Indians top Twins 6-2, end 11-game losing streak
(Yahoo! Sports)

CLEVELAND (AP) — Justin Masterson pitched seven strong innings and Shin-Soo Choo went 4 for 4 to lift Cleveland over Minnesota 6-2 Wednesday, ending the Indians’ 11-game losing streak.

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reak-yahoo-sports/

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Red Sox RHP Padilla goes on DL; Mortensen
recalled (Yahoo! Sports)

BOSTON (AP) — The Boston Red Sox placed right-handed reliever Vicente Padilla on the 15-day disabled list with arm tightness and promoted right-hander Clayton Mortensen from Triple-A Pawtucket before their game against Texas on Wednesday.

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called-yahoo-sports/

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7,000

7,000 Just taking a few minutes to acknowledge that this is officially post #7,000 on ’30-Year Old Cardboard’. YIPPEE!!! WOO-HOO!!!! HOORAH!!! CHEERS!!!! And now back to your regularly scheduled program.

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http://bapple2286.wordpress.com/2012/08/08/7000/

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Can Jose Reyes Challenge Past Marlins Hit Streaks

Jose Reyes hit an infield single in last night's 4-2 victory over the New York Mets, and that extended his current hitting streak to 25 games. Reyes's hitting streak has been one of the bright spots of the Miami Marlins as of late, and the streak has not been a dinky one-hit-per-game one. No, Reyes has had some legitimately awesome performances as of late, as he has hit .362/.406/.604 during the hit streak, including belting eight doubles, two triples, and four home runs. Needless to say, the Jose Reyes the Marlins thought they were getting before the season has been here since May, but right now he is on a tear in order to get his batting line back up to expected levels after a poor April.

The hit streak is what has Marlins fans particularly interested in Reyes's accomplishments. Now, I'm a little more of the opinion that Tom Tango shares (you can see it highlighted in this post title), but I guess it is still a little fun to talk about lengthy streaks. Last night, Reyes tied the third longest hit streak in Marlins history, tying Kevin Millar's streak from 2002 and only one behind Emilio Bonifacio's streak from last season. Of course, the team leader is Luis Castillo, who had a hit in 35 straight games in 2002. So the natural question is this: can Jose Reyes challenge Luis Castillo's hit streak?

Well, let's use a little bit of math to find out.

As of yesterday night's game, ZiPS's rest-of-season projection for Reyes, which is supposed to be a true-talent estimate of his skill, projects a .295 hitter. That is pretty good, obviously, and it certainly gives Reyes a good chance to continue his streak as compared to other hitters of the past (such as the above-linked Dan Uggla) who do not usually boast high batting averages. But the batting average includes only AB, so we should convert the average to a rate of hits per PA. Reyes is projected to get .269 hits per PA according to ZiPS.

From then, it is pretty simple. Let us assume Reyes will get around 4.5 PA per game. What are the odds he has one hit in those 4.5 PA of a game? Well, it is the same as one minus the odds that he does not get a hit in any PA. When you do all of those calculations, you expect that the odds of Reyes getting at least one hit in a given game is 75.6 percent.

Time To Streak

So, what are the odds he matches and beats the various Marlins hit streaks? Well, obviously with tonight's game, he has a 75.6 percent chance to match Emilio Bonifacio's streak and surpass Kevin Millar's streak. What are his odds of beating Bonifacio? Well, it is just his odds of getting one hit tonight and tomorrow, or 0.756 squared. That gives him a 57.2 percent chance to beat Bonifacio. You can see that, while one game seems fairly easy, the odds certainly drop quickly on that second game.

What does that mean for Reyes's attempt at Castillo's 35-game hit streak? To match it, he would have to get hits in 10 more games straight. As a result, the odds of that happening are 0.756 to the tenth power, or just 6.1 percent. His odds to surpass the streak are 4.6 percent. That means that Reyes is only expected to match the streak once out of every 16.4 attempts, and he only beats the streak once out of every 21.7 attempts.

At this stage and with his skills, it does not seem completely out of reach. Let's put that 6.1 percent mark into some context. In Reyes's current hitting streak, he has walked six times in 109 PA. That means that Reyes is expected to beat Castillo's streak more often than he has walked during the streak. In fact, Reyes is expected to beat the streak about as often as players like Daniel Murphy or Yunel Escobar have walked in their PA this season.

Go Streaking

All of this is to say that, as odd and quirky as streaks can be, this one is actually fairly attainable. If you were looking for a perfect candidate to break a hitting streak by the great Luis Castillo, you might as well look at the guy who has been doing a Castillo impersonation for much of the season. Jose Reyes does not strike out often (8.7 percent this season, the third lowest strikeout rate among qualified major leaguers) and does decently on balls in play (.305 BABIP this year, .313 career), so he is perfectly tuned to put balls in play and let his speed and bat skills get him base hits.

