Sports

Dale vs. Dale: A Daytona 500 the Jarretts, NASCAR won’t forget

Published

2 years ago

February 14, 2023

admin

2:50 PM ET

The 1993 Daytona 500, run 30 years ago today, is first and foremost a love story.

Yes, it was the Dale and Dale Show. Yes, it was the victory that sparked Dale Jarrett’s climb toward the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Yes, it was the first Cup Series win for second-year team owner Joe Gibbs, also a future Hall of Famer, who has since added 199 more of them. Yes, it was all of that and more. But yes, it was also a love story. After all, it did happen on Valentine’s Day.

To fully appreciate that day, we must put it within the context of the era. This Daytona 500 was the first race run after the retirement of Richard Petty. It marked only the second career start for a kid named Jeff Gordon, hailing from California and driving a rainbow-covered car he might as well have just landed from another planet. His boss, Rick Hendrick, was respected throughout the garage, but he also had yet to win a series championship. This was still the world of Junior Johnson, Darrell Waltrip and above all else, Dale Earnhardt. Alan Kulwicki and Davey Allison were still alive, the defending series champion and the defending Daytona 500 champion. People still believed that having a multicar team would never work.

Gibbs had just retired as Washington’s head coach, his final game on the sideline (for then, at least) had taken place only six weeks earlier, a loss in the first round of the NFL playoffs. The year before, he won his third Super Bowl ring as a head coach. A lifelong hot-rod enthusiast, Gibbs was making his foray into the NASCAR world with the assistance of Hendrick. Among his very first hires was an up-and-coming crew chief named Jimmy Makar, and it was Makar who suggested hiring his brother-in-law as their driver.

“Joe always said what a dummy I was because he didn’t even have an employee, we agreed together to hire Jimmy Makar,” confesses Norm Miller, then the CEO of Interstate Batteries, who had signed on to sponsor the No. 18 Chevy. Their primary corporate color was green. To old-school NASCAR racers, a green car was viewed as being almost as lucky as a black cat walking under a ladder in a room full of broken mirrors. “But Joe is a winner. I don’t know if you know this, but he won a racquetball national championship. And just as we’d signed on, he won a Super Bowl. So, I figured, ‘Well, if racing doesn’t work out, we got to enjoy some football and other stuff. Let’s just take a chance and see what happens.’ Jimmy, he wanted to take a chance on Dale Jarrett.”

The 36-year-old North Carolinian owned one career victory, earned in a nail-biter at Michigan International Speedway with the Wood Brothers in ’91. Even with that trophy, he was still viewed in the garage as little more than a journeyman racer, the well-liked son of an all-time great.

“I was certainly under no illusions that I was in demand, or that people were fighting over hiring me,” Jarrett explained with a laugh last fall. “But I also was taught at a very young age that even when others might not bet on me, then I should still have the confidence to bet on myself. I learned that from my parents, though I don’t think they ever thought those lessons would apply to me becoming a race car driver.”

Ah yes, Mom and Dad. And that brings us to our love story.

Ned Jarrett first met Martha Ruth Bowman at a small town dance in the 1950s. Ned was the son of a sawmill owner, and as a kid, he would sit at the local general store and eavesdrop on the local farmers as they excitedly chattered about a racetrack that was being plowed into a hillside in nearby Hickory. They bragged about how they were going to take their vehicle over to the oval and prove just how fast it was. Little Ned was immediately enamored. When his father took him to brand-new Hickory Motor Speedway, it marked the beginning of a lifelong obsession with stock car racing.

Ned and Martha married on Feb. 18, 1956, and the early years of their marriage were punctuated by Ned’s success in NASCAR’s Sportsman Division, the precursor to today’s Xfinity Series. His chief rival and best racing pal was Ralph Earnhardt. Martha Jarrett and Earnhardt’s wife, also named Martha, became inseparable.

The Jarretts and Earnhardts travelled together, ate together, helped each other through numerous pregnancies, and even hosted baby showers for each other. At one of those showers, Ned drove Martha to the event but refused to go inside. A few days earlier, Ralph had put the bumper to Ned on the final lap to take away a sure victory, and Ned refused to look Earnhardt in the eye. The shower was being thrown for Ned’s second child, a boy they would name Dale. The Earnhardts had a 5-year-old boy of their own in tow, also named Dale.

The reality of the racing life was that Martha Jarrett enjoyed her friends, but she hated Ned putting his life on the line multiple nights per week. That anxiety only increased when Ned moved up to the Grand National Series, what we now know as the Cup Series, where the racetracks were bigger, the cars were faster and deaths were entirely too common. This was the 1960s.

