Rockies pitcher German Marquez is Saturday’s Box-Toppers Player of the Day.
Also Saturday, Diamondbacks pitcher Zack Greinke rises to fourth place in Box-Toppers season player rankings after earning Player of the Game honors.
Top 10 players
Here are the top 10 players in Box-Toppers points (BTP) for the 2017 season as of July 29:| Player | Pos | Team | BTP | |
| 1 | Kershaw, Clayton 2494 | pi sp | lad nl | 22.1 |
| 2 | Scherzer, Max 2588 | pi sp | dc nl | 20.0 |
| 3 | Sale, Chris 2806 | pi sp | bos al | 17.1 |
| 4 | Greinke, Zack 1871 | pi sp | ari nl | 13.4 |
| 5 | Wood, Alex 3246 | pi sp | lad nl | 13.0 |
| 6 | Strasburg, Stephen 2736 | pi sp | dc nl | 12.4 |
| 7 | Santana, Ervin 2005 | pi sp | min al | 12.4 |
| 8 | Carrasco, Carlos 2885 | pi sp | cle al | 11.4 |
| 9 | Paxton, James 3280 | pi sp | sea al | 11.0 |
| 10 | deGrom, Jacob 3343 | pi sp | nym nl | 10.7 |
Player of the Day—Marquez struck out 10 over seven innings, allowing two runs, three hits and no walks, in the 4-2 win over the Nationals. Marquez had a perfect game going into the sixth inning, retiring the first 16 batters.
American League Player of the Day—Orioles pitcher Kevin Gausman struck out eight over 8 2/3 scoreless innings, allowing seven hits and three walks, in the 4-0 win over the Rangers.
American League Batter of the Day—Rajai Davis of the Athletics hit a two-run, walk-off homer in the 5-4 win over the Twins. Davis also doubled and went 4-for-5, scoring twice.
National League Batter of the Day—There is no NL Batter of the Day for Saturday because no NL batter earned Player of the Game honors.
Rankings—Diamondbacks pitcher Zack Greinke rises from sixth to fourth place in Box-Toppers season player rankings after earning Player of the Game honors Saturday.
Greinke (7IP 4H R BB 9K W in the 7-1 win over the Cardinals) earns 1.0 Box-Toppers point, giving him 13.4 for the season. He ranks third among NL pitchers behind Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers (22.1) and Max Scherzer of the Nationals (20.0). Greinke is 6.6 points behind second-place Scherzer, meaning it would take at least four starts to catch him.
Greinke also now has 169.5 career Box-Toppers points, maintaining his 10th-place rank among all players since 1995, when Box-Toppers tracking began. Greinke trails ninth-ranked Roy Halladay (170.7).
Top 10 watch—In addition to Greinke, one other player in Box-Toppers top 10 player rankings started Saturday—Mets pitcher Jacob deGrom—but he did not earn Player of the Game honors.
deGrom (6IP 5H 3R 2ER BB 10K L in the 3-2 loss to the Mariners) had a Box-Toppers game score of +5.0. But since the Mets lost, he did not earn Player of the Game honors, even though his game score was higher than Player of the Game Jarrod Dyson of the Mariners (2-3 2BI). Dyson had a Box-Toppers game score of +1.0.
Scoring—Marquez earns 2.0 Box-Toppers points for being Player of the Day and Gausman earns 1.7 points for being AL Player of the Day. Davis earns 1.5 points for being AL Batter of the Day. All of Saturday’s other Players of the Game (listed in the chart below) earn 1.0 Box-Toppers point.
About Box-Toppers—Box-Toppers tracks who most helps their team win the most games. Using standard box score statistics, Box-Toppers uses a simple formula to determine a Player of the Game for each Major League Baseball game played. That player is the person who contributed most to his team’s win. In regular season games, players earn 1.0 Box-Toppers point for being named Player of the Game and can earn bonus points for being Player of the Day or top player or batter in their league for the day.
Box-Toppers strives for accuracy. See a mistake in a post? A wrong name, wrong team, grammar error, spelling goof, etc.? Thanks for pointing it out! Contact Box-Toppers here. Let's fix it and make it right.
