For Cardinals fans, it is deja vu. It feels as if we have taken a trip back to the Summer of 2002. We get the call or we log on and look at the news. Some of us catch it on the ESPN bottom line feed. By now, everyone in Cardinal Nation has heard the somber news: relief pitcher Josh Hancock is dead at 29.

If you haven't heard what happened, Hancock was driving on Highway 40 in St. Louis late Saturday night/early Sunday morning, when he ran into the back of a tow truck park on the side of the road. The truck driver said the vehicle did not slow down at all. Hancock was pronounced dead on the scene. I'll link the story later on in this post for the rest of the details.

As a fan of the Cardinals, you become attached to the players. It is that way with any fan of any team. The names, the faces; they all change throughout the years, but while a certain player wears your team's uniform, you embrace him. You spend countless hours cheering for him, sometimes cursing him, but most of the time pulling for him.

And when you hear the news that one of your team's players has died, it feels as if you've lost a friend. I don't care if that sounds weird or whatever, it is the truth.

Hancock was a pitcher who would tackle any assignment with tenacity. Sometimes he'd blow it, and sometimes he would excel in it. I'll be the first to admit, I was frustrated from time to time with his performance. But I admired his willingness to take any situation he was thrust into and pitch his game no matter what. And even if he did give up a big home run, Hancock always had the ability to bounce back the next day. That is the kind of player that is loved in Cardinal Nation. Every player has their bad moments, but the ones who brush it off and give it their all for the fans, the team, and the organization the next day are exactly the type of player that define a "true" Cardinal. Hancock was the perfect definition of a "true" Cardinal.

For this to happen twice in five years to one team is almost unheard of. The Darryl Kile incident was devastating. In fact, the team still has a large "DK 57" sign painted on the bullpen wall to this day. Kile's death is still so fresh in the mind of several players, that they become worried when a teammate is late to the ballpark.

Just three days ago, when Hancock overslept and didn't show up to the park on time, teammates who experienced the Kile incident firsthand began calling Hancock's cell phone frequently, worried that something had happened.

I can only imagine the grief that hit every member of the team when they heard the news last night and this morning. I received the news when my cousin, a Cubs fan, called and asked me if I had heard the news. I immediately had a Darryl Kile flashback.

Hancock was an integral member of the bullpen that were the unheralded heroes of last year's World Series club. Hancock could be used in many situations. At times he was brought in to be the 8th inning setup guy. Other times, when the starting pitching struggled, Hancock was brought on to pitch a few innings to save the rest of the bullpen from fatigue.

And now, fans, friends, teammates, and the baseball world mourn his loss. My thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of Josh Hancock. He will always have a special place in all of the Cardinal fans, just like DK before him.

Story

Tonight the Yankees finally won a game but Alex Rodriguez went 0 for 4 with 2 strikeouts. He's now 1 for 14 in his last 4 games.

A-Rod now at .348/.412/.899 for a 1.311 OPS

Barry hit his 8th home run tonight and just missed in another at bat with a very long fly ball before getting intentionally walked and then walked again.

Bonds is now at .362/.519/.828 for a 1.347 OPS

That's right. For all of the big talk about A-Rod's great April at age 31. Barry Bonds is now statistically having a better month than him at age 42. Sure Rodriguez is good. He's a good hitter for a 3B. But come on now. This is Barry Bonds time. The man is a legend among legends. Everyone else will merely be a footnote in comparison.

There was Babe Ruth. Then there was Ted Williams. Now there is Barry Bonds.

Labels: Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds

As to point out the obvious in case anyone missed it:
Cubs, lol

So, once more:


The Dugout

Labels: Chicago Cubs, Mark Prior, Obvious

The Yankees lost to the Red Sox last night 11 to 4 as their only starter who was getting the job done, Andy Pettitte, got demolished.

The Yanks now have the 3rd worst team ERA in the major leagues at 5.12 and at 8-13 they also have the 3rd worst record in MLB.

How could a team getting paid so much be so bad?

Perhaps the worst thing for the Yankees is that many of their hitters including Rodriguez, Giambi, Posada, and Jeter are having great seasons so far. Sure Johnny Damon and Bobby Abreu are underperforming. Matsui has had injury problems and Doug Mientkiewicz and Melky Cabrera suck. But all things considered their offense is performing about as well as it can be expected to perform. They are scoring quite a few runs. In fact, they lead the major leagues in runs scored. The problem is their pitching is just so awful that it doesn't matter how many all star caliber players they have in their lineup.

Just imagine how things would be looking if A-Rod hadn't hit those two walk off homers earlier in the year. 6-15?

Alex Rodriguez does appear to be slowing down and without his heroics the Yankees can't seem to even stay close. In his last 3 games he's 1 for 10 with just 1 single. His numbers have dropped to .365/.429/.941 and he has just 2 games left to hit another homer to break the record for home runs in April. He and Albert Pujols (2006) share the record with 14 currently.

But no, the absolute worst thing for the Yankees right now has to be Mariano Rivera. For so long the Yankees could count on Rivera to come in and shut their opponents down when needed but not this year. Rivera has blown both save opportunities he has had this year and is without a single save through April 27th. Last night he came in for the 9th to try and keep the game within' striking distance. The Red Sox were up 7 to 4 when he entered. Rivera could only get one man out while allowing 3 hits & a walk. All 4 base runners scored for the final 11 to 4 margin. Rivera's season ERA is now an insanely awful 12.15!

Labels: Alex Rodriguez

With Barry Bonds hitting at close to his 2001-2004 level I was wondering when opposing teams would start treating him like this again.

Last night the Arizona Diamondbacks intentionally walked a 42 year old man 3 times and unfortunately the guy batting behind him, Ray Durham, couldn't get the job done.

The Diamondbacks won the game 3 to 2. Giants starter Barry Zito dropped to 2-3 but he pitched a decent game.

For the game Bonds went 1 for 1 (single) with 3 IBB and 1 HBP so Bonds got on base every time he came to the plate to raise his OBP to a ridiculous 2001-2004ish .507!

If this sort of treatment becomes common for Bonds now it's more vital than ever that other Giants hitters start picking up the slack. It may be time to move Bonds back to the 3rd slot so he has more chances of being hit home with all the walks.

I know Bonds has done much better since being moved to the 4th slot but now that he's locked in and getting this treatment it may be time to try and take advantage of the opposing teams fear and have both Aurilia and Durham batting behind him.

Labels: Barry Bonds

Giants 5 Dodgers 4 in Los Angeles

The Giants were able to win tonight without having a great game from either their starting pitcher (Russ Ortiz) or Barry Bonds. This is a great thing for the Giants because they have been relying on excellent starting pitching and Barry Bonds heroics to carry them to most of their victories this season. Tonight it was Barry's supporting cast that came up big in their first sweep in LA since 2002.

Ray Durham & Bengie Molina had the biggest hits of the night and each finished with 2 hits and 2 RBI.

Starting pitcher Ortiz was lucky to allow just 3 runs in his 5 1/3 innings as he put 11 men on base (8 hits, 1 walk, and 2 hbp)

But the Giants relief pitching continued a recent streak of success. The Giants relievers combined to allow just 2 hits in the 3 2/3 innings they came in for and Armando Benitez is now 7 for 7 in save opportunities this year with his ERA dropping to 2.16 after tonight.

Barry Bonds had an uneventful night by his standards going 1 for 3 with an intentional walk and 1 run. The intentional walk was an interesting play though. It was only his 4th of the season and it makes me wonder if Bonds is going to start getting walked like this again (this was not a normal IBB situation) now that everyone can see what he can still do with the bat. This time the IBB backfired in a big way as Bonds as Durham and Molina got hits and Bonds ended up scoring.

The Giants now sit on top of the NL West and only the Red Sox, Indians, and Mets have fewer losses than their 8. This is huge stuff for a team that not too many were giving any chance of success coming into the season and for a team that started the year 2-7. The Giants have now won 8 in a row and 10 of 11.

As good as things are going for the Giants one must be concerned with their overall poor offense and the fact that they only have 2 more runs scored than allowed. They will no doubt need to improve the offense somehow to keep winning.

The pitching is looking pretty good on the other hand. Only the Mets have allowed fewer runs so far this year.

Tonight the Yankees lost their 6th straight game to drop to 8-12 on the season. After dropping 3 games to the Red Sox and 2 more to the lowly Devil Rays, the Yanks lose tonight 6 to 0 to the Blue Jays.

They are now in last place in the AL East 5.5 games behind the Red Sox.

Prized Yankees pitching prospect Phil Hughes made his major league debut and it was less than stellar as he allowed 7 hits and 4 runs in just 4 and 1/3 innings.

But tonight wasn't only about the continued awful pitching from the Yankees it was also about complete failure of their vaunted offense.

The Yankees couldn't score a run tonight and could only muster 4 hits.

How about Alex Rodriguez? 1 for 4 (single.) His average is down to a weak .378 (?)

Barry Bonds and the San Francisco Giants beat the Dodgers again last night for their 7th straight victory and they are now 9-1 since starting the season 2-7. Like so many games recently, the difference was a home run by Barry Bonds. This time it was a 3 run homer in the first inning to give the Giants a 4-0 lead.

This was the Giants 7th straight victory. While their offense is still struggling (they are tied for the second fewest runs in the majors) Barry & the pitching is keeping their win streak and their season alive. They are now only 1 game out of first place (behind the Dodgers) in the NL West. The Giants have allowed the fewest runs of any team in the major leagues.

During these 7 straight victories Bonds has hit 4 home runs and each time his home run has provided the margin of victory. Is there even an argument about who has been the National League's most valuable player so far this year?

Randy Wolf who gave up Bonds' home run said this about it "I think he got it off the end of the bat. When he hit it, I really didn't think it was going to be a home run. I've given up quite a few to know what they sound like, but he's a guy with kind of superhuman power and he doesn't always need to hit it perfectly."

Barry Bonds career milestones:

Bonds passed Willie McCovey to become the Giants all time leader in RBI with 1,389.

Tied Pete Rose for 5th all time in runs scored with 2,165.

