CANADA - MAY 12: The Blue Jays have relied heavily (too heavily?) on the strong right arm of reliever Duane Ward. (Photo by Jeff Goode/Toronto Star via Getty Images) | Toronto Star via Getty Images
Today marks Duane Ward’s 62nd birthday.
Duane ranks second on the Blue Jays’ all-time saves list with 121. Jordan Romano is third with 105 saves. The way pitching is changing, I don’t see anyone getting into that top three for a long time, unless the tide changes again and we go back to one reliever getting all the save opportunities.
Ward was born on May 18, 1964, in Park View, New Mexico. Drafted out of high school, he was selected ninth overall in the first round of the 1982 amateur draft by the Atlanta Braves. The tall (6’4”) right-hander initially struggled as a starting prospect in Atlanta’s system, battling control issues—walking five batters per nine innings and not yet racking up strikeouts as he would later. On July 6, 1986, the Jays traded Doyle Alexander to the Braves for Ward. Alexander was a solid starter, but the Jays ultimately got the better end of the deal.
After brief stints in the majors in 1986 and 1987, Duane began the 1988 season in the Jays’ bullpen and quickly emerged as Tom Henke’s setup man. He excelled, posting a 9-3 record with 15 saves and a 3.30 ERA over 111.2 innings in 64 games. With 60 walks and 91 strikeouts, his wildness contributed to his effectiveness. Times have certainly changed—no setup man would be expected to pitch 111 innings today. Now, if a reliever throws 70 innings, it’s considered a heavy workload.
Ward continued as Henke’s setup man for the next four seasons, and together they formed an outstanding bullpen duo. Duane improved each year, with ERAs of 3.77, 3.45, 2.77, and 1.95. He was no longer used strictly as a setup man—often pitching multiple innings—and reached double digits in saves each season, peaking at 23 in 1991. His strikeout rate soared to 11 per nine innings that year, while his walk rate decreased. He finished ninth in Cy Young Award voting in 1991.
After Tom Henke left via free agency following the 1992 season, Duane took over as the Jays’ closer. He thrived in the role, leading the league with 45 saves, striking out 97 in 71.2 innings, and posting a 2.13 ERA. Those 45 saves remain the highest single-season total in Blue Jays history. Ward’s dominance showed in his 12.2 strikeouts per nine innings and a .182 opponents’ batting average. He earned an All-Star selection, finished fifth in Cy Young voting, and even received MVP votes.
Ward played a crucial role in the Blue Jays’ two World Series championships. In 1992, he appeared in three ALCS games against Oakland, earning a win, and pitched in four World Series games against Atlanta, collecting two wins, allowing no runs, and striking out six in 3.1 innings. In 1993, Ward made four appearances with two saves in the ALCS victory over the White Sox, then added four more outings—including a win and a save—in the World Series win over the Phillies.
Duane missed all of 1994 due to a torn rotator cuff. He attempted a comeback in 1995, but after just four appearances, his career ended at age 31—a testament to the toll that heavy reliever workloads can take. Ward was an outstanding pitcher for six seasons, frequently throwing 95 mph fastballs and sharp sliders. In his era, relievers were expected to pitch more than one inning per outing, and Ward often appeared in 80 games a season.
Rob Neyer ranked him as the Blue Jays’ second-best reliever in franchise history. Ward now runs the “Duane Ward Baseball Clinic” and delivers motivational speeches, also traveling with the Jays’ baseball clinics. My youngest son attended those clinics a couple of times, and Duane was great with the kids.
Happy Birthday, Duane! Wishing you a fantastic day.
Also, having birthdays:
Tilson Brito turns 54. Before being traded to the A’s, he was a utility infielder in 1996 and 1996. He played in 75 games for the Jays. Hitting .228/.306/.291.
Mike Maksudian turns 60. He had three at-bats with the team in 1992. He’d go on to have a few at-bats with the Twins and White Sox.
Ryota Igarashi turns 47. He pitched one inning for the Jays in 2012, spent two seasons with the Mets, and played several games with the Yankees.
Ryan Burr turns 32. He pitched in 36 games with the Jays over the past two seasons. In 34.2 innings, he had a 3.89 ERA. In his one outing last year, he injured his shoulder and ended up having right capsule surgery and is currently recovering from that, and is a free agent.
On non-Jays birthdays, Kirk Gibson turns 69 today. He had a very good 17-year MLB career, finishing with a .268/.352/.463 batting line, 255 home runs, 284 steals and a 38.4 bWAR. The one moment that everyone remembers is the pinch-hit walk-off home run against Dennis Eckersley in Game One of the 1988 World Series.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Yankees’ Gerrit Cole was quick to point out that his second straight dominant start in his long-awaited return from Tommy John surgery was just that: his second start.
“Small sample size,” the former Cy Young winner said.
What a sample, though.
After allowing two hits over six scoreless innings against Tampa Bay in his first major league start since Game 5 of the 2024 World Series against the Dodgers, the 35-year-old Cole did even better against struggling Kansas City. He allowed four hits while striking out 10 without a single walk, sending the Yankees to a 7-0 victory — their 14th straight win over the Royals.
“I feel like maybe the first game was the appetizer,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said, “and that was the main course right there. That was surgical. You saw everything, like, good fastball, both breaking balls going, mixed in the cutter a little bit, made some really good change-ups along the way. There was good defensive plays behind him early and then he kind of cruised.”
Cole (1-0) needed only 79 pitches to get through 6 2/3 innings, and he probably could have gone deeper into the game against Kansas City. But at this point in what the Yankees hope is a long season, there was no reason to push Cole’s once-ailing right elbow.
The closest the Royals came to scoring off him came in the third, when Michael Massey hit a one-out double. Cole bounced back to strike out Isaac Collins, bringing Maikel Garcia to the plate. He ripped a single to right field, Aaron Judge fielded a tough hop cleanly, and then made a perfect throw to catch Massey at the plate for the final out of the inning.
Cole also stranded Garcia at second base after a two-out double in the sixth. Salvador Perez singled off him in the seventh.
And that was it. All the runners Kansas City managed against him.
“I think it just reminds you of who he is, and how great a consistent pitcher he is,” Boone said. “And to see him go through the process the last several months to get back to this, and go out there and execute like he is here to start, it’s fun to watch.”
Cole brutally was efficient, especially with his 96 mph fastball. He threw first-pitch strikes to 16 of the 23 batters he faced, and only a couple of batters even managed to drive the count to three balls against him the entire night.
“I expect to execute pitches. I don’t necessarily expect to not give up any runs, especially on 75% strikes. You’re putting a lot of pressure on guys,” Cole said. “So you have to play good defense, which is what we did tonight.”
There was pressure on Cole to execute, too, because the Yankees never really gave him a cushion. They managed a pair of runs on a single by Paul Goldschmidt, a triple by Ben Rice and Judge’s sacrifice fly, but the rest of their offense came after Cole departed.
It wasn’t nearly as prolific as the Yankees’ memorable 15-1 win in which they belted six homers and had 24 hits — and, in a first for one of the game’s historic franchises, every player in the New York starting lineup had at least two hits.
But with Cole back on the mound, they only needed a fraction of that offense in the series finale.
“It’s two games. Small sample size,” Cole said. “We still have stuff to improve, and just have to keep the same mindset that we have right now, and that’s to take it one outing at a time.”
(Original Caption) Three of the New york Yankees who had a lot to do in the 4-2 win over the Dodgers in the final game of the Series, whoop it up in GALA style after the classic triumph, October 7. Left to right are: out fielder Mickey Mantle, who homered; pitcher Bob Kuzava, whose mound performance saved the game; and outfielder Gene Woodling, who also homered.
Bob “Sarge” Kuzava was a left-handed pitcher who found success with the New York Yankees during a career in the majors that lasted a decade and saw him suit up for eight different teams. Kuzava, pronounced koo-ZAH-vuh, was born and raised in Wyandotte, Michigan, a town about 15 miles outside Detroit that now features a baseball field named in his honor.
Kuzava’s biggest claim to fame was being a valued swingman for Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel during the Yankees’ early-1950s dynasty. In fact, the southpaw became the first pitcher to earn a save in back-to-back World Series clinching games, turning the trick to close out Subway Series showdowns with the New York Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers in 1951 and 1952, respectively.
Robert Leroy Kuzava Born: May 28, 1923 (Wyandotte, MI) Died: May 15, 2017 (Wyandotte, MI) Yankees Tenure: 1951-54
Signed by Cleveland before the 1941 season out of St. Patrick High School in Wyandotte, Kuzava reported to Class-D Mansfield in Ohio. He performed modestly enough at age-18 to get the bump in 1942 to Class-C Charleston, where he posted a terrific campaign. Impressing both his organization and the fans in West Virginia’s capital, Kuzava went 21-6 with a 1.72 ERA and 1.145 WHIP in 235 innings.
However, Kuzava’s baseball career would not fully begin until after military service. Able men throughout the sport joined the fight in World War II, and Kuzava entered the U.S. Army in 1943. He served through 1945, focusing on military policy and spending two years overseas in Burma (now Myanmar), India, and China. When speaking about his time in the service, Kuzava said he was fortunate to see little, and no heavy, action but was nonetheless simply happy to survive and make it home.
After returning from the service, the left-hander had a solid season in Class-A for the Wilkes-Barre Barons, one of the predecessors of the Yankees’ current Triple-A club. Playing alongside future big leaguers like Ray Boone (Aaron’s grandfather), Kuzava went 14-6 with a 2.36 ERA in 217 innings, earning his first taste of the big leagues in a couple innings as a September call-up for Cleveland in 1946. While Kuzava did not make the club out of spring training the following year, he again got a few more cups of coffee in 1947, appearing in four games. Instead, most of his time was spent in Baltimore, as the O’s were a Triple-A affiliate for Cleveland in their final years as a minor-league club before the St. Louis Browns came to town and became the modern Orioles.
Cleveland eventually dealt Kuzava to the White Sox following the 1948 season as part of a trade including Ernest Groth for Frank Papish. This provided Kuzava with his first full season in the majors. In 1949, Kuzava appeared in 29 games for the Pale Hose, posting a 10-6 record with a 4.02 ERA while making 18 starts, good enough to earn him a single AL Rookie of the Year vote (the Browns’ Roy Sievers took home the honors with 10).
Kuzava started the 1950 campaign with Chicago but was traded in May when the White Sox packaged him alongside Cass Michaels and Johnny Ostrowski in a trade to Washington for Eddie Robinson, Ray Scarborough, and Al Kozar. The parts of two seasons that Kuzava spent with the Senators got interrupted by a torn Achilles. The injury occurred when Kuzava attempted to cover first on double play and got stepped on by former White Sox teammate Nellie Fox.
The extent of the injury was not known to the Yankees and general manager George Weiss, who acquired Kuzava at the then-Trade Deadline on June 15, 1951.
In exchange for Tom Ferrick, Bob Porterfield, Fred Sanford, and some cash, the Yankees got a still-on-crutches Kuzava. However, the Yankees needed a lefty reliever and once recovered, Kuzava quickly became an important arm for Stengel’s club as a bullpen arm and spot starter. With New York in 1951, Kuzava went 8-4 with a 2.40 ERA appearing in 23 games and making 8 starts.
Kuzava’s earn-your-pinstripes moment arrived during the 1951 World Series against the crosstown rival Giants. With a chance to clinch the Yankees’ third consecutive championship in Game 6 at Yankee Stadium, Kuzava made his playoff debut in a helluva spot: the ninth inning with the bases loaded after three-straight singles off Johnny Sain, none out, and the Yanks holding a 4-1 lead. Stengel opted for the lefty despite a pair of right-handed batters due up next in future Hall of Famer Monte Irvin and recent “Shot Heard ’Round the World” playoff hero Bobby Thomson due up. The move was called “perhaps as deep and mystifying a piece of managerial strategy as any world series has seen,” by the New York Times. He hadn’t pitched in a week and a half.
Per SABR, Stengel told an admittedly nervous Kuzava to get the ball over and make the Giants hit it in the air. That is exactly what Kuzava would do. Irvin flew out to left, as did Thomson. Two runs scored to trim the lead to 4-3, but both Kuzava and his skipper were happy to trade them for outs. Then Kuzava preserved the Yankees championship by recording the final out against another righty, pinch-hitter Sal Yvars, who almost found the outfield grass until Hank Bauer who made a game-saving, diving catch.
That moment gave Kuzava the save and secured the Yankees’ three-peat, a feat only matched by the 1936-39 Yankees, the the 1972-74 Oakland A’s, and of course the more recent 1998-2000 Yanks. This particular dynasty wasn’t done yet, however, as they had their sights set on breaking the record held by those Lou Gehrig/Joe DiMaggio-led late-’30s teams.
The left-hander continued serving as an important bullpen arm and occasional starter over the next few seasons. In 1952, Kuzava won eight games and posted a 3.45 ERA across 28 appearances and 12 starts. The Yankees won another championship that season this time taking down the Dodgers in seven games.
For the second year in a row, Kuzava didn’t pitch in the Fall Classic until the very end. And wouldn’t you know it? The bases were loaded again. He was last on the mound on September 27th during a meaningless game against the Philadelphia A’s. Stengel had stuck with his top starters in Game 7, deploying each of Eddie Lopat, Allie Reynolds, and Vic Raschi before having to to turn to someone else when it was evident that Raschi didn’t have it.
So in came Kuzava with a 4-2 lead in the seventh, nowhere to put Hall of Famer Duke Snider, and the fans at Ebbets Field imploring “the Duke of Flatbush” and their Dodgers to finally drop the hammer on the hated Yankees. Remarkably, Kuzava stayed cool and induced a pair of popups from Snider and no less a luminary than Jackie Robinson himself. He needed a last-second bailout by Billy Martin to actually snare the second pop fly, but the inning was over with the Yankees still up by two.
A high throw by Gil McDougald on an error with one out in the eighth gave Brooklyn two more cracks at tying the game off Kuzava. The unflappable southpaw instead struck out pinch-hitter Andy Pafko and got a fly ball from Carl Furillo to Gene Woodling just shy of the warning track in left. The final inning was the least dramatic, Kuzava retiring the side in order and ending it on a fly ball from Pee Wee Reese to Woodling in left. A euphoric Yogi Berra hopped aboard hit batterymate’s back in the celebration.
That Game 7 cemented Kuzava’s place in history. Although the save statistic was not yet established, he became the first person in baseball history to earn a save in back-to-back World Series clinching games. Oakland’s Rollie Fingers almost accomplished the feat, but Darold Knowles got the save for the A’s in 1973, sandwiched between Fingers’ saves in 1972 and 1974. Will McEnaney of the Cincinnati Reds become the second pitcher to accomplish this after closing the doors in 1975 and 1976.
There has only been one pitcher to top Kuzava and McEnaney and, of course, it was another Yankees legend: Mariano Rivera. Mo earned the save in the clinching games of the 1998, 1999, and 2000 World Series, extending the Yankees’ dynasty nearly 50 years after Kuzava inked his name in the record books.
