From The Babe’s home run handles to Bonds’ maple mashers: A brief history of bats
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Bradford Doolittle
So often in recent years, baseballs have been the subject of controversy. How tightly are they wound? What is the height of their seams? What’s inside them that might determine how far they fly? What has been slathered onto them that might impact how slick they are?
In that sense, the sudden furor over so-called torpedo bats is refreshing. At least, for once, we’re arguing and conspiracy-theorizing about a different piece of equipment.
But torpedo bats are simply an iteration in the art of bat-making, a practice that has been evolving since the day some long-gone hominid first swatted at a round stone with a stick they found lying on the ground.
In that spirit, let’s take a moment to consider the turning-point moments in baseball bat history — an abridged guide to how we got from sticks to torpedoes.
Wee Willie, wood wars and the wild west of bat experiments
From the beginning, the partnership between players and their bats have been personal affairs, with everything from length to weight to wood preference coming under scrutiny. While the points of emphasis in the game have changed, the choice of bat has always depended on the size of the hitter, the shape of his swing and the kind of batsman he wants to be.
During the early days of baseball, regulations were few and far between and there was a lot of experimentation with the stick. During the late 1880s and early 1890s, some hitters used a flat-faced bat that was supposed to help with bunting but looked more suitable for hammering nails.
Bats were heavier in those days. The style of knob varied, from a ball-shaped knob, a mushroom knob to a barely-there knob at the end of bat handles that were much thicker than the ones we see now. Future Hall of Famer Nap Lajoie used a bat that had two knobs, which seemed to work fine considering he ended with 3,243 career hits, five batting titles and a modern-era record .426 batting average in 1901.
Like many hitters of his time, Ty Cobb swung a heavy bat (40 ounces until late in his career; bats today weigh between 30 and 33 ounces), and he gripped it with his hands apart to maximize control. That was the dominant theme of the era: The ability to control the bat while slapping at the ball, or bunting, was far more important than bat speed. Perhaps the avatar for that kind of baseball was Wee Willie Keeler, the guy who said, “Keep your eye on the ball and hit ’em where they ain’t.” Keeler, who stood 5-foot-5, slapped the ball around with what was basically an oversized baton.
Keeler’s bats measured 30½ to 31 inches in length (bats are now typically 33 or 34 inches), with varying weights up to 46 ounces. Such a thing would look comical in today’s game. Keeler flourished with his small body and heavy bat, hitting .341 over a long career. Power was simply not the aim for Wee Willie, and only 33 of his 2,932 career hits were homers — an estimated 30 of which were of the inside-the-park variety.
Even after specifications on what was allowed were codified, there remained plenty of experimentation. A famous take on bat shape was that of Heinie Groh, an on-base machine for the Giants and Reds in the early 20th century. His “bottle bat” had a long, thick barrel and thin handle. It looked like something more apt for cricket than baseball. Groh’s teammate, Hall of Famer Edd Roush, used a 48-ounce stick.
There was also a long-standing competition in wood sources, with hickory rivaling ash for supremacy. Cobb used a bat made out of what he claimed was black ash, but was probably just white ash. Perhaps the most famous bat in history was Shoeless Joe Jackson’s “Black Betsy,” a massive 36-inch, 39-ounce stick Jackson used his entire career. It was made out of a hickory tree from South Carolina, his native state.
Hickory has fallen completely out of favor, and, considering the rise in importance of power and bat speed over the decades, it’s not hard to understand why. According to Steven Bratkovich, author of “The Baseball Bat: From Trees to the Major Leagues, 19th Century to Today”, Roger Maris used a 33-ounce ash bat when he broke Babe Ruth’s home run record in 1961. If he had used a hickory bat of the same dimensions, it would have weighed 42 ounces.
The invention of The Louisville Slugger
The origin story of the Hillerich & Bradsby Co., at least the bat-making portion of it, traces back to a seminal spring day in 1884. As with most of baseball’s storied past, details of the story have been questioned — even the Louisville Slugger Museum refers to it as “company legend” — but if it’s not exactly true, it ought to be.
One of the great hitters of the day, Pete Browning, had a frustrating day at the plate during a home game in Louisville and seemed to be especially irked by a bat that had broken. In the stands was 17-year-old Bud Hillerich, son of a local woodworker and an apprentice in the craft. Browning, having heard of Hillerich’s skills, asked the teenager whether he could help. Hillerich could, and the next day Browning rang out three hits with the custom-made bat Hillerich constructed for him out of Northern White Ash.
Browning went on to win two battling titles after that day, adding the nickname “the Louisville Slugger” to his existing moniker “Gladiator.” The ramp-up was a bit slow, but by 1894, the company had trademarked “Louisville Slugger” and the bat business was swinging away.
Three years later, Honus Wagner’s big league career began with the Louisville Colonels. Just after the turn of the century, when he had become one the game’s first true superstars with the Pittsburgh Pirates, he also became what is believed to be the first athlete to endorse athletic gear when he signed on as a pitch man for the Louisville Slugger. His autograph began appearing in the wood of the bat itself — the beginning of that long-common practice.
For 100 years or more, the Louisville Slugger reigned supreme as the bat of choice in the majors. The Slugger remains a popular choice, but in recent years, it has had to make room for batmakers such as Victus and Marucci atop the leaderboard.
The Babe’s thin-handled stick helps change baseball forever
Baseball writer and historian Bill James has often pointed to the continual thinning of the bat handle as a key driver of the game’s shift from an emphasis on bat control to one of bat speed. This evolution began in the early 1920s and, yes, it exploded when Ruth clubbed an unthinkable 54 homers in 1920, turning the dead ball era on its ear.
Ruth swung heavy bats — it’s one of the things for which he’s most well known. They tended to weigh at least 44 ounces and as heavy as 50, though it’s not believed he used the latter much during the regular season. But the handles were thin, allowing him to lash the bat around on the pitchers of his day. There was no one factor that led to the game’s transformation to a power-based sport, but the proliferation of thin handle bats in the wake of the Ruth phenomenon was certainly a contributor.
Incidentally, Ruth modeled the bat shape after that of another Hall of Famer, Rogers Hornsby, who didn’t use as heavy a stick but favored thin handles, recognizing their value in getting the bat head through the zone more quickly than was possible with thicker handles. Through 1920, Hornsby was already a .328 career hitter but had just 36 career homers in 2,903 plate appearances. During the next nine seasons, he hit .384 with 241 homers.
Other players, including The Babe, tend to notice such things.
Teddy Ballgame’s baked bats
If you had to anoint one player as the Albert Einstein of hitting, it would be Ted Williams. Williams had a theory of everything, as long as it pertained to hitting, and there was no detail too small. Naturally, this included his bats.
The story goes that while Williams was still in the minors, using a fairly standard-for-the-time 35-ounce bat, he borrowed a lighter stick from a teammate named Stan Spence. He used it to club a home run to center field and immediately knew that, for him, the lighter bat was the way to go. Initially, when Williams tried to order a lighter-weight model, Hillerich and Bradsby tried to talk him out of it. But you couldn’t really talk Teddy Ballgame out of anything.
A few years later, around 1948, a young Red Sox fan named David Pressman — who must have been a spiritual descendant of Bud Hillerich — noticed that, one night, after he had left a bat outside overnight in some dew-covered grass, it felt heavier. When he weighed it, sure enough, it had gained about two ounces. Assuming it had absorbed some moisture, he put the bat into a coal oven and — voila! — it was back to normal.
The story was recounted in Ben Bradlee Jr.’s “The Kid.” The excited Pressman managed to get this information to Williams, his favorite player, who invited him to Fenway Park for a chat. Pressman told him what he had found, and Williams listened. They settled on a system of using clothes dryers in the Boston Red Sox clubhouse to heat up and dry out Williams’ bats, and Williams used scales to monitor the weight of his weapons of choice from there on out.
This system of heating up his bats continued during the rest of Williams’ Hall of Fame career, during which he hit .336 with 299 homers — beginning with his age-30 season. Williams and Pressman remained friends and associates for the rest of Teddy Ballgame’s life. But Williams insisted Pressman keep the bat-heating ploy a secret until his passing.
However, Williams did ask Pressman to explain the theory of bat-heating one time to Joe DiMaggio. DiMaggio, according to Pressman, looked unconvinced and simply walked away.
Superballs, pine tar — and an MLB ‘Mission: Impossible’
Cheating has a long, inglorious history in baseball, and when it comes to bats, there have been plenty of shenanigans and intrigue. DiMaggio used a bat named “Betsy Ann” during his 56-game hitting streak in 1941. The bat was stolen in the midst of his spree between games of a doubleheader. Despite his despair over losing Betsy Ann, DiMaggio kept his streak alive. Then she returned, arriving a week later in a plain brown package delivered by a courier. It turned out that the thief, a guy from Newark, had bragged about his prize to the wrong people.
One famous incident was the George Brett pine tar episode from 1983, though despite the rule on the books about the substance, it has never really been explained why having extra pine tar on a bat, while messy, would give a hitter any kind of edge.
Numerous players have been rumored to have used corked bats, which seemed to be most prominent from the 1970s through the early 2000s. The goal was simply to lessen the weight of the bat in the never-ending pursuit of bat speed.
There are all sorts of things you can stuff into a bat. On Sept. 7, 1974, Yankees star Graig Nettles homered against the Tigers. His next time up, Nettles stroked a single but broke his bat in the process. While Nettles ran to first, Detroit catcher Bill Freehan was busy chasing the six Superballs that had come tumbling out of Nettles’ bat.
Nettles explained that the bat had been a gift from a fan and, apparently, the powers-that-be bought his story. Nettles wasn’t suspended.
In another famous incident, a suspension was handed out. During a game at Chicago’s Comiskey Park in 1994, White Sox manager Gene Lamont challenged Albert Belle’s use of a bat, and it was confiscated by the umpiring crew for later investigation.
Meanwhile, the rest of the game played out. Cleveland reliever Jason Grimsley crawled through the ceiling from the visiting clubhouse to the umpire’s room and swapped Belle’s bat out for one belonging to Paul Sorrento, leaving behind chunks of ceiling tile and mangled metal. The umpires were not fooled, and Belle was suspended seven games.
An even longer suspension was doled out to Sammy Sosa in 2003, when his bat shattered during a game and revealed the cork that was within. Sosa claimed he picked up the bat by mistake. He did not get the same benefit of the doubt that Nettles did.
Barry, Barry good wood
Barry Bonds hit 73 home runs in 2001. It’s a record. No, really, you can look it up.
There has been so much clamor about Bonds’ training methods over the years that his place in bat evolution tends to be overlooked. When Bonds set that record, he swung bats made out of maple, not ash.
ESPN wrote about this at the time. Bonds said then, “I tried it and I liked it. Ash wood is a softer wood that has a tendency to split and crack easier. Maple gives you the opportunity that if you feel comfortable with it, you’ve got a chance of keeping it for a while.”
It seemed to work out for him. Bonds wasn’t the first player to use a maple bat, but many others followed his example once his historic numbers attracted unprecedented attention.
A few years later, after the use of maple bats spread, it became a source of concern. While maple bats were harder to break than bats made out of other wood, including ash, when they did come apart, they tended to shatter. This would send dangerous shards of wood flying through the air around the field. People got hurt. Since then, after some MLB-led investigations into maple bats, the manufacturing processes evolved and the rate of broken bats has improved.
In the years since Bonds largely sparked their proliferation, maple bats raced past ash as the wood of choice in the big league. The trend was accelerated by blight — a massive infestation of invasive beetles wreaked havoc on the ash trees that companies such as Hillerich & Bradsby so long relied upon. More than three years ago, The Athletic profiled this sea change in the industry, describing Joey Votto as the last of the ash bat advocates. Votto, of course, has since retired.
Even so, more than 150 years since the advent of major league baseball, the source of wood for bats is not a settled, consensus part of the game. Birch is used in some bat models, and bamboo is often cited as a possible competitor. How long before someone tries to bring back hickory?
The only constant is change.
Synthetic sticks
In 2022, commissioner Rob Manfred announced that baseball would be experimenting with aluminum bats in hopes of introducing them for regular-season use in the middle of that campaign.
Except he didn’t — because that story making the rounds three years ago was an April Fools Day concoction, one that has cropped up around that date a few times. But this hoax underscores why it’s outlandish to even ponder metal bats rising from Little League and college ball up to the majors. Pitchers might have to wear Kevlar on the mound. Still, while aluminum bats aren’t coming to MLB, James wrote about the profound impact the advent of metal bats at other levels of the game has had in the big leagues in “The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract.”
In a nutshell, James wrote that it was once dogma that a hitter couldn’t prosper by crowding the plate and trying to drive outside pitches to the opposite field, the likely outcome being a stream of ground outs to middle infielders. But then aluminum sticks showed up and amateur batters found they were able to drive outside pitches just fine. Soon, advanced hitters learned that the same approach worked once they made the switch to wood.
Now, it’s no longer considered strange to see a hitter trying to drive the ball, in the air, to the opposite field. (See: Aaron Judge.) There’s more to it than the rise of the aluminum bat, but the kind of stick a player uses as a kid impacts what they do when they swing wood bats when they reach the big time.
The bat, er, beat goes on
The appearance of the torpedo bat is noteworthy, but the only thing novel about it is that it took so long for someone to think of it. There have been flat bats and round bats. Thin handles, thick handles, V-handles (a Don Mattingly innovation) and axe handles. Heavy bats, heavier bats and light bats. Short bats and long bats. The bat is always changing, and always has.
Twenty-five years ago, the rise of maple seemed like a revolution. Thirty years before that, it was the sudden appearance of cupped bats, a style in which the end of the bat is hollowed out. The origin story of those is another murky area, but it appears that while you could get cupped bats in America as early as the late 1890s, they first became much more popular in Japan’s professional leagues. In the late 1960s, onetime Cubs outfielder George Altman played in Japan after his career in the majors wound down, then brought some of the cupped bats back with him, where they attracted the attention of outfielder Jose Cardenal. (Or possibly Lou Brock, and Cardenal saw Brock with them.) The use of cupped bats had been sporadic but spread quickly, and the bats are now ubiquitous.
With companies such as Victus offering painted bats and other modes of aesthetic customization, including the popular pencil bats, bats have become as much about personal expression as they are about productivity. This is on full display on Players Weekend, when players and those who supply their bats can let their creativity fly. While these innovations might not have much competitive impact, they add color and flavor to the old game.
Torpedo bats are just the latest entrant on this ongoing continuum. They are the product of a collaboration between data science, bat manufacturers and each individual player. Just as bats have long been made to spec depending on a player’s swing and proclivities, so too is the torpedo bat.
For now, we can’t declare one way or another whether the advent of the torpedo bat is going to change the game, but it probably won’t. As we collect the data, chances are any tangible effect the bat might have will be subsumed by a thousand other factors that produce the game’s statistics. Perhaps we wouldn’t even be discussing this if Yankees announcer Michael Kay had not pointed out that New York was using these newfangled bats during a historic game in which the team ultimately went deep nine times against the Milwaukee Brewers.
Torpedo bats won’t work for everyone, but for some they will. Will they change the game? Whether they’re here to stay or another passing fad, they’re part of a sport that is constantly evolving — and will continue to do so.
HOUSTON — Astros starter Framber Valdez said he apologized to catcher Cesar Salazar after hitting him in the chest with a pitch Tuesday night, but the left-hander insisted it wasn’t intentional.
Valdez appeared to shake off Salazar on a 1-0 pitch with the bases loaded and Trent Grisham of the New York Yankees at the plate in the fifth inning. Salazar then urged Valdez to step off the mound, but he proceeded with the pitch, which Grisham launched to deep left field to give New York a 6-0 lead in an eventual 7-1 win.
On the second pitch to the next batter, Valdez hit Salazar in the chest with a 93 mph pitch, raising questions about whether he was upset about what happened in the Grisham at-bat and if it was intended.
Valdez said it was not.
“What happened with us, we just got crossed up,” Valdez said in Spanish through an interpreter. “I called for that pitch, I threw it and we got crossed up. We went down to the dugout and I excused myself with him and I said sorry to him and I take full responsibility for that.”
