Frank Wren is the little-known Braves GM, probably because he was serving under John Schuerholz his entire career, and we all know how much Schuerholz loves to get attention. Anyway, Wren’s running the show now, and he joined The Monty Show on Sporting News Radio to talk about the Braves. He was asked about the decision to let Andruw Jones walk which was imminent last year because of financial reasons. Wren took it even a step further:

We had the ability to watch over the last two or three years that Andruw was not the same, and he wasn’t the same player he was three years ago. We had already seen the decline begin. Now he very well may get it back to some extent but we had seen the decline so [letting him go] was easier.

While this is the type of thing that would make Dodger fans groan since it would fall into the Ned Colletti category of failing to do proper homework (much like the Jason Schmidt trade), I’m not buying it. Wren says Andruw was showing signs of losing it two or three years ago. Two years ago Andruw had one of his best offensive seasons, and three years ago he popped 51 out of the park. Contrarily, it appeared as if after all the time in the league, Andruw was just coming into his own; last year’s season was the anomaly. And even with his poor hitting, Jones was still playing really well defensively. It may be easy to speak from hindsight after seeing what Andruw’s done this year, but I don’t believe the Braves wouldn’t have been interested in re-signing Jones had his price tag been cheaper. I’d be really interested to know if Wren saw a decline in Jones’ work ethic, rather than physical skill — now that would make more sense.

Leave it to me to be right on time to the party and post this right after Chris Osgood had his worst game of the Stanley Cup Finals. Anyway, Kristen Bell, the star of Heroes, Gossip Girl, Veronica Mars and much more, revealed her first crush to NHL.com in an interview:

NHL.com: If you could meet any hockey player, who would you meet and why?

KB: Chris Osgood was my first crush. Brad Pitt be damned, he had nothing on Osgood’s rookie skill and sad eyes. There was actually a day in high school when I wrote on a name tag ‘Mrs. Osgood’ and wore it the whole day. I really thought we were perfect for each other. I’d love to meet him and probably apologize that things never worked out.
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NHL.com: If you had the Stanley Cup for one day, what would you do with it?

KB: I would start by eating an entire box of Fruity Pebbles out of it. Then I’d take an afternoon sponge bath in it. Then I’d retro fit it with handles and make it into a Stanley Cup handbag.

Fruity Pebbles + Sponge Bath = Dream Come True. I can’t think of much better things to do with the Stanley Cup, but one would involve this lovely young lady pictured down here. As far as the above picture of Ms. Bell, I have to give major thanks to my man Justin for the tip. And there’s one more included after the jump, just for him.

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Joe Sports Fan, as they often do, came up with a great bit and put together a set of faux trading cards they call “The Uglies.” It was a natural response to OK!Magazine’s Top 50 Good Looking Men or something like that. Whatever. What does matter is not necessarily their selection of players — they certainly missed quite a few uglies — but the information on the back of the cards was impeccable. Here are my favorites (make sure you go over there to check out the rest).

And for my money, it doesn’t get much better than Mike Ricci’s possible ancestry being a sewer rat. I absolutely lost it when I read that. As for Willie, I could easily see him slipping on a blue collar outfit janitor style.

I suppose another way of asking the same question is: should the refs be blowing the whistle that late in the game? In case you missed the close play or want to see it again, here it is, because it’s pretty clear there’s a lot of contact.

That looks a lot like a foul, and I’ll go on the side that says Brent Barry should have been put on the line. But it’s not something I’m going to waste much oxygen on. The Lakers were in charge the entire game, leading the whole way. If the Spurs wanted to win, they had 48 minutes to ensure the game wouldn’t be put in the referees’ hands for the final seconds, which they let happen. Now one conspiracy theory issue is something BP pointed out at Awful Announcing prior to the game: Joe Crawford was reffing it. The same Joe Crawford who kicked Duncan out of a game last year for laughing. No nonsense Joe Crawford, who was responsible for the non-call on Fisher. I wouldn’t blame him for the loss — far from it — but I do think this is a great side note.

Yes, I may have slacked on my duties and missed the fact that Justin Upton took the collar last week against the Marlins (and nearly wore the hat Tuesday night going 0-for-4 with 3K’s), but I was all over the affairs in Anaheim.

You might think that I was rooting for Ervin Santana in the top of the 9th inning with the game tied 2-2 because I wanted my Angels to win, but you would be partially wrong. Oh no, I had ulterior motives. I was knuckling up on my chair waiting to see if Matt Joyce could do what he hadn’t done before: put a ball in play against Ervin Santana. And much to my delight, Mr. Joyce obliged my greatest wishes by failing to connect for the fourth time in the night. His final line for the evening: 0-for-4, 4K’s, three swinging, one looking, all against Ervin Santana. And the Angels won 3-2 on a game-winning hit by Gary Matthews Jr. in the bottom of the 9th. Lovely.

So to Matt Joyce, I wish you nothing but success in the future, so long as you’re not playing the Angels, and so long as you aren’t chasing the Golden Sombrero. Also, we must establish some LBS Golden Sombrero Club policy here. I’m thinking no on awarding retroactive Sombreros in case we don’t see it within 24 hours. Justin Upton, you are lucky my friend. And proudly, there are now three members and counting in the LBS Golden Sombrero Club.

I’m not really sure if I should laugh at this story or feel embarrassed by it. Since I’m an unabashed Orlando Cabrera fan, I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt on the matter. And a little background on the story, first. I heard an interview OC gave within the last year where he was campaigning to win the Gold Glove award, sharing with the listeners how much pride he takes in playing excellent defense at shortstop. OK, now onto the incident(s) that rubbed Ozzie Guillen the wrong way, as passed along by the One Dog, Lance Johnson:

Guillen read a story in the Sun-Times on Sunday that brought to light the fact that twice this season Cabrera has called up to press boxes during games to complain about errors that were charged to him: once in Toronto and a second time at U.S. Cellular Field.

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