August 2025

There were 1,614 posts published in August 2025 (this is page 75 of 162).

Mark Pope can’t keep Denzel Aberdeen out of the practice gym

After eight weeks of summer practice, Mark Pope gave his Kentucky Wildcats some time off before the fall semester begins later this month. But he’s having trouble keeping all of his players out of the Joe Craft Center practice gym, even while conducting an interview in his office right above the court.

“We tried to kick everybody off campus. To try to get everybody off campus to go home and refresh.” Pope said earlier this week on the Eye on College Basketball with Matt Norlander. “And then I’m sitting here in the office, and Denzel Aberdeen is down there in a full sweat getting a ton of work done. Reece Potter is out there getting shots.

“I mean, you think about DA. He’s got a national championship ring on his finger, and in our one week off, where we’ve told these guys they’re banned from the gym, these guys are still breaking in. That’s the type of group we have.”

This shouldn’t be too shocking to hear. If anyone knows what it takes to win at this level, it’s Aberdeen. After improving his individual game across all three seasons at Florida, capped with a national championship victory as a junior back in the spring, he transferred to Kentucky for a new challenge in what will be his final college run. It’s also nice to see Potter, a seven-footer coming over from a lower-level program in Miami (OH), embracing the grind, too.

Norlander did push back a touch, asking Pope how these guys are still able to get into the practice gym against the coach’s orders. For one, Pope is confident his players will still dedicate at least a few days off from working out during this break. But secondly, he’s not going to tell a group of players hungry to get better that they can’t eat, especially when it comes to someone like Aberdeen.

“Denzel, in the gym right now. Winner, winner, winner,” Pope said when asked to quickly describe Aberdeen. “He’s just a winner. He’s got a championship ring, man. That’s hard to get. He’s incredible.”

A seasoned super athlete at 6-foot-5 with a 42-inch vertical, Aberdeen expects to play a significant role for the Wildcats in 2025-26, potentially as a starter. He averaged 7.7 points in 19.8 minutes per outing last season off the bench on a loaded Gators’ squad. But when given starter minutes, he stood out: 14.4 points, 2.6 assists, and 2.4 rebounds in 29.8 minutes per outing while shooting 42.9 percent from the field and 41.4 percent from deep across five games as a starter against SEC foes.

If Aberdeen can put up comparable numbers in his role at Kentucky, all those extra hours in the gym will not only pay off for him as an individual but also for the Wildcats’ chances of making a deep NCAA Tournament run.

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Mookie Betts leads Dodgers to sweep over Padres to reclaim NL West lead

The Los Angeles Dodgers came up with a massive sweep over their NL West rivals this weekend, thanks in large part to a go-ahead home run from Mookie Betts on Sunday afternoon.

Betts, after the San Diego Padres had rallied back from a four-run hole and tied the game up, drilled a deep solo home run over the left field wall at Dodger Stadium. That put the Dodgers up 5-4 and eventually led them to the one-run win.

The shot came after he was walked and flew out twice. The former MVP has had a rough season, too, and currently holds a career-worst .241 batting average.

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The Dodgers had jumped out in front early on Sunday, thanks to a three-run homer from Freddie Freeman and a solo shot from Andy Pages in the first inning off of Yu Darvish. The Padres then slowly clawed back in it, and Jose Iglesias hit Xander Bogaerts in in the eighth inning to finally tie things back up.

That win followed a 6-0 win over the Padres on Saturday and a narrow 3-2 win on Friday. That three-game sweep was the Dodgers’ first since they swept the Chicago White Sox in early July. The Padres haven’t been swept since mid-May.

The wins also came at a critical time for the Dodgers, and not just because it snapped a four-game losing skid. They were losing their grip on the NL West race amid a recent surge from the Padres, who entered the series on a five-game win streak. The Padres even took a one-game lead in the division race after they rolled over the San Francisco Giants on Wednesday.

But thanks to the sweep, which pushed them to 71-53, the Dodgers now have a two-game lead once again and are all alone at the top.

Though they are currently out in front, there is still a big stretch of the season left. The Padres will have plenty of opportunities to rally and win the division — something they haven’t done since 2006. The two teams will run it back with a three-game series at Petco Park starting on Friday, too, so things could easily flip right back over the next week.

But at least for now, the Dodgers’ lead in the NL West is still safe.

Mookie Betts leads Dodgers to sweep over Padres to reclaim NL West lead

The Los Angeles Dodgers came up with a massive sweep over their NL West rivals this weekend, thanks in large part to a go-ahead home run from Mookie Betts on Sunday afternoon.