Oh yeah and Bonds Bombs Counter: 741

Labels: Barry Bonds

The Yankees have dropped to 8-11 with their 5th straight loss by losing to the should be lowly Tampa Bay Devil Rays again! The Devil Rays are now 1/2 game ahead of the Yankees in the AL East.

For the first time this season Alex Rodriguez went hitless. His 0-3 night dropped him from a .400 to .385 batting average.

The story for the Yanks isn't that A-Rod finally cooled down (for one game anyway) but that the Yankees pitching continues to be absolutely terrible. Coming into this game they were 25th out of the 30 teams in the major leagues with a team ERA of 4.67 but I think they've actually been worse than that makes it seem.

Meanwhile the Mets lead the majors with an insane team ERA of 2.59! (The Mets also lead the majors with a .294 team batting average.)

Somewhat lost in all of the hoopla over A-Rod's great start, Barry's homers, and Dice-K's MLB debut is the fact that Joe Mauer is again flirting with a .400 batting average.

Mauer in fact right now sits exactly at .400 (along with Alex Rodriguez & Matt Holliday.)

Last year Mauer became the first catcher in American League history to lead the AL in hitting. Can he do it back to back? I'm betting on him.

Will he hit .400? Well someone has to do it eventually, might as well be Mauer. It's pretty impressive that this young catcher (he's only just turned 24) is hitting at this level.

Mauer is hitting far better away than at home. In 2006 he hit .359 away from Minnesota but "only" .335 at home. This year he's hitting .448 away and .361 in Minnesota.

Matt Holliday in comparison is reaping the rewards of playing in Denver (just like the incredibly overrated Todd Helton.) Holliday is hitting .439 at home and .359 away. Last year he hit .373 at home and .280 away.

Yes you read that correctly .373 at home and .280 away. To me what you hit away is what kind of hitter you really are. People who complain about steroids hurting the integrity of statistics in MLB are barking up the wrong tree. DENVER IS THE PROBLEM.

OK sorry to Joe Mauer for going off on this rant as this post is supposed to be about him and his amazing hitting. But I think it's a shame that a bullshit hitter like Matt Holliday is even mentioned in the same breathe as a real hitter like Joe Mauer. Denver is a shame and if I had my choice I'd ban Denver before steroids.

Certainly every player who plays their home games in Denver should have an asterisk placed by their statistics and should be made ineligible to lead the league in anything.

Labels: Joe Mauer

The Yankees lost again tonight. They now have an 8-10 record. Despite scoring boatloads of runs they can't seem to get it going because their pitching is pure crap.

Their starting pitching is atrocious other than Andy Petite and this year even the bullpen has become suspect with Mariano Rivera showing serious signs of slippage.

This means the Yankees are wasting one of the greatest Aprils in the history of baseball. Alex Rodriguez hit 2 more home runs tonight to tie Albert Pujols record from last season of 14 for April. Rodriguez also went for 4 for 5 and now has a .400 batting average for the year.

A-Rod's Crazy #'s: .400 AVG, .453 OBP, 1.053 SLG, 14 HR, 26 R, 34 RBI

He's now on pace for 126 home runs and 306 RBI. Not to mention 270 hits and 234 runs. Add that to a .400 batting average and you have I don't know, RIDICULOUS?! When is this guy going to slow down?

It's really amazing that the Yankees have the loaded lineup they do and that they are getting one of the greatest Aprils in history from Alex Rodriguez and they are still sitting at 8-10.

Labels: Alex Rodriguez

There have been 3 very good things about the Giants this season:

1) Barry Bonds hitting at a level very close to his 2001-2004 peak. (.348/.466/.804)

2) Rich Aurilia hitting well above his career average. (.323/.357/.462)

3) The Giants starting pitching dominating.

The Giants won today because of #1 and #3 (Aurilia went 0 for 3 today to snap a 14 game hitting streak.)

Barry Bonds hit his 6th home run of the year and Matt Cain pitched a complete game 3 hit, 1 run masterpiece to lower his season ERA to 1.55, although Cain has pitched excellently in every game this year this was his first victory due horrible run support by the Giants.

While Cain has been the hottest Giants pitcher in the rotation, the other Giants pitchers are doing great too. Matt Morris is 2-0 with a 2.00 ERA. Noah Lowry has a 2.70 ERA. Barry Zito has recovered from a poor beginning to his Giants career, and now has a 3.70 ERA for the season after not allowing a run in either of his last two starts. Russ Ortiz is coming off of a solid start as well in which he allowed only 2 runs in 7 innings.

The Giants 2-1 victory today means that the Giants swept the Arizona Diamondbacks to go over .500 for the first time this year with a 9-8 record. The Giants have now won 5 games in a row.

The Giants have allowed only 7 runs in their last 4 games. To give a good example of how dominant their starting pitching has been this year: They have allowed 2 or less runs in 10 of their 17 games this year.

The problem with the Giants is that other than Bonds, Aurilia, and Ray Durham they've been struggling at the plate. The Giants cannot expect Bonds to continue to hit at this pace at his age (although I'm certainly hoping...) and they cannot expect their starting pitching to stay this dominant. They need to get more runs from their offense. Looking at their lineup it's hard to see where those extra runs are going to come from.

Bonds Bombs Counter: 740.

Labels: Barry Bonds

Earlier today I posted an entry about 10 early season stars. This entry is the other end of the spectrum: 10 players off to a really slow start.

Manny Ramirez - Ramirez is a career .313 hitter with 471 home runs. He's hitting a paltry .179 this year with a horrid .250 slugging percentage. The Red Sox are doing well despite this awful hitting by their cleanup hitter which is a very good sign for their team as Ramirez is sure to heat up eventually.

Albert Pujols - Pujols and the Cardinals are struggling. The defending champion Cardinals are at 7-10 and have been having a hard time scoring runs recently. Pujols who has a career batting average of .330 is hitting just .203 this season.

Doug Mientkiewicz - The next to nothing production the Yankees are getting from their first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz is a big part of their struggles this year. He's hitting .128 with a .205 slugging percentage. He's not a great hitter anyway (career .268/.358/.403) but the Yankees certainly expect more than .128 from him.

Gary Sheffield - Ouch. Sheffield has not delivered for the Tigers so far. His season stats thus far include a .119 batting average and .186 slugging percentage.

Melky Cabrera - Cabrera has been another weak link in the Yankees lineup thus far. He's hitting .210 which isn't all that shockingly bad. It's when you see that his slugging percentage is also .210 where it gets really concerning for Yankees fans. As is clear from his slugging percentage: Cabrera has yet to have an extra base hit in 62 at bats. He's also got a paltry 1 walk which has helped him to a hideous .231 OBP.

Gary Matthews Jr. - Matthews Jr. had a breakthrough season last year and then had a nasty spring season in which he was finger pointed for HGH use. Whatever he's taking it's not helping this year. He's hitting .217 with a .233 slugging percentage. He has just one extra base hit all season (a double.)

Jermaine Dye - One of the top hitters in the AL last season, Dye is off to a poor start with a .204 batting average, .310 OBP, and .408 SLG.

Carlos Zambrano - Zambrano has been solid each of the last 4 years but is off to a crap start this year at 1-2 with a 7.77 ERA. He has the worst ERA in the majors for any pitcher with 20 or more innings (there's 61 one of them currently.)

Mariano Rivera - 2 save opportunities, 2 blown saves. Season ERA: 8.44!

Adam LaRoche - LaRoche has the worst batting average of any qualified hitter in the majors. He's hitting exactly .100 but does have a couple of homers so his slugging percentage of .240 is a bit higher than some of the other hitters on this list. LaRoche hit .285 with 32 homers last year.

Dishonorable Mention for Sammy Sosa because he's actually doing better than I thought he would with his 4 homers and 11 RBI. But his overall numbers are still pretty crap: He's hitting just .204 and has a .232 OBP.

Barry Bonds went 2 for 3 with a solo home run today. Bonds is now hitting .349 with 5 home runs. Bonds has been extremely hot recently: He is .588 with 4 homers in his last 6 games.

Barry Zito pitched 7 1/3 scoreless innings and is now 2-2 with a 3.70 ERA for the season. Zito started the season poorly with 2 losses and an ERA over 8 for his first two starts as a Giant. But he's now won 2 in a row without allowing a run in either game.

Bonds' homer was the only run of the game as the Giants moved to .500 for the first time this season by beating the Arizona Diamondbacks 1 to 0.

The Diamondbacks fell to 10-9, 0.5 games ahead of the Giants.

Bonds Bombs Counter: 739 (16 more to tie Aaron.)

Labels: Barry Bonds

The 2007 season is almost 3 weeks old now. Let's take a look at 10 early season MLB stars:

Alex Rodriguez - Certainly the hottest player in the major leagues. Rodriguez is finally playing up to his talent level and doing all of the things that the Yankees are paying him for. His April may go down as the greatest April in MLB history. We'll see if he keeps this up and do a comparison at the end of the month. Right now his numbers are astounding. In 15 games he has 12 homers and 30 RBI. He's hitting .371 with an incredible 1.048 slugging percentage. He's already hit 2 walk off home runs this year. He's carrying the Yankees on his back right now and they are still only 8-7 but without A-Rod they may be 5-10. His dominance has been incredible. He has 5 more home runs than anyone else in the league. He has more home runs than numerous entire teams (see earlier blog entry about that.) Perhaps most amazing is that his league leading RBI total (30) is TWICE as many as second place man Michael Cuddyer of the Twins.

Barry Bonds - Barry is proving to everyone that he can still hit. It's doubtful that there has ever been a better 42 year old hitter in the history of baseball. He has recovered from a slow start (and not coincidentally so have the Giants) and now has some mighty fine numbers for the young season. Bonds is hitting .325 and has a league leading .700 slugging percentage. He's hitting .571 with 3 homers in his last 5 games.

Vladimir Guerrero - Vlad is leading the AL in batting average at .388 and he's slugged 4 homers. His Angels are having a disappointing season so far but it's certainly not Guerrero's fault.

Joe Mauer - Mauer shocked baseball last year with his .400 tease. Although his average dropped towards the end of the season, he still became the first catcher to ever lead the AL in hitting. This year he is looking to prove it was no fluke. The 24 year old catcher is off to a very good start in doing just that. He's hitting .377 and he's got an awesome .476 on base percentage.