Valdez was then asked directly if he did it on purpose.
“No,” he said. “It was not intentional.”
Valdez and Salazar were talking when reporters entered the clubhouse after the game, and Valdez said they had sorted things out.
“We were able to talk through it,” he said. “We spoke after the game … at his locker and everything’s good between us. It’s just stuff that happens in baseball. But yeah, we talked through it and we’re good.”
Salazar also was asked about what happened on the pitch where he was hit.
“The stadium was loud,” he said. “I thought I pressed the button, but I pressed the wrong button. I was expecting another pitch, but it wasn’t it.”
Salazar said Valdez didn’t hit him on purpose.
“No, me and Framber we actually have a really good relationship,” he said.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
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David Schoenfield
With each postseason expansion throughout MLB’s history, the value of division races has diluted. In the wild-card era, you can finish in second place — or even third or fourth — and still win the World Series.
Does that make September less exciting? There’s no doubt it brings more teams and more fans into the mix. And a big game is still a big game, even if there is slightly less tension in a Red Sox-Yankees or Mets-Phillies series than there otherwise might be if both teams already know they’re going to make the playoffs.
Thus, we’re mostly left with wild-card races and battles for seeding to occupy our time and scoreboard watching. That still offers plenty of fun, still makes September the best month on the baseball calendar, and there’s still a lot of sweating going on when your closer walks two batters in the ninth trying to protect a one-run lead. The 12 postseason slots aren’t completely locked up, so if you’re a fan of the Mets or Mariners, you can’t breathe easily just yet — not until a playoff spot is clinched and the champagne uncorked.
September is here, believe it or not. We have races to decide. Let’s rank their potential excitement level over the final month.
1. National League West race
Standings: Los Angeles Dodgers up 2 games on San Diego Padres
What’s at stake: This is the best rivalry going on in the majors right now. The teams don’t like each other, the fans don’t like each other, and there’s still that element of David trying to knock out Goliath as the Padres seek their first division title since 2006 and their first World Series title ever. The teams have met three times in the NL Division Series since 2020 — with the Dodgers winning in 2020 and 2024 and the Padres victorious in 2022 — and with another rematch possible, home-field advantage could be key.
Do the Dodgers need to win the division? No, they will still be more focused on getting the pitching staff healthy and ready for October than on getting consumed in the race to win the division. It would probably mean more to the Padres, who want to finally beat their I-5 rivals in something besides that one playoff series. On the other hand, San Diego is probably a little better equipped for a short wild-card series, as it can ride its bullpen for the two or three games.
Series to watch: Somehow, the schedule-makers thought it would be a good idea to not have the Dodgers playing the Padres in September. The Dodgers finish with a road trip to Arizona and Seattle while the Padres end at home against Milwaukee and Arizona. The Dodgers won the season series, so they own the tiebreaker.
Dodgers player to watch: Blake Snell has been a notable second-half pitcher in his career and has a 2.54 ERA since returning from the injured list in August, but he hasn’t been quite as dominant as when he gets on one of his patented hot streaks (such as the second half last year, when he had a 1.45 ERA and .130 average allowed). The Dodgers won last season despite a beat-up rotation that wasn’t even all that effective in the playoffs. But the bullpen has been nowhere near as strong this season as in 2024, so they’ll need that dominant version of Snell down the stretch and in October.
Padres player to watch: Ramon Laureano has been the team’s best hitter since he was acquired at the trade deadline, slashing .305/.354/.581 with seven home runs and 23 RBIs in 28 games. He helped keep the offense afloat in August as Manny Machado and Fernando Tatis Jr. each hit just one home run on the month and Jackson Merrill has been injured. Laureano’s production has been great, but the Padres need more power from their big two.
