Jim Leavitt, 68, was arrested Monday night after police in St. Petersburg, Florida, say an altercation with an ex-girlfriend turned physical.
Keith Hernandez joins the show to celebrate 20 years of SNY and talk Mets-Phillies | The Mets Pod
On the latest episode of The Mets Pod presented by Tri-State Cadillac recorded live outside the Rotunda at Citi Field, Connor Rogers and Joe DeMayo welcome Keith Hernandez to the show to talk 20 years of baseball on SNY and all things Mets.
Keith chats with the guys about his favorite years calling Mets games, as well as the performances of Juan Soto, Pete Alonso, Mark Vientos, and the call ups of pitching prospects Jonah Tong and Nolan McLean.
Keith also reveals what he really thinks about Gary Cohen, Ron Darling, Steve Gelbs -- and the Philadelphia Phillies.
Later, Connor and Joe go Down on the Farm to check in on Brandon Sproat, and answer live questions from the crowd outside of Citi Field.
Be sure to subscribe to The Mets Pod at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Vancouver Canucks 2025–26 Player Preview: Victor Mancini
Welcome to The Hockey News - Vancouver Canucks site’s player preview series for the 2025–26 season. In these articles, we’ll preview the players who are expected to play for the Canucks in the 2025–26 season. This edition will cover one of the young faces on the Canucks’ blueline with Victor Mancini.
Mancini’s 2024–25 Season
Starting his year in the New York Rangers organization, Mancini made his NHL debut during the Rangers’ season opener on October 9th against the Pittsburgh Penguins, and scored his first NHL goal against the Detroit Red Wings just a week later. Mancini would spend 15 games with the Rangers throughout the season, scoring one goal and four assists, along with three goals and seven assists in 23 games with their AHL affiliate, the Hartford Wolf Pack.
Mancini would join the Canucks in the infamous January 31st trade that sent JT Miller back to the team that drafted him, and he would spend the remainder of the NHL season playing 16 games with Vancouver. He scored his first goal as a Canuck during the team’s historic comeback win over the Dallas Stars on April 8th, and had 21 blocked shots and 24 hits in his tenure with Vancouver. Mancini also spent seven regular-season games with the Abbotsford Canucks, and had eight points in the playoff run to the Calder Cup victory.
Mancini’s 2024–25 Letter Grade
For his impressive efforts in both the NHL and AHL last season, Mancini earned a B+ letter grade. He was a solid depth option for the Canucks’ strengthened defensive core in the NHL and was a key piece for the Abbotsford blueline in his limited regular-season stint, along with his production during the Calder Cup run.
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Mancini’s 2025–26 Predictions
Mancini spent the majority of his time in Vancouver paired with Derek Forbort on the Canucks’ third defensive line, and will likely spend time cycling through in that spot with another young defenceman in Elias Pettersson. The sole defensive addition the Canucks have made this offseason was signing Pierre-Olivier Joseph in free agency, so depending on training camp and preseason form, it is likely Mancini factors into the Vancouver lineup for opening night, even if he is sitting in the press box for the first puck drop.
Adam Kierszenblat’s Stat Prediction: 1G, 4A, 5P
Izzy Cheung’s Stat Prediction: 1G, 8A, 9P
Kaja Antic’s Stat Prediction: 3G, 8A, 11P
Bold Prediction: He will see extended time on the second powerplay unit.
Player Preview Articles
Make sure you bookmark THN's Vancouver Canucks site and add us to your favourites on Google News for the latest news, exclusive interviews, breakdowns, and so much more. Also, don't forget to leave a comment at the bottom of the page and engage with other passionate fans through our forum. This article originally appeared on The Hockey News.
Ten bold predictions for the 2025 college football season: Arch Manning for Heisman, ACC gets No. 1 seed
James Franklin will finally win The Big One — more than once. Preseason favorite Arch Manning will actually win the Heisman. Iowa will have a 3,000-yard passer. Plus, more bold-but-possible predictions.
Neemias Queta's stellar EuroBasket debut included a notable development
Neemias Queta's stellar EuroBasket debut included a notable development originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
If you’re a Boston Celtics fan searching for optimism amid a depressing offseason, allow us to direct you to the 2025 EuroBasket tournament in Riga, Latvia.
