Injuries, especially to a pitching staff, make teams scramble to plug the holes. The Red Sox, four games in back of the Rays when the evening started and licking many wounds in their starting rotation, are not immune to this fact. So it was that the wonderfully-named Charlie Zink found his way atop the hill in Fenway for his first major league start tonight against the Texas Rangers. It was a performance he won’t soon forget.

Zink toiled in the minors for six years after being signed as an undrafted minor leaguer in 2002. The 28-year old knuckleballer looked good this year going 13 - 4 with a 2.89 ERA for the Sox Triple-A affiliate in Pawtucket, RI. The kid came recommended by none other than Sox great Luis Tiant so on Monday the Red Sox, having put knuckleballer Tim Wakefiled on the DL, ignored Zink’s pedigree (did I mention he graduated from the baseball powerhouse Savannah College of Art and Design?) and plopped him in the midst of a pennant race. But how bad could it be; the kid already had his own Wiki page.

The game began in a way which, if it were written for Hollywood, would have been laughable: the Sox posted 10 runs in the first inning including not one, but two, three-run homers by David Ortiz. The Sox offensive barrage offered up a new definition of the term “breathing room” for the uninitiated Mr. Zink. Now, it was up to him.

Having been untouched in the first Zink got rattled a bit in the second, giving up two runs but — given the pad — it was forgettable. You could almost hear Ortiz in the dugout approaching Zink afterward: “Forgehedaboudit man.” In the third and fourth Zink was on a roll: three up and three down in both innings. The kid might have something here.

But, in the fifth, the knuckler betrayed him. The first seven batters he faced went: double, ground out, single, single, double, double, double and then, he was done. Texas scored eight that inning to tie the game and the improbable appearance of the no-longer a kid from Carmichael, CA had ended. His final line for the night: 4.1 innings, 11 hits, 8 runs (all earned), one walk and one strike out. His ERA was 16.62.

Overall, a poor outing — one which might very well be his last in the majors — but for a few innings Charlie Zink lived a dream; Fenway Park in a pennant race with a 10-run lead and 38,000 people cheering his name.

Down On Half Street: Let us now dispense forever with the tiresome: “Houston you have a problem” signs and simply note that while the cynics say that it was only a matter of time before the Nats’ bats were loosed against the likes of the lowly Astros, it was damned good to see. From where I sat, the first Belliard home run looked like it was going foul, so the explosion of fandom was all that much sweeter.

It was good to see Kentucky’s bat come to life and you have to feel good for Tim Redding, who finally notched a win after throwing his standard very good game for six innings. But while we’re focused on the bats and Timmy, let’s note that reliever Steven Shell looks like the (proverbial) real deal. Note to Jim Bowden: perhaps you should trade Shell to another team for some prospects! Oh wait, Shell is a prospect. Hey, I have an idea, let’s keep him.

Me Droogs: In an unprecedented show of friendship, the three writers of this blog met for an evening of baseball. We actually sat together during the Nats loss to the Tracy’s — an 11 inning 7-5 affair that the Nats should have won, and would have won, were it not for (in my humble opinion) a late game non-interference call by umpire Angel Hernandez. Every umpire misses a call, but Hernandez’s missed calls are famous — as are his temper tantrums. In 2001 he threw football player Steve McMichael out of Wrigley Field after McMichael (who sang “Take Me Out to the Ballgame), had the temerity of questioning his competence. In another incident, Hernandez threw Dodger first base coach Mariano Duncan’s hat into the stands after Duncan threw it to the ground in arguing a call.

No kidding.

In any event, it was great to see the Droogs who, in the midst of the Thursday night loss, received news that Ryan Langerhans was being called up from Columbus and would soon be rejoining the club. We were thrilled. 

Buyer’s Remorse: The first assessment is in on who got the better of the Rich Harden to Chicago for Sean Gallagher, Matt Murton, Eric Patterson and Double-A catcher Josh Donaldson trade– and the nod goes to Billy Beane and the A’s. The common notion is that Gallagher was the key to the trade for Oakland, with early reports suggesting that outfielder Matt Murton would head to Sacramento, Oakland’s triple-A affiliate. But Murton has always been underestimated and it’s no secret that Lou Piniella never really took to him. So when Murton arrived in Oakland, they told him he would start in left field. A very smart decision. I always thought Murton would look good in a Nats uniform: he has a career .294 batting average, a .362 OBP and .448 slugging.

