Connect with us

Published

on

The scope of the alleged illicit scouting ring being orchestrated by suspended Michigan analyst Connor Stalions continues to grow, as sources told ESPN on Tuesday that he bought tickets for games at four schools outside of the Big Ten that were either in College Football Playoff contention or playing contenders.

There also is record of Stalions buying tickets to the 2021 and 2022 SEC title games, sources told ESPN. The tickets to the SEC title games were purchased on the secondary market, according to sources.

ESPN also learned that Stalions, who is at the center of an NCAA investigation into Michigan’s alleged sign-stealing operation, bought tickets to a 12th Big Ten school, as sources at 12 of the 13 possible Big Ten schools have a record of Stalions buying a ticket there. ESPN reported on Monday there were 11 schools.

According to four sources, all of the tickets for games outside the Big Ten involved CFP contenders and were purchased either toward the middle or end of the 2022 season, as Michigan was headed to the College Football Playoff for the second consecutive season.

The Big Ten announced last week that Michigan (8-0, 5-0) is under NCAA investigation for the alleged sign-stealing operation. The Wolverines are the No. 2 team in the country and the current betting favorite to win the national title.

Soon after ESPN reported that Stalions had emerged as a centerpiece of the NCAA’s investigation into Michigan’s sign-stealing scheme on Friday, the school suspended him with pay. Since that time, schools around the country have been checking their ticket data — which includes the secondary market in most cases — to see if Stalions purchased tickets to their games.

So far, ESPN has confirmed that Stalions has purchased tickets to more than 35 games at 17 stadiums around the country. He has used a network of at least three people, who were forwarded the tickets to attend games.

A source told ESPN on Tuesday that the NCAA has been sent at least an hour of video evidence that shows a person sitting in a seat appearing to tape the home sideline with a smartphone. Stalions purchased the ticket for that seat. The video is expected to be used as part of the investigation to show that electronics were used in the signal-stealing ring, according to sources.

“Unless something happens right now, it’s irrelevant,” said a source on a Big Ten campus, underscoring the frustration around the league. “Everyone is mad. This is not right. But what is the NCAA going to do about it?”

Although the NCAA is leading the investigation into Michigan, the Big Ten could take action against the school before the probe is complete, sources told ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg on Tuesday. The Big Ten’s sportsmanship policy states that commissioner Tony Petitti has the “exclusive authority to determine whether offensive actions have occurred,” and to impose discipline for members.

The policy lists “integrity of the competition” as a fundamental element that all Big Ten schools are expected to uphold. Institutions are responsible for “the actions of its employees” and for cooperating with the league during an investigation.

The Big Ten has two categories for discipline. The first includes fines that don’t exceed $10,000 and suspensions of no more than two contests. The second, for major disciplinary action, requires approval from an executive committee made up of representatives of different schools, which can deny proposed penalties or reduce them but not add to them. The Big Ten’s penalties for Michigan State from the fight with Michigan in the Michigan Stadium tunnel in 2022 were an example of major disciplinary action.

A source told ESPN that the Big Ten would want to have “as full of a picture of what the facts actually are if we were to act” before the NCAA completes its investigation, which likely would not occur until sometime in 2024.

In a statement last week, Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh denied “illegally stealing signs” and said he had never “directed any staff member or others to participate in an off-campus scouting assignment.”

NCAA enforcement timelines are notoriously slow. Michigan is still under investigation for recruiting violations tied to allegations that emerged during the COVID-19 mandated recruiting dead period. (Harbaugh served a school-imposed three-game suspension for those violations earlier this year, but the case remains unfinished.)

The emergence of Stalions purchasing tickets at three College Football Playoff contenders outside the Big Ten reflects the potential breadth of the operation, which sources told ESPN last week was “elaborate.”

After ESPN reported on Monday that sources at 11 of the possible 13 Big Ten schools had confirmed Stalions bought a ticket in his name at their stadium, another source at a 12th Big Ten school found a record of Stalions purchasing a ticket at their stadium. The school that didn’t find Stalions in their records does not have access to search names in secondary markets.

According to the source, the ticket was purchased across from the visiting sideline for a game against Ohio State. It’s the fourth Ohio State-related game that ESPN has confirmed, three of which were in opposing stadiums where the tickets were purchased across from the visitor’s sideline. The fourth was OSU’s game against Penn State on Saturday, for which Stalions had purchased tickets across from both sidelines, according to sources. Michigan still must play both of those teams this season.

Those tickets were not used after Stalions’ name emerged in an ESPN story on Friday.

On Tuesday, a Michigan spokesman reiterated that the school is “unable to comment further due to this being an ongoing investigation.”

