Baseball News
A sweep would be sweet. Win today and we can potentially pack some champagne for the road trip…
Join us in the comments, on the SB Nation app (available on iOS or Android!) or on the site, as the Braves face the Philadelphia Phillies for the final time in the 2026 regular season.
Robert Suarez sighted:
Worst-To-First Retrospective: Sid Bream shares his reflections on 1991 season
MiLB: Rome Emperors 2026 season recap, Augusta GreenJackets 2026 season recap
The Dodgers road trip moves on to Cincinnati, where the Dodgers will face a reeling Reds team they just swept last week in Los Angeles. Since the Reds were swept, they lost their first two road games against another division leader, falling to the Milwaukee Brewers 20-0 on Friday and 13-9 on Saturday.
Tarik Skubal and Nick Lodolo are on the mound, with the left-handers providing a rematch of last Tuesday’s low-scoring affair at Dodger Stadium. Lodolo allowed three runs in his 4 2/3 innings and struck out six. Skubal pitched into the eighth inning for the first time since joining the Dodgers in earning the win.
Francisco Lindor – SS
Juan Soto – DH
Bo Bichette – 3B
Carson Benge – RF
Jared Young – 1B
A.J. Ewing – CF
Francisco Alvarez – C
Brett Baty – 2B
Nick Morabito – LF
SP: Christian Scott – RHP
Ben Rice – DH
Cody Bellinger – LF
Aaron Judge – RF
Luis Garcia – 1B
Spencer Jones – CF
Anthony Volpe – 2B
Ryan McMahon – 3B
Austin Wells – C
Jose Caballero – SS
SP: Cam Schlittler – RHP
First pitch: 1:35 pm EDT
TV: SNY
Radio: Audacy Mets Radio WHSQ 880AM, Audacy App 92.3 HD2
Sunday notes…
Cubs lineup:
Pirates lineup:
Matthew Boyd had a bit of a rough patch in August, but has thrown well in two September starts, both of which were against the Brewers. The numbers aren’t great for September — 4.38 ERA, 1.216 WHIP — but both of those starts include runs charged to him after he left the game.
He faced the Pirates July 24 at PNC Park and allowed one run in seven innings. Do that again, Matthew.
Bubba Chandler has had an up-and-down year in his first full MLB season.
He’s been much better in the second half. First half: 19 games (18 starts), 4.77 ERA, 1.452 WHIP. Since the All-Star break: nine starts, 3.21 ERA, 1.112 WHIP. Much of the improvement has been cutting way down on walks. He had 55 walks in 94.1 innings before the ASB. Since then, in 47.2 innings — just about half what he had before — he’s walked just 15.
His only start against the Cubs this year was May 27 at Wrigley Field. He allowed eight hits and four runs in five innings.
Here is the weather forecast for the area around Wrigley Field.
Today’s game is on Marquee Sports Network.
Here is the complete MLB.com live streaming page for today.
Baseball-reference.com game preview
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The 2026 game discussion procedure has been changed, so please take note.
You’ll find the game preview, like this one, posted separately on the front page two hours before game time (90 minutes for some early day games following night games).
At the same time, a StoryStream containing the preview will also post on the front page, titled “Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of week/date) game threads.” It will contain every post related to that particular game.
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What we learned as Phillies fight back, finish Atlanta trip strong originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
ATLANTA — Thirteen games remained, and the Phillies’ slow start to September was beginning to hang over them.
The division had gotten away from them for the moment. Their spot in the Wild Card picture hadn’t. But after dropping the first two games of the weekend in Atlanta, they needed to right the ship.
So did Andrew Painter.
The 23-year-old entered Sunday coming off a start in which he allowed five runs on 10 hits across five innings. He didn’t have his best stuff in the Phillies’ 9-4 win over the Braves at Truist Park, either.
What he did have was enough.
Painter worked through traffic, escaped his biggest jam and gave the Phillies a chance to win. There were moments throughout the start that might have gotten away from him during his first stint in the majors.
Not anymore.
For a team in win-now mode, it can be difficult to fully appreciate the development of a rookie taking the ball every five days. But Painter’s in-season growth has become one of the brighter parts of the Phillies’ 2026 season.
What did we learn?
SETTLED IN
Painter allowed six hits through his first four innings and walked four overall. His command wasn’t particularly sharp.
His damage control was.
J.T. Realmuto gave him some room in the second, turning a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 Phillies lead with a two-run homer.
