The season starts off strong, wrapping up The Best of Both Worlds and following it with one of my favorite hidden gem episodes in the series. After a lull of a few episodes things pick back up again as the writers setup the finale with Reunion. While season 4 isn’t particularly loaded with must-watch episodes, it’s probably the most even season in terms of overall quality.

As I’ve mentioned in the previous iterations of this guide, my purpose is to speed someone right to the meat and potatoes of the series. I’ve marked the bad episodes that lack any details about the overall series mythology “skip” – the one-offs that aren’t necessarily great but might be worth coming back to “skippable” – episodes that are solid or contain required information about the series mythology, “watch” – and the unforgettable episodes, “must watch.”

The Best of Both Worlds Part 2 – Must Watch - As Locutus and the Borg speed toward Earth the crew struggles to devise a plan to stop them. The conclusion of the two-parter is considered by some to be the pinnacle of entire series. To be sure I think it’s a spectacular episode but in hind-sight I wouldn’t put it at the head of my personal top ten list. As I mentioned in the previous season what we didn’t know at the time was how diluted the Borg mythology would become over time, thanks to Voyager and First Contact. Based on First Contact, we’re to believe the Borg Queen was on board? Then there’s the notion that the Borg can’t function without a member of their collective once indoctrinated, which is immediately violated in later episodes they’re featured in. These are petty quibbles. Taken by itself this is a wonderful episode that instantly infused Picard with depth and complexity not possible at any point previous in the universe.

Family - Must Watch – Family would land somewhere on my top five list of underrated episodes. The ship returns to earth for a refit and the crew is given much needed shore leave. For the first time in the series, events from previous seasons have ramifications in a completely different episode. The series becomes an arc. Worf’s adopted parent’s visit him, concerned about his recent dis-commendation by the empire. Beverly stumbles on a message for Wesley from his Dad. Picard returns home to France, still recovering from his experience with the Borg. The episode holds the distinction of being the only one in the series that doesn’t feature a single shot of the bridge and that’s sort of an apt metaphor for the episode itself. This is a character building episode devoid of any action. We get a penetrating vision into how the events of the series are shaping the characters we love. It’s a tantalizing episode and makes me wonder what might have been if the show had been made today and been allowed to be more serialized.

"Looks like your eye-line sensors are screwing up boy."

Brothers – Must Watch – This is a pivotal episode in Data’s story arc and a good one, if a little uneven. Data appears to be acting oddly before he commandeers the ship. He beams himself down to a planet and is brought face to face with Noonian Soong. Eventually Lore, called in a similar manner as Data, appears and the father and his two sons struggle to rectify some of their differences. Unfortunately the episode suffers from being too short. There is a compelling mystery adventure that consumes the first fifteen minutes of the episode. What’s happening to Data? How is the crew going to stop him? Then the character study of Noonian and his two sons for the last twenty five that just completely puts the first story on hold. Maybe this should have been a two parter but as is neither story is given enough screen time and feels only partially fleshed out. This is probably the only episode in all seven seasons that Lore does more than mustache twirling. His scenes with Noonian show a depth and longing to his character. It’s a window that’s open only a brief instant before the story rushes to an inadequate climax. Why was Lore interested in the emotion chip when he already had emotion? Data shows himself to be an ungodly liability to the crew in the first fifteen minutes. Did they really just shrug off him stealing the entire ship because of some latent programming that even he wasn’t aware of? There’s good stuff here that you have to see but none of it is explored to it’s potential and ends up feeling unfulfilling when it’s over.

Suddenly Human – SKIP – The Enterprise rescues a group of alien soldier children on a training mission and finds an indoctrinated human among them. On Troi’s advice, Picard attempts to be a father figure to the young man and ends up paying the price. Man this one sucks. Chad Allen (a regular on My Two Dads, and Doctor Quinn Medicine Woman) plays the boy and goes with “Angsty Flat-Talker” for his performance choice. I’ve never seen either of those other shows but his performance here is abysmal and only made worse by pairing him for all his scenes with Patrick Stewart. There’s a bunch of awkward “alien” rituals in the story, some nails-on-a-chalkboard melodrama, and the common Star Trek problem of the aliens looking identical to humans except for a small prosthesis on their noses. Avoid this one.

Remember Me – Skippable – Beverly tries to uncover the reason why Enterprise crew members are disappearing, and why she’s the only one that remembers them. This is an episode where the buildup is greater than the actual payoff. It IS fun as more and more crew members start disappearing until Beverly and Picard are the last two standing on the bridge together. The loneliness and solitude of it all is something you actually feel watching the episode…until we find out that it was dip-shit Wesley that caused the problem and the writers bring back a Star Trek deus ex machina to fix the problem: The Traveler. Seriously they couldn’t have inverted the primary warp transducers or…re-calibrated  the primary…something to get her out of the warp bubble. They HAD to bring back the Traveller who essentially just fixes it with MAGIC! Not only that but we come to find out that Wesley is magic too! Fixing the problem with techno-babble is still just making up the solution to the problem but it does so in a way that doesn’t utterly violate the established rules of the fictional universe. The reason the Traveller sucks is because he may as well just be Harry Potter waving a wand at the warp drive. Still, the ride here may be worth the ending.

Legacy – Skippable – The Enterprise assumes orbit around Tasha Yarr’s birth planet to save a missing crew and they discover the sister she left behind, Ishara. Data must work with her and discern whether her motivations to help them are genuine or not. It’s tempting to give every Data-centric episode a watch because Brent Spiner infuses them so easily with depth and complexity. However Ishara has a penchant for the cringe-worthy melodrama that made many of Tasha’s episodes in the first season so unwatchable. Ishara cares VERY PASSIONATELY for her coalition that we know nothing about (and in fact seems a bit douchey.) It makes it difficult to care about anything she says and a bit mystifying as to why Data seems to care for her in the slightest. Still, there are some good bits here. If you decide to skip at least watch the first five minutes of the episode for a good poker scene.

"I thought the show could use more kids."

Reunion – Watch – Picard is asked to negotiate a conflict over who is to be the next head of the Klingon high council. Meanwhile Worf is reunited with K’Ehleyr who, unbeknownst to him, has given birth to their son Alexander. Love or hate the Klingon stories, Worf’s story arc is an important thread in the overall mythology (especially this season) and makes this one a watch. Ultimately though you’ll probably forget this one that’s heavy on plot but light on characters and ideas.

Future Imperfect – Watch – During a patrol of the Neutral Zone, Riker takes an away team to investigate a strange power source and is overwhelmed by a toxic gas. He awakens 16 years later as Captain of the Enterprise and no memory of the intervening time. This a great concept episode. It’s a lot of fun to see where the crew end up, even when we know it probably isn’t real. Still, the last third falls apart a bit bringing back the one-armed Romulan and steering the story towards a conclusion that doesn’t really live up to the promise of the episodes concept. Regardless, it’s a fun ride in getting there. I especially love the way Riker figures out what’s going on the first time.

Final Mission – Skippable – Wesley and Picard crash on a desert planet. When they finally find water, it is protected by a shield and Wesley must race against the clock to get past it and save Picard’s life. This episode will actually make you thirsty. It also holds the distinction of being one of the first Wesley-centric episodes that doesn’t get an outright skip. There isn’t much here however. The writers toss in an abrasive alien pilot to crash with the two leads and provide some dramatic tension and there’s some motherly stressing from Beverly on the Enterprise but nothing ever really goes anywhere. The really promising material, that being Picard’s ambiguous relationship to Beverly and Wesley’s dead father Jack, remains unspoken and left me wondering again if there might not have been more here had the show been serialized.

The Loss – Skippable – The Enterprise gets stuck in the wake of two dimensional beings and Counselor Troi loses her empathic abilities as a result. I’m dying to give this one a SKIP because Troi acts like such a giant sassy-pants ass in the episode. The Loss is split between two stories, one of them a compelling mystery and the other a tedious and annoying character study. The story about how the crew is going to save the ship is actually a fun one. However Troi’s run in with “disability” is so annoying you may throw your remote through the screen. She goes from Queen Compassion to self-entitled emo-narcissist so fast it’s as though this hateful egocentric character has been lurking beneath her this entire time. Rather than causing you to empathize and like her more it gives her personality a slightly nasty edge. Watch at your own risk.

Data’s Day – Must Watch – Data writes a letter to Maddox about a typical day of his which includes a wedding, learning to dance, and a skirmish with the Romulans. The episode is a wonderful departure from the shows conventional narrative. Data’s first person narrative structure and the episodes “day-in-the-life” structure provide a wealth of wonderful insights into the crew and daily activities on the ship. This episode was scripted by Ronald Moore, who wrote a number of good ones and later went on to do the new Battlestar. There are several highlights but my favorite is when Worf and Data help each other pick out a gift for Keiko and O’Brien’s wedding.

"Sure you can tell us apart. I have facial hair. Totally different."

The Wounded – Watch – The Enterprise is fired upon by Cardassians retaliating for the destruction of their outpost by a rogue Federation ship. As a sign of good faith, Picard takes on a delegation of Cardassian’s and tries to chase down the rogue ship that is lead by Benjamin Maxwell, O’Brien’s ex-captain. This episode cheats the Cardassian’s into the  series mythology. I say cheats because according to the episode the Federation was involved in a very serious war with them just a year before the episode. As the flagship, you’d have thought the Enterprise would have had more to do with the conflict. Still it’s forgivable. Marc Alaimo plays Gul Macet in the episode and later went on to play Gul Dukat in DS9. This is a wonderful character story of O’Brien and his former captain Maxwell, played wonderfully by Bob Gunton (the warden from The Shawshank Redemption.) In an unusually strong and nuanced performance for a guest star, Gunton delivers through expression and inflection the weight of his choices and mistakes. His final scene is heart breaking, as he and O’Brien sit in a darkened Captain’s ready room and reminisce about the war and he finally  accepts the inevitable.

