Jonathan Lee    AccuScore Analyst
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• The Braves are a mess, and Mark Teixeira is likely to be exiting stage left soon.  Their lineup will become significantly worse without him, but not as much as the various injuries.  Chipper Jones and Tim Hudson were both placed on the DL Monday while Brian McCann is recovering from a mild concussion.  It sounds like Hudson could be gone for the season, and he will be making the trip to see Dr. James Andrews.  Not a good sign.  This season is also exactly why I stay away from Chipper.  He’s great when in the lineup, but you can never be sure when that will be.  Luckily, McCann should be back soon.  I like him over Russell Martin and Geovany Soto as the best fantasy catcher the rest of the way (provided he’s healthy of course).

• Is this good or bad news?  Michael Young broke a finger and will miss 5-7 days.  On one hand he’ll be missing a week, but on the other hand he’s only missing a week.  Either way, I’d be concerned because hand injuries are never good for hitters and even if he returns quickly it could still bother him when he swings.  Or not.  Right now expect Young back next week and in the lineup unless something else happens.

• Jason Isringhausen regained his closer role by attrition pretty much because Ryan Franklin has been a fire-starter recently.  Izzy hasn’t been much better but Tony LaRussa just seems to be looking for answers.  Both pitchers will rank very low in my Closer Report this week.  Only rely on either if you’re in desperate need for saves.  There is a possibility that Adam Wainwright could make his the DL as a reliever, that wouldn’t be wise since he is one of the best starters in the league.

• Chicago and Milwaukee battled it out for first place, and the Cubs prevailed 6-4 in one of the best games of the year.  Game 1 of the 4 game set had a playoff type atmosphere.  For the Cubs to win against CC Sabathia on the road must give them a bit of a mental edge going forward.  Sabathia was average on Monday instead of the spectacular he had been in his last three starts going 6.2 innings allowing 3 ER and striking out 3.  Alfonso Soriano looks all the way recovered from his injury blasting a home run and a double off the wall against Sabathia (that really should have been a triple had he ran) going 2-4 with 3 R, 1 RBI, and a BB.  Carlos Marmol got his fifth save in place of Kerry Wood.

• The Pirate closer situation is a mess in the wake of the Marte/Nady trade.  The one thing owners can rely on is that there won’t be very many leads to protect for Pittsburgh down the stretch.  Someone among the committee of John Grabow, Tyler Yates, and Denny Bautista will be getting some saves, but none of them are especially good and I say none gets double digit saves by the end of the year.  Take your best guess as to who the main guy will be; it’s as good as mine.

• Roy Oswalt returned from his hip injury, and lasted five innings (4 R, 1 BB, 5 K) against the Reds. 

• There might be some radar gun exaggeration at Dodger Stadium, but if the numbers were correct Brian Wilson was dealing some serious heat.  He came in protecting a one run lead for the Giants and blew away the Dodgers hitting 101 mph at least twice and topping the century mark several other times.  He notched his 28 save of the year.

• The Dodgers may have finally gotten tired of the debacle that is Andruw Jones.  The $18 million man was sitting on the bench Monday in favor of Andre Ethier.  If this continues, Ethier’s mixed league value is saved as Juan Pierre will be playing everyday in left providing much more value to your team than the real-life Dodgers.  In other news out of L.A., Nomar Garciaparra was out with a Grade-1 knee sprain so .200 hitting Angel Berroa will be starting for the next few days.  Shocking that Nomar has gone down again, he was always so durable.

• If A.J. Burnett keeps pitching like he did Monday (7 IP, 1R, 10 K) he would be a huge help to a contender and swing one of the close divisional races.  Toronto GM J.P. Ricciardi said however that the right-hander “is not going anywhere.”  Burnett won his career-high 12^th game.

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