Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:
Phillies 6, Mets 3: The Phillies beat the Mets in walkoff fashion for the second straight day and, once again, they came from behind to do it. Philly trailed 3-1 heading into the bottom of the ninth but Maikel Franco tied it up with a two-run homer off of Edwin Díaz. Two more Phillies batters reached to bring up Jean Segura. Díaz, still pitching, then served up a walk-off three-run home run and that was that. The Phillies came into the series losers of seven straight but completed a four-game sweep. The Mets came in embattled and flailing and continue to flail.
Rangers 3, Tigers 1: Rangers starter Ariel Jurardo tossed seven shutout innings and was staked to a 2-0 lead thanks to two Joey Gallo solo homers and Shin-Soo Choo hitting a sac fly for a third run. Texas has won five in a row and, thanks to the Astros skid, are only four and a half games back in the AL West.
Pirates 10, Astros 0: About that skid: Josh Bell, Kevin Newman, Corey Dickerson, Starling Marte and Jacob Stallings all hit homers for the Pirates as they routed the Astros for the second straight game. Joe Musgrove tossed six shutout innings and three Bucco relievers no-hit Houston for the final three innings. The Astros have lost nine of 11 games and, as stated above, now only lead the Rangers by four and a half. I’d love to see a race here given how few races we’ve seen, so please, keep this up Houston.
Rays 5, Twins 2: This game was tied at two by the second inning and then it stayed tied until the friggin’ 18th. I love me some baseball and everything, but that’s a bit much. Especially considering that there was a nearly one-hour rain delay here before they got underway AND the game lasted five hours and forty-two minutes. As it was, Yandy Díaz broke the tie with a sac fly before Willy Adames and Ji-Man Choi each singled in runs to give Tampa Bay the winning margin. Nineteen pitchers were used in this game. It wasn’t that long ago when two teams wouldn’t have had nineteen available pitchers between them for a ballgame.
Brewers 4, Mariners 2: Orlando Arcia hit a three-run homer in Milwaukee’s four-run fourth inning after Chase Anderson bunted in run on a suicide squeeze. Anderson likewise allowed only one earned-run while working into the sixth to help the Brewers salvage one in the three-game set.
Cubs 9, Braves 7: Atlanta took a 6-1 lead by the fourth but it didn’t hold thanks to the Cubs scoring seven runs between the fourth and the fifth. Former Brave Jason Heyward tripled in a run in the fifth to tie things up and Victor Caratini hit a two-run homer, scoring Heyward, to give the Cubs the lead in the same inning. The clubs traded runs to make it 9-7 Cubs by the sixth and that set the stage for new Cub — and former Brave — Craig Kimbrel to lock down his first save in his first game in 2019. as is often the case with Kimbrel, it wasn’t a stress-free affair. He got two quick outs before putting two on and then getting out of the jam thanks to a diving play by Anthony Rizzo when Kimbrel failed to cover first base. I suppose that happens when you didn’t get a spring training and thus didn’t get to do all of those pitcher fielding drills.
Nationals 8, Marlins 5: Victor Robles and Matt Adams homered in Washington’s five-run sixth inning to erase a three-run deficit. Juan Soto and Kurt Suzuki also went deep. The Nationals have won 8 of 10 and are not at .500. What a difference a month makes.
Dodgers 12, Rockies 8: A Coors Field special, with 20 runs on 33 hits between ’em. Three of those hits and four of those runs came off of Wade Davis in the ninth inning, with Chris Taylor singling in a run and Kiké Hernandez hitting a three-run pinch-hit homer to turn a tie game into a Dodgers win. Taylor had for hits on the night. Max Muncy, Cody Bellinger, Alex Verdugo and Justin Turner all homered for L.A. Muncy homered twice. The Dodgers have beaten the Rockies 12 straight times.
Diamondbacks 5, Giants 1: Dbacks starter Alex Young made his major league debut, allowing one run on five hits in five innings, with a Brandon Belt solo homer as the only blemish. After that Snakes’ bullpen no-hit the Giants for the final four frames. I feel like “Brandon Belt hits solo homer, Giants otherwise shut out” is something I’ve seen in the box scores 10 times this year, but it’s probably just me imagining things. Nick Ahmed and Carson Kelly went deep for Arizona.
Angels 8, Athletics 3: Kole Calhoun and Shohei Ohtani each hit two-run homers and every Angels batter in the lineup had at least one hit. Starter Griffin Canning allowed only three hits over six while striking out six in helping the Halos to their fourth straight win.
