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World Series Game 3 LiveBlog/Chat

While addressing the media before Game 3, manager Joe Girardi named CC Sabathia as his Game 4 starter. Sabathia would be starting on three day’s rest, but the decision doesn’t come as a huge surprise, since it would allow him to start a possible Game 7, if necessary, also on three day’s rest. Girardi hinted…

Cole Hamels was 10-11 with a 4.32 ERA during the regular season. His 6.75 ERA over three starts during the postseason was enough for Charlie Manuel to opt for Pedro Martinez in Thursday’s Game 2 rather than last season’s World Series MVP, prompting many to wonder, “What’s wrong with King Cole?” The truth? Not as…

- Poor Alex Rodriguez. The usual (and unusual) suspects are already piling on after his punchless start to the World Series. From the unusual department, on Friday we learned that he supposedly has two paintings depicting himself as a centaur above his bed. – Orioles international scouting director John Stockstill met with Cuban left-hander Aroldis Chapman…

David Wells is a real renaissance man. First, he was cast as the “Charles Barkley-type” for MLB coverage on TBS. Now, he’s a guest columnist for the New York Post during the World Series. In his newest piece entitled “City of Brotherly Love? My Butt!”, the former Yankee southpaw has Philadelphia in his crosshairs: They…

The awful umpiring during the postseason has been discussed ad nauseam here, most recently during the World Series, with a curious double play call in Game 1 and a missed double play call in Game 2. So, who’s the biggest culprit for the added scrutiny? Technology, says Joe Lemire of SI.com: It’s hard to quantify…

Quiet mornings like this one can see rumors take on a life of their own. Hence the Cubs quickly coming out to address rumors of a possible Milton Bradley-for-Vernon Wells trade, saying discussions of a potential swap have “no legs at all.” With five years remaining on his deal, Vernon Wells has one of the…

Cito Gaston announced that that next season will be his last as manager of the Blue Jays. The Toronto staff have some big changes in store, as hitting coach Gene Tenace will retire and as mentioned in the previous post, pitching coach Brad Arnsberg has left to join Brad Mills in Houston. Bruce Walton will…

While the Blue Jays lost pitching coach Brad Arnsberg to the Astros on Friday night, things are looking up with the rumors of a possible Vernon Wells-for-Milton Bradley trade. According to the Toronto Sun, Chicago would be willing to split the difference on the monies owed to the two players — Wells’ $107 million and…

Joe Girardi confirmed that Johnny Damon will start in left field for Game 3. While he didn’t make it official, this all but guarantees that Hideki Matsui will be sitting on the bench to start Saturday’s game in Philadelphia. While Nick Swisher and Damon have batted a combined .176 with two home runs and six…

Uh-oh. This weekend’s New York-Philadelphia showdown might be impacted by rain. According to Weather.com, there’s a 40 percent chance of rain for first pitch on Saturday. But no worries, Bill Conlin of the Philadelphia Daily News has some advice: My take? Enjoy temperatures in the 70s tomorrow. At game time, a humid breeze from the…

The Giants could have gone out and picked up Felipe Lopez or Ronnie Belliard to fill a colossal hole at second base at midseason, but they guessed wrong and picked Freddy Sanchez. They may well have lost the NL West in the process. Not that they deserved to have things turn out so badly. Sanchez…

How exactly do we weigh opportunity? Andy Pettitte has been far from an ace while finishing with ERAs over 4.00 each of the last four seasons, yet he keeps winning 14 games every year and is now up to 229 victories for his career. That comes with being an above average starter for very good…

Manager Charlie Manuel announced Friday that Joe Blanton would start Game 4 for the Phillies on Sunday, essentially setting his rotation for the rest of October. The guess going in was that the Phillies would try to get away with using Cliff Lee in Games 1, 4 and 7. Blanton still figured to start Game…

After briefly getting some reluctant love from Yankees fans while batting .438 with five homers and 12 RBIs through the first two playoff rounds, Alex Rodriguez is 0-for-8 with six strikeouts in the World Series. Judging from the fan and media reaction Rodriguez seems to be one more 0-fer away from once again being public…

Jay-Z and Alicia Keys performing “Empire State of Mind” prior to Game 2 last night seemed to work out pretty well, as nearly every player from both teams congregated atop the dugout to watch, Ozzie Guillen snapped cellphone pictures from the FOX pregame show stage, and the New York crowd didn’t even boo them off…

Josh Johnson and Jeremy Hermida were born one day apart in January of 1984, they’re both arbitration eligible this offseason, and they’re both under team control through 2011, but Joe Frisaro of MLB.com reports that the Marlins are taking very different approaches with the two players. According to Frisaro the Marlins are interested in signing…

* Fired by the Rockies midway through his eighth season as manager, Clint Hurdle is now one of four finalists to replace Rudy Jaramillo as Rangers hitting coach. The other guys up for the job are former A’s hitting coach Thad Bosley, former Cubs hitting coach Gerald Perry, and longtime Rangers outfielder Rusty Greer. *…

It’s hard to truly gauge crowd noise from the TV broadcast. TBS, for example, is notorious for over-amplifying the crowd via some unique mic placement (they did it with the Braves for years and still do it now that they broadcast national games).  At the same time, the Indians broadcasts I watch most nights during…

Like the bad calls mentioned earlier, Jeter’s bunt attempt with two strikes on him in the seventh ended up not making a difference, but my mouth was agape when he tried to lay it down all the same.  What were you thinking, Derek? Did Girardi actually give you the bunt sign with two strikes and…

We’ll see the Game 2 ratings later today, but the ratings for Game 1 are in, and they’re very, very high: Game 1 was the second-highest-rated MLB postseason game since 1999. It was seen by 19.5 million viewers, which marked a 33 percent increase over last year’s Game 1. That increase also marked the second-biggest…

That’s the rumor Jon Heyman is spreading: The Sox stand ready to offer Bay $15 million per year over four years. This doesn’t pass the smell test for me. Why on Earth would the Sox make an offer to Bay before seeing whether or not Matt Holliday — an obvious upgrade over Bay — can be had? …

You can tell just how hard it was for the media to go with that “A-Rod: clutch God” line of thinking they’ve been forced to adopt this year, because after just two bad games, they’re back into their old groove. First it was Joe Buck last night who, according to one reader, was “single handedly…

After the way the postseason has gone, everyone is watching the umpires closely, so it’s probably worth noting that they blew two calls last night. First base ump Brian Gorman was wrong when he called Chase Utley out at first on the double play that ended the top of the eighth. It wasn’t Don Denkinger…