MLB Bullets is inevitable

Good morning. Happy Labor Day.

• Astros pitcher Justin Verlander tossed his third career no-hitter as Houston beat the Blue Jays, 2-0 on Sunday. Verlander is only the sixth pitcher to have three or more career no-hitters.
• That’s a fact included among these facts and figures about Verlander’s no-no.
• Emma Baccellieri looks at Verlander’s career and writes that his third no-hitter cements his place among the all-time greats of the game.
• Bradford Doolittle looks at Verlander’s 2019 season and writes that Verlander was already a lock for Cooperstown before this year but now he’s even more of a lock. He also writes that Verlander is the favorite for the AL Cy Young Award now.
• Adrian Garro says Verlander is actually the Thanos of baseball. So could he snap the last two Cubs games out of existence?
• As impressive as Verlander’s feat was, it might not have even been the most impressive pitching performance on Sunday. Indians pitcher Carlos Carrasco took the mound for the first time since being diagnosed with leukemia three months ago. He gave up a run on two hits over one inning of relief, but the results weren’t really very important compared to the fact that he was pitching at all.
• The toxicology reports came back on the late Angels pitcher Tyler Skaggs and Skaggs had a combination of opioids and alcohol in his system when he died.
• Bill Shaikin writes that Skaggs’ death could lead to a huge legal battle over who provided him the opioids.
• Bob Nightengale writes that the cause of Skaggs’ death in no way diminishes the tragedy of his death.
• Last month I linked to stories about the arrest of former pitcher Octavio Dotel and the naming of former infielder Luis Castillo in connection with a major drug ring arrest in the Dominican Republic. Last week a judge in the Dominican Republic dismissed the charges against both retired players for lack of evidence. So that’s good news for them and baseball.
• More legal news as former Mets second baseman Wally Backman was arrested on domestic violence charges. This in not the first time Backman has been charged in a domestic violence incident. Backman denies all the allegations. (And I have no doubt that certain members of the New York media, some of whom have an unhealthy obsession with Backman’s supposed right to manage the Mets, will continue to stump for him after this.)
• Chace Numata, a catcher for the Double-A Erie SeaWolves in the Tigers’ system, was seriously injured last week in a skateboarding accident.
• After he left Saturday’s start after three innings due to knee pain, Yankees left-hander CC Sabathia may have played his last game. Sabathia has made it quite clear that this is his final season and his health is the reason why.
• The Giants activated Pablo Sandoval off the injured list so he could have one final at-bat under his long-time manager Bruce Bochy. Bochy is retiring at the end of the year and Sandoval is undergoing Tommy John surgery and it certainly is possible the Kung-Fu Panda has played his last game as well.
• Thomas Harrigan has a list of former players who went out on a high note in their final career game. Unfortunately, Sabathia isn’t likely to be one of them, but a recent former Cubs player is.
• Dodgers rookie pitcher Dustin May got hit in the face with a line drive on Sunday.
• Indians outfielder Tyler Naquin made a spectacular catch at the wall on Friday night but unfortunately he tore his ACL on the play and is out for the season and he could miss the start of 2020.
• Following up the big story from last week, the Royals have announced an agreement to sell the team to local businessman John Sherman.
• The Minnesota Twins hit their 268th home run of the season on Saturday, setting a new single-season team home run record with a month left to go in the season.
• David Schoenfield looks back at the best of the 2019 Twins home runs.
• Bradford Doolittle asks “Are the 2019 Twins the greatest home-run-hitting team of all-time?” (ESPN+ sub. req.)
• Michael Baumann writes that the changes in the ball has turned every player into a home run hitter, which he humorously calls the “democratization of dingers.” He contrasts this to the “Steroid Era” where primarily players on “the juice” were the ones hitting all the home runs. It’s worse in Triple-A, where Dixon Machado, of all people, has 17 home runs for Iowa in 102 games this year. He had 21 in over 1,000 games in his career in the majors and minors before this season.
• R.J. Anderson has five players included in the September call-ups that he thinks could make a difference down the stretch.
• Eddie Matz talks to several major leaguers about what it was like the time when they first got told they were going to the majors. Aaron Judge was eating dinner with his parents. They ended up driving him to Yankee Stadium.
• Jay Jaffe argues that White Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito is the most improved pitcher in the majors this year. The changeups are not what they seem.
• Sticking with the Pale Hose, Tim Anderson isn’t necessarily having a great year, but he’s certainly having the most “unique” year, writes Brendan Gawloski.
• The Brewers have designated reliever Jeremy Jeffress for assignment, just one year after he was named an All-Star.
• Tim Brown speaks with Red Sox manager Alex Cora as the team desperately tries to stay alive in the wild card hunt in September.
• Ken Rosenthal defends the new “hard” July 31 trading deadline that a lot of front offices absolutely loathe. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• Tom Hoffarth speaks with the creators of the 1969 Baseball Encyclopedia on the 50th anniversary of its publication. For any baseball fan that can remember the time before there was an internet, the “Big Mac,” as it was called, was the most important book in the world.
• And finally, I like to finish with something fun or cute. And it doesn’t get much more fun or cute than a dog dressed up like the Phillie Phanatic.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.