Ian Kinsler - Who? Exactly. Kinsler is a young player (24) who is swinging a big bat for the Rangers early in the year. His batting average is sitting at .333 and his 7 home runs are more than anyone not named Alex Rodriguez. He's second in the AL (behind A-Rod) with an .833 slugging percentage.

Tim Wakefield - Wakefield is 2-1 with a 1.35 ERA which leads the American League. His season ERA is usually over 4 but there was one big exception which was 2002. He finished the 2002 seasons 11-5 with a 2.81 ERA. The Red Sox would like to see him do something similar (or even better, of course) this year.

Rich Hill - The Chicago Cub's Hill has been lights out this year. He's leading the NL in most pitching statistics including Wins (3), ERA (0.41), WHIP (0.68), and opp avg (.113), He's also currently enjoying a scoreless innings streak of 16. He's 27 but has very little MLB experience, coming into this season with only 20 career starts. It will be interesting to see if this is an early season aberration or if Hill is going to be a star pitcher for the Cubs.

Hanley Ramirez - Last year's NL rookie of the year is not experiencing any sort of sophomore jinx so far. Florida's SS is currently 3rd in the NL with a .373 batting average and 5th with a .627 slugging percentage.

Daisuke Matsuzaka - Despite his record being 1-2, Dice-K is living up to the hype. He has 24 strikeouts in 20 innings and a 2.70 ERA. All eyes will be on Matsuzaka Sunday as he pitches for the first time against the Yankees.

Joe Saunders - Perhaps a somewhat sentimental choice for the early season stars as Saunders is the only Virginia Tech alumni in the major leagues but he's got the numbers to back up this selection. He is 2-0 with a 1.96 ERA. Last night he pitched 6 scoreless innings in getting the win for the Angels while wearing a Virginia Tech cap (Bud Selig gave him special permission to do so.)

The last 15 years or so in the major leagues have been marked by huge offensive numbers. Feats which were rare in the past such as hitting 50 home runs became common place.

The early results this year show a swing back to the pitchers a bit.

If you look at team batting averages you'll see that currently 17 of the leagues 30 teams have a team batting average of under .250, last year there was not a single team that finished the year under .250, now obviously the season is young and I don't expect 17 teams to finish under .250 but it's definitely quite an interesting situation.

The overall major league batting average last year was .269, so far this year it's at .251, the combined MLB slugging percentage has dropped from .432 to .393!

Now these hitting struggles do not apply to New York City. The top two hitting teams so far this year are the Mets at a ridiculous .303 and the Yankees at .283

Another strange fact of this young season. So far the NL is out hitting the AL .253 to .247, usually of course the AL has a higher batting average due to the DH rule.

Here's a comparison of the past 8 seasons (including this one.)

YEAR - AL - NL
2007 - .247 - .253
2006 - .275 - .264
2005 - .268 - .262
2004 - .270 - .263
2003 - .267 - .261
2002 - .264 - .259
2001 - .267 - .261
2000 - .276 - .266

Most interesting to me is how much the AL has dropped. 28 points so far, the NL drop of 11 points isn't nearly as dramatic. Very interesting indeed. Any conspiracy theories you'd like to provide to explain this huge drop in AL offense?

Another example on how ridiculous A-Rod's season has been so far: He now has more home runs than 8 teams in the major leagues.

Rodriguez has a total of 10 home runs.

These are the teams he is besting as of now: (3 of them are the favorite teams of BigShowBaseball.com contributers...)

Oakland A's - 6 (ihateu)
Colorado Rockies - 7
San Francisco Giants - 7 (that's me)
Washington Nationals - 8
LA Dodgers - 8
Minnesota Twins - 8
LA Angels - 8
St. Louis Cardinals - 9 (ryan)

He's also tied with the Kansas City Royals at 10 homers.

Perhaps even more crazy is the fact that his 26 RBI in 14 games isn't all that far behind the LA Angel's team total of 37 RBI in 15 games.

Alex Rodriguez hit another walk off home run today to help the Yankees come from behind to beat the Indians 8 to 6. It was a 3 run homer as he came to the plate with the Yanks down 6 to 5 with 2 outs. Rodriguez has gone from the goat of the past to the hero of the present.

Rodriguez's stats for the young season are incredible. Nearly Bondsian.

Current Numbers
Batting Average: .351 (Bondsian.)
OBP: .421 (Not quite Bondsian.)
SLG: .965 (Bondsian.)
HR: 10 (Bondsian.)
Strikeouts: 17 (17 strike outs in 61 at bats? Definitely NOT Bondsian here.)
Walks: 7 (Nope.)
RBI: 26 (Well Barry never batted cleanup for an all star team.)

And to drag out the old tried & true "at this rate..."/"on pace for..."

A-Rod is on pace for 116 HR and 301 RBI.

Of course there's no way he can keep up this pace all season but I must admit those particular numbers are even past Bondsian!

Last Night:

John Maine of the Mets took a no hitter 7th inning before it fizzled out. The Mets still won the game against the Marlins 9 to 2. The Mets have gone their entire franchise history without a single no hitter.

Meanwhile the White Sox had their 16th no hitter in their franchise's history. To be fair to the Mets in this comparison, the White Sox are a much older franchise.

Mark Buehrle threw his first career no-hitter for the White Sox and was very close to throwing a perfect game. He faced the minimum of 27 batters. The only runner to get on board was Sammy Sosa who was walked in the 5th inning. Sosa then got picked off first. Good going Sammy!

Buehrle is now 1-0 with a 2.08 ERA for the year as his first 2 starts were no decisions. The White Sox have won all three of his starts this year.

Last night the Giants beat the Cardinals 6 to 5 in 12 innings. The 12th inning hero was Rich Aurilia who knocked in the winning run in the 12th inning with mighty Barry on deck.

Bonds hit #738 in the 8th inning to tie the game 5 to 5. It was an absolutely towering shot that splashed into McCovey Cove. It was his first "splash" home run of this season. He is now 17 behind Hank Aaron for the all time home run record.

Bonds season stats: .306 AVG, 4 HR, 10 RBI, .458 OBP, .694 SLG (1.152 OPS which is best in the NL)

Look at those numbers and then remember that this man is 42 years old. Absolutely incredible. Sure it's still early but if he can finish the season with numbers in that range certainly there would have to be new words created to describe his greatness.

Luckily for the Giants, Bonds is not the only hot hitter, Rich Aurilia has been having a great season and last night's game winning hit is just another example of what he can do with the bat. Aurilia is 8th in the NL currently with a .353 batting average.

For the Cards, Albert Pujols showed signs of awakening from his early season slumber. He came into this game with a .160 batting average. He's now up to .200 after going 3 for 5 including his 4th home run of the season.

They play again this afternoon. Unfortunately for the Giants and their fans it's unlikely that Bonds will start today because of it being a day game after a night game, especially since last night's game went so late. Bonds has only sat out 1 game so far this year.

Labels: Barry Bonds

What teams are off to a better than expected start?

The Cincinnati Reds are currently 8-6 and sitting on top of the NL Central. They were picked finish dead last in this division by Sports Illustrated. While it's early and 8-6 isn't *that* impressive, it's still a pretty good way to start the season.

The Seattle Mariners are another team that was selected by SI to finish last in their division (the AL West) and yet are currently leading. They have a 5-4 record and 17 scoreless innings pitched by their phenomenal ace Felix Rodriguez. Rodriguez takes the mound again tonight.

The season is still extremely young and there's still a very good shot both of these teams will indeed end up last place in their respective divisions of course but hey *golf clap* to a nice start! I sure wish my San Francisco Giants were among the teams doing better than expected, but no, they seem to suck just as everyone thought they would!

Who is the greatest Yankee of all time at each position?

Well first let's set the criteria. I'm only going to consider what a player did with the Yankees. For example Alex Rodriguez's seasons with the Mariners and the Rangers don't come into play when considering his place among the all time great Yankees.

The New York Yankees All Time Team (With Stats As A Yankee)

First Base - Lou Gehrig (.340 AVG, 493 HR, 1995 RBI, .447 OBP, 632 SLG)

This is no a brainer. Gehrig is arguably the greatest first baseman to ever play the game. He played his entire career with the Yankees. He was nicknamed the "Iron Horse" because of playing in 2,130 consecutive games. This was the major league record for over 50 years until Cal Ripkin broke it in the 1990s.

Choosing Gehrig's greatest season is difficult because he had so many great years but I have to go with 1927 as Gehrig's greatest. In 1927 he won the MVP over Babe Ruth with a .373 batting average and a .765 slugging percentage.

Gehrig was a Yankee from 1923 to 1939. 17 Seasons. He won 6 World Series with the Yankees. In 34 World Series games he hit .361 with 10 home runs and a .731 slugging percentage.

Second Base - Tony Lazzeri (.293 AVG, 169 HR, 1154 RBI, .379 OBP, .467 SLG)

Lazzeri had his best season in 1929 when he hit .354 with 18 home runs. Lazzeri was a Yankee from 1926 to 1937. 12 Seasons. He won 5 World Series with the Yankees.

I also considered Willie Randolph for this position. Randolph had a .275 batting average for the Yankees while playing in the 10th most games in Yankees history with 1694. Randolph is also second in Yankees history with 251 stolen bases.

Shortstop - Derek Jeter (.317 AVG, 183 HR, 863 RBI, .388 OBP, .462 SLG)

Jeter has become a modern legend of Yankees baseball. He is rapidly climbing the all time Yankee leader board in multiple categories. His greatest season so far was 1999 when he hit .349 with 24 home runs and a .552 slugging percentage.

Jeter has been a Yankee his entire career which began with a short stint in 1995. This year is his 13th in the major leagues. He's won 4 World Series titles with the Yankees. He's hit .302 in the 6 World Series he has been a part of.

Third Base - Alex Rodriguez (.301 AVG, 127 HR, 378 RBI, .398 OBP, .560 SLG)

Yes this is based on the three years (and the helluva start he's had this year) A-Rod has played for the Yankees. 3B has not been a very strong position for the Yankees compared to the other positions. In fact if it wasn't A-Rod I might have gone with Wade Boggs here who is of course much more known for his work with the Red Sox. Boggs did hit .313 in 2600 plate appearances for the Yankees.