During the ’64 World 600 at Charlotte, Ned burned his hands pulling Fireball Roberts out of the inferno that ultimately killed his friend. Dale and older brother Glenn were watching from the infield. The following season, Jarrett suffered a broken back at Greenville-Pickens Speedway, asking the ambulance driver to turn off the siren and take it slow to the hospital when he looked out the window from his stretcher and saw Martha was following, behind the wheel of the family station wagon with the kids.

“We lived in neighborhoods where people had what you would call normal jobs, lawyers and salesmen, things like that,” Dale Jarrett recalled of his childhood. “Everything that we did as a family was very normal. We went to church every Sunday, Mom made sure me, my older brother and my younger sister were where we needed to be. The only part of it that wasn’t like everyone else was that Dad was racing at Daytona and Darlington. And he was good at it.”

Ned Jarrett wasn’t simply good. He was the best. He backed up his two Sportsman titles with Grand National championships in 1961 and ’65. He earned 50 wins, then second only to Lee Petty on NASCAR’s all-time victories list. The only victory that eluded him was Daytona.

“I can remember seeing him drive by in the lead right at the end of the 1963 Daytona 500,” Dale remembered. “He went right by us where we watched from the infield, but then ran out of gas.”

Instead, his signature win came two years later, a Southern 500 victory at Darlington by a stunning 14-lap margin and essentially clinching the ’65 title. The images of his sleek, dark blue No. 11 Ford Galaxie streaking around the Track Too Tough To Tame are iconic to this day, as are the photos of Ned and Martha’s embrace and kiss in Victory Lane.

Then, he retired.

“Ford was pulling out of NASCAR and that seemed like the right time to exit with them,” Ned recalled in 2021. “Plus, I had made a promise to Martha.”

That promise was that if and when he won a second Grand National championship, he would hang up his helmet. He did. Martha was so relieved. Her nerves would no longer be frayed from having to watch a loved one hurtle around ovals at 150 mph.

Ned tried to be a coffee salesman. That didn’t work, so he helped manage his father’s lumber business. Then he became the promoter of Hickory Motor Speedway and Metrolina Speedway in Charlotte. Martha sold tickets and ran the front office while the kids sold programs and hot dogs. She settled into motherhood, watching Dale become a three-sport athlete, so good that he received offers to attend college as a quarterback and a full scholarship to South Carolina to play golf. Older brother Glenn went to UNC as a catcher. Younger sister Patti met Makar.

Ned kept his racing bug fed first through his short tracks and then via a broadcasting career that moved from public address announcing at Hickory to MRN Radio to the TV booths of ESPN and CBS Sports. Glenn ended up on TV, too, as a pit reporter.

Life was good. It was safe.

“Then I kind of went and threw a wrench into that, didn’t I?” Dale admits. “I didn’t go to college to play golf. I decided, at 20 years old, that I wanted to be a racecar driver. I don’t think my mom was super happy about that. But she also never tried to stop me.”

Dale battled his way through the short tracks of the Carolinas and then became a charter member of the NASCAR Busch Series, the revised version of Ned’s Sportsman Division. He won a handful of races and by the late-1980s was a midpack Cup Series driver. Over his first 168 starts, he earned the one win and seven top-5 finishes. But he also scored only one DNF. He was a smart racer. Still, no one saw coming what happened on Feb. 14, 1993.

No one except for the Jarretts.

“I remember when we got to the garage for Speedweeks there at Daytona, we had been assigned garage No. 11, Dad’s number,” remembered Dale. “We had been so fast in testing during January, I remember calling Dad and saying, ‘Dad, I really think we can win this thing.'”

When CBS held its Daytona 500 production meetings and producer Bob Stenner asked his broadcasters what they expected to happen on Sunday, Ned told the room to keep an eye on his son.

“I told them, this is not me playing favorites, this is based on what I had seen and if they had really been paying attention to what they had seen, that Dale was really fast,” Ned explained nearly 30 years later. What he didn’t know that day was that Stenner later went to Ken Squier and Neil Bonnett, who were in the broadcast booth with Jarrett, and told them that if Dale Jarrett was in the lead or had a chance to win on the final lap that they should be quiet and let his father do the talking.

