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LEBANON, Tenn. — Joey Logano felt he couldn’t get to the finish line fast enough with his No. 22 Ford sputtering and nearly out of gas.

First, he had to hold off the driver with the fastest car to win the rain-delayed race that seemingly wouldn’t end Sunday night at Nashville Superspeedway in a NASCAR Cup Series-record fifth overtime.

Logano had a pack of pursuers on his bumper and knew he had to make one more move to block Tyler Reddick in Turn 4. Then Logano went “bonkers” after making it over the line first at the Ally 400.

“Definitely as close as you can cut it for sure,” Logano said about stretching his fuel almost to the last drop.

Logano held off Reddick’s charge in Turn 1 on the final lap and again in Turn 4. He then beat Zane Smith, Reddick, Ryan Preece and Chris Buescher to the line in the race that started nearly six hours earlier and went 31 laps longer than the 300 that were scheduled.

The fuel light in Logano’s Ford came on going into Turn 3 after the engine sputtered on the backstretch, and Logano — who ran the last 110 laps without stopping on the 1.33-mile concrete oval — said it stumbled across the line. All the caution laps helped stretch a tank expected to last 85 laps at best.

“It’s a much-needed win for sure,” a smiling and relieved Logano said about his first victory this year and 33rd of his career.

If the finish wasn’t thrilling enough, the mayhem continued. Chase Briscoe ran out of fuel. Daniel Suarez and Martin Truex Jr. made contact, spinning Truex into the wall. Chase Elliott spun off Turn 4 and into the grass.

Smith wasn’t happy at finishing second, though he said he wouldn’t do anything different after the rookie’s best Cup finish.

“I felt like I chose the right lane, and it’s crazy how much different these cars drive with cleaner air,” Smith said. “Just proud of our strategy there.

Reddick was upset with himself on pit road, convinced he let his second victory of the year slip through his fingers.

“All the good cars ran out of fuel, and we were in position to pass the 22,” Reddick said about Logano. “He hadn’t been good all day long, and I didn’t get the job done.”

Denny Hamlin, who started on the pole and took the lead with seven laps left in regulation, was two laps from winning when Austin Cindric’s crash set up the chaotic finish. Hamlin finished 12th after pitting in overtime to avoid running out of fuel.

“It certainly stinks,” Hamlin said,

A thunderstorm that forced NASCAR to halt the race at 137 laps for 1 hour, 21 minutes washed off the traction that had built up. As a result, several cars got loose and crashed into the wall or slid into the grass.

That helped set up a thrilling race after Christopher Bell won the first two stages before crashing.

Hamlin took the lead going high into Turn 1, and Chastain went to the apron trying to hold him off and wobbled. That was enough for Hamlin to pass Chastain’s Chevrolet in what turned out to be only the first late lead change of a race that featured repeated crashes on restarts.

“I had a shot to win,” said Chastain, who led 45 laps while seeking his first win since the 2023 season finale at Phoenix.

Cindric set up the repeating overtimes when he made contact with Noah Gragson with two laps left. On the restart, points leader Kyle Larson caught the apron and slid with the right corner of his Chevrolet sending Chastain into the wall in Turn 1 for the 12th caution.

Larson then ran out of gas on another restart, causing Kyle Busch to crash into him. That’s when Hamlin went for gas, scrambling the field for the wild finish.

Bell, who won last week at New Hampshire, won the first two stages before hitting the wall on lap 228.

“Just put myself in a bad spot and lost my cool,” Bell said. “Got back in traffic with all those yellow flags. Had a bad restart.”

Drivers tried to run as many laps as possible before an incoming thunderstorm on a steamy, humid Tennessee afternoon.

Lightning brought out the red flag, stopping the race after 137 laps with clouds in Turn 4 so heavy that it looked like a funnel was trying to form before heavy rain. The storm moved through quickly and dryers hit the track about 25 minutes after racing stopped.

Barely a half-hour after the race stopped, a rainbow could be seen. NASCAR sent drivers back to their cars about 70 minutes after the red flag, and the stoppage lasted 81 minutes with 143 laps remaining.

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Ohtani blasts 54th HR as Dodgers clinch NL West

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Ohtani blasts 54th HR as Dodgers clinch NL West

PHOENIX — Shohei Ohtani matched his career high with his 54th home run, Freddie Freeman went deep twice and the Los Angeles Dodgers clinched their 12th National League West title in 13 years by beating the Arizona Diamondbacks 8-0 on Thursday.

Ohtani’s homer splashed into Chase Field’s swimming pool behind the right-center wall for a 6-0 lead in the fourth inning. The two-run shot gave him 101 RBIs for the season and matched his career-best home run total with the World Series champion Dodgers last year. He has scored a big league-high 144 runs.

Los Angeles, which clinched a postseason berth last week, won its fourth straight division title.

