THT Daily: Short Seasoners
by Matthew CarruthJune 22, 2007
Major League News for June 22
LinksPlayer News
Yesterday’s Results
Today’s Games
Standings
Top Minor League Performances
Stats
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Links
Dukes is Gone - Tampa Bay has had enough, at least for the time being. Elijah Dukes was removed from their roster. No update yet on what the immediate future holds.
Cards Get Maroth - The Cardinals acquired LHP Mike Maroth from the Tigers today for unspecified compensation (read: not a whole lot). They also recently signed Tomo Ohka. Spaghetti, mean wall. Wall, spaghetti.
Nevermind - A few days ago I wrote about the Marlins have some great pitching waiting on the DL in Josh Johnson and Anibal Sanchez. You can now scratch both of them off the list. Johnson is back with the team, but Sanchez is going under the knife for a torn labrum. I wouldn't expect anything productive from him in the future.
Streak Garners Watson a Promotion - Brandon Watson of the 43-game minor league hitting streak fame earned a promotion to Washington soon after the streak ended.
Felix Tosses 8 Scoreless, Still Not Right - Despite the fantastic results, some are pointing out the Felix's stuff is still off compared to his pre-injury starts.
BONUS LINK: Henry --> Barcelona - Thierry Henry heads to FC Barcelona for 2007/8. Good lord is that offense stacked.
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Player News
Player news items are provided by RotoworldThe Orioles confirmed that Miguel Tejada has a small, non-displaced fracture in his left wrist and said the shortstop hopes to play through the injury.
"It's just a crack," VP of baseball operations Jim Duquette said. "That means it will heal, but if you re-injure it and it becomes a fracture, then the only way to make it heal properly is to put a screw in it. That's certainly more complicated." Doctors told team officials that it was going to be a week to 10 days before the injury starts healing. If Tejada wants to try to play through it, the Orioles would probably let him. "He said that he was sore, but he could play," Duquette said. "He thinks it is going to feel better. He seems to have a very high pain threshold, but you don't want to risk making it worse."
Felix Hernandez struck out nine in eight innings and combined with J.J. Putz on a shutout of the Pirates on Thursday.
With Jeff Weaver turning the trick on Wednesday, the Mariners hurled back-to-back shutouts for the first time since 2004. Hernandez answered questions about his health with his best performance since his one-hitter against Boston on April 11. He hit 97 mph on the gun fairly regularly and showed better command of his fastball than he had at any point since returning from the DL. It's not guaranteed to carry over to his start against the Red Sox next week, but Felix owners should be feeling a whole lot better about things right now.
Erik Bedard is day-to-day with a Grade 1 hamstring strain suffered in his victory over the Padres on Thursday.
That's the mildest type of strain, so it's possible he'll be ready to make his next start. Another possibility is that he'll be pushed back two or three days. Since the Orioles have Monday off, it wouldn't be a problem.
Athletics activated RHP Rich Harden from the 15-day disabled list.
The A's will get Harden regular work in the pen with an eye towards putting him in the rotation next month. There's a chance that he'll stay in the pen and take over the closer's role at some point, but it probably won't come to that.
According to ESPN.com's Jayson Stark, the Braves are much more interested in Mark Buehrle than the Mets are.
The Mets have indicated don't want to give up Lastings Milledge or Carlos Gomez for a player in his walk year, and it's safe to assume the Braves feel the same way when it comes to Jarrod Saltalamacchia. Yunel Escobar is a player we bet the White Sox would have a lot of interest in. The Braves value him highly, but it might be worth surrendering him to add Buehrle to the rotation.
Jason Giambi agreed Thursday to meet with baseball steroids investigator George Mitchell and apologized for his conduct.
This could allow him to avoid a suspension. "I alone am responsible for my actions and I apologize to the commissioner, the owners and the players for any suggestion that they were responsible for my behavior," Giambi said in a statement. He'll be the first active player to speak with Mitchell as part of the investigation.
Miguel Tejada, who suffered a bruised wrist Wednesday, was pulled for a pinch-runner after bunting into a fielder's choice in the first inning of Thursday's game.
How ridiculous. Tejada's consecutive games streak is worthless if this is what he'll do to extend it. The Orioles knew in advance that this was how it would play out, as they moved Tejada up to the second spot in the order to accomodate him. We're certainly not questioning Tejada's toughness, but if he was too hurt to play, he should have been a man and sat out.
Athletics designated outfielder Milton Bradley for assignment.
Bradley had to have done something to really upset management and/or his teammates. Sure, the club was at least a little frustrated about his frequent injuries, but he was playing pretty well when he was able to take the field, batting .292/.373/.446 in 65 at-bats. Maybe the A's will be able to trade him for some relief help, though he'll have little value left now that the team has to move him. The Padres, Cardinals, Marlins, White Sox, Astros, Rangers, Braves, Yankees, Orioles and Mets are some of the possible contenders that could use him, and since he's making just $4 million and is a free agent at season's end, it wouldn't be a huge risk to bring him in.
Joe Girardi has declined to Orioles' offer to make him their next manager, agent Steve Mandel told ESPN.
The job was Girardi's for the taking, but it appears he'll remain with YES for now and wait for something better to open up. The Orioles have a nice tradition on their side and an ample payroll, but the meddling owner and the Yankees-Red Sox factor combine to make the job less attractive.
