9/9: The Berken Byrd

How's that for a play on words? Except for the whole birds being able to bark thing, of course. Byrd threw a gem against Toronto and followed it up with a stinker against Chicago. What's he got in store for Baltimore? On the other side, Berken has a 6.07 ERA an 4-11 record. These are the types of games we should win. Will we?

Can David Ortiz make it to 30 home runs and 2010?

Back when David Ortiz was mired in his homerless streak, not bopping his first home run until May 20 and his second until June 6, I made a bet with a friend that Ortiz would end up with 30 home runs.

Ortiz had a torrid June and kept consistently banging out the home runs, so it was looking more and more like I would win the bet. However, Big Papi has followed up a .222/.330/.495 August with a clunker in September: .160/.250/.280 through September 9.

In my mind, the more pressing issue here is 2010. Do we hand Ortiz the DH job automatically and pray he comes through with it? The way I see it, Ortiz is virtually untradeable and it's impossible to relegate him to a bench spot.