TOWER GROVE — Besides offering headline magicians and sportswriters alike a dangerous arsenal of puns this Holliday Season — see what I did there? so ingenious … — free-agent outfielder Matt Holliday has also proven inadvertently adept at fueling the hot-stove league with some speculative geography.

Whether the market for him is moving or not, there’s always something to write about Holliday and there’s always something to explore about where this Oklahoma native would be “most comfortable” playing.

Because, you know, Rand McNally holds the key to decision.

A common theme that has thread through stories about Holliday this winter — especially as he hit the open market, and as baseball approaches its Winter Meetings — is where, not always what team, he would be the best fit. He’s been portrayed as a Midwest boy looking for a Midwest team. He’s been painted, mostly by unattributed sources, as someone eager to play in the big city on the big stage (read: New York or Boston). Mostly because he rented a place out in Malibu, Calif., last winter, he’s been mentioned as a hitter who would like to bask in the Southern California sun. All of it may be truthful, but not entirely revealing of the truth.

Holliday, when he was with the St. Louis Cardinals, talked about how attractive it would be to be “centrally located”, somewhere near or in the middle of his family that is scattered around or on the fringe of the Midwest. He didn’t, however, say that it was a priority — just part of the equation. He also expressed a curiosity with the bigger-market teams, like the New York Yankees, and why wouldn’t he? Carlos Beltran, on the eve of free agency, said similar things. It’s savvy to show interest in teams that can drive a player’s salary just by being present as a possibility, and the big-market teams tend to … oh … you know … compete, annually.

But, Holliday never once narrowed the geography of his decision, save to point out that people reading into his rental last winter were headed in the wrong direction. He could have easily stayed in Denver or gone off to Austin, Texas, and what then? Holliday repeated as such last week in an interview with former big-league reliever Rob Dibble and host Jody McDonald on Sirius/XM MLB Home Plate:

Jody McDonald: “Do you see yourself as a midwest kind of guy or could you see Matt Holliday playing in a northeast city?”

Holliday: “I’ve been around, and I’ve lived in some big cities so I would say that I’m open to any sort of coast or city. Obviously I’ve never lived in some of the big cities on the east coast but at the same time I’ve spent some time there and (with) my dad being from Pennsylvania I have some experience on the east coast. My brother lived in Atlanta for a while, so I’ve been around a little bit so I wouldn’t consider myself somebody who really has to stay in the midwest.”

Sure enough, the team’s interested in Holliday come from all compass points. There is , of course, the Cardinals. The Boston Red Sox are lurking. The Seattle Mariners have been mentioned a few times as a possibility. Atlanta craves a big bat, but is fearful of the price. And so on. A report this morning on FOXSports.com quotes an anonymous executive saying that Boston is starting to prefer Holliday over Jason Bay, the other impact-bat left fielder available in the market. The logic is based on draft-pick compensation, and it does outline a current scenario that would shift the Holliday market away from the Cardinals. Check the 8:59 a.m. entry.

Holliday’s roots were also the subject of an interest article in Sunday’s New York Daily News by Anthony McCarron. In it, McCarron explores Holliday’s upbringing as the son of a coach, nephew of a scout and boyhood pal of the Oklahoma State baseball program. (It was, years ago, where I first saw Holliday while in Stillwater, Okla., to cover a Mizzou-OSU baseball series. Never missed one.) Besides invoking the name of Oklahoma State great Robin Ventura — now on a Hall of Fame ballot near you — McCarron also addresses the geography question, through the prism of the Yankees and an answer from Tom Holliday, Matt’s father:

“I don’t think that’d be any problem,” Tom Holliday says. “He’s grown-up. He’s a man about that baseball world right now, and certainly everybody knows how much emphasis there is on winning in New York. He knows that and I think he totally appreciates that.

“We’re a baseball-crazy family, so we feel he could play anywhere.”

