#48 So 10 MLB GMs sit down at a poker table ...

The Opener

1. The Brewers swept the Dodgers, have won 10 games in a row and now sit in a tie for first place with the Cubs. Of their six runs on Sunday, five were scored by Andrew Vaughn, Blake Perkins, Andruw Monasterio, Joey Ortiz and Eric Haase. Jackson Chourio got the other one. Somewhere in there is the 🤷‍♂️ that the Brewers should put on an alternate cap.
2. Major League Baseball is reportedly investigating Braves assistant coach Eddie Pérez for seemingly threatening to have his pitchers throw at Yankees infielder Jazz Chisholm. For the second time in just a couple weeks, the Yankees were noticeably relaying a pitcher’s signs from second base — which is perfectly legal — much to the opposition’s annoyance. Chisholm and Pérez got into it, and Pérez was seen pointing at his own head. Chisholm took that as a threat; Pérez claimed he was just telling Chisholm to “be smart;” and now MLB will adjudicate the matter.
3. David Robertson is back for his 17th season and third stint in Philadelphia after signing a one-year, pro-rated contract with the Phillies that works out to be about $5.5 million over the weekend. Robertson is 40 years old (he will join Justin Verlander, Charlie Morton, Max Scherzer, and Jesse Chavez as guys in their fifth decade of life who have thrown a big-league pitch this season), self represented, and put on a showcase for interested teams in Providence, RI. These facts are not related nor do they necessarily add up to anything, they’re just slightly askew of the norm in a pleasant way.

Reason to believe

By Zach Crizer

This window between the All-Star break and the trade deadline is short and potent. Over the next 10 days or so, you’re going to see a lot of individual baseball games treated like the New York Times election needle. A quiver to the left means your team should sell their third baseman, a flinch to the right means they should pony up a decent prospect for a relief pitcher.

Like this.

The Diamondbacks and Cardinals are two of the teams in the middle, that pressurized place where a single decision can swing the moods of multiple summers. Did Eugenio Suarez’s second straight multi-homer game really make the D-backs more inclined to keep him and compete? Or more inclined to ask for a king’s ransom? I have my suspicions but hold that thought.

I’m not going to pretend I know how MLB front offices make the buy/sell decision, but I can sympathize with what must be a very difficult call given the margins in this era, when there are three wild cards per league and something like 80% of the teams are built to aim for one, whether they’re saying it out loud or not.

Lifting a finger and gauging the winds of the rumor mill, the D-backs, Cardinals, Rangers and Reds are firmly on the fence. The Giants, Red Sox and Rays have broken toward buying (Rafael Devers trade notwithstanding), while the Guardians, Twins and Royals seem to be sliding toward selling. Any club not already mentioned in this paragraph is either more likely than not to reach October or has less than a 3% shot, per FanGraphs playoff odds (entering Sunday).

So that means a full third of the league that is close enough, feisty enough or invested enough to find a reason to believe. And also that a full third of the league has to squint to see that reason. If you’ve ever walked by 10 finance bros who know each other stonily playing poker in Las Vegas, well, the idea isn’t too far off.

There’s some math lurking in there, but there are so many other variables that there just necessarily has to be a lot of gut feeling.

Using those FanGraphs playoff odds, I went through the three seasons of the three-wild-card format (2022-2024) and the last five seasons of the two-wild-card format (2016-2021, no 2020) to get a sense of the opportunity at play.

Here’s one nudge toward buying: A team with odds below 50% on July 20 has made the playoffs in every season except 2023. In the current format, 14 teams have reached July 20 with odds between 25% and 50%. Five of them have gone on to make the playoffs, a batting title contender of a success rate, at .357. So it’s probably appropriate that all three teams in that range as of Sunday (Red Sox, Rays, Giants), are likely looking for reinforcements.

Below that 25% threshold, it gets tougher. Last year’s Tigers are a gleaming reminder of what could be, but they’re also the only club to emerge from the pack so far in the three-wild-card years with odds that low at this juncture. As every wishy-washy trade deadline preview can attest, it’s easier to make the postseason with more wild cards, but tougher to pull off something very unlikely, because more players are staying in the hand.

Limiting our sample to teams with July 20 odds of greater than 1% but less than 25%, the Tigers are the only one of 19 teams to make it since 2022 (.053, in batting average terms). Over the last five seasons of the two-wild-card format, five of 46 teams in that boat jumped up and seized spots in smaller October fields (.109), and one of them (the 2021 Braves) famously won the World Series.

If you’re a GM making that calculation, the decision almost inherently turns into a mirror. You could view those numbers as discouraging, as permission to reload for next year, because you already doubted your club’s strength or because (like the D-backs’ Mike Hazen) you are secure enough to think you could turbocharge that 2026 team with a clever deadline. Or you could see them as ripe for regression, the gambler’s fallacy bolstered by projections or perceptions or preseason expectations.

So what does the club think about itself? That’s what we’re about to find out. And I don’t think this week’s games will change as many minds as you might think.

The Bullpen

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If you have not yet seen Ronald Acuña Jr.’s throw, congratulations on having a much better grip on your digital life than us, and enjoy. If you have already seen it, enjoy again.

And maybe from this angle, too.

My current favorite thing about this play is the credit Nacho Alvarez Jr. is getting for his deke of the unsuspecting runner. “[Vivas] got deked,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said, via MLB.com. “That just can't happen. I did that all my career at third base, just kind of play dumb, play dead. And that's what [Vivas] read. The body language of Alvarez there, just deked him.”

Meanwhile, here’s what the rookie who was filling in at third base told The Athletic: “Alvarez said he wasn’t deking the runner, he just didn’t expect Acuña to throw to third.” Shhhh, Nacho, just take that credit. –ZC

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Count me among those who didn’t realize Pete Alonso was working on the second-longest active streak of consecutive games played — until it was nearly broken on Sunday. I did know he had played all 162 last year…because it was so notable to me that it took him fewer than 100 games this season to surpass the fWAR amassed in a full, but not especially effective, 2024 season.

Alonso bruised his right hand in the cage and again during an at bat on Saturday and initially sat out Sunday’s game, but he entered later as a defensive replacement for his 354th consecutive game. It is perfectly Pete to be reliable, available, and just eager to be out there playing with his boys. It’s one of the reasons the Mets should bring him back next offseason on a more respectable contract. But. I’m sorry Pete. This is actually a story about how durable Matt Olson is. Because Pete’s 354-game streak is second only to Olson’s — which is more than twice as long at 718 games. –HK

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We referenced Bryan Woo’s near-no-hitter against the Yankees a few weeks ago, and as it turned out, it was a more meaningful start for Woo and his family than we could have realized at the time. Woo’s 95-year-old grandfather, John, passed away during that game, which Woo knew was likely to be the case when he started the night. From the MLB.com story: “Woo lost the no-hitter on his 96th pitch, and he’s convinced that the first 95 were a parallel to John’s age.”

That story also mentions how Woo’s parents, who we gif’d in the newsletter linked above, attend every one of his starts, even on the road. That’s just lovely. –HK

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Tarik Skubal is utterly dominant. He’s the reigning Cy Young-Award winner, started the All-Star Game last week, and just notched his seventh double-digit strikeout start of the season on Sunday night. So there’s something sort of charming about his open bafflement at his own inability to reliably retire Corey Seager.