Sure enough, as the leaders crossed the start-finish line with two laps remaining, the green No. 18 Chevy carried enough momentum off the fourth turn to slide by Gordon into second place behind, of course, the black No. 3 Chevy Lumina of the other Dale. Earnhardt was at the height of his almost-mythical struggle to win NASCAR’s biggest race.

As Dale Jarrett moved into second, the CBS cameras showed Martha, her head thrown into her hands, unable to watch. She was sitting in a passenger van, seeking some solitude to ease her nerves. Those old feelings were back. The anxiety from decades earlier, only now it wasn’t watching her husband at some dirt track on a Wednesday night. This was her little boy, in the Great American Race. CBS had a TV monitor set up for her. Now they had a camera pointed at her.

From the booth, speaking to his wife but also to the millions watching at home, Ned said, “Hold on, Martha, he’s going to be OK, dear…”

Over the last round of pit stops, most everyone in the field had taken only two new tires, including Earnhardt. Makar, however, had decided to give Jarrett four. As a result, Earnhardt’s car was slipping and sliding, on the constant edge of being out of control. Jarrett’s ride looked like it was on rails as he rode up to back of the other Dale’s machine and used the push of the air to shake his opponent loose.

They flashed under the white flag nose-to-nose, Jarrett on the inside. As Jarrett led the pack onto the backstretch, Stenner’s voice crackled in the earpieces of the three men in the broadcast booth.

“Take it, Ned.”

“Come on, Dale! Go, baby, go! All right, come on. I know he’s got it to the floorboard. He can’t do any more. Come on, hang it to the inside, don’t let him get to the inside of you coming around this turn … here he comes, Earnhardt … it’s the Dale and Dale show as they come off of Turn 4 … you know who I’m pulling for, it’s Dale Jarrett … bring her to the inside, Dale, don’t let him get down there…”

As Ned said it, Dale did it.

“Ever since that day, people have asked me if Dale could hear me, like I was in his headset like a spotter or a crew chief would be,” Ned explained. “When I tell them that he didn’t, I don’t think they believe me. He just knew what to do. He certainly has never needed my coaching at Daytona, I can tell you that.”

“He’s going to make it! Dale Jarrett is going to win the Daytona 500! All right!”

CBS once again cut to the exasperated woman in the van. The mother who used to make sandwiches on the tailgate of her station wagon for her kids during races. The wife who tore tickets. The heartbroken friend who attended the funerals of her friends’ husbands who had died in the same races that her husband had run. She threw her hands above her head, then went down into a position of prayerful thanks.

“Look at Martha, oh dear!”

CBS pit report David Hobbs sprinted out to the van from the pits. As the cameraman reached out and congratulated her, the quiet woman said, “Thank you,” as tears streamed down her face.

“Oh, that poor girl, she needs help!”

In Victory Lane, Dale was handed an earpiece so that Ned could talk to him on live TV.

“I tell you, your mama was watching, and you can’t believe the way she broke down when this race was over,” Ned said. “Of course, you had to expect that. Proud of you.”

“You came so close, I believe it was in ’63 when you ran out of fuel,” Dale replied. “I thought we’d get this one for the whole family.”

Everything was still so new for Gibbs and Miller they didn’t realize they were supposed to stay for a post-victory news conference. Miller and his family went back to their beach condo. Gibbs went across International Speedway Boulevard to eat at Steak and Shake. That’s why the entire Joe Gibbs Racing team still goes there after every Daytona 500 win. So far, they’ve done it four times.

The Jarretts spent their evening in the racetrack infield. Because that’s what they’d always done. The following weekend at Rockingham, Ned found Earnhardt and apologized for showing so much favoritism over the final lap of the Daytona 500 broadcast. The Intimidator thanked him, but said there was no need, explaining, “I’m a father, too.”

Ned retired from broadcasting more than a decade later and was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2011. Dale won 32 races in all, became a broadcaster himself in 2009, and went into the Hall of Fame five years later.

During a visit to Ned and Martha’s home in Newton, North Carolina, in 2018, Martha expressed relief that her six grandchildren chose to excel in a lot of different sports, but none became full-time racers — although the oldest, Jason, did try before becoming a spotter.

“I miss my friends at the racetrack,” she admitted. “But I don’t miss being a nervous wreck all the time.”

On Feb. 6, 2023, Martha Jarrett passed away at the age of 91. Today is Ned’s first Valentine’s Day without his beloved in nearly seven decades. But as sad as that might be, as sad it will always be until he takes his place by her side once again, this day will also never fail to bring a smile to his face. Or ours. A family’s most memorable moment together, also one of the greatest moments in NASCAR’s 75-year history.

