In 1903, the American League launched a New York franchise to compete with the senior circuit’s Giants. They set up shop in Washington Heights at one of Manhattan’s highest points, taking the apropos name of Highlanders. Despite their status as an expansion team, they got off to a strong start, posting winning campaigns in each of their first two seasons. Before their third, they added a pitcher who’d had intermittent success in independent ball but carried with him some question marks. He’d end up spending four years in New York’s rotation at a critical period in their development.

William Johnston Hogg
Born: September 11, 1881 (Port Huron, MI)
Died: December 8, 1909 (New Orleans, LA)
Yankees Tenure: 1905-08 (as New York Highlanders)

Bill Hogg spend his life in a state of perpetual motion. Born in Missouri, his father was a railroad agent who followed the lines out West, ending up in Pueblo, Colorado by the time Hogg was 10. Young Bill played baseball on the sandlots of Pueblo, showing enough with his right arm to earn a spot on the local Class B pro club at 18. He quickly established a reputation as an uneven talent, showcasing superlative speed and movement on his pitches but struggling with control.

Hogg joined up with the Seattle Clamdiggers of the Class B Pacific Northwest League in 1902, where he began experiencing the injuries that would dog him throughout his career. After pitching through a sore arm, he eventually broke it. It was a turning point for the young hurler. “Ever since my arm was broken I have caught particular Cain when I exercise my whip strenuously,” he’d say years later. “After I take a full turn in the box I can’t sleep for a couple of nights…there’s no relief.”

Nonetheless, he returned in ‘03, pitching well enough to draw the attention of the Portland Browns of the Class-A Pacific Coast League. He made the jump after a row with Seattle manager Dan Dugdale reportedly led to fisticuffs, ending his run with the team. But his time in Portland would end nearly as soon as it began. After a “drunken quarrel on the streets of Portland,” the club suspended Hogg. He spent the year bouncing between three different teams but won 33 games, earning a spring training invite in 1905 from the fledgling Highlanders.

Hogg earned a spot on the team, making his MLB debut on April 25 against the Senators. “He was cool, had lots of speed, good control of his side arm delivery, and whisked the ball over the edges of the plate,” read an encouraging report from The Washington Post. He ended up cracking the rotation as the season went on, a berth he’d hold down for most of the next three seasons. Hogg had his best year in 1906, winning 14 games along with a 2.93 ERA in 25 starts for a squad that would finish three games back of the White Sox for the pennant.

On the heels of that strong campaign, Hogg was nearly involved in a trade that would have transformed baseball forever. The Highlanders dangled their rotation piece for a talented 20-year-old outfielder who’d yet to reach his potential. At the 11th hour, the Tigers decided to hang on to Ty Cobb. He’d win his first of 12 batting titles the next year, and the rest is history.

In ’07, the injuries that he’d been playing through began to catch up to Hogg. He missed over a month with a sprained shoulder and a separate illness. The issue came to a head in ‘08, as Yankees president Frank Farrell suspended Hogg due to poor conditioning when a sore arm kept him off the mound. Clark Griffith, the future Hall of Famer who’d spent 20 years as a player before becoming the Highlanders’ first manager, defended his player, whose maladies he believed to be genuine. This disconnect between the skipper and his front office may have played a role in Griffith’s midseason firing, which opened him up to manage and, ultimately, own the Washington Senators.

Before the ‘09 season, Hogg’s contract was sold to the Louisville Colonels of the American Association. He continued to struggle with his health during his lone season in Louisville, but still won 17 games as an important contributor as the Colonels won the league’s championship. After the season, Hogg and a teammate went down to New Orleans to continue playing semipro ball. It was there that the 28-year-old would succumb to his health issues, dying on December 9, 1909. The cause of death was what was then called Bright’s disease but would now be called nephritis of the kidneys, the discovery of which vindicated a man who had unfairly been branded lazy for his difficulty staying on the field. While Hogg’s time in the major leagues was brief, he showcased a remarkable combination of talent and perseverance to perform effectively while dealing with a debilitating illness, playing a key role on several of the first AL teams in New York.

