Tag: mlb

A new group is buying up minor league baseball teams at a feverish pace. What’s the end game?
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A new group is buying up minor league baseball teams at a feverish pace. What’s the end game?

WAPPINGERS FALLS, N.Y. — The artificial turf at Heritage Financial Park is new. So is the right-field wall that opens wide enough for an 18-wheeler to haul concert equipment onto the field. The party deck is sponsored by a brewery that’s 10 miles away, giant windows have been installed around the corporate event space overlooking left field, and the renovated home clubhouse, where the Hudson Valley Renegades dress before games, has two indoor batting cages flanked by state-of-the-art data and motion-capture technology.This is Class-A baseball in 2024. Quirky and local, but also big business that’s booming. Minor-league attendance is up and approaching pre-pandemic levels, new ballparks are being built, and existing franchises are selling at what are believed to be record prices. These are...
MLB insiders “pretty worried” by rise in arm injuries to top young starting pitchers
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MLB insiders “pretty worried” by rise in arm injuries to top young starting pitchers

Matt Blake texted Cleveland Guardians pitcher Shane Bieber a conciliatory message over the weekend. As a member of the Cleveland player-development system in the 2010s, Blake aided Bieber’s rise from college walk-on to unanimous American League Cy Young Award winner in 2020. For a time, Bieber represented the modern model for the manufacturing of a big-league ace, a player who added strength to his frame, velocity to his fastball and spin to his offspeed pitches as he ascended the ranks.By the time Blake sent his text, though, Bieber had become part of a growing, more troubling demographic: talented young pitchers who will spend this season as spectators. Two days after the Miami Marlins announced 20-year-old phenom Eury Pérez would undergo Tommy John surgery, the Guardians disclosed Bieb...
With the Yankees, Juan Soto’s historic bet on himself is about to pay off
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With the Yankees, Juan Soto’s historic bet on himself is about to pay off

On July 16, 2022, more than 37,000 fans crammed into Nationals Park on a muggy midsummer afternoon. Washington already had 62 losses by that point — still days before the All-Star break — and there was little hope that a second-half surge was coming. Fans were there to see their homegrown prodigy, Juan Soto, and because of a Star Wars-themed bobblehead giveaway: “Juan Solo.”Soto had helped the franchise win its first World Series in 2019, and became the youngest player to win an NL batting title the following season. On that afternoon, fans clutched their bobbleheads and rose to their feet every time Soto stepped to the batter’s box, as they had for five years. It would have been a mundane 6-3 loss to the Braves — except that a few hours before, The Athletic reported that Soto declined a ...
Inside the ‘very predatory’ world of illegal betting that lured Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter
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Inside the ‘very predatory’ world of illegal betting that lured Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter

In the story Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter Ippei Mizuhara initially told to ESPN, the two men logged into Ohtani’s bank account together on eight or nine occasions in 2023 and wired increments of $500,000 to Mathew Bowyer, an alleged illegal bookmaker under federal investigation. In the story Ohtani told the public days after Mizuhara recanted his initial claims and was fired by the Dodgers, the interpreter stole the money to pay off his gambling debts.Both versions of the story generated a question that stumped the general public: Why would a bookie extend a line of credit of at least $4.5 million to someone who said he was drawing an $85,000 salary as an interpreter with the Los Angeles Angels? The scenario was easier to understand for those acquainted with the inner workings of gambling ...
MLB’s weirdest injuries of 2023, from a pool basketball mishap to a toilet setback
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MLB’s weirdest injuries of 2023, from a pool basketball mishap to a toilet setback

Every year at this time, we marvel at the many creative ways baseball players find to make an appearance on the ever-popular Strange But True Injuries of the Year leaderboard.So we’d like to thank this year’s baseball population for … cooking breakfast … playing the piano … and doing their best to get in and out of their hotel bathroom safely. But you know what’s especially amazing? None of those mishaps even topped this list!Really? Yes, really. So here they come, the Strangest But Truest Injuries of 2023.First prize: Eye confess!We always award Injury of the Year bonus points to guys who manage to get hurt while they’re already hurt. So here’s to Rays relief warrior Pete Fairbanks, who couldn’t even cover up the Giannis imitation that got him into this mess.When Fairbanks met with the R...
MLB’s 20 most mind-blowing hitting, pitching feats of 2023 — with Kyle Schwarber leading off
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MLB’s 20 most mind-blowing hitting, pitching feats of 2023 — with Kyle Schwarber leading off

