Quote of the Day "To avoid situations in which you might make mistakes may be the biggest mistake of all." Peter McWilliams

Daily quiz Six QBs were taken in the first round of the 1983 NFL Draft- what Hall of Famer was the first non-QB taken that year? Thursday's quiz Jim Kelly, Ken O'Brien, Todd Blackledge, Tony Eason, John Elway were the five QBs picked ahead of Dan Marino in the '83 NFL Draft. Wednesday's quiz I had never heard of him, but Antonio Villaraigosa is the mayor of Los Angeles.

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Friday's List of 13: Our baseball List of 13...........
13) Marlins 41-39-- Tied for first with Phillies, have better pitching, so we'll give them the nod over Philly for this week. 19-10 vs lefties, 22-29 vs righties-- will Florida add a lefty bat (Russell Branyan?) in July?

12) Blue Jays 42-38-- Survived Halladay's injury, but three teams ahead of them in AL East combined to go 22-8 over last ten games, so they're falling further behind. Played most extra inning games in AL (4-5).

11) Brewers 42-39-- Willie Randolph has done good job shoring up what had been horrendous infield defense; they need Manny Parra to bounce back down in AAA-- they don't have a replacement as the fifth starter.

10) Rangers 42-35-- Need Hamilton back healthy so they can outscore their sometimes suspect pitching. Millwood has been super for Texas, but will he wilt in summer heat? Marlon Byrd has been terrific.

9) Rockies 41-37-- Jimenez might be most underrated pitcher in major leagues. Tracy is confounding fantasy league owners with platooning all over place. With all they've been thru, they're game out of Wild Card.

8) Tigers 43-35-- Have scored 36 less runs than Cleveland but lead Tribe by 13 games; they're 13-9 in one-run games, while rest of the division is 35-48. You could make case for Leyland as Manager of the Year.

7) Cardinals 43-37-- Ryan Franklin's 19 saves are just further evidence of Dave Duncan's brilliance; remember, he took washed-up starter named Dennis Eckersley and turned him into Hall of Fame closer 20 years ago.

6) Giants 42-35-- Say Bochy's club wins Wild Card; who is going to be happy facing Lincecum-Cain-Johnson in a short series?

5) Angels 43-34-- Abreu had four HRs all year until he hit a pair off of Guthrie Thursday night-- if they ever get Guerrerro's bat going, they're going to score lot of runs. Their middle relief is still a problem.

4) Rays 44-36-- Only two AL East teams can make playoffs, so as long as Red Sox are pitching-rich and Tampa Bay keeps winning, people in the billion dollar stadium are justifiably going to be nervous.

3) Bronx Bombers 45-33-- Pittsburgh is actually paying half of Hinske's salary to sit on the bench in the Bronx, which seems funny, except that its true. In reality, seems like Bombers have two AAA teams, the one in Scranton, and then the Pirates.

2) Red Sox 48-30-- If Lowell's injury is severe, they'll need to add a bat, but they've got ton of minor league pitching talent, so they can afford to pay the price to make a deadline deal. Rays make them nervous, too.

1) Dodgers 50-29-- Now the great chemistry experiment begins-- Torre did a masterful job during MannyGate but what now, now that he has four quality outfielders who all deserve to play? Ethier hit around .225 while Ramirez was gone; he is the most logical candidate to sit.

Thursday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) Whatever happened to free speech? Pirate shortstop Jack Wilson vented the other day when Nyjer Morgan was traded to Washington; his comments were heartfelt and pointed, so of course, on Wednesday he apologized, because thats what truth tellers do these days-- after saying exactly what they think, they cover their butts by apologizing. Too bad.

12) Whats up with the state of Minnesota? A couple years after they had a pro wrestler as governor, they elect a comedian senator. Now, lot of politicians are funny, but very few are actually trying to be funny.

11) It costs $15 just to tour the Dallas Cowboys' new stadium.

10) Weird Wednesday-- only three baseball games were going on at 10pm and that included the game in San Diego that started just after 10.

9) Hanley Ramirez has RBI in his last ten games, longest streak by a National League shortstop since Arky Vaughn in 1940.

8) A day after rallying from 10-1 deficit to win 11-10, greatest comeback in franchise history, Orioles blew a 4-run lead in ninth inning and lost in 11 innings to Boston. Last 24 Baltimore hitters went down in order; so much for using the great comeback as a springboard to progress.

7) Yovani Gallardo has started twice against the Mets this year and lost both games 1-0. He's an excellent pitcher.

6) Pablo Sandoval dropped a foul pop up hit by Colby Rasmus in the 10th inning, then Rasmus hit a walk-off homer, giving Cardinals a tense 2-1 win at Busch Stadium. Very tough way to lose a game.

5) Final tally for the Dodgers during Manny Ramirez' suspension was a 29-21 record; I guess its good business, but little weird that Dodgers TV broadcasts were pumping up Manny's return to action like he's some kind of hero, instead of a guy coming back from suspension.......

4) After Astros scored six runs in top of fourth in San Diego, Astros' TV showed a couple of fans wearing bags on their heads at Petco. Since this is the Gadget Era, the two fans snapped pics of themselves with their camera phone and took the bags off to admire the pictures. Tough times for the Padres, but at least the weather's always good in San Diego.

3) Rangers blew a 7-1 7th-inning lead, but Hank Blalock bailed out the bullpen with a walkoff blast over the centerfield fence, giving Texas 9-7 win, moving them within a half-game of the Angels in the AL West.

2) Billy Joel had a 22-2 record as a Golden Gloves boxer. Imagine a guy with those talented fingers risking them boxing? He quit when his nose got broken in his 24th fight.

1) One bad thing about the rise of the Internet-- too many people who just spread rumors-- how about reporting facts, or spreading opinions, but rumors are annoying. The day after Brandon Webb's shoulder was all but prepped for labrum surgery, it comes out that he doesn't need any surgery, and all three doctors he saw agreed with that, so the report that got lot of attention on Tuesday was 100% false. Terrible journalism.

Wednesday's List of 13: Random thoughts as we start July......
13) Free agency in NBA/NHL started at midnight July 1, so there will be some interesting news in next couple days. 35-year old Jason Kidd is a target of a few different teams. He has a ton of miles on those legs, but he averaged eight assists a game on a good team last year. We'll see. .

12) Bad news for Yao Ming, whose broken foot isn't healing properly; no one knows whats going to happen here, which leaves the Rockets in limbo, as far as their roster goes, because it is common knowledge that you don't want Ron Artest being the best player on your team, due to his not being the most stable person on/off the court. Well, if Yao can't play, Artest would be Houston's best player. Big dilemma for them.

11) Pistons have the most money to spend in free agency, so they fired their coach after just one season Tuesday. Why? They were 4-0 when the Billups/Iverson trade went down-- did Curry make the trade? No, he started Iverson over Rip Hamilton, and one thing an NBA coach cannot do is tick off his best player. Thats career suicide.

10) High school All-American Lance Stephenson finally found a school for the fall-- he will go to Cincinnati, but the question now is just how much baggage he brings with him to the Queen City, as he has a court case against him, and some NCAA eligibility questions. Lets face it, if he's really good, he'll be gone after one year, anyway. Some coaches get seduced by talent, but sometimes the seduction gets them fired.

9) Tony Gwynn Jr hit his first homer in Texas Friday, then went into a 1-17 slump right after. Home runs can be fool's gold sometimes.

8) Its stunning how bad the Mets are playing; granted they have injury issues, but there is no stability in the day-day lineup, and their defense is a horror because of it. The GM has done little to upgrade the roster.

7) Ian Snell requested the Pirates send him to AAA, then he struck out 17 guys in his first AAA start, including 13 in a row at one point, but the Bucs' GM made comments that sounded like Snell had burned lot of bridges with the Pirate players/coaches, so he won't be back real soon, but the way Pittsburgh is going, he could get traded.

6) Pirate fans were little bit fired up about McCutchen/Morgan at top of the order after they traded Nate McLouth, then they traded the speedy Morgan to the Nationals for hideous Lastings Milledge, a move that is a baffler, even to my friend who's a Pirate fan. "They just want Pittsburgh to hate them." said my friend, who is from the Three Rivers area. That helps explain why Pirates have been under .500 every year since 1992.

5) Manny Ramirez played two games at AAA Albuquerque, then went and played in three Class A games-- why? Unless they were just trying to get the Class A team some big paydays, it makes no sense. Just for the record, they drew 8,099/6,424/6,877 in his three Class A games.

4) Dan Haren lowered his ERA to 2.19 and also homered as Arizona got its eastern swing off to a good start, winning 6-2 in Cincinnati. By the way, Randy Johnson now has eight wins for the surging Giants.

3) Boston led 10-1 in 7th inning at Baltimore last night but lost; in the long history of the Orioles, this was their greatest-ever comeback win. O's scored five runs in seventh and another five in the eighth.

2) Quote of the Night: "This is a bad lineup the Padres are running out." Houston Astros' TV analyst commenting on the San Diego lineup that had a combined .211 batting average going into Tuesday's action.

1) Why would Kelvin Sampson appeal his penalty to the NCAA? Does he think there's a school in this country that would hire him? If there is, thats a pretty sad commentary. He lost his appeal and has sanctions on him until the fall of 2013, which seems more than fair.

Tuesday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) Reason #4,598 why your kid should throw lefty-- Bruce Chen is in the major leagues again, this time with the Royals. Now on his 10th club in 11 major league seasons, Chen made his first big league start in three years in Pittsburgh Saturday night-- he has a 35-38 career record, and as recently as 2005, Chen won 15 games for the Orioles.

12) Update on Jason Giambi, who hit .342 for the A's in 2001, with 38 homers, 120 RBI, then sold out to the Bronx Bombers, where he went in the ashcan after the steroids stuff came to light: He is hitting .200 so far this season, with 10 homers, 38 RBI. He is a horrendous first baseman; even though you hear he's a good guy, he's stealing Mr Wolff's $$$.

11) How can the A's not have a decent 1B or 3B? I mean, Giambi is a complete stiff now, worse on defense than offense-- when Mark Ellis came off the DL, he moved Adam Kennedy to 3B, so Oakland has two 2B in its starting lineup, which is just freakin' terrific. They wasted ton of money on Eric Chavez, which is part of why they're terrible now.

10) You'll see Matt Holliday's numbers go way up as soon as he leaves Oakland-- A's just don't have any decent tablesetters in front of him, and they have a guy hitting .200 behind him. If he has a half a brain, Holliday signs with a real good team, and finds himself in middle of potent lineup next year where he can show once again just how good he is.

9) Arizona scored one run in five of Doug Davis' nine home starts.

8) Mets' Fernando Nieve had rough night at Miller Park in 10-6 loss at Milwaukee; Brewers swung at 31 of his 68 pitches in 3.1 innings-- on the 18 balls they put in play, Brewers got 11 hits. Not good.

7) Washington Nationals made a pitching change in 8th inning Monday, replacing Ron Villone with Julian Tavarez; Villone has pitched for dozen big league teams, Tavarez for eleven. They might be the best packers in the major leagues, either them or their wives.

6) Villone has pitched in 45 different major league ballparks.

5) This is how good Josh Greinke has been for Kansas City this year; Royals scored two runs in three of Greinke's starts- they won all three.

4) Cardinals scored three or less runs in Joel Pineiro's last nine starts.

3) Astros walked Adrian Gonzalez in 4th inning with first base open and two outs, leading 1-0. If Padres keep Gonzalez, and it looks like they're going to, they have to find decent hitter to bat behind him. Kouzmanoff isn't respected enough that they'll pitch to Gonzalez very often.

2) I watch a ton of baseball, love the Extra Innings package, and as I sit here every night, it is obvious that two things are way down this season: attendance and scoring. Teams that fall out of contention are going to be playing in front of tons of empty seats the second half of the season.

1) Watching CNN the last week, I'm thinking being rich and famous ain't all its cracked up to be. Not that I wouldn't like to give it a try.......

Monday's List of 13: Wrapping up a sports weekend.........
13) Interleague play is over, and once again the American League drilled its NL rivals, winning by 137-114 margin. Closer than last year, but not very close at all. Results are broken down by division in the box above.

12) Actually, there is one interleague game left, a Cub-White Sox game that has to be made up after a rainout last week.

11) To me, this should guarantee the American League champ home field in the World Series, but no, jackasses that run MLB use the winner of an exhibition game, the All-Star Game, to determine home field for the most important event of the baseball season. Just a terrible idea.

10) A total of nine runs scored in this weekend's Boston-Atlanta series. Thats nine runs total in three games.

9) Braves' Tommy Hanson hasn't allowed a run in his last three starts, for a total of 19.1 consecutive scoreless innings. Those were starts #3-5 in his major league career, so he is quite a hot prospect for the Braves.

8) When the Mets got only four hits total Friday/Saturday, it was first time since April, 1967 they had got that few hits in consecutive games.

7) Andre Ethier hit three homers Friday night against Don Wakamatsu's Seattle Mariners; when Ethier was a kid, he attended a baseball camp run by Wakamatsu. Interesting to see if Ethier stays in the Dodger lineup on Friday, when Mr Ramirez returns from his 50-game suspension.

6) Nationals-Orioles series this weekend brought together announcing teams of the two teams-- both clubs share MASN network; interesting to hear Rob Dibble/Jim Palmer share the airwaves-- it made for pretty good television, since both guys are opinionated and smart.

5) Then there is Bert Blyleven, who minces no words on Minnesota's broadcasts; when Francisco Liriano couldn't bunt a runner over Sunday, the play-by-play guy was coming up with excuses, but Blyleven was quick to chime in, "Why can't he learn to bunt? Its not that hard."

4) Only 17 of 60 starting pitchers Saturday/Sunday finished 7th inning, with just four finishing the 8th inning. JA Happ's 100-pitch shutout in Toronto Saturday was the only complete game of the weekend.

3) There is no truth that Chien Ming Wang is Korean for "Ed Whitson."

2) Apparently, the NHL wanted to have two outdoor games next year, Flyers-Bruins in Boston, and Canadiens-Flames in Calgary, but hideous NBC, which shows some NHL games but doesn't pay rights fees, put pressure on the league to only have the game in Boston, so the NHL did the wrong thing and cancelled the game in Alberta. Too bad.

1) If the playoffs started Monday morning, these would be the teams:
NL-- Phillies-Mil/StL-Dodgers-Giants
AL-- Red Sox-Tigers-Angels-Bronx

Sunday's List of 13: Our weekly baseball List of 13........
13) Mariners 38-36-- Felix Hernandez looked like Bob Gibson against the Dodgers Saturday night; this team plays with enthusiasm, which in the last couple years, you couldn't say about the Mariners.

12) Marlins 38-38-- NL East is combined 32-47 in interleague play, so when they get back to playing each other this week, someone will have to step up. Marlins have the best starting pitching of top three teams.

11) Brewers 40-34-- Surprise team of NL is 20-18 on road, but is just 20-16 at Miller Park; big comeback got Hoffman off hook Saturday.

10) Cardinals 41-35-- Traded for Mark DeRosa Saturday, which fills a hole at 3B, but what to do with Khalil Greene? Their starting pitching is still sub-standard, but they'd be in playoffs if they started today.

9) Giants 39-34-- Blew game they should have had Saturday, now only 8-11 in one-run games, but 24-12 at home. Next question is which of its minor league pitching prospects gets to fill the #5 starter role?

8) Rays 41-35-- Its freakin' June 28 and they haven't played Blue Jays yet, which means 18 of their last 85 games are against Toronto. Who is the genius who thought this was good scheduling?

7) Toronto 41-35-- Luckily for Jays, Roy Halladay comes off DL to start the first of those 18 against the Rays. Marco Scutaro deserves to be on the All-Star team. Gaston has done good job with this group.

6) Rockies 39-35-- They've won 19 of last 22 games, are only 1.5 games out of Wild Card, and have all the momentum- they're 22-20 on the road, which has often been a weak point in past.

5) Rangers 40-35-- Fell out of first place last night for first time in seven weeks; looks like two eastern teams will make playoffs, so that makes a series against Angels this coming week pretty darned important.

4) Angels 40-32-- Getting Lackey back was huge-- their bullpen has been weak, so they needed an innings-eater to protect the pen. 13-4 vs the NL they made up four games on Texas during interleague play.

