Frayed Knot

4-3 to end the game (although it took nice scoop by Freddie to secure the out). Phils now 1-5 in their last six playoff games in 'The Bank'

FC: 3-6 (well turned by Freddie/Mookie) 1st & 3rd, two outs, and Roki Sasaki is coming trying for the final out Trea Turner up

So of course Bader lines a single to LF (and gets pinch-run for) 1st & 2nd / one out. Tying run on 2nd, winning run on 1st.

A Sac Bunt results in a tag play at 3rd [3B to SS covering] so now one out / runner on 1st, a clear step down from prior to the bunt attempt. And now the previously mentioned Harrison Bader PH AB

Well this game suddenly got interesting. Dodgers scored four in the 7th and led 4-1 heading into the 9th Dave Roberts went to (former Nat) Blake Treinen and his 5.40 ERA (8.70 over the final month) to close out the three-run lead but that didn't go well [single - double - double] and it's now 4-3, runner on 2nd, still no outs. Alex Vesia on to pitch.

13 combined Ks so far is the main reason for no runs. No one has threatened the fences and few have even briefly disturbed any of the outfielders. 1 hit / 3 walks for Phils (including one just now) 1 hit / 1 walk for Dodgers

I didn't hear when it occurred, but Harrison Bader came up with a leg injury in Game #1 so is out of the lineup and available only of possible PH duties. Of course the big thing about that is that PH'ing is his least valuable skill. So what this has done is throw their OF into a tizzy. Brad Marsh is back in CF but it was his decline in CF that led to them dealing for Bader at the deadline. We all know that Castellanos is a more than occasional adventure in RF (not that Teoscar Hernandez is winning any GGs out there either) while LF is, at least for this game, being manned by rookie Otto Kemp who mostly filled-in for Bohm at 3B this year playing just eleven games in the OF, seven as a starter. So definitely a defensive concern for the Phils out there. Castellanos already took a funky route to one fly ball in the 1st inning. He ultimately made the catch although the Romanian judge seriously docked his score on style points. Scoreless thru 4 innings with just one hit in the game (single by Mookie).

Game #2 @ 6:08 tonight. Blake Snell vs Jesus Luzardo The games today are at 6:08 & 9:08 but the AL ones tomorrow at 4:08 & 8:08, which seems kind of odd. My first thought was that 4:08 Eastern would make it too early for LA fans but MLB apparently has no problem laying a 1:08 midweek local time start on Mariners fans.

Mariners win 3-2. Series tied 1-1 Runs scored = 5-5 Yanx/Jays runs scored = 31

Most if not all of us likely missed this late start Game 1 of this series which was won by the Tigers 3-2 in 11 innings. And when I heard the result this morning it took a minute to remind myself that this was an actual extra inning game rather than a fake extra inning game. Tigers won on a two-out single. And now, in order for the Mariners to even up the series, they're going to have to go through Tarik Skubal to do so. Luis Castillo (no, not that one) is on the mound for Seattle.

'Toe' Nash was the perfect wish-upon-a-star ballplayer for the early days of the internet. The publicity generated by a few actual articles about him, which were in turn amplified by the echoing drumbeat of the early on-line world during his brief time with Tampa Bay, was enough to convince some fans that the next great thing had been discovered and it was only a matter of when, not if, he took the baseball world by storm. And why didn't the Mets sign him?!?!?!?!? ... ****ing lazy, cheap-ass Wilpons! Both sad, but also not surprising, to read of his death at such a young age.

FINALLY!, 13-7 is your final. Yanx down two games to none on a combined score of 23 - 8 Too bad this isn't a soccer tourney where the Yanx would not only have to win the next game to stay alive but they'd have to do so by at least 15 runs or the Blue Jays would advance on aggregate.

QUIT WALKING GUYS!!!!

Hmmmm, now 13-7 and the Jays still have 7 outs to secure. The starter Yesavage was removed (with a no-hitter) with one out in the 6th. [CROSSOUT]Four[/CROSSOUT] .. now five Toronto relievers have recorded just one out each while coughing up 7 runs on 7 hits since. Finally the top 7th is over but the Yanx are perfectly capable of scoring six in the two innings they have left.

