#baseball

#baseball

Connelly Early toes the rubber in a game no one - including his mother - thought he'd be pitching tonight.

Hundreds of people, young, old and wearing matching commemorative T-shirts, just finished dancing the "YMCA" on the field at Yogi Berra Stadium at Montclair State University. Little League teams, former MLB players and local politicians laugh and clutch their gloves as volunteers hand out souvenir baseballs. Yankees organist Ed Alstrom plays "Charge!" from a stage in center field, and the crowd responds on cue.

Bryce Eldridge, less than a week into his major-league career, remains in search of his first hit. That milestone, among others, should come in due time. While still batting .000, Eldridge has shown small glimpses of the promise that made him one of baseball's top prospects. His at-bats have been good, said manager Bob Melvin of the Giants' top prospect. We'd love for him to get his first hit and get that out of the way, but he has not looked overmatched.

The book is a skillful mix of history, personal connections, and insights based on watching innumerable games as a lifetime fan. She writes about the way baseball has been affected by changes in technology, from "moneyball" math to television cameras intruding on the playing field, the shift in ownership from families to billionaires, even the way stadiums are designed, the shift from "the sun is the pitchclock," keeping the action going to one estimate that there are only 17 minutes of action in a baseball game.

Describe your favorite fragrance: I HAVE FOUR. SEA AIR NIGHT BLOOMING JASMINE, FRESH CUT GRASS, AND MY WIFE, MICHELE 3. Choose an architect to design your dream house: a) Frank Lloyd Wright b) I. M. Pei c) Walter Gropius 4. Circle your preferred fruits: Banana Apple Pomegranate Pear Cherry d) Frank Gehry Pineapple Blueberry Grape e) Louis Sullivan Other: JAMES OTHER No Plum Nectarine CONTEST

1905 - Frank Smith of the Chicago White Sox pitched a no-hitter against the Detroit Tigers in a 15-0 victory in the second game of a doubleheader. The score is the most lopsided margin of victory for a no-hitter in AL history. 1912 - Smokey Joe Wood of the Red Sox, on his way to a 34-win season, beat Washington's Walter Johnson 1-0 at Boston. The victory was Wood's 14th consecutive, two shy of Johnson's AL record of 16 straight.

These losses aren't even funny anymore. They're certainly not fun. Not only have the Twins now lost the season series to Chicago, they snapped the White Sox's 205-game losing streak when trailing after eight innings. Of course it's THIS team. On to the parody, and I don't mean this pretend masquerading as a ballclub. Man, it's a late one,The fall attendance in a downward run,'Cause we find the Minnesota Twins certainly done;The owner's a fool.

The Grid, which challenges users to Remember A Guy that fits into various different categories every day, delivered an efficient if sometimes maddening way to scratch a mental itch that has been with me for more or less my whole life. At the very least, I'll generally do one in the morning to wake my brain up, and while I'm not sure that thinking about what teams Mike Fetters played for before breakfast is right for everyone, it absolutely works for me.

The Yankees survived by inches, maybe thanks in part to catcher Austin Wells trying to blow foul a White Sox flyball to right that looked like a game-winner. "It might have (worked)," Wells said. "I hope other people were helping to blow it, too." The White Sox had the winning run on third base with one out in the 10th inning of a 2-2 game, so Boone opted for a five-man infield hoping reliever David Bednar would get a strikeout, popup or groundball right at someone.

Butler plays Hank Thompson: a former baseball player who can't play anymore; a bartender who, after some of the early events of the movie, can't drink anymore; and a devoted San Francisco Giants fan surrounded by Mets fans. As his not-quite girlfriend Yvonne ( Zoë Kravitz) says, he's "a good country boy" who calls his mom in California every day. They end every call with "Go Giants!"

"In San Diego, people know what .394 is,"

BOONVILLE, Missouri -- The softball field at Boonville Correctional Center has two fences. The first is a standard outfield fence, 275 feet from home plate, stretching from foul line to foul line. The second, about 50 feet farther, is made of taut barbed-wire strands ringed by circles of razor wire, separating the state penitentiary from the world. It's a stark reminder that the field is, quite literally, a diamond in the rough.

The Mariners reinstated Bryce Miller from the 15-day injured list and selected the contract of a fellow right-handed pitcher. Jackson Kowar and Casey Legumina were optioned to Triple-A Tacoma.

The Rockies have improved over the course of the season, but with a 36-89 record, they remain one of the worst teams in baseball.