Category: MLB

The Mets went to extra innings and lost to the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday night by a score of 4-3.

Here are the takeaways...

-- After striking out the first two batters he faced, Nolan McLean couldn't put the opening inning to bed and allowed three straight singles, two of which came with two strikes. The third hit of the inning produced an out as right fielder Austin Slater gunned down Jorge Soler at third base, but not before Nolan Schanuel crossed home plate to put the Angels up 1-0... or so the Mets thought.

As it turned out, thanks to replay, Soler was tagged out before Schanuel touched home plate which should've canceled the run from counting. However, New York either didn't see it or caught it too late because nobody in the dugout challenged the call, which is a reviewable play, on the field. The mental lapse cost McLean and the Mets a run. Would it come back to bite them?

-- New York would get the run back in the third inning. After Slater, in the Mets' starting lineup for the first time because of lefty Reid Detmers on the mound, doubled with one out, Bo Bichette drove him in with a two-out single. Slater had a good game and finished 2-for-3 alongside his outfield assist at third base from right field.

-- McLean followed up the missed call in the first inning by retiring the next seven hitters in a row before issuing a one-out walk in the fourth. The inning began innocently, but a single and a wild pitch, the right-hander's first of the season, put runners on second and third with one out. McLean managed to strike out Josh Lowe for a path out of the inning, but after getting ahead in the count 0-2 to Vaughn Grissom, he left a sweeper in the zone that Grissom lined into center field for a two-run single. McLean lost Oswald Peraza to a single after getting to two strikes as well before finally ending the inning with a strikeout.

Not only were the three earned runs the most allowed by the rookie in the first four innings of his career, it was also the shortest outing of his career after he was not given the fifth as Tobias Myers took over to start the fifth inning. McLean's final line: 4 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 6 K. His season ERA rose to 2.97.

While it wasn't the right-hander's best performance, the decision by manager Carlos Mendoza to pull him after just 78 pitches (51 strikes) was certainly interesting.

-- As for Myers, he found himself in trouble immediately after the first two hitters he faced reached base. He managed to escape without allowing a run and ended up going 2.2 scoreless innings.

-- Thanks to Myers' efforts, the Mets were able to hang around before tying the game in the seventh. Still facing Detmers, who had been cruising right along, Mark Vientos began the seventh with a double down the left field line. Marcus Semien followed with a single to put runners at the corners with nobody out and Andy Ibañez, in his Mets debut, drove in a run with a sacrifice fly.

New York continued to play solid baseball after Semien stole a crucial base with one out to advance to second in front of Tyrone Taylor who knocked him in with a game-tying single. The Mets would end up loading the bases, knocking Detmers out of the game in the process, but were unable to push across the go-ahead run against the Angels bullpen after Bichette grounded into a force play and Juan Soto struck out to leave them loaded.

-- Things stayed tied through the bottom of the ninth inning where Craig Kimbrel was tasked with sending the game to extra innings. Things got dicey after pinch-hitter Yoan Moncada doubled with one out to bring up the top of the order, but Kimbrel struck out Zach Neto for the second out and New York wisely intentionally walked Mike Trout, already 2-for-4 on the night, to pitch to Schanuel who grounded out to end the inning. 

-- In the top of the 10th inning, after the Mets got the first batter to reach, Bichette grounded into a double play and Los Angeles returned the favor by intentionally walking Soto to face Francisco Alvarez who popped out to end the frame. In the bottom half of the inning, Austin Warren came in and walked the first batter he faced before allowing a single to load the bases. 

After Warren nearly escaped the jam by retiring the next two hitters, Peraza stroked a two-strike single into left field for the game-winner. Mets pitchers not being able to put away hitters with two strikes was a theme for most of the night and the miscall in the first inning that New York failed to review cost them dearly in the end.

Game MVP: Oswald Peraza

He finished 3-for-5 with the game-winning hit in the bottom of the 10th inning.

Highlights

Bo Bichette ties it with an RBI single 💪 pic.twitter.com/8a944wOBo6

— SNY (@SNYtv) May 3, 2026

Nolan McLean has struck out four through three innings 🔥 pic.twitter.com/JogvIIXLb9

— SNY (@SNYtv) May 3, 2026

Andy Ibáñez gets his first RBI as a Met with a sac fly and the Mets are within one! pic.twitter.com/msZ75y1u4q

— SNY (@SNYtv) May 3, 2026

Tyrone Taylor ties the game with an RBI single! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/AApsnKi4Lc

— SNY (@SNYtv) May 3, 2026

What's next

The Mets close out their series with the Angels on Sunday afternoon starting at 4:07 p.m. on SNY.

RHP Clay Holmes (3-2, 1.75 ERA) looks to keep his fantastic beginning to the season going and will face off against RHP Jack Kochanowicz (2-0, 3.09 ERA).

Matt Olson has been absolutely crushing the ball this season. Through roughly 20% of the season, he is on pace for 55 homers and 65 doubles. He has a monster 171 wRC+, plays elite defense at the first base position, and is leading the NL in fWAR. With Olson leading the way, Drake Baldwin, Michael Harris, and Ozzie Albies have been premium offensive contributors as well. With Ronald Acuna seeming likely to miss at least some time with a hamstring injury, the Braves could really use Austin Riley stepping up and producing like he is paid to fill in some of that production for the time being. Austin has put together two nice nights at the plate in Coors, punctuated by a huge homer Saturday night. Here’s hoping that could be a turning point for Austin, because while the team has started this season incredibly well, some of this offensive production seems likely to come back to Earth, at least some, and especially without Ronald Acuna in the lineup.

Braves News

Ronald Acuna exited Saturday’s game with a hamstring injury, with details presumably coming soon, as he is set to receive an MRI.

Alex Anthopoulos had an interesting conversation with 92.9 The Game, covering a few notable topics.

Chris Sale and Drake Baldwin led the way to a 9-1 blowout of the Rockies.

The Braves optioned Anthony Molina, re-signing Carlos Carrasco to the major league roster.

Grant McAuley took a look at Bryce Elder’s strong season so far.

MLB News

Cardinals’ Lars Nootbar is set to begin his rehab assignment in the next couple weeks.

The Mets extended catcher Luis Torrens for another two years to the tune of $11.5 million.

