Category: Sports News

A week ago Tuesday, Pete Crow-Armstrong was on first base in a game against the Mets. It’s the top of the seventh and there’s one out. The Cubs are leading the game 7-3.

Then PCA took off for second on what turned out to be ball four to Michael Busch.

This is what happened next [VIDEO].

PCA was called safe at second, only to have the review crew rule him out for coming off the base and being tagged by Mets shortstop Bo Bichette.

Interestingly enough, in the video clip you don’t see second base umpire Stu Scheurwater make a call at all – as if PCA was just safe because Busch had walked. It should be noted that Scheurwater did not make an immediate judgment for the same reason umpires do not do so on missed tags or missed bases by runners. It’s not the umpires’ place to call attention to plays that are incomplete for any reason. It’s the players’ responsibility to know the possibilities and the alternatives, under the rules as written.

This play has happened at least two other times over the last couple of decades to Cubs runners.

On April 20, 2007, Ronny Cedeno was on first base with one out in the ninth in a game the Cubs were trailing 2-1. He took off for second as ball four was thrown to Jacque Jones.

Then this happened:

It’s much more clear here. Cedeno clearly came off the base and was tagged by Cardinals shortstop David Eckstein. Of course, there was no replay review back then, but the play was pretty obvious. That was a really bad play by Cedeno, under the rule he has to hold the base. If he had done so, he would have represented the tying run with one out. Instead the Cubs had a runner on first with two out, and Matt Murton popped up to end the game.

A similar play occurred June 9, 2023 in San Francisco. Nick Madrigal was on first base with one out in the top of the first. Ball four was thrown to Seiya Suzuki as Madrigal took off for second.

Here’s what happened [VIDEO].

The same thing happened. Madrigal briefly came off the base and was tagged out. This time, a review crew reversed the safe call and Madrigal was out. The Cubs eventually won the game anyway, 3-2.

For the sake of argument, let’s say the ball four pitches in each of these situations had been a hit by pitch instead. In that case, the ball is dead and the runner would have been safe.

So why not have the same situation if it’s ball four? In my opinion, this rule should be changed to make it the same as a HBP if a runner is going in that situation. In that case – same as a walk – the batter is awarded first base and any runners are safe at other bases.

Here are the rules in question.

MLB Rule 5.06 (3) (b) says, in regard to base advances:

Each runner, other than the batter, may without liability to be put out, advance one base when:

The batter’s advance without liability to be put out forces the runner to vacate his base, or when the batter hits a fair ball that touches another runner or the umpire before such ball has been touched by, or has passed a fielder, if the runner is forced to advance.

This applies to a hit, a hit batter, an error, many other things… except! This comment is below that rule:

A runner forced to advance without liability to be put out may advance past the base to which he is entitled only at his peril. If such a runner, forced to advance, is put out for the third out before a preceding runner, also forced to advance, touches home plate, the run shall score.

This is the situation we’re talking about here. On a hit batter, the ball is dead. But on a walk, the ball is considered “live” in this situation, and that’s the rule by which PCA was tagged out. There’s another place in the rule book where this play is specifically referred to, as a comment to Rule 5.09 (b) (6):

PLAY — Runner on first and three balls on batter: Runner steals on the next pitch, which is fourth ball, but after having touched second he overslides or overruns that base. Catcher’s throw catches him before he can return. Ruling is that the runner is out.

Again, this is precisely what happened on this play.

Here’s what Cubs manager Craig Counsell said about this incident:

“Umpires interpret rules correctly. They don’t get that stuff wrong,” Counsell said. “It’s a bad rule. It’s a terrible rule. I mean, I don’t know what else to say. Like, not a good rule.”

I concur with Counsell. The rule (or, more correctly, the comment noted above) should be changed to note that if that pitch is ball four and caught by the catcher, the ball should be dead and the runner given second base. The key here is “caught” – if the ball isn’t caught for any reason, sure, the play should then be live and continue.

That’s it. That’s the point of this article and my argument. Change this rule as noted above. That’s what I think. That’s what Counsell thinks. What do you think?

No snappy post-colon headline here. I can’t think of a better way to describe the Braves over the last two weeks, or in June as a whole, other than awful. While I’ll get to the actual horrendous stats in a bit, I do want to indicate that things aren’t awful because the Braves lost a bunch of games, or because they basically destroyed their division lead.