Rodriguez's best season with the Yankees so far has been 2005 when won the MVP hitting .321 with 48 home runs. Although many Yankees fans seemed to immediately forget how good he was all year due to his poor post season.

This is Rodriguez's 4th year with the Yankees, as is well known among New Yorkers he has yet to appear in the World Series. Although he is well known for his post season failures, his career post season batting average of .280 isn't that bad. It's his recent lack of success going 3 for 29 combined in the '05 and '06 postseasons that has hurt his reputation.

Outfield - Babe Ruth (.349 AVG, 659 HR, 1975 RBI, .484 OBP, .711 SLG)

Well this was a really difficult selection? Babe Ruth's numbers speak for themselves. He holds many Yankees records and as you probably know he even "built" Yankee Stadium.

Ruth's best year stat wise was probably his first with the Yankees in 1920. He took advantage of Polo Grounds with an .849 slugging percentage which stood as the single season record for 81 years until Barry Bonds broke it in 2001. He also broke his own record for home runs in a season with 54, this record would only last until next season when he would break it again with 59 home runs. Finally in 1927 he would break the record again with 60 home runs. This record stood until another Yankee Roger Maris broke it in 1961 with 61.

Just to add to his ridiculous resume he also won 5 games without a loss as a pitcher with the Yankees.

Ruth played 15 seasons with the Yankees from 1920 to 1934. He won 4 World Series with the Yankees. He hit .344 with 15 home runs in the 7 World Series he played in for the Yankees. (He also won three World Series with Boston in 1915, 1916, and 1918 before the Red Sox wisely sold him to the Yankees.)

Outfield - Mickey Mantle (.298 AVG, 536 HR, 1509 RBI, .421 OBP, .557 SLG)

Mantle played his entire career with the Yankees. He won 3 MVP awards with his best seasons coming in 1956 & '57. '61 was a really good one too although that year he finished second in the MVP voting to his teammate Roger Maris.

Mantle played 18 seasons from 1951 to 1968. Mantle played in 12 World Series for the Yankees and won 7. He hit 18 World Series home runs.

Outfield - Joe DiMaggio (.325 AVG, 361 HR, 1537 RBI, .398 OBP, .579 SLG)

DiMaggio also played his entire career for the Yankees. His best year statistically was probably 1939 when he hit .381 with 30 home runs but his most famous season is 1941 when he hit safely in 56 consecutive games which is of course still the record today for longest hitting streak.

DiMaggio was out of action from 1943 to 1945 because of World War II. He was in the prime of his career at the time.

DiMaggio won an astounding 9 World Series championships in his 13 seasons with the Yankees.

Catcher - Yogi Berra (.285 AVG, 358 HR, 1430 RBI, .348 OBP, .483 SLG)

Berra won 3 MVP awards but his best offensive season came in 1950 when he finished 3rd in the voting. In 1950 he hit .322 with 28 home runs and 124 RBI.

Berra played all but 4 games of his career for the Yankees. In '65 he played 4 games for the Mets. His career for the Yankees spanned from 1946 to 1963 for a total of 18 seasons. During that period he played in an incredible 14 World Series and won 10. He hit 12 World Series home runs during his career.

DH - Don Mattingly (.307 AVG, 222 HR, 1099 RBI, .358 OBP, .471 SLG)

Mattingly only played 76 games as a DH, I am including him at this position because I think he's the most deserving Yankee hitter that I was not able to include among the "regular" positions.

Mattingly played his entire career for the Yankees. His best year was either 1985 when he hit 35 home runs and had 145 RBI or 1986 when he hit .352 with 31 home runs. He won the MVP in '85 and finished second in '86.

Mattingly played 14 seasons from 1982 to 1995. The Yankees did not make it to the World Series during these years.

Other Yankee hitters I considered for this position include Earle Combs, Bill Dickey, Bob Meusel, Paul O'Neil, Bernie Williams, Ricky Henderson, and Reggie Jackson.

Starting Pitcher - Whitey Ford (236 Wins, 2.75 ERA)

Ford's best years came in 1963 (24-7, 2.74) & 1964 (17-6, 2.14) or perhaps 1958 when he had a 2.01 ERA. Maybe most impressive is that he won his only Cy Young award in 1961 when he had one of his highest single season ERAs at 3.21, in fact the only year he was higher than that was his last full season in the majors in 1965 when he had a 3.24 ERA. When your career worst single season ERA is 3.24 you know you are a good pitcher. He has the 3rd highest career winning % of any pitcher in the modern era with at least 100 wins at .690.

Ford was a Yankee for his entire 16 year career from 1950 to 1967. He missed two seasons in '51 and '52 due to military service in Korea.

Ford pitched in 11 World Series, the Yankees winning 6 of them. He went 10-8 with a 2.71 ERA in his World Series career.

Starting Pitcher - Lefty Gomez (189 Wins, 3.34 ERA)

Gomez's best year came in 1934 when he went 26-5 with a 2.33 ERA.

He spent his entire career except for one game he started for Washington in 1943 with the Yankees. He pitched for the Yankees for 13 seasons from 1930 to 1942.

He won 5 World Series with the Yankees and went 6-0 with a 2.86 ERA in 7 World Series starts.

Starting Pitcher - Red Ruffing (231 Wins, 3.47 ERA)

Ruffing was with the Yankees from 1930 to 1946. He had four 20+ win seasons and they were right in a row from 1936 to 1939. His best season coming in 1939 when he went 21-7 with a 2.93 ERA.

He won 6 World Series with the Yankees and went 7-2 with a 2.63 ERA in 10 World Series starts. Had 8 complete games in those 10 starts.

Starting Pitcher - Mel Stottlemyre (164 Wins, 2.97 ERA)

Stottlemyre's best year came in 1968 when he went 21-12 with a 2.45 ERA along with 19 complete games and 6 shutouts.

Stottlemyre pitched his entire 11 year career with the Yankees. He played from 1964 to 1974. The Yankees only went to the World Series one time during that period, his rookie season in 1964. The Yankees lost that World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals. Stottlemyre was 1-1 with a 3.15 ERA in 3 World Series starts.

Starting Pitcher - Spud Chandler (109 wins, 2.84 ERA)

Chandler won the MVP (the only Yankee pitcher to ever do so) in 1943 with a 20-4 record and a 1.64 ERA

Chandler was with the Yankees for his entire career which was from 1937 to 1947. Chandler turned 30 years old during his rookie season because he went to college and then spent 5 years in the minor leagues. He missed most of 1944 and 1945 due to joining the army to fight in World War II. His best three seasons were '42, '43 and '46 so one has to wonder what great years he missed in '44 and '45. Those missed seasons along with his very late start makes Chandler an interesting "What If?" As he seemingly could have had a hall of fame career if things had worked out a little differently.

Chandler holds the record for the highest career winning percentage of all time for any pitcher with more than 100 wins.

He won three World Series with the Yankees. He had a 2-2 record with a 1.61 ERA in World Series play.

Relief Pitcher - Mariano Rivera (413 Saves, 2.31 ERA)

Rivera has spent his entire 13 year career with the Yankees from 1995 to present day. His best year so far was in 2005 when he had a minuscule 1.38 ERA to go along with 43 saves. His high year for saves came in 2004 with 53. Rivera has been one of the few relief pitchers in the history of baseball who has been able to perform consistently over a long period.

He's won 4 World Series with the Yankees and his overall post season stats are incredible. He has 34 post season saves with a 0.80 post season ERA.

Labels: All Time Team, New York Yankees

My choices for the 5 best hitters in the Major Leagues (2007 stats in parenthesis)

1. Barry Bonds (.303 AVG, 3 HR, 8 RBI, .465 OBP, .636 SLG)

Barry #1? He only hit .270 with 26 home runs in 2006. He's 42 years old. How could I choose him as #1? Well his 2001-2004 seasons were not merely good. They were 4 of the greatest seasons in the history of baseball and because of that I feel the title "greatest hitter in the game" is his to lose. I don't feel he lost it last year despite his poor numbers (by Barry standards, he still had the best OBP in the major leagues last year, think about that.) because he was never really healthy and when he finally got kind of healthy towards the end of the year he was knocking the cover off the ball. This year he's healthy and this year he will prove he is still the best hitter in the major leagues, not only now, but ever.

2. Albert Pujols (.160 AVG, 3 HR, 7 RBI, .263 OBP, .380 SLG)

Pujols is the easy choice for best hitter in the game. He was the best hitter of 2005 and 2006 which to most will make him the choice this year. I understand this and it makes quite a bit of sense. I would have succumbed to the pressure of consensus and placed him at #1 but he's off to a horrendous start this year. I'd be willing to place a large bet that Barry Bonds will have a higher OPS than Albert Pujols this season.

3. Alex Rodriguez (.375 AVG, 8 HR, 21 RBI, .448 OBP, .979 SLG)

A-Rod has failed so miserably in the playoffs recently that many people have forgot what a great hitter he is usually. He is making people remember that this year. He's off to a blazing start. And while last year was a failure by his standards by most players standards it was still a very good season. He hit .290 with 35 home runs in 2006.

4. David Ortiz (.267 AVG, 4 HR, 12 RBI, .365 OBP, .622 SLG)

Ortiz had 47 homers and 148 RBI in 2005, 54 & 137 in 2006. This guy just gets it done. Unlike Rodriguez, Ortiz has made a name for himself with his clutch hitting.

5. Jim Thome (.306 AVG, 3 HR, 6 RBI, .479 OBP, .611 SLG)

Thome will most likely join the 500 home run club this year. He's hit at least 42 home runs in each of his last 5 full seasons. He seems somewhat overlooked quite often so here you are Jim, getting looked at.

Sorry to Jermaine Dye, Miguel Cabrera, Jason Giambi, Ryan Howard, Justin Morneau, Joe Mauer, Manny Ramirez, Vladimir Guerrero, and all the other excellent hitters to not make my fantastical list. Better luck next time!

The Giants may have a star on their hands with pitcher Tim Lincecum. He was a college baseball star with the Washington Huskies where he was a two time Pac-10 pitcher of the year. The Giants selected him 10th in the 2006 draft.

