Baseball, Basketball and Football

Manny Ramirez has 496 homeruns and he just needs four more to get to that exclusive club and be the 24th player in MLB history to have 500 homeruns or more. Something of topic, but ironically 24 is the number in Manny Ramirez’s Red Sox shirt, maybe that’s destiny.  Four homeruns may seem like a small number but you know what they say, an inch close or an inch too far. Manny’s last homerun was 6 games ago; ironically it was the winning hit in the 8th inning. After that it seemed like Manny’s luck went from the best player of the MLB to being expulse next game in his first at bat. Yeah… after the winning homerun day in, Ramirez was ejected from the game in his first at bat because he argued a call. I could not believe it, Manny Ramirez one of the most patient batters in the plate I have ever seen in my life. When I saw the video, I don’t know why Manny even thought about arguing that call; it was a perfect pitch in the corner. After that game he started to have not so great games. The next two games he had only one hit each game. Then he got three hits, so he is starting to get back on track. I think Manny is playing like that because he is mentally not in shape. That game where he got ejected really got to him because he was doing so well and he got ejected and next day he was going to have a day off. He is really close to get to 500, so he has to stop worrying about the past and start thinking in the present because he is close to the leadership of every batting stat in the MLB so if he just concentrates on the upcoming games and not in the past games he is going to get to 500 homeruns really quick. I think also that he might get to be the leader in homeruns and I’m certain he is going to be leader in RBI’s; I have no doubt about that. Manny’s mental illness is over and now he just has to worry about getting to that magical number on his HR career stat…500.

As the season develops and the players start to get in real shape the real leaders are starting to show and protrude from the pack. What I mean is that the players, who for me are the best in the MLB, are starting or had already gotten where they should be. I’m going to talk about the pitchers, who I honestly don’t talk very much about. Brandon Webb a young boy which has 28 years is the sole leader in the whole MLB in games won with 4 games won. Is no surprise, since he was the starting pitcher with most games won last season, winning 18 games with the Diamondbacks? If he continues to pitch the games as he is pitching right now throughout the whole season, my prediction is that that he will end up with 17-19 wins and 7-11 looses. Barry Zito, the pitcher with most looses in the MLB with 4 games lost. Ironically the pitcher with most looses is in the team with the 2nd worst record which are the San Francisco Giants, with a record of 5 games won and 11 lost. Maybe is just a bad start for this veteran that in 2003 had 23 wins and just 5 looses or maybe he is being affected by not a useless offense but a offense that is asleep, an offense that has not found rhythm yet, but sooner or later they will find it and when that happens, San Francisco will be a team which would not be good to be taken lightly.  First I’m going to tell you what the stat ERA means. ERA means earned runs average, which means you multiply the numbers of runs the batters made the pitcher by 9 and then divide the solution by the number of innings the pitcher played. A pitcher with an ERA of 0.00 means that he allowed no runs during the time he was in the mound and a pitcher with an ERA of maybe 10.00 means he allowed an average of 10 runs during the time he was in the mound. The player with worst ERA in the MLB is C.C. Sabathia from the Cleveland Indians. Is a little odd, since Sabathia was the pitcher which the Indians could rely on and was a key player for the Indians last year by helping them getting to the post season. C.C Sabthia is not old but he is pitching like he was old. I bet that when he plays more game and gets in shape, maybe he would not be an incredible pitcher, but a better one than he is right now.

I think that the leaders in batting of this season are a little odd. I mean the leader in homeruns this season is Mark Reynolds which in last season he was the 58th player with most homeruns in the National league. He just had 17 homeruns last season and he was not a star for the Diamondbacks either. Now, he is the only leader in homeruns with 5. He started with a good season, but as the season goes I think he is going to decay and stop doing so homeruns. That is what always happens and always stop doing homeruns and get forgotten. Also the player with the best average is Jason Kendall which last season had an average of .226. That is no t good for a player that has in this regular an average of .538. That average is amazing, but like a said, he started with a good season but I think he is not going to do very good in the future. The leader in RBI’s is obviously going to be the player with more homeruns which is Mark Reynolds. I think someone who is close to the leader who is Brandon Inge which had a really good season last year, is going to be the leader in RBI’s or also maybe Kevin Youkilis which has an average of .324 in this season with the Boston Red Sox. Another player who may get close to be the player with the best average I think it could be Ivan Rodriguez with the average of .235 who had a really good second game against the Royals. I think that the leader in Homeruns for a while could be Manny Ramirez from the Red Sox which has a triple in this season or Carlos Quentin from the White Sox which has 6 hits in the last 6 games with 8 RBIs. I think that the current leaders will not last long, and be replaced by better players. 

