• The Mets beat the Marlins, 7-2. The planet’s best pitcher against a Triple-A squad — who could’ve have anticipated such a result? Uh, everyone.
• The Pittsburgh/Atlanta game was insane. The Pirates took a 9-4 lead into the bottom of the ninth, but the Braves tied. Then the Bucs jumped ahead in the 12th, 12-9, before allowing two runs in the bottom half and hanging on for a 12-11 victory. Xavier Nady, whom I’ve been following since he took home Cal League MVP honors in 2001 while playing for a great Lake Elsinore Storm club (Peavy and Mets left-hander Oliver Perez also played on that team, which went 91-49), knocked two homers, including the game winner.
• The Giants really stink. Good thing they’re paying Barry Zito all that money.
• The Brewers and Cubs ran a clinic on how not to close a game. Locked in a scoreless tie headed to the ninth, Milwaukee plated three runs in the top half off “closer” Kerry Wood, then watched “closer” Eric Gagne cough up three of his own in the bottom half. The Brewers scored in the top of the 10th and hung on to win, 4-3. Who got credit for the victory? The least deserving guy in the ballpark, of course: Gagne. The next time someone tries to tell you that a pitcher is good because of his won-loss record, remind them that the rules dictating how a win is “earned” don’t necessarily correlate with actually contributing to victory.
• Break up the Nationals. With Monday’s 11-6 drubbing of Philadelphia, they’re assured of finishing no worse than 2-160 this year.
• Livan Hernandez pitched well in his Twins debut. Actually, for all the grief Minnesota took in signing him, he matched Johan Santana’s line — two runs in seven innings — and got the win. Not that he’ll keep pace with Santana beyond, oh, right about now, but still…
• The White Sox seem to be a sexy dark horse candidate this season, but I just don’t see it. By my count, they’ve got about three or four good pitchers, depending on whether you believe Octavio Dotel can stay of the disabled list. One of them (Mark Buehrle) got absolutely pounded at Cleveland. Granted, the Indians will do that to a pitcher, but if the White Sox can’t win behind Buehrle, then what are they going to do when, say, Gavin Floyd toes the slab?

Good times, my friends. Good times…

Post from: Knuckle Curve

He was a tremendous mentor to the young guys on our staff. When he said something, you listened. He was the ultimate professional on and off the field. Just a tremendous, tremendous guy — and a big part of everything we accomplished that year.

Cardwell also threw a no-hitter on May 15, 1960, in his debut for the Cubs just two days after being acquired from Philadelphia. It came at Wrigley against the rival St. Louis Cardinals.

My thoughts go out to the family and friends of Mr. Cardwell.

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Clement made just 12 starts in 2006 with Boston and missed all of last season while recovering from shoulder surgery. Maybe he has something left, but I wouldn’t count on it.

Post from: Knuckle Curve

• Rob at Cub Reporter hooks us up with footage from a 1981 game between the Cubs and Reds.
• Dan at Get Up, Baby laments the continued decline of Scott Rolen.
• Pat at FanHouse muses on the Pirates motives behind hiring John Russell as their new skipper.
• Lisa at Astros Dugout discusses the (relatively) recent trade with Philadelphia that netted Michael Bourn.

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Red Sox: $143.0
Angels: $109.3

Indians: $61.7
Yankees: $189.6

Diamondbacks: $52.1
Cubs: $99.7

Rockies: $54.4
Phillies: $89.4

If you’d seeded the playoff teams by money spent on salary, here’s what it would have looked like:

1. Yankees
2. Red Sox
3. Angels
4. Cubs
5. Phillies
6. Indians
7. Rockies
8. Diamondbacks

Three of the four teams from the bottom half have advanced the LCS. One of the two smallest salaried teams in the dance is guaranteed to reach the World Series. I don’t really care which of them makes it, although I have a slight preference for the Rockies because they’ve never been there before and I think they’re the better team.

On the other side, I continue to pull for the Indians. Hey, if they can knock off $190 million, $143 million should be piece of cake, right?

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Happy Monday, and welcome to our latest poll. Manager of the Year is always a tricky one for me. What criteria should we use to determine the winner? If we look only at total victories, we ignore factors such as improvement from one season to the next. If we consider improvement from one season to the next, but overlook the fact that management spent an obscene amount of money to put itself in that position, we still miss a big part of the picture.

I usually try to balance overall performance with what our expectations were of a given team coming into the season. For example, in the National League, even though the Cubs improved greatly from 2006 to 2007, it was hardly surprising given all the high-profile moves they made over the winter to help enhance their chances of reaching the postseason.

In the American League, I like Cleveland’s Eric Wedge. This is mostly due to the fact that I badly misjudged the Indians’ chances in ‘07. Many others expected them to do well, and perhaps I should have been one of them. Instead, I had them finishing fourth in the AL Central and they made the playoffs.

The rest of the pack is tough, because no-one really surprised me in a good way. As I’ve said before, if Mike Hargrove hadn’t left the Mariners, I think he’d deserve strong consideration. Beyond that, I’m not sure.

But enough about me. Who gets your vote, and why?

Post from: Knuckle Curve

I thought the Cubs would be giving Arizona a better fight, but that’s been the story with the Diamondbacks all year. As a Padres fan, I take some pleasure in knowing that only teams from our division have won so far on the NL side. Not much, mind you, but some.

