
Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee show why college football still runs through the SEC
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adminThere are a few inarguable truths in life that all of us should abide by. Never get involved in a land war in Asia. Never text your ex after 2 a.m. And never throw darts without an appropriate amount of glass in your house.
OK, that last one’s a little fuzzy, but we assume Jimbo Fisher knew what he was talking about.
But more than any of those things, the one bit of advice Fisher failed to adhere to was this: You come at the king, you best not miss.
In the five months since Fisher’s incendiary news conference in which he called Saban a false god, suggested Alabama cheated with impunity, said he wasn’t worried about a confrontation with his former boss, and, yes, mangled the advice about stones and glass houses, there was almost a palpable sense that, regardless of what happened in the season’s first five weeks, this would be a grudge match for the ages.
Oh, it was.
Both teams went to battle without their starting quarterbacks. Of course, one of those QBs was the Heisman Trophy winner, but like Texas A&M‘s NIL deals, it’s best not to dwell on details.
For the Aggies, Haynes King actually played well, despite being tormented by a ferocious Alabama defensive front. Will Anderson Jr. danced past the A&M O-line like a guy who had too many Mountain Dews trying to find the bathroom at a crowded cocktail party, racking up eight QB hurries on the night. Still, King threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns and was poised to deliver the game winner until — well, it’s hard to describe what happened on the final play of the game. “Despicable” was a word Fisher used back in May, and it seems fitting now.
0:22
No. 1 Alabama survives a last-second scare from Texas A&M to win a thriller in Tuscaloosa 24-20.
For the Tide, Jahmyr Gibbs led a rushing attack that racked up 288 yards on the night. In Young’s place, Jalen Milroe completed just 12 passes, but three went for touchdowns. Alabama turned the ball over four times and missed two field goals, but A&M could only do so much with the advantages. Fisher, of course, is no god. (Though you should probably go look into his “deal.”)
In the end, there was nothing pretty about Alabama’s 24-20 win. But a cleanly played game would’ve been a disappointment. This one played out exactly as it was supposed to, a mirror image of the battle of words between the two coaches — a frenetic, ugly, ill-advised slugfest in which both teams did as much damage to themselves as they did to their opponent.
It was that kind of week in the SEC.
Georgia thumped Auburn, a much-needed sense of dominion against a team the Bulldogs were supposed to beat handily. Still, Georgia has now gone three straight games — and 117 consecutive throws — without a touchdown pass. Will the next challenge be as accommodating as Auburn? And seriously, is Auburn just keeping Bryan Harsin around for fun now? The man deserves a more compassionate end.
Ole Miss fell behind early against Vanderbilt, then turned on the afterburners and roared to a 52-28 win. The Rebels are 6-0 with three winnable games in front of them before a date with Alabama.
Tennessee, too, remains undefeated, annihilating LSU 40-13 for the Volunteers’ first win in Baton Rouge since Brian Kelly’s ancestors first landed on the swampy shores of Louisiana to set up a homestead so many years ago.
It was a Saturday in which the SEC offered a reminder that it is still the chief power broker in the country, with the Tide, Bulldogs, Rebels and Vols now accounting for more than a quarter of the country’s remaining undefeated teams. (And Shane Beamer offered his own reminder with dancing and cheap sunglasses).
Climate check ? pic.twitter.com/z9yv0lY14e
— Gamecock Football (@GamecockFB) October 9, 2022
And yet Ohio State demolished Michigan State and has a strong case for the title of the nation’s best team. At the very least, they’ve probably made Spartans boosters a bit concerned about that $95 million investment they made in Mel Tucker. Ohio State has beaten him twice since that deal was announced, by a combined score of 105-27.
And the Red River… what are we calling it now? Rivalry? Revue? Rigmarole? They’re all good. Regardless, Texas rolled Oklahoma 49-0. The Sooners have now lost three in a row for the first time since 1998. Their last two losses have come by a combined 80 points — or three points more than the 10 losses the team had between 2017 and 2021. Quinn Ewers returned for Texas and turned the state fair into Oklahoma’s Dustbowl 2.0, a cloud of misery that John Steinbeck would’ve found too depressing for publication. Depressing, too, is the thought of what might’ve become of this season for the Longhorns had Ewers not gotten hurt in the first half of their game against Alabama.
Instead, we leave Week 6 largely as we entered it. Teams ranked in the top 10 went 9-0. The status quo remains.
The narcissist in us won’t allow us to believe bigger surprises await. Thank goodness Fisher is here to remind us we’re not gods.
TCU-Kansas lives up to the hype
There’s a theory that suggests computing technology increases exponentially, and if that’s true, then there will come a time when artificial intelligence far surpasses human intelligence. And if that’s true, then logic might follow that some society has already reached that point, and as such, there is a hypothesis that our entire existence now is simply a computer simulation.
Until this week, simulation theory existed largely on the fringes of metaphysics, and most everyone agreed it could never be proved.
But then, on the same Saturday as the Red River game and the long-awaited showdown between Jimbo Fisher and Nick Saban, the center of the college football world was instead in Lawrence, Kansas. That, friends, is an inarguable glitch in the matrix.
Imagine back in May, when Jimbo Fisher sent an army of private detectives to sift through Nick Saban’s trash, that Texas A&M- Alabama would be but an afterthought because Kansas was 5-0.
Imagine, back when Oklahoma fans welcomed home prodigal son Brent Venables with thunderous approval, that the Sooners’ showdown against Texas would be a lopsided embarrassment, with Oklahoma being shut out 49-0.
Imagine, when Texas landed Ewers and A&M signed the No. 1 recruiting class in the country, and Houston was hailed as a potential playoff party crasher, that instead, the unquestioned top team in Texas would be TCU.
