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Blue Jays Place Santiago Espinal On Injured List

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The Toronto Blue Jays have placed infielder Santiago Espinal on the 10-day injured list with a left oblique strain, per a team announcement. To fill the roster spot, the Jays have recalled utility-man Otto Lopez from Triple-A.

Espinal has had a breakout year with Toronto, posting a .267/.322/.370 slash line and earning his first All-Star nod. He has particularly hit lefties well; in 113 at bats the righty has produced a strong .301/.375/.451 line, good for an .826 OPS. Additionally, Espinal has filled in admirably for Blue Jays, logging time at second base, third base, and shortstop. Recently, however, Espinal has been platooning with Cavan Biggio at second base.

Lopez, ranked as the Blue Jay’s 17th-best prospect by MLB.com, made his MLB debut in 2021 — tallying a single plate appearance. The 23-year-old has been shuffled on and off the Major League team this season, but has yet to have a plate appearance. In Triple-A, the right-handed Lopez has hit a strong .297/.378/.415 for a .793 OPS, striking out a low 15.6%  of the time and walking at a high 10.5% clip. Lopez has experience at all three outfield spots, second base and shortstop and will likely be used as a late-game substitution by the Blue Jays, who are in the thick of their playoff push.

Stephen Vogt To Retire After 2022 Season

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Two-time All-Star and fan-favorite Stephen Vogt has decided to retire from Major League Baseball at the end of the 2022 season. The veteran catcher shared his plans to call it a career after ten years in the big-leagues with Janie McCauley of the Associated Press. 

Stephen Vogt | Stan Szeto-USA TODAY Sports

Originally a twelfth-round pick by the Rays in 2007, Vogt made his MLB debut with Tampa in 2012 at age 27, going hitless in all 25 of his at-bats during his first season. Traded to Oakland the following April, Vogt saw his hitless streak extend to 0-for-32 before finally connecting on his first hit (a home run).

Despite his slow start, Vogt quickly endeared himself to A’s fans with his heroics in the 2013 postseason. In the ninth inning of a scoreless Game 2 of the ALDS, Vogt lined a single with the bases loaded to walk off the Tigers and even the series at one game apiece.

Vogt’s role expanded during the 2014 season, logging a total of 84 games as a catcher, first baseman, left fielder, right fielder, and designated hitter. To the tune of a .279/.321/.431 slash, Vogt helped propel the A’s to a wild card berth. To this day, cheers of “I believe in Stephen Vogt!” continue to ring out at RingCentral Coliseum during his plate-appearances — a callback to his original stint in green and gold.

The next few years would see Vogt develop into one of the most dependable and productive catchers in the league. From 2014 to 2016, he swatted 41 home runs, drove in 162 runs, and posted a wRC+ of 105, good for seventh amongst catchers. Though he spent most of his prime years behind the dish, Vogt continued to collect innings at first base, left field, and right field, for Oakland. His blend of offensive production with defensive versatility earned him nods to the American League All-Star team in 2015 and 2016.

The A’s designated Vogt for assignment in June of 2017 after he struggled during the first half. He finished the season in Milwaukee, where he accumulated a .789 OPS for a contending Brewers team. Just when Vogt looked as if he was back on track, a shoulder injury kept him out for all of 2018, threatening his career. When the Giants gave him an opportunity by signing him to a minor-league deal at the beginning of 2019, Vogt relished it. He slashed .263/.314/.490, hit 10 home runs in 99 games, and re-established himself as a productive big-leaguer.

Vogt went on to spend the COVID-shortened 2020 and the beginning of 2021 with the Diamondbacks, before being traded to the Atlanta Braves, with whom he earned a World Series ring. Oakland welcomed him back on a one-year contract at the beginning of 2022, where he will finish his playing career. Altogether, Vogt will have amassed with well over 700 games played, more than 500 hits, and nearly $14MM earned by the time his season ends. Vogt himself summed up his roller coaster career, telling McCauley:

“I haven’t always been the best player. I’ve been one of the best players in the league, I’ve been one of the worst players in the league. I’ve been injured and everywhere in between, I’ve been DFA’d twice, I’ve been traded, I’ve been non-tendered, you name it. I’ve been the guy that knew he was going to have a job next year to the guy that had to fight for his job next year, and just always go out and earn it.”

