SI:AM | An Unlikely All-Star Snaps the NL’s Long Losing Streak

Plus, why MLB players are obsessed with a new internet game.

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I was really hoping to see MLB’s new tie-breaking home run derby last night.

In today’s SI:AM:

⚾ The NL breaks the streak

❔ MLB players’ new obsession

🏈 Pat Fitzgerald’s future

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Elias Díaz to the rescue

The MLB All-Star Game is an opportunity for all the biggest names in the sport to share the field for one night. But the hero was the most anonymous guy.

Rockies catcher Elias Díaz came through in the clutch with a two-run homer in the eighth inning off Orioles pitcher Félix Bautista that proved to be the game-winner.

Díaz is 32 and in his ninth season in the majors. He’s having the best offensive season of his career (third among all catchers with a .277 batting average), which earned him his first All-Star nod. He’s also the first Rockies catcher to be selected for the All-Star Game.

Díaz entered the game as a pinch hitter with a runner on first and nobody out in the top of the eighth inning as the NL trailed 2–1. He was facing one of the game’s hardest-throwing pitchers in Bautista. The pressure was on.

On a 2–2 count, Bautista left a splitter over the heart of the plate, and Díaz punished him, ripping a homer over the wall in left.

“I feel like I went in with a really good plan,” Díaz said after the game, through a translator. “Just talking with the hitting coach, he showed me the numbers, kind of showed me the plan. I was looking for a specific pitch; I was able to get it and connect.

"When I was rounding the bases, I was just overwhelmed with emotion.”

Josh Hader pitched a scoreless bottom of the eighth, and Craig Kimbrel—despite making things interesting by issuing a couple of walks—closed things out in the ninth to give the NL its first All-Star Game victory since 2012. Díaz was named the MVP of the game.

The never-ending Dan Synder saga

Tim Heitman/USA Today Sports

Today is usually the quietest day on the sports calendar, but not this year. ESPN just published a bombshell report about Dan Snyder, Roger Goodell and the NFL.

The story focuses on the leak of bigoted emails sent by Jon Gruden that led to his dismissal as coach of the Raiders, as well as how the leak ultimately led to Snyder’s sale of the Commanders.

It would be impossible to fully summarize the entire 7,000-word story here, but the biggest takeaway is that four owners told ESPN they believe Goodell was personally involved in the email leak. Reporters Don Van Natta Jr. and Seth Wickersham speculate that Snyder was behind it, or perhaps NFLPA head DeMaurice Smith.

The ESPN story makes a compelling case that the leak of the emails set off a chain of events that led to Snyder’s sale of his team. The leaks came after the NFL had concluded its investigation into allegations of the Commanders’ toxic workplace environment. The league had already done its best to minimize the impact of that investigation by instructing investigator Beth Wilkinson not to present her findings in writing. But the leak of Gruden’s emails (in which he used a racist trope to describe Smith and made other misogynistic, anti-LGBTQ statements) drew additional scrutiny of Washington’s workplace culture, including a congressional inquiry that later uncovered allegations of financial misconduct.

The ESPN story is a fascinating look at the inner workings of the NFL and well worth your time on this otherwise slow news day.

The best of Sports Illustrated

• Stephanie Apstein wrote about my current obsession—Immaculate Grid—and why MLB players are equally obsessed with the game.
• I also wrote about the new feature that makes Immaculate Grid even better.
• Conor Orr believes these three NFL teams aren’t going to live up to the hype this season.
• Even after being fired by Northwestern amid a hazing scandal, Pat Fitzgerald won’t be out of a job for long in the bottom-line-oriented business of college sports, Pat Forde writes.
• Barry Bonds believes he was “vindicated” and deserves to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
• Oregon State QB DJ Uiagalelei was picked in the last round of the MLB draft.
• The WNBA’s biggest names will descend upon Las Vegas this weekend for Saturday’s All-Star Game, with seats still available for as little as $32, per SI Tickets.

The top five...

… things I saw yesterday:

5. Shