Here's a random yet fun slice of the big baseball pie via Baseball-Reference.com's Play Index Batting Game Finder...

Since 1956, players with the most games where they reached base 2+ times within the first 1,985 games of their career:

                   Games Link to Individual Games
+-----------------+-----+-------------------------+
 Wade Boggs         1180 Ind. Games
 Frank Thomas       1179 Ind. Games
 Rickey Henderson   1169 Ind. Games
 Edgar Martinez     1136 Ind. Games
 Jeff Bagwell       1134 Ind. Games
 Derek Jeter        1120 Ind. Games
 Manny Ramirez      1116 Ind. Games
 Joe Morgan         1108 Ind. Games
 Barry Bonds        1107 Ind. Games
 Chipper Jones      1102 Ind. Games
 Gary Sheffield     1087 Ind. Games
 Jim Thome          1079 Ind. Games
 Alex Rodriguez     1077 Ind. Games
 Carl Yastrzemski   1072 Ind. Games
 Pete Rose          1072 Ind. Games
 Tim Raines         1071 Ind. Games
 Bernie Williams    1062 Ind. Games
 John Olerud        1062 Ind. Games
 Frank Robinson     1061 Ind. Games
 Paul Molitor       1053 Ind. Games
 Tony Gwynn         1052 Ind. Games
 Craig Biggio       1052 Ind. Games
 Mark Grace         1048 Ind. Games
 Rod Carew          1039 Ind. Games
 Roberto Alomar     1028 Ind. Games
+-----------------+-----+-------------------------+

Say what you want about Derek Jeter...but, you can't say that he doesn't reach base...and often. (And, yes, I used 1,985 games since that's the number of games that Jeter has played in his career, so far.)

The 2008 Mets have become just the 7th team in baseball history to have four players on their team appear in 159+games in the same season.  Here's the list via B-R.com PI:

 Year Lg Team                              Number Players Matching
+----+--+---------------------------------+------+-----------------------------------------+
 2008 NL New York Mets                          4 Carlos Beltran / David Wright / Carlos Delgado / Jose Reyes
 1968 NL Chicago Cubs                           4 Billy Williams / Ron Santo / Don Kessinger / Randy Hundley
 1965 NL Cincinnati Reds                        4 Pete Rose / Deron Johnson / Vada Pinson / Tommy Harper
 1964 NL St. Louis Cardinals                    4 Ken Boyer / Curt Flood / Dick Groat / Bill White
 1962 AL Los Angeles Angels                     4 Leon Wagner / Albie Pearson / Lee Thomas / Billy Moran
 1962 NL San Francisco Giants                   4 Jose Pagan / Willie Mays / Orlando Cepeda / Chuck Hiller
 1961 AL Detroit Tigers                         4 Rocky Colavito / Jake Wood / Bill Bruton / Norm Cash

Now that the regular 2008 season is over, we can begin to put some accomplishments in persective. The C. C. Sabathia acquisition will go down as one of the greatest mid-season trades of all time. Yesterday, his 10th complete game of the year helped the Brewers make the playoffs for the first time in ovet 25 years.

Sabathia is the first guy in quite a while to get 10 CGs in a season:

  Cnt Player            Year CG Age Tm  Lg  G   GS SHO GF  W  L  W-L% SV   IP   H   R   ER  BB  SO   ERA  ERA+ HR  BF   AB  2B 3B IBB HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB CS Pk BK WP   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  OPS+  Pit  Str
+----+-----------------+----+--+---+---+--+---+---+---+--+--+--+-----+--+-----+---+---+---+---+---+------+----+--+----+----+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+----+----+----+
    1 C.C. Sabathia     2008 10  27 TOT ML  35  35   5  0 17 10  .630  0 253   223  85  76  59 251   2.70  162 19 1023  942 38  1   1   7   9   6  20  12  3  2  2  2  .237  .285  .340  .625   65 3814 2530 
    2 Randy Johnson     1999 12  35 ARI NL  35  35   2  0 17  9  .654  0 271.2 207  86  75  70 364   2.48  186 30 1079  993 28  4   3   9   4   3  14  42 17  5  2  4  .208  .266  .335  .601   55           
    3 Scott Erickson    1998 11  30 BAL AL  36  36   2  0 16 13  .552  0 251.1 284 125 112  69 186   4.01  113 23 1102 1011 44  4   4  13   7   2  23  28  7  1  0  4  .281  .334  .401  .735   92           
    4 Randy Johnson     1998 10  34 TOT ML  34  34   6  0 19 11  .633  0 244.1 203 102  89  86 329   3.28  135 23 1014  907 38  1   1  14   5   2  13  31 19  3  2  7  .224  .300  .344  .644   71           
    5 Curt Schilling    1998 15  31 PHI NL  35  35   2  0 15 14  .517  0 268.2 236 101  97  61 300   3.25  134 23 1089 1000 56  6   3   6  14   7  18  10  5  0  0 12  .236  .282  .373  .655   74           
    6 Pedro Martinez    1997 13  25 MON NL  31  31   4  0 17  8  .680  0 241.1 158  65  51  67 305   1.90  219 16  947  860 24  4   5   9   9   1  16  20  5  3  1  3  .184  .250  .277  .527   42           
    7 Pat Hentgen       1996 10  27 TOR AL  35  35   3  0 20 10  .667  0 265.2 238 105  95  94 177   3.22  155 20 1100  988 49  2   3   5   5   8  24   7  9  2  0  8  .241  .308  .355  .663   68           
    8 Greg Maddux       1995 10  29 ATL NL  28  28   3  0 19  2  .905  0 209.2 147  39  38  23 181   1.63  262  8  785  748 22  0   3   4   9   1  16  26  6  2  0  1  .197  .224  .258  .482   29           
    9 Greg Maddux       1994 10  28 ATL NL  25  25   3  0 16  6  .727  0 202   150  44  35  31 156   1.56  271  4  774  726 22  2   3   6   6   5  21  22  6  2  1  3  .207  .243  .259  .502   34           
   10 Kevin Brown       1993 12  28 TEX AL  34  34   3  0 15 12  .556  0 233   228 105  93  74 142   3.59  116 14 1001  903 41  4   5  15   5   3  15  10 10  2  1  8  .252  .319  .353  .672   84           
   11 Chuck Finley      1993 13  30 CAL AL  35  35   2  0 16 14  .533  0 251.1 243 108  88  82 187   3.15  143 22 1065  959 38  1   1   6  11   7  21  21  9  0  1  8  .253  .314  .364  .678   79           
   12 Randy Johnson     1993 10  29 SEA AL  35  34   3  1 19  8  .704  1 255.1 185  97  92  99 308   3.24  136 22 1043  913 37  3   1  16   8   7  16  28 12  2  2  8  .203  .290  .322  .612   64           
   13 Jack McDowell     1993 10  27 CHW AL  34  34   4  0 22 10  .688  0 256.2 261 104  96  69 158   3.37  125 20 1067  981 43  4   6   3   8   6  19  10 15  6  1  8  .266  .314  .379  .693   87           
   14 Kevin Brown       1992 11  27 TEX AL  35  35   1  0 21 11  .656  0 265.2 262 117  98  76 173   3.32  115 11 1108 1007 40  1   2  10   7   8  29   7 12  2  2  8  .260  .316  .335  .651   85           
   15 Roger Clemens     1992 11  29 BOS AL  32  32   5  0 18 11  .621  0 246.2 203  80  66  62 208   2.41  175 11  989  907 39  2   5   9   5   5  28  24 12  1  0  3  .224  .279  .308  .587   60           
   16 Doug Drabek       1992 10  29 PIT NL  34  34   4  0 15 11  .577  0 256.2 218  84  79  54 177   2.77  124 17 1021  945 35  4   8   6   8   8  20  18 14  3  1 11  .231  .274  .330  .604   77           
   17 Jack McDowell     1992 13  26 CHW AL  34  34   1  0 20 10  .667  0 260.2 247  95  92  75 178   3.18  123 21 1079  983 45  9   9   7   8   6  12  29 16  4  0  6  .251  .307  .379  .686   92           
   18 Terry Mulholland  1992 12  29 PHI NL  32  32   2  0 13 11  .542  0 229   227 101  97  46 125   3.81   92 14  937  871 43  3   3   3  10   7  14   2  5 15  0  3  .261  .298  .365  .663   93           
   19 Charles Nagy      1992 10  25 CLE AL  33  33   3  0 17 10  .630  0 252   245  91  83  57 169   2.96  133 11 1018  944 41  4   1   2   6   9  34  12 15  0  0  7  .260  .300  .346  .646   82           
   20 Melido Perez      1992 10  26 NYY AL  33  33   1  0 13 16  .448  0 247.2 212  94  79  93 218   2.87  138 16 1013  901 33  3   5   5   6   8  19  18 18  9  0 13  .235  .308  .332  .640   79           
   21 Curt Schilling    1992 10  25 PHI NL  42  26   4 10 14 11  .560  2 226.1 165  67  59  59 147   2.35  150 11  895  819 30  4   4   1   7   8  11   7  7  0  0  4  .201  .254  .288  .542   58           
   22 Roger Clemens     1991 13  28 BOS AL  35  35   4  0 18 10  .643  0 271.1 219  93  79  65 241   2.62  164 15 1077  993 46  8  12   5   6   8  18  23 16  1  0  6  .221  .270  .328  .598   61           
   23 Jack McDowell     1991 15  25 CHW AL  35  35   3  0 17 10  .630  0 253.2 212  97  96  82 191   3.41  117 19 1028  930 44  5   2   4   8   4  11  22 10  5  1 10  .228  .292  .347  .639   78           
   24 Jack Morris       1991 10  36 MIN AL  35  35   2  0 18 12  .600  0 246.2 226 107  94  92 163   3.43  124 18 1032  922 28  6   5   5   5   8  23  32  8  0  1 15  .245  .315  .347  .662   79           
   25 Jaime Navarro     1991 10  24 MIL AL  34  34   2  0 15 12  .556  0 234   237 117 102  73 114   3.92  102 18 1002  908 39  3   3   6   7   8  20  23  7  0  0 10  .261  .318  .370  .688   91           

