Category: Baseball

On Wednesday, the Houston Astros officially announced they would not be renewing the contract of manager Joe Espada, one day after the Seattle Mariners were granted permission to interview him for their vacant managerial role.

The move follows three seasons and two AL West titles for Espada in orange and blue. Espada had a strong lineup, but big shoes to fill in taking over for the retiring Dusty Baker after serving as Houston’s bench coach since 2018. Inheriting a strong roster with some glaring flaws, he led the club to a 256-229 record in his tenure. Previously, Espada spent time on the coaching staffs of the New York Yankees and Florida/Miami Marlins stretching back to 2010 in the role of third base and/or infield coach. Houston had already fired general manager Dana Brown in August, leaving the future for Espada murky at the end of his contract this year.

The 51 year old Puerto Rican was selected 45th overall in the 1996 draft by the Oakland Athletics, an impressive feat as he’d starred at the University of Mobile in Alabama, competing at the NAIA level of college athletics. Espada spent a decade playing in the minors, including stints with the now-defunct Low-A Southern Oregon Timberjacks in Medford, OR and later in then-Triple-A Vancouver with the Canadians as an A’s prospect. Espada bounced around to the Rockies, Marlins, Royals, Cardinals, Rangers, and Rays before returning to his alma mater to coach and play indy ball. His coaching path took him up through the minors when he was hired as a hitting coach in the Marlins system, eventually joining the Marlins big league staff in 2010. Espada has been a coach on the staff for the Puerto Rican national team in the World Baseball Classic since 2013.

The case for Seattle to pursue and hire Espada is straightforward. The Mariners have made it clear they are seeking a manager with outside perspectives, experience, and the ability to augment the existing programs in place. Espada has worked across several successful organizations, spent the past three years as an active manager with undeniable success, and is already quite familiar with the American League West. Espada would also be Seattle’s first Spanish-speaking manager since Lou Piniella, and the first full-time manager born outside of the contiguous United States (Cuban Marty Martinez, known for signing Edgar Martinez and Omar Vizquel as a scout, managed one game for Seattle in 1986 in the absence of full-time skipper Chuck Cottier). It goes without saying that the capacity to communicate fluently to the majority of the players on the roster is an extremely valuable skill, particularly when trying to communicate and deliver educational and instructive concepts while building buy-in and trust.

Houston choosing to not renew Espada could be seen as a red flag, but the decision appears most concentrated with their owner, Jim Crane, whose decision-making with personnel is more pockmark than not at this point. Espada has spoken about how the impacts of being steeped in two organizations (New York and Houston) highly inclined towards incorporating analytics and advanced data-tracking into their philosophies has helped him learn to be a better communicator and teacher, as well as his experience raising his children, including a daughter, Viviana, with an autism diagnosis. Astros beat reporter for The Athletic, Chandler Rome, described Espada as “[a manager with a reputation as a players’ manager who allowed Houston’s veteran clubhouse to function how it saw fit.” That may strike a workable balance for Seattle, who has valued player agency in Jerry Dipoto’s decade and change of tenure, but is in need of greater balance.

They’ll also need to navigate the elephant in the video room that comes with any former Astros hiree of a certain era.

After serving on the Yankees staff through the 2017 season, Espada joined the Astros in 2018, in the middle of their sign-stealing cheating scandal that helped accelerate their decade of success. It is not clear what involvement Espada had in the cheating scheme, which began prior to his arrival in 2017 per MLB’s investigation and continued through the 2018 season. Much blame was levied on his predecessor as Houston’s bench coach, Alex Cora, as well as veteran player Carlos Beltrán, but given Cora departed, it seems likely Espada was aware at a minimum. Nonetheless, he was named the interim manager in Houston upon the year-long suspension of manager A.J. Hinch.

MLB is not an organization nor a culture that values consequences if they impede what they want, however. Hinch was hired immediately after his suspension by the Detroit Tigers. Cora’s suspension led to him being immediately rehired, extended, and as recently as this month having the Phillies publicly pursue him doggedly to the point he chose to turn them down. Espada, like the rest of the Astros coaching staff, players, and organization save general manager Jeff Luhnow, saw little or no consequence for their decision to cheat to win. While this has long drawn frustration within the sport and outside of it, there is a genuine uncertainty that MLB’s investigation struggled to identify: who actually did what, and how do you determine responsibility?

Can Espada be the right fit for Seattle? We’ll know soon if the Mariners think so.

Welcome to the 2026 edition of Ranking the Rockies, where we take a look back at every player to log playing time for the Rockies in 2026. The purpose of this list is to provide a snapshot of the player in context. The “Ranking” is an organizing principle that’s drawn from Baseball Reference’s WAR (rWAR). It’s not something the staff debated. We’ll begin with the player with the lowest rWAR and end up with the player with the highest.

No. 41, Zac Veen (-0.3 rWAR)

Zac Veen (No. 6 PuRP) has had a lot of ups and downs in his tenure with the Rockies.

There was a lot of excitement when the outfielder was drafted ninth overall in 2020 out of Spruce Creek High School in Port Orange, FL and he ended up making his MLB debut on April 8, 2025 after nearly breaking camp with the team.

It didn’t go very well.

Veen played 12 games with the Rockies in 2025, slashing just .118/.189/.235 with eight total bases and 14 strikeouts. He fared a little better in Triple-A Albuquerque — slashing .289/.354/.468 through 90 games — but it was revealed in spring training 2026 that Veen was dealing with substance abuse off the field.

When he arrived at Salt River Fields to start 2026, Veen was a different player.

He’d put on about 43 pounds from the end of last season, and was a new player both physically and mentally. Veen played in 11 spring games, hitting .250/.375/.550 with two homers.

He was optioned to Albuquerque to start the year, and absolutely tore through the Pacific Coast League. Ahead of his call-up on August 11th, Veen was hitting a scorching .327/.402/.635 with 24 home runs and 18 stolen bases. He was named PCL Player of the Month for June — where he hit .366/.385/.782 with 24 extra-base hits — as well as back-to-back PCL Player of the Week for the weeks of August 2nd and August 9th.

Veen was recalled on August 11th and made his MLB re-debut on August 12th against the Arizona Diamondbacks. He immediately made his presence known by hitting a home run into the pool at Chase Field in his first game back:

He doubled down by hitting a splash home run into McCovey Cove in San Francisco in the very next game:

He also had that wild play at home on August 16th:

Veen came back with a vengeance, but it didn’t last.

After about a week, he began to cool off both at the plate and in the field. He was primarily used as a late-inning pinch hitter, or he would be pinch-hit for late in games. He didn’t make much of a case for himself, though, as he also committed numerous blunders in the field (though only two were scored as errors).

The most egregious ones were on September 17th against the San Diego Padres, where Jackson Merrill and Xander Bogaerts hit back-to-back triples, though they could’ve been scored as errors.

He also bobbled a few during the season-closing Diamondbacks series.

As shown by his -4 OAA and -5 DRS, Veen’s defense left much to be desired, especially late in the season.

Offensively, Veen slashed just .232/.312/.435 in 36 games. It’s not a terrible line, but it’s nothing to write home about either. The 39.2% strikeout rate is, though, as it was second only to Braxton Fulford (40.0%) and nearly double his strikeout rate in Albuquerque (20.4%).

Skyler Timmins wrote about Veen’s performance in early September, and not much has changed since then.

Veen’s torrid Triple-A season was rewarded, though, as he finished the year as Baseball America’s Triple-A Player of the Year, PCL MVP — the first Rockies prospect to win the award since Nolan Arenado’s cousin Joshua Fuentes in 2018 — and a postseason All-Star.

As the Rockies continue their rebuild, there will be some tough decisions to make.

Zac Veen’s future is one of them.

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Ex-Yankee Jake Bauers is quickly becoming a household name in Milwaukee.

The Brewers first baseman earned NLCS MVP honors after recording six RBIs in the four-game sweep of the two-time defending champion Dodgers.

He put his name in the franchise’s history books by becoming the first Brewer to win the championship series honor, with his go-ahead two-run homer in Game 3 potentially swinging the series.

“I don’t know,” Bauers said said after Thursday’s 6-4 win. “I just let it all come to me. I didn’t chase it. I didn’t want anything. I just wanted to be a part of something, and that’s what I got.”

The other time they won a league pennant, in the 1982 ALCS, the award went to the Angels’ Fred Lynn.

Bauers was close to being nowhere near the NLCS when he contemplated retirement two years ago.

He batted .202 and hit twelve home runs for the Yankees in 2023 and was traded to Milwaukee after the season’s end. He began his tenure there by batting .199 in 2024.

Bauers only changed his mind on retirement when his wife told him she was pregnant, and Bauers kept at it to help support his family.

Bauers had decent stretches for the Yankees in a rough 2023 for the club, working his way up from Triple-A Scranton Wilkes-Barre, but his 30-game stretch with a .495 OPS in August and September ended the season on a sour note, and the Yankees sent him to the Brewers for two minor league outfielders.

Bauers might very well face the team that he debuted with in the World Series in a week’s time: he was drafted by the Padres in 2013, but was traded to the Rays the following year and made his debut in Tampa in June 2018.

After floating through several organizations and spending time between the majors and minors in 2025, Bauers had a breakout this season, slashing .266/.389/.484 with 26 home runs.

Now, after four trades, three releases and thoughts of retirement, he’s helped lead the Brewers to their first pennant since 1982, just a year after being swept by the Dodgers in the same series.

He went 4-for-14 en route to the NLCS MVP award, but the four hits made noise.

He had a two-run double in Game 4 during the Brewers’ comeback and hit a two-run home run in the seventh inning of Game 3 to help Milwaukee grab the lead for good.

“He’s been huge for us all season, and I’m just really proud of him,” teammate Christian Yelich said. “He’s been a huge part of our team, and he had an unbelievable series with some great at-bats and a huge homer last night and a big double today to get things rolling. He did a great job.”

Bauers and his Brewers will open the World Series and host the Guardians or Rays at American Family Field on Oct. 23.

Rawlings has announced the Gold Glove finalists for the 2026 season at each position group in both the American and National Leagues. Pittsburgh Pirates star second baseman Brando Lowe is up for the award which would be his first gold glove of his career.  

The finalists are coming from The National League Central. Lowe, alongside a pair of division rivals in Brice Turang of the Milwaukee Brewers and rookie JJ Wetherholt of the St. Louis Cardinals, is one of three players up for those honors at second base in the NL.

The 32-year-old was Acquired in a three-team trade from the Tampa Bay Rays last offseason alongside Mason Montgomery and Jake Mangum that saw Mike Burrows head to the Houston Astros. The star second basemen did not disappoint this season for the Buccos. 

He slashed .260/.331/.493 with 35 home runs and 96 RBIs over a career-high 656 plate appearances for the Pirates. Lowe controversially was not an All-Star this year, but he did finish with 5.4 bWAR, which is the highest mark of his career.

It might be a tough award to win this year for Lowe because of how good Turang and Wetherholt have been defensively for their respective teams. Lowe finished the season with 13 defensive runs saved which is 10 behind Turang who had 23. 

The veteran had 15 outs above average which was one more above Turang but was well under wetherholt who had 25. 

Lowe was so important to the Pirates winning season this year. He finished the year leading the team in home runs and RBIs and he was the best defender on the team. It would be amazing to see a Pirate win this award. Third baseman Jared Triolo was also announced as a gold glove finalist as well for Pittsburgh. 

The winners will be announced on November 1st. 

The quest for a three peat is over. The Commissioner’s Trophy will find a new home.

A year after the Dodgers swept the Milwaukee Brewers in the 2025 NLCS, Milwaukee returned the favor with a four-game sweep over the defending two-time champions, marking their first World Series appearance since 1982. The best team in the 2026 regular season will try to secure their first championship in franchise history.

Game 4 did not look promising in the early goings for the Brewers, as Andy Pages collected his third hit with runners in scoring position of the postseason to start the scoring against old friend Dustin May in the bottom of the second inning. Shohei Ohtani had his breakout moment, smashing a three-run home run to give the Dodgers their biggest lead of the series. Little by little, Milwaukee went from being hitless over their first three innings to chipping away at Tyler Glasnow and the bullpen, scoring six unanswered runs and breaking the hearts of Dodger fans in attendance.

Glasnow was in total command over his first 10 batters faced, striking out six while working with a four-run cushion. A walk to Brice Turang spelled the Dodgers’ inevitable doom, as William Contreras and eventual NLCS MVP Jake Bauers roped ground-rule doubles to cut the Dodger lead in half. Glasnow managed to complete four full innings, but Milwaukee kept the blood pouring as David Hamilton brought the lead to one run with a base hit up the middle in the top of the fifth.

Evan Phillips came in relief of Glasnow to keep the lead alive, but after two consecutive two-out walks to Turang and Contreras, Dave Roberts decided to bring in Alex Vesia to face Bauers with the bases loaded. Vesia couldn’t locate the zone and allowed Milwaukee to tie the game on four pitches without a swing of the bat from Bauers. Garrett Mitchell had only hit one home run against a left-handed pitcher in the regular season. He hit his second home run off a southpaw in as many days with a go-ahead home run against Tanner Scott in the top of the sixth inning, completing the comeback for a hungry Brewers team.

The Dodgers managed to grab a lead in every game against Milwaukee, but the Brewers kept finding ways to turn things around. A team that scored a combined four runs in last year’s NLCS, Milwaukee turned things around by scoring a combined 21 runs in the four-game sweep. Four runs for the Dodgers in both Games 2 and 4 were the most they could muster against Milwaukee, and the team averaged less than three runs scored per game.

The last time the Dodgers were eliminated in the postseason before Thursday, Kiké Hernández lined out to Lourdes Gurriel Jr. to help the Arizona Diamondbacks finish a three-game sweep in the 2023 NLDS. Hernández once again represented the final hope for the Dodgers, lining out to Jackson Chourio in left field and sending the city of Milwaukee into an unforgettable frenzy.

2026 was the final season of Kevin Gausman’s five-year, $110 million free-agent contract. In the first four seasons, Kevin posted a 48-41 record, a 3.48 ERA, and an 11.5 bWAR. A good return on a big free-agent contract. Not all that many of those go as well as this one did.

But 2026 was his age-35 season, and sometimes pitchers don’t do well in their mid-30s.

The Yankees have long since been eliminated, and now the World Series is at an end as well. The Rays found the Brewers to be a far tougher opponent than New York or Cleveland, and the Brew Crew have captured their first championship in franchise history. Now, the MLB offseason will commence, and there are several dates to keep an eye on in the months ahead.

With the lockout becoming more likely to begin in December, expect to witness a lot of cancellations, alterations, or postponements of important events such as the Winter Meetings, owner meetings, and the draft lottery. If the MLBPA and the owners’ dispute lasts deep into 2027, there’s at least a chance we may not see any baseball at all in the majors in 2027. The best-case may be something like what happened last time around, when an agreement was reached in early March and no games were ultimately lost outside of spring training; the 2022 campaign just began and ended a week later than originally planned.

Regardless, the list below tracks all the important dates that you’ll need to keep track of as we make our way through the offseason, with modifications to be anticipated from the impending lockout.

October 29: Free agents will automatically file at 9 a.m. EST. They won’t be allowed to sign for five days.

November 1: Gold Glove Award winners will be announced at 9 p.m. EST on ESPN. Cody Bellinger, Austin Wells, and José Caballero were all named finalists this season.

November 2: Free agents will be free to sign with any team at 5 p.m. EST. This also marks the last day to reinstate players from the 60-day injured list and issue qualifying offers to free agents who are eligible. Jazz Chisholm Jr. and David Bednar are among the Yankees who could potentially receive the QO, which has been set at $23.15 million.

Additionally, the Hall of Fame eight-person Contemporary Baseball Era ballot for post-1980 managers, executives, and umpires will be released, and the BBWAA Award finalists will be revealed on MLB Network from 6 – 8 p.m. EST.

November 5: Silver Slugger finalists will be announced by Louisville Slugger at 11 a.m. EST.

November 6: Heart & Hustle Awards will be announced, and the Platinum Glove Award winners will be revealed at the Gold Glove Awards dinner in New York City.

November 9: Rookie of the Year will be announced at 7 p.m. EST on MLB Network.

November 9-13: The GM Meetings will begin on November 9th and continue through the 13th.

November 10: Manager of the Year will be announced at 7 p.m. EST on MLB Network.

November 11: The Cy Young Awards and the new BBWAA Relievers of the Year honors will be announced at 7 p.m. EST on MLB Network. Yankees’ ace Cam Schlittler is a frontrunner for the Cy Young after a stellar second season in pinstripes; he would be New York’s first winner since his teammate Gerrit Cole in 2023.

The MLB Awards Show, premiering on MLB Network at 9 p.m. EST, will reveal the All-MLB first and second teams, the Hank Aaron Award winners, Comeback Players of the Year, Mariano Rivera & Trevor Hoffman Relievers of the Year, and the Edgar Martinez Designated Hitter Award winner.

November 12: This year’s MVP Award winners will be announced at 7 p.m. EST on MLB Network.

November 16: The 2027 Hall of Fame ballot will be released at 12 p.m. EST. Andy Pettitte and Alex Rodriguez are among the candidates from last year’s cycle who earned enough votes to carry over into 2027. Retirees from 2021 will be under consideration, with Giants great Buster Posey leading a group that also includes career Yankee Brett Gardner.

November 17-19: The owners meetings will take place in New York City.

November 17: The Silver Slugger Awards will be announced.

This date also marks the Rule 5 protection deadline, which means that teams have to add any eligible players to their 40-man roster in order to make sure that they aren’t available for the draft.

The deadline for players to accept qualifying offers will also be at 4 p.m. EST.

November 20: This marks the deadline for decisions on tendering or non-tendering contracts for eligible players.

December 1: The Collective Bargaining Agreement expires at 11:59 p.m. EST, and barring a surprise in the current negotiations, the lockout will officially begin. As a reminder, minor-league players who are not already on a team’s 40-man roster have their own separate CBA that ends in December 2027, and no matter how long the MLB lockout lasts, the minor-league season will begin on time.

December 6: The Hall of Fame announces the Contemporary Baseball Era inductees. As mentioned in the November 2nd note, only managers, executives, and umpires are under consideration by that commitee for 2027. The more familiar BBWAA results come later on.

December 7-9: The Winter Meetings are scheduled be held in San Diego, but the major-league parts of it will likely be cancelled due to the lockout.

December 8: The Draft Lottery will take place, but will likely be postponed due to the lockout.

December 9: The Rule 5 Draft is scheduled take place, but will likely be affected in some way due to the lockout. The MLBPA did propose moving it up to late November so that there isn’t a repeat of what happened during the 2021 lockout, when the major-league portion of the Rule 5 was cancelled and only the minor-league phase was held. (There have not been any updates on the proposal’s acceptance.)