Sports

MLB playoff contender tiers: From the locks to the long shots

Published

7 hours ago

August 11, 2025

admin

MLB playoff contender tiers: From the locks to the long shots

David SchoenfieldAug 10, 2025, 07:00 PM ET
Close
- Covers MLB for ESPN.com
- Former deputy editor of Page 2
- Been with ESPN.com since 1995

The early returns from the MLB trade deadline are filtering in. The dog days of August are challenging pitching staffs. The Boston Red Sox are humming, the New York Yankees are stumbling and the New York Mets might be crumbling. Yes, it’s going to be a fun stretch drive.

How do the postseason races stand? Let’s break down the contenders into playoff tiers.

Tier I: The locks

Biggest surprise: Andrew Vaughn has been raking since coming over from the White Sox in a trade in which Chicago was clearing him off its roster. Rhys Hoskins might return from the injured list later this month, but Vaughn has hit so well that Hoskins has likely been Wally Pipp-ed and relegated to part-time DH duty (depending on how often Christian Yelich can play the outfield). Vaughn has — so far — provided some much-needed power, which had been the Brewers’ only weakness.

Injury to watch: Hard-throwing rookie Jacob Misiorowski is out because of a shin contusion but should be back soon, and the Brewers probably welcomed the break to limit his innings anyway. So keep an eye on Jackson Chourio, who is likely out a couple more weeks because of a strained hamstring. Chourio had been red-hot in July, with an OPS over 1.000 before hitting the IL.

Player to watch: Brandon Woodruff. The one-time Brewers ace hadn’t pitched since September 2023 before finally returning in July and has delivered six excellent starts with a 2.29 ERA, 45 strikeouts and just six walks.

His fastball velocity isn’t where it was before his shoulder injury, but Woodruff has been locating where he wants, as batters are hitting .111 against his four-seamer and .156 against his sinker. A playoff rotation with Freddy Peralta, Woodruff, Misiorowski and Quinn Priester, who has won 10 consecutive decisions, looks like one that could deliver the Brewers their first World Series title.

Biggest surprise: Well, there are two ways to look at this. The Dodgers are in the bottom half of the majors in ERA with Yoshinobu Yamamoto their only starter who has been in the rotation all season. Sitting in first place despite those injury issues can be viewed as a pleasant surprise. Or maybe it’s a bad surprise that a team that was a huge favorite to run away with the National West has to fight for the division title.

The Dodgers have essentially used a six-man rotation all season, with pitchers making just seven starts on four days of rest. Yamamoto hasn’t started on all four days of rest all season. With the Dodgers battling the Padres for the division crown, will manager Dave Roberts go to a five-man rotation? What about in the postseason, when four days of rest is generally the norm if you want to use just your top four starters?

Injury to watch: Just one? While the rotation is slowly getting healthier (Blake Snell is back), late-game relievers Tanner Scott (elbow) and Kirby Yates (back) are on the IL.

Player to watch: With Mookie Betts seemingly mired in seasonlong mediocrity, the Dodgers will need Freddie Freeman to heat up again. The first baseman was hitting .374 with a 1.078 OPS through May but then hit .226 with just two home runs in June and July. In late July, he said he fixed something in his swing, and he hit .400 with three home runs in his first 14 games after that proclamation. If Freeman is back, the offense might be the best in the majors again.

Biggest surprise: The Blue Jays were 26-28 on May 27 but have the second-best record in the majors since, and journeyman starter Eric Lauer has been a key reason. After not pitching in the majors in 2024 and finishing the season in Korea, he joined the rotation for good on June 11 and has gone 5-1 with a 3.16 ERA since then, with the Jays winning nine of his 11 starts.

Injury to watch: The Jays signed Anthony Santander to a five-year, $92.5 million contract after a 44-homer season with the Orioles, but he has been out since May 29 because of a shoulder injury and hit just .179 before that. Getting back a productive Santander would help boost an outfield that has been mix-and-match all season.

Player to watch: The Blue Jays acquired Shane Bieber from Cleveland at the trade deadline, getting a pitcher still rehabbing from Tommy John surgery. He should have two more rehab starts before he’s ready to join the rotation — and the Blue Jays will be counting on him to be in the playoff rotation.

Depending on how Bieber performs, it wouldn’t be shocking for him to leapfrog Jose Berrios and Kevin Gausman as the Game 1 starter. Lauer and Max Scherzer will be in that mix, with Chris Bassitt hanging around as well. That rotation depth is why the Jays rate as the heavy favorite to win the division — and at the minimum look like a playoff lock.

