MLB

Dave Bush showed Saturday night against the Cubs that his performance in the second half of 2008 was no fluke.

Bush went out and held the Cubs in check. He picked up a quality start but unfortunately, the Brewers bullpen let him down and the Brewers took the loss 6-5 at Miller Park. Bush went 6 1/3 innings and gave up only three runs to a powerful Cubs offense. He allowed six hits, struck out five and allowed a home run to Fukudome.

By the time the Kansas City Royals got on the scoreboard it was too late to make a comeback. CC Sabathia had given the Yankees seven-and-two-thirds innings of shutout baseball and Jose Veras held the shutout until Tony Pena Jr. grounded in the Royals' first and only run of the night.

Once again, the Yankees jumped on the Royals' pitching. Johnny Damon singled, Nick Swisher walked, and Jorge Posada doubled in two first-inning runs for the second straight game. In the third, the Yanks' catcher doubled in another run after Swisher tripled in captain Derek Jeter.

The Giants opened up the season 2-1 against the Brewers. Enough of a great start to pump life back into what has been a downer for most Giants fans the past few years.

But the series that started in San Diego on Friday was enough to remind the fans of those embarrassing times.

A game in which San Diego, the Little League team of the NL West, should have lost, they ended up winning. Was it the bad defense, the hitting, away game, or just the pitching?

Marlon Anderson was cut by the New York Mets today to make room for Livan Hernandez, the starting pitcher in today's game against the Marlins.

Originally an "okay field, some hit" second baseman with the Phillies, Anderson had two stints with the Mets as a utility player, mostly as an outfielder and pinch hitter. As a Met, he batted .254 with 11 home runs over parts of four seasons. Widely praised as a pinch hitter, Anderson has batted .273 over his career in that role.

This season the New York Mets are going to have to rely deeply on their bullpen to prevent a third straight collapse from happening.

Last year, the Mets blew over 30 save opportunities, while the Phillies blew none, which was the main difference between the two teams and was the reason why the Mets didn't go to the playoffs.

However, times have changed in Flushing, as Omar Minaya quickly decided to fix up this problem, to allow the Mets to succeed next season and to put some hope into the fan base.

Here are some players whose nice starts could continue.

Grant Balfour, RP, Tampa Bay Rays

Four reasons Balfour can get saves this year:

1)  Balfour’s 2008 season: 58 innings, 82 strikeouts, 1.54 ERA, 0.89 WHIP.  

It looked like all it took to rejuvenate the Minnesota Twins offense was a whiff of U.S. Cellular Field.

This perception was a wrong number, as the Twins dropped an 8-0 decision to the White Sox Saturday afternoon. 

I felt like I was serving a court ordered punishment watching this game today.

Instead of posting a pitching line for the Houston hurlers I'm just gonna post this:

Albert Pujols 2-4, 2 HR, 7 RBI.

I need to puke.

Oswalt's game was dealing.

Houston looked like they were going to be in good shop, with two runners on in each of the first 3 innings. However they couldn't drive any runs across and missed out on all three opportunities.

When Billy Beane went on a totally different approach to start the 2009 season to bring in better offensive players, it was a major surprise.

He brought in Jason Giambi (32 home runs), Matt Holliday (25 home runs), Nomar Garciaparra, and, of course, Orlando Cabrera, who is a solid offensive shortstop, but his defense dramatically improved the A's up the middle.

Yet, even with the excitement of these new players to benefit the offense, there was another contract extension more A's fans should have been paying attention to.

Mets fans, sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but apparently, SNY can't televise the Mets game until 7:05 PM EST, because FOX has an exclusive broadcast window, which comes to effect on Saturdays from 4:00 PM EST to 7:05 PM EST.

The MLB blackout rules are trash.

Here's another rule if you are in the territory of your team's blackout map, and your team isn't shown on cable—guess what? You are out of luck my friend.

You'll probably say, "No problem, I got MLB Extra Innings!"