Though his retirement spells the end of his playing career, it seems that Vogt will not be able to stay away from the game for long. Renowned for his clubhouse presence and reputation as a beloved teammate, Vogt drew high praise from former A’s (now Padres) manager Bob Melvin, who told McCauley that he is bullish on Vogt’s managerial potential: “What he means to a clubhouse is immeasurable… [Vogt] definitely has a future in managing.”

Vogt himself said in 2020 that he’s “always wanted to manage,” so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see him mentioned in potential coaching and managerial searches down the line.

Rays Designate Kevin Herget For Assignment

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The Rays announced Thursday that they’ve designated righty Kevin Herget for assignment. His spot on the 40-man roster will go to infielder/outfielder Miles Mastrobuoni, whose selection to the Major League roster (covered here this morning) is now official. Catcher Rene Pinto was optioned to Triple-A Durham, as expected.

It’s the second DFA of the season for the 31-year-old Herget, although unlike his first stint on the big league roster earlier this summer, Herget actually got into a pair of games and made his MLB debut this time around. That marked the culmination of an arduous, nearly decade-long grind through both the minor leagues and the independent circuit for Herget — a 39th-round pick out of Division-III Kean University by the Cardinals back in 2013.

Herget’s pair of calls to the big leagues this season have been well-earned. In his first year with the Rays organization, he’s logged 93 2/3 innings in Durham while pitching to a sharp 2.98 ERA with a solid 24.9% strikeout rate and a pristine 3.9% walk rate. It’s by far the most success Herget has enjoyed in parts of five seasons at the Triple-A level, where he has a lifetime 4.16 ERA, 22.7% strikeout rate and 5.8% walk rate in 376 1/3 innings. Herget’s brief MLB experience during this most recent stint saw him yield a pair of runs on two hits and no walks with one strikeout in 2 2/3 innings.

With the trade deadline squarely in the rear-view mirror at this point in the season, the Rays’ only real choices with Herget are to place him on outright waivers or release waivers. He went unclaimed and was outrighted to Durham last time around, so Herget would have the option to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency if he passes through waivers a second time. However, with just a couple weeks left in the season, it seems likelier that he’d accept and head back to Durham — particularly since he’ll be a minor league free agent this winter anyway.

Giants Select Shelby Miller

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12:23pm: The Giants formally announced that Miller has been selected from Sacramento and Waites has been optioned there in his place.

12:21pm: The Giants are selecting the contract of veteran right-hander Shelby Miller from Triple-A Sacramento prior to Thursday’s game against the Rockies. Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle tweeted earlier that Miller was in the clubhouse, and Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic now adds that Miller has been informed he’ll be active for today’s game (and not simply on the taxi squad). The Giants designated outfielder Lewis Brinson for assignment yesterday, so they already have an open spot on the 40-man. Slusser adds that righty Cole Waites looks to have been optioned to Sacramento to open a spot for Miller on the active roster.

San Francisco will be the seventh Major League team for Miller, once one of the game’s brightest young arms but now a journeyman who’s found himself closing games for the Giants’ top minor league affiliate in 2022. Still just 31 years old, Miller opened the year with the Yankees’ Triple-A club but opted out of that deal early in the season and signed with the Giants in June. He’s logged a combined 2.87 ERA between the two Triple-A clubs this season, punching out 31.2% of his opponents against a 9.5% walk rate. He’s also picked up a dozen saves (eight with the Giants organization) and five holds out of the bullpen this year.

A former first-round pick who was regarded as one of the sport’s premier pitching prospects, Miller debuted with the Cardinals as a 21-year-old in 2012 and spent the two subsequent seasons as a mainstay in the St. Louis rotation. The Cards parted with Miller in a trade that sent then-star outfielder Jason Heyward from Atlanta to St. Louis, and Miller made the All-Star team in his lone season as a Brave (despite an MLB-worst 17 losses, which were the result of a dismal team surrounding him).

Despite Miller’s sterling 3.02 ERA in his first season with the Braves, Atlanta couldn’t resist when the D-backs offered up Dansby Swanson, Ender Inciarte and then-top pitching prospect Aaron Blair in return for Miller — just six months after Swanson had been drafted with the No. 1 overall pick. It’s gone down as one of the most lopsided swaps in recent memory, as Swanson has blossomed from steady everyday shortstop into one of the NL’s top all-around players in 2022. Inciarte, meanwhile, had several seasons as a strong everyday center fielder in Atlanta.

