Blake, 28, also has a real estate background and seemed completely smitten with the reality star. He even proposed to Emma, but she soon ended the relationship.
Now, the O Group agent has confirmed she is back together with Blake, despite her friends’ concerns.
Opening up to Tudum, she explained: “If I really cared about making myself look good, I would’ve stayed broken up with him or would’ve said, ‘Nope, we’re not together.’
“But ultimately, with relationships, there’s back and forth — and I think that that’s OK to show.”
Diving into why she reunited with her ex, Emma continued: “I had a realization at the reunion that I was [thinking too much] about what other people think.
“If I want to go spend time with this person, why am I so concerned about what everyone else is going to say? After the reunion, I went to go see him, and we’ve been traveling and been together ever since.”
During the reunion, Emma revealed she was back in contact with Blake.
It also came to light that Emma had “lied” to Chrishell about going to the Bahamas for Blake’s birthday, which has played a part in souring their friendship.
The duo were at a Beyoncé concert when Emma abruptly left.
Chrishell revealed: “You [Emma] told me that you were going to Boston to see your family and that’s why you had to leave early. That’s what you told me.”
She went on to add: “The next day she shows up in the Bahamas with Blake.”
The 44-year-old claimed she disliked Blake because the relationship causes Emma to “flake” on their friendship.
But Chrishell’s disappointment didn’t end there, the actress also claims Blake has problematic views.
Back in May, a fan took to Instagram and asked Chrishell: “What’s happening with you and Emma? Hot topic on Reddit.”
She responded: “Ask her about her MAGA bf who told me pronouns are dumb and that he likes to use the N word. I just can’t with that. Too old to allow that in.”
The social media comment sparked online conversation and press coverage which didn’t exactly paint Emma in a favourable light.
During the season nine reunion, Chrishell opened up about the post, claiming Blake revealed his views during a conversation in her kitchen.
“He told me proudly [that] he openly uses the N-word. He thinks that people [who] don’t sing lyrics with all the words, he thinks they are the ones that are too woke,” she explained.
Emma, who was there during the chat, fired back with: “He never said the word woke. He never said that.”
She went on to explain that Blake expressed that “he’s friends with a bunch of rappers and they try and get him to say it [the N-word] and he says no”.
Emma also argued that Chrishell’s post was not an accurate representation of what Blake said, and that he never voiced any political views.
Selling Sunset Season 9 is streaming now on Netflix
In large part, because the pitcher acquired to be its anchor was struggling to find himself.
It’s easy to forget now, with Blake Snell in the midst of a historic October performance that has helped lead the Dodgers back to the World Series. But for most of his debut season in Los Angeles, the two-time Cy Young Award winner and $182-million offseason signing was grappling with frustration, enduring what he described recently as “the hardest year of my career.”
First, there was well-documented early adversity: A shoulder problem that Snell quietly pitched through in two underwhelming starts at the beginning of the campaign, before sidelining him on the injured list for the next four months.
Then, there was an ordeal Snell detailed last week for the first time: In late August, on the same day his wife, Haeley, gave birth to the couple’s second child, Snell got so sick in the hospital that he fainted, was taken to the emergency room, and kept overnight hooked up to IV fluids.
“It’s been a lot,” Snell told The Times last week, while reflecting on a difficult season now primed for a triumphant final act. “But that’s what this is all about. Find the best in yourself. Fight through all the doubt, the bull—. And figure it out.”
Dodgers vs. Toronto Friday at Toronto, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
Saturday at Toronto, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
Monday at Dodgers, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
Tuesday at Dodgers, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
*Wed., Oct. 29 at Dodgers, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
*Friday, Oct. 31 at Toronto, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
*Saturday, Nov. 1 at Toronto, 5 p.m., Fox, AM 570, KTNQ 1020, ESPN Radio
*-if necessary
CLIPPERS
Walker Kessler had 22 points and nine rebounds, Lauri Markkanen scored 20 and the Utah Jazz beat the Clippers 129-108 on Wednesday night in the season opener for both teams.
Brice Sensabaugh added 20 points off the bench for Utah, which set a team record for points in a season opener.
The new-look Clippers appeared confused on the court at times in a disappointing debut for a team with lofty aspirations. Ivica Zubac led them with 19 points and seven rebounds. James Harden and Brook Lopez each scored 15. Kawhi Leonard had 10 points on 3-of-9 shooting.
It was their most lopsided season-opening loss in 17 years.
From Bill Plaschke: The extraordinary athlete stepped on to the Crypto.com Arena court baseline during the first quarter of the Lakers season opener Tuesday night amid great buzz.
When his smiling face was later shown on the video board, he was enveloped in the night’s loudest individual cheers.
With injured and bespectacled James watching stoically from the end of the Laker bench while new owner Mark Walter was witnessing the same mess in a baseline seat nearby, the Lakers stumbled their way to a 119-109 loss to the Golden State Warriors.
1921 — Green Bay Packers play 1st APFA (forerunner to NFL) game; beat Minneapolis Marines, 7-6 at Hagemeister Park, Green Bay, Wis.
1949 — Don Doll of the Detroit Lions intercepts four passes in a 24-7 victory over the Chicago Cardinals.
1960 — Jim Martin of Detroit becomes the first kicker to kick two field goals over 50 yards in a game as the Lions beat the Baltimore Colts 30-17.
1964 — Joe Frazier dominates German Hans Huber for an easy points win to capture the boxing heavyweight gold medal in Tokyo.
1971 — Greg Pruitt rushes for 294 yards on 19 carries to lead the Oklahoma Sooners to an NCAA record 711 yards rushing and a 75-28 pounding of Kansas State.
1976 — Pittsburgh’s Tony Dorsett rushes for 180 yards in a 45-0 rout over Navy to become the top career rusher in NCAA history with 5,206 yards.
1988 — Dan Marino passes for 521 yards, three touchdowns and five interceptions as the Miami Dolphins lose to the New York Jets 44-30. Marino completes 35 of 60 passes as he produces the second-best single-game total yardage in NFL history.
1993 — The Toronto Maple Leafs break the NHL record for most victories at the start of the season, winning their ninth straight game by beating the second-year Tampa Bay Lightning 2-0.
1999 — Florida State’s Bobby Bowden gets his 300th win with a 17-14 win over his son, Clemson coach Tommy Bowden. With the victory Bowden joins Bear Bryant, Pop Warner, Joe Paterno and Amos Alonzo Stagg as the only major college coaches to reach 300 victories.
2000 — The New York Jets, trailing 30-7 at the end of the third quarter, come back to beat the Miami Dolphins 40-37 in overtime on Monday night. The Jets score four touchdowns and a field goal in the fourth quarter to force overtime.
2005 — San Diego’s LaDainian Tomlinson is held to a career-low 7 yards rushing in 17 carries and fails to score in the Chargers’ 20-17 loss at Philadelphia, ending his NFL record-tying streak of games with a touchdown at 18.
2008 — Carolina’s Brandon Sutter gives one of hockey’s most famous families another milestone, scoring his first NHL goal in a 4-1 loss at Pittsburgh. The 19-year-old Sutter, son of New Jersey Devils coach Brent Sutter, is the ninth member of the Sutter family to play in the NHL.
2011 — Tim Tebow rallies the Broncos for two touchdowns in the final 2:44 of the fourth quarter to force overtime, and Matt Prater’s 52-yard field goal gives Denver an improbable 18-15 victory over the stunned Miami Dolphins. The Broncos appeared beaten when they trailed 15-0 with 5:23 left and took over at their 20.
2016 — Jay Ajayi ties an NFL record by surpassing 200 yards rushing for the second game in a row, helping the Miami Dolphins rally past the Buffalo Bills 28-25. Ajayi rushes for 214 yards in 29 carries after totaling 204 yards a week earlier in a win over Pittsburgh.
2019 — All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving pours in 50 points, setting a new NBA record for points on debut with a new team as his Brooklyn Nets go down 127-126 at home to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Compiled by the Associated Press
THIS DAY IN BASEBALL HISTORY
1945 — Jackie Robinson signs a contract with the Montreal Royals, minor league farm team of the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at [email protected]. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
For much of the year, the Dodgers’ starting rotation felt broken.
In large part, because the pitcher acquired to be its anchor was struggling to find himself.
It’s easy to forget now, with Blake Snell in the midst of a historic October performance that has helped lead the Dodgers back to the World Series. But for most of his debut season in Los Angeles, the two-time Cy Young Award winner and $182 million offseason signing was grappling with frustration, enduring what he described recently as “the hardest year of my career.”
First, there was well-documented early adversity: A shoulder problem that Snell quietly pitched through in two underwhelming starts at the beginning of the campaign, before sidelining him on the injured list for the next four months.
Then, there was an ordeal Snell detailed last week for the first time: In late August, on the same day his wife Haeley gave birth to the couple’s second child, Snell got so sick in the hospital that he fainted, was taken to the emergency room, and kept overnight hooked up to IV fluids.