Perhaps the truly wild part of this entirely impossible scenario is that Saturday’s TCU-Kansas showdown wasn’t overhyped. If anything, we massively underestimated how much drama the Frogs and Jayhawks could muster.
TCU’s onetime backup QB now looks like a Heisman contender. Max Duggan threw for 308 yards, ran for 55 more and accounted for four touchdowns. Every time Kansas steadied itself and got off the mat in the second half, Duggan delivered another haymaker, leading TCU to touchdowns on four of its last five drives of the game.
Meanwhile, the fairy-tale season at Kansas played out — well, like a fairy tale on Saturday, when the Jayhawks turned to a magic Bean to salvage their fading fortunes. Jalon Daniels left the game near the end of the first half with an injured shoulder, turning over the reins to Jason Bean, who threw four second-half TD passes, leading the Jayhawks back from the brink of the abyss again and again down the stretch.
The second half of Saturday’s game saw Kansas erase leads of 10-3, 17-10, 24-17 and 31-24, and only a failed fourth-down conversion with 37 seconds remaining kept the Jayhawks from a chance to tie it at 38, too.
The game was decided not by inches but by margins undetectable by the world’s most powerful microscopes, as Derius Davis tiptoed the sideline for TCU and Quentin Skinner tapped his knee in the back of the end zone on a late score to keep Kansas alive.
0:55
Quentin Skiner does a great job as he comes down inbounds for the Kansas’ touchdown as they tie it 31-31.
It was a battle rife with cinematic drama that not only warranted the title of Week 6’s best matchup but will undoubtedly be in the conversation as one of the most entertaining games of the 2022 season.
And it happened at Kansas.
And yes, Kansas’ record is no longer unblemished. Reality — if that’s what we’re living in — had to return eventually. And no, TCU isn’t likely to overshadow college football’s behemoths for long. And yes, had Ewers been healthy all season, it might well be the Longhorns who are the talk of the sport now.
But for one magical afternoon, nothing in college football mattered as much or offered more drama than the happenings in Kansas. As the great Jasper Beardsley said, “What a time to be alive.”
That is, if we’re not all actually in a simulation.
Big wins out west
Don’t sleep on the Pac-12. OK, sleep a little on the Pac-12. The games are on late. You’ve got things to do on Sunday, and Home Depot opens early. Still, be sure to at least check the scores and highlights, because for the first time since the Hoover administration, the Pac-12 has some serious playoff juice.
UCLA staked its claim to contender status with an incredibly impressive 43-32 win over Utah. Dorian Thompson-Robinson was 1 yard shy of throwing for 300, and Zach Charbonnet was 2 short of rushing for 200, and the defense came up with one critical play after another.
The Bruins’ first four wins were far from emphatic, but the past two weeks, they’ve largely had their way with Washington and Utah, making a serious statement that Chip Kelly’s past decade was like that season of “Dallas” that turned out to all be a dream. Seriously, Kelly supposedly coached the San Francisco 49ers for a year. There’s no way that really happened.
0:21
UCLA gets on the board first as Dorian Thompson-Robinson extends into the end zone for a touchdown.
Meanwhile, USC avoided a potential trap game against Washington State, and we think it’s time the pundits gave credit where it’s due. Yes, Lincoln Riley has injected new life into the Trojans’ program, and sure Caleb Williams, Mario Williams and Jordan Addison have been excellent. But the real hero of this team? Travis Dye‘s mustache. Not since Tom Selleck has L.A. had such fantastic facial hair.
Two weeks ago, it looked like Washington could be a real playoff contender, too, but Saturday proved an absolute embarrassment in a 45-38 loss to Arizona State. Xazavian Valladay ran for 111 yards, caught four passes, scored twice and accounted for an all-time record in Scrabble points as the Sun Devils suddenly look frisky now that Herm Edwards is out.
And if Week 1 convinced us to give up on Oregon, the Ducks keep trying to remind us that anyone can lose to Georgia by 46. Oh, sure, not Auburn or Missouri or Kent State … but, you know, good teams. The Ducks dominated Arizona and have topped 40 in five straight games. And are we ready to love Bo Nix again? He’s like that boyfriend you’ve decided to dump a dozen different times, but then he shows up with In-N-Out burgers at 2 a.m. and you figure, “Ah, another week can’t hurt.”
This list of genuine playoff contenders isn’t long, but as the season approaches its midpoint, the Pac-12 has three teams that fit the bill. That’s three more than it’s had at this time of year in a long time.
Pokes keep winning
Oklahoma State is the No. 7 team in the country, is 5-0 for the second straight season and has an impressive win over Baylor in its back pocket. But it might still be fair to ask a pretty basic question: Are the Pokes all that good?
Yes, there have been dominant stretches — the fourth quarter vs. Arizona State, the first half against Baylor, Spencer Sanders‘ take-no-prisoners late touchdown drive Saturday — but those always seem to be paired with other stretches in which Oklahoma State can’t get out of its own way.
That was largely the story Saturday against Texas Tech, a team that has also spent much of the season looking like Nic Cage’s IMDB page — beat Texas one week, make “The Wicker Man” the next — and once again, it’s not entirely clear who played well.
Texas Tech started its third different QB of the season, and Behren Morton threw for 379 yards. Oklahoma State relied on the veteran Sanders, who accounted for three total TDs despite completing less than half his passes.
Oklahoma State went up 17-7. Texas Tech went to the half with a 24-20 lead. The Cowboys scored. The Red Raiders scored. The Pokes led by just 3 entering the final quarter, then a game filled with offensive fireworks slowed to a crawl. One drive is “Leaving Las Vegas,” and the next is “Bangkok Dangerous.”
