MY BASEBALL BIAS

‘The Hits Keep Coming’ internet radio show on Blog Talk Radio just had it’s twelfth episode on the air tonight. Thanks to Anthony and Ian for helping make everything go smoothly, as well as the conversation and taking out part of their evening to talk about the sport we love. The first was live and streaming; whereas, the second hour was just recorded after we got off the air.

A very special thanks to Sean from BlogTalk Radio for joining us tonight on the show. Sean is a White Sox fan and gave us a lot of insight on his White Sox and the AL Central.

Website: http://blogtalkradio.com/oriolepost

You can listen to the show in the BlogTalk Radio section on the sidebar. Look for The Hits Keep Coming… picture and there will be a media player for you to listen. Or you can download it to listen later on, down at the bottom of this post.

First Hour:

• Special announcement concerning our two shows also being broadcast on MVN.com radio.

• Elijah Dukes-Gary Sheffield reaching out to him and the restraining order his wife got.
• Return of Ryan Howard’s bat
• The free falling Yankees and the return of Roger.
• AROD Saga
• The free falling Milwaukee Brewers
• Barry Bonds and his not giving items to the Hall of Fame
• Ozzie Guillen’s love/hate relationship with A.J. Pierzynski

Second Hour:

• League and Divisional roundups

All of the talk today has been on AROD’s actions in Toronto this past week, but a few other things happened last night that went slightly unnoticed.

Dice-K Dicey Again

Dice-K struggled last night against the Indians and this time he didn’t use the bed he sleeps on or the floor or a tummy ache as an excuse for a bad outing. There’s no doubt that when he’s on he can be very good. He does have a tendency though to be inconsistent, relying more on his secondary pitches than his fastball to get batters out. He didn’t walk anybody last night, ap problem that has plagued him when he has an uneven performance. This time out he was hittable… very hittable. The Indians racked up 12 hits and scored six runs in 5 2/3 innings. In Dice-K’s last outing vs. Texas, he gave up five earned runs. I’ve said before that fatigue is something the Red Sox are going to have to monitor when it comes to Dice-K. Could this be the start?

• Dice-K admitted he had problems and his manager thought his biggest problem was locating his fastball.

• Josh Beckett had something dripping from his finger last night… antiseptic.

• Can anyone get Kevin Youkilis out? It remains a tough endeavor writes Gordon Edes.

• Erik Bedard threw a four hitter last night and won for the first time since April 18. The Orioles have now won five straight games but face a tough Angels team on the road this weekend.

• Orioles reliever Jaime Walker had a child and guess what he named him? Click here to find out.

• James Shields continues to be one of the most underrated pitchers in all of baseball this season. He’s now 4-0 on the season (should be more like 8-0) and shutdown a Tigers lineup that put 22 hits the previous night. Granted that was against Casey Fossum, who wouldn’t even have made the starting rotation of my 13 year-old all-star team, but seriously, Shields was dynamite once again.

• The message sent to Elijah Dukes yesterday from a court judge was very clear… stay away from your wife.

• Joe Maddon is thinking about changes to the Devil Rays starting rotation. Don’t think Joe, just do.

• Pitcher Runelvys Hernandez, who signed a minor league contract with Boston this past offseason, plans on leaving the organizations AAA club.

OK, enough links. Two AL EAST teams are in action tonight… the Orioles in LA and the Blue Jays hosting the Tigers. Tomorrow starts another Red Sox/Yankee series. Are the Yankees done in the AL EAST?

Remember that our AL EAST radio show “Beasts of the East” will air on Saturday morning at 11:00 a.m. ET. A reminder and post on that tomorrow with some exciting news.

Enjoy the games tonight!!!

This just in from Peter Abraham -

Jason Giambi was seen by foot and ankle specialist Dr. William Hamilton today and found to have a tear of the plantar fascia in his left foot. That is the tissue that connects the heel to the base of the toes.

