Paul Swydan: Hi everybody!

Join Jeff and myself – and maybe even Chris – tonight at 9 pm ET to talk some Hot Meetings and Winter Stove action. I mean, Hot Winter and Meetings Stove. I mean … you know what I mean.

Get your questions in, and I’ll get some polls up (polls at bottom of transcript). See you soon!

Paul Swydan: Hey gang, what’s shaking? Baseball things happened today. Let’s talk about them!

Comment From Joe
How many GMs read FanGraphs?

Paul Swydan: More than the average bear, I’d wager.

Jeff Zimmerman: At least half at one or another.

Paul Swydan: And when I say read, I mean, article are likely provided to them in form or another. Don’t know that lots of GMs are actively refreshing the site to see what new form of chicanery we’ve concocted each day. They have lots of stuff to do and junk.

Jeff Sullivan: Hey everybody! It’s the winter meetings!

Jeff Sullivan: So let’s talk about the meetings and all the attendant rumors and whatnot.

Jeff Sullivan: Not real interested in the HoF voting yesterday. Worked out reasonably. Miller should be in. Didn’t want to go in after his death. Okay. Let’s just go ahead and not chat about that

Jeff Sullivan: Hottest topics at the moment are a Trumbo three-team trade and I guess Rajai Davis going to Detroit

Comment From SMC
Danny Espinosa to NYY makes too much sense to not happen.

Jeff Sullivan: I like the rumor about the Nationals balking at the idea of trading Espinosa away. No they aren’t. Cute try though. More than happy to move him.

Dan Szymborski: And we are live

Dan Szymborski: just transitioning over – I’ve been chatting at ESPN for last 2 hours

Comment From Mr. Wrestling IV
Dan, it’s 12:02, are you alive?

Dan Szymborski: I hope someday to live-tweet my death on Twitter or whatever the social network thing at the time is.

Comment From Anon21
Fitting that Halladay—seemingly a pretty classy athlete—retires away from the Phillies, whose fanbase is a subhuman pool of sentient slime.

Dan Szymborski: That’s too mean! I know lots of great Phillies fans. Every fanbase has a subsection of terrible fans.

Eno Sarris: See you in fifteen!

Eno Sarris: Lyrics of the day from one of my favorite songs of all time, and not just because it comes from the modern Brian Eno:

Bear in mind
we all fall behind
from time to time

Should be easy.

Comment From Jon
Happy Repeal Prohibition Day, Eno!

Eno Sarris: Sometimes, kids, the government makes good decisions.

Comment From Chris B.
Oh, cool. While convincing myself to love Will Smith, I found the Oliver five-year projections box on player pages. This changes … some things a little bit.

Eno Sarris: Those are pretty awesome.

Dave Cameron: Going to start a few minutes late today; I’m pretty under the weather and didn’t get much sleep last night, so I’m trying to gain some level of consciousness before answering questions.

Dave Cameron: Okay, coherence not guaranteed, but let’s try this.

Comment From Mooser
Better deal for Yanks, McCann or Ellsbury

Dave Cameron: McCann, pretty easily.

Comment From SMC
I’m a NYY fan. How should I feel about Ellsbury?

Dave Cameron: Feel that he’s a good player. Be happy he makes the team better.

Paul Swydan: HI Everybody!

Soooooooooooooooo….anything happen in the baseball world today?

My goodness. Today there was a veritable bonanza of baseball things. Let’s talk about them, shall we? Jeff Z and I will be here at 9 pm ET to talk all about it. Until then, I will put up some polls (polls at bottom of transcript), and you can pop some questions in the queue.

Also, don’t forget to buy The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2014, on sale now!

See you at 9!

Paul Swydan: Hi guys, sorry, I was on the phone. Let’s light this candle!

Comment From JonCor
In terms of all the moves, why today?

Paul Swydan: I wish I had a good answer for this. I have absolutely, positively, no idea.

Paul Swydan: Jeff will be along in a sec.

Comment From Pat
Considering their abundance of young arms, should the Mets consider trading low-upside, but steady Dillon Gee to fill their OF/SS hole?

Dan Szymborski: On your mark, get set, terrible.

Dan Szymborski: (How I feel about the last 18 hours of Tigers moves)

Comment From Bret
Which is the better signing: Dioner Navarro or AJ Pierzysnki?

Dan Szymborski: Dioner kebab.

Comment From Brock Holt!
Brock Holt!

Comment From Guest
The Orioles did something! The Orioles did something! The Orioles *falls asleep*

Jeff Sullivan: All right! Whew! This delay was caused by Willie Bloomquist

Jeff Sullivan: Although you could argue I’m still a day early since I’m usually going on Tuesday mornings. This is a one-time switch to correspond with the ZiPS roll-outs

Jeff Sullivan: So in the future, back to ordinary chat scheduling. For now, let’s do this

Comment From GSon
huray!!. only five minutes late…

Jeff Sullivan: Six

Comment From Not a Mariners Fan
Thoughts on Willie Bloomquist?

Dave Cameron: Opening up the queue a little early today because I’m not sure how many people are actually going to be around for the chat, given holiday travel. We might not go the whole hour, depending on the number of questions, but you have a better chance of getting your question answered this week compared to most.

Comment From hazel
Who’s on your HOF ballot?

Dave Cameron: Too many to name. I’d probably have ~15 guys on there.

Comment From Mo Speights
Do you think the Rays would consider trading Price to another AL East Team?

Dave Cameron: Sure, if the deal were so lopsided that they were both helping themselves and harming their division rival. I’d say that’s unlikely though.

Comment From Noah
After signing a bargain in Chris Young, what do you think the Mets will do next in free agency? Continue signing low cost low risk players are try to make a big splash?

Dan Szymborski: We…are…live…

Dan Szymborski: Can’t…type…words…any…faster…than…this.

Dan Szymborski: Must…run…whole…chat…this…way…or…maybe…not

Comment From Steve
Why didn’t the Angels just go after Peralta??? Seems stupid when they had to trade Bourjos for Freese

Dan Szymborski: When you can get a worse player for your main trading chip and one of your top prospects, YA GOTTA DO IT

Comment From GSon
most under rated signing of this hot stove so far.. David Murphy?