That’s where Celtics big man Neemias Queta took the court for his native Portugal against Czechia early Wednesday morning — and put on an absolute show.
Queta racked up a game-high 23 points on 11 of 15 shooting along with 18 rebounds, four blocks and two steals to power Portugal to a 62-50 win, the country’s first in EuroBasket competition since 2007.
Queta was an force on both ends, scoring at will in the paint and dominating on the glass to become the first player with at least 20 points and 15 rebounds in his EuroBasket debut since FIBA began tracking rebounding numbers.
But the most notable moment from Queta’s performance came at the very beginning, when the 7-foot big man buried a 3-pointer to open the scoring for Portugal.
For context, Queta has yet to attempt a 3-pointer over four NBA seasons. Yet there he was on Portugal’s opening possession, spacing the floor and knocking down a deep ball.
Lest the hype train go off the rails, Queta only attempted that one 3-pointer in Wednesday’s game, so we’ll need to see a bigger sample size. But there’s little doubt that Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla would be thrilled if Queta developed a 3-point shot.
While the C’s just smashed the NBA record for 3-pointers made in a season, they lost two sharpshooting big men this offseason in Kristaps Porzingis (trade) and Al Horford (likely leaving in free agency). Even if Queta can make the occasional 3-pointer for Boston this season, that could help open up a Celtics offense that will need to rely more on spacing and ball movement with superstar Jayson Tatum sidelined to due to injury.
Czechia is not a very talented opponent, so it’s worth monitoring how Queta fares against the likes of Nikola Jokic (Serbia), Giannis Antetokounmpo (Greece), Alperen Sengun (Turkey) and Porzingis, who is playing for Team Latvia. But Queta’s debut Wednesday morning certainly was an encouraging sign.
Portgual’s next EuroBasket game is against Jokic and Serbia on Friday at 2:15 p.m. ET.
Canadiens: Reinbacher To Attend Rookie Showcase
Every year, NHL official trading card partner Upper Deck hosts the NHLPA rookie showcase, and this year is no exception. The 2025 event will take place in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 3 and will feature 32 NHL prospects.
David Reinbacher will represent the Montreal Canadiens, but Ivan Demidov, who is expected to be the Calder Trophy front-runner by many, will not be in attendance. Last season, both Lane Hutson and Logan Mailloux represented the Habs, but this time around, only one player will be sent.
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Reinbacher will be joined by 30 other players, such as Ryan Leonard for the Washington Capitals, Tij Ingila for the Utah Mammoth, Quinn Hutson (Lane’s brother) for the Edmonton Oilers, and, of course, the draft’s first overall pick, Matthew Schaefer, representing the New York Islanders.
The marketing initiative allows Upper Deck to take photos of the rookies for their upcoming card releases. Demidov isn't missing anything exciting, and he’s already confirmed for the forthcoming Upper Deck Series 1 release, scheduled for October 15, 2025. The promotional images already released show that the card company already has the pictures of Demitov it needed for the upcoming release.
For years, collecting Montreal Canadiens’ players' cards was a reasonable endeavour, and you could do it without needing to break the bank, but since Hutson’s arrival on the market, prices have risen. When Upper Deck SP Authentic was released last week, Hutson’s Future Watch Autographed cards were selling $1,400 CAD.
That being said, Series One is not as high-end as SP Authentic, and the price tag should be much more reasonable. Case in point, Hutson’s Young Guns rookie card typically sells for $150 CAD. It will be interesting to see how Demidov and Reinbacher’s rookie cards measure up.
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FROM THE THN ARCHIVE: Original Six Hockey Trade
Now and then, The Hockey News - Toronto will look back on some of the in-depth features from the past years. During the 2017-18 season, the Maple Leafs and their original-six rivals appears to be on very divergent paths. The Maple Leafs had found their groove with a young core building off their 2017 Stanley Cup Playoff appearance, while the Canadiens seemed to crumble. The Leafs are strong, but have yet to have success deep in the playoffs, but the Canadiens were going south, but are now seeing some success with their young core, earning a playoff appearance in 2025.
