Baseball has a way of humbling you, regressing your performance to the mean wherever the mean may be and however you may be skirting it. The Baseball Gods are equally jealous and impish. In other words, the other shoe always drops. Though Randy Dobnak’s peripherals and underlying stats have flashed danger throughout his Kansas City tenure, his luck ran out and his magic evaporated—on Harry Potter night at the ballpark, no less—during a 6-3 loss to the Miami Marlins.

Entering tonight, Dobnak had a 1.92 ERA but a 4.55 expected ERA. He wasn’t striking guys out, and he wasn’t allowing any home runs. Unfortunately, Dobnak gave up a pair of looong home runs. The first one was to third baseman Graham Pauley in the second inning, a two-run shot:

Dobnak wobbled through the next few innings before giving up another big ol blast to designated hitter Kyle Stowers, his 17th of the year.

Throughout all this, the Royals offense was…sleepy? Sleepy is the best way to put it, yes. Kansas City mustered all of four (4) baserunners in the first seven innings, looking like they wanted to go home from the September heat as soon as possible. Meanwhile, Dobnak gave up three consecutive hits in the seventh inning, all of which came around to score. Dobnak didn’t record an out, and was charged six earned runs.

The eighth inning, though, was an absolute hoot. First, that’s when the Royals finally scored. Josh Rojas singled and Isaac Collins walked. Carter Jensen doubled, and Bobby Witt Jr. followed it up with a near-home run that nevertheless resulted in an RBI and getting Jensen to third base.

It was there where the wheels came off. Marlins pitcher Victor Vodnik stepped awkwardly off of the mound, and was called for a balk. Jensen trotted home, and Royals had briefly scored their third run of the inning.

But I said “briefly” because the umpires convened together and reversed the balk, something that I don’t ever think I’ve seen. Manager Matt Quatraro was absolutely furious. Totally, completely furious. Q got tossed by and yet nevertheless continued to stalk second base umpire Chris Guccione around the field, unleashing his anger.

The umpires’ word is final, however. Quatraro got a hearty ovation from the crowd, but eventually trudged back to the dugout. The Royals would eventually get that third run back on a solo home run from Nick Loftin, but losing 6-3 is only barely better than losing 6-2.

Kansas City has now lost two in a row, thereby firmly demolishing whatever thin, thin possibility they had at magicking their way into the playoffs. At least Q getting tossed was neat.

Mariners 9, Red Sox 6

This game: Randy Arozarena, .12 WPA

All the other games we’ve watched this season: Carlos Vargas and Julio Rodríguez, -.02 WPA each

Game thread comment of the day:

Speaking of game threads: we have an app now! (Search “SB Nation” on your app platform of choice) And I think it makes it so much easier to participate in game threads! If you downloaded it and used it please leave some feedback in the comments here that I can pass along to my bosses.

Will Smith slots into the fifth spot in the lineup in his first game back as the Dodgers welcome the Cardinals into town.

Tuesday’s game info

• Teams: Dodgers vs. Cardinals
• Ballpark: Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles
• Start time: 7:10 p.m. PT
• TV: SportsNet LA
• Radio: AM 570 (English), KTNQ 1020 AM (Spanish)

It’s September and it feels like we’ve been waiting a lifetime for this 2026 Braves team to put everything together. Glimpses of dominant pitching and barrages of offensive power have rarely coincided for long stretches. 

After a frustrating loss to the Giants to finish out August, the Braves similarly squandered opportunities and fell to the Washington Nationals tonight by a final score of 9-5. The struggles on the road noted in our “three stats to keep in mind” article continue and two Nationals, making their MLB debuts, had a memorable night at the Braves’ expense.

It was a tough night all around, and it began with Jake Irvin getting three swinging strikeouts to start the game. AJ Smith-Shawver labored in his four innings of work. He pitched a scoreless frame in the home half of the first, but not without dramatics. CJ Abrams led off with an infield single and immediately stole second. Dylan Crews struck out before Brady House walked. The hot-hitting Daylen Lile grounded into a force out and stole a base of his own. Rookie Yohandy Morales, in his first MLB plate appearance, struck out swinging to end the threat.

Given the lead after an Ozzie Albies two-out solo shot in the second, Smith-Shawver gave it right back and then some. Ha-Seong Kim made a stellar play to get the first out before things went off the rails.

Harry Ford worked a one-out walk. A ball hit by Jorbit Vivas glanced off Matt Olson’s glove and trickled all the way into right field for a double to put runners at the corners. Jacob Young struck out swinging for out number two. Abrams’ RBI single gave the Nats the lead. Crews walked before a mound visit to get Smith-Shawver to settle in, only for Brady House to double home two more runs immediately after. Lile struck out looking, but it was 4-1 after two innings.

