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STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — On Jan. 22, two days after the 2024 season had officially ended with Ohio State beating Notre Dame to win the College Football Playoff national championship, Penn State coach James Franklin was in Philadelphia recruiting. His cellphone rang.

It was 5:06 a.m. Ohio State defensive coordinator Jim Knowles was calling about Penn State’s open DC job.

“To be honest with you,” Franklin said, “I didn’t know how serious it was, but it went pretty quickly from that point on.”

Franklin hasn’t claimed many wins over Ohio State, a program that is 12-1 against the Nittany Lions since 2012, but luring Knowles away from Columbus — not to mention a handful of other blue-blooded programs — was a big one.

Knowles, 60, is widely regarded as one of the top defensive coordinators in the country. His defense at Ohio State last year ranked No. 1 in points allowed per game (12.9), yards allowed per game (255), yards allowed per play (4.2) and red zone touchdown percentage (42%). Which is why his move is one of the most stunning of the offseason. The veteran coordinator who had just won a national title at one of the nation’s wealthiest and most storied programs is moving to a rival Big Ten school.

“First thing I thought was, ‘How did we get him?'” Penn State defensive tackle Zane Durant said.

Knowles, in a recent interview in his new office, was candid about why he left Ohio State, and told ESPN it boiled down to the timing of Ohio State’s contract extension offer. He was hoping to get a deal done before the Buckeyes went to the national championship game. Had Ohio State offered him one before they faced Notre Dame, Knowles said he “would not have explored or considered other options.”

“I did not want to put anyone, including myself, in a position to have to deal with it immediately following the national championship game,” he said. “And that’s the way it happened.”

It created a situation, he said, that eventually turned “awkward.”

“Season’s over, everything coming to a head again quickly,” Knowles said. “Ohio State hasn’t come forward with a deal, and it’s like, OK, if I’m going to act on this or at least explore it, I have got to make the call.”

ON JAN. 26, the Ohio State Buckeyes and about 30,000 fans celebrated the first team in the sport’s history to win four straight playoff games, culminating in a championship following the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff.

What created a stir, though, was who wasn’t in Ohio Stadium.

“I was asked not to go to the parade, and I respect that,” Knowles told ESPN during an April interview in his office at Penn State’s Lasch Football Building. “I’m not trying to be a secretive guy. Here’s this offer, there were a couple others that were every bit as much money, and then there was Ohio State’s offer, which was still great money, but not as much, so then you have to sit with it.”

Penn State offered Knowles a $3.1 million annual salary that would make him the highest-paid defensive coordinator in college football. He’s also from Philadelphia, where he went to St. Joe’s Prep, and grew up a Penn State fan forced to watch the Sunday recap show with George Paterno because he couldn’t find the games on any of the three channels he got at home. Knowles also had known Franklin for years and spoken to him about the job before. Knowles flew to Oklahoma to see his fiancée for a few days and consider his options.

“Maybe I’ll take less because Ohio State’s a great place,” he said, “but then they asked me not to come to the parade. So then you’re like, ‘OK, honestly, the writing is on the wall.’ Now it becomes something. It’s always something on the outside world, but now it’s become something here, too. I hadn’t made any decisions, but you just kind of feel like — I wouldn’t say I’m not wanted here — but you just feel like, OK, now it’s gotten awkward.”

Meanwhile, at the national championship celebration, Ohio State coach Ryan Day was at the podium praising Knowles as “the defensive coordinator of the best defense in the country that was completely dominant in the playoff.”

Day declined comment for this story.

Knowles said a new deal at Ohio State was “really under question” in the days leading up to the national championship game, but nobody ever said his contract wouldn’t be extended. It just hadn’t happened as early as Knowles would have preferred.

“Ohio State didn’t want to do it,” he said. “And so then all of a sudden it becomes a rush at that point because people are trying to make decisions on other jobs. They want to know whether you’re interested or not.”

When asked about Knowles’ contract situation, Ohio State athletic director Ross Bjork declined comment.

Franklin said Penn State was already “pretty far along” in its search to replace former defensive coordinator Tom Allen, who left to take the same job at Clemson. Franklin had been considering a group of candidates that included some NFL assistants, college coordinators and a few head coaches that had been out of work.

And then Knowles entered the mix.

