Category: Sports News

Hello, friends.

What a weird series we just witnessed. I’m not sure that I’ve ever witnessed other team fans cheering so much for an Oriole and probably I never will again. The circumstances surrounding Pete Alonso and the Mets, and the fact that he came over to the Orioles afterwards, are not repeated just every year and the O’s aren’t likely to sign most of the players who are so beloved. I can’t imagine a fanbase-wide kind of warmth for a former Oriole. I don’t cheer in any way for a player on another team who used to play here when they are playing the Orioles. I don’t even clap for the “welcome back” video package.

Alonso homered again last night and the Mets fans were happy about it. I guess it helps that this season is a lost cause for them, so it’s not like it hampered their chances in any way. The Orioles finished off a sweep by taking a 7-1 victory on Wednesday. That’s the other weird thing. Or maybe it’s not so weird. Right after everybody gives up on the O’s, they go ahead and look like a competent baseball team for a few days, or maybe even several days.

It’s probably too late for it to matter, unless they just pretty much run the table, but as long as that possibility is alive, we might as well cling to it. Those slim hopes got a small boost yesterday, as on top of the Orioles winning their own game, Cleveland and Chicago flipped in the AL Central. That’s significant for the O’s because the Orioles have the head-to-head tiebreaker over the White Sox, which they do not against the Guardians. So, if the O’s do somehow run down the current wild card 3 team, they would have the edge in a tie.

There are also the Rangers and Blue Jays still to pass. That’s another reason why it’s so unlikely and why the Orioles probably have to run the table. Maybe they could spare a loss. Their last three series are Brewers, Jays, and Yankees. It’s a tough road. The Rangers are the only one of these teams to play today.

There were two bits of Orioles news yesterday. The team placed infielder Jackson Holliday on the 10-day injured list with left wrist inflammation. Since there’s not much season left, that means he’s probably done for the year, a disappointing end to a disappointing season. Posting a .921 OPS in July got people’s hopes up, but Holliday has sagged since, dropping a .495 OPS in August and .520 in September, tanking his season numbers.

Not much to do except hope this was connected to the wrist issue. That’s not a crazy thing to think, since players poorly play through injuries that should have them on the IL with some frequency. But it’s not guaranteed. The Orioles are really going to have to think hard about what Holliday will have to offer next year, and if that’s a roster space they need to improve. If he was a 2 WAR player, there’s something there, but this year he had a 0.2 bWAR.

Also announced yesterday was a diagnosis for injured pitcher Kyle Bradish. It’s a sports hernia for Bradish. Manager Craig Albernaz said they are exploring the next steps. Bradish’s season wrapped with a 4.12 ERA, or an exactly league average 100 ERA+. You may have had higher hopes. I certainly did. Hopefully next year is better for him as well, with Tommy John surgery farther in the rear view mirror.

Orioles stuff you might have missed

Pete Alonso delivered. Too many Orioles hitters haven’t. (The Baltimore Sun)
This reaction to Tuesday’s big homer from Alonso is not wrong. Some guys just have not been carrying their share of the load.

Concerns for and about Samuel Basallo (Steve on Baseball)
Steve Melewski takes a look at Basallo, another Oriole who’s mightily slumping late in the season.

The very fun group of Orioles prospects going to the Arizona Fall League (Orioles On The Verge)
The prospect enthusiasts of the Orioles On The Verge podcast are enthused about the guys heading out to Arizona this year. It’s a more interesting group than some recent years.

Where should MLB add expansion teams? We asked the Orioles. (The Baltimore Banner)
Nashville? Charlotte? Honolulu? Let’s get weird.

Birthdays and Orioles anniversaries

Today in 1970, the Orioles clinched the American League East title. The O’s actually lost their game on this day, a 2-0 setback to Washington, but since the Yankees were beaten by the Red Sox, the Orioles clinched. They went on, as you know, to win the World Series.

In 1999, the Orioles team plane took off without Cal Ripken Jr. This incident was cited when GM Frank Wren was fired shortly after the season. In the O’s game that night, during the course of an 8-3 Orioles victory over the Twins, Jesse Orosco set a major league record with his 1,072nd appearance as a pitcher. Orosco finished with 1,252 games, still the recordholder. The active leader, Kenley Jansen, is in 19th place on the career list with 980 appearances.

There are a pair of former Orioles who were born on this day. They are: 2025 reliever Kade Strowd, and 1979-81 infielder Wayne Krenchicki.

Is today your birthday? Happy birthday to you! Your birthday buddies for today include: Wild West outlaw Billy the Kid (1859), Marriott founder J. Willard Marriott (1900), author Ken Kesey (1935), baseball Hall of Famer Orlando Cepeda (1937), Hall of Fame basketball coach Phil Jackson (1945), Indian prime minister Narendra Modi (1950), Super Mario voice actor Charles Martinet (1955), and actress Danielle Brooks (1990).

On this day in history…

In 1630, the city of Boston was founded in what was then the Massachusetts Bay colony.

In 1787, the Constitution was signed at the end of a nearly four month long Constitutional Convention.

In 1862, the Union Army of the Potomac and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia clashed in the Battle of Antietam, with the Union driving off the invading army. The battle saw over 22,000 casualties, of which more than 3,500 were killed. This remains the single bloodiest day in the history of the United States military.

In 1908, nearly five years after its first flight, the Wright Flyer, being flown by Orville Wright, crashed. A passenger, Lt. Thomas Selfridge, was killed during the crash, making him the first ever fatality from an airplane.

In 1944, the Allied powers launched Operation Market Garden, a combined air-and-land invasion of the Netherlands meant to secure an invasion route into Germany. The 60-mile advance liberated much of the Netherlands from Nazi occupation; however, the main objective of securing a bridge over the Rhine was not accomplished with great losses suffered by the British paratroopers who were tasked with capturing and holding the bridge as relief never arrived.

In 1983, Vanessa Williams was named Miss America, the first Black winner of the pageant.

**

And that’s the way it is in Birdland on September 17. Have a safe Thursday.

When I trained to become a lifeguard, one of the first lessons we learned was that a drowning swimmer is very dangerous. In their desperate flailing, they can accidentally take potential rescuers or nearby swimmers down with them.

That might explain what happened in St. Louis Wednesday afternoon, when the San Francisco Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals in 10 innings, putting the Cards on the brink of being eliminated from the playoffs. Just like the Giants.

Drew Gilbert delivered a two-run home run in the top of the 10th inning and the Giants held on for a 6-5 win, taking a road series for the first time in three months.

The Cardinals were already on the fringes of the wild-card race before losing to the Giants in five of their six games this month. They’ve fallen to 75-78 and their tragic number is down to two.

Gilbert spoiled a nice comeback by the Cardinals, who rallied for two runs in the bottom of the 9th off Dylan Smith. Leo Bernal delivered a game-tying single with his team down to their last strike, but at that point, the Cardinals had been sucked into the Giants’ whirlpool, like a lifeboat that stayed too close to the Titanic.

Anthony Molina bounced back from his worst outing of the season with his best, going 5.2 shutout innings and striking out two. He gave up only two hits, both of them to center fielder Nathan Church, who may now be his archnemesis. He left with a 1-0 lead which stretched to 3-0 in the 7th, when a Jonah Cox RBI single and a Jordan Walker era got the Giants two runs.

Cox went 3-for-4 and moved to second base from center in the bottom of the 10th, which only featured fly balls to the outfield. He individually manufactured the Giants’s first run of the game by singling and stealing two bases before scoring on a weird double play where Cox raced home and beat the tag on Bryce Eldridge at second base.

Andrew Knizner went 3-for-4 and was hit by a pitch — clearly the Cardinals are afraid of him. Shay Whitcomb went 2-for-5 and scored a run, bringing his average ever so close to the Mendoza line.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Giants game in 2026 without some very silly, costly baseball. The Cards got back in the game thanks to two rough defensive plays. Carson Seymour would have been out of the 7th unscathed if he’d managed to catch a simple toss from Eldridge as he covered first. Then Christian Koss kept the inning alive by air mailing the throw to first on a routine ground ball. To top it all off, Trent Harris relieved Seymour and let in another run when his first pitch was a wild one.

The managers each threw a bone to box score enthusiasts in the 10th, when a pinch-runner and a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the 9th led to four defensive changes for the Cardinals in the top of the 10th, including the DH coming in to catch. Not to be outdone, Tony Vitello made five separate defensive changes in the bottom of the inning, a true treat to anyone inexplicably scoring at home.

The Giants are still sinking, but they’ve lifted their heads closer to the surface thanks to climbing over the Cards. The dream of 70 wins is still alive. Watch out, Dodgers.

WASHINGTON — There are 12 former All-Stars and at least two future Hall of Famers occupying the Philadelphia Phillies clubhouse on a given day. This collection of well-paid, salty, accomplished stars will command most of the attention as the Phillies attempt, for the fifth consecutive year, to bring a World Series title home to Philly.