Biggest surprise: Everyone knew about Pete Crow-Armstrong‘s defense, but certainly nobody expected him to hit for this kind of power and turn into an MVP candidate in his first full season. He’s doing it despite the highest swing rate in the majors, which gives him one of the worst chase rates. He would have the lowest OBP for an MVP winner. Still, he had his highest monthly batting average (.308) and slugging percentage (.637) in July, although he’s slumping in August.

Injury to watch: The big one was Justin Steele going down for the season because of Tommy John surgery. Jameson Taillon is still out because of a calf strain. The Cubs acquired Michael Soroka at the deadline to help the rotation, but he lasted two innings in his first start before going down because of a sore shoulder, and his availability the rest of the season is unknown.

Player to watch: Rookie starter Cade Horton is emerging as a force. He joined the rotation in May and had a 4.80 ERA through his first two months but has allowed no runs in five of his past six starts, including his past four in a row. Coming off an injury-plagued 2024, the Cubs are being very conservative with the 23-year-old’s pitch counts (fewer than 90 pitches in his past four outings), but he has been efficient enough to give them five or six innings.

Some of Horton’s peripheral numbers — so-so strikeout rate, not a ton of swing-and-miss — don’t necessarily match up with all the zeros, but he’s limiting hard contact. With Soroka out, Horton is vital to the Cubs’ hopes of running down the Brewers in the NL Central.

Biggest surprise: Kyle Schwarber hitting a lot of home runs is hardly a surprise — he has reached 40 three times — but Schwarber as a potential MVP candidate? That wasn’t on anyone’s preseason scorecard. OK, maybe that’s still a long shot given that Crow-Armstrong’s all-around value gives the Cubs outfielder a big edge in WAR and Shohei Ohtani is now pitching to go with his Schwarber-like offensive numbers. Still, Schwarber looks unstoppable at the plate right now and leads the NL in home runs and RBIs as his OPS inches closer to 1.000.

Injury to watch: Aaron Nola has been on the 60-day IL with a stress fracture in his right rib and has made a couple of rehab starts, so he should be returning to the rotation soon. The Phillies haven’t really missed him because of their pitching depth, but a healthy Nola will bump Taijuan Walker from the rotation, plus he could leap over Jesus Luzardo as the fourth starter in the playoff rotation.

Player to watch: Trea Turner hit well for three months to begin the season but went homerless in July, and his OBP dropped way off. At his best, he’s an offensive force who hits for average and some power while setting the table for Bryce Harper and Schwarber behind him. He can also have spells when he starts chasing too much and the offense dries up. The Phillies are a lock to get in, but they need the best version of Turner down the stretch to hold off the Mets in the NL East.

Tier II: Should get in

What they need to do to become a lock: The Tigers seemed like a lock when they held a 14-game lead in the American League Central before the All-Star break while playing like the best team in baseball. Then they lost 12 out of 13 games, and Cleveland got hot. The Guardians are at least close enough to put a little fear in the Tigers.

The lineup scuffled in July, but the bullpen still feels like the key here. The Tigers are 19th in the majors in bullpen ERA and 28th in reliever strikeout rate. It’s not good when you’re ranked with the Nationals and Rockies. They added some reinforcements at the trade deadline, but Kyle Finnegan and Rafael Montero aren’t solutions.

Injury to watch: The Tigers signed Alex Cobb to a one-year, $15 million contract in the offseason, but the 37-year-old right-hander has yet to pitch in the majors this season because of hip inflammation. After his first rehab stint was cut short in June, he’s trying to get healthy enough to provide a boost to the rotation.

The Tigers traded for Charlie Morton and Chris Paddack, but Cobb could be in the same scenario he was with Cleveland last season, when he made just three regular-season starts but was in the playoff rotation.

Player to watch: It has been an odd season for Riley Greene, whose strikeout rate is over 32% and whose walk rate has plummeted from last season (11% to 6%). The home run and RBI numbers are there, although he has been in a deep slump since the All-Star break. Can he be consistent enough to lead the Detroit offense and deliver in crunch time, or will the better pitchers in the postseason exploit his swing-and-miss tendencies?

What they need to do to become a lock: In 2022, the Padres made the biggest splash at the trade deadline, acquiring Juan Soto and Josh Hader and eventually reaching the NLCS. This deadline, general manager A.J. Preller was again on a mission, trading top prospect Leo De Vries to acquire Athletics closer Mason Miller to strengthen what was already perhaps the game’s best bullpen. Preller also filled some holes in the lineup with the additions of Ryan O’Hearn, Ramon Laureano and Freddy Fermin.

