Category: Sports News

One thing is for sure. You cannot say you were not entertained by the Cubs’ 5-4 win over the Rockies Monday evening at Wrigley Field.

It had a little bit of everything — some solid pitching, some blown leads, Pete Crow-Armstrong’s cycle and and in the end, the Cubs’ ninth walk-off win of 2026 on a bases-loaded walk drawn by Matt Shaw.

Let’s rewind to the beginning.

Shōta Imanaga continued his good pitching over the Rockies. He allowed a leadoff single, then retired the next three Rockies in the first inning.

Then PCA hit his second leadoff home run in the last three days [VIDEO].

That one took four pitches instead of the one pitch it took for him to do it Saturday. And that ball was crushed! [VIDEO]

Cubs leadoff homer facts from BCB’s JohnW53:

Pete Crow-Armstrong’s homer was his second in three games as the Cubs’ first batter of the game. The first was at San Francisco.

He is the 39th Cub since 1876 to do it at least once at home and on the road.

The Cubs have hit 137 first-batter homers at home and 130 on the road, for a total of 267.

Jimmy “Pony” Ryan and Rick Monday hit the most at home, 12. Alfonso Soriano is a distant third, with five, followed by Ian Happ and Corey Patterson, with four.

Soriano is the leader in total first-batter homers, with 22. Ryan had 19; Monday, 17; Dexter Fowler, 12; and Abner Dalrymple, Happ and Brian McRae, eight. No one else had more than five.

Imanaga allowed a two-out single to Jake McCarthy in the second — and then picked him off [VIDEO].

The game stayed at 1-0 Cubs into the sixth. The Cubs had several scoring chances, mainly because PCA was putting together his cycle. He tripled leading off the third [VIDEO].

Unfortunately, he was stranded. The same thing was PCA’s, and the team’s, fate in the fifth — leadoff double, then stranded [VIDEO].

Imanaga had a run charged to his record in the sixth, and it wasn’t all his fault. He allowed a leadoff walk, then a fielder’s choice and a fly to center had him one out away from finishing six innings with a 1-0 lead. But another single put runners on first and second with two out, and Craig Counsell replaced Imanaga with Phil Maton. I was a bit surprised, as Imanaga was at 89 pitches. But Counsell must have realized that Rockies manager Warren Schaffer would replace Ezequiel Tovar with pinch-hitter Troy Johnston and he preferred that matchup.

Unfortunately, Maton hit Johnston to load the bases and then walked Cole Carrigg to force in the tying run.

The Cubs got the lead back in the bottom of the sixth. With two out, Moisés Ballesteros walked. This triple by Matt Shaw made it 2-1 Cubs [VIDEO].

The Rockies asked for a review and as you can see in that clip, the ball was clearly fair.

PCA completed his cycle — in reverse order, the first Cub to do that! — with this leadoff single in the seventh [VIDEO].

It was the team’s first cycle since Carson Kelly’s last year against the A’s in Sacramento, and the first by a Cub (and by anyone at Wrigley Field) since Mark Grace cycled in 1993. Later this morning (at 9 a.m. CT) I’ll have a full history of Cubs cycles here. Here’s more on Cubs cycles from John:

PCA’s was 13th in franchise history, including two before Modern Era, both by Jimmy Ryan, in 1888 and 1891.

…..

No player before PCA had been picked off after completing his cycle.

On Aug. 2, 1940, Joe Cronin of the Red Sox, against the Tigers, tripled in the first and struck out in the third. He led off the fifth with a double, then was picked off on pitcher Bobo Newsom’s throw to shortstop Dick Bartell.

Jimmie Foxx, up next, homered, after which Newsom was replaced by Tom Seats. Cronin singled in the sixth and homered in the eighth to complete the cycle.
…..
After George Sisler of the Browns completed his cycle with a two-out single in the ninth inning on Aug. 13, 1921 against the Tigers, he tried to steal second and was tagged out, ending the game.

Less than a year later, on July 3, 1922, Bob Meusel of the Yankees began his cycle by singling in the first inning and was caught stealing.

No other player who hit for a cycle was nailed on a steal attempt for more than a century, until Elly
De La Cruz was out trying to steal home after his cycle-completing triple on June 23, 2023.

Here’s more on the reverse cycle:

And a bit more on reverse cycles from John:

There have been only 10 games in MLB history in which a player made a natural cycle in reverse: homer, triple, double and single in that order. 

The first two were in 1885 and 1887; the third in 1904; and only seven since 1937. None were by a Cub.

