I base my mental image of the Winter Meetings on the scene in Glengarry Glen Ross with Al Pacino leafing through a brochure with a potential client in a bar. It's a great scene filled with the perfect mix of booze and false optimism. If you haven't seen it, there's no way for me to capture the mood. If you have seen the movie or play, you can probably picture it too: dim lights, two scotches and melted ice, and Brian Sabean going over the merits of Noah Lowry with another weary GM. I'd like to think there's a shiny brochure too.

So here we go. The Winter Meetings. Nashville, baby. Nashville. As of yesterday, there weren't too many Giants fans expecting a miracle contender in 2008. Now that a bunch of GMs are in the same hotel, I'm starting to get goofy. Maybe, just maybe, the Reds would give up Joey Votto and Edwin Encarnacion for Noah Lowry. It's an unrealistic and lopsided trade...but a few of those trades get made every winter. The Giants deserve to be on the right end of an old-fashioned fleecin' for once. Preferably one that doesn't involve the Pirates -- for karma's sake -- though I could probably live with another one of those.

The rumors have been a mixed bag so far. There are whispers that the Giants could trade one of their limited trade chips for Miguel Tejada, which would upgrade the Giants from a '77 Gremlin to a '77 Gremlin with a single spinning rim. Then there are beat writers dropping names like Carlos Gomez, Melky Cabrera, and Andy Marte, which are names the beat writer probably didn't just pick out of a Topps box. We can debate the relative merits of Melky Cabrera later, but not one of those names is a quick fix. This team needs a backup point guard more than it needs a quick fix, so those names at least hint at an organization pointed in the right direction.

What's your prediction? Pain, joy, or indifference regarding the pending transactions? Vote in the poll, if you would.