News
Carlos Estévez suffered his second blown save of the season on Tuesday, giving up three runs on one hit and three walks in a brutal inning against the Rockies.
Oof. Estévez came on with a two-run lead to protect, and looked like he was going to breeze through the ninth inning after getting the first two outs before issuing a walk to Ryan McMahon. He then got ahead of Hunter Goodman 1-2 before walking him after an eight-pitch battle and then walked Michael Toglia on four pitches to load the bases. Estévez then got ahead of Jacob Stallings 0-2 before allowing a go-ahead three-run double. Even with this debacle, the 32-year-old hurler holds a respectable 3.38 ERA, 1.31 WHIP and a 10/9 K/BB ratio over 11 innings to start the season. His job isn’t in jeopardy just yet, but with Lucas Erceg looming, he’ll need to be better his next few times out or he could start feeling the heat.
Adael Amador is starting at second base and batting ninth for the Rockies on Thursday.
Amador has now started three of the last four games at second base for the Rockies. He’s gone just 7-for-43 this season with 15 strikeouts in 16 games. He’s just 22 years old, so there is plenty of time for him to adjust to the MLB level, but he doesn’t need to be on redraft radars right now.
Jackson Holliday is playing second base and batting second for the Orioles on Thursday against the Twins.
With Cedric Mullins sitting out on Thursday, Gunnar Henderson will bat lead off, and Holliday will jump up from sixth in the order to second. Holliday is riding a hot streak right now, and the Orioles are taking advantage. This is likely just a one-game sample with no Mullins or Adley Rutschman in the lineup, but Rutschman has been struggling, so perhaps it could become a more permanent spot in the lineup for Holliday moving forward.
Endy Rodriguez (finger) had his splint removed this week.
Rodriguez suffered a lacerated right index finger on April 14th. Now that he is out of his splint, he “is playing catch and doing a slightly modified swing.” Once he can progress to taking full swings, we’ll have a better sense of the timeline for his return.
Isiah Kiner-Falefa (hamstring) is back to baseball activities.
The speedy infielder is expected to start running the bases by this weekend and then should progress to batting practice. He could begin a rehab assignment by the middle of May.
Ryan Brasier (groin) pitched a scoreless inning for Triple-A Iowa on Wednesday.
He gave up a hit and struck out two batters on 16 pitches in the outing. Brasier will likely need a few more outings before he returns to the big league bullpen, but the Cubs could certainly use his experience at the end of games.
Freddy Peralta (groin) threw off flat ground on Wednesday and expects to make his next start.
Peralta acknowledged that he may need one extra day of rest, which is in line with what Brewers manager Pat Murphy said on Monday as well. Fantasy managers should start Peralta as they would normally.