For the first time since Deion Sanders arrived at Colorado, the pressure is on.
Not that there isn’t a level of pressure felt by every college football coach, but Sanders arrived in Boulder with little in the way of outside expectations. Some of that came with the fact that he was inheriting a one-win team and some because he’s Deion Sanders, a beloved football icon who had earned the benefit of the doubt by entertaining fans for decades.
Either way, success at Colorado this year was never going to be measured in the way it will be at other Pac-12 programs like Oregon, Utah, USC or Washington. Still, Sanders laid out a high standard when he arrived and reiterated that Tuesday.
“My expectations are lofty,” he said. “So, you know darn well how the season is going with my expectations. It depends on your expectation. You can’t mix my expectation and your expectations because they don’t coincide. You know what mine are. I know where I feel like we should be record-wise and I know what we can accomplish.”
Safe to say, 1-3 in the Pac-12 isn’t the win-loss record he was referring to, even though his team’s 4-3 overall mark is better than what many outside observers had envisioned in August.
The pressure now, though, isn’t about preseason predictions. This pressure comes from how those expectations evolved and were espoused from within the program as the team started 3-0.
In a celebratory postgame news conference after Colorado upset national runner-up TCU to open the season, Sanders singled out ESPN’s Ed Werder — though he was merely chosen, seemingly at random, as a figurehead for any perceived doubter — and asked, “Do you believe now?”
He might as well have been speaking to the country. The clip made the rounds on the internet and served as an exclamation point on an impressive victory. It was a moment where it felt like Sanders demanded for the Buffaloes’ on-field performance to be held to a higher standard.
As in, I’ve been saying we are good. Here’s the proof.
That’s a dangerous game to play in college football after game No. 1, but after three wins to open the season, it was clear the Buffs were significantly better than a year ago. Not conference-contender better. More like, should-reach-a-bowl-game better.
In fact, a bowl game seemed like a safe bet. Since 2010 (not including 2020), 91% of FBS teams that started 3-0 reached bowl games.
But after the Buffs came back to beat Colorado State in double overtime to move to 3-0, safety Shilo Sanders was aiming much higher.
“We have the talent to be the best in this conference, in the country,” he said.
In a sport where players and coaches often cliché their way through news conferences, Colorado — led by Coach Prime and his sons, Shilo and Shedeur Sanders — embraced lofty expectations. It’s part of their appeal.
Phase I, the nonconference portion of the schedule, was an unmitigated success. A nearly unprecedented level of buzz was layered over an encouraging start on the field.
Since then, it’s been bad.
The Buffs’ 1-3 stretch to open Pac-12 play, Phase II, doesn’t need a full autopsy. It’s enough to know it was bookended by a 42-6 loss to Oregon and the biggest blown lead in school history (against a team that might not win another conference game) — Colorado’s double-overtime loss to Stanford heading into the bye week was so bad it made Sanders question his team’s desire.
“They gotta make up their mind, are they in love with this game or like it,” Sanders said. “When you love something, you give to it unconditionally. You give everything you got to it. But when you like it, that’s just a button you push.”
That once-promising bowl trip is looking less likely. ESPN’s Football Power Index gives Colorado just a 30% chance to reach the six-win mark necessary to reach the postseason. In its five remaining games, Colorado plays three ranked teams, starting with No. 23 UCLA at the Rose Bowl on Saturday (7:30 p.m. ET, ABC), then has a home game against No. 11 Oregon State next week and a trip to No. 13 Utah for its season finale.
Its other two opponents — Arizona and Washington State — also have winning records. It’s an unforgiving road.
It’s especially daunting given Colorado’s deficiencies. The Buffaloes rank last in the country in total defense (473.7 yards per game). Only Stanford has a worse scoring defense than the Buffaloes among Power 5 teams (35.9 points per game). They rank No. 128 nationally in penalty yards per game (80.0).
On offense, Shedeur has put up massive numbers — he ranks No. 4 nationally in passing yards with 2,420 — but part of the reason he throws so much is that there is no running game to speak of. Colorado ranks last among Power 5 teams in rushing yards per game (86.3) and per carry (2.66). Sanders has also been sacked more times (34) than anyone at the FBS level.