“But then, Ohio State’s trying to keep him,” Franklin said. “We’re involved. Oklahoma needs a defensive coordinator. Notre Dame needs a defensive coordinator. I think what people don’t realize a lot of times — even for these head coaching positions — there’s not as many obvious candidates out there that people think. It’s a smaller list than people realize. So now you’ve got four or five football powers all fighting over one guy at the end of the cycle.”

Franklin called his boss, athletic director Pat Kraft, and told him the price to hire Knowles.

“In years past, we wouldn’t have been able to do that,” Franklin said.

The difference?

“Pat and the president,” he said. “Not lip service to say we’re trying to win at the highest level.”

Knowles said the 2024 season at Ohio State was the toughest environment he had ever been a part of — there was “finger-pointing” at the defense after the 32-31 Oct. 12 loss at Oregon, and it was grueling piecing the team back together after its fourth straight loss to rival Michigan in November — but that’s not why he left.

“I don’t think it did,” Knowles said, referring to the pressure of coaching at Ohio State and if that affected his decision. “I mean, if I’m honest with myself, I don’t think it did. You become accustomed to it. It didn’t keep me up nights or anything like that. I’m up nights trying to get it right. But I did that when I coached at Cornell or Western Michigan. I was the same way. You grind over those details for the players because you don’t ever want to put them in a bad position or not have coached them something. You just become accustomed to the environment.”

When Knowles was first hired at Ohio State, he said former friends and teammates who were in the Columbus area tried to warn him “this is an incredibly difficult and highly scrutinized place to coach,” he said. “Fans are tough.

“I kind of blew it off,” Knowles said. “I’m like, ‘I grew up in Philly. I’ve been around Eagles fans. We threw snowballs at Santa Claus.’ But yeah, when you’re in, it’s really tough.”

“It’s real,” he said. “Anybody who works there will — if they’re being honest — will tell you that it’s real. It’s almost like a badge of honor there. It’s like, ‘Oh yeah, well this is Ohio State. This is what you have to expect. This is just the way it is here.’ If you give up a touchdown but you win 63-7, somebody somewhere is going to have something to say about it.”

FRANKLIN SAID HE planned to take one full day this spring to watch the Nittany Lions’ past two games against Ohio State and go through Knowles’ scouting reports in detail. In 2023, Penn State lost 20-12 to Ohio State in Columbus after Knowles’ defense held the Nittany Lions to one touchdown. Last year, Penn State lost 20-13 to Ohio State, dropping Franklin’s record to 1-10 against the Buckeyes.

“We’ll as a staff dig into that deeply and spend a day grinding through it and hearing the tough feedback and asking tough questions,” Franklin said. “That’ll be really valuable.”

As Ohio State’s defensive coordinator, Knowles studied Penn State quarterback Drew Allar probably as much as anyone, and he has already shared his scouting report. Allar called it “eye-opening.”

The report included what Ohio State thought of Allar athletically, how he went through his progressions, and the tendencies he showed on film. Much of it was what his own Penn State coaches had already told him, but hearing it from a former opponent drilled it in.

“Knowing that other opponents saw it on film means it’s true, I have to get better in those areas,” Allar said. “And there were a couple unique things, like deep balls in general — I put a lot of air on balls down the field and I thought that was kind of unique. I never really heard that before and I thought that was a good perspective shift for me. There’s time to let the receivers run under the ball, but there’s times when you have to put it on them right away.”

Franklin said the players — and the staff — need “thick enough skin” to hear the feedback and “not be sensitive.” He’s looking for Knowles to educate the team on who Ohio State was concerned about when it played Penn State — and who the Buckeyes weren’t concerned about. What things did the Nittany Lions do well? Did they have any tendencies or indicators that were giving away pass or run plays?

In addition to sharing Ohio State’s perspective, Franklin said he asked Knowles to do an “honest evaluation” of the Nittany Lions’ offense following spring football practices — and he asked the same of offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki to provide a report on what he saw from Knowles’ defense.

“There’s some sensitivity to how you deliver that message because you’re peers and you’re working together,” Franklin said. “Whereas when he was the defensive coordinator at Ohio State, there was no sensitivity to it. This is how we see it — black and white. We’re not worried about anybody’s feelings. So to get that report, yeah, I think is powerful.”

Knowles downplayed any notion that his insider tips might make the difference in winning at Ohio State on Nov. 1.

