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Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Tampa Bay Rays Breakout Star Turning Heads
While the Tampa Bay Rays have been trying to figure out how to pile up more victories in the American League this season, they've been watching Jonathan Aranda mash at the plate. Aranda has been a pleasant surprise for manager Kevin Cash and his Rays teammates. But Aranda had to deal with injuries last season, cutting into his prospective playing time at first base. This season, though, appears to be taking a different course for him. He's making the most of it, becoming the Rays' full-time starting first baseman. What about his statistics? He's been nothing short of spectacular. Through Friday night's action, Aranda is hitting .315 with six home runs and 20 RBIs. He's got an OPS of .927 and a .523 slugging percentage. Those numbers are far and away better than his career numbers. Advertisement Let's look at some granular numbers from Aranda's season, this time up until Thursday's games. Aranda was a pure boss when it comes to breaking balls, slugging .690 against them. He's been waiting on the pitch, not flailing away at the plate. What about off-speed pitches? Aranda was mashing at a .269 clip with a .462 slugging percentage. Jonathan Aranda is filled with lots of confidence early this season for Tampa Bay 'I'm feeling good right now. Feeling a lot of confidence,' Aranda said through interpreter Eddie Rodriguez, reported. 'I'm just looking for that pitch that I can drive, and that's what I've been doing.' Cash knows that he's got a diamond in the rough, so to speak, with Aranda on his team. He's not complaining one bit. Advertisement 'He's really balanced. And I think even when he gets off balance, or the timing gets messed up, he keeps his hands and the barrel in the zone a long time where he can get out on his front foot and just push a ball the other way,' Cash said. 'We saw him do that a handful of times on the [last] homestand. That's a sign just of a really good hitter that's seeing the ball well.' Don't be surprised if Aranda ends up getting a spot on the AL All-Star Team when the summertime classic takes place.
Yahoo
22-04-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Indigenous Players vie for the 2025 Stanley Cup
Miles Morrisseau ICT The challenge for hockey's biggest prize, the Stanley Cup, is under way and once again Indigenous players are in the mix. TJ Oshie, Ojibwe is back in the hunt for one more cup after the Washington Capitals historic season. Team captain Alexander Ovechkin achieved one of the greatest milestones in hockey when he eclipsed Wayne Gretzky's record for most goals, the great chase had the eyes of the hockey world focused for much of the season. He broke the record on April 6, when he scored goal 895 and finished the season with 897. The Capitals have recalled Ethan Bear, Ochapowace Cree Nation from the Hershey Bears of the American Hockey League (AHL) in time for its post season run. SUPPORT INDIGENOUS JOURNALISM. Bear, 27, who signed with Washington after stints with the Vancouver Canucks, Carolina Hurricanes and Edmonton Oilers; led Hershey with 46 points and a plus/minus of +33. The 5'11', 197-pound defensemen represented the team at the 2025 AHL All-Star Classic in February and was named to the AHL's 2024-25 Second All-Star Team. The Capitals look red hot heading into the playoffs with a group that wants to put another championship onto their mantle, next to the franchise's first and only Cup from 2018. They finished at the top of the Eastern Conference and will be taking on the Montreal Canadiens in the first round. Sign up for It has been nearly 60 years since the Toronto Maple Leafs have won the NHL's greatest prize. At that time, they were led by George Armstrong, Anishinaabe/Algonquin who was known to his teammates and his fans as 'Chief'. Armstrong was captain for 13 years and he lifted Lord Stanley's mug four times, including the last one for the franchise in 1967. This year, the team is one of the best in a generation and have a real chance to win it all. There are no Indigenous players currently suiting up for Toronto but they are led behind the bench by Craig Berube, Cree descent who is also known to his team and his fans as 'Chief'. Berube coached the Leafs to their first Atlantic division title this year and are looking to go deep into the playoffs. Berube has won it all as coach of the St. Louis Blues when that franchise won their first championship in 2019. The Leafs will be facing