Is it spring training yet? No — but the championship season is upon us, a finer thing still.

THE MORNING HORSEHIDE HERALD

"Every Score Set Down, No Deed Unsung"

~ Being a Faithful Daily Chronicle of the National Pastime ~

Volume I · No. 60 · Sunday, the Sixth of September, Two Thousand and Twenty-Six

Reporting 15 contests from the day prior.

The Game of the Day

THE MORNING AFTER THE MIRACLES, GREENE COLLECTS FOUR RUNS IN FOUR STRAIGHT VISITS AND CLEVELAND IS WHITEWASHED: TIGERS 6, GUARDIANS 0

The very pitching card this paper advertised yesterday — Messick against Valdez — is settled almost single-handedly by Riley Greene: two homers off the young left-hander, a run-scoring single and a run-scoring double besides, four runs driven home in four consecutive turns at bat, no Tiger having done the like since Castellanos in 2017 — and Friday's twice-walk-off heroes are held to three hits entire

Parker Messick tried to finish Riley Greene with a cutter in the first inning Saturday evening, and the pitch arrived over the plate instead of off it. Greene sent it deep to left-center through a crosswind, and the evening at Progressive Field — the bill these pages advertised only yesterday, Messick and his handsome earned-run figure opposing Valdez — had found its author before most of the crowd had found its seats. The man would not be done until he had driven home a run in four consecutive plate appearances: the first-inning blast, a fought-off line single in the third, a second homer leading off the sixth — a 421-foot copy of the first, struck to very nearly the same seat — and a seventh-inning drive off the reliever Festa that screamed for the fence, fell a foot short of a three-homer night, and settled for a run-scoring double. No Tiger had posted runs driven in across four straight visits since Nick Castellanos in the July of 2017. "I was just trying to find barrels, just trying to focus on being on time," Greene shrugged afterward. "The result's the result. They were homers."

The setting made the performance stranger and sweeter both. Greene entered the night a career .168 hitter in Cleveland's yard — nineteen hits in one hundred thirteen regular-season tries — and yet keeps more homers there than in any park save his own; one of them, the scorers note, came off this same Messick in the last days of September a year ago. The two are friendly, All-Star teammates in July, neighbors of a sort in Florida. "I think he owes me a fishing trip that we've been talking about," said the beaten pitcher, who between Greene's blows retired eight straight, five by strikeout, and bore the whole verdict with grace: "He's a great hitter, and he's a huge part of their lineup. I'm sure they're happy to have him back." Detroit's rookie Malgeri added three hits and testified to the phenomenon in plainer words: "He was locked in, and it's contagious." Valdez and the relief corps did the rest — three Cleveland hits all night, not a runner crossing — and Friday's heartbreak of the twice-walked-off doubleheader was answered in the only currency September accepts.

For Cleveland the silence was expensive. Twenty-four hours after Rocchio's two swings wrote the season's gladdest column, the Guardians' hold on the American's last wild-card chair is sole property no longer: Toronto's fourth straight victory, sung in the card below, draws the two clubs level at two-and-seventy wins against one-and-seventy defeats — and the Maple Leaf nine, having taken the season's series four games to two, carry the tiebreaker in their pocket. The Central's account stands unchanged only because Chicago obliged by losing the same evening, that lead holding at two and a half. "Riley had a great game, but our whole team did," said the manager Hinch, declining the singular for the plural as managers must. The desk, unbound by clubhouse etiquette, records what the box score records: one man, four turns, four runs, and a pennant race rearranged by suppertime.

News Around the League

THE INFIRMARY WARD: THE GREAT OHTANI SITS A THIRD STRAIGHT NIGHT WITH THE INVALID LIST NOW OPENLY WEIGHED, TROUT'S HAND ESCAPES WITH A BRUISE, AND GRISHAM'S HAMSTRING GIVES WAY AGAIN

The ward's gravest file remains the game's most famous. Shohei Ohtani was held from the Dodger lineup a third consecutive day Saturday — the knee, the biceps, and the neck, the catalogue this ward has carried all week — and the club now weighs the question it has resisted: whether to commit him to the invalid list at all. The rules sharpen the dilemma; a two-way man's minimum stay is fifteen days, as a pitcher's is, and three days is the most any stint may be backdated, so the hour of decision is upon them. "If it doesn't feel good today, then the IL certainly should be on the table," allowed the manager Roberts, who holds out the hope that six or eight days of rest might yet beat fifteen of paperwork. The man himself took his swings in the cage and has not spoken to the press since the seventeenth of August; his club, as the card below attests, keeps winning without him, which settles nothing and soothes everything.

