Note:Open Division Pool Play second round Nov. 1 at higher seeds; Divisions 2-5 second round Nov. 4; Open Division Pool Play third round Nov. 5 at higher seeds; Division 1 quarterfinals Nov. 6; Divisions 2-5 quarterfinals Nov. 7; Open Division crossover round Nov. 8 at higher seed; Divisions 2-5 semifinals Nov. 11; Open Division semifinals Nov. 12 at Woollett Aquatics Center; Division 1 semifinals Nov. 12; Finals (all divisions) Nov. 15 at Mt. San Antonio College.
Note:Open Division Pool Play second round Nov. 1 at higher seeds; Divisions 2-5 second round Nov. 4; Open Division Pool Play third round Nov. 5 at higher seeds; Division 1 quarterfinals Nov. 6; Divisions 2-5 quarterfinals Nov. 7; Open Division crossover round Nov. 8 at higher seed; Divisions 2-5 semifinals Nov. 11; Open Division semifinals Nov. 12 at Woollett Aquatics Center; Division 1 semifinals Nov. 12; Finals (all divisions) Nov. 15 at Mt. San Antonio College.
Six months later, with LAFC preparing to enter the MLS playoffs, that reunion is just a loss away. So now Cherundolo, who took LAFC to the MLS Cup final twice in his first three seasons as coach, is hoping to put off that departure for another couple of months.
“I’d love to stay until early December,” he said. “That would be ideal. That is what we’re all trying to achieve at LAFC.”
And that appears well within reach for LAFC (17-8-9), which has six wins and 19 points in its last eight games, the last a 2-2 draw Saturday in Colorado. As a result LAFC, the No. 3 seed in the conference, will enter the playoffs as the hottest team in the West and arguably the best team in MLS since the mid-summer acquisition of forward Son Heung-min.
LAFC has lost just one of the 10 games the former Tottenham captain has played in, with Son scoring nine goals and assisting on three others. He has also provided a big boost to winger Denis Bouanga, who scored 11 times in his last 10 games, giving LAFC the most dynamic scoring tandem in the league.
LAFC will open the best-of-three conference quarterfinals next weekend against Austin (13-13-8) at BMO Stadium. The second leg will be played in Texas with a third game, if necessary, in Los Angeles.
Austin is one of just two teams that beat LAFC twice this season, though it enters the postseason having lost three of its last four. Cherundolo said none of those numbers matter now. Not only do regular-season records get thrown out for the playoffs, but even the rules change. In the first round of the MLS postseason, for example, games that are tied at the end of regulation go straight to penalty kicks.
“It’s a new scenario. So it does change the way you play a little bit,” Cherundolo said. “I don’t think current form has a ton to do with it. Last season there were some surprises in the first round of playoffs.
“We’ll do our very best to make sure that doesn’t happen to us.”
Should LAFC, which has never lost in the first round of the playoffs under Cherundolo, make it past Austin it will face the winner of the Vancouver-Dallas series in the conference semifinals. That could be a matchup between Son and Vancouver’s Thomas Muller, who has seven goals and three assists since joining the Whitecaps from German power Bayern Munich two months ago.
The Western Conference playoffs will open with Wednesday’s wild-card match between Portland and Real Salt Lake. The winner of that game will meet conference champion San Diego in the first round. The other final first-round series will see No. 4 seed Minnesota face fifth-seeded Seattle.
Regardless of who reaches the MLS Cup, for the 13th consecutive season the league will not have a repeat winner. The Galaxy (7-18-9), which won the title last season, were eliminated from playoff contention a month ago and finished the season with franchise-worst totals for wins (seven) and points (30) in a full season while matching the record for most losses with 18.
They did end on a high note, however, beating Minnesota 2-1 in their season finale for their third win in their final four games. That allowed them to escape the conference cellar and finish two points ahead of last-place Sporting Kansas City (7-20-7).
Messi wins Golden Boot
Inter Miami star Lionel Messi celebrates after scoring against Atlanta on Oct. 11.
Locked in a tight battle for the league scoring title entering the final month of the season, Messi took his game to another level — if that’s possible — and scored five times in Inter Miami’s final two matches to claim the Golden Boot by a wide margin over Bouanga.
Messi had a hat trick against Nashville on Saturday, putting the game away with a third goal in the 81st minute to finish with 29 goals in 28 games. That’s the fourth-best single-season total in MLS history. Bouanga finished with a career-best 24 goals, tying him for second place with Nashville’s Sam Surridge.
