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Before we get to bowl season, we need to get through awards season, and this year’s group of nominees are a who’s who of college football’s best.

Michael Penix Jr., Jayden Daniels, Brock Bowers, Marvin Harrison Jr. and more will all be looking to take home hardware at this year’s “Home Depot College Football Awards” on Friday (7 p.m. ET on ESPN/ESPN App) .

Here are our picks for who should be honored — and who will actually nab the trophies.

Chuck Bednarik Award (defensive player of the year)

Finalists: UCLA‘s Laiatu Latu, Alabama‘s Dallas Turner and NC State‘s Payton Wilson

Who should win: Wilson

It’s easy to look at something as simple as sacks and peg Latu or Turner as the favorite here, but the award goes to the best overall defender, and it’s impossible to ignore Wilson’s all-around dominance. He’s one of just 24 Power 5 linebackers to have at least 75 snaps as a pass-rusher and 250 or more in coverage, and of that group, Wilson has the best tackle rate (94.9%), the most run stuffs (25), the most tackles for loss (17.5), the most takeaways (5) and the most passes defended (8) — not to mention the most tackles overall (138). He’s one of just two players to have made or assisted on a TFL in every game this season, and he leads all Power 5 defenders in tackles at or behind the line of scrimmage (37). Since 2018, he’s one of just three players to rack up 100 tackles, 15 TFLs, 5 sacks and 3 interceptions in the same season. He has done everything.

Who will win: Latu

We’re not saying voters are easily swayed by one or two gaudy stats, but Latu has the sexiest numbers of any of the nominees: 13 sacks (most in Power 5) and 21.5 tackles for loss (most in FBS). He’s more of a one-trick pony than Wilson — but it’s a pretty darned impressive trick.


Fred Biletnikoff Award (outstanding receiver)

Finalists: Ohio State‘s Marvin Harrison Jr., LSU‘s Malik Nabers and Washington‘s Rome Odunze

Who should win: Odunze

All due respect to the other two finalists, but when Washington — the No. 2 overall playoff seed — had its season on the line, it put the ball in Odunze’s hands because, as coach Kalen DeBoer said, he was the best player on the field. Odunze’s 81 catches, 1,428 yards and 13 touchdowns are all impressive — though, in fairness, all fall short of the stats compiled by Nabers. But Odunze has a higher catch rate on contested throws and a higher rate of first downs, and it’s impossible to ignore how critical some of his catches were in shaping the playoff race in 2023.

Who will win: Harrison

Honestly, pick any one of the three, and you’d get little pushback. They all have a compelling case, they’re all more than deserving, and all three have been among the very best players at any position this season. But it’s hard to imagine Harrison’s Ohio State career coming and going without him taking home this trophy. He has been so dominant — and at times this year, as the only real offensive threat on the field — that this feels as much a lifetime achievement award as it is one for the best receiver in 2023.


Lou Groza Collegiate Place-Kicker Award (outstanding place-kicker)

Finalists: Miami (Ohio)‘s Graham Nicholson, UNLV‘s Jose Pizano and Alabama’s Will Reichard

Who should win: Pizano

He missed just two kicks all season, and was a perfect 16-of-16 on anything less than 40 yards. He connected on both of his attempts beyond 50, so he has the leg. But the most impressive thing about Pizano’s efforts were the impact his kicks had on UNLV’s season. Six of his field goals put the Rebels ahead. In the playoff era, Pizano is one of just 10 kickers to have at least 20 made field goals, connect on at least 90% of his tries and have six or more of those kicks put his team ahead. Three have won the Groza, and the others all came in seasons in which another kicker with the same marks won it. Pizano is the only kicker to hit those marks in 2023.

Who will win: Reichard

Kicks at Alabama tend to get noticed a lot more than kicks at Miami (Ohio) or UNLV.


