This has been an important month in Major League Baseball as teams try to separate themselves after the trade deadline.

Only one month remains to make a final impression. What teams did in August determines how desperate they are in September.

There are also players either performing at their best or worst at this point in the season.

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Here, we take a look at some of the biggest winners and losers of August, based on performance and record.

 

Winner: St. Louis Cardinals

The Cardinals put on a show in August, boasting a dominant 21-6 record for the month.

Albert Pujols, at 42 years old, is playing some of the best baseball he's ever played. He inched closer to 700 career home runs Monday night, hitting his 694th homer.

It was hit off Cincinnati Reds left-hander Ross Detweiler, who became the 450th pitcher Pujols has homered against, passing Barry Bonds for the most number of pitchers blasted.

Pujols has a 1.374 OPS with eight home runs in August heading into Tuesday's action.

Then you have Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado, who are second and third in WAR, respectively, behind only Aaron Judge. For as great as they've both been this season, August was Arenado's best month and Goldschmidt's best since May.

Goldschmidt led MLB with nine home runs in August heading into Tuesday, while Arenado and Pujols tied with three others with eight.

 

Loser: New York Yankees

Other than watching Aaron Judge chasing Roger Maris' home run record, and the fact that they are still likely to finish with a top-two record in the American League, it's been a miserable month for the Yankees.

They're 10-17 in August after Tuesday night's win against the Los Angeles Angels. It's by far their worst month of the season.

The Yankees' OPS in August is .651. They are slashing .222/.298/.353 through 26 games.

They lost three games in a row to the lowly Angels and Oakland Athletics, a pair of non-contenders in the AL West. To make matters worse, Aroldis Chapman's disappointing 2022 season is being punctuated with a stint on the 15-day injured list with "a pretty bad infection" on his leg, stemming from a new tattoo.

The Yankees have been toward the top of the standings for most of the season but are now 23-30 since the end of June.