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

Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong enters the weekend series against the Pirates with 41 home runs and 36 stolen bases, perhaps on pace for the seventh 40/40 season ever and first by an Cub.

Earlier this week I asked you how many steals you thought PCA would wind up with.

Here’s what you said:

This seems about right, from 4-8 more steals in the Cubs’ final 15 games.

In addition, if he hits two more home runs he’ll have more than any Cubs left-handed hitter ever. Hall of Famer Billy Williams hit 42 in 1970.

Here are the answers to the two national questions asked this week, both were about predicting this year’s league pennant winners.

A close call between the Brewers and Dodgers among voters, with the Cubs third.

To me, the American League is a closer call. Really, only the Rays and Yankees are good teams in that league; the rest is a toss-up. Things could get interesting if either the Rays or Yankees get upset before the ALCS.

Thanks for participating in this week’s survey!

This edition of SB Nation Reacts is sponsored by FanDuel.

Well, it was fun while it lasted.

In Thursday’s 2-1 loss to the Astros at Citizens Bank Park, the Phillies offense put together perhaps the most undisciplined displays of hitting MLB has ever seen.

They faced Christian Javier, Houston’s right-handed starter who is a shell of the pitcher that famously threw six no-hit innings against them in Houston’s combined no-hitter in Game 4 of the 2022 World Series. He entered Thursday’s finale with a 5.98 ERA in 14 starts, and yet, the Phils were once again stymied by him, tallying just three hits.

But even worse was the method in which they failed.

The Phillies saw 65 pitches thrown out of the strike zone against the Astros on Thursday and they swung at more of those pitches out of the zone than not. That 52.3% chase rate is the highest number ever recorded since it became a trackable number in 2009.

So yes, the Phillies are chasing at the plate, but it goes beyond just what we see on the field.

They’re also chasing their ultimate goal of a World Series title.

Are the two related?

Following the arrival of Luis Arraez from the Giants at the beginning of August, the offense underwent a much-publicized transformation.

Suddenly, a team that had for years been among the worst offenders in chasing pitches out of the strike zone was resisting their primal urges. A team that, for the first five months of the 2026 season, had the lowest on-base percentage in the sport, was getting on base more than any other. A team that had one of the highest strikeout rates had the lowest, and a team that had one of the lowest walk rates, had the highest.

• Through July: .303 OBP (30th), 7.8 BB% (28), 23.7 K% (25)
• 8/1 through 8/23: .367 OBP (2nd), 11.6 BB% (1), 14.5 K% (1)

It was a remarkable turnaround, one that was really difficult to comprehend. How could a team that had, for so many years, displayed such an aggressive approach at the plate suddenly change their stripes as a collective unit? Some credit was being heaped on Arraez, at least on the reduction of strikeouts, although Arraez is not known to be one of the most patient hitters at the plate, either.

We all wondered, could it last?

It did not. Beginning with their west coast road trip in Seattle, the Phils left their patience on the plane. Since the start of their three-game series against the Mariners, they have a .293 OBP (4th-worst), 7.6 BB% (22nd), and 21.5 K% (19th).

Their 34.9% chase rate over that stretch is tied for 8th-highest. From August 1 through 24, it was 31.5%, 21st.

After Thursday’s game, Bryce Harper acknowledged the Phils essentially handed Javier an easy day, and noted these kinds of efforts cannot happen.

Once the calendar flips to October, it’s not suddenly going to become easier not to chase. Learn the habits now and they’ll become habits when it matters most.

As the team chases their elusive World Series title, the pressure will only mount. And in recent seasons, when pressure has mounted on the Phils, particularly in the postseason, their chasing leads to more chasing.

And that’s the point. When the Phillies had their magical ride to the World Series in 2022, the only thing they were chasing was ending their 11-year postseason drought. And make no mistake, they did not play well in the season’s final month, almost choking that away. But after finally earning the final wild card spot, they were done chasing. They were in the moment, with no pressure on them, and played the best baseball we’ve seen from them during this five-year run of success.

