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Toledo Mud Hens at Iowa Cubs (cancelled)

They were rained out in Iowa on Tuesday, postponing the long-awaited Tigers debut of River Ryan. The game doesn’t matter in the International League standings, and won’t be made up, so we should see Ryan start Wednesday’s game at 1:10 p.m. ET.

Erie SeaWolves 6, Reading Fightin Phils 1 (box)

With a postseason spot secured already, this series doesn’t mean a whole lot, but it’s one last road trip to help prepare for the Eastern League postseason. They won the League title in 2023 and 2024 under Gabe Alvarez, before getting bounced in the postseason under Andrew Graham last year. Now Tony Cappuccilli will take his turn. There were no signs of Ben Jacobs or Bryce Rainer joining the roster. They did get Chris Meyers and Luke Taggart added to the roster from Toledo to pitch in.

Max Alba got the start, and he managed to pitch to contact for five innings of one-run ball.

Meyers drew a leadoff walk in the top of the third. Luke Shliger stayed red hot with a two-run shot to right field. The left-handed hitting catcher has been on fire since getting promoted to Erie, and now has four homers in 15 games with the SeaWolves with pretty decent strikeout to walk numbers to boot. He was released by the Giants back in July and looks like a quality pickup for the Tigers though he’ll turn 25 this month. Shliger is decidedly on the small side for a catcher at 5’7” but he looks reasonably good behind the plate, and the Tigers are good at coaching catcher defense. Of course, that’s one of the few things the Giants do well too.

Seth Stephenson followed Shliger with a single, and after Peyton Graham took a called strike three, Woody Hadeen singled Stephenson to third and then stole second. Zyhir Hope did the job, lifting a sac fly to score Stephenson, and Thayron Liranzo singled in Hadeen, though the catcher was cut down trying to take second on the play.

Alba allowed his run on a solo shot in the bottom of the third, and so it was 4-1 at that point. Meyers came through with a solo shot in the top of the fourth to make it 5-1.

Zyhir Hope drilled a triple off the top of the wall in the fifth but was stranded.

Tanner Kohlhepp handled the sixth, and Shliger came back for more, leading off the seventh with a solo shot to left field for a 6-1 lead.

Kohlhepp was strong through the seventh as well, and Taggart handled the eighth and ninth without much trouble to wrap this one up.

Shliger: 3-4, 2 R, 3 RBI, 2 HR

Stephenson: 2-4, R, SB, 2 K

Hadeen: 1-3, R, BB, K, SB

Hope: 1-2, RBI, 3B, K

Alba: 5.0 IP, ER, 3 H, BB, 2 K

Coming Up Next: It’s a 6:45 p.m. ET start in Reading on Wednesday.

Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across MLB. Throughout the year we ask questions of the most plugged-in Pirates fans and fans across the country.

This week’s question asked you about Pittsburgh Pirates manager Don Kelly. All that we know about Kelly’s deal was that he was extended. The Pirates did not release for how long. If they want out, there’s a real chance he has no guaranteed money left on his deal.

So while the Pirates have been better of late, and at 72-73, are fast approaching the Mendoza Line again, but I think we all wanted and hoped and expected playoffs this season, and the Bucs need a miracle for that.

The question is, do you expect Don Kelly back next season or are the Pirates moving on?

Cast your vote, tell us in the comments, and we’ll be back soon with the results!

MLB.com | Max Ralph: One of the joys of this season has been getting more access to Joey Votto’s analysis as one of the savvier players in recent MLB history. I’d encourage you to look up some of his other breakdowns of players today, but we’re going to focus on his thoughts on the newly-returned Aaron Judge. Votto raves about Judge being the greatest hitter of all time (his 176 career wRC+ IS third best in the game’s history), in particular because of his ability to still find pull-side power in a Stadium built more for lefties.

CBS Sports | Roto Staff: Jazz Chisholm Jr. had to leave late in Tuesday’s win over the Rockies, after seeming to overextend something in his hand on a stolen base attempt in the ninth inning. Jazz tried to play through it in the bottom half but was eventually yanked. If it’s a burgeoning thumb problem, expect at least a day off for the second baseman on Wednesday.

Baseball Prospectus | Daniel R. Epstein ($): Once again, the Yankees have made one of the sport’s best bullpens seemingly out of wholecloth. David Bednar was always the big name in the ninth inning, but the other higher-leverage arms, like Paul Blackburn and Brent Headrick, were certainly not top of our minds at the beginning of the season, nor where they considered much by PECOTA, the proprietary projection systems BP uses that the Yankees have a habit of outpacing.

