HBT: The Phillies, an already good team on the upswing, just picked up a stud pitcher (Roy Oswalt) in with playoff experience who does really well in his new park.

HBT: The ace waived his no-trade clause and jumped to Philadelphia, which is giving up J.A. Happy and two prospects. First reaction? Win for the Phillies.

Seven points about the Roy Oswalt trade to the Phillies:

1. This is bad news for the Cardinals, Reds and any other club thinking wild card. The Phillies already had closed to 3 1/2 games of the division-leading Braves and within 2 1/2 games of the wild-card leading Giants on the strength of a seven-game winning streak that was fueled by an offensive resurgence.

With Oswalt, Roy Halladay and Cole Hamels, the Phillies have the second-best 1-2-3 rotation trio in the league (after the Giants). Count on the wild card coming out of the NL East, which should make the races in the Central and West even more entertaining.

2. This makes the 2010 Phillies better than the '09 Phillies. When Chase Utley returns, that is. The reason: Halladay, Oswalt and a back-to-form Hamels are better than Cliff Lee, Pedro Martinez and whoever was the Phillies' third-best starter last October.

3. The Phillies still shouldn't have traded Cliff Lee. No knock on Oswalt but he's not pitching like Lee. And the Phillies would have had Lee for the entire season, not two months. And ...

4. The Phillies gave up more to get Oswalt than they received from the Mariners for Lee. Quick review:

For Lee, the Phillies received OF Tyson Gillies, RHP J.C. Ramirez and RHP Phillippe Aumont. At best, Gillies projects as a Brett Gardner-type left fielder, Ramirez as a back-end rotation guy and Aumont, who knows after the way this season has gone. The 6-7 right-hander has been a disappointment, being demoted from Class AA to A where he has been pitching in relief. "He's been awful this year," a scout says. "His command is off the charts bad. He will flash you plus stuff but he can't command. I think he'll end up as a bullpen guy."

To get Oswalt, the Phillies traded LHP J.A. Happ, OF Anthony Gose and SS Jonathan Villar. Even if Gose and Villar don't pan out, Happ already has shown he can win in the major leagues, going 12-4 with a 2.93 and winning Sporting News' NL Rookie of the Year in 2009. He will make his first start for the Astros Friday night.

Gose, 19, has plenty of speed and a strong arm but is considered raw. For example, he has 36 stolen bases in Class A but has been caught 27 times. Villar, 19, was considered an up-and-comer by the Phillies. In low Class A this season, he was hitting .272 with 38 stolen bases --- but 42 errors at shortstop.

5. Trading for Oswalt doesn't hurt Philly's chances of retaining Jayson Werth. Because the Astros have agreed to pay a large chunk of Oswalt's salary --- $11 million of the $23 million-plus he's guaranteed through 2011, according to reports --- the Phillies are in much the same situation with Werth as they already were. Which means ...

6. Werth might not return next year but he figures to be with the Phillies as they make a run at history. They are trying to become the first team to win three straight NL pennants since the Cardinals in the early 1940s.

7. Joe Niekro can relax. He will remain the Astros' franchise leader in wins. Oswalt could have tied Niekro's total of 144 with one more win, and he was scheduled to start for Houston Friday night. Instead, he'll go for win No. 1 with the Phillies at Washington.

Stan McNeal is a writer for Sporting News. E-mail him at smcneal@sportingnews.com.

BALTIMORE -- Buck Showalter was hired to manage the Baltimore Orioles on Thursday, his latest rebuilding project in a major league career full of them.

Orioles president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail said Showalter's first game will be Tuesday night at Camden Yards against the Los Angeles Angels.

Baltimore had the worst record in the majors at 31-70 going into Thursday night against Kansas City and is headed toward its 13th straight losing season. The Orioles fired manager Dave Trembley on June 4 and replaced him on an interim basis with Juan Samuel.

Showalter's move was first reported by ESPN, where he worked as an analyst. His last television appearance was on Monday.

Showalter is a two-time AL Manager of the Year, winning the award in 1994 with the New York Yankees and 2004 with Texas. Both times, he had taken over teams that were struggling and helped them win.

The 54-year-old Showalter also was the first manager in the history of the Arizona Diamondbacks. He was hired well in advance and given time to put the Diamondbacks in position to contend once they started playing in 1998. He was fired after the 2000 season, and Arizona won the World Series the next year.

