As a number of postseason races go down to the wire in the final week of the regular season, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world today:
1. NL West race tightens further:
The Padres punched their ticket to the postseason last night on a game-ending triple play against the Dodgers. While both clubs are now assured of a spot in the postseason, they both still have something to play for throughout this final week of the season. The Padres now sit just two games back in the NL West with two games to go in the head-to-head series. San Diego also holds the tiebreaker after beating L.A. in the season series, meaning that if they can complete a sweep of their division rivals they’ll exit the series tied in the standings but holding onto the NL West crown entering their final series of the season in Arizona. Tonight’s game will feature a battle of front-of-the-rotation arms for each club, with right-hander Dylan Cease (3.42 ERA) taking the mound against Jack Flaherty (3.40 ERA in nine starts with L.A.) at 7:10pm local time.
2. Sale makes final push for Triple Crown:
After their win over the Mets yesterday, the Braves are lined up to send their two best pitchers to the mound for games two and three of a pivotal series. In tonight’s game (scheduled for 7:20pm local time), veteran lefty Chris Sale will not only be pitching for his team’s playoff hopes but also to put the finishing touches on a sensational campaign that appears likely to earn him the first Cy Young Award of his career.
That’s not the only plaudit within reach for Sale, however, as he currently leads the majors by measure of ERA, has won 18 games to put him in a tie for the MLB lead with Tigers southpaw Tarik Skubal, and has struck out 225 batters this year, second only to Skubal’s 228. A strong start against the Mets would not only greatly improve Atlanta’s chances of returning to the postseason but could also wind up being what pushes him over the edge as he pursues a pitching Triple Crown. If he manages to overtake Skubal by season’s end and finish first in the majors in all three categories, he’d be the first pitcher to win an MLB-wide Triple Crown in a 162-game season since Johan Santana pulled off the feat in 2006.
3. Offseason managerial market taking shape:
Over the weekend, the Reds became the latest team to part ways with their manager when they fired David Bell after six seasons at the helm of the club. They join the White Sox and Mariners in having fired their managers this year, while it’s been a poorly kept secret for months that Skip Schumaker is likely to depart the Marlins at the end of the season after the club voided their 2025 option on his services to allow him to explore other options this winter.
The Mariners seem unlikely to jump into the managerial market this winter, as Dan Wilson replaced Servais without the “interim” label being attached to his title. But the Sox, Reds, and Marlins could be joined by more clubs looking for new management if other teams part ways with their managers as the regular season comes to a close. The Rockies have reportedly not yet made a decision on Bud Black’s future with his contract set to expire after the season, while there have been reports of potential changes looming in St. Louis as well.
Let’s hope Sale has a great game tonight to gives himself a chance to claim the triple crown and help knock the Mutts out of a playoff position.
There should be a comeback player of the year award because chris has the best comeback in recent memory
Sale’s had a truly incredible season, on multiple levels.
Is it still the triple crown if Sale leads just the NL? Hands down Cy Young winner for me.
@sad
There is.
There is no team in the entire league named Mutts
The Sox traded Sale to Boston for Yuan Moncada, Michael Kopech, and a couple of others. Moncada was then considered the no. 1 prospect in the sport. Kopech was a can’t-miss fireballer. How did that work out? Sale helped the Bosox to a World Series championship, while Moncada flamed out and Kopech never came close to the hype.
realsox: Moncada was a great pickup both offensively and defensively. Don’t judge him over the past four seasons. He caught covid-19 in 2020 which lingered into 2021. There was also the mental stress of not being able to get his family out of Cuba. Then the injuries started but when he played, he was as good a third baseman as anyone in the game. Kopech pitched brilliantly in his WS debut, then tore his UCL in his second start. He wasn’t the same when he came back but proved at the end of last year and with the LAD that he’s good out of the bullpen. Yes, I wish the Sox had kept Sale, but they were in a rebuild. Not like the one they’re in currently, trading players like Cease for low level prospects.
You are talking about the white Sox and sale? Chicago had to trade him he was about to become a free agent, he had the uniform cutting incident, he hated Kenny Williams and the team
The White Sox under Kenny Williams and Company had a young core to build with. They even signed them to affordable extensions. They then over spent on aging players and ran out of budget before they completed the team. Instead of eating some major money, and shipping off the bad contracts, Williams chose to trade away the young cost controlled talent. He shipped Quintana to the Cubs (where he won a WS), Easton to the Nationals (where he won a WS), Sale to the Red Sox (where he won a WS, and Semein to Oakland (where he won a few AL West titles). For some reason, this caused many on this website to think this was a good idea. Any rebuilding team was told they should trade their young talent and start their rebuild over. Dumb!
The White Sox weren’t in a rebuild until they traded Sale.
The year Sale’s putting up has to be galling to the Bosox.
What are the odds that in a year where so many guys have gone down, Sale is going to have his best, healthiest year since 2017?
Beauty of baseball
@Canuckleball
Finally get out of the failed Boston system and get into a system that understand analytics and logic.
