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This team is a study in contradictions. Two 10-game winning streaks (out of the three total 10+ game winning streaks in MLB this year) and a 10-game losing streak. The team has a leaky bullpen and yet it’s something like a quarter of their games that have been won in their last team at-bat. There are the 10 walk-offs but also, this is the third extra-inning win on the road (and eighth overall). I know there was at least one bottom of the eighth winning run scored at home. That’s 14 of 58 wins there. There was a game in LA that they beat the Dodgers 6-4 with two runs in the ninth. So 15 of 58 wins involved the Cubs scoring in their last time at the plate to win.

It’s totally crazy. The wins against bad starters. The wins against bad bullpens. Those are likely going away when the postseason comes. Well-rested elite starters and the top end of the bullpen throws almost all of the relief innings come postseason. You don’t win as much on depth anymore as top end talent. That’s an easy narrative for this team.

But Jared Jones is the type of guy who starts a playoff game. And he pitched like he belongs there. Yohan Ramirez came in with a 6-2 record, a 3.21 ERA and a whisker shy of 10 strikeouts per nine innings of work. Ramirez is on a one-year deal. If and when the Pirates fall out of contention, teams are going to be calling about Ramirez with the intention of having him work the sixth or seventh inning for their playoff teams.

This isn’t a win that readily falls into the Cub narrative. The Cubs had just seven prior wins with three or fewer runs. In fact, this game does interact with the first paragraph. The Cubs have had three 3-2 walk-off wins this year. Add to that now a road, extra-inning 3-2 win. There’s also a 2-1 walk-off. So five of their eight wins now with 3 or fewer runs are last at-bat winners. The other three are all shutouts. There are no 3-0 or 3-1 wins yet this year.

Let’s not forget the perspective check. Today I start with: That’s 1-0 on this 17-game gauntlet. There are four teams with more wins than the Cubs. There is one team with as many wins as the Cubs. The Cubs are currently holding a 2.5 game lead for the first Wild Card spot. The Cubs are on a pace to win 91 games. Fangraphs had them with a record of 7-9-1 for this 17 game stretch at the start of the day. This was not one of the seven, so currently at +1. I’d honestly take the eight if it was offered. I hope I’m selling them short.

A giant hat tip to Matthew Boyd and a smaller hat tip to the Cub defense. They were against the ropes several times, but they never broke. Boyd’s seven innings of one-run ball made this possible. Credit where credit is due, Caleb Thielbar and Gavin Hollowell retired all six batters they faced to close this out, with Hollowell facing the top of the Pirate order. Hollowell is the 11th different Cub with a save. I asked near the end of the first half if more Cubs would have at least one save or more walk-offs. Saves are more likely, but at some point, even Oprah runs out of new people to give a save to.

Eleven different people with saves is already remarkable. I was surprised to learn that just last year the Diamondbacks had 17 different players combine for 42 saves, with 10 being the high. The Cubs have 21 saves among 11 players. Jacob Webb leads with five. Phil Maton and Ethan Roberts, both on the IL, have the most relief innings without registering a save. Tyler Ferguson does not have one yet. Nor did Drew Pomeranz before he was DFA. Aaron Civale was two outs away from one. Maybe a presently rehabbing starter or a deadline acquisition could push the number higher. Curious, if nothing else.

It all adds up to a season not quite like any other. In basketball, this was the kind of team that lived in purgatory. It’s not good enough to win a championship. Nor does it have a chance to win the draft lottery. In baseball, there is little benefit to tanking. Even where there are a few benefits that flow from a bad record, most of them take a long, long time to come to fruition. Almost all of the draft picks and international free agents take years to cultivate. So might as well make the most of it. Maximize your team at the deadline and hope to win two series rather than one in October. One feels like the ceiling. Break the ceiling and hope to catch lightning in a bottle after that.

Three Positives and Pete:

• Matthew Boyd threw seven innings of one run ball.
• Ian Happ, one hit, one very big run, one even bigger outfield assist.
• Gavin Hollowell. Didn’t worry about the ghost runner, got three balls in play and picked up a save.
• Pete had a homer for the first Cub run, doubled, and had a huge intentional walk. I think the old cliche about an unintentional walk after an intentional walk probably disappeared with the automatic walk, but Ramirez walked Seiya Suzuki after walking PCA to load the bases. That pair of walks won this game for the Cubs. It was probably the right (unconventional) strategy there.

