Vance Worley Shuts Out O's for Four Innings in Pirate Win; Chris Denorfia, Travis Wood Lead Cubs to 4th Straight Victory

Players of the Day for Sunday, March 15, 2015

Grapefruit League

Worley: 4 scoreless

Pittsburgh had one of the best pitching staffs in either league last season, and it appears that management is intent on building on that reputation.

On Sunday, starter Vance Worley blanked the Orioles over four innings, allowing two hits and a walk, striking out two.

Worley went 8-4 with the Pirates last season, his first winning campaign since 2011. He started 17 games and put down a marker with a 2.85 ERA. He bolsters a solid rotation.

The Orioles broke through in the sixth inning on Steve Pearce's two-run homer, but that was all the offense they could muster. After scoring single runs in the first and fourth, the Pirates put up a pair of runs in the eighth inning for the 4-2 win.

Cactus League

Travis Wood

After starting out a dismal 1-8, the Cubs have started winning, and the rest of the NL Central may want to start paying a little closer attention as the Cubs have won four straight.

Denorfia: HR 2RBI

One such team with a front row seat to the remaking of the cuddly Cubs is Cincinnati, which yesterday out-hit their rivals, 7-1, but still lost the game, 2-1. That's because the one hit allowed by Reds' starter Johnny Cueto, was a third inning home run by Chris Denorfia, after putting Dexter Fowler on base via a walk.

It could have been worse. Cueto worked four innings, and, despite just allowing the one hit, he did walk three.

The other part of the Cubs' winning equation was the five scoreless innings thrown by starting pitcher, Travis Wood, who scattered three hits, issue just one walk and fanned four.

Cincinnati (5-7) finally broke through for a run in the ninth inning, but the Cubs held on for the win.

Denorfia was picked up by the Cubs in the off-season, after he split 2014 between San Diego and Seattle. Wood has been a mainstay for the Cubs the past three seasons, after starting his MLB career with the Reds. In 89 starts for the Cubs, Wood has compiled a record of 23-38.

Freddy Garcia Blanks Nationals as Baltimore Wins; Travis Wood's Grand Slam Completes Cubs' Sweep of White Sox

Players of the Day for Thursday, May 30, 2013

American League

At the ripe, young age of 36, Freddy Garcia knows how to pitch in the majors. A veteran of 14 seasons, the lanky Venezuelan has been around, now with his sixth team, the Baltimore Orioles.

Freddy Garcia

Garcia, who hasn't thrown a complete game since 2006 and hasn't pitched a shutout since 2001 (when he threw three), came pretty close Thursday, blanking the Nationals over eight full innings in Baltimore's 2-0 victory, their second straight over the Nats after splitting a pair of games with Washington down I-95 in the nation's capitol earlier in the week.

Garcia (2-2) allowed just three harmless singles - two in the second inning and one in the sixth - struck out six and didn't issue any free passes before giving way to Jim Johnson, who notched his 17 save of the season.

The win kept Baltimore smack in the heat of the AL East race, just 2 1/2 games behind Boston and 1/2 game behind the Yankees, who were swept four straight by the Mets, the first time the Mets have ever swept a series from the Yanks. Tampa Bay is also within range, just three games out.

Baseball gets back to more traditional in-leauge games after four days of interleague contests. The Yankees host the Red Sox, while Baltimore remains at home to host three with the Detroit Tigers, the first game of the series starting Friday at 7:05 pm EDT.

National League

The Chicago Cubs would probably be perfectly content to play the rest of their games this season against their cross-town AL brethren, the White Sox, after taking four straight from them during this week's interleague play.

Travis Wood

The final nail in the coffin for the White Sox was delivered by starting pitcher Travis Wood, who wasn't all that sharp from the mound, but extended a 2-1 Cubs' lead with a grand slam homer in the fourth inning off Sox starter, Jake Peavy.

Wood went six innings, giving up five hits, two walks and two runs, striking out six to improve to 5-3, but his slam was the telling blow in the Cubs' 8-3 triumph. Wood also singled, going 2-for-3 with 4 RBI. The homer was his second of the season.

Even with the four straight wins, the Cubs are still 12 1/2 games out in the NL Central, but at least they have a three-game edge on last place Milwaukee, who have lost six in a row, including being swept four straight by the Twins.

The Cubs remain home, opening a three game series with Arizona starting Friday afternoon at 2:20 pm EDT. The White Sox - 4 1/2 back of Detroit in the AL Central, travel to Oakland for a three-game series with the A's, starting Friday at 7:10 pm PDT.

Today's Trivia: Who was the last American League pitcher to throw more than five shutouts in a single season?

Yesterday's Answer: Babe Ruth's 119 extra base hits in 1921 still stands as the all-time, single-season record.

