ST. LOUIS — Jean Segura‘s career spanned 11 seasons and 1,328 games before he finally reached the postseason, the longest active streak in the major leagues. On the morning of his first playoff game, the Philadelphia Phillies‘ second baseman barely slept. He awoke at 7 a.m. “with adrenaline in my body.” Friday wore on, and that edge never left.
“I was mentally focused on every play, every pitch,” Segura said. “I came prepared today to play a game, and to be able to be here — I just thank God that everything was on my side.”
With the Phillies down a run, the bases loaded, one out in the top of the ninth and the St. Louis Cardinals scrambling to replace their wounded closer, Segura snuck a grounder past a slightly drawn-in infield, plating two runs and propelling the Phillies to an improbable 6-3 win in the opening game of their best-of-three wild-card series, putting them on the cusp of advancing into the National League Division Series.
The Cardinals, backed by a stellar performance from Jose Quintana and an electrifying pinch-hit homer by Juan Yepez, held a 2-0 lead heading into the final inning and had every reason to believe they were headed toward a Game 1 victory. They were at home, with a sold-out Busch Stadium crowd in a frenzy, and their lights-out closer, Ryan Helsley, was on the mound.
What followed strained credulity.
The Cardinals were 93-0 in postseason history when leading by multiple runs entering the ninth inning. The Phillies, meanwhile, were 0-54 during the regular season in that same situation. They wound up scoring six times — the most by a team trailing entering the ninth in postseason history. None of their runs came on hard contact. Alec Bohm was plunked with the bases loaded, Brandon Marsh hit a chopper that bounced past the glove of Nolan Arenado, Kyle Schwarber produced a sacrifice fly and Bryson Stott brought in a run after Paul Goldschmidt made a diving play on his grounder but threw late to home.
The biggest runs came off the bat of Segura, who lunged toward a slider low and away from Andre Pallante and hit a four-hopper to the right side that snuck through a sprawling Tommy Edman, who was playing slightly in to account for Segura’s speed. The Cardinals had a ground ball pitcher against a ground ball hitter and got a grounder that could have produced a game-ending double play — but it was hit just a tad too far to the right.
“That’s just kind of how the inning went,” Arenado said. “It wasn’t going our way.”
And it all seemed to stem from Helsley’s right middle finger, the one he jammed while gathering himself on a fielding play in the penultimate game of the regular season. Helsley threw some pitches off the mound during Thursday’s workout, and though he admitted to his finger feeling slightly stiff, he informed the Cardinals that he would be ready to close out games in the postseason.
Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol turned to Helsley with one on and one out in the eighth and watched him make quick work of Marsh and Schwarber. Shortly after the ninth inning began, though, Marmol said Helsley “started to lose a little bit of feel for his pitches.”
Helsley, who emerged this season as one of the sport’s most dominant closers, began to miss well wide of the strike zone and ultimately threw only nine of his 23 pitches for strikes in the ninth. J.T. Realmuto contributed a one-out single, then Bryce Harper and Nick Castellanos drew back-to-back walks, the latter on pitches that were either way up and in or way low and outside. By that point, the Cardinals had Pallante and Jack Flaherty warming in the bullpen. Bohm would be Helsley’s last batter — and Helsley hit him on the left shoulder with a 101 mph fastball.
After throwing a warm-up pitch well outside, Helsley exited, then departed Busch Stadium to get imaging done on his troublesome finger.
He might be lost for the series.
“We’ve had guys step up all year,” Marmol said. “If he goes down, someone else has to step up and do that job, so it’s part of it. No one’s going to feel sorry for us, I’ll tell you that. “
Friday’s top of the ninth marked the only half-inning in baseball this season where a team allowed at least six earned runs on three hits or fewer, with no extra-base hits allowed, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. There have now been five games in postseason history in which a team that led by two or more runs after the eighth inning lost by two or more runs — and the Cardinals have been involved in three of those. It marked the first time the Phillies had scored six or more runs in any postseason inning.
They picked the perfect time.
“It was special,” said Zack Wheeler, who threw 6⅓ scoreless innings against the Cardinals, exiting three batters before Jose Alvarado gave up the two-run homer to Yepez.
“That was probably the most exciting inning I’ve ever been a part of,” Realmuto said of the top of the ninth. “And it didn’t even take a big home run. The momentum was there for us and multiple guys stepped up when they needed to.”
WASHINGTON — The Milwaukee Brewers placed outfielder Jackson Chourio on the 10-day injured list Friday after evaluations of his strained right hamstring revealed more significant issues than expected.
Chourio was injured Tuesday while running the bases on a triple in the fifth inning. The move to the IL was made retroactive to Wednesday.
Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said the 21-year-old Chourio likely will require more than a minimum stay on the injured list.
“It won’t be anytime soon,” Murphy said before the Brewers’ series opener against Washington. “He was diagnosed a little more severely than we initially thought. To what extent, I’m not exactly sure. Nor are they. We’re just going to have to rehab it.”
Murphy said Chourio will receive a platelet-rich plasma injection.
Chourio is hitting .276 with 17 homers, 67 RBI and 18 steals for Milwaukee, which entered Friday with the best record in the majors at 64-44. He was replaced on the active roster by outfielder Brandon Lockridge, who the Brewers acquired Thursday from San Diego for pitcher Nestor Cortes, infielder Jorge Quintana and cash.