There have been exactly 400 cycles since the first, in 1882. The most recent before PCA’s was by Byron Buxton of the Twins on July 12, 2025.

Oh, yes. As John mentioned, PCA immediately got himself picked off [VIDEO].

The pickoff hurt the Cubs in that inning, because they then loaded the bases on a single by Alex Bregman and walks drawn by Michael Busch and Seiya Suzuki. But Ian Happ and Nico Hoerner struck out to end the inning.

Jacob Webb had thrown a 1-2-3 top of the seventh but gave up a leadoff single in the eighth. That brought in Caleb Thielbar, who struck out TJ Rumfield, but then issued a walk. After a fly ball to center, Carrigg smashed a three-run homer.

That, I am certain, brought out the sad thoughts in you that most of us have been thinking for a month now.

But the Cubs did not give up on this game. In the bottom of the eighth, pinch-hitter Pedro Ramirez led off with a single. He wa forced at second by Shaw, and then another pinch-hitter, Michael Conforto, walked.

Both runners moved up on a wild pitch, which was important. PCA was the next hitter and he hit a line drive to right, deep enough to score Shaw to make it 4-3 [VIDEO].

The chanting of “PCA! PCA! PCA!” you hear in that clip is about the loudest I’ve ever heard it. Pretty cool.

Bregman followed with a walk, but Busch struck out to end the inning.

Daniel Palencia threw a 1-2-3 ninth, with all three outs recorded by strikeout.

That set up the Cubs’ game-winning rally, which was accomplished with only one baseball put in play. Suzuki led off with a walk. Happ hit a weak little comebacker to pitcher Juan Mejia, who threw to second — at least one out, and possibly a double play, right?

Well, nope, fortunately for the Cubs. Mejia threw the ball away and Happ was safe. Suzuki, the tying run, wound up on third.

Ramirez, who is looking like a quality MLB hitter and should be getting more playing time, singled in Suzuki to tie the game [VIDEO].

The bases remained loaded, with Happ at third representing the winning run.

Shaw drew ball four on a 3-1 pitch and the Cubs had their wacky win [VIDEO].

As I mentioned earlier, that’s now nine walk-off wins for the Cubs this year. The franchise record is 14, set in 1930 — that seems a mark this year’s Cubs might break. The MLB record for such things is 17, set by the Pirates in 1959 and matched by them in 1977.

More on the walk-off wins from the Cubs this year:

The number of walk-offs is one reason Palencia has only three saves (and no blown saves) — there just haven’t been many save opportunities! The Cubs have had only 21 save opportunities, tied for the fewest (also Red Sox, Giants, Mets) in MLB this year. The Rays and Nationals have the most with 39. The Cubs have 10 saves — three by Palencia, two by Thielbar and one each from Ben Brown, Corbin Martin, Hoby Milner, Colin Rea and Jacob Webb.

Here are Counsell’s postgame comments [VIDEO].

The Cubs, after a 7-22 run, have now won four of their last five. That’s something to build on, and it is still just mid-June.

The Cubs will go for the series win Tuesday evening at Wrigley Field. Edward Cabrera will start for the Cubs and Ryan Feltner goes for the Rockies. Game time is again 7:05 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network.

I was writing up the biweekly update last night, and Baldwin’s absence in the hitter tables and charts was a glaring omission. The other times, I’d write something like, “Oh yeah, Drake Baldwin is otherworldly, again.” But for the first half of June, no Drake Baldwin.

At the moment, Baldwin has an insane .403 wOBA / .418 xwOBA in 216 PAs. He played as the DH enough to drop his overall defensive value into the marginally-negative, but still managed 2.1 fWAR in those 216 PAs, which is an fWAR/600 pace of close to 6. Since he’ll be playing catcher more (a lot more) going forward, he could easily push that threshold… if he keeps hitting.

But, will he? A wRC+ above 150 is a tall order. He was already a revelation with a 125 wRC+ last year, and didn’t just hit the ground running in 2026, but rather pulverized the terrain and all opposing pitching on it. Here’s a crazy stat: his lowest wRC+ in any calendar week was 101, while he had three weeks above 200.

All that said, he did miss some time with an oblique injury, and had just one rehab start due to a rainout (in which, of course, he homered).

So, is he going to return and do the same crazy stuff he was doing before the injury? Or, is there going to be an adjustment period and/or regression to something perhaps resembling 2025 rather than 2026?

Good morning.

