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Wow. So it turns out that, on any given day, even the Orioles are capable of looking like a behemoth. Despite the fact that inclement weather forced a time change for Wednesday’s series finale, and that they were facing a team that had demolished them 39-9 in a series sweep last week, the Birds were unflappable today. Behind six scoreless innings from their de facto ace, Kyle Bradish, and ten hits from the offense—including a homer by Adley Rutschman and three hits from, of all people, Blaze Alexander—the Orioles chased the Yankees out of town and took a series win with a 7-0 spanking of New York today.

Today was a lot of fun. It’s been a crappy season for Baltimore so far, so it’s critical to enjoy the good times when fans can. Thus, a few pieces of good news.

First: Kyle Bradish is so back! I know, I know, it was just one start. But it’s not just the results; it’s how he looked. (I mean, the results were really nice: Bradish shut out MLB’s third best offense, with just one hit allowed in six innings — and that came on a nice effort by Jazz Chisholm Jr. on a second straight curveball.) Bradish’s stuff was great today. Normally, command and spin are challenges for Tommy John survivors, and while three walks is more than Bradish would like, there were no issues with his spin rates today. His curveball was ruthless: his spin rate on the pitch was up today, and he got a 50% whiff rate with it. Beautiful. Here’s a swaggy montage.

As for the offense, they didn’t freak out, even against a lefty! Max Fried has had great numbers this season, but he’s been off in his last three starts, including this one. Of 61 pitches, only 34 were strikes. Fried lasted just three innings and allowed three runs, all earned, on five hits and a walk. (According to reports after the game, the lefty was pulled early with elbow soreness and is going in for imaging. All best of luck to him.) Clearly, Fried wasn’t working with his best stuff today, but the Birds showed a good approach in exploiting his command problems. That counts as a win.

Let’s recap. From the start, Fried was having trouble landing his fastball. He allowed a Taylor Ward single in the first inning (guys, Ward swung!). But after falling behind 3-1 to Gunnar Henderson, Fried jammed the O’s shortstop inside with a bunch of sinkers, getting a rather lucky GIDP.

No more lucky escapes for Fried in the second. Pete Alonso led off with a single, showing nice timing. Two quick outs followed—Tyler O’Neill was frozen on a low strike that former O’s farmhand J.C. Escarra challenged, and Leody Taveras erased the Polar Bear with a fielder’s choice. But hottest-bat-in-the-lineup-lately (maybe?) Coby Mayo nicely built himself a 3-1 count, then melted a fastball past the third base bag, at 111 mph. Taveras, showing no hesitation, rounded the bases and scored. The Orioles had a 1-0 lead.

Ordinarily, a 1-0 lead isn’t worth a hill of beans against the Yankees, but in this case, the offense was just getting started.

Blaze Alexander, tablesetter par excellence today, led off the third inning with a great bunt. He got to take an extra base when Fried muffed the throw to first. Taylor Ward walked. Of course. A Gunnar groundout moved Alexander to third, and Adley boosted his RISP numbers by cracking a noisy flyout to center. 2-0 Orioles. They had one more run in them: Pete Alonso, who is hitting well lately, singled to right. Ward scored, making it 3-0. There might have been more, but Alonso got himself rung up at second trying to stretch the single into a double. Speed is not a leading quality of polar bears.

The Orioles offense—and for that matter Blaze and Adley—still had more in the tank. The Yankees lifted the struggling Fried and put in right-hander Paul Blackburn. Blaze Alexander singled on a hanging sweeper and stole second while Taylor Ward stood at the plate and stared at pitches. Gunnar flew out to center, but with two outs, Adley connected a little further. His immediate reaction suggested he thought he’d gotten under it—but he ran all the way to second, where he was told by the grounds crew that it was a home run. Kinda funny, but they counts all the same.

The Orioles added a sixth and seventh run in the sixth inning against former Ray Ryan Yarbrough—another lefty!! Tyler O’Neill led off with a walk, and Coby Mayo scorched another loud line drive into left field. Weston Wilson kept the line going with another line drive single, loading the bases for Blaze Alexander. Some days, this fact would kill the rally. But not today. Blaze connected on a low-and-outside offspeed pitch, and drove it past the third baseman and shortstop. Two more runs scored. 7-0, Orioles.