Game 103, July 24: Cubs 3, Pirates 2 (58-45)

Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.

THREE HEROES:

• Superhero: Matthew Boyd (.300). 7 IP, 29 BF, 7 H, 3 BB, R, 4 K
• Hero: Gavin Hollowell (.209). IP, 3 BF (Sv 1)
• Sidekick: Dansby Swanson (.196). 1-4, RBI

THREE GOATS:

• Billy Goat: Michael Busch (-.156). 0-5
• Goat: Carson Kelly (-.130). 0-3
• Kid: Pedro Ramirez (-.126). 1-4, R

WPA Play of the Game: Dansby Swanson’s RBI single in the 10th inning with Ian Happ’s very close foot-first slide (that I very much thought was going to be overturned). (.304)

Pirates Play of the Game: Yohan Ramirez’ strikeout of Nico Hoerner for the first out of the 10th. (.118)

Cubs Player of the Game:

Game 102 Winner: Seiya Suzuki received 20 (of 49) votes. Ian Happ received 18.

Rizzo Award Standings: (Top 5/Bottom 5)

The award is named for Anthony Rizzo, who finished first in this category three of the first four years it was in existence and four times overall. He also recorded the highest season total ever at +65.5. The point scale is three points for a Superhero down to negative three points for a Billy Goat.

• Pete Crow-Armstrong +21
• Carson Kelly +16.5
• Michael Busch/Ben Brown +13.5
• Alex Bregman +13
• Jameson Taillon/Phil Maton -10
• Nico Hoerner -13
• Caleb Thielbar -14
• Dansby Swanson -15

Up Next: Game two of the 17-game stretch and of the weekend series in Pittsburgh. Shōta Imanaga (6-8, 3.91) starts for the Cubs. He’s 2-2 over his last seven with a 2.31 ERA (39 IP) and is coming off of a win. He faces Pirates ace Paul Skenes (9-8, 3.43). Skenes is just 3-3 with a 4.58 (39.1) over his last seven. So they are catching him at a good time. Sort of. The three wins? His last three starts (5 ER over 18.1). He’s 2-3 with a 2.77 ERA over eight career starts against the Cubs. He hasn’t been the winning pitcher against them since 2024 and has been the loser three of four starts.

That’s as much optimism as I can muster against one of the best pitchers on the planet. Keep it close and hope to steal it.

Guardians fans everywhere are frustated with Kyle Manzardo. Is there hope for things to change for the struggling Guardians’ first baseman?

After posting a 113 wRC+ and hitting 27 home runs in 2025, expectations for Kyle Manzardo were understandably high coming into 2026. So far, Manzo has come up short of those expectations, and he’s having a fairly disappointing season with a 90 wRC+ and 11 homers. Today, we’re asking the question: has Kyle Manzardo been figured out by the league, or is this just a young player going through the ups and downs that come with establishing himself at the MLB level?

I think this season is a little more complex than just “he’s been bad.” It’s been a hot and cold season for Manzardo thus far.

We can see here that after a very slow start, he had a blazing 6-7 week long stretch before cooling off again. So what’s changed?

We can see from this data that his approach data is generally stable or improving. Chase% spiked a bit during his hot streak, but Whiff% and K% are both moving down, which is good. BB% is up as well, with the most recent two sets of data both being above league average. Even with his slow start, the BB% was basically league average (8.9% in 2026). This is all a good sign. Nothing is skyrocketing or plummeting in any alarming way. So if his approach is still intact, the next question becomes whether he is doing enough damage when he makes contact.

One of the first things that stands out is the average exit velocity is pretty stable across the board. The first bucket of games is a bit lower, but not by a significant amount. The outlier here is how the Hard-Hit% and Barrel% have fluctuated so much with relatively stable exit velocity. We can also see his SqUpCon%* is going up, which is generally a good thing. The last number is his LASS%**, and we can see that it has swung pretty wildly as well. Getting fewer balls in the optimal 8-32 launch angle is consistent with a drop in Barrel%. So here it looks like we may have a piece of the puzzle, but launch angles have nothing to do with exit velocity. If we really dig into the weeds and look at the distribution of exit velocities in the three different stretches, we can see that he’s actually getting a lot more contact in the 90-94.9 mph range in the first and third bucket of games. He’s gone from 19.6% to 12.2% and then back up to 19.6%. Hard-Hit% measures the percentage of balls that have an exit velocity over 95 mph, and he is just missing that window a bit more now than he was during the hot streak. All these things combine to paint a picture of a hitter that’s just lost a touch of their precision. At the MLB level, the difference between driving the ball in the gap for extra bases and hitting a routine flyout can come down to a few millimeters of contact point on the bat and a few milliseconds of timing. Being just a tiny bit off can change everything.

