Verlander becomes 3rd SP to 500 starts, matches Clemens in wins

Philly's Justin Verlander of blew past a number of milestones in recent weeks, starting his 500th career game and notching his 211th career win.

Verlander finally notches 200th win

It took the first half of the DMBL season but Justin Verlander finally gained entry into the vaunted 200-win club.

Greinke tops Maddux for most starts all-time

Despite a subpar season, Zack Greinke continued to move up the all-time DMBL pitching charts in 2022, toppling Greg Maddux for most career starts all-time and stands on the cusp of 500 heading into next season.

Kershaw moves into No. 2 all-time in strikeouts

Hoboken's Clayton Kershaw moved past Pedro Martinez for No. 2 all time in strikeouts on Monday night, trailing only fellow left-hander Randy Johnson.

Verlander now 3rd all-time in strikeouts

Heading into his next start in Sunday's doubleheader action, Justin Verlander now stands 3rd all time in strikeouts and has moved into the top 10 this season in most every major pitching category.

Strasburg suffers just second loss

Stephen Strasburg found his name in the loss column on Saturday for the first time since April.

Strasburg approaches win percentage mark

At one point this season, Stephen Strasburg was 2-0 and fell to 2-1 after his fifth start, when he was ripped for 7 runs in 6+ innings by El Paso way back in April. He's now 18-1.

End Of The Line: Tim Hudson

End Of The Line is an occasional offseason series that will take a closer look at the career of DMBL players leaving the league after the 2016 season. Today, we look back at longtime Carolina Mudcat, Tim Hudson.

Halladay -- it would be so fine!

Roy Halladay, the DMBL's active leader in most every pitching category, entered rare territory after a masterful 2-0 shutout of Arkansas on Thursday night. He limited the Golden Falcons to three hits while striking out five and walking just one.

The game featured a number of career milestones for the Philly ace. It was his 19th career shutout, breaking a tie with Curt Schilling for 4th all-time, and moving into a tie with Pedro Martinez for 3rd place. The only pitchers with more DMBL shutouts are Kevin Brown (24) and Greg Maddux (32). It also was the 65th complete game of his career, breaking a tie with Randy Johnson and moving into 5th place all-time.

Halladay passed Andy Pettitte into 9th place all-time in innings pitched, and is just a trio of outs from John Smoltz for 8th place. He now stands within 1,000 innings of Maddux, the all-time leader, with 3,415 1/3 innings pitched.

Halladay set career highs last season in wins (21), innings (250 1/3), complete games (12) and shutouts (4). He originally was selected by Philly in the 9th round of the 1999 draft, pitching for the Endzone Animals in 2000. He was the 11th overall pick of the 2002 draft by Carolina, where he spent the next eight seasons, before being shipped to Philly in a blockbuster trade in January 2010. Incredibly, Halladay has made no fewer than 30 starts in any of his 11 seasons, including 10 straight, every year since 2002.

First-place trade

Big trade yesterday between the two first place teams. Newark gave up Jimmy Rollins and Brandon Lyon and Philly gave up their second round pick and Rafael Soriano. Rollins immediately took over for the injured David Eckstein and started contributing: 1-3 with a stolen base in game one and 2-4 with a homer in game 2. Eckstein may return from the DL and find that he has no job left. In fact Eck's locker was temporarily moved to the janitor's closet when Rollins arrived. "They got no respect for me. Don't they know that I'm a scrappy fan favorite?" said Eckstein.

Pedro Martinez shutout Vancouver this morning on three hits, beating fellow legend Greg Maddux. Pedro improved to 9-3 on the season. Maddux and Pedro rank #1 and 2 on the all-time wins list. By the way, the loss was Vancouver's fifth in a row, sending them into fifth place overall.

Manny Ramirez's double in yesterday's game against Vancouver was his 400th, becoming only the sixth player in DMBL history to reach the feat. He is only a few behind Jeff Bagwell (406) and Larry Walker (407), both retired, so expect Manny to climb ahead to fourth by the end of the year. The all-time leader is Edgar Martinez (493).

Don't forget, we'll be off for the weekend and return Monday with a doubleheader.

Golden Falcon golden achievements

Arkansas' Barry Bonds became the all-time leader in career at-bats Sunday. Bonds passed Roberto Alomar on the all-time list and is now sitting comfortably in first. Since Alomar and Bagwell - the two closest behind him - are retired and Pudge Rodriguez is more than 400 ABs behind Bonds and also an oldster, he may be there for a while. If he wasn't the all-time walks leader, he might be at a 1000 by now (hmmm not to self, who are the top plate appearance leaders?). Bonds also holds the career records for home runs, hits, RBIs, and on base percentage.

Congratulations to Pedro Martinez on his 200th career win against South Boston Saturday. Martinez pitched eight innings surrendering three runs on eight hits and striking out 10 Gangsters.