ESPN | Jeff Passan: Baseball’s in a bad place, where overblown player salaries have teams struggling to make money and proving the need for a salary cap. Of course baseball’s also in a great place where two new owners can make up brand new teams and make a bunch of money!

Kidding aside, Passan walks us through six possible expansion franchises, including trendy spots like Nashville and returning a team to Montreal. The big viable city, in Jeff’s eyes? Salt Lake City, Utah.

Lazaro Montes hit the longest home run ever recorded at T-Mobile Park, and the Mariners continued to pitch like the worst staff in the majors.

The Mariners took their latest bludgeoning on Tuesday with a 10-5 loss to the Rangers. Bryce Miller got the start and was bad and brief, and the bullpen folded behind him. The Mariners are last in the majors by just about every pitching category since the All-Star break, and there’s no sign it will let up any time soon.

The bad pitching made Tuesday’s game long, boring, miserable, and predictable, except for one play:

Lazaro Montes got a middle-middle fastball from Cal Quantrill in the fourth inning and hit it a very long way. It was the longest home run hit at T-Mobile Park in the Statcast Era. I can tell you the metrics — 116.1 mph, 24 degrees, 474 feet — but you really have to witness it yourself.

I’ve never seen a batter hit one on the concourse in center field. Most of the very impressive homers that get hit in Seattle are going to the Hit-It-Here Cafe, or the bleachers in left. The homers that land in the space between left-center and right-center tend to have impressive metrics, but rarely have the same visual effect, since most batters are physically limited to the first few rows.

That’s what I thought would be the case when Montes flipped his bat and implied a homer. I’m aware of his infinite power, and I didn’t doubt it would impress. But when the camera turned to center and started to zoom, I thought “wow, this might get halfway up,” which alone would have deserved a good amount of space in this recap. Instead, it just kept going and going and going, so far up into the stands that I couldn’t tell where it landed on the first few replays. When I eventually realized what he’d done, I just… I don’t know — I really don’t know what I’ve witnessed.

The only thing that comes to mind is this Carlos Peguero homer from 2013, which might have gone further, but landed somewhere out of frame limiting the effect.

Montes’ blast was most of the Mariners offense on Tuesday. They scratched across nine hits and a walk, and picked up a couple more runs in garbage time. But five runs just isn’t enough when the pitching staff gives up 10.

Miller made his second start after being moved to the bullpen in late August. He never actually got an appearance as a reliever because Emerson Hancock landed on the injured list shortly after the decision, allowing Miller to slot back into the rotation. In his first start last week, Miller was pulled in the middle of the fifth inning after just 63 pitches, implying the org still sees him in something of a hybrid role going forward.

It’s hard to say what the plan was meant to be on Tuesday. Miller threw 84 pitches — close to a starter’s workload — but only made it through 3 2/3 innings before getting the hook. Whether this was a true start or a cold open or some pork-themed invention, Miller didn’t execute. He picked up six strikeouts and 10 whiffs, but gave up three walks and four hits, and often seemed to spin his wheels, unable to put batters away with any sort of efficiency. He eventually handed the ball to the bullpen with the bases loaded in the middle of the fourth inning.

“It’s frustrating,” Miller said after the game. “Too many long at-bats. It felt like everything was five to nine pitches… Overall, I gotta do a better job with having quicker innings, quicker at-bats, and not having to burn the bullpen.”

Any hope for Miller in this one died pretty quickly. In the first inning, he threw a first-pitch, middle-middle fastball to Corey Seager, who mashed it 418 feet to right. (This felt like a very long home run at the time).

Miller entered the fourth down just 2-0, but was already at 63 pitches. After loading the bases with two singles and a walk, Dan Wilson went to José Ferrer to try to escape the inning. Ferrer gave up a hard grounder that went right through Cole Young at second base to make it 4-0.

That kind of felt like the game. Sure, Montes’ homer brought the Mariners back within one in the bottom of the frame. But they still had five innings left to cover with a bad and overworked bullpen. I feel like I’ve written some version of this in every recap I’ve done the last few months. This was the dynamic that led to 22-0 and 19-2 losses in Miller starts last month, for instance. Had the Mariners not had an off day Monday, that might have been the case again. Instead, the bullpen was rested and everyone was available for a normal-bad pitching performance. Eduard Bazardo got shelled in the fifth, giving up five runs on a pair of homers. Cooper Criswell gave up another run in the seventh. Carlos Vargas, Mickael Rucker, and Hoby Milner each managed clean innings.

The Mariners needed seven pitchers to throw 193 pitches to scratch and claw and fight their way to only allow 10 runs in this one. Kade Anderson gets the ball tomorrow, and since he’s also on a fairly strict pitch count, this could be the start of another very long week.