Where does this leave us? Overall, the evidence doesn’t really point to a hitter that’s lost his ability to do damage to a pitch in the box. It’s more consistent with a hitter that’s just off in their precision, enough to drastically alter outcomes. It also doesn’t help that in this most recent stretch, he’s running a wOBA and xwOBA difference of -.076. While an xwOBA of .276 is still far below what you’d expect, at least some portion of these poor results can be attributed to luck. All those things considered, while there’s no guarantee he will snap back into form tomorrow, there’s also no reason to think any of this isn’t fixable. He just needs to get locked back in and find that tiny extra bit of precision in his swing that he had a solid grip on just a few short weeks ago.

Glossary

*SqUpCon% (Squared Up Contact %) – How much exit velocity did you get as a share of how much exit velocity was possible, based on the swing speed and the speed of the pitch when the player made contact.

**LASS% (Launch Angle Sweet Spot %) – Percentage of batted balls with a launch angle between 8 and 32 degrees (These numbers are based on the range where most damaging contact resides)

Guess who had another fantastic start in Jersey Shore? Checking in on the kids:

Lehigh Valley 6, Indianapolis 3

Steward Berroa enjoyed a three hit day for the IronPigs, possibly his last day as a member of the Phillies’ 40 man roster with their impending need to add Brian Keller. Berroa was the only one with more than one hit, yet Felix Reyes and Dylan Moore chipped in with a two-run home run apiece. On the mound, Drake Fellows had six innings where he only allowed three runs, but did not walk a single batter and struck out four.

Harrisburg 3, Reading 0

One hit? One gosh dang hit?

That was all the Fightin’ Phils could muster on the evening, Bryan Rincon getting a measly single as Jake Irvin, rehabbing for the Nationals, and two relievers shut them down. A shame as Andy Seminaris had another solid pitching performance for the farm system, also going six innings and allowing only two runs on seven hits and no walks, striking out seven. Considering that they haven’t been getting many good pitching performances lately, this was certainly one where you’d want to see the offense do anything good.

Brooklyn 4, Jersey Shore 3
Jersey Shore 5, Brooklyn 0

Playing in a doubleheader due to weather earlier in the week, the Blue Claws saw the best and most agonizing. In the first game, the two teams were tied at one after seven, yet going into the eighth inning, the bullpen could not hold it together. Camron Hill was on the mound and with the ghost runner on, allowed three straight baserunners to give the Cyclones two runs. Another scored later in the inning before the Jersey Shore got their chance. They capitalized, scoring two runs of their own before Tyler Miller was called out on strikes with runners on second and third to end the first game.

In game two, it was the Ramon Marquez show. In five innings, he was spectacular, only giving up a hit and a walk and striking out ten in yet another showcase for possible teams interested in doing a deal with the Phillies. He has been a revelation this year for the Phillies’ player development system.

Clearwater 11, Daytona 0

Juan Villavicencio had two hits, including a double, while Will Vierling had two hits and three RBI, Nolan Beltran had two hits and two RBI, Matthew Ferrera had an RBI double to help pace an offense that put up another impressive offensive performance before the game was called due to rain after the top of the sixth inning. Cade Obermueller had four innings of no-hit shutout baseball, striking out five and walking two. If we’re looking at teams the Phillies might be trading prospects from, this might be the leader in the clubhouse.

Blake Snell’s second rehab start went well, striking out three in 2 2/3 innings for Triple-A Oklahoma City. He allowed two singles and a run which scored after Snell departed, throwing 49 pitches with no walks.

Player of the day

Matt Gorski had six singles and no extra-base hits in his first nine games off the injured list for Triple-A Oklahoma City, but he made up for lost time on Friday. The Comets first baseman homered and doubles, while driving in four runs.

Triple-A Oklahoma City

The Comets put up crooked numbers in three different innings in a road win over the Sacramento River Cats (Giants).

Hyeseong Kim singled twice, walked twice, scored three runs, stole a base, and made this incredible play at second base.

