A Thought for the Day from Yaz

"I think about baseball when I wake up in the morning. I think about it all day and I dream about it at night. The only time I don't think about it is when I'm playing it."

Triple Crown Threats

My money's on Big Brown.

It's pretty much a three-horse race: Josh Hamilton, Lance Berkman and Big Brown.

Both Hamilton (Rangers) and Berkman (Astros) have more than piqued our interest, although there's still a lot of baseball to play.

Can one of them, please, put a merciful end to major-league baseball's four-decade Triple Crown drought?

The last player to lead his league in batting average, home runs and RBI is now pushing 70. Carl Yastrzemski capped Boston's "Impossible Dream" season of 1967 with baseball's elusive trifecta.

Hamilton -- current Sports Illustrated cover boy -- ranks first in RBI, first in HRs and second in batting average among American League hitters. Houston's Berkman, meanwhile, is tattooing NL pitching at the tune of second in home runs, second in batting average and third in RBI. Big Brown has the easier trip. He needs only to win Saturday's Belmont Stakes to become thoroughbred racing's first Triple Crown winner in 30 years.

Carroll Hardy

In 1961, batting for LF Carl Yastrzemski, Red Sox pinch hitter Carroll Hardy bunted for a single in the eighth inning of a 7-6 loss to the Yankees. Hardy would be the only player to pinch-hit for both Captain Carl and Ted Williams.