the Ottawa Senators in the first round in what is being called the Battle of Ontario. Travis Hamonic, Metis Nation is making his first appearance in the playoffs since joining the Senators. The veteran defenseman has been in the league for 15 years, coming into the NHL with the New York Islanders, he has also played with the Calgary Flames and The Vancouver Canucks and has been with the Senators since 2021. If he can help this team win it all, it would be a first for him and the franchise. Zach Whitecloud and the Vegas Golden Knights are once again among the favorites in the Western Conference. Whitecloud, Sioux Valley Dakota Nation finished the season with 4 goals and 9 assists along with 37 minutes in the penalty box. The Knights finished at the top of the Pacific division and will be facing off against the Minnesota Wild in the first round of the playoffs. Brandon Montour, Mohawk from Six Nations of the Grand River who hoisted the cup last year as a member of the Florida Panthers will be watching from home this year. Montour signed with the Seattle Kraken for $50 million in the offseason and had an outstanding year with his new team. Montour scored eighteen goals the most in his career, along with 23 assists for 41 points the second most in his career. Montour is becoming the face of the Kraken franchise and added another line to the record books when he scored the fastest overtime goal in the history of the league. The NHL Playoffs are a grueling four rounds, with series going seven games if necessary. The finals are expected to begin in the first week of June. Like this story? Support our work with a $5 or $10 contribution today. Contribute to the nonprofit ICT. Sign up for ICT's free newsletter.
New York Times
02-04-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
NHL's weirdest honor? A brief history of the Second-Team All-Star goalie
With just a few weeks left before awards ballots go out, we already know how one of the races will go. Connor Hellebuyck will win the Vezina Trophy. And if there's any justice, the GMs who vote on the award will make it unanimous. Cool. Now let's talk about the best goaltending honor. Not the honor for best goaltender — I mean the honor for goaltending that is the best. The best honor, as in the most fun, the most interesting, and also the weirdest. Advertisement I'm talking about the Second All-Star Team honors. Yes, this might be something only I'm interested in. But today, I'm going to try to get you on board. Each year, PHWA writers vote to create two All-Star teams, which are not to be confused with the (far inferior) teams from the actual All-Star Game in seasons where the NHL forces us to endure one. These postseason All-Star Team honors are a genuine distinction, proof that a player was considered among the very best at his position during that season. Each of the two teams consists of two defensemen, a center, left and right wingers and a goalie. The highest vote-getters earn First-Team honors, which is the very best of the best of any given year. Then comes the Second Team, which is … sometimes interesting. That's true at all positions, at least occasionally. Sometimes you'll see a good-but-not-great player earn Second-Team honors up front, such as Thomas Vanek in 2007 or a 39-year-old Ray Whitney in 2012. Sometimes, a lesser-known defenseman will earn the honors, such as Lubomir Visnovsky in 2011 or Francois Beauchemin in 2013. But for the most part, a look at the Second-Team All-Star squads shows pretty much the names you'd expect — the best of the best, with the occasional exception that proves the rule. Second-Team goalie honors? Those get weird. Or at least, the Second-Team goalie honor serves up some names that you might generously call unexpected. It could happen again this year, with Logan Thompson battling Andrei Vasilevskiy for Second-Team honors. One of those guys has a Vezina, a Conn Smythe and multiple Cup rings. The other is Logan Thompson, who got traded in the offseason for mid-round draft picks. He's probably the favorite. Why? Because goaltending is weird. And apparently, being the league's second-best goaltender is especially weird. Let's remember some guys who had one year where they were very nearly The Guy. Advertisement The postseason All-Star Teams date back to 1931, and I won't spend a ton of time going through names you've never heard of. But after starting off honoring future Hall of Famers such as Tiny Thompson, Roy Worters and Charlie Gardiner, it didn't take long for the Second Team to start getting, uh, eclectic. Ever