Top player from each game
Listed from highest to lowest Box-Toppers game score| 7/29 | Score | Game | Player of the Game | AB | R | H | BI | IP | H | R | ER | BB | K | |
| MLB | 10.0 | COL 4, WSH 2 | German Marquez (W, 9-4) | - | - | - | - | 7.0 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 10 | |
| 9.0 | ARI 7, STL 1 | Zack Greinke (W, 13-4) | - | - | - | - | 7.0 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9 | ||
| AL | 6.2 | BAL 4, TEX 0 | Kevin Gausman (W, 8-7 | - | - | - | - | 8.2 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 8 | |
| 5.0 | SD 4, PIT 2 | Dinelson Lamet (W, 5-4) | - | - | - | - | 6.0 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 7 | ||
| 5.0 | `LAA 6, TOR 5 | Yusmeiro Petit | - | - | - | - | 4.0 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 5 | ||
| 4.0 | PHI 4, ATL 3 (F/11) | Hector Neris (W, 3-4) | - | - | - | - | 2.0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | ||
| 3.2 | MIA 7, CIN 3 | Adam Conley (W, 4-3) | - | - | - | - | 7.2 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 7 | ||
| BAT | 3.0 | OAK 5, MIN 4 | Rajai Davis RF | 5 | 2 | 4 | 2 | - | - | - | - | - | - | |
| 3.0 | NYY 5, TB 4 | Chase Headley PH | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | - | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| 2.2 | LAD 2, SF 1 | Rich Hill (W, 8-4) | - | - | - | - | 5.2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | ||
| 2.2 | CLE 5, CHW 4 | Andrew Miller (W, 4-3) | - | - | - | - | 1.2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | ||
| 2.0 | BOS 9, KC 8 (F/10) | Eduardo Nunez 2B | 6 | 2 | 3 | 3 | - | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| 2.0 | DET 5, HOU 3 | Jose Iglesias SS | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | - | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| 2.0 | CHC 2, MIL 1 (F/11) | Wade Davis (S, 21) | - | - | - | - | 1.0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | ||
| 1.0 | SEA 3, NYM 2 | Jarrod Dyson CF | 3 | 0 | 2 | 2 | - | - | - | - | - | - |
AL—Overall American League Player of the Day, worth 1.7 total Box-Toppers points.
NL—Overall National League Player of the Day, worth 1.7 total Box-Toppers points.
BAT—Top AL or NL Batter of the Day, worth 1.5 total Box-Toppers points.
All other players listed here earn Player of the Game honors, worth 1.0 Box-Toppers point.
` Pitcher had a no-decision in the game and did not pick up a win or a save.
Box-Toppers point totals of the day’s top players
Here are Box-Toppers point totals of each of the Players of the Game. Players are ranked by their Box-Toppers point total for the current season (’17). Also shown are each players’ Box-Toppers point total for this season and last (’16-17), the period 2012-2017 (’12-17) and each players’ career point total. Also shown is how their 2017 Box-Toppers point total compares with their 2016 total (+/-).| Player of the Game | Pos | Team | ’17 | ’16-17 | ’12-17 | Career | +/- |
| Greinke, Zack 1871 | pi sp | ari nl | 13.4 | 23.1 | 92.4 | 169.5 | 3.7 |
| Hill, Rich 2215 | pi sp | lad nl | 8.7 | 23.1 | 27.1 | 46.8 | -5.7 |
| Gausman, Kevin 3191 | pi sp | bal al | 8.1 | 18.9 | 32.3 | 32.3 | -2.7 |
| Iglesias, Jose 3532 | ss | det al | 7.0 | 7.0 | 8.0 | 8.0 | 7.0 |
| Lamet, Dinelson 3808 | pi sp | sd nl | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 |
| Marquez, German 3788 | pi sp | col nl | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 | 4.7 |
| Miller, Andrew 2436 | pi mr | cle al | 4.0 | 12.0 | 19.0 | 27.0 | -4.0 |
| Davis, Wade 2681 | pi cp | chi nl | 4.0 | 8.0 | 23.0 | 30.0 | 0.0 |
| Neris, Hector 3553 | pi cp | phi nl | 4.0 | 6.0 | 7.0 | 7.0 | 2.0 |
| Conley, Adam 3594 | pi sp | fla nl | 3.0 | 9.7 | 12.7 | 12.7 | -3.7 |
| Nunez, Eduardo 2795 | lf 3b 2b | bos al | 3.0 | 8.5 | 15.5 | 18.0 | -2.5 |
| Petit, Yusmeiro 2337 | pi mr sp | ana al | 2.0 | 4.0 | 11.0 | 20.7 | 0.0 |
| Davis, Rajai 2430 | rf | oak al | 1.5 | 1.5 | 13.5 | 26.2 | 1.5 |
| Headley, Chase 2552 | 3b ph | nyy al | 1.0 | 5.5 | 15.0 | 29.5 | -3.5 |
| Dyson, Jarrod 2813 | cf | sea al | 1.0 | 2.5 | 6.5 | 9.0 | -0.5 |