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These four Cubs prospects are SURGING in April. Jonathon Long's power is yet again on display, Grant Kipp looks like the steady starting option he gained a reputation as in 2025, Pedro Ramirez could break into the majors any month with his hit ability, and Riley Martin has already made an impact with the big league club, suffering some injuries. View the full article

Currently playing for the Double-A Portland Sea Dogs, Franklin Arias has out-performed his expectations in the early going of 2026. With huge questions surrounding the future of Trevor Story and his declining production should Arias take the leap into the majors? Franklin Arias could be an asset for the Red Sox with his new power surge and elite contact in the lineup. View the full article

Twins System Recap: Riley Quick made his first start since being promoted to Cedar Rapids and was every bit as dominant as he was in Fort Myers. After delivering four innings of one-hit, shutout ball while striking out five for the Kernels, Quick has a 0.00 ERA, 0.42 WHIP, and 18 strikeouts in 12 total innings with three walks. View the full article

Coming into this season, the weakness of the Cubs' bench was a glaring problem. Little was expected of Michael Conforto or Dylan Carlson, but with Seiya Suzuki starting the year on the injured list, the team was compelled to hope for at least some amount of help from each. Because Craig Counsell didn't trust Carlson, he instead moved Matt Shaw into an outfield role, which forced the team to carry Scott Kingery for the first few weeks of the campaign. Of Shaw himself, no one knew quite what to expect. His rookie season was so uneven and so pockmarked by big changes in mechanics and approach that projecting his offense was difficult, and he had lost his regular defensive home when the team signed Alex Bregman. Kingery and Carlson are gone, now, but the former has been replaced with Nicky Lopez, who's just Scott Kingery in a mirror. He, too, is a glove-over-bat utility infielder whose glove is merely good, not great. He, too, is a quasi-local product. He just happens to bat left-handed. Suzuki is back and has taken nicely to a restored home in right field, while rookie Moisés Ballesteros has been terrific as the DH. That's slightly reduced the role of Shaw and significantly reduced what the team is asking of Conforto, which is for the best. However, Counsell has tried hard to keep finding regular playing time for Shaw, and the sophomore is rewarding his manager's proactive show of faith. He's ironed out some of his early wrinkles in the outfield, still taking shaky routes but making most of the plays asked of him thanks to good jumps and his above-average speed. Lately, he's also been called upon more often on the dirt. Nagging injuries for Alex Bregman and Dansby Swanson have prompted Counsell to slot Shaw in at third and second base, where he's much more comfortable. In Wednesday's final game of a road trip to face the Dodgers and Padres, Shaw started at second, with Nico Hoerner moving to shortstop to fill in for Swanson. He and Conforto were the catalysts of a key victory, as they continue to play better than was expected. Shaw collected three hits against the Padres; Conforto had a double and scored twice, including the go-ahead run in the top of the sixth. Shaw is the big story, though. He, too, had a double, his sixth of the year. Then, in the top of the eighth, he got just enough of a Jason Adam fastball that caught just too much of the upper third of the zone. Often, when a player hits a high heater a long way, we say they got on top of the ball. That couldn't have been less true in Shaw's case: he clipped the ball with a 41° launch angle, arcing high down the left-field line. Because he caught it flush enough to hit it 101.2 miles per hour, though, it carried just beyond the reach of Padres left fielder Nick Castellanos and into the stands for a homer. View the full article

Fish On First staffers react to the latest Miami Marlins series and prepare you for what lies ahead. Wednesday's show was hosted by Alex Carver and featured panelists Kevin Barral, Jeremiah Geiger and Isaac Azout. The following topics were covered: Sandy Alcantara's impressive outing against the Los Angeles Dodgers Liam Hicks' spectacular season The chaotic ending to Wednesday's game What to do with slumping Owen Caissie Who can be trusted in Miami's bullpen during Pete Fairbanks' IL stint Previewing and predicting the next series against the Philadelphia Phillies You can find Fish Unfiltered and Fish On First LIVE on the Fish On First YouTube channel, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever else you get your pods. Our next FOF LIVE episode will be Saturday at approximately 10:00 p.m. ET midway through the Marlins-Phillies series. View the full article

If you put the phrase "side of the rubber" in the Brewer Fanatic search tool, you'll be inundated with a plethora of Matthew Trueblood articles. The Brewers have used this with aplomb in the past to change how pitches tunnel as they approach home plate, and to change the angles they arrive at to either keep them over home plate for longer or shorter periods of time, and Matt loves to write about it. In Kyle Harrison's case, what they've managed to do is create an angle for him to pitch from that really emphasises his breaking ball, while creating an even more unique fastball for the hitter to deal with. It's a familiar formula; I just beat Matt to writing about it this time. Fastballs aren't straight. The majority of true four-seam fastballs have an element of tailing action, moving toward the pitcher's arm side. Harrison was already an outlier in this respect because of his low arm slot, which traditionally makes getting a fastball to "rise" more difficult and emphasises that tailing action. Where some pitchers try to cut their fastballs and emphasize the vertical movement, Harrison has an outlier combination of both vertical and horizontal movement. The only starter in baseball with a comparable fastball from the left side is Cole Ragans, with 17" of induced vertical break and 13.6" of horizontal break. That's quite the comparison, with Ragans's four-seamer performing to an expected batting average of just .188 in 2025. It feels important to preface this article by also admiring how the Brewers have put in a lot of work to clean up Harrison's delivery, and have managed to access more induced vertical break than ever. He averaged 13" with the Red Sox in 2025 and is now up to 15" on average. That makes a heck of a difference in the batted-ball quality for opposing batters. Now, on to the juicy stuff. If we compare the pitch chart above for 2026 with his chart from 2025, there are some notable changes. The breaking pitches are breaking slightly less; the fastball is rising more; there's been a small change in arm angle; and, of course, the changeup profile was altered when he moved to a "kick-change". What I'd like to focus on, however, is the HAA, or the horizontal approach angle. There's been a lot of talk about vertical approach angles on fastballs, making them appear as though they're still rising by the time the pitch reaches the plate. Vertical approach angle is affected by spin rates, arm angles and location (i.e., there will be a lower vertical approach angle on pitches at the top of the zone than at the bottom). Horizontal approach angles, accordingly, are affected by arm angles, release points and horizontal break. When talking about the usefulness of this approach angle, if we consider yourself in a batters box with a coach lobbing balls towards you. The first coach lobs from right in front of you, and your brain finds it easy to pick up the point at which you'll make contact. Now imagine the coach changes position, and throws from a 45° angle. That ball is now coming in towards you at a different trajectory and your brain is forced to decipher movement on two planes. We have to remember as well that, although the ABS system uses a two-dimensional "pane" to assess if a pitch is a ball or strike, hitters have different positions within the batter's box that can change the point at which they impact the ball. Most make contact significantly in front of the ABS zone (which measures at the midpoint of home plate) which can neutralise some of the angular momentum of a pitch, but there is an interesting trade off. Waiting further back in the box to make contact will reduce the vertical approach angle of a pitch, as gravity has more time to straighten the approach angle, while it exacerbates the sweeping horizontal angle of an incoming pitch. It's this secondary movement that Harrison's move across the rubber is emphasizing across his two main offerings. On the fastball, where previously it actually entered the zone quite straight, it's now boring in on the hitter allowing Harrison to really excel coming inside to right handers, especially with his changeup as a real threat to drift off that. As for the slurve, this is perhaps the most meaningful change. The graph below highlights the relationship between Harrison's horizontal approach angle and his hard hit rate: We can see a clear correlation across Kyle Harrison's slurve performance in each of his seasons in the big leagues, tying in well with the line of best fit. While the regression line expects some, well, regression, this season, it still predicts that the slurve will be measurably more successful with an increased horizontal approach angle (HAA). In short, the more the slurve is sweeping across the front of the strike zone, the more Harrison can avoid barrels and reduce the quantity of hard hit balls. While there are some changes in locations with the slurve, the quality of contact is noticeable from last season to this. In 2025, the pitch had an expected Weighted On-Base Average (an overall expected metric covering strikeouts, quality of contact, walks, etc) of .356. That figure was .347 across a larger sample in 2024, and .402 in 2023. In 2026, his xWOBA is just .197 to begin the season. It's a small-ish sample, but the trend lines would suggest a direct correlation between his HAA and the quality of contact given up, such that we should expect this to continue during the year. One final point based on his last start. Looking at the 2026 pitch map, his slurve has been anything but a consistent, downward breaking shape throughout the season. He's seen it back up quite regularly and failed to get that downward movement. In his last start however you can see how much tighter and more consistent the slurve shape was with how clustered together the blue dots are: As a result, the whiff rate skyrocketed. He could command it better as a result, finding locations in the shadow areas that encouraged chase and some really uncomfortable swings. He showed that, even with the early success of his slurve, that there's more in the tank. The Brewers have made some simple adjustments and tweaks that have allowed yet another pitcher to take a leap forward. It's almost comical at this point. And Kyle Harrison is taking full advantage of the H&H car wash. Have you enjoyed Kyle Harrison's start to the season? And perhaps for my self, do you enjoy these kinds of analytical pieces? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below! Pitch Graphs _ PitchProfiler.html View the full article

