The entire landscape of Major League Baseball is virtually guaranteed to change from one season to the next. The annual awards that were handed out over the course of this week are yet another example of that.
Just to pick one race, let’s go with the AL MVP competition. Just before the season, SportsBetting.com ranked the most likely candidates as Mike Trout of the Angels and Luis Robert of the White Sox. Based on what we saw in 2020 and, for Trout, over a multiyear period, the status of favorite for both made sense. Indeed, both played like MVPs while they were on the field, but injuries kept both players off the field so often that they were never factors in the race.
Meanwhile, eventual landslide AL winner Shohei Ohtani was tied for third in the futures market with the Yankees’ Aaron Judge. But the AL finalists in addition to Ohtani were further down the list, with Toronto’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr. coming in tied for eighth (at 20-1) and Blue Jays teammate Marcus Semien off the board entirely, so somewhere south of 100-1.
That’s just one award, but that dynamic repeats for all of them, no matter where you’re getting your odds. The reason is simple: Predicting the future is hard. It’s hard in life. Hard in sports. Hard when it comes to teams. It’s especially hard when it comes to players.
Let’s do it anyway. Here’s a very early stab at the 2022 MLB awards races. How early? So early, that you might even call it way too early.
AL Rookie of the Year
My favorites: Bobby Witt Jr., Royals; Adley Rutschman, Orioles; Shane Baz, Rays
Witt and Rutschman are two of the consensus top prospects in the game. Both are on a trajectory for a 2022 debut after they played extremely well when they reached Triple-A last season. We don’t know how the current CBA negotiations are going to affect MLB service time as it relates to arbitration eligibility and free agency, so we don’t know if the Royals and Orioles are going to see any benefit in delaying the debuts of their top prospects.
Baz doesn’t carry that caveat because he debuted for the Rays in 2021, and he was dominant over his first three big league outings. He even earned a Game 2 start for Tampa Bay in its division series against the Red Sox. He figures to be a rotation fixture for the Rays going forward, and the Rookie of the Year formula is always an uncertain combination of opportunity and performance.
Early indications are that Witt seems like a no-brainer to break camp with the Royals next spring. There’s simply nothing left for him to prove in the minors, and the Royals are trying to win, so if Witt is part of their best configuration, they’ll want him out there as often as possible. Rutschman’s ETA is a little more unclear than that, and the Orioles are not yet pushing toward contention. It would be great to see a season-long battle between Witt and Rutschman, because it could be a memorable one.
We can’t forget about Seattle OF Julio Rodriguez, who just might be the best prospect of them all. He hit .347 with patience, power and speed across two levels for Mariners affiliates in 2021. He also starred for the Dominican Republic during the Tokyo Olympics. Still, Rodriguez doesn’t turn 21 until Dec. 29, and right now has reached only Double-A, where he played 46 games this past season. The Mariners will try to contend in 2022, but have decent outfield depth.
Rodriguez might well force his way onto Seattle’s opening day roster, but if not, then he’d start behind the favorites in what is shaping up as a tremendous AL rookie class. How tremendous? Among other top prospects who could play significant roles next season whom we haven’t even mentioned are Baltimore righty Grayson Rodriguez, Detroit hitting prospects Spencer Torkelson and Riley Greene, and Kansas City catcher/slugger MJ Melendez.
Moreno has rocketed up the prospect rankings by hitting everywhere he’s gone. Baseball America ranked Moreno as Toronto’s No. 8 prospect before last season and as the Jays’ second-best catching prospect behind Alejandro Kirk. By BA’s midseason rankings, Moreno held the No. 1 overall spot for the Jays. That’ll happen when you hit .367, get a smattering of Triple-A playing time at age 21 and keep on mashing during the Arizona Fall League. He lost development time to a thumb injury in 2021, and the Jays have Danny Jansen and Kirk as a nice combo behind the plate. Nevertheless, Moreno’s trajectory makes him a player to watch.
My pick: Witt. He’s the full package and should get a full season to show it.
It’s much harder to identify classic Rookie of the Year candidates on the NL side, but that’s not to say front-runners won’t emerge. We’ve shied away from listing some likely 2022 rookies as favorites here because of injuries (Padres IF C.J. Abrams) or a lack of consistency (Cardinals IF Nolan Gorman and SP Matthew Liberatore). Any of those players could show up in spring training and become what Jonathan India was for the 2021 Reds.
