Sports
Shohei Ohtani's three-run blast caps memorable All-Star week for Dodgers
Shohei Ohtani wasn’t able to participate in this week’s Home Run Derby. But the Dodgers slugger didn’t leave All-Star week in Texas without a memorable big fly.
In the third inning of Major League Baseball’s 94th All-Star Game on Tuesday night at Globe Life Field, Ohtani wowed the 39,343-person crowd the best way he knows how: smoking a no-doubt, 400-foot home run halfway up the right-field stands in the American League’s eventual 5-3 win over the National League.
“At this point, it’s normal for him,” teammate Teoscar Hernández said. “It’s Shohei being Shohei.”
The blast was Ohtani’s first home run in the Midsummer Classic, where he is now two for six with three walks in four appearances (he also has a win as a pitcher, making him the only player in MLB history with both a home run and win in the event).
It was the first All-Star Game homer by a Dodgers player since Mike Piazza in 1996, and only the second by a Japanese-born player after Ichiro Suzuki’s inside-the-park home run in the 2007 game.
However, it was also the only scoring for the NL on Tuesday, denying Ohtani potential most valuable player honors that instead went to the Boston Red Sox’s Jarren Durran, a former Long Beach State and Cypress High standout, who broke a 3-3 tie in the fifth inning with a two-run homer.
“In general, I haven’t really hit well during the All-Star Game, so I’m just relieved that I put a good ball in play,” Ohtani, who also had a first-inning walk, said through interpreter Will Ireton. “I was really just focused on having a regular at-bat, as if I was in the regular season.”
Ohtani’s blast opened the scoring Tuesday night, coming on a 2-and-0 splitter from Boston Red Sox right-hander Tanner Houck. Like everyone else in the ballpark, Ohtani began to admire the drive as soon as he hit it, leaning back in the batter’s box with a long gaze before flipping his bat and rounding the bases.
From the dugout, Dodgers teammate Freddie Freeman flung his arms in celebration, while Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow’s jaw dropped.
As Ohtani came around third, he also put his arms in the air — doing the same hip-shaking, Dragon Ball Z-inspired long ball celebration that accompanied the NL-leading 29 homers he hit for the Dodgers during the first half of the season.
“It felt inevitable he was going to do it,” Freeman said. “He steps in the box, and you kind of figure he would come through. Pretty awesome.”
The Dodgers had three other players in Tuesday’s All-Star Game. A night after winning the Home Run Derby, Hernández started in center field but went 0 for 2. Catcher Will Smith entered the game in the sixth inning and recorded a single. But, in the next at-bat, Freeman came off the bench and grounded into a double play, stepping on the foot of Cleveland Guardians first baseman Josh Naylor for an awkward out that required a video review.
Glasnow, a first-time All-Star, watched the game from the dugout, unable to take the mound because of a back injury that landed him on the injured list. Glasnow has been throwing this week, and expects to return from the IL when eligible next week.
But as usual, no one topped Ohtani’s exploits Tuesday night.
Houck said he was trying to throw a low splitter to Ohtani, but left too much of it over the heart of the plate.
“Just a good swing,” he said. “The boys were going out there swinging today.”
Oakland Athletics closer Mason Miller, a flame-throwing 25-year-old rookie right-hander, had better luck against Ohtani in his last at-bat in the fifth inning, striking him out with a couple of 100-mph fastballs and a swing-and-miss slider below the zone.
“I wasn’t giving him one up,” Miller told the Fox broadcast. “That’s for sure.”
When Ohtani met with reporters during the eighth inning, he was asked if he was rooting particularly hard for an NL comeback given his MVP candidacy (a player from the losing team hasn’t won All-Star Game MVP since Carl Yastrzemski in 1970).
“In an ideal world, yes,” he said with a chuckle.
Still, “it’s an honor just being here,” he added.
Indeed, even without any award-winning hardware, Ohtani managed to once again be a main attraction on baseball’s biggest night of stars.
Missing glove
As Freeman dug through his locker in the NL’s visiting clubhouse a few hours before the game, he realized something was missing.
“Where’s my glove?” he asked out loud, with a laugh. “I seriously don’t have a glove.”
Turns out, as he was packing up his stuff at the end of the Dodgers’ series in Detroit on Sunday, Freeman’s first baseman’s glove was accidentally packed in the bag he sent back to Los Angeles.
A Little League-esque sequence ensued.
First, Freeman sought out NL starting first baseman Bryce Harper, knowing he and the Philadelphia Phillies star share Rawlings as an equipment sponsor.
Before first pitch, however, Freeman learned that New York Mets slugger Pete Alonso had an extra mitt with him in Texas.
“He was like, ‘Hey, I don’t a have a glove,’” Alonso chuckled. “I was like, ‘Well, that’s a problem. I have an extra one. Would you like to use one of mine?’”
