A baseball legend could return to the Los Angeles Angels’ dugout this offseason … as the team’s new manager. Former Angels slugger and St. Louis Cardinals legend Albert Pujols is expected to interview for the team’s vacant managerial spot, according to baseball insider Jon Heyman.
The news comes a day after the team announced it parted ways with Ron Washington.
While Pujols is better known for his time in St. Louis — where he hit a phenomenal .326/.417/.614 over 12 seasons — he spent 10 years with the Angels toward the end of his career. Pujols’ numbers declined precipitously during the back-end of that deal and he was released during the 2021 MLB season. Pujols quickly joined the Dodgers, where he went on to experience a late-career resurgence of the next season-and-a-half before retiring from baseball.
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Following his retirement, Pujols opted to remain the dugout as a manager. He was named the manager of the Leones del Escogido, a professional baseball team in the Dominican Republic, ahead of the 2024 season. Pujols helped lead the team win the Serie Final last season and the 2025 Caribbean Series.
CLEVELAND (AP) — Chase DeLauter will make his major-league debut as the Cleveland Guardians try to avoid being eliminated by the Detroit Tigers in their AL Wild Card Series.
DeLauter, who turns 24 on Oct. 8, will play center field and bat seventh. It is the first time a Cleveland player will make his big-league debut in a postseason game.
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″Just with where we’re at. Offense has been a struggle for us and we’re looking to generate some more offense,” manager Stephen Vogt said. “Chase has played a lot of center field, he’s been a very good outfielder. He’s been a very good hitter. We feel like this is the right move to do.”
Cleveland struck out 15 times and managed only four hits in a 2-1 loss to the Tigers on Tuesday.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, DeLauter is the sixth player overall to accomplish the feat and the first since 2020, when Tampa Bay pitcher Shane McClanahan, San Diego pitcher Ryan Weathers and Minnesota outfielder Alex Kirilloff all made their debuts in the postseason.
Vogt said he told DeLauter on Monday there was a good chance he would play on Wednesday.
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Selected 16th in the 2022 amateur draft, DeLauter hit .278 with five homers and 21 RBIs in 34 games at Triple-A Columbus.
Even though putting DeLauter out there might be considered a risk, Vogt noted it’s not any different from what they have done all season.
“We’ve pushed the envelope all year. Why stop now? We’ve had to do some really uncomfortable things all year,” Vogt said.
DeLauter likely would have been up at some point during the regular season, but he was sidelined by injuries for much of this year. He was hurt during a pregame workout at spring training on Feb. 28 and had bilateral core muscle surgery on March 4 for a sports hernia.
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After eight games at the rookie-level Arizona Complex League Guardians, DeLauter played his first game this year for Triple-A Columbus on May 23, but he stayed in the lineup only until July 12. He had surgery 11 days later to repair a fractured hamate bone in his right wrist.
DeLauter had been slated to play in the Arizona Fall League and had been taking batting practice at the organization’s Arizona complex before he was called up to the postseason roster.
“You’re making your major league debut and you’re in a wild card series and elimination game. Have fun, embrace it, enjoy it,” Vogt said. “Chase is ready. You can see it on his face how good of a player he is, and we’re going to roll with it, and we’re excited for him and his family.”
After dismantling Pafos FC in the Champions League, Bayern Munich will travel to Eintracht Frankfurt for a key Bundesliga tilt.
Die Adler can be a handful, but the Bavarians are riding high at the moment and could be too much for the offensive strong, but defensively challenged Eintracht Frankfurt squad to handle.
Let’s get into all of it right here! This is what we have on tap for this edition of the Bavarian Podcast Works — Preview Show:
Also, be sure to stay tuned to Bavarian Podcast Works for all of your up to date coverage on Bayern Munich and Germany. Check us out on Patreon and follow us on Twitter @BavarianFBWorks, @BavarianPodcast @TheBarrelBlog, @BFWCyler, @2012nonexistent, @TommyAdams71 and more.
The 2025-26 NBA season is here! Over the next few weeks, we’re examining the biggest questions, best- and worst-case scenarios, and win projections for all 30 franchises — from the still-rebuilding teams to the true title contenders.
2024-25 finish
Record: 19-63 (14th in the East, missed playoffs)
Offseason moves
Additions: Collin Sexton, Spencer Dinwiddie, Pat Connaughton, Mason Plumlee, Kon Knueppel, Liam McNeeley, Sion James, Ryan Kalkbrenner, Drew Peterson, Antonio Reeves
Subtractions: Mark Williams, Jusuf Nurkić, Seth Curry, Taj Gibson, Vasilije Micić, Josh Okogie, Nick Smith Jr., Damion Baugh, DaQuan Jeffries, Wendell Moore Jr.
