Welcome to another edition of Five Things I Liked (Or Didn’t Like) This Week. The parenthetical part of the title is largely just a nod to Zach Lowe, whose ESPN basketball column inspired this one. He occasionally mentions flaws or foibles holding a particular team or player back, in lovingly GIF’ed up detail. I’m more of a rah-rah type, and plenty of weeks I don’t have a single Didn’t Like in the column at all. This week, though, I can’t help it; mental lapses, baserunning errors, and overall sloppiness are all over the column. That’s not to say I don’t love watching it, because part of what’s fun about baseball is when a theoretically staid game gets messy, but let’s be clear: A lot of these plays are not good plays. We’ve got superstars getting confused, on-field collisions, and absolute howlers. Let’s get started.
1. The Profligate Nationals
The Nats are one of the unheralded fun stories of the baseball season. They’re hanging around .500 and playing like better days are ahead. CJ Abrams and MacKenzie Gore look like franchise mainstays. James Wood, another part of the return from the Juan Soto trade, isn’t far off. Mitchell Parker and Jake Irvin might be mid-rotation starters. Jacob Young is an elite defender. They have plenty of interesting role players, and the whole team plays with reckless and joyful abandon.
That’s particularly true on the basepaths, where the Nats rank third in steals but only 11th in total baserunning value. They’re always angling for how to advance another base, whatever the costs. Sometimes that ends in tears. Read the rest of this entry »
Welcome to another edition of Five Things I Liked (Or Didn’t Like) this week. I’m not sure if this is by design or simply a scheduling coincidence, but this week was full of compelling matchups between current rivals. The Cubs and Cardinals squared off. So did the Yankees and Orioles. The Guardians and Mariners aren’t exactly rivals, but their series rocked too, and I’m sad I couldn’t find a way to squeeze them in this week. That said, there’s a ton to talk about, so let’s get to it, after our usual nod to Zach Lowe of ESPN, who is surely enjoying a well-deserved vacation after the conclusion of the NBA season. To baseball! Read the rest of this entry »
If you’ve been in a ballpark a half hour or so before game time, you’ve probably noticed the starting pitchers playing catch with a teammate or a coach in the outfield. You’ve likely also observed them subsequently going into their respective bullpens to warm up, readying themselves to face hitters once the contest begins. This is integral to a starter’s pregame preparation, but it’s only part of the start-day routine. That routine, which varies from pitcher to pitcher, is typically scripted. From going over scouting reports to the number of throws mades before taking the game mound, everything is planned out.
How exactly does a big league starter prepare for a game? A pair of New York Yankees — pitching coach Matt Blake and veteran left-hander Nestor Cortes — detailed the process in separate interviews last weekend at Fenway Park.
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Matt Blake:
“Some guys are a little more scripted than others. They’re all going to be in the vicinity of 25-35 pitches. You might have some outliers who are closer to 20 or 40, but generally 25-30ish pitches is usually the target to get yourself ready. That’s in the ’pen. There is some level of catch-play before, whether it’s long toss or PlyoCare work, to get your body prepared to get on a mound for the 25-30 pitches.
“Depending on their arsenal, they might carve out a certain amount for each pitch. For instance, Gerrit [Cole] is pretty scripted. He might do 12 or 13 out of the windup, then 12 or 13 out of the stretch, and then assess if he needs any more than that. Some guys might be mostly out of the windup and a couple out of the stretch at the end. We’re always trying to identify the foundational routine. What is it they need to work on to get ready for the game plan that night? Maybe you’re facing a couple of batters at the end of your bullpen. You’re saying, ‘This is the first batter and these are the areas I want to get to. Here is the second batter.’ You’re putting together some sequences that are akin to what you’re going to throw to start the game off. Read the rest of this entry »
Even before he fractured his right arm during Sunday’s 9-3 loss to the Red Sox, Anthony Rizzo had already endured a rough 12 1/2 months. His 2023 season was wrecked by the aftereffects of a May 28 collision with Fernando Tatis Jr., which manifested themselves as post-concussion symptoms that sapped his production before he was shut down in early August; he didn’t play again that season. He started slowly this year, and while his bat perked up in late April, he fell into a deep slump at the beginning of June and was benched during the Yankees’ recent series against the Dodgers. He showed a few positive signs upon returning to the lineup, but now he’s expected to miss the next eight weeks.
Rizzo’s injury occurred during the seventh inning of Sunday night’s game at Fenway Park. After Alex Verdugo and Giancarlo Stanton both singled off pitcher Brennan Bernardino to start the inning, Rizzo grounded to the right side of the infield. First baseman Dominic Smith ranged over to field the ball and started to throw to second base before realizing he had no shot at forcing Stanton out. He then threw to Bernardino — or rather, behind him. The pitcher dropped the ball as he got to the bag, where a sprinting Rizzo swerved to his right to avoid a full-on collision. He lost his balance and went down hard, rolling over on his right arm. He remained on the ground in obvious pain while being tended to by the Yankees’ athletic trainers, then left the field and was replaced by pinch-runner Oswaldo Cabrera.
Initial imaging with a fluoroscope at Fenway Park was negative, but further testing in New York on Monday revealed that Rizzo had fractured the radial neck of his right arm — that is, the part of the radius near the elbow. Such injuries are more common in children than adults, and often occur on a traumatic fall onto an outstretched hand, which, bingo. Such fractures are usually not displaced, and that would appear to be the case with Rizzo, who won’t need surgery. While initial reports placed his absence in a four-to-six week window, on Tuesday the Yankees said that Rizzo will need about eight weeks before returning to games, with the first baseman saying he was told it’ll be “probably four, five weeks” of no baseball activity. Read the rest of this entry »
Welcome back to Top of the Order, where every Tuesday and Friday I’ll be starting your baseball day with some news, notes, and thoughts about the game we love.
No division race is tighter than the AL East, with the Yankees leading the Orioles by just 1.5 games ahead of their three-game matchup that begins tonight in the Bronx. Both teams are virtual locks to make the playoffs, but securing the division title is crucial because of the almost-certain bye that would come with it. This is a fierce race that looks like it’ll go down to the wire, but these head-to-head games might not be as important for their divisional hopes as their off-the-field showdown leading up to the trade deadline.
While the Orioles and Yankees won’t have much overlap in terms of trade needs — and as such won’t be competing for many of the same players — they’re obviously competing to get better and build more complete rosters so they can outlast the other and make a deep October run. The thing is, considering there are only five teams right now that are out of the playoff picture — the White Sox, Marlins, Athletics, Rockies, and Angels — actual upgrades available on the trading block might be in short supply. That means the Yankees and Orioles will need to capitalize on whatever improvements they can make. This environment could set the stage for New York and Baltimore to be among the most active teams over the next month and a half.
The Yankees have arguably the two best hitters in the entire league in Aaron Judge and Juan Soto, and though the rest of the lineup is good, it doesn’t inspire nearly as much confidence. Anthony Volpe’s flattened swing path has helped him cut down on his strikeout rate and spray more hits to the opposite field, but this month his strikeout rate is back up to 27% and he hasn’t walked since May 30. Alex Verdugo has been solidly above average and stabilized left field, which had a cavalcade of players come through last year, and Giancarlo Stanton’s streakiness has worked itself out to a 121 wRC+ and 17 homers, even though his on-base percentage is below .300. The catching duo of Jose Trevino and Austin Wells has come around too, though Trevino’s throwing issues were firmly on display on Sunday, when the Red Sox stole nine (!) bases against him.
And then there’s the triumvirate of underperforming infielders: Anthony Rizzo, Gleyber Torres, and DJ LeMahieu. I’d be shocked if Torres didn’t keep his job; after an anemic start, his bat has started to come around (112 wRC+ since May 12). But LeMahieu hasn’t hit much at all since signing his six-year deal before the 2021 season, and Rizzo has struggled for a full calendar year now, though at least some of his 2023 woes can be attributed to the post-concussion syndrome that caused him to miss the final two months of last season. Further complicating matters is Rizzo’s latest injury, a fractured right arm that won’t require surgery but will keep him out for an estimated four to six weeks, according to The Athletic. In the short-term, the Yankees are expected to play Oswaldo Cabrera at third and LeMahieu at first, with catcher/first baseman Ben Rice likely to replace Rizzo on the roster. A bat like Rockies third baseman Ryan McMahon would go a long way toward lengthening the lineup while also improving the defense.
The Orioles, on the other hand, have gotten strong production up and down the lineup, with the exception of Cedric Mullins, who has made up for his offensive struggles with excellent defense. But their pitching — widely viewed as a strength coming into the offseason — has been hammered by injuries.
The Yankees weathered the loss of Gerrit Cole with aplomb — so much so that I’m not sure they’ll need to be in the market for starting pitching, even as Clarke Schmidt is expected to be out for a while with a lat strain. Cole is slated to be activated and make his season debut tomorrow night. Meanwhile, the sheer quantity of Orioles starters on the IL all but necessitates making an acquisition on that front. Dean Kremer will be back soon from triceps tightness, but Tyler Wells and John Means are out for the year, and Kyle Bradish could be destined for the same fate. He recently landed on the IL for a second time this year with a sprained UCL in his elbow. That leaves AL Cy Young frontrunner Corbin Burnes, Grayson Rodriguez, and Kremer as the top three starters of a playoff rotation, with the revelatory Albert Suárez and Cole Irvin right behind and rookie Cade Povich potentially pushing for a spot as well.
There would certainly be worse playoff rotations around the league, but the O’s would be doing a disservice to their deep offense if they neglected to improve their starting pitching, especially after they failed to address last year’s rotation before the deadline and then were pounded by the Rangers and swept out of the ALDS. Their wealth of position player depth in the minor leagues should allow them to add at least one or two of the top available starters: Garrett Crochet, Erick Fedde, Tyler Anderson, Cal Quantrill, and Jesús Luzardo.
