Daily News and Notes

By Richard Van Zandt; BaseballEvolution.com

 

Notes through games of Wednesday, September 20

 

Congratulations to the Bronx Bombers who despite losing 3-2 to the Blue Jays in Toronto, won their 9^th consecutive American League East division title when the Twins knocked off the Red Sox 8-2 in Boston despite David Ortiz’ 50^th home run of the season.  With the Braves record streak of 14 consecutive division titles snapped, the nine straight titles is now the longest current streak in the majors and is tied for the second longest in sports history. 

 

Congratulations as well to Ortiz whose blast made him just the 13^th player in American League history and only the 39^th in major league history to reach the 50 home run mark.  He is the first in the AL to do it since both Alex Rodriguez and Jim Thome accomplished it in 2002.  The home run also tied Ortiz with Jimmy Foxx for the Red Sox all-time franchise mark.  Double X hit 50 for Boston in 1938.

 

Best wishes to Royals manager Buddy Bell who will take a leave of absence from the team – possibly for the rest of the season – to deal with a growth found near his tonsils in a routine exam.  K.C lost the game on Wednesday 3-0 to L.A. and needs now to win 5 times in their last 10 games to avoid losing 100 games.

 

And a huge welcome back to Peter Gammons who made his return to the airwaves on Wednesday, reporting from the Red Sox game for ESPN less than three months after suffering a near fatal brain aneurysm.  A member of the writer’s wing of the Hall of Fame and one of the most knowledgeable men in the game, Gammons was felled on June 27 at his home in Cape Cod.  He expects to be in the ESPN studio during the playoffs and plans to be at the 2006 World Series.  Great to have you back Mr. Gammons!

 

The Chase is Wild

 

The White Sox hopes of repeating took a near fatal blow on Wednesday when they lost at home to Detroit 6-2.  Jeremy Bonderman held the Sox in check, allowing just two hits in the first five innings before giving up solo home runs to Juan Uribe and Tad Iguchi in the sixth.  Joel Zumaya and Todd Jones then shut them down the rest of the way and the Tigers got late homers from Curtis Granderson and Ivan Rodriguez to seal the win.  Jon Garland gave up 5 runs on 12 hits in 7 innings as the Sox lost for the 5^th time in 6 games, and the 7^th time in their last 10.  Chicago is just 7-12 in September and they now trail the Tigers by 6 in the Central and the Twins by 5 ½ in the Wild Card chase after watching the Twins handle the Red Sox in Boston Wednesday. 

 

In that game, Big Papi’s 50^th jack in the sixth gave Boston a 2-1 lead but Torii Hunter turned it around in the 8^th with a three run jack off Craig Hansen and the Twinkies would score four more times in the 8^th and 9^th to make it an 8-2 final.  Boof Bonser threw seven strong innings, allowing just the two runs, to earn his sixth win of the year and 3^rd in his last four decisions.  In his last 8 starts Bonser’s ERA is 3.31.  The Twins remained a half a game behind the Tigers for the division lead.

 

AL Wild Card

Minnesota        – 90-61 –

Chicago            – 85-67 5.5

 

The Padres and Dodgers both lost on Wednesday, San Diego remaining a half a game ahead of L.A. in the West but Los Angeles with the loss, fell into a tie with the Phillies for the Wild Card lead.

 

Philadelphia evened things up with a 6-2 win over the Cubs as Brett Myers tossed a complete game while striking out 12.  Chase Utley and Pat Burrell both homered for the Phillies in the win, the team’s 5^th in their last 6 games, and 7^th in their last 9.

 

The Dodgers – who led the West by 4 games on September 1 – fell 6-4 in Los Angeles to the Pirates who won for the 5^th straight game and improved their record since the all-star break to 35-27.  Freddy Sanchez had four hits in the win to up his major league leading batting average to .346 as Greg Maddux was denied the 332^nd win of his career.

 

San Diego failed to capitalize on the Dodgers loss with David Wells allowing 11 of the D’Backs 18 hits in his 6 1/3 innings of work in the Padres 8-2 loss.  Edgar Gonzalez allowed just 1 run in 7 innings for Arizona to out duel the veteran Wells.

 

The Giants and Marlins both won on Wednesday and remain within sight of the Wild Card lead (albeit they need binoculars at this point).  The Giants 7-4 come from behind win over the Rockies – led by Barry Bonds’ go ahead pinch hit single in the 8^th – kept them in the chase, 3.5 games back and the Marlins 6-3 win over the Mets – backed by two home runs and 8 1/3 strong innings from Dontrelle Willis – left them 4 games back of the leaders.

