With the final week of the regular season just over the horizon, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world headed into the weekend:
1. Soto undergoing testing:
Yankees superstar Juan Soto had a scary moment during the club’s game against the Mariners yesterday when he slid hard into the right field wall while making a catch in the outfield. Soto stayed on the ground briefly but got up and resumed play shortly thereafter. As noted by MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch, the initial diagnosis on Soto’s knee was a contusion but the Yankees are still sending the phenom for x-rays to make sure there isn’t a more serious issue at play. The addition of Soto over the offseason completed transformed the Yankees’ lineup headed into the 2024 campaign, and the 25-year-old star has delivered with an incredible .286/.418/.575 slash line in 149 games this year. The Yankees clinched a spot in the postseason earlier this week, meaning they’ll be able to afford the pending free agent plenty of rest ahead of the postseason should that prove necessary.
2. Series Preview: Tigers @ Orioles
The Tigers have emerged as baseball’s most fascinating story this September as they’ve surged to a 11-5 record this month that’s allowed them to catch a flailing Twins club that’s gone 7-11 since the start of the month, leaving the two teams tied in the final AL Wild Card spot. Minnesota won the season series over Detroit and holds the tiebreaker between the two clubs, however, meaning that if the Tigers are to close out their surprise run to the postseason they’ll need to keep winning games, including a tough three-game set this weekend against the Orioles in Baltimore. Meanwhile, the Orioles have plenty of incentive to make the road as difficult as possible for the Tigers as they could clinch a playoff spot in front of their home crowd this weekend with a sweep.
Detroit has not yet announced their starter for tonight’s game, but the series will kick off at 7:05pm local time tonight with Corbin Burnes (3.06 ERA) on the mound for the Orioles. Tomorrow, right-hander Reese Olson (3.50 ERA) will take on lefty Cade Povich (5.74 ERA in 14 starts) and the series will wrap on Sunday with an as-of-yet undetermined starter on the mound for Detroit against breakout journeyman Albert Suarez (3.60 ERA).
3. Pitchers’ Duel in Texas:
Two of the league’s most talented starters are set to face off at Globe Life Field this evening when the Mariners send youngster George Kirby to the mound to face Jacob deGrom in the veteran’s second start since returning from Tommy John surgery. Kirby, 26, has had a down year by his lofty standards thanks to a brutal six-start stretch that began in mid-August where he saw his ERA balloon from 3.13 to 3.77 thanks primarily to a whopping nine home runs surrendered in 31 innings of work. He bounced back from that rare tough stretch in his most recent start, however, blanking the very same Rangers club he’s set to face tonight with seven scoreless innings that saw him allow just one hit in a 7-0 victory over the club in Seattle last week.
Also making his second consecutive start against the same club is deGrom, who struck out four in 3 2/3 scoreless innings of work against Seattle during his season debut last week. It was just deGrom’s 33rd start since the start of the 2021 season as the veteran ace has battled injury after injury in recent years, but on a rate basis he’s been the most effective starter in all of baseball over that time with a microscopic 1.99 ERA and an even strong 1.60 FIP in 190 1/3 combined innings of work that have seen him punch out 42.8% of opponents.
The Red Sox should trade Tanner Houck. This season, he’s thrown 1,116 Sweepers, 664 Splitters, and 861 Fastballs. This is a career year where his value is at his highest, assuming he can make one more start this year without getting pulled (he got scratched today). His arm will fall off some 5 to 10 starts into next season. Get value for him now so y’all aren’t jerking around saying “He’ll be back in 2027 though!!!”
Detroit just took 2 of 3 from Baltimore on the road before sweeping KC. Bring it, Comerica will be electric. They have exceeded all expectations. A team playing without expectations is dangerous for any opponent. Let’s go boys!
I truly admire what the Tigers have achieved so far this season. You can see how differently they’re carrying themselves now, and with such a strong sense of belief. I really hope they make it into the postseason this year.
We took 2 of 3 in Comerica and tonight are playing in Baltimore. At this point with 9 games left I just want 3 things: luck, health, and a wild card.
Good call, had that reversed. KC on the road was huge though! Same here…no more injuries, Just need a few things to go their way. MN is reeling. It’s ours to take IMO.
I like it when a new face makes the PO. On the other hand, kind of sad to see the Braves probably not make it. Too many injuries.
Must be nice to have a starting rotation set… Tigers have Skubal, Olson and Mize… the rest bullpen days. Mize and Olson just came off the IL, it was worse before that.
