- There are still three winless teams: the Astros, the Rays, and the Red Sox.
- The Astros are by far the least YCPB team of these, as they weren’t really expected to compete.
— However, today, they did have a 4-0 lead after the first inning… and ended up losing 12-4.
- the Rays.
— Mark Teixeira has more RBI than their entire team.
— As a team, they’re batting just .136. Johnny Damon is 1-for-15 and Manny Ramirez and Dan Johnson are both 1-for-17.
—- going back over their last ten games, from the 2010 ALDS on, they’ve scored just 20 runs
—– they haven’t had a lead all season.
—— they are the first team since the 1992 Tigers to begin the season 0-5 at home while never leading.
——- to add insult to injury, Jeff Mathis doubled against them twice today.
- the Red Sox.
— their relief pitcher Dennys Reyes had a fun line today: 0 IP, 0 H, 1 BB, 3 ER.
— He faced three batters, walked one on four pitches (a guy who was repeatedly trying to bunt), and hit two. Surprisingly, even though Dice-K started this game, he wasn’t the one to do that. He’s only the sixth player to have that line in the last ninety years.
—- Speaking of Dice-K, he’d never given up a run in fifteen innings at Progressive Field (I still want to call it Jacobs Field, by the way). That lasted through one out in the first inning today.
—– Cleveland’s starter Mitch Talbot has a career K/9 of 5.0. Tonight, he struck out seven Red Sox through 4.1 innings.
—— this play. Just watch it.
- the Rangers, on the other hand, are undefeated. And slugging over .600 as a team. Keep in mind, over six games, two of the pitchers they’ve faced have been Jon Lester and Felix Hernandez.
– they have a +22 run differential already. h/t @bkabak
- Royals/White Sox today. Here is your WPA graph.
— Down by three, with two outs and nobody on, the White Sox rallied to score four runs off Joakim Soria.
— Matt Thornton, Chicago’s closer, blew it in the bottom of the ninth, only for the White Sox to win in extras.
—- It was the fifth straight game at Kaufman Stadium between the Royals and White Sox that’s gone extra innings.
- Mets/Phillies.
— The Mets were down 7-0 early and rallied to tie it up.
— They still lost, though.
—- Oh, Mets.
- Pirates/Cardinals.
— the Cardinals haven’t scored more than three runs in any game so far this year. The last time they didn’t score more than three runs through the first five games of the season was 1919.
— the Pirates beat Chris Carpenter for the first time since 2004.
—- the Pirates’ team ERA is currently 2.60.
—– and they’ve won back-to-back road series for the first time since 2007.
- the Orioles actually lost. Bizarro YCPB?
- h/t @Buster_ESPN three of the top eight current OPS leaders in the majors are catchers. None of them are named Mauer, Posey, McCann, or Santana.
