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Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY BALTIMORE - Increasingly, the starting pitcher finds fewer safe spaces as the species withers amid baseball's modern demands. Yet October might be its most optimal [...]

Byline: Scooby Axson, USA TODAY Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani is having another historic year, closing in on MLB's first 50-homer, 50-steal season. As good as he is at [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist PHOENIX - His high school had a graduating class of 65 and no baseball field. The team was relegated to playing games in a city park [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist He is the greatest show in baseball. He is the Dwight Gooden of 1984. He is the Kerry Wood of 1998. He is the Stephen Strasburg [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY DUNEDIN, Fla. - As Chris Bassitt's career nears an apex, it's clear there are certain terms that will likely never be associated with the Toronto [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY PHILADELPHIA - Cristian Javier was no secret. You don't pitch seven no-hit innings in Yankee Stadium, strike out 194 batters in less than 150 innings, [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY The charismatic slugger is lapping the field in production, threatening records, and achieving at a level that forces the baseball aficionado to hunt through grainy [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY BALTIMORE - He is the best pitcher in the American League right now and, less than two years removed from searching for a job, is [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist LOS ANGELES - Max Scherzer emerged from the Los Angeles Dodgers' dugout Tuesday afternoon, with the beautiful sunshine overhead, the beautiful San Gabriel Mountains to the [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY Since 1995, MLB's first postseason with wild cards and a five-game division series, no World Series champion has had to play more than 18 playoff [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA TODAY PHOENIX - We knew this season would be wacky with only 60 games, but the zaniness has exceeded everyone's wildest expectations. Take the Diamondbacks. [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - For 17 games stretched over 30 unforgettable days, a half-dozen Nationals pitchers embraced the unsustainable, steered into the uncomfortable and [...]

Byline: Jesse Yomtov, USA TODAY With the 2019 World Series in the books and the Nationals crowned champions, it's time to turn the page to the winter ahead - and [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY CLEVELAND - Mike Clevinger grew up as one of the first children of YouTube, wiling away many a teenage night in the mid-2000s falling down [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA TODAY HOUSTON - Their personalities are drastically different, growing up on different sides of the country, born seven years apart, but at times, they can [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques Innovation, or progressive thought, or disruption has done remarkable things to baseball's landscape over two decades. It has rendered entire roles obsolete, changed the way the game [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA TODAY PHOENIX - There might not be a more valuable pitcher in the game. Certainly, no one had a greater impact on his team's success. [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. - The reigning American League Cy Young Award winner is one year removed from when he couldn't say much of anything, not [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA TODAYSCOTTSDALE, Ariz. - Diamondbacks closer Greg Holland closes his eyes, takes a deep breath and allows those unpleasant memories to slowly trickle back into his [...]

Byline: Jesse Yomtov, USA TODAYUSA TODAY is counting down the top 10 candidates on the 2019 Baseball Hall of Fame ballot in advance of the Jan. 22 election results. The [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY BOSTON - Clayton Kershaw took a couple of wrong turns as he departed a press obligation in search of the visiting clubhouse at Fenway Park. [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY If there are two things baseball fans in general, and Hall of Fame voters in particular, have always revered, it's round numbers and pitching wins. [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, USA TODAY OAKLAND - Now that he has claimed a regular spot in Cleveland's rotation, Shane Bieber knows he'll get to make his third home start [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA Today It was perhaps the most bizarre, eccentric, insane pitching matchup Sunday in the history of Major League Baseball. Shohei Ohtani vs. Sergio Romo at [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA Today It was perhaps the most bizarre, eccentric, insane pitching matchup Sunday in the history of Major League Baseball. Shohei Ohtani vs. Sergio Romo at [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA Today PHOENIX - Josh Hader has the look of a Southern California surfer with the dirty-blond, shoulder-length hair and ink-stained arms, but he's from a [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, Columnist, USA Today PHOENIX - The greatest free agent class in baseball history just got a whole lot better, and you better believe the Yankees are paying [...]

