The Baseball Buffet for 4/5/2025

Issue #236

What follows is a new feature for 2025 at Now Taking the Field. The goal with The Baseball Buffet series is to provide the best daily dose of relevant baseball info in a smart-brevity format (mostly short bullets, getting to the point, with quick analysis/insights.) Think of it like what baseball fans of a certain age would look forward to in their morning newspaper’s sports section each day! Let me know what you think of each issue… leave a comment on the post or send me an email at [email protected].

⚾ Welcome! ⚾

The 9th day of the season included a a nearly full (14) slate of games:

• NYY 9, PIT 4 - The Yankees jumped out to an early 7-1 lead through four innings—but not because of homeruns. Rather, Mitch Keller just let up a lot of hits and walks (3.2 IP, 8 H, 7 ER, 4 BB, 4 K). Aaron Judge did hit his major-league leading 6th HR later in the seventh, and Max Fried pitched well (5.2 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 6 K).

• CHW 4, DET 7 - Jack Flaherty pitched well (5.2 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 7 K), Kerry Carpenter hit two HR, and Riley Greene added his third HR of the year.

• STL 9, BOS 13 - 29 hits and 22 runs in all, the Red Sox started things off with homers by Trevor Story and Wilyer Abreu in the first inning, and then led throughout the contest. Ivan Herrera and Brendan Donovan each homered for STL.

• SDP 1, CHC 3 - Shota Imanaga pitched well (7.1 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 4 K), with the lone run allowed coming from a HR from the generally defense-first catcher Martin Maldonado. Ryan Pressly locked down his third save of the season.

• TOR 0, NYM 5 - Pete Alonso got things going with a two-run HR in the bottom of the first, and Tylor Megill (5.1 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 4 K) pitched well to notch his second win of the season.

• ATH 6, COL 3 - The Rockies kept matching the Athletics one run at a time to force extra innings 3-3. The A’s finally scored 3 in the top of the 11th and then Mason Miller got the save to close it out. The only HR in the game came from rookie Jacob Wilson, who is off to a good start batting .379 thus far.

• SEA 9, SFG 10 - A pretty wild one, with the Mariners and Giants going back and forth, leading to an 8-8 tie through six. No other runs were scored until the 11th, when Seattle scored and then the Giants came back with two to win. In total there were 32 hits (though only three HR: Julio Rodriguez, Jorge Polanco, Matt Chapman), with the Mariners using nine pitchers, and the Giants using eight.

• AZ 6, WAS 4 - Corbin Carroll had two HR, and three D-Backs relievers pitched scoreless innings after starter Brandon Pfaadt had let up HR to Nationals CJ Abrams, Nathaniel Lowe, and Luis Garcia Jr.

• LAD 2, PHI 3 - Tommy Edman hit his fifth HR of the season (and added to his major-league leading 9-game hitting streak) and Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched well (6 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 5 K) , but the Dodgers finally lost as Jesús Luzardo was again outstanding (7 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 8 K).

• MIA 0, ATL 10 - The Braves finally put a W on the board, and did so in resounding fashion as Spencer Schwellenbach was superb (8 IP, 2 H, 0 ER 0 BB, 10 K) and the offense collected 16 hits, including the first homers of the year from Marcell Ozuna and Matt Olson.

• BAL 2, KCR 8 - Seth Lugo pitched well (6 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 2K) and three relievers pitched scoreless innings to lockdown the win. Orioles superstar SS Gunnar Henderson was back from injury, but was only 1-4 with a fielding error in his season debut.

• TBR 2, TEX 5 - Tyler Mahle pitched well (5 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 5 K) and Luke Jackson notched his MLB-leading fourth save.

• CIN 2, MIL 3 - Tyler Alexander threw no-hit ball over 5.2 IP while recording 6 strikeouts. Brice Turang hit a two-run HR in the bottom of the fifth, and that turned out to be the difference maker.

• CLE 8, LAA 6 - Mike Trout and Logan O’Hoppe hit homers for the Angels, but Jose Ramirez had three HR by himself to lead the Guardians to victory.

Who’s on the move?

In this section I won’t list 26th-man moves, or every time a team shuttles relievers back and forth to AAA to keep a stock of fresh arms in the bullpen. I’ll focus on the biggest, more impactful demotions, promotions, and injury list changes (for a full list, see all the latest MLB transactions).

➕ Starting Rehab Assignment

• CIN RP Alexis Diaz

🤕 Placed on the IL

• STL 2B Nolan Gorman - 10-day IL (right hamstring strain)

• TEX SP Jack Leiter - 15-day IL (right middle finger blister)

• WAS SP Michael Soroka - 15-day IL (right arm biceps strain)

On this day in baseball history…

Here is what stands out to me for this day in baseball history (for a longer list, see the feature at the Baseball Almanac or the Bullpen feature at Baseball-Reference.com):

📅 On April 5…

• 1983: Tom Seaver ties a record. According to baseball-reference.com, “On Opening Day at Shea Stadium, pitcher Tom Seaver makes his first appearance for the Mets since his trade to Cincinnati in 1977, as he combines with Doug Sisk to shut out the Phillies, 2 - 0, on five hits. For Seaver, it's his 14th Opening Day assignment, tying the record set by Walter Johnson with the Washington Senators.”

