First AL and NL playoff spots clinched
With nine games left to play, the New York Yankees and the Milwaukee Brewers are the first two teams to secure a playoff bid. At 89-63 and 88-64 respectively, the two have been dominant in the AL East and NL Central divisions.
Led by AL MVP front-runner Aaron Judge, this Yankees squad has been one of the top offensive teams in the league all year. They lead the league with 222 home runs (almost 1.5 per game), 760 total runs and are slugging .470. They haven’t clinched the division over the rival Baltimore Orioles, but with a 4.5-game lead, they are likely to do so very soon.
The Brewers have put up solid numbers this season despite being in the worst division on paper. They clinched the division with relative ease, with the just-above .500 Chicago Cubs 11 games back. They are a top-five pitching and hitting team (3.64 ERA and 735 runs), and are capable of making a deep postseason run.
Seattle’s base-running disasters
Sometimes an overlooked skill in baseball, base running is one of the game’s fundamentals that’s taught during tee-ball. In the second half of the season especially, the Seattle Mariners, however, have moments when it seems like they’ve forgotten those fundamentals.
The first blooper of the week was in a bases-loaded, two-outs scenario with former NLCS MVP Justin Turner of the Mariners at the plate against the Yankees. After a 2-0 pitch missed the zone to make it three balls and no strikes, Yankees pitcher Luis Gil looked to be taking his time and slowly walked back to the mound and grabbed the rosin bag. The Seattle runner on third, Victor Robles, decided it was the right time to steal home, but Gil was aware of the situation, quickly threw the ball to his catcher to record the out and the Mariners left the inning empty-handed.
The next day, when the Mariners and Yankees went to extra innings, Seattle found themselves with a 2-2 count in the bottom of the 10th. Randy Arozarena stepped into the box looking to score Julio Rodriguez, who was on third. On a 90-mph offspeed pitch, Arozarena swung and let go of the bat, which flew right to Rodriguez. The startled base runner jumped out of the way, toward his dugout, and New York catcher Austin Wells threw the ball to third-baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. to notch the out.
A first in San Francisco
The San Francisco Giants’ McCovey Cove is one of the most famous landmarks in baseball. The Cove is the mouth of a creek that leads into the bay where players have been hitting home runs for 25 years. Not just every player’s hit homers there, though—only lefties have hit the ball 366 feet into the cove.
Giants outfielder Heliot Ramos changed that this week when he became the first righty to do it. On a full count in the bottom of the ninth inning, San Diego Padres pitcher Robert Suárez threw a 100-mph fastball to the outside of the plate which Ramos took the opposite way. Even though it took a righty 25 years to nail one into the Cove, it all makes sense when looking at the bat’s angle, the necessary speed and the distance that needs to be covered.
The double play going into the weekend
The New York Mets have garnered a one-and-a-half game lead over the Atlanta Braves for an NL Wild Card bid. Facing one of the top teams in the league in the Philadelphia Phillies does not make it easy to hold on in the season’s final weeks, but it is imperative they do so if they want to keep their season alive.
Prediction: The Mets take two of three games.
Similar to last week, the Braves are on the other side of that coin. They have a much easier opponent in the second-worst team—the Miami Marlins. Coming off of a 20-4 loss against the Los Angeles Dodgers, Miami will try to play spoiler at the end of the season.
Prediction: The Braves take all three games.
Last weekend the Phillies won their series and the Dodgers split theirs, moving my prediction total to 10-13-3.