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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Kyle Larson rallied from early electrical issues Sunday to win for the seventh time this season and storm into the third round of NASCAR’s playoffs.

Larson’s victory on The Roval at Charlotte Motor Speedway ended a topsy-turvy day for Hendrick Motorsports. Larson and reigning Cup champion Chase Elliott moved into the round of eight, but Alex Bowman and William Byron were eliminated and Elliott was nearly sabotaged by a vengeful Kevin Harvick.

Harvick seemingly lay in wait to deliver his payback on Elliott for Elliott costing him a win at Bristol three weeks ago. The apparent retaliation came about halfway through the race when Harvick sent Elliott into the wall — a wreck that put Elliott on the verge of elimination.

But his No. 9 team got Elliott back into contention — even with his bumper flapping in the wind off the back of his Chevrolet — and he drove through the field and into position to ruin another day for Harvick.

Elliott and his crew had said over their public team radio that Elliott should wreck Harvick if he got close to him again on Sunday, and as they hurtled into the first turn with 10 laps remaining, perhaps Harvick began to worry.

He botched the entry, almost as if he was looking in his rearview mirror, and drove directly into the wall in a hard hit that crumpled the entire front end of his Ford. The crowd roared its approval as Elliott cruised through the crash scene and Harvick’s title run came to its earliest end since the elimination format began in 2014.

Harvick had advanced to the third round the past seven years and all the way to the title race five times. He didn’t exactly say he wrecked Elliott as payback for Bristol but didn’t deny it, either.

“You remember Bristol,” Harvick said the first time he was asked if it was deliberate. The second time he was asked he responded “sometimes real life teaches you good lessons.”

On the day he made his 750th career start, he finished 33rd and was eliminated along with Christopher Bell, Byron and Bowman.

When asked if the two are now even, Harvick simply walked away.

Elliott subtly masked his pleasure.

“As far as Kevin goes, I just want to wish them a merry offseason and a happy Christmas,” Elliott said.

Is it over as far as Elliott is concerned?

“For us, we’re just eyes forward and happy to be moving on,” Elliott said. “That’s the big picture. We’ll keep fighting.”

Larson, meanwhile, plunged to 36th when he began to lose power in his Chevrolet and had to make multiple pit stops to address the electrical issues. A lengthy change of his alternator belt saved his race and staved off his own startling flirtation with an early playoff exit.

Instead, Larson became the first driver in NASCAR history to win three road course races in a season. He passed Denny Hamlin for the lead with eight laps remaining and is the first driver since Kasey Kahne in 2006 to win both the Coca-Cola 600 in May and Charlotte’s fall race in the same season.

“I noticed my battery was going low, I was getting stressed out, like, ‘Man, I’m not going to get knocked out of the playoffs like this!’ It wasn’t looking too good,” Larson said. “You think you’re good, then all of a sudden you’re running like 40th. You’re like, ‘Well, I’m down below the cutline.’

“I knew I was going to have some sketchy moments. I just had to pick my way through traffic and stay calm.”

His victory ended Elliott’s streak of two consecutive wins on the hybrid road course/oval that Charlotte officials designed in 2018 to add an interesting new circuit to the playoffs. The venue didn’t disappoint on Sunday as drivers jockeyed over 109 laps trying to avoid playoff elimination.

Tyler Reddick and Chris Buescher, two drivers not in the playoffs, finished second and third. Kyle Busch and Hamlin were fourth and fifth and Matt DiBenedetto finished sixth.

The next six positions went to playoff drivers — Joey Logano in seventh, followed by Bell, Ryan Blaney, Bowman, Byron and Elliott.

GMS RACING

Ty Dillon will return to full-time competition next season as the driver for GMS Racing in its inaugural Cup season.

Dillon has run four Cup races this year with Gaunt Brothers Racing and 11 Xfinity Series races with three different teams. He lost his ride at the end of 2020 and has been trying to claw his way back into a seat, and GMS Racing said Dillon was the only driver the team seriously looked at for the job.

Dillon will drive the No. 94 Chevrolet for the team in an alliance with Richard Childress Racing and ECR Engines. The car number dates to the 1990s, when current GMS Racing president Mike Beam partnered with Bill Elliott to form Bill Elliott Racing to field the No. 94.

The original Bill Elliott Racing shop is still a part of the GMS Racing facility.

RICK WARE RACING

Rick Ware Racing will be a full Ford team in 2022 with an alliance with Stewart-Haas Racing and Roush Yates Engines.

RWR has fielded four cars per race this year and owns three charters and leases a fourth. The team owner is under pressure to unload some of the charters to focus on fielding competitive cars.

Ware said Sunday he will have two cars next year, perhaps a third.

“I’m not prepared to run four cars at this time,” Ware said.

