Well the search is going by with very little information.

Mark Shapiro and company are being very closed off in terms of what's going on so far.

The people that have been confirmed from one source or another to have at least been on the list of 30 candidates the Indians were targeting.

The list has been narrowed down to 8 or 10 names though.

Manny Acta
Bobby Valentine
John Farrell
Torey Lovullo
Travis Fryman.

That's all I've been able to dig up.

We've learned yesterday that John Farrell has pretty much re-confirmed his disinterest in the team. Theo Epstein gave the Indians permission to do what they wanted to do, yet Farrell has oddly maintained that he doesn't want the job? That confuses me, but whatever, if he's happy, he's happy.

I personally don't want someone who shows this much disinterest, so cross him off the list and move on. I said we should go after him until he was interested, but yeah, never mind. He wants to manage, but he wants to fulfill a one year commitment to Boston? I can respect that, but I don't understand it in this day and age.

Manny Acta on the other hand, wants the job very much. He is one of the few candidates that has been confirmed. He'll probably receive a phone interview rather soon.

Bobby Valentine has spoken out and said he very much would be interested in Cleveland, which is surprising to me. I'm sure a phone interview will take place rather soon if there is mutual interest on both sides, and I'm sure there is.

Terry Pluto has brought up Travis Fryman's name, but color me not-believed. Fryman has stated before on different occasions he has no intent on managing at a higher level or with any other organization. Mahoning Valley suits him for this point in his life. He's enjoying his family and if he really does, he won't be pulled away.

It would be an injustice to him to not only pull him away from that, but throw him into the fire of being a major league manager with just two years of short-season ball under his belt. If anything, him, like Lovullo, should have a few years of major league experience as a bench or third base coach before doing something like that.

Anyway, I phone interview Bobby Valentine just for the heck of it. If you can at least get his insight that would be fantastic. He will obviously be interested in the job, so he's going to say stuff that would get him the job. He'd give you his opinion on what he'd do you and you take those ideas and think about them, even if you don't hire him. Because Bobby Valentine knows baseball and what he says should carry some weight.

Some international news on the Indians... It looks like they've got an interest in Yusei Kikuchi.. I'd rather just call him Keith. If we sign him, that's what he'll be called. But look he's comparable to the Tazawa kid the Red Sox signed last year. He's young and expected to go number one overall in the Japanese draft, however could ask teams not to draft him so he can pursue a MLB contract.

So there's that. I've never heard of the kid until now. So this is a bit of a surprise.

Finally.. Matt LaPorta undergoes surgery and is going to need 4-6 months to recover.

For those of you who can count, six months from now is Mid-April.

Hopefully though, it won't take that long. I jinxed things the other day when I said "I think all the surgeries are over," and also went on to type awesome things about LaPorta's future in the forthcoming End of the Year Feathers.

Oh boy... Anyway, LaPorta's situation was compared to Hafner's by Castrovince, so hopefully he can get ahead of that and only be slightly off with his teammates. If he does play in the spring though, I'll be happy.

I've continued to watch for manager news like a hawk. But man it is slow and there is very little. Anyway, I've put a big dent in the End of the Year Feathers and I'm hoping to have it up Friday, because the offseason chart is ready to go and that can't go up until I officially begin the offseason with the Feathers.

So I'll work at my best to get that up Friday and then get the chart going for Saturday.