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What’s Happening in Baseball Today
The First Pitch: May 27, 2026
Within the first 55 games of their season, the Chicago Cubs have two 10-game winning streaks. Now, they also have a streak of 10 straight losses.
The Cubs’ riches-to-rags circumstance reaches double-digit standing with a bludgeon, being handed a 12-1 whipping by the Pirates at Pittsburgh. Jordan Wicks, making his first start this season for the Cubs after beginning the year at Triple-A, is lit up for five first-inning runs, and eight before departing midway through the fifth.
No team in major league history has experienced multiple 10-game win streaks and at least one 10-game skid in the same season—let alone the first third of a single campaign.
During their slide, the Cubs have been outscored 65-25, are batting .179 and have a staff ERA of 6.18.
A day after being no-hit by Houston, the Rangers quickly make up for lost offense, piling up eight runs on five hits in the first inning alone against the visiting Astros, on their way to a 10-7 victory. Two walks and a hit batsman from Astros starter Jason Alexander helps fuel the Rangers’ initial rally, capped by Joc Pederson’s three-run homer.
The eight runs are the most scored by the Rangers in the first inning since 2012, and they’re the second most by a team coming off a no-hit loss. In 1905, the White Sox scored nine to start a 15-1 win in the nightcap of a doubleheader, after being no-hit by Boston’s Bill Dinneen in the first game.
Nick Kurtz is kept off the basepaths for the first time in 48 games, failing to reach in either of his four at-bats as the A’s suffer a 4-1 home loss to Seattle. The streak ends with Kurtz tied for the all-time franchise mark within a season, matching Mark McGwire—who reached safely in each of his last 48 games in 1995; McGwire still owns the A’s record over multiple seasons, as he extended his streak to 61 to start his 1996 season.
During his 48-game streak, Kurtz batted .308 with 11 doubles, a triple, eight homers, 37 RBIs, and 48 walks; he was held hitless in 13 of those games.
With the loss, the A’s drop below .500 to 27-28—but still lead the AL West by a half-game over the Mariners. Ironically, the NL Central’s two last-place teams—the aforementioned Cubs and Pirates—would share first place in the West by two games.
The Yankees accomplish something none of their almighty predecessors of lore could not. In a 15-1 smacking of the Royals in Kansas City, every member of the Yankees’ starting lineup has at least two hits, with the team in total collecting 21; six of those are home runs, tying a one-game record by a team at Kauffman Stadium. Amed Rosario (see below) leads the way for New York with four hits including a pair of homers.
Nine other teams have hit six homers in a game at 53-year old Kauffman Stadium. None of them were the Royals.
The 21 hits by the Yankees are the most given up in the post-1900 modern era by any major league team based in Kansas City (not including the Negro League Monarchs, owing to a lack of data) in a home game. That includes not only the Royals, but also the A’s (1955-67) and the Federal League’s Packers (1914-15).
Recently released by the Mets, veteran closer/reliever Craig Kimbrel finds yet another new home with the Tampa Bay Rays, and gets quickly inserted into the action, pitching a scoreless eighth in a 6-1 loss at Baltimore. The Rays are the 11th team for Kimbrel—and the ninth over just the past five-plus seasons.
Bob Horner, the burly slugger with curly blonde locks drafted by Atlanta in the first round of the 1978 amateur draft and immediately inserted into the Braves’ starting lineup without any minor-league seasoning—blasting 23 homers over 89 games to win NL Rookie of the Year honors—passes away at the age of 68.
Over a 10-year career in which he amassed 218 homers, four of them in a single game in 1986,—a game which, ironically, the Braves lost—Horner never played a single game in the minors. Injuries and weight issues did take their toll on his playing longevity; salary-depressed collusion also didn’t help, as Horner fled to Japan after 1986 after being offered little to nothing by MLB owners during the offseason; in 1988, he returned to America and played one more season with the Cardinals, collecting just three homers in 60 games before retiring at age 30.
Congrats, Your Box Score Line Was the Best (Hitters Edition)
6-3-4-4—Amed Rosario, New York Yankees
The veteran utility guy has been feeling some of that Bronx Bomber energy in this, his second season with the Yankees. In New York’s 15-1 pasting of the Royals at Kansas City, Rosario enjoyed his second multi-homer game of the year—doubling his career total—while adding a pair of singles. As much as Rosario looks to be enjoying playing for the Yankees, he definitely enjoys playing against the Royals; in 50 career games against K.C., he’s batting .329 with seven homers and 32 RBIs.
Congrats, Your Box Score Line Was the Best (Pitchers Edition)
6-1-0-0-2-3—Emerson Hancock, Seattle
The 26-year-old right-hander continues what’s evolving into a breakout season. At Sacramento against the A’s, Hancock retired the first 12 batters before a walk and (only) base hit began the fifth. Perhaps just as impressively, he kept Nick Kurtz off the basepaths in three at-bats, helping to end his 48-game on-base streak. In 11 starts this season, Hancock is 4-2 with a fine 2.78 ERA.
It Was Whatever-Something Years Ago Today
2017: No team scores more than six runs in any of the 16 games played. In 703 previous days in which 16 games were played going all the way back to the beginning of big-league ball in 1876, that had never happened.
You Say It’s Your Birthday
Happy birthday to:
Cuban-born Angels third baseman Yoan Moncada (31)
Toronto pitcher Jose Berrios (32), pitcher of 108-82 record who just underwent Tommy John surgery
Todd Hundley (57), two-time All-Star catcher; collector of 202 home runs including 41 alone in 1996
Frank Thomas (58), Hall-of-Fame slugger with 521 career home runs; unquestionably the greatest hitter in White Sox history; two-time AL MVP, five-time All-Star; four-time league leader in walks, on-base percentage and OPS
Jeff Bagwell (58), Cooperstown-bound first baseman who tops Astros all-time lists in home runs, RBIs and walks; 1991 NL Rookie of the Year; 1994 NL MVP; top NL hitter in 1994 and 1999; 152 runs scored in 2000 most by major leaguer since 1936
Gary Nolan (78), 10-year pitcher for Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine, 1972 All-Star with 15-5 record and 1.99 ERA
Born on this date:
Terry Moore (1912), four-time All-Star outfielder for the Cardinals; career .280 batting average
Pinky Higgins (1909), third baseman of 1,941 hits; three-time All-Star; twice knocked in over 100 runs (on less than 10 home runs)
Frank Snyder (1894), 16-year catcher; member of two world champion Giants teams (1921-22)
Shameless Link of the Day
Check out our story on Houston’s Daikin Park, which was notoriously known as Enron Field when it opened.
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