Sports

Dodgers defense ruins strong return by Yoshinobu Yamamoto in loss to Cubs

Published

2 hours ago

September 11, 2024

Dodgers defense ruins strong return by Yoshinobu Yamamoto in loss to Cubs

The Dodgers have gotten almost nothing but bad news on the pitching injury front this year.

On Tuesday, however, the storm clouds hovering over the staff might have finally — or at least partially — begun to clear.

It wasn’t just that Yoshinobu Yamamoto struck out eight batters in a dazzling four-inning, one-run return from the injured list. Or that Tyler Glasnow took another step in his recovery from elbow tendinitis, throwing a bullpen session ahead of a scheduled simulated game later this week.

Rather, for the first time in months, the team might actually be able to do more than dream about what a potential postseason rotation could look like.

“I feel much better about the rotation tonight than I did 24 hours ago,” manager Dave Roberts said.

Now only if they could have done something about their sloppy defense.

The Dodgers lost 6-3 to the Chicago Cubs at Dodger Stadium on Tuesday, with numerous defensive miscues (including three errors in a decisive five-run eighth inning) contributing to each of the Cubs’ tallies in their series-clinching win.

“We made a lot of mental mistakes tonight,” third baseman Max Muncy said. “We’ve got to eliminate that.”

Indeed, for a team that Roberts hoped would be in “playoff mode” at this point — as they close in on another National League West division title, holding a 4 1/2-game lead at the end of play Tuesday — the maddening mental lapses in the field wasted what was otherwise an encouraging day on the mound.

With Yamamoto at last back, Glasnow looking increasingly likely to come back in time for the playoffs, and top trade deadline acquisition Jack Flaherty continuing to bounce back in a resurgent 2024 season, the Dodgers might wind up with three talented starters to rely on after all.

Less than three weeks out from the start of the postseason, the makings of an actual October rotation are finally coming into focus.

“It’s starting to turn,” Roberts said, “in terms of getting back the rotation that we had envisioned.”

This all, of course, remains no guarantee.

Yamamoto and Glasnow still have many boxes to check before being sure-fire postseason weapons. Flaherty, who dealt with back problems with the Detroit Tigers earlier this season, still needs to get across the finish line healthy. The Dodgers could still benefit from the emergence of a clear No. 4 starter, too, currently evaluating Walker Buehler, Landon Knack, Bobby Miller and Clayton Kershaw (if he returns from his current toe injury) for such a role.

But if things keep trending this way, the Dodgers’ potential playoff pitching plans might not be as patchwork as the team once feared.

Especially if Yamamoto can repeat what he did Tuesday night.

After missing almost three months with a strained rotator cuff in his right pitching shoulder, Yamamoto couldn’t have been more impressive in his long-awaited return.

He commanded his fastball to both sides of the plate, touching 98 mph on multiple occasions. He landed his curveball for strikes, and got six whiffs on 10 swings with his splitter. The only run he gave up came in the second, scoring after Freddie Freeman failed to snag a high-hopper near the first-base line.

“It was a much better return start than I expected,” Yamamoto said after inducing 11 swings-and-misses and flashing an uptick in velocity from earlier this season. “I’m really relieved I was able to return and pitch well.”

The fourth inning was the end of the line for Yamamoto, who hadn’t thrown more than two innings in either of his minor-league rehab starts in recent weeks.

But the Dodgers are hoping it’s the start of a late-season surge from the 26-year-old, $325-million pitcher, who now has a 2.88 ERA and 92 strikeouts in 15starts in his debut campaign.

“He really showed out,” Roberts said. “I didn’t know if there was going to be rust or how he was going to command the baseball, but he passed with flying colors.”

Glasnow, whose October status had been uncertain since going on the injured list with his elbow injury last month, also appears to be turning a corner.

The veteran right-hander and de facto staff ace threw his second bullpen in the last week Tuesday, impressing Roberts and other club executives in an extended session that included his entire pitch mix.

“It was good,” Roberts said. “I didn’t talk to him about it afterwards, but my eyes liked what I saw.”