The one mutual need for the Yankees and Orioles is where all teams overlap at the deadline: the bullpen. Both teams have excellent back-end duos — Baltimore has Craig Kimbrel and Yennier Cano, while New York boasts Clay Holmes and Luke Weaver — but there’s a steep dropoff after that. The shallow seller’s market ought to create a lesser supply of available relief arms, which would likely inflate the cost that teams would ask for in return. This is where the strength of the New York and Baltimore farm systems (both of which are excellent) really come into play. These two organizations can afford to overpay for a third high-octane reliever — such as Carlos Estévez, Tanner Scott, Michael Kopech, and perhaps even Mason Miller — without sacrificing their long-term outlook.
The final distinction is the two teams’ disparate payroll situations. While it doesn’t appear as if the Yankees have any restrictions for this season — and the pursuit of keeping Soto surely will be unaffected — owner Hal Steinbrenner certainly sounds like a man who wants to decrease payroll from the $302 million it’s at this season. Next year’s payroll is already at $182 million, and that’s before factoring in arbitration raises to key players like Trevino, Schmidt, and Nestor Cortes — not to mention the exorbitant price that’ll be required to re-sign Soto. Torres and Verdugo are also set to hit free agency this offseason, and the current payroll figure for 2025 doesn’t include what it will cost either to bring them back or backfill their positions. That could make them less interested in trading for players on guaranteed contracts beyond this season, even those who would fit well, like McMahon.
On the flip side, the Orioles have an extraordinary amount of flexibility under new owner David Rubenstein, who hasn’t publicly commented on specific payroll plans but essentially can’t do anything but spend more than the Angelos family did in the last several years of its ownership. Huge raises are coming for Adley Rutschman, Gunnar Henderson, Ryan Mountcastle, Bradish, and others, but Baltimore has a paltry $2 million committed to next season. That should give GM Mike Elias carte blanche to acquire anyone he wants at the deadline no matter how many years of club control the player has remaining, provided he’s willing to give up the necessary prospects.
All of this will play out over the next six weeks before the deadline. In the meantime, the battle for the AL East begins in earnest tonight.
Welcome to another edition of Five Things I Liked (Or Didn’t Like) This Week. I was under the weather late last week, which was not fun at the time. On the bright side, it gave me plenty of time to sit on the couch and watch baseball. To be fair, that’s what I do even when I’m not sick, but this time I had a good excuse. Baseball cooperated, too: There were some elite series and fun matchups over the past week. Stars facing off? We’ve got that. Baserunning hijinks and defensive lapses? You bet. Beleaguered backups bashing baseballs belligerently? Absolutely, alliteration and all. Shout out to Zach Lowe – now let’s get down to business.
NEW YORK — For a matchup with so much history — the most common World Series pairing, and the most storied as well — meetings between the Dodgers and Yankees have been curiously rare since the introduction of interleague play in 1997. It took until 2013 for Major League Baseball to bring the Dodgers back to Yankee Stadium for the first time since the 1981 World Series clincher, and until this past weekend they had made just one other visit (2016). The more balanced schedule adopted last year has made meetings between the two teams an annual occurrence, but even so, this still feels like the best kind of novelty that interleague play can muster.
Particularly so to this scribe, for whom the 1978 and ’81 World Series were foundational experiences as a young third-generation Dodgers fan who never dreamed that he would one day cover baseball, let alone in the Bronx. This was the first of the Dodgers’ three visits where I was able to enjoy games as both a fan (Friday night, from my ticket group’s regular seats in section 422) and a member of the media. Getting paid to have this much fun? I recommend it.
With both teams leading their respective divisions, with national television on hand for all three games, and with Yankee Stadium filled with sellout crowds of 48,000-plus — including a substantial, colorful contingent of Dodgers fans, many of them decked out in Shohei Ohtani jerseys — this past weekend brought an electrified, playoff-like atmosphere to the Bronx. Not that the Yankees, who entered the series having won eight straight and who still own the AL’s best record (46-21), weren’t already doing their best to create one. Offsetting their sluggish play over the past few weeks, the Dodgers (41-26) rose to the occasion by taking two out of three tension-filled games, winning 2-1 in 11 innings on Friday and turning a tight game on Saturday into an 11-3 laugher. The Yankees avoided a sweep and rewarded their frenzied fans by winning a seesaw battle on Sunday night, 6-4, thanks to a well-timed three-run homer by Trent Grisham, who was only playing because Juan Soto spent the series on the bench due to inflammation in his left elbow; the go-ahead blast came off Tyler Glasnow as Yankees fans chanted “We want Soto! We want Soto!”