January 8: This is the official deadline for arbitration numbers to be exchanged between players and teams, but it will likely be postponed due to the lockout.

January 15: International Free Agent market for 2027 opens.

January 19: The results of the 2026 BBWAA Hall of Fame ballot and the 2027 inductees will be revealed, and we’ll find out who will be cementing their names in Cooperstown. 

February 19: Yankees spring training opener, on the road in Dunedin against the Blue Jays (subject to change due to the lockout).

March 25: Yankees Opening Day, at home against the Blue Jays (subject to change due to the lockout).

On what might have been his final night in the Dodgers clubhouse, Tarik Skubal did not want to contemplate his future.

From two lockers over, however, teammate Blake Snell didn’t waste any time in beginning to make a sales pitch to this winter’s top free agent player.

“I just said, he can’t leave me, especially on these terms,” Snell told the California Post, following the Dodgers’ elimination in the National League Championship Series. “The goal is to win a World Series, and we weren’t able to do that … So now that it’s over, it’s like, ‘Don’t leave.’”

When the offseason begins next month, there will be plenty of other teams making their own efforts to woo Skubal.

As a 29-year-old two-time Cy Young Award winner, he could be poised to break MLB’s record signing for a pitcher, currently held by fellow Dodgers ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto at $325 million.

The Dodgers, however, might have something of a leg up.

After they traded for Skubal in a blockbuster deal at this year’s deadline from the Detroit Tigers, the left-hander quickly embraced his surroundings in Los Angeles.

“Incredible organization, incredible teammates, incredible fanbase,” he said, after being denied the chance to start a potential Game 5 following the Dodgers’ four-game sweep to the Brewers. “Doesn’t make this feel any better. It sucks. But you know, I think everybody in here gave it everything they had, and sometimes that’s just baseball.”

When asked if he hoped to be back with the Dodgers next year, Skubal wasn’t ready to begin speculating about his free agency.

“I’m not going to comment on my future really at all,” he said. “Today sucks. That’s kind of where my head’s at.”

But when reflecting on how much he enjoyed his three-month stint in the organization –– the first time he had played for any other team than the Tigers –– he was effusive in his praise for the club and its players.

“It was great,” he said. “The guys in this clubhouse are great. The veterans who are here, great. The young guys are great. It’s a group that works their a– off and goes out and competes with the best of them.”

“Extremely grateful for all the guys in this clubhouse and how they welcomed me and supported me,” he added. “Always had my back from day one. So extremely thankful.”

Few players had more of an impact on Skubal than Snell –– a fellow left-handed, two-time Cy Young Award winner who just happens to share the same representative in super-agent Scott Boras.

From almost the moment Skubal arrived, he and Snell struck up a friendship that helped the midseason acquisition quickly acclimate to his new, unfamiliar surroundings.

They talked practically daily. They referred to themselves as “best friends” in social media posts. Their bond became so evident to the rest of the roster, Miguel Rojas created an AI video of them wrapping together that went viral on social media.

“He’s just a great human, great pitcher,” Snell said. “Fun to learn from. Fun to have conversations with. Just talk baseball with.”

And while, during the season, Snell said they didn’t discuss Skubal’s future, the recruiting effort was on as soon as their campaign ended Thursday night.

“I would love nothing more,” Snell said, “than for him to be back.”

The Dodgers, of course, are expected to pursue Skubal this winter. Just like when they made him a priority at the deadline, he represents the most impactful potential move they could make during the offseason.

That doesn’t mean re-signing him will be easy. The threat of a lockout, and potential implementation of a salary cap or other stricter financial regulations, could complicate their ability to add another mega-contract to their already bloated long-term payroll.

Skubal will have no dearth of other serious suitors, as well.

Snell knows that, noting that regardless of what happens, “I’m excited for what’s to come for him.”

“Whether that’s with us or another team, wherever he goes, they’ll know they’re getting a great dude,” he said.

However, this year’s Dodgers rotation of them, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tyler Glasnow formed an impactful collective relationship.

“How much we cared for each other and pushed each other and wanted each other to succeed,” Snell said, “it was real.”

Which is why, when Snell was asked how badly he wanted Skubal to re-sign with the Dodgers, he cracked a sly grin.

“Really bad,” he said.

Already, the Skubal sweepstakes are underway.

In my glorious middle school prime, the be-all and end-all of t-shirt-based playground bravado was centered around the output of the No Fear T-Shirt Corporation. On the mean streets boulevards of Pleasant Hill, California, I learned valuable life lessons from reading my classmates’ aggressive clothing. I learned that if you died with the most toys, you still died. I learned that if you can’t win, don’t play. And I learned that second place is the first loser.

In the end, the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers were both losers. The Giants, because they lost 97 games, traded 25% of their team at the deadline, embarrassed themselves on the field with errors and homophobia, and employed the Jim Tomsula of major league managers. The Dodgers because they paid $616 million dollars to be the first loser. Actually, they’re tied for the second loser!

The Los Angeles Dodgers were swept in the National League Championship Series, something that has never happened to the San Francisco Giants. They’ve been swept in the World Series, in 1989. They’ve been swept in the Division Series, by the Marlins in 1997. But they’ve never suffered the ultimate in baseball humiliation: An NLCS sweep.

The Milwaukee Brewers were so confident in Game 4 that they spotted the Dodgers four runs, with Dustin May intentionally serving up a gopher ball to a hobbled Shohei Ohtani for a three-run home run.

Aww, he punched with both fists!

It’s not clear whether May’s pitch was a mistake, a selfless gift like you’d grant to a Make-A-Wish child, or a cruel gambit designed to make the Dodgers and their fans enjoy a few innings of false hope before the Brewers destroyed their dreams. Nevertheless, Ohtani celebrated, Chavez Ravine went wild, and the Dodgers did not score another run, finishing the series with just 11 runs in four games.

For the record, Ohtani, Mookie Betts, Kyle Tucker, and Freddie Freeman made $160M combined this season, though I believe through deferrals and delayed signing bonuses it somehow counts for Negative-Eleventy Million for competitive balance tax purposes.

The Brewers climbed back in the game by hitting back-to-back ground-rule doubles off Tyler Glasnow ($95M through 2028), which bounced off LA’s child-sized fences in both left and right field. Some say the correct term is “automatic double” and you will pry the laptop out of my cold, dead hands before I ever type that.

