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Pittsburgh Steelers Linked to Arizona Wildcats Star in Latest NFL Mock Draft

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Pittsburgh Steelers Linked to Arizona Wildcats Star in Latest NFL Mock Draft


Arizona Wildcats star wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan has constantly been projected to be a top-10 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. However, he has started falling of late in some mock drafts.

McMillan and Arizona have not lived up to their early-season hype. Through seven games, they hold a 3-4 record and have not looked good in the process.

Despite the team falling aggressively, McMillan has continued to put up solid production. So far this season, he has caught 47 passes for 780 yards and four touchdowns. He’s still a first-round pick at this point in time, but his draft stock has fallen.

The 33rd Team recently put out their new mock draft, where they reflect his falling draft stock.

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In that mock draft, they had McMillan sliding all the way down to the No. 22 overall pick. They had the Pittsburgh Steelers happily picking up a massive steal by taking him with that selection.

“McMillan is listed at 6-foot-5 and has the best ball skills I’ve ever seen for a wide receiver prospect. He has magnetic hands, unreal focus in tight windows, and routinely comes down with high-difficulty contested/acrobatic catches.”

It has been widely known that the Steelers would like to pick up another wide receiver alongside George Pickens. They tried to acquire Brandon Aiyuk and have been mentioned in trade rumors for the top wide receivers on the trade market.

Should they be unable to acquire another wide receiver before the trade deadline, pursuing one in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft would make a ton of sense.

Seeing McMillan fall to the later stage of the first round would be a major surprise. He’s arguably the best wide receiver in the draft class.

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There are clearly some areas that need to improve. He’s not a super-fast wide receiver, which could cause some concerns about his ability to create separation in the NFL. However, his production speaks for itself.

All of that being said, it will be interesting to see how McMillan finishes out the 2024 season. The team success around him should not impact his draft outlook.

If he were to land with Pittsburgh, McMillan would be an instant starter. The Steelers would be a great landing spot for him, although he would not be pleased with such an aggressive draft slide.



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Arizona Diamondbacks Gameday Thread, #42: 5/13 @ Rangers

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Arizona Diamondbacks Gameday Thread, #42: 5/13 @ Rangers


Last night was the seventh consecutive game where the Diamondbacks were held to six hits or fewer. That ties a franchise record, last done in April 2022, and previously in August 2011. The team’s .477 OPS over that time is actually lower than either streak, though due to the efforts of the pitching staff, Arizona are actually 3-4 during the current run. They went 2-5 in 2022, and 1-6 in 2011. There hasn’t been a longer streak in the majors since the Angels went nine in April last year. In the National League, the Pirates went eight in June 2023. And in case you are wondering, the last team to reach a double-digit streak of games with 6 or fewer hits each time? The 1968 Astros reached 11, the year before the mound was lowered.

Let’s hope the D-backs render that moot and the offense comes to life a bit. The three runs added in garbage time last night, because one of the Rangers’ relievers couldn’t find the strike-zone, certainly padded Arizona’s resume. But they were more because of walks than hits. I’ve no doubt the team will hit better. They have batted .152 over the past week. It’s the second lowest in franchise history for a seven-game span. The only worse was April 7-15, 2022 when Arizona hit a remarkable .135, going 28-for-208 in that span. They actually scored three more runs than the current streak, mostly because they had twice as many home-runs (6-3).



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Arizona Democrats debate for state’s top education job

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Arizona Democrats debate for state’s top education job


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Democrats Brett Newby and Teresa Leyba Ruiz are set to make the argument to voters that they’re the best candidates to serve as Arizona’s top education official for the next four years.

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The Arizona Republic will be streaming the Democratic debate for the Superintendent of Public Instruction race in partnership with the Arizona Media Association. The debate starts at 6 p.m. on May 13.

The office is currently held by Tom Horne, who will on May 14 face off in an Arizona Media Association debate against fellow Republican candidate Kimberly Yee, who currently serves as state treasurer.

Newby has worked as a behavioral analyst and professor, according to his campaign. He received a master’s degree in special education. His campaign has hinged on issues like downsizing the state’s controversial Empowerment Scholarship Program, retaining teachers and hiring more school counselors.

Ruiz attended Roosevelt Elementary School District and Phoenix Union High School District as a child before earning her Ph.D. from Arizona State University. She worked as a teacher at the middle and high school level before becoming president of Glendale Community College.

Like Newby, her campaign has also focused on the ESA program. She has also focused on advocating for more funding for public schools and supporting both rural and urban school districts. Ruiz has also spoken publicly about the teacher retention crisis as part of her campaign.

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Arizona Diamondbacks Gameday Thread, #41: 5/12 @ Rangers

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Arizona Diamondbacks Gameday Thread, #41: 5/12 @ Rangers


The last trip through the rotation for the Diamondbacks has been really good:

By that 5-game rolling average game score, it’s the best we’ve seen since a run around the All Star Break in 2022:

If we restrict to 5-game stretches with 5 different starters, it’s the best since September 2019:

So yeah, it’s been a while since we’ve had it this good. But this is still a far cry from the best in Diamondbacks history — the current stretch is only tied for 58th all-time. Here’s the best ever:

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The good news is that there’s still quite a lot of room for Zac Gallen to improve on his last start, which had a Game Score of only 47. Doing so would give us an even better 5-game average. A score of better than 60 would surpass the 2022 streak; 69 or better would surpass 2018. Although it would take a career-best-tying 89 (reached against the Cubs on September 8, 2023) for him to pull the overall average into a tie for the franchise record. But any improvement on his last start would bring the rolling average up in the franchise rankings.

All records queried here are courtesy of Retrosheet.



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