If you read only one thing…..

The Braves and Padres stories have been intertwined all season following the major trade before the season that saw Craig Kimbrel go to the Padres and Cameron Maybin go to the Braves. The rest of the parts are either gone or irrelevant at this point. This week saw the two teams battle it out in an epic series that has included a bench clearing brawl. According to video footage, an umpire even tackled Matt Kemp.

The Braves held the lead most of the game as Julio Teheran seemed in control through six innings of action. Things went south in the seventh inning and eventually the Padres took the game in extra innings. Kimbrel notched his 15th save in the thriller against his former band mates, but just to prove that closers aren’t always reliable, his ERA went down to a pedestrian 3.91. This was from the guy that was the best closer in the game the past three seasons. Go figure.

Just as we expected….

Los Angeles’ Albert Pujols hit his 17th home run of the season against the Rays. Mike Trout also hit his 17th on the season (and came very close again in the 9th), but Pujols dinger was special. It was his fifth home run against the Rays this season. He will be sad to see the Rays leave the schedule as he’s become one of just a handful of players to do that against the Rays outside of divisional play. Ivan Rodriguez was one of the others. Pujols keeps joining more and more rarified air with each passing season.

Scott Kazmir has come full circle a couple of times in his career. He began as a hot shot prospect with the Mets before he was traded to the Rays. He cut his teeth with the Rays and seemingly looked like he would have a long career. Then, he suddenly became ineffective and hurt. After a turn with the Sugarland Skeeters (an independent league team) he came back and became an all-star pitcher again. He threw eight shutout innings to theoretically increase the odds that he will be dealt before the July 31st deadline.

But we didn’t see this coming….

Most fantasy baseball fans thought Shaun Marcum was dead. Of course, they didn’t think that literally, but he might as well have been. He threw seven shutout innings on Thursday night to lift his record to 3-1. It would figure that he would be with the Indians because he seems like a character straight out of Major League. You could almost picture him pitching in the Mexican Leagues and getting a call from the Indians. The truth is that he did not pitch in 2014 and went 1-10 with the Mets in 2013. I guess that’s close enough.

I usually don’t like to dominate this section with two hitters or two pitchers, but the Marlins David Phelps does deserve his own mention. He spun eight scoreless innings against the Rockies on Thursday. Like Marcum, he hasn’t exactly enjoyed a great deal of success up to this point, but a 3-3 record on that club is pretty good considering their overall record. Like Marcum, I wouldn’t put too much stock into that performance, but a blind pig finds mud every now and then.

The Rest of the Details

Save Chances

• Craig Kimbrel (converted)
• Zach Britton (converted)

Lineup Moves

• Zack Cozart out for the season with knee surgery
• Rangers release Mike Kickham
• Erik Bedard retires
• Royals designated Erik Kratz for assignment
• Nationals acquire David Carpenter from Yankees
• Braves designated Trevor Cahill for assignment

Rumors and Transactions

Ruben Amaro Jr. shot down a rumor that the Mariners were asking about Ben Revere and that the Phillies were asking for Tajjuan Walker or James Paxton in return. That’s probably because they would have been laughed out of the room. However, both general managers represent the prehistoric way of thinking, so who knows what they may be cooking up at this point.