Allar: Time for PSU to get over ‘hump’ vs. top 10
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Jake Trotter
LAS VEGAS — With one of college football’s most loaded and experienced rosters, Penn State quarterback Drew Allar admitted it’s time for the Nittany Lions to defeat top-ranked opponents.
“We definitely need to get over that hump,” Allar said Wednesday during Big Ten media days. “There’s no question about it.”
Under coach James Franklin, the Nittany Lions have been a consistent winner, finishing with double-digit victories six times over the past nine years. That included last season, when Penn State went 13-3 and advanced to the CFP semifinals.
Yet under Franklin, the Nittany Lions have also struggled against the best, going just 4-20 against teams ranked in the AP top 10.
All three of Penn State’s defeats last season came against AP Top 5 opponents, including the 27-24 loss to Notre Dame in the playoff semifinal. Penn State also fell to Ohio State (20-13) at home and Oregon (45-37) in the Big Ten championship game by just one score.
“We definitely need to find different ways to come out with different results in those games,” said Allar, who is 23-6 as a starter at Penn State but threw an interception late against the Fighting Irish, leading to their game-winning field goal. “We haven’t really been blown out of the water by any team. … It’s just about execution … finding those areas to make one or two more plays throughout those games. … That’s going to be our focus.”
Allar and the Nittany Lions enter the 2025 season with big expectations. With proven players on both sides of the ball returning, Penn State has been ranked No. 1 in ESPN’s offseason poll.
Allar, who opted to return to State College after flirting with leaving early for the NFL, also has the fifth-shortest odds to win the Heisman Trophy, according to ESPN BET.
Allar said Penn State’s experience could be the difference this season in close games against top opponents.
“Because we know what those situations feel like,” he said. “So just channeling that and staying in that present moment when those opportunities do come, I think is going to be the biggest thing for us.”
Allar said he has spoken with Franklin and offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki multiple times this offseason about how they can finally win against top-ranked teams.
Franklin noted Wednesday that his program is acknowledging the past — and embracing the opportunity ahead to change the narrative.
“The best part about it? We’re in total control,” he said. “We want people to shut up? We can shut ’em up real easy.”
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Jorge Castillo
NEW YORK — The Yankees are acquiring third baseman Ryan McMahon from the Rockies in exchange for minor league pitchers Griffin Herring and Josh Grosz, sources confirmed to ESPN on Friday.
The Yankees will assume the remainder of 30-year-old McMahon’s contract, which includes approximately $4.5 million for the remainder of 2025 and $32 million over the next two seasons.
An All-Star last season, McMahon was batting .217 with 16 home runs and a .717 OPS in 100 games for Colorado in 2025. He hit home runs in the first two games after the All-Star break and another on Tuesday and is on pace to keep his four-year 20-homer streak alive.
While the production has resulted in a 92 OPS+, which suggests McMahon has been 8% worse than the average major league hitter this season, he still represents a significant offensive upgrade at third base for New York.
The Yankees have had Oswald Peraza, one of the worst hitters in the majors, manning third base nearly every day since the club decided to release DJ LeMahieu, another former Rockies player, earlier this month and move Jazz Chisholm Jr. to second base. Peraza, while a strong defender, is slashing .147/.208/.237 in 69 games this season. His 24 wRC+ ranks last among the 310 hitters with at least 160 plate appearances this season.
Defensively, McMahon is a Gold Glove-caliber third baseman whose four Outs Above Average is third in the majors this season. He joins a Yankees club that has been marred by sloppy defense, most recently on Wednesday when it committed four errors in a defensive meltdown against the first-place Toronto Blue Jays.
Herring, 22, has recorded a 1.71 ERA in 89⅓ innings across 16 starts between Low- and High-A this season. He was a sixth-round pick out of LSU in the 2024 draft.
Grosz, an 11th-round pick in 2023, had a 4.14 ERA in 87 innings over 16 games (15 starts) for High-A Hudson Valley this season.
With third base addressed, the Yankees will continue to seek to acquire pitchers to bolster both their rotation and bullpen.
MLB.com first reported on the Yankees trading for McMahon.
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Jorge Castillo
The Mets acquired left-handed reliever Gregory Soto from the Orioles on Friday in exchange for two minor leaguers in what could be the first of multiple moves by New York to bolster its bullpen before the trade deadline Thursday.
The trade, which sent Class A right-hander Wellington Aracena and Double-A right-hander Cameron Foster to Baltimore, gives the Mets a hard-throwing left-hander to complement the club’s only lefty on the roster, Brooks Raley, who returned from Tommy John surgery last week.
Soto, who is 30 and was an All-Star with the Detroit Tigers in 2021 and 2022, has posted a 3.96 ERA with a 27.5% strikeout rate in 45 appearances this season. The Mets will be his fourth team since the 2022 season.
On Monday, Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns plainly signaled that upgrading the bullpen for the stretch run is his top priority.
The need is clear. Injuries and overuse have depleted a relief corps that led the majors in bullpen ERA through May 31. Since June 1, the group has posted 4.52 ERA, good for 23rd in the majors.
Aracena, 20, is 1-1 with a 2.38 ERA in 17 games for St. Lucie. The Orioles said he is one of two pitchers in the minors this season to have thrown at least 60 innings without surrendering a home run.
Foster, 26, is 5-2 with two saves and a 2.97 ERA while pitching at the Double-A and Triple-A levels.
BOSTON — Hundreds of Aramark workers at Fenway Park are on strike and planning to stay out for all of a homestand between the Boston Red Sox and the Los Angeles Dodgers starting Friday night.
Concession workers had set a deadline of noon Friday for Aramark and Fenway Park to reach an agreement with the Local 26 chapter of the Massachusetts and Rhode Island hotel, casino, airport and food services workers union.
The union went on strike at noon asking for “living wages, guardrails on technology and R-E-S-P-E-C-T!”
With the Red Sox and Dodgers scheduled to start at 7:10 p.m. EDT, union officials had a request for fans attending this homestand with food and beer workers on strike.
“We’re asking you to NOT buy concessions inside the ballpark,” Local 26 wrote on social media. “Tailgate before the games!”
Union workers walked the picket line wearing green T-shirts declaring “FENWAY WORKERS ON STRIKE.” They carried signs in the shape of a baseball proclaiming Local 26.
The Red Sox go out of town Monday with a game that night at Minnesota.
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