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It’s incredible to me that we have less than three weeks of regular season baseball left. The summer absolutely flew by, and while I’m excited to not put up with 90-degree heat and humidity every day, I am not ready for the winding down of the season. Well, hey, three weeks is still a lot of baseball!
Today’s Headlines
Cream City Sweep
The Brewers completed a sweep of the Cubs on Wednesday, which also marks the second straight week that the Brewers beating the Cubs has made my lead item. Oh well, they should try not being so good, I guess? Sorry Chicago.
Unlike Tuesday’s game, the Brewers didn’t have to claw their way back to win this one, as they jumped out to a 7-0 lead by the end of the third inning. They scored the first six on a trio of home runs, starting with Christian Yelich driving in three in the first:
Then a solo shot from Jackson Chourio in the second:
And a milestone two-run dinger from William Contreras in the same frame:
That’s career HR number 100 for Wild Bill, and it remains just ridiculous to me how the Brewers managed to win the Sean Murphy trade between Oakland and Atlanta. Has anybody gotten to the bottom of how they even got involved? Need to get Pablo Torre to Find Out about this one.
Chourio added another run in the third inning with an RBI single to score Garrett Mitchell, putting an exclamation point on his incredible performance in this series:
Jackson Chourio put on a SHOW during this three-game sweep 👇🔵 8 Hits🔵 2 HR🔵 6 RBI🔵 4 Runs
— Milwaukee Brewers (@brewersbot.bsky.social) 2026-09-10T03:20:05.000Z
The Cubs finally got on the board in the top of the fourth with an RBI groundout from Michael Busch. Contreras singled in another run in the bottom of the sixth to put the Brewers back up by seven runs, and it ended up being quite a bit more impactful than you might think. The Brewers didn’t need to come from behind on Wednesday, but that doesn’t mean there was no drama…
Brandon Sproat came in to pitch for Milwaukee in the eighth for a quick and mostly uneventful inning as he got a flyout, hit a batter, and then induced a double play to face the minimum. He came back out for the ninth, and things were a bit rougher for him. He started the inning by walking Pete Crow-Armstrong, who stole second on a bad pickoff throw, and then third on a wild pitch. Sproat proceeded to then walk Seiya Suzuki and Michael Busch back-to-back before striking out Alex Bregman. And then he walked Ian Happ to bring in a run with the bases still loaded. The Brewers were still up 8-2 at that point, and Sproat exited in favor of Abner Uribe. Nico Hoerner then won a six-pitch battle with Uribe that ended with a single to bring in another Chicago run, but he did get the second out of the inning on a Pedro RamÃrez groundout, albeit with another Cub crossing the plate on the run. So currently the score is 8-4 with two outs in the top of the ninth. Uribe’s first pitch to Michael Conforto was a center-cut sinker at 99.7 mph and Conforto smashed it into the right-center gap for a double to bring home another pair of Chicago runs:
That’s 8-6 now, after the Cubs put up five runs in the top half of the ninth. But that would be all, as Uribe struck out BJ Murray Jr., and the entire home crowd at AmFam finally exhaled.
It’s been a weird season for the Cubs:
Chris posted this yesterday. Today the Cubs were swept by the Brewers and are 10 games back with 15 games left.Just an absolutely incredible thing.
— Doug Gray (@dougdirt24.bsky.social) 2026-09-10T02:44:56.095Z
But it’s been a pretty dominant season for the Brewers, with the best record in baseball, that 10-game lead in the division, and a magic number to clinch the NL Central of only five right now.
Wild West
The Brewers have the best record in baseball but only the second-largest division lead, which would be the 11 games that separate the Dodgers and Padres. But while the division might be out of reach for the Dads, their four-game win streak has put them half a game up on Arizona for the third wild card spot. The Nats struck first on Wednesday, putting up two runs in the top of the third, but the Padres immediately responded with a trio of their own in the bottom half of the inning and didn’t look back. Jackson Merrill played the hero for San Diego, going 4-for-5 with a triple, two homers, two runs, and six runs batted in:
That makes him personally responsible for a full two-thirds of the Padres run output! Merrill’s been on fire in the second half of the season, but his first few months were so bad his overall line is still pretty middling, so hopefully people will forget about him come draft season in 2027. Or if they read PL, probably not:
The Padres and D-Backs actually end the regular season with a three-game series against each other, so hopefully that’s a high-stakes playoff-deciding weekend rather than just going through the motions for a predetermined playoff picture.