Glasnow will next throw a two or three inning simulated game Friday during the team’s trip to Atlanta. If that goes well, he could be on track to return before the end of the regular season, an encouraging development for the team’s $136.5-million offseason acquisition, who was 9-6 with a 3.49 ERA before getting hurt.

“To get him in a major league game [before the end of the regular season] is a priority,” Roberts said.

During his pregame address with reporters, Roberts still exercised cautious optimism while discussing the state of the Dodgers pitching staff (which is still without Kershaw, who once again played catch Tuesday, and Gavin Stone, who remains shut down with shoulder inflammation).

“There’s, in theory, a hope part of this, but there’s also a realistic part of it,” Roberts said when asked how built-up Yamamoto and Glasnow could be by the time the playoffs begin.

“I think that we’re all comfortable in the sense that, whatever the buildup is, is what it is, and we’ve got to go from there. So obviously I’d love to say that six [innings] and 90 [pitches] would be great. How realistic that is for both those guys, time will tell.”

By the end of the night, the manager had more pressing frustrations with his team’s porous fielding — the main culprit in what was their fourth loss in the last six games.

After taking a 3-1 into the eighth — Tommy Edman hit two early home runs, his first long balls of the season, and Max Muncy went deep in the fifth — the Dodgers capitulated during the Cubs’ five-run rally.

Reliever Alex Vesia issued a leadoff walk. Throwing errors from Austin Barnes (who fired wide of first base on a swinging bunt) and Tommy Edman (who threw a ball from center that neither shortstop Miguel Rojas nor Muncy at third base corralled) led to the two tying runs. Then the go-ahead run scored when second baseman Kiké Hernández lost the ball while trying to tag a baserunner on a potential double play.

“It was very uncharacteristic,” Roberts said. “Just a different team that I didn’t really recognize in that eighth inning.”

Barnes took accountability for his errant throw.

“It was horrible,” he said. “This one’s on me.”

The guilty party on Edman’s error wasn’t as clear in the postgame clubhouse.

Muncy, who let the ball get by him at third base before it dribbled into the Dodgers’ dugout, said he thought Rojas was going to cut the play off at shortstop.

“I mean, it was thrown right at him,” Muncy said. “Yeah, I thought he was going to catch it.”

Roberts, however, said Rojas was trying to deke the runner at first base to prevent him from going to second, putting a glove up as nothing more than a decoy believing Muncy was positioned to get the ball behind him.

“Miggy made the right play as far as trying to keep that runner at first base,” Roberts said. “I don’t know if Max was in the right position to be quite honest, and then the ball got by him. That’s a play that shouldn’t get past the third baseman.”

Those mistakes muted the good vibes that emanated the ballpark after Yamamoto’s impressive start. They served as a reminder of the fine-tuning left to take place in the season’s final stage.

Still, from where the team was just a few days ago, when Flaherty seemed like their only safe bet to anchor a potential postseason rotation, brighter days might finally be on the horizon for the Dodgers’ injury-plagued pitching staff.

It didn’t result in a victory Tuesday. But it could position them for a deep October push that once seemed in doubt.

“Obviously it never feels good to lose a ballgame,” Roberts said. “But I think the big takeaway is that we have [Yamamoto] back.”

Gonsolin starts rehab

In other positive pitching injury news, right-hander Tony Gonsolin began a rehab assignment with triple-A Oklahoma City, pitching two scoreless innings in his first game action since undergoing Tommy John surgery last year.

Gonsolin remains unlikely to contribute to the major-league roster this year, Roberts said, barring a “crazy scenario.”

But by getting some rehab starts in before the end of this year, Gonsolin should be set up for a smoother return to the Dodgers rotation in 2025.

Teoscar’s return

The Dodgers lineup is expected to get a boost of its own Wednesday, with Teoscar Hernández scheduled to rejoin the batting order after missing the last four games with a foot contusion.

Hernández was available off the bench Tuesday, with Roberts joking pregame he “couldn’t convince the training staff” to green-light the slugger’s return to the lineup quite yet.