Kuzava stayed with the Yankees for the 1953 season, another solid year in the Bronx resulted in a 6-5 record with a 3.31 ERA. The team continued rolling as well winning the World Series in six games over the Dodgers; Kuzava again pitched just once, but this time it was just a third of an inning in the Game 5 victory. Reynolds relieved Kuzava for the save in that game, and then collected the win in relief of Whitey Ford for the clincher in Game 6. Martin’s walk-off single secured the club’s fifth consecutive title, a streak that remains unmatched to this day.
In 1954, Kuzava’s role in New York began shrinking as age and mileage started catching up to him. Fresh off the franchise move from St. Louis, the Orioles claimed him off waivers in August of that season, ending his Yankees tenure after four seasons and three World Series championships in the Bronx. In parts of four seasons with the Yankees, Kuzava went 23-20 with a 3.39 ERA and 13 saves.
Kuzava’s career then turned into the familiar late-career baseball shuffle many veteran pitchers experienced during that era. He spent time with the O’s, Phillies, A’s, Pirates, and Cardinals organizations while continuing to bounce between the majors and high minors. His best seasons were behind him, but Kuzava’s ability to provide innings and mentorship kept him around until 1960 when he finished up his career as a player-manager for the Charleston White Sox in the South Atlantic League.
As a manager, and after, Kuzava spoke out about the difficulties black athletes were experiencing at the time. Recalling the experience, Kuzava said, “I’d get phone calls from people threatening that if those guys played, they were going to do this or that. It was terrible. I’m talking 1960! We had Cubans whose skin was darker than the Blacks and they could live with us in the hotels. The Blacks couldn’t and those were the guys who went to war for us along with me and the other guys.”
Across 10 MLB seasons, Kuzava compiled a 49-47 record with a 4.05 ERA and 13 saves across 213 appearances. Often shifting between starting and relieving, Kuzava regularly did whatever managers needed him to do.
Following his time as a big leaguer and manager Kuzava spent another decade travelling the country scouting ballplayers. As his family grew and the strain of travel picked up, he decided to return to Wyandotte and started a career in the beer industry. In 2003, Kuzava was elected to the Polish-American Sports Hall of Fame. The three-time champion only passed away a few years ago, at age-93 in May 2017, one of the last living links to the heart of that particular Yankees dynasty.
Happy birthday, Sarge!
See more of the “Yankees Birthday of the Day” series here.
DETROIT — Detroit Tigers pitchers Casey Mize and Kenley Jansen both left against the Los Angeles Angels because of right groin issues, potentially adding to a crowded injured list.
Mize started the game and threw four scoreless innings, striking out six, before leaving the game. The 29-year-old was making his third start after returning from the injured list because of a similar injury against the Atlanta Braves.
When healthy, the right hander has pitched well this year with a 2-3 record and 2.27 ERA over nine starts.
“Same area — just the sensation of it was less than last time,” Mize said. “Obviously, we’ll know more in the next couple days. But I don’t think it was as bad as what I felt in Atlanta. We’ll see how I wake up and feel.”
Jansen earned the first two outs of the ninth inning before leaving the game with a trainer. He was replaced by Brenan Hanifee, who recorded the final out to secure the Tigers’ 4-0 victory and snap a season-long, seven-game home losing streak.
Jansen has a 1-3 record, a 4.80 ERA and seven saves this season.
The Tigers have a disappointing 22-34 record this season, partly due to injuries. Other players currently on the injured list include ace left-hander Tarik Skubal and veteran right-hander Justin Verlander, along with hitters Parker Meadows, Kerry Carpenter, Javier Baez and Gleyber Torres.
ARLINGTON, Texas — Former NL MVP outfielder Andrew McCutchen was designated for assignment by the Texas Rangers after he hit .192 in his 37 games.
The 39-year-old McCutchen was replaced by free agent infielder Nicky Cruz in a move spurred by the lingering absences of shortstop Corey Seager and second baseman Josh Smith. Seager is out with lower back inflammation, and Smith still hasn’t rejoined the team since a stint in the hospital with viral meningitis.
“Certainly respect to Andrew, what he’s accomplished, not only in this game, but more importantly, who he is as a person,” president of baseball operations Chris Young said. “It’s been wonderful having him around, but we’re at a point where given the injuries on the left side of the infield, middle infield specifically, that we’re thin and so Nicky gives us another option and provides some versatility.”
The Rangers had another setback with their middle infield when shortstop Ezequiel Duran exited a game against Houston after four innings due to an illness.
Lopez, who started at second base in the No. 9 spot against the Astros, moved to shortstop to replace Duran. Justin Foscue took over at second.
The 31-year-old Lopez, who signed a major league contract, has played in 693 big league games over parts of eight seasons with five teams. The left-handed hitter was designated for assignment by the Chicago Cubs.
McCutchen had two doubles, one home run and five RBIs with Texas, with 21 of his plate appearances coming as a pinch hitter. Those were the most at-bats as a pinch hitter for any MLB player this season.
The Rangers have seven days to trade, release or outright McCutchen to the minor leagues.
McCutchen played the past three seasons for Pittsburgh, the club that drafted him in the first round in 2005 and promoted him in 2009 for his major league debut. McCutchen played his first nine years in MLB with the Pirates, making five straight All-Star teams and winning the 2013 National League MVP award while becoming one of the most popular players in that franchise’s history.
He then bounced around with four other teams between 2018 and 2022 before reuniting with the Pirates. He played in 135 games last year, hitting .239 with 13 homers and 57 RBIs before becoming a free agent.
He is a career .271 hitter with 333 homers, 1,157 RBIs and 220 stolen bases in 2,299 games.
“I played against him during his MVP season,” Rangers manager Skip Schumaker said. “I know who this guy is and I got to know him even better this year. Those are not easy, but part of the game. He was a pro and understood.”
Seager is doing moderate baseball activity, but there is no timeline for his return. The two-time World Series MVP, including with the Rangers in 2023, has been eligible to come off the 10-day disabled list.
Smith had been on the IL since May 5 with a right glute strain when the Rangers announced May 15 that the 28-year-old would be hospitalized at least a week after feeling ill and getting the diagnosis of meningitis. Young said Smith could rejoin the club soon.
“We’ll be able to evaluate where he is from a strength standpoint,” Young said. “The physical toll that it’s taking on him and what the buildup is going to be, I can’t answer yet. But he’s healthy. We’re very grateful to the doctors and the medical staff that treated him and took great care of him.”
With a short slate of games to choose from, I've still found enough tantalizing value for today's MLB same-game parlay predictions.
I'm sticking with a trio of evening affairs, starting with the Toronto Blue Jays and Baltimore Orioles in what looks to be a high-scoring clash, before shifting over to Paul Skenes holding court for the Pittsburgh Pirates against the Chicago Cubs.
Patrick Corbin vs. Chris Bassitt in 2026 is a recipe for an Over.
Corbin's surface-level results haven't been too bad, boasting a 3.86 ERA over 44 1/3 innings since debuting with the Toronto Blue Jays earlier this year. But a quick look under the hood tells us he's heading toward a significant statistical correction.
He's got an expected ERA of 5.40 thanks to one of the slowest and least deceptive fastballs in the game. The Baltimore Orioles will exploit his 25th-percentile hard-hit rate, and I'm targeting outfielder Taylor Ward, who projects as having one of the best matchups on the slate, per Batters-Box.