Things are different now. The weight of postseason failures are heavy and this team presses as a result. They’re constantly chasing that moment, chasing that home run in a big spot, chasing that 2022 and ‘23 feeling again.

For a few weeks, they stopped doing that. They let pitchers come to them. They took their walks. They passed the baton. As a result, they scored a lot of runs and won a ton of games.

It’s hard to imagine the Phillies playing with patience in a pennant race and in October, but Harper is right.

If they don’t get back at least a little of what they did for the first three weeks of August, it’s likely going to be another short run of postseason baseball in October for them.

The Cincinnati Reds sit 8 games under the .500 mark, mired in last place in the National League Central for yet another year. That, mind you, all comes after they surged to nearly 10 games over .500 during the season’s first month.

Only the hapless Colorado Rockies and homeless Athletics have a worse run differential than Cincinnati, who at -122 sit a full 100 runs worse than the Pittsburgh Pirates – the occupants of 4th place in the division. Shall we say, it has not been a good year in the Queen City.

For one Elly De La Cruz, though, things are all seemingly falling into place.

He figured out how to master left-handed pitching, hitting a league best .350 against southpaws as part of an overall .350/.417/.657 mashing of them (who’s 188 wRC+ ranks as 2nd best in all of Major League Baseball). Just this week he unleashed a 102 mph relay throw that’s the fastest by an infielder in the statcast era. He set a career high with 26 homers while bashing homers in five straight games, in the process setting the mark for the most homers in a single season by a switch-hitter.

On the whole, he’s hitting .283/.362/.511 with 26 homers and 25 steals in 567 PA, and that’s despite missing time earlier in the year with a hamstring problem. He’s been a 5.0 bWAR per Baseball Reference, while FanGraphs has him at 5.6 fWAR – the fourth best position player in the game this year (despite, ahem, missing that time).

All told, it seemed as good a time as any to ask you how he’s done so far in 2026 earlier this week, and all he did since I opened that poll was continue on his epic dinger streak while facing the two best teams in the sport (Milwaukee and the Dodgers). Unsurprisingly, I guess, you all think he’s been doing A-OK.

If anything, what’s notable here is that 44% of respondents think he’s somehow not been an A-grade player this season. Perhaps that’s them voting on a curve knowing that there’s still so much that Elly has yet to tap into in this, just his age-24 season, and only after he reaches those higher heights will we truly be able to give him an ‘A’ on his own standards.

Regardless, Cincinnati’s superstar shortstop is just that – a bona fide superstar in today’s game, and it seems he’s only now just busting out of his shell.

MLB Reacts is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook.

Good morning! Yesterday, the Los Angeles Dodgers called up their top prospect, Josue De Paula, as a replacement for Shohei Ohtani, who was placed on the IL due to injuries in both his knee and bicep and who is in danger of missing the playoffs.

De Paula’s promotion has Red Sox fans once again wondering whether Franklin Arias might make his debut before the end of the season, and, moreover, whether he might crack the postseason roster. De Paula, a Brooklyn native who is cousins with Stephon Marbury and Sebastian Telfair, is about 6 months older than Arias. But he had not yet progressed to AAA and arguably did not perform as well at AA as Arias did, slashing .293/.390/.528 to Arias’s .318/.407/.587 (2026 stats).

But while it’s easy to look at the two situations and applaud the Dodgers for appearing to be more aggressive with a lesser talent, we’re not dealing with an apples-to-apples comparison here. First, in order for Arias to be eligible for the postseason roster at this point he would have to be serving as an injury replacement for someone currently on the roster, as De Paula is. Second, De Paula is a defensively limited outfielder, and he is likely only going to be used as a DH/bench bat by the Dodgers.

In other words: the Dodgers had a hole and De Paula fills it, regardless of whether he’s actually ready to perform in the big leagues. That’s not necessarily the case with Arias. The Sox have plenty of middle infield options at the moment, and Curtis Mead may join those ranks soon. And while it may very well be true that Arias would already perform better than all of them, it’s impossible to say that for sure. No Red Sox fan who lived through the Kristian Campbell experience should blindly assume that Arias is going to take the big leagues by storm. And, of course, the impending lockout and the impact that would have on his development hangs over all of this.

