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June 13 was a perfect night for Matt Cain and the San Francisco Giants.

Cain tossed the first perfect game in team history, retiring all 27 Houston Astros hitters in order and striking out 14 of them. Giants fans went ballistic when first baseman Brandon Belt caught the final out, and it marked yet another special moment in Giants history.

However, there haven’t been any special moments for Cain since the perfect game.

When Cain threw his perfect game, he was viewed by just about everyone as the ace of the Giants’ pitching staff. Tim Lincecum was struggling, and Cain, who had never received much attention, suddenly was the recipient of lots of attention.

And he’s still been getting lots of attention. However, it hasn’t been good attention.

Since throwing the 22nd perfect game in league history, Cain has struggled. He hasn’t pitched into the ninth inning or shut out the opponent in his last eight starts, and he is just 2-2 in those starts (1-2 in his last seven starts). In his last seven starts, the Giants are 2-5.

Cain only allowed two earned runs in five innings Wednesday against the Mets, but those stats don’t show how he performed. Gregor Blanco saved a run with a spectacular catch in the fourth inning, and Cain got away with some mistakes when runners were on base.

In the start before that, Cain shut down the Dodgers for 4.2 innings. Then, he started to make some mistakes. He left pitches over the plate consistently, and the Dodgers scored two runs in the fifth and one run in the sixth. Cain wasn’t charged with a loss, but he deserved one (the Giants eventually lost in extra innings).

Even though he still has decent numbers (Cain is 10-4 with a 2.82 ERA), Giants fans have a reason to be concerned. Cain has always been known for his consistency, and while he has been somewhat consistent since his perfecto, Giants fans haven’t seen the dominant performance we’ve been looking for from Cain (after the perfect game).

Cain doesn’t let many runners on base (he has a team-leading 1.00 WHIP), but he has struggled to pitch out of jams. He did a good job getting out of jams against the Mets on Tuesday, but in other previous starts, he struggled with that.

When Tim Lincecum was struggling mightily in the first half, Cain dominated to make up for Lincecum’s struggles. However, Lincecum has done well since the All-Star break, and Cain has been the one struggling.

Luckily, the rest of the pitching staff has picked him up nicely.

Ryan Vogelsong led the league in ERA before his start Friday night against the Rockies. Vogelsong doesn’t lead the league anymore, but he still does boast a 2.38 ERA and a 9-5 record. His streak of 16 consecutive quality starts ended against the Rockies (he allowed four earned runs in 6.1 innings pitched), but he continued his streak of 21 starts with six-plus innings pitched.

Vogelsong has a true feel-good story and better statistics than Cain, yet people still think of Cain as the team’s ace. Vogelsong knows how to force weak contact, get out of jams and pitch under pressure, which is why he’s been so good. Cain has struggled to do some of that, and he’s made more mistakes than Vogelsong.

Right now, Vogelsong is the team’s ace. Cain is still a good pitcher, but fans should be worried about him. Usually, I’m ecstatic when Cain starts, because I know he will turn in a good performance. However, I don’t have that feeling right now.

He has shown signs of anger and frustration after bad innings and seems to have lost his confidence. Lincecum’s struggles were much worse, but Cain’s have been similar. His next start will be against the Cardinals, who have scored the second-most runs in baseball. That definitely won’t help his confidence.

It may take a little while before we see the dominant performance we’ve been looking for. Cain has been missing his spots, and opponents have been taking advantage of his struggles. If Cain can deliver against the Cardinals, I wouldn’t be worried anymore.

However, if his recent struggles continue, it could spell doom for the Giants down the stretch.   

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Love him or hate him, Alex Rodriguez will find himself among the greats at Cooperstown some day. Although it is a dark time for Major League Baseball, we need to learn to accept that the Steroid Era happened, and the only thing we can do about it is to prevent it from happening again.

Alex Rodriguez is one of the many faces and one of the greatest players of the Steroid Era. While many fans won’t acknowledge his records, and no matter how many asterisks are placed next to his name, each and every one of his 644 home runs has happened. Each of his 1,937 RBI are in the books.

Rodriguez, who turned 37 in last week, has an excellent shot of being the next player to reach the 3,000-hit plateau and needs only 128 more to accomplish the feat. He would be one of only five players in the 3,000 hit/500 home run club along with Willie Mays, Eddie Murray, Hank Aaron and Rafael Palmeiro. He is also only 17 home runs away from sending another Hall of Famer, this time Willie Mays, down the all-time home run list.

He is also an admitted steroid user and used banned substances while with the Texas Rangers from 2001-03. 

