Welcome to The Pregame Lineup, postseason edition! We'll keep you up to speed on everything you need to know every weekday throughout the 2025 MLB playoffs. Thanks for being here. We're still in the thick of the playoffs right now, but baseball's awards season is just around the corner. On Wednesday, we got our first significant sneak preview, with Rawlings announcing the finalists (three per position, per league) for the 2025 Gold Glove Awards. You can get a look at all of the finalists and read more about their qualifications in our story. Here are four points to consider before winners are unveiled on ESPN on Nov. 2. Center field, center stage: Do you like athletic, graceful, jaw-dropping center-field defense? Well then this season was a blast for you, thanks in large part to a wave of dynamic players overtaking the position. Four of the six finalists were age 24 or younger this season: Ceddanne Rafaela (Red Sox) and Julio Rodríguez (Mariners) in the AL, plus Pete Crow-Armstrong (Cubs) and Victor Scott II (Cardinals) in the NL. PCA and Rafaela ranked tied for first and tied for third, respectively, among all defensive players in Statcast's Outs Above Average (OAA). Double gold: There are 60 finalist slots … but only 59 finalists. You can thank Toronto's Ernie Clement for that. Clement just made headlines with his bat in the ALDS, but versatility and defense are typically more of his calling card. He is an AL finalist at both third base (where he made 66 of his 140 starts) and at the utility spot. Clement could become the fourth player to win a Gold Glove at multiple positions but the first to do so in the same year. You can't win 'em all, Big Dumper: It's fair to say that 2025 has been Cal Raleigh's year. But one thing Raleigh won't win in 2025? A Gold Glove. This after winning the Platinum Glove as the AL's top overall fielder just last year. That may say something about the Dumper's defense taking a bit of a step back, at least by some measures, but also plenty about a strong group of challengers. Along with Boston's Carlos Narváez, the finalist field includes two catchers who have gone head to head with Raleigh this postseason: Detroit's Dillon Dingler and Toronto's Alejandro Kirk. Familiar faces, new places: For a long time, you could count on looking out to right field and seeing Mookie Betts and Bryce Harper. But both have executed impressive moves to the infield in their early 30s. Harper is now an NL finalist at first base for the second time in two years since making the full-time move, and he's still looking for his first career Gold Glove. Betts already has six from his right-field days, but adding one at shortstop at age 33 would be an enormous accomplishment. -- Andrew Simon |
For the most part, losing Games 1 and 2 at home in a best-of-seven series has spelled doom. Only three teams in MLB history have come back to win after facing that reality under the 2-3-2 series format: the 1985 Royals, the '86 Mets and the '96 Yankees, all in the World Series. Overall, teams up two games to none in a best-of-seven series have gone on to win nearly 84% of the time (78-15). In other words, the road ahead couldn't be much steeper for the Blue Jays and Brewers. After dropping the first two games of the LCS at home, both now head to enemy territory in search of a lifeline for their seasons. This is only the second year where the road team went up two games to none in both LCS in the same postseason. The last time it happened? The second year of LCS play in 1970, when the round was a best-of-five. The Blue Jays are up first, with Game 3 tonight in Seattle (8:08 p.m. ET, FS1). They'll look to starter Shane Bieber to hold the Mariners in check while they try to get their offense sorted against the Mariners' George Kirby and Co. After their onslaught against the Yankees in the ALDS, the Blue Jays are hitting .131 with a .429 OPS in this series.
Somehow, the Brewers' offense has been even worse against the Dodgers, slashing .086/.143/.155. Dodgers starters have been dominant so far, with Blake Snell tossing eight scoreless in Game 1 and Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowing only one run in a complete game last night. It won't get any easier with Tyler Glasnow getting the ball for Los Angeles in Game 3 tomorrow night.
-- Thomas Harrigan |
Blue Jays fans, look to the skies. If you need a sign that Toronto can still rally in the American League Championship Series, it's up there … "it" being a majestic flight map recreation of the Blue Jays logo drawn across the skies of Nova Scotia. Canadian pilot Dimitri Neonakis -- who's become a local celebrity for creating artwork through his flight paths -- created the Jays-themed masterpiece yesterday by turning a normally 37-mile flight from Halifax International Airport to small-town Debert into a 354-mile route that took the shape of Toronto's blue jay-and-maple leaf logo. And the most impressive part is, all of Neonakis' flight path drawings are "hand flown" -- he doesn't use autopilot.
This time, Neonakis was celebrating the Blue Jays' first trip to the ALCS since 2016. But he also does a lot of his sky art for good causes. Learn more about him right here.
-- David Adler |
"If he's healthy, he's one of the best players in the game and he's in his prime. He's going to get paid." The sentiment among executives around the league on Kyle Tucker is firm: He's the top free-agent player available on the market this winter. Despite some injury setbacks, Tucker had another productive campaign with the Cubs, posting a bWAR above 4 for the fifth consecutive season. Entering his age-29 season, Tucker is in the prime of his career, setting him up for a significant contract in terms of both dollars and years. The Cubs -- who've never signed a player for more than $200 million -- are expected to offer him a deal. But they'll have opposition from a few clubs who haven't been shy about making big splashes in years past. Those include the Dodgers, Phillies and Giants. Mark Feinsand dove into Tucker's market, while speaking to several executives around MLB about his projected value in free agency. Meanwhile, Tucker's former Astros teammate Alex Bregman is set to hit the open market once he opts out of the first year of his three-year, $120 million contract with the Red Sox after the World Series. Bregman missed two months with a right quad strain, but still posted an .821 OPS with 18 home runs and 62 RBIs. He quickly became a leader in Boston's clubhouse, and should draw interest from the Red Sox in his sweepstakes, with expected competition from Detroit, Toronto and others. -- Justin Morris |
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