Houston Astros superfan Mattress Mack can’t lose, no matter who wins the World Series
INSTEAD OF A bank vault or a Brink’s truck, the betting slips from what could be the largest payout in sports gambling history are being guarded by nothing more than an old, tattered Houston Astros backpack. On a recent Tuesday afternoon in Houston, with the MLB playoffs about to begin, the faded blue nylon bag — its contents worth potentially millions — sits on the floor of the massive Gallery Furniture showroom, just within arm’s reach of its owner: the Houston furniture magnate and Astros superfan Jim McIngvale, better known around these parts and in the world of high-stakes sports gambling as “Mattress Mack.”
Lanky and seemingly equal parts ears, teeth, cowboy boots and charisma, McIngvale has been a household name in Houston for decades thanks to his wacky TV commercials and his Ross Perot delivery. “I just have what you might call a high tolerance for risk,” McIngvale says. “Damon Runyon said ‘All horse players die broke.’ And I know I shouldn’t bet with my heart, but it’s hard not to and it’s a lot more fun.” In 2017, McIngvale gained national notoriety for opening his doors and sheltering hundreds of victims of Hurricane Harvey for weeks inside his furniture showroom, something he also did after Hurricane Katrina years prior. After the storm, as the Astros continued their historic run to the 2017 World Series, McIngvale was in the news yet again, this time for an only-in-Texas furniture promotion through which anyone who bought a mattress from Gallery Furniture would get it for free if the Astros won it all.
In a rather ingenious move at the dawn of the legal sports gambling era, McIngvale hedged his potential business losses by placing seven-figure bets on the Astros. Good thing. He ended up having to refund more than $10 million worth of mattresses. “We take large wagers from sports bettors of all stripes, but I’m not sure anyone does it with as much panache as Mack,” says Ken Fuchs, head of sports at Caesars Entertainment. “That’s why I bring in [Hall of Fame baseball owner and promoter] Bill Veeck as the only comparison with Mack. He’s never afraid to make a statement or take a risk and, clearly, he has fun doing it.”
By the end of the 2017 MLB season, McIngvale was such a Houston institution the Astros brought him along as one of their own for the trip to the White House. “We invited Mack because he had become such an example of everything the Astros and Houston had been through together in that year,” says Anita Sehgal, the Astros’ senior vice president of marketing and communications. “Houstonians have watched him build his life in Houston while giving back every step of the way. That’s why they have a special love for him. For Mack it’s not about words, it’s about action.”
In more ways than one.
Now, five years later, with the Astros poised to face the Philadelphia Phillies in the World Series, McIngvale’s original furniture promotion — and the epic sports bets behind it — have quintupled in size to what is about to be a record-breaking $75 million World Series squeeze play. By the start of the Fall Classic on Friday, McIngvale says he’ll have around $10 million (at an average 7.5-to-1 odds) riding on the Astros. In other words, the exact kind of nerve-frying, death-defying stakes Mattress Mack, 71, has been drawing aces his whole life.
On the eve of the MLB postseason, we spent time with McIngvale for a look behind the scenes at the remarkable life and times of Mattress Mack and the moments during the past four decades that led him to take such a big swing on his hometown team.
“I just get bored to death with stability, which is why I guess I like all of these big bets,” he shrugs, even as he faces the culmination of all his business success, sports-gambling excess and Astros madness. “I thrive on chaos.”
If that’s true, with an entire furniture fortune now riding on the Astros, McIngvale is about to have the time of his life.
IT’S JUST AFTER noon inside the bustling, 110,000-square-foot original Gallery Furniture showroom on the north side of Houston, and McIngvale is where he always is and where he hopes to remain “until I die” — behind the front desk, noshing on an orange and taking customer service calls. While McIngvale, who is worth an estimated $300 million, checks on the delivery status of a bedroom set, visitors wander through the property, a mesmerizing wonderland of furniture, kitsch, memorabilia and community outreach.
The football field-sized warehouse out back is stuffed with mattresses in anticipation of another Astros title. On the north side of the building is a daycare funded by McIngvale. To the south, a trade school. (The saying around here is that since the hurricane this location has become a community center disguised as a furniture showroom.) One 360-degree panorama near the entrance includes, I swear, the customized Texas A&M presidential motor scooter that belonged to George H.W. Bush, four stuffed raccoons playing poker on top of a bar, a glass showcase overflowing with humanitarian awards, a 30-foot nutcracker doll next to a similarly ginormous Christmas tree, a series of paintings of steers relaxing on sofas, a framed excerpt from Thomas Paine’s 1776 “Common Sense,” a 5-foot wooden fish carved from a tree stump and painted like the Texas flag, a six-piece leather, reclining living room set (last one, as is — no returns), a giant slab from a 513-year-old African Bubinga tree, a signed poster from the Chuck Norris movie “Sidekicks” and an ornately framed oil painting portrait of McIngvale’s north star, his father, George Sr.
In the 1960s Jim was a prep football standout at Bishop Lynch High School in Dallas, a school his father helped found. (Jim claims his junior high coach, Bob Barrett, was among the group of officers who arrested Lee Harvey Oswald at the Texas Theatre.) A few years later when a former high school teammate of McIngvale’s didn’t have the money or the means to get back to college, George McIngvale put him in his car and drove him 2,000 miles back to Dartmouth. “My father was a giver, even when he didn’t have money to give, so he died without a lot, but he died very happy,” McIngvale says. “And that spontaneity, that taking care of people, that, maybe not a lot of thinking, but more just ‘ready-fire-aim’ approach to life? That’s where it comes from.”
EVEN THOUGH McINGVALE was a member of the legendary 1969 and 1970 Texas Longhorns football teams that won 30 straight games and back-to-back national titles, you can tell the overall importance of this experience in his life by where the Longhorns team photo is displayed inside Gallery Furniture: right above the customer restrooms. “I was a great football player, I just had two small problems,” McIngvale says. “I was too small and I was too slow.” Spending all that time on the sidelines, however, McIngvale became close with another major influence in his life, Frank Medina, the Longhorns trainer from 1945 to 1978. “He was all of 4-foot-10, but he was a fireball,” McIngvale says. “He’d get right up in your face and scream ‘What are you saving it for, son? Is that all you got?’ And he taught me this line: ‘Ask, take and give no quarter.’ In other words: Never give up and never ask for anything. Do it yourself.”
Before he started selling furniture, McIngvale was a “broke failure” living at home in Dallas, trying to keep the lights on at his first business, a fitness center. Around 1978, hoping to sell some gym memberships, he attended “Muhammad Ali Appreciation Day” at Market Hall in Dallas. Late in Ali’s career, in between fights, the three-time heavyweight champ cashed in on his popularity with barnstorming-type “exhibitions” where he’d spar with local heavyweights and sign autographs for fans. After quickly dispatching a handful of local heavyweight hopefuls, Ali, always the showman, grabbed the ring announcer’s microphone and taunted the crowd: “Any y’all want to fight?”
Only one hand went up.
It was McIngvale’s.
“OK, come on up here then, Great White Hope,” Ali yelled.
Inside the ring, as a trainer laced up McIngvale’s gloves, Ali leaned in and told McIngvale the plan for the spectacle. After sparring for a round, Ali would drop his guard and McIngvale would seemingly knock his lights out, then stand over Ali and taunt the fallen champ. McIngvale did exactly as Ali told him, and when the crowd turned on McIngvale, Ali miraculously sprang back to life, grabbed the mic and confessed to choreographing the entire stunt.
