Justin Verlander is a no-hit pitcher. But he's also a no-hit hitter. It's like he's pitching to himself almost. In his career during interleague play, Verlander is 0-for-20 with 13 strikeouts and his seven other outs weren't exactly results of bad luck.

But Verlander is trying to change that. It's no secret around Detroit that he desperately wants to get his first hit and he's working harder than ever to get it. Apparently, he talks about it all the time, to the amusement of his teammates, and is even working with hitting coach Lloyd McClendon: 

"I've changed my batting stance," Verlander said. "I tweaked it."

If you know Verlander, you know he's serious about all of this. You know that as competitive his personality is, he can't stand the idea that he can't hit.

"To not succeed at anything pisses me off," Verlander admitted. "And not just to not succeed -- to not excel."

Verlander doesn't just want to get his first hit, though; he wants to homer.

And Verlander's work is starting to pay off in batting practice at least. He homered during BP in Minnesota, inspiring McClendon to predict that Verlander would collect his first hit when he pitches hits next week in Cincinnati, and he homered again in Boston this week -- twice, reportedly.

After the jump is video of him hitting one out over the Green Monster:
 

Chan Ho Park made a pretty nice Major League career out of pitching. In fact, at the age of 38, he's still pitching over in South Korea, last I checked. He provided 17 years of service for seven different big league teams and, on October 1, 2010, he became the winningest Asian pitcher in MLB history (124).

However, I have to believe the legend of Chan Ho Park will forever be his candid interview after a bad start with the Yankees, during which he blamed his poopy performance on sloppy poops. It's something Park has tried to address, but I don't care what anyone says; it will follow him wherever he goes. 

Maybe, just maybe, he's trying really hard to change that with this ridiculous South Korean life insurance commercial wherein he's rapping in a language I don't understand and poking himself in the eye [via Deadspin]:

 

That's pretty good. I think I'd rather just see "I had a lot of diarrhea" get auto-tuned, though. If you have a link to that, please send that shib over.

Major League Baseball is 'looking into' a spat that occurred between home plate umpire Laz Diaz and New York Yankees catcher Russell Martin on Wednesday night. According to Martin, he and Diaz got into an argument over balls and strikes early in the game and Diaz's bizarre way of holding a grudge was to not allow Martin to throw new balls back to his pitcher: 

"He said that it was a privilege that I had to earn, for me to throw the ball back," said the catcher, a seven-year veteran and three-time All Star. "That's never happened to me before. I even told him, because there's guys on base, I like to keep my arm loose. Nope. 'I'm not letting you throw the ball back.' That's pretty strange, to me. That's a good story, huh?" [...]

"I think it happened in the second inning or something," Martin said at his locker after the game. "And then even at the end of the game, after I got hit in the neck, I'm like, 'can I throw the ball back now?' He's like still, no. I'm like, 'you're such a d---. You're a d---, dude. Like, for real. Unbelievable.' "

After the game, Martin again called Diaz a "dick" and told reporters to "write it hard." Oh, it's full on [written].

But yeah, I've never heard of this happening before. I know some umpires in lower levels of ball like to take the liberty to throw the ball back to the pitcher, some doing so as hard as they can, like it's going to impress a scout in the stands. But this... this is new to me.

Matt Kemp's ailing hamstring, which he aggravated in last night's Dodgers loss against the Brewers, has once again forced him to the DL. Kemp had an MRI done this morning, and it was revealed that he had a grade 1 strain, which was the same as he had before, as well as the mildest type of strain. Kemp will apparently be missing four weeks at minimum. To replace Kemp on the roster, the Dodgers have called up Alex Castellanos, an infielder, from AAA Albuquerque. In 22 games this year, Castellanos has a 1.235 OPS and five homers in the notorious hitter's haven.

Even though the Dodgers went 9-5 during Kemp's last DL stint, they can't afford to be without him for any substantial period of time. The starter while he was injured, Tony Gwynn Jr, will likely be taking over the starting role in center field once again. Gwynn is a gifted fielder, but his offense leaves a lot to be desired. He has a .662 OPS this year (and a .644 OPS for his career), and hasn't homered at all. It's not even fair to compare him to Kemp, who has a 1.163 OPS (a whopping 500 points higher than Gwynn) and 12 homers.