It has been almost two weeks, since the regular season of baseball has started, and some teams have started breaking away from the weaker teams in their division. Although, the teams that are breaking away from the weaker ones are not the teams that someone who followed the last season would have thought. The team who has the biggest lead over the last team on its division is the Chicago White Sox which has three a three game lead over the Detroit Tigers. The Detroit Tigers who had a sixteen games advantage over the White Sox last season are now trailing by three games. The Tigers had not won a single game in this current season. It seems that the Tigers are suffering the revenge of last season’s weak teams. The creepy thing is that they started the regular season with a three game series against the Kansas City Royals which was the second worst team in the MLB last season. The even more amazing is that, they started the regular season at their own ballpark, the Comerica Park. The Tigers who had won eleven games and had lost eight game last season against the Royals, had a good chance of winning since their starting pitcher was Justin Verlander who was the third pitcher with most wins last season. The Tigers were put on some fight, by going to extra-innings, but enough since the Royals won in the eleventh inning with a hit right down the middle of John Buck to send Mark Teahen who was in second base to home. The final score was 4-5. The next night, maybe it was because they had lost the opening game or maybe it was because they lost it on their ballpark, whatever the reason was, the Tigers did a poor job at the second game and lost badly against the Royals 0-4. The offense did not help Kenny Rogers and the batter who did the only two hits for the Tigers Edgar Renteria, did not get any help from his teammates. It was a hit parade for the Royals that night. The third night was not so different than the second one, because the Tigers lost 1-4. Again the Tiger’s powerful pitching did not get any help from their offense, which the only danger they caused, was the solo-homerun of Brandon Inge. I think that the Royals thought they were at the batting cages and just swung powerful and incredible hits. With two homeruns, one of Alex Gordon in the 4th inning and another one of Mark Teahen in the 6th inning, and eleven hits by the Royals in total in the game, the Tigers had another loss and the Royals, another win. My opinion is that the Royals must had felt throughout these three games, that they were on batting practice, because although the Tiger’s pitching was not bad, they did not got help from their offense so that must had brought down the spirit of the pitchers throughout the games. After that series against the Royals the Tigers had to face the White Sox which were also almost in the last place of their division, last season. After using the best of the best of the Tiger’s starting pitchers, the team used Nate Robertson and then, the Tiger’s bats waked up. Ivan Rodriguez was the star for the Tiger in the first game by hitting a two doubles in the 2nd inning and 3rd inning and then hitting a single in the 5th inning. Having three RBI’s Rodriguez was not the only one who gave the team some hope, Clete Thomas got three single hits done and made one RBI for the team. Although the offense was doing a good job and the pitching was not so bad either, the White Sox got a sweet revenge. Carlos Quentin hit a homerun in the 2nd inning and then A.J. Pierzinsky with another homerun in the 7th inning. Also Jim Thome and Paul Konerko with a double each and then Jermaine Dye and A.J. Pierzinsky with two doubles each. The final score was 8-5. The second game against the White Sox had kind of the same story; the starting pitcher was Dontrelle Willis and did a very good job. Brandon Inge shined for the Tigers by making a two-out double and sending home three runs, and then a two-run homerun in the 4th inning. The Tiger’s performance was impeccable and outstanding with the exception of one error, but it was not enough. Luck, was on the White Sox’s side. With only making THREE hits in the WHOLE GAME the White Sox were able to get the win. The first hit is made by Jim Thome, after Willis walked two batters; Thome makes a double bringing in one run. Then Carlos Quentin makes another double bringing another run home. Finally Jermaine Dye with a solo Homerun to finish the game. The final score was 3-5 for the White Sox. I think that the second game, the Tigers should have won it because they gave everything they had in that game, but in the end; luck was on the White Sox’s side. On Sunday 6th the final game of the series between the Tigers and the White Sox is played. I personally think that the Tigers are going to desperately go for that win and I think that would be enough for them. The Tigers started off with shaky firsts games, but have been progressing and I think they would get the win on Sunday. The Tigers just needed to get their batters and pitchers warmed up for the real thing and that is what those five games did for them. I think the Tiger’s were not aware of how much damage the teams they faced off in the last five games could do to them, but know they are going to play with all they have. I think that the Tigers have the potential to win on Sunday because, as we can see, the batters are starting to show what they are made of, and the rookie of the year in 2006, Justin Verlander would give the same or even more effort than he gave at the start of the regular season. So, I personally believe that The Detroit Tigers deserved the win in Sunday, way more than the Chicago White Sox.