Story One - Stairs climbs north
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (CP) - Unlike their courtship of other players this off-season, the Toronto Blue Jays had little trouble getting a deal done with Matt Stairs.
"It didn't take very long for me to say yes," the Fredericton outfielder, speaking from Bangor, Maine, said Wednesday of his preliminary agreement on a one-year deal. "It took about 10 minutes to get done. I was extremely happy, I'm really looking forward to coming back to Canada."
The contract is expected to be finalized and announced later this week, allowing the Blue Jays to keep an extra spot open on their 40-man roster for Thursday's Rule 5 draft.
Stairs joins the Blue Jays as a fourth outfielder and left-handed bat off the bench, brigning with him a .358 average plus nine home runs and 23 RBIs in 106 career at-bats at the Rogers Centre.
Toronto will be the 38-year-old's 10th stop in a nomadic yet solid career that will leave him among the greatest Canadian batters to ever play the game. In 1,416 games over 14 seasons, Stairs has 220 homers (second only among Canadians to Larry Walker's 383) and 751 RBIs.
He also reunites with general manager J.P. Ricciardi, who helped sign Stairs as a free agent Dec. 1, 1995 with the Oakland Athletics, where he enjoyed his finest seasons.
"I didn't think we'd be apart 15 years," Stairs said in his trademark deadpan. "J.P. is a good guy, we go way back, and he knows what he's doing. He's a good GM."
Ricciardi wouldn't confirm the deal but said he had spoken with Stairs' representatives. On Tuesday, he admitted the club's interest in him.
"I've always liked Matt," said Ricciardi. "I helped bring him over to Oakland so I've known him a long time."
Stairs batted .247 with 13 home runs and 51 RBIs last season for Kansas City, Texas and Detroit. The Royals did Stairs a favour by moving him to a contender in a deadline deal but when the Rangers faded they put him on waivers and the Tigers claimed him.
He played 14 September games with Detroit, hitting two homers with eight RBIs in helping the Tigers reach the post-season. Ineligible for the playoffs because he wasn't on the roster before Sept. 1, Stairs went home while his teammates reached the World Series.
In coming to Toronto, he sees a chance in getting back to the post-season.
"That's the biggest thing for me now," he said. "The last few years in Kansas City I was mainly in a rebuilding situation helping out in a leadership role as the older guy in a younger clubhouse. Now I'm coming back to Canada on a team with that has a chance to get to the post-season.
"It's something I'm looking forward to."
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Story Two - Lilly signs with Cubs
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (CP) -- Spurned by Ted Lilly, the Toronto Blue Jays shifted gears at the baseball winter meetings Wednesday by zeroing in on Gil Meche and reaching a preliminary agreement on a one-year deal with Canadian outfielder Matt Stairs.
Larry OBrien, the agent for Lilly, told general manager J.P. Ricciardi and his staff during a morning meeting that they were out of the running for the left-hander. Later that night, OBrien said Lilly had agreed to a four-year, US$40-million deal with the Chicago Cubs, pending a physical.
"At the end of the day, Ted decided he wanted a change of scenery," OBrien said in an interview outside the Disney Dolphin Hotel. "The decision had nothing to do with length of contract or money. The offers are all about the same."
Lillys departure means Meche becomes the Blue Jays main target to bolster their starting rotation. Meche is also being pursued by the Cubs while the Kansas City Royals and Texas Rangers are also said to have jumped hard into the chase.
The Blue Jays had hoped to leave Orlando with both Lilly and Meche. Their best offer, believed to be for slightly less than the one to Lilly, has been made and its up to Meche now.
"I think weve done everything we could possibly do," said Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi. "Really the ball is in their court at this point.
"I dont think its going to be a long wait. I think well find something out in the next few days."
Ricciardi said the goal now is to add one more pitcher, be it Meche or someone from their fallback list, which includes Jeff Suppan and Mark Redman. That pitcher would join ace Roy Halladay, A.J. Burnett and Gustavo Chacin with a host of internal options to compete for the final spot.
"If we walk out of here with one, well be in the same boat we were in last year with three good pitchers in the front," said Ricciardi. "Our ultimate goal was to have two guys, we tried to get two, we didnt get one, well see if we get the other one."
Josh Towers and Shaun Marcum are chief internal candidates to fill out the rotation.