Yesterday, both Gallagher and Murton shined in the Connie Mack’s 9-2 drubbing of the Angels and over at Thunder Matt’s Saloon (named for the now-departed), fans of the Baby Bears were suffering buyer’s remorse. They weren’t the only ones: the Trib’s Fred Mitchell noted that 44 years ago the Cubs made a transaction that sent future Hall of Famer Lou Brock to St. Louis – a trade against which ”all other major Cubs transactions are measured.”  And just who did the Cubs get for Brock? This guy:

The Nation: Everything seems to be clicking in Boston, where Dustin Pedroia’s bat has come to life. The second sacker (and starting All Star) is hitting .311 and sending the Bosox faithful into paragons of ecstacy. There’s no question about it. He’s simply the best baseball player who ever lived. (And he will be …  until, that is, the day that the Evil Empire signs him for $140 million.) I know — let’s talk about Duston Pedroia on Baseball Tonight!

The Bosox are now the class of the AL, and godonlyknows just how good they can be when the get a little from the bullpen. Even so, I can’t help noting that “Red Sox Nation” has been notably silent on the one transaction they once trumpeted — the signing of this guy to a “no lose” minor league deal:

We here at the Dogz have recently learned that Bartolo is either on the DL or that he is the unknown in that song about “the man who never returned.” My bet? He is lost forever ‘neath the streets of Boston.

Rays and Reds: One of the salutory things about being a father is that, from time to time, you get to schlepp your children’s . . . stuff . . . around the country when they decide to move. So it was that I was able to visit Boston at the same time the Bosox visited Tampa Bay. While that eliminated any chance I had to visit Fenway, it yielded a late night foray to a Framingham bar, where a television larger than I have ever seen showed the Bosox taking on the Tampa Bay Rays in a Tuesday tilt at Tropicana. And it gave me a chance to rub shoulders with a group of baseball-savvy Bosox fans who, when not drinking, were yelling epithets at Terry Francona and Jason Varitek.

The Tuesday night Rays-Sox contest was one of the best television games I had seen in some time and convincing evidence that — unless the rest of the AL comes armed and ready – they are likely to get schooled by the rejuvenated Rays. The Rays swept the Sox in three (much as they had earlier swept the Cubs), and now sit atop the AL East. The world is turned upside down. “They’re good,” one Sox fan told me, “they’re the next Big Red Machine.” Well, probably not: but their bullpen is solid and with Evan Longoria and a rehabbed Carlos Pena at first (he had 46 home runs last year), the Rays are among the best teams in the game. But the key to their success (of course) is pitching.

On the night I watched, Matt Garza – who came over from Minnesota — shut down the Bosox for seven innings, before giving way to J.P. Howell and Grant Balfour. Howell looked unhittable, and when he set down Varitek the Bosox catcher looked absolutely baffled. It reminded me of the look Joe Morgan gave to Catfish Hunter during the second game of the 1972 World Series. Morgan could never solve Hunter, and the Reds (at the beginning of the Big Red Machine era) hit a combined .209 against the ”Swingin’ A’s.”

“The Big Blue Machine” is, in fact, nothing like the 1972 Reds. But it’s a lot like the “Swingin’ A’s,” who were grounded by strong pitching and punch-and-judy hitters. Hunter, Odom, Holtzman, Fingers and Blue stifled the Reds “machine” of Bench, Rose, Concepcion, Morgan, Geronimo, and Foster — exhibit A of how good pitching always beats good hitting. So it was in the Rays-Bosox series: as Kazmir, Garza, Shields, Wheeler, Howell and Percival held the Sawx to ten earned runs in three games. ”They’re the next big Red Machine,” a Red Sox fan told me, shaking his head after Grant Balfour shut down the B’s in game two. I disagree: if anything, the Tampa Bay Rays of 2008 are more like the “Swingin’ A’s.”

