Category: Sports News

Craig Kimbrel is still working out the kinks with his new team.

In his second appearance with the Mets, Kimbrel and catcher Francisco Alvarez got their wires crossed during the sixth inning with two outs on a 2-2 pitch to Shohei Ohtani with the Dodgers leading 4-0.

Alvarez called for time while Kimbrel was mid-windup and the veteran reliever nearly threw the ball at the Mets catcher, who was about five steps across home plate toward the pitcher’s mound.

Francisco Alvarez calls time and Craig Kimbrel stops his pitching motion just before throwing the ball pic.twitter.com/v7GuyJcg1B

— SNY (@SNYtv) April 14, 2026

Ohtani and home plate umpire Nic Lentz immediately ducked to avoid what looked like a potentially dangerous situation if the ball was released.

Alvarez did not get out of the way and instead stood his ground and tried to quickly get into a stance to catch the pitch, despite the distance between him and the pitcher closing.

Kimbrel was able to hold himself back from throwing the pitch and looked away as Alvarez came to the mound — and Ohtani took a sigh of relief.

“Whoa,” the Mets broadcast of Ron Darling and Gary Cohen said in unison.

“Alvarez was running out to try and beat the pitch clock, and Kimbrel was ready to throw the pitch,” Cohen said. “That could have been a disaster.”

“That was almost going to be a little league distance pitch,” Darling added. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this before. Alvarez gets time from the umpire, but Kimbrel doesn’t know that. Wow.”

Kimbrel wound up getting Ohtani to fly out to right field to end the inning, though four runs was more than enough for LA as right-hander Justin Wrobleski shut the Mets offense down.

It’s been a brutal stretch for the Mets, who have now lost six straight with Juan Soto sidelined with a calif strain.

They will try to break free when they send ace Nolan McLean to the mound opposite Dodgers star Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Tuesday night.

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Gunnar Henderson and Yordan Alvarez were two of the best hitters in the majors in 2024 before underperforming last season. 

Both have rediscovered that form to start the year, creating strong value on their props in favorable matchups tonight.

Here are my best free MLB player props for Tuesday, April 14. 

Best MLB player props today

Player	Pick	Odds
Gunnar Henderson	Over 1.5 total bases	+100
Drake Baldwin	Over 0.5 RBI	+165
Yordan Alvarez	Over 1.5 total bases	-105

Gunnar Henderson Over 1.5 total bases [+100]

After finishing fourth in the AL MVP race in 2024, Gunnar Henderson took a step back in 2025.

However, the Baltimore Orioles shortstop is swinging the bat well again, which is why my MLB picks are hammering his total bases prop. Henderson ranks in the 97th percentile in overall offensive talent according to THE BAT X, and he is slugging .691 over the last two weeks.

Henderson will have the platoon advantage at home against Arizona Diamondbacks starter Merrill Kelly, with a stiff 13 mph breeze blowing out to the outfield at hitter-friendly Camden Yards.

Kelly is making his season debut after dealing with a back ailment, and he logged a 4.16 xERA across 32 starts last year. The D-backs also have one of the worst bullpens in the majors waiting in the wings.

• Time: 6:35 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: DBacks.TV | MASN

Drake Baldwin Over 0.5 RBI [+165]

Drake Baldwin won the NL Rookie of the Year Award last season and has been even better this year. 

The Atlanta Braves catcher ranks in the 95th percentile in xSLG (.586) and the 88th percentile in barrel rate. Baldwin leads the Braves with 17 RBI, and he’s driven in a run in nine of his last 14 games.

Baldwin will have the platoon advantage against Miami Marlins right-hander Max Meyer tonight.

Meyer owns a 3.68 ERA through three starts, though his xERA sits significantly higher at 5.42. The right-hander posted a 4.73 ERA with a 1.42 WHIP in 12 starts last season, struggling particularly on the road.

• Time: 7:15 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: BravesVision | Marlins.TV

Yordan Alvarez Over 1.5 total bases [-105]

After an injury-plagued campaign in 2025, Yordan Alvarez is healthy and playing like an MVP candidate. The Houston Astros slugger is fourth in the majors in slugging percentage (.714), and his expected xSLG is even higher at an incredible .821.