3) Bronx 42-32-- Bully team-- just 10-9 in one-run games. They get an upgrade on defense when Jeter sits out- the Pena kid can pick it. Have outscored Mets 29-1 in last three meetings. 4-1 against Mets, just 5-7 against rest of the National League.

2) Red Sox 46-28-- Francona just seems happier this year-- this team is rolling, and he doesn't have a certain leftfielder giving him ulcers. Now in October, he'll probably meet up with the leftfielder, which bring us to...

1) Dodgers 48-27-- Tremendous job by Torre having team thrive in the no-Manny era, but their feeble effort against Felix Hernandez Saturday shows just how much they'll need him when October rolls around.

Saturday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) How is it there are 83 kinds of lottery tickets/scratch offs, but we can't play poker for money online? Gambling is only legal when creeps who run our governemnt get a cut.

12) Mike Kzryzewski made $3.6M a year at Duke this year; the next highest-paid employee was the school's chancellor, at $963,000.

11) Of the 16 offensive/defensive coordinators in the Big East, 11 are in their first year in the job. Lot of turnover in college football coaching.

10) Oklahoma Sooners scored 51.1 ppg LY, still lost twice; their 24-14 loss to Florida in their bowl game didn't do anything to enhance the bad bowl record of Bob Stoops, who now makes $5 a year.

9) Not only is Washington hoop recruit Abdul Gaddy one of five best incoming freshmen, he can't go to the NBA after one year of college, due to his being too young-- he was 17 when he got out of high school.

8) Orioles catcher Matt Wieters was also the closer at Georgia Tech.

7) Friends who have kids in high school tell me the kids get homework in the summer, reading assignments. Why is this? Summer is for fun, and what if a kid transfers into the school? Then he/she is already behind.

6) By way of review, here are things not to do as governor of a state--
a) Don't use anythibng but cash to pay for hookers.
b) Don't try to use state jobs to increase your own bankroll.
c) If you cheat on your wife, keep it on this continent.
d) If you must have a girlfriend on another continent, don't go see her on Father's Day weekend, especially if you have four kids.

5) Four franchises who have gone unusually long time since they won a league title-- SF Giants (1954-- they were in NYC then), Bruins 1972, Knicks 1973, Miami Dolphins, 1973.

4) I'm thinking major leaguers should watch the College World Series to regain a sense of how enthusiastic these kids are about playing-- it may sound corny but its true-- there's nothing wrong with showing that you love to play the game, and love to win.

3) GMs in Montreal, New Jersey have lot of work to do; Devils have nine unrestricted free agents, Canadiens 10. NHL free agency starts this Wednesday. Hard to believe it'll be July freakin' 1st already.

2) Flyers have some pruning to do after trading for Chris Pronger- they were already way over the salary cap, now they need to dump salary.

1) NHL's salary cap goes up $100,000 next year, to $56.8M; wondering if the small increase is symbolic, to show that this league hasn't been as badly hurt by the recession as some others, especially the NBA?

Friday's List of 13: Random thoughts after the NBA Draft.....
-- ESPN covers tonight's draft; sadly, Stuart Scott is hosting the show, and he makes the hideous Chris Berman look like Walter Cronkite, so it could be a long night. John Saunders wasn't available tonight?

-- ESPN has a camera inside the Clippers' war room, which is a little bit like having access to watching Michelangelo paint, except the opposite. The Clippers are by far the NBA's worst organization, and possibly the worst in all of sports. They have more people in the room than they do players-- what do all these people do? You half-expect to see people in their draft room playing checkers or putting golf balls across the carpet.

-- At least ESPN has Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy analyzing and taking airtime away from the pompous Jay Bilas.

-- The draft room in Memphis looks like a Vegas sports book, with the guys huddled around a TV to see the 9th at Santa Anita. Grizzlies take Hasheem Thabeet, who Bilas then says may never be good on offense. The second pick won't be good on offense? Thats Grizzlies basketball.

-- When word got out that Farrah Fawcett died today, a woman I work with asked "Who else?", meaning these things happen in 3's. Earlier in the week, Ed McMahon had died. Well, sure enough, Michael Jackson passed away at age 50, a very strange man dying way too young.

-- James Harden goes to the Thunder-- he is wearing a bow tie. Saw lot of his games at Arizona State-- thought he was little soft, but Sendek is a terrific coach, so he must have a high basketball IQ.

-- Purple seems to be color of the day, as far as dress shirts go. Maybe because the Lakers won the championship, but lot of purple shirts.

-- Sacramento takes Tyreke Evans, meaning he'll probably get traded, since the Kings couldn't possibly have a real good point guard, right? A very good pick by a team that desperately needs good things to happen.

-- Minnesota takes Ricky Rubio, the Spanish kid no one has seen play, other than the two weeks during the Olympics last year; buy a warm coat Ricky-- its freakin' cold in Minnesota.

-- Fran Fraschilla, one of our favorites, raves about Rubio, then points out that Minnesota doesn't have a coach yet. Brilliant move, not having a coach on draft night-- no wonder they have four first round draft picks.

-- The Timberwolves don't have a war room, just a bunch of people who look like they're sitting around the receptionist's desk. They take Jonny Flynn, a pure point guard-- they're going to be really young, so the new coach, as Jeff Van Gundy said, will probably be fired in 18 months.

-- Actually, when Stuart Scott doesn't screw around, he's little bit better than Berman, who is incapable of playing it straight.

-- Golden State takes Stephen Curry, and all the Knick fans there moan really loudly, since New York picked next-- they took Jordan Hill, who is a terrific rebounder, but Chase Budinger would've been a better pick. To me, the team that takes Budinger gets a genuine steal.

-- Its been 22 years since the Knicks drafted a guy who made a All-Star team-- point guard Mark Jackson from St John's who is working right there for ESPN. Last time Knicks won a playoff series, Jeff Vam Gundy was the coach, and he's sitting there, too.

-- Toronto takes Demar DeRozan, who is very raw player-- Mark Jones tries to pump him up by telling him how great the public transportation in Toronto is. NBA players take limos, Mark.

-- Milwaukee traded Richard Jefferson yesterday, then drafted Brandon Jennings, who was mediocre in his year over in Italy last winter. How in the name of Toby Kimball do the Bucks sell season tickets? Bucks said they would have taken Jonny Flynn, had he been available. Whoops.

-- Orlando dumped Rafer Alston to the Nets for Vince Carter, which I guess was inevitable the way his minutes went in the Finals. Bad news for Nets' coach Lawrence Frank, the longest-tenured coach in Eastern Conference, even though he still looks like he's 14 years old.

-- Williams kid from Louisville is the 11th pick, and the first college senior drafted. Its almost like playing four years in college isn't good.

-- My 83-year old dad asks, "Are there any white guys getting drafted?" Only a wise guy would tell him that if he wants white guys, he should watch the NHL Draft, which is Friday night on Versus.

-- Hey, its Larry Bird's turn to draft-- he takes Tyler Hansbrough, who happens to be white. Terrible pick. No wonder the Pacers aren't good. Chase Budinger would've been a much better pick.

-- Good lord, Steve Kerr is on crack-- the Suns are trading Stoudemire to the Warriors for Biedrins, Bellinelli and some other stiff-- Suns will be the worst team in the league soon. Steve Nash must be the next guy out of town, right? Who the hell is he going to pass the ball to? If Kerr iusn't careful, he'll be the next basketball coach at Florida International.

-- Speaking of FIU, they dropped cheerleading this week, supposedly to save money, but maybe it was just to protect attractive young women from being around Isiah Thomas.

-- Three of the top 15 picks have dads who played in the NBA.

-- Dick Vitale is loud, even in the summer. he predicted Stephen Curry as Rookie of the Year next year. He'll definitely have the green light to shoot the ball, no doubt about that, playing for Don Nelson.

-- Stu Scott, playing it straight tonight, gives us two good tidbits; UCLA has had a player drafted in 13 straight drafts, and 76ers used six starting lineups last year, the fewest of any NBA team. Good work, Stu.

-- Hey, I heard Bruce Pearl was supposed to be on the telecast; he did an appearance with Mike Francesa last week, but no sign of him tonight.

-- Minnesota takes Ty Lawson, but we're told he's getting traded to the Nuggets, where he'll play for another former Tar Heel, George Karl.

-- Greg Oden has played in 65 of a possible 164 NBA games since he got out of Ohio State after one season-- this would qualify as a bust. There is still time for him to become a player, but he'd have to stay on the floor for it to ever happen. Too many kids leave school too early.

-- I like the Hawks taking Jeff Teague-- terrific player. Its first time ever that Wake Forest has had two players taken in the first round.

-- Ben Zobrist has eight HRs in June, second-most in major leagues.

-- Portland just took someone named Victor Claver from Spain, and now the Kings just took someone named Omri Casspi-- I spend hundreds of hours watching basketball all winter-- I've never heard of either guy, but Fraschilla gives Casspi the thumbs up, which is good enough for me.

-- ESPN's Lisa Salters asks Shaq in a phone interview if he would come off the bench if the Cavaliers wanted him to-- who fed her this idiotic question???? Later on, Jeff Van Gundy laughs and says that if he wants to get fired, Mike Brown will bring Shaq off the bench. Enough said.

-- By the way, I was out moving my car when Utah took Eric Maynor, but the VCU guard is really good and will help Jerry Sloan's team.

-- You can tell Jay Bilas is fighting the urge to say "upside" about every player-- Dallas just took a kid who started parttime in his only season at Ohio State-- that should work out really well.

-- How are the Phillies in first place? Their pitching is hideous.

-- The Knicks just traded Quentin Richardson for Darko Milicic, so we get to see the 24-year old Croatian up close next winter, playing in the best system for his passing/shot blocking skills. Its now or never.

-- OK, almost time for me to wrap this up, because Oklahoma City just took a kid from Guadalupe; not only have I never heard of the kid, I've never heard of Guadalupe. Ric Bucher reports that Dallas will trade the kid from Ohio State to the Thunder for this kid.

-- I'm sticking it out until the Knicks pick again, then I'm off to Wendy's to clog my arteries-- the Grizzlies just took the Carroll kid from Mizzou who has a liver disease. I'm not kidding-- the disease shouldn't affect his playing career, but would it kill them to draft a healthy person?

-- Knicks just drafted Toney Douglas, a guard from Florida State whose brother is a receiver for the Falcons. He's going to help the Knicks.

-- Why did Patty Mills leave St Mary's? He hasn't been drafted yet. The Cavaliers just drafted a guy from the freakin' Congo, for Pete's sake. I'm baffled why a kid like Mills would leave without a first round promise?

-- Jay Bilas must be a tailor-- he knows how long everyone's arms are.

-- My one last emphatic statement on this draft-- if the kid from Israel and the kid from Guadalupe are better than Chase Budinger, then I'll be dating Pamela freakin' Anderson pretty soon. There is no way on God's green earth that Budinger isn't a 1st round pick- its why the NBA can be really annoying- they draft these foreign kids and then they disappear, sometimes never to be seen again. I don't understand it, which is why I am off to eat hamburgers-- it makes me feel better, but not smarter.

Late Update-- Pistons took Budinger with the 44th pick in draft, then dealt him to Houston. Portland was smart and drafted Patty Mills. .

Thursday's List of 13: Playing uniform number association.....
This is purely objective, but these are players I associate with certain numbers-- I probably left out some obvious ones. Make your own lists and see what you come up with.........I'll go in numerical order.......

4-- Gehrig, Favre, Orr-- Bobby Orr revolutionized hockey, rushing the puck the length of the ice, through the entire team, to set up chances for the Bruins. Too bad his knees were so bad-- I met him in 1986-- he was in a charity softball game, but his knees were so bad he hit fly balls so he wouldn't have to run them out. A very nice man.

7-- Elway, Mantle, Esposito, Roethlisberger-- Elway somehow survived a summer in Oneonta to become one of the all-time greats. Big Ben shot an 81 at Bethpage Black recently. Must be nice to have skills.

8-- Ripken, Berra, Steve Young, Aikman-- Kids in Baltimore can't wear number 8, because everyone wanted it and there were lot of disputes, so they just retired the number. Now thats quite an honor.

9-- Ted Williams, Howe, Bobby Hull, Brees-- Imagine the numbers Ted Williams would've put up if he didn't miss five years in his prime to go serve in the Korean War? Or if he played home games where right field fence was closer than it is at Fenway?

11-- Messier, IThomas, JRollins, Fitzgerald-- Despite his horrendous record as an executive, Isiah was a great player. Messier is a god in New York because he guaranteed a title, then came through in heroic style.

12-- Staubach, Bradshaw, Brady, Kelly-- The best QB number-- to this day, Elway and Roger Staubach are best QBs I've seen, but Brady has been climbing the list pretty quickly. Don't underestimate Bradshaw, a winner of four Super Bowls-- he only acts dumb.

13-- Wilt Chamberlain, Warner, Marino, Nash-- Wilt got made at people who said he was selfish, so he led the NBA in assists the next year. He was that freakin' good. I love watching Steve Nash play, and now he can play next year without Shaq clogging up the middle.

20-- Barry Sanders, Billy Sims, Lem Barney-- Has one number on the same team ever been worn by three better players? I don't think so.

21-- Clemente, Tomlinson, DWilkins-- If Dominique Wilkins played for a winning team, or in New York, he would be an icon to this day-- thats how good he was. Clemente and Pete Rose are two best baseball players I've ever seen (Hank Aaron, too).

32-- Magic Johnson, Jim Brown, OJ Simpson, Sandy Koufax-- OJ was a great, great player, no matter what he did after football. Koufax pitched a shutout in Game 7 of '65 series, on two days' rest. An amazing feat.

34-- Shaquille O'Neal, Rollie Fingers, Earl Campbell-- Shaq just got dealt to Cleveland as I was typing this. Earl Campbell was an awesome back; look up some of his runs on Youtube-- tough as nails.

56-- Lawrence Taylor-- I'm not a Giant fan, but when I see number 56 anywhere, I think of LT, who made so many big plays as a pass rushing linebacker from the outside. Even when I see Mark Buehrle pitching for the White Sox, I see his number 56 and I think of LT, maybe because I am from New York and we saw all his games and he was always in the papers. Taylor wore number 98 as a college player at North Carolina.

75-- Deacon Jones, Mean Joe Greene, Howie Long-- If I was a lineman who played defense, I'd damn sure want to wear either 75 or 85 (Jack Youngblood's number). When I was a little kid, Deacon Jones was just the best, crushing opposing QBs. I'd be thrilled if Howie Long's son is close to as good a player as his dad was.

Wednesday's List of 13: Cleaning out a cluttered mind........
13) Manny Ramirez is suspended for 50 games, but is playing in rehab games in the minor leagues; in my humble opinion, he shouldn't be able to do this until the 50-game suspension is over, but thats just me. Only good part of this is Albuquerque franchise cleans up for two nights with very big crowds- they drew 15,321 Tuesday, a huge crowd for them.

12) If you care about such things, Ramirez went 0-2 against southpaw Manny Parra, who was in the big leagues until recently.

11) Last year's Mets were first team in 40 years to have four guys start 158+ games; three of those four guys are on the DL right now.

10) Texas beat LSU 5-1, evening the College World Series 1-1, with the championship game Wednesday night in Omaha. Can't say that college coaches coddle their pitchers-- freshman threw complete game for the Longhorns, after he had pitched briefly in relief Monday night. Wow. If a minor league manager ever did that, his butt would get fired.

9) We've started looking at college football stuff for this fall-- Nebraska Cornhuskers are -43 in turnovers the last five years, going 9-4 LY, even though they were -11 in turnovers. They could make a quantum leap to top of Big 12 North just by turning around that turnover stat.

8) Minnesota Gophers are supposed to be better this fall; their turnover ratios the last three years: +18/-15/+12, with records of 6-7/1-11/7-6. If they can have a positive TO ratio this fall, they might go to decent bowl.

7) Totally underrated fact is that Navy is 50-25 in football the last six years, showing that if you have a dominant running game, you can beat people. Middies don't have offensive balance, but they still win.

6) Timberwolves traded Foye and Miller away Tuesday, now have the #'s 5,6,16,28 picks in Thursday night's NBA draft. Safe to say they're thinking this is a pretty deep draft. Wizards are happy to have Foye and Miller so their perimeter shooting will be better.

