{"id":672581,"date":"2026-04-10T16:27:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T16:27:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/672581\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T16:27:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T16:27:43","slug":"which-underachievers-should-panic-plus-jo-adell-defensive-stalwart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/672581\/","title":{"rendered":"Which underachievers should panic? Plus: Jo Adell, defensive stalwart"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Windup Newsletter \u26be | This is The Athletic\u2019s MLB<\/a> newsletter. Sign up here<\/a> to receive The Windup directly in your inbox.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re just about 10 percent of the way through the season. Too early to call it, but maybe not too early to ask if a few favorites are in trouble. Plus: Jayson Stark investigates if Jo Adell\u2019s triple-homer-robbery game was the greatest defensive performance of all time, and we have our baseball card of the week! I\u2019m Levi Weaver \u2014 welcome to The Windup!<\/p>\n

Panic Button: Which underachievers are in trouble?<\/p>\n

Yesterday, we took\u00a0a look at the AL West<\/a>, since the presumptive favorite (Seattle) was just swept into last place by a division rival (Texas). We could do the same for the AL Central today, after Minnesota\u2019s sweep of Detroit, but let\u2019s broaden the scope a bit:<\/p>\n

I count six teams who were supposed to be legitimate contenders in 2026 who have thus far been, to varying degrees, Pretty Not Great.<\/p>\n

But which ones are really in trouble? Here are my best guesses. If the scores seem low, just remember \u2026 it\u2019s April 10th. Nothing is insurmountable just yet, but these games\u00a0do\u00a0count.<\/p>\n

Philadelphia Phillies: 6-6, fourth place in NL East. Panic level: 1\/10.\u00a0Charlotte Varnes has a more detailed account \u2014\u00a0some good, some bad<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 but they haven\u2019t scored in 20 innings, and they\u2019re not hitting left-handed pitching. Do we think they\u2019re this bad? I don\u2019t. I still think this is a playoff team, and they\u2019re still giving their youngsters\u00a0space to learn<\/a>.
\nSeattle Mariners: 4-9, last place in AL West.\u00a0Panic level: 2.5\/10.\u00a0Over on the Baseball Savant leaderboard, the top four teams in any stat are highlighted in red, while the bottom four are highlighted in blue. The Mariners offense, at time of writing, has\u00a0five blues and no reds<\/a>.Of note, their pitching staff has\u00a0five reds and no blues<\/a>. We\u2019ve seen this movie before, in 2024 when Seattle went 85-77 and missed the playoffs by one game. They need the 2025 versions.
\nDetroit Tigers: 4-9, last place in AL Central.\u00a0Panic level: 4\/10.\u00a0They just got swept by the Twins, their center fielder is in the hospital after\u00a0a scary collision<\/a>, and the duo of Riley Greene and Spencer Torkelson\u00a0has been frustrating<\/a>. Don\u2019t forget: This team blew an unblowable division lead last year. With Tarik Skubal approaching free agency, it probably has a little over two months to solve this.
\nBoston Red Sox: 4-8, last place in AL East.\u00a0Panic level: 4.5\/10.\u00a0The problem in Boston is twofold. First, the bats haven\u2019t been very good. But two: The division is stacked, with four teams that should be good and another \u2014 the Rays \u2014 who usually find a way to outperform expectations. Boston has to row upstream to to get back on track, and I\u2019m not sure it has the bats to do that.
\nChicago Cubs: 6-6, last place in NL Central. Panic Level 5\/10.\u00a0Like the Blue Jays, the Cubs are dealing with injury issues, primarily in the rotation, where three starters are on the IL. Matthew Boyd should be back soon, but Cade Horton\u2019s season is over, and who knows how Justin Steele will look after returning from Tommy John surgery. Seiya Suzuki\u2019s return is imminent, but even the healthy players have struggled: Alex Bregman, Dansby Swanson and Michael Busch are all hitting under .200. It\u2019s encouraging that Nico Hoerner is\u00a0discovering some pop<\/a>.
\nToronto Blue Jays: 5-7, fourth place in AL East.\u00a0Panic level: 6\/10.\u00a0If you thought the Cubs had some injury issues \u2026 Alejandro Kirk, Addison Barger, Jos\u00e9 Berrios, Shane Bieber, Trey Yesavage, Cody Ponce, Bowden Francis and Yimi Garc\u00eda are all on the IL. It\u2019s so dire that the reigning AL champs have signed 36-year-old Patrick Corbin (who hasn\u2019t had an ERA under 4.40 since 2019) to a one-year deal.The Blue Jays were mere inches from winning the World Series last year, then invested heavily in their roster, trying to make up for the loss of Bo Bichette in free agency. So far, they\u2019re one Boston Red Sox Offense from being in last place in the division.<\/p>\n

Honorable mention:\u00a0The also-injured and just-swept-by-the-Rockies Houston Astros (6-7), and the also-also-injured Padres (7-6), who avoided this list thanks to Xander Bogaerts\u2019 12th-inning walk-off grand slam to beat the Rockies.<\/p>\n

