MLB Player News

Otañez returns to the big leagues with Luis Medina (elbow) landing on the injured list ahead of Saturday’s game against the Phillies. The 27-year-old righty has made three scoreless relief appearances this season in his first taste of the majors.

Maybe it shouldn’t be a total surprise that Bradish places on the short list of the league’s most inconsistent starters in his first full year back from Tommy John, but his strong showing at the end of the year did suggest more was in store. Still, things do seem to be getting better; he has a 2.78 ERA in his last nine starts after coming in at 5.03 in the first seven. Overall, he’s allowed one or no runs six times and four or more runs five times. He’ll take a 5-7 record and a 3.64 ERA into his next start versus the Nationals.

We’re all about looking on the bright side, and Aldegheri struck out three and walked one tonight, which is a nice improvement on his 5/7 K/BB from his previous three starts this season. Perhaps the Angels could look at alternatives prior to Aldegheri’s next start Sunday against the A’s, but it seems more likely that they’ll just stick with him for now and hope that Grayson Rodriguez can come off the IL and take his spot at the beginning of next month.

Yates was pitching with the Angels down 6-0 in the ninth, so this was hardly a crucial appearance for the 39-year-old. Still, it was nice to see him average 91 mph with his fastball for just the second time this season and fan three batters for the first time. His average fastball tonight was still down 1.7 mph from last year, and there’s little reason to expect big things going forward. However, there’s no one in the Angels pen who is clearly a better bet than Yates at the moment.

And he got to stay in left field the whole way through. That wouldn’t typically be noteworthy, but the Orioles needed someone to play third base after Blaze Alexander got hurt in the third inning tonight. The seemingly obvious move with Jackson Holliday unavailable would have been to lose Coby Mayo as the DH and play him at his natural position, but the Orioles instead galaxy-brained using Leody Taveras at the hot corner, even though Taveras had never played any infield as the pro. Ward, on the other hand, has started at third 42 times as a major leaguer and 101 times as a minor leaguer. Still, Ward stayed put and all worked out in the end. Taveras played five innings at third without incident, and the Orioles did finally sacrifice the DH and stick Mayo at third for the final two innings of a 6-1 win.

Incredibly, the Rockies collected hits in their final eight at-bats tonight. The first four of those, off Garrett Whitlock in the eighth, proved irrelevant, as the Rockies had two runners thrown out on the bases and failed to score. In the ninth, though, they opened up with four straight hits against Aroldis Chapman. The first of those might have been handled by Caleb Durbin at third, and the third was a sac bunt attempt on which the Red Sox were late to cover first base. McCarthy then ended the game with a slapper down the third base line that Jarren Duran kicked around in the left field corner for a triple, handing Chapman his first blown save of the year.

Feltner walked four, but the Red Sox did a poor job of making him pay. It’s the third time in five starts since coming off the IL that Feltner has completed six innings and turned in a quality start. He’s 2-2 with a 4.79 ERA in 10 starts overall, and he’ll likely make his next start Sunday against the Twins.

Bennett was outstanding at Coors Field, generating 15 whiffs and allowing three hard-hit balls. The four hits he gave up were all singles, and he walked none. It should have gotten him his second career victory in six starts, but his 2-0 lead was blown in the ninth. Bennett figures to start again at home against the Yankees on Saturday.

Chapman has lost back-to-back games. The last one was mostly bad luck in a tie game against the Blue Jays. He didn’t have any luck tonight, either, but it was more the defense coming up a little short on a couple of hits and a bunt single on a sacrifice attempt on which Willson Contreras vacated first base and second baseman Andruw Monasterio was late to cover. Chapman allowed just one hard-hit ball, which was a Hunter Goodman single. Still, his ERA more than doubled from 0.83 to 2.08, and he gave up four hits in an outing for the first time with the Red Sox and the fifth time in his 886 career appearances.

It’s unclear if Alex Cora’s frequent shoehorning of Yoshida into the Boston lineup early on this season played a role in his being let go, but it really should have. It has made sense for the Red Sox to roll out Yoshida against righties since Roman Anthony went down, but he’s still not helping at all, having hit .198 with one homer and five RBI in his last 30 games. It seems unlikely that the Red Sox will make a big change this year, but if Yoshida doesn’t pick it up, perhaps they’d be open to releasing him prior to the last year of his five-year, $90 million deal in 2027.

The Nationals had a one-run lead when Mead took Seth Johnson deep, but it did make things more comfortable as Richard Lovelady and Clayton Beeter closed out the contest. It was Mead’s 12th homer in 225 plate appearances. He totaled five in 488 plate appearances with the Rays and White Sox over his first three seasons.