Kansas City’s second-round pick from the 2018 draft, Jonathan Bowlan, tossed a 98-pitch no-hitter in a High-A game last night. This was Bowlan’s fifth appearance at the level after a promotion earlier this season, and he was excellent in the four starts prior in which he had a 2.16 ERA and a sub-1.00 WHIP with a healthy 30.9 percent strikeout rate and a minuscule 2.1 percent walk rate. It sounds like another promotion could be on the way.

The Royals made another piece of news by agreeing to swap catcher Martín Maldonado for Chicago reliever Mike Montgomery . Maldonado is clearly a defensive add as the Cubs have gotten excellent offensive production from the position with a league-leading 138 wRC+ from catchers. Montgomery has struggled this season, but he just turned 30 and is a year removed from a 1.5 WAR season with 124 quality innings.

Pitching Performance of the Day

Luis Castillo and Jakob Junis were the only two starters to reach double-digit strikeouts yesterday, but Castillo isn’t much fun discussing since he’s owned in basically all leagues. Junis, on the other hand, has an 11.9 percent ownership rate in ESPN leagues. He allowed only one run and one baserunner per inning yesterday over seven innings. In his last two starts, he has 16 strikeouts and four walks over 14 innings with only three runs allowed. Is he worth consideration on the waiver wire?

The short answer is probably no. His ERA is still north of 5.00 despite the two strong outings, and his 4.57 xFIP doesn’t indicate a massive amount of bad luck. His middling strikeout rate has dipped a bit from last year to this one, though that could turn around as his swinging strike rate has improved. The big concern is that he did well at limiting walks last year with a 5.1 percent walk rate, but his walk rate before yesterday’s start was 8.1 percent. His real problem is that his slider is his only plus pitch. It’s a good one, but his fastball must improve. I’m never a fan of guys who throw a four-seamer and a two-seamer, and Junis might do well to pick one and develop it.

Hitting Performance of the Day

As of this writing, the Angels-Astros game was still ongoing, and eight guys already had multi-homer games. Six guys double donged and Travis d’Arnaud had the rare triple-dong game. He walked in his other two plate appearances and drove in five on the night. The 30-year-old catcher is on his third team this season, but he’s been better since joining his current team, the Rays. In 141 PA with Tampa d’Arnaud has a 107 wRC+ and a decent .195 ISO. He hasn’t had much of a split, but he has walked more and struck out less with the platoon advantage. Here are all three of his homers from last night.

 

 

Game of the Day

You might have noticed that the last of d’Arnaud’s three home runs was a three-run shot that came in the top of the ninth with the Rays trailing by two. When d’Arnaud came to the plate, the Rays had just a 7.5 percent chance of winning as they were down to their final out. The home run added a whopping 72.7 percent to Tampa’s win probability, and they got the necessary three outs in the bottom half to close it out and win by one. Here’s the game graph courtesy of Fangraphs.

What to Watch for Today

It’s the time of year to spend your afternoons reading about random trade rumors. With the August trade deadline eliminated, this could be a more active July than normal, not that July is usually boring. Just yesterday names like Zach Wheeler, Robbie Ray , and Will Smith were the subject of rumors. It’s possible some team(s) strike(s) early before the market gets thin and prices theoretically go up, so tomorrow’s Round-Up could be recapping a serious trade.