“I don’t know about that,” he said. “There’s so much more to do to get ready.”

At the very least, Kotelnicki said Knowles has everyone’s attention because “he’s been there.”

“This is what we have to do,” Kotelnicki said. “Why? Because if we don’t, it’s going to cost you a game. And so yeah, you hope that his perspective in that area is the difference — or is part of the difference.”

PENN STATE OPENS the season with four straight home games — none bigger than Sept. 27 against Oregon, the first indicator of how seriously to take the Nittany Lions in the Big Ten and CFP races. Oregon was the only team able to score more than 17 points on Knowles’ Ohio State defense last fall.

Knowles said he never personally received any death threats following the loss to Michigan — as Day’s family did — and it was more difficult to go to work following the loss at Oregon because he felt “like I had let a lot of people down because defensively, we struggled.”

It was a different story in the CFP quarterfinal at the Rose Bowl, when Ohio State trounced the Ducks 41-21 on New Year’s Day.

Without quarterback Dillon Gabriel, and ranking No. 109th in the country in returning production (43%) according to ESPN’s Bill Connelly, Oregon looks vastly different than it did a year ago. Knowles, though, is still running the same defense at Penn State and again has NFL talent to execute it.

“They’ve consistently been very good,” Knowles said of the Nittany Lions’ defense. “I’m able to blend more concepts than just throw everything out and start over. I’ve been real mindful of that process. If I can create things that are similar to what they’ve done here, that’s what I’ve done — tried to err on the side of similar terminology. When you come into a defense that’s been pretty good, there’s a culture here. And I feel like coach Franklin has built that.

“You definitely see a real defensive mentality in the whole thing,” he said. “And so I thought, well, maybe I can be of service. You get to my age, and you’re like, ‘Where can I help the most? How can I add value?’ and just be a part of something that’s bigger than myself. When you’re in this business, sometimes you see situations where people get a hard time for winning 10, 11 games here. Maybe I can help.”

Franklin has won 80.2% of his games (97-24) against opponents not named Ohio State, Michigan and Oregon. He’s 4-18 against that trio. The Nittany Lions avoid Michigan for a second straight season but travel to Ohio State on Nov. 1 — where they haven’t won in six straight tries.

“Every year, it’s one or two games,” senior defensive end Dani Dennis-Sutton said. “Everybody knows the biggest teams. If we get over that hump as far as beating the big teams, then I think we’ll be where we want to be. For the past however many years, Penn State has always had a dominant defense — hard-nosed, blue-collar defense — but the last part is just coming up big in those big-time games and big-time moments.”

Dennis-Sutton is facing the lofty expectations of helping replace the production from former defensive end Abdul Carter, who was drafted by the New York Giants. Dennis-Sutton had 13 tackles for loss last year and 8.5 sacks playing opposite Carter.

To better understand Knowles’ defense, the Nittany Lions watched film of Ohio State’s defense. Senior defensive tackle Zane Durant said they watched a lot of the national title game against Notre Dame, and the win against Tennessee, plus some regular-season games to study “basic concepts early in the season.”

“It’s unique,” Durant said. “I’m learning a lot of stuff through coach Knowles. He’s a pro-style type of defense. I feel like this is beneficial for me, for my future and things like that and learning the game a lot more. He’s breaking it down in the details and depth, why we’re doing things, and kind of just giving us a bigger picture to why we do it, so it can help you retain the information more.”

Knowles is Penn State’s third defensive coordinator in as many seasons, but Knowles said he wouldn’t have joined a program he didn’t believe could contend for a national title. Unlike defenses he has been hired to resurrect in the past (see: Oklahoma State), Penn State’s defense isn’t broken.

“We’ve played them three years and the games have always been close,” Knowles said. “You see the investment financially. I noticed, like we had at Ohio State last year, you see guys coming back that could have moved on. I think that’s a very telling example of the health of the program.”

Dennis-Sutton is one of them.

He said Knowles’ defense has “so many different intricacies” in one play and it hasn’t been easy to learn.

“But once you learn it, you’re like, ‘Oh, OK, I see why he was the No. 1 defense,'” Dennis-Sutton said. “Because he has an answer for everything.”

The question will be if he has one for Ohio State.

