Baseball is a game that has always held its own history in high regard. And one of the best ways to keep track of that history has been through statistical milestones, numbers that have come to act as a sort of distillation of greatness. Round numbers that represent on-field brilliance in an easy-to-understand way.

Granted, changes in the game are in turn changing these milestones. The way the game is played and the meaning of the numbers being tallied isn’t what it once was; the sabermetric revolution has altered how we look at these statistics. Still, there’s something undeniably special about those iconic career marks. While their relevance may fade someday, we’re not there yet.

All that said, we have a handful of players who are looking at potentially reaching some significant statistical thresholds during the 2022 season.

Let’s have a look at some of the big ones looming this year.

Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Max Scherzer joined an exclusive club over the weekend.

Scherzer entered the game against the San Diego Padres with 2,994 Ks. The 3,000th came in the fifth inning against Eric Hosmer; he’d finish the game with nine Ks in eight innings, leaving his total (for the moment) at the delightfully-palindromic 3,003. He is the 19th pitcher in MLB history to cross that threshold.

What’s crazy is there was even more history to be made.

And down the stretch they come.

We’re in mid-August and entering the home stretch of the Major League Baseball season. By the time you read this, teams will have roughly 40 games left until playoff time. It looks like there are some foregone conclusions, but also a few hard-fought races – particularly for some of the squads battling it out for wild card spots.

The competition for MLB’s individual awards looks a little different. We have a little bit of turnover from midseason, but it has mostly been holdover chalk; some of our picks at the halfway mark have really solidified their positions. While we’ve got a couple of two- or three-man races, it’ll really take some leaps for anyone else to crowd their way in. But hey – six weeks is a LONG time. And a lot can happen. We’ll just have to see how it plays out.

This is Clubhouse Leaders.

(Note: All statistics through Aug. 12.)

So we’re pulling the trigger just a little early for our final MLB Award picks. There are still a handful of games left to be played as this goes to print, but the truth is that none of the races are so close that the final picks are likely to change.

(Feel free to point this out to me after one of the contenders goes off and hits half-a-dozen homers or whatever and makes me look foolish.)

It has been a remarkable year in Major League Baseball, with all of the requisite ups and downs that come with the longest regular season in American professional sports. Through it all, there have been a few players who have outshined the rest. Some have been steady all season, while others have ridden periodic, meteoric hot streaks to gaudy final numbers. All have earned their spots in this conversation, but there can only be one winner of these trophies.

Here they are: 2018’s final Clubhouse Leaders.

We’re in mid-August and entering the home stretch of the Major League Baseball season. By the time you read this, teams will have roughly 40 games left until playoff time. It looks like there are some foregone conclusions, but also a few hard-fought races – particularly for some of the squads battling it out for the wild card bids.

The races for MLB’s individual awards are in a similar state. Some of these seem to be all but over, while others feature players going head-to-head with extraordinary performances. Take a look and see what kind of movement we’re dealing with here.

This is Clubhouse Leaders.

Yes, yes, I know. We tend to view the All-Star break as midseason and that’s not for a couple more weeks. However, when you’re reading this, we’re going to be right around the 80-game mark, which is the ACTUAL middle of a 162-game season.

And so here we are with Clubhouse Leaders.

Major League Baseball has the longest season of any of the major professional sports leagues, with 162 games to be played before reaching the October postseason. That many games leaves room for a lot of changes to happen over the season's six-month course.

We’re approaching the one-quarter mark and what we see can start to be taken seriously. With just over 40 games in the books, a significant chunk of the 2018 season is in the rearview mirror. There have been some impressive performances thus far; let's look at one man's opinion regarding who would win MLB's major individual awards if the season ended today.

The end of another long Major League Baseball season is upon us. At the time this piece is going to press, a handful of games remain, but as far as making predictions for MLB awards, the season is effectively over.

A number of players have had spectacular seasons in 2017. In a year where both home runs and strikeouts have come at an unprecedented pace, we’ve seen some incredible individual performances.

Again, it’s possible that a truly monstrous final week – in either the good or bad sense – could alter the trajectory of one or more of these players. However, the likelihood of that is slim. The reality is that what we see is almost certainly what we get at this point.

And so, my final predictions for MLB’s 2017 award winners.

We’re well into August and the MLB season is about to make that final push through season’s end and on into October.

By the time you read this, the official halfway point of the Major League Baseball season will have passed; the unofficial halfway point – the All-Star Game – just a few days away.