According to an ESPN article published in 2011, the Steroid Era “refers to a period of time in Major League Baseball when a number of players were believed to have used performance-enhancing drugs, resulting in increased offensive output throughout the game.” Although there is no definitive start day like the Dead Ball era (1901-1919), it is credited to have began in the late 1980s through the mid-2000s. 

In 1961, baseball commissioner Ford Frick petitioned to have Roger Maris’ home run record kept separate from Babe Ruth’s, citing the length of schedule (teams played more eight more games when Maris his 61 home runs in 1961 than then did when Ruth hit 60 in 1927. Maris hit home runs 60 and 61 in the last eight games that season). Many baseball traditionalists felt the same way.

Now, today’s traditionalists feel that Maris is still baseball’s single-season home run king.

“The institution of the asterisk, the most important typographical symbol in American sport, (is) terribly unfair. To take away Ruth’s record was to take away something that was held so close to the hearts of the baseball establishment that they couldn’t see doing it. Nonetheless, Roger Maris, did it. He hit 61 home runs and the fact that it took 162 games; he also had to do it playing at night, to bat against the screwball, having to travel to the west coast for games, and to do it all with a parade of reporters I think is unfair.” -Daniel Okrent in Ken Burns: Baseball

Regardless, there is a huge difference between the extra eight games (and exactly seven at-bats) between Ruth and Maris, and the body-altering drugs and chemicals between Maris and players like Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds or Sammy Sosa.

Another rule change that Frick was instrumental in was the widening of the strike zone so that Maris’ mammoth 1961 campaign never happened again, which opened the door to the “Golden Age of Pitching.” This launched the careers of Juan Marichal, Sandy Koufax, Bob Gibson and the dominant pitchers of the 1960s. 

Since there was a rule change implemented before those players started the dominant stages of their careers, should there be asterisks placed next to the names of those players too?

Baseball historians, while determining what records stand and which ones don’t, determined that everything after the year 1900 would be deemed the “Modern Era.” By this time, the strike zone was defined, four ball walks existed, the pitchers mound was 60 feet six inches from the now pentagon-shaped home plate. 

So because of the rules’ stabilization, Major League Baseball does not recognize records and statistics compiled in that era to be comparable to the statistics achieved today. Therefore records like Nap Lajoie’s .427 average in 1901 are the standard, whereas Hugh Duffy’s .440 average in 1894 (which is the highest single-season average since baseball’s inception) are not.

But Hugh Duffy still did it. And he is in the Hall of Fame.

Don’t get me wrong. Rule changes implemented by the Major League Baseball front office is no way comparable to injecting yourself in the butt with HGH and testosterone.

Just a quick disclaimer before we get into the juicy part: steroids are bad. They are wrong. Don’t do them. People who use steroids are cheaters. The damage that steroids users risk to their bodies far outweigh the athletic benefits of using them…not to mention the influence that professional athletes have on young and amateur athletes across the world.

Although there is no definitive start date of the Steroid Era, the pioneers of the era were the Bash Brothers Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco, who hit a combined 410 home runs while they were teammates with the Oakland Athletics from 1987 until 1992 when Canseco was traded to the Texas Rangers. McGwire was limited to only 74 games in 1993 and 1994 with foot injuries and the labor dispute…a dispute that would result in the cancellation of almost 950 MLB games, including the entire 1994 postseason.

Fans were disgruntled following the 1994 player strike and the 20 percent decrease in attendance from 1994 to 1995 reflected that.

However, in 1998, the home run phenomenon climaxed.

1998 was about three players: Seattle Mariner Ken Griffey Jr (one of the rare Steroid Era sluggers who hasn’t been linked to steroids), Chicago Cub Sammy Sosa, and McGwire (now with the St. Louis Cardinals)…all three in pursuit of Roger Maris’ single season home run record. Griffey was the early favorite. The reigning AL MVP fell five home runs short of tying Maris the season before and would finish the 1998 season with 56 again.  

The spotlight all summer was on Sosa and McGwire. The NL Central rivals were hitting home runs at a record-breaking rate and stayed almost neck and neck the entire way, and were tied at 55 apiece on August 31. But, while playing Sosa and the Cubs, McGwire hit his record-tying 61st off of Mike Morgan on September 7, then the record-breaking shot off Steve Trachsel the next night. McGwire finished the season with 70 home runs, which stood as the record until Barry Bonds hit 73 in 2001.

The excitement of the home run had fans flooding stadium gates. There were 5,064 home runs hit in the major leagues in 1998, which was the most all time and the first time there had been over 5,000 hit in a season. There were more hit the next season (5,528). And even more the next (5,693). The amount of home runs hit in the National League had more than doubled from 1992 (1,262) to 2000 (3,005).

