THT Daily: drama teams
by Dave StudemanMay 24, 2009
Major League News for May 24
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/
Player News
Player Headlines are courtesy of RotoworldMatt Cain pitched nine innings of one-run ball as the Giants rallied for a late-inning 5-1 victory against the Mariners on Saturday night.
Cain fanned seven Seattle batters without issuing a single walk. He surrendered ten hits, but each one was a single. 65 of his 88 pitches were strikes. Those thinking of selling high on his early season success may want to take a step back. He's 5-1 with a 2.40 ERA and will take on the Cardinals next time out.
Josh Geer held the Cubs to one earned run as the Padres picked up their eighth straight victory Saturday in a 3-1 win.
Geer looked fantastic, fanning seven Cubs batters without walking one. His only real mistake pitch was driven over the center field wall by Derrek Lee. Other than than, he was spot on. The Padres are still under .500, but are playing some gritty baseball and outperforming all expectations. We'll see if they can keep it up as they go for their third straight series sweep Sunday against the Cubs.
Jason Giambi blasted his 400th career home run on Saturday night.
It was his only hit and the A's wound up losing to the Diamondbacks, but the feat should be celebrated nonetheless. Giambi, 38, is batting .212 this season with four home runs and 19 RBI.
Evan Longoria isn't expected to miss more than one game despite getting nailed in the elbow with a pitch Saturday night.
Manager Joe Maddon said Longoria simply suffered "one of those good old contusions," and reiterated that his third baseman should be "fine" after a day of rest. Look for Reid Brignac to start at second base on Sunday, with Akinori Iwamura sliding to third.
Joey Votto hit two home runs in his return to the lineup Saturday.
So much for the dizziness. Votto looked great, blasting a solo shot in the bottom of the first inning and a three-run bomb in the second. Ramon Hernandez also pitched in two RBI, but the Reds couldn't catch the Indians. Votto is batting .371 with seven home runs and 31 RBI in 116 at-bats this season. Hopefully he's back in the lineup for good.
According to Bart Hubbuch of the New York Post, Francisco Rodriguez is out indefinitely due to lower back spasms.
K-Rod collapsed outside the clubhouse from the pain and was seen tearing up as a stretcher was called for. He has taken on a hefty workload in New York this season and it's obviously affecting him physically. J.J. Putz picked up his second save Saturday night and is likely to fill in should there be a save situation over the next few days. If Rodriguez requires a stint on the disabled list, Putz would obviously take on a ton of value.
Anthony Swarzak tossed seven scoreless innings in his major league debut Saturday against the Brewers.
That's quite the entrance. He didn't blow away the Milwaukee batters, but pitched to contact and was aided by strong defense. He's sure to get another start, and it should come next week against the Red Sox. We'll see how he fares against that lineup.
Koji Uehara left after the third inning Saturday with soreness in his left hamstring.
Uehara had tossed three scoreless innings. He'll be reevaluated Sunday morning, and is obviously in danger of missing his next scheduled start. Low on pitchers with high enough pitch counts, the O's will probably have to go fishing in their farm system if a replacement is needed. Stay tuned.
Yesterday’s Results
For the full scoop regarding yesterday's games, read "And That Happened" at Shysterball.American League NYN 3 BOS 2 (Recap and Boxscore) NYA 5 PHI 4 (Recap and Boxscore) CHA 4 PIT 0 (Recap and Boxscore) COL 4 DET 3 (Recap and Boxscore) MIN 6 MIL 2 (Recap and Boxscore) ARI 8 OAK 7 (Recap and Boxscore) SF 5 SEA 1 (Recap and Boxscore) National League ATL 4 TOR 3 (Recap and Boxscore) TB 10 FLA 3 (Recap and Boxscore) BAL 2 WAS 1 (Recap and Boxscore) CLE 7 CIN 6 (Recap and Boxscore) TEX 6 HOU 3 (Recap and Boxscore) STL 5 KC 0 (Recap and Boxscore) LAN 5 LAA 4 (Recap and Boxscore) SD 3 CHN 1 (Recap and Boxscore)Check out Fangraphs' scoreboard to see all the games in action.
