SweetSpot

          Tuesday's Top 5: Kyle Schwarber is dreamy

          1. Kyle Schwarber, Chicago Cubs: So good, so very good. A little more than a year ago, Schwarber was playing for Indiana University. Now he looks like he's going to be an integral part of the Cubs as they chase a wild-card berth. Filling in at catcher for the injured Miguel Montero, Schwarber tied up the game against the Reds with a two-run homer in the ninth off J.J. Hoover, after fouling off four pitches with two strikes. Where was Aroldis Chapman, you ask? He had thrown 44 pitches in going two innings on Sunday and 13 more on Monday, so wasn't available. Hoover isn't an easy guy to face, however: Schwarber's 397-foot blast was the first home run he'd allowed all season.

          So the game went extra innings. By the 13th, most of the crowd remaining may have been Schwarber's friends and family -- he's from Middletown, Ohio. He treated them to another homer, a low liner to right field, completing a 4-for-7 night. In 11 games in the majors he's hitting .410/.439/.744. He's a patient hitter with big power and it wouldn't shock me if in a few years he's putting up better numbers than Kris Bryant. Montero is on the DL with a sprained thumb and will resume the catching duties when he returns, but the Cubs may want to find a way to keep Schwarber on the roster. He's still raw behind the plate and while he played 36 games in left field in the minors last year, he hasn't played there in 2015. Maybe he sticks as a third catcher/pinch-hitter/occasional left fielder.

          By the way, just like the Astros took Mark Appel over Bryant, they also passed on Schwarber last year, taking Brady Aiken first overall as the Cubs took Schwarber with the fourth pick.

          Other cool factoids: Schwarber has two four-hit games in the 11 he has played. All the other Cubs have one. Also, the Cubs now have 10 extra-innings wins, most in the majors. The other Cub with a game-tying home run in the ninth and another in extra innings: Andre Dawson in 1990.

          2. Shin-Soo Choo, Texas Rangers: In the midst of a terrible slump, Choo went 4-for-5 -- a single, double, triple and home run. I believe that's called a cycle. Cool. The Rangers beat the Rockies 9-0.

          3. Nate Karns, Tampa Bay Rays: He tossed five scoreless innings, but that's not why our Top 5 committee selected him Tuesday night. I mean, it was the Phillies. You have to go eight or nine against them to merit consideration. But Karns also got his first major league hit -- a home run, the first by an American League pitcher since Zach Britton in 2011. And the Rays won 1-0. Karns is the sixth pitcher in American League history to homer in a 1-0 game. The others: Milt Pappas, Early Wynn, Spud Chandler, Red Ruffing, Long Tom Hughes. You're probably asking who Long Tom Hughes is. Well, he pitched around the turn of the century. The previous one. While pitching for a bad Washington Senators team, he once declared, "The American League is a joke. I am tired of being the scapegoat of the Washington club for the last two years. ... I will join an amateur club or play with the outlaws. This proposition of being the fall guy for the bunch is not what it is cracked up to be." I love you, Long Tom Hughes.

          As for Karns, he did homer back in high school in 2006. "I just swung away," he said.

          4. Aaron Nola, Philadelphia Phillies: Karns faced Nola, the No. 1 pitching prospect for the Phillies, making his major league debut. He looked good, striking out six and issuing just one walk in six innings. With a delivery and release point that resembles Pedro Martinez's, Nola looked like the polished pitcher he was advertised as since being drafted last year out of LSU, with good fastball command and movement, if not necessarily a guy who lights up the radar gun. Keith Law ranked him No. 38 on his recent midseason top 50 prospects list.

          5. Franklin Gutierrez, Seattle Mariners: In a crazy game in Detroit, the Mariners scored four in the first. Nelson Cruz and J.D. Martinez exchanged monster home runs. The Tigers took an 8-6 lead. Then, with two outs and the bases loaded in the eighth, Gutierrez lined a pinch-hit grand slam off Neftali Feliz to cap a five-run rally. It was just the second pinch-hit grand slam in Mariners history -- come on down, Ben Broussard -- and a crushing defeat for the Tigers, a team that needs a good week or it likely trades David Price and Yoenis Cespedes at the trade deadline.

          Honorable mention: The Angels (16 wins in their past 19 games); Yasiel Puig's arm; the Royals (see my blog here); Jacob deGrom's hair; chewing gum and bat flips; Dellin Betances; Adam Wainwright's softball appearance; Eric Campbell's big two-run pinch-hit single for the Mets, when Matt Williams inexplicably brought his infield in while leading; Vincent Velasquez, for his first his major league win; Mark Buehrle, for his 209th. It was one of those great nights.