JT Realmuto returned from injury for the Phillies after 10 days, DFAing Dylan Moore.

Just when it seemed like the Atlanta Braves were starting to turn a corner with injury luck with all of the positive updates on players who are currently on the injury list and Michael Harris II continuing to rake despite quad issues of his own, the injury bug appears to have taken another bite from this squad.

Ronald Acuña Jr. has exited Saturday night’s game against the Colorado Rockies with what appears to be a left hamstring issue. Acuña was simply running out a ground ball to second base and pulled up grabbing at his left hamstring. He walked off the field under his own power but he did need help getting down the stairs according to what we saw on the television broadcast.

We’ll provide more updates as they become available and hopefully it’s not as bad as looks for Acuña.

[UPDATE 11:08 p.m ET]: Walt Weiss talked to the media following the game and stated that Ronald Acuña Jr. will be going for an MRI. He said he was hoping for it to be a cramp but also it’s “never good” whenever you see a guy going in for an MRI for this sort of thing. All we can do is keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best at this point.

The Colorado Rockies were hoping their offense would take flight after last night’s showing, but unfortunately it did not. Instead, the offense was limited to just four hits, while Chase Dollander got roughed up for the first time this season.

Playing from behind

Brennan Bernardino served as the opener, and he left Dollander with a mess right off the bat. Bernardino failed to get out of the first inning giving up a single to Ronald Acuña Jr., and then he surrendering a two-run homer to Drake Baldwin to make it a 2-0 ballgame with zero outs in the first.

Ozzie Albies then doubled before Matt Olson finally flew out to center record the first out for Bernardino. A wild pitch allowed him to advance to third, and then Bernardino struck out Michael Harris II.

Warren Schaeffer likely envisioned Bernardino finishing at least the first inning, if not multiple innings, but ended up lifting him after just 0.2 innings. Dollander entered and immediately walked Mauricio Dubón, but then struck out Austin Riley to limit the damage.

The Braves Chase’d Dollander

Dollander started off the second inning strong with a strikeout of Mike Yastrzemski, but then gave up a double to Jorge Mateo. Acuña then came up to the plate and grounded out, but he pulled up halfway to first base. Hopefully it’s not an extended injury, given his history.

Next up, Baldwin singled to score Mateo and put the Braves up 3-0 but then Ozzie Albies struck out to end the inning.

Dollander recorded a 1-2-3 third, but the fourth and fifth got dicey.

The fourth started off with a walk to Austin Riley, which inevitably came back around to haunt. Yastrzemsky popped out to Karros, but then Riley stole second and then was knocked to third by a Mateo single. Eli White — who entered for Acuña — bunted, which scored Riley and moved Mateo to third. Baldwin struck again, though, with an RBI double to put the Braves up 5-1 and then Albies hit a sac fly to score White. Matt Olson flied out to end the inning, but the damage was done.

The fifth inning started with a single by Harris, which turned into two bases on an error committed by Troy Johnston. Dubón grounded out, but Riley homered to center to put the Braves up 8-1.

It was just Dollander’s fourth home run allowed this year, but he came back to get Yastrzemski and Mateo.

The sixth featured a lot of traffic, but nobody came around to score. Dollander was lifted after the sixth with a final line of 5.1 IP, 8 H, 6 ER, 3 BB, 3 K, 1 HR. He threw 97 pitches, 61 for strikes.

“I thought (Dollander) was just a little behind today,” Schaeffer said after the game. “I think (it was) unusual, with some walks. The breaking ball and the off-speed stuff — not enough strikes out of those so he relied on his fastball a little more. And they got him. I mean, that’s a good lineup. Tip your hat to that lineup, it’s a really good lineup.”

Dollander echoed that postgame with the media.

“I just didn’t get ahead and then didn’t put guys away when I needed to,” he said. “I started falling behind when I got ahead and it’s not conducive to success.”

When asked about pitching behind an opener versus starting, Dollander responded that it doesn’t change his mentality.

“I’m just trying to get the guys innings and put up zeroes just like I was when I was starting,” he said. “The mentality does not change at all. If you fall into that trap, it’s not good for pitching.”

You can watch Dollander’s full postgame interview here (courtesy of Patrick Saunders).

Offensive Offense

The Rockies offense, once again, was MIA tonight. They did not record a hit until the third inning, when Kyle Karros singled to lead off the inning. Ezequiel Tovar and Troy Johnston both flied out to center, but then Jordan Beck smacked a double to (barely) score Karros and end the shutout.

Brenton Doyle struck out, but at least the Rockies plated a run.

But that was the end of the scoring.

There was some traffic in the fifth, when Karros and Tovar walked back-to-back to start the inning, but Johnston grounded into a force out, Beck was called out on strikes, and Doyle struck out swinging to strand the runners.

Their next hit wouldn’t come until the seventh, when Brett Sullivan led off with a single. But then three-straight strikeouts stranded him at first. Willi Castro got a hit with one out in the ninth, but Sullivan grounded into a double play to end the game.

In total the Rockies offense mustered just four hits, but walked three times and struck out 12 (11 of those were against Chris Sale).

Up Next

The Rox will look to avoid the sweep at the hands of the Braves tomorrow afternoon. Kyle Freeland will face Spencer Strider, who is making his 2026 debut. First pitch is at 1:10pm.

See you then!

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Soon after the 27th out was recorded in the 5-1 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays, Giants players filed out of the dugout into the clubhouse as somber as one leaves a church pew at a funeral. Heads were mostly bowed. Hats pulled low. Eyes kept down. The coaches busied themselves with their game-prep clipboards and binders. The auxiliary staff gathered equipment. Amidst the muffled bustle, Rafael Devers and Willy Adames stayed frozen on the bench, bearing expressions infinite in their emptiness. 

The pair have sat shiva together after each loss so far in Florida. After today’s defeat, a camera operator slowly zoomed in on the two processing their grief. Adames started to distractedly wipe his brow of sweat, hiding his face in the crook of his arm. Beside him, Devers’s wide, glazed-over eyes laid the hollowness behind them bare as Katrina and the Waves 1983 hit “Walking on Sunshine” blasted over the stadium PA system.  The song’s refrain “I’m walking on sunshine…wooah!” repeated again…and again…and again… and again… as the camera closed in on Devers’s face, numb and in hell. 

