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THT Daily: Few Games, Lots of Action

by Matthew Carruth
June 12, 2007

Major League News for June 10
Today’s Links
Player News
Yesterday’s Results
Today’s Games
Standings
Top Minor League Performances

You can always find the most recent THT Daily at http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/content/thtdaily/

THT Links

The plan - There's finally hope in Tampa Bay.

Damaged goods? - Apparently Freddy Garcia's arm is shot. What this means for the Phillies from The Good Phight.

Video malfunction - Apparently the Jumbotron at Camden Yards is on its last legs, and the team and the stadium authority are squabbling over what to do with it.

Broken fin - FishStripes reports that starter Anibel Sanchez
is going back to Dr. James Andrews for a check up following a setback in his recovery from offseason shoulder injury.

Rise of the Ancient Mariner - It's always nice to see a dormant fanbase come back to life when their team stops sucking. A look at the Mariners' dramatic win last night through the lenses of win expectancy and a fan who is starting to believe again.

3,000,000 - Congratulations, Aaron, on 3,000,000 visitors to your site. We miss you here at THT.

Free James Loney! - The Dodgers are once again calling up youngsters James Loney and Matt Kemp, this time to spell Nomar Garciaparra and Luis Gonzalez. Unfortunately for Dodgers fans, the plan is to play them one or two times a week.

Wait till... - South Side Sox throws in the towel and lays out a rebuilding plan.

Player News
Player Headlines are courtesy of Rotoworld

Joe Crede has decided to undergo back surgery that will likely cost him the rest of the season. Crede probably won't be officially ruled out for the year after the procedure, but it's hard to see him returning prior to September and even a comeback for the final three or four weeks of the season seems like a long shot. Josh Fields could spend the rest of the season as the White Sox's regular third baseman.

Carlos Zambrano pitched eight innings of one-run ball and hit his second homer in a 2-1 win over Houston on Monday. At 862, Zambrano has a higher OPS than Astros cleanup hitter Carlos Lee (859). More importantly, he's pitched very well in three of his last four starts. He didn't have a single eight-strikeout game over his first 10 starts. Now he has three. All three hits he allowed tonight were singles, and he walked just one. We wouldn't expect Zambrano to start being Mr. Consistency, but he's probably going to be one of the NL's top-five fantasy starters the rest of the way.

Eric Milton will undergo Tommy John surgery Friday and miss the rest of the season. Milton is in the final season of his three-year, $25.5 million contract and it's hard to imagine him returning to Cincinnati, so his Reds career ends at 16-27 with a 5.83 ERA in 66 starts. With Milton out of the picture, it's that much more likely that Homer Bailey will remain in the rotation for the rest of the season.

The farmer who accused Juan Uribe of shooting him during an altercation last year received a payment from the shortstop as part of a settlement ending legal action against him, a lawyer for Uribe said Monday. According to the report, Uribe paid $25,500 to make the case go away. "The complainant dropped the charges and recognized that Juan was not involved in the incident," lawyer Maria Luisa Guzman told The Associated Press.

Cubs placed third baseman Aramis Ramirez on the 15-day disabled list, retroactive to June 7, with patellar tendinitis in his left knee. He'll be eligible to return in 11 dats, Mark DeRosa will be the Cubs' regular third baseman while Ramirez is out, with Ryan Theriot and Mike Fontenot sharing time at second.

According to SI.com's Jon Heyman, the Reds have already made Adam Dunn available in trade talks. Dunn and Brandon Phillips to the Nationals for Jon Rauch and Saul Rivera? Excuse us if we don't trust GM Wayne Krivsky to get a great return for Dunn, who is on pace for a fourth straight 40-homer season. He's a tougher sell because he'd likely void his $13 million option for 2008 if traded. The Padres are believed to be interested, and the Dodgers could really use a power hitter. AL contenders with potential fits for an outfielder or DH include, the Yankees, White Sox, Mariners and Twins. However, we could see the Yankees going after Ken Griffey Jr. first and he's not a Twins kind of player even if the team did have room in its budget for him.

Yesterday’s Results
Inter-League
SF      4  TOR     3    (Recap and Boxscore) Bonds: HR #747; Morris: 9 IP, 3 R

American League
SEA     8  CLE     7    (Recap and Boxscore) Ibanez: 2B, 3B, 2 HR, 5 RBI

National League
PHI     3  CHA     0    (Recap and Boxscore) Eaton: 7 IP, 0 R
CHN     2  HOU     1    (Recap and Boxscore) Zambrano: 8 IP, 0 R, HR; Williams: 7 IP, 2 R
LAN     5  NYN     3    (Recap and Boxscore) Gonzalez: 2 2B
First Inning's Major and Minor League Daily Reports:

Today’s Games
 National League
 ---------------
 New York Mets at Los Angeles Dodgers, 10:10 PM
  (R) John Maine (6-3) vs. (L) Hong-Chih Kuo (0-1)
 
