Here at the old Weird and Wild column, we’re hanging onto those roller-coaster handle bars for dear life, because one week into a new baseball season, this sport is taking us on a ride unlike any seen before.

And if you’re guessing those wacky robots are to blame, good guess! So let’s get this column started, with this unprecedented refrain:

1-2-3 strikes you’re … what?

It’s a challenging new era for baseball — and the math isn’t mathing. (Rick Scuteri / Imagn Images)

Once upon a time, baseball was a simple game. It was 1-2-3 strikes you’re out at the old ball game — and hey, how are those peanuts and Cracker Jack going down? But then …

Those pesky robot umps came to town.

And you know what we’ve learned after a wild week of robotized baseball? Those robots never did promise there would be no math!

So in the last week, we’ve seen an at-bat (Monday) where the Yankees’ José Caballero rolled up three swinging strikes and a called strike … yet there he was, standing on first base (courtesy of two astute ABS challenges).

We’ve seen another at-bat (Saturday) where the Reds’ Eugenio Suárez took three called strikes, fouled off another strike, swung and missed at another strike … and wasn’t even out, let alone struck out. (As beleaguered home-plate ump CB Bucknor probably recalls, Suárez got two straight third strikes overturned.)

Then came Tuesday night in Houston, when it was the human umpires’ turn — to lose track of the swings, the strikes and the count. So why was the Astros’ Cam Smith, a man who swung and missed at three straight pitches, still digging into the batter’s box? That’s why.

Technically, that one wasn’t an ABS situation. Then again, you know what those robots did while all that chaos ensued? They just sat back and let a bunch of well-meaning humans wear it.

Are we good with that?

We ask because math has always been one of the fun parts of baseball. But friends, here’s an important announcement:

Those days are over.

The robots are messing with that math. And that can be hard to process. So here to help is the son of a high school math teacher, Doug Glanville — also my co-host on the ever-popular Starkville podcast, which will return April 18 as part of The Athletic’s Rates and Barrels feed.

“There’s a new math, apparently,” Glanville told Weird and Wild, “where we seem to be able to jump from three to infinity. So Eugenio Suárez may still be hitting. He’s still going. He’s still challenging pitches. I think that is something that’s possible now in the new ABS world.”

Hmmm, it doesn’t seem like it is, but who are we to say? It’s a crazy new time — so crazy that it isn’t even safe to count to three anymore.

“I love the idea that today, we’re challenging old traditions,” Glanville said. “Sometimes it came in the form of changing the running lane. But it also can come in the form of how we count. The strike zone is now a construct we’re trying to figure out. There could be five strikes. Maybe there could be invisible strikes. We don’t know. So there’s all kinds of new territory I’m excited to explore.”

Maybe you’re a little afraid of that new territory. Maybe you liked it when a guy who swung and missed three times was actually out. But there’s nothing to be afraid of,” Glanville said. “The world, as always, is changing.

“We have to think outside the box here,” he said. “The beauty of today’s game is, you can strike out more ways than ever, right? It used to be just three strikes. Now it’s the pitch-clock violation. It’s a challenge overturn. I’m excited by the next frontier of how someone can strike out. There might be one day when there’s one strike and you’re out.

“Or you’ve actually given examples that, in some cases, it’s the other way around. It’s three strikes and you walk. So that’s very exciting.”

WEIRD & WILD: “Maybe we’re heading for a time where you CAN’T strike out. Maybe that’s even what baseball is aiming for. That’s one way to cut the strikeout rate, right?”

GLANVILLE: “Look, it’s the era of the pitcher. They’re so dominant. It’s the hardest it’s ever been to hit, and we never thought about this. We kept thinking about: Let’s move the mound back. Let’s make the plate bigger or smaller. We were trying all kinds of physical things to change the game, and it was right in front of us the whole time. You’ve just got to give hitters infinite strikes. Then it’s easy. Just stop counting.”

But wait. Do we want to stop counting? Do we want to stop adding and subtracting? Do we want to live in a world where the math of baseball is upside-down and somewhere, in their invisible robotized clubhouse, those robot umps are just laughing at what they’ve done to us?

“They can do logarithms, and they could solve how to land on the moon,” Glanville said of those robots. “So this is too easy for them. I think that’s what the problem is.”

W&W: “So with all these math issues, I can’t decide. Should the next commissioner of baseball be somebody like Cal Ripken Jr.? Or do we need a descendant of Sir Isaac Newton?”

