Is it too late for Florida State to turn its season around?
-
Andrea Adelson, ESPN Senior Writer
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida State coach Mike Norvell has dealt with 0-2 starts. Bad home losses. Negativity. Quarterbacks getting booed.
Never, however, as a defending conference champion.
And never as a top-10 team.
Coming off a season when Florida State was left out of the College Football Playoff as an undefeated conference champion, Norvell had plenty on his plate: rebuilding a roster, developing leadership and getting his team past a snub that continued to sting months later.
He felt good about his plan, telling ESPN in July, “This has been arguably the best offseason I’ve ever been a part of. The way that they approached our winter drills, spring practice, summer, the work has been there. It’s a fast, explosive, powerful football team.”
But Florida State’s first two games exposed not only flaws in what should have been team strengths but also a general lack of cohesion and leadership that has led to mistrust on the field. What’s more, all of this played out with a national television audience watching and with the school’s lawsuit against the ACC challenging the grant of rights as a backdrop.
The Seminoles have not looked fast, explosive or powerful. Rather, they allowed Georgia Tech and Boston College to be the aggressors, dictating exactly how the first two games of the season would go. Meanwhile, offensive coordinator/offensive line coach Alex Atkins will miss his third game Saturday as he serves an NCAA-mandated three-game suspension for recruiting violations.
Norvell has vowed to be better as his team attempts to hit the reset button on its season against Memphis.
The question, of course, is this: Is it too late?
AS THE GAME clock wound down against Boston College, the Florida State sideline was as quiet as the rest of the stadium. Athletic director Michael Alford stood with his arms crossed, looking up at the scoreboard, disbelief settling in over a 28-13 loss that would drop the Seminoles from preseason No. 10 to outside the AP Top 25.
Another Florida State official used the word “bewilderment” to describe the scene. Norvell glared straight ahead as he ran off the field. Nobody — from Alford to Norvell to the coaching staff and players — expected to start 0-2.
Florida State was supposed to be past all this after Norvell elevated the program from irrelevance to an ACC title in four years. Perhaps the lowest point came in 2021 when the team got off to an 0-4 start and quarterback Jordan Travis was booed so badly he considered quitting football. From that point to the 2023 ACC championship game, Florida State went 28-6.
If the Seminoles engendered any sympathy after getting left out of the playoffs, it quickly dissipated after the school opted to sue the ACC to get out of the league. The team’s 0-2 start has drawn widespread ridicule on social media and whispers in ACC circles about karma being delivered to the two schools that have filed lawsuits (Clemson having lost 34-3 to Georgia in Week 1).
The lawsuits, however, have nothing to do with the on-field performance. The snub did send the program reeling, at least in the short term. For four years, Norvell had told his players that if they put in the work, the reward would follow. Except in the case of the playoff, it had not, leading to anger and a crisis in confidence.
Nearly a quarter of the roster either opted out of last season’s Orange Bowl or entered the transfer portal; Florida State lost that game to Georgia 63-3. Ten players off its 2023 roster were drafted, including Travis, receiver Keon Coleman, defensive end Jared Verse and defensive tackle Braden Fiske.
Players throughout the offseason, and at ACC Kickoff, lamented the snub and vowed not to fall short of the playoff again. Asked whether the playoff snub has lingered this year, receiver Kentron Poitier delivered an emphatic no.
“It ain’t about last year, it’s about this year,” Poitier said. “Yeah, we talk a little bit about [the snub], but this is a whole new team.”
Norvell, meanwhile, had conversations with Alabama in January about replacing Nick Saban. But he stayed at Florida State and earned a contract extension that will pay him $10 million a year until 2031. At the time, he said, “There’s a lot of excitement around our program. I’m just excited to continue to build upon the foundation that’s been laid.”
Florida State dipped into the transfer portal again to rebuild. Since his arrival, Norvell has been strategic about the type of players he has brought into the program. Early on, he brought in players with multiple years of eligibility to help lay a foundation, including Verse, Trey Benson and Jammie Robinson. Florida State rose back to an elite level thanks in large part to the portal evaluations the program made — from Verse, Fiske and Coleman to Johnny Wilson, Benson, Jermaine Johnson, Keir Thomas and Robinson.
This year, though, Norvell wanted to add complementary players to a roster that returned 82 players — many of whom Norvell recruited. In his mind, the foundation had been set, and the Seminoles wanted to rely on their role players taking on bigger starting roles while using portal players to complement what they already had.
The Seminoles signed 17 transfers this time around, bringing in a top-10 portal class. The Seminoles knew they had to bring in a veteran quarterback with Travis gone and Brock Glenn still in need of development. They targeted the two biggest names: Cam Ward and DJ Uiagalelei. The quarterbacks visited on the same weekend in December.
