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In the pre-season it was Roy Halladay.  For the first three months of the year it was Ubaldo Jimenez.  Josh Johnson took over for a little while, but as of now there can be no doubt.

The St. Louis Cardinals' Adam Wainwright is now your front-runner for the National League Cy Young Award.

Remember just under two months ago, when Jimenez won his 14th start of the season to run his record to 13-1 with a 1.15 ERA?

There was a time when Jonathan Papelbon was considered one of the elite closers in baseball, among the likes of Mariano Rivera, Joe Nathan, and Francisco Rodriguez.

Between a mid-90s fastball that could hit 98 MPH, a plus splitter, a solid change-up, and a slider of the same description, Papelbon had a deathly arsenal that he could unleash at will on opposing hitters.

In his first full year in 2006 as the Red Sox closer, Papelbon was brilliant. He threw 68.1 dominant innings, striking out 75 and walking only 13 en route to a 0.92 ERA and an All-Star selection.

The Seattle Mariners are owners of the third worst record in baseball this season, and typically when a team performs as badly as the Mariners have this season, someone has to pay for it.

In the case of the Mariners, the wrong people have paid for it. After turning the Mariners around from a 101 loss team in 2008 to an 85 win team in 2009, Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu and his coaching staff were fired Monday.

The San Diego Padres and San Francisco Giants play the first game of a three-game set that is sure to be an epic battle between two NL West teams.

Both are locked in a battle for the top spot in the division, there's already trash talk going on, and both want a series win in a big way. The winner of this series will definitely be in the driver's seat.

There will be several things to watch for during this series and several keys for each team to come out on top, but here are 10 things to watch for over the next three days.

Back in the day, there was a pro wrestler who went by the moniker of The Genius. You may remember him.

As you could guess, The Genius' entire shtick was centered around his (supposed) immense level of intelligence. He wore a academic cap and graduation gown to the ring and mocked the audience with derogatory poems about the area in which their civic arena was located.

Throughout the season, the Mets bullpen situation has certainly been a sticky one. Even its formerly reliable names have not come through for the team this year.

A bullpen is comprised of pitchers who can come into a game in various situations to provide a reliable effort to help hold down the fort. The Mets haven't seen nearly enough of that this year.

As a friend of mine said to me a couple of weeks ago, if there is anything the 2010 Philadelphia Phillies baseball season has taught us, it is that 162 games can make for a very long season.

In just the last six weeks alone, the Phillies have been without Chase Utley, have spent three weeks without Jamie Moyer or Shane Victorino, and have lost Ryan Howard.

And yet, however improbably, the Phillies have simply prospered during the absence of three of their biggest stars and one of their most consistent starters.

Before the season started most analysts would have predicted that Lyndsey Lohan would have won an Oscar, before the NL West race would come down to the Giants and the Padres, but here it is—August—and San Francisco and San Diego were all set to square off in an NL West showdown.

8:05pm ET, Friday, 8/13 TV: CSN, FSMW

Probable pitchers: Thomas Diamond (0-2, 8.00) vs. Jake Westbrook (6-7, 4.54)

4:10pm ET, Saturday, 8/14 TV: FOX

Probable pitchers: Carlos Zambrano (3-6, 5.46) vs. Chris Carpenter (13-3, 2.89)

2:15 pm ET, Sunday, 8/15 TV: WGN, KSDK

Probable pitchers: Ryan Dempster (10-8, 3.66) vs. Jamie Garcia (10-5, 2.71)

2010 season matchups

The Cubs are even with the Cardinals in six matches so far this season (3-3).

It’s been about eight months and 114 games now.

Raise your hand if you’re over Curtis Granderson.

To those with arms unraised: what on earth are you waiting for?

Curtis Granderson, the smiling cherub now with the evil New York Yankees, isn’t coming back. So stop the pining.