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The 2025 Stanley Cup playoffs are down to their final two teams, as the Florida Panthers and Edmonton Oilers meet for the second straight season for the right to lift the chalice. One of the players in this series is going to win the Conn Smythe as NHL postseason MVP.

Mikko Rantanen led the Conn Smythe Watch over the past two rounds of voting. But he’s gone, and so are the Dallas Stars, which means there’s a new leader for NHL postseason most valuable player.

We asked more than two dozen national and beat writers covering the Stanley Cup Final to name their top three MVP candidates after three rounds of play. Ballots were collected and tabulated before Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final.

Keep in mind that in the NHL, the Conn Smythe is based on a player’s performance during the entire postseason, not only the championship round. The award is voted on by an 18-person panel of Professional Hockey Writers Association members.


The current MVP leader

McDavid won the Conn Smythe last postseason in a losing effort. Based on his lead for the award heading into that rematch with Florida, he might win it again — whether the Oilers win or lose.

McDavid takes over the lead from Rantanen, moving up from third on our voters’ ballots before the conference finals. He’s the only player to appear on every ballot we collected, and he was ranked first overall on 71% of them. Every ballot that didn’t have McDavid first had him ranked second.

The Edmonton star enters the Final with 26 points (six goals, 20 assists) in 16 games. He roasted the Stars with points in every game, and nine points total in their five-game elimination of Dallas. Two of those goals ended up being game-winners, although the Oilers outscored the Stars by a 19-5 margin in their wins.

“McDavid won me over in the last series,” one voter revealed.

Last postseason, McDavid became the second non-goalie in NHL history to win the Conn Smythe in a losing effort, as the Oilers fell in Game 7 to the Panthers. Now, he’s trying to become the fourth player ever — and the first player since Sidney Crosby (2016-17) — to win consecutive Conn Smythe Trophies.

There’s a non-zero chance he could win a second straight playoff MVP award in a losing effort, given his current level of support from voters. But that’s probably the last thing McDavid wants to experience again.

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McDavid: Everybody stepped up in series win

Connor McDavid reflects on the Oilers heading back to the Stanley Cup Final to play the Florida Panthers.


The other favorites

If it’s not McDavid, “Playoff Bob” might have the inside track for the Conn Smythe over his Florida Panthers teammates.

Bobrovsky has a .912 save percentage and a 2.11 goals-against average in the playoffs. He had a save percentage of .920 or better in four of the Panthers’ five games against the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference finals — his worst game statistically was in their Game 5 elimination of the Canes. That’s the only game of his past nine appearances, dating back to the second round against Toronto, in which Bobrovsky had given up more than two goals. Bobrovsky is tied with Edmonton’s Stuart Skinner with three shutouts to lead the postseason.

Bobrovsky was the clear second choice by our voters, thanks to four first-place votes for the Conn Smythe.

“If Florida wins, I assume it’ll be because Bob is amazing,” explained one voter who had him second.

Barkov leads the Panthers with 17 points in 17 games, including six goals. Look no further than Game 5 against Carolina to witness his impact, as Barkov was a one-man forecheck before assisting on the series-clinching goal late in the third period. The Panthers score 57% of the goals and generate 57% of the expected goals when Barkov is on the ice at 5-on-5.

Florida’s captain was first on one ballot we collected and appeared on 63% of all ballots. That’s actually more than Bobrovsky (58%), but Bob had the higher placements.

For what it’s worth: Barkov was second to McDavid in the Conn Smythe voting last season despite not receiving a first-place vote.

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Fortenbaugh’s best bet for Panthers-Oilers Stanley Cup rematch

Joe Fortenbaugh explains why he’s taking the Panthers to repeat as champions against the Oilers.


Making their cases

Draisaitl received the most support of any player outside the top three, but there was a palpable gap between him and Barkov. Draisaitl appeared on 42% of the ballots we collected but received only one first-place vote.

The Oilers star is one point behind McDavid, with 25 through 16 games, and has scored one more goal (seven) than McDavid in the playoffs. If Draisaitl has a dominant Stanley Cup Final and Edmonton wins the Cup, he’s in position to potentially hurdle over McDavid for MVP.