Then they came the rest of the way back by stealing bases, drawing walks, and generally remaining unintimidated by the team who swept them last year. It could also be the facial hair. Milwaukee hadn’t been to the World Series since 1982 and more than one Brewer has a mustache that would fit in just fine in the early 80’s.

The Dodgers’ two biggest free-agent splashes of the offseason were Tucker (four years, $240M) and reliever Edwin Diaz (three years, $69M [nice]), who actually played great against the Brewers after having wildly disappointing regular seasons. This winter, they’re hoping to bring back trade deadline acquisition Tarik Skubal, and then fill out their pitching staff with Robbie Ray, Michael King, and Kevin Gausman, while adding Seiya Suzuki for their outfield. Hell, why not let him try to pitch, too?

The early exit does give Ohtani a chance to spread his wings even further, and take over as the placekicker for the Los Angeles Rams. Catcher Will Smith plans to patch things up with Chris Rock now that he has some time off and Max Muncy plans to squint at a lot of things and then yell at them. And ownership plans to bulldoze the Hall of fame in Cooperstown and build a giant data center on the land.

Given his recent legal troubles and his sale of the Los Angeles Lakers, Dodgers owner Mark Walter may be facing financial uncertainty. So much that he’s reportedly considering selling his interest in his private prison corporation, or Palantir.

The Dodgers are going on vacation. Because they got swept. Say hi to JT Brubaker in Cancun, Max!

Notes from Game 4

• The Brewers’ hitting coach is Daniel Vogelbach, a 33-year-old who made the All-Star team as a DH in 2019. Vogelbach was listed at six feet tall and 270 pounds, Perhaps unsurprisingly, Vogelbach was not known for his foot speed or his defense. He played first about 30% of the time and the rest was all DH.
• It feels like teams often choose a hitting coach who is multi-skilled, with a wide range of reasons why they were professional baseball players. Vogelbach is a one-tool athlete. He managed to have a nine-year MLB career with the build of Chris Farley. OF COURSE he knows how to hit!
• The moment I knew the Dodgers were truly in trouble was just after they’d walked in the tying run in the 5th inning. FS1 went to a crowd shot, and landed on actor Chris Klein, from “American Pie” and “Rollerball.” That was the best celebrity fan they could zoom in on? Was Jason Bateman busy recording a podcast or something? You know the series had gotten hopeless because even Kevin Hart wouldn’t show up for guaranteed camera time.
• There was a Tanner Scott-Garrett Mitchell matchup in the 6th inning where both players would have better names if the first and last were reversed. Anyway, Mitchell crushed a home run to give the Brewers an insurmountable lead.
• Related: “Cooper Pratt” is a wildly unlikeable name.
• Not only did the Brewers end our national nightmare by sweeping the boys in blue, they limited the number of times baseball fans had to listen to John Smoltz talk. We only have to hear him seven more times, max, thanks to Milwaukee.
• If you happen to be watching the baseball playoffs with your five-year-old nephew, angrily shouting “Kyle Tucker!” is a great way to feel like you’re swearing without corrupting a minor.
• The biggest loser is Pat Riley, who registered the trademark for “Three-Peat” back in 1989. His Lakers let him down by losing to the Detroit Pistons in their attempt to win three straight titles, as did his own Miami Heat by losing to the San Antonio Spurs in 2014. That’s the real reason Riley has a bad relationship with LeBron James now. Since the Lakers in 2002, none of the Big Four sports teams have three-peated, with this year’s Dodgers being perhaps the biggest threat in two decades. Riley also owns the rights to “Four-Ward,” which hasn’t yet come up.
• Byron Scott invented the term and then Riley trademarked it. Maybe that’s why Riles bailed after 1990 — he was worried Scott was coming after his royalties.

LOS ANGELES — Dodger Stadium joined a select group of baseball stadiums on Thursday, when the Milwaukee Brewers swept the Dodgers to earn a trip to the World Series for the first time since 1982. The stadium at Chavez Ravine is only the fourth MLB ballpark since the start of divisional play to have three consecutive pennants clinched on its field.

In 2024, the Dodgers closed out the New York Mets in Game 6 of the NLCS for their fourth pennant under manager Dave Roberts, but it was the first time the team clinched at Dodger Stadium since 1988. Last year, they followed that up with a sweep of the Brewers, culminating with Shohei Ohtani striking out 10 in six scoreless innings while also hitting three home runs in the finale in Los Angeles.

Since 1969, with the introduction of divisions and thusly another round of the postseason before the World Series, only three other ballparks have seen three consecutive pennants clinched.

Turner Field, Atlanta (1995-97)

Everyone remembers the Eric Gregg Game, when the home plate umpire had a broad definition of the strike zone during Livan Hernández’s 15-strikeout game, but that was Game 5 in Miami. The Marlins clinched the pennant in Game 6, beating the Braves in Atlanta in the first year they played in Turner Field.

In 1998, the Braves stayed alive by winning two games in San Diego, one of only four of 43 teams down 3-0 in a best-of-7 series to force at least a Game 6. But the Padres recovered to win Game 6 in Atlanta to win their second pennant.

After seeing other teams celebrate a pennant on their field, the Braves did so themselves by closing out the Mets at home. But even that was tough, as the Braves were up 3-0 and the Mets won the next two games, forcing the series back to Atlanta.

The 1990s were a fertile time for the Braves, and only a new stadium prevented this from being an even longer run. The Braves swept the Reds in the 1995 NLCS then beat the Cardinals in seven games in 1996. Both were clinched at their old ballpark, Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, so this was really a five-year streak of the National League pennant won in Atlanta.

Wrigley Field, Chicago (2015-2017)

The Mets in 2015 beat the Dodgers in a five-game Division Series, then swept the Cubs in the NLCS, finishing off the series in Chicago. One year later, the Cubs beat the Dodgers in six games to claim their first pennant in 81 years.

In 2017, the Dodgers turned the tables, winning the first three games before the Cubs staved off an NLCS sweep by winning Game 4. Kiké Hernández homered three times in a blowout win in Game 5, clinching the Dodgers’ first pennant in 29 years, and the third straight celebrated at Wrigley Field.