heard of Wilf Cude, Earl Robertson, Mike Karakas, or Jim Henry? You're not alone. Shout out to Frank Brimsek, a legitimate star who'd periodically show up to claim Second-Team All-Star honors during the 1940s, five times in all and presumably out of a sense of duty, before the voters would go back to giving it to guys named Paul Bibeault. One more weird thing happens in the pre-expansion era: In the decade between 1954 and 1963, we get an era where the only goalies to earn Second-Team All-Star honors are Terry Sawchuk, Glenn Hall and Jacques Plante. That's it. Just three of the greatest of all time, passing it around between themselves. It wouldn't last, although it took the voters a few more years to start getting really weird. Things start to wobble a bit in the 1970s, when we get multiple Second-Team appearances by guys such as Chico Resch and Don Edwards. Neither of those guys was a Hall of Fame candidate, and Resch is known more for his broadcasting career, but they were both solid players in that journeyman kind of way. Then things get weird. Does anyone remember Mario Lessard? You old-timers might — he was the Kings' goalie in the Miracle on Manchester game — but I'm guessing the younger fans might not know the name. He was a ninth-round pick whose career only lasted four full NHL seasons. But one of those came in 1980-81, when he led the league in wins with 35. That was enough to earn him a couple of Hart votes, and enough All-Star love to land Second-Team honors behind Mike Liut (who won the Pearson Award that year over Wayne Gretzky, but that's a whole other thing). Advertisement Two years later, the Second-Team honors went to Rollie 'The Goalie' Melanson, who split the Islanders' net with Billy Smith. In fairness, he led the league with a .909 save percentage, which, if you adjust for the early-'80s era, is the modern equivalent of (runs numbers) about 1.005. But while Melanson was good again the next year and would play several more seasons, he never received another All-Star vote. The year after Melanson's win, the 1984 Second-Team honors went to Pat Riggin of the Capitals, presumably because he had the league's best GAA at 2.67. He also got a handful of votes in 1985, but then was out of the league completely in just three seasons. Then, after a one-year hiatus with future Hall of Famer Tom Barrasso, the Second-Team honors went to Bob Froese, who I remember best as the only guy I know of to ever retroactively lose credit for a goalie goal. Keep your head up, Bobby — they can take your goals away, but not your Second-Team All-Star goalie honors. No, really — we've tried, and they apparently can't take those away. All told, this was not a bad decade. Given how we remember this era being dominated by Patrick Roy, Dominik Hasek and Martin Brodeur, you might assume that trio hoarded the All-Star honors. But that's not the case; Brodeur won Second-Team honors twice and Roy once, but they still left the other seven years up for grabs. As a result, we get to recognize some dependable 1990s mainstays who never won any other awards. That list starts with Daren Puppa, who earned the Second-Team honors in 1990. That's not the Lightning-era Puppa that you might remember, but rather the Sabres version Buffalo was constantly trying to replace for reasons nobody ever fully understood. Puppa had led the league in wins in 1989-90, a feat matched by fellow second-teamer Kirk McLean in 1991-92. McLean would play nine more years for four different teams, but would never appear on another ballot. Our next second-teamer might be controversial, as there are some fans who insist to this day that he was a superstar who belongs in the Hall of Fame. Yes, it's our old pal Chris Osgood, who won a league-leading 39 games for the Red Wings in his first year as a full-time starter. He'd play 14 more seasons in the NHL, but never again finished in the top five of All-Star balloting, because the writers hate voting for Red Wings. (Please do not check any of the era's other award results to verify that statement.) After a two-year stop with Brodeur, the honor ended the decade in the possession of Boston's Byron Dafoe, largely on the strength of his league-leading 10 shutouts. Those were the last All-Star votes of his career, which lasted just five more seasons, two of which were with the Thrashers so they barely count. I'd have more to say about Dafoe, but I just learned from his Hockey-Reference page that his middle name was apparently Jaromir, and I'm too thrown off by that to go any further. Let's