Fan News

Here's my third update on how I think the All-Star rosters should look like, following the rules of at least one player from each team and overall 32 players. An asterisk* denotes injury. Agree or disagree? I'd love to hear.

American League:

First Base: Justin Morneau (Min) continues to be looked over for the two players in the AL East. He leads American League first basemen in RBI (56) and hits (84). He's also second in batting average (.324) and is very underrated defensively.

The San Diego Padres defeated the Seattle Mariners 4-3 Thursday afternoon in the rubber match of a three-game series. The Padres (29-36) were able to avoid a three-game sweep with the mid-day sun beaming down on the crowd of more than 25,000 at Petco Park.

The visiting Mariners (32-24) got out to an early lead when Ken Griffey Jr. jolted a ball deep to left-center field to plate Mike Carp for the 1-0 lead. Young Brandon Morrow started his second game since returning from the DL for the Mariners.

Another one bites the dust.

With this week's disappointing, yet predictable news that Sammy Sosa failed a drug test in 2003, the running list of great home run hitters linked to PED's continues to grow.  

While many people had already subconsciously assumed this to be true, the news put another dark cloud over America's past time once again.  

Then, the discussions began, does Sammy Sosa still belong in the Hall of Fame?

It was November of 2003, and the Red Sox were still crushed from the jarring defeat in Game Seven of the ALCS, at the hands of their hated nemesis yet again. Aaron Boone had hit a walk off home run off of knuckleballer Tim Wakefield.

The Yankees were going to the World Series. The Red Sox were going home. The pain became a little easier to swallow when the Yankees eventually lost the World Series to the Marlins.

One could say Josh Beckett has been doing things for the Sox since before he was traded to them.

I was forced to go to the game by myself last night because I just couldn't find anyone to go with me and I had to go.  I've decided it is actually good to go to a game by yourself every once in awhile.

I was able to really enjoy the game and just observe everything that was going on.  There were a few things that really stood out to me and reminded me why I love this game so much.

It started with Omar Vizquel before the game even started.

Anyone who knows Ubaldo Jimenez knows that his boyhood hero is Pedro Martinez. Jimenez watched his fellow country man dominate opposing Major League hitters from his home in the Dominican Republic.

There may be no crying in baseball, but there's definitely some heavy-duty lying going on. And it isn't just the players saying they've never done drugs.

It's the owners, the managers, the commissioner, the entire baseball establishment. Everyone's lying about drug use. The establishment still wants the public to believe that steroid abuse is the exception rather than the rule.

Talk about a slug fest. The Yankees mopped up their downtown rival Mets on Sunday, June 14. The final score was 15-0 in favor of the Bronx Bombers, a win that could prove monumental for their team morale.

Inconsistencies early on and the inability to defeat their hated rival Red Sox may linger in the minds of the Yankee players and coaches, but this win should help raise their spirits.

The Chicago Cubs' offense has been called a lot of things over the past few months—scary, awful, woeful, and laughable. When looking at the statistics, people may be missing one word from the Cubs 2009 batting performance:

Historic.

Heading into Friday's tilt with the cross-town rival White Sox, the Cubs, as a team, were hitting .212—that's a tabulation of every Cubs player that has had a single at-bat this year, including the ghost of Cubs' past, Aramis Ramirez.

As hush-hush as your granny's sex life, the Reds' brass continue to keep a tight lid concerning the extent of their key player's injuries.

The fine folks of Reds' country need to face the fiddle.  Joey Votto has vertigo. 

He may try another couple of stints with the big club, but as soon as he needs to travel via the skyway—he will land dizzier than a Friday night frat boy.