This one goes to eleven! [FIMG=300]https://bouquetsbrickbatsreviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/this-is-spinal-tap3.-.jpeg?strip=info&w=1800[/FIMG]

Vladdy Jr = Grand Slam 9-0 w/one out in the 4th

Fried now out after retiring nine of the 18 batters he faced. Will Warren on in relief. Still 5-0 but bases loaded/none out.

Game 2 (FS1): Max Fried (201st ML game) for the Yanx vs Trey Yesavage (4th ML game) for the Jays Yanx have the (on paper) favorable pitching match-ups going forward in this series ... but someone forgot to tell the Blue Jays that. Jays have tallied five off of Fried thru 3 innings while Yesavage is thru 4 and has K'd 10 of the 13 batters he's faced including the last six straight.

Especially on rye with mayo! I think I must have hit the N key while trying for the nearby B which then caused the auto-correct to insert a U in front of that N that I so obviously was negligent to include. aka: Artificial UNintelligence.

9th inning, still 5 - 3, Roki Sasaki in for the save. Realmuto - K Kepler - Double Bader - GO 4 - 3 Bryson Stott up ... Pops out to 3B, game over Phils score three times in the 2nd vs Ohtani but are shut out in the other eight frames. I was thinking this is the most uneatable the Dodgers have looked in several years ... but they're trying to prove me wrong (not a hard thing to do)

It just wouldn't be a Dodger post-season game without Kike Hernandez getting a clutch hit for them. Dodgers were down 3-0 early but now up 5-3 thx to the Hernandez 'brothers' Kike (2R 2B) and Teoscar (3R HR) Heading to bottom 8th my spell-check keeps turning Kike into Mike. Yes, I know the K and M are close on the keyboard but I'm not a dunce ... at least not usually

I won't say the Yanx are tossing this game on the trash heap ... but Paul Blackburn is now in absorbing the 8th inning Blue Jay abuse. 10-1 Jays and still batting. But as recently as the top of the 6th, this was a very different game. That's when the Yanx loaded the bases w/no outs and Judge, Bellinger, Rice, and Stanton due up. K*, BB, PO-5, K * we just might have to concede, based on his post-season history, that Judge is most certainly not a 'True Yanqui'

=MFS62 post_id=206442 time=1759606805 user_id=60] Michael Busch led off the game for the Cubs with a homer and it's been downhill ever since.

The Blue Jays will be without SS Bo Bichette for this series - he's been out since early September with a knee injury (occurred in a game against the Yanx) Also not on the Toronto roster in this series: RHPs Chris Bassitt (injury) and Max Scherzer (no longer very good) as the Jays try to get more LHPs in vvs NYY

I'm sure Jarred Kelenic has been mentioned in this thread somewhere. And he's in the news this week because, after spending most of the 2025 season on the Braves' AAA team, and not doing well there or in the majors, he was outrighted to the minors by the Braves and has chosen to become a Free Agent. w/Braves this season: 65 PA, 10-for-60 w/two 2Bs & two HRs plus 5 BB/23 K [.167/.231/.300 // 531] w/AAA Gwinett: .not a lot better 213/.286/.309 even with a much bigger sample size [399 PA] Sometimes the expected path must never materializes. - 6th overall draft pick in 2018 - traded just six months later in the Diaz/Cano deal (formerly the Cano/Diaz deal) - immediately shines in Mariners system jumping from mid-60-ish prospect status (pre-2019) to top-10 (pre-2020) then top-5 (pre-2021) - ML debut in May of '21 still just 21 y/o and was given regular playing time (377 PA) though not much success - ditto in '22 although with less playing time - '23 seemed to maybe be a breakout year (400+ AB / 111 OPS+) for a guy still young, but it wasn't going to be w/Seattle following an off-season trade to the Braves It was at this point where I figured the Braves, at worst, got themselves a good platoon OF'er and maybe a rising star. But an 679/87 OPS/OPS+ despite another season of 400+ ABs just didn't cut it and he both regressed and barely played in '25 Now he's job seeking and anything better than a split contract w/a ST invite seems like an overly optimistic scenario for the just-turned 26 y/o