How Jose Abreu went from career lows to ALCS dominance
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Buster Olney, ESPN Senior Writer
ARLINGTON, Texas — In the worst of times for Jose Abreu, among the many days and weeks of professional failure for someone who had had so much success, he ran into Reggie Jackson, the Hall of Famer who serves as an adviser in the Houston Astros organization, at Minute Maid Park. The two men walked across the outfield early one May afternoon, and Abreu, speaking in Spanish, quietly “talked and talked and talked,” Jackson recalled late Thursday night. And Jackson listened.
Maybe Abreu sought out Jackson because he’s a former MVP, someone who could relate to Abreu’s challenges as a slugger with high expectations for himself. Maybe it was because Jackson is part of the Astros’ leadership. Or maybe it was because Jackson understands what it means to be a star moving from one team to another and feeling like you’re letting new teammates down. What Abreu said to Jackson that day — the feelings he expressed — now must feel like some nightmare, one that he has moved beyond to assume his intended role as a clubhouse and production leader.
Abreu clubbed a pivotal three-run homer in the Astros’ 10-3 wipeout of Texas in Game 4 of the American League Championship Series Thursday night, and after he waded through 20 minutes of media questions about his restored preeminence, describing a strange tag that he made to blunt a Texas Rangers rally and laughing about his first stolen base in 925 days, Abreu walked over to teammate Martin Maldonado, grinning. He lifted a fist, as if he was going to club his friend, before gently tapping Maldonado on the back. Each chuckled, sharing silent emotions.
A moment like Abreu had in Game 4, Maldonado said later, “couldn’t happen to a better person, after everything he has been through; it has been tough.”
After a first half that ranks among the lowest in his career — his .537 April OPS was the worst of any month he’s ever had –, Abreu is mashing again, wrecking the line scores of pitchers. He’s clubbed four homers in eight games in this postseason, driving in 11 runs, the sort of production the Astros envisioned when they signed Abreu to a three-year, $58.5 million deal in the offseason. Houston added an experienced, dangerous slugger capable of punishing as Abreu follows Yordan Alvarez in the lineup.
The Astros and Rangers were tied 3-all in Game 4 when Houston hitting coach Alex Cintron pulled Abreu, getting ready to bat in the fourth inning, aside in the dugout. Cintron showed him videotape of Abreu’s plate appearance in the second inning, with a side-by-side comparison from an at-bat in September. Cintron told Abreu that he needed to be sure to keep his weight on his right leg a little longer, rather than to spin out. By the time Abreu strode into the batter’s box, the Astros led 4-3 after Alvarez drove home a run with a deep sacrifice fly. Cody Bradford, the left-hander brought in to face Alvarez, now had to deal with Abreu — with two runners on base. Bradford tried to pump a 91 mph fastball past him.
Without success. Out in the visitors bullpen, the Astros’ Hunter Brown initially thought he might be able to catch Abreu’s drive, only to watch it soar into the seats way over his head, 438 feet from home plate. Abreu trotted around the bases, and teammates spilled onto the apron of the Houston dugout, celebrating, pointing at him. Javier Bracamonte, an Astros’ coach in the bullpen, ran around happily among the relievers. Afterward, Abreu would look at Cintron’s tablet again, to see the at-bat once more.
“It was a great swing,” Abreu would later say in Spanish. “I think the team, in that moment, needed something to open up the scoring a little bit more. Just grateful for what life has given me. … It was a really pretty swing. When I watched it back on the iPad, it reminded me of who I am.”
Teammate Mauricio Dubon said, “He’s an ox. He’s a strong man. There’s nothing to be surprised about.”
One inning later, Abreu came up big again. The Rangers started to counterattack, with two runners on base and nobody out in the fifth inning. Corey Seager smashed a line drive — right at Abreu, who speared the ball and tried to tag out Marcus Semien as the runner slid back into first base. Semien was called safe, but the Astros asked for a replay review, which would show what Abreu said he felt — that he had brushed the batting glove hanging out of Semien’s back pocket. The call was overturned.