Miller, meanwhile, struggled immediately with Arizona and wound up limping through a trio of injury-plagued seasons in Phoenix. He’s since pitched in the Majors with the Rangers (2019), Cubs (2021) and Pirates (2021), but Miller has just a 7.04 ERA in 195 2/3 frames since being traded by the Braves nearly seven years ago.

There’s little denying, however, that he’s been impressive in a bullpen role with the top affiliates for the Yankees and Giants in 2022. Whether that leads to an eventual early-30s renaissance for Miller remains to be seen, but this is the healthiest and most effective he’s been in years. And with his 32nd birthday not yet having taken place, there’s still plenty of time for the once-vaunted righty to be reborn as a quality big league reliever. Both Miller and the Giants surely hope that today’s promotion can be the first step toward just such an outcome. He’ll be a free agent at season’s end, and a strong couple weeks to close out the season could make him an interesting, low-cost target for clubs over the winter.

Rockies Promote Ezequiel Tovar, Place Brendan Rodgers on Injured List

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Sep. 22: The Rockies have officially announced Tovar’s promotion. In a corresponding move, infielder Brendan Rodgers will be placed on the 10-day IL with a left hamstring strain, retroactive to September 19. With only 13 games left in Colorado’s schedule, Rodgers may be sidelined for the rest of 2022.

Sep. 21: The Rockies are going to promote shortstop prospect Ezequiel Tovar, according to Daniel Álvarez-Montes of El Extrabase. Tovar is already on the club’s 40-man roster, though the Rockies will need to open a spot for him on the active roster.

Tovar, 21, signed with the Rockies as an international amateur in 2017. He was certainly a notable signing at the time, agreeing to a bonus of $800K, the highest given out by the club that year. But the youngster has increased his stock tremendously in recent years.

Through the end of the 2019 season, he had shown some decent plate discipline but little power. He hit only two long balls over 118 games in rookie ball and A-ball in 2018 and 2019. However, as Baseball America notes in their scouting report on Tovar, he bulked up during the pandemic shutdown in 2020 and has been on a meteoric rise up prospect lists ever since. He began this year in Double-A and played 66 games for the Hartford Yard Goats. In that time, he hit 13 home runs, stole 17 bases and hit .318/.386/.545 for a wRC+ of 153. He was recently promoted to Triple-A but only got into four games before being launched up to the big time.

Tovar already had a strong reputation for his speed, bat-to-ball skills and shortstop defense, which means the development of his power at the plate has the potential to turn him into an all-around superstar. Based on his tremendous breakout, he’s shot up to the #13 slot on Baseball America’s list of top prospects in the league, #28 at MLB Pipeline, #36 at FanGraphs, #25 on Keith Law’s list at The Athletic and #40 at ESPN.

For the Rockies, they have a legitimate opening at shortstop for the first time in a long time. Troy Tulowitzki manned the position from 2006 until his trade in 2015. That was followed by the Trevor Story era, which lasted until he reached free agency just under a year ago. This year, the club signed Jose Iglesias to take over, but only on a one-year deal. He’s been on the IL the past few weeks, with utility player Alan Trejo taking over. Tovar will have the last few weeks of the season to show the Colorado brass how he handles the big leagues, with the possibility of cementing himself as the shortstop of the future. Though the club is well out of contention at this point of the season, the chance to see what Tovar can bring to the table will give Colorado fans something to watch as the season winds down.

If Tovar can indeed earn himself a permanent spot with the big league club, there could be some domino effects. There’s not enough time remaining in the season for Tovar to get to 130 at-bats, meaning he will hang onto rookie/prospect status into the offseason. Under the new collective bargaining agreement, players with less than 60 days of service who appear among two preseason Top 100 lists at Baseball America, ESPN or MLB Pipeline can net their team a bonus amateur draft choice based on their early-career finishes in awards voting, so long as their club carries them on the MLB roster for a full service year. If Tovar can get himself a Rookie of the Year award or some MVP votes during his first couple of full seasons, he could net the club an extra draft pick.

Rays To Select Miles Mastrobuoni

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The Rays appear set to select the contract of infielder/outfielder Miles Mastrobuoni and option catcher Rene Pinto to Triple-A Durham. Former big league outfielder Denard Span, now a special assistant with the Rays’ baseball operations department, tweeted that Mastrobuoni has been informed he’s going to the big leagues. Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times reported that Pinto was likely to be sent back down to Durham. The Rays still need to make a corresponding 40-man roster move.