And it was exciting…until it was revealed that players had been using performance-enhancing drugs and all the splendor has turned into bitterness

But players can argue that ball players had been using advantages to get the upper hand over their opponent for decades. After all, Ty Cobb was notorious for sharpening the spikes on his cleats in an attempt to slice open opposing players’ shins, right? Or what about stealing signs? Or Joe Niekro’s emery board? Or Kenny Rogers’ pine tar?

Right. But they haven’t been injecting testosterone and hormones into their bodies to give them a chemically produced edge.

Although the Steroid Era is a black mark on professional baseball history, we need to acknowledge that it happened and take away things that can help improve the game. Steroids saved baseball. The Steroids Era is a part of baseball history, and the players from that era belong in Cooperstown. Perhaps not hanging in the same hallway as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and Hank Aaron. But they belong somewhere.

Alex Rodriguez happened. He is a feared hitter that is capable of changing the game with a simple flick of his wrists. And, for that, he is Hall of Fame worthy.

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The Toronto Blue Jays have had their fair share of spectacular trade deadline moves in the past.

Whether it was acquiring players for a long-term goal, or maybe picking up a guy to help them make a World Series push, the Jays have done it all.

That being said, they’ve also made some pretty abysmal calls from the management side, but let’s be honest—which team hasn’t?  

With the trade deadline inching closer and closer, we take a look back on Toronto’s best deadline acquisitions—the ones which had the most impact, and the one’s that helped the ballclub exactly the way they needed to. 

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After reading through these slides, your appreciation for the “Iron Man” Cal Ripken Jr. will only grow.

Major League Baseball boasts the longest and most grueling season in professional sports, so injuries are undoubtedly expected.

But there’s a fine line between injuries and injury-plagued players.

I’m not talking “soft” in regards to attitude or style of play, but rather health and being able to stay on the field and perform at a high level.

I’m sure there’s a long list of other players who belong on this list, but here are 14 of the most oft-injured players in the past 25 years.

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Barry Larkin and Ron Santo will be enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame this week, taking their place alongside 295 others who have a plaque hanging in Cooperstown.

The Hall of Fame is meant to showcase and preserve the game’s greatest players, moments and artifacts, but has provided moments and talking points of its own over the years. The current debate about whether to allow known steroid users into the Hall is going to rage for years to come.

Here, we take a look at the 10 greatest moments of the inductees’ speeches.

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Ever since Major League Baseball was founded in 1869, franchises have been relocated, renamed, players have come and gone and legends have been born and enshrined in history. 

In the 143 years since baseball has been deemed a profession in America, 30 franchises have stood the test of time, each of them with their own incredible histories and traditions. 

As a personal vice and out of curiosity, I compiled a spreadsheet calculating the all-time winning percentage of every franchise, including how often they appear in the postseason, win pennants and world championships, as well as how many of their playoff trips result in World Series berths and titles, relative to how long each team has been in existence.

The placement of some teams will be obvious, but others were a shock to me and may be to you as well.

Here are my rankings of the 30 current MLB franchises based on all-time records.

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Raul Mondesi, Jr. might want to take a few baseball lessons from his famous father, the former Dodger great by the same name.

When it comes to walk-off wins, the idea is for the home team to celebrate, not the other way around. 

After smacking an 0-1 curveball from Missoula Osprey pitcher Dexter Price for an apparent game-tying home run in the bottom of the 10th inning, Helena Brewers prospect Raul Mondesi, Jr. inexplicably forgot to touch home plate, a huge gaffe observed by Osprey catcher Michael Perez and home plate umpire Blake Mickelson.

After Mickelson put a new ball into play, Perez motioned for his pitcher to throw him the baseball, turning to the umpire and appealing for the man in black to ring Mondesi up for the most improbable of base-running mistakes.

A home plate umpire’s bond with home plate is special. Umpires spend a considerable amount of time studying the precise dimensions of the 17″-wide dish, they brush and wipe it clean throughout the game and rule every pitch in relation to whether it has passed over home plate.

And when asked, umpires are quick to discipline a runner for failing to touch home plate when required to do so.

Helena manager Jeff Isom was in shock: “On any home run, the umpire has one job and that’s to watch the plate and make sure the runners touch it. He said [Mondesi] missed it by eight inches.”

Game over, Missoula wins, 2-1.

As the great Vin Scully said about Kirk Gibson’s 1988 home run in Game 1 of the World Series, “The impossible has happened.”

Official Baseball Rule Rule 7.10(d)—used by minor league ball in addition to MLB—covers appeal plays in regards to missed bases:

Any runner shall be called out, on appeal, when … He fails to touch home base and makes no attempt to return to that base, and home base is tagged.

Ouch.

At least Mondesi, Jr. has some company.

