David Price may not have had his usual awesome stuff last night, but he was pretty darn good. And did he ever compete in a highly significant game for the Rays against the Baltimore Orioles. The Rays faced the O’s at Camden Yards and Dave ran into some jams, one a bases loaded jam, another a first and third jam, but he got out of both of them with minimal damage, and kept his team in good shape for the playoffs as the Rays defeated the O’s 4-3 last night to take game one of this important three game set with Baltimore. David went only five innings–and wow it was a war–threw 99 pitches, 67 for strikes, 32 for balls, he gave up 10 hits, two earned runs with two walks and 6 K’s. His fastball was hitting 94 most of the time, his change up, his curve and his cutter were locating well and breaking sharply. The Orioles designated hitter, Danny Valencia,  was hitting only .239 coming into the game, but he was seven-for-10 against Dave coming in and was three for three off DP last night. That guy is David’s worst nightmare. Throw in the basher Chris Davis (.305, 45 hrs, 1115 RBIs), the stellar Adam Jones (.300, 25, 89), Brian Roberts (.265 in only 42 games, but an excellent hitter), Manny Machado (one of the best young players in the game, .296, 11-58)  Matt Weiters (hitting only .235 but with 18 hrs and 59 RBIs), J.J. Hardy (.258, 22-66) and Nick Markakis (.279, 8-50) and you have the best hitting lineup in the majors. Getting through that group is an Empire State Building–type order. The main thing Dave did was compete his heart out. He knew how important this series is to his team, and he was not going to let his team down last night. He left with a 4-3 lead, and Jamey Wright, Joel Peralta, Jake McGee and Fernando Rodney allowed only one more run, a homer by Wieters, to preserve the victory. Dave moved to 7-5 with a 3.29 ERA. More importantly to him and his teammates, the Rays moved to 71-52 overall, one back of the Red Sox in the AL East. The Sox are at 74-53. The Rays are a game up in the loss column and that’s significant. If the Rays can win more than the Sox do from here on out they win the division. Rays are a half game up on the A’s for the wild card lead. Would really like to see the Rays win the division though. It’s tough in that wild card game when you have one game to decide your postseason future. If you lose the wild card game you’re done for the year. The Rays want to win this division. If they have to be a wild card team, they want to be the top team to host, but they want to come out on top in the AL East. Last night’s game was critical. There still are 39 games left, and they all matter. This was a division foe who is chasing them, and the Rays need to get the series at Baltimore. The O’s dropped to 67-57, 4.5 back of Rays. Alex Cobb on the hill for Rays tonight. Alex has had an awesome year for the team. He’s one of those stellar young pitchers on the Rays’ staff. He’s 25. Alex is 7-2 with a 2.94 ERA and pitched a nice game last week in his first game back from the DL getting the victory over Seattle. He had a scary incident in June when he got hit by a line drive and suffered a concussion. Alex is back and looking very good. He’ll face Miguel Gonzalez (8-5, 3.84) tonight. If the Rays can get this one tonight, that would be huge. But what am I saying, they’re all huge now. Red Sox at Giants at 10:15 PM ET/9:15 CT. Sox beat the Giants last night, 7-0.

Pedro Alvarez with a big night at the plate last night. El Toro hit number 31 and drove in his 82nd run. He hit a solo shot as the Pirates beat the San Diego Padres, 3-1. Pedro also had a base hit with Andrew McCutchen on first and Pedro’s single got by the right fielder and both Cutch and ‘Dro scored. So Pedro accounted for all three runs the Bucs scored. Francisco Liriano had another stellar outing for the Bucs. He gave up four hits in seven innings, walked two and K’d 13. Francisco moved to 14-5 on the season. He has a 2.53 ERA. Mark “the Shark” Melancon finished it off in the ninth for his eighth save in 10 opportunities. Mark didn’t have his best outing giving up two hits and a run, but he struck out a pair and finished it off for Liriano. Mark’s ERA is now 0.93. The Pirates pitching has been superb this season. Bucs move to 73-51, a game ahead of the Cards who have been winning lately. They’re only two and a half ahead of the Reds, who have been surging as well. NL Central is a horse race with Secretariat, Man o’ War and Seabiscuit competing. Should be a highly compelling race the rest of the way.

