Without turnaround, struggling Astros could disappear in Central

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Another Day, Another Dollar
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A terrific three-team race in the National League Central is threatening to whittle down to two. The Houston Astros, after four rough days in Chicago followed by this weekend in Cincinnati, are headed back to Texas for what could be a make-or-break homestand.

The Chicago Cubs are up first for three games. Then come the Cincinnati Reds, Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres. The Cubs games are obviously crucial. The other three are teams the Astros do well against.

If the Astros don't, however, they could start fading from contention as their starting pitching continues to put strain on the bullpen and an aging offense continues to struggle.

The Astros, who once led by four games, have lost 14 of their past 24 games after Saturday's victory. They had been alone in first place since July 9.

That was before they lost three of four against the Cubs, during which the Astros hit .200, stranded 35 runners and struck out 45 times.

"The better teams you play, the more you have to take advantage of opportunities," second baseman Jeff Kent said. "The last few weeks we haven't been able to do a great job of it. We've been doing an OK job of it, but not a great job."

The Astros have problems. They're hitting .257 as a team, fifth lowest in the National League. With Roy Oswalt on the disabled list and no idea when he'll return, the Astros are going with a rotation of Wade Miller, Tim Redding, Ron Villone, Jeriome Robertson and Jared Fernandez.

They've added journeymen Dan Miceli and Rick White in an effort to reinforce a bullpen that leads the league in innings and support a rotation that has averaged 5.4 innings per start.

Compare that to the Cubs, who are going down the stretch with a rotation that includes Mark Prior, Kerry Wood, Carlos Zambrano and Matt Clement.

Chicago also has Sammy Sosa back. After a terrible start and the corked-bat incident, Sosa has regained his power stroke, batting .299 with 22 home runs and 49 runs batted in through a 51-game stretch going into the weekend.

If Sosa keeps that up the rest of the season, the Cubs are going to be tough to beat because of their starting pitching.

"The slow start is just a slow start sometimes," Cubs manager Dusty Baker said. "Nothing more than that. He still has a chance, even though he missed something like 24, 25 games, to have over 100 RBI, and he still has a chance to win the home run title. That's pretty amazing."

The Cardinals, who went into the weekend tied with the Astros for first place, know what it's like to be carried by one player. Albert Pujols singled in his first at-bat Friday night to extend his hitting streak to 29 consecutive games, four short of the club record set by Fort Worth's Rogers Hornsby back in 1922.

"He just keeps going, there's nothing surprising about it," Cardinals outfielder Jim Edmonds said. "He's got a good head on his shoulders, he works hard and he stays consistent. That's pretty much what you want in a young player."

The Cardinals can't match the Cubs starting pitching, but Matt Morris, who has been sidelined since July 22 with a fractured right hand, threw 60 pitches in a simulated game on Tuesday and could be close to returning for the stretch run.

Even with all their problems, the Cardinals rotation has a 4.42 ERA, just slightly higher than the Astros (4.40), and their starters, going into the weekend, had thrown 98 more innings.

The Astros could use some help for the stretch run, but the best they've done so far is Miceli and White, and catcher Mitch Melusky, who was signed this week out the independent Atlantic League and assigned to Double-A Round Rock. He could be called up in September.

They'll need some help. Houston will play 16 of 26 September games on the road, where they're six games under .500. The 10 home games are against the Giants, Cardinals and Brewers.

"If we don't pick it up, we're not going to get there," first baseman Jeff Bagwell said.

That makes the upcoming homestand that much more important. Everything points to the next two weeks as being crunch time for the Astros.

SPOTLIGHT ON ...

With a little fine-tuning Maddux is back on track

The Atlanta Braves were worried about their pitching as the the July 31 trade deadline approached, and they couldn't do anything about. But they are seeing a resurgence from 37-year-old right-hander Greg Maddux, who struggled through the first three months of the season.

Maddux has lost just once in his past eight starts, going 5-1 with a 3.35 earned-run average. With 11 victories going into today's start against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Maddux's chances of winning at least 15 games for a major league-record 16th straight season is no longer out of the question.

Maddux, though, is still trying to figure out what happened during the first three months of the season, when he went 6-8 with a 4.84 ERA. This is a guy who was 16-6 with a 3.05 ERA in 2002 and hasn't had an ERA over 3.57 since 1987.

"No one was used to seeing me get my [butt] kicked," Maddux said.

