With just over a month left in the regular season, MLB contenders are starting to reveal themselves. 

Of the division races, only the NL West's is truly suspenseful, since it has two of the three best teams in baseball. The division leaders elsewhere at the start of September are likely to remain that way. That's with all due respect to the Philadelphia Phillies and Oakland A's, who probably feel like they have a shot at making a run in their respective divisions. 

For all of the highlights, there was also disappointment over the last few weeks.

So let's go over the biggest MLB winners and losers of August.       

Winner: New York Yankees

Despite a blip at the end of the month, the Bronx Bombers did more for their 2021 reputation in August than any team. A 13-game winning streak, which the Yankees had not accomplished in 60 years, pushed them past the Boston Red Sox for the top American League wild-card spot.

Simply put, this has been the scariest team in baseball since the All-Star break, and we still don't necessarily feel great about its consistency. 

The Yankees went 6-1 to start August before trading wins and losses with the Seattle Mariners, Kansas City Royals and Chicago White Sox. 

Only the Rays scored more runs than the Yankees last month.

Gerrit Cole is doing Gerrit Cole things, becoming the fastest Yankees pitcher to 200 strikeouts in just 24 games.

Luis Severino is throwing again, and getting Corey Kluber back in the rotation should help a lot, despite his shaky outing Monday night against the Los Angeles Angels.     

Loser: Javy Baez and the New York Mets

As if the organization had not found enough ways to embarrass itself in recent years, now the players have to be admonished for gesturing negatively against their own fans.

Booing the customer is bizarre, but Baez trying to explain it is downright sad.

"We're not machines," Baez told reporters. "We're going to struggle seven times out of 10. It just feels bad when ... I strike out and get booed. It doesn't really get to me, but I want to let them know that when we're successful, we're going to do the same thing to let them know how it feels."

The Mets were toward the bottom of nearly every offensive statistical category in August. Entering Tuesday, Baez was slashing .207/.258/.414 in that time, and he missed 11 straight games in the middle of the month with back spasms.

Other than sweeping the Washington Nationals at Citi Field in mid-August, there has not been much to cheer for with the Mets.

They allowed the Phillies to supplant them as the threat to Atlanta in the NL East, and their wild-card chances are thin, with five better teams vying for the two spots.    

Winner: Bryce Harper

Speaking of the Phillies, let's just take a moment to admire Bryce Harper, who entered Tuesday slashing .323/.444/.774 in 93 at-bats in August.   

Harper also had 10 home runs and 10 doubles and drew the third-most walks in that time. He hit his 26th home run of the season in Monday night's win over his former team.

It's wild to think this guy was not an All-Star considering what he's done the past month.

Harper's been healthy and playing every day without breaking stride.

"He's meant so much to us," Phillies manager Joe Girardi said of Harper after Monday's game. "He's grinded it out, played every day, stolen bases, played good defense, walked, driven in runs, big hits. He's been special."

Loser: San Diego Padres

After lofty expectations, the Padres find themselves fighting for the final wild-card spot. It's still in play, but August was not favorable to San Diego. 

The Padres had three separate four-game losing streaks in the month. 

Hard-throwing right-hander Chris Paddack, pitching for the first time Monday since July 27, led the Padres to just their fourth win in their previous 17 games. 

What had been a compelling and dominant three-team race in the NL West is now down to two squads, with the Padres looking up at the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers. 

Adam Frazier was the major league leader in hits when San Diego acquired him from the Pirates, but he has not been the same player since. 

Entering Tuesday, Frazier was slashing just .235/.287/.272 in August, by far his worst month of the season. He had 19 hits in that time, compared to no other month with fewer than 29. 

It got so bad, Frazier was benched for three straight games in favor of Jurickson Profar. 

Every other team seriously competing for the NL wild-card spots has looked better than San Diego in recent weeks.     

Winner: Joey Votto

Votto continues his impressive bounce-back season from a forgettable 2019 and 2020.    

He hit 28 home runs within 100 games for the first time in his career. Votto was right there with all of the game's top-performing first basemen in August—only Colorado's C.J. Cron and Chicago's Jose Abreu had more RBI.

Votto has talked openly about rediscovering how to hit after hitting rock bottom last year. He says it's fun again, and it certainly appears that way. 

Votto is top five in barrels per plate appearance and top 10 in average exit velocity, according to Baseball Savant. 

Even though he missed a month of action with a thumb injury, Votto is having the best power-hitting season of his career, just shy of his 38th birthday in September.

Loser: Boston Red Sox

The Red Sox are probably the most obvious loser of August.

A recent COVID-19 outbreak and losses to the Rays the past two days diminished realistic hope of competing for the division title they once seemed poised to claim. 

Disappointment and fatigue are palpable in the clubhouse. After mostly having no COVID issues leading up to August, the Red Sox have had 14 separate incidents of positive tests or close contacts from players and staff since Aug. 3. 

Testing issues even made it difficult for manager Alex Cora to name a starter for Tuesday against the Rays after Monday's game concluded. 

While the Red Sox generally hit the ball well last month, pitching was subpar. They entered Tuesday tied for the fifth-highest WHIP in August, with the ninth-highest ERA and opposing batting average. 

Boston's pitching staff was arguably the worst among playoff contenders in the month.   

Winner: Adam Wainwright

At age 40, Wainwright is the second-oldest pitcher on a major league roster, but nothing about his 2021 season suggests someone who's aging.

Wainwright is in the middle of one of the more impressive stretches of his career.

He pitched the most innings in August and posted the lowest WHIP, ahead of Brewers stud Corbin Burnes. His ERA in August was an impressive 1.43, and no pitcher won more games than Wainwright (five).

On the season, he holds a 2.97 ERA in 26 starts, and over his last nine starts, Wainwright's FanGraphs WAR is 2.0. Only Burnes and Walker Buehler have been as valuable as pitchers.

No one in their right mind would have predicted this at the start of the season. This is someone who just two years ago wasn't even guaranteed a spot in the rotation.