Speaking of which: Our beloved Nats are in Cincinnati for a four game set at the Great American Ballpark — where, after just one game and one inning, Junior has already hit number 304.

The Reds are Major League Baseball’s oldest franchise, and one of its most storied. But, since last winning a world series (in 1990), the “Redlegs” have fallen on hard times and are now rebuilding. The Dusty Baker 9 now features a great aging star, some sometime hitters, and a bevy of young throwers — all of whom (if Dusty’s legacy is an indication), will soon be on their way to the Mayo Clinic, for Tommy John surgery. These are not your daddy’s Reds: Brandon Phillips is their best ballplayer, Jay Bruce is one of their “emerging 8’s,” and Cueto and Volquez may well anchor a great pitching staff in the future. But the future seems a long ways away for those who decide to take in a game at the Great American Ballpark.

The New Rule: Taking advantage of a new Major League rule, the Washington Nationals are considering trading 1st Baseman Nick Johnson for “a player to be named much, much later.” While the Nats front office would not name the player, it is thought to be young Bobby Bailey, a T-baller with the Overland Park, Kansas T-ball league. Bailey is believed to be a prized prospect in the Kansas City Royals scouting system.”He’s an integral part of our decades-long effort to rebuild our team,” a Royals’ scout noted proudly. While only six years old, Bailey is viewed by the Nats as a potential future player whose upside is that “while we don’t know whether he can run, hit or catch, he never gets injured.” As one Nats insider told River-Dogz: “This kid is just a stud, he just rolls with the punches.”

Okay … well, heartless as this may seem, the truth of the situation is even more heartless. In many ways, Johnson was more valuable to the Nats than Ryan Zimmerman; he was a silent clubhouse presence who led by example. His second deck home run earlier this year was a sign of things to come — a prodigious shot. He’s gone for the remainder, after a wrist failed to heal. While “Meat Tray“ is a very fine . . .  yes, indeed a very fine hitter (and leader too), you can see why other teams pursue Johnson, while passing on his replacement. The front office quietly has it that Nick is snakebit. Maybe. But for pursuing scouts, anxious to land a leader and trade some prospects, Johnson appears fragile. There’s a world of difference.

This is a disaster. 

On another note: We mourn the passing of Ryan Langerhans to Triple A Columbus, where he will attempt to break out of his career-long slump. We have heard from sportswriters of the BBWA that the motion to change the phrase “Mendoza Line” to Langerhans Line has been tabled, pending the outcome of Pete Orr’s tenure as Langerhans’ replacement in the Nats’ lineup. We wish Ryan well. Everyone struggles in baseball, but he has struggled more than most.

The Grey Eagle: You can make the argument (you can make it, but you would lose) that Tris Speaker was the greatest center fielder of all time. That would place him ahead of Babe Ruth and Willie Mays, of course, and that’s not possible. But he’s certainly in the top five and perhaps in the top three. There’s a reason for that — and it had nothing to do with his deep friendship with that world-class chump, Ty Cobb. Speaker was the first in a long-line of unappreciated Red Sox: brilliant players who were eventually cast away for money or bums because the owner thought they were too expensive, washed up …  or just because.

The list includes Ruth, Fisk and Clemens. But Speaker was the first to go — and the worst decision in Red Sox history (yes, worse than Ruth because in Speaker at least they knew, yes the keepers of the asylum just knew), and Boston fans talked about it for years afterwards. Speaker went to Cleveland, of all places (in 1916), and for a few bucks and some prospects. That’ll show him!

So if Cincinnati is a place where pitchers go to die, then Boston is a place where great players go to get traded. Still.

Anyway. I was reading about Speaker the other day (there’s this) and I was just stunned by his statistics. Two in particular. The retro-sheets show that Speaker played so shallow in center field that he sometimes covered second during double plays: 6-8-3! He holds the record for double plays by an outfielder (139). Of course this was the dead ball era, but still. Then there’s this: in over 10,000 at bats he struck out 220 times. 