Bart seems to have the inside edge on succeeding Buster Posey as the Giants’ everyday catcher. He maintains his rookie status despite having 35 big league games under his belt. Posey’s retirement opens up the door of opportunity for him.
Greene is more of a question mark in terms of spending most of next season at the big league level, even though the Reds appear to be in veteran-shedding mode. After missing all of 2019 due to Tommy John surgery, Greene spent 2020 at Cincinnati’s alternate training site, so 2021 was his first game action since 2018. The stuff was still there — Greene will be a darling of anyone dazzled by Statcast readings — but his results tailed off after he ascended to Triple-A. Throwing his name into this mix is a testament to his raw stuff.
Davis is a fast riser in the Cubs’ system after adding more power to his arsenal. The rebuilding Cubs might have everyday at-bats available for a young player of his ilk, though it seems likely he’ll begin 2022 in Triple-A.
Sanchez could have plenty of company in the Marlins’ 2022 rookie class, joining fellow hurlers Max Meyer and Edward Cabrera, and possibly slugging outfielder JJ Bleday. Sanchez is coming off surgery to repair a small tear in his shoulder, and while current reports are that he’ll be good to go in 2022, we have to see that happen before we can truly believe it — any kind of shoulder issue has to be handled delicately. Still, if Sanchez is a full go, we’ve already seen his stuff play in the majors, with an 80-grade fastball (per Baseball America) that earned him two postseason starts in 2020.
Other sleeper candidates include a pair of Cincinnati prospects — SS Jose Barrero and SP Nick Lodolo — as well as suddenly overlooked Braves CF Cristian Pache. Phillies SS Bryson Stott has gotten a lot of recent attention and the Phils do need a long-term shortstop solution.
My pick: Bart. He might not have the most upside of the NL rookie class, but he should be a steady and frequent contributor in a key role for a contending team.
This race looks like it’ll be wide open, with former winners Chris Sale, Shane Bieber and Justin Verlander all in various post-injury stages, and Cole having come back to the pack a little bit after his up-and-down second half last season.
Giolito struggled with some inconsistency in 2021, but he has a history of overcoming those issues with his cerebral, self-aware approach to the game. Also, anyone who is a fixture in the White Sox’s rotation is a contender, so in a subhead to this section, you might as well list Lance Lynn, Dylan Cease and maybe even Michael Kopech. There aren’t many managers who value length from starters like Tony La Russa, and while that might not turn the heads of voters like it once did, it might hold some sway in a tight race.
With Berrios, we also have to mention teammate Robbie Ray, the 2021 AL winner who is a free agent, so it’s hard to say he’s a favorite in either league. Meanwhile, Berrios is an underrated pitcher who combines durability and consistency as well as anyone, and his peripheral numbers have ticked up to the point where it feels like he’s poised for a career season.
As for Cole, he has plenty to prove after his 2021 drop-off, but he is still, after all, Gerrit Cole.
Sleeper: Shohei Ohtani, Angels
Corbin Burnes’ Cy Young win shows that you don’t need to lead the league in innings to win the honor in today’s game. Ohtani has the potential to put up a top-five season just for his pitching alone, and as good as he was on the mound in 2021, there were still some unpolished edges to his game. More than anything, it just feels like if Ohtani sets his sights on building a case for this award and boosting the oft-criticized Angels rotation, he, perhaps more than any player in the game, can get there by sheer will.
My pick: Berrios. A (relatively) new team, a contract extension — things just seem to be coming together for Berrios as he gets into the prime of his career.
The 2021 season was great, as all full baseball seasons are, but it wasn’t as great as it could have been because of major injuries to some of the game’s best players. None of those injuries was as devastating as were the maladies that limited to deGrom to 92 innings. Still, since the start of the 2018 season, here are deGrom’s numbers per 162 games: 12-8, 1.94 ERA and 289 strikeouts.
There is at least some sentiment that Wheeler got jobbed in the 2021 balloting, and if he can repeat his performance in 2022, maybe he gets a closer look next time around. The key question for him is whether there will be a price to pay from his leap in innings from 71 in 2020 to 213 1/3.
I remained convinced that Buehler is going to put it all together some year, post enormous numbers and run away with a Cy Young Award. His numbers were awfully good in 2021, so if he improves on those, look out.
We’ve seen Flaherty enjoy a prolonged stretch when he pitched at an elite level before. Last season, he wasn’t quite at that level, and injuries had something to do with it. He’s at the point in his career where he could become the next career-long Cardinal, or position himself for a major payday in free agency. Next season could be the one in which Flaherty establishes himself over a full season as the ace the Cardinals need.