No, the reason why this is awful is because it’s the second year in a row that we’ve basically seen how the combination of not pushing full bore to win every game and an entirely self-inflicted adverse change in offensive approach can absolutely destroy a team.

If the Braves had hit a run of poor outcomes in one-run games (part of 2025), or a massive xwOBA underperformance (part of 2024), then you could say, “Yeah, but look at the first two months” and write it off as a correction (there’s that word again). But that’s not really what happened. This isn’t the space for it, and I’ll cover their self-inflicted gaping wound later, but fundamentally, the Braves did this to themselves. Again. So they’ll need to stop doing it to themselves, or else this is literally just going to be 2025-except-for-two-months-without-an-0-7-start-before-it. In case you forgot, the Braves started 2025 0-7, but then went on a bit of a tear afterwards, looking like the team they were earlier in terms of offensive approach, albeit with some inconsistency. Then, the offensive approach clearly shifted towards walking and slapping at the ball, and though maybe they couldn’t have overcome the injuries and one-run game stuff, the combination of all of those things destroyed the season.

The 2026 season isn’t destroyed yet, but the Braves can’t stay passive at the plate for much longer and continue to reap the withered fruit (and losses) from doing so. Whatever the rationale for changing how they approach plate appearances from April and much of May, it needs to be identified and crossed off, or else 2026 will just be 2025 compressed into four months and not six. It doesn’t matter what the pitching does, it doesn’t matter what they do or don’t do at the Trade Deadline, it doesn’t really even matter who is or isn’t healthy (within a reasonable level of injury): what matters is some collectively group of bats hitting akin to their talent level (a la, a top ten in baseball unit) and not something worse. If they can do that, this will be a good season, If they can’t, prepare for pain.

Anyway, onto the actual biweekly stuff:

Past summaries:

• So far, so good through mid-April
• Even better in late April
• May-be they’re just really good
• Late May just good, rather than absurdly awesome
• A June swoon so far

How did the Braves do recently?

Awful. At 3-9 in June’s second half, the Braves were definitively the worst team in baseball in that span. That two of those three wins came in a single series against the Brewers, of all teams, makes it worse, not better, as it means they went 1-8 against the Giants, Padres, and Cardinals. Though none of the games were these super-gigantic mismatches, the Braves should’ve gone something like 6-6 or maybe even 7-5 at the outside given the team talent levels and pitching matchups. They… did not.

The end result is that the Braves’ 9-14 June was their worst calendar month since last year’s 8-17 July… but the team was largely already dead by that point. The last time the Braves had a month with a sub-.400 winning percentage other than 2025 was August 2017, the last time it happened while they were relevant to the playoff picture was the September 2014 collapse that cost the Frank Wren regime their jobs and ushered in years of deliberate losing in Atlanta.

While some collapses are somewhat unjustified for various reasons, especially when concentrated in small samples, it’s hard to feel that way here:

• In June’s second half, the Braves were dead last in position player value (below replacement) and 29th in xwOBA. This is also true for June as a whole. The fielding was top ten-ish, but they also tossed away an entire game with bad fielding, so that doesn’t do much in the way of consolation.
• In June’s second half, the Braves were 23rd in pitching value (19th for the month). This breaks down into 27th in the rotation and 12th in the bullpen (26th and fourth for the month). The ERA-/FIP-/xFIP- ranks are 16th/19th/20th (and ninth/15th/17th for the month). This isn’t good, but it’s eminently survivable with good defense and actual hitting. The Braves… did not produce actual hitting.

So, put this together, and you have the Braves shedding, over the course of June:

• Four wins off their projected end-of-season total;
• About six percent in playoff odds (down to 92 percent);
• About 28 percent in division odds (down to 61 percent); and
• Going from the best record to the fourth-best record.

From June 16-on alone, they have shed:

• Three of those four wins;
• Even more in playoff odds (seven percent, over six); and
• 21 percent of the division odds.

How are the Braves doing overall?

