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Six hundred and thirty-nine days. 

That’s how long it had been since Sean Manaea last stayed in a game for seven innings. 

He’s gone six innings once and five several times since then, but hadn’t reached the seventh-inning stretch since Oct. 8, 2024, in an NLDS win over the Phillies. 

That changed Thursday. 

Despite giving up a leadoff home run, Manaea went a season-high seven innings in the Mets’ 7-3 win over the Royals, allowing three runs (two earned), walking just one and striking out six. 

“He just wanted to be a horse out there,” Mets manager Andy Green said. “Filled up the strike zone. Anybody that gives up a homer on the first pitch and just goes back in there all day, you love that. 

“I thought he was fantastic. It was huge for us. We’ve run through a ton of bullpen pieces to get seven strong; couldn’t ask for anything more.” 

Poor length out of starters has been an Achilles’ heel for the Mets all season, and that hasn’t changed recently. 

Christian Scott went just four innings against the Braves on July 3. Freddy Peralta went just 4 ²/₃ three days later in Atlanta. Even in the Mets win over the Royals on Wednesday, Scott went just five. 

Manaea didn’t just break that trend. He made life 10 times easier for the bullpen. Between Huascar Brazobán and Devin Williams, Mets relievers tossed two scoreless innings to seal the win. 

“We need length out of the rotation,” Green said. “Outings like that set you up to win tomorrow’s baseball game, and that’s what we’ve been missing to some degree: having multiple outings like those in a week.

“That’s huge for us going into tomorrow, to be able to rest the vast majority of our pen arms.”

The 34-year-old allowed a homer to Lane Thomas on the game’s first pitch, but settled in immediately after. Manaea retired the side in the second and third innings while inducing a Tyler Tolbert groundout — a rarity after he tied the MLB record Tuesday with 12 consecutive hits. 

Manaea gave up a solo shot to Bobby Witt Jr. in the fourth but bounced back again by retiring the next five batters.

The lefty then maneuvered his way out of trouble in the seventh — a single, error, double and walk yielding just a single Royals run to keep the Mets’ lead intact, 6-3.

“It’s the culmination of a lot of hard work and people believing in me, me believing in myself,” Manaea said. “The whole squad coming together; it feels really cool to do something like that again.”

The St. Louis Cardinals will try to take the final game of their 5-game set with the Milwaukee Brewers Thursday night at Busch Stadium as Andre Pallante gets the ball for the Cardinals. RHP Logan Henderson will make the start for the St. Louis Cardinals. First pitch is scheduled for 6:45pm at Busch Stadium and the TV broadcast will be available on Cardinals.tv.

The Red Sox have suffered a low blow to their pitching staff. 

Left-hander Ranger Suárez has been placed on the 15-day injured list with a left groin strain retroactive to Monday, the team announced Thursday. 

Suárez has been a bright spot in a dark Red Sox season, holding a 3.15 ERA and 1.16 WHIP with opponents hitting .232 against him in 17 starts. 

The move takes him off his last start before the All-Star break, which was expected to be Saturday against the Mets at Citi Field. 

It will also take him out of the 2026 All-Star Game after being selected for the second time in his career. 

“Obviously it doesn’t feel great [to miss the All-Star Game],” Suárez told reporters of his injury, per MLB.com. “I’m obviously sad. I wanted to be able to go there and represent my team, and also enjoy the moment.

“But I think the best thing for me is to take care of my body and that’s what I’m going to do.”

Missing the All-Star Game likely stings even more as it’s in Philadelphia, where Suarez spent eight seasons playing for the Phillies. 

Suárez said he will not be in attendance at all, choosing to stay in Boston to rehab. 

“At the end of the day, he is an All-Star,” Red Sox interim manager Chad Tracy told MLB.com. “He’s been named an All-Star, so you love the players that make the All-Star team. 

“You can’t take away from an All-Star season, and now our biggest objective is, let’s make sure we do the right thing and get him healthy and have him ready after the break.”