Betts, after the San Diego Padres had rallied back from a four-run hole and tied the game up, drilled a deep solo home run over the left field wall at Dodger Stadium. That put the Dodgers up 5-4 and eventually led them to the one-run win.

The shot came after he was walked and flew out twice. The former MVP has had a rough season, too, and currently holds a career-worst .241 batting average.

[Join or create a Yahoo Fantasy Football league for the 2025 NFL season]

The Dodgers had jumped out in front early on Sunday, thanks to a three-run homer from Freddie Freeman and a solo shot from Andy Pages in the first inning off of Yu Darvish. The Padres then slowly clawed back in it, and Jose Iglesias hit Xander Bogaerts in in the eighth inning to finally tie things back up.

That win followed a 6-0 win over the Padres on Saturday and a narrow 3-2 win on Friday. That three-game sweep was the Dodgers’ first since they swept the Chicago White Sox in early July. The Padres haven’t been swept since mid-May.

The wins also came at a critical time for the Dodgers, and not just because it snapped a four-game losing skid. They were losing their grip on the NL West race amid a recent surge from the Padres, who entered the series on a five-game win streak. The Padres even took a one-game lead in the division race after they rolled over the San Francisco Giants on Wednesday.

But thanks to the sweep, which pushed them to 71-53, the Dodgers now have a two-game lead once again and are all alone at the top.

Though they are currently out in front, there is still a big stretch of the season left. The Padres will have plenty of opportunities to rally and win the division — something they haven’t done since 2006. The two teams will run it back with a three-game series at Petco Park starting on Friday, too, so things could easily flip right back over the next week.

But at least for now, the Dodgers’ lead in the NL West is still safe.

Mookie Betts’ late home run lifts Dodgers to series sweep of the Padres

Mookie Betts celebrates his go-ahead home run in the eighth inning of a 5-4 win over the San Diego Padres at Dodger Stadium on Sunday. (Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)

For so much of this year, the Dodgers have been picking Mookie Betts up amid a career-worst season at the plate.

On Sunday afternoon, with a rivalry game and division lead hanging in the balance, he returned the favor with his biggest swing in ages.

After once leading by four, then watching the Padres claw all the way back to tie the score, the Dodgers completed a weekend series sweep on Betts’ go-ahead home run in the bottom of the eighth — his no-doubt, 394-foot, stadium-shaking blast sending the Dodgers to a 5-4 win and two-game lead in the National League West.

As Betts came to the plate in the eighth inning, Dodger Stadium was silent and tense.

In the first inning, the team had ambushed Padres starter Yu Darvish for four runs on long balls from Freddie Freeman and Andy Pages.

From there, a crowd of 49,189 watched the Padres slowly storm back.

Tyler Glasnow fizzled after two electric opening innings, leaving the game at the end of the fifth after giving up two runs.

A patchwork Dodgers bullpen couldn’t hold the Padres off, giving up runs in the top of the sixth and eighth that transformed the score into a 4-4 tie.

At that point, San Diego had the advantage. Their league-leading bullpen was fresh. Their closer, Robert Suarez, was on the mound. And the Dodgers were almost completely out of pitching options, having burned five relievers to get the previous nine outs.

But then, Betts delivered. In a 2-and-0 count against Suarez, he launched a center-cut fastball deep into the left-field stands.

It was the kind of moment that has eluded the former MVP so often this year. The kind of heroic act the Dodgers (71-53) had been waiting for despite his career-worst .241 batting average.

Mookie Betts runs the bases after hitting a solo home run in the eighth inning for the Dodgers against the Padres on Sunday. (Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)

Just like that, the Dodgers completed their sweep against the Padres (69-55). They went from second place at the start of Friday to all alone back in first three days later.

Long before the dramatic ending, Sunday had started like the previous two nights. The Dodgers were getting good pitching, with Glasnow striking out four of his first five batters while pumping increased fastball velocity and generating foolish swings with his slider. The Padres were making mistakes; most notably, Freddy Fermín getting gunned down by Pages from center while trying to leg out a double in the top of the third, turning what could have been a crooked-number inning into only a one-run rally.

Darvish, meanwhile, made a pair of two-strike mistakes, leaving a fastball up to Freeman for a three-run homer before failing to bury a splitter to Pages for a solo shot.

Read more:Dodgers capitalize on Padres’ sloppiness to retake sole possession of first place

Things began to shift, however, in the fifth. Ramón Laureano lifted a solo drive just over the wall in right. And though Glasnow got out of a jam later in the inning, his fading command and rising pitch count forced him from the game after 91 throws.

That meant, with the Padres turning to their shutdown (and, after two defeats to start the series, well-rested) bullpen, the Dodgers’ shaky relief corps was asked to protect a narrow lead.

