If anyone is wondering why you shouldn't put too much stock in early standings, I direct you to the American League West. The A's started the year 12-4, and have lost eight of their last night to sit just a game above .500. Ironically over the last week and a half, the Rangers and A's have nearly inverse run differentials (+21 for Texas, -19 for Oakland), and that's spurred their turnarounds. In another odd note, the A's this year are 11-2 against AL West teams, and just 2-10 in teams outside of the division. Oh, and what about the Angels, baseball's most confusing team? Well, after sweeping the Tigers and outscoring the defending AL champs by 18 runs during their three game set last weekend, Anaheim is just 2-4 this week against the Rangers and Mariners, and need a win today in Seattle to prevent themselves from losing three of four to the Mariners.

PIC OF THE DAY

Yonder Alonso of the Padres dumps the water bucket on teammate Nick Hundley after Hundley's walkoff single (Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports)

Game of the Night: Brewers 6, Dodgers 4. On a night loaded with close (although unexciting) games, this one stood out from the bunch. A Luis Cruz RBI groundout in the sixth put Los Angeles on top 3-2, but the Brewers surged back in front on the seventh after a two-run homer from Carlos Gomez off of Matt Guerrier to spoil Matt Magill's attempt for his first major league win. In the eighth, Martin Maldanado struck a two-run homer off of Guerrier to extend Milwaukee's lead to 6-3. Andre Ethier responded with a solo homer off of (who else?) John Axford to make it a 6-4 game, but freshly minted Brewers closer Jim Henderson picked up his sixth save of the year despite letting the tying run get to second with two outs in the ninth.

Miami Marlins right fielder Giancarlo Stanton hit his first home run of the year on Saturday night in his 18th game. Stanton got his money's worth with the moonshot, as his first inning homer off of Chicago Cubs starting pitcher Travis Wood traveled an estimated 440 feet and went over the scoreboard in left field at Marlins Park. Last May, Stanton hit a similar blast that broke the same scoreboard he cleared against the Cubs.

Unfortunately for Stanton and the Marlins, his first homer of the year wasn't enough and Miami fell 3-2. Their record now sits at 5-19, 10.5 games behind the first place Braves in the NL East. 

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The St Paul Saints of the American Association indy league are at it again. The Saints have been known for goofy promotions for years, and on May 11th against the Gary SouthShore RailCats, they're going to crank things up to another level and play without umpires.

Balls and strikes will be called from behind the mound by a judge, complete with a robe and a gavel that he'll bang on home plate to start the game. As for calls on the basepaths, there will be 12 Little League players in box seats up the first and third base lines that will act as a jury. Majority will rule, and the judge will break any ties from his position on the field.

There's also going to be a judge located in the ballpark's main seating area to mediate disputes between any fans.

While this is something that will absolutely never (under any circumstances) take place in an actual major league game, it's going to be interesting to see how it works out. The jury scenarios could take some extra time, but managers arguing with umpires ends up taking up just as much time during a close play that they disagree with. There's also the very real possibility that the judge either gets in the way of a player attempting to make a play, or gets hit by a ball.

The scenario of an umpire calling strikes from being the mound actually took place for an inning during Spring Training, when home plate umpire Seth Buckminster got hurt and Tim McClelland was forced to engage in the unusual behind the mound practice since umpiring crews in Spring Training only consist of three umpires.

[Ballpark Digest]

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Anibal Sanchez set the Tigers franchise record for strikeouts in a game on Friday night, fanning 17 Braves and getting 28 whiffs on the evening (good for a 23.1% whiff rate). Considering that Detroit currently features strikeout artists like Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, and Mickey Lolich, that somehow makes Sanchez's accomplishment that much more awesome in context.

PIC OF THE DAY

An ironic one...Josh Reddick slips on the outfield grass in front of an "Athletics" sign in the outfield (Ed Szczepanski-USA TODAY Sports)

Game of the Night: Dodgers 7, Brewers 5. The Dodgers are finally back up to .500, but it wasn't an easy trek there on Friday evening. Milwaukee to a 3-2 lead in the fifth after a Yuniesky Betancourt solo homer tied the game and a Jean Segura RBI single but them in front. The Dodgers tied the game at three after an Adrian Gonzalez RBI double in the bottom of the inning, but the Brewers jumped back out in front after a run-scoring single off the bat of Norichika Aoki. Another Gonzalez doubled in the seventh plated two more and put the Dodgers in front 5-4, and they added two more in the eighth against Brandon Kintzler. Milwaukee made it interesting in the ninth, scoring a run on a Segura infield single, but Ryan Braun grounded out as the tying run to end the game.

