Just got a text message from a sympathetic Cubs fan who says that he just heard Joe Morgan say on ESPN that the Reds have signed Dusty Baker to be their manager next season.

If anyone has a corroborating source, I’d love to hear about it. And to start crying.

UPDATE 11:09 pm
Thanks, Zeldink, for the link:

Dusty Baker has agreed to a three-year deal to manage the Cincinnati Reds, beginning with the upcoming season, ESPN has learned.Baker, a former Cubs and Giants manager and current ESPN analyst, will continue to work with ESPN through this season’s League Championship Series and World Series.

Baker is expected to be introduced at a news conference in Cincinnati on Monday.

With so many managers still in flux–Larussa, Torre, etc.–is there really any reason to make this decision before the postseason is even over? Even if your GM has a long history of jumping the gun?

My irritation over this issue is significant. Podcast soon to come.

John Fay hits you with this one:

There’s been a lot of speculation nationally about the possibility of former St. Louis GM Walt Jocketty ending up with the Reds, given the that Reds CEO Bob Castellini was once a limited partner in St. Louis and he’s known to admire the work Jocketty did with the Cardinals.But it’s not going to happen.

“Wayne Krivsky is our GM. Period,” Castellini said Monday through a spokesman.

Krivsky has one year remaining on his contract. The Reds are 152-172 in his two years as GM.

Jocketty was dismissed after the season by the Cardinals.

I read the quote to my Crack Technical Staff, who responded:

Do you love me? Question mark. Please, please. Exclamation point. I want to hold you in parentheses.

When you look at the sentence, it’s just a statement of fact followed by a statement of punctuation. It doesn’t say anything about what the fact will be tomorrow.

Hope never dies.

The Phillies were the second team swept out of contention this weekend when the Rockies beat them 1-2. The team of the 10,000 losses just keeps on marching.

I’m pleased to see the Rockies win, but MLB and TBS have to be hating these short series. Don’t these teams know anything about advertising??

My favorite quote from the Phillies game wrap:

“It’s crazy, man,” added Romero. “I know I executed my pitches, but … that one out of the reach of Jayson, and [the hit past] Chase — I tip my hat. They put enough wood on the [ball]. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s unfortunate that we came up short. We showed a lot of character, and now we have to go home and watch the [Rockies] continue to play.”

It’s my favorite because of the words in square brackets, indicating that those words weren’t actually part of the quote. What did Romero call the team if not [Rockies]? Probably [them], but my imagination likes to wander.

The Cubs are officially eliminated from the post season now, having lost their third in a row to the Arizona Diamonbacks. I certainly didn’t expect the Cubs to go all the way, but I didn’t expect them to go out in three games. That was really a sad showing. I feel bad for Cubs fans tonight, and that’s coming from a Reds fan.

With regard to Piniella’s decision to pull Carlos “the Moose” Zambrano from game 1 after 85 pitches with the game tied, I have to wonder whether that still seems like a good decision now that he doesn’t need to be fresh for game 4.

In other news, the Rockies are looking to subject the Phillies to the same fate. The CTS just told me that the Rockies starter was 2 years old when the Phillies’ starter broke the majors. If the Rockies win tonight, will major league managers everywhere suddenly come to appreciate the value of youth, even in the face of experience? Yeah, probably not.