And not a second too soon.
“People in the crowd were already asking my friends, ‘Hey, are you with him?’ And they were like, ‘Uh, no, no, we’re not with him,'” McIngvale says.
McIngvale’s wife, Linda, was with him at the event. “It just showed what a great personality Ali had, and of course Mack loved that side of Ali. [Ali] was obviously the greatest boxer of all time, but what Mack also loved was he was also the greatest promoter of all time, too.”
Says McIngvale, “I just seem to stumble into these things. I’m not shy, and I have a high tolerance for risk. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t.
“It’s like when you lose a million-dollar bet, you just say, ‘What’s next?’ That’s all you can do. But I do know we sold a lot of gym memberships that day.”
AFTER GALLERY FURNITURE opened in 1981, a Texas oil bust forced Houstonians to tighten their belts and threatened to bankrupt McIngvale. Down to his last $10,000, McIngvale spent half on inventory and half on a TV commercial shoot. After three hours in front of the camera, though, he had nothing on tape he could use. “I was stuttering and stammering and down to my last take,” McIngvale says. “I had the day’s receipts in my back pocket, so I pulled those out and waved them around and said ‘Gallery Furniture will save you … MONEEEY!’ The producer said, ‘That’s it, that’s the commercial.’ And it stuck.” The over-the-top spots started airing late at night on Channel 39 in Texas, where McIngvale enjoyed a long association with Houston Wrestling and WWE Hall of Fame announcer Paul Boesch.
Mattress Mack was born.
Combined with McIngvale’s longtime association with the Astros, it’s a character who immediately draws comparisons to legendary MLB owner and promoter Bill Veeck, the man who, in 1979, gave us Disco Demolition Night. “Someone who bets big and bets with his heart, with a colorful personality,” Fuchs says. “Like Veeck, Mack thinks about ideas in such a large way, but he’s able to act on them and execute them.”
McIngvale’s catch phrase has been flooding the Houston airwaves nonstop since the 1980s. (He has screamed it while wearing a mattress, while nearly being trampled by livestock, while fighting Chuck Norris, tumbling with Olympians, arm wrestling comedian Joe Piscopo and posing next to pretty much every B-level celeb in Texas.) Mattress Mack has become a part of the community’s subconscious. McIngvale says he recently walked past an autistic teenager shopping for furniture with his parents, and the normally nonverbal child said, “Hiya, Mack!” His mother burst into tears.
“I’ve always been bombastic and wanted to be a big promoter like W.C. Fields or Bill Veeck,” McIngvale says. “That’s what I’ve always dreamed of being, and now I’m getting to live it out.”
McINGVALE’S APPETITE FOR sports gambling started in 2006 when he says he won $250,000 on Texas and Vince Young in the national championship game. But it was two die-hard Peyton Manning fans who helped him develop the idea to hedge his furniture promos with massive sports wagers. Well, kind of. In 2014, before the Broncos played the Seahawks in Super Bowl XLVIII, two employees convinced McIngvale there was no way on Earth that their boy Peyton would ever lose to the lowly Seahawks. So — ready, fire, aim! — McIngvale announced that if the Seahawks somehow beat Manning everyone would get their furniture for free. “I didn’t hedge anything on this at all,” he says, “and it really got away from me in the last three or four days.”
By Saturday, Gallery Furniture had sold every mattress, every sofa, every ottoman and every last lamp in stock. “The damnedest promotion we ever had,” McIngvale says. “On Saturday night at 7 o’clock I’m standing on top of the desk at the front of the store screaming at the people that they have to go home now, we have no more furniture. It. Was. Unbelievable. We sold every last stick of furniture we had. Never happened in our history before.”
McIngvale knew he was on to something. He was ecstatic. Right up until he did the math just before kickoff.
“I hadn’t told my wife or anyone else about this, but we were on the hook for a whole lot if Seattle won,” he says.
Far too nervous to watch the game, McIngvale ran on the treadmill in the exercise room at the back of his warehouse for three hours. (He doesn’t have a TV at home.) When the two Peyton Manning fans were nowhere to be found, McIngvale knew he was screwed. All he could do then was wait for the postgame call every gambler dreads. “The phone rang at the end of the game, I picked it up and I said, ‘Who won?’ and my wife says ‘Seattle won you big dummy, how much money did we lose?’ And I just spit it out: ‘Nine million. We’re out nine million,'” McIngvale recalls. (McIngvale has run this story through the Mattress Mack Filter in recent years. An ESPN story from 2014 says he actually lost $7 million.) “Let’s just say, yeah, she wasn’t a happy camper. That’s when I realized I needed to find a way to hedge this stuff somehow.”
In 2017, a day after Hurricane Harvey decimated Houston, Gallery Furniture inventory control manager Anthony Lebedzinski arrived at the showroom where, he says, McIngvale was already handing out keys to the company’s fleet of delivery trucks to any able-bodied adult willing to help rescue people from the floodwaters. Later that day while trying to reach a trapped family, Lebedzinski nearly drowned when he was sucked into the filthy floodwater by an open manhole cover. “He was halfway to Galveston Bay before he saved himself,” McIngvale says. Daring rescues like Lebedzinski’s continued for days until there were hundreds of families not just sheltering but living inside McIngvale’s pristine showroom. “Mack’s always first, first in the water, first to open his doors, first to help,” says Houston schoolteacher and Astros fan Deirdre Ricketts. “All Houstonians have big hearts, but Mack’s might be the biggest.”
“People asked, ‘How can you let them sleep on the brand-new furniture like that?'” McIngvale says. “What am I going to do, let them all drown? So that was it. To me, it was nothing. It was the right thing to do. And I wanted my kids to see me doing that. At the end of the day we’re all going to be judged by our creator, and he isn’t going to ask how much money we made. Instead, he or she will ask us how much of a difference did you make?”
McIngvale’s immediate, large-scale, open-arms policy set the tone and created a path forward in the terrifying, chaotic and critical early days of the city’s recovery. It was the best of Houston, Sehgal says, the way people took McIngvale’s example and ran with it, coming together across the board to help each other.
One of the temporary residents pulled out of the floodwaters and fed, clothed and sheltered at Gallery Furniture for several days was Khanh Doan, 31. At a recent home Astros game, Doan finally got to thank McIngvale in person.
For saving his life?
“No,” he says.
“For saving my life, my mother’s life and my father’s life.”
During the past decade McIngvale has also helped raise $12 million for tsunami relief, he delivered 25,000 care packages to seniors during the COVID pandemic and he opened his showroom again during last year’s winter storm and power outages. In August when the team from nearby Pearland, Texas, made it to the Little League World Series, McIngvale and the Astros raised money to send the players’ families to Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
“Mack’s always the first to step up for anything that’s impacting Houston,” Sehgal says. “Big or small.”
IF YOU REALLY want to catch a glimpse of McIngvale’s electric Mattress Mack alter ego, don’t ask about Texas football, his Elvis memorabilia collection or even his weakness for racehorses and Ferraris. Instead, ask about his life’s masterpiece: The Promotion. By combining all of his passions — furniture sales, community, sports, gambling and Texas-sized spectacle — McIngvale has achieved a kind of gambler’s nirvana by finding a way to bet millions upon millions on his beloved Astros and other teams without ever really “losing” a cent, all while pushing his brand equity through the roof.