But even with offensive sparks Brewer Hicklen and Ha-Seong Kim (yes, you’re reading that correctly – they were 1-for-3 with a walk and 3-for-3, respectively), the Braves couldn’t take advantage of a short night for Jake Irvin and dig themselves out of the hole created early. The aforementioned eight- and nine-hole hitters had two situations in both the third and fifth where they both reached with no outs. In the third, Drake Baldwin doubled home a run to cut the deficit to 4-2. But the runners, on second and third with no outs, would be stranded after the next three went down in order. Baldwin giveth but he also taketh, because in the fifth inning with yet another two runners on with no outs situation, Jared Simpson (also making his MLB debut) got him to ground into a double play. 

The Braves gave Chicago’s Braden Montgomery a storybook MLB debut back in April, and they were kind enough to do that for Yohandy Morales tonight, who homered for his first MLB hit in the bottom of the third to make it 5-2 Nats. 

AJSS finished his four innings with six hits, five earned runs, three walks, five strikeouts, and one homer, putting his ERA above a 7. Victor Mederos pitched around a leadoff walk and two-out single in the bottom of the fifth, but otherwise kept the game there, being the only Braves reliever tonight to pitch a scoreless frame. 

The Braves had a debut of their own — Blake Burkhalter got the ball to pitch the bottom of the sixth. The 25 year old righty was understandably nervous. He gave up a single to Young, who advanced to second on a wild pitch. Abrams walked. Young got to third on a Crews lineout before coming home on a House sac fly to make it 6-2. A foul tip into Baldwin’s glove secured Burkhalter’s first MLB strikeout, which came against reigning NL Player of the Week Daylen Lile. 

Brent Suter got the seventh for Atlanta and Morales hit a leadoff double. Pinch-hitter Andrés Chaparro and Harry Ford were retired, but the latter’s groundout advanced Morales to third. He came home to score on Suter’s pickoff error. Young’s single plated another to make it 8-2 Nationals.

Irvin’s exit after four innings came with a flicker of hope we could come back against the notoriously-awful Nats bullpen. Alas, Jared Simpson no-hit the Braves in his three innings of relief in his debut.

A patented late Braves-rally-that-ultimately-falls-short came in the eighth inning where Ha-Seong Kim hit his third single of the night (!) to lead off the inning. Two force outs by Baldwin and Acuña Jr., Ronald getting to third on defensive indifference, and a wild pitch by new reliever Clayton Beeter allowed Ronald to score to make it 8-3. Matt Olson followed with a ground-rule double to center and got to trot home on Michael Harris II’s homer to left center to make it 8-5.

Mop-up man Suter stayed in for the eighth and got two outs before issuing a walk to Lile, giving up a single to Morales, and then another single to Chaparro to make it 9-5.

The Braves didn’t have that Marlin in them and Ozzie, Austin Riley, and Hicklen went down in order against Orlando Ribalta to end this nightmarish contest.

ABS challenges stayed unused in key situations. The top and heart of the order looked helpless at the plate for the majority of the game. Balls kept finding their way past our infielders to the tune of .478 BABIP (thanks, Ivan!). And thus, the Braves continue their frustrating trend of playing down to inferior opponents. 

I’ll cling to the delusion of a Kim redemption tour as a silver lining. The Braves will finish this two-game set tomorrow afternoon at 1:05 pm ET.

The St. Louis Cardinals begin a long west coast swing as they’ll take on the Los Angeles Dodgers Tuesday night. The Cardinals are starting Michael McGreevy while the Dodgers are expected to start LHP Eric Lauer. First pitch scheduled for 9:10pm central time and the game broadcast will be available via Cardinals.tv.

Quincy referred to today’s start for Gavin Williams as “season defining.” If this game is defining the rest of the season, we’ll be looking at another playoff berth for Cleveland.

The Toronto Blue Jays rolled into Cleveland with an opener for Game 1 of the three game series. Gavin Williams, coming off of his worst start of the season, came back tonight to throw one of the best starts of the season. In the fifth inning, Gavin gave up a single and a walk. A throwing error by the catcher and a wild pitch by Gavin allowed the only run, unearned, to score under Gavin’s watch. Otherwise, the Big Rig was lights out. Gavin threw a career high 13 strikeouts to the Blue Jays and only gave up two hits and a walk in his 7.0 innings of work.

Hunter Gaddis pitched the eighth, striking out one, and Matt Festa closed it out having only given up one hit.

The Cleveland Guardians scored six runs on eight hits and every run was scored via the home run ball. In the bottom of the fifth, down one, Angel Martínez drew a walk. With one out, after committing an error that gave the Blue Jays the lead, Patrick Bailey sent a fly ball to center for a two run homer.