On Tuesday night against the Mariners, Joe Ryan threw six innings of one-run ball before surrendering a leadoff double in the top of the seventh. He exited in a very winnable 1-1 tie game. Before long, the score was 7-1 and the Twins were lopsided losers. Kody Funderburk quickly allowed the inherited runner to score. In the eighth, Cole Sands gave up a three-run homer to Josh Naylor. (Who pimped the living hell out of it.) In the ninth, newly acquired veteran Luis García — recently waived by the Mets after posting a 7.11 ERA through six appearances — allowed two more runs to cap off a bullpen meltdown that torpedoed Minnesota's chances of locking up a series win. On Wednesday, Eric Orze entered in the ninth to protect a one-run lead and gave up three earned runs while recording one out, sealing another series loss. These were the the 10th and 11th losses in 13 games for the Twins, dropping them five games below .500. For the season, their relievers rank 25th in baseball with a 5.31 ERA and 27th in Win Probability Added at -1.58. It hasn't quite been the worst relief corps in the league, but it's been close, and costly. As expected. Making matters worse: Louis Varland is reaching new levels of dominance in Toronto. After setting a record for reliever usage in the playoffs last year, and prompting Blue Jays starter Kevin Gausman to call his deadline acquisition "one of the greatest trades we've ever made," Varland is further elevating his game here in 2026. Through 16 innings, he has a 0.56 ERA and 26-to-4 K/BB ratio with zero home runs allowed. His fastball is averaging 98 MPH. His strikeout rate (43%), FIP (0.63) and fWAR (1.0) all lead the American League. In fact, Varland's WAR is more than double that of the entire Twins bullpen (0.4). It's hard to overstate what a difference he could be making as leader of this reconfigured unit. Alas, Varland is now a Blue Jay, due to the controversial decision to ship out the breakout reliever and his five remaining years of control as part of last year's deadline teardown. Whereas the Griffin Jax and Jhoan Duran trades were fairly conventional rebuild moves, the Varland trade was much more of a head-scratcher. Up until he was dealt just minutes before the deadline, he seemed likely to stick around as the long-term leader of a rebuilding relief corps. We're seeing now why that may have been a good idea. Instead, we're seeing the downside of an audacious, risk-laden decision. Varland is starring in the Blue Jays bullpen while the Twins flounder in part because of their complete lack of late-inning weapons. Alan Roden seemed like an odd fit when Minnesota's front office targeted him and only looks more so now — he was buried in the minors on the LH-hitting OF depth chart before suffering another significant injury last week. Roden is out for the next month at least and possibly much longer. Ouch. Which brings us to Kendry Rojas, the other half of the Varland return. He was always the centerpiece of the deal from the Twins' view, and we're seeing why this year. Rojas looked great in camp and has been stellar in his handful of appearances for the Saints. He's already debuted for the Twins, tossing two scoreless innings of relief while filling in for Funderburk last week, and as long he stays healthy it won't be long before he's back. With his upper-90s heat and whiff-centric stuff from the left side, Rojas is a high-caliber arm with the realistic potential to flip the narrative (at least somewhat) on the Varland trade. Fair or not, there's going to be a lot of pressure on him to do so. Right now, the contrast is impossible to ignore. Varland is becoming exactly the kind of late-inning force the Twins desperately lack — dominant, reliable, game-altering — just in someone else’s bullpen. Minnesota is left searching for answers in the innings that matter most, hoping Rojas can eventually help bridge that gap. View the full article

My Saturday morning started great. I woke up early, biked to the gym, and bought a new grill at my local hardware store. It felt like a productive start to the day, yet something felt off. My intuition proved right. After the Boston Red Sox pounded the Orioles in a 17-1 win, Craig Breslow abruptly fired manager Alex Cora and five members of their coaching staff. Look, it was obvious the Red Sox needed a semblance of change. They’ve gotten off to one of the worst starts in franchise history. The offense is tepid and can’t hit fastballs if their lives depended on it. But it’s atypical to see almost the entire team’s coaching staff let go early in the season. At the very least, my money was on just hitting coach Pete Fatse getting sacked. Baseball is full of bizarre storylines. (In recent years, the recurring theme for the Red Sox is petty drama.) Alas, some teams have parted ways with their managers and still reached the playoffs. Let’s take a look at them. In-Season Manager Changes Followed by a Playoff Run Year Team Manager Date Fired Replacement Record Rest of the Season Postseason Result 2022 TOR Charlie Montoyo 7/13/22 John Schneider 46-42 45-29 Lost in WC (SEA) 2022 PHL Joe Girardi 6/3/22 Rob Thomson 22-29 65-46 Lost in the WS (HOU) 2009 COL Clint Hurdle 5/29/09 Jim Tracy 18-28 74-42 Lost in NLDS (PHI) 2008 MIL Ned Yost 9/15/08 Dale Sveum 83-67 7-5 Lost in NLDS (PHI) 2022 Toronto Blue Jays On July 13, 2022, the Blue Jays let go of Charlie Montoyo and handed the keys to bench coach John Schneider for the interim. Overall, the team held a 46-42 record and the third wild-card berth, but they started July with a lackluster 3-9 record. Toronto finished the season with a 45-29 record (ranked third in the American League) and held onto its wild-card berth, snapping a six-year postseason drought. Schneider was promoted to full-time manager in October 2022. 2022 Philadelphia Phillies On June 3, 2022, the Phillies fired Joe Girardi. At the time, things looked dire for the Phillies. They were third in the National League East with a 22-29 record and 5.5 games behind a wild-card berth. Led by former bench coach Rob Thomson, the team finished the season with an 87-75 record (third in their division). They clinched the final NL wild-card spot and danced to their first World Series appearance since 2009. Like Schneider, Thomson took over as full-time manager in October. 2009 Colorado Rockies On May 29, 2009, the Rockies parted ways with Clint Hurdle. Colorado was 14.5 games behind the Dodgers with an 18-28 record (fifth in the National League West). Hurdle’s replacement was bench coach Jim Tracy, the father of the Red Sox’s new skipper, Chad Tracy. The senior Tracy pulled the Rockies out of the basement. They ended the season with a 92-70 record, ranked second in their division. To this day, the Rockies’ 2009 record stands as the best in the franchise’s 33-year history. The team reached the National League Division Series. Come November, Tracy was named full-time manager. 2008 Brewers On September 15, 2008, the Brewers fired Ned Yost. The team held an 83-67 record and were tied with the Phillies for the wild-card, which sounds fine, except they entered September with a 5.5-game lead over the Phillies and were 3-11 in the first two weeks. Third base coach Dale Sveum managed the team for the remaining 12 games and the postseason. They lost to the Phillies (who went on to win the World Series) in the National League Division Series. Sveum’s managerial stint with the Brewers was short, but he’d later manage the Cubs. Could the Red Sox sneak into the postseason this year? History says so, but there’s a fundamental difference in the aforementioned teams and the 2026 Red Sox. Managers do their best with the rosters that the front office hands them. The 2022 Blue Jays had four All-Stars. The 2022 Phillies had Bryce Harper, fresh off his 2021 MVP season. J.T. Realmuto and Aaron Nola were still in their prime. The 2009 Rockies had Troy Tulowitzki just reaching his peak and a future Hall of Famer in Todd Helton. The 2008 Brewers had two All-Stars and a core of burgeoning young talent. The 2026 Red Sox will be lucky to have more than one player represent the team at the All-Star Game in Philadelphia. Cora wasn’t given the optimal roster to manage. President of Baseball Operations Craig Breslow repeatedly echoed that the team needed a power bat, but neglected to sign any marquee free agents, instead trading for 33-year-old veteran Willson Contreras. To Contreras’ credit, he’s done well in Boston, but more often than not, there’s nobody on base when he goes deep. Despite the team’s surplus of outfielders, none of them were traded in the offseason, leaving Cora to juggle all five. The bullpen was the red-headed stepchild of the offseason. Breslow traded workhorse reliever Brennan Bernardino for Braiden Ward, a speedy outfielder, who profiled as redundant given that the team already had utility player Nate Eaton stashed away in Worcester. Cora himself wasn’t perfect. Like most people, he falls into the ambiguous grey area. At his worst, he played favorites, his bullpen usage was questionable, he was a slave to the platoon, players seemed to lack fundamentals, the defense committed egregious errors, and runners looked lost on the basepaths. I’m saying this as a huge Cora fan. Astute leaders don’t surround themselves with yes-men. They recognize the importance of healthy tension and constructive criticism. They understand there isn’t one way to solve a problem. They learn from their mistakes. Breslow hasn’t demonstrated any of these qualities. In the wake of the Rafael Devers trade last June, Breslow acknowledged, “We want people to feel valued. We want people to feel like the work that they’re doing matters, that their voices are heard. And I think there’s an opportunity for me to do a better job making sure that everybody in this organization knows that.” Sunday morning, after Cora was fired, Breslow addressed the clubhouse in a brief “five or six” minute meeting. Players didn’t have the chance to, in Breslow’s words, “have their voices heard.” Reliever Garrett Whitlock told reporters, “They made it very clear that we get paid to play baseball, and we need to just focus on playing baseball.” That same morning, Breslow and President Sam Kennedy held a press conference where Breslow emphasized the human element of the game: “On a human level, on a personal level, it's incredibly difficult. These are people that you build close relationships over multiple years. They are really, really good people, good fathers, good husbands. You know, I think we tend to think about only the professional aspect of this, but you know, the human side makes it just unbelievably difficult. You know, you wrestle with these things. But when you get to the point where you feel like this is the best decision for the organization and the best decision for the players, no matter how difficult you have to do it.” For someone with a Mensa-level EQ, Breslow has a strange way of showing that he’s attuned to the human side of baseball operations. The Red Sox reportedly didn’t offer Alex Bregman a full no-trade clause – which was a reasonable ask – considering the organization’s history. Since 2018, the Red Sox front office has been a revolving door, but I took comfort in knowing that the team had one of the best managers. Cora had a feel for the game, something Breslow seems to lack despite spending 12 years in the majors. Breslow seemingly cares more about his computer models being correct than what’s actually unfolding on the field. He doesn’t recognize what leadership looks like. Why? Because it can’t be quantified. George Washington took the green French officer, Marquis de Lafayette, under his wing during the Revolutionary War. Plato tutored Aristotle. Gandalf guided Bilbo and Frodo through Middle Earth. David Ortiz mentored Xander Bogaerts and Mookie Betts. The Red Sox could’ve had their leader in Bregman, Kyle Schwarber, or Pete Alonso. Maybe Breslow’s model advised him not to overpay them. Roman Anthony is only 22 years old, and he’s expected to carry the weight of the team on his back and address the media when veteran players refuse to. I know it’s early, and there’s a lot of baseball to be played, but the odds aren’t in the Red Sox’s favor. PECOTA projects that the team has a 15.1% chance of making the playoffs and a 1.0% chance of winning the division. Teams that pulled off an in-season managerial change had front offices that constructed rosters that were worth saving. Right now, the Red Sox are a sinking ship. body { font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin: 20px; } table { border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; } th, td { border: 1px solid #000; padding: 8px 12px; white-space: nowrap; vertical-align: middle; } thead th { background-color: #001f3f; color: #ffffff; font-weight: bold; } .title { text-align: center; } /* Centered columns: Year, Team */ .center { text-align: center; } /* Left-aligned columns: Manager, Date Fired, Replacement, Record, Rest of the Season, Postseason Result */ .left { text-align: left; } /* Widths */ .w-narrow { width: 60px; } .w-rest { width: 70px; white-space: normal; } .w-wide { width: 140px; } View the full article

