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Quick Hits: Red Sox, Cardinals, Giolito

Four teams have at least a 98% chance of reaching the postseason this year, according to Baseball Prospectus’ Playoff Odds Report. The Yankees, Rangers, Nationals and Reds look like playoff teams now, but they all saw what happened to the Braves and Red Sox last year, so I doubt any contending teams intend on coasting from this point on. Here are today’s links…

The Red Sox “weren’t trying very hard” to trade Josh Beckett before the non-waiver trade deadline, Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com reports. The Rangers and Braves are believed to be among the teams that spoke to Boston’s executives about Beckett, Heyman writes. One unnamed GM said “Boston’s first priority has to be to trade Josh Beckett” this August. Another executive suggested the Rangers could make sense for Beckett, who would have to be placed on waivers to be traded this month.
The Cardinals signed 16-year-old right-hander Ronald Medrano, Ben Badler of Baseball America reports. Medrano has touched 90-91 mph with his fastball and has shown good feel for his secondary pitches. He had been considered one of the top Nicaraguan prospects available, according to Badler.
Nationals first rounder Lucas Giolito re-injured his pitching elbow and will be examined by Dr. Lewis Yocum, ESPN.com’s Keith Law reports. Giolito, who was at one point a candidate to be selected first overall, signed for $2.925MM after the Nationals drafted him 16th overall in June.

And That Happened: Sunday’s scores and highlights

Pirates 6, Cardinals 3: For the second straight year the Pirates play a nineteen inning game. This time, unlike the game against the Braves in which they were royally screwed, the Pirates won. Thank you Pedro Alvarez and Andrew McCutchen who drove in runs in the 19th, Alvarez with a homer. They had to burn…

National League Notes: Braves, Jackson, Cabrera

A pivotal battle between two division rivals in the midst of a playoff race took 19 innings to complete as the Pirates beat the Cardinals by the score of 6-3. Pedro Alvarez gave Pittsburgh the lead in the top of 19th when he hit a solo shot against Barret Browning. The Pirates took the three-game series with the win and would be headed to the playoffs if the season ended today as the second Wild Card.

Here’s the latest news and headlines from around the National League…

With the Braves set to play one more series against the Nationals after this week’s showdown, Atlanta realizes the importance of making up ground in D.C. starting on Monday, writes Andrew Simon of MLB.com. The Braves have a comfortable hold on the top Wild Card spot but have played well enough to make a run at the division only to be matched win-for-win by Washington. ”We have the opportunity to take advantage because it seems like every time we win, they win and they don’t lose very often,” said Freddie Freeman. “So this is our time to try to take control of things and get a little closer.”
Nationals right-hander Edwin Jackson, a free agent after the season, would like to remain in D.C. on a deal longer than the one-year contract he signed in February, according to MLB.com’s Bill Ladson. “Anything more than one year,” Jackson said. “It would be nice to settle down for more than one year, for sure. I would like to [stay]. I could see myself being a part of [the Nationals], but at the end of the day, it’s up to ownership.”
The battle against performance-enhancing drugs remains an uphill struggle for Major League Baseball, opines Ken Rosenthal of FOXSports.com. Rosenthal suggests Melky Cabrera‘s actions reflect a desperate person willing to resort to desperate actions as he may have viewed PEDs as the lone way to salvage his career. While there may be less users in baseball as compared to a decade ago, players are still abusing the system and reaping the benefits that Cabrera enjoyed for almost a full season, if not longer.

Hey 19

The Pirates and the Cardinals play 19 innings, Pittsburgh coming out on top 6-3. The Buccos almost won the game in the 17th when a Garrett Jones grounder went off the pitcher for a two-out single with the bases loaded, but the Cardinals came back and tie the game on a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the inning. Pedro Alvarez hit the only home run of the game in the 19th, and Andrew McCutchen added a bases loaded single to finish off the scoring. Wandy Rodriguez, who was supposed to start Monday night, pitched two innings for the win.

The Pirates take two out of three from St. Louis to extend their wild card lead over the Cardinals to two games. The also stay one game ahead to the Giants, and gain a game on the Braves for the first slot and home field in the wild card game.

Pirates outlast Cardinals 6-3 in 19 innings

The Pirates and Cardinals had already split a pair of one-run games Friday and Saturday, but they were just setting the table for Sunday’s marathon, a 19-inning affair won by Pittsburgh 6-3. Pedro Alvarez hit a go-ahead homer off Barret Browning in the top of the 19th to break the tie, and Andrew McCutchen later…

Jaime Garcia tallies career-high 10 strikeouts in return

Jaime Garcia looked about as good as the Cards could have hoped for in his return from an eight-week stint on the disabled list Sunday at Busch Stadium. The left-hander struck out a career-high 10 batters while allowing just two unearned runs and five hits over eight strong innings against the visiting Pirates. Garcia threw…

Minor Moves: Matt Young

Here are the day’s minor league transactions…

The Cardinals have signed Matt Young, reports Brian Walton of TheCardinalNation.com (on Twitter). The Tigers released the 29-year-old last weekend, and he went 2-for-3 with a walk in his first game for St. Louis’ Triple-A affiliate yesterday.