Ray Guy Award (punter of the year)

Finalists: Vanderbilt‘s Matthew Hayball, Florida State‘s Alex Mastromanno and Iowa‘s Tory Taylor

Who should win: Taylor

Have you watched any Iowa football lately? Punting is kind of a big deal. Indeed, when a fan base openly roots for punts, it is both an indictment of the offense and a serious point of pride for the guy booting those punts. Taylor certainly gave his fans their money’s worth. He punted 86 times this season — 11 more than any other player in the country. He racked up 4,119 punt yards, 752 more than anyone else and 1,014 more yards than Iowa’s offense managed. (In fact, Taylor punted for more yards than 33 offenses in FBS.)

Who will win: Taylor

Not only should he win, they should probably name a street after him in Iowa City.


Maxwell Award (college player of the year)

Finalists: LSU’s Jayden Daniels, Oregon‘s Bo Nix and Washington’s Michael Penix Jr.

Who should win: Daniels

There are lots of ways to measure who the best player in college football is, but here’s one pretty simple metric: Who averaged the most yards? That’d be Daniels … by an incredible 74 yards per game. OK, another one: Who was responsible for the most touchdowns? Again, it’s Daniels with 50 (40 passing and 10 rushing), who had four more total TDs than Nix despite playing one fewer game. Here’s one more amazing stat for the LSU QB: In the history of college football, only one player has ever had 50 touchdowns, committed five or fewer turnovers and averaged 400 yards of offense per game. That’s Daniels. No one else is close.

Who will win: Daniels

In eight of the past nine years, the Maxwell winner has also taken home the Heisman. Here’s guessing Daniels makes it nine of 10.


Davey O’Brien National Quarterback Award (best quarterback)

Finalists: LSU’s Jayden Daniels, Oregon’s Bo Nix and Washington’s Michael Penix Jr.

Who should win: Daniels

As noted above, he was quite good at pretty much everything.

Who will win: Penix

Unlike the Maxwell Award, the Davey O’Brien tends to differ a bit from the Heisman and leans toward quarterbacks who also won a bunch of games. That might be the edge Penix needs to win it. Because while Nix had the nifty completion percentage, he lost head-to-head against Penix twice. And while Daniels’ stat line is on another planet, LSU never sniffed the playoff, while Penix has his Washington Huskies in the mix for a national title.


Outland Trophy (most outstanding interior lineman)

Finalists: Notre Dame‘s Joe Alt, Kansas State‘s Cooper Beebe and TexasT’Vondre Sweat

Who should win: Alt

The Notre Dame left tackle has been arguably the best offensive lineman in the country the past two seasons. He graded out as Pro Football Focus’ top tackle for the second straight season, and his numbers support the placement. He allowed just three pressures and one sack all season from his left tackle spot, and on 347 run-blocking snaps, he blew just two.

Who will win: Alt

All three finalists had tremendous seasons, but sometimes the obvious pick is obvious for a reason.


Paycom Jim Thorpe Award (best defensive back)

Finalists: Iowa’s Cooper DeJean, Georgia‘s Malaki Starks and Air Force‘s Trey Taylor

Who should win: Taylor

He’s the odd man out when it comes to notoriously tough defenses, but the numbers make Taylor’s case pretty easy. He has more interceptions (3) than DeJean or Starks. He has 30 more tackles (71) than Starks and 40 more than DeJean. He allowed just 72 total yards on 21 targets in coverage, posting an eye-popping 0.22 yards per coverage snap.

Who will win: Starks

DeJean missed three games down the stretch. Taylor plays in the Mountain West. Starks played on a team that spent the bulk of the season atop the rankings. At the end of the day, Starks was certainly good enough to win — 51 tackles, 7 pass breakups, 2 interceptions, 0.4 yards per coverage snap — but the extra eyeballs on his games certainly don’t hurt.