GLANVILLE: “I think I’m voting for my mom.”

For more of this allegedly entertaining banter, be sure to listen to us on Starkville, when it returns April 18, wherever you get your podcasts.

Hanging with Mr. Robot

Sandy Alcantara pitched such a gem on Wednesday, ABS decided to take the night off. (Carmen Mandato / Getty Images)

As long as our favorite robot umps keep working their magic, is it possible these columns will just about write themselves? It is.

So do we need a special recurring place in Weird and Wild World to keep you updated on all the fun-filled robot developments of this season? Of course we do. That means it’s time to hang with Mr. Robot, because there’s so much going on here besides balls and strikes.

WE JUST WENT OLD SCHOOL IN MIAMI! Thanks to friend of the column Len Kasper, the great radio voice of the White Sox, for making sure we didn’t miss the old-school event of the year, Wednesday in Miami.

Here’s a prediction: We won’t see another game like this for the rest of the season. That’s because it contained all of this:

An actual complete game — by Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara.

A shutout — yes, not “only” a complete game, but also a shutout in which the starting pitcher discovered it was legal to go all nine innings.

A Maddux — right, not “just” any old shutout. It was an official “Maddux,” because Alcantara ripped through those nine run-free innings in a mere 93 pitches. And to qualify for Maddux-hood, it takes fewer than 100.

But wait. You’re no doubt thinking: Didn’t we have three “Madduxes” just last season? We did indeed, courtesy of Tarik Skubal, Sonny Gray and Nathan Eovaldi. But here comes the grand finale. You know what we didn’t have in that game Wednesday?

We didn’t see even one frigging challenge!

It’s the first time that’s happened in any game in the ABS era, because plate ump Mike Muchlinski was that good, apparently. So here’s a round of applause for the man in blue. And now here’s a question we need your help with:

What should we call this?

Is it safe to assume we’ll see very few games this year with zero challenges? Let’s go with yes. So don’t we need a fun name for a game like that? Ab-so-freaking-lutely. All right, then. It’s time for the first reader poll in Weird and Wild history.

Can’t wait to see how you vote. And if you have other inspired names, add them in the comments section below. You know the drill.

TAP HERE AND DRIVE HOME SAFELY — Meanwhile in Baltimore on Wednesday, we had another first. A major-league baseball game ended on a strikeout … on a pitch the umpire called a ball.

But Orioles catcher Samuel Basallo thought otherwise. And one tap of the helmet later, we had a reversal, a 27th out, a high-five line … and a phenomenon I named weeks ago, after the first game I saw all spring almost ended on a challenge.

It’s a “tap-off.” No polls needed. This one is locked in the lexicon. Run with it.

NEWS AT 11 — What’s the over/under on the eventual record for Most Challenges in One Game? I’ll go 12 by one team, 18 by both teams. We’ll monitor that as we go along, but we have a leader on the challenge board now that we’re one week into life in the Land of the Robots.

Wednesday in Kansas City, the Twins and Royals cooked up 11 challenges in one game on plate ump Andy Fletcher. And that’s not even the Weird and Wild part. The Weird and Wild part is, the Twins burned through their first challenge in the top of the first inning. Then …

They got eight in a row right.

That broke down as two in the bottom of the first, one in the third, one in the fifth, one in the sixth, one in the seventh, one in the eighth and one more in the ninth. Twins catcher Ryan Jeffers went 1-for-3 at the plate (as a hitter), but 4-for-4 in the challenger column, nailing three in a row as a catcher and a fourth as a batter.

Nobody in MLB has gotten more challenges right than Jeffers (7-for-10). Can we propose an MVC (Most Valuable Challenger) award? He might win it.

DON’T LET THIS MAN CHALLENGE — Ah, but who’s the anti-Jeffers? Cardinals catcher Pedro Pagés is the leader in this clubhouse. He just strung together the first four-game lost-challenge streak in robotized history. Missed one Opening Day, went 0-for-1 in Game 2, went 0-for-1 in Game 3, went 0-for-1 in Game 4, then finally broke the streak Wednesday.

Not far behind: Guardians catcher Bo Naylor, Red Sox catcher Carlos Narváez and Marlins catcher Liam Hicks were all 1-for-4 through Wednesday. Should we overreact? Why not? It’s what we do best in the first week of April.