In the bottom of the seventh, Angel Martínez got on base to lead things off again. With a single to right, Angel reached first base. Angel Genao came on as a pinch-hitter for Travis Bazzana. On his first pitch of the game, Genao launched a fly ball to the left field home run porch for another two-run home run.

Angel Martínez, after scoring twice on home runs, decided to hit one of his own in the bottom of the eighth. With one out, Jo Adell singled to right and was lifted for pinch-runner Petey Halpin. Angel Martínez came on, with two outs, and hit a curveball in a high arc out to right center for the third, and final, two-run homer of the night.

Something to note, Angel Martínez fouled a ball off the top of his foot in the second inning. It took him a bit to get back into it. He, obviously, finished the game and made an great catch the following inning.

Game 2 of the series is another 6:40 PM EDT start tomorrow. Dylan Cease and Joey Cantillo will be facing off as the starting pitchers.

The Rays came away with a very satisfying win tonight. With hits across the lineup (Victor Mesa Jr. led the way with three; defensive gems across the field; and outstanding pitching (minus a few blips), this was a satisfying win.

It sure didn’t seem like we were heading to this outcome at the start of the game. Freddy Peralta, facing his former team, had a shaky first inning. He gave up a lead off home run to Francisco Lindor, and then two singles soon after. Maybe there were some emotions pitching against friends; maybe Mets players just knew what to expect from him. But he got out of the inning having given up just the one run, and then he cruised.

We didn’t have much time to wallow about the deficit, as tied the game. In the bottom of the first, Yandy doubled and then booked it around the bases to score on Junior Caminero’s single. A double play prevented the Rays from scoring further.

But Tampa Bay did get the lead in the third inning. Victor Mesa Jr., back from an IL stint, singled and moved to second on a Walls bunt, from where he scored on Ryan Vilade’s single. And they made that score 3-1 in the sixth inning, thanks to Nick Fortes, whose double drove in Simpson from first base.

Fortes advanced to third, at which point the Mets pulled the infield in so close that they could have reached out and touched the batter, Taylor Walls. Walls responded by hitting the ball in the air, and plenty deep, scoring Fortes on the sacrifice.

That brought up Diaz. In the previous at bat, Yandy had hit a deep fly to center — 379 feet to be exact — and after it was caught he stood at the batters box, staring in disbelief. Well he must have had a good think about what went wrong because in the sixth inning he hit the ball almost identically except twenty feet farther, for a solo home run.

Ryan Vilade then followed with a triple (!), which ended Sean Manaea’s night. He had pitched fairly well, but probably should have been pulled before giving Yandy another bite at that apple. At the end of six innings the Rays had a 5-1 lead.

Peralta left the game after the sixth and wow was he good. He pitched a 3-hit no-walker, with seven strikeouts and fourteen (14!) whiffs.

The Rays went with Garrett Cleavinger to pitch the seventh inning. I understand sometimes you need to let guys pitch through their problems but at this point I’d rather drink spoiled milk than watch Cleavinger on the mound. So I can’t even tell you how he managed to load the bases with just one out, but loaded they were. I guess even Kevin Cash was starting to feel queasy, so he brought in Tyler Wells to get out of the jam. Wells got out number two on a pop up to the catcher, but then walked in Mets run number two. A second infield pop up later and the inning was mercifully over.

As my colleague Darby Robinson so aptly puts it: “Every time Cash wants to use Clev he should just use the guy he’s gonna call to to clean up Clev’s mess instead.”

The Rays tacked on one more run: in the bottom of the eight inning, Mesa Jr. singled and Walls doubled to put Mesa Jr. on third base. Vilade hit a come-backer that seemingly bounced off the torso of reliever Yan. By the time Yan got a handle on the ball and tossed to the catcher, Mesa Jr. had scored run number six.

Meanwhile, Tyler Wells and Kevin Kelly treated us to a scoreless eighth and ninth inning, and the Rays were able to close out their eighty-fifth win of the season.

It was great to see the timely hitting tonight, from soft singles to loud home runs. But the Rays defense also deserves star of the game status. Junior Caminero had two very nice plays at third base, and Chandler Simpson ran down a very difficult fly ball in the corner, with other players simply make tough plays look routine.

This was one of those games where you think “yeah, this is a playoff team!” If my math is correct, the magic number to win the division is now 22.

LOS ANGELES — Blake Treinen was at Dodger Stadium on Tuesday, though wasn’t activated once active roster limits expanded on September 1. The veteran right-hander checked off the usual late-stage boxes for rehabbing relievers in the last week with Triple-A Oklahoma City.

Treinen pitched back-to-back outings last Wednesday and Thursday, then on Sunday pitched in multiple innings, and retired all four batters he faced.