Pure cinema. The clip was better than anything Giants fans had watched all game, and thank god the camera caught the moment, considering how one failed to track the flight of a consequential ball off of Heliot Ramos’s bat in the 2nd. 

I say consequential because in theory, this hit should’ve been the Giants’ first home run since last Sunday — coincidentally the last outing of the evening’s starter, Landen Roupp, and San Francisco’s last win.

Runs have been hard to come by for this club. Wall-clearing power, nearly impossible. Going into Saturday’s contest, the 2026 Giants have gone homer-less in a MLB-leading 19 games. Their record in those games: 3-16, good for a .158 win-loss percentage that’s the lowest in the National League. Conversely if a Giant homers in a game, the team is 10 – 3, which is a much better .769 win-loss percentage, which means good things happen when the Giants hit a home run, which means it was kinda messed-up when Ramos’s 108 MPH shot to center somehow got knocked out of the sky and fell to earth twenty feet short of the wall.  

Baseball should be played outside. God wants it that way. Hurricane Milton made that abundantly clear in 2024, and yet, the Rays organization stubbornly spent all of last season rebuilding Tropicana Field’s roof in blasphemous defiance.

Because of this repeated hubris, new rules were made to account for totally foreseeable occurrences like a baseball hitting a bunch of metal hanging down from the ceiling. The rule: If a fly ball hits one of the lower two catwalks between the foul lines, a home run should be awarded. That rule makes a lot of sense. What doesn’t make a lot of sense is having a rule and not enforcing it. Or not having a way of enforcing it. Or not having a back-up plan, like an all-seeing eye-in-the-sky in case something goes awry. 

Something went awry in the 2nd inning of Saturday’s game. Heliot Ramos ripped a 96 MPH four-seam from Rays’ starter Griffin Jax to dead-center. It shot off his bat at 107.9 MPH with a 33 degree launch angle. A baseball with similar off-the-bat metrics left Ramos’s bat under a roofed park in Arizona back in June 2024. 108 MPH exit velocity, 35 degree launch angle. It cleared the center field wall with ease, officially traveling 424 feet, officially outta here in all 30 Major League parks. It stands to reason a similarly struck ball in a similarly, climate-controlled enclosed arena, would also clear an outfield wall by plenty. 

Apparently not. Ramos’s projected 420 foot bomb was quickly downgraded to a routine 380 foot flyout after it fell into center fielder Cedric Mullins glove. Ramos lingered around second base, mouthing “No way,” looking around in disbelief. What went on up there was apparently beyond the field of vision for the four bleary-eyed umpires in attendance, and out of frame of the dozens of officially sanctioned cameras that Big-Brother MLB games nowadays. Giants coaches voiced their discontent, gesturing towards the heavens, towards he obvious. The umpires performed an official review on the play, waiting on the field for visual confirmation to bail them out for their collective blink. They surely understood what had happened by that point, but now needed visual proof, another angle. There were plenty that provided cursory evidence. How ‘bout Heliot Ramos trotting out of the box as if the ball was destined to splash down in the aquarium; or Griffin Jax rubbernecking the drive from the mound? With his eyes pinned to the ball at the center field wall, Cedric Mullins clearly says “Oh sh*t”  before retreating back across the warning track to catch the baseball dropping from the sky like a dead dove. 

One of the catwalks turned a sure-fire tater into a can of corn, and I guess since the lens’ eye missed it, it didn’t happen, no matter what physics and geometry and logic dictates. What is written in the official scorebook is what happened. No questions asked. Baseballs fall from the sky all the time.

The home run that never was cost the Giants the game.

Well, probably not.

It cost them an early lead, at least, a brief boost in energy, a reprieve from the suffocating bleakness that has blanketed the team. The solo shot could’ve meant something — but it didn’t happen, so nothing happened. A couple of frames later, the Rays scored first with three consecutive weak singles off Landen Roupp in the 4th. A lead-off double, a pair of walks, and a single helped chase the right-hander off the mound with just an out recorded in the 5th, serving Roupp his shortest outing of the year. The Giants bullpen kept things mostly steady in relief, and the offense avoided the complete embarrassment of another another shutout when Devers doubled home Luis Arraez in the 6th.    

Arraez’s one-out double gave San Francisco their first at-bat with a runner in scoring position. They managed just one yesterday; today they got three and a hit! Devers punched a hard-hit liner towards left field that Chandler Simpson jumped after, pocketed in his glove momentarily before jostling free after colliding with the wall.

So I guess things evened out. Tropicana’s structural features, they giveth and taketh. Thanks to a wall, the Giants had their first run in the series — four innings late, but what can ya do? Be mad at a building? 

ANAHEIM, Calif. — They were once core four prospects and considered the Mets’ future, but these days Francisco Alvarez, Brett Baty, Mark Vientos and Ronny Mauricio are an overall reflection of the team’s disappointing play.

The foursome began Saturday with a combined -0.8 bWAR, a troubling factor in the Mets’ 11-21 start.

Baty and Vientos have taken on larger roles than originally anticipated due to injuries: Juan Soto missed nearly three weeks in April and Jorge Polanco has missed the past 2 ½ weeks. Mauricio became the starting shortstop last week when Francisco Lindor hit the injured list with a left calf strain.

The Mets need improvement, and it might start with these four, all of whom have shown flashes over the last few seasons. A closer look:

Alvarez

After a fast start to the season, the 24-year-old catcher has cooled, both offensively and defensively.

Though his strikeout percentage has dropped, so has Alvarez’s hard-hit ball rate. The idea that he can help anchor a lineup as a consistent 25-homer-a-season presence might be fading.

Will the Mets ever get the offensive presence from Alvarez that compensates for his difficulty behind the plate?

Most notably, Alvarez ranks only in MLB’s fifth percentile for blocking balls in the dirt. Alvarez has been league average in throwing out base stealers.

Luis Torrens is the superior defensive player — explaining the two-year contract extension he received from the club Saturday — and it might be time, for the third straight season, to consider whether Torrens should play more often than a traditional backup.

