Clearing the Bases: Best team in baseball?

Clearing the Bases: going through some of the most notable links from the past week...

Buster Olney had this interesting nugget of information in a recent blog:

By the way, I e-mailed this question to a number of talent evaluators, general managers, scouts, other executives and players: Who is the best team in baseball? Got back 20 responses within a 12-hour period.
Here's the breakdown:
Detroit Tigers -- 11
Boston Red Sox -- 6
Los Angeles Angels -- 3

That's pretty interesting. No mention of the Indians? I think they're right up there with the Tigers and Red Sox, and possibly a bit ahead of the Angels. I'm not surprised that there are no NL teams on the list, though...

A message to the media: Don't steal from blogs, especially when the stories are made-up...

A proposal to fix the HR Derby that I'm sure we'll all support…

American League pitchers, take note: Tony Pena doesn't want your charity (via Rob Neyer's blog)

Deadspin, with this great take on the All-Star game fiasco: "As tends to be the case with La Russa anymore, he's so busy thinking about how he's three steps ahead of everyone else that he walks smack dab into a pole."

Baseball Prospectus' All-Star Game recap…

THT with an analytical (you know, actually involving research) look at the Buehrle signing…

Braves reliever Wilfredo Ledezma is stuck in Venezuala, thanks to an unfortunate laundry accident…

An in-depth look at the two-horse NL Central race.

Random Video of the Week: I really don't think these kids are eight years old, but still, this football highlight video is impressive. By the way, that #20 sure can block…