• 1993: The Rockies and Marlins are born. The first new N.L. teams since 1969 both play their first games. The Rockies lose 3-0 to the Mets at Shea Stadium, and the Marlins win 6-3 over the Dodgers at Joe Robbie Stadium.

• 2005: The Nationals get started. The Washington Nationals franchise, formerly the Montreal Expos, lose 8-4 to the Phillies in their inaugural season opener.

🎂 Today’s Birthday Boys🎉

• Bill Dineen (1876) won 20+ games four times, though in 1902 he had an even 21-21 record. Overall he had a 3.01 ERA and 107 ERA+ across 3,074.2 IP in 12 seasons.

• Ron Hansen (1938) played parts of 15 seasons and started strong by winning the AL Rookie of the Year Award in 1960 after hitting 22 HR with 86 RBI for the Orioles. After several years in Baltimore he played for the White Sox, including in 1964 when he hit 20 HR and scored 85 runs.

• Rennie Stennett (1949) played most of his 11-year career for the Pirates, and was part of both the 1971 and 1979 championship teams. His best season came in 1977 when he hit .336 with 28 SB.

Today’s Matchups

We have a full slate today (15), so there are lots of possibilities. Some games that jump out to me are:

• LAD vs. PHI has a nice matchup in Roki Sasaki and Aaron Nola, and it is the first game after the Dodgers losing for the first time yesterday.

• TBR vs. TEX features Jacob deGrom’s second start of the year, going up against 24-year old Taj Bradley who also had a good first start.

HR Watch

Predicting who might hit a HR on any given day is a challenge—especially early the season. But here are a few to consider based on opposing SP past performance:

• BAL Ryan Mountcastle, 8-19 with 3 HR and a triple vs. KCR Michael Wacha

• BAL Cedric Mullins, 8-20 with 2 HR, a triple and two doubles vs. KCR Michael Wacha

• HOU Yordan Alvarez, small sample but is 5-8 with 2 HR vs. MIN Bailey Ober

• CHC Justin Turner, small sample but is 5-8 with 2 HR and 2 doubles vs. SDP Nick Pivetta

• LAD Mookie Betts, 7-20 with 2 HR and a double vs. PHI Aaron Nola

Hits Watch

If you play MLB’s Beat the Streak mobile game, or otherwise bet on/parlay players to collect hits, I’ll try to provide some good options in this section. Early in the season there aren’t any active streaks to report on yet, so in addition to the HR Watch guys listed above, here are some others to consider based on opposing SP past performance:

• PIT Tommy Pham, 6-12 with a double vs. NYY Marcus Stroman

• PIT Bryan Reynolds, 5-10 with a double vs. NYY Marcus Stroman

• NYY Trent Grisham, small sample but is 3-3 with a HR vs. PIT Bailey Falter. Grisham bats left-handed but has reverse splits, hitting for a bit of a higher average against LHP like Falter.

Who is streaking?

Now that we’ve had more than a week of the regular season, I’ve started sharing out the top active hitting streaks each day. These are players who for this reason might also be interesting picks to get a hit today:

• 9 - LAD Tommy Edman (but is 1-17 vs. Aaron Nola)

• 8 - SDP Jackson Merrill

• 8 - MIL Brice Turang

• 8 - ATH Jacob Wilson

• 7 - BOS Alex Bregman

• 7 - SFG Heliot Ramos

• 7 - STL Nolan Arenado

• 7 - MIL Jackson Chourio

• 7 - PIT Isiah Kiner-Falefa

Who might struggle today?

Betting against any given player to not get a hit is tough, as guys in the starting lineup get at least one hit in a game more often than not. That said, here are some guys who clearly have struggled against their opposing SP today:

• LAD Max Muncy, 1-21 with 11 K vs. PHI Aaron Nola

• LAD Tommy Edman, 1-17 though interestingly 0 K vs. PHI Aaron Nola

• LAD Will Smith, 2-20 with 6 K (though 1 HR) vs. PHI Aaron Nola

• SEA Randy Arozarena, 3-23 with 9 K vs. SFG Robbie Ray

• CHC Ian Happ, small sample but is 0-5 with 5 K vs. SDP Nick Pivetta

• BAL Gunnar Henderson, 1-11 vs. KCR Michael Wacha

• CHW Andrew Benintendi, 1-10 vs. DET Reese Olson

Once we get a few weeks into the season I’ll starting sharing out some starting pitchers to consider for strikeout totals (over/under bets), some teams that might explode offensively that day, and even some fun with NRFI (no-runs in the first inning bets). But these kinds of things are hard to judge early in the season until we see how teams and players are starting out the year.

⚾ Enjoy Day Ten! ⚾

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