Last Night In Baseball: Yankees Rally Late, Brewers’ Lineup Save Miz

The Yankees got most of their scoring in late. Ronald Acuña Jr. made history. Jacob Misiorowski looked off, but the Brewers’ lineup did not. Wednesday’s MLB action provided all that and much more. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball: So much of the excitement in last night’s Yankees-Angels game came after hours. For one, the game was on the west coast, and then the scoring didn’t begin until the fourth, when New York went up 1-0. A homer by Angels’ first baseman Vaughn Grissom tied things up in the seventh, and the score stayed that way until extras. Cy Young candidate Cam Schlittler looked the part, going eight innings with nine strikeouts against two baserunners and a lone run allowed, but Los Angeles’ starter Reid Detmers was nearly as impressive, going seven frames with six hits, eight strikeouts, no walks and one run. The Yankees’ bullpen took care of business in the ninth. The Angels’ pen was also on point… until it wasn’t. Luke Murphy entered in the top of the 10th, and started his appearance by striking out rookie outfielder Spencer Jones. The right-hander then allowed a single to shortstop José Caballero and walked second baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr before getting the second out. That’s when things really unraveled. Catcher Austin Wells, who had come on as a pinch-hitter earlier in the game, hit a two-run single off Murphy. Then left fielder Cody Bellinger picked up his third hit of the game, a liner to center, to make it 4-1. New York’s own center fielder, Trent Grisham, then singled to score Wells, and DH Ben Rice made it four singles in a row and a 6-1 game. Murphy was lifted, but the damage was done: New York scored five runs in a row with two outs, and while L.A. managed to get two back against new pitcher Michael Fulmer in the bottom of the inning, the Angels needed more than that to keep the game going. The Yankees climbed to 3.5 behind the Rays in the AL East — Tampa Bay fell to the Mets, 10-4 — and also picked up a game on the Red Sox in the wild-card race, since Boston lost to the Marines, 8-3. Pretty good night for the Yankees after it nearly going awry. Things did not work out as well for the Dodgers. While Los Angeles went up on the Cardinals 3-0 in the first on a Freddie Freeman homer… …and then made it 5-3 in the sixth when shortstop Mookie Betts also went yard… …even Yoshinobu Yamamoto couldn’t keep St. Louis down the whole game. Yamamoto went seven innings and pitched into the eighth, but gave up another two runs to leave with the score 5-4. Then first baseman Alec Burleson tied the game off reliever Tanner Scott in the same inning with a sac fly. The game stayed tied thanks to this fantastic play by second baseman José Fermín… …and then it was Fermín who came around to score in the 10th, on a single by shortstop Thomas Saggese. St. Louis got some insurance right after when Joshua Báez — who had entered as a pinch-hitter earlier and hit an RBI double to make it a 5-4 game — doubled in two more runs. The Dodgers scored once in the bottom of the 10th thanks to a passed ball and ground out, but Riley O’Brien shut them down otherwise and picked up his 35th save of the year. St. Louis is now .500 once more after winning the series against Los Angeles, and 3.5 back of a wild-card spot. With the Braves and Brewers both victorious on Wednesday, the Dodgers find themselves a game back — and effectively two since Atlanta has the tiebreaker — of the second Wild Card Series bye. The Brewers could have easily lost on Wednesday to the Cubs, given that ace Jacob Misiorowski did not look like one. He struck out five batters over four innings while also walking four, and was charged with five earned runs. The bullpen, though? Five scoreless frames, with just one walk and one hit marring them. That gave the offense time to do its thing. Left fielder Jackson Chourio would go 4-for-6 with two runs and an RBI — of those two knocks, one was a double and another a homer. Catcher William Contreras was a more modest 2-for-5, but his one RBI came at the right time, and gave the Brewers a lead they would not relinquish. Shout out to rookie shortstop Cooper Pratt, too, who went 2-for-4 with a walk, a run and an RBI against the Cubs on Wednesday, adding to what has already been a big series for him. The Cubs already had little chance of taking the NL Central from the Brewers with what limited time is left in 2026, but losing these last two games after the football-esque score on Monday has Chicago nine back now. Luckily for the Cubs, they have the third-best run differential in MLB, and have a cushy wild-card lead, too. Chicago lost, yeah, but check this catch by shortstop Nico Hoerner, anyway. Absolutely ridiculous. The Orioles are not in as comfortable a situation as the Cubs — Baltimore began the day 1.5 out of the AL wild-card race, and the Guardians lost, giving the O’s a chance to make up ground. That did not happen. The Rockies scored a run in the ninth to tie the game, 3-3, and then in the 11th Baltimore made it a 5-3 game. Bad news for the Orioles, but the Rockies were at home and came to bat once more. Grant Wolfram came on in relief, and allowed an RBI single to first baseman TJ Rumfield on the seventh pitch of the at-bat. Wolfram got two outs after this, but getting through the heart of the Rockies’ order wasn’t enough. Second baseman Adael Amador hit a ground-rule double to move Rumfield to third, and then catcher Brett Sullivan — brought on as a defensive replacement — got the walk-off knock. The Orioles are still 1.5 behind the Guardians, an opportunity wasted against a Rockies team trying to avoid having the worst record in MLB. Good news for Colorado on that front: this dub paired with the Angels’ loss has the Rockies with the second-to-worst record, one up on L.A. With San Diego’s series loss to the Reds, the Diamondbacks were in position to get back into the last wild-card spot despite losing their own series. Arizona is now half-a-game up thanks to defeating the Phillies and ending their six-game winning streak, and pulled it off with an eighth-inning homer from catcher James McCann. A 1-0 dub, and pulled off in a bullpen game: Taylor Clarke went just 1 ⅔ innings, and six other relievers followed him. None of them gave up a run to the Phils, so even though Andrew Painter went seven scoreless, that solo dinger was all it took for an L. Or a win, if you’re looking from the D-backs’ perspective. How many home runs would Ronald Acuña Jr. have if he hadn’t missed significant time with torn ACLs, plural? Hard to know! But what we do know is that the 28-year-old right fielder has 200 actual career long balls, after launching his 14th of the season on Wednesday against the Nationals. Acuña has 200 dingers and 225 career steals after 904 games, 25 games quicker than Alfonso Soriano managed, per MLB, making him the fastest-ever player to reach that mark. Dozens of players have had 200 steals and 200 homers, but the list gets a lot shorter fast: just 25 have even 250 or more of each, and all of eight have 300 a piece. Acuña is young enough to make progress on becoming the ninth. Or 10th, rather: Guardians’ third baseman José Ramírez is four dingers away from being ninth on that list. The Rangers aren’t in a position where they can lose very many games, not with four teams within 1.5 games of the last wild-card spot in the AL and the Twins just 3.5 behind. And not with the Astros seeming to get their footing a little better than Texas is in the AL West race. The Rangers lost to the lowly A’s on Wednesday, 9-2, and that occurred opposite an Astros’ W over the White Sox, to give Houston the series win. All the scoring came in the eighth, when left fielder Nelson Velázquez, who had come on earlier as a pinch-hitter, drove a two-run single to center to score infielders Isaac Paredes and Jose Altuve. Davis Martin, now blisterless, looked great for the White Sox in his return from the IL, going 5 ⅔ while scattering five hits. Hayden Wesneski did better than that, though, going seven scoreless with one hit and three total baserunners, and the difference ended up mattering: Sean Newcomb gave up those two runs in relief of Martin, and the Astros’ pen didn’t give up a thing to Chicago. Houston is now 71-69, two games up in the AL West, while the White Sox are further ahead than that in the Central but also lucky everyone else in the division besides the Tigers — who are nine out — lost.