THT Daily: Division races
by Matthew CarruthAugust 30, 2007
Major League News for August 30
LinksPlayer News
Yesterday’s Results
Today’s Games
Standings
Top Minor League Performances
Stats
You can always find the most recent THT Daily at http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/content/thtdaily/
Links
To be in a pennant race - The Good Phight gives us a taste of what it's like, for all fans of less fortunate teams.
Equal opportunity - Cyril Morong over at Beyond the Box Score takes a quick look at how integration might have impacted Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb.
G.O.A.T. - Baseball Musings points out that the Padres are on pace for a historically high run differential; amazing since they're in a division race with a team with a -38 differential.
Really? - NY Daily News: "The tide in the AL East race may very well be turning." Really? Really?
Desperate - The Dodgers successfully claimed Esteban Loaiza off waivers.
THT Links represents the best efforts of our editors in scouring the various tubes of the interweb for both relevant and irrelevant news items. If you have happened upon a story that we have overlooked or wish to give feedback of any sort, please notify us at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Player News
Player news items are provided by RotoworldAccording to the Boston Globe, Manny Ramirez's strained left oblique will sideline him "indefinitely."
Meanwhile, the Boston Herald quotes Ramirez as saying that he may miss as many as 10 games. "I don't think it's going to be a couple of days," manager Terry Francona said. "It's more likely to be multiple days as opposed to tomorrow. I think we need to play this one out. He's still pretty sore." Francona added that Ramirez has been playing through back problems for six weeks, which may help explain why he's hitting just .253 with two homers this month.
Ben Sheets came off the DL Wednesday to help spark Milwaukee to a much-needed 6-1 win over the Cubs.
This was just the Brewers fourth win in 15 games. Sheers lasted six innings in his first outing since July 14, improving to 11-4 by giving up just six hits and a run, striking out two and walking one. He's lowered his ERA to 3.30.
Aaron Harang tossed a two-hit shutout Wednesday to lead Cincinnati to an easy 8-0 whitewash of the Pittburgh Pirates.
Harang's 14th win of the season was masterful, as he needed just 94 pitches -- 70 strikes -- to polish off the Pirates. He struck out eight, walked one, hit one and lowered his ERA to 3.51 with this effort, his fourth straight win.
Manny Ramirez is out of the lineup for Wednesday's game with what the Red Sox are now calling a strained left oblique.
That's worse than a minor back issue. Still, the Red Sox are listing him as day-to-day and seem optimistic that he'll be able to play this weekend. Eric Hinske is starting in left field tonight.
Erik Bedard will miss his start Saturday versus the Red Sox because of a sore oblique.
Bedard said the injury has been bothering him for three or four weeks, which serves to explain some of his recent mediocre performances. The Orioles will go with Radhames Liz on Friday and Garrett Olson on Saturday, which seems like more bad news for the Yankees.
Yesterday’s Results
American League TB 5 BAL 4 (Recap and Boxscore) NYA 4 BOS 3 (Recap and Boxscore) CLE 4 MIN 3 (Recap and Boxscore) KC 5 DET 0 (Recap and Boxscore) OAK 5 TOR 4 (Recap and Boxscore) LAA 8 SEA 2 (Recap and Boxscore) TEX 5 CHA 4 (Recap and Boxscore) National League ATL 7 FLA 4 (Recap and Boxscore) PHI 3 NYN 2 (Recap and Boxscore) MIL 6 CHN 1 (Recap and Boxscore) HOU 7 STL 0 (Recap and Boxscore) CIN 8 PIT 0 (Recap and Boxscore) LAN 10 WAS 9 (Recap and Boxscore) SD 3 ARI 1 (Recap and Boxscore) COL 8 SF 0 (Recap and Boxscore)
Today’s Games