(Taylor Wilhelm/Yahoo Sports Illustration)
The Big Question: What does the core look like?
The Hornets own the NBA’s longest active postseason drought, stretching nine seasons; they haven’t won a playoff seriessince 2002. To the extent that they’re relevant in the world of the NBA at the moment, it’s primarily due to LaMelo Ball’s connection to the 6-7 meme, which, as a 43-year-old father of two, is something I’m both intimately familiar with and utterly unable to firmly grasp.
The only franchise with a lower winning percentage over the last 15 seasons — the Pistons — crawled their way out of the muck and back to relevance last season in large part by building a sensible and cohesive team around their crown-jewel pick-and-roll ball-handler, Cade Cunningham. More importantly: Detroit got a career-high 70 games and 2,452 minutes out of its former top draft pick.
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You can’t change fates if you’re not on the floor, and the Hornets’ chances of experiencing a similar revival likely rest with a similar resurgence in availability from Ball — an inarguably gifted, often maddening, rarely present weathervane who has played more than 51 games once in five pro seasons, owing largely to persistent ankleinjuries.
The Hornets went 16-31 in the 47 games in which Ball appeared last season, getting outscored by 3.9 points per 100 possessions. As bad as that was, though, it wasn’t nearly as bad as what happened when LaMelo wasn’t around: They went a staggering 3-32 in the 35 games he missed, and got outscored by a jarring 13.3 points-per-100 with him off the floor.
They need Ball on the floor not only because he’s their primary ball-handler, most gifted playmaker and leading scorer, but also because they need to see whether what they’ve assembled around him is as sensible and cohesive as what the Pistons put around Cade last season. They never really had a chance to determine that last season, even when Ball was healthy; the Hornets lost more games to injury than any team outside of Philadelphia, according to Spotrac’s injury data, with Ball, Brandon Miller, Grant Williams, Tre Mann, since-traded centers Mark Williams and Nick Richards, and pretty much every other player even theoretically expected to provide meaningful minutes in Charlotte missing noteworthy chunks of time.
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With Ball missing significant time due to ankle woes and enticing swingman Miller, the No. 2 pick in the 2023 NBA Draft, sidelined for the final three months of last season following wrist surgery, the Hornets’ most prized young players have shared the floor for just 828 minutes over 39 games combined over the last two seasons, according to PBP Stats. Hornets president of basketball operations Jeff Peterson said on media day that both Ball and Miller are fully operational and ready to go entering training camp; if they can stay that way into the season, hopefully Charlotte can begin assessing in earnest whether they’re able to serve as the engine of a turnaround.
The Hornets are already dealing with some dings — veterans Grant Williams and Josh Green are likely to miss training camp still rehabilitating from their respective surgeries — but if and when the injury bug bites again, this time around they’ll have some failsafe options, especially in the backcourt.
Collin Sexton, imported from the Jazz in a trade that helped signal Utah’s commitment to going full youth movement in the backcourt, is one of just 17 players in the NBA to average more than 17 points and four assists per game on .600 true shooting over the last three seasons; he should provide a legitimate injection of efficient shot-making and complementary ball-handling. The well-traveled Spencer Dinwiddie offers a steady set of hands off the bench who can also scale up into starter’s minutes if necessary. And Mann, limited to just 13 games last season by a herniated disc in his back, returns on a three-year, $24 million deal to see if the tantalizing production he posted in the first month of last season — 14.1 points and three assists in 24.5 minutes per game off the bench, shooting 40% from 3-point range and 90.5% from the foul line — was a sign of bigger things to come.
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Squint a little and you kinda-sorta can see it. Ball at the controls, flanked by some combination of Miller, Sexton, lottery-pick marksman Kon Knueppel, ex-Celtics combo big man Williams, energetic 3-and-D wing Green and Miles Bridges — that’s a team that should be able to play the kind of uptempo, bombs away style that second-year coach Charles Lee sought to bring over from Boston.
Center could be a bit of adventure, with 12-year veteran Mason Plumlee returning for his second tour of duty in Charlotte to join young offensive rebounding machine Moussa Diabaté and second-round pick Ryan Kalkbrenner, whom Lee reportedly believes “can morph into a player akin to veteran center Brook Lopez,” in the running for starters’ minutes. But there might be enough screen-and-dive juice to provide the framework for a respectable 4-out, 1-in offense. (Early returns suggest that Sexton and Plumlee could start next to Ball, Miller and Bridges.)