Ward had also visited Miami and told ESPN in a previous interview that he made it clear to both coaching staffs that he planned to declare for the NFL draft but would keep his options open to return to college. “A lot of schools wanted to rush my decision, but I was going to do it on my time no matter what,” Ward said. Ultimately, Uiagalelei committed to the Seminoles on Jan. 1; Ward declared for the draft the same day but did not sign with an agent. He changed his mind and decided to play at Miami, committing Jan. 13.
Uiagalelei had previously played in the ACC, starting his career at Clemson before going to Oregon State for 2023. From the beginning, there were questions about whether he would be able to play at an elite level at his third school. One opposing coach observed, “I just never felt like that guy was a championship quarterback. He’s just never been able to be accurate.”
Two games in, Uiagalelei has been erratic at best, and he was booed against Boston College, where the crowd also chanted for the backup, Glenn. In two games, Uiagalelei has thrown for 465 yards with a touchdown and an interception, and he is averaging just 6.7 yards per completion.
The other portal additions have been quiet, too. Defensive end Marvin Jones Jr., whom the staff raved about all spring and summer, has been neutralized as a threat (two total tackles). Alabama transfer receiver Malik Benson ranks third on the team in receiving yards. Roydell Williams leads the team in rushing but is averaging only 3.2 yards per carry.
Asked after the Boston College game whether he had missed on his portal evaluations, Norvell responded tersely, “Obviously I’ve not done a good job putting our guys in a position to showcase what I believe that they are. So I’ll be better.”
But the issues go beyond the portal players. Between 2020 and 2023, Florida State signed 25 ESPN 300 players; 13 remain on the team. Three are starters. Players Florida State wants to rely on — including DJ Lundy and defensive end Pat Payton — had to be persuaded to return to the Seminoles in the first place. In December, Payton threatened to enter the portal before changing his mind; Lundy entered the portal, and committed to Colorado, before opting to stay with the Seminoles.
What also has been glaring is the lack of leadership. Perhaps the staff thought replacing 10 NFL draft picks would not be as difficult as it has been, both from a standpoint of production and leadership. “Travis, Verse and Fiske were all next-level guys who had been through the battles, and they don’t have it this year,” another opposing coach said.
Florida State worked the entire offseason on this needed intangible. Norvell held a retreat for the veterans who made up his leadership council in January, six months earlier than usual, understanding he had a new group that had big shoes to fill. Players in March discussed the need to get to know each other better, identifying three key words to building a successful team: relationships, accountability and mindset.
At a team meeting the day before spring practice began, center Maurice Smith told his teammates to get out of their comfort zones and start building relationships with guys outside their position groups: “We’re not here for NIL,” Smith told them. “We’re here to create a team and make a run. We only go as far as our relationship goes.”
Asked about the opportunity for players to step up in the face of adversity to emerge as leaders, Norvell admitted, “There’s an open door for that. I don’t want a team that waits for the adversity for the people to arise, but it’s also necessity that in these moments, when it does happen, who are you? What is the true core identity?”
After the Boston College game, Poitier and linebackers Lundy and Cam Riley said multiple times that players had to start trusting each other.
“I would probably say really believing in each other, trusting our brothers, knowing if a safety is in the fit, just trusting he’s going to be there and not being hesitant and second-guessing yourself,” Riley said.
A third opposing coach noted that it usually takes a few games before a team identity emerges, something that has become more challenging in the portal era with a revolving roster door. “Internally how you hold it together is even more challenging,” the coach said.
PERHAPS MOST DISCONCERTING to those close to the program is the performance against Boston College. Florida State lost to Georgia Tech on a last-second field goal on a different continent. Against the Eagles at home, Florida State got dominated across the board and, by the end of the game, looked like a team that had given up.
In both games, Florida State failed to both run the ball and stop the run, a head-scratcher to those around the program because the coaching staff believed its offensive and defensive lines would give Florida State an opportunity to contend again.
Florida State returned the most experienced offensive line in the ACC with 190 starts and two preseason All-ACC players in Smith and tackle Darius Washington. With added depth in their running back room, the Seminoles felt they could be a dominant run team and rely on Uiagalelei to be a complementary player, allowing him to thrive without putting the pressure of an entire offense on his shoulders.
The first drive of the season against Georgia Tech showcased exactly that — five rushes for 58 yards, two passes for 17. But since that drive, Florida State has not been able to run with any consistency. The Seminoles have routinely lost their one-on-one matchups, making it far more difficult to run. In two games, they have 119 total yards and are averaging 0.92 yards before contact — the worst under Norvell.
