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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The only time they’ve seen each other face-to-face in recent months was over burrito bowls.

This feels entirely wrong for Travis and Trevor Etienne, brothers separated by only about an hour’s drive, but also by careers that demand nearly all of their time. Usually, when they are in close proximity, it is within orbit of their mother’s kitchen, where there’s always a real, home-cooked, authentically Cajun meal waiting — smothered pork chops with corn and rice for Travis or turkey necks with mustard greens with ham hock for Trevor. There’s no place the Etienne brothers would rather be than crowded around Donnetta Etienne’s table. But this meetup wasn’t about the food. It was business: a commercial shoot for Chipotle, starring big brother Travis, an emerging NFL star for the Jacksonville Jaguars, and little brother Trevor, an emerging SEC star for the Florida Gators.

The script goes like this: Trevor is running through football drills. Travis is nearby, shouting advice, critiquing each move, timing each step. Trevor responds, again and again, with an exasperated, “Bro?” Then the pair retires to Chipotle, where Trevor places his order — a bowl with chicken, white rice, cheese and lettuce — which Travis immediately compliments as the perfect selection.

It is marketing. It is also a genuine window into their relationship.

Flash back to Trevor’s senior season at Jennings High in 2021. He was coming off a leg injury that required surgery and upended his sophomore campaign. He was tentative, worried about aggravating the injury. Travis was on the sideline for the game.

“Bro?” Travis yelled. “You going to stop playing soft or what?”

Flash back to 2022, Travis’ second season with the Jags. He was having fumble issues, putting the ball on the ground twice in three games. In the locker room before his next contest, Travis picked up his phone and saw a text from his little brother.

“Bro,” it read. “Two hands on the ball.”

This is how it’s been their whole lives. Travis as mentor, Trevor as protégé; Travis as prospect, Trevor as critic. They did it on the playground; on the basketball courts down the road from the house where they grew up; through hundreds of miles of distance between Jennings, Louisiana, and Clemson, South Carolina; and now, in front of the cameras for a burrito company.

They never dreamed they’d be here, Travis said — famous and cameras rolling. But this was part of the plan, a plan to stay true to their roots, to stick together at all costs, and to always look out for each other.

“It’s crazy to see people interested in us, and we’re just being ourselves,” Travis said. “It’s just cool to see where football has taken us.”


HOW FAR HAS football taken the Etienne brothers?

They started out in Jennings, Louisiana — population 9,837 — as big fish in a small pond. It’s the type of place where roots run deep and few roads lead to someplace better.

Sports were Donnetta’s way of keeping her boys away from the seedier elements of town.

“We kind of sheltered them from the drugs and alcohol and gangs,” Donnetta said. “You finish practice and school, you’re tired. So we did a three-sport household for each kid, and that kept them off the streets, kept them rooted and grounded in their books. It was a good formula.”

Travis was a superstar from the first time he touched a football, running for five touchdowns in his first Pee Wee game.

Trevor was the chubby kid who followed in Travis’ footsteps — “the annoying little brother he was always trying to get rid of,” Trevor said.

Trevor is six years younger than Travis. He’s the more outgoing of the two and is eager to speak his mind. Travis is a cutup in small groups of close friends or around Donnetta’s house with family, but in public, he mostly keeps quiet. Trevor, on the other hand, has a ready-made line for all occasions. James Estes, who served as offensive coordinator at Jennings High during both brothers’ time there, remembers Trevor showing up late for practice one day. He watched as Trevor made his way across the practice field, Estes waiting to dress him down.

“Where have you been?” Estes yelled.

Trevor shook his head.

“Coach,” he said, “you won’t believe it. Bigfoot grabbed me, and he stole my car.”

The whole team burst out laughing. How could Estes be mad now?

“You knew he’d been thinking about that for the 20 minutes it had taken him to get to practice,” Estes said.

When he was young, Travis hated having his little brother always in tow. He’d leave the house to play with friends, and Trevor would sneak out behind him, popping out of the shadows at the opportune time to join the older kids.

