Mother's Day in Major League Baseball, part two

Mothers everywhere received a huge endorsement on Mother's Day from Grady Little, who is in his fourth season as a big league manager. "I think the job of being a mother is tougher than being a manager, probably," Little said. "A lot of times when you're a mother, if you don't do something in the right way sometimes, you don't have to read about it in the paper and hear about it on ESPN."

"I've had some pretty good luck on Mother's Day. If you hit a home run, it's a cheap way of getting out of a gift," Ken Griffey Jr. said with a grin. "My mom's real easy. All she wants is a phone call. I think that's all most mothers really care about -- just a phone call from us, letting them know we think about them. She never really asks for anything. But if she did, she'd definitely get it."

Ethier, who had a big two-out hit in the eighth inning to catapult the Dodgers past the Reds, said he was going to give his bat to his mom.

"I was lucky the company that makes my bats put her name on it, so I'm going to give her this one so she can put it up in the house," Ethier said. "Dads are important too, but moms deserve this because they do a lot of the work."

"The way players are superstitious in baseball, I wouldn't be surprised if you see some guys trying to sneak the bats out there tomorrow," said Juan Pierre, who had two hits, a run scored and the go-ahead RBI in a five-run eighth inning. "Individually, guys were staying within their game plans and we ended scoring some runs."

That's what Juan Pierre had to say about today's game. They had a total of 18 hits today, using those pink bats. Not everyone used them. Maybe they should have. It certainly didn't help Russell out, though. With today's win, we are now three games ahead of San Diego! Furcal went 4 for 4 today! Wow! Let's see how soon everyone forgets about that one.