By the fourth, Painter was in trouble.
He walked Austin Riley on seven pitches. After a groundout, Painter walked Ha-Seong Kim to put two aboard. Michael Harris II followed with a sharp single, hit too hard to score Riley from second.
Bases loaded.
Ronald Acuña Jr. up.
Painter had already struck Acuña out with a fastball and later allowed him a hit on one. This time, after getting ahead, he went to a changeup. Acuña lifted it into right field, but not deep enough for a sacrifice fly.
That brought up Matt Olson, who has had some success against Painter this season.
Olson hit another changeup sharply on the ground, but Luis Arraez went down to make a slick play and end the inning.
Three runners stranded.
Painter left after five innings having allowed six hits and four walks. Only one run crossed the plate.
“Paint was a little rough today, honestly, command and stuff,” Don Mattingly said. “But the one thing you gotta like is him kind of fighting through traffic, getting big outs, getting out of the innings, not letting anything kind of get rolling.”
That wasn’t always happening earlier in the year.
Painter could have a shaky inning or lose the feel for a pitch and suddenly find himself out of a game before settling into it. Mattingly has seen that change.
“It kind of shows his character from the standpoint of just keep turning the page, keep going, keep fighting,” he said. “Today was a perfect example of that.”
Kyle Schwarber sees something similar.
“There’s gonna be a lot of days where it can be a battle, a grind, and then there’s maybe days that you just gotta go out there and compete and figure it out as you go,” Schwarber said. “That’s the maturation of becoming a big leaguer and finding yourself.”
Painter knew why Sunday became such a grind.
“I think I was getting pretty tilted over my shoulders, and it kind of causes me to overcorrect,” he said. “You see some of those pulling fastballs and changeups consistently missing arm-side up.”
It wasn’t his cleanest start.
It might have been one of the better examples of how far he’s come.
BETTER WITH TRAFFIC
The numbers with runners on base back it up.
During Painter’s first stint in the majors, opponents hit .348/.386/.591 with six home runs against him with men aboard.
The biggest change since his return has been his ability to finish hitters in those situations.
Painter’s strikeout rate with runners on has jumped nearly eight percentage points during his second stint. Opponents’ OPS has dropped 197 points.
That’s where the poise has shown itself most.
“I feel like he’s doing a really good job of holding his head, even if he feels like he might not have it early,” Schwarber said. “It feels like he gets into that rhythm and he keeps fighting as the game keeps going on.”
His improved four-seam fastball has helped. So has simply learning how to navigate major-league innings when everything isn’t working.
Sunday wasn’t necessarily the cleanest example statistically. There were plenty of runners and too many walks for Painter’s liking.
“The four walks just can’t happen,” he said.
But Atlanta had 10 baserunners against him and managed one run.
“If you can get outs without your best stuff, definitely,” Painter said. “Obviously, you gotta get there.”
He did.
And the Phillies eventually rewarded him for it.
BULLPEN FALTERS, BOHM RESPONDS
Alex McFarlane gave the Phillies a clean sixth before José Alvarado took over in the seventh.
Alvarado had been rolling.
That ended Sunday.
A single, a wild pitch and another single brought home the tying run, another late-inning blow for a Phillies bullpen that has struggled to silence opponents lately.
After blowing three separate leads Friday night, the Phillies were tied again.
This time, the offense answered immediately.
Kyle Schwarber singled to begin the eighth. One out later, Bryce Harper ripped his second double of the afternoon, putting runners on second and third for Luis Arraez.
Arraez swung at the first pitch and popped out.
His production in those situations has been one of the more surprising parts of his Phillies tenure. Arraez entered Sunday batting .262 with runners in scoring position for Philadelphia after hitting .382 in those spots with San Francisco before the trade.
Alec Bohm picked him up.
Bohm drove a two-run double into the gap, putting the Phillies back in front in a situation where he’s been one of their best hitters all season.
He’s now batting .339 with runners in scoring position and two outs, the best mark on the Phillies and 13th best in baseball.
“Bohmer comes up, and it’s a big two-out RBI double, and then it just kind of kept going,” Schwarber said. “Guys just kind of piling on the hits, piling on the good at-bats.”
They piled on five more runs before the inning ended, turning a tie game into a seven-run advantage and finally giving the bullpen some breathing room.
Philadelphia finished 6-for-14 with runners in scoring position.
That was a welcome change.
After a red-hot August in which the offense ranked at or near the top of baseball in essentially every major category, the Phillies entered Sunday with MLB’s lowest OPS in September.