Sports

Northern Illinois over Notre Dame is what makes college football more than NFL Lite

Published

1 hour ago

September 11, 2024

Press Room

Northern Illinois over Notre Dame is what makes college football more than NFL Lite

Northern Illinois coach Thomas Hammock’s cheeks were soaked with some of the happiest tears of his life. He was drenched in the overwhelming joy of leading his alma mater to the biggest win in school history.

His nose was running as the pride overcame him. It wasn’t pretty, but it was beautiful.

It was college football.

“All these guys that have been with our program, been through the ups and downs and to continue to fight. It’s like they my kids. I’m happy for the adversity. The push through no matter the situation,” he said. “I just couldn’t be more proud.”

“THEY BELIEVED.”
Northern Illinois HC Thomas Hammock spoke from the heart after an incredible upset over Notre Dame. @NIU_Football pic.twitter.com/pFrS5ok5U7
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— NBC Sports (@NBCSports) September 7, 2024

When the 28.5-point underdogs finished their 2 1/2-hour bus ride home to DeKalb, Ill., after beating No. 5 Notre Dame, a swarm of fans waited in the dark to welcome them.

The HUSKIE FAITHFUL gave the dawgs a warm welcome home last night!! Thank you to all of the fans‼️#SOAR | #TheHardWay 🦴🏴‍☠️ pic.twitter.com/HBWVctBovO
— NIU Football (@NIU_Football) September 8, 2024

As I watched the aftermath of the weekend’s most impactful result, it reminded me why this has been my favorite sport for decades. I enjoy the NFL, America’s most popular sport. But I love college football. I grew up on it.

To me, the difference in the two was crystallized by Hammock’s Huskies and everything they experienced: Every single weekend, some team is playing a game the players will remember for the rest of their lives.

GO DEEPER

Thomas Hammock and Northern Illinois believed — and that was enough to shock Notre Dame

Also on Saturday, a freshman kicker named Kyle Konrardy — who had never attempted a college kick — flipped the fortunes of the entire state of Iowa by drilling a 54-yard field goal that put Iowa State on top of Iowa for just the second time in a decade.

In Week 1, oft-downtrodden Vanderbilt snapped a 10-game losing streak by bullying trendy College Football Playoff contender Virginia Tech and surviving a furious comeback with an overtime win. It set off a flood of chest bumps, hugs and “I love you” as the sideline spilled onto the field.

This moment 🥹 pic.twitter.com/wCH8nyNDvZ
— Vanderbilt Football (@VandyFootball) September 1, 2024
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And in Week 0, Georgia Tech flew to Ireland and beat its conference’s proudest program, Florida State, which went 13-0 a season ago on the way to an ACC title. It might mean more to the players competing, but it all means a ton to the fans and alums watching around the nation and world, too.

Northern Illinois signed up to play what’s commonly known in college football as a “paycheck game,” earning $1.4 million for the experience of playing on one of sports’ most hallowed grounds and, presumably, to lose. Sometimes, though, games like these don’t play out like the architects of the contract intend.

No matter what happens this season or for the rest of Hammock’s run at NIU, reality is this: Decades from now, people will still be talking about the time their beloved Huskies walked into Notre Dame Stadium, kicked a 35-yard field goal to win it and blocked a 62-yard prayer to seal it.

In the past five years, college football has rapidly evolved (some would argue devolved) into something different than what those of us who grew up on the sport fell in love with.

Conference makeups are unnatural, the tectonic plates shifted by nonsensical moves prodded by checks from television companies at the cost of tradition, athlete experience and regional identity, once the sport’s signature.

Athletes finally have long-deserved freedom to earn money on their name, image and likeness, but because the sport had to be dragged into a more equitable landscape by the courts, that newfound freedom has also meant roster management is more difficult than ever, and for now, players’ connection with their campus is more tenuous than ever.

The NCAA is ensnared in an endless string of antitrust lawsuits that stand to continue to reshape college sports.