Once again, they couldn’t.

In the sixth, Anthony Banda gave up one run on a pair of doubles (the second one, a floating fly ball into the right field corner from Ryan O’Hearn that slow-footed Teoscar Hernández couldn’t track down).

And though Blake Treinen stranded a runner at third in the seventh — thanks in no small part to a generous strike call against Manny Machado that negated a walk — more trouble arose in the eighth.

Alexis Díaz started the inning by hitting a batter, then gave up a double to Laureano on a line drive to center. Alex Vesia took over from there and retired both batters he faced. But the first one was a ground ball from Jose Iglesias, just enough to get a runner home from third for the tying run.

Dodgers reliever Alex Vesia, right, celebrates with catcher Will Smith after the Dodgers’ 5-4 win over the Padres at Dodger Stadium on Sunday. (Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)

For a fleeting moment, all the momentum the Dodgers had built this past week seemed to be fading.

Instead of retaking control of the division lead, they risked finishing this weekend tied atop the standings.

With one swing, Betts changed all that.

In a year of so much frustration, his moment of salvation finally arrived.

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Start of Sunday’s Mets-Mariners MLB Little League Classic delayed due to rain

The start of Sunday’s MLB Little League Classic between the Mets and Mariners in Williamsport, PA., has been delayed due to rain.

The rain began to come down in buckets at around 5:45 p.m., and the tarp was placed over the field at Journey Bank Ballpark at Historic Bowman Field.

The game, the finale of the three-game set which began at Citi Field, will now begin at 7:45 p.m. 

Fortunately, the Mets players had plenty of chances to soak in some of the fun with the Little League World Series players before the rain.

When things get underway, right-hander Clay Holmes will climb the hill for the Mets, serving as the home team in the game, for his 25th start of the year. He has pitched to a 3.71 ERA and 1.349 WHIP over 126 innings with 101 strikeouts and 52 walks.

Holmes has struggled of late; in five starts since the All-Star break, he has pitched to a 5.56 ERA (3.95 FIP) and a 1.765 WHIP in 22.2 innings. He has just 18 strikeouts to 11 walks.

Seattle is sending out righty GeorgeKirby for his 16th start of the year. He has a 3.71 ERA and 1.071 WHIP over 85 innings with 90 strikeouts to 20 walks. After struggling to start the year (6.16 ERA over his first six outings), he has been solid since the break, with a 2.32 ERA (2.21 FIP) and 0.935 WHIP in 31.0 innings over his past five starts with 34 strikeouts to eight walks.

Paul Goldschmidt’s three hits, sloppy St. Louis defense lead to Yankees’ three-game sweep of Cardinals

The Yankees secured a three-game sweep, defeating the St. Louis Cardinals by a score of 8-4 on Sunday afternoon.

Here are the key takeaways…

— For the first time in 46 games, Anthony Volpe was not the starting shortstop for the Yankees. Volpe is just 3-for-his-last-26 at the plate, and if you zoom out further, he’s 11-for-his-last-55 with 13 strikeouts.

Jose Caballero got the start at short, and he ended up playing a huge role in the victory. Leading off the top of the ninth in a 4-4 game, Caballero hit a high-chopper to second, and while Thomas Saggese had plenty of time to make the play, he ended up throwing it away, putting Caballero on second.

The Yankees would go on to load the bases, and Cody Bellinger found a hole between first and second, with the ball getting past Saggese for his second error of the inning, scoring two New York runs. The Yankees would add another on a Jazz Chisholm Jr. groundout, going up 7-4. 

Caballero went 1-for-4 with an RBI, but his speed was what put things in motion in the ninth.

— Welcome back, Paul Goldschmidt!

After playing 836 regular-season games as a Cardinal, including winning an NL MVP in 2022, Goldschmidt got his first start as a visitor in St. Louis.

The crowd gave Goldschmidt a standing ovation in the second inning, and he ended up having a really nice day at the plate, going 3-for-5 with an RBI double in the ninth and a run scored earlier in the game.

–Goldschmidt was part of a three-run fourth inning for the Yankees against Miles Mikolas. After a Chisholmwalk and a Goldschmidt double, the bottom of the Yankees’ order delivered with three-straight RBI hits by Jasson Dominguez, Ryan McMahon, and Caballero, as the Yankees jumped out to a 3-0 lead.

— It wasn’t a great afternoon for Yankees starter Will Warren, though the defense behind him didn’t give him a ton of help. After three scoreless innings to get things started, Warren ran into trouble in the fourth, allowing a pair of two-out runs after the inning began with a McMahon error.