Devil’s Due – Skippable – The Enterprise answers a distress call from a planet whose thousand year contract with the devil is about to come due. The she-devil in question says that the Enterprise is now hers as it was in orbit when the contract came due. Picard requests a mediator and orders Data to arbitrate the dispute. Definitely lighter fare in a pretty heavy season, which isn’t a bad thing. There are some fun scenes between Ardra (the devil) and Picard, especially in his pajamas. However the episode requires too much suspension of disbelief, ever for Star Trek. As when Data and Picard are returning to the Enterprise and Ardra makes the entire ship disappear. Given the explanation of her powers later on it seemed dubious to me that the Enterprise would 1. not be able to escape from it and 2. not spot the source of what was making them…erm…disappear. Especially because they overwhelm her so easily (and off camera) later in the story. Still, it isn’t a terrible episode and might be worth a viewing if you’re not just hitting the high points in the season.

Clues – Skippable – Another promising concept episode with an inadequate ending. After passing through a wormhole the entire crew except for Data is rendered unconscious for thirty seconds. When they come to, they begin discovering mysterious signs aboard the ship that things are not as they appear, including Data. It’s a fun ride the first time through, staring at Data’s glassy eyed expression and wondering what’s on the other side of it. However as the mystery builds and the time begins to run out, we as the viewers start to realize that whatever is at the end of the mystery isn’t going to live up to it’s epic promise. And then it doesn’t.

First Contact – Watch – An Arkonian hospital takes in a patient with five fingers and toes. Meanwhile the government looks to push into space and break the warp barrier for the very first time. In another interesting departure from their more common narrative structure, we don’t actually see a federation uniform or hear any of the main cast speak for the first 8 minutes of this episode. In fact the camera never goes anywhere without an Arkonian until we see the Enterprise leaving orbit at the end. It’s an interesting vision of what it must be like for a species to discover the universe of aliens that is the Federation for the first time. However much of the story is consumed with dry politics and cliched xenophobia that doesn’t hold up to repeat viewing. Still, it’s an interesting window into a mission type we don’t see too much of throughout the series.

"Do you have ANY idea how CREEPY this is?!?"

Galaxy’s Child - Watch – Dr. Leah Brahms comes on board the Enterprise to study changes Geordi has made to the engines she designed. Their interactions don’t live up to Geordi’s expectations he developed after he fell in love with her on the holodeck in a previous episode called Boobytrap. They put their differences aside though after the ship is latched onto by an energy sapping alien the size of a ship. Geordi’s creepy and overly familiar advances towards Brahams are like a train wreck you can’t look away from. As the episode creeps closer and closer towards Leah discovering the source of his amorous and stalker-y feelings I find myself wanting to turn it off rather than sit through the incredibly awkward confrontation. The episode uses the “ship-in-peril” sub-plot as a way of moving the two characters past the disastrous interaction and while in reality I don’t think it would save Geordi from a stalker indictment, in the context of the episode I bought it. At the end of the episode Geordi and Leah are friends when she gets up to answer a call from her husband leaving Geordi staring out the window of Ten Forward, forever alone.

Night Terror’s – Watch – The Enterprise finds the crew of a missing science vessel all dead, save for one catatonic Betazoid. As they try and get to the bottom of what happened crew members begin experiencing nightmarish hallucinations. I love this episode. There are a few genuinely creepy moments throughout (particularly when Beverly is in the cargo bay with the bodies) and the soundtrack stands out from this season as being uniquely moody and atmospheric. It’s not without it’s share of ham of course. A couple of guest stars turn in painful performances and the flying effect used repeatedly when Troi is dreaming looks downright silly. Still it’s a fun and slightly unnerving ship-in-peril episode.

Identity Crisis – Watch – The Enterprise investigates the disappearance of several crew members from Geordi’s former assignment before coming on the Enterprise. As they start to understand what happened to each member Geordi finds himself wondering if he’ll be the victim of the same phenomena. This is a difficult episode to explain as the mystery of why Geordi’s crewmates disappeared is given a nice gentle introduction. There’s a wonderful moment in the holodeck with some wonderful creep factor based around a single shadow. Because the episode builds so well, when the answer to the mystery is finally revealed it’s earned and doesn’t feel like a cheat as is the case in a number of others. Low point though with the ultra violet black-light “makeup.”

um-tis um-tis um-tis um-tis

The Nth Degree – Watch – Lt. Barclay returns as the crew investigates the cause of a malfunction aboard a deep space telescope. When Barclay and LaForge try and study a mysterious probe they find nearby the probe knocks Barclay unconscious. When he comes back Barclay finds all of his cognitive abilities as well as his self-confidence begin to grow exponentially. At it’s core, The Nth Degree is a pure wish-fulfillment episode: the nerdy uncomfortable outcast becomes the man he always dreamed to be. Barclay’s transformation is extremely fun to watch as he goes from a state of constant neuroticism to hitting on Troi, stealing the show in a play, and staying up all night arguing theory with Albert Einstein. It’s enough to distract from the episodes stupid conclusion and the source of the alien “probe,” which is all tacked on in the final three minutes: Alien explorers bringing the galaxy to them rather than going out and exploring it themselves. How is it these aliens aren’t fighting a hundred wars with pissed off species whose incompatible technology got wrecked? Ah well, still a decent episode.

Qpid – Watch – In an effort to repay a debt to Picard for saving his life, Q places Vash and the crew in a recreation of Robin Hood and his merry men. It’s an incredibly dumb episode not really worthy of any analysis. This same year this episode came out Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was released (Kevin Costner’s followup to Dances With Wolves.) I doubt it was a coincidence. Vash and Picard still have zero chemistry and even Q seems wasted once the ham-tastic Robin Hood sequence begins. Still there’s enough humor here to make it watchable (With John De Lancie there usually is) and, bizarrely the writers bring Vash back AGAIN in a DS9 episode later on which I guess technically makes this a mythology episode.

The Drumhead – Watch – During an investigation of a warp core explosion and the sale of top secret schematics to the Romulan’s, the federation brings in Admiral Norah Satie. The admiral begins to unfold what she believes to be  greater and greater web of conspiracy. Occasionally there are ambitious episodes in the series that, for better or for worse, try and make some kind of social commentary. In this case it’s mostly for the better. Admiral Satie’s search for Romulan spies aboard the ship is a cold war paranoia metaphor that works until the last act where it becomes so overt she nearly transforms into a mustache twirling McCarthy.  However the show got a strong English actress in Jean Simmons to carry the roll. So often Patrick Stewart dwarfs his guest stars but the last scene in this episode between Jean Simmons and him crackles.

Half a Life – SKIP – Lwaxanna Troi falls in love with a man who has reached the age where it is custom among his people to commit suicide. I’m going to be very honest here. Full disclosure. I’m not a hundred percent certain that I’ve ever made it all the way through this episode before, front to back. I’ve seen it in fits and spurts and probably watched all of it cumulatively over many attempted viewings. I find Lwaxanna such a depressingly terrible character and Majel Barrett’s acting so irritating that I’ve never sat through it one sitting. There ARE some good elements here and it makes the whole episode feel like such a waste. David Ogden Stiers is a wonderful character actor and turns in a fine performance as Timicin, the man Lwaxanna falls in love with. This could have been thoughtful metaphor about trying to reconcile cultural differences so vast they may be irreconcilable (say, female circumcision or various religious practices.) Why they chose THIS plot with such a mind-bogglingly awful character as Lwaxanna (who it’s hard to believe anyone could fall in love with let alone refrain from jettisoning out an airlock) is unknown.

"Can I put my worm in you? heh heh heh. But seriously I could die if you say no."

The Host – Watch – Beverly falls in love with an alien ambassador who’s personality is actually the total of two different organisms, the host body and the symbiotic organism inside of him. When the negotiator’s host body is injured Riker takes the symbiote on to finish the ambassador’s mission and Beverly must struggle to understand her…I dunno. Own feelings. Or something. All right so this episode isn’t quite in my wheelhouse. It isn’t the fact that the episode is romance heavy, it’s that the romance isn’t based in character, just a bunch of readily available cliche. The entire romance between the two of them occurs off-camera. We never really get to know who Ambassador Odan is and there isn’t anything new revealed about Beverly that makes the romance between the two of them interesting or believable. There might have been potential here to learn about Beverly’s relationship with Jack or something that would have brought some dramatic tension. Still, this episode introduces the Trill, an important species in DS9 and there are some nice thoughts as to the physical and spiritual nature of love and sexuality. There are also some nice scenes between Beverly and the other crew members and a great ending. Oh and Riker and Bev boink, presumably while Geordi sits in Ten Forward still staring out the window. Still forever alone.

The Mind’s Eye – Must Watch – Geordi is brainwashed by the Romulan’s in order to assassinate a Klingon leader and breakup the alliance between the Klingon’s and the Federation. The episode is an obvious nod to the Manchurian Candidate and foreshadows some of the events to come in Redemption Parts 1 and 2. There are some chilling scenes when Geordi is being held captive by the Romulan’s and a nice tense race to the finish. Good one to watch.

In Theory – Watch – On the advice of the senior crew, Data enters into a romantic relationship with a fellow crew member and the ship pointlessly gets into peril to keep everyone’s attention for 45 minutes. I just kept thinking two things while watching this: 1. The senior staff must really not like this woman if they’re telling Data to return her advances. Why would they think a romantic relationship with someone completely incapable of emotions actually be good for her? And second, why did the writers feel it necessary to include the dark matter ship-in-peril plot? Ultimately all it does is steal screen time away from a significant development in one of the most loved character’s story arc. Quibbles aside, as usual Brent Spiner’s performance is compulsively watchable and this story is a poignant one. By the end when the inevitable happens and Jenna leaves Data’s quarters we’re left with a long shot of him stroking Spot and we’re not certain who to feel sorry for.

"Huuuuman's have a way of showing up when you LEAST expect them!! See what I did there? See it sounded like I was talking about Picard but really I'm talking about me because I look like Tasha. It's like one of those Double Entendre things and I did it all creepy like OOOoooOOoooo.....OOoooooOooo...I'll come in again."