My pick: DeGrom. There are a lot of ifs for most of the pitchers mentioned in this piece, because that’s the nature of forecasting pitching. For deGrom, there is only one if: If he makes 30 or so starts, he is the front-runner.
AL MVP
My favorites: Shohei Ohtani, Angels; Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Blue Jays; Mike Trout, Angels
For Ohtani, the question has to be whether some minor fatigue develops with the fascination of just how marvelously unique his 2021 season was. He did fall off a bit toward the end of the season at the plate, and if the Angels manage him a little more carefully going forward, that might be enough to open the door for someone else.
That someone else could certainly be Guerrero, whose 2021 numbers (1.002 OPS) were good enough to get him AL MVP honors in many seasons. The sustainability of those numbers, or at least most of them, is made more likely by the fact that they were undergirded by real improvements in approach and plate discipline, the kind of things that are usually sticky. As a reality check, you also think back to the heights of Bryce Harper’s age-22 season (1.109 OPS) and what came next, and you wonder if some regression is almost inevitable.
As for Trout, the only number of his that has declined is games played. Unfortunately, that’s a big one. After missing a total of 16 games from 2013 to 2016, he has missed at least 22 in each full season since. Yet he remains a player for whom a 1.000 OPS is the expectation, not the upside. Literally: His career OPS is 1.002. If he plays a full season of at least 140-145 games, he’ll be part of the MVP conversation.
Franco entered the big leagues with the burden of having been baseball’s top consensus prospect for multiple seasons. With expectations so high, a disappointing debut seemed almost like an inevitability. Indeed, other than homering in his first game, he did get off to a slow start — for all of 15 games, during which he hit .197. After that, he hit .314/.372/.500. He also put up a BABIP of .311, which is kind of low for a player with his contact and line-drive ability. In the minors, he was at .334. So his already-impressive numbers could have been even better.
Franco doesn’t turn 21 until spring training, so maybe we’re jumping the gun. We’ve never had a position player win an MVP award in his age-21 season. Still, Franco is someone who leaped from top prospect status to putting up a consecutive-game on-base streak in the majors that had him listed alongside Mickey Mantle on a daily basis. Special players do special things.
My pick: Trout. This seems like less of an obvious pick than years past, because the mounting injury problems have really started to take over Trout’s narrative. How could they not after a season in which he went down with a calf strain in the middle of May, and then missed the rest of the season? Still, when he did play, he showed zero degradation of his skills. And his skills remain the best in the game.
This is either a great list or a boring list. On one hand, the familiarity it conjures is a reflection of how many generational players there are in the senior circuit right now, and how many of them are either in their primes, or on the ascent. If you wanted to add Bryce Harper to that list, I wouldn’t argue with you. The only reason Ronald Acuna Jr. isn’t there is because we don’t know for sure when he’s coming back from his ACL tear, and we need to see if he has been in any way diminished by the injury.
Among the trio listed as favorites, Betts has the most to prove, though “prove” might not be an appropriate description. It’s simply that he is coming off a down season by his immense standards. He hit .264, matching his career low. The last time Betts hit that number, the following campaign he responded by hitting .346 with an OPS over 1.000 and posted an epic 10.7 bWAR.
Soto will be on the favorites list for the foreseeable future. It’s not just that he’s consistent. It’s that the level at which he produces that consistency is MVP-caliber. His mean expectation is just that high. Coming off his age-22 season, he has a career .981 OPS and has averaged 6.1 bWAR per 162 games. He showed us in the Home Run Derby what his raw power is. Now imagine Soto fully manifesting that raw power in games for a full season, going along with his best-in-the-game combination of strike zone judgment and plate discipline, and elite bat-to-ball skills. Excuse me while I clean up the drool from my keyboard.
And Tatis could hit 50 home runs and steal 40 bases as a shortstop. It’s an awfully exciting time in the National League.
Sleeper:Trea Turner. OK, Turner is a star player and not really the platonic ideal of a sleeper candidate, but I want to throw some attention his way. His power breakout in 2021 is a major development for a player who seems to have established himself as a .330-type hitter during this phase of his career and has some of baseball’s best speed skills. If he ends up moving back to shortstop full time to replace Corey Seager, he’ll have plenty of positional value as well. The competition in the NL is so fierce with elite talents that it is hard to imagine a real sleeper breaking through, so Turner is the best I can come up with.
