NEW YORK – The 2010 Major League Baseball All-Star game was a dud as far as viewership goes, earning the game’s lowest television rating in history.

The National League defeated the American League 3-1 for their first victory in over a decade in a mostly uneventful contest Tuesday night that was televised on Fox.

The telecast posted a 7.5 fast national rating and 13 share, down 16 percent from the 8.9 fast national rating and 15 share tallied for last season’s 2009 game when the AL beat the NL 4-3.

Prior to this new record low, the previous low was an 8.1 national rating and 14 share in 2005.

Ratings represent the percentage of all households with televisions, and shares represent the percentage of all homes with TVs in use at the time.

At the time of this article, we were unable to locate the ratings for the 2010 State Farm Home Run Derby that took place the night before when Boston Red Sox slugger, David “Big Papi” Ortiz won handily over his less-experienced competition.

Used with permission of the author.

Jay Donetelli is a Tampa-based freelance sportswriter and contributor to Sports Climax. With an opinion sharper than an Ovechkin skate blade with the sting of an Ali jab, Donetelli has a loyal cult of readers who have found a way to love him.

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax, LLC

The Brew Crew handed the Pittsburgh Pirates a classic bitch-slapping, squashing them in a three-game series while sending 36 runners across the plate. Milwaukee outscored the listless Pirates 36-1 in the 3-game series with the final game a 25-hit, 20-0 mercy killing.

That loss was the most lopsided in the Pirates 124-year history and BTW, this all happened on Pittsburgh’s home field.

“It was fun and it was special . . . I enjoyed it.” said Brewers Ryan Braun after knocking two over the fence and driving in 5 runs in the 20-0 game.

Yeah, fun and special for the ones laying out the can of whoopass on a group of MLB impersonators. Now ask the Pirates what they thought of the 20-0 disaster.

Pirates’ pitcher Daniel McCutchen (0-2) 14.73 ERA said this:

“Lots of times, it felt like I was throwing batting practice to them.”

Maybe because you basically were . . .

Pirates manager John Russell chimed in with the obvious:

“They came in and kicked our butt.”

Yes they did and they threw in a couple of backhanded bitch-slaps in just for good measure.

This is becoming a part of a pattern for the Pirates who have lost eight times this season by six or more runs while being outscored in those games 85-13.

That 85-13 is not a typo, people . . . it’s just an all out swift kick in the nuts!

20-0 box score on MLB.com

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

LOS ANGELES, CALIF. – The Los Angeles Dodgers have a .500 record after 14 games, but if their pitching were worthy of their hitters, the team would be on top of its division.

A glance at a box score from last night’s 14-6 victory against the Cincinnati Reds can get you giddy when you see the batting averages of their starting lineup.

Leading off, shortstop Raphael Furcal sports a .356 BA. The outfielders are all contributing with CF Matt Kemp batting .333 to go along with his seven home runs, RF Andre Ethier killing at .400 and Manny is still Manny with a .421 average. First baseman James Loney is holding his own with a .317 average, 3B Casey Blake is handling his business with a .313 average and even C Russell Martin, who is a notorious slow starter is batting a sizzling .317 this season.

So why are they 7-7 at this point of the season? It’s the pitching, stupid.

What was a concern throughout the off-season is now a reality, even this early. Without having picked up an additional starter, the rotation looks thin already unless everyone comes through with a solid 6-7 innings.

Ned Colletti, the team’s GM held the line, presumably on orders from ownership and failed to snag someone like Joel Piniero. The right-hander now pitching in Anaheim for the Angels was still available three weeks prior to spring training. He signed a two-year $16 million deal and has already paid dividends for his team with a sizzling 1.77 ERA in three games.

In some respects you could almost sympathize with Colletti since he hoped that Chad Billingsley and Hiroki Kuroda would return to form. The team also banked on Vincente Padilla continuing to pitch like he did when he arrived last summer as a cast off from the Texas Rangers.

So far Billingsley has been unable to pitch past the fifth inning, even in his only win and is struggling with an ERA over 7.0. No one can pinpoint what his problem is and his future contributions can only be considered iffy.
Padilla sports a 1-1 record but a whopping 8.04 ERA and has pitched a total of 15.2 innings in his three starts.

Kuroda is doing much better leading all starters with a 2-0 record and an ERA of 2.18, although he coughed up six runs last night against the Cincinnati Reds.

Clayton Kershaw has a win under his belt, but still needs too many pitches to achieve an ERA of 3.18. And therein lies the problem for the starters.

