May 17
May 17, 2022
1. The ivy is fully grown at Wrigley Field, summer is here
Ready for another summer of baseball?
Here are today’s games, with three doubleheaders:
2. Johnny Cueto is back in the big leagues
After signing a minor-league deal this spring, he made his debut last night with the White Sox in familiar Kansas City, and here was his stat-line:
6.0 IP, 2 hits, 0 ER, 7 K’s
3. Manny Machado is an avid chess player
From the New York Times (article link below):
4. Brett Phillips hit a circus home run at The Trop
And launched into a full sprint around the bases, no one knowing if it was considered gone or not.
5. Shohei Ohtani made it onto the Google Trends page
We might assume this includes searches for his name in Japanese, too:
大谷 翔平
6. Willson Contreras had a cloud-nine dream of first inning
Batting in the lead-off spot, he hits the first pitch for a double and scores the next at-bat. Then the Cubs bat around, he comes up again in the first inning, and again on the first pitch he goes yard — grand slam.
And it’s his 100th career home run.
Two pitches. First inning. Double and grand slam. Unreal.
7. The clutch hit of the night: Luis Robert
Tie game in extra innings, the White Sox needing a bounceback after a poor series against the Yankees, and he steps up and hits one almost into the fountains.
8. The moonshot home run of the night: Trevor Story
Over the Monster, out of the ballpark.
9. The best and worst pitching performances yesterday
Starting with the good: Luis Severino (6.0 IP, 1 ER, 1 hit)
And the bad: Noah Syndergaard (0.2 IP, 4 ER)
10. The Rangers made an official commemoration of the iconic Odor vs. Bautista fight
You’d think MLB would advise them against it (and maybe they did), but kudos to the Rangers — a perfect “This Day in History” post.
11. Various news and bits from around the league
12. And lastly, this guy is the baseball fan of the year
As Pete Rose once said:
“I’d walk through hell in a gasoline suit to play baseball.”
This guy just about did it, only to watch the Tigers lose yet again.