The cliché is to compare Major League Baseball’s regular season to a marathon.

On Tuesday, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts used the mile as his analogy instead.

“The third leg is the hardest leg,” Roberts explained, drawing a comparison to the four laps run in mile-long 1600-meter races. “I think it’s just kind of like that.”

Indeed, the Dodgers came flying out of the gates at the start of this year, reaching Independence Day with five more wins than any other team in the majors.

But then, in a repeat of last season, came an early second-half slide, with the club going 23-26 over its subsequent 49 games.

The third lap was taking its toll –– especially for an aging roster coming off back-to-back World Series marches.

“You can layer in the fact that we’ve had a lot of seasons together, and played a lot of baseball,” Roberts said.

“They call them the dog days for a reason,” newly acquired pitcher Tarik Skubal added.

This week, however, has brought another familiar turn in the Dodgers’ pursuit of a third-straight title.

Also like last season, they have begun a return to form just as October has appeared on the horizon, matching a season-long win streak on Tuesday by collecting their sixth victory in a row with a 3-2 defeat of the Cincinnati Reds.

“You get that second wind in September,” Roberts said.

“Everyone’s kind of turning up the intensity a little bit,” Skubal echoed.

It was at almost this exact point last season when the Dodgers made a similar shift following a late-summer slump. On Sept. 6, they were walked off for a second-straight night by the Baltimore Orioles. They were in a dogfight in the NL West after a 22-32 slump.

From there, though, they closed the regular season on a 15-5 tear, locked up the NL West crown in the final week of the regular season, and proceeded to win nine of their first 10 playoff games en route to a second-consecutive title.

This year, the turnaround has begun a few days earlier. And this time, another strong finish should put the club in an even better playoff spot.

With Tuesday’s win, the Dodgers’ magic number to clinch the NL West is already down to seven. More importantly, they are now 2 ½ games up on the Atlanta Braves for the National League’s No. 2 playoff seed –– which would not only come with a bye, but perhaps put the Dodgers on the easier side of the NL postseason bracket (as things stand, the No. 2 seed is likely to face either the Braves, Dbacks or Padres in the Division Series, while the currently top-seeded Brewers would likely be in line for a more daunting matchup with either the Phillies and Cubs).

“We realized [the magic number] was 7 because they put it on the scoreboard,” Teoscar Hernández joked afterward. “But we’re not thinking about October right now. We’re thinking about just playing the game, win games and just be ready for it.”

Just as important as playoff positioning, after all, is the way the team has been playing to right the ship this week.

It starts, fittingly, with starting pitching, where the Dodgers on Tuesday watched Skubal deliver his most efficient outing with the team.

For his first since arriving in Los Angeles, and his second time all season, the two-time Cy Young Award winner worked into the eighth inning in a 94-pitch effort, allowing just two runs (both on a monstrous 444-foot Elly De La Cruz homer in the third) over 7 ⅓ frames to lower his ERA in seven Dodgers starts to 2.93.

The lineup, meanwhile, has made such production on the mound count –– thanks to renewed production at the plate from several important veteran bats.

Will Smith opened the scoring on Tuesday with his first home run since coming off the injured list. Then Hernández continued his blistering return to form with three hits and a walk, including a triple that nearly went for an inside-the-park home run (he was thrown out at home on a whopping 105 mph relay throw by De La Cruz at shortstop) and a tie-breaking RBI single in the fifth. He is now 16-for-32 over his last nine games.

“This just changes the dynamic of our lineup,” Roberts said of Hernández. “Especially when there’s still some guys that aren’t swinging the bat well.”

That includes Shohei Ohtani, was back out of the lineup on Tuesday while being load-managed.

And yet, the Dodgers didn’t break their stride, or lose any momentum in a stretch run that has seen them steadily gain steam.

“The fourth leg is the easiest,” Roberts said, referring back to his mile metaphor, “because you see the finish line.”

Three of the Mets’ new prospects were in the middle of things for their respective clubs again on Tuesday night. 

Both Billy Amick and Emilien Pitre enjoyed strong showings for Syracuse. 

Amick was on-base two times facing his old teammates with the St. Paul Saints, leading off the second with a single, then crushing a solo shot to deep left-center in the top of the fourth. 

The slugger was retired each of his next two times up, but is now up to 36 homers total on the minor league season, six of which have come up at the Triple-A level. 

Pitre enjoyed a strong night, reached three times of his own. 

He drove in the opening run of the game with a single in the first, drove in another in the third, then drew an eight-pitch walk with nobody out in the fifth. 

