Baltimore Orioles catcher Adley Rutschman will compete in next Monday’s Home Run Derby in Seattle.

He looks to join Cal Ripken Jr. (1991) and Miguel Tejada (2004) as the third Orioles player to win the event.

The 25-year-old Pacific Northwest native (Portland, Ore.) will compete in his first All-Star Game on July 11.

Rutschman is batting .268 with 11 homers and 35 RBIs in 79 games in his second big-league season.

The No. 1 overall pick in the 2019 draft slugged 13 homers in 113 games during his 2022 rookie campaign.

Rutschman joins a derby field that includes Tampa Bay’s Randy Arozarena, Seattle’s Julio Rodriguez, Toronto’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr., the New York Mets’ Pete Alonso and the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Mookie Betts. Two more participants are still to be announced.

–Field Level Media

With outfielder Bryan Reynolds back in the fold, the Pittsburgh Pirates will hit the road this week in an attempt to find some of the form they showed on the most recent homestand.

Reynolds returned Sunday from a stint on the injured list because of lower back inflammation and went 0-for-4 in a 6-3 defeat to the Milwaukee Brewers. It was Pittsburgh’s second consecutive defeat after opening a six-game home stretch with four consecutive wins.

Now the Pirates head to Los Angeles to open a four-game series against the Dodgers on Monday night before they close the first half of the season with a visit to the first-place Arizona Diamondbacks.

The Pirates won two of the three home games they played against the Dodgers from April 25-27. In the two victories, Reynolds combined to record three hits with two RBIs, as he was in the middle of a streak when he recorded an RBI in six consecutive games played.

In the April 27 victory that earned the series win over the Dodgers, Pittsburgh right-hander Mitch Keller matched a career high with 10 strikeouts to earn the win. Three starts later, he set a career best with 13 strikeouts against the Baltimore Orioles.

Keller (9-3, 3.34 ERA), who was named a National League All-Star on Sunday, is scheduled to start Monday’s series opener. In three career starts against the Dodgers, he is 2-1 with a 5.27 ERA and has 18 strikeouts in 13 2/3 innings.

“A lot of hard work, a lot of people supporting me along the way — family, coaches, teammates, probably a lot of people I’m missing,” Keller said of his All-Star nod, according to the Pittsburgh Post -Gazette. “Just everybody the past couple years. It’s really cool. Really cool moment.”

The Dodgers are undecided on their starter for Monday. Left-hander Clayton Kershaw (10-4, 2.55 ERA), himself named an NL All-Star, is in line to take the mound but has been dealing with shoulder discomfort. Rookie right-hander Michael Grove (0-2, 7.54) will be on hand as a potential replacement Monday if Kershaw goes on the injured list.

The Dodgers will unleash a number of All-Stars on the Pirates even if Kershaw doesn’t take the mound as Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, J.D. Martinez and Will Smith all were honored. But the Dodgers have not been playing like a team with so many top players.

Los Angeles will return home after consecutive defeats to the lowly Kansas City Royals, who won their first series since mid-May. The Dodgers went 3-3 on a trip to face a pair of last-place clubs in the Colorado Rockies and Royals.

Dodgers pitchers gave up a combined 15 runs over the past two games at Kansas City as starters Julio Urias and Tony Gonsolin combined to pitch just 6 2/3 innings. A taxed bullpen only adds to the speculation that Kershaw will go on the IL and not risk a short start Monday.

“Those guys just outplayed us,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of the Royals, who are second to last in baseball with 319 runs scored. “It’s a different brand of baseball, as far as putting the ball in play, hitting behind runners, stealing bases. They were excellent at situational hitting. To be quite honest, we couldn’t keep up. That’s how they beat us.”

–Field Level Media

The distances to the fences at Petco Park have shortened in the 18 seasons since Phil Nevin said “hitting a home run in San Diego is like hitting one out of a national park.”

Comments such as that hastened Nevin’s trade to the Texas Rangers in 2005.

Now the manager of the Los Angeles Angels, Nevin — who still ranks third on the Padres’ list of all-time home run leaders — will return to Petco Park on Monday night with a pair of players who might be able to clear the walls of a national park.

Shohei Ohtani drove homers of 493 feet and 454 feet over the past three days — giving him 31 home runs for the season. And Mike Trout hit a 436-foot bomb Sunday in a 5-2 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks for his 18th home run of the season.

For the next three days, American League All-Star Game starters Ohtani and Trout will lead the Angels on offense in a three-game, interleague series in San Diego. Plus, Ohtani is scheduled to be the Angels’ starting pitcher on Tuesday.

The good news is the Padres hope this could be a reconnaissance mission for Ohtani. San Diego is said to be one of the potential landing spots for him when he becomes a free agent after this season.