QuesTec was considered one possibility. Maddux has always made his living with pinpoint location and getting hitters to swing at pitches outside the strike zone. He was also known as a pitcher who usually received a generous strike zone from an umpire. That comes from hitting the exact spot the catcher set up.

Whatever it was, Maddux was forced to reshape his approach.

"There's no magic formula to follow to have success in this game," Maddux said. "You can't be afraid to try something different."

So he began experimenting with every part of his delivery, from where he held his hands at the start of his windup, to his stride toward the plate. He hasn't made drastic changes but has done some fine-tuning that has helped get him straightened out.

"When you're doing stuff mechanically wrong, but you can't feel it, you don't know what to fix," he said. "If the ball feels good leaving your hand, but it's not going where you want it to go, now you're guessing how to fix it."

Maddux still doesn't think he has completely fixed the problem, and he allowed 13 hits in five innings against the Padres on Tuesday.

But Padres outfielder Phil Nevin offered a tongue-in-cheek reason for the rough outing.

Maddux can be a free agent after the season and Nevin said, "We tried to get Maddux's numbers up so we don't have to pay him as much next year. We want him in San Diego."

SHORT HOPS

• After 30 home runs and a 5.71 earned run average, the Orioles dropped pitcher Rick Helling. Said Helling, in his usual classy manner: "They wanted to go with young guys … which is completely understandable. I knew that might be the case when I signed here, so it wasn't really surprising. I wish I had pitched better. Regardless of the young guys, if I had pitched better this probably wouldn't have happened."

• Devil Rays second baseman Marlon Anderson is making $600,000. The significance? He is the highest-paid position player in the Devil Rays' starting lineup these days. First baseman Travis Lee makes $500,000, and everybody else is $300,000 to $325,000.

• Padres reliever Trevor Hoffman, who has undergone two shoulder surgeries and missed the entire season, has started throwing batting practice again and could be activated at some point in September.

• The Pirates are 31-25 since June 14, the best record in the National League Central. They were 13-12 since trading reliever Mike Williams to the Phillies, which began their house-cleaning, and manager Lloyd McClendon said, "I guess we were supposed to go away and not compete. No. We'll show up anyway, and we'll play."

• Everybody saw former Ranger Travis Hafner hit for the cycle for the Cleveland Indians on Thursday, but Ryan Ludwick, in less than a week, had two game-winning hits in extra innings and his first two-home run game. Said manager Eric Wedge: "I like his swing, I like his power and I like his bat speed. He just needs time in the big leagues."

• Thursday's giveaway at Cincinnati's Great American Ball Park was a poster depicting Adam Dunn, who entered the game hitting .217, Austin Kearns, who underwent season-ending shoulder surgery earlier that day, and Aaron Boone, long since traded to the Yankees.

• Kent Mercker on getting traded to the Braves: "It kind of amazes me that they want me. When I found out, I got on the Internet to see the standings, and I was like, 'Wow.' They're 12 games up in the division again … I suppose it's a big enough cushion that I can't screw it up."

• Since Fred McGriff went on the disabled list last month, the Dodgers have rotated Paul Lo Duca, Shawn Green, Jeromy Burnitz, Robin Ventura and Adrian Beltre through the cleanup spot in their feeble lineup.

• Marlins pitcher Dontrelle Willis seems a lock for the National League Rookie of the Year because he's 11-3 with a 3.10 ERA and a big favorite of the national cable sports shows. The Diamondbacks' Brandon Webb is only 7-6, but he also has a 2.56 ERA, and opponents are hitting .217 off him. Opponents are hitting .241 off Willis.

• In three games this season in which Pedro Martinez of the Red Sox has gone at least eight innings, he has failed to go beyond the fifth inning in each of his subsequent outings. In those three games, Martinez has a 10.67 ERA and an 0-3 record, his only three losses of the 2003 campaign.

• Shigetoshi Hasegawa is 11-for-11 as the Mariners' closer and is working on a streak of 26 consecutive scoreless innings. But he is ready to hand the role over to Kazuhiro Sasaki, who was activated last week off the disabled list. Said Hasegawa: "Being the closer doesn't matter. Look at my fastball. It's just 89, 90 [mph]. I don't have a typical finishing pitch. I don't have a money ball."

• Amaury Telemaco hasn't pitched in the majors since 2001 because of shoulder surgery, but the Phillies are calling him up to pitch against the Cardinals tonight. He replaces fifth starter Brandon Duckworth.

• The Phillies also brought up second baseman Chase Utley, who hit .323 with 18 home runs and 77 runs batted in in 113 games at Triple A Scranton. In doing so, they're moving Placido Polanco to third base because David Bell is sidelined with a herniated disk in his back.