In Pittsburgh the ward held its breath and exhaled. Mike Trout, five-and-thirty now and still the Angels' first citizen, was struck on the left hand by a ninth-inning pitch and left the game; the X-rays came back negative, and the club expects him in the lineup this very afternoon. And in San Diego the Yankees lost the outfielder Trent Grisham to the ten-day invalid list — the right hamstring, the same muscle that shelved him in June, felt first on a stolen-base try Friday night. The club recalled the young Jasson Domínguez from Scranton to fill the post. "It feels like he felt a little bit better today than when he did it a couple of months ago," offered the manager Boone, hopefully. Swift knitting to every name above, and to the great one especially.

THE MILESTONE DESK: MURAKAMI MAKES IT THREE SOUTH SIDERS AT THIRTY HOMERS APIECE — AND THE CROWNS OF BOTH LEAGUES' FENCE-CLEARERS TIGHTEN BY A SWING

The trio this desk half-promised on Friday is complete. Munetaka Murakami, the left-handed slugger crossed over from Japan this winter past, opened Saturday's contest with a towering two-run blast to left — his thirtieth of the season, and the blow that makes the White Sox a club with three thirty-homer men, Vargas and Colson Montgomery having reached the figure together only the night before, as these pages sang yesterday morning. It is but the fourth such season in the franchise's long annals, the company being the vintages of 2004, 2006, and 2008. Murakami joins Ohtani, Suzuki, and the great Matsui as the only Japanese-born men ever to strike thirty in an American season — and Montgomery, two batters later, answered with his one-and-thirtieth to reclaim the club lead, the tenth time the two have homered in the same game this year. That the evening ended in defeat, the card below relates; the slugger declined all consolation: "Obviously I'm really happy about getting 30, but moreover we lost the game. So that's very much disappointing."

The desk lifts its eyes to the leagues' twin crowns while it is about the arithmetic. In the American, Tampa Bay's Junior Caminero struck his eight-and-thirtieth Saturday in Arlington to pad his lead over Houston's Alvarez at seven-and-thirty, with New York's Rice at six-and-thirty close astern. In the National, Philadelphia's Kyle Schwarber answered Acuña's theatrics with his one-and-fortieth, while Chicago's Crow-Armstrong — whose pursuit of forty this desk has followed all week — went homerless in Miami and stands yet at nine-and-thirty, the threshold still one swing distant. One-and-twenty days remain; the desk commends both tables to the reader's morning attention.

THE RESTORATION DESK: THE CAPTAIN STANDS AT THE FINISH LINE, THE WIRES COUNT EIGHT CAVALRIES COMING, AND EVERY CONTENDER CHECKS ITS CALENDAR

The wire desks Saturday drew up a muster roll of the wounded who may yet rejoin the season's last battles, and the first name upon it is the one these pages have tracked since May. Aaron Judge, absent from the Yankee lineup since the one-and-thirtieth of that month with the fractured rib, took batting practice on the Petco field a second straight day and is expected to stand in against live pitching Monday; the hope, openly held, is a return during the homestand New York opens Tuesday against Colorado. "He's at the finish line to be ready to play," said the manager Boone Saturday night, and the clubhouse speaks of it like men awaiting a ship. "We're all as eager to have him back now as we were right when he went out," said Rice.

