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We knew this day was eventually coming, but man, it still hurts.

We wanted him to pitch forever.

We wanted him to join that illustrious 300-victory club, selfishly knowing we will never see it again.

The news stung Wednesday that Justin Verlander was calling it career at the conclusion of the Detroit Tigers’ season.

"This season has challenged me in ways I haven't experienced before, both physically and mentally," Verlander said in his social media post. "I've always believed that as long as I could compete at the level I expect of myself, I'd keep playing. I never wanted to retire because of a milestone, a number, or a date on the calendar. I wanted the game to tell me when it was time.

"Over the last several months, I've realized that time has come."

Justin Verlander’s right arm was a gift to the game. And most notably to the Detroit Tigers and Houston Astros.

The former drafted him and threw him into Major League Baseball’s deep end shortly thereafter, while the latter became his second home after a late-career trade that saw him refine his craft, ratchet up his dominance and become a World Series champion.

The 266 wins, 3,554 strikeouts and three Cy Young Awards are more than enough evidence his Cooperstown case is airtight. Yet Verlander, who announced Wednesday, July 8 that he will retire after this season, was so much more than just the numbers.

Sure, he had his share of big-game failings — 556 career starts and 10 trips to the postseason will bring its share of rainfall — but Verlander also stood tall when it mattered most countless times.

Here’s five moments that defined Verlander’s nearly peerless career:

More: Justin Verlander's season debut was ugly but Tigers believe in return at 43

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There are a lot of fun opportunities to fade and back a handful of arms this evening. Here are my three favorite MLB player props and MLB picks from Wednesday’s slate.

Let’s dig in!

Best MLB strikeout props and starting pitcher picks today

Player	Pick	Odds
Slade Cecconi	Under 4.5 strikeouts	-170
MacKenzie Gore	Over 6.5 strikeouts	-133
Roki Sasaki	Over 2.5 earned runs	+114

Strikeout prop: Slade Cecconi Under 4.5 strikeouts (-170)

My grandparents would be furious that I am fading a fellow Italian, but it has to be done.

Cleveland Guardians starter Slade Cecconi owns the worst matchup strikeout rate on Batters-Box current season dataset this evening as he takes on a red hot Minnesota Twins offense. The Cleveland right-hander has faced a poorly-rated strikeout matchup 22 times over the last three seasons, and during that span, he has gone under this number 54.55% of the time.

Over Cecconi’s last five outings, his strikeout rate has stayed below 16%. Meanwhile, the Twins have been absolutely humming offensively, posting an 18% strikeout rate over their last 21 games. During that stretch, Minnesota owns a 137 wRC+, .366 wOBA, and .842 OPS.

Batters-Box also has the Twins without a single hitter above league average in strikeout rate against Cecconi this evening.

I would alt this down to Under 3.5 for plus money. Do not take this any higher than it is.

• Time: 7:40 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: MNNT, CLEG

Strikeout prop: MacKenzie Gore Over 6.5 strikeouts (-133)

A team that has been nothing short of puke-worthy over its last 12 games is the Los Angeles Angels. Sure, they are a team we all love to take a few punches at from time to time, but during that stretch, their offense is posting just a 69 wRC+, 26.4% strikeout rate, and a brutal 4.6% barrel rate.

I think Texas Rangers southpaw MacKenzie Gore is in an all-time shove spot against this struggling Angels lineup. Six Angels hitters in their last 30 plate appearances own a strikeout rate of at least 23%. Over their last 60 plate appearances against lefties, five hitters are above 25%, with four sitting above 28%.

Gore owns an elite strikeout rating on Batters-Box. In a small sample size of seven elite-rated matchups, he has surpassed this prop in six of them, including two games with 10+ strikeouts. Home is where Gore has really shined, posting a 29.2% strikeout rate while generating a 29.9% chase rate out of the zone.

Over their last 12 games against left-handed pitching, the Angels rank dead-last in chase rate out of the zone at 40.3%. They also own the third-worst strikeout rate and contact rate against lefties during that stretch.

