Message from the Commish

Congratulations to Nate on his third Mosquito League championship. Nate dominated the league this year and Casey swept by me in thefinal days to knock me out of a money position for the first time in five years. Congrats to Casey as well for a strong finish and his second money finish in as many years. I don't know if you guys saw this, but Casey posted a message on the league website. Basically, he noted that the league activity seemed a little low this year and interest didn't seem real high. There were not a ton of messages posted and communication seemed to be less than in past years. I think this is due to a few things. One, Nate pretty much had this thing locked up in July, so it was hard to compete. Two, the season is long and we always have a tendency to lose interest towards the end. It's the nature of fantasy baseball. Three, we're getting older, working harder andspending more time paying bills, raising families and watching CSI. That'sthe way it goes. Regardless, I see no reason why we can't keep this league going for many years to come. We have a great format and everyone understands the rules,but maybe we need to spice things up a little. We could easily adopt akeeper format. We could keep say, two batters and one pitcher each year attheir auction value which would be subtracted form your $260 cap at the nextauction. Or, we had the NL-only league for years. Maybe we give it a gowith an AL-only league. Or we can keep the league how it is, which would befine too. I just wanted to throw out a couple ideas to spark some interest.So, now we start our 13th season of the Mosquito League. Thirteen is acrazy number, anything can happen in 2006. Maybe JV will step out of his12-year slump. Maybe Phat T will have a big year now that he's 21 and usingheavy doses of beer to remove the week brain cells. Maybe Lahti and Rivestwill regain their form as league dominators, or shit, maybe hell will freezeover and one of the Mickelsen's will win the league. ;-)That brings us to the auction. I think our best bet is to still have theauction in Michigan around Christmas time. Christmas is on a Sunday thisyear. Nate has already informed me that the morning of the 26th is out.So, I would suggest doing the auction on Friday the 23rd, Monday the 26th(later in the day) or sometime on the 27th.The other option is to have the auction sometime in March, most likely somewhere other than the UP. I would like to see this league get to a point where we could accomplish this. Christmas time is just so busy and so earlyfor the auction and it works, but I'm afraid that it's just going to keepgetting more difficult to schedule. The one idea I had was to have theauction in Chicago. For many people in the league, it's a 7-hour drive orless and for the rest of us, it's a major airport to fly into allowing forsome cheaper airline prices and easier schedules. Now, I understand thatthis becomes more difficult with families and jobs and everything else thatis going on, but we're talking 2 days/one night out-of-town.If I tell you right now that we are having the auction March 11th inChicago, how many people would be unable to get work off and get permissionform the wife, or hech, take the wife and set-up grandma and grandpa tobaby-sit. I would take care of organizing hotels and getting us cheaprooms. All you would have to do is get there. This also might work inMilwaukee or Minneapolis.Our last resort is to use the internet and do a draft. I think this will bethe beginning of the end for this league as the auction is the heartbeat ofthe Mosquito League, but it might work if that's what we have to do.So here's what I need form you:1) Any recommended changes for the league (Keepers, Al-only, no changes,etc.)?2) What are the dates that you will be home for Christmas, be specific!3) If Christmas doesn't work for us, give me a yes or no on whether youcould swing one night away in March for the draft. If yes, give me yourpreferred city.I look forward to hearing from you guys.