The Padres have the deepest bullpen and a deeper lineup. Will that be enough to cover their lack of power (next to last in the majors in home runs) and a middle-of-the-pack rotation (getting Dylan Cease on a roll would be nice)? Maybe. But it’s clear that to not just lock up that playoff spot but also chase down the Dodgers in the NL West, Padres manager Mike Shildt will have to ride those bullpen arms.

Injury to watch: On Saturday, Michael King made his first start since May 18 after being out with a pinched nerve in his shoulder. If King is at full health, having him and Nick Pivetta lead the rotation would pair nicely with that loaded bullpen.

Player to watch: Second-year center fielder Jackson Merrill hasn’t replicated his rookie power numbers, and his OBP cratered in July, when he hit .196/.262/.304. The early returns are better this month, and though the Padres upgraded their offensive depth, they need Merrill to be a force.

New York Mets

What they need to do to become a lock: It’s not so easy to buy your way into the playoffs, is it? The Mets correctly upgraded a struggling bullpen by adding Ryan Helsley, Tyler Rogers and Gregory Soto, but now it’s the offense that is going through some rough times. Despite adding Juan Soto and getting a much better season from Pete Alonso (he has already surpassed last year’s RBI total), the Mets are scoring fewer runs per game than in 2024.

The Mets were 21-10 at the end of April with a plus-54 run differential. Since then, they’ve gone 42-45 with a minus-24 run differential. Soto, Alonso, Francisco Lindor and Brandon Nimmo have scuffled of late, and Soto has been terrible all season with runners in scoring position (.190/.331/.360). There’s too much talent here for the Mets to miss the playoffs.

Injury to watch: Tylor Megill, out with an elbow sprain, is the one injured player who could return and help, whether in the rotation or the bullpen.

Player to watch: Soto. It’s time for him to put the team on his back.

Tier III: Have work to do

How they make the playoffs: Hit better with runners in scoring position. The trade deadline additions of Josh Naylor and Eugenio Suarez, plus the gradual improvement of rookie Cole Young and the surprising production from Dominic Canzone, have made this one of the deeper lineups in the league. The Mariners rank 10th in OPS and second in road OPS — but they’re just 24th in OPS with runners in scoring position.

Injury to watch: Bryce Miller (elbow inflammation) has made two rehab starts. He threw four scoreless innings in the first outing but served up three home runs in the second. His fastball velocity was sitting at 96. He could be in line for two more starts before potentially replacing Logan Evans in the rotation — and giving the Mariners their projected five-man group for the first time all season.

Player to watch: Naylor was acquired for his bat, not his legs, but he is running like Rickey Henderson since joining the M’s, swiping 10 bases in his first 13 games — pretty remarkable for a player who ranks in the third percentile of all players in running speed. He left Thursday’s game because of some discomfort after a swing, but the Mariners said it’s likely just a day-to-day situation.

Boston Red Sox

How they make the playoffs: Keep pitching like they have. While going 24-10 since June 30, the Red Sox have a 3.08 ERA. Garrett Crochet has led the way and is now toe-to-toe with Tarik Skubal in the AL Cy Young race, but Lucas Giolito is also 7-1 with a 2.43 ERA over his past 11 starts and Brayan Bello is 5-2 with a 2.42 ERA since July 1.

Injury to watch: Though he’s not on the IL, closer Aroldis Chapman left a game in late July because of back tightness. He has allowed one earned run over his past 32 innings, so keeping the 37-year-old healthy is vital.

Player to watch: Rookie outfielder Roman Anthony just signed an eight-year, $130 million extension (escalators could bring the total value up to $230 million). Though the 21-year-old has shown precocious plate discipline that suggests the bright future the Red Sox are banking on, his home run power hasn’t shown up yet, in part because he’s still hitting a lot of balls on the ground. He’s already good, but maybe he’ll be great down the stretch.

How they make the playoffs: Have Carlos Correa turn back the clock. In a shocking trade deadline deal, the Astros reacquired their former shortstop to play third base with Isaac Paredes injured. Correa was having a poor season with the Twins, with the worst OPS of his career, although he has hit better in his first week with the Astros. With an offense that has been forced to play a lot of Triple-A fillers because of injuries, Correa could provide a huge boost.

Injury to watch: Will Yordan Alvarez make it back? The superstar DH has played just 29 games, none since May 2, because of a right hand fracture. He has been taking batting practice in Florida. Meanwhile, Paredes remains out because of a serious hamstring injury, choosing rehab with the hope of returning this season. Center fielder Jake Meyers is still rehabbing a calf strain.

Player to watch: The Astros have struggled to fill the rotation behind Hunter Brown and Framber Valdez because of the injuries. Spencer Arrighetti just returned from the 60-day IL and allowed 11 hits and five runs in 3⅔ innings. He had a strong second half last season, so the Astros would love for him to step up as a strong No. 3 starter.

New York Yankees

How they make the playoffs: Hit better. Field better. Pitch better. Run the bases better. The Yankees are 20-31 since June 13, losing 10 games in the standings and dropping from first to third place.

It has been a comedy of errors at times, but, at the minimum, they need the bullpen to figure things out. The Yankees rank in the bottom third of the majors in bullpen win probability added. Maybe David Bednar‘s five-out save the other day will at least settle down the closer situation, as he’s likely to take over that role from Devin Williams.

Injury to watch: Aaron Judge is back from the flexor strain in his elbow that sidelined him for 10 days, although still serving only as a DH. It shouldn’t affect his offense, but the Yankees would love to get him back on the field defensively so they can use Giancarlo Stanton, who had been hot, as the DH. Stanton is unplayable on defense, so he’s limited to pinch-hitting duties with Judge occupying the DH spot.

Player to watch: If Judge is producing, the Yankees will score. The bullpen has the talent to get hot down the stretch. But suddenly, the rotation has some concerns as well. Carlos Rodon has walked 15 over his past 20 innings across four starts. Even going back to June 8, his ERA is just 4.50 after a great first two months. Is he a reliable No. 2 starter behind Max Fried?

Tier IV: The long shots

How do they get in? Continue to ride Nathan Eovaldi and Jacob deGrom in the rotation, figure out the closer situation and have the offense keep hitting like it did in July, when it was better than it had been all season.

Journeyman Robert Garcia had been closing of late, but he gave up two critical home runs to the Mariners last weekend and now that role is once again in flux. The Rangers are done with the Mariners, but their six remaining games against the Astros loom large.

How do they get in? The Guardians looked out of it when they were 40-48 in early July, with the Tigers seemingly running away with the division. But Cleveland has gone 21-8 since then, and the upcoming schedule is pretty soft as they finish this series against the White Sox and then play the Marlins, Braves and Diamondbacks.

Six games against the Tigers in September means the AL Central might not be decided until then. The offense, hitting just .224 through July 6, has averaged more than five runs per game since then, with a lot more of the timely hitting we saw last season. It helps that Jose Ramirez got hot right at that time.

Tier V: The really long shots

How do they get in? They’re the seventh team in a race where only six teams get in, so they’ll need to get some help, which the Mets seem to be accommodating right now. But the Reds also need to get the rotation back in a groove.

After posting a 3.69 ERA in April and 3.17 in May, the rotation ERA rose to 4.52 in June and 4.16 in July, but there are some positive developments. Hunter Greene is about ready to return from his rehab, and Zack Littell had a terrific first start with the Reds after coming over in a deadline deal, allowing one run in seven innings with a season-high 15 swing-and-misses.

How do they get in? If the Reds need a little help, the Giants will need a lot of help. They blew up the bullpen, which had been the strength of the team, by trading Tyler Rogers and Camilo Doval, so we’ll see whether they have enough depth there. Same with the rotation. With Landen Roupp injured and Hayden Birdsong demoted to the minors, the rotation features recent call-ups Carson Whisenhunt and Kai-Wei Teng. Justin Verlander has reeled off three good starts in a row, although each was limited to five innings. They’ll need those three to pitch well behind Logan Webb and Robbie Ray.

How do they get in? In the American League, anything still feels possible. Just look at last year, when the Tigers were already buried at this point, only to reel off an improbable run to the postseason. The Royals would need to leap past three teams to get a wild card, but if the Yankees keep fading, all it would take is a little hot streak to jump past Texas and Cleveland as well.

The Royals will have to score more runs, but the offense had its best month, and it has had a few big offensive games in August. Bobby Witt Jr. has had another strong season, but what if he really heats up like he did last July and August?