In all of his years in baseball, Sam Suplizio couldn’t remember anyone being as big of a jerk as Toronto Blue Jays manager Jim Fregosi had just been. In western Colorado, Suplizio was simply ‘Mr. Baseball.’ Suplizio had been on the path to the majors before a wrist injury in 1956 prevented that from happening. With the dream over, he headed west and began a successful career in the banking industry. His love for the game would be backed by his growing wealth, and in the Rocky Mountains, his moniker was earned. Mr. Baseball brought the Junior College World Series to a permanent home in Grand Junction, and he was a formidable voice for the Colorado Baseball Commission, a group that helped bring Coors Field and the Colorado Rockies into existence. As successful as he was in a suit and tie, a pair of stirrups and cleats were always preferable to Suplizio. He managed Grand Junction’s summer collegiate team for nearly two decades and served as a coach and scout for a few major league organizations. In 1981, Brewers general manager Harry Dalton brought his friend in for his greatest assignment: teaching Paul Molitor to play center field. Suplizio packed his how-to manuals and spent three weeks with Molitor, who lasted roughly a month in center. Nonetheless, Suplizio had a great reputation around baseball for his work with outfielders, and by 1999, he was employed by the Angels as a volunteer coach. Suplizio had the cash to get any seat in the house, but it was his credentials that got him his preferred seat, one that money couldn’t buy. Now retired from his day job, he spent a chunk of his summers following around the Angels. He worked out with the outfielders before games, and once play commenced, Suplizio would stick around and watch from the dugout. He wasn’t supposed to. In a rule that would surely trouble the Shapiro-era Blue Jays, teams were limited to a handful of coaches on the bench for games. Yet, the rule was consistently broken, and coaches such as Suplizio watched on from the dugout while opposing teams looked away. On June 15, 1999, Suplizio planned to do what he had done dozens of times that season. He had flown to Toronto to meet the Angels before the start of a two-game series, did some pre-game work on the turf and then he intended, as always, to watch from the bench. He was also there being Mr. Baseball. Before the game, Suplizio sought out Fregosi to say hi to Toronto’s first-year manager. He had well wishes to pass along from former Expos manager Buck Rodgers, and Fregosi’s son had played college ball at New Mexico, like Suplizio had. This was not their first interaction. As Suplizio approached Fregosi, he surely noticed the shiner Toronto’s manager had received just a few days earlier. His attention would quickly be diverted to the words coming from Fregosi’s mouth. The Angels were at their limit for coaches in uniform, and the Blue Jays were enforcing the rule. Suplizio wouldn’t be sitting in the first base dugout tonight. Nor would he ever again. Perhaps Fregosi was crusty from the day-old newspaper report that Skinny Joe had tattooed his left eye; perhaps the Blue Jays were just done looking the other way on this, as teams weren’t doing it for them. In ‘98, former 100-base stealer Maury Wills served in a Suplizio-type capacity for new Blue Jays manager Tim Johnson. No one in the American League scored fewer runs than the Blue Jays had in ‘97, and Johnson arrived to change that and talk about ‘Nam (accomplishing both). Wills was with Toronto for the entire spring and was a hit in camp. “I wish we could keep him all year,” said Ed Sprague. When the Blue Jays returned from a 3-6 road trip in early April, Wills greeted them back in Toronto. In the dugout for the first time all season, Wills proved to be a good luck charm, as the Jays swept the White Sox, and the Yankees were headed north next. After losing the series opener to New York in 11 innings, the Blue Jays found themselves in another tight one the following evening. Yankees manager Joe Torre knew of Wills’ presence in the other dugout, and with the game tied in the ninth, Torre didn’t feel the need to tolerate the rule-breaking any longer. Prompted by what he thought was Wills shouting from the dugout, Torre said he went to home plate umpire Rocky Roe and had Wills removed from the game. The Blue Jays were incensed. Sprague called Torre’s move “weak.” Johnson wouldn’t speak to Torre. For his part, Wills said it wasn’t him shouting, but he did admit to being involved in the giving of signals. He joked he must’ve not done a good enough job on the weekend if the White Sox hadn’t noticed him, but either way, he was hurt. “It felt like I was thrown out of my own home, my own life,” he said. “But, hey, they’re trying to win a ballgame. I might have done the same thing.” Toronto correctly assumed that George Steinbrenner noticed Wills on television and asked to have him removed. For his part, Torre was unapologetic and took the heat for The Boss. “[Wills] is a competitive guy who competed when he played, and he’s good at what he does. If they wanted him to be that active, they should have made him one of their six coaches.” Can’t fight that logic. (photo credit: Cooperstowners in Canada) Wills spent the rest of the series in the tunnel between the clubhouse and the dugout, with the team officially put on notice by the American League about his presence on the bench. Johnson asked for an exception, but none would be made. On May 6, Toronto was told that Wills would not be permitted on the bench during games again. The Suplizios of the baseball world could slyly watch on from the dugout without a care, but Wills was a bona fide legend of the game, and as Johnson’s successor was about to find out, even franchise legends didn’t go unnoticed. Having been named manager of the Canadian national team, Blue Jays catching coach Ernie Whitt thought he would get some preparation in. The Pan American Games were around the corner, and Whitt would join Fregosi on the bench for a game early in the ‘99 season. Toronto would be called out on coach quantity again, forcing Whitt to leave the contest. The team would ensure it wouldn’t happen a third time. As an organization, the Blue Jays enacted a policy that it would no longer allow any excess coaches on the bench, and Fregosi was about to impose that limit on the Anaheim Angels. Fregosi had little time for Suplizio’s pleading. “[Suplizio] was on the bench when we were in California, and I didn’t say one word. I went to him before the game as a common courtesy, so I wouldn’t have to do it during the game. If he wants to make a big deal about it, I will.” Suplizio slinked off and sat behind the dugout for the second game of the series, saying he didn’t want to make a fuss over things other than wishing to call Fregosi “small.” An AL official called the Angels a few days later and officially put an end to Suplizio’s days on the bench. Each team got a similar phone call. Toronto’s team policy and subsequent callout of Suplizio would push the American League into enforcing its own rule for limiting coaches on the bench. Somewhere along the line, that rule changed, noticeable in Toronto’s dugout with Edwin Encarnacion cameos and unheard-of titles being bestowed on DeMarlo Hale and Don Mattingly. Why did Fregosi choose to make an example of Suplizio, who considered the Blue Jays manager a friend? Maybe Fregosi thought the familiarity would smooth his action over as Toronto made a point following the incidents with Wills and Whitt. It certainly did not. As Wills did, Suplizio felt humiliated, and the incident sparked, for the time, the American League having to enforce a rule it previously hadn’t. View the full article

Back on April 15, we took a look at the Mets’ catching tandem and praised Francisco Alvarez for his offensive prowess. Back then, his 179 wRC+ ranked eighth in baseball among players with a minimum of 50 plate appearances. He was on top of the world, leading his team in home runs and showing why he is one of the best up-and-coming talents in the National League. He is, after all, just 24. Since then, however, Alvarez’s offensive numbers have crashed, and his wRC+ is now barely above the league average, at 107. From April 14 until April 29, he hit a rough .139/.238/.167 with no home runs, only one run scored, and a 24 wRC+. Yes, you read that right. It’s not that he has been unlucky during that time, as his .201 wOBA is very close to his .219 xwOBA. What's going on? Francisco Alvarez Has Stopped Hitting the Ball Hard What has happened to Alvarez since the middle of the month? Well, his 21.4 percent strikeout rate over that stretch isn’t alarmingly high, but his 28.6 percent hard-hit rate is alarmingly low, much worse than his 39.1 percent mark for the season and the 54.3 percent he had last season. He hasn’t been squaring up the ball for a couple of weeks now and his numbers have suffered as a result. Alvarez is also expanding the zone a bit more this year. Last season, he had a 27.7 O-Swing%, or percentage of swings on pitches out of the zone. It’s up to 31.3 percent this year, and 32.7 percent since April 14. There are other issues, too. This year, Alvarez has feasted on off-speed pitches (.569 wOBA, .482 xwOBA), much like last season. However, his .183 wOBA vs. breaking pitches has been a problem, and even if his .247 xwOBA against that specific pitch type suggests some positive regression is on the horizon, it’s still bad. He is also slugging just .333 vs. fastballs, down from .488 in 2025. A Stunning Reverse Split Threatens To Sink Alvarez's Season One curious development while looking over Alvarez’s stats and splits is his stunning ineffectiveness against left-handers. He is showing a reverse split, which is incredibly rare: against lefties, he is sporting a horrible 60 wRC+, while he is at 123 against righties. Over the course of his career, he does have a higher wRC+ vs. righties, at 107, than he does while facing southpaws (102). However, this year’s gap is astonishing, and, frankly, puzzling. Perhaps Alvarez has had problems picking up the ball against certain lefties at specific angles this year, or perhaps his approach against such pitchers has gone haywire. However, this smells like small-sample noise, which means his fortunes should change for the better, at least against southpaws. There’s no reason for his performance while facing lefties to fall so calamitously during his prime. All things considered, Alvarez does need to change some recent habits, such as chasing breaking pitches out of the zone. He should be fine over the long haul, though: let’s not forget he is a 24-year-old catcher coming off a highly productive season last year. View the full article

The Fish On First LIVE panel debates what to do about Owen Caissie's ongoing struggles at the plate. The rookie outfielder is homerless over his last 22 games with a .156/.200/.219 slash line.View the full article