Eventually, though, Travis saw the advantage of having a teammate with him everywhere he went. Travis was tall and lean and lightning quick and a playground legend around Jennings. Trevor, on the other hand, was small and unassuming, easy to overlook. He was Travis’ secret weapon.

“Everyone always underestimated him, but he was always the best one,” Travis said. “I’d always pick him first, and we’d always win.”

Still, the narrative persisted: There was Travis, and there was Travis’ little brother.

This isn’t a matter of conflict, both men insist. They never cared. But the dynamic had a way of carving out roles for each.

Travis was the trailblazer, the kid who was destined to find his way to someplace beyond Jennings. He had so much natural ability as a runner, he couldn’t fail, but much of his evolution into a well-rounded player came by trial and error. Former Clemson teammate Darien Rencher remembers practices when the Tigers’ staff tried to use Travis as a slot receiver, and he didn’t even know how to get into a stance at the line of scrimmage. It took him years to refine that skill set before he blossomed into one of the better receivers out of the backfield.

Trevor witnessed his share of those practices on visits to Clemson. He got the message loud and clear that, to be a running back in the NFL, he’d need to do more than run.

“Trevor showed up for [a recruiting] camp at Clemson, maybe his sophomore year,” Rencher said, “and he’s out there running legit routes. We joked with Travis, like, dang your little brother learned this way before you did.”

Trevor wasn’t as naturally gifted as his older brother, but the lessons imparted by Travis gave him a road map that allowed him to flourish, too, and, in many ways, blossom into a better all-around player at an earlier age than Travis.

Travis’ success was predestined. Trevor’s success was calculated.

“Trevor had a cheat code,” Rencher said. “He had a front-row seat to just absorb everything Travis might not have even known he was given — all that experience and wisdom and expertise.”

But the rewards flowed in both directions. Knowing his younger brother was watching was always the push Travis needed to keep refining his game and, perhaps more importantly, to take each step away from the field carefully, intentionally. Even his surprising decision to return to Clemson for his senior season, he said, was made in part to show Trevor the value of a degree, of finishing a job once it’s started.

“I feel like it put pressure on him,” Trevor said. “Everything he does is magnified because I’m watching. He had to be his best at every moment to make sure I’m doing the right things.”

Trevor watched, so Travis worked.

Travis succeeded, so Trevor followed.

“They would always compete with each other,” Estes said. “They pushed each other harder than any of us could ever push them.”

It wasn’t by design exactly, but it proved to be the perfect blueprint.


TRAVIS DOMINATED DURING his time at Jennings. He went to college at Clemson, where he won a national title and carved his name into the ACC record books, setting the conference mark for rushing yards and touchdowns, and an NCAA record by scoring a touchdown in 46 career games. Then he was selected in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft by the Jacksonville Jaguars. This year, he’s one of just two running backs in the NFL with 500 yards and seven touchdowns through seven games.

Trevor, too, was a star runner at Jennings, where he was arguably a more versatile back than his older brother, even filling in at QB as a senior after the team’s starter was injured. Trevor finished his high school career with nearly 2,500 rushing yards and 34 touchdowns, earning scholarship offers from across the country.

When Travis was at Clemson, Trevor would make the trip from Louisiana every chance he got. He desperately wanted to stay close to his older brother, and the distance back then, he said, actually brought them closer together. It forced them to cherish the time they spent with each other. But Trevor chose Florida not because it was close to his brother’s NFL home, but because it was separate from Travis’ own path. It was a chance for Trevor to strike out on his own, to create a story that was less epilogue to the Travis Etienne story and more an early chapter of the Trevor Etienne journey.

“I told my brother to go wherever you want to go,” Travis said. “But I told him no Clemson. I wanted him to carve out being his own man, and I felt like he was an SEC running back.”

