Garret Anderson Drives in 10 Runs
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by Niteowl049
Baseball Notebook
Garret Anderson Drives In Ten Runs: Alex Rodriguez Hits No. 41 and No.42
The Los Angeles Angels, who are fighting to hold on to their slim lead over the Seattle Mariners, defeated the New York Yankees 18-9 behind the hitting of Garret Anderson who drove in ten runs. Anderson had a career game hitting a grand slam and a three run home run and two doubles. Entering the game, Anderson had 6 home runs and 40 RBI's in 76 games and had hit only two home runs since the 22nd of July.
Anderson is one of the few players in the majors who has played for the same team with this season being his fourteenth year with the Angels. He missed the entire month of May and last half of June due to injuries. In his fourteen years with the Angels his worst batting average was .280 and has a lifetime .296 batting average.
Kelvim Escobar (14-6) took the win and is only one win behind John Lackey, who is among the major league leaders in wins with 15. With Bartolo Colon on the disabled list, Escobar has stepped up and taken the No. 2 slot in the rotation and has a very slight chance of winning 20 games. This is his best season since 1999 when he was 14-11 with the Toronto Blue Jays.
Mike Mussina (8-9) was ineffective to say the least for his second straight start and has given up 14 runs and 16 hits in his last 6 2/3 innings and his ERA stands at 5.22 for the season. Six of his eight wins this season have come against teams with losing records. The other two wins came against the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Cleveland Indians. It is looking like Mussina will never win 300 games since he needs 53 wins and will be 39 in December. His 5.22 ERA is highest among the current starters in the rotation.
Alex Rodriguez hit his 41st and 42nd home runs in the Yankees loss. He has seven more home runs than he hit last season and matched his 121 RBI's of last season with 36 games to go in the season. To win 90 games the Yankees need to play 20-16 baseball the rest of the season while the Red Sox can play 14-22 the rest of the season and still win 90 games.
Wilson Betemit, so far, has proved to be a good pickup for the Yankees. In 156 at-bats with the Dodgers, Betemit had 10 home runs and 26 RBI's but in only 32 at bats with Yankees has 3 home runs and 15 RBI's and is slugging .594 with the Yankees.
Around the Bases:
Jair Jurrjens (1-1) outpitched Fausto Carmona (14-8) as the [Detroit Tigers]] moved to within half a game of the first place Indians in the AL Central....Erik Bedard struck out 11 as the Baltimore Orioles defeated the Texas Rangers 6-2. Bedard now leads the majors in strikeouts with 218 with Johan Santana in second with 191. Since April 23rd, Bedard has only lost twice and is 6-0 with a 1.99 ERA since the All Star break.
Dan Haren improved his record to 14-4 as the Oakland Athletics moved to within one game of .500 for the season....Jon Lester (2-0) didn't pitch too well allowing 5 runs in 5 innings but the Boston Red Sox had built up an 7-2 lead after four innings so he was the beneficary of the potent Red Sox offense. In the battle of the Drews, the leader in home runs is Stephen with 9 and J.D. with 6 with J.D. leading in RBI's by a 45-42 margin. Red Sox would have been better off signing Stephen Drew than J.D and would have saved about $14 million.
Scott Boras is somewhere thinking that he sure snookered the Red Sox into signing Drew who has shown he is a journeyman baseball player at best. Even Julio Lugo and Coco Crisp have more RBI's than Drew. Drew is 12th in slugging percentage on the team with even Curt Schilling outslugging him.
The Seattle Mariners defeated the Minnesota Twins 7-2 to remain two games behind the first place Angels in the AL West. Richie Sexson hit his 21st home run but is far behind his pace of last year when he hit 34 and drove in 107 runs but only has 61 RBI's this season with August coming to a close soon....The Philadelphia Phillies overcame an early 3-0 deficit to defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-4 as Aaron Rowand hit his 21st home run, and has hit 10 since the All-Star break after hitting 11 before the break. Rowand needs 4 home runs to establish a personal season high and has already driven in more runs (70) than his previous personal best. The win enabled the Phillies to break out of a second place tie with the Braves and take sole possession of second place in NL East.
The Atlanta Braves exposed their weakness in the bottom two spots in their rotation as Jo-Jo Reyes couldn't hold an early 3-0 lead and Braves lost the game 8-7. Reyes didn't take the loss since the Braves took a 7-5 lead after he left the game. Jeff Keppinger is hitting .377 this season for the Cincinnati Reds....The Milwaukee Brewers, Chicago Cubs and St. Louis Cardinals all won their games yesterday as the Brewers remained tied with Cubs for first place with the Cardinals three games back in the NL Central....The Cardinals scored four times in the eighth inning to take a 5-2 win over the Florida Marlins. Albert Pujols hit his 29th home run. His next home run will give him 30 or more for home runs for the seventh straight season starting his career but he still needs 19 more RBI's to reach 100 RBI's for the seventh straight season.
Greg Gross hit a grand slam to lead the Brewers to their 7-4 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks and Dave Bush (10-9) took the win. It doesn't look good for Brewers tonight as they face Brandon Webb, (13-8) who has a streak of 42 consecutive scoreless innings going into the game. The Brewers are countering with Jeff Suppan (8-10), who has not won a game against a team with a winning record since the 21st of May when he defeated the Dodgers....The Chicago Cubs, who were trailing 1-0 since the top of the first inning came back in the top of the ninth to score five runs and win against the San Francisco Giants by a 5-1 score.
The Colorado Rockies took a 9-2 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates and are tied with Dodgers for third place in NL West with both teams six games behind the first place Diamondbacks. Rookie Ian Stewart hit a grand slam for his first major league home run but he won't be playing third base much since the player he replaced Garrett Atkins who had the day off has 86 RBI's. Brad Hawpe hit his 22nd home run and now has 84 RBI's which are the identical numbers he finished with last season in 499 at bats. He has posted those same numbers this season in 386 at bats.
Wild Card Races
American League
The Seattle Mariners have opened a two and a half game lead over the New York Yankees in the AL wildcard race and are only two games behind the Angels in AL West race so are covered either way. The Detroit Tigers are the only other team even remotely close to taking the wild card with them being four games behind the Mariners. The Toronto Blue Jays are next in line, but nine games back but can't be taken seriously as a contender for the wild card.
National League
In the NL wild card race, the Philadelphia Phillies and the San Diego Padres are tied for the lead with the Atlanta Braves one game back and the Cubs and Brewers two games back. In third place are the Rockies and the Dodgers, who are two and a half games back. The Cardinals are next being five games back and the next team behind them is the Nationals who are ten games back.