Samad Taylor's two homers and Alek Jacob's three-strikeout save delivered a 7-6 win by the Triple-A El Paso Chihuahuas over Albuquerque. Jake Cunningham's five RBIs, including a two-run homer, pushed the High-A Fort Wayne TinCaps past South Bend 7-4. Victor Duarte's two-run shot and Rordy Mejia's 2⅔ scoreless innings carried the Low-A Lake Elsinore Storm to a 4-3 win in Ontario. The Double-A San Antonio Missions fell 4-3 in Tulsa despite back-to-back homers from Leandro Cedeño and Tirso Ornelas. Padres Minor-League Transactions No roster moves Samad Taylor Goes Deep Twice, Triples In Chihuahuas' Victory The El Paso Chihuahuas built a five-run lead and then survived a late Albuquerque Isotopes rally to win 7-6. Samad Taylor powered the offense with a 3-for-5 night, with two home runs, a triple, four RBIs, and two runs scored. Jose Miranda finished 3-for-3 with a walk and an RBI. Sung-Mun Song added two hits, two runs, and a double. The Chihuahuas pounced in the first. Sung-Mun Song singled with one out, Taylor crushed a two-run homer to right-center, and Jose Miranda capped the inning with an RBI single that brought home Nick Schnell. El Paso added a Song RBI double in the second, a Jase Bowen sacrifice fly in the fourth following a Jase Bowen triple, and another two-run Taylor blast in the sixth that pushed the lead to 7-3. The Isotopes finally broke through against starter JP Sears in the fifth. After a strikeout, five consecutive singles produced three runs and chased Sears from the game, still with the Chihuahuas leading 5-3. Yuki Matsui, nearing the end of his rehab assignment, surrendered two more in the sixth on two hits, a walk and a strikeout. Albuquerque trimmed it to one in the eighth on another sacrifice fly off Eli Villalobos. Sears, working 4⅓ innings, gave up seven hits and three earned runs while walking one and striking out five. Alek Jacob took over in the ninth, struck out three of the four hitters he faced, walked one, and locked down his second save. EP_0429.mp4 Player AB R H RBI BB K Jase Bowen, CF 4 1 2 1 0 1 Sung-Mun Song, 3B 5 2 2 1 0 1 Samad Taylor, LF 5 2 3 4 0 1 Nick Schnell, RF 4 1 1 0 1 3 Mason McCoy, SS 5 0 1 0 0 2 Nate Mondou, 1B 5 0 1 0 0 1 Jose Miranda, DH 3 0 3 1 1 0 Clay Dungan, 2B 4 0 0 0 0 2 Rodolfo Durán, C 4 1 1 0 0 2 Player IP H R ER BB K HR JP Sears 4 1/3 7 3 3 1 5 0 Miguel Cienfuegos (W, 1-0) 2/3 0 0 0 1 1 0 Yuki Matsui 1 2 2 2 1 1 0 Eli Villalobos (H, 2) 2 1 1 1 0 1 0 Alek Jacob (S, 2) 1 0 0 0 1 3 0 Missions Drop Tight One In Tulsa As Drillers Rally The San Antonio Missions saw a 3-0 lead slip away in Tulsa, falling 4-3 to the Drillers after a tying solo home run in the fifth and a go-ahead RBI double in the seventh. Carson Tucker had a productive night with two doubles in four at-bats. Kai Murphy added two hits and a run scored. Romeo Sanabria reached three times with a hit, an RBI, and a walk. San Antonio struck first in the top of the first. Murphy had a leadoff double and scored on a Sanabria single. The Missions stayed quiet until the fourth, when Leandro Cedeño and Tirso Ornelas hit back-to-back solo home runs, Cedeño to center and Ornelas to right, opening a 3-0 cushion. It was the first of the season for Cedeño and the third for Ornelas. The Drillers answered in the bottom of the inning. Starter Victor Lizarraga gave up a two-run home run to cut the lead to one, then surrendered a tying solo blast in the fifth. Lizarraga went five innings, allowing two hits, three runs, all earned, on two walks and three strikeouts. San Antonio could not crack the Tulsa bullpen the rest of the way. In the bottom of the seventh, Sadrac Franco gave up an RBI double that put the Drillers ahead for good. The Missions had a chance to tie in the ninth as Albert Fabian was hit by a pitch with one out and went to third on Tucker's second double of the game. Ethan Salas, who had homered in three straight games, came off the bench to pinch-hit, but popped out to third. Braedon Karpathios also pinch-hit, flying out to center to end the game. SA_0429.mp4 Player AB R H RBI BB K Kai Murphy, CF 4 1 2 0 0 0 Romeo Sanabria, DH 3 0 1 1 1 1 Leandro Cedeño, 1B 4 1 1 1 0 1 Tirso Ornelas, RF 4 1 1 1 0 1 Ryan Jackson, 2B 4 0 1 0 0 0 Albert Fabian, LF 3 0 1 0 0 1 Kai Roberts, PR 0 0 0 0 0 0 Carson Tucker, 3B 4 0 2 0 0 0 Francisco Acuna, SS 3 0 0 0 0 1 Ethan Salas, PH 1 0 0 0 0 0 Chris Sargent, C 3 0 0 0 0 2 Braedon Karpathios, PH 1 0 0 0 0 0 Player IP H R ER BB K HR Victor Lizarraga 5 2 3 3 2 3 2 Sadrac Franco (L, 0-2) 1 1/3 2 1 1 1 2 0 Harry Gustin 1 2/3 0 0 0 1 1 0 Jake Cunningham Homers, Drives In 5 As TinCaps Outlast Cubs The Fort Wayne TinCaps weathered a four-run South Bend fourth inning and pulled away for a 7-4 win, behind a five-RBI performance from Jake Cunningham. Alex McCoy came around to score three times with two hits, including a double, and two stolen bases. Jack Costello reached three times and stole three bases. Rosman Verdugo went 2-for-3 with two walks and a stolen base. McCoy reached base in four of his five plate appearances and has an 18-game on-base streak and has a Midwest League-leading 10 doubles. Through three innings the contest was a stalemate. Then came the fourth. Verdugo, Lamar King Jr., and McCoy strung together three consecutive singles to load the bases, and Cunningham slashed a two-run single to right. Two batters later, Costello laced a two-RBI single to left to make it 4-0 Fort Wayne. The TinCaps' lead lasted barely a half-inning. Starter Isaiah Lowe gave up a single, a double, and a three-run homer to open the bottom of the fourth, then walked a batter and yielded another single before being lifted with runners at first and second. Braian Salazar entered and surrendered a sacrifice fly that tied the game on an inherited runner. Lowe was charged with all four runs over 3⅓ innings, allowing four hits and walking four with two strikeouts. Fort Wayne reclaimed the lead in the fifth on a Cunningham two-run homer to center, his fifth of the season, that scored McCoy. Cunningham added an RBI in the ninth on a sacrifice fly that brought home McCoy. The bullpen kept South Bend off the board the rest of the way. Salazar tossed 1⅔ scoreless innings to pick up the win, his second of the year. Kleiber Olmedo worked two perfect innings and Tucker Musgrove punched out one in a eighth. Clay Edmondson allowed one hit and struck out one to seal his third save. FW_0429.mp4 Player AB R H RBI BB K Kasen Wells, CF 4 0 1 0 1 2 Rosman Verdugo, 2B 3 1 2 0 2 0 Lamar King Jr., C 5 1 2 0 0 1 Alex McCoy, LF 4 3 2 0 0 1 Jake Cunningham, RF 4 2 2 5 0 2 Carlos Rodriguez, DH 5 0 1 0 0 2 Zach Evans, 3B 4 0 0 0 1 0 Jack Costello, 1B 2 0 1 2 1 0 Dylan Grego, SS 4 0 0 0 0 3 Player IP H R ER BB K HR Isaiah Lowe 3 1/3 4 4 4 4 2 1 Braian Salazar (W, 2-2) 1 2/3 1 0 0 1 0 0 Kleiber Olmedo (H, 3) 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 Tucker Musgrove (H, 1) 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 Clay Edmondson (S, 3) 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 Victor Duarte's Homer Sends Storm Past Tower Buzzers The Lake Elsinore Storm rallied from an early two-run hole to beat the host Ontario Tower Buzzers 4-3. Victor Duarte's two-run home run in the fifth put the Storm ahead, and the bullpen made the lead stand up. Justin DeCriscio finished 2-for-4 with two doubles and a run. Ryan Wideman went 2-for-5. Luke Cantwell added two hits, scored a run, and stole a base. George Bilecki, Qrey Lott, and Bradley Frye each added a stolen base. Ontario opened the scoring in the bottom of the third. Starter Jesus A. Castro walked three batters in the inning, including a bases-loaded walk, before being lifted. Rordy Mejia inherited the bases loaded with one out and limited the damage to a sacrifice fly, leaving the Storm down 2-0. Lake Elsinore came right back in the fourth as George Bilecki lined an RBI single to right and Lott followed with a sacrifice fly, knotting the score at two. The Storm took the lead an inning later. With two outs, DeCriscio doubled and Duarte hammered a two-run homer to center for a 4-2 advantage. Ontario answered with a solo home run in the sixth, but Lake Elsinore's bullpen kept the Tower Buzzers off the board the rest of the way. Vicarte Domingo pitched the final two innings, allowing one hit and a walk with a strikeout, for his second save. LE_0429.mp4 Player AB R H RBI BB K Ryan Wideman, CF 5 0 2 0 0 2 Bradley Frye, 3B 4 0 1 0 0 2 Justin DeCriscio, 2B 4 1 2 0 0 0 Victor Duarte, C 4 2 2 2 0 2 Luke Cantwell, 1B 3 1 2 0 0 0 Truitt Madonna, 1B 1 0 0 0 0 0 Jorge Quintana, SS 3 0 0 0 0 2 George Bilecki, RF 3 0 1 1 1 2 Qrey Lott, DH 2 0 0 1 1 1 Conner Westenburg, LF 4 0 0 0 0 2 Player IP H R ER BB K HR Jesus A. Castro 2 1/3 3 2 2 4 2 0 Rordy Mejia (W, 1-1) 2 2/3 2 0 0 2 4 0 Carson Swilling (H, 3) 2 1 1 1 0 2 1 Vicarte Domingo (S, 2) 2 1 0 0 1 1 0 Top-20 Prospect Performance Kash Mayfield: DNP Ethan Salas: 0-for-1 Kruz Schoolcraft: DNP Bradgley Rodriguez: DNP Humberto Cruz: DNP Miguel Mendez: DNP Ty Harvey: DNP Jorge Quintana: 0-for-3, 2 K Kale Fountain: DNP Ryan Wideman: 2-for-5, 2 K Jagger Haynes: DNP Lamar King Jr.: 2-for-5, R, K Romeo Sanabria: 1-for-3, RBI, BB, K Truitt Madonna: 0-for-1 Michael Salina: DNP Garrett Hawkins: DNP Kavares Tears: DNP Deivid Coronil: DNP Francis Pena: DNP Bryan Balzer: DNP View the full article