In the dugout, Astros manager Dusty Baker joked with Abreu, who was born in Cuba, that he knew there was no football in Abreu’s homeland, “but you’ve got to tackle him and make sure he doesn’t get to the bag.”
Abreu would walk in the seventh, steal second base — his first steal in 925 days — and score again. The Astros evened the series at 2-all, and now Jose Abreu and his teammates are two wins away from reaching the World Series, two victories away from having a shot at becoming the first team in 23 years to win back-to-back titles. Back in spring training, a friend had asked Abreu if it was difficult after leaving the White Sox, an organization he had played for, won his MVP for, over nine seasons. “What are you talking about?” he retorted. “I’m with the champs.”
Abreu began working out in the Astros’ camp well before it officially opened in mid-February, wanting to indoctrinate himself as quickly as possible, and out of excitement for the opportunity to augment a roster that had just won the 2023 World Series. He said he felt right away as if he was welcomed like family.
Abreu would need the full support of teammates, because he had a horrific start: before he hit his first homer in his 51st game with the team, he was hitting .214 — lots of singles, very little power. And the more he struggled, the more work that he put in to try to revitalize his offense. Cintron began to view Abreu’s relentless diligence as a problem. As Abreu relentlessly took batting practice, his coaches believed, he was sapping his energy day after day — and likely prolonging his slump.
On that May day when Abreu walked with Jackson, he assured Jackson that he was working hard, that he was trying to get better. He apologized for how he had performed. He felt bad about how he was doing, Jackson recalled. And he said how much he appreciated all the support he was feeling, from ownership and the front office and Baker and his teammates.
But it took several more months — and a more drastic intervention — before Abreu’s season turned around. He had a sore back, and staffers talked to him about going on the injured list. Abreu pushed back on that idea. He felt like he needed to stay on the field, something he’d always done with the White Sox; in six of his eight full seasons in Chicago, he played in at least 152 games.
He finally relented and was placed on the injured list Aug. 10, getting a chance to let his body and his mind heal. “After that,” Cintron said, “he was a different guy.”
Abreu had 34 hits in his last 31 regular-season games, with eight homers among 16 extra-base hits, and staffers sensed him relaxing. On Thursday night, Abreu told the horseshoe of reporters who surrounded him, “I’m somebody who likes to read. I’m somebody who likes to think positively, listen to stuff about motivation, things like that. I have to acknowledge my family. My wife has always been there for me. My kids are a major motivation to stay positive every day, because they demand more of me each day.”
“This team has helped me in any way possible to be in the best position possible to compete, and I’m grateful to all of them — all of the guys here, the coaches. They’ve always been there for me. All I should really say, truly, is ‘thank you’ to all these guys here who have supported me every step of the way.”
And now, in October, he is rewarding Baker, Jackson and his teammates for their faith in him, for their trust.
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Bradford Doolittle
Ichiro Suzuki became the first Japanese-born player to be elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, falling one vote shy of unanimous selection, and he’ll be joined in the Class of 2025 by starting pitcher CC Sabathia and closer Billy Wagner.
Suzuki, who got 393 of 394 votes in balloting of the Baseball Writers Association of America, would have joined Yankees great Mariano Rivera (2019) as the only unanimous selections. Instead, Suzuki’s 99.746% of the vote is second only to Derek Jeter’s 99.748% (396 of 397 ballots cast in 2020) as the highest plurality for a position player in Hall of Fame voting, per the BBWAA.
“There was a time when I didn’t even get a chance to play in the MLB,” Suzuki told MLB TV. “So what an honor it is to be for me to be here and be a Hall of Famer.”
Suzuki collected 2,542 of his 3,089 career hits as a member of the Seattle Mariners. Before that, he collected 1,278 hits in the Nippon Professional Baseball league in Japan, giving him more overall hits (4,367) than Pete Rose, MLB’s all-time leader.
Suzuki did not debut in MLB until he was 27 years old, but he exploded on the scene in 2001 by winning Rookie of the Year and MVP honors in his first season, leading Seattle to a record-tying 116 regular-season wins.
