MLB Top 10: Yanks Enter Week Hotter Than Boston -- Will it Stay that Way?

It was an interesting week in baseball -- Randy Johnson won his 300th career game in front of about 12 people in Washington, the Dodgers stole a couple wins from Philadelphia in walkoff fashion, the Rangers proved their worth with a brutal East Coast road trip, and the Rockies started slugging the tar out of the ball...and they weren't even playing at home. So who heads up this week's Top 10 list as the team playing the best baseball?1. Philadelphia Phillies (33-22)The Phillies had a pair of tough walkoff losses in Los Angeles over the weekend, but prior to the late-game collapses the Phils were winners of seven straight. With the Mets running into serious injury problems, Philadelphia has a hold on the NL East -- they have a chance to expand that three game division lead starting Tuesday night when they travel to New York for a three game series.2. New York Yankees (33-22)The Yanks continue to play well, winning seven of their past ten games, including a series win over the Rangers last week at Yankee Stadium. Get ready for the hype machine to gear up again, as another Yankees/Red Sox series starts Tuesday night. Which team holds first place heading into the series likely depends on the results of tonight's ESPN game against the Rays, but you have to figure the Yanks will finally pick up their first win of the season over the Red Sox during this series. I'm sure the Yanks would love a series win over the BoSox, but at this point they might just settle for a single win.3. Colorado Rockies (24-32)The Rockies are still in last place in a pretty bad NL West, but they're definitely on a collective hot streak with the bat. Coming into Monday, Colorado won their past four games by the score of 38-10. Even more surprising is the recent success they've had on the road, especially considering they won three straight against a Cardinals team competing for an NL Central crown. Anything more than a .500 finish is probably unrealistic for the Rockies this year, but they've played very well the past few days and could play spoiler for a lot of teams down the stretch. Jason Marquis continues to increase his trade value, although that probably says something about the quality of pitching available on the trade market.3. Oakland Athletics (25-30)Don't look now, but the A's have the longest winning streak in the majors, running off six straight victories. The pitching has been very effective, allowing just seven runs in those six games. The real key to success may be the quality of teams, though -- those wins came against Chicago and Baltimore, two clubs who have really struggled to score consistently this year. They'll have a nice test this week in a four-game set against Minnesota. One encouraging sign has been Matt Holliday's continued adjustment to the American League...it'll be interesting to see if Billy Beane can get a better package of prospects in a trade compared to the two compensatory picks he'd receive by just letting Holliady walk in the offseason.4. Texas Rangers (33-23)Texas just keeps chugging along, with no real competition in the AL West -- the Angels are still hovering around .500 and entered Monday trailing the Rangers by 4.5 games. The Rangers put a nice feather in their cap over the weekend, taking a series from the Red Sox in Boston for the first time in about a decade. Nelson Cruz continues to put up some amazing numbers, leading the AL in homers with 17 -- how good is that Carlos Lee deal looking for the Rangers now? At the time Cruz was just a throw-in for the Rangers including Kevin Mench in a Lee-for-Francisco Cordero swap...now he's looking like the best player in the deal, even if it took him until he was 28 to finally figure it out.5. San Francisco Giants (29-26)San Fran is rolling, and part of the reason is Randy Johnson pitching like he's 10 years younger. The Giants have won seven of ten, including a doubleheader sweep of Washington that saw Johnson get his 300th career win. It's a shame that so few people turned out to watch the game, considering it might be a long time before we ever see another 300-game winner, and the fact that as little as two years ago it looked like Johnson would never get there as he battled injuries. The Giants still trail the Dodgers by eight games and have almost no chance of reaching the playoffs, but they're far from being an automatic W on the schedule at this point.6. Chicago Cubs (28-26)The Cubs are really struggling to score runs right now, but the good news is that they're finding ways to win games. The pitching has been very good lately -- how about Randy Wells coming out of nowhere to be a solid backend starter? -- and the Cubs are only 3.5 games out of first place despite the issues on offense. Many people are giving up on the Cubs already, but if they can hang around that 3 games back mark until Aramis Ramirez returns or Jim Hendry adds a bat, they could be dangerous down the stretch. Don't be surprised if they're playing in October again this year.7. Boston Red Sox (33-24)With Toronto fading in recent weeks, the AL East is back to the "way it should be" -- a race between the Red Sox and Yankees. Boston got beat up a little bit over the weekend against Texas, but played extremely well in Detroit prior to that series. In the sweep of the Tigers, Josh Beckett nearly threw a no-hitter, which should be an encouraging sign...Boston's chances of winning the division are a lot higher if Beckett can pitch a few more regular season games the way he usually pitches in the playoffs. The Red Sox have one hell of a six game stretch coming up, hosting the Yankees before traveling to Philadelphia to take on the defending World Champs...could it be a preview of this year's World Series?8. Tampa Bay Rays (29-29)They're still trailing the division-leading Yankees by 5 games, but could do a bit of catching up tonight with a win on national television. Things haven't been easy for the Rays this year, but they've been playing well as of late -- they managed to sweep the Royals last week without too much trouble, David Price is adjusting well to the majors, and the offense is still rolling along. After the rubber game with the Yankees tonight, the Rays go home for a mildly interesting homestand against the Angels and Nationals...considering their styles of play, you could argue that a Rays/Angels series will be played more like a National League series than Rays/Nationals.9. Los Angeles Dodgers (39-20)Although they've been treading water record-wise lately -- a nice square 5-5 in their past ten games -- LA still holds the best record in baseball thanks to a steady streak of series wins. That streak was snapped with a four game split against the Phillies, but the two wins they were able to capture over the world champs were certainly a pair of the most exciting finishes the team has had all year. Manny watch: the slugger is still 5th in the All-Star voting, and is reportedly looking good in private workouts. They've certainly played well without him -- if he can come back without any rust, they'll be nearly unstoppable in that division.10. Milwaukee Brewers (33-24)It's been an interesting week for the Brewers, to say the least. They went through a stretch of horrible pitching in Florida, but managed to escape Miami with a win -- Manny Parra has been so bad on the road that when he gave up 5 runs in 6 innings against the Braves on Sunday it was considered an improvement. They responded nicely by bringing their bats to Atlanta, though, and the pitching rebounded nicely from the Florida debacle by shutting out Atlanta in each of the series' first two games. Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun each had a two-home run game in the series, which is encouraging to those who were worried about the offense in recent weeks as well. The Brewers enter an interesting series against the Rockies tomorrow -- they'll hold a nice division lead heading into the series thanks to the Rockies, but will their shaky pitching be able to slow them down?