If there is anyone who can break Castillo's Marlins record, it is Jose Reyes. And at 6.1 percent chances, don't be too surprised if it does happen. Because if Adam Jones or Adrian Beltre can draw a walk, Reyes has a chance than that to go streaking with his hits.

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8/8 News, Links, Discussion: Braves-Phillies,
Hanson Update, Bourns Suitors

Game 3 vs. Phillies After Cole Hamels shut the Braves down in a 3-0 loss, the two teams will face off in the rubber game tonight. Kyle Kendrick will start for the Phillies. Kendrick’s poor peripherals have caught up to him this season after a fluky 3.22 ERA in 114.2 innings last year. He owns [...]

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Tim Allen

While many of us rarely take the time to venture over to the NBA side of SB Nation, the SBN family suffered a great loss today. Tim Allen, one of the leads over at Canis Hoopus, our Minnesota Timberwolves blog, has passed on at age 29.

"We are deeply saddened to report the passing of Tim Allen. At this time, details surrounding his death are still unconfirmed and we urge everyone to respect the privacy of his family. The only thing that matters right now is the loss of our friend."

Much as we all love to talk about our respective favorite sports, for better or for worse, it's moments like these that abruptly remind us of the fragility of life and the fact that at the other end of our articles, of our comments, is another person, another human being.

Our deepest condolences go out to the Allen family today.

http://www.canishoopus.com/2012/8/8/3227820/tim-allen

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Astros Minor League Recap: August 8, 2012

With the promotion of Brandon Barnes to Houston and Marc Krauss immediately filling his spot in Oklahoma City, the domino's might be starting to fall. There's an open spot in Corpus now and it's just waiting to be filled by George Springer. Although, Springer was in the Lancaster line-up late last night, so if he's on his way to Corpus, he left this morning. But, it's not likely since they are currently on the road in High Desert, so they'll probably wait until the finish up the road trip so he can pack all of his things up.

Jose Cisnero did one of his turn arounds and pitched a terrible game last night. He's going to do that. He pitches lights out and then turns around and tosses up a stinker. If he gets a shot in Houston, he could be the second coming of Felipe Paulino.

I was able to catch some of Vincent Velasquez's start on MiLB.tv last night and the thing that really stands out is that everything has some horizontal movement on it. The announcer even called one I think was either a 2-seam fastball or changeup a breaking ball. It just had that movement moving away from a left-handed hitter, it wasn't his slider. From the angle of the camera, you couldn't really see vertical movement. Vince's start wasn't his best as he struggled with location a bit and you could just tell a lot of pitches were left up in the zone that were able to be handled for hits. But, when he was on, his pitches were just nasty as they just fell away from the zone and still produced whiffs.

Oklahoma City RedHawks lost 10-3

• Jose Cisnero-2 2/3 IP, 7 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 3 BB, 4 SO, 1/2 GO/AO, 73 pitches
• Brian Bass-4 1/3 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 SO, 6/1 GO/AO, 59 pitches
• Jimmy Paredes CF-2-5, 2B
• Angel Sanchez 2B-3-5
• Mike Hessman 1B-2-3, BB
• Marc Krauss LF-1-3, BB, OF Assist
• Matt Dominguez 3B-2-4, 2B

Corpus Christi Hooks: Off

Lancaster JetHawks won 15-7

• David Martinez-5 IP, 10 H, 5 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 4 SO, 1 HR, 5/5 GO/AO
• Chia-Jen Lo-2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 4 SO
• Erik Castro 1B-3-5, 2 2B, HR
• Domingo Santana RF-1-3, 2 BB, SO, OF Assist
• Drew Muren LF-3-4, HR, 2 BB, SO
• Telvin Nash DH-2-6, 3 SO
• Carlos Perez C-1-4, 2 BB
• Enrique Hernandez 2B-2-5, 2B

Lexington Legends: Off

Tri-City ValleyCats won 13-9

• Vincent Velazquez-3 1/3 IP, 5 H, 6 R, 5 ER, 2 BB, 7 SO, 1 HR, 1/2 GO/AO
• Kenny Long-3 2/3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 SO, 4/1 GO/AO
• Joe Sclafani SS-2-4, 2B, 2 BB, SO, 2 SB
• Andrew Aplin CF-2-5, 3B, BB, SO, SB
• Jesse Wierzbicki 1B-2-6, 2B, 2 SB
• Tyler Heineman DH-3-6, SB
• Preston Tucker RF-1-4, 2 BB, SO, CS
• M.P. Cokinos C-3-5, 2B, SO
• Jarrod McKinney LF-1-4, 2B, 2 SO

Greeneville Astros lost 8-3 (Finished from July 19)

• Daniel Minor-6 1/3 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 SO, 11/4 GO/AO
• Christian Garcia-1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 SO
• Brian Blasik 2B-2-4, SB
• Terrell Joyce DH-0-4, 3 SO
• Ariel Ovando RF-2-3, BB
• Michael Martinez 1B-2-3, 2B, BB

Greeneville Astros lost 2-1

• Frederick Tiburcio-6 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 SO, 7/2 GO/Ao
• Tanner Bushue-2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 SO, 2/2 GO/AO
• D'Andre Toney CF-1-3, 2 BB, 2 SO, CS
• Angel Ibanez 3B-2-4, 2B, BB, SO
• Michael Martinez 1B-3-4, 2B, BB
• Ariel Ovando RF-0-5, 3 SO
• Jean Batista 2B-1-4, 2B, SO

GCL Astros lost 9-2

• Brandon Culbreth-3 1/3 IP, 2 H, 6 R, 5 ER, 3 BB, 4 SO, 4/3 GO/Ao
• Darwin Rivera 3B-2-3, HR
• Jon Carnahan C-2-2, 2B

GCL Astros lost 2-1

• Enderson Franco-4 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 4 SO, 5/2 GO/AO
• Gera Sanchez-1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 SO
• Alfredo Gonzalez C-1-3, SO, 2 SB

DSL Astros lost 6-3

• Juan Hernandez-2 2/3 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 3 SO
• Erick Hurtado-3 2/3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 6 SO
• Mesac Laguna RF-1-4, 2B, SO
• Hector Roa LF-3-4, 3B, HR, CS
• Randy Cesar 3B-1-3, 2B, BB, SO

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The Yankees outfield; what could have been.

[...]

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http://bronxbaseballdaily.com/2012/08/the-yankees-outfield-what-could-have-been/

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Wednesday Rockpile: Series Win Offers Glimpses of
Non-Terrible Future

Let's get this out of the way first: barring a stretch of competent baseball that we haven't seen from this team since April, the Rockies are going to lose over 100 games this year (they are 40-68). Okay, so maybe competent is overstating it: Colorado only needs to go 23-31 down the stretch. Then again, over their last 54 games the Rockies are 16-38. Of course the expansion Rockies, who this team uncomfortably reminds me of, were 36-72 through 108 games, and they had a finishing kick of 29-25 to finish at 67-95.

In any case, before last night's win I was significantly more skeptical of Colorado's chances to avoid 3 digit losses this season. As I've said before, baseball is weird. It clinched not only the Rockies' first series win against the Dodgers in LA since September 2010, but it was also the first series win of any kind by the Rockies in over a month*. These last two games have been a peak into a fantasy world in which the four man rotation works and Colorado has competent pitching. It's certainly a nice vision, but to date it has yet to come anywhere close to fruition. More performances like this will be required to avoid 100 losses. Many more.

*Fun fact: Colorado hasn't won a home series since June 1-3 against the Dodgers. It stands to reason that in the worst year in franchise history the Rockies have finally decided to play well against the Dodgers. LA is one of four teams that the Rockies are over .500 against this season -- the Nationals and the Astros, the best and the worst teams in MLB by record are two of the others.

I remain doubtful that Project 5,183 is the right way to attack the Coors problem (and Yahoo's Steve Henson is too), but at the least Alex White has shown some quantum leaps from the pitcher he was earlier this year. Drew Pomeranz looks like a useful piece too. There's good news about Jhoulys Chacin and Jorge De La Rosa too. While those four would comprise a rotation that is well below league average, it's a rotation whose true talent level is much closer to mediocre than what Colorado is getting this season.

And while we're on the topic of hope, the Rutlegend wrote another verse in his epic saga last night with a 3 double, 3 RBI night. Jon Sickels of Minor League Ball has a favorable writeup on Josh Rutledge's career prospects.

Off-Topic.

At the very least, the Rockies are not the Astros. The play really is better to watch with Yakety Sax playing in the background. The hyperlink of the article is precious.

Dexter Fowler is ascendant, entering the prime of his career. He is 10th in fWAR this year among center fielders, though the Coors effect led David Schoenfield to rank him 14th on his list. I would argue that the disadvantages posed by Coors Field with respect to defensive metric scores would mitigate that effect somewhat on fWAR.

Mike Ekstrom was warned by MLB about taking too long to warm-up on pitching changes. Adam Sobsey of Baseball Prospectus has an amusing account of the occasions in question.