How do you explain all star tanner houck..luck? Why not call it what it is a great pitcher finally healthy vs taking cheap shots
@Poolhalljunkies
I don’t know. I’m just a stupid old troll, trolling the Red Sox.
Braves understand analytics? Have you heard of Snitker?
@stpeteirish
No, I’ve never heard of that individual.
What are you trying to say ? The braves win because they understand analytics? ..1st. How is that better than boston when the braves have 1 title in the past 25 years to bostons 4…and yea how are those analytics working this year? The injured list wins every time..ask chris sale
Curse of the Billy Goat will outlive us all.
RE Canuckle
“What are the odds that in a year where so many guys have gone down, Sale is going to have his best, healthiest year since 2017?”
Projections didn’t see that coming.
Of course, neither did anyone else.
Which is why it’s weird that so many people hate projections.
Dasha: Agree. With the Sox he was always hurt. What were they supposed to do? So they sent what had been a broken down player to the Braves. How were the Sox to know that he would go injury-free for an entire season? Not easy pulling a fast one past AA.
Boston must love paying his full salary this season.
Smacky…the red sox are paying 17 million of his salary the braves took the remaining 10 mil. His original 2024 salary was 27 million at the time they sold 1 year if sale and 17 mil for 6 years of grissom time will tell but the sox still have plenty of time to win this deal
Makes sense $17m seemed a low salary for him.
Smacky: Atlanta must love it, too.
@Smacky
The Red Sox decided that that money was better spent on Grissom than on Sale.
300ish PA’s for a player who’s just 23 isn’t enough to pass a lot of judgement on.
In hindsight, sure, the Red Sox would like a do-over. But, this outcome for Sale wasn’t what anyone was expecting.
LFGSD! Setting up for the Postseason is more important than the NLW crown, don’t blow your load just for that.
Go Pads
Now, if only the Mariners get into the playoffs and my predictions from the start of the season still have a chance.
Ignorant SOB and myself both predicted that as well… but YankeeBleacherCreature and YankeeClipper made me change to NYY vs. SD! Just hoping my boys make it, don’t *really* care whom they face! Cheers Yorkie, have a great day dude!
Don’t forget me on that – maybe a hope more than a prediction though!
Unfortunately for the old york, Houston clinched the AL West on Tuesday night so Seattle’s tragic number is down to 2. Mariners lose tie-breakers vs. all AL wild card contenders.
@ChuckyNJ
Oh well, I guess I’ll see you at Chuck E. Cheese.
Take it game-by-game, but keep the foot on the gas.
Tell that to Gleyber Torres, whose base-running blunder took the Yankees out of a big inning and cost them a winnable ballgame Tuesday night.
Yankees still need 1 more win to clinch the AL East as Baltimore locked up the tie-breaker while punching their own ticket to October.
Rooting for a Yankees vs. Padres World Series match up! It would be a great rematch to watch.
@Warden of the North(acoss13)
No, MIL vs. CLE or MIL vs. KC?
Old York,
I wouldn’t mind any of those match-ups but I’d like a rematch of the Padres and Yankees to happen. It’s the two teams I’ve been watching this season since both Chicago teams sucked this year.
Warden: Anyone but the Yankees.
Avenger,
The Yankees have to reach the World Series first. Lord knows Aaron Boone will do his best to give Clay Holmes every opportunity to blow a lead for them in the playoffs.
Det rematch.
Toegate partie deux might be fun too
What? Nobody cares about the Padres except for Padres fans. And you wouldn’t even know Padres fans existed when the Dodgers play in SD. Nobody would watch it. Dodgers vs Yankees, and the world is watching.
Who cares what the world wants? The thousands of Padres fans who stayed late at Dodger Stadium chanting till midnight could be heard as far away as Elysian Park.
setting up for the postseason seemed to be priority (over winning Wednesday) with the boozefest that erupted after game, anyway. Hopefully Cease only had two and is ready tonight.
Triple play with Ohtani on deck is 1/100000000000000000000 odds. 20,000 not-so-loyals had already left the stadium and missed it.
Oddly, my most hopefull wish, being as realistic as I can, is not the division, but making sure the Dodgers don’t celebrate the division win in LA and in front of the Pads. I.e., win at least one more of these games in the series.
Luckily I had that Triple Play down as part of my 4-team parlay. Not sure if it was Shohei or Ippei who phoned me before the game for the heads up.
Not so many fans left the stadium as it may seem. Lots of people watch the 9th from the concourse as we always do. So I got to see the TP but I wish I had not. Very ugly. A bunt was the right play in that situation, anything to avoid the DP and bring up Ohtani as the winning run and the rest of the top of the order after that. Rojas showed it on the first pitch then got greedy. If the Padres now see themselves as the team of destiny I would not blame them.
You’re advocating for a bunt, down by 2 in the 9th, against a pitcher that had given up 3 straight hits? Good thing you’re not a Manager, BlueSkies.
Uh, yes. For the reasons described. Considering how it worked out I don’t see how you can seriously argue against it.
Who do the Dodgers play in their final series?
