Baseball

While it tends to be quite difficult to root against the long shot, the underdog and the Cinderella story, sometimes the plug gets pulled on the dream and there's nothing left to be said.

Before last night's 14-strikeout blowout by Detroit Tigers ace Justin Verlander, the New York Yankees took two of three games from the Seattle Mariners in the Bronx last weekend.

The Tigers' 7-2 smacking marks the Yankees' 11th loss in their last 17 games, and the Bombers are now four games deep into a 20-game stretch that continues with three more versus the Tigers.

According to Andrew Baggerly of CSN Bay Area, Pablo Sandoval will return to the San Francisco Giants' infield sometime in the middle of next week.

Bruce Bochy said trainers tell him Pablo Sandoval is a week away from activation. He's eligible Thursday.

With CC Sabathia as the ace, Hideki Kuroda as a strong No. 2 and Andy Pettitte set to come back in September, do the New York Yankees have a starting rotation good enough to make it to the World Series?

Are the Yankees too dependent on Pettitte's comeback? If he doesn't return, is Freddy Garcia a suitable replacement? Should general manager Brian Cashman have traded for a starting pitcher at the July 31 trade deadline?

The Seattle Mariners' recent seven-game winning streak may be over, but it sure was nice to enjoy a week's worth of winning baseball in an otherwise disappointing season.

The biggest question now is whether some of the encouraging signs found within this stretch will have any long-lasting meaning.  Over the course of this week and next, I hope to tackle a few of these questions in search of answers.

The Padres ownership saga is unofficially complete.

John Moores has agreed to a deal to sell the San Diego Padres to the O'Malley group, according to The Union-Tribune San Diego. The price? A figure close to $800 million.

It is certainly a bit of a misnomer to use the term "underpaid" when discussing professional baseball players. With a new league minimum salary of $480,000, even the sixth outfielder and the lefty specialist make more annually than the President of the United States.

The Toronto Blue Jays have had a rough 2011 season. Three of their opening day starting position players are on the DL and another one is not with the team anymore. Their pitching staff has also been depleted by injuries.

Despite this, the team has still been able to be competitive. They sit two games under .500 at 53-55 and are just five games back of the second wild card spot.

The Baltimore Orioles are having a nice surprise season right now, and, considering how many of their players are performing thus far, it's justifiable to wonder just how on Earth they're doing it.

For the Orioles, it would be greatly beneficial to have these guys break out and perform like they're capable of. It would almost be as if the O's did make a significant deadline deal to boost their team.

Here is one thing we can all agree on: CC Sabathia cannot pitch every day.