Baseball

Justin Verlander overcame a rocky start and rain delay to get his fifth win and Miguel Cabrera hit another homer as the Detroit Tigers beat the Cleveland Indians 11-7 on Wednesday night, sweeping the two-game series between the AL Central's top teams.

The occasional hit batter will not deter Texas Rangers right-hander Tanner Scheppers from pitching inside. Scheppers’ willingness to go inside with the fastball has contributed to his success this season. In the process, Scheppers has hit four batters, second-highest total among major league relievers. Baltimore’s Darren O’Day leads with five hit batters. “That’s part of the game,” Scheppers said. “Some guys hang over the plate, and it just happens. As a … [visit site to read more]

The Texas Rangers cleared a roster spot for Wolf by returning right-handed reliever Cory Burns to Triple-A Round Rock. The move made the Rangers the only major league team with more left-handers than right-handers in the bullpen. The Rangers have four left-handers — Neal Cotts, Michael Kirkman, Joseph Ortiz and Robbie Ross — and three right-handers. Only six other clubs have as many as three left-handers in the bullpen: Baltimore, Detroit, Minnesota, Oakland, Seattle and … [visit site to read more]

Despite only getting 4 hits, the Tides win 4-3. Josh Stinson has a nice outing, giving up 3 ER in 6 IP on six hits and two walks, striking out 7/4. Mike Belfiore gave up 3 hits in a third of an inning, though was not charged with any runs. Manny Delcarmen and Jairo Asencio combined to throw two and thirds scoreless. Both are making a case to be back in the majors. Xavier Avery went 1-3 with a walk, two strikeouts and a stolen base. Ryan Flaherty goes 2-4. LJ Hoes goes 0-4 with a K. Brandon Wood had another extra basehit for the Tides. He is now OPSing 878 in 10 games as a Tide. Bowie won 7-5. Zach Clark, the newest knuckler, gave up 2 ER in 5 IP on 5 hits (1 HR) and 2 walks, striking out 4, with a GB/FB of 9/0. I suppose that would suggest his knuckler was working? I don't know though. Facing rehabbing Brett Myers, the Baysox would score 3 ER in 4.1 IP. Henry Urrutia would go 1-4 with a walk and a stolen base. Ty Kelly would go 0-4 with a walk and a stolen base. The Keys were rained out. The Shorebirds won 8-6. Matt Taylor had another quality start, giving up 3 ER in 6 IP on 7 hits and two wild pitches, striking out 3 with a GB/FB of 9/4. Torsten Boss went 1-5 with a K. Joel Hutter went 0-4 with a walk. Gregory Lorenzo went 0-5 with a K. Rod Bernadina went 2-2 with a double, a walk, a sacrifice and a stolen base. Adrian Marin DNP. Your minor league boxers.

ARLINGTON — Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington waffled as to whether right-hander Ross Wolf will get another start in the Memorial Day doubleheader at Arizona. Wolf, in his first major league start in his 12th professional season, earned his first major league win Wednesday by allowing only one run in five innings during a 3-1 victory against Oakland at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington. His next step is uncertain. “We’ll make a decision on that as we move forward,” Washington … [visit site to read more]

May 22 (Reuters) – If Don Mattingly’s comments and lineup change were aimed at shaking up his struggling Los Angeles team, he certainly got his wish as the Dodgers hammered Milwaukee 9-2 on Wednesday. With the Dodgers bottom of the National League West despite having one of the highest payrolls in Major League Baseball, Mattingly questioned his team’s toughness and benched outfielder Andre Ethier. “It’s not all grit and no talent that gets there, and it’s not all talent and no grit. … View full post on Yahoo! Sports – MLB – Toronto Blue Jays News