On the other end, Jesus Sanchez has been swinging a hot bat and has owned right-handed pitching this year (.194 ISO). Bassitt doesn't give up a ton of hard contact, but he also misses zero bats. Whether it's a two-hit game or an extra-base hit, Sanchez rounds out this SGP nicely.
If you're hesitant about backing a specific Blue Jays hitter, you can triple-up on Baltimore bats by adding Ward, Tyler O'Neill, and Pete Alonso to the Over instead, bumping the line to +1200.
Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes has hit maybe the roughest patch of his career, allowing nine earned runs over his last 10 innings across two starts.
That won't last. He had allowed one run or less in eight of nine starts before that, including back-to-back scoreless outings where he completed eight innings of work immediately prior to that stumbling block.
His expected ERA for the season remains 2.41 (95th percentile). While the Chicago Cubs exploded for 10 runs and their first victory after 10 straight losses, this is a notable step up in competition. I don't love the price on either individual prop, but sandwiching them together helps get this SGP started on the right foot.
With Colin Rea on the mound, Brandon Lowe is a prime candidate to continue swinging a hot bat. He homered yesterday and is batting .287 with a .346 ISO vs. right-handers.
It's one of the best hitter matchups on the board, according to Batters-Box, along with teammate Oneil Cruz. And if you want to give it a little extra juice, adding Cruz and the Pirates' moneyline pumps the line to +1000.
Astros vs Rangers SGP: Not everything's bigger in Texas
This is a simple handicap, and almost a polar opposite of the angle I took above in Toronto vs. Baltimore.
I like Nathan Eovaldi and Spencer Arrighetti to keep this score low. The veteran Texas Rangers right-hander keeps the ball on the ground and is still inducing chase and whiff at elite rates (97th and 90th percentiles, respectively). Even if his strikeout rate hasn't followed suit, he's pitching deep enough into games (seven innings or more in four straight) that he can clear this number.
If you're more comfortable going on his outs prop, fair warning that it's at 18.5.
Arrighetti has excelled at limiting hard contact, with a hard-hit rate in the 90th percentile. He's also surrendered just one home run this season, and the Texas offense doesn't worry me with its below-average wRC+ (96). He'll pitch into the sixth, and maybe even finish the frame.
Time: 9:05 p.m. ET
Where to watch: SCHN, RSN
Odds are correct at the time of publishing and are subject to change. Not intended for use in MA. Affiliate Disclosure: Our team of experts has thoroughly researched and handpicked each product that appears on our website. We may receive compensation if you sign up through our links.
Yankees ace Gerrit Cole showed no signs of it as he made his second start back Wednesday night following a 569-day recovery from Tommy John surgery.
The dominant right-hander was in complete control all night, mowing his way through the Royals’ lineup to help New York lock up its fourth consecutive win.
“If the first start was the appetizer, this was the main course,” Aaron Boone said. “He had everything going.”
Cole certainly did, as he struck out five of the first seven Kansas City hitters he faced before allowing his first base runner of the night on a one out double in the bottom of the third.
He then received some help from his defense, as Aaron Judge unleashed a perfect throw on a liner to shallow right, gunning down Michael Massey trying to score the opening run of the game.
“All I was thinking was I don’t want this run to score,” Judge said. “Especially with Gerrit in his second game, it was a tight game at the time -- I knew if I was able to stop them there, they probably aren’t scoring the rest of the game.”
And that's exactly how things played out, as Cole threw things in cruise control the rest of the way, completing six-plus scoreless innings of work.
He allowed just four hits, didn't issue a walk, and struck out 10 batters for a franchise-best 28th time as a Yankee.
"We are watching excellence," Boone said. "I don't want to understate or overstate it, it was just an excellent, efficient, surgical outing where he had everything going."
"It's a good night when everything comes together like that," Cole added.
The Yankees' ace has now put together 12.2 scoreless frames over his first two outings back atop the rotation.
Cole himself isn't satisfied yet.
"It's coming along, there's still some stuff to work on," he said. "We moved the ball well around the zone, sometimes maybe didn't quite get through the fastballs as well as we could've, so there's absolutely still stuff to work on."
Cole is lined up to take the ball back home against the Guardians next week.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton has begun running outside after imaging on his ailing right calf left the club feeling good about his recovery, but manager Aaron Boone said it still was unclear when he would be back in the lineup.
Stanton has been sidelined since April 24, after he experienced some stiffness while running the bases in a game against Houston.
“I think he wants it fully clear, and I think we got enough news today that allows us to take that step to hopefully the running goes in line with how he’s feeling, and we can start to ramp up,” Boone said before the Yankees’ series finale against the Royals.
Stanton was off to a good start through the first 24 games of the season, hitting .256 with three homers and 14 RBIs. The availability of the five-time All-Star’s right-handed bat in the middle of the lineup especially is valuable on nights in which Boone has a lineup that is loaded with left-handers, such as Ben Rice, Trent Grisham, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger and Austin Wells.
“Having him in the middle, his presence is massive,” Boone said. “So you know, hopefully not too much longer.”
Jasson Dominguez was recalled from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre when Stanton got hurt, only for the young outfielder to join him on the injured list when he strained the AC joint in his left shoulder May 7 while colliding with the outfield wall at Yankee Stadium.
He received an injection in his shoulder on May 11 and has been hitting off a tee for about a week.
The plan for Dominquez is to begin ramping up baseball activities, while the Yankees are completing their series in Kansas City and heading to Sacramento for three games against the Athletics to conclude their six-game, seven-day road trip.
“Hopefully when we get back next week,” Boone said, “there may be some live (batting practice) situations for him.”
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA - MAY 27: Willy Adames #2 of the San Francisco Giants is tagged out by Aramis Garcia #35 of the Arizona Diamondbacks in the eighth inning at Oracle Park on May 27, 2026 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images) | Getty Images
Team News
Sewald notches 100th save after injuries nearly derailed his career “I wasn’t even healthy enough to throw [much] last year, so a lot of that was just, am I going to get to play again? Because I’m getting older, and I wasn’t healthy,” the 36-year-old said. “So definitely more doubt just that I was going to get to play, let alone kind of be at my peak. I’m just fortunate to be out there pitching, really, is what it comes down to. I’m just excited that I’m healthy enough to go out there.” https://www.mlb.com/dbacks/news/diamondbacks-stay-hot-complete-sweep-of-giants
Diamondbacks sweep Giants for 2nd time in past 10 games
“Crazy inning,” Ginkel said. “It’s a play we’ve worked on in spring training. Now with the PitchCom and stuff, you’re trying to navigate signs and more like, how can we be more opportunistic with our pickoffs? I think with that inning going the way it did, and you didn’t know which way the ball was gonna go, I think that was a great time for it.”
MLBPA makes 1st proposal in collective bargaining negotiations
“The MLBPA’s proposal would reduce the amount transferred to lower-revenue Clubs, weaken the Competitive Balance Tax, and lead to even more payroll disparity than exists today. For example, under the Union’s proposal, the Los Angeles Dodgers would pay less in luxury tax payments, giving them an additional $70 million to spend on payroll.”
