MLB Player News

Mountcastle went 1-for-4 with a solo home run in Thursday's 8-7 victory over Oakland.

Mountcastle led off the fourth inning with a solo shot off Adam Oller, tying the game 4-4. The 24-year-old first baseman has six homers on the season, including four in his last three games, tying him with Pete Alonso for the MLB lead. Mountcastle is slashing .264/.293/.679 with a league-leading 19 RBI through 53 at-bats to start the year.

Diaz went 1-for-4 with a solo home run in Thursday's 9-3 win over Boston.

Diaz led off the bottom of the first inning with a 434-foot bomb off Corey Kluber to tie the game 1-1. Diaz has shown some unexpected power early this season -- he already has four long balls after hitting just nine in 473 at-bats last season. The 31-year-old Diaz is batting .275/.388/.600 with 13 runs scored and nine RBI while serving as Tampa Bay's primary leadoff hitter.

Flores went 3-for-5 with two RBI in Wednesday's 10-5 loss to the Dodgers.

Flores has started three of the last four games at first base, and he's gone 5-for-13 with four RBI in that span. All of those starts came against southpaws, so it's still too soon to see if he'll break out of a short-side platoon role. He's done well this season with a .346/.414/.654 slash line, two home runs, six RBI and six runs scored over 29 plate appearances.

France went 2-for-4 with an RBI single, a walk and a run in a win over the Cubs on Wednesday.

France gave the Mariners some all-important breathing room with his seventh-inning knock, which plated J.P. Crawford to extend Seattle's lead to 3-1. The multi-hit effort was simply an extension of a torrid stretch for France over his last 10 games, a span in which he's generated a .356 average, .887 OPS and five multi-hit tallies overall across 50 plate appearances.

The Orioles selected O'Hearn's contract from Triple-A Norfolk on Thursday.

The O's kept three catchers for a while but will now shift back to two with O'Hearn taking Anthony Bemboom's spot. O'Hearn had put up a 1.074 OPS with four home runs in his first nine games with Norfolk. He could see some starts against righties.

Dalbec started at shortstop and went 0-for-4 in Wednesday's 9-7 loss to the Rays.

Dalbec made his second career start at shortstop, and it was an inauspicious one. He booted a grounder in the first inning that helped lead to Tampa Bay scoring three times. Dalbec is familiar with that side of the infield, having come up through the system as a third baseman, but he doesn't have a defensive home on this year's club. He's expected to remain up with the team while the Red Sox are projected to face four straight lefties through the weekend, but Dalbec could be back in the minors after that stretch.

Pasquantino went 1-for-3 with a solo home run, an additional run and a walk in Wednesday's 10-1 rout of the Rangers.

Pasquantino knocked a 388-foot homer in the third inning for his second long ball of the campaign. The first baseman extended his on-base streak to eight games, and he's slashing .385/.500/.769 over that stretch. As he did as a rookie last year, Pasquantino has demonstrated elite command of the strike zone in 2023 -- he has a 16.3 percent walk rate that matches his 16.3 percent strikeout rate through 49 plate appearances.

Alonso went 2-for-3 with a walk, a solo home run and a second run scored in Wednesday's 5-2 win over the Padres.

His fifth-inning shot off Blake Snell was Alonso's sixth homer in 13 games to begin the season. The first baseman is batting .250 (12-for-48) with 12 RBI and 11 runs scored, and he seems intent on not just reaching 40 homers as he did in 2022, but matching or topping the career-high 53 he slugged as a rookie in 2019.

Wade is out of the lineup for Wednesday's contest against the Dodgers, Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area reports.

The Giants are going with a right-handed heavy lineup against Clayton Kershaw in the Dodgers, so Wade will get a night off against the future Hall of Famer. Wilmer Flores gets the start at first while Darin Ruf will make his 2023 season debut for the Giants as the designated hitter.

Votto (shoulder/biceps) has gone 4-for-32 with three walks and 20 strikeouts through the first eight games of his rehab assignment at Triple-A Louisville.

Votto hasn't suffered any reported setbacks with his surgically repaired left shoulder or biceps since beginning the rehab assignment April 1, but he's clearly struggling to get his timing back at the plate. Elite plate discipline and stellar bat-to-ball skills have been foundational traits for Votto throughout his career, so it's especially troubling that he's struck out in 55.6 percent of his plate appearances at Triple-A thus far. Votto was initially expected to return from the 10-day injured list when he was first eligible April 6, but his activation looks as though it'll be delayed until he can show some semblance of progress during his rehab assignment.