Jackson Roberts Articles - Page 5

Not even the most optimistic Bronx Bombers fans foresaw a start quite like this. The New York Yankees are 10-3, sole possessors of the best record in baseball, all while Aaron Judge has struggled and Gerrit Cole has yet to see the field. It’s been the definition of a full-group effort to get the Yankees’ […]

It’s been a long time coming, but the message 14 American League teams have been hoping would arrive for years could be coming through the wires at any minute: “Houston, we might finally have a problem.” After a seven-year reign of dominance at the top of the AL, the Houston Astros are off to a […]

Through the Los Angeles Angels’ first 12 games of the 2024 season, two things have become clear. One, Mike Trout is as incredible now, at age 31 and having missed huge chunks of the last three seasons, as he ever has been. It has been a joy to watch Trout launching balls out of every […]

Wednesday really is shaping up to be a national holiday (no pun intended) for Major League Baseball. 20-year-old phenom Jackson Holliday, the most hyped minor league prospect since Bryce Harper, will take the field at Fenway Park for the first time with the Baltimore Orioles. Call your dad 🧡 pic.twitter.com/a7wUO13W9A — Baltimore Orioles (@Orioles) April […]

What looked like a total snoozefest in San Diego through four innings ended up producing the moment of the year in the sport so far. The San Diego Padres trimmed an 8-0 lead to 8-7 by the bottom of the eighth inning and sent Fernando Tatís Jr. to the plate as the go-ahead run against […]

Tuesday was supposed to be a day of celebration at Fenway Park. The Boston Red Sox, unexpectedly sitting at 7-3 heading into their home opener, are set to honor the 2004 curse-breaking World Series team. The day should have had nothing but good vibes, but instead, the team is in chaos mode after the Red […]

The Baltimore Orioles were the toast of the town across Major League baseball in 2023. After half a decade of futility, the O’s catapulted themselves to the penthouse of the AL East, won 101 games and parlayed that into a blockbuster offseason trade and top-five World Series odds. Nine games into 2024, though, the Orioles […]

Hey Chicago, what do you say? After dropping the first two games of the season to the defending champion Texas Rangers, it’s been nothing but smooth sailing for the Chicago Cubs. The Cubbies have won six of seven, they’re top five in OPS, runs scored and walks and they just took two out of three […]

Major League Baseball, how we missed you. The 2024 MLB season has already kicked into high gear, with potential surprise contenders, massive losing streaks, and historic moments galore. And now that we have a sample size, our MLB Power Rankings might actually carry some weight. There’s plenty of movement in the following MLB Power Rankings, […]

Major League Baseball finds itself facing an existential crisis in 2024. And no, it isn’t a franchise forcing its way out of a city or a global superstar being caught up in an illegal gambling scandal. It’s something much more wide-reaching and difficult to solve. Why do pitchers keep dropping like flies? Not even a […]

Less than two weeks into the new season, what every team in baseball secretly fears at all times seems to be coming to pass. After their worst year as a franchise since the Reagan administration, the New York Yankees are one of the most fearsome teams in Major League Baseball once again this season. Not […]

Friday night in Anaheim was something of a fever dream for Boston Red Sox fans. They watched as their team got off to a 5-1 lead, made two horrific errors that immediately preceded a game-tying grand slam, then retook, conceded and retook the lead once more. An 8-6 win over the Los Angeles Angels gave […]

A six-game sample size is far too small to induce any panic, but it’s been far from an ideal start to the season for the Philadelphia Phillies. Touted as a World Series frontrunner by many, the Phillies have had a sluggish start to their 2024 campaign, with a 2-4 record and -14 run differential. Of […]

There’s something glorious about Friday night hitting and a full slate of MLB games waiting to bring the drama. It’s like NFL RedZone, but for three straight days. This weekend, we’re through the initial adrenaline surge of Opening Week and ready to hit the ground running, as rivalries are renewed and the league’s best jockey […]

Just six days into a brand-new season, the mood at Citi Field was akin to a funeral. The New York Mets were 0-5, coming off their second-straight extra innings loss to the Detroit Tigers while being one-hit in the second game of a doubleheader, which was only happening because the weather in New York had […]

The ongoing saga that is the Oakland Athletics franchise and their planned move to Las Vegas has become the darkest cloud looming over Major League Baseball. Oakland fans are devastated, the team has become unwatchable and it’s unclear when or how the Athletics will return to competence on the field. Thursday, a piece of the […]

After their most exciting offseason in recent memory, the San Francisco Giants have been swiftly served a slice of humble pie. The team is 2-5, having just been swept by the archrival Dodgers, who they now trail in the NL West by four games. There’s plenty of time to right the ship, and of course, […]

In an awful year for pitching injuries, one more just got added to the list. And this one might be the most devastating news yet. Eury Pérez, the phenom Miami Marlins pitcher still two weeks away from his 21st birthday, was shut down for the 2024 season due to injury Thursday and is set to […]

If predictability is what you’re looking for in your sports teams, you would have hated being a San Diego Padres fan the past few seasons. They’ve overperformed and they’ve underperformed. They’ve seen Fernando Tatís Jr. become a superstar, get suspended, and find his way back. They’ve gone all-in, fully pivoted and slashed the budget, then […]

