Talking Baseball

The Atlanta Braves, one of three teams in the NL East interested in Derek Lowe, signed the free agent to a four year contract on Tuesday.

The contract will put Lowe in a Braves uniform through the 2012 season and is worth a reported $60 million.

Lowe went 14-11 with a 3.24 ERA for the Dodgers in 2008 and was 6-1 with a 1.27 ERA in his final 10 starts of the regular season.

He has pitched for the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers during his career.

With Lowe now on board the Braves rotation will also have Javier Vazquez, Jair Jurrjens and recently signed Kenshin Kawakami to fill spots 1 through 4.

The fifth spot will be a battle between James Parr, Tommy Hanson, Jo-Jo Reyes, Charlie Morton and quite possible Tom Glavine.

The Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY is calling and the phones for Jim Rice and Rickey Henderson were the recipients of those calls.

Henderson has been elected to the Hall after appearing on his first ballot and Rice has been elected to the Hall after appearing on his final ballot.

Henderson is the game’s all-time leader in stolen bases and Rice received 412 of the 405 votes needed to be elected to the Hall.

This is the first time in 20 years that the Hall will induct left fielders. Andre Dawson and Bert Blyleven missed their chance for election again.

Henderson played 25 seasons in the Majors over four decades and racked up 3,055 hits. He made his debut in 1979 and finished in 2003.

Rice played 16 seasons with the Red Sox and collected 382 homeruns, 2,452 hits, and 1,451 RBIs to go along with a career .298 average.

The Baltimore Orioles and free agent catcher Gregg Zaun are close to agreeing to a one year contract that would bring the free agent to Baltimore for the 2009 season.

With Ivan Rodriguez still on the market, the Orioles instead decided to sign a catcher that hit .237 in 86 games with the Toronto Blue Jays in 2008.

Rodriguez is pretty much headed for the Hall of Fame and has 295 career homeruns and 1,217 RBIs in his career.

Zaun began his career in the Majors with the Orioles in 1995. Earlier in this off-season the Orioles signed free agent catcher Chad Moeller to a contract.

These two catchers will hold the position until prospect Matt Wieters is ready to take over on a full-time basis.