Shawn McFarland checks out what we’ve learned about the Texas Rangers in recent days as they continue on a demanding stretch in June.

Evan Grant writes that the Rangers suffered through the latest of the most prevalent kind of Rangers loss in the series opener against Minnesota.

MLB dot com’s Jared Greenspan breaks down the first phase of All-Star voting and I guess here is where I admit that I don’t know how the All-Star voting works anymore.

Grant notes that apparently Ezequiel Duran is just about Texas’ best hope in the voting unless I guess like 900,000 of you want to start writing in Nicky Lopez.

Kennedi Landry writes that the Rangers are hosting rehabbing top prospect Sebastian Walcott in Arlington to let him hang out in a big league environment.

Grant writes that Walcott is on target to make his season debut sometime in late July as the young shortstop begins to ramp up baseball activities.

Jeff Wilson notes that Corey Seager landed on the seven-day concussion IL but could return after the series against Minnesota if he’s feeling better.

And, Grant writes that the Rangers could see a couple of World Series-winning lefties return this summer with Jordan Montgomery and Cody Bradford showing progress in their rehab.

Have a nice day!

Outfielder Brett Callahan has been an interesting though unheralded Detroit Tigers’ prospect for a few years now. Initially, he caught our eye with good pull power and a strong throwing arm. Over the last few seasons, his complete game has really come together. After a modest start in his Double-A debut this spring, he’sreally caught fire over the last month. Callahan has a strong enough all-around game, the kind of the Tigers sorely lack in their outfield, that if he even develops into an average hitter he’s going to be a pretty valuable. His speed and defensive ability lower the bar a bit, and at the same time the 24-year-old is now tearing up the Eastern League pretty well.

The Tigers selected Callahan in the 13th round of the 2023 draft. He played his college ball at St. Joseph’s University, a relatively small Jesuit run private college near Philadelphia. The Tigers have seemingly scouted smaller colleges, and the northeast in general, more than most MLB teams in recent years, and it has paid some dividends. They landed Callahan for just $197,500, and got a very good deal.

The left-handed hitter posted a solid full season debut in Single-A ball in 2024. His numbers didn’t leap off the page, and for a relative unknown on draft day, it takes a lot to get some attention. It didn’t help that a dislocated finger and a leg injury shortened his season. Still, he hit seven homers in 62 games with an 8.8 percent walk rate and an acceptable 21.2 percent strikeout rate, slashing .276/359/.439 while stealing 20 bases. That, combined with the built-in loft and pull tendencies in his swing got our attention here.

A quad injury in 2025 made for another somewhat abbreviated campaign, but he advanced to High-A West Michigan and remained productive despite being a little more limited in the speed department. His strikeout and walk rates moved just slightly in the wrong directions, but he still hit nine homers in 55 games, slashing .259/.316/.473, good for a 123 wRC+ and was clearly slowed by the injury a while.

That kept him enough on the radar that we ranked him 26th in the system with a 40+ grade over this past offseason. However, he still was unnoticed by most of the national prospect sites. His “pedigree” as it were, along with the injuries and an aggressive approach at the plate despite decent K-BB numbers, just never got him on the radar.

Things changed this spring, as Callahan made a few trips over to the major league side of spring training camp with the Tigers and did damage. Clearly healthy, running well, and with a little more muscle on his 6’0” 195 pound frame, Callahan launched a pair of homers in Grapefruit League action, as he and fellow Erie SeaWolves hitter, 2B/SS John Peck, both made an impression as more mature, physical players showing some signs of breaking out into really legitimate prospect territory.

That impression has proved accurate. Callahan now has 12 homers in 55 games, and while UPMC Park is a bit of a launching pad, the exit velocities have been strong. Even more importantly, Callahan has improved his plate discipline, walking 13.9 percent of the time against a very reasonable 20 percent strikeout rate despite the difficulty of the toughest leap in competition prospects face until they hit the big leagues. He’s hitting .278/.388/.527 and has collected 20 stolen bases. The Double-A rule allowing only one disengagement, rather than two as in the majors, has probably helped with that as fellow SeaWolves Peyton Graham and Seth Stephenson are both racking up huge stolen base totals as well, but Callahan has above average to plus speed, and that translates to covering quite a bit of ground in the outfield as well.

What really ties this all together is that Callahan isn’t just some wild swinging masher bound to flame out in Triple-A or the bigs. He’s really put together a much more disciplined approach and is chasing less and less, despite the fact that he will absolutely take his hacks when he sees something he likes. Despite the aggression, his swing is fairly compact as well, so he’s not as vulnerable to getting started too early the way many big swinging left-handed power hitters are. Even better, Callahan’s good speed and excellent arm strength and accuracy translate into a future as a pretty good right fielder. Even as a future role player, he has the well-rounded game to contribute even during cold stretches at the plate.