Four games do not make a baseball season. The very nature of baseball is that it is meant to be a grind, where the team that wins will be the team that stays mentally strong through six straight months. But it’s hard to imagine a four-game start that could have been any worse for the […]

The first team to five wins this season wasn’t the defending champion Texas Rangers. It wasn’t Shohei Ohtani’s Los Angeles Dodgers, Aaron Judge’s New York Yankees, or Ronald Acuna Jr.’s Atlanta Braves. It wasn’t even the uber-talented Baltimore Orioles. Nope, just as we all expected, the Pittsburgh Pirates were the first team in MLB to […]

He didn’t become a full-time pitcher until the age of 18. He was working at a car wash in his native Dominican Republic until the Houston Astros signed him for a mere $5,000 at age 22. He spent the better part of eight years in Minor League Baseball, not to mention a global pandemic that […]

If it weren’t for the existence of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the entire baseball landscape would be touting the San Francisco Giants as the reigning champions of the 2023-24 offseason, with their numerous All-Star acquisitions and exciting new depth on both sides of the ball. Instead, because the Giants have the misfortune of existing at […]

For 36 of the 37 innings they played in Seattle over the weekend, the Boston Red Sox 2024 season actually looked quite promising. In 22 innings pitched, the starting pitching struck out a combined 27 batters with a 1.64 ERA. Rafael Devers, Tyler O’Neill, and Enmanuel Valdez launched clutch home runs. Even the defense looked […]

No matter how the New York Yankees are playing at any given time, the fan base is always pushed to one extreme side of the fence or the other. Either the Yankees are playing well and their fans are declaring them invincible, or they’re scuffling and the Bronx Zoo are calling for heads. After their […]

For all the excitement of MLB Opening Day, there’s often a feeling of hesitation for baseball fans as their team’s seasons get underway. The first few games can feel like a trial run as teams feel each other out and star players struggle through their first couple outings. Sure, the games count now, but is […]

There’s a lot that must feel new about this season for Rhys Hoskins. It’s his first as a Milwaukee Brewer, after the emotional rush of the 2022 playoff run with the Philadelphia Phillies, a season-ending ACL tear to start 2023, and the experience of becoming expendable once Bryce Harper moved to first base. Yet with […]

It’s often said that hope springs eternal around this time of year in Major League Baseball. Opening Day brings teams a clean slate and the promise of 162 games to write their own narrative after hearing everyone else’s opinions all offseason long. But occasionally, that hope flickers out before the fans ever had a chance […]

It’s amazing how quickly the MLB season establishes its flow. Opening Day comes, every team throws a big party at the stadium, the game starts and all of a sudden, we’re chugging along steadily towards the All-Star break. So even though most teams have only played one or two games, the action is already heating […]

Oh, how glorious Opening Day truly was. Thirteen games were played, teams quickly catapulted into first or last place and we can say a bunch of players are on pace for 162-homer seasons. Baseball has returned to our lives once more, promising us excitement each and every day from now until the end of October. […]

The hours before the first pitch of the MLB season are some of the most magical hours of the calendar year. It’s a blank slate, a serene time when every fan has hope for their team’s future. And as great as it is to watch that team take the field on television, on Opening Day, […]

For all the talk about the San Francisco Giants being unable to land any big fish in free agency this decade, they had one of the best hauls in their franchise’s history this past offseason. Jung-hoo Lee gives new manager Bob Melvin speed and contact at the top of their lineup. Matt Chapman and Jorge […]

Some say the most wonderful time of year is the holiday season. Others know it’s Opening Week in Major League Baseball. Each of these 30 teams has precious, glorious hope right now, with no scar tissue built up yet from the painful losses that are sure to come. So on the eve of this magical […]

One of the biggest milestone moments in the lead-up to MLB Opening Day is each of the 30 teams naming their starting pitchers for day one of the impending 162-game marathon. For some teams, it’s as easy as telling their established ace, “Hey, go get ’em champ.” But in many cases, there are internal debates […]

With Opening Day games set to kick off in under 24 hours, it’s the last day for all of us to stake our claim on the 2024 MLB season before it’s officially tainted by hindsight. And while favorites are favorites for a reason, today is the day to buck the trend. That’s right, it’s time […]

Take a deep breath, baseball fans. We finally made it to the end of an arduous offseason, one full of twists and turns we never could have imagined. The marquee free agents have signed, the TV deals are (mostly) straightened out and as we speak, and the fields are being freshly painted with those glorious […]

We’ve arrived at the final destination on our journey through the 2024 MLB positional rankings and appropriately enough, we’re finishing up with the best finishers in the sport: The relief pitchers slamming the doors at the end of games. Relievers aren’t the names that get top billing when it comes to marketing the sport, but […]

Of all the positions to rank in 2024, starting pitchers are easily the most challenging. Pitchers in today’s MLB have pushed the sport–and their bodies to the absolute limit. This isn’t the game your parents grew up watching. The stuff is far more explosive, yet throwing a ball as fast as humanly possible comes with […]

From the “Yankee Clipper” to the “Say Hey Kid” to just “The Kid,” the history of Major League Baseball is littered with larger-than-life center fielders. And it’s no exaggeration to say we’re living through a golden age for the position right now. Whether you like former MVPs in their prime, young superstars rapidly ascending to […]