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Baltimore Orioles first baseman Chris Davis struck out for the 200th and 201st times of the season in Friday’s 5-4 win over the Tampa Bay Rays, becoming the first player in American League history to record back-to-back seasons with 200 or more strikeouts, per Sportsnet Stats.

Despite setting the unwanted record, Davis still managed to have a decent night, as his solo home run in the fourth inning cut Tampa Bay’s early lead to 4-2.

However, he missed out on a big opportunity in the bottom of the seventh, striking out with two outs and the bases loaded while his team was still down by a run.

The Orioles managed to emerge victorious, keeping pace with the division-leading Boston Red Sox at two games back in the American League East.

Davis isn’t the first player to strike out 200 or more times in back-to-back seasons, as Mark Reynolds accomplished that feat in 2008 (204), 2009 (223) and 2010 (211) while playing for the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Davis is within striking distance of Reynolds’ single-season record of 223 strikeouts. He is on pace to finish just one shy at 222, which would tie him for the American League record set by Adam Dunn for the Chicago White Sox in 2012.

Even with all the strikeouts, Davis has been a huge part of the Orioles’ playoff push, recording 38 home runs, 82 RBI and 94 runs in 142 games, with his 82 walks helping to make up for an unsightly .222 batting average.

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Los Angeles Angels designated hitter Albert Pujols hit the 600th double of his career in Friday’s 5-0 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays, becoming the 16th player in major league history to reach the milestone, per Sportsnet Stats.

Pujols accomplished the feat with one out in the first inning against Blue Jays pitcher R.A. Dickey, but the Angels were unable to score a run in the inning, ultimately wasting their best scoring chance of the game.

While a prolific compiler of two-baggers throughout most of his career, the 36-year-old Pujols has largely become a home run and singles hitter the past two seasons, with Friday’s double giving him just 17 for the year.

He had 37 or more doubles in 11 of his first 14 seasons (from 2001 to 2014), but then hit just 22 in 157 games last year, and is now in danger of setting a new career-low mark in the category.

Pujols only had 19 in 2013, but he was limited to 99 games due to injures, marking the only time in his career he has played fewer than 140 games.

Even if the trend continues, Pujols could eventually climb into the top 10 of the all-time doubles list, as there are still five years remaining on the 10-year, $240 million contract he signed prior to the 2012 campaign.

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The Cincinnati Reds set an unwanted MLB record in Friday’s 9-7 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, becoming the first team to surrender 93 or more home runs by relief pitchers in a single season, per ESPN Stats & Info.

The record-setting long ball came in the seventh inning of Friday’s game, with Pirates third baseman Jung Ho Kang hitting a two-run shot off Reds relief pitcher Blake Wood, who has actually been one of the team’s more effective bullpen options this season, sporting a 3.78 ERA over 69 innings.

Kang‘s blast tied the game at 6-6, setting the table for Pittsburgh to eventually pull off a two-run victory in 10 innings, with five of the team’s nine runs coming against Cincinnati relievers.

The bullpen struggles explain why the Reds enter Saturday with an ugly 62-84 record even though the team has a decent lineup and some promising young starting pitchers.

Cincinnati’s bullpen ERA of 4.99 ranks third-worst in the major leagues, better than only the Colorado Rockies (5.09) and Arizona Diamondbacks (5.10).

Given that Colorado’s relievers have to pitch approximately half their innings at Coors Field, it’s safe to say the Reds have one of the two worst bullpens in the major leagues.

If there’s one bright spot, it’s freshly minted closer Raisel Iglesias, who owns a 1.26 ERA in 43 innings of relief work this season.

However, the 26-year-old Cuban may ultimately end up as a part of the starting rotation, leaving the Reds with more questions than answers as they begin early preparations for 2017.

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Toronto Blue Jays designated hitter Edwin Encarnacion hit his 40th home run of the season in Friday’s 5-0 win over the Los Angeles Angels, joining Carlos Delgado and outfielder Jose Bautista as the only players in franchise history to record multiple 40-homer seasons in a Toronto uniform, per Sportsnet Stats.

With the Blue Jays already leading 3-0 in the top of the ninth inning, Encarnacion drove a two-run blast far over the left-center field fence off Angels reliever Homer Bailey.

The insurance runs ultimately proved to be unnecessary, as Blue Jays closer Roberto Osuna held the Angels scoreless in the bottom of the ninth to keep his team two games behind the Boston Red Sox in the American League East.

With his contract up at the end of this season and the Blue Jays already having a ton of money committed to the offensive side, Jon Heyman of Today’s Knuckleball reported Encarnacion could join the Red Sox as a replacement for legendary designated hitter David Ortiz, who plans to retire at the end of this season.

