Kuzul

Los Angeles Angels pitcher Matt Shoemaker was hit in the head by a line drive off the bat of the Seattle Mariners’ Kyle Seager on Sunday and was sent to the hospital.

He underwent surgery after being diagnosed with a “small skull fracture and hematoma,” per Pedro Moura of the Los Angeles Times. It is uncertain when he will return to action.

Continue for updates.

Shoemaker Released from Hospital 

Tuesday, Sept. 6

Angels general manager Billy Eppler confirmed Shoemaker is at a Seattle hotel and might return to Los Angeles on Wednesday, according to Moura. 

Shoemaker Undergoes Surgery

Monday, Sept. 5

Eppler told reporters Shoemaker had surgery Sunday night to stop the bleeding. Eppler added Shoemaker is “recovering well.”

Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register reported, “Shoemaker is expected to make a full recovery for next season.”

Shoemaker Walks off Under Own Power After Scary Incident

Sunday, Sept. 4

Moura noted the line drive came off the bat at 105 mph. The crowd in Seattle gave Shoemaker a standing ovation as team doctors helped him off the field.

Seager Comments on Shoemaker’s Injury

Sunday, Sept. 4

“That was terrifying,” said Seager, per Shannon Drayer of MyNorthwest.com. “The scariest thing I have seen on a baseball field. That was bigger than [baseball], that was real.”

Shoemaker Has Been Bright Spot for Disappointing Angels

Entering play Sunday, Shoemaker had 26 starts on the season for the Angels. He sported a 3.91 ERA, 1.23 WHIP and 141 strikeouts in 158.2 innings, and the strikeouts and innings pitched were both already career-high totals.

He was also formidable in 2014 with a 3.04 ERA and 1.07 WHIP in 27 appearances (20 starts) but struggled some last year with a 4.46 ERA in 25 games.

This is a lost season for the fourth-place Angels, who were 21.5 games behind the Texas Rangers entering Sunday. He wouldn’t be rushing back to a pennant race, and teams can expand their rosters to 40 players in September to help account for injuries.

Los Angeles still has pieces in its starting rotation, including Jered Weaver, Tyler Skaggs and Ricky Nolasco, who can shoulder more of the load and attempt to save the bullpen innings while Shoemaker is out.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

The Cincinnati Reds announced that center fielder Billy Hamilton exited Sunday’s game against the St. Louis Cardinals with a strained left oblique following a checked swing. It is uncertain when he will be ready to return to the lineup.

Continue for updates.

Latest on Hamilton’s Timeline for Return

Monday, Sept. 5

Reds manager Bryan Price told reporters Hamilton’s injury “may not be a season-ender” and that the center fielder will be re-evaluated in five to seven days.

Latest on Hamilton’s Testing 

Monday, Sept. 5

Mark Sheldon of MLB.com reported that Hamilton will undergo an ultrasound to determine the severity of the injury.

Hamilton Out vs. Mets

Monday, Sept. 5

Hamilton will not be in Monday’s lineup against the New York Mets, per the Cincinnati Enquirer‘s C. Trent Rosecrans:

Holt Replaces Hamilton in Center

Sunday, Sept. 4

The injury came as Hamilton was up to bat in the third inning. He immediately reached for his left side following a checked swing. After the team’s trainer attended to Hamilton, Price brought in Tyler Holt to finish the at-bat and play in center.

Hamilton Struggling to Stay Healthy

Durability has been a concern for Hamilton the past couple of years. He played in 114 games in 2015 and has already suffered a knee injury, thumb injury and concussion this season.

When healthy, Hamilton has demonstrated marked improvement at the plate in 2016 for the Reds. He slashed .226/.274/.289 with four home runs last season but has three homers, 17 RBI and a .261/.321/.344 slash line in 118 games this year.

Despite the better offensive stats, the Reds will miss him most on the basepaths if he is forced to sit out for an extensive period. Hamilton stole 56 bases in 2014 and 57 bases in 2015, and he leads the league with 58 stolen bases in 2016.

He is arguably the fastest player in baseball and a threat to steal and turn a walk or single into the equivalent of a triple every time he gets on base. Hamilton also forces opposing pitchers to focus more on him than hitters, which allows sluggers such as Joey Votto to inflict additional damage off mistakes.