Baty

There was so much hope Baty had finally arrived following a strong two-month stretch to conclude last season, but mostly he’s just appeared lost at the plate and frustrated by umpires.

Baty, 26, has bat speed — he ranks in MLB’s 75th percentile in that category — but his strikeout percentage and hard-hit ball rate are problematic.

After spending the last two seasons at third base and second base, he’s playing neither position this year as he receives work in right field and at first base. Has the change been too much for Baty to absorb?

Vientos

Other than the Mets’ first road trip of the season, when he helped carry the lineup, it’s been a slog for the 26-year-old as he adjusts to playing first base on an almost regular basis.

Vientos’ underlying numbers paint an ugly picture, with his average exit velocity, strikeout percentage and walk percentage all ice cold. Ideally, the Mets would just use him against left-handed pitching, but that luxury hasn’t been possible due to the injuries.

Vientos entered Saturday with an .833 OPS in 26 plate appearances against lefties. But in 56 plate appearances against righties, that number dropped to .548.

Defensively, he’s a work in progress at first base. He earned praise early in the season for his glovework, but there have been glaring letdowns. And his baserunning doesn’t earn him bonus points.

Most glaringly, he ran through a stop sign at third base last week and was thrown out by plenty at home plate.

Mauricio

Of the four players, the 25-year-old Mauricio is the least tested. He began Saturday with only 321 major league plate appearances, largely a result of losing the 2024 season rehabbing a torn anterior cruciate ligament.

The Mets received a reminder of his power potential Friday when he crushed a go-ahead, seventh-inning homer. The blast was Mauricio’s first this season. He began the day with 10 strikeouts in 29 at-bats, without a walk.

“It’s been difficult,” Mauricio said. “I think there are moments where maybe you are trying to focus on too many things. In order to kind of make it a little bit easier on myself I kind of have to simplify the game, focus on the things I can control, and the things you can’t control you just let that go and play the game.”

With fireman Fernando Cruz having pitched Friday night and three of four days, it was Jake Bird who got the call in the role Saturday, which began an uneven string of relief work from a Yankees bullpen that is fighting for roles.

Bird showed potential and issues before Camilo Doval did the same in what became a 9-4 win over the Orioles in The Bronx.

After Ryan Weathers (with the help of a misplay from Ben Rice) loaded the bases without an out in the sixth in a game the Yankees led by five, manager Aaron Boone went to the righty Bird for the righty Pete Alonso.

A move that might have looked poor on paper worked, Alonso grounding into a double play that scored a run.

But on the verge of escaping, the inconsistent Bird walked Tyler O’Neill and gave up an RBI double to Samuel Basallo before getting out of the inning with the Yankees in front 6-3.

“Jake Bird had some really good moments again today,” Boone said. “I thought [he] stabilized through a dangerous part of the game for us.”

Bird passed the baton to Doval, one of the quietly more important Yankees considering his potential and his volatility for a team that needs quality setup men ahead of David Bednar.

Pitching for a second straight day, Doval walked Dylan Beavers and displayed a career-long issue: a struggle to hold runners on base.

Beavers stole second and third and then scored on a groundout.

“I thought he threw the ball well, but a little slow in the running game,” Boone said of Doval, who had been excellent Friday and on Saturday recorded two outs before giving the ball to Tim Hill, who once again just needed one pitch (which induced a groundout from Gunnar Henderson) to escape.

Paul Blackburn pitched the final two scoreless innings as the Yankees ran away from Baltimore and helped preserve further work from an unorthodox bullpen.

The Yankees are carrying Blackburn and Ryan Yarbrough, two arms capable of starting, while searching for reliable bridges to Bednar.

The bullpen as a whole started well, became an issue for a short while and has pitched better of late, posting a 2.79 ERA in the past 14 games.

“I think our pen’s done a really nice job,” Boone said. “I think leaving spring training, maybe we had some question marks to answer down there. And it’s still going to evolve and get there. But I think by and large, those guys have done a really nice job.”

Jasson Domínguez, who was drilled in the elbow and left Wednesday’s game, returned to the lineup and served as designated hitter.

Domínguez went 1-for-4 with a single.

Giancarlo Stanton has begun hitting, Boone said, taking cuts Friday for the first time since straining his calf April 24.

There is no known timetable for Stanton to start running.

Elmer Rodríguez is expected to receive at least one more start and is lined up to pitch Tuesday in a series opener against the Rangers.

• CHECK OUT THE LATEST MLB STANDINGS AND YANKEES STATS

His teammate earlier this season at Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, Carlos Lagrange, remains on the Yankees’ radar.

The fireballing righty has pitched to a 3.75 ERA in six starts — while maxing out at 83 pitches in an outing — and struck out 30 while walking 14 in 24 innings.

There is still uncertainty whether Lagrange, whose four-seamer has averaged 99.2 mph, can better help this season in the rotation or bullpen.

“[He] continues to give us reason to be very excited about him,” Boone said of the 22-year-old, who finished last season at Double-A Somerset. “Another step up to Triple-A, and starting there and getting rolling. So far I think it’s been good.”

Anthony Volpe, who remains at Double-A Somerset despite being healthy enough to return to the majors, was set to play his 12th rehab game Saturday night.

Volpe is expected to play for Somerset again Sunday before his rehab clock runs out and the Yankees will have to decide whether to bring him back — and if so, whether he would be the starting shortstop over José Caballero — or whether to option him to the minors.

Boone and Gerrit Cole greeted Sarah Langs, an MLB researcher who is fighting ALS, on the field before the game and gave Langs a signed bat for her birthday.

With a chance to secure the series win, the Braves had ace Chris Sale on the mound at Coors Field with young Rockies star Chase Dollander expected to take the mound after an opener.

The Braves followed my recommendation in the first inning, jumping on the opener Brennan Bernardino, as Ronald hit a line drive single and Drake Baldwin sent an opposite field shot over the left field wall for a two-run homer. Ozzie doubled before Bernardino recorded two outs and was yanked for Dollander to face Dubon. That’s a pretty disastrous opener scenario for Colorado. Dubon walked, but Austin Riley struck out to end the inning.