Check out the cool kids

JJ Wetherholt is among the intriguing rookies in this year’s class. (Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Images)

Does it feel like we’re headed for the most epic Rookie of the Year race of all time? Heck, yeah, it does. So let’s have some fun with this.

THE WETHERHOLT REPORT — He homered in his first game in the big leagues. He got a walk-off hit in his second game in the big leagues. So I don’t know if smooth Cardinals second baseman JJ Wetherholt is going to win that Rookie of the Year award — but I’ve been thinking about it.

Fun fact alert! Did you know that no player who goes by his initials, not his given name, has ever won a Rookie of the Year award? True. Even wilder (and weirder), only two players who go by his initials have ever won an MVP or Cy Young Award.

I’ll give you four seconds to name them. Time’s up! It’s R.A. Dickey, your 2012 National League Cy Young winner. And Hall of Famer CC Sabathia, who won the American League Cy Young Award in 2007. Would it seem almost fitting if some initialed legend joins him since it’s the year of ABS?

NOW STARRING IN THE PITT — Konnor Griffin is 19 years old. More importantly, he’s also now a Pirate. I’ve heard enough Bobby Witt Jr./Mike Trout comps to be stoked about that. But not just because there’s nothing cooler than when the stars of tomorrow arrive.

It’s because this guy is a Weird and Wild notes machine waiting to happen.

The only other teenager to play for the Pirates in the last 50 years – Aramis Ramirez, in 1998.

Most hits by a teenage shortstop in the last 50 years — Robin Yount 223, Edgar Renteria 70, José Oquendo 41, Alex Rodriguez 36.

Teenagers who got at least one hit at any position in the 2000s — Juan Soto, Bryce Harper, Jurickson Profar, Mike Trout, Justin Upton, BJ Upton, José Reyes.

We’re about to add to all of those lists!

JOSE CAN YOU SEE — You think Diamondbacks third baseman Jose Fernandez will remember Tuesday night, his first game in the big leagues? Let’s go with yes. Three hits … two homers … and here’s the Weird and Wild part:

When Fernandez launched a go-ahead home run in the eighth inning off Tigers closer Kenley Jansen, I don’t know what the rest of the planet was thinking. But here’s what I was thinking:

Has a guy playing his first game in the big leagues ever hit a go-ahead homer that late in a game against a fellow who was pitching in his 935th game in the majors?

So I asked my friends from Baseball Reference, Kenny Jackelen and Katie Sharp, to see if we’d just witnessed a record in that important category that I just made up.

And that answer was … of course! Here’s the leaderboard.

DATEHITTERPITCHER  GAMES*

3/31/2026

Jose Fernandez 

Kenley Jansen 

 935

8/5/2014 

Javier Báez

Boone Logan

448

6/20/2003

Miguel Cabrera 

Al Levine  

311

4/24/1949 

Lloyd Merriman 

Hugh Casey 

308

8/23/2002 

Josh Bard  

James Baldwin

221

THE FANTASTIC FOUR — Finally, let’s not forget Tigers phenom Kevin McGonigle — if only because he got four hits in the first game he ever played in the big leagues, and … loyal reader Robert Yahrmatter had a fun question about it:

How many players skipped Triple A and went 4-for-4 on Opening Day?

Excellent. So I ran that question past Kenny and Katie. And the answer was … just one (sort of). It’s that same Kevin McGonigle — but it’s complicated.

That’s because they did come up with a list of cool names who technically did this. It includes Wee Willie Keeler (1898), Casey Stengel (1912), Frankie Frisch (1921), Mel Ott (1933) and Joe Medwick (1934). Only one asterisk: They all did it before Triple A, as we know it today, even existed.

But among the players of the last 75 years? Nope. Never happened … until McGonigle found his way into the batter’s box on Opening Day.

This Week in Useless Info

Shohei the hitter and Shohei the pitcher are setting the standard with their streaks. (Luke Hales / Getty Images)

THE SHOH MUST GO ON — It’s a whole new year, so it’s time once again to remind you that Shohei Ohtani is a real person. Or is it possible he’s really two people inside one body? Here’s what we mean.

There’s Shohei the hitter — He has now reached base in his last 37 games in a row (regular season). That’s the longest current on-base streak in baseball.

And there’s Shohei the pitcher — He has now spun off 22 2/3 shutout innings in a row (regular season). That’s the longest active scoreless-inning streak by any starting pitcher in baseball.