MLBPA makes its first CBA proposal, highlights increased minimum salary and new ‘integrity tax’ Here are some of the highlights of the MLBPA’s proposal:
Draft picks and other benefits for low-revenue clubs active in free agency and other signings
Significant increases to 40-man minimums, including a major-league minimum salary of $1.5 million beginning in 2027
A new “Competitive Integrity Tax” applying to clubs that fail to meet minimum payroll benchmarks
Expansion of salary arbitration eligibility
Enhanced compensation and contract guarantees for players in salary arbitration
Increased benefits for lower-revenue clubs who lose players to free agency
Qualified free agency for players with five or more years of service who have reached age 30
“Luxury Tax” threshold increases and removal of non-monetary policies
Expanded draft lottery to further deincentivize tanking
Increased revenue sharing that initially guarantees every small-market club a minimum of $240 million in revenue every season
Five years later, looking at each team’s best 2021 Draft pick D-backs: Chad Patrick, RHP (fourth round) There still might come the day when Jordan Lawlar fulfills the promise he showed as the sixth overall pick and a former Top 100 prospect, but he hasn’t found established big-league success in part due to injuries (the latest being a broken right wrist). We turn instead to Patrick, who signed for $350,000 out of Purdue, was traded twice in 2023 and has found a place on the Brewers pitching staff — first as a starter last year and as more of a swingman in ‘26. Patrick enters Wednesday with a 2.63 ERA this season, 20th-best among 130 Major Leaguers with at least 40 frames.
The most commonly used letter in the English alphabets is E.
The second most common letters are T, A, I, N, and O. The least used letter in the English alphabets is the letter Q.
The majority of plant life is located in the ocean.
There are around a total of 228, 450 known species in the ocean and around 2 million more species are left undiscovered. Most of the plants found in the ocean are kelp, seaweed, seagrass, and algae. Marine plants are divided into 3 categories, euphotic/sunli, dispothic/twilight, and aphotic/midnight.
There are 336 dimples on a regulation golf ball.
The little indents on golf balls aren’t just there to help you differentiate it from other sports balls. The dimples on a golf ball’s surface create a thin turbulent boundary layer of air that clings to the ball’s surface, which affects the overall trajectory of the ball.
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Josh Inglis' expert pick: Angels/Tigers Under 8.5
Price: 48¢ (+108) at Polymarket
Let’s stay on the getaway angle today, with the Los Angeles Angels going down to Tampa after today’s game, while the Detroit Tigers are also hitting the road for the weekend.
This total feels inflated at first glance, because of the pitching matchup, but Jack Flaherty has at least started to rein in his wild walk rate, and both his BABIP and LOB% help explain why the expected metrics are pointing toward better results ahead.
Grayson Rodriguez is still working his way back after missing all of last season and now draws a Tigers offense that ranks dead last in the American League in OPS over the last 30 days. These are also the No. 28 and No. 29 offenses in wOBA over that same stretch.
On paper, the matchup appears favorable for Chicago’s left-handed bats, but Bradley’s arsenal tells a different story. His high-velocity riding four-seam fastball paired with a well-tunneled splitter consistently forces left-handed hitters out in front, especially when they’re trying to lift the ball for power.
The results back it up: Bradley has held left-handed hitters to a .187 batting average and a .599 OPS this season. Because of that pitching advantage, I think the Minnesota Twins should be priced closer to 49-cent (+104) underdogs in this spot.
Time: 2:10 p.m. ET
How to watch: CHSN, MNNT
Joe Osborne's expert pick: Astros moneyline
Price: 44¢ (+127) at Polymarket
These teams are trending in opposite directions, so I’m backing the underdog with the hotter lineup and starting pitcher. Spencer Arrighetti is having a breakout season, allowing two earned runs or fewer in all seven starts (in which Houston has won six).
That includes a dominant outing against Texas two weeks ago, when he gave up just one hit over 7 1/3 scoreless innings. Nathan Eovaldi has been steady, but he’s now facing a red-hot Houston Astros lineup that ranks third in OPS, with an MLB-best 14 home runs over the past week.
Time: 8:05 p.m. ET
How to watch: RSN/SCHN
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NEW YORK — Cincinnati Reds starter Rhett Lowder threw 45 pitches to hitters at Citi Field, the next step in his recovery from a right shoulder injury.
“Feels good,” he said. “I think we got a good grasp on it early.”
Lowder simulated three innings of work against a handful of Reds teammates, including outfielder Will Benson. Provided he comes out of the session feeling healthy over the next few days, Lowder likely would be scheduled to throw about 70 pitches for Triple-A Louisville at Memphis, a St. Louis Cardinals affiliate.
Cincinnati manager Terry Francona didn’t rule out the possibility Lowder could return to the Reds’ rotation after that one minor league rehabilitation start.
“I think there’s a lot of possibilities. Don’t know that we need to put the cart ahead of the horse. Getting him healthy is what’s really important,” Francona said before his team’s series finale against the New York Mets.
“The fact that he almost could keep throwing — I think he was out for only two or three days. That was all it was. So, he’s not building back up. They just really have been stressing and working on like, range of motion, activating the right muscles and trying to re-train that shoulder. Probably the best way I could say it. And he’s done a really good job.”
Lowder exited his May 7 outing against the Chicago Cubs in the fourth inning and was placed on the 15-day injured list May 13, retroactive to May 10, with right shoulder pain.
The 24-year-old rookie is 3-3 with a 5.40 ERA in eight starts this season and 5-5 with a 3.52 ERA in 14 career outings. He was selected seventh overall by Cincinnati in the 2023 amateur draft from Wake Forest.
Lowder made his major league debut in August 2024 and compiled a 1.17 ERA in six starts spanning 30 2/3 innings that year. But he didn’t pitch in the majors last season, missing time because of a right forearm strain and making only five minor league appearances.
Franklin Arias of the Portland Sea Dogs is present during a Minor League Baseball game at TD Bank Ballpark in Bridgewater, United States, on May 1, 2026. (Photo by Dan Squicciarini/NurPhoto via Getty Images) | NurPhoto via Getty Images
Jake Bennett’s five-inning start proved yet again that he could be a good spot starter, if for no other reason than to gauge future value as this team may find itself firmly in selling territory as 2026 grows older. Wednesday morning’s start against the Rail Riders (Yankees AAA) was another in a long line of reputable outings, as he struck out seven and recovered extremely well after allowing a first inning home run to George Lombard Jr. And yes, that is the son of the George Lombard, the former Red Sox minor league bench coach and former Braves teammate of Andruw Jones, Greg Maddux and the like. Anywho, after Bennett’s five innings, the bullpen was sharp, not allowing a hit the duration of the game. Meanwhile, the top of Worcester’s lineup shone; Braiden Ward, Nate Eaton and Anthony Seigler, in the one-through-three holes, had seven hits between them and the 7-1 lead they had after four was key in allowing Bennett and his associates to coast the rest of the way.
Blake Wehunt had maybe his best outing of the season. The 6’7” righty out of Georgia (that’s not the Bulldogs but instead the Owls of Kennesaw State) had eight strikeouts, allowing just two hits and a walk in six innings of work. Franklin Arias belted his 12th home run of 2026 and Johanfran Garcia got his seventh homer in the fifth. Add in three runs in the sixth and Portland also coasted to an early afternoon W, their eighth win in nine games. A big factor in that has been Arias, who has 25 total bases in the last five games.
And another coast! Despite some really spotty pitching by Marcus Phillips against Asheville (Astros High-A). Enddy Azocar’s new teammates surely like him, as he had his first home run since being promoted to High-A, and it was a grand slam to answer a run to get Greenville to within neccessity of a save situation. The score was 11-5, and there it’d stay. Ronny Hernandez also contributed three hits, coming within a triple of hitting for the cycle.
The lone loser in the organization, the RidgeYaks fell to Hickory (Rangers A). This shouldn’t have even came down to two Hickory runs in the late going, but it did, but this was overall not a well-played game by Salem outside of a good shutout four relief innings from Luis Cohen. They had two defensive errors and just three hits, two from Kleyvar Salazar and one from Skylar King.