Tracy added that he hopes Sonny Gray is able to take Suárez’s spot as an injury replacement for the Midsummer Classic. 

As for replacements in Boston, Tracy said Brayan Bello could be recalled from Triple-A Worcester. 

The White Sox kick off the 2026 MLB draft by making the No. 1 overall selection at noon CT on Saturday, and will choose among three plum prospects: UCLA shortstop Roch Cholowsky, Georgia Tech catcher Vahn Lackey and shortstop Grady Emerson from Fort Worth Christian (Texas) H.S. We’re digging deeper into all three players in anticipation of the third No. 1 overall pick in White Sox history.

The White Sox could add a potential cornerstone player by selecting UCLA shortstop Daniel Roch Cholowsky with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 MLB draft. In doing so, Cholowsky would become just the third college shortstop ever selected first overall, joining Bill Almon (1974) and Dansby Swanson (2015). Although neither player went on to a Hall of Fame career, that would be rare company, and another indication of just how highly Cholowsky is regarded.

Or perhaps … was regarded? As the draft comes closer, some of the conversation for No. 1 overall has shifted to the other prime prospects, Georgia Tech catcher Vahn Lackey and prep shortstop Grady Emerson. That could be a case of overall draft fatigue and prospect evaluators rationalizing their professions. Still, Cholowsky has been at or near No. 1 overall in mock drafts for essentially a solid year now. The right-handed hitter entered the spring with a reputation for elite bat-to-ball skills and polished defense, then strengthened his case by continuing to produce throughout the 2026 season.

If Cholowsky is Chicago’s pick, that would indicate the White Sox went with the prospect many evaluators considered the most complete position player in the class. Cholowsky offers an advanced offensive approach, dependable defense at shortstop, and the kind of all-around game that gives him both a high floor and an equally enticing ceiling.

For an organization that has emphasized athleticism — especially up the middle — at premium defensive positions and high baseball IQ throughout its rebuild, picking Cholowsky makes perfect sense. Rather than drafting for immediate need, the White Sox would be staying true to their philosophy of taking the best player available. They were also high on Cholowsky coming out of high school, scouting him extensively ahead of the 2023 draft, meaning that this is a relationship that has been years in the making.

For Cholowsky, baseball has always been a way of life: His father, Dan, was a first-round pick by the Cardinals in 1991 and spent eight seasons in professional baseball before becoming a major league scout. That familial background helped shape one of the most polished players in the draft, giving Cholowsky an advanced feel for the game long before he arrived on a college campus.

The 6´2´´, 202-pound Arizona native arrived at UCLA as one of the nation’s top prep recruits and quickly became the centerpiece of the Bruins’ lineup. Over the next three seasons, he developed from a polished contact hitter into one of college baseball’s most complete players, combining consistent production with elite defense at shortstop. As a junior, the 21-year-old slashed .320/.452/.636 with 21 home runs and finished as a finalist for the Golden Spikes Award. He closed out his UCLA career with a .329/.447/.624 slash line, along with 52 home runs over 178 career games, and was one of the NCAA’s premier defensive shortstops, finishing his final season with 15.3 defensive runs saved.

What stands out most about Cholowsky isn’t one loud tool — it’s the completeness of the package. MLB Pipeline gives him at least a 60 grade in four of the five major scouting categories, including his hit, power, arm, and field tools, resulting in a 65 overall. He controls the strike zone, rarely gives away an at-bat, and consistently squares up the baseball. As he’s added strength throughout his amateur career, the power has come naturally without sacrificing the disciplined approach that made Cholowsky successful in the first place. If that profile sounds familiar, it should. It’s become the blueprint for the type of hitter GM Chris Getz and his front office have prioritized throughout the rebuild.

