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HOUSTON — HERE, JOSE ALTUVE is safe. From the boos and hisses, the anger and loathing, the emotion his mere existence conjures. This man, baseball’s smallest player and yet one of its biggest stars, lives a binary existence. He is a villain in 29 stadiums. And then he comes home.

Here, in this proud and protective city, Altuve is not a hero. He is the hero, the face of the Houston Astros, the reigning World Series winners intent on becoming the first back-to-back champions in Major League Baseball this century. When Altuve steps to the plate in the bottom of the first inning tonight in the sixth game of the American League Championship Series against the Texas Rangers, the sold-out crowd at Minute Maid Park will rise and fete him — and with good reason. The Astros are one win shy of the World Series because of Altuve’s latest opus, a go-ahead three-run home run in the ninth inning of Game 5 that should burnish his legacy.

Altuve’s, though, is a legacy already written. In Houston, he can’t be touched; outside of it — fair or not — he is defined by the Astros’ actions in 2017, when they implemented a sign-stealing scheme en route to the franchise’s first World Series title. It matters not that several of his 2017 teammates say Altuve declined to use the system in which Astros employees banged on a trash can to inform hitters when an off-speed pitch was coming, nor that an analysis of regular-season games that year validated such claims.

How MLB handled the franchise’s scandal — the league validated the championship and opted not to punish the players despite commissioner Rob Manfred’s report twice referring to the scheme as “player-driven” — did Altuve no favors. He receives justice by voice box. The criticism never abates, except along the I-10 corridor from San Antonio into Louisiana and especially in Houston, where orange clothing connotes membership in a group that treats Altuve with a particular sort of veneration. Outside of it, the general public believes what it wants to believe.

Nearly four years after the breadth of the Astros’ cheating was exposed, the stain on Altuve is indelible. He lives with it — with the public perception about his involvement with the trash can bangs, with the charges that his knowledge of the system amounted to complicity no matter his level of involvement.

“I just don’t really have a lot to say about it,” Altuve told ESPN earlier this month. “I play for these guys, for my team. We have a big opportunity to win again. I want to put all my energy toward winning for my team versus getting distracted by paying attention to other things.”

Altuve’s ability to channel negative to positive reveals itself every October, when he is the undisputed king of active players. Following an atypical 2022 postseason in which he didn’t drive in a run, Altuve has whacked three home runs in these playoffs, all helping lead to wins. Among his current peers, he is the leader in almost every counting statistic: games played (101), plate appearances (466), total bases (211), hits (113), runs (86), singles (67), doubles (20) and home runs (26, three shy of Manny Ramirez’s all-time mark). The Astros’ current streak of LCS appearances stands at seven, one fewer than Atlanta’s major league record set in the 1990s. Another championship would further cement the Astros’ place as a dynasty.

Altuve is no small part in that. Since 2017, the Astros are 19-5 when Altuve goes deep in a playoff game. This is not mere correlation; he is the cause, and yet Altuve’s present accomplishments only further the vitriol toward him. The better he is today, the more it serves to remind of the past.

And so home games are Altuve’s respite, the salve on wounds that have not healed and might never. For 13 years Altuve has been a part of these fans’ lives. When October rolls around, the city coalesces around another march toward a championship, and everything is right again.

“Never gets old,” Altuve said. “As a team, a player, I enjoy every playoff game more. It’s about winning. Nothing else.”


IN THE WEEKS after the revelation of the sign-stealing scheme, Tony Adams sequestered himself in a room and went to work. A web developer and designer, Adams, born and raised about a half-hour outside Houston, culled footage of 58 Astros home games in 2017 and ran the audio through an app he created. Of the 8,274 pitches he listened to, he logged 1,143 pre-pitch noises. Some players were tipped on more than half the off-speed pitches they saw. Most of the Astros’ regulars were around 30%. Altuve was at 4.2%.

