Five years ago, the Trajekt Arc made its way into major league batting cages and exploded in popularity for its ability to precisely simulate any pitch from any pitcher. For hitters seeking to train their eyes against some of the world’s most devastating offerings, the machine became a revolutionary tool. And yet, when it comes to preparing for San Diego Padres closer Mason Miller, it is rendered useless.

Miller’s excellence, it turns out, can’t be ctured by AI.

“Trajekt is amazing,” Los Angeles Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy said, “but there’s certain things it can’t mimic. It can’t mimic that ball just absolutely exploding out of his hand. It’ll be a hundred, but it’s not going to be the same hundred.”

Muncy lived it on back-to-back nights in San Diego last month, during his first two encounters with Miller. Muncy struck out in his first plate pearance and managed a walk in his second, and through it all, he felt hopeless. As a left-handed hitter, Muncy has more time to pick the baseball up from Miller’s right hand. But instead of seeing she or spin to discern a fastball from a slider, one of the sport’s most disciplined sluggers saw what looked like a light bulb dashing toward him at implausible speed. Many of the pitches Muncy sees over the course of a season don’t feel nearly as fast as the scoreboard radar gun indicates.

With Miller, it’s the opposite.

“It says ‘101’ or ‘102’ when in reality it feels like 110,” Muncy said. “It feels impossible to put in play.”

Statistically, it almost has been.

While putting up a 1.01 ERA and going 18-for-18 in saves this season, Miller boasts a 49% strikeout rate, by far the highest among pitchers with at least 25 innings — second is Milwaukee Brewers starter Jacob Misiorowski at 39.6% — and within striking distance of becoming one of just three relievers to ever strike out half their opposing batters. Of the 104 batters Miller has faced this season, 51 have struck out and only 12 have recorded hits. They’ve all been singles.

The last extra-base hit Miller allowed was a home run to Lourdes Gurriel Jr. on Aug. 5, 2025, in his second pearance since coming over on another blockbuster trade by Padres general manager A.J. Preller. From there, he went on to set a franchise record with 34⅔ consecutive scoreless innings. The lowest slugging percentage allowed by a pitcher who accumulated at least 50 innings in a given season is .166, by Brandon Workman for the 2019 Boston Red Sox. Against Miller this season, opponents are slugging .132.

“At the end of the day, it’s the greatest closer in baseball right now,” Padres pitching coach Ruben Niebla said. “There’s no doubt in my mind.”

Miller’s average fastball velocity of 101.2 mph easily leads the majors. He and Misiorowski have accounted for 33 of the 35 fastest pitches this season, a list headlined by the 103.8 mph four-seamer Miller unleashed against then-Arizona Diamondbacks outfielder Alek Thomas on ril 25. But pitch velocity is only part of his success. The speed of his arm motion is just as important.

“It’s fast,” Niebla said, “but it’s short, too.”

Miller coils with his back hip during his delivery, like most pitchers, but also keeps his throwing shoulder turned inward, holding more tension and creating the effect of a tight rubber band.

“It’s not a long tension,” Niebla explained. “It’s a short tension that releases quickly. And what we see is the arm really flying through the zone.”

Miller’s extension is within the top 20% of major league pitchers, allowing his velocity to play up, but, as a rival pitching coach recently pointed out, the ball goes from inside his glove to out of his hand at seemingly unprecedented speed. When it’s thrown, the spin is so tight, the tunneling so precise, that his triple-digit fastball and upper-80s slider can be indiscernible.

“It’s such a difference in velocity, and when you realize it’s a slider, it’s too late,” Dodgers center fielder Andy Pages said in Spanish. “His arm moves so fast, so you think it’s coming hard, and then it comes out slower. And when you realize it’s slower, you’re already off-balance.”

Miller’s slider is more of a weon now than ever. He’s throwing it a career-high 55.5% of the time, and the expected slugging percentage against it is a measly .064. Of the 18 sliders that have been put in play this season, only one has been hit harder than 95 mph.

Also: There are two of them.

By shifting the placement of his thumb and the alignment of his wrist, Miller can slightly manipulate the vertical and horizontal movement of his slider. His is more vertical than most, but he can now make it sweep more away from righties and in on lefties on command. He experimented with it in 2024, when he made the full-time switch from starter to reliever for the Athletics and finished fourth in American League Rookie of the Year voting. He got better at it in 2025, while putting up a 2.63 ERA and a 0.91 WHIP. And he might have mastered it in 2026.