Messi also had five assists in three October games to finish with a league-high 19, tying him for fourth place on the all-time list there as well. Messi’s 48 goals contributions (29 goals, 19 assists) is second all-time to Carlos Vela, who scored 34 times and had 15 assists for LAFC in 2019.
Eastern Conference playoff field
MLS bills the final day of the regular season “Decision Day” because it’s the day the postseason field is determined. But in the Eastern Conference, the nine playoff qualifiers had already been decided by the final weekend. So had the conference champion, with the Philadelphia Union (20-8-6) having secured the league’s best overall record and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs two weeks ago.
Still, some playoff pairings were determined on Decision Day.
With its win over Montreal, Cincinnati (20-9-5) grabbed the second seed in the postseason tournament on a tiebreaker over Inter Miami (19-7-8). Both teams finished with 65 points, but Cincinnati had one more regular-season victory.
As a result Cincinnati will open the playoffs against seventh-seeded Columbus (14-8-12) while Inter Miami will face No. 6 Nashville (16-12-6).
With its win over Philadelphia, Charlotte (19-13-2) clinched a fourth-place finish and home field for its playoff opener with New York City (17-12-5) next weekend. The two wild-card teams, Chicago (15-11-8) and Orlando (14-9-11), will meet Wednesday in Chicago with the winner facing the Union in the conference quarterfinals.
The late night circuit got its version of a unique crossover event Tuesday night as Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert appeared as guests on each other’s shows.
It was a fitting stunt considering both talk show hosts have been at the center of noteworthy professional situations shrouded in political and national significance, and both orbit in the same universe of President Trump’s contempt. The two hosts, who have vocally supported each other through the respective ordeals on their shows, were now able to continue the mutual backing in full force, face-to-face.
In the wake of the fallout of Kimmel’s suspension earlier this month over comments he made related to the death of conservative pundit Charlie Kirk, the recently reinstated host charged ahead with moving his L.A.-based show to Brooklyn for a week as planned, with Colbert among the star-studded list of guests. Colbert was effusive in his support of Kimmel after ABC pre-empted his talk show, criticizing the decision as “blatant censorship.”
Kimmel, meanwhile, appeared on “The Late Show,” alongside pop star Sam Smith. Earlier this year, CBS announced it was canceling “The Late Show” and would end after the season wraps in May 2026 — marking not only the end of Colbert’s run at the helm, but also bringing the late night institution to a close after a 30-year run. The decision, the company said, was due to financial reasons and not — as many have speculated — because of Colbert’s criticism of a deal between the Trump administration and Paramount, the parent company of CBS, the network that airs “The Late Show,” over.a 2024 “60 Minutes” interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. Kimmel was one of the many who expressed disdain over the decision, even campaigning for Colbert to win an Emmy though Kimmel was on the same ballot. (Colbert ultimately won.)
Ahead of Kimmel’s appearance on “The Late Show,” Colbert hosted another late-night host, Conan O’Brien, who appeared as a guest Monday, opening the conversation with, “Stephen, how’s late night? What’s going on? I’ve been out of it for a little bit — catch me up on what’s happening.”
“I’ll send you the obituary,” Colbert replied.
Here are five standout moments from the night of shared grievances.
Stephen Colbert, left, and Jimmy Kimmel backstage at “The Late Show.”
(Scott Kowalchyk/CBS)
Colbert says he ‘sweat through his shirt’ the day he told his staff ’The Late Show’ was canceled
In his first sit-down interview since the “The Late Show” was canceled, Colbert walked Kimmel through the timeline of his show’s cancellation. He said he received the news from their mutual manager, James Dixon, after the taping of his show on July 16. He got home to his wife, Evie McGee-Colbert, two and a half hours later. As he walked into the apartment, according to Colbert, his wife said, “What happened? You get canceled?”
Dixon knew for a week but had been hesitant to relay the news to Colbert, who was on vacation. Once he learned the show’s fate, Colbert said he was unsure about when he should break the news to his staff, debating whether to wait until after the summer break or in September. His wife, though, said he would tell them the following day.
“We get into the building,” he said, “I go up the elevator, I walk through the offices. By time I get to my offices, I have sweat through my shirt because I didn’t want to know anything my staff didn’t know. And I said, ‘I’m going to tell my staff today,’ but then we couldn’t do a show if I told them because everybody would be bummed out and I would be bummed out.”
He only told executive producer Tom Purcell at first. He got through the whole show. And then he asked the audience and staff to stick around for one more act so he could record the announcement.