Over to Stark for that investigative report.<\/p>\n

Stark Observations: Jo Adell, greatest defensive game ever?<\/p>\n

From my latest<\/a>\u00a0article<\/a>, digging into whether or not Angels outfielder Jo Adell\u2019s three-HR-stealing performance in a 1-0 victory is the greatest defensive game of all time:<\/p>\n

When nights like that come along in baseball, America turns its longing eyes toward us, here at Weird and Wild World Headquarters. So \u2026 (America asks) \u2026 How rare was that? \u2026 How historic was that? \u2026 How Weird (and Wild) was that?<\/p>\n

Thanks for asking. After nearly a week of people saying that might have been the greatest defensive game of all time, I was no longer just wondering about that. I decided: I\u00a0had to know.<\/p>\n

So, the Weird and Wild column tried to answer that question. Spoiler alert: We\u2019re going with yes on that!\u00a0But here\u2019s how hard it was to get there.<\/p>\n

What do the record books say?\u00a0Ho-ho-ho. Now that\u2019s hilarious. The record books are absolutely no help on stuff like this. You want to know which right fielder holds the record for most putouts in a game? Oh, you can find\u00a0that\u00a0in your dusty old record book. But most home run robberies in a game? Good luck, pal.<\/p>\n

What do the number crunchers say?\u00a0Fortunately, our favorite researchers could at least dish out some fun facts on this feat. Here are my four favorites:<\/p>\n

He\u2019s a one-man team:\u00a0The wild-card era is more than three decades old. In all that time, according to STATS Perform, only one\u00a0team\u00a0has robbed three home runs in a game. It was (yup) Team Jo Adell.
\nEven two is an event:\u00a0You should know that home-run robbery data goes back only a little over 20 years. But in all that time, according to Sports Info Solutions, there have been only two other outfielders who even stole\u00a0two\u00a0home runs in a game: Nook Logan in 2005 and Jes\u00fas S\u00e1nchez last year.
\nA game for all seasons:\u00a0How hard is three in one game? Only five outfielders in the sport had three (or more)\u00a0all season\u00a0last year; Fernando Tatis Jr. had four. Cedric Mullins, Ram\u00f3n Laureano, Bryce Teodosio and Jacob Young had three apiece. (Hat tip: Sports Info Solutions.)
\nOnce (maybe thrice) in a lifetime:\u00a0Just for fun, want to hear a couple of names of famous active players who never even robbed three home runs in their outfielding careers? How about Andrew McCutchen \u2026 and Bryce Harper (with two each). Of course, it doesn\u2019t help if you play in a park where the fence is 30 feet high. But whatever!<\/p>\n

I enjoyed all those meaty tidbits. But they don\u2019t really tell us if this was the greatest defensive game ever. So I kept plowing forward. It was time to find out \u2026<\/p>\n

For the full story,\u00a0click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Back to you, Levi.<\/p>\n

Baseball Card of the Week: 1958 Topps Bill Mazeroski<\/p>\n

\"\"\/ \"\"\/<\/p>\n

The backs of old baseball cards are occasionally really funny to me. No card today would list stats under \u201cYEAR\u201d without telling you\u00a0what year (1957, if you\u2019re wondering). Nor would they tell you that a guy lived in the state of \u201cO\u201d (Maz lived in Ohio \u2014\u00a0not Oregon or Oklahoma).<\/p>\n

But my favorite part of this card is the guy who appears to be \u2026 holding Mazeroski\u00a0(???) asking \u201cWho are you?\u201d Why did they choose this pose?<\/p>\n

Handshakes and High Fives<\/p>\n

I told you yesterday I\u2019d let you know if the caps changed my mind on any of the City Connects. I don\u2019t love the Royals\u2019 gradient cap, but otherwise, no major changes. Here, our three-member panel\u00a0ranks the new releases<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Do you know which uniform number is retired in St. Louis, despite no player ever having worn it in a regular-season game? You will after you read\u00a0Tyler Kepner\u2019s \u201cSliders\u201d column<\/a>\u00a0this week.<\/p>\n

When Tyler Samaniego debuted earlier this week, he became the first Red Sox pitcher in almost 50 years to register his first three outs on strikeouts. After the game,\u00a0he talked about his dad<\/a>, who passed away in 2022.<\/p>\n

Has your favorite pitcher looked a bit different this year? Maybe he\u2019s on Eno Sarris\u2019 list of\u00a0pitchers who have made the biggest changes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

New Giants manager Tony Vitello has gotten a significant amount of criticism in his first year. Grant Brisbee goes over the critiques and tells us\u00a0what\u2019s warranted, and what\u2019s not<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We did not write about White Sox pitcher Duncan Davitt being called up. That\u2019s OK, because his hometown paper has a good write-up<\/a>\u00a0by \u2026\u00a0sports columnist Duncan Davitt<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Most-clicked in our last newsletter:\u00a0The Pirates\u2019\u00a0City Connect 2.0 jersey reveal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udceb Love The Windup? Check out\u00a0The Athletic\u2019s other newsletters<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Windup Newsletter \u26be | This is The Athletic\u2019s MLB newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Windup…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672582,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2397],"tags":[5,4,144,25,4216,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-672581","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-phillies","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-philadelphia","11":"tag-philadelphia-phillies","12":"tag-philadelphiaphillies","13":"tag-phillies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116381356057330062","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=672581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}