The deal with Stairs is expected to be announced later this week, allowing the Blue Jays to keep a spot on the 40-man roster open for Thursdays Rule 5 draft. The Fredericton native and Ricciardi know each other from their days in Oakland and Stairs nearly signed with Toronto before the 2003 season.
"Im very excited," Stairs said in an interview from Bangor, Maine. "We worked on it (Tuesday) night and it took about 10 minutes to get done. I was extremely happy, Im really looking forward to coming back to Canada."
Stairs batted .247 with 13 home runs and 51 RBIs last season for Kansas City, Texas and Detroit. The 38-year-old is a career .358 hitter with nine home runs and 23 RBIs in 106 at-bats at the Rogers Centre and is happy to be joining a team with post-season aspirations.
"Thats the biggest thing for me now," he said. "The last few years in Kansas City I was mainly in a rebuilding situation helping out in a leadership role as the older guy in a younger clubhouse. Now Im coming back to Canada on a team with that has a chance to get to the post-season. Its something Im looking forward to."
A deal with veteran infielder Chris Gomez, who spent 2004 with the Blue Jays, could also be completed in the next few days.
"We had Gomey here before and he did a great job for us, hes a great guy, a good veteran player," said Ricciardi. "Hes a guy weve talked about."
But Lillys loss was sure to sting, with the only solace being that he didnt end with the rival New York Yankees. The Boston Red Sox took a major step forward Tuesday when they reached tentative deals with outfielder J.D. Drew and shortstop Julio Lugo, making the AL East as competitive as ever.
OBrien said Lillys decision to cut the Blue Jays had nothing to do with his altercation with manager John Gibbons in the tunnel after he was pulled from a Aug. 22 start in Toronto.
"None whatsoever," said OBrien. "As a matter of fact, his relationship with Gibby got better after the altercation.
"He has a respect for John and the organization . . . Ted is happy to be a Cub and he wants to be part of bringing a pennant and World Series to Chicago.
Word of Lillys decision came shortly after new Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella kept up his teams pursuit of Lilly and Meche.
Piniella said he has been on the phone with both -- he knows Meche from their days in Seattle where he also managed Pete OBrien, brother of Larry OBrien -- and believes they would benefit from a move to Wrigley Field.
"Part of my job since Ive been here in Orlando has been a little bit like a college recruiter, calling these guys. I enjoy that," Piniella said.
"I think theyve both been successful major-league pitchers but I think theres still some upside there for them. Weve got a good pitching coach in Chicago, Larry Rothschild, theyll benefit from that experience also. Hopefully things will fall our way."
Canadian Grammy hopes run high
TORONTO (CP) - Grammy hopes run high for Canadian favourites Nelly Furtado and Nickelback as the U.S. recording academy announces its nominations Thursday for the best in music.
The "Promiscuous" singer and radio-friendly rockers top the list of Canuck contenders expected to garner serious consideration south of the border.
"Nelly Furtado has had pretty much the biggest, high-profile pop comeback in recent years," says Aaron Brophy of Chart Magazine.
"This third record ('Loose') is a huge, massive worldwide hit. She's probably our best bet to at least get nominations or some level of attention at the Grammys."
The 48th annual Grammy Awards will be handed out in Los Angeles on Feb. 11.
A nomination for Nickelback and their bread-and-butter rock would be a long time coming for the Alberta band.
The boys released "All the Right Reasons" on Oct. 4, 2005, mere days after the eligibility period closed for Grammy nominations, shutting them out of the 2006 trophies.
But after a year in which their tunes flooded airwaves both in Canada and the U.S., observers say the hardware could finally be theirs in 2007.
"Nickelback are definitely going to get very serious consideration in Grammy nominations, particularly in the hard rock category," says Brophy, also offering Peterborough, Ont.'s Three Days Grace as a potential sleeper in the rock category.
Richard Flohil of the trade publication Applaud agrees, also pointing to veteran rocker Neil Young as having a good shot at Grammy notice for his controversial anti-Bush album "Living With War."
Among the lesser knowns, Flohil reminds music fans that polka king Walter Ostanek of St. Catharines, Ont., is a perennial Grammy favourite.
"The real surprises sometimes come in the categories that nobody worries about, like the niche music categories," says Flohil.
Dark horses include Broken Social Scene, whose self-titled disc was released late last year and generated heavy critical buzz.
