May 25th. It is my daughter Gabi’s Birthday and the Date the town of Parkersburg, Iowa will never forget. For the past several months, I have been buried at my editor working on a documentary that chronicles the Falcons 2008 football season. You can click on the “Touchdown in the Heartland” link to your right to see more on that project. Stay tuned for more details. This project has consumed a lot of my creative energy. Yes, I’m unable to MY SPACE, FACEBOOK, Web Cam or Tweet. I’m just a man doing my best to coach my daughters in softball, crank out year end football DVD’s, and try to keep my struggling Fantasy baseball team out of last place.

Thank God we have Bob to fill us in on all that is baseball because without him my daily dose of MLB is watching my team fall in the standings. I mean who knew this was the year Brandon Webb would crash, Garrett Atkins would turn into a modern day Bill Bergen.

http://ndai.blogspot.com/2006/09/worst-hitter-ever.html

I flat out need help, Or I’m going to Go HONG MAN-CHOI on my fellow fantasy owners at the next free agent draft!

Get Back on the Juice Bash Brother.
That’s about it. In my small but safe world this is all I can handle right now. That and as Little NBA as I can swallow. Thank God for Dustin Pedroia.

Here’s a headline you might want to get used to: “Nats lose again, Dunn Homers.”  Pittsburgh beat Washington 8-5, their 6th loss in a row, and 9th out of their last 10.  They have scored 5 or more runs in each of those 10 games!  However, they lead the majors with 41 errors and their bullpen has a 1-14 record.  Guzman and Zimmerman are hitting great, but it won’t matter.  Dunn has 12 HR and the Nats have 11 wins…The Yankees have won 7 in a row, and A-Rod and Teixeira both hit homers in their 9-1 win over Baltimore.  A-Rod has only 7 hits since his return, 5 HR and 2 singles.  At 558, he is 5 HR behind Reggie Jackson for 11th on the all-time list.  Atlanta gave Jair Jurrjens some support with 13 hits, and the Braves won 8-1 over Colorado.  Jurrjens: 7 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 8 K.  He is now 4-2 (1.96).  Casey Kotchman and Kelly Johnson each had 3 hits for the Braves.  Todd Helton smacked his 2,000th hit for the Rockies.  Helton doesn’t always drink beer, but when he does, he prefers Dos Equis…Dontrelle Willis sighting: 6.1 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 5 K.  In his first win since September 2007, Willis leads the Tigers past Texas 4-0.  Don’t be quick to buy stock just yet.  Arizona beat Florida 5-3.  The Marlins have lost 7 of 8 and 13 of their last 17.  Hanley Ramirez remained above the ruins with his 7th HR and his .348 Average.  Details of the game are sketchy because nobody was there to see it.  Oakland beat Tampa Bay with a 3-run HR from Matt Holliday in the 11th inning.  Extra innings tied at 0-0!  Josh Outman pitched well, going 6 with only 3 hits allowed, 1 walk and 6 K.  Carl Crawford stole his 25th base for the Manta Rays.  Boston inched closer to division leader Toronto with a 2-1 win from Tim Wakefield, his 5th of the year.  Jacoby Ellsbury has a 14 game hit streak.  First place Milwaukee won for the 7th straight time, downing Houston 4-2.  Dave Bush goes to 3-0 and Trevor Hoffman clamped it down for his 10th save.  Ryan Howard hit HR #9 and Cole Hamels outdueled  Johnny Cueto in the Phillies’ 4-3 win over Cincinnati.  Jay Bruce hit his 12th HR in the loss for the Reds.  Philly has won 5 in a row.  Kansas City was down 5-2 to Cleveland, thanks to Cliff Lee, but Kerry Wood gave up 2 HR, a triple, a walk and a RBI sac to blow the save and lose the game in the 9th.  Whoooops!  KC 6, Cleveland 5.  Joel Piniero pitched a complete game shutout against the Cubs for the Cardinals.  The 3-0 win is rare in this rivalry, and it snaps a skid for the Redbirds.  Pineiro gave up only 3 hits, walked none and struck out 5.  The White Sox are 7-1 when Mark Buehrle pitches, but they’ve only won 9 games without him.  He raised his record to 6-1 after a 6-2 win over Minnesota, losers of 5 in a row.  Jermaine Dye and Paul Konerko homered for the Pale Hose, who ironically wear black socks, and Joe Mauer hit HR #7 to stretch his hit streak to 12 games.  San Diego edged San Francisco 2-1 behind Chris Young, who is the latest to beat Barry Zito even though being out-pitched by him.  Zito went 8, but gave up 2 solo HR for the loss, his 4th against 1 win.  The Giants are giving Zito 1.25 runs per game, the worst support in the majors.  The fans are giving him even less.  The Angels dropped Seattle 6-5 behind Matt Palmer, who raised his record to a spotless 5-0.  Bobby Abreu went 3-4 with 2 RBI and Maicer Izturis was 3-4 with 3 runs scored for the Halos.  Brian Fuentes struck out the side in the 9th for his 10th save.  Ichiro kept his hit streak alive at 13, and Ken Griffey hit career HR #615 in the loss for the Mariners.  Los Angeles got by the Mets again, 5-3.  Chad Billingsley is 6-1 after striking out 7 and going 2-2 with a RBI double at the plate.  Casey Blake was the hero, with his 6th inning 3-run HR (CASEY BLAKE HR METER at 9).  Blake went 2-4 and is hitting .283 after a bit of a rough start.  He also leads the Dodgers in homers.  Jonathan Broxton pitched a clean 9th inning for his 10th save.

