I'm not sure why exactly, but after a recent pay-per-view binge it struck me as a good idea to write up a couple quick movie reviews. Apparently this is what happens when re-signing Nick Punto is the biggest headline of the Twins' offseason. Sorry.


Forgetting Sarah Marshall tends to get thrown into the massive and ever-expanding Judd Apatow pile, but his producer-only influence appears to be pretty minimal compared to his writing and directing. Most of Apatow's movies are filled with obvious laughs in funny scenes built around goofy banter that's seemingly pieced together around a basic plot to make a film, but Forgetting Sarah Marshall is much more story driven and ultimately more cute than funny.

There are still plenty of laughs, but the memorable one-liners are more or less non-existent and aside from a little male nudity the film more easily fits under the umbrella of modern romantic comedies than something out of the Apatow factory. Jason Segel is bumbling at times and very charming at others as a relatively unique leading man, and Russell Brand is a perfect fit as the swarthy rock star who breaks up Segel's relationship with Kristen Bell's character.

Of course, perhaps the movie's biggest flaw is that while Bell plays a television actress on a hit show she gets overshadowed by Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com third runner-up Mila Kunis, who plays what can only be described as the world's most beautiful and down-to-earth hotel desk clerk. Perhaps not enough setup is devoted to showing why Segel's character would be so crushed by breaking up with Sarah Marshall, or perhaps her celebrity implies the heartbreak and Kunis steals her spotlight anyway.

Either way, at no time during the film did it seem like Segel should be leaning toward Bell over Kunis, which given the plot was a fairly big bump to get over. Apatow favorites Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd make amusing quasi-cameos, 30 Rock co-star Jack McBrayer provides the most laughs per second as an out-of-his-element honeymooner, and there are a pair of obese hotel workers who account for a large percentage of the movie's big laughs.

Ultimately the movie is a step above the average romantic comedy because of some well-placed adult-themed humor and a good cast, but fails to hit as many high points as the average Apatow flick thanks to the Segel-penned script refusing to stray quite as far into the world of absurd dialogue. That's not necessarily a bad thing, because several of Apatow's latest films are more hit than miss anyway, but Forgetting Sarah Marshall didn't give itself a chance to be a truly memorable comedy.

Cheesy and incredibly forced baseball-related rating: Line-drive single.


I'm not usually a huge fan of superhero movies or even films that revolve around special effects and/or action sequences, but Iron Man is far more than that thanks to Robert Downey Jr.'s excellent portrayal of Tony Stark. Downey as Stark is so amusingly charming and the actual creation of his superhero is so intriguing that my favorite parts of the movie were the non-action scenes and the story captivated me despite zero prior knowledge of the comic book.

Most of the secondary characters lacked depth because the movie focused on establishing Downey as the uber-cool hero, but Jeff Bridges still managed to play a plenty convincing, slick villain and Gwyneth Paltrow was fetching enough in an extremely understated role to convince you that Stark could develop a crush on his longtime assistant even while being a brash billionaire genius super-celebrity who has everything and everyone else he wants.

Jon Favreau directed a sleek, fast-paced film that seemed a half-hour shorter than the 126-minute run time despite needing about 30 minutes of setup before completely diving in. I'm rarely blown away by superhero attempts and Iron Man certainly doesn't come close to ranking among my all-time favorite movies, but it's clear to me how much comic book fans would adore the film and even as a non-comic book guy it definitely had little trouble holding my attention.

In fact, between great special effects, interesting action scenes that avoided being overdone, a likable yet slick hero, snappy dialogue, and a cameo by Marvel icon Stan Lee it was nearly a perfect comic film for a non-fanatic. Downey carried the film far more than the story or effects, and Bridges again showed that he can thrive playing just about any type of character with any type of haircut. Not a perfect movie by any means and no hugely memorable moments, but two hours of non-stop enjoyment.

Cheesy and incredibly forced baseball-related rating: Ground-rule double.

We haven't done one of these in a while. Today's live chat will begin at noon, with doors opening 15-20 minutes early for pre-submitted questions.

Hello like before
I'd never come here if I'd known that you were here
I must admit though that it's nice to see you, dear
You look like you've been doing well

- Bill Withers, "Hello Like Before"

I'm back from Beckett Media headquarters in Dallas and my annual blog-neglecting hibernation while putting together the Rotoworld baseball magazine each winter is finally over. We seemingly never have quite enough time at the Beckett offices to be fully comfortable with how every last inch of the magazine turned out, but I'm very happy with the product that will be hitting newsstands next month. Based just on word count alone you won't find a better value, because $6.99 for 175,000 words is ridiculous.