Down On Half Street: Elijah Dukes looks like a sorry outfielder — he has not mastered the depth of right field in Nationals Park — but he can hit the ball. Against the Rangers at Nationals Park on Friday night he went 5 for 6 and raised his average to .270. We all watched closely as Manny congratulated him after the game. Dukes even parked one in Center Field. He’s starting to look like the player the Nats thought he might be when they got him from Tampa Bay . . . Enough about this worrying whether the Nats are going to draw. There were 30,000-plus to see the Nats in a 14 inning tussle with the Rangers last night. And the crowd is hardly filled with neophytes. There is a surly quality to the fans along the right field line (where I sit), particularly on ground balls hit to Felipe Lopez . . . camera shots of people streaming in from Half Street now seem to have become a tradition . . . Josh Hamilton struck out three times in the Nats 4-3 win. He looked awful. He should have never agreed to that Sports Illustrated profile.

The Killer: I thought a lot about the Minnesota Twins and all the might-have-beens had they hung around Washington instead of moving to the twin cities. One thing: I have heard that Harmon Killebrew is the model for the MLB logo and the story makes sense  . . .

but I have found no confirmation of it. And the closest I could find of something that looks like a Killebrew stance that might be used for a logo is this:

which is itchy close … but only close. The Twins, of course, started out here before Calvin Griffith moved them after the 1960 season. They went to capture a pennant in ‘65 with a team that should have been in Washington. Killebrew was the center of that team. In ‘65 he hit 25 home runs with 75 RBIs — an off-year in which he was injured much of the time. Tony Oliva, in only his second full year, hit .321 and led the league in hitting.  But it was Killebrew who was the heart of those Twins’ teams: when he retired he had hit 573 home runs, had been in the top ten in the AL in OBP in nine years (and in the top ten in slugging in ten), and played on eleven all star teams. The Twins did well in Minnesota, but only just: “He kept us in business,” Calvin Griffith said of Killebrew.

The early ’60s were very good years for the Twins, with one World Series title, but they were not great years. The great years were the late ’80s and early ’90s. The Twins won the series in ‘87 and again in ‘91, behind the hitting of Kent Hrbek, Gary Gaetti and Kirby Puckett – two of whom are in the Hall of Fame — and the pitching of Bert Blyleven and

Then there’s this:

twer it so …

The Nation: Me droog Tom (you remember Tom) and I spent Thursday night talking about baseball, and about halfway through our discussion he asked me whether it was true that the Red Sox are now actually hated — after spending years as the darlings of American fandom. It didn’t use to be that way, he noted. I told him that it was true. “You bet they’re hated,” I said, “especially Varitek.” But over the last two days I’ve changed my mind: I don’t think they’re hated, I think they’re getting too much attention. It’s not their fault.

Here’s what I mean. On any given night you can tune into Baseball Tonight and hear Peter Gammons whinge on and on about the trials and tribulations of Dustin Pedroia. Here’s Dustin hitting for the cycle, here’s Dustin making a terrific play, here’s Dustin meeting with the Queen. Why, I bet that Dustin can even sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” There’s no question that Pedroia was a terrific find for the Bosox (and I love Gammons, frankly), but Pedroia’s not a great player, he’s not even close to a great player. Then too, the guy I saw last night, Ian Kinsler, is much better — but gets half the attention.

By-the-bye, the young lady behind me noticed that Kinsler was all over the field, ranging to his left and right to scoop up ground balls and every time he did she would yell “get ‘em gadget.” And then she would giggle. Get it? Get em gadget?

Kinsler’s hitting .306 with ten home runs and 45 RBIs: a clip that should net him 120 RBIs and close to 25 home runs. Pedroia’s hitting .277 with six home runs and 32 RBIs. Kinsler has better range at second, better speed, a better glove. But Pedroia leads the All Star balloting (Kinsler is second) by some 200,000-plus votes. Why? Because Pedroia plays in Boston, that’s why.