Minute Maid Park, Houston (2017-19)

Everyone’s sweethearts, the bang-bang 2017 Astros finished off the American League Championship in Game 7 over the Yankees. Lance McCullers Jr. pitched the final four innings, which was the last save of at least three innings in a postseason clinching game before Aaron Ashby for the Brewers on Thursday night in Los Angeles.

In 2018, Alex Cora — the bench coach for the Astros in 2017 who would later serve a one-year suspension for his role in the sign-stealing scheme — was now managing the Red Sox and closed out the Astros in five games, the finale in Houston.

The Astros battle the Yankees again in 2019 and won the ALCS in six games, finishing things off at Minute Maid Park.

Trea Turner will open the season at shortstop. Don Mattingly is returning as manager. Alec Bohm could be back at third base, Luis Arraez could also return. The majority of a bullpen nobody liked is set to return, no starting pitchers are getting dealt to help in other areas, and it sounds like Brandon Marsh isn’t going anywhere, either.

All these nuggets from Dave Dombrowski’s press conference on Thursday may have you feeling perplexed, bewildered, confused and perhaps a bit frustrated.

To be fair to Dombrowski and Mattingly, they were never going to come out and say, “Get ready for an off-season of big changes.” You never make promises you don’t know if you can keep, and with the lockout looming and so much roster inflexibility, the level of change desired by most may not be realistic. We’ve been saddled with an underachieving roster that appears headed in the wrong direction, and we want to know that the 70-year-old team president is seeing what we’re seeing.

Based on his statements Thursday, it seems clearer to Dombrowski there are more issues to deal with than in past seasons, but he’s not exactly matching our energy. Which, to be honest, is probably a good thing. Were he to signal that players under contract for 2027 weren’t in the team’s plans for next year, he’d have a hard time getting any kind of trade value for them.

But it does feel like the future Hall of Fame executive is not keeping up. Organizations like the Tampa Bay Rays, Cleveland Guardians and the NL champion Milwaukee Brewers, are doing laps around the Phils. It’s telling that, after their fifth straight postseason appearance, the team fired their longtime hitting coach Kevin Long, and their infield coach Bobby Dickerson, because they couldn’t get this team of stubborn veterans to play better. The roster, coaching staff, farm system, heck the entire organization, feels stuck in neutral compared to these small-market, low-budget teams that feature an array of good, young, athletic talent with homegrown superstars at the big league level and more on the way.

The Phillies’ farm system is not producing quality baseball players in the numbers it should, and they’re still trying to figure out why.

Meanwhile, the Brewers have quietly been one of baseball’s best teams for the last decade. Since 2018, Milwaukee has missed the postseason just once in nine seasons, when the 2022 Brewers finished in 2nd place with an 86-76 record and just barely missed out on the third wild card that the Phillies used to sneak into the tournament.

Finally, on their 8th try in 9 seasons, they’ve reached the World Series. They lost a heartbreaker of a seven-game series in the ‘18 NLCS to the Dodgers, lost in the wild card round four times, fell in the NLDS in ‘21, and were swept by the very same Dodgers they dispatched in four games last night.

It was very cool to see the Brewers avenge their sweep at the hands of Los Angeles last season, taking out the team that swept them a season ago as they sought their third straight title. It happened because the players displayed a resiliency that the Philadelphia nine has been lacking in recent seasons.

The Brewers moved past their failures. The Phillies are still struggling to do so.

In 2023, the Phils looked well on their way to following up their magical run to the World Series the season before after blitzing the Diamondbacks 10-0 in Game 2. We all know what happened next. Arizona adjusted their approach to the Phillies’ lineup, they didn’t adjust back, and they choked away Games 6 and 7 in the NLCS.

The Phillies are 4-12 in 16 playoff games since that fateful Game 3 in Arizona. Last year’s roster was probably the best of the bunch. The 2025 Phillies were a team playing extremely well heading into October, with no real weaknesses anywhere. Their four-game loss was excruciatingly close, and I believe if they’d advanced past the Dodgers, they would have won it all.

But they didn’t, and the specter of all those failures has haunted every player since. It was one of the reasons most fans wanted to see big changes this off-season. Sure, there were questions about the physical abilities of the aging roster but, just as importantly, something needed to be done to snap the collective psychosis of a group that routinely tightened up and succumbed to expectations every year.

The Brewers, meanwhile, have been making big changes to their roster every year. Much of that is due to a limited payroll, so it has been forced upon them in a way it has not Dombrowski and the Phils. It would be understandable if, after seven straight failures, they felt as if there was a steel ceiling above them that they would never break through.

Entering the 2026 playoffs, the Brewers postseason record since ‘23 was 4-10. But with new players on the roster every year, a culture of failure was never really able to set in.

Compare the 2023 Milwaukee squad to the one that is currently rampaging through the league right now.

2023 Brewers:

C – William Contreras
1B – Rowdy Tellez
2B – Brice Turang
SS – Willy Adames
3B – Brian Anderson
LF – Christian Yelich
CF – Joey Wiemer
RF – Tyrone Taylor, Sal Frelick, Mark Canha
DH – Jesse Winker

SP – Corbin Burnes, Freddy Peralta, Brandon Woodruff, Colin Rea, Wade Miley, Adrian Houser
RP – Devin Williams, Bryse Wilson, Joel Payamps, Hoby Miler, Elvis Peguero

2026 Brewers:

C – William Contreras
1B – Jake Bauers, Andrew Vaughn
2B – Brice Turang
SS – Cooper Pratt (21), Joey Ortiz
3B – David Hamilton
LF – Jackson Chourio
CF – Garrett Mitchell
RF – Sal Frelick, Luis Lara
DH – Christian Yelich

SP – Jacob Misiorowski, Shane Drohan, Kyle Harrison, Robert Gasser, Logan Henderson, Brandon Sproat
RP – Trevor Megill, Chad Patrick, Aaron Ashby, Abner Uribe, Grant Anderson

William Contreras, Brice Turang, and Christian Yelich are the mainstays. Sure, throw Sal Frelick into the mix if you want, too. The entire pitching staff is different, as is the majority of the position player grouping.

This is just in a span of four seasons. The Phillies, meanwhile, have featured much of the same roster during that stretch.

I can’t say for sure that player turnover has helped Milwaukee move past their postseason failures, but it helps to shake up the echo chamber. It’s also much easier to do when no one is signed for more than three seasons at a time. The Phils’ collection of longer contracts limits their flexibility, especially with their highest-priced players also possessing the ability to block trades.