“This is awful,” he thought to himself then.
Which now, has made his dominant postseason — including an 0.86 ERA in his first three playoff outings, and a scheduled Game 1 start in the World Series on Friday night — all the more gratifying.
“It’s been a lot,” Snell told The Times last week, while reflecting on a difficult season now primed for a triumphant final act. “But that’s what this is all about. Find the best in yourself. Fight through all the doubt, the bull—. And figure it out.”
Early in the year, that group dealt with its own rash of injuries, losing Snell, Tyler Glasnow, Roki Sasaki and others in a harrowing flashback to 2024.
This time, most of their top arms returned healthy. But up until six weeks ago, they still faced genuine questions for the fall.
At that point, Yoshinobu Yamamoto was mired in an up-and-down stretch following his All-Star selection in the first half of the year, raising worries he could be tiring en route to making a career-high 30 starts.
Glasnow had returned from his early-season shoulder problem, but grinded through six starts from July 29 to Aug. 30 with an ERA above 4.00.
And while Shohei Ohtani was pitching well, he was also continuing to build up in his return from a second career Tommy John surgery.
Suddenly, it all left Snell to be the linchpin for the pitching staff — thrusting him to the center of the late-season resurgence that was soon to come.
“With every great starting staff, you got to have that anchor,” manager Dave Roberts said. “Having him get back to pitch the way he did, sort of raised the bar for everyone.”
This past winter, the Dodgers made Snell their top priority for a reason.
They looked at the patchwork rotation that nearly derailed their 2024 World Series run, and decided the year’s staff needed another star to build around.
Yamamoto, Glasnow and Ohtani already provided a well-established foundation. Clayton Kershaw, Emmet Sheehan, Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May offered plenty of depth to withstand a 162-game marathon.
What was missing, however, was another bona fide ace; the kind capable of swinging postseason series and transforming October fortunes. In Snell, they saw such potential. His presence, they hoped, would complete their title-defense blueprint.
“As we were talking about ways that we could put ourselves in the best position to win a World Series in 2025,” president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said the day Snell was introduced by the club, “all conversations kept coming back to Blake.”
For most of the year, of course, Snell’s impact was limited. After his two injury-hampered starts at the beginning of the season, he remained out of action until after the trade deadline.
During that time, the Dodgers slow-played Snell’s recovery — putting him through a meticulous process (similar to their handling of Glasnow and Ohtani) that was designed to have him ready for the stretch run of the season, and hopefully peaking in time for the start of the playoffs.
Upon his initial return in early August, Snell seemed to be on track, with the left-hander posting a sub-2.00 ERA in his first four outings off the IL.
Then, however, came another unforeseen setback, after he rushed home from an Aug. 22 outing in San Diego for the birth of his child.
By the time Snell’s wife went into labor later that week, the 32-year-old arrived at the hospital feeling “extremely sick,” he recounted last week. At one point, as he got up from a couch to go hold his newly born baby, he said he passed out and fainted right there in the room.
Snell was taken to the emergency room and stayed there overnight, getting two IVs to combat an unspecified illness undoubtedly compounded by exhaustion.
“I couldn’t really stand,” he said. “I just felt awful.”
And yet, a few days later, there Snell was back atop the Dodger Stadium mound; making sure that, after his extended absence earlier in the campaign, he wouldn’t miss another start.
“That’s what I signed up to do,” Snell said. “When I pitch, I just forget about it. I don’t allow a lot of excuses.”
Snell’s illness was unknown at the time, but the physical toll it had taken quickly became obvious. His velocity was noticeably down in a three-run, 5 ⅓ innings start on Aug. 29 against the Arizona Diamondbacks. Six days later, he toiled again during a “frustrating” outing in Pittsburgh, yielding a season-high nine hits and five runs to the lowly Pirates.
Pushing through those games, though, gave Snell a key to hone in on for the rest of the season. “If this is who you are today, figure it out,” he told himself. And finally, with no more disruptions to his routine, improvement flowed quickly.
Dodgers pitcher Blake Snell puts his arm around catcher Ben Rortvedt as they walk back to the dugout together on Sept. 17.
Snell said after that outing, which was followed by one more six-inning, one-run start in his regular-season finale in Arizona: “[I’m] starting to be able to play catch with more intent and work on stuff … Coming through in the push to the postseason, and being able to make it, that’s what the whole season is for.”
The old adage in baseball is that hitting can be contagious.
In the case of this year’s Dodgers, starting pitching evidently can be, too.
As Snell got hot in September, so did the rest of the team’s resurgent rotation. Yamamoto rediscovered his early-season form, winning National League pitcher of the month with an immaculate 0.67 ERA in four starts. Glasnow finished the month with a 2.49 mark, after finally refining the mechanics of his throw. Ohtani, meanwhile, got stretched out to six innings, maintaining his two-way dominance over repeated full-length appearances.
The bar had been raised, with the constant cycle of gems continuing to push it a little bit higher.
The pitchers rode off the momentum and relished in their shared success; to the point that Roberts joked they almost seemed to be competing to outdo one another.
“I think we’re all good,” Glasnow said. “So it was just a matter of time until all of us did good at the same time.”
But in these playoffs, no one has been more lethal than Snell. In his 21 innings so far, he has thrown a scoreless frame in all but one.
Dodgers pitcher Blake Snell walks off the mound after striking out the last batter of the second inning of Game 2 of the NLDS against the Philadelphia Phillies.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
He was good in his first start, producing seven innings of two-run ball against the Cincinnati Reds in the wild-card round. He was superb in the next, going six scoreless against the Phillies in a hostile road environment.
His masterpiece, however, came in Game 1 of the NL Championship Series, when he tossed eight scoreless innings, struck out 10 batters, and ruthlessly toyed with a Milwaukee Brewers lineup helpless to adjust to his manipulative changeup.
“We’ve all known this: Blake, when he’s right, is the best pitcher in the game,” Kershaw, his future Hall of Fame teammate, said afterward. “To have a guy that can do that, set the tone, and just have a guy that you can count on like that, it’s huge.”
For his part, Snell continues to insist that “I feel like I could be way better.” After his repeated setbacks earlier this year, he claims that, “even now, I’m still battling.”
The numbers, of course, tell a different story. In the live-ball era (since 1920), only three other pitchers with 20 or more innings in a postseason had at least 20 strikeouts and a sub-1.00 ERA (Sandy Koufax in 1965, John Smoltz in 1996 and Justin Verlander in 2013).
On Friday night, Snell will be on the bump once again, trying to continue a dazzling streak for himself and his rotation.
What once felt like the hardest year of his career, is now four wins away from being the most fulfilling.
“It’s what you have to go through to win a World Series,” he said. “You can find an excuse, or you can find a way to figure it out.”
Jeremy Sheffield has played Patrick Blake and his twin brother Jez in Hollyoaks, but the actor also appeared in Coronation Street
Angie Quinn Screen Time Reporter
22:31, 21 Oct 2025
Jez Blake arrived in Hollyoaks as the twin of his deceased brother Patrick(Image: Channel 4)
Hollyoaks actor Jeremy Sheffield previously appeared in Coronation Street before securing his memorable parts on the Channel 4 drama.
The 59-year-old actor is recognised for portraying Chester’s Patrick Blake between 2012 and 2016, and has recently returned to the enduring soap as the character’s twin sibling Jez.
Jeremy initially left Hollyoaks in 2016, when his character met a shocking end at the hands of killer granddaughter Nico Blake (Persephone Swales-Dawson).
Discussing his character in 2024, actor Jeremy hinted at a troubling history between Jez and his late twin, reports the Manchester Evening News.
He revealed to Inside Soap magazine: “A huge event blew the brothers apart and Jez disappeared – whatever went on was so traumatic he just had to escape. I imagine Jez was Patrick’s first victim.”
However, before the actor set foot in Chester as Patrick or his wicked serial killer twin Jez, Jeremy featured on competing soap Coronation Street and contributed to a beloved character’s exit.
In December 2011, Jeremy joined the Cobbles as Danny Stratton, who became a fresh romantic prospect for unlucky-in-love Becky McDonald (Katherine Kelly).
Danny, working as a hotel manager, initially encountered Becky at a perfect moment as she attempted to move forward from her collapsed marriage to Steve McDonald (Simon Gregson), who had swiftly begun a fresh relationship with Tracy Barlow (Kate Ford).
Becky and Danny’s romance hit a rocky start when she discovered a woman and a young lad at his house, leading her to believe he was a married man.
However, Danny quickly clarified that the individuals were his sister and son, Billy.
When Tracy accused her romantic rival of causing her miscarriage, the Weatherfield locals turned against Becky.
But, Danny, being the good soul he is, stepped in to clear Becky’s name and expose Tracy as a fibber.
Just as things seemed to be looking up for the new couple, Danny and Becky, they were left heartbroken when his hotel company moved him to Barbados, putting their relationship in jeopardy.
