The MLB Sleepyhead Summary is a new regular column that helps British baseball fans keep up to speed with MLB despite the time difference!

Things have rarely been dull in Miami during the period of Jeffrey Loria’s ownership of the Marlins. He’s a controversial figure, put politely, and few will be too sad to see him leave when the sale of the club to a new ownership group formally goes through later this year.

However, the team won a World Series in his first year and they’re making a run to get to the post-season for his final year too.

Giancarlo Stanton hit his 50th home run of the season on Sunday as the Marlins completed a 3-0 sweep of the San Diego Padres to put them 4.5 games behind for the second NL Wild Card. That’s still a fair gap to make up, but it’s certainly possible with a month of games still to be played.

Arizona now have a 1.5 game lead over Colorado for the first Wild Card spot after they swept a three-game series against the San Francisco Giants. The first two games were close one-run affairs and the third game was going that way too until the D-Backs exploded for nine runs in the eighth inning on their way to an impressive 11-0 victory. The Rockies held their Wild Card spot with a 2-1 series win over Atlanta.

The Milwaukee Brewers had a good weekend as they became the first team since early June to get the better of the LA Dodgers in a series. Jimmy Nelson took a no-hitter into the sixth inning of Sunday’s game as the Brew Crew prevailed 3-2 over the returning Yu Darvish and took the series 2-1.

That came at a good time for Milwaukee as the NL Central-leading Chicago Cubs lost a series 2-1 to Philadelphia, Rhys Hoskins homering in his fifth consecutive game for the Phillies to make it 11 long-balls in his first 18 MLB games, which puts the Brewers just two games behind the Cubs. The Cardinals lost their weekend series against Tampa Bay 1-2, whilst Pittsburgh just about kept their hopes alive by winning two of three in Cincinnati.

In the American League, the Baltimore Orioles had a great weekend in Boston. After thumping the Red Sox 16-3 in the series opener, they took the following two games as well (a combined score of 25-4) to put themselves just two games behind the Twins for the second Wild Card. Minnesota won their weekend series against Toronto 2-1 with Byron Buxton hitting three home runs in the decider on Sunday.

The Yankees have a 3.5 game lead over Minnesota for the first AL Wild Card as they recovered from losing their series opener against Seattle by winning the following two games, Sunday’s including five first-inning errors by the M’s (three by Jean Segura alone). The Wild Card isn’t the Yankees only focus though.  Baltimore’s wins over Boston helped out the New York Yankees as they are now just 2.5 games behind the Red Sox in the AL East.

It wasn’t such a good weekend for the Angels, Royals and Rangers. The Angels lost their series against Houston 1-2, whilst both the Royals and Rangers were swept in three-game series. Texas lost three to Oakland in a series they would have expected to enjoy, yet Kansas City’s losses may have been just as painful. Although Cleveland were always going to be a tough opponent, the Royals failed to score a single run across the three games.

This week

Miami’s play-off credentials will be firmly tested as they head to Washington for a three-game series starting on Monday. Arizona are hosting the LA Dodgers hoping they can follow the Brewers’ lead in winning a series against the best team in the Majors.

It could be an important week in the NL Central as the contending teams are coming together, with Milwaukee hosting St Louis and Pittsburgh heading to Wrigley Field to face the Cubs.

In the American League, Baltimore will look to keep their good form going with a three-game series at home against the Mariners. Boston will hope to end their four-game losing streak against Toronto with the Blue Jays probably needing a sweep to keep an outside chance of getting back into it in September. The Yankees will see if they can gain even further ground in the AL East by earning some wins against Cleveland.

The Twins match up against the White Sox once again after a five-game series last week, the Angels are hosting the A’s and Tampa Bay and Kansas City collide with both needing wins to jump some of the teams ahead of them in the Wild Card race.

Finally, the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros will play an emotional three-game series. The devastation caused by Storm Harvey has meant that the series will be moved from Houston. Originally it was thought they would swap it to Texas (Arlington), but the latest news is that it may move to Tampa Bay instead. Clearly, there are difficult logistical problems involved for Houston home games in the immediate near future, yet in the greater scheme of things they seem inconsequential.

The MLB Sleepyhead Summary is a new regular column that helps British baseball fans keep up to speed with MLB despite the time difference!

The Los Angeles Dodgers’ victory on Thursday meant that they not only became the first team in the Majors to get to 90 wins in 2017, but they also reached that mark more quickly than any team in the club’s long history.

The Dodgers took three games out of four against the Pittsburgh Pirates and the one they lost was an epic on Wednesday, with Rich Hill pitching 9+ no-hit innings and then being handed a loss.

The tough series has put the Pirates 8.5 games out in the NL Wild Card and there were 1-2 losing series for fellow challengers Milwaukee (versus San Francisco) and St Louis (versus San Diego). The Cardinals had further bullpen issues on the field and even worse off it, with Trevor Rosenthal confirmed as requiring Tommy John elbow surgery.

That made for a good few days for the Chicago Cubs as they took two from three against Cincinnati to give themselves a 3 game lead over the Brewers in the NL Central.

Arizona have a half-game lead for the first Wild Card after splitting a four-game series against the Mets. Robbie Ray made a successful return on Thursday from a DL stint, but there was more bad news for the Mets in the same game as Michael Conforto dislocated his shoulder whilst swinging his bat.

The Rockies are still in second place despite losing two of three against Kansas City. They have a 3.5 game lead over Milwaukee, 5 over St Louis and then 5.5 over the Miami Marlins. Giancarlo Stanton continues to cause major damage at the plate, belting his 47th home run of the season on Thursday.