The Reds will likely turn to Holt until Hamilton is ready to return. He has played a career-high 91 games this year, although he is far from a proven commodity after hitting a combined .097 for the Reds and Cleveland Indians in 2015.

While it is a lesser club with Hamilton out, this is a lost season for Cincinnati. There is no need to rush him back from this latest ailment, as it is far more important that he is healthy and ready to go at the start of the 2017 campaign.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Major League Baseball’s final month of the regular season has arrived, and with it, the pressure to perform has only increased. Some players thrive under the spotlight, raising their games to levels worthy of inclusion on B/R’s Team of the Week.

Others fall far short of meeting even the most modest expectations and find themselves here, among the candidates to star on our latest installment highlighting baseball’s biggest duds of the past seven days.

Duds come in all shapes and sizes and on contenders and non-contenders alike. Case in point: Addison Russell isn’t just the starting shortstop on baseball’s best team, the Chicago Cubs, but he gets the starting nod on this week’s All-Dud team as well.

Besides Russell, who fills out our 10-player roster featuring one player per position, including a designated hitter and starting pitcher? Let’s take a look.

Begin Slideshow

Time waits for no man. It’s mean like that. It’s even meaner to baseball players, systematically robbing them of their skills as they drift further from their youth.

Except for Adrian Beltre, who’s playing like he’s 37 going on 27.

It feels like Beltre has been lost in the shuffle in the Texas Rangers‘ rise to the top of the American League in 2016, but he’s been creeping back into the spotlight since the All-Star break. The creeping continued in a 12-4 thumping of the Houston Astros on Saturday at Globe Life Park in Arlington, Texas. Beltre pitched in three hits, including his 439th career home run.

So it goes for Beltre in the second half. He was just OK in the first half, hitting .281 with a .778 OPS and 12 homers. But since the break, he’s hit .311 with a .985 OPS and 14 homers. The veteran third baseman has been among the American League’s top hitters.

Just like that, a season that once seemed ticketed for mediocrity is now looking a lot like the other five seasons Beltre’s given the Rangers since he arrived in 2011. He averaged an .872 OPS and 27 homers in the first five. He now has an .852 OPS and 26 homers in 2016.

It would’ve been understandable if Beltre had never gotten to this point. After all, his modest first half came on the heels of a modest age-36 season last year, in which he OPS’d just .788 with 18 homers.

Plus, we know what the usual aging curves say about the progression of offensive skills over time. Per research offered by Jeff Zimmerman at Beyond the Box Score in 2011, hitters normally peak in their mid-to-late 20s and are well below their peaks by the time they hit their late 30s. By all rights, Beltre should be an Albert Pujols-like shell of his former self.

But he’s not. And it’s not as if we’re watching a guy who’s gotten hot because he’s getting little dinkers and duck snorts to fall in.

Compared to the first half, Beltre’s second half has seen him improve an already strong contact habit and make better contact through a higher launch angle and more exit velocity (per Baseball Savant):

This is number-y nerdspeak for stating the obvious: Beltre is locked in.

He usually is in the second half. He has a career .857 OPS after the break, compared to .783 before the break. More specifically, he’s at his best in August and September. 

“I think he is a player who smells the playoffs,” Rangers manager Jeff Banister told Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News. “The desire to win and advance is what he plays for. Playoff races and opportunities sharpen great players and heighten their drive. That’s why you see great players do great things at big moments.”

Another thing that’s not out of the ordinary is the excellent glovework Beltre is providing at the hot corner. Defensive runs saved and ultimate zone rating both rate him as one of baseball’s elite defensive third basemen. Since these metrics are now taken into account in the voting, it’s possible his Gold Glove collection will grow from four to five this winter.

It’s unlikely any of this will garner Beltre American League MVP attention. Nonetheless, it shouldn’t be lost on what he means to the Rangers. They wouldn’t be much worse than their 82-54 record without him, but wins above replacement confirms he’s been by far their best everyday player:

1. Adrian Beltre: 4.9
2. Ian Desmond: 3.1
3. Rougned Odor: 2.2

From where he is now, Beltre is a lock for another 5-WAR season. That would give him 10 of those since 2004, more than any other player.

To boot, seven of these 10 seasons will have come since Beltre’s age-31 season in 2010. Aging curves and rational logic insist that’s not supposed to happen, and it’s not like third basemen have a history of being exempt from the rule. Once Beltre crosses the 5-WAR threshold this season, he’ll become the only third baseman in history to collect as many as seven such seasons past the age of 31.