My pick: Tatis. I see the Padres as having a big bounce-back year under Bob Melvin, not just because of the manager, but because of better injury luck. Tatis is going to produce, but he should put up his numbers in a more high-stakes context next year amid a three-team scrum with the Giants and Dodgers in the NL West. Soto is capable of putting up the kind of monster numbers to overcome that, but he will be handicapped to an extent by the fact that the Nationals aren’t likely to be very good.
LOS ANGELES — It’s easy to take Shohei Ohtani for granted. By now, we’ve settled into the rote comfort: He is the best player on the planet, and that’s that. Ohtani’s baseline is everyone else’s peak. He is judged against himself and himself only.
And it’s human nature that when we watch something often enough — even something as mind-bending as a player who’s a full-time starting pitcher and full-time hitter and among the very best at both — it starts to register as normal.
Which is why his performances on Friday — the unleashing of the full extent of Ohtani’s magic — was the sort of necessary reminder that one of the greatest athletes in the world, and the most talented baseball player ever, is playing right now, doing unfathomable things, redefining the game in real time. And that even when he starts the day mired in an uncharacteristic slump, Ohtani needs only a single game to launch himself into the annals of history.
Where Ohtani’s performance in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series ranks on the all-time list of games will be debated for years. In the celebration following Los Angeles‘ 5-1 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers, though, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts stood on the field and said, “That’s the greatest night in baseball history,” and no one cared to argue.
Over the course of 2 hours, 41 minutes, in front of 52,883 fans, with millions watching domestically and tens of millions more in Japan, Ohtani threw six shutout innings and struck out 10 in between hitting three home runs that traveled a combined 1,342 feet, including one that left Dodger Stadium entirely. It was the sort of game that happens in comic books, not real life — and it was a game that completed a championship series sweep and sent Los Angeles to its second consecutive World Series. It was the kind of night that leaves patrons elated they saw it and also just a little ruined because they know they’ll never see anything like it again. Everyone was a prisoner, captive to perhaps the greatest individual game in the quarter-million or so played over the last century and a half.
It was, at very least, one of the finest displays of baseball since the game’s inception, up there with Tony Cloninger hitting two grand slams and throwing a complete game in 1966 or Rick Wise socking two home runs amid his no-hitter on the mound in 1971. And unlike those, this came in the postseason, and in a game to clinch Los Angeles the opportunity to become the first team in a quarter-century to win back-to-back championships.
It wasn’t quite Don Larsen throwing a perfect game — but Larsen went 0-for-2 in that game and needed a Mickey Mantle home run to account for his scoring. It wasn’t Reggie Jackson hammering three home runs, either — because Reggie needed Mike Torrez to throw a complete game that night to make his blasts stand up.
Ohtani is the only player who can do this, the offense and the defense — the mastery of baseball, the distillation of talent into something pure and perfect.
Hours earlier, his day had started by navigating the tricky balance of starting and hitting on the same day. His metronomic routine, such a vital piece of his three MVP seasons (the fourth will be made official in mid-November), is upended completely when he pitches. He budgets for the extra time he needs to spend caring for his arm by sacrificing his attendance at the hitters’ meeting, instead getting the intel he needs from coaches in the batting cage about an hour before the game.
Nobody could tell, when Ohtani arrived in the underground cage Friday, that he was mired in a nasty slump that had stretched from the division series through the third game of the NLCS, a jag of strikeouts and soft contact and poor swing decisions and utter frustration that got so bad earlier in the week he had taken batting practice outside at Dodger Stadium, something he never — like, really, never — does. He had decided to do so on the plane ride back from Milwaukee, where the Dodgers had humbled the Brewers with the sort of starting pitching never seen in a league championship series.
Game 4, his teammates were convinced, was going to be a culmination of that extra cage work and the matching of his pitching peers’ dominance.
“You guys asked me yesterday, and I said I was expecting nothing short of incredible today,” Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy said. “And he proved me wrong. He went beyond incredible.”
After walking the leadoff hitter, Brice Turang, Ohtani struck out the next three hitters, popping a pair of 100 mph-plus fastballs and unleashing the most confounding version of his splitter seen all year. He followed by obliterating a slurve from Jose Quintana in the bottom of the inning for a home run, the first time a pitcher ever hit a leadoff homer in the game’s history, regular season or playoffs.