But an early Juno favourite will certainly be shut out. While Toronto's k-os generated Canadian praise for his catchy "Atlantis: Hymns for Disco" - out here since October - it won't be released in the U.S. until January, making it ineligible for this year's trophies.
Among the U.S. acts expected to gain nods are R&B veteran Mary J. Blige, chart-topper Justin Timberlake, "American Idol" winner Carrie Underwood and hip-hop duo Gnarls Barkley.
Other artists likely to garner Grammy notice are John Mayer, James Blunt and British crooner Corinne Bailey Rae.
Oscar Season Begins with Eastwood Win
Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima, his as yet unreleased World War II battle epic told from the perspective of the Japanese troops, was named Best Film on Wednesday by the National Board of Review.
Flags of Our Fathers, Eastwood's WWII battle epic told from the perspective of the U.S. troops, made the group's cut as one of 2006's 10 best films.
Eastwood, 75, only recently won a batch of awards, including two Oscars, for directing and producing 2004's Million Dollar Baby. And just before that, he was in the game with 2003's Mystic River.
The NBR honors are the first major kudos of the award-show season. After Wednesday, there will only be 80 ad-buying, DVD-distributing days left until the 79th Annual Academy Awards. As such, the road to the Kodak Theater might have gotten unexpectedly longer for Dreamgirls, the odds-on pick of pundits to claim the Best Picture Oscar.
In the eyes of the NBR, a coalition of historians, students, educators and others, the show-biz musical not only wasn't the year's best film, it wasn't one of the year's 10 best films. Its all-star actors—Beyoncé Knowles, Jamie Foxx and Eddie Murphy—were similarly shut out.
Jennifer Hudson, the American Idol castoff who makes her film debut in Dreamgirls, was the movie's only NBR winner, sharing an honor for breakthrough actress with Babel's Rinko Kikuchi. The 25-year-old Hudson is considered a serious contender for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar.
Having better luck with NBR voters: the Oscarless Martin Scorsese, named Best Director for The Departed; Forest Whitaker, honored as Best Actor for channeling despot Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland; Helen Mirren, tapped as Best Actress for channeling stoic Queen Elizabeth II in The Queen; Djimon Hounsou, a Best Supporting Actor winner for Blood Diamond; and Catherine O'Hara, recognized as Best Supporting Actress for the latest Christopher Guest spoof, For Your Consideration.
Hounsou's Blood Diamond costar, Leonardo DiCaprio, was passed over twice—once for his work in the diamond-trade thriller and once for his star turn in The Departed. DiCaprio and his Departed costars, however, were honored en masse as Best Ensemble.
Other snubees: Mel Gibson, coming up empty with Apocalypto, and everybody who worked on The Queen, save for Mirren.
The NBR isn't a dead-on predictor of Oscar success—American Beauty is its last Best Film winner to claim the Academy's top prize—but it's a pretty good gauge. Last year, all five Best Picture Oscar nominees began their award-show runs on NBR's Top 10 list.
Unlike some other groups, the NBR doesn't do nominations; it just announces winners. But it does its part to help make everybody a winner by lauding nearly three dozen films—including 10 overall picks, 10 indies, five foreign-language movies and five documentaries—as being among the year's best.
In addition to the Eastwood offerings, the NBR's main top 10 list honored Babel, Blood Diamond, The Departed, The Devil Wears Prada, The History Boys, Little Miss Sunshine, Notes on a Scandal and The Painted Veil.
Former Vice President Al Gore's global-warming horror show, An Inconvenient Truth, was named Best Documentary; Penélope Cruz's star vehicle, Volver, was honored as Best Foreign Film; and Cars pulled away as Best Animated Feature.
Emilio Estevez's Bobby, whose Oscar momentum stalled once the reviews came out, did manage a mention on the Top Independent Films list, as did Starbucks' personal favorite, Akeelah and the Bee.
Actor Eli Wallach, director Jonathan Demme and producer Irwin Winkler were all tapped for special honors.
The awards are scheduled to be presented Jan. 9 in New York City.