This afternoon, at work, I was casually watching the live box score for the Reds-Mets game on Yahoo Sports. In the seventh inning, Rick Ankiel hit a run-scoring triple. That was amazing enough -- Ankiel only has 9 triples in his career. I happened to look at the box to see what else he had done that day, and found that he had also hit two doubles. Seven total bases in the game, without hitting a homer... hmm. That got me curious: what is the record for most total bases in a game without hitting a homer? Through the miracle of Baseball References' s play index, I have the answer. 10 or more total bases in a game, without hitting a homer, has been done a total of 38 times. To my surprise, only two of them precede the modern era; Babe Ruth had 10 TB in a game in 1918, and Harry Hooper did the same in 1919. (It should be noted that Baseball Reference's database currently only goes back to 1916.) Hooper is also the only player who has achieved the feat twice; he did it again in a 1924 game. Both times, he reached 10 TB with two triples and two doubles in five official at-bats. There are eight games on the list in which the player hit three triples. The first one was achieved by the Cardinals' Les Bell, on September 22, 1926, against the then-Brooklyn Robins (now the Dodgers). He hit three triples and a double for 11 total bases. (The Robins' starter, Jesse Barnes, was yanked after surrendering 7 earned runs in 1.2 innings.) The most recent such game, and the most recent on the list overall, was accomplished by then-Minnesota Twin Denard Span, on June 29, 2010, against the Tigers. He hit three triples and a single in four official AB for 10 total bases, and also walked. His WPA for the game was +0.419. Armando Galarraga was the Tigers starter who got roughed up, as the Twins won 11-4. Nine times the feat has been accomplished by a batter who only hit one triple in the game, most recently by the Pittsburgh Pirates' Rennie Stennett on September 23, 1975, in a game against the Cubs. In that game, Stennett was 7-for-7 with one triple, two doubles, and four singles. The Pirates absolutely blew out the Cubs, 22-0, with Rick Reuschel having probably the worst start of his career, surrendering 8 runs and getting only one out. The really eye-catching entry in the list is Johnny Burnett's 11 total bases for the Cleveland Indians against the Philadelphia Athletics, on July 10, 1932. This turned out to be a heartbreaker for Cleveland as they lost, 18-17 in 18 innings, but Burnett put himself into the record books in a major way. He racked up those 11 total bases by going 9-for-11 with two doubles, seven singles, and no triples. He's the only player ever to reach 10 or more TB in a game without hitting any home runs or any triples. His nine hits in the game is the major league record by a good bit; no other AL hitter has ever exceeded six hits in a game of any length, and only two NL hitters have reached seven hits in a game. However, the record holder is... if you thought it was someone like Ruth or Ted Williams, you're going to be disappointed. The record for most TB in a game without a homer is 12, set by... Chicago White Sox outfielder Lance Johnson, in a September 23, 1995 game against the Twins, in the Metrodome. In that game, Johnson was 6-for-6 with three triples and three singles. Amazingly, he only saw a total of 13 pitches! Were Twins pitchers throwing a lot of hanging breaking balls that day? The Sox won the game 14-4; Twins starter Jose Parra was the victim, surrendering 8 runs (7 earned) in 5.2 innings. To finish the story... I was really hoping that today Ankiel would get one more opportunity to swing the bat to see if he could hit another triple and join the 10-TB-without-a-HR club. And sure enough, in the bottom of the 9th, with two out and one on, Ankiel's slot in the batting order came up. Alas... the Mets chose to pinch-hit for him. Had he been allowed to bat, and hit that triple, it wou

This is the time of year when it falls to pieces. I have no words to say. Year after year it gets hard to find new ways to say the same thing. Below .500 and falling. And that is where the Royals set once again. In fact all I can really offer is this photo from tonight's loss; And maybe a chance that this team can find away to steady the ship.But I've grown to be a callused old man (fan) now and I didn't believe the hype at the start of the year or at the height of the 12 days or so in first place. So yes, I guess I do get some sick satisfaction from being right. But I want to be wrong I so want to believe I'll see a Royals team in the playoffs before I die. But I'm not the same 16 year old I was when I started this blog, nor is Gordon the same prospect , neither are you the reader. Face it we're all growing old and running out of time.Time to see, to hear, to feel, a Royals we deserve. One that won't disappoint us and break our hearts....

Clay Buchholz pitched five-hit ball over seven innings to improve to 7-0, and the Boston Red Sox beat the Chicago White Sox 6-2 Wednesday night to avoid a three-game sweep.