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Four games went into extras last night, and half of them were won by the away team. I don’t know if that’s more or less than I expected, honestly. Also totally unrelated but Chris Sale has a 2.08 ERA in his age 37 season.
Today’s Headlines
Tar1k
Replacing a letter in somebody’s name with a number for a reference is the refuge of scoundrels but I cannot help doing it for stuff like this. I’m sorry. But not really. Please re2pect my choices.
Tarik Skubal made what might be his last start (of 2026 at least) in a Tigers uniform on Wednesday, and it kicked off with a career milestone as he got Taylor Ward to swing over a changeup for his 1,000th career strikeout. Skubal’s 1,000th strikeout, to be clear. Ward is at 790 strikeouts for his career.
Skubal’s up to 116 punchies on the year which is pretty impressive given that he’s thrown roughly 20 less innings than the guys around him on the leaderboard. I guess that’s why we’re all speculating about where his next start will take place, huh? His entire 6.2 inning appearance against the Orioles was a show of his usual dominance, giving up four hits, one walk, striking out six, and leaving with the Tigers up 7-1.
Unfortunately, things took a turn once Kyle Finnegan came in from the bullpen and proceeded to go walk, single, single before being lifted for Drew Anderson, letting both of the runners he inherited from Skubal score in addition to a pair of his own. The O’s tied things up in the eighth on a two-run triple from Coby Mayo:
The score remained all knotted up at seven each until the 11th inning when Baltimore added a pair of runs, which were quickly matched by a leadoff two-run homer from Spencer Torkelson (sometimes the Manfred Man does lead to fun little happenings, I suppose.)
Not a bad way to hit your 100th career dinger, I suppose. Detroit wouldn’t be able to get the run they really needed, though, and Baltimore got a clutch two-out single from Colton Cowser to score what would end up being the winning run in the 12th.
Skubal took an optimistic tack on the milestone outing in his post-game interview:
“Some of these accomplishments just hit different,” he said. “That one, for whatever reason, just felt more special than every other one. The first time I struck out 200 in a season felt special to me, and I don’t really know why. Just as I was getting closer, I was like, ‘This is pretty cool.’
“And when you take in my career, you get a little bit nostalgic in those moments. I don’t know if I could’ve convinced myself when I was 19 that I would strike out a thousand guys in the big leagues. Just little things like that are special. It might not mean a lot; the guy right next to me [Justin Verlander] has got 3,500 of them. But nonetheless, they’re special to me.”
…
“I want to live in the moment. There’s a lot of stuff going on around me that I have no control in,” Skubal said. “I try to be pretty present all the time. And when the fans get on their feet like that and give you a pretty good ovation, it’s special. It’ll never not be special, and it’s something I’ve always appreciated. And hopefully they feel the same way. Hopefully they feel like I’ve given everything to the team, to the city, because I truly have.”
It’s taken him 857 innings to get to the mark, setting a new franchise record previously held by Max Scherzer. We’ll have to wait and see what uniform Skubal is wearing next time he toes the rubber as the Tigers are now seven games under .500 and have four teams between them and the third AL Wild Card spot. It sounds like the man himself doesn’t expect it to be with Detroit.
Cam And Went
Skubal wasn’t the only ace to do his job and be undone by his bullpen yesterday, as Cam Schlittler threw a gem:
Seated for the Schlitt Show 🍿#RepBX
— New York Yankees (@yankees.mlbbsky.com) 2026-07-30T01:59:38.000Z
Schlittler now has an AL-best 2.04 ERA, the best stretch for a Yankee starter through July since Ron Guidry’s 2.02 ERA in 1973.
Cam left with the Yankees up 4-1, with three of their runs coming off the bat of Spencer Jones, who hits the ball pretty hard:
The White Sox got their revenge in the bottom of the eighth, however, thanks to back-to-back dingers from Sam Antonacci (a two-run job) and (who else) Munetaka Murakami:
The Yankees retook the lead in the 11th on an Anthony Volpe sac fly, but a deeply ill-advised pickoff attempt in the bottom half of the inning let Murakami score to tie the game yet again:
MUNE STAYS READY 😤
onto the 12th 👀 pic.twitter.com/jJglQAAmIb
— White Sox on CHSN (@CHSN_WhiteSox) July 30, 2026
The Yankees wasted a bases-loaded, one-out opportunity in the top of the 12th, and a Chase Meidroth sac bunt followed by an Edgar Quero single brought Tristan Peters around to score, and now the White Sox will look to split the series on Thursday.
A Real Life Trade!
Ok sorry that’s probably overhyping it. Yesterday the Angels sent Logan O’Hoppe and Chase Silseth to the Rangers in exchange for infielder Angel Arredondo, who is currently in low-A. It’s…definitely a trade.
were the angels just trying to dump O’Hoppe’s minimal salary because I got nothing www.nytimes.com/athletic/747…
— Keith Law (@keithlaw.bsky.social) 2026-07-30T03:31:58.546Z
O’Hoppe has played 74 games this year, starting at catcher in 68 of them, but he’s only slashing .209/.271/.295 and his defensive numbers are…bad. I won’t list them all but everything on Savant is below zero. Silseth, on the other hand, is enjoying a very good season, sporting a 2.72 ERA over 39.2 innings, although his xERA ad FIP are both roughly a full run higher. It’s easy to see how both of these guys would slot in on the Rangers, although Texas has already assigned O’Hoppe to AAA. The AL West remains very tight, with the Rangers as the only team above .500 and trying to expand a 1.5-game lead over Houston coming into the home stretch.
By The Numbers
3 times this season the Giants have scored 16+ runs in a game, the most in MLB.
101.9 the minimum velocity on Mason Miller’s fastball in his save against Colorado yesterday.
Best Moments From Yesterday
Hot Corner For All!
Gabriel Arias hit a double in Cleveland’s 6-1 win over the Reds yesterday, and showed us that it’s not just the fielder who needs to always be ready for the ball over at third base:
That’s some heads-down ball from Mike Estabrook.
R.A. Vaughn
It was a game to forget for the Brewers, who got a 16-3 thrashing at the hands of the Giants, but it did mean we got to see Andrew Vaughn pitch an inning which featured him hucking an 82.5mph fastball as well as a bunch of actually pretty impressive knuckleballs, including a pair to induce a swinging strikeout for Osleivis Basabe:
That first one you can see right at the beginning of the clip has a reading of 15 rpm on Savant. It was one of five pitches that measured at less than 50 rpm, and seven under 100. That’s fun.
Injuries and Other Moves
⚾ Nick Kurtz came out of the game yesterday after being hit in the forearm in the first inning. We should have more news soon.
⚾ The Red Sox officially moved Curtis Mead to the IL with a fractured wrist. He looks to avoid surgery, but the timetable for his return is still 6-8 weeks.
⚾ Minnesota placed Byron Buxton on the IL due to a right hip impingement. He suffered a right hip strain earlier this month and only just returned from that IL stint.
Articles You Should Read
Things Have Turned Out Pretty Well for Jake Mangum – Michael Baumann, FanGraphs
How a No-trade Clause Can Still Become a Yes: ‘Use That as a Leverage Weapon’ – Andy McCullough and Dennis Lin, The Athletic (gift link)
The Alluring Mediocrity of Tomoyuki Sugano – Bradley Woodrum, Baseball Prospectus (sub req’d)
Fantasy Baseball Coverage