Then there is Jonathan Bowlan, an easygoing dude from Memphis, quiet and forthright, making his way through his first full season in the big leagues. Bowlan might not realize it yet, but he may have more to do with whether the Phillies raise a trophy in October than any of the superstars.

Bowlan, 26, has emerged as the Phillies’ primary set-up man, aiming, along with 25-year-old Orion Kerkering, to form a bridge between the club’s quartet of ace starting pitchers and their dominant closer, Jhoan Duran.

It is thankless work, and the sixth through 10th innings are exactly where the Phillies’ prior championship quests have gone awry. Lately, they’ve been trouble spots as the club staggers down the stretch to finalize a National League wild-card berth.

Bowlan has given up a run in five consecutive appearances entering Wednesday, Sept. 16, including late-game homers in three of those; Kerkering gave up runs in four of his last five games, including multiple-run outings in Phillies losses.

“Those innings,” says interim manager Don Mattingly, “are always the stressful innings.

“And you'd like to be able to lock down that end of the game when you get a lead or you're in a close game.”

Mattingly was speaking after Bowlan gave up a first-pitch, three-run, pinch-hit homer to Daylen Lile in the seventh inning of a 6-3 loss to Washington, the latest setback that imperiled the club’s wild-card standing. Oh, the team’s still on fairly firm ground, with a 95% chance to reach the playoffs, according to FanGraphs.

It’s just that the Phillies keep slipping down the pecking order and, with a rough combo of a flailing lineup and slumping bullpen, inspiring little confidence in their postseason chances.

For Bowlan, learning to cope has come before having to face the bright lights of the postseason. He’s found that in reflecting on failure, there’s a fine line between quickly moving on and interrogating what went wrong.

“There’s definitely times I lose some sleep at night, for sure,” Bowlan tells USA TODAY Sports. “But as soon as you wake up the next morning, it’s a new day. It’s a blessing. God woke me up to continue on. And you can’t live in the past. Because you can learn from your experiences, for sure. And that’s what I continue to try and do.

“It’s taken some time to learn that, about the short memory. But I’ve gotten to the point where, ‘Yeah, you can think about it a little bit.’ And there’s times where it was a tough thing to happen in that situation.

“But you live and you learn. All you can do is just keep chugging along. Keep moving.”

Look, the Yankees are probably cooked in the AL East at this point. They had their opportunities, but the Rays have opened up a 4.5-game AL East lead with 10 games left for the Bombers, and they would need to sweep the four-game set coming up next week—one that features a doubleheader Tuesday—to even have a remote chance since that would give them the tiebreaker over Tampa Bay.

The odds are the odds at this point: a 5.9-percent chance per FanGraphs to win the AL East. Old friend Brandon McCarthy was more likely to get a hit in a given at-bat (.062 career batting average) than the Yankees are to pull this off. Bartolo Colon’s .084 average would be a dream in comparison. Hits did occasionallyhappen for McCarthy! But it ain’t lookin’ pretty for the 2026 Yanks.

So the Rays are almost certainly winning the division and the Yankees and Red Sox will almost certainly duke it out again in a best-of-three Wild Card Series. Great. Fabulous. The rest of the AL is a damn mess:

Yuck! The skinny on the teams still competing for division titles:

• The White Sox were once actually coasting a bit to that AL Central crown and even a first-round bye, but they’ve really begun to run out of steam.
• The Guardians are now just barely in front of Chicago for both of those, but if it ends in a tie, then the White Sox have the tiebreaker, so how comfortable can Cleveland really feel?
• The AL West is even more garbage, with the Rangers’ win and Astros’ loss last night bringing them even at .500 on the dot, in first place. I would say that I cannot believe how much the Mariners beefed this, but, well, they have a history. So does the division itself! All these AL West teams have negative run differentials, by the way.
• Back to the matter at hand, the Astros have the tiebreaker between those two, but with Yordan Alvarez looking hobbled … I don’t know.

Shooting from the hip, I trust Cleveland to eke out their third consecutive division title. They have a roster more accustomed to the chase this time of year and the White Sox have been surviving on some magic beans for much of the season anyway. This is not to imply that the Guardians are actually good, mind you; it was just always going to be a tough sell for the Pale Hose to go from 121 losses in 2024 and 102 last year to not only a winning record this year, but a division title as well. It could still happen, sure! I’d think it was more interesting. But my brain says Cleveland.

