Good morning. From our top story, it appears silly season came early this year.
- Cardinals manager Oli Marmol was ejected after home plate umpire Doug Eddings told rookie pitcher Hancel Rincon that he couldn’t wear his cap at an angle. (The Athletic sub. req.) Steve Berman with the story.
- Here’s a non-paywalled version of the Marmol/Eddings/Rincon fiasco by Cesar Brioso.
- Eddings said Rockies hitter Hunter Goodman asked about the cap, but Goodman denied that he said anything about Rincon’s cap. (The Athletic sub. req.) Brendan Kuty with the story.
- The next day, all the Cardinals (and some of the Rockies) wore their caps askew in solidarity with Rincon during pre-game warmups.
- Ken Rosenthal reports that MLB told Eddings that he acted inappropriately (The Athletic sub. req.) in telling Rincon to wear his cap straight.
- Eddings ended up apologizing to Rincon and Marmol. By the way, Rincon got sent back to Triple-A Memphis after all this. So it sounds like this is all over.
- A new report by Paolo Torre raises new questions about Mark Walter’s purchase of the Dodgers and their lucrative TV deal. Gabe Lacques has a summary and a link to the podcast.
- Congratulations to former Cub Aroldis Chapman who became the ninth player to record 400 saves this weekend. Ian Browne with the highlights.
- Sticking with Boston, former Red Sox manager Joe Morgan died at 95. Our condolences go out to his friends, family and the Red Sox organization. Also, this is not the Hall-of-Fame second baseman Joe Morgan, who died a few years ago.
- Gabe Lacques reports that the Red Sox are placing outfielder Ceddanne Rafaela on the injured list and are not calling up former top prospect Kristian Campbell.
- About Kristian Campbell. Julian McWilliams goes in-depth on the Driveline revolution in hitting and how it has done more harm than good to players like Campbell. McWilliams admits that the Driveline approach has benefitted many hitters, but some like Campbell have been left behind.
- Maddie Lee reports that the Dodgers Shohei Ohtani may return to the lineup this week after missing four-straight games. However, his return to pitching seems more and more unlikely this season.
- Alden Gonzalez has five questions about the rest of Ohtani’s year.
- Jack Baer noticed that the Dodgers dropped outfielder Kyle Tucker to eighth in the lineup and Tucker hit his first home run in Dodger Stadium since mid-June.
- Brent Maguire has eight injured players who could make an impact with their return the rest of the season.
- Theo DeRosa has some teams that could play spoiler this September.
- Jay Jaffe has a new way of showing how the Giants have been so disappointing this year.
- Sticking with Northern California disappointments, Ben Clemens points to the Athletics’ pitching to explain why Sacramento has been so terrible.
- Zack Meisel, Cody Stavenhagen and Tim Britton look at the poor teams chasing the final Wild Card spot in the American League and note that some teams might earn easier playoff matchups by losing more games. (The Athletic sub. req.)
- Bob Nightengale wants to toughen the rules to reduce the number of position players pitching. He also has some other notes, one of which clearly demonstrates that he doesn’t understand WAR.
- Eno Sarris reveals a new metric to evaluate a pitcher’s command. (The Athletic sub. req.)
- Mark Feinsand explains why the Tigers should be more optimistic about 2027.
- Diamondback Geraldo Perdomo left the game on Sunday after getting hit in the head with a line drive while running the bases.
- And finally, Brian Murphy has MLB’s ten greatest games of all time.
Read the full article here