I might have to dabble on Gore to hit 10+ strikeouts this evening. I would not pay much extra juice for this number, so if the price climbs, I would rather look at 8+ strikeouts at plus money.

• Time: 8:05 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: RSN, ABTV

Earned runs prop: Roki Sasaki Over 2.5 earned runs (+114)

I think the Rockies are in a boom spot against Dodgers struggling right hander, Roki Sasaki. According to Batters-Box’s current season dataset, the Rockies own the highest-rated offense on the slate, featuring five strongly rated bats and four with elite ratings. Yes, the entire lineup is in a great spot against the Dodgers right-hander.

On top of that, Colorado has been absolutely humming over the last week, posting a 155 wRC+ over its last six games.

Sakaki in his last three outings he has an 8.53 ERA, 5.61 xERA and 1.74 WHIP. He is allowing hitters to produce nearly 54% hard hit and over 20.5% barrel rate during that stretch as well. 

• Time: 10:10 p.m. ET
• Where to watch: SNLA, COLR

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The San Francisco Giants made a roster move on Wednesday, ahead of their series finale matinee against the Toronto Blue Jays. Shortly before first pitch, the team announced that center fielder Jonah Cox had been placed on the 10-Day Injured List, retroactive to July 6, with a left oblique strain. Taking his place on the roster is utility player Jesús Rodríguez.

It’s a tough break for Cox, who wasn’t on many people’s radar to be injured given that he’s hardly playing. The Giants made the shocking move to call him up straight from AA Richmond on May 31, but he’s received just 29 plate appearances in that time, though he’s gotten into 24 games to provide defensive value in center field (and even at second base a touch).

Given that the Giants called him up from AA, there’s a chance that Cox will make his AAA debut while on a rehab assignment, which is a little bit funny.

While Cox’s injury gives the Giants fewer star defensive options, it does improve versatility, as Rodríguez has spent ample time this year at catcher, second base, and left field, and was initially developed as a third baseman. He can play all over, though it’s clear the Giants are currently not high on his ability to catch, as evidenced by the recent promotion of Drew Cavanaugh.

Rodríguez made his MLB debut earlier this year and hit 9-39 with two home runs, three walks, and just five strikeouts, though he’s been scuffling quite a bit in AAA since getting optioned on June 1. There will likely be more moves incoming, as the beat reporters have reported that left-hander Carson Whisenhunt has a locker at Oracle Park, and is likely to start on Thursday.

Well, let’s see if the magic of the toy dragon will work two days in a row. Please Jays score some runs.

Feeling bad for Braydon Fisher and family losing his father. 65 is too young to die.

Go Jays Go

The Mets are making a flurry of bullpen moves ahead of Wednesday night's game. 

Austin Warren has officially been placed on the 15-day IL with a right forearm strain.

SNY MLB Insider Chelsea Janes confirmed reports earlier in the day that indicated this would be the case, as Warren underwent testing following back-to-back rough outings. 

Warren allowed a combined nine runs on eight hits in his last 2.0 innings of work. 

"Haven't felt great the past couple," he said. "That's part of the game these days, I had outings earlier in the year that I hadn't felt great but went better, I just threw a pitch last night and it didn't feel great so I told them right away."

Warren and the Mets are still awaiting results from the MRI. 

In a corresponding move, righty Tobias Myers has been recalled from Triple-A Syracuse. 

Myers was an extremely valuable piece for New York's staff over the first few months of the season, but like Warren, he was roughed up over his last few big-league appearances. 

He's put together just two clean outings since May 14th, racking up a 10.38 ERA over that span. 

When at his best, though, the 27-year-old has proven to be a versatile weapon in long relief or the late innings. 

Additionally, the Mets DFA'd Matt Seelinger after his rough debut and recalled Xzavion Curry from Triple-A.  

