MLB Mlb Rumors

The Texas Rangers were a popular darkhorse pick to win the AL West this season, and for a time they were leading the division. Unfortunately over the last few weeks they've seen their lead on the Angels disappear and are a game back going into Friday night's action. In fact, if you were so inclined, you could say that the Rangers' division lead has gone in the red.

Which seems somewhat apropos at the moment because it's not just their division lead that the Rangers couldn't maintain. Apparently owner Tom Hicks couldn't meet last month's payroll and had to borrow $15 million from Major League Baseball to pay his team.

Jeff Francoeur seems like kind of a weird dude. I base that solely on the fact that, according to something I read Monday, he owns a pair of lucky "turkey underwear."

Yes, I wish I was kidding. But I'm not! Frenchy rocked out the bird-covered drawers in multiple games recently, based on the fact that the team is 7-0 on days when he wears them.

Francoeur said he had not worn the turkey briefs for back-to-back games all season, but will Tuesday (the Braves were off Monday, and he planned to ask his wife, Catie, to wash the underwear).

[...]"I wore the turkey underwear," he announced before Sunday's game. [Tommy]Hanson then proceeded to pitch six scoreless innings Sunday and the Braves beat the Red Sox, 2-1.

Today's world of widespread steroid use is particularly depressing. Baseball, of course, has gotten the worst rap, for various reasons. And Darren Daulton, in a recent interview with ESPN Radio's Mike Missanelli in Philadelphia, is probably not going to assist in that stereotype.

That's because Daulton, via Sports Radio Interviews, recently made some pretty, ahem, bold statements on air with Missanelli relating to his drug use as a professional baseball player. Well, kind of -- he never directly admits to taking steroids, per se, but he apparently did do a lot of drugs.

The "Battle For The Best Third Place Team in Chicago," also known as the Crosstown Rivalry, will come to an end for the 2009 season on Sunday, but that doesn't mean there won't be any lingering issues between the two teams.

Though the Windy City rivals have split the first two games of this series, which has been pretty entertaining to watch, the big story was and still is the argument between Lou Piniella and Milton Bradley on Friday.

Piniella sent Bradley home early on Friday after calling him a "piece of [naughty word]" in the visitor's clubhouse. According to both of them they've hugged out their differences, and now the Cubs seem to be turning their anger towards the White Sox. Particularly Cubs pitching coach Larry Rothschild, who wants to know who's been snitching.

With the Cubs imploding and the Brewers still in desperate need of pitching, the road to a playoff return for the St. Louis Cardinals is looking more and more wide open. The Cardinals see this opportunity themselves.

As such, they have begun keeping tabs on A's slugger Matt Holliday should Oakland decide to move him before the trade deadline, a major league source told FanHouse's Jeff Fletcher. St. Louis is cautious because of the size of Holliday's paycheck -- $13.5 million this year -- and his sagging performance in his first season away from Coors Field, but the team is interested in getting perennial MVP candidate Albert Pujols some help in the middle of the order.

Joe Strauss of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch also reported that the team is stepping up its efforts to bring Holliday back to the National League for a stretch run.

With the White Sox and Cubs set to begin their second series against each other this season at U.S. Cellular Field, former White Sox first baseman Frank Thomas is back in Chicago, but instead of playing he's now a member of the local media. The two-time AL MVP is 41 years old now but he's still open to the idea of coming back and playing if anybody is interested in his services.

The problem is that there just aren't that many teams in the market for a 41-year old designated hitter right now, and it's highly unlikely there will be any suitors for the Big Hurt in the near future. So it's not exactly a shocker that while giving a radio interview in Chicago on Thursday Thomas said he's very close to just hanging up his cleats.

When the news broke that Sammy Sosa had tested positive for steroid use back in 2003 last week it was kind of like when American Idol runner-up Adam Lambert came out of the closet. You didn't really need to be told anything because you could just see it. When Sosa morphed from a beanpole at the start his career to the behemoth he was at the end of it, it was pretty obvious.

I mean, you didn't need to look past those bulging biceps peeping out of Sosa's jersey to become suspicious of where he got them. Of course, as it turns out, Sosa didn't really care because he wanted you to see those guns of his. He even had his jerseys altered to do just that.

A few weeks ago there was quite a bit of controversy surrounding Phillies outfielder Raul Ibanez, steroids and a blog. More specifically, a media firestorm started when a blogger named JRod wrote a post on MidwestSportsFans.com that looked at the possibility of Ibanez using steroids because of the way he'd been playing in the 2009 season.

The Philadelphia Inquirer then picked up on the story, brought it to Ibanez, Raul responded and then the next thing we knew Jerod Morris, JRod, was showing up on ESPN's Outside the Lines and was berated by Ken Rosenthal and John Gonzalez. Morris was shown off as the latest example of all things wrong with blogging and had to be reprimanded for his seemingly innocuous deed.

As Eric Milton eyes his return to the Dodgers' starting rotation, general manager Ned Colletti has been out watching some of their minor-league affiliates recently. It's no secret the Dodgers would like to upgrade starting pitching before the trade deadline, and reportedly Colletti is checking out which minor leaguers in the Dodgers' system can be used in a trade to acquire left-hander Jarrod Washburn from Seattle.

The Mariners are still hanging around in the AL West, though, so it's not exactly a sure thing they'd be willing to part with Washburn. He does make quite the hefty salary, but his contract is up at the conclusion of this season, so moving him wouldn't really save the Mariners much money.

Moneyball, Michael Lewis' novel about the economics of baseball (to put it in a nutshell), was all set to begin production next week with Brad Pitt and Steven Soderbergh in tow. Read: the nerds have finally won, Lebowski!

Unfortunately that would-be -- and actually fictional -- revolution has now been delayed for the foreseeable future as Columbia Pictures, for all intents and purposes, pulled the plug on the movie.