A former minor league player who never made it to the majors, Showalter is known for a strong will and an obsession with fundamentals, details and preparation - he would often sleep in his office when there was a day game following a night game.

Showalter also does not tolerate players acting like stars, even if they are top talents. He feuded with Alex Rodriguez in 2003, when they were together in Texas.

Showalter's last year as a manager was 2006 with the Rangers. His overall record is 882-833 in 11 years.

In Baltimore, Showalter faces an especially tough task.

The once-proud franchise has fallen on hard times since reaching the playoffs in 1997, usually finishing far behind rich AL powers Boston and the Yankees. No one pitcher currently on the Orioles has more than four victories this year and no hitter is at .300.

The Orioles interviewed former major league managers Bobby Valentine and Eric Wedge, ex-Baltimore catcher Rick Dempsey and Samuel before settling on Showalter.

MacPhail wanted to have a manager in place this season, to give the newcomer a better chance to evaluate the talent in Baltimore. MacPhail joined the franchise in June 2007.

Trembley was one of four managers to be fired this year. Kansas City's Trey Hillman, Arizona's A.J. Hinch and Florida's Fredi Gonzalez also were dismissed.

Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

We've spent so much time trying to determine if 2010 is the Year of the Pitcher or the Year of the Walk-off that we may have missed the real story line of this season in Major League Baseball altogether: It's the Year of the Prospect.

Heck, if it sounds better, we can even call it the Year of the Future. Personally, that a puts the year into an esoteric construct that, frankly, seems a bit scary. How can the here-and-now be the year of the future? Has baseball developed some sort of space-time continuum that we didn't know about?

The Year of the Prospect seems a lot safer. But I digress.

Domonic Brown is the latest super prospect to be called up to the big club.

Of the top 20 pre-season prospects in Baseball America's Top 100, 14 of them have been called up to the majors already this season. The latest? Phillies outfielder Domonic Brown, who had his MLB debut Wednesday night and promptly went 2-for-3 with two RBI and two runs scored. He also got a standing ovation from the sold-out crowd before his first at-bat. Brown was recently tabbed as Baseball America's top prospect at the mid-way point of the season. Part of the reason was because of his outstanding .327 with 20 home runs and 68 RBI in 93 games in the minors this season. Brown also had an OPS of .980, and his batting average actually improved to .346 in his 28 games in Class AAA.

The real reason, however, that Brown was listed as the top prospect in baseball at the mid-way point? Eight of the 14 guys ahead of him have already been called up. Make no mistake, Brown's call-up is a huge deal for Phillies fans, who now have the benefit of watching the future in the midst of a pennant race. Hey, maybe the present can be the future after all.

It seems that way for the Braves, too. Jason Heyward earned his way into the Atlanta outfield in spring training and earned a spot on the All-Star team after a fantastic first half. The 20-year old is batting .273 with an OPS of .845 (and an OPS+ of 128). He has 48 RBI and 30 extra-base hits on the season, including 11 home runs, and that includes a stint on the DL this season. Since Heyward's first game back from the DL earlier this month, he has raised his batting average 26 points, albeit despite a drop in his power numbers. Still, with his team in first place by 3.5 games, the future is, and has been, now for Heyward.

It seems ridiculous to have a "Year of the Prospect" discussion and be five graphs in without mentioning Stephen Strasburg. Strasburg, despite recent injury concerns that had him miss a start and get stuck on the bench for 10 days, has exceeded the Nationals' expectations. Most importantly, the buzz around Strasburg has done something nobody else has been able to do in Washington: fill seats.

Stephen Strasburg has lived up the hype.

The best thing about some of these prospects is that they don't seem to be your run-of-the-mill first-round call-ups (does that sentence break some sort of hyphen record?). Heyward is the future. So is Brown. Strasburg is the franchise in Washington (and, by the way, his teammate Drew Storen – ranked 92nd on BA's list – is no slouch himself). Mike Stanton is the "next great" superstar in Florida. Buster Posey supplanted a Molina in San Francisco, and he's not even the best catching prospect to come up this year. Carlos Santana already has begun his own era in Cleveland.

The list is way deeper than just those names, too. Starlin Castro, Ike Davis, Pedro Alvarez, Wade Davis, Mike Leake, Austin Jackson and Mat Gamel are just some of the players on the top 100 list to not only be productive in the majors already, but also be on their way to becoming outright stars and, in some cases, franchise saviors. There's a real, legit case to be made that 2010 is all about the prospects … or the future … or the prospects of a successful future.