Chris Sale worked a clean first and handed things back to the offense. Jorge Mateo doubled with one out in the second and advanced to third on a Ronald Acuna groundout. Unfortunately, Ronald pulled up limping on that play and appeared to have injured his hamstring, walking off under his own power. Drake Baldwin brought Mateo home with a opposite field line drive single. The next threat was in the bottom of the third, as the Rockies got a leadoff single from Karros. Mauricio Dubon made a spectacular sprinting catch, crashing into the wall in center field, robbing double bases and an RBI for the first out of the inning. That was a big deal, as the Rockies ended up getting an RBI double, but that easily could have been a 2 or 3 run inning without that catch.

The Braves broke things open in the fourth, however, scoring three runs on an Austin Riley walk, a Jorge Mateo infield single, an Eli White bunt single, and a Drake Baldwin frozen rope double. Atlanta now carried a 6-1 lead heading into the bottom of the fourth inning, where Chris Sale worked around a walk for another scoreless frame. Onto the fifth and Michael Harris doubled ahead of Austin Riley, who absolutely launched a homer off a 98 MPH fastball into the left field seats. That’s Austin’s second productive game straight at the plate, as getting real production from him would be huge for this team.

Chris Sale lost his command to start the bottom of the fifth, walking the first two batters. This seemed to frustrate Sale a bit, as he started pumping upper 90s with his fastball. One soft grounder and two strikeouts later, the inning was over with no damage done. The game settled down from here, and Sale completed two more innings, finishing with a flourish of three consecutive strikeouts following a leadoff single in the seventh. Chris ended up with 7.0 innings of 1-run ball with a season-high 11 strikeouts on a monstrous 20 whiffs.

Dylan Lee pitched a clean eighth inning and Matt Olson launched a moonshot of a solo homer in the ninth, at just under 110 MPH off the bat and a 39 degree launch angle, his 11th homer of this young season.

Hunter Stratton got mop-up duty in the ninth, with an eight run cushion. He had no issue finishing the game, with some assistance from a tailor-made double play to end the ballgame. That’s now 10 series wins and one split through 11 series and a 23-10 record for Atlanta. They will go for a sweep behind the returning Spencer Strider tomorrow.

ST. LOUIS — Roki Sasaki might’ve finally turned a corner from his recent struggles Saturday night.

Too bad the Dodgers’ offense took too long to do the same.

Despite a season-best six-inning, three-run start from Sasaki, the Dodgers remained mired in their recently maddening slump during a 3-2 loss to the Cardinals at Busch Stadium. 

In their latest sign of futility, they endured eight shutout innings that included as many hits as double plays (four each). Then, despite some good batted-ball luck that keyed a last-gasp, two-run rally in the ninth, they fittingly ended the game by stranding the tying and go-ahead runners on base.

“Just comes down to, we didn’t score enough tonight,” manager Dave Roberts said.

Indeed, Saturday followed what has become an uncomfortably common script for the Dodgers (20-13) in recent days.

They couldn’t generate power, failing to hit a home run for a fifth straight game (the longest drought for the club since 2015). They couldn’t take advantage of situational opportunities, either, going hitless with runners in scoring position until their short-lived comeback attempt in the top of the ninth.

That inning was keyed by three two-out singles that all deflected off the glove of a Cardinals fielder. Andy Pages then snuck a seeing-eye grounder through the infield to cut the deficit to one.

Alas, Dalton Rushing struck out as a pinch-hitter to end the game and send the Dodgers to a fourth straight defeat.

They still somehow finished with six runners left on base, even when accounting for all the double plays they hit into.

In the first inning, Will Smith became the first victim on an inning-ending grounder that was turned by shortstop Masyn Winn. In the third, Alex Freeland got doubled off after an overly aggressive jump on a lineout to second from Shohei Ohtani. Another double play ended the fourth, when JJ Wetherholt made a spinning turn at second on a ground ball from Teoscar Hernández. Then in the fifth, Hyeseong Kim couldn’t leg out a tapper back to the mound that was also turned for two.

“Once we started to build something, the double plays got us,” Roberts said. “They turned a couple really good ones. That certainly kills innings.”

It also meant that, when Sasaki stumbled in a three-run third inning, the 3-0 deficit might as well have felt like 30.

Even with some fortunate bounces at the end, the Dodgers fell to 5-9 in their last 14 games.

“There’s gonna be times where we’re not clicking,” Pages said through an interpreter afterward. “And this is one of those times right now.”

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What it means

Before Saturday’s game, Roberts joked he was an “eternal optimist” while declaring “today’s the day” the lineup would finally turn things around.

By the end of the night, such laughter was gone –– but the manager was still trying to put a spin on the team’s confounding recent struggles.

Roberts maintained that the club’s slide is “what every team is going to go through in baseball throughout the course of a season.” He downplayed the notion that it has revealed larger concerns in the offense, noting what he felt were higher quality at-bats throughout Saturday’s game.

“I thought the intentions were better on balls in the hitting zone,” he said, after noting pregame that his hitters seemed too “passive” on pitches they should attack.

“Yes, we hit into some double plays tonight. But I thought we took some good walks and, obviously, in the ninth inning, I thought we put together some good at-bats. I just think we need to be aggressive and take what the pitcher gives you. But every team goes through this through the course of the season.”

Who’s hot

Sasaki … at least by the end of the night.

After drastically changing his signature splitter last week — abandoning his traditional forkball grip for a more prototypical splitter release — the right-hander used both variations of the pitch Saturday. It led to varying degrees of success.

Early on, Sasaki had his usual command problems, walking two batters and hitting another in his first two innings. Then in the third, the Cardinals finally got to him. Iván Herrera and Alec Burleson hit back-to-back doubles off his fastball. Jordan Walker got a hanging forkball in an 0-2 count that he belted for a two-run blast.

Just like that, it was 3-0 with no outs in the inning.

Another disastrous performance seemed to be at hand.

The one thing Sasaki has done well this season, however, is bounce back from such adversity. And over the rest of Saturday night, he provided his best example yet. The 24-year-old retired 12 of his final 13 batters to complete six innings for the first time this year. He also recorded only his second “quality start” (at least six innings, no more than three earned runs) in 14 career starting performances in the majors. 

There’s still a long way to go in his development. And his ERA is still an unsightly 5.97.