Thanks to Peter Abraham at the LoHud Yankees Blog for this one.

How many players do you think have had 100 RBI each of the last six seasons (2003 through 2008)?

You probably guessed a number higher than three, the actual number.

Now, can you figure out who those 3 players are? Two are pretty easy: Albert Pujols and Alex Rodriguez.

The third one might surprise you.

I was reading on BTF about the Angels Pythag luck which led me to run a few quick studies. The fact of the matter is that the AL is so much better than the NL this year it isn't particularly close.

While Howard leads all of MLB in HR and RBI by a wide margin, he's not having quite as good a year as you might think. (I know that sounds crazy.)

First, check out this list of lowest OPS+ values for a guy with 47+ HR. It's been done 92 times, and only twice has a guy been under 130. Think about his OPS+ of 121...does that seem like a number that a guy leading all of baseball in HR and RBI should have?

A large part of it is his low batting average. Two years ago, he hit .313 and slugged .659 with an OPS+ of 167. This year, he's batting only .248 and slugging .537. That's 65 points off his batting average and 122 points off his slugging average. His extra bases are roughly the same--the difference is actually about 30 fewer singles, and the fact that he's got more ABs this year.

His OBP is also way down from .425 to .337, thanks partly due to the low BA again, but also due to the fact that he's walking less. He already has more PAs in 2008 than he did in 2006, but he has 27 fewer walks at the moment.

I'm not suggesting that Howard is a dud. However, it's also true that his 2008 is not in the same league as his 2006 was, or even his 2007.

On the suggestions page, kingturtle mentioned that Jose Reyes has put up some very high triples totals through the age of 25. In fact, with 71 triples through his age 25 season, Reyes is 18th all time,  10th since 1901, and 2nd since 1940. Reyes needs another 3 triples this season to match Carl Crawford for #1 since 1940.

Here are the leaders in triples through age 25 (seasonal age, not actual) since 1940.

When Phil Hughes was removed from a tie game tonight, it almost assured that the Yankees will have 2 semi-regular starters with winless seasons. Both Hughes and teammate Ian Kennedy have failed to register a major league win, despite making 8 and 9 starts respectively.  Barring  the unexpected, they will become just the 3rd pair of teammates to each make at least 8 starts and fail to register a win.  Here are the other 2.