Not only that, the running backs were simply not involved against Boston College. Florida State had four designed runs for running backs in the first half, the fewest in the first half of a game by an ACC team since Duke had four against Boston College in 2011.
Although Florida State did not call many designed runs for Travis last season, he always brought the threat to run; that simply does not exist with Uiagalelei, a dynamic that has affected the way defenses have decided to play Florida State. The fact that Georgia Tech and Boston College — two teams that ranked last in the ACC in rushing defense a year ago — have shut down the Seminoles is particularly galling to those close to the program.
One factor at play is Atkins’ suspension. The NCAA handed down a three-game suspension and two-year show-cause penalty stemming from recruiting violations in 2022. Although Norvell calls the plays, Atkins is hands-on with the offensive line over the course of the game and has the best feel for when to make rotations, substitutions and specific line calls. He is not allowed to be with the team on game day, including for pregame walk-throughs and planning.
The Florida State defensive front has not been much better. The Seminoles have allowed 453 yards rushing in two games, the most they have allowed in their first two games of a season since at least 2000.
One coach who watched the opener against Georgia Tech used the word “tender” to describe the defense. Norvell said he noticed players pressing to make plays against Boston College and “trying to do almost too much.”
“That’s on the linebackers and the D-line,” Lundy said. “We’ve got to play better. Teams can’t be able to run the ball on us. We’ve got to figure out how to stop the run, and we’re going to do that, I promise you.”
There seems to be a clear disconnect between what is happening in practice and what is happening on the field. Asked why what is happening in practice is not happening in games, Lundy said, “We just got to be better at executing our game plan. We’ve got to be more disciplined, more fundamental. We’ve got to do what we do in practice. But it’s all going to come down to execution.”
AD Alford has never wavered in his belief in Norvell, even when Florida State started 0-4 in 2021 and people wondered whether the coach was on the hot seat. Alford told ESPN in a phone interview last week, “I’ve got full faith in Mike and the team. We live in such a competitive arena every day, and we know what it takes to endure tough times. We have that unconquered spirit here. They’re going to be fine. They’ll get it fixed.”
BACK IN JULY, when Norvell spoke with ESPN during ACC Kickoff, he spoke about the challenges in pushing Florida State even further — to a place where the Seminoles compete not just for ACC championships but for national championships.
Two months later, his words sound more prescient than ever.
“The closer you get to the tip of the mountain, the steeper it gets. You miss a step there, and it can be a tumble, and we’ve seen that happen within our own program years back. … Now it’s time to go take another step,” Norvell said. “It’s time to be better than what we’ve been, and the challenges, the adversity, all those things, they’re going to show up. We haven’t arrived. But there’s also a lot of excitement.”
Now is the time to see what type of response and leadership Florida State has on its 2024 team before it’s too late.
“Our program is built off responding,” Lundy said. “There’s a lot of season left, and we’ve got to decide what we’re going to make the season to be. We’ve got to come together. It’s all on us. Coach likes to take the blame, but it’s on us.”
Hard-throwing rookie Jacob Misiorowski is a National League All-Star replacement, giving the Milwaukee Brewers right-hander a chance to break Paul Skenes‘ record for the fewest big league appearances before playing in the Midsummer Classic.
Misiorowski was named Friday night to replace Chicago Cubs lefty Matthew Boyd, who will be unavailable for the All-Star Game on Tuesday night in Atlanta because he is scheduled to start Saturday at the New York Yankees.
The 23-year-old Misiorowski has made just five starts for the Brewers, going 4-1 with a 2.81 ERA while averaging 99.3 mph on his fastball, with 89 pitches that have reached 100 mph.
If he pitches at Truist Park, Misiorowski will make it consecutive years for a player to set the mark for fewest big league games before an All-Star showing.
Skenes, the Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander getting ready for his second All-Star appearance, had made 11 starts in the majors when he was chosen as the NL starter for last year’s All-Star Game at Texas. He pitched a scoreless inning.
“I’m speechless,” said a teary-eyed Misiorowski, who said he was given the news a few minutes before the Brewers’ 8-3 victory over Washington. “It’s awesome. It’s very unexpected and it’s an honor.”
Misiorowski is the 30th first-time All-Star and 16th replacement this year. There are now 80 total All-Stars.
“He’s impressive. He’s got some of the best stuff in the game right now, even though he’s a young pitcher,” said Yankees slugger Aaron Judge, who is a starting AL outfielder for his seventh All-Star nod. “He’s going to be a special pitcher in this game for a long time so I think he deserved it and it’s going be pretty cool for him and his family.”