Sprinkle in some second-unit offense from the likes of Mann, Dinwiddie and rookies Liam McNeeley and Sion James, and some continued defensive improvement from a group that leapt five spots in points allowed per possession in Lee’s first year on the bench, according to Cleaning the Glass, and the Hornets could look considerably more spirited on a nightly basis.
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“At the end of the day, we are still in the building phase,” Peterson told reporters after the draft. “And to get to where you want to go, it starts with competitors.”
The Hornets have the ammunition to add more competitors, owning all of their own future first-round picks while also having added a top-five-protected future first in the Mark Williams trade — reportedly the least favorable of Cleveland’s, Utah’s and Minnesota’s first-rounders in 2029 — plus three future seconds in the deals to take on Sexton and Pat Connaughton. As Jared Dubin noted at Last Night in Basketball, since taking the reins in Charlotte, Peterson has turned a handful of not-in-the-future-plans players and three second-round picks into three first-rounders and 12 future seconds. (And counting, potentially, if Sexton, Green and Connaughton wind up on the move.)
Combine that with a pretty clean cap sheet — the only non-rookie-contract money on their books beyond the end of 2026-27 is Ball’s max — and the Hornets could be in position to make consequential additions as soon as next summer. First, though, Peterson and Co. need to figure out what they’re shopping for — which core components fit together, and which holes still need to be filled in.
Best-case scenario
Ball and Miller play more minutes together this season than they have over the last two, and they look great doing it, with Ball marrying his gaudy numbers with more temperate shot selection and ball control, and Miller showing the kind of all-around growth that validates some of those eyebrow-raising Paul George comps. Knueppel hits the ground running as a central-casting, high-floor complementary piece capable of spacing the floor and shouldering some shot-creation workload.
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With LaMelo at the wheel and those bright young things running the wing, the Hornets become one of the league’s most fearsome transition outfits, sending them rocketing up the offensive efficiency rankings and sending play-by-play man Eric Collins into frankly uncomfortable fits of broadcasting ecstasy. Lee continues to coax the defense toward respectability; in a shattered and shaken-up Eastern Conference, that’s enough to get back into the play-in picture, and to give Hornets fans a reason to believe there’s an actual plan at work, and that it’s starting to work.
If everything falls apart
Ball can’t stay on the floor. None of the failsafe options can keep the offense out of the depths of the NBA basement without him. Miller and Knueppel strain under the weight of the additional offensive workload they have to shoulder in LaMelo’s absence. Despite Lee’s best efforts, neither the offense nor the defense can climb out of the bottom 10, leaving the Hornets once again mucking about in the lottery and once again wondering what, if anything, they can build with this collection of pieces.
2025-26 schedule
Season opener: Oct. 22 vs. Brooklyn
Small sample size theater, but still: When Ball and Miller shared the floor last season, the Hornets outscored opponents by one point per possession — the efficiency differential of a 43- or 44-win team. Get anything close to reasonable health from them, and Charlotte should have a good chance of leaping a bar this close to the floor.
More season previews
East: Atlanta Hawks • Boston Celtics • Brooklyn Nets • Charlotte Hornets • Chicago Bulls • Cleveland Cavaliers • Detroit Pistons • Indiana Pacers • Miami Heat • Milwaukee Bucks • New York Knicks • Orlando Magic • Philadelphia 76ers • Toronto Raptors • Washington Wizards
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West: Dallas Mavericks • Denver Nuggets • Golden State Warriors • Houston Rockets • Los Angeles Clippers • Los Angeles Lakers • Memphis Grizzlies • Minnesota Timberwolves • New Orleans Pelicans • Oklahoma City Thunder • Phoenix Suns • Portland Trail Blazers • Sacramento Kings • San Antonio Spurs • Utah Jazz
CLEVELAND (AP) — Rookie Dillon Gabriel will get his first NFL start on Sunday when the Cleveland Browns face the Minnesota Vikings in London.
The Browns announced on Wednesday that they were benching Joe Flacco after he struggled to lead the offense in the first four games.
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Cleveland is 1-3 and ranked next-to-last in scoring, averaging 14 points per game. The team has scored 17 points or fewer in nine straight games dating back to last season. Gabriel will be the fifth different starting QB in 10 games, joining Jameis Winston, Dorian Thompson-Robinson, Bailey Zappe and Flacco.
Gabriel was selected in the third round of April’s draft. He has seen action in two games — Week 2 at Baltimore and Week 4 at Detroit — and has completed all three of his passes for 19 yards and a touchdown. He was named the backup quarterback at the end of training camp after the Browns traded Kenny Pickett to the Las Vegas Raiders.