The rest of the roll reads like reinforcements posted to every front of the wild-card wars. Boston's Garrett Crochet, runner-up for last year's American pitching laurels, threw off a mound Friday for the first time in more than three months and may return this month as a relief weapon. Arizona's Corbin Burnes, lost to the surgeon's table eleven starts into his desert tenure, has begun rehabilitation starts and could rejoin a club presently seated in the National's last chair; San Diego's Nick Pivetta, shelved since April, progresses toward a return within days for the very club chasing that chair. And in Houston, Carlos Correa — whose 2026 seemed finished upon the ankle surgeon's May verdict — runs at nearly full speed and shifts his rehabilitation to the club's Florida grounds, an improbable October card not yet ruled out. The desk notes the pattern with approval: September's scrums shall be settled not only by who is standing, but by who gets back up.

THE MATTER OF THE TILTED CAP, CONCLUDED: AN UMPIRE'S APOLOGY ON THE FIELD, A CLUBHOUSE IN CROOKED BRIMS, AND THE ACCUSED CATCHER CLEARS HIS NAME

The Herald confesses a weakness for a story in which the pastime remembers its manners, and Denver supplied one Saturday. The reader will want the Friday prologue: in the sixth inning of his major-league debut, the Cardinal rookie Hancel Rincon was directed by the umpire Eddings to straighten the angle of his cap's bill — no rule forbidding it, the arbiter later conceded, only an "unwritten" one — and the argument that followed cost the manager Marmol his evening. Saturday the game answered in kind. Cardinal players, coaches, and their faithful alike wore their own brims at a defiant tilt in solidarity with the young man; Eddings stopped Rincon on his walk to the bullpen and, by the pitcher's account, apologized and wished him luck in his career. "I told him, 'Don't worry, it's nothing personal, and everything stays here,'" said Rincon, who then threw a spotless sixth inning and banked the first strikeout of his major-league life. "I felt big support from my teammates. Obviously, when you are together, like this group, we're gonna be much better."

There remained only the matter of the man wrongly named. The wires had identified Colorado's catcher Hunter Goodman as the complainant whose word set the whole affair in motion, and Goodman — stung by two days of anonymous abuse over it — flatly denied the charge Saturday: "I never once mentioned the hat. I don't care how they wear the hat. I'm trying to find out where the ball is coming out." His own manager pressed Eddings on the point and reports the umpire never named Goodman at all. The catcher then went out and struck the bases-loaded single that decided the actual ballgame, as the card below relates — proof, if the desk may editorialize, that the surest answer to a controversy remains a base hit. The Herald tips its cap to all parties. At a slight angle.

The Rest of the Card

ABOVE THE WATERLINE AT LAST — OKAMOTO'S FOUR HITS CARRY TORONTO LEVEL WITH CLEVELAND, TIEBREAKER IN POCKET: MAPLE LEAF NINE 4, ROYALS 3

For the first time since the third of April, the Blue Jays' wins outnumber their defeats — two-and-seventy against one-and-seventy — and the club celebrated the crossing by seizing a share of the American's last wild-card chair, the head-to-head verdict over Cleveland already banked as this paper recorded on Friday. The evening's engine was Kazuma Okamoto, whose first four-hit night in the majors ran to two doubles, a rare single driven the opposite way, and two runs cashed; the ancient Max Scherzer, two-and-forty years old and mending all season, gave five and two-thirds of three-run ball and pronounced himself stronger by the outing: "I feel healthy, I feel good, everything's in a good spot." Toronto struck first with two in the opening frame, absorbed Kansas City's answer, and went ahead for keeps in the seventh, Fluharty winning in relief of the veteran with Varland sealing his three-and-thirtieth save; the loss fell to Kimbrel. "We struck first, got punched back in the mouth and stayed on it," ruled the manager Schneider, whose club has won four running and eight of ten — the hottest hand in the entire scrum — and goes for the sweep at 2:10 this afternoon.

