Benches Clear In Baltimore, The New York Mets Are Melting & Triston Casas Has Arrived (MLB Round Up Blog)
Just a wild slate of MLB last night to really kick off the home stretch of the season. We got playoff races all over the board. Prospects finally getting called up. Late inning underdogs and filthy pitching performances. And of course it wouldn't be good baseball drama without somebody's bench clearing. Let's get into the action.
---
Braves Catch The Mets In A Ridiculous 10-9 Game vs Oakland
Today is September 7th and the Braves are tied for first place in the NL East. Incredible run no doubt. But how good?
Meanwhile the Mets...
Anyways last night's game in Oakland was just old fashioned silly. From 3-0 in the 1st inning all the way back to… 9-9 in the 5th? What the fuck?
It's a weird time of the year. Also the same time underdogs cash the most often. More importantly, I don't think anybody saw the A's and the Pirates playing a pivotal role in September NL East drama but here we are. The next 4 weeks should be outstanding.
Padres Walk Off The Diamondbacks
Padres at home against the red hot Baby Backs and Merrill Kelly. He competed his balls off through 7 hard innings that you don't see a lot these days. Musgrove gave up a couple early and then the Padres bullpen went to work. Just a classic full 9-inning affair that ends with fireworks in San Diego. That's sneaky huge for them while the Brewers are nipping at their heels as -190 favorites on the other side of the division in Colorado. So much shit has been talked about the Padres recently and after last year you're just hanging on for dear life as a Padres fan. This was a very, very loseable game and they come back and find a way.
Quick Wild Card Update:
With that let's go to Colorado:
Like I said the Brewers were significant favorites. We talked about it on Hot Ice. I blogged about it last night. There's big value on Rockies at home as dogs if they're juicing up an 11+ total against a notable starting pitcher. That's a lot but just remember it and thank Rico and Ev for packaging the insight. For now, let's get to the bottom of the 8th inning. 2 outs. Nobody on with the Rockies trailing 6-5
Weird spot for the Brewers when the last few years have been dominated in these spots by Hader but I digress. It's late inning baseball and the Brewers need a win. Let's go to the new guy Taylor Rogers
By the way - shoutout Randall Grichuk for having to constantly answer for being drafted one spot ahead of Mike Trout. Being a living trivia question is no way to go through life.
Randall Grichuk will be just fine.
Will The White Sox Be Okay?
They drop 3-0 to the Mariners while the Guardians win and the Twins get rained out. Just a tough blow to trade such close games, but the get a chance today to win a series. I have anxiety for my White Sox buddies just typing this knowing that it's very much a Must Win Game today at 3:10 central. Kopech vs. Castillo. Absolutely need this one going into a 4 game stretch at Oakland.
Meanwhile the Mariners are probably cumming themselves watching Logan Gilbert last night. Maybe not the biggest playoff experience with only 18,000 paid attendance (makes me sick) but the stakes are high and he delivers with 6 shutout innings and 9 strikeouts, the last one being absolute CHEDDAR
Anyways huge win for Mariners as they stay atop the Wild Card
Meanwhile the 3-4 seeds are legitimately FIGHTING to get into the playoffs
The Orioles come back down 3-0 to hang a 5 spot in the 3rd off Mitch White. He deserves his own deep blog but for now I would just say the Orioles continue to shock me. Even though they've been doing it all year and even though I've been wrong so many times about them. I'm still waiting for the wheels to fall off. At some point it has to, right?
Wrong. Brandon Hyde won't let the boys slow down, and this little pow wow is only going to add fuel to the Baltimore clubhouse. They benefit from conflict a lot more than the Blue Jays in my shallow, narrow opinion. Just seems like the group that wants all the smoke.
And as I said before, Yankees get rained out so let's just make a note that the Rays on and are now 4.5 games back of 1st in the AL East with 28 games left in the year.
Another year. Another Rays team littered with Oh That Guy Is Still Playing? One of those things where we won't full appreciate the organization's success until Michael Lewis or Malcolm Gladwell get their hands on the story. Oh well. We're watching it now in real time and it's magnificent.
So Is Triston Casas
Time to call out a couple things from last night we really like. Triston Casas is this legend-in-the-making first baseman for the Red Sox. He just got called up to the Big Leagues and was raising eyebrows with his pregame routine of laying shirtless in the outfield and feeling the ground on his body. I guess it's called grounding. Turns out Jake is a huge proponent of the holistic properties of centering yourself in this manner. Or something like that. I'm working on it guys.
So is Christian Yelich.
His power is down significantly from just a few years ago when he led the NL in slugging back-to-back seasons. His combined slug for 2018-19 was a preposterous .631 over 1231 plate appearances. Since then t's dropped to .392 in 1278 plate appearances. So nearly equal sample size, yet two different sluggers. Obviously the power lurks in there somewhere or else this wouldn't be possible…
Speaking of homeruns, I'm going to call this out every time it's relevant so get comfortable.
Oneil Cruz Will Hit 1,000 Homers
1,000.
Speaking of which.
Craig Kimbrel notched his 1,000 career strikeout around this time last year. Unarguably one of the best closers in MLB history. A true shutdown filthy badass disgusting closer.
And last night he came out to Let It Go
It's a good song if we're being honest. I have no problem singing that shit and feeling passionate and connected to Elsa's journey. You can call me a pussy all you want just leave Disney out of it.
Hayden Wesnewski Debut For Cubs
I'd be remiss not to end with the new Cubs guy. He came over from the Yankees for Scott Effross because the Yankees… didn't… need… starting… pitching? Bizarre turn of events and now that I've seen Hayden pitch, I wouldn't trade it for anything. Not even Scott Effross. The man has insanely filthy stuff
Naturally I can't help myself. I'm already picturing this guy clean sweeping awards because that's what this game does to you. I'm a glutton for punishment.
Anyways that's the blog for what's going on in MLB. Lots of races and interesting shit down the stretch. We're all over it on Starting so maybe checkout the show if you want more baseball and sweet dudes in your life.