Some quick notes for your reading pleasure:  MLB action from last night…Jack Wilson went 4-4 with a pair of doubles and a triple, 2 RBI and scored 3 runs to lead Pittsburgh past Washington 12-7.  The Nats helped out by committing errors and having a lousy bullpen.  They have lost 5 in a row.  Jim Thome hit HR #548, but Chicago lost their 5th in a row anyway, losing 3-2 to Toronto.  The White Sox have lost 12 of their last 15, while the Blue Jays have an AL-best 27-14 record.  Scott Richmond was just fine for Toronto, 7 IP, 5 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K.  No win, though, he left up 2-0 before the bullpen allowed 2 runs to tie the game in the 8th.  Atlanta grounded into four double plays against Colorado, helping Jason Marquis beat them 5-1.  The former Brave hurler went 8 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 3 K to win his 5th game for the Rockies.  Braves starter Derek Lowe gave up only 3 hits in 8 innings, but was denied his 6th win and the Braves fell to 6-11 at home.  Mark T$ix$ira hit 2 HR and A-Rod hit his fourth to propel the Yankees to a four game sweep of the Twins, 7-6.  New York has won 6 in a row.  Justin Morneau went 4-5 for the Twins.  Milwaukee started 4-9, but they have went 20-5 since.  They swept the Cardinals behind Braden Looper and got 4 runs from Ryan Braun on 2 hits and 2 walks.  Jason Kendall had 2 hits to push him over 2,000 for his career, the 8th most by a full-time catcher and just 47 behind Johnny Bench.  That is amazing.  Johnny Bench is roughly 100 times better than Jason Kendall.  Would Anyone take Kendall over Bench?  I didn’t think so.  Jason Bartlett was 3-3 with 5 RBI and 3 runs scored for Tampa Bay in a 13-4 rout of the woeful A’s.  Jason Isringhausen made his 2009 debut, pitching a scoreless 9th for the Rays, his first action since August of last season for St. Louis.  The Dodgers are an MLB-best 27-13 after an extra-inning win over New York, 3-2.  Angel Pagan of the Mets was 4-6, and they outhit LA 11-5, but still managed to lose due in large part to their 5 errors.  Randy Wolf pitched well again for LA, but left with no decision for the 6th time in his 7 starts. *Belated Casey Blake HR Meter-8*  California (don’t get me started) clubbed 15 hits against the Mariners and had 7 players with multi-hit games.  Kendry Morales was 3-5 with 2 HR, 3 RBI and 3 R in the 10-6 Angel win.  Seattle had 10 hits and a HR from Russell Branyan, his 10th.  They have now lost 11 of their last 14, but on the positive side, Ichiro is quietly up to a 12 game hit streak.

Enough is enough.  What a rotten four days for Boston.  Bruins, gone.  Celtics, gone.  Red Sox, struggling mightily.  Did anything bad happen to the Patriots too?  At least that doesn’t bother me.  I will try to post as much as possible about some baseball and other things leading up to what we are really here for, FOOTBALL SEASON…Let us never lose sight of that.  Keep checking with us.