Redemption Part 1 – Must Watch – A civil war threatens the Klingon Empire and Worf has to choose between his between his duties as a Star Fleet Officer and loyalty to his people. It doesn’t get much more important than the season ending two-parters. This episode introduces the Durass sisters, nullifies Worf’s discommendation, puts Gowron in charge of the empire, and introduces a familiar looking Romulan. They dump so much money into these season finales that the space battles are pretty epic. I still stand by my criticism that the Klingons behave like such neanderthal’s that they never should have made it into space. Where are all the nerdy Klingon scientists anyway? But I digress. In truth it’s a pretty well written episode until the very last cringe-inducing line.

Big “Thank You” this week to everyone who posted comments asking where the hell this guide was. Probably wouldn’t have gotten done without you. In the comments below tell us what the best and worst episodes are from this season. If you enjoyed the review please hit a share button and help us out. And watch for the Season 5 Guide Coming “Soon.”

What I did instead of working on the website...for two months...

So until some kind soul decides to actually pay us to do this rather than us just doing it for fun, keeping a regular review schedule is probably going to remain a pipe dream. Now that the manner in which I afford this hobby is managed and taken care of we can get back to business. If you’re interested in receiving a notice when there are updates, go up to the “Follow Us” option at the top and fan the Facebook page.

In the meantime, there are a number of changes and updates I’d like to complete including making it easier to follow us when we do post new content, a submission section for anyone who is interested in contributing a review or article of their own, and cleaner navigation and categorical breakdown.

For now, there’s a new Star Trek season review and expect more content coming shortly.

…maybe.

Deus Ex: Icarus Effect is a sci-fi, cyberpunk novel by James Swallow. I’ve never read anything by him before, but I saw that he wrote some Warhammer 40k, Star Trek and Dr. Who stuff before, so I figured someone writing other nerdy stuff couldn’t do that bad of a job with a video game novel. The book revolves mainly around two characters: Anna Kelso, a fairly typical “hot chick who’s also smarter and tougher than most of the guys in the story” secret service agent, and Ben Saxon, another fairly typical “walking badass who also happens to be a good guy at heart and won’t be corrupted” private military contractor. The book takes place in the somewhat near future where augmentations and modifications to the human body are becoming more and more common, and the underlying plot is that both people and governments alike have become split on the idea of augmentation and are at a point where they need to decide whether or not to continue to allow the technology to exist. Competing organizations with their own agendas want to influence this decision, and both Anna and Ben are thrust into a large-scale conspiracy story and must work to find the truth about what’s going on and fight to help ensure that outside threats don’t compromise this delicate point in time.

Handgun, books, bottle of whiskey. Badass? I think so.

The reason I say this book is like an Old C’s pizza is because while it was a good read and I was left satisfied, there’s nothing new or exciting here. It’s a solid sci-fi book, nothing more and nothing less. There’s lots of well-written action sequences that help keep pace. There’s a decent, though somewhat predictable, conspiracy angle. The characters may be somewhat cliché in their character flaws, but they have an interesting enough backstory to not end up being too bland. It’s a good mix of conventional elements that make up a solid final product.

One of the things I did enjoy was Swallow’s use and vision of technology. Many times authors in this genre don’t think far enough ahead and end up having technology in their stories that isn’t advanced enough for the setting. But I was pleased with just about every aspect of it in this book. All the biotech stuff for the augmentations was neat, the military and cyberpunk elements fit in well, and even the general tech for things like mobile devices is well done. Sometimes it’s the little things that set a book apart, or drag it down. In this case, it made an unspectacular book just a bit better.

Another thing I enjoyed was the lack of a cliché romance that sometimes gets shoehorned into a book where a female and male are co-leads. There’s a random, really out of place, sex scene, and a little bit of a romantic tone towards the end, but nothing that stood out or made the book worse. I was also happy with the lack of a “we started as enemies but grew to become friends” type of character relationship. For a book that puts together a set of characters who have never met, its written realistically for how I imagine real people would react in a similar scenario.

This book won’t win any awards. But if you like sci-fi, cyberpunk, or shadowy, conspiracy-type books then you could do worse. I give it a rock solid three augmented badasses

Out of five.

Here it is! The breakthrough season of The Next Generation. With the addition of collars, all of the officer’s now look like they’re in adult outfits. Crusher’s back with an incredibly absurd hair cut (didn’t she learn from the one thing Wesley does right?) The shows music heads in a completely new direction – from synthesized dreck to more ambient and tonal accents.

Most importantly the writing moves from space viruses and aliens of the week to more personal character driven stories. This season contains some of the best episodes in all seven, including The Best of Both Worlds and Yesterday’s Enterprise. In fact this may be the best season of all seven – even more hilarious as, due to the writers strike that caused a shorten second season and birthed a clip show, the writers had virtually no episodes written.

In your face Dan Brown.

Does that mean it’s totally devoid of suck? Well…perhaps on the level on the first two seasons, yes. Still, there are a few episodes interspersed in Season 3 that really don’t add much by way of character development or mythology, or are just plain awful.

As I’ve mentioned in the previous two iterations of this guide, my purpose is to speed someone right to the meat and potatoes of the series. I’ve marked the bad episodes that lack any details about the overall series mythology “skip” – the one-offs that aren’t necessarily great but might be worth coming back to “skippable” – episodes that are good or contain required information about the series mythology, “watch” – and the episodes that would be great in any season “must watch.”

Evolution – Skippable – That darned Wesley falls asleep at his desk while experimenting with microscopic robots called nanites. Instead of eating him they escape and start eating the ships computer. Crusher returns for some nice exchanges between her and Picard. The writing is solid (except for the term “food slot” – hadn’t we already coined the term “replicator” by now?) Still, this episode is unusual in that it is mostly about the guest star rather than any of the crew, in this case Doctor Paul Stubbs, the astrophysicist whose one chance at greatness is being ruined by the nanites. There are better episodes beyond.

The Ensigns of Command – Watch – The crew is contacted by a reclusive race that is colonizing a planet now inhabited by descendants of a lost group of human explorers. Because of radiation on the planet the only person who can beam down is Data. A few common series cliches crop up here including female characters who find Data’s childlike obliviousness sexy, as well as stubborn inhabitants of a planet that don’t seem to realize: THEY’RE IN THE FUTURE. Everyone can vaporize you from space. Still, this is a pretty good episode in which Data’s character grows a layer or two.

The Survivors – Skippable – A mystery episode. The crew answers a distress call from a federation colony to find the surface of the planet completely obliterated except for a house on a tiny patch of land. Inside is an elderly couple that refuses to leave despite the barren planet. Meanwhile Troi starts being driven mad by music…and so will you. If not by the music then by Deanna’s relentless screaming and crying. It’s not a terrible episode by any means except for the taxing requirements placed on Deanna’s acting ability. There is a wonderfully chilling moment at the end of the episode when we discover what it is the couple has been hiding, but once you know the secret the episode isn’t worth much beyond the final five minutes.

"Laura?"

Who Watches The Watchers – Watch – A group of scientist are studying a race of bronze age proto-vulcan’s when the holographic generator that keeps them hidden from the natives malfunctions. Leland Palmer, one of the proto-vulcans, is injured and in a stupor, sees the Captain and crew saving him. When he comes-to again on the planet he starts a new religion worshipping his god, “The Picard.” This is a fascinating episode in which the show reveals itself to be almost overtly atheist, or at least anti-religious. In an effort to reverse the damage done by their exposure Picard spends an afternoon giving one of the proto-vulcans a tour of the ship culminating in a wonderful scene where he demonstrates to her how any technology sufficiently advanced enough is indistinguishable from magic.

The Bonding – SKIP - If you thought that what the show needed was a fresh infusion of child acting than here is your episode! A redshirt member of an away team dies on a mission. While getting counseled through the loss by Deanna, the away member’s son starts to get visits from his deceased Mom. It’s not a TERRIBLE episode by any means and there are some nice scenes where Worf, a fellow orphan, tries to reach out to the child. Gabriel Damon, the son, doesn’t do an awful job but doesn’t really have the acting chops to carry this heavy material. In general, the episode suffers from the same problem most of the other episodes have that focus on a guest star character: it’s just not all that interesting.

Booby Trap – Watch - This a is mythology episode referenced later. The Enterprise is cataloging the ruins of a planet that was the final battle of two species over a thousand years. The crew happens upon one of their battleships in pristine condition, at the same time fall into the same energy sapping booby trap the crew of the ancient vessel did. To help him figure out a way to escape Geordi recreates one of the Enterprise Warp Drive designers on the holodeck, Dr. Leah Brahams, and becomes attached to her. It’s a nice character building episode for Geordi and lingers a lot building chemistry between the crew members. It’s a joy to watch Picard’s glee over getting to live out a boyhood fantasy he had while building ships in bottles. The “relationships on the holodeck” theme had been touched on earlier in 11001001 where Riker met Minuet – but unlike where Riker lingered bizarrely over his digital date here the results are much more believable when Geordi realizes his infatuation and decides to step away.

The Enemy – Watch –  Geordi finds himself marooned on a planet, the captive of an injured Romulan named Bochra. The planet plays hell with their different physiologies, blinding Geordi and paralyzing Bochra. As the episode progresses, Geordi, who has the means to save them both, eventually earns Bochra’s trust and willingness to see through mutual hatred. For the most part, antagonists in Star Trek episodes are lacking in complexity. Their evilness tends to lack motivation as they’re in the story simply to provide conflict. This episode contains both. The scenes between are convincing exchanges between two people whose dislike is based on systematic cultural propaganda and not each other. However, on the bridge the more prototypical Star Trek conflict is occurring between Picard and the one-armed-Romulan, Admiral Tomalok. Tomolak is the stock xenophobic Star Trek adversary, lying at all times, unreasonable, and reckless – a contrast to Patrick Stewart’s measured and even-handed Picard. The nicest bit in the entire episode though occurs with Worf’s refusal to donate some mojo in his cells that could save a second Romulan dying in sick bay. Despite numerous pleas from different crew members the writers don’t sell Worf out and have him see the error of his ways. Instead Worf refuses and we learn something about his character. The Enemy is a nice episode breaking a bunch of new and interesting ground with only a few of the nagging problems of the first two seasons.