This is a weird section / question to answer. On the season, the Braves look okay. But June was so aberrant and so problematic that things don’t feel okay, and they will quickly not be okay if any of June leaks into July. If June 2026 Braves was a virus, you’d need to quarantine it immediately, except that they went through all of June without doing it, so…

On the season, the Braves are now 19th in position player value and 14th in pitching value. They are underperforming their run differential by two games, but overperforming BaseRuns by two games. However, by WAR-wins, they have sunk down to a “should be a 42-41 team,” because their offensive performance has just been so unthinkably poor that it basically reverses the credit for all the good play they managed previously. Basically, it’s kind of an interesting thing, conceptually. The number of games suggests that one bad month will have a hard time counteracting two great ones, though I guess it’s technically possible if the bad month was horrendous. But, context-neutral performance without tallying wins and losses is a lot more granular.

I’ll just summarize it this way: if the Braves don’t start playing better now, they are already dead for the season, unless they luck into some kind of insane one-run game overperformance or something else that is unlikely to happen. They can’t play “the way they have been,” where that includes the season as a whole, because doing so will lead to them having a .500ish record at the end of the year.

How are the hitters doing?

What a psychotically stupid question to have as a standard biweekly recap section, past me.

The hitters died. Not literally, but figuratively. And also, if they had died literally, it’s not clear whether you’d be able to tell a difference in their results.

This chart probably says most of it here. The Braves only had two or three guys even play okay over the last two weeks. Mauricio Dubon is playing out of his mind, but no one else even played that well. On the season, this slide has transformed the team into one where they have five producers, and… nothing else. It’s basically half a lineup. Again, to be clear: the talent level is not “half a lineup.” But the overly-passive approach has killed any semblance of additional production that would push the roster into more than “half a lineup.” Drake Baldwin shed in two weeks basically a third of what he had accumulated in about two months.

Left side is last two weeks, right side is the season as a whole.

Mauricio Dubon deserves a medal for being the only guy really chugging in June, and Ozzie Albies basically stole a win from the Brewers with two cheap homers to right field that one time, but beyond those guys, Matt Olson, and Michael Harris II, the rest of the position players probably could’ve been submerged in a vat of acid and then brought back to the plate and I’m not sure June would’ve been any different.

How are the pitchers doing?

It’s kind of like the lineup…

Chris Sale is the only guy doing stuff, but he’s pitching like a normal-Cy Young-candidate-in-an-age-without-Jacob-Misiorowski. Everyone else, well… they didn’t help. Bryce Elder and Martin Perez have reasonable stats on the season as a whole, but got shelled recently — though Elder’s was largely HR/FB-related. The whole Grant Holmes saga and JR Ritchie failing to hit the ground running multiple times are additional, but nowhere near primary, reasons why June went as it did.

On the relief side, Dylan Lee, Didier Fuentes, and Robert Suarez all continued to be awesome, though it doesn’t really matter when they don’t get leads with which to pitch… or the team elects not to use them with said leads. Oh, and Robert Suarez got hurt. Lee in particular is having a ridiculous season: he has 1.4 fWAR already, and has already amassed a career-high 15 shutdowns.

Anyway, see you next month, if no one dips us all in a vat of acid. Which may be preferable at this point.

Sluggish bats, bullpen struggles doom Phillies in series finale against Pirates originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

Both the Phillies and Pittsburgh Pirates were forced to brave triple-digit temperatures in their series finale at Citizens Bank Park on Thursday afternoon.

The Pirates just braved ‘em a little better than the Phillies did.

The Phils concluded their last homestand before the All-Star break with a 6-1 loss to their cross-state rivals in front of a parched crowd of 37,851. The two teams split the four-game series.

Left-handed relief pitching proved to be an issue for the Phillies in the series. Kyle Backhus hit two of the three batters he faced – one of the HBPs forced in a run – in Wednesday night’s game, which the Phillies ended up winning, 10-6. He returned in Thursday’s defeat and gave up a solo homer to the first batter he faced in the ninth.

Earlier in the game, lefty Tim Mayza faced five batters in the fifth inning and gave up three hits and the tying run.

Two innings later, the Phils’ top bullpen lefty, Jose Alvarado, faced six batters and was tagged for three hits, one of which was a triple, and two runs as the Pirates took the lead.

Alvarado’s ERA stands at 6.10. He has allowed 41 hits in 31 innings.

Phillies baseball boss Dave Dombrowski has several holes to consider filling at the trade deadline. A late-game bullpen arm, possibly from the left side, could be one of them if Alvarado can’t get it going.

The bullpen struggles continued in the eighth inning when Lou Trivino gave up two runs, including a home run to Endy Rodriguez.