In the American League, the recently-hot Minnesota Twins hoped to continue their winning ways by flat-track-bullying the Chicago White Sox in a five-game series. It didn’t turn out that way as Chicago edged the series 3-2, but the Twins have still held onto the second Wild Card spot for now.

The Royals, Mariners, Orioles, Rays and Yankees all won their respective series 2-1, with the Yankees now having a 3.5 game lead for the first Wild Card spot and showing they are firmly up for the fight during a fraught Thursday game against Detroit that included three bench-clearing brawls.

The winners on the week were Texas as they got the better of the Angels 3-1, whilst Anaheim suffered another loss with starting pitcher JC Ramirez being placed on the DL with an elbow injury.

The results put the Royals, Angels and Mariners half a game behind the Twins for the second Wild Card, with Texas 1 game back, the Rays and Orioles 3 games back and Toronto barely holding on at 5.

Elsewhere, the Cleveland-Boston series lived up to expectations as the two teams played a close contest and shared two wins apiece. Most notable perhaps was the fourth game and the Indians knocking Chris Sale around for the second time in August.

This weekend

In the National League, the Cubs will look to pad their Central lead with a three-game series in Philadelphia, whilst St Louis are hosting the Rays and the Brewers have the tough task of taking on the Dodgers. Yu Darvish may be back on the mound on Sunday after a DL stint, with Clayton Kershaw scheduled to make his latest rehab start in Triple-A on Saturday.

Colorado are in Atlanta for three games, with Arizona hosting the Giants and Miami hosting the Padres.

As for the American League, there are some very interesting match-ups involving the Wild Card hopefuls. The Mariners and Yankees will square off in New York (Sonny Gray and Masahiro Tanaka currently scheduled to pitch on Saturday and Sunday respectively), with the Twins heading to Toronto in a series that could either help the Blue Jays get back into the race, or knock them out of it.

Meanwhile three other teams are facing the leaders of their own division: the Angels against the Astros, the Royals against the Indians and the Orioles against the Red Sox. The team that may fancy their chances of gaining further ground are the Texas Rangers as they take on the Oakland A’s.

It’s been a good few days for teams in red.

The St Louis Cardinals did have their eight-game winning streak snapped by Atlanta on Sunday, but their run of wins has seen them leap up the NL Central standings and firmly back in contention for the division title. The Chicago Cubs now have just a one-game lead over the Redbirds, with Milwaukee and Pittsburgh still in the hunt too.

The LA Angels have also been winning in red and they delivered a blow to their AL West, and Wild Card, rivals the Seattle Mariners by sweeping their four-game series at Safeco Field. The Angels have a six-game winning streak going and have gone from being sixth in the Wild Card race last Sunday to holding the second Wild Card spot one week later.

The New York Yankees are still in the first AL Wild Card spot, although they’ve fallen an extra 2.5 games behind Boston at the top of the AL East standings over the past week, in part due to the Red Sox’s play against them this past weekend.  The Red Sox have won ten of their last eleven games.  Cleveland have also slightly padded their AL Central lead, increasing their gap by two games to 4.5 over Minnesota.

The LA Dodgers and Washington Nationals have also both increased their healthy leads in the NL West and East divisions respectively, although this is the only context in which the word healthy applies to the Nats. Thankfully the damage done to Bryce Harper following a slip on a wet first-base bag is not as bad as it looked, but he’s still likely to be out for several weeks.

The Colorado Rockies are also breathing a sigh of relief after the initial scan results of Nolan Arrenado’s hand were positive after he was hit by a pitch on Sunday. A broken bone in that area usually costs a player six weeks and that would have put the star third baseman out of action for the rest of the regular season, but it looks like it’s just going to be a bit sore for a few days.

The Rockies didn’t have any other luck this weekend as they were swept by the Miami Marlins. Giancarlo Stanton is on an absolute tear at the plate: he’s homered in four consecutive games and has 21 in his last 33 games to put him seven clear of Aaron Judge at the top of the MLB home run list with 42.

The Marlins are 8.5 games behind the Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks, who are tied for the two Wild Card races on 65-52 records, but if Stanton can keep on slugging at this rate then he should make it fun at least.

What’s coming up

The St Louis Cardinals have yet another big week in store as they start out with two inter-league games in Boston on Tuesday and Wednesday before heading to Pittsburgh to start a series against their NL Central rivals on Thursday.

The Pirates meanwhile are in Milwaukee for three games to open this week. The Brewers always looked like a team that would be jumped by better clubs at some point and that’s starting to happen, but if they could sweep this series then that will at least keep their hopes up. The series finale on Wednesday is a 19.20 BST start and should see Gerrit Cole and Jimmy Nelson on the mound.

The Chicago Cubs are facing the Cincinnati Reds and they hold a 6-3 season series record against them.

Elsewhere among the National League play-off hopefuls, the Dodgers are in inter-league play against the Chicago White Sox (which might not be a lot of fun for the White Sox), Arizona are facing a somewhat-scuffling Houston Astros (Colin McHugh and Zack Greinke start it out in the first game of the series) whilst the Colorado Rockies are taking on the Atlanta Braves.

Monday’s game from that series should offer a strong contender for feel-good story of the week as the Rockies’ starter is scheduled to be Chad Bettis, making his season debut after undergoing surgery and chemotherapy for testicular cancer.

Inter-league match-ups will also be important for AL play-off hopefuls too. The LA Angels are in Washington taking on the Nationals, whilst the New York Yankees have a four-game home/road split Subway Series against the Mets.

Wild Card chasers Baltimore and Seattle are facing each other, the Rays are taking on the Blue Jays and there’s an AL Central battle between the Minnesota Twins and Cleveland Indians, with the latest Bartolo Colon appearance likely to come on Tuesday.