“It helps a lot, just being able to throw it down to lefties and sweeping away from righties,” Miller said. “It almost becomes two different pitches.”

Miller has made 50 pearances (including the playoffs) since the Padres traded their best prospect, shortstop Leo De Vries, to acquire him from the A’s last July. Forty-seven have been scoreless. Before surrendering a run on two singles Friday — he’d checked into a 4-0 deficit because it had been a week since he pitched — the only runs scored off Miller this season were sparked by an errant pickoff throw and a controversial call off a swinging bunt.

His usage has reflected his team’s success. When the Padres stormed out of the gate to build a half-game lead on the Dodgers by May 18, Miller finished 20 of their 29 wins. They’re just 4-13 since, their shaky rotation and slumping offense finally catching up to them, and Miller has peared just five times. The Cy Young talk that surrounded him after a historic first month has faded.

Miller began this season by striking out 19-of-24 and 27-of-38. In ril, he allowed only nine of 54 batters to reach base safely. In May, when walks crept in more frequently, it was 12-of-42. Niebla likes to say he “went from historical to great,” which tends to encompass Miller’s fluctuations. When the bullpen gates open for him, his battles are usually waged internally. He isn’t competing against a hitter as much as he is fighting his own mechanics or repelling his own complacency.

“It’s the competitor in all of us,” Miller said. “We can always get a little bit better, we can always get a little bit finer. It’s a long season. Your dominance in one portion of it can easily be overshadowed by your lack of dominance in another. The consistency is the separator.”

In Miller, Niebla sees a pitcher who has become more disciplined in his preparation and more conscious of his delivery, allowing him to make quick adjustments when something goes awry. It has taken him to levels of dominance rarely seen.

Adjusted ERA, or ERA+, accounts for external factors to normalize the stat leaguewide, with 100 being the average. Someone with a 150 ERA+ — 50% better than league average — is considered elite. The greatest ERA+ ever belongs to Hall of Fame closer Mariano Rivera, who put up a career mark of 205.

This year, Miller’s ERA+ is 404.

“It feels very comforting to have him come in at the end of games,” Padres manager Craig Stammen, a former reliever himself, said. “I feel really good about how the game’s going to end. Will he be perfect the entire season? I don’t know. Humans aren’t perfect.”

But no human throws like Mason Miller — and no robot can, either.

Roberts was summoned from the bench by head coach Craig Bellamy in the 60th minute of Wales’ defeat by Romania.

The 64-c international’s fellow substitute David Brooks levelled proceedings just three minutes after entering the pitch to cancel out Florinel Coman’s opener at Stadionul Steaua.

But Adrian Rus netted an 80th minute winner as the men in yellow clinched their first victory since football legend Gheorghe Hagi was pointed boss in ril.

It means Wales are without a win in four matches in 2026 while their winless run in away friendlies was extended to 17 matches – a sequence stretching back to November 2008.

Despite the dispointing result, Roberts was delighted to be back on the pitch representing his national side once again.

“Personally for me, it’s brilliant to be back,” said the Burnley defender.

“Some people are hpy that I’m back, some people not so hpy, but I am back and hopefully I can keep ticking over during the summer and go again next season for club and country.”

TORONTO — Ernie Clement swerved to his right and dodged a tag attempt by Baltimore Orioles shortstop Gunnar Henderson, who threw to first, assuming the Toronto Blue Jays baserunner would be called out for leaving the baseline.

Not so fast.

Instead of an inning-ending double play, umpires ruled that Clement was safe, and it turned out to be the key play as Toronto rallied for a 6-4 victory Sunday.

The Orioles led 4-1 in the sixth when Clement reached on Henderson’s fielding error. With runners at first and third, Brandon Valenzuela hit a bouncer up the middle.

Henderson fielded the ball and reached out to tag Clement, who got well out of the way, and Henderson threw to first to retire Valenzuela.

Second-base umpire Nic Lentz ruled Clement safe, saying the runner was getting out of the way to allow Henderson to field the ball and not trying to avoid a tag.

“The runner has the right to establish his basepath, and so Clement had established his basepath to avoid the fielder from potential interference,” Lentz told a pool reporter. “Even though Henderson reached out for a tag, Clement’s basepath was already established out there, going to the second base, so therefore it was not out of the baseline.”