Carlos Rodón, Carlos Estévez and Casey Mize were named replacement pitchers on the AL roster.
The New York Yankees‘ Rodón, an All-Star for the third time in five seasons, will replace teammate Max Fried for Tuesday’s game in Atlanta. Fried will be unavailable because he is scheduled to start Saturday against the Chicago Cubs.
In his final start before the All-Star game, Rodón allowed four hits and struck out eight in eight innings in an 11-0 victory over the Cubs.
“This one’s a little special for me,” said Rodón, an All-Star in 2021 and ’22 who was 3-8 in his first season with the Yankees two years ago before rebounding. “I wasn’t good when I first got here, and I just wanted to prove that I wasn’t to going to give up and just put my best foot forward and try to win as many games as I can.”
The Kansas City Royals‘ Estévez replaces Texas’ Jacob deGrom, who is scheduled to start at Houston on Saturday night. Estévez was a 2023 All-Star when he was with the Los Angeles Angels.
Mize takes the spot held by Boston‘s Garrett Crochet, who is scheduled to start Saturday against Tampa Bay. Mize gives the Tigers six All-Stars, most of any team and tied for the franchise record.
Royals third baseman Maikel Garcia will replace Tampa Bay‘s Brandon Lowe, who went on the injured list with left oblique tightness. The additions of Estévez and Garcia give the Royals four All-Stars, matching their 2024 total.
The Seattle Mariners announced center fielder Julio Rodríguez will not participate, and he was replaced by teammate Randy Arozarena. Rodríguez had been voted onto the AL roster via the players’ ballot. The Mariners, who have five All-Stars, said Rodríguez will use the break to “recuperate, rest and prepare for the second half.”
Arozarena is an All-Star for the second time. He started in left field for the AL two years ago, when he was with Tampa Bay. Arozarena was the runner-up to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. in the 2023 Home Run Derby.
Rays right-hander Drew Rasmussen, a first-time All-Star, is replacing Angels left-hander Yusei Kikuchi, who is scheduled to start Saturday night at Arizona. Rasmussen is 7-5 with a 2.82 ERA in 18 starts.
San Diego added a third NL All-Star reliever in lefty Adrián Morejón, who replaces Philadelphia starter Zack Wheeler. The Phillies’ right-hander is scheduled to start at San Diego on Saturday night. Morejón entered the weekend with a 1.71 ERA in 45 appearances.
-
David Schoenfield
We’re past due to hand out some midseason grades, so let’s hand out some midseason grades.
As we pass the 90-game mark in the 2025 MLB season, my team of the first half isn’t the well-rounded Detroit Tigers, who do get our highest grade for owning MLB’s best record, or the explosive Chicago Cubs or Shohei Ohtani‘s Los Angeles Dodgers, but a team most baseball fans love to hate: the Houston Astros. They lost their two best players from last season and their best hitter has been injured — and they’re playing their best baseball since they won the 2022 World Series.
Let’s get to the grades. As always, we’re grading off preseason expectations, factoring in win-loss record and quality of performance, while looking at other positive performances and injuries.
Jump to a team:
AL East: BAL | BOS | NYY | TB | TOR
AL Central: CHW | CLE | DET | KC | MIN
AL West: ATH | HOU | LAA | SEA | TEX
NL East: ATL | MIA | NYM | PHI | WSH
NL Central: CHC | CIN | MIL | PIT | STL
NL West: ARI | COL | LAD | SD | SF
Tarik Skubal is obviously the headline act, but the Tigers are winning with impressive depth across the entire roster.
Javier Baez is putting together a remarkable comeback season after a couple of abysmal years and will become the first player to start an All-Star Game at both shortstop and in the outfield. Former No. 1 overall picks Casey Mize and Spencer Torkelson have put together their own comeback stories, while Riley Greene has matured into one of the game’s top power hitters.
Given their deep well of prospects and contributors at the MLB level, no team is better positioned than the Tigers to add significant help at the trade deadline.
I heard someone refer to them as the Zombie Astros, which feels apropos. Alex Bregman left as a free agent, they traded Kyle Tucker, Yordan Alvarez has been injured and has just three home runs, and the Jose Altuve experiment in left field predictably fizzled.
But here they are, fighting for the best record in the majors and holding a comfortable lead in the AL West. They’re getting star turns from Hunter Brown, Framber Valdez and Jeremy Pena, while the risky decision to start Cam Smith in the majors with very little minor league experience has paid off, as he has now become their cleanup hitter.
If we ignore the COVID-19 season, the Astros look on their way to an eighth straight division title.
