Six scoreless innings from Blake Snell gave the Dodgers exactly the kind of outing any club would welcome.

On paper, it looked like a performance worth applauding.

Snell, however, framed it more cautiously, calling the start a “good starting point.”

“I think I can be way better,” Snell said.

As Snell reflected on his work in the Dodgers’ 5-3 win over the Washington Nationals on Saturday night, his tone made clear that satisfaction had not yet arrived. The results were strong, but in his view, his form still had another level to reach.

He isn’t alone.

The starters who will comprise the Dodgers’ postseason rotation know that when the playoffs start, they will have to pitch better than they have. Their team’s inconsistent offense will once again give them little margin for error, perhaps even less than last year with Shohei Ohtani dealing with multiple injuries.

If October marks the start of the baseball season in Los Angeles, September is spring training. The pitchers have three weeks to prepare for the starts that will define their seasons, or perhaps even careers. Up next will be Tyler Glasnow, who pitches Saturday in only his third start since returning from a 3 ½-month absence that was forced on him by back spasms.

The night before Snell beat the Nationals, Tarik Skubal was flabbergasted by his stat line in his start against the St. Louis Cardinals: 5 ⅓ innings, two runs, 10 hits, all of them singles.

“I mean, 10 singles,” said Skubal, taking solace in how he didn’t give up any extra-base hits. 

Skubal said he threw the ball well, pointing to how pitches that missed by a couple of inches to either side radically transformed certain at-bats.

“In my eyes,” Skubal said, “that’s executing a pitch.”

Which isn’t to say he Skubal viewed himself entirely as a victim of dumb luck.

“I’ve gotta continue to make pitches and continue to suppress contact and try and get misses when I can,” he said.

The start was the sixth for Skubal since his trade from the Detroit Tigers. He has pitched more than six innings only once for the Dodgers, with whom he is 1-2 with a 3.03 earned-run average.

“I know we haven’t seen the best of him yet,” manager Dave Roberts said.

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The Dodgers saw the best of Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Wednesday – for five innings.

Facing the Cardinals, Yamamoto had a no-hitter through five innings that was broken up in the sixth on a leadoff single by José Fermín. Two batters later, Yamamoto gave up a home run to Thomas Saggese. 

In the next inning, Yamamoto gave up a leadoff double to Jordan Walker, which was followed by a home run by Leo Bernal.

“When I went into the stretch, my control was really bad,” Yamamoto said in Japanese.

He departed the game with a 5-4 lead, which the bullpen failed to protect. The Dodgers lost the game in extra innings.

Yamamoto was frustrated, as he thought it was inexcusable to lose a game in which the Dodgers’ slumping offense scored five runs.

“They scored for me, and it was a game we could have won if I’d held the other team,” Yamamoto said.

Yamamoto has made 25 starts, and his numbers are better than they were last year at the same stage, as he has a 2.67 ERA in 165 innings. Through his first 25 starts last year, he had a 2.90 ERA in 139 ⅔ innings.

Yamamoto’s personal trainer, Osamu Yada, said Yamamoto should start hitting his stride in the second half of the month, which should position him to perform as well, if not better, in the playoffs than he did last year when he was the most valuable player of the World Series.

As for Snell, he said he had to be more efficient.

His six-inning effort was an inning longer than his previous start, but he continued to call on himself to pitch deeper into the game.

“Going six is cool, and it’s a good starting point,” Snell said. “I really want to go seven, eight. I want to get to nine.”

Snell, who pitched for only the fifth time since he returned from an early-season elbow operation, threw 100 pitches.

“I just can’t be walking guys that I know I can get out. Just gotta get ahead, quit trying to be so perfect and just attack it.”

That’s what Snell did when he pitched seven shutout innings against the Cincinnati Reds in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series last year. That’s what he did when he blanked the Milwaukee Brewers over eight innings in the opening game of the National League Championship Series.

Snell knows where he wants to be when the playoffs open. He has three more regular-season starts to get there.

CAIRO — The U.S. military said Saturday it had hit three Iranian oil tankers after Navy warships came under missile fire, issuing a sharp warning that it would “if necessary, destroy Iran’s limited and exposed oil fleet.”