As for the AL West? Hooboy. Give me the Rangers, whatever. They’re oh-so-quietly getting healthier and Houston’s dropped seven of ten, including a clunker last night to the crappy Royals. Although the Astros get to end the season with four games against the awful A’s, I think Texas will take advantage of a not-so-tough slate of their own. Corey Seager has an OPS over .900 in his past month of play. He would love nothing more than to pants Houston again.

I know the Wild Card is its own mess that could allow for one of the two division contenders that loses out to sneak into October anyway if Toronto and Baltimore can’t heat up. But let’s focus on those two bye contenders. Which teams win the divisions? Who makes it to the ALCS? Sadly, one of them will, while two of the Yankees, Rays, and Red Sox will be stuck at home. Them’s the breaks.

Today on the site, Scott will discuss the RailRiders’ last-ditch effort this week to make the International League playoffs, Matt will run through the Rivalry Roundup, Jonathan will celebrate the 109th birthday of a wartime Yankee who had a film career as well, and John will muse on Giancarlo Stanton’s speed. (Yes, really! It’s a fun piece, I promise.) Later, Peter will break down an excellent strikeout from Max Fried for his Sequence of the Week.

Today’s Matchup:

Offday

Toledo Mud Hens 3, Louisville Bats 1 (box)

Left-hander Jackson Wolf continued his excellent run since coming over from the Padres in the Casey Mize trade, while Jace Jung provided the offense on Wednesday.

Wolf located his fourseam and sinker well in this one, and dropped in plenty of good curveballs to baffle the Bats. He scattered five hits and two walks, pitching into the sixth with five strikeouts on the day. His outings tend to feature a fair amount of traffic, but very little damage.

He holds an ERA under 2.00 since coming over, and hasn’t allowed a single home run. It’s only 27.2 innings, but it’s also notable that Wolf’s strikeout rate has spiked from 21.2 percent in the Padres system, to 31.8 percent in Toledo. I don’t really see any outstanding differences in his stuff, but the Padres are pretty poor at developing pitchers so hopefully the Tigers are helping him improving his approach, pitch mix, and location. With pitching depth always a key concern, it feels like the Tigers have a pretty nice sixth starter who can also pitch in as a lefty in relief if Tyler Holton, Brant Hurter, or Drew Sommers need backup in 2027.

The Hens didn’t have much going on offensively in this one, but in the bottom of the third, Andrew Navigato drew a one-out walk. Trei Cruz ripped a single to center field, and Jung launched his 21st home run of the season to right field.

That blow made it 3-0. Wolf gave up a run in the fifth, but came back out to collect two outs in the sixth before giving way to the pen.

Nick Sandlin and Jack Little got the Hens through the eighth. Tanner Rainey walked a batter but closed it out for his fifth save.

Our friends at Tigers Minor League Report voted Max Anderson their minor league player of the year this week. He posted a single and a double in this one. No doubt it’s been a frustrating year for him, as he improved his swing decisions as needed but never got the call to the big leagues. He should get his opportunities in 2027.

Anderson: 2-4, 2B

Jung: 1-4, R, 3 RBI, HR, K

Wolf (W, 4-1): 5.2 IP, ER, 5 H, 2 BB, 5 K

Yahoo Sports: As you likely know by now, Aaron Judge exited yesterday’s game early when Heliot Ramos pinch-hit for him in the sixth. The Yankees announced it midgame as “lower leg tightness.” It’s some relief I suppose that Judge didn’t re-aggravate the rib fracture that kept him out for over three months, and Judge himself downplayed the seriousness of the ailment after the game.

“We’re still trying to ramp up so there’s still going to be little things like this that come up,” Judge said after the Yankees 13-inning loss to the Twins. “I just thought it would be best instead of pushing through it like I normally do.” Judge seemed to view his exit from the game as precautionary, and likened it to the type of thing that would happen in spring training when small, nagging things pop up as players get back into playing shape.

MLB.com | Patrick Donnelly: Clarke Schmidt came off the 60-day injured list yesterday, something we saw coming; he allowed two hits but got two strikeouts while facing four batters in his first MLB action since July 3, 2025. What we didn’t see coming was who was pushed off the roster to make room for Schmidt: fan favorite Oswaldo Cabrera. The utilityman Cabrera had spent most of the year at Triple-A, hitting .288 with 19 homers and a .790 OPS, but hasn’t spent much time with the big club ever since suffering a brutal ankle injury in a play at home plate last May. Cabrera seems likely to be claimed on waivers, meaning his time in the Bronx is likely to come to an end after being a member of the organization since signing at age-16 in July 2015.