2001 Cincinnati Reds
 Player              Ag  G    ERA   W   L  SV  GS  GF  CG SHO   IP     H    R   ER   HR  BB   SO   BFP  WP HBP BK IBB ERA+
 Rob Bell            24   9   5.48   0   5  0   9   0   0   0   44.3   46   28   27   9   17   33  188   1   3  0   1  84
 Brian Reith         23   9   7.81   0   7  0   8   0   0   0   40.3   56   37   35  13   16   22  192   1   2  0   0  59

1999 San Diego Padres
 Player              Ag  G    ERA   W   L  SV  GS  GF  CG SHO   IP     H    R   ER   HR  BB   SO   BFP  WP HBP BK IBB ERA+
 Stan Spencer        30   9   9.16   0   7  0   8   1   0   0   38.3   56   44   39  11   11   36  183   1   1  1   1  46
 Heath Murray        26  22   5.76   0   4  0   8   1   0   0   50.0   60   33   32   7   26   25  234   1   1  1   4  73

Via Baseball-Reference.com's Play Index Pitching Season Finder...

Amercian League right-handed pitchers who have won 19+ games in a season at age 39 or older:

                   From  To   Ages Seasons
+-----------------+----+----+-----+-------+
 Cy Young          1907 1909 40-42       3
 Mike Mussina      2008 2008 39-39       1
 Early Wynn        1959 1959 39-39       1

Seasons/Careers found: 3.

Just three guys.  File this under:  You don't see that everyday.

Last night, the Mets gave up their second grand slam to a pitcher this year.

Those are the only two this year:

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 2008-06-23    Johan Santana     NYM  SEA Felix Hernandez   tied   0-0  t 2 123   2 0-0   1  4 Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep CF-RF); Beltre Scores/unER; Clement Scores/unER; Bloomquist Scores/unER; Hernandez Scores/unER 
       2   1 2008-09-22    Jonathon Niese    NYM  CHC Jason Marquis     tied   2-2  t 4 123   0 0-0   1  4 Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF); DeRosa Scores; Johnson Scores; Theriot Scores 

And here are back years:

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 2006-07-07    Jose Lima         NYM  FLA Dontrelle Willis  down   0-3  t 4 123   0 0-0   1  4 Home Run (Fly Ball); Willingham Scores/unER; Hermida Scores; Treanor Scores 

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 2002-06-02    Bruce Chen        MON @PHI Robert Person     down   0-3  b 1 123   2 1-0   2  4 Home Run; Giambi Scores; Lee Scores; Pratt Scores 

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 2001-09-29    Jimmy Haynes      MIL @COL Denny Neagle      down   6-9  b 4 123   2 0-1   2  4 Home Run (CF-RF); Ochoa Scores; Uribe Scores; Bennett Scores 

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 2000-05-24    Mike Johnson      MON @SFG Shawn Estes       down   0-7  b 5 123   2 0-0   1  4 Home Run (LF-CF); Kent Scores; Snow Scores; Burks Scores 

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 1998-07-20    Denny Neagle      ATL  CHC Kevin Tapani      down   0-1  t 3 123   2 1-1   3  4 Home Run (Line Drive to Deep LF); Hill Scores; Orie Scores; Servais Scores 
       2   1 1998-09-02    Jesus Sanchez     FLA  STL Kent Mercker      down   0-3  t 4 123   0 1-1   3  4 Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF Line); Gant Scores; Tatis Scores; Polanco Scores 

  Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 1996-09-07    Andy Ashby        SDP @STL Donovan Osborne   tied   1-1  b 5 123   1  -       4 Home Run (Deep CF-RF); Mabry Scores; Pagnozzi Scores; Alicea Scores 

   Yr#    G# Date          Pitcher           Tm   Opp Batter            Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit  R Play Desc.
+-------+---+-------------+-----------------+---+----+-----------------+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+--+-------------------------+
       1   1 1995-05-29    Shane Reynolds    HOU @FLA Chris Hammond     ahead  2-0  b 2 123   1 1-1   3  4 Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF); Pendleton Scores; Whitmore Scores; Johnson Scores 
       2   1 1995-06-27    Jim Bullinger     CHC  PIT Denny Neagle      tied   2-2  t 6 123   2  -       4 Home Run (Deep LF-CF); Merced Scores; Garcia Scores; Liriano Scores 
       3   1 1995-08-25    John Cummings     LAD @PHI Jeff Juden        down   2-10 b 4 123   2 2-2   5  4 Home Run (Fly Ball to Deep RF Line); Webster Scores/unER; Hayes Scores/unER; Van Slyke Scores/unER; Juden Scores/unER

I had no idea that Denny Neagle hit two slams.

These are all the grand slams by pitchers going back to 1987, excluding any possible ones hit by pitchers playing positions other than P (such as, for example, PH.)