Trent Grisham was up and heard some LOUD "we want Soto chants"…
“This whole series has been fun,” slugger Aaron Judge told ESPN’s Buster Olney afterward. “I know they took the series, but these are the games you want to play in, back and forth like that and it comes down to an MVP with two guys on — those are the moments you live for right there.” Judge was referring to the game’s final out, where Clay Holmes struck out Mookie Betts chasing a low-and-away slider with runners on first and second.
Unofficially, it may as well have been Teoscar Hernández Weekend. While the Yankees held the Dodgers’ 1-2-3 of Betts, Ohtani, and Freddie Freeman to a combined 7-for-35 performance with 11 total bases in the series, Hernández himself went 6-for-12 with two doubles and three homers while driving in nine of the Dodgers’ 17 runs. The 31-year-old left fielder snapped the seal on a scoreless game with a two-run double in the 11th inning on Friday night. His grand slam — his second home run of the night — broke open Saturday night’s game, and his double and solo shot on Sunday accounted for two of the three extra-base hits collected against Yankees starter Luis Gil, with the last of those hits temporarily giving the Dodgers the lead before Grisham’s home run.
Both teams played the series at less than full strength, with the Yankees not only missing ace Gerrit Cole — whose rehab from a bout of nerve inflammation in his elbow is progressing well — but also Soto. The superstar right fielder started each of the Yankees’ first 64 games, but he left Thursday’s contest against the Twins during a 56-minute rain delay due to lingering discomfort in his left forearm. Though it had bothered him for the past couple weeks, it apparently hadn’t prevented him from destroying opposing pitching; prior to his absence, his .603 slugging percentage, 190 wRC+, and 4.1 WAR ranked second in AL only to Judge, with the two outfielders ranking first and second in the majors in the latter two categories to that point. An MRI taken Friday revealed only inflammation in Soto’s forearm, much to the Yankees’ relief. In addition to fetching Cole Gatorade during an in-game interview with the Fox Sports booth on Saturday, Soto served as a decoy off the bench all weekend, though Dodgers manager Dave Roberts saw through the ruse.
“Where they’re at in the standings, with how well they’re playing and what’s at stake this year, I really wasn’t too concerned about him being played this weekend,” he told reporters after Sunday’s game. Yankees manager Aaron Boone, who had hinted before Sunday’s game he might use Soto, said he expects the right fielder back in the lineup for the series against the Royals, which begins on Monday night.
As for the Dodgers, in addition to being without Clayton Kershaw as he recovers from shoulder surgery, they’ve been without third baseman Max Muncy since May 15 due to an oblique strain. Though hardly as central to the Dodgers offense as Soto is to the Yankees, Muncy is hitting .223/.323/.475 for a 123 wRC+, his best mark since 2021. What’s more, his fill-ins — mainly Enrique Hernández, with Miguel Rojas and Chris Taylor also chipping in — have combined to hit just .171/.241/.276 (52 wRC+) with two doubles and two home runs in 83 plate appearances. Hernández, who’s hitting just .207/.273/.314 (72 wRC+) overall, hit one of those doubles on Friday, and one of those homers on Saturday.
Muncy is of particular importance to the Dodgers because his presence lengthens a top-heavy lineup that’s gotten just a 77 wRC+ (.210/.273/.334) showing from its 6-7-8-9 hitters this year (including seven games for which Muncy himself batted sixth). Without him, the Dodgers had gone 10-9 — all against sub-.500 teams (the Reds, Diamondbacks, Mets, Rockies, and Pirates) — from the time of his injury to the start of Friday’s series, scoring three or fewer runs in nine of those games, and averaging just 4.05 runs per game in that span, with two double-digit blowouts padding that average by three-quarters of a run.
On paper, Friday’s pairing of ace-in-the-making Yoshinobu Yamamoto and injury fill-in Cody Poteet (subbing for Clarke Schmidt, who’s out due to a lat strain) looked like a mismatch, but it turned into a pitchers’ duel. Each team collected just four hits through the first nine innings; five times, a half-inning ended with a runner stranded in scoring position. Yamamoto was phenomenal, holding the Yankees to two hits and two walks over seven innings while striking out seven, lowering his ERA to an even 3.00. He ended the first inning by striking out Giancarlo Stanton swinging on a slider in the dirt with a runner on second, escaped the second by whiffing Jose Trevino on a slider outside with runners on the corners, then retired the next 11 in a row before walking Judge with two outs in the sixth. Yamamoto followed by striking out Stanton again, this time by elevating a 97-mph heater.
The closest the Yankees came to scoring was in the eighth, when reliever Anthony Banda notched two strikeouts, yielded back-to-back singles to Anthony Volpe and Alex Verdugo, and gave way to Blake Treinen, who has been absolutely dominant since returning from a nearly two-year absence due to shoulder woes, throwing 11 scoreless innings with 16 strikeouts and two walks. One of those walks was wisely issued to the red-hot Judge. Stanton followed, just getting under a sinker that was hit into the left-center gap but didn’t quite reach the warning track before Teoscar Hernández hauled it in.