Old friends from their days playing against each other in the NL East when Freeman played for Atlanta, Alonso joked he didn’t charge Freeman anything for the rental, either.
“Nah,” he said. “Just friendship dues. That’s it.”
Dad duty
When Hernández became the first Dodgers player to win the Home Run Derby on Monday night, there were a few current Dodgers who were missing from the celebration.
While Glasnow stuck around to the end of Hernández’s dramatic win, the club’s three other All-Star hitters were all gone by the end of the three-hour slugfest.
The reason, for Smith and Freeman at least?
They were on Dad duty, having brought their young children with them to Texas this week.
“I had to leave early,” joked Smith, whose daughter Charlotte is almost 2. “My daughter was not having it.”
The same went for Freeman, who was in town with his three sons, Charlie, Maximus, and Brandon.
Hernández said he didn’t give his lineup-mates a hard time, joking he hardly even noticed until seeing social media users wondering about their absences Tuesday.
“At the end of the day, it was a good day,” he said. “I won. So that’s all that matters.”
During batting practice before Monday’s Derby, Freeman’s oldest son, 7-year-old Charlie, received big ovations from the crowd as he raced after fly balls.
In the visiting clubhouse after Tuesday’s All-Star Game, all three boys were climbing over their eight-time All-Star of a dad.
“This is what makes it fun for me now,” Freeman said. “Obviously it’s still fun to play in All-Star Games. But when you have the joy of him coming and shagging balls and stuff like that. To see their faces, that’s what makes it fun.”
Sports
Steelers’ Mike Tomlin laments ‘volatile rhetoric’ across sports after DK Metcalf fan altercation
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Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin expressed his support for wide receiver DK Metcalf before the star player’s two-game suspension for throwing a punch at a fan was upheld.
Tomlin didn’t elaborate on his reaction to seeing the clip, which showed Metcalf near the barrier between the Steelers’ sideline and the stands. The CBS broadcast caught the interaction, which showed Metcalf pull on the fan’s shirt and take a swing.
Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin looks on from the sideline during the first half at M&T Bank Stadium on Dec. 7, 2025. (Mitch Stringer/Imagn Images)
The longtime head coach acknowledged Tuesday the increasingly “volatile rhetoric” in sports.
“Not only (in) our business, (but) college, youth sport parents,” he said. “I think it’s just a component of sport that’s developed and developed in a big way in recent years, and it’s unfortunate.”
It’s unclear what the fan, who was identified as Ryan Kennedy, said to Metcalf that sparked the altercation. Kennedy was accused of making a racist comment and saying a derogatory remark about the player’s mother. However, Kennedy vehemently denied the accusations in a statement through a law firm. The statement said no hateful language was used.
Another report said that when Metcalf was playing for the Seattle Seahawks, he reported the fan to team personnel when he was in Detroit previously.
SEVERAL NFL TEAMS HAVE PLAYOFF-CLINCHING SCENARIOS IN WEEK 17
Pittsburgh Steelers’ DK Metcalf wipes his face on the bench during the second half of an NFL football game against the Detroit Lions, Sunday, Dec. 21, 2025, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Rey Del Rio)
Tomlin didn’t speculate when asked if there were more teams could do to protect players in that situation.
“Me speaking on it and speaking on it in detail and particularly expressing my opinion regarding things doesn’t help the circumstance in any way,” he said.
The NFL upheld Metcalf’s suspension on Tuesday night.
The league said Metcalf violated league policy, which states players may not enter the stands or otherwise confront fans at any time on game day and … if a player makes unnecessary physical contact with a fan in any way that constitutes unsportsmanlike conduct or presents crowd-control issues and/or risk of injury, he will be held accountable.”
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He will miss the team’s final two games of the season and leave a boatload of money on the table.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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January has traditionally been the harshest time of the year for the Kings, who haven’t had a winning record in that month the last three seasons. But winter grew dark and gloomy a little earlier than usual because December has hardly been a walk in the park.
With Tuesday’s 3-2 loss to the Seattle Kraken, the Kings head into the NHL’s three-day Christmas break having lost six of their last seven. And things aren’t getting easier any time soon: when the team returns to the ice Saturday, it will play host to the Ducks, who lead the Pacific Division in wins, before closing out 2025 Monday on the road against the Colorado Avalanche, who lead the NHL in wins.
“It’s not going the way we all want to,” forward Kevin Fiala said. “But you know, that’s going to happen for everybody. So it’s us who have to do something about it. Who can pull us out of it? Nobody else.
“I’m not worried. Like, I’m sure we’re gonna get out of this. But it’s not acceptable right now.”
And if it doesn’t change right now, the rest of the season will be as cold as a winter frost for the Kings.
It’s not just that the team is losing, but how it’s losing that is most concerning. The Kings (15-12-9) are 31st in the 32-team NHL in scoring, 30th on the power play and have scored more than two goals just twice in 11 games this month. That’s negated a defense that is second in the league in goals allowed.
