The Atlanta Braves called up right-hander Elieser Hernández from the minor leagues, and a few days later he finally appeared in his first big league game since 2024.After throwing three scoreless innings in relief and earning the win at Baltimore, he was immediately designated for assignment.“I hate it, to be honest with you,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “I wish the rules were different.”What Atlanta did is fairly common now. If a pitcher works several innings of relief — even if he does so effectively — keeping him is essentially wasting a roster spot for the next couple days.
So a fresher arm is brought in to replace him.Baseball's union is proposing rule changes related to this type of roster churn. The players want pitchers optioned shortly after an outing of at least nine outs or 50 pitches to get major league pay and service time for the four days following the appearance. The union is also proposing to reduce the number of optional assignments to the minors from a maximum of five per season to three.That wouldn't necessarily have helped Hernández, since he was designated for assignment, not optioned.
Weiss didn't mention the option rules but instead took aim at the limit of 13 pitchers on a roster.“I wish the number of pitchers weren't restricted,” Weiss said Saturday. “I think if you were able to carry an extra pitcher here and there, you wouldn't have to do those things — have to DFA a guy that was one of the heroes of the game last night. We want to be able to reward those guys, not DFA them.”Trivia timeJacob Misiorowski of the Milwaukee Brewers struck out the first seven hitters he faced — and 12 of the first 13 — on Sunday against Colorado.
He's now up to 185 strikeouts this year, an average of 13.88 per nine innings.The single-season record for strikeouts per nine innings (with a minimum of 100 innings) is 13.82. Who holds it?Performance of the weekDylan Cease threw a one-hitter in Toronto's 6-0 win over Boston on Saturday. He was the first Toronto pitcher to throw a one-hit shutout since Brandon Morrow in 2010.Cease threw a no-hitter two years ago, but he was with San Diego then.Earlier this month, he took a no-hitter into the ninth at San Francisco, but he was pulled after it was broken up.Comeback of the weekHouston trailed the Chicago White Sox 5-0 before scoring eight runs in the top of the sixth Friday night.
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