Suzuki and Sabathia finished first and second in 2001 voting for American League Rookie of the year and later were teammates for two seasons with the Yankees.
Sabathia, who won 251 career games, was also on the ballot for the first time. He was the 2007 AL Cy Young winner while with Cleveland and a six-time All-Star. His 3,093 career strikeouts make him one of 19 members of the 3,000-strikeout club. He was named on 86.8% of the ballots
Wagner’s 422 career saves — 225 of which came with the Houston Astros — are the eighth-most in big league history. His selection comes in his 10th and final appearance on the BBWAA ballot, earning 82.5% for the seven-time All-Star.
Just falling short in the balloting was outfielder Carlos Beltran, who was named on 70.3% of ballots, shy of the 75% threshold necessary for election.
Beltran won 1999 AL Rookie of the Year honors while with Kansas City. He went on to make nine All-Star teams and become one of five players in history with at least 400 homers and 300 stolen bases.
A key member and clubhouse leader of the controversial 2017 World Series champion Astros, whose legacy was tainted by a sign-stealing scandal, Beltran’s selection would have bode well for other members of that squad who will be under consideration in the years to come.
Also coming up short was 10-time Gold Glove outfielder Andruw Jones, who was named on 76.2% of the ballots. Jones saw an uptick from last year’s total (61.6%) and still has two more years of ballot eligibility remaining.
PED-associated players on the ballot didn’t make much headway in the balloting. Alex Rodriguez finished with 37.1%, while Manny Ramirez was at 34.3%.
The three BBWAA electees will join Dick Allen and Dave Parker, who were selected by the Contemporary Baseball Era Committee in December, in being honored at the induction ceremony on July 27 at the Clark Sports Center in Cooperstown, New York.
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Ryan McGee
ATLANTA — The 2025 edition of the College Football Playoff National Championship game was not about vengeance. It wasn’t about proving people wrong. Nor was it about wadding up a scarlet and gray rag and stuffing it directly into the mouths of the chorale of outside noise.
Bless their hearts, that’s what the Ohio State football team and coaching staff kept telling us. That beating Notre Dame on Monday night and winning the school’s first national title in a decade wasn’t about any of that stuff.
But yeah, it totally was.
“We worked really hard to tune out the outside noise, truly,” confessed Ohio State quarterback Will Howard, words spoken on the field moments after having a national champions T-shirt pulled over his shoulders and punctuated by slaps to those shoulders from his current teammates as well as Buckeyes of days gone by. “But outside noise can also be a great way to bring a team together. You close the doors to the locker room to lock all that out, bunker down together and go to work. That’s what it did for us. I think anyone on this team will tell you that.”
Well, now they will. Finally.
The “it’s not about that” mantra was what the Buckeyes kept repeating, in unison, beginning way back in the summer weeks leading into a campaign when they were voted No. 2 in the nation in both preseason polls. Those expectations were earned in no small part because of a much-hyped offseason, powered by an NIL shopping spree worth $20 million, according to athletic director Ross Bjork, to lure transfers from around the nation.
We were told that, no, it wasn’t about those players justifying their decisions to change teams. Like Howard, who came to Ohio State from Kansas State, and running back Quinshon Judkins, who became a Buckeye after carrying the football at Ole Miss. Both are still viewed as traitors by many at the places they departed. But no, it was never about sending a message that they were right to pack up and move to Columbus.
Yeah, right.
“When people asked me why I left Ole Miss to come here, my answer was always the same: To go somewhere that I could win a national championship,” said Judkins, who scored three of Ohio State’s four touchdowns against the Fighting Irish. He grew up one state over from the site of the CFP title game, 270 miles away in Montgomery, Alabama. “Now, that championship has happened. And I’m not going to lie: To do it back here in the South, in Atlanta, in front of so many people who have known about me all the way back to high school, that makes it even more special.”