He will go on the disabled list today. Giambi was given a walking boot to immobilize the area and will be evaluated again in three weeks.

No word as of yet who will be called up to replace Giambi on the roster.

This means lots more of Johnny Damon as the DH and Melky Cabrera in center field.

And the hits just keep on coming. No big surprise really. Giambi hit a home run the other night in Toronto then limped around the bases like Kirk Gibson.

AL EAST STANDINGS - May 31th

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Yesterday’s Results

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Today’s Games

Chicago White Sox @ Toronto Blue Jays
CHW: Buehrle (2-1, 3.86 ERA) vs. TOR: Halladay (4-2, 4.37 ERA)

Baltimore Orioles @ Los Angeles Angels
BAL: Burres (2-2, 3.27 ERA) vs. LAA: Escobar (6-2, 2.64 ERA)

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The Bias Links

• AROD was at it again last night, and I don’t mean receiving numerous lap dances at a Toronto Strip Club. He apparently yelled something at Blue Jay’s third baseman Howie Clark as he was running to third that caused Clark to bail on catching the ball and ultimately allowing a run to score. AROD said he yelled “hah”, the Blue Jays said he yelled “mine”. Either way, SS John McDonald was not happy with Rodriguez and manager John Gibbons called it un-Yankee like and “bush league”. The two teams meet again in the middle of July.

• AROD also refuses to discuss his off the field affairs and stresses that it won’t become a distraction for the team.

• Roger Clemens is chomping at the bit to return on Monday night for the Yanks against the White Sox.

• Richard Griffin says that AROD’s private life is none of our business.

• Joe Torre’s reaction to AROD’s off-field exploits.

• Jesse Litsch, who was knocked around last night against the Yankees, has been demoted, but not because of his recent poor outings.. The Blue Jays needed to make room for Roy Halladay on the roster who will start tonight against the White Sox.

I’ll get to some more links later for Boston, Baltimore and Tampa.

From Peter Abraham -

Brian Cashman admitted today that Phil Hughes has a Grade 3 ankle sprain and will need 4-6 weeks of rehab time before he gets back on the mound.

Given that will take Hughes an additional four weeks to get his arm ready to pitch, we’re looking at 8-10 weeks before he is back on the mound. And that’s assuming everything goes well.

So don’t expect Hughes back before mid-August. A Grade 3 sprain is the most serious. That is on top of a Grade 2 hamstring year.

Tough break for the kid. If the Yankees continue to slide however, it may be a blessing in disguise. Instead of running him out there every fifth day, Hughes can just take his time and make sure he comes back 100 percent.

This does reopen a trade possibility for a pitcher now in my opinion. Jon Lieber would be someone to target so we’ll see what comes of that.

Note: SHOW IS AT 8 PM TONIGHT

Bloggers Anthony of the Oriole Post and Jason of My Baseball Bias and I produce an hour long baseball show every week called, “The Hits Keep Coming” on Blog Talk Radio.

If you’d like to call in, the phone number is 718-664-6564 or you can send us an instant message if you use AOL IM at hitskeepcoming20. Join us at: http://blogtalkradio.com/oriolepost at 8PM Eastern Time tonight!

Here’s what we’ll be talking about tonight:

• Elijah Dukes-Gary Sheffield reaching out to him
• Return of Ryan howard’s bat
• The free falling Yankees and the return of Roger.
• AROD Saga
• The free falling Milwaukee Brewers
• Barry Bonds and his not giving items to the Hall of Fame

Buster Olney sees a lot of Wade Boggs in Kevin Youkilis -

If Wade Boggs wasn’t in the Hall of Fame, you could say that Kevin Youkilis is a right-handed Wade Boggs, because of all the similarities between the two. Neither was ever considered a top prospect, neither is blessed with what scouts would call a good baseball body, and neither Boggs nor Youkilis has ever been confused with Rickey Henderson or Jose Reyes for foot speed.

