Baseball Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous baseball thoughts and observations.

There are currently seven teams still looking for their first win of the season. If I had to give odds on who will be the last team to win a game this season among the Orioles, White Sox, Rangers, Phillies, Astros, Cardinals and Giants - I would narrow it down to either the Orioles or Giants because of schedule. The Orioles play their next two series against the Yankees and Tigers while the Giants face the Dodgers and then the Padres (again). It is conceivable that either team could start off 0-9 and in the case of the Giants - I would love that. If the Giants started 0-9 - the negativity coming out of the clubhouse would be literally visible... It looks like Trot Nixon has gotten off to a hot start for Cleveland and I think that's great. Nixon leads the AL with 3 doubles and is hitting a hot .556 after 9 at bats. Its too bad he was such a fragile player in his time in Boston... "Mark" this up as one of the bigger early season surprises - the leader in RBI for all MLB right now is 2nd baseman Mark Ellis of the A's with 7 runs knocked in. Who knew?... The Nationals are crazy if they don't play Ryan Church every game... Mike Lowell had 3 errors last night. That's the first time in his career that he had 3 errors in a game. I'd put the over/under on the number of errors he has for the rest of the season till the All-Star break at 3... If you like longshots - the Devil Rays are listed as big underdogs today (risk $100 to win $250). In baseball every game really is a coin flip and this game has a few extra wrinkles. First there was the delay from the postponement yesterday, second you have the extra pressure on Andy Pettitte as he returns to New York, third you have Johnny Damon who is banged up and may miss the game and finally you have Jae Seo who knows what its like to pitch in NYC and won't be intimidated. Tampa always plays the Yankees tough and the longs odds may make this worth a couple of shekels...