This could be at least a half-grade higher based on everything that has gone right: Pete Crow-Armstrong‘s attention-grabbing breakout, Tucker doing everything expected after the big trade, Seiya Suzuki‘s monster power numbers and Matthew Boyd‘s All-Star turn in the rotation. The Cubs are on pace for their most wins since their World Series title season in 2016.
There have been a few hiccups, however, especially in the rotation with Justin Steele‘s season-ending injury and Ben Brown‘s inconsistency, plus rookie third baseman Matt Shaw has scuffled, and the bench has been weak aside from their backup catchers.
Still, this is a powerhouse lineup, and the Cubs will seek to improve their rotation at the deadline.
They just keep winning of late, going from 25-27 and seven games behind the Yankees on May 25 to taking over first place from the slumping Bronx Bombers, a remarkable turnaround over just 36 games. They went 27-9 over a 36-game stretch ending with their eighth win in a row on Sunday.
George Springer‘s recent surge has been fun to watch, a reminder of how good he was at his peak, and Addison Barger has been mashing over the past two months.
Some of the stats don’t add up to the Blue Jays being this good — they’ve barely outscored their opponents — but there might be more offense in the tank from the likes of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and a healthy Anthony Santander, and the bullpen, a soft spot, is the easiest area to upgrade.
Their success is best summed up by the fact that Freddy Peralta is their lone All-Star, but they have a whole bunch of players who have contributed between 1 and 2 WAR.
Brandon Woodruff looked good Sunday in his first start in nearly two years, so that could be a huge boost for the second half.
I’m curious to see how Jackson Chourio performs as well. While his counting stats — extra-base hits, RBIs — are fine, his triple-slash line remains below last season, especially his OBP. He had a huge second half in 2024 (.310/.363/.552), and if he does that again, the Brewers could find themselves back in the postseason for the seventh time in eight seasons.
The Rays started off slow, with a losing record through the end of April, but then went 33-22 in May and June to claw back into the AL East race — as the Rays usually do, last year being the recent exception.
Two key performers have been All-Star third baseman Junior Caminero, who has a chance to become just the third player to hit 40 home runs in his age-21 season, and All-Star first baseman Jonathan Aranda.
Due to the league wanting the Rays to play more home games early in the season, the July and August slate will be very road-heavy, so we’ll see how the Rays adapt to a difficult two-month stretch, especially since their pitching isn’t quite as deep as it has been in other seasons.
No, they’re not going to be the greatest team of all time. But they might win 100 games — even though Blake Snell and Roki Sasaki, their huge offseason acquisitions, have combined for just two wins in 10 starts.
The lineup, of course, has been terrific, with Ohtani leading the NL in several categories and Will Smith leading the batting race. By wRC+, it’s been the best offense in Dodgers history.
If they can get some combo of Snell, Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow healthy, plus Ohtani eventually ramped up to a bigger workload on the mound, the Dodgers still loom as World Series favorites.
They are on pace for 95 wins, mainly on the strength of Zack Wheeler, Ranger Suarez and Cristopher Sanchez, who are a combined 23-7 with 11.8 WAR. Jesus Luzardo‘s ERA is bloated due to that two-start stretch when he allowed 20 runs, but he has otherwise been solid as well.
But, overall, it hasn’t always been the smoothest of treks. The bullpen has imploded a few times and the offense has lacked power aside from Kyle Schwarber. Bryce Harper is back after missing three weeks, and they need to get his bat going. Look for some bullpen additions at the trade deadline — and perhaps an outfielder as well.
The Cardinals have been a minor surprise — perhaps even to the Cardinals themselves. St. Louis was viewing this as a rebuilding year of sorts — not that the Cardinals ever hit rock bottom and start completely over. They had a hot May, winning 12 of 13 at one point, but the offense has been fading of late, with those three straight shutout losses to Pittsburgh and six shutout losses since June 25.
The starting rotation doesn’t generate a lot of swing and miss, with both Erick Fedde and Miles Mikolas seeing their ERAs starting to climb. Brendan Donovan is the team’s only All-Star rep, and that kind of sums up this team: solid but without any star power. That might foretell a second-half fade.
All-Star starting pitchers Logan Webb and Robbie Ray, plus a dominant bullpen, have led the way, although after starting 12-4, the Giants have basically been a .500 team for close to three months now. Rafael Devers hasn’t yet ignited the offense since coming over from Boston, and the Giants have lost four 1-0 games.
These final three games at home against the Dodgers before the All-Star break will be a crucial series, as Los Angeles has slowly pulled away in the NL West.
This was an “A-plus” through June 12, when the Mets were 45-24 and owned the best record in baseball, even though Juan Soto hadn’t gotten hot. Soto finally got going in June, but the pitching collapsed, and the Mets went through a disastrous 1-10 stretch.