BY KEN CAMPBELL (From. Mar 5, 2018/vol. 71, issue 12)
After last season, some of the Toronto Maple Leafs’ alumni group got together and quietly made a request to upper management. They certainly appreciated the luxury box they had for games, but the sightlines weren’t the greatest. So they asked team president Brendan Shanahan whether an upgrade might be possible.
You have to remember these guys don’t generate any revenue, so to relocate them to a better box would mean potentially displacing customers who were paying insanely large money for the privilege. So Shanahan handed over his luxury box to the alumni. Now, the men who have sweated and bled for the Blue and White have impeccable sightlines and enjoy the best food and drink money doesn’t have to buy.
There’s something happening in The Center of the Hockey Universe™ and it isn’t limited to the ice. Largely because of the presence of Shanahan, the Maple Leafs are becoming the gold-standard franchise of the NHL. Pre-game ceremonies that were once cheesy and amateurish are classy and poignant. The team’s 100th anniversary celebration was impressive from beginning to end, starting with the official repatriation of prodigal son Dave Keon and the long overdue retiring of numbers.
The Leafs have Shanahan, who does nothing but make the right moves, the dean of GMs in Lou Lamoriello, the best coach of his generation in Mike Babcock and a player who stands to become the organization’s first true superstar in Auston Matthews. (And yes, I said it. The Leafs have never had a true superstar, always valuing the collective over the individual. Now fight me.)
Meanwhile, 313 miles northeast, the Montreal Canadiens are still treating their former players like royalty and hitting all the right notes when it comes to pomp and circumstance. But when it comes to the onice product, the two organizations could not be going in any more different directions. When it comes to what we’re seeing on the ice, the Maple Leafs are morphing into what the Canadiens used to be, and the Canadiens are deteriorating into Les Feuilles d’Erable, a French Canadian version of what the Maple Leafs once were.
The Leafs have gone 50 years without winning a Stanley Cup, and they’ll probably make it 51 this spring. Simply put, they’re just not ready to position themselves as a serious contender. But for the first time in forever, there is evidence of a plan. The Canadiens? Well, they haven’t won in a quarter century and their youngest fans are the first in the organization’s history to have absolutely no recollection of seeing their team win the Cup. Care to make a wager on which of the two droughts will end first?
The Maple Leafs are morphing into what the Canadiens used to be and the Canadiens are deteriorating
What makes it even worse from a Canadiens’ perspective is there looks as though there’s no semblance of a plan, no success in giving this team an identity. The Canadiens have been too small and not productive enough down the middle since La Macarena was popular and they responded to that by getting bigger and slower at every position, but not getting bigger or better at center. They’ve made panic moves that have managed to land them such luminaries as Andreas Martinsen and Dwight King and the needle continues to move backward. Prior to 2016, when they took Mikhail Sergachev and Victor Mete, they hadn’t drafted a topflight defenseman since P.K. Subban – and we all know how that turned out. Of the 25 players they took in four drafts from 2008 through 2011, just Brendan Gallagher is on the roster. They hit home runs in 2007 with Ryan McDonagh, Max Pacioretty and Subban, but two of the three are gone and Pacioretty’s days with the Habs look to be dwindling to a small number.
Sound like an organization we all used to know? You know, the one that ran really good players out of town (see Subban), or traded players without giving them a chance (see Sergachev) in order to plug gaping holes in its roster? The Leafs once traded the pick that New Jersey used to get Scott Niedermayer to acquire Tom Kurvers. The Habs could’ve had a defense corps with McDonagh, Subban, Sergachev and Mete on it. Remember when the Leafs destroyed their young players the way the Canadiens are doing with Alex Galchenyuk? Remember when they would get players, overhype and miscast them, kind of the way the Canadiens are doing with Jonathan Drouin?
Here’s the thing. I never bought the notion the Leafs were obsessed with simply making money. Over the past two decades, you’d be hard-pressed to find an organization that has frittered away more money in an attempt to build a contender and a legitimate organization on and off the ice. It wasn’t that the people who ran the Leafs were greedy, they were simply incompetent. As desperately as they wanted to win, they had no clue how to go about it. Now, they do.
