THT Daily: The wrong league
by Dave StudemanJune 22, 2009
Major League News for June 22
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 RotoworldAccording to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Albert Pujols "called his shot" Sunday before blasting a fourth-inning grand slam over the left field wall.
As the Post-Dispatch's Joe Strauss reports, "After opening the third inning with a fly out, Pujols returned to the Cardinals clubhouse to review video. There he predicted to assistant hitting coach Mike Aldrete that his next at-bat would ricochet off the yet-to-open Royals Hall of Fame behind the visitors bullpen in left field." "He didn't say he might hit the Hall of Fame. He said he would hit the Hall of Fame," Aldrete recalled. The ball traveled 423 feet and broke a 4-4 tie.
The Yankees don't seem all that concerned with CC Sabathia's latest ailment, termed "biceps tightness."
There are no further tests scheduled for the big man. That could change, but it's pretty clear the Yankees are treating this as minor. "I'm not really concerned that much," said Sabathia, who is listed as day-to-day. Let's hope he doesn't miss a start.
Albert Pujols homered twice while driving in six runs as the Cardinals stomped the Royals 12-5 on Sunday.
Pujols also singled and doubled between his five trips to the plate but scored only on the two homers. Today's big day furthered Pujols' major league lead with 26 homers, and he also now sits atop the RBI leader board with 68. He's on pace for an insane .329-60-157 season.
Nick Green hit a walk-off solo homer in the bottom of the ninth inning to beat the Braves on Sunday.
Technically it was a homer, but the opposite field "blast" was just inside the Pesky Pole and probably only traveled about 320 feet. The homer was Green's fourth of the season and gave Jonathan Papelbon the win in relief.
After homering as a pinch-hitter Saturday, Ryan Howard returned to the hospital because of his fever.
Howard is expected to miss Sunday's game, ending his major league-high consecutive-game streak at 343. Matt Stairs is hitting cleanup in his place.
Red Sox placed RHP Daisuke Matsuzaka on the 15-day disabled list, retroactive to June 20, with shoulder weakness.
An MRI showed no structural damage, so the Red Sox will just go with weakness. That Dice-K agreed to go on the DL is all that matters. He's better off making starts in the minors than he is pitching as a mop-up man out of the bullpen. John Smoltz will replace him in the rotation.
Yesterday’s Results
For the full scoop regarding yesterday's games, read "And That Happened" at Shysterball.American League BOS 6 ATL 5 (Recap and Boxscore) DET 3 MIL 2 (Recap and Boxscore) STL 12 KC 5 (Recap and Boxscore) HOU 4 MIN 1 (Recap and Boxscore) LAN 5 LAA 3 (Recap and Boxscore) SEA 3 ARI 2 (Recap and Boxscore) National League FLA 6 NYA 5 (Recap and Boxscore) TB 10 NYN 6 (Recap and Boxscore) BAL 2 PHI 1 (Recap and Boxscore) TOR 9 WAS 4 (Recap and Boxscore) CHN 6 CLE 2 (Recap and Boxscore) CHA 4 CIN 1 (Recap and Boxscore) COL 5 PIT 4 (Recap and Boxscore) SD 4 OAK 1 (Recap and Boxscore) SF 3 TEX 2 (Recap and Boxscore)Check out Fangraphs' scoreboard to see all the games in action.
Today’s Games
National League --------------- St. Louis Cardinals at New York Mets, 7:10 PM (R) Todd Wellemeyer (6-6) vs. (R) Tim Redding (0-2) Chicago Cubs at Atlanta Braves, 7:10 PM (R) Ryan Dempster (4-4) vs. (R) Javier Vazquez (4-6) Inter-League ------------ San Francisco Giants at Oakland Athletics, 10:05 PM (L) Jonathan Sanchez (2-7) vs. (R) Trevor Cahill (4-5) Colorado Rockies at LA Angels of Anaheim, 10:05 PM (R) Aaron Cook (6-3) vs. (R) Matt Palmer (6-0)
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 42 27 .609 0.0 41 1NYA 38 31 .551 4.0 38 0
TOR 38 33 .535 5.0 40 -2
TB 37 34 .521 6.0 43 -6
BAL 32 37 .464 10.0 30 2
American League Central DET 38 31 .551 0.0 38 0
MIN 35 36 .493 4.0 37 -2
CHA 33 36 .478 5.0 32 1
KC 29 39 .426 8.5 29 0
CLE 29 42 .408 10.0 34 -5
American League West TEX 37 31 .544 0.0 36 1
LAA 36 31 .537 0.5 34 2
SEA 35 34 .507 2.5 32 3
OAK 30 38 .441 7.0 31 -1
National League East Pwins Diff PHI 36 31 .537 0.0 35 1
NYN 34 33 .507 2.0 33 1
FLA 35 36 .493 3.0 32 3
ATL 32 36 .471 4.5 32 0
WAS 20 47 .299 16.0 26 -6
National League Central STL 39 31 .557 0.0 39 0
MIL 37 32 .536 1.5 36 1
CHN 34 31 .523 2.5 34 0
CIN 34 34 .500 4.0 33 1
HOU 32 35 .478 5.5 30 2
PIT 31 38 .449 7.5 34 -3
National League West LAN 46 24 .657 0.0 44 2
SF 37 31 .544 8.0 35 2
COL 36 33 .522 9.5 37 -1
SD 30 38 .441 15.0 26 4
ARI 29 41 .414 17.0 31 -2
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 SD AAA Matt Antonelli.... 4 3 2 1 0 1 0 KC AAA Kila Kaaihue...... 4 2 0 0 2 1 1 DET AAA Scott Sizemore.... 6 3 0 1 1 0 0 MIL AA Taylor Green...... 3 2 0 0 1 2 0 LAA AAA Howie Kendrick.... 4 4 1 0 0 0 0 WAN A Derek Norris...... 3 2 0 0 1 1 1 LA A Kyle Russell...... 5 2 2 0 0 0 2 PHI AA Michael Taylor.... 5 3 0 0 1 0 1 WAN AAA Justin Maxwell.... 3 2 0 0 1 1 1 FLA AAA John Raynor....... 4 1 0 0 1 1 0 ARI A Rossmel Perez..... 3 2 1 0 0 1 0 NYM A Wilmer Flores..... 4 3 1 0 0 0 0 ORG LVL PLAYER IP H R ER SO BB HR Notes HOU A Jordan Lyles...... 6 2 0 0 11 2 0 TB A Nick Barnese...... 7 1 0 0 6 0 0 BOS A Stephen Fife...... 5 4 1 1 7 0 0 BOS A+ Casey Kelly....... 6 1 0 0 5 2 0 TEX AAA Neftali Feliz..... 5 7 1 1 7 1 0 COL AA Jhoulys Chacin.... 7 5 1 1 4 1 0 COL AAA Franklin Morales.. 6 4 1 1 4 1 0 LAA AAA Trevor Bell....... 7 3 2 0 4 1 1 OAK AAA James Simmons..... 6 6 2 2 3 0 0 CLE AA Scott Lewis....... 4 1 0 0 4 2 0 NYM A Jeurys Familia.... 7 5 1 1 2 1 0 HOU A+ C. Hicks.......... 5 5 5 5 5 3 0
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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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