Greg Maddux had a great pitching line in Sunday's game: eight innings, two hits, one unearned run allowed, no walks, seven strikeouts. Good enough for a win, right? wrong! Carolina's Clay Hensley outdueled the veteran, allowing only two hits and four walks in six innings. Two costly errors in the second inning did Vancouver in and the offense couldn't hit its way out of a wet paper bag.

Philadelphia has officially put Magglio Ordonez on the trading block. Ordonez has lost playing time to younger outfielders Reed Johnson, Vernon Wells, and Michael Cuddyer. The oft-injured star has only hit .163 in 43 at bats this season.

Pedro goes for 200

As mentioned in yesterday's entry, Arkansas' Pedro Martinez will try for his 200th career victory Saturday against South Boston. He'll be facing Dontrelle Willis. Martinez will be only the second in DMBL history to achieve 200, Greg Maddux being the first.

Philly's Brandon Webb pitched a gem against Vancouver last night. Webb limited the Iron Fist to one run on four hits over 8.1 innings. Philly is now a half a game out of first with Arkansas idle yesterday.

Marietta's Francisco Liriano is continuing where he left off in spring. Liriano is now 3-0 on the season and held the potent Sugar Bears offense to only three hits in seven innings at Newark. Liriano has a 1.71 ERA on the year.

Philly cut Marco Scutaro, who had been taking David Eckstein's place in the lineup. The Animals decided to go with Khalil Greene who had recently been signed. Journeyman infielder Todd Walker was signed to provide some help at second base.

Throwing Fuel on the Fire

The Sharks had a bit of a comeback yesterday against the Buddahs. Team Buddah had just gone up to a 5-1 lead going into the bottom of the seventh. Starter Jose Contreras was finally showing signs of fatigue and gave up a couple of runs in the bottom, making it 5-3. After Eric Chavez doubled in the eighth, Contreras was removed for the closer, Bob Wickman. Now Wickman had been anything but good up to this point. Though he had a strong spring, Wickman had already blown two saves and was sporting a 5.68 ERA. Well the Human GasCan was called in to shut the door on the Sharks, but instead gave up three straight singles followed by the crowning moment - Johnny Damon's three-run shot over the right field wall. Jersey manager Matt Nokes was livid after the game, tossing bats and Gatorade bottles all over the locker room. For the moment, Wickman has been demoted as the team's closer, replaced by Todd Jones.

Roger Clemens and Randy Johnson each moved closer to their 200th victory yesterday. Clemens, who notched the win against Las Vegas is now at 193 career victories and Johnson, who beat the Mighty Men, is at 189. Arkansas' Pedro Martinez will try for win #200 Saturday. The only pitcher with more than 200 wins pitched his first game this season yesterday. Vancouver's Greg Maddux recorded the win against Philly by limiting the first-place Endzone Animals to one run and four hits over eight innings.

Opening day notes

Well the big day finally came and the results of all that hard work is coming to fruition.

The Newark Sugar Bears came roaring out of the gates, destroying newcomer Sardine City 15-3 and 18-7 in their doubleheader. The Sugar Bears have scored more in their two games than the rest of the Hanover Division combined! The first game saw fan favorite and longtime Sugar Bear Randy Johnson start as a "treat" for the hometown faithful. Johnson pitched adequately, but the pressure wasn't really on when Manny Ramirez drove in 6 runs. Chien-Ming Wang, who started game two, deferred his start in game one. Management feels that Wang is their true #1 starter, but gave the start to Johnson because of his iconic status with the fans. Wang didn't have a good start in game two but was rescued by an outpouring of offense and shutdown performance by the Sugar Bear pen.

Meanwhile the other newcomer, Team Buddah, didn't fare much better, though they had some luck in their schedule - the Buddahs only played one game on Sunday. Team Buddah dropped their opener to the Rat Pack, despite rallying to tie the game twice in the latter innings. In the end, Mark Teixeira came through with an RBI single in the bottom of the ninth to win it for the Pack.

Marietta's Francisco Liriano continued his spring training excellence by striking out 8 in five and 1/3 innings against Hoboken.

Who had the most dominant start yesterday? Take your pick between Philly's Johan Santana and Arkansas Pedro Martinez. Santana mowed down the South Boston lineup, striking out 12 in 7 innings and surrendering only two runs. Meanwhile, the defending McDonald Award winner shut down the Bushslappers by allowing only one run in eight innings and striking out eight. Martinez outdueled rookie Anibal Sanchez, who pitched a complete game.

Lots of transactions to pour through over the weekend as final roster cuts were due. Las Vegas gave up on Gary Sheffield, despite protecting him, but the Rat Pack were already over their five man limit on inelligible players and Sheffield was the oldest of the group. Hillsborough broke up their Cordero Connection by releasing Francisco. Arkansas claimed second baseman Brandon Phillips from Carolina.

Finally the first injury of the season was to Marietta's Bengie Molina. Molina, who is in his sixth DMBL season, was visibly shaken after his first at-bat, a fly-out to center field. Jorge Posada is expected to take the bulk of the catching duties, and Molina may be placed on the DL.