To Adams, now 57, the data did not definitively suggest that Altuve was innocent. Manfred’s report alluded to other methods of sign-stealing used by the team. But it was enough to convince Adams that on the continuum of Astros players cheating, Altuve was far from the most egregious offender.

That belief underpins the defense of Altuve by Astros fans like Adams. He understands the aspersions cast on the 2017 team. Like many others, though, he also sees the contempt toward Altuve as disproportionate to what the publicly available data suggests. Altuve’s refusal to separate himself from those with whom he wore a uniform — “I always say this is a team,” Altuve said in 2020, “and if we are something, we all are something” — only ingratiates him to his fans more.

“He’s the face of the franchise, and he’s so good, and he’s not going to defend himself,” Adams said. “That’s the way he is. I think he’s the ultimate teammate. I can’t imagine anybody not wanting him on the team. He’s taken all of this for the team. Never broke. Never got mad. Never wavered. It’s admirable.”

In another world, Adams’ brother likes to tell him, Altuve is the most popular player in the sport: a 5-foot-6 marvel, barely scouted and signed for just $15,000 out of Venezuela, who turned into a Hall of Fame-caliber second baseman. Since Altuve’s debut in 2011, he leads MLB with a .310 batting average and 1,819 hits, has whacked 200 home runs and stolen 293 bases, and ranks third in offensive wins above replacement behind Mike Trout and Freddie Freeman.

Because of this, his reverence in the Astros organization is unparalleled — though perhaps the same could be said about the rancor outside of it. Only three players on the Astros’ active roster remain from 2017: Altuve, third baseman Alex Bregman and right-hander Justin Verlander. As Astros players went elsewhere in free agency, the wrath concentrated toward those still around. George Springer, now with Toronto, receives the occasional sprinkling of heckles, and Carlos Correa, a Minnesota Twin, hears them slightly more frequently, but neither they nor Bregman faces anything close to the derision reserved for Altuve.

The booing of Altuve knows no bounds. Regardless of the crowd size, the score, his performance that day, he wears the aural disdain of those outside of Houston. And yet Altuve, still elite, bore the brunt and learned to play in this new paradigm.

“He does good when he gets booed,” Astros center fielder Mauricio Dubon said. “He doesn’t care. I think it’s funny. He seems to enjoy it, and [it seems like] he hits a home run every time they boo him. I really hope they boo him.”

“I hate it, because he’s a great human being,” Astros reliever Ryne Stanek said. “One of the nicest people that I’ve ever met. Humble, kind, obviously supremely talented and a very good baseball player, but a good human being. You never know walking into a clubhouse what a superstar is going to be like, especially in their prime. The crazy thing is he’s 33, and he’s got the second-most pumps in postseason history. You’ve got to be good for a long time to do that, but also you have to be on a team that gets there. And he’s a huge reason why this team gets there and has gotten there for seven years.”

That’s the rub, of course. Had Altuve’s play faded, had the Astros’ success dwindled, had there been some sort of penance for misdeeds real or imagined, perhaps that would have been karmic retribution enough — the comeuppance Manfred forwent when he traded immunity for players’ testimony during the league’s investigation. But Altuve has only thrived. Among players with at least 1,000 plate appearances since 2021, his adjusted OPS ranks 11th in baseball.

“He’s been the one that’s kept the window open,” Astros outfielder Chas McCormick said. “We’ve lost some great players when I was in the minor leagues and by the time I got up to the big leagues. But when you have Jose Altuve and you have Alex Bregman and Yordan Alvarez — I mean, you’re going to always be in great shape because those guys are great hitters.”


EVERY YEAR THE ASTROS make another October run, Altuve’s postseason résumé grows more impressive. Should Houston win tonight or in a potential Game 7, he will pass Yadier Molina during the World Series for the sixth-most playoff games in baseball history. Considering playoff expansion, Derek Jeter’s record of 158 postseason games is well within reach, especially if Altuve remains in Houston after the expiration of his seven-year, $163.5 million contract at the end of next season.