The bullpen was hardly the only culprit in defeat. The Phillies’ bats produced just four hits on the day and never built on an RBI double by Bryce Harper in the third inning. Harper has at least one RBI in eight straight games. He leads the team with 57.

Right-hander Alan Rangel started for the Phillies. He did not allow a run and left with a 1-0 lead after four innings. However, he needed 90 pitches to complete those four innings. Rangel is filling the fifth spot in the rotation until the Phillies add an arm in a trade or Andrew Painter returns from Triple A as a new man.

Pittsburgh got excellent pitching from Jared Jones, Carmen Mlodzinski, Gregory Soto and Mason Montgomery.

Montgomery struck out Brandon Marsh, Alec Bohm and Bryson Stott to end the game at 3:38 p.m. The temperature on the scoreboard read 105 degrees.

The Phillies hit the road for Kansas City after the game. They will play their next nine games on the road, taking them into the All-Star break. They are off Friday before starting a three-game series against the Royals on Saturday. After Kansas City, the Phils play three at Cincinnati and three at Detroit. It’s a favorable schedule for the Phillies as the Royals, Reds and Tigers are a combined 35 games under .500.

(More coming…)

Pittsburgh Pirates vs. Philadelphia Phillies, July 2, 2026, 12:35 p.m. ET

The Pittsburgh Pirates are finishing off a four-game set against their in-state rival, the Philadelphia Phillies.

Taking the mound to close out the series for the Pirates is Jared Jones, who is making his seventh start of the season. In his last appearance on June 27 against the Cincinnati Reds, Jones pitched 4.2 innings, giving up four hits and three earned runs as Pittsburgh lost 9-7 at home to Cincinnati. Jones has only gone five innings in one of his six starts this season, so the bullpen might be tasked with picking up a few more innings than they normally would.

Countering for the Phillies is Allen Rangel, who is making his first start of the season. Rangel has made three relief appearances for the Phillies this season as a long reliever:

• Pitched 3 innings against the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field on April 22.
• Pitched 5 innings against the Washington Nationals on June 22, giving up one earned run.
• Pitched 4 innings against the New York Mets on June 27 in a 6-2 loss at Citi Field. Tim Mayza was the opener, and Rangel came in during the second inning. He gave up four hits and four earned runs as the Phillies struggled to give him much run support.

Location: Citizens Bank Park, Philadelphia, PA

Broadcast: KDKA AM/FM, Sportsnet Pittsburgh

Pitching Matchup: Jared Jones (1-1, 5.76 ERA) vs. Alan Rangel (0-1, 4.50 ERA)

BD community, chime off in the comments section below.

Here are the lineups. For the Phillies:

Got the powder blues on#RingTheBellpic.twitter.com/jkKbRRFg9g

— Philadelphia Phillies (@Phillies) July 2, 2026

For the Pirates:

7/2 ⚾ Pirates Lineup is Out

📊 Live Line: Pirates +109 • O/U 10.5

Full matchup stats, BvP, & umpire ratings:https://t.co/ZEHYUZEcFl#Pirates#PiratesLineup#MLBpic.twitter.com/YqYMVkXint

— MLB Daily Lineups (@DailyMLBLineups) July 2, 2026

Let’s talk about it.

José Canseco is probably one of the most famous baseball players of recent times. While he had success in the major leagues, winning several awards and two championships, said fame is probably infamy more than anything else. He was always a bit of a character and his revelations about PED use, both by him and other players, only burnished his reputation as a wild card. His career with the Yankees wasn’t especially notable other than one moment or two, but he did end up winning a World Series ring.

As he celebrates his birthday today, let’s look back at the wild life and times of José Canseco.

José Canseco Capas Jr.
Born: July 2, 1964 (Havana, Cuba)
Yankees Tenure: 2000

Canseco was born in Cuba in 1964, along with a twin brother. Said twin — Osvaldo, more commonly known as “Ozzie” — would also make the major leagues, albeit with less success and fame. His family left Cuba shortly after Fidel Castro came to power, eventually settling in Miami, Florida.

In high school, Canseco was a bit of a slow developer, failing to make his school’s varsity team until he was a senior. However, he pretty quickly hit the ground running as a senior, catching the eye of former major league pitcher Camilo Pascual, who happened to be both the father of one of Canseco’s teammates and also a scout for the Oakland Athletics. He convinced his employers to draft Canseco, and the A’s picked him up in the 15th round of the 1982 Draft.

