Welcome to The Pregame Lineup, a weekday newsletter that gets you up to speed on everything you need to know for today’s games, while catching you up on fun and interesting stories you might have missed. Thanks for being here.

Shohei Ohtani is back on his old stomping mounds tonight at Angel Stadium (9:38 p.m. ET, MLB.TV and MLB Network). He's just pitching for the other side.

Ohtani will take the mound for the Dodgers against his old team. But his pitching repertoire has been completely remade.

Ohtani keeps evolving as a pitcher with the Dodgers. Here are three things that stand out.

1) He's letting his fastball rip

Ohtani has always thrown hard. But not this hard. Which is crazy coming off major elbow surgery.

Ohtani's four-seamer is averaging a career-high 98.2 mph. His previous best was 97.3 mph in 2022. 

He's throwing 61% of his heaters 98 mph or faster, 31% of them 99 mph or faster and 10% of them 100 mph or faster. Ohtani is hitting those benchmarks twice as often as any other season.

2) His splitter has all but disappeared

When Ohtani first came to the big leagues, his splitter was his best pitch. It might've been the best pitch in baseball, period.

In 2018, he racked up 35 strikeouts on splitters in 59 plate appearances. His next full season pitching in 2021, he had 78 K's in 138 plate appearances. 

Back then, Ohtani was throwing his splitter about 20% of the time. Now? Less than 4% of the time. And he's only throwing it against lefties, when it used to be a wipeout pitch against all hitters. The reason might be what the Dodgers have done with the movement: Ohtani's splitter used to be all vertical drop, now it's getting tons of horizontal break. That's great against lefties, but maybe not against righties, where it runs into their barrel.

3) His slider is his nasty new out pitch

So what's taken the place of Ohtani's splitter? Interestingly, it's his slider -- a pitch he's rarely ever thrown before.

Now, we're not talking about Ohtani's sweeper -- the slower, side-to-side breaking pitch that had taken over as Ohtani's No. 1 pitch in 2022 and '23. No, we're talking about his traditional slider -- thrown harder, in the high 80s, with tighter break. Ohtani only started throwing that slider late in 2022, and he barely sprinkled it in in '22 and '23.

But in 2025, he's throwing the slider 11% of the time. And it's his new nastiest pitch. Ohtani is generating a 58% swing-and-miss rate with his slider, and he has nine K's with it -- his most on any pitch type.

– David Adler 

Steven Kwan has three Gold Gloves and two All-Star nods on his resume, but that success didn't come easy for the Guardians outfielder, who racked up another assist last night to add to his MLB-leading total.

MLB's new YouTube series called "No Easy Outs" explores the challenges that some of the game's biggest stars had to overcome to achieve their big league dreams. The conversations are aimed at a younger audience so that kids can see the power of resilience.

Watch Kwan speak candidly about his trials and tribulations growing up in the premiere episode, then catch the second installment, which will feature Pirates star Andrew McCutchen, on Aug. 30.

• Phillies at Reds (5:10 p.m. ET, MLB.TV): Ace Hunter Greene returns from the injured list at the perfect time for the Reds, whose Wild Card push has them two games out. Greene enters tonight with a career-best 2.72 ERA, but support may be tough to come by against Cristopher Sánchez, who has averaged more than seven innings a start in his 12 outings since the beginning of June. 

• Twins at Yankees (7:05 p.m. ET, MLB.TV): The Twins' arrival in the Bronx on Monday immediately reversed the Yankees' two-month tumble, following a decades-long pattern we've seen from these clubs. Last night's win gave the Yankees a video game-esque 125-44 record (.740) against Minnesota since 2002, including the postseason. Twins rookie and AL Player of the Week Luke Keaschall, born the year this run began, already has four multihit games in August.

• Cubs at Blue Jays (7:07 p.m. ET, MLB.TV): The Brewers' push for a 12th straight win (which started at 2 p.m.) coincides with a mini-slump for the rival Cubs, who have dropped five of seven. Despite that, the North Siders have enjoyed the quick rise of rookie Cade Horton, who enters tonight's start with a streak of 23 1/3 consecutive scoreless innings. In his last three starts against the Cubs, Kevin Gausman has struck out 28 batters and walked just one.

Here is what MLB Pipeline’s experts said of White Sox No. 11 prospect George Wolkow, a 19-year-old playing for Single-A Kannapolis: “Wolkow has a massive 6-foot-7, 239-pound frame with more strength and leverage than most players his age. Add in his bat speed and he has as much power upside as anyone in the Minors.”

It’s a fun bit of irony, then, that Wolkow made news yesterday for a ground ball that came off his bat at an estimated 70 mph in a game against visiting Augusta.

You have to read the full story, which involves a timeout request that wasn’t granted by the home-plate umpire, a balk call and a one-handed swing all leading to a run-scoring hit. Reporter Ben Weinrib talked to Wolkow, who described himself as being “as surprised as everybody else” at the result of the play -- and gave partial credit to the iPitch machine his team uses for batting practice.

Someday soon, Wolkow might make a name for himself with some Frank Thomas blasts at Rate Field. For now, though, his most famous bit of contact is something completely different.

-- Andrew Simon

Pete Alonso is the Mets’ new home run king, having swatted his 253rd and 254th home runs last night to pass Darryl Strawberry for first on the franchise’s all-time list. 

The Mets are the third team to see their career dinger record change hands in the past five years, following the Angels (Mike Trout in 2020) and the Padres (Manny Machado in 2024). While many team home run marks will be tough to top, others may fall sooner rather than later. Here are four that could be in play before the current decade is over.

Royals: Salvador Perez -- 24 away from topping George Brett (317)

Perez will have a good chance to break Brett’s record as soon as next season, assuming Kansas City picks up the veteran’s $13.5 million club option. The 35-year-old has hit at least 21 homers in nine of the past 11 years, excluding only the full season (2019) he missed while recovering from Tommy John surgery and the shortened ’20 campaign. 

Guardians: José Ramírez -- 58 away from topping Jim Thome (337)
The ultra-consistent Ramírez is still going strong at the age of 32. He’s on pace to eclipse the 30-homer mark for the second straight season and the fourth time in his career. J-Ram’s contract with Cleveland runs through 2028, so he has plenty of time to surpass the Hall of Famer Thome.

D-backs: Ketel Marte -- 63 away from topping Luis Gonzalez (224)
Nearly two decades since he last suited up for the D-backs, Gonzalez’s status as the franchise’s home run king remains intact, thanks in large part to the club’s decision to trade Paul Goldschmidt and his 209 career D-backs homers after the 2018 campaign. Marte, though, has Gonzalez’s mark in his sights, especially after signing a contract extension with the D-backs earlier this year.

Blue Jays: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. -- 158 away from topping Carlos Delgado (336)
This one is a bit further down the road, but now that Guerrero is under contract with the Blue Jays through 2039, it’s only a matter of time before he overtakes Delgado on the franchise’s all-time home run list.

Now that you're up to speed, take our quiz on every team's all-time home run leader.

-- Thomas Harrigan

Come on out to newly named Daikin Park, home of the Astros, for some exciting food offerings on tap, headlined by the Chicken Waffle Sandwich. The basics are pretty much all right there in the name, but if you’re into accoutrements, the chicken is topped with pepper jack cheese, bacon onion jam and honey chipotle aioli, and is comfortably nestled between two Belgian-style waffles. 

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