It also helps to have great young players emerge to push the team forward.

The Phillies received an acceptable contribution from center fielder Justin Crawford, a better return (especially at the end) from Andrew Painter, and a surprising one from reliever Alex McFarlane. But that was it. The rest of the roster was returning veterans or castoffs from other organizations brought in on one-year deals. The younger vets that were here — Bryson Stott, Brandon Marsh and Alec Bohm — never materialized into being dependable, consistent players.

Milwaukee, however, saw their home grown stars provide them with elite production this year. Turang led the team in WAR (7.3), while Chourio (4.9) and former first round pick Garrett Mitchell (3.4) were right behind him 2nd and 3rd among position players. Jacob Misiorowski (6.5 WAR) just might be a unanimous selection for NL Cy Young Award this season. These were all positive additions from the farm system, and they added pieces through some smart deals, like Contreras coming from Atlanta as part of a three-team deal and signing Jake Bauers to a one-year, $2.7 million deal this off-season.

Milwaukee also made some dangerous decisions on elite arms that only came as a result of their payroll limitations.

They traded Corbin Burnes at the start of the 2024 season, the final year of his contract. They sent Freddy Peralta to the Mets prior to this season. They dealt their elite closer Devin Williams to the Yankees ahead of the 2025 season and sent All Star closer Josh Hader to the Padres in August of 2022. If the Brewers had the kind of payroll flexibility the Phillies do, perhaps some of those deals don’t happen. They did that once before with former MVP Christian Yelich, who inked a nine-year, $215 million deal before 2020. Six years later, they’re nearing the end of that contract and are struggling to get to the finish line.

Of course, Milwaukee is at the forefront on all of the analytics and data that is available. Eno Sarris of The Athletic outlined all the different ways the Brewers are working to get an edge in these areas. Meanwhile, the Phillies still can’t figure out how to align hitting information coming from their data analysts to the coaches up and down the organization. Long was fired this week in large part because there was a disconnect in the wiring somewhere. The Phillies hope to hire a new hitting coach that will be able to teach and implement this information to hitters at the big league level.

The Brewers are 10 years ahead of the Phils in this department. Perhaps that’s why they had 8 players with at least 250 plate appearances generate an OPS+ over 100. The Phillies had 2.

At his end-of-season news conference on Thursday, it sounded like Dave Dombrowski was a bit more aware of the state of the team’s roster, but didn’t display any real sense of alarm or urgency. He’s right when he says their starting rotation remains a strength and will provide the team with a high floor. He hopes to get the same kind of boost from Aidan Miller and Bryan Rincon that Milwaukee is getting from their home-grown talent.

We remain hopeful he’ll reach into a bag of tricks and find creative solutions to fixing a bad lineup and a bullpen that needs more trustworthy arms. And he’ll have to do it all while working around a work stoppage.

Make no mistake, the Phillies can’t become the Brewers, or the Rays, or any other franchise like them in just one off-season. But they can start by, in private at least, recognizing the severity of the situation.

Ten of the 26 men on the Yankees’ roster are now free agents following the conclusion of the 2026 World Series, and as a team that has a tremendous amount of money already locked up in various players — $177.8 million already allocated to Cody Bellinger, Aaron Judge, Gerrit Cole, Max Fried and Carlos Rodón — while caring a little bit about CBT thresholds, the money does matter to the club even if it doesn’t to me. Labor strife on the horizon also weighs in on all these conversations, while most people around baseball think some games will be played in 2027, a possible abbreviated spring training or otherwise shortened season means you need players that can ramp up quickly.

Here’s our list of 10 men:

The first question is who gets the Qualifying Offer, a one-year deal at just over $23 million. Trent Grisham got the QO last year and is therefore ineligible this time around, and frankly should be allowed to walk. Backward steps offensively and defensively, along with his inability to be QO’d, makes that an easy decision for me. Contrary to perhaps popular sentiment, Jazz Chisholm Jr. should be given the Qualifying Offer, even if it seems the Yankees are unwilling to extend it.

Jazz can be an incredibly frustrating experience as a fan, but he still put up three and a half wins in what was a down year offensively. Among primary second baseman, that was good enough to be the second best at the position in the American League, and with the Yankees his 10.1 fWAR builds out to a 4.8 win season projected over 600 plate appearances. He’s frustrating to watch, and he’s also a good player!

You have to bake in some IL time and you have to square the circle of second base, where the Yankees seem willing to platoon Anthony Volpe, and there’s no sense in paying a platoon player $23 million. If you QO Jazz, he needs to be your primary option at the keystone.

David Bednar is the other guy that seems worth QO’ing, but committing high dollar amounts to relievers always worries me. The Yankees spent $26.637 million on their bullpen this year, the second-best unit in the game by ERA. In 2019, they spent just a hair over $50 million. Again, I don’t care about their budget, but the team does, and spending $23 million on a guy pitching one inning makes me a little wary of the team’s ability to make moves in-season, even more so when we consider potential changes to the way players are compensated.

At the same time I don’t love the idea of locking Bednar up for the next four or five years. His K-BB rate, my personal favorite single pitching stat, fell six and a half points this year. His four-seam velo dropped almost a full mile per hour, and you don’t really recover velocity at age 32. He’s been very good since coming to the Bronx, and seems to have the mentality to handle pitching in New York, but boy I don’t want to see what he looks like at 36.

The rest of this group is hard to parse. I don’t mind Paul Goldschmidt as a strict platoon bat in theory, but I don’t trust the org to not overplay him, and in two straight seasons we’ve seen serious dropoffs in the second half — going from a 124 wRC+ to an 83 this year, and a 114 to a 76 last year. I think the game has passed the future Hall of Famer by.

Ryan Yarbrough and especially Paul Blackburn should have some offers from multiple teams, and both should garner interest from the Yankees. Yarbrough’s flexibility in going multiple innings and Blackburn’s emergence as a true high-leverage arm both make them good candidates for something like the two-year, $20 million deal Luke Weaver signed a couple years ago, massive upgrades from their current deals.

The rest of the crop I can take or leave.

So, assuming a non-catastrophic resolution to the CBA troubles, we’ve got two, perhaps up to four, of the Yankees’ free agents returning, adding about $65 million to payroll if all four guys come back. I don’t care about the budget but the team does, and that makes me a little worried about them making any other moves.