First off, it’s absurd that one *regular old human has the longest streak in both of those categories. (*Not actually either regular or old.) Second, it made me curious about Babe Ruth, because I love to be curious about the difference between Ruthian feats and Ohtanian feats. So …

Babe’s longest scoreless inning streak: 25 innings, May 27 to June 9, 1916.

Babe’s longest on-base streak: 50 games, May 17 to July 12, 1923.

So think about this: In a week, Ohtani could have a longer scoreless streak as a pitcher than the Babe ever had — and remember, the Bambino was arguably the most dominating left-handed pitcher in baseball for a couple of years there.

And in two weeks, Ohtani could have a longer on-base streak as a hitter than the Babe, even though the pitchers he faced were so terrified of Ruth, he had an on-base percentage over .500 in five different seasons.

Shohei Ohtani. He’s still the gift that never stops giving to the Weird and Wild column.

DANCE OF THE POLAR BEAR — There was going to come a time, sometime in 2026, when Pete Alonso hit a home run for a team not named the Mets. When he finally hit one of those on Tuesday, as an Oriole, how loudly were the baseball gods laughing?

The pitcher who served up this blast, just to provide a little entertainment value for anyone who ever set foot in Queens? That would be ex-Mets legend Jacob deGrom, because of course it was.

Back in another lifetime for both of them, according to Kenny and Katie, the Polar Bear once got 260 at-bats — and bopped 21 home runs — for the Mets in games started by … his old friend, deGrom. We just have one question: Who should send whom the thank-you card?

DOES ANYBODY HEAR A TRUMPET — As long as we’re doing this roll call of ex-Mets, Edwin Díaz also barged into this column. It’s always great to see him.

He’ll be the Dodgers’ first full-time closer since Kenley Jansen. And that got me thinking, which is always dangerous.

Did you know that Jansen’s last regular-season save for the Dodgers was on Oct. 1, 2021? And Díaz’s first save for the Dodgers was last Friday. Now here comes the Weird and Wild part.

In between those two saves, would you believe that 35 Dodgers pitchers saved a regular-season game? And that’s not even counting their emergency postseason closers — Roki Sasaki, Tyler Glasnow and Walker Buehler — who bump that crazy total up to 38. Is that the most of any team in baseball? Obviously.

One more request: If you remember the exhilarating saves by beloved Dodgers Matt Sauer, JP Feyereisen, Andre Jackson, Yohan Ramirez, Justin Bruihl or Jake Reed, raise your hand!

HEY, HAPPY NEW YEAR — Is there anything that feels more irrelevant in the first week of any season than that thing we like to call “last year”?

Cal Raleigh — hit 60 home runs last year. That was a lot. But it’s now this year. And the list of sluggers who hit a home run this year before a certain 60-homer man includes Jacob Young, Cole Young, Oswald Peraza, TJ Rumfield and Rafael Marchán. Naturally.

Juan Soto — led the National League in stolen bases last year. We didn’t see that coming, but it was cool. Except now it’s this year. And the list of men who stole a base this year before the stolen-base champ includes Yordan Alvarez, Nick Kurtz and Cal (60-Homer) Raleigh.

Trea Turner — was the National League batting champ last year. But this year, Turner went into the weekend with half as many hits (five) as Joey Wiemer, a man who hit .182 for the Omaha Storm Chasers last year.

Seriously, even the Loch Ness Monster isn’t as mysterious as March/April in …

Baseball!

This Week in Strange But Trueness

The White Sox have a new slugger in Munetaka Murakami, but like old Sox teams, they’re still finding creative ways to lose games. (Patrick McDermott / Getty Images)

DO THESE SOX MATCH — Like the other 29 teams, the White Sox were still undefeated as they lined up along the base lines in Milwaukee on Opening Day. Good times!

Unfortunately, then the season started.

Here at Weird and Wild World HQ, we admire innovation. So full credit to the White Sox. Over the past three seasons, nobody else has found more innovative ways to lose baseball games.

So while they were busy getting swept by the Brewers in their first series of the year, they managed to …

• Lose a game where they led off the top of the first inning (i.e., the season) with a homer, by Chase Meidroth.

• Lose another game, two games later, in which they had a first-inning grand slam (by Munetaka Murakami).

Does that seem as hard to you as it does to me? Once again, Kenny Jackelen and Katie Sharp took a look at just how hard that was to do. And the answer? Tell ’em, Wash. It’s incredibly hard.

