A little THT Daily

Player Headlines

Courtesy of Rotoworld:

Geovany Soto underwent an MRI on his right shoulder Thursday that revealed no structural damage. Soto is dealing with a bit of inflammation and irritation in his shoulder, but shouldn’t miss any significant time. The Cubs are hoping he’ll return after two or three more days of rest. Koyie Hill will continue to fill in.

Marlon Byrd had a three-run homer, an RBI groundout and an RBI double in the Rangers’ 12-8 win over the Indians on Thursday. The Texas papers had made it pretty clear that the left-handed-hitting David Murphy would be the Rangers’ primary left fielder, but Byrd started there for the second time in three games and did so even though the Indians threw a right-hander in this one. The Tigers have three right-handers going this weekend, so it will be interesting to see how Byrd is used. If he starts two games, then it looks like Murphy may be close to worthless in AL-only leagues, at least for the short term.

Chris Carpenter took a no-hitter into the seventh inning on Thursday, allowing just one unearned run over seven frames as the Cardinals beat the Pirates 2-1. A very encouraging regular-season debut for Carpenter, who posted a 1.52 ERA in spring training. He fanned seven batters while allowing two walks in seven innings of work, and didn’t surrender a hit until Ramon Vazquez singled to center with two outs in the seventh. Carpenter used 92 pitches over the seven frames, and Vazquez’s hit prevented Tony La Russa from having to make a tough decision since the team wanted to be cautious with Carpenter’s pitch count.

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.

American League East        Pwins  Diff
TOR      3   1 .750    0.0    3     0    
BAL      2   1 .667    0.5    1     1    
TB       2   1 .667    0.5    2     0    
BOS      1   2 .333    1.5    1     0    
NYA      1   2 .333    1.5    2    -1    
American League Central     
KC       2   1 .667    0.0    2     0    
MIN      2   2 .500    0.5    1     1    
CHA      1   2 .333    1.0    1     0    
DET      1   3 .250    1.5    1     0    
CLE      0   3 .000    2.0    1    -1    
American League West        
TEX      3   0 .000    0.0    2     1    
OAK      2   1 .667    1.0    2     0    
SEA      2   2 .500    1.5    3    -1    
LAA      1   2 .333    2.0    1     0    


National League East        Pwins  Diff
FLA      3   0 .000    0.0    2     1    
ATL      2   1 .667    1.0    2     0    
NYN      2   1 .667    1.0    2     0    
PHI      1   2 .333    2.0    1     0    
WAS      0   3 .000    3.0    1    -1    
National League Central     
CHN      2   1 .667    0.0    2     0    
STL      2   2 .500    0.5    2     0    
PIT      2   2 .500    0.5    2     0    
CIN      1   2 .333    1.0    1     0    
HOU      1   2 .333    1.0    1     0    
MIL      1   2 .333    1.0    1     0    
National League West        
COL      2   1 .667    0.0    2     0    
SF       2   1 .667    0.0    2     0    
LAN      2   2 .500    0.5    2     0    
SD       2   2 .500    0.5    2     0    
ARI      1   2 .333    1.0    1     0