MLB Page 751 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Jackie Robinson died unhappy with baseball
There was no Jackie Robinson Day in 1972. On the 25th anniversary of him breaking the MLB color barrier on April 15, 1947 the league hadn’t retired his number. In fact until June 1972, the Dodgers had never retired a number. They would do so for him, Sandy Koufax, and Roy Campanella. The league didn...

Gabe Kapler backing over the unwritten rules all the way to the bank
The buddy cops driving the MLB’s unwritten rules squad car last night were Bob Melvin and Eric Hosmer of the SDPD. The Padres’ manager and first baseman respectively took issue with a bunt single by Giants’ utility man Mauricio Dubón in the sixth inning with San Francisco up nine runs....

Sorry not sorry, Clayton Kershaw deserved a chance to finish that game
Look, I understand the arguments and the rationale. Clayton Kershaw is coming off an injury-plagued season and he didn’t even have a proper spring training to prepare for this season. He’s 34 and hasn’t had a 200-inning season since 2015. ...

Sports is about magical moments and Dave Roberts robbed us of one
Dave Roberts must have had a ski mask on yesterday in Minneapolis....

Narrative Ball: Tom Murphy
Welcome to Narrative Ball, a series dedicated to pointing out some lesser known players and changing the narrative surrounding them in an effort to put them in the same class as some of the best players in baseball. This is not just an attempt to shine a light on someone worthy of more praise than t...

Actually, dude, we can go anywhere
MLB owners and front offices probably forgot the concept of shame long ago. I doubt most of them could spell it much less define it at this point. You still see owners in other sports wince when one of theirs goes off script and lets in a glimpse of how things really work behind the curtain (see: Sn...

Steven Kwan is kicking off his career hotter than anyone ever
First things first, I just want to say that I know he’s only played four career games, but that doesn’t take away from how insane Cleveland’s 24-year-old rookie, Steven Kwan, has been during this stretch. In 19 plate appearances, Kwan has recorded nine hits (three extra-base hits) and six walks for ...

When Jackie opened the door, these men walked through
It took 2,559 days after Jackie Robinson’s debut for the Brooklyn Dodgers for Major League Baseball to have its 42nd Black player appear in a game. Those seven years and two days saw 11 of the league’s 16 franchises integrate. The Boston Red Sox were the last to do so with Pumpsie Green in July 1959...

Baseball Zen is the rare case of MLB doing something right
If you’re a veteran of getting various out-of-town sports packages (Monday morning is a bit early for the jokes that would normally go here) you’ve probably been annoyed by what goes on during commercial breaks. DirecTV would just show you your market’s commercials, but if you go through the streami...

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. made every baseball sorry it was ever born
We’re going to be hearing from Blue Jays fans all season, and it’ll be kicked into overdrive here in the next month after the Leafs barf all over themselves in the first round again. All of that energy will definitely be channeled into the Rogers Centre immediately. You won’t be able to duck it....

The White Sox had better hope injuries don’t again haunt them all season
A sweep of the Detroit Tigers would have been the ideal way for the Chicago White Sox to begin the 2022 season, but sometimes the ball bounces off the wall, just over the right fielders’ glove for a game-winning hit. Hey, it’s a 162-game season, there’s going to be some head scratchers....

Overpaying Aaron Judge was a mistake the Yankees used to make without blinking
In the scene at the climax of Layer Cake, an English gangster flick Daniel Craig made two years before becoming James Bond, the antagonist goes on this tangent about taking shit, and how eventually, if you climb high enough, you forget what shit even looks like....

Did you notice these cool details from MLB Opening Day?
After an offseason filled with turmoil and uncertainty, Major League Baseball kicked off the 2022 season yesterday...with two postponements, one of them Red Sox at Yankees. Yeah, that wasn’t a great way to kick things off. Pushing back the start of your marquee series is never a good thing,especiall...

Deadspin’s 2022 MLB predictions: The good, the bad, the frustrating
You don’t need sportswriters to tell you that the Dodgers are going to be better than the Diamondbacks this year. You already know that. At the same time, it feels wrong to go into the baseball season without looking ahead at it, without trying to gaze into a crystal ball to make some kind of picks....

Deadspin MLB Gambling Guide/Futures Bets to make for 2022 Season
What an interesting offseason, huh?...

MLB adopts technology after discovering it’s a good thing
In a sport where some stadiums still adjust the scoreboards by hand, it’s not surprising it took a massive sign-stealing scandal for the MLB to try technology. The league announced it will allow teams to use PitchCom this season, a device worn by catchers, pitchers, and a player or three that lets t...

Yes, a pitcher can be the best player in baseball, especially if he also hits 40 HRs
Quarterback is the most important position in football because a quarterback has the ball in their hands for nearly half of the game. They control the game’s pace of play, the efficiency of the passing attack, and although it’s not done nearly as much nowadays, they can even call their team’s plays....

The Rays are at it again
The Tampa Bay Rays once again ducked having to pay a player some serious money when they shipped Austin Meadows off to Detroit for Isaac Peredes. Meadows is still some three years from free agency, but the Rays are probably fearing that second arbitration year like Baba Yaga. I mean, Meadows might m...

Have you noticed the Padres starters?
Boy, the Padres sure love a starting pitcher, don’t they?...

Can the Mets still compete with deGrom sidelined?
Jacob deGrom is the best pitcher in baseball when healthy. That’s indisputable at this point. Since the start of 2018, deGrom has posted a 1.94 ERA, 205 ERA+, 12.0 K/9 rate, and 0.881 WHIP across 581 innings pitched. No one else even comes close to those figures. The problem has been deGrom’s inabil...