Upon getting drafted and working his way through the minors, Canseco’s talent started to draw rave reviews. His ability to hit monster home runs got him all kinds of lofty comparisons, with some even dubbing him “the next Mickey Mantle.” Oakland eventually called up Canseco to the big leagues in September 1985. He impressed in his short cameo, hitting five homers in that final month. The following year in his first full season, Canseco was good enough to be honored with the 1986 AL Rookie of the Year.

Two other important things for the A’s happened that season. One was that a midseason managerial changed led to them hiring Tony LaRussa. The other was that Oakland gave a MLB debut to another young slugger in Mark McGwire. The following year, McGwire won Rookie of the Year himself, as he and Canseco formed a powerful middle order combo that would be dubbed “The Bash Brothers.” (Later, wonderfully parodied by Andy Samberg and “The Lonely Island.”)

In 1988, Canseco broke out in a big way. Putting up the first-ever 40-40 season with 42 homers and 40 steals, he was named AL MVP, helping the A’s win the American League pennant. They would famously be upset by the Dodgers and Kirk Gibson’s heroics in the World Series, with Canseco going just 1-for-19 in the five games. Despite that, he had arrived into stardom.

Around that time, Canseco’s off the field antics also started to get him a name. Prior to the 1989 season, he was arrested for carrying a loaded handgun while on a college campus, claiming that he was carrying the gun for protection. Between that and injuries, he was limited to 65 games that season. However, he again helped Oakland win the AL, and this time around, he hit much better, as the A’s beat the Giants in the “Bay Bridge Series.”

Canseco and the A’s returned to the World Series in 1990, but fell to the Reds. Over the next couple years, Canseco generally continued putting up good numbers, but he continued to get unneeded attention off the field. Further legal issues and further tabloid fodder — such as a rumored affair with popstar Madonna — eventually became a bit too much for the A’s. Just ahead of the 1992 trade deadline, Oakland sent him to Texas.

With the Rangers, Canseco continued producing, but those teams generally went nowhere. Plus, the most famous moment of that stint was probably him failing to catch a ball on the warning track, allowing it to bounce off his head and over the fence for a home run.

Despite still mostly putting up decent numbers and still having his prodigious power, Canseco started to become a journeyman after that. Texas eventually traded him to the Red Sox, and after that he had stints back in Oakland, with the Blue Jays, and then with the early “Hit Show” Devil Rays. It was in Tampa Bay where in the midst of an injury-plagued 2000 season, Tampa Bay placed him on waivers. Somewhat shockingly, as they didn’t particularly need an outfielder/DH type, the Yankees claimed him and agreed to terms with the D-Rays on a trade on August 7th. Speculation was heavy that the Yankees only claimed him to keep him away from some of the other contending teams that might’ve had an interest in Canseco. By his own admission, Joe Torre didn’t really know what to do with him.

Canseco’s tenure with the Yankees wasn’t especially notable, except for a towering home run that he hit at Yankee Stadium.

Canseco put up just above average numbers, but he ended up being somewhat useful, as the Yankees stumbled down the stretch and just barely hung on to the AL East title. However, they caught fire in October, eventually beating the Mets and winning Canseco his second ring. Personally though, he didn’t have fond memories of his Yankee tenure, calling it “the worst time of my life,” due to his curtailed playing time.

Canseco played for the White Sox in 2001. That would be his last major league season, although not for a lack of trying. After failing to make the Montreal Expos in 2002 spring training and spending much of it back at the White Sox Triple-A affiliate, he announced his “retirement,” but continued playing in various independent leagues for several years after that. As late as 2018, he still appeared in some games for various independent teams, often trying his hand as a pitcher as well.

Now, it’s time to talk about the thing I haven’t been mentioning throughout all this: Canseco’s steroid use. Rumors around his PED use dated back to during his active playing career, but Canseco admitted to using them in his infamous book “Juiced” released in 2005. The book gained notoriety as Canseco not only admitted his own use, but accused several other famous major leaguers as well, including his former Bash Brother McGwire. He ended up being proven correct on many of the names. He said his own use dated back to his early minor league years and continued throughout pretty much all of his MLB years.