The whole Daily News story is worth reading for more on Holliday’s family — similar to the story done in The Post-Dispatch right before the playoffs — and for interesting comments from an unnamed scout and from Jim Duquette, a former big-league general manager. Not entirely independent of the geography question and partially based on the Albert Pujols situation/request described in Sunday’s Post-Dispatch, Duquette offers this thought on where Holliday will land. “My gut is that he stays with St. Louis,” Duquette told The New York Daily News. “I think they have the wherewithal and the desire and, in the end, that’ll be his best fit. They can win and he’ll help them keep Albert, who finally got some protection in the lineup from him.”

Hit the links for some Holliday Shopping (it’s just too tempting):

• Will Leitch, the founder of Deadspin and a devoted Cardinals fan, right down to his Rick Ankiel No. 66 footie pajamas, argues in New York magazine that Holliday is “exactly the player the Yankees need.” Even as he illustrates how Holliday fits the Yankees, Leitch detonates the idea of Holliday helping the New York Mets. He also makes the point that with Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui possibly coming off the books this winter, the Yankees have the money and that means if they want Holliday “they can have him.”
• River Avenue Blues, a Yankees blog, respectfully disagrees. Well sort of.
• At ESPN.com, Jay Jaffe continues breaking down the HolliBay debate, and he sides with defense as being the deciding factor, making Holliday worth at least $3.6 million more in value than Bay. He also suggests a fit for Bay’s bat and his glove, and it’s not Fenway Park.
• At Baseball Prospectus, Marc Normandin considers the free agents that can fill a team’s need for power. Atop his list is Holliday, and he argues that Bay and Holliday are actually headed in opposite directions with their power production.

And, finally some more comments from Holliday in his Sirius/XM interview …

On Pujols winning the MVP: “Obviously everyone who watches SportsCenter sees the big things he does and all the home runs he hits. Obviously those things are very impressive but I think I was really impressed with a lot of the little things. The consistency with which he hits the ball hard and I think his defense and the risks that he’s willing to take as a first baseman are things that I saw that are pretty unbelievable. He’s willing to be playing back at first base with a guy on third and if the ball’s hit hard enough he’s willing to take a chance to throw home to get the out. Just a lot of things that he has confidence in himself that he’s willing to do and try that maybe other first basemen in the league may not want to do. … To get a chance to play with him on a daily basis and to watch him play, I was extremely impressed with all facets of his game.”

On Mark McGwire joining the Cardinals as hitting coach: “… As an instructor goes, I think he understands. He went through a lot of steps in hitting. He went from his rookie year of hitting 49 home runs to a couple seasons I think he hit close to .200 to kind of learning about his swing. Kind of a self-made hitter and eventually was hitting in the .300 range with a .400 on base percentage and still hitting tons of home runs so I think he learned a lot through his career and the type of hitter he was. I think that from a mental side he’s big on knowing pitchers and recognizing pitches and using your eyes to help you as much as you can and some of those things that I think get overlooked at times. I think he’ll do a great job teaching mental things of how to approach pitchers and how to set up pitchers and make sure that you’re using your eyes and some of the things that really helped him along the way. I think he’ll be a very good instructor.”

On Adam Wainwright, Chris Carpenter and the Cy Young garboil: “I was disappointed. I was disappointed for them, knowing how great they were, and you know I think Wainwright, we had his 20th win. He left the game, I think we were up 6-1 in maybe the 6th or 7th inning and he comes out of the game and they end up beating us and he doesn’t get his 20th win. I think had he gotten to that magic number of 20 wins I think he wins the award pretty easily. It’s frustrating to think that one game like that could probably have cost him what is the best award for pitchers in baseball. I was kind of frustrated for him and frustrated that he didn’t win the award, or even Carp. His numbers were really good and leading in the league, I think, in ERA and some of the other categories. But obviously Tim Lincecum is a fantastic pitcher and that’s not taking nothing away from him but you know, Wainwright pitched some huge games for us getting us to the playoffs and when you pitch in those kind of games and come up as big as he did, I just think that that deserves to be rewarded.”

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