Apr 30, 2021; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; The benches clear after Philadelphia Phillies relief pitcher Jos Alvarado (46) struck out New York Mets left fielder Dominic Smith (2) during the eighth inning at Citizens Bank Park. Mandatory Credit: Kam Nedd-Imagn Images
Earlier this month, MLB held its second annual “Rivalry Weekend,” primarily pairing teams with inter-league geographic rivals. The Mets played the Yankees, the Dodgers played the Angels, the Cubs played the White Sox, the Orioles played the Nationals, and so on and so forth. The Mets will likely face the Yankees during every Rivalry Weekend until the end of time, yet one might begin to wonder…are the Yankees actually the Mets’ biggest rivals?
It’s in the spirit of this question that I’ve attempted to rank all 29 other major league clubs according to the intensity of their rivalry with the Mets, beginning with the most friendly relationships and ending with the most heated. The following countdown is entirely subjective and by no means an exact science, with factors like geographic proximity, postseason history, and regular season competition all playing some role.
Without further ado, here is the list…
TIER 1: Rivalry? We might as well be friends!
29. Mariners The Mariners are like the New York Mets of baseball, as A-Rod might say.
28. Angels The historically less successful, lower-payroll, mishap-prone team in a two-franchise city, with some of the best players in recent memory but not much to show for it? The Angels and the Mets are basically cousins from across the country.
TIER 2: A gentleman’s rivalry for a gentleman’s game
27. White Sox Similar situation to that of the Angels, except comparisons between the Mets and White Sox feel more oriented towards geographic circumstance than team identity.
26. Twins The Twins took a jab at the Mets after beating them at Citi Field in April. That’s about as heated as this match-up has gotten over the years.
25. Guardians Did the Francisco Lindor trade start any sort of rivalry? Not really.
24. Tigers The Mets almost played the Tigers in the 2006 World Series…see entry No. 5 for more.
23. Rays There’s no hint of a rivalry here, but the Rays have to be above the rest of the relatively neutral AL Central because at least one person in the Citi Field stands can reliably be overheard complaining about Tampa Bay and their “analytics” during a given game.
TIER 3: I guess there’s something there
22. Blue Jays The Mets and Blue Jays swapped enough players in the 2010s that their match-ups were certainly intriguing (though not necessarily heated) since someone seemed to always be facing their former team, whether José Reyes or Noah Syndergaard or R.A. Dickey or Marcus Stroman.
21. Rockies One of two out-of-divsion National League teams the Mets have never faced in a postseason series. The Rockies lost both their first game and their first home game to the Mets within the span of one week in 1993, but got their revenge by winning the first game at Coors Field in walk-off fashion against the Amazins’ in 1995.
20. Pirates The Pirates are the other out-of-divsion National League team the Mets have never faced in a postseason series, though the two teams did compete for division titles in the old NL East back in 1973 and 1990.
19. Diamondbacks The Mets eliminated the Diamondbacks in their first-ever postseason series in 1999, but Arizona quickly got over that defeat with a World Series title two years later.
18. Padres A rivalry that briefly sizzled when Buck Showalter approached a shiny-eared Joe Musgrove. If the Mets and Padres were to meet in another postseason series sometime soon, especially with Juan Soto facing his ex-teammates, this one could move up the list.
17. Rangers Between Brandon Nimmo and Jacob deGrom (and Kumar Rocker?), the Rangers have a healthy collection of former Mets. That’s sure to make things somewhat intriguing for at least the next several years.
TIER 4: Memories of a Fall Classic
16. Royals Even as they were ripping apart the Mets’ championship hopes with speed, defense, and an unhittable bullpen, it was difficult to root too hard against the scrappy 2015 Royals.
15. Athletics The A’s ended the 82-win 1973 Mets’ incredible run to the World Series, though the Amazins’ put up a valiant seven-game fight.
14. Orioles “They can take our Polar Bear, but they still can’t hit Jerry Koosman” – some nostalgic Mets fan, moments before their mind dissolves into a psychedelic dream-state with indiscernible technicolor images flashing by. Ron Swoboda parallel to the ground in mid-air. Don Buford running out of room at the fence. Gil Hodges holding a shoe-polished baseball in front of the home plate umpire. Cleon Jones kneeling in the outfield. “Those were the days” – that Mets fan, probably.
TIER 5: Things can get tense
13. Astros It seems like these days every team’s fanbase fashions themselves something of a rival to the Astros, but this ranking is more a result of the tense 1986 NLCS, which concluded with two marathon extra-inning games. Speaking of 1986…
12. Red Sox The enemy of my enemy is my 13th-biggest rival — at least according to this placement, anyway. The Fenway Faithful might not be so kind-hearted after the 1986 World Series, but I still believe Mets fans primarily feel a strange kinship with the staunchest anti-Yankee fanbase. Though they’re still a team from Boston, this is about as friendly as a New York-Boston relationship can get.
11. Brewers Until 2024, the Brewers would have been ranked back in Tier 3 with the Rockies, Pirates, D-backs, and Padres. Things began to change when David Stearns made the switch from Milwaukee to New York. On Opening Day 2024 — the first game of Stearns’ tenure — the Brewers were promptly involved in a benches-clearing incident at Citi Field, and on the Crew’s last day of the 2024 season, Pete Alonso hit a backbreaking home run to eliminate them from postseason contention with two outs left to go before sealing the Wild Card Series.
10. Giants The orange in the Mets’ color scheme and the inspiration behind their “NY” cap logo, the Giants are barely hated in their old home of New York. Sure, the Mets eliminated them in 2000 and got eliminated by them in 2016, but there’s been no prolonged period of drama. Still, the New York history makes these franchises natural competitors for the same reason it makes them natural allies.
TIER 6: Bad Blood
9. Reds If a franchise’s all-time WAR leader punches Bud Harrelson, they can’t be listed any lower than this. Punching Bud Harrelson is an automatic trip to Tier 6.
8. Cubs Between the wild Black Cat division chase in 1969 and the NLCS sweep in 2015, the Mets have upended the Cubs in some pretty pivotal moments over the years.
7. Nationals Ah, the 2010s. A decade when the Mets seemed to get their lunch money stolen by the Nationals every year…except for 2015, when they pulled off memorable win after memorable win against Washington to win the NL East. Even in 2019, a year when neither team won the division, each managed to pull off an absurd comeback against the other down the stretch. Whether it was Yoenis Céspedes and Lucas Duda mashing in 2015 or Daniel Murphy and Bryce Harper treating Citi Field like Coors Field in the following years, the Nats and Mets certainly know how to make fools of one another.
6. Marlins Roses are red, violets are blue, the Marlins will win in Game 162. Three legendary Mets collapses — 2007, 2008, and 2025 — each made complete with a devastating loss to the Fish on the final day of the regular season. The Mets may have bigger rivals, but no one has been a bigger crimp in their plans.
5. Cardinals This pair of superteams battled in the NL East during the mid-1980s, with the Cardinals outpacing the Mets by three games in both 1985 and 1987. But the ultimate dagger came two decades later, when the young duo of Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright combined to shock Shea Stadium in Game 7 of the 2006 NLCS. Even 20 years later, I’m not sure Mets fans have come to terms with that night’s events.