Here’s how it works: It starts with picking underdogs and getting favorable odds. Because, without the futures aspect, none of the math works. For example, this season McIngvale’s initial $3 million bet at Caesars for the Astros to win it all at +1000 covered him for the first $30 million in potential furniture refunds. Next, McIngvale makes the grand announcement, which is some variation of: Spend $3,000 or more on a mattress and accept delivery within 24 hours, and if the Astros go on to win it all, your purchase is free. Then, the more furniture he sells through the promotion, the more McIngvale bets on the Astros, whose line has moved from 10-to-1 to 8-to-1 to 4-to-1 to their current status as World Series favorites.
Fuchs says McIngvale’s idea to use sports gambling as a business hedge is a different angle than anyone has ever seen before. “He’s laying off the risk with these wagers, covering one big loss with one big win,” adds Patrick Everson, senior reporter for Vegas Insider. “It’s kind of a genius business move, really. And, clearly, he’s got the money to lose. He’s not losing any sleep at all.”
What McIngvale really understands better than gambling, furniture or promotion, though, is human nature. Even the slightest chance to get something for free is practically irresistible to most consumers, especially those already on the fence about needing a new mattress. The more sales increase, the more McIngvale gets to do the thing he loves most: bask in the attention and fly off to Vegas to place ridiculously large bets, sometimes with a briefcase full of cash. “It’s just like in the movies, the briefcase gets its own seat on the plane,” says Gallery’s Gerald McNeil, a former Pro Bowl returner with the Browns in the 1980s who now works with McIngvale. After the first few spur-of-the-moment trips to Vegas with McIngvale, McNeil started keeping a change of clothes in his car at work. “I guess it’s my job to save the suitcase if the plane goes down,” McNeil says.
Sports gambling is still illegal in Texas, so when he doesn’t feel like jetting to Vegas, McIngvale will simply drive roughly 125 miles east until the betting app on his phone pings to let him know he’s in Louisiana and free to drop another million or five. On the eve of the past Super Bowl, outside a rest stop in Vinton, Louisiana (and on live TV, of course — this is Mattress Mack after all), McIngvale dropped $5 million on the Cincinnati Bengals, the largest Super Bowl bet in history. And this summer, as the Astros caught fire and the promotion exploded — until July, McIngvale was refunding double the customer’s money on mattresses and furniture — McIngvale flew to sportsbooks in Iowa and Vegas to bet another $4 million in a single night.
“I sweat these games because of these promotions and it is so much anxiety,” McIngvale’s wife, Linda, says. “I don’t know how he doesn’t get anxious about it. I think he does and pretends like he doesn’t.”
“My wife says I have a gambling problem,” McIngvale says. “I say I have a promotion problem.”
They’re both probably right.
If the chosen team happens to win, great, McIngvale’s losses are covered, thousands of ecstatic customers blab for years to everyone they know about that time they won the lottery at Gallery Furniture, and many of them turn around and spend the refund on more furniture.
After the Astros won it all in 2017, McIngvale got to live out every gambler’s dream, flying home from Vegas with that raggedy old Astros backpack of his stuffed with almost 50 pounds of the sportsbooks’ money.
If the team loses, well, that’s when McIngvale really wins. For example, last season McIngvale “lost” his $3.35 million wager when the Braves beat the Astros in the World Series. McIngvale pulled out all the stops for that bet, trying to appeal to a higher power by packing a suite at Minute Maid Park with nuns from the Dominican Sisters of Mary Immaculate Province. The sisters became known as the “Rally Nuns” until a 7-0 loss at home to the Braves in a godforsaken Game 6.
It wasn’t quite as soul-shattering a defeat as you’d imagine for McIngvale, though. The odds on that bet covered McIngvale for more than $35 million in freebies. So, assuming the promotion brought in around $30 million in sales (during the fall, no less, which is typically a slow time in the furniture biz), at even a 40% markup, minus his wager, McIngvale confirms that he still came away with a cool profit, probably somewhere close to $9 million. And that’s not even counting the value of all the free advertising, promotion and goodwill that McIngvale says is “exponential,” or the fact that, according to TurboTax, itemized gambling losses can be tax deductible.
“Oh, it’s definitely a win-win,” McIngvale says. “These promotions just bring the brand to life and give us a ton of brand equity that we wouldn’t have otherwise. The customers love it so they’re totally engaged and talk about it for years. Because it runs all season long it probably ups the number of people following the Astros, too, because now they have a real vested interest in the team.”
WHEN McINGVALE WAS a panelist at a gambling conference and trade show in New Jersey this summer, Everson says he heard minor grumblings from bettors about the whole Mattress Mack phenomenon. Mainly, that it’s unfair how McIngvale is allowed to place multimillion-dollar bets while sportsbooks strictly limit what the average person can wager. Besides sounding a lot like airline passengers who blame the awful conditions in economy on the people flying first class, this really is an issue with sportsbooks policy, not McIngvale. One sports gambling industry insider said the reason sportsbooks love McIngvale so much and allow him to keep betting bigger and bigger amounts is all the free promotion they get out of it, and the fact that, well, he’s kinda terrible at it.
During a brutal losing streak in 2022, McIngvale dropped $15.4 million on the Patriots, the Titans, the Bengals and Alabama. He was about to be out another cool $5.5 million in the NCAA tournament until Kansas came back from 16 down at the half to defeat North Carolina. Just before the tip, McIngvale sneaked off to Louisiana to bet another $1 million on Kansas at -190. The wager broke all his rules about taking only underdogs and not gambling with his heart. “Stupid bet,” he says. “I see all these kids when I go to Vegas and it’s the weirdest thing because they all know me from gambling. People think I’m a great handicapper but I’m really not.”
After March Madness, McIngvale brought Jayhawks coach Bill Self into the store for the first day of the $14 million giveaway party. “First customers, a big family, comes up to say thanks to Self and I asked them, ‘How much did y’all win?'” McIngvale says, placing his hand on his forehead. “Sixty-four thousand. Sixty. Four. Thousand. It about knocked me over.”
Another reason the books love McIngvale is what Vegas Insider calls the Mattress Mack effect. McIngvale’s huge wagers on the Astros actually help defray the sportsbooks’ liability on more popular teams like the Yankees and Dodgers, teams that would normally be a loss for casinos. For the record, McIngvale doesn’t like the idea of limits, either. “I think they ought to take bigger bets,” he says. “It’s like if some customer comes in here and wants to spend a million dollars. Well? Knock yourself out. What difference does it make? Yes, the sportsbooks have to hedge it the other way, but they ought to have enough savvy to do that. They’re going to take some big losses, but they’re also going to get some big wins too if they have the numbers right.”
That math will continue to keep people like Fuchs up at night until the Astros are eliminated or sports gambling history is made. Although it’s clear he gets a kick out Mattress Mack, and the promotional mileage of his big bets, Fuchs stops short of rooting for the Astros. “It will be a lot of fun to be on this roller coaster as they progress through the postseason,” he says. “That’s the beauty of Mack’s hedge. It works out for everybody. Well, unless we lose $30 million.”