But the trend line, for the first time this year, finally appears to be pointing up. 

“I do think that there was a lot of growth,” Roberts said. “Each of his last handful of starts, he’s gotten better.”

Who’s not

Of the many, many hitters who don’t look right in the Dodgers’ lineup, no one’s slump has been more consequential than Ohtani’s.

After his ice-cold bat, the rest of the offense seemed to follow his lead.

On Saturday, the two-way star went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts. In this series, he has now made an out in all nine trips to the plate. Overall, Ohtani hasn’t recorded a hit since Monday. And after it seemed like he was getting back on track last week, his season batting average is back down to .252 and his OPS is down to .835.

When Ohtani last spoke to reporters Tuesday, he framed his slow start as nothing out of the ordinary, saying it usually takes until May for him to typically find his swing. However, he also acknowledged that, when his hitting mechanics are off, his two-way duties can make it more difficult (or at least take longer) to get his swing synced back up.

Case in point: He has just one home run in his last 18 games and only two extra-base hits in his last 12.

Up next

The Dodgers will try to avoid getting swept for the first time this season Sunday, when Justin Wrobleski (4-0, 1.50 ERA) will face off against ex-Dodger Dustin May (3-2, 5.28 ERA).

The Arizona Complex League, a.k.a. Rookie Ball, started this afternoon. I normally don’t do a full recap of the ACL Cubs. Instead, I just give a link to the box score and comment if anything extraordinary happened today. I also don’t wait for the ACL Cubs to finish before I hit “publish” on the nightly wraps. I’d rather get the recaps to you before you go to bed at night than wait for a West Coast rookie ball team to finish up. Today was a day game so that was not a problem, but once summer rolls around and things get scorching hot in Arizona, the games will almost all start near sundown.

Last night shortstop Ty Southisene scored the winning run for Myrtle Beach in the bottom of the ninth. That’s the last thing he’s going to do for the Pelicans because he was promoted to High-A South Bend.

Everyone lost but Mesa.

Iowa Cubs

The Iowa Cubs were cast out by the St. Paul Saints (Twins), 16-2.

So the Saints scored in every inning but the sixth. Doug Nikhazy’s I-Cubs debut was one he’d like to forget as he got clobbered for eight runs on six hits over 2.2 innings. Nikhazy walked three and struck out four.

Close to all of the I-Cubs offense came from right fielder Kevin Alcántara. Alcántara singled and scored in the second inning on a double by DH BJ Murray. Then in the seventh inning, Alcántara hit his league-leading 11th home run of the year.

Alcántara went 3 for 4 with the home run and he scored both of Iowa’s runs.

Murray was 2 for 3 with the double and a walk.

Center fielder Brett Bateman went 1 for 2 with two walks.

That’s all of Iowa’s hits today.

Murray’s double.

The Jaguar strikes again for 397 feet.

Knoxville Smokies

The Knoxville Smokies were left on the launchpad by the Rocket City Trash Pandas (Angels), 7-5.

Starter Tyler Schlaffer pitched 4.1 innings and surrendered two runs, one earned, on three hits. Schlaffer did walk four while striking out three.

Schlaffer was relieved by Jace Beck who allowed one inherited runner to score and five more of his own. Beck’s final numbers were five runs on seven hits over 1.2 innings. Beck walked one and struck out two.

Left fielder Andy Garriola homered twice tonight: a two-run home run in the second inning and a solo home run in the fourth. Garriola leads the Smokies with seven home runs. Tonight he finished going 2 for 3 with walk and the two home runs.

Shortstop Jefferson Rojas was 2 for 4 with an RBI double in the sixth inning. Rojas scored on Garriola’s first home run.

South Bend Cubs

The South Bend Cubs were boiled by the Ft. Wayne TinCaps (Padres), 7-6.

Kevin Valdez started and allowed four runs on six hits over 3.2 innings. He walked three and struck out two.

Ethan Flanagan took over in the fifth inning and gave up just one run on four hits over the next four innings. Flanagan struck out four and walked one.

JP Wheat was called upon to get the save in the top of the ninth and in typical wild JP Wheat fashion, he took the loss after allowing two runs on no hits and four walks. Wheat also uncorked two wild pitches. He struck out one in the one inning of work.

Second baseman Drew Bowser tied the game up 5-5 with a two-run double in the fifth inning. Bowser went 1 for 2 with two walks and a hit batsman.

First baseman Cole Mathis was 1 for 3 with a triple and two walks. One of the two walks came with the bases loaded for one run batted in. He scored twice.

Bowser’s double.

Myrtle Beach Pelicans

The Myrtle Beach Pelicans were hypnotized by the Columbia Fireflies (Royals), 4-3.

Dominick Reid turned in a decent start, going five innings and allowing just two runs on five hits. He did walk four batters while striking out six.

Hayden Frank tossed the final four innings, gave up his first two runs of season and took the loss. Frank allowed two runs, one earned, on three hits. He walked one and struck out two.

Catcher Logan Poteet was 1 for 2 with two walks and an RBI single in the seventh inning.

Left fielder Jose Escobar went 1 for 4 with a two-run single in the first.

Poteet’s RBI single.

ACL Cubs

Cubs 7, Athletics 5

Kaleb Wing, the Cubs’ fourth-round pick last year, made his professional debut in this game and allowed one run on two hits over four innings. He struck out six and walked no one. Something tells me he’ll be in Myrtle Beach soon.

Second baseman Juan Cabada, a top 20 prospect in most Cubs prospect lists, went 3 for 5 with a triple, a run sored and three RBI in his stateside debut.

And, so, it ends. By going 0-for-4 today, Vargas’s streak ended at 27 games. That’s still the second longest in franchise history. You have to go all the way back to the early stages of the franchise’s sophomore season in 1999, to find the only bigger streak. Club legend Luis Gonzalez reached 30 games between April 11 and May 18 that year. But, as we’ll see, there are grounds for thinking Ildemaro’s may be more impressive, given the offensive environment of the time. It’s been a while since any D-back has come close to approaching Gonzo. Over the past twenty years, just three reached 20 games: Paul Goldschmidt (26 in 2013-14), Ketel Marte (21 in 2024) and Vargas. Here’s the top dozen.