TIER 7: All-Out Rivals
4. Dodgers In some ways, the Mets are more of a brother to the Dodgers than the Yankees. So many elements of their identity trace back to the Brooklyn Dodgers, from Citi Field’s Ebbets-esque design to the Mets’ Dodger-blue primary color to the core tenet that fans will stand proud even while enduring disappointment after disappointment. The Flushing Faithful were born from the Flatbush Faithful. But that brotherly cross-country relationship has grown increasingly fraught over the years as the Mets and Dodgers have faced each other in a number of high-octane postseason series, with L.A. keeping a pair of beloved Mets teams away from the World Series in 1988 and 2024 and the Mets eliminating the Dodgers in the 2006 and 2015 NLDS (the latter intensified by Chase Utley’s hard slide into Ruben Tejada). Throw in the newly-cited mantra of becoming the “East Coast Dodgers,” and the big-budget Mets have practically declared open war on the franchise that once called New York City home.
3. Braves It takes a special type of rivalry for an opposing team’s star player to name their kid after your team’s stadium. The Mets and Braves have had a contentious relationship since being re-aligned into the same division in 1995, with the Braves winning the first 11 titles in the new NL East as the Mets fought and failed (at least until 2006) to overcome Atlanta’s dynasty. The ferocity of the rivalry was renewed in 2022, when the Braves broke the Mets’ hearts with a late September sweep, eventually matching New York’s 101-win record and earning the tiebreaker to advance to the Division Series. It’s also been well documented that the Braves’ ballparks, whether the old Turner Field or the new Truist Park, have tended to be a house of horrors in both climate and outcome for the Mets.
2. Yankees There’s just something about New York baseball. Whether it was the Dodgers and Giants battling for pennants or both National League squads attempting to knock off the mighty Yankees in the World Series, the baseball world revolved around New York for the first half of the 20th century (especially in the decade of Willie, Mickey, and the Duke). The Mets and Yankees rivalry is all that remains from that rich history of intra-city competition. It undeniably peaked in 2000 with the first all-New York World Series since 1956, but it proves itself alive and well with every season’s Subway Series games, which manage to produce a playoff atmosphere no matter each team’s respective record. Sure, it’s a one-sided hatred, with more fire and fury coming from the Mets’ side. Sure, it’s interleague play, and most of the games are early-season contests with little larger consequence. Sure, up until the Juan Soto signing the Mets never had a particularly resounding victory over the Bronx Bombers (and even that one played out in a bidding war rather than on the field). But still…there’s just something about New York baseball.
1. Phillies The only rivalry that seems to regularly produce legitimate loathing between players and fans alike. Tension had been bubbling up for decades, with the Phillies barraging the Mets throughout the late 1970s and the Mets handling the Phillies throughout the 1980s. Then, in the mid-2000s, both teams weren’t just competitive at the same time — they were simultaneously elite. Jimmy Rollins called the Phillies the team to beat in the wake of the Mets’ 2006 division title (kicking off a chain reaction of trash talk) and Philadelphia lived up to the title, stunning the Mets after a late-season collapse in 2007 and edging them out in the NL East en route to a World Series championship in 2008. Plus, from Dwight Gooden to Hansel Robles (twice) to Rhys Hoskins to José Alvarado, this match-up has seen its fair share of bad blood over the years. In the words of David Wright: “I love the rivalry. I don’t necessarily love the city or the people. Or the players.”
May 19, 2026; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Jesús Luzardo (44) throws a pitch during the first inning against the Cincinnati Reds at Citizens Bank Park. Mandatory Credit: Eric Hartline-Imagn Images | Eric Hartline-Imagn Images
Quick: name the most valuable Phillies pitcher by Wins Above Replacement.
Well, that wasn’t very difficult, was it? You said Cristopher Sánchez so quick I barely had time to take a sip of my tea. That’s okay. The first question is the warm-up. Now name the second-most valuable.
Did you say Jesús Luzardo? Good/bad news: you’re right/wrong. He’s the second-most/fourth-most valuable pitcher on the Phillies by WAR. Actually, he’s the second-most/only the seventh-most valuable Phillie overall by WAR. Zack Wheeler has been on fire since he returned, but Luzardo still has produced more value/less than half as much value than him.
Don’t adjust your monitor: nothing is wrong with the above paragraph. All of those statements are true, simultaneously. And this isn’t some sort of Schrödinger’s Phillie, where Luzardo is both extremely valuable and somewhat less so until you open the box.
See, there’s two main types of WAR: FanGraphs WAR, or fWAR, and Baseball Reference WAR, or bWAR (sometimes rWAR). And they disagree on Luzardo. The fine folks at FanGraphs have Luzardo at 1.7 fWAR, trailing only Sánchez’s 2.8, and a bit ahead of Wheeler’s 1.4. Meanwhile, the renowned recorders at Baseball Reference have Luzardo at 1.0 bWAR, far behind Sánchez’s 3.7 and Wheeler’s 2.1. A difference of 0.7 WAR in the evaluation of Luzardo may not sound like a lot, but fWAR has him as more valuable than Wheeler so far, and bWAR has him as just about half as valuable. That’s a pretty sizable difference. So what’s going on here?
First, to level-set: this is not a case where either formulation of WAR is wrong. fWAR and bWAR, as we’ll get into shortly, are both setting out to measure the same thing— how valuable a given player is—, but through decidedly different approaches. Neither one is incorrect on Luzardo; they’re just defining value differently. Despite the title of this piece (lamentably straightforward, I was fresh out of puns), we’re not really going to be determining how valuable Luzardo is here. Rather, by taking a look at how the two main forms of WAR ended up disagreeing on Luzardo’s value, we’re going to get a more holistic sense of how he’s performed so far.
So, why do fWAR and bWAR diverge when it comes to Luzardo? It comes down to what inputs they use for assessing pitchers. fWAR for pitchers is based on Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP). FIP tries to eliminate the impact of defense by taking only the plays that are determined solely by the actions of the pitcher and the batter into account: strikeouts, walks, home runs, and hit by pitches (to be technical, FanGraphs treats infield flies as strikeouts when calculating FIP for fWAR purposes, whereas standard FIP doesn’t). bWAR, on the other hand, is based on runs allowed, and innings pitched. There’s more to the calculations than just that, of course. But that information is all we need to explain the variance on Luzardo.
Luzardo has been good to great at most of the things that go into FIP. His 27.7 K% is in the 84th percentile. His walk rate of 6.5% is in the 81st. His 0.73 HR/9 is tied for 21st among qualified pitchers, and the total number of gopher balls he’s allowed (5) doesn’t pop any eyes. He’s hit four batters so far, which is more than most pitchers, but that doesn’t seem to be dragging his FIP down (or up, rather) much. His FIP of 2.82 is ninth-best in baseball, and so it’s no surprise that he’s doing well in the FIP-based fWAR.
But you can see the caveat coming: FIP, and thus fWAR, doesn’t take into account batted balls other than homers. And you can’t tell the story of Luzardo’s season without discussing those. Luzardo has been solid at avoiding homers, but he’s too often been sent into spirals by balls in play. Of all the pitchers in baseball who’ve pitched enough to be deemed qualified for the leaderboards, only one has suffered a worse BABIP than Luzardo: pity the suffering (and wonderfully alliterative) Cade Cavalli. That alone can’t explain Luzardo’s performance so far; Sánchez has the fifth-highest BABIP against in baseball, and he’s doing things that are giving us cause to bring up Grover Cleveland Alexander and Carl Hubbell (not that it’s ever a bad time to discuss the old greats). But hits aren’t the statistic that goes into bWAR. Runs allowed are. Luzardo has stranded 67.1% of the baserunners who reached against him. That puts him at 66 of 76 qualified pitchers; no Phillies pitcher allows a greater proportion of his baserunners to score.