Here's a complete look at the 2006 National Board of Review winners:
Film: Letters from Iwo Jima
Actor: Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland
Actress: Helen Mirren, The Queen
Supporting Actor: Djimon Hounsou, Blood Diamond
Supporting Actress: Catherine O'Hara, For Your Consideration
Director: Martin Scorsese, The Departed
Foreign Film: Volver
Documentary: An Inconvenient Truth
Animated Feature: Cars
Ensemble Cast: The Departed
Breakthrough Performance by an Actor: Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Breakthrough Performance by an Actress: Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls, and Rinko Kikuchi, Babel
Directorial Debut: Jason Reitman, Thank You for Smoking
Original Screenplay: Stranger Than Fiction
Adapted Screenplay: The Painted Veil
Career Achievement: Eli Wallach
Billy Wilder Award for Excellence in Directing: Jonathan Demme
Career Achievement in Producing: Irwin Winkler
William K. Everson Film History Award: Donald Krim
Bvlgari Award for NBR Freedom of Expression: Water and World Trade Center
XM, Sirius open to raising radio service prices
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Both U.S. satellite radio providers envision a time when they will raise the monthly fee subscribers pay for their services, but no increase is planned in the near term, executives said on Wednesday.
Speaking at separate investor conferences in New York, executives from XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. and Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. said it is more likely that in time they will increase subscription fees rather than lower them from the current standard of $13 a month.
"When you think about where we can go with our pricing, we have plenty of flexibility, but to date we have kept our pricing low to continue to drive subscriber growth," Joseph Euteneuer, XM's chief financial officer, said at a UBS investment conference in New York.
XM most recently raised its price, boosting its monthly fee by 30 percent early in 2005. Both services offer discounts for multiple subscriptions and advance payment.
XM Chairman Gary Parsons noted that when the price hike was initiated some of the discounted rates for multiple accounts were unaffected, and that any new rate increase might be targeted at "family plan" rates.
Sirius Satellite Radio has held its price steady for several years and Chief Executive Officer Mel Karmazin, speaking at a Credit Suisse investor conference, said that it has added significant amount of programming during that time.
Shock jock Howard Stern started a five-year, $500 million pact with Sirius this year.
Karmazin suggested that Sirius would not resist a move to a higher price before XM, if the time were right.
"We think there is an opportunity to increase our pricing," Karmazin said. "When we were at $12.95, our competitor was at $9.95, and very wisely they raised their price to $12.95."
"In that period of time we got the NFL, Nascar, Howard Stern. So we think there is a history of us being the premium priced content company," he said.
Higher fees would boost revenue for both money-losing companies, whose popularity remains solid -- Sirius alone expects to nearly double its subscriber totals this year.
But a rate hike could sour those who still think of traditional radio as free and already pay monthly fees to services like subscription music services and cable or satellite television.
Moreover, satellite radio faces competition from a growing number of entertainment options that can occupy consumers' time and money, such as iPods and video game consoles.
Karmazin said price change is inevitable, including the possibility that the radios themselves could one day be free, should the market demand such a scenario. Satellite radio devices range from less than $50 to more than $300 in cost.
"We certainly have the ability to reduce prices. If down the line free radios become common place, our costs are coming down to where it is absolutely possible." he said. "The pricing points today (of radios) is not stopping somebody from buying satellite radio."
Disney's "Pirates" sells 5 million DVDs in first day
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Holiday shoppers in North America snapped up nearly 5 million DVD copies of "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" in the hit title's first day in release, Walt Disney Co. said on Wednesday.
The strong start for "Dead Man's Chest," which was released as a single DVD and a two-disc box set on Tuesday, means that Disney's Buena Vista Worldwide Home Entertainment could have the three best-selling DVDs for 2006, Disney said.
"Dead Man's Chest" also is on track to unseat the previous live-action record-holder for DVD sales, "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl," which sold about 16 million DVD copies and 2 million home-video units, a Disney spokesman said.
DVD sales can account for as much as half of a movie's total revenues. "Dead Man's Chest," the follow-up to "Black Pearl," has generated more than $1 billion in worldwide box office receipts, making it the top-grossing film of the year.
"Black Pearl" pulled in about $654 million at box offices worldwide. A second "Pirates" sequel is set for release in May.
The top DVD sellers for 2006 now include Disney-Pixar's "Cars," with 13 million DVDs sold since its November 7 release, and "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," with 12 million sold since its release by Disney and Walden Media on April 4, Disney said.
Other contenders for the top DVD slots are Warner Bros. " Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," and "X-Men: The Last Stand."
The biggest-selling DVD of all time was Disney's and Pixar Animation Studios' "Finding Nemo," which sold about 27 million units, Disney said.