Warren’s fifth inning started with a Chisholm throwing error, and after the Cardinals scored their third run of the game on an Alec Burleson RBI single, Warren’s afternoon ended shortly thereafter.

Warren went 4.2 innings, allowing one earned run (three runs total) on six hits to go along with three strikeouts and one walk.

— The Yanks evened the game in the seventh thanks to some small ball. After Trent Grisham walked to get things started, an Aaron Judge soft hit to right moved Grisham to third, and the speedy outfielder came around to score on a Bellinger sac fly to center.

— Both benches had some problems with home plate umpire Nick Lentz. In the fourth, after Aaron Boone was chirping at Lentz about the strike zone, it was major league field coordinator and director of catching Tanner Swanson who got tossed after the inning was over. Then, in the top of the seventh, Cards skipper Oli Marmol got the hook after being dissatisfied with the strike zone.

— Camilo Doval allowed a game-tying solo home run to Cards catcher Yohel Pozo in the sixth inning, and has now allowed at least one earned run in four of his eight appearances with the Yankees. Doval owns a 6.43 ERA since being traded to the Yanks from the San Francisco Giants.

Game MVP

Goldschmidt, who had three hits in his first start as a visitor in St. Louis since his days as a Cardinal.

Highlights

Upcoming schedule

The Yankees have a day off on Monday before starting a quick two-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday night at 7:35 p.m.

Carlos Rodon is scheduled to face righty Shane Baz.

Reds end Brewers’ record 14-game win streak with Austin Hays walk-off hit in extra innings

Milwaukee’s magical 14-game win streak has come to an end as the Cincinnati Reds walked off the Brewers in extra innings Sunday. 

With the bases loaded, Reds designated hitter Austin Hays hit down the left-field line to send TJ Friedl home for a walk-off in the 10th inning.

Cincinnati’s victory ends the Brewers’ franchise record winning streak. It also saved the Reds from a series sweep at home after they blew leads in each of the first two games of this three-game series.

After staying scoreless for a while, the Reds struck first in the seventh inning, with catcher Jose Trevino’s sacrifice fly letting Hays come home for a 1-0 lead.

And for a moment, it looked like the Brewers would keep the late-game magic going, as William Contreras hit a two-run homer in the top of the ninth to take a late 2-1 lead.

But Trevino hit another key RBI single in the bottom of the ninth to keep Cincinnati alive and send the game into extra innings.

Pitcher Andrew Abbott had a good start for the Reds, with seven strikeouts in seven innings. The Brewers didn’t break through until Abbott left after the seventh. The Brewers took the lead off Emilio Pagán, who gave up the go-ahead homer in the ninth inning to Contreras. 

If the Brewers had pulled it off, it would have been the third straight improbable victory of the series. On Saturday, Milwaukee earned the win in extra innings after some key defensive mistakes from the Reds. And Friday, the Brewers went from 8-1 down to power to a 10-8 win.

Despite the loss, Milwaukee will hope to keep its red-hot summer going with a five-game away series at the Chicago Cubs this week, including a doubleheader Monday.

Reds end Brewers’ record 14-game win streak with Austin Hays walk-off hit in extra innings

Milwaukee’s magical 14-game win streak has come to an end as the Cincinnati Reds walked off the Brewers in extra innings Sunday. 

With the bases loaded, Reds designated hitter Austin Hays hit down the left-field line to send TJ Friedl home for a walk-off in the 10th inning.

Cincinnati’s victory ends the Brewers’ franchise record winning streak. It also saved the Reds from a series sweep at home after they blew leads in each of the first two games of this three-game series.

After staying scoreless for a while, the Reds struck first in the seventh inning, with catcher Jose Trevino’s sacrifice fly letting Hays come home for a 1-0 lead.

And for a moment, it looked like the Brewers would keep the late-game magic going, as William Contreras hit a two-run homer in the top of the ninth to take a late 2-1 lead.

But Trevino hit another key RBI single in the bottom of the ninth to keep Cincinnati alive and send the game into extra innings.

Pitcher Andrew Abbott had a good start for the Reds, with seven strikeouts in seven innings. The Brewers didn’t break through until Abbott left after the seventh. The Brewers took the lead off Emilio Pagán, who gave up the go-ahead homer in the ninth inning to Contreras. 

If the Brewers had pulled it off, it would have been the third straight improbable victory of the series. On Saturday, Milwaukee earned the win in extra innings after some key defensive mistakes from the Reds. And Friday, the Brewers went from 8-1 down to power to a 10-8 win.

Despite the loss, Milwaukee will hope to keep its red-hot summer going with a five-game away series at the Chicago Cubs this week, including a doubleheader Monday.