Although the Yankees have had worse records at various times this year, they may have reached their lowest level of embarrassment with Sunday’s defeat in San Francisco. Not only did the Yankees lose to an awful Giants team, but they looked putrid in every area: the defense committed three errors, Mike Mussina nibbled his way to three-and-two counts at every turn and failed, and the hit-or-miss offense accounted for only two runs against a less-than-stellar San Francisco staff. One look at the lineup fielded by Joe Torre would have accurately foretold the outcome. Torre’s lineup included the light-hitting Miguel Cairo in the No. 2 spot, the lifeless bat of Kevin Thompson hitting seventh, and the completely lifeless bat of Wil Nieves in the No. 8 spot. For a team that is supposed to have a powerhouse lineup, it was an embarrassing lineup card that Torre filled out sometime on Sunday morning. It also served as an indictment of the glaring inability of GM Brian Cashman to put together a halfway credible bench. With Nieves, Cairo, Thompson, and Andy Phillips all borderline major leaguers, the Yankees have somehow managed to compile the worst bench in all of major league baseball. And that’s shameful for a team with the kind of resources the Yankees have at their disposal…

It was simply a weekend of horrible news involving recently retired players from the 1990s. On Sunday, we learned of the death of former standout closer Rod Beck, who was just 38. Beck was found alone in his home, the circumstances of his death remaining a mystery pending autopsy results. Beck did have a recent history of drug abuse, but there was no immediate word as to whether drugs played a role in his passing. Nicknamed "Shooter" because of his freewheeling lifestyle and attitude, Beck became a primetime close for both the Giants and Cubs. He didn’t have an overpowering fastball in his later years, but made up for it with an aggressive willingness to throw strikes and a split-fingered fastball that amounted to a poor man’s version of Bruce Sutter’s splitter… I’ll always remember Beck bursting onto the scene at the Hall of Fame Game in Cooperstown during the summer of 1991. At the time an unknown minor leaguer in the Giants’ system, Beck came into the game in relief, hurled two and a third scoreless innings of relief, and left a loud impression on the Doubleday Field crowd with his firebrand fastball. That exhibition game was a signal of good things to come, as it has been for so many young pitchers over the years, from Steve Carlton to Cole Hamels…

On Friday, disturbing news filtered out about another former Giant, Mel Hall. Often a lightning rod for controversy, Hall faces charges of aggravated sexual assault against two underage girls. The incidents allegedly took place in 1998 and ’99, when Hall was serving as a basketball coach. I always liked Hall as a player—he hustled and hit well in the clutch, becoming one of the few bright spots for the awful Yankees of the early ’90s—but his behavior has sometimes raised questions, from his relentless taunting of a young Bernie Williams to his bizarre decision to bring his pet cougars into a shocked Yankee clubhouse. Unfortunately, Hall’s behavior may have gone from simply strange to deviant and criminal.

From about the middle of his rookie season, Sabermetric critics have harped on Chien-Ming Wang’s low strikeout rate. As they point out, most starting pitchers who don’t have at least decent strikeout totals have difficulty sustaining success over the long term. To many critics, he is the new Ron Bryant or Ray Washburn, a pitcher who will flame out quickly because of his inability to strike out hitters. Well, Wang may have defused those critics, at least for the moment, with his career-high ten-strikeout performance against the Mets on Sunday. More importantly, Wang limited the Mets to only two runs while coming within one out of his second complete game to the season.

Even more to the point, perhaps we should recognize Wang for what he is: an exception to the strikeout rule. Even prior to Sunday’s game, Wang has been thoroughly dominant, and while his strikeout totals have improved over last year, they remain generally unimpressive. I suspect that a lot of Wang’s Sabermetric critics don’t actually see him pitch much. While he doesn’t dominate with the strikeout, he does dominate with the ground ball. Very few of the ground balls he surrenders are hard-hit one-hoppers; they are usually weak three or four-hop choppers, kept off the fat part of the bat.

Wang is now well into his third major league season and shows no signs of allowing his performance slip to the low levels of his K rate. If anything, his ERA continues to fall steadily. It’s time to stop comparing him to the likes of Bryant and Washburn and recognize him for what he truly is—this generation’s Tommy John. And that’s pretty darn good…

Playing in the Midwest can sometimes stunt a player’s level of recognition. That’s certainly the case for Casey Blake, who has very quietly assembled a 26-game hitting streak for the Indians. After seeing his power production fall off for the last three seasons—accompanied by an appropriate falloff in playing time—Blake has reemerged as an important player in Cleveland. He’s filled a major void at third base, made necessary by the disappointing development of Andy Marte. Blake also gives the Indians an insurance policy at first base and the outfield corners. In an era when baseball has become overly specialized, a versatile player who can handle both third base and the outfield—two vastly different positions—takes on added importance. Blake is just one of many reasons why the Indians have vaulted themselves to the top of the American League Central standings…

It would have been a massive upset if the Orioles had not fired Sam Perlozzo after losing three more games over the weekend, giving them eight straight defeats and 13 in their last 15. By all accounts, Perlozzo is a good guy and hard worker who established a reputation as a baseball man through his work as a minor league skipper and major league coach. Unfortunately, he was not well suited to being the manager of the Orioles. His inability to handle the pitching staff—specifically a tendency to remove effective starters in favor of struggling relievers—was probably his greatest weakness. And fair or not, everyday players like Corey Patterson and Jay Gibbons failed to develop under Perlozzo’s watch. That’s not to say that the current embarrassment endured by the Orioles is all Perlozzo’s fault—the front office has to take a large share of the blame here along with an underachieving bullpen—but this team should have a better record than 29-40, the third worst mark in the American League. Sometimes the manager should take the fall, and perhaps Baltimore will be better for it… With regards to interim manager Dave Trembley, I wouldn’t expect him to be working the Orioles’ dugout for too long. Trembley, an organizational man, will serve as a placeholder until the team can either bring in a high-profile manager like Joe Girardi or lure Davey Johnson into returning to Baltimore.

On Tuesday night, the Tigers’ Justin Verlander simply overpowered the Brewers in pitching the season’s second no-hitter. (The softer-tossing Mark Buerhle became the first to do so on April 18.) Verlander’s stuff was so good that by the middle innings the no-hitter seemed inevitable, barring some blooper off the bats of one of the Brewers. Verlander certainly didn’t show any fatigue in the late innings, reaching 102 miles per hour with one of his fastballs in the ninth inning. Given Verlander’s imposing fastball and devastating curve last night, his no-hitter is sure to be well remembered among the great pitching performances in recent history.

By their very nature, no-hitters are memorable occurrences, but we’d like to know which is the most memorable no-hitter in major league history?

The answer is perhaps too obvious: Don Larsen’s perfect game for the Yankees in the 1956 World Series. So let’s narrow our "Fan Forum" question a bit further, giving us room for some debate. What is the most memorable no-hitter/perfect game in regular season history?

Just to initiate the debate, here are a few possibilities:

*On May 1, 1991, Nolan Ryan throws his seventh and final no-hitter

*Rick Wise pitches a no-hitter in 1971 and also hits two home runs, making this arguably the best one-man show in the regular season history

*Dock Ellis hurls a no-hitter in 1970 while allegedly under the influence of LSD

*On September 9, 1965, Sandy Koufax throws his fourth and final no-hitter, a perfect game against the Cubs

*Jim Bunning pitches a perfect game on Father’s Day in 1964

*Bob Feller throws the only no-hitter on Opening Day, 1940

*Johnny Vander Meer pitches his second straight no-hitter on June 15, 1938

Having watched the Pirates stumble their way to three straight losses at the hands of the Yankees, I think it’s high time that this once proud franchise make some major changes to its structure. The Pirates made so many fundamental mistakes on defense and in running the bases that they took on the aura of a Rookie League team buried low in the minors. Indecisiveness by third baseman Jose Bautista led to Friday night’s loss in extra innings, the repeated inability to hit the cutoff man resulted in numerous extra bases for the Yankees, and Freddy Sanchez’ inexplicable decision not to tag up from second to third on a deep fly ball to right field derailed a potential game-tying rally on Sunday. The inability of a team to execute basic fundamental plays on the bases and in the field reflects badly on the manager; that is why Jim Tracy, who supposedly emphasizes the fundamentals, should be given the boot.

Yet, it’s not all Tracy’s fault. While he has a decent core of talent to work with—including Sanchez, Jason Bay, Adam LaRoche, Xavier Nady, Ryan Doumit, Ian Snell, and Tom Gorzelanny—this Pirates team has too many problem areas. They are a punchless offensive team, with major holes at shortstop and center field, and have a bullpen that is a borderline mess. The inability of Dave Littlefield to make trades—it seems like he needs a federal proclamation to make an in-season deal—has hurt the Pirates badly in their efforts to improve from Central Division doormat to legitimate contender. The Pirates have needed an offensive boost for years now, but only LaRoche and Nady have been brought in through recent trades to help the situation. The team needs better hitters at short, center, and third base, but Littlefield seems unwilling to trade from the team’s depth of starting pitching to address the problem. Given the continuing inertia on the part of Littlefield, who is the anti-Trader Lane, it’s time to change the general manager, too.

The Pirates haven’t fielded a .500 team since 1992, despite the influx of money brought upon by the addition of wonderful PNC Park. Littlefield and Tracy have had their chance to improve the on-field product, but the bottom line remains a team that hasn’t shown one ounce of improvement over last year or the year before. They are still a sub-.500 team that lacks talent and the ability to play sound baseball, one that has no business calling itself a postseason contender. It’s time for a change—and that change needs to start with the manager and the general manager…

The annual Cooperstown Baseball Symposium, which took place last week at the Hall of Fame, once again proved to be a fountain of baseball knowledge, academic discussion, and good-time socializing at Cooperstown’s late-night establishments. The most interesting nugget that came out of the Symposium, at least indirectly, involved the rumor that Hall president Dale Petroskey would like to become a candidate to replace Bud Selig as commissioner once he retires. Petroskey has long been rumored to be angling toward a return to politics—he once worked for President Reagan—but his interest in the commissionership has apparently become his first priority… In other matters related more directly to the Symposium, a number of the game’s leading academics, including Ron Briley, George Gmelch, Larry Hogan, Alan Levy, Joel Nathan Rosen and Bill Simons, attended the conference. Not surprisingly, there were several outstanding presentations made by baseball academics and historians. University of Nebraska professor Dave Ogden opened some eyes with his examination of select youth baseball, which is now becoming a training ground for future major leaguers and may be contributing to the lack of African Americans playing professional baseball today. Steve Treder of The Hardball Times impressed with his study of how increased interest in the Negro Leagues has not translated into increased participation by African Americans in baseball today. He also cited how improvements in civil rights have not led to a corresponding decrease in real-life racism. In spite of advancements in the law, the racial divide remains ever present, resulting in a larger presence of ghettoes in cites like Kansas City and Chicago… Another highlight of the symposium involved a three-hour panel on Hall of Fame executive Branch Rickey. The panel examined Rickey’s days as an undergrad at Ohio-Wesleyan, his pursuit of a legal degree at Michigan, and his efforts in bringing Jackie Robinson to the major leagues. The panel, which was very informative, included the sons of famed Supreme Court justices Earl Warren and Thurgood Marshall along with Rickey’s grandson, Branch III. If there was a criticism, the panelists took only one question from the audience in the Hall’s Grandstand Theater, which seemed a bit on the skimpy side after three hours worth of presentations… All in all, it was a good show put on by Jim Gates and the staff at the Hall of Fame Library. If you’re a researcher or an academic interested in baseball, the symposium should become a must-attend on your baseball calendar in 2008…

Finally, I found it somewhat surreal watching highlights of Sunday afternoon’s game between the Mets and Tigers at Comerica Park. I haven’t seen as many birds—were they seagulls?—descend upon the playing field since a Yankees-Brewers game at County Stadium in the 1980s. With so many birds flying throughout the outfield and infield, all that was missing was Tippi Hedren, Suzanne Pleshette, and Rod Taylor from the 1963 Hitchcock classic. Ah yes, combining baseball and horror, my two favorite pastimes.