“My stage manager goes, ‘Oh no, we’re done, Steve, we’re done.’ And I said, ‘nope, there’s one more act of the show. Please don’t let the audience leave.’ And he goes, ‘No, boss, no. Boss. I got that. I got the thing here. We’ve done everything.’ And I said, ‘I’m aware of that. And I’m here to tell you there’s one more act of the show,’” he explained. “So I went backstage, I said, ‘Everybody, get on Zoom.’ I told everybody as briefly as I could so they wouldn’t find out about it on air. And then I went back out on stage to tell everybody. And I was so nervous about doing it right — because there was nothing in the prompter, I was just speaking off the cuff — that I f— up twice. And I had to restart and the audience thought it was a bit and they started going, ‘Steve, you can do it.’ Because I always messed up on the sentence that told them what was happening. And then I got to the sentence that actually told them was happening, and they didn’t laugh.”
Kimmel, in turn, shared that he found out about “The Late Show’s” cancellation while attending a No Kings protest march.
Kimmel says he took the call from ABC about his suspension from the bathroom
Jimmy Kimmel on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” Tuesday.
(Scott Kowalchyk/CBS)
Like Colbert, Tuesday marked the first time Kimmel had been interviewed since his suspension earlier this month, and he detailed the day he got the news he was being pulled from the air.
Kimmel’s office is busy — there’s roughly five other people working in there with him at all times, he told Colbert. So when ABC executives wanted to speak with him less than two hours before he was set to tape that night’s episode, Kimmel resorted to the bathroom to take the call in private.
“I’m on the phone with the ABC executives, and they say, ‘Listen, we want to take the temperature down. We’re concerned about what you’re gonna say tonight, and we decided that the best route is to take the show off the air,’” Kimmel said before the audience interjected with boos.
“There was a vote, and I lost the vote, and so I put my pants back on and I walked out to my office,” before telling some of his producing team the news, he said. “My wife said I was whiter than Jim Gaffigan when I came out.”
The decision on Kimmel’s suspension came so late in the day that the audience was already in their seats and had to be sent home, Kimmel told Colbert.
A sign of the times?
While touting the crossover event in his monologue (“We thought it might be a fun way to drive the President nuts so…”), Kimmel took time to stress the groundswell of support Colbert has both in New York, where he does his show, and in Kimmel’s homebase of L.A. To prove it, the camera cut to a photo showing signs that were displayed over the 101 freeway in L.A. when Kimmel went back on the air following his suspension. They read: “Public pressure works — Kimmel is back!”
“And this is the sign that is up now,” Kimmel continued, cutting to video of more recent signage over the freeway. “It says, “Now do Colbert.”
Gavin Newsom traveled to Brooklyn. Or did he?
Seth Meyers, left, Josh Meyers as California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Jimmy Kimmel on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”
(Randy Holmes/ABC)
The California governor — who also moonlights (by proxy of his social media team) as the unofficial No. 1 Trump troll — made the cross-country trip to Brooklyn to surprise Kimmel on stage. Or did he? As the host mentioned the politician’s latest jab at Trump during his monologue, Newsom barreled onto the stage on a bike before finding his place next to Kimmel for a roughly six-minute spiel, delivered in his best California bro speak, on his mission to bring people together.
“L.A and N.Y.C., we’re not so different,” Newsom said. “I mean, we both just want to be free to smoke weed while riding our electric scooters to a drag queen brunch.”
As Kimmel pressed how exactly they can succeed in coming together, a blustering Newsom responded: “We already started, dog. These people get it. They have their own great late night hosts here in NYC, but tonight they chose my homie from L.A. They could be partying with my dude, J-Fall and The Roots crew — they’re a rap band … because you did look confused. Anyway, these Brooklyn-istas came to see you instead of checking out the political commentary of John Oliver or J-Stew or pay their respects to Colbert before he shipped off to Guantanamo Gay, or they could have gone and watched whatever that little creep Seth Meyers is doing … dude dresses like a substitute Montessori teacher. I mean, do you know why he sits down for his jokes? Same reason yo’ mama sits down to pee.”
Cue a special appearance from Seth Meyers, Kimmel’s friend and fellow late night host to rein in … his brother? For the non-late night connoisseurs reading this: Meyers’ brother, Josh, played the “Covid bro” version of Newsom during the pandemic in sketches that aired on NBC’s “Late Night with Seth Meyers.” Newsom took the gag further on Tuesday, impersonating Josh impersonating himself on Kimmel’s stage.
“We’re bros, but no, we’re not,” Newsom as Josh said. “Look, I get this all the time, probably because we’re both so hot.”
Meanwhile, keeping the planned awkwardness going, Kimmel took the opportunity to mention to Meyers that he was in town if he wanted to get dinner. Meyers responded: “What happened with your show? I thought this whole thing was, you know … “
“We’re back on the air,” Kimmel said. “We’re back on now.”
It should also be noted that Kimmel, Colbert and Meyers later posed for a photo onstage and uploaded it to their respective social media accounts with the caption, “Hi Donald!”
Guillermo brings the fun (and the tequila)
Guillermo Rodriguez, left, Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert taking a round of shots on “The Late Show.”
(Scott Kowalchyk/CBS)
Looking ahead at the remaining months Colbert will be on the air, Kimmel asked the host when he was going to “go nuts,” and suggested he lose his glasses and “maybe do some ayahuasca on set.” Kimmel then gifted him a bong with a Statue of Liberty design, which he called a “chemistry set.”
Colbert started playing along by unbuttoning his blazer and saying “f— that” to a signal that he only had a minute left in the segment. (“What are they gonna do, cancel me?” Colbert asked). Then, as if right on cue, Guillermo Rodriguez, Kimmel’s friend and sidekick on his show, came onto the stage with tequila (and three shot glasses) in hand.
On the first round of Don Julio, Colbert made a toast: “To good friends, great jobs and late-night TV.”
Colbert then poured another round and Kimmel pulled out the bong he had gifted the host. The group then took one more shot together and Kimmel toasted to Colbert.
Guillermo, who got a round of hearty cheers from the crowd, is known for giving out shots and toasting with A-Listers at awards shows and other Hollywood events.
SAN FRANCISCO — This is the time to bring on the rivals. The Dodgers are used to taking on challengers down the pennant stretch: the San Francisco Giants and San Diego Padres — and, in a previous version of the National League West, the Atlanta Braves and Cincinnati Reds.
The final two weeks of the regular season are upon us. The Dodgers have one remaining head-to-head matchup that really matters — and that series starts Monday at Dodger Stadium, against the Philadelphia Phillies.
The Phillies?
The Phillies have not been realigned into the NL West. However, although the three division champions automatically qualify for the playoffs, the two with the best records earn a bye into the division series. The division champion with the third-best record — right now, that would be the Dodgers — must play in the first round.
The Milwaukee Brewers, the presumed champions of the NL Central, boast the best record in baseball. The Phillies, the presumed champions of the NL East, lead the Dodgers by 4 ½ games. The Dodgers have 13 games to play.
The Dodgers got a bye and lost in the division series in 2022. They got a bye and lost in the division series in 2023. They got a bye and came within one game of elimination in the division series in 2024. Would they be better off not getting a bye and playing in the first round?
“There is not a question in my mind that that does not make sense,” Andrew Friedman, the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations, told me last week. “It is better for your World Series odds to not play those three games.”
The five days off that come with a bye can disrupt the timing of hitters. They also can allow time for injured and weary players to recover — that could be critical for Dodgers catcher Will Smith, in particular — and for the Dodgers to arrange their starting rotation just the way they might like it. And, of course, you can’t be eliminated in the first round if you don’t play in it.
“We have made our life more difficult to this point,” Friedman said, “but I still think we have a really good run in us, and we’ll make it competitive. So obviously these three games against Philly are really important in that.”
What if the three games against the Phillies go poorly?
Even if they don’t, the Dodgers might not win the division. The Padres are closer to the Dodgers than the Dodgers are to the Phillies.
San Diego trails the Dodgers by 2½ games in the NL West.
If the Padres win the NL West, how much would that hurt the Dodgers’ chances of a lengthy postseason run?
Not much, if at all. Both teams almost certainly would end up in the wild-card round.
The NL West champion would play the last team into the NL field, most likely the Giants or New York Mets and maybe even the Reds or Arizona Diamondbacks, with the chance the opponent exhausted its pitching just to get into the playoffs. The other team would play the Chicago Cubs, and would avoid the possibility of facing the surging Phillies until the NLCS.
If the NL West comes down to the last day or two, the Dodgers would have to determine whether to use their best starters on that final weekend or line them up for the wild-card series.
In that scenario, what might be the decisive factor in the Dodgers’ calculus?
The NL West champion would play all three games of the wild-card round at home; the runner-up likely would play all three games on the road. The Dodgers are 48-26 at home, 36-39 on the road. (The Padres are 47-28 at home, 35-40 on the road.)