A Big Ten official also declined further comment. On Monday, the league told ESPN that the league “considers the integrity of competition to be of the utmost importance. Due to the ongoing nature of the NCAA investigation, the conference has no comment at this time.”

ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg contributed to this report.

Continue Reading

Sports

Baffert’s Rodriguez wins Wood, enters Derby field

Published

on

By

Baffert's Rodriguez wins Wood, enters Derby field

Rodriguez led all the way to win the $750,000 Wood Memorial on Saturday, earning enough points to move into the 20-horse field for next month’s Kentucky Derby.

Breaking from the rail, the Bob Baffert-trained colt ran 1 1/8 miles on a fast track in 1:48.15 under Hall of Famer Mike Smith in light rain and 45-degree temperatures at Aqueduct in New York. Rodriguez won by 3 1/2 lengths.

The victory was worth 100 qualifying points for the May 3 Derby, potentially giving Baffert three entrants as he seeks a record-setting seventh victory in his return to the race from which he was banned for three years.

Later Saturday, Baffert was to saddle Citizen Bull, last year’s 2-year-old champion, and Barnes in the $500,000 Santa Anita Derby in California, where it was sunny and 82 degrees.

He sent Rodriguez to New York to split up his Derby contenders. The colt was sent off at 7-2 odds in the 10-horse field and paid $9.30 to win the 100th edition of the Wood. He is a son of 2020 Kentucky Derby winner Authentic.

“Bob told me this horse is probably quicker than you think,” Smith said. “He can get uptight pretty easy, and the whole key was just letting him alone out there. I don’t think he necessarily has to have the lead. He just wants to be left alone.”

Smith has twice won the Kentucky Derby. Rodriguez would be his first mount since 2022. At 59, he would be the oldest jockey to win.

“That’s up to all the owners and Bob,” Smith said. “I was glad they pulled me off the bench and I hit a 3-shot for them.”

Grande, trained by Todd Pletcher, was second. He went from having zero qualifying points to 50, which should get him into the Derby starting gate for owner Mike Repole, who is 0 for 7 in the Derby.

Passion Rules was third. Captain Cook, the 9-5 favorite, finished fourth for trainer Rick Dutrow, who hasn’t had a Derby runner since 2010 after winning the 2008 race with Big Brown.

The $1.25 million Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland was postponed from Saturday to Tuesday due to heavy rain and potential flooding in the region. That race and the Lexington Stakes on April 12 are the final Derby preps of the season.

Continue Reading

Sports

Nebraska transfer WR Gilmore dismissed from team

Published

on

By

Nebraska transfer WR Gilmore dismissed from team

LINCOLN, Neb. — Nebraska receiver Hardley Gilmore IV, who transferred from Kentucky in January, has been dismissed from the team, coach Matt Rhule announced Saturday.

The second-year player from Belle Glade, Florida, had come to Nebraska along with former Kentucky teammate Dane Key and receivers coach Daikiel Shorts Jr. and had received praise from teammates and coaches for his performance in spring practice.

Rhule did not disclose a reason for removing Gilmore.

“Nothing outside the program, nothing criminal or anything like that,” Rhule said. “Just won’t be with us anymore.”

Gilmore was charged with misdemeanor assault in December for allegedly punching someone in the face at a storage facility in Lexington, Kentucky, the Lexington Herald Leader reported on Jan. 2.

Gilmore played in seven games as a freshman for the Wildcats and caught six passes for 153 yards. He started against Murray State and caught a 52-yard touchdown pass on Kentucky’s opening possession. He was a consensus four-star recruit who originally chose Kentucky over Penn State and UCF.

Continue Reading

Sports

What are torpedo bats? Are they legal? What to know about MLB’s hottest trend

Published

on

By

What are torpedo bats? Are they legal? What to know about MLB's hottest trend

The opening weekend of the 2025 MLB season was taken over by a surprise star — torpedo bats.

The bowling pin-shaped bats became the talk of the sport after the Yankees’ home run onslaught on the first Saturday of the season put it in the spotlight and the buzz hasn’t slowed since.

What exactly is a torpedo bat? How does it help hitters? And how is it legal? Let’s dig in.

Read: An MIT-educated professor, the Yankees and the bat that could be changing baseball


What is a torpedo bat and why is it different from a traditional MLB bat?

The idea of the torpedo bat is to take a size format — say, 34 inches and 32 ounces — and distribute the wood in a different geometric shape than the traditional form to ensure the fattest part of the bat is located where the player makes the most contact. Standard bats taper toward an end cap that is as thick diametrically as the sweet spot of the barrel. The torpedo bat moves some of the mass on the end of the bat about 6 to 7 inches lower, giving it a bowling-pin shape, with a much thinner end.


How does it help hitters?

