MLB Player News

Littell put together an excellent start on Saturday, shutting out the Reds over seven frames with five strikeouts. He scattered three hits and one walk. The 28-year-old right-hander ends the day with a 4.21 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, and a 104/22 K/BB ratio across 113 1/3 innings. He lines up for a start against the Astros in Houston on Saturday.

Tonight’s homer was hit 106.8 mph off Michael Lorenzen. Grissom’s .246/.325/.410 line isn’t spectacular, but his 47 percent hard-hit rate, in combination with a tiny 11 percent strikeout rate, is very impressive. It seems doubly painful that the Red Sox traded Kyle Harrison for Caleb Durbin when they could have just gone forward with Grissom instead.

Ureña struck out seven in another solid outing. He’s allowed a total of nine runs over 39 innings in his last seven starts, and he’s now 3-4 with a 2.68 ERA overall. Ureña is still a tough sell in mixed leagues as a rookie in a tough situation in Anaheim, but he’s emerging as one of the Angels’ building blocks.

Lorenzen has lost his last six decisions, and his ERA is up to 8.01. The Rockies probably don’t have anyone they want to replace him with at the moment, but this can’t go on for too much longer. He’s given up 99 hits in 60 2/3 innings. The next highest total in the majors in 86 hits, and that’s from Sandy Alcantara, who has worked 82 1/3 innings.

It was Madrigal’s fourth start in eight games since he was called up last week, and he’s now 6-for-15 in the span. Somewhat interesting is that Madrigal has hit balls 111.6 mph this spring and 113.6 mph in Triple-A this year. Previously, his hardest-hit ball was 106.9 mph for the Cubs in 2023. Maybe it’s enough to turn him back into a viable major leaguer, but he also has to stay healthy, which has been a big issue.

Freeman took Walbert Ureña deep to extend his hitting streak to eight games, and he’s up to .277/.353/.380 for the season. It was his third homer in 157 plate appearances, giving him one more than he had in 428 plate appearances last year.

Soderstrom helped complete the Athletics’ comeback with a single off Caleb Thielbar to tie the game in the eighth inning. Heading into this game, he had a .182 batting average against left-handed pitchers, so that knock was as shocking as it was huge. He’s gotten his season back on track with hits in 12 of his last 13 games with three home runs and three doubles over that stretch.

Sterner was tasked with holding onto a one-run lead in the 10th inning and did the job here. The game-changing at-bat came when he struck out Pete Crow-Armstrong with a runner on third and one out after a tough battle. This may have little to do with the Athletics’ closer hierarchy as Hogan Harris came on for the bottom of the ninth in a tie game after nabbing the save on Tuesday. Continue to keep an eye on this bullpen.

Springs could not hold the early lead his offense granted him. Home runs by Seiya Suzuki and Pete Crow-Armstrong plus a run-scoring triple from Michael Busch and a heap of other hard-hit balls between them forced Springs to hit the showers early. Both his bullpen and lineup picked him up though, so he didn’t get saddled with the loss. Proceed with caution ahead of a two-start week for Springs against the Brewers and Rockies, with both starts coming at home.

That’s it, Crow-Armstrong is officially hot. That home run was his second in his last four games and he’s currently riding an eight game hitting streak. He also struck out with a runner on third while down by one in the 10th, but let’s focus on the big picture. Zooming out a bit, Crow-Armstrong’s quality May with a .762 OPS, four home runs, and six stolen bases flew a bit under the radar due to how poor of an April he had plus some extra-curricular antics. Now, it looks like he’s carried that hot hitting into June and is even taking more walks than we’ve ever seen from him during his short big league career. There’s a massive up arrow on Crow-Armstrong right now.

Rea settled in decently well after letting up a run in each of the first two innings and fighting through some traffic in each. He set down seven of the last eight hitters he faced and the only one who reached – Zack Gelof via a walk – was picked off. Now, many of those outs were well hit balls that were fortunately hit directly at a defender, but it’s all the same in the box score. Just be cautious ahead of a two-start week for Rea coming up in Coors Field against the Rockies then in San Francisco against the Giants.