Newsletter Excerpt, July 31, 2026 -- "The Waiting"

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With the Padres closing to within two games of a playoff berth, it seems likely they’ll hold on to Mason Miller, taking a big name off the board. The Cardinals dropped three of four to the Cubs to slip under .500 and three games out of a playoff berth. I personally think teams within three games of a playoff berth have no business selling; why are we expanding the playoffs if teams are going to treat playoff berths with that kind of disregard? We already have the NBA for that. Still, they’re the contender most likely to pull the ripcord. I’m not sure they can get too much for Dustin May, Lars Nootbaar or Riley O’Brien, but if they were to shop Ivan Herrera, that could return a highly-rated prospect. Herrera is 26, controlled through 2029, and hitting .246/.364/.383 while catching about twice a week. Just to pick one division, the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays could all use a player like that.

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Newsletter Excerpt, July 29, 2026 -- "Thinking Inside the Box"

 

 

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                 AB  R  H  BI

Mayo DH           3  2  2   2 3B, 2 BB 

Mayo, one of the most disappointing young hitters of the decade, may have turned around the Orioles’ season. He didn’t bite on those two Skubal sinkers just inside off the plate, drawing a walk. It was just Mayo’s 20th walk of the season, and just his tenth after picking up two strikes. Mayo had a 91/9 K/BB in two-strike counts, and just a .213 OBP in those spots, coming into today. Skubal walking him there was the first highly unlikely event in a game that was about to be filled with them.

Mayo wasn’t done. With two outs and two on in the eighth, the Orioles down 7-5, he crushed an 0-2 changeup off the center-field fence for a triple to tie the game. It was the first triple of Mayo’s MLB career. If was just his 12th hit all season in 66 PA after falling behind 0-2. On 0-2 pitches, Mayo had struck out 22 times and gotten just six hits.

The game was tied.

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Newsletter Excerpt, July 29, 2026 -- "D-5"

 

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

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So I don’t think we’re going to get much action over the next few days. There aren’t enough clear sellers at the moment, and too many front offices want to see two or three more games to figure out what they should do. I find myself tracking the standings as if it were September, with each day moving the needle on what the Tigers or Cardinals or Padres will do next Monday

It doesn’t help that the deadline is the latest it has ever been, August 3. Our fan clocks are all off, like dogs after daylight savings time kicks in. We’re hungry now! Stop telling me dinner time is an hour from now! We, as fans, are looking at the calendar, seeing it’s the tail end of July and demanding trades. In fact, it’s just D-5, and we have a long, long way to go.

 

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Newsletter Excerpt, July 27, 2026 -- "Rentals"

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When you look at the deals that have been made, what’s clear is that since 2016, teams focus on years as much as wins. Players who come with more than two months of control have fetched far higher prices, from Juan Soto (James Wood, CJ Abrams, MacKenzie Gore and more), Chris Archer (Tyler Glasnow, Shane Baz, and Austin Meadows), and even last year’s pair of reliever deals. Teams are willing to trade top prospects; they’re just not willing to do it for rentals. You see the names above, and we can add Leo De Vries and Eduardo Tait and Noelvi Marte and Simeon Woods Richardson and Agustin Ramirez, all top-100 prospects, some top-50 and higher. No one’s traded a De Vries or a Marte for a rental in a decade.

Conversely, the highest-rated prospects traded for rentals are an unimpressive group. Robby Snelling was a top-40 guy at the start of 2024 who was in the process of pitching his way off the lists when AJ Preller traded him for Tanner Scott. Calhoun, James Tibbs III, Thayron Liranzo, and Tekoah Roby were all rated in the lower reaches of some lists in the year they were dealt or just after that. The Nationals got more top-50 guys for Soto than have been traded for rentals at the last eight deadlines in total (2020 never counts).

 

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Newsletter Excerpt, July 25, 2026 -- "Rangers 5, Mariners 4"

 

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You could reduce last night’s game to its simplest elements. The Rangers hit two home runs, the Mariners didn’t hit any. Ball go far, team go far. Rangers pitchers struck out nine men, Mariners pitchers struck out four; starter Bryce Miller did not strike out a single batter, the first time in 85 career starts he’d failed to get strike three. Miller’s velocity was down and he got just five swings-and-misses on the night, none on his four-seamer.

Miller’s inability to put hitters away was costly. In the fourth, with two out, one on and an 0-2 count on Jake Burger, he tried to put Burger away with a fastball up. It wasn’t nearly up enough for an 0-2 fastball, and Burger jumped on it for a two-run homer to right. Two innings later, Miller got ahead 0-2 on Brandon Nimmo before allowing a 1-2 single, then got ahead 0-2 on Evan Carter before throwing four straight balls, none all that close. Both players would score, breaking a 3-3 tie and providing the decisive runs. Miller has returned to being the pitcher he was in 2024, but his bad night last night was a big part of the Mariners’ loss.

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Newsletter Excerpt, July 24, 2026 -- "Sleepless in...Yonkers?"

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

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Diamondbacks (54-49) at Nationals (52-51)

The Nationals are the Pirates without the starting pitching: Surprisingly strong offense, bad bullpen. They’ve made it work to reach the end of July in the best place they’ve been since 2019. It’s not a fluke; the Nats have outscored their opponents and have a 53-50 third-order record.

So why don’t I believe? Because my read is that the front office doesn’t. The new regime, led by Paul Toboni, went into a rebuild, trading away MacKenzie Gore for a volume package and sitting out the offseason. It would be a shift for them to now burn prospects for relief pitching to chase, in all likelihood, a #6 seed. There’s so much good stuff happening here, according to plan, which is why they’re 52-51. When I look at Miles Mikolas and Zack Littell, though, I just can’t buy in all the way.

The Nats may get trapped by the standings, and yes, that’s a phrase I expect to use a lot this week. It’s very hard to sell, or even just not buy, when you’re a doubleheader sweep out of a wild-card berth. So this series, against a Snakes team four games ahead of them in the standings but three games worse by third-order record, has outsized importance. The Nats are also up 2-1 in the season series and can lock up the tiebreaker by taking two games.

The Diamondbacks, who seem to be in this spot every year, have won nine of 11 and now hold the #3 wild-card slot, barely ahead of a whole pack. They can only win a wild-card slot, with the Dodgers running away with the NL West. It’s a bit of a mystery how they’re here: 24th in wRC+, 26th in starters’ FIP, 13th in relievers’ FIP. They’re just 18-15 in one-run games and 19-17 in 1/x games, so they’re not getting exceptionally lucky. Taking three of four, including a makeup game in St. Louis, from the Cardinals over the last week has solidified their position.

With Corbin Burnes now a September dream if he returns at all this year, and Michael Soroka out well into August, the Diamondbacks will need a starting pitcher. This weekend, they’re starting two of the three pitchers, Mitch Bratt and Kohl Drake, they got for Merrill Kelly at last year’s deadline. They could use a hitter at any of the hitting positions -- first base, DH, left field -- as well. I’m not buying Max Kepler.

This is a critical series. The Diamondbacks are probably a buyer, and I have had them as a playoff team all year. They go from D.C. to Pittsburgh. Playing six good games can give them some real separation from two chasers, even potentially turn those opponents into sellers. 

Friday: Diamondbacks (Rodriguez) at Nationals (Palmquist/Littell), 6:45 ET, local RSNs

Saturday: Diamondbacks (Bratt) at Nationals (Griffin), 4:05 ET, local RSNs

Sunday: Diamondbacks (Drake) at Nationals (Mikolas), 1:35 ET, local RSNs

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