Double-A Tulsa

The Drillers were one out away from losing in a combined perfect game, but instead just suffered a blowout loss to the Arkansas Travelers (Mariners). Tulsa’s lone baserunner was a two-out infield single in the ninth inning by Sam Mongelli that involved a throwing error.

Adam Serwinowski struck out nine but also allowed six runs and two home runs in six innings.

High-A Great Lakes

Zach Root had a rough time with more walks (six) than strikeouts (five) in the Loons’ loss to the Lansing Lugnuts (A’s). Root allowed three runs, two earned in 5 2/3 innings, and after a 9.4-percent walk rate through his first 13 starts the left-hander has 10 walks and a 22.2-percent walk rate in his last two outings.

Class-A Ontario

The Tower Buzzers tied things in the ninth inning, then beat the San Jose Giants on the road in 10 innings.

First baseman Easton Shelton homered again, because that’s what he does, with five home runs over his last five games and an .871 slugging percentage in July. Shelton’s 31 home runs lead the minor leagues, one shy of doubling the second-place slot in the California League.

Transactions

Double-A: Shortstop Elijah Hainline was activated off the injured list after missing three weeks. Left-hander Wyatt Crowell was placed on the 7-day injured list.

High-A: Infielder Nico Perez was activated off the injured list after missing six and a half weeks.

Friday scores

• Oklahoma City 8, Sacramento 2
• Arkansas 8, Tulsa 0
• Lansing 3, Great Lakes 1
• Ontario 9, San Jose 8 (10 innings)

Saturday schedule

• 4:05 p.m. PT: Tulsa (Christian Zazueta) at Arkansas (Ryan Sloan)
• 4:05 p.m.: Great Lakes (Brady Smith) at Lansing (Tucker Novotny)
• 5 p.m.: Ontario (TBA) at San Jose (TBA)
• 6:37 p.m.: Oklahoma City (Cole Irvin) at Sacramento (Carson Whisenhunt)

Brady Smith, the Dodgers’ third-round pick in 2023 and now 21 years old, makes his High-A debut on Saturday after posting a 3.88 ERA in 19 starts for Class-A Ontario, with 104 strikeouts (37.5 percent rate) and 27 walks in 65 innings.

The Royals are impressed with Randy Dobnak through his first two starts, writes Anne Rogers.

“I’m just here to pitch,” Dobnak said. “If they want me to start, if they want me in long relief, at the end of the day, I’ll do whatever the team needs. I’ve done both over my career over the years. My mindset is any time I get the ball, just go out there and do my thing.”

Manny Randwaha writes about Kyle Isbel’s performance with three hits in a rehab start.

When he was placed on the IL in early June, Isbel said that the key to his recovery would be managing the inflammation, and so the timetable for a return was uncertain. Now that he’s back on the field in game action, the key will be to keep from reaggravating the foot.

“It’s just getting the inflammation down, and then there’s not really a timetable on it,” Isbel said. “Just more symptom-based. … Just a lot of pressure in the bottom of my foot.”

Kiley McDaniel at ESPN has farm system snapshots for each team.

System snapshot: The system has improved the past few years: Recent draft additions SS Josh Hammond and LHP David Shields have been trending up, RHP Kendry Chourio and CF Angeibel Gomez were signed internationally, and money was spread around in the 2026 draft to land CF Zion Rose, RHP Taylor Rabe and RHP Jack Slightom. Lefties Justin Lamkin and Maxx Yehl are sleepers who could move quickly.

Biggest need: It feels like continuing to add potential impact talent is the long-term focus, but I could see the Royals adding some prospects that can help the 2027 big league team if they see a clear path to filling a role and thus shortening the list of winter needs.

FanGraphs ranks Bobby Witt Jr. as the player with the second-most trade value in baseball.

There’s not really much point in talking to team sources about Witt’s talent. What are they going to say? Instead, we mostly talked about his contract, and whether it should push him down the list a bit. I tried to model it to get a sense of how much of a negative to assign it in my head, but truthfully, I struggled to put a value on it. If you think that the highest AAV he could realistically achieve when getting a new deal at age 31 is $40 or $45 million, the odds of an opt-out aren’t that high, and it won’t cost you that much to renegotiate. If you think that the top end of the salary range has been permanently expanded by the Soto and Tucker deals, it’s a more pressing concern. But even if you treat Witt as being on a four-year deal, he projects as the best player in baseball for those four years. I’m also not particularly concerned with the downside of him declining and then accepting the option; hitters don’t have the same career-altering injury risk that pitchers do, so the odds of taking a huge L on the deal are meaningfully lower.