“He had a good up-and-down the other day. For us it’s more of he’s here. We’ll see when we activate him,” manager Dave Roberts said Tuesday. “I assume we will activate him very soon.”

Treinen last pitched for the Dodgers on June 19, sidelined since with right elbow inflammation. In seven games on a rehab assignment, Treinen had seven scoreless appearances, the first with Class-A Ontario and the last six with Triple-A Oklahoma City.

In those seven games, Treinen struck out eight of his 25 batters faced (32-percent strikeout rate) with two walks, two singles, and two hit batters. Before landing on the injured list in June, Treinen had a 3.52 ERA and 5.23 xERA in 29 games in the Dodgers bullpen, with 25 strikeouts and 10 walks in 23 innings, plus one save.

Because Treinen is on the 60-day injured list, the Dodgers will need to make a corresponding move to make room for him on the 40-man roster.

Notes

Justin Wrobleski wasthe pitcher called up on Tuesday, after getting four outs on Saturday while rehabbing in Triple-A. The plan for Wrobleski is to pitch in relief this month for the Dodgers, as that will be his likely role during the postseason.

The Dodgers plan to call up a sixth starter at some point this weekend against the Washington Nationals, because they play nine days in a row on the homestand before their next day off. Emmet Sheehan has pitched three straight excellent starts for Oklahoma City, and last pitched on Saturday, with seven strikeouts and one run allowed in 5 2/3 innings.

Gavin Stone’s 30 days of rehab are up on Friday, which means the Dodgers will need to add him back to the 40-man roster whether he’s called up or not by Saturday. Stone last pitched on August 26, with five strikeouts in four scoreless innings, and has a 1.54 ERA with 18 strikeouts against one walk in 11 2/3 innings. He is not listed to start for Oklahoma City on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday this week. Stone is on the 60-day injured list and will require a corresponding move to be added back to the 40-man roster.

There is no date yet set for when Shohei Ohtani might next pitch in a game, but it won’t be until this weekend at the earliest. “I do stand by that nothing’s going to happen until potentially Sunday,” Roberts said, “But I do think there’s a conversation that needs to be had this week about what the outlook is, and we haven’t had that yet.”

Ben Casparius is also on the 60-day injured list with shoulder inflammation and pitched in 10 rehab games for Oklahoma City. But he last pitched on August 19, and was shut down with what Roberts called arm fatigue.

Kris Bubic, acquired by the Dodgers from the Kansas City Royals on August 3 and also on the 60-day injured list, started a rehab assignment with Oklahoma City on Tuesday. Bubic pitched a perfect inning in relief with two strikeouts and an infield popout.

Blue Jays 1 Guardians 6

The Jays had all sorts of troubles with Guardians starter Gavin Williams. Well, really just one trouble. They couldn’t hit him. Williams went seven innings and allowed just two hits and a walk with thirteen strikeouts.

Our one run was in the fourth. Kazuma Okamoto led off with a single. After Andrés Giménez struck out, Ernie Clement went to a full count and the Jays sent Okamoto (surprising me, Oka is not fast and the Jays were striking out a lot). Clement took ball four, but the Guardians threw to second anyway. The throw was well wide of second and Okamoto went to third on the play. After Myles Straw struck out (I really thought that he had to make contact or we weren’t going to score at all today) Williams threw a wild pitch to Brett Bateman, allowing Oka to score. Oka going first to home without the help of a hit wasn’t on my bingo card.

The Jays didn’t have any more luck against Guardian relievers, Hunter Gaddis and Matt Festa.

The bullpen day started off ok, for the Jays, but didn’t end well.

• Spencer Miles opened, and gave up just a two-out single in his inning.
• Ricky Tiedemann allowed a pair of walks in his inning, but no runs.
• Spencer Arrighetti pitched two excellent innings, both 3 up 3 down. But he gave up a walk and a homer run in his third inning. He ended up going 3.2 innings, giving up the two earned.
• Joe Mantiply got the last out of the sixth. But in the seventh, he gave up a single and a home run to start the inning. He went 1.1 with 2 earned, on three hits.
• Michael Lorenzen gave up two more in the eight, on another home run. As they mentioned on the broadcast, that allowed the Guardian to let their closer sit.

The Jays had three hits in total. Kirk, Guerrero, and Okamoto had one each.

Jay of the Day: Okamoto (0.13 WPA) for getting us our run.

Other Award: Arrighetti (-0.12), Mantiply (-0.11), Straw (-0.12, 0 for 2, k), Bateman (-0.10, 0 for 4, 2 k) and Lukes (-0.09, 0 for 4, 2 k).

I wasn’t expecting a sweep, but now we need to get the next two. Tomorrow Dylan Cease (9-5, 2.33) and Joey Cantillo (9-7, 3.70). Go Jays.