Many Tiger fans got their first look at Bruce Rondon in spring training when the 22-year-old Venezuelan was pushing radar guns into triple digits. His command wasn’t there though, and he was sent to AAA to begin the year. But that didn’t last long. Just like last season when he went from the Florida State League to the Eastern League to the International League, Rondon was on the move early again this year. Only this time it was to Detroit, where the future closer made his debut last night.

As expected, his stuff was electric, topping 100 five times in 19 pitches.

Unfortunately, he also gave up 3 hits, a run, and blew the 3-2 lead he inherited from Justin Verlander.

Welcome to the Show, kid.

Maybe it's all of the injuries this season. Maybe it's the fear of missing the playoffs this year and next. For whatever reason, the New York Yankees look like they're (already) ditching their plan to cut back on spending.

Much was made about the Yankees' desire to keep payroll below the expected $189 million luxury tax threshold for next season, but that's apparently growing increasingly unlikely. New York was aiming to not only save millions by not having to pay the luxury tax, but they were also looking to game baseball's collective bargaining agreement by raking in more money through the market-disqualification rebate. Apparently, though, the Yankees are running the numbers and finding that the benefits of their scheme aren't outweighing the cost of rebuilding.

They still have to work out an extension with Robinson Cano, and even if the two sides get creative and sign Cano to a deal heavy on signing bonus and deferral dollars/light on annual salary, it would be hard to build a contending roster while staying below that $189 million figure: nearly $74 million is already on the books for next season between Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira and CC Sabathia.

While there are quite a few teams that would jump at the chance to claim tens of millions, for the Yankees, it's pocket change. This line basically sums it all up:

"They're going to be over 189 ... They know it. Everyone knows it. You can't run a $3 billion team with the intentions of saving a few million dollars."

[Yahoo! Sports]

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Admittedly, the MLB All-Star Game is notably better than it's NBA and NFL counterparts.  However, just because the it's best available, does not mean it cannot be improved upon.  More often than not, we're left with something resembling the best players in the game getting together for an exhibition.  But the current climate of the game has left many fans with a sour taste in their mouth when it comes to the Mid-Summer Classic.  So how can we improve this game so that it fits the desires of fans and brings about the best competition?  First, we have to start with what issues the game is plagued with.

1. Fans, especially in the American League are subject to an onslaught of undeserving Yankees and Red Sox in the All-Star Game.  In 2012, every starter for the AL team played for either the Red Sox, Yank, Rangers or Tigers with the exception of Jose Bautista.  How could anyone justify starting a .248 hitting Curtis Granderson over the likes of Mike Trout or Adam Jones?  How could anyone justify starting a defensively deficient, .228 hitting Mike Napoli at catcher above Joe Mauer or Matt Wieters?  This is the result of fan voting.  While it serves it's purpose as a way of getting fans involved in the game, more than anything it has alienated smaller fan bases out West and has prevented the best players from participating.  The best way to fix this is to simply take the best statistical players and start them.  This does not have to be an argument between old school vs new school, even though it inevitably would turn into one (remember the nightmare last fall between Triple Crown Winner Miguel Cabrera and best player in the game Mike Trout?)  MLB would simply need to come to one common way of evaluating players statistically and start those players.

2. Revamp the Home Run Derby.  Every year, I'm excited to watch this game, in fact, I'm giddy over it.  Then it turns into a 2.5 hour marathon of hearing Chris Berman incessantly chant "Back back back back back".  The derby has it's moments though, like watching Josh Hamilton in Yankee Stadium or the ridiculous roof shot Mark Trumbo hit in Kansas City last season.  We could improve this event by allowing participants to use metal bats.  It may scare away some players because of the bat weight difference, but it would also result in 600 foot homeruns, the like we've never seen before.  We could also turn this into an international affair.  Instead of American League versus National League, why not allow countries to field two participants each?  That almost always brings out the best, especially among the Latin American countries.  Also, if there's a way to speed up the derby by perhaps placing time limits or making players swing at pitches, we could cut the run-time in half.

Do you need another reason to dislike Miami Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria? Of course you do. On Tuesday, Loria apparently overrode manager Mike Redmond and switched starting pitchers Ricky Nolasco and Jose Fernandez in Miami's doubleheader with Minnesota. Loria wanted Fernandez to start the day game and Nolasco to start the night game.