Northern Illinois’ entire athletic revenue last year was just over $22 million. The nation’s leaders in that particular race — Ohio State and Texas — brought in revenues more than 10 times that.

The Huskies have a collective called Boneyard Victor E., and though exact numbers are hard to come by, it’s safe to assume no Northern Illinois roster will be suiting up for $20 million like Ohio State or even $12 million like Florida State.

Schools like NIU, where Huskie Stadium seats 28,211 compared to the 77,622 seats in Notre Dame Stadium, are often helpless when bigger schools see standout players on film in leagues like NIU’s Mid-American Conference and offer a check that those schools can’t match to join a bluer blood’s roster.

Hammock’s roster wasn’t immune. Florida swiped NIU edge rusher George Gumbs. Louisville grabbed center Pete Nygra.

NIU beat Notre Dame on the scoreboard and the line of scrimmage anyway.

These are new realities that programs in lower-level conferences have to deal with. The mostly static ecosystem of the sport of the past century has quickly morphed into a merciless food chain, and those on the bottom half are left to grapple with the consequences. It’s not just players: Good head coaches at small programs leave for coordinator jobs at more well-funded programs, often seeing a clearer path to their own dreams.

Maybe moments like the ones we’ve seen the first couple of weeks will be rarer as it becomes harder for schools outside of the four power conferences to keep their best players and hire great coaches.

I suspect not. I hope not.

One secret of college football is the players at the bottom of the standings generally work just as hard as those at the top. They might be less gifted in size or skill, less well-coached or have fewer resources to maximize what ability they do have.

But they work hard. And they do it with zero promise that it will pay off with a moment like the one the Huskies got to enjoy Saturday.

So when that work pays off for everyone to see? When a moment like the one we saw Saturday arrives with no warning? It moves me. I suspect it moves you, too.

It’s why everyone in America with a microphone wants to talk to Hammock, the 43-year-old coaching in his sixth season at NIU, in the aftermath of Saturday’s shocker. He earned just over $677,000 last season to work just as hard as Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman, who earned over $6.5 million in 2022.

Hammock’s tears resonated with anyone who saw them. How could they not? There’s so much of our day-to-day lives that’s ordinary. Plenty that is artificial.

What Northern Illinois did was extraordinary. It was authentic.

It was beautiful.

It was college football.

(Photo of Northern Illinois defensive end Jalonnie Williams: Brian Spurlock / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Sports

Carl Banks reveals Lawrence Taylor's contention Giants legends would have played better against Vikings

Published

1 hour ago

September 11, 2024

Press Room

Carl Banks reveals Lawrence Taylor's contention Giants legends would have played better against Vikings

New York Giants fans are reeling after watching what unfolded at MetLife Stadium in a 28-6 loss to the Minnesota Vikings in Week 1, but it isn’t just fans going through a whirlwind of emotions.

Former players are frustrated too, including one of the franchise’s legends.

The Giants wore their century red uniforms to commemorate the team’s 100th season, and several team legends were honored at the stadium among the franchise’s 100 greatest Giants.

Lawrence Taylor is surrounded by Giants fans during Fan Fest at MetLife Stadium to celebrate 100 seasons of the New York Giants Friday, Sept. 6, 2024. (IMAGN)

Among them were Lawrence Taylor and Carl Banks, two vital members of the Giants teams that brought home Super Bowl titles in 1987 and 1991. Taylor ranked first overall among the 100 greatest Giants ever, while Banks was 17th.

During an appearance on the “Bleav in Giants” podcast, Banks revealed that, after watching the first half the Giants played against the Vikings, Taylor wanted to put his pads back on.

“I can tell you when we were lining up to be introduced as the top 100 players, a guy who never really comments on games because he doesn’t watch many of them was Lawrence Taylor. He looked at me and — this is a true story, folks. If you want to know what we [the 100 greatest Giants] were thinking at halftime,” Banks explained.

