The agent for Livan Hernandez(notes) is saying that his client wouldn't mind returning to the lowly Washington Nationals, and the team apparently has some interest, according to MLB.com.

Hernandez started off the season with the New York Mets and then got released with a 5.47 ERA and 135 innings under his belt. His ERA came down a whopping .11 when he pitched for Washington later in the year.

He does like to pitch and will stay in games, but he needs a lot of run support: In the last two years, he's pitched 363 2/3s innings and has a 5.74 ERA.

Source: MLB.com

Boston Red Sox ace Josh Beckett(notes) would like to stay in New England for a while, it appears. He's apparently planning to meet with the team in the next few weeks to discuss a contract extension, according to WEEI.

He'll make $12.1 million next year but is free to roam the streets of any city he wants after next season if a new deal can't be worked out.

It looks like Red Sox GM Theo Epstein is plenty aware of the big bucks it will take to retain Beckett: "He's put himself in a position to be valued very highly by us," he said to WEEI, but he wasn't predicting a definite deal: "Those things have a way of taking care of themselves. ... We'll see what happens."

Source: WEEI

Clint Hurdle got canned early in the season as the Colorado Rockies' manager. That didn't stop the team from rolling to 92 wins and the wild card before getting stopped by the Philadelphia Phillies in the first round of the playoffs.

Now it's looking like Hurdle may join the Texas Rangers as the hitting coach, according to MLB.com. Hurdle had the same job with the Rockies from 1997 to 2001. The Rockies were at the front of the National League pack in runs scored for three of those seasons and only two runs off the lead during the other two. Hurdle also helped guide Larry Walker to the 1997 Most Valuable Player Award. Walker, Vinny Castilla(notes), and Todd Helton(notes) also won Silver Sluggers under his watchful eye.

So the Rangers appear to want a little bit of that magic. First thing they might want to do is find a way to thin out the air at their stadium.

Will be interesting to see if Hurdle has any interest in bringing Milton Bradley(notes) back to the Rangers, which some team execs supposedly would like to do since the Chicago Cubs want to unload him and the Rangers lacked a certain punch without Bradley in the lineup this past season.

Source: MLB.com

Former New York Yankees first baseman Don Mattingly really, really wants to be a manager in the big leagues, but he apparently doesn't want to do it for the Washington Nationals. Rumor has it that Mattingly turned down an offer to interview with the team and help turn it around, according to MLB.com.

There is apparently some belief that this indicates that Mattingly and his current employer, the Los Angeles Dodgers, are formalizing some kind of plan for hitting coach Mattingly to take over for Joe Torre when Torre finally decides to call it quits.

Meanwhile, the Nats apparently want to name a new manager within the week. Interim manager Jim Riggleman is a possibility as well as former Seattle Mariners and Arizona Diamondbacks manager Bob Melvin.

Whatever happens, the coaches have all been promised jobs within the organization for next year.

Source: MLB.com

A month ago, the Texas Rangers scoffed at the notion that it could bring back outfielder Milton Bradley(notes), but now it's looking like the idea is gaining some steam in the executive suites, according to MLB.com

Bradley was with the team in 2008 when he had a .321 average and led the American League in OPS (on base plus slugging). The loss of Bradley to the Chicago Cubs is part of the reason the Rangers scored 115 fewer runs in 2009 than in 2008.

He's got two more years and about $20 million left on his deal with the Cubs but they want to unload Bradley. Who wouldn't want a guy who injured himself while trying to go after a first baseman after he had gotten on base, confronted a television announcer in the press box for comparing him to Josh Hamilton(notes), and complained of the "negativity" in Chicago.

Source: MLB.com

The Atlanta Braves are denying it, according to MLB.com, but the word on the street is that the team is joining the fray for the services of young gun Cuban defector Aroldis Chapman, according to Sports Illustrated.

Sports Illustrated has it that the two sides are planning to meet up soon enough but GM Frank Wren tells MLB.com that no such plans exist.

Other teams supposedly willing to throw a boatload of cash at the 21-year-old lefty Chapman to get him are the Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox, Chicago Cubs, Detroit Tigers, Seattle Mariners. New York Yankees, Oakland Athletics, San Francisco Giants, and St. Louis Cardinals. In short, everybody wants him.

Source: Sports IllustratedMLB.com

Philadelphia Phillies center fielder Shane Victorino(notes) is not happy with one of the team's former managers, Larry Bowa. Not happy one little bit. Bowa apparently said that the Phils are sign stealers and the New York Yankees apparently agree with him. That would explain why Jorge Posada(notes) is using seven billion signs even when nobody is on base.

Last night, Victorino let it be known that his team isn't cheating and that Bowa has no idea what he's talking about, according to the New York Post. "I guess he knows something that I don't know about, obviously," Victorino said. "You know, everybody makes excuses. Everybody is going to find a reason. For Bowa to come out and say something like that if he doesn't know what he's talking about, if he doesn't have cold, hard facts, he shouldn't say something like that.

The New York Mets actually had the sneaking suspicion that the team was stealing signs back in 2007 and even using a video camera in center field to do so. The Mets went so far as to ask the league to investigate, which ended up going nowhere.

Plus, if the team was cheating and stealing signs, they sure aren't doing a good job of using the info. As Victorino points out, it didn't exactly help them win Games 3 or 4.

Source: The New York Post

When Michael Weiner takes over as the head of the Baseball Players Association, he will be focused mainly at first on whether any off-season collusion is occurring between teams to keep prices low, according to the Boston Globe.

"I think some people on the management side have done a pretty good job of getting out to the public that it's not going to be a strong market," said Weiner. "I think that remains to be seen."

Hmmm. Maybe it's America's recent economic woes that might help keep prices low and the fact that such big-name free agents such as last winter's C.C. Sabathia(notes) and Mark Teixeira(notes) aren't available this off-season.

Other things that will be on his mind include having a shortened schedule and changing things to have day games played when teams are about to travel.

Source: Boston Globe

The Philadelphia Phillies are in a tough spot right about now. Down three games to one the New York Yankees in the World Series, it's looking like they may be turning over the World Champion crown soon. Of course, four teams in World Series history have come back from such a deficit to win it: the 1984 Kansas City Royals, the 1968 Detroit Tigers, the 1958 New York Yankees, and the 1925 Pittsburgh Pirates so it is possible.

Phillies pitcher Cole Hamels(notes) apparently doesn't seem to think so. He's reportedly already saying that he can't wait for the whole thing to be over. Hamels has had a tough year being an average pitcher after a stellar 2008 that left him as the MVP of both the National League Championship Series and the World Series. And his postseason has been absolutely lousy, unless you count the birth of his first child, which happened just after his Game 2 NLDS start.

Folks in Philly are apparently unhappy with the comments of Hamels, especially since he could be the guy who starts a seventh game if the Phils make it that far, according to the Kansas City Star. Phillies manager Charlie Manuel simply sees this as a case of a young guy who hasn't dealt with real adversity before.

Oh, and take heart, Phillies fans, those Yankees and Tigers won those Series with the last two games on the road.

Source: Kansas City Star

Suspended NASCAR driver Jeremy Mayfield has had quite a year. NASCAR accused him of taking methamphetamines, he called the police on his stepmother for trespassing while supposedly looking for her cat, and now his former lawyer is saying that he is owed a boatload of cash, according to ESPN.

Charlotte-based attorney Bill Diehl, who charges $1,000 an hour, handled Mayfield's case against NASCAR to protest the suspension for methamphetamine use and he's saying Mayfield hasn't paid him anything. Mayfield has apparently dumped Diehl as his lawyer and now has Mark Geragos at the helm. Geragos has repped a slew of celebs and big cases, including ones for Michael Jackson, Winona Ryder, and everybody's favorite husband, Scott Peterson.

Mayfield has spent part of the last few months crying poor but Diehl says he's not so bad off and he is determined to get the dough owed him.

Source: ESPN