MLB Player News

Cole has been sidelined since early June due to neck tightness. The Blue Jays don’t exactly have a ton of room in their major-league bullpen at the moment, so there’s a chance he remains at Triple-A Buffalo once he completes his rehab assignment.

McNeil has hit three of his six homers the last two days. His exit velocity numbers aren’t any better than usual this year, but he’s pulling the ball more frequently and also striking out less than ever. It’s led to an excellent .257/.355/.533 line so far. That .276 isolated slugging percentage is more than twice as high as his .125 mark over the previous three years. Alas, while things are definitely looking up here, McNeil unfortunately does not have any games remaining against the Rockies.

While Mets hitters were combining to hit six homers, Megill allowed none to Colorado. He’s surrendered just five in 64 2/3 innings on the season. Throw in the outstanding 30% strikeout rate, and it’s kind of surprising he’s not doing better than a 3.76 ERA. Alas, it’d held him back that he has far weaker numbers with men on base than with the bases empty. He remains a fair mixed-league play anyway, and he’ll get the Rays next.

The smart ballclub let one pitcher throw four innings to finish the 13-5 game today. The other wasted four of its five best relievers. Poor Victor Vodnik, who has already missed six weeks with shoulder inflammation this season, made 36 pitches over two innings after having already pitched Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. Blackburn might be good for a couple of more saves like this over the course of the year. There’s the chance he’ll be needed in the rotation at some point, but with Frankie Montas and Sean Manaea on the way back, the Mets would prefer that not be the case.

Only six of the 15 balls in play against Dollander were hard hit, but those six produced two homers, a double and three singles, and the rookie also gave up two soft hits besides. Dollander, who was moved up in the rotation to make this start instead of facing the Giants on Tuesday, is now 2-6 with a 6.85 ERA. He’ll pitch in Atlanta next weekend.

Alonso had three hard-hit balls in the contest, but the second homer didn’t cross the threshold; it left his bat at 94.4 mph. The homers were his 16th and 17th of the year, and he tied and passed David Wright to move into second place on the Mets’ all-time list at 243. He’s only nine behind Darryl Strawberry for first place.

Just us thinking about how the Rockies were leaving Freeman on the bench two-thirds of the time so that they could play Nick Martini and Kyle Farmer. At least he’s playing now, and he’s opened June 11-for-23 with five extra-base hits and no strikeouts in seven games, putting him at .306/.366/.468 on the season.

As a team the Orioles were only able to scratch out one run on eight hits in the contest against Jacob Lopez and company. Rutschman walked in the first inning, singled in the third and singled in the fifth before being retired for the first time on a ground ball back to the mound in the seventh. With his two-hit effort, the 27-year-old backstop is now hitting .227/.321/.374 with seven homers and 18 RBI on the season.

It was a curious decision by Reds manager Terry Francona to use Santillan on Sunday. Emilio Pagan has pitched just once since picking up his 15th save on June 3. Pagan threw a scoreless inning in a non-save situation on Friday, meaning he had a day of rest before the save situation arose Sunday. It’s unclear why exactly Pagan didn’t pitch, though it’s clear if the Reds make a change in the ninth inning Santillan would be an option to close along with Graham Ashcraft.

The 35-year-old right-hander walked one batter while striking out two in the ballgame. The A’s got to him early and often in this one, scratching out a run in the opening inning and adding three more (one unearned) in the second. Sugano settled in nicely afterwards, but the damage had already been done. He got four whiffs on 87 pitches on the afternoon, posting an underwhelming CSW of only 17 percent. He’ll attempt to bounce back as he carries a 3.23 ERA, 1.10 WHIP and a 42/12 K/BB ratio (75 1/3 innings) into Saturday’s matchup against the Angels.

Arozarena got the scoring started in the ballgame as he drove in Julio Rodriguez with an RBI double off of Tyler Anderson in the top half of the first inning. He also started a rally with a one-out single in the fifth inning then swiped second base and scored on an RBI knock off the bat of Jorge Polanco. With his three-hit attack, Arozarena is now slashing .228/.344/.386 with seven homers, 26 RBI and 11 stolen base (in 11 attempts) on the season.