Baseball Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous baseball thoughts and observations.

You want to know why the Orioles are in first place in the AL East with a 6-1 record? Going into today's games the Baltimore Orioles have used 8 pitchers in relief and only Greg Aquino among those 8 has allowed an earned run (he has allowed 2 in 1 and a third innings). That's 7 relievers with 0.00 ERA's. They have only allowed just 3 runs all season from the 7th to 9th innings. That's why they have been winning... Jason Kendall is leading the NL in batting with a .522 average. Is it too early to ask if he'll be able to hit .400 in a season? No? Well is it too early to speculate if he'll break Hugh Duffy's single season mark for batting average? Duffy hit .440 in 1894. Kendall's got that topped by over 80 points at the moment... I'm frankly surprised that the Giants have managed to win 3 games already with that line-up...