IN THE END, few things can capture the inexplicable phenomenon that is Mattress Mack better than McIngvale’s Astros game attire. About an hour before the Astros faced the Diamondbacks on Sept. 27, McIngvale shuffled into the mezzanine level of Minute Maid Park by himself, sporting his signature look: well-worn black cowboy boots, a slightly askew orange-billed Astros cap, blue business slacks and an authentic Alex Bregman home white Astros jersey over a white button-down oxford, covered in a galaxy of black dots from the Sharpie McIngvale uses to take notes and sign autographs. McIngvale always completes this ensemble with the single most egregious sports-fashion crime of them all: tucking his game jersey into his pants.
And yet, somehow, on him it works.
Apparently, $70 million in free furniture as an accent piece will do that for an outfit. McIngvale promises that number will keep climbing as long the Astros keep winning, the odds remain favorable and the sportsbooks keep taking his bets. McIngvale is close to several of the Astros, especially Bregman, who shares his passion for racehorses, and he insists the players get a kick out of his promotions and don’t feel the least bit of pressure to help remodel the living rooms of half of Houston.
“This year he’s done it right, and if the Astros win it all it’s so exciting for him and the customers,” Linda McIngvale says. “Mack has this huge connection to the team now, and he loves doing this. … The man works really hard so, you know, it’s all good.”
Mobbed by fans the second he steps into the park, it takes McIngvale an hour to walk along the mezzanine from home plate to right field. And when he does finally reach his seat about 10 rows behind the Houston dugout, Section 122 erupts in a wave of applause. The Astros’ response to McIngvale’s arrival is even more dramatic: three homers in four at-bats to blow the game open in the sixth. “He’s an icon, I love him, he’s Mack to me, not Jim McIngvale,” says Sehgal, the Astros SVP. “He’s just an authentic fan with a really big heart, the kind of person you can’t see without it putting a smile on your face.”
Outside of Houston, McIngvale has quickly become an irresistible storyline as a quirky curiosity in the burgeoning world of mega-sports gambling. Inside this city, though, he remains something completely different and far more impactful. For three straight hours inside Minute Maid Park, fans beam when they recognize Mattress Mack. Some yell out “Legend!” and keep walking to their seats. Others repeat his quirky catch phrase or reveal exactly how much free furniture they won in 2017. A little girl asks him if he’s a ballplayer. A few fans bend his ear for gambling advice on the Texans and Oklahoma State. But the vast majority of people who stop do so to offer some heartfelt variation of the same message: “Thank you for everything you’ve done for this city the last 40 years. Go Stros! Let’s get those free mattresses!”
With spring ball underway, it’s becoming more and more apparent how our Way-Too-Early Top 25 teams will perform come fall. But whether it’s inexperience showing or a complete makeover of a wide receiver room, there are plenty of things these teams are leaning on, such as an elite defense or a veteran quarterback.
Our college football experts break down every team’s strength and weakness.
Strength: Star power. The Buckeyes have arguably the top offensive and defensive players returning in college football in wide receiver Jeremiah Smith and safety Caleb Downs. Both standouts figure to be on every preseason All-America team after playing massive roles during Ohio State’s national championship run through the playoff.
Weakness: Inexperience. With the bulk of last season’s title team now preparing for the NFL draft, the Buckeyes will introduce eight new starters on defense and a bevy of new faces on offense. That includes quarterback, where freshman Julian Sayin will enter the spring as the favorite to succeed Will Howard. — Jake Trotter
Strength: Impact defenders. The Longhorns lose star power on the back end with Jahdae Barron and Andrew Mukuba gone, but between edge rushers Colin Simmons and Trey Moore, linebackers Anthony Hill Jr. and Liona Lefau and safety Michael Taaffe, defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatkowski will disrupt offenses while new players fit into place.
Weakness: Growing pains. Steve Sarkisian centered his Texas rebuild around the need for “big humans,” and the Longhorns’ offensive and defensive lines were strengths during their past two playoff runs. Both will see wholesale makeovers this year, with one full-time starter returning on the OL and just two scholarship interior defensive lineman coming back. There is a lot of talent, of course, but not much time for the newcomers to grow up, with a road trip to Ohio State kicking off the season and the SEC schedule awaiting. — Dave Wilson
Strength: An elite defense. The Nittany Lions had good defenses earlier in coach James Franklin’s tenure, but they reached a higher rung in the past two seasons under coordinators Manny Diaz and Tom Allen. Now they’ve plucked playcaller Jim Knowles from national champion Ohio State to oversee a unit that, despite losing Abdul Carter and others, returns impressive contributors in end Dani Dennis-Sutton, linebacker Dominic DeLuca, safety Zakee Wheatley and others.
Weakness: Wide receiver. Penn State’s drop-off at wide receiver has been glaring at a time when the team’s overall talent has improved. After losing Mackey Award-winning tight end Tyler Warren to the NFL, the Nittany Lions need reliable options to emerge for quarterback Drew Allar in his final year. Penn State returns Liam Clifford and went to the portal for transfers Kyron Hudson (USC) and Devonte Ross (Troy). — Adam Rittenberg
Strength: The secondary. Losing Xavier Watts and Benjamin Morrison might be a huge red flag at a lot of schools. Not at Notre Dame, where the defensive backfield remains elite. Start with sophomore corner Leonard Moore, who established himself as one of the top young prospects in the country last season, allowing less than 40% completions and racking up 11 pass breakups and two picks. Christian Gray was a solid performer on the other side, while Adon Shuler blossomed at safety. Notre Dame added a solid option at safety in Virginia Tech transfer Jalen Stroman. The back end of the defense should be the strength of this unit, just as it was a year ago.
Weakness: Quarterback. Perhaps “weakness” is the wrong word here. Marcus Freeman likes what he has to work with at the position. But after two straight years with veteran QBs, Notre Dame will turn to someone without much playing time under his belt in 2025. Who? Well, that’s the big question. Steve Angeli has a leg up based on experience — even though he doesn’t have much of it — but redshirt freshman CJ Carr has a chance to be special. The battle to see who leads the offense will be among the most watched in all of college football, and finding the right answer might be the biggest obstacle between now and another playoff bid for Notre Dame. — David Hale
Strength: Linebackers. Even after losing star linebacker Jalon Walker, a potential first-round pick in the NFL draft, and three-year starter Smael Mondon Jr., Georgia’s linebackers figure to be the heart of the defense in 2025. CJ Allen is the leader of the unit after ranking second on the team with 76 tackles to go with three tackles for loss and five quarterback hurries last season. Gabe Harris Jr. and Raylen Wilson got plenty of action last season, and Chris Cole was named to the All-SEC freshman team by the league’s coaches. Allen, Cole and Wilson were ranked either the No. 1 or No. 2 linebacker prospects in the classes of 2023 and 2024 by ESPN’s recruiting analysts. Georgia coach Kirby Smart also added freshman Zayden Walker, the No. 1 outside linebacker prospect in the class of 2025.