Of all the teams to start 5-0 this season, only Coastal Carolina allowed more points in the process than Oklahoma State. Sanders is completing just 56% of his throws against Power 5 foes. And yet, for a few drives every game, Oklahoma State looks like it’s poised for another “Raising Arizona.” The Cowboys are a paradox wrapped in an enigma topped with a mullet.
Abanikanda runs wild
Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi promised his team would run more this season after saying goodbye to QB Kenny Pickett and offensive coordinator Mark Whipple. Mission accomplished.
Pitt fed tailback Izzy Abanikanda 36 times during Saturday’s 45-29 win over Virginia Tech, and he made every one of them count.
Abanikanda rushed for 320 yards and six touchdowns in the win, becoming the first Power 5 or BCS conference back to go for more than 300 yards and six scores since Ricky Williams did it in 1998. After the game, Mike Ditka immediately texted Saints management and suggested trading as many picks as it takes to get Abanikanda in the 2023 draft.
2:31
Israel Abanikanda can’t be stopped as he rushes for six touchdowns, tying the Panthers’ school record set back in 1910.
For Pitt, Abanikanda’s big day was a salve for an offense that struggled mightily last week against Georgia Tech. For Virginia Tech, the Hokies are off to their worst start (2-4) since 1991.
But the story, of course, was Abanikanda, who now leads the country with 13 scrimmage TDs. His 320 yards were the fourth most in a game in ACC history, according to ESPN Stats & Information research, and he passed Tony Dorsett for the most in a single game in Pitt history.
Now, if some newspaper doesn’t run with the headline “Pitt’s Abanikanda don’t want none unless it’s touchdowns, hon” on Sunday, then journalism is officially dead.
Heisman Five
Bryce Young missed Week 6. Jalon Daniels left early. A half-dozen other big-name QBs also dealt with injuries that cost them some or all of Saturday’s action, meaning it was a great time to get some new names into the Heisman mix.
1. Ohio State QB C.J. Stroud
Stroud threw six TDs to Ohio State receivers and, because he’s a man of the people, one to Michigan State, too. It was Stroud’s fourth game this season throwing four TDs or more. Our working theory is that he’s been catching up on “House of the Dragon” on his sideline iPad, and so he’s in a rush to score on every possession to get back to his stories.
2. Tennessee QB Hendon Hooker
Hooker led Tennessee to another dominant win, throwing for 239 yards and two touchdowns without a pick. Since Hooker’s first start for the Vols in Week 3 of last season, he’s 12-5 with 41 passing touchdowns (20 more than his former team, Virginia Tech, has in that span) while throwing just two interceptions (19 fewer than SEC East rival Florida).
3. USC QB Caleb Williams
Williams struggled at times against Washington State’s defense, completing just over half his throws for just 188 yards. But he tossed two TDs, converted several big third downs and kept USC undefeated. But if any Oklahoma fans are reading this, just know that he’s not actually happy and he keeps all your letters in a lavender-scented box next to his bed.
4. UCLA QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson
In just his 304th start (note: that’s a rough estimate), Thompson-Robinson set the UCLA record for career touchdown passes in Saturday’s impressive win over Utah. In all, he accounted for five TDs on Saturday, averaged 13 yards per throw, and utterly flummoxed one of the Pac-12’s best defenses.
5. Alabama RB Jahmyr Gibbs and Alabama LB Will Anderson Jr.
OK, we’re probably not permanently dropping Young from our Heisman contenders, but for this week at least, let’s recognize how good two of his teammates were. Gibbs carried 21 times for 154 yards, and since Young went down with a shoulder injury last week, Gibbs has 328 rushing yards, is averaging better than 10 yards per carry and has scored twice. Meanwhile, Anderson racked up eight QB hurries and spent enough time in A&M’s backfield that Jimbo Fisher assumed his NIL collective owed Gibbs money.
The most college football thing to happen in Week 6
Jackson State ran its record to 5-0 as Shedeur Sanders threw for 332 yards and three touchdowns in a 26-12 win over Alabama State. That puts Deion Sanders’ team at 3-0 in conference play, but he has a big, fat zero when it comes to true SWAC-ness.
Alabama State coach Eddie Robinson — no relation to the longtime Grambling coach — was less than pleased with Coach Prime’s apparent prima donna attitude before the game.
“He ain’t SWAC. I’m SWAC.”? Alabama State HC Eddie Robinson about Jackson State HC Deion Sanders #bamastate #swac #swarmas1 #theeibelieve pic.twitter.com/sJuZjnSXdB
— The Wild Card (@wildcard2k) October 8, 2022
Robinson said he “prays [Sanders] doesn’t get a Power 5 job” so they can play again next season and, in theory, exact some revenge.
You hear that, Auburn? No hiring Deion. We need more SWAC grudge matches.
The other most college football thing to happen
Give Florida State credit. Even after five of the most miserable seasons in school history, the Seminoles keep finding new ways to inflict pain on their fanbase.
On Saturday, the latest blow came from the punter because it’s not enough to simply throw salt in FSU fans’ wounds. The Noles needed to dump a jug of cheap tequila on top of all that salt.
Alex Mastromanno was either running a fake punt or trying to rugby punt or wanted to see what would happen if every Florida State fan on the planet slammed their heads against a wall at the same time. It’s hard to say which was his true motivation. But the end result is that, rather than take off running and likely picking up a first down, he batted a punt beyond the line of scrimmage, setting up NC State at the FSU 13-yard line.
0:38
Alex Mastromanno fakes a punt for the Seminoles, then at the last minute forgets where he is, accidentally punting past the line of scrimmage.
One drive earlier, Devin Leary was sidelined with a shoulder injury, leaving NC State with virtually no answers on offense, but it didn’t matter. Christopher Dunn booted a 53-yard field goal to pull the Wolfpack to within 1, then managed another field goal on their next drive to pull ahead 19-17.