He's now 3-0 in the minor leagues with 28 strike outs in 18 2/3 innings pitched. 0 runs allowed. With the Giants bullpen in disarray many Giants fans are calling for Lincecum to be called up to be a closer but certainly the Giants want him to be a starter.

Could the Giants move one of their current starters (Russ Ortiz? Matt Morris?) for a reliever (Brad Lidge?) Complete conjecture but Giants fans feel something must be done about the bullpen which is blowing games seemingly every chance they get.

Matt Cain pitched another tremendous game and comes away with nothing due to a pathetic performance by the Giants 'pen.

Last week Cain took a loss 1-0 while allowing 1 hit (and 1 run) in 7 innings. Last night he pitched 7 scoreless innings allowing just 2 hits. He left the game after 7 innings with the Giants up 3 to 0.

Then the 8th inning came. The Rockies scored off of three different Giants relievers (you call THAT relief?!) to take a 5 to 3 lead that would up as the Giants couldn't muster anything in the top of the 9th.

The good news for the Giants is that their starting pitching is looking really good right now. 22 year old Matt Cain although he still winless on the year with a 0-1 record is pitching like an Ace. He has allowed 8 hits this season in 20 innings with 17 strikeouts. His ERA is 1.80 and his opponents batting average is an incredible .125! On Monday Barry Zito threw 6 scoreless innings while winning his first game for the Giants. Matt Morris is 2-0 with a 2.38 ERA and although Noah Lowry has been very unlucky with a 0-2 record he's got a 2.77 ERA.

The other good news is that Barry Bonds seems to be on a roll. He went 1 for 1 (double) with 3 walks in getting on base on all 4 PA last night. His OBP is now .465 and he's got a .303 batting average with a .636 slugging percentage.

The bad news? They are still having trouble scoring enough runs as evidenced by tonight's game and the bullpen is absolutely awful. Oh yeah and they are 4-8 which puts them 5 games behind the LA Dodgers already.

Unquestionably the most quoted baseball player of all time is Yogi Berra. He just had a way with words. Here are some of his best quotes:

"So I'm ugly. So what? I never saw anyone hit with his face."

"You can't think and hit at the same time."

"It's so crowded, nobody goes there anymore." - Talking about a restaurant.

"I Knew I was going to take the wrong train, so I left early."

"I don't know. I'm not in shape yet." - When asked what his baseball cap size is.

"A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore."

"You're never out of it till you're out of it."

"When you get to a fork in the road, take it."

"If people don't want to come to the ballpark, how are you going to stop them?"

"We have deep depth."

"If the world were perfect, it wouldn't be"

"It's deja vu all over again."

"It was hard to have a conversation with anyone; there were so many people talking."

"Thank you for making this day necessary." - On being honored by fans in his hometown of St. Louis.

"I'm not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did."

"I don't know if it's good for baseball, but it sure beats the hell out of rooming with Phil Rizzito" - About his teammate Joe DiMaggio marrying Marilyn Monroe.

"I never said half the things I said."

You probably just laughed when you saw the title of this post. And hey, I don't blame you. I just put a "vs." in between the 2006 National League MVP and a guy who has trouble hitting anything offspeed and looks like a lost child in the outfield. It is a no brainer, right?

Wrong. I am not going to compare their careers (even though they've just begun), because obviously, Ryan Howard would win that without a doubt. I'm going to compare their rookie years, which are a lot closer in terms of numbers than most people would think.

Ryan Howard won the 2005 NL Rookie of the Year. You all know the story. Jim Thome was the Phillies' first baseman at the time, but people around baseball knew that the team couldn't hold back Howard for very long. When Thome went down with an injury, Howard busted out.

Duncan has had a much quieter first leg of his career. He was called up for 9 games in September of 2005, and hit the last regular season home run in the Old Busch Stadium. Being the son of Cardinals' pitching coach Dave Duncan, many wondered if Chris was getting his chance at the big leagues because of who his father was. He proved them wrong in 2006. A first baseman originally, Duncan was switched to an outfielder because some guy named Albert Pujols looks to hold down that job for another 15 years or so. Duncan was shaky defensively, but he had tons of raw power. However, when it came time to vote on 2006 Rookie of the Year, Duncan was nowhere near the top.

Take a closer look, though, and you will see that Howard and Duncan had very similar numbers. I'm not saying that Duncan will smack 58 home runs this year or win an MVP, as Howard did in his second year in 2006, but let's take a look at the numbers, and you will see that I'm not so crazy.

Games Played/At Bats

To set the tone for this whole comparison, we have to look at games played and at-bats. Duncan had the edge in games played, leading Howard 90-88. However, Duncan played in a platoon in the outfield and was used as a pinch hitter off of the bench occasionally. Howard, on the other hand, became the everyday first baseman after Thome was injured, giving him the edge in at-bats 312-280.

Chris Duncan: 90 GP, 280 AB
Ryan Howard: 88 GP, 312 AB

Advantage: Howard

Hits/Average/Runs Scored

Although he led in at-bats, Howard only had 8 more hits than Duncan, leading 90-82. That gave Duncan a .293-.288 advantage in the batting average department. Regardless of having less at bats, Duncan still scored 8 more runs than Howard, 60-52. It helped Duncan to have Albert Pujols hitting behind him, though.

Chris Duncan: 82 H, .293 AVG, 60 R
Ryan Howard: 90 H, .288 AVG, 52 R

Advantage: Duncan

Extra Base Hits/HR/RBI

This category is pretty even, for the most part. In the case of extra base hits, Howard led in the doubles department 17-11. Duncan held the edge in triples, though, 3-2. That brings us to the category that everyone looks at: home runs. And wouldn't you know, we've got a tie. Each player had 22 HRs their rookie campaign. The difference between the two? Howard had 20 more RBIs than Duncan, 63-43. However, just like with the run stat, their place in the lineup probably determines this one. Duncan bat in 2nd most of the year, whereas Howard was usually in the 3rd of 4th spot.

Duncan: 11 2B, 3 3B, 22 HR, 43 RBI
Howard: 17 2B, 2 3B, 22 HR, 63 RBI

Advantage: Howard. However, if Duncan had close to the same number of at bats, would this be a push? It's hard to say.

Strikeouts/Walks

Howard struck out 100 times in 2005. Duncan only struck out 69 times in 2006. Howard held the edge in walks 33-3o.

Duncan: 69 K, 30 BB
Howard: 100 K, 33 BB

Advantage: Duncan.

OBP/SLG

Chris Duncan, surprisngly, owns this category. His OBP was .363 and his SLG was .589. Howard, meanwhile, had an OBP of .356 and a SLG of .567.

Duncan: .363 OBP, .589 SLG
Howard: .356 OBP, .567 SLG

Advantage: Duncan

Hardware

Ryan Howard won some hardware in his rookie year: the 2005 NL Rookie of the Year trophy. Chris Duncan won some hardware, too: a World Series trophy.

Advantage: Push

Final Stat Line

Chris Duncan: 90 GP, 280 AB, 82 H, .293 AVG, 60 R, 11 2B, 3 3B, 22 HR, 43 RBI, 69 K, 30 BB, .363 OBP, .589 SLG, 1 World Series Ring

Ryan Howard: 88 GP, 312 AB, 90 H, .288 AVG, 52 R, 17 2B, 2 3B, 22 HR, 63 RBI, 100 K, 33 BB, .356 OBP, .567 SLG, 1 Rookie of the Year Trophy

3 Advantages to Duncan, 2 Advantages to Howard, 1 Push

So how do you call this one? Certainly, Howard had more of an impact with voters' and gained more noteriety throughout his rookie campaign. Chris Duncan was mostly known as the guy dropping balls in the outfield for the Cards. However, when you see the numbers, he holds an advantage in several categories.

So what's the final decision? Who had the better rookie season? I'm going to say PUSH. I bet some of you are quite surprised to see that Duncan actually had a comparable, if not better, rookie season that Ryan Howard. So I am making it a push so that you all can personally decide for yourself who had the better rookie campaign. Obviously, Howard went on to have an amazing season in 2006. Do I think Duncan will have a season like that in 2007? No, I don't. Do I think he will be as good as Howard is as a ballplayer? Probably not. But you never know. Regardless, Duncan's rookie season is no fluke. He has gotten off to a hot start in 2007 and he looks to build on his success. As for Howard? Expect the same. Howard and Albert Pujols will be the dominating prescence at 1B in the National League for years to come, and will battle it out for MVP year after year. Only time will tell if Duncan can become a dominating presence at the plate like Howard has become.

This is why I love baseball. It's amazing when you lay the numbers out, isn't it?

Are you looking for a high quality frequently updated blog for your favorite team or for the team your team is playing? I've scoured the internet to find the best blog available for every MLB team. They are as follows, alphabetically:

Arizona Diamondbacks - AZ Snakepit

Atlanta Braves - Braves Journal

Baltimore Orioles - Camden Chat

Boston Red Sox - Joy Of Sox

Chicago Cubs - Bleed Cubbie Blue

Chicago White Sox - South Side Sox

Cincinnati Reds - Cincinnati Reds Blog

Cleveland Indians - Let's Go Tribe

Colorado Rockies - Purple Row

Detroit Tigers - The Detroit Tigers Weblog

Florida Marlins - Fish Stripes

Houston Astros - The Crawfish Boxes

Kansas City Royals - Royals Review

LA Angels - Halos Heaven

LA Dodgers - True Blue LA

Milwaukee Brewers - Brew Crew Ball

Minnesota Twins - Nick & Nick's Twins Blog

New York Mets - Mets Blog

New York Yankees - Replacement Level Yankees Blog

Oakland A's - Athletics Nation

Philadelphia Phillies - The Good Phight

Pittsburgh Pirates - Bucs Dugout

San Diego Padres - Gaslamp Ball

San Francisco Giants - McCovey Chronicles

Seattle Mariners - Lookout Landing

St. Louis Cardinals - Viva El Birdos

Tampa Bay Devil Rays - A Tampa Bay Devil Rays Blog

Texas Rangers - Lone Star Ball

Toronto Blue Jays - Batter's Box

Washington Nationals - Capitol Punishment

Barry Bonds went into tonight's game hitting .192 with .346 slugging pct.