Over in the AL, it’s harder to reach any solid conclusions based on one game, but I’m surprised that the Indians blew out the Yankees in Game 1. Sure, Cleveland has a potent offense, but four home runs? Two of those came off Chien-Ming Wang, who hadn’t surrendered more than one homer in a game since April 29 against Boston.

I hope the Indians reach the World Series. Then again, I prefer to see teams rewarded for being smart and not necessarily just being able to cover their mistakes with wads of cash.

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Teams are running out of time to make their move. The AL West and Central have been decided — if not mathematically, then practically speaking. The AL East is still up for grabs, but unless you’re a fan of the Red Sox or Yankees, that’s not a particularly compelling story line seeing that the runner-up almost certainly will win the wild card.

In the National League, things are a little more interesting. The Mets continue their free fall and now are just 1 1/2 games ahead of Philadelphia in the East. The Mets head to Florida for a series with the Marlins (hopefully in front of more than 375 people), while the Phillies are in Washington to face the Nationals. Advantage? Well, someone has the opportunity to make up ground in the wild card race.

The same 1 1/2 game gap separates the Cubs from second-place Milwaukee in the Central. Chicago plays host to the Pirates, fresh off losing four straight in San Diego; the Brewers face the Braves in Atlanta. This could be a great chance for the Cubs to get some separation headed into the final week.

Out west, meanwhile, Arizona’s lead over the Padres has slipped to a half game, while the Rockies — a long shot — find themselves five out and playing excellent baseball. The Diamondbacks are at home against the stumbling Dodgers. Here in San Diego, two of the hottest teams in the National League square off in what could be the Rockies’ last grasp at a playoff shot — a tremendous run considering their extreme youth and relative inexperience.

The real question is how much pride the Dodgers will play with now that they’re essentially out of the race. If you’re a fan of the Padres or Rockies, you hope LA will come out fighting. The Dodgers have been so inconsistent that it’s impossible to say which team will show up over the weekend.

Whatever happens, we’ve got some potentially exciting matchups. Seriously, is this the best time of the season or what?

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Two aspects of this story fascinate me:

1. The announced attendance was 10,121, but a photo from the game tells a very different story. Er, forget steroids for a moment; someone is cheating here, and it ain’t the players.
2. The Marlins are a great case study in the difficulties of promoting a team that has no identity. This is a franchise that came into existence in 1993 and has won two World Series. If you’re keeping score at home, they’ve won rings in 13.3% of their seasons. The Boston Americans/Red Sox have done so in 5.6% of their seasons, the Dodgers (and their various predecessors) in 4.8%, the Cubs in 1.6%. Heck, the Cubs haven’t won the World Series since 85 years before the Marlins came into existence. (Even Miami’s original team, the Class D Florida State League Hustlers, didn’t appear until two decades after the Cubs’ last World Series victory.) Anyway, the point is that apparently winning isn’t enough to sustain a franchise. There needs to be at least some kind of tradition, and it’s hard to build one when you’re busy slashing payroll all the time and alienating your potential fan base.

[Tip o' the Knuckle Curve cap to Baseball Musings, whose suggestion of a move to Havana, Cuba, intrigues me...]

Post from: Knuckle Curve

American League

• Mariners at Tigers, 4:05 p.m. PT — Both teams are three games back of the Yankees in the AL wild card race. Miguel “Don’t Let the Career-High 13 Wins Fool You” Batista faces Justin Verlander. Whatever happened to Brandon Inge, anyway? That guy was good for, like, 5 minutes.
• Indians at Angels, 7:05 p.m. PT — First off, we should rename these teams “Europeans” and “Animal Spirits.” Second, why did Cleveland sign Jake Westbrook to a huge contract extension in April? The new Bill Wegman was really good in 2004, but otherwise has been a league-average pitcher. The Angels counter with John Lackey.

National League

• Cubs at Pirates, 4:05 p.m. PT — The Pirates are going nowhere, but Tom Gorzelanny is an exciting young pitcher. The 24-year-old left-hander has scuffled a bit since the All-Star break, but 13 wins on a bad Pittsburgh team is impressive. Another intriguing southpaw, Rich Hill, goes for the Cubs. Jose Bautista is having a decent season at third base for the Pirates, but it’s hard not to wonder how different that franchise might be right now if it hadn’t given away Aramis Ramirez, who has been a force in Chicago ever since. Hey, at least the Bucs got Bobby Hill in the deal. Nobody can take that away from them. Nobody.
• Padres at Rockies, 6:05 p.m. PT — Justin Germano averages 5.70 K/9 for his career. Elmer Dessens checks in at 5.44. Hmmm, good hitters making contact at Coors Field? Dessens is pitching for his fourth team over the past two seasons. Wow, he must be really coveted.
• Cardinals at Diamondbacks, 6:40 p.m. PT — Have you noticed how good Adam Wainwright has been in the second half? Try 6-2, 2.43 ERA, 3-to-1 K/BB ratio good. I think it’s safe to say that Wainwright’s re-adjustment to a starting role is complete. He’ll face perennial Cy Young candidate Brandon Webb on Friday.

One game? Go with Wainwright/Webb. That has a chance to be fantastic. Happy watching!

Post from: Knuckle Curve