He'll have the platoon advantage against struggling Colorado Rockies hurler Michael Lorenzen, who sports an ugly 6.09 xERA through three starts, ranking in the 11th percentile in hard-hit rate and the sixth percentile in xBA (.323).

Alvarez will also benefit from 15 mph winds blowing out to the outfield at Daikin Park.

• Time: 8:10 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: Rockies.TV | Space City Home Network

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Justin Wrobleski had the best start of the Dodgers season to date and the best outing of his career in Monday night’s win over the New York Mets.

Wrobleski was so efficient in his eight scoreless innings that some of the talk afterwards was about why he didn’t get a chance to finish the game. After all, he was only at 90 pitches through eight innings, during which he allowed only two singles and nothing else.

“He certainly earned the opportunity to go back out for the ninth. He pitched a heck of a ballgame,” manager Dave Roberts told reporters Monday night at Dodger Stadium. “The decision was, he hasn’t more than five innings in a long time, so now you’re talking about the health of the player. There’s more to that than pitch counts.”

In his first two outings this season, Wrobleski pitched four innings in bulk relief on March 30 against the Cleveland Guardians, then pitched five innings in a start and win over the Toronto Blue Jays last week. He last pitched more than five innings last July 19, with Triple-A Oklahoma City, and his professional career high was seven innings, done on June 16, 2024 with Double-A Tulsa and again on May 10, 2025 with Oklahoma City.

The top three in the Dodgers rotation — Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow, and Shohei Ohtani — have pitched six innings in every start so far, and Emmet Sheehan pitched six in his last start as well. Yamamoto faced two batters in the seventh inning last week in Toronto but didn’t retire either one. No Dodgers starter had gotten an out beyond the sixth inning before Monday night, when Wrobleski completed eight innings.

Jorge Polanco broke up the perfect game bid with a single in the fifth inning, but was erased on a double play. Francisco Alvarez singled in the eighth inning, the only other Met to reach base against Wrobleski. None reached scoring position.

Wrobleski got an 80 game score for his effort, the best by a Dodgers starter this season, topping Shohei Ohtani’s 73 game score on March 31 against Cleveland, with six strikeouts over six scoreless innings.

With only two strikeouts, Wrobleski wasn’t dominant, but he was efficient, getting 10 outs on two or fewer pitches. He gave up some hard-hit balls but almost all were on the ground. Most notably, shortstop Miguel Rojas robbed Bo Bichette of a hit with a diving stab and throw up the middle in the second inning.

“Those guys are very, very aggressive. If they’re going to put the ball in play, there’s only so much a pitcher can do outside of trying to get behind and make them chase out of the strike zone,” Roberts told reporters. “We want outs. He’ll get his strikeouts. With two strikeouts and no walks, I love the no walks. The two strikeouts isn’t a second thought. It was a great, great major league outing.”

Wrobleski faced only 25 batters to get through his eight innings, one over the minimum. He’s the first Dodgers starter to complete eight innings in 25 or fewer batters since Clayton Kershaw on July 15, 2022 in Anaheim, the second of his two flirtations with perfection that season.

Tanner Scott relieved Wrobleski and needed only eight pitches to finish the game, putting the Dodgers total at 98 pitches. It’s only the second MLB game this season with a team throwing fewer than 100 pitches. Miami Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara needed only 93 pitches to shut out the Chicago White Sox on April 1. The previous time the Dodgers threw fewer than 100 pitches was September 12, 2021, when Max Scherzer threw 92 pitches in eight innings, followed by Justin Bruihl’s six-pitch ninth to finish off the San Diego Padres.

It was great to see the Mariners finally play up to their potential for an entire weekend. That it came at the expense of the Astros makes it all the more sweet. Between the odd fourth game against Houston on Monday, the quick three-game road trip to San Diego in the middle of this week, and a quick second series against the Rangers back at home this weekend, I’m not sure what the MLB schedule makers were thinking with this week. 

The Mariners won the inaugural “official” version of the Vedder Cup last year, taking five of six games against the Padres. The last time San Diego won this regional rivalry was back in 2021.