National League --------------- New York Mets at Philadelphia Phillies, 1:05 PM (R) Orlando Hernandez (9-4) vs. (R) Kyle Lohse (7-12) St. Louis Cardinals at Houston Astros, 2:05 PM (R) Joel Pineiro (3-1) vs. (R) Matt Albers (3-6) Cincinnati Reds at Pittsburgh Pirates, 7:05 PM (R) Matt Belisle (7-8) vs. (R) Matt Morris (8-8) Milwaukee Brewers at Chicago Cubs, 8:05 PM (L) Manny Parra (0-1) vs. (L) Ted Lilly (13-7) Arizona Diamondbacks at San Diego Padres, 10:05 PM (L) Doug Davis (11-11) vs. (R) Chris Young (9-4) American League --------------- Boston Red Sox at New York Yankees, 1:05 PM (R) Curt Schilling (8-5) vs. (R) Chien-Ming Wang (15-6) Detroit Tigers at Kansas City Royals, 2:10 PM (R) Jeremy Bonderman (10-7) vs. (R) Leo Nunez (2-1) Tampa Bay Devil Rays at Baltimore Orioles, 7:05 PM (L) Scott Kazmir (10-8) vs. (R) Jeremy Guthrie (7-4) Seattle Mariners at Cleveland Indians, 7:05 PM (L) Horacio Ramirez (8-4) vs. (L) Aaron Laffey (2-1) Chicago White Sox at Texas Rangers, 8:35 PM (L) John Danks (6-12) vs. (R) Kevin Millwood (8-11)
Standings
The graphics next to each team are called "sparklines.” They depict each team’s performance over the last month. Each "up" bar is a victory and a "down" bar is a loss. There are horizontal lines for home games and red bars represent games decided by two runs or less. "PWins" is short for Projected Wins, based on each team’s Run Differential, and is often a better measure of a team’s true strength. Other team graphs and stats can be found on our Team Page.American League East Pwins Diff BOS 80 53 .602 0.0 85 -5NYA 74 59 .556 6.0 80 -6
TOR 67 66 .504 13.0 71 -4
BAL 58 73 .443 21.0 61 -3
TB 53 80 .398 27.0 51 2
American League Central CLE 75 57 .568 0.0 73 2
DET 71 62 .534 4.5 72 -1
MIN 67 66 .504 8.5 69 -2
KC 59 72 .450 15.5 62 -3
CHA 57 76 .429 18.5 52 5
American League West LAA 79 54 .594 0.0 76 3
SEA 73 58 .557 5.0 66 7
OAK 66 69 .489 14.0 68 -2
TEX 60 72 .455 18.5 63 -3
National League East Pwins Diff NYN 73 59 .553 0.0 71 2
PHI 70 62 .530 3.0 70 0
ATL 69 65 .515 5.0 72 -3
FLA 58 76 .433 16.0 60 -2
WAS 58 76 .433 16.0 56 2
National League Central CHN 67 64 .511 0.0 70 -3
MIL 66 66 .500 1.5 64 2
STL 64 65 .496 2.0 58 6
CIN 61 72 .459 7.0 61 0
PIT 59 73 .447 8.5 59 0
HOU 59 74 .444 9.0 58 1
National League West SD 73 59 .553 0.0 73 0
ARI 74 60 .552 0.0 63 11
LAN 70 63 .526 3.5 69 1
COL 68 65 .511 5.5 71 -3
SF 61 73 .455 13.0 66 -5
Wildcard Standings American League SEA 73 58 .557 0.0 NYA 74 59 .556 0.0 DET 71 62 .534 3.0 MIN 67 66 .504 7.0 TOR 67 66 .504 7.0 National League PHI 70 62 .530 0.0 LAN 70 63 .526 0.5 ATL 69 65 .515 2.0 COL 68 65 .511 2.5 MIL 66 66 .500 4.0
Top Minor League Games
The following list, provided by First Inning, includes the top minor league batting (based on Runs Created) and pitching (based on Game Score) performances from yesterday.ORG LVL PLAYER AB H 2B 3B HR BB SO Notes LAA AAA Brandon Wood...... 4 2 1 0 1 0 0 BAL A Billy Rowell...... 5 3 2 0 0 0 0 CHC AAA Eric Patterson.... 4 3 2 0 0 1 0 TB AA Reid Brignac...... 4 2 0 0 1 1 1 ARI AA Joshua Ford....... 4 2 0 0 2 1 1 SD A Cedric Hunter..... 3 2 2 0 0 1 1 CLE AAA Andy Marte........ 5 1 1 0 0 0 0 STL A- Jonathan Edwards.. 5 4 1 0 1 1 0 ARI AA Aaron Cunningham.. 5 3 1 0 1 0 0 LA AAA Tony Abreu........ 4 2 2 0 0 0 0 SEA AAA Bryan LaHair...... 5 3 2 0 0 0 0 BOS AA Jeff Natale....... 2 2 2 0 0 1 0 ORG LVL PLAYER IP H R ER SO BB HR Notes KC AAA Luke Hochevar..... 8 6 2 1 5 0 1 TOR AA Ricky Romero...... 7 5 1 1 7 2 0 WAN AAA Collin Balester... 6 2 1 0 4 0 0 LAA A+ Stephen Marek..... 8 4 2 2 7 1 1 15 GB CIN AA Johnny Cueto...... 6 4 2 2 9 3 1 DET AA Dallas Trahern.... 6 5 4 3 7 3 1 11 GB WAN A+ Clint Everts...... 4 1 0 0 5 0 0 WAN A+ Craig Stammen..... 4 6 1 1 5 0 0 OAK A+ Andrew Bailey..... 7 7 2 1 4 2 0 LA AAA Miguel Pinango.... 6 11 2 2 4 0 0 13 GB PIT A+ Todd Redmond...... 7 9 5 5 4 0 1 12 GB CHC AA Jeff Samardzija... 7 5 3 2 2 0 1 12 GB
THT Stats
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Matthew Carruth is an editor for The Hardball Times. He welcomes any and all sorts of communication at his email.