2. American League East
Standings: Toronto Blue Jays up 3 games on New York Yankees, 3.5 games on Boston Red Sox
What’s at stake: This has been the wildest division race all season. The Blue Jays were eight games back in late May when they fell under .500 but have now held first place since July 3. The Yankees fell as many as 6.5 games back in August before cleaning up against the Washington Nationals and Chicago White Sox this past week to draw closer. The Red Sox were 41-44 on June 30, but only the Brewers have a better record since that date. The Yankees have a plus-134 run differential, whereas it’s plus-56 for the Blue Jays and plus-102 for the Red Sox, so you wonder why they’re even in this position. However, New York is 5-8 in extra-inning games (the Blue Jays are 8-4) and hasn’t played well against Toronto and Boston (5-15).
Series to watch: Blue Jays at Yankees (Friday-Sunday); Red Sox at Blue Jays (Sept. 23-25); Yankees at Red Sox (Sept. 12-14). All three season series have already been clinched: The Blue Jays over the Red Sox and Yankees and the Red Sox over the Yankees. That will leave the Yankees on the short end of any tiebreaker.
Blue Jays player to watch: Toronto acquired Shane Bieber at the deadline even though he was still completing his minor league rehab from Tommy John surgery. He has allowed three runs in two starts for the Blue Jays, striking out 15 with no walks in 11⅓ innings. It’s just two starts, but he looks like he did when he was the Cleveland ace, plus he has allowed the Jays to go to a six-man rotation. Don’t be surprised if he ends up as the Game 1 starter in the postseason.
Yankees player to watch: Aaron Judge is still probably the MVP favorite, but after missing 10 days with a flexor strain in his right elbow, he hasn’t been quite the same, hitting .241/.417/.506 with six home runs and 12 RBIs in 24 games in August. Though those are still good numbers, it seems fair to call it a slight slump by Judge’s recent historic standards — and it’s not the same level of production as before his injury. He also still hasn’t played the field, which limits the red-hot Giancarlo Stanton to pinch-hitting duties when the Yankees are on the road (manager Aaron Boone has been willing to play Stanton in right field at Yankee Stadium, where there’s less ground to cover).
Red Sox player to watch: Sixty-nine games into his career, 21-year-old rookie Roman Anthony has made it clear: He’s going to be a big star. Sure, he can cut his strikeout rate a bit, but he already has A-plus plate discipline and has the second-highest hard-hit percentage in the majors behind only Kyle Schwarber. And Anthony is also quickly learning to lift the ball, slugging six home runs in August after hitting one each in June and July.
3. National League race for No. 2 seed
Standings: Milwaukee Brewers hold No. 1 seed with 5.5-game cushion; Philadelphia Phillies up 1 game on Dodgers, 3 games on Padres
What’s at stake: The Phillies hold a comfortable lead over the Mets in the NL East, so they have about a 90% chance of winning the division, but Philadelphia is neck and neck with the pair of NL West rivals for the second-best record in the NL. Home-field advantage isn’t a must to win a World Series — we’ve seen wild-card teams take it all, such as the Rangers in 2023 when they were the fifth seed in the AL — but the Phillies have an extreme home/road split this season, going 45-23 in Philadelphia and 34-35 elsewhere. They’re hitting .275 with an .808 OPS at home, .239 with a .693 OPS on the road.
Series to watch: Phillies at Dodgers (Sept. 15-17). The Phillies finish with a six-game homestand against the Miami Marlins and Minnesota Twins, which looks like a favorable way to end the season.
Phillies player to watch: Kyle Schwarber, of course, and Cristopher Sanchez as he takes over the role of staff ace from the injured Zack Wheeler. But the bullpen has been the issue the past two postseasons for the Phillies, which puts Jhoan Duran on the spot as well. Acquired from the Twins at the trade deadline to take over as closer, Duran has mostly done the job, but he blew one save against the Nationals, picking up the loss, and then lost another game against the Mets when he allowed four straight hits without getting an out.
4. American League race for top two seeds
Standings: Detroit Tigers hold No. 1 seed and are up 0.5 games on Blue Jays, 3.5 games on Yankees, 4 games on Red Sox and 4.5 games on Astros
What’s at stake: Bragging rights? Momentum heading into the postseason? Home-field advantage? Sure, all those things are nice, and the Tigers have a notable home/road split (44-25 versus 36-33), so securing that top seed, which they’ve held much of the way in the AL, would be the final touch on an excellent regular season. Still, if you’re manager A.J. Hinch, you’re not going to burn out your rotation in September just to get that top seed. If the Astros climb closer to the Tigers and Blue Jays, however, it will get more interesting as teams want to avoid that wild-card series if possible.