The Padres have been one of the most entertaining teams over the last few years. They’ve got tons of superstar talent on the big league roster and haven’t been afraid to make aggressive moves to stay competitive. Years of those win-now moves have depleted the depth in San Diego’s organization, which makes this roster pretty top heavy and potentially very fragile. When everyone is healthy and things are working as they should be, this team is as good as any other in the National League. 

While the Padres’ pitching staff isn’t currently at full strength, the lineup is firing on all cylinders. Built around a quartet of stars, the offense mirrors the construction of the entire roster: extremely top heavy. Fernando Tatis Jr. hasn’t been able to replicate the MVP-type production from earlier in his career before his motorcycle accident in 2021, but he’s still been one of the best players in baseball over the last three years. Manny Machado is the iron man of the group; he’s played in less than 150 games in a season just three times in his 12-year career and one of those times was his rookie year when he was called up midseason. He’s been one of the most consistent producers in baseball as well, the metronome in the heart of the Padres lineup. I’m not sure Xander Bogaerts will ever get back to the level of production he enjoyed in Boston, but he plays excellent defense at a premium position. The star with the biggest question marks is Jackson Merrill; he took a step back last year after a fantastic debut in 2024, though he’s still only 23 years old and still has an extremely high ceiling.

Probable Pitchers 

Updated Stuff+ Explainer 

• Stuff+ scores for Mariners starters

Michael King looked like an ace in his one lone full season in the starting rotation back in 2024. He had made the switch from the bullpen during the year prior, but his follow up campaign after his breakout was filled with injuries. He missed about two and half months of the season last year with a shoulder injury and another two weeks in August with knee inflammation. He never really looked settled last year and his ERA and FIP really suffered. He’s got a couple of solid pitch pairs to attack batters on both sides of the plate; four-seam-changeup against left-handers and sinker-sweeper against right-handers. With his low-slot delivery, he gets a ton of horizontal movement on his secondary pitches, while still staying pretty vertical with his fastballs. 

Randy Vásquez has spent the last few seasons as a reliable, innings-eating back-end starter for the Padres. Between 2023 and ‘24, he had the lowest strikeout rate among all qualified starters, though his ERA was a decent 4.27. All of a sudden, he’s throwing two ticks harder this year and he’s more than doubled his strikeout rate. The extra oomph on his pitches is obviously great, but it’s particularly helpful for Vásquez because of his seven-pitch repertoire. Discerning which of those seven pitches is heading towards the plate is a lot easier when you only have to worry about a 93 mph fastball rather than 95 mph heat. With the threat of a true, bat-missing heater in his back pocket, his entire arsenal becomes more effective because he has so many looks he can present to the batter.

I can only assume that Walker Buehler’s 2019 and ‘21 seasons are doing a lot of heavy lifting for his reputation as he’s bounced between three different teams over the last two seasons. He put up 5.1 and 5.6 fWAR in those two campaigns but underwent Tommy John surgery in 2022. He hasn’t been the same since and he was legitimately one of the worst pitchers in baseball last year. His four-seam fastball was one of the best in baseball at his peak but it’s lost a ton of its carry and just isn’t an effective pitch anymore. He’s tried to adjust by deepening his repertoire and mixing in all of his secondary pitches a lot more often. It didn’t work in Boston last year, but the Padres desperately needed starting pitchers this spring, so they’re giving Buehler another shot to see if he can figure things out.

The Big Picture:

Haha, Lastros.

Managers are hired to be fired. This is not news to anyone who has watched baseball for a significant period of time. It is exceedingly rare for a baseball manager to ever retire on his own terms. Heck, even some recent Hall of Fame-caliber managers who retired found themselves managing other teams in relatively short order, suggesting that their retirement may not have been entirely voluntary.

Some day, Matt Quatraro’s term as the Royals manager will come to an end. It will almost certainly be because he has been fired. Not because he’s a bad manager, though, but because that’s a fate that awaits almost everyone who has ever taken on the role. That day is hopefully a long way off, though, because he’s one of the very best managers in the league.

It’s actually pretty rare to see a manager fired just because his team is losing. Usually, a managerial firing is accompanied by one of three other criteria. First, if a general manager feels like he’s on the hot seat. He can attempt to keep his job by persuading the people above him, whether that’s the owner or the president of baseball operations or whatever, that the problem isn’t the players he acquired, but how they’re being managed. Second, if a team severely underperforms their expectations, this often goes hand-in-hand with the first one. Third, a manager can be fired if he loses the support of the clubhouse.