FSU still had a chance to win late, but because Mike Norvell had minimal confidence in his kicker, he had Jordan Travis throw into the end zone on a second-and-8 play from the NC State 22, and it was picked off.
NC State trailed 17-13 when Leary went down. It attempted just two passes the rest of the way, and still pulled off the 19-17 win.
There’s pain. There’s unimaginable pain. And then there’s what happened to FSU on Saturday.
Next up? Clemson.
Purdue finally fends off a comeback bid
The football gods had not been kind to Purdue to start the season. The Boilermakers led in the final minute of each of their first five games, only to see Penn State emerge with a four-point win on a TD with 57 seconds to play, and Syracuse win by 2 on a TD with just seven seconds remaining.
It made for a somber backdrop as Taulia Tagovailoa hit Corey Dyches from 18 yards out for a potential game-tying touchdown with 35 seconds remaining Saturday at Maryland, but at long last, Purdue’s luck changed.
1:13
Maryland scores a touchdown, then appears to haul in a game-tying 2-point conversion, but the play is called back and the Terps fail on their next attempt.
The Terps appeared to have tied the game on a 2-point try in the back corner of the end zone, but the score was waved off due to a flag for an illegal man downfield (a penalty that has become college football’s equivalent of your buddy who ruins everyone’s fun by refusing to split the check evenly because he only had a salad). Maryland’s second crack at the 2-point try came up short, and Purdue escaped with a 31-29 win.
Purdue looks like the favorite now in the topsy-turvy Big Ten West, where the Boilermakers are tied for first with — surely this can’t be right? — Nebraska, among others, though no one from the division is ranked in the AP top 25. It’s nice to see that, while the Big Ten is stealing teams from the Pac-12, it managed to steal only the vibe of the ACC Coastal.
Victory bells for Leach’s Bulldogs
That unbearable clanging noise still ringing in your ears is simply the Mississippi State bandwagon rolling through SEC country.
Mike Leach’s crew dominated Arkansas 40-17 on Saturday, with Will Rogers setting the SEC record for career completions in the win, topping Aaron Murray’s previous mark of 921 in just his 28th career game.
Arkansas, which played without QB KJ Jefferson, suffered a third straight loss, dooming a once-promising season to a 1-3 mark in SEC play.
For Mississippi State, it was a statement win for a multitude of reasons. The defense was stout, fending off all three of Arkansas’ fourth-down attempts, stuffing drives at its own 8, 29 and 37. The ground game excelled, too. While Leach typically throws the ball between 40 and 600 times per game, the Bulldogs actually racked up 173 yards and three touchdowns on the ground Saturday. It was the most rushing yards by a Leach-coached team since Washington State went for 253 against Cal in 2016.
And, of course, the Bulldogs still threw the ball with ease. Rogers finished with 395 passing yards and three TDs, including one to Caleb Ducking — who now has seven TD catches on the season, offering a rare opportunity for Mississippi State fans to actually intend to type the word “ducking” in text messages.
The party could come to a screeching halt over the next month, however, as Mississippi State goes to Kentucky and Alabama in back-to-back weeks before hosting Auburn and Georgia.
Under-the-radar play of the day
With two interceptions, it was hardly Drake Maye‘s finest day for North Carolina, but he still threw for 309 yards — averaging 11 yards per attempt — and tossed two touchdowns, including this ridiculous completion to Josh Downs that was reminiscent of either Patrick Mahomes or Neo in “The Matrix.”
DRAKE MAYE OFF HIS BACK FOOT ? @UNCFootball #SCtop10 pic.twitter.com/3AEBkQ4mCr
— ACC Network (@accnetwork) October 8, 2022
The Tar Heels are now 5-1 and in clear control of the ACC Coastal. Perhaps as significant for the Heels is their defense held back-to-back ACC opponents to 24 points or fewer for the first time since Weeks 1 and 2 of the 2020 season.
Under-the-radar game of the day
Georgia Tech is now 2-0 since moving on from former coach Geoff Collins. It’s fair to wonder — if he’d just let the team eat something other than Waffle House, perhaps the Yellow Jackets might’ve started playing this well much earlier.
On Saturday, Tech built a 20-6 lead on Duke entering the fourth quarter, but the Blue Devils refused to roll over. A punt return for a TD brought Duke to within one possession, and on the final drive of regulation, the Blue Devils went 80 yards on 14 plays before Riley Leonard hit Nicky Dalmolin for a TD with eight seconds remaining to force overtime.
In the extra frame, however, Georgia Tech kicked an easy field goal, then watched as Duke went backward on its possession, with kicker Charlie Ham missing from 52 yards.
Now, who wants to celebrate with a bacon-egg-and-cheese hash brown bowl?
Big bets and bad beats
UConn went on the road against FIU on Saturday as a 5.5-point favorite. It marked the first time the Huskies were favored in any FBS game against a team not named UMass since 2017 vs. East Carolina, and the first time as a road favorite since 2015 against Tulane. It was due credit for a team that is, at long last, not a total embarrassment. Indeed, Saturday’s 33-12 win over FIU means the Huskies are on a winning streak! They’ve now won two games in a row and have three wins in a season for the first time since 2017. UConn has set an incredibly low bar for itself, and it’s nice to see Jim Mora casually stride over it like Lamar Jackson strutting into the end zone.
The magical start to Kansas’ season came to an end against TCU, but Jayhawks backers are still riding high. Kansas was a 7.5-point underdog at kickoff, and while it lost 38-31, that’s still a cover — the ninth straight for the Jayhawks dating back to last year’s 57-56 win over Texas. Since then, Kansas is 6-3, but all three losses have come by seven or less.