In 1908, Giants rookie Fred Merkle famously forgot to touch second base on an apparent walk-off base hit. Merkle, the runner on first at the time, was forced to touch second base by virtue of batter Moose McCormick becoming a runner, so when Merkle inexplicably drifted off the base path to go celebrate with his team, outfielder Solly Hofman and Hall of Famer Johnny Evers saw what was happening and facilitated an appeal.

Umpire Hank O’Day obliged and ruled Merkle out for missing the base, effectively wiping out the game-winning run and resulting in a walk-off tie.

When the game was replayed to determine a winner, the Cubs won the contest, eventually finishing just one game ahead of the Giants for the NL pennant.  

Maybe it’s a teenager thing; Merkle was 19-years-old when he committed his bonehead play, famously known as “Merkle’s Boner”. After all, Mondesi, Jr. is also 19-years of age.

As Isom instructed his team, “From now on, make sure you jump on the plate on a homer.” Just hopefully not so hard that you break your ankle in the ensuing celebration a la Angels stud Kendrys Morales.

Gil Imber is Bleacher Report’s Rules Featured Columnist and owner of Close Call Sports, a website dedicated to the objective and fair analysis of close or controversial calls in sports.

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One quick look at the numbers for Washington Nationals outfielder Bryce Harper clearly shows that he is on a pace to rival numbers put up by other famous teenagers in MLB history.

Through 51 games, Harper is hitting .280 with seven HRs, 20 RBI, an .848 OPS and an OPS-plus of 129.

Not too many youngsters can lay claim to those types of lofty numbers at such a young age.

We will take a look at 10 other teenagers who displayed raw power at an early age.

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Almost every boy can think back to a time when he was young and played catch with his father in the yard or at the local baseball field. For many children, this helped spark an interest in baseball.

Some children were lucky enough to have their first catch with fathers who were also Major League Baseball players. Learning from someone who had a major league pedigree certainly helped these youngsters develop into good baseball players.

There were a number who would go on to follow in their father’s footsteps and reach the big leagues. Amongst the long list of father-son combinations to play in the major leagues, a few stand out a bit more than others.

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After 50 years and a grand total of 8,019 games before it, the New York Mets have finally tossed a no-hitter, and I am proud to say that I was in attendance.  

The scene was electric at Citi Field as Johan Santana dazzled for nine straight innings in front of a crowd that was 27,069 strong.

The night was filled with suspense and a few minor outbreaks of rain, but not even a few rain drops could stop the Mets ace from dominating the Cardinals. 

The Mets ace fanned eight Cardinals batters on the night, which is pretty impressive considering that the Cardinals came into the game as the National League’s leaders in batting.

Santana was helped with some great defense by his teammates as well. David Wright made some tough plays look easy over at third base, and Mike Baxter made an incredible catch in the 7th inning as he crashed into the wall to save the Mets no-hitter. Baxter would end up leaving the game with a shoulder injury.

As I was watching the final three innings, it reminded me of the feeling that I had for this years Super Bowl. I told myself that there was no way that Santana was going to pull this off, but that feeling faded away more and more with every out.

Then there was the ninth inning.  

Santana retired Matt Holiday and Allen Craig, but he still had to face last years World Series hero David Freese.

Santana threw three straight balls before fighting back in the count to strike him out on a change-up, and then Citi Field erupted.

It was truly an amazing moment and it is one that I will never forget. 

Santana’s gem goes right up there with the greatest moments in Mets’ history, which includes the World Series titles in 1969 and ’86, and Mike Piazza’s game winning home run against the Braves that was just days after the attacks of September, 11th.

Santana’s accomplishment was even more special because of the wait. It was something that Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Jon Matlack, Nolan Ryan, David Cone, Dwight Gooden and all pitchers before him could not do as Mets, which will forever grace him in the hearts of the fans. 

I also have to mention that the irony in this game was almost unbearable. 

Carlos Beltran, who is a former Met, almost broke up the no-hitter when he ripped a ball down the third base line. The ball should have been called fair, but it was ultimately called foul by third base umpire, Adrian Johnson. Met killer Yadier Molina was the batter that hit the ball that Mike Baxter caught, and he is the same player that smashed the game-winning home run to beat the Mets in the 2006 National League Championship series. The pitcher that struck out Beltran in that NLCS game to win it for the Cardinals was Adam Wainwright, who also happened to be the pitcher that started against Johan Santana Friday night.

There could not have been a better script. 

As soon as it happened, I received numerous phone calls and texts from people that know what I have gone through with the Mets, which made the experience that much more special. It was also great to see what this game meant to my uncle, as he has been a Mets fan from day one. 

This was truly an amazing moment for the Mets and their fans, and who knows if this game sparks a rally for the rest of the season “You Gotta Believe!”

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