In a surprising romantic turn, Becky chose to join Danny and Billy in their new life overseas, bidding a final farewell to Weatherfield in January 2012.
Apart from Hollyoaks and Corrie, soap star Jeremy has featured in several other telly shows and films, including Murder in Suburbia, Hotel Babylon, Creep and The Wedding Date.
He also portrayed Alex Adams in Holby City from 2000 to 2003. In 2010, he took part in the ITV series Dancing On Ice.
According to IMDB, Jeremy’s first acting gig was as a dancer in Queen’s iconic music video for the chart-topping ‘I Want To Break Free’. He also played the man in Natalie Imbruglia’s music video Torn.
Hollyoaks airs Monday to Wednesday on E4 at 7pm and first look episodes can be streamed Channel 4 from 7am
MILWAUKEE — Blake Treinen’s first save of the postseason was hardly a memorable performance.
He threw more balls than strikes. He walked the first batter he faced and nearly hit the second. And he got the final out on a pitch that was well out of the strike zone.
But he did get the final out, preserving the Dodgers’ 2-1 win over the Milwaukee Brewers in the opening game of the National League Championship Series on Monday.
And for Treinen and the bullpen he’s supposed to be anchoring, that counts as major progress.
“We’ve been putting in a lot of work to try to get some things in a better place with myself,” Treinen said. “Today, I thought I executed almost every pitch.”
The fixes, he said, were simple mechanical tweaks that helped set up his pitches.
“Sometimes through catch-play and touching the mound a little bit, things start to click. And you’re kind of shocked at how a subtle tweak can change everything,” he said.
In the Dodgers’ World Series run last season, Treinen was as vicious as an ill-tempered Doberman, going 2-0 with three saves, a 2.19 ERA and 18 strikeouts in 12 1/3 innings.
This year, not so much. In his first four playoff appearances more batters got a hit than struck out and five of the 12 men he faced reached base. That followed a disastrous September in which he went 1-5 with a 9.64 ERA.
He wasn’t so much putting out fires as he was starting them. The poor performances began to build on one another.
“At times this year, when it hasn’t gone well, th[ings] can speed up a little bit in your mind,” he said. “That’s the hard part, to carry the thoughts and focus on what you’re good at.”
But manager Dave Roberts, who has had Treinen for the last five seasons, kept giving him chances to turn things around.
“I think the best way to for me to kind of view it is whether you’re a position player slumping or a pitcher maybe not getting the outs at the clip that you want, we all know what our abilities are,” Treinen said. “Dave’s seen me at my best and at my worst, and so when he calls my name, I’m grateful that he has confidence in me.
“And I have confidence that he’s putting me in situations for the team to win. So there’s a lot of peace in that.”
Treinen may have been at peace but he didn’t have much wiggle room when he replaced Roki Sasaki on the mound Monday with two out in the ninth and the Dodgers clinging to a one-run lead.
Sasaki, the team’s surprise playoff closer, had been lights out in the postseason, with just one of the 17 hitters he faced reaching base. Against the Brewers, he gave up two walks, a ground-rule double and a run-scoring sacrifice fly in the span of two outs. When Treinen entered, Milwaukee had the tying run on first and the winning run on third — and the right-hander immediately made things worse by walking William Contreras on six pitches to load the bases.
Treinen quickly got ahead of Brice Turang, the Brewers’ left-handed cleanup hitter, but courted disaster again when he sailed a 1-2 sweeper that nearly hit Turang. That would have forced in the tying run had Turang not instinctively danced out of the way, eliciting a groan from the sold-out crowd.
“It’s a natural reaction,” Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said. “When the ball is coming towards you, it’s a breaking ball, your natural reaction is to do that.
Dodgers pitcher Roki Sasaki delivers in the ninth inning against the Brewers in NLCS Game 1 on Monday.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
“It happens. He’ll learn from that situation. But it’s hard.”
For Treinen, whose only luck lately has been bad luck, the break was one he quickly cashed by getting Turang to chase the next pitch, which was head high, to end the game.
That swing brought equal measures of joy and relief for Treinen, who has supplied little of either for the Dodgers this postseason. This time, he said it felt good to finally be able to contribute.
“Our guys have been playing great baseball,” he said. “Our bats are doing a great job. Our starters have been amazing. So [I’m] just doing my job to finish the game.”
He also did his job in picking up Sasaki, the hero of the NL Division Series win over the Phillies, who stood to be the goat if the Dodgers lost Monday.
“Any time as a professional, when you have the ability to pick up your teammates, there’s a lot of pride in it,” Treinen said. “You just want to do your part because it’s a team game.
“I’ve certainly had guys pick me up this year. To have the opportunity to pick someone else up, it feels good.”
And it’s been a long time since Treinen has felt that.
One way to keep Dodger relievers from ruining the team’s postseason run is to keep the bullpen gate closed for as long as possible.
Blake Snell gave that strategy a whirl in Game 1 of the National League wild-card series Tuesday, pitching a solid — sometimes brilliant —- seven innings. But even then he and his teammates had to wait out the nightly bullpen meltdown before escaping with a 10-5 win over the Cincinnati Reds to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series.
“Blake was fantastic tonight,” manager Dave Roberts said. “You could see he was in complete control. The fastball was great. The change-up was plus.
“Kind of mixing and matching and he really was in control the entire game.”
The bullpen? Not so much. But we’ll get to that in a minute.
For Snell, it was that mixing and matching that made him so tough, Cincinnati manager Terry Francona said.
“The big difference-maker was his change-up,” Francona said. “It was his ability to manipulate the change-up, even vary it. He’d throw one that was 87 [mph] and one that was 82. And he threw two, three, four in a row at times at times, all different speeds.
“You throw a 97 [mph fastball] in there, and it becomes difficult.”
Snell was efficient from the start, retiring the side in the first on seven pitches. He set down the first eight Reds in order, then after giving up a double and walk in the third, retired the next 10 in a row, allowing him to pitch deep into the game.
Given the bullpen’s continued struggles, that’s likely to be a blueprint the Dodgers will continue to follow in the playoffs.
“It felt good to go deep in the ballgame,” said Snell, whose seven innings matched a season high. “I felt really in control, I could read swings and just kind of navigate through the lineup.
Dodgers fans cheer for Blake Snell as he walks off the mound in the fifth inning.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
“The deeper that the starters go in the game, it means we’re pitching good. But it means you’re giving the bullpen a break. So it just makes for a different game that favors us.”
Tuesday’s start was Snell’s 11th, for three teams, in the postseason. But it was his first since 2022. Getting back to October was one reason why the left-hander signed with the Dodgers 10 months ago (the five-year $182-million contract the team was offered was another reason).
“It’s awesome,” said Snell, who was wearing a blue hoodie emblazoned with the Dodgers playoff slogan “Built For Fall” across the front. “There’s nothing better than pitching a postseason game in front of your home crowd. To be able to enjoy that, it meant a lot.”
And Snell took advantage, breezing into the seventh having given up just a hit. He didn’t give up a run until Elly De La Cruz’s fielder’s choice grounder with two out in the inning.
De La Cruz would score the Reds’ second run on Tyler Stephenson’s double three pitches later.
Snell got the next hitter to end the threat, with the seven innings pitched marking a career playoff best. He had matched his playoff high with nine strikeouts by the sixth inning, which he needed just 70 pitches to complete. He wound up throwing 91 pitches, giving up four hits and a walk, before Roberts went to the bullpen to start the eighth, with predictable results.
Alex Vesia was the first man through the gate and he retired just one of the three batters he faced. He was followed by flamethrower Edgardo Henriquez, who walked the first two hitters and gave up a hit to the third, forcing in two runs.
Jack Dreyer was next and he walked in another run. After entering the inning down by eight runs, Cincinnati brought the tying run to the on-deck circle with one out.
Dreyer eventually settled down, retiring the side, but the three pitchers needed 59 pitches — and 30 minutes — to get through the inning. By the time Blake Treinen came on to finish things off, starter Emmet Sheehan had started warming up.
All told, Roberts needed four relievers to get the final six outs, leaving the Dodgers hoping for a Snell-like performance from Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Game 2 on Wednesday to avoid straining the bullpen further.
“Those guys are on their heels with the lead we have,” Roberts said of the Reds entering the eighth inning. “When you start being too fine and getting behind, you start giving them free bases, that’s how you can build innings and get momentum. So that’s what I saw in that inning there for sure.
“If we don’t feel comfortable using certain guys with an eight-run lead, then we’ve got to think through some things.”
Maybe Snell will get a chance to finish what he starts next time out. It’s certainly no worse than the alternative.
Blake Snell did not sound bitter. Somehow, he was not racked with regret.
Rather, when asked at his introductory Dodgers news conference this past offseason about the most infamous moment of his career, he took a brief moment to think. Then, unexpectedly, he expressed gratitude instead.