I know that talking about economics in a baseball article isn’t that exciting, but it’s worth dwelling on the contract in Witt’s case. That’s because there aren’t really any other negatives to be had here. Witt is on a Hall of Fame trajectory. 

The Royals activated Nate Pearson and optioned Eli Morgan to Omaha.

Brian Sparks at Sports Illustrated writes that Luinder Avila could be a 2027 rotation option for the Royals.

There will be a public hearing on a rezoning plan for the proposed ballpark development at Crown Center on Monday.

Boston may be interested in Angels shortstop Zach Neto.

Which teams could be interested in Rockies catcher Hunter Goodman?

How Boston’s winning streak changed the trade deadline.

Who should trade for Luis Arraez?

The Reds won’t do a full rebuild, and will retool for next year.

Clay Holmes says the Mets aren’t talking contract extension.

Blue Jays outfielder Addison Barger will have season-ending surgery.

Does the Hall of Fame need to take another look at Kenny Lofton?

Mark Cuban’s firm buys a minority stake in the Athletics.

LeBron James signs a two-year deal with the 76ers.

Tony Romo is arrested for suspicion of driving under the influence.

Kansas City hotels had their ten highest-revenue days ever during the World Cup.

Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery have agreed to delay closing their billion merger well into next year.

Marmot researchers have put the animals on OnlyFans to raise money.

Your song of the day is Steely Dan with Do it Again.

Good morning everyone and welcome to the weekend!

The M’s dropped a hard-fought first game of the series to the Rangers 5-4, yet another crushing loss for a team that keeps stacking them up.

Somehow, the Mariners are just a good weekend away from reclaiming the AL West crown. Despite their recent poor performance, do you still believe the M’s will end the season atop the division?

In Mariners news…

• Bryan Woo was the latest guest on the Cal Raleigh Show.

• John Trupin offered a trio of blueprints to a successful trade deadline for the Mariners.
• Adam Jude at The Seattle Times reports that the M’s have shown interest in Reds outfielder Spencer Steer.

Around the league…

• Rangers catcher Danny Jansen is considering elbow surgery. The injury has kept him out of action since early June and he’s currently testing whether he can proceed with rehab without going under the knife.
• Blue Jays outfielder Addison Barger will undergo his own season-ending elbow surgery.
• Marlins right-hander Max Meyer has been shut down from throwing after suffering a neck strain earlier this week.
• MLB Pipeline refreshed their list of each organization’s top 30 prospects with the draft concluded.
• Dan Szymborski at Fangraphs tried to figure out when the A’s competitive window will truly begin, pointing out that they’ll need to find some real pitchers first.
• The Astros are dealing with another injury to their pitching corps.

• Here’s another Secret Base auto-recommendation.

What a game the Yankees just pitched to open their series against the Phillies with a 1-0 win! Cam Schlittler was dominant for 7.1 scoreless innings with a dozen strikeouts, Brent Headrick escaped an eighth innings bases loaded jam against Kyle Schwarber, and David Bednar extended his MLB-leading scoreless streak to 22.2 innings to nail down the save in the ninth. They needed this performance to hold serve in the division with the Rays pummeling the Guardians, so let’s see how those other games panned out.

Tampa Bay Rays (60-43) 11, Cleveland Guardians (54-51) 3

The Rays’ offense keeps on rolling, tallying their second double-digit scoring effort in their last four games. It helps when your starter can take pressure off the offense the way Shane McClanahan did with his five innings of one-run ball. Ryan Vilade got things started with a two-run homer in the second after Jonny DeLuca reached on a one-out single. Brayan Rocchio cut that deficit in half with an RBI double in the fourth, but from there Tampa kicked it into top gear scoring nine unanswered.

Three of those came in the fourth, Cedric Mullins leading off with a triple and scoring on a DeLuca single. Chandler Simpson singled and Vilade walked to load the bases with no outs, after which a Ben Williamson fielder’s choice and Nick Fortes singled each plated a run. Junior Caminero added an RBI single in the sixth and Fortes an RBI double in the seventh to extend their lead to 7-1, the number nine hitting catcher Fortes going 4-for-4 on the day. In the eighth, Jonathan Aranda drew a leadoff walk, Mullins doubled, and DeLuca walked to again load the bases. A Simpson sac fly drove in their eighth run, and a Richie Palacios three-run no-doubter made it a complete laugher.

