GAME DAY 48 ACTION!

YUMA 11, BLACK MESA 8
WP: Carlos Zambrano (5-2, 3.04)
LP: Jon Garland (4-5, 4.30)

Travis Hafner had four hits, including a pair of homers, driving in five runs on the day as the Firebirds outlasted Jeff Kent and the rest of the Anomalies on the road in Black Mesa. The two-homer game raised Hafner's total to 17, second in BARB to Darwin's David Ortiz. Carlos Zambrano was decent, but the Anomalies got back into the game thanks to Kent, who also had 5 RBI to go with his third homer of the year. Impressive, but what about Jon Garland? Black Mesa’s pitcher took the loss, but he also clubbed his SECOND boundary belt of the year in the third inning after none other than Zambrano. Hard to fathom!

BROOKLYN 4, S-MART 2
WP: Roy Oswalt (6-2, 3.46)
LP: Jason Schmidt (0-3, 4.57)
SV: Rodriguez (10)

Bobby Abreu and Roy Oswalt shocked the 39,512 in attendance with a double steal with nobody out in the seventh, and Ichiro Suzuki followed with a two-run single to break a 1-1 tie as the Moabs continued their recent climb back up the standings of the East, what rival GM Andrew Haynes has called the "Division of Death". Oswalt, allowed to bat with no one out, rewarded his manager’s faith with a single and showed his athleticism in the highly-unlikely double steal.

(The Boom Sticks, it should be noted, have no choice but to allow their starters to go deep into games. With MASSIVE injuries afflicting their pitching staff all at once (Kenny Rogers, Jake Westbrook, Freddy Garcia and now Fernando Rodney), GM Jeff Purves’s club looks like the first BARB club to fall seriously out of contention and they are likely sellers by the All-Star Break.)

DARWIN 13, LAS VEGAS 7
WP: Kelvim Escobar (6-1, 3.96)
LP: A.J. Burnett (2-4, 4.10)

Backup catcher Miguel Olivo hit a sac fly, laid down a sac bunt, and when finally called upon to drive the ball, hit a grand slam off reliever Chuck James to lead the aroused Finches to a win in a slugfest on the road in Las Vegas. The Finches got an early lead for Kelvim Escobar on Billy Hall’s three-run homer off Burnett, which was good, as Escobar had easily his worst start of the season. David Ortiz also had a homer, a solo shot and his BARB-leading 19th of the season.

ARIZONA 3, SAN JOSE 1
WP: Rich Hill (2-1, 5.56)
LP: Jarrod Washburn (3-3, 4.29)
SV: Cotts (2)

Jose Reyes tripled, homered and stole his 19th base of the year while backing Rich Hill’s eight strong innings with a pair of fine defensive plays in the hole, a one-man show and the D-Backs seventh win in their last ten games. The only run allowed by Hill was unearned, triggered by an error by Ricky Weeks. It turned out, after the game, that Weeks was injured and the second baseman was placed on the disabled list and in all likelihood has lost his starting job to some condition of Mark Loretta and B.J. Upton.

OAKEYLAND 3, FROSTBITE FALLS 2
WP: Jeff Francis (5-3, 3.42)
LP: Bronson Arroyo (4-5, 4.98)

Jorge Posada hit a three-run homer in the first, and Jeff Francis made only one mistake (a two-run pinch-homer by Morgan Ensberg), and Francis would go to pitch a three-hitter, going all the way and not allowing a single Squirrels baserunner after the fifth inning, a dominating performance for the home team.