Weakness: Running backs. As hard as it is to believe, the program that produced NFL running backs Nick Chubb, D’Andre Swift and James Cook in recent years might have a question mark at the position going into the season. Nate Frazier returns after leading the team with 671 yards as a freshman in 2024. Trevor Etienne, who had 631 yards with nine touchdowns last season, left for the NFL. Injuries have hampered top backups Branson Robinson and Roderick Robinson II, who combined for only 29 carries last season. They’re missing spring practice, because of knee and ankle injuries, respectively. The Bulldogs also bring back third-down back Cash Jones, Chauncey Bowens, Dwight Phillips Jr. and add freshman Bo Walker. Georgia averaged only 124.4 rushing yards in 2024, which ranked next to last in the SEC and was the worst mark in the Smart era. — Mark Schlabach
Strength: Front seven. Despite the departures of Jordan Burch and Derrick Harmon to the NFL, this is where Dan Lanning’s recruiting — and Oregon’s development — has shined. With both Matayo Uiagalelei (16 tackles for loss, 12.5 sacks, 4 pass breakups, an interception and 2 forced fumbles) and Teitum Tuioti (12 tackles for loss, 7.5 sacks, 2 pass breakups) set to enter their junior seasons, the once-youthful freshmen who made an impact right away are ready to lead a group of edge rushers who could make up one of the strongest units in the nation.
Weakness: Quarterback. It might be too early to say that this position is a true weakness until we see Dante Moore play inside this offense, but he will have big shoes to fill after the Ducks’ past two quarterbacks (Bo Nix and Dillon Gabriel) turned Autzen Stadium into their playground. Moore is in good hands; he’s working with offensive coordinator Will Stein, who should help him improve and excel. Moore is also coming off two unusual seasons in the sport: starting as a true freshman at UCLA and being thrown right into the fire, then sitting a year behind Gabriel. Now that Oregon is handing the reins to Moore, we’ll quickly be able to see how much he has learned and how much the Ducks allow him to do within the offense. — Paolo Uggetti
Strength: Quarterback. Cade Klubnik enters his third full season as the starter, so this has to be a strength for the Tigers. We have watched Klubnik mature over the past two seasons from an often-unsure first-time starter to a player in far more command of the offseason last year, and he had an under-the-radar great performance in 2024 (3,639 yards, 36 TDs, 6 INTs). Clemson returns its top three receivers, and it gets Tyler Brown back from injury, so the potential is there for this to be the Tigers’ best offense since Trevor Lawrence‘s last season in 2020.
Weakness: Running back. We have pointed out previously that this is the biggest question mark on the team following the departure of starter Phil Mafah (NFL draft), injury to Jay Haynes (knee rehab) and general lack of experienced depth. That is why, at least for now, this position is considered a “weakness.” There is plenty of talent, starting with freshman Gideon Davidson, but we simply don’t know how the rotation will shape up and who is going to get the bulk of the reps. — Andrea Adelson
Strength: Quarterback. What a luxury it is to enter a season with a proven, experienced quarterback who is the leading returning passer in the SEC. Garrett Nussmeier will be in his fifth year on campus and his second season as a starter. He threw for 4,052 yards, 29 touchdowns and 12 interceptions last season. Nussmeier is 10-4 as a starter, and he is now fully in charge of the LSU offense and should be poised for his most productive season. He has a group of talented pass catchers to throw to, including transfers Nic Anderson and Barion Brown, as well as speedy slot receiver Aaron Anderson, who had a breakout season a year ago with 61 catches for 884 yards.
Weakness: Retooling the offensive line. The Tigers lose four starting offensive linemen from a year ago, including projected first-round NFL draft pick Will Campbell at left tackle. Josh Thompson, a transfer from Northwestern, could play tackle or guard, and LSU likes its young talent up front. But there will be a lot of new faces in new places. Sophomore Weston Davis has a big opportunity to win the right tackle job after playing sparingly as a highly touted true freshman last season. The only returning starter, DJ Chester, is likely to move from center to guard. — Chris Low
Strength: Overall defense. It would definitely be fair to point to the return of quarterback Jake Retzlaff as an obvious strength; anytime you return the starting quarterback from an 11-win team, you’re in good shape. But this BYU team won with defense, and it has enough key players returning to expect it to be one of the best units in the country again.
Weakness: Defensive line. As good as the defense will be, there are some holes to fill on the line. This is nitpicking, though. Tyler Batty‘s departure is the one that looms largest, both in terms of production and leadership. But Blake Mangelson, Isaiah Bagnah and John Nelson were also key contributors, and the depth without them is questionable. — Kyle Bonagura
Strength: Front seven. The Gamecocks powered one of the nation’s stingiest defenses with a dominant front in 2024, and that unit should carry South Carolina again this fall despite significant offseason turnover. All-SEC freshman Dylan Stewart looks poised for a Year 2 jump and will start opposite senior Bryan Thomas Jr., who logged 4.5 sacks a year ago. Down five starters from last season’s front seven, the Gamecocks hit the portal for key reinforcements including transfer tackles Gabriel Brownlow-Dindy (Texas A&M) and Zavion Hardy (East Mississippi CC) and linebacker transfers Justin Okoronkwo (Alabama) and Shawn Murphy (Florida State).
Weakness: Interior offensive line. South Carolina enters 2025 without the center (Vershon Lee) and both starting guards (Kamaar Bell and Torricelli Simpkins III) who paved the way for the SEC’s fourth-ranked rushing attack last fall. Troy transfer Boaz Stanley projects to take over at center, and newcomers Nick Sharpe (Wake Forest) and Rodney Newsome Jr. (Western Kentucky) arrive as the likeliest options to fill in the guard spots. Can that trio — playing between starting tackles Josiah Thompson and Cason Henry — jell well enough to protect LaNorris Sellers and move bodies for transfer running back Rahsul Faison? — Eli Lederman
Strength: Quarterback. Rocco Becht, who threw for 3,505 yards with 25 touchdowns in 2024, will return for his third year as ISU’s starter. There were some inconsistencies throughout last season, but Becht will be among the best quarterbacks in the Big 12. He was particularly good in the bowl game against Miami, throwing for three touchdowns in a 42-41 win.
Weakness: Receiver. Let’s just call it a question mark. The Cyclones relied on two of the best receivers in the country last season — Jaylin Noel and Jayden Higgins — and they accounted for 167 of the 277 catches on the team (60.3%). No other true receiver had more than 11 catches. With that type of production to replace, the team is starting over. — Bonagura
Strength: Defensive front. It starts in the interior with 325-pound Tim Keenan III, who’s back for his redshirt senior season, and James Smith, a prime candidate to be Alabama’s top breakout player on defense and a dynamic playmaker in the middle of that defensive line. LT Overton is also back for his senior season after leading the team with nine quarterback hurries in 2024. He was Alabama’s most impactful pass rusher. Florida transfer Kelby Collins is a key addition, an edge rusher who has shown he can get to the quarterback going up against SEC tackles.
Weakness: Receiver depth. Ryan Williams had an exceptional freshman campaign, especially the way he torched defenses the first part of the season. The challenge now is to find more dependable playmakers around him at the receiver position. Germie Bernard is back after leading Alabama with 50 catches last season. The Alabama coaches are excited about the talent at receiver, but which players are going to emerge as options 3, 4 and 5? Miami transfer Isaiah Horton is one to watch. — Low
Strength: Overall experience. Illinois didn’t suffer the normal experience drain that comes with winning 10 games for the first time since 2001. A few key players had their eligibility expire, but Illinois retained several potential NFL draft departures, and it avoided critical portal losses. Quarterback Luke Altmyer is back for a third season as the starter, and he will play behind a seasoned line. All-Big Ten selections Xavier Scott and Gabe Jacas lead a defense that returns mostly intact.