The Price – Skip - The Enterprise hosts a group of alien’s negotiating for the rights to a stable wormhole. One of the negotiators, Devinoni Rall, who has an uncanny knack what he does, begins negotiating his way into Troi’s pants. After Troi lets herself be seduced in several creepy scenes of spectacularly bad chemistry, she finds out that Rall is actually half Betazed too. This presents her the “complicated” choice of having to protect the creepy unethical negotiator she’s now sleeping with or do her job. Simply a bad episode, not a terrible one. Wesley is barely around, Lwaxanna never appears, and Troi never has to cry. Still, it’s a shame that often times the writer’s only ideas for what to do with a Troi-centric episode in these early seasons is to have her be romanced…badly. The prelude to this cringe-worthy romance between Devin and Troi consists of him coming to her office and within 30 seconds running his hand on her arm and messing up her hair. When I tried that at my last job I ended up unemployed and writing episode guides for 17 year old television shows. WTF Star Trek? You lied to me! (side note: technically this is a mythology episode. There’s a scene where two Ferengi get marooned in the Delta Quadrant. They return later in an episode of Voyager. I’m still giving this one a pass though.)

"Really what I'm interested in when you get down to it...is rock and rolling all night. And sometimes...partying everyday."

The Vengeance Factor – Skippable - The crew is negotiating a peace between a species with butts on their heads and marauders they cast out a hundred years before. The marauders, who look like members of The Kiss Army, are starting to show up dead and one of the servants of the negotiators is the cause. Just kind of a dull episode with a nice premise buried beneath a convoluted setup: The servant in question, Yuta, is a 100 year old genetically altered assassin whose entire life has been about killing. That might have been an interesting premise with implications about personal identity and self-determination. Instead it takes twenty minutes of exposition about this species before we even realize that Yuta matters to the plot at all. There’s a nice scene toward the end when Riker confronts her but it isn’t worth sitting through the entire thing.

The Defector – Skippable - The Enterprise receives a distress call from inside the Romulan neutral zone and comes to the aid of defecting Romulan, Admiral Ja’Rok. Ja’Rok says he has information about a Romulan base in the neutral zone intended to be the spearhead to an invasion. The crew must try to figure out if he’s telling the truth. This is another episode focused on someone other than a primary cast member however in this case, thanks to a quality performance by James Sloyan, this one is actually pretty good. In a Romulan-centric season Sloyan brings some diversity to the Federation enemy by playing Ja’Rok as a patriotic countryman who sacrifices everything for what he believes to be the greater good. In his jousts with Picard we see two men who want to trust each other but are too worn by years of cultural hatred. It’s all enjoyable and the episode teases some epic-ness-ness but ultimately doesn’t go very far, ending up a small blip in the series. A good one to circle back to if you find yourself addicted. One thing that starts to irk me at this point in the series: Why in all the universe is the One-Armed-Romulan the only one the Enterprise always seems to run into?

The Hunted – Skippable - While considering a planet’s application for entrance into the Federation, the Enterprise becomes involved in the recovery of one of their escaped prisoners. Troi senses he may be more than he seems. Her discovery leads to the Enterprise being embroiled in a conflict between a society and it’s cast offs from war. Kind of. James Cromwell (Zerphram Cocrane) plays the Prime Minister of the planet seeking Federation entrance and, while it’s nice to see him there isn’t a lot for him to do with this part. For the most part the writing in this one is a little misdirected. The action in the story is centered around the prisoner, Roga Danar, running rampant through the ship. The problem is that since the story has painted him as such a martyr we never really feel any sense of danger because we know the writers wouldn’t have him kill anyone (though it might have been a little more interesting if he had.) There are some nice Machurian Candidate and brainwashing ideas here that are toyed with briefly when Data and Danar have a conversation about their mutual programming and being more than the sum of their parts. Mostly the episode is about action and the ending is an anti-climax.

The High Ground – Skippable -While delivering medical supplies, Beverly gets abducted by terrorists whose enigmatic leader wants her to find a cure for a transport system they use that’s killing them. I really WANT to give this one a watch. It’s fantastic new ground for the series. Beverly and Finn, the leader of the terrorists, have conversations about the nature of terrorism, the difference between a terrorist and a revolutionary is just the difference between winning and losing. In fact the episode seems strangely pro-terrorist, especially when Data tells Picard that according to his research, terrorism seems an effective way of promoting social change. There’s also a nice bit at the end between Picard and Beverly when Beverly thinks they might die and touches on their relationship that’s always just below the surface. The problem is the scenes that aren’t between Picard, Beverly, and Finn are flat and cliched. In order to provide Finn’s intellectual terrorist an adequate counterbalance, there are a number of scenes between Riker and the head of police, Alexana. Alexana is an impassioned officer…a little TOO impassioned – her melodramatic ramblings border on Tasha Yarr’s Season 1 suck. And after such interesting discussions on the moral ambiguity of terrorism the writers try and wrap a happy bow around the episode by having a child terrorist lay his weapon down at the end and Riker and Alexana share a platitude. Icky.

Deja-Q

Deja Q – Must Watch – Q is made human as punishment from the continuum. Picard grants him temporary sanctuary on the ship and assigns Data to follow him for the duration of his stay. This is one of the top ten episodes of the series, easily the best pure “Q” episode (considering Q-Who was really about the Borg.) Q’s brief struggle with being human is funny and incredibly well written. The scenes between John De Lancie and Brent Spiner are addictively watchable and the episodes finale is clever and pitch perfect.

A Matter of Perspective – Skippable - Continuing Season 3′s overall trend of, “Yeah…that was Ok,” is A Matter of Perspective. The episode actually begins with a great teaser. The crew is researching the progress of a Doctor Apgar who is looking into harnessing Kreiger waves on a Federation space station. We see the bridge of the ship with the space station on the viewer. Riker’s voice comes over communicator saying he’s ready to leave. As he does, the space station explodes. After the opening credits, Riker is accused of the Doctor’s murder by the local police, whose governmental politics are (GASP) guilty until proven innocent. Picard convinces him to hold an investigation on the holodeck where Riker’s visit to the destroyed space station is recreated, as seen by various members of the ship and station personnel. It’s an interesting idea but the Riker created in the police recreations is such a mustachio’d twirling lunatic that it kind of ruins any of the suspense in the episode. Part of the promise of the opening tease was that we didn’t get to see exactly what happened on the space station, which means that we don’t KNOW if Riker is guilty or, short of that, culpable for something. It’s an opportunity to at least see the ordinarily blandly stalwart first officer in another light. However about the point that the sheriff’s holo-decked version of Riker yells, “YOU’RE A DEAD MAN APGAR!!” we know the episode isn’t going to be revealing any interesting nuances to Riker’s personality. It would have been much more interesting had the recreations built a plausible setup based on what we already know of Riker’s character. Doesn’t matter anyway because Wesley solves the problem for everyone. Swing and a miss.

Yesterday’s Enterprise – Must Watch - When most Trek fanatic’s I know list their top five, Yesterday’s Enterprise is in there someplace. While not one of my personal favorites, it is one of the best hard sci-fi episodes in the series and an incredibly important episode in the show’s mythology. The Enterprise is investigating a temporal rift in space when a vessel from the past slips through, altering the present. The Federation is now at war with the Klingons, Tasha is at tactical, Data Worf is gone, and the only one who realizes anything has changed is Guinan.  She pleads with Picard to send the vessel from the past back, something that they both know would mean the deaths of everyone on board. It’s a great alternate history kind of story where the ordinarily plushy universe of Trek gets a little more dystopic, including an oddly gory battle at the end. One of the reasons to watch the show.

"Something's itchy."

The Offspring – Watch – Data creates his own child, a daughter named L’al. If you haven’t seen this one go watch it right now. When you’re done come back and we’ll talk about it. Seen it? All right. I like this episode but didn’t we cover this in Measure of a Man? If Data is a sentient self determining being then it would follow that so is his offspring. Yet here again we have some cliched Federation honcho demanding that an artificial person be moved against their will. It’s a contrivance simply to lend the story some conflict and is completely unnecessary and a little anti-climactic given…how the episode ends. The real joy in the story is in Data’s relationship with his daughter and exploration of parenting. Had the story really needed a conflict to hold our interests it could have been Data’s battle with L’al’s “sickness” throughout the entire episode which eventually resulted in her death. As long as we’re splitting hairs here about a decent episode: Hallie Todd’s performance as L’al is incredibly grating. She spends most of the episode doing a robot voice rather than exuding the childlike essence that Brent Spiner does so well with. Regardless, it’s a wonderful episode and I still get dust in my eyes at it’s conclusion everytime. Must remember to not chop onions whenever I watch this one…

Sins of the Father – Watch - Worf meets his younger brother and returns to the Klingon homeworld to defend the honor of their father, accused of being a traitor against the empire. This is an incredibly important episode in Worf and the Klingon’s story arc. We are introduced to the Klingon government and it’s inner-workings, Worf’s brother, and the House of Durass. It’s all very well and good if you like Klingon’s but whenever I watch these episodes I end up fixated on the same thing: How the hell did the Klingon’s achieve space travel? They’re portrayed as such murdering back-stabbing petulant cave men. It doesn’t make sense to me that a species who never appears to demonstrate any intellectual prowess what-so-ever could have even made it to the rocket age. Still, this is one you have to watch.

Allegiance - Watch - Picard is kidnapped and replaced with a doppleganger. While the real Picard struggles to figure out a way to escape his prison with three other captive aliens, his double takes the Enterprise into danger. I’m going to use the excuse that this is the first episode that introduces the nausigans…that’s why it gets a Watch and not a skippable. The nausigans are an intimidating looking alien that are somewhat significant in Picard’s story arc later in the series. Really though I just like this episode. The real Picard ends up in a fascinating Cube-esque scenario he needs to figure his way out of, and his double plays nicely against our expectations of Picard. His scenes are fun and sometimes cringe inducing. The ending doesn’t quite provide the payoff that the setup promises but it’s still an enjoyable ride in getting there.

