The 21^st Annual Rookie draft will be held on January 19^th at Noon Eastern Time. A Chat room will be set up on AOL to accommodate those who cannot make it here in person.

I have submitted all the vital information to Diamond Mind so feel free to place your order. When you order the game and/or the disk, mention that you are a member of the TML National and you will qualify for the 30% discount.

I have created the League using the 2000 season disk and will migrate everything forward once I have the 2001 set installed. There has been some division changes with the new managers.

Albany will be moving into the Clemente to replace WW (formerly NC)

Jersey and Ft. Lauderdale will move into the Mantle to replace Albany and AS (formerly WP)

WW (formerly NC) will move into the Mays in Jersey's Place

Sleepy Town (ST) is the new franchise name for Miami.

AS (formerly WP) moves into the Aaron.

New managers in TML 2001 have been previously announced, but they are:

We welcome all of you.

Of course we are going to miss both Kevin Powers and Roy Gorham tremendously. Roy will be staying in the retros with us and Kevin is finishing up his last season (1967).

As previously announced, Scott Lagace has taken the reigns from Kevin as the WebMaster/Roster Dude/Commissioner Prodder. He has already posted up the trades/rosters and stats from 1967 and is doing a great job filling the seemingly unfillable show. Thank you Scott!

Here are the results of the All Stat Voting and Player/Pitcher Awards for 1951 and 2000

1B Gil Hodges TG Earl Torgeson RR

2B Jackie Robinson NY Red Schoendienst RV

SS Alvin Dark DY Johnny Pesky MG

3B George Kell RR Willie Jones CS

OF (starters) Stan Musial CS, Richie Ashburn TG, Ralph Kiner MG

(backups) Bobby Thomson TG, Sam Jethroe BU, Ted Williams MV

C Roy Campanella BU Yogi Berra RR

Starting Pitchers Warren Spahn MV, Murry Dickson RR, Early Wynn MG, Ken Raffensberger NC

Relief Pitchers Ted Wilks DY, Lou Brissie NC, Frank Smith RV

Our Player of the Year for 1951 was Stan Musial of Commack. This was Musial's 3^rd player of the Year in the 4 years we have played this era. The only time he has not won it was in 1949 when he finished second to Ralph Kiner's Triple Crown. Kiner and Jackie Robinson finished 2, 3 in the balloting.

The Pitcher of the Year, for the 1^st time was Warren Spahn of Mudville. This was the first win for Spahnnie. Murry Dickson of Rainier finished a distant second to Spahn..

2B Jeff Kent MV Edgardo Alfonzo NY

SS Nomar Garciaparra NC Derek Jeter NY

3B Chipper Jones DY Tony Batista TG

OF (starters) Barry Bonds TG, Bernie Williams TG, Vladimir Guerrero MA

(backups) Sammy Sosa ZR, Manny Ramirez JG, Geoff Jenkins TG

C Mike Piazza GC Ivan Rodriguez NY

Starting Pitchers Randy Johnson NY, Pedro Martinez, Kevin Brown ZR, Mike Mussina TG, Greg Maddux ZR

Relief Pitchers Trevor Hoffman MV, Robb Nen ZR, Billy Koch CS

Our Player of the Year for 2000 was Vladimir Guerrero of Miami. This was Vlad's 1^st honor. He received 13 or the 23 first place ballots to edge out Barry Bonds of Troy. No one else was in the same area code as these two. Oddly enough, Bonds received more first place votes for outfielder on the All Star team than Guerrero.

The Pitcher of the Year, for the 1^st time was Randy Johnson of New York. The Unit led the league in wins and struck out a record 412 batters to edge defeat runner up Pedro Martinez of Gotham City.