On the other side, Poteet, a 29-year-old righty whose previous major league experience was 58.2 innings with the 2021–22 Marlins, did an impressive job of working his way through the Dodgers’ lineup twice. Though he didn’t have a single clean inning, he held the Dodgers to just two hits, two walks and a hit batsman, using a double play and a pickoff — Enrique Hernández, who reached on an error by second baseman Gleyber Torres — to reduce traffic.
Poteet departed with two outs in the fifth following a walk of Enrique Hernández and single by Betts. Lefty reliever Victor Gonzalez — one of three ex-Dodgers who took the mound for the Yankees in the opener — induced Ohtani to line out to Anthony Rizzo to end the threat, but the early move to the bullpen created a ripple effect that carried through Saturday night, forcing Boone to turn to his less-trusted arms. He used six relievers after Poteet, calling upon both thrice-DFA’d Michael Tonkin and Ian Hamilton to get more than three outs. After working a scoreless 10th, Hamilton walked Freeman to start the 11th, then one out later gave up the big hit to Teoscar Hernández, a 109-mph two-run double into the gap. Dennis Santana (another ex-Dodger) relieved him and almost made matters worse by issuing a two-out walk to Andy Pages before retiring Gavin Lux. The Dodgers won, but only after Yohan Ramírez allowed an RBI single to Judge, then held on to notch his first save as a Dodger.
Saturday night’s game pitted a pair of pitchers who have successfully shaken off miserable 2023 campaigns, righty Gavin Stone and lefty Nestor Cortes. Stone, who was rocked for a 9.00 ERA and 6.64 FIP in 31 innings last year, moved to a bigger glove to help him combat a pitch-tipping issue; relying more on a sinker-slider combo than before, he’s turned in a 2.93 ERA and 3.46 FIP in 67.2 innings. Cortes, who made three trips to the injured list last year due to hamstring and rotator cuff strains, has been healthy this season, lowering his ERA from 4.97 to 3.68 and his FIP from 4.49 to 3.77.
The two teams traded runs in the second and third innings, with a Teoscar Hernández homer and an Ohtani RBI single (one of his two hits in a relatively quiet series) producing the runs for Los Angeles, and an Austin Wells groundout and a Judge home run driving in those for New York. The Dodgers pulled ahead 3-2 in the fifth on Enrique Hernández’s solo homer off Cortes, then padded that lead in the sixth when Teoscar Hernández followed a Freeman double and a Will Smith single with an RBI groundout.
The Yankees had a chance to claw back that lead when they loaded the bases with two outs in the sixth, chasing Stone — who scattered eight hits and two walks — in the process; lefty Alex Vesia retired Volpe on a fly ball, ending the threat. The Dodgers broke the game open in the eighth when Teoscar Hernández clubbed a grand slam off Tommy Kahnle. After Santana allowed two runs in the ninth in what turned out to be his final appearance before being designated for assignment, Boone called upon utilityman Oswaldo Cabrera to get the final out. He did, but not before walking both Teoscar Hernández and the nearly unwalkable Pages, bringing in the 11th and final Dodgers run. Judge homered for the second time in the game with two outs in the ninth.
Sunday offered the series’ most tantalizing pitching matchup, with Gil, the AL Pitcher of the Month for May, up against Glasnow. The Yankees claimed their first lead of the series in the third inning, when Cabrera pounced upon a 97-mph first-pitch fastball on the inside edge of the plate, homering off the foul pole in right field. The Yankees added another run when Verdugo doubled into the right field corner, then scored when Pages crashed into the wall trying unsuccessfully to hold onto a 104-mph, 390-foot drive to center field off the bat of Judge; that went for a double as well.
Through four innings, Gil allowed just two baserunners, walking Freeman with two outs in the first inning and surrendering a leadoff double to Teoscar Hernández in the second. The Dodgers, who have been one of the worst teams in the majors against four-seamers 97 mph and higher — their .220 wOBA is the majors’ fifth-lowest — couldn’t solve Gil’s fastball-changuep-slider combination until the fifth, when Pages ripped a 108-mph double into the left field corner off a hanging slider. Lux then laced a fastball to left; any thought Pages had of scoring was undone when he missed third base and doubled back. Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake checked on Gil, but Boone stuck with him. Lux stole second as Enrique Hernández struck out, then Betts fought off a high inside fastball for a two-run double into the left field corner. With two outs in the sixth, Teoscar Hernández finally ended Gil’s night with a solo homer off a changeup, giving the Dodgers a 3-2 lead.
The 26-year-old righty’s three runs allowed matched his total from his previous seven starts, across a combined 44.2 innings. He struck out five while giving up five hits and walking one as his ERA rose to 2.04, but he was hardly disappointed. “I really liked this outing, actually,” he said via an interpreter. “They have a really good lineup. To be able to go out there and battle these guys, it’s fun.”