Would there be any precedent for the Dodgers not minding if the Padres won the NL West?
In 1996, the Dodgers and Padres were tied for the NL West lead heading into the final day of the regular season, with the two teams facing one another. Both teams were guaranteed a playoff spot.
The Padres won the game, and with it the division. The Dodgers started Martinez in their playoff opener three days later. They lost that game, and they were swept in the series by the Braves. The winning pitchers in that series, in order: John Smoltz, Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine.
How many games are the Dodgers on pace to win?
Ninety-one.
In Friedman’s previous 10 seasons running the Dodgers, what is the fewest number of games they have won?
Ninety-one, in 2016.
How did the Dodgers do that October?
They earned a bye into the division series, in which they beat the Washington Nationals. They lost to the Chicago Cubs in the league championship series.
One of the most thrilling and unexpected moments in the tennis world in recent weeks was headlined by a Latina.
On Aug. 25, during the first round of the U.S. Open women’s singles tournament, U.S. player Madison Keys — who went into the competition ranked sixth in the world and had previously won the 2025 Australian Open — was defeated by Mexico’s Renata Zarazúa after three neck-and-neck sets.
The Mexican native, who is ranked 82nd in the world, previously had an 0-6 record against opponents ranked in the top 10.
After the over-three-hour match, Zarazúa revealed that she was so nervous before playing Keys that she was nearly in tears — but that she felt dialed in as the first game began.
“I’m a little bit small in height, so coming in here, it was like: ‘Oh, my God. This is huge!’ But I was just trying to focus on the court,” said Zarazúa, who stands 5 feet 3 inches tall. “I just tried to find my way and enjoy it, because I knew that when I retire, I’m going to be really happy about it.”
By securing this win, Zarazúa became the first Mexican player to defeat a top 10 seed at a major since Angélica Gavaldón upset No. 3 player Jana Novotná in the 1995 Australian Open.
When she was done with post-match obligations, Zarazúa noticed her phone was blowing up with messages and mentions online.
“It was funny because it was the first time I got a lot of followers in a few hours,” she told The Times in a Zoom interview. “It was hard at the moment, because I didn’t want to distract myself too much with social media. So I just left it until the tournament was over, and now I’m just looking at the messages and all of that. The attention was a bit more than I expected. Singers and actors and actually [reached out] and I was like, ‘Oh, this is cool.’”
Mexican actor Eiza González was one of the stars whose message surprised Zarazúa; she admitted she is a big fan of the “Baby Driver” star. She also noted that notable brands like Evian and sports networks like ESPN and Televisa also contacted her following her first-round win.
But Zarazúa didn’t let the spotlight affect her preparation for her second-round singles match against France’s Diane Parry.
“I honestly kept my routines going exactly the same. Even though the chaos was going on, the next day [my team and I] were back on the courts at 9 a.m. practicing, because that’s how I was preparing before my first round,” she said. “I didn’t really celebrate because I don’t think it was the right time. I literally stayed in my room, had dinner and went to bed early.”
During her second singles match on Aug. 28, she began to feel the weight of expectations as a sizable Mexican crowd cheered her on.
“I felt like I just couldn’t shake the nerves off. I just didn’t want to let the people down,” Zarazúa said. “At some point during the match I realized I should be doing this for me. I should be winning for me and not to please people. That’s what helped me settle the nerves and when I started playing better.”
Zarazúa ultimately exited the tournament after losing to Parry in a three-set match that ended in a super tiebreak.
“My mind started overthinking a little bit more than I should have, but I think that will help me as an experience for the next matches that I’m in that situation,” she said. “I’ve never felt that much support from the people. It was one of those days that you will remember forever, but it was also really heartbreaking.”
Zarazúa was also eliminated in the second round of women’s doubles play on Sunday alongside her partner Miyu Kato, after losing to the duo of Wu Fang-Hsien and Fanny Stollár.
When asked what it felt like to be the face of Mexican tennis, Zarazúa said she doesn’t feel burdened by the title.
“For me it’s more of a motivation, actually, because I’m a little bit older in the tennis world. I’m 27, so sometimes you really need that push to keep you going or something to look forward to,” she said. “For me to be that face of Mexico is what keeps me alive. Honestly, I don’t take it as an extra pressure on myself.”
Over on the women’s doubles side of the bracket, perennial star Venus Williams staged her comeback after a 16-month hiatus alongside 22-year-old Canadian Leylah Fernandez.
There is an over two-decade age gap between Williams and Fernandez (who has Ecuadorean and Filipino heritage). Yet their chemistry on the court did not point to that being a struggle.
The duo was a late wild-card entry into the tournament, and handily defeated its first three opponents without dropping a set.
“I feel like we kind of don’t really need to say much on court, and it just kind of flows,” Fernandez said after one of the pair’s wins last week. “That’s what I like, that we don’t need to talk as much, plan so many things. When I cross, I know Venus is behind me moving to the other corner; when she crosses, I’m going to go to the other corner. Just kind of like a nice harmony dynamic.”
Williams added, “I think we have a very similar mindset, similar attitude. So I think we’re on this wavelength that makes it easy for us to really move in the same direction.”
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But this isn’t the first time that Fernandez has found success on the U.S. Open stage. In 2021, she made it to the women’s singles final of the tournament as an unseeded player before losing to fellow tennis youngster Emma Raducanu in straight sets. Their match was the first U.S. Open women’s singles final between two teenagers since 1999. En route to the final, Fernandez beat marquee players like Naomi Osaka, Angelique Kerber and Aryna Sabalenka.
Williams and Fernandez’s underdog run came to an end Tuesday in a straight-sets loss to the top-seeded duo of Taylor Townsend and Katerina Siniakova in the quarterfinals.
Following the loss, Fernandez thanked Williams for reminding her why she decided to play tennis.
“It’s just been an incredible week and a half being here and learning so much from from Venus. I’m just kind of like a sponge, so I’m just sucking everything in and learning,” Fernandez said in a post-match interview Tuesday. “Venus playing on the court, for joy, brought me back [to] why I started playing tennis … I started playing tennis for the love of the game and for bringing joy on court, not only for myself, but also for the fans.”
Brazilian Beatriz Haddad Maia entered the U.S. Open as the top-ranked active Latina player in the tournament. The 29-year-old São Paulo native advanced to the women’s singles round of 16 before being bested by American Amanda Anisimova. Haddad Maia and her doubles partner, Laura Siegemund, were eliminated from the women’s doubles bracket in the second round by Marta Kostyuk and Elena-Gabriela Ruse.
Three Colombianas also made an appearance at the U.S. Open earlier in the tournament.
Camila Osorio lost her first-round singles match against New Zealand’s Lulu Sun in three sets. The 23-year-old player also reached the women’s doubles round of 16 with her partner Yue Yuan, where they lost to Townsend and Siniakova.
Emiliana Arango ran into Iga Swiatek, the second-ranked player in the world and 2025 Wimbledon singles champion, in the first round of the women’s singles tournament. The 24-year-old Arango was defeated by Swiatek in her U.S. Open debut.
Julieta Pareja was also making her U.S. Open debut on both the singles and doubles brackets. At 16, she was the youngest player at this year’s tournament. Pareja was eliminated in the first round of singles play by 9th-ranked Elena Rybakina. She and her doubles partner Akasha Urhobo were ousted in the first round by Xu Yifan and Yang Zhaoxuan.
It was ICE’s first major event since $170 billion was earmarked for border and immigration enforcement in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was signed into law on July 4. Included in the legislation was tens of billions for new deportation agents and other personnel.
According to ICE, 3,000 people attended the expo, and nearly 700 received tentative job offers. This adds on to the more than 100,000 applications that the Department of Homeland Security claims to have received in recent weeks.
The agency has tried to sweeten the deal with incentives such as bonuses of up to $50,000 and student loan repayment benefits, in an effort to hire 10,000 deportation officers by the end of the year.
As aspiring ICE agents created a line out the doors of the career expo, a group of about 30 protesters yelled “Go home Nazis,” among other things, at expo attendees.
Of particular note was the sizable Latinx representation among the ICE agent hopefuls.
An interaction that Mejia captured between one young Latinx man named Ricardo with his friend over text captured the tension of communal versus personal goals.
“Oh hell no Ricardo I thought you was joking. I will not speak to you ever again if you become and ice agent … You have a dad who was deported dude.”
ICE officials say it’s the first of several hiring events planned around the country. According to the ICE website, there is a DHS expo scheduled for Sept. 15 and 16 in Provo, Utah.
NEW YORK — Daniil Medvedev’s match was delayed more than six minutes between points Sunday night, after a photographer entered the court on match point and the 2021 U.S. Open champion became enraged by the chair umpire’s decision to award his opponent a first serve.