He's now hitting .276 with a .621 slugging pct.

Bonds went 3 for 3 with 2 home runs and 4 RBI tonight in the Giants 8 to 5 win over the Pirates.

The Giants will need a lot more of these kind of games from Bonds to have a shot at making the playoffs this year.

This was Bonds 70th career multihomer game. The major league record is 72 by Babe Ruth.

Bonds Bombs Counter: 737

Labels: Barry Bonds

"He pitches as though he's double parked" - Vin Scully on Bob Gibson.

"Blind people come to the park just to listen to him pitch" - Reggie Jackson on Tom Seaver.

"He's much more intelligent than I am because he doesn't have a 95 or 98 mile per hour fastball. I would tell any pitcher who wants to be successful to watch him, because he's the true definition of a pitcher." - Randy Johnson on Greg Maddux.

"It actually giggles at you as it's going by." - Rick Monday on Phil Neikro's knuckleball.

"I call Mo' 'the Equalizer.' I mean, I can't tell you how comforting it felt to have him come in when I left the game." - Roger Clemens on Mariano Rivera.

"Greg Maddux could put a baseball through a life saver if you asked him." - Joe Morgan on Greg Maddux.

"Trying to hit him was like trying to drink coffee with a fork." - Willie Stargell on Sandy Koufax.

Felix Hernandez threw a one hit shut out against the Red Sox tonight in Boston. Prior to the game all of the excitement was building up for Dice K's home debut. And while Dice K pitched a pretty good game allowing 3 runs in 7 innings, he was over shadowed by Hernandez's outstanding performance. Hernandez carried a no hitter all the way into the 8th inning.

Hernandez threw 8 shut out innings on opening day so he's now pitched a total of 17 scoreless innings this season with only 4 hits allowed. A Pretty Good Start to the season, no?

---
Seattle Side Note: Seattle is 3-2 (17 scoreless innings pitched by Hernandez has helped their cause) but their hitting has been awful in this early season. Suzuki at a .222 batting average is the only hitter in the 1 through 5 slots over .200

The Giants have fallen to 1-6 despite holding the Padres to 2 hits and 1 run last night. Matt Cain threw 6 innings of no hit ball and it still wasn't enough for the Giants hitters who couldn't muster a single run.

The Giants have now scored 14 runs in 7 games. They have 2 home runs for the season. There are 7 players who have more home runs by themselves including Alex Rodriguez with 5. Jose Reyes has 10 runs for the Mets, the way things are going he may pass by the Giants soon.

The Giants starting pitching (other than Zito) has been pretty good. It's the hitting that's killing them. They have to start scoring some runs or this season will be over very soon. All that will be left is the wait for Bonds to break Aaron's record.

It'd be much nicer from my perspective if Bonds were to break Aaron's record in the midst of a pennant chase rather than while the Giants are 25 games out of first place.

In other news the Yankees have 5 guys in their starting 9 hitting at least .346 (Damon, Jeter, Abreu, Rodriguez, Posada) which has helped them score 41 runs in 6 games, three times as many as the Giants in one less game.

Hello again, folks! It's Ryan here and I'm about to hit you with my take on some of the recent happenings in baseball. We are going to start with one of my favorite subjects.

Brad Lidge Demoted as Astros Closer

Let's face it, folks, Albert Pujols ruined this guy's career. He has never been the same. Scott Podsednik may have helped him out a little, but the one that really damaged him was the fastball that he grooved down the middle of the plate to lose Game 5 of the 2005 NLCS. Even though the Astros ended up beating the Cards in 6 that year, Lidge apparently now has what they call in baseball circles as, "The Thing." It is that "thing" that is stuck in your mind and will not allow you to do your job.

Rick Ankiel was the same after throwing several wild pitches in Game 1 of the 2000 NLDS. He could never get the ball over the plate the same after that. He is now in the Cardinals minor league system trying to latch on as an outfielder. He's a superb athlete and he is doing really well for a position change that far into his career.

But back to Lidge. Yesterday, the Astros were down 5-0 in the 9th against the Cardinals. Albert Pujols came up to face Lidge with runners on first and second and one out. Pujols grounds to short, but Adam Everett booted the ball and instead of an inning ending double play, the bases were loaded with Scott Rolen coming to the plate. Lidge then surrenders a bases clearing double to Rolen, as the 'Stros defecit increased to 8.

Why Phil Garner did not pull Lidge here, I don't know. But he left him in and allowed another batter to reach base before Yadier Molina came to the plate. At one point in the at-bat, Lidge threw a high fastball that almost caught Molina in the head, knocking him to the ground. The very next pitch, Molina doubled in two more runs to increase the score to 10-0.

At this point, Garner finally pulled Lidge, who left to boos. Of course he did. Fans were calling for his head after he blew a save in the season opening game against the Pirates.

You have to wonder how things would have changed if Everett wouldn't have booted the sure double play ball. Lidge would still be the closer. And who knows? Maybe his psyche would be slightly repaired by getting Pujols out.

But like so many times in baseball, the error was costly. Not only did it officially put the game out of reach, but it cost Lidge his job. For a man who has great stuff, Lidge has lost the ability to get out of the 9th inning regularly.

The closer is baseball's most unpredictable position. The career life of a closer is often short and usually ends in a very ugly fashion. Ask Mark Wohlers or Mitch Williams, among others. Some can bounce back. Just look at Dennis Eckersly. Giving up one of the most famous home runs to Kirk Gibson could have derailed his career. But he had the mental makeup to bounce back and finish off his Hall of Fame career. The closer position is a crapshoot.

Brad Lidge was on his way to being the next Trevor Hoffman, Billy Wagner, etc. But instead, with one pitch, Lidge's career came crashing down for everyone to see. Now he will be stuck in 6th and 7th inning duty for the Astros, instead of one of the best closers in the game. Amazing how one pitch can change things.

Tribute to Jackie Robinson

I think it is absolutely fantastic the way the MLB is handling the Jackie Robinson tribute. For a league and a sport that has been under the microscope for the steroid scandal, they've shoved all of that aside by handling themselves in a classy way to celebrate the 60th anniversary of one of the game's most important players entering the league.

Without Robinson, who knows where the game would be? He handled all of the pressure of being the first African-American in the league, as well as the racism that came with it, in a way that most of us may not have been able to. He was an amazing player and person.

Now the league is letting players, and in some cases, entire teams wear the league-wide retired #42 on Sunday April 15, in tribute. Banding together players of all races, creeds, and beliefs to pay homage to Jackie Robinson is a fantastic tribute. The league hit a home run with this one.

And Finally, My Thoughts on the Cardinals...

Yeah, I have to do it. The Cards had a rough start but have rebounded to win their last two and they are now 3-4. The Cardinals were in quite a funk in their first series against the Mets, in which they were swept. But their offense is coming around, and after Sir Albert busted out of his early slump with a 2 run home run, it was a sign that things are starting to come together.

But the real story has been the pitching of the Cardinals. Yesterday, Kip Wells got the W in a game in which his stat line looked like this: 7.0 IP, H, 7K. Wow.

Braden Looper, career reliever, got his first win as a starter today against the Pirates going 7 innings, giving up 2 hits, and striking out 3.

Adam Wainwright had a great start the other night against the Astros, as well, to get his first win as a big league starter. He's been a career starter every year he's played professionally, except for last year. So this is not a surprise, but it is a good thing to get that first win out of the way, especially at the worst park in the league for pitchers.

The only concern with the starting rotation is Chris Carpenter. After his opening night loss, his arm swelled up and had fluid in the elbow. Not a good sign. Hoewver, things were looking up near the end of the week, as the swelling went down. Carpy threw a bullpen session on Friday or Saturday, but his arm swelled back up. He did not make the trip to Pittsburgh, as he is back in St. Louis having an MRI today. The Cardinals called up Randy Kiesler from AAA Memphis to start in place of Carpenter tomorrow night.

As a fan, I'd like to see Carpenter get back as soon as possible. But I also know that if they rush him back, his history of arm problems could catch up to him and force him to miss a big chunk of the season.

For now, I think the Cardinals will be fine with the rotation they have. As long as their offense keeps warming up, the Cardinals may get back to their winning ways.

I also want to give props to Yadier Molina, who has carried over his hot hitting from the postseason (in which he led the Cardinals in hits) and spring training to the regular season. That is good news from a guy who hit .216 last year. Molina in quite possibly the best defensive catcher in the game, and if not, he will be. He is only 24 years old and a future Gold Glove winner, as well as a future All-Star. Adding offense to his phenomenal command behind the plate, Yadi is rounding himself into a complete catcher.

That is all for me today. Great baseball action in the first week and I hope it keeps up so we have an enjoyable 2007 season. Enjoy the games, folks!

The first week of the MLB season is over. Who are the seven biggest losers of the first week? (Teams & Players)

1. San Francisco Giants 1-5

Disappointing start for the Giants to say the least. The pitching has been decent at best and the offense has been awful. The Giants have scored only 14 runs, the fewest in the major leagues. I made some predictions about how great the Giants were going to be this year. Looks like that's going really well, eh?

2. Barry Bonds & Barry Zito

The Barry Brothers as I like to call them. Both off to pretty crap starts for the Giants which of course has quite a bit to do with the #1 selection. Zito is off to an 0-2 start with an 8.18 ERA. Bonds is hitting .222 during the first week. Interestingly him hitting 3rd seems to be working as he's now got 4 hits in 5 first inning at bats but unfortunately he's a hitless in 13 at bats in the 2nd through 9th innings. I'm sure there are other players that should be included here but these guys are included because I'm a Giants fan and I was (and am still trying to be...) so hopeful about their performance this year.

3. Houston Astros 1-5

Not only are they 3 games out of first place already but they are killing their shot at getting Roger to come back to Houston.

4. St. Louis Cardinals 2-4

The defending champions are 2-4 and got swept by the Mets in the first series. Not exactly the way they wanted to start the season.

5. New York Yankees 2-3

The Yankees are 2-3 which isn't that bad I suppose but I really wanted to include them. Plus you have to consider they have started their season against the awful Devil Rays and O's. They are actually lucky not to be 1-4 because of A-Rod's grand slam Saturday night.