The Yankees picked up their Gil, as Verdugo and Judge both collected infield singles on hard-hit balls that bounced off the gloves of corner infielders (Freeman for the former, Enrique Hernández for the latter). That brought up Grisham, who tormented the Dodgers with his defense and timely hitting during the 2022 Division Series as a Padre, but who has languished on the Yankees bench since arriving in the Soto blockbuster. Treated to a rare start on Thursday, he collected his first hit since April 29, ending an 0-for-20 slide by clubbing a three-run homer off the Twins’ Pablo López. Here he did the same. Glasnow left a 97-mph fastball in the middle of the zone, and Grisham launched a 108-mph missile into the right field stands to give New York a 5-3 lead as the Yankee Stadium crowd erupted. Though he’s now hitting just .100/.258/.280 in 63 plate appearances, three of his five hits have been three-run homers.
“Yes, I heard them,” said a good-natured Grisham of the Soto chants. “It wasn’t about [sending a message]. I was just happy that I was able to stay present in the moment, worry about myself, and put a good swing on one.”
“Grish can get to a heater, and he didn’t miss it,” said Boone.
“Grisham works his butt off every single day,” said Judge. “I wasn’t too happy with [the chant], but I think he made a good point.” To their credit, fans chanted “We want Grisham!” when he batted again in the eighth, drawing a walk.
Grisham’s big hit undid an otherwise strong effort from Glasnow, who reached double digits in strikeouts for the fifth time this season, striking out 12 in six innings to lift his NL-leading total to 116 over 86 innings. “Bad counts, bad pitches right over the zone,” he lamented. “I wish I could have located them a little differently.”
The Dodgers continued to apply pressure, putting runners in scoring position in each of the final three innings. Lefty reliever Caleb Ferguson, yet another former Dodger, walked Pages (his fourth straight game of drawing a base on balls, accounting for five of his 10 walks) to lead off the seventh, then took second on a Lux single. Boone went to Luke Weaver, his most heavily used reliever this year. Enrique Hernández tried to bunt, first popping one foul that Trevino dropped; both he and Boone lobbied for interference, but Hernández hadn’t left the batters’ box as the catcher made his way around. With the infield drawn in, Hernández got his second attempt down, but Trevino quickly fired to Cabrera, and Pages, who had gotten a good secondary lead, nonetheless missed the bag with his front leg as he slid; by the time his back foot touched, Cabrera had gotten the forceout. Betts followed by grounding into an inning-ending double play.
In the eighth, Ohtani doubled off Weaver and eventually scored on Smith’s sacrifice fly, but the Yankees answered when Judge won a six-pitch battle against Ramírez with a thunderous, towering 434-foot solo shot to left field. It was his major league-leading 23rd home run and his third hit of the night. He went 7-for-11 with three walks, two doubles, and three homers in the series, raising his seasonal line to .305/.436/.703 (214 wRC) with 4.9 WAR; all of those figures save for the batting average lead the majors.
In the ninth, Holmes got two outs before allowing back-to-back singles to Lux (his third hit of the night) and Enrique Hernández. That gave Betts one more chance to play the hero, but the closer whiffed him for his 19th save of the season.
Remarkably, it’s been 43 years since the Yankees and Dodgers met in a World Series. That was after the two teams squared off 11 times in the Fall Classic over the 41-season span from 1941 to ’81. Both managers acknowledged the possibility of meeting again down the road but downplayed it, though Roberts saw it as a good test for his team. “I think that playing with this media attention, sold out [crowds], the energy – you feel it — a team that you potentially could meet in the World Series, is sort of a barometer,” he said before Sunday’s game.
“Both teams brought our best and fortunately for us, we won the series,” he said afterward, hardly disappointed by taking two of three on the road against top competition. “It was just a good environment all weekend. Good to show well against those guys. They’re a heck of a ballclub.”
When we last checked in on Aaron Judge on April 24, the big slugger was scuffling, hitting just .180/.315/.348 through the Yankees’ first 24 games. He had homered just three times, and was approximating league-average production thanks mainly to his 15.7% walk rate. A smattering of fans had booed him on his own bobblehead day at Yankee Stadium, when he struck out in all four plate appearances, and the haters on social media were sure that he was washed. Since then, he’s turned his season around in emphatic fashion, destroying opponents’ pitching, taking his place atop a few key leaderboards, and helping New York assemble the AL’s best record at 42-19.
Judge homered three times in a three-game series against the Giants at Oracle Park this past weekend while helping the Yankees to a sweep. It was the Linden, California native’s first time playing at the park of his favorite childhood team, and the ballpark he would have called home had Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner’s last-ditch effort to re-sign him in December 2022 not succeeded. He went yard twice off Jordan Hicks in Friday night’s 6-2 win, first with a three-run shot and later a solo one, then connected off Logan Webb for a two-run blast in a 7-3 win on Saturday; the 464-foot projected distance on that one made it his third-longest of the season. He merely went 2-for-3 with two singles, two walks, and two steals in Sunday’s 7-5 win, with Juan Soto filling the power vacuum by homering twice.
