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Snakes alive Injuries not stopping Diamondbacks
Posted: Thursday July 06, 2000 03:21 AM
A championship-caliber club can win without a full deck, and no division leader has fought through more major injuries than the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Diamondbacks have had to do without Matt Williams, Todd Stottlemyre, Matt Mantei and Erubiel Durazo for weeks at a time, but they're still on top in the National League West. Manager Buck Showalter told me that even though his lineup has no real right-handed power threat, he would much rather bring in another starting pitcher than a big bat. One spot Arizona won't have to worry about is closer. Byung-Hyun Kim, or "BK" as Showalter calls him, has been nearly automatic. The 21-year-old can move his fastball up, down, in or out. With 67 K's in his first 37 2/3 innings he's on pace to post the highest strikeouts-per-nine innings ratio in baseball history. Giambi just keeps getting betterThe A's had baseball's second-best record in June, and a big factor in that was the performance of MVP candidate Jason Giambi. Through the weekend, he was in the top 10 in seven major offensive categories in the AL, but what impresses me is his ability to steadily improve. Giambi's average, homers, RBIs and walks have gone up every year since his rookie season. At just $3.1 million a season, Giambi may be baseball's best bargain. No mark safe from MacJust when you thought Mark McGwire couldn't set any more home run records, he did just that. On Saturday, McGwire became the first player in major league history to have at least 30 homers by the All-Star break in four different seasons. How valuable is Big Mac to the Cardinals? The team has a $12 million insurance policy on McGwire because they estimate he accounts for an extra 600,000 in attendance every season.
Ozzie Smith, a 15-time All-Star, is a baseball analyst for CNN/Sports Illustrated and is a regular contributor to CNNSI.com.
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