Here's the thing though: Zito didn't suck (loud crash as you drop whatever that is that you were holding). He began with three scoreless innings, and finished with five innings pitched, giving up three hits, two earned runs and two walks, with five strikeouts. Xavier Nady had a two-run homer in the fourth; did you know he leads the NL in RBIs? Dumatrait, by the way, went 5 2/3 scoreless innings for the win, so congratulations to all of you who have him on your fantasy teams. *Crickets.* But Zito; light at the end of the tunnel. I know he can win a game if we all believe. Clap your hands if you believe!

• His Mob Name Is Joey Three Times. Remember this day, my friends, as the day that The Big Red Machine returned to Cincinnati. The Reds hit seven homers — three by Joey Votto — to claim a 9-0 win over the Cubs. The seven home runs broke the Reds' team single-game record at Great American Ball Park, and it's the most the Reds have hit in a game since setting the NL record with nine in Philadelphia on Sept. 4, 1999. Four of them came in the fourth off of Jon "Danger: Flammable Contents" Lieber.

• Bring Back The Sex Doll Shrine. Carlos Gomez hit for the cycle, which last happened to a Twins player a mere 22 years ago when Kirby Puckett did it. Livan Hernandez took a shutout into the ninth, and the Twins beat the White Sox 13-1. By the way, a friend of mine who saw the shrine said it was nothing bad, and that the only reason there was a controversy was because the Toronto media was determined to make make a big deal out of it. Beanball war! I hope the two teams harbor no ill feelings toward one another.

• Battle Of Unbeatens Results In One Being Beaten. Cleveland's Cliff Lee — the anti-Zito — improved to 6-0 in six total starts, handing Chien-Ming Wang his first loss in a 3-0 decision over the Yankees. Fun fact I learned from a blog named CastroTurf: Lee (0.81 ERA) is working on a streak of 28 consecutive innings without giving up a walk, which is the longest streak in the majors.

• Your Eephus Pitch Update. Today's victim of the eephus pitch is David Ortiz (actually Tuesday, I think). Enjoy.

The single digit protruding from his glove certainly looks like Gorzelanny may be sending a message to the umpire, the Phillies, the entire NL, or perhaps to Pirates' fans, who may be getting frustrated with the team's 10-15, last-place start. Pirates spokesman Jim Trdinich tries to explain. Meanwhile, I would invest in one or two of the dolls over at eBay, before the price goes up. It would be a nice companion piece to this in your collection.

• Zito To Watch Games From The Outfield For A Spell. With the Giants' Barry Zito being demoted to the bullpen on Monday, it's going to be a while probably until we're able to see that "I just got rocked" expression that we've all come to know and love from our favorite $126 million starter. Fortunately, Big League Stew over at Yahoo has quite a collection of those precious moments, which they share with you here. As Stew points out, at $18 million per season, Zito is the most expensive reliever in the majors, beating out Mariano Rivera by $3 million. He is also only the third pitcher ever to start 0-6. The sad thing is that the Giants would be having a strong season if Zito were decent; at 12-15 they're hardly the '62 Mets that everyone had predicted. On Monday Matt Cain broke his 10-game winless streak, 4-0 over the Rockies; SF's fourth win in six games.

• Red Bull Gives Him Wings. Something about being back in Oakland has rendered Frank Thomas lighter than air; as nimble as a forest creature. On Monday he tripled for the first time in six years (oxygen! Medic! Cough!), collecting three hits against former teammate Jon Garland, as the Athletics took the AL West lead from the Angels with a 14-2 win.

• 'The Game Has Been Called Due To The Drought'. The Orioles could have pulled ahead in the East, but instead there is a three-way tie for first. That's due to Monday's Baltimore-Chicago game ending after 11 innings, 3-3, due to inclement weather. The game will resume at the beginning of the 12th inning later this season, but no date was set. All the statistics from Monday count, including homers by Chicago's Juan Uribe and Baltimore's Ramon Hernandez.

• Arizona Mathematically Clinches NL West. Will rest starters for playoffs beginning Wednesday.

Zito was staked to a 3-0 lead over the Diamondbacks and of course lost it — pitcher Brandon Webb adding to the torment by crushing a two-run double — lasting only 3 2/3 innings in Arizona's 5-4 victory. And so, as any schoolchild knows, Webb is now 5-0 and Zito 0-5, making that oven look like a mighty inviting place for manager Bruce Bochy to lay his weary head. Zito, who has legally changed his middle name to "Tweak My Mechanics," now has an ERA of 5.61. Hey, there's only five years remaining on his $126 million contract, so there's nowhere to go but up! Here's how the McCovey Chronicles views the situation. And one of their commenters chimes in with this. Nice. Oh, that Zito quote, as told to the Chronicle:

"We came out and we capitalized on Webb's mistakes. They gave me a lead of 3-0, and I feel like shit. I let them back in the game. I gave them two runs in a shutdown inning, and then I went out in the fourth and gave up a hit to Webb."

Webb still isn't hitting .130, but his five wins match the total of the Giants' starting rotation. He allowed three runs and nine hits over six innings, striking out seven. The Diamondbacks are 15-5 and lead the NL West by six games. They never led by more than five in winning the division last season.

• Mystery Science Theater 3000. John Smoltz became the first player in baseball history to receive a congratulatory text message on getting his 3,000th career strikeout — it came from BFF Greg Maddux, LOL — but the Braves still lost to the Nationals 6-0. Smoltz is now No. 16 on the list. Willie Harris' RBI double in the second gave the Nationals a 1-0 lead, and John Lannan got the win.

• A Royal Ass-Kicking. Troubled by lackluster sales of their team calendar, the Kansas City Royals surrendered to C.C. Sabathia and the Indians, 15-1, on Tuesday. Sabathia had 11 strikeouts and was supported by 17 hits, led by Casey Blake, who was 4-for-4 with 6 RBI.

• Dustin Time, I Found You Dustin Time. Josh Beckett was scratched just before game time with a stiff neck, but the Red Sox won their sixth straight anyway, 7-6 over the Angels. Dustin Pedroia had a tiebreaking, run-scoring double in the eighth. Still, all of that is no excuse for this very disturbing image. Nightmare Fuel tag ... activate!

• Pitch Perfect. Shall we exult over the Pirates' win? Yes, let's. It's not often that one of their pitchers isn't used for batting practice, but Paul Maholm was not to be trifled with on Tuesday, holding the Marlins to one run and four hits over six innings in a 3-2 win.

You might remember last year, when Barry Bonds became the only man to ever dress up as Paula Abdul and not need fake breasts. (It was for the yearly Giants' "American Idol" contest, or something.) Well, the Giants pulled off the stunt again this year, and we have to say, this whole Barry Bonds and Barry Zito being best pals thing is starting to make us uncomfortable.

Though not as uncomfortable as Giants rookie Eddy Martinez-Esteve makes us.

Afterwards, of course, everyone went to the clubhouse and had sex with each other. Naturally.

Guys Named Barry Are Into Drag [The Big Picture]
Hide Your Eyes, Children [Deadspin]

Free-agent left-hander Barry Zito and the San Francisco Giants have agreed to a seven-year, $126 million contract, according to baseball officials.

Zito, the 2002 American League Cy Young Award winner with the Oakland Athletics, considered offers by the New York Mets, Texas Rangers and Seattle Mariners before relocating across the Bay.

And oh, no, to the best of my knowledge Barry Zito is not Japanese and/or plays small forward for the Knicks. Sorry. You see, I was just about to tell you how the New York Yankees signed Japanese pitcher Kei Igawa today, and couldn't find it in my heart to take his photo down, OK?

Giants Land Zito [Yahoo! Sports]
Igawa Inks $20M Deal With Yanks [The Staten Island Advance]

I'd have bet that something called "At Home, with Lisa Guerrero" would've been softcore porn, but it's not. The former Monday Night Football sideline reporter has a TV show somewhere in which she visits people in their homes and does friendly little features on them. Here, she visits Barry Zito.

Zito's nice enough to share a few of his habits with Guerrero, which include yelping at Seals, playing guitar in the street for change, and never ever cleaning out his refrigerator. He also gets Lisa G. to yelp like a seal, which might be something that you've spent some time thinking about on your own.

Zito's a free agent. If your favorite team is in a city that has seals, you've got a chance.

At Home with Barry Zito [YouTube]
A's offer arbitration to Zito but not to Payton [Contra Costa Times]

[A-Rod] is not the only player who is suddenly displaying national pride none of us ever knew was there. Manny Ramirez is also apparently playing for the D.R. even though he made a huge deal out of becoming an American citizen a few years ago, with running out into left field at Fenway waving an American flag and everything. [Ed. Note: We completely forgot about this.] So I guess Manny just became a citized for the tax benefits? And Barry Zito is playing for Italy - wasn't Zito raised by a couple of hippies in Southern California?

Of course everything A-Rod does is scrutinized more intensely, and to a certian extent I'lla dmit he brings that upon himself (hell, as a lifelong Yankee fan I won't tell you I am completely in love with the guy either). But to be fair the only reason he's getting heat about his comments is because he's the only player so far that has been asked to justify his decision to play for someone else besides the U.S. Go ask Manny or Zito to explain their decisions.

Excellent points, all. We love the idea of Zito hanging out with the rest of the Italian team, with blonde streaks in his hair and a soul patch, asking the other pitchers where he can find some nice spots for surfing. And then they beat his ass.

A-Rod: The World's Free Agent [Deadspin]

(The woman in the picture there with Barry, by the way, is Carolyn Gross, a motivational speaker on issues of office time management and morale boosting techniques. In case you were wondering what those people looked like.)

(Update: Zito has decided to play for the U.S. Which kind of renders this whole post moot. But hey, we like Zito's shirt.)