In recent years, Canseco has become a bit of a meme figure. He has a very interesting Twitter feed, a lot of which revolves around his hatred of Alex Rodriguez. He’s participated in some very odd celebrity boxing matches, including one with former child actor Danny Bonaduce. He lost an MMA match. He’s gotten himself in legal trouble on various occasions, including once where he tried to smuggle fertility drugs back over the US-Mexico border. I don’t know either.

Yes time travel is possible. Will explain later.

— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) August 13, 2012

There are many, many things you can say about José Canseco. Many of them aren’t good. However, you can never say that he’s boring.

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See more of the “Yankees Birthday of the Day” series here.

At the end of last season, Andrew Alvarez had five really nice starts for the Nats. He did not go that deep into games, but Alvarez proved to be effective with his breaking ball heavy attack. However, I was not fully convinced about the lefty. With a fastball that averaged 91, and middling results at AAA, I thought it was a flash in the pan.

This season Alvarez is proving me wrong one outing at a time. He is still not going deep into games, but he is just getting as many outs as the team needs. On the season, the 27 year old southpaw has a 3.05 ERA and 2.65 FIP in 41.1 innings across 11 appearances and 5 starts. The velocity is more in the 92-93 range and his breaking balls are as sharp as ever.

For a guy who does not throw hard, Alvarez gets a ton of strikeouts. This season, he has 48 K’s in 41.1 innings. He is striking out 27.6% of hitters, which has him tied with Braxton Ashcraft and Reid Detmers, two breakout arms who throw much harder than him. My favorite part of Alvarez’s game is his ability to finish guys off with two strikes. It is a skill that not many arms on this staff have, but he does it super well.

Andrew Alvarez is really good at putting hitters away with two strikes

— federalbaseball (@federalbaseball) July 1, 2026

His go-to two strike weapon and his best pitch is his curveball. It is a really sharp curve that he throws quite hard and commands well. His other pitches do not really pop on most stuff models, but stuff+ really likes his curve. Despite not throwing his fastball that hard, his 83 MPH curveball is significantly harder than the average 80 MPH lefty curve. 

Most harder curveballs sacrifice some movement in exchange for the extra power. That is not the case for the Alvarez curve though. He actually gets more drop and break than the average curveball. It is truly a unique pitch and has been getting exceptional results. Batters are hitting .179 with a 35.1% whiff rate on his hook. Of his 48 strikeouts, 30 of them have come on the curveball. With that context, it is no surprise that the curveball is his most used pitch.

The curve is not Alvarez’s only swing and miss breaking ball though. He also has a slider which he throws 26.3% of the time, just 2% less than the curve. The slider comes in at about the same speed, so if you did not know any better, you would think it is a misread curve. However, if you look at the pitch plot, the two pitches have very distinct movement profiles. 

Having two breaking balls at the same speed with different movement is also a unique piece of Alvarez’s arsenal. The slider actually has a higher whiff rate than the curve, but it gets hit harder and he only has 11 strikeouts on the pitch. Here is a neat video of Alvarez getting strikeouts on the slider and the curve though.

Andrew Alvarez, Filthy Breaking Balls. 😷 pic.twitter.com/8PH0r6ckD5

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) June 15, 2026

It is no secret that Alvarez is a breaking ball reliant pitcher. He throws either the curve or the slider 54.7% of the time. That is his bread and butter, and he knows it. The fact that Alvarez knows himself so well as a pitcher is another strength for him.

The fastball is not a strength of Alvarez’s game, but he mixes in his 4-seamer and sinker just enough. Batters are hitting over .300 on both, but the heaters keep them honest and get a good amount of ground balls. On the season, Alvarez has an elite 55% ground ball rate.

Despite not having a great fastball, Alvarez still has good stuff, just not in the traditional way. His breaking balls grade out well, and he uses that to get strikeouts. He is a good example of a pitcher not having to throw 100 to be a swing and miss guy.

Andrew Alvarez has basically scrapped his fastball for his sinker vs LHB (Good!), but still throws it too much to RHB (Bad!)

Only 34 thrown, but the sinker has worked vs righties, tho expected numbers say that may not last. Would rather see it more than the FF pic.twitter.com/rxgZewYpIP

— Aaron Lichstrahl (@AJ_Lich) June 25, 2026

While Alvarez will walk some hitters, his overall command is strong. He does a nice job placing his curveball at or below the bottom of the zone and locating his 4-seamer at the top of the zone. Alvarez also spots his sinker down and into lefties, which is a nice spot to put it. His overall location+ grade is 106, which is better than average. 

