FanHouse Themelvin

Jon was supposed to cover the Diamondbacks yesterday to close out our Spring preview of the NL West, but he got busy and I will be taking over today. I know you were expecting something wacky and facetious, but this is the Diamondbacks, and Arizona is a franchise deserving only the most reserved, tactful perspective. My original idea was to cover all of the new faces in the ballpark this year and the ramifications of agism and maturity in baseball, but then I remembered that D. Baxter the Bobcat was arrested for DUI and all I could type was "lol" with a bunch of o's in the middle. As a Cleveland resident, I eagerly await the story about Slider punching a woman in the face.

Today's Dugout is after the jump.

David Eckstein, the favorite son of old men who hate statistics, has managed to get his scrappy, sinewy body wedged within the blades of the rumor mill. Our Will Brinson reports that Mr. Eckstein may be headed to Arizona, and he also manages to express some disgust over the notion that Eckstein is somehow better than mediocre.

Well, I'd like to make a counterpoint. David Eckstein, you see, he's a scrapper. I don't really know what "scrapper" means, but still, he's a scrapper. A hard worker. What? You want me to back that up? Well, uh, look at that picture. It lacks any specific context, but you can tell that he's running hard! Look at that face. It's a face of determination. Well, that, or he's making that whiny sort of fart noise you can only make with your mouth. Fine, Brinson, you win this round.

Today's Dugout is after the jump.