The Guardians got a pair of consolation runs in the ninth, Gabriel Arias reaching on a two-out single and Austin Hedges hitting a two-run homer, but it wasn’t enough to stop the Rays from becoming the first team in the AL to 60 wins.

Other Games

Boston Red Sox (53-49) 6, Toronto Blue Jays (47-57) 4

Two days after having their franchise record 15-game winning streak broken by the Orioles, the Red Sox weathered a late Blue Jays rally to avoid the start of a losing streak. They had control for most of the contest, scoring five unanswered through the first six innings while Patrick Sandoval tossed 4.2 scoreless innings. Anthony Seigler led off the first with a homer and then led off the third with a single to set up a two-run blast from Ceddanne Rafaela. In the sixth, Masataka Yoshida walked, Caleb Durbin was hit by a pitch, and Jarren Duran singled to load the bases with one out. An Andruw Monasterio sac fly brought home their fifth run, though Durbin was thrown out at home on a Connor Wong single to end the inning.

This opened the door for a Blue Jays rally the next inning. Ernie Clement got plunked and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. blooped a one-out single to put a pair on with one out for Kazuma Okamoto, whose three-run home run pulled Toronto within one and gave him 23 on the year to break Shohei Ohtani’s record for the most home runs by a Japanese-born rookie. After Durbin grounded out with the bases loaded in the bottom of the frame, the Blue Jays tied the game on a Nathan Lukes leadoff double, Daulton Varsho single, and Andrés Giménez sac fly. That would not last for long as the Red Sox reestablished a two-run lead in the bottom of the inning on a Duran leadoff single and back-to-back RBI doubles from Romy Gonzalez and Seigler, the former Yankee farmhand going 4-for-5.

Houston Astros (51-54) 9, Chicago White Sox (54-48) 5

The White Sox looked to be well on track for a stress-free win, scoring three in the first and two in the fifth without the Astros managing a reply. In the first, they loaded the bases with no outs to set up a Colson Montgomery sac fly, Braden Montgomery RBI single, and Chase Meidroth HBP with the bases loaded, while in the fifth, Meidroth hit a two-run double. Meanwhile, Davis Martin pitched a shutout through five, only for the wheels to fly off in the sixth.

The Astros sent 14 men to the plate and scored eight runs — four apiece off Martin and Bryan Hudson. Amazingly, they only hit one homer in the frame — a two-run shot from Cam Smith to give them the lead. By the time the dust had settled on the inning, the Astros had tallied seven hits, two free passes, an intentional walk, and a hit-by-pitch, so rather than regurgitate it all, I’ll just leave this here for you:

Christian Vázquez wrapped up the scoring with an RBI double in the ninth in what was a wild game both literally and figuratively — a combined seven batters were hit by pitches, four for the White Sox and three for the Astros.

Texas Rangers (52-51) 5, Seattle Mariners (51-53) 4

Neither starter was at their sharpest, Bryce Miller allowing five runs on six hits in 5.1 innings while MacKenzie Gore gave up three runs on seven hits in five innings. A Wyatt Langford solo shot opened the scoring in the bottom of the first. Weston Wilson responded with an RBI single in the second, though Randy Arozarena would ground out to strand the bases loaded. Texas retook the lead in the fourth on a two-run blast from Jake Burger. Dominic Canzone responded with a two-run double in the fifth to grab Seattle’s first lead. Burger tied the game with an RBI single in the sixth and Nicky Lopez restored their lead with an RBI sac bunt, though this time it was Joc Pederson’s turn to strand the bases loaded with a pop fly. Seattle almost made them pay, pulling to within one in the ninth as Colt Emerson doubled, advanced to third, and scored on a wild pitch, but the comeback attempt would fall just short.

Here's what happened in Mets Land on Friday, in case you missed it...

• Mets' bullpen wastes Sean Manaea's strong six innings in 4-2 loss to Dodgers
• Juan Soto to get MRI on Saturday after exiting game vs. Dodgers with left calf soreness
• Carson Bengeshowcases arm with two outfield assists in loss to Dodgers
• Manaea relishes the "challenge" of facing Dodgers
• Amid Francisco Lindor chatter, David Stearnswon't rule anything out ahead of trade deadline
• Clay Holmes on Mets future, reveals not "a ton" of progress on contract extension talks
• Stearns discusses approach with Mets’ catchers ahead of trade deadline, long-term state of rotation
• Jonah Tong strikes out nine, Ronny Mauriciogoes yard for Triple-A Syracuse 

• WATCH: How much of Mets roster should be moved in preparation for the 2027 season? 

