And The Beat Goes On: Nov. 1st

Today's track is a Flying Lotus trip-hop special called "Massage Situation" ... and if you've ever taken the time to listen to these morning tracks, you know that this track is chiller than the other side of the pillow:

● Jeff Wilson writes about the Rangers being committed to keeping their core players together. Evan Grant writes that Alexi Ogando will not participate in winter ball this off-season.

● MLB Trade Rumors ranks the top 50 players in this winter's free-agent class, and arrives at the conclusion that the Rangers will only sign one top-50 free agent -- Roy Oswalt. FanGraphs also has their top 50 free agent rankings out. 

● Kevin Sherrington and Barry Horn believe that C.J. Wilson is at the top of the Rangers' off-season priority list, and that the club is, in fact, intent on keeping him.

● Scoreboard Daily talked to Wilson after the conclusion of the World Series, and managed to extract this tidbit out of him:

SBD: Well, one of those factors is you. I know there’s not much you can say – or even much to know at this point, but what are the chances you’ll be back next year?

C.J.: Yeah, there’s a great chance because I like it here and I’ve won here. I’ve proved that I can be a good pitcher here. There have been a lot of people over the years that have said it’s impossible to pitch here in Texas and look what we did here on the rotation – we went out and won a bunch of games and threw a bunch of innings and did stuff that no other organization can say…not even the mighty Red Sox or Yankees. They didn’t do what we did. It’s now all about figuring out how all of the guys on the team – not just me – there’s Elvis, Nelson, Josh, Ian – a lot of guys have contractual things that are coming up. I think one thing the Rangers want me to know is what they’re planning on doing with all of these other guys in the long term. So that gives me confidence that we’re going to keep winning.

Not that this matters much if the Rangers are truly dead set against re-signing C.J., but, well, you know ...

● The Fielding Bible Awards are out, and Adrian Beltre has been conferred the title of best defensive third baseman in baseball for the 2011 season by an esteemed panel comprising the likes of Bill James, Peter Gammons, Joe Posnanski, John Dewan, and others.

● Jim Callis writes that Yu Darvish will rank as the No. 4 prospect in baseball behind Bryce Harper, Mike Trout, and Matt Moore once he makes the journey stateside.

● Chris Jaffe has a cool piece ranking the best post-seasons of the last 15 years.

● The Los Angeles Times reports that Frank McCourt is close to yielding to Bud Selig's desires, and is close to reaching an agreement with MLB on a bankruptcy settlement where he would agree to sell the team. It turns out that stubbornness costs a lot of money to sustain.