JAMES BOND

Daniel Craig capped his final opening weekend as James Bond with a stop at Charlotte Motor Speedway, where he waved the green flag on NASCAR’s playoff race.

Craig is a car enthusiast — he said he’s currently driving an “Audi RS6 which is quite pokey” — and has previously tested for Aston Martin on a closed course. Sunday was his first NASCAR race.

UP NEXT

The opening race of the third round of the playoffs is next Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway. Kyle Busch is the defending race winner.

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‘New York, New York’ to play only after Yanks win

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'New York, New York' to play only after Yanks win

TAMPA, Fla. — The Yankees will play Frank Sinatra’s version of the “Theme From New York, New York” only after home wins instead of after all games in the Bronx, going back to the original custom set by owner George Steinbrenner in 1980.

The Yankees said players and staff were tired of hearing a celebratory song following defeats.

After Sunday’s 4-0 spring training loss to Detroit at George M. Steinbrenner Field, the Yankees played Sinatra’s 1966 recording of “That’s Life,” a 1963 song by Dean Kay and Kelly Gordon. The change occurred two days after the team ended the ban on beards imposed by Steinbrenner in 1976.

The team said various songs will be used after losses.

“New York, New York” first was played at the end of Yankees wins after Steinbrenner learned of Sinatra’s version from a disc jockey at Le Club, a Manhattan restaurant and disco, former team public relations director Marty Appel told The New York Times in 2015.

The song, with music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, was first sung by Liza Minnelli for the 1977 Martin Scorsese film “New York, New York” and Sinatra performed it in a Don Costa arrangement for his 1980 recording “Trilogy: Past Present Future.”

For several years, the Yankees alternated the Sinatra version after wins and the Minnelli version following defeats. In recent years, the Sinatra rendition has been played after all final outs.

The Yankees said Friday that they were ending their ban on beards, fearing the prohibition might hamper player recruitment.

Hal Steinbrenner took over in 2008 as controlling owner from his father, who died in 2010.

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Mets’ Manaea strains oblique, likely to start on IL

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Mets' Manaea strains oblique, likely to start on IL

New York Mets left-hander Sean Manaea has been shut down for a few weeks due to a right oblique strain and will likely start the season on the injured list, manager Carlos Mendoza told reporters Monday.

Manaea, who is projected as the team’s No. 2 starter, went 12-6 with a 3.47 ERA with 184 strikeouts with the Mets in 2024, leading to a three-year, $75 million deal in December.

“The good news is … the tendon is not involved, the rib cage is not involved,” Mendoza said of the MRI results for Manaea. “It’s just straight muscle, so he’s going to be shut down for a couple of weeks — and then we’ll reassess after that. We’ve got to build him back up again. Safe to say that he’s probably going to start the season on the IL. … Once he’s symptom-free, he’ll start his throwing.”

It is the second injury to the Mets’ starting rotation after right-hander Frankie Montas was shut down for six to eight weeks on Feb. 17 after suffering a high-grade lat strain.

Kodai Senga, Clay Holmes and David Peterson are set to top the Mets’ starting rotation to begin the season. Paul Blackburn, Griffin Canning and Tylor Megill will compete for the final two spots until Manaea and Montas return.

The Mets have also lost reserve infielder Nick Madrigal for an extended period after he suffered a fractured left shoulder during Sunday’s spring training game against the Washington Nationals.

Madrigal, who is fighting for a roster spot, fell to the ground while throwing to first base after making a bare-handed play on a ground ball. He was originally diagnosed with a dislocated shoulder but further tests revealed the fracture in his non-throwing shoulder.

Mendoza told reporters that Madrigal, who signed a one-year deal with the Mets in January, will have a CT scan and will be sidelined “for a long time.”

Field Level Media contributed to this report.

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‘I think our pitching is going to surprise people’: Can the Mets’ rotation quiet the critics again?

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'I think our pitching is going to surprise people': Can the Mets' rotation quiet the critics again?

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Mid-February live batting practice sessions are usually forgettable, but the one held on the main field at Clover Park the day after Valentine’s Day was different for the New York Mets.

Kodai Senga, the presumed ace a year ago, faced four hitters. He threw 16 pitches, touched 96 mph and didn’t appear compromised from the shoulder injury that kept him out for all but 5⅓ innings during the 2024 regular season. Afterward, he shared laughs with catcher Luis Torrens and pitching coach Jeremy Hefner.

“I saw a smile on his face,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said. “That’s a good sign.”

Last spring, Senga, coming off an outstanding rookie year, was supposed to be a sure thing. Instead, he was shut down with a shoulder injury before appearing in a Grapefruit League game and started just the one game in July.

