In the end, the Sox certainly would not have been the only team to win it all with drug/steroid abusers. The Yanks had Clemens, Justice, Giambi, and Petitte all under the steroid cloud, along with Darryl Strawberry's illegal drug taking. Half of the 1986 Mets championship roster was on coke, with the other half a bunch of drunks.

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Sucks to be him.

Zito and the Giants take game one away from Dodgers with ace Billingsley on the mound!

I hope this isn't a jinx, but this may be the best, or at least close, start to a season in Zito's career. Even during those great years in Oakland he struggled during the first month or so.

He'll never be worth the money he's being paid, but for a fourth starter, he'd been very good finally.

Zito was putting it together in the second half of last season. He's not the pitcher SF wanted, but he's able to give some quality innings.

That's been his problem the last couple of years. When the Giants are out of it, he starts pitching well. So to see him pitch great to start a season is encouraging. He is so cerebral, it's obvious the big contract and expectations messed with his head. But now that he's the fourth starter the pressure is off, and he seems to be thriving. We'll see how things continue.

The Giants took the series 2-1 against the Dodgers so I'm happy. It's the last time they play until August.

By the way, I'm sorry to everyone for being such a homer. I love my Giants and I hope it doesn't bug everyone. If I thought it would stimulate some discussion I would start a "How 'bout Them Giants" thread, but it would be just me talking to myself. Sometimes I wish I was a Yankee fan so I could be enthusiastic with a lot of other members here, or a Red Sox fan so I can cheer the Yankees failure along with SC.

So it goes for west coast baseball fans.

Interleague baseball coming up *yawn*

If it were up to me I would get rid of interleague play. I know that won't happen, but I enjoy the unbalanced schedule where teams play more games within their own division, which is good for rivalries. But interleague play takes away from the rest of the regular season. For example, the Giants were in Chicago to play the Cubs earlier for a two game series. And that's the only time the Giants visit Wrigley field all year... two games. But then the Giants have to play San Diego and Colorado for 18 games each, or whatever it is. No wonder the east and west coast teams are so foreign to one another.

It's interesting here because the Mets get to play the Yankees and Red Sox.
I can see where other parts of the country would not have any interest.

I agree with you, Blibble. I'm not too fond of interleague games as it detracts from and waters down the divisional races. But I accept it as a measure Baseball instituted to freshen its image. Some of the matches provide spectacle, like Chi v. Chi and NY v. NY.

I sound like a fogey, but I loved the consistency and symmetry of the two, six-team divisions where each team played its 5 division rivals 18 times, and its out of division teams 12 times each. Interleague play has always had a bit of an artificial quality to it, especially where NL teams use the DH in midseason.

Randy Johnson will be trying to win his 300th career win tonight against the Nationals. Have they been talking about it on ESPN at all? It seems like it's been fairly quiet even though it will be a huge achievement for a future hall of famer.

It will be quite an achievement, especially since no pitcher with a remote shot of three hundred wins is even halfway there yet. We may have to wait more than a decade to get the next 300 game winner. The five man rotation and a growing reliance on bullpens have made it more difficult in this era to get 300. I remember years when Wilbur Wood and Phil Niekro would win 20+ and lose 20+ games. They'd rack up more decisions than today's players get starts.

Jamie Moyer just won his 250th, but he's as old as Johnson. They went against each other in a game last year and it marked the oldest combined age of starting pitchers in a game in baseball history. I think it was 90 or 91.

The thing that is remarkable about Randy Johnson is that he was terribly inconsistent when he broke in the big leagues. His tenure with Montreal was not memorable and early time with Seattle was not great. He really did not start getting to be great until 1993. The Big Unit then went on an incredible stretch dominating MLB from 1994-2002.

To me, his biggest highlights were the ALDS performace against NY in 1995, the tiebreaker game vs. California in 1995, and the 2001 World Series. Johnson pitched in a blowout game in Game 6 of the World Series and stayed in too long, in my opinion. I thought they would need him for Game 7, which he did come in to relieve Schilling. Johnson threw 2 dominant innings and ended up as Co-MVP. Had Arizona lost that series, it would have been remembered for the blown saves by their closer, Kim, rather than being remembered for the Big Unit and Schilling.

The entire 2001 World Series was incredible. For New York, that series swept our imagination - President Bush throwing out the first pitch in Yankee Stadium, Jeter's amazing "Mr. November" home run, Soriano winning Game 5, the fans chanting for Paul O'Neill. It was an exciting and engaging series, and it distracted us from all else that was going on around us.

HBO did a special on that postseason and the incredible healing power that it had for NY. Try and catch it if they ever replay it.