Much as been made by fans following popular baseball prospect site, baseballamerica.com, posting their organizational rankings among all MLB teams. The hometown Phillies ranked as the 29th worst farm system in the league based on prospect talent. This seems bad, huh? For a team with aging stars and up against the luxury tax threshold, an injection of young talent could be the only way to prolong this current run of regular seasons success for the Phillies. You are now thinking, how could they have fallen from 20th (in the preseason ranking) to near dead-last? What might have caused this? Well, two things. The graduation of prospects and the lack of development elsewhere. In regards to the former, it always seems to go over the casual fan’s head that could be a driving factor in these nonsensical rankings (nothing against rankings, I love them…but they are really arbitrary and objective). The Phillies graduated two Top100 MLB prospects in Andrew Painter and Justin Crawford. That is a legit major factor! This doesn’t even factor in struggles by Jean Cabrera, Aroon Escobar, Dante Nori, and Carson DeMartini. Not to mention their best prospect has yet to take the field (a consensus Top20 prospect in the game) in shortstop Aidan Miller.

I’m NOT saying this isn’t time to hit the panic button. Development has stagnated among prospects, especially on the hitting side. It feels any promising prospect hits that AA/AAA wall and nothing ever materializes. Its frustrating! The Phillies need to do a lot better in both drafting and international scouting. It is largely why the last few years the Phillies have needed to sign and trade for talent rather than find it within the organization. It isn’t a sustainable model if you aren’t blowing past the luxury tax.

You may ask, has it always been like this? Haven’t the Phillies had touted prospects and a system not that long ago? Lets look back at 2016, using a similar list from baseballamerica.com (its their preseason ranking, they didn’t do a full 30 for midseason). In 2016, the Phillies ranking 8th in the league. Led by promising names like JP Crawford, Nick Williams, Jake Thompson, and Jorge Alfaro.

Now these are some great names. The Phillies most impactful player wound up being 23rd ranked 1B-only prospect Rhys Hoskins. Who if memory serves me correctly, wasn’t nearly as fawned over as the monstrous OF Dylan Cozens. A lot of the names on here were also acquired via trade including: Nick Williams, Jake Thompson, Jorge Alfaro, Zach Eflin, Nick Pivetta, Darnell Sweeney, Ben Lively, Jimmy Cordero, and Tom Windle. 10 years later, only Hoskins, Crawford, Eflin, and Nick Pivetta remain major leaguers or had significant impacts.

If you were to tell me that there will be less than four impactful players from this year’s midseason Top30 Phillies list, I wouldn’t argue with you. I’m not sure the same amount of pedigree is there as there was in 2016. However, there is still some optimism. Gage Wood looks at a MINIMUM a major league reliever, Aidan Miller will be a major league player once healthy, Francisco Renteria, Alirio Ferrebus and Ramon Marquez are three of the best international signings/prospects the Phillies have ever had in the system. The Phillies should get another good player at 36 in the draft this weekend.

I think its important to put into perspective that 29th in a vacuum doesn’t mean a whole lot and while you can be down on the system overall, to not put much stock in lists and rankings. Read up on these players, watch these players, or at the very least follow people that do and LISTEN.

The San Francisco Giants wrap up this series against the Toronto Blue Jays this afternoon at Oracle Park.

Taking the mound for the Giants will be right-hander Logan Webb, who enters today’s game with a 3.66 ERA, 3.32 FIP, with 78 strikeouts to 24 walks in 93.1 innings pitched. His last start was in the Giants’ 15-3 loss to the Colorado Rockies on Friday, in which he allowed seven runs on 11 hits with two strikeouts and two walks in three innings.

He’ll be facing off against Blue Jays right-hander Dylan Cease, who enters today’s game with a 2.79 ERA, 2.27 FIP, with 137 strikeouts to 41 walks in 90.1 innings pitched. His last start was in the Blue Jays’ 2-0 win over the Seattle Mariners on Friday, in which he allowed just three hits and a walk with nine strikeouts in seven innings.