The Mets thrived without him, even with a rotation full of newcomers and uncertainty, completing an 89-win campaign capped by a trip to the National League Championship Series. But as they look to improve on that finish after a monster offseason, questions around the rotation remain.

Can Senga stay healthy? When will Frankie Montas, shut down for up to eight weeks with a lat strain, return? Will Clay Holmes, exclusively a reliever the past six seasons, successfully transition back to starting games? Will Sean Manaea continue where he left off last season after a midseason delivery change produced elite results? Was David Peterson’s career year — he posted a 2.90 ERA in 21 starts — an aberration?

“I will say, I feel much better about our starting pitching depth sitting here today than I did a year ago,” Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns said days before Montas sustained his injury during his first bullpen session of camp. “We made that a priority of our offseason. We brought in a number of players at all levels of free agency.”

All levels but one: proven ace-level starting pitchers.

The Mets’ offseason will be remembered for bookend investments in All-Stars to fortify their lineup: Juan Soto in early December and Pete Alonso the week before pitchers and catchers reported for camp. For the second offseason under Stearns’ direction, though, they had holes to fill in the rotation and did not acquire any of the premium starters available.

A year after their long-term bid for Yoshinobu Yamamoto fell short, the Mets did not aggressively pursue the three top starters available in free agency: Max Fried, Blake Snell and Corbin Burnes. (Fried strengthened an already-strong rotation strength across town, signing with the New York Yankees on an eight-year, $218 million deal.)

Instead, they made low-risk, high-reward short-term investments with an emphasis on depth. They re-signed Manaea to a three-year, $75 million contract. They signed Holmes, a two-time All-Star closer, to a three-year, $38 million deal to become a starter. They added Montas, an injury-plagued right-hander who recorded a 4.84 ERA in 2024, on a two-year, $34 million deal. They signed Griffin Canning, a former top prospect, to a one-year, $4.25 million deal after the right-hander pitched to a 5.19 ERA and surrendered 31 home runs last season, the second-most in baseball, for the last-place Los Angeles Angels.

The additions join Senga, Peterson, Paul Blackburn and Tylor Megill to round out the options for a six-man rotation, which the Mets plan to deploy in large part to accommodate Senga.

“I think our pitching is going to surprise people, even though there’s a lot of talk about starting pitching,” Mets owner Steve Cohen said. “And another thing is we’re flexible. If we have to make changes or improve the team during the year, you saw what we did in ’24 and we’ll do it again in ’25.”

For all the offensive fireworks and Grimace-engineered vibes the 2024 OMG Mets produced, extracting value from the starting rotation was the foundation for their success. Luis Severino, signed to a one-year, $13 million deal, recorded a 3.91 ERA over 31 starts last year after posting a 6.65 ERA with the Yankees the year before. Jose Quintana registered a 3.75 ERA in 31 starts in his age-35 season on a $13 million salary. Manaea dropped his arm slot in his 21st start and pitched to a 3.09 ERA over his final 12 outings before the playoffs.

“[We] want to be a team that can improve players,” Cohen said. “And I think from a pitching perspective, we’re able to do that.”

Hefner pointed to Severino’s jump from 89⅓ innings in 2023 to 182 innings last season as evidence that, with the required work ethic, a successful sizable workload increase is possible.

“I feel like our performance staff does a good job of monitoring guys and not just putting reins on them,” Hefner said. “They’re very much like, ‘Let’s go. Let’s push. How far can we take them?’ As long as they’re recovering and they’re honest with us and they’re staying on top of their programs, we have full confidence that a guy could make a big jump in innings.”

In Holmes, the Mets will attempt a more extreme escalation.

The Yankees’ former closer has totaled 337⅓ innings over his seven-year career, including 63 innings each of the past two seasons. He hasn’t started a game since September 2018. To get through a lineup two or three times, Holmes said he plans on incorporating a changeup — a pitch he started tinkering with in bullpens last season — for the first time and using his four-seam fastball more often to complement his sinker (his best pitch). The goal is to build up to 90 pitches by Opening Day.

“I would say now it’s starting to get a little different,” Holmes said last week. “I threw three innings the other day. It was probably the first time I’ve done that in a while.”

Relievers have successfully made the jump to starter. Hall of Famer John Smoltz famously converted from starter to closer back to starter. For the Mets, a club with World Series aspirations, it’s a risk they decided is worth taking.

Of course, that risk won’t matter if they can’t keep their starting pitchers healthy — and that starts with Senga, who, alongside Manaea, will top a rotation the Mets hope will help lead them back to October.

“He just needs to be healthy,” Mendoza said. “As long as he’s taking the ball. But we got some good options. And we talked to him about that. He doesn’t have to be the hero, feeling like he’s the ace of the staff, because we got some options. And we like those guys at the front end of the rotation.”

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