Trevor never chafed at his brother’s long shadow, he said. At home, he was always his own man, Donnetta said. He got “Trevor criticism, not Travis criticism.” But truth is, Trevor liked being compared to Travis. After games at Jennings, he’d text Travis with his stat line, a challenge to big brother to match those numbers on Saturday.

“No matter what I do, I’ll still be his little brother,” Trevor said. “But I looked at it as someone to look up to. Him setting all those records was just pushing me, showing me what could be done.”

For his part, Travis was happy to defer praise. He doesn’t like talking about himself, but get him on the subject of Trevor’s football exploits and he can’t help but gush.

“He’d always make comments that Trevor was actually better than he was,” former Clemson running backs coach Tony Elliott said.

Ultimately, Trevor landed in the SEC, at Florida. Earlier this season, he ran for 173 yards and a touchdown in an upset win over Tennessee. On Saturday, he’ll play against Georgia (3:30 p.m. ET, CBS) in his big brother’s home turf in Jacksonville. In the Gators’ loss there last year, Trevor scored a touchdown.

​​”It was like, ‘I got a touchdown in big bro’s house,'” Donnetta said. “So I’m hoping we get two touchdowns in big bro’s house [this year]. It means everything to him to touch big bro’s end zone.”


IT’S 74 MILES from Ben Hill Griffin Stadium in Gainesville to EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville — “The Swamp to the Bank,” as Donnetta calls her weekly journey — but it’s funny how far that can seem amid the buzz of daily life. Usually, the brothers bridge the distance via the family group text or a home-cooked meal delivered by Donnetta in a cooler.

Donnetta is in Florida now, too. She likes to cook on Wednesdays, knowing it suits Travis’ practice schedule to come by for a meal that night. Travis once noted during a media session at Clemson that he’d added nearly eight pounds in eight days by bingeing on Popeye’s chicken during a visit home for spring break. He loves to eat, and so when Donnetta cooks, he stakes his claim. Travis cleans his plate, then insists on another helping because he knows any leftovers get packed up in the ice box for a trip to Gainesville.

Then Friday, Donnetta arrives at Florida with a meal for Trevor, which always feels a bit light.

“And I tell him it’s because your crybaby brother acts like I give you everything,” Donnetta said. “They’ll be fighting for the meat right out the pot.”

There’s only so much catfish or ribs or chicken-fried steak to go around. That’s worth the fight. But the Etiennes have never viewed success or fame or legacy as a zero-sum game. Living the dream was possible only if both brothers were a part of it.

This is the whole point. Success for the Etiennes isn’t some distant point when their careers are established and their bank accounts flush and their family secured for generations. It’s the journey they’re on, a journey that would be utterly exhausting alone but is instead a genuine adventure together.

There’s a bit of advice Travis once imparted to Trevor that’s always stuck with the younger Etienne: “He told me not to worry about leaving a legacy,” Trevor said, “but to live a legacy.”

But lately, Travis has been giving some thought to getting older. He’ll be 25 in January, a number that puts him in the prime of his life but somehow seems preposterous to him. Last year, he hosted Christmas for the whole family at his house. Donnetta cooked, and they all wore matching pajamas and watched Christmas movies. It was like old times, except that Travis was now the centerpiece — a grown man with a job, a house and a life that his whole family has invested in, too. His friends say he can still act like a kid in the right context, but in that moment, it became clear to him: He’s grown up.

Where did the time go? It’s actually watching Trevor play that makes him feel — not old, per se, but matured. Back at Jennings and at Clemson, he lived in the moment. The journey was one foot in front of the other, with daily calls or texts to Trevor, who mapped each step for later use. Now, Travis sees his brother following that path at Florida, and it’s a bit like a time capsule. It’s only when Trevor does it that Travis’ own journey feels real, that the details sink in and he can remember just how grueling and exhausting and exhilarating it all was.

After they’d finished shooting the commercial, their agent, Sam Leaf Ireifej, called Donnetta at home. On the set, Travis had shed his usually reserved demeanor and was instead cracking jokes and laughing loudly.