Doak Walker Award (premier running back)

Finalists: Oklahoma State‘s Ollie Gordon II, North Carolina‘s Omarion Hampton and Missouri‘s Cody Schrader

Who should win: Gordon

Gordon led the nation in rushing yards (1,614), finished second in rushing TDs (20) and finished third among Power 5 backs in yards per rush. He topped 100 yards in eight of his past 10 games and had one stretch of three straight games with more than 270 yards of total offense.

Who will win: Gordon

Among the finalists, he has the most rushing yards, most touchdowns, best yards-per-carry average and the most scrimmage yards, while also being the only one of the three to play for a conference title. Sometimes it’s easy.


John Mackey Award (outstanding tight end)

Finalists: Ohio State’s Cade Stover, Georgia’s Brock Bowers and Colorado State‘s Dallin Holker

Who should win: Bowers

OK, so he missed three games. What Bowers does in 10 games is more than what most tight ends do in … a lifetime? Despite running nearly half as many routes as Holker, Bowers finished with the same number of receiving TDs (six) and just eight fewer catches and 43 fewer yards.

Who will win: Bowers

He’ll take his trophy and every defensive coordinator in the SEC will breathe a sigh of relief that they won’t have to see him again in a Georgia uniform.

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Remembering Ruffian 50 years after her breakdown at Belmont

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Remembering Ruffian 50 years after her breakdown at Belmont

Thoroughbred racing suffered its most ignominious, industry-deflating moment 50 years ago today with the breakdown of Ruffian, an undefeated filly running against Foolish Pleasure in a highly promoted match race at Belmont Park. Her tragic end on July 6, 1975, was a catastrophe for the sport, and observers say racing has never truly recovered.

Two years earlier, during the rise of second-wave feminism, the nation had been mesmerized by a “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. King’s win became a rallying cry for women everywhere. The New York Racing Association, eager to boost daily racing crowds in the mid-1970s, proposed a competition similar to that of King and Riggs. They created a match race between Kentucky Derby winner Foolish Pleasure and Ruffian, the undefeated filly who had dominated all 10 of her starts, leading gate to wire.

“In any sport, human or equine, it’s really impossible to say who was the greatest,” said outgoing Jockey Club chairman Stuart Janney III, whose parents, Stuart and Barbara, owned Ruffian. “But I’m always comfortable thinking of Ruffian as being among the four to five greatest horses of all time.”

Ruffian, nearly jet black in color and massive, was the equine version of a Greek goddess. At the age of 2, her girth — the measurement of the strap that secures the saddle — was just over 75 inches. Comparatively, racing legend Secretariat, a male, had a 76-inch girth when he was fully developed at the age of 4.

Her name also added to the aura. “‘Ruffian’ was a little bit of a stretch because it tended to be what you’d name a colt, but it turned out to be an appropriate name,” Janney said.

On May 22, 1974, Ruffian equaled a Belmont Park track record, set by a male, in her debut at age 2, winning by 15 lengths. She set a stakes record later that summer at Saratoga in the Spinaway, the most prestigious race of the year for 2-year-old fillies. The next spring, she blew through races at longer distances, including the three races that made up the so-called Filly Triple Crown.

Some in the media speculated that she had run out of female competition.

Foolish Pleasure had meanwhile ripped through an undefeated 2-year-old season with championship year-end honors. However, after starting his sophomore campaign with a win, he finished third in the Florida Derby. He also had recovered from injuries to his front feet to win the Wood Memorial and then the Kentucky Derby.

Second-place finishes in the Preakness and Belmont Stakes left most observers with the idea that Foolish Pleasure was the best 3-year-old male in the business.

Following the Belmont Stakes, New York officials wanted to test the best filly against the best colt.

The original thought was to include the Preakness winner, Master Derby, in the Great Match Race, but the team of Foolish Pleasure’s owner, trainer and rider didn’t want a three-horse race. Since New York racing had guaranteed $50,000 to the last-place horse, they paid Master Derby’s connections $50,000 not to race. Thus, the stage was set for an equine morality play.

“[Ruffian’s] abilities gave her the advantage in the match race,” Janney said. “If she could do what she did in full fields [by getting the early lead], then it was probably going to be even more effective in a match.”

Several ballyhooed match races in sports history had captured the world’s attention without incident — Seabiscuit vs. Triple Crown winner War Admiral in 1938, Alsab vs. Triple Crown winner Whirlaway in 1942, and Nashua vs. Swaps in 1955. None of those races, though, had the gender divide “it” factor.

The Great Match Race attracted 50,000 live attendees and more than 18 million TV viewers on CBS, comparable to the Grammy Awards and a pair of NFL “Sunday Night Football” games in 2024.

Prominent New York sportswriter Dick Young wrote at the time that, for women, “Ruffian was a way of getting even.”

“I can remember driving up the New Jersey Turnpike, and the lady that took the toll in one of those booths was wearing a button that said, ‘I’m for her,’ meaning Ruffian,” Janney said.

As the day approached, Ruffian’s rider, Jacinto Vasquez, who also was the regular rider of Foolish Pleasure including at the Kentucky Derby, had to choose whom to ride for the match race.

“I had ridden Foolish Pleasure, and I knew what he could do,” Vasquez told ESPN. “But I didn’t think he could beat the filly. He didn’t have the speed or stamina.”

Braulio Baeza, who had ridden Foolish Pleasure to victory in the previous year’s premier 2-year-old race, Hopeful Stakes, was chosen to ride Foolish Pleasure.

“I had ridden Foolish Pleasure and ridden against Ruffian,” Baeza said, with language assistance from his wife, Janice Blake. “I thought Foolish Pleasure was better than Ruffian. She just needed [early race] pressure because no one had ever pressured her.”

The 1⅛ mile race began at the start of the Belmont Park backstretch in the chute. In an ESPN documentary from 2000, Jack Whitaker, who hosted the race telecast for CBS, noted that the atmosphere turned eerie with dark thunderclouds approaching before the race.

Ruffian hit the side of the gate when the doors opened but straightened herself out quickly and assumed the lead. “The whole world, including me, thought that Ruffian was going to run off the screen and add to her legacy,” said longtime New York trainer Gary Contessa, who was a teenager when Ruffian ruled the racing world.

However, about ⅛ of a mile into the race, the force of Ruffian’s mighty strides snapped two bones in her front right leg.

“When she broke her leg, it sounded like a broken stick,” Vasquez said. “She broke her leg between her foot and her ankle. When I pulled up, the bone was shattered above the ankle. She couldn’t use that leg at all.”

It took Ruffian a few moments to realize what had happened to her, so she continued to run. Vasquez eventually hopped off and kept his shoulder leaning against her for support.

“You see it, but you don’t want to believe it,” Janney said.

Baeza had no choice but to have Foolish Pleasure finish the race in what became a macabre paid workout. The TV cameras followed him, but the eyes of everyone at the track were on the filly, who looked frightened as she was taken back to the barn area.

“When Ruffian broke down, time stood still that day,” Contessa said. Yet time was of the essence in an attempt to save her life.

Janney said that Dr. Frank Stinchfield — who was the doctor for the New York Yankees then and was “ahead of his time in fixing people’s bones” — called racing officials to see whether there was anything he could do to help with Ruffian.

New York veterinarian Dr. Manny Gilman managed to sedate Ruffian, performed surgery on her leg and, with Stinchfield’s help, secured her leg in an inflatable cast. When Ruffian woke up in the middle of the night, though, she started fighting and shattered her bones irreparably. Her team had no choice but to euthanize her at approximately 2:20 a.m. on July 7.

“She was going full bore trying to get in front of [Foolish Pleasure] out of the gate,” Baeza said. “She gave everything there. She gave her life.”

Contessa described the time after as a “stilled hush over the world.”

“When we got the word that she had rebroken her leg, the whole world was crying,” Contessa said. “I can’t reproduce the feeling that I had the day after.”