You can read/listen to more from Dan Levy at OntheDLpodcast.com and follow him on Twitter @onthedlpodcast

MLB.com's Joe Frisaro reports the Rangers are still talking with the Marlins about acquiring infielder Jorge Cantu prior to Saturday's nonwaiver trading deadline.

Florida is trying to get two young pitchers from Texas; Frisaro reports one of them is Evan Reed, who is pitching for Double-A Frisco.

Cantu would give Texas a right-handed hitting alternative to first baseman Chris Davis, who has hit poorly since being recalled from the minors. Cantu is batting .260 with 10 home runs and 54 RBIs.

Nationals right-hander Miguel Batista is doing damage control a day after his "Miss Iowa" quip.

Batista tells The Washington Post he sent flowers to the real Miss Iowa, Katherine Connors, as a mea culpa for a quote some -- including the Miss Iowa folks -- considered disrespectful.

First, the back story: Batista pitched five shutout innings Tuesday in an emergency spot start, after Stephen Strasburg was scratched with shoulder inflammation. Afterward, Batista talked about being booed by disappointed Nationals fans as he took the mound.

"Imagine if you go to see Miss Universe, then you end up having Miss Iowa, you might get those kind of boos," Batista said. "But it's OK. They have to understand that as an organization we have to make sure that the kid is fine. You don't want to expose him out there and screw up his future."

Batista tried to clarify today. "People started booing me, and they hadn't seen me throw a pitch yet," Batista tells the Post. "It's like you hear Miss Iowa, and you say, 'Iowa?' And then you see her up close and you say, 'Wow, she's gorgeous.' "

Connors -- or at least the Miss Iowa organizers -- got wind of the Batista quote and, in a statement, fired back.

"I know I can throw a pitch or two!" Connors was quoted as saying, per the Des Moines Register. "The question is, can Miguel Batista walk the runway in a swimsuit?"

Also, Craig Heitkamp, executive co-director of the Miss Iowa Pageant, invited Batista to be a judge at the state pageant Oct. 23-24 in Ames.

Once upon a time, there was a man named Jeff. A man named Jeff and a man named Joe. Well, maybe you already know how the story begins.

The Great Mariano Rivera, the Hammer of God, had been banished to the bullpen, a failed starter. But John Wetteland welcomed him with open arms.

?You hand the ball to Buck,? Wetteland explained. ?And Buck hands the ball to me.?

?Thank God for that,? said Mo.

But on October 8, 1995, Game 5 of the ALCS, Mariano handed the ball to Buck, and Buck handed it to Jack McDowell.

A man named Jeff. Jeffrey Allan Nelson had an idea. And a man with an idea is a powerful thing. Nelson was sitting in the Mariners bullpen during this, the first night of the Yankees Dynasty. Instead of celebrating his team?s victory, Nelson lost himself in thought. If only Wetteland had followed Mariano. What if bullpen roles were rigidly defined? No way would the Yankees give up runs! Bullpen roles so defined that the Yankees can forfeit wins by adhering to meaningless statistics used only in rotisserie leagues, arbitration cases and in deciding the Rolaids Relief Man Award!! Mmm, Rolaids.

Within a month, Joe Torre replaced Showalter as Yankees manager. Another month, and Nelson was shipped to the Bronx. The rest, as they say, was history, as they say.

In 1996, Nelson pitched in a team-leading 73 games, Rivera became the best reliever in baseball, and the Yankees won their first World Series in 18 years. And Wetteland won his Rolaids Relief Man Award.

But Wetteland left New York, and here?s where the story gets interesting.

Jeff pitched his plan to Joe.

Step 1: Assemble the best group of position players and starting pitchers in baseball so that the bullpen doesn?t really matter.
Step 2: Install Rivera as closer, ensuring a dominant bullpen.
Step 3: Build a fucking bridge.

And so it was. Joe Torre commissioned the building of a bridge. The Bridge to Mariano. Jeff was the architect, but he recruited his childhood friend Mike Stanton to help him build. Together, alternating shifts, they built the bridge. And what a bridge it was. It had aqueducts and arches and triangles and suspensions and all that stuff that makes bridges not spectacularly collapse. Quieter than the Bridge on the River Kwai. More flip than the Flipper Bridge. It was the most important bridge in the history of bridges. From 1997-2000, Stanton pitched to a 4.17 ERA and Nelson pitched to a 3.08. Their pitching was fine, and not much was made of it at the time. But what a bridge! How can you blame them for being pedestrian relievers when they were so busy building a fucking bridge?!?

