The Buzz · August 9, 2026
The Buzz — Sunday, August 9
A Saturday night that put two pitchers on the same all-time list in the same game, a rookie who hit a ball halfway to the concourse, and a streak-ender that came on a grounder — five names, with the number that settles each one.
Max Scherzer
The take Scherzer passed Johnson for sole 10th in career Ks
3,516 — that is the number, and it puts Scherzer alone in 10th on the all-time strikeout list, past Walter Johnson's 3,515. He entered Saturday needing four strikeouts, got exactly four, and the milestone was a called third strike on Kyle Schwarber leading off the sixth at Citizens Bank Park.
That same sixth inning is where the start came apart. Back-to-back homers tied it 2-2, and Scherzer was done at 5 1/3. The Blue Jays won 7-5 in 11, so the night goes down as a milestone, not a quality start. Eighteen strikeouts separate him from Gaylord Perry at No. 9, and every name above him is either in Cooperstown or named Justin Verlander.
Max Scherzer cards on eBay →(paid link)
Jac Caglianone
The take Four-hit two-homer night with a 448-foot blast
448 feet to center off Clay Holmes, at 111.9 mph off the bat — and that was just the first home run. Caglianone went 4-for-4 with two doubles, two homers, and four RBIs in Kansas City's 6-3 win, the first Royal ever with two doubles and two homers in a single game. This is not a one-night spike: over seven August games he is hitting .429 with a 1.322 OPS. The power was the report on him as a prospect, and August is confirming it at the level that matters.
Jac Caglianone cards on eBay →(paid link)
Shohei Ohtani
The take Ohtani extras go-ahead hit ends Dodgers seven-game skid
The headline says Ohtani ended the skid, and the box score says 1 RBI in the 10th, and both are true. What the highlight will not show is the shape: an infield single, a grounder that first baseman Tim Tawa knocked down but could not convert, scoring the automatic runner with two outs. Ohtani finished 1-for-5. The hit that snapped a seven-game losing streak was a ball a first baseman got a glove on and could not finish.
It was needed because Edwin Diaz blew his second consecutive save on back-to-back triples in the ninth. Kyle Tucker's solo homer in the eighth had been the Dodgers' only run through regulation. The streak is over and Ohtani is on the winning play — but a club that needed a grounder to end a week without a win has more to fix than one rally can answer.
Shohei Ohtani cards on eBay →(paid link)
Josh Naylor
The take Naylor two-homer highlights vs Rays
Every run the Mariners scored came off Naylor's bat, and they still lost 3-2. Two solo shots — 367 feet in the second, 434 feet at 106.8 mph in the seventh — were the entirety of Seattle's offense. The night matters because it ended a homer drought dating to June 12, nearly two months without one. Naylor's 9th and 10th of the year came off two different relievers, so the power showed up against more than one look. But two home runs producing two runs in a one-run defeat is a highlights reel sitting inside a problem.
Josh Naylor cards on eBay →(paid link)
Aaron Nola
The take Nola hits 2,000 Ks same night as Scherzer milestone
2,000 strikeouts in 309 career games. That pace ties Nola for the 10th-fewest to the mark — the list ahead of him includes Randy Johnson, Clayton Kershaw, Gerrit Cole, and Pedro Martinez, names that tell you how early and how hard he started missing bats. He became just the second Phillie to reach the number, joining Steve Carlton, when he fanned Brandon Valenzuela in the second on Saturday.
The timing made it noisy: Scherzer was in the other dugout passing Walter Johnson for 10th all-time. Two starters, two milestones, one game at Citizens Bank Park. Nola himself noted the coincidence afterward. He had eight strikeouts through five innings of two-run ball before a 104.8 mph comebacker off the bat of Jesús Sánchez caught his right knee in the sixth.
X-rays were negative — a contusion, not a fracture — and the club expects him to make his next start. The milestone is the headline and the knee is the footnote. The Phillies lost 7-5 in 11, but Nola's night was already complete. What 2,000 strikeouts in 309 games confirms is a decade of missing bats at a rate most arms never touch, and the only question worth asking is whether the knee cooperates long enough to let him keep climbing.
Aaron Nola cards on eBay →(paid link)
The one that could go sideways
Four of these five are settled. Scherzer is in the book. Caglianone's August is a confirmation, not a surprise. Ohtani got the win his club needed, and Naylor's two homers are a footnote in a loss. Nola's right knee is the thread dangling. Negative X-rays and a club saying he will make his next start is not the same as a pitcher throwing his next start — and if the contusion from a 104.8 mph comebacker costs him the Field of Dreams outing, the milestone night becomes the night he got hurt, which is the wrong headline for a pitcher who just put himself on a list with Steve Carlton.