Transactions: · Milwaukee Brewers selected the contract of LHP Brian Fitzpatrick from Nashville Sounds. · Milwaukee Brewers sent RF Luis Matos outright to Nashville Sounds. · SS Cristopher Acosta assigned to ACL Brewers. · RHP Luke Roupe assigned to ACL Brewers. · RHP Bryan Regalado assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · OF Alexander Frias assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · SS Tyler Rodriguez assigned to ACL Brewers from Wilson Warbirds. · RHP Dariel Jaquez assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · RHP Johandry Ramirez assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · SS Jonathan Rangel assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · SS Juan Martinez assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · OF Kenny Fenelon assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · LHP Joan Pena assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · RHP Johandry Ramirez assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · RHP Bryan Regalado assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · OF Brailyn Antunez assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · RHP Diustin Mayorquin assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Blue. · OF Alexander Frias assigned to ACL Brewers from DSL Brewers Gold. · SS Tyler Rodriguez assigned to ACL Brewers from Wilson Warbirds. Reminder: ACL play begins on Saturday. Game Action: Nashville pre-game media notes Nashville 7, Norfolk (Orioles) 4 Box Score As always, you are encouraged to read the official round-up from the team’s site: Williams Walks-Off Tides with Three-Run Homer in Thriller On a night where two big leaguers began their rehab assignments at Nashville, it was the future stars who shone the brightest. Jackson Chourio and Andrew Vaughn began their rehab assignments in Nashville and made an immediate impact. In the first, Chourio walked, then aggressively took third on Vaughn’s single. Unfortunately, Jeferson Quero could only produce a shallow pop fly that resulted in Chourio being thrown out at the plate for a double play and the Sounds failed to score. In the third, Chourio once again led off with a walk. After a deep fly out from Vaughn, Quero connected with an RBI double into the left field corner. Chourio was running with the pitch and scored easily on the play, courtesy of the Nashville X account: Chourio looked patient at the dish and fast on the base paths in his five innings of play. Over his last 11 games, including his two doubles on Wednesday, Quero is batting .349/.362/.628 (.990 OPS). The Sounds added solo runs in sixth and seventh to take a 3-1 lead. Cooper Pratt, Brock Wilken and Eddys Leonard all came up with big hits to set up or drive in runs: Pratt was 2-for-3, with a walk, and two steals on the night. Wilken's double was a laser: To that point, the Sounds had successfully deployed a bullpen game, with Craig Yoho, Carlos Rodriguez, and Reiss Knehr combining to shut down Norfolk through the middle innings. However, in the top of the 9th inning, Easton McGee surrendered the lead on a two-run home run. The Sounds would not be denied victory. In the 9th, Quero doubled in the tying run: Then after an intentional walk to Luis Lara, Jett Williams lined an opposite field homerun to give the Sounds their first walk-off victory of the season: Nice to see a total team victory with just about everyone chipping in at the plate, on the base paths, and in the field. On a night where former bullpen mate Brian Fitzpatrick made his MLB debut in Milwaukee, the pitchers honored him with a resounding Johnny Wholestaff victory. The Sounds are scheduled to play a doubleheader on Thursday, with more major league talent on display when Coleman Crow and Robert Gasser will take the mound. Biloxi pre-game media notes Pensacola (Marlins) 12, Biloxi 4 Box Score O'Rae, Burke Extend Streaks, Shuckers Drop Game Two of Series to Blue Wahoos It was a rough night at the park for the Biloxi, who fell 12-4 to Pensacola after a late-inning surge by the home team. Despite the lopsided final score, The Shuckers wasted no time getting on the board, plating two runs in the top of the 1st inning. The offense turned free passes and stolen bases from Dylan O’Rae and Jesus Made to put pressure on the Pensacola defense. Damon Keith then fired one back up the middle to give Biloxi a quick 2-0 cushion, courtesy of the Biloxi X account: However, starter Tyson Hardin (4.2IP 6H 7R 6ER 2BB 6K) struggled to contain the Blue Wahoo's offense all night. In the first, Pensacola rallied for two runs on two hits, and an error by Made. In the second Pensacola added a solo home run to take the lead. The Shuckers used some small ball to manufacture a run in the fifth with a single from O’Rae and then three walks to force in a run. Pensacola then put the game away with a three-run rally in the fifth, and a five-run rally in the seventh. Sam Garcia and Anthony Flores each worked scoreless outings in relief, despite working around some traffic on the bases. Biloxi managed to scratch across one final run in the 9th thanks to a double by Matthew Wood, and then sac fly from Made, but it was far too little, too late. RHP Jaron DeBerry (2-2, 3.86 ERA) leads the Shuckers on the mound on Thursday. Wisconsin pre-game media notes Wisconsin was once again rained out on Wednesday, their sixth rainout of the month. They will attempt to play two on Thursday, with Wande Torres (1-0, 5.14 ERA) and Bryce Meccage (1-0, 2.93 ERA) the probable starters. Wednesday’s game notes show JD Thompson to make his professional debut on Saturday. Wilson pre-game media notes Wilson 5, Salem (Red Sox) 1 Box Score Late Rally Propels Warbirds to Victory The Warbirds played one of their better games of the season on Wednesday morning. Not since the opening series of the season had Wilson won a game by more than three runs or held an opponent under two runs scored. The three extra base hits for the Warbirds were their most in a week and snapped a stretch of 17 consecutive singles by the team. Jarrette Bonet (6IP 2H 0R 0ER 1BB 2K) pitched well enough to earn the win, but the Wilson offense laid dormant until late in the game. The Warbirds snuck out to a 1-0 lead on a passed ball in the first. Bonet would make that run hold up until he exited after tossing 74 pitches. It was the second consecutive six-inning outing for the undrafted 20-year-old who now sports a 3.09 ERA in 23.1IP this season. Bonet gave way to Tanner Perry (2IP 1H 1R 1ER 2BB 2K) who escaped a threat in the top of the seventh when the leadoff man walked, stole second, and then advanced to third on a passed ball. Perry was able to wiggle off the hook by retiring the next three men in order to hold the one-run lead. However, the next inning Perry allowed the game-tying home run on the first pitch of the 8th. That’s when the Warbirds offense finally woke up. Frederi Montero responded instantly with a leadoff home run in the bottom of the 8th. Filippo Di Turi followed with a one out triple and scored on a sac fly. After three consecutive walks to load the bases, Jeremy Ebel would put the game out of reach with a two-run single to make it 5-1 Wilson. Ebel, who had a triple earlier in the game, is warming up with a .268/.444/.366 (.810 OPS) over his last 12 games. Handelfry Encarnacion was on base three times (a single and two walks). Jadyn Fielder drew three walks and added one of three Wilson steals. Jose Anderson struck out four times and now 47 strikeouts in 86 at-bats this season. Andrew Healy (0-0, 13.50 ERA), the 2025 9th round draft pick from Duke will take the mound for Wilson on Thursday. Looking ahead to the weekend, Jacob Morrison is listed as Saturday’s probable starting pitcher. That would mark the professional debut for the 3rd round pick out of Coastal Carolina from last year. Organizational Scoreboard including starting pitcher info, game times, MiLB TV links, and box scores Current Milwaukee Brewers Organization Batting Stats and Depth Current Milwaukee Brewers Organization Pitching Stats and Depth View the full article