Could Castellanos start in center for the Dodgers? Sure, but I don't think it would work out too well. First off, he's an infielder (not an outfielder, especially in the toughest position of the outfield). Secondly, Castellanos just came back from a hamstring strain of his own on Sunday that kept him out for a month. I'm sure that rushing him into center field wouldn't be a very wise decision given the uncertainty surrounding Kemp's hamstring. Starting Castellanos at second or third base could be a valid plan though, as the Dodgers are currently rotating the scrappy trio of Jerry Hairston Jr, Adam Kennedy, and Elian Herrera at the two positions. Castellanos provides much more offensive firepower than all three of those hitters combined, and could make a half-decent substitute for Kemp in the lineup while he's hurt.

Photo courtesy of Daylife.com

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A disastrous season for the Colorado Rockies has gotten even worse, as they've had to place shortstop Troy Tulowitzki onto the 15-day DL with a left groin strain. The Rockies are already nine games under .500 and 11.5 games out of first place, so it's not like this will impact their playoff chances at all....but it's still bad news for the team.

Tulowitzki first injured the groin on Wednesday's game against Houston, leaving in the seventh inning of Colorado's 13-5 win. Tulowitzki is Colorado's franchise player, making $8.25 million this year and under contract until the 2020 season. He has an .846 OPS and eight homers this year, down from a .916 OPS and 30 homers last year. Injuries have been a common problem from Tulo, as he's missed at least 40 games in two of the five seasons of his career.

When healthy, Tulowitzki is one of the best shortstops in the game, both offensively and defensively. He'll be replaced at shortstop (at least for tonight) by veteran Marco Scutaro, with Jordan Pacheco taking over Scutaro's spot at second base. Pacheco has shown himself to have an adequate bat in the majors, albeit with no patience at the plate whatsoever. Scutaro is a decent enough hitter (even if his numbers this year don't reflect that), and he's also a pretty good defender wherever he is on the infield.

Neither of those two will be able to adequately replace Tulowitzki in the Rockies lineup though, and a long year just got a little longer.

Photo courtesy of Daylife.com

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Bad news for the Baltimore Orioles, as right fielder Nick Markakis will miss 3-4 weeks after breaking the hamate bone in his hand. Roch Kubatko of MASN is reporting that the injury first occured seven or ten days ago on a slide into second base, but the full break occured on Tuesday while swinging.

The Orioles are exploring various internal options to replace Markakis on the roster, including Xavier Avery, Lew Ford, Jai Miller, and Jamie Hoffman. Avery is the only one who's been in the majors this year, and in 15 games in the majors, he OPSed .616 with four stolen bases. In AAA Norfolk, Avery has an .832 OPS, five homers, and eight stolen bases, Ford has a .941 OPS in 12 games, Miller has a .719 OPS (but seven homers) in 45 games, and Hoffman has a .724 OPS and six stolen bases in 48 games.

The options for the first-place O's are slim, but here's the thing...Markakis isn't exactly lighting the world on fire this year. While he has eight homers, his OPS is just .785, and his defense hase been pretty awful according to both DRS and UZR. I don't think his loss for the better part of a month is really going to cripple the team, but it's not like they're going to vastly improve without him, either.

In perhaps more important news for the team, Kubatko is also reporting that Adam Jones iced his wrist after being plunked last night, and will be fine. Jones has not only been the most valuable player on the Orioles this year, he's also been one of the most valuable players in the league. If he would be in line to miss a significant amount of time, the Orioles would be in real trouble.

Photo courtesy of Daylife.com

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It is never too early to start talking about the trade deadline, especially when we can talk about would-be contenders that might unexpectedly end up being sellers rather than buyers at the deadline.  Over the next few weeks, we'll be taking a look at many of these such teams, and there is a surprisingly large amount, and what exactly they might be looking to sell if they don't turn around their season in a hurry.

The Detroit Tigers were supposed to cruise to the AL Central title this year with many experts predicting 100+ wins for the team since they were so clearly the class of a weak division.  As of right now, the Tigers are now "the class" of the division resides in third place and four games under .500

So, what can the Tigers potentially offer to the rest of the league?

Big Chips: Jose Valverde

Coming off a 2011 campaign in which he was perfect on all his save opportunities, Jose Valverde has been something of a disappointment this year with a 4.66 ERA.  Still, he has a strong track record of being a proverbial "capital C" closer.  Given that about half the teams in the league have had to replace their closer for one reason or another, that could make Valverde a hot commodity, even if he isn't usually lumped in as one of the elite closers in the game.  The fact that he is a rental will bring his price tage down a bit, but teams have been known to pay premium prices, making Valverde their best trade asset if they want to infuse this team with some young talent.