And yet… man, Trevor Story can barely throw the ball across the diamond right now. I’m a baseball romantic, and the romantic move is to call up Arias. Argue for pragmatism all you want, but you’re a liar if you say a part of you doesn’t want to see Arias debut this month and then shine on into October.

Use this space to talk about De Paula, Arias, and whatever else you want and, as always, be good to one another.

Another day of minor league baseball is in the books. See the results below. Check out the previous day’s recap here.

AAA: Sugar Land Space Cowboys (71-69) lost 8-0 (BOX SCORE)

McPherson started for Sugar Land and allowed 4 runs over 1.2 innings. He was relieved by Nezuh who tossed 3.1 scoreless innings with 6 strikeouts. The bullpen allowed four runs late and the offense had a rough game as Sugar Land was shutout in the 8-0 loss.

Note: Ferreras is hitting .325 in Triple-A.

• Pascanel Ferreras, SS: 2-for-4, SB
• Joey Loperfido, DH: 1-for-3, BB
• Lucas Spence, RF: 1-for-4, 2B
• Cesar Salazar, C: 2-for-4

• Brandon McPherson, RHP: 1.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 0 K
• Jackson Nezuh, RHP: 3.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 6 K
• Kai-Wei Teng, RHP: 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 3 K
• Logan VanWey, RHP: 1.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 1 K
• Alimber Santa, RHP: 1.0 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 1 K

AA: Corpus Christi Hooks (61-74) lost 5-3 (BOX SCORE)

Mancini started for the Hooks and allowed one run over 3 innings. The offense got on the board in the 5th on a Nunez groundout. Leach relieved Mancini but allowed 4 runs as the RockHounds took the lead. The offense got 2 runs back in the 6th on a Moss 2 run double but that was it as the Hooks fell 5-3.

Note: Moss is hitting .400 in Double-A.

• Jack Moss, 1B: 2-for-4, 2B, 2 RBI, SB
• Anthony Huezo, DH: 0-for-3, RBI, SB
• Zach Daudet, 3B: 1-for-3, R, BB, SB

• Joey Mancini, RHP: 3.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K
• Hudson Leach, RHP: 1.1 IP, 1 H, 4 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K
• Andrew Marrero, RHP: 0.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, o ER, 0 BB, 0 K
• Colby Langford, LHP: 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K
• Railin Perez, RHP: 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K

A+: Asheville Tourists (43-87) SEASON OVER

A: Fayetteville Woodpeckers (2-0) won 8-1 (BOX SCORE)

The Woodpeckers got on the board in the first inning on a Durnin RBI single and Alvarez sac fly. They got another run in the second inning on a Flores RBI single. Beck got the start and went 4.2 innings allowing one run while striking out 5. The offense got another run in the 5th with an Alvarez walk. In the 6th the offense scored 3 runs on a Ramirez RBI triple, a steal of home and a Durnin RBI single. Tryon added an RBI double in the 7th. Verdugo was fantastic closing it out as he struck out 6 over 4.1 scoreless innings as the Woodpeckers swept the series 2-0.

Note: The Woodpeckers are moving on to the Championship Series!

• Owen Nowak, LF: 0-for-1, 2 R, 3 BB
• Kam Durnin, SS: 2-for-4, R, 2 RBI, BB
• Kevin Alvarez, CF: 0-for-2, 2 R, 2 BB
• Waner Luciano, 3B: 2-for-5
• Ben Tryon, 1B: 1-for-4, R, 2B, RBI, BB
• Rashawn Galloway, RF: 1-for-4, R, 2B
• Arturo Flores, C: 1-for-4, RBI
• German Ramirez, 2B: 2-for-4, 2 R, 3B, RBI

• Jagger Beck, RHP: 4.2 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 K
• Ryan Verdugo, RHP: 4.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 6 K (WIN)

Today’s minor league starters:

SL: Bryce Mayer – 7:05 CT

CC: Nolan DeVos – 7:00 CT

AV: SEASON OVER

FV: OFF