Christian Yelich Leads Brewers Over Cards, Closes Gap On Cubs; Gary Sanchez Powers Yankees Past Rays

Players of the Day for Tuesday, September 25, 2018

American League

Sanchez: 2-for-4, HR, 4RBI

Yankees' catcher, Gary Sanchez, broke out of a mammoth slump with a three-run homer and an RBI single as the Yankees improved their chances of hosting the AL wild card game with a 9-2 victory at Tampa Bay.

Sanchez capped a seven-run third inning uprising by the Yankees with his 17th home run, then singled home Giancarlo Stanton in the fifth.

Entering the game, Sanchez was 1-for-27 over his last eight games, his average dropping to a pathetic .180.

The win moved the Yankees 2 1/2 games better than the A's in the wild card race. Oakland lost, 10-8, in 11 innings at Seattle on Chris Herrmann's two-run, walk-off homer.

The Yankees have five games left to play, Oakland, four. New York needs any combination of two wins or two Oakland losses to wrap up the top wild card and home field for the single elimination playoff game.

The Yankees - winners of four of their last five - play game three of their four-game set at Tampa Wednesday at 7:10 pm. Oakland wraps up its series in Seattle on Wednesday.

National League

Yelich: 3B, HR, 6 RBI

With the regular season expiring on Sunday, there were some big changes in National League division and wild card races, most of them centered on Milwaukee's 12-4 thrashing of the Cardinals in St. Louis.

Christian Yelich - in search of his first batting title - banged out two big hits for the Brewers and drove in a career-high six runs. In the fourth inning, Yellich's bases-loaded triple blew open the game, putting the Brewers up by a 6-0 score. The Brewers added one in the fifth and two in the eight before Yelich struck again in the ninth, this time clearing the wall in center field with his 33rd home run, a three-run shot, putting him among the leaders with 33 homers and 104 RBI.

The way Yelich has been going in September, the batting title may not be all he's going to get. A trip to the playoffs is a virtual lock and an MVP award could be in his bright future. Yelich leads the league in batting with a .321 average, his 33 homers are three behind leader Matt Carpenter, with a logjam of players in the mix. Four have 34 homers, and five - including Yelich - have 33. His 104 RBI is good for fourth, behind Chicago's Javier Baez's 110. Jesus Aguilar and Nolan Arenado each have 105.

The September numbers for Yelich are off the charts. He's batting .346 (28-for-81) with seven homers and a whopping 28 RBI.

Milwaukee (91-67) now leads Colorado by 3 1/2 games for the top wild card. St. Louis (87-71) dropped a half-game behind Colorado for the second NL wild card after the Rockies routed Philadelphia 10-3. Better yet for the Brewers was Pittsburgh's 6-0 win at Chicago. Chris Archer blanked the Cubs for six innings and a pair of relievers finished them off. That left the Brewers 1/2 game behind the Cubs in the division race with four games to play. The Cubs (91-66) have five games remaining.

After taking the first two in St. Louis, Milwaukee will be looking for the series sweep when they take the field in St. Louis, Wednesday, 7:00 pm EDT.

In the West, Colorado is now in the second wild card spot, 1/2 game ahead of the Cardinals, but also trail the Dodgers by a mere 1/2-game in the division race. LA dropped a 4-3 decision at Arizona.