The 23-year-old seems to be finding his groove following his promotion to Syracuse, now hitting .283 with a .367 OBP and .782 OPS through 15 games at the new level. 

Meanwhile down in Double-A, Jefferson Rojas had a rare quiet night at the plate, but he was able to reach another milestone for the season. 

With his stolen base in the bottom of the fifth, Rojas officially joined the 20-20-20 club. 

While he hasn’t been showcasing his speed too much since joining Binghamton, the 21-year-old is now up to 20 stolen bases, 24 homers, and 25 doubles on the Double-A season.

Rojas has a few more days to add to those numbers, as the Rumble Ponies wrap up their season this weekend. 

The Texas Rangers scored ten runs while the Seattle Mariners scored five runs.

In the bottom of the fourth inning, after the Rangers had scratched and clawed their way to a 4-0 lead, the Mariners scored three runs on one hellacious swing as rookie Lazaro Montes feasted on a middle-middle fastball and unloaded for one of the loudest, most impressive home runs you’ll ever see.

It’s the kind of home run that will be in highlight packages and make headlines on every baseball website. The kind of dong you’d see Nomar Mazara run into out of nowhere every now and then.

Anyway, Cal Quantrill allowed three runs over six innings and the Rangers won by five runs. But hey, all the M’s fans who would later spend the rest of the night booing the home team before vacating T-Mobile many innings early can say they were there for the famous Montes dinger!

With the victory, the Rangers are within a game of .500 again as they kept pace with the other AL playoff hopefuls.

Player of the Game: There is plenty to choose from tonight. Quantrill, unfazed by the Montes dong, ended up with another quality start. Nicky Lopez had three hits in three at-bats. Wyatt Langford hit a big two-run home run to help quell Seattle’s potential rally. Robert Garcia returned and pitched a scoreless, hitless inning of relief with a strikeout.

Justin Foscue smacked a pinch hit, two-out RBI single with the bases loaded in the top of the fourth when the game was still in doubt and it seemed like the Rangers might waste their thousandth bases loaded opportunity this season. Corey Seager homered in the first inning to kick off the scoring and also made one of the craziest throws from shortstop that I’ve ever seen.

But in a season where the bottom of the lineup has felt like a black hole at times, tonight No. 9 hitter Danny Jansen contributed with a three-run home run that turned the game into a blowout and followed that up with an RBI single to lead the way with four RBIs.

Up Next: The Rangers and Mariners are back at it tomorrow with LHP Cody Bradford expected to make the start for Texas opposite LHP Kade Anderson for Seattle.

A rare midweek, mid-series afternoon first pitch from T-Mobile Park is scheduled for 3:10 pm CDT and will be telecast via the Rangers Sports Network.

Mariners Pitchers 2023-2024: Lazaro Montes, +0.20
Mariners Pitchers The Other Five Years This Decade: Eduard Bazardo -0.31 WPA, Bryce Miller -0.12 WPA, José Ferrer -0.12

Game Thread Comment(s) of the Day

Even Dodgers catcher Will Smith, who’d never be accused of wearing his emotions on his sleeve, was a little worried during his monthslong absence because of a persistent neck injury that he might not be healthy by the end of the season.

“‘It was kind of the ‘who knows how long it’s going to take,’” Smith said when the Dodgers activated him at the beginning of the month. “But at some point I was going to be fed up and just kind of deal with it.”

It apparently didn’t come to that. And in the Dodgers’ 3-2 win against the Cincinnati Reds on Tuesday, Smith’s fifth time in the lineup since returning from the injured list, he put the Dodgers ahead with a first-inning home run and guided Dodgers left-handed starter Tarik Skubal through 7 ⅓ innings of two-run ball.

“He called a great game,” Skubal said of his Team USA teammate. “And the targets that he sets up, and the way that he goes about it, he gives me a ton of confidence back there.”

A neck problem that was initially expected to resolve on its own in a few days turned into a nearly three-month IL stint. With the revolving door behind the plate in Smith’s absence, getting him back down the stretch and into the postseason was going to be key.

While Smith was on the IL, backup catcher Dalton Rushing was thrown into the starting role, learning how to balance the defensive responsibility of serving as the main backstop at the major-league level with a desire to also contribute offensively.

It's nice to have you back, Will. pic.twitter.com/AZgPMTHgsG

— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) September 9, 2026

Rushing seemed to be getting the hang of it, with Chuckie Robinson and then Eliézer Alfonzo behind him, before he hurt his right elbow right before the trade deadline. The Dodgers traded for an entirely new catching duo, Hunter Feduccia and Ben Rortvedt, who held down the position until Smith’s return.