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‘You could feel it like in your bones’: Aaron Judge meets his October moment at last

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October 8, 2025

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'You could feel it like in your bones': Aaron Judge meets his October moment at last

NEW YORK — Never were the questions of Aaron Judge‘s fitness for October particularly fair, but that’s life for the biggest man in the biggest city whose biggest failures had come at the biggest times. The burden of greatness is heavy. The burden of greatness in New York is planetary. And for those unleashing screeds on Judge’s postseasons — on hot take shows and sports-talk radio and in bars and at family dinners and everywhere, really, that anyone talks about the Yankees — it was never about whether they were fair. After all, his performances had been undeniably foul.

Judge never paid any of this any mind because he does not wire himself to do so. He cares about winning. He cares about success. He cares more than anyone who criticizes him, mocks him, derides him, leans into his past performances as if they’re predictive of an unknowable future. Judge always separated those struggles, not just because he needed to but because it is how he lives, purposely boring and boringly purposeful. He believed the moment would present itself and he would meet it. And why wouldn’t he think that? Every other endeavor in his baseball life had treated him that way.

Regardless of how the American League Division Series between the Yankees and Toronto Blue Jays breaks, what Judge did Tuesday night was the sort of thing that should put to rest questions about his October aptitude. It won’t, because it never could, but the wide-eyed, wonderstruck, childlike gawking of everyone in the Yankees’ clubhouse told the story of Tuesday night’s season-saving 9-6 victory against the Blue Jays in which Judge left jaws agape.

Poor Louis Varland. The right-handed reliever entered in the fourth inning to protect the Blue Jays’ 6-3 advantage in a game that could have clinched their spot in the AL Championship Series. He fooled Judge on a 90 mph curveball and then blew a 100 mph fastball by him and then threw another fastball at 100, up and in. Like, really in. Like, 5.9 inches off the inner corner of the plate, at triple digits, with tremendous carry, an absolute nightmare of a pitch for any hitter at any time in the game’s history to touch, let alone punish.

Nearly 400 feet later, when the ball banged off the left-field foul pole — the one place in Judge’s world where something foul is indeed fair — no one on the field could believe it. The absurdity of it all — manipulating his 6-foot-7, 282-pound body to so thoroughly alter his standard bat path, turn on 100 and keep it fair — was not lost on Varland, the Yankees who kept watching replays of the swing in the dugout, or the 47,399 at Yankee Stadium who bore witness.

“He made a really good pitch look really bad,” Varland said.

All postseason, Judge has been doing that. His 11 playoff hits lead MLB. For all of the ugliness of striking out with the bases loaded in Game 1 of this ALDS, his at-bats have been competitive all October. What he did to Varland was the culmination, precisely what the Yankees needed to see another day.

“You could feel it like in your bones,” Yankees reliever Tim Hill said. “It was crazy. It was amazing. I mean, just the pitch that he hit. All that. I’m sure my guy over there on the other side is questioning everything.”

Yes, pitching to Aaron Judge is the sort of thing of which existential crises are made. Before Tuesday, he had never hit a pitch 100 mph or faster for a home run. He hit 53 home runs this season — and none on a pitch outside the rulebook strike zone. Before Tuesday, the Blue Jays were 39-0 this season in games during which they led by at least five runs, too.

It’s impossible to overstate how out of character this was for Judge. He prides himself on good swing decisions because he knows how important they are. On pitches in the strike zone this season, Judge batted .400, 40 points higher than the next-best hitter. He slugged .867, 115 points higher than Shohei Ohtani. In his 214 plate appearances this year that ended on pitches outside of the rulebook zone, Judge batted .109 and drove in one run. All year. He didn’t have a single extra-base hit on such pitches.

One of the biggest home runs in the career of a two-time MVP favored to win a third this year was on something he never does. And if a willingness to exit his comfort zone and in the process do something that few in the history of baseball would be physically capable of doing doesn’t show that Judge isn’t just capable of success in October but destined for it, well, nothing would. And that’s fine with him. He knows emotion is the fuel that feeds the prognostications of inevitable letdown, not consistency or logic.

“I get yelled at for swinging at them out of the zone, but now I’m getting praised for it,” Judge said. “It’s a game. You’ve got to go out there and play. I don’t care what the numbers say or where something was at. I’m just up there trying to put a good swing on a good pitch, and it looked good to me.”

