MLB Weekly Recap (June 15-21): Dominant Pitchers & Surging Marlins!

Hey babes!

This week in baseball, the pitchers stole the spotlight ~

From Logan Gilbert’s dominant week to complete-game brilliance from Dustin May, several starters reminded us just how powerful great pitching can be. I’m breaking down the standout performances, the biggest sweeps, and my team temperature check

Plus:

• Pete Crow-Armstrong making Cub’s history
• Why the Miami Marlins are becoming impossible to ignore
• My sneaky team of the week after their wild comeback 
• The series I’m watching this week + why

And for this week’s soft-girl baseball take, we’re talking about why baseball rewards the teams and players who refuse to give up, even when the odds aren’t in their favor.

Grab a cozy drink, settle in, and let’s catch up on everything that happened around baseball from June 15-21.

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Transcript

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Hey babe! Welcome to Baseball for Girls, where baseball meets soft girl energy. I'm Shaughnessy, and here we do baseball with heart, humanity, and a little humor. So whether you're brand new to the game or deep in your baseball era, you're in the right place. So grab something cozy and settle in. And let's get into today's episode. Let's play ball! Hey babes! Welcome back to another episode of Baseball for Girls. And this week we're going to be doing another recap for the week of June 15th through the 21st. So just to go ahead and jump right in, the weekly vibe for this week that I was picking up on was that pitchers were really dominating. So there were several pitchers this week that had really good games. In fact, Logan Gilbert was a starting pitcher of the Seattle Mariners. He won Player of the Week this week, and that was attributed to his 18 strikeouts and only giving up five hits and 13 and a third innings pitched. So that was really impressive to do in a week. Um but for his most recent game versus the Orioles. So he played that game on uh Tuesday, which would have been, I guess, the 16th. Yes, Tuesday the 16th. He played uh seven innings, only gave up two hits and one run and one walk with 10 strikeouts. So he had a really good game that day. But other pitchers that I really wanted to mention are Dustin May. So he just did a complete game versus the Padres last Monday on June 15th. So Dustin May is the starting pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals. He pitched a full game, so nine innings pitched with only one hit given up, um, no runs and only one walk or nine innings pitched. He played the entire he played the entire game. So that was pretty incredible. And then from the Yankees, Cam Schlittler, he pitched six innings, only giving up four hits, no runs, no walks, and 13 strikeouts in a very dominant five to zero win versus Cincinnati Reds this past weekend on Friday. And Kyle Bradish from the Baltimore Orioles, who's like my favorite pitcher, he played on Wednesday versus the Mariners, and he got a win. He pitched seven and two-thirds of an inning, gave up five hits, only one run, and only one walk, and he had 12 strikeouts, which was the most that he had so far this season. So, really, the pitchers this week were on their A game, and honestly, I just find pitchers in incredibly impressive anyway. Now moving on to the sweeps from this past week. So during the weekday series, the Daughters swept the Rays, the Twins swept the Rangers, the Blue Jays swept the Red Sox, and the Giants swept the Braves. Which is quite surprising because the Braves are still the best team in baseball. And over this past weekend, the Tigers swept the White Sox and the Marlins swept the Giants. So for my sneaky team of the week, I am choosing the athletics. So the athletics have been doing, you know, pretty well for the kind of team that they are, but this past weekend, on Friday, they played the Angels. So it was Angels at Athletics, and I was actually watching that game, and in the fourth inning, the Angels scored seven times, which was yeah, I mean, seven times in an inning is pretty, you know, remarkable. And you know, it kind of just fell like, oh, well, you know, they're up by seven. It's probably gonna be a wash of a game, but in baseball, we know like fourth inning is still pretty early in the game. That game went on to extra innings, and the final score was 12 to 11 for the athletics. So the athletics won 12 to 11 in a walk-off fashion. So in the bottom of the 10th, the athletics actually won because of a walk-off walk. So the bases were loaded, the batter at the plate ended up walking, and because he walked, that drove in a run, and that run is what won the game. So it was just it was a ridiculous game, honestly, to watch, but to just see the athletics climb back from nothing and win after being down seven. I mean, that's a team that you need to be watching out for. And now for the teams that are heating up and cooling down, so we're doing our temperature check. So this week I'm gonna start with the teams that are heating up. So the Miami Marlins, they have been doing really well. They've been playing very good baseball for the month of June. The Miami Marlins are dominating baseball. They have a 15-4 record for the month of June. But overall, their record is 40 wins to 38 losses, so just above 500 at 513. They're on a four-game winning streak right now, and they've won seven and lost three of their past 10 games. What's really interesting about the Miami Marlins for this season is that is that they are the only team to give pitching losses to Shohei Otani, Paul Skeens, and Jacob Mizarowski, who is of all of those pitchers are like the most dominant pitchers in baseball right now. They are all up um for as candidates for Cy Young, which is, you know, the award given to like the best pitcher from the past year or the past season, and none of them could beat the Miami Marlins. So they are truly heating up. The other team that I think is heating up right now are the Chicago White Sox. They have been playing some pretty good baseball. The White Sox were actually in the first place in the AL Central for a little while, but now the Guardians are back on top. But the White Sox are only one game behind. They have won 20 of their last 24 home games, and in that, they've won eight consecutive home series, including ones that were versus the Braves and the Dodgers. Currently, the White Sox are actually on a three-game losing streak, like I mentioned. They were just swept this past weekend by the Detroit Tigers, and they've won four and lost six of their past 10 games, but overall they've won 39 and lost 37 of their total games, placing them right above 500 at 513. So the same uh record as the