We were told that, no, it wasn’t about the all-star coaching staff, including offensive coordinator Chip Kelly, who once served as head coach with the Oregon Ducks, Philadelphia Eagles and San Francisco 49ers and left the same gig at UCLA to take a demotion at Ohio State. In no way was this winter about proving that Kelly hadn’t lost the edge that once had him hailed as a mastermind of modern football offenses.
Um, OK.
“For me, it feels good to have fun again,” said Kelly, 61, flashing a face-splitter grin rarely seen during his NFL and UCLA tenures. Buckeyes coach Ryan Day, 45, is a Kelly protégé, having been coached by Kelly as a New Hampshire player. Kelly’s playcalling that has been a CFP bulldozer scored touchdowns on Ohio State’s first four drives. “I never forgot how to coach. But maybe I forgot how to have fun at the job.”
“I know this,” Kelly added, laughing. “It’s a lot more fun when you’re moving the football and winning.”
And, man, we were told so many times that in no way was this season or postseason about hitting a reset button on the perception of Day, in his sixth season as the leader of an Ohio State football program that is second to none when it comes to pride but also exceeded by none when it comes to pressure. Day dipped deep from that “Guys, it’s not about me” well on the evening of Nov. 30, after his fourth straight regular-season defeat at the hands of arch nemesis Michigan. When the Buckeyes were awarded an at-large berth in the newly expanded 12-team CFP, he once again implored to anyone who would listen that the narrative of his team’s postseason should be about its destiny rather than the future of the coach.
For a month of CFP games and days, all the way up until Monday’s kickoff, Day reminded us all that none of this was about him. Even though a security detail was assigned to his home in Columbus ever since the Michigan game. Even as the internet was aflame with posts about his job security and memes questioning his choice of beard dyes. Even as, in the days leading into the title game, his wife opened up to a Columbus TV station about the family’s dealings with death threats.
And even as, during the championship game itself, Ohio State’s seemingly insurmountable lead shrank from 31-7 midway through the third quarter to a scant eight points in the closing minutes.
But as the clock finally hit zeroes and the scoreboard read “Ohio State 34, Notre Dame 23” with OSU-colored confetti raining down over the Buckeyes’ heads, the story — as told by the team itself — was indeed suddenly about Day, and his staff, and his players, and their shared personification of the T-shirts and flags worn by so many of their supporters among the 77,660 in attendance: “OHIO AGAINST THE WORLD.”
Even if, for them, sometimes Ohio’s flagship football team found itself up against a not-insignificant percentage of Ohio itself, including the folks who refused to attend the CFP opener in Columbus because they were still mad about the Michigan defeat and no doubt will still consider this natty as having an asterisk because of that same loss.
Because for all of Day & Co.’s talk of this not being about revenge, the truth was revealed on their postgame faces. Their shared expressions of restraint, the ones we’d seen all fall, were instantly replaced by a collective look of relief. Their frowns washed away by Gatorade dumps, revealing the smiles of men who had indeed just sent a message and were finally willing to admit that had been their motivation all along.
You only had to ask. Because, finally, they would answer.
“I feel like, from the start of this thing, we were knocking on the door. But you have to find a way to break through and make it to where we are right now,” said Day, no longer stiff-arming the question but definitely still working to stifle his emotion. “In this day and age, there’s so much noise. Social media. People have to write articles. But when you sign up for this job, when you agree to coach at Ohio State, that’s part of the job.
“I’m a grown-up. I can take it. But the hard part is your family having to live with it. The players you bring in, them having to live with it. Their families. In the end, that’s how you build a football family. Take the stuff that people want to use to tear you apart and try to turn that into something that makes you closer.”
For 3 hours and 20 minutes, the Buckeyes pushed back on Notre Dame with both hands. They also pushed back on those would-be team destroyers and head coach firers. When it was over, they extended one finger in the direction of those same haters. It wasn’t a middle finger, but it was close. It was the finger that soon will be fitted for a national championship ring.
“Ohio State might not be for everybody,” Day added, smiling once again. “But it’s certainly for these guys.”
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