Inside the Yankees’ clubhouse, they’ve been yearning for Judge to have a game like this, to further validate their unflinching belief in him. The past is indisputable. Judge’s postseason OPS is more than 250 points lower than during the regular season. The Yankees haven’t won a championship during his 10 years in the big leagues. It’s real, and it’s regrettable, and it’s part of his legacy. It is also not the ink with which the future is written, which is why Aaron Boone, the Yankees’ manager with whom Judge is extremely close, said: “I don’t worry about Aaron and his state, even understanding all the outside noise.”

From Boone’s perch atop the dugout, he had the perfect view of the left-field foul pole. As the ball carried through the night, Judge stood near home plate. He didn’t pull a Carlton Fisk, trying to wave it fair. He just waited for it to land.

And when it did, helping raise his batting average this postseason to .500 and his OPS to 1.304 — nearly 300 points better than his career regular-season OPS, for the record — Judge uncorked a mini-bat flip and started his jog around the bases. When he got back to the dugout, teammates lined up and greeted him with a full high-five line.

“He’s the real deal, and as beloved a player as I’ve ever been around by his teammates,” Boone said. “They all admire him, look up to him, respect him, want his approval, and that’s just a credit to who Aaron is and how he goes about things.”

After slapping the last hand, Judge took one more step toward the end of the dugout. There awaited a television camera. Judge looked at it, pointed and turned around. He then pirouetted back and gave the audience one more stare. This was not an accident. Nothing Judge does is. It was a message, a reminder, a siren for everyone that didn’t believe.

The Yankees were still alive. And as long as that’s the case, he plans on carrying them. Even in October.

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Sullivan’s debut as Rangers coach spoiled by Pens

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October 8, 2025

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Sullivan's debut as Rangers coach spoiled by Pens

  • Greg WyshynskiOct 8, 2025, 12:06 AM ET

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      Greg Wyshynski is ESPN’s senior NHL writer.

NEW YORK — Mike Sullivan coached the Pittsburgh Penguins for 10 seasons, leading them to two Stanley Cup championships. On Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden, he watched them ruin his debut as the New York Rangers‘ latest head coach.

Sullivan admitted it was a peculiar feeling having Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and others he coached in Pittsburgh suddenly become his opponents.

“I mean, obviously it’s different. It’s different. I knew that was going to be the case,” he said after Pittsburgh’s 3-0 victory on the opening night of the 2025-26 NHL season. “But I’m excited about the group we have here in front of me with the Rangers. I’m looking forward to working with this group.”

The Rangers were shut out by goalie Arturs Silovs (22 saves) and watched forward Justin Brazeau score two goals in the Penguins’ win. They were outshot 15-5 in the third period and couldn’t muster anything consistent offensively in Sullivan’s debut.

“Well, I think my first observation is we got a long way to go to become the team we want to become. Some of it I think we can iron out, but certainly we’ve got a ways to go,” said Sullivan, who will coach Team USA in the 2026 Winter Olympic men’s hockey tournament in Italy. “I’m not going to overreact to it. It’s one game. We’ve got a lot of hockey to play,” he said. “So is it disappointing? Yeah. We’re going to see what we can take from it. We’ve got to move on.”

Sullivan and the Penguins agreed to part ways in April despite his being under contract through the 2026-27 season. Hired in 2015-16, Sullivan was the franchise’s most successful coach with 409 wins, only the 14th coach in NHL history to win 400 games with one team. Pittsburgh won back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2016 and 2017 with Sullivan.

Days later, after he left the Penguins, Sullivan was hired by the Rangers to replace coach Peter Laviolette, signing a five-year contract that made him the NHL’s highest-paid coach. Sullivan, 57, had previously served as an assistant coach with New York from 2009 to 2013, during which time he coached Rangers GM Chris Drury as a player.

Penguins captain Crosby acknowledged it was a different feeling having Sullivan behind the Rangers’ bench instead of his.

“I just go out there and compete, but it’s always weird that first little bit,” he said.

For Crosby, it wasn’t just seeing Sullivan coaching the opponents. Sullivan brought former Penguins assistants David Quinn and Ty Hennes with him to New York.

While Sullivan took the loss against his former team, new Penguins coach Dan Muse earned a victory against his. Muse was an assistant coach under Laviolette for two seasons in New York and reportedly interviewed for the vacancy before Sullivan was hired. Crosby was happy to get Muse the win.