Arizona (80-79) fell 1½ games behind the New York Mets (81-77) for the final NL wild-card spot and also is one game back of Cincinnati (81-78). The Diamondbacks close with three games at San Diego.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto (12-8) allowed four hits in six innings and struck out seven to finish with 201. His 2.49 ERA ranked second in the NL behind the 1.97 ERA of Pittsburgh’s Paul Skenes.

Three relievers finished a five-hitter in the Dodgers’ 10th shutout.

Freeman and Andy Pages homered back to back starting the second inning, Freeman off opener Jalen Beeks (5-3) and Pages against Nabil Crismatt. Mookie Betts added a two-run single.

Freeman, who had three RBIs, has 23 homers while Pages has 27.

Arizona finished 43-38 at Chase Field. The crowd of 34,952 raised home attendance to 2,393,773, the Diamondbacks’ highest since 2008.

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Bochy’s Rangers future unclear as season ends

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Bochy's Rangers future unclear as season ends

ARLINGTON, Texas — Bruce Bochy is in the final games of his three-year contract with the Texas Rangers, a span that began with the franchise’s only World Series title, but baseball’s winningest active manager isn’t ready to discuss if he will be back next season.

“Season’s not over. It’s something we’ll talk about when the season’s over,” Bochy said before the Rangers lost 4-0 to Minnesota in their home finale Thursday. “So I’m going to stick with that right now and see if we can win a couple of games here.”

Both Bochy, who turned 70 this season, and Chris Young, the team’s president of baseball operations, said they will talk about next season after this one is done. The Rangers, who will miss the playoffs for the second year in a row since that championship in 2023, finish with three games at Cleveland this weekend.

“The two of us will sit down and talk about where things are, what happened this year, where we’re going,” Young said. “There’s things that I’m sure he’s going to want to know about the future of the team and we’ll talk about it, like we did three years ago, and figure it out.”

Young, who pitched a season for Bochy in San Diego, was the Rangers general manager when he hired Bochy as manager after the 2022 season. They were coming off their sixth consecutive losing season, the longest streak in the half-century since the franchise moved to Texas in 1972.

At that time, Bochy had been out of managing for three seasons. He stepped away from the San Francisco Giants in 2019 after 13 seasons and three World Series titles, which followed 12 seasons and a National League pennant with the Padres.

“Just love him. He’s great. I love working with him. He’s been wonderful,” Young said. “He came here to win a World Series. He’s helped us accomplish that. And, you know, we’ll figure out what the future holds.”

Young didn’t have a timeline on how quickly a decision could be made after the season ends this weekend.

The Rangers (80-79) were eliminated from playoff contention Tuesday night when they lost their eighth straight game, but ended that losing streak the next night. They can still finish with a winning record, but would have to win two out of three against the playoff-chasing Guardians.

Bochy has a career record of 2,251-2,264 over his 28 seasons, with those wins ranking sixth among all managers – the five ahead of him are all in the Hall of Fame. No managers in the past 60 years have more than Bochy’s four World Series titles, and the only ones all-time with more are Joe McCarthy, Casey Stengel and Connie Mack.

“Oh, I’ve really had a great time, and it’s as much fun as I’ve had in the game,” Bochy said of his three seasons back in the dugout. “I said this when I came back, you have a deeper appreciation when you’re out, especially for three years and you realize what you have, how blessed you are to be doing what you’re doing. It’s been a lot of fun and I still love it, and enjoy it.”

The only current MLB manager older than Bochy is 73-year-old Ron Washington with the Angels, though he hasn’t managed a game for the Angels since June 19 before he had quadruple bypass heart surgery.

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Horton ‘adament’ he can pitch, but Cubs unsure

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Horton 'adament' he can pitch, but Cubs unsure

CHICAGO — The Cubs were still evaluating the extent of starter Cade Horton‘s back injury on Thursday, leaving the National League Rookie of the Year candidate’s status for the wild-card playoff series in question.

Manager Craig Counsell said “Cade is on track still,” though an MRI on Wednesday showed “some areas of concern” in the ribs.

“Right now, Cade is a go,” Counsell said, adding that Horton is “adament he can pitch.”

Counsell said another physician will look at the imaging. Horton is scheduled to resume throwing on Friday after being off the past two days.

“We want to make sure we use this time to let Cade tell us how he feels, let Cade show us how he feels, consult our doctors and let them make recommendations and get the best decision we can make,” Counsell said.

Chicago will play the San Diego Padres in Game 1 of the National League wild-card series on Tuesday. The Cubs’ magic number for clinching the top wild-card spot — and homefield advantage in the first round — was at two over Padres entering Thursday’s game against the playoff-contending New York Mets.

Horton is 11-4 in 22 starts and 23 appearances. The 24-year-old right-hander has a 2.67 ERA that ranks second among qualified rookies.

Horton left Tuesday’s start against New York after three innings due to back tightness. He was sick following his previous start and had been coughing, which led to the issues in the back and ribs.

Counsell said the Cubs won’t announce their postseason rotation until next week.

“We’re at this phase where we’re starting to put plans into place,” Counsell said. “We have multiple ones. We’ve got four baseball games left, which affects things.”

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