THT Daily: Red Hot

Zack Greinke and the Dogers are red hot. Greinke now has a 0.40 ERA after shutting down the White Sox last night, and the Dodgers are now 11-0 at home, the fastest home start in National League history.

Major League News for May 5

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 Rotoworld
Cole Hamels (ankle) is expected to throw a bullpen session Tuesday.
The Phillies are a little concerned about Hamels’ ability to field his position, but he could put those worries to rest fairly quickly today. He’s still on track to start Friday against the Braves.

X-rays and a CT scan on Rick Ankiel’s head revealed no fractures as a result of Monday’s collision with the wall in center field.
“He was never knocked out,” GM John Mozeliak said. “He never lost consciousness. My understanding was that he had some discomfort in the face area, obviously, from hitting the wall. But for the most part right now, we’re encouraged based on Dr. Paletta’s first [evaluation], just getting to see him on the field.” No word yet on whether Ankiel will land on the DL. Colby Rasmus figures to start in center field for at least the next few days.

Jorge Posada will have an MRI on Tuesday after hurting a hamstring during Monday’s game.
Manager Joe Girardi said the catcher felt it “grab.” If Posada needs some DL time, the Yankees would probably call up Kevin Cash to play behind Jose Molina.

Ryan Zimmerman went 4-for-4 with two doubles, three runs scored and two RBI as the Nationals beat the Astros 9-4 on Monday night.
Zimmerman emphatically pushes his hitting streak to 22 games with the stellar four-hit performance. Over the first 21 games of the streak, he’d never managed more than two hits, but tonight he reached base in all five trips to plate, rounding out the hit-fest with a walk. He’s now batting .333/.393/.588 this season.

Zack Greinke recorded his MLB-leading sixth victory with a shutout of the White Sox on Monday.
He’s just unbeatable right now. Greinke allowed six hits, walked none and struck out 10. Granted, he was facing a lineup that included three minor leaguers in Jayson Nix, Scott Podsednik and Brent Lillibridge. But it was another extremely impressive effort, one that lowered his ERA to 0.40.

Cubs placed RHP Carlos Zambrano on the 15-day disabled list with a strained left hamstring.
Zambrano is expected to miss two to three weeks. He was injured while trying to beat out a bunt single in Sunday’s victory against the Marlins. Randy Wells and Jose Ascanio look like the best to replace him in the rotation with Mitch Atkins struggling in Triple-A. Ascanio has a 1.25 ERA at Iowa, but the Cubs probably have more faith in Wells.

Yesterday’s Results

For the full scoop regarding yesterday’s games, read “And That Happened” at Shysterball.

American League
BOS     6  NYA     4    (Recap and Boxscore)
BAL     8  TB      4    (Recap and Boxscore)
CLE     9  TOR     7    (Recap and Boxscore)
MIN     7  DET     2    (Recap and Boxscore)
KC      3  CHA     0    (Recap and Boxscore)
LAA     5  OAK     2    (Recap and Boxscore)
TEX     6  SEA     5    (Recap and Boxscore)

National League
NYN     6  ATL     4    (Recap and Boxscore)
FLA     3  CIN     2    (Recap and Boxscore)
WAS     9  HOU     4    (Recap and Boxscore)
CHN     4  SF      2    (Recap and Boxscore)
MIL     7  PIT     4    (Recap and Boxscore)
PHI     6  STL     1    (Recap and Boxscore)
LAN     7  ARI     2    (Recap and Boxscore)
COL     9  SD      6    (Recap and Boxscore)

Check out Fangraphs’ scoreboard to see all the games in action.

Today’s Games

National League
 ---------------
 Houston Astros at Washington Nationals, 12:35 PM
  (R) Roy Oswalt (0-2) vs. (L) Scott Olsen (1-3)
 San Francisco Giants at Chicago Cubs, 2:20 PM
  (R) Tim Lincecum (2-1) vs. (L) Sean Marshall (0-1)
 Milwaukee Brewers at Pittsburgh Pirates, 7:05 PM
  (R) Jeff Suppan (1-2) vs. (R) Ian Snell (1-3)
 Cincinnati Reds at Florida Marlins, 7:10 PM
  (R) Edinson Volquez (3-2) vs. (R) Chris Volstad (2-0)
 New York Mets at Atlanta Braves, 7:10 PM
  (R) Livan Hernandez (1-1) vs. (R) Kenshin Kawakami (1-3)
 Philadelphia Phillies at St. Louis Cardinals, 8:15 PM
  (R) Brett Myers (1-2) vs. (R) Adam Wainwright (3-0)
 Colorado Rockies at San Diego Padres, 10:05 PM
  (R) Aaron Cook (1-1) vs. (R) Josh Geer (0-0)
 Arizona Diamondbacks at Los Angeles Dodgers, 10:10 PM
  (R) Max Scherzer (0-2) vs. (R) Jeff Weaver (0-0)
 