Jackson, Quentin Lead White Sox; Travis Wood Blasts Astros

Players of the Day for Monday, May 9, 2011

American League

Edwin Jackson

So far this season, the Cleveland Indians have made a shambles of the AL Central, but it's still early May, giving the rest of the division plenty of time to make up ground.

With the Indians idle on Monday, the Tigers and White Sox took the opportunity to pick up a half game on the division leaders. Detroit bludgeoned Toronto, 10-5, and the Sox took down the Angels, 8-0, behind seven shutout innings from Edwin Jackson (3-4), and a huge night from Carlos Quentin.

Carlos Quentin

Jackson allowed five hits and a solitary walk while fanning five. With his pitch count at 101 and the 8-0 lead in hand, he took a seat after seven complete innings.

Quentin doubled in runs in both the 3rd and 5th innings, capping off his night with his 8th home run of the season, a towering, 3-run blast to center field, giving him five RBI for the game.

Batting either in front of or behind Adam Dunn and Paul Konerko, Quentin usually has plenty of opportunities to drive in runs, and he's up to 23 so far. With the amount of talent on both the Tigers and White Sox - not discounting the Royals, who are loaded this year - one gets the distinct feeling that the AL Central will eventually evolve into one of the better pennant races of the season.

Chicago has gotten off to a very slow start (14-22), while the Indians have put up the best record in the AL, at 22-11. With 9 1/2 games to make up, the White Sox have their work cut out for them.

National League

Cincinnati's Travis Wood had one of those games pitchers dream about.

Travis Wood

Wood shut out the Astros over 6 2/3 innings and belted a three-run homer, propelling the Reds past Houston by a 6-1 score.

In his best outing of the season, Wood limited the Astros to six hits while striking out six and issuing just one walk. His home run - the second in as many seasons - broke a 0-0 tie in the third inning, giving Wood a working margin that he did not squander.

The win was just Wood's second, against three losses, but it gave the starter some confidence moving forward. Wood will continue as a part of the Reds rotation that has seen both Johnny Cueto and Homer Bailey return from the DL.

The win left the Reds just one game behind idle Central division-leading St. Louis.

Travis Wood's 1-Hitter for Naught; Rajai Davis Slams Angels

Players of the Day for Saturday, July 10, 2010 National League Philadelphia catcher, Carlos Ruiz, came off the disabled list just in time to ruin the weekend for the Cincinnati Reds. Ruiz, who hadn't been behind the plate or standing beside it with a bat since June 18, led off the 9th inning with a double, spoiling Reds' starter Travis Wood's bid for a perfect game. Wood retired the final three Philadelphia batters and finished with a one-hitter; the problem was that the score was still tied 0-0, after regulation as he and Roy Halladay locked into a death-match-like pitching duel. Halladay also went none full innings, allowing just five hits, one walk and struck out 9. Wood fanned 8 and walked nobody. Neither pitcher earned a decision, despite the outstanding mound work. In the 11th inning, Ruiz doubled again, this time with one out, and a few batters later scampered home with the game-winner on Jimmy Rollins' walk-off single to right for the 1-0 win, the Phillies' third straight victory over Cincinnati in their final at-bat. Despite dropping three in a row, the Reds have managed to remain in first place in the NL Central, two games better than the Cardinals, but Wood, a rookie who made his third start Saturday, his time in the majors has been bittersweet. Over 20 2/3 innings, he's allowed just 9 hits and 7 runs (5 earned), with a 2.18 ERA and 0.68 WHIP. While he's holding opponents to just a .127 batting average and has a 17-5 K-BB ratio, he's yet to earn a decision. The way he's throwing, a little patience may eventually turn into many Ws. American League Oakland's Rajai Davis had been struggling so badly at the plate that he was scratched out of the A's lineup the past two games and demoted to 9th in the batting order on Saturday. Since June 20th, he'd gone 2-for-31 (.064), but the three-day hiatus seemed to be just the tonic needed to get him back in the swing of things. in five at-bats, Davis smacked a grand slam off Angels' starter Matt Garza - who recorded what is probably the worst stat line of the season for a starting pitcher: 5 innings, 11 hits, 13 earned, 2 walks, 3 Ks, 3 homers - doubled twice, singled, drove in five runs, scored three and stole his 27th base of the season. Davis raised his batting average a whole 10 points with the effort, from .257 to .267. Slump? What slump? Oakland pounded the Angels, 15-1, and all of a sudden, the team that's been chasing Texas all season - the Angels - are beginning to feel a little heat from behind. The A's are 8 1/2 back, just 4 games behind the Angels as the two teams wrap up their three-game series and head to the break. At least the Angels didn't lose any more ground to the Rangers. A day after getting the guy they wanted, Cliff Lee, from Seattle, he was on the mound for Texas, though his first outing did not go as planned. The lowly Baltimore Orioles touched Lee up for 3 homers and 6 runs in a 6-1 win. Lee worked the entire 9 innings and took the loss.