How do they get in? They’ve run hot and cold all season, going 16-12 in May and 17-10 in June before stumbling to 7-18 in July. The key will be the offense, which scored 151 runs in June but just 98 in July. Junior Caminero saw his OPS drop 150 points; Jonathan Aranda dropped over 100 points and then fractured his wrist; Brandon Lowe got injured and had just two RBIs in nine games (he’s back now); and Josh Lowe hit .186. The odds are slim, but we’ve learned to never count out the Rays.

How do they get in? The starting pitching will have to improve, as the Cardinals rank 25th in rotation ERA and 29th in strikeout rate. That suggests improvement — at least enough to produce a late surge — is unlikely. Oh, the offense also tanked in July.

It looks as if it will be a third straight season without making the playoffs. No wonder attendance has declined to its lowest per-game average since 1995 (not including 2021) and because that was the post-strike year, the lowest in a non-strike-affected year since 1984.

How do they get in? When the Marlins swept the Yankees last weekend to climb to .500, they momentarily offered a glimpse of hope, climbing six games out of a wild card. Then they lost three of four, so their playoff odds have dipped back to around 1%. You never know, of course, and maybe Sandy Alcantara will suddenly reel off eight Cy Young-caliber starts in a row.

Sports

‘Cool milestone’: Verlander gets 3,500th career K

Published

10 hours ago

August 11, 2025

admin

'Cool milestone': Verlander gets 3,500th career K

ESPN News Services

Aug 10, 2025, 07:58 PM ET

SAN FRANCISCO — Justin Verlander added another memorable chapter to his legendary pitching career Sunday, yet was hardly in the mood to celebrate.

Verlander struck out the side in the first inning against the Nationals to become the 10th pitcher in MLB history to reach 3,500 career strikeouts. Not long after, things began to unravel for the three-time Cy Young Award winner as the Giants dropped an 8-0 decision to Washington in front of 40,000 fans at Oracle Park.

Washington scored four times in the second inning and five overall on 11 hits against Verlander in the latest outing in what has been a season-long struggle for the 42-year-old.

“I was happy to get there, happy to have a moment with the fans,” said Verlander, who is 1-9 in 20 starts with the Giants and has a 4.53 ERA. “Cool milestone. I really appreciate what it’s taken to get there.”

Verlander hasn’t given the Giants much to celebrate this season, though he had been in the best stretch of the season before getting roughed up Sunday. In his three previous games, Verlander had a 0.60 ERA with 14 strikeouts in 15 innings.

He finished with six strikeouts against the Nationals, but spent most of his postgame media session focused on his season rather than the 3,500 strikeouts.

Though acknowledging frustration about his 2025 results, Verlander likened his performances to the 2022 campaign, when he went 18-4 with a 1.75 ERA with the Houston Astros en route to winning his third Cy Young.

“Stuff’s great, stuff’s fine,” Verlander said. “I’ve spent a lot of the season looking at comparables. It’s right on par, literally almost up and down the board, with [2022] when I won the Cy Young. So, I think the stuff is just fine. The results have been frustrating.”

With 3,503 career strikeouts after Sunday’s outing, Verlander trails Walter Johnson by 11 strikeouts for ninth most on the all-time list.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Sports

Raleigh clubs MLB-best 45th HR in Mariners’ win

Published

10 hours ago

August 11, 2025

admin

Raleigh clubs MLB-best 45th HR in Mariners' win

ESPN News Services

Aug 10, 2025, 07:35 PM ET

SEATTLE — Cal Raleigh hit his major-league-leading 45th home run in a four-run first inning, and the Seattle Mariners hung on for a 6-3 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday.

Raleigh’s two-run shot came off Rays starter Adrian Houser, before Eugenio Suarez added a two-run single for the M’s in the first.

Raleigh, who went 1-for-5, joins Ken Griffey Jr. as the only Mariners players to hit 45 home runs in a season, according to ESPN Research. Griffey did it 5 times.

Raleigh also moved into a tie with Johnny Bench (1970) at second all time for most homers by a catcher in a season. The Kansas City Royals‘ Salvador Perez belted 48 in 2021.

Raleigh homered in all three games of the series.

Sunday’s win was Seattle’s seventh straight, the longest active run in the American League. Josh Naylor also homered for the M’s, who wrapped up a 9-1 homestand.

Seattle starter Bryan Woo (10-6) allowed three runs on seven hits over six innings with nine strikeouts. It was his 23rd start this season of six innings or more. Woo, who walked one batter, also tied the MLB record set by Hall of Fame pitcher Juan Marichal in 1968 for the most consecutive games at the start of the season pitching that long and also allowing two walks or fewer.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.