Five years ago, Snell was pitching the game of his life in Game 6 of the 2020 World Series. With his Tampa Bay Rays facing elimination against the Dodgers, he had answered the bell with five one-hit, nine-strikeout, virtually flawless Fall Classic innings.
What happened next remains controversial to this day. Snell gave up a one-out single in the sixth inning to Austin Barnes. Rays manager Kevin Cash came to the mound with a stunningly quick hook. The Dodgers went on to mount a rally against the Tampa Bay bullpen, ending a three-decade title drought while the left-handed ace watched from the bench. And in the aftermath, the second-guessing of the decision was as immediate as it was decisive.
Almost everyone else in the baseball world thought Snell should have stayed in.
Over time, however, the pitcher himself came to view it as a valuable lesson.
“It was a moment in my life that I’m very appreciative of,” Snell said last winter, donning a Dodger blue jersey for the first time after signing with the club for $182 million as a free agent.
“If I wanted to stay out there longer, I should have done a better job before that game to make that decision easier on Kevin. It’s ultimately up to me to be a better pitcher there in that moment.”
Five years later, he’s about to get his chance for postseason redemption.
Snell’s debut season in Los Angeles did not go as planned this year. He made two underwhelming starts at the beginning of the campaign while quietly battling shoulder soreness. He spent the next four months sidelined on the injured list, returning in time to make only nine more starts down the stretch.
Although his final numbers were strong (a 2.35 ERA, 72 strikeouts in 61⅓ innings, and Dodgers wins in seven of the 11 games he did pitch), his injury left his overall impact limited.
To Snell and the team, though, none of that matters now. Their union was always rooted in postseason success. And on Tuesday night, when the Dodgers open a best-of-three wild-card series against the Cincinnati Reds, it is Snell who will take the bump for Game 1 at Dodger Stadium.
“That’s why I came here,” Snell said amid the Dodgers’ division-clinching clubhouse celebration last week. “Get to the postseason, and see how good I can be.”
It’s an opportunity that’s been half a decade in the making.
Ever since breaking into the majors in 2016, and winning his first Cy Young Award with an immaculate 21-win, 1.89-ERA season two years later, Snell’s raw talent has never been in question. No starting pitcher in the history of the sport (minimum 1,000 career innings) has averaged more strikeouts per nine innings than his 11.2 mark. Even in the game’s modern era, few have possessed such a wicked arsenal, with Snell’s slider and curveball alone boasting a whopping career whiff rate of roughly 50%.
What Snell hasn’t done, however, is prove himself to be a workhorse. He has never had a 200-inning season. He has never gone six full frames in any of his 10 playoff starts. Through the years, he has been dogged by high walk rates and inefficient outings and a tendency to simply waste too many pitches. When Cash came to the mound in that sixth inning of the 2020 World Series, it only reinforced his five-and-dive reputation.
That’s why, when Snell looks back on that moment now, he views it through a lens of valuable perspective.
“I just learned, the manager’s job is to do whatever he thinks is gonna help the team win, and my job is to make him believe I’m the best option for us to win,” Snell said this past weekend, when asked about that ignominious Game 6 again. “And I didn’t do a good job of that, because he took me out.”
Thus, Snell has been on a different mission over the five years since. He not only wants to get back to the World Series and win his first championship. But he wants to do so as a bona fide October ace, the kind of anchor of a pitching staff that can get deeper into outings.
“[The playoffs are] where you want to see: What kind of player are you? How do you handle pressure situations? When everything is on the line,” Snell said. “That’s why I like it. It really allows you to understand who you are as a pitcher, where you’re at, and where you need to grow … How to find advantages to push yourself deeper in the game.”
The last time Snell pitched in the playoffs, such goals remained a work in progress. As a member of the San Diego Padres in 2022, he amassed just 13⅔ innings over three postseason starts, recording a 4.61 ERA while walking nine total batters.
Over the three seasons since then, however, he feels he has made more tangible strides. In 2023, he won another Cy Young by going 14-9 with a 2.25 ERA, averaging close to six innings per start despite a major-league-leading 99 walks. Last year might have been even more transformational, even as he battled injuries with the San Francisco Giants.
During his lone season in the Bay, Snell picked the brain of Giants ace Logan Webb, who has led the National League in innings pitched over each of the last three seasons. Their talks centered on the value of short at-bats, the importance of “dominating the inside part of the plate,” and the significance of executing competitive misses on throws around the edge of the zone.
“That was probably one of my biggest years of growth and development, in the sense of how to go deeper into games,” Snell said.
The results certainly backed that up, with Snell rebounding from an injury-plagued first half to post a 1.23 ERA over his final 14 starts. In an early August trip to Cincinnati (his last time facing the Reds ahead of this week’s playoff series), he threw his first career no-hitter on just 114 pitches.
“That no-hitter was insane,” said current Dodgers outfielder and former Giants teammate Michael Conforto, who like Snell went from San Francisco to Los Angeles as a free agent last offseason. “He just had everything working. He was hitting every corner. He knew exactly where he wanted to put it, and he put it there every time.
“That’s the kind of performance he’s capable of every time he goes out,” Conforto added. “It’s just a very, very tough at-bat. Especially when he’s throwing strikes.”
This year, Snell’s evolution has continued around the Dodgers — where manager Dave Roberts has lauded him as a “next-level thinker” for the way he can read opponents’ swings, figure out their tendencies in the batter’s box, and adapt his plan of attack to what he feels a given matchup requires.
Since returning from his early-season shoulder injury, Snell has increasingly tapped into top form. He has cut down on walks and wasted pitches. He has posted a 2.41 ERA over his nine second-half starts. His last three outings in particular: 19 innings, one run, 28 strikeouts and only five free passes.
The most important development has been his relationship with Roberts, who left Snell in the game after late-inning mound visits in each of his last two starts, and watched him escape high-leverage jams.
Those moments could be invaluable as the Dodgers enter the playoffs, giving Roberts a level of confidence to push his Game 1 starter and cover for what has been an unreliable bullpen.
“He understands his role on this ball club,” Roberts said. “When you put a starter in a position where they know they have to go deeper, you’ve got to just naturally be more efficient.”
It’s a skill Snell has been honing ever since that fateful October night five years ago. Starting Tuesday night, it’s about to be tested again.
“That’s everything,” Snell said of pitching in the postseason again. “To face the best when the stakes are highest, that’s what I’ve always wanted.”
Another week, another big-name running back across the field on the opponent’s sideline.
Rams running back Kyren Williams acknowledged the well-deserved attention Saquon Barkley received last week before the Rams played the defending Super Bowl-champion Philadelphia Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field.
Now Jonathan Taylor of the Indianapolis Colts, the NFL’s leading rusher, is coming to SoFi Stadium.
Williams said a “competitive mindset” drives him when high-profile backs are in the building.
“I know how people look at those guys,” Williams said, “and so it’s like, ‘Bro, you better look at me the same way.’ I love it.”
Williams, who signed a $23-million extension before the season, and second-year pro Blake Corum are providing the Rams with the backfield balance coach Sean McVay envisioned as the Rams built a team regarded as a Super Bowl contender.
Last season, the 5-foot-9, 207-pound Williams carried the ball 316 times. Only Barkley (345 carries) and Derrick Henry (325) of the Baltimore Ravens had more. The Rams averaged 103.8 yards rushing per game, which ranked 24th among 32 teams.
Through three games, the Rams are ranked ninth, averaging 127 yards rushing per game.
Williams, a fourth-year pro, has rushed for 226 yards and a touchdown in 55 carries (4.1 yards per carry). He also has five receptions for 35 yards and a touchdown.
Rams running back Kyren Williams celebrates after scoring a touchdown against the Houston Texans on Sept. 7.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Corum has rushed for 99 yards and a touchdown in 14 carries (7.1 yards per carry). He has one catch for 14 yards.
“Those two play off each other really well,” McVay said, adding, “We feel really good about where both of those guys are at, and continue to lean into it and look for a good balance of being able to keep Kyren feeling good throughout it and take advantage of Blake’s skill set.”
McVay has said that ideally he would like to see Williams get 65% of the carries, Corum 35%. But the flow of the game dictates whether that plays out.
After Williams carried the ball 18 times, and Corum only once, in the opener against the Houston Texans, the duo provided more balanced production in the next two games.
“It was a good one-two punch,” offensive coordinator Mike LaFleur said.
That is what McVay and general manager Les Snead aimed for after Williams carried a combined 544 times in the previous two seasons.
“We’ve got it kind of dialed into where, like, we’re able to feed off each other,” Williams said of he and Corum. “It’s like friendly competition as well. I go out and make a play, now Blake is going to come in and make a play.
“It allows me to stay fresh throughout the whole game. So it doesn’t feel like I just took 50 carries and it’s only the second quarter. To me it’s a great system.”
Rams running back Blake Corum carries the ball during a preseason win over the Dallas Cowboys in August.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Corum, a 2024 third-round draft pick from Michigan, is enjoying the expanded opportunity after getting only 58 carries last season.