get to the 2000s. Advertisement This is where things really go off the rails. In 2000, the Second-Team honors went to a guy who posted 42 wins and a sub-2.00 GAA for the best team in the league. So far so good, and this goalie was indeed very good that year. Unfortunately for the Blues' Roman Turek, that would be the last award votes he'd get in his career, which turned out to only have four seasons left in it. Ah well, at least I'm assuming the playoffs went great. Next up may be my favorite name on the list: Flyers legend Roman Cechmanek. He'd been drafted as a 29-year-old in 2000 and took over the starter's job as a rookie. In addition to those Second-Team honors, he nearly beat out Hasek for the Vezina and even finished fourth in Hart voting, trailing only some guys named Joe Sakic, Mario Lemieux and Jaromir Jagr. Despite how you may remember it, he was actually really good in all three years in Philadelphia, at least in the regular season (playoffs, not so much). Then he was traded to the Kings, played one season, and was done in the NHL. Things get stranger in 2002, when Jose Theodore took home Second-Team honors. That might not sound weird, since Theodore won a Vezina and a Hart in his career. Here's the issue: He won both of those awards that year. Yes, the same year he was also named a Second-Team All-Star. In other words, the same writers who decided that Theodore should be only the second goalie of the expansion era to be named MVP also thought he wasn't even the best goalie in the league that season. First-Team honors went to Patrick Roy. Sure, why not? By 2003, nobody knew what to expect from the goalie All-Star voting. Might as well hand Second-Team honors to a 27-year-old in his first full season as a starter. Why not. Come on down, Marty Turco, you're the second-best goalie in the league this year. Also, the second-best Marty, but we take what we can get. After that stretch of four straight out-of-left-field picks, the voters settled down, bouncing back and forth between Brodeur and Roberto Luongo until 2009, when they gave the Second-Team honors to Blue Jackets rookie Steve Mason. He took home the Calder, too, despite being only 20 years old when the season ended. It would be the last hardware he'd win in an NHL career that was over before he turned 30. If there's a patron saint of the Second-Team All-Star goalie, I think it might have to be Ilya Bryzgalov. Advertisement The 2010 winner checks all the boxes. He got the honor once. It was the only one of his career. He was genuinely very good in the season he was honored — seriously, I'm not sure you can say that any of these guys didn't deserve it — but never quite reached those heights again. And when you hear his name, you go, 'Oh right, I remember that guy, he was pretty good for a minute.' It makes you happy. Well, unless you're a Flyers fan, but everyone else really enjoyed how this all turned out. If we skip ahead to 2014, we meet our first second-teamer who's still active today. That would be Semyon Varlamov, who earned the honors by winning 41 games for the Avalanche in that weird year where Patrick Roy turned them from a laughingstock into a contender overnight. In 11 seasons since then, including the last few reunited with Roy, Varlamov has received All-Star votes exactly one other time, back in 2021. Finally, we have what may be the weirdest single-season goalie story of the modern era. When the 2014-15 season began, Devan Dubnyk was backing up Mike Smith in Arizona. By mid-January, he was traded to the Wild for a third-round pick, having started just 16 games on the year. Then he pretty much immediately became the best goalie in the league the rest of the way, and was nearly a Hart finalist based on that half-a-season's worth of work. He also earned Second-Team All-Star honors for, it goes without saying, the only time in his career. And that's pretty much where our story ends. Since 2015, every goalie to be voted a second-teamer has been a reasonably big name with a good-to-great resume, at least assuming Thatcher Demko can get back on track. Can Logan Thompson bring the tradition back? We'll see, because he's only 28 and has plenty of runway ahead of him, and this could simply be the year that kicks off a long and successful career as a starter. Or maybe not, and the curse honor of the Second-Team All-Star goalie claims another name. Maybe we have to wait until next year, when the honors go to Joey Daccord or Petr Mrazek or Samuel Ersson or some guy who isn't even in the league yet. It would be weird. It would not be any weirder than what this honor has already given us, which is why it's the best. (Top photo of Wild goalie Devan Dubnyk in 2015: Derek Leung / Getty Images)