TRANSACTIONS The Twins signed utility man Henry Kusiak away from Lew Ford and the Long Island Ducks of the independent Atlantic League. In a Ducks press release, Ford said, "Henry was outstanding both at the plate and in the field during the season's first week. He has earned this opportunity, and we wish him the best of luck int he Twins organization. In the first five games of his season, Kusiak hit .474 with a 1.395 OPS. He hit two home runs including one that traveled 419 feet. He has two doubles and two stolen bases. While he has played all around the diamond, the 25-year-old was playing right field in a game earlier this week and made a diving catch in Trevor Bauer's no-hitter. Kusiak played at Missouri Southern from 2020-2024. He played 77 more games in 2024 for Windy City of the Frontier League. In 2025, he was named the Rookie Hitter of the Year in the American Association and a league All Star when he hit .309/.377/.481 (.858) with 16 doubles and 12 home runs. Saints Sentinel St. Paul 4, Iowa 11 Box Score Sam Gallagher: 3 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 3 BB, 4 K HR: Kyler Fedko (7), Aaron Sabato (2) Multi-hit games: Ryan Kreidler (2-for-4, 2B, R) This author wrote “it was all bad” for last week’s Saints game. Well, this one was only slightly better. Ryan Armstrong found the AAA confines unfriendly and cold; he was roughed up for three runs across three frames as he battled his command. The struggles were passed to Marco Raya, who coughed up a trio of runs across two innings. Travis Adams, Dan Altavilla—both additions to the list of those victimized by Iowa hitters. Grant Hartwig was the only pitcher not to allow a run, and even he walked a pair. The Saints did lead at one point. Ryan Kreidler doubled to start the second, and Emmanuel Rodriguez singled him home. Then, Kyler Fedko stepped up to the plate and smoked his seventh home run of the season. Aaron Sabato connected on a long ball in the seventh, yet all he did was cut the deficit from eight to seven. The Cubs don’t boast an especially powerful farm system, but they did send one of their finer products to the field in Kevin Alcántara. The outfielder singled and walked in four plate appearances. Wind Surge Wisdom Wichita 5, Arkansas 1 Box Score Aaron Rozek: 4 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K HR: None Multi-hit games: Kyle DeBarge (2-for-4, R) An explosive sixth inning led the Wind Surge to victory on Wednesday. Ron Gardenhire would have been proud of the offensive showing. Three singles and a walk scored the first run. Two RBI groundouts brought the total to three—the latter of which existed only because of Kyle DeBarge’s madman dash home as seen below. One more walk then begat a two-run single by Jorel Ortega. That’s five runs scored with just singles, free passes, and grit. Alejandro Hidalgo might be up to something this season. In 11 ⅔ innings out of the bullpen, the righty has 23 strikeouts, an unbelievable rate even over a short sample. Four gopher balls have ballooned his ERA to 5.40, but the radical whiff increase is something to keep an eye on. The Travelers are a part of the juggernaut Mariners farm system. A constant stream of talent, Arkansas claims two Top 100 players in Lazaro Montes and Michael Arroyo. The former went 0-4 while the latter went 1-for-3 with a walk. Kernels Nuggets Cedar Rapids 4, West Michigan 3 Box Score Riley Quick: 4 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 5 K HR: Jay Thomason (2) Multi-hit games: Khadim Diaw (4-for-4, 2B, R, RBI) The Kernels won on a walk-off home run on Wednesday. Do you think Riley Quick is bored? What with the immediate, outright dominance and all that. “I thought pro-ball was supposed to be difficult,” he demurs while twisting a hitter into knots with a breaker. Perhaps even the lone allowed baserunner was a gift; he was erased with a double play one batter later, anyway. The righty out of Alabama has now tossed 12 innings in the Twins system. He has relinquished two hits, walked three, and has struck out 18. Cedar Rapids plated two in the fourth on a Rayne Doncon double before adding on with a Khadim Diaw RBI knock in the sixth. It was part of an incredible day for Diaw: the catcher went 4-for-4 at the plate with a double and three singles. He alone collected half of the Kernels’ hits in the game. One of those non-Diaw knocks was also the game’s biggest: pinch-hitter Jay Thomason stepped up to the plate in the ninth with the score tied. He fell down 0-2. A foul kept him alive, and two balls pushed the count even. One more foul begat the golden swing. Thomason smacked a hanging breaking ball deep to right field, hitting the pitch just hard enough to clear the wall for a walk-off homer. Bryce Rainer is ranked as the 30th-best prospect in baseball, according to MLB Pipeline. He reached base all four times, collecting two hits while walking twice. Mussel Matters Fort Myers 6, Daytona 12 Box Score Eric Hammond: 2 ⅓ IP, 3 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 3 K HR: None Multi-hit games: Yasser Mercedes (2-for-4, 2 RBI, BB) Fort Myers jumped out to an early lead, plating three in the second. Ian Daughtery provided the initial RBI knock, before he, too, touched home—along with Byron Chourio—after a Yasser Mercedes single. The Mighty Mussels’ Twitter account hints toward future endeavors. This was their last post until announcing the game’s end. Daytona bludgeoned Eric Hammond for four runs (three earned) in the second, then returned for another four-run frame, this time almost entirely credited to poor Adam Falinski. In fact, the first four Fort Myers hurlers of the night left the game with more earned runs than they started with. Runs in the fourth and sixth helped pretty the lipstick on this metaphorical pig, but the inevitable result remained unchanged. Byron Chourio and Bryan Acuña were on-base fiends at the end of the lineup, combining to reach base six times with five runs scored. Chourio also stole his seventh base of the season. Cincinnati’s second-round pick in 2024, infielder Tyson Lewis, is their third-ranked prospect, and he singled once in four at-bats. TWINS DAILY PLAYERS OF THE DAY Twins Daily Minor League Pitcher of the Day – Riley Quick Twins Daily Minor League Hitter of the Day – Khadim Diaw PROSPECT SUMMARY Here’s a look at how the Twins Daily Top 20 Twins Prospects performed: #1 – Walker Jenkins (St. Paul) - 1-4, K #2 – Kaelen Culpepper (St. Paul) - 0-5, 2 K #3 – Emmanuel Rodriguez (St. Paul) - 1-4, R, RBI, 3 K #4 – Eduardo Tait (Cedar Rapids) - 0-4, K #7 – Gabriel Gonzalez (St. Paul) - 0-3, BB, K #9 – Marek Houston (Cedar Rapids) - 0-4, 2 K #11 – Riley Quick (Cedar Rapids) - 4 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 5 K #13 – Brandon Winokur (Cedar Rapids) - 0-4, R, 3 K #14 – Quentin Young (Fort Myers) - 0-5, 3 K #15 – Marco Raya (St. Paul) - 2 IP, 3 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 2 K #16 – Hendry Mendez (Wichita) - 1-4, R, K #17 – Kyle DeBarge (Wichita) - 2-4, R #19 – Khadim Diaw (Cedar Rapids) - 4-4, 2B, R, RBI THURSDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS Iowa @ St. Paul (6:37 PM) - RHP Matt Bowman vs #OldFriend LHP Charlie Barnes Arkansas @ Wichita (6:35 PM) - RHP Sam Armstrong West Michigan @ Cedar Rapids (6:05 PM) - RHP Eli Jones Fort Myers @ Daytona (5:35 PM) - RHP Matthew Dalquist View the full article

There were zero homegrown hitters in Wednesday's Miami Marlins lineup. Seven of the nine starters were acquired by the organization via trade, including six in classic rebuilding transactions, with the Marlins sending away major league veterans in the process. The cheapest pick-ups of them all? Shortstop Otto Lopez, who's been rapidly accumulating value since coming aboard as a waiver claim, and catcher Liam Hicks, a former Rule 5 draft pick. A Rule 5 pick is a glorified waiver claim, deemed undeserving of occupying a 40-man roster spot by their previous team—much less an active roster spot—and galaxies away from contending for an everyday MLB role. The process is sexier just because we have not seen these youngsters fail in the majors yet, but statistically, the vast majority of them will. The Marlins took a flier on Hicks in December 2024. In the span of a year and a half, the former Detroit Tigers farmhand has come a long way. Hicks opened the scoring in the Marlins' series-clinching victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers and also helped manufacture the run that put his club ahead for good. As a rookie in 2025, the left-handed-hitting Canadian made himself rosterable on the strength of great bat control and swing decisions; as a sophomore, he has put on physical strength and it has only enhanced his offensive profile. Hicks boasts a superb .315/.365/.576 slash line this season while seeing action in 29 of Miami's first 31 games. His solo home run off Tyler Glasnow in the second inning was his farthest batted ball to date (398 feet). As a result of it, he has surpassed his home run total from last season, when he played in 119 contests. Before this uptick in power, Hicks had already established himself as a gifted contact hitter. That was on display again versus Dodgers right-hander Will Klein in the eighth inning. He caught up to an elevated 98 mph fastball and chopped it to the right side, advancing Xavier Edwards to second base. Hicks ranks in the 99th percentile among MLB hitters with a microscopic 7.7% strikeout rate. Edwards would later score on a two-out Javier Sanoja RBI single. Hicks is on pace to produce approximately five wins above replacement in 2026. For context, multi-time All-Star second baseman Dan Uggla, who is the best Rule 5 pick in Marlins history and among the best picks made anywhere in the league so far this millennium, peaked at 4.6 fWAR and 4.4 bWAR. Even anticipating some regression from Hicks as the season unfolds, he is a massive upgrade over every other Marlins catcher of the post-J.T. Realmuto era. From 2019-2025, the Marlins received a total of 4.2 fWAR from their backstops, ranking 29th in MLB, per FanGraphs. Marlins fans continue to clamor for prospect Joe Mack, and understandably so—he has brilliant defensive skills and ample power at the plate. Even a few months ago, it was not unreasonable to view Mack as Hicks' eventual replacement, but that notion is now outdated. The best version of this team must have them frequently in the lineup together. Additional notes - Prior to Wednesday, Sandy Alcantara's career numbers at Dodger Stadium had been hideous, with a 14.46 ERA and eight homers allowed in 18 ⅔ innings pitched. He chipped away at that by limiting LA to two runs in six innings, and that actually undersells his effectiveness because one of those runs scored on an Alex Call pop-up that Otto Lopez lost in the sun. - Sanoja relishes big moments. He entered this game with an elite .891 OPS in 98 career high-leverage plate appearances, as defined by Baseball-Reference. Consider that his overall OPS in the majors is just .680. - In the absence of Pete Fairbanks (nerve irritation), Calvin Faucher has the most ninth-inning experience among active Marlins pitchers. He converted his 23rd career save on Wednesday, but issued three walks in the process (one of those being intentional). He's now up to 12 walks on the season, already halfway toward matching his total from 2025. - The Marlins overcame Faucher's wildness thanks to Edwards' unassisted double play, which involving tagging out Shohei Ohtani, then stepping on first base to retire Freddie Freeman to preserve a 3-2 lead. - In the top of the fifth, Esteury Ruiz took Glasnow deep for what was his first hit as a Marlin. Quite unexpected coming from the wiry outfielder, who had previously homered only twice in his life against MLB right-handers. - Way back on March 28, Owen Caissie went 3-for-4 in a win over the Colorado Rockies, flying out to center field for his lone out of the game. Since then, however, Caissie has made 22 more starts and registered at least one strikeout in each of them. On Wednesday, Caissie broke a tie with Jeremy Hermida (2007) and Jorge Alfaro (2019) to establish a new franchise record: most consecutive starts with a strikeout by a Marlins position player. The Marlins get approximately 49 hours to recuperate between games in advance of Friday's series opener against the Philadelphia Phillies. Their opponent, on the other hand, had their scheduled game postponed due to inclement weather, necessitating a split doubleheader on Thursday, so that'll create a nice rest advantage for the Fish in their attempt to return to the .500 mark. Probable starters for the 7:10 pm game are right-handers Zack Wheeler and Eury Pérez. View the full article

On Wednesday evening, the Royals announced via social media that pitchers Ryan Bergert and Ben Kudrna underwent successful surgeries on their arms. Bergert and Kudrna are both on the 40-man roster, though neither made the Opening Day roster. The former Padre, acquired with Stephen Kolek for Freddy Fermin at last summer's Trade Deadline, is the more accomplished of the pair. Berger pitched 76.1 IP with the Padres and Royals a season ago. In that 19-appearance sample (15 starts), he posted 3.66 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, 22.6% K%, and 11.8% K-BB%. He walked fewer batters with the Royals (9.8% BB%) than the Padres (12.1% BB%), but his ERA with the Royals (4.43) was much higher than his one with the Padres (2.78). Still, Bergert showcased a solid profile and a strong ability to flood the strike zone, especially with the Royals, as illustrated in his TJ Stats summary from 2025. Bergert's chase%, whiff%, and xwOBACON left a bit to be desired, as they all rated slightly below average. However, he was showing some progress in Spring Training and Triple-A Omaha (23.8% K% and 2.79 ERA in 9.1 IP) before going down with an injury. As for Kudrna, the 2021 second-round pick was added to the 40-man roster this past offseason, and hopes were high that the local Kansas prep product would be a dark horse to make his MLB debut this season. Kudrna posted a 4.21 ERA and 1.29 WHIP in 94 IP with the Double-A Northwest Arkansas Naturals. However, he had a 24% K%, 15.7% K-BB%, and 3.17 FIP. Omaha was a much tougher challenge for Kudrna. In four outings, three starts, and 11.1 IP, he posted a 14.29 ERA, 2.74 WHIP, 9.54 FIP, and -11.1% K-BB%. His one outing with the Storm Chasers this year wasn't much better, as he posted a 9.00 ERA, 3.00 WHIP, and 7.10 FIP. Kudrna posted a solid whiff rate in Omaha as well as limited hard contact, but his TJ Stuff+, zone rate, and chase rate metrics were all mediocre, as illustrated in his TJ Stats season summary below. The typical recovery timetable for surgeries such as Kudrna's is 3-6 months. Thus, it's possible that Kudrna could return in Late August or September if his body responds well to the recovery process. That said, at 23 years old, it's likely that the Royals will take it slow with Kudrna, which probably rules out any return to Omaha this season. Both players will likely be placed on the 60-Day IL, opening two roster spots for potential pitchers in the near future. View the full article