Mike Minor didn’t have his best stuff Saturday Night. He got rocked. That happens occasionally to all pitchers. Hopefully, it won’t happen to Mike any more this season. Against the Washington Nationals, Mike only lasted 1 and 2/3 innings giving up four hits, four runs with four walks and two K’s. He threw 67 pitches, 40 for strikes. Just didn’t have his usual command Saturday night. Mike is now 12-5 with a 3.06 ERA. Braves came back and tied it in the ninth on a dramatic two-run homer by the red hot Jason Heyward, but lost 8-7 in 15. But the Bravos did take two of three from the Nats and are 76-48, 16 games ahead of the second place Nats in the NL East. The Braves have  the best record in baseball. Braves at Mets for two, then go to St. Louis for a four game set beginning Thursday. Mike faces Joe Kelly (4-3, 3.01 ERA 29 walks, 55 K’s) Thursday Night in St. Louis at 8:15 ET/7:15 CT on Sportsouth. Mike now has 36 walks on the season and 145 K’s. David pitches next against the Yankees on Sunday at Tampa against Ivan Nova (7-4, 3.17 ERA, 27 walks, 89 K’s).Dave has an astounding 19 walks and 106 K’s.

Sonny on the hill tonight. Pumped for that. Sonny and the A’s are at home facing the Seattle Mariners. Sonny 1-1 with a 1.00 ERA with five walks and 20 K’s. He was brilliant last Thursday against the Astros as posted last week. He’ll face Joe Saunders of the M’s (10-12, 4.86 ERA, 47 walks, 83 K’s). A’s are 71-53, a half game back of the Texas Rangers in the wild wild AL West. They are even in the loss column. Texas is 72-53. The Rangers blasted the ‘Stros last night, 16-5. They’ll play’em again tonight. Should be compelling in the west too, with the A’s and Rangers battling for the coveted division title.

Brandt in third place in the Fed Ex rankings, 841 points behind first place Tiger and 75 points behind second place Matt Kuchar. Brandt is playing with Tiger and Matt Thursday and Friday at the Barclays in Jersey City, New Jersey, just outside of the Big Apple. PGA commissioner Tim Finchem calls it the LIberty National golf course of the best golf arenas on the planet. Should be very exciting. Some people quit following golf after the PGA is over with, but I find the Fed Ex playoffs extremely compelling. Especially with Brandt right in the thick of it again. Looking for B to have a good weekend. Will have a preview and picks on the regular blog early Thursday morning. The top 100 players in the rankings after this tournament move on to the Deutsche Bank Championship just outside of Boston, then it gets cut down after the Deutsche to the top 70 for the BMW Championship outside Chicago, and finally the top 30 after the BMW play for the $10 million dollar first place prize money at the Tour Championship at East Lake just outside of Atlanta. Mathematically there will probably be about only five or six players who can win it all at the Tour Championship. That’s where Brandt won it last year. He was fourth and overtook the three guys in front of him to capture the Cup.

Luke finished in the 160’s on the money list and will have to play in the new format to qualify for next year’s tour. The 126th-200 players on the PGA tour will play with the top 75 from the Web.com tour in the Web.com playoffs, a series of three tournaments, with the top 50 finishers gaining their tour card for next year. The catch is the top 25 on the Web.com money list have already qualified for the tour, so there really are only 25 spots available for the 132 to 144 players who will compete in the series. Very interesting format there. A lot of pressure for Luke. It’ll be challenging. But I believe in him. The tour season made him tougher. The Web.com playoffs will end the week after the Tour Championship. Will keep you posted on that. The President’s Cup is in October too. Brandt in good shape for the team, but needs to play well in the playoffs to insure his spot.

Football practice going very well. One of the big things is the play of our defensive line. We’re pretty loaded up front on the d line this year. Very good group. O line playing well too. The other cornerback spot opposite Andre Hal is a position of interest. Redshirt freshman Paris Head is battling it out with senior Steven Clarke for the spot. Torren McGaster, another redshirt freshman, is in the competition also. So is redshirt freshman Taurean Ferguson. We’ve got a good group in the secondary.

Very bothered with what happened this past summer. Extremely empathetic for the victim and her family. It’s was sad and very tragic and still is. It’ll take a good while to get over this. Just feel really bad for the victim.  I hope the Vanderbilt community is reaching out to her with everything they’ve got to give her all the support she needs. It was horrific. But we do have a lot of good kids on the team. I know James, Vice Chancellor Williams and Chancellor Zeppos were very saddened and disturbed by this incident as a lot of people are. It’s very troubling. I’m excited about Ole Miss, but troubled by what happened. Hopefully the victim can get her life back on track and have a great life ahead of her. She deserves it.