Loria insisted Fernandez, the team's prized 20-year-old rookie, pitch in the first half of the doubleheader at frigid Target Field instead of the scheduled Nolasco because the day game was expected to be warmer. The temperature at Fernandez's first pitch (38 degrees) was actually colder than at the beginning of Nolasco's start (42 degrees).

Rookie manager Mike Redmond delivered the news to Nolasco about 2½ hours before the first game against the Minnesota Twins, and it did not go over well with him or his teammates. Standard protocol for doubleheaders is that veterans choose which game they want to pitch. Not only did Loria ignore that and further alienate Nolasco, the Marlins' highest-paid player who has previously requested a trade, he sabotaged Redmond less than 20 games into his managerial career.

This is a joke. Less than a month into Redmond's tenure as Marlins manager, he's already become Loria's puppet running the club. Nolasco, Miami's longest tenured and higher paid player, is getting disrespectced once again. Perhaps the best part of this is Loria's "warmer weather" logic, when in reality, the opposite actually ended up being true. For the record, Fernandez allowed four runs in five innings, the second straight bad start of his career, while Nolasco picked up his first win of the year for Miami in the nightcap. 

It's really great that Jeffrey Loria cares so much about the team that he owns that he's fiddling with the on-field product a month into a season that's bound to be a complete disaster. You can't even use the logic behind his dismantling of the team last year to rationalize this decision. There's not one good thing on the field that could have come from Fernandez starting game one and Nolasco starting game two and finding out two and a half hours before the game.

If Fernandez ended up getting hurt in the earlier start for whatever reason, the few remaining Marlins fans probably would have ended up marching on Marlins Park with pitchforks in hand once news that it was Loria's decision to swap him and Nolasco leaked out.

UPDATE: Loria claims to be innocent in the whole matter, according to a report from Fox Sports.

“I had nothing to do with the decision,” Loria told FOXSports.com on Friday. “I was informed of the decision by the baseball department. I told them it was their call.

“I don’t make decisions on who to pitch and when, how to go about it - that’s not my role. Sometimes they call me and tell me what they’re doing. But I don’t call them up and say, ‘This is what is going to happen.’ That’s not true.”

This is just getting ridiculous now. So by "baseball department", is he throwing president of baseball operations Larry Beinfest and GM Michael Hill under the bus while absolving himself and team president (and resident gopher) David Samson? What a dysfunctional organization.

[Yahoo]

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It is that time of year, time for MLB to publish the All-Star ballot for our voting pleasure. Or your scrutinizing displeasure depending on who you are. While it can be fun to cast votes for your favorite players, it can also be a painful exercise due to all the annual annoyances in the ballot.

For example, the good folks at MLB just can't seem to perform the simple task of getting the right players on the ballot. The most obvious issue is with injured players. Now, it is understood that these ballots need to be finalized for printing at some point, but given the technological era we live in and the amount of online voting involved, you'd think the MLB big wigs could find a way to develop a more dynamic ballot that isn't littered with players who haven't played all this year.

2013 is no exception as the ballot is awash in players who haven't so much as touched a big league field yet:

Mark Teixeira - Out until May 1st... not really, but let's keep pretending that will happen.

Casey Kotchman - Out with a stupidity-induced injury, not that he was ever going to get votes anyway.

Corey Hart - On the shelf for months.

Stephen Drew - How about we just always assume Drew family members will be too hurt to play and ban them from all future All-Star ballots.

Hanley Ramirez - The Dodgers have enough money, make them pay to reprint the ballot with someone other than the injured HanRam on the ballot.

Brian McCann - Because of this clerical error, El Oso Blanco is getting screwed in the ballot box.

Carlos Ruiz - Suspended for 25 games, so it isn't like this came by surprise.

Curtis Granderson - What do you know? Another injured Yankee!

Derek Jeter - Heaven forbid an All-Star ballot not have Derek Jeter on it even when he is unlikely to even be healthy in time for the Mid-summer Classic. It wouldn't be a shock if he still appears on the ballot after his retirement.

Delmon Young - We actually approve of this inclusion in light of the burgeoning effort on the internet to get Delmon voted into the game.

Adam Eaton - Since he is a rookie, you can't even justify his inclusion based on career track record.

Luke Scott - With all the platoon players the Rays employ, you'd think they could pick someone who is actually healthy and playing. But you have to appeal to the Tea Party, right?