It’s weird—some days it just looks really easy. Over the last week, the Orioles offense has scored more than three runs only once: today, seven materialized with ease. And after giving up seven, nine, eleven and twelve runs to the Yankees in last week’s series, Orioles pitching nearly no-hit them today.

It starts, of course, with the starter. Like I said, Bradish was in command the whole game, save for the Chisholm double in the fifth, the Yankees’ first and only hit of the game, and the only time they created any suspense on the basepaths. That inning, with Chisholm already aboard, Bradish spiked a curveball, allowing the speedster to take third. But then he whiffed Ryan McMahon. He walked Spencer Jones, putting runners at the corners. But after a long battle with Anthony Volpe, he finally got him swinging, too, and left the mound with that emphatic-slash-disdainful walk Bradish does when he’s in the zone.

Then, a bullpen combo of Keegan Akin, Dietrich Enns, and Yennier Cano combined for three hitless, scoreless innings. Poetry.

Today’s convincing win doesn’t erase the frustrations of the prior 43 games, but it did help. Outclassing the scary Yankees today—winning the series against them, even!—has to be a confidence booster. If the rotation starts to take a cue from Kyle Bradish and the hitters can do more of this, well, the Orioles start to look like an excellent team.

So who was your Most Birdland Player today? A dominant Bradish, looking like himself? Coby Mayo, with two hits and the game’s first RBI? Adley Rutschman, who homered and drove in three runs? Offensive powerhouse and speedster Blaze Alexander?

Sound off in the comments.  

Owners of the worst production from the leadoff spot in all of Major League Baseball, the Cincinnati Reds have finally, mercifully seen enough of the way their old lineup produced.

Ahead of Wednesday’s game against the Washington Nationals, manager Terry Francona bumped up the stars of his lineup a slot and began to stack the top of his lineup full of the best bats he can find. No longer is TJ Friedl hitting leadoff with Matt McLain slumping in the #2 spot – instead, Elly De La Cruz will hit 2nd with Sal Stewart 3rd, JJ Bleday 4th, and Spencer Steer 5th tonight as the Reds face Washington starter Jake Irvin, a righty.

Will Benson will lead off again against the RHP, and it remains to be seen how Francona will adjust the top of the lineup on days when the Reds face a southpaw.

Notably absent from this lineup today is Ke’Bryan Hayes, who was a flashpoint during yesterday’s game for a) not being pinch-hit for in the 4th inning with the bases loaded (and grounding into a double-play) and later b) being pinch-hit for in a bases-loaded spot after the game had already gotten out of hand.

Nathaniel Lowe is also back in the lineup tonight at DH one day after questionably being on the pine against a RHP (and against his former club).

Here’s the lineup for the start of the second game of this series, one that will feature Nick Lodolo on the mound for the Reds for his second start of the season:

First pitch is set for 6:40 PM ET in GABP.

With the news that Gavin Lux has had another setback in his recovery from several injuries to begin the 2026 season, the Rays will be without their anticipated second baseman for the foreseeable future. This is unfortunate for Lux as he’s in a contract year and his injuries will almost certainly impact his earning potential in 2027. The Rays are still in relatively good shape at second base with Ben Williamson’s continued growth at the position and Richie Palacios settling into a consistent role.

Williamson is maintaining a 101 wRC+ against lefties and Palacios has a 109 wRC+ against righties – together they’ve formed a solid platoon at second base. The Rays production at second by wRC+ ranks a respectable 13th in the league.

Defensively, they each have -2 outs above average and Williamson has 1 defensive run saved while Palacios has none. They’ve also converted 92% of ground balls and line drives hit to them into outs which is league average for the position. They appear to be a roughly average defensive pair in the early part of the season. Given that Williamson is a plus defender at third base and solid at shortstop, I do expect him to be better than average at second base as he gets more reps there.

While the Rays do appear to be fine at second base, I don’t think that will stop them from exploring potential upgrades as the summer goes on. Carson Williams has played a few games at second base since his demotion and could be an interesting internal candidate to play there in the majors if needed. He’s already a plus defender at shortstop, so there’s reason to believe the athleticism would translate similarly to second base. Carson likely offers more upside on both sides of the ball than either Williamson or Palacios. However, he’s still refining his approach to reduce the swing-and-miss – and seeing encouraging results – so consistent playing time in Triple-A may still be best for his development.

