Nationals' Riggleman helps Phillies with 100th win

In beating the Braves on Sunday - gladdening the hearts of Phillies fans everywhere - Washington manager Jim Riggleman won his 100th game since taking over the Nationals in the middle of the 2009 season. Of course, Bobby Cox has 2,145 in his two stints with Atlanta, but look what Riggleman had to work with.

The Pirates beat Houston, 9-3, on Sunday to leave Pittsburgh with a 7-2 record on the team's final and most successful homestand of 2010 and to dodge a 101st loss, which would have guaranteed them their worst season since they lost 104 in 1985. The hapless Bucs are 55-100.

But now comes the tricky part. After going 40-41 at PNC Park, they play their final seven on the road, where they are 15-59 - on a pace for the NL's worst road record since the 1962 Mets went 17-64 during their 120-loss inaugural season. And no NL team has won fewer than 20 road games since the 1963 Mets went 18-62.

The six or so Bucs fans left are no doubt lighting candles at the shrine of Marvelous Marv Throneberry and hoping for an intercession by the spirit of Choo-Choo Coleman.

They'll need help from somewhere. The Pirates, who play three in St. Louis starting Monday and four at Florida after that, have lost 45 of their last 51 road games and have been outscored, 432-228, away from home.

Chicago owner Tom Ricketts showed his fluency in corporate lingo Sunday, telling ESPNChicago that he's in no hurry to choose a new Cubs manager: "We don't really have a hard-coded time frame on that."

If it were up to us, we'd think outside the box and pick disgruntled Chicago White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen because: (1) we're lazy (he's just across town) and (2) we like to have our copy prewritten (he's a walking, talking High&Inside). But that's unlikely to happen, because: (A) Ozzie doesn't like the amenities at Wrigley Field and (B) he doesn't need the (B).

Let us walk you though the other candidates for the Cubs' new paradigm going forward (we'd use PowerPoint, but High&Inside lacks the synergy to be optimized for that platform at this juncture of excellence): interim manager Mike Quade, former Cleveland manager Eric Wedge, Washington coach Pat Listach, former Arizona skipper Bob Melvin, former Seattle honcho Don Wakamatsu, and former Cubs star Ryne Sandberg, the manager at triple-A Iowa.

At the end of the day, it should be Sandberg, because you know the Hall of Famer can hit the ground running.

Before San Francisco's 10-9 loss to the Colorado Rockies on Saturday, Giants pitchers had gone 18 straight games giving up three or fewer runs, the longest stretch since the White Sox set the major-league record at 20 in 1917, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

St. Louis Cardinals reliever Blake Hawksworth, who received about 30 stitches in his mouth after a liner by the Cubs' Sam Fuld hit him in the face in the fifth inning of Saturday's 7-3 loss, was released from the hospital early Sunday and back in uniform by afternoon, swollen but unbowed. Manager Tony La Russa said he wouldn't play.