“It’s been great getting my feet under me, being able to just go out there and play free and fast,” he said. “Kyren and I are feeding off each other, so it’s been phenomenal.”
Against the Eagles, Williams bested Barkley, who was limited to 46 yards rushing in 18 carries.
Taylor, the 2021 NFL rushing champion, arrives Sunday averaging 112.7 yards rushing per game. Last week, he gained 102 yards and scored three touchdowns in 17 carries against the Tennessee Titans.
After each of the last two games, Taylor was named AFC offensive player of the week.
Both Williams and Corum aim to continue their production, and to break free for long gains. This season, each of their longest runs has been 15 yards.
“I know I’m capable to create not those 15-yard runs but those 40- and 50-yard runs,” Corum said. “Just need to keep working in practice to hopefully go out and show that on Sundays.”
From Jack Harris: With two out in the seventh inning Wednesday night, and Blake Snell trying to put the finishing touches on his best performance in a Dodgers uniform, Roberts appeared to be coming to the mound after a pair of walks to turn to his shaky bullpen with a three-run lead.
As he usually does when removing a pitcher, his gait was slow — at least, initially.
Once Snell saw him coming, however, Roberts picked up his pace — as he will sometimes do when electing to leave a pitcher in the game.
“You know what, in that situation, I was actually 50/50,” Roberts said. “Obviously, 99.9% of the time, I’ve got my decision made. But in that moment, I was kind of up in the air.”
After a brief discussion with his starting pitcher, he let Snell stay in.
“He’s one of the guys that we have to push,” Roberts explained afterward. “He’s got the track record for it. The DNA, the talent to do it. So it’s important.”
“For us to win 13 games in October, we’re gonna need certain guys to be pushed and go deeper.”
Five throws later, the two-time Cy Young Award winner, and $182-million centerpiece of the club’s offseason, rewarded the decision. He sent Otto Kemp down swinging with a 95 mph fastball. He authored an emphatic ending to his scoreless seven-inning start, one that lifted the Dodgers to a 5-0 win over the Philadelphia Phillies to maintain a two-game lead in the National League West standings.
Get the latest on L.A.’s teams in the daily Sports Report newsletter.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
ANGELS
Brandon Woodruff pitched five solid innings, Sal Frelick hit a three-run homer and Blake Perkins tied a career high with five RBIs to lead the Milwaukee Brewers to a 9-2 win over the Angels on Wednesday night.
Woodruff (7-2) gave up two hits and one run, struck out nine and threw 52 of his 69 pitches for strikes. He was pitching on 10 days rest to manage his workload after he missed last season while recovering from right shoulder surgery.
Angels starter José Soriano (10-11) exited with one out in the second after being struck by a line drive off the bat of Jake Bauers. Soriano sustained a right forearm contusion. X-rays were negative.
Fortunately for the Chargers, the diagnosis was a dislocated elbow, sidelining him four weeks on injured reserve — far better than the season-ending outcome many had feared.
“He’s like Wolverine,” coach Jim Harbaugh said, invoking the regenerating “X-Men” character. “One of the toughest things I’ve ever seen. He wasn’t going to sit or lay down on the field. … A new level of respect.”
But USC’s rising star defensive coordinator said on Wednesday that he has not been contacted about the open job across town and reiterated that his attention was trained on the Trojans’ upcoming matchup with Michigan State on Saturday night.
“We’ve got a lot of stuff on defense that we’ve got to clean up and improve on,” Lynn said. “So that’s where all my focus is right now.”
From Ben Bolch: The fallout from UCLA coach DeShaun Foster’s dismissal deepened Wednesday when interim coach Tim Skipper disclosed that defensive coordinator Ikaika Malloe had agreed to “mutually part ways” with the team, depriving the Bruins of one of their most respected assistant coaches.
Meeting with reporters for the first time since he was selected to coach the team for the rest of the season, Skipper said he didn’t know the specifics of Malloe’s departure. One person close to the coaching staff, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the subject, told The Times that Malloe couldn’t get past blaming himself for the team’s 0-3 start, even suggesting that he be fired instead of Foster, so it was agreed that it would be best if he took time to regroup and focus on himself.
General registration for 2028 Olympics tickets will open in January 2026, more than a full year ahead of the ticket timeline used during the Paris Games, LA28 announced on Wednesday. Tickets to the Paralympics — coming to L.A. for the first time — will go on sale in 2027.
Beginning next year, fans can register to enter the lottery for Olympics tickets at the organizing committee’s website la28.org. If selected in the random draw, fans will receive a purchase time and date for when ticket drops begin in spring 2026. Fans who are not selected for the first round of ticket drops will be automatically be entered into subsequent ones. LA28 officials plan to announce more information about the process later this year.
Single-event tickets will start at $28, with early access for locals around Olympic venue cities. In addition to major sports zones in Downtown L.A., Exposition Park, the Sepulveda Basin, Long Beach, Inglewood and Carson will host multiple Olympic events. L.A., Long Beach and Carson will host the majority of the Paralympic events.
Salt Lake (10-15-4) has lost four of its last five matches.
Son, who joined LAFC (13-7-8) a month ago from the English Premier League, scored on a breakaway in the third minute for a 1-0 lead. He was left wide open in the middle of the field in the 16th and scored from distance to make it 2-0.
Son ran with Denis Bouanga from midfield on a 2-on-1 breakaway and scored an easy tap-in for a 3-1 advantage. Bouanga scored six minutes later on another breakaway to break a tie with league legend Carlos Vela for the most goals in club history with 94.
1899 — The Cincinnati Open begins. It is the oldest tennis tournament in the United States still played in its original city and is now known as the Cincinnati Masters & Women’s Open.
1938 — The Chicago Bears beat the Green Bay Packers 2-0. Left end Dick Plasman tackles Arnie Herber in the end zone in the fourth quarter for the win.
1946 — Joe Louis knocks out Tami Mauriello in the first round at Yankee Stadium in New York to retain the world heavyweight title.
1960 — Goose Gonsoulin intercepts four passes to lead the Denver Broncos to a 27-21 win over the Buffalo Bills.
1965 — In his first collegiate game, quarterback Billy Stevens of Texas-El Paso gains 483 total yards in a 61-15 rout of North Texas State. Receiver Chuck Hughes has 349 of those yards.
1966 — Baltimore quarterback Johnny Unitas throws 4 touchdown passes in 38-23 win at Minnesota to surpass Y.A. Tittle as NFL’s career leader with 212; finishes career with 290 TD passes.
1967 — U.S. yacht Intrepid beats the Australian yacht Dame Pattie in four straight races to defend the America’s Cup.
1977 — U.S. yacht Courageous beats the challenger Australia in four straight races to defend the America’s Cup.
1982 — In a rare father-son matchup, coach Jack Elway leads San Jose State to its second consecutive upset of quarterback John Elway and Stanford 35-31 in Palo Alto, Calif. John Elway completes 24-of-36 passes for 382 yards and three touchdowns. Spartans quarterback Steve Clarkson, throws for 285 yards, three touchdowns and scores on a three-yard keeper for the win after a Cardinal fumble. Stanford reaches the Spartans’ 26-yard line, but Elway gets sacked on four consecutive plays to end the game.
2005 — Green Bay’s Brett Favre joins Dan Marino and John Elway with 50,000 yards passing and also breaks Elway’s single-stadium NFL touchdown record of 180 with a 4-yard toss to Tony Fisher with 4 seconds left of a 26-24 loss to Cleveland at Lambeau Field.
2011 — At 16, Lexi Thompson becomes the youngest player to win an LPGA Tour event. The 16-year-old Floridian closes with a 2-under 70 to win by five strokes over Tiffany Joh at the Navistar LPGA Classic in Prattville, Ala. Thompson shatters the age record for winning a multiple-round tournament held by Paula Creamer, who won in 2005 at 18.
2011 — Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton sets an NFL rookie record by throwing for 432 yards against the Green Bay Packers. Newton, who tied the record by throwing for 422 yards in last week’s loss at Arizona, completes 28 of 46 passes with one touchdown in the 30-23 loss to the Packers. Newton’s 854 yards passing is also the most yards for a player in his first two games.
2013 — American Jordan Burroughs earns another wrestling world title. Burroughs, a gold medalist at the 2012 Olympics, extends his undefeated streak to 65 matches with a 4-0 victory over Iran’s Ezzatollah Akbarizarinkolaei in the 163-pound category at the Laszlo Papp Sports Arena in Budapest, Hungary.
2016 — Detroit’s Anquan Boldin has a touchdown catch in the Lions’ 16-15 loss to Tennessee, to join Terrell Owens as the only players in NFL history to have at least 1,000 career receptions and a touchdown catch with four teams.
THIS DAY IN BASEBALL HISTORY
1903 — Philadelphia’s Chick Fraser pitched a 10-0 no-hitter against the Chicago Cubs in the second game of a doubleheader. The Cubs won the opener 6-5. Fraser struck out five and walked four. Peaches Graham, normally a catcher, was the loser in his only major league decision.
1908 — Bob Rhoads of the Indians pitched a no-hitter against the Boston Red Sox for a 2-1 victory in Cleveland.
1930 — New York pitcher Red Ruffing hit two home runs as the Yankees edged the St. Louis Browns 7-6 in 10 innings.
1954 — The Cleveland Indians clinched the American League pennant with a 3-2 triumph over the Detroit Tigers.
1963 — The New York Mets lost their last game at the Polo Grounds — 5-1 to the Philadelphia Phillies before a crowd of 1,752.
1968 — Ray Washburn threw a 2-0 no-hitter against the San Francisco Giants at Candlestick Park, one day after the Giants’ Gaylord Perry tossed a no-hitter against Washburn’s St. Louis Cardinals.
1980 — Minnesota’s Gary Ward hit for the cycle in a 9-8 loss at Milwaukee. It was Ward’s 14th career game and the home run was his first in the major leagues. The Brewers won the game in the bottom of the ninth on Gorman Thomas’ two-out two-run homer.
1984 — The Detroit Tigers clinched the American League East Division with a 3-0 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers, making the Tigers the fourth team in major league history to lead from start to finish. The other three teams were the 1923 New York Giants, 1927 New York Yankees and the 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers.
1984 — Montreal’s Tim Raines became the first player in major league history with four consecutive seasons of 70 or more stolen bases by swiping four in the Expos’ 7-4 win over the St. Louis Cardinals.
1985 — Boston catcher Rich Gedman hit for the cycle and drove in seven runs as the Red Sox rout the Toronto Blue Jays, 13-1.
1987 — Detroit’s Darrell Evans became the first 40-year-old player in major league history to hit 30 home runs in a season as the Tigers beat the Milwaukee Brewers 7-6.
1996 — Roger Clemens equaled his own major league record, fanning 20 batters and pitching a four-hitter to lead Boston over the Detroit Tigers 4-0.
2003 — Atlanta clinched its 12th straight division title when second-place Florida was mathematically eliminated from the NL East race after a 5-4 loss to Philadelphia. The record title streak started in 1991, when the Braves won the NL West. They moved to the East Division in 1994 and trailed Montreal by six games when the strike stopped the season in August.
2006 — The Dodgers hit four consecutive homers in the bottom of the ninth to tie the game and Nomar Garciaparra’s two-run homer in the 10th lifted Los Angeles to an 11-10 victory over the San Diego Padres.
2011 — Erick Aybar went 4 for 4, with four extra-base hits and tied a franchise record by scoring five runs, leading the Angels to an 11-2 victory over the Baltimore Orioles.
2012 — Dusty Baker managed his 3,000th game, guiding the Cincinnati Reds against one of his former teams, the Chicago Cubs.
2020 — Garrett Crochet becomes the first player in over a decade to go straight to the majors when the #11 pick from the 2020 amateur draft makes his maiden appearance pitching in relief for the White Sox against the Reds. After working out at the Sox’s alternate training site in Schaumburg, IL since being signed, he impresses by striking two of three batter he faces and regularly hitting 100 mph on the radar gun with his fastball.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at [email protected]. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
Dave Roberts started out of the dugout with a walk.
Once Blake Snell caught his gaze, it turned into a trot.
With two out in the seventh inning, and Snell trying to put the finishing touches on his best performance in a Dodgers uniform, Roberts appeared to be coming to the mound after a pair of walks to turn to his shaky bullpen with a three-run lead.
As he usually does when removing a pitcher, his gait was slow — at least, initially.
Once Snell saw him coming, however, Roberts picked up his pace — as he will sometimes do when electing to leave a pitcher in the game.
This time, it was the latter.
After a brief discussion between manager and starting pitcher, Snell stayed in.
Five throws later, the $180-million offseason signee rewarded the decision, striking out Otto Kemp with a 95-mph fastball to put an emphatic ending on his scoreless seven-inning start, one that lifted the Dodgers to a 5-0 win over the Philadelphia Phillies.
Entering Wednesday, all the discussion around the Dodgers had centered on the bullpen. The slumping unit was coming off two of its worst performances of the season. The majority of Roberts’ pregame address with reporters was spent dissecting how to fix it.
“Before the results, has to be confidence,” Roberts said, comparing the relief corps’ struggles to the second-half scuffles that the offense only recently emerged from. “It’s just kind of trying to reset a mentality, a mindset and expect that things happen. … You can’t chase a zero in an inning until you execute the first pitch, and then keep going like that. And I think that right now you can see that they’re kind of trying a little too hard.”
On Wednesday night, however, Snell made their job easy.
Efficient from the start with the kind of aggressive, attacking game plan he had acknowledged was missing in his last three outings, Snell went to work quickly against the Phillies, retiring the side on eight pitches (and two strikeouts) in the first inning, en route to setting down the first eight batters he faced.
Brief trouble arose in the third, when Bryson Stott and Harrison Bader had back-to-back singles.
But then Snell froze Kyle Schwarber with a curveball, one of the seven punchouts he recorded with the pitch. He had a season-high 12 strikeouts on the night.
And after that, the Phillies didn’t put another runner aboard until the seventh, with Snell breezing through the next 12 batters.
In the meantime, the Dodgers built a lead. Freddie Freeman homered to lead off the second. Ben Rortvedt (starting his third straight game behind the plate, even with Dalton Rushing back from a leg injury) added an RBI single later in the inning, following an Andy Pages hit-and-run single that put runners on the corners.
Another run came around in the fourth, after Pages worked a two-out walk, stole second, took third on a wild pickoff throw and scored on an RBI single from Kiké Hernández (who played third base in place of Max Muncy, who still felt “fuzzy” on Tuesday from a hit-by-pitch he took to the head over the weekend).
And from there, the Dodgers watched Snell cruise, with the $182-million offseason acquisition attacking the corners of the strike zone while also inducing misses on 24 of 54 swings.
The night culminated in the seventh, after walks to Nick Castellanos and Max Kepler drew Roberts out of the dugout. In the bullpen, left-hander Alex Vesia was getting warm. For a brief moment, it appeared the game would be in the hands of the relievers.
Snell had other ideas, signaling Roberts to hurry to the mound in the middle of his walk before seemingly pleading his case to stay in.
Whatever he said, Roberts listened.
Snell stayed on the rubber. A crowd of 50,859 roared in approval.
Against his final batter, Kemp, Snell fell behind, missing low with a changeup before pulling a fastball wide. Undeterred, he went back on the attack, getting one foul ball with a heater on the inner half, then another with a curveball that leaked over the plate. The count was 2-and-2. Chavez Ravine rose to its feet.
The next pitch — Snell’s 112th of the night — was another fastball, this time on the upper, outside corner at 95.3 mph. Kemp swung through it. Snell screamed and pumped his fist. In the dugout, Roberts raised an arm in the air, then began clapping as Snell walked off to a raucous ovation.
The next two innings were refreshingly simple. Alex Vesia retired the side in the top of the eighth. The Dodgers made it a five-run lead by scoring twice in the bottom half of the frame, including on Shohei Ohtani’s 51st home run of the season. Embattled closer Tanner Scott spun a stress-free ninth, pitching three consecutive scoreless outings for the first time since early July.
Come October, that’s the kind of blueprint the Dodgers (who maintained a two-game lead in the National League West over the San Diego Padres) will have to try and replicate.
Their bullpen still needs fixing. Their relief issues aren’t solved. But more gems like Snell’s would certainly help.
Sept. 12 (UPI) —Taylor Swift has agreed to sit for a deposition in the legal battle between actress Blake Lively and actor and producer Justin Baldoni, according to court documents.
Swift has agreed to the request from Baldoni’s legal team but is not available until Oct. 20, which falls beyond the Sept. 30 deadline imposed by U.S. District Court Judge Lewis J. Liman.
Lawyers for Baldoni have asked for an extension from Oct. 20 to Oct. 25 to depose Swift, who will be unavailable because of “pre-existing professional obligations.”
The 35-year-old pop icon is releasing her 12th albumThe Life of Showgirl on Oct. 3 and is “unable to do so [attend a deposition]” before the court-imposed deadline at the end of the month.
Liman has yet to rule on the extension request.
Lively, 38, is suing Baldoni, her co-star in the film adaptation of Colleen Hooover’s romantic novel It Ends With Us, for alleged sexual harassment on the movie set. Lively also contends the 41-year-old and his fellow Wayfarer Studios producers launched a smear campaign against her following the accusations.
Lively has already given a deposition in the case, while Baldoni has yet to be deposed.
Swift was not involved in the film, although one of her songs was used. She was, however, close friends with Lively and her husband, Canadian actor Ryan Reynolds.
At issue in Swift’s deposition will likely be anything the pair said or wrote about conditions on the film set.