There are a couple interesting external candidates if the Rays did decide to make a trade. Funny enough, they’re both former Rays. Brandon Lowe is set to become a free agent after this season and could be a somewhat affordable rental if the Pirates fall out of contention later this summer. He’s been able to stay healthy, there’s still plenty of impact left in his bat, and his defense is still passable.

Another option, although less likely given the cost and positional fit, could be Isaac Paredes. He would likely be more expensive given his extra year of team control, but the former Ray continues to outperform his raw exit velocity data by consistently pulling the ball in the air. He’s been working in at second base this season for the first time in a few years and he seems to be more than capable of holding his own there. Paredes’s data at the position looks solid in a small sample, and the eye test suggests he’s at least passable there:

There are a few other guys having some strong starts that could be available at the deadline, but none of them have the track record comparable to Lowe or Paredes.

Lux’s on-base ability would still add an important dimension to the lineup if he’s able to return later this season, but the Rays appear reasonably positioned to withstand his absence for now. Williamson and Palacios still look capable of forming a viable second-base platoon for the remainder of the season. Carson Williams could emerge as an internal option if the Rays are willing to give him consistent major-league reps, and a pair of former Rays may also become trade candidates if the organization looks to clear future 40-man roster pressure ahead of the Rule 5 crunch this winter.

Things stink right now. The Yankee offense has been present for one game out of the last six, and we’re in the dark about the Max Fried’s potential elbow injury. On top of all that, New York lost a game that it felt like they were never involved in in the first place, managing a single base hit — at least it was a double! — in a 7-0 loss to the Orioles.

I wrote about what I think is wrong with Max Fried in the middle of the game, and it turns out I was wrong and everything is worse! The lefty was experiencing posterior elbow pain and removed himself from action. He’ll be examined by team doctors today and head back to New York for further imaging tomorrow. This is almost exactly the same process José Caballero went through earlier this week. The key difference is of course that a finger injury is just plainly less worrisome than elbow pain.

I think it’s worthwhile to take this as a moment to remember that so much of the stuff we worry, fester, argue, complain, and speculate about end up being null. We’ve spent the last two weeks wondering what happens with the pitching when Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodón are fully functional, whether Ryan Weathers or Will Warren go to the bullpen, and well we may have one of the answers presented to us.

Nature may abhor a vacuum but baseball abhors a surplus. The Yankees had too many starting pitchers, or at least they seemed like they would. Now, we’re left in the dark — the club clearly wants Cole to continue to build up despite throwing 77 pitches in his last outing, and who knows how long Fried will need before those elbow troubles are resolved.

That all this came in a game that was determined to annoy us regardless made everything worse. More than half the Yankee lineup no longer seems competitive, no matter how optimistic Michael Kay was about J.C. Escarra’s last eight games. Kyle Bradish has excellent breaking stuff, and has handled the Yankees well before, but the bottom four of the lineup all feature OPSs below .600. Jazz Chisholm Jr. had a booming double and finished the game at .608, and Trent Grisham is not at this time a leadoff hitter ahead of arguably the best two sluggers in the game.

That Jazz double was in fact the team’s only hit of the day, with Bradish posting six shutout innings before a trio of Oriole relievers shut down the rest of the game. The Yankees did manage five walks against seven strikeouts, a pretty good ratio for any game, but in that success the team kind of shows its weakness. They do walk a lot, and that’s good! Not making outs, getting yourself on base — these are things that should drive scoring.

Except, it’s very hard for a run to score because of a walk alone. Conversely, before certain commentators say certain things, it’s also very hard for a run to score because of a groundball to the right side alone. It’s much easier for a run to score because you drove a fastball into the gap for an extra-base hit. I think the determination to work counts, and wait for one pitch, is causing the Yankees as a group to be a little too passive. Take two of Aaron Judge’s ABs for example:

Look, I think that Aaron Judge is the most talented right-handed hitter in the game’s history, and any one pitch can take a guy by surprise. Both times here though, the best pitch he sees — indeed, the only strike he sees — is in a hitting zone, and is taken. Maybe if he swings, he swings through it, or he flies out, and who am I to tell Aaron Judge how to hit but the team from top to bottom looks a lot like they have a directive to see four pitches every at-bat regardless of where those pitches are. Or maybe I’m wrong about this too, and the plain fact is six hitters in the regular lineup probably shouldn’t be at this point.