And Youkilis grinds through his at-bats, likes Boggs once did. He works the count, fouls off tough pitches, makes opposing pitchers sweat. He gets a lot of cheap hits — flares and dinkers and dunkers — in the same way that Boggs and Tony Gwynn and Derek Jeter get a lot of cheap hits, the classic sign of good hitters. Now Youkilis has a 21-game hitting streak, nine consecutive multihit games, and he is hitting .358.

I couldn’t agree more. I finally bit my lip and added him to one of my fantasy teams last night. He’s fun and frustrating to watch at the same time.

Now the question needs to be asked:

Could he become a future Yankee like a few other famous Red Sox?

Still Having a Good Time Amidst a Losing Streak

What a way to start the morning. Coffee, toast and A-ROD with a mistress.

The Yankees are on a five game losing streak, have lost 13 out of the their last 18, are currently 14.5 games behind the Red Sox in the AL EAST and now this -

NY POST STORY by Dave Mangan

I don’t really have much to say and could care less if A-ROD had dinner with a “supposed mistress”, went to a strip club and then took off to the Four Seasons for what was no doubt a few innocent games of Scrabble. However, he plays on a really bad Yankee team at the moment and every one will be gunning for you, especially the NY papers. If anything, it was an extreme lack of judgement. A-ROD had “no-comment” when asked about it by the Post.

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Welcome to the Club, Youk!

Kevin Youkilis now has a blog.

He hasn’t written much yet, but he wanted everyone to know that he’s faster than most people give him credit for (Youkilis hit an inside-the-park home run the other night against the Indians).

I have a love/hate relationship with Youk. He plays for the Red Sox so right there he’s got a strike against him. What I do admire though is his ability to work pitchers. He’s a hell of hitter and his defense ain’t that bad either.

Let me just clarify, he does play for the Red Sox and I do still hate him even though I like him.

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Stay Away for a Year. Better Yet… Stay Away Forever

This news just came out of Tampa -

PLANT CITY – A Hillsborough County judge granted a one-year restraining order to NiShea Gilbert, the wife of Tampa Bay Devil Ray Elijah Dukes.

The order means Dukes, who waved his appearance and was not present in the Hillsborough Circuit Court in Plant City, cannot contact his wife for one year.

As part of the ruling, handed down by Circuit Judge Judge William Levens, Dukes is ordered to undergo psychological evaluation before he is allowed to see his children. Also under the order, Dukes is not allowed to possess weapons.

“I’m just happy that I’ve got it for a year, and I can move forward,” Gilbert, 26, said outside the courtroom.

Gilbert said her life lately had been “hell” and that she hopes that the psychological evaluation will get Dukes the help she feels he needs.

“He just needs to get help so he can be a normal, functioning citizen,” she said.

Gilbert said she wasn’t surprised Dukes wasn’t present.

“He never shows up to court,” said Gilbert, accompanied by her mother Mary, who added the last few weeks had been difficult

“I’m just glad it’s all over,” Mary said.

Gilbert’s attorney, Dale Gabbard, said the next step will be arranging a hearing to determine child support and alimony.

Here’s hoping this lady can get on with her life.

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Other News and Links

• Dan Shaughnessy is back on the Red Sox bandwagon. Surprised? Nah… Shaug’s was just waiting for them to get 20 games over .500.

• Even though I’d like to give Josh Beckett one of my fingers, he was masterful last night. SPECIAL TREAT LINK - Terry Francona video if you click here.

• Joel Sherman thinks that no moves (Todd Helton or Richie Sexson) are good moves right now for the Yanks.

• A decision on Jason Giambi could come today from the commish.

• Red Sox prospect Jacoby Ellsbury has a sore back and Manny Delcarmen was optioned back to AAA when Josh Beckett was activated.

• Don Zimmer might be the last man alive that thinks the Yanks can catch the Sox.

AL EAST STANDINGS - May 30th