Captain’s Holiday – Watch - In this season’s special features there is an interview with Patrick Stewart in which he says that he felt his character was becoming a bit dry. Picard’s roll on the show was becoming little more than that of a negotiator – someone who stood on the bridge and talked. Apparently this was the reason for Captain’s Holiday: keeping the show’s anchor cast member happy.  So, Picard is burnt out and forced to take a vacation by Crusher. He heads to Risa and tries to spend some time reading and relaxing by the pool, but ends up with a woman named Vash searching for a relic left by a time traveler. Frankly, it’s a pretty lame episode. There are a couple of nice bits between the crew and the Captain in the first ten minutes but otherwise the story is mostly devoid of humor or any intrigue. There are a pair of time traveler’s that are trying to retrieve a relic, a ferengi that I think is supposed to be funny (he isn’t), and a makeout session that doesn’t make a ton of sense. In fact when Picard kisses Vash, her personality seems so in contrast to his own that it’s almost as though he’s just doing it to either shut her up or have a fling…which isn’t really keeping with Picard’s character. It’s all kind of a mess but Vash reappears later in this series and another. Watch with a friend or a bottle.

Tin Man

Tin Man – Watch – The Enterprise takes a psychic diplomat named Tam Elbrun on board who is to help the crew make first contact with a ship that might be a living being. Tam has a volatile personality sculpted by years of being overwhelmed by his powerful psychic ability he is  unable to turn off. This is an episode you see often in trailers and retrospective’s concerning the series. The art design and special effects used to bring Tin Man to life were some of the most interesting in the series to that point. Some of the best music in the series also finds it’s way into this one. Tin Man’s journey through space isn’t painted with loud fanfare or obvious strokes, but with subtle strings and woodwinds almost as though he were a whale floating in the ocean. However what makes this episode interesting to me is Tam and his ability to read thoughts that he can’t turn off. In his scenes with the crew we see him responding to things the crew say to him out loud as well as what they’re saying in their own heads. We get a sense of what an awful, self-esteem destroying life it must have been to be constantly assaulted by the things people think but don’t say. It’s a compelling and thoughtful episode.

Hollow Pursuits – Must Watch - Hollow Pursuits introduces Lieutenant Barclay. Barclay is a new transfer to Geordi’s engineering team, shy and reclusive. Geordi can’t stand him but is instructed by Picard to draw the reclusive engineer out of his shell just as strange malfunctions begin occurring on the ship. In doing so, Geordi discovers Lieutenant Barclay has a bit of a holodeck addiction. It’s a theme that the series has been screaming for since the holodeck gained the ability to simulate people. A holodeck is potentially a more addictive escapist medium than television, video games, or drugs combined. Finally we get an episode that deals with it in a somewhat realistic, if amusing fashion. It’s a wonderful episode that digs a layer or two deep beneath the conventions of the universe to consider the ramifications of it’s inner workings.

The Most Toys – Watch – Data is captured by a collector of rare items named Kivas Fajo who makes the crew believe he was destroyed in a shuttle accident. Perhaps one of the best guest star appearances in the entire series, Saul Rubinek plays Fajo with such energy and self love that it’s hard for us not to love him too, despite his status as Data’s captor. The best sequences in the episode occur in conversations between Fajo and Data where he tries to make Data behave more like a piece of property than a captive. Fajo’s manipulations serve as a wonderful medium for exposing the outer limits of Data’s personality that we see only brief glimpses of throughout the series. Despite a mostly humorous tone throughout the episode (due to Saul’s giddy performance) the ending has a chilling moment and leaves the viewer to decide what Data might be capable of, as he stares blankly into the faces of his comrades who are wondering the same thing. It’s a complex and thoughtful episode.

Sarek

Sarek - Watch – The famous Ambassador Sarek comes on board the Enterprise to negotiate a peace treaty. When he does, strange emotional outbursts begin occurring among the crew and it seems that Sarek’s questionable emotional state may be the cause of it. The episode bridges the gap between some of the original shows lore and the Next Generation and there are some fun sequences including a brawl in Ten Forward. Perhaps most famous is a sequence that could have been a throwaway in an otherwise mostly average episode. Picard, under the duress of Sarek’s psychic emotional baggage, freaks the hell out and Patrick Stewart shows everyone he could read the classifieds and make it sound like Hamlet. In his rants we hear bits and snippets of events in Sarek’s life to which we have no background or insight and yet we feel the anguish and regret of Sarek’s lifetime in Stewart’s performance.

Menage a Troi – SKIP – Lwaxanna, the Ferengi, and Wesley create a trifecta of badness in this slap-sticky scholck ridden monstrosity. Lwaxanna, Troi, and Riker are kidnapped by a horny ferengi that wants Lwaxanna to read his opponents minds and play with his lobes. Wesley saves the day. It isn’t season one bad but it’s close. As usual in these terrible episodes, Patrick Stewart provides the lone moment of redemption as he’s forced to fake a smitten rage at the ferengi to get Lwaxanna back. When he tells Wesley to set course for Betazed at Warp 9, we feel his pain and are hoping for an equally speedy end to the episode. Oh and that plucky Wesley gets a field promotion to ensign. Avoid this mire of misguided camp at all costs.

Transfigurations – Skip – Beverly suffers the Florence Nightingale (Lorraine McFly?) over a patient the crew finds crashed on an alien planet. The patient suffers from amnesia and is experiencing a cellular mutation. As the crew investigates this John Doe’s past he and Beverly form a bond. There isn’t a lot of fun to be had in watching the Dr. Crush on this character. In fact I found her scenes between Troi and Wesley to be a bit shallow as she struggles to make a simple crush sound more profound. It doesn’t help that John Doe speaks in slow deep bass like he’s just fallen out of a romance novel or a self-hypnosis tape.

The Best of Both Worlds Part 1 - Must Watch – One of the top ten episodes of the entire series. The Borg send a single ship toward Earth. At this point in the series the Borg had only been seen in the single episode where Q tossed the ship into their territory. Before the movie and Voyager sapped them of almost all of their fright and intimidation (the shark in Jaws is scariest when you DON’T see him) this was how bad-ass the Borg were. One single vessel could assimilate all of humanity. With this two-parter the show reaches an epic level of story telling not yet seen even in the movies.

In the comments section leave a mention of what you think the best and the worst episodes from this season are. If you enjoyed the review please hit a share button and help us out!

Go To Star Trek The Next Generation Season 4 Guide

If you get the chance to a draft of auction live (and by live I mean in-person, in the same room with all your league mates) I highly recommend it. It really changes the dynamic when you can shit talk everyone’s picks and strategies right to their face. Unfortunately most of the time you’re going to be conducting your draft/auction via the internet. So with that in mind here are my thoughts on the different live drafts.

First of all, I did the software pre-test on their site. But once I went to my actual draft lobby on the day of, I was prompted to install another Java add-in when trying to join. Not a huge deal, but it was kind of chinsy that I passed their pre-test but was then prompted to install something to launch the actual draft app. *Thumbs down*

Overall their live draft was okay. It was a pretty standard look and feel and is relatively easy to navigate. One huge negative is that there are no sound notifications. Now I know a lot of people probably mute that stuff, but if you’re looking up news or projections on another site, or just making another rum and coke, and want that audio cue that it’s your turn, you’re out of luck. It should at least be an option on the site, but it’s not.

I did enjoy that they have an option to sort by their projected stats, and this includes projected point totals based on the league settings. Sorting by projections is nice and all, but the fact that it includes the specific point totals for your league helps out. However, their projections were kinda screwed up in places and players like Mike Stanton and Buster Posey had no projections. Their average draft position was still listed, but if you sorted by projected points they would not appear on the list, so you really had to pay attention when sorting.

Overall, they have an okay thing going, but it’s not up to par with the big boys. No player news, no grid view of teams, nothing other than the basics; which is on par with what they have to offer in terms of leagues I suppose.

2 Hanley Ramirez drives Out of 5

Chances are you’ve done a draft on Yahoo at one point or another. Their draft app is pretty much the same across the board for all sports. I had originally written in this spot that their drafts are reliable and easy to use, however this weekend right as one of my drafts was about to start I was booted from the draft lobby and could not re-connect for about 5 minutes. I was lucky that I rejoined with 30 seconds left on my first pick, but it was still pretty sorry. Once I joined, my lobby was also buggy where scroll bars were missing and I could not maximize or minimize the lobby. Another of my league mates had the exact same problem (to be fair, I tried to join from two different computes are two different browsers and had the same problem on both, and my buddy was on an entirely different operating system from me). I did another draft later on that had no issues, but since one of the only things Yahoo has going for them is their reliability and ease of use, they lose points here.

My biggest beef with Yahoo is that they don’t offer projected stats. You can see the previous year’s stats if you sort by position, but no projections. It’s not a huge surprise since their site doesn’t offer anything in the way of projections itself. And I know drafting based on projections isn’t the best idea, but it should still be an option. Yahoo is still behind the times in that regard; really outdated for live drafts.

Their auction software is pretty nice however. Again it’s easy to navigate and use. And I love that you can show your opponents remaining money, max bid, and average amount left per player right on the main screen. They also have a grid view that allows you to see which teams have players at each position (handy for helping to determine your opponents needs without having to look at each team individually). It would have been nice to see the actual players as opposed to just whether or not they have a short stop, but it’s still a great option and a step in the right direction.

Lastly, neither of their draft tools offer any sort of player news or updates in the draft. So again you’ll have to have a separate window open to research players or get updates/news.
Their live draft tool is still pretty last-gen and I’d give it 2 stars normally. But their auction tool, even though it too lacks projections, is definitely ahead of the curve.

