Baseball

Last Week: 4-3
This Week: KC (8/23-25); at Tor (8/26-29)

So, What Happened?

The Tigers had a "sandwich week."

Their bread was a win over the Yankees on top and a sweep of the Indians on the bottom. In between there were three losses to the Yanks.

Kind of like good rye bread with head cheese inside.

Winning a Triple Crown is one of the rarest feats in all of baseball. Very rarely do we even see one player contending for the average, home run, and RBI titles.

And you're telling me that there are three contenders in the National League this year?

Colorado's Carlos Gonzalez, Cincinnati's Joey Votto, and St. Louis's Albert Pujols are all in the hunt for the Triple Crown. And if none of them wins the honor, it will be one of them that keeps another from winning.

All season long, these three have been hitting absurdly for average and power.

The Chicago White Sox setup man and part time closer Matt Thornton has been shut down with a forearm injury.

"I'm not concerned with my overall health,'' Thornton said. "I'm concerned about missing some time is what I'm concerned about."

According to Thornton he's been able to "warm-up through" the forearm pain all year, but now the pain has become too much. "Now warming up has turned into some pretty good soreness. I've got to take a step back"

This week it was announced that a grand jury is indicting Roger Clemens for lying to congress. Really. In this economy. 

Glad to know we're keeping on top of the things that are important.

I've been very clear in several articles that I think we need to give up the war on PED's because it will never work. But even if you believe that drug testing in sports can work, you have to admit that prosecutions like this one are frivolous.

It's starting to look increasingly clear that—now some three quarters into the season—the Yankees have lost their gamble on Javier Vazquez.

The Steroid Era has been around pretty much since the early nineties, a span of about nearly 20 years. With a grueling 162 game regular season plus postseason play, it adds up to playing nearly 200 baseball games if you want to go ahead and count Spring Training. 

The Kansas City Royals are trying to turn around their franchise, from the bottom up.  They are asking their fans to be patient as they try to get the talent in the minor leagues to build from within.  Slowly but surely, we’re seeing positive signs.

We’ve talked about Mike Moustakas (he’s a part of our Prospect Tracker, so click here to find the latest update)

Assuming that everything that owner Tom Ricketts has told us is true, and Jim Hendry really will be leading the search for the next Cubs manager to replace the retiring (retired?) Lou Piniella, do not believe that former Cubs legend Ryne Sandberg is a lock to be the man.

In fact, if you read into the tea leaves, Hendry doesn't feel that Ryno is ready to be a major league manager and instead would prefer one with previous major league experience.

Most people say that 2010 so far has been the "year of the pitcher." Well, there have been some fabulous hitters this year too.

A lot of these guys from this list could be MVP candidates, and that's why they are on this list, because they're that good.

Making my decisions for these ten players was extremely difficult, but I think I made the right choices.

All the stats used in the article are current as of 8-19-10.

Feel free to voice your opinion.

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