One of MLB‘s most consistent hitters in recent years, the 33-year-old Encarnacion has hit 34 or more home runs in five consecutive seasons, topping out at 42 in 2012.

With 15 games remaining on the schedule, he still has plenty of time to set a new personal single-season best for long balls.

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Atlanta Braves outfielder Matt Kemp recorded the 1,500th hit of his career in Friday’s 7-2 loss to the Washington Nationals, doing the honors with his first of two hits for the night, a lead-off double in the bottom of the second inning, per ESPN Stats & Info.

Kemp quickly came around to score the Braves’ first run of the game when the next batter, catcher Tyler Flowers, hit an RBI single to center field to cut Washington’s early lead to 5-1

The 31-year-old outfielder later added a single in the bottom of the sixth, pushing fellow outfielder Nick Markakis into scoring position, which later allowed Atlanta to chop the lead to 5-2.

Ultimately unable to get anything else going against Nationals ace Max Scherzer, the Braves lost 7-2 to drop to 56-91 for the season.

While he hasn’t been able to stop the bleeding from a team perspective, Kemp has been highly productive since coming over from the San Diego Padres at the trade deadline. Since that time, Kemp is boasting a .286 batting average, .335 on-base percentage and .500 slugging percentage in 42 games for Atlanta, with eight home runs, 30 RBI and 26 runs over 168 at-bats.

He enters Saturday’s game as the owner of an eight-game hitting streak, with 14 hits over that span, including three doubles and three home runs.

Combining his production from San Diego and Atlanta, the veteran outfielder has 31 home runs and 99 RBI, marking just the second time in his career he’s reached the 30-homer plateau.

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Boston Red Sox designated hitter David Ortiz moved past Frank Robinson to take sole possession of 11th place on the all-time extra-base hits list during Friday’s 7-4 win over the New York Yankees, leading off the bottom of the sixth inning with a double to deep center field, per Sportsnet Stats.

Ortiz later came around to score on a sacrifice fly by third baseman Travis Shaw, extending Boston’s lead to 4-2 at the time.

Earlier in the game, Ortiz had kicked off the scoring with an RBI single in the bottom of the first, helping the Red Sox jump out to an early 2-0 lead in their first turn at the plate.

Now boasting 1,187 extra-base hits in his 20-year career, Ortiz sits one ahead of Robinson (1,186) and just three behind 10th-place Lou Gehrig (1,190).

Things are bunched pretty close near the top of the list, giving Ortiz a shot to move as high as eighth place even though he plans to retire at the end of the ongoing season.

Ken Griffey Jr. and Rafael Palmeiro are tied in eighth place with 1,192 career extra-base hits, putting them well within Ortiz’s reach before he hangs up the cleats.

Seventh place, however, is quite clearly out of reach, as Los Angeles Angels designated hitter Albert Pujols has 1,205 extra-base hits and counting.

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MLB officially has its first 2016 division winner: The Chicago Cubs clinched the National League Central title on Thursday.

But the Cubs still have something to play for. The team has yet to clinch home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

Of course, there are other teams and players with more to play for. Check out the biggest takeaways from this week in MLB in the following slides. 

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Fact: Chris Sale threw his sixth complete game of the season in the Chicago White Sox’s 7-4 win over the Kansas City Royals on Friday night. His six complete games lead the majors.

Bleacher Report will be bringing sports fans the most interesting and engaging Cold Hard Fact of the day, presented by Coors Light.

Source: B/R Insights

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It looked like a heck of a party at Wrigley Field, and why not? It’s not every day the Chicago Cubs can spray some champagne.

Hey, Chicago hadn’t clinched a playoff spot in about 12 months, and that’s a long time to go without a party. The Cubs hadn’t celebrated a division title in eight years, and that can feel like a lifetime.

Seriously, there’s nothing wrong with a celebration, especially for a team that has had as perfect a season as the Cubs have had (and a perfect clinching day with a walk-off home run). The Cubs spent the spring listening to people say they were the best team in baseball, and they’ve gone out and proved it.

They’ve been good, they’ve been fun and there’s absolutely no doubt that when the postseason begins in another two weeks, they’ll go in as the team with the best chance of winning it all.

And then what?

It’s easy enough to predict the party will continue, and Friday was just the beginning rather than the end. It’s easy enough to suggest the best team will win, even though we know from recent history the best team usually doesn’t win.

The Cubs know that from last year, when they weren’t the best team in the regular season but looked like the best team in October…until they couldn’t even win one game against the New York Mets. They should know it from 2008, when they were the best team in the National League in the regular season…and couldn’t win a single game when they got to October.

