As Astros pitcher Roy Oswalt studied videos of Cardinals batters in preparation for Game 6 of the 2005 National League Championship Series - the biggest game in Houston franchise history - he got an unusual interruption. Astros owner Drayton McLane came up to Oswalt and promised to buy him a bulldozer if he could pitch the team into the World Series for the first time. The incentive worked. Oswalt pitched seven strong innings and beat the Cardinals 5-1 in St. Louis, sending the Astros to the...

The Baseball Writers' Association of America did a pretty good job with their latest Hall of Fame ballot. They elected Jim Thome, Vladimir Guerrero, Trevor Hoffman and Chipper Jones, and held off Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds. They could have done better by electing Edgar Martinez, Mike Mussina, Omar Vizquel - and even long shot Fred McGriff - but maybe those guys will make it on another ballot. Mussina is on the ballot another five years. Before we get too far into the Hall of Fame analysis,...

So much for having a day off. It's back to the baseball grind tonight with the Royals arriving at Camden Yards for a three-game series. Jason Hammel turned in five quality starts out of six outings before his swollen right knee altered the early course of his season. He's allowed nine runs (eight earned) and 13 hits in his last two starts covering 10 1/3 innings, with five walks and eight strikeouts. He hasn't cleared the sixth in either start. The Orioles require more innings from Hammel....

According to a baseball source, the Nationals were not one of the teams to place a bid on Japanese pitcher Yu Darvish through the posting process, which ended at 5 p.m. Wednesday. That takes the Nationals out of the mix for a right-hander, who is described as the best pitcher not currently in the major leagues and helps to better explain general manager Mike Rizzo's hesitance to address the subject publicly. The news was first reported by The Washington Post. If Darvish isn't in...

DALLAS - Mark Buehrle was the guy the Nationals wanted. However, in the wake of the left-hander's decision to spurn a three-year offer for between $42-$45 million from Washington to sign a four-year deal with the Marlins on Wednesday, Nats general manager Mike Rizzo isn't too heartbroken that the deal never came to fruition. "We weren't - I wasn't - comfortable going four years on him as a starting pitcher," Rizzo said Wednesday night, less than two hours after finding out that weeks of...

DALLAS - Looks like the Nationals, like most of baseball, are balking at the notion of paying left-hander C.J. Wilson north of $100 million to solidify their rotation. A source at the Winter Meetings told me tonight that the Nats are moving their focus to the other two top free agent pitchers, lefty Mark Buehrle and right-hander Roy Oswalt. This is typical of baseball's biggest offseason gathering: A free agent shoots for the moon, teams bristle at his asking price and the clubs move on to...