2B Red Schoendienst RV

SS Chico Carrasquel MV

3B Fred Hatfield AV

OF Gil Coan NC

OF Hank Sauer NC

OF Richie Ashburn TG

C Yogi Berra RR

1B Travis Lee WP

2B Pokey Reese MF

SS Omar Vizquel CS

3B Joe Randa MF

OF Ron Gant ZR

OF Mike Cameron DV

OF Paul O'Neill DY

C Ivan Rodriguez NY

P Greg Maddux ZR

Rodriquez and Randa are repeat winners from 1999.

We have accumulated a whole heap of numbers. I am in the process of smashing and mashing them and will post a thorough look at where we stand in our next installment. Until then, here are some tidbits courtesy of Kevin:

Roger Clemens became the first TMLer to pass the 300-win mark with 313. He also leads in career games started with 507 and has passed Nolan Ryan to become the all time strikeout leader with 3,474.

Randy Johnson broke his 1-year-old strikeout record by fanning 412. Randy is 3^rd all time in strikeouts with 3,359. It is possible for the Unit to take over the career lead next year. He is also 6^th all time in wins with 205.

Interestingly enough, Clemens has only led the league in strikeouts once, for Kentucky in 1988. Ryan led the league in 1979, 1980, 1989 and 1990. (If he were still pitching his pattern would have been to lead the league the last 2 years). Johnson has led the league 7 times (1991-1993, 1995, 1998-2000. Sandy Koufax led the league 5 times from 1961-1966.

Pedro Martinez's career ERA has dropped to 2.54 which leads the modern TML era. He is 2^nd overall to, well, you can guess.

Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire are tied for the all time Homerun lead at 563. Bonds' 1717 Rbi's moved him into 2^nd all time, 3 behind Eddie Murray.

Rickey Henderson's numbers after 2000 (real life through 2000 in parentheses)

Hits 2918 (1914)

Walks 2059 (2070)

Runs 2162 (2178)

SB 1408 (1370)

Not bad, huh!

Tony Gwynn leads in career hits and doubles.

As I said, the numbers are starting to pile up and the names from the 60's are starting to find their way onto all time lists. Several of the 60's players are just beginning their careers in the 50's so players like Mays and Mantle are adding numbers from 2 seasons at a time.

Some managerial notes:

TML Current (22 years)

Wins - Rocky Hall 2,119, Mike Mayko 2,013, Dave Pittner 1,959, Larry Alber 1,874, Rich Goldberg 1,851, Jim Pertierra 1,850, Jim Schembari 1,814

All time (37 Years)

Dave Pittner 3,251, Jim Pertierra 3,131, Larry Alber 2,986

There have been 37,610 regular season games played in TML Now (1979-2000) and 17,091 games played in TML Retro (1927-8, 1936-8, 1948-1951, 1961-1966). Concisely, what that means is that Larry and I have played 540 games against each other over the years. Where does time go?

The two time defending champions mean business. Even with franchise kingpin Sandy Koufax's retirement, the Woodchoppers raced out to a 25-3 opening period riding a 17 game winning streak into period 2. 7 of the 8 Eastern Division teams are at least playing .500 ball as they beat up on the Northern Division this time. McGraw sits atop the North with a 15-13 record. Pre-season favorite, Mudville, is lurking 3 games back of New York.

Player of the 1^st Period was Jimmy Wynn of New York. The Toy Cannon hit .367 with 11 homers, 36 RBI's and a 1.231 OPS and 38 runs created. Runner-up was Willie McCovey of Mudville.

Pitcher of the Period was Dick Hughes of Mew York. Hughes was 7-0 with a 1.76 ERA. Larry Jackson of New York was runner up.

The TML 1952 draft will take place at 7 PM Eastern on January 19^th. I am still working on the rookie list and it will up there shortly.

Scott Lagace is the trade reporter and keeper of the official rosters for ALL TML Leagues. Please submit any trades and/or cuts to Scott.

The 1967 season will be our last with Diamond Dreams.

Starting with 1952 and 2001 we are using Diamond Mind exclusively. Please place your orders as soon as you can. Both season disks are available.

I hope that each of you and your families have a fine Holiday season. I thank each of you for your friendship. I have none better!

Jim