Combined they get 3 Ian Kinsler gappers Out of 5

ESPN’s auction tool is close to perfect if you can get used to the pace (it gives you less time than Yahoo when it’s your turn to nominate, and less time during the countdown) and can get over the annoying auctioneer’s voice. The only things missing that I really wanted were the grid view of players taken per team (like Yahoo has), and the ability to see the max bid of other teams (again, which Yahoo offers). You can see max bid if you mouse over the teams, but I’d like that prominently displayed. Their system does offer projections, and includes their “player rater” index which shows that even though Andres Torres may be ranked lower than Jason Bay, his player rater index is actually higher. Unfortunately, the full projections listed for each player disappear and are replaced by an abbreviated version when that player is up for bidding. Not a huge deal, but I don’t understand why pitchers don’t have their projected strikeout totals listed, for example. One last thing that I loved is their projected standings for the league, which is updated with each pick. So if you’re in a 5×5 roto league, you can see where the teams stack up based on ESPN’s projected stats. Very handy if you think to yourself “man I could use some more speed,” this allows you to look at everyone else and see where your team stacks up in terms of steals. I love this option.

Their regular drafts function pretty similarly, nothing too different to report other than it’s a draft rather than an auction. You still get the projections and player rater rankings, still get the projected standings. Plus the look and feel is almost exactly the same between the two (as opposed to Yahoo where the live draft and auction have a different look and feel).

While I like that they give updates for each player, for most players it’s just an update on what they did in their previous game. It’s a nice touch to offer news right in the draft room so you don’t have to go to a separate window, but it would be nice if it was actual news or analysis as opposed to just “Joey Votto went 2-3 yesterday and an RBI and a run scored.” Thanks, but I’d like to see that combined with an actual blurb of fantasy advice, especially when you’re in a Jager fueled haze at the later rounds and are trying to decide between a possible sleeper pick or an established vet for a bench or utility spot.

Lastly, one small negative is their drop-down menus in the draft require you to scroll around in them. If I want to sort by a specific position for example I click the drop down, but have to scroll in that drop down. Why can’t the entire list of options just open in that menu? Small gripe I know, but I think we’d advanced past this kind of limitation in menu technology.

It’s close to being perfect, but a few additions and tweaks are needed before I can say it is.

I give it 4 Carl Crawford swipes Out of 5

CBS’s live draft tool is very basic looking, but not in a bad way. It’s easy to get around and use, so while it lacks some visual polish it makes up for it in functionality. You’ve got all the basics, plus some.

First of all let me say that the one thing I’m not crazy about is the lack of a giant draft button for the player I have highlighted. The reason being is that I like to have someone selected, but be able to sort other players and have a look before I click “draft.” Say it’s the middle rounds and I have Carlos Beltran in mind, but I want to look at relief pitchers as well. I’d like the option to have Beltran selected with a big draft button by his name, but look at other players and sort their projections; and then if time runs low and I can’t find anyone else, I can just click “draft.” Yes I could always use the queue to have the player I want set to auto draft, but that’s just extra time or effort that I don’t feel I should have to put in. With CBS, you have to click on the player’s name and then click “draft” in their player info window. It would be nice to have someone selected, but be able to search other players without needing to go back to a player to draft them (or put that player in your queue).

Okay, now that aside, there are some things that I really love about their draft. First: GRID VIEW WITH PLAYERS LISTED! Most draft apps let you either see your team with a drop-down that lets you select other teams, or the players drafted in that round (with a drop down to view other rounds). Yahoo’s auction drafts let you see a grid of the other teams, but CBS’s tool lets you see a grid of all teams with all the actual players drafted. This is awesome. I can look at every other team’s roster and who they’ve taken on a single page, which is a huge help in determining not only who I should take next, but what positions I should pay attention to when queuing up players. Huge bonus points to them for having this.

Another thing I like is player news and analysis right in the draft window. If someone is hurt, you can mouse over the icon and see what the injury is. And when you click on a player’s name it opens their profile window (which has the draft & queue buttons) that shows their latest news as well as CBS’s fantasy analysis. So unless you’re a big fan of a different site’s analysis, you don’t really need any other windows open to do research.
Lastly, I’m a fan of the “top players” sorting option in the window. You can sort by their player rankings by default, or sort by just a certain position, however with CBS you can also sort by the top players at each position. When you do this it changes the sorting to show your roster settings, and then lists the top players for your roster positions. Say you have a need at catcher, middle infield, and outfield, you could use this sorting option and it will give you the top player available at each position. So you wouldn’t need to sort by catcher, then middle infield, then outfield. Obviously it lists their top choice, so you’d be wise to sort individually to see who the second and third best options are. But for the casual drafter, or even just to get a quick view of who’s available at the positions you need (if there isn’t a catcher listed in the next few players for example), it’s nice option that the other sites don’t have.

*Note, I didn’t do an auction on CBS since it wasn’t an option in the free leagues I was joining/creating).
While their live draft may lack the visual polish of the others, I found it to be the most functional, all-in-one tool, of all the drafts.

5 nasty Tim Lincecum curveballs

    
Out of 5

Click to purchase on Amazon

Similar to: Amelie

Mary & Max took me completely by surprise. Given the aesthetic of the film and the comical tone, I was prepared for another quant little claymation film. The story revolves around two adorably sculpted characters that resemble Don Martin drawings: Mary Daisy Dinkle from Australia and Max Jerry Horowitz from New York.

Mary, a child from Australia lives in a world dominated by browns. Her mother drinks, shop lifts, and accuses Mary of getting fat. Her father works in a factory and spends his spare time stuffing animals in the shed. Mary’s parents provide her young mind with few answers to her questions about life so, in a moment of inspiration, she picks a name out of an American phone book and writes the name a letter.

Her letter finds Max. Max lives in a one bedroom apartment in New York. Mary’s brown letter is an invasion of color in Max’s otherwise black and white life. He suffers from asperger syndrome (calling himself an aspy) and regularly has panic attacks when he receives letters from Mary. When Mary asks him about love it bring on an attack so serious he is briefly institutionalized and subjected to shock treatments. Mary and Max become dependent on each other through a series of gifts and funny letters.

As the story progresses we start to sense a deep reservoir of feeling hiding behind the movies whimsical tone. Details about their family history that were so casually tossed out between jokes become deep scars that surgery can’t remove (the way in one scene Mary removes her birthmark.) It’s hard to say much more about the movie without giving away some of the surprise the movie brought me.

This kind of immersion wouldn’t have been possible if the details of the movie hadn’t been so expertly assembled. Toni Collette and Phillip Seymour Hoffman provide Mary and Max’s voice and are pitch perfect. Hoffman is particularly good as the lonely Horowitz and it wasn’t until the end of the movie that I even realized that it was his voice. Mary’s Australia and Max’s New York are very well visualized as well. When Max walks into his building and climbs into the elevator I was reminded of the Coen Brother’s hotel in Barton Fink.

One of the differences between a good movie and great one is I will return to a great movie’s characters in my mind days after I’ve watched the film. It’s been a week now since I saw Mary and Max and I can honestly say that I’ve thought about it at some point each of the last seven days. Here is an animated movie that doesn’t pander to any particular audience or age group. It doesn’t dumb itself down. Instead it tells a story about two people that is whimsical, funny, lonely, sad, and intensely human.

Verdict: Watch

note: this review is a part of Ian’s List of Shame.

Click to purchase on Amazon

Similar To: Spartacus, Gladiator, The Ten Commandments

Synopsis: When a Jewish prince is betrayed and sent into slavery by a Roman friend, he regains his freedom and comes back for revenge.

At three hours and thirty minutes, Ben Hur is the longest movie I’ll be watching on my own List of Shame. It took several stabs before I found the willpower to successfully sit down and tackle the whole thing. In my first tentative attempt I got about as far as the nativity scene that occurs in the first five minutes of the movie, when I paused it and said to myself, “Wait…it’s about Jesus? I’m not prepared for a BIBLICAL epic.”

Finally on my third try, I watched the entire film. It would be silly to brand a movie of this magnitude with a simplistic label of “good” or “bad.” There are too many chapters, stories, and sub-texts to the entire thing of wildly varying interest. I can say that I spent more time enjoying it than not.

Like Shaun of the Dead, Ben-Hur is two distinct films, only in this case woven into each other. In the first film, Charlton Heston plays Judah, a benevolent prince of Judea that is betrayed by a man with whom he shares a slightly homoerotic friendship. The Roman imprisons Heston’s Mother and Sister and makes Heston a slave rower on a Roman warship. After saving the Captain of the ship and working for him for many years, Heston wins his freedom and returns to Judea. After finding out that his mother and sister have died in prison, he challenges his former friend in a violent chariot race. Heston wins and his friend is brutally trampled during the race. He returns home to the relationship with a former slave girl that he loves.

The second movie begins with Jesus’ birth in Nazareth. At the point in the film where Judah is taken by the Romans through the desert and not given any water for the trip they make a stop in Nazerth. Here Jesus feeds Judah the water and keeps the objecting Roman captors at bay with a mere glance. Later in the film when Judah returns to Jerusalem he finds that he has actually been lied to: His mother and sister aren’t dead but have actually been in a Roman jail for five years where they have contracted leprosy. Judah takes them to see Jesus preach but arrives too late. Jesus is crucified. There is a purifying storm as he hangs from the cross and Judah’s mother and daughter are cured! Judah hugs the two of them, the music swells, and the movie ends.

Better than any modern computer generated nonsense.

As a normally secular moviegoer I find the two stories to be incompatible. Judah’s story is one of brutal revenge and seems in direct contrast to the story of Christ. When Judah’s former Roman friend is trampled in the race the camera hangs for a long time on the images of horses stomping him unrecognizable. Judah shows no remorse for his lost friend and, with his dying breath, the Roman torments him further by telling him his mother and sister have leprosy. We are left to feel satisfied that four horses tap-danced on his face, not guilty for our lack of forgiveness. His families leprosy is only further undeserved torment, not necessarily a manifestation of Judah’s sins. When the crucifixion rain shower washes away their sickness and the music is telling me how I am supposed to feel I was left feeling conflicted. Was the revenge a good thing or a bad thing? Is Christ’s death just a convenience for bad writing and I’m reading too much into it?

Define "Man"

Ultimately it doesn’t matter. With the exception of Heston’s, the acting is dated, the writing is silly, and the music is entirely too heavy handed. But Judah’s journey is gorgeously filmed and captivating. And when Heston got behind the reigns of his chariot I forgot for a time I was watching a three and a half hour 1950′s biblical epic. The chariot race is one of the most exciting and visceral sequences I’ve ever seen in any movie. It isn’t in 3-D, is devoid of any computer effects and alone was worth the entire film.