Today’s Games
National League --------------- Chicago Cubs at San Diego Padres, 4:05 PM (L) Ted Lilly (5-3) vs. (R) Chris Young (3-2) Inter-League ------------ Colorado Rockies at Detroit Tigers, 1:05 PM (R) Jason Hammel (0-3) vs. (L) Dontrelle Willis (1-0) Philadelphia Phillies at New York Yankees, 1:05 PM (L) Cole Hamels (2-2) vs. (L) CC Sabathia (4-3) Tampa Bay Rays at Florida Marlins, 1:10 PM (R) James Shields (3-4) vs. (R) Josh Johnson (3-1) Cleveland Indians at Cincinnati Reds, 1:10 PM (L) Cliff Lee (2-5) vs. (R) Johnny Cueto (4-2) Baltimore Orioles at Washington Nationals, 1:35 PM (R) Brad Bergesen (1-2) vs. (R) Shairon Martis (5-0) Toronto Blue Jays at Atlanta Braves, 1:35 PM (R) Scott Richmond (4-2) vs. (R) Jair Jurrjens (4-2) New York Mets at Boston Red Sox, 1:35 PM (R) Tim Redding (0-0) vs. (R) Tim Wakefield (5-2) Pittsburgh Pirates at Chicago White Sox, 2:05 PM (R) Jeff Karstens (1-2) vs. (L) Mark Buehrle (6-1) Texas Rangers at Houston Astros, 2:05 PM (R) Brandon McCarthy (3-2) vs. (L) Mike Hampton (2-3) Kansas City Royals at St. Louis Cardinals, 2:15 PM (R) Brian Bannister (3-1) vs. (R) Joel Pineiro (5-3) Arizona Diamondbacks at Oakland Athletics, 4:05 PM (R) Jon Garland (4-2) vs. (L) Josh Outman (1-0) LA Angels of Anaheim at Los Angeles Dodgers, 4:10 PM (R) Matt Palmer (5-0) vs. (R) Chad Billingsley (6-1) San Francisco Giants at Seattle Mariners, 4:10 PM (L) Barry Zito (1-4) vs. (R) Felix Hernandez (4-3) Milwaukee Brewers at Minnesota Twins, 8:05 PM (R) Dave Bush (3-0) vs. (R) Scott Baker (1-5)
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 TOR 27 19 .587 0.0 28 -1BOS 25 18 .581 0.5 24 1
NYA 25 18 .581 0.5 22 3
TB 23 22 .511 3.5 26 -3
BAL 18 25 .419 7.5 17 1
American League Central DET 24 17 .585 0.0 24 0
KC 21 22 .488 4.0 22 -1
MIN 21 23 .477 4.5 23 -2
CHA 19 23 .452 5.5 17 2
CLE 17 27 .386 8.5 20 -3
American League West TEX 25 17 .595 0.0 24 1
LAA 22 20 .524 3.0 21 1
SEA 20 24 .455 6.0 18 2
OAK 15 25 .375 9.0 17 -2
National League East Pwins Diff PHI 23 18 .561 0.0 22 1
NYN 23 19 .548 0.5 23 0
ATL 22 20 .524 1.5 20 2
FLA 19 25 .432 5.5 18 1
WAS 12 30 .286 11.5 17 -5
National League Central STL 26 17 .605 0.0 24 2
MIL 26 17 .605 0.0 24 2
CIN 22 20 .524 3.5 21 1
CHN 21 20 .512 4.0 21 0
PIT 19 24 .442 7.0 22 -3
HOU 18 23 .439 7.0 19 -1
National League West LAN 30 14 .682 0.0 29 1
SD 21 22 .488 8.5 17 4
SF 20 22 .476 9.0 19 1
ARI 19 24 .442 10.5 19 0
COL 17 25 .405 12.0 21 -4
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 CIN AA Chris Heisey...... 5 3 2 0 1 0 0 3 R PIT A+ Matthew Hague..... 4 4 1 0 0 1 0 MIN A+ Ben Revere........ 3 3 2 0 0 1 0 HOU A+ Jason Castro...... 3 3 2 0 0 1 0 TEX A+ M. Moreland....... 5 2 1 0 1 1 0 DET AA Alexander Avila... 4 3 1 0 1 0 0 LA A Kyle Russell...... 4 2 1 0 1 0 1 PHI A+ Dominic Brown..... 2 2 1 0 0 3 0 BAL AA Brandon Snyder.... 3 2 0 0 1 2 1 5 RBI ! SEA AA Gregory Halman.... 5 2 1 0 1 0 2 STL AA Daryl Jones....... 4 2 1 1 0 1 0 PIT A Robbie Grossman... 5 2 0 0 1 0 2 ORG LVL PLAYER IP H R ER SO BB HR Notes SF AA M. Bumgarner...... 6 2 0 0 10 1 0 PHI A+ Kyle Drabek....... 6 4 4 4 9 3 0 SF AAA Kevin Pucetas..... 7 7 1 0 7 1 0 ARI A+ Trevor Harden..... 7 6 1 1 3 1 0 CIN A Matthew Fairel.... 7 2 0 0 1 1 0 14 GB NYY A Brett Marshall.... 7 8 3 2 4 2 0 14 GB SD AA Matthew Latos..... 4 1 1 1 4 3 0 NYY A+ D.J. Mitchell..... 5 4 2 2 6 3 1 CLE AA Zach Putnam....... 2 1 0 0 2 0 0 LAA AA Trevor Reckling... 5 6 3 3 3 2 0 9 GB BAL AAA C. Tillman........ 2 3 2 0 2 0 0 TOR AAA Bradley Mills..... 7 8 4 3 2 1 1 12 GB
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Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.
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