5) Spanish point guard Ricky Rubio looks like Pete Maravich, but can he play? Lot of debate on that subject. Its also going to be expensive to get him out of his Spanish contract, all for a guy shrouded in mystery.

4) Which reminds me that I once kept a guard named Milos Vujanic on my fantasy league team for two years; kept reading how good he was-- he was once involved in a Knicks-Suns trade, but he never came here to play. Only guy in the history of the world who didn't want to play ball in the best league in the world. I still wonder how good he was/wasn't.

3) Clemson's Trevor Booker led ACC last winter in blocks/rebounds, the first player to do that since Tim Duncan. You'd think he'd be preseason Player of Year in ACC, but since he isn't on Duke/North Carolina, it is doubtful he will be, even though he's a damn good player.

2) SI.com reported Tuesday that Bo Ryan is teaching some zone defense to his World University Games team-- in his entire career, Ryan's teams haven't played one possession of zone defense, but he's been told that in international ball, its good to mix things up. Ryan is a brilliant coach who won four national titles at the Division III level, before becoming coach of the Wisconsin Badgers, where he wins fairly regularly.

1) Sad to report the passing of the great Ed McMahon at age 86; he was King of the Sidekicks, a likeable man who made being second banana into an art form. What a great laugh he had. I'm sure he had an ego, we all do, but he put his away for an hour every night and got rich doing it.

Tuesday's List of 13: Random stuff on another cloudy day.....
13) When Donald Fehr became boss of the players' union in 1986, the average salary for a major leaguer was $289,000; last year, average salary was $2.9M, so the players profited from his leadership, even if fans or the game itself didn't. Fehr is going to retire next year, at age 61.

12) We have worlds colliding later this week, with NBA Draft and NHL Draft on consecutive nights (Thurs/Fri). Talk about cultural diversity.

11) The NHL has the best draft- they move it around the league, and all the teams' honchos are present, sitting at huge tables on the arena floor. Kids and their parents sit in the arena seats and wait to be called. Of all the leagues, they definitely do their draft the best.

10) Tennessee hoop coach Bruce Pearl, one of the all-time great talkers. will be working on ESPN's coverage of the NBA Draft.

9) Potential bad news for Cavalier fans-- Lebron James is moving his basketball camp from Akron to San Diego. Camp costs $650 for kids who stay overnight, $510 for day campers, but the move out of Akron surely has to send chills down spine of hoop fans on Lake Erie.

8) Hard to believe Miami Hurricanes are 9-15 in ACC football the last three seasons- they're supposed to be better this season.

7) Auburn hired Gene Chizik as head coach this winter- the guy had a
5-19 record in two years at Iowa State; in fairness, people in Ames say he was rebuilding the right way, but still, for an SEC team to hire a guy with a 5-19 career record, when Turner Gill was available, well, lets just say it raises some eyebrows.

6) Green Bay Packers went 6-10 last year but fans don't seem outraged; only 192 people didn't renew their season tickets.

5) If I was a Viking fan or player, especially Sage Rosenfels, I wouldn't be happy about the Favre-to-Minnesota soap opera. How would you like to be a Viking veteran, having to go to all the offseason stuff that is mandatory, then have the new star QB waltz in whenever he feels like it, which is ezxactly what is going to happen. It doesn't breed winning.

4) Dodgers are now 25-16 without Manny Ramirez, with nine games to go before he comes back. Interesting thing will be how they handle four quality outfielders-- someone has to sit, or get traded. Very tough to sit Juan Pierre, who has been a stellar leadoff hitter.

3) CBSSports.com reports that when brothers are the starting pitchers in a big league game, the older brother is now 12-9 against the younger one, after Jeff Weaver beat brother Jered in Anaheim Saturday night.

2) Looks like Cardinals may have lucked into finding a third baseman, as Khalil Greene has been crushing the ball since coming back from anxiety problems that sent him to the DL. They moved him to 3B, and now he looks like the player the Padres thought he was four years ago.

1) PGA Tour moves to Hartford this week; if you're going, recommend sitting by the driveable par-4 15th hole. Great fun, and you're close to the 17th green and 18th tee. Also a good place to stand is by the driving range and the putting green, so you can how hard these guys practice.

Monday's List of 13: Wrapping up a sports weekend...........
13) TV golf starts at 9am Monday on ESPN, and switches to NBC at 11:30. Hopefully the weather will hold up and they can finish.

12) David Duval's last top 10 finish in any tournament was in Las Vegas back in 2002, quite a comedown for someone once ranked #1 in world; he was ranked 882nd in the world coming into the US Open. Looks like he's on his way back after the way he's played so far this week.

11) Colorado Rockies are now 16-1 in their last 17 games, as they head out for an interesting week, at Anaheim/Oakland-- they'll see old friend Matt Holliday when they get to northern California.

10) Frank Anderson, father of A's pitcher Brett Anderson, is Oklahoma State's baseball coach; he replaced Tom Holliday, Matt's father-- the two sons are teammates, for one year. Little bit unusual.

9) Albert Pujols hit two more homers in Tony Larussa's 2,500th win as a manager-- Pujols now has eight homers in his last ten games.

8) Tampa Bay's Jeff Niemann is luckiest guy going; in his last twelve starts, Rays have scored 102 runs (8.38), winning 10 of the 12 games.

7) Phillies have to be glad to head to Tampa, since they just went 0-6 at home against Toronto/Baltimore this week- they play better away from home, but they miss Ibanez badly, and their pitching has been subpar.

6) Yes, that table above is correct-- Marco Scutaro is second in major leagues in runs scored. Guy gets the most out of his ability.

5) Indians have now lost their last six games, giving up 51 runs.

4) Rangers are hanging onto first place in AL West by a thread after bad weekend in San Francisco, where they scored seven runs in three games.

3) CC Sabathia left with tightness in his bicep in second inning in a 6-5 Florida win; Sabathia is a terrific innings-eater, so if he is out for a long time, it will have a domino effect on the rest of a fragile pitching staff.

2) 16 of 30 starting pitchers finished the 7th inning Sunday, with two of them finishing the 8th. Only six relief pitchers got decisions Sunday, as ten of the fifteen games stayed under the total.

1) If the baseball playoffs started Monday morning, these would be the playoff teams: AL-- Boston-Detroit-Texas-Bronx
NL-- Philadelphia-St Louis-Los Angeles-San Francisco.

Sunday's List of 13: Random thoughts on a soggy Father's Day
13) No team has ever started a baseball season 13-20 in its first 33 home games and gone on to make playoffs; the '09 Phillies are in that boat.

12) Josh Beckett's shutout Saturday was his third in regular season, his first since 2005-- he also has three postseason shutouts.

11) Alexi Ramirez went 4-5 Saturday, with a homer, double, four RBI at Cincinnati; he only saw nine pitches all night, and still got four hits.

10) Carl Crawford could add a hit a week to his average if he became an expert bunter; thats 26 hits a year; in 2007, his last full season, adding a hit a week would have raised his batting average from .310 to ,360.

9) Arizona pitcher Dan Haren is one of the best, but he claims to never have read a book from cover-to-cover; if that is true, how the hell did he get into Pepperdine, which is a pretty good school?

8) Crummy weather flooded clubhouse and lobby at Miller Park, one of baseball's few domed stadiums; supposedly, everything will be OK for the Brewers' next home series, but weather has been awful this spring.

7) Why would the Mets have FOX News' Greta van Susteren throw out the first ball (for the second time) Saturday? She's from Wisconsin, so she probably roots for the Brewers-- are they that desperate for money that they use the ceremonial first pitch as an advertising ploy?

6) I wonder if the Bronx Bombers' head honchos had any idea their new ballpark would be such a bandbox; the outfield walls are shorter-- some of the power alleys are a few feet closer to home plate, but did they have a clue so many HRs would be hit there? There is school of thought that things could change when they take the old stadium down, as far as the wind and all that. Doubt they'll move the fences back next year, though.

5) North Carolina hoop coach Roy Williams was in Omaha to root for the Tar Heels at the College World Series.

4) Butler had two guys make the 19/under team that will play overseas this summer, making Bulldogs early favorite to be best mid-major team in college hoop next winter, especially with Patty Mills headed to NBA.

3) There is new four-team football league starting October 8; they'll play each other twice, for six-game season. Former Buffalo QB JP Losman is going to be Las Vegas' QB, playing for former Giant coach Jim Fassel.

2) NBC shows less live golf than CBS or ABC, choosing to pick good shots from whomever and show them on replay; they've been dealt one lousy hand this weekend with the rain on Long Island- we'll see how they handle what promises to be a very long Sunday of televised golf.

1) Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there. You deserve it.

Saturday's List of 13: Notes on the draft from AL perspective
13) Minnesota's #1 pick has a stress fracture in his arm; of course, they don't have a shot at him unless he is hurt and might even be able to sign him for less, since he is injured. Small market teams can't afford to miss on their first round picks.

12) 12 of Cleveland's top 22 picks were college kids; nine of their top 13 were pitchers.

11) Indians will groom top pick Alex White to be their closer.

10) The way the new Bronx ballpark is, they're going to have trouble in recruiting free agent pitchers; perhaps with that in mind, 11 of their top 15 draft selections this year were pitchers.

9) Three of Seattle's top nine picks played at North Carolina; their 10th went to NC State. Only four of their top fifteen picks were pitchers.

8) Texas drafted Ruben Sierra Jr in the sixth round, hoping he is as good as his dad, whose best days came with the Rangers.

7) Two of Toronto's top three picks were lefty pitchers from Canada--their 50th and final pick was a pitcher from Semiahmoo HS in Spruce Grove, Alberta; wonder how long baseball season is there?

6) Couple of kids got drafted from Skagit Valley College, which I never heard of; turns out it is a community college in state of Washington.

5) Detroit drafted Austin Wood in 5th round; he is the kid who tossed 13 innings (169 pitches) in an NCAA tournament game, so we know he doesn't need a pitch count. He'll be a situational lefty for the Tigers.

4) 12 of the A's top 14 picks were college kids, as usual; they selected Blake Crosby (Bobby's brother) in 42nd round. Ed Crosby scouts for the A's. Hope this kid is more durable than his brother has been.

3) LSU OF Jared Mitchell also played football in Baton Rouge, catching passes for the Tigers. He got drafted by White Sox GM Ken Williams, whose son is a punt returnerfor Arizona State.

2) Tyler Skaggs got drafted by the Angels out of Santa Monica HS-- is there a better place in America to go to high school than Santa Monica, where you can hang out down by the pier whenever you like. Nice.

1) Six of Kansas City's top seven picks were pitchers; their top pick is Missouri Tiger Crow, was not only was Washington's top pick LY, but stands to be the first Mizzou alum to play for the Royals.

Friday's List of 13: Our major league baseball List of 13.......
13) Rays 35-33-- Ben Zobrist now has enough plate appearances, and is your American League leader in slugging percentage.

12) Rockies 33-33- Very happy to report that espn.com has revamped its boxscores-- they now include swings/misses by pitcher, pitches seen by each hitter, in other words, they've made then a whole lot better, which makes it easier for us to learn more. Excellent!!!!!

11) Mets 33-31-- $150M doesn't buy as much as it used to; unless they get Reyes back healthy, they'll have a long, frustrating season.

10) Tigers 35-31-- Curtis Granderson has 16 HR, 39 RBI, underrated for sure-- he is making up for diminished production by Magglio Ordonez.

9) Giants 34-31-- Tickets that normally cost $24 will be $9 Tuesday in Oakland, as A's celebrate 20th anniversary of their last world title. Back in '89, those tickets cost $9, so they're rolling back prices for a night.

8) Cardinals 36-31-- Pujols has on-base percentage of .447; only one of their other regulars has one over .339. Carpenter has allowed 30 hits in 51 innings-- they need him healthy the rest of the way.

7) Brewers 37-29-- How about Milwaukee being in first place even after losing Sabathia and Sheets from last year's team? Fielder/Braun are super combination-- two guys who hit for both power and average.

6) Rangers 37-28-- Young Davis is hitting .200, with hefty 95 strikeouts in 220 plate appearances, fueling speculation that Texas could join the Nick Johnson sweepstakes.

5) Phillies 36-28-- World champs just don't have much pitching, and are a disaster (13-19) at home. Without a lot of resources down on farm, it'll be interesting to see if they can add some pitching before July 31. Next couple weeks could be struggle, with Ibanez on the DL.

4) Bronx 37-29-- Guy from Albany took his dad to game Thursday as a Father's Day present; 1:00 game started at 6:27. Wonder how many of those $9 beers they sold during the rain delay?

3) Angels 35-29-- They've won six games in row, they're getting healthy and they have the best manager in baseball. Interesting race looms with the Rangers, but with Texas laying off non-baseball employees this week am guessing Halos are better suited to add players at trade deadline.

2) Red Sox 40-26-- They have abundamce of pitching wealth in minors, so they can pick and choose what moves they make. Would they go for a Jack Wilson at shortstop? Pittsburgh would love to dump his salary.

1) Dodgers 44-23-- Russell Martin is hitting .240 with no homers, they haven't had Manny for last 35-40 games, and they're still jogging in NL West, even though Giants are improved. Will coast into playoffs.

Thursday's List of 13: Clearing out a cluttered mind........
13) First things first; our thoughts and prayers go out to Dave Rose and his family; BYU's coach was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer earlier in the week, and thats news that rarely has a happy ending.

12) Lets hear it for Manny Acta; weasel media types have Acta being canned any day now, like anyone else could do better with the pathetic team he was handed in Washington. So this week, when Nationals went to the Bronx, you figured only reason Acta wasn't ousted was because ownership didn't want to get the new skipper off to a bad start.........

11)........but Nationals fought hard last night, losing 5-3 (they led 3-2 in 7th inning), then won 3-2 tonight-- you're going to tell me Acta isn't a good enough manager to run the Nationals? Horse hockey, its political baloney to try and placate a dwindling fanbase. Show some onions and keep your manager, Washington-- just get him some better players.

10) Have to give Washington credit for consistency; they've played 20 series coming into this week, ten at home, ten on road- they were 1-8-1 in home series, 1-8-1 in road series. Just a terrible defensive outfield, but the young pitchers they've brought up have been a big improvement.

9) Reason #4,172 why you can't trust a lawyer-- Timberwolves hired a new guy to run their basketball operations last month, a lawyer who is experienced more in the business side of basketball; at his hiring, the guy said he would do nothing to hurt coach Kevin McHale, or something to that effect. Three weeks later, McHale has been fired as the coach of the T-Wolves. So much for trusting a guy at his word......

Armadillo's note: If your last name is Jednak-Gianetti-Garvey, disregard the previous note. I know, I know, not all lawyers are weasels........

8) Anyway, I think McHale would be a terrific college coach; he seems to be very personable, so he'd be good at recruiting, plus players say he was excellent at skill development, which is what college coaches do lot of. Doubt he'd want to do it, but I bet he'd be a keeper.

7) WCC took major hit this week when St Mary's Patty Mills went to the NBA, as did Gonzaga's Austin Daye-- those two moves probably make the WCC a one-bid conference next March.

6) Holy Cross head coach Ralph Willard, an excellent coach, quit his job to become as assistant to Rick Pitino at Louisville, a curious move that fuels speculation surrounding the court case involving woman who tried to extort money from Pitino, which has been pushed back to an August court date. Willard could be the interim head coach, if need be.

5) That leaves Holy Cross and USC as the only D-I hoop jobs open and as far as 2009-10 goes, Holy Cross has better chance of getting into the NCAAs-- most of USC's roster already skipped town, which is why....

4) .........if I'm running USC's athletic department, I would already have inked Reggie Theus as my new basketball coach; he has NBA experience, he's a great recruiter and he'll play an entertaining style to draw players and fans into the Galen Center. Theus was an actor/model at one point; I'm thinking he'll be a positive force with players' moms on home visits.

3) If you want to read a book that is equal parts interesting/disturbing, read poker player Mike Matusow's biography, Check Raising the Devil which details his drug use, his time spent in jail and his poker exploits. After reading this book, I'd be hesitant to ever sit down at a poker table, for a variety of reasons.

2) Tampa Bay's Ben Zobrist deserves to be on the AL All-Star team; he is hitting .310, with 14 HRs, 39 RBI and a .420 OB%; he plays all over the field, and has been very valuable to the AL champs. Luckily for him, Joe Maddon is the AL manager, so doubtful he gets overlooked.