During the preseason, Gabriel led the Browns to either a touchdown or field goal on five of his seven drives. He also directed a pair of two-minute, first-half drives against the Philadelphia Eagles and Los Angeles Rams.
In his two preseason outings, Gabriel completed 25 of 37 passes for 272 yards with one touchdown and one interception.
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Cleveland will practice at its facility today before taking a flight to Britain.
Among the 33 quarterbacks who have made at least 56 pass attempts, Flacco is last in the league with a 60.3 passer rating, has the second-worst completion rate (58.1%) and his six interceptions are second most.
The Browns offense is ranked 27th in total yards (279.8 yards per game), 20th in passing (195 ypg) and 30th in rushing (84.8 ypg).
The switch to Gabriel is also sure to reignite questions about where Sheduer Sanders might eventually factor down the line or if Sanders will be Gabriel’s backup? He has been the third-string quarterback the first four weeks.
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Sanders dropped to the 144th pick and fifth round after many thought he would go in the first two rounds. He completed 17 of 29 passes for 152 yards and two touchdowns in two preseason games.
William Saliba has given an update on his ankle injury, revealing that he hopes the problem is behind him now.
Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images
William Saliba has had a disrupted start to the new campaign, following an injury sustained in the warm-up to Arsenal’s match against Liverpool.
Though the centre-back tried to play on and start the match, he only managed five minutes before being withdrawn. He then missed the international break and Arsenal’s match against Nottingham Forest, as well as sitting on the bench against Athletic Club.
Saliba did then return and play 90 minutes against Manchester City and Port Vale, but he was only used as a substitute for the game against Newcastle United on Sunday.
Photo by George Wood/Getty Images
The fact Saliba didn’t start the Newcastle game raised some concerns that he’s still carrying the ankle problem.
But whilst the 24-year-old admits he was feeling it around the time of the Manchester City clash, he insists he feels better now.
“It’s better now,” Saliba said on Tuesday. “I was feeling [it] a bit before City, and even after, but yeah now I’m feeling better. I hope I will not have pain anymore.”
Photo by Justin Setterfield/Getty Images
In general, players who take part in pre-match press conferences in UEFA competitions usually go on to start the following match, putting Saliba in line for a start against Olympiacos on Wednesday.
But Arteta has been known to break these traditions to maintain some pre-match unpredictability, so we’ll have to wait and see what happens on Wednesday night.
If Saliba does start, it will be his first appearance for the club since signing a new five-year contract to 2030.
Gary Danielson hasn’t worked an SEC football game in almost two years, but the longtime CBS Sports commentator and former “SEC on CBS” broadcaster still has plenty of opinions about the state of the conference — starting with the Alabama Crimson Tide.
Danielson joined SiriusXM’s Chris “Mad Dog” Russo on Monday’s edition of “Mad Dog Unleashed” for a recap of Week 5 in college football, which included the former SEC football voice’s thoughts on Alabama’s 24-21 win over the Georgia Bulldogs at Sanford Stadium.
For Danielson, the praise starts with first-year starting quarterback Ty Simpson.
“When I was doing the games two years ago, I was whispered on the sideline by two highly placed guys that I respect that he was going to be the next great one at Alabama,” Danielson said of Simpson. “And he’s turned out to be pretty darn good.”
Danielson added that after the shock of the Crimson Tide’s 31-17 loss at Florida State in the season opener, and all the subsequent criticism coach Kalen DeBoer and players received in the wake of it, Alabama is “showing their pride.”
“One of the things that I’ve always talked about when Alabama won all those games back when I was doing them when Nick Saban was there, is that Alabama made clutch plays at the end of games to win games they could have and should have lost, but they found a way to win them anyway. Whether it was a fumble late against LSU (in 2014), when they held LSU to a field goal and took three straight timeouts and they went all the way down the field to score, there’s always been clutch plays. And it looks like this team is getting clutch for Kalen DeBoer.”
“When he has a quarterback, he’s a pretty darn good coach,” Danielson added of DeBoer, who went 25-3 at Washington before being named Alabama’s coach in January 2024.
Alabama certainly had a quarterback against Georgia. Simpson was 24-of-38 for 276 yards and two touchdowns. He led the Crimson Tide on two long touchdown drives to open the game as Alabama took an early 14-0 lead.
Later, Simpson put the game out of reach with a third-down pass to Jam Miller for a seven-yard pickup and a first down to midfield with less than 1:30 to play.
Chris ‘Mad Dog’ Russo reacts to Alabama football win over Georgia
For his part, Russo is already willing to go ahead and declare Alabama a College Football Playoff team — or in his uniquely ‘Doggy vocabulary,’ a “tournament” team.