 

NL Wild Card

Los Angeles     – 79-73 –

Philadelphia      – 79-73 –

San Francisco   – 75-76 3.5

Florida             – 75-77 4.0

 

All-Time Leaderboard Update – In the past week…

 

Making possibly his last home start for the Astros, 44-year-old Rogers Clemens pitched six shutout innings against Cincinnati to earn the 348^th win of his HOF career.  In 17 starts the Rocket is 7-5 with a 2.37 ERA and has allowed less than 3 earned runs in a game 14 times.  He has two more scheduled starts left in the season as he attempts to become just the 8^th pitcher in history to win 350 games.  With six strikeouts in the game, Clemens now needs just 9 more K to reach 4,600. 

 

Craig Biggio broke an 0-for-30 slide Sunday with his 279^th career home run and then collected 3 more hits over the next three days – including his 280^th HR in support of Clemens on Wednesday – to give him 2,919 hits in his career.

 

Tom Glavine won the 289^th game of his career to break a tie with Tommy John and move alone into 24^th place all-time. 

 

With his pinch hit single on Wednesday, Barry Bonds collected the 1,923 RBI of his career to pass Foxx and take sole possession of 7^th place on the all-time list.

 

Jim Thome broke a tie with the injured Manny Ramirez and took sole possession of 26^th all-time in HR with 471.  He needs four to tie Stan Musial and Willie Stargell on the career list.

 

Alex Rodriguez had a big week, hitting two HR to catch and pass Jose Canseco for 29^th place all-time. He also had 8 RBI in the week to give him 1,342 in his career, enough to move him past Johnny Mize and Gary Gaetti for 74^th on the career list, and he also scored four times to move past Fred McGriff into 93^rd place on that list.

 

Moises Alou on Wednesday hit the 315^th home run of his career to tie Jeromy Burnitz for 101^st all-time, 1 behind Shawn Green.  With two hits in the game, he now also needs just 9 more to reach 2,000. 

 

Frank Thomas scored three times to top 1,400 for his career.  He now has 1,401, four behind Mike Griffin for 79^th all-time.  And with 2 RBI on Wednesday, the Big Hurt with 1,572 in his career moved to within 3 of Sammy Sosa for 34^th all-time.

 

With five hits, Steve Finely moved past Heinie Manush into 78^th place on the career hit list with 2,528.

 

With 8 hits, Omar Vizquel moved past Ozzie Smith and Harry Hooper into a tie with Roger Connor for 87^th all-time with 2,467 career hits.

 

Carlos Delgado this past week collected the 1,700^th hit of his career.  He needs just one RBI to tie Bob Johnson for 100^th all-time.

 

Andruw Jones hit three HR to catch and pass both Darryl Strawberry and Joe Adcock and move into 83^rd all-time with 337.  He needs one more to tie Don Baylor.  Vlad Guerrero also hit two in the week and is now tied with Strawberry for 85^th all-time (335). 

 

On Sunday Tim Salmon hit his first HR since August 5 and now needs just two more to reach 300 in his career.

 

Jeff Kent had 3 RBI during he week to break a tie with Johnny Bench for 67^th place with 1,379.

 

Luis Gonzalez with 1 RBI broke a tie with Ruben Sierra and Roger Connor for 81^st.

 

Mike Piazza’s 4 RBI broke a tie with Del Ennis and gave him sole possession of 98^th all-time, seven behind Jim Thome who is 1 RBI behind Dan Brothers for 96^th place on the career list.

 

Kenny Lofton moved past Harry Hooper and Gary Sheffield into 69^th place all-time in runs with 1,431, 2 behind Steve Finley who broke a tie with Sheffield and now has 1,433.

 

Lofton meanwhile stole two bases and now has 594 in his career, tying him with Dummy Hoy for 17^th all-time.

 

Bernie Williams is now 87^th after passing Brett Butler with 4 runs scored in the past week.  With 1,362, he is four behind Vada Pinson. 

 

Jaime Moyer tied Rick “Big Daddy” Reuschel for 82^nd all-time with 214 career wins.

 

Kenny Rogers tied Pedro Martinez and Curt Schilling for 97^th all-time in wins with 206.  The three are all just one win behind Bob Lemon, Carl Mays and Hal Newhouser for 94^th place.

 

Billy Wagner needs one save to tie Troy Percival for 11^th all-time.

 

Tom Gordon moved past Dave Giusti and Willie Hernandez and tied Ted Abernathy for 61^st all-time with 148 career saves.

 

Mike Timlin recorded four saves to move past Gary Lavelle for 70^th place with 138.

 

Francisco Cordero moved past Kaz Sasaki and tied Ron Davis for 75^th with 130 saves. 

 

Joe Nathan tied Antonio Alfonseca and Duane Ward for 85^th in saves with 121. 

 

And Trevor Hoffman of course with 476 career saves, needs just 2 more to tie Lee Smith for first all-time.