MLB

Even after absorbing Tuesday's loss to the visiting Baltimore Orioles, the San Francisco Giants are humming along now that May is but a memory.

Since the calendar flipped to June, the Gents (quick note—I don't care that the New York nickname was Gints and neither does anyone else in the Bay Area) are 9-5. If you include the last five games of a mediocre preceding month, San Francisco is 13-6.

So things are good for the baseball-conscious in the City.

Nevertheless, there are three glaring and potentially enduring problems with the club.

Chase Utley.  Ryan Howard.  Jayson Werth.  Placido Polanco.  Shane Victorino.  Raul Ibanez. 

Sounds like a pretty explosive line up, does it not?

Well, lately, this line up has been far from explosive.

Over the past month, Phillies fans as well as the baseball world has been dumbstruck.  With a line up that includes so many talented players, there is no reason that the team should hit a prolonged slump.

The Bash Brothers, Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco, took the baseball world by storm with their home run hitting prowess at the close of the 1980s.

They ushered in an era of increased power through science, the steroid age of baseball. A fun, but ultimately disappointing time to be a baseball fan.

Baseball has had a wonderful history of high-profile power-hitting teammates, from Ruth and Gehrig, to Mantle and Maris, and Mays and McCovey.

With half of the Crosstown Classic played, it is almost as traditional to pick the best of the two clubs as to play the series.

To the disdain of the North and South sides of Chicago, both the Cubs and White Sox are less than stellar this year, combining for a record of 56-69 before action on Tuesday.

While nothing is written is stone just yet, there is a pretty good chance that the Atlanta Braves will find themselves sans-Chipper Jones when the team reports to Spring Training in 2011.

(Oh, and yeah, I know that the Braves are a first place team with a lot going right for them right now.)

It's been a while since Atlanta Braves fans have had much to cheer about. Long gone are the days of Maddox, Glavine, and Smoltz, the Jones boys broke up after 2007, the streak of 14 consecutive NL East Championships ended five seasons ago, and the 1995 World Series is but a distant memory.

We all knew that their reign atop the NL East couldn’t last forever.

Name the second highest paid player on the Colorado Rockies.

During his 12 years in Toronto, Roy Halladay was usually lights out against the Yankees. Now with Philadelphia, Halladay was looking to continue his dominance of New York on Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium.

The Yankees roughed up Halladay for six runs, including three home runs, as the Yankees topped Philadelphia, 8-3, in the opener of three-game series featuring last year’s World Series participants.

Just when it seemed as if things were getting brighter for the Los Angeles Dodgers pitching staff, the team was dealt another blow on Tuesday afternoon, when they announced that Chad Billingsley would be placed on the 15-day disabled list with a groin injury.

According to team reports, Billingsley suffered the injury sometime during his start in Friday's 10-1 loss against the Los Angeles Angels.

The MLB Player Draft has brought some gems to the Mets in recent memory. On the other hand, on several occasions, drafting hasn't really yielded much talent

Simply put, in terms of the quality of their number one overall picks, the Mets organization has had ups and downs throughout the 2000s.

This is a look at where the Mets went right and wrong in their top draft selections since 2000, and where all those guys are now.

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