Ippei and the Folsom All-Stars… jk it’s the Rox
At coors
They won’t win all three, Rox playing well Dodgers pen will be gassed and no day off between Thursday and Friday.
The Rox are 10-11 for the month of September. Better than their normal, but hardly playing well.
Anything can happen in Denver. The real event is tonight. The Dodgers have to bounce back from one of the ugliest game endings ever witnessed. Unfortunately I witnessed it myself in person.
The White Sox are very likely to commit to hiring Sizemore as their ‘permanent ‘ manager after the season.
How do you know that? Just yesterday Getz said the Sox are going after people “still in uniform,” meaning members of the coaching staff on playoff teams, while conceding that Sizemore has done a “great job” and deserves to be “in the mix.” It’s all well and good that players like and respect him, but it’s worth noting that the team hasn’t played any better under him than it did under Agricola.
coop: Sounds like a Getz move to me. All this talk of getting Schumaker or someone else who took his team to the PO (along with Ng) last year isn’t going to happen. Who in their right mind would want to manage this bunch of rejects knowing skinflint Reinsdorf won’t allow any signing over $1M?
Sale the beanpole!
All the media wants to talk about is Dodgers and that they’re the greatest team ever built, but they might get knocked down to the Wild Card round if they aren’t careful. Padres could easily sweep this series and it’s hard to stop a hot team going into the playoffs (2019 Nats, 2021 Braves, 2022 Phillies, 2023 Rangers).
Atlanta’s roster when healthy is deeper than the Dodgers. I don’t think the Dodgers this year have enough starting pitching. You got Flaherty and Yammamoto then who? The rest is wildly inconsistent and you just don’t know what you are going to get.
Foot: The problem is, if SD wins the division, the week off might cool them down. The Pads can’t tank the next two games obviously and with Cease pitching tonight, I doubt that’s even possible. But if last year is any proof, winning a division is sure death. That’s why I’m glad the O’s didn’t take the ALE this year.
Good point! 4,5 and 6 seeds been doing well lately.
The Astros haven’t had any issue with the bye, neither did the Yankees in 2022.
Considering how recently the bye system was implemented it’s a little early to evaluate how it’s working. But for certain if anyone imagined the teams forced to play the wildcard series would be at an inherent disadvantage in the DS should be taking some notes.
Waaaaaaaaaa. The media is talking about the Dodgers! Sniff sniff. How’d that sweep go for you, Whiner?
From breaking your pinkie finger on a ball hit back up the middle to breaking your wrist in a bike accident ya had to be cussing the gods out. The only real injury of concern was really the UCL surgery in 2020. That is what confuses and angers me about the Sale trade. It’s not like he was having consistent arm problems, his injuries were freakish, he was going to bounce back and he showed signs last September with how he closed out the year. Bravo to AA for actually recognizing what was happening and fleecing my team. Vaughn Grissom is a replacement level bum.
9 IL stints, a TJ, 17-18 4.16 in 56 starts since the 2018 World Series plus moving that contract. Seemed like a good idea at the time. It backfired, but ten out of ten times you make that move.
kingbum: Don’t worry. If Grissom is that bad, he’ll be playing for the White Sox next year.
Think we can get Crochet for him?
Should the Yankees experience an early exit from the playoffs, how does Boone keep his job?
That depends on Cole….If Cole isn’t Cole I think Boone gets a pass. That team is only going as far as Judge and Cole can carry them.
@RickP
“Should the Yankees experience an early exit from the playoffs, how does Boone keep his job?”
The F/O can realize that the manager is only a small factor in the outcome of a game or series.
Since I can’t get an answer in the live chat, does anyone know if the White Sox will also claim the record for most games back in a division? Last time I looked it was 53.5.
White Sox won’t get that record. The 1962 Mets, in their first season of existence, finished 60.5 games behind San Francisco.
I believe that honor goes to the 2018 Baltimore Orioles. The same year Boston is lights out and can’t be beat winning 107 games Baltimore finished 61 games back.
Derek Shelton: 291-412 managerial record.
How is this turd not in danger of being fired???
Working for the ballclub that thought it smart to DFA Rowdy Tellez when he was 4 plate appearances away from a $200K bonus.
Lifelong Pirate and I am talking 60 plus years and I am embarrassed by what this organization has become. If they don’t fire everyone from Cherington down, only because you can”t fire the owner, I will for the first time in my life refuse to follow my beloved Pirates until they do.
Just when the seas start to calm, daylight pokes through and the horizon clears… regression on the whole. Embarrassing.
Cardinals fans can only dream of waking up one morning and seeing that Marmol has been fired.
Who breaks first if out early in the playoffs; the Dodgers with Roberts or the Yankees with Boone?
Who loses first? The parlay could depend on the minute
@RSox
“Who breaks first if out early in the playoffs; the Dodgers with Roberts or the Yankees with Boone?”
Hopefully neither team is making that decision based on the outcome of a short series
Managers have very little influence on the outcomes of specific games or series.
Unless they managers do something egregious they are unlikely to be fired