So far the non-traditional approach with openers has worked and set Madden and Hurter up for success. Whatever gets them to the postseason. Then it’s anybody game like last year with Texas and Arizona playing the hot hand into the World Series
Tonight is a must win for Baltimore.
Regardless of what happens these last 9 games it’s been a surprising and fun run. Has also likely provided this young Tigers team with experience on handling late season high pressure games. Hopefully this incentivizes Chris I to invest in improving this team further in 2025, but doubt he’ll open his wallet since he prefers profit over winning
If the Tigers make it, I just hope they’ll be competitive and not just happy to be there.
with those top 3 starters i’d be terrified to face them in a short series
They are already winning now.
The young Tigers have responded and carried this team late. Too much Baez and Badoo early on might have cost us. Go Tigers!!
am an orioles fan but you’re right. O’s have hit a wall while the tigers are surging. good to see you motown fans enjoying that young pitching staff. skubal is lights out. O’s, while solid positionally, lacking on the mound though in fairness they’ve suffered many injuries. will be a good series between two young, upcoming teams with something to play for
Someone forgot to tell them that the front office felt they were out of it at the deadline. More experienced players would have realized the futility being 10 back of the wild card. Good thing they don’t know any better!
The Orioles can clinch “this weekend with a sweep.” Hahahaha…they hurt my heart sometimes 🙁
He brought in a #2 starter in Eflin and Seranthony was 9 for 9 in save chances before last night. The Rogers move was terrible but it’s ignorant to act like Elias did nothing or failed at the deadline
Pretty sure Burnes, Eflin, Suarez, and Kremer are all SP, and generally pretty good ones, but don’t let facts get in the way of your feelings.
If you want to embarrass yourself, who am I to stop you?
Kremer and Suarez are pretty poor options in the postseason
I would trust Suarez in any game at this point. He’s one of the most underrated guys in the sport right now and one of Elias & Co.’s best under-the-radar finds.
Kremer is steady but unspectacular, and while he does have some blowups here and there which skew his overall stats, he’s got that bulldog mentality and keeps the team in the game most times out.
Plus G-Rod is nearing his return, although he may work as a bulk/piggyback guy initially.
burnes and eflin, yea
after that, neh
You specifically said “they have no SP” and I disproved that.
Cry about it.
I’m not really sold. His number are fairly pedestrian across the board. It’s why I was pretty surprised that they settled on Rogers as their other pickup. Eflin was a good trade but he really should probably be the number 3 in a postseason rotation.
He’s much better than you are giving him credit for, which is understandable if you don’t watch him pitch regularly. Jolly Olive on Youtube has a really good video about him, which I highly recommend watching. In fact, watch all of Jolly Olive’s videos. He’s really great lol.
But point is, I am not worried in the slightest if G-Rod isn’t ready and Suarez has to start game 3 in the WC round.
Maybe they go deep in the playoffs, or maybe they don’t, but Burnes, Eflin, and Suarez is a perfectly solid 1-2-3.
I was fairly surprised that only 15,000 fans showed up in Miami to see Ohtani hit 50 HRs and swipe 50 bags. Honestly, that franchise needs to be moved elsewhere.
Ohtani is the most exciting player in the game, he was approaching an unheard of milestone, and the fans were uninterested. Maybe Florida just isn’t the right environment for baseball? Not a critique of the state, just a reflection of their acted-on preferences.
Mike – Years of ownership neglect has taken away interest from the Marlins fanbase. The 50/50 is not a big deal because all stolen base records are now tainted due to the latest rules changes.
That’s one thing MLB doesn’t realize, you can’t change the rules and then expect records achieved with the help of said rules to be respected. The records are tainted, just like most every “record” in 2020.
@Fever Pitch Guy
But we’ve been doing that since MLB started. Look at the HR record that Ruth held. He did that is much less games than the current record holders. So, technically, Ruth is still the HR king, but then you got people saying that he didn’t play during integration and such. Add in the fact that the mounds were lowered in ’69 and on and on with all the different rule changes.
Do you think we should have separate stats and leaders based on when a new rule was implemented to the league? There have been so many rule changes since the 1800s.
@Old York
To add to that. Ground rule doubles today were called home runs back then. So how many of Ruth’s HRs left the ball park by air and how many by bounce.
