Here is the fallout from those two postponed games as it relates to two-start pitchers.
MLB Power Rankings:Where we care what you've done for us lately when we break down the who's who and the what's what in the baseball world each week.
It's been a while since a week of baseball was this sad -- we saw the tragic passings of Nick Adenhart, Harry Kalas and Mark Fidrych. And without waxing too sentimentally, it's the loss of these men that remind us exactly just how little sports matter in the grand scheme of things. RIP, gentlemen. Power rankings (that feel just a tad inconsequential, to be honest) after the jump.
Starting Five is our wrapup of the previous day's baseball action, with a quick nod to what is ahead.
You Oughta Know ... That the Nationals can still go 0-162. Washington lost at Atlanta in a game that ended at 1:25 AM ET, thanks to a two-hour rain delay and 10 innings.
The Nationals came back from deficits of 4-1 and 5-4, tying the game 5-5 with a run in the top of the ninth. But lefty Joe Beimel, their seventh pitcher, had to work a second inning and gave up the winning run in the 10th, when Kelly Johnson hit the winning single.
Washington, 0-4, left 16 runners on base. The good news for the Nationals is they are getting closer to a win; after losing by six runs on Opening Day, they have cut their final deficits to five, two and now one. Also, the Nats are just three games behind the Braves in the wild-card race.
Somebody call 
Placing 
After the 
Starting Five
