> Roger Clemens held the Twins to a double and a single in a 5-1 Yankee win, but what's telling here is *how* he did it -- just 4 strikeouts, with 100 pitches in 8 innings, retiring his last 15 faced.
It's Win #350 for the Rocket, and note also that the Yankees felt compelled to use Rivera in a non-save situation, rather than Flaming Proctor. (Of course, after watching the A's handle the Yankees on Saturday and Sunday, Mariano was well rested.)
Meanwhile, Alex Rodriguez left the game after a collision at first, from a sprained right hamstring. Even when the Yankees win this year, they lose. With the Red Sox beating the Rangers, the lead remains 10.5, and the wild card is 8.5.
For the Twins, they've scored just 1 run in their last 18 innings, having been shut out last night by Jeremy Bonderman and Doug Jones in Detroit. Justin Morneau just doesn't look right following his injury.
> The Cubs win again, jumping early and often on the Nats. The Brewers kept pace by pounding those always comical Pirates, but the terrific June continues for Chicago, bringing them above .500, and 6.5 games out of the division, 5 games out of the wild card.
It was the 7th win of the year for Ted Lilly, who, along with Jason Marquis, has managed to make the Cubs off-season drunken sailor spending spree not look quite so, well, drunken.
> The Indians continued to roll, with a 10-2 crushing of the Devil Rays. Fausto Carmona's 9th win came after his worst outing of the year, and keeps the Tribe 2 games up in the Central.
> The Mets became the latest team to go to Colorado and get their noses bloodied, the victims of an 6-2 beatdown. Tom Glavine didn't like the altitude in a 6-run third inning, and is now just 7-6 with a 4.39 ERA is his Death March Year to 300 Wins. Jason Hirsh shrugged off an 5+ ERA and 8 home runs in his last three starts to get the win, and also had 2 RBIs.
> My pick to win the AL Central... is now just a few games out of, gulp, last. The White Sox scored 6, but Bobby Jenks blew the save, and the Orioles took the win.
And in other news... I'm just about ready to begin projectile vomiting over the idea that we should all be putting our brains in a box and celebrating Griffey and Bonds in the All-Star Game.
I don't care that both are hitting again this year. I don't care that they're got monstrous home run numbers. I don't care that we're supposed to be telling our kids about them.
One is a regrettable human being, a terrible team mate, and a likely perjurer, independent of the obvious roid/HGH/blood of young boys cheating.
The other is a guy who threw a perfect career away to chase money, and got his karmic comeuppance with a string of injuries and a franchise that hasn't been relevant for the entire time he's been there.
We don't have to forget about all of that because they're having good years. In fact, it's kind of more important to remember now.
That doesn't make us cynical mean blogger people. That makes us people who decide the worth of athletes beyond last week's box scores. (Which is, of course, more than we can say for the World Wide Lemur.)