NINE DAYS' REST, SEVEN SPOTLESS INNINGS, AND A SECOND STRAIGHT WHITEWASHING AT THE HARBOR: FENWAY MEN 5, BALTIMORES 0

The winningest arm in the American took the hill precisely as yesterday's desk note advertised, and pitched like a man who had spent his nine days' holiday sharpening knives. Sonny Gray, six-and-thirty and deliberately rested since the six-and-twentieth of August, carried seven scoreless innings of three hits for his seventeenth victory against four defeats — Boston's second consecutive shutout of the Orioles, a first for the club this season — and admitted afterward that Friday's benches-clearing theatrics had seasoned his purpose: "We wanted to kind of bury these guys, especially after whatever that dude was trying to do last night." The scoring was patient work: Eli White's two-out, bases-loaded dunker cashed two in the sixth, Wong cashing a third behind him, and Isiah Kiner-Falefa — lately returned from the ward himself — doubled home two in the seventh before saving the eighth with a diving stop, that inning's true crisis passing when Weissert struck out Alonso with the bases full. Baltimore has now lost five running, stands three from the last chair, and sends its faithful to a 1:35 finale hoping to avoid the broom; Boston, winners of three straight, sits six clear in the wild-card row's second seat.

THE FREE PASS TO THE MAN AHEAD IS TAKEN AS AN INSULT AND ANSWERED WITH THREE RUNS: TAMPA MEN 6, LONE STAR NINE 3, IN TEN INNINGS

Arlington's tenth-inning arithmetic was orthodox — the automatic runner bunted along, first base open, an intentional pass to the dangerous Díaz — and Jonathan Aranda, standing on deck through all of it, read the strategy as an affront: "When they intentionally walked him, I took it personally." He drove Latz's 1-2 slider 409 feet to right-center with two aboard, and the verdict was written. The blast decorated a night of superior pitching: Drew Rasmussen gave seven innings of one run and three hits without a walk, outlasting the great deGrom pitch for pitch, his only blemish Pederson's first-pitch homer in the sixth; Junior Caminero supplied his eight-and-thirtieth homer, the American's leading count, and Palacios his eighth, with Wells — the deadline acquisition from Baltimore, of all provisioners — throwing two scoreless frames for the win. Texas banked two in the eighth to force the extra chapter and no more; the Rangers have dropped two running and slip two full games from the last chair, while the Tampa men hold the East by four with the clubs meeting again at 2:35 this afternoon.

RICE REACHES IN ALL FIVE VISITS, RODÓN PERMITS TWO HITS, AND A FOUR-AND-THIRTIETH LEVEL SEASON IS BANKED: BRONX BOMBERS 5, SAN DIEGO NINE 1

The Yankees' one-and-eightieth victory carried a quiet civic guarantee — a four-and-thirtieth consecutive season no worse than level, a run of institutional stubbornness dating to 1993 — and was built on the era's least Yankee-like virtues: patience and the single. Ben Rice reached base in all five plate appearances, three singles and two walks, sprayed with such line-to-line craft that his manager reached for the highest local compliment: "I told him, he's doing his Tony Gwynn imitation." The second inning did the heavy work — three consecutive walks, Goldschmidt's forcing in a run, Cody Bellinger's two-run single behind them — and Ray was gone after seven outs, charged with five. Carlos Rodón made it stand with five innings of two hits and seven strikeouts, Machado's five-and-twentieth homer the only Friar coin, and the local boy Spencer Jones added two more hits to his homecoming week. The freight ran south as well as north: San Diego's defeat, paired with Arizona's ten-inning heroics below, surrenders the National's last chair by half a game — and the same clubs close the set at 4:10 this afternoon, Cole opposing King.

FOUR RELIEVERS THROW THE SILENCE, MARTE LEVELS IT, AND THE LAST CHAIR CROSSES THE DESERT ONCE MORE: SNAKES 4, ASTROS 3, IN TEN INNINGS

The chair this paper has watched change hands all week changed hands again by the Houston midnight — the fifth transfer inside seven mornings — and Arizona took it back with its bullpen's finest hour. Down 3-1 behind Pfaadt's honest six and a third, the Snakes chipped to within one in the seventh, drew level on Ketel Marte's eighth-inning homer to right, his two-and-twentieth, went ahead in the tenth, and then asked the young Brandyn Garcia to hold it against the heart of the order: he struck out the mighty Alvarez looking on a 98-mile sinker to open the frame and ended the night fanning Altuve on one harder still. "I did try to let that one eat as hard as I could," the closer grinned, his fifth save banked behind Loáisiga's win. Four relievers — Ginkel, Morillo, Loáisiga, and Garcia — covered three and two-thirds without a run, Morillo's scoreless string reaching eighteen games; the manager Lovullo's verdict, "that's the reason why we win so many one-run games here," reads like the season's thesis. Houston's lead in the West holds at three over beaten Texas, but the second seed stays a game and a half distant — and the clubs go again at 2:10, Arizona sending Rodriguez and his fourteen victories to press the advantage.