Well that was short-lived.  The Sports Gods giveth, the Sports Gods taketh away…All the excitement of Tuesday from the wonderful Boston trifecta was washed away in a slow, agonizing defeat-filled day.  On the West Coast, the Red Sox started things off with a 5-4 loss in 12 innings to the Angels.  Big Papi was 0-7 with 12 LOB, as the Halos took 2 of 3 from visiting Boston.  Ouch.  Then, in the deep Southeast, the Orlando Magic stormed back from 10 down to grab their first lead with 8 minutes left in the game and then took over to defeat the turnover-plagued Celtics 83-75.  Double ouch.  Their series is now tied, 3-3, and will conclude Sunday night in Boston.  Where, it just so happens, our little trail of cross-country tears comes to a painful end.  Carolina knocked off the #1 seed Bruins with an overtime goal by Scott Walker, 3-2 to advance to the Eastern Finals, winning Game 7 on the Bruins’ home ice, and ending their best season in quite some time rather unceremoniously.  Triple ouch!  So there you have it.  One of the absolute darkest days in Boston sports history concluded just 48 hours after one of it’s best.  Sports can be an emotional roller coaster.  For all the anti-Boston fans, the haters, etc., and I know there are tons of you, rejoice while you can, it may be your teams next.  The Red Sox will be alright, and the Celtics may still win their series, but this was a big blow to the head.  Cut me, Mick, cut me!

                  Images from a very rewarding night for ICS…

It was a small schedule of games in the league last night, but there were some highlights and lowlights worth noting, nonetheless.  In New York, the Mets lost to Atlanta, 8-3, ending their 7 game winning streak even though the invincible Johan Santana was on the mound for the home team.  Santana improved his ERA to 0.78 in his 7th start of the year, but couldn’t get the win.  He is 4-2 and NY has lost 3 of his starts, even though both of his losses were with no earned runs.  He is also 0-4 against the Braves lifetime.  Derek Lowe ground ball outed the Mets to death for his 5th win against 1 loss.  Yunel Escobar and Matt Diaz each had 3 hits for the Braves, who decided to wear their ugly-ass blue alternates yet again.  At least they are better than their Sunday red alternates.  Carl Pavano sighting in Cleveland:  He has won 3 in a row after downing the White Sox 9-4.  He gave up 10 hits and 4 ER, but the Indians pounded the Sox pitching.  Chicago has lost 7 of their last 9.  Cincinnati walloped Arizona 13-5 behind an 18 hit attack.  Leading the way was Willy Taveras who went 5-5 with 4 R and 2 RBI.  Bronson Arroyo got the win, his 5th, even though he gave up 5 ER and 10 Hits.  He is 5-2 with a 7.02 ERA.  Sorry, Johan, I had to mention that.  Walks, Errors and unearned runs…San Francisco and Washington had all of these in the Giants’ 11-7 win over the Gnats.  No, wait.  I can’t waste that on this team, they’re not pesky.  Ryan Zimmerman went 4-5 with 2 HR and 4 RBI, but could not prevent Washington from reclaiming the worst record in the majors at 10-20.  Daniel Cabrera fell to 0-4 after walking 6 and giving up 8 runs.  Only 4 were earned, but they were all ugly.  Cabrera has gone 12 straight starts without a win.  Welcome to the miracle that is the Washington pitching corps…He went up against Randy Johnson, so it was a 6′-9″ vs. 6′-10″ matchup, the tallest ever in MLB history.  And one of the ugliest.  Johnson won #298 despite giving up 8 hits, 4 ER and 3 HR.  He has allowed an MLB-worst 10 HR so far this year, and 400 for his long career.  Only Jamie Moyer has given up more among active old men pitching in the majors.