In fact, they found only one other instance in the entire Baseball Reference database in which a team lost two games like that in the same series.

That other team was more recognizable than this team, because it was the 1988 Yankees. First, they lost a game on July 21 even though Rickey Henderson hit a leadoff bomb against Mark Gubicza. Two games later, they lost a July 23 tilt even though Dave Winfield cranked a first-inning slam off Floyd Bannister.

Little did Rickey and Winfield know when they did that that they weren’t merely heading for the Hall of Fame. They were headed for a mention in this Weird and Wild column almost 40 years later.

WAIT, IT ISN’T LAST YEAR ANYMORE — Let’s refresh your memory. The Blue Jays played in the World Series last year. The Rockies, um, didn’t. But they did lose 119 games, which doesn’t happen much.

So what happened the first time those teams played each other in 2026, on Monday in Toronto?

Rockies 14, Blue Jays 5 happened. And it doesn’t get much weirder (or wilder) than that. So once again, my friends from Baseball Reference were back on the case. Their assignment: to find the worst teams ever to win a game by nine runs or more against a team that had been the champions of their league the year before.

Just for fun, we decided to include the 19th century, even though there was no such thing as a World Series back then. By doing that, the Rockies turned out to be only the ninth-worst team, by winning percentage, to win a game by that many runs against an opponent that had won a “pennant” the previous year. Also, by doing that, we got to drop these fun names.

The worst team ever to do that: Favel Wordsworth’s 1873 Elizabeth Resolutes, of the late, great National Association, somehow beat George and Harry Wright’s Boston Red Stockings, 11-2, on the Fourth of July that year. But you should know that was only Game 1 of a doubleheader. And those Stockings then turned the table in Game 2, winning a 32-3 nailbiter.

The worst team in the World Series era: Moving along to the 20th century, Beany Jacobson’s 1905 Washington Nationals enter the conversation. They sprung a 14-0 shocker against Myron Grimshaw’s fearsome Boston Americans on Sept. 11. But …

Even though Boston had won the first World Series, in 1903, there was no World Series in 1904. Here’s what that means: In the 12 decades since the World Series became an annual event, no team coming off as messy a season as the Rockies had ever won a blowout that large against a team coming off a World Series visit until … (yep) this week!

LESS IS MOORE — You know who isn’t a pitcher for a living? Phillies utility dude Dylan Moore. But you know who pitched for the Phillies in an unsightly 13-2 loss to the Nationals on Monday? That very same Dylan Moore.

So why would we be writing about that in a column like this? Haha. Pretty amusing question. We’re writing about it because that means Moore made his first pitching appearance for the Phillies before he made his first plate appearance for the Phillies.

And how many true position players have ever done that in the 141-year history of the Phillies franchise? According to the Jackelen/Sharp research titans, that would be precisely one … a fellow named Dylan Moore.

A BRAND NEW START OF IT — You know what keeps this column in business? It’s just the fascinating parade of stuff that doesn’t look anything like the stuff that happened before it. We live for that stuff.

So on that note, let’s take a look at these two sets of fascinating digits.

4-4-0-2-3-6-1-1

And …

0-0-1-2-0

All right, who out there knows the connection between those sets of numbers? Here’s a clue: They were both produced by the same pitching staff. Here’s another clue: That staff wears pinstripes.

Ding-ding-ding. Time’s up. What’s that first set of digits? It’s the inning-by-inning run totals allowed by the Yankees to the Blue Jays, starting late in Game 1 of their ALDS last October and running through the first six innings of Game 2.

And what’s that second set? That’s the game-by-game run totals allowed by this year’s Yankees through their first five games of this season.

It adds up to 21 runs in eight innings last October … and three runs in 45 innings this March/April.

Many of the same men threw those pitches. But any other resemblance is purely coincidental — because after all, it’s …

Baseball!

YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE IS MELTING AWAY – Finally, speaking of those Yankees, baseball is amazing. And thank goodness it is, because it never stops rolling weird/wild tidbits like this off its assembly line.

The Yankees: Just gave up three runs in their first five games of the season (while getting 135 outs).

Paul (Cy Young) Skenes: Just gave up five runs in his first inning of the season (while getting two outs).

I would not have predicted that. You would not have predicted that. Skenes definitely would not have predicted that. I don’t know, in fact, how we can even explain these things, until you remember what the heck we’re even talking about here. Oh, that’s right. It’s …

Baseball!