Sweeps. Lots of sweeps. As well as a home run that was and another that wasn’t. Wednesday’s MLB action provided all that and much more.
Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball:
Phillies Sweep Marlins
Not only were there loads of sweeps on Wednesday as series concluded, but they had postseason race implications. What a treat! Unless the team you were rooting for was on the wrong side of one of the sweeps, that is.
The Marlins still have wild-card hopes, for instance, but they shrank considerably in the last three days thanks to the Phillies. Philadelphia swept Miami at home, knocking the Marlins to .500 at 64-64, and four games back of the third wild-card spot, behind two other teams closer to it than they are. Aaron Nola shined for the Phils, throwing seven innings with eight strikeouts against a single walk, and mostly scattering five hits to give up one run.
With a little help from the defense, Nola’s strong effort wasn’t wasted. Here’s left fielder Brandon Marsh making a heck of a play in foul territory in the eighth, with two runners on and the Marlins threatening.
The game-winning hit came much earlier than that, however, courtesy trade deadline acquisition Luis Arraez. The second baseman hit his sixth home run of the season, a two-run shot off Sandy Alcantara in the third, to give Philadelphia a 3-0 lead.
The Phillies would hold on, 4-1, and reach 70 wins in the process. Philadelphia is two games up on the Padres for the second wild-card spot in the NL, and four games behind the Cubs for the top one. Meanwhile, the Marlins will now try to get back above .500 and close the gap with San Diego as they face the Nationals over the weekend.
And Dodgers Sweep Rockies
The Rockies aren’t playing for much at this point in terms of wins and losses, other than trying to avoid a fourth-straight 100-loss season, or having the worst record in the majors. Facing the Dodgers doesn’t exactly help with either of those goals, either in theory or practice: Los Angeles swept the Rockies, and did so with a couple of doses of Mookie Betts.
In the fourth, Betts added on to the Dodgers’ lead with his 16th homer of the year, a 375 footer off starter Kyle Freeland.
Betts would then drive in the dagger in extras, after first baseman Freddie Freeman broke the tie with a sac fly in the top of the 10th. The shortstop picked up his third hit of the day and second RBI with a single to center, making it 6-4, Dodgers.
Betts’ season line is never going to fully recover after a poor start that saw his OPS fall to .591 on June 12. However, he’s batting .273/.313/.458 with 10 of his 16 homers and 10 doubles in the 56 games and 230 plate appearances since, which will certainly play when combined with his glove: Betts has now managed to get to a league-average two wins above replacement with over a month of games left to improve on that. There have been far worse worse seasons than this one.
And! Twins Sweep Braves
Phillies over Marlins and Dodgers over Rockies? Those are the kinds of sweep you maybe don’t expect, but aren’t surprised by. The Twins over the Braves, though? That’s an upset. The Twins are under .500 even after winning three of three from Atlanta, while the Braves were, before this series, right there with the Dodgers fighting for a bye of the Wild Card Series.
Kody Clemens had something to say about all that, though. The Twins’ second baseman and left fielder hit a two-run double scoring outfielders Byron Buxton and Luke Keaschall in the fourth inning, driving in the runners that reliever Luke Dodd inherited from AJ Smith-Shawver.
And then, with the game tied 4-4 following three unanswered runs from the Braves, Clemens did it again, this time singling in DH Josh Bell in the seventh to make it a 5-4 game.
That would prove to be the game-winner: after reliever Kody Funderbunk allowed three runs to tie things back up, Atlanta couldn’t get back on the scoreboard against Minnesota’s other four relievers. The Braves have been stuck at 74 wins for a few days now — three behind the Dodgers — while the Twins are actually in possession of the AL’s final wild-card spot, with a half-game lead over the Rangers.
White Sox? Avoid A Sweep
You know who wasn’t swept? If you read the section heading, then yes, what an inane question to ask. The White Sox lost the first two games of this series to the Cubs thanks to walk-off hits, but managed to win the third and pull even with the other Chicago squad for the season, 3-3.
Most of the White Sox offense came in the eighth, when right fielder Braden Montgomery hit his 11th double of the season two drive in a pair and give the Pale Hose a 3-0 lead.
That would be all the scoring in the game, too: the White Sox got two innings out out of Sean Newcomb to start, then six scoreless from José Urquidy. While trade deadline pickup Clay Holmes gave up one run over 5 ⅓ for the Cubs, that was one run too many.
