Baseball

Here’s a look at the unheralded fantasy baseball players who played well yesterday.

Boston Red Sox at Cleveland Indians

The story here, besides Boston falling to 0-6, was the pitching. Fausto Carmona (seven scoreless innings, two hits) and Jon Lester (seven scoreless innings, three hits, nine strikeouts) tossed gems. Marco Scutaro went 2-for-2 with a walk.

Oakland A’s at Toronto Blue Jays

The Colorado Rockies are the overwhelming favorite of baseball writers to win the 2011 NL West crown.  With a collection of young players who possess an excellent combination of speed and power, the Rockies will certainly score a bunch of runs this year. Despite an excellent offense, the club will need a solid performance from their pitching staff to dethrone the defending champion San Francisco Giants. 

The Kansas City Royals will be taking on the Detroit Tigers in game one of a three-game set at Comerica Park in Detroit on Friday afternoon.

KC will be looking to continue their hot start to the season and improve their record to 5-2 while the Tigers are trying to climb out of a season-opening hole that has left them at 2-4 to start 2011.

As the Philadelphia Phillies roll into Atlanta for a three-game set against the Braves, they are set to see Tim Hudson on Friday night.  This is the Tim Hudson whose competitive advantage these days seems to rely on hitting the other team's players and attempting to shorten their season. 

He is especially prone to doing this when playing teams that compete in his division.  And since the Phillies have owned this division for the past four years, their players have the biggest bulls-eye for Hudson.

The Oakland Athletics and Minnesota Twins enter this weekend's three-game series with identical 2-4 records. Both teams are currently tied for last in their respective divisions (the A's are tied with Seattle and Minnesota is tied with Detroit).

The Athletics salvaged one game of their three-game series against the Toronto Blue Jays on Thursday afternoon with a 2-1 victory behind a solid pitching performance by Trevor Cahill.

Minnie Minoso was one of the best players of the 1950s. He had a Hall of Fame career, although he will never be voted into the Hall of Fame.

They're calling in the Calvary at Dodger Stadium,  This on the heels of a San Francisco Giants fan getting attacked by LA Dodgers fans in the parking lot following a Dodgers-Giants game. 

Heading into Milwaukee, I was feeling pretty good about the Atlanta Braves. Their pitching was phenomenal, their offense came off an 11-run game, and spirits for the team were high. 

They won a series on the road against a team that has given Atlanta fits in the past two years. It looked like the Braves would be able to open at home with a winning record due to their success against Milwaukee. 

The Texas Rangers have looked unstoppable while sweeping the Boston Red Sox under the mat in opening weekend. People were still skeptical and said the bottom half of the Rangers rotation consisting of Derek Holland and Alexi Ogando would falter. The duo stunned everyone and had arguably better outings than C.J. Wilson and Colby Lewis.

View From the Rockpile: Musings from a Mile High along the Journey to Rocktober

Although Rocktober magic has made the club's recent slow starts a distant memory, the Rockies entered 2011 determined to get off on a better foot than in previous seasons.

Coming off of a less than stellar 7-11 2010 record against the divisional rivals, the Los Angeles, Dodgers, the Rockies welcomed an early season opportunity to make a statement that they are a force to be reckoned with in the 2011 Wild Wild NL West.