The attacks came just a day after President Donald Trump attempted to downplay the conflict as “small potatoes,” but they underscored a renewed shift toward open fighting in a stop-start war now stretching into its sixth month. The conflict began with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Feb. 28, and since then both sides have pursued military and economic pressure as diplomatic efforts have fallen apart.

According to the U.S. military statement, an American aircraft carrier and a destroyer avoided “multiple unprovoked Iranian attacks” while operating in the region. No U.S. service members were injured, officials said. The military added that two Iranian oil carriers were “permanently disabled,” while a third tanker, which was not carrying cargo, was destroyed.

U.S. officials said the vessels belonged to a shadow shipping network used to generate funding for Iran’s influential Revolutionary Guard and allied armed groups across the Middle East.

Earlier, Iranian state television reported that four U.S. missiles had struck a tanker roughly six miles (10 kilometers) off Kharg Island, the site of a key export terminal handling much of Iran’s oil. The island has been hit repeatedly during the war, including in March when U.S. strikes targeted military facilities there.

The U.S. said one tanker was struck off Kharg Island and another was struck near Jask, east of the Strait of Hormuz. The unladen tanker was hit in the Gulf of Oman. The statement shared what it called video footage of the strikes.

“We will not hesitate to defend American forces, and if necessary, destroy Iran’s limited and exposed oil fleet,” the head of U.S. Central Command Adm. Brad Cooper said.

The strikes came nearly a week after the U.S. and Iran resumed attacks following a month of relative calm, with the strait and Iranian communities along it again being targeted. At least five people were killed earlier in the week during a U.S. bombardment of southern Iran. One strike hit a wedding.

The resumption of fighting came after new U.S. efforts to apply economic pressures on Tehran, whose hard-line new senior leaders have signaled the willingness to dig in after weathering decades of sanctions.

Meanwhile, the issue that helped lead to the war – Iran’s nuclear program – was meant to be addressed in negotiations that fell apart soon after the U.S. and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding in mid-June. Instead, Tehran’s new leverage focuses on the strait that is crucial to global oil and natural gas shipments and was seen as an international waterway before the war began.

The U.S. military has been helping to guide ships through the strait as Tehran asserts control and targets some vessels, but overall traffic remains low.

___

Anna reported from Jerusalem.

A wealthy influencer died after undergoing penis enlargement surgery at a clinic in Thailand while on vacation with his wife.

An inquest in London heard last month that Igho Ubiribo, 43, died in March after he was injected with 40 milliliters of hyaluronic acid and lidocaine at the Thai clinic.

The British-Nigerian businessman had been taking a break with his wife, Danielle Simba Allen, when he chose to undergo the procedure.

After the treatment, Ubiribo, who spent much of his time at a $1.1 million home in the Crenshaw neighborhood of Los Angeles, went for a massage with Danielle before complaining of chest pain and fainting twice.

Ubiribo, a well-known social media personality with 185,000 Instagram followers, was rushed to hospital by ambulance, where he was still able to respond to questions.

Once he got to the Sukhumvit Hospital in Bangkok, Ubiribo was admitted to the emergency room where he was seen by doctors who recommended a CT scan.

However Ubiribo lost consciousness before the scan could be carried out.

Dr Thongchai Chansirirattingkul, of Sukhumvit Hospital, said: ‘He had had two cases of syncope (fainting) earlier, when he was having a massage.

‘He had had 40 milliliters of penile filler injections earlier that day.’

Assistant coroner Jean Harkin said: ‘Igho Ubiribo was having a massage with his wife when he started to complain of chest pain.

‘When he was in the ambulance he was able to answer questions normally. His wife was able to confirm that he had passed out two times.

‘When he got to the hospital, his wife confirmed that he had filler injections in the penis.’

She added: ‘The cardiologist talked about his clinical condition, prognosis and interventions.

‘He was sent to the intensive care unit.’

His wife had told doctors at the hospital about her husband’s penile procedure.

They confirmed he was suffering from a pulmonary embolism – when a clot blocks a blood vessel in the lungs.