1) Why can't major leaguers catch popups anymore? Jack Cust dropped an easy one in LA just now, and Orlando Cabrera dropped an easier one on the next play. Luis Castillo started a trend last week, not a good one. Try using two hands, fellas. Announcers who are ex-players try to make excuses for these guys, but gee whiz, they're freakin' popups!!!!!

Jason Giambi should watch Daric Barton play first base; Giambi is so inflexible now, so terrible at balls in the dirt-- Barton stretches out for a thrown ball, saving infielders errors they'd have with Giambi at 1B.

Wednesday's Den: Umpiring statistics you might care about....
All these stats are through games of Saturday June 13.......
-- An average of 295.7 pitches are thrown in a big league game. with each hitter seeing 3.83 pitches per plate appearance.
-- The average half-inning lasts 16.5 pitches, which means that average pitcher throws 104 pitches, if he lasts six innings.
-- An average of 9.27 runs are scored in each game, with 4.7 walks and 13.6 strikeouts.

-- So far, 460 games stayed under the total, 425 went over.
-- Umpires whose games behind plate have gone over a lot: Gibson 6-2, Crawford 8-3, Johnson 7-3, Meals, Reilly, Cooper all 8-4.
-- Under umpires: Fletcher 10-2, Hirschbeck 10-3, Gorman 9-3, Barrett 8-3.
-- Umps where home team wins a lot: Knight 12-2, Crawford 9-2, Scott, Everitt, both 10-3.
-- Umps where road team wins a lot: Reilly 9-3, Davidson, Diaz both 8-3, Nauert, Reliford both 8-4.

-- Umpires where favorites win a lot (figures based on $100 play on the favorite in each game): Hernandez +870, Meriwether +845, Iassogna +841, Guccione, +833
-- Umpires where underdogs fare well: Joyce +945, Hoye +830, Wendelstedt +788, Wegner, +763, Reilly +729

-- Umps with highest pitches/batter: Knight 4.08, Everitt 3.97, Fletcher 3.96, Davis, Meals both 3.952, Barry 3.950.
-- Umps with lowest pitches/batter: Bucknor 3.590, Tschida 3.592, Wolf 3.61, O'Nora 3.67, Hirschbeck 3.69.

-- Umpires with highest walk/strikeout ratio: Marsh .748, Runge .746, Johnson .723, Crawford .687, Cousins .680.
-- Umps with lowest walk/strikeout ratio: BWelke .370, Miller .375, Campos, .390, Scott .395.

-- Umps with most runs/game in their games behind dish: McClelland 12.6, Crawford 11.6, Gibson 11.22, TWelke 11.21, Iassogna 11.0.
-- Umps with least runs/game: Fletcher 6.38, Hudson 7.0, O'Nora 7.21, Barry 7.36, Gorman 7.38.

His numbers don't reflect it so much yet this year, but not only is Jim Wolf a pitcher-friendly umpire, his brother Randy is a starting pitcher for the Dodgers. He, Hirschbeck, Gorman are always pitcher-friendly.

Tuesday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) There is a kid named Jeremy Tyler in San Diego who is skipping his senior year of high school to play pro hoop overseas, which certainly is his choice-- its a free country, but would you want your son going to a country like Israel, so far away, with so much random violence?

I know we have a lot of violence here, but this is home, where a 17-year old can lean on friends and family if things go badly-- what the hell will he do in Israel of things go bad? Or Spain? Turkey? Russia? Its stupid to put a 17-year old in that spot, but they're going to do it.

12) Sonny Vaccaro has it out for the NCAA and is using this kid as one of his guinea pigs; Brandon Jennings didn't seem to enjoy the European experience very much last season. Arizona would have been better.

11) Speaking of Jennings, he made some noise when he claimed that the European point guard Ricky Rubio is overrated; says he held Rubio to no points and two assists in a game last season. Whomever takes Rubio has to negotiate an expensive buyout, then hope the hell he is good.

10) Easy to bash Stan Van Gundy now, but Jameer Nelson's minus-11 in NBA Finals was lot better than Rafer Alston's minus-36; the better guy played the most. Alston seems like a guy who would be happier being a starter on a cruddy team rather than sub on a championship contender.

9) I'm old enough to remember Phil Jackson as a sub on the Knick title teams in early 70's (he missed 1970 playoffs after back surgery)-- who knew he would wind up as the most successful coach in NBA history?

8) Tom Brady is due $14.5M the next two years; Peyton Manning is due $29.8M; at some point, the Patriots are going to have to pay Brady what he is due-- how much $$$ has he put in the Krafts' pockets?

7) Cleveland Indians are on pace to set the record for most times hit by a pitch, a record they set..........last year.

6) John Lackey got his first career hit (in his 27th AB) against Zito in the 4th inning of Angels' win at Pac-Bell Monday night.

5) Bad news for Angels came right after Lackey's HR, when CF Torii Hunter crashed into the fence going after a batted ball and lost the battle with the fence. Seemed like bruised ribs, something like that. Weird thing is that score was 8-0 Angels when it happened.

4) Red-hot Rockies (won last 11 games) host AL champ Rays (11-4 in last 15 games) tonight in Denver. Interesting series.

3) No team needed Monday off more than Toronto; their three starters lasted a total of 10 innings in home sweep by Florida this weekend.

2) Could someone explain to me why all TV has to be digital? Lot of people have those little portable TVs, which are now useless. There has to be a good reason why this became a rule, but it escapes me.

1) Hard to believe June is half-over already; time is our most precious of all commodities, have to use it wisely.

Monday's List of 13: Random thoughts as we start Year 9.......
13) First of all, thanks to everyone who reads this website; hard to believe its been eight years since I started this, but it has been and now we move on to Year 9. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.

12) When Johan Santana beat the Phillies earlier this week despite giving up four HRs, he was just second Met pitcher ever to do that; Rob Gardner did it in 1966, against the Pirates.

11) Odd Rob Gardner trivia; he was traded from Bronx to the A's April 9, 1971, as part of a package for Felipe Alou. Eight weeks later, A's traded him back to Bronx for Curt Blefary (who struck out for last out of the '71 playoff loss to Orioles later that year).

10) In November of '72, Bronx traded Gardner back to the A's, this time for Matty Alou. All in all, Gardner was traded twice by Oakland, but his total contribution to the A's was 15 innings of pitching. Go figure.

9) I'm not fond of TV "information people"going on air and saying a guy will be fired, its just matter of when. It becomes news when it happens, not before. Manny Acta will move on- you could put Miller Huggins, Walter Alston, Dick Williams and Sparky Anderson on Washington's staff and they still ain't winning anything. You need good players to win.

8) In his last six starts, Johan Santana has allowed 29 runs in 36 innings.

7) Cubs fired hitting coach Gerald Perry after they lost four games in row; funny, when the Cubs hit well, Lou Piniella gets all the credit, but lose few games in a row, and the hitting coach gets the gate. Doesn't seem right. Cubs really crushed the ball with Perry out of the way- they beat Minnesota 3-2.

6) Big day for complete games Sunday, with five; Cliff Lee didn't allow a hit until Molina got one leading off 8th inning. In four of the five games between AL East-NL East teams, one of the teams scored 10+ runs.

5) Matt Holliday's brother is Arizona State's pitching coach; ASU beat North Carolina in extra innings Sunday in first game of College World Series in Omaha. Holliday's dad is an assistant coach at NC State. Third base coach at ASU is former big leaguer Andy Stankiewicz.

4) The little I see of college baseball on TV, its seems lot different than major leagues-- would think it is lot more important to pitch inside in a college game, becuase with metal bats, much easier to poke the outside pitches to opposite field. Way too many sacrifice bunts in college ball.

3) Penguins just won Stanley Cup for first time since 1992, which is the last time Pirates had a winning season-- could it be an omen??????

2) I'm thinking Stan Van Gundy will see Derek Fisher draining 3's in his sleep for the rest of his life.

1) Only two games on the baseball schedule Monday; good night to check out some college baseball. Wish NY-Penn League team across river in Troy was playing, but their season starts later this week. Minor league baseball is highly underrated; its a fun and inexpensive night out.

Sunday's List of 13: Cleaning out a cluttered mind.......
13) Jim Calhoun is 67 years old, he's beaten cancer out twice; Saturday, he was in a 50-mile bike race for charity, but fell 12 miles into the race. Did he quit? No, he finished the 50 miles, then collapsed, exhausted, dehydrated. Turns out he broke five ribs when he fell, but still rode the last 38 miles of the race. He's definitely very tough, and maybe a little crazy, too.

12) Other than soldiers and firefighters, I'd nominate Calhoun as one of the toughest guys in the country; if you're a UConn player, how do you ever not get back on defense if your coach rides 38 miles with five broken ribs?

11) Adrian Gonzalez walked 2+ times in eight straight games, making him the first player since at least 1920 to do that. Not even Barry Bonds in his heydey walked as much as Gonzalez has been for the Padres.

10) All of which is huge indictment of Chase Headley, Kevin Kouzmanoff and the Padres' front office, since there is no one to bat behind Gonzalez.

9) I listen to New York City talkshows sometimes, and these jackasses are critical of David Wright, because his HR numbers are down, Wright is leading the league in hitting (no Met has ever led the NL in hitting) and had 36 RBI going into today's game. Ever think his HR numbers will never be what they were because fools that own the team built a cavernous yard?

8) On June 13, Denver Broncos named Kyle Orton their starting QB, three full months before their Sept 13 opener in Cincinnati. Now, consider that Orton was acquired in the Jay Cutler deal, and the only guy he had to beat out was professional son Chris Simms; why exactly is this newsworthy? The guy beat out no one. Denver has had a horrific offseason.

7) Red Sox closer Papelbon was recently fined $1,000 for "slow play" the first major leaguer this year fined under this new rule. You could nail a lot of guys for same violation, especially hitters who step out of the box a lot.

6) Jose Contreras has come storming back from minor leagues, throwing 16 scoreless innings since his return to the big club, winning two starts.

5) Torii Hunter hit three home runs Saturday night against the Padres, all solo shots, in the 2nd, 3rd and 7th innings. .

4) Dodger-Ranger game was delayed by a power outage when it was 0-0 in 6th inning; power outage didn't refer to Russell Martin's hitting-- Martin still hasn't homered in '09, after hitting 42 HRs the last three years.

3) Say what you want about Friday night's dropped popup, but Saturday Luis Castillo handled the situation like a classy professional. No excuses, just played another game and helped his team win this one. Good for him.

2) After four complete games Friday, there were none Saturday; only three of the 30 starting pitchers finished the 8th inning, only ten went 7+.

1) Colorado Rockies have now won ten games in row, and are 30-32 with 100 games left in season. They've pitched a lot better since they changed managers, but they really haven't hit that much better.

Saturday's List of 13: Wrapping up a baseball Friday........
13) Not often you see a major league ball game end on a dropped popup to the infield, but Luis Castillo snatched defeat from jaws of victory when he dropped an easy popup that would've given the Mets a win. Instead, they lost their third game in a row, a sloppy 9-8 loss in the Bronx.

12) Game took 3:46 to play; Bronx pitchers walked nine hitters, with Joba Chamberlain using 100 pitches to get just 12 outs. Very ugly game.

11) Somehow Jon Switzer (career ERA of 6.16 in 67 career IP) is back in big leagues; he gave up long HR to Matsui that put Bronx ahead 7-6. Back in 2007, Stokes, Fossum, Switzer were all on Devil Rays squad that went 66-96 and had worst bullpen in MLB history- now they've all pitched for Mets this year- what the hell is Omar Minaya thinking about??????

10) If you don't count games against the Red Sox (unfortunately for Bronx fans, those games all count) the Bombers are 21-6 in their last 27 games. .

Elsewhere in the world........
9) Colorado Rockies are on a nine-game winning streak. Problem for them is they'll need to win another nine in a row to get back into contention.

8) Fantasy owners all over America lost their lunch with news that Jake Peavy and Roy Halladay are both hurt, probably for extended periods. So much for Peavy being dealt at the trading deadline.

7) Howard tied game game 2-2 with ninth inning HR off Ramirez, but Red Sox won 5-2 in 13 innings, striking out 20 Philly hitters.

6) There were four complete games Friday night, a lot in modern baseball; Hochevar threw an 80-pitch gem against the Reds, Jimenez got complete game win over Seattle, throwing 127 pitches at Coors Field. Lincecum and Haren also had complete game wins.

5) Texas has shut out its last two opponents, but Padilla labored through five innings, putting seven men on base in five IP, throwing 100 pitches in 6-0 win over the Dodgers. Rangers signed El Duque to minor league deal, so you know they're wary of their own pitching depth.

4) Gabe Kapler homered to give Rays a 4-3 win over Washington, but only after Nick Johnson dropped foul pop in same at-bat. Is there a full moon?

3) Detroit's Porcello held Pirates to one run in seven IP, and knocked in a couple runs, as Detroit beat Pittsburgh 3-1.

2) Atlanta prospect Hanson got his first big league win, but not before he put 14 men on base in 5.2 IP; disappointing first couple of starts for him.

1) Think about it; Luke Hochevar threw an 80-pitch complete game, while Joba Chamberlain threw 100 pitches in four IP, the night after David Price had a 105-pitch, 4.1 inning outing. Throwing strikes makes life easier.

Friday's List of 13: Our major league baseball List of 13..........
13) Reds 31-28-- Jay Bruce is hitting .214, Volquez is on DL, but they are keeping their heads above water. Good manager, that Dusty Baker.

12) Rays 31-31-- They insist on batting BJ Upton leadoff, despite his dismal numbers. If Rays were .500 two years ago, they'd be throwing a parade for them-- now they're a disappointment. Gotta love people.

11) Cubs 29-28-- Just 6-11 in one-run games, 13-18 on road-- they are definitely underachieving, but are only 2.5 games out of first place.

10) Giants 31-28-- When you have serious starting pitching, you'll be in every game. Could use another hitter for run ar the Wild Card.

9) Cardinals 33-28-- Rotation is messed up; they're 4-6 in last 10 games, only 21-21 vs righty starters, but they have the single best player.

8) Brewers 33-27-- Dropped here after getting swept three straight by Colorado, but Hoffman has been super as the closer so far.

7) Mets 31-27-- Everybody gets offended when Cole Hamels calls them chokers, then they give up late-inning leads on consecutive nights against the Phillies. Whomever misdiagnosed Reyes' hamstring should be fired.

6) Blue Jays 34-28-- Lost tough 1-0 game in Texas Thursday; getting lot of mileage out of suspect players. They better not trade Halladay.

5) Rangers 34-25-- Having super year while getting very little from their injured star Hamilton-- president Ryan has helped their pitching a lot, mostly by bringing in new pitching coach Mike Maddux.

4) Bronx 34-26-- Will probably make playoffs even if they lose division, but their inability to beat Boston has to be a concern. You know they'll be buyers at trading deadline in late July.

3) Phillies 35-23-- At some point, champs' lack of starting pitching has to become an issue, but right now, their superior defense and hitting in the clutch are bailing them out.

2) Red Sox 36-24-- Ortiz hit three HRs in four games, but now has to sit in Philly, since there is no DH in NL parks. Their wealth of prospects give them a huge edge in buyer's market at trading deadline.

1) Dodgers 40-21-- LA's outfield is playing so well, going to be hard to decide which one sits when Ramirez comes back in three weeks. Their biggest problem right now is settling down back end of rotation.

Thursday's List of 13: Famous people, obscure facts...........
13) Before buying the Seattle Pilots and moving them to Milwaukee for the 1970 season, Bud Selig had an agreement to buy the White Sox and move them to Milwaukee the year before, but the AL vetoed the deal.

12) Pete Rose served three years in the Ohio Army National Guard with a reserve unit at Ft Thomas, Kentucky, where he served as the company cook. Rose's daughter Cara was a regular on Melrose Place.

11) John Elway hit .318 as an OF for Oneonta of NY-Penn League back in 1982 (Class A ball), before his senior year as the Stanford QB.

10) Actor John Goodman went to Southwest Missouri State on football scholarship, but wound up studying in drama department with Kathleen Turner, after an injury ended his football career.

9) NBA games are televised in 42 different languages around the world.