Game #92

Who: San Francisco Giants (38-53) vs. Toronto Blue Jays (43-49)

Where: Oracle Park, San Francisco, California

When: 12:45 p.m. PT

Regional broadcast: NBC Sports Bay Area

National broadcast: n/a

Radio: KNBR 680 AM/104.5 FM, KSFN 1510 AM

2026 has been the Year of the Injured List for Cubs starting pitching. If you’ve spent any part of this season refreshing social media for injury updates more than checking the box score, you’re not alone. But somehow, the Cubs will enter tonight’s game against the Orioles with a 51-40 record. While that puts them seven games back of the Brewers in the division, it does give them a pretty good shot of making the playoffs through the Wild Card. You can see FanGraph’s odds of the Cubs making the playoffs below:

Trust me, you’d much rather look at that chart than their odds of winning the division.

There was a lot to be hopeful for in Matthew Boyd’s outing on Tuesday. Boyd threw six scoreless innings giving up three hits and walking two while striking out seven Orioles. If he can continue to throw like that and avoid the injured list, it could be huge for the Cubs as they try to make the Postseason for the second year in a row.

The problem is that it isn’t too hard to squint and see a scenario where it all falls apart a little. Below are all of the starting pitchers who have thrown at least 5innings for the Cubs this season, including pitchers currently on the injured list who may return this season:

Edward Cabrera and Jameson Taillon are both on the injured list and throwing. They seem like they could return sometime after the All Star Break. Cabrera has been hit or miss for the Cubs this season. When he’s been on and good, he’s been excellent. When he’s been dealing with blisters, other injuries, or missing the plate he’s been pretty shaky. He’s pretty obviously a step up from Jordan Wicks and David Peterson, however.

Taillon’s return comes with a few more question marks. The 34-year-old has struggled a lot with the long ball so far this season. His HR/9 of 2.66 leads all of baseball among starters with at least 50 innings pitched. The next closest pitcher is Jeffrey Springs of the Athletics who has a 2.31 HR/9 and plays in one of the most hitter-friendly parks in baseball in Sacramento.

The problem for Taillon, and really all of the Cubs pitchers who are experiencing elevated home run rates, might be that home runs are really up across the board. Below are two graphics, the first showing the three-year park factors across the league and the second showing 2026 park factors:

To be clear, part of the reason we use multi-year park factors is to smooth out some of the noise from year to year. We also already know from reporting from The Athletic’s Eno Sarris that the ball is flying much more this season:

That could be a problem across the board for the Cubs pitchers who generally pitch more to contact due to the elite defense playing behind them. However, if the baseball is designed such that it flies further, home run balls aren’t exactly defensible. That would mean the elevated home run rates some Cubs pitchers are seeing could just get worse as the season gets hotter.

The bottom line is that the Cubs starters are walking a fine line between being a competitive playoff team and not. The pitchers who could return from the injured list are some of the pitchers who might be most impacted by the changing baseball and home run environment. With few in-house options for additional starters, here’s hoping Jed Hoyer and Carter Hawkins have more trades in mind than the small move they already made for David Peterson.

The lineups are out for tonight’s middle game between the Atlanta Braves and the Pittsburgh Pirates and there aren’t too many shocks or surprises going on as far as the Braves are concerned. Michael Harris II is still leading off, Austin Riley is near the bottom, the top of the order seems a bit imposing while you’re hoping for the best from the middle and the bottom portion of the lineup.

Here’s how things are looking for the Braves tonight:

The catcher decision is an interesting one since this’ll actually be the first time that Grant Holmes has formed a battery with Joey Bart, as his past three starts (since Bart joined the club) have all been with Drake Baldwin serving as the backstop. We’ll see how that goes in terms of a pitching combination and we’ll also see how it goes for Bart at the plate as he’s currently hitting .136/.269/.318 with a .273 wOBA and a 68 wRC+ since joining the Braves. That’s not great but to be completely honest, it’s better than the production they had been getting from previous catchers.

Drake Baldwin, on the other hand, has looked more like his usual self since the calendar went from “June” to “July” so hopefully he’ll continue to keep things going in the right direction. The same goes for the rest of the lineup as well, as they’re showing serious signs of getting things back rolling again at the plate after spending a month wandering in the wilderness as a unit.

We will update this post with the Pirates lineup once they release it. For now, make sure to join us late on as first pitch is set for 6:40 p.m. ET tonight at PNC Park.