MLB Player News

Strotman spent all of last season with the Giants’ Triple-A affiliate, registering a 6.32 ERA and a 63/36 K/BB ratio in 52 2/3 innings. The 26-year-old should just be organizational relief depth for the Astros.

There was a lot of good and also plenty of weird in this start from Meyer. First with the good, he forced 22 total swings-and-misses. That’s only the 16th instance so far this season of a pitcher recording that many whiffs in a single game. The bulk of those came from the combination of his slider and sweeper, which have each been borderline unhittable this season as he’s found some more velocity on each. Now for the weird, he didn’t get many called strikes and found himself hunting for the whiff a bit too often through the fourth, fifth, and sixth innings after his lineup had built him a big lead. He simply wasn’t in the zone enough, especially with his fastball, to give his team any length. Also, he could not figure out Byron Buxton who launched two home runs off him. All in all, this was an encouraging start, just one that felt like it could have yielded better results. Next, he’s lined up for a two-start week against the Mets and Braves with both starts coming at home.

After smoking two home runs in his first seven games of the season, Caissie hadn’t hit one since before this game. That was 28 games and 88 plate appearances ago for a player whose power is their carrying tool. He finally managed to get off the schneid here though with a 400 foot blast off Simeon Woods-Richardson, but still has a lowly .609 OPS and strikeout rate north of 40% as he tries to maintain his strong-side platoon role in the Marlins’ outfield.

When Buxton is hot, he gets really, really hot. This pair of home runs gave him 15 on the season. Seven of those have come in the 11 games he’s played in May. Zoom back a little bit further, and he has 10 over his last 15 games. Stretch it back a little bit further again, and all 15 of Buxton’s home runs have come in his last 26 games. That power surge has tied him with Munetaka Murakami for the third-most long balls in the league while Aaron Judge and Kyle Schwarber are the only hitters with more.

It’s another day that ends in “y” and another awful outing for Woods-Richardson. The Marlins had a run on the board against him before he recorded an out, partially due to an error, and he never settled in. After the Twins tried to stretch him through the fourth inning, he let the first four batters of the inning reach safely, was yanked, and both inherited runners he left came around to score. This latest blowup pushed him to an abhorrent 7.71 ERA on the season with 20 strikeouts and 20 walks through 42 innings. The Twins are likely thinking about anyone in the organization that could possibly take his rotation spot.

The slam off Matthew Liberatore was Kurtz’s third in 15 career at-bats with the bases loaded. It was also his first homer in 63 plate appearances against lefties this season. He’s previously gone 7-for-43 with two RBI in his 12 games in which the opposition started a lefty. Fortunately, he’s done plenty of damage against righties along the way, and he’s currently sporting a .267/.418/.453 line for the year.

Ginn gave up at least one hit each inning, but eight were singles and only four came on hard-hit balls. He induced a double play ball in the first, and the Cardinals went on to make outs on the basepaths in the fourth and sixth. Ginn, who opened 0-1 in five starts and three relief appearances, has pitched 14 innings with one earned run allowed while winning his last two starts. He’ll take his next turn in Anaheim against the Angels. It’s a two-start week, as he’ll also face the Padres on the road, but he’d make for a risky streaming pick.

It’s obviously not a save, but it would have been one if the A’s hadn’t expanded their lead from three runs to four in the bottom of the eighth. The ninth is wide open again in Sacramento after Perkins blew his most recent opportunity on May 6, but he’s clearly still very much in the mix after having gone 3-for-3 last month.

Liberatore’s velocity was a little better than usual tonight and he had great success in amassing a 58 percent CSW on the 19 curveballs he threw, but thanks to Nick Kurtz’s grand slam in the fifth, the results just weren’t there in the end. The loss leaves him 2-2 with a 4.40 ERA. That’s not much different than his 4.21 ERA from last year, but his strikeout and walk rates are both significantly worse now than they were then. If he’s just going to be a fifth starter, it might be worth dropping his changeup and cutter and taking another look at him as a reliever at some point.

Both of his singles came on grounders, one hard and one soft. That was probably to be expected from a guy with a 58 percent groundball rate in Triple-A. Being tied for the highest batting average of all-time (although not the highest OBP of all-time) should earn Bolte another start Thursday against righty Michael McGreevy. He’s only guaranteed to play against lefties after getting the call Tuesday, but the A’s definitely need to see if they can catch lightning in a bottle here.

If Lars Nootbaar can pull off a successful comeback later this month, Scott is probably going to find himself in Triple-A for a spell. He’s hitting just .178/.243/.228, dropping his career line to .202/.277/.283. He’s even disappointed a bit on the basepaths, getting caught on three of his nine steal attempts. Last year, he was 34-for-38.