Defensively, Cholowsky has every opportunity to remain at shortstop as a professional. His smooth actions, reliable hands, instincts and above-average arm have long drawn praise from scouts. While he won’t wow anyone with top-of-the-scale speed, his feel for the position allows him to make difficult plays look routine.

Cholowsky would join an emerging young core that already includes Colson Montgomery, Kyle Teel, Braden Montgomery, Noah Schultz and Grant Taylor, giving Chicago yet another premium talent to build around. Given Colson’s seemingly inevitable move to third base at some point, selecting Cholowsky won’t create a clog on the roster or in the lineup.

Cholowsky should begin his professional career shortly after signing, with a token Winston-Salem assignment likely coming later this summer. (Cholowsky is considered “MLB-ready,” and would not be out of place as one of the two White Sox September call-ups.) Because of his advanced offensive approach, defensive polish, and experience against some high-level collegiate competition, almost assuredly, he will move through the White Sox system more quickly than the typical first-round pick.

Cholowsky would arrive in Chicago with one of the most polished résumés in the 2026 draft class. If his college success can carry over to professional baseball, the White Sox may have found another foundational piece for its next championship-caliber club.

Carson Whisenhunt hopes to keep competing in MLB after return in Giants' win originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area

SAN FRANCISCO – With an opportunity to get his name into the conversation about who should be in the Giants’ starting rotation, Carson Whisenhunt admitted he tried to do too much and was rushing his delivery in his return to the majors.

The numbers showed he was correct in that assessment.

Called back up from the minors before Thursday’s game against the Colorado Rockies, Whisenhunt set a career-high with four walks while throwing 87 pitches in 5 2/3 innings, a respectable 65 percent success rate — but not exactly the type to secure a roster spot.

So now, Whisenhunt has to play the waiting game. Will he still be in the rotation when his next turn comes up, or will he head back down to the minors?

When that scenario played out in mid-June, the Giants sent Whisenhunt to Triple-A Sacramento. All sides agree that the brief trip back to the minors did Whisenhunt some good and got him going back in the right direction.

The Giants felt good enough about it to give Whisenhunt another shot in the pros, and he held up pretty well despite the command issues in San Francisco’s 8-2 win.

Whisenhunt set down the first eight batters he faced, pitched out of bases-loaded jam in the third then gave up a two-run home run to Willi Castro in the fourth, the only runs the Rockies got off the Giants starter.

“Whisenhunt was really good today,” Rockies manager Warren Schaeffer said. “He pounded his fastball. His changeup was good. I thought he attacked the strike zone well, just kept us off balance.”

That was quite a compliment when compared to Whisenhiunt’s postgame talk with reporters. The Giants pitcher said he was out of sync in the early part of the game.

“Felt comfortable, felt confident. But a little rushed, just trying to do a little too much I think,” Whisenhunt said. “The first two innings felt really good. Third inning’s when I felt it.

“Then going back out in the fourth I felt like I slowed it ack down and everything was fine after that. It’s just a little bit going on.”

Before the game, Giants manager Tony Vitello spoke about Whisenhunt’s opportunity to make a case for himself to be in the starting rotation.

Afterward, Vitello sounded very pleased with what the Giants got out of Whisenhunt.

“He was good,” Vitello said. “If you’re going to harshly critique, to me it looked like he was rushing a little bit off the stretch. You want to be quick to the plate but it’s a fine line. Aside from that it was outstanding.”

Now comes the waiting.

It could be hours or days. But soon and very soon, Whisenhunt will get a message from management letting him know he’s staying or to pack his bags for another trip back to Sacramento.

“Just trying to do whatever I can to stay but also give the team a chance to win, that’s the biggest thing,” Whisenhunt said,. “Obviously don’t know what’s going to come from tonight’s outing, if I’m going to stay or not, but hopefully I do. Just building off what I’ve done the past few times I’ve had a chance to come up here.”

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Anaheim Angels @ Texas Rangers

Thursday, July 09, 2026, 7:05 PM CDT (105.3 The Fan / Rangers Sports Network)

The Shed

LHP Reid Detmers vs. RHP Nathan Eovaldi

Go Rangers!

