Morning Mound Visit: Brady Singer carries no-hitter into eighth

It only took Brady Singer nine major league starts to show baseball at large why the Royals took him in the first round in 2018. Against the Cleveland Baseball Team, Singer tossed 7 ²⁄₃ scoreless innings in what was eventually an eight-inning outing in which he allowed no runs, one hit, struck out eight, and walked two.

Singer ultimately lost his no-hit bid when Austin Hedges hit a ground ball through the vacated second base position. Though Singer couldn’t finish out the game, this was a tremendous outing for a pitcher who hadn’t quite found his footing.

In Singer’s first eight starts, he hadn’t finished the sixth inning or allowed fewer than two runs in any outing. Entering Thursday, Singer had a 5.16 FIP and had surrendered home runs on 22.9 percent of his fly balls. In his most recent start, the Chicago White Sox tagged him for five runs in 5 ²⁄₃ innings on 10 hits.

Lindsey Adler | The Athletic $: Skip Bayless said some willfully ignorant and harmful things regarding Dak Prescott opening up about his depression. Lindsey Adler wrote about her own experience with depression and made it clear that Prescott’s battle doesn’t make him weak.

Lauren Theisen | Defector: It’s been less than a month and disgraced commentator Thom Brennaman would have us all believe that he’s a better person now than the one who so casually uttered a homophobic slur into a hot mic. That’s a dubious claim at best and Lauren Theisen makes that abundantly clear.

Ken Schultz | Baseball Prospectus $: Javier Báez, who typically plays with infectious joy, is having a rough year. It’s not simply that is numbers are down. El Mago doesn’t look like he’s having as much fun, and that’s a real loss for baseball.