Troy Percival’s attempted comeback has sparked a lot of interest. Detroit and Philadelphia are among the clubs interested in the closer. He makes sense for the Cubs too. General manager Jim Hendry was pursuing him when Percival signed with the Tigers in 2005. … Nothing’s etched in stone, but it appears Roger Clemens will face the White Sox in the June 4-7 series at U.S. Cellular. He’s expected to make a Triple-A start Monday, putting him on schedule to make his season debut sometime after Saturday. … The Mets are investing $7.5 million to build a new academy in the Dominican Republic. They are hoping to schedule some exhibition games there next spring. … Indians left-hander C.C. Sabathia reached 1,000 career strikeouts Monday, becoming the fifth youngest to reach that milestone in the last 25 years. The others who did it before turning 27 are Kerry Wood, Pedro Martinez, Dwight Gooden and Clemens. … Leo Mazzone’s foray to Baltimore hasn’t been a success. He’s unlikely to outlast beleaguered manager Sam Perlozzo, who hired him. … Andruw Jones isn’t helping his free-agent stock. The Braves dropped him to sixth recently, the first time he hadn’t hit cleanup for Atlanta since 2005. … The Brewers are hoping Ben Sheets won’t have to miss Monday’s scheduled start because of a problem with blisters. … Mark Loretta is proving to be a very good signing for Houston. He started at different positions four games in a row last week, moving from shortstop to third, second and first base. … When infielder Tony Abreu plays, the Dodgers have three leadoff men in their lineup. He had a .397 on-base percentage in Triple A, where he was hitting .347.