8) Madonna moved from Pontiac, MI to New York City in 1977 at age 19 to pursue a career as a dancer; she worked at a Dunkin' Donuts for a while in the late 70's, to make ends meet.

7) Richard Gere went to UMass on a gymnastics scholarship.

6) Before becoming a famous actor, Clint Eastwood worked as a fireman, a gas station attendant and played ragtime piano at a bar in Oakland.

5) While a student at Kansas, Wilt Chamberlain won the high jump at his league's track and field championship meet three years in a row.

4) No NHL player can wear number 99, in homage to Wayne Gretzky, who is probably the greatest hockey player ever.

3) Both of Eldrick Woods' parents are/were 25% Chinese; Woods has a couple half-brothers and a half-sister, from his dad's first marriage.

2) CNN's Anderson Cooper spent two summers of his college years as an intern at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

1) Joe Gibbs, Bill Parcells and Bobby Bowden all worked as assistants at Florida State under Bill Peterson, who went on to the NFL but went 1-18 in a short but disasterous tenure with the Houston Oilers. He was 69-49-11 as the head coach at Florida State.

Wednesday's List of 13: Some of the baseball drafts great steals
Thanks to an interesting article by David Sabino on cnn.com, we came up with a list of some of the great steals of the baseball amateur draft
13) Rays-- James Shields, 16th round, 2000. With all the high picks they have had, who knew their ace would be a 16th-round pick?

12) Nationals-- Jason Bay, 22nd round, 2000. Montreal Expos struck gold taking a Canadian kid, but its worked out better for the Red Sox.

11) Rangers-- Ian Kinsler, 17th round, 2003. Almost as big a steal as my man Garvey getting him in second round of this year's fantasy draft.

10) Pirates-- Nate McLouth, 25th round, 2003. Drafting isn't the issue; their big problem is re-signing veterans and actually trying to win games.

9) Rockies-- Brad Hawpe, 11th round, 2000. Colorado built core of its World Series team by drafting guys from the major college programs.

8) A's-- Rich Harden, 17th round, 2000. Oakland also drafted Jonathon Papelbon once upon a time, but never signed him. Billy Beane likes to accumulate draft picks after his free agent stars fly the coop.

7) Angels-- Mike Napoli, 16th round, 2000. Halos once drafted Aaron Hill, but couldn't sign him. Four of their five Opening Day starting Ps were Angel draftees. Mr Moreno has baseball's best organization.

6) Padres-- Jake Peavy, 15th round, 1999. Recent drafts haven't been at all good, but not only is Peavy great, he won't let the Padres trade him.

5) Brewers-- Manny Parra, 42nd round, 2001. He hasn't quite panned out yet, but how often do you find a prospect like this in 42nd round?

4) Red Sox-- Kevin Youkilis, 8th round, 2001. Boston has also traded Hanley Ranirez, Freddy Sanchez, but their farm system is really loaded.

3) Phillies-- Ryan Howard, 5th round, 2001. Utley-Hamels-Howard are all homegrown, which has to make their world title a little sweeter.

2) Twins-- Jason Kubel, 12th round, 2000. Justin Morneau was picked 89th in the draft. Joe Mauer turned down a chance to be Florida State's QB. Minnesota contends because they scout very well.

1) Cardinals-- Albert Pujols, 13th round, 1999. Ten years ago, 401 guys were drafted ahead of Pujols, making him the Tom Brady of baseball.

Tuesday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but........
13) How can anyone vote for Manny Ramirez for the All-Star Game in a season where he isn't playing in fifty consecutive games? He is fifth in the NL standings, which shows you how stupid it is that the fans get to vote for starters in a game whose outcome actually has meaning, which is another ridiculous thing that we'll save for another day.

12) Nice security at the French Open; no wonder we had to bail their butts out in WWII. Federer should have decked the freakin' guy. .

11) Detroit's Armando Galarraga is 0-6, 6.37 in seven nighttime starts; he is 3-0, 3.50 in six daytime starts. Go figure.

10) I got a flier in the mail from the NFL Shop Monday-- looks weird to see a Matt Cassel number 7 Chiefs' jersey. Here's guy who didn't play in college, did pretty well in his only year playing for Patriots but didn't get in the playoffs, and is now THE MAN in Kansas City. We'll see.

9) There is a story in Miami paper this week that says when he was the coach of the Redskins, Joe Gibbs used to have his family tape its dinner conversations and send them over to his office, so he could keep up on their activities. Thats the life of a football coach. Not much home life.

8) Texas Rangers re-upped manager Ron Washington for next year, good news for everyone. Washington is one of my favorites after he was great as a third base coach/infield coach with the A's, who should have hired him instead of Bob Geren, who always looks confused in the dugout. .

7) Pirate pitcher Ross Ohlendorf had a former major leaguer as a college baseball coach at Princeton (Scott Bradley) and a former major leaguer as a pitching coach in high school (Lee Tunnell). Pretty lucky kid.

6) If Blue Jays try to trade Roy Halladay, former used car dealer Bud Selig should block the deal, seeing as he is also baseball commissioner.

5) Adding to the weirdness of Arizona's 9-6 win in 18 innings over San Diego Sunday: 1) after tying game with five runs in bottom of 9th inning, Padres never got another hit, in nine more innings, against a bullpen that has been horrendous all season 2) Padres had to use SS Wilson to pitch the 18th inning after they ran out of pitchers- he took the loss.

4) Sean West allowed only three baserunners in eight innings as Florida beat the Giants, 4-0. It was the first major league win for young West.

3) Pirates, Braves played late into the night in Atlanta Monday, before Braves scored an an infield hit in the 15th to win 7-6. Very close call at the plate decided the game; umpire Knight seemed to make correct call.

2) Jose Contreras came back from his exile to minor leagues and blanked Detroit for eight innings, beating Tigers 6-1, giving Pale Hose a split in a Monday twinbill with Detroit, who still lead the AL Central. Contreras allowed only two baserunners in his eight innings on the mound.

1) Have to laugh at some frontrunning jackasses in New York who called a radio talkshow Monday to suggest Mariano Rivera should be replaced as closer of the Bronx Bombers. This guy is one of the greatest closers of alltime, he is still damn good, but because he lost to the Rays Saturday, these idiots think Joba Chamberlain could do better. Wow. Send Rivera to Oakland-- we'd be glad to have him.

Monday's List of 13: Random thoughts after a very long day...
13) My Sunday began when the alarm rang at 4:50am, and ended when I pulled back in the driveway 20 hours later, as I took the 170-mile trip to Long Island for my godson's high school graduation. Good day, but long.

12) Graduation ceremonies were in Hofstra's basketball arena-- 3,500 or so people there. First high school graduation I've been to since my own 100 or so years ago. Very organized, with 521 kids graduating-- 519 of then are going to college, the other two joining are joining the marines. Three kids received appointments to military academies.

11) One kid's family did the wave in their row when his name was called one guy blew an air horn when a relative walked across the stage-- sadly, someone confiscated the air horn after that. Fun police are everywhere.

10) Anyway, its a proud moment when you finally get graduate school and move on to the next chapter in your life. My godson is heading to St Rose here in Albany, where he play college baseball and hopefully study more than I did when I was in college.

9) The first hour or so of the ride home was made easier by NBA game on the radio, with Hubie Brown/Jack Ramsay doing analysis-- everyone who broadcasts basketball, and I mean everyone, should listen to a tape of their broadcast. They talked about the game, making short points that made the listener feel like they were courtside. Fun to listen to.

8) Dr Jack sounded like he was really pulling for JJ Redick, but from the pain in his voice after a couple turnovers, it is obvious Redick is hurting the Magic bigtime. Dwight Howard didn't touch the ball on Magic's last eight possessions, which is the responsibility of the Orlando guards.

7) If you watch a lot of college hoop on TV, Redick would be the most recognizable Orlando player-- other guys on Magic played at St Joe's, Nebraska, Western Kentucky, Charleston, Fresno State, Texas Tech and Delta State. Five Orlando players never played college basketball.

6) One last Ramsay thing-- he coached two of the most interesting clubs of the 70's-- we all know he coached Bill Walton's Trailblazers to a 1977 NBA title, but he also coached the Buffalo Braves before that-- McAdoo Ernie D and the late Randy Smith, who passed away last week. Braves were an exciting team before they got sold, moved to San Diego, where the sorry legend of the Clippers was born.

5) Eldrick Woods won his 67th PGA tournament Sunday-- funny thing is that the tournaments without Woods get terrible ratings, but they're always more interesting, because they're only tourneys with suspense as to who will win. He is already the greatest golfer ever.

4) Tennessee football coach Lane Kiffin is either the dumbest guy in the whole country, or he just doesn't care- he let ESPN's cameras film one of his meetings with a recruit, which is an NCAA violation, Kiffin's fifth minor violation since becoming Vols' coach. He hasn't coached one game yet, and he's already committed five NCAA violations. With rebuilding the order of the day in Knoxville, 2009 could be a long year for Kiffin, but he does have a knack for getting his face on television.

3) Why is gas cheaper on the New York State Thruway than in Albany? This has never been true before, why now? Could it be greedy bastards at Exxon/Mobil need to pay for all the mini-marts they're building?

2) So far, teams in the College World Series are two from ACC (Virginia, North Carolina), two from SEC (Arkansas, LSU), Fullerton, Arizona St and Southern Miss. Texas-TCU winner is the eighth team.

1) The kid on Texas who threw 13 innings of relief and 169 pitches in the 25-inning game again Boston College last week? He faced one batter in Longhorns' split against TCU this weekend- Game 3 is Monday nite. The kid says his arm is fine. I just hope he gets drafted this week.

Sunday's List of 13: Wrapping up a baseball Saturday......
13) Rafael Furcal pinch-hit a ninth inning HR to tie game, then Ethier hit his second homer of game to win it in the 12th as Dodgers rallied to beat the Phillies for the second consecutive day.

12) Nationals whacked John Maine around, Lannan got 19 ground ball outs in Washington's weekly win, a 7-1 triumph over the erratic Mets.

11) Astros are 24-30, despite their 2-3-4 batters hitting .356/.347/.321.

10) Jon Lester retired the first 19 Rangers, Boston won easily 8-1.

9) Ben Zobrist homered and tripled as Tampa Bay won a sloppy game 9-7 in the Bronx, scoring four runs in the ninth off Rivera.

8) Both teams lost their DH during the game; wonder when the last time both teams lost their DH during a nine-inning game.

7) Trevor Cahill pitched six solid innings, as Oakland won its fifth game in a row, 9-4 over the slumping Orioles. Young A's rotation has had an excellent week-- four of the five starters being rookies.

6) Baltimore's Luke Scott is on fire; he has 10 HRs in his last 18 games.

5) Series in Detroit, Seattle have both been split so far this weekend; all four games have been 2-1 scores. Offense seems to be down this year.

4) Detroit's Edwin Jackson is 6-3, 2.16 after being overlooked last fall in the playoffs by Tampa Bay, and subsequently traded-- he could have an All-Star Game in his immediate future, if his next month is a good one.

3) Arizona's Max Scherzer is NL's version of Scott Kazmir-- he blanked the Padres for five innings Saturday, but had to leave game because in his five innings he threw an uneconomical 104 pitches.

2) There were three complete games Saturday, a lot for one day, while two other starters finished the 8th inning. The Met game was so boring they got talking about the 1980-81 A's, because Steve McCatty is now Washington's pitching coach. Those A's had 90 complete games in '80 and 60 (in shortened 104-game season) in '81, then all the starters' arms fell off in '82 and '83, as Billy Martin scampered back to the Bronx.

1) Whomever signs Matt Holliday next winter is getting one excellent ballplayer-- for my fantasy team's sake, I'm hoping Boston or Philly or the Cubs, but if I had to wager on it, I'd say he winds up in Anaheim.

Saturday's List of 13: Ranking prospects for Tuesday's draft.....
Baseball America follows amateur baseball as much as anyone, so we'll run with their rankings for players in Tuesday's draft......

Best athlete
College
1) Jared Mitchell, OF, LSU
2) Brett Jackson, OF, California
3) Grant Green, SS, USC

High school
1) Donavan Tate, OF, Cartersville, GA
2) Jacob Stewart, OF, Fort Collins, CO
3) Everett Williams, OF, Austin, TX

Best Pure Hitter
College
1) Dustin Ackley, 1b, North Carolina
2) AJ Pollock, OF Notre Dame
3) Tim Wheeler, OF Sacramento State

High School
1) Max Stassi, C, Yuba City, CA
2) Wil Myers, C, High Point, NC
3) Jeff Malm, 1b, Las Vegas

Best Power Hitter
College
1) Chris Dominguez, 3B, Louisville
2) Kent Matthes, OF, Alabama
3) Tommy Mendonca, 3B, Fresno State

High School
1) Bobby Borchering, 3B, Ft Myers, FL
2) Randal Grichuk, OF, Rosenberg, TX
3) Matt Davidson, 3B, Yucalpa, CA

Fastest Runner
College
1) Jared Mitchell, OF, LSU
2) Jeremy Hazelbaker, OF, Ball State
3) Jordan Henry, OF, Ole Miss

High School
1) Reggie Williams Jr, OF, Tampa
2) LeVon Washington, OF, Gainesville, FL
3) Reymond Fuentes, OF, Manati, PR

Best Defensive Player
College
1) Ryan Jackson, SS, Miami
2) Matt den Dekker, OF, Florida
3) Tony Sanchez, C, Boston College

High School
1) Jiovanni Mier, SS, LaVerne, CA
2) Donavan Tate, OF, Cartersville, GA
3) Steven Baron, C, Miami

Fastball
College
1) Stephen Strasburg, San Diego State
2) Kyle Heckathorn, Kennesaw State
3) Sam Dyson, South Carolina

High School
1) Shelby Miller, Brownwood, TX
2) Jacob Turner, St Louis
3) Zach Wheeler, Dallas, GA

Closest to Major Leagues
College
1) Stephen Strasburg, P, San Diego State
2) Dustin Ackley, 1B, North Carolina
3) Kyle Gibson, P, Missouri

High School
1) Tyler Matzek, P, Mission Viejo, CA
2) Jacob Turner, P, St Louis
3) Matthew Purke, P, Spring, TX

Friday's List of 13: This week's baseball List of 13.........
13) Rays 28-28-- AL champs have nine guys on the disabled list.

12) Giants 27-25-- Out of 24 guys who won 300 games, Randy Johnson is only the fifth to win #300 on his first try.

11) Mets 28-24-- Getting swept in Pittsburgh wasn't as bad as finding out Reyes has torn hamstring-- did their doctors study in Grenada????

10) Blue Jays 30-26-- Is Cito Gaston ever mentioned as a top manager? Maybe he should be.........

9) Angels 27-25-- If they had to do over, think they would have ponied up the big bucks to keep K-Rod? I do.

8) Braves 26-26-- Added McLouth for nothing, might be getting Hudson back in August, just called up top pitching prospect Hanson-- this is a dangerous team right now.

7) Rangers 31-22-- Have a 3.5-game lead in AL West, but gave up 12-8 runs in their losses in Bronx this week. Need Hamilton back healthy.

6) Cardinals 31-23-- Not sold on their pitching, despite allowing third-fewest runs in NL so far this season. Will need to add talent in July.

5) Brewers 31-23-- Farm system is producing lot of talent; Ken Macha would be NL Manager of the Year if the vote were taken today. It isn't.

T3) Bronx 32-22-- Scoring ton of runs since ARod came back, but Wang is a disaster on hill. Lead major leagues with 5.74 runs scored per game.

T3) Boston 32-22-- Ortiz went to eye doctor Thursday, so maybe he is like Vaughn in Major League and will start pounding ball again once he puts on a pair of spectacles. Or maybe his career is over.

2) Phillies 32-20-- World champs won last seven games, and maybe they found replacement for Myers with young lefty Bastardo. Down road, I will be stunned if they don't add another starting pitcher.

1) Dodgers 37-19-- Are going to jog in NL West, will have to adjust to getting Ramirez back in lineup July 3, but if you're a Dodger fan, don't be scheduling any important business for October evenings.

Thursday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) If anyone from Burger King Corporation is reading this, the fastest service I've ever gotten at a fast food place was Monday at lunchtime at the BK at corner of Fuller and Western Aves. Tremendous service, so I highly recommend that place for lunch.