What’s most impressive is, nobody saw this coming. Of all the people potentially to challenge the record in 2026, he was likely among the longest odds. Corbin Carroll? Sure. Ketel Marte? Of course, especially given his previous 21-game streak. They have a far better track record. For most of the other entries on the chart above, the players concerned were well known to be decent hitters. Even the notoriously light-hitting Tony Womack came in to the 2000 season with a .278 career average. But at the end of last year, when the streak was just three games old, Vargas was a career .249 hitter. His previous high hit streak before this? Just ten games, in 2022 when he was with Washington.

The 24-game streak at the start of the season makes it particularly impressive. That’s the longest streak to open a campaign for fifty years. Ron LeFlore of Detroit reached thirty at the beginning of 1976. Doing so also allows Vargas to get into some uncharted territory elsewhere. At the end of the streak yesterday, he was batting .404 on the season with 99 PA in the books. That’s comfortably the deepest into the season that an Arizona player has been able to post a .400 average. Here are the five previous D-backs with the most PA to reach the .400 mark (only stats at the end of the game being counted):

1. 77 PA: Geraldo Perdomo, May 3, 2023, BA .409
2. 67 PA: Mark Reynolds, June 1, 2007, BA .413
3. 64 PA: Greg Colbrunn, May 25, 2000, BA .404
4. 60 PA: Orlando Hudson, April 15, 2007, BA .411
5. 58 PA: Pavin Smith, April 18, 2025, BA .408

Gonzalez came achingly close to smashing them all, including Vargas. On June 4th, 1999 he went 2-for-4 and raised his average for the season to .398. That was as close as he got in a meaningful size. But that .398 did come over a much longer period, covering 227 plate-appearances and 201 at-bats. On the surface, that’s much more impressive than Vargas. Except, 1999 was a very different era, as Jack reminded me on X. There are reasons hit streaks of over 25 games have become much less frequent. The overall batting average that year was .271: this year, it’s .243. Put another way, if we assume 4 AB per game, a league average batter hitting 25 games in a row was roughly five times more likely in 1999.

The actual results bear this out. We asked Baseball Reference for all the hitting streaks of 25 games within a single season during the divisional era, led by Pete Rose’s 44 games in 1979. There were 82 all told over the fifty-seven seasons from 1969-2025, so about one and a half per year. But there have only been six since the end of 2016, and none of those got past 26 games. [Vargas’s season-spanner doesn’t count, of course] In contrast, 2011 alone had four, two of which reached the thirty-game checkpoint. Things peaked, unsurprisingly, in 1999, with six 25+ streaks. Gonzo’s 30-game run was surpassed later in the year by Vlad Guerrero reaching 31.

The other unexpected bonus in this being an early-season surge, is seeing a Diamondback hitter as the #1 for the batting title. When was the last time a Diamondback was in that position? The most literal answer is boring, albeit with a surprising name. Jeff Mathis went 3-for-4 on Opening Day 2017, and that .750 batting average was tied with six others for the major-league lead after that day. But that’s also not really what we’re wondering. What about as late in the season as we are now? Then the answer is a more predictable name: Paul Goldschmidt led all of MLB in batting average on August 18, 2015. Here’s the relevant Fangraphs leaderboard.

In fact, again looking from May 1 onwards in each season, only 2015 Paul Goldschmidt and 1999 Luis Gonzalez have ever led MLB in batting average. The latest date Gonzo led was June 5, 1999 — when he was hitting .390, the day after coming one hit short of batting .400. Again, it was a very different offensive environment, let’s say. As some of you might know, we have never had a full-season batting champion. 2015 Goldy would finish 4th, while 1999 Gonzo would finish 6th. The closest we’ve ever come was 2019 Ketel Marte, who finished 3rd, and never led.

Here are the others who led after only 1 or 2 games besides Mathis: 2000 Steve Finley, 2013 Gerardo Parra, and 2014 Goldschmidt (after just the Australia series; it helps that only two teams had played!). And here are the others who led later on in April: 2001 Jay Bell (April 18-19), 2007 Orlando Hudson (April 15 and 20), and 2011 Miguel Montero (April 8-10, 13-14). All told, that’s some pretty good company for Vargas. Is it sustainable? Almost certainly not, though even after this afternoon’s ohfer, Ildemaro still has a striking 47-point lead over the current runner-up, the Astros’ Yordan Alvarez.

Still, we’ll continue to enjoy it while it lasts. You can only appreciate the wonders of a game where, for more than a month an unheralded journeyman on his fifth stint with the Diamondbacks, was the best hitter in baseball.

The Dodgers nearly suffered their second shutout loss in as many weeks, managing to get a pair of late runs in the ninth inning but falling to the St. Louis Cardinals 3-2 on Saturday.

Roki Sasaki had a decent start in the first inning, getting his first two outs on eight pitches, but put two men on with two outs by walking Alex Burleson and allowing a single to Jordan Walker. A bookend strikeout of Nolan Gorman helped him get out of the inning unscathed. Sasaki needed just three pitches to get two outs in the bottom of the second, but plunked Ramón Urías on a 1-1 count before walking Victor Scott II to once again put two on with two outs. Sasaki got another bookend strikeout— this time against J.J. Wetherhold— to strand the pair.

Once the Cardinals came to bat in the bottom of the third, Sasaki got ambushed early with a pair of doubles from Iván Herrera and Burleson to give St. Louis the early lead. Walker got to an inside slider from Sasaki and drilled a line drive that snuck over the left field wall to give the Cardinals a three-run lead. It was the eighth home run that Sasaki has allowed this season— tied for fifth most this season— and the fourth allowed over his last two starts. He would follow up that inning by retiring nine hitters in a row as he completed six full innings for the first time while tossing a career-high 104 pitches.

Sasaki has continued to display dominant results over the first two innings of his starts, as he has allowed just one run in innings 1 and 2 over his six starts, but he has allowed 18 runs after the start of the third inning, resulting in a 9.72 ERA from innings 3 and beyond this season. A positive note for Sasaki is that the walks have decreased dramatically, as he has walked just three hitters over his last 11 innings.