One of the surest signs a manager is about to be fired is when you see a lack of effort from the players on the field or you start hearing about discontent in the clubhouse. The manager role is named that because they manage the game, but in modern MLB, it’s about managing the people in the clubhouse as much as it is about deciding on-field strategy.

It’s easy for all of us sitting on our couches to see that John Schreiber shouldn’t be pitching in high-leverage situations anymore. Not only has his ability seemed to decline since last season, but the bullpen has added arms and seen other arms improve since last season, too. If it’s easy for us to see, you have to know Q has seen it, too. However, if Q summarily dropped a respected veteran reliever from his position without cause, it would make everyone wonder how safe their own roles on the team were.

Think about your own job for a moment. I know that playing baseball is different, but this part isn’t. If you knew someone who had been with the company for a while and had done a pretty good job for years, suddenly demoted or laid off after the company hired some more people, you’d wonder about your own job security, too, wouldn’t you? It might motivate some people, but other people – especially high performers who know they have options elsewhere if things don’t work out here – could very well decide it isn’t worth trying to please a manager who seemingly can’t be pleased and start job hunting.

So, in the name of giving people a sense of security, knowing they won’t be demoted or cut for a bad performance or two, Quatraro has given Schreiber multiple opportunities to get the job done. This also applies to Carlos Estévez getting the first save opportunity at the start of the year. The difference between the two, even beyond Estévez’s injury, is that Schreiber’s struggles haven’t obviously affected games until this week.

That brings us to the flip side of that loyalty coin. If you leave low-performers in prestigious positions while people who are playing better are relegated to less important roles, you run the risk of demoralizing the team that way, too. That was something previous leaders such as Dayton Moore and Mike Matheny struggled with and at least partially led to their dismissal. The good news is that we have years of evidence that Matt Quatraro can handle those situations pretty well.

In 2024, he entered the season with Will Smith, the respected veteran, as his closer. It didn’t take him long to remove Smith from the position and promote James McArthur to the role when the former faltered while the latter pitched well. By April 5, Quatraro gave Smith a save situation but had McArthur warmed up and replaced him before he could blow the game. Later that year, when McArthur struggled, Quatraro removed him and promoted the newly acquired Lucas Erceg to the role instead.

Also in 2024, when MJ Melendez was being counted on to keep getting better, and Hunter Renfroe was added to the team, they started the year batting fifth and sixth, respectively. A week into the season, Renfroe was batting eighth more often. By the end of April, Melendez had been demoted to batting seventh. Renfroe was easier to demote with Nelson Velázquez hitting well to start the year, and Melendez was moved down when Michael Massey got hot.

It’s very en vogue to criticize how Quatraro has handled the bullpen and lineup, but the truth of the matter is, he rapidly makes changes when he has options. One of the reasons I was so optimistic about this season is that I felt like the Royals had given him more options to work with than ever before. And, to that end, I expect him to make changes soon. He’s given Schreiber, Vinnie Pasquantino, and Salvador Perez 10% of the season to show they can do better than they have. They earned that with their veteran performance in years prior. But they didn’t do it, and so change has to come.

To that end, I would be very surprised if we see Schreiber pitching in high leverage again for a while, at least. And if we get to the end of the week and Vinnie and Salvy are still killing rallies while batting third and fourth, I’ll be both amazed and upset. Changes are coming, not drastic ones, we’re not cutting guys after 16 games, but significant changes all the same.

Running a team means remembering that players are people. That means that some deference to veterans is not just warranted, but required. I know many of you are snake-bitten by how Ned Yost, Mike Matheny, and Dayton Moore seemed to constantly defer to veterans for weeks, months, and even years after they had shown they couldn’t get the job done anymore. But the team has operated differently under J.J. Picollo and Quatraro. Veterans get chances to keep their old jobs, but they aren’t unlimited anymore. And that’s just good people management.

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After a thrilling affair yesterday, the Los Angeles Angels and New York Yankees will play their second game of the series tonight.

I think the Angels have a pitching advantage here, and thus see value in backing them.