Fever Pitch: Totally agree. Acuna is a terrific player, but his 70 SB aren’t as impressive as Rickey Henderson’s 100+ bases
Fever Pitch: Totally agree. Acuna is a terrific player, but his 70 SB aren’t as impressive as Rickey Henderson’s 77 bases in ’89.
Old York: Lowering the .round was done the year after Denny McLain won 30 games. Any time rules are changed it skews the history books. Aaron is the all-time HR king (cheaters excluded) but what would Ruth have hit if the same ball was used during his career?
Pryer to 1969, there were no set standards for the pitching mound. they were different in all parks.
@ButCanHePitch
It’s hard to say for sure, since two rules during Ruth’s era would have affected his home run record.
Before 1920, if you hit a home run with runners on base and the winning run scored before you crossed home plate, you were only credited with a triple. Ruth lost at least one home run due to this rule.
Also, back then, if a ball went over the fence in fair territory but landed foul, it was ruled a foul ball. You couldn’t hook a ball around the foul pole for a home run like today. Research by Bill Jenkinson shows Ruth lost many home runs because of this rule, including some that would have been unquestioned by today’s standards.
So, given the fact that we have made so many changes since then, it’s honestly tough to compare who hit the most HRs or who stole the most bases because we were using different standards even between decades. Honestly, it might make more sense to have multiple record holders based on the era they played in and the rules linked to them. I’m pretty sure, if Bonds and Aaron were using the same rules as Ruth, they would not have as many HRs.
@avenger65
Aaron didn’t play with rules that if the score was 3-3 in the 9th and a runner is on base and the batter hits an actual over the fence HR, that HR doesn’t count because the runner on base scored to win the game 4-3 instead of 5-3.
Also, how many of Aaron’s HRs hooked around the foul pole? Back then, if it went over the fence but hooked around the pole, it was a foul ball not a HR.
When you look deeper at the details including the rules, you find out that a lot of the stats are hard to compare because these players played with different rules.
Old – I understand what you’re saying, but I think you’re misconstruing the definition of “tainted” which is based entirely on the court of public opinion. That’s all it is, an opinion and nothing more.
Never will MLB put an asterisk next to a record the way it was done with Roger Maris, but there are still plenty of tainted records. Most people don’t recognize Bonds as the all-time homerun champ, his numbers are tainted just like Sosa, ARod, McGwire, Palmeiro and Ramirez.
Integration is very different because it’s a what-if situation, we simply don’t know for sure how records would have been impacted.
Let’s say Judge had missed half of this season due to injury, would that have tainted Santander being the homerun champ? Of course not, because there was no guarantee Judge would have won it.
So “no” on separate stats and leaders, but “yes” on people being unexcited about records being easily broken because of rules changes.
avenger – Yep, not a coincidence Acuna doubled his single season high for stolen bases as soon as the rules changed.
avenger – Yep, not a coincidence Acuna doubled his single season high for stolen bases as soon as the rules change.
@Fever Pitch Guy
I said nothing about tainted stats. You’re the one who brought it up. I’m just saying that it’s tough to make comparisons between eras of players because they did play with different rules. As I pointed out above, Ruth dealt with a few rules that don’t exist today. How many HRs in the modern era have either hooked around the foul pole or hit the pole and went foul? We can’t really make comparisons between stats of individuals when not everything is equal. Given Ruth played at Yankee Stadium as a Lefty, he probably hooked a fair number of balls around the pole that were called foul.
We’ll never know for sure but that would change the HR count of others as well.
utero – What an immature, idiotic and ageist comment.
Who else has 50? Nobody ….. but Elly has 64. I won’t bother giving his last name, if you want to know then get off your Sago Mini and look it up yourself.
And last year 3 guys had between 54 and 73 genius.
And NOBODY had at least 50 in the 5 years prior to the rule changes.
If you want to learn more about baseball you’ll have to pay for it like everything else you pay for.
Old – Did you know when Babe played for the Yankees it was only 296 feet to the right field wall, a full 18 feet closer than it is now.
@Fever Pitch Guy
And your point?
How many would Aaron have hit if they designed the stadium for his swing?
Tainted? When has the game ever been pure?
Mikenmn: I don’t deny Ohtani is an exciting player but my choice for most exciting player is Elly de la Cruz. Just my opinion.
avenger – I would have gone for Duran before he cooled down recently.
Moscow? Pyongyang? Timbuktu? Beruit?