Welcome back to Top of the Order, where every Tuesday and Friday I’ll be starting your baseball day with some news, notes, and thoughts about the game we love.
The emotional toll of losing Ronald Acuña Jr. to another ACL tear is obvious. The entirety of the baseball world came together to express shock and disappointment at Sunday evening’s news that Acuña would need season-ending surgery for the second time in four years. At his best, Acuña is arguably the most electric player in the game, as we saw last year during his otherworldly MVP-winning campaign, when he became the first player ever to hit 40 home runs and steal 70 bases in the same season. Baseball is simply not as exciting without him on the field.
Beyond that, though, the injury is a devastating loss for the Braves, whose probability to win the NL East — which was already diminished, as Dan Szymborski noted in his column on Friday — sunk by 10 percentage points within a day after Acuña went down. Sure, he was struggling over the first third of the season — he hit just four home runs in 49 games, and his OPS was nearly 300 points lower than last year’s mark — but his importance to the Atlanta lineup is undeniable.
Monday’s game, an 8-4 loss to the Nationals, provided a look at what the Braves’ offense will look like without the reigning MVP. The good news was that third baseman Austin Riley returned after missing 13 games with an intercostal strain, but it was clear that this was not the same unit that last year drew comparisons to the 1927 Yankees. Second baseman Ozzie Albies replaced Acuña in the leadoff spot, with Riley sliding to the two-hole and DH Marcell Ozuna, who’s been the team’s most productive hitter this year, moving from fifth to third in the order, ahead of slugging first baseman Matt Olson. After that, things drop off considerably, though it helps that catcher Sean Murphy is back from the oblique strain that kept him out since Opening Day. Read the rest of this entry »
Welcome back to Top of the Order, where every Tuesday and Friday I’ll be starting your baseball day with some news, notes, and thoughts about the game we love.
The Blue Jays haven’t yet crashed into a windowpane, never to recover, but 23-26 certainly isn’t what was expected of them entering the season. Before the season, our playoff odds gave them 49% chance to make the postseason. Toronto’s odds peaked at 57.9% on April 22, but since then, the team has fallen off. As of this morning, the Blue Jays have a 24.0% probability to make the playoffs. That leaves them with some serious decisions to make over the next two or so months before the July 30 deadline. Considering their current situation, let’s take a look at their options if they choose not to bolster their big league roster by the end of July.
Stand Pat
This is the most straightforward option: Don’t do anything and hope for some improvements. Every hitter other than Daulton Varsho, Davis Schneider, and Danny Jansen has underperformed this year, and maybe the Blue Jays can stay in the hunt long enough for their bats to catch fire. The organization may determine this is its best option simply because their players probably would have less trade value while they are playing below expectations. If the return package isn’t what the Blue Jays want, why not stay they course?
Only Sell The Rentals
The Blue Jays have a whole bunch of free agents after the 2025 season. And while they could decide to trade those guys (more on this later), Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins may find it best to hold on to them and go for one last run next season. But that doesn’t take the Blue Jays out of the action at the deadline; they have several enticing players on expiring contracts to dangle to contenders.
Justin Turner has slumped horribly recently — entering last night’s game, his wRC+ in May was -21, after 152 in March/April, bringing his seasonal wRC+ down to 96 — but if he can rebound to being solidly above average, contenders would be happy to acquire his righty bat and postseason experience. The Twins, Rangers, and Rays all have gotten wRC+ values below 80 from their designated hitters, and Turner can also fill in at third base, second base, and first.
Yimi García has been one of baseball’s best relievers this season, allowing just one run in 19 innings. He’s also struck out 35% of opponents, and his xERA (1.44) and FIP (2.24) both back up his solid performance. He would make any contender’s bullpen better, and he’s always bounced around between roles, so he doesn’t have to be pigeonholed into a particular inning or situation. It is worth noting that García has never been this good before, and as Ben Clemens wrote in his column yesterday, “you can’t trade your newfound reliever for a shiny prospect,” so it’s unlikely that García alone would net the Blue Jays a strong return package. That said, if Toronto is out of the race, it might as well get something for a 33-year-old reliever who might not be with the team next year anyway.
Lefty Yusei Kikuchi is rather quietly pitching the best he ever has in the majors, with a 2.64 ERA across 10 starts and a career-low walk rate of 5.5%. Teams always need starting pitching, and his above-average rate of inducing grounders and popups will play anywhere.
Rounding out this group is Jansen, who on a rate basis has hit better than any other catcher in baseball, with a 191 wRC+ in 82 trips to the plate entering last night’s game. His injury history should scare teams a little bit; he’s never had more than 384 plate appearances in a season, and that was back in 2019. It’s also worth noting, as our associate editor Matt Martell wrote last year for the New York Times, that teams rarely trade for a catcher during the season because of the particular challenges that come with the position. Even so, I think Jansen is well-suited for the role Mitch Garver held last year with the Rangers: catching sometimes but also getting plenty of plate appearances at DH to make sure his bat stays in the lineup.