My Yankees vs. Angels predictions and MLB picks for Tuesday, April 14 break it all down below.

Who will win Angels vs Yankees today: Angels +1.5 (-130)

Los Angeles Angels SP Reid Detmers' 2.53 xERA ranks in the Top 15% of baseball through three starts, and that’s just a massive gap compared to New York Yankees hurler Ryan Weathers' 5.12 xERA (Bottom 25th percentile).

This is effectively the difference between a top-third starter, and a guy who is a bridge to the rest of the rotation being healthy. 

Detmers generates chases at a 95th percentile rate this year, which is consistent with what he’s been in his career.

Although New York has shown more patience at the plate this season, they still have plenty of hitters who carry a lot of swing and miss, which is always going to make them vulnerable to this pitching archetype.

I don’t think Detmers needs to be stellar for the Halos to hang here. Weathers is on borrowed time relative to his actual performances compared to the underlying metrics.

COVERS INTEL: Ryan Weathers' 2.81 ERA masks a 5.12 xERA, which is the largest gap between actual and xERA among Yankees starters this season.

Angels vs Yankees Over/Under pick: Over 8.5 (-120)

Weathers’ pending negative regression certainly plays an influential role here. I set the total at the same number as the market, but metrics such as favorable matchups and both teams’ offensive tendencies lean me towards the Over.

Mike Trout, Zach Neto, and Jo Adell have all had good success against Weathers historically. All three have over 40 plate appearances against him, and all three have posted a Top 20% wOBA against him over that sample.

If that trio has success, we can roughly estimate the Angels scoring 4-5 runs. That should be enough.

Although Detmers' chase creation gives him an edge, his fastball-heavy approach also makes him a candidate to give up runs against the best fastball-hitting team in baseball YTD.

Angels vs Yankees odds

• Moneyline: Angels +150 | Yankees -180
• Run line: Angels +1.5 | Yankees -1.5
• Over/Under: Over 8.5 | Under 8.5

Angels vs Yankees trend

The Angels have won three of the last five head-to-head matchups with the Yankees. Find more MLB betting trends for Angels vs. Yankees.

How to watch Angels vs Yankees and game info

Angels vs Yankees latest injuries

Angels vs Yankees weather

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Boston Red Sox ace Garrett Crochet had the worst game of his career on Monday night, getting lit up for 11 runs (10 earned) while recording just five outs in his team's 13-6 loss to the Minnesota Twins.

Last year's AL Cy Young runner-up, the 27-year-old's velocity and spin rate were down in the start, according to MassLive, but Crochet told reporters "I don’t think that’s anything to fret over."

An All-Star each of the past two seasons, the left-hander acknowledged that he hasn't been at his best in the opening weeks of the season.

"Command as a whole has been spotty. Gotten away with it a little this early in the year," Crochet told reporters, "but tonight they made me pay. It was weak contact, hard contact, walks, hit by pitch, a little bit of everything.”

The Twins scored four runs in the first inning against Crochet but blew it open in the second, plating seven runs – including home runs by Victor Caratini and Ryan Kreidler before the left-hander was yanked before making it through the second inning.

Is Garrett Crochet hurt?

Crochet told reporters he's fine physically and manager Alex Cora said that his ace is "healthy, so that's the most important thing."

Crochet pitched a career-high 205 ⅓ innings in 2025, up from 146 in 2024, his final year with the Chicago White Sox. He had his workload limited with the White Sox after Tommy John surgery and the team transitioning him to a starting role.

“It’s a little eye-opening, obviously,” Red Sox pitching coach Andrew Bailey said. “I think there’s a little frustration and curiosity, but like for me, there’s a couple balls on the line, jam shot to the left, a couple walks mixed there and then obviously they were able to step on some pitches in zone and hit him out of the yard. And it happened really quickly. So just got to move past it.”

Garrett Crochet stats 2026

• Four starts, 19 innings pitched
• 7.58 ERA – 16 earned runs
• 22 strikeouts, seven walks

Garrett Crochet college

The White Sox selected Crochet with the 11th overall pick out of Tennessee in the 2020 draft. He made his big-league debut just a few months later in the COVID-shortened season, pitching five regular-season games before also participating in the postseason.