The Yankees get an offday tomorrow, one that feels desperately needed. Of course we’ll spend it worried about the state of Max Fried’s elbow, but after a really frustrating six games, maybe this can be a good reset point. The Subway Series kicks off from Queens on Friday night, and if nothing else we’ll get to watch Cam Schlittler pitch. The annual battle for New York starts at 7:15pm Eastern, and if you have Apple TV+ you just might be able to view it.

Box Score

In Patrick Bailey’s second start in Cleveland, he showed why the Guardians decided to trade for the defensive-first catcher.

Bailey’s task on Tuesday was to handle the Guardians’ worst starting pitcher so far in 2026, Slade Cecconi. Coming into the game, Cecconi had a 19% whiff rate and had been attempting a fairly even pitch mix between his five offerings – 34% four seamers, 26% cutters, 16% sinkers, 15% curveballs, and 10% sliders/sweepers. Below, you can view a map of Slade’s pitch selection patterns for the year from Baseball Savant:

After the game, Cecconi told reporters that he did not shake Bailey off even one time, so we know that the game-calling was the catcher’s doing when analyzing differences below. During his four innings of work against the Angels, Slade achieved a 25% whiff rate while going to a fastball-heavy mix, throwing his sinker 38%, his four-seamer 33% and his cutter 22% of the time, cutting his curveball and sweeper usage to a combined 6%. He also displayed a significant change in location choices, as seen below with a chart from Baseball Savant:

If you do some quick math, here, you’ll see that Bailey had Cecconi avoiding wasting pitches below the zone, instead peppering the top of the zone and above. Cecconi’s sinker and four-seamer both are above average in vertical movement, so this seems to reflect Bailey trusting that this movement would result in more whiffs if aimed at a higher location, while encouraging Cecconi to let loose with his velocity (his fastball mix showed improvement over his year averages by over 1 mph for each pitch).

Bailey’s choice to focus on fastball mix was interesting because the Angels are solidly top five in MLB against four-seamers and cutters… however, they are 29th against sinkers in MLB. Cecconi’s sinker, meanwhile, has been his best pitch by run-value in 2026 at +2.5 runs above average. My guess here is that Bailey particularly liked how the sinker would play off of Slade’s cutter and fastball, and chose to risk the Angels’ ability to hit those two pitches in order to get the most out of a pitch in the sinker that has been the Halos’ kryptonite. This turned out to be an effective strategy, and demonstrates Bailey’s quickness in being able to analyze both pitcher and opposing team to devise an effective game-calling strategy.

Bailey also displayed his elite pitch-framing ability, particularly in an at-bat against the most dangerous hitter on the Angels, Mike Trout, in the third inning. As seen in the graphic below, Bailey was able to steal two strikes in that top of the zone section he was targeting throughout the game to neutralize Trout in pitches three and five (a big deal, for as any Guardians’ fan who has followed the future Hall-of-Famer’s exploits against Cleveland for the past decade knows). Not only was the umpire fooled, but Trout – who has one of the game’s most elite eyes at the plate – was confused, as he offered no ABS challenge.

Later that inning, Cecconi surrendered a double and Bailey’s framing went to work on Vaughn Grissom, as seen below:

Pitch number one was PROBABLY a strike, remembering that GameDay’s zone and the ABS zone do not always align. The umpire and Grissom believed it was, at least. He then expanded his zone later in the at-bat to get the swinging strikeout accordingly.

Homeplate umpire Jeremie Rehak had a very good game, but Bailey was still able to help provide a 0.15 run advantage in his framing work as outlined by @UmpScorecards on Twitter.

It will likely be difficult to watch Patrick Bailey hit. He is unlikely to be any better than what Bo Naylor was, there, during his cumulative time with the Guardians. So, when we ask ourselves why the team gave up valuable assets to acquire Bailey and risked disrupting their pitching and catching situations, we need to carefully watch how he affects the game defensively. The Angels did not attempt any steals against Bailey, who is excellent in the run-game management category, nor did Bailey allow any passed balls. Most importantly, Bailey seems to have the inherent trust of his pitchers due to his reputation, and demonstrated the ability to plan an execute an effective game-plan to get the most out of a struggling pitcher against a solid lineup.

