Just some baseball stuff

According to some reports, Cole Hamels had 160 strikeouts in his first 25 starts (in 145 1/3 innings or 9.91 per nine innings), which is the second most by a left-hander over that span behind Fernando Valenzuela. Of course this doesn’t include his 15-strikeout performance against the Reds last week, or the six strikeouts he had last night in grinding out the win over the Braves.

Speaking of which, the win over the Braves was interesting for a couple of reasons, but mostly because of the way Hamels bounced back after the first and second innings. In those opening frames Hamels gave up seven hits to the first 11 hitters and, more importantly, three runs in the first inning. From watching on my TV (a set that is both falling apart, but artfully decorated with the post-modern crayon musings by a three-year old boy) and based on conversations from folks in the know, it was clear that Hamels had become a bit unhinged after giving up a home run to Chipper Jones in the three-run first.

Hamels also was a little beside himself during last Thursday’s loss to the Washington Nationals at the Bank when he struggled through 5 1/3 innings for his first loss of the season. Yet according to reports, Hamels was put back on track thanks to a visit to the mound by pitching coach Rich Dubee, who asked the lefty if he was on anything.

Yeah?

“He asked me if I was on anything,” Hamels told the writers. “I wasn't, I just get that way sometimes with my adrenaline.”

As far as the strikeouts go, Hamels only got his first one in the fourth inning in the win over the Braves. He finished with six to give him 43 in his six starts (40 2/3 innings). Only the Padres’ Jake Peavy has more.

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Also at the top of the strikeout-leaders list is Dodgers’ lefty Randy Wolf, who has 36 strikeouts in six starts and 35 2/3 innings. At 3-3 and riding a two-game losing streak, Wolf has worked into the sixth inning of all his starts, which puts him on pace for 210 innings this season. Wolf needs to pitch 180 innings to have a $9 million option for 2008 kick in.

Speaking of former Phillies, the Dodgers are considering using Mike Lieberthal at third base because of some injuries, poor play and few other options. Lieberthal, of course, has caught more games than any other Phillie in franchise history and hasn’t done anything on the diamond other than squat behind the plate since his junior year of high school.

Whether or not it comes to Lieberthal getting a new glove and standing upright on the field remains to be seen. At this point it seems that the ex-longest tenured Philadelphia athlete is struggling to get used to his new role as a backup catcher. Listen to Lieby tell the Los Angeles Times about the adjustment.

“I miss playing,” Lieberthal said. “That's the best part of the day.”

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Brett Myers threw nine of his 11 pitches for strikes in his two-thirds of an inning last night.

In his eight relief outings covering 8 1/3 innings, Myers has thrown 154 pitches, compared to 283 pitches in three games and 15 1/3 innings as a starter. I don’t know what any of this means, though manager Charlie Manuel and Dubee believe that Myers is still easing into his new role.

“He's using up a lot of adrenaline right now because it's so new to him,” Dubee told Courier-Post raconteur, Mike Radano.

For some reason it still makes sense to me to have Myers go for a four, five or six-out save on occasion even though Manuel seems to be locked in to using his players in well-defined roles. Until it’s proven to me that Myers can’t be like old-school closers like Bruce Sutter and pitch more than one inning, I’m always going to think it should be an option from time to time.

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Phil Sheridan of the Inquirer columnized about the death of Josh Hancock and Tony La Russa’s “agenda.” According to reports it appears that Hancock might have been impaired while driving at the time of his accident. Meanwhile, La Russa was arrested for DUI during spring training and still awaits misdemeanor charges.

According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, La Russa “has declined questions about his arrest since making a brief statement to media hours after being released.” Asked about whether his manager should be more aggressive when dealing with such issues since his DUI arrest, Cardinals’ GM Walt Jocketty told the paper, no.

“Personally, I don't think so. I see how he deals with things. I think he would tell a player, ‘Look, it could happen to anybody. It happened to me. You've got to be careful how you conduct yourself.’”

Either way, it seems to that this would be a good chance for Major League Baseball to do something bold or Tony La Russa to take a stand… or both.