That’s a lot to clean up, but coming out of the bye week, Deion expects progress.
Specific to the penalty issue, he said the coaching staff broke down where the problems have occurred and keyed in on those areas.
“We have addressed all of that and addressed the individuals that are consistently being penalized and how we’re going to improve that,” Sanders said. “We’ve addressed it tremendously. And you should see a tremendous improvement this Saturday.”
Here is where Phase III begins.
With tens of millions of eyes on the program, the Buffs went from overachiever to underachiever in the span of less than two months. The final five games will determine how this season is remembered.
ESPN baseball reporter. Covered the Washington Wizards from 2014 to 2016 and the Washington Nationals from 2016 to 2018 for The Washington Post before covering the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB for the Los Angeles Times from 2018 to 2024.
NEW YORK — A blunder that typifies the current state of the New York Yankees, who find themselves in the midst of their second six-game losing streak in three weeks, happened in front of 41,401 fans at Citi Field on Saturday, and almost nobody noticed.
The Yankees were jogging off the field after securing the third out of the fourth inning of their 12-6 loss to the Mets when shortstop Anthony Volpe, as is standard for teams across baseball at the end of innings, threw the ball to right fielder Aaron Judge as he crossed into the infield from right field.
Only Judge wasn’t looking, and the ball nailed him in the head, knocking his sunglasses off and leaving a small cut near his right eye. The wound required a bandage to stop the bleeding, but Judge stayed in the game.
“Confusion,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I didn’t know what happened initially. [It just] felt like something happened. Of course I was a little concerned.”
Avoiding an injury to the best player in baseball was on the Yankees’ very short list of positives in another sloppy, draining defeat to their crosstown rivals. With the loss, the Yankees, who held a three-game lead over the Toronto Blue Jays in the American League East standings entering June 30, find themselves tied with the Tampa Bay Rays for second place three games behind the Blue Jays heading into Sunday’s Subway Series finale.
The nosedive has been fueled by messy defense and a depleted pitching staff that has encountered a wall.
“It’s been a terrible week,” said Boone, who before the game announced starter Clarke Schmidt will likely undergo season-ending Tommy John surgery.
For the second straight day, the Mets capitalized on mistakes and cracked timely home runs. After slugging three homers in Friday’s series opener, the Mets hit three more Saturday — a grand slam in the first inning from Brandon Nimmo to take a 4-0 lead and two home runs from Pete Alonso to widen the gap.
Nimmo’s blast — his second grand slam in four days — came after Yankees left fielder Jasson Dominguez misplayed a ball hit by the Mets’ leadoff hitter in the first inning. On Friday, he misread Nimmo’s line drive and watched it sail over his head for a double. On Saturday, he was slow to react to Starling Marte’s flyball in the left-center field gap and braked without catching or stopping it, allowing Marte to advance to second for a double. Yankees starter Carlos Rodon then walked two batters to load the bases for Nimmo, who yanked a mistake, a 1-2 slider over the wall.
“That slider probably needs to be down,” said Rodon, who allowed seven runs (six earned) over five innings. “A lot of misses today and they punished them.”
Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s throwing woes at third base — a position the Yankees have asked him to play to accommodate DJ LeMahieu at second base — continued in the second inning when he fielded Tyrone Taylor’s groundball and sailed a toss over first baseman Cody Bellinger’s head. Taylor was given second base and scored moments later on Marte’s RBI single.
The Yankees were charged with their second error in the Mets’ four-run seventh inning when center fielder Trent Grisham charged Francisco Lindor’s single up the middle and had it bounce off the heel of his glove.
The mistake allowed a run to score from second base without a throw, extending the Mets lead back to three runs after the Yankees had chipped their deficit, and allowed a heads-up Lindor to advance to second base. Lindor later scored on Alonso’s second home run, a three-run blast off left-hander Jayvien Sandridge in the pitcher’s major league debut.
“Just got to play better,” Judge said. “That’s what it comes down to. It’s fundamentals. Making a routine play, routine. It’s just the little things. That’s what it kind of comes down to. But every good team goes through a couple bumps in the road.”