This will be just the latest feather in the cap of a career that will merit consideration for not just induction into the Hall of Fame, but also induction on Beltre’s first ballot when his time comes. Cooperstown is picky with third basemen, but WAR rates him has one of the five best to ever play the hot corner.

The one thing missing from Beltre’s career is a World Series ring. He came close to winning one in 2011, hitting .300 with an .889 OPS in a World Series the Rangers (famously) lost in seven games. He’s played in only four postseason games since then, including three in last year’s American League Division Series against the Toronto Blue Jays in which he was badly beaten up.

But now, Beltre’s red-hot bat is just another reason to like the Rangers’ chances of getting it done this season. He’s part of a deep lineup that can do it all. Cole Hamels and Yu Darvish are a deadly one-two punch in the Rangers’ starting rotation. In their bullpen is a parade of hard-throwers no team will want to face in October.

Beltre will need to defy age for a couple of more months to see the Rangers’ quest through to the end. But hey, since he’s already made it this far…

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs unless otherwise noted/linked.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

The Atlanta Braves are reportedly considering signing former NFL quarterback Tim Tebow to a minor league contract after meeting with him following his workout for MLB teams earlier this week.

Pedro Gomez of ESPN reported Saturday that sources confirmed the Braves have “definite interest” in the outfielder, who last played organized baseball in 2005. Tebow put his baseball skills on display for 27 of the league’s 30 teams Tuesday in Los Angeles.

Josh Peter of USA Today said there were mixed reviews after the session, with one American League scout saying: “It was a complete waste of time. It was like watching an actor trying to portray a baseball player. He tried. He tried. That’s the best I can say. He is crazy strong, and could run well in one direction, but that’s it. He only had one good throw of all his throws.”

Another scout, this one from the National League, provided a more favorable assessment: “Better than I expected, to be honest. … That’s a big dude, for as fast as he can run. The power was impressive, but I wish he could have translated it maybe a little better [against live pitching].”

According to Jon Morosi of the MLB Network, Tebow had one hit in six plate appearances against former MLB reliever Chad Smith in the workout.

The 6’3″, 260-pounder has always had a unique blend of size, power and athletic ability, but it didn’t translate to consistent on-field success in the NFL. Now he’s 29 and trying to make the transition to baseball at a time when most players are already enjoying their peak seasons.

Even the most optimistic outlook would suggest he needs at least one full season in the minor leagues to adjust to live pitching. It’s unlikely he’ll ever make a significant impact in the majors, even if he’s signed.

That said, the Braves would be a nice landing spot. They already own one of the league’s top five farm systems, according to Bleacher Report’s Joel Reuter. It also helps that Atlanta has a big following throughout the Southeast, where the Florida Gators QB rose to superstardom.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Right now, New York Yankees general manager Brian Cashman looks to be a genius.

He had arguably the best July of any baseball executive. Cashman traded several of the team’s talented veterans for a haul of prospects that now give New York one of baseball’s best minor league systems.

He was able to get Alex Rodriguez to retire and Mark Teixeira and Brian McCann to accept lesser roles all to make way for a group of talented young players who have the Yankees back into playoff contention.

Did you know, though, that more young players will continue to have an impact as we head into September?

Begin Slideshow

NEW YORK — There were four of them, four young starting pitchers, and last October they carried the New York Mets into the World Series.

It felt like it could be the start of something big—a team built around strong young arms that could think about winning with them, year after year. The Mets lost the World Series to the Kansas City Royals, but with pitching like this, there would be more chances.

There still could be, but on this first weekend of September, the Mets are battling for a playoff spot, and only one of those four young pitchers is healthy enough to pitch. If last year’s Mets were a lesson on how to build with young arms, this year’s Mets are the reminder that all too often those arms can break.

The Mets sent 24-year-old Noah Syndergaard to the mound Friday night against the Washington Nationals. Syndergaard didn’t win, but he looked so good the Mets could dream of having him start a winner-take-all Wild Card Game in 33 days.

Nice dream, but how do the Mets get there with a rotation that currently consists of Syndergaard, 43-year-old Bartolo Colon and three guys who spent most of this season in the minor leagues?

Already, the Mets lost 27-year-old Matt Harvey for the season from surgery to deal with thoracic outlet syndrome.