Although medics tried to resuscitate him, he died in the early hours of March 6 after more than 100 minutes of CPR.

His London-based primary care doctor confirmed that Ubiribo had an operation on his joints, was pre-diabetic and suffered from gout but had no other medical issues.

Meanwhile, pathologist John du Parcq carried out a postmortem in the UK and also found Ubiribo had suffered a pulmonary embolism.

In his report, Dr du Parcq said: ‘Cellular material found in Mr Ubiribo’s lungs matched the hyaluronic acid used in his penis filler jab, in keeping with a pulmonary embolism.

‘This matches the Thai autopsy.’

The couple had been staying at the Marriott Hotel in the Thai capital, an inquest at Inner West London Coroners’ Court heard.

The clinic where the procedure was carried out was not named.

Besides his Los Angeles home, Ubiribo owned a $600,000 flat in Shepherds Bush, West London, with his Anglo-Zimbabwean socialite and fashion designer wife.

The couple got married in 2022 in Harare, Zimbabwe, in a $473,000 ceremony described as ‘lavish’ by Zimbabwean media.

Ubiribo – whose nicknames were ‘Tiny and ‘Ego’ – was laid to rest in London in May in a gold coffin which reportedly cost more than $675,000.

Mourners at his funeral included his childhood friend and Nigerian afrobeat star Davido as well as celebrity barman Cubana Chief Priest and Pastor Tobi Adegboyega.

Speaking at the funeral in Kensington, Davido said: ‘I won’t lie, it is not easy when someone like Tiny leaves. His absence is heavy; it doesn’t feel real.

‘A man of so much energy, so much presence. The silence is heavy. He is not someone I ever thought I would be speaking about in the past tense.’

The pair’s social media showed a luxury lifestyle, with the couple pictured skiing in designer gear and posing with Rolls-Royces and yachts,

Although it is not known how many men have penis fillers every year, reports suggest that it is a growing number.

Hyaluronic acid is injected into the penis before being massaged to spread it out, which the patient should then continue to do at home.

The resultant increase in penis width lasts for between six and nine months.

The procedure – which costs up to $9,000, has been criticized by medical professionals, with the British Association of Urological Surgeons issuing warnings against it.

Professor Vaibhav Modgil, an NHS andrologist and consultant urological surgeon from Manchester, said he had seen men come to hospital with their skin sloughing off.

He said: ‘It can be devastating for the patient.’

Professor Modgil added: ‘Men will go in thinking, ‘Oh, it’s gonna be brilliant’, but they might come out actually being even more dissatisfied than when they went in.’

In 2017, a Swedish man died when he had fat transferred into his penis – only to suffer an embolism caused by it migrating into his bloodstream.

And 65-year-old billionaire Ehud Arye Laniado suffered a fatal heart attack during a private penis enlargement injection treatment at an aesthetic clinic in Paris in 2019.

Coroner Jean Harkin recorded a narrative conclusion on Ubiribo’s death.

She said: ‘Igho Ubiribo, a businessman, died as the result of a cosmetic procedure abroad.

‘His death was caused by a pulmonary embolism as the result of an injection of hyaluronic acid into the penis.’

She added: ‘My sincerest condolences go out to Ms Allen.’

This was supposed to be remembered as Pete Crow-Armstrong’s arrival, the season Cam Schlittler carved out a reputation as a true ace, and the 2026 campaign in which the White Sox finally climbed out of baseball’s basement.

Instead, the lasting headline will be something far less celebratory: a year defined by disappointment, and not just from one underachieving club.

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The Mets failed to absorb the hard lessons of last season and somehow slid even further. The 2025 ALCS field turned into a warning label for almost everyone except the Yankees — yes, Blue Jays, Mariners and Tigers, that includes you. More broadly, the American League was so shockingly weak that even some of baseball’s most frustrating teams remained mathematically alive for a postseason spot with three weeks still on the schedule.

Pittsburgh appeared to build a stronger roster around Paul Skenes, only for Skenes to regress and drag the Pirates down with him. Terry Francona’s familiar managerial magic did not carry the Reds for a second straight season, and Tony Vitello’s college-baseball energy failed to translate into a spark for the Giants.