The latest Medvedev meltdown on Louis Armstrong Stadium led to a wild change in the match. The No. 13 seed was a point away from being eliminated, then won the next two sets to force a deciding fifth before Benjamin Bonzi eliminated him from a second straight major with a 6-3, 7-5, 6-7 (5), 0-6, 6-4 victory that ended early Monday.
“I tried to stay calm in the match but it was not easy,” Bonzi said.
Daniil Medvedev, right, reacts next to chair umpire Greg Allensworth after a photographer ran onto the court during his match against Benjamin Bonzi in the first round of the U.S. Open on Sunday night.
(Adam Hunger / Associated Press)
Bonzi had just hit his first serve leading 5-4 in the third set. After he missed it, a photographer left his position before the Frenchman could hit his second.
Chair umpire Greg Allensworth told the photographer to get off the court, then announced that Bonzi would get another first serve because of the delay — which is common in tennis. Medvedev then approached the chair to complain about the decision.
“He wants to go home, guys. He doesn’t like to be here. He gets paid by the match, not by the hour,” Medvedev shouted into the microphones behind the chair.
Medvedev kept encouraging the loud boos on Armstrong, which eventually lasted so long that he then tried to get fans to quiet down so Bonzi could serve. When Bonzi finally did, he missed the first serve and then lost the point, and Medvedev won the game and later the set in a tiebreaker to prolong the match.
“I never experienced something like that,” said Bonzi, who had fans chanting his name at times.
It was reminiscent of Medvedev’s 2019 match on the same court, when fans booed him for his antics and he later taunted the crowd in his post-match interview, saying the jeers gave him energy. Medvedev had snatched the towel from a ballperson during the match and was given a code violation by umpire Damien Dumusois. Medvedev then threw his racket in the direction of Dumusois, barked something at him and later flashed his middle finger next to his forehead as he walked past the umpire’s chair, actions that led to him being fined $9,000 for that match.
Medvedev reached the final that year, then won the title two years later. But he went just 1-4 in Grand Slam tournaments this year and was also upset by Bonzi in the first round at Wimbledon.
Medvedev sat in his chair for a few minutes after the match and repeatedly smashed his racket before eventually departing.
A U.S. Tennis Association spokesman said the photographer was escorted from the court by U.S. Open security and his credential was revoked.
But it turns out that the older sister was being held back by her younger sibling — at least that’s what Venus Williams joked on Monday after winning her first match with new doubles partner Hailey Baptiste during the first round of the D.C. Open.
“I think, from the first point, I could see that we were going to be a good team,” Williams said during her on-court interview following the American duo’s 6-3, 6-1 victory against Eugenie Bouchard and Clervie Ngounoue. “We just should have started playing earlier, years ago, right? I think Serena was just in the way.”
After the capacity crowd of around 3,000 roared with laughter at the quip, Williams smiled and waved to the camera: “Sorry, Serena.”
Williams, 45, had every right to be giddy after a successful return to the court following a 16-month hiatus, during which she underwent a medical procedure to remove fibroids from her uterus last July.
“It’s just nice to be able to play,” Williams said during her postmatch news conference with Baptiste. “Where I am at this year is so much different than where I was at last year. It’s night and day, being able to be here and prepare for the tournament as opposed to preparing for surgery a year ago.”
She added: “Tennis is a game. It’s our life. It’s literally our obsession. … But at the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter if your health is not there. So it definitely put it in perspective for me and maybe made it easier to make the decision to maybe come back out here and maybe play even freer.”
Williams’ comeback is just getting started. The seven-time major winner and one-time Olympic gold medalist is scheduled to face Peyton Stearns of the United States in the first round of the women’s singles tournament at 4:30 p.m. PDT Tuesday.
Later this week, Williams and Baptiste will face the winner of Tuesday’s match between Cristina Bucsa/Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Taylor Townsend/Shuai Zhang in the women’s doubles quarterfinals.
As for Serena Williams, the 23-time major singles champion hasn’t played since “evolving away from tennis” following the 2022 U.S. Open, where she and Venus lost in the first round in doubles and she advanced to the third round in singles before losing to Australian Ajla Tomljanovic in her final match.
“I keep saying to my team: The only thing that would make this better is if she was here,” Venus Williams said of her sister while speaking to reporters Sunday. “Like, we always did everything together, so of course I miss her.”
ATLANTA — Seattle’s Cal Raleigh won his first Home Run Derby after leading the big leagues in long balls going into the break, defeating Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero 18-15 in the final round Monday night.