Verdict: Watch

For those of you who like to create a league to play in with your friends (or total strangers on the internet), here’s a breakdown of what each site has to offer in terms of options available for creating a league. Now please note that I’m basing my opinions of being able to set up a customized league where you play for free. All of these sites let you start a league and invite people. But being able to customize things like scoring settings, positions, doing a draft or auction, etc, are all important to me. The more you play fantasy sports, the more you tend to want to try other options and experiment with league settings. And I think being able to do that without having to pay is a huge plus. So based on that, here’s a breakdown of what the sites have to offer

There are three options on CBS: fantasy baseball free, fantasy baseball premium, and fantasy baseball commissioner (apparently it’s the official game of mlb.com as well). First of all let me say that their options are very disappointing. If you’re looking to set up a customized league for free, then CBS isn’t for you. Their free fantasy baseball offering is staggeringly limited. If you’re looking to create a league, you only have the following options: standard roto (4×4 without runs or strikeouts), 5×5 roto, roto plus (and even weirder 4×4 format that uses OPS and OBP in place of AVG and homers), or head-to-head (this is head-to-head points, where whoever accumulates the most points based on the stock values gets a win). There’s no standard points-only, no H2H with multiple wins and losses, and nothing is customizable. You can’t customize the roster, the number of innings pitched, scoring categories, etc. And you’re limited to a live draft or an autodraft, no auctions. Fantasy baseball commissioner lets you do all of this, but it’ll run you $180 (“only $15 per player in a 12-team league”). They offer fantasy baseball premium, which is also a pay service, which offers four levels depending on how baller you are and how much you want to spend on playing fantasy baseball.

One nice option they have, even in their free offering, is selecting a “winner’s league” option. This means you can accept only managers who won a league last season. Not that winning a public league is that tough, but you could (in theory) get a group of guys who all won their public league together for a little more competition. I don’t know if anyone’s actually using it, but it’s at least something different.

While the option to fully customize your league as you see fit is available, you may have to pay for it. And considering that other sites like ESPN and Yahoo offer these options for free, I can’t see the value here. If you’re looking for pay leagues with big prizes and money management, then it’s probably up your alley. But honestly, I think ESPN and Yahoo are better options for most people.

I give it two Mariano Rivera cut-fastballs Out of 5

– When it comes to free fantasy baseball, Yahoo is the king. The number of options you have is second to none. You can determine what kind of scoring you want with regular head-to-head leagues, roto, points-only, H2H points (where the most points during the week ears a win) or H2H one win (where whoever wins the most categories earns a single win). You can customize what scoring options you want available, your rosters positions, innings pitched requirements, league divisions, when the playoffs run, trade deadlines, player eligibility, etc. It offers just about anything that you could want. You could make just a simple home run derby league where you roster 10 players and just see who hits the most homers all year, all the way up to a fully-customized H2H points league.

It should be noted that there are limitations on roster size and total number of categories you can choose for scoring. So if you want to have things like grounded into double play, sacrifice hits, caught stealing, or intentional walks, you may need to get creative and forgo scoring for singles, doubles, triples and homers, and go with just a point for each total base. Or eliminate saves and blown saves and only score net saves. But even with these limitations, I found a way to set up a good scoring system for just about any league.

Yahoo also allows you to set up keepers and pre-set draft orders based on your previous season and even allows you set up a draft based on picks being traded.

Another plus is being able to edit your league settings up to the draft, or in some cases during the season. This is a nice plus if you’ve created a league but forgot to add something, or need to edit a setting. This also means that if you want to create a private league, but then end up needing managers, you can open it to the public to get the last few spots filled. On the other sites it’s either private only, or public only. Not a mix.

Yahoo gives you everything you need to create a league. While there’s no “premium” option to allow for you to play for money, or a good way to collect league dues through the site (if you decide that you want to do a money league), it has pretty much anything you can think of. And it’s all free and available in any type of league you choose.

I give it 5 amazing Troy Tulowitzki throws Out of 5

ESPN is pretty close to Yahoo, but there are a few flaws that keep it from being the best.

They have three offerings: league manager, ESPN custom, and standard free or prize eligible leagues. Their league manager option is the premier setup. It allows you to customize rules, scoring, roster positions, etc. It gives you essentially the same options that Yahoo does including league history and keepers (not sure about creating a custom draft order that included traded draft picks as I haven’t played in a keeper league on ESPN before. Sorry). The only problem is that it’s a private league only. So say you have 5 or 6 buddies who want to play in a league, but you need a few more players to fill out the rest of the spots, you can’t just open the league up to the public for the last few openings. The ESPN custom option does allow for almost full customization of all league settings, just like the league manager, but it’s main drawback is that once you’ve created a league, there’s no way to make any sort of changes (only league manager allows you to make changes to settings, scoring, etc). It’s totally locked once the league is created. Lastly there’s the standard and prize eligible leagues that use either ESPN’s standard roto or head-to-head (each category) scoring. No customization is available other than prizes available (which determines the price of the league).

Again, like Yahoo there isn’t a great way to manage league dues if you’re in a money league. And there’s no baller money league option like CBS. ESPN does give you everything you need to create a league the way you want. However their fully customizable league manager doesn’t allow for public leagues, and their default custom leagues don’t give you the league manager options. If they could combine those two leagues together, then they’d have essentially the same product that Yahoo does. So they’re very close to being at the top, and my main gripes are relatively specific ones that probably don’t matter to most people. But hey, this is MY review!

I give it 4 sweet Chase Utley swings Out of 5

There isn’t much for me to comment on here because MLB.com doesn’t offer very much. As the new kid on the block, that’s probably to be expected. As I mentioned earlier MLB.com and CBSsports have teamed up to offer fantasy baseball commissioner (the $180 a league fantasy league). But other than that, they only have two offerings: public leagues or private leagues.

Both leagues have the same settings and scoring. Teams are split into two divisions and the leagues are head-to-head points (the winner is chosen by which team accumulates the most points) where you set your roster for the entire week; no daily scoring available. The rosters are C, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, 3 OFs, DH, and “Pitching Staff” (you don’t draft individual pitchers but rather an entire team’s staff. Think of it like a team defense in fantasy football), and 6 bench spots. Scoring for hitters is a little weird with: 1B(1), 2B(2), 3B(3), HR(4), Runs(1), RBI(1), walk(1), SB(2) caught stealing(-1). Why the negative for caught stealing but not strikeouts (or some other negative)….. And then you’re scored on your “pitching staff.” Wins are worth 5 points, which is fine. But then strikeouts, earned runs, and walks + hits allowed are all scored on a scale. For example, 0-4 strikeouts is worth 0 points, 8-10 is worth 2 points, 20+ is worth 10 points. They have a similar scale for earned runs and for walks + hits. And nothing for saves (WTF, are closers worthless in this game?). Hitter stats accumulate during the week, and pitching stats are scored each day, then added up during the week.

Public leagues are all random 12-team leagues with two division winners making the playoffs, and two wild card teams with the best records making it as well. You can either choose a live draft based on the time you can make a draft. You can choose an auto-draft league where you pre-rank your players and then then all teams auto-draft based on those rankings. Or a simple draft where all teams are placed in the league with an automatically generated list of players. I have no idea what formula is used to determine who is placed on what team, and it seems like an easy way to get screwed by the computer, but who knows. Though honestly this could a really interesting idea since you’re not even allowed to pre-rank, you have to work with the random team assigned to you and wheel and deal to improve it. It seems like it could be a fun change of pace since everyone would be on level ground with a random team.

The private leagues don’t offer much more. You can choose and 8, 10 or 12-team league, the date your playoffs start, which 2 wild card teams make the playoffs (either the best records, or the team with the most points). And much like ESPN and CBS, private means you have to invite your entire league, you can’t do a combination or public and private.

One thing that MLB.com offers which is kind of interesting is the option of “top 10 scoring,” which essentially means you don’t manage your roster, but instead each week your team is scored based on the optimal lineup you should have had. Essentially it’s saying “don’t worry about managing your lineup, we’ll give you the points based on the best guys you had on your team, whether they were starting or not.” I don’t really see the point in having this option and still having a bench, but I suppose it’s nice for newbies or people who don’t want to worry about who they should start each week (or a nice bonus if one of your players gets hurt on a Tuesday and misses the rest of the week). I suppose if you want the “thrill” of drafting a team and managing the roster without the “hassle” of determining who to actually play, then maybe this option is for you. Or then again if you’re new to fantasy baseball there is the option to start and stay competitive even if you don’t know what you’re doing. So if you want to invite your wife to play, or do a league for family members who don’t play fantasy sports, or get an office league going, you could do it and allow for everyone to be able to stay in the hunt all season.

I think the best thing that MLB.com has to offer is that each league champion is eligible to compete for $10,000, so there’s always something to shoot for. While their leagues are very simple, I do like the fact that it’s designed for people at any skill level to be able to compete. And I do think the entirely random draft for all teams is a novel idea. But overall there just isn’t much here, even by the simplest of standards.

I give it 1 fantastic Ichiro catch Out of 5

Read Part 3 of our Fantasy Baseball Sites Review: The Draft – Where Seasons Are Won Or Lost on One Click

Shaun of the Dead

Synopsis: A man decides to turn his moribund life around by winning back his ex-girlfriend, reconciling his relationship with his mother, and dealing with an entire community that has returned from the dead to eat the living.

Shaun of the Dead feels like two different movies. The first is a Lost Generation story about Simon Peg’s character Shaun. Shaun is 29 years old, still living with the roommates he graduated from college with. When he’s not working his job at the local electronics superstore managing insolent teenagers whose loan goal is not ending up like Shaun, he’s drinking at the local pub with his girlfriend and slovenly friend Ed, played by Nick Frost. After Shaun’s girlfriend leaves him and he goes on a humiliating bender with Ed, he decides that he needs to get his life in order. Oh and in the mean time there’s a zombie apocalypse starting to happen.

