Ryan Vogelsong signed a two-year contract extension with the San Francisco Giants for $8.3 million. (AP)A contract extension with the San Francisco Giants means the world to right-hander Ryan Vogelsong. It means finally, at age 34, he won't have to worry about getting cut in spring training. It means he'll have the security of a guaranteed paycheck for 2012, 2013 (for $8.3 million total), plus 2014 (if the Giants pick up his option). It means a certain kind of validation for all of the hard work he has put in during his unlikely journey to success in the major leagues. It means more opportunities to tip his cap to grateful crowds at AT&T Park.

But does it mean anything to the rest of the Giants rotation, particularly to Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum, and whether the team will lock them down for big-money, long-term deals?

Lincecum and his agent have been just fine doing arbitration year to year with the Giants. Andrew Baggarly of the San Jose Mercury News reports that both sides will exchange salary proposals for 2012 by the middle of next week. Lincecum, who will be a free agent after the 2013 season, did recently propose an eight-year contract that the Giants had no interest in accepting. Cain, conversely, will be a free agent at the end of this season after he earns $15 million. So there's a sense of urgency there for Giants vice president Bobby Evans:

Evans confirmed that the club has spoken with Cain's representatives in recent days. He described the talks as "very healthy dialogue and it's ongoing."

"I'm an optimist by nature so you can pretty well gather we'll do everything we can with all parties to come to agreeable terms," Evans said. "They've been very responsive."

With due respect to Vogelsong, locking him up while letting Lincecum and Cain dangle seems backward. But truthfully, it's easier for ownership to commit $8.3 million to a pitcher than it would be $80 million for Cain or $125 million for Timmy.

Especially when Barry Zito is still on the books. That has to be a hangup, doesn't it?

Manny Ramirez (right) gets friendly during a break in their aquatic exercise class. (ESPN)In one scene, he choked back tears. In another, he frolicked with some elderly ladies in a swimming pool during an exercise class. For those reasons alone, this ESPN video of slugger Manny Ramirez being interviewed by Pedro Gomez is must-see TV.

Ramirez, who promptly quit baseball this past April after being suspended for 100 games following another failed drug test, told Gomez he is a "changed" person, and that he still has something left in the baseball tank:

"I want to show people that Manny can change, that he can do the right thing," Ramirez told ESPN's Pedro Gomez in an interview. "And to show people that I still can play. I don't want to leave the game like I did. I also want to show my kids that if you make a mistake, don't quit. Just go back and fix it. And if you're going to leave, leave the right way."

Oh, and he wants to be a "role model." Ramirez, 39, appeared to have more problems than retiring gracefully when, in September, he was arrested and charged with battery following a domestic dispute with his wife.

"It was bad. I almost lost my family," Ramirez said, his voice trembling.

It was a powerful moment, as long as you believe Manny was being earnest (and not just being Manny, for once.) But the moment was fleeting. Manny couldn't help but revert to being the goofball that he is.

J.C. Romero finished the 2011 season with the Colorado Rockies. (AP)Relief pitcher J.C. Romero said he wanted to clear his name after getting suspended for 50 games by Major League Baseball in 2009 after flunking a drug test. So, he did what we do best in America: He filed a lawsuit.

Nearly three years later: Great success!

The litigious left-handed specialist tells the New York Daily News that "justice is served" after his attorneys settled a suit against the makers and distributors of an otherwise approved supplement called 6-OXO Extreme. GNC, the Vitamin Shoppe, Ergopharm and Proviant Technologies had been put on the hook by Romero after a drug test found androstinedione in Romero's system in August 2008, when he pitched for the Philadelphia Phillies. (You might remember andro from such classics as "Quit Looking in Mark McGwire's Locker!")

Romero, who won two games in the 2008 World Series against the Tampa Bay Rays, always claimed he had been wronged by a tainted supplement.

"I didn't cheat," said Romero, 35. "Some other people were being negligent and I had to pay the price. But I've been using this to educate other players. I haven't been able to be the same since I was suspended. I didn't believe the suspension could affect me the way it did.

"The amount of money (in the settlement) isn't relevant. What is relevant is that people know my side. Some fans questioned my integrity. Now there is some closure and I can say the 2008 World Series was legit. Now I can focus on dominating for another five years, hopefully."

Someone with a 4.07 ERA and 372 walks allowed in 649 career innings calling himself "dominating" might be a tad misleading, though Romero does dominate left-handed batters. That's why the St. Louis Cardinals signed him in December. Still, this story leaves several questions unanswered, such as:

Reds GM Walt Jocketty shrewdly signed Ryan Madson for $8.5 million. (AP)Ryan Madson seemed to have struck it rich in free agency in December.

But now he's going to have to prove himself all over again as a closer if he wants the big, big money.

The AP reported early Wednesday morning that the Cincinnati Reds and Madson had reached an agreement on a one-year contract worth $8.5 million. Great work if you can get it, but nothing close to the $44 million deal Madson reportedly was set to sign with the Philadelphia Phillies a month ago. That deal was apparently nixed by ownership, prompting Phillies' GM Ruben Amaro to turn around and spend $50 million on former Boston Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon.

A month later, something has now become apparent to Madson's agent, Scott Boras: Not only were the Phillies not going to pay his client, but no other teams were going to give Madson $44 million, either. Supply, say good-bye to demand. (And the next time someone insists that Boras could sell sand to Egypt, remember this moment.)