The Mariners’ breakout slugger nicknamed “Big Dumper” advanced from the first round on a tiebreaker by less than an inch over the Athletics’ Brent Rooker, then won his semifinal 19-13 over Pittsburgh’s Oneil Cruz, whose 513-foot first-round drive over Truist Park’s right-center field seats was the longest of the night.
Hitting second in the final round, the 22-year-old Caminero closed within three dingers, took three pitches and hit a liner to left field.
Becoming the first switch-hitter and first catcher to win the title, Raleigh had reached the All-Star break with a major league-leading 38 home runs. He became the second Mariners player to take the title after three-time winner Ken Griffey Jr.
“Usually the guy that’s leading the league in homers doesn’t win the whole thing,” Raleigh said. “That’s as surprising to me as anybody else.”
Raleigh was pitched to by his father, Todd, former coach of Tennessee and Western Carolina. His younger brother, Todd Raleigh Jr., did the catching.
“Just to do it with my family was awesome,” Raleigh said.
Just the second Derby switch-hitter after Baltimore’s Adley Rutschman in 2023, Raleigh hit his first eight left-handed, took a timeout, then hit seven right-handed. Going back to lefty, he then hit two more in the bonus round and stayed lefty for the semifinals and the final.
Caminero beat Minnesota’s Byron Buxton 8-7 in the other semifinal.
Atlanta’s Matt Olson, Washington’s James Wood, the New York Yankees’ Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Rooker were eliminated in the first round of the annual power show.
Cruz and Caminero each hit 21 long balls and Buxton had 20 in the opening round. Raleigh and Rooker had 17 apiece, but Raleigh advanced on the tiebreaker of their longest homer, 470.61 feet to 470.53.
“One little tweak in the system and I’m not even in the next round, so that’s crazy,” Raleigh said.
Cruz’s long drive was the hardest-hit at 118 mph.
The longest derby homer since Statcast started tracking in 2016 was 520 feet by Juan Soto in the mile-high air of Denver’s Coors Field in 2021. Last year, the longest drive at Arlington, Texas, was 473 feet by Atlanta’s Marcell Ozuna.
Wood hit 16 homers, including a 486-foot shot and one that landed on the roof of the Chop House behind the right-field wall. Olson, disappointing his hometown fans, did not go deep on his first nine swings and finished with 15, He also was eliminated in the first round in 2021.
Chisholm hit just three homers, the fewest since the timer format started in 2015.
Clippers executives were serious when they said they had not soured on James Harden’s future with the franchise after an underwhelming postseason performance.
Harden declined his player option for $36 million with the Clippers on Sunday and intends to sign a two-year deal with the team for $81.5 million, league sources with knowledge of the deal not authorized to discuss it publicly said. The second year is a player option and is partially guaranteed.
The deal gave Harden a raise and the Clippers some salary flexibility going forward.
“He’s our No. 1 priority,” Lawrence Frank, the Clippers’ president of basketball operations, told the media after the first round of the draft Wednesday night. “We’re super hopeful that James is here and he’s here for a long time. He has a player-option, so he can opt-in … or he can opt-out and hopefully we can do a deal that makes sense for both sides. But James, as you guys know, was phenomenal and we hope to continue to see his play.”
Though the Clippers drafted a center in the first round with the 30th pick, getting Yanic Konan Niederhauser of Penn State, Frank said his team “probably will have at least three centers.”
The Clippers can use their non-taxpayer mid-level exception that’s projected to be about $14.1 million on a player or two, and perhaps even find a center.
Harden played in 79 games this past season, played the fifth-most total minutes in the NBA (2,789), was fifth in the league in assists (8.7), averaged 22.8 points per game and was the only player with 1,500 points, 500 assists, 100 steals and 50 blocks.
Harden, however, struggled during the postseason, averaging 18.7 points per game in the series the Clippers lost to the Nuggets. He scored just 33 points combined in Games 4, 5 and 7 losses, including seven points in Game 7.
Clippers guard James Harden looks to shoot during the team’s win over San Antonio Spurs on April 8 at Intuit Dome.
(Carrie Giordano / Associated Press)
Harden turns 36 in August and was not made available to speak with media during traditional exit interviews every team typically hosts to close out a season.
“When it was James this year with no Kawhi, with Norm [Powell] and [Ivica] Zubac and the rest of the group, we really asked James to do a lot,” Frank said shortly after the Clippers were eliminated from the playoffs.
“And at his age to deliver what he did…[He played in] 79 games, and he does that time and time and time again. We have a deep appreciation for that sort of availability and to be able to deliver and do what he did…We have a great level of appreciation for what James did this year.”
