"Paging Randy Johnson. Mr. Randy Johnson, please pick up the white courtesy telephone. Your limousine out of town is waiting."

That's right, another perfect Pinstripe marriage seems about to draw to a close. If you believe SI.com's Jon Heyman, there's a "50-50" chance that the New York Yankees are about to trade yet another "can't-miss" free-agent signee (or overpriced tradee) from a couple years back, so they can, y'know, sign another "can't-miss" free-agent signee.

How's this strategy working for you so far, Steinbrenner? Let's track the Yankee progress since their last title, in 2000. Here are there additions:

2001: Mike Mussina (six-year, $88.5 million)
2002: Jason Giambi (seven-year, $120 million), Raul Mondesi ($13 million), Robin Ventura ($8.5 million; traded David Justice), Rondell White ($4.5 million), Sterling Hitchcock (three-year, $15.5 million)
2003: Jose Contreras (four-year, $32 million), Hideki Matsui (three-year, $21 million), Jeff Weaver ($4.1 million; traded Ted Lilly)
2004: Alex Rodriguez (last seven years of a 10-year, $252 million, though Rangers paid some; traded Alfonso Soriano), Gary Sheffield (three-year, $36.8 million), Kevin Brown (last two years of a seven-year, $105 million; traded Jeff Weaver), Javier Vazquez (four-year, $45 million; traded Nick Johnson and Juan Rivera), Tom Gordon (two-year, $7.3 million)
2005: Randy Johnson (three-year, $57 million; traded Javier Vazquez), Carl Pavano (four-year, $40 million), Jaret Wright (three-year, $21 million)
2006: Johnny Damon (four-year, $52 million), Bobby Abreu (last two years of a five-year, $64 million; traded prospects)

And here are the subsequent dumps:

2003: Mondesi, Ventura, White, Hitchcock
2004: Contreras, Weaver
2005: Vazquez
2006: Brown, Sheffield, Wright, Gordon

And here are the world championships: Zero.

Nice. Does anyone believe this mercenary mission is working? According to Heyman's article, the plan is to play a little buyer's remorse on Johnson, pay a bunch of his salary to ship him somewhere like Arizona, and use the "savings" (yeah, right) to give Barry Zito $16 million per year for six or seven years. And this is to say nothing of Pavano, whom the Yanks would gladly trade you for a bag of balls, and A-Rod, who's been the biggest flop on Broadway since No No Nanette. But this time around? Oh, yeah, it'll totally work.

Seattle, Indianapolis and New England are locked into home Wild Card games, and all Philadelphia has to do is win this week, and they'll be there, too. History tells us at least one of these four teams is going to lose. Which one (or more) do you think it'll be, and if you had to guess, which road Wild Card team do you think will do it to them?

BoDog Bookmakers, BoDog.ws: Right now, I would say Seattle or Indianapolis will lose in the first round. Indianapolis has to learn how to win late in the season. If they don't turn it around, it could result in the conclusion of Tony Dungy as the Colts' head coach. Seattle will only host a playoff game because they play in the worst division in the weaker conference of the NFL. As for who might pull the upset, there are two teams to look out for in this situation right now. First: Denver, who has a pretty good chance of making it into the playoffs. Second, there are the Tennessee Titans, who'll need a little bit of help if they are going to make it in. Both of these teams are led by rookie quarterbacks who aren't exactly playing like rookies. Vince Young is proving why he was the first QB selected in the Draft, and Jay Cutler is doing things with the Denver offense Jake Plummer could only dream of.

I know you like San Diego in the AFC. But if something odd happens next week, and Baltimore gets home-field advantage, do you still think the Chargers could go into Baltimore and quiet a raucous Ravens' crowd?

BDB, BoDog.ws: I would love to see that match-up. Philip Rivers has to perform better if San Diego wants to beat a dominating Ravens team. If he's not playing well, it won't matter if the game takes place in Baltimore or San Diego; the Ravens will win, regardless. LaDainian Tomlinson has been incredible this season, but he can't do it alone versus Ray Lewis, Ed Reed and the rest of the Ravens defense.

The Pittsburgh Steelers sure went from the penthouse to the outhouse, becoming the fourth Super Bowl champion in eight years not to make the playoffs the following year. (It only happened once in the prior 10 years.) Why does that keep happening, and do you expect Bill Cowher to be back next year?

BDB, BoDog.ws: That's what makes the NFL great: from year to year, it's always anybody's game. Parity among teams has given fans a chance to believe their team has a chance every year. Pittsburgh was very lucky in 2005; it almost seemed that every break or bounce went their way. Starting with Big Ben's motorcycle crash in the off-season, all those breaks and bounces seemed to go the other way for Pittsburgh this time around. If Bill Cowher isn't back, it will be his choice. I wouldn't be surprised if he takes a year off, and resurfaces with the Carolina Panthers in 2008.

For pure viewing pleasure, do you have a favorite New Year's Day bowl game? And do you have a New Year's Day game wager you like most?

BDB, BoDog.ws: The Rose Bowl is the biggest game of the day. It features two teams that could've been #1, and two big-time schools with rabid followers. It will be a very entertaining game. As for wagers, I have something small on Auburn. I like Kenny Irons, and he'll use this game to prove that scouts should believe his junior-year stats (1,293 yards, 13 TDs), rather than his disappointing senior-year stats (821 yards, 4 TDs), when evaluating his capabilities for the next level.

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