In Montreal, well, we’ll allow the recent history to speak for itself. The Canadiens have become the dysfunctional, panicky, knee-jerk operators of a hockey team and there’s a real possibility things are going to get worse. These are the kinds of moves that can take years to untangle. And if that happens, their fans are going to get a long dose of the kind of hell their English Canadian rivals have gone through for decades.
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Shaikin: The National League has one .300 hitter. What's up with that?
In a city where craft beer is everywhere, a golden brew holds a special place in the hearts of San Diegans. Within the name of the beer is a tribute to a beloved local hero.
It’s called .394 Pale Ale.
In 1994, Tony Gwynn batted .394, a career high good for one of his eight National League batting titles. It’s the highest batting average in the NL during the past 95 years. If you know, you know.
“In San Diego, people know what .394 is,” said Kristen Ballinger, marketing director for AleSmith, the brewer. “If it wasn’t a strike-shortened season, it would have been .400.”
Read more:Shaikin: Will Smith could win a batting title. Could the Dodgers stop him?
Three decades later, the magic of a batting title or a .400 season has virtually disappeared from the major leagues.
And a traditional standard of excellence now is an endangered species: the .300 batting average, a popular and easily understood statistic that has been devalued and rendered borderline worthless by baseball’s analytical revolution.
In a previous generation, this development would be almost scandalous: With one month left in the regular season, the NL has one .300 hitter.
One.
He is the Dodgers’ Freddie Freeman, who has nine .300 seasons to his credit. He batted .200 in June and .253 in July, and here he is leading the league at .302.
“You hit .330, you hit .325 and you never win,” Freeman said. “To be grinding this year and leading is kind of a weird thing.
“For you to be talking to me about a batting title at the end of August, it means I’ve had a pretty good year. I think I’m OK with that.”
Freeman thought back to Monday night, when the visiting Cincinnati Reds went to the bullpen in the seventh inning of a game they trailed by six runs. The new pitcher: not a mopup man with a mid-80s fastball, but a second-year reliever with a 100 mph fastball.
“I don’t think you can really talk about the art of hitting .300. The pitching is just too good. It’s hard to combat,” Freeman said.
“My whole goal every year is to hit .300. It’s getting harder and harder. I’m just trying to adjust with the league.”
Read more:With a little help from a Coldplay meme, Freddie Freeman stays hot in Dodgers’ win
Only one player has won a batting championship with a lower average than Freeman’s .302: Carl Yastrzemski of the Boston Red Sox, who won the American League by hitting .301 in 1968.
That was the Year of the Pitcher. Bob Gibson of the St. Louis Cardinals put up a 1.12 earned-run average, one of seven pitchers to finish with an ERA under 2.00. Offense was in such short supply that, after the season, baseball lowered the pitcher’s mound from 15 inches to 10.
The major league batting average was .237 that season, with teams scoring 3.4 runs per game. This season: .246, with 4.4 runs per game.
But batting average is nonetheless depressed by the emphasis on home runs and on getting on base, and by the deluge of strikeouts triggered by pitchers throwing harder than ever.
“And how many times do you see balls hit up the middle and they’re outs, even [with baseball] regulating the shift?” Reds manager Terry Francona said. “Guys hit a nice one-hopper up the middle, and they’re out.
“Hitters don’t know — a lot of them — how to go the other way to combat that. So that takes away a lot of hits.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts conceded that so many pitchers throwing so hard challenges batters, especially as they hear that on-base percentage is widely considered more important than batting average.
Read more:Clayton Kershaw is masterful again in Dodgers' win over Reds
“I honestly think hitting is as hard as it’s ever been,” Roberts said. “You don’t see the same guys as much.
“But also, yeah, batting average isn’t valued as much — until you get to the postseason. Then you want guys that can get hits and drive in runs, right?”
So much of baseball’s charm is statistics that can be passed down among generations, in the only major sport popular in the United States for more than a century. Babe Ruth, meet Shohei Ohtani.