You can go back to 2003 and to 1984, too, but on this day, there’s no reason to cause Cubs fans any more pain. The hangovers from all the celebrating they did Friday afternoon and into the night will be tough enough.

Besides, the point today isn’t that Chicago won’t win. If I had to put money on one team today, with no odds attached, I’m betting on the Cubs. They have a better and deeper rotation than they did a year ago, the kids are a year older and better and the moves they made last winter really should make them less vulnerable against high-octane pitching.

They could face the Mets again, this time in a best-of-five division series, but these aren’t the same Mets. They could have a tough time in a National League Championship Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, but are Clayton Kershaw and Rich Hill going to be healthy? They could find a challenge from the Washington Nationals, but is it as big a challenge if Stephen Strasburg isn’t there to team with Max Scherzer at the top of the rotation?

No, the Cubs’ biggest challenge is the one they’ve faced since February or since October. Or in any of those other Octobers they’ve played in since 1908.

It’s the challenge of their history, and the challenge of their fans’ expectations.

What happens if they lose Game 1 of a series? What happens if they’re down two games to none or three games to one?

Given how things went in 1984 and 2003, what happens even if they’re one win away from a World Series? Sorry again for bringing that up.

The Cubs and their fans justifiably think this is their year, but the neat thing about October is that just about every team that gets there finds a reason to feel the same way. The 162-game season can be such a challenge that teams that survive it often start to believe they have destiny on their side.

Or sometimes it’s “Dustiny,” as Cubs fans said in 2003 when Dusty Baker was their manager (and as Nationals fans may say with Baker in Washington now).

People in Cleveland will feel it after watching the NBA Cavaliers come from three games to one down against the Golden State Warriors and then seeing the Indians spend the summer in first place.

People in Texas may feel it after watching their Rangers dominate the American League West.

And yes, Theo Epstein no doubt felt it in 2004, when his Boston Red Sox came from three games to none down against the New York Yankees in the American League Championship Series.

Epstein has accomplished quite a bit since coming to the Cubs five years ago, but in terms of breaking the curse, he no doubt understands he still hasn’t accomplished a thing. The Cubs have celebrated division titles before, even if they never celebrated one exactly the way they did Friday.

Yes, there really was a DJ in the clubhouse, as you can see in this tweet from Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune:

Why not?

Cubs manager Joe Maddon set up similar celebrations when he ran the Tampa Bay Rays. The Rays always had fun, and when they went all the way to the World Series in 2008, they were hailed as a spectacular success.

His Cubs won’t be a spectacular success this year unless that DJ shows up three more times.

Maybe he will. For a Cubs fan—and even neutral fans—it wouldn’t be the worst thing to see.

Heck, it looked like fun.

Danny Knobler covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report.

Follow Danny on Twitter and talk baseball.

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Los Angeles Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen is set to hit free agency after his one-year, $10.65 million contract expires at the end of the 2016 season, per Spotrac. 

Having spent his entire seven-year career with the Dodgers, Jansen revealed to Jon Heyman of Today’s Knuckleball that he isn’t automatically committing to Los Angeles in the winter:

LA’s nice. LA’s great. LA gave me the opportunity. LA converted me when I failed as a catcher. I’m grateful about it, and will never forget LA. But at the same time, we’ll have to see what’s good for the family… It’s going to be a tough decision. It’s not going to only be me.

Jansen originally joined the Dodgers organization as a catcher, though he was unable to find success at the plate in the minors. It was there he moved from behind the plate to the mound, joining the Dodgers bullpen in 2010. 

After two years as a middle reliever and setup man, Jansen became the team’s closer in 2012 and hasn’t relinquished the role since. 

Over the past five years, the Curacao native has recorded 177 saves, including 44 in 2014. In total, his 186 career saves are a Dodgers all-time record. He also hasn’t recorded an ERA over 2.76 in that span and is experiencing a career year in 2016. 

In 65 games, Jansen has already tied his career high with 44 saves while posting an ERA of 1.72, which will be the lowest of his career in a season in which he appeared in over 25 games. 

It warranted his first-ever All-Star selection and has helped the Dodgers open up a four-game lead in the National League West over the San Francisco Giants entering Friday night. 

He doesn’t have the most overpowering stuff compared to other premier closers around the game such as Aroldis Chapman of the Chicago Cubs and Jeurys Familia of the New York Mets. But a fastball that tops out around 94 miles per hour is supported by a seldom-used slider that is more than 10 miles per hour slower, per Fangraphs, which has made him so tough to figure out:

Excelling at a position that has become a hot commodity in a game that stresses pitch counts from its starters, Jansen will surely garner plenty of attention during free agency this winter. 

If a team that is desperate for late-inning help comes along, a bidding war might decide where Jansen lands in 2017. 

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com. 

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