As the great Chris Fallica noted this week, there have been 18 SEC games over the past five seasons in which a team was favored by 30 or more, as Georgia was against Auburn for much of the week leading up to kickoff. The favorite in those games is just 6-12 against the spread, with the Dawgs a woeful 1-4. So, lucky for UGA backers that the line moved down to 27.5 in time for Saturday’s game. Auburn was on course to cover until Georgia engineered a late 11-play, 65-yard drive that included two third-down conversions (one on third-and-15) and was capped by a Branson Robinson TD run. Final score: Georgia 42, Auburn 10, and a garbage-time cover that beleaguered Bulldogs fans deserved.
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Inside the shift in evaluating MLB draft catching prospects
Published
5 hours agoon
July 8, 2025By
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Dan HajduckyJul 8, 2025, 04:30 PM ET
Close- Dan Hajducky is a staff writer for ESPN. He has an MFA in creative writing from Fairfield University and played on the men’s soccer teams at Fordham and Southern Connecticut State universities.
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — It’s the top of the 11th inning of an early March baseball game at North Carolina. With a runner on first and two outs, a Coastal Carolina batter laces a single through the right side of the infield. The Tar Heels’ right fielder bobbles the ball, then slips. The runner barrels around third toward home, where catcher Luke Stevenson awaits.
The relay throw naturally takes Stevenson to the third base side of home plate, into the path of the runner diving headfirst. Stevenson slaps a tag between his shoulder blades, shows the umpire the mitted ball and erupts into a fist pump. The game remains tied. In the bottom half of the inning, UNC wins on a sacrifice fly.
The Tar Heels went on to claim an ACC title, where Stevenson was named MVP. They hosted and won an NCAA tournament regional, rose to No. 1 in Division I, then fell at home to Arizona in a super regional and missed returning to the Men’s College World Series for the second consecutive year. Days later, Stevenson, a draft-eligible sophomore, reported to Phoenix for the MLB combine. Depending on who you ask, Stevenson is the first or second-best pure catcher and a consensus mock top-35 pick for the 2025 MLB draft, which begins July 13 (6 p.m. ET on ESPN).
Stevenson and other catchers with MLB potential have long been evaluated on how well they manage pitchers, frame pitches and lead a team’s defense — including directing positioning and keeping runners from stealing and scoring. But MLB general managers and player personnel say dual-threat backstops such as Seattle’s Cal Raleigh, an AL MVP favorite, now rank as the standard bearers for players in the pipeline to baseball’s major leagues. The gap between a catcher with All-Star potential and one who could hold down the position at a replacement level is glaringly obvious.
What might not be so obvious, however, is just how much MLB’s 2023 rules changes are now influencing how the position is being taught, played, coached and scouted at all levels of the game — and just how much of a premium is being placed on the offensive abilities of catchers such as Stevenson or Coastal Carolina’s Caden Bodine, another likely early draft pick.
From high school and youth ball to college and the minor leagues, a shift has already begun. In fundamental ways, the value of the position itself is being reframed — and Stevenson is a fitting avatar for catchers joining the professional ranks at a time when their livelihoods are in flux, their success most likely dictated by their capacity to adapt to this new reality.
“I don’t want to say it’s a dying position, [but] the bar for a being a good catcher offensively is so low,” said one MLB director of amateur scouting. “You could be an everyday catcher if you hit .210 with 10 home runs. [But] if you hit .210 with 30 home runs and a Platinum Glove? You’re a superstar.”
Jim Koerner, USA Baseball’s director of player development, said it’s still imperative for catchers to wield “middle-infield hands” and a strong arm to be an MLB starter.
“[But] in five years,” he said, “once they institute robo umps, I think it’s going to be completely an offensive position.”
AHEAD OF THE 2023 MLB season, at the behest of on-field consultant and former Chicago Cubs and Boston Red Sox president Theo Epstein, the league instituted a slew of rule changes intended to energize a purportedly staling sport. Baseball banned defensive shifts, instituted a pitch clock, limited mound disengagements to two per plate appearance and widened the bases from 15 inches to 18 inches — all changes first tested in the minor leagues.
The dividends were immediate. In 2023, runners stole 3,503 bases and upped it to 3,617 last season, the most in 109 years and the third most in any MLB season. The average game time fell to 2 hours, 36 minutes in 2024, the quickest in 40 years. Attendance and television engagement records were set in 2023 and broken in 2024.
Just as quickly, it became harder for catchers to stop runners from stealing. Catchers faced an increase of nearly 12 and 14 more stolen base attempts a season in 2023 and 2024, respectively, than in 2022. Exchange times and pop times increased exponentially to compensate, as did the speed at which catchers throw on steal attempts. But runners are faster and — owed to new limited disengagements rules for pitchers — closer to their would-be stolen bases than ever.
From 2016 to 2022, the lowest average caught stealing percentage for a single season among qualified catchers was 22.28% in 2021. In 2023 it was 17.43% and, last season, it was 18.78%. Through July 7, MLB runners have stolen 1,947 bases, on pace to eclipse 2024’s total. The Minnesota Twins stole an MLB-low 65 bases in 2024; 14 teams already have more in 2025.
Jerry Weinstein, a Chicago Cubs catching consultant, said pitchers get the ball to the plate in the 1.3-second range, and catchers’ pop times are between 1.8 and 2.0 seconds.
“There’s nothing we can do to improve that, that’s a staple,” Weinstein said. “The average runner runs 3.35, one-tenth of a second for the tag … it’s a math problem. If the baserunner is perfect, and the catcher and pitcher are perfect based on those parameters, the guy’s going to be safe most of the time. Which is exactly what we’re seeing.”
