CINCINNATI — The fifth-place Pirates spent most of their trip to Ohio punching away at the contending Reds’ playoff hopes. The Reds had the final blow.

Right fielder Noelvi Marte robbed Bryan Reynolds of a game-tying homer in the ninth inning, clinching a 2-1 win for the Reds against the Pirates on Thursday afternoon at Great American Ball ...Read more

BALTIMORE — With their most disappointing season in years nearing a close, the Orioles gave Camden Yards one last finish to remember in their final home game of 2025.

Coby Mayo crushed a game-tying, two-run home run in the eighth and Dylan Beavers hit a walk-off homer an inning later to beat the Tampa Bay Rays, 6-5, on Thursday afternoon. It ...Read more

Seattle catcher Cal Raleigh became the seventh player in MLB history to hit at least 60 home runs in a season Wednesday night when he drove two hits out of T-Mobile Park during the Mariners' 9-2 win over the Colorado Rockies.

In related news, the man who reportedly caught the milestone ball appears to have given it away to a young fan sitting ...Read more

SEATTLE — The list of Cal Raleigh's achievements this year are as long as a moonshot to straightaway center. He set the single-season home run record for catchers, switch hitters and Mariners, won the Home Run Derby in July and may have just taken over as the front-runner for American League MVP.

But Wednesday, he did something that would ...Read more

TAMPA, Fla. — Let’s first offer a sincere welcome to the new ownership group that is buying the Tampa Bay Rays. The sale will mark a fresh start for the franchise and a new chapter in the quest to keep the team in Tampa Bay. Jacksonville home builder Patrick Zalupski and his investors certainly have reason to celebrate. But they might soon ...Read more

Bob Melvin wasn’t the Giants’ problem this season.

No, that would have been streaky hitting, a stripped bullpen and the inability to perform in any way, shape or form when the stakes were truly high.

The Giants found new and exciting ways to win games this season, but also to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, often with a comedic ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — There’s something you need to understand in order to fully appreciate the magnitude of baseball’s newly announced Automated Balls and Strikes challenge system.

You may think that it sounds like a no-brainer. What harm can come from allowing batters, pitchers and catchers a couple of chances a game to appeal for a near-...Read more

Season after season, they could only watch as someone else took their turn atop a place that seemed to grow farther away with each passing year.

When the 2001 Mariners ran away with the American League West, clinching their third division title (1995, 1997) on Sept. 19, and rolling to an MLB-record 116 wins, turning then-Safeco Field into the ...Read more

PHOENIX — The Dodgers might’ve finally found an answer to their long-maddening bullpen problems.

Just use some starters.

In a 5-4 extra-innings win over the Arizona Diamondbacks that lowered their magic number to clinch the National League West to one, the Dodgers again squandered a late-game lead when their traditional relievers faltered...Read more

ANAHEIM — Just when Yusei Kikuchi was about to end his first Angels season on a high note, it ended on a slightly concerning one.

The left-hander came out of the Angels’ 3-2 victory over the Kansas City Royals on Wednesday night because of a left forearm cramp.

Kikuchi was working on a one-hitter when he took the mound in the sixth. Before...Read more

SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants hope there will plenty of splash hits over the course of Rafael Devers’ nine years at Oracle Park, and the left-handed slugger started the count Wednesday night with a towering shot that barely made it to the water.

The first splash hit of Devers’ career proved to be decisive in a 4-3 win over the St. Louis ...Read more

Taj Bradley will enter the offseason on a high note, delivering his best outing in a Twins uniform in his last start of the regular season. The Twins bullpen, well, not so much.

Bradley yielded two hits and one run in six innings against the Texas Rangers on Wednesday, striking out nine, but the Rangers scored three runs against two relievers ...Read more

CHICAGO — One night after hitting a go-ahead home run to complete a heroic comeback, Francisco Alvarez hit another. But there was no coming back from this one.

The unraveling started long before Alvarez took left-hander Matthew Boyd deep in the fifth inning. Jonah Tong was lit up in the third inning, surrendering four runs to get the hook ...Read more

NEW YORK — Aaron Judge joined a small group of sluggers on Wednesday night, as the Yankees’ captain recorded the fourth 50-homer season of his career in an 8-1 win over the White Sox.

The victory coincided with yet another Blue Jays loss, as they fell to the Red Sox, 7-1, in Toronto. With four games left in the regular season, the Yankees ...Read more

CLEVELAND — It’s starting to feel like Groundhog Day.

The Tigers lost their eighth game in a row Wednesday night, beaten by the Cleveland Guardians for the fifth consecutive time, 5-1 at Progressive Field, pushing them a full game behind the Guardians, who also own the tie-breaker, in the Central Division.

Aspects of these losses are ...Read more

ANAHEIM, Calif. — There are now 59 members of baseball’s 400 Home Run Club. Of those, only 44 are in the Hall of Fame, and with most of those who aren’t the reason is obvious. They were part of the PED discussion that inflamed passions for most of the last three decades: Barry Bonds (762), Alex Rodriguez (696), Sammy Sosa (609), Mark ...Read more

CINCINNATI — Paul Skenes needed just 3 1/3 scoreless innings to finish his season with a sub-2.00 ERA and presumably lock up the Cy Young Award. He did that easily.

Then he threw a fourth. And a fifth. And a sixth.

On a day Skenes could have focused on personal accolades, he reached two milestones and went further, throwing six scoreless ...Read more

BALTIMORE — The Rays lost a combined no-hitter in the seventh inning Wednesday but won the game, beating the Orioles, 6-2.

The bid for what would have been the second no-hitter in Rays history and first in the majors this season ended when Griffin Jax allowed a leadoff single to Tyler O’Neill in the seventh.

It had been a team effort to ...Read more