No one writes an ode to a high OPS. The .300 hitter is going the way of the complete game. The Dodgers have no complete games this season.
Roberts lives in the San Diego area. He has not tried a .394 Pale Ale.
“I’m more of a lager guy,” he said.
But baseball should listen up to what he says about .394.
“Right now,” he said, “I would say less than 5% of active players know what that means.”
Sign up for more Dodgers news with Dodgers Dugout. Delivered at the start of each series.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
How Jimmy Butler is at center of Warriors' Jonathan Kuminga contract stalemate
How Jimmy Butler is at center of Warriors' Jonathan Kuminga contract stalemate originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
With the pre-divorce posturing of the Warriors and Jonathan Kuminga in its ninth week, anticipation has become tedium, which is a hothouse for conjecture finger-pointing. The Blame Game is in full effect.
Golden State CEO Joe Lacob is catching arrows for his publicly staunch devotion to Kuminga, who is catching arrows for rejecting multiple offers. Former general manager Bob Myers is catching arrows for drafting Kuminga, at age 18, on the recommendation of lieutenants in the front office. Coach Steve Kerr and the members of his staff are catching arrows for not teaching Kuminga how to become a young Paul George.
Current general manager Mike Dunleavy is catching arrows for staying patient rather than making a trade that will vault the Warriors back to the top of the NBA mountain – as unrealistic is that is.
Meanwhile, Jimmy Butler III, whose arrival spun Kuminga toward the exit, is somewhere sipping coffee and playing dominoes.
The case for keeping Kuminga on the roster was considerably weakened on the afternoon of Feb. 6 when Butler was acquired in a trade with the Miami Heat. With the Warriors going in circles with or without Kuminga, Dunleavy gambled on Butler and hoped the move would put the squad back into the NBA playoff picture.
It did. The Warriors, 25-26 before Butler’s debut, won 14 of 16 games immediately after Butler joined the roster. Over the final 31 regular-season games, they were 23-8 – third-best record in the league – with a core of Stephen Cury, Draymond Green and Butler.
Golden State was 13-2 with Butler while Kuminga was inactive with a right ankle sprain. That effectively sealed the young forward’s fate. The Warriors might have consulted an attorney to start divorce proceedings, with at least three valid reasons for taking such action.
One, they know Kuminga was aching to start and there is no way Kerr would start JK at forward ahead of decorated veterans Green or Butler.
Two, there was no way Kerr would start a frontcourt of Kuminga, Butler and Green (at center), inviting a clogged offense that would make every game an obstacle course for Curry and the three defenders chasing him.
Three, the idea of patching a Warriors-Kuminga relationship that spent four years trying to make the incompatible somehow compatible is not desirable for either party.
It always was difficult for Kuminga, a raw talent coming to a franchise which had dreams of transforming his elite physical attributes into a future cornerstone. His arrival coincided with a remaking of the player-development staff, recruiting highly respected Jama Mahlalela from Toronto and Dejan “Deki” Milojević from Serbia.
That led to a 2022 NBA Finals victory, which planted a seed of belief that the so-called “two-timelines” approach could sprout success. It has not. And Kuminga remains a square peg in a system designed for those who fit neatly into round holes.
“One guy that was put in a similar situation is Paul George when he got to Indiana,” one NBA front-office executive tells NBC Sports Bay Area. “When he got there, they were right on the cusp. Danny Granger was playing in front of him, and Lance Stephenson was there. And eventually, he was able to play with that David West group; they were competing for championships.
“But it was like the perfect setup for Paul. They weren’t a big-market team, but they were a good team. He got a chance to grow while they were trying to win. And a lot of his mistakes weren’t as magnified as Kuminga’s have been because of the team he is on.”
George came off the bench as a rookie and became a starter in Year 2. The Indiana Pacers reached the Eastern Conference finals in Year 3, with George becoming an NBA All-Star and being voted Most Improved Player.
Whereas George entered the NBA at age 20, having played two years of collegiate ball as a starter at Fresno State, Kuminga entered the league after starting 13 games with the G-League Ignite. Very different conditions, very different trajectory, very different result.