I have a new favourite player. Rookie Phillies pitcher Antonio Bastardo!!

What an awesome name to strike fear into opponents

I'll have to look for that HBO special. Sounds very interesting.

I remember Soriano hitting the HR in the 8th inning off of Schilling and thinking that the Yanks had won it. It was a good pitch - low and away - yet it was still hit for a homer. You can't fault the pitcher - it was just a great hit. Then the Diamondbacks got a rally started, aided by an error and Luis Gonzalez hitting a very tough pitch from Rivera - after significantly choking up on the bat. That Game 7 was one of the best decisive games in the past 25 years.

Poor Randy Johnson. He has said he wants to get his 300th win out of the way so that it's not a distraction. So he finally gets the chance tonight and the game is delayed and finally postponed because of rain. He must have been going crazy during the delay wondering if he was going to pitch or not.

Tom Glavine was released by the Braves yesterday. With Smoltz on the DL, Glavine will be one of the last of the Braves dynasty (lacking in championships, but still a dynasty in my opinion.)

Smoltz is expected to come off the DL soon. He's my favorite player outside of Philadelphia, and I expect him to do well for the Red Sox.

With many teams looking for starting pitching, I bet Glavine finds a team willing to give him a shot.

This was an interesting list to go through...

A list of the #1 draft pick in baseball in the last 25 years...

i wonder if the cubs could be interested...there was talk about schilling wanting to play for the cubs and tampa bay, but yea.

I wonder how things would work if baseball went to 20 teams, with the remaining 10 being in a separate league. Then you have something like in the English Premier League where, at the end of the season, the bottom three teams are relegated and the top three teams in the league below are promoted. I wonder if that would encourage teams like the Pirates to try harder to put better teams on the field.

It won't ever happen, but it's fun to think about. I would love to see that.

I'd say about 10 out of the 25 have/had average or better MLB careers (or in the case of guys like Hamilton and Price, show great promise).

40% success rate among those 1st pick is a lot better than I had expected. It seems though that position players in the 1st slot succeed considerably more often than pitchers.

I heard a stat the other day on ESPN that say something like no pitcher taken in the 1st pick in the last X number of years has won a Cy Young. I believe it.

Nothing would encourage the Pirates. They are the saddest story in the league. It's a shame, because PNC park is beautiful, and the franchise produces good players, but they trade them away for younger (read: cheaper) talent. Their owner sucks balls.

Believe me, as a Buffalo Bills/Sabres fan, I know how that works. Owners who have the cash to spend but refuse to do so because they're only interested in turning profits? Yeah. It blows to be a fan of those teams.

I think relegation would be a great idea. I think all sports should implement it. Imagine not having to waste your time on a Kings-Clippers game...

just wondering here what is the royal's record?

Zack Grienke.

I usually don't care about interleague games, but A's fans have been throwing some fuel onto the Giants/A's rivalry this past week by saying Vin Mazzaro is going to be as good as Lincecum, and he may very well be someday. But tonight watching the two youngsters face each other was fun, especially because Lincecum pitched a complete game shutout against Oakland. It's always nice to see A's fans boast and then have it shoved down their throats.

300 home runs for Lance Berkman! And 2,000 hits for Tejada, in the same game. AND we won, thank goodness.

well sosa has been tested positive of steroids in '03, and i am saddend since this man was a fan favorite of mine when he was with the cubs. well now it is a fact, and i am not totally shocked of the news...lets see who the remaining people of the '03 tests.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=4264062

Do you guys think we are finally seeing results in baseball with drug testing going on? I heard an interview with Mike Krukow who said when he pitched, he would take greenies because they were legal. I didn't know what greenies were, and Krukow said that there were days when his arm hurt so bad that he couldn't hold his arm up above his head, but after taking greenies which would mask the pain, he could go out and pitch normally.

The focus has always been on steroids, but now that greenies as well as other drugs are illegal there is a huge youth movement in all of baseaball beacause older players can't play through the pain without cheating like they used to.

If you look around all of baseball there is a ton of young talent coming up that may not have had a chance before, and the playing field seems to be leveling out. There are only a couple of teams that are dominant while the rest of the teams are fairly equal. As of two days ago the Giants had the sixth best record in the majors, which seems ridiculous after years past. But with the MLB cracking down on cheating it makes sense that all of the teams who were benefiting the most from older sluggers who were cheating are now brought down to a realistic level.

I'm not sure if I've explained my point well enough, but basically it's nice to see a more pure form of baseball being played with more teams having a chance to compete.

John Smoltz makes his debut with the Red Sox tonight.