In the days leading up to his first draft as Astros general manager, Dana Brown was back in his element. 

“This is probably the fun part of the job because it’s something that I’m so used to,” Brown said at the time. “We’re going through all these names and we’re having conversations, and I’m bringing a lot of my philosophies and my thought processes to it, and so it’s actually exciting and it’s refreshing to be able to talk about some upcoming young players.”

The draft was a major reason Jim Crane hired Brown five months prior, and the first-year GM, who was and remains far more involved in the draft process than others in his position, set expectations a mile high.

Brown said he wanted to “nail” the 2023 draft, and to him, nailing the draft meant drafting four Major Leaguers.

“The average is usually two, I like to double that average, and we were able to do it in Atlanta, and I expect to do it here,” Brown said.

While three years is a bit early to fully judge an MLB draft class, Brown’s first with the Astros appears likely to fall short of his lofty goals.

First round pick Brice Matthews, the 28^th overall pick of the draft, debuted last season, and has been on the Astros’ active roster the entirety of the 2026 season. Only 14 of the 27 players picked ahead of Matthews have appeared in a major league game, and his career 0.7 bWAR is higher than five of those picked ahead of him.

The Tigers selected Kevin McGonigle nine picks later, but he signed for almost $400k more than Matthews. The Astros had a limited draft pool meant they probably would not have been able to sign McGonigle if they drafted him.

The Astros third-round pick, Jake Bloss, made his Major League debut less than a year after he was drafted, second fastest in the class behind Paul Skenes. Hours before he was set to make his fourth start for the Astros, Brown traded him to the Blue Jays as the centerpiece of the Yusei Kikuchi deal.  

Matthews and Bloss are currently the only members of Brown’s first draft class as Astros GM to make the major leagues, though that could change soon.

Sixth round pick Ethan Pecko was just named Pacific Coast League Pitcher of the Month, and Brown identified him as an option to start this weekend in Arlington. Before the season, FanGraphs rated the 23-year-old right-hander as the Astros’ fourth best prospect, who projects as a number 4 or 5 starter.

It’s only a matter of time before Pecko will be the class’s third big leaguer, but a fourth seems unlikely, at least out of the day one or day two picks.

Second round pick Alonzo Tredwell is Brown’s best hope of the early picks, but he hasn’t pitched this season due to a shoulder injury. Tredwell has only thrown 157 minor league innings since being drafted. A back injury limited him to nine games during his final season at UCLA, and he underwent Tommy John Surgery in high school.

Fourth round pick Cam Fisher was released last season, while fifth round pick Chase Jaworsky is batting .177 in High-A with the Marlins after being traded as part of the package to land Jesus Sanchez. 

Injuries have limited seventh round pick Joey Dixon to 7.1 innings in the Astros system, while eighth rounder Ryan Johnson and 10^th rounder Austin Deming have been released.

11^th round pick Nehomar Ochoa and 12^th round pick Anthony Huezo, high school picks who signed for $300,000 and $397,000 respectively, are having good seasons in A-ball and have yet to celebrate their 21^st birthday, while 14^th rounder Jackson Nezuh has a 3.97 ERA in Double-A. 

Nezuh is rated as one of the Astros top 15 prospects by multiple outside publications, while Huezo is inside the top 25.

There’s still a chance Brown’s first draft class as Astros GM produces four major leaguers. That would qualify as a successful draft, especially given the limited draft capital he had to work with. The bigger question, though, is whether anyone from the class develops into an impact major leaguer. Three years in, that outcome appears far less likely.

Multiple sprained fingers have cost George Lombard Jr. time at Triple-A, but he is on the precipice of rehab games and may not be far off from The Bronx at some point after he proves he is healthy.

The club’s top prospect has resumed hitting, in addition to field work, putting him in position to go on a minor league rehab assignment “somewhere around this All-Star break,” Cashman said Thursday.