The strikeouts continued — one in the third inning, two more in the fourth, preceding Ohtani’s second home run, which left 50,000 mouths agape. In the stands, they cheered, and in the dugout, they whooped, and in the bullpen, they screamed: “The ball went out of the stadium!” Alex Vesia, the reliever who would come in after Ohtani struck out two more in the fifth and sixth innings, could not conceive that a person could hit a baseball in a game that far. Officially, it went 469 feet. It felt like 1,000.
“At that point, it’s got to be the greatest game ever, right?” said Vesia, who did his part to help keep it so. Ohtani allowed a walk and a hit in the seventh inning, and had Vesia allowed either run to score, the sparkling zero in his pitching line could’ve been an unsightly one or crooked two. When he induced a ground ball up the middle that nutmegged his legs, Mookie Betts was in perfect position to hoover it, step on second and fire to first for a double play that preserved Ohtani’s goose egg.
In the next inning, Ohtani’s third home run of the night, and this one was just showing off: a shot to dead center off a 99 mph Trevor Megill fastball, a proper complement to the second off an 89 mph Chad Patrick cutter and the first off a 79 mph Quintana slurve). If it sounds impressive to hit three different pitches off three different pitchers for home runs in one night, it is. To do so throwing six innings, allowing two hits, walking three and striking out 10 is otherworldly.
“We were so focused on just winning the game, doing what needed to be done, I’m not sure we realized how good it really was,” Dodgers catcher Will Smith said. “I didn’t really appreciate it until after. Like, he actually did that?”
Yes. Yes he did. In baseball history, 503 players have hit three home runs in a game, and 1,550 have struck out 10 or more in a game. None, until Friday, had done both. And that’s what Shohei Ohtani does, who he is. For eight years, he has transformed what is possible in baseball, set a truly impossible standard to match, and now, finally, having signed with a franchise capable of giving his talents the largest stage, Ohtani gets to perform when it matters most.
Milwaukee won more games during the regular season than anyone. Regardless of how impotent the Brewers’ offense was this series, they were a very good team, and the Dodgers flayed them. The final game was an exclamation point — and a warning for the Seattle Mariners or Toronto Blue Jays, whichever survives the back-and-forth American League Championship Series.
LOS ANGELES — Shohei Ohtani has propelled the Los Angeles Dodgers back to the World Series with a two-way performance for the ages.
Ohtani hit three mammoth homers and struck out 10 while pitching into the seventh inning, and the Dodgers swept the Milwaukee Brewers out of the NL Championship Series with a 5-1 victory in Game 4 on Friday night.
The Dodgers will have a chance to be baseball’s first repeat World Series champions in a quarter-century after this mind-blowing night for the three-time MVP Ohtani, who emphatically ended a quiet postseason by his lofty standards. Ohtani was named the NLCS MVP essentially on the strength of this one unforgettable game.
“It was really fun on both sides of the ball today,” Ohtani said through his interpreter. “As a representative [of the team], I’m taking this trophy, and let’s get four more wins.”
After striking out three in the top of the first inning of Game 4, Ohtani hit the first leadoff homer by a pitcher in major league history off Brewers starter Jose Quintana.
Ohtani followed with a 469-foot blast in the fourth, clearing a pavilion roof in right-center.
Ohtani added a third solo shot in the seventh, becoming the 12th player in major league history to hit three homers in a playoff game. His three homers traveled a combined 1,342 feet.
Ohtani (2-0) also thoroughly dominated the Brewers in his second career postseason mound start, allowing two hits in his first double-digit strikeout game in a Dodgers uniform.
The numbers tell the story. Ohtani is the first player in MLB history to hit two-plus homers as a pitcher in a postseason game, according to ESPN Research. He is also the first MLB player with more homers hit (3) than hits allowed (2) in a postseason pitching start and the first player to hit a leadoff homer as a pitcher (regular season or postseason).
“Sometimes you’ve got to check yourself and touch him to make sure he’s not just made of steel,” said Freddie Freeman, last season’s World Series MVP. “Absolutely incredible. Biggest stage, and he goes out and does something like that. It’ll probably be remembered as the Shohei Ohtani game.”
After the Brewers’ first two batters reached in the seventh, he left the mound to a stadium-shaking ovation — and after Alex Vesia escaped the jam, Ohtani celebrated by hitting his third homer in the bottom half.
The powerhouse Dodgers are the first team to win back-to-back pennants since Philadelphia in 2009. Los Angeles is back in the World Series for the fifth time in nine seasons, and it will attempt to become baseball’s first repeat champs since the New York Yankees won three straight World Series from 1998 to 2000.