 American League
 ---------------
 Cleveland Indians at Toronto Blue Jays, 12:37 PM
  (R) Anthony Reyes (1-0) vs. (L) Brett Cecil (0-0)
 Baltimore Orioles at Tampa Bay Rays, 4:08 PM
  (R) Koji Uehara (2-2) vs. (R) Matt Garza (2-2)
 Texas Rangers at Seattle Mariners, 4:40 PM
  (R) Vicente Padilla (1-2) vs. (L) Erik Bedard (2-1)
 Boston Red Sox at New York Yankees, 7:05 PM
  (R) Josh Beckett (2-2) vs. (R) Joba Chamberlain (1-0)
 Minnesota Twins at Detroit Tigers, 7:05 PM
  (R) Nick Blackburn (2-1) vs. (R) Rick Porcello (1-3)
 Chicago White Sox at Kansas City Royals, 8:10 PM
  (R) Gavin Floyd (2-2) vs. (R) Kyle Davies (2-1)
 LA Angels of Anaheim at Oakland Athletics, 10:05 PM
  (R) Shane Loux (1-2) vs. (L) Dallas Braden (3-2)

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     18  10 .643    0.0   17     1    
BOS     16  10 .615    1.0   15     1    
NYA     13  12 .520    3.5   11     2    
TB      11  16 .407    6.5   14    -3    
BAL     10  16 .385    7.0   10     0    
American League Central     
KC      15  11 .577    0.0   15     0    
DET     13  12 .520    1.5   13     0    
MIN     13  13 .500    2.0   11     2    
CHA     12  13 .480    2.5   11     1    
CLE     10  16 .385    5.0   12    -2    
American League West        
SEA     15  11 .577    0.0   14     1    
TEX     13  12 .520    1.5   13     0    
LAA     11  13 .458    3.0   12    -1    
OAK      9  14 .391    4.5   11    -2    


National League East        Pwins  Diff
FLA     15  11 .577    0.0   13     2    
PHI     13  10 .565    0.5   12     1    
NYN     11  13 .458    3.0   12    -1    
ATL     11  14 .440    3.5   12    -1    
WAS      7  17 .292    7.0   10    -3    
National League Central     
STL     17   9 .654    0.0   16     1    
CHN     14  11 .560    2.5   13     1    
MIL     14  12 .538    3.0   13     1    
CIN     13  12 .520    3.5   12     1    
PIT     12  13 .480    4.5   14    -2    
HOU     11  15 .423    6.0   11     0    
National League West        
LAN     19   8 .704    0.0   18     1    
SF      12  12 .500    5.5   11     1    
ARI     11  15 .423    7.5   11     0    
SD      11  15 .423    7.5   10     1    
COL     10  14 .417    7.5   12    -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
FLA A+  Michael Stanton... 5  3  2  1  0  0  0  
CLE A+  L. Chisenhall..... 5  4  1  0  1  0  0  3 R
SEA AAA Jeff Clement...... 5  3  1  0  1  1  1  
TEX A+  M. Moreland....... 5  3  1  0  1  0  0  
SEA AAA Michael Saunders.. 6  2  0  0  2  0  1  
ARI AA  Gerardo Parra..... 5  3  0  0  1  0  0  
TOR AA  Bradley Emaus..... 6  4  0  0  1  0  0  
BOS A+  Ryan Kalish....... 4  2  0  0  1  1  1  4 RBI
TB  AA  Desmond Jennings.. 4  3  1  0  0  0  0  
TOR AA  David Cooper...... 5  4  1  0  0  0  0  
OAK AA  Corey Brown....... 4  3  1  0  0  1  0  3 LD
PIT AAA Neil Walker....... 5  3  1  0  0  0  0  3 LD

ORG LVL PLAYER            IP  H  R ER SO BB HR  Notes
TOR AA  Marc Rzepczynski.. 8  5  2  1  6  1  0  
PHI AA  Vance Worley...... 6  6  2  2  7  0  0  
CHW AA  Aaron Poreda...... 5  0  0  0  8  5  0  
ATL AA  Scott Diamond..... 6  7  2  1  8  3  0  11 GB
MIN A+  M. McCardell...... 6  6  3  3  7  1  1  
SF  AA  Henry Sosa........ 6  4  0  0  4  1  0  
SF  A+  M. Bumgarner...... 5  3  2  1  4  1  0  
STL AA  Lance Lynn........ 5  5  0  0  6  2  0  
TEX AA  Kasey Kiker....... 5  5  2  2  6  3  0  
NYY A   Pat Venditte...... 1  1  0  0  3  0  0  
HOU AAA Bud Norris........ 5  6  2  2  6  3  1  
NYY A   Brett Marshall.... 5  7  3  3  4  3  0

First Inning’s Major and Minor League Daily Reports:

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