“I saw a different side of Travis,” Ireifej said.

Donnetta smiled. She’s heard this before.

“Well, of course,” she told him. “He was with Trevor.”

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2025 MLB Home Run Derby: The field is set! Who is the slugger to beat?

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2025 MLB Home Run Derby: The field is set! Who is the slugger to beat?

The 2025 MLB All-Star Home Run Derby is fast approaching — and the field is set.

Braves hometown hero Ronald Acuna Jr. became the first player to commit to the event, which will be held at Truist Park in Atlanta on July 14 (8 p.m. ET on ESPN). He was followed by MLB home run leader Cal Raleigh of the Seattle Mariners, James Wood of the Washington Nationals, Byron Buxton of the Minnesota Twins, Oneil Cruz of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays, Brent Rooker of the Athletics and Jazz Chisholm Jr. of the New York Yankees.

On Friday, however, Acuna was replaced by teammate Matt Olson.

With all the entrants announced, let’s break down their chances at taking home this year’s Derby prize.

Full All-Star Game coverage: How to watch, schedule, rosters, more


2025 home runs: 17 | Longest: 434 feet

Why he could win: Olson is a late replacement for Acuna as the home team’s representative at this year’s Derby. Apart from being the Braves’ first baseman, however, Olson also was born in Atlanta and grew up a Braves fan, giving him some extra motivation. The left-handed slugger led the majors in home runs in 2023 — his 54 round-trippers that season also set a franchise record — and he remains among the best in the game when it comes to exit velo and hard-hit rate.

Why he might not: The home-field advantage can also be a detriment if a player gets too hyped up in the first round. See Julio Rodriguez in Seattle in 2023, when he had a monster first round, with 41 home runs, but then tired out in the second round.


2025 home runs: 36 | Longest: 440 feet

Why he could win: It’s the season of Cal! The Mariners’ catcher is having one of the greatest slugging first halves in MLB history, as he’s been crushing mistakes all season . His easy raw power might be tailor-made for the Derby — he ranks in the 87th percentile in average exit velocity and delivers the ball, on average, at the optimal home run launch angle of 23 degrees. His calm demeanor might also be perfect for the contest as he won’t get too amped up.

Why he might not: He’s a catcher — and one who has carried a heavy workload, playing in all but one game this season. This contest is as much about stamina as anything, and whether Raleigh can carry his power through three rounds would be a concern. No catcher has ever won the Derby, with only Ivan Rodriguez back in 2005 even reaching the finals.


2025 home runs: 24 | Longest: 451 feet

Why he could win: He’s big, he’s strong, he’s young, he’s awesome, he might or might not be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. This is the perfect opportunity for Wood to show his talent on the national stage, and he wouldn’t be the first young player to star in the Derby. He ranks in the 97th percentile in average exit velocity and 99th percentile in hard-hit rate, so he can still muscle the ball out in BP even if he slightly mishits it. His long arms might be viewed as a detriment, but remember the similarly tall Aaron Judge won in 2017.

Why he might not: His natural swing isn’t a pure uppercut — he has a pretty low average launch angle of just 6.2 degrees — so we’ll see how that plays in a rapid-fire session. In real games, his power is primarily to the opposite field, but in a Home Run Derby you can get more cheapies pulling the ball down the line.


2025 home runs: 20 | Longest: 479 feet

Why he could win: Buxton’s raw power remains as impressive as nearly any hitter in the game. He crushed a 479-foot home run earlier this season and has four others of at least 425 feet. Indeed, his “no doubter” percentage — home runs that would be out of all 30 parks based on distance — is 75%, the highest in the majors among players with more than a dozen home runs. His bat speed ranks in the 89th percentile. In other words, two tools that could translate to a BP lightning show.

Why he might not: Buxton is 31 and the Home Run Derby feels a little more like a younger man’s competition. Teoscar Hernandez did win last year at age 31, but before that, the last winner older than 29 was David Ortiz in 2010, and that was under much different rules than are used now.


