A Day of Struggles

You're probably asking yourself why I have a picture of some oddly dressed man tilling the soil accompanying the piece today? The reason is that I'm haunted by gardeners. It seems like there is someone outside my office blowing leaves on a daily basis with one of those gas powered jobs. I swear it's flipping annoying. Why can't they all just get together and make Tuesday gardening day? Maybe I'll get on that in my free time.

There have been three no-hitters thrown this year, and each pitcher that tossed one had a losing record at the time of their no-no: Justin Verlander was 2-3, Francisco Liriano was 1-4 while Ervin Santana was 5-8 meaning we got three no-hitters from guys who were a combined 8-15. What is it that I always say about win-loss records...

A couple of pitchers who just aren't getting it done of late – here's a lefty and a righty.

Barry Zito: 10.25 ERA over his last three starts.Joel Pineiro: 14.85 ERA over his last four starts.

Zito is now on the DL with a foot issue, and Pineiro could have pitched his way out of the Angel's starting rotation with his recent work (optoins include Garrett Richards, Hisanori Takahashi and Trevor Bell).

David Wright is back. Since he returned from the DL, he was on the outs because of a back issue, he has hit .392 with 13 RBI. At the other end of the spectrum, you know the end that you don't want to have right in your face, Adam Lind has hit .093 the past two weeks. How is that possible? In case you haven't noticed, Lind's average is down to .273 as he has hit .196 over his last 27 games. Since we're talking about struggling hitters, I felt I had to mention Matt Joyce. The Rays' slugger, and I use that term loosely, has hit .241 in 17 games since the All-Star break which is actually a massive improvement over the .173 he hit in June and .184 he hit in July. The duo has rather similar totals to this point of the year.

Joyce: .282-15-50-54 with a .845 OPS Lind: .273-19-59-43 with a .800 OPS

WHO AM I?

I have a better ERA than James Shields, Scott Baker, Jon Lester, Felix Hernandez, Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum and Cliff Lee.

I have a better WHIP than all but four pitchers in baseball.

I have more strikeouts than Bud Norris, Matt Garza, Ryan Dempster, Zack Greinke, Yovani Gallardo, Jon Lester, Matt Cain and Josh Beckett.

Who am I?

Alex Rodriguez is an idiot. He did performance enhancing drugs, he dated Cameron Diaz and caused a nauseating scene at the Super Bowl which I detailed in A Question, A Statement, A Pukefest. Now there are allegations of underground gambling. I'm telling you, I just don't get it. Why do athletes systematically engage in self destructive behavior? Perhaps it's the sense of entitlement they feel because people have been kissing their asses since they were old enough to wipe them on their own. Just makes me sick.

The answer to the question - Who Am I? -  is the Angels' Dan Haren. The Angel's ace has an 11-6 record, 2.89 ERA, 0.99 WHIP and 131 Ks. Haren is currently the 21st most valuable player in baseball – at least according to Yahoo Sports.

By Ray Flowers