With rotation spot on the line, James McDonald beats Cardinals

James McDonald entered Friday’s outing needing some sort of turnaround to save his rotation spot after a disastrous six-start run. He did that and more, shutting out the Cardinals for six innings and striking out seven in the Pirates’ 2-1 victory. McDonald, an All-Star snub after going 9-3 with a 2.37 ERA and a 0.97…

Keith Law: “Miguel Cabrera is the third-most valuable player on his own team”

Keith Law is still catching hell from Cardinals fans over his 2009 Cy Young Award ballot which they (erroneously) believe screwed Adam Wainwright and/or Chris Carpenter out of the Cy Young Award. That’s not his problem. He’s wrongfully accused of hating every team’s fans at some time or another, but Keith votes his mind and…

Leo Mazzone calls Strasburg shutdown “pathetic,” forgets what happened to Steve Avery

I’ve mentioned several times that I don’t like the impending Stephen Strasburg shutdown. I think that the Nationals, especially after they realized they had a playoff contender on their hands, needed to manage his workload in such a way that he could pitch into the postseason. That said, one cannot be blind to pitcher injuries…

Jaime Garcia has been cleared to return, so the Cardinals are shifting Joe Kelly to the ‘pen

Cardinals right-hander Joe Kelly has posted a solid 3.41 ERA this season over the first 12 starts of his major league career, serving as a fantastic fill-in for injured lefty Jaime Garcia. But Garcia just wrapped up a rehab assignment Tuesday night at Triple-A Memphis, so Kelly’s run in the rotation is over. According to…

Fun With the Wild Card

The Giants beat the Nationals 6-1 behind a five-hitter by Madison Bumgarner, and three hit games by Marco Scutaro, Hunter Pence, and Brandon Belt. The Giants remain tied for first in the NL West with the Dodgers. The Cardinals beat the Diamondbacks 8-2 to put some distance between those two teams in the wild card race, Matt Holliday continuing his power hitting with his 23rd home run. Matt got off to a slow start, but is slugging nearly .600 since the middle of May.

With the Dodgers beating the Pirates earlier, the race for the second wild card slot became very interesting. One game now separates the Pirates, the NL West leaders, and the Cardinals. If the Dodgers and Giants end up tied for the NL West, and tied with one or more teams for the second wild card, we’ll have a fun few days of playoffs. The NL West teams would play for the division, then the loser would go into a playoff for the second wild card position, and the winner of that would need to play the first wild card for the right to go to the NLDS. If we end up with three teams tied for the second wild card that would require a two-day playoff. So in the best case scenario, we are looking at four days of playoff games to determine a first round team, the Giants or Dodgers potentially playing in all four games, potentially in four different cities.

And That Happened: Tuesday’s scores and highlights

It was shutout Tuesday, apparently. Let’s tally the goose eggs: Yankees 3, Rangers 0: Hiroki Kuroda with the two-hit shutout. He was masterful, but man, there were a lot of ill-advised Texas swings in the parts of this one I watched. Either Kuroda had them more fooled than someone on the foolingest day of his life [...]

And That Happened: Tuesday’s scores and highlights

It was shutout Tuesday, apparently. Let’s tally the goose eggs: Yankees 3, Rangers 0: Hiroki Kuroda with the two-hit shutout. He was masterful, but man, there were a lot of ill-advised Texas swings in the parts of this one I watched. Either Kuroda had them more fooled than someone on the foolingest day of his life [...]

Brian Fuentes placed on restricted list for personal reasons

St. Louis has placed left-hander Brian Fuentes on the restricted list for an undisclosed personal reason, calling up Trevor Rosenthal from Triple-A to take his place on the roster. Fuentes signed with the Cardinals last month after being released by the A’s and Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post Dispatch reports that the 37-year-old…

Cardinals Place Brian Fuentes On Restricted List

The Cardinals have placed left-handed reliever Brian Fuentes on the restricted list after he asked to be excused for personal reasons, according to Jenifer Langosch of MLB.com (via Twitter).

Fuentes, 37, signed a minor league deal with the Redbirds exactly a month ago after being released by the Athletics. The 12-year veteran has struggled in 2012, posting a 7.20 ERA and 1.70 WHIP in 30 innings with Oakland and St. Louis. He owns a 3.62 ERA, 1.26 WHIP and 204 saves in 613 1/3 career innings.

Player on the restricted list do not count against their team’s 25- or 40-man rosters. They also do not accrue Major League service time and are sometimes not paid.

Lance Berkman has cartilage damage in his left knee

Lance Berkman‘s right knee has him on the DL. The other day we learned that his left knee is bothering him too. Though it was originally reported that it was just “soreness” and that there was no damage, an MRI has revealed cartilage damage. Joe Strauss has a good story about what Berkman faces now.…

Juan Pierre wins it for Phillies in 11th

Juan Pierre has collected more infield hits than anyone else in the game since arriving in the majors in 2000, but he had never won a game with one until now. Pierre beat out a grounder to deep short in the bottom of the 11th inning to score Jimmy Rollins and give the Phillies an…

Cardinals Sign Lance Zawadzki

Today’s minor moves..

The Cardinals signed infielder Lance Zawadzki to a minor league contract, according to the Pacific Coast League transactions page. The 27-year-old was previously with the Braves' Triple-A affiliate where he hit .231/.271/.340 with three homers in 157 plate appearances.

Happy Halladay

The Roy Halladay we all know and love pitched for the Phillies tonight as he held the Cardinals to two hits and one run during eight innings of work. He walked none and struck out eight, his only mistake a home run ball to Carlos Beltran. Roy has now put together two great strats in a row.

This was supposed to be the Phillies formula for winning this season. The great rotation would hold the opposition in check so the weakened offense could score enough to win. With the injuries to the starting staff this season, that didn’t happen. Maybe Roy can help this formula work the rest of the way.