Emmanuel Rodriguez has been the hottest bat in the Saints' lineup over the past two weeks. What is the key to his success, and could he force his hand to be called up to the Majors in the near future? View the full article

Box Score SP: Taj Badley - 7 IP, 2 H, 2 ER, 2 BB, 7 K (114 pitches, 73 strikes (64% strikes)) Home Runs: None Bottom 3 WPA: Eric Orze (-0.70), Josh Bell (-0.18), Matt Wallner (-0.13) Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs) Taj Bradley entered Wednesday's game looking to get back to his dominant ways. Bradley surrendered four monster home runs, his first of the season, last weekend against the Rays—two each to former teammates Junior Caminero and Jonathan Aranda. But this game was different, Bradley had control, and marched through seven innings in which he allowed two runs on just four hits and two walks, while striking out seven. Derek Shelton trusted his newfound workhorse, letting him throw more pitches than any Twins pitcher had since Kenta Maeda was chasing a no-hitter during the 2020 pandemic season. Arguably, that trust tipped over from admirably old-school to inadvisable passivity in the seventh. With the Twins nursing a 2-1 lead, Bradley gave up back-to-back doubles to left-handed batters to tie the game with two outs in the inning, already having passed 100 pitches—even though lefty Anthony Banda was warming in the pen. Banda came out in the eighth to relieve Bradley and took care of business, setting the stage for the Twins to take the lead again. A Little Life The Twins offense was virtually non-existent Tuesday night, making their Monday outburst feel a bit like a mirage. Lately, they seem unable to muster the consistency of approach and production that characterized their hot streak earlier this month. They did get something going in the fourth inning, though. Ryan Jeffers singled with one out and advanced to second on a walk by Kody Clemens. Luke Keaschall blooped a single into center, and although Jeffers couldn't score after holding up to make sure the ball fell in, both he and Clemens scored when Brooks Lee followed with a flared single of his own. Jeffers (.409 OBP) and Clemens (who got on base three times Wednesday and is hitting his stride as the team starts seeing more righty hurlers) have become quietly vital to the team's offense, especially with some of the others in the group beginning to struggle. Those two runs didn't prove decisive, but briefly, it looked like their late tally could. Another Jeffers single set the wheels in motion, and James Outman (pinch-running for the catcher) stole second base. After two strikeout, Victor Caratini pinch-hit for Matt Wallner and came up huge: The Twins threatened to score some insurance runs, too, loading the bases for Byron Buxton, but the Twins' star slugger flied out to end the frame. And a Painful Death Those insurance runs, as it turned out, were much-needed, and because they didn't get them, the Twins lost. Eric Orze couldn't find the strike zone, walking Randy Arozarena to lead off the inning. He fell behind most of the hitters he saw, and though he came back to strike out one of them, he surrendered back-to-back singles and a walk to give Seattle the lead and left Taylor Rogers in a jam, to boot. Rogers minimized the damage reasonably well, but another run scored on a sacrifice fly. The Twins went down with barely a whimper in the bottom of the ninth. What’s Next? The Twins take on the Toronto Blue Jays at home for a four-game series. The Twins will send Bailey Ober to the mound (2-1, 3.94 ERA) in Thursday's series opener, facing Toronto ace Kevin Gausman (2-1, 2.57 ERA). Postgame Interviews Coming soon. Bullpen Availability Chart View the full article

The Milwaukee Brewers are losing a key member of their bullpen. Left-handed reliever Angel Zerpa was placed on the 15-day injured list Wednesday with left forearm tightness. Left-handed reliever Brian Fitzpatrick had his contract selected from Triple-A Nashville and will be making his MLB debut. The Brewers had an open spot following outfielder Luis Matos being designated for assignment. Following a strong performance for Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic, Zerpa emerged as another late-inning weapon out of the Brewers' bullpen. He started the season with four scoreless outings, but has allowed runs in six of his last eight appearances for a 6.39 ERA in 12 games. In his most recent outing, Saturday vs. the Pittsburgh Pirates, he allowed three runs (one earned) on one hit and a walk with a strikeout in two-thirds of an inning. It was the third consecutive outing Zerpa allowed a run. Fitzpatrick was a 10th-round selection by the Brewers in the 2022 draft out of Rutgers. In 10 appearances at Nashville this year, Fitzpatrick had a 1.74 ERA with two walks and 11 strikeouts in 10⅓ innings. In his five minor-league seasons, Fitzpatrick has appeared in 81 games, including 15 starts, and posted a 3.49 ERA with 3.6 walks and 9.9 strikeouts per nine innings. The Brewers also formally sent outfielder Jackson Chourio and first baseman Andrew Vaughn to Nashville to begin their rehab assignments. Also, Matos went unclaimed on waivers and was outrighted to Nashville. View the full article

I spent a lot of time this offseason thinking about the players who were supposed to make the Toronto Blue Jays' Opening Day roster. Here at Jays Centre, we put out roster predictions. We wrote about the rotation, the bullpen, the lineup, and the bench, considering projected performance, positional logjams, and possible platoons. We wrote about guys like Eric Lauer, Davis Schneider, and Nathan Lukes until there was absolutely nothing left to say. That's what the offseason is for. Then the season started, and, well... fans plan. The baseball gods laugh. You don't need to know much about baseball to know it takes more than 26 guys to get through a season. At least one player you'd never even heard of in March will have made an impact for your favourite team before October. Right now, the Blue Jays have six five (I started this before Eloy Jiménez was DFA'd) players on their active roster who weren't around on Opening Day, not including Trey Yesavage, who returned from the injured list on Tuesday. Since we didn't spend much, if any, time thinking about these players over the winter, I thought it would be a good idea to give them all a little attention right now. Starting with the pitchers (I'll get to the hitters tomorrow), let's take a quick look at what each of them has done for Toronto in 2026. Patrick Corbin, SP 2026 Stats: 4 GS, 19.1 IP, 3.72 ERA, 16 K, 6 BB, 2 HR Signed a one-year, $1 million contract with the Blue Jays on April 3, shortly after Cody Ponce tore his ACL. Recalled from the Dunedin Blue Jays on April 7. Patrick Corbin has been everything the Blue Jays could have hoped for (and more). The 36-year-old signed with Toronto on April 3, and despite missing spring training, he was already pitching for the major league team a week later. The rubber-armed veteran has since thrown 19.1 innings over four starts, and the team is 3-1 in his outings. The Jays signed Corbin out of desperation for innings, and so far, the lefty has delivered with quality on top of quantity. He's been so steady that Eric Lauer is now the likely candidate to move to the bullpen when José Berríos returns from the IL. None of this is to say Corbin will stick in Toronto's rotation all year. We're still talking about a guy with a 5.47 ERA and a 5.65 xERA from 2021-25 (and a 5.84 xERA in 2026). Ideally, he gets bumped out for a healthy Shane Bieber before long. However, that doesn't take away from what Corbin has done for the Jays to this point, and it's nice to know that for as long as they need him, he'll be there. Joe Mantiply, RP 2026 Stats: 9 G, 10.2 IP, 3.38 ERA, 15 K, 3 BB, 1 HR Re-signed with the Blue Jays on a minor league contract on March 3. Selected to the roster when Brendon Little was optioned to Triple-A. From 2021-24, Joe Mantiply made 236 appearances for the Diamondbacks with a 3.63 ERA, a 3.49 xERA, and 3.2 fWAR. Yet, amidst a disastrous 2025, he found himself left on the scrap heap, and the Blue Jays were able to pick him up for nothing. So far in 2026, the lefty looks like his old self. Wait, scratch that. He looks better. Yes, it's early – really early – but Mantiply's stuff looks great. He has struck out one-third of the batters he's faced and induced grounders on more than half the balls his opponents have hit into play. If he keeps pitching this well, he has a good case to stick around even if another lefty (i.e., Lauer or Corbin) eventually moves to the bullpen. That's the optimistic take. As much as I want to focus on the positives, I need to point out that John Schneider has largely limited Mantiply to lower-leverage opportunities as a lefty specialist. The realist in me knows that the 35-year-old soft-tosser will remain on the roster bubble until he proves he can hold his own against opposite-handed hitters with the game on the line. The Others These four pitchers weren't on the Blue Jays' Opening Day roster, nor are they currently on the team's active roster. They did, however, spend time with the big league club at some point this year. Lazaro Estrada: 1 G, 4.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 3 K (15-day IL, shoulder impingement) Josh Fleming: 1 G, 3.0 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 1 K (DFA'd, re-signed to new minor league deal, assigned to Triple-A Buffalo) Chase Lee: 1 G, 1.1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 K (Optioned to Triple-A Buffalo) Austin Voth: 1 G, 2.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 K (DFA'd, re-signed to new minor league deal, assigned to Triple-A Buffalo) View the full article

The Toronto Blue Jays are getting healthier. A day after welcoming back Trey Yesavage, the Blue Jays announced that George Springer has been activated off the 10-day injured list. While Springer will not be in the starting lineup during the Blue Jays’ series finale against the Boston Red Sox, he will be available off the bench. Springer originally fractured his left big toe on April 11 after following a pitch off his foot. The 36-year-old exited the contest and has missed the past 15 games after being placed on the IL on April 12. Through 14 games, Springer is batting .185 with two home runs and six RBIs. During his absence, the Blue Jays have gone 7-8, and have been rotating Myles Straw, Nathan Lukes, and Ernie Clement through the leadoff spot. In a corresponding move, the Blue Jays designated Eloy Jiménez for assignment. The 29-year-old appeared in 12 games with the Blue Jays, batting .290 with three RBIs and a .343 on-base percentage. With Springer set to return to the DH role, and Jiménez offering no real positional flexibility, the Blue Jays were forced to make this move. First pitch on Wednesday is set for 3:07 p.m. at the Rogers Centre. View the full article