The bad news is the Padres are about 15 wins shy of where they thought they would be at the midpoint of the season.

“No one thought we’d be where we are,” San Diego manager Bob Melvin said earlier this week as the Padres suffered five straight losses to the struggling Washington Nationals and Pittsburgh Pirates. Now they return home from a 1-5 road trip.

Ten days ago, the Padres thought they were on the threshold of a winning streak that would push them past .500. Instead, they’ve gone 1-7 to fall a season-worst eight games under .500. Two of those losses were by a single run and one was in extra innings. The Padres are 5-15 in one-run games and 0-7 in extra innings. Sunday’s 4-3 loss at Cincinnati was the Padres’ eighth defeat in 12 rubber matches of three-game series.

“Our fans have been great,” said Melvin. “They are behind us every game. They deserve more.”

And after Sunday’s loss in Cincinnati, he said: “We’ve experienced this quite a bit. We have to pick ourselves up and get home and get to work.”

The series against the Angels will begin with right-hander Jaime Barria (2-3, 2.92 ERA) starting for Los Angeles against projected Padres starter Blake Snell (4-7, 3.21).

Snell’s record is misleading. The left-hander hasn’t allowed a run in four of his last seven starts with a 0.86 ERA and a 0.833 WHIP — four runs on 20 hits and 15 walks with 66 strikeouts in 42 innings. But the Padres are only 4-3 in those games while scoring two or fewer runs three times. Snell is 1-2 lifetime against the Angels with a 3.52 ERA, a 1.087 WHIP and a .173 opponents’ batting average in four starts with 29 strikeouts in 23 innings.

Barria will make his 18th appearance of the season on Monday but only his sixth start. The 26-year-old Panamanian is 1-0 against the Padres in two previous appearances (both starts), giving up three runs on nine hits and a walk with seven strikeouts in nine innings. Five of his last seven appearances have been as a starter. He is 1-1 with a 4.43 ERA and a 1.343 WHIP as a starter.

–Field Level Media

The Atlanta Braves will try to run their winning streak to nine games when they open a three-game series at the Cleveland Guardians on Monday night.

Atlanta also has won 16 of its past 17 games and 23 of 26 to take a nine-game lead in the National League East.

“These guys don’t get caught up in what we’ve done or any of that,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “They’re just about today’s game.”

Atlanta will put its winning streak in the hands of right-hander Bryce Elder (6-1, 2.44 ERA), who enters the series opener with the second-lowest ERA in the majors.

Elder is 2-0 in his past three starts with a 1.42 ERA.

In his most recent outing last Tuesday against the visiting Minnesota Twins, Elder allowed two runs and four hits in six innings, earning the win in a 6-2 victory.

On Sunday, the 24-year-old was named to the NL All-Star team, something few imagined after he went 6-5 with a 4.46 ERA in 18 appearances (17 starts) with Atlanta’s Triple-A team, the Gwinnett Stripers, last season.

“I’m going to keep doing the same thing, regardless of whether you get a vote or however it works,” Elder said before learning he was selected to the All-Star team. “I don’t even know how it works, but I mean it’d be great if I did. I’m not acting like it wouldn’t look good, but I’ve got another five days, and it was a little bit sloppy (against the Twins), so I got some more work to do.”

The Braves have supported their pitchers by hitting at least one home run in each of the past 20 games.

The Guardians blew a four-run lead in the ninth inning Sunday against the Chicago Cubs but pulled out an 8-6 win in the 10th to give them a 4-2 mark on their just-completed road trip.

Cleveland will ask 23-year-old rookie right-hander Gavin Williams (0-0, 2.84 ERA) to quiet Atlanta’s hot bats in the series opener.

Williams, who is ranked as Cleveland’s top prospect and 12th overall in the majors, according to MLB Pipeline, will make his third major league start.

Williams most recently tossed seven shutout innings in a 2-1 win against the Kansas City Royals last Tuesday. He allowed just one hit with six strikeouts and a walk.

He departed with the game still scoreless, and the Guardians eventually scored two runs in the ninth to win.

“We were working really well together,” Cleveland catcher Bo Naylor said. “All I had to do was click a button and let him do the work. He showed us what he’s made of right there.”

The only other pitcher in team history to toss at least seven innings while holding opponents to one or fewer hits within the first two games of his career was Addie Joss in his MLB debut on April 26, 1902.

“He’s got a big arm,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said of Williams. “That’s an upper-90s fastball with carry (and) two breaking balls. He pitched effectively at the top or just above the zone, and he threw a lot of strikes. When he didn’t want to throw a strike, he didn’t throw a strike.”

Williams has never faced Atlanta in his career, and Elder has never pitched against Cleveland.

–Field Level Media