“This should probably be a top four thanks to Draisaitl,” argued one voter who had Leon right outside of their top three.

Bennett is the clear third choice on the Panthers. He appeared on 20% of the ballots we surveyed and garnered two second-place votes. Like Draisaitl, he’s only one point off the scoring lead for his team (16 points in 17 games).

Bennett leads the playoffs with 10 goals and has been a physical force for the Panthers in every series. As a pending unrestricted free agent, a Conn Smythe Trophy would do wonders for his earning potential.


On the cusp

Evan Bouchard, D, Edmonton Oilers
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, F, Edmonton Oilers
Seth Jones, D, Florida Panthers
Brad Marchand, LW, Florida Panthers

Bouchard was the only player in this tier to appear on multiple ballots, all of them third-place votes. He’s tied for fifth in the playoffs with 17 points, easily the most by any defenseman in the postseason, with 13 of those points coming at even strength. He leads all Oilers in average ice time (25:01 per game) and has skated to a plus-9.

The rest of the players received only one third-place vote.

Nugent-Hopkins is third on the Oilers, with 18 points in 16 games. He had the game-winner in the first period of their critical Game 2 win over the Stars.

Jones has seven points in 17 games for the Panthers, skating to a plus-9. While he has played on what’s technically the second paring with Niko Mikkola, Jones is leading Florida with 24:59 in average ice time per game.

Finally, Marchand has been huge for the Panthers down the lineup with 14 points in 17 games, bringing his trademark hustle, agitation and offense to the fourth run to the Stanley Cup Final in his career. He also scored the most important goal of the Panthers’ postseason: in overtime of Game 3, down 2-0 to Toronto in the series.

But one voter fancied Marchand’s linemate as an under-the-radar choice. “Eutu Luostarinen would legit be fourth for me,” the voter declared of the Florida winger, who has 13 points in 17 games.


Lack of buzz

Stuart Skinner, G, Edmonton Oilers
Sam Reinhart, F, Florida Panthers
Matthew Tkachuk, RW, Florida Panthers
Carter Verhaeghe, LW, Florida Panthers

According to ESPN BET, these players are among the top 10 in odds to win MVP before the Stanley Cup Final. But none received a vote on any of the ballots we surveyed.

Tkachuk (16 points in 17 games) and Verhaeghe (14 points in 17 games) are both among the Panthers’ leading scorers, with Verhaeghe having scored two game-winning goals in the playoffs. Verhaeghe appeared on one Conn Smythe ballot last postseason, while Tkachuk did not appear on any. Reinhart is right behind them, with 13 points in 15 games, having missed a couple games against Carolina due to an injury.

Skinner is perhaps the greatest reminder that the Conn Smythe is an award for the totality of the playoffs. Skinner has been incredible since his reset, getting benched in favor of Calvin Pickard before returning against Vegas in the second round when Pickard was injured. Since Game 4 against the Golden Knights, Skinner is 6-1 with a .944 save percentage, a 1.41 goals-against average and three shutouts.

Could an MVP effort in the Stanley Cup Final counterbalance Skinner’s struggles earlier in the playoffs? Perhaps. But then he’d still have to overcome McDavid for playoff MVP. And according to the ballots we received, McDavid’s running away with the thing right now.

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Schwarber reaches 1,000-hit milestone with HR

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Schwarber reaches 1,000-hit milestone with HR

NEW YORK — Philadelphia Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber topped Mark McGwire for most home runs among a player’s first 1,000 hits, hitting long ball No. 319 during Friday night’s 12-5 victory over the New York Yankees.

“I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not,” Schwarber said.

Ten days after lifting the National League to victory in the first All-Star Game swing-off, Schwarber keeps going deep. He hit a pair of two-run homers Friday night, with the first drive, his milestone hit, starting the comeback from a 2-0 deficit. He got the ball back after it was grabbed by a Phillies fan attending with his friends in Yankee Stadium’s right-center-field seats.

“I saw it on the video and then I see the dude tugging,” Schwarber said. “I’m like: ‘Oh, they all got Philly stuff on.’ That was cool.”

He met the trio after the game, gave an autographed ball to each and exchanged hugs. When he went to get a third ball to autograph, one of the three said he just wanted the potential free agent to re-sign with the Phillies.