Defensive whiz Kevin Kiermaier, righty changeup specialist Trevor Richards, and lefty power bat Daniel Vogelbach round out the group of seven Blue Jays who get to fly freely at the end of the season.
Blow It Up
OK, but what if the Jays do decide to more or less tear it down? After all, it is the struggling big three hitters — Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, and George Springer — who deserve at least a decent chunk of the blame for Toronto’s underperformance. The team didn’t even get a homer from a cleanup hitter until Bichette hit one on Wednesday — 48 games into the season!
I don’t think the Blue Jays would go so far as to trade Kevin Gausman, Chris Bassitt, or José Berríos, since Berríos is the only one pitching particularly well this year and his opt out after 2026 may complicate things too much to work out a trade, but the rest of that group of players with club control beyond this season could be on the block, headlined by Guerrero Jr. and Bichette.
Vladdy continues to tantalize with his bullet home runs (though he has only five this year) and massive exit velocity, but as we move further and further away from it, his MVP-caliber 2021 campaign looks more like an outlier than a sign of things to come, as it surely appeared to be in its immediate aftermath. Still, he’s in just his age-25 season, and it’s absolutely plausible that another team could bring out the best in him. I’m puzzled trying to figure out what he’d bring back in a trade, since he’s making $19.9 million this year and will probably be up around $25 million next year, but let’s not overthink things. He’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and if his suitors aren’t going to give up at least one top 100 prospect for him, the Blue Jays should tell them to get lost.
Bichette is more or less the same guy at the end of every season, with a wRC+ between 120 and 130 in each of the last four years; over the last three, he’s hit 29, 24, and 20 home runs, respectively. His fielding is always below average (but not terrible), and the only skill that’s on the decline is his base-stealing, with 25 stolen bases in 2021 followed by 13 in ’22 and just five last season, though he already has four this year. On the surface, the man is a metronome, but things get … weird … under the hood. Last year, his first-half wRC+ was 132, followed by 109 in the second half. The year prior, it was just 106 in the first half before he surged to 164 after the All-Star break. That streakiness is why I’m really not concerned about his performance thus far this year; the dude is bound to get hot at some point! It would be foolish of teams to just assume things will even out, but they shouldn’t read too much into his slow start, either. A contending team in need of a shortstop this year, such as the Giants or Guardians, would certainly be interested.
The Blue Jays would get far more modest returns for right-handed closer Jordan Romano, righty relievers Chad Green and Erik Swanson, lefty relievers Tim Mayza and Génesis Cabrera, and utilitymen Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Cavan Biggio, but they could be used as an add-on piece to sweeten the return in a trade for one of Toronto’s top players or to acquire prospect depth in a separate deal. After all, the Blue Jays’ farm system has just two Top 100 Prospects: lefty pitcher Ricky Tiedemann and infielder Orelvis Martinez.
I’m not here to advocate for Toronto to take any particular path; I’m just laying out the options. The worst plan for the Blue Jays would be not having one.
Weekend Windup
Here are some things to keep an eye on as we head into the long Memorial Day weekend:
• Ketel Marte looks to extend his 21-game hitting streak — the longest in the majors this season — when the Diamondbacks begin a three-game set at home tonight against the Marlins. Lefty Braxton Garrett gets the start for Miami, which bodes well for Marte, who is hitting .347 against lefties this year.
• The Cubs and Cardinals will finally meet for the first time this year, opening a three-game set tonight at Busch Stadium. The Cardinals have looked cooked for most of the first quarter of the season, but they enter the weekend just five games out of first place in the NL Central after winning eight of their last 10 games — including being the first team to sweep the Orioles in the regular season since Adley Rutschman came up two years ago.
• Juan Soto returns to San Diego for the first time since the Padres traded him to the Yankees last December, and comes back to town on fire. Over his last six games, Soto is 9-for-23 (.391) with four home runs and seven RBIs. After a mini-slump dropped his average to .301 and his OPS to .917, those numbers are back to .312 and .972, respectively. He’ll be flanked in the lineup as usual by Anthony Volpe, who’s got a 16-game hitting streak, and Aaron Judge, who homered yet again on Thursday for his 15th of the season.
• Once his 10-game suspension for pitching with “sticky stuff” is over, Ronel Blanco is set to return on Sunday against the A’s. While he asserted the substance he got caught using was just rosin mixed with sweat, he’ll surely be under increased scrutiny. Blanco, who has a 2.09 ERA in eight starts so far in 2024, was the first pitcher to be suspended for foreign substances this season after four were suspended last year.
• Nick Lodolo is aiming to return to the Reds rotation on Monday, and boy could they use him. The Reds have floundered to a 4-16 record in their last 20 games, and Lodolo had a 3.34 ERA and 2.90 FIP in six starts before hitting the IL with a groin injury. That was his second IL stint this year, after he missed the season’s first couple weeks while recovering from the leg fracture that cost him most of 2023.