The Janneys soon flew to Maine for the summer, and they received a round of applause when the pilot announced their presence. At the cottage, they were met by thousands of well-wishing letters.

“We all sat there, after dinner every night, and we wrote every one of them back,” Janney said. “It was pretty overwhelming, and that didn’t stop for a long time. I still get letters.”

Equine fatalities have been part of the business since its inception, like the Triple Crown races and Breeders’ Cup. Some have generated headlines by coming in clusters, such as Santa Anita in 2019 and Churchill Downs in 2023. However, breakdowns are not the only factor, and likely not the most influential one, in the gradual decline of horse racing’s popularity in this country.

But the impact from the day of Ruffian’s death, and that moment, has been ongoing for horse racing.

“There are people who witnessed the breakdown and never came back,” Contessa said.

Said Janney: “At about that time, racing started to disappear from the national consciousness. The average person knows about the Kentucky Derby, and that’s about it.”

Equine racing today is a safer sport now than it was 50 years ago. The Equine Injury Database, launched by the Jockey Club in 2008, says the fatality rate nationally in 2024 was just over half of what it was at its launch.

“We finally have protocols that probably should have been in effect far sooner than this,” Contessa said. “But the protocols have made this a safer game.”

Said Vasquez: “There are a lot of nice horses today, but to have a horse like Ruffian, it’s unbelievable. Nobody could compare to Ruffian.”

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Volpe toss hits Judge as sloppy Yanks fall again

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Volpe toss hits Judge as sloppy Yanks fall again

NEW YORK — A blunder that typifies the current state of the New York Yankees, who find themselves in the midst of their second six-game losing streak in three weeks, happened in front of 41,401 fans at Citi Field on Saturday, and almost nobody noticed.

The Yankees were jogging off the field after securing the third out of the fourth inning of their 12-6 loss to the Mets when shortstop Anthony Volpe, as is standard for teams across baseball at the end of innings, threw the ball to right fielder Aaron Judge as he crossed into the infield from right field.

Only Judge wasn’t looking, and the ball nailed him in the head, knocking his sunglasses off and leaving a small cut near his right eye. The wound required a bandage to stop the bleeding, but Judge stayed in the game.

“Confusion,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I didn’t know what happened initially. [It just] felt like something happened. Of course I was a little concerned.”

Avoiding an injury to the best player in baseball was on the Yankees’ very short list of positives in another sloppy, draining defeat to their crosstown rivals. With the loss, the Yankees, who held a three-game lead over the Toronto Blue Jays in the American League East standings entering June 30, find themselves tied with the Tampa Bay Rays for second place three games behind the Blue Jays heading into Sunday’s Subway Series finale.

The nosedive has been fueled by messy defense and a depleted pitching staff that has encountered a wall.

“It’s been a terrible week,” said Boone, who before the game announced starter Clarke Schmidt will likely undergo season-ending Tommy John surgery.

For the second straight day, the Mets capitalized on mistakes and cracked timely home runs. After slugging three homers in Friday’s series opener, the Mets hit three more Saturday — a grand slam in the first inning from Brandon Nimmo to take a 4-0 lead and two home runs from Pete Alonso to widen the gap.

Nimmo’s blast — his second grand slam in four days — came after Yankees left fielder Jasson Dominguez misplayed a ball hit by the Mets’ leadoff hitter in the first inning. On Friday, he misread Nimmo’s line drive and watched it sail over his head for a double. On Saturday, he was slow to react to Starling Marte’s flyball in the left-center field gap and braked without catching or stopping it, allowing Marte to advance to second for a double. Yankees starter Carlos Rodon then walked two batters to load the bases for Nimmo, who yanked a mistake, a 1-2 slider over the wall.

“That slider probably needs to be down,” said Rodon, who allowed seven runs (six earned) over five innings. “A lot of misses today and they punished them.”

Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s throwing woes at third base — a position the Yankees have asked him to play to accommodate DJ LeMahieu at second base — continued in the second inning when he fielded Tyrone Taylor’s groundball and sailed a toss over first baseman Cody Bellinger’s head. Taylor was given second base and scored moments later on Marte’s RBI single.

The Yankees were charged with their second error in the Mets’ four-run seventh inning when center fielder Trent Grisham charged Francisco Lindor’s single up the middle and had it bounce off the heel of his glove.

The mistake allowed a run to score from second base without a throw, extending the Mets lead back to three runs after the Yankees had chipped their deficit, and allowed a heads-up Lindor to advance to second base. Lindor later scored on Alonso’s second home run, a three-run blast off left-hander Jayvien Sandridge in the pitcher’s major league debut.

“Just got to play better,” Judge said. “That’s what it comes down to. It’s fundamentals. Making a routine play, routine. It’s just the little things. That’s what it kind of comes down to. But every good team goes through a couple bumps in the road.”

This six-game losing skid has looked very different from the Yankees’ first. That rough patch, consisting of losses to the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Angels, was propelled by offensive troubles. The Yankees scored six runs in the six games and gave up just 16. This time, run prevention is the issue; the Yankees have scored 34 runs and surrendered 54 in four games against the Blue Jays in Toronto and two in Queens.

“The offense is starting to swing the bat, put some runs on the board,” Boone said. “The pitching, which has kind of carried us a lot this season, has really, really struggled this week. We haven’t caught the ball as well as I think we should.

“So, look, when you live it and you’re going through it, it sucks, it hurts. But you got to be able to handle it. You got to be able to deal with it. You got to be able to weather it and come out of this and grow.”

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Former White Sox pitcher, world champ Jenks dies

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Former White Sox pitcher, world champ Jenks dies

Bobby Jenks, a two-time All-Star pitcher for the Chicago White Sox who was on the roster when the franchise won the 2005 World Series, died Friday in Sintra, Portugal, the team announced.

Jenks, 44, who had been diagnosed with adenocarcinoma, a form of stomach cancer, this year, spent six seasons with the White Sox from 2005 to 2010 and also played for the Boston Red Sox in 2011. The reliever finished his major league career with a 16-20 record, 3.53 ERA and 173 saves.

“We have lost an iconic member of the White Sox family today,” White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement. “None of us will ever forget that ninth inning of Game 4 in Houston, all that Bobby did for the 2005 World Series champions and for the entire Sox organization during his time in Chicago. He and his family knew cancer would be his toughest battle, and he will be missed as a husband, father, friend and teammate. He will forever hold a special place in all our hearts.”

After Jenks moved to Portugal last year, he was diagnosed with a deep vein thrombosis in his right calf. That eventually spread into blood clots in his lungs, prompting further testing. He was later diagnosed with adenocarcinoma and began undergoing radiation.

In February, as Jenks was being treated for the illness, the White Sox posted “We stand with you, Bobby” on Instagram, adding in the post that the club was “thinking of Bobby as he is being treated.”

In 2005, as the White Sox ended an 88-year drought en route to the World Series title, Jenks appeared in six postseason games. Chicago went 11-1 in the playoffs, and he earned saves in series-clinching wins in Game 3 of the ALDS at Boston, and Game 4 of the World Series against the Houston Astros.

In 2006, Jenks saved 41 games, and the following year, he posted 40 saves. He also retired 41 consecutive batters in 2007, matching a record for a reliever.

“You play for the love of the game, the joy of it,” Jenks said in his last interview with SoxTV last year. “It’s what I love to do. I [was] playing to be a world champion, and that’s what I wanted to do from the time I picked up a baseball.”

A native of Mission Hills, California, Jenks appeared in 19 games for the Red Sox and was originally drafted by the then-Anaheim Angels in the fifth round of the 2000 draft.

Jenks is survived by his wife, Eleni Tzitzivacos, their two children, Zeno and Kate, and his four children from a prior marriage, Cuma, Nolan, Rylan and Jackson.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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