MLB Player News

Bard was claimed off waivers by the Yankees from the division-rival Rays in early August and wound up making just one relief appearance for New York before being send back to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. The 31-year-old right-hander holds a respectable 4.44 ERA, 1.11 WHIP and 68/25 K/BB ratio across 81 innings (55 appearances, three starts) between the Yankees, Rays and Angels in the majors since 2018.

And that’s why no matter how much better Pedro Pagés’s defense is, the Cardinals need to have Herrera in the lineup most of the time. The bat is plenty good to justify starts at DH, as well. Herrera’s three-homer game is the first ever by a Cardinals catcher. All three blasts traveled at least 395 feet and were homers in all 30 ballparks, says Statcast. The hilarious thing was that the Angels intentionally walked Nolan Arenado to face Herrera in the seventh, after he had hit two homers, and it worked! Herrera struck out in that at-bat before hitting a three-run homer an inning later. Herrera is 7-for-15 to start the season. His career line is up to .298/.374/.438 in 342 plate appearances.

Gray was outstanding for six innings today, giving up only a homer to Mike Trout and amassing a 9/0 K/BB. The seventh, though, started with two singles and a bounced HBP on an 0-2 pitch to Nolan Schanuel. Gray’s next and final pitch was hit for a grand slam by Logan O’Hoppe. Obviously, it makes for a lousy box score, but this was an extremely encouraging outing from Gray after his rough spring and average season debut. With his velocity up by about one mph, he got 22 whiffs on 48 swings and had a 40% CSW. He’ll get the Pirates next.

Kikuchi gave the Angels the quality start they badly needed today and even left in line for the win after the team took a 5-3 lead in the top of the seventh. The tired bullpen couldn’t hold it, though. Kikuchi also allowed three runs in six innings against the White Sox his first time out, but he’s yet to earn a win. He’ll face the Rays next.

Pretty much everyone in the Angels pen besides Anderson was burnt out coming into this one — and even Anderson, who threw 11 pitches Tuesday, was going back-to-back days — but the team decided against calling up anyone. Anderson took over with a 5-3 lead in the seventh and blew the lead then. Even so, he was left in with the score tied to open the eighth. All three batters then reached against him, two of them while trying to sac bunt. Brock Burke, working for the third time in four days, took over and allowed the three runners to score before giving up four runs of his own. The Angels then used Reid Detmers, who has never been a reliever before and threw 40 pitches Monday, to finish the game off. It’s really pretty disgusting that the Angels didn’t protect their guys by bringing up a fresh arm, but they hoped to get away with it in advance of having Thursday off.

O’Hoppe’s second career slam and second homer of 2025 brought an end to what had been a stellar outing from Gray, giving the Angels all kinds of momentum as they took a 5-3 lead. They did lose 12-5, however.

Massey gave the Royals a 2-1 lead in the 10th on an infield single. It’s the third RBI of the season for the 27-year-old, and he’s off to a non-descript .273/.292/.364 slash to open the 2025 campaign.

Rodriguez opened the regular season on the shelf with elbow inflammation. There isn’t an official return timetable yet, but he’s trending towards rejoining Baltimore’s rotation at some point in May. The 25-year-old righty should progress to facing hitters in a live batting practice session at some point soon before he’s cleared to start a minor league rehab assignment.

It was an awful game for Turang for 10 1/3 innings, but he was able to squeeze in the game-winner to make it a happy day for the Brewers and a day that could have been worse for fantasy managers who roster him. The 25-year-old is hitting .320/.333/.440 to begin the year, so it’s hard to complain about the production thus far.

Chourio started the scoring with a solo homer off Cole Ragans to lead off the game. That would be the last run that the Brewers would score until the 10th inning when Chourio came up hughe with an RBI double to tie the game at 2-2. The 21-year-old star is now hitting .286 with a .500 slugging mark over the first six games of 2025.

Peralta and Cole Ragans gave baseball fans one of the best pitching duels of the season Wednesday, and unfortunately that means neither gets a win. Peralta allowed an RBI single in the second to Cavan Biggio, but from that point on he was outstanding; forcing 19 swings and misses while striking out eight with no walks. Peralta has been excellent in both starts this year and now has a 2.08 ERA over those two outings, but zero wins to show for it. Fair sport. He gets the Rockies next week.