I’ve jokingly referred to Callahan as Kerry Carpenter 2.0 for a while now, and though he’s unlikely to be quite as dangerous a hitter as Carpenter at the major league level, the defense and base stealing ability give him dimensions to his game that Carpenter has never had to offer. And possibly the run he’s on says that a true breakout is underway that could give the Tigers the whole package.

Callahan has mashed five home runs over his last eight games alone, striking out just four times in that span against six walks. He’s trimmed his swinging strike rate down 2.5 percent to a pretty manageable 13.5 percent despite the tough leap in competition this season. His progress now bears close watch, as he’s angling toward a promotion to Triple-A Toledo sometime around the All-Star break, when the Tigers usually do most of their midseason promotions.

As you might expect for a left-handed power hitter with loft in his swing and pull tendencies, Callahan does struggle somewhat with left-handed pitching. He’s getting his first taste of consistently good left-handed pitchers at Double-A, and he’s holding his own with a .786 OPS, but his .983 OPS against right-handed pitching speaks to a likely future role as the strong side of a right field platoon.

Callahan holds a 1.274 OPS overall in June, so he is clearly on one heck of a tear. Whether he can sustain it into July remains to be seen, but he has clearly improved quite a bit. He’s not going to crash the gates and end up on top 100 lists this offseason unless he keeps it going the rest of the year, but all signs point to a developing hitter who already has the speed, arm strength, and defensive chops to be a valuable all-around contributor.

If you like an underdog story in the vein of Carpenter, or Keider Montero, Brett Callahan is your guy right now. His chase and strikeout rates are fine for the Double-A level, but he projects to a low average hitter who walks some and ideally hits for average power. With his all-around game, including the ability to play some center field, that’s enough to make him an average player. And if it all comes together with the bat Tigers fans are going to be very pleased with the results.

Yesterday MLB released the first update of the voting totals for next month’s All-Star game which, if you haven’t heard, will be hosted at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia. We still have a lot of baseball to get through before we arrive to the Midsummer Classic, but the first vote totals paint a pretty good picture for the hometown Phillies as far as how many representatives will take the home field.

If voting ended today, Brandon Marsh would be a starter on the NL All-Star team. Obviously, it doesn’t, but it’s very encouraging to see Marsh’s fantastic season so far being rewarded with the recognition it deserves. He seems to be a safe bet to be at the game in some capacity. Ditto Kyle Schwarber, who in almost all likelihood will not pass Shohei Ohtani in votes for the NL designated hitter and therefore won’t start but looks likely to be the NL’s reserve DH as far and away the second most vote getter. Elsewhere, Bryce Harper is currently third in voting for first baseman with a decent gap between Matt Olson and Freddie Freeman ahead of him, but it’s not out of the question that the gap could be closed somewhat, as Harper’s numbers are either on par or superior to the other two. It’s possible he ends up as a reserve or a replacement.

After that, things get strange. Alec Bohm and Bryson Stott are both second at their positions in voting despite their poor starts to the season. Justin Crawford and Adolis Garcia are ahead of such players as Pete Crow-Armstrong and Jackson Chourio. Trea Turner, despite being one of the worst qualified hitters in the sport so far, is fourth in voting for NL shortstops. Of course, much of this is Phillies fans stuffing the ballot for the hometown team, but it’s an almost certainty that no one from this group will make the roster unless something drastic changes or Philadelphia commits to the bit.

So, now that we’ve seen the first voting update, how are we feeling about the NL vote leaders so far? How are we feeling about the Phillies possible representatives? Keep in mind that this of course does not include pitchers, of which the Phillies should have at least one nomination in Cristopher Sánchez. But still, these vote totals so far bode well for the Phillies chances of having multiple representatives for their home All-Star game.

It was a rough weekend for Orioles star shortstop Gunnar Henderson. With two outs in the bottom of the 9th Saturday, Gunnar took a fastball to the ribs from Padres reliever Ron Marinaccio, presumably as retribution for Xander Bogaerts being hit in the head by a pitch earlier in the game. That moment sparked a bizarre reaction from manager Craig Albernaz postgame, as the skipper seemed to defend the intentions of the San Diego reliever more than his player. Things didn’t get much better Sunday, as Henderson made two errors in the 9th that allowed an insurance run to score in another loss to the Padres.