On the whole, Luzardo has allowed 32 runs across 61.2 innings pitched. Hence the relatively unenthusiastic rating of Luzardo by bWAR. Wheeler’s allowed 7 runs in 37.2 innings pitched, and that’s how he surpasses Luzardo in bWAR, even as he posts a lower K% and an only slightly lower BB%.
So, which WAR variant represents the real Luzardo? They both do. Luzardo is a pitcher who strikes out tons of batters and hands out walks like a dentist hands out Halloween candy. He’s also, at least in this campaign, a pitcher who’s prone to allowing runs, who lets a large proportion of his base runners pass Go, collecting their $200 along the way. That run-proneness may not last—his xERA of 3.15 is far lower than his actual ERA of 4.38, suggesting some bad luck—, but if we’re evaluating how he’s done so far, we have to take what actually happened into account.
To focus only on the runs allowed would be to ignore the excellent peripherals that showcase Luzardo’s obvious talent. To ignore them would be to ignore something that is quite obviously rather important to his job performance. “I’ve looked at life from both sides now”, sang Joni Mitchell. She certainly wasn’t referring to bWAR and fWAR. But you ought to follow her example when evaluating Luzardo.
Just like that, the waking nightmare that has been consuming the Cubs comes to an end. I don’t know about you, but I have no surprise whatsoever that the streak went away with a thump and not a whimper. The Cubs put 10 runs on the board while running up 14 hits and drawing seven walks. Two batters were hit by pitches and so the Cubs managed to have 23 baserunners. They managed a team hitting line of .341/.460/.561. For one day, the offense played at the level of an MVP candidate.
I said this just a day or two ago. I understand why Ian Happ would get a day off or two given his struggles. Also, any resurgence of this team is almost certainly going to involve Ian so I don’t have a lot of joy seeing him out of the lineup. With his five-RBI outburst that included a homer, Ian continues to lead the Cubs in OPS among qualified hitters. He does so by leading them in slugging percentage and being second in on-base percentage. Until some of his teammates can sustain their production, it is a justifiable choice for Ian to bat in the middle of the lineup where he is typically found. Importantly, he has generally been the Cub who has performed best against right handed pitching through almost his entire Cub career.
The offense was the big story of the night, but there was a subplot. Jameson Taillon in his return to face the team that drafted him had another rough outing. The Cubs are surely approaching a difficult decision with Jameson. I’m not sure that his stuff would play significantly better out of the bullpen, but he doesn’t appear to have the ability to consistently get major league hitters out well enough to justify his spot in the starting the rotation once a few more pitchers get healthy. You hate to see it, but at some point, unless there is something ailing him that can be fixed physically, he may be nearing the end.
The Cub bullpen came through to keep this one on ice. They threw four scoreless innings, striking out five. Jacob Webb led the way with a perfect inning and three strikeouts. Webb appears to have emerged as the Cubs best reliever. Ethan Roberts appears to be a lot of smoke and mirrors, but he did throw another scoreless inning and has an 0.68 ERA that comes almost entirely in low leverage situations. You almost have to consider him for some higher leverage spots.
Speaking of leverage, am I the only one who has noticed how little leverage the Cub bullpen has encountered year to date? I’ve mentioned this in passing a couple of times. But this is the first time I’ve done a deep dive into it. Prior to Wednesday’s games, the Cubs had played 55 games to the Brewers’ 52. So raw stats can be awkward. But check this out. High leverage opponent plate appearances: Cubs 333 and Brewers 353. So 5 or 6 innings difference despite three less games. The Brewers have been really good, so not super wacky I guess. Medium leverage: Cubs 689, Brewers 732. Now you’re at maybe 10 innings difference despite three less games. The Cubs have faced almost 200 more plate appearances in low leverage situations than the Brewers. So it’s not my imagination.
Last thought. Those three games aren’t nothing either. This first half has been a gauntlet. As someone who blogs about every game, the cadence of the games is always front and center. This has felt like an unending line of games. That was a brutal combo with all of the pitching injuries and has surely exacerbated the Cub problems and them running out of gas. The 10-game losing streak is absolutely disconcerting, but I’m not ready to say that the ship has sailed on this Cub team yet.
Nothing like a win to walk me and surely a whole bunch of others back from the ledge a little.
Three Positives:
Michael Conforto came off of the bench and hit a two-run, pinch-hit homer to help put this one on ice. He got to hang around and have a second plate appearance and drew a walk. You have to love a day that measures out to an 838 wRC+.
This was Ian Happ’s night. A two-run single in the first and a three-run homer late to break a tie. He drives in five of the 10 runs on the night.
Six Cubs in all had a night that registered as over 200 wRC+, including Kevin Alcántara, who walked in his only plate appearance. But this spot goes to Dansby Swanson, another beleaguered Cub vet. He had a single, double, walk, stolen base and two runs scored.
Game 56, May 27: Cubs 10, Pirates 4 (30-26)
Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.
THREE HEROES:
Superhero: Ian Happ (.256). 2-6, HR, 5 RBI, R
Hero: Alex Bregman (.119). 2-6, 2B, R
Sidekick: Michael Busch (.085). 1-3, 2 BB, HBP, RBI, R
THREE GOATS:
Billy Goat: Jameson Taillon (-.169). 5 IP, 21 BF, 5 H, 2 BB, 4 ER, 4 K
Goat: Seiya Suzuki (-.113). 1-5, R, DP
Kid: Moisés Ballesteros (-.045). 0-2, K
WPA Play of the Game: Brandon Lowe’s one-out, three-run, game-tying homer in the third inning. (.250)
Cubs Play of the Game: Alex Bregman doubled with a runner on first and no outs in the seventh inning, setting up Ian Happ’s heroics. (.167)
Cubs Player of the Game:
Game 55 Winner: Alex Bregman received 52 of 84 votes.
Rizzo Award Standings: (Top 5/Bottom 5)
The award is named for Anthony Rizzo, who finished first in this category three of the first four years it was in existence and four times overall. He also recorded the highest season total ever at +65.5. The point scale is three points for a Superhero down to negative three points for a Billy Goat.
Michael Busch +21
Nico Hoerner +12
Alex Bregman +9.5
Michael Conforto +9
Shōta Imanaga +7
Jameson Taillon/Phil Maton -9
Matt Shaw -10
Dansby Swanson -13
Seiya Suzuki -27.5
Current Win Pace: 86.79 wins
Up Next: The fourth and final game of the series between these two teams. If you haven’t heard, it’s been a few years since the Pirates actually won a home series versus the Cubs. I’m reminded of a game last May 1. Colin Rea faced Paul Skenes in an afternoon game in Pittsburgh. The Pirates staked Skenes to two early runs. But Dansby Swanson, Kyle Tucker and Seiya Suzuki all took Skenes deep and Skenes ended up a loser as the Cubs won 8-3.
Rea comes in with a 4-3 mark and a 4.83 ERA in 54 innings. This will be his ninth start of the season. He hasn’t won since May 1. In four starts since then, he’s allowed 14 runs (13 earned) in 21.1 innings. Last time he started rough but ended up throwing seven innings and allowing just three runs. That was his second quality start (though he technically also had a quality relief behind an opener). Skenes is 6-4 with a 3.00 ERA in 60 innings. This is his 12th start of the year. He’s lost two straight, allowing nine earned runs in 10 innings against the Blue Jays and Phillies.
It’s a tough matchup, but you never know. Maybe the bats are sufficiently awakened to steal one against Skenes and the Pirates.
TOR vs 
BAL
CHC vs 
PIT
HOU vs 
TEX
