May 19, 2003 [LINK]

Expos back to Puerto Rico?

In their never-ending bid to bluff Washington and Virginia governments into forking over more public funds for a new stadium, thus increasing the value of the Montreal Expos franchise, MLB officials recent hinted that the Expos may play even more of their "home" games in Puerto Rico if satisfactory terms on relocation are not reached. The Expos are playing 22 games in Hiram Bithorn stadium this year, and may play as many as 40 games there next year. Meanwhile, RFK Stadium sits empty, except for soccer games...

Sean Burroughs of the San Diego Padres hit a rare (and questionable) inside-the-park home run at QualComm stadium on Friday. The ball bounced into the Padres bullpen in the left field corner, went inside a small room, bounced off a plastic garbage can back into play. Braves' left fielder Chipper Jones waved to signal that the ball had rolled out of play, which would have meant it was a ground rule double, but none of the umpires could see back into that corner. It's one of the odd quirks of that stadium, the diagram of which I've just updated.

The Braves are the hottest team in the major leagues right now, but the Expos continue to win most of their games and are chasing the Braves in the NL East. The Yankees are slumping a bit, allowing the Red Sox to grab a share of the lead. In fact, there are close races in five of the six divisions; only the Giants have a solid margin over the second place team.

Prior to the beginning of this season, the Tigers moved the left field fence in Comerica Park, reducing the distance to left center field from 395 to 370 feet. It obviously hasn't helped the team win any more games.