12) 11 of the 32 NFL teams will have a different coach this season than they did in Week 1 of the 2008 season.

11) Dodgers are now 16-10 without Manny Ramirez and lead NL West by 9.5 games. The other four NL West teams aren't very good, with two already firing their managers this season.

10) Five of the Lakers' six assistant coaches played in the NBA. Patrick Ewing is only Orlando assistant (out of four) who played in the league.

9) Since Rams' domed stadium opened in 1995, 21 of the other 31 teams have gotten either new or significantly refurbished stadiums; eventually, the Jones Dome will have to be refurbished for Rams to stay in St Louis.

8) In his last three starts, Francisco Liriano has allowed 16 runs in just 12 IP; if the Marlins could send Ricky Nolasco to the minors for being terrible (and it has helped, with two excellent AAA starts) what stops Minnesota from doing the same thing with Liriano?

7) What were Nationals doing waiting until 10:55pm to postpone their game with Randy Johnson and the Giants? Game was scheduled for 7:00 start-- who would have been there to see the end, had they played? The game is now part of a 4:35 Thursday doubleheader, with Big Unit going for his 300th win against Washington.

6) Another depressing day to be a Pirate fan, as Nate McLouth got dealt to Atlanta for three minor league guys. Pittsburgh will bring its prospect McCutchen up from AAA to play CF, but not like they couldn't stand to have a few good players on the field at the same time. Pretty sad.

5) Ichiro Suzuki has now hit in 27 straight games-- of all guys in major leagues now, I've always given him the best shot at challenging the record of 56; thought he might have done it when he was a little faster. .

4) Padres now have two Princeton basketball players on their team, as Will Venable was called up from Portland; he scored over 1,000 points for the Tigers, and is son of former Giant OF Max. Pitcher Chris Young is the other former Tiger on the San Diego roster.

3) A's won last two nights in Chicago, but these are batting averages of #'s 5-9 hitters in their lineup Wednesday: .219-.205-.213-.125-.182. It is going to be tough sledding in Oakland until they get better hitting.

2) This will never happen, but would have been fun to see Phil Jackson coach a major college program for 5-6 years and see how he would have done. He's very smart, so he probably would have done well, but doubt recruiting side of things would have been appealing to the Zen Master.

1) Toughest job at NBA Finals is Jeff Van Gundy broadcasting while his brother is coaching Orlando; Jeff has already said he is rooting for Magic to win, and volunteered not to work the Finals if ABC execs thought it would be inappropriate. I love his TV work, so I'm glad he'll be on air.

Wednesday's List of 13: Random facts on a June day..........
13) I'm not a big All-Star Game guy, but I always watch introductions of the players, because it is humbling for even the biggest stars; this year is going to be great, when 37-year old Raul Ibanez is introduced as a 2009 All-Star, the first time in his long career he will be an All-Star.

12) Record for most RBI in one season without hitting a home run came back in 1902, when Lafayette Cross knocked in 108 runs for Philly A's at the age of 36. He knocked in 100+ runs three times; never hit 10 HRs

11) So Vince Young wants to be a starting QB; as great as he was in his college career, it would be intriguing for a team like my Rams, but do you entrust your franchise to a guy who has had some shaky moments the last couple of years, mainly off the field? QB is a tough position; lot of expectations, lot of credit/blame dished out. Have to have a thick skin to be a terrific NFL quarterback, but Young hasn't shown that yet.

10) Speaking of the Rams, I have a recurring nightmare that the guy from Blackberry computers is going to give up trying to buy an NHL team, is going to buy the Rams and move them to Hamilton, Ontario. When you have thoughts like that going through your mind, its hard to sleep well.

9) Dodgers are 6-6 in last dozen home games after a 13-0 start; June is not their best month. Last winning June for the Dodgers was in 2003.

8) Weird stat: Adam Dunn has 16 homers, his team has 14 wins.

7) A's now have four rookies in their five-man starting rotation, with the 24-year Outman the oldest of the four. A's will be good in 2011, if they can find some position players to go with these pitching prospects. Sad news for me is that 2011 is two years from now, but so be it......

6) I'd like to see swing/misses added as an official pitching stat; what is more basic to pitching than making a batter swing and miss?

5) Vitaly Lunkin won over $1.8M by winning the first big event at this year's World Series of Poker. Greg Raymer finished third, continuing to show that he is one of the world's great players. All in all, there will be 57 tournaments in this year's WSOP, culminating in Main Event July 3.

4) NHL office has to be happy the Penguins beat Detroit and kept hope alive for a long, exciting series. Home side won all three games so far.

3) Only four of ten starters in NBA Finals played college basketball.

2) If I ran horse racing, the three Triple Crown races would be run on Memorial Day weekend/4th of July/Labor Day weekend. This is so the horses would have more time to recover, and would remain healthier.

1) Randy Johnson goes for win #300 in Washington Wednesday-- he is going to be the last 300-game winner for a long time, maybe ever.

Tuesday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but..........
13) Cleveland Browns coach Eric Mangini has a football camp for some underprivileged kids in Connecticut; for some bizarre reason, he had his Cleveland rookies ride a bus for 10 hours to get to the camp and work at it, while he and his coaches flew to the camp. Not surprisingly, rookies weren't too happy about this. Way to get off on the right foot, coach.

12) Cal-Irvine trailed Virginia 2-1 in top of 6th late Sunday night, when they pulled an odd defensive move; with a runner at third and one out, Irvine used five infielders, with the CF playing behind second base. Sure enough, batter hit the ball right to the extra fielder, who got a key out. In all my years, have never seen five infielders used in that situation before.

11) SEC football teams have agreed to limit themselves to signing 28 new recruits a year; Ole Miss signed 37 kids this spring. Considering that 85 scholarships per school is the limit, that means their other four classes (college football teams generally redshirt all their freshmen, so they have five classes of players on scholarship) that leaves 12 players a year for the other four classes with the Rebels.

10) The more college baseball I see, the more I like it, although coaches have to get a grip on butchering their pitchers. Letting the Wood kid on Texas throw 169 pitches the other night wasn't exactly great coaching.

9) Tim Clark lost to Steve Stricker in a playoff at Colonial Sunday, his 7th second-place finish on Tour without a win. He hit the flag with his approach on the second playoff hole, and still lost the hole. Still, hard to feel to bad for a guy who cashed a check for half a million this week.

8) When Nick Saban coached the Dolphins, he had first shot at signing Drew Brees but passed, wary of Brees' surgically-repaired shoulder that he hurt playing for the Chargers. You can easily make the point that the Saints signing Brees is the best thing thats happened to Alabama football in quite some time, seeing as how it led to Saban bolting Miami quickly, and re-vitalizing the Crimson Tide program.

7) There was a rumor my Rans were interested in Michael Vick, but no way, and here's why; remember when the St Louis Blues hockey team played in an arena called the Checkerdome? It was called that because the Ralston-Purina pet food company is in St Louis, so doubtful that a city where dogfood is a big industry would be anxious to employ Vick.

6) Phillies have played in eight three-game series this season where they split the first two games; the road team won Game 3 in all seven series.

5) Washington Nationals are 2-0 in the second game of a series if they won the first game; they're 2-12 in second game if they lost the opener.

4) Brutal start to road trip for the Mets, who blew a 5-0 lead to Pirates and lost 8-5 at PNC. Its games like this that rear their ugly head late in the season in a close pennant race. JJ Putz gave up five straight hits in the 8th inning, as Pittsburgh rallied for the upset win.

3) There is a kid pitching for Astros' AAA team named Bazardo who is 6-2, 2.58 in eight starts at Round Rock; this makes him interesting guy to follow as far as my fantasy team goes, but then I look at his record in 2008 and I see this: also in AAA, 4-13, 6.72 in 22 starts, when batters hit .340 against him for the season. Now they're hitting .210; go figure.

2) Whats up with the White Sox? First Jake Peavy turned down a trade to South Side, now Roy Oswalt has, too. AL Central is wide open, so White Sox are still contenders. Maybe pitchers are wising up and want to stay where there is no DH, and the ERAs are a little lower.

1) Rough few days in Cleveland, with Cavaliers getting beat by Magic in the NBA playoffs, then woeful Indians losing three of four to Bronx and then of course, Mangini's odd treatment of his rookies with the Browns, who are the most beloved team in Cleveland. If you know someone from the Buckeye State, give them a hug today.

Monday's List of 13: Wrapping up a sports weekend........
13) Joe Paterno needs a new agent; he made $1.03M last year, while nomad Nick Saban earned $3.8M at Alabama. Doesn't seem right.

12) Then there's Les Miles at LSU, whose contract says he has to be paid $1,000 more than any other SEC coach, so he apparently made at least $3,801,000 last season. JoePa needs to call Miles' agent.

11) What would happen if another SEC coach had the same clause put in his contract that Miles has?

10) New Mexico football coach Mike Locksley was accused of both sexual harassment and age discrimination recently, which is unusual only because he hasn't even coached in a game yet. Maybe Locksley can call Lane Kiffin for advice on how to break into a job quietly.

9) When San Diego State beat Fresno State in NCAA tournament in an elimination game Saturday, it was first NCAA tourney win for the Aztecs since 1990. Tony Gwynn has done a solid rebuilding job.

8) Freddie Lewis of the Giants is only major leaguer ever whose first two big league home runs were 1) a grand slam and 2) part of a cycle.

7) Four of the starters in Florida Marlins' rotation are 6-7 or taller.

6) You'd think with three sons as major league catchers that the dad in the Molina family was a backstop himself, but no-- he was not only a second baseman, but good enough to be in the Puerto Rican baseball Hall of Fame.

5) Adrian Gonzalez is the first major leaguer to 20 HRs this season.

4) Angels trailed Seattle 6-0, rallied to win 9-8, but Scioscia has to be concerned with his starting pitching.

3) Edwin Jackson allowed only three baserunners in eight innings as Detroit blanked the Orioles 3-0 at Camden Yards. Jackson was lone major league starting pitcher to finish the 8th inning Sunday.

2) Playoff teams, if baseball playoffs started Monday morning:
AL: Bronx-Detroit-Texas-Red Sox
NL: Philadelphia-Milwaukee-Los Angeles-Cardinals

1) What genius decided the first two games of the Stanley Cup Finals had to be played on consecutive nights? At what point is it the job of the commissioner to step in, tell TV no? Hockey is a great, physical game; players need a day to recover in between games of the Finals.

Sunday's List of 13: Famous people, obscure knowledge......
13) The late Paul Newman was a radio man/gunner on a plane aboard the USS Bunker Hill during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945.

12) Robert Redford once got a baseball scholarship to University of Colorado, as a pitcher.

11) Long before he owned race cars, David Letterman was a pit road reporter for ABC at the 1971 Indianapolis 500, back when he was a weatherman at a TV station in Indiana.

10) When he was 14, Martin Sheen organized a strike of caddies at a private golf course where he was working in Dayton.

9) John Madden was the catcher on his college baseball team at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo.

8) Former Presidential candidate Mitt Romney was once governor of Massachusetts; his father had been governor of Michigan; one of the elder Romney's brothers once played QB for the Chicago Bears.

7) Denzel Washington played freshman basketball at Fordham-- his coach there was former Warrior/Sonic coach PJ Carlesimo.

6) Because of a virus he had as an infant, actor Rob Lowe is deaf in his right ear.

5) In June 1980, Vanna White was a contestant on Price Is Right-- she didn't win anything.

4) When Toronto Argonauts won 1991 Grey Cup, two of its owners were the late John Candy and Wayne Gretzky.

3) Before Dick Vitale was yelling on TV, he was a pretty good coach going 78-30 at U of Detroit, including a 21-game win streak in 1977; one of those wins was over Marquette in Milwaukee, later that year, Marquette won the national title.

2) Don't think athletes in New York get overrated quickly? Career won-lost record as a pro quarterback for Joe Namath: 77-108-3, with 173 TD passes, 220 INTs.

1) When George McGovern ran for President in 1972, Bill Clinton ran his campaign in Texas; one of the people who worked with him in Texas was an obscure TV producer named Steven Spielberg. Both of them are a little more famous these days.

Saturday's List of 13: Random stuff as we wait for the sun......
13) Let me get this straight; Colorado was in the World Series in '07, but now, just 19 months later, they fire their manager? Last winter, the Rockies traded Matt Holliday to Oakland for three players, only one of whom is in the major leagues. How about firing the guy who is responsible for that trade? Jeff Franics had shoulder surgery over the winter- he in the Rockies' best pitcher. This move is change for the sake of change, and thats no way to run a multi-million $$ business.

12) I'll say this, then I'll move on; for the past four years, I watched all the Colorado games, because Holliday is on my fantasy team-- I say without any doubt that Clint Hurdle is a good manager. Whatever problems the Rockies have/had, manager wasn't one of them.

11) The new baseball stadium in the Bronx cost $1.5B-- it doesn't have an out-of-town scoreboard- the scores just flash now and then in between all the commericals they have on the regular board. Hard to believe for $1.5B they couldn't post the other scores permanently.

10) If you're voting for the All-Star team, when you get to shortstop in the American League, if you vote for Derek Jeter, you just do not care about voting for the guy having the best season. The correct guy to vote for? Marco Scutaro of the Blue Jays would be that guy.

9) Rays lead the major leagues in runs scored, but are under .500 for the season; LY, they won the American League without coming close to leading the league in scoring, Their pitching is much worse in '09.

8) Tampa Bay added Pat Burrell from the Phillies to help their record against lefty pitching; so far this season, Rays are 5-10 vs southpaws while Philadelphia is 11-4 against lefties without Burrell. Go figure.

7) But why are the Phillies 16-6 on the road, 10-14 at home?

6) A's are only AL team under .500 at home; seven of the 16 teams in the NL are under .500 at home. I have no explanation for this.

5) Going into Friday's games, major league teams were forty games over .500 when opposing lefthanded starting pitchers (233-193).

4) Cardinals have allowed the least runs in baseball; at some point, will pitching coach Dave Duncan get a mention for being first coach inducted into the Hall of Fame? He might be best pitching coach ever.

3) Padres have been outscored by 29 runs, but are 24-23; they're 12-6 in one-run games.

2) Best wishes to ESPN's Lee Corso, who suffered a minor stroke in the last few days; he is expected to fully recover.

1) "I'm tired of watching him." This brutally honest quote is from the interim GM of the Washington Nationals, Mike Rizzo, who optioned Daniel Cabrera to the minor leagues this week. Cabrera looked like he could be the next Randy Johnson, but has never been very good

Friday's List of 13: Our major league baseball List of 13.......
13) Cubs 23-23-- Get feeling Soriano isn't so popular in Chicago.....

12) Angels 24-22-- Getting healthier, still favored to win AL West.

11) Giants 23-23-- Starting pitching is the most important thing.

10) Reds 26-20-- Play lot better on the road than at Great American.

9) Mets 26-20-- Livan Hernandez was first Met starting pitcher to get into 8th inning this year....in New York's 46th game!!!!!

8) Phillies 25-20-- Myers' injury could become a major problem.

7) Tigers 26-19-- Young Porcello's rapid rise to majors sign of times.

6) Brewers 27-20-- Will they trade for Jake Peavy in July?

5) Rangers 27-19-- Harrison has bad arm; will be interesting to see if their pitchers hold up under Nolan Ryan's directive that pitchers are to go deeper into games.

4) Red Sox 28-20-- Ortiz now batting sixth; team struggling on road.

3) Cardinals 28-19-- St Louis paper concerned that they won't add to roster in July, that their early success clouds fact that this team still has lot of flaws.

2) Bronx 27-20-- Teixeira has turned into Lou Gehrig since A-Rod is active; there are only five AL teams whose record is 4+ games over .500, and freefalling Toronto is one of those.

1) Dodgers 33-15-- Martin still hasn't hit a home run this season.

Thursday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but........
13) Horrific loss for Toronto, blowing Halladay's 8-3 lead in 8th, and then blowing 10-8 lead in 11th-- they lose 12-10 at Camden Yards, as they conclude a dismal 0-9 road trip.

12) Padres won for 11th time in last 12 games, as bullpen got the last eight outs in Peavy's 8-5 win against the Snakes in the desert.

