Kuzul

You might've heard Bryce Harper's season got off to quite a start.The Washington Nationals outfielder—whom many consider a Most Valuable Player candidate in only his second season and at the ripe old age of 20—smashed a pair of homers in the season opener.The performance already has triggered all sorts of talk about what's to come in 2013 for Mr. Harper, including a piece by fellow Bleacher Report MLB Lead Writer Zachary D. Rymer on why Harper's hot start is just the beginning of what will be an MVP campaign.But do MVPs actually need to start hot in order to get the hardware?A review of the first-month production* of past MVPs dating back to the turn of the century revealed some impressive results.From 2000 through 2012, there were 25 total MVP-hitter seasons. (For the purposes of this research, we'll ignore Justin Verlander's 2011 because, comparing hitters to pitchers is like comparing ...

In the 2012 MLB season, 27 different players hit 30 or more home runs. Only one team, the Los Angeles Angels, had three players appear on that list: Mark Trumbo (32), Albert Pujols (30) and Mike Trout (30). It was the first time since 2000 that three Angels players topped the 30-HR mark in a season. Seven of the 30 MLB franchises have never had three (or more) players hit 30 or more HRs in a season. The seven: Baltimore, Kansas City, New York Mets, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Tampa Bay and Washington. Of the remaining 23 teams, here’s a look at the last season in which each team had a trio of 30-HR hitters in the same season. The list begins with the team with the longest drought, the San Francisco Giants, who have not had three (or more) players hit 30-plus homers in a season since 1966. Last year ...

Philadelphia’s Roy Halladay has been one of the majors' best pitchers in the past decade. Unfortunately, his 2012 season mirrored the Phils' '12 campaign as the team dropped from 102 wins in 2011 to 81 last year. Halladay struggled with an 11-8 record and an ERA of 4.49 (his 11 wins were the fewest since he had eight in 2004; his ERA was the second worst of his career). The 2012 season was only the second time in Halladay’s career where he did not have a complete game (he did not have a complete game in 2000 with Toronto). This broke Halladay’s streak of 11 straight seasons where he had at least one complete game. It was also rare considering that Halladay had been the league-leader in complete games for five consecutive years (two with Philadelphia and three with Toronto). Halladay leads the majors with most complete games in this ...

The New York Yankees have chosen to fill their designated hitter slot in the lineup with a combination of several low cost options in 2013, and who gets the bulk of at-bats will likely be decided in spring training.General manager Brian Cashman brought in two left-handed bats—Travis Hafner and Dan Johnson—as well as two right-handed bats—Juan Rivera and Matt Diaz—to compete for at-bats.A platoon of one left-handed hitter and one right-handed hitter seems like the most likely scenario at this point, as either right-handed bat will also be the fourth outfielder.Cashman has succeeded in the past with low-risk, high-reward contracts (Freddy Garcia and Bartolo Colon first come to mind). With an entire spring to prove themselves, the Yankees and manager Joe Girardi are sure to find at this one diamond in the rough.The four candidates haven't exactly had the most success in the majors over the past few seasons, so ...

Spring training, the time of year when jersey numbers like 68, 75 or 83 are commonplace.Spring training, the time of year when fans are mesmerized by 420-foot bombs, but then have no idea who hit them. Or, they watch a pitcher breeze through the heart of the order by striking out the side, then rack their brains, wondering where the heck did that guy come from? New York Mets fans won’t have to wonder. This slideshow will introduce you to the five latest spring training invitees, some of whom could start the season in Queens.Begin Slideshow

The San Francisco Giants won the World Series, and there's no doubt that they were the better team and deserved to hoist up the Commissioner's Trophy.Winning games is obviously the goal in Major League Baseball, but I thought it could go deeper than that. Unlike football, baseball doesn't have a salary cap, and that gives small-market teams more of a disadvantage.So, I wanted to see how much each team paid per win in 2012. I took each team's payroll (via CBS Sports) at the beginning of the season and divided it by the number of wins it had in the regular season.Here is the list, ranked from most expensive to least. Obviously, the lower the price, the better.Begin Slideshow

Matt Harvey's line of duty in 2012 has come to an end following a strong outing a couple of nights ago against the Philadelphia Phillies. It's hard to complain about Harvey's performance in his rookie season. In fact, he was one of the Mets' few bright spots in the second half. In the majors, Harvey is 3-5 in 10 starts with a 2.73 ERA, 1.15 WHIP and 70 strikeouts in 59.1 innings. Harvey's stats alone tell you a story about the pitcher.Despite a small amount of starts, only three wins for Harvey is an absolute sin with that ERA. Harvey may as well have eight wins with all the good starts he's had. He had only pitched two bad games. The mediocre Mets offense, though, deprived him of the extra wins.The most obvious thing we've learned about Harvey this season is that he's a strikeout machine; seventy in 59.1 innings is great. He ...

Third place doesn't doesn't seem like much of a prize, particularly in the National League Central. But it could mark the way to bigger and better thingsin the future. Relative to the past few years, Pittsburgh is on its way up. Milwaukee has seen better days, although this relationship is the reverse of what has happened this year.Going into tonight's game, the Pittsburgh Pirates and Milwaukee Brewers have identical records, 74-72. Pittsburgh has actually done better against the rest of the National League, 70-64, versus 66-68 for the Brewers. But Milwaukee leads the two teams' season series eight to four.On paper, Milwaukee looks like the more powerful team.They've scored the third most runs (701) in the majors. Old standbys such as 2011 National League MVP Ryan Braun and Aramis Ramirez have been joined by rookie Norichika Aoki among the league's best hitters. The Pirates, meanwhile, are in the bottom third ...

With his next home run, Ryan Braun will become the sixth player in Milwaukee Brewers history to hit 200-plus HRs as a Brewer. The current 200-HR club for the franchise: Robin Yount (251), Prince Fielder (230), Geoff Jenkins (212), Gorman Thomas (208) and Cecil Cooper (201). If you add in Braun’s 119 career stolen bases with the club, he will become only the second player in Brewers history to have 200 home runs and 100 stolen bases with the franchise. Yount is currently the only member of that group with his 251 home runs and 271 steals. Could there be any other current players who might be joining Yount (and Braun) in the near future on the 200-100 list?There are two possibilities: Corey Hart has 151 home runs and 83 stolen bases with the Brewers, and second baseman Rickie Weeks has the 100-100 tag on his resume with 126 homers ...

Sometimes in the grind that is a 162-game MLB season, the All-Star break is seen by many players as a blessing. For some, the break provides a golden opportunity to spend time with family and friends. For other players, the break bestows a chance to simply get away and recharge batteries. I do not know what Adrian Gonzalez did during the break. But whatever the great first baseman did, this consummate professional has had a breakout second half for a Red Sox team fighting mightily to find its way.    Marching forward, it should be noted that Gonzalez did not produce a poor first half by any stretch of the imagination. For Sox fans, this slugger has been a calm amid the storm.But keeping things in laymen’s terms, a split of Gonzalez’s first- and second-half stats (per MLB.com), shows a much different player: HALF AB H 2B HR RBI BB SO ...