The Cubs can afford a loss or two no problem, as they are six games up on the next-best team outside the wild cards, but the White Sox needed a dub to keep their distance from the Twins, who now sit four back in the AL Central.
Pirates Walk Off Tigers
The Pirates lost the series opener but picked up the next two wins, which is a little bit of a surprise given the opposing direction the two teams have been going in of late, but don’t discount what having Oneil Cruz back in the lineup and in the field means. Cruz went 1-for-3 with an RBI and a walk in his second game back, and just as importantly both the bullpen and the lineup picked things up for Paul Skenes after he departed: Skenes allowed three runs in 4 ⅓ innings, but that’s all Detroit would get.
In the ninth, catcher Rafael Flores Jr. — who had entered the game as a pinch-hitter for Henry Davis in the seventh — clubbed a solo homer to tie the game 3-3: it was his second dinger of the day, as he also went yard during that pinch-hit appearance. Closer Kenley Jansen had blown the save against just the second batter he faced, but things were about to get worse: second baseman Brandon Lowe came up with no one on and two outs, and he drilled a middle-inside cutter over the fence for a walk-off homer.
That was Lowe’s 27th dinger of the season, and Jansen’s fifth loss and fifth blown save. The Tigers have slipped to just 1.5 behind the Twins for the last wild-card, but with five other teams in between the two, while the Pirates have narrowed the gap between themselves and the Marlins, and are 5.5 back of the Padres after picking up a game on San Diego with this W.
Alonso Hits 2 No Wait 1 Homer
Orioles DH Pete Alonso hit his 29th homer of the year in the third inning against the Yankees on Wednesday. No one disputes this version of events. Look, here it is, video evidence.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, with the Orioles and Yankees tied 3-3 and the bases empty with two outs, Alonso hit a home run. Or at least, he thought he did, as did a stadium full of fans and a whole lot of people on social media, too.
The call on the field went under review, but was not overturned: Alonso thought he had his 30th homer of the season and a 4-3 lead for Baltimore, but instead, he missed the next two pitches he swung at and struck out to end the inning, with the game still tied.
New York would score two more and end up winning, giving them the series win — the Orioles have a chance at avoiding the sweep on Thursday, though, when the two play their series finale. Baltimore needs the win more than New York, too: the O’s are 1.5 back of a wild-card spot after briefly holding onto one earlier this week.
D-Backs Bend But Don’t Break
It took extra innings, but the Diamondbacks defeated the Red Sox and avoided being swept, and on the same day that the Padres lost to the Mets — that leaves Arizona just a game back of San Diego for the final wild-card spot in the NL, despite dropping the first two games of this series to Boston.
The D-Backs were up 5-2 after the top half of the sixth, but then DH Mickey Gaspar hit his third homer of the year, a three-run shot to tie it up.
The score would stay tied through nine, and Arizona would strike first in extras. DH Nolan Arenado singled in a run to make it 6-5, and a bases-loaded walk to third baseman Jose Fernandez gave the D-backs the insurance they needed to win. Boston would push a run across in the bottom of the 10th, but thanks to that free pass, it didn’t matter.
The Red Sox are still 5.5 up on the Rangers for the last wild-card, with plenty of space between Boston’s spot as the second wild-card and the Twins as the third, given the Sox are nine games over .500 and Minnesota is below it. Arizona, meanwhile, just needs to stay as close to the Padres as possible from here on out: the two end their season in San Diego with a three-game series.
Nationals Knock Rangers From Wild-Card
The Rangers just can’t seem to get over the hump. After losing this series to the Nationals, Texas is 62-65 and half-a-game out of the AL’s last wild-card spot. Cade Cavalli saw to that: he struck out 11 batters in six innings, allowing four baserunners and no runs.
Washington was already ahead 3-0 at this point, but got the W with some additional emphasis: in the seventh, DH Andrés Chaparro went yard with his eighth homer of the season, a 397-foot shot that came off the bat at nearly 105 mph.
Chaparro has played in just 56 games this year, but he’s made the most of the opportunities he’s had: after two seasons of replacement-level play, the 27-year-old is batting .250/.360/.543 in 136 plate appearances.
The Nats might be seven games back of a wild-card spot, but there’s still over a month to play spoiler like this, if nothing else.