Series to watch: Tigers at Yankees (Sept. 9-11); Tigers at Red Sox (Sept. 26-28); Yankees at Astros (Tuesday-Thursday); Astros at Blue Jays (Sept. 9-11)
Tigers player to watch: The Tigers have been searching for a No. 2 starter behind Tarik Skubal all year. Jack Flaherty has been inconsistent all season and had three starts in August where he allowed five or more runs. Casey Mize has a 7.20 ERA over his past eight starts. Chris Paddack? No. Maybe it’s 41-year-old vet Charlie Morton, who has a 4.61 ERA in his five starts with Detroit, as he has mixed in three excellent outings with two bad ones (although he fanned 10 in one of the bad ones). No matter what, there are going to be a lot of bullpen games for the Tigers in the playoffs when Skubal isn’t pitching, especially since the pen was much better in August after struggling in June and July (and adding some depth at the deadline).
5. American League West
Standings: Houston Astros up 2 games on Seattle Mariners
What’s at stake: The Mariners haven’t won a division title since … hold on here, scrolling through the years on Baseball-Reference.com … that’s right, the 116-win season in 2001. The Mariners made some weird pact with the baseball gods that season, which for some reason didn’t include them making the World Series after their historic regular season but did include them not making the postseason again until 2022. That’s right: They remain the only franchise never to appear in the Fall Classic. Winning the division would increase their odds just a bit and allow them to set their rotation for the ALDS.
Series to watch: Mariners at Astros (Sept. 19-21). The season series is tied 5-5, so the winner of this series gets that crucial tiebreaker edge. Of note: The Mariners have lost five consecutive road series and are 1-6-1 (they split a four-game series) in their past eight. The Astros have managed to keep their grip on first place despite going 12-13 in July and 13-15 in August. They’ve won every full-season AL West title going back to 2017.
Astros player to watch: Yordan Alvarez returned last week after being out since early May with a hand injury. He homered in his second game back and didn’t strike out in his first five games. The Astros have even started him twice in left field, allowing them to give Jose Altuve a DH day. Bottom line: If Alvarez is producing, a below-average offense suddenly looks at least like an average — or better-than-average — offense. With Alvarez, Altuve and Carlos Correa, it’s 2019 or 2021 all over again, two seasons that ended with the Astros playing in the World Series.
Mariners player to watch: How much does Cal Raleigh have left in the tank? He’s sitting on 50 home runs but also hit .194 in July and .173 in August. He’s still doing damage with the long ball and has had 17 home runs and 36 RBIs over the two months, but he’s not carrying the offense as he did in the first half.
6. American League Wild Card
Standings: Mariners hold third wild-card spot and are up 2.5 games on Kansas City Royals, 3 games on Texas Rangers and 4 games on Cleveland Guardians
What’s at stake: By no means are the Mariners out of the AL West race against Houston, but they also haven’t played well enough to pull away in the wild-card fight, even after everyone declared them a sure-thing playoff team following the acquisitions of Eugenio Suarez and Josh Naylor at the deadline. But given Seattle’s recent history of just missing the playoffs — two wins short in 2021, one short in 2023 and 2024 — Mariners fans are understandably nervous about blowing it, especially with the Royals and the Rangers refusing to go away.
Series to watch: Mariners at Royals (Sept. 16-18); Royals at Guardians (Sept. 8-10); Rangers at Guardians (Sept. 26-28). The Royals finished one game ahead of the Mariners for a wild-card spot last season, so this looks like the key series. The Mariners have one three-game series in Houston starting Sept. 19. If they can survive this current road trip — they just went 1-2 against Cleveland and now head to Tampa and Atlanta — that series looms large as well.
Royals player to watch: Is it too late to toss Bobby Witt Jr. into the Judge/Raleigh MVP debate? He’s making a late run with his outstanding all-around game and just had his best month of the season. With Vinnie Pasquantino mashing home runs and some trade acquisitions chipping in, Kansas City is peaking at the right time. The Royals have played well for two months now and have a pretty soft schedule for the final month.