THE MILESTONE EVENING GOES FOR NAUGHT — JEFFERS' THREE-RUN BLOW OVERTURNS THE TRIO'S THUNDER: TWIN CITIES NINE 6, SOUTH SIDERS 4

Chicago's first inning made franchise history, as the milestone desk above relates at proper length — Murakami's two-run thirtieth, Montgomery's one-and-thirtieth two batters later, three runs and three thirty-homer men on one September scorecard — and Minnesota spent the middle innings dismantling the celebration. Two runs in the fourth drew close, and in the fifth Ryan Jeffers turned on Kay for a three-run blast, his fourteenth, that stood the ledger on its head; a seventh-inning run supplied the margin, and Bradley — the very arm that had surrendered the milestone — settled in for his eleventh victory, Gómez sealing the one-and-twentieth save. The South Siders' lead in the Central holds at two and a half over Cleveland — beaten the same evening, as the lead column relates — and their game-and-a-half hold on the American's second seed survived the night besides, Houston having lost in sympathy. The clubs conclude their season's business at 6:20 this evening, Ober opposing Hudson, and the White Sox will be glad to see the back of a Minnesota club that keeps spoiling their parties.

SPRINGS SCATTERS THE SOUND'S BATS AND THE SPOILERS RUN THEIR STRING TO FOUR: MACKMEN 6, MARINERS 2

The Athletics continue their September office with the relish of men who have nothing to lose and lately lose nothing: a fourth consecutive victory, built early and defended late. Lawrence Butler's thirteenth homer and Max Muncy's ninth — the Athletics' own Muncy, the desk hastens to note, no relation to the Angeleno — carried a lead that grew by installments through four innings, Bolte and Walton doubling home the trimmings, and Jeffrey Springs made it stand for his fourth victory, the Mariners held to six hits and their two runs arriving only after the issue was settled, Kirby bearing the loss. Seattle has now dropped three running and eight of its last ten, a once-plausible September now visible chiefly in the rearview; the Mackmen, last in the West and first in mischief, get their chance at a sweep at 4:10 this afternoon.

KIKUCHI'S FIRST VICTORY OF THE YEAR ARRIVES IN SEPTEMBER, AND TROUT LEAVES WITH A BRUISE, NOT A BREAK: HALOS 6, CORSAIRS 1

The Angels' second win in their last twelve engagements was a night of small mercies. Yusei Kikuchi, winless through five defeats this season, carried the decision at last behind twelve hits of support — Meckler doubling twice, Nathaniel Lowe homering, Trout and Neto cashing runs — while Pittsburgh's Bryan Reynolds supplied the home nine's whole account with his sixteenth homer, the loss falling hard on Ashcraft and his fourteen victories. The anxious moment came in the ninth, when Mike Trout took a pitch off the left hand and departed; the X-rays read clean, as the ward above records with relief, and the great man is expected back for the rubber match. That engagement carries the day's most interesting name: Paul Skenes takes the hill for the Corsairs at 1:35 against Ureña and his 2.85 — the sort of Sunday bill that makes a last-place visitor's trip worthwhile.