Baldoni’s legal team at one point tried to subpoena Swift, a move that was not well received by the pop star’s team. The filing was later withdrawn.
In the most recent court filing, Lively’s legal team told the judge they expect Baldoni’s lawyers to ask for a 30-day extension to the court proceedings, beyond the Sept. 30 deadline.
“Ms. Lively misleadingly implies the Wayfarer Parties seek a blanket thirty-day extension of the discovery cut-off date,” Baldoni’s lawyer wrote in the filing.
“In fact, the Wayfarer Parties requested an agreement solely to take the deposition of Taylor Swift during the week of October 20-25.”
It took until August, but the starting rotation the Dodgers envisioned in spring training is intact and delivering.
Vowing not to revisit the predicament they found themselves in last postseason, when only two true starters and a stacked bullpen somehow patched together enough innings to win a World Series, the Dodgers added two-time Cy Young award winner Blake Snell to a rotation that already boasted four potential aces and several other candidates coming off injuries or ascending from the minor leagues.
Snell complained of shoulder inflammation April 2 after his second start and took his sweet time recovering — four months, to be precise. But if his performance against the Toronto Blue Jays on Saturday night at Dodger Stadium is a fair indication, the wait was worthwhile.
Snell struck out 10 in five scoreless innings of a 9-1 Dodgers victory, living up to the Snellzilla nickname he stole from his older brother as a brash 11-year-old and still uses as his Instagram handle. In two starts since coming off the injured list, the left-hander has 18 strikeouts in 10 innings.
The Dodgers offense was fueled by the long ball early on, with Max Muncy belting a two-run, opposite-field home run in the fourth inning and Shohei Ohtani absolutely crushing his 40th homer of the season 417 feet to dead center in the fifth with nobody on base.
Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani hits his 40th home run of the season Saturday against the Blue Jays.
(Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images)
A six-run rally an inning later put the game away. Two hit batters and two walks set the table, and Dalton Rushing and Mookie Betts each delivered two-run singles with none out. Andy Pages drove in the last two with a two-out double, his second hit of the inning.
The win was the second in a row against Toronto (68-50), which remain in first place in the American League East. The series concludes Sunday with another formidable starter — Tyler Glasnow — taking the mound for the Dodgers (68-49).
Glasnow took a similar if less pronounced path than Snell this season, going on the injured list before the end of April and not returning until July 9. He has given up only one run in four of his five starts since returning and most recently went seven strong innings against the St. Louis Cardinals.
It’s clear that Snell and Glasnow are healthy, their arms as fresh and live as would be expected coming out of spring training. The same is true of Ohtani and Clayton Kershaw, two future Hall of Famers whose recoveries from injuries also were methodical and unhurried. Both are pitching well.
And so is Yoshinobu Yamamoto, the only starter whose health hasn’t cost him time off. He’s made 22 starts, going 10-7 with a 2.51 earned-run average and leads National League starters with eight scoreless outings.
The Dodgers employ a sixth starter to give Ohani and Yamamoto five to seven days off between starts. The job belonged to Dustin May until he was traded to the Red Sox at the deadline, creating an opportunity for Emmet Sheehan, who was impressive over 60 innings as a rookie in 2023, but had Tommy John surgery in May 2024.
He’s pitched well, posting a 3.00 ERA over 30 innings, giving the Dodgers a luxury they haven’t enjoyed in recent memory: trotting out a starting pitcher every night that can prevent runs through the middle innings.
That leaves the bullpen to finish the job, and injuries and inconsistency continue to riddle the relief corps. Roberts said help is on the way, with several key relievers on the mend. If they return as effective as the starters, pitching could be a Dodgers strength entering the postseason.
TAMPA, Fla. — Blake Snell nearly had a flawless return from the injured list on Saturday afternoon.
If only the Tampa Bay Rays didn’t have slugger Yandy Díaz, or a quirky short right-field wall at their temporary home at Steinbrenner Field.
Making his first start since the second week of the season, when he went down with a shoulder injury that shelved him, Snell largely looked like the ace the Dodgers thought they were getting when they signed him to a $182-million contract this offseason.
Over a five-inning outing that included eight strikeouts, no walks and a whole bunch of flailing swings by the Rays, the veteran left-hander flashed his two-time Cy Young Award-winning stuff and tantalizing late-season potential for this year.
However, in the Dodgers’ 4-0 loss to the Rays, Snell gave up three runs on a pair of long balls to Díaz — who twice took advantage of the ballpark’s short porch in right field.
“I thought, to be quite frank, he was a victim of this ballpark,” manager Dave Roberts said afterward. “There were a couple fly balls to right field that just went out. … Unfortunately, got a little bit of bad luck.”
After the Rays’ permanent home, Tropicana Field in nearby St. Petersburg, had its canvas roof shredded during Hurricane Milton this winter, the club relocated to Steinbrenner Field for this season; using the New York Yankees’ open-air, Tampa-based spring training park for its home schedule.
Since the 10,000-seat venue was modeled after Yankee Stadium in New York, its defining feature is a short right-field wall (similar to the one in the Bronx) that measures at just 314 feet down the line — eight feet shorter than the dimensions at Tropicana Field.
In the bottom of the first inning, Díaz took full advantage, golfing a 3-1 fastball the other way for a solo home run. According to MLB’s Statcast system, the ball traveled only 326 feet, and would have stayed in play at each of the league’s other 29 stadiums. But not here, and especially not on a sweltering summer afternoon with a first-pitch temperature of 91 degrees.
“I was surprised,” Roberts said of watching Díaz’s ball land in the first row of seats.
“They took advantage of the field,” added right fielder Teoscar Hernández.
Indeed, Díaz repeated the act two innings later; snapping the groove Snell had settled into after retiring seven of the next eight batters, including five on strikeouts.
On a 1-1 fastball that was up in the zone, Díaz launched one to the opposite field again, hitting a two-run blast on a 341-foot fly ball that would’ve been a homer in only two other parks (Yankee Stadium, and Daikin Park in Houston).
“The first homer to Yandy, that was not a good pitch,” Snell said. “On the second homer, I thought that was a really good pitch to him, and it was. Just a good result for him.”
Still, on the whole, Snell offered plenty of promise in his return to action Saturday.
First and foremost, he filled up the strike zone, eliminating his habit of nibbling around the plate by throwing 57 strikes in 86 pitches.
“I was in the zone more than I thought I would’ve been,” he said. “You’re just trying to feel it out again, so I like that.”
And, in another positive development, many of those strikes were of the swing-and-miss variety.
Snell racked up 19 total whiffs, tied for third-most by a Dodgers pitcher in a game this season. Seven came on 12 total swings against his changeup, a key offspeed pitch that showed no signs of rust after his four-month layoff. Five more were courtesy of his slider, with the Rays coming up empty on all five swings against it.
“I was in the zone, I was confident, I knew what I wanted to do,” Snell said. “Overall, first start back, emotions, there’s a lot that I’m dealing with to get better. … But definitely something to build on, learn from.”
In the big picture, after all, the Dodgers’ main priorities for Snell are: 1) Stay healthy; 2) Pitch better than he did at the start of the season, when his bothersome shoulder contributed to two underwhelming outings that marred the beginning of his Dodgers career.
Tampa Bay’s Yandy Díaz watches his solo home run off Dodgers pitcher Blake Snell during the first inning Saturday.
(Chris O’Meara / Associated Press)
Down the stretch this season, the Dodgers’ biggest strength might be their rotation. Yoshinobu Yamamoto is in the Cy Young Award conversation. Tyler Glasnow has looked improved since returning from his own shoulder injury. Shohei Ohtani has quickly rediscovered his premium stuff coming off a second career Tommy John procedure. And even Clayton Kershaw has been productive in his 18th season.
The biggest linchpin, though, likely remains Snell — whom the Dodgers targeted this offseason in hopes of avoiding the tightrope they walked last October, when their injury-ravaged rotation was almost completely depleted by the start of the postseason.
“Last year, we found a way to do it, not having that [rotation depth],” Roberts said. “But having the starters healthy, pitching the way they’re capable of, makes it a better quality of life for everyone.”
While the Dodgers had managed in Snell’s absence, maintaining a narrow lead in the National League West despite another prolonged stretch of patchwork pitching, Roberts acknowledged they had missed his “presence” over the first two-thirds of the season.
And after watching from afar how well Snell finished last year — when he rebounded from another extended early-season IL stint with the San Francisco Giants by posting a 1.23 ERA over his last 12 starts, including his first no-hitter exactly one year ago Saturday — Roberts was hopeful the 32-year-old could mount a similar “heater” now.
“He’s really focused,” Roberts said. “I love where his head’s at.”
The results on Saturday might not have been enough to compensate for the Dodgers’ quiet day at the plate — with their lineup managing only six hits and squandering its best opportunity to rally on Hernández’s bases-loaded, inning-ending double-play grounder in the top of the sixth.