Regarding Golden State’s prevailing quandary, the blame must be shared by the front office, the coaching staff and Kuminga himself.
But it was Butler who last season gave the Warriors the kind of bump they surely hoped Kuminga might provide by Year 4. Following two previous big-money acquisitions in the Lacob era – David Lee in 2010, Kevin Durant in 2016 – Jimmy showed he can lift the Warriors to a higher level.
Sometime within the next 10 months, Kuminga will move on. And all parties will know any hope for his future in Golden State was sacrificed for Butler’s present. Blame Jimmy at your own risk.
College football’s 25 most powerful people: See the USA TODAY Sports ranking
Who are the 25 most powerful people in college football? USA TODAY Sports enlisted a panel of experts to rank them. Here is our list for 2025.
With preparation, Greg Sankey became college football’s most powerful person
One word pops up repeatedly in conversations about SEC commissioner Greg Sankey: Preparation. That traces its roots to his affinity for John Wooden.
Giants pitcher Landen Roupp gets great news after scary-looking injury
Giants pitcher Landen Roupp gets great news after scary-looking injury originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
SAN FRANCISCO — There was so much concern about Landen Roupp’s knee when he went down last week in San Diego that he didn’t even really notice at first that he had taken a line drive off his right hamstring. There’s no avoiding it now for the Giants right-hander.
Roupp has a huge bruise on the back of his leg that’s several different colors, but he’s not sweating it. The bigger long-term concern is the injury in his left knee, but he got good news there on Monday.
A second examination confirmed that Roupp only has a bone bruise in his left knee and that all of the ligaments are intact. That was a huge relief for Roupp, who sat on the field at Petco Park last Wednesday and feared that his ACL was torn.
“Basically every (doctor) I’ve talked to has said I’m pretty lucky with how it looked to not tear a single thing in my knee,” he said Tuesday. “I’m pretty happy about that.”
Any sort of tear or surgery could have put much of 2026 in doubt, but Roupp was instead told that he’ll need about four weeks to recover from the bone bruise. While that effectively ends his 2025 season, it’s great news overall and should leave him with a normal offseason.
If Roupp is done after 22 starts, his sophomore season will go down as one of the biggest positives for the 2025 Giants. Roupp posted a 3.80 ERA and 3.90 FIP, but a lot of the damage came in his final two starts, when he was trying to knock the rust off after missing three weeks with elbow discomfort. When he went on the IL for the first time in late July, he ranked among the league leaders with a 3.11 ERA.
During a six-start stretch in June and July, he allowed just four earned runs over 30 1/3 innings. Roupp said he feels like he proved a lot.
“I can be a starter in the big leagues and hopefully at least have a spot next year in the rotation,” he said. “But obviously I have a lot of learning to do.”
Roupp had to fight for a bullpen spot in the spring of 2023 and then win a fifth starter competition against Hayden Birdsong and Kyle Harrison this spring. Manager Bob Melvin smiled when told about Roupp’s comments on Tuesday. There’s no need to be “hopeful” about having a rotation spot.
Mitch Brown’s coming out shows the AFL what courage and grace look like | Jonathan Horn
In revealing why it took him so long to come out as bisexual, the former West Coast Eagle highlights just how far the sport has to go
As a footy writer, I keep a rather shambolic database of current and former footballers. It’s kind of a buoy I can grab on to when I’m up against a nasty deadline. Sometimes it’s four of five paragraphs; sometimes it’s a sentence on so-and-so’s inability to kick on his left, or his poor record against a certain player, or something vaguely interesting he said on a podcast. When Mitch Brown became the first man in VFL/AFL history to come out as gay or bisexual, I was curious to see what I had written on him. Here’s my Pulitzer worthy offering: “Nathan’s twin. Married to a netballer. Unlucky with injuries. Went and played in the Ammos.” If ever there was evidence that we’re just scratching the surface when it comes to this sport and the people who play it, it was there.
We learned a lot more about Brown on Wednesday. When he was drafted to West Coast, he was 18 and living in a two-team town, a town where footballers were worshipped and indulged more than any other, a club coming off a controversial premiership where the partying was completely out of control. During his time at the club, they resolved to instil a different culture. They drafted cleanskins. But it was still a football club. It was still pre same-sex marriage Australia. It was still what he called a “hypermasculine environment,” he told The Daily Aus.
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Continue reading...Mets trying to get to bottom of Ryan Helsley's struggles after blown save against Phillies
Ryan Helsley's time in Flushing has been anything but successful for the All-Star closer.
Since the Mets acquired him from the Cardinals at the trade deadline, Helsley has pitched to a 0-3 record and a 10.38 ERA -- thanks to 14 runs (10 earned) in 8.2 innings pitched. In four save opportunities, Helsley has blown each one, including Tuesday's eventual 6-5 win over the Philadelphia Phillies.
With a 5-3 lead, manager Carlos Mendoza called on Helsley to hold the lead for closer Edwin Diaz. It's the first save opportunity Helsley has had since Aug. 15 against the Mariners. In three appearances (3 IP) between outings, Helsley has allowed three runs -- all coming from one appearance. The veteran right-hander had pitched in a low-leverage situation in Monday's series opener against the Phillies, striking out one in a 1-2-3 frame.
Helsley would have the opposite outing, giving up a two-run shot with one out to Harrison Bader to give up the lead. After a walk, Mendoza had no choice but to remove Helsley for Diaz, who got five outs to pick up the win thanks to Brandon Nimmo's walk-off single in the ninth.
Diaz was asked about his cohort in the bullpen and if he could relate to his struggles. The Mets closer knows struggles all too well, as he had a rollercoaster season in 2024 before rounding into his 2022 dominant form by the end of the year. And because of that, he trusts Helsley to figure it out.
"I've been through that. My advice to him is just, stay with your head up. We trust him," Diaz said after Tuesday's game. "We know what pitcher he is. He's one of the best closers in the game. He's going through some bad moments right now but we trust in him and we support him. Just stay with your head up and we keep going."
Just last year, Helsley led MLB with 49 saves in 53 opportunities with a 2.04 ERA. So that dominance is in there and the Mets know it, they are still trying to navigate these struggles.
Helsley intimated in the past that he's still adjusting to his new role with the Mets, but Mendoza hinted that it could be something else. Is Helsley tipping his pitches? Some games, it feels like it and the Mets are trying to get to the bottom of it.
"Too good of a stuff for them to be taking some really good swings on fastballs, get really good takes on sliders. We got to look back and see what we’re missing," Mendoza said of Helsley. "For teams to have comfortable at-bats like that, something is going on here. We have to figure it out."
After appearing in back-to-back games, Helsley is likely unavailable in Wednesday's series finale with the Phillies, so the right-hander will have to wait until the Marlins series to show that he can be the bridge to Diaz that the Mets traded for.
Clayton Kershaw is masterful again in Dodgers' win over Reds
The Dodgers might be sprinting toward the finish line this year, trying to edge out the San Diego Padres in a tight National League West race.
But on Tuesday night, in a win that kept them one game up in the standings with 29 to play, they made a 6-3 win over the Cincinnati Reds feel more like a nice, leisurely stroll.
Clayton Kershaw continued his renaissance season, pitching five innings of one-run ball to earn a fifth-consecutive victory (his longest such streak since the end of the 2022 season). The offense steadily wore the Reds' pitching staff down, answering a first-inning Cincinnati run with one of their own before taking the lead for good in the fourth.
It all added up to a third-straight win for the Dodgers (76-57), and helped them hold serve on a night the Padres beat the Mariners in Seattle (despite blowing an early five-run lead).
“It's been really fun to watch our guys play at the level that they're capable of,” manager Dave Roberts said. “I like how we're playing. I like where we're at right now."
Kershaw provided the bedrock for Tuesday’s victory.
The left-hander was pitching on four days’ rest for the third time this season (more than anyone else on the team), so that Shohei Ohtani could be lined up to start ahead of an off day on Wednesday. His already diminished fastball was playing down, averaging only 88 mph. And early on, the Reds (68-65) tagged him with a quick run, after Spencer Steer led off with a double and later scored on Miguel Andújar’s groundout.