2025 home runs: 16 | Longest: 463 feet

Why he could win: If you drew up a short list of players everyone wants to see in the Home Run Derby, Cruz would be near the top. He has the hardest-hit ball of the 2025 season, and the hardest ever tracked by Statcast, a 432-foot missile of a home run with an exit velocity of 122.9 mph. He also crushed a 463-foot home run in Anaheim that soared way beyond the trees in center field. With his elite bat speed — 100th percentile — Cruz has the ability to awe the crowd with a potentially all-time performance.

Why he might not: Like all first-time contestants, can he stay within himself and not get too caught up in the moment? He has a long swing, which will result in some huge blasts, but might not be the most efficient for a contest like this one, where the more swings a hitter can get in before the clock expires, the better.


2025 home runs: 23 | Longest: 425 feet

Why he could win: Although Caminero was one of the most hyped prospects entering 2024, everyone kind of forgot about him heading into this season since he didn’t immediately rip apart the majors as a rookie. In his first full season, however, he has showed off his big-time raw power — giving him a chance to become just the third player to reach 40 home runs in his age-21 season. He has perhaps the quickest bat in the majors, ranking in the 100th percentile in bat speed, and his top exit velocity ranks in the top 15. That could translate to a barrage of home runs.

Why he might not: In game action, Caminero does hit the ball on the ground quite often — in fact, he’s on pace to break Jim Rice’s record for double plays grounded into in a season. If he gets out of rhythm, that could lead to a lot of low line drives during the Derby instead of fly balls that clear the fences.


2025 home runs: 19 | Longest: 440 feet

Why he could win: The Athletics slugger has been one of the top power hitters in the majors for three seasons now and is on his way to a third straight 30-homer season. Rooker has plus bat speed and raw power, but his biggest strength is an optimal average launch angle (19 degrees in 2024, 15 degrees this season) that translates to home runs in game action. That natural swing could be picture perfect for the Home Run Derby. He also wasn’t shy about saying he wanted to participate — and maybe that bodes well for his chances.

Why he might not: Rooker might not have quite the same raw power as some of the other competitors, as he has just one home run longer than 425 feet in 2025. But that’s a little nitpicky, as 11 of his home runs have still gone 400-plus feet. He competed in the college home run derby in Omaha while at Mississippi State in 2016 and finished fourth.


2025 home runs: 17 | Longest: 442 feet

Why he could win: Chisholm might not be the most obvious name to participate, given his career high of 24 home runs, but he has belted 17 already in 2025 in his first 61 games after missing some time with an injury. He ranks among the MLB leaders in a couple of home run-related categories, ranking in the 96th percentile in expected slugging percentage and 98th percentile in barrel rate. His raw power might not match that of the other participants, but he’s a dead-pull hitter who has increased his launch angle this season, which might translate well to the Derby, even if he won’t be the guy hitting the longest home runs.

Why he might not: Most of the guys who have won this have been big, powerful sluggers. Chisholm is listed at 5-foot-11, 184 pounds, and you have to go back to Miguel Tejada in 2004 to find the last player under 6 foot to win.

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Judge MLB’s fastest to 350 HRs, but Yankees lose

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Judge MLB's fastest to 350 HRs, but Yankees lose

NEW YORK — Aaron Judge became the fastest player to hit 350 home runs, reaching the mark with a two-run drive for the New York Yankees off the Chicago CubsBrad Keller on Saturday.

Judge hit his 35th home run of the season, a two-run blast in the ninth, but it was too little too late as the Yankees fell to the Cubs 5-2 in the Bronx.

“I just think he’s playing in a different league,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said after the game.

Playing in his 1,088th game, Judge bettered Mark McGwire’s record of 1,280 by nearly 200 games.

“Big Mac did a lot of great things in this game, and he’s definitely a legend,” Judge said.