“Every team will tell you, especially early in the season, it’s not going to be perfect. You’re just trying to be on the same page as much as possible. And I feel like he prepared us well to start the year,” Crosby said.

Pittsburgh had Crosby, Malkin and Letang in its starting lineup, three players who have been on the Penguins team together since 2007.

“We had three guys that have been playing together for 20 years, and I thought it was important that they get to start the game together,” Muse said.

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Sasaki ‘primary option’ at closer, says Roberts

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October 8, 2025

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Sasaki 'primary option' at closer, says Roberts

  • Alden GonzalezOct 7, 2025, 11:14 PM ET

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      ESPN baseball reporter. Covered the L.A. Rams for ESPN from 2016 to 2018 and the L.A. Angels for MLB.com from 2012 to 2016.

LOS ANGELES — Roki Sasaki hasn’t been officially declared the closer, but he might as well be. Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Tuesday that Sasaki is “definitely the primary option now” in the ninth inning, but that is also contingent on his workload.

“We have to win X amount of games [to secure a championship], and he’s not going to close every game,” Roberts said before Tuesday’s workout from Dodger Stadium. “It’s just not feasible, so, you’ve got to use other guys.”

Roberts attempted to do that in Game 2 of the National League Division Series on Monday night, deploying Blake Treinen with a three-run lead in the ninth inning. But Treinen allowed the first three batters to reach, cutting the Philadelphia Phillies‘ deficit to a single run. Alex Vesia followed by facing three batters, retiring two. Sasaki then entered the game and recorded the final out in what amounted to his fifth major league relief appearance since transitioning to the bullpen in mid-September.

The Dodgers entered the postseason with a leaky bullpen they hoped to shore up with starting pitchers, most notably Sasaki but also Emmet Sheehan, Clayton Kershaw and, at times, Tyler Glasnow. The likes of Treinen, Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates and Michael Kopech — the latter two currently recovering from injuries but expected to be available for a potential National League Championship Series — were expected to anchor a dominant bullpen. All of them, to varying degrees, have fallen out of favor, but Roberts will inevitably have to trust them again at some point.

“If there’s a world where you can use five pitchers and finish a postseason and win the postseason, I think a lot of people would sign up for that,” Roberts said. “But that’s impossible. So you’ve got to use your roster at certain times and kind of pick spots where you feel best and live with whatever outcome. But that’s just the way it goes to win, for us, 13 games in October.”

In hopes of winning at least one, the Phillies, coming off back-to-back losses in Philadelphia, will turn to veteran right-hander Aaron Nola with their season on the line in Game 3 on Wednesday. Nola, 32, navigated a career-worst year in 2025, going 5-10 with a 6.01 ERA. But Phillies manager Rob Thomson will deploy lefty starter Ranger Suarez behind Nola, with Cristopher Sanchez fully rested for a potential Game 4.

Thomson said he went with Nola because of Nola’s strong finish to the regular season — eight innings of one-run ball against the Minnesota Twins — and because Nola is more comfortable starting than coming out of the bullpen. A lefty is typically a better option against the top of the Dodgers’ lineup, but the left-handed-hitting Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman have combined for a 1.056 OPS against Suarez.

“I have trust in both of them, don’t get me wrong,” Thomson said. “But Nola has pitched in some really big games for us in the last couple of years.”

Thomson said center fielder Harrison Bader, who suffered a hamstring strain in Game 1, will be a “game-time decision” on Wednesday. Bader pinch hit in the ninth inning of Game 2 and was replaced by a pinch runner after his single. Starting him as the designated hitter and putting Kyle Schwarber in the outfield is not an option.

“He’s still got to run,” Thomson said of Bader. “If he can run, he’s going to play center field.”

Dodgers catcher Will Smith, nursing a hairline fracture in his right hand, has not started any of the team’s four playoff games but has caught the final innings in each of the first two games of this series. Doing so again in Game 3 makes sense, given that the Dodgers would have the platoon advantage by starting the left-handed-hitting Ben Rortvedt against Nola and later turning to the right-handed-hitting Smith against Suarez. But Roberts said “there is hope” of Smith catching the whole game.

“I’ll make the decision tomorrow,” Roberts said. “Each day, it’s gotten better, so I feel more confident that he’ll be able to start.”

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