11) You might want to test Carlos Zambrano for steroids-- he went postal after a close call went against him at the plate, smashing stuff inside the Cub dugout after umpire Carlson ran him from Cubs' 5-2 win over the Pirates. He definitely has anger management issues.

10) Matuszaka is still winless after losing in Minnesota; Red Sox are 2-6 in their last eight road games.

9) Tampa Rays are in complete disarray; they've given up 19 runs in their last ten innings, their DP combination is on the DL, Upton has been awful. Most everything that went so right last year is not going nearly as well now- pitching, defense. Bottom half of their lineup is more reminiscent of the Montgomery Biscuits than the Rays.

8) Ichiro Suzuki has a 21-game hitting streak; am really surprised he never challenged the 56-game hitting streak record, the way he could get infield hits using his speed from lefthand side of the plate.

7) Randy Johnson won his 299th game as Giants beat Atlanta, 6-3.

6) The baseball used in Japanese pro leagues is little bit smaller than the baseball used in this country. There is a difference in height of the seams between the major and minor league balls in this country.

5) Rice University has great baseball program, led by Wayne Graham who played two seasons in big leagues, for a total of 30 games with Phillies in '63, Mets in '64. Thats Gene Mauch one year and Casey Stengel the next, so I'm guessing he has a lot of interesting stories.

4) Iowa State, Colorado don't have baseball teams, so Big 12 is really ten teams when you're talking college baseball.

3) College football coaches' poll is going back to secret ballot starting in 2010, which is bad news for fans, since having transparency in the voting process made it more interesting, forcing coaches to be a little more conscientscious when filling out their ballots.

2) Lakers are now 20-0 at home in Game 5's when series is tied 2-2.

1) Red Wings eliminated Chicago in five games, move on to play the Penguins in the Stanley Cup finals. Semifinal series lasted total of just nine games- the league could use a more interesting final series.

Wednesday's List of 13: Random thoughts on a rainy night
13) Orlando beats the Cavaliers in OT, goes up 3-1 in Eastern finals; only eight NBA teams have won a series after being down 3-1.

12) Wish NBA playoffs had shorter series; imagine the drama if the series were best-of-3 or best-of-5? Would be like March Madness.

11) Illinois hoop coach Bruce Weber got a 50% raise and a three-year extension, so he'll make $1.5M a year now; he was getting paid a lot less than many of his peers. Seeing as he has gotten Illini to national title game and has shown loyalty to team that saw previous coaches Lon Kruger, Bill Self skip town, the raise seems justified.

10) Red Sox scored 10+ runs in four of last seven Wakefield starts.

9) Alarming news from Las Vegas, where Jeremy Shockey was at a party at Hard Rock, but got taken out on a stretcher, unconscious. Hopefully he's OK and just got dehydrated from all that sun......

8) Former Florida Gator Nick Calathes is apparently blowing off the NBA Draft to play pro ball in Greece, despite fact Dallas seems to be interested in drafting him. Rumor mill has Calathes' dad behind this very curious decision.

7) A young lady in Maryland is about to graduate high school- she has never missed a single day of school, from K-Grade 12, for total of 2,340 straight days, and she is also a straight-A student, who will be going to Maryland this fall-- she wants to be a doctor. Just hope she doesn't have a nervous breakdown if she gets a B in college.

6) Best commercials on TV right now are the Dos Equus spots with the guy who is "....the most interesting man in the world." They just never get old. Sometimes, unintentional comedy is the best.

5) You know your team is in the soup when your starting pitcher on Opening Day is in the minor leagues before Memorial Day-- ladies nad gentlemen, your 2009 Florida Marlins........

4) I've been killing Jason Giambi all spring for crawling back to the A's after he blew them off eight years ago at the peak of his career, but he just got a huge hit to put A's up 4-3 in 7th inning, so credit is given where it is due. He's still hitting only .218, but it was a big hit.

3) Three nights in a row, I've seen umpire Adrian Johnson involved in a big argument, a red flag that he might be a bad umpire.

2) Orioles are bringing star catching prospect Matt Weiters up this Friday-- he and David Price were the two best prospects in minors.

1) Pat on the back to Manhattan basketball coach Barry Rohrssen; he gave a 6-10 kid from California a basketball scholarship, despite fact kid doesn't have a left hand. He runs well, blocks shots well, and had a 10-point scoring average at Fork Union prep school last year. The coach feels his team needs to work harder, so he's bringing in kid who has overcome a real big obstacle to become a scholarship player. This is a good story-- congrats to the player and kudos to the coach for having some guts to give a hard-working player a chance.

Stay thirsty, my friends........

Tuesday's List of 13: Wrapping up a memorable Memorial Day
13) Padres came off a 9-0 homestand but had lost eleven road games in a row; they trailed 7-1 in 8th inning, then rallied to win 9-7 in 10 innings at Arizona, another demoralizing day for the Diamondbacks.

12) Tampa Bay led 10-0 at Cleveland and lost 11-10, with Indians scoring seven runs in the bottom of the ninth. Prize rookie Price had his second major league start, walking five, striking out six in 3.2 IP. He was removed after throwing 95 pitches.

11) More bad news for Rays is that 2B Iwamura is out for year with a torn ACL-- he was hitting .310, so thats a big blow for Tampa Bay club that gave Adam Kennedy away to Oakland three weeks ago-- Kennedy is hitting 441 after 15 games with the A's. .

10) Russell Martin stole second for Dodgers when they led 7-0, and you're thinking, whats he doing? Then Colorado cuts lead to 7-6 and you realize that all is fair at Coors Field. LA wound up pulling away for a 16-6 win, as they improved to 10-7 without Manny Ramirez.

9) All in all, seven teams scored double figure runs on Monday.

8) Then there was Milwaukee, where Carpenter was perfect for six innings, but Cardinals still lost 1-0 in 10 innings at Miller Park.

7) Boston-Minnesota game was first major league game in 12 days with no walks by either side-- there were 18 strikeouts, as Red Sox shredded Liriano for 11 hits in four innings in their 6-5 win.

6) Astros-Reds game was first big league game in nine days where both starting pitchers gave up 10+ hits; oddly, the last one was the southpaw matchup between Santana and Randy Johnson May 16. All eight Cincinnati runs in this game were unearned, most unearned runs a team allowed in one game since the White Sox on 6-1-02. .

5) Freddy Sanchez had six hits in Pirates 10-8 win at Wrigley; he is first Pirate since Wally Backman in 1990 to get six hits in a game.

4) White Sox had 16 hits Monday at Anaheim....in first four innings. It is also hard to believe teams that led 10-2 and 7-1 in 8th inning both got beat Monday, but Rays, Diamondbacks did. I really have no reason why, but Mr T threw out the first ball at Wrigley Monday, and he also sang Take Me Out to the Ballgame in 7th inning.

3) Twins are first team since 2003 Expos (Guerrero/Wilkerson) with two players hitting for cycle in the same season.

2) Right now, Jason Bohn is 125th on the PGA Tour money list with $284,935 in earnings this year-- 37 golfers have earned $1M+ in '09.

1) Nuggets had 20 offensive rebounds, were +18 on boards in their Game 4 win over Lakers, evening series 2-2. If you like watching a bunch of guys shooting foul shots, the NBA is for you-- 84 charity tosses were attempted, 49 by Denver, 35 by the Lakers. Terrific.

Memorial Day is about stopping to think about the men/women who risk(ed) their lives to protect us; we're lucky to live in a free country, but people have to risk their lives for it to stay that way. Stopping every event at 3pm local time for a moment of remembrance was a nice touch, fitting tribute today-- we can never give enough thanks.

Monday's List of 13: 13 kids who impressed us at the Gym Rat
From 8am Saturday to 9pm Sunday, I spent 28 hours watching kids play basketball-- here are 13 players who impressed me-- maybe not the 13 best players I saw, but kids who did positive things.....these are all 15-year olds, unless otherwise noted.......

13) Jude Weekes-Young, Team CJEOTO-- Played top of pressure defense, and was a force, causing lot of turnovers. His team lost in a tiebreaker to get to playoffs; too bad, they could have won it.

12) Alex Mitola, Hoop Heaven Elite-- Generously listed at 5-9, but we can't measure heart, and this kid has a huge one-- he was MVP of the tournament, with his team surviving OT in semifinals, winning big in the finals over top-seeded Metro Hawks.

11) Zack Karalis, New England Storm-- Polished game, gets to hoop easily and has nice perimeter jumper. Pretty good passer, too.

10) Alessandro Troia, LI Lightning-- Tough kid, diving on floor for loose balls, drawing a charge in a 20-point game. We like that.

9) Rob Hazard, RI Breakers-- We couldn't find anyone who could contain his dribble; eventually, teams contained him by not letting him get the ball. Has a very bright future.

8) Austin Taps, LI Lightning-- Brian Uhrlacher in shorts-- physical player who lowered his shoulder while driving to hoop, taking guys in his way with him. Surprisingly soft hands, good touch on shots.

7) Cleanthony Early, BC Eagles (17 y/o)-- Drained three straight 3's, talking to press table after each one....."They better start guarding me or I'll do this the whole game." It didn't even sound like taunting.

6) Michael Hyland, Hoop Heaven Elite-- Swished a trey from corner at buzzer in overtime to win semi-final game for his team.

5) Malik Draper, Firm AC-- Makes space with his dribble, runs the floor really well, and played good defense, blocking a few shots. As he gets older and stronger, is going to become a really good player.

4) Darryl Adams, Almighty Force-- Scrappy kid kept his team in the game with series of driving layups and offensive rebounds.

3) Darius Osorio, New Jersey Panthers-- Diminutive point guard did well against pressure, using bounce passes to get ball out of traps. Is going to have to become a better shooter as he gets older. When he does that, he's going to be a college player.

2) Larry Graves, MetroHawks-- Really aggressive pushing ball on the fast break, creating lot of easy baskets for teammates. Lefty needs to work on his shot, because teams will play off him otherwise.

1) Shane Richard, MetroHawks-- Had one of best games we've seen a kid have, making five or six 3's in a row-- even kids on older team for MetroHawks who were watching game were impressed. He is also a solid rebounder. Reminds you of prototypical Princeton-style kid.

Sunday's List of 13: Quick observations from the Gym Rat
13) After 15.5 hours of watching basketball in person Saturday, I'm a little on the bleary-eyed side, so please excuse any typos here. Was at the Gym Rat Hoop Challenge Saturday, and will be there Sunday too, mostly at Siena College. Lot of good ballplayers here.

My job is to help evaluate who the better players in the 15-year old age group, the youngest of the three groups. Here are some of my quick observations, before I go grab a few hours sleep.......I'm going to have a list of 13 kids who impressed me on Monday so we'll leave that alone today

12) As always in spring/summer ball, better bring a solid point guard and couple of kids who can rebound with anyone, or else you're in for a long day. Refs generally let the kids play more this time of year.

11) Best kid I saw today, in terms of potential, was Kuran Iverson, a big kid from ANU Generation in Connecticut; he is still raw and time will help make him stronger, but he looks like a great prospect.

10) Best guard I saw was Rob Hazard from Rhode Island Breakers.

9) Best name of the day: Austin Taps. Pretty good player, too.

8) I am told part of the reason there aren't usually as many standout 15-year olds is the really great ones play up an age group or two.

7) Fire alarms went off at Union College early in the second-to-last games of the day, just what we didn't need, delaying things half hour or so. At least it was a nice night to stand outside during the delay.

6) Chanango Vipers are team made up mostly of kids from Norwich High, hardly a hoop power, and they got fed to the wolves, put in a pool with three pretty good teams: the Rockland Rockets, MABC Bengals and Sports University All-Stars. They had to play great just to stay within 20 points of any of those teams, no disrespect meant, just that they got dealt a really tough hand to play.

5) Liked Team CJEOTO from New Jersey; in particular kid named Jude Weekes-Young, a slashing wing from Bridgewater who really plays good defense. Will be interested in seeing them again Sunday.

4) Kid named Alex Mitola can really shoot-- he plays for school in New Jersey, Gill-St Bernard-- he led his county in 3-point shooting last winter. Hoop Heaven Elite is a pretty good team.

3) You get a wide variety of coaching styles; one guy was yelling at his point guard, "You're KILLLLLLING US!!!!" when his team was up by 20 points. Most coaches are a lot calmer than that.

2) Thought the officiating was very good Saturday; it was warm in the gym, so kids got frustrated sometimes as day went on, but refs kept control of things all day. Excellent job by them.

1) Tournament play in all three age brackets begins Sunday afternoon with finals of all three divisions Sunday night at Siena. Kids working as court monitors on the Siena courts are all current Siena players.

Saturday's List of 13: Famous names, obscure knowledge......
13) Vice-President Joe Biden graduated from U of Delaware, where he ranked 506th in a class of 688; that said, he has received honorary degrees since then from seven different universities.

12) There have been 44 US Presidents; Mr. Biden is the 47th VP.

11) Donald Sterling bought the Clippers for $12.7M back in 1981-- Forbes Magazine estimated earlier this year they're worth $297M now, despite a history littered with ineptitude and losing.

10) Kavin Garnett graduated from the same high school (Farragut) in Chicago as Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak; Sajak is on the Board of Trustees at Hillsdale College in Michigan, alma mater of 70's Green Bay Packers' kicker Chester Marcol.

9) As of July 2008, Harrison Ford's movies have grossed $3.4B, just in this country. Thats billion with a B. Ford is a self-taught carpenter who was once a stagehand for The Doors.

8) One of Bob Costas' first broadcasting jobs was play-by-play guy for the Spirits of St Louis in the old ABA in the mid-70's.

7) Tom Cruise went to eight different elementary schools and three different high schools, and also briefly attended Franciscan seminary school in Ohio-- yes, Tom Cruise thought about becoming a priest.

6) Lakers' owner Jerry Buss went to college at Wyoming, and once was a chemist for the US Bureau of Mines.

5) Bud Selig owned a big chunk of the Milwaukee Braves, but got rid of that when the team was moved to Atlanta; in 1968-69, White Sox played 20 "home" games in Milwaukee, and the games drew so many fans that it was instrumental in Selig buying the Seattle Pilots in 1969 and moving them to his hometown, where they became the Brewers.

4) Talkshow host Jimmy Kimmel grew up mostly in Las Vegas, and went to college at both UNLV and Arizona State, fun places to go to school, but maybe too much fun, since Kimmel never graduated. He was once Ben Stein's sidekick on an MTV gameshow-- at one time, Stein was actually a speechwriter for Richard Nixon. Seriously.

3) Before striking gold by founding, then selling broadcast.com, for a cool $6B, Mark Cuban was a bartender in the Dallas area, and also a disco dance instructor.

2) Actress Mimi Rogers sits on the Board of Directors of the World Poker Tour. I'm guessing it would be easy for her to bluff me.

1) Bill Murray has eight siblings, one of whom is a nun. One of his sons was at one time Director of Basketball Operations at Quinnipiac College in Connecticut. Murray's father was a lumber salesman.

2

Friday's List of 13: Our first baseball List of 13.......
Its too early to be ranking teams, but we're doing this every Friday, so why not start today? Feel free to disagree-- you can't be on this list if you're under .500..........

13) White Sox 5-4-- Steve Stone is major upgrade in broadcast booth.

12) Royals 5-4-- Hurt by Alex Gordon going on DL Thursday.

11) Bronx 5-5-- When your own radio announcers are ripping relief pitchers in second week of the season, it could signal a problem.

10) Tigers 5-4-- Good recovery after pretty rough start.

9) Phillies 4-4-- Defending champs treading water so far.

8) Orioles 6-3-- Doubtful they have enough pitching for long haul.

7) Cubs 5-4-- Milton Bradley ejected from another game Thursday.

6) Padres 7-3-- Outstanding job in spring training by these coaches.

5) Cardinals 8-3-- Hurt by rib cage injury to potential ace Carpenter.

4) Mariners 7-3-- New leadership has made an early difference.

3) Dodgers 7-3-- Billingsley, Kershaw abused the Giants this week.

2) Toronto 8-3-- Could they be this year's version of the 2008 Rays?

1) Marlins 8-1-- Not sure why they're winning; it doesn't matter.

Thursday's List of 13: Nobody asked me, but........
13) It isn't politically correct to say so, but baseball overdoes it with all these Jackie Robinson tributes; first, they permanently retire the number 42, but on April 15, everyone wears it. Its great to honor him and all, but this is more about getting African-American demographic more involved with baseball than it is about honoring Robinson.