There had been opportunities earlier Sunday that went nowhere, too.
“We had some chances early and weren’t able to tack on,” Mattingly said. “But finally, you get to break through and put some runs up. It was huge.”
Mattingly wasn’t interested in turning one inning into something bigger than it was.
“You hope that,” he said when asked whether it could carry over. “But it’s just day to day. At this point, you gotta try to win a game every day. Just keep fighting. Get yourself to the finish line.”
The Phillies needed something positive before leaving Atlanta.
Painter kept them in the game without his best stuff. The offense finally broke through when the bullpen gave the lead back.
With an off day Monday before six games against the Nationals and Mets, they at least gave themselves something to take with them.
A victory.
And 12 games left to keep fighting.
Remember Johan Oviedo? He’s not so much the forgotten man of the Red Sox pitching staff (that’s very much Tanner Houck) he’s more like the guy we never even got to meet in the first place. But, like Houck, he is working his way back and hopes to contribute the big league team at some point. He’ll make a minor league rehab appearance on Thursday. He’s ahead of Garrett Crochet in the rehab race, but Chad Tracy is still being non-committal about what role, if any, he may play this year. “Accumulating volume, getting his feet wet back out there will be important, and then we’ll go from there,” Tracy said. “But upbeat probably. It’s a long journey for some of [these injured pitchers]. So when they finally get to get back onto a mound, it’s exciting — on a mound in a real game.” (Tim Healey, Boston Globe)
Ranger Suarez had a much shorter and much less intense stint on the injured list, but it still took him a wile to work his way back into form when he returned to the mound. After back-to-back gems, he finally looks like his old self, to which he credits a mechanical tweak. “Before, I was leaning forward, so I wasn’t able to locate my sinker,” Suarez said. “Today, my sinker was on point, so that was a pitch that was working for me. I was able to establish that pitch to open my secondaries.” (Ian Browne, MLB.com)
As for Crochet, he threw another bullpen on Friday and got his velocity up to around 93.5 MPH. “Looked good,” Chad Tracy said. “Added in some sweepers, which was good. I think last time he added in cutters. He added some sweepers, so he keeps adding pitch types, and looked good. Just briefly checked in with him, and he said he felt good, which is good news.” (Scott McGlauglin, WEEI)
The fact that the pitching staff has been able to withstand so many injuries is a testament to the depth compiled by Craig Breslow, and the performance of guys like Peyton Tolle in particular. Tolle is arguably the best Red Sox rookie starter in several decades. “Just considering [it’s his] first full season, and the evolution of his stuff and how he uses it, being able to take on more innings and still looks very strong while he’s doing it, [the] strikeout numbers, the ERA. He’s been just a steady force as a rookie pitcher in the rotation,” said Chad Tracy. (Alex Speier, Boston Globe)
If Tolle keeps it up, he may one day find himself the recipient of baseball’s highest honor. No, I’m not talking about induction to the hall of fame, I’m talking about having a street in suburban Utah named after him in this random development that was obviously planned by a Red Sox fan:
Location: Wrigley Field – Chicago, Illinois
Broadcast: KDKA AM/FM, Sportsnet Pittsburgh / MLB.TV
Pitching Matchup: Bubba Chandler (7-9, 4.25 ERA) vs. Mattew Boyd (8-4, 4.03 ERA)
The Bucs are back in action today for the final game of their Chicago trip, where they swept the White Sox but are in danger of being swept right back by the Cubs. They the travel to Milwaukee after that. With the team’s playoff hopes fast dried up, let’s see how the team finishes the year without much to play for.
Sunday afternoon marks the final time this season that the Cincinnati Reds will have to line up across from the Milwaukee Brewers. Given that the Beermakers have dropped 33 runs on Cincinnati pitching in just the last day and a half, that’s perhaps the most welcome news any of us could get even knowing that the rest of the Reds schedule for 2026 seems equally as daunting.
Before the Reds can slink back south to Great American Ball Park to face the Los Angeles Dodgers for the bulk of the work week, they’re going to have to deal with Milwaukee a final time – this time with lefty Robert Gasser getting the start. Fortunately, they’ll be sending ace Chase Burns to the bump to begin this one, though as his most recent outing (3.0 IP) dictated, he’ll be on a very, very short leash as his innings are managed.
First pitch in this Sunday matinee is set for 2:10 PM ET, also known as ‘right in the middle of the Bengals/Bucs game,’ so plan accordingly.
Here’s how both clubs will line up to start:
Time/Place: 12:10 p.m., Comerica Park
SB Nation Site:Purple Row
Media: Detroit SportsNet, MLB.TV, Tigers Radio Network
Pitching Matchup: RHP Jackson Jobe (1-2, 4.45 ERA) vs. RHP Gabriel Hughes (0-7, 5.81 ERA)
| Player | G | IP | K% | BB% | GB% | FIP | fWAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jobe | 6 | 28.1 | 20.8 | 9.6 | 51.2 | 5.14 | 0.0 |
| Hughes | 12 | 57.1 | 19.2 | 8.4 | 39.9 | 3.81 | 1.1 |
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After playing some awful baseball in the first two games, the Phillies will attempt to salvage the finale of their series in Atlanta.
Andrew Painter will start for the Phillies. The rookie will attempt to improve on his two starts against the Braves earlier in the season when he gave up eight runs in 9.2 innings.
Grant Holmes goes for Atlanta. The righty shut the Phillies out for six innings when he faced them on Monday.
Game time is 1:35 PM and will be televised locally on NBCSP as well as ESPN Unlimited.
Easiest, when half the roster sits on the IL relegated to rooting from the dugout, is to blame the training and Strength & Conditioning staff. Yet this is a bit of a simplistic and knee-jerk reaction. Which trainer is to blame for Jamie Arnold taking a line drive to the face?
The flurry of injuries that decimated the A’s felled so many key players both on the big league roster and the minors. The list produces a pretty good team: Brent Rooker, Luis Severino, Nick Kurtz, Shea Langeliers, Jacob Wilson, Tyler Soderstrom, Joshua Kuroda-Grauer, JT Ginn, Leo De Vries, Jamie Arnold, all out for the season, and now Gage Jump likely following suit. Denzel Clarke and Zack Gelof also have missed appreciable time along the way.
That’s insane, but the injuries fall into various buckets so let’s examine the buckets…
Fluky and unpreventable
Kuroda-Grauer, who was humming along when one not-so-fine day he fouled a ball off of a ball and ruptured his testicle, and Arnold, whose cheek and sinus bones could not withstand a line drive that creamed them on the fly, suffered injuries absent any potential blame (other than perhaps not insisting every player wear a cup). These injuries demonstrate how not everything can be a referendum on the adults in charge.
Unrelated to preparation or diagnosis
Gelof’s knee laceration, incurred while sliding hard into the side wall where there was wire netting, is an example of an injury that cannot be traced to stretching, conditioning, or anything related to the preparation or diagnosis of the human body.
The same can be said of the unfortunate play where a poor Gelof throw caused Kurtz to get tangled up with the runner going by and the 1Bman’s thumb was a casualty of the collision. Most likely Wilson’s shoulder injury, the result of diving for a ground ball, also falls into the category of a “a baseball play” in which a perfectly conditioned body could still suffer the malady.
Most likey, Langeliers’ injury was also “just one of those things” as he tore a meniscus running the bases. One can question the strength and conditioning program when a player’s body doesn’t hold up to an ordinary event, but most often it’s just that if you run the bases 1,000 times 999 of those times it will go smoothly and once in a while it just doesn’t.
Ordinary injuries with room for questions
Now we get into the gray area, where you can easily say, “That injury happens around MLB all the time” and yet you can also ask, “Could it have been prevented?”
Rooker injured his knee, but it was not a single event. Rather it was pain that worsened over time, starting with a bone bruise contusion. A cortisone injection and rehab were supposed to alleviate the problem, but didn’t and subsequently tests revealed an articular cartilage tear and loose bodies in his left knee, leading to season ending surgery. Certainly there is room to ponder a misdiagnosis or poor decision-making along the way, but it’s not a slam dunk to draw any particular conclusion.
Soderstrom is another example where a player went down with a known injury, in this case a hip impingement, then tried to come back and “play through it” only to punt soon after and shut it down. One can reasonably question the wisdom of this decision, given how inevitably Soderstrom succumbed to surgery soon after.
Similarly, De Vries had a known shoulder issue that affecting his throwing at SS but continued to play for quite some time before eventually shutting it down, being diagnosed with a labrum tear and having surgery that will likely keep him sidelined for about 8 months. This is an especially troubling arc considering that had De Vries undergone surgery 6 weeks earlier he might be ready for the start of the 2027 season — but we also don’t know exactly when the labrum tore so we are left with as many questions as answers.