It’ll be the first call to the big leagues for Mastrobuoni, whom the Rays selected with their 14th-round pick back in 2016. The now-26-year-old Mastrobuoni has never garnered much prospect fanfare despite consistently producing at an above-average level in the minors. Baseball America ranked him 20th among Tampa Bay farmhands on their midseason update of the Rays’ system — the first time he’s ever appeared among their top 30 prospects there. FanGraphs listed him 37th among Rays prospects back in March.

The increased attention on the lefty-swinging utilityman is understandable, given his output in recent seasons. Mastrobuoni split the 2021 season between Double-A and Triple-A, hitting at a combined .298/.376/.424 clip in 434 plate appearances. This year in Triple-A, he’s continued to hit for average and draw walks at a high clip but has also lowered his strikeout rate and displayed previously unseen power. In 573 plate appearances, Mastrobuoni has slashed .300/.377/.469 with more home runs (16) than he’d hit in his entire career prior to the 2022 season (13). He’s also turned in a career-high 32 doubles and swiped a career-best 23 stolen bases (in 26 attempts).

As with so many players who come up through the Rays’ system, Mastrobuoni is accustomed to playing multiple positions. He’s logged 463 innings at second base this season but also seen action in right field (201 innings), left field (147 innings), center field (123 innings), at shortstop (96 innings) and at third base (17 innings). That defensive versatility isn’t a newfound trait, either; Mastrobuoni has at least 42 career games at all six of those positions, though second base has been his most frequent spot on the diamond.

Now that he’s on the 40-man roster, Mastrobuoni can serve as a flexible depth piece in Tampa Bay for the foreseeable future. He’ll be under club control through at least the 2028 season and will be optionable for the next three years.

Royals Fire President Of Baseball Operations Dayton Moore

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The Royals have fired president of baseball operations Dayton Moore, according to a report from Andy McCullough and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Royals chairman and CEO John Sherman then confirmed the move in a press conference and announced that general manager J.J. Picollo is now in charge of baseball operations, per Lynn Worthy of the Kansas City Star.

“Dayton’s 16 years of leadership here will always mark the transformation into a World Series championship club,” Sherman says in a press release announcing the move. “Our fans, our region, and our community will never forget the excitement we shared in back-to-back pennants and the World Series Championship in 2015. He always put the Kansas City Royals first, and we’re stronger today because of it.”

Moving onto Picollo, Sherman says: “J.J.’s experience in baseball has prepared him for the challenges ahead. He has played a key role in evaluating and developing many of our franchise’s most talented players, including the core that won the 2015 World Series and the young core on the major league team today. He will brings a new lens and approach to leading our baseball operations. I look forward to working with J.J. as we continue to build and develop our team to compete at a high level.”

Moore, 55, was hired by the Braves as a scout in 1994, eventually working his way up to assistant general manager. The Royals hired him to be their general manager in 2006. As mentioned, Moore eventually led the Royals to a title in 2015, but it wasn’t a smooth ride. The Royals were one of the worst teams in baseball for an extended stretch that started before Moore joined the club, posting a losing record in nine straight seasons from 2004 to 2012.

However, the upside of all that losing was that the club was able to stockpile young talent through drafting and trading, eventually slingshotting itself to success. They used the second overall pick of the 2005 draft to grab Alex Gordon, the second overall pick of the 2007 draft to grab Mike Moustakas and the third overall pick in the 2008 draft on Eric Hosmer. Moore traded Zack Greinke in 2010, then one of the best pitchers in baseball, for a four-player return that included Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar. That trade also netted Jake Odorizzi, who was later part of a trade that netted the Royals James Shields and Wade Davis from the Rays. Those players, along with international signees like Salvador Perez and Yordano Ventura, formed a core that allowed the club to return to contention. The Royals got above the .500 mark in 2013, then won the AL Pennant in 2014 and won the World Series in 2015.

It’s been a rough tumble from those heights, though, with the club posting an even 81-81 record in 2016 and falling below it in each season since. The franchise was hoping to use the same playbook of building a strong stable of young players around which to build a winning ballclub, but it’s yet to be as successful this time around. Some of the club’s most recent first round draft picks have reached the majors, including Brady Singer, Bobby Witt Jr., Jackson Kowar and Daniel Lynch. The team was hoping that 2022 would be a season where they returned to contention but they are currently sporting a record of 59-89, better than just five other clubs around the league and guaranteed a sixth-straight losing campaign.