Weakness: Lack of explosiveness on offense. Illinois finished last season ranked 92nd nationally in yards per game and 71st in yards per play. The team also loses most of its receiving production with Pat Bryant (54 catches, 984 yards, 10 touchdowns) and Zakhari Franklin (55 catches, 652 yards, 4 touchdowns) departing. Illinois likely will need an uptick in rushing production from a group of ball-carriers to help offset the wideout losses. — Rittenberg
Strength: Coaching. We’re mostly focusing on players here, but let’s make an exception at ASU. The job Kenny Dillingham has done at his alma mater is one of the most impressive turnarounds we’ve seen in college football in recent years. To go from the bottom of the Pac-12 to the playoff in consecutive seasons is almost inconceivable. It should give ASU fans the confidence that they’ll be competitively relevant as long as he’s around.
Weakness: Running back. The question here is how the Sun Devils will fill the void left by Cam Skattebo. He ran for 1,711 yards, had another 605 in receiving yards and was one of the best players in college football. Maybe it’s unfair to say their running backs are a weakness; the opportunity to prove otherwise just wasn’t there last season. Kanye Udoh‘s arrival from Army, where he ran for 1,117 yards last season, is promising, though, and Kyson Brown did have a 100-yard rushing performance against Arizona. — Bonagura
Strength: Tight end RJ Maryland looked like one of the best tight ends in the ACC and a genuine NFL prospect through the first half of last season before going down with an injury. Matthew Hibner picked up the slack the rest of the way and didn’t miss a beat. Maryland should be back to 100 percent for the season, and Hibner returns, giving SMU a terrific one-two punch that should equate to some dynamic options in the passing game. Given the turnover at wideout, this could be a big area for SMU to rely on as the Mustangs look to make it back to the College Football Playoff.
Weakness: Established skill players. The three leading receivers from last season are gone, including do-it-all tailback Brashard Smith, meaning there’s a big void as SMU searches for reliable playmakers. There are options, including Romello Brinson, Jordan Hudson and a pair of talented freshman at receiver and LJ Johnson Jr., Miami transfer Chris Johnson and Derrick McFall at tailback — but none of those players is a sure thing. Last year, Smith was as dynamic as anyone in the country — an explosive runner, an effective pass catcher, a better-than-expected blocker. Is there anyone who can become that guy this year? Or will SMU need to dip back into the portal to fill out its ranks? — Hale
Strength: Big plays. In his second season as the starting quarterback, Avery Johnson (responsible for 32 TDs last year, one of three Power 4 QBs with 2,700 yards passing and 600 rushing) can get the ball to running back Dylan Edwards, (7.4 yards per carry), Jayce Brown (17.5 yards per catch) and New Mexico transfer WR Caleb Medford, who has averaged 18.5 yards per catch on 29 career receptions.
Weakness: A DB makeover. The Wildcats lost the Big 12 Defensive Lineman of the Year, Brendan Mott, who was a pass-rush disruptor, along with their three top corners (including draft prospect Jacob Parrish), from a defense that ranked 77th versus the pass last season. But they have added transfer corners Jayden Rowe (Oklahoma) and Amarion Fortenberry (South Alabama) along with safeties Gunner Maldonado (Arizona) and Mar’Quavious Moss (West Georgia), so we’ll see if they can fill the gaps left behind. — Wilson
Strength: Defensive star power is back. The faces of Indiana’s defense won’t look much different from those who helped propel the team to a 10-0 start and a CFP appearance. Three first-team All-Big Ten defenders return in end Mikail Kamara, linebacker Aiden Fisher and cornerback D’Angelo Ponds. Indiana also retained coordinator Bryant Haines, a Broyles Award finalist. Haines will need to build depth at all three levels, but he can lean on productive players to lead the way.
Weakness: Interior line play. For all the great things Indiana did in 2024, its line play, especially on offense, was exposed in losses to Ohio State and Notre Dame. The offensive line will look dramatically different, and Indiana will need immediate contributions from transfers like Pat Coogan (Notre Dame), Kahlil Benson (Colorado) and Zen Michalski (Ohio State). The defensive line also suffered significant losses with the departures of James Carpenter and CJ West. If IU can’t hold up in the middle of its lines, a drop-off is likely. — Rittenberg
Strength: Offensive line. The Gators bring back four starters — including All-America center Jake Slaughter — to a unit that gave up 20 sacks last fall, tied for 40th-best nationally and down from 39 sacks allowed in 2023. That continuity bodes well as Florida continues to build around quarterback DJ Lagway and Freshman All-SEC rusher Jadan Baugh. The Gators have a hole to fill at right tackle following the graduation of 11-game starter Brandon Crenshaw-Dickson; redshirt sophomore Bryce Lovett and veterans Devon Manuel and Kamryn Waites should all factor into competition for the open tackle spot opposite Austin Barber.
Weakness: Wide receiver. Florida has its quarterback in Lagway, but the state of the Gators’ receiving corps is less certain following the departures of leading pass catchers Chimere Dike and Elijah Badger. Eugene Wilson III, a freshman All-American in 2023, returns after suffering a season-ending hip injury last fall, and UCLA transfer J. Michael Sturdivant stands as another proven downfield target after four seasons with the Bruins. Freshmen Vernell Brown III, Dallas Wilson and Naeshaun Montgomery represent a trio of less experienced options, but each could be called upon to play a role in the passing for the Gators in 2025. — Lederman
Strength: Big-play defenders. Defensive line depth was the backbone of Tennessee’s playoff team last season. Some key pieces from that defensive line are gone, but several of the Vols’ impact defenders are back, starting with leading tackler Arion Carter at linebacker and Joshua Josephs at defensive end. They combined for 15.5 tackles for loss last season. In the middle of the defensive line, Bryson Eason and Jaxson Moi are both back, while cornerback Jermod McCoy — albeit coming off a torn ACL in January — and safety Boo Carter are stalwarts in a deep secondary.
Weakness: Proven playmakers at receiver. As quarterback Nico Iamaleava steps into his second season as Tennessee’s starting quarterback, he’ll do so without four of his top five pass catchers from a year ago. The Vols were lacking when it came to explosive plays in the passing game last season, which means it’s time for former five-star prospect Mike Matthews to step up and be a bona fide downfield threat after catching just seven passes last season. The same goes for holdovers Chris Brazzell II and Braylon Staley, Alabama transfer Amari Jefferson and maybe even Carter, who’s planning to pull double duty at safety and receiver. — Low
Strength: The ground game. No Power 4 running back (minimum 100 carries) had a better rushing average last year than Louisville’s Isaac Brown (7.11). Lower the qualifying amount to 60 carries, however, and Brown is fourth. Instead, it’s his teammate, Duke Watson, who leads the way at 8.91 yards per rush. The pair of rising sophomores were as explosive a combination as there was in the country last season, racking up nearly 1,800 rushing yards and 18 touchdowns combined. They’re a year older now, and they’ll be running behind one of the best offensive lines in the ACC. The Cards will want to be balanced offensively, but put the ball in the hands of either Brown or Watson enough times and a home run is just waiting to happen.
Weakness: Interior D-line. Jordan Guerad and Rene Konga both return from a 2024 squad that wasn’t exactly great, and the depth behind them comes entirely from the portal (Denzel Lowry, Jerry Lawson). There’s upside here — especially after a fairly strong finish to 2024 by Guerad — but this is a group that still has a lot to prove. Wesley Bailey and Clev Lubin should be solid edge performers, but shoring up the middle of the defense will be an offseason priority, and it starts at the line of scrimmage. — Hale
Strength: Running game. The Wolverines always find a way to produce on the ground, and 2025 should be no different. Bowl game MVP Jordan Marshall and Alabama transfer Justice Haynes provide Michigan with a viable rushing duo. Key pieces up front, headlined by Giovanni El-Hadi, are back as well. The running game stands to benefit from what should be an improved passing attack.