The rotation injuries have piled up, exacerbating the lack of bullpen depth. Recent games have been started by Justin Hagenman (who had a 6.21 ERA in Triple-A), journeyman reliever Chris Devenski, Paul Blackburn (7.71 ERA) and Frankie Montas, who has had to start even though he’s clearly not throwing the ball well. The Mets need to get the rotation healthy, but also could use more offense from Mark Vientos and their catchers (Francisco Alvarez was demoted to Triple-A).
At times it has felt like Cal Raleigh has been a one-man team with his record-breaking first half. But he will be joined on the All-Star squad by starting pitcher Bryan Woo, closer Andres Munoz and center fielder Julio Rodriguez, who made it on the strength of his defense, as his offense has been a disappointment.
The offense has been one of the best in the majors on the road, but the rotation has been nowhere near as effective as the past couple of seasons, with George Kirby, Logan Gilbert and Bryce Miller all missing time with injuries. They just shut out the Pirates three games in a row, so maybe that will get the rotation on a roll.
They’re just out of the wild-card picture while hanging around .500, so we give them a decent grade since that exceeds preseason expectations. It feels like a little bit of a mirage given their run differential — their record in one-run games (good) versus their record in blowout games (not good) — and various holes across the lineup and pitching staff.
But they’ve done two things to keep them in the race. One, they hit a lot of home runs. Two, they’re the only team in the majors to use just five starting pitchers. The rotation hasn’t been stellar, but it’s been stable.
The Padres are probably fortunate to be where they are, given some of their issues. As expected, the offensive depth has been a problem.
Not as expected, Dylan Cease has struggled while Michael King‘s injury after a strong start has left them without last year’s dynamic 1-2 punch at the top of the rotation (although Nick Pivetta has been one of the best signings of the offseason). Yu Darvish just made his season debut Monday, so hopefully he’ll provide a lift.
The Padres haven’t played well against the better teams, including a 2-5 record against the Dodgers, but they did clean up against the Athletics, Rockies and Pirates, going 16-2 against those three teams.
For now, the Reds are stuck in neutral. Leave out 2022, when they lost 100 games, and it’s otherwise been a string of .500-ish seasons: 31-29 in 2020, 83-79 in 2021, 82-80 in 2023, 77-85 in 2024 and now a similar record so far in 2025.
The hope was that Terry Francona would be a difference-maker. Maybe that will play out down the stretch, but the best hope is to get the rotation clicking on all cylinders at the same time. That means Andrew Abbott continuing his breakout performance, plus getting Hunter Greene healthy again and rookie Chase Burns to live up to the hype after a couple of shaky outings following an impressive MLB debut.
Throw in Nick Lodolo and solid Nick Martinez and Brady Singer, and this group can be good enough to pitch the Reds to their first full-season playoff appearance since 2013.
The Yankees have hit their annual midseason swoon — which has been subject to much intense analysis from their disgruntled fans — and that opening weekend sweep of the Brewers, when the Yankees’ torpedo bats were the big story in baseball, now seems long ago.
Going from seven up to three back in such a short time is a disaster — but not disastrous. Nonetheless, the Yankees will have to do some hard-core self-evaluation heading to the trade deadline.
The offense wasn’t going to be as good as it was in April, when Paul Goldschmidt, Trent Grisham and Ben Rice were all playing over their heads. So, do they need a hitter? Or with Clarke Schmidt now likely joining Gerrit Cole as a Tommy John casualty, do they need a starting pitcher? Or both?
From the book of “things we didn’t expect,” page 547: The Marlins are averaging more runs per game than the Orioles, Padres, Braves and Rangers, to name a few teams. They’re averaging almost as many runs per game as the Mets, and last time we checked, the Marlins weren’t the team to give Soto $765 million.
An eight-game winning streak at the end of June has the Marlins going toe-to-toe with the Braves for third place in the NL East even though the starting rotation has been a mess, with Sandy Alcantara on track to become just the fourth qualified pitcher with an ERA over 7.00.
Heading into the season, I thought that if any team was going to challenge the Dodgers in the NL West, it would be the Diamondbacks. The offense has once again been one of the best in the majors, but the pitching issues have been painful.
After the aggressive move to sign Corbin Burnes, he went down with Tommy John surgery after 11 starts. Meanwhile, Zac Gallen, Eduardo Rodriguez and Brandon Pfaadt each have an ERA on the wrong side of 5.00. Rodriguez was better in June before a shellacking on July 4, while Gallen remains homer-prone, so it’s hard to tell if improvement is on the horizon. Their playoff odds are hovering just under 20%, so there’s a chance, but they need to get red-hot like they did last July and August.
