A day after Chien Mien Wang performed capably in an extended spring training stint, The Journal News’ Peter Abraham reports the Yankees have placed both Mike Mussina and Carl Pavano on the 15 day disabled list. “Today was was a very good day for Alan and Randy Hendricks.” opines Abraham, which either means the brothers are licking their chops over the percentage they’ll get from Roger Clemens holding the Yankees up, or maybe Peter means they all went to see the Aqua Teens movie. Probably the former.
The Mets’ El Duque swears he wasn’t trying to knock down DC’s Shawn Hill yesterday, and I for one, believe him. I don’t think he was trying to serve up gopher balls to Dmitri Young, Ryan “Metal” Church or Chris Snelling, either.
Your Mound Duel Of The Day : Jose Contreras and 3 White Sox relievers combined to one hit the Indians today at the Jake, yet lost, 2-1, as Cleveland’s C.C. Sabathia struck out 10 over 8 innings. Joe Borowski pitched a scoreless 9th to earn his 5th save, as Punch A.J. stranded Jim Thome on first base to end the contest.
Two weeks does not a full season make — otherwise your Extra Innings bill would be the ripoff of the century — but based on the evidence to date, the Devil Rays have a real shot at 4th place in the AL East this season. Or would you believe a very close 5th? Tampa just broke a 4-4 deadline with the Twins, as Akinori Iwamura, Dioner Navarro and Carlos Pena came up with consecutive hits off Joe Nathan to give the D-Rays a two run advantage. Perhaps as remarkable was Jae Seo (4 earned runs, 9 hits, no walks over 7 innings) actually keeping the visitors in the game for a change.