“Sometimes it’s difficult to make sense of things,” coach Jim Hiller said when asked to explain a slide that has dropped the Kings into the middle of the division standings. “We just feel like we haven’t had a good run of games where we felt like, win or lose, we really like how we’re playing.
“That’s something that we’ll keep driving towards. We just haven’t had it yet.”
Last season, Hiller’s Kings tied franchise records for wins and points in the regular season and had the best home mark in team history. This season, they’re 4-8-4 at Crypto.com Arena, the second-worst home record in the Western Conference. And that has general manager Ken Holland answering questions about Hiller’s future behind the bench.
“I expect him to be here the rest of the season,” said Holland last week, not exactly a full-throated vote of confidence.
Yet for all their struggles, December has just been a continuation of the things that have plagued the Kings all season.
“We all have high expectations for ourselves,” Hiller said. “We just haven’t hit our stride yet. That’s the part that we’re chasing. That’s what we have to focus on. We have to hit that stride.
“It’s a difficult time right now, for sure.”
On Tuesday, Hiller tried to shake things up by mixing up his lines, most significantly pairing Fiala and Andrei Kuzmenko with center Alex Turcotte. And while Fiala and Kuzmenko both responded with goals, they didn’t come until the Kraken had taken a 3-0 lead.
The first goal came from Jordan Eberle, who was left alone in front of the Kings’ net, giving him plenty of space to settle a pass from Matty Beniers before lifting the puck around goaltender Pheonix Copley and under the crossbar for his 13th goal of the season. It was the fourth power-play goal the Kings had allowed in the last two nights and the sixth in four games.
The Kraken doubled their lead on a quirky goal less than eight minutes later, with Copley misjudging a deflected shot from Seattle’s Frederick Gaudreau, allowing the puck to knuckle off his glove then trickle through his legs for the goal.
Ben Meyers extended Seattle’s lead to 3-0 with less than four minutes left in the second before the Kings finally got on the board with an unassisted goal from Fiala, his 13th of the season, 11 seconds later.
Kings coach Jim Hiller watches from the bench during the second period of a 3-2 loss to the Seattle Kraken on Tuesday night at Crypto.com Arena.
(Luke Hales / Getty Images)
Now the Kings will have three days to think about that, although Fiala said he’d gotten over the game by the time he finished showering.
“If you win five in a row or lose five in a row or whatever, it’s forgotten. It’s in the past,” he said. “I think we take the good things with us and the bad things we hopefully analyze and get better at.”
For Hiller, the break couldn’t come at a better time. Or a worse time since the team’s current seven-game slump is its deepest since the winter of 2023-24. That one cost coach Todd McLellan his job.
“I hope the players are able to relax and refresh themselves,” Hiller said. “It’s been from September till now, with the schedule and how busy it is. And 85% of our games, we’ve been playing within one goal.
“It’s taxing physically and mentally. So I’m sure those guys need a break.”
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An internet rumor swirled last week that a longtime NFL reporter had died at the age of 40.
News of Jane Slater’s supposed death on social media, but she was quick to shut it down.
An X user posted a screenshot of a post on Facebook that showed Slater in black and white with the graphic “1980-2025” saying she had died at 40. Slater, 45, was born in 1980, but the years written in the post would mean she died at either age 44 or 45.
NFL Network sideline reporter Jane Slater stands on the sidelines prior to an NFL football game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Chicago Bears, at Soldier Field on Dec. 26, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois. (Todd Rosenberg/Getty Images)
“A veteran reporter who covered the Dallas Cowboys—having followed the team for over a decade—has passed away at the age of 40 after a tragic domestic violence incident, leaving behind a 5-year-old child. Her years of dedicated work, along with the heartbreaking circumstances surrounding her death, have left loyal fans stunned, devastated, and praying for her and her family,” the post read.
The user asked Slater, “did you pass away??”
Jane Slater speaks with T.Y. Hilton of the Dallas Cowboys after the game against the Philadelphia Eagles at AT&T Stadium on Dec. 24, 2022 in Arlington, Texas. (Cooper Neill/Getty Images)
STEELERS’ AARON RODGERS HILARIOUSLY TRASH TALKS STAR DEFENDER IN MIC’D UP MOMENT
“I don’t think so? But does this mean there is (a) glitch in the matrix? I’m gonna wrap myself in bubble wrap until NYE,” Slater joked.
If there is one thing the Facebook post got correct, it’s that Slater does mainly cover the Cowboys for the NFL Network.
NFL Network reporter Jane Slater on the sideline prior to an NFC Wild Card Playoff game between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Dallas Cowboys at Raymond James Stadium on Jan. 16, 2023 in Tampa, Florida. (Perry Knotts/Getty Images)
Prior to joining in 2016, Slater worked for ESPN and the Longhorn Network, having attended the University of Texas. She also hosted a radio show in Dallas.
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