“You show up to the field every single day trying to get a win at the end of the day, and I think our fans kind of latch on to that, right?” Schwarber said. “It’s been fantastic these last 3½ years, four years now. The support that we get from our fans and it means a lot to me that, you know, that they attach themselves to our team.”

Schwarber tied it at 2-2 in the fifth against Will Warren when he hit a 413-foot drive on a first-pitch fastball.

After J.T. Realmuto‘s three-run homer off Luke Weaver built a 6-3 lead in a four-run seventh and the Yankees closed within a run in the bottom half, Schwarber sent an Ian Hamilton fastball 380 feet into the right-field seats.

Schwarber reached 1,000 hits with eight more homers than McGwire. Schwarber has 36 homers this year, three shy of major league leader Cal Raleigh, and six homers in seven games since he was voted All-Star MVP. He has 33 multihomer games.

“I don’t know where we’d be without him,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “Comes up with big hit after big hit after big hit. It’s just — it’s amazing.”

Schwarber, 32, is eligible for free agency this fall after completing a four-year, $79 million contract. He homered on all three of his swings in the All-Star Game tiebreaker, and when the second half began, Phillies managing partner John Middleton proclaimed: “We love him. We want to keep him.”

“He’s been an incredible force all season long,” Realmuto said. “What he’s meant to his team, his offense, it’s hard to put in words.”

A World Series champion for the 2016 Chicago Cubs, Schwarber has reached 35 homers in all four seasons with the Phillies. He’s batting .255 with 82 RBIs and a .960 OPS.

He also has almost as many home runs as singles (46).

Schwarber had not been aware he topped McGwire for most homers among 1,000 hits.

“I had no clue. I didn’t even know it was my 1,000th, to be honest with you,” he said.

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A’s Kurtz becomes first rookie with 4-HR game

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A's Kurtz becomes first rookie with 4-HR game

Nick Kurtz of the Athletics became the first rookie in Major League Baseball history to hit four home runs in a game, part of a spectacular Friday night for the 22-year-old that will go down as one of the greatest offensive displays the sport has seen.

Kurtz also matched the MLB record with 19 total bases in the 15-3 triumph against the Astros in Houston.

“It’s arguably the best game I’ve ever watched from a single player,” Athletics manager Mark Kotsay said. “This kid continues to have jaw-dropping moments.”

Kurtz didn’t make an out all night, going deep in the second, sixth, eighth and ninth innings. He also doubled — a 381-foot drive that would have been out in six major league ballparks — and singled on his 6-for-6 night to equal Shawn Green, who had four homers, six hits and 19 total bases for the Los Angeles Dodgers on May 23, 2002 at Milwaukee.

Kurtz and Green are the only players with six hits in a four-homer game.

“It’s hard to think about this day being kind of real, it still feels like a dream,” Kurtz said in a postgame television interview. “So it’s pretty remarkable. I’m kind of speechless. Don’t really know what to say.”

It was the 20th four-homer game in major league history and second this season. Arizona’s Eugenio Suárez did it on April 26 against Atlanta. No player has ever hit five home runs in a game.

Kurtz finished with eight RBIs and six runs scored.

The 6-foot-5, 22-year-old slugger has 23 homers in 66 games this season. The fourth pick in last year’s amateur draft out of Wake Forest, he made his major league debut April 23 and hit his first homer May 13.

He is the youngest player with a four-homer game. Pat Seerey of the Chicago White Sox was 25 when he homered four times on July 18, 1948.

“This is the first time my godparents have been here, so they probably have to come in the rest of the year,” Kurtz said. “My parents flew in today. They’ve been here a bunch, but it was cool to have some family here for that.”

On Friday, Kurtz homered off each of the Astros’ four pitchers: Ryan Gusto, Nick Hernandez, Kaleb Ort and outfielder Cooper Hummel, who worked the ninth with the game out of hand. His longest drive was his third, a 414-foot solo shot off Ort in the eighth.

For his fourth homer, Kurtz hit an opposite-field line drive to the Crawford Boxes in left field on a 77 mph, 2-0 pitch from Hummel. The three-run shot made it 15-2.