But one MLB director of player development said even with the rise in stolen bases’ effect on strategy, the best batteries still control how efficiently they get outs.
“From an analytic standpoint, swinging the count in your favor is more valuable than defending the stolen base,” the player development director said. “Ninety feet matters in certain situations, [but] some teams don’t even care. They’d rather have a guy execute his stuff: High leg kick, deliver the stuff, go for the punch out.”
Behind the plate, he said, there’s a different catching archetype than there was 25 years ago. They’re now bigger, taller and can get under the ball with a one-knee-down stance behind the plate. But, unlike the days when an offensive juggernaut catcher was a rarity — Mike Piazza and Carlton Fisk, or dual-threats like Johnny Bench, Ivan Rodriguez and Yogi Berra — now an adept offensive catcher can separate himself from a logjam.
“If you can’t hit,” he said, “you’re going to have a hard time sticking around.”
From both 1991-1998 and 1999-2007, there were eight MLB catchers (at least 50% of games at catcher) with three or more .800 OPS, 10-home run, 50-RBI seasons. From 2008-2015, that number fell to five. From 2016 through 2024, there were three.
“The offensive product is incredibly low, the physical demands very high, and what we value in catching has changed so much and is on the precipice of changing again,” said a director of amateur scouting. “We put so much value on catchers being able to frame pitches and get extra strikes … and the minute that goes away, that drastically changes how we evaluate amateur and professional catchers.”
When organizations find offensive-minded catchers who are capable behind the plate, they tend to hold onto them.
“It’s getting harder and harder to find those guys that are really offensive, they’re few and far between,” a director of amateur scouting said. “You name one, then I’ll name one. I guarantee it’s going to be a short list.”
Another director of amateur scouting said part of what makes some catchers in this year’s draft so valuable is that they can catch and potentially be a standout offensive performer.
“You don’t want [a catcher you draft in the first round] to have a position change a year and a half down the road,” the scout said. “You’re going to move him to first base or left field, and now the offensive bar is so much higher there.”
Which is why some MLB scouts are high on Stevenson and think he can handle the adjustments the position now requires. He was steady behind home plate for North Carolina, a great blocker but below-average receiver. But it’s what the 6-foot-1, 210-pound, left-handed hitting All-America catcher did with his bat that has drawn the attention of MLB scouts: Among Division I catchers who have caught 90 games since 2024, Stevenson ranked second in home runs (33), third in runs (104) and sixth in OPS (.960). He drew 29 more walks (107) than any other catcher while having the second-best chase rate (17.2%) and second-most pitches per plate appearance (4.09).
Although some MLB scouts and player development personnel have raised questions about Stevenson’s glove and whether he could thrive behind the plate at the sport’s top level, others say his power and discerning eye come at such a premium that defensive concerns are secondary and correctable. One director of amateur scouting said Stevenson’s floor is backup catcher at the MLB level.
One executive of a team with a top-10 draft pick said Stevenson is in the mix that high because his defensive technique is easily adjustable, but an eye and bat like that at a position such as catcher is too rare to pass up.
“You could be an outstanding defensive catcher, but if you can’t hit a lick, it’s hard to make a roster as an everyday player,” he said.
“Hardest position to evaluate,” another director of amateur scouting said, “amateur catcher.”
He compared the predraft evaluation to college quarterbacks trying to play in the NFL: “Can you transition? With edge rushers, you have less than three seconds to get rid of the ball — same for a catcher, you want him to be better than two and to be able to throw it on the bag. Guys that are 1.78, 1.83, 1.85? They can get away with a higher throw, but the 2.0 guys have to be perfect. It takes a special human being to do it and do it for many years.”
Steve Rodriguez, Stanford University’s catching coach, was Trevor Bauer and Gerritt Cole’s catcher at UCLA before spending six seasons in the Atlanta Braves and Arizona Diamondbacks organizations. He lauded Stevenson’s prowess with a bat and said he is underrated behind the plate.
“[With] his ability and size to be light on his feet and his knees … I watch him and he can scrape the dirt with that knee down so easily: That means his balance and flexibility is at a high level,” Rodriguez said. “When you’re able to do that with the skill set he has with his hands, you have a pretty phenomenal player.”
Stevenson said UNC catching coach Jesse Wierzbicki, a former UNC starting catcher who played in the Houston Astros minor league system, hammered receiving and blocking drills all season — footwork, transfers to second base, stealing strikes. He also had inspiration at home.
“You’ve got eight guys staring at you, being a leader on that field, directing traffic,” Stevenson said. “I was probably 8 years old — my mom caught, so I was always wearing the gear — when I fell in love with it. It’s what I wanted to do.”
ON A FRIGID Tuesday morning in March, more than 50 high school boys in full uniform took the field at the USA Baseball Complex in Cary, North Carolina, with Jim Koerner in the stands. Koerner develops on-field programming and curriculum for USA Baseball’s 13- to 17-year-old teams and is one of amateur American baseball’s most important barometers. His son, Sam, 18, catches for Pro5 Academy’s Premier team, an elite developmental academy.
Scattered around the diamond were players committed to Old Dominion and NC State, Virginia Tech and UNC, Ohio State and Tulane. Haven Fielder, the San Diego State-bound son of Prince Fielder, is Pro5’s designated hitter. Sam committed to Division I Radford University in Virginia. Almost all of them take remote classes and rarely, if ever, attend high school in-person.
The elder Koerner said it’s a moment of extreme change, both for the beloved sport that has long been his livelihood and the position his son fell in love with. From a young age, Sam showed a natural lean toward catching, but Jim said he urged Sam toward the position he thought would provide the best chance of a prosperous baseball life.
Now he’s not so sure.
Twenty years ago, Jim Koerner said, catchers were as still as possible; now, framing and throwing are more important than blocking, and passed balls are skyrocketing.