@MartialArtisan
London Marlins. Put a big ‘L’ on the hat.
two franchises in florida disgraceful. they’re like two restaurants in bad locations. put the the bay team on the east side of tampa where they can draw from that metropolitan area and orlando and place the marlins somewhere in broward county/ft lauderdale from where they can easier pull from throughout the region and both franchises would draw significantly better. problem is the governments of both locations are subsidizing the venues thus the teams make a business decision based not on which will draw better.
The Marlins average the second fewest amount of fans per game only ahead of the A’s. The Marlins haven’t ranked out of the bottem 4 in attendance since 2012, the year LoanDepot Park opened.
They only averaged 20k fans per game in 2017 when Giancarlo Stanton was chasing Barry Bonds’ single season Home Run record, why would they come to see the accomplishment of a guy on the other team…
@Rsox
Fair enough. As I said, team should move.
Det, NY, Min.
Its not a given Baltimore even makes the playoffs……
The Oriioles really only need to win like 3 or 4 of the final 9 games and they should be in, and some of the important IL guys should start trickling back in over the next few days, probably starting with Coulombe and Urias this weekend, and Westburg should be ready by the start of the NYY series next week.
Re: Det, NY, Min
In this scenario with NY getting a WC and Baltimore missing the playoffs, are you seriously suggesting that the Red Sox with the AL East?
I think he meant NY wins the East and the three wild cards all come from the Central.
There really should be a mention about Kirby’s home/road splits, his Road ERA is 34% higher than his Home ERA.
In other words Soto got an owie. Play on!
Juan Soto to the Dodgers 2 billion for 10 years 80% deferred over the next 50 years.
Tigers sweep Orioles.
Yankees sweep Orioles.
Orioles sweep Twins.
Maybe, just maybe, 2 out of 3. 🙂
Were going to party down,we’re going to Tiger town ya ya. Harris with his deep steal of Sweeney, and Wencell’s bat heating up after his stint on the I.L. Along with Greene’s who was in the same boat as him. We like Detroit’s chances, and they control their own fate.
If the team makes the playoff’s anyone can win, and if they don;t it just means they weren’t ready to do it. This is how you grow a playoff team. All they have to do is win, and continue to play like every game is its last. GO TIGERS !
The Orioles have their hands full. They have to play these next 3, at home, vs the surging Tigers. Whichever team takes 2 of 3 (or sweeps) will be in the playoffs.
Then the O’s need to go on the road to play the Yankees and if the O’s haven’t clinched yet, NY will do all they can to stop that. Then they have to finish in Minnesota, another scuffing team that’s fighting for their playoff life. If the O’s are in by next friday, they may lay down for the Twins.
The Tigers go home to for their final 6 vs the hapless Rays and the hopeless White Sox.
This weekend is the real deal. If the Tigers take 2 or 3 in Baltimore, the Twins and O’s might really pucker up.
Go Tigers?
Tonight’s game was lost in the 1st inning when Meadows and Carpenter couldn’t call the other off and catch a routine fly ball. Now down 5-0. This seems like the 10th time this year the Tiger’s have let a catchable ball fall in because they WON’T GO CATCH THE BALL!
Go Red Sox!
A bunch of haters on here talking about the O’s. This team has struggled so much in the second half because of an absurd amount of injuries. Literally 13 people landed on the IL and you have to fill holes with rookies and scrubs. They were healthy last year and won 101. If this team was healthy again this year they would have repeated or come close. Top three of Burnes, Bradish and Eflin heading into the postseason. I would have taken that all day. Yes Elias went cheap on getting Roger’s but the asking prices were absolutely insane. Elias has completely rebuilt this organization from top to bottom.
Don’t complain about Oriole injuries in the second half & having to call up minor leaguers! Half of the Tigers lineup was called up after the Trade Deadline. They survived with only one of their starting pitchers plus one starter brought up from minors. Tigers were hit with the injury bug hard in the second half also.
At one point, the O’s had an entire playoff-caliber starting rotation, infield, and 7-8-9th inning relief corps on the IL. Oh, and a potential everyday RF/DH who was a consensus top 25ish prospect heading into 2024 for good measure.
I have never seen anything quite like that in my 30 years of being an Orioles fan. It was frickin’ absurd.
Dude the Tigers just went a month with 1 starting pitcher. Literally. Since the start of August “starters” for Detroit have thrown 80 less innings than the next lowest team number (White Sox), and it’s a sizable gap to the next team.
No one wants to hear whining about your rotation injuries lol.