About one-third of those words were written by me, one-third were penned by Matthew Pouliot, and the rest were split between Craig Calcaterra, David Pinto, Nate Stephens, Nick Nelson, Chris Wesseling, Derek Carty, Drew Silva, and Conor Glassey, which is a group that likely includes several recognizable names whether you're a Rotoworld reader, blog enthusiast, or Twins fan. Toss in Beckett turning those words into a great-looking magazine and I'm confident stacking it up against anything on the market.

Not only does the name Beckett rightfully carry a ton of weight in the magazine world, their ability to put out great products is matched only by their hospitality. Last week was my third trip to Dallas and each trek has involved a ton of stressful, last-minute labor on an important project, yet it always seems more like spending a few days at a friend's house than work. Mike Obert is the friend whose place we crash at, Tim Trout makes life easy coordinating things on Beckett's end, and everyone at the office is great.

We work hard on the magazine all day in a wonderful environment full of smart, easygoing people and then go out to dinner together each night. In fact, even considering the part about having to actually put together a 175,000-word product in a short period of time I look forward to the Beckett trip each winter. All of which is a long way of saying thank you to Mike, Tim, Brett, Brent, Kyla, Pete, and everyone else for treating us so well and making a tough few days seem easy. And for introducing me to hibachi.

Between my trip to Las Vegas for the winter meetings and self-imposed hibernation for the Rotoworld magazine it's been a while since AG.com was running normally with near-daily entries. Thankfully the Twins were kind enough to do absolutely nothing during that time, sitting on their hands until blogging resumed. Thanks, fellas. There's still an outfield logjam and it still involves Delmon Young, third base still belongs to Brian Buscher and Brendan Harris, and the bullpen still looks exactly the same.

I'm on record saying that decent-bat, poor-glove third basemen like Garrett Atkins, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Casey Blake, and Ty Wigginton simply aren't sizable enough upgrades over a Buscher-Harris platoon to justify the prices to acquire them, so the Twins' lack of action on that front doesn't bother me one bit. Similarly, while my sense at the winter meetings was that the Twins were clearly looking to deal Young, hanging onto him is far from disastrous at this stage.

However, the Twins' odd refusal to address the bullpen cost them a trip to the playoffs last season and has led to them watching this winter as quality late-inning options like Jeremy Affeldt, Bob Howry, Joe Nelson, and Takashi Saito signed reasonably priced deals elsewhere. There's some talk of being in the mix for Brandon Lyon and they were in attendance last week when a rehabbing Chad Cordero tried to show that he's healthy following surgery, but most of the good, low-cost options have dried up.

It's possible that the Twins are essentially counting on Jose Mijares to be their big bullpen addition for 2009 and certainly he looked as good as any free agent while allowing just one run in 10 appearances down the stretch last season, but he's hardly a sure thing late-inning option if you trust his career-long track record more than his two-week debut. For one thing, Mijares walked zero batters in 10.1 innings with the Twins after handing out 60 walks in 85 innings between Double-A and Triple-A.

Mijares had a 3.71 ERA in those 85 innings and less than 10 percent of those frames came at Triple-A, which means that he'll enter 2009 as a 24-year-old rookie with a grand total of 19 career innings above Double-A. I'm all for giving young, inexperienced players a chance in key roles, but I'm also a believer in minor-league track records predicting major-league success and nothing Mijares did prior to those two weeks in Minnesota suggested "sure thing."

Far too many fans and media members are criticizing the Twins for not spending money just to spend money without realizing that throwing millions at someone like Wigginton wouldn't actually improve the team much, if at all. However, bringing in even one capable veteran reliever could have a major impact and comes with a minimal cost. Not only were Affeldt, Howry, Nelson, and Saito all reasonably priced individually, the foursome is guaranteed a combined $9.1 million for 2009.

If you're curious, last winter the Twins gave out $8.8 million in guaranteed money to Livan Hernandez and Craig Monroe. I'm perfectly fine with the Twins coming in significantly under what everyone seems to feel their budget should be if the likely alternatives are using that excess money to pay a premium for marginal upgrades or swap cheap talent for expensive mediocrity, but they were (and still are, to some extent) in position to cheaply boost the bullpen and so far at least have watched the pitch go by.

I'm back now, guys. Feel free to, you know, do something.