During yesterday's Brewers-Dodgers game, Andre Ethier doubled to left center, and Matt Kemp scored from first on the play. However, while Kemp was coming into third base, he considerably slowed up, and limped off the field after scoring. While in the dugout, Kemp then proceeded to leap up and down a few times to test his hamstring out, and then pulled a Bo Jackson and broke a bat over his knee before heading to the clubhouse. 

The implications for another Matt Kemp injury for the Dodgers are massive. The Dodgers seemed to rush Kemp back after the first knee injury, and after he aggravated the same injury, I highly doubt they'll do the same again. Kemp will have an MRI on Thursday to determine the extent of the damage to the hamstring, and whether or not anything is torn, or if the injury is just another strain.

On the flipside of Kemp getting hurt again, how awesome is it that he reached into his Bo Jackson bag of tricks and snapped a bat over his knee? The video I posted doesn't show the bat snap too well, but you do see Kemp fling two parts of the bat before exiting into the clubhouse. I couldn't find a clip of Bo doing this on Youtube, but I did find baseball's favorite malcontent, Milton Bradley, snapping his bat after a strikeout with the Padres.

Ah, Milton Bradley...I can't hate too much on him, since I got his autograph at a fanfest before the season in which this happened. Hopefully, Kemp doesn't turn into Bradley, and actually fulfills his ultimate talents.

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Coming into Wednesday's game against the Rangers, the Mariners offense was really, really bad. No power. No patience. But last night, something happened against the Texas Rangers, the best team in the American League. The Mariners put 21 runs on the board, including eight runs in the second AND third innings. I've created a special "Hitting Lines of the Night" category just for the Mariners offense. It's funny, though. Even after this 21 run, 20 hit, four homer rout, the Mariners team OPS sits at .669...the second worst mark in the American League, and fourth worst in baseball. Ah, the Mariners...

Game of the Night: Mariners 21, Rangers 8. I'm going to keep talking about this, mostly from the non-Seattle offense side of things. Remember, the Mariners pitching staff still allowed EIGHT RUNS in this game, including the team getting outscored 8-4 over the final three innings of hte game. The Mariners pitchers (Blake Beavan and Hisashi Iwakuma, WHO GOT A SAVE IN A 13 RUN WIN) allowed 13 hits and eight runs, walking just one while only striking out two. After the first 2 1/3 innings, the Texas pitching staff actually didn't do a bad job. They went 6 2/3 innings, allowed five hits and five runs, while walking four and striking out six. One really bad thing for the Rangers: they had to burn nearly their entire bullpen. Texas used six relievers, with the only holdout being closer Joe Nathan. Why are you using Alexi Ogando, Mike Adams, and Koji Uehara in a TEN RUN GAME? Absolutely ridiculous bullpen management by Ron Washington.

Pitching Lines of the Night: Francisco Liriano shut out the A's over six innings, allowing three hits and two walks, striking out nine in the process. AJ Burnett of the Pirates continued his great year, allowing just one unearned run over seven innings to the Reds on two hits, two walks, and three strikeouts. 

Hitting Lines of the Night (non-Mariners edition): Carlos Gonzalez of the Rockies went 4/5 with three runs, four RBI, and three homers. In a losing effort, Lucas Duda of the Mets went 3/4 with three RBI and two homers. The Padres Carlos Quentin went 3/4 with four RBI, a walk, a double, and two homers. 

Hitting Lines of the Night (Mariners edition): In their rout of the Rangers, the meat of Seattle's order did a ton of damage. Third place hitter Kyle Seager went 4/6 with four runs, two RBI, and two doubles. Cleanup hitter Jesus Montero went 3/4 with four runs, four RBI, two walks, a double, and a homer. And finally, fifth place hitter Justin Smoak went 3/5 with three runs, six RBI, a walk, a double, and two homers. Whew.

