Jose Mijares opts out of deal with Red Sox

From Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports comes word that veteran reliever Jose Mijares officially opted out of his minor league contract with the Red Sox on Sunday morning to pursue a better opportunity.

Mijares was buried too far down the Boston bullpen depth chart to have a legitimate shot at an Opening Day roster spot and will try to latch on with a team that is a little more desperate for relief help. He had an ugly 5.14 ERA in seven innings this spring in Red Sox camp, but the 29-year-old left-hander boasts a 3.23 career ERA in 259 total major league frames.

Mijares has held left-handed batters to a .225/.288/.335 slash line since breaking into the bigs as a 23-year-old in 2008 with the Twins. He should have no trouble finding another contract.

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Christian Yelich simply can’t be stopped. The Brewers outfielder (and defending NL MVP) entered Saturday’s game with a league-leading 11 home runs after swatting two against the Dodgers on Friday night, then clubbed another two homers in the first six innings of Saturday’s game.

The first came on a 2-1 pitch from the Dodgers’ Hyun-Jin Ryu, who lobbed a changeup toward the bottom of the strike zone before it was lifted up and out to center field for a solo home run in the third inning.

While Chase Anderson and Alex Claudio held down the fort against the Dodgers’ lineup, Yelich prepared for his second blast in the sixth inning — this one a 421-foot double-decker on a first-pitch curveball from Ryu.

One pitch. That's all. #ThisIsMyCrew pic.twitter.com/CI5BGNHdZl

— Milwaukee Brewers (@Brewers) April 21, 2019

Yelich’s 13 home runs not only gave him a stronger grip on the league’s leaderboard, but helped him tie yet another franchise record, too. Per MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy, he’s tied with Prince Fielder for the most home runs hit by a Brewers player in a single month, and sits just one home run shy of tying Álex Rodríguez’s 2007 record for most home runs hit within any club’s first 22 games of the season.

It may be far too early to predict which players will finish first in the MVP races this fall, but there’s no denying Yelich has already set himself apart from the competition. Through Saturday’s performance, he’s batting .361/.459/.880 with a 1.329 OPS and MLB-best 31 RBI across 98 PA so far.