“With a positional player on the mound, I’m just trying to move the ball forward,” Kurtz said. “You don’t want to be the guy that strikes out. That’s only my second at bat ever off a positional player, so I don’t know. Just trying to move the ball forward and get something that I can touch, and I hit another one.”

Kurtz’s double in the fourth inning hit just below the yellow line over the visitor’s bullpen, narrowly missing what would have been a fifth homer.

“Everybody was just like, laughing,” A’s shortstop Jacob Wilson said. “How is he doing it? This is not normal. He’s playing a different sport than us right now. It’s not baseball, it’s just T-ball what he’s doing right now.”

With the baseballs from his last two homers inside a plastic bag at his locker, Kurtz signed scorecards from all four A’s broadcasters and a lineup card. One of the scorecards and a bat were bound for the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Kurtz has been the best hitter in the majors in July, ranking first in batting average (.425), on-base percentage (.494), slugging percentage (1.082), runs (22), doubles (13), homers (11) and RBIs (27).

He extended his hitting streak to 12 games, and his 23 home runs are the most for an A’s rookie since Yoenis Céspedes in 2012 and fourth most in franchise history.

Kurtz entered Friday as a -325 favorite at ESPN BET to win American League Rookie of the Year. His odds moved to -2500 after Friday night.

Information from ESPN Research and The Associated Press was used in this report.

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Yankees land 3B, acquire McMahon from Rockies

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Yankees land 3B, acquire McMahon from Rockies

NEW YORK — The Yankees on Friday acquired third baseman Ryan McMahon from the Colorado Rockies in exchange for minor league pitchers Griffin Herring and Josh Grosz, the teams announced.

The Yankees assumed the remainder of McMahon’s contract, which includes approximately $4.5 million for the rest of 2025 and $32 million over the next two seasons, a source told ESPN.

An All-Star last season, McMahon, 30, was batting .217 with 16 home runs, a .717 OPS and a National League-leading 127 strikeouts in 100 games for Colorado in 2025. After a dreadful start to the season through April, he has been significantly better, with a .246 batting average, 14 home runs and an .804 OPS. He hit home runs in the first two games after the All-Star break and another Tuesday. He is on pace to keep his four-year 20-homer streak alive.

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. On Wednesday, the Yankees committed four errors against the American East-leading Toronto Blue Jays.

“He has had some ups and downs offensively this year,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said of McMahon. “I know, over the last month, he’s really swinging the bat well, but he’s a presence, and he can really defend over there at third and has for a number of years. So, we’re excited to get him.”

Arizona Diamondbacks third baseman Eugenio Suarez, who began Friday with 36 home runs and an MLB-leading 86 RBIs, could be the best hitter moved before the July 31 trade deadline, but the Yankees were not particularly aggressive in pursuing him, a source told ESPN’s Jeff Passan.

Though McMahon’s offensive production resulted in a 92 OPS+, which suggests he has been 8% worse than the average major league hitter this season, he’s still a significant offensive upgrade at third base for New York. The Yankees have had Oswald Peraza, one of the worst hitters in the majors, playing third base nearly every day since the club released DJ LeMahieu, another former Rockies player, earlier this month and moved Jazz Chisholm Jr. to second base.

Peraza, though 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.

McMahon has played his first eight-plus seasons with the Rockies. They selected him in the second round of the 2013 draft. He debuted four years later and became a regular in 2019. By then, the Rockies were descending to the bottom of the NL West. This year, they’re 26-76 and could finish with the most losses in major league history.

He leaves that environment for New York’s pressure cooker and a club with World Series aspirations, a change the Yankees hope can help McMahon.

“Hopefully, the environment is a great thing for him, that he falls into that and doesn’t have to be the guy,” Boone said. “Go do your thing. Go find the role. But it’s our job — my job, staff, coaches, players — to make sure they’re welcomed and get them as comfortable as possible.”

The price for McMahon — and his team control over the next two seasons — was a pair of pitchers who have not reached Double-A.

Herring, 22, has 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 seek to acquire pitchers to bolster their rotation and bullpen. Luis Gil‘s return should help. The right-hander, who has been out all season because of a lat injury, made his third rehab start Wednesday. Boone said there’s “a good chance” Gil gets another start in the minors before making his season debut.

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