They can’t pitch deep into the game with an occasional exception and the middle relievers as well as last season’s darling, set-up man George Sherrill, have given up runs at a record pace.

Five of the team’s seven losses were recorded by the bull pen. Jonathan Broxton is the only exception. The young closer hasn’t given up a run in 5+ innings.

No one is running away with the NL West. The Giants got off to a hot start but have come down to earth losing 6 of the last ten, leaving the small market San Diego Padres atop the standings with a 9-6 record. And as they like to say in a sport that has a 162 game schedule. it’s still early.

Re-printed with permission of the author.

Paula Duffy is a national sports columnist for Examiner.com and the Huffington Post and regularly comments on sports/legal matters for radio affiliates of ESPN and Fox Sports. She founded the sports information site, Incidental Contact, is the author of a line of audio books designed for sports novices and in her spare time practices law in Los Angeles. 

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

Aubrey Huff never had a three home run game in his Major League career, but that’s not going to keep him from telling his grandchildren otherwise.

Despite absolutely crushing three balls to the deepest parts of AT&T Park on Wednesday in the Giants 6-0 win over the Pirates, Huff is still without a personal long-ball trifecta.

“I’ve never had a three-home-run game. I’m going to go ahead and chalk that up as a three-home-run game in my mind,” Huff said. “I don’t know if I can hit a ball any better. I hit one to center for an out and the one to right-center was just ridiculous.

If that don’t go out, I don’t know what you can do. Everybody in spring told me, ‘You’ll see, you’ll see.’ I’m like, ‘Come on, if you get it it’s going to go.’ ‘Nah. …’ “I get it now. I get it,” Huff said.

In his first at bat against Pirates right-hander Charlie Morton leading off the second inning, the Giants cleanup hitter smoked a ball high off the right-center field wall. It kicked toward the foul line, away from right fielder Garrett Jones, and before second baseman Akinori Iwamura could retrieve the unusual carom, Huff was sliding safely into home, earning his first homer as a Giant in less than conventional fashion.

“When I hit it, I thought it was gone anyway. In most parks it is,” Huff told the Associate Press. “I saw it bounce off the wall and as soon as I rounded first I saw it took an amazing hop right. I’m like: ‘Oh boy, here we go. If I am going to hit one out I’m going to try to get a cheapie.'”

Later, to end the fourth inning, Huff watched in frustration as Pittsburgh center-fielder Andrew McCutchen ran down his long fly-out in deep center. His next at bat in the sixth, resulted in another China Basin cruelty, as Huff’s smash was absorbed by the vaunted “Triples Alley, ” ironically holding him to a double.

It was the fourth time in the series Huff was likely robbed by the dimensions of his new home.

Aaron Rowand and Eli Whiteside didn’t endure similar misfortunes. Whiteside’s three-run blast – his first of the year – into the left field seats staked his battery mate Jonathan Sanchez (1-0) to a 4-0 second-inning lead, and Rowand’s fifth-inning bolt made it 6-0. Since opening the season 0-for-10, Rowand is 12-for-30 (.438), and has more hits than any leadoff hitter in baseball on the year.

Giants manager Bruce Bochy was unsure about writing Whiteside’s name into the lineup early on Wednesday with Bengie Molina amidst a scorching stretch at the plate. But after going 2-for-3, and catching a scoreless eight-inning, 11 strikeout performance by Sanchez, Whiteside proved to be up to the challenge.
“Pretty good job back there,” Sanchez said of Whiteside. “He got me deep in the game.”

Outside of a shaky first inning, Sanchez was excellent, but had to escape a bases-loaded jam in the sixth to earn his first career win over the Pirates. It was his fourth career outing with 10 or more strikeouts, and the 11 matched a career high he set during his no-hitter last July 10. Sanchez, who received a standing ovation while walking off the field in the eighth, went more than seven innings for the first time since August 26, against Arizona (seven starts).
“I feel more confident out there,” Sanchez said. “I can trust myself now.”

The Giants improved to 7-2 in 2010, the team’s best start since going 8-1 to open the 2003 season. That year the Giants went 100-62 to win the NL West.

Re-printed with permission of the author.

Theo is a staff reporter and feature writer for the Marin Independent Journal where he covers local prep and college sports. As an Associate Production Manager for ESPN, he helped produce Sunday Night Baseball among other national ESPN and ABC Sports telecasts. Besides his contributions to Examiner.com, the I.J. and Sports Climax, Theo is the play-by-play voice for Sonoma State University baseball and softball.

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™