And once he returns to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, if he picks up where he left off before the injury, he has a chance to force his way to the Yankees.

That would depend on what their shortstop situation looks like with José Caballero and Anthony Volpe.

“Looking forward to getting him back and active and he might be a choice at some point,” Cashman said. “More importantly, we just got to get him playing again and turning him loose again in Triple-A. Really talented player that offensively was coming a long way of closing the gap despite his age. Defensively, he’s plug-and-play, ready to go.”

The 21-year-old Lombard, after an early-season promotion from Double-A, was hitting .231 with a .765 OPS and eight steals in 42 games at Triple-A before getting hurt June 16.

But he had been heating up prior to the injury — “thriving and conquering the final level,” as Cashman put it — hitting .306 with a .998 OPS in 14 June games.

“He’d been pushing himself before the injury,” Cashman said.

The San Diego Padres seemed to have turned a corner. The final four games before the All-Star break will tell a bit more, but the club has its first two-game win streak since June 26. The offense also tagged the Arizona Diamondbacks’ pitching staff for a season-high 10 runs last night. San Diego is, at the very least, heading in the right direction.

The lineup looked fantastic in Wednesday night’s win over the Dbacks. Luis Campusano hit his first home run since returning from the IL and Miguel Andujar had three (yes, you read that right) doubles. San Diego will need to keep its foot on the gas to achieve its first series win of July against Arizona tonight.

Taking the mound

Merrill Kelly (AZ) v. Griffin Canning (SD)

Similar to Zac Gallen, Kelly has been an ace in the past for Arizona and has looked nothing like it this year. The right-hander has been saddled with a 5.71 ERA this year. He’s been even worse lately, pitching to a 6.28 ERA in his last 38 2/3 innings.

Prediction of the day: Fernando Tatis Jr. is going to hit a home run. Across 31 at-bats against Kelly, Tatis has four home runs and a 1.186 career OPS. Unless Kelly has his stuff working tonight, it seems plenty possible that No. 6 comes tonight for Tatis.

Canning has actually pitched considerably better in his last two outings than he has this whole season. After turning in his worst start of the year (4 ER, 0.2 IP), Canning has since given up just three runs across 8 1/3 innings. It’s not miraculous, but it’s a start.

Hopefully, Canning can keep that up against the Dbacks tonight. Most of Arizona’s lineup has faced the righty sparingly and none have seem him this season. That should work in Canning’s favor. That said, if he stumbles, the bullpen is well-rested.

Batter up!

While Andujar and Campusano were the headliners on Wednesday evening, Tatis and Jackson Merrill went 4-for-9 from the top two spots in the order. In a night where Manny Machado was getting a rest day, it felt good to watch the lineup produce without the slugger.

1. Fernando Tatis Jr., RF
2. Jackson Merrill, CF
3. Xander Bogaerts, SS
4. Manny Machado, 3B
5. Gavin Sheets, LF
6. Ty France, 1B
7. Luis Campusano, C
8. Miguel Andujar, DH
9. Jake Cronenworth, 2B

The Friars pounded out a convincing 10 runs against Arizona last night. It’s only the third time this season the club has scored runs in the double digits. If the lineup continues to produce consistently that way, the pitching staff would get some stress taken off of them.

Relief corps

With Michael King pitching six innings of one-run ball, and the offense giving the pitching staff a sizable lead to work with, the bullpen had plenty of room to work with. Ron Marinaccio and Kyle Hart covered the final three innings, giving up a combined three runs in those frames. Thankfully, it didn’t affect the outcome of the game.

Jhony Brito has been working out of the bullpen for San Diego since getting called up earlier this week. He’ll be available alongside Yuki Matsui, Mason Miller, Adrian Morejon, Wander Peralta and Bradgley Rodriguez. All figure to be high-leverage options for San Diego to turn to in a close game.