WILD PITCHES

Pudge on a rampage

On a table in the Florida Marlins clubhouse Wednesday was a bobblehead doll of the comic book character The Incredible Hulk. The green doll has an expression of rage on its face and both arms are bent in a fighting mode.

Pitcher A.J. Burnett took black paint and wrote on the back of the doll: "7 Rodriguez."

That's apparently a real-life portrait because Ivan Rodriguez went through a stretch where he was thrown out three times in 13 games. That equals the number of times he was thrown out in 11 years with the Rangers.

After getting tossed for the second time Aug. 3, Rodriguez said: "There's no reason for me to get thrown out. The fans come to see me and the Marlins play. They don't come to see the umpire... I regret what I said. I'm just going to keep my mouth shut, so they don't throw me out the rest of the season."

That promise lasted eight days. He was thrown out Tuesday when he slammed his facemask down after a close play at home plate went against the Marlins.

"Maybe he's shooting for the record," Marlins manager Jack McKeon said. "We need him to stay in games. We need him to calm down."

Nothing in return

The New York Yankees gave up their best (and maybe only) pitching prospect in Brandon Claussen to get Aaron Boone from the Cincinnati Reds, only to find him completely lost at the plate.

Boone is 7-for-52 (.135) with one home run with the Yankees. That's not going to sit well with many people, including the owner.

"It's all about getting started and recognizing pitches," Boone said, taking the standard position about the difficulty of changing leagues.

Another possibility is that the Yankees were deceived by Boone's power numbers in the other league.

Of the 18 home runs he hit with the Reds, 17 of them were delivered in hitter-friendly ballparks: 10 in the Great American Ballpark, one at Coors Field, four at Miller Park, and two in Hiram-Bithorn Stadium in San Juan. Boone hit only one home run without help from a short porch, at Tropicana Field.

Piazza back catching

Mike Piazza is back in the Mets lineup but still resistant to the idea of switching from catcher to first base.

He needs eight more home runs to set the all-time record for homers by a catcher, and the Mets aren't ready push him to first base. But they do need him to make a commitment to switching over in the near future, and he hasn't done that yet.

Instead, Piazza said he intends to remain behind the plate because 'I don't want Steve Trachsel or Al [Leiter] to suffer for my learning on the job."

However former Gold Glove first baseman Keith Hernandez, who is a broadcaster for the Mets, said Piazza should make the switch now.

"I do believe Mike should get his games in now," Hernandez said. "The Mets are in last place, so who cares?"

McLemore not happy

Mark McLemore, hitting .233, has been spending a lot of time on the bench since the Mariners acquired Rey Sanchez. McLemore is struggling with that.

"I want to play, period," McLemore said.

He talked to manager Bob Melvin about the problem earlier in the season but doesn't want to walk that path again.

"Why should I talk to the manager?" McLemore asked matter-of-factly. "That didn't work before."

Still, McLemore, 38, is trying to keep the needs of the team in mind.

"We've got to be concerned about winning," McLemore said. "And that's what I'm most concerned with. And I could make things easier for the manager."

Such as?

"I could hit," he said with a smile.

RANKING THE TEAMS

CLUTCH HITTING

Teams by batting average with runners in scoring position:

AMERICAN LEAGUE

Team AB H Avg.
Kansas City 1045 321 .307
Seattle 1097 335 .305
Toronto 1112 336 .302
Boston 1167 338 .290
Baltimore 1067 294 .276
Tampa Bay 1057 289 .273
Anaheim 1011 272 .269
Oakland 940 250 .266
Chicago 959 254 .265
NY Yankees 1111 288 .259
Minnesota 1135 292 .257
Texas 1028 262 .255
Cleveland 993 251 .253
Detroit 848 180 .212

NATIONAL LEAGUE

Team AB H Avg.
Atlanta 1073 321 .299
St. Louis 1113 309 .278
Colorado 1144 317 .277
Montreal 1023 279 .273
Florida 1090 294 .270
NY Mets 1000 264 .264
Pittsburgh 1029 266 .259
Arizona 1035 267 .258
Philadelphia 1122 290 .258
San Francisco 1016 259 .255
Houston 1022 258 .252
Chicago 1016 254 .250
Cincinnati 986 244 .247
San Diego 1022 251 .246
Los Angeles 955 234 .245
Milwaukee 985 238 .242

All statistics through Friday unless indicated.


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