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The Brian Sabean ? Fresno Bee: "Grizzlies catcher Buster Posey, one of baseball's top hitting prospects, reached base four times, going 3 for 4 with two runs scored. He also was hit by a pitch." The Ned Colletti ? Dylan Hernandez of the Los Angeles Times: "Chad Billingsley provided the Dodgers with their first non-awful start of the season ? and was, in fact, quite brilliant at times on his way to pitching 5 1/3 innings of one-run ball. Billingsley encountered trouble in the third inning, when back-to-back singles put men on first and second with one out. He forced Andrew McCutchen to ground into an inning-ending double play. An inning later, Billingsley loaded the bases by walking former teammate Delwyn Young, but struck out Andy LaRoche and pitcher Paul Maholm to preserve the Dodgers? 2-0 advantage." The Dan O'Dowd ? Steve Foster of Inside The Rockies: "Colorado Rockies pitching prospects Jhoulys Chacin and Christian Friedrich both pitched solid games in their season debuts Thursday. Chacin, starting for the Triple-A Colorado Springs Sky Sox on the road in Tacoma, pitched five scoreless innings and allowed one hit and one walk while striking out six. He threw 83 pitches and took the win as the Sky Sox shut out the Rainiers 2-0. Friedrich, starting for the Double-A Tulsa Drillers, pitched six innings and allowed four hits and a walk while striking out five in a 7-0 loss against Corpus Christi." The Josh Byrnes ? Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic: (Fourth starter Rodrigo) Lopez said he has gradually inched closer to a full recovery from Tommy John surgery in August 2007. He said in spring training that he felt "really close" to where he was before surgery. Lopez never was an overpowering pitcher, but he had a 3.57 ERA (2002) and 3.59 ERA (2004) while pitching in the AL East for Baltimore." The Jed Hoyer ? Gaslamp Ball: "Chad Huffman was lost off the waiver wire. The Padres were hopeful that he'd get through waivers.? He's a good right handed hitter.? They exposed him to waivers because they wanted to protect their pitching depth.? They had to put someone on waivers to add Matt Stairs.? Hoyer thinks Towers probably had something to do with Huffman being picked up by the Yankees.? Aaron Cunninham's track record is much more complete than Huffman.? Having multiple right handed hitting corner outfielders is not a good use of the 40 man roster." The Doug Melvin ? Tom Haudricourt of the Journal Sentinel: "The Brewers use a statistical-based formula to assign salaries for pre-arbitration players and offered Gallardo $450,000. Gallardo and Witt thought he merited more after coming back from a knee injury that forced the native of Mexico to miss most of the 2008 season. In 30 starts last season, Gallardo went 13-12 with a 3.73 ERA, allowing only 150 hits in 185 2/3 innings while logging 204 strikeouts. When the sides couldn't agree on a salary for 2010, the Brewers renewed Gallardo at their figure. Renewals sometimes lead to hard feelings, such as with first baseman Prince Fielder in 2008. But after taking a break of five or six days, the sides began talking about a long-term deal for Gallardo." The Jim Hendry ? Joe Aiello of View From The Bleachers: "For the second straight night, the starting pitching was outstanding. (Randy Wells) eventually slot in the rotation as the # 4 starter. To get a 6 inning performance that didn?t include a single run allowed is way more than you can ask for out of your fourth starter. He started a little shaky from a pitch count standpoint and I worried that he might not get into the 6th inning before he would hit 100 pitches. He settled in and got through the 6th to pick up not only the win, but also a much deserved quality start that included three double plays. The John Mozeliak ? Dan of Viva El Birdos: "While I have serious reservations about Ryan Franklin, Closer, I can't say that I have a problem with Mo's strategy once I started looking at it. l think he is right to value relievers in the manner that he has, and that this philosophy toward roster construction is another piece in the puzzle of how the Cardinals can afford to keep big ticket stars like Matt Holliday, Albert Pujols, and Adam Wainwright, with a mid-market-ish payroll. You do this by not paying the bullpen over $16MM to give you half that in value." The Walt Jocketty ? John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer: "Bronson Arroyo has never missed a start - not in Little League, not in high school, not in the minors. But his next one may be