Byline: John Hickey, Special to USA TODAY OAKLAND - Shohei Ohtani made plenty of noise in his 23 years, carving out a path to the major leagues as a dominant [...]

Byline: John Hickey, Special to USA TODAY OAKLAND - Shohei Ohtani made plenty of noise in his 23 years, carving out a path to the major leagues as a dominant [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY Finding the best path to 27 outs is perhaps baseball's most evolving and enduring puzzle. Yet in many quarters, a permanent solution appears at hand. [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, USA TODAY - As the 40 or so players shuttled from one field to another during the Los Angeles Angels' first workout of the spring, it [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports A sense of finality used to permeate at the ballpark whenever Mariano Rivera trotted in from the bullpen, a feeling heightened at [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports A sense of finality used to permeate at the ballpark whenever Mariano Rivera trotted in from the bullpen, a feeling heightened at [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports With the Los Angeles Dodgers ahead 3-1 in Game 3 of their division series, Yu Darvish hit Arizona Diamondbacks pinch-hitter Christian Walker [...]

Byline: Bob Klapisch, @BobKlap, USA TODAY Sports If I were the Cleveland Indians, I'd be worried about facing CC Sabathia. Not because he's the New York Yankees' hardest thrower (obviously [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports In Seattle they called it the Fernando Rodney Experience. It wasn't a reference to his lengthy major league career, now in its [...]

Byline: Bob Klapisch, @BobKlap, USA TODAY Sports Ever since Aroldis Chapman showed the first signs of what became a full-blown slump, the New York Yankees have been frantically looking for [...]

Byline: Bob Klapisch, @BobKlap, USA TODAY Sports With fewer than 50 days to go in the Major League Baseball regular season, we're approaching the summer's 11th hour, which is why [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports Leaving the field to the cheers of an appreciative crowd Wednesday brought back memories for Sonny Gray of some of his biggest [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports In almost every way, Brian McCann's choice of the Houston Astros as the team to join when the New York Yankees decided [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports Luis Severino's average fastball checks in at 97.2 mph, the top velocity among all qualifying major league starters. So naturally, he has [...]

Byline: Frankie Piliere, @FPiliereD1, Special for USA TODAY Sports The Minnesota Twins have the No.1 overall pick in the Major League Baseball draft, which begins Monday. Here are the top [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @JorgeLOrtiz, USA TODAY Sports It's an issue ballplayers assiduously avoid but quickly recognize, like a no-hitter in progress. Except there's nothing to celebrate about this phenomenon. [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports In the handful of games he has played in his career at Coors Field, Greg Holland hasn't noticed a difference in the [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, bnighten@usatoday.com, USA TODAY Sports Detroit Tigers ace Justin Verlander walked into the visiting clubhouse at 10:30 Tuesday morning, his ears covered by headphones, his dark brown eyes [...]

Byline: Steve Gardner, @SteveAGardner, USA TODAY Sports A familiar axiom in baseball is there's no such thing as a pitching prospect. The idea behind it is that even the best [...]

Byline: Gabe Lacques, @GabeLacques, USA TODAY Sports Zach Britton was clad in a sharp, navy blue suit and green tie, not his Baltimore Orioles uniform, when he accepted his 2016 [...]

Byline: Bob Nightengale, bnighten@usatoday.com, USA TODAY Sports Bodies and broken-down arms are littered everywhere inside the Colorado Rockies home at Coors Field in Denver. If you're a hitter, you voluntarily [...]

Byline: Scott Boeck, @scott_boeck, USA TODAY Sports Billy Wagner was a flame-throwing left-hander and one of baseball's elite closers during his era. Despite his 5-10 frame, Wagner overpowered batters with [...]

Byline: Jorge L. Ortiz, @jorgelortiz, USA TODAY Sports Thanks in large part to Andrew Miller's exploits, the unconventional use of elite relievers has emerged as a central theme of this [...]