Moore can’t entirely be blamed for the team’s recent failures, of course, just as he can’t claim all of the credit for its previous successes. The Royals, like all MLB teams, employ dozens of analysts, scouts and other executives to make their baseball decisions. But the organization has decided that it was time for change and set their sights on the person at the top of the pyramid.

The new face of the front office will now be Picollo, who isn’t a new name for fans of the club. The 51-year-old was also a Braves scout but was brought along by Moore to be the Royals’ director of player development. He will now step into the spotlight and try to steer the franchise forward. Despite the club’s recent struggles, there are reasons to think he might be well-positioned to correct course in short order. The poor results in recent seasons have led to a pile of young talent on the team, though the Royals will have to find better ways of maximizing their skills. Financially, the club has limited commitments, with Salvador Perez and Hunter Dozier the only two players on the books beyond 2023. Of course, the Royals have never been a high-spending club, meaning that they will likely want to see improvements from their player development operations before they decide to start writing big checks. The franchise is clearly looking for change, but Picollo might start by looking inside the house before he looks outside.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

MLBTR Poll: Predicting The NL East Winner

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As the regular season nears its conclusion, the playoff picture has mostly come into focus. Of the 12 teams currently in playoff position, 10 have a cushion of at least 4 1/2 games. The Padres and Phillies are working to hold off the Brewers for the final two Wild Card spots in the National League, but the rest of the teams currently in playoff position have put themselves in a great spot to reach the postseason barring a major collapse. There’s an outside shot the White Sox track down the Guardians in the AL Central or the Orioles get back into the AL Wild Card race, but it’d take a major turn of events over the next two weeks.

There’s a similar lack of intrigue in most of the division races. The Astros and Dodgers have already clinched their respective divisions. The Yankees, Guardians and Cardinals all hold leads of six-plus games in theirs. The only division race that promises plenty of intrigue down the stretch: the battle for the NL East.

Both the Mets and Braves are already guaranteed to make the postseason. They’re each likely to surpass 100 wins. Yet one of those teams will come up just shy of a division title, leaving them as the #4 seed in the National League. That means a three-game series against the #5 seed in a first-round Wild Card set under the playoff format introduced in this spring’s collective bargaining agreement. Obviously, both teams would much prefer to secure the division title (and almost certainly the NL’s #2 seed and accompanying first-round bye). Which one is the frontrunner for the division crown? Let’s take a look at the remaining road for each and their current health outlook.

Mets (95-56 record, +147 run differential)

Remaining schedule: at Oakland (three games), vs. Miami (two games), at Atlanta (three games), vs. Washington (three games)

The Mets have 11 games remaining. Eight of them are against teams 28 games or more below .500. The other three: a crucial series next weekend in Atlanta. New York welcomed back Max Scherzer from a brief injured list stint on Monday. He came out with six perfect innings against the Brewers, striking out nine, before being lifted due to a pitch count limitation. The Mets rotation is at full strength at the right time, pushing players like Tylor Megill and David Peterson into the bullpen.

The biggest current injury for the Mets is on the position player side. Right fielder Starling Marte has yet to return after suffering a non-displaced fracture in his right middle finger two weeks back. Anthony DiComo of MLB.com tweeted this afternoon that the All-Star outfielder is hopeful he’ll be back in time for next weekend’s series with the Braves. Center fielder Brandon Nimmo, meanwhile, left today’s game with left quad soreness. Mike Puma of the New York Post relays that he’s likely to go for imaging tomorrow but Nimmo downplayed the severity of the issue postgame.

Braves (93-56 record, +171 run differential)

Remaining schedule: at Philadelphia (four games), at Washington (three games), vs. Mets (three games), at Miami (three games)

The defending champions dug themselves an early hole with a mediocre first two months, but they’ve been incredible since the calendar flipped to June. They’re a staggering 70-28 over the past three and a half months, nearly erasing a deficit that was once as high as 10 1/2 games in the process. They’ve pulled even with the Mets in the loss column but have two fewer wins, leaving them with a bit more work to do to get ahead in the standings.

