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By Gary Armida

It’s been awhile since we’ve done a Fungos column. As baseball is midway through the “Dog Days” of August, pennant races are heating up. The NL East, AL Central, and the NL West leaders are seperated by just one game. Fans are watching in amazement at CC Sabathia (see above article), the Rays staying in first despite losing the core of their team, and the Yankees offense just absolutely tanking when it counts most. Yes, the 2008 season has been good to the fans thus far with the promise of more drama to come. Let’s take a quick look around the world of baseball

• The Dodgers are in full “win now” mode. This time, they added future Hall of Famer Greg Maddux to their rotation. The crafty righty will take the spot vacated by Brad Penny who has been ruled out as a starter for the remainder of the season. The 42 year old is just 6-9 this season, but that is a result of pitching for the Padres. In 153.1 innings, he’s thrown to a 3.99 ERA and a solid 1.220 WHIP. He averages close to 6 innings a start so the Dodgers’ bullpen will need to give innings on most nights. Maddux represents stability to the Dodgers and will start this Friday. Manager Joe Torre said that Maddux will have a spot in the rotation for the rest of the season (no surprise here). Although he has a 5.77 ERA outside of PETCO Park, look for Maddux to be rejuvinated by gaining 16 games in the standings. The Dodgers are streaking and let’s give credit to GM Ned Colletti for addressing the weaknesses of the team when they were languishing below .500 for most of the season. With Manny Ramirez, Casey Blake, and now Maddux, the Dodgers have reinforced their already talented, albeit inconsistent lineup.
• That scream you heard was the shouts from Queens when Mets fans are coming to grips with the reality that Billy Wagner will not be coming back any time soon. His rehab has been shut down and he is out indefinitely. The Mets lead the NL East by one game over the Phillies, but have blown numerous leads over the past two weeks. As we’ve discussed previously, they are toying with the idea of taking one of their starters and putting them in the closers role. If that happens, look for John Maine to fill that spot. However, with the bullpen reinforced with the undervalued Luis Ayala (who got two big outs last night), manager Jerry Manuel can mix and match as he has done over the past few games. If that stays the course, look for Pedro Feliciano and Joe Smith to get ninth innings duties based on matchups. The Mets have the horses to win in the regular season, but will need Wagner back if they want to go deep into the playoffs. We’ll keep you posted on the happenings.
•  Staying in New York, the Yankees better hope that they are at rock bottom. With an opportunity to beat their nemesis, AJ Burnett, the Yanks fell 2-1, moving 11 games out of first in the East and 6 games behind the Wild Card leading Red Sox. To rub salt in the wounds, they had their opportunity late when Alex Rodriguez failed to run hard out of the box and was thrown out at second when attempting to get the double. Johnny Damon dropped a somewhat routine flyball in centerfield, which will have all of New York buzzing about the return of Melky Cabrera. Listen, Damon is no longer a great outfielder, but he will make that catch 9 out of 10 times. They need his offense. Hideki Matsui is attempting to come back and help the team rather than have surgery. Kudos to Matsui for caring that much when nobody would have thought less of him if he had the surgery. He’ll DH the rest of the way which will force Jason Giambi and Damon to play the field more often.
• The Red Sox are having a scare of their own with their inconsistent ace, Josh Beckett. They have pushed his start back to next Tuesday (against the Yankees) because of lingering numbness in his hand. While this could be minor, Beckett has been relatively healthy over the past three seasons after gaining the reputation of injury prone in Florida. The Red Sox have recovered well from the Manny Ramirez fiasco, but losing Beckett for an extended period of time will put a ton of strain on Diasuke Matsuzaka and Jon Lester. If they do lose Beckett, they can still make the playoffs because of their depth, but a post season run is unlikely without the ace who steps up during important games.
• The Rays are having problems besides the injury bug. BJ Upton, the talented centerfielder, failed to run hard to second and was tagged out by a hustling Mark Teixeira when Upton thought he hit a homerun. This is not the first time Upton has exhibited this type of behavior, as Upton has been benched two other times for similar behavior. Upton is talented but with a .269/.380/.398 line, he is no superstar. With the Rays losing their best two players, Upton needs to pick up the slack. Sunday was not a good start. Manager Joe Madden left him in the game this time, but that is more of a product of necessity than anything else. It is mistakes and behavior like that which causes teams to collapse during September.
•  While the Brewers are riding the CC train, their most important offensive player, Ryan Braun, has sat out the last couple of games with a recurrence of his rib injury. The club has stated that it is just tightness, but it could possibly be worse. Braun is the team leader in homeruns, RBI, batting average and slugging percentage. If Braun cannot heal the Brewers will have trouble scoring runs.
• The Royals signed Kip Wells, who was recently released by the Rockies. Why? I don’t know. In all seriousness, he’ll be used out of the bullpen and help eat some garbage innings for the Royals young pitchers. It’s a useless signing really. Small market teams cannot waste money like this, even if it’s just $90 thousand dollars.
• The Texas Rangers announced that Chris Davis, the powerful rookie with 12 homeruns, will now move to third base on a full-time basis. Davis has played third during his minor league career, but had been the starting first baseman since his call up. Moving Davis to third not only gives him a boost in value, considering his position, but also signals the end of Hank Blalock at third base (at least for the Rangers). Perhaps Blalock can be a first baseman or a designated hitter as he still can swing a bat well.

That’s it for today. Have a great day. Enjoy the baseball.