His struggles against the Padres are not part of a developing situation with the former All-Star, but the continuation of a season filled with frustration and disappointment. The soon-to-be 25-year-old is on pace to set career-worsts in batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, and walk rate while seeing noticeable dips in his average exit velocity and hard-hit rate.

That’s not to say he’s been an outright bad player. His .715 OPS is right around league average. His OPS+ of 100 is exactly at league average. Despite his obvious struggles at the plate, he is still only two behind Pete Alonso for the Orioles’ home run lead, is tied for second on the team with 68 hits and is third with 34 RBIs. He’s still on pace for a bWAR around 3.0, which would be well below his career rate of 6+ bWAR per season, but still make him an above-average starter.

But as we near the halfway point of the 2026 season, it’s clear that his performance hasn’t been good enough to elevate this Orioles team above mediocrity. And unlike many of his teammates, the shortstop doesn’t seem to be making significant strides as the season goes on. On May 11th, when we last spoke on this site about Gunnar’s underwhelming performance, the Orioles’ country boy was slashing .211/.269/.421 (.690 OPS) with 9 HR, 21 RBI and 56 Ks in 171 ABs.

In 32 games since then, we’ve seen the Orioles’ presumed best player pick up his game somewhat. In that time frame, he’s slashing .250/.333/.414 (.747 OPS) with 5 HR, 13 RBI and 24 Ks in 128 ABs. The strikeout rate falling from just shy of 33% to just below 19% is easily the stars’ biggest improvement over the last month or so. But even those improved numbers would represent career lows in average and slugging and a near career low in on-base percentage.

During that same time period, we’ve seen several of his fellow Orioles take significant leaps in their offensive output. From May 11th onward, Pete Alonso is slashing 301/.364/.520 (.885 OPS) with 8 HRs and a 22% strikeout rate. The much-maligned Coby Mayo is slashing .241/.310/.519 (.829 OPS) with 6 HRs and a 37% strikeout rate. Colton Cowser has also begun to turn his season around since the middle of May, hitting .263 with a .897 OPS, 7 HRs and a 29% strikeout rate.

This is not to blame Gunnar for all of the Orioles problems, nor to say that good teams can’t survive cool patches from their stars. If you look around the league, you can find plenty of examples of teams finding success with underwhelming performances from star players. Cal Raleigh and Julio Rodriguez are struggling in Seattle and the Mariners still find themselves atop the AL West. The Braves are the best team in baseball despite superstar Ronald Acuña Jr. battling through a hamstring injury that’s cost him 18 games this season.

However, the Orioles’ path to success was meant to go through the route of an elite offense that props up an average to above-average pitching staff. After their recent offensive upturn, the O’s currently sit 8th in MLB at 4.7 runs/game. Baltimore is 14th in batting average at .243 and 11th in OPS at .728.

And while the offensive numbers are certainly good, they are also distinctly not great, and having a great offense seems to be the only thing that can propel the O’s to the postseason. Currently, the Orioles sit two games out of the final Wild Card spot in the American League (three games in the loss column).

Without changing anything about their pitching staff, Bill James’ Pythagorean Theorem of Baseball says the O’s would have to score about half a run more per game to make up the difference between them and the Rangers/A’s for the final AL playoff spot. That increase would also catapult them from 8th to 4th, just behind the Nationals, Dodgers and Brewers, and just ahead of the Yankees.

And while, yes, Adley Rutschman continuing his recent hot streak, or Jackson Holliday finding some measure of consistency, would undoubtedly upgrade this offense, the biggest missing piece right now is a fully operational Gunnar Henderson.

The West Coast road trip that starts today should provide Henderson with an opportunity to show how locked in he can be going forward. It starts with a rematch against the Seattle Mariners, a team that Gunnar has a .845 career OPS against, but which held him to a 2-for-14 series last week at Camden Yards. The O’s then travel to the two-time defending champion Dodgers, a team that has stymied Henderson to the tune of a .546 career OPS. Make it past LA and he heads to Anaheim with his 1.203 career OPS against the Angels—his best mark against any single opponent. All three series should offer opportunities for him to continue to make adjustments against tough pitching and build confidence at the plate.

With 89 games left to play, the story of the 2026 season is far from complete for both Gunnar Henderson and the Orioles. But more than anyone, Baltimore needs their best player and face of the franchise to play like his best self if they want to improve upon their current 13.5% odds to make it to the postseason.