I am not willing to say that Bailey’s defensive prowess will make up for his lack of hitting ability quite yet. It’s his second game catching, here, and I will likely need to endure some painful outs from him while hitting for a while to know how I feel. But, I do think it’s important to remember that one of the things analytics has most trouble capturing is catcher value. Catchers – especially as Cleveland uses them – have a dramatic impact on the confidence levels and talent maximization of pitchers.

If Bailey costs the team in run-production, he may be able to more than compensate by assisting them in run prevention. Some have called the Patrick Bailey-Austin Hedges tandem an “Iron Curtain” strategy by the Guardians. For one night, at least, the early returns were positive as the plan unfolds.

After ending yesterday’s game against the Chicago Cubs with a one-hitter, the Atlanta Braves are looking to secure an early series win and a whole new offensive plan with rookie JR Ritchie on the mound. Let’s look at who we have.

The one question that’s been surfacing is, “Where’s Dominic Smith on the starting lineup?”

With Ronald Acuña Jr. still absent, Manager Walt Weiss has been making a few adjustments to right field, and so far, it’s been working. That doesn’t mean, however, Braves Country isn’t missing their new heavy-hitter on the starting roster, especially since he’s been consistently producing results.

Regardless, the Braves lineup consists of Mauricio Dubón batting leadoff. Sandy León is set to take over the catching spot as Drake Baldwin occupies DH in the two-hole.

Both Dubón and León will be facing Cubs starting pitcher Shota Imanaga for the first time, while four member of the Braves’ offense (Ozzie Albies, José Azocar, Baldwin and Matt Olson) all averaging over a 1.000 OPS against the lefty.

The remainder of the lineup is identical to yesterday’s, with a few slight changes in order due to the shift in leadoff.

Though pulling off a win in yesterday’s matchup, the offense is looking to make a bigger impact on a team that’s also leading their division and known to get hot at the right times. To avoid a revenge run from the hot Cubs, they’ll have to establish their runs early to rattle Imanaga and impact their bats.

As for Acuña, he is set to continue running drills at Truist to test his hamstring, according to Braves insider Grant McAuley, and will be on standby for a return date.

First pitch is set for 7:15 p.m EST tonight.

TV: NESN

First Pitch: 6:45 p.m. ET

The Red Sox and Phillies will tell us a lot about themselves during Wednesday’s matchup at Fenway Park.

Boston and Philadelphia both notably fired their managers three weeks ago, with the former treading water (7-7) since dismissing Alex Cora in favor of Chad Tracy, while the latter has completely turned things around (11-3) after dropping Rob Thomson for Don Mattingly. It’s not like things will stay this way forever, though — right?

Willson Contreras will return to the lineup for the home team, batting fourth after receiving an extra day of rest. Connor Wong will replace Carlos Narváez behind the dish, while Ceddanne Rafaela gets the night off after playing every game this month.

Kyle Schwarber is back in the leadoff spot, so be careful if you’re sitting in the right field grandstand.

Sonny Gray will make his second start since returning from the injured list on May 6, where he pitched five scoreless innings in a victory over the Detroit Tigers. Andrew Painter will make his first career start at America’s Most Beloved Ballpark, carrying a 6.89 ERA with 30 strikeouts across 32.2 innings pitched during his rookie campaign in 2026.

It’s always nice to win a day game, especially when that win clinches the first team sweep of the season! Messick wasn’t as in control as he usually is today, but he still turned in 6.2 innings of quality baseball. His final line: 6.2 IP 4H 2R 7K 3BB. The only runs of the day came off a Zach Neto 2-run homer in the 5th.

The Guardians started off scoring quickly, with Angel Martinez hitting a leadoff homer.

Martinez had a great series, going 3/7 with 2 HR and 3 SB in the two games he played. Jose walked, DeLauter singled off the pitcher, and then Fry drove them in with an RBI groundout.

DeLauter drove in a run in the 3rd on a sac fly to center (which he smoked).

In the 6th, the Guardians tacked on an insurance run with a Daniel Schneemann RBI single.

Bullpen was great. Festa came on in relief of Messick in the 7th – with a runner on first – and got Adam Frazier (lol) to ground out. Sabrowski pitched the 8th, striking out 3. Cade got the save in the ninth striking out the side. He has been fantastic over the last month.

Relatively uneventful game today, but it ended in a W.

The Guardians welcome the Reds this weekend, where it’ll be Bibee against a presently unknown Reds pitcher.