His son, like Stevenson, is a left-hitting catcher. Sam is just shy of 6 feet and defensively gifted with a plus-arm. He also hits well for contact. He situationally adapts his catching stance: one knee down if the bases are empty, traditional with runners on. Sam said, even with the position under siege, it’s easier to throw out of that. Anything to tip the scales.
“[Sam] has aspirations, like a lot of young kids,” Jim Koerner said. “It’s hard to tell young kids, ‘Hey, man, you’re a really good receiver … but in five years, that might not matter. Just focus on your arm and hitting.'”
Sammy Serrano, Sam’s catching coach and a second-round draft pick in the 1998 MLB draft, said he isn’t worried about Sam or how he’ll adapt to rule changes. Serrano said Sam has an extremely high baseball IQ and he “just happens to be the catcher.”
During a game this spring, Sam Koerner took a relay from right field, swiped his mitt across the plate and waited: Runner out. Seconds later, he was in the dugout asking Serrano, what he could do to improve his timing and technique. It was a good play, but Sam isn’t interested in only good.
“He always wanted to [be a catcher],” his father said. “Two or three years old, he’d squat down in front of the TV and I’d be like, ‘Hey Sam … whatcha doin’?’
“He’d just point at the catcher on TV.”
DAVID ROSS’S WARM laugh spilled through a cellphone speaker when asked how well he would fare as a catcher in today’s MLB.
“I probably wouldn’t have a job,” he said. “I hit .180 my last year in Boston and I laughed: I got a two-year deal. I had a couple of deals on the table. That would’ve never happened early in my career when framing wasn’t a thing.”
Ross’s career was extended by his proclivity in the margins.
“When I was coming up, you had holds, hold pick, pitchouts, slide steps, four or five different signs from coaches that would help you manage the running game,” he said. “Well, that turned into nobody wanted to run anymore because the percentages didn’t match up. Now you see all these teams building with legit base stealers and athletes.”
After retiring following their 2016 World Series victory, Ross became a special assistant with the Cubs, then worked as an ESPN analyst before becoming the Cubs’ manager from 2020 to 2023, the first season under the rule changes. He is torn on some elements of the changes and changes that still might come, such as the Automated Ball-Strike system already implemented in MiLB that MLB tested this spring training.
“As a player, it’s a hard job, mistakes cost games, so, I love the challenge system because you’re going to keep the beauty of the game,” Ross said. “I don’t think we’ll get away from — you’re still going to be teaching kids about receiving, blocking, throwing, calling the game, the little intricacies of baseball. I don’t think that’s going to go away. Even with all the analytics, you still need a sense of feel back there.
“But offense has won out.”
Two-time All-Star catcher Jonathan Lucroy was an offense-first catcher out of college who became an analytic darling of the mid-2010s for his ability to frame pitches.
A mid-2000s ESPN feature on Lucroy pointed to then-Cubs general manager Epstein’s savvy in being an early adopter to the framing movement, which included the signing of Ross. Ironically, it’s the same aspect of the game Epstein might undo if an ABS system is implemented.
“Framing will be so devalued because of the advent of the ABS system and they’ll be prioritizing the offensive side of the position even more,” Lucroy said. “I’m biased, but I’ve experienced it firsthand.”
Lucroy predicted that the bedrocks of the position will remain.
“The most important part of the position is the game management and leadership,” he said. “There’s a lot of psychology that goes into it: How different guys communicate, how they receive information, take it in, apply [it]. You can’t take a paint brush and swipe it across and everyone does it the same way.”
Lucroy got to know his pitchers, learn about their families, how they respond to constructive criticism.
“How do you go out and speak to them properly to reel them in? Get them to change stuff up, change their thought process?” Lucroy said. “Are they a hand-hold guy? Do you have to tell them everything’s good, breathe, slow it down? The majority of guys are like that. On the flip side, a guy like Max Scherzer you can go out and yell at him, insult him a bit, and he responds positively.”
Lucroy said Jason Kendall once told him that the best catchers were also the best communicators, that their job is to make the pitcher look as good as possible.
‘”Make them more important than you,'” Lucroy recalled. “You want them to trust you and believe in you, like any other relationship. ‘Cause 99% of the time, guys don’t feel the best when they go out and play.”
Lucroy said catchers will adapt to the rule changes, because they always do. Lucroy said he thinks once an ABS system is instituted, catchers will go back into a more traditional stance, which means they’ll block balls better and throw out more runners.
But having experienced an analytics revolution himself, he worries about coming into an MLB transitioning between eras.
“The game is always shifting, always evolving,” Lucroy said. “If you go back and look at 2016, remember how the Cubs had Willson Contreras back there? And they put in David Ross. Why? Because David Ross is a veteran who ended up being a future manager who knows what the heck he’s doing and how to handle guys in big situations.”
Lucroy said he doesn’t think that’s an accident.
“Framing is important, to a certain extent,” he said, “but the best framers in the world aren’t catching in the World Series — the better offensive guys are. Even the years when I was one of the top framers in the league, I think I made the playoffs once.”
SAM KOERNER’S PRO5 TEAM took on a Canadian baseball academy at a minor league stadium in Holly Springs, North Carolina. The bases were wider — Sam called them “pizza boxes” — than those at the USA Baseball complex, so they stole more often here.
Sam was one of three catchers on the roster that day, and the only one committed to a college. He didn’t play until the eighth inning, and when he finally got to bat, he cranked the first pitch over the right field wall. It nearly hit a car on the adjacent NC 55 roadway.
His dad rushed to pull the video — it was Sam’s third in-game home run ever — but the camera was off.
In the press box afterward, Sam said he’s taking a gap year. He’ll enroll at Radford in the fall of 2026 and play with Pro5 until then, maximizing his growth literally and technically.