in jeopardy. If he can't go - and that's a large if - it could open a spot for Aroldis Chapman, the Cuban left-hander who was sent down after suffering back spasms." The Ed Wade ? Bernardo Fallas of the Houston Chronicle: "Make no mistake: That is confidence ? not arrogance ? emanating from (Bud) Norris, at 25 the youngest of the Astros' starters. The type of confidence that, combined with what teammate Geoff Blum describes as ?electric stuff,? propelled the upbeat California kid's rapid ascent to the majors after he was selected in the sixth round of the 2006 draft. Norris knows a thing or two about firsts. Last year, he became the first pitcher to win his first three starts in an Astros uniform since Roger Clemens won seven in a row in 2004. In doing so, Norris also became the first rookie in Astros history to win his first three career starts. He finished 6-3 with a 4.53 ERA in 11 games (10 starts)." The Neal Huntington ? Dejan Kovacevic of the Post-Gazette: "Starter Paul Maholm showed swing-and-miss stuff at times, but he also was hit with authority in allowing four runs and six hits over his six innings. The offense produced eight hits, but 11 runners were stranded for a total of 30 in the series. Most glaring in this one: LaRoche looked at a third-strike fastball with bases loaded and one out in the fourth. Defensively, shortstop Bobby Crosby committed two throwing errors, and first baseman Garrett Jones mishandled a ground ball. There were no fewer than three other miscues, too." The Frank Wren ? Caroll Rogers of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "Hanson came out firing hard in his 2010 debut, hitting 98 mph on the radar gun in the first inning, but the Cubs fed off some of that velocity, at least Colvin and Byrd did. ?Today might have been one of those days where I might have been a little too good,? Hanson said. ?I wish I could have had a little better command.? Hanson walked three, including pitcher Randy Wells in the second inning. He fell behind in the count on both home runs. He had thrown 63 pitches by the end of the third inning and 100 with one out in the sixth, when Bobby Cox came for the ball." The Omar Minaya ? MetsToday: "There are two main reasons I prefer to see (Jose) Reyes at leadoff. First, because after the first inning, the leadoff spot isn?t necessarily the leadoff spot any more ? unless the pitcher / #9 hitter makes the third out of a future inning. And actually, the #1 spot in the order often is an RBI opportunity, because the pitcher is called on to bunt a runner into scoring position. I like Reyes hitting with men in scoring position ? he seems comfortable in that situation and the numbers support it (.291 career avg. through over 660 ABs). Further, I don?t know that Reyes would steal as many bases from the two-hole, with David Wright hitting behind him." The Ruben Amaro ? Darryl Grumling of the Mercury: "(Tyson) Gillies, the Reading Phillies' promising center field prospect, made his "Baseballtown" debut a solid one in Thursday night's Eastern League opener against Portland. Batting leadoff, the 21-year-old speedster reached base and eventually scored in his first plate appearance, then drove in a run in his second trip to the plate." The Larry Beinfest ? Jeff Mills of the News-Record: "(Chad) James hasn't thrown a pitch in a game that counts yet, and Baseball America already lists him as the third-best prospect in Florida's farm system behind power-hitting outfielder Mike Stanton and first baseman Logan Morrison. "It's all so new," James said. "I'm just trying to take it all in, this first experience, and get used to professional ball. I'm going to find out what a long season is like. I've never played 140 games in a row, every day." Hardly. James was 9-1 with a 1.36 ERA and more than 100 strikeouts as a high school senior. Not bad for a converted outfielder and leadoff hitter." The Mike Rizzo ? Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post: "Since 2007, the Phillies have beaten the Nationals 41 times in 57 games, a .719 winning percentage; only the Padres (13-5, .722) have a better winning percentage against the Nats over that span. The Phillies have ascended to the top of the National League and the Nationals have sunk to the bottom, and their games against one another have served as both a reason and reflection." Chris Reina is the executive editor of RealGM. Click here to follow his Twitter feed. |
Each NL team is represented below, marked by a not-so-subtle nod to the general managers we focus so much of our site's attention towards and our namesake.