And for all the single-team stars who have landed elsewhere in free agency, Altuve in another city, another uniform, doesn’t seem right. His bond with Houston runs too deep. Together, they have weathered the lows and celebrated so many highs, from his three-homer game to kick off the division series in 2017 to the home runs in the final two games of the 2017 ALCS that ousted the New York Yankees to the pennant-winning shot off Aroldis Chapman in 2019. And yet even that pantheon moment for Altuve comes with a caveat: suspicion from those who believe the unproven theory that Altuve refused to let teammates rip his shirt off because he was wearing a buzzer to electronically transmit forthcoming pitch types, which Altuve has denied.

Manfred’s report said MLB’s “investigation revealed no violation of the [league’s sign-stealing] policy by the Astros in the 2019 season or 2019 postseason,” but skepticism toward the league’s efforts at accounting for the entirety of cheating across the sport keeps the buzzer theory alive. Nothing Altuve can do will quell the theories. His jersey will forever be like the briefcase in “Pulp Fiction,” hiding something mystical and important and impossible to truly know.

Altuve learned quickly not to rage against a narrative he cannot change. He prefers to write an alternative one at-bat by at-bat, like the one he had Friday night against Rangers closer Jose Leclerc. Less than 30 minutes after Astros reliever Bryan Abreu plunked Rangers outfielder Adolis Garcia with a 99 mph fastball that prompted the benches to clear, Altuve came to bat with two runners on and the Rangers ahead 4-2. On the second pitch, Leclerc unfurled a 90 mph changeup that tumbled low and inside. Altuve took that familiar hack — his left leg striding toward the plate, his back knee bending, his bat whipping through the strike zone — and sent the ball just over the outstretched glove of Rangers left fielder Evan Carter at the outfield fence.

“No. 1, he wants to be up there,” Astros manager Dusty Baker said. “No. 2, he’s got a high concentration level, because that’s what it takes in big moments like that: concentration, desire and relaxation all encompassed into one. And everybody can’t do all three of those things.

“And so, I mean, this dude is one of the baddest dudes I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen some greats.”

Altuve stuck his tongue out as the ball left his bat, a reflexive move that was as Jordan-like as a baseball player can get. Rangers fans, stunned at the prospect of a third straight loss at home after carrying a decided advantage following a pair of road wins to kick off the series, were too shocked to boo. All they could do was shake their heads, lament their misfortune, add themselves to the list of teams that had been Altuve’d in October. He ran the bases with pure stoicism — no bat flip, no Eurostep, not even a smile, lest he invite animus beyond the regular dosage.

“This team deserves the best version of me, and that’s being focused,” Altuve said in early October. “I think that’s something you learn through the years. Like you said, I’m 33 now. You learn, you get older, you get better at some things and you still have to learn other things.

“My team makes everything easier for me because they play hard, they love the game, they love winning.”

His team, his support system, erupted in the dugout and poured onto the field to revel with him, and 250 miles away in Houston, his city exulted, saved again by the player whose career they’d helped save by believing the story they wanted to believe. And for the 26th time in the postseason, the time of year that always seems to bring out the best in him, Jose Altuve rounded the bases toward the plate and touched home, safe.

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Stanton won’t blame ailing elbows on torpedo bats

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Stanton won't blame ailing elbows on torpedo bats

NEW YORK — Giancarlo Stanton, one of the first known adopters of the torpedo bat, declined Tuesday to say whether he believes using it last season caused the tendon ailments in both elbows that forced him to begin this season on the injured list.

Last month, Stanton alluded to “bat adjustments” he made last season as a possible reason for the epicondylitis, commonly known as tennis elbow, he’s dealing with.

“You’re not going to get the story you’re looking for,” Stanton said. “So, if that’s what you guys want, that ain’t going to happen.”

Stanton said he will continue using the torpedo bat when he returns from injury. The 35-year-old New York Yankees slugger, who has undergone multiple rounds of platelet-rich plasma injections to treat his elbows, shared during spring training that season-ending surgery on both elbows was a possibility. But he has progressed enough to recently begin hitting off a Trajekt — a pitching robot that simulates any pitcher’s windup, arm angle and arsenal. However, he still wouldn’t define his return as “close.”

