Jake

I mean probably not so much that you bother putting Jarred Kelenic on the 40 man just to take him back off and lose whoever you had to cut to make room for him (and lose Kelenic to the waiver wire potentially although I doubt it).

As for Colson in the clutch, to me we've got bad batted ball luck/small sample variation written all over it. Depending on which way you define it, it's <.150 BABIP and the Statcast metrics look just fine. And also FWIW, if you simply look at his "high leverage" splits, which doesn't really require late innings even though it helps, that's his best split with .960 OPS in high leverage.

Hays is the obvious replacement on the roster.

Too bad for Tanner. Have a feeling it's a mix of pain from whatever's wrong and knowing this could be his last shot at the big leagues.

Good stuff.

FWIW, Newcomb has not historically had very pronounced platoon splits. They are reversed this year but it's a small sample.

I'm not seeing a hit batsman here

Seems increasingly likely this game will be decided by the jamshot + SB combo.

Does this mean the people yearn for Bryan Hudson?

Not sure the right strategy with Burke here. May not be a good idea to let him face Wood again even with the low pitch count. On the other hand, I don't love anyone in the bullpen.

Sox have squared up their pitcher several times in the past couple of innings. If I was the Nats, I don't know that I'd send back out there.

Well that's somewhat baked into the calculation so I wouldn't necessarily blame it on that. I'd guess that heavy ground ball approaches are going to be more vulnerable to stretches of bad luck since you're not getting any of the three true outcomes to stabilize the results. Would also be more likely to have stretches of good luck for the same reason of course.

Hasn't been worth harping on, but Luisangel's batted ball luck has been pisspoor this season. Not so much that he's lowkey hitting well or anything crazy like that. But his xwOBA is above the likes of Tanner Murray and Edgar Quero and will be ahead of Tristan Peters after today.

Interesting, so really you want that thing to pop off near the bag since it can only help you by bothering and/or blocking the fielder

Rules question: suppose the tag had only hit Woods's helmet, as it was leaving his head. One could argue that the helmet would have blocked the fielder's tag from hitting Woods's body efficiently. Do we treat the helmet as part of his body for some period of time even if it has stopped being in contact with his head?

Vargas continues to hit into tough luck

72mph exit velo jamshot to start the inning. Grant doesn't give up much hard contact but also doesn't get quite as many whiffs as you would think given how great his stuff looks.

Saw this in the WBC as well but Sam's chasing MLB pitching out of the zone. Combined with his passivity early in the counts that could limit his ability to do much damage.

I agree with you. I just meant that if it wasn't called interference then he would be out.

Well, if there's no interference, then Miguel really was out. But I don't know why he called him safe first. And obviously there was interference so ump should probably be calling that before he rings up the baserunner.

2nd base ump: safe, out, safe

Wilbur seems underappreciated. Part of me feels like some people look at that fantastic run as not real because he was throwing knuckleballs. I think that makes it even cooler.

Luis Robert 2026 batting statistics: .231/.333/.333, 13.3% BB%, 18.9% K%, .103 ISO, 97 wRC+. I'm reminded of last season when he had a stretch of excellent plate discipline but was unable to pair that with any slugging. Best stretch of hitting came when he started letting loose and chasing a bit

Comments from Sox coaches to James Fegan recently makes me think the Sox intend to give Acuna a reasonably long leash and see some of his issues at the plate as partly due to changes they have made him make. I'm perfectly happy to keep running him out there because he's got a little talent and he's not blocking anyone important.

Not a bad loss in my book. The young slugging core had great games at the dish. Some old guys who suck gave up a bunch of runs. Okay.