Then, before Syndergaard took the mound Friday, manager Terry Collins said 25-year-old left-hander Steven Matz won’t pick up a ball until Monday and won’t go with the Mets when they begin their next trip in Cincinnati. A while later, the Mets announced that 28-year-old right-hander Jacob deGrom had an MRI on his right forearm, and while they said doctors found no structural damage, they also said deGrom “likely” won’t be making his next start.

“Really unfortunate to hear that,” Syndergaard said, after the 4-1 loss to the Nationals.

Collins and deGrom tried hard to paint a brighter picture, calling the MRI results a great relief.

“I’m pretty certain I’ll be back out there [this season],” deGrom said.

Perhaps he will be, but the doctor’s recommendation was he takes medication to reduce the inflammation and doesn’t attempt to throw until the soreness subsides.

“I’ve got to be smart about it,” deGrom said. “I feel like I could throw now.”

It’s admirable and understandable that he wants to pitch, but the fact is no one can yet say when it would be smart for him to pitch. The same goes for Matz, who last started Aug. 14 before he added shoulder soreness to the bone spur in his elbow as ailments that have derailed his season.

At this point, deGrom seems significantly more likely to return than Matz, but the Mets can’t count on either of them. They’ll have to scramble, but then again they’ve been scrambling all season.

They’ve lost three-fourths of their Opening Day infield, with second baseman Neil Walker (back surgery) the latest casualty. The only “healthy” infielder is shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera, who has started just 12 games since July 31 because of knee trouble but has still managed to hit six home runs in his last eight games.

Collins talks regularly about needing to give Cabrera and left fielder Yoenis Cespedes (playing with a sore quadriceps) rest to get them through the season.

“We can’t lose Yoenis Cespedes for two weeks,” Collins said Friday. “We’ve got to have our lineup intact to have a chance.”

The surprising thing is the Mets still have a chance, even with the pitchers hurt, even with the patched-together lineup. There’s no way they’re catching the Nationals in the National League East—Friday’s loss dropped them 10.5 games behind and gave the Nats a magic number of 18 with 28 games left—but the Mets remain just two games behind the St. Louis Cardinals for the final wild-card spot.

Not only that, but after this weekend, the Mets will have 25 games remaining. Three of those 25 will be the week after next in Washington, but the other 22 will be against the Philadelphia Phillies (seven), Atlanta Braves (six), Cincinnati Reds (three), Minnesota Twins (three) and Miami Marlins (three).

It would be hard to come up with an easier final month.

With opponents like that, Syndergaard might make a run at the Cy Young Award. He’s given up just three runs in 22 innings in his last three starts, with opponents collecting just seven hits in 68 at-bats (.103). His ERA for the season is 2.56, which trails only Kyle Hendricks’ of the Chicago Cubs (2.09) and Madison Bumgarner‘s of the San Francisco Giants (2.49).

He could face Bumgarner in the Wild Card Game. He could face Hendricks in a division series game.

All the Mets have to do is get there. With a strong, young and healthy pitching staff, they’d be a good bet to do it.

The four pitchers who carried them to the World Series are still young and strong. But right now, only Syndergaard counts as healthy.

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

Follow Danny on Twitter and talk baseball. 

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

The final month of the MLB regular season has arrived, and with that comes roster expansion from 25 to 40 players.

For contenders, it’s a chance to add one last wave of reinforcements for the stretch run, generally in the form of additional bullpen arms and bench bats.

Corey Seager proved that September call-ups are capable of making a real impact last season, though, when he took over as the Los Angeles Dodgers’ everyday shortstop over the final month.

For non-contenders, it’s an opportunity to get an up-close look at some of the minor league talent who may be ready to step into a more prominent role the following season.

Zach Davies turned heads after joining the Milwaukee Brewers rotation in September last year, parlaying that into a spot on the team’s staff in 2016.

Now that teams have made the first wave of call-ups this season, let’s take a look at some of the notable prospects joining the MLB ranks and take a crack at predicting whether they’ll boom or bust down the stretch.

Here’s how we defined those two categories:

• Boom: A prospect who makes a legitimate impact, whether it’s in a starting role or as a key bat off the bench or an arm in the bullpen.

• Bust: A prospect who fails to make a legitimate impact due to lack of playing time or poor performance.