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Wednesday Pebble Report: Scahill with Strange
Complete Game, Extra-Base Hits Out of Style

Colorado Springs 1, Omaha 6

The Sky Sox have seen a lot of players moving in and out of their team this past two weeks, and it has left them crippled in several areas, but especially in the bullpen. It is likely for this reason that Rob Scahill, despite being very hittable, was allowed to pitch the entire eight innings to his 11th loss of the season. The starter allowed 11 hits and six earned runs during the eight frames. He walked one and struck out three.

The Sky Sox offense was also quiet. Charlie Culberson with three singles and Brandon Wood with a single and a double accounted for five of the seven total team hits. Brendan Harris' double was the only other Colorado Springs extra-base hit, and he came around to score off a Chad Tracy sacrifice fly to take a 1-0 lead in the second inning, and the rest was all Omaha. The final hit was a Tim Wheeler single. Catcher Omir Santos struck out three times, and after a hot start to his time with the Rockies, he is now hitting .185 over his past ten games.

The Drillers were off. They will play today.

Rancho Cucamonga 11, Modesto 9

Starter Kennil Gomez allowed nine of Rancho Cucamonga's 11 runs a cross the three innings he pitched, leading to his fourth loss of the season, all with the Nuts. In addition to five walks allowed, three of his seven hits left the yard. Chad Rose followed with control problems of his own in relief, and two more runs crossed under his watch. Craig Bennigson, Michael Solbach and Nick Schnaitmann were effective, but it was too late.

Only one of Modesto's 13 hits was for extra bases, a triple from Kyle Parker, one of three hits on the night for the prospect. The Nuts were still able to put together a more than decent offensive performance, especially considering it was mostly singles. Rafael Ortega, Jayson Langfels and Helder Valezquez each put up two hit outings, with Ortega stealing three bases in the process. In addition to a single each, Delta Cleary Jr. and Jared Clark reached base twice via the walk, leading to three runs scored between them. Only Brett Tanos was hitless for Modesto.

The Tourists also had a day off yesterday.

Vancouver 1, Tri-City 8

With the only win in the Rockies' MiLB system yesterday, the Dust Devils also didn't need the extra-base hit to put up their eight runs, thanks to large amounts of walks and stolen bases. Derek Jones' triple was his lone hit of the game, but he also walked three times and stole two bases. Kyle Von Tungeln also reached base three times on walks and stole a base. Francisco Sosa was the only Dust Devil with multiple hits in the game, and he also stole two bags. In total, there were eight walks and six stolen bases for the team.

Benjamin Hughes was excellent on the mound, allowing only one unearned run. The pitcher walked no one and struck out six, allowing four hits over five and two thirds pitched. Chris Dennis and Brook Hart continued good 2012 seasons with a clean finish to the game. This trio of older 2011 draftees are hoping for chances to continue their careers with Asheville next season.

Grand Junction 4, Orem 6

Offense was more sparse for the GJ Rockies than the previous two affiliates, but the trend of low extra-base hits continued, with a Correlle Prime double the only one for the club. Between the Nuts, Dust Devils and GJ Rockies, 21 runs were scored between them with just three non-singles hit. Speaking of Prime, the 2012 high school draftee with the awesome name has broken out of his slow start, and hardcore. He is hitting .405 over his past ten games with a 1.041 OPS. Also beginning to heat up is second round pick Max White, the only multi-hitter of the game with a pair of singles and two runs batted in. Though White's recent play has only been "average", it is a significant step forward from his extremely slow start to his pro career. David Dahl kept his hitting streak alive with a single.

Jayson Aquino's second stateside start was very similar to his first. He struck out six, while allowing one run over six innings on four hits and two walks. Unfortunately, the start went to waste, as none of Jonathan Vargas, Rayan Gonzalez or Raul Fernandez pitched well out of the pen. The offense battled back multiple times at the end of the game to take the lead, but ultimately ended up on the short end. It was Gonzalez, who has had a very strange first pro season, who was stuck with the loss, his third.

DSL Orioles 5, DSL Rockies 3 (11 innings)

After struggling through most of July, Joel Payamps' last two starts have been an excellent rebound. Through five innings, Payamps allowed five hits, walked no one and struck out four. Three runs crossed, two of which were earned. Both teams committed four errors in the game. Marcos Derkes tripled for the team's only extra base hit, with Luis Jean's two singles marking the most hits for any player on the team in the game. There were lots of switches in the lineup; 14 position players saw game action, and each of them got at least one at bat. Manuel Montilla got his third loss of the year, after giving up two runs in the 11th inning, his third inning of work.

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