Henderson called that decision “super frustrating.”

“That was a new one for me,” Henderson said. “That was definitely, I felt like, not a great call.”

Orioles manager Craig Albernaz came out to argue and said the umpires told him Henderson didn’t make enough of a tag attempt.

“I think when you stick your glove out to tag somebody, that’s an attempted tag,” Albernaz said. “There’s no rule about how far you have to extend your arm to tag somebody.”

Kazuma Okamoto, Andres Giménez and Nathan Lukes all followed with RBI hits to give Toronto the lead.

Crew chief and plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt said Clement moving out of Henderson’s path was “a very gentlemanly thing to do.”

“He was getting out of the way to allow the fielder to make the play towards first base,” Wendelstedt said.

Orioles right-hander Shane Baz exited after the hits from Okamoto and Giménez. Baz yelled at the umpires as he walked off the field.

“The only reason I’m not going to talk about that play is because I will get fined,” Baz said afterward. “That’s the only reason.”

The Orioles were further frustrated when, in the ninth, Jackson Holliday was called out for leaving the baseline between home and first as he tried to avoid a tag from pitcher Louis Varland.

“The runner had not established his basepath, and then he deviated more than 3 feet to avoid that tag,” Wendelstedt explained. “That’s when I called him out.”

Antonelli kept his cool through two race starts – the initial one and the final one after the red flag – to hold the lead off the line for the first time this season and utterly dominate.

An absolute masterclass from Antonelli for his first Monaco win underlined his credentials as the likely world champion this year, even if there are scheduled to be 16 races remaining.

The talk before the race was whether Antonelli could for the first time this year keep his position off the grid.

In fact, he got away well, and instead it was Max Verstpen’s Red Bull alongside him who suffered an engine problem off the line and was passed by the entire field before retiring after limping around the first l.

That left Hamilton chasing Antonelli but any sense of competition evorated almost immediately.

The Mercedes was 2.9 seconds clear at the end of two ls and continued to build a lead of more than five seconds by the end of 10 ls.

He had to back off a little to manage overheating brakes for 10 ls but then was able to pull away again.

Antonelli was more than 20 seconds clear of Hamilton when the first safety car was called with 18 ls to go after Lance Stroll crashed his Aston Martin at the final corner.

But even though Antonelli missed the pit lane entry the first time around – asking his engineer whether to pit and being told too late that he should – he stopped the next time around and retained his lead.

Antonelli said: “It was one of those days where we had incredible pace. It was just coming all so natural. The car was feeling incredible and was just giving me the confidence to push.

“The job isn’t finished. It’s still a long season. We are going to keep pushing and keep raising the bar. The goal is to keep performing like this.”

DENVER — Milwaukee Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski threw a 103.7 mph pitch Saturday night against the Colorado Rockies, the fastest by a starter since began in 2008.

The 24-year-old right-hander’s record-setting pitch was low and outside to Kyle Karros in the third inning.

“It’s one of those things: It is what it is,” Misiorowski said. “I’m going to keep going, trying to get strikeouts, and if that’s what it takes to get strikeouts, then so be it.”

Misiorowski has thrown the 12 fastest pitches by a starter this season. His previous high was 103.4 mph against the St. Louis Cardinals on May 25.

He threw 52 pitches 100 mph or faster Saturday night, including a record 45 of at least 101 mph. He allowed just an unearned run while striking out eight in seven innings, lowering his ERA to 1.50 in a 7-1 victory over the Rockies at Coors Field.

“Miz has got great extension and great velocity, so that doesn’t surprise me,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said about the 103.7 mph fastball. “But we’ve got to get off that — the harder the better, and all that. He’s got to throw the ball in the zone and throw his other pitches in the zone. As I say often, good hitters can time up anything.”

Misiorowski threw a record 57 pitches 100 mph or faster in the May 25 game, including 40 of 101 mph or faster.

Aroldis Chman holds the record for fastest pitch by any pitcher since 2008, throwing a 105.8 mph pitch as a member of the Cincinnati Reds in 2010.

Misiorowski moved his career strikeout total to 203 in 28 pearances, tying him with the Pirates‘ Paul Skenes and former Mets right-hander Noah Syndergaard as the seventh-fastest player in MLB history to reach 200 strikeouts.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.