Sam doesn’t have to contend with new MLB-type rules yet, but if aspiration meets opportunity, he soon will.
“It’s already a challenge trying to hold runners on [even] though the rule changes aren’t affecting me,” Sam said. “I don’t know what else [catchers] could do. I’m just tryin’ to be as fast as I can to second base, on the bag.”
In working with thousands of players and coaches across the U.S., Jim Koerner said MLB’s rules changes haven’t been adopted at the youth levels, which means they haven’t directly altered how youth ball is played — yet. But for Sam and his peers, and even younger players, making it to an NCAA baseball team and eventually to MLB are the goals.
“The way pro evaluators are going to look at the catching position is going to start to change now,” Koerner said. “But on the flip side, when you value the guy on the mound as much as he’s valued now at the professional level, they still need to trust the guy catching. There’s still a confidence, a comfort, a leadership aspect.”
It’s the aspect Sam prides himself on most and what Lucroy said was invaluable.
“Building good relationships with my pitchers, always having their back,” Sam said. “It makes them perform better knowing they have a guy behind the plate where they can, even as simple as 0-2, they can spike a brick in the dirt and know I’m going to pick ’em up and block it and throw the guy out at first.”
At lunch in between his game and a weightlifting session, Sam inhaled a Philly cheesesteak. He buzzed while breaking down the catching techniques of Cincinnati’s Jose Trevino and San Francisco’s Patrick Bailey. He also acknowledged that during a game earlier, his middle finger got caught asking for a curveball and he took a 90-mile-per-hour fastball in the chest plate.
Jim said it’s just how Sam is; there is no version of him absent of catching.
“When he was 7 or 8, he’d get back there and see these big guys come to hit and … he’d be excited but he’d look at me like…” Jim said, his eyes going wide.
“I was scared to death,” Sam said.
“But he eventually warmed up to it,” Jim said, smiling.
They fell into a cadence, starting and finishing each other’s anecdotes. They’ve chosen a baseball life, devoid of free time. Jim wishes he were home more often, and Sam might as well live in catching gear. Recently, they tried to game-plan on a rare, shared day off. They couldn’t decide what to do. Eventually, Jim pitched batting practice to Sam.
“[At a] concert the other day, one of the guys was tellin’ a story about fishing, being out there with his daughter and she’s thinking, ‘We’re going fishing?’ The guy says, ‘It’s not … just fishing,'” Jim said.
“When I ask Sam, ‘Hey, do you wanna hit? You wanna go lift?’ For him, it might be just baseball.”
Suddenly, a knock came on the press box door to vacate. Sam and Jim turned in their chairs and shared a glance.
“Well, for me,” Jim said, packing up, “it’s not just baseball.”
Sports
Pirates ball-crusher Cruz accepts HR Derby invite
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5 hours agoon
July 8, 2025By
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Field Level Media
Jul 8, 2025, 04:16 PM ET
Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Oneil Cruz accepted an invitation on Tuesday to compete in Monday’s Home Run Derby in Atlanta.
Cruz is the fifth player to commit to the competition, held one day before the All-Star Game. The others are Ronald Acuna Jr. of the Atlanta Braves, Cal Raleigh of the Seattle Mariners, James Wood of the Washington Nationals and Byron Buxton of the Minnesota Twins.
Cruz, 26, is known for having a powerful bat and regularly delivers some of the hardest-hit homers in the sport. His home run May 25 at home against the Milwaukee Brewers had an exit velocity of 122.9 mph and was the hardest hit homer in the 10-year Statcast era.
But Cruz has never hit more than 21 in a season, and that was in 2024. He’s on track to set a new high this year and has 15 in 80 games.
Cruz has 55 career homers in 324 games with the Pirates.
Cruz will be the first Pittsburgh player to participate in the Derby since Josh Bell in 2019. Other Pirates to be part of the event were Bobby Bonilla (1990), Barry Bonds (1992), Jason Bay (2005), Andrew McCutchen (2012) and Pedro Alvarez (2013).
Overall, Cruz is batting just .203 this season but leads the National League with 28 steals.
Among the players to turn down an invite to the eight-player field are two-time champion Pete Alonso of the New York Mets, Kyle Schwarber of the Philadelphia Phillies and 2024 runner-up Bobby Witt Jr. of the Kansas City Royals.
Defending champion Teoscar Hernandez of the Los Angeles Dodgers recently turned down a spot as a consideration to nagging injuries.
Top power threats Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees and Shohei Ohtani of the Dodgers also are expected to skip the event.
Sports
Yanks moving Chisholm back to 2B after 3B stint
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5 hours agoon
July 8, 2025By
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Field Level Media
Jul 8, 2025, 01:40 PM ET
New York Yankees All-Star Jazz Chisholm Jr., after making 28 starts in a row at third base, is moving back to second base starting with Tuesday’s game against the Seattle Mariners, manager Aaron Boone said.
Boone confirmed the change on the “Talkin’ Yanks” podcast on Tuesday.
Chisholm, who is batting .245 with 15 home runs, 38 RBIs and 10 steals in 59 games, has recently been bothered by soreness in his right shoulder, which he said is an issue only on throws.
He said he prefers to play second base and prepared in the offseason to exclusively play in that spot before injuries played havoc with Boone’s lineup card, starting with Chisholm’s oblique injury in May.
Third baseman Oswaldo Cabrera went down with a season-ending ankle injury on May 12.
DJ LeMahieu manned second base while Chisholm was at third, but Boone has a better glove option in Oswald Peraza, a utility man with a stronger arm plus defensive skills across the infield.
LeMahieu, 36, is batting .266 with two home runs and 12 RBIs this season.
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