Alas, in 2000, Jeff was passed over from the All-Star team by Joe, and upon leaving the Yankees, Nelson bitterly decreed, ?Tear down this bridge.? Mariano was left bridgeless.

?Thank God for that,? said Mo.

The Yankees Dynasty crumbled with the departure of Nelson. Who could have known that the guy pitching 70-80 slightly leveraged innings per year could have been so influential? But as it turned out, Jeff was more than baseball. Jeff had pioneered, engineered and maintained the Bridge to Mariano. And Jeff left the bridge in ruins.

Upon Jeff?s departure, trolls could be seen patrolling the remains of the Bridge to Mariano. Yes, the trolls were the only ones who had realized the importance of the bridge. To the trolls, Jeff had been more than a decent relief pitcher. Old Nellie had also been blessed with the ability to try to pick a runner off first when there was already a runner on third! The gall! The ingenuity! There was once a dream that was the Yankees Dynasty, the trolls thought. And we fear that it will not survive the offseason. The trolls sought the bridge?s resurrection.

The Yankees acquired better relievers in those later years, having led the Majors in WPA in the decade since, but nary a relief man could pay the troll toll. Not a Flash, not a Proctor, not even the Rules Joba could recreate the Bridge to Mariano. For Farnsworth?s fastball flew forever straight. The eighth inning! And the dulcet melodies of the rotation beckoned Hughes. The eighth inning! Who can be the bridge to Mariano? The eighth inning!!

Years from now, when the Yankees struggle to find Mariano?s successor; most fans will miss the Greatest Closer of All-Time. But let this serve as a reminder; the trolls were right. Bullpen is principal to victory, yet Rivera was never key to the bullpen. It was always the Bridge to Mariano.

So we march on, analysts against the trolls, traversing an endless bridge to nowhere.

Say you?re a Major League Baseball General Manager and your long-term planning shows an opening at second base in 2012. The farm system looks bare at the position and nobody currently on the big club looks like a candidate for the job that season. The plan would be to make some calls to feel out the trade market and parallel track an approach focused on the free agent market.

A look at the 2012 free agent class shows that Rickie Weeks would have to be high on your list of acquisition targets, but now comes the hard part. How do you budget for Weeks? What will the market bear for a player of Weeks?s skill and performance history?

Rickie Weeks, to date, has underachieved. Coming into the 2010 campaign, the second overall pick in the 2003 Amateur Draft had hit .247/.351/.415 for his career. He?s struggled with the glove, his bat has been inconsistent and he can?t seem to stay on the field. Weeks has never played more than 130 games in a season.

Still, he has shown flashes. He hit .251/.422/.481 in the second half of 2007, his 24-year old season. The enormous difference between his on-base percentage and his batting average suggested Weeks might be a special player, a middle infielder with superb pitch recognition skills and excellent power. From August 1st through the end of the 2007 season, Weeks hit .273/.442/.553.

Now a darling breakout candidate, a kid on the cusp of superstardom, the incredible finish to the 2007 campaign would not carry over. 41 games into the 2008 season Weeks was hitting .184/.317/.329. With a low batting average that was unlikely to remain suppressed for a full season, Weeks once again finished strong, hitting .261/.373/.448 over final two months of the 2008 season.

So now Weeks was entering his 26-year old campaign. He had amassed a good amount of Major League service time and even if he was inconsistent, he had played at a high enough level for extended stretches that there was still plenty of hope that Weeks could fulfill his promise. Perhaps his biggest drawback early in his career, his erratic fielding had even begun to stabilize in 2008. 2009 would be his year.

Unfortunately, 2009 would be anything but Weeks?s year. He would tear the tendon sheath in his left wrist on May 18th in the midst of his best season to date. For the first time in his career he was off to a good start, hitting .272/.340/.517. Now a wrist injury would call into question how he might ever bounce back.