VIKINGS CREATE HAVOC FOR DANIEL JONES; GIANTS FALTER IN FRONT OF ORGANIZATION’S LEGENDS

“Lawrence looked at me at halftime and said, ‘Carl, I could pick 22 of us right now and go out and play better than these guys. We’d be in this game.’ The youngest guy in that line was probably 50 years old. Lawrence Taylor looked at me and said, ‘I can get 22 of us right now and go out there right now and whoop these guys’ a–.’”

The championship pedigree that was most recently seen during the 2011 NFL season hasn’t shined in East Rutherford, New Jersey, for some time. The Giants have only made the playoffs twice since then, the most recent coming in 2022 during head coach Brian Daboll’s inaugural season.

New York Giants quarterback Daniel Jones jogs off the field during the first half of a game against the Minnesota Vikings Sunday, Sept. 8, 2024, in East Rutherford, N.J. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

And it doesn’t look like a championship-caliber team in the Giants’ locker room this season after the disaster that unfolded Sunday. Quarterback Daniel Jones and the Giants’ offense were booed off the field after an atrocious outing that resulted in no touchdowns.

Jones has been the target of Giants fans after Week 1. He went 22-for-42 for 186 yards with two interceptions while getting sacked five times in the loss. Entering his sixth season, and, more importantly, the second year of the four-year, $160 million deal he signed before last season, Jones is expected to be leading the Giants back to the playoffs like he did in 2022.

Instead, in his first game after tearing his ACL midway through the 2023 campaign, Jones appears to have regressed.

The Giants have a chance in Week 2 against the Washington Commanders, a team that was blown out by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 1.

But the product Taylor and the rest of the sold-out crowd in MetLife Stadium witnessed has the former linebacker wanting to help his old team out because the grit and fight just wasn’t there.

New York Giants legend Lawrence Taylor enters the field before a game between the New York Giants and the Minnesota Vikings at MetLife Stadium. (John Jones-Imagn Images)

“To start your season off looking the way you did on both sides of the ball … you look like you’re stuck in 2023,” Banks said.

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Scott Thompson is a sports writer for Fox News Digital.

Sports

ESPN exec on Charles Barkley: ‘I would be lying if I said we weren’t interested’

Published

8 hours ago

September 10, 2024

Press Room

ESPN exec on Charles Barkley: ‘I would be lying if I said we weren’t interested’

Charles Barkley may be the hottest free agent to hit the market next year, if he hits the market.

As Warner Bros. Discovery wrangles with the NBA in court, hoping to win back a piece of the league’s media rights for 2025, there is already a line of suitors for Barkley, the company’s biggest star in sports.

ESPN’s chief of content, Burke Magnus, said Tuesday he would be interested in bringing Barkley to the network if he were available. Asked at a Front Office Sports conference in New York if he could see a world with Barkley at ESPN, Magnus said he could.

“Yeah,” Magnus said at the “Tuned In” conference. “That would be a perfect world. … I would be lying if I said we weren’t interested in Charles. The entire industry is interested.”

NBC chairman Mark Lazerus said he would also have interest in Barkley. NBC will start broadcasting the NBA next season.

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‘Sunday Night Basketball’ on NBC — part of new NBA media rights deal — could be a hit

Whether Barkley would have interest in ESPN or NBC is another question. The Basketball Hall of Famer, who has been part of TNT’s iconic “Inside the NBA” studio show since 2000, said in August he would remain with TNT Sports even after it lost the NBA. Barkley is in the third year of a 10-year, $210 million deal.

“I love my TNT Sports family,” Barkley, 61, said in a statement in August. “My #1 priority has been and always will be our people and keeping everyone together for as long as possible.

“We have the most amazing people, and they are the best at what they do,” his statement continued. “I’m looking forward to continuing to work with them both on the shows we currently have and new ones we develop together in the future. This is the only place for me.”

In July, Disney, NBC and Amazon won the bidding rights for the NBA’s next media deal, which will start with the 2025-26 season and last 11 years. The agreements with the three companies are worth $77 billion in total. WBD did not get a piece of the rights and sued the NBA to enforce what it says are matching rights from the current contract.

That lawsuit is currently in New York State court with a schedule that has put it on course for trial in April.