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With Cole Hamels on the mound, everyone knew the game would be a low-scoring affair...for both teams.

It's seemingly just as hard for the Phillies' offense to score when Hamels pitches as it is for the opposing team, and the trend would continue in Game Two of a four-game series against the Houston Astros.

Hamels left the game in the seventh inning after giving up only two runs. Unfortunately, his offense only gave him one.

Although the Atlanta Braves have been leading the NL East for some time now, they made a number of trades to try and strengthen their team for the stretch run.

With the Phillies getting key players back in their lineup seemingly every day, the Braves were looking for guys like Rick Ankiel, Derek Lee, and Kyle Farnsworth to fill in some holes that the team had.

Tony La Russa refers to it as “Fuzzy Baseball.”  He uses the term to describe his team’s focus when they commit errors, run the bases poorly, and generally play bad fundamental baseball. 

This type of play is abnormal for La Russa’s teams and the St. Louis Cardinals.  But this season it’s been a frequent problem.

Irony: the all-time hits leader in Florida Marlins history burns his old team for the game-winning RBI single in the bottom of the ninth in Flushing.

NEW YORK-- It was a chilly and misty night at Citi Field, almost a tease of October, which the Mets hope to somehow get to. That may be a stretch, but if they will play deeper into the season, tonight certainly helps.

The Mets were 0-7 entering this season against Marlins ace Josh Johnson before beating him on opening day. Johnson hasn't been on top of his game of late, and the Mets hit him hard tonight.

In fact, they had a collection of great at-bats and baserunning plays throughout the entire game.

With his retirement now as a player and manager complete, Lou Pinella will wait for a call from Cooperstown as one of this generation's most successful managers having won 1,835 games with five major league clubs.

A World Series-winning manager with the Cincinnati Reds in 1990, Pinella won six divisional championships in 23 seasons including a record 116 games versus just 46 losses with a Seattle team that included future Hall of Famers Alex Rodriguez and Randy Johnson in 2001.

Johnny Damon is a touchy subject for the Red Sox nation even though it's been almost five seasons since he wore a Red Sox uniform. Some of us are thankful for the 2004 World Series he helped win and some think he should be forever shunned for joining the Yankees. 

Damon clearly thinks that the Nation favors the latter. 

First of all, no one is anointing Mike Quade the next manager of your Chicago Cubs. He is an interim manager and there will be plenty of available candidates and many interviews for Cubs GM Jim Hendry to sort through this offseason.

Still, it is reasonable to assume that Quade's assignment is an indication that he is, indeed, one of the candidates for the permanent job going forward.

As Quade himself stated, "It's absolutely an audition."

In honour of the great hostile manager Lou Piniella retiring this weekend, we here at MWS have decided to count down ten of the best baseball manager ejections.

10. Terry Francona (Boston Red Sox, MLB)—2010 VS Toronto Blue Jays


Nothing too crazy here, though it is pretty funny to watch the usually collected Francona get tossed in Toronto, then sort-of mimick the umpire's tossing motion.

I'm not going to throw the towel in quite yet on the Chicago White Sox season, however, with each passing day, the playoff window is growing smaller and smaller.

Chicago currently stands four and a half games behind the impressive Minnesota Twins (7-3 over the past 10 games) for first place in the AL Central. 

This season had been a bumpy road so far.