Wednesday’s games brought another big shakeup to the top five of the Baseball Musings Batter Rankings. Cal Raleigh of the Mariners and Aaron Judge of the Yankees now rank two and three respectively, separated by 1.37 points. It’s another point in the closeness of the AL MVP race.
Raleigh went three for five with a double and two home runs in a 9-2 win over the Rockies, the Mariners clinching the AL West title. That brings Raleigh’s home run total to 60, the first American League player outside of the Yankees to reach that total. He hit seven home runs in his last nine games to put himself in a position to set a new American League single season record of 63. You can see his probabilities here based on this 2025 Musings Marcels prediction. After games of the 13th, his probability of hitting 63 home runs stood at 0.00066. Today it’s 0.058. It’s going to be a fun last weekend. I suspect he’ll DH the rest of the way to give his legs some time off for the post-season. Note that his game score of 81 came in fourth on the day. His teammate, Julio Rodriguez, went two for four in the game with a homer and a walk and ranks fourth.
Judge posted a slightly better game than Raleigh, going three for four with a walk and two home runs for a game score of 84. He became just the fourth hitter to collect four 50 home run seasons. Judge’s slash line stands at .328/.455/.681. The MVP vote comes down to does a player who wins the triple crown in averages, the two big ones at a very high level, trump someone who hits 60 home runs mostly as a catcher? WAR is supposed to take defense into account, and Judge is ahead 9.6 to 9.1.
The Yankees beat the White Sox 8-1. With the Red Sox defeating the Blue Jays 7-1, New York and Toronto own the same record, but Toronto is in first place via the tie breaker.
Juan Soto of the Mets remained in first place, going one for four with a home run in a 10-3 Cubs win. The Mets still hold the third wild card slot as both Cincinnati and Arizona lost as well.
Fifth place belongs to Yandy Diaz of the Rays, who did not play in the 6-2 win over the Orioles.
The highest game score of the day went to Edmundo Sosa of the Phillies, an 88, one of five eighties on the night. He went three for four with three home runs in a record setting game for Philadelphia. Kyle Schwarber posted an 85 in that game as he homered twice, recording a score of 85.