These are not meant to be long-term predictions for what type of future these players will have; it’s simply a look ahead to how they might fare in September.

Note: To be considered for this list, a player must still have rookie eligibility. That left guys such as Byron Buxton, Cody Reed, Dalton Pompey and Kevin Plawecki excluded from the conversation.

Begin Slideshow

New York Mets starting pitcher Jacob deGrom is battling forearm tightness that has put him on the shelf since Sept. 2, and it is unclear when he will return to the mound. 

Continue for updates.

Collins Comments on deGrom’s Timeline for Return

Sunday, Sept. 4

Mets manager Terry Collins told reporters there is a “good chance” deGrom will miss multiple starts as he recovers from his forearm inflammation.

DeGrom Comments on Playing Status 

Friday, Sept. 2

“I’m pretty certain I’ll be back out there,” deGrom said when asked whether or not he will play again this season, per Anthony DiComo of MLB.com.

Mets Release Statement on deGrom’s MRI

Friday, Sept. 2

The Mets provided details on the nature of deGrom’s visit to the hospital on Friday, via Steve Gelbs of SNYtv:

After experiencing soreness in his right forearm last night while pitching, Mets pitcher [Jacob] deGrom this afternoon had a precautionary MRI at the Hospital for special Surgery in New York. There is no structural damage.

DeGrom will take medication to relieve the soreness and will resume throwing when the discomfort subsides. He is likely to miss his next start.

DeGrom Diagnosed with Inflammation

Friday, Sept. 2

Per Mike Puma of the New York Post, deGrom underwent an examination Friday, which showed no structural damage, but there is inflammation that is likely to cost him at least one start.

DeGrom Struggling to Regain Momentum From ’15

Something has seemed to be off for the last two weeks. DeGrom has allowed 31 hits, four home runs and 16 earned runs in three starts since Aug. 18.

DeGrom has been solid in 2016, though, nothing like the Cy Young contender he was last season. He’s on pace to record the worst marks of his career in ERA (3.04), WHIP (1.203) and hits allowed per nine innings (8.6).

Injuries have been a factor in his career, though. He missed the entire 2011 campaign after undergoing Tommy John surgery in late 2010. He was sidelined during his rookie year because of rotator cuff tendinitis, and he dealt with back problems during the early stages of this season.

The Mets starting rotation has already been hit hard by injuries.

Matt Harvey is out for the season, and both Steven Matz and Jon Niese are on the disabled list as well. Bartolo Colon and Noah Syndergaard have been the only reliable starters in New York this season. 

Entering play Monday, the Mets are a game behind the St. Louis Cardinals for the National League‘s second wild-card spot. Losing deGrom would be a crushing blow for a team that’s already had its share of injuries while fighting to make another playoff appearance after a run to the World Series in 2015. 

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Cincinnati Reds first baseman Joey Votto was not in the team’s lineup Friday against the St. Louis Cardinals due to a neck injury, but he has since returned to action.

Continue below for updates:

Votto Returns vs. Cardinals

Saturday, Sept. 3

The Reds announced Votto is batting third and playing first base against St. Louis.

Votto Has Performed Well for Struggling Reds

Votto has been one of the hottest players in the majors despite a miserable start to his 2016 season. Entering the All-Star break, he was hitting just .252, which was on pace for a career-worst mark. 

But since July 15, he’s been red hot, raising his averaging to .309 with 22 home runs and 78 RBI through Friday. ESPN Stats & Info tracked his play through Aug. 23:

Votto has been able to avoid major injuries since he missed 100 games in 2014 with a quadriceps injury.

When healthy, he’s Cincinnati’s most productive bat. Last year was the sixth time in his career that he hit more than 20 home runs and the fourth time he led the league in walks. 

His bat wasn’t enough for a Reds team that was one of the worst in baseball with a 64-98 record in 2015, which was their worst season since a 62-win 1949. This season hasn’t gone much better, as the Reds are 57-77 while sitting 29.5 games behind the Chicago Cubs in the National League Central.

There was even more pressure for Votto to produce in 2016 after the Reds dealt Todd Frazier (35 home runs last year) to the Chicago White Sox in the offseason. 

The Reds are already on the wrong side of one of the toughest divisions in baseball, and losing Votto for any amount of time would only have made things worse. Thankfully, they’ll have him back for the stretch run as they try to gain some momentum heading into next season. 

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com