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BRISTOL, Tenn. — Aric Almirola continued the trend of non-playoff drivers stealing the show with a pole-winning run Friday at Bristol Motor Speedway.

The Saturday night race at Bristol is the first playoff eliminator and the 16-driver field will be cut by four. Christopher Bell is the only driver locked into the next round because non-playoff drivers Erik Jones and Bubba Wallace won the first two rounds.

Now it will be Almirola leading the field to the green flag after Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Chase Briscoe couldn’t knock him from the pole in Friday’s final run. Briscoe, as well as SHR driver Kevin Harvick, are both below the cutline and in danger of playoff elimination.

Almirola, who announced before the start of the season that he was retiring and then did a mid-season about-face, is not racing for the championship. He was 19th in the standings at the end of the regular season.

“We were bummed out we didn’t make the playoffs, but we’re showing what we’re capable of. We can race with these guys,” Almirola said.

His lap at 127.826 mph on the short track held off Briscoe, who went 127.503 mph to put a pair of Fords on the front row. It’s the fourth pole of Almirola’s career.

Alex Bowman of Hendrick Motorsports qualified third in a Chevrolet and was followed by Toyota driver Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing. Current Cup champion Kyle Larson of Hendrick qualified fifth — hours after announcing a three-year contract extension — ahead of fellow playoff drivers Ryan Blaney of Team Penske, Harvick, Bell of JGR and Austin Cindric of Penske.

Brad Keselowski, who is not playoff eligible for the first time in almost a decade, qualified 10th as Fords took seven of the top-11 starting spots. Cole Custer of SHR qualified 11th.

Kyle Busch, who is in danger of elimination, qualified 21st. He spun in Friday practice and his run with JGR and Toyota is nearing an end. He announced this week he’s moving to Richard Childress Racing and Chevrolet next year, and his final title chase with Gibbs will end if the two-time champion is eliminated.

Austin Dillon, who is also below the cutline, qualified 28th. Harvick is last in the 16-driver playoff field and must win Saturday night to advance.

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Rangers’ Eovaldi set for MRI after groin injury

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Rangers' Eovaldi set for MRI after groin injury

ARLINGTON, Texas — Texas right-hander Nathan Eovaldi left Thursday’s 6-0 win over Washington with right groin tightness and will get an MRI on Friday.

Eovaldi threw a 94 mph fastball to Luis Garcia Jr. for strike one after issuing a one-out walk to Nick Senzel while holding a 3-0 lead. Eovaldi then turned and faced the outfield. He was visited by manager Bruce Bochy and head trainer Matt Lucero and left for the dugout.

“I went to throw it, and I kind of felt it,” Eovaldi said. “The initial thoughts that went through my head were I can call out the training staff, then maybe get the two warmup throws just to kind of check it out and stuff, but they wanted to play it safe and take me out of the game.”

“We’ll see how it feels (Friday). Just play it safe. Again just trying to be smart with this, not push it.”

“He may need some rest,” Bochy said. “That’s what we’re going to find out. We’ll take care of him and do what’s right.”

Eovaldi limited the Nationals to two hits and two walks over 5 1/3 innings while throwing 92 pitches — 13 short of his season high. He struck out eight batters for the fourth time this year, his season high.

Eovaldi went 12-5 for Texas last season, tying for the team lead in wins as the Rangers went on to win the franchise’s first World Series title. Signing as a free agent in December 2022, he was Texas’ No. 1 starter for much of the season after 2023 acquisitions Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer were sidelined with injuries. DeGrom and Scherzer have yet to pitch this season.

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Yastrzemski hits HR in win after ‘Papa Yaz’ visit

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Yastrzemski hits HR in win after 'Papa Yaz' visit

BOSTON — A visit from “Papa Yaz” before the game and a home run during it made for a memorable afternoon for San Francisco Giants outfielder Mike Yastrzemski.

The grandson of Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski hit a solo homer to right field — not far from where the former Boston outfielder’s retired No. 8 is hanging from the facade — to help the Giants beat the Boston Red Sox 3-1 on Thursday.

“I’m looking around, and I have my greatest childhood memories here,” said Mike Yastrzemski, who also homered five years ago in his only other visit to Fenway Park, where his grandfather played 23 seasons.

“The first one was like, super crazy, where I actually couldn’t believe that happened,” he said. “It was a little bit more normal this week, and I actually got to enjoy it while I was here rather than reflecting on it and being like, ‘Man, that was really cool.'”

Yastrzemski, 33, has three home runs this season and 90 in his six-year career, all with the Giants. This one cleared the short wall in front of the Red Sox bullpen in the third inning of a scoreless, hitless game to give San Francisco a 1-0 lead.

Giants manager Bob Melvin thanked “the baseball gods.”

“Got a smile out of me,” said the former major league catcher, who spent one of his 10 big league seasons in Boston and was not quite 6 when Carl Yastrzemski won the AL Triple Crown and led the “Impossible Dream” Red Sox to the pennant in 1967. “I was just awestruck. So, I didn’t have a ton to say to him. … There are some cool days in baseball, and I’ve had a lot of them. This was one of them.”

Mike Yastrzemski said he sees his grandfather a couple of times a year. He will sometimes ask the three-time batting champion and ’67 AL MVP for hitting advice, but the man he calls “Papa Yaz” will more often talk about family.

“One of the things that he’s done incredibly well as a grandfather is letting me have my career,” Yastrzemski said. “He’ll pick up the phone when I call, and if I ask him questions, he’ll answer. But he’s never forcing anything on me. He’s never suggesting anything. He’s always told me, ‘When in doubt, talk to your hitting coaches.'”

On Thursday, Yastrzemski said, they didn’t talk about hitting at all. The elder Yaz asked how he was physically, and it was “just good to see him,” Mike said.

“It was fun to just have him around for a minute,” he said.

And then the 84-year-old Hall of Famer split without sticking around for the game.

“I think he left the car running when he was in here,” Yastrzemski said with a smile. “But that’s normal. He’s quick to the point.”

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Pitcher Urias pleads no contest to battery charge

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Pitcher Urias pleads no contest to battery charge

Former Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Julio Urias pleaded no contest Wednesday to a misdemeanor domestic battery charge tied to his September arrest on suspicion of domestic violence.

Urias was placed on 36 months of summary probation and ordered to complete 30 days of community labor as well as a 52-week domestic violence counseling course, a spokesperson for the L.A. City Attorney’s Office said. In addition, Urias, 27, must pay a domestic violence fund fee, not possess any weapons, not use any force or violence, pay restitution to the victim and abide by a protective order.

The four other misdemeanor charges against Urias — an additional count of domestic battery involving a dating relationship, as well as one count each of spousal battery, false imprisonment and assault — were dismissed.

Urias was originally arrested Sept. 3 on suspicion of felony domestic violence for an incident that occurred in the parking lot of BMO Stadium after an LAFC soccer match, during which an eyewitness saw Urias get into a physical altercation with his wife. Urias was booked on suspicion of corporal injury on a spouse or cohabitant and released on $50,000 bail the following morning.

The California Highway Patrol’s major crimes division spent the ensuing three months investigating the incident before handing the case over to the L.A. District Attorney’s Office on Dec. 11. A little less than a month later, the district attorney’s office ruled that it would not file felony charges against Urias.

Prosecutors wrote in a charge evaluation worksheet that Urias pushed his wife against a fence and “pulled her by the hair or shoulders” but added that “neither the victim’s injuries nor the defendant’s criminal history justify a felony filing.”

Three months later, on April 9, the city attorney’s office filed five misdemeanor charges against Urias, four of which carried a maximum penalty of one year in L.A. County jail.

Major League Baseball launched a separate investigation that might be on the verge of completion now that the legal process has played out, though a timeline is unknown.

Urias, once one of the brightest young pitchers in the sport, could become the first player to be suspended twice under MLB’s domestic violence policy, which launched in September 2015. He was originally suspended 20 games by MLB in August 2019 in the wake of an arrest on suspicion of misdemeanor domestic battery, though he was not criminally charged in that incident.

Urias’ attorney could not be reached for comment. An MLB spokesperson declined comment.

Signed out of Mexico shortly after his 16th birthday, Urias navigated through the Dodgers’ farm system as a prized prospect, eventually joining the team as a 19-year-old rookie in 2016. He then returned from major shoulder surgery to become an important contributor on championship-caliber teams, recording the final out of the 2020 World Series, accumulating 20 wins in 2021 and finishing third in National League Cy Young Award voting in 2022.

As a young free agent with relatively few innings under his belt, Urias was widely projected to sign a $200-plus million contract this past offseason before the arrest, but now his MLB future appears to be in jeopardy.

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