The Dodgers on offense were left stunned by the Cardinals defense as they couldn’t get anything going against Michael McGreevy. Will Smith hit into an inning-ending double play in the first inning, and the Dodgers couldn’t come through with two men on base and less than two outs in the second. The Dodgers were able to get the leadoff man on in the third with a bunt single from Alex Freeland, but Shohei Ohtani’s line drive was snared on a diving catch by Wetherholt, doubling up Freeland at first for another double play. The Cardinals would turn another pair of double plays to end both the top of the fourth and fifth innings.

The Dodgers managed to put multiple guys on base against Ryne Stanek in the top of the seventh, including their first hit since the third inning from Teoscar Hernández, but Andy Pages struck out swinging representing the tying run to get the Cardinals out of trouble. Jojo Romero followed Stanek with a perfect eighth inning, striking out both Miguel Rojas and Ohtani.

The Dodgers put up a two-out rally against closer Riley O’Brien as Kyle Tucker and Teoscar Hernández reached on infield singles. Max Muncy lined a ball just over a leaping Wetherhold into right field to bring home Tucker and score the first Dodger run since the sixth inning on Friday. Pages kept the rally going with a base hit to left field to bring home Hernández, putting both the tying and go-ahead runs on base in a one-run game. Dalton Rushing came in to pinch hit, but went down swinging as the Cardinals took the series from the Dodgers and rattled off their sixth consecutive win.

In what has been an utterly brutal week for an anemic Dodgers offense, the team is averaging just 2.4 runs per game this week while recording just five extra-base hits— all doubles, no home runs— over that stretch. The Dodgers have performed miserably with runners on base this week, as they are hitting just .225 with runners in scoring position while leaving a combined 40 runners on base over their last five games. The Dodgers have now dropped four of their last five games against the Cardinals at Busch Stadium dating back to last season.

Game particulars

• Home runs— Jordan Walker (10)
• WP— Michael McGreevy (2-2): 6 IP, 3 hits, 0 runs, 3 walks, 3 strikeouts
• LP— Roki Sasaki (1-3): 6 IP, 5 hits, 3 earned runs, 2 walks, 4 strikeouts
• SV— Riley O’Brien (9): 1 IP, 4 hits, 2 earned runs, 0 walks, 2 strikeouts

Up next

The Dodgers close out their series in St. Louis on Sunday (11:15 a.m. PT, SportsNet LA) before heading down to Houston for a three-game set against the Astros. Justin Wrobleski makes his fifth start while old friend Dustin May goes for the Cardinals.

Excuse me while I pinch myself to make sure I’m not dreaming. No, this is real. The St. Louis Cardinals continue to prove they are more than just a timid rebuild as Michael McGreevy threw a gem and Jordan Walker’s bat continued to provide the power leading the Cardinals to a 3-2 win over the overpaid Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Cardinals bats would ignite starting in the 3rd inning as Ivan Herrera and Alec Burleson hit back-to-back doubles giving St. Louis a 1-0 lead. They would add to that score immediately afterward as Jordan Walker powered a 372 foot shot barely over the left field wall giving the Cardinals a 3-0 lead.

Meanwhile, Michael McGreevy appeared to be channeling his inner Greg Maddux as he kept the Dodgers on the ground tossing 6 innings allowing only 3 hits and no runs including a Sportscenter double play turned by now and future up-the-middle combo JJ Wetherholt and Masyn Winn. Someone find the radar gun and measure the velocity of Winn’s throw to first. 91.6 mph!That had to sting Burleson’s glove.

Ryne Stanek came in to handle the top of the 7th inning and after getting the first two outs decided to allow some drama. He gave up a single and a walk, but managed to get Pages to chase two pitches out of the zone to escape with no damage. All’s well that ends well. JoJo Romero was the designated 8th inning guy and he got the Dodgers out 1-2-3 including striking out Shohei Ohtani who was held hitless by the Cardinals pitching staff Saturday night.

Riley O’Brien was brought in to lock down another Cardinals victory in the top of the 9th inning. He was tasked with tackling 2-3-4 of the Dodgers lineup and struck out Freddie Freeman on 3 pitches with an ABS challenge assist from eagle-eye Ivan Herrera. Smith lined out to Jordan Walker in right field. Kyle Tucker reached on a sinking line drive that Masyn Winn was not able to pick in time. Hernandez also reached on a ball that Masyn Winn was not able to snag cleanly up the middle which brought up the tying run in Max Muncy. He lined a ball just over JJ Wetherholt’s leap to bring in Tucker for the Dodgers lone run making it 3-1 Cardinals. Andy Pages singled in Hernandez pulling the Dodgers to within a run of the Cardinals making it 3-2 St. Louis. Pinch-hitter Dalton Rushing fortunately struck out to end the game.

I can’t believe that I’m saying this, but the Cardinals will go for a sweep of the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sunday as Dustin May will pitch the most appropriate jersey number to calendar day in history with his May 3 attire. First pitch is scheduled for 1:15pm at Busch Stadium Sunday.

The Kansas City Royals (13-19) face the Seattle Mariners (16-17) in the second game of their series. The Royals won Friday’s opener 7-6. Starting pitchers are Seth Lugo for Kansas City, with a 2.63 ERA, and Emerson Hancock for Seattle, with a 2.86 ERA.

How to watch Kansas City Royals vs. Seattle Mariners

• Date: Saturday, May 2

• Time: 9:40 p.m. ET / 6:40 p.m. PT

• Where: T-Mobile Park, Seattle, WA

• TV Channels: Mariners.TV, Royals.TV

• Live Stream:ESPN+, MLB.TV | Follow on Yahoo Sports

Team records

• Kansas City Royals: 13-19 (No. 5 in AL Central)

• Seattle Mariners: 16-17 (No. 3 in AL West)

Odds

• Spread: Seattle Mariners -1.5

• Moneyline: Seattle Mariners -147 (57.0%) / Kansas City Royals +123 (43.0%)

• Over/Under: 7.5

Starting pitchers

Kansas City Royals: Seth Lugo (1-1, ERA: 2.63, K: 31, WHIP: 1.17)
Seattle Mariners: Emerson Hancock (2-1, ERA: 2.86, K: 32, WHIP: 0.98)

Weather: 72°F at first pitch

Ballpark: Capacity: 47,929 | Roof: Retractable | Surface: Grass