He said he will first have to go on a minor league rehab assignment at an unknown date for an unknown period. It won’t start in the next week, he added.

“This is very unique,” Stanton said. “I definitely haven’t missed a full spring before. So, it just depends on my timing, really, how fast I get to feel comfortable in the box versus live pitching.”

While the craze of the torpedo bat (also known as the bowling pin bat) has swept the baseball world since it was revealed Saturday — while the Yankees were blasting nine home runs against the Milwaukee Brewers — that a few members of the Yankees were using one, the modified bat already had quietly spread throughout the majors in 2024. Both Stanton and former Yankees catcher Jose Trevino, now with the Cincinnati Reds, were among players who used the bats last season after being introduced to the concept by Aaron Leanhardt, an MIT-educated physicist and former minor league hitting coordinator for the organization.

Anthony Volpe, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger, Paul Goldschmidt and Austin Wells were among the Yankees who used torpedo bats during their season-opening sweep of the Brewers.

Stanton explained he has changed bats before. He said he has usually adjusted the length. Sometimes, he opts for lighter bats at the end of the long season. In the past, when knuckleballers were more common in the majors, he’d opt for heavier lumber.

Last year, he said he simply chose his usual bat but with a different barrel after experimenting with a few models.

“I mean, it makes a lot of sense,” Stanton said. “But it’s, like, why hasn’t anyone thought of it in 100-plus years? So, it’s explained simply and then you try it and as long as it’s comfortable in your hands [it works]. We’re creatures of habit, so the bat’s got to feel kind of like a glove or an extension of your arm.”

Stanton went on to lead the majors with an average bat velocity of 81.2 mph — nearly 3 mph ahead of the competition. He had a rebound, but not spectacular, regular season in which he batted .233 with 27 home runs and a .773 OPS before clubbing seven home runs in 14 playoff games.

“It’s not like [it was] unreal all of a sudden for me,” Stanton said.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone described the torpedo bats “as the evolution of equipment” comparable to getting fitted for new golf clubs. He said the organization is not pushing players to use them and insisted the science is more complicated than just picking a bat with a different barrel.

“There’s a lot more to it than, ‘I’ll take the torpedo bat on the shelf over there — 34 [inches], 32 [ounces],'” Boone said. “Our guys are way more invested in it than that. And really personalized, really work with our players in creating this stuff. But it’s equipment evolving.”

As players around the majors order torpedo bats in droves after the Yankees’ barrage over the weekend — they clubbed a record-tying 13 homers in two games against the Brewers — Boone alluded to the notion that, though everyone is aware of the concept, not every organization can optimize its usage.

“You’re trying to just, where you can on the margins, move the needle a little bit,” Boone said. “And that’s really all you’re going to do. I don’t think this is some revelation to where we’re going to be; it’s not related to the weekend that we had, for example. Like, I don’t think it’s that. Maybe in some cases, for some players, it may help them incrementally. That’s how I view it.”

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Rangers’ Eovaldi gets season’s 1st complete game

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Rangers' Eovaldi gets season's 1st complete game

CINCINNATI — Nathan Eovaldi pitched a four-hitter for the majors’ first complete game of the season, and the Texas Rangers blanked the Cincinnati Reds 1-0 on Tuesday night.

Eovaldi struck out eight and walked none in his fifth career complete game. The right-hander threw 99 pitches, 70 for strikes.

It was Eovaldi’s first shutout since April 29, 2023, against the Yankees and just the third of his career. He became the first Ranger with multiple career shutouts with no walks in the past 30 seasons, according to ESPN Research.

“I feel like, by the fifth or sixth inning, that my pitch count was down, and I feel like we had a really good game plan going into it,” Eovaldi said in his on-field postgame interview on Victory+. “I thought [Texas catcher Kyle Higashioka] called a great game. We were on the same page throughout the entire game.”