Yesterday’s Results
American League LAN 8 TOR 4 (Recap and Boxscore) SEA 3 PIT 0 (Recap and Boxscore) TEX 6 CHN 5 (Recap and Boxscore) National League COL 4 NYA 3 (Recap and Boxscore) BAL 6 SD 3 (Recap and Boxscore)
Today’s Games
National League --------------- Philadelphia Phillies at St. Louis Cardinals, 8:10 PM (L) Jamie Moyer (6-5) vs. (R) Anthony Reyes (0-8) Inter-League ------------ Chicago Cubs at Chicago White Sox, 4:05 PM (R) Carlos Zambrano (7-6) vs. (L) Mark Buehrle (4-3) Minnesota Twins at Florida Marlins, 7:05 PM (R) Boof Bonser (5-3) vs. (L) Scott Olsen (5-6) Cleveland Indians at Washington Nationals, 7:05 PM (R) Fausto Carmona (8-2) vs. (L) Micah Bowie (4-2) Colorado Rockies at Toronto Blue Jays, 7:07 PM (R) Jason Hirsh (3-6) vs. (R) Josh Towers (2-5) Oakland Athletics at New York Mets, 7:10 PM (L) Lenny DiNardo (2-3) vs. (L) Tom Glavine (5-5) Los Angeles Dodgers at Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 7:10 PM (R) Derek Lowe (7-6) vs. (R) Andrew Sonnanstine (1-1) Detroit Tigers at Atlanta Braves, 7:35 PM (L) Kenny Rogers (0-0) vs. (R) John Smoltz (8-3) Kansas City Royals at Milwaukee Brewers, 8:05 PM (L) Jorge De La Rosa (4-8) vs. (R) Jeff Suppan (7-7) Houston Astros at Texas Rangers, 8:35 PM (R) Woody Williams (3-9) vs. (R) Kevin Millwood (3-6) Baltimore Orioles at Arizona Diamondbacks, 9:40 PM (R) Daniel Cabrera (5-8) vs. (R) Brandon Webb (7-4) Pittsburgh Pirates at LA Angels of Anaheim, 10:05 PM (L) Zach Duke (3-6) vs. (L) Joe Saunders (3-0) Cincinnati Reds at Seattle Mariners, 10:05 PM (R) Aaron Harang (7-2) vs. (R) Cha Seung Baek (3-3) Boston Red Sox at San Diego Padres, 10:05 PM (R) Daisuke Matsuzaka (8-5) vs. (R) Greg Maddux (6-3) New York Yankees at San Francisco Giants, 10:15 PM (L) Kei Igawa (2-1) vs. (R) Matt Cain (2-7)
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 46 25 .648 0.0 44 2NYA 35 35 .500 10.5 41 -6
TOR 34 37 .479 12.0 36 -2
TB 31 39 .443 14.5 28 3
BAL 31 41 .431 15.5 35 -4
American League Central CLE 42 29 .592 0.0 41 1
DET 42 29 .592 0.0 44 -2
MIN 36 34 .514 5.5 36 0
CHA 29 39 .426 11.5 28 1
KC 29 44 .397 14.0 31 -2
American League West LAA 46 27 .630 0.0 43 3
OAK 39 32 .549 6.0 41 -2
SEA 37 32 .536 7.0 35 2
TEX 28 44 .389 17.5 31 -3
National League East Pwins Diff NYN 38 32 .543 0.0 37 1
ATL 38 35 .521 1.5 35 3
PHI 37 35 .514 2.0 35 2
FLA 35 38 .479 4.5 35 0
WAS 30 42 .417 9.0 27 3
National League Central MIL 41 31 .569 0.0 38 3
STL 32 37 .464 7.5 28 4
CHN 32 39 .451 8.5 37 -5
HOU 31 41 .431 10.0 33 -2
PIT 31 41 .431 10.0 30 1
CIN 28 45 .384 13.5 32 -4
National League West SD 41 30 .577 0.0 44 -3
ARI 42 31 .575 0.0 37 5
LAN 41 31 .569 0.5 39 2
COL 38 34 .528 3.5 36 2
SF 30 41 .423 11.0 35 -5
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 ARI AA Carlos Gonzalez... 4 2 0 0 1 0 0 NYM AA F. Martinez....... 4 2 0 0 1 1 0 ARI AA Justin Upton...... 4 1 0 0 0 2 1 SEA AAA Jeff Clement...... 5 4 3 0 0 0 0 CIN A Chris Valaika..... 3 2 1 0 1 2 1 NYY A+ Jose Tabata....... 2 1 1 0 0 2 0 TOR A Travis Snider..... 3 2 0 0 1 0 0 MIL A+ Lorenzo Cain...... 4 2 2 0 0 1 1 CLE A+ Stephen Head...... 5 2 0 0 1 1 0 CIN AAA Joey Votto........ 3 2 0 0 0 1 0 OAK AAA Daric Barton...... 5 4 0 0 0 0 0 4 R LAA AAA Brandon Wood...... 3 0 0 0 0 1 0 ORG LVL PLAYER IP H R ER SO BB HR Notes MIN AAA Matt Garza........ 7 4 0 0 8 2 0 TB AAA Mitch Talbot...... 6 4 1 1 6 0 0 WAN A Jhonny Nunez...... 5 4 2 2 4 0 0 DET AA Dallas Trahern.... 7 5 1 1 4 3 0 CHW AA Gio Gonzalez...... 5 5 3 3 7 5 0 MIL A Jeremy Jeffress... 5 2 0 0 5 2 0 PIT AA Wardell Starling.. 3 3 1 0 5 1 0 BOS AAA Kason Gabbard..... 6 5 2 2 6 2 0 COL A+ Chaz Roe.......... 8 9 2 2 5 0 1 OAK AA Michael Madsen.... 6 3 1 0 3 3 0 KC A+ Blake Johnson..... 6 1 0 0 3 3 0 PHI AA Carlos Carrasco... 5 4 1 1 4 3 0
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.