ACUÑA ADMIRES HIS THUNDER AT LEISURE, AND WHEELER RENDERS THE FULL-COUNT JUDGMENT: PHILLIES 4, ATLANTAS 2

The night's theatre was a duel inside the duel. Ronald Acuña Jr. struck a 450-foot blast off Zack Wheeler in the third and toured the bases at a promenade, savoring every boo Citizens Bank Park could raise; Kyle Schwarber answered an inning later with his one-and-fortieth homer, the majors' leading count, and Wheeler filed the insult for the fifth, when he ran Acuña to a full count and blew a 96-mile fastball past him on the outside corner to strike out the side. "Our guy just rounds the bases — who hits 50 here," the pitcher observed afterward, the jab aimed with the same precision as the fastball. "I really wanted to strike him out right there and kind of get him back." Wheeler's whole line — six innings, three hits, nine strikeouts, nineteen swings-and-misses, one run — reads like a man emerged from his August troubles; Riley's sixteenth homer trimmed the margin in the seventh before Duran sealed his thirtieth save. The East's lead is cut to four games, the Phillies sit half a game behind Chicago for the wild card's first chair, and the set concludes at 1:10 this afternoon, Mahle opposing Nola.

THE BOBBLEHEAD WORKS ITS ANNUAL MAGIC — DE LA CRUZ'S EFFIGY-DAY BLAST HELPS FELL THE GAME'S BEST LEDGER: REDS 5, BREWERS 3

The Queen City has learned to schedule its miracles: for the second consecutive season, Elly De La Cruz homered on the night the club handed out his likeness in miniature, crushing May's 0-2 fastball a tracked 438 feet to the berm beyond center — his two-and-twentieth, his first since the two-and-twentieth of August, and the levelling blow in an evening Cincinnati won by degrees. Stephenson and McLain added fifteenth homers apiece, Santillan took the decision, and Pagán sealed the one-and-twentieth save while Milwaukee's Ashby — a man beaten only twice all season entering — absorbed his third defeat, Contreras's fourteenth homer the visitors' best answer. The Brewers' lead in the Central slips to seven over surging Chicago, the first time in weeks the gap has worn single digits so thin; the clubs go directly again at 12:10 this very noon, Harrison opposing Singer, the day's earliest bell.

THE TWO-HUNDREDTH BALL LEAVES A YARD WHERE BALLS SELDOM LEAVE, AND A NEW MAN SURVIVES THE NINTH: CUBS 6, MIAMI NINE 5

Chicago's evening in Miami banked two firsts: Michael Conforto's third-inning drive, 411 feet to center in a park that discourages the practice, was the club's two-hundredth homer of the season — no other club in the majors has yet reached the figure — and the ninth belonged to Ryan Zeferjahn, who recorded five outs for his first save in Cub flannels, pacing the dugout between innings to keep his blood warm. "I got the best defense behind me, and I let them work, and it came up huge," said the reliever, whose 7.20 figure after the deadline trade had tried the faithful's patience. The offense gathered six runs by the sixth — Happ driving in two, Crow-Armstrong, Busch, and Hoerner a run apiece — and then held its breath as Miami closed to one; Rolison improved to eight victories against a single defeat. The forty-homer question stands unanswered another morning, the center fielder held in the yard at nine-and-thirty, and the Cubs — winners of three straight, half a game up on Philadelphia for the wild card's first chair — send Holmes and his 2.09 against Phillips at 1:40 to close the set.

SIX BALLS LEAVE CITI FIELD IN GIANT LIVERY — TWO FROM DEVERS, TWO FROM THE UNHERALDED KOSS: ORANGE AND BLACK 9, FLUSHING NINE 5

Rafael Devers is conducting one of the hot streaks the annals keep: two more homers Saturday — the five-and-thirtieth among them — run his six-game account to six homers and seven walks, a combination no Giant has managed since 1900 save Barry Bonds in 2004 and Willie Mays in 1958. Yet the day's charm belonged to Christian Koss, owner of one homer in 138 tries entering, who struck two — his first multi-homer game at any level since a High-A afternoon in 2021 — and confessed the simplest philosophy in the game: "Hit the ball hard and hope good things happen." Basabe and McCray joined the parade for six balls over the Flushing fences in all, Molina winning his third as a Giant, and the evening even supplied farce: the manager Vitello was ejected in the second inning for emerging to discuss a foul-ball challenge — "I walked out without any fire in me," the puzzled skipper testified, "and I got thrown out for walking out of the dugout." Ewing's two-run homer led the Mets' portion. The clubs settle the set at 1:40 this afternoon, Perdomo opposing Scott.

