Baseball

The San Francisco Giants will rely on strong starting pitching, a struggling Padres team, and an easy September schedule to overtake the San Diego Padres and win the 2010 National League West.

The Schedule:

The Giants are currently three games back of the Padres with 28 games to play. 12 of the remaining games are against teams with sub .500 records, and another seven of those games are against the division leading Padres. The other games are against the struggling Cubs and the hated Dodgers.

It may be all over except for the crying.

With eight innings of one-hit ball on Thursday afternoon against the Oakland Athletics, C.C. Sabathia has become the front-runner for the AL Cy Young Award, and he may have even clinched it.

Why?

Well, I'll tell ya.  C.C. Sabathia will be the 2010 AL Cy Young Award winner because . . . 

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The Florida Marlins and the Washington Nationals engaged in a pretty ugly melee on Wednesday night, and the more I read about the events as they transpired the more I am beginning to think that something isn't right.

Chris Sale was one of the many top-level college pitchers being looked at in the 2010 MLB Draft.

I was hoping, as a Cleveland Indians fan, that they would select Sale with the fifth pick. Instead, they went with Drew Pomeranz.

The Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Mets then drafted Barret Loux and Matt Harvey, respectively, as Sale continued to fall.

After the Blue Jays drafted Deck McGuire, considered the most major league-ready pitcher at the time, the White Sox drafted Chris Sale with the 13th pick.

It’s time to continue our journey around the league, looking at each team’s closer situation. The National League West is home to one of, if not the, worst bullpens in the league, but also a few of the elite closers.  Let’s take a look at all the updated situations:

The Boston Red Sox have released journeyman outfielder Jeremy Hermida, according to Sean McAdam of CSNNE.com. As much as Hermida expressed surprise when he was designated for assignment at the end of July, surely his outright release yesterday could be considered a shock.

Hermida's release was confirmed late last night via an online announcement on RedSox.com.

If you haven’t noticed, the young lefty phenom out of Cuba, Aroldis Chapman, finally made his debut for the Cincinnati Reds last night.

According to Jon Heyman of Sports Illustrated, when the Dodgers put Ted Lilly on waivers leading up to the trade deadline, the Yankees made and won the claim for the pitcher. Then the Dodgers pulled him off of waivers, and no deal was made.

In a year of stunning rookie performances, Cuban defector and Reds uber-prospect Aroldis Chapman made his major-league debut on Tuesday, facing three batters in one inning of work. The 22-year-old was electric, hitting 103 mph on the radar gun.

The Boston Red Sox have dealt struggling reliever and hometown flame-thrower Manny Delcarmen to the Colorado Rockies for minor league pitcher Chris Balcom-Miller, according to Alex Speier of WEEI.com.

After first breaking in with the Sox's in 2005 and posting a respectable 3.00 ERA, the 28-year-old Delcarmen has experienced distinct peaks and valleys in his six seasons in Beantown.