“That was a great win for Alabama. That’s going to get them into the (playoff) field. You win at Georgia, you’re going to make the tournament at the end of the year. That’s all there is to it.” –Chris Russo on Alabama’s win over Georgia.
Alabama’s eight remaining opponents will have something to say about that, starting with the Crimson Tide’s Week 6 opponent in Vanderbilt this Saturday. Alabama (3-1 overall, 1-0 SEC) is ranked No. 10 in this week’s AP Top 25 poll. Vanderbilt (5-0, 1-0) is No. 16.
Atlético Madrid: Simeone heaps praise on Griezmann
Atlético Madrid: Simeone bows to Griezmann
Antoine Griezmann has once again left his mark on the Colchoneros’ history. The former French international scored his 200th goal for Atlético Madrid last night, further cementing his status as a living legend of the club. Facing Eintracht Frankfurt in the Champions League, the Madrid side put on an attacking masterclass (5-1), confirming their resurgence after a shaky start to the season. In their last three outings, they have found the back of the net 13 times, including a resounding victory over Real Madrid (5-2). For Griezmann, this will be a night to remember, as he now stands as the second-highest scorer in the club’s history, within touching distance of the all-time record.
Simeone, moved and ambitious
After the match, Diego Simeone did not hesitate to praise his player, whom he has coached for over a decade. “We played a very good match, with solid control right from the start. It’s a very important victory in the Champions League,” the Argentinian told Marca, before adding: “The supporters give us so much. I hope I can repay them with the competitiveness they expect.” Pleased with his team’s attacking momentum, Simeone nonetheless stressed the need to remain demanding, correcting certain details at both ends of the pitch. Yet his heartfelt tribute to Griezmann perfectly illustrates the Frenchman’s importance to Atlético’s project: a leader, a goalscorer, and an icon the club will be celebrating for a long time to come.
Manchester United: Mbeumo calls not to blame everything on Ruben Amorim
Manchester United just can’t find their rhythm. The pressure is now mounting on Ruben Amorim. But Bryan Mbeumo, for his part, refuses to lay all the blame at his manager’s feet.
Only two wins since the start of the season. Another defeat, this time against Brentford (3-1). Fourteenth place in the table. Under fire, Ruben Amorim finds his work under scrutiny. Yet for Bryan Mbeumo, it’s the players who need to take a hard look at themselves. Speaking to Sky Sports, the 26-year-old Cameroon striker insists the squad must step up:
Of course, I’m disappointed with the result. I received a very warm welcome from the fans and I’ll never forget it. But I think everyone in the team needs to take responsibility. When you play for a club of this stature, you have to understand what that means. As a group, we need to do better.
Mbeumo, who joined for £71 million this summer, prefers to keep a cool head. He says his focus is on the daily grind—not on the outside noise:
The most important thing is to stay focused internally, avoid social media, and keep our minds on the pitch.
🚨🎙️ | 🇨🇲Bryan Mbeumo: “All team members must take on their responsibilities. When you play for such an important club, everyone must know what they have to do. As a team, we need to do BETTER.” #MUFC
Liverpool boast a wealth of attacking talent at the moment – with Alexander Isak, Hugo Ekitike and Florian Wirtz all joining over the summer.
Those players can be added to a contingent that already includes superstar Mohamed Salah, Cody Gakpo and Federico Chiesa – as well as rising star Rio Ngumoha.
The winger provides a sterling example of the kind of pathway available to elite young talents while Trey Nyoni also joins Rio in the first-team picture.
Sonni-Lambie on a hot streak
But Liverpool’s pedigree in youth talent production is deep and not just limited to those currently on the fringes of the first team.
The club’s underage sector boasts a red-hot striker at the moment who simply cannot scoring.
With Kareem Ahmed giving Rob Page’s side the lead in the early stages, Sonni-Lambie struck again to make it five goals in only seven matches this season. He also hit the crossbar in a scintillating performance.
The striker has hit goals against Stoke (1), Burnley (2) and Blackburn (1) in the U18 Premier League and has now got stuck in on the continental stage having drawn a blank on matchday one against Atletico Madrid.
🏴 Joshua Sonni-Lambie for #LFC’s U18 side this season:
⚽️ Goal vs Stoke City ⚽️⚽️Two goals vs Burnley ⚽️ Goal vs Aston Villa ⚽️ Goal vs Blackburn Rovers 🅰️ Assist vs Newcastle
Sonni-Lambie is well-regarded around the Liverpool academy – signing his first-ever professional deal back in February 2025. It may well be only a matter of time before the teenager’s talents put him on the radar of first-team coach Arne Slot.