12) As the late George Young used to say, ".....whenever you don't think its about the money, its always about the money."

11) Why some teams never win; in 2000, the Saints decided to take a QB early in the 6th round- they took West Virginia's Marc Bulger. 31 picks later, the Patriots took a signal-caller named Brady. Whoops.

10) Only 14 of 32 starting QBs in the NFL are with the franchise that drafted them. Kurt Warner wasn't even drafted. Go figure.

9) 49ers are mending fences, will bring Matthew Stafford in Monday for a meeting with team officials, after they questioned his ability to be a franchise QB because of an earlier interview with team officials.

8) Steelers ranked #1 in NFL merchandise sales for fiscal year ending March 31-- still find it odd that they have six 1:00 Sunday home tilts this coming season. You'd think they'd get a lot of 4:15 starts.

7) Looks like Jon Gruden has found a home on NFL Network, where he will work the NFL Draft; it doesn't help me, SINCE MY STUPID CABLE SYSTEM STILL DOESN'T HAVE NFL NETWORK!!!!!

OK, sorry about that.....

6) Eli Manning got called for jury duty in Jersey City last month; he went in, met with the judge but was excused. No truth to the rumor that the judge called in David Carr to replace Eli.

5) Weird story from college sports, where Duke's basketball player Greg Paulus, who was an outstanding high school QB in Syracuse, is considering playing college football for a year at Michigan. Paulus has one year of football eligibility remaining-- he ran an offense similar to Michigan's in high school, but that was four years ago, and New York isn't exactly a hotbed for high school football, so it has been open for debate exactly how good Paulus was in high school.

4) Funny how two subs on Minnesota Gophers "decided" to transfer just when the Gophers needed two scholarships for their incoming recruits. Its called running players off, and its an underreported and somewhat disappointing side of college sports. Scholarships are not 4-year deals, they're renewable 1-year agreements. If you don't play up to snuff, you suddenly become expendable, just like in real life.

3) Interesting to see if Isiah Thomas gets FIU on ESPN next winter-- Sun Belt only has four ESPN slots, one of which is their conference tournament final. Back when ESPN just started, the Sun Belt was one of the first leagues to let ESPN broadcast its games regularly- would be nice if ESPN showed a little loyalty, gave them more timeslots.

2) Why do kids who declare early for the NBA Draft hire agents? To keep their options open in case of injury, they shouldn't, but the lure of easy money has a very strong appeal, as Glenn Frey once sang. Agents front kids money, so they can live the good life sooner. Guy like Jonny Flynn should go work out without an agent, but once he signs an agent, he's locked into going pro.

1) Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched 6.1 innings in his first two starts; he allowed 19 baserunners, nine runs, and is now on DL with "fatigued arm". If I owned a major league ballclub, would be a cold day in hell before any of my pitchers threw in the World Baseball Classic.

Wednesday's List of 13: Quick impressions of '09 NFL slate.....
13) Labor Day is September 7 this year, as late as it can be, so first NFL Sunday is the 13th, and regular season ends January 3, which is much later than usual. Tennessee-Pittsburgh is the season opener at Heinz Field on Thursday night, September 10.

12) Look at Week 1-- the Thursday night game and 1:00 games, only one of the ten games is a divisional game, but the three 4:00 tilts, the Sunday and two Monday night games? Six divisional contests.

11) Speaking of which, the now-traditional Monday night twinbill is Buffalo at New England (Tom Brady's return) followed by San Diego at Oakland, as four teams from the old AFL square off.

10) October 25, Patriots-Buccaneers play over in London. Buffalo is playing another home game in Toronto, this one December 3 against the Jets, a Thursday night divisional contest.

9) Giants have rare three road games-in-row stretch in Weeks 2-4, as they visit Dallas-Tampa-Kansas City, opening the Cowboys' "Jerry Dome" in a Week 2 Sunday night game.

8) Saints have three primetime games, all at home, against the Falcons and Patriots on Monday nights in Weeks 8,12, then a Saturday game with the Cowboys in Week 15.

7) NFL insists on tempting fate by scheduling December primetime games in cold weather cities-- Baltimore visits Lambeau Field on the 7th of December; three weeks later, the Vikings visit Chicago. It isn't fair to the paying customers to play night games in these places in December, but those games get better TV ratings, so no one cares.

6) Colts get five primetime games, including two of first three weeks, at Miami in Week 2, Arizona in Week 3; the Week 10 game against New England is the only one of the five that is an Indy home game.

5) Thanksgiving Day schedule: Packers at Detroit, Raiders in Dallas and the Giants out in Denver, another cold weather night game.

4) If you don't think network TV has a New York bias, think again; the Giants have only three 1:00 Sunday home games, the Super Bowl champ Steelers play six home games at 1pm Sunday. Normally your more attractive TV teams play lot of games at 4:15 or at night. NFL did give the Steelers three primetime road games.

3) Only three of the eight NFL Network games are divisional games, which is weird because you'd think games played after short week of preparation would be better suited for divisional rivalries, but games like Bears-49ers, Dolphins-Panthers and Chargers-Titans are on the NFLN schedule. Not crazy them having a Thanksgiving night game- who wants to go to a bar to watch a game on Thanksgiving night?

2) As for Jay Cutler and the Bears, they play five primetime games; only one of their first five games is at 1:00. Chicago's most intriguing game in 2009 might be an August 30 exhibition game in Denver, when Mr Cutler faces his former team, in the one exhibition game where a lot of the starters play into the second half.

1) All 16 games in Week 17 are on Sunday, January 3rd, with six of the 16 games that day divisional rivalry games. With New Year's Day on a Friday, sounds like an excellent weekend filled with fun stuff.

Tuesday's List of 13: Random thoughts on a sad day.............
13) Sad day in sports Monday, with passing of both Harry Kalas and Mark Fidrych. We're constantly reminded that we're not guaranteed anything in this world, so we have the make the most while we can.

12) I met Harry Kalas at the Vet in 1990, after a Phils-Reds game; a very nice man with an amazing voice. We talked for few minutes; it turned out his brother was a professor at UAlbany. He had no reason to be nice to me, other than thats just the way he was. NFL Films is going to miss him, and Philadelphia will miss him a ton.

11) Mark Fidrych owned baseball in 1976; he was 19-9, 2.34 in his 29 starts, finishing 24 of them; the Tigers sold out most of his home starts the second half of the season. The Bird was quirky (he talked to the baseball before he threw it), he was 21, and boy was he good. Sadly, he hurt his arm, and was 10-10 the next four seasons- he never cashed in on his amazing success of '76. Monday he died at age 54, in an industrial accident at his business. Just very sad.

On to happier subjects, though just about anything would qualify....
10) NFL Draft is April 25-26, with a 4:05 start on Saturday the 25th for what reason nobody knows. Guess they want the draft on TV at night. Decisions like this are part of why I wound up divorced.......

9) 49ers interviewed Matthew Stafford, and their psychologist was asking the QB about his parents' divorce when he was in high school. Stafford bristled at some of the questions, so as a result, the 49ers are not going to draft Stafford, if he is available. Given that the Niners are not exactly solid under center, and this is a source of controversy in the Bay Area. Would love to be a fly on the wall to hear some of the conversations regarding critical decisions that teams have in the draft.

8) If you're a trivia buff, Jody Gerut hit the first homer at Citi Field; he was the first batter, and homered down the rightfield line.

7) San Diego used 46 different pitchers in spring training, and they came up with obscure names on the Opening Day roster, but skipper Bud Black is a pitching guru, and Padres look improved in the early days of this season. Weird thing is they won the first game played at Citi Field, with former Mets Sanchez, Bell getting the last six outs.

6) Was watching replay of a UCLA-Stanford baseball game Sunday night, and Bruins' SS is the son of A's 3B coach Mike Gallego-- kid pitching for Stanford was son of Bill Mooneyham, who pitched for the A's in 1986, where he was briefly a teammate of Mike Gallego. Sometimes its a small world we live in.

5) Cool name for Stanford's baseball stadium-- Sunken Diamond.

4) Our next item is too strange to be true, but I checked it out and it is true-- Florida International is in discussions to hire Isiah Thomas as its new basketball coach. FIU is in the Sun Belt Conference- their big rival is Florida Atlantic, coached by the even more-inept Mike Jarvis. Imagine those two matching wits twice a season? Priceless.

3) #125 on the PGA Tour money list is Alex Cejka, with $194,266; so far, 20 golfers have already earned $1M+ this season.

2) 7pm Tuesday, NFL Network for the chosen few, nfl.com for the rest of us-- the 2009 NFL schedule is unveiled.

1) Don't look now, but the Padres have won five games in a row, are 6-2 and are the surprising leaders in the National League West.

Monday's List of 13: Wrapping up a sports weekend........
13) Kenny Perry has earned $28,808,705 in his golf career, a fabulous career, but every day he wakes up the rest of his life, he will think of April 12, 2009 and he'll cringe, at least for a second. He had two-shot lead with two holes to play at Augusta Sunday, but bogeyed three of the last four holes and lost in a playoff to Angel Cabrera. Tough day.

12) In his career at Augusta, Perry is -3 on 17th hole, but he bogeyed it Sunday, which will gnaw at him, since he had just birdied 16 with maybe the shot of his career, a brilliant tee shot that put him square in the driver's seat. Unfortunately for Perry, he just didn't finish it.

11) All in all, a strong day for golf, with Mickelson/Woods paired in the same group and combining to go -9 on the day-- they got a little more airtime than the leaders did, to the point that you wondered if CBS would show Eldrick and Lefty driving out of the parking lot.

10) Time for me to vent a little-- I pay $169 a year for Extra Innings package on digital cable, which I love, except on Saturday afternoons, when my blood boils because I get blacked out of games due to FOX having exclusivity over the 4-7 pm window. If I'm paying extra, why in the name of Bowie Kuhn should I get blacked out of games?

9) Worse yet, FOX had a game at 4:00 Saturday; three games started at 1:00, but none of them were on the Extra Innings package- why?? Fans who have Extra Innings package would be much better off if the FOX package didn't exist, and that doesn't make sense.

8) As if the Angels haven't had a bad enough week, benches emptied in first inning of their game with Boston Sunday, after Josh Beckett dusted Bobby Abreu after Abreu had called time. By the time order had been restored, four Angels, including two coaches, and zero Red Sox had been tossed. Angels won the game 5-4.

7) Texas led 4-0 after seven in Detroit, lost 6-4, one of those losses that paralyzes a team, since it instills that they never have game won because their bullpen sucks. Home team is now 6-0 in Ranger games.

6) A's lost 1-0 to Seattle, but got brilliant pitching performance by young Cahill, who had no-hitter in 7th inning of his second big league start. Eric Bedard looks like he has regained his old form, as Seattle is off to a 5-2 start. A's wore those damn ugly black shirts/hats again, which irritates the hell out of me, but if they had won, not so much.

5) Washington Nationals head into their home opener Monday as the only winless team in baseball, and with an outfield of Dunn-Milledge Kearns, one of the worst defensive outfields in majors. Washington has lot of space in its home park-- they need good outfielders.

4) Evan Longoria still hasn't been in the major leagues for a full year, but he has already been in the All-Star Game, the World Series, and the World Baseball Classic. Pretty good start to a career.

3) When Flyers blew third period lead and lost 4-3 at home Sunday to the Rangers, they blew home ice edge in first round of the playoffs that start this week. Penguins now have home ice in the first round.

2) One other feat at Augusta that deserves mention is Dustin Johnson eagling consecutive holes, which rarely happens anywhere, especially in a major tournament. He still finished just -1.

1) At the end of the day, Kenny Perry may have been sad, but he did take home a check for $660,000, and if thats the worst day any of us ever had, it would be a hell of a life.

Sunday's List of 13: Random thoughts on Easter Sunday.....
13) At first glance, Kenny Perry-Angel Cabrera pairing Sunday at the Masters seems like advantage, Perry, since he's won ten PGA Tour events, but not only did Cabrera win the '07 US Open, he's also won three tournaments on the European Tour. It should be fun.

12) Cabrera has 14 top 10's in 114 PGA Tour events, with earnings of $5,424,057 in this country. He was ranked 69th in world before this week, Perry was ranked 11th.

11) Anthony Kim's rollercoaster week at Augusta: 75-65-72.

10) High drama in Washington DC last night, as Boston U scored in OT to beat Miami, OH 4-3, to win the college hockey national title. Terriers' winning goal was fluky, as shot from left point got blocked by a Miami defenseman, but it popped in air and went over shoulder of the Red Hawks' goalie, who lost sight of the puck. Miami had led 3-1 before Terriers scored twice in 0:42 to tie game. Playoff hockey is highly underrated.

9) When is NHL going to wise up and get some games on ESPN? They do an excellent job of covering the game, and they're so visible, it just seems stupid that the NHL doesn't have a presence there.

8) USC's Mark Sanchez won't attend the NFL Draft in New York in two weeks, an indication he ain't going to get picked too quickly.

7) Mark Teixeira sat out Saturday night's game in Kansas City with a sore wrist, which he said prevented him from batting right-handed. If I'm being a jerk here, I apologize, but the guy makes $20M a year, so if he can't bat righty, why not bat lefty (Teixeira switch-hits)? If he was good enough to play the field (he said he was) then shouldn't he play and bat lefty, or am I expecting too much from a $180M man?

6) Indians are off to an 0-5 start, giving up 47 runs. Not good. Over in the National League, the Nationals haven't won yet, and may not for a while. They're just not very good. Kansas City is 2-3, but they've scored a total of only eight runs in the five games.

5) Russell Nathan Jeanson Coltrane Martin Jr. catches for Dodgers; he is wearing "J. Martin" on his jersey this season in tribute to his mother's (Jeanson) family.

4) Albert Pujols homered twice, knocked in seven runs for St Louis is Cardinals' 11-2 win over Roy Oswalt and the Astros.

3) Mets got good first start from Livan Hernandez as they won big in Florida, 8-4; Luis Castillo was 4-4 for the Metropolitans.

2) Red Sox held off Angels 5-4 in Anaheim, but Jonathan Papelbon had to throw 39 pitches to earn the four-out save. Jason Bay hit two homers for the Red Sox, who wore new hats Friday night, ones with actual red socks on them, instead of the traditional "B".

1) Pretty good sports day today; the first full Sunday of baseball, last day of NHL season, last Sunday of the NBA, Masters final round, so lot of good action. Cubs-Brewers is the ESPN Sunday night game.

We're only 13 days from the NFL Draft; no idea what Detroit will do with the first pick, which obviously will make everything a lot more interesting. If my Rams don't take an offensive tackle, I'll be stunned.

Saturday's List of 13: Odds and ends on baseball salaries
13) Was surprised that only four Boston Red Sox are earning more than $10M this year; was more surprised that JD Drew makes $14M and is the highest-paid player on the team. Do me and my fantasy team a big favor-- save some room for Matt Holliday next year.

12) Bronx Bombers have nine players making $13M+ this year, with Alex Rodriguez getting paid $33M this season.

11) The three lowest payrolls this year: Florida $36,834,000
San Diego $43,734,200.........Pittsburgh $48,693,000.

10) Four highest payrolls: Bronx $201,449,189, Mets $149,373,987 Red Sox $121,745,999.............Detroit $115,085,145.

9) Overall, major league payrolls are down $47M this season.

8) Underpaid players: Tampa Bay's Evan Longoria, $550,000, James Shields $1.5M; Russell Martin $3.9M, Jose Reyes $6.125M.

7) Overpaid (or, isn't this a great country) players: Gary Sheffield, $14M, Jeff Suppan $12,750,000, Carlos Silva $12,250,000.

6) Travis Hafner made $11.5M LY. He knocked in 24 runs.

5) Colorado must have to overpay to get pitchers to come to Denver: Kevin Marquis makes $9.875M, Aaron Cook $9.375M.

4) Rafael Furcal turned down $40M for four years from the A's-- he is making $7.5M from the Dodgers. Go figure.

3) Minnesota only has five guys making more than $3M this year.

2) Of 27 guys listed on Oakland's roster, 17 make $420,000 or less.

1) Tampa Bay may be the defending AL champ, but they still have the lowest payroll in the AL East-- $63,313,034.

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