Houston picked up Carlos Lee and Woody Williams. I still don’t know what to think about the 6 year deal for Lee. I did read that he only has a no-trade clause for the first 4 years of the contract which is good cause I don’t think a man of his size will age that well. It is going to be fun to watch Berkman now that he has a legitimate bat behind him. Woody Williams is old and will need to stay healthy. He did have a good ERA last year though. What the Astros really need is for Pettitte and Clemens to not retire. If they come back there is no doubt in my mind the Astros win the central.

Another big pick up was done by yours truly. I managed to pick up a Nintendo Wii on the black market. It is freaking unbelievably fun. I’m not kidding, Emily has sent me two emails today talking about how much fun she thinks it is. The game comes with a demo disc that lets you play either golf, tennis, baseball, bowling, or boxing. I had more fun playing any one of those sports games than I have ever had playing a 360 game. In the baseball game you hold the controller like a bat and take a cut when you want your batter to swing. Say you have a swing similar to Gary Sheffield and shake the bat as the pitcher goes through his motion, your on screen player will be doing the same thing. And believe me, it is way more rewarding to hit a homerun by taking a hack rather than just pushing a button. In the tennis game, you hold the controller as if you are holding a racquet and when you do a forehand swing your character on the screen does a forehand, when you do a backhand your character does a backhand. In bowling you go through the same motion you would if you were bowling. So much that if you snap your wrist at you’re release point you will put spin on the ball. All the sports games on the demo disc are like this. In golf you hold the controller like a golf club and in boxing you literally are throwing jabs and hooks. Nintendo has hit a homerun with their motion censored controller and I don’t see how the X-box or Playstation will be able to compete. Slightly better graphics will be completely irrelevant if those other systems cannot find a way to match the Wii’s controller.