Severino, Ginn and Jump fall into a common category: arm injuries for pitchers because, well, pitching is really bad for the arm. Ginn’s is an elbow impingement, Jump’s shoulder soreness from impingement, Severino’s shoulder strain the most significant. Did the A’s staff do anything wrong failing to prevent these injuries from happening?
One could always ask whether the “between starts” regimen is the best possible one — teams differ around how bullpen sessions, long toss, treatment and the like are managed — and perhaps there could be better communication to catch problems in the earliest stages. (For example, Jump threw a fastball 91 MPH last night which could have been seen as a big red flag but went on to throw a couple dozen more pitches before exiting.) But pitcher arm injuries are hardly an “A’s special” and in fact the A’s have not been hit any harder than their opponents in this regard.
Post-injury response
Rooker and Soderstrom are examples of a puzzling response to managing an injury, De Vries possibly as well at the minor league level, but they are not the only ones.
Lawrence Butler looked very slowed down the first half of 2026 following his knee surgery and you wonder if the A’s whiffed not easing him in with a rehab stint at AAA and a more gradual return to full time RF duty with the big league club. Last year saw Wilson try to play through a hand injury that left him clearly diminished and both Wilson and Max Muncy had injuries from HBP in which a fracture wasn’t properly diagnosed the first time.
Conditioning
We don’t know why Denzel Clarke keeps suffering soft tissue injuries, particularly to his hamstrings, but this issue cropped up again while rehabbing a separate injury (bone bruise). Last season, Clarke missed significant time after injuring his right adductor muscle rounding 3B to score on a base hit.
All bodies are different and you shouldn’t be too quick to judge who comes to the party with a little more baby fat than his peer. Nonetheless it’s hard to imagine that Kurtz wouldn’t benefit from a slightly more svelte physique and Butler came to camp looking like he had “bulked up” in ways that only hampered his mobility.
Just looking at all the bodies on the field it’s not hard to imagine where some improvements could be made in the “strength and conditioning” realm — but fans are also far from strength and conditioning experts and players have considerable say in how they manage their own bodies.
Like I said, when you take a deep dive you are left with more questions than answers. But it’s the internet, so here’s where you get to weigh in with what you think the answers are despite the apparent murkiness of the landscape. The only part we are all likely to agree on is that the A’s have a far better team on the IL than they can put on the field, and if the team is to be competitive going forward that script needs to flip. Somehow.
It’s getaway day for the Atlanta Braves, but not before one last regular season contest against the Philadelphia Phillies. With the series secure, the Braves have the opportunity to make it a truly nightmarish weekend for our NL East foes and break out the brooms this afternoon.
There are some changes to the lineup for Walt Weiss’ club, but the name atop the batting order made me laugh. We’ve been let down in 2026 with the first-world complaint of not being able to complete a sweep in a series finale. But Michael Harris II leading off and in line to get the most at-bats off of RHP Andrew Painter is a deliberate choice – no foot off the gas here.
As noted in the preview, Michael has only faced Painter thrice, but is rocking that 1.000 / 2.333 / 3.333 slash line. A late scratch on April 24, Mike was clutch incarnate with a pinch-hit, two-out, two-RBI double off Painter to give the Braves the lead in an eventual Atlanta win. Let’s hoping he can add to his legend more here this afternoon.
Ronald Acuña Jr. will still bat second but get a day off from the field today. Matt Olson is working his way out of his slump with some promising signs and will continue to in the three-hole, but that glove is still gold at first base. Drake Baldwin will catch for Grant Holmes and hit cleanup. Mauricio Dubón will follow and man left field. Ozzie Albies and Austin Riley are at their usual bases and hitting sixth and seventh, respectively. Mike Yastrzemski returns to the lineup after going 3-for-3 with a walk in Friday’s showdown. Ha-Seong Kim will complete the infield at shortstop and hit ninth.
The Phillies will run the exact same lineup as last night’s game.
They optioned reliever Grant Holman to reinstate LHP Tanner Banks from the injured list, giving their beleagured bullpen a fresh arm and depriving us of a Grant Holmes vs. Grant Holman matchup.
This series has given us electric and heartburn-inducing moments as well as as some rare enjoyable AND comfortable baseball. What does today’s matinee bring? Hopefully, some brooms. First pitch for Braves-Phillies is at 1:35 pm ET.