It’s all very compelling. Simon Pegg plays Shaun as an affable everyman who’s starting to realize his life isn’t going the way he wanted it to but isn’t sure how to change. After relating a story to a friend he’s shocked when he realizes that story was from five years ago. He’s been moving through his life like a metaphorical zombie. The movie features lots of clever visual references to zombies, even before the apocalypse occurs. My favorite bit was the opening titles where we see everyday Londoners standing in lines, waiting for the bus, and working dull dead-end job with vacant empty expressions on their faces.  The movie’s opening scenes are hyper-edited with quick cuts and fast zooms that make everything feel very glossy and commercial (with the exception of a wonderful twin set of before-and-after apocalypse shots where the camera tracks Simon along his morning walk.)

Brothers in Arms

Then the zombies start to take over and Shaun and Ed devise a plan to save Shaun’s mother and ex-girlfriend before getting the entire group to safety at the pub. When they get to the pub the second movie begins. At this point the movie becomes entrenched in rote execution of the various zombie tropes: claustrophobia, gore, infected loved ones. There’s still some of the witty dialogue we got used to earlier but, given the movies commitment to sticking to the zombie archetype, it clashes heavily and makes everything feel unbalanced. When the comedy from the dialogue isn’t cancelling out the terror of the encroaching zombies, the zombies are cancelling out the comedy from the dialogue. About the time one of the men in the group is eviscerated and torn into pieces and the director makes the odd decision to not turn the camera away, the movie stops being funny altogether and rushes the characters to the finale.

The movie ends up feeling like a little bit of a grind and a let down. It’s too bad because there’s a great idea in the first half that becomes a victim of the plot in the second: What happens to a man who’s life doesn’t mean much when conventional life on earth loses all meaning. Still Shaun of the Dead is a very watchable movie and easy to recommend. You just might want to turn your head when one of them gets pulled through the window.

Verdict: Watch

List of Shame Tangent

Shaun of the Dead made this reviewer’s List of Shame by landing number 18 overall on the IMDB’s top 20 horror movies. While certainly a fun movie, it isn’t nearly as deserving of a top 20 ranking as some of the movies that follow it or didn’t even make the list. It raises an interesting consideration as to the value of Internet Movie Database’s rankings. Compare Shaun of the Dead’s position at 18 to it’s position of 52 on Rotten Tomatoes. Rotten Tomatoes rankings are based on critics reviews typically written around the time of the original release of the movie. IMDB’s rankings are done by it’s users who I’m guessing are generally younger more savvy internet users who haven’t seen a number of the 51 other movies on the Rotten Tomatoes list. Shaun of the Dead has 144,000 rankings. It’s worth it to consider that A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Fly, Evil Dead 2, and Dracula haven’t earned that number of rankings combined.

Since I love fantasy baseball, I decided to try something new this year. I’ve played in just about every format I can think of: head-to-head, points only, roto, keeper leagues, etc. But I generally only play on one site (Yahoo), even though I use other sites like ESPN and CBS Sports to do some research and analysis. But this year, I’ve decided to play in a league on each of the major sites (ESPN, Yahoo, CBS Sports), and to also include MLB.com since they’re in the fantasy game as well now, and over the course of the season I’ll review each site and what they offer in terms of:

• Pre-draft materials and options for creating leagues as a commissioner
• Live draft performance and presentation
• In-season options like ease of adding/dropping players, making trades, comparing free agents
• Additional items like mobile phone apps, stattrackers, etc
• End of year review

They say you can’t win your league during the draft, but you can definitely lose it there. I’m not entirely sure that’s true seeing as how I’ve won leagues where I only had 5 players on my roster that I actually drafted. But no matter what, research and preparation can definitely help you out before your league starts. The sites I’m comparing won’t have that much that’s different between them, but it’s the way it’s presented that’s the key.

The first thing I notice about Yahoo’s fantasy baseball site is that they really seem to be keen on their own “experts” rankings, rather than projections. Now I understand that projections aren’t always correct, and aren’t the best way to evaluate players. But with all their talk about comparing and trending stats, it seems to me that they should have projections on what players will do. They do have projections in their draft kit, but you have to do a little searching to find it as it’s not prominently listed. Instead, they focus on ranks, and have their own “O-Rank” system which (almost always incorrectly) rates players. I understand the point of O-Rank, but I really dislike it because it’s not updated enough to be useful throughout the season.

They do have a very nice list of player ranks where their experts each rank the positions and then a composite rank is given. And they have usually well-written position primers where they list their top-5, players they’re staying away from, players to reach for, and bargain picks, as well as top prospects.

Usually you’ll find one expert that you agree with, so it’s nice to see where they all rank players against each other, especially for the mid to lower-tier players.

They do have some AL and NL-only cheetsheets, and auctions values, as well as sleepers, busts and injuries provided by rotowire. But it’s just a page with a link to a set of PDFs. Pret-ty lame Milhouse. They have mock draft lobbies for H2H, roto, and auctions. So just about everything you need is on the site somewhere, but the main thing I dislike about Yahoo is how their articles are displayed and how they’re archived. New articles push old ones off the main page. To find an archived article you have to do a little searching (and trying to search based on an individual expert is kind of a pain). Overall, their site is just kind of disorganized, and if you don’t go to it daily, you’d have a tough time finding exactly what you’re looking for.

I give it 3 Ubaldo Jimenez heaters

Out of 5.

Their main fantasy baseball draft page is similar to Yahoo’s. Recent links from their experts, news, etc. I do like that there’s an upcoming article schedule, so I can see what’s going to be on the site in the next few days. But instantly you’ll notice that like half the crap on their site is for “insiders.” I’m not going to pay to be an ESPN insider, and it sucks that so much of their content that’s prominently displayed is blocked.

However, the thing that really sets ESPN apart from the other sites in my opinion is their draft kit (which thankfully is almost entirely free). The number one most useful tool to me is their player projections. Like I said earlier, projections aren’t always right and not always the best way to evaluate players, but ESPN has full projections for all players (not just the top-10 or 15), as well as analysis of why they think they’ll get to those numbers. They have very in-depth position reviews, cheatsheets for all leagues and auction values, mock draft lobbies, keeper rankings, depth charts (and closer charts), sleepers and busts, and injury roundups. Basically, it’s just about everything you can use, and it’s all easy to find right on the main page.

The one thing that does really stand out is that their position ranking and review doesn’t include where they actually get the composite rankings. Sure they’re giving me the top 40 second basemen in the league, but what I like about Yahoo is at least I see where each “expert” ranks them. I like seeing the individual rankings that lead up to the actual composite ranking.

While the main page is just average and they try to pimp being an “insider” on you, their prominently displayed draft kit is awesome.

I give it 5 Evan Longoria bombs

Out of 5.

The first thing you’ll notice about CBS sports is that there’s a lot of news and a lot of articles. And you’ll also notice that it can all be broken out into specifics for your type of league. While many sites offer ADP, auction values, rankings, etc for AL and NL-only, H2H or roto, CBS actually gives you the option to get all those by themselves. Now that’s not a huge deal, but say you’re playing in a NL-only roto league, you can get a draft kit specific to that. It’s definitely much more catering to the experienced players. They have multi-position player guides, and position changes from the previous year. They have hitting and pitching optimizer calculators, hitting and pitching consistency charts, and a few other tools that, again, cater to the more hardcore players. They’ve very interesting, but for the average Joe just looking for some ranks and projections it’s a bit much.

They do offer the standard assortment of rankings, sleepers and busts, depth charts etc. Their articles are more in-depth than Yahoo, but not quite as thorough as ESPN. But in terms of quantity of news and articles, they are at the top. I didn’t see a place to do a mock auction though, only mock drafts for H2H and roto, which was disappointing.

They offer projections, and in those projections each player does have a nice bit of analysis. I don’t think it’s quite on par with ESPN, but it’s very close (and leaps and bounds ahead of Yahoo). However, my biggest problem is their projections are based around standard points league values. So when you see their projections, they’re sorted by CBS-specific fantasy points. For example, their projections have JJ Putz as the 4th best closer in the league (ahead of Mario Rivera, Joakim Soria, and Jonathan Papelbon). Now that could happen I suppose, but it seems wrong to me.

Overall, it’s a good site. It definitely caters to more experienced players, and I don’t like how they incorporate their fantasy points into their projections, but it’s a solid place to go for research.

I give it 3 Joe Mauer frozen ropes.

Out of 5.

They’re kind of the new kid on the block. MLB.com has had fantasy related articles, but they were more of the top-10 players, and sleepers or busts variety. They’ve upped their game lately though and have a decent fantasy section. You’ll find articles and blog posts about fantasy strategy, player news, and they also offer player previews. It’s pretty simple stuff, very nice looking, but simple. You can tell it’s tailored to the casual player as they don’t have draft kits that compare roto to H2H values, ADP, AL or NL-only, that sort of thing. No mock draft lobbies. Just a ranking of players with projections, though it includes generic auction values, which is nice.

Their player preview is pretty good. Maybe it’s just because it looks so much better than the other sites, but I do like it. It gives a projected line and analysis or each player; and not just the top guys, you can get a blurb on former #1 overall pick Luke Hochevar if you so desire.

They have this Bloomberg Sports draft list that they’re trying to pimp as well, but I don’t quite know what it is. I clicked on their link and was given a popup that had some projections, but at a glance it told me that Carlos Gonzalez would have 47 RBIs this year, Miguel Cabrera was going to hit .301, and that Tim Lincecum would K 208 batters. Maybe that’s just a sample as it’s clearly trying to get me to buy something that go along with the Fantasy Commissioner league, but it was really weird.

There’s really not much here, but what they do have looks nice. There’s some okay analysis, but nothing that you can’t get at the other sites. Their projections seem right and it’s nice to see them right out there on the front page, but this site should be used as more of a plan B, or somewhere to go to get a little extra info on a player. But its overall usefulness as a pre-draft research tool is limited.

I give it 2 Jose Reyes head-first slides



Out of 5.

Read Part 2 of our Fantasy Baseball Review: Creating Your Own League