As much as we love baseball season, and as much as we love talking about it, it’s fun compiling a morning rundown of what happened the day before in MLB action.  However, we are not a blog-first site, meaning we unfortunately have very little time to post the kinds of things we want to.  Ideally, I would love to have numerous posts throughout the day and more interesting takes on all the sports news of the day, but we aren’t able to do that very often.  However, we will post when we can and we hope you will visit the site often, no matter how current the blog material is, because there are always going to be videos to see and buy, and plenty of cool webcam action as well.  I just wanted to make note of this in case there was anyone out there who checks in every day looking for fresh material.  I don’t mean to disappoint those readers, I just don’t currently have the time to devote to the posts.  In the future, this may change, but for now, we will have to work it this way.  While we’re here today, though, why not touch on some baseball items?  What better place to begin than with the new ‘worst team in baseball’, the Cleveland Indians.  A 3 game sweep at the hands of Detroit dropped the bumbling Indians to 11-21, percentage points behind the Washington Nationals, who had won 3 in a row before Sunday’s loss to Arizona.  For Washington, at least Ryan Zimmerman has a 28 game hit streak, so they’ve got that going for them, which is nice.  Both teams, and Oakland as well, are horrible…Ryan Franklin had his scoreless streak closing for St. Louis come to an end with a blown save against Cincinnati, but the bats bailed him out in extra innings, so he picked up a win despite giving up a couple of homers…The Mets are back to being the Beast of the East, for now.  They have won 7 in a row after a rough start…Speaking of 7 in a row, thats how many starts Roy Oswalt had made without a win until yesterday, when he gave up 4 runs in 6 innings, but still got the W against San Diego…Ken Griffey Jr. hit HR #614 in the Mariners’ 5-3 win over Minnesota.  It was his 7th HR on Mother’s Day in his 21 year career.  Momma’s Boy…The Angels have won 7 of their last 8 and 10 of 13 after sweeping the previously red-hot Royals.  Kansas City is still tied for first in the Central with Detroit, though…Toronto has 10+ hits in most of their games, so it’s no surprise they have the best record in the AL.  But they keep getting big pitching as well.  Brett Cecil got his first major league victory in just his second start for the Blue Jays, going 8 innings, giving up only 5 hits, no runs, 2 walks while striking out 6 against the hapless A’s in a 5-0 win…*Casey Blake HR Meter is at 6…Boston took 2 of 3 from Tampa Bay at Fenway to win their first series against the Rays out of their last 7.  Papelbon struck out the side in the ninth for his 8th save after getting himself in a bit of a jam with the tying and go-ahead runs on base.  The Red Sox also called up Daniel Bard from Pawtucket.  Don’t know who Daniel Bard is?  You will…As the immortal “Sweet” Lou Palmer once said, “Happiness is Connecticut in your rear-view mirror.”  I have no idea what that has to do with anything we’ve discussed here today, but I have always been fond of that quote, so I leave you on that note.

Here are some guys who did good things for their teams yesterday in MLB action…Michael Bourn went 3-4 with 2 R and 1 RBI to lead Houston past Atlanta, 7-5.  Justin Verlander nabbed a win with the following line in Detroit’s 3-1 win over Cleveland: 7 IP, 2 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 11 K.  Johnny Cueto was even better for Cincinnati.  8 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 1 BB and 9 K did in Pittsburgh and lowered his ERA to 1.65 in a 5-0 win.  Kevin Youkilis is hitting .407 after going 2-4 with 1 R, 2 RBI and a HR in Boston’s 5-3 loss at Tampa Bay.  Carl Crawford led the Rays with his 4-4 performance at the plate.  He walked once, scored twice, had an RBI and swiped 6 bases to tie the modern-day record.  John Baker did what he could for Florida, going 3-4 with a 2B, HR and an RBI, scoring 3 times, but the Marlins still lost to the Cubs, 6-4.  D Lee hit a grand slam for the Cubs.  Jose Guillen was a big 2-3 for the Royals, driving in 4 and scoring once with a BB, 2B and HR to lead KC past Minnesota, 7-5.  Ian Kinsler went 2-4 with a 2B and a HR, scored twice and drove in 2, helping Texas knock off the White Sox 5-1.  Matt Harrison pitched 5 innings of 6 hit scoreless ball with no walks and 3 K for the Rangers.  Barry Zito pitched well but again left with no decision in the Giants’ 1-0 win over Colorado.  His 7 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 4 K kept the Rockies down, but it took 10 innings for the Giants to push a run across.  Chad Billingsley went to 5-0 with a 2.21 ERA after pitching 7 innings, giving up 4 hits, 2 runs, 4 walks, and striking out 8, as the Dodgers defeated San Diego 7-3.  He also managed to go 1-3 at the plate with a run scored and 1 RBI.  The Dodgers are now 10-0 at home to open the season, a team record.  The last NL team to do that was the 1983 Braves, also managed by Joe Torre.  It is the longest streak in the majors since the 2003 Royals somehow won their first 11 home games under Tony Pena.  Pena’s bench coach then was Bob Schaefer, who happens to be Torre’s bench coach in LA.  Hmmm.