We’re witnessing perhaps one of the best hitters ever at his peak. Miguel Cabrera had a month of May that was historic.
The Detroit Tigers slugger hit 12 home runs and drove in 33 runs in 28 games last month, and entered June hitting .372 wit…
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Monday Morning Manager: Cabrera is no Hack, but he’s on pace
Posted on 03 June 2013.
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Blockbusters revisited: Greinke to the Brewers
Posted on 29 May 2013.
Zack Greinke has bounced around a lot in the last three seasons, from Kansas City to Milwaukee to the Los Angeles Angels and now to the Los Angeles Dodgers, who made him one of the best-paid pitchers in history this offseason as a free agent.
…
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College baseball NCAA bracket released
Posted on 27 May 2013.
It’s a bracket of college teams, but without the major hoopla. It’s the NCAA college baseball tournament, and the road to Omaha, Neb., and the College World Series begins this week.
The top eight national seeds:
North Carolina (52-8)
Vand…
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Monday Morning Manager: Sabathia having rare winless month
Posted on 27 May 2013.
The 300-win milestone is not likely to be reached as often as it was in the 20th century. Teams just don’t let pitchers make enough starts to let it happen.
It will have to be an ace who is as healthy as a horse, taking the ball every fifth d…
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Mattingly odds-on favorite as first managerial casualty
Posted on 22 May 2013.
It’s been a disappointing first quarter of the season in Los Angeles, for both the Dodgers and the Angels.
Both teams have huge payrolls and big expectations in 2013, and both are struggling. They both won on Wednesday, however — the Dodgers are 19-26 after a win at Milwaukee on Wednesday, and the Angels are 19-27 after beating Seattle.
But there’s a long climb back to the top of their divisions, especially for the Angels, who are already 10.5 games behind the Texas Rangers. And the Dodgers, with the largest payroll in history, look like a fantasy team on paper but have little actual chemistry on the field. Only the Marlins have scored fewer runs, and this is a team with Matt Kemp, Adrian Gonzalez, Andre Ethier and Carl Crawford. Kemp has hit just two home runs.
On Wednesday before the game in Milwaukee, Dodgers manager Don Mattingly seemed to be ready to crack.
It’s not just all, ‘Let’s go put an All-Star team out there and play games, and the team with the All-Star team wins,’ Mattingly told reporters. “… All grit and no talent is not going to get you there, and all talent and no grit is not going to get you there. There’s got to be a mixture of both.”
The Dodgers are off on Thursday, returning home. It would almost be a shock if the team didn’t make a move.
Wrote USA Today’s Bob Nightengale: “Mattingly will be baseball’s first manager to be fired this season. He knows it. The players know it. And, yes, the front office is bracing for it.”
And over in Orange County, Angels owner Arte Moreno gave Mike Scioscia a vote of confidence last week.
“Mike has zero problems, OK?” Moreno said to FoxSports.com. “This is his 14th year. Mike goes beyond what he does on the field. He’s a good person. He’s a good person in the community. A very good baseball guy. You don’t have to ask me. You just ask other managers, other baseball people. Look at 14 years’ worth of productivity. Look at his record. He has two World Series rings with the Dodgers. He has one with the Angels. We’ve been to the playoffs.”
Source: About.com
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Blockbusters revisited: Roy Halladay trade
Posted on 22 May 2013.
Roy Halladay has played in the major leagues for 15 seasons and has one of the smallest transaction histories of any modern player. He was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in 1995 and was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies in 2009. That’s all…
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Monday Morning Manager: Race to the bottom
Posted on 20 May 2013.
It’s only happened twice this year — on Friday, April 19 and Monday, April 29.
Through seven weeks of the Major League Baseball regular season, those were the only two days in which the Houston Astros and Miami Marlins both won.
In contrast…
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More instant replay is coming; let’s pick up the debate
Posted on 19 May 2013.
Don’t like the proposals for expanded instant replay in baseball? Blame the NFL.
“Now we’re addicted to instant replay,” writes Mark Kiszla of the Denver Post. “The NBA stops the flow of the game so a referee can check to see which player tou…
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Bryce Harper earns a dubious comparison
Posted on 15 May 2013.
One show I always like to catch on MLB Network is “Prime 9,” which is a countdown show with a subject and then nine answers, such as the nine best second basemen of all-time, the nine best teams of the 1990s, etc.
A fun one I saw recently was…
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Blockbusters revisited: The first Adrian Gonzalez trade
Posted on 15 May 2013.
As part of our Wednesday series re-grading big baseball trades of the past few years, let’s go back to a trade from December 2010 that promised to remake the Boston Red Sox. And then a year-and-a-half later, he was dealt again. First basema…
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