A player has a few opportunities to make a lot of money in Major League Baseball. A draft pick as high as Weeks receives a hefty signing bonus. A player can start off his career with enough promise to compel their employer to buy out arbitration years and maybe a free agent season or two. Sticking at second base, think Robinson Cano or Dustin Pedroia for these sorts of contracts. Players can also make a lot of money on a year-to-year basis in arbitration. And finally, guys can hit it big on the unrestricted free agent market. For Weeks, the wrist injury that took out his 2009 season also eliminated any hopes he may have had for a big contract or multiple lucrative arb years before he became a free agent. His window was closing.

Understandably given the nature of his injury, Weeks started slowly this season. On May 23rd, he was hitting .246/.338/.374. Since then, he?s been one of the very best players in baseball. Weeks is hitting .307/.407/.589 over his last 58 games while playing a decent enough second base. He homered for the third consecutive game last night. Already he has been worth 4 Wins Above Replacement (according to Fangraphs), a higher total than any other full season of his career and remember, he has been strong finisher his whole career. At 27, Weeks seems to be putting it all together.

This brings me back to the beginning of the piece. What do you make of Rickie Weeks if you need to look to the free agent market for a second baseman in 2012? He might be a top-10 player in all of baseball, he might tank, his fielding may regress to the point where he must be moved off of second as he ages, the wrist injury could pop back up in some form or another. You get the picture. Right now, he is probably the most difficult player in baseball to project.

For his part, Weeks has eight months of baseball that will in all likelihood set up the rest of his life. If he performs, he will earn tens of millions of dollars well into his 30?s. If he doesn?t, he will likely play out lesser contracts for (relatively) short money.

From a baseball analyst?s perspective, when you take into account the factors that go into projecting future performance, there is no greater enigma right now than Weeks. And from a human perspective, for anyone trying to earn as much as possible in their respective fields, how can you not relate to a guy who has faced this much adversity and is now pushing for his chance to fulfill all that promise and strike it rich? Weeks has a small window to show what he can do. Meanwhile, teams around the league have to decide what sort of commitment they?re willing to make to a player who would come with no shortage or risk or reward.

"The wrong way, but faster." Max Power

I could point to a dozen articles discussing the varying shapes and sizes of the strike zone, but when my friend Don asked whether umpires really change their zone depending on the score, I drew a blank. Factors such as the identity of the pitcher and the ball-strike count influence an umpire's process, but only so that he can do the job to the best of his ability. Yet for some reason, it's been casually accepted by some that umpires might be so unprofessional that they call a larger strike zone in a blowout to quicken the pace of the game.

Fortunately, this assertion is not backed up by any evidence, as umpires appear to call consistent zones depending on the score. Below, I plot the 25%, 50%, and 75% contour lines for called strikes based on four different score differentials. The zones are jumbled and mostly indistinguishable, so, on the whole, umpires do not call to the score.

Perhaps there are some umpires who regularly schedule early dinner reservations, but the only ump I'm willing to openly critique is the only umpire who invites such criticism: Joe West.

I graphed West's strike zone at the point where he is equally as likely to call a strike as he is a ball. I also dug up the two Red Sox vs. Yankees games that West umpired, and plotted those ball/strike calls. West, you may remember, publicly denounced the length of these games. However, I found no evidence of bias. If anything, West has squeezed batters in Sox/Yanks games and batters in blowout games (blue line).

Umps aren't alone in being accused of unprofessionalism. Weeks ago, Patrick Sullivan* questioned the commonly-held wisdom that players try to get out of the ballpark ASAP during getaway games. It's hard to believe that batter would swing at bad pitches just because they're playing in the final game of a series, but that's what I checked for.

*You can follow Sully on Twitter, if only to observe him incessantly hound the insufferable Boston media. For example, "Shaughnessy on May 9: 'Beltre is emerging as an Edgar Renteria or Rasheed Wallace, take your pick.'"

You'd be hard-pressed to find statistical evidence that umpires and players sacrifice quality for expediency.

Cliff Lee pitched another great game last night. He has rightfully received a lot of accolades for his pitching prowess this year and was the prize target when the Seattle Mariners were auctioning him off to the highest bidders earlier this month.

Let's face it, Lee is having a pretty good season, no?

Oops, that game log actually belongs to Carl Pavano. Yes, the pitcher no Yankees fan likes. Boston fans adore him because New Yorkers don't, as well as the fact that he brought them Pedro Martinez in a trade with the Montreal Expos in November 1997. I'm sure the Minnesota faithful is appreciative, too. You see, the 34-year-old righthander is 12-6 with a 3.26 ERA this year. After last night's victory, he has now won his last seven decisions, including four complete games and two shutouts.