The Cubs' pitching depth has been annihilated by injuries. The bullpen has lost its projected closer and top three setup options. Cade Horton is done for the year, and Justin Steele just had a setback. The rotation in Iowa is so thin that they only have one traditional starter. This isn't luck. This is a risky plan gone awry. Let's look at the injuries one by one. You'll see the common thread: not randomness, but identifiable durability concerns. Cade Horton: Elbow; previous Tommy John surgery and shoulder issues Caleb Thielbar: Hamstring; 39 years old Hunter Harvey: Tricepts; pitched 15 innings combined the past two years Daniel Palencia: Lat strain; battled shoulder issues last year and throws a million miles an hour Ethan Roberts: Attacked by a falling vent; is not rich enough to have others do routine housework or to buy fancy no-slice vents Riley Martin: Elbow inflammation; is a pitcher Phil Maton: Knee, also older pitcher (now back on the roster) Matthew Boyd: Bicep strain; has been hurt more than healthy in career spanning over a decade (now back on the roster) Let's look at the bullpen first. Relying on two pitchers over age 35 as your high-leverage adds is always going to carry added risk. Their arms are sound, but the aches and pains and strains come fast and furious as you age. With Maton's knee and Thielbar's hamstring, this struck. Soft tissue and joint injuries become more common for older players. Added to the risk inherent in the pitchers' arms, this was always a gamble. The younger pitchers were also risky. Any contribution by Harvey was always going to be a bonus; that's why spending so much on him felt peculiar in the first place. Palencia is battling recurring shoulder issues, and even top-100 prospect Jaxon Wiggins is injured, taking away a possibility for help. Jed Hoyer tried to build a bullpen, but each player took a significant durability concern into the season. The Cubs put a huge amount of faith in Horton this year. That, too, was always a gamble. Horton came into his pro career having pitched 53 2/3 innings in college and coming off Tommy John surgery. He was then babied through a year in the minors, averaging barely four innings per start, only to injure his shoulder the next year. Horton is a prime example of the axiom that the best predictor of future injury is past injury, particularly when the injuries are all to the same pitching arm. The team babied him again in late 2025, and he still went down, again. The rest of the rotation has a similar risk. Edward Cabrera has been injured for parts of every year of his career. Boyd is 35 and has his own injury demons to counter. Colin Rea is 35, and Javier Assad had a lost season last year with an oblique issue. Shota Imanaga had a hamstring issue last year. Jameson Taillon had a calf strain and a groin strain. The Cubs didn't spend on Dylan Cease, who cost a premium because he never misses a start. Instead, they chose to spread their resources more evenly (and, of course, to spend less than the Blue Jays are spending on their roster, overall). This could work if arms are available to call up, but to this point, there are no reliable options in the minor leagues. Instead, they now have a cheaper but thinner rotation, and it's backfired. They'll have to spend either money or farm-system talent (the latter, at least, being in short supply at the moment) to reinforce this stuff before the trade deadline. This can all still work, given the Cubs' elite defense and deep offense. The Cubs should remain in contention this summer. But against good teams, both in the regular season and the playoffs, pitching reigns supreme. The Cubs, at this point, are lacking in that department, with few internal options to supplement. It's probably more a failure of the scouting and development side than anything else, but that's Hoyer's responsibility, just as his choices with regard to trades and free agency are. View the full article

The Boston Red Sox will be without their ace for a while. Left-handed starter Garrett Crochet went on the 15-day injured list Wednesday due to inflammation in his left shoulder. Third baseman-outfielder Nate Eaton was called up from Triple-A Worcester to take Crochet's roster spot. Crochet had been slated to start Friday, with left-hander Jake Bennett a likely candidate. Crochet hadn't displayed the same form that led to his brilliant 2025 season, when he finished second in AL Cy Young Award voting and went 18-5 with a 2.89 FIP with an 5.7% walk rate and 31.3% strikeout rate, leading MLB with 255 strikeouts. In six starts this year, Crochet had a 4.33 FIP and 6.30 ERA, having allowed five runs twice and 11 in another. He has a 8% walk rate and 26.8% strikeout rate. Surprisingly, this move comes after perhaps his best start of the season. In Saturday's 17-1 victory over the Baltimore Orioles, Crochet went six shutout innings, allowing three hits and two walks while striking out seven. Eaton played in 41 games for the Red Sox last year, putting up a .296/.348/.383 slash line with one homer, four RBIs and nine stolen bases. In 27 games for Worcester this year, Eaton's slash line is .292/.373/.458 with three homers, 12 RBIs and six stolen bases. View the full article

To say the beginning of the season has been an absolute disaster for Brayan Bello could almost be considered an understatement. The 26-year old righty was hoping to build off a solid 2025 while positioning himself as a crucial piece of the Boston Red Sox’s rotation behind Garrett Crochet, Sonny Gray, and Ranger Suarez. Unfortunately for him, he’s currently sitting on a 9.00 ERA after his blow-up start against the Orioles with a measly 13.0% strikeout rate to go along with an 11.3% walk percentage. His FIP has shot up to 8.27 to pair with a -0.6 fWAR. As a long time Bello Believer (trademark pending), I wanted to take a look under the hood and see if we could explain what’s going on with the young, former Opening Day starter. Maybe the most glaring thing is that Bello has all but scrapped his four-seam fastball. While it was never a pitch he favored, it’s taken a significant step back behind his other options, including a new curveball, so far in 2026. In 2025, he threw the four-seamer 15% of the time and averaged 95.1 MPH on it. Now, that percentage has dipped to 3% and it’s lost some gas at 93.7 MPH. This could be, in part, due to pitching coach Andrew Bailey’s preferred use of off-speed and breaking pitches, but the last time that happened in 2024 Bello was vocal about reintroducing the pitch back into his mix and it helped to turn his season around. From the outside looking in, it seems more like Bello no longer trusts the pitch and that has taken away a lot of his grip-it-and-rip-it style of pitching. That style though, is what his career has been built on. He’s been at his best when he just pitches. Now, he seems to be trying to nibble on the edges of the plate too much and he’s being crushed as a result. That’s not the only reason for concern, though. Bello has raised his arm angle a staggering 10 degrees, from 33 degrees in 2025 to 43 degrees this season. If you compare pictures or videos from previous seasons to now, it’s fairly noticeable. While there are merits to raising the arm slot, none of them have really panned out for Bello. It is likely what has contributed most to his massive uptick in generating whiffs, up from 20.1% last season to 31.6% now, but it’s also leaving him vulnerable to his sinker playing a lot higher in the zone than intended. We saw the results of that against the Orioles, when Adley Rutschman took a 95 mph sinker that hung out high and inside to deep right field. To be fair, Bello gave up home runs on his cutter and four-seam fastball as well, but the sinker got crushed all night because it failed to sink at all. That flat action on all of his pitches is a direct result of his raised arm angle as well. While the raised arm slot would work, or should work, for a four-seam fastball because the angle causes it to ride more, it has the opposite impact on the sinker. As we know, Bello is a sinker-heavy pitcher so such a drastic, upward change in his arm angle makes the pitch less effective. It also takes the sweeping motion away from his sweeper and forces him to rely on that new curveball as a snappier breaking ball. We can see an obvious difference if we look at his movement profiles from 2025 and 2026 side-by-side. His changeup and sinker are living in the same zone again this season, but when the velocity is down on the sinker, almost a full mile per hour from 95.3 to 94.4, then the pitches don’t play off each other nearly as well as they did last season. His four-seamer gave hitters a different look last season but now, when he does throw it, it’s cheating into the same movement profile as his sinker. Flattening out his arm angle could do wonders for him, and there’s been some tinkering from start to start recently, but we’ve yet to see it pay any true dividends. Also contributing to the issue is that Bello has lost spin rates on each of his pitches, and some have a fairly significant drop-off. His sinker is down from 2,121 RPM to 2,036 RPM, his cutter from 2,479 RPM to 2,333 RPM, the four-seamer from 2,161 RPM to 2,056 RPM, the sweeper from 2,476 RPM to 2,335 RPM, and his changeup is down from 1,842 RPM to 1,696 RPM. Yes, he’s working with a much smaller sample size so far this season, but the decrease in revolutions per minute is concerning. That spin allows the ball to break how it’s supposed to. It helps aid in the “ride” the four-seam is supposed to have and is what forces a sinker to dive as it’s reaching the plate so the hitter swings over the top of it. Now though, a lot of his pitches are living in the same RPM realm and it’s causing them to bleed into one another as they approach the plate. The sweeping action is less on his sweeper, down from 9.9” of glove-side break to 7.2” of glove-side break, and his cutter is almost running completely flat in 2026 as it has dropped from 0.9” of glove-side break to a measly 0.2”. Without the spin on each pitch, likely due to the increased arm slot, Bello goes from a groundball-inducing sinkerballer to someone who can't aggressively attack the bottom of the zone. This makes every other pitch in his arsenal far less effective as a result. I won’t go so far as to say that the Brayan Bello we got in the second half of 2024 and most of 2025 is gone, but it’s looking like that version of him is very lost right now. Might he benefit from a stint in Worcester to get his mechanics back on track> If the rotation were completely healthy, that’d be an easy enough decision. With Johan Oviedo on the 60-day IL and Sonny Gray on the 15-day IL, though, it’s a bit easier said than done. Once Gray comes back (Alex Cora gave a positive update on him before being ousted), then a much tougher conversation is likely going to happen than what happened on the mound during Bello’s start. Rookie Payton Tolle looked absolutely dominant against the Yankees in his season debut. He was electric and brought an energy to the team that they’ve needed since the season started. Perhaps he (and fellow rookie Connelly Early) can keep pitching well enough to buy Bello a little time to get his A-game back. View the full article

Riley Quick came with his fair share of question marks when the Twins drafted him last summer, but his early performance has been otherworldly. It's too early to say definitely, but the Twins may have something special here. View the full article