“It was frustrating early,” Smith said. “Just looking for answers why it was taking longer, but we finally got those answers. And then it was kind of a pretty straightforward process from there. So last month or two hasn’t been too bad.”

Smith and the Dodgers sought multiple doctors’ opinions. He was eventually diagnosed with an annular tear and given two possible recovery timelines. Though they proceeded with hope for the earlier return, the longer one came to fruition.

Now, the Dodgers are carrying three catchers, trying not to overwork Smith in his first weeks back. He’ll be out of the lineup Wednesday and play two of three games in Miami, manager Dave Roberts said.

With Rushing back on the IL for the same elbow injury, Feduccia can also serve as a left-handed bat off the bench, and Alfonzo gives the team more substitution flexibility.

Read more:Shohei Ohtani out of the Dodgers lineup, available to pinch-hit

Entering Tuesday, Smith had already thrown out three baserunners attempting to steal in his first week back in action. But despite some hard contact, hits weren’t falling for him. He went two for 17 with a single and a double in the same time period.

“Will is just very consistent, dependable,” Roberts said. “I know he’s taking really good at-bats. Hitting some balls to the warning track.”

On Tuesday, batting third in the lineup against Reds left-handed starting pitcher Nick Lodolo, he showcased the kind of influence he can make on both sides of the ball.

In Smith’s first at-bat, he battled for nine pitches, finally lifting a changeup over the left field wall.

“That was really good to see,” Roberts said. “With Will, it’s just great having him in there because you know you can count on the at-bat quality, and obviously having him behind the plate has been good.”

The next inning the Dodgers (88-57) doubled their score when Tommy Edman — hitting in the leadoff spot in place of Shohei Ohtani (right biceps and left knee), who was out of the lineup Tuesday as the Dodgers ease him back from a four-day absence over the weekend — was hit in the leg by a pitch with the bases loaded.

The Reds then tied the score in the third, as Elly De La Cruz launched a two-run homer off Skubal. But the Dodgers pulled ahead again two innings later, courtesy of the red-hot bat Teoscar Hernández has been swinging in September.

Hernández avenged his ill-fated inside-the-park home run attempt — he was thrown out at the plate on an aggressive send two innings earlier — with a well-struck RBI single.

Skubal wrapped up his deepest start of his Dodgers tenure to a standing ovation. He’d limited the Reds to just four hits, while recording five strikeouts in an efficient performance.

Flame-throwing reliever Edgardo Henriquez replaced Skubal, tasked with recording the last two outs of the eighth. He did so with the help of an ABS challenge from Smith that secured an inning-ending strikeout.

Lefty Tanner Scott earned the save, retiring three straight batters after a leadoff walk, and the Dodgers extended their winning streak to six games.

“It’s the last stretch,” Smith said at the beginning of the month. “We’re fighting for seeding as well. So yeah, it’s definitely time to step on the gas.”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

The Mets’ offense is rolling down the stretch. 

They’ve been on an outstanding run over the past week or so, and much of that success has come early and often against opponents starting pitching. 

Tuesday night, it was Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara’s turn. 

Alcantara shut the Mets down across six stellar innings the last time these two teams matched up in Queens, but it was a completely different story this time around. 

Francisco Lindor took the very first pitch he saw 405 feet to deep center for a leadoff homer.

“That’s a fun way to start a baseball game,” Andy Green said. “It just let’s everyone on the other team know that we’re coming for ya, and he set that tone out of the gate.”

The Mets tacked on another run on a Jared Young single later in the inning. 

Juan Soto then continued the early-barrage in the top of the second, demolishing his third career homer off Alcantara, this one being 417 foot three-run shot to dead-central.

And New York wasn’t done there, as Brett Baty stayed red-hot at the plate as well, one-upping Soto with a 426 foot solo blast of his own to dead-center. 

Alcantara tied his season-low with just 4.1 innings pitched, as he was chased from the ballgame after allowing seven runs on as many hits while issuing four free passes.

“I love the way we’re jumping on starting pitchers,” Green emphasized.

“We’ve had really good at-bats against great pitching and we’ve put pressure on the other team not waiting for them to throw the first punch, we’ve gone out there and thrown it -- we threw a lot of them again today.”

The Mets have now scored seven or more runs in four of their five victories so far this month. 

While they did go down quietly the rest of the way against the Marlins' bullpen, their own relievers did an even better job of keeping the lead afloat to secure the series victory. 

New York will to continue rolling against Janson Junk as they go for the sweep on Wednesday.