Last Night in Baseball: Meet MLB's surprising home run leader

There is always baseball happening — almost too much baseball for one person to handle themselves.

That's why we're here to help, though, by sifting through the previous days' games, and figuring out what you missed, but shouldn't have. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball:

MLB's HR leader … the Athletics' Tyler Soderstrom?

It's not like the Athletics have never had big bats in the history of their franchise. The Bash Brothers helped bring the A's their most recent World Series title in 1989. (That was an entire Taylor Swift's lifetime ago!) Even more recently, Brent Rooker just put together back-to-back 30-home run seasons. 

Still, the A's are not the first (or second, or even 27th) team you probably think of if you're talking about sluggers. And yet, it's their first baseman who is currently leading the majors in dingers. 

On Thursday, Soderstrom blasted his ninth homer of the season to lead the A's to an 8-0 win and a series sweep over the hapless White Sox. 

Though he's in the midst of a breakout year, it's understandable if you aren't all that familiar with the 23-year-old. Here are a few facts to get to know him a little more:

• He was the 26th-overall selection of the 2020 MLB Draft.
• His nine homers rank as the second-most in franchise history through 19 games. He's tied with Reggie Jackson (1974) and Mark McGwire (1992), and trails Bob Cerv (1958) and Khris Davis (2019) by one.
• He was raised on an almond farm in Turlock, California, where he grew up playing on a small "Field of Dreams"-type baseball field.
• His dad, Steve, was also a first-round draft pick who pitched three games for the San Francisco Giants in 1996.

Patrick Corbin's mysterious bug bite 

Corbin made his first home start with the Texas Rangers on Wednesday. But as he revealed on Thursday, he almost didn't pitch due to a mysterious bug bite that left him with a swollen ankle. 

"It was really bad in the morning," Corbin said. "I wasn't sure if I was going to throw."

"He had a bite. He could hardly walk when he came into the clubhouse," Rangers manager Bruce Bochy said. "Some kind of venom got in there. Not sure if it was a spider or what. He was 50-50 on whether he would make the start or not."

The venom didn't hurt Corbin — or maybe it helped him in a Peter Parker kind of way. The 35-year-old earned his first win of the season after allowing just one run against the Los Angeles Angels. 

Corbin, who is staying at Max Scherzer's home, just signed with the Rangers last month after spending the previous six seasons with the Nationals. They say everything is bigger in Texas. Apparently, that includes the bugs.

Nolan Jones takes a baseball to the beans

Listen, if Nolan Jones can laugh about it, then so can we.

"He might have got him somewhere in the groin area." We can feel pretty confident in that assertion, yes.

Justin Martinez brings the heat

Part of what makes baseball so gripping are the moment-to-moment decisions and plays. Here, you see Diamonbacks' reliever Justin Martinez with the bases loaded, in a 1-2 count just nine pitches into his outing, trying to clean up a mess and hold Arizona's slim 6-4 lead over the Marlins. 

This is a situation where a pitcher has what basically boil down to two options. Throw something a hitter is going to chase or not go after at all, giving them the opportunity to mess up while you leverage the remaining balls the plate appearance has left before a walk. Or! You could throw the hitter off guard by going maximum velocity down the pipe, instead, in the hope they either won't be able to catch up to it enough to cause damage with it, or will simply blink, ending the at-bat. 

Martinez got Connor Norby to blink on a 102-mph heater that, ever so briefly, looked like it might tail away from Norby and the strike zone. It did not do that. Threat and inning over, and the Diamondbacks would go on to complete the sweep.

Reds fall apart late, courtesy Mariners' power

The Reds and Mariners played a wild one, with the Mariners extending their lead to 5-3 in the top of the eighth, only for the Reds to go ahead, 7-5, on a grand slam by Jake Fraley in the bottom of the inning. 

Seattle would respond with a Cal Raleigh blast followed by another by Randy Arozarena, which tied it up and sent the game to extras. The Mariners would pile on in the 10th, with Arozarena's two-run double the dagger, and the Reds had no answers for that in the bottom of the frame. Seattle took the game 11-7, and the series as well.

Mariners vs. Reds Highlights | MLB on FOX

Baseball can be a cruel roller coaster of a game, but that's so much of the appeal, isn't it? 

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