Spotlight Series: Shockingly, the White Sox beat the Rays yesterday 4-3 to complete a three game sweep in Tampa Bay. Despite the questionable ejection of Jose Quintana in the fourth inning, reliever Nate Jones kept the Rays relatively in check in relief of him, while the rest of Chicago's bullpen shut down the Rays offense. Tampa scored three runs on the day, all coming via home run. Luke Scott hit a solo shot in the second, and Carlos Pena hit a two-run homer in the sixth that brought the Rays within a run, but they couldn't tie it up. The White Sox took a first inning lead on an RBI single by Alex Rios before Scott's homer tied the game, and they regained the lead for good in the third, thanks to an RBI single by Dayan Viciedo that was followed up with an Alexei Ramirez sac fly. Ramirez would tack another run on in the fifth, doubling in Viciedo for the fourth run of the game for the White Sox. Despite the sweep, the Rays are still in a tie with the Orioles at the top of the AL East, thanks to Baltimore getting swept in Toronto. The red hot White Sox now hold a 1.5 game advantage in the AL Central over the Indians, and their record is equal to that of both the Orioles and Rays. After a day off for both teams today, the White Sox will head home to host the Mariners, while the Rays host divisional rival Baltimore to sort out the tie at the top of the division.

Other Games: The Bruce Chen led Royals knocked off the Indians 6-3. The Twins shut out the A's 4-0. The Cubs got a walkoff homer from Darwin Barney to beat the Padres, and sweep the series, 8-6. The Pirates edged the Reds 2-1, and won the series against the NL Central leaders. The Blue Jays hit four solo homers en route to beating the Orioles 4-1, completing the sweep. The Braves beat the Cardinals 10-7, and are 5-1 against the defending World Champions this year. The Red Sox continue to play good baseball, beating the Tigers 6-4. The Phillies used nine runs in the final three innings to beat the Mets 10-6. The Mariners obliterated the Rangers 21-8 in a game that Texas had no shot in early on. The Marlins used a Giancarlo Stanton homer to beat the first place Nationals 5-3, and to creep to within a half game at the top of the division. Carlos Gonzalez's huge day led the Rockies to a 13-5 win over the Astros. The Yankees edged the Angels 6-5 to avoid a sweep. The Brewers beat Clayton Kershaw and the Dodgers 6-3, but the bigger news was Matt Kemp leaving the game for LA. The Diamondbacks beat the Giants 4-1, as Tim Lincecum looked off his game yet again.

Today's Games: Only three games on the slate today. Max Scherzer takes on Josh Beckett in Boston, Bud Norris and Jeremy Guthrie duel in Colorado, and Zack Greinke will take on Chad Billingsley in LA.

Enjoy your day of baseball, everyone.

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The Atlanta Braves completed a much needed shortstop switch after Wednesday's win over the Cardinals, demoting incumbent Tyler Pastornicky to AAA Gwinnett and promoting Andrelton Simmons from AA Mississippi to the majors. 

Pastornicky had struggled both offensively and defensively in the majors after winning the starting job in Spring Training. This year, he had just a .605 OPS, and was lately ceding one start a week to veteran Jack Wilson. Pastornicky's defense, never thought to be a particularly strong suit, was ghastly. His DRS for the year was -16, the worst mark in all of baseball at any position by far, and his UZR was -10, another terrible mark. The Braves just couldn't go on with it anymore.

Simmons is a magnificent defender, with ESPN's Keith Law ranking both his glove and arm as an 80 on the 20-80 scouting scale, and his speed as a 60. For the season in Mississippi, the 22 year-old Simmons had a .794 OPS, three homers, and ten stolen bases. The homers were part of a recent power surge, as all came in the last week. Simmons possesses solid plate discipline, walking and striking out 20 times apiece this year, but his pop is minimal overall.

Since the middle of 2010, the Braves have experienced a lot of insufficient production at shortstop after trading incumbent Yunel Escobar to the Blue Jays in July of that year, in exchange for Pastornicky and the starter for the rest of 2010 and all of 2011, Alex Gonzalez. Escobar has thrived in Toronto on both offense and defense, accruing 6.1 fWAR in 240 games in Toronto. Gonzalez and Pastornicky combined for just under one win (0.9 fWAR) during their time in Atlanta, which is a huge dropoff from Escobar, who had a contentious relationship with outgoing manager Bobby Cox. After nontendering second baseman Kelly Johnson following the 2009 season, and the lowball trade of Escobar, Atlanta's treatment of middle infielders has been questionable, especially when you throw the perhaps above market value for an aging Dan Uggla into the mix as well.

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