Mark Bowman of. MLB.com is reporting this morning that rehabbing outfielder Ronald Acuña, Jr. may play in both of today’s Gwinnett Stripers games after last night’s contest was unable to be played due to inclement weather and thus he return to the big league roster could be delayed until Monday.

Coming into Friday, it was expected that Acuña, Jr. would return during this weekend’s series against the Baltimore Orioles. If his activation occurs on Monday, it would be against the New York Metropolitans.

Acuña, Jr. has played in only 53 games with Atlanta this season but was third on the team in wRC+ prior to last night’s game. His returns would bolster a Braves team whose offense has rebounded after the All-Star break but cratered in June and early July when the team saw its double-digit division lead dwindle to a handful of games.

He went on the 10-IL on June 10th with a left hamstring injury.

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Dylan Cease is riding the best stretch of his career, and his slider is the pitch Boston can’t touch.

The Toronto Blue Jays send their ace, Dylan Cease, to the mound at Fenway Park on Saturday against a red-hot Boston Red Sox club and Sonny Gray.

Cease has been overpowering lately, and his highly effective slider highlights my Blue Jays vs. Red Sox predictions and MLB picks for this Saturday, July 25 matchup.

Blue Jays vs Red Sox predictions

Blue Jays vs Red Sox best bet:  Dylan Cease Over 7.5 strikeouts (-125)

Dylan Cease is the Toronto Blue Jays’ one bright hope this season, pitching at an AL Cy Young level and cashing the Over on this prop in nine of his last 11 starts, thanks to a deadly wipeout slider that will be effective again Saturday.

Cease’s slider is a deadly weapon that the Boston Red Sox simply can’t handle. It’s the best slider in baseball at a +16 run value, and opposing hitters are batting just .135 against it, an absurd number for that pitch.

Cease does have to be careful with Willson Contreras, who owns a .500 slugging mark against sliders this year. But Contreras also whiffs 44% of the time on the pitch, so Cease still holds the strikeout edge.

It helps that this comes a night after Boston struck out 13 times against Toronto’s staff. I wouldn’t play this bet past -130.

COVERS INTEL: Cease is pitching the best ball of his career right now, leading the AL in FIP (2.39), H/9 (6.4) and K/9 (13.4).

Blue Jays vs Red Sox same-game parlay (SGP)

For the same-game parlay, I’m building around Cease and a couple of low-bar bats. 

Dylan Cease Over 7.5 strikeouts doubles down on my best bet, and I’ll add the Blue Jays moneyline in a near-pick’em with the ace on the mound. 

From there, Daulton Varsho Over 0.5 total bases and Kazuma Okamoto Over 0.5 total bases ask only that two of Toronto’s streakier bats reach base once, with Okamoto coming off a three-run blast on Friday.

Blue Jays vs Red Sox SGP

• Blue Jays moneyline
• Daulton Varsho Over 0.5 total bases
• Kazuma Okamoto Over 0.5 total bases
• Dylan Cease Over 7.5 strikeouts

Blue Jays vs Red Sox home run pick: Kazuma Okamoto (+450)

Kazuma Okamoto woke up on Friday with a massive three-run blast to dead center, snapping an 0-for-24 skid. As we know, Okamoto goes on these home run sprees.

He homered five times in five games in early May, then three times in four games around the All-Star break, and his swings on Friday suggested another run could be coming.

Red Sox starter Sonny Gray is a tough customer, but he isn’t unbreakable, as his 1.0 HR/9 shows. His four-seam fastball is vulnerable, allowing a .493 slugging mark, and Okamoto is the Grim Reaper for center-cut fastballs, slugging .580 with a +12 run value on the pitch.

I’d play this until +400 at a quarter unit. 

Blue Jays vs Red Sox odds

• Moneyline: Toronto -110 | Boston -110
• Run line: Toronto -1.5 (+155) | Boston +1.5 (-180)
• Over/Under: Over 7.5 (+100) | Under 7.5 (-120)

Blue Jays vs Red Sox trend

Dylan Cease has struck out at least eight batters in 12 of 18 starts this season. Find more MLB betting trends for Blue Jays vs. Red Sox.

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