Big 44 Brings Phillies Within 3
And now to the NL East! Atlanta was once seemingly unassailable atop the division, but there’s only so long you can fight off Kyle Schwarber, right? The Astros found that out the hard way on Wednesday, as they fought a pitched battle with the Phillies. They put up four runs in the top of the third inning thanks to a double from Yordan Alvarez to score Cam Smith, then a two-run homer from Isaac Paredes to score Yordan, and a Yainer Diaz single to score Jose Altuve. Houston didn’t enjoy the lead for long, though, as the Phillies tied it up in the bottom half of the third, although they scored their runs in more chaotic ways (of course they did, it’s the Phillies!) First we have Trea Turner earning his treats by making Bryan De La Cruz play a little jump rope on a ground ball single:
And then Bryce Harper scoring both Turner and De La Cruz on a single that seemed to really sneak up on Christian Walker:
Luis Arraez then proceeded to nearly take Hunter Brown’s head off with a single back up the middle to score Harper:
Smith hit a two-run homer in the fourth to put the Astros back on top, but the Phillies scored one on a solo Turner dinger in the fifth and busted things open in the sixth. Edmundo Sosa singled home Arraez, and a bases-loaded walk to De La Cruz put the Phillies back on top. Schwarber then added some insurance runs:
“Do what you do best” indeed.
Houston would get another run from a Paredes single in the seventh, but the Phillies went on to win 11-7. Schwarber’s heroics helped us all not focus on the terrible, no-good day that Cristopher Sánchez had, as he pitched six innings, giving up 10 hits, six runs (all earned), and only striking out three. All’s well that ends well, I suppose. And with that win, the Phillies are suddenly only three games back of Atlanta. They finish up the series against Houston today but then play Atlanta this weekend, so we could see a new leader in the division come Monday.
Catch And Release
Ok well, we can’t only talk about division leaders or races today, so that’s right, it’s time for the Mets and Marlins! Wednesday’s tilt was a wild affair, with the Mets putting up six runs in the second inning:
And another pair in the third on a Christopher Morel homer:
Janson Junk only made it through those three innings, and it was a pretty rough day for a guy who actually threw the ball pretty well according to the computah:
Janson Junk (MIA) allowed eight earned runs in three innings against the Mets
— Pitcher List Stats (@pitcherlistplv.pitcherlist.com) 2026-09-10T02:22:12.811Z
I reckon most pitchers would gladly have one of those days where you have your F stuff and your A results. In any case, the Mets were up 8-0 in the fourth when the Marlins scored a trio of runs, but it was in the sixth when they really got things rolling:
Unfortunately for them, the Mets answered back with another six-run inning in the top of the seventh:
Both teams threw another run on the board across the seventh and top of the eighth innings, and then the Marlins put up another pair of runs in the bottom of the eighth and another three in the bottom of the ninth. The game ended with Miami losing 15-14, with both teams combining for 35 hits (Miami had 20 of them!)
The Mets are the second team in the last 90 years to:Lead by 8 or more runsthen be tied or fall behindAnd then lead by 6 or more runsjoining: 7/18/1998 CLE at CHWh/t @EliasSports
— Sarah Langs (@slangsonsports.bsky.social) 2026-09-10T03:22:14.258Z
[extremely Orson Welles voice] AAAAAAHHHHHHH THE METS
— Chris Cwik (the real one) (@Chris_Cwik) October 25, 2015
By The Numbers
5 consecutive games with a dinger for Elly De La Cruz.
9 total swings and misses from the Dodgers’ bats against the Reds last night. One of them was against Jose Trevino.
Best Moments From Yesterday
2,500 For Altuve
The Astros may have been bested by Philadelphia, but Jose Altuve notched a milestone 2,500th hit in the third inning:
He’s a free agent in 2030, at which point he may only be a (relative) handful of hits away from 3,000…
The Yankees Finally Cash In
Coming into Wednesday, there were two teams who were yet to hit a grand slam. One of them was the Yankees. Emphasis on was. Enter George Lombard Jr.:
It just so happens that I was up in the Bronx to witness this in person, and let me tell you, people were pretty amped. And a ton of people were fully aware that it was the first grand slam of the year.
So now there’s only one team left without one; can you guess who it is? That’s right, it’s the Brewers.
Injuries and Other Moves
âš¾ The Dodgers are calling up top prospect Josue De Paula for Friday’s series. The corresponding move is Shohei Ohtani going to the IL, which will be a 15-day stint for him due to the two-way rules.
âš¾ LA was also without Freddie Freeman on Wednesday due to knee soreness, although they are adamant that he won’t be going on the IL.
âš¾ Jazz Chisholm Jr. is going on the IL due to a thumb sprain he suffered on Tuesday. Anthony Volpe is being called back up as the corresponding move. Volpe’s been playing some second base in AAA, and it doesn’t seem like the Yankees will radically realign the infield.
âš¾ Baltimore has placed Blaze Alexander on the IL due to low back discomfort.
âš¾ Arizona got some pitching help back from the IL as they activated both Zac Gallen and Michael Soroka on Wednesday.
Articles You Should Read
Five Things I Learned at Saberseminar 2026 – Ben Clemens, FanGraphs
Hope Slips In When MLB Owners Slip Away – Justin Klugh, Baseball Prospectus (sub req’d)
Fantasy Baseball Coverage
