Hello,
The Dodgers finished their series with the Reds on Sunday, with LA winning the final 3 games. LA won Sunday's game 1-0 in 11 innings and were powered by Yasiel Puig's 10th homer of the season. It was this walk off homer, I love the slide at the end of circling the bases:
I wasn't able to check the score on this game until about the 6th inning. At that time the Dodgers only had 1 hit and that hit was by pitcher Chris Capuano. LA ended up with only 5 hits in the whole game, however they had the only hit that mattered. That was Puig's 10th homer and also his 23rd RBI. I know it's not a coincidence that the Dodgers have been much better since he's been with the team.
After getting a contribution from Skip Schumaker yesterday, the Dodgers received another unexpected contribution on Sunday. Don Mattingly turned to Brandon League and he was able to deliver. League was one of 5 Dodgers pitchers that shut out the Reds. League pitched two very solid innings, he gave up no hits, no runs and only 1 walk. League got the win and improved his record to 6-3. He still has that unsightly 5.17 ERA and I'm not convinced he'll be on the Dodgers playoff roster. (Fingers crossed that LA makes the playoffs.)
With the Diamondbacks losing again, LA expanded their lead over them by 2.5 games in the NL West.
LA gets Monday off and then they have a two game series with the Yankees. Derek Jeter is back with the Yankees, hitting a home run on the first pitch he saw today. The Yankees won Sunday's game with the returning Alfonso Soriano's walk off hit. In fact Soriano was 4 for 5 in the game, I'm not sure but that seems to be how many hits he finished with in his Cubs career. Meanwhile no more word on when Alex Rodriguez will be able to play or if he's going to be suspended by MLB first. The Yankees are a decent team, at 55-50, but for them they have the misfortune of playing in the best division in MLB, the AL East.
With their current record the Yankees would be second place in the NL West. However in the AL East they are in 4th place, which is made even worse by trailing the first place Red Sox by 7.5 games. With or without Rodriguez things are looking bleak for the Yankees playoff hopes. This song describes the mixed emotions of any complicated relationship, which is what the Yankees and Rodriguez have:
Meanwhile the A's continue rolling, they slapped around the Angels today 10-6 as they strengthen their lead on the AL West. The Rangers have completely fallen apart, losing 4 in a row and 8 of their last 10 games. Meanwhile the A's have won 3 straight games and now lead the second place Rangers by 6 games. With some people thinking the A's are going to end up with Jake Peavy, it's looking good that the A's are going to reach the playoffs. In fact, ESPN.com says they have a 90.9% chance of reaching the playoffs.
Meanwhile the Braves continue to do well. Although I'm not 100% convinced they won't flop again once they reach the playoffs. They were able to sweep the Cardinals and won 4 of their last 5 games. St. Louis may be the best team in MLB now, they are a team that doesn't seem to have any weaknesses. In the NL East the Braves lead the second place Nationals by 8.5 games and the third place Phillies by 11 games.
The Nationals have won 3 games in a row, but they've only 4 of their last 10 games. The Nationals are still 8.5 games out in the NL East. I wonder how hard the Phillies are even trying, they've lost 8 games in a row. Also Philadelphia has Jonathan Papelbon whining that he didn't come to the Phillies for this kind of play. Honestly I wasn't real sad when Papelbon didn't resign with the Red Sox. I'm sure the Phillies aren't real happy about signing him either. The Phillies were planning on having a lot of success and they overpaid Papelbon to help them do that. There's still the last two years of Papelbon's 4 year, $50 million dollar contract that someone has to pay for. I'm not sure why anyone would want to pay him that kind of money. (Dearest Dodgers please don't consider trading for Papelbon.)
themusicaddict
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