MLB

The Boston Red Sox officially promoted Mike Hazen to general manager Thursday, the team confirmed. Hazen takes over for Ben Cherington, who resigned shortly after Dave Dombrowski was named president of baseball operations.    

A frustrating season for Washington Nationals second baseman Danny Espinosa will end early, as the 28-year-old is battling a hamstring injury.   

Continue for updates.

With the MLB postseason around the corner, Bleacher Report brought in a couple of very qualified individuals to give their predictions.

With less than two weeks remaining in the MLB regular season, the playoff picture is coming into focus as teams have few opportunities left to stake their claim to a postseason spot.

The St. Louis Cardinals and Pittsburgh Pirates enter Thursday's slate of games as the only two teams to clinch playoff berths thus far, but there are likely many more to come over the next few days, as some of the divisional races are reaching nearly insurmountable levels.

Fact: This is the third consecutive year the Pittsburgh Pirates have clinched a playoff spot on September 23.

Bleacher Report will be bringing sports fans the most interesting and engaging Cold Hard Fact of the day, presented by Coors Light.

Source: SportsCenter

Baseball great Yogi Berra died September 22 at the age of 90. As the baseball world reacted to the terrible news, legendary announcer Vin Scully gave a touching tribute to the 10-time World Series champion before the Los Angeles Dodgers game Wednesday night. 

All eyes are still focused on the pennant races and postseason in Major League Baseball, but all 30 clubs are already making plans for the offseason involving free agents and whom they can afford to sign. 

We are less than two weeks away from the start of the 2015 MLB playoffs, with the AL Wild Card Game set to be played on Oct. 6 and the NL Wild Card Game slated for Oct. 7.

Anything can happen in October—as we've seen time and again—and trying to predict how the postseason will shake out is often an exercise in futility.

After all, how many people can honestly say they picked Kansas City versus San Francisco in a thrilling seven-game World Series last year?

There's nothing quite like late September baseball. The air is crisper, the ball makes a different sound when it comes off the bat, every game takes on increased importance and teams and players alike are jockeying for position in races for playoff spots and individual awards.

While all of that is enough to keep much of the baseball universe's focus squarely on the action, it hasn't kept the rumor mill from looking ahead and beginning to pick up steam in advance of the upcoming offseason.

Thursday features four MLB games in the afternoon and eight at night.  Clayton Kershaw is an easy No. 1 choice among the eight starting pitchers available in early contests, but his $14,700 salary will likely have DraftKings daily fantasy players searching for a cheap second arm.