6. Washington Nationals 1-6

18 runs scored. 45 runs allowed (by far league worst.) I only ranked them 6th because everyone knew they would be bad but they may be even worse than expected.

7. Philadelphia Phillies 1-5

The Phillies have got off to a slow start and they are already 4 games behind the Braves. They are going to have to get their act together fast because the NL East has the best teams in the NL in my opinion (besides the Nationals of course...)

The Mets are dominating early. They've now scored 41 runs while allowing 3 through their first four games.

These Mets are not going to need a miracle to win the NL, I think it's more like the rest of the NL will need a miracle to beat them!

Ah yes, that was witty. You know the Miracle Mets of '69. I was there. No, maybe not. Whatever, my point is the Mets are kicking some serious ass.

My San Fran Giants on the other hand dropped to 1-3 tonight. They managed to score just 1 run on 12 hits in their 2 to 1 loss to their rival the LA Dodgers. Bonds went 0-4. In good Giants news Noah Lowry pitched a real good game and the Giants have got pretty decent performances from their starting pitching overall. It's been their offense that just isn't producing enough runs that's the problem. Their relief pitching has been very shaky so far too. Definitely an area of concern.

I may back off my bold statements about I made about Bonds earlier. I still think he's going to have a really good season but I guess I do have to realize he is 42 going on 43.

The Twins got their game tonight postponed. The Twins and the Mets are the only undefeated teams left.

In the very good news department the Yankees have dropped to 1-2 in giving the mighty Orioles their first win of the season.

Dice K got off to an awesome start to his MLB career today by throwing 10 strike outs in 7 innings and allowing just 1 run (a home run) and 6 hits (and 1 walk) as the Red Sox beat the Royals 4 to 1.

Red Sox fans have to be excited. (Forrest?)

If this start is not a fluke and in fact a good indication of Dice K's skills then the Red Sox may have one of the best rotations in baseball (and then if Rocket is comes back to Boston?..)

I got to say, people of the universe, I think the Red Sox are going to top the Yankees this year in the AL East.

Labels: Boston Red Sox, Dice K

The season is just a few days old but some teams have got off to a very good start while others have started off sluggishly. Let's take a gander at the early season winners & losers.

Here's a look at the teams who are 3-0:

New York Mets

The Mets look great. I expect the Mets to have the best record in the NL this season they are doing a good job of living up to the hype early. Sweeping the defending champion Cardinals in the first series of the year is quite a way to start. Not only did they win all three games but the combined score of the the three games was 20 to 2. Ouch! The offense looks great and the pitching even better. How about John Maine last night? 7 innings of 1 hit ball. Offensively the Mets have been rolling in particular Beltran, Reyes, and Lo Duca are off to fast starts. Delgado and Valentin are struggling but I don't think anyone is too worried about that the way things are going now.

Minnesota Twins

Justin Morneau and Joe Mauer are picking up right where they left off last year. These guys are two of the best players in the majors. Morneau won the MVP last year and he's looking like he wants to challenge for another one this year. Mauer is looking like he may be one of the best hitting catchers ever. He's only 23 and he's got a career batting average of .322 with a .400 OBP and .472 SLG. He became the first catcher ever to win the AL batting crown last year at .347, surely that's just a fluke? After 3 games this season he's sitting at .455 (ah I love early season crazy numbers.)

LA Angels

These numbers say it all: Angels team batting average: .337, Angels team ERA 1.67. Sports Illustrated picked the Angels to win the World Series this year and Vladimir Guerrero (.545 batting average) and Gary Matthews Jr. (.500 avg) and the rest of the Angels are making SI's prediction look quite likely.

Pittsburgh Pirates

This is only the crap team sitting at 3-0. Are the Pirates going to surprise people this year or is this merely an early season fluke? I'm betting on fluke myself. They swept the Astros in their opening series and the Astros aren't too good either. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if you are a Pirates fan you should enjoy this while you can. How about Salomon Torres 3 saves in the first 3 games? Surely he will continue this pace and finish the year with 162 saves, no?

&

How about the 0-3 teams?

St. Louis Cardinals

This is the other side of the Mets series which means the defending champs have scored 2 runs in three games while giving up 20. Luckily for the Cards they are playing in a pretty weak division that they can probably win again with a win total in the low 80s. Are they distracted by the Tony LaRussa debacle? Are they satisfied after winning the rings last year? Did they run into a really good Mets team pissed off from last year? Some combination of the the three maybe. Regardless I wouldn't be *too* worried if I'm a Cards fan. I still think they are going to win their division. I think the Mets are the best team in the NL by quite some margin so it's not an easy early series either. The biggest early season disappointment has to be Albert Pujols who is just 1 of 10. Clearly Pujols will not continue to hit .100, expect the Cards to be up at .500 sooner rather than later.

Baltimore Orioles

The Orioles suck. Their team average in the first series against the Twins? .192 and that's despite Aubrey Huff hitting .455 in the series. Expect a lot more where this came from. The Orioles are going to finish well under .500 this season.

Texas Rangers

So far Sammy Sosa has 1 single in 7 at bats. Slammin' Sammy indeed. One can hope this is an indication of how Sosa's season will go. The Rangers have a team batting average of .161 after three games and not even one player hit .300 in their series against the Angels. Usually you have at least one lucky bastard, you know? The Rangers also suck. The Cards are not in good company!

Houston Astros

Another reason the Cards have no reason to get too concerned, last years biggest challengers are also 0-3. My bold prediction is that this years Houston team will be as much of a challenge. Clemens is not going to waste his time trying to save these guys again. Craig Biggio will get his 3000th hit this year but that's about all of the good news coming out of Houston.

Barry Bonds hit a solo home run in the first inning last night for his 735th career home run and his first of the season. 21 more to break Hank Aaron's record. Unfortunately he went hitless otherwise (1 for 4 for the game) and the Giants suspect relief pitching gave up 2 runs in the 8th inning to lose the game to the Padres 5 to 3.

It was also his 86th career home run against San Diego, his most against any one team.

In other Barry news, he had a running catch in the 3rd inning that took away what looked to be an easy double and another Padres run. Bonds is looking very agile and in great shape as the season starts. Has he turned back the clock 5 years this season? We hope so.

The Giants are now 0-2. (Obviously then the Padres are 2-0, eh?)

As a Giants fan I'm excited about how Barry is starting off the season but I'm very concerned about the team overall. The relief pitching is going to be a problem for sure and we need better performances out of Zito and Cain.

Bonds Bombs Counter: 735

Bonds Season Stats:

.286 Avg
.375 OBP
.714 SLG
1 Home Run

Chris Young became the 435th pitcher to surrender a home run to Barry.

Young's also got a bit of a streak going for himself. He is now 9-0 with 16 no decisions (he got a no decision in this game as well) over his last 25 road starts. This means he's gone 25 consecutive road starts without picking up a loss. This ties him with Allie Reynolds who set the mark of 25 in 1949-50. Young's teams have gone 17-8 during those 25 games.

Labels: Barry Bonds

What will the Yankees do without Damon? Well it's nothing serious, he may not even have to go on the DL.

Melky Cabrera is taking his place for now. Cabrera is one of the few players on the Yankees who wasn't purchased for some ridiculous amount of money in the free agent market.

He's an actual home grown Yankee!

In other words, he's not that good.

The Yankees will surely be trying to buy another all star if Damon can't come back healthy.

Labels: New York Yankees

I've changed the look again. The site was loading up kind of slow so I took out some things and sort of streamlined it a bit. I think this will make it easier to get around. I'm also adding team specific pages which will include information on buying tickets. They'll also include an "All Time Team" for each team and team records/stats.

Opening day for the Padres and the Giants and I'm here to report on the action as it happens.

If you are a Giants or Padres fan watch this space for live updates! I'll be updating this entry at the end of each half inning.

The Giants have their new ace Barry Zito starting the game. The Padres start Jake Peavy. Both Zito and Peavy had disappointing years last year. Zito went 16-10 with a 3.83 ERA and Peavy went 11-14 with a 4.09 ERA.

Brian Giles hit a double and Adrian Gonzalez hit a single to knock in Giles and give the Padres a 1-0 lead.

Overall Zito looked pretty good in the first inning despite allowing the run.

Now the Giants are up. Bonds is batting third now so he is guaranteed to come up in the first inning. New lead off hitter Dave Roberts is up first. Not an awful at bat but he's out on 5 pitches. Ball hit on the ground towards first base. Vizquel struck out. Bonds got a full count and then hit a ground ball towards the gap at third for a single. Bonds 1 for 1 batting 1.000 my friends. Bonds steals second! Ray Durham now with an RBI opportunity hits the ball to SS for what looks like an easy out but the 1B drops the ball on the throw. Bonds sees this and runs for home unfortunately for the Giants the Padres recover and he's thrown out at home.

Top of the second goes easily for the Giants. Padres down 1 2 3. Bonds looks good in LF on the third out. Giants fans all over have to be happy with what they are seeing from Barry Bonds early. He looks healthy, much healthier than last season.

Padres up 1 to 0 going into the bottom of the second inning.

The Giants have Aurilia, Molina, and Feliz coming up. I'm happy that the Giants have moved Molina up in the lineup from the projection I listed earlier today. Feliz put up a pretty good battle but the Giants went down in order as well.

Padres up 1 to 0 after 2.

Padres down in order in the top of the 3rd. Zito is looking really good. Unfortunately for Giants fans (and you may have noticed this includes ME) Peavy has looked very good too.

The Giants have Winn, Zito, and Roberts coming up. I don't remember where I read it but I do remember reading that Zito likes to hit and that's one of the reasons he came to the NL so I'm interested to him up at the plate.

Well he didn't look too good. He's 1 for 30 life time now. Two outs.

Roberts got to first base on a short hit that Peavy dropped. He really showed his speed on this hit. Unfortunately Vizquel couldn't take advantage. He lined out to center. Bonds will lead off the 4th for the Giants.

At the end of 3 innings it's still Padres 1 and the Giants 0.

Top of the 4th is going badly for the Giants. Zito walks the lead off hitter Mike Cameron who comes around and scores on Josh Bard's single up the middle. Feliz makes an error on the next ball hit in play to put men on first and second. Another hit loads the bases and then Zito walks in a run! Luckily Zito was able to get Peavy to hit into a double play to stop the bleeding.

The Padres are up 3 to 0 after 3 and a half innings.

Bonds walked on 5 pitches to start the Giants half of the 4th inning. Durham strikes out. Aurilla pops up. Molina pops up. Ouch! Hate to see Bonds' walks wasted like that. Peavy is looking very much in control.

Zito had a good top of the 5th with 2 strike outs.

Padres 3 to 0.

In the bottom of the 5th Winn is walked and so Zito is PH for with Lance Niekro. Unfortunately Niekro is struck out anyway. Roberts flies out to end the inning. Jake Peavy is just rolling through the Giants with ease right now. Still 3 to 0.

Top of the 6th goes easily for the Giants and relief pitcher Kevin Correia. 3 up and 3 down.

Time for the Giants to make some noise!

Vizquel, Bonds, and Durham are due up.

Vizquel flies out. Bonds grounds out to first. Durham gets a hit. Actually the first real hit of the game for the Giants. Can the Giants get something started? It's up to Rich Aurilia. Aurilia gets it to a full count and hit the ball pretty solidly but alas just a fly out. Inning over and it's still 3 to 0.

The Padres have tagged another run on their lead. It's now 4 to 0 heading into the bottom half o the 7th. Things do not look good for the San Francisco Giants.

The Padres have made what I hope to be a huge mistake. They've replaced Peavy who was just mowing down the Giants. Cla Meredith has relieved him. Molina singles off him to give the Giants some hope. Unfortunately Feliz strikes out. But Winn singles. Men on first and second. Some excitement in San Fran? Ryan Klesko is pinch hitting for the pitcher. He hit .280 last year.

Ouch. Double play. I think that was the Giants big chance but the top of the lineup is up next inning.

After 7 innings it's Padres 4 & Giants 0.

After the Padres top of the 8th it's 7 to 0. I was worried about the Giants relief pitching and today's game certainly hasn't changed that. Just ouch all around my friends. Awful day for the Giants.

Sure now the top of the lineup comes up but it's probably way too late to make a difference. Giants need a miracle starting now!

No miracle but Bonds hit a fly ball to the warning track which while it doesn't count for anything was a nice display of power. 1 for 3 with a walk for the game for Barry.

Still 7 to 0 with one inning left.

Final Score

Padres 7, Giants 0.

Great game for Padres starter Jake Peavy who pitched 6 scoreless innings with 6 strike outs and only 3 hits allowed and Padres catcher Josh Bard who went 4 for 5.

Labels: San Diego Padres, San Francisco Giants

The Giants start their season today against the San Diego Padres.

In my opinion the Giants are being underrated by the so called baseball experts. I am expecting a huge season out of the Giants and I think they will contend for a playoff spot.

The Giants projected line up looks like this (with 2006 Stats) :

1. Dave Roberts, CF - .293, 49 SB

2. Omar Vizguel, SS - .295, 24 SB

3. Barry Bonds, LF - .270, 26 HR

4. Ray Durham, 2B - .293, 26 HR

5. Rich Aurilla, 1B - .300, 23 HR

6. Pedro Feliz, 3B - .244, 22 HR

7. Randy Winn, RF - .262, 11 HR

8. Bengie Molina, C - .284, 19 HR

Bonds will surely DH in all AL games with Ryan Klesko or Jason Ellison taking his spot in the OF

Looking at this lineup I'm struck by a few positive things. First of all I believe that Bonds good finish to last year and his great spring training point to a possible return to something close to his 2001-2004 numbers. I'm very hopeful that he'll put up numbers far surpassing .270 and 26. Even last year when he struggled he lead MLB in OBP. Bonds is still one of the biggest impact offensive players in the major leagues. This fact is being overlooked by most sportswriters simply because they do not like him. This is a big factor in the Giants being underrated this year. Another positive point is that the top of the line up looks stronger than it has in recent years. There is now speed at the 1 and 2 slots especially Roberts as the lead off man with 49 steals. This should give Bonds some excellent opportunities. I also feel that Bonds has more protection than he has recently with Durham & Aurilia coming off great years. If Durham and Aurilia can match last year they should be good enough in the 4 and 5 slots. I also think Molina is a strong hitter to have in your 8th slot. He hit .284 last year with 19 home runs. Very good for an 8th slot hitter and for a catcher.

I'm also happy that Bonds is batting 3rd. He's not gone along with it in the past but now he seems happy to be hitting 3rd. This will allow him to get up in the first inning of every game and should get him more PA. I think this will make for more productive first innings and get the Giants off to a good start more often. I also think it's important for the Giants run production for Bonds to be surrounded by decent hitters both in front and behind him. The Giants are quite weak at #6 with Feliz only hitting .244 last season.

Certainly it's not an overpowering line up. But if Bonds can come close to his 2001-2004 production and the rest of the line up can have above average seasons I think that people will be surprised by the level of run production this line up can create.

Pitching. I'm very excited by the pitching of the Giants this year. I'm looking for a break out year for both Matt Cain and Nick Lowry. I'm also looking for Barry Zito to return to his Cy Young level. The Giants are not a very good defensive team and that will put even more pressure on the pitchers. The Giants and their fans have to hope that every pitcher in the rotation all pitches up to their potential.

The projected rotation is as follows:

1. Barry Zito: 16-10, 3.83 ERA
2. Matt Cain: 13-12, 4.15 ERA
3. Matt Morris: 10-15, 4.98 ERA
4. Noah Lowry: 7-10, 4.74 ERA
5. Russ Ortiz: 0-8, 8.14 ERA

The relief pitching may be one of the biggest problems for the Giants. Hopefully Armando Benitez can improve on last years 17 saves and 3.52 ERA

Labels: Barry Bonds, San Francisco Giants

Yesterday was the first full set of games in the major leagues. An exciting day for baseball fans everywhere.

American League

Yankees 9, Devil Rays 5 in New York.

A Rod and the Yanks get off to a fast start. Well actually they got off to a rocky start with starting pitcher Carl Pavano allowing 4 runs in the 5th inning to put the Yanks behind 5 to 3. But the Yankees ridiculously loaded lineup was able to easily come back against the awful Devil Rays. They scored in the 6th, 7th, and 8th innings. Rodriguez went 2 for 5 with a home run. So the Yankees were able to start off with a win despite poor pitching and poor defense (3 errors including an error each by the happy couple of Rodriguez and Jeter.) This game is a likely indicator to how things will go all season. The Yankees can afford awful pitching and poor defense because their lineup is so stacked. But again I think it will catch up to them in the playoffs when they are playing talented teams and against the top pitching.

Mariners 4, A's 0 in Seattle

20 year old (21 on April 8th) Felix Hernandez got the season off to a great start by pitching 8 scoreless innings with 12 strike outs. He allowed just 3 hits and 2 walks.

Blue Jays 5, Tigers 3 in Detroit

Can Detroit prove last year was more than a fluke? They are not off to a good start with this 10 inning loss to the Blue Jays.

Twins 7, O's 4 in Minnesota

2006 AL MVP Justin Morneau starts off the year by going 3 for 4 with a home run.

Indians 12, White Sox 5 in Chicago

Jose Contreras has a 63.00 ERA after allowing 7 earned runs (and another unearned) in the first inning. Bad news for White Sox fans and for anyone who has Contreras on their fantasy team.

Angels 4, Rangers 1 in LA

Sammy Sosa goes 0 for 3 in his return to the Rangers all these years since Dubya traded him away. I predict Sosa to have a season similar to that of 1989 when he was last with the Rangers. Although already he has more walks than he did that season. He was walked once in this game while in 1989 he had 84 at bats without a single walk.

Royals 7, Red Sox 1 in Kansas City

Both the Red Sox and the Yankees started their seasons out against poor teams. Unfortunately for the Red Sox they lost their first game as Curt Shilling got shelled. He allowed 8 hits and 5 runs in only 4 innings.

National League

Marlins 9, Nationals 2 in Washington

They're still the Expos to me. For Florida Dontrelle Willis got off to a good start with just 1 earned run in 6 innings. Marlins lead off man SS Hanley Ramirez started the year off with 4 hits including 2 doubles. Miguel Cabrera had 3 hits with a home run and 4 RBI.

Diamondbacks 8, Rockies 6 in Denver

Forget steroids. Games in Denver throw off the numbers to a far greater degree. Todd Helton has a career .333 batting average yet would be struggling to even attain a career .300 batting average if he had played his career in San Francisco for a great example. Seriously. I'm not joking. Look at these combined numbers from 2004 to 2006. Helton hit .353 with a .613 SLG at home during this period and .293 with a .473 SLG on the road. Sure it's normal for a player to have better numbers at home but not that kind if disparity year after year. I'd ban Coors Field before steroids. Coors Field has a much bigger impact on the numbers. If a truly great player ever plays for the Rockies it will make a true mockery of all MLB records. Oh yeah and the Diamondbacks won this game.

Braves 5, Phillies 3 in Philadelphia

After failing twice at bunting ahead the runner in the 10th inning Edgar Renteria hit a 2 run homer that put the Braves in the lead. They held the Phillies scoreless in the bottom of the 10th for the win. This was the usually light hitting Renteria's second homer of the game. He hit a solo shot in the 8th inning that had tied the game at 3. This was the 6th career multihomer game for Renteria. His career high for home runs in a season is 16.

Pirates 4, Astros 2 in Houston

The Astros wasted a good start by Roy Oswalt who allowed just 1 earned run in 7.2 innings. Jason Bay hit a 2 run home run in the 10th inning to give the Pirates the lead & the win as the Astros were held scoreless in the bottom of the 10th.

Brewers 7, Dodgers 1 in Milwaukee

Good news for Giants fans like myself. The Dodgers vaunted pitching staff is off to an awful start with Derek Lowe allowing 6 earned runs in 4 innings. The Brewers' Ben Sheets on the other hand started the year off with a complete game 2 hit gem. He allowed 0 walks.

Reds 5, Cubs 1 in Cincinnati

Read Ryan's entry for this one.