Overall, I am very encouraged by Alvarez’s season. The fastball will limit him, and he is not necessarily a guy you want facing hitters 3 times. However, he is a really solid piece in this pitching staff. Moving forward, I think he could have a lot of success in a Brad Lord type role.

We saw Lord and Alvarez team up yesterday, and that is a cool concept. Those two could combine for 7 innings and create a very good starter in the aggregate. While Alvarez does not have the flashy velocity many teams are looking for, he is proving that his spin heavy attack is not a flash in the pan.

Some English soccer fans weren’t done getting their sports fix after their comeback win over DR Congo on Wednesday.

Following Harry Kane’s heroics that sent the Three Lions through to the World Cup Round of 16 in Atlanta in the afternoon, a group of supporters made their way to the Braves game against the Cardinals.

Standing in a section beyond left-center field, the fans threw their support behind Braves center fielder Michael Harris, singing songs like “Walking in a Harris wonderland” and “Baseball’s coming home again with Michael Harris.”

England fans have chosen a random baseball player, Michael Harris of the Atlanta Braves, to support more than anyone else at the baseball after beating DR Congo

And it’s absolutely class pic.twitter.com/KsG12Hf0I6

— Lloyd Canfield (@LloydCanfield) July 2, 2026

An appreciative Harris threw a ball toward the fans before the start of an inning.

“So it’s my first experience of baseball and we didn’t know what to expect,” an English fan named Nige told Braves TV reporter Wiley Ballard. “And what we’re trying to do is just bring a little bit of English atmosphere to what is obviously a slightly different sport. But it’s amazing, it’s fantastic to see something different. I love the whole build, I love the atmosphere, I love the fact that you guys do something so big. Just to be part of it for one night is really special.”

There's only two Michael Harris, actually. pic.twitter.com/Hy3XxdvQEK

— Joan Vázquez (@knockknockjoan) July 2, 2026

Harris went 1-for-4 with an RBI in Atlanta’s 5-1 win as the Braves improved to 50-34.

The NL East leaders are 2 1/2 games up on the Phillies entering Thursday.

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Every match of the FIFA World Cup will air on either FOX or FOX Sports 1. If you don’t have cable, you can take advantage of a DIRECTV free trial to stream it all.

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Harris, 25, was the NL Rookie of the Year in 2022, when he burst onto the scene by slashing .297/.339/.514 with 19 homers and 64 RBIs.

After a couple of down years offensively, Harris is hitting .293 with an .817 OPS, 14 homers and 44 RBIs in 78 games this season.

England now heads to Mexico City for a daunting match against Mexico at Estadio Azteca on Sunday.

The Cincinnati Reds have lost four straight games overall and all six of the games in which they have played the Milwaukee Brewers so far in 2026, and now they get to face the single most intimidating pitcher on the planet today. Great!

Following yet another late game collapse on Wednesday evening, the Reds are now seven games under .500 and should almost immediately begin going into hibernation mode, the 2027 season (ha) a much more realistic time to be ambitious than this disastrous 2026 one. And now, this Thursday afternoon, they get to face Jacob Misiorowki, who tops the FanGraphs fWAR leaderboard for pitchers so far this season while also topping the fastball velocity readings by nearly 2.5 mph.

Interestingly enough, it’s Cincinnati’s Chase Burns who sits second on that velocity list. Even though he’s 2.4 mph behind the Miz on average, he’s still one of the elite chuckers in the game, and that’s who Cincinnati will send to the bump in this series finale. There’s at least a bit of hope, if not much, that Burns can once again be the guy who stems the tide and gets this moribund franchise pointed back in the correct direction for at least one day.

It’s beyond bleak, folks. 85 games into the season, up against the most dominant arm in the sport, and knowing a loss would sink you a full eight games under the .500 mark? That’s a season-ending scenario just about any way you look at it, even though Nick Krall will point at the injured list and tell you it’ll be just like making a trade.

Cincinnati’s season isn’t just on the brink, it’s leaning over it.

First pitch on Thursday is a 2:10 PM ET matinee. Here’s how the Reds will line up to start:

Burns Day for the series finale

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— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) July 2, 2026