MLB Bullets Has Been Whacked

Its' a great day because the Cubs are in first place (in the race for the second wild card spot).

• The baseball world is still buzzing from the firing of Tigers President Dave Dombrowski. (Oh. He wasn't fired. he was just "released from his contract." My mistake.) Grant Brisbee looks back at Dombrowski's time in Detroit and has some lessons we can learn about building winners from Dombrowski.
• Dave Cameron thinks that Dombrowski only had one weakness: he could never put a solid bullpen together.
• Dombrowski himself felt that something was up because there had been no talks about signing him to a new contract.
• Craig Calcaterra thinks that Dombrowski's firing went down like a mob hit. "Leave the spreadsheets. Take the cannoli."
• He won't be unemployed for long, as Dombrowski has admitted that he has had "some nice conversations" with teams about job openings.
• This wasn't the first time Dombrowski had been fired. The last time was in 1986--by then-White Sox GM Hawk Harrelson. So that's something that Dombrowski has in common with Tony LaRussa.
• Larry Lucchino is also out as team president in Boston and some think Dombrowski might replace him. But Gordon Edes thinks that the Red Sox already have the perfect candidate in interim president Sam Kennedy.
• Neil Paine and Nate Silver create a formula for determining which teams should buy and which should sell at the trade deadline. It may not be the teams that you expect. Also, Paine and Silver say the worst thing a team could do at the deadline is stand pat.
• So that brings us to the Padres. Ben Reiter tries to defend GM A.J. Preller's decision to not sell any of his players at the deadline.
• Doug Glanville talks about Wilmer Flores and how tough it is to be traded. Surprisingly, even though he's from Philadelphia, Glanville wasn't thrilled when the Cubs traded him to the Phillies.
• The Dodgers are paying $87.5 million this year to players who don't play for the Dodgers. That doesn't even count someone like Bronson Arroyo who is technically a Dodger but will never pitch for them because of injuries.
• Dan Graf remembers that 30 years ago yesterday, baseball went on strike. What? You don't remember the strike of 1985? I remember it. It lasted two days.
• Grant Brisbee wonders where the hell Gordon Wittenmyer got his medical degree from.
• Brian Costa and Geoff Foster notice that what is missing from all the baseball fights over the past two seasons is actual fighting.
• Anthony Castrovince lists those under the most pressure down the stretch in the pennant chases.
• Rob Neyer says that while Alex Rodriguez may not be a hero, what he's doing this season certainly meets the definition of "heroic." At least in the baseball sense of the word. We have lots of things to criticize A-Rod about. We don't need to go after him because he didn't rescue a kitten from a burning building.
• Jayson Stark remembers in spring training when he thought the Nationals might have one of the best starting rotations of all time. Now he's not even sure they have the best rotation in their division. Stark talks with several scouts to compare the pitchers on the Nats and the Mets.
• Jonah Keri looks back at one of the craziest weeks in the history of the New York Mets.
• Speaking of crazy stuff and the Mets, reliever Jerry Blevins was looking to return from an injury in September. That is, until he slipped on a curb and refractured his arm. Now he's out for the year.
• Jon Stewart left the Daily Show last night. After despairing that everything in America is worse now than when he started, he remembered that his beloved Mets are now in first place. So at least something is better now than then.
• Russell Carleton wonders why walks are way down recently.
• LaTroy Hawkins got the save for the Blue Jays against the Twins on Wednesday, becoming the 13th player in history to record a save against all 30 teams.
• From the oldest to the youngest. Ben Lindbergh looks at how young MLB has gotten over the past decade, and especially this season. And especially Mike Trout and Bryce Harper.
• Just in case you're wondering, a roundup of all of this year's Top 100 preseason prospects who have played in the majors already.
• Can't make it to Cooperstown? You can now virtually tour the Hall of Fame with Google Street View.
• Curt Schilling supports a proposed ban on smokeless tobacco at all ballparks in Boston.
• The Nationals will give away a Jayson Werth Chia Pet.
• A squirrel on the field took over a Rays-Tigers game.
• Huston Street has not yet learned that you never joke around with a woman in labor.
• When Jeremy Markovich was a student at Ohio University, he had heard rumors that Mike Schmidt hit a 500 ft. home run while playing there. He asked Schmidt about it, and he denied it. Not content to leave well enough alone, he tracked down the truth about that supposedly-titanic blast.
• And finally, you won't want to miss this softball player hitting a home run from behind his back.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.