“A lot of the conversations begin in earnest in the GM Meetings,” said an AL exec. “And with all the time leading up to [the Winter Meetings], a lot get completed.”

This year two of the most talented and high-priced free agents remain unsigned. Zack Greinke and Josh Hamilton are two of the prized free-agents this year.

Greinke is expected to command upwards of a $150 million contract and Hamilton is looking for multiyear deal that will pay him in excess of $25 million a year.

Expectations are always high among fans and media, and rumors of trades and transactions will dominate baseball news for a week, MLB Winter Meetings previews and projections have begun

The Los Angeles Dodgers are expected to be one of the most active teams at this year’s meetings. The Dodgers have established themselves as the leader among baseball teams for spending money on new players. New TV baseball contracts are in place and the Dodgers aren’t afraid to spend.

Still all baseball team general managers look forward to this time of year. While players earn their living between April and October general managers earn their paychecks from October to March. The Dodgers, Red Sox, and Rays are expected to be among more active teams pursuing new talent.

The Toronto Blue Jays made a big splash ahead of the meetings in a blockbuster deal with the Miami Marlins.  The Miami Marlins sent All-Stars Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle, Josh Johnson and John Buck to the Toronto Blue Jays as part of a 12-player trade.

That means teams in the American League East will be looking to compete. For baseball fans it’s like Christmas comes early for their favorite teams.

The Red Sox have been a team in turmoil throughout the 2012 season, and rumblings of big changes have been making news throughout the summer. The Red Sox will now have the flexibility to rebuild the team and take it in a different direction.

Red Sox chairman Tom Werner said, ”Hopefully this deal will go through today,” Red Sox chairman Tom Werner said Saturday morning. “If it falls into place, the deal sheds us from tens of millions of dollars of long-term commitments. It gets us great prospects who will improve our major league roster as soon as next year. It brings us a player in James Loney who was ‘untouchable’ a couple of years ago. It allows us to start over with free agents. We want to win for our fans and we now have huge financial flexibility to improve the team.”

Still the deal represents a major shift in direction for the Red Sox who traded two of their top prospects Anthony Rizzo and pitcher Casey Kelly to acquire Gonzalez in a trade with the San Diego Padres prior to the 2011 season. Gonzalez is making $21 million this season, the first in the seven-year, $154 million extension he signed in April 2011. Crawford has been a major disappointment in Boston, largely due to injuries, however, new ownership for the Dodgers seized the opportunity to acquire players with superstar abilities to add to their roster.

From now until then, and perhaps later most of the news you hear about baseball will have to do with trades and rumors of trades.

This year, two extra teams have been added to major league baseball’s playoff format, which makes the news wires busier than ever. This season in major league baseball will have ten-team playoff format.

Suddenly teams who were not normally in contention this time of year are actively seeking to make trades to improve their teams, and of course, make the playoffs. And MLB baseball trades will be affected.

That has opened up a brand-new strategy for teams to understand. Simply put, there are more teams looking to improve, then there are teams looking to sell off assets in a trade.

More demand for players will drive up the asking price of those teams looking to sell. Supply and demand works in business and in baseball.

Each year seemingly one or two players will make the news every day until they are traded, not traded or the deadline passes. This year’s feature player is Justin Upton of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

About three weeks ago he became the subject of trade talk, and the number of rumors have snowballed ever since.

Remember one thing about trade rumors in baseball, in fact in trade rumors in any sport.  rumors are published on a daily basis and they don’t have to be true. By definition it’s a rumor.

And while they are fun for baseball fans, players are often on the receiving end of personal attacks and innuendo. For example Upton’s agent recently began defending his client.

“What I don’t like are the comments and innuendos made about Justin’s work ethic and character, especially from those gutless people that don’t want to put their name by a quote., said Larry Reynolds.

It’s best, take baseball trade rumors, for what they are and enjoy the game.

This year, Brandon Phillips and Johnny Cueto from the Cincinnati Reds won’t be added to the roster.  Superstar and $240 million man Albert Pujols of the Angels is not an All-Star for the second year in a row.

Voting for the Final Vote will add one additional player to each league roster.

For the American League the candidates are, Jonathan Broxton, Yu Darvish, Ernesto Frieri, Jason Hammel, and Jake Peavy. The National League candidates are Michael Bourne, David Freese, Bryce Harper, Aaron Hill and Chipper Jones.

Voting will conclude for the final vote on Thursday at 4 PM Eastern time. The Home Run Derby is expected to draw lots of attention as always.

Texas Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton received  11,073,744 votes to shatter the previous record by nearly 4,000,000 votes. Buster Posey led all National League players with 7,621,370 votes.

Controversy surrounding Youkilis and manager Bobby Valentine began in April, with Valentine questioning the effort being put forth by Youkilis. The drama continued when Youkilis went to the disabled list. Rookie third baseman Will Middlebrooks assumed starting responsibilities at third base, and when Youkilis return from the disabled list the Red Sox had too few positions for too many players. The result was forcing gold glove first baseman Adrian Gonzalez to right field to keep Youkilis in the lineup. That situation became unworkable and the trade was made. Middlebrooks expressed his appreciation for Youkilis via Twitter  ”It was truely an honor playing with and learning from Youk… He’s the definition of a professional. Played the game right,” he wrote.

The Boston crowd also expressed its appreciation to Youkilis with a rousing ovation following his RBI triple in the eighth inning and his subsequent removal from the game.

The judge presiding over the trial said he expected it would take six weeks to complete the new trial. Clemens took notes occasionally during the jury selection from a group of 90 potential jurors. When Clemens was introduced, he stood and faced the pool of potential jurists and said, “Good morning.”

In 2010, Clemens was indicted over the testimony he gave to Congress back in 2008, when he steadfastly denied ever using human growth hormones or steroids. Prosecutors claim they are in possession of evidence that proves Clemens perjured himself and are seeking to discredit his testimony.

On Monday, a list of over 60 potential witnesses for the prosecution was read to the court. Defense lawyers have nearly 30 witnesses for their case. Included in the list are Mike Stanton, Paul O’Neill and Andy Pettitte, players who played with Clemens while he was with the New York Yankees.

A mistrial was declared by Judge Reggie Walton in U.S. District Court just two days after opening arguments at the first trial for Clemens in July of last year. A video clip was shown to jurors by the prosecutors, which included material that had been banned by the judge, unless Clemens’ lawyers raised the information.