This six-game losing skid has looked very different from the Yankees’ first. That rough patch, consisting of losses to the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Angels, was propelled by offensive troubles. The Yankees scored six runs in the six games and gave up just 16. This time, run prevention is the issue; the Yankees have scored 34 runs and surrendered 54 in four games against the Blue Jays in Toronto and two in Queens.
“The offense is starting to swing the bat, put some runs on the board,” Boone said. “The pitching, which has kind of carried us a lot this season, has really, really struggled this week. We haven’t caught the ball as well as I think we should.
“So, look, when you live it and you’re going through it, it sucks, it hurts. But you got to be able to handle it. You got to be able to deal with it. You got to be able to weather it and come out of this and grow.”
Bobby Jenks, a two-time All-Star pitcher for the Chicago White Sox who was on the roster when the franchise won the 2005 World Series, died Friday in Sintra, Portugal, the team announced.
Jenks, 44, who had been diagnosed with adenocarcinoma, a form of stomach cancer, this year, spent six seasons with the White Sox from 2005 to 2010 and also played for the Boston Red Sox in 2011. The reliever finished his major league career with a 16-20 record, 3.53 ERA and 173 saves.
“We have lost an iconic member of the White Sox family today,” White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement. “None of us will ever forget that ninth inning of Game 4 in Houston, all that Bobby did for the 2005 World Series champions and for the entire Sox organization during his time in Chicago. He and his family knew cancer would be his toughest battle, and he will be missed as a husband, father, friend and teammate. He will forever hold a special place in all our hearts.”
After Jenks moved to Portugal last year, he was diagnosed with a deep vein thrombosis in his right calf. That eventually spread into blood clots in his lungs, prompting further testing. He was later diagnosed with adenocarcinoma and began undergoing radiation.
In February, as Jenks was being treated for the illness, the White Sox posted “We stand with you, Bobby” on Instagram, adding in the post that the club was “thinking of Bobby as he is being treated.”
In 2005, as the White Sox ended an 88-year drought en route to the World Series title, Jenks appeared in six postseason games. Chicago went 11-1 in the playoffs, and he earned saves in series-clinching wins in Game 3 of the ALDS at Boston, and Game 4 of the World Series against the Houston Astros.
In 2006, Jenks saved 41 games, and the following year, he posted 40 saves. He also retired 41 consecutive batters in 2007, matching a record for a reliever.
“You play for the love of the game, the joy of it,” Jenks said in his last interview with SoxTV last year. “It’s what I love to do. I [was] playing to be a world champion, and that’s what I wanted to do from the time I picked up a baseball.”
A native of Mission Hills, California, Jenks appeared in 19 games for the Red Sox and was originally drafted by the then-Anaheim Angels in the fifth round of the 2000 draft.
Jenks is survived by his wife, Eleni Tzitzivacos, their two children, Zeno and Kate, and his four children from a prior marriage, Cuma, Nolan, Rylan and Jackson.
ESPN baseball reporter. Covered the Washington Wizards from 2014 to 2016 and the Washington Nationals from 2016 to 2018 for The Washington Post before covering the Los Angeles Dodgers and MLB for the Los Angeles Times from 2018 to 2024.
NEW YORK — The New York Yankees, digging for options to bolster their infield, have signed third baseman Jeimer Candelario to a minor league contract and assigned him to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, the affiliate announced Saturday.
Candelario, 31, was released by the Cincinnati Reds on June 23, halfway through a three-year, $45 million contract he signed before the start of last season. The decision was made after Candelario posted a .707 OPS in 2024 and batted .113 with a .410 OPS in 22 games for the Reds before going on the injured list in April with a back injury.
The performance was poor enough for Cincinnati to cut him in a move that Reds president of baseball operations Nick Krall described as a sunk cost.
For the Yankees, signing Candelario is a low-cost flier on a player who recorded an .807 OPS just two seasons ago as they seek to find a third baseman to move Jazz Chisholm Jr. to second base, his natural position.
Candelario is the second veteran infielder the Yankees have signed to a minor league contract in the past three days; they agreed to terms with Nicky Lopez on Thursday.