SYRACUSE 9, ST. PAUL 7 (BOX)
A real barn burner, but another Syracuse win. Eight different Mets patched it together on the mound, and they did just enough to support the offense. MJ Melendez followed up his four hit night with two more long balls. Billy Amick added his sixth at Triple-A (though he’s batting only .221). Emilien Pitre had two more hits and a walk to get his OPS back above .800 at the level. It’s been a loss of a season for the organization across most levels but there are some interesting things happening in the minors down the stretch here.
PORTLAND 1, BINGHAMTON 0 (BOX)
The offense had more errors than they had runs. They had nearly as many caught stealings as they had hits. Obviously not what you want. Gabe Davis continues to look like a savvy trade acquisition though, so that’s a plus.
MJ Melendez
Mitch Voit
Another day of minor league baseball is in the books. See the results below. Check out the previous day’s recap here.
Hendrickson started for Sugar Land and went 7 innings allowing 3 runs, all in the third, while striking out 7 batters. The Sugar Land offense got on the board in the 5th inning on a Ferreras 2 run single. Roa tossed a scoreless 8th inning but the offense was unable to score again and Sugar Land fell 3-2.
Note: Ferreras is hitting .319 in Triple-A.
Hicks got the start for the Hooks and went 4.2 innings but struggled allowing 6 runs on 9 hits. The Hooks offense got on the board in the 5th inning on a Bush solo home run. The bullpen tossed 3.1 scoreless innings but the offense was quiet the rest of the way as the Hooks fell 6-1.
Note: Bush has 13 home runs this season.
Today’s minor league starters:
SL: TBD – 2:05 CT
CC: Trey Dombroski – 1:00 CT
AV: SEASON OVER
FV: TBD – 4:05 CT
Consistency should not lower appreciation for what the Yankees have accomplished over the last decade-plus, and there is no better time than in a late-season series against the Mets to point that out. The Mets have been throwing money at their problems for a few years now, and somehow new problems keep coming up. That advantage that benefits both of these teams only goes so far, and if we look back on their campaigns in 2026, it’s interesting to see how each team handled the absence of their top player.
Juan Soto and Aaron Judge have combined to miss 136 games this season, a total of 51 for Soto and a whopping 85 for Judge. Although each offense is unique, it is reasonable to argue that the burden of the team’s production placed on these two is relatively similar. Judge theoretically should mean as much to the Yankees’ attack as Soto means to the Mets.
Before getting into the details, the one number that actually counts leans heavily in favor of the Yankees, as they went a very respectable 46-39 without Judge on the field in 2026. Meanwhile, the Mets basically owe their status as a below-.500 club and complete irrelevance in the NL playoff picture to Soto’s absence, possessing a putrid 20-31 record without their star hitter.
Strictly speaking, in terms of pure offensive production, the gap between these two teams in 2026 is not as large as the one that their record would seem to indicate. The Mets entered play on Saturday with a 97 OPS+, slightly worse than the Yankees’ 100 mark. Accounting strictly for the time without these gigantic hitters, the Yankees had a .684 OPS without Judge, while the Mets were at .673 without Soto. Part of what has hindered the Mets’ season even further is that Francisco Lindor has also missed a healthy chunk of time, playing only 90 games to this point — although we should note that this doesn’t create an incredible disparity in the comparison between the time without Judge and Soto since there was minimal overlap in the missed time of the two Mets stars.
It’d be a neat narrative if we could come here and talk about how the Yankees’ offense dealt with missing Judge in a far superior manner than the Mets handled Soto’s absence. That isn’t necessarily the case, even with the best efforts of Ben Rice. The Yankees’ offense without Judge had to lean heavily on their pitching staff to get those wins, often scoring just barely enough to make it. Only one of these pitching staffs possesses the tools to take over and carry a team, and the numbers back that up. It’s not the full picture, but the Mets accumulated a 4.24 ERA in the 51 games Soto didn’t appear in while the Yankees had an earned run average a full run lower at 3.22 when Judge was out.
Even with Soto potentially available for all of their games, the Mets probably didn’t have enough for a meaningful fight in the National League — and the Yankees possibly could have found their way to the postseason even without Judge for a single game. The discrepancy in these two teams’ records would seem to suggest that at least for 2026, the Mets are more reliant on Soto than the Yankees are on Judge. That’s not to say they shouldn’t be happy to have number 99 back; we shouldn’t lose sight of what this team accomplished in his absence and how much worse it could’ve been. After all, just look at the Mets.