“Would have been great if we got a win today. I’ve been surrounded by a lot of great teammates, been on some good teams, so they really put me in the best position to go out there and perform at my best.”

Judge, who turned 33 in April, debuted with the Yankees at age 24 in 2016. McGwire finished in 2001 at age 38 with 583 homers, currently 11th on the career list.

Chicago starter Matthew Boyd gave up a pair of doubles to Judge on the afternoon but kept the rest of the Yankees in check, winning the matchup of All-Star left-handers against Max Fried, who left after just three innings with another blister on his pitching hand.

A first time All-Star, Boyd (10-3) won his fourth straight start and fifth consecutive decision, giving up four hits in eight scoreless innings with six strikeouts and no walks. He threw 62 of 85 pitches for strikes.

Daniel Palencia, throwing at up to 101.1 mph, got two outs for his 11th save in 12 chances to help snap the Yankees’ five-game winning streak.

Fried (11-3) allowed nine of 18 batters to reach, giving up four runs — three earned — six hits and three walks in three innings. He threw just 39 of 73 pitches for strikes.

Fried, a three-time All-Star, was on the injured list for blisters on his left index finger in 2018, ’19, ’21 and ’23. He had been 6-0 against the Cubs.

Nico Hoerner tripled leading off the game and scored on Kyle Tucker’s groundout. Carson Kelly and Ian Happ hit run-scoring singles in the third around Dansby Swanson’s RBI grounder.

Kelly homered in the eighth off Jonathan Loaisiga, who has allowed a career-high seven home runs over 23⅓ innings in his return from Tommy John surgery.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

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On Buxton bobblehead day, All-Star hits for cycle

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On Buxton bobblehead day, All-Star hits for cycle

MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota Twins All-Star center fielder Byron Buxton admitted to feeling a little added pressure before Saturday’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates. It was his bobblehead day, meaning the first 10,000 fans to walk through the gates at Target Field would receive a replica of Buxton doing his “Buck Truck” home run celebration.

“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous before the game started, just knowing it was bobblehead day,” Buxton said. “Obviously you want to come out and do something good.”

Buxton did more than something good. He became the first player to hit for the cycle at Target Field since the ballpark opened in 2010, helping ignite the Twins to a 12-4 win over the Pirates.

It was the 12th cycle in Twins history and the first since Jorge Polanco had one in 2019.

Buxton had three hits through three innings — a single in the first, a triple in the six-run second and a double in the third. After singling again in the fifth, he had one more opportunity in the bottom of the seventh.

Buxton, who will participate in next week’s Home Run Derby in Atlanta, crushed a 427-foot solo homer off Pirates reliever Andrew Heaney with two outs in the seventh to make it an 11-3 game and complete the cycle. That brought the Target Field crowd to its feet, with many fans celebrating with Buxton bobbleheads.

With his team holding a comfortable lead, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli almost took Buxton out of the game before his final at-bat, he admitted afterward. Thankfully for Baldelli — and Buxton — a few coaches reminded the skipper what was at stake.

“He was 4 for 4 at the time. But with everything going on during a game, sometimes I’ll be the one that might miss on a hitting streak or something that’s going on with a particular player,” Baldelli said. “But once they reminded me of that, he was going to stay in the game. He was going to get another at-bat, regardless of the score, and give him a chance to do something great.”

The homer was Buxton’s 21st of the season, tied for fifth most in the American League. With two runs driven in Saturday, Buxton now has 55 RBIs on the season — just one shy of his single-season high. He boasts an OPS of .921 and is 17 for 17 in stolen bases.

“It’s one of the greatest first halves I’ve ever witnessed,” Baldelli said.

Buxton was replaced in center field after the seventh inning, but not before getting a standing ovation curtain call from Twins fans. He also received a Gatorade bath courtesy of teammate Ty France, who was headed to the clubhouse before realizing that nobody had doused Buxton yet after the game.

“It’s special,” Buxton said. “To be able to come out on bobblehead day like this and have a day like this is something I won’t forget.”

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