It feels like it has been more soap opera than baseball season in Boston, with the Devers drama finally ending with the shocking trade with the Giants.
If you give added weight that this is the Red Sox, a team that should be operating with the big boys in both budget and aspirations and instead seemed to only want to dump Devers’ contract, then feel free to lower this grade a couple of notches, even if the Red Sox are close in the wild-card standings.
On the field, the heralded rookie trio of Kristian Campbell, Roman Anthony and Marcelo Mayer hasn’t exactly clicked, with Campbell returning to the minors after posting a .902 OPS in April. A big test will come out of the All-Star break, when they play the Cubs, Phillies, Dodgers, Twins and Astros in a tough 15-game stretch.
After last season’s surprise playoff appearance, it’s been a frustrating 2025 — although I’m not sure this result is necessarily a surprise.
There were concerns about the offense heading into the season and those concerns have proven correct. They were getting no production from their outfield, so they rushed Jac Caglianone to the majors to much hype, but he has struggled and might need a reset back in Triple-A. Even Bobby Witt Jr., as good as he has been (on pace for 7.5 WAR), has seen his OPS drop 140 points.
On the bright side, Kris Bubic emerged as an All-Star starter and Noah Cameron has filled in nicely for the injured Cole Ragans, so maybe they trade a starter for some offense.
Coming off a catastrophic 2024 season, nobody was expecting anything from the White Sox. Indeed, another 121-loss season loomed as a possibility. While they’re on pace to lose 100 again, they’ve at least played more competitive baseball thanks to their pitching.
Rookie starters Shane Smith and Sean Burke have shown promise, while rookie position players Kyle Teel, Edgar Quero and now Colson Montgomery are getting their initial taste of the majors.
There has been the mix of calamity: Luis Robert Jr. has been unproductive and is probably now untradable, and former No. 3 overall pick Andrew Vaughn hit .189 and was traded to the Brewers.
The Twins are one organization that might like a do-over of the past five seasons. It feels like they’ve had the most talent in the division, but all they’ve done is squeeze out one soft division title in 2023. Now, the Tigers have passed them in talent and other factors, such as payroll flexibility.
There’s still time for the Twins to turn things around in 2025, but outside of that wonderful 13-game winning streak, they haven’t played winning baseball.
Overall, it’s been yet another bad season, despite Paul Skenes‘ brilliance. Really, do we talk enough about him? Yes, we do talk about him, but he has a 1.95 ERA through his first 42 career starts. Incredible.
Here’s an amazing thing about baseball. The Pirates are not a good team, but they recently put together one of the best six-game stretches in history. That’s not stretching the description. First, they swept the Mets — a good team — by scores of 9-1, 9-2 and 12-1. Then they swept the Cardinals — a good team — with three shutouts, 7-0, 1-0 and 5-0. They became the first team since at least 1901 to score 43 runs or more and allow four runs or fewer in a six-game stretch. And then they promptly got shut out three games in a row, making them the first to win three straight shutouts and then lose three straight shutouts.
Eighteen of our 28 voters picked them to win the AL West before the season, but it’s looking more and more like the 2023 World Series might be a stone-cold fluke in the middle of a string of losing seasons. That year, nearly everyone in the lineup had a career year at the plate, and the pitching got hot at the right time.
This year’s Rangers, though, have struggled to score runs, and while some have pointed to the offensive environment at Globe Life Field, they’re near the bottom in road OPS as well. It’s been fun seeing Jacob deGrom back at a dominating level, and Nathan Eovaldi should have been an All-Star.
Put it this way: If the Rangers can somehow squeeze into the postseason, you don’t want to face the Rangers in a short series. Indeed, if any team looms as an October upset special, it might be the Rangers.
The Nationals received superlative first-half performances from James Wood and MacKenzie Gore, while CJ Abrams is on the way to his best season. But there remains a lack of overall organizational progress, which finally led to the firings on Sunday of longtime GM Mike Rizzo and longtime manager Dave Martinez. A 7-19 record in June sealed their fate, as the rotation has been bad and the bullpen arguably the worst in baseball.
Until the Nationals figure out how to improve their pitching — or, better yet, find an owner who wants to win — they will be stuck going nowhere.
That fell apart in a hurry. Sunday’s loss was Cleveland’s 10th in a row, a stretch that remarkably included five shutouts. Indeed, the Guardians have now been shut out 11 times; the franchise record in the post-dead-ball-era (since 1920) is 20 shutouts in 1968.