“It wasn't a great night, stuff-wise,” Kershaw said. “Didn't have a lot of life on the fastball, or really anything.”
And yet, starting with that Andújar grounder, Kershaw proceeded to retire the last 14 batters he faced. Six came via strikeout, marking his second-highest strikeout total this season. And of balls put in play, only four were “hard hit” (with an exit velocity greater than 95 mph). Not one left the bat at more than 100 mph.
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It was the latest example of the 37-year-old left-hander’s newfound recipe for success: Hitting both sides of the plate with his fastball, leaning heavily on a slider that generated five whiffs and four outs, and mixing in his trademark curveball and newfangled splitter to keep an entirely right-handed Reds lineup off-balance in a 72-pitch outing.
“We kind of flipped the script and just started throwing kind of a lot of different stuff, trying to be creative, keep them off balance,” Kershaw said, while giving credit to catcher Will Smith’s pitch-calling behind the plate.
“I've seen growth in that sense,” Roberts added. “Just in the last couple years, he's been more open to doing different things. And I commend him for that. I think in that fourth inning [when Kershaw retired the side with two strikeouts], you could see — it didn't matter what Will was putting down, he felt like he could throw anything. And that's something that was really rare and really cool to see."
Given the low pitch count, Kershaw might have been able to go past the fifth. He and Roberts appeared to have a brief conversation in the dugout before shaking hands, a sign his night was over. But between his quick (by modern-day standards, at least) four-day turnaround, and the team’s careful management of his workload overall this season, Kershaw’s five innings were plenty.
“I think that he's smart enough to understand how many bullets he has,” Roberts said.
On the season, Kershaw is 9-2 with a 3.06 ERA, third-best among Dodgers starters this year. He also finishes August with a 1.88 ERA in five starts, third-best among National League starters for the month.
"It was a good August,” Kershaw said. “Fun to be a part of it this time of year."
While Kershaw cruised, the Dodgers’ offense also found a groove.
They erased the early 1-0 deficit in the bottom of the first, when Mookie Betts walked, Freddie Freeman doubled and Betts scored on a throwing error by Reds left fielder Austin Hays.
They took a 2-1 lead in the fourth, after a leadoff double from Teoscar Hernández, an infield single from Michael Conforto on a scorching comebacker that ripped the glove right off the hand of Reds pitcher Nick Martinez, and a sacrifice fly from Kiké Hernández (who returned to the lineup for the first time since early July after being out with an elbow injury).
Then, in the sixth, they broke the game open with a four-run rally.
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Smith turned around a center-cut fastball for an opposite-field, leadoff home run, a positive sign for the slumping catcher who entered the night with a .150 batting average in August and only one long ball in his previous 25 games.
Miguel Rojas came off the bench for a two-run double later in the inning, smoking a flyball to deep center that got Noelvi Marte (who was making his first career MLB start in the middle of the outfield) turned around at the warning track.
Ohtani followed that with an RBI single to right, helping him break a one-for-16 skid.
The only bad news for the Dodgers on Tuesday came pregame, when left-handed reliever Alex Vesia was placed on the injured list with a right oblique strain. Vesia described the injury as mild and was hopeful of returning once his 15-day IL stint was complete.
But even without him, the Dodgers’ bullpen largely coasted in relief of Kershaw. Blake Treinen and Tanner Scott, both having recently returned from the IL, pitched scoreless innings in the eighth and ninth (giving Scott his first save since returning). And though Hays hit a two-run home run in the seventh off Ben Casparius, it did little to make Tuesday feel like anything more than a late-season cakewalk — even amid a mad dash down the season’s closing stretch.
Sasaki’s latest rehab start
In triple-A Oklahoma City, rookie pitcher Roki Sasaki made the third start of his minor-league rehab stint, giving up three runs in 3 ⅔ innings on five hits, two walks and four strikeouts. The most encouraging takeaway from the outing was Sasaki’s fastball velocity, which averaged 96 mph for a second-straight outing and topped out at 98.8 mph — the hardest he has thrown in his recovery from a shoulder injury. Sasaki is expected to make at least one more rehab start before being ready to be activated.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.