The Braves kick off a four-game set with the Phillies tomorrow. That’s a much more difficult series than any the Mets will play (aside from the Braves themselves), but Atlanta just swept Philly last weekend.

Like the Mets, Atlanta doesn’t have any key starting pitchers currently on the injured list. Rookie star Spencer Strider is battling some oblique soreness and had today’s scheduled start pushed back slightly, but there’s no indication an IL stint is currently under consideration. As with New York, Atlanta is down one star position player thanks to a fractured finger though. The Braves lost Ozzie Albies to a right pinky fracture over the weekend. There’s a chance he returns in the postseason but he’s not expected back before the end of the regular season. Rookie Vaughn Grissom filled in well in recent weeks while Albies was rehabbing a broken foot; he’ll be asked to do the same for the stretch run.

Tiebreaker procedure

The final three games between the Mets and Braves obviously loom as the largest remaining on the schedule for both clubs. Not only are they the most directly impactful in the standings, they also carry implications for the tiebreaker. The new CBA did away with the traditional Game 163 in favor of a tiebreaker system. If two clubs finish the season with the same record, the team with the better head-to-head mark gets the nod in the standings. The Mets lead this year’s season series 9-7, meaning Atlanta would need to sweep their final meeting to secure the tiebreaker.

How does the MLBTR readership expect things to play out? Which team will celebrate an NL East crown two weeks from now?

(poll link for app users)

Which Team Will Win The NL East?
Mets 53.21% (6,340 votes)
Braves 46.79% (5,574 votes)
Total Votes: 11,914

 

Injury Notes: Treinen, Nelson, Severino, Britton

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The Dodgers have been without reliever Blake Treinen for much of the season, as shoulder issues have kept him on the injured list. The right-hander was out of action between mid-April and early September, and his return to the active roster this month lasted just two appearances. Treinen went back on the IL with shoulder tightness on a placement retroactive to September 7. While he’ll be eligible to return from that stint tomorrow, manager Dave Roberts informed reporters Treinen’s shoulder hasn’t responded to a Monday bullpen session as hoped (via David Vassegh of AM 570 LA Sports and J.P. Hoornstra of the Southern California News Group).

Roberts indicated there’s some concern Treinen may not be available in time for the postseason, which kicks off just over two weeks from now. Los Angeles is assuredly going to get a bye past the first-round Wild Card series, which will afford Treinen a bit more time to try to work his way back. If they could get the 34-year-old back in the fold, it’d go a long way towards improving their playoff bullpen. While he’s been limited to just five appearances this year, Treinen was one of the sport’s best late-game weapons a season ago. He worked to a 1.99 ERA with a 29.7% strikeout rate while inducing grounders on over half the batted balls he allowed through 72 1/3 frames in 2021.

Some other injury notes from around the game:

  • The Diamondbacks placed rookie starter Ryne Nelson on the 15-day injured list this afternoon, recalling southpaw Tyler Holton from Triple-A Reno in his place. The right-hander is dealing with scapula inflammation that’ll end his season a few weeks early. Manager Torey Lovullo didn’t sound especially concerned about the issue long-term, telling reporters (including Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic) the club was proceeding with an excess of caution with the season winding down. Lovullo indicated Nelson should be in the mix for a spot in next year’s season-opening rotation, hardly a surprise given his prospect pedigree. Baseball America’s #96 overall farmhand entering the 2022 campaign, Nelson struggled with the longball in a hitter-friendly Triple-A environment but impressed in his first three big league starts. He allowed only four runs (three earned) with 16 strikeouts and six walks in 18 1/3 innings to kick off his MLB career.
  • The Yankees reinstated Luis Severino from the 60-day injured list this afternoon, as expected. New York already had a vacancy on the 40-man roster, and they optioned Miguel Andújar to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to open a spot on the active roster. Severino, who missed two months after suffering a lat strain in mid-June, returned with five innings of one-run ball in a win over the Pirates. The righty tossed 64 pitches and figures to progressively build his pitch count with each start in preparation for a potential role in the playoff rotation. New York is also likely to soon welcome back reliever Zack Britton, who hasn’t thrown an MLB pitch since undergoing a UCL repair last September. Joel Sherman of the New York Post was among those to relay that Britton has reported to the major league club after making eight appearances on a rehab stint. While he’s not yet been formally reinstated from the 60-day injured list, that seems likely to occur in the coming days.

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