Weakness: Pass catching. The Wolverines had just one player total more than 250 receiving yards last season, tight end Colston Loveland, who’s now preparing for the NFL draft. Inconsistent quarterbacking played a part. But Michigan’s wideouts didn’t produce nearly enough plays to strike fear in the opposition. The Wolverines are banking that a pair of portal additions in Donaven McCulley (Indiana) and Anthony Simpson (UMass) can bolster the playmaking on the perimeter. — Trotter
Strength: Stability. Mike Elko’s first task upon his hiring last year was just to build a team from a collection of individuals following a frantic re-recruiting process of his own roster, while patching holes in the portal. This year, the offensive line is much improved, and Marcel Reed is the entrenched starter at quarterback now with Conner Weigman‘s transfer to Houston. That’s something to build on.
Weakness: Familiar faces at receiver. The Aggies threw just 18 TD passes last year, and eight of them went to Noah Thomas, who transferred to Georgia. With Thomas gone, the Aggies lost their top five receivers. A&M landed Micah Hudson, a former five-star recruit from Texas Tech, in the portal, but he’s no longer with the team. KC Concepcion (NC State) and Mario Craver (Mississippi State) join sophomore Terry Bussey, a former five-star and a dynamic athlete, in the WR room’s extreme makeover. — Wilson
Strength: Running game. The Hurricanes believe they have the potential to field their best offensive line under Mario Cristobal, anchored by rising junior Francis Mauigoa and Anez Cooper on the right side. With Mark Fletcher Jr. and Jordan Lyle returning as the top two running backs, the Hurricanes should be able to run the ball more consistently this season.
Weakness: Secondary. This was a huge weakness last season when Miami struggled down the stretch with inconsistent play and a lack of depth. Miami added three highly rated players from the transfer portal to help shore up the unit and perhaps force turnovers. Miami had 14 total interceptions last season, ranking in the bottom fourth of the country and in particular had a drop-off in its safety play. Miami needs a far better performance from this group in 2025. — Adelson
Strength: Quarterback. After being the guy who simply handed the ball off to Ashton Jeanty for most of the season and then turning into the guy who nearly helped the Broncos upset Penn State with his marvelous play under center, 2025 could be Maddux Madsen‘s breakout year. Madsen was impressive throughout last season managing the offense (3,080 yards, 23 touchdowns and only six turnovers), avoiding mistakes and playing winning football. Another year in the offense will only do wonders for Madsen and sure, he won’t have the safety blanket that was Jeanty behind him, but if anyone can figure out how to evolve as a player in these circumstances, Madsen has shown he has more talent and ability than first meets the eye.
Weakness: Running back. Let’s not go too far away from Madsen under center. This is an obvious pick, but it’s obvious for a reason. Replacing Jeanty, his leadership, energy, production and overall gravity, are an impossible task, but if Boise State wants to return to the College Football Playoff this coming season, they’ll need to at least partially or collectively try to get as close as they can to replicate Jeanty’s 374 carry, 2,601, 29-touchdown season. Good luck with that. — Uggetti
Strength: Defensive line. Walter Nolen, Princely Umanmielen, JJ Pegues and Jared Ivey — four high-impact players who charged one of the nation’s best defensive lines last fall — all are gone. Still, Ole Miss has the talent to make this unit a difference-maker in a renovated defense in 2025. Suntarine Perkins will again be one of the keys to the pass rush after turning in 10.5 sacks last fall, second most among SEC defenders. LSU transfer Da’Shawn Womack and Nebraska’s Princewill Umanmielen will add to that edge depth. Inside, Zxavian Harris, the towering, 6-foot-7, 320-pound nose tackle, is poised to slot into the spots where Pegues and Nolen were so effective a year ago.
Weakness: Secondary. Defensive coordinator Pete Golding’s best-in-the-nation run defense helped balance a bottom-half SEC secondary last season. Assuming even a slight regression in the Ole Miss front seven in 2025, there will be more pressure on a wholly unproven Rebels defensive unit. Junior cornerback Chris Graves Jr. returns as the most experienced member of a secondary down its top eight snap-getters from a year ago. Ole Miss turned to the transfer portal to retool around him. Safety Sage Ryan arrives from LSU with 19 career starts in 43 games, and Jaylon Braxton (Arkansas) and Kapena Gushiken (Washington State) bring experience as well, but this is a new-look unit that will have to jell quickly in the fall. — Lederman
Sports
‘Gotta carry it like a battle scar’: Can Yankees bounce back from fifth-inning World Series nightmare?
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Jorge Castillo
TAMPA, Fla. — Aaron Boone’s first message to the 2025 New York Yankees, delivered at Steinbrenner Field in mid-February when all uniformed personnel were still beardless and an ulnar collateral ligament had not yet torpedoed their ace’s season, was about hunger. Having the hunger to win. Fighting for it.
“It’s not just a given,” said Boone, who is entering his eighth season as the team’s manager. “The early indications tell me I do think we have an edge to us, a purpose to what we’re doing. But it’s early. We gotta live that.”
For the Yankees, and their fan base, expectations never fluctuate. It’s forever World Series or disappointment, and disappointment has punctuated each of the past 15 seasons.
That appetite spiked coming off a 2023 season in which the Yankees missed the playoffs for the first time in seven years. This season, the hunger is amplified by a vastly different result in 2024: The Yankees reached the World Series only to squander a five-run lead in a home elimination game against the Los Angeles Dodgers — with one of the worst defensive innings in postseason history.
Baseball is a sport that requires people to constantly flush away inevitable failure to move on to the next pitch, the next at-bat, the next game. But, as Boone knows, failure can also serve as a motivator. His players are learning all about that, too.
“I think some of those things, some of those feelings you don’t necessarily get over ever,” 23-year-old shortstop Anthony Volpe said. “But I think our team and our clubhouse has done a pretty good job of using those things and those feelings to push us to new heights and new things. I think the best part is I don’t think we’ll ever get over that.”
The inning-long disaster gave way to an equally long offseason: seeing Juan Soto defect to the rival New York Mets in free agency this winter, losing ace Gerrit Cole to Tommy John surgery this spring. Now, with a reshuffled roster, the Yankees will look to move forward, starting with their season opener Thursday at Yankee Stadium against the Milwaukee Brewers.
How do the players — and the franchise — bounce back?
“When you mess up a couple of times in one game, especially in the biggest game of the year, it sucks,” Yankees second baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. said. “Then that brings in the hunger for this year. Like everybody is ready to roll. Everybody’s super excited. Everybody’s locked in.”
THE TEAM THAT plays Thursday in the Bronx will be very different from the one that took the field on the eve of Halloween, the last time Yankee Stadium hosted a baseball game.
That night, the fifth-inning debacle — made possible by three two-out miscues, opening the door for the Dodgers to score five runs — did not ultimately cost the Yankees the World Series. New York rallied and led 6-5 entering the bottom of the eighth inning before fumbling another lead. But it is the infamous fifth inning’s sequence of events — Judge dropping a routine fly ball in center field, Volpe committing a throwing error, Cole not covering first base on a ground ball to Anthony Rizzo that should’ve ended the inning without a run scored — that will be remembered.