 Inter-League
 ------------
 Texas Rangers at Pittsburgh Pirates, 7:05 PM
  (R) Kevin Millwood (2-5) vs. (L) Zach Duke (2-6)
 Cleveland Indians at Florida Marlins, 7:05 PM
  (R) Fausto Carmona (7-1) vs. (L) Scott Olsen (4-5)
 Arizona Diamondbacks at New York Yankees, 7:05 PM
  (R) Brandon Webb (6-3) vs. (R) Chien-Ming Wang (5-4)
 Washington Nationals at Baltimore Orioles, 7:05 PM
  (L) Micah Bowie (2-2) vs. (R) Daniel Cabrera (5-6)
 Chicago White Sox at Philadelphia Phillies, 7:05 PM
  (R) Jose Contreras (4-6) vs. (L) Cole Hamels (8-2)
 Milwaukee Brewers at Detroit Tigers, 7:05 PM
  (R) Jeff Suppan (7-6) vs. (R) Justin Verlander (6-2)
 Colorado Rockies at Boston Red Sox, 7:05 PM
  (R) Aaron Cook (4-2) vs. (R) Tim Wakefield (5-7)
 LA Angels of Anaheim at Cincinnati Reds, 7:10 PM
  (R) Kelvim Escobar (7-3) vs. (R) Bronson Arroyo (2-7)
 San Diego Padres at Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 7:10 PM
  (R) Greg Maddux (5-3) vs. (L) Scott Kazmir (4-3)
 Seattle Mariners at Chicago Cubs, 8:05 PM
  (L) Jarrod Washburn (5-5) vs. (L) Rich Hill (5-4)
 Oakland Athletics at Houston Astros, 8:05 PM
  (L) Joe Kennedy (2-4) vs. (R) Roy Oswalt (6-4)
 Atlanta Braves at Minnesota Twins, 8:10 PM
  (R) Kyle Davies (3-4) vs. (R) Kevin Slowey (1-0)
 St. Louis Cardinals at Kansas City Royals, 8:10 PM
  (R) Brad Thompson (4-1) vs. (R) Brian Bannister (2-3)
 Toronto Blue Jays at San Francisco Giants, 10:15 PM
  (R) AJ Burnett (5-5) vs. (L) Noah Lowry (5-5)

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     40  22 .645    0.0   39     1    sparkline graph
NYA     30  31 .492    9.5   35    -5    sparkline graph
TOR     30  33 .476   10.5   31    -1    sparkline graph
BAL     29  34 .460   11.5   32    -3    sparkline graph
TB      28  33 .459   11.5   24     4    sparkline graph
American League Central     
CLE     37  25 .597    0.0   35     2    sparkline graph
DET     36  26 .581    1.0   37    -1    sparkline graph
MIN     30  31 .492    6.5   31    -1    sparkline graph
CHA     27  33 .450    9.0   24     3    sparkline graph
KC      24  40 .375   14.0   25    -1    sparkline graph
American League West        
LAA     40  24 .625    0.0   38     2    sparkline graph
SEA     34  26 .567    4.0   31     3    sparkline graph
OAK     34  28 .548    5.0   36    -2    sparkline graph
TEX     23  40 .365   16.5   26    -3    sparkline graph


National League East        Pwins  Diff
NYN     36  26 .581    0.0   36     0    sparkline graph
ATL     35  29 .547    2.0   32     3    sparkline graph
PHI     33  31 .516    4.0   31     2    sparkline graph
FLA     31  33 .484    6.0   32    -1    sparkline graph
WAS     26  37 .413   10.5   24     2    sparkline graph
National League Central     
MIL     34  29 .540    0.0   32     2    sparkline graph
CHN     28  34 .452    5.5   34    -6    sparkline graph
STL     27  33 .450    5.5   24     3    sparkline graph
HOU     26  37 .413    8.0   27    -1    sparkline graph
PIT     26  37 .413    8.0   26     0    sparkline graph
CIN     25  39 .391    9.5   28    -3    sparkline graph
National League West        
SD      36  26 .581    0.0   38    -2    sparkline graph
ARI     37  27 .578    0.0   33     4    sparkline graph
LAN     36  28 .563    1.0   34     2    sparkline graph
COL     31  32 .492    5.5   28     3    sparkline graph
SF      29  34 .460    7.5   33    -4    sparkline graph

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, with a focus on each team’s top prospects.
ORG LVL PLAYER            AB  H 2B 3B HR BB SO  Notes
CIN A+  Jay Bruce......... 4  3  2  0  0  1  1  
KC  AAA Billy Butler...... 4  1  0  0  1  0  1  
LAA AAA Brandon Wood...... 5  2  1  0  0  0  2  
LA  AAA Andy LaRoche...... 4  2  0  0  0  0  0  
ARI AA  Carlos Gonzalez... 4  1  1  0  0  0  1  
LAA A   Matthew Sweeney... 3  3  2  0  1  1  0  
COL AAA Ian Stewart....... 5  1  0  0  1  0  2  
LAA AAA Terry Evans....... 5  2  1  0  1  0  1  
OAK AAA Daric Barton...... 5  2  1  0  0  1  0  
BOS A+  Luis Soto......... 4  3  2  0  1  0  0  3 LD
BOS AAA George Kottaras... 4  2  0  0  1  0  2  
TB  AAA Ben Zobrist....... 3  2  1  0  0  2  1  

ORG LVL PLAYER            IP  H  R ER SO BB HR  Notes
TB  A+  Wade Davis........ 7  2  2  1 13  0  1  
PHI A+  Carlos Carrasco... 9  3  0  0  7  0  0  
MIN AAA Matt Garza........ 6  8  2  2  6  1  0  
HOU AA  Troy Patton....... 7  5  1  1  4  2  0  
SD  A+  Wade Leblanc...... 7  8  4  4 10  0  1  
TEX A   Kasey Kiker....... 5  1  0  0  8  3  0  
PHI AAA J.D. Durbin....... 6  5  2  2  7  1  0  
CLE AAA Sean Smith........ 7  5  4  4  4  1  0  
TB  A   J. Hellickson..... 6  1  0  0  5  3  0  
FLA A+  Brett Sinkbeil.... 7  4  2  1  4  0  1  13 GB
PIT AAA Shane Youman...... 8  4  0  0  6  2  0  
BAL A   Pedro Beato....... 6  6  1  1  4  0  0  

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Matthew Carruth is an editor for The Hardball Times. He welcomes any and all sorts of communication at his email.



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