Preview/Prediction

In fantasy baseball, we use statistics all day, everyday. But a surprisingly high number of managers tend to ignore some fundamental statistics generated by the Society for Baseball Research. Get to know a new Sabermetric each week in this new series. This week we're looking at BABIP.

Almost two weeks and 46 at-bats following home run 599, Alex Rodriguez belted his 600th career home run and officially became the youngest to do so at age 35, displacing Babe Ruth who did so at age 36. The Yankees have been reeling as of late, in part due to Rodriguez.

Finally, last night, the Mets did something positive. They didn't throw the ball around and pitch poorly; they actually played a winning style of baseball.

What that did against the first-place Braves was cut the Mets' deficit to 6.5 games in the NL East. With one more game to go against them tonight, the Mets would love to win the series and gain another game on them before heading to Philadelphia.

In order to do that, they'll hope Mike Pelfrey can finally deliver a quality outing, which he hasn't since June 25.

Weeks ago, most of Red Sox Nation seemed to give up on the idea that the Sox could overtake the Yankees and win the AL East. The conventional wisdom was that the team was now fighting to overtake the Rays for the Wild Card spot.

But things have recently changed. 

In the last 10 games, the Yankees are 5-5, while the Rays have gone 9-1, tying New York for the AL East lead. 

The Dog Days of August have officially arrived!

Baseball has had lots of interesting stories develop over the course of the year, and with the season coming to a close, the endings to those stories will be written.

The following is a list of 10 things that this baseball fan would thinks would be cool to see happen this year. Some are possible, some are impossible to predict, but all could be very interesting.

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A.J. Burnett sure wasn't happy to play his old team tonight. The Blue Jays bats ran rampant over the fireballer, knocking him out in the fifth inning after notching seven runs against him. The Blue Jays hit six doubles in the sixth, two of them by Travis Snider.  After the seven-run inning by the Jays that put them up 8-2, New York would come back to score runs in the bottom of the fifth, sixth and ninth. The Bluebirds would hang on though to win the heavy-hitting contest, 8-6.

In 2012, the Florida Marlins will move into a new ballpark in downtown Miami and will be renamed the Miami Marlins with an all new logo, color scheme, and young nucleus.

Most of their stars will be 30-years-old or younger, and I will highlight that here. Certainly, they have one of the most talented nucleus of players in the Major Leagues, and there is no telling what they can do once they move into a new environment, a true baseball stadium with the top players in the game.

(Coral Gables, FL) - After a disappointing 1-2 in a three game set with the Washington Nationals the Philadelphia Phillies are heading on the road for a three game set with the Florida Marlins.

For the Phillies a three game set with the NL East third ranked Florida Marlins is coming at the worst time. The Phillies are 25-31 on the road this season and with the Marlins only four games back of the Phillies for second place in the division the Fightin's will need to gain ground in Florida if they want to catch up to the Atlanta Braves.

The day after the San Diego Padres acquired veteran bat Ryan Ludwick, he went 1 for 2 with a run scored. It's a great start.

But who came out victorious after the Padres, St. Louis Cardinals, and the Cleveland Indians made the three team trade was a question.

Here's what each team got:

Padres: OF Ryan Ludwick

Cardinals: RHP Jake Westbrook, LHP Nick Greenwood

Indians: RHP Corey Kluber

The Padres gave up the two minor league pitchers for Ludwick.

THE NUMBERS GAME
 
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