“I mean, it’s tough,” Cole said. “Just gotta carry it like a battle scar.”
Said Boone: “I feel like it’s going to sting forever. And that’s what I said to the guys immediately after the game. Hard for me to say if the way it happened, if that makes it sting any more. I don’t know. Getting to where we got to and the amount of success we had last year and not finishing it off, it hurts.”
Baseball history is littered with postseason collapses. Several of them have happened in New York, including in 2003 at the old Yankee Stadium, when Boston Red Sox manager Grady Little stuck with Pedro Martinez in the eighth inning with a 5-3 lead in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series. The decision backfired. The Yankees rallied to tie the game and, in the 11th inning, Boone — then a Yankees infielder — clubbed a Tim Wakefield knuckleball into the left-field stands to send New York to the World Series.
But Boston proved you can reach the summit after hitting rock bottom — the Red Sox exacted their revenge in the ALCS against the Yankees the next year by becoming the first team in major league history to overcome a 3-0 deficit to win a best-of-seven series.
“Losing Game 7 [in 2003] was devastating, and it’s hard not to have that linger a little while into the offseason,” said Miami Marlins assistant general manager Gabe Kapler, an outfielder on both the 2003 and 2004 Red Sox teams. “And we definitely felt like we were as good or were better than the Yankees in 2003. We made some important additions in that offseason, and we felt like going into 2004 we were poised to make a run.”
In the days after the World Series, the Yankees received another dose of motivation. Members of the Dodgers emptied a saltshaker on an open wound when they criticized the Yankees in various podcast interviews, pointing out that they entered the series expecting to exploit New York’s subpar defense and baserunning. Around this time, too, bumper stickers of the Fox score bug from the fifth inning — showing the Yankees up 5-0 with two outs — went viral.
Jon Berti, a Yankee in 2024 who signed with the Chicago Cubs during the offseason, said Dodgers players “disrespected” the Yankees with their criticism. Boone said he hopes his team will handle winning the World Series “with a little more class” if it does so. Yankees reliever Luke Weaver said he didn’t understand the motivation for the comments. Other Yankees steered clear.
“What am I going to say?” said Yankees outfielder Aaron Judge, the reigning AL MVP. “You win, you can kind of say whatever you want. If you don’t like it, you got to play better.”
The Yankees won for most of the 2024 season, finishing with an AL-leading 94-66 record before knocking off the Kansas City Royals and Cleveland Guardians to claim the pennant.
“I think there’s a blend of like, pride and confidence for how well we played, for how long we played,” said Cole, who will act as an unofficial pitching coach this season while he recovers from surgery. “And then there’s like a little chip. There’s like a little edge. So it’s a nice blend of like, ‘Hey, we know we’re good. We know we can get back there.'”
The Yankees’ attempt to return will come in a wide-open American League. PECOTA, Baseball America’s widely cited projection system, predicts the Yankees will finish with 85 wins, enough for a third-place finish in the competitive AL East, the seventh-best record in the AL and a 51.1% chance of making the playoffs.
This year, they will rely on a new group of veterans — headlined by lefty ace Max Fried, All-Star closer Devin Williams and former MVPs Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt — and a wave of young position players — Volpe, Jasson Dominguez, Austin Wells and Ben Rice will begin the season as regulars — to absorb Soto’s departure and a rash of injuries. And to become that last team standing, they’ll have to play better when it matters most.
“In my two seasons, I think there’s always been laser focus,” Volpe said. “But I think there’s probably just that little — I mean, a pretty big chip on everyone’s shoulder.”
THIS OFFSEASON WAS full of change for the Yankees — and represented a shift in their place in the landscape of Major League Baseball. The Dodgers, not the Yankees, are now the organization irking owners around the sport with their lavish spending, again positioning themselves as World Series favorites with a lucrative revenue stream from Japan and a projected payroll more than double that of 16 other teams, according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts. Meanwhile, the Mets lured Soto to Queens after his sensational season in the Bronx — a previously unthinkable notion for the little brother franchise in the decades before billionaire Steve Cohen bought it.
Even the Yankees’ traditions have changed. Last month, hours before the club’s Grapefruit League opener, owner Hal Steinbrenner announced a modification to the organization’s long-standing facial hair policy — since 1976, beards had been outlawed, with free agent signees famously changing their signature looks upon becoming Yankees. “Well-groomed beards” are now allowed, though the definition of “well-groomed” remains unclear.
Days later, the team confirmed — in the wake of the Dodgers celebrating their World Series title to the song on the field at Yankee Stadium last fall — that Frank Sinatra’s rendition of the theme from “New York, New York” will be played only after wins. The song — for several years Liza Minnelli’s version was used after losses — had been played after all Yankees home games since 1980.
Of course, much remains the same. The oft-stated win-or-bust goal stands. And the Yankees’ projected payroll is again more than $300 million, fourth in the majors.
Upon hearing Soto’s decision, GM Brian Cashman sprang into action, making a series of moves in December to overhaul the roster. The Yankees signed Fried to an eight-year, $218 million contract two days after Soto chose the Mets. Williams, strikeout specialist Fernando Cruz, Bellinger and Goldschmidt were acquired over the next 10 days. The front office didn’t spend enough to fix everything — upgrading third base remains unchecked on the list of priorities — but the transactions raised the team’s floor.
“I think we addressed some needs or some deficiencies more so than we would’ve been able to had we brought Juan back,” Boone said. “But there’s a lot of different ways to do it. And I think if it has to be one way, you limit yourself a little bit.”
Regardless, a series of blows this spring is already testing the team’s depth.
Losing Cole leaves the Yankees’ projected top-tier rotation without its No. 1 option. Luis Gil, the reigning American League Rookie of the Year, will miss at least the first two months with a lat strain. Clarke Schmidt will begin the season on the injured list with a balky back.
With those three sidelined, Carlos Rodon will be the team’s No. 2 starter and will get the ball for Thursday’s season opener. Marcus Stroman, who reported to camp not expected to make the rotation, will begin the season as the No. 3 starter. Will Warren, a 25-year-old rookie, and Carlos Carrasco, a 38-year-old non-roster invitee to spring training, round out the group.
Giancarlo Stanton, who, alongside Soto, powered the Yankees’ postseason run with a Herculean October, has torn tendons in both of his elbows and will miss substantial time, if not the whole year. Their veteran third-base option, DJ LeMahieu, is hurt again. Other concerns include Dominguez’s defense in left field and a shortage of right-handed hitters to better balance the lineup.
“All you’re trying to do is create that type of momentum to when you finally get everything you want, it’s on the right trajectory,” Weaver said. “So it’s kind of weathering the storm, so to speak, in order to hopefully see that rainbow.”
The Yankees, as they have done in each of the past four years, could acquire a player in the final days leading up to the start of the regular season to bolster the roster. Last season, in need of a third baseman, they traded for Berti the day before Opening Day.
“I think we have a good team,” Cashman said, “and we look forward to testing it when we deploy March 27th.”
The 2025 Yankees will undoubtedly be tested. By the injuries. By the rest of the American League. By the weight of what happened during — and since — Game 5.
“You think about any loss, you can’t really sit there and dwell on it,” Judge said. “Whether it’s losing Game 1 or losing Game 5, a loss is a loss. We just didn’t do our job.”
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