Matthew Boyd and Jared Jones both look to continue torrid stretches Friday when the visiting Chicago Cubs open a three-game series against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Boyd (6-1, 4.15 ERA) won his fourth straight start on Saturday after allowing just one solo homer and two other hits over six innings in Chicago’s 6-2 victory over the Minnesota Twins. The left-hander has a 2.57 ERA in five starts since returning from surgery to repair a meniscus tear sustained while playing with his kids.

“Everything is just moving in the right direction: endurance, how you feel through the outing and afterward. All that’s feeling good,” said Boyd, who came off the injured list on June 25.

An All-Star for Chicago in 2025, Boyd has struggled in his career versus Pittsburgh. He is 1-3 with a 6.18 ERA in eight appearances (all starts) against the Pirates.

Seiya Suzuki also has experienced problems with Pittsburgh this season. He is just 5-for-24 (.208) with eight strikeouts in seven games against the Pirates, who have won four of those games.

Suzuki, however, has heated up this month.

He belted a solo homer in the first inning of Chicago’s 5-1 setback to the Detroit Tigers on Wednesday, giving him at least one hit in 10 of his last 11 games. He has gone deep four times during that stretch.

Unfortunately for the Cubs, the team’s bats went silent after Suzuki’s 17th homer of the season.

Like Boyd, Jones (2-1, 4.05) also has pitched well of late for Pittsburgh.

Jones allowed one run on three hits with a season-high nine strikeouts in five innings of a 5-1 victory over the Cleveland Guardians last Saturday.

He has yielded just two runs on five hits and fanned 23 batters against just three walks in three starts (15.0 innings) in July. He retired 30 batters in a row before Steven Kwan had a base hit in the third inning on Saturday.

That said, the opposition is batting just .100 (5-for-50) versus Jones during the three-game stretch.

“Giving up a run, I had some choice words for myself. But yeah, just hearing those numbers and sitting back and realizing what I’ve done over the last three games, it’s been pretty cool,” Jones said.

Jones’ impressive three-game stretch came on the heels of a rough six-start beginning to the season. The right-hander had been working out the kinks after missing all of last season after suffering an elbow injury during spring training.

Jones, 24, is 1-2 with a 5.24 ERA in four career starts against the Cubs — all coming during his rookie season in 2024.

The Pirates settled for a split of a doubleheader against the New York Yankees on Wednesday following a 2-0 setback in the nightcap.

Pittsburgh’s Nick Gonzales carries a seven-game hitting streak into Friday’s game. He is 12-for-31 with two homers and five RBIs during that stretch.

Gonzales, however, is 2-for-18 this season against the Cubs.

–Field Level Media

The New York Yankees continue to search for answers offensively as they open a 10-game road trip with a matchup against the Philadelphia Phillies on Friday.

The Yankees split a doubleheader with the Pittsburgh Pirates on Wednesday, although they scored in just two of their 18 innings that day. New York dropped the opener 5-3, managing only six hits in the process, while the nightcap resulted in an uninspiring 2-0 triumph.

“We’ve got to improve (at the plate),” manager Aaron Boone said. “I feel like I’ve said that a lot here over the last month. We know we’ve got to produce better offensively, and consistently, night in and night out. We’re working to get that done. For us to reach our peak, we’ve got to get some guys going and be more consistent.”

New York continues to play without star outfielder Aaron Judge, who has been out since May 31 with a fractured right rib.

“It’s Aaron Judge; it’s a massive presence,” Boone said. “But again, he’s not there right now. Look at these names. We have a lot of good names here, capable, and we’ve got to step it up a little better.”

The Phillies’ offense has not been particularly impressive lately either, managing only one run in three of their six games since the All-Star break. Their bats showed some life in Wednesday’s 9-5 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers, with Alec Bohm leading the way with a homer and three RBIs.

“Nothing in this series changes our thoughts,” said Phillies interim manager Don Mattingly, whose team dropped two of three to Los Angeles. “If we play well, we’re capable of being fine.”

Philadelphia has played well with Jesus Luzardo (9-4, 3.43 ERA) on the mound, having won his last 10 starts. The lefty allowed one run in five innings against the New York Mets on Saturday in his first start since the All-Star break.

“He threw a lot of pitches in those first couple innings, and then he settled in and quickened up after that,” Mattingly said.

Luzardo has struggled against New York in his career, going 0-3 with an 18.36 ERA in three appearances (two starts).

New York will give the ball to Will Warren (7-4, 4.00), who made a relief cameo in Wednesday’s doubleheader against Pittsburgh. The lefty threw two-thirds of an inning in the nightcap with one strikeout, allowing one hit and one walk in a 16-pitch effort.

Now, Warren will make his first start since July 12, when he yielded one run in five innings against the Washington Nationals. He was originally slated to start Tuesday’s affair against the Pirates before that game was rained out.

“As a starter, I feel like I’m being crafty and pitching a little more than just the blacked-out adrenaline, throwing as hard as I can in the ninth,” Warren said Wednesday.

The 27-year-old has made two career starts against the Phillies. Each resulted in a no-decision, and he holds a 4.91 ERA in 11 innings against them.

–Field Level Media

Two teams taking inventory as the trade deadline approaches go head-to-head Friday night when the San Francisco Giants host a three-game interleague series against the Los Angeles Angels.

The Angels have lost 13 of their last 18 and the Giants 12 of their last 19, falling a combined 33 games out of first place in their respective divisions following their most recent defeats Wednesday.

Los Angeles has scheduled right-hander Grayson Rodriguez (3-3, 8.23 ERA) for the series opener, opposed by San Francisco ace Logan Webb (5-7, 3.87).

The curtain-raiser will feature a somewhat rare Oracle Park appearance by Angels legend Mike Trout, who has hit just one home run in 21 plate appearances over five visits dating back to 2015. In fact, the homer came in Trout’s second game in San Francisco on May 2, 2015, when he took Tim Hudson deep.

At the time, the Giants were the defending World Series champions, while the Angels were coming off a playoff appearance. Los Angeles hasn’t been back to the postseason, while San Francisco has experienced just nine playoff games in the past 11 seasons.

The Trout-Webb matchup has been entirely one-sided. They hadn’t gone head-to-head until last April, when Webb struck out his rival three consecutive times in some epic duels that lasted a combined 21 pitches. They haven’t seen each other since.

They also missed each other at the All-Star Game earlier this month in Philadelphia, when Trout started for the American League. Webb was not summoned from the National League bullpen.

The Angels and Giants enter the lead-up to the Aug. 3 trade deadline as potential sellers, and both Trout and Webb’s names have been mentioned.

Trout recently took time to claim he’s more interested in helping drive the Angels back into the postseason.

“Could I take the easy way out and just leave? Yeah,” Trout admitted to reporters. “But, for me, right now, my focus is on trying to get this club back in the playoffs.”

The 34-year-old hasn’t homered since July 8 at Texas.

Webb is winless in three July starts, allowing 15 earned runs across 16 2/3 innings. He’s served up four homers in those outings after allowing just five through his first 14 starts.

Though the Giants find themselves in a deeper hole than the Angels in terms of playoff contention this season, Webb shares Trout’s attitude: fix the problem rather than leave it to someone else.

“We know we are capable of better,” he expressed recently to the media, “and we keep pushing ahead.”

The 29-year-old will be facing the Angels for just the third time. He has an 0-1 record and a 1.54 ERA from the previous two meetings.

Rodriguez has never faced the Giants, but he does have a winning record (4-2) in career interleague games.

The 26-year-old has been much better on the road (2-0 with a 3.48 ERA) than at home (1-3, 10.22 ERA) this season.

–Field Level Media