mlb Page 388 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Pablo Sandoval Smashed Three Home Runs In His First Three World Series At-Bats Tonight
The only men to ever hit three home runs in a single World Series game? Babe Ruth, Reggie Jackson, Albert Pujols ... and now Pablo Sandoval. The San Francisco Giants are now up 6-0 in the fifth inning of Game 1, having already knocked out Justin Verlander. And it's only the second three-HR game ever...

Your World Series Game 1 Open Thread
The World Series is upon us! Game 1 starts at 8 p.m. EDT, and this is where you can yak about the game as it unfolds before your eager eyes. Tonight's pitching matchup is Barry Zito vs. Justin Verlander, which means that you will be simultaneously soothed by Zito's totally chill curveball and elect...

The Last Center Fielders Standing Are Two Damn Good Ones
You've assuredly heard lots about the players who will be most important in this World Series. Buster Posey, Justin Verlander, Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder, Matt Cain, Pablo Sandoval—they were deserved all-stars in July, and they've been talked to death this October. But why think of the World Ser...

The Pirates Lied About A Prospect Who Got Hurt During Some Team-Sanctioned Military-Type Exercises
When details got out about the Pittsburgh Pirates putting prospects at their fall instructional league through Navy SEALs-type training last month, it was easy to point and laugh. That pointing and laughing was made even easier because, around the same time the SEALs regimen was being reported, an e...

Grantland's Jonah Keri Picks The Giants In Seven; ESPN's Jonah Keri Likes The Tigers In Five
Today on Grantland, a pair of World Series preview pieces: Rany Jazayerli on why the Tigers could win, and Jonah Keri on how the Giants could take home the championship. Both men predict the series will go seven games—Jazayerli takes Detroit; Keri, San Francisco. Also on ESPN.com: a list of experts'...

Someone In Detroit Wants To Trade His House For World Series Tickets
Here are two things that Detroit has:...

The Giants Are Headed To The World Series Without One Of Their Best Players Because They Are Stupid
The San Francisco Giants will play in the World Series with a stupid, self-inflicted handicap. They will be without Melky Cabrera, their best regular-season hitter. Cabrera, whose 50-game performance-enhancing-drug suspension just ended, was left off the Giants' postseason roster for the dumbest of ...

The Marlins Have Fired Ozzie Guillen
The Marlins have fired manager Ozzie Guillen, reports everybody, after a hilarious 69-93 season that included a five-game suspension, a feud with his closer, and a premature reality-show cancellation, and fell short of everyone's expectations. The Marlins were apparently unaware of Guillen's body of...

The Giants' Pennant Run Ended Right As Rain
How many LCS clinchers, not involving your team, do you actually remember? Carlos Beltran standing stock-still, Aaron Boone going deep, Sid Bream's slide, Chris Chambliss's homer...and that's probably about it. It's probably fair to add last night's Giants win, a 9-0 drubbing that was decided by th...

"3 words... FIRE MIKE MATHENY": The Best Fans In Baseball Are Having A Major Meltdown
Cardinals fans are known the world over as the best fans in baseball. This is, of course, indisputable but it makes what has to be a fandom-wide psychotic break after watching their beloved Cardinals get shellacked by the Giants in Game 7 of the NLCS troubling indeed....

The San Francisco Giants Are Going To The World Series
The Giants trounced the Cardinals by a score of 9-0, completing an impressive comeback from a 3-1 series deficit and managing to kill the previously immortal St. Louis Cardinals. Even a team as resilient as this Cardinals team can only be carried so far by the likes of Daniel Descalso, Pete Kozma, ...

Hunter Pence Had Three Hits On One Swing
OK, so technically that's impossible, but look at this thing! In the bottom of the third, as Hunter Pence's bat explodes in his hands, the ball makes its way down the barrel of the bat, hopping all the way like some kind of concussed bouncing Mickey Mouse head in a Sing-Along Song. Pence wound up w...

Aural History: How An Old Lady In Brooklyn Ensured That The "Shot Heard 'Round The World" Call Was Heard 'Round The World
It was Oct. 3, 1951, and the New York Giants were about to lose the pennant to the Brooklyn Dodgers two games to one in a best-of-three series. In Brooklyn, a 26-year-old travel agent asked his mother to flip a switch on his reel-to-reel machine, and few moments later at the Polo Grounds in Upper ...

Your NLCS Game 7 Open Thread
There are not many words to describe a Game 7. "Awesome" would be a good place to start and finish. The Cardinals jumped out to a 3-1 series lead, riding whatever Tony LaRussa magic potion/moonshine he left in the office but the Giants have battled back to force this decisive game. Joe Buck and Tim...

Lil Wayne Sang "Take Me Out To The Ballgame" At Last Night's Cardinals-Giants Game
A lady in a ridiculous hat singing "God Bless America" wasn't the only crazy thing to happen during the seventh inning stretch last night. The San Francisco Giants also welcomed Lil Wayne onto the field, where he led the crowd in a less than rousing rendition of "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."...

Here Is A Terrible Performance Of "God Bless America" By A Woman Wearing The City Of San Francisco On Her Head
The Beach Blanket Babylon is one of this country's longest-running and best-known musical revues, and features performers who wear ridiculous hats. These performers regularly make appearances singing at San Francisco Giants games, so nobody was too surprised when the company's Misa Malone arrived ...

The Marlins Ate $8 Million Worth Of Salary To Get Rid Of "Bitter Pariah" Heath Bell
The Miami Marlins traded Heath Bell away to the Arizona Diamondbacks—well, gave him away and promised to pay part of his salary, more than traded—and the Miami Herald dispatch announcing his departure made sure to give him a good kneecapping on the way out....

The Red Sox Pull Off Trade For John Farrell, Will Get "Marginal" Piece Not Named John Farrell In Return
John Farrell will be managing the Boston Red Sox next year and Mike Aviles (reportedly) will be an infielder for the Toronto Blue Jays. The decision to trade an actual professional athlete for a guy whose primary responsibility is to put professional athletes in a certain order for hitting purposes...

Missouri Man Holds Up Bank, Yells "Go Cards" As He Makes His Getaway
Fans of the St. Louis Cardinals are just the best in baseball, aren't they? While everyone else robs banks in the greater St. Louis area in such a negative, surly way, Cardinals fans do it with gusto and spirit and enthusiasm....