MLB

Coming into Friday night's games, it appears that the Oakland A's may have come out of the starting gate with a small, although not decisive, lead in the division race.

That's in spite of the fact that the four teams of the American League West have very similar records. And the first month of the season is just closing.

There are two considerations that put Oakland a little ahead. One is how well they've done in the division itself. The other is how many tough games outside the division they've played.

Enough with watching these Giants snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and having to listen to some knucklehead impersonate a first-grade teacher and say, "There's no reason to panic. It's still early in the season."

Oh, we'll hang with the Giants through all 162 games. It's the folks who think anything short of accepting every loss gracefully is actually a show of pure panic.

If you were to ask me in mid-March who I thought would be the A's leader in RBIs through the first month of the season, I probably wouldn't have said Cliff Pennington. 

Well, Pennington, a former first-round pick, is off to a strong start for the A's this season. Through 24 games, Pennington has managed to hit .250/.337/.461 and has collected a team-leading 15 RBIs. 

While his batting average is nothing to excited about, his unexpected display of power, however, should make even the most pessimistic A's fan feel all giddy inside. 

Daniel Murphy has been out for the entire season so far with a sprained right knee, but he is getting closer to returning to Flushing as he is currently down in Port St. Lucie hitting in the batting cages, according to Andy Martino of the NY Daily News .

The A's have had a promising start to the 2010 campaign. Some have left A's fans weeping saying "this looks all too familiar!" But there is room for optimism, and since I'm the optimism king of my Oakland A's, I feel it's my duty to keep fans uplifted.
At the beginning of the season I predicted a season winning percentage of no worse than .500 in 2010. I stand by that. The A's have the talent that goes far overlooked by the rest of the league. In fact, the A's could surprise everyone.

To use a Joe Maddonism, I'm "digging" John Jaso. You could make the argument that no Rays player has been better over the last ten games than Jaso. Considering the offensive tear this team is on, that's a pretty strong statement.

Has Jaso been the best Ray? Decide for yourself:

Player A: .342 avg, 1 HR, 12 RBI, 10-8 BB-K ratio

Player B: .286 avg, 1 HR, 7 RBI, 8-15 BB-K ratio

Player C: .455 avg, 1 HR, 10 RBI, 9-1 BB-K ratio

Getting off to a good start is important in almost every facet of life.

In baseball, starting off the season on the right foot can set a team up for a nice run deep into the season.

The ability to collect a surplus of wins in April does wonders for losing streaks that a team may experience further down the long road that is the Major League Baseball season.

Like any team in the MLB, the San Francisco Giants have had their own ups and downs during the first month of baseball.

The Arizona Diamondbacks faced the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field with demonstrators in favor of and against the new immigration laws signed by Jan Brewer (the governor Of Arizona).

This is do or die for New York's Javier Vazquez . Unfortunately for Javy, with the way John Danks has been throwing the ball lately, it is looking more like the latter.

Fans are not going to be kind to the man who is making $11.5 million and is being outpitched by 23-year-old Phil Hughes , who is making $447,000.

Hughes is far and away performing better than Vazquez this year, and Yankees fans are certainly going to let him know that.

Dontrelle Willis pitched arguably his best game for the Detroit Tigers Thursday night, earning his first victory since May of 2009.

This is only Willis's second victory since arriving in the Miguel Cabrera trade and signing a three year extension.

Willis has struggled since coming to the American league. This is a step in the right direction for Willis who is still a fairly young pitcher at 28-years-old. Its easy to forget Willis has pitched in the world series (2003,) won rookie of the year, and won more than 20 games in a year (2005.)