Climbing the Ladder with the National League 7/13/2008
by Scott Powers
NL set for 79th All-Star Game in New York
The votes are in. The rosters are set. MLB is ready for the 2008 All-Star Game, held at Yankee Stadium in its final year.
First on the agenda is the State Farm Home Run Derby on Monday night, featuring a young slate of sluggers.
Lance Berkman, Ryan Braun, Dan Uggla and Chase Utley will represent the NL. Berkman is by far the most experienced, with more than double the career homers of any other contestant and three Home Run Derby appearances under his belt.
That and Berkman’s white hot first half are why he has the best chance to win the derby. Look for him to do something like what Bobby Abreu did in 2005, hitting a rhythm to crush 24 home runs in one round.
It remains to be seen who will start the game for the NL, but it won’t be Edinson Volquez, who threw 114 pitches in defeating the Brewers on Saturday. Nor will it be Tim Lincecum, who will face the Chicago Cubs this afternoon.
The Cubs, once again the top team in baseball, are well represented, sending eight players to New York City. Before the Final Vote, no other team had more than two representatives.
The Cubs could have a stake in who wins the game as they look primed for a World Series run.
They were dealt a blow Monday when the Milwaukee Brewers traded for the top pitcher on the market, C.C. Sabathia, whom the Cubs were rumored to have targeted.
But the Cubs countered by getting Rich Harden from the Oakland Athletics. Harden went 5.1 scoreless innings and struck out 10 in his Cubs debut.
The Cubs won five of six games this week to stretch their lead over the St. Louis Cardinals to five and a half games.
The outlook of the NL West hasn’t changed much. The Arizona Diamondbacks are at .500, but their competitors keep losing, maintaining a solid deficit.
The San Francisco Giants, in particular, have struggled. The offense can’t seem to get it going, and they’ve lost six straight going into today.
The Los Angeles Dodgers, however, are right there with the D’backs. Unfortunately, they won’t get Rafael Furcal’s 1.045 OPS back until September.
It’s the NL East that’s interesting.
The New York Mets have won eight in a row to climb back near the top of the division.
The Mets are now tied with the Florida Marlins and half a game behind the Philadelphia Phillies. Their wins came against the Phillies and the struggling Giants and Colorado Rockies.
As is often the case in hot streaks, the pitching staff is to thank, having allowed just four runs in the past five games, including a combined one-hit gem Saturday.
The Florida Marlins put together a four-game win streak heading into today’s action. As long as All-Stars Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla continue to hit the cover off the ball, that lineup can continue to produce runs, and the young rotation will have leads to work with. The Marlins could continue to pester the Phillies and the Mets into September.
As if the Washington Nationals’ season could get any worse, they’ve lost eight of their last 10. It would be time to look into whom they might trade at the deadline for prospects, but they don’t have any star players.
Only Christian Guzman is putting together a good season, sporting a .313 batting average at the top of the order.
He’ll be the Nat’s’ lone representative in the All-Star Game, in which the NL might just have enough star power to win for the first time since 1996.
