Until I started this site, I was a Twitter critic. I thought that it was simply one aspect of Facebook (status), which some find to be Facebook’s most annoying feature. This is somewhat true, were I to follow a bunch of random people on Twitter I would undoubtedly be bored out of my mind. But instead I decided to follow only a few sports fans, some bloggers, some athletes, and mostly sports reporters. And boy did this pay off.

On the morning of the trade deadline I checked headlines on the usual sites, scanned over my Google reader and wrote an article that morning without any idea of the sort of exhilaration I would be facing in mere hours. Sure I was excited for the trades to go down, but I didn’t quite realize exactly how close to the action I was going to be.

All of a sudden, as I refreshed my twitter, different reporters were talking about possible players the Red Sox would exchange for Victor Martinez. Two minutes later reports were coming in confirming names. Two minutes after that and new names were coming in. MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo, SI.com’s Jon Heyman, Jeff Blair (a Canadian columnist), MLB.com’s Ian Browne, Bob Nightengale and the New York Post’s Joel Sherman were all in this circle of news, hearing a rumor and posting it immediately. And I was a part of it, it was almost as if I was in the war-room with these guys, spitting sunflower seeds and talking potential deals. Because of a tip off one of these guys got, I was able to post that the Twins had pulled off the deal for Orlando Cabrera several minutes before MLBTradeRumors was able to.

I really felt like I was right there on the front lines, I was literally watching these rumors unfold before my eyes. And I wasn’t just standing-by either. I was writing an up-to-the-minute feed of what was going on in our forum (which got a substantial number of views, so clearly some people were relying on my feed for their news) all the while, updating articles, checking sites and refreshing twitter. It was clicking and typing mania. And of course, I was updating my own Twitter, so I could keep my legions informed. And when I heard that the Twins were in the Heath Bell chase, I wrote this…and then this 17 minutes later. And what happened then? People were re-Tweeting my Tweets essentially citing me as their source for the news. Because I was right there with the rest of the reporters, updating news just seconds after they did.

And when, around 4:20 p.m., after it seemed impossible for any new deal to break, Jon Heyman tweeted the Peavy deal, I had the immediate reaction as all of the other reporters, ‘is this a joke?’. But I quickly found out it wasn’t. And my heart was racing. If it was a couple hours later and I was reading it on ESPN it might not have been that exciting. But it wasn’t like that. It was exciting because I was finding out before people at ESPN. And considering I was just sitting in the Bowdoin College library…that’s pretty neat.

4:04 p.m. Joel Sherman pointed out via twitter that the Jays were only going to move Rolen if Halladay was traded.

4:07 p.m. ESPN says Jays and Angels are in discussion over Halladay

4:26 p.m. Halladay rumors are false. He’s staying in Toronto.

4:36 p.m. I wrote this in the post below, but the Red Sox made a last second attempt at Halladay, but the deal fell apart because Red Sox would not give up Buchholz and Bard.

At 4:21, Jon Heyman posts on Twitter that Jake Peavy has been traded to the White Sox…again! I’m assuming this time Peavy has waived his no-trade clause?

A couple minutes later he confirmed it’s no joke.

4:29 p.m. SI.com reports that Peavy must still agree to deal, suggesting it hasn’t happened yet. Can’t imagine the Padres would have done it if Peavy wasn’t going to accept but who knows.

4:38 p.m. Peavy accepted the White Sox…he’s going to ChiTown.

4:39 p.m. Debate rages about whether Peavy is done for the year and how much the Padres are paying, but no one knows either.

When a player like Peavy is being surrounded by rumors its usually because they are in the final year of their contract and they play for a crappy team. While San Diego is not going to make the playoffs, Peavy is contracted through 2012. So it is a little strange that so soon after granting a contract extension in ‘07, and without any decline in production, the Friars want to rid themselves of Peavy. Most teams would rather hang on to him and build their franchise around him, but I guess the Padres just want to rebuild their franchise, period. That means they are looking for a team to pick up at least the majority of the $53 million they owe Peavy between 2010 and 2012. More or less, they need a team who has prospects to trade and money to spend. Yes, the Cubs are still the frontrunner, and the Dodgers can meet both criteria as well. But I want to suggest two teams that I haven’t heard in the media in relation to Peavy. The Angels and Red Sox.

The Angels, the regular favorite of the AL West look to almost certainly surrender the division this year unless they do something about it, and Peavy would really be doing something about it. They are a wealthy club, and have some money to spend (after striking out in the Teixeira sweepstakes). I could see a deal where they pay almost all of Peavy’s contract and give up infield prospect Brandon Wood, who is mostly stuck in their franchise anyway.

The Red Sox don’t really need pitching. They don’t need it at all actually, and are trying to trade Brad Penny for a regular shortstop because they have enough depth with Smoltz coming back and Clay Buchholz dominating in triple-A. But if they were to say trade Buchholz (and again use money tagged for Teixeira) to nab Peavy, you are looking at sure-fire spot in the playoffs, and the most ridiculous playoff rotation ever of Josh Beckett, Jake Peavy and Jon Lester. Daisuke, Smoltz and Wakefield would work the ‘pen. You wouldn’t even need a bullpen, you could just pair up one of the second three with the first three and you’d have a great complete game every time. It’s not going to happen, but that’s about as close to a World Series guarantee as you’re gonna find.

Note: Credit Cot’s Baseball Contracts for all of the contract info