Marlins statistically. And as for the teams that are cooling down, the Texas Rangers are the team that I think is starting to struggle a little bit. They were just recently swept by the twins, like I mentioned, during the week. They won their most previous game, but they have been losing a lot of series uh as of late. Right now they are 37 to 40, so 37 wins to 40 losses, bringing them below 500 at 481, and they've won four and lost six of their past 10 games. And another team that I wanted to point out as cooling down is actually the Braves. I mean, granted, taking this with a grain of salt because the Braves are the best team in baseball right now, statistically, so they do have a lot of leeway to have a bit of a slump because right now they have recently been swept by the Giants this past week, like I mentioned. And like I mentioned too, the Giants were just swept by the Marlins. So it's not like the Giants are some, you know, super dominant team. And the Braves have won three and lost seven of their past 10 games, but currently they are 48 to 28, so 48 wins to 28 losses, bringing them well above 500 at 632. So, like I mentioned, they definitely have some give, but it's just strange to see the Braves lose so much and so often in this past month. And now for the home run leaderboards. So Kyle Schwarber at the top still with 29 home runs. So Kyle Schwarber is the designated hitter for the Philadelphia Phillies, and then Jordan Alvarez is also a designated hitter for the Houston Astros. He has 25 home runs, and we have Byron Buxton, he is a center fielder for the Minnesota Twins. He has um climbed up to 24 home runs, and so those are the top three home run leaders as of right now, and I just love keeping up with this and just seeing Kyle Schwarber every single time I do this. But my favorite statistic from this week is PCA, so Pete Crow Armstrong. He won Player of the Week this week for the National League because he hit for the cycle on Monday. So hitting for the cycle, it means that the player was able to get a home run, um, a double, a triple, and a single. So getting all the options of hits that you can have in a single game. So his first at-bat, he hit a home run. The second at bat, he got a triple, the third at bat, he got a double, and in his last at bat, he got the single. He's also the first Cub to hit in a cycle in reverse order, because it was home run, triple, double, single. And this is the 13th cycle in all of Cubs history. So obviously, that's incredibly impressive. Hitting for the cycle is really hard and obviously incredibly rare. So, props to PCA. We love him. And for my softer take for this week, I think that never giving up is really the theme of this week and just of baseball in general. Just thinking back to the athletics and just any of the games where teams come from behind. Like even when things are looking not great and it seems like it might be easier to just give up, you should always take whatever opportunities you have and use them to your greatest advantage because you never know what's gonna happen at the end of the game. And finally, for the games that I'm excited for this upcoming week, the Marlins are gonna be playing the Rangers. So the team I said was heating up, the Marlins is playing the team that I said might be cooling down in the Rangers. So that'll be interesting to see if the Marlins can maintain their winning streak and go to five games in a row, or if the Rangers are gonna snap out of their little slump and beat the very dominant Marlins. The other matchup I'm excited for this week is the Braves versus the Padres. So, like I mentioned, the Braves have not been having a good go at it lately, and now they're playing an interleague game versus the Padres, who are not the best team in baseball right now, but they play very good baseball. They've been starting to heat up a lot more lately, and currently they have won 39 and lost 37 total, which brings them right above 500 at 513. They've lost five and won five of their past 10 games, and they're currently they just lost a game yesterday and also lost that series versus the Rangers this weekend. So they are still trying to find their rhythm. So it'll be an interesting um inner league game to watch. And then for over the weekend, I'm excited to see the Cubs versus the Brewers series, mostly because it's an interdivision series. So we know that the Cubs and the Brewers are both in the National League Central. The National League Central has been dominating baseball this entire season. The Pirates got back above 500, but now the Reds are a little bit below 500. I believe they're at 481. So they do have one team that's no longer above 500, but they are still the best division right now. So it'll be super fun to watch the Cubs versus the Brewers and see who's going to win. Right now, the Cubs have won six and lost four of their past 10 games. They've won 40 and lost 37 overall, bringing them to above 500 at 519. The Brewers are currently at the top of the division. They've won 46 and lost 29, bringing them well above 500 at 613. They've won 5 and lost 5 of their past 10, then they've won their most recent game. But honestly, this will also be really interesting to watch because it is a rematch. Since the um Cubs and Brewers are in the same division, they will be playing each other quite often. So they've already played each other and the Brewers swept the Cubs at the end of May at Wrigley Field, so at the Cubs' home stadium. So it'll be interesting to see in this rematch if the Cubs will sweep or take the series from the Brewers at their home stadium. And so I think those will be some pretty good games to watch. So you should definitely keep an eye out for those. Okay, babes. I think that's all I have for you today. I am officially back in America. I arrived last Wednesday. So I'm back on the East Coast, and I'll be able to watch games more consistently and not having to just watch reruns and recaps the next day all the time and really be able to keep up a lot better. And so I'm really excited for that. And stay tuned for my tiny baseball lessons episodes where I kind of just give mini lessons in baseball. The next one will be on pitchers and like how pitchers are assigned a win or loss or no decision, um, and just like a bunch of little quirks about pitchers. So that'll be the next tiny baseball lessons episode, which will go along with the position series where I go through every position and kind of give a quick little overview to get a better and to help you get a better understanding of what the position does. So yeah, I hope you'll tune in for that. And I hope you have a good rest of your week. Thank you for joining me and the softest corner of sports media, and I'll see you next week. Bye.