Pavano leads the American League in shutouts (2) and ranks second in wins (12), complete games (5), BB/9 (1.19), and WHIP (1.01); third in innings (143.2); fifth in K/BB (4.26); 11th in W-L % (.667); and 12th in ERA (3.26).

How is Pavano putting up such heady stats? In a nutshell, there are two major reasons for his success.

1. Pavano ranks first in the AL in O-Swing% (the percentage of pitches a batter swings at outside the strike zone) at 36.1%. The league average is 28.8%.

2. Pavano ranks second in F-Strike% (first pitch strike percentage) at 68.3%. The league average is 58.8%.

The comparison to Lee is appropriate in that the 2008 AL Cy Young Award winner is fourth in O-Swing% (33.7%) and first in F-Strike% (70.2%).

The bottom line is that pitchers who get ahead in the count, widen the strike zone, and get batters to swing at their pitches are usually successful. In addition to Pavano and Lee, there are three pitchers who also rank in the top 10 in MLB in both of these categories: Scott Baker (35.3%, 65.4%), Dan Haren (36.3%, 66.9%), and Phil Hughes (33.6%, 65.7%). Roy Halladay (32.0%, 67.9%) and Ricky Nolasco (32.7%, 64.8%) are among the top 15 in O-Swing% and F-Strike%.

I would take those seven pitchers on my team. Don't be misled by Baker's 5.15 ERA. His Fielding Independent Pitching ERA is 4.00. The difference between his ERA and FIP is 1.15, which is the fourth-highest in the majors. Only Brandon Morrow (1.40), Francisco Liriano (1.36), and Justin Masterson (1.27) have bigger deltas. Unlike Baker (whose success is based on his strong K and BB rates), the latter three are benefiting from their low HR/9 rates with Liriano at a league-leading 0.15 (2 HR in 122 IP).

As it relates to Pavano, his .255 BABIP and 74.4% LOB are significantly better than his career averages of .306 and 69.9%, respectively, which may suggest that he could be prone for reversion to the mean over the balance of the season. However, I am not nearly as pessimistic as ZIPS (Szymborski Projection System), which forecasts Pavano to go 3-5 with a 4.88 ERA from here on out.

With outstanding control and three plus pitches (fastball, slider, and changeup) in terms of run value, Pavano should continue to have his way with hitters, albeit at a pace perhaps closer to his FIP (3.85) or xFIP (3.88) than his ERA (3.26). Working on a one-year deal for $7 million, the 12-year veteran has been a bargain for the Minnesota Twins.

A free agent at the end of the year, don't be surprised if Pavano signs a new contract that pays him more per season than the one he inked with the Yankees (4/$39.95M) in December 2004. Just don't look for him to return to the Big Apple unless, of course, it's to face the Bronx Bombers in the postseason in October.

[Thanks to ESPN for the game log and Fangraphs for the stats and rankings.]

Yesterday I wrote about some of the surprises that a B-Ref Play Index search for individual teams? all-time single season WAR leaders turns up, and limited it to the American League. Today, let?s look at the National League. Because I referenced some bad MVP decisions in yesterday?s piece, I want to make clear that I am not advocating that the MVP simply be handed to the player with the highest WAR (though you could come up with a worse system). It?s simply a solid representation of a player?s contribution and when you dig in, it can turn up some unexpected items.

As you might imagine, Hank Aaron is all over the top of the Braves list but the third best season in Braves history belongs to Darrell Evans. He hit .281/.403/.556 in 1973, good for a 9.0 WAR year, easily the very best year of his long career. The best position-player season of the last 20 years for the Braves was Marcus Giles?s 2003. I would have thought Chipper Jones.

Ron Santo Hall-of-Fame supporters looking to rile themselves up should check out the Cubs list. Santo is mixed right in there with Ernie Banks and a few others and in fact, from 1964 to 1969, no National Leaguer amassed a greater WAR total. Right behind Santo on THAT list are Willie Mays, Aaron and Roberto Clemente.

The first, second, third, fourth and fifth best seasons in Cincinnati Reds history belong to Joe Morgan. Do you get the sense that people don't quite appreciate what a great player he was? I know I expected him to be up there, but the five best seasons in the history of a franchise with no shortage of history and success like the Reds? It's incredible. Morgan bears some responsibility for a legacy that could be so much more due to his broadcasting style and occasional unfortunate commentary, but he really does seem unfairly underrated nonetheless. He's on the short short list of the very best players of all time.