“That was special,” Freeman said. “We’ve just been playing really good baseball for a while now, and the inevitable kind of happened today — Shohei. Oh my God. I’m still speechless.”
After capping a 9-1 rampage through the NL playoffs with this singular performance by Ohtani, the Dodgers are headed to the World Series for the 23rd time in franchise history, including 14 pennants since moving from Brooklyn, New York, to Los Angeles. Only the Yankees, last year’s opponent, have made more appearances in the Fall Classic (41).
Los Angeles will have a week off before the World Series begins next Friday, either in Toronto or at Dodger Stadium against Seattle. The Mariners beat the Blue Jays 6-2 earlier Friday to take a 3-2 lead in the ALCS, which continues Sunday at Rogers Centre.
The Dodgers had never swept an NLCS in 16 previous appearances, but they became only the fifth team to sweep this series while thoroughly dominating a 97-win Milwaukee club. Los Angeles is the first team to sweep a best-of-seven postseason series since 2022 and the first to sweep an NLCS since Washington in 2019.
“I’ll tell you, before this season started, they said the Dodgers are ruining baseball,” Los Angeles manager Dave Roberts shouted to the crowd during the on-field celebration. “Let’s get four more wins and really ruin baseball!”
The NL Central champion Brewers were eliminated by the Dodgers for the third time during their current stretch of seven playoff appearances in eight years. Even after setting a franchise record for wins this season, Milwaukee is still waiting for its first World Series appearance since 1982.
“We were part of tonight an iconic, maybe the best individual performance ever in a postseason game,” Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said. “I don’t think anybody can argue with that. A guy punches out 10 and hits three homers.”
The Brewers had never been swept in a playoff series longer than a best-of-three, but their bats fell silent in the NLCS against the Dodgers’ brilliant starting rotation. Los Angeles’ four starters combined to pitch 28⅔ innings with two earned runs allowed and 35 strikeouts.
The Dodgers added two more runs in the first after Ohtani’s tone-setting homer, with Mookie Betts and Will Smith both singling and scoring.
Jackson Chourio doubled leading off the fourth for Milwaukee’s first hit, but Ohtani stranded him with a groundout and two strikeouts.
Struggling Dodgers reliever Blake Treinen allowed two more baserunners in the eighth, and Caleb Durbin scored when Brice Turang beat out his potential double-play grounder before Anthony Banda ended the inning.
Roki Sasaki pitched the ninth in the latest successful relief outing for the Dodgers’ unlikely closer.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Miller Moss threw two touchdown passes to Chris Bell and ran for a score, Louisville intercepted four of Miami star Carson Beck‘s passes and the Cardinals got one of the most significant wins in their history by topping the second-ranked Hurricanes 24-21 on Friday night.
Louisville (5-1, 2-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) got touchdowns on its first two drives for a quick 14-0 lead, and the Hurricanes (5-1, 1-1) trailed the rest of the way.
Louisville also snapped Miami’s 10-game home winning streak. The last team to win at Miami? That was Louisville, in 2023.
The Hurricanes were in field goal range, but Louisville’s T.J. Capers intercepted Beck’s pass at the 30 with 32 seconds left to seal the win.
Moss completed 23 of 37 passes for 248 yards, and Isaac Brown ran for 113 yards on 15 carries for Louisville. Bell had nine catches for 136 yards, his TD grabs going for 35 and 36 yards.
Beck completed 25 of 35 passes for 271 yards for Miami. The Hurricanes had little success rushing the ball, generating only 63 yards on 24 carries against a Louisville team that came into the night with the No. 1 defense in the ACC.
Louisville came into the game 1-8 against teams ranked Nos. 1 or 2 in the AP poll. The win was over then-No. 2 Florida State, a 63-20 romp in 2016.
On the road, there had never been a night like this for the Cardinals. They were 0-18 against Top 10 teams in true road games before Friday. Most of them weren’t even close: Louisville dropped those games by an average of 26.3 points.
Miami got to 14-10 at the half and trailed 17-13 going into the fourth, but Moss’ 36-yard scoring grab with 13:27 remaining gave the Cardinals a two-score lead again. Beck — who threw two interceptions in the first half — had another picked off on the ensuing drive with 7:50 remaining, but Miami got the ball right back on a fumble.
Malachi Toney scored on a 12-yard run one play after the fumble, then threw a 2-point conversion pass himself and Miami was right back in it — down 24-21. But the Hurricanes got no closer.