Don Mattingly proposes an NV MVP do-over if Ryan Braun's appeal is denied later this month. (Getty)So, Don Mattingly proposes re-voting for NL MVP if Ryan Braun is denied his appeal of a positive drug test for a banned substance. Fair is fair, right? Performance enhancing drugs are bad, right? What Mattingly suggests (via ESPN) sounds noble and seems to appeal to fairness, as long as you ignore that he is manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers and thinks Matt Kemp should have won MVP.

"To me Matt was the best player in the game last year," Mattingly said. "Ryan had a great year too.

"But you guys (the media) always ask me about unwritten rules, about catchers and stuff like that. Then we have the unwritten rules about voting, because he wasn't on a winning team. You guys gotta get your unwritten rules together."

Ah, good ol' unwritten rules. And that's the rub, isn't it? (In the world of performance-enhancing drugs, there's the Clear, the Cream and the Rub.)

There's nothing actually written anywhere saying "you'll be stripped of the MVP" if you get caught using banned substances. If Braun's appeal is denied this month (as it probably will be), he will be suspended for the first 50 games of the upcoming Milwaukee Brewers season. That's his penalty. That's the punishment any player in his position can expect. Enacting some kind of ad-hoc retroactive justice would be bad news bears. There's no precedent for going back and re-voting for awards, and to go looking for one invites chaos.

If we're going to slip into our time machine and strip Braun of the award, why stop there?

Barry Larkin joins Ron Santo in the Hall of Fame's 2012 class. (Getty)In his prime, the only real question about Barry Larkin was his durability. Would he be healthy enough, and would his career last long enough, in order for him to make the Hall of Fame?

On Monday, he got the call from Cooperstown.

On his Hall third ballot since retiring in 2004, Larkin achieved baseball immortality by getting 86.4 percent of the vote. He got 62.1 percent a year ago, with 75 percent necessary to win. Larkin, who played his entire 19-season career with the Cincinnati Reds, is the 22nd shortstop in Hall history.

In an interview on the MLB Network, Larkin said "it was almost an out-of-body experience" to learn he had been selected. But it was his physical body that had everyone questioning how long he would last. He managed to play in at least 150 games in a season only four times. Only seven times did he play in at least 140 games. But he was able to overcome periodic injuries. After all, here he is — a Hall of Famer.

Former Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins pitcher Jack Morris fell short with 66.7 percent of the vote (after getting 53.5 percent a year ago), but appears in decent shape to be elected next season. Former Houston Astros slugger Jeff Bagwell, who probably would have made the Hall already if not for a dubious association with steroids, saw his percentage jump from 41.7 percent to 56.

Former Montreal Expos great Tim Raines had his best showing to date, jumping from 37.5 percent to 48.7. Someday, probably, all of these players will reach Cooperstown. Alan Trammell's chances improved too, after he jumped from 24.3 percent to 36.8; perhaps Larkin's election will get more voters to focus on Trammell's also-worthy career as a shortstop. Here's a link with the full list of results, including those for Larry Walker, Edgar Martinez and Mark McGwire.

But this day belongs to Larkin, a Cincinnati kid who grew up to play with the hometown team, dominating on both sides of the ball and winning a World Series in 1990.

Longtime Cincinnati Reds shortstop Barry Larkin could hear from the Hall of Fame on Monday afternoon. (AP)

Word on the street is that if anybody gets a Hall of Fame nod on Monday afternoon, Cincinnati Reds great Barry Larkin will be the guy. A sound choice (if it happens) but also pretty cheap on the part of the baseball writers who do the electing for Cooperstown. They're going to leave many deserving players out.

At least eight others, in fact.

As it stands, the upcoming induction ceremony this summer will feature the widow of Ron Santo — the late Chicago Cubs third baseman was the veteran's committee choice — and (maybe) Larkin. Imagine if the BBWAA did the right thing eight more times. A ceremony with 10 inductees would be twice as long as any Yankees-Red Sox Sunday night game.

Ten new Hall of Famers? Pretty unlikely. And such a pity. Everybody gets all gaga about the next class of Hall of Fame nominees, which includes the likes of Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mike Piazza, Sammy Sosa, Craig Biggio and Curt Schilling. But before we deal with that sure-to-be-controversial logjam, we've got eight holdovers to pine about:

doc_snakeRoy Halladay for the save? Only in the Amazon. (And not the online one.)

Halladay, runner-up for the Cy Young Award in the National League, showed he could tame the deadliest of rivers just as effectively as he tames opposing lineups for the Philadelphia Phillies. On a recent fishing expedition to Brazil with buddy Chris Carpenter of the St. Louis Cardinals (and former major-league closer B.J. Ryan), the Good Doctor helped to rescue a local fisherman who had been wounded by — gulp — an anaconda.

Top that, Clayton Kershaw.

Bassmaster Skeet Reese broke the news on his blog that he and Halladay saw a man sitting "bare naked" on a tree by the side of the river. But he wasn't there scouting major leaguers who just happened to float by: {YSP:MORE}

fisherman

What we were able to figure out is that he was fishing in the river for tropical fish to sell for aquariums when he got attacked by an anaconda.

The snake apparently bit him on the [butt] but he was able to free himself before the snake wrapped