The Athletic | Brendan Kuty: ($) Spencer Jones has been a bit of a revelation for the Yankees this year, producing at a high level across the outfield throughout the summer. He’s benefited from shadowing another big lefty swinger in the outfield: Cody Bellinger. Bellinger is only 31, but has a very long and decorated track record for a player his age, something Jones has tried to tap into during his time with the Yankees. “As a young guy, I can’t help but watch every time he’s up there,” Jones said of Bellinger. “When we are in the dugout,” Jones said, “he’s one of those people I can go up to and ask, like, ‘Yo, what did you see?’ He’ll tell me bluntly what he saw, how he saw it, and essentially what he’s going to do next time.”

New York Daily News | Gary Phillips: Ryan Weathers cleared a key hurdle in his rehab earlier this week, tossing 15 pitches in a bullpen session and sitting 87-90 mph on his fastball. The hope, if things go right, is for the lefty to get into game action before the regular season ends. It’s a tight timeline, but with Weathers set to throw another bullpen on Friday before perhaps facing live hitters early next week, it’s doable. The Yankees could certainly use his arm in the bullpen as they try to sort out what their playoff relief corps will look like.

FanGraphs | Davy Andrews: This here isn’t news, but it is fun. Andrews discusses the Amazon TV show Reacher, in which the titular character tries to maintain a low profile by checking into hotels under aliases, which are always Yankees second basemen. The problem, of course, is that Reacher’s cover is often blown, because Yankee second basemen are frequently famous people with recognizable names (don’t choose “Starlin Castro” as your alias if you’re trying not to attract attention!). So, Andrews endeavors to help Reacher by finding players who played second base for the Yankees who would help Reacher stay undercover. Good aliases include second basemen from New York’s Higlander days, like Joe Ward, and Otis Johnson. The worst possible aliases Andrews found? Robinson Canó and Mickey Mantle.

Mike Krukow reflects on narrating MVP Baseball video game with Duane Kuiper originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

The Giants have struggled in 2026 and are out of the postseason chase for the fifth consecutive MLB season. Looking ahead to next season, the team is eager to bounce back and bring glory back to the diamond in San Francisco. But when the Giants take the field in 2027, longtime broadcaster Mike Krukow will not be a part of the journey after announcing that he will retire from the role at the end of this year.

And now that his retirement is official, Krukow has taken time to reflect on his storied broadcasting career — with multiple prestigious opportunities coming along the way. Sitting down with NBC Sports Bay Area Giants insider Alex Pavlovic, Krukow talked about the time he and Duane Kuiper provided commentary for the “MVP Baseball” video game series.

“We were really proud of that,” Krukow told Pavlovic. “It was a good project and we were involved with a bunch of engineers that put this thing together that really had a real passion for this project, and we had fun when we did it. And I found out what your voice is capable of because they give you a phonebook worth of dialogue that you had to talk about.

“A little tougher for Kuip because every time there was a line, it had to be inclusive of all the 600 players in the game. But you had about four hours of voice, and then you were done. That was it; you couldn’t go anymore. But they were so creative. We had one project where they gave us a game on TV, and it was like a video game with no sound. And the whole concept was just do the game, they set up the situation, talk about the game like you would talk about it. Talk about the elements of the weather, I mean, whatever. Talk about it like it’s a regular game.”

Doing commentary for the game required Kruk and Kuip to really channel their love for baseball, but the project gave the two a chance to add their own flair and give a whole new set of fans the chance to truly understand how the pair called games.

“It took us about 40 minutes to do nine innings,” Krukow told Pavlovic. “And it was really fun. But there were a lot of things that they did that were cutting edge. We would have chalk talks, and they would say ‘okay, what can we bring into this?’ And we would talk ball, we would talk ball for hours, and the next time we would gather, which would be in about a week or so, we’d come back and all these things we talked about were in the game.”

Krukow and Kuiper provided commentary for all three MVP Baseball titles stemming from 2003-05. While EA Sports stopped making the series ahead of the 2006 MLB season in favor of the MLB 2K franchise, the game left a lasting impact on Krukow’s legacy, cementing his status as one of baseball’s best announcers.

Krukow, who has been a Giants broadcaster for 36 years, has dealt with health related issues in recent seasons– most notably inclusion body myositis that has caused him to use a wheelchair. And while the disease has forced him to cut back both on his travel schedule and overall workload, he has continued to capture the hearts of many and provide moments that will live forever on in Giants history.

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