There’s nothing worse than watching a team that can’t score runs, so that tells you how exciting the Guardians have been. Last year, the Guardians hit exceptionally well with runners in scoring position, keeping afloat what was otherwise a mediocre offense. That hasn’t happened in 2025 (trading Josh Naylor didn’t help either). Throw in some predictable regression from the bullpen, and this season looks lost.
We can’t give this a complete failing grade due to the emergence of All-Star shortstop Jacob Wilson (the Athletics’ first All-Star starter since Josh Donaldson in 2014) and slugging first baseman Nick Kurtz, who have a chance to finish 1-2 in the Rookie of the Year voting. Plus, we have Denzel Clarke‘s circus catches in center field.
But otherwise? Ugh. The Sacramento gamble already looks like a disaster, three months into a three-year stay. The team is drawing well below Sutter Health Park’s 14,000-seat capacity, with many recent games drawing under 10,000 fans. Luis Severino bashed the small crowds and the lack of air-conditioning.
The A’s had a groundbreaking ceremony for their new park in Vegas, renting heavy construction equipment as background props. Maybe they should have spent that money on more pitching help.
Based on preseason expectations, the Braves have clearly been the biggest disappointment in the National League — fighting the Orioles for most disappointing overall.
What’s gone wrong? They haven’t scored runs, as the offense continues its remarkable fade from a record-setting performance just two seasons ago. The collapses of Michael Harris II and Ozzie Albies lead the way, with lack of production at shortstop and left field playing a big role as well. Closer Raisel Iglesias has struggled, and the team is 11-22 in one-run games. Spencer Strider hasn’t yet reached his pre-injury level and Reynaldo Lopez made just one start before going down.
The Braves haven’t missed the playoffs since 2017, but that run is clearly in jeopardy.
The Orioles have a similar record to the Braves but have played much worse, including losses of 24-2, 19-5, 15-3 and two separate 9-0 shutouts.
They will spend the trade deadline dealing away as many of their impending free agents as possible, and then do a lot of soul-searching heading into the offseason. After making the playoffs in 2023 and 2024, will this season just be a blip? While the pitching struggles aren’t necessarily a big surprise, what has happened to the offense? Are some of their young players prospects or suspects?
After two months of Cleveland Spiders-level baseball, it would be easy to make fun of the Rockies. Especially since they recently announced Walker Monfort — son of the owner — was promoted to executive VP and will replace outgoing president and COO Greg Feasel.
On the other hand, the Rockies are doing something right: They just drew 121,000 for a three-game series against the White Sox.
-
Jesse Rogers
CHICAGO — Former White Sox lefty Mark Buehrle was forever immortalized inside Rate Field as the team unveiled a statue in his honor Friday.
Buehrle, 46, played 16 years in the majors, including the first 12 with the White Sox, who he helped win a World Series in 2005. He won 214 games and pitched 200 innings or more in 14 consecutive seasons from 2001 to 2014.
“I can’t put it into words,” Buehrle said after the unveiling. “You don’t play the game for any of this. You never think of number retirements or statues. I can’t even wrap my head around it. It doesn’t make sense.”
The statue is an action shot of him throwing a pitch.
His wife and kids were in attendance and helped pull off the cover to unveil the statue while his 2005 teammates looked on. The event kicked off a weekend reunion for the World Series team which went 11-1 in the postseason, beating the Houston Astros in four games to take home the title.
Buehrle was a five-time All-Star and four-time Gold Glove winner, finishing fifth in Cy Young voting in 2005.
“Well-deserved,” former right fielder Jermaine Dye said of the statue. “Great teammate. Great leader. Definitely someone you want on a ballclub to lead a pitching staff.”
The White Sox rotation — led by Buehrle — threw four complete games in the ALCS against the Boston Red Sox in 2005, missing a fifth complete game by two-thirds of an inning. It’s an unheard of accomplishment in today’s game since starters infrequently go the distance.
Besides being an innings-eater on the mound, Buehrle was a fast worker — a favorite trait of his catcher, A.J Pierzynski. And he wasn’t someone who threw a lot of different pitches. He caught it and threw it without much input from behind the plate.
“He was fast,” Pierzynski said. “We had Jermaine Dye calling pitches from right field some games. We did come crazy things you wouldn’t recommend to people to do nowadays.”
Buehrle is a notoriously low-key guy who hates the spotlight but even he was moved by the team’s decision to honor him with a statue, which joins former slugger Harold Baines in the right-field concourse.
“I joked with him when I saw him,” Dye said. “I told him ‘Man it takes you getting a statue to get you out of the house.'”
Buehrle added: “I was literally nervous as can be today. This is not my comfort zone but by no means am I taking it lightly. This is incredible.”
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike