I'm not sure what to make of Lou Piniella's outburst about poor Ben Grieve. My first reaction is that it was a pretty classless act and that Lou should have taken that outburst privately to his office. I don't believe in berating players to the public. How is his player supposed to react? If I was Grieve, I'd be embarrassed and hurt. Then again, Grieve makes a lot of money and for a million or so, I'd be willing to take public abuse.

Grieve has been a puzzle since he's come into the league. He's never developed into the kind of player he was expected to become. He is one of those quiet guys who just don't seem to care. But I'm sure he must and I'm sure this is the first time in his life that it isn't coming easy to him. Some players adjust and some don't and it appears that Grieve won't or can't. Perhaps a move would help him but that is how he came to Tampa in the first place. Tampa scored nine runs today (last I checked and Grieve was one of the few on the team not to contribute. The poor guy will probably be released or traded soon. He even said in an interview yesterday that when he showed up at the ballpark, he wasn't sure if he still had a job. Poor guy.

The Yankees are having a big day against the defenseless Mets. Clemens won his 301st and Matsui--who has been on fire lately--hit his second grand slam of the season. Clemens pitched eight innings of six hit ball and is now 8-5. Put him on the AllStars!

In the second game, Soriano and Jeter started the Yankees off with back to back homers off of Tom Glavine of all people. The poor Mets always get the good players on their way downhill.

Speaking of downhill, the Cubbies have lost several heartbreakers lately with six-fingered Alfonseka (I know I'm not spelling his name correctly) blowing the save for the second night in a row. That has to be demoralizing. On the flip side, the doers of the damage, the White Sox, are now on fire and back from the dead. What a strange season. The teams I keep giving up for dead keep reviving. First the Reds, then the Blue Jays, then Arizona and now the White Sox. Maybe I'm a reverse jinx for teams going bad?

It's time to look at the last seven days for my favorite boxscore players:
- Hank Blalock. Blalock had another good week batting .348 with a homer, double and three RBI. He is still batting .335 for the year.
- Mark Teixeira. Teixeira batted .261 for the week with a homer, triple and a double accounting for four RBI. He is now batting .247 for the year.
- Pat Burrell. Oh man. Burrell is still scuffling big time. He only batted .107 last week and his average for the year is at .201. He came up 28 times and only had three hits. Hard to figure...real hard.
- Coco Crisp. How can you not keep checking a guy with that kind of name? Well...I may not have to keep checking much longer as he only hit .250 last week and is now batting .206 for the year. Not a good start for the fast man.
- Sean Burroughs. Jeff's son had a rough week and only batted .186 for the week. He sits now at .289 but he has a pulled groin muscle.
- Miguel Cabrera. The pride of Marakay has started his big league career (seven games so far) with a .214 average but of his six hits, four have been extra bases and he has six RBI in those seven games. He's going to be great.
- Jose Reyes. The twenty year old hope of the Mets had a good week batting .316 to raise his season average to .222. The Mets have said recently that they have changed their mind and Reyes will stay at short for the rest of the year. That's great news!
- Albert Pujols. The .400 and triple crown watch is on. Pujols only batted .533 last week and is up to .387 for the season. He also has 21 homers and 69 RBI. 50 of his 113 hits have been for extra bases. This man has driven in 326 runs in his first 2.5 seasons. Amazing.