The benefits for those who like swinging with it — and not everyone who has swung it likes it — are two-fold. Both are rooted in logic and physics. The first is that distributing more mass to the area of most frequent contact aligns with players’ swing patterns and provides greater impact when bat strikes ball. Players are perpetually seeking ways to barrel more balls, and while swings that connect on the end of the bat and toward the handle probably will have worse performance than with a traditional bat, that’s a tradeoff they’re willing to make for the additional slug. And as hitters know, slug is what pays.

The second benefit, in theory, is increased bat speed. Imagine a sledgehammer and a broomstick that both weigh 32 ounces. The sledgehammer’s weight is almost all at the end, whereas the broomstick’s is distributed evenly. Which is easier to swing fast? The broomstick, of course, because shape of the sledgehammer takes more strength and effort to move. By shedding some of the weight off the end of the torpedo bat and moving it toward the middle, hitters have found it swings very similarly to a traditional model but with slightly faster bat velocity.


Why did it become such a big story so early in the 2025 MLB season?

Because the New York Yankees hit nine home runs in a game Saturday and Michael Kay, their play-by-play announcer, pointed out that some of them came from hitters using a new bat shape. The fascination was immediate. While baseball, as an industry, has implemented forward-thinking rules in recent seasons, the modification to something so fundamental and known as the shape of a bat registered as bizarre. The initial response from many who saw it: How is this legal?


OK. How is this legal?

Major League Baseball’s bat regulations are relatively permissive. Currently, the rules allow for a maximum barrel diameter of 2.61 inches, a maximum length of 42 inches and a smooth and round shape. The lack of restrictions allows MLB’s authorized bat manufacturers to toy with bat geometry and for the results to still fall within the regulations.


Who came up with the idea of using them?

The notion of a bowling-pin-style bat has kicked around baseball for years. Some bat manufacturers made smaller versions as training tools. But the version that’s now infiltrating baseball goes back two years when a then-Yankees coach named Aaron Leanhardt started asking hitters how they should counteract the giant leaps in recent years made by pitchers.

When Yankees players responded that bigger barrels would help, Leanhardt — an MIT-educated former Michigan physics professor who left academia to work in the sports industry — recognized that as long as bats stayed within MLB parameters, he could change their geometry to make them a reality. Leanhardt, who left the Yankees to serve as major league field coordinator for the Miami Marlins over the winter, worked with bat manufacturers throughout the 2023 and 2024 seasons to make that a reality.


When did it first appear in MLB games?

It’s unclear specifically when. But Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton used a torpedo bat last year and went on a home run-hitting rampage in October that helped send the Yankees to the World Series. New York Mets star Francisco Lindor also used a torpedo-style bat last year and went on to finish second in National League MVP voting.


Who are some of the other notable early users of torpedo bats?

In addition to Stanton and Lindor, Yankees hitters Anthony Volpe, Austin Wells, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt have used torpedoes to great success. Others who have used them in games include Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero, Minnesota’s Ryan Jeffers and Toronto’s Davis Schneider. And that’s just the beginning. Hundreds more players are expected to test out torpedoes — and perhaps use them in games — in the coming weeks.


How is this different from a corked bat?

Corking bats involves drilling a hole at the end of the bat, filling it in and capping it. The use of altered bats allows players to swing faster because the material with which they replace the wood — whether it’s cork, superballs or another material — is lighter. Any sort of bat adulteration is illegal and, if found, results in suspension.


Could a rule be changed to ban them?

Could it happen? Sure. Leagues and governing bodies have put restrictions on equipment they believe fundamentally altered fairness. Stick curvature is limited in hockey. Full-body swimsuits made of polyurethane and neoprene are banned by World Aquatics. But officials at MLB have acknowledged that the game’s pendulum has swung significantly toward pitching in recent years, and if an offensive revolution comes about because of torpedo bats — and that is far from a guarantee — it could bring about more balance to the game. If that pendulum swings too far, MLB could alter its bat regulations, something it has done multiple times already this century.


So the torpedo bat is here to stay?

Absolutely. Bat manufacturers are cranking them out and shipping them to interested players with great urgency. Just how widely the torpedo bat is adopted is the question that will play out over the rest of the season. But it has piqued the curiosity of nearly every hitter in the big leagues, and just as pitchers toy with new pitches to see if they can marginally improve themselves, hitters will do the same with bats.

Comfort is paramount with a bat, so hitters will test them during batting practice and in cage sessions before unleashing them during the game. As time goes on, players will find specific shapes that are most comfortable to them and best suit their swing during bat-fitting sessions — similar to how golfers seek custom clubs. But make no mistake: This is an almost-overnight alteration of the game, and “traditional or torpedo” is a question every big leaguer going forward will ask himself.

Continue Reading

Trending