We’ll see what happens in the World Series, but another opportunity for a historic comeback has come and gone. The 2004 Boston Red Sox remain the only team ever to overcome an 0-3 series deficit in a best-of-seven series in the history of baseball. 

That’s hopefully a trend that goes on forever, leaving the legendary 2004 team on a pedestal of its own. Now with that said, it’s starting to get really annoying to see the media attempt to connect a modern-day team to the ‘04 Sox every single time a club goes down three games to none in a series. Sure, it’s a nice 2004 PR bump – not that the team needs it – but doing the “but dude, remember ‘04?’ for all of these teams is getting ridiculous. 

While many of these occurrences have sparked a quick chuckle and move on, the bit really gets old fast. 

Examples? 

David Ortiz’s razzing (one of many) of Derek Jeter during the 2023 ALCS. Aaron Boone showing the 2022 Yankees highlights of ESPN’s Four Days in October to fire up his squad (because showing an all-time low point of franchise history should do the trick!). The list goes on and on.

So honestly, credit to Dave Roberts – the man who ignited that magical October to begin with – for not inserting Red Sox propaganda into the 2026 NLCS, where it had no business being. Los Angeles got swept by the Milwaukee Brewers to end their bid for a three-peat and keep Boston’s long-standing legacy alive. 

The funny thing with so many of these examples is that whenever the teams or media point to 2004 to draw up a narrative, the incoming sweep (or gentleman’s sweep) feels inevitable and often plays out that way. That’s all the more reason to let the 2004 team live on their own and stop forcing the Sox into headlines where they don’t belong.

Only one other team has even forced a Game 7 after falling down 0-3. That would be the 2020 Houston Astros in the COVID season, who won three in a row before the Tampa Bay Rays finally woke up to win Game 7 and keep the Red Sox exclusive in their club. THAT was a fine time to make 2004 connections given how close Houston actually came to joining the party. 

Until a team is on the doorstep for real, please stop injecting 2004 talk into every single October. What the 2004 Red Sox did was amazing. Hardly any other team has even come close. It’s more than enough.

The Atlanta Braves have been making some small and quiet moves with their roster since their elimination in the NLDS and here’s another one. After they selected Danny Young’s contract last week, the Braves have decided to do the same with Brett Wisely as well. DaShawn Keirsey Jr. ended up getting outrighted to Triple-A Gwinnett as a corresponding move so they made a decision on him at some point without publicizing it. All of this was found on the Braves’ transaction page and was reported initially by Harrison Smajovits of Atlanta Braves on SI.

Wisely didn’t make any appearances with the Braves at the big league level in 2026 as he ended up playing 125 games for the Gwinnett Stripers this season. He had himself a pretty solid year at the plate, as he hit .281/.399/.436 with 11 home runs and 127 wRC+ at the Triple-A level last season. That’s to say that I’d imagine that the Braves aren’t bringing him up at this point in the offseason because they figure that he’s part of their big league plans for 2027.

Wisely has never really been able to translate his Triple-A success to big league success, so I’m guessing that the Braves figure that this is a good way to make sure that they’ll keep their options open with him being used in another transaction down the road, since putting the veteran on the 40-man roster means that he won’t be able to use his rights as a minor league vet to elect free agency. Wisely’s last stint with the big league Braves lasted all of 4 games and nine plate appearances in 2025, in case you’re wondering whether or not there’s really something here.

Either way, it’s a totally procedural move that gives the Braves a chance to do something with Wisely from a transactional standpoint going forward during the offseason without potentially losing him for completely nothing. We’ll see how it goes, though.

Shohei Ohtani’s plans are unchanged.

Despite his injury crisis this year, and the limitations it left him with in the playoffs, the two-way star still wants to be a two-way player again next season.

“Yes, definitely,” Ohtani said through interpreter Will Ireton on Thursday night, when asked if he intended to return to pitching in 2027. “And [I’m] looking forward to having a better season next year.”

The Dodgers would shudder at the idea of another Ohtani campaign going worse than this one.

In his attempt to return to a full-time two-way role for the first time since 2023, the four-time MVP ended up getting hurt, being shut down as a pitcher after only 85 innings, and slumping mightily at the plate for much of the playoffs while trying to manage his far-less-than-100% health.

His October limitations proved costly to the Dodgers.

His inability to withstand the physical toll of his one-of-a-kind role was one of the key reasons they were knocked out in the National League Championship Series.

On Thursday night, he indicated it’s possible he might need to have offseason surgery, as well; though he did not specify if it would be for his inflamed left knee, ailing right arm, some other unknown issue, or potentially all of the above.

“Hard to tell at this point,” Ohtani said. “It’s something that’s going to be analyzed, discussed over the offseason, and see if that’s a viable thing to do.”

And yet, the 32-year-old didn’t waver in his desire to continue to both hit and pitch moving forward.

He didn’t seem daunted by the disastrous way this season played out.

“I haven’t been able to really come to grip in terms of what I’ve learned overall this season,” he said. “It’s something that I’m going to kind of go back to the drawing board in terms of treatment, training program, and see what I can come up with for next season.”

The question, of course, is not whether Ohtani can still be dominant in his two dueling roles. This year, he still batted .275 with 30 home runs and 81 RBIs as a hitter, while going 8-2 with a 1.79 ERA in 14 pitching starts.

The problem was, after his knee started barking in June, and his arm became increasingly bothersome from July onward, he wasn’t able to make much of an impact on the mound or in the batter’s box.

His final pitching start came on July 3, with repeated attempts to build back up scuttled by physical setbacks.

His form at the plate dipped drastically over the final two months of the regular season, requiring an injured list stint in September that did little to get him back to himself.

In the playoffs, Ohtani hit just .192. Before his three-run homer in Game 4 of the NLCS, he didn’t have an extra-base hit or an RBI.

Because of all that, there was speculation the Dodgers might try to manage him differently next year –– and, if not ask him to give up on pitching, try to moderate his workload in a way that won’t be so taxing on his body.

If anything, however, Ohtani on Thursday night seemed to bemoan the fact he didn’t pitch more this year, noting how he wasn’t available for the postseason rotation.

“Not quite satisfied with how things shaped up on the pitching side,” he said.

What all that means for 2027 remains unclear –– especially with the threat of a looming lockout and potential offseason recovery process.

The only thing Ohtani knows for sure: He still wants to continue in his two-way role.