And That Happened

Giants 8, Diamondbacks 1: The Giants beat back the charging horde. Three hits and two runs scored for Carlos Beltran, three runs batted in for Orlando Cabrera and a strong six innings for Ryan Vogelsong. Jason Marquis: eh, not quite the game-changing acquisition Kevin Towers may have imagined.

Red Sox 4, Indians 3: Walkoff homer for Jacoby Ellsbury. His second game-winning hit in as many nights.

Mariners 7, Athletics 4: Get the sea-saw Seattle Mariners. Seventeen straight losses not too long ago and now five wins in their last seven. Charlie Furbush allowed one run and two hits while striking out three and not walking anybody. Not a world-beating performance, but it did at least allow me to say “Charlie Furbush.”

Phillies 8, Rockies 6: Ryan Howard drove in four with a homer and a double helping Roy Halladay get his 14th win despite not having his best stuff going.  Six wins in a row for inevitable and irresistible force that is the Philadelphia Phillies.

Brewers 10, Cardinals 5: I touched on this one yesterday. La Russa allowed Edwin Jackson to take just an awful beating. He said that it was because the bullpen needed the rest. Query: what is the point of having a zillion guys in your bullpen like La Russa insists upon if you can’t use the thing every day? Of course, La Russa largely led the charge to eliminate the traditional bullpen roles of “long man” and “mop up man,” each of whom would have been really useful here, so I guess we shouldn’t be shocked.  Three homers for Casey McGehee, by the way. Sorry to slight him here, but I’m still suffering from La Russa derangement syndrome.

Braves 6, Nationals 4: Nice to see that the real Dan Uggla has been returned to the Braves and that impostor Uggla who spent the first three and a half months with the team has been removed. Two-for-four with a big homer as Uggla extends his hitting streak to 25. As for the Nats: I think Chien-Ming Wang may be done. I like the guy, but if you face 23 Braves hitters and fail to strike out a single one, things are bleak. The Braves ain’t picky. Your mama could strike out six Braves hitters on short rest.

Cubs 1, Pirates 0: Matt Garza and Charlie Morton each threw seven shutout innings, but Starlin Castro connected on a solo homer off Chris Resop in the eighth. Oh, and Bob Davidson got all ejecty again in this one, because that’s what he does. Six straight losses for the former darlings of the NL Central.

Rays 9, Blue Jays 1: Carlos Villanueva didn’t fool anyone (2.2 IP, 9 H, 8 ER, 3 HR). Casey Kotchman, Ben Zobrist and Robinson Chirinos all went deep, and by then things were out of hand.

Tigers 5, Rangers 4: Doug Fister’s Detroit debut worked out quite nicely (7 IP, 8 H, 2 ER). Homers for Ryan Raburn and Alex Avila.

Twins 11, Angels 4; Michael Cuddyer and Delmon Young each had two homers. One of Cuddyer’s was a grand slam. This is what happens when a sinkerball — in this case Joel Piniero’s — doensn’t sink.

Padres 3, Dodgers 0: Tim Stauffer shut out the Dodgers for six innings. Homer from Jason Bartlett as the Padres avoid the sweep.

Astros 5, Reds 4: Jordan Lyles finally gets the winless monkey off his back. J.D. Martinez was 3 for 4 with a homer and four RBI.

Royals 6, Orioles 2: Luke Hochevar shut the O’s down into the eighth inning. Billy Butler had a three-run homer in the seventh to give the Royals some insurance.

Yankees 18, White Sox 7: Good for the Yankees — rah rah rah — but seriously: A.J. Burnett was given 13 runs to play with — 13! — and he still couldn’t last the five innings to pick up the win.  All kinds of crooked numbers in the box score. Granderson had five RBI. Jeter went 5-for-6 with two runs batted in.

Marlins vs. Mets: POSTPONED: Rain is grace; rain is the sky condescending to the earth; without rain, there would be no life.