Bizarre stories all around as season heads into June

Ejections, bitter arguments, lurid stories, cries of "Mine!" And that was just what was going on in the Rodriguez household last week.

Yes, that was one hootenanny of a week in baseball, topped by the A-Rod situation, which went from bad to bush league to, strangely enough, heroic (in a sporting kind of way) on Sunday night. That's certainly more than we can say for the Cubs' meltdown, Gary Sheffield mouthing off again, the Padres' Pine Tar Reenactment and Ozzie Guillen offering himself up for sacrifice.

This week's Power Rankings, before the weirdness overwhelms us all ...

MLB Power Rankings Rank LW Team 1 1 Boston Red Sox So they lost another series to the Evil Empire. At home, to boot. And, yeah, that $70 million for J.D. Drew is not exactly paying off yet (23 games in the past month, a .165 average and .305 on-base). Still, no one in Beantown should be questioning this team's clear superiority. Of course, they will. "I mean, we're in the questioning center of the world here," Kevin Youkilis says. 2 2 Cleveland Indians Not to get all touchy-feely, but this team has something going for it. If you saw Friday's comeback -- five runs in the bottom of the ninth off Tigers' closer Todd Jones -- you'd touchy-feel it, too. Yeah, the Tribe merely split the series with the Tigers, and there's still concern about lefties Cliff Lee and Jeremy Sowers (combined 3-9 with a 6.52 ERA). Still, a 2 1/2-game lead in the Central is solid. 3 4 Los Angeles Angels Nobody's going to confuse the Angels with, say, the Yanks or Tigers or Indians in run-scoring ability. But they're doing OK. Vladimir Guerrero, who hit a two-run walkoff shot Sunday, is a given. First baseman Casey Kotchman (.304, .378 on-base) is finally delivering. And with Garret Anderson taking Shea Hillenbrand's DH spot this week, things should get even better in L.A. 4 3 New York Mets The surging D'backs beat them two out of three, but as the weeks pile up, the Mets are establishing themselves as the class of the NL. Jorge Sosa and Oliver Perez have stabilized the rotation. David Wright got back on track with a .951 OPS in May. Carlos Delgado is finally beginning to hit. They have a tough June, facing only one sub-.500 team (St. Louis). The Mets can handle. 5 6 San Diego Padres The power of the appeal can be awesome. Catcher Josh Bard went George Brett-ish after a re-called homer Thursday -- the umps got it right, by the way -- and was slapped with a three-game sitdown. He cried foul, though, and as the appeal wound its way through baseball court, Bard homered Sunday (for real, this time) and drove in four runs to beat the Nationals, 7-3. Case closed. 6 7 Los Angeles Dodgers Just listening to manager Grady Little, it's pretty apparent that you couldn't get his blood pressure to rise 10 points if you had him straddle the San Andreas Fault during an 8.0. A close play at the plate Sunday set him off, though, and the umps sent him packing. The Dodgers still won, clinching their fourth straight series, and the NL West, unlike years past, looks legit. 7 8 Atlanta Braves The good: Since his five-K performance in Boston on May 20, Andruw Jones has just six Ks in 12 games, a .951 OPS and has raised his batting average from .212 to .230. The bad: If you haven't seen it yet, this act by Double-A manager Phillip Wellman is mildly funny until you realize that it's probably an act of career suicide. Who can take him seriously? 8 10 Arizona Diamondbacks They're young and sassy and they can hurl a little, too. Which makes them the Hilton-Lohan-Spears of the baseball world. The Diamondbacks have won nine of 10, including taking two of three from the beat-up Mets, the best team in the NL. I think the D'backs are ready for their closeup. "I think," outfielder Eric Byrnes told the Arizona Republic, "this is a playoff team." Could be. 9 5 Detroit Tigers Who doesn't like a man who's unafraid to say what he wants to say? There's a lot of good to Gary Sheffield. But when he says that there are fewer blacks in baseball because Latinos are easier to control (in GQ), when he loses his cool in a blowup at an umpire (resulting in a suspension), his level-headedness and credibility take a major hit. Sheffield thinks before he speaks. He should think more. 10 9 Milwaukee Brewers The Crew won its first series in a month, taking three of four from the Marlins. Next step: Beating a winning team once in a while. If there's one person that will keep the Brewers from tumbling too far out of their current spot in the PRs, it's No. 15, Ben Sheets. A stopper in the truest sense of the word, Sheets has won five of his last six decisions -- four coming after Milwaukee losses.