Reuters
26-03-2025
- Sport
- Reuters
Panthers hopeful F Brad Marchand makes debut on Friday
March 26 - Winger Brad Marchand's time sitting out due to an upper-body injury could end Friday, Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice said Wednesday. The Panthers (43-25-3, 89 points), who host the Utah Hockey Club on Friday, haven't suited up Marchand since he was acquired on March 7 from the Boston Bruins for a conditional second-round draft pick in 2027. Marchand, 36, who had spent his entire career with Boston, last played on March 1. "He has been on the ice for a little bit now," Maurice said. "That's probably the advantage to four days (off) in that we don't lose another game. We'll get him through a full practice (Thursday) and make an assessment. But we are shooting for Friday against Utah right now." Marchand skated in Wednesday's practice at right wing with the second line, which Maurice said could be his assignment with Sam Bennett and Mackie Samoskevich. Forwards Sam Reinhart and Bennett were given the day off. Florida also is without winger Matthew Tkachuk (lower-body injury), who usually is at right wing with Bennett at center. "We're not jamming these guys back on their first available day," he said. "We're not bringing them in early. If (Marchand) says he wants a few more days, we're good with that." Marchand has 21 goals, 26 assists, a minus-8 rating, 62 penalty minutes, 27 blocks and 66 hits in 61 games this season, which started as his 16th with Boston. He had said that he wanted to finish his career in Boston, but contract extension talks didn't go well. Marchand is set to be an unrestricted free agent following the season. He has 422 career goals, 554 assists, a plus-284 rating that is best among the NHL's active players, 1,113 penalty minutes, 374 blocks and 1,1024 hits in 1,090 regular-season games -- all with Boston since the 2009-10 season. Marchand was a member of the Stanley Cup champions in the 2010-11 season. He has 56 goals, 82 assists, a plus-30 rating, 159 penalty minutes, 75 blocks and 195 hits in 157 playoff games. A two-time All-Star Game selection (2017, 2018), Marchand earned NHL All-Star Team honors after the seasons in 2017, 2019, 2020 and 2021.
Fox News
17-02-2025
- Sport
- Fox News
Charles Barkley hopes San Francisco mayor can 'do something about the homeless population'
Charles Barkley has hope for the city of San Francisco after saying during the NBA All-Star Game broadcast that he met with Mayor Daniel Lurie. The city was the host for the 2025 NBA All-Star Game. Barkley had been on the city's case because of its crime and homeless population. During the broadcast, he expressed some optimism that the city would start cleaning up. "Shoutout to the people of San Francisco, especially the mayor. I met the mayor a couple times. He's been tremendous, and hopefully we can do something about the homeless population," Barkley said during a game between Team Shaquille O'Neal and Team Candace Parker. Barkley said last month he would skip going to the game because it was in San Francisco. "He's going to make the All-Star Team," Barkley said at the time. "I'm not going. I'm not going to that rat-infested place out in San Francisco." Barkley responded to one of his colleagues calling San Francisco "beautiful." "San Francisco is not a beautiful city. Rats. Cats. Y'all are not gonna make me like San Francisco. No. Nope, nope, nope" However, it was far from the first time he had criticized San Francisco. Last year, he ripped the city during the NBA's alternative broadcast of the All-Star Game, which took place in Indianapolis. Barkley asked Reggie Miller which he would choose: playing in the cold in Indianapolis – where Miller spent his entire 18-year NBA career – or "being around a bunch of homeless crooks in San Francisco." Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green called Barkley "crazy" and said that Barkley was not "welcome" in the city. Parker said, "we love San Francisco," but Barkley offered a retort. "No we don't," he said. "… You can't even walk around down there." He later suggested you could walk around the city with a "bulletproof vest." Lurie has vowed to make San Francisco's streets safe again, build "enough housing to turn around our affordability crisis" and tackle "our drug and behavioral health crisis." Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