Rangers player to watch: The Rangers looked out of it, and they’re going to be without Nathan Eovaldi for the rest of the season — and likely Marcus Semien as well — and Corey Seager for some period of time following an appendectomy. But they just won three series in a row. Without Eovaldi, Jack Leiter has to continue to pitch well: He has a 2.88 ERA over his past 11 starts and just tossed back-to-back excellent games.
Guardians player to watch: Cleveland is barely hanging in there, taking two of three against the Mariners as Kyle Manzardo hit big home runs in wins Friday and Saturday. He’s hitting .273/.362/.545 since July 12, giving Cleveland a much-needed power source other than Jose Ramirez.
7. National League East and NL Wild Card
Standings: Phillies up 6 games on Mets in division; Mets up 4 games on Cincinnati Reds in wild card
What’s at stake: The Mets temporarily made the division race interesting again after sweeping Philadelphia early last week but then lost three of four at home to the Marlins. That’s unacceptable if you want to win the division. The Reds continue to falter, so the Mets’ wild-card spot looks reasonably safe, though they are just .500 since May 1.
Series to watch: Mets at Phillies (Sept. 8-11); Mets at Reds (Friday-Sunday). With next week’s four-game series, the NL East remains in play even though it would take an epic New York comeback combined with a Phillies collapse for the Mets to win the division. They’ve already clinched the season series over the Phillies with a 7-2 advantage. Meanwhile, the Reds have a chance to put pressure on the Mets with a three-game series in Cincinnati before New York’s trip to Philadelphia.
Mets player to watch: Nolan McLean and Jonah Tong. The Mets’ rotation has scuffled for a while, so suddenly the season rests heavily on their two prized rookie starters. McLean won his first three starts, allowing just two runs in 20⅓ innings. Tong, who led minor league starters in ERA and strikeouts, beat the Marlins in his debut Friday, striking out six in five innings with no walks while showcasing the changeup that allowed him to dominate the minors.
Reds player to watch: What’s happening with Elly De La Cruz‘s power? He hasn’t homered since July 31 and has just one in his past 58 games.
8. National League Central
Standings: Brewers up 6.5 games on Chicago Cubs
What’s at stake: This is another David vs. Goliath matchup. Milwaukee, of course, is Goliath. The Cubs won the NL Central in the COVID-shortened season of 2020 but haven’t taken a full-season division title since 2017. Given the Brewers’ lead with no signs of faltering, the odds are slim that Chicago can chase them down.
Series to watch: The two teams are done for their season series, and the Cubs took it 7-6, so at least they own the tiebreaker.
Brewers player to watch: Closer Trevor Megill landed on the IL a few days ago with a flexor strain in his elbow after blowing three saves since mid-August, so Abner Uribe takes over. If the Cubs have a chance to catch the Brewers, it might be because the Milwaukee pen, which has been worked hard, burns out in September, especially with the Brewers in the midst of playing 19 games in 18 days.
Cubs player to watch: Kyle Tucker slumped as he played through a hairline fracture in his right hand for two months. He finally broke out with three home runs in two games and has hit over .400 his past nine games. The Cubs’ offense was horrid in August — Pete Crow-Armstrong also struggled — and they’ll need Tucker and the rest of the lineup to rebound in September.
9. American League Central
Standings: Tigers up 9.5 games on Royals
What’s at stake: This one is all but over — though, it’s not impossible for the Royals. The Mets blew a seven-game lead in 2007 with 17 games to play. The 1995 Angels entered September with a 7.5-game lead and lost the division in a tiebreaker game. The 2009 Tigers were up seven games on Sept. 6 and blew it. The 2011 Braves had an 8.5-game lead in the wild-card race at the start of September and missed the playoffs. And during that same season, the Red Sox were leading the Yankees in the AL East and nine games up on the Rays — who would catch them on the final day of the season to win the wild card. So … you never know.
Series to watch: The Tigers and Royals are done playing each other, with Detroit winning the season series 9-4.
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