It’s the most wonderful time of the year … except for one thing:It’s no longer baseball season!But that’s where we come in. It’s our not-so-solemn duty to get you through these long, chilly, baseball-free months by helping you relive the best of the Strange But True baseball season of 2023. Don’t tell us you already forgot that …An unforgettable on-base streak ended even though the man who compiled that streak was standing on first base. … And we really did see a real human being steal third base and home on the same pitch. … And a team pitched a no-hitter despite the minor hindrance of also allowing seven runs — in the same inning!We’re not making any of that up. We spend the whole year keeping track of wacky stuff like this so you don’t have to. So join us now as we relive The Strange B...
Who is Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and why is he getting $325 million from the Dodgers?
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Who is Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and why is he getting $325 million from the Dodgers?

Yoshinobu Yamamoto might be the best pitcher alive right now. That’s who he is, and it’s why he’s getting a 12-year, $325 million deal from the Los Angeles Dodgers.If that seems hyperbolic to you, then you’ve come to the right place. You want to know who Yamamoto is and why he’s able to afford the guacamole at Chipotle like it’s no big deal. He’s never thrown a pitch in the majors; how can he be the best pitcher alive?To be fair, that “might be” is doing a lot of work. Gerrit Cole is a marvel, and so is Zack Wheeler. You can scroll through this list of the highest WARs over the last three seasons and pick your personal favorite for “best pitcher alive.” Don’t forget about Roki Sasaki, another Nippon Professional Baseball pitcher you’ll be very, very, very, very familiar with at this time ...
Shorter pitch clock, new runner’s lane among MLB’s rule changes for 2024
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Shorter pitch clock, new runner’s lane among MLB’s rule changes for 2024

A tighter, 18-second pitch clock with runners on base … a new, wider runner’s lane between home and first base … one fewer mound visit.All those rule changes are coming to Major League Baseball in 2024, as part of a series of tweaks and changes announced by MLB on Thursday. The Athletic initially reported on many of these proposals in early November from the general managers’ meetings. They were formally approved by the competition committee Thursday. The most notable changes are these:The pitch clock: With runners on base, pitchers will have 18 seconds between pitches, down from 20 this year. MLB proposed the change after seeing the average time of a nine-inning game grow by more than seven minutes, from 2 hours, 36 minutes in April to 2:44 in September.The runner’s lane: After years of ...
Dodgers trade for top starter Tyler Glasnow, but risks abound — Law
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Dodgers trade for top starter Tyler Glasnow, but risks abound — Law

Trade details: The Los Angeles Dodgers acquire RHP Tyler Glasnow and OF Manuel Margot from the Tampa Bay Rays in exchange for OF Jonny Deluca and RHP Ryan PepiotOn the same day when they introduced Shohei Ohtani as a Dodger, the team swung a big trade, agreeing to a deal that would add right-hander Tyler Glasnow and outfielder Manuel Margot from the Rays in exchange for two young players, right-hander Ryan Pepiot and outfielder Jonny Deluca, who haven’t even reached arbitration and have five and six years of team control left, respectively. (The deal is contingent on Glasnow and the Dodgers working out a contract extension, but that’s not part of the trade itself, as the Dodgers are only acquiring one year of Glasnow’s service and the $25 million he’s owed for 2024.)Glasnow is one of the ...
The flight of N616RH: When Shohei Ohtani’s contract saga jumped the shark (tank)
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The flight of N616RH: When Shohei Ohtani’s contract saga jumped the shark (tank)

On Friday morning, Robert Herjavec was tracking to be on time for a 9 a.m. flight out of John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana, Calif., until his 5-year-old twins, Hudson and Haven, announced in the car that they were hungry.Herjavec, a Canadian businessman and star of “Shark Tank” and “Dragons’ Den,” was traveling solo with the twins. Not wanting to start a four-and-a-half-hour flight on the wrong foot, Herjavec stopped for breakfast and texted the pilot that they’d be late. “That’s the beauty of having your own plane,” Herjavec said by phone Monday. “You show up whenever you want to go.”Herjavec didn’t know at the time that the 40-minute delay had just added fuel to a rumor spreading rapidly since the previous night, when an X user posted that a private jet, tail number N616RH, was scheduled ...