Lockridge, who hit .216 with five RBI in 47 games with the Padres this season, was inserted into the leadoff slot Friday against the Nationals.
ESPN baseball reporter. Covered the Washington Wizards from 2014 to 2016 and the Washington Nationals from 2016 to 2018 for The Washington Post before covering the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB for the Los Angeles Times from 2018 to 2024.
The New York Yankees released right-hander Marcus Stroman on Friday, abruptly terminating the veteran’s underwhelming tenure with the club.
The Yankees signed Stroman to a two-year contract worth $37 million guaranteed before the start of last season and will eat the remainder of his $18 million salary.
Stroman, 34, has an $18 million vesting option for 2026 that would have triggered if he pitched 140 innings pitched this season, but Stroman, with 39 innings under his belt on Aug. 1, won’t reach that goalpost and will become a free agent this winter.
“Obviously, that was tough today,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “The perception around Stro for us, if you got to be around him the last couple of years, he’s an awesome competitor.”
Boone said Stroman took the news of his release like “a pro.”
“Had a good interaction with him,” Boone said. “I feel he’ll be a guy I’ll stay in touch with for the rest of our lives. Appreciative of him.”
In the end, Stroman, who is 3-2 with a 6.23 ERA in nine starts this season, was the odd man out of the Yankees’ rotation with Luis Gil scheduled to come off the injured list to make his season debut Sunday against the Miami Marlins.
As it stands, New York’s starting rotation will consist of Max Fried, Carlos Rodon, Gil, Will Warren and rookie Cam Schlittler, who impressed team decision-makers enough in three starts since making his major-league debut on July 9 to convince the Yankees to pay Stroman to not pitch for them.
Stroman’s release also relieves a roster crunch with the Yankees adding four more players acquired before Thursday’s trade deadline to the roster: relievers David Bednar, Camilo Doval and Jake Bird and utilityman José Caballero. The Yankees traded Oswald Peraza to make room for Caballero while right-handers Ian Hamilton and Yerry de los Santos were optioned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre on Thursday. Cutting Stroman opened the final needed roster spot.
Stroman’s brief time in the Bronx was turbulent. An All-Star with the Chicago Cubs in 2023, Stroman recorded a 4.31 ERA in 30 appearances (29 starts) for the Yankees in 2024 and didn’t pitch in a postseason game as New York advanced to the World Series. The Yankees, anticipating a starting pitching surplus, then attempted to trade him over the offseason but couldn’t swing a deal.
As a result, Stroman reported to spring training not projected to make the Opening Day starting rotation. Unhappy with the possibility, he scoffed at the notion of being a reliever upon reporting to camp for workouts two days later than the team expected. Manager Aaron Boone called the situation “awkward.” Injuries to Gerrit Cole and Gil over the following month, however, opened the door for Stroman to begin the season in the rotation.
The 11-year veteran was placed on the injured list with a knee injury in April, missing more than two months before returning June 29 to make six starts. His final outing with the Yankees came Thursday when he surrendered four runs on six hits across five innings against the Tampa Bay Rays.
Stroman finished his Yankees career with a 4.69 ERA — the 11th-highest mark in the majors among pitchers who have logged at least 190 innings over the last two seasons. He can now sign with another club on a prorated minimum — approximately $230,000 for the remainder of the 2025 campaign.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
MIAMI — Xavier Edwards hit a tying two-run single in the ninth, then raced home with the winning run on Agustin Ramirez‘s chopper in front of the plate as the Marlins rallied to beat the New York Yankees13-12 on Friday night.
Edwards’ hit came off new Yankees reliever Camilo Doval (4-3), and Edwards beat the attempted tag at home on Ramirez’s fielder’s choice grounder. After Edwards’ single off Doval, Jose Caballero, also a newcomer, committed an error in right field, allowing the Marlins to tie the score.
The Yankees had won 79 straight games when scoring 10-plus runs, which was the longest streak in major league baseball since 2019, according to ESPN Research.
Giancarlo Stanton and Trent Grisham each hit three-run homers that helped the Yankees build a 9-4 lead before the Marlins stunned New York with a six-run seventh.
Kyle Stowers hit a grand slam off newly acquired Yankees reliever Jake Bird, and Javier Sanoja hit a solo shot off David Bednar, another new acquisition. Ramirez singled twice, including a leadoff base hit and a go-ahead single that put the Marlins up 10-9.
Anthony Volpe then tied it at 10 with a leadoff home run in the eighth, and Bednar pitched a scoreless inning before Ryan McMahon‘s RBI single against Anthony Bender (3-5) in the ninth. Volpe, who had four hits, gave the Yankees a two-run cushion with a run-scoring double.
Yankees starter Carlos Rodon was lifted in the fifth after issuing his fifth walk. The left-hander shook his head as he left the mound, with his outing ending after he struck out nine and allowed two walks and four runs.
Rodon held the Marlins without a hit before Eric Wagaman‘s leadoff single in the fifth. Sanoja launched an opposite-field two-run shot off Rodon, and pinch hitter Liam Hicks drove in two with a single off Jonathan Loaisiga that made it 6-4.