But it nonetheless raised hopes about the potential of the team’s late-season rotation, offering a long-awaited glimpse of the kind of dominance Snell could provide to the Dodgers’ push to defend their World Series championship.
“I thought Blake threw the baseball really well today,” Roberts said. “Just kind of seeing him out there, competing, making pitches, it just makes you feel better going forward.”
Kayleigh McEnany and husband Sean Gilmartin welcomed their third child — a girl.
“We are overjoyed to announce the newest member of the ‘Outnumbered’ family,” Emily Compagno said Monday during the Fox News Channel show she co-hosts with McEnany. She noted that viewers could see the baby “letting out a big yawn” in photos provided by her mom and dad.
Avery was born on Wednesday, the network said.
McEnany tweeted Monday that she and her husband are “so in love with our new baby girl, Avery Grace! Blake and Nash love their baby sister, and we are enjoying this beautiful time in life!”
McEnany was a tad more nuanced in notes given to Compagno, who quoted the three-time mom as saying that while big sister Blake, 5, “can’t stop thinking about the baby,” big brother Nash, 2, had “finally warmed up to her.”
In her announcement, the former White House press secretary included Psalm 139: 13-14, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.”
.@GilmartinSean and I are so in love with our new baby girl, Avery Grace!
Blake and Nash love their baby sister, and we are enjoying this beautiful time in life!
“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully… pic.twitter.com/kgBNTD5SM7
Compagno said the “Outnumbered” crew, headed by Harris Faulkner, was “wishing Kayleigh and Sean all the best as they continue to grow their beautiful family.” She told McEnany to please come back, but “not too soon.”
McEnany announced back in March that she and Gilmartin were expecting their third child.
“It’s very sweet. It’s been a special time,” she said. “I’ve been pregnant during Christmas and during Thanksgiving, and my daughter Blake now knows, so she runs up and holds my stomach and is like, ‘Let me kiss the baby.’ ”
The baby got in just under the June deadline that McEnany shared at the time.
McEnany and Gilmartin, a pitcher who retired from professional baseball in 2022, started dating in 2015 and got married in 2017. After working in broadcast media initially, McEnany served as press secretary to President Trump from April 2020 through the end of his first term in January 2021, landing at Fox soon after.
Some of Blake Lively‘s text messages with friend Taylor Swift could be disclosed in court, in a recent development of the actor’s winding legal battle against her “It Ends With Us” co-star Justin Baldoni.
U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman on Wednesday filed an order denying the “Gossip Girl” alumna’s request to keep her messages with Swift out of litigation, according to legal documents reviewed by The Times. “Given that Lively has represented that Swift had knowledge of complaints or discussions about the working environment on the film, among other issues, the requests for messages with Swift regarding the film and this action are reasonably tailored to discover information that would prove or disprove Lively’s harassment and retaliation claims,” reads the order.
Baldoni and his Wayfarer Studios filed a request for production connected to the Lively-Swift texts in February, asking for “‘all documents and communications related to or reflecting Lively’s communications with Taylor Swift” about their 2024 romantic drama and subsequent legal proceedings.
The “It Ends With Us” co-stars have engaged in a legal back-and-forth for months after Lively accused director Baldoni of sexual harassment on the set of the film and accused his team of orchestrating a smear campaign against her in December. The allegations first surfaced in a report from the New York Times. She formally sued Baldoni in federal court on Dec. 31. Baldoni and nine other plaintiffs — including his crisis PR team and executives at Wayfarer Studios — hit back that same day with a $400-million countersuit against Lively and her husband, “Deadpool” star Ryan Reynolds, and a separate defamation complaint against the New York Times.
Liman dismissed Baldoni’s complaints, which failed to meet legal standards, earlier this month. The judge said in his Wednesday order that “Lively’s motion is rooted in the broader concern that the Wayfarer Parties are using demands for communications with Swift not ‘to obtain information relevant to claims and defenses in court, but to prop up a public relations narrative outside of court.’ ”
Wednesday’s order also denied Baldoni’s cross-motion to compel Lively to produce documents connected to the production.
Baldoni’s team subpoenaed Swift earlier this year but eventually withdrew it after the singer and her legal reps dismissed it as an “unwarranted fishing expedition,” according to Variety.
In a statement shared with multiple outlets, a representative for Lively reacted to this week’s order, claiming, “Baldoni’s desire to drag Taylor Swift into this has been constant dating back to August 2024” and is an effort to influence the singer’s fan base. In the past, the devoted league of Swift supporters known as Swifites have banded together to criticize the singer’s high-profile exes and in recent years, rallied against Ticketmaster over allegations of fraud, price-fixing and antitrust violations.
“We will continue to call out Baldoni’s relentless efforts to exploit Ms. Swift’s popularity, which from day one has been nothing more than a distraction from the serious sexual harassment and retaliation accusations he and the Wayfarer parties are facing,” the spokesperson added, according to People.
Representatives for Swift and Baldoni did not immediately respond to The Times’ request for comment.
June 9 (UPI) — A New York judge on Monday dismissed Justin Baldoni’s $400M lawsuit against actress Blake Lively.
Federal Judge Lewis Liman of New York’s southern district accepted the motion to dismiss the multi-million-dollar counter lawsuit filed by Baldoni that alleged defamation and extortion. In addition, the judge, likewise, tossed out a $250 million defamation lawsuit against The New York Times.
“The [parties in the suit known as the] Wayfarer Parties have not alleged that Lively is responsible for any statements other than the statements in her CRD complaint, which are privileged,” Liman wrote in his 132-page ruling.
“The Wayfarer Parties’ additional claims also fail,” the judge added. “Accordingly, the Amended Complaint must be dismissed in its entirety.”
However, Liman noted that Baldoni, 41, will still have the legal option to amend his claims for breach of implied covenant and contract interference with a June 23 deadline.
The It Ends With Us director Baldoni was accused in December of sexual harassment by his co-star Lively, which Baldoni claimed was “categorically false.”
In January, Baldoni filed a $250 million libel lawsuit against the New York Times over an article that “falsely” detailed Lively’s allegations during filming.
Lively, 37, claimed in her California Civil Rights Department complaint filed Dec. 20 that the harassment damaged her business and caused her family, including husband actor Ryan Reynolds, “severe emotional distress” and after the suit alleged Reynolds called Baldoni a “sexual predator.”
On Monday, lawyers for Lively — Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb — called the court decision a “total victory and a complete vindication.”
“As we have said from day one, this $400 million lawsuit was a sham, and the Court saw right through it,” they said in the statement, adding they look forward to the “next round,” which will be to seek attorney fees, treble and punitive damages.
Discovery+ announced plans in March to air a docuseries in Britain this month called Baldoni vs. Lively: A Hollywood Feud.
Meanwhile, the trial for Baldoni and Lively, which was scheduled for March 26, was expected to see both names testify.
In the latest twist in the legal saga between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, Lively is dropping two claims against Baldoni of emotional distress.
As if the drama couldn’t get any messier, the accusations continue to fly. Baldoni’s lawyer filed a letter requesting that the judge in the case compel Lively to “identify her medical and mental health care providers” — signing a HIPAA release to open up access to her therapy notes and pertinent medical info, as People reported.
Rather than do so, the letter says, Lively requested to withdraw her claims of emotional distress, but maybe just for now. Baldoni’s attorney Kevin Fritz said the actor wanted to keep the right to re-file those emotional distress claims at a later time — but Lively “can’t have it both ways.”
Lively’s lawyers take another view.
Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb accused Baldoni’s legal counsel of a “press stunt,” saying they are simply “preparing our case for trial by streamlining and focusing it,” as per Deadline’s reporting.
U.S. District Court Judge Lewis J. Liman had this to say on Tuesday: The two parties must decide “whether the dismissal is with or without prejudice” before proceeding further — the claims are either to be dismissed forever or possibly pursued again, but there is no in-between.
Representatives of Baldoni and Lively did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment on Tuesday.
She accused Baldoni, along with his team, of orchestrating a smear campaign against her after she reported on-set sexual harassment, as first reported by the New York Times.
Most recently, Lively sought to dismiss a defamation countersuit from Baldoni. The motion, filed in March, cites a California law that prohibits “weaponizing defamation lawsuits” against those who have filed suit or “spoken out about sexual harassment and retaliation.”
Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman later called the motion “one of the most abhorrent examples of abusing our legal system.”
But Lively’s motion only picked up steam as it drew widespread support from advocacy groups. Equal Rights Advocates, a gender equity and workplace protection-oriented nonprofit based in San Francisco, urged a federal judge to support the motion and uphold the aforementioned law.
Jessica Schidlow, legal director at Child USA, a nonprofit that pushes for more legal protection of abuse victims, told The Times in May that if the law were to be struck down, it would “essentially do away with the protections for all survivors.”
“It would be a devastating setback and completely undermine the purpose of the law, which was to make it easier for victims to come forward and to speak their truth without fear of retaliation,” she added.