HITLESS THROUGH FOUR, SIX RUNS IN THE FIFTH — THE MILE HIGH NINE OVERTURN THE EVENING ENTIRE: MILE HIGH NINE 10, CARDS 7

St. Louis had built the game these pages expected: a 3-0 lead on Joshua Báez's second-inning homer and Iván Herrera's two-run fifth-inning blast — that man's second of the series, his ninth-inning thunder having decided Friday's contest in these very columns — while Liberatore retired ten straight and carried a no-hit account into the fifth. Whereupon Coors Field did what Coors Field does: six runs in the frame, six hits and two wild pitches and an error among them, and a four-run seventh behind it, sparked by Hunter Goodman's bases-loaded single — the same catcher whose name the cap affair had dragged through two days' mud, as the news columns above relate, answering his critics in the game's oldest language. "It keeps happening in slightly different ways, which makes it incredibly frustrating," said Liberatore of the recurring fifth-inning ambush that now marks his 5-14 ledger; Bernardino took the win, Romano the fifteenth save, and the rookie Rincon, crooked cap and clear conscience, threw his spotless sixth. The Cards slip a game under level and four from the last chair; the set is decided at 3:10 this afternoon.

THE STAND-IN AT THE TOP OF THE ORDER ROBS WITH THE GLOVE AND DECIDES WITH THE BAT: BOYS IN BLUE 6, SENATORS 5

Three nights into the great Ohtani's absence, the leadoff post belongs to Tommy Edman, and the utility man is keeping it warm to the point of scorching. In the fifth he went full-stretch at the left-center wall to take extra bases — his pitcher thought a homer — away from Lile; in the seventh, with the champions down 4-2 and two aboard, he turned on Beeter's slider and drove it deep to right for the go-ahead three-run blast, his sixth of the year. "When you don't have Shohei in there, to put Tommy in there and really still be productive, it's great," said the manager Roberts, whose lineup card had also lost Muncy to illness and Rushing to a sore elbow two hours before the bell. Glasnow ground through six-plus without his best stuff, Washington's Daylen Lile drove in two, and the capital club's ninth-inning run made Scott's one-and-twentieth save honest work, Vesia taking the decision. The champions have won three running, hold the West by ten and a half, and go for the sweep at 10:10 tonight — the card's lone lamplighter's shift, Wrobleski and his eleven victories against Alvarez.

The tables this Sunday morning read thus. In the American: Tampa Bay holds the East by four over New York, Boston seven and a half astern; the White Sox keep the Central by two and a half over Cleveland, their second-seed cushion a game and a half over Houston; the Astros hold the West by three over Texas. The wild-card row is the morning's theatre: New York and Boston secure, and the last chair now a bench for two — Toronto and Cleveland level at two-and-seventy wins apiece, the Maple Leaf nine holding the season-series tiebreaker, with Texas two behind and Baltimore three. In the National: Atlanta by four over Philadelphia; Milwaukee by seven over Chicago; Los Angeles by ten and a half over Arizona — and the wild-card ledger reads Chicago's first chair by half a game over the Phillies, with the last chair returned to Arizona by half a game over San Diego, Miami and St. Louis four back. Today's bill is a Sunday feast of fifteen engagements, nearly all of them by daylight and all verified against the schedule; the desk directs the eye to five. At 12:10 in Cincinnati the Brewers seek their remedy at once, Harrison opposing Singer; at 1:10 in Philadelphia the East's argument concludes, Mahle against Nola; at 1:35 in Pittsburgh the Corsairs send Skenes against Ureña and his 2.85; at 1:40 in Cleveland the whitewashed Guardians hand the ball to Williams and his thirteen victories against the rookie Jobe, with a chair to defend; and at 2:10 in Houston Arizona presses its reclaimed advantage behind Rodriguez, he of the fourteen victories and the 2.59. The late shift is short and sweet: New York at San Diego at 4:10, Cole opposing King, and the night owls' lone reward at 10:10, the champions going for the sweep at Chavez Ravine. Until the morrow's dispatch, keep your scorecards near and your enthusiasms nearer.

~ THE HERALD ~

The Herald Acknowledges Its Debts