MLB Player News

At .291/.355/.417 in 223 at-bats, the 26-year-old Luna was outhitting Belliard this season. He’s not a particularly good defender at second, but since he can also play shortstop, third base and the outfield corners, he’s a pretty valuable player. This is disappointing news for those who picked Joe Inglett up in AL-only leagues, as instead of taking over as a regular, Inglett will have to compete for time at second base. The Indians need to figure out if either can be counted on as a 2007 regular. Luna becomes a decent pickup in AL-only leagues.

Jackson Merrill’s fourth-inning single was the only hit the Cardinals could muster. With his velocity up by about one mph, McGreevy got 17 whiffs tonight and bested his previous high for strikeouts by two. He’s now 3-2 with a 2.18 ERA on the season, though this is really the first time he’s looked like someone who can back that up. He entered the night with a 16 percent strikeout rate, a 4.38 SIERA and a 5.77 xERA. We still wouldn’t want to use him in mixed leagues next week in Sacramento against the A’s.

All of the runs came in the fifth, when Canning gave up four singles, a double and two walks before departing. The big blow was JJ Wetherholt’s groundball single to right with the bases loaded. Fernando Tatis Jr. was anticipating throwing out the runner from second at the plate, but instead the ball rolled under his glove for a Little League grand slam. Canning struck out five and allowed just two hits and no walks through four. This leaves him with a 6.75 ERA after two starts, but he’s pitched better than that suggests. He’ll face the Brewers next.

All four hits were singles and only one was a hard-hit ball, but his roll continues. Herrera is batting .320 with three homers and seven doubles in his last 20 games.

Machado seemed to have things turned around there for about a week, but now he’s back down to .195/.305/.344 on the season. His EV numbers are down some, and his strikeout rate is up some. He should still bounce back, but maybe not to his usual norms.

Vientos was practically the lone source of offense for the Mets here. His solo home run in the second inning stood as their only run until the top of the 10th when he hit an RBI double on the first pitch of the frame. After being lifted for a pinch runner, Carson Benge drove his replacement Vidal Bruján to give the Mets a valuable insurance run. That means Vientos had a hand in all three of the runs they scored in this win. While it doesn’t always look pretty, Vientos has four home runs, 11 RBI, and an .824 OPS over his last 15 games as he tries to reestablish himself as a true middle of the order bat.

McLean made it look easy in this one. Besides a solo home run by Nolan Arenado, only one other Diamondback reached scoring position. That came in the first inning while Arenado’s homer was in the second, so Arizona didn’t threaten at any point after then. He forced multiple swings-and-misses with four different pitches and located his four-seam fastball especially well against left-handed batters, which can sometimes be a problem for him. Next, he’s scheduled to face the Tigers back home in Citi Field.

Otherwise shut down by Nolan McLean and the Mets’ bullpen, Arenado’s solo home run was the only run the Diamondbacks could push across in this one. It was his sixth long ball of the year and despite not hitting the ball hard very often and making generally poor swing decisions, he’s been highly productive thus far. His .271/.320/.449 is a huge step up from the hitter he’s been over the past few seasons, it just feels unsustainable given his underlying stats.

Nelson leaned on his trusted fastball to put together his best start of the season here. Any good game against the Mets’ anemic offense should be taken with a grain of salt, but he completed six innings for the first time all year and did so blowing fastball after fastball by them. That pitch accounted for six of his nine total whiffs and he threw them nearly 60% of the time. It had a 70% strike rate and the Mets only managed three hard-hit balls against it. Besides a solo home run from Mark Vientos, they practically never made Nelson sweat. Nelson has now stacked back-to-back good games after his two-start disaster from a few weeks ago and will try to keep the momentum rolling in his next scheduled start on the road against the Rangers.

The Cubs can do no wrong at the moment and Suzuki has been at the center of their surge. His home run here was a towering shot that traveled 419 feet and was hit 110 mph off the bat. Past that, he drew walks that were part of rallies in the first and seventh innings. On the season, he has a .304/.414/.565 slash line with seven home runs across 25 games.

The Cubs’ starting pitcher corps has been depleted by injuries, so they called on Brown to return to their rotation and he delivered them four quality innings. He leaned on his knuckle-curve as his primary pitch and it forced five of his nine total swings-and-misses. Also, his fastball didn’t lose much velocity despite him throwing 46 pitches, the most he’s thrown in a single outing since March 31st. Javier Assad threw bulk innings in relief later in this game and it feels like these two could be in a piggy-back situation moving forward. If Brown sticks in the rotation for another turn, he’ll face the Braves in Atlanta.