He's long been a favorite of this site, but Jimmy Wynn claims 3 of the top 20 seasons in Astros history. It would be hard to identify a player whose reputation as a player is more hampered by context. He played home games in the Astrodome during a brutal pitcher's era and was a high-OBP/low-AVG type. He finished his career with just a .250 batting average but a 128 OPS+.

Adrian Beltre's 2004 is the second best season in Dodgers history. The rest of the list includes names you'd expect except for number seven. There's that guy again! It's Wynn, who hit .271/.387/.497 for the 1974 Dodgers.

Four of the ten best Mets seasons took place between 1996 and 1998, and the names blew my mind. I guess John Olerud's doesn't - he was an excellent player and his 1998 is tied for the best Mets season. Who's he tied with? Yup, Bernard Gilkey, who hit .317/.393/.562 for the 1996 Mets. Edgardo Alfonso's 1997 and Lance Johnson's 1996 rank 7th and 9th respectively. Alfonso's 2000 ranks 10th.

So Chase Utley's been pretty good, right? He's one of the best players of the last bunch of years, the very best player in fact during one of the most successful stretches in Philadelphia Phillies history. Well Mike Schmidt had NINE seasons better than Utley's second best. Ryan Howard's best season ranks 52nd in Phils history ($125 million LOL).

I have never heard of Sixto Lezcano, but apparently he had the 4th best season in Padres history. For any reader who feels inclined, I would love to learn more about Sixto if you could share memories in the comments section.

Rogers Hornsby, Stan Musial, Albert Pujols, Hornsby, Musial Pujols...check out the St. Louis Cardinals list and you get a real appreciation for the standing that Pujols already has in the game's history.

Quick Eephus Definition:

An Eephus pitch (also spelled Ephus) in baseball is considered a junk pitch with very low speed. The delivery from the pitcher has very low velocity and usually catches the hitter off-guard.

A few Famous Eephus Throwers:

Bill Lee (named his the spaceball) Rip Sewell Pascual Perez Kazuhito Tadano Steve Hamilton

Vicente Padilla is beginning to garner a reputation around the NL for his ...

I first travelled with the Mop-up Duty boys to Comerica in 2002 on the way back from Chicago after seeing the friendly confines of Wrigley Field.  It was 3 years after the ballpark had opened in 1999 and the Tigers were a terrible team that season, going 55-106.  We saw them in early August - August 5th, 2002 to be specific.  I ...

For his entire 25-year baseball career (save for one season) Héctor Espino played in Mexico.  In Mexican professional baseball, he was the premier slugger, hitting 783 home runs in his career (combining Mexican League, Mexican Pacific League and International League numbers).  This is how he earned the nickname “The Mexican Babe Ruth.”

Espino was born June 6th, 1939 in Chihuahua, Mexico.  A 5’11″ 185lbs. ...

With pitch count being a legitimate concern (and some would say offensive strategy) I wanted to see how some of the Jays starters stacked up in the stat category pitches per out.

Of course pitches per out isn’t the worlds greatest stat. It doesn’t factor in type of out (flyball, linedrive, gb, etc), what’s happening to the non-out pitches (giving up ...

They are the forgotten ones: John Mayberry, Al Woods, Otto Velez, Cliff Johnson & Jorge Orta.  In the Blue Jays’ formative years, they were the heart of an anemic lineup and carried the Jays offense on their shoulders.

In 1980 DH Otto “The Swatto” Velez,  LF Al Woods and 1B John Mayberry combined for 65 HR, 52% of the team’s total ...

The Blue Jays traded slugging prospect Brett Wallace to Houston as part of a three-team trade that saw the Phillies acquire star pitcher Roy Oswalt.

With seven shutout innings from call-up Brad Mills, the Blue Jays make it 12 for 12 against the Orioles.

Unless some out-of-its-mind organization (the Mets?) hands over its top minor-league prospect, the Jays are better off keeping Jose Bautista. However, it's a virtual certainty reliever Scott Downs will be traded by Saturday.

Between Romero?s pitching, Bautista?s bat and Escobar?s defence, the Jays covered all the bases in an 8-2 win.

Blue Jays beat up on their favourite whipping boys again as the next lineup shuffle begins.