In the first inning, Wyatt Langford homered for Texas against Carson Spiers (0-1), and that proved to be all Eovaldi needed. A day after Cincinnati collected 14 hits in a 14-3 victory in the series opener, Eovaldi (1-0) silenced the lineup.

“We needed it, these bats are still quiet,” Texas manager Bruce Bochy said of his starter’s outing. “It took a well-pitched game like that. What a game.”

The Reds put the tying run on second with two out in the ninth, but Eovaldi retired Elly De La Cruz on a grounder to first.

“He’s as good as I have seen as far as a pitcher performing under pressure,” Bochy said. “He is so good. He’s a pro out there. He wants to be out there.”

Eovaldi retired his first 12 batters, including five straight strikeouts during one stretch. Gavin Lux hit a leadoff single in the fifth for Cincinnati’s first baserunner.

“I think it was the first-pitch strikes,” Eovaldi said, when asked what made him so efficient. “But also, the off-speed pitches. I was able to get some quick outs, and I didn’t really have many deep counts. … And not walking guys helps.”

Spiers gave up three hits in six innings in his season debut. He struck out five and walked two for the Reds, who fell to 2-3.

The Rangers moved to 4-2, and Langford has been at the center of it all. He now has two home runs in six games to begin the season. In 2024, it took him until the 29th game of the season to homer for the first time. Langford hit 16 homers in 134 games last season during his rookie year.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Source: USC flips Ducks’ Topui, No. 3 DT in 2026

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Source: USC flips Ducks' Topui, No. 3 DT in 2026

USC secured the commitment of former Oregon defensive tackle pledge Tomuhini Topui on Tuesday, a source told ESPN, handing the Trojans their latest recruiting victory in the 2026 cycle over the Big Ten rival Ducks.

Topui, ESPN’s No. 3 defensive tackle and No. 72 overall recruit in the 2026 class, spent five and half months committed to Oregon before pulling his pledge from the program on March 27. Topui attended USC’s initial spring camp practice that afternoon, and seven days later the 6-foot-4, 295-pound defender gave the Trojans his pledge to become the sixth ESPN 300 defender in the program’s 2026 class.

Topui’s commitment gives USC its 10th ESPN 300 pledge this cycle — more than any other program nationally — and pulls a fourth top-100 recruit into the impressive defensive class the Trojans are building this spring. Alongside Topui, USC’s defensive class includes in-state cornerbacks R.J. Sermons (No. 26 in ESPN Junior 300) and Brandon Lockhart (No. 77); four-star outside linebacker Xavier Griffin (No. 27) out of Gainesville, Georgia; and two more defensive line pledges between Jaimeon Winfield (No. 143) and Simote Katoanga (No. 174).

The Trojans are working to reestablish their local recruiting presence in the 2026 class under newly hired general manager Chad Bowden. Topui not only gives the Trojans their 11th in-state commit in the cycle, but his pledge represents a potentially important step toward revamping the program’s pipeline to perennial local powerhouse Mater Dei High School, too.

Topui will enter his senior season this fall at Mater Dei, the program that has produced a long line of USC stars including Matt Leinart, Matt Barkley and Amon-Ra St. Brown. However, if Topui ultimately signs with the program later this year, he’ll mark the Trojans’ first Mater Dei signee since the 2022 cycle, when USC pulled three top-300 prospects — Domani Jackson, Raleek Brown and C.J. Williams — from the high school program based in Santa Ana, California.

Topui’s flip to the Trojans also adds another layer to a recruiting rivalry rekindling between USC and Oregon in the 2026 cycle.

Tuesday’s commitment comes less than two months after coach Lincoln Riley and the Trojans flipped four-star Oregon quarterback pledge Jonas Williams, ESPN’s No. 2 dual-threat quarterback in 2026. USC is expected to continue targeting several Ducks commits this spring, including four-star offensive tackle Kodi Greene, another top prospect out of Mater Dei.

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