I’m not whining mind you (well, okay, I’m whining just a bit) — I’m just building a case for claiming that the Red Sox are not hated. They’re over-exposed. And that has nothing to do with the Red Sox. It has to do with the way that the baseball media cover them. The same is true of the Cubs, by the way. And, well, you know … I love the Cubs. And the Nats, of course. But honest-go-God, I know that ESPN has to worry about ratings, but we’ve got the Cubs and Yanks and Bosox covered — let’s see the Rangers and Pirates and, yes, even the Royals. It shouldn’t be that I have to go to a Nats game to be expose to the likes of an Ian Kinsler.

The Cleveland Naps: When I was a kid I was always delving into the history of baseball, honing my skills at talking about guys like Nap Lajoie and Kid Nichols. History is what I had instead of an ability to hit a curveball. But I only learned recently that the current Cleveland Indians were once named the Cleveland Naps in his honor (his name, by the way, is French Canadian — and is pronounced La-jway). That’s how good he was.

One thing’s for sure: they’re not going to be renaming the Nats the Felipe’s anytime soon.

This baseball card just sold for $28,000:

Pssst! Don’t tell anyone, but I want it. I would be willing to trade my wife for it — whaddaya think? Here she is:

I went to the Nats game on Tuesday. They were sloppy, uninterested, forgettable and disappointing. Felipe Lopez failed to cover second and Ryan Langerhans (he’s hitting .188), let a ball slide past him in left. The scorer called it an error and later changed it to a double. It was an error. I was embarrassed for them — I was embarrassed for Manny. Don Sutton is forever praising Manny for his patience, but I think it’s about time he started throwing something around the clubhouse. I understand they’re injured, I understand they’re building, but there’s no excuse for looking like they’ve arrived not ready to play. The crowd around me was sullen, critical, disgusted. In my book, they had every right. The Nats have the lowest batting average in the Majors — it’s time for someone to get upset about it.

The Emerging 8s

It struck me the other night that we’re seeing the blossoming of a new era of great centerfielders — triple-crown contender Josh Hamilton in Texas, rookie phenom Jay Bruce in Cincinnati, heavy-hitting Chris Young in Arizona, the Wahoo’s Grady Sizemore (he’s a veteran, but only 26), and the under-the-radar Adam Jones.

Jones is going to be a terrific player. I saw him clear the bases against the Bosox the other night — and it was a sight. He was the big name in the trade for Eric Bedard, and I wondered at the time whether the O’s got enough, but have since decided they got more than enough. Once Jones starts hitting for average (and he will), the Orioles will put him in the fourth spot for the next fifteen years and just watch him — unless Angelos interferes and does something stupid. Jones will have competition from this guy:

who just gets better and better and better. They talk about his base stealing and his speed (and it’s damned good, no doubt), but it’s his brain and not his legs that need to kick in. I saw him try to steal third twice this year, once for the third out. He hasn’t tried it since, and has been steady at the plate. With Jones in Baltimore and Milledge here … well, it will make the I-95 worth seeing.

Well, as Mark said the other day, “because Tom liked it.” True, but it was not some random notion on my part. It’s a bit of a rip-off of a Red Sox blog called Boston Dirt Dogs. The original idea for that site was to pay homage to the good, solid players who regularly get their uniform dirty. ‘Gritty’ would be a good description of these types of guys. Sox catcher Jason Varitek and third baseman Mike Lowell fit the mold. Former Indians outfielder Trot Nixon and former Brewer Gabe Kaplan do as well. They’re the type of player I love to watch. They may not be future Hall of Famers, but you know they leave it on the field.

I want to see that type of play out of the Nationals too. And given the new stadium’s proximity to the Anacostia, I thought the name River Dogs would be perfect. Of course, the Charleston, South Carolina minor league baseball team is called the River Dogs so we used the ‘Z’ so as to not get sued. Plus, Z is one of the most kick-ass letters in the alphabet. ‘X’ and ‘K’ are in that gang too. All elbows and knees. Tough. Really. You could look it up.

We want to hear who you think are River Dogz or when someone makes a play worth of the moniker. If you see a player dive into the third row for a foul pop, for instance, let us know and we’ll tout the effort. This team isn’t filled with superstars so we’ll have to outplay everyone else in order to win. Go Dogz!