MLB first-quarter standings watch. Plus: Trivia that’ll impress

AL EastBlue JaysOriolesRaysRed SoxYankeesAL CentralGuardiansRoyalsTigersTwinsWhite SoxAL WestAngelsAstrosAthleticsMarinersRangersNL EastBravesMarlinsMetsNationalsPhilliesNL CentralBrewersCardinalsCubsPiratesRedsNL WestDiamondbacksDodgersGiantsPadresRockiesScores & ScheduleStandingsPodcastsThe Windup NewsletterFantasyMLB ProspectsMLB OddsMLB PicksPower RankingsNewsletterMLB first-quarter standings watch. Plus: Trivia that’ll impressThe A's currently have a 75 percent chance to make the postseason, according to Baseball Reference. Raymond Carlin III / Imagn Images Share articleThe Windup Newsletter ⚾ | This is The Athletic’s MLB newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Windup directly in your inbox. It’s time for an MLB standings check at the quarter three-quarter pole. Plus: Relief for Ian Happ and an early Baseball Card of the Week — with a twist. I’m Tyler Kepner, pinch-hitting for Levi Weaver. Welcome to The Windup! Did you know that the term “quarter pole” refers to the distance to the finish line? I always thought it meant distance from the start. I guess it’s good that I cover baseball instead of horse racing. Anyway, I raise this because every team in the majors has played about a quarter of its schedule, give or take a game or two. That means we’re at the three-quarter pole. If you haven’t paid much attention to the standings yet, that’s OK. But now’s a good time to start. Here’s an observation that stands out from each of the six divisions: NL East — Mets (15-25), 12 1/2 games behind the Braves: Teams often emphasize the importance of winning the series. The Mets just won two out of three series out West, going 5-4 on their swing through Anaheim, Denver and Phoenix … and they lost a game in the standings. At 10 games under .500, the Mets are much better off looking at the wild-card standings. They left Citi Field on April 30 trailing by 11 1/2 games in that race. They return trailing by eight. They still have MLB’s worst record (15-25), but progress is progress, and a potential jolt is expected to arrive today. NL Central — Pirates (22-19), five games behind the Cubs: Put the Brewers to the side, because they’re always good. Of the three other teams chasing the Cubs in this division, Pittsburgh just might have the best chance of contending all summer. That’s because the Pirates have reason to be confident both at the plate and on the mound. Only six MLB teams are averaging five runs per game on offense with an ERA under 4.00: the Yankees, Dodgers, Braves, Brewers, Cubs … and Pirates! NL West — Rockies (16-25), one game behind the Giants: For the Rockies, this is sort of like 1993 all over again. That was their expansion season, so everyone assumed they’d finish last. Indeed, they weren’t very good, with 95 losses. But they didn’t finish last because another team — the Padres — was terrible and sold off its best players. You’ve got to wonder if the woeful 2026 Giants will play the role of the 1993 Padres. AL East — Orioles (19-23), nine games behind the Rays: As Brittany Ghiroli wrote last week, the Orioles can thank the rest of the mediocre AL for still having real hope of making the playoffs. On their own, though, they haven’t done much. The rotation’s ERA was 5.07 before yesterday, ahead of only Houston and Colorado. The defense has been shaky. And you have to wonder when (or if) we’ll see the versions of Colton Cowser, Coby Mayo and even Gunnar Henderson that once had the industry so excited. Maybe Mayo’s performance yesterday is a start: He belted a go-ahead three-run homer in the seventh to beat the Yankees, 3-2, at Camden Yards. AL Central — White Sox (19-21), 1 1/2 games behind the Guardians: Are the White Sox good now? After 324 losses over the last three seasons, “kinda” is actually really encouraging. They’ve already taken series from Toronto, Arizona, San Diego and Seattle, all regarded as contenders at the start of the season, and several hitters command your attention, like Munetaka Murakami, Colson Montgomery and Sam Antonacci. And starter Davis Martin has made seven starts in a row without allowing more than two runs. AL West — A’s (21-19), two games ahead of the Mariners: Yesterday, Baseball Reference gave the A’s a 75 percent chance to make the postseason. That feels aggressive to me, but hey, they’re fun to watch, and sluggers Nick Kurtz, Brent Rooker and Tyler Soderstrom — each with only five home runs — haven’t even gotten hot yet. Maybe they’re just scared to wear that terrifying elephant home run mask (pictured above). More trends: In this week’s Power Rankings, every team gets at least one reason to believe. Things have gone so well for the 27-14 Cubs that even after losing a series to the Rangers over the weekend, they still held a 3 1/2-game lead in the NL Central. Only one team has a bigger lead over its closest division rival: the Braves, who are running away with the NL East. With the Cubs meeting the Braves today for the first time this season, it’s a good time to check out Patrick Mooney’s excellent story, if you missed it, on Ian Happ. I’ve always felt kind of bad for Happ, who made his MLB debut nine years ago tomorrow: A four-time Glove winner, Happ is off to a good start this season, his last before free agency. Mooney details how veterans like Anthony Rizzo and Cole Hamels made a lasting impact on Happ, especially on his status as a guy who “posts.” Players who do that, Mooney writes, “force their way into the lineup with their talent and willpower. It’s being available and having the fortitude to play through aches and pains.” The Cubs already have Alex Bregman, Nico Hoerner and Dansby Swanson signed into their mid-30s, so you have to wonder if they’ll make another long-term commitment to Happ, who turns 32 in August. But in a game with so much unpredictability, there is no attribute more respected than doing all you can to be ready to help your teammates every day — and that’s Happ. With the Tigers and Mets starting a three-game series at Citi Field today, it’s a good time to salute Rusty Staub, the answer to one of baseball’s all-time greatest trivia questions: Who is the only player in MLB history to get 500 hits for four different teams? The best trivia questions are like Russian nesting dolls. You get closer to the answer by removing layer after layer. The outer shell is every player in baseball history. From the question, we know that this player got at least 2,000 hits. So remove that shell, and we shed everyone who never did that. That leaves us with a shell of the 298 players who have collected 2,000 hits. Removing that shell brings us to a specific subset of well-traveled, very good hitters — Roberto Alomar, Adrián Beltré, Carlos Beltrán, Gary Sheffield and so on — mostly from the modern era, when players change teams more often. That’s where the fun starts. Did this player play for four teams long enough to get 500 hits in each place? That would require a minimum of three seasons (and probably four) with each team. So you start eliminating options based on their length of service with their teams. Beltre, for example, had 750 hits with the Dodgers, Mariners and Rangers — but played only one year for the Red Sox. Great trivia questions also have a bit of misdirection, leading you down a logical path that’s actually a dead end. Here, the misdirection is the era: Staub played most of his career before free agency, so you wouldn’t necessarily think of players from his era. Staub didn’t hop around on three- or four-year free-agent contracts. He just happened to be traded at fairly regular intervals from 1963 to 1979: six years with Houston, three with Montreal, four with the Mets, three-plus with Detroit. By that point, Staub had gotten those 500 hits in all of those spots. He finished with 2,716 hits — 792 with the Colt .45s/Astros, 709 with the Mets, 582 with the Tigers and 531 with the Expos, where he earned his memorable nickname: “Le Grand Orange” for his distinctive hair color (or “colour,” I guess). The nickname was fitting in other spots, too: The Astros, Tigers and Mets all have orange in their color scheme. Staub played the 1980 season for the Rangers and lasted five more in New York as a pinch-hitting specialist, restaurateur and all-around class act with a deep commitment to the families of fallen police officers and firefighters that has endured after his death, in 2018, at age 73. As the splitter rises in popularity, why do left-handers rarely throw the pitch? Eno Sarris and Fabian Ardaya looked into it. Interim manager Chad Tracy has brought calm to the Red Sox following the “flawed and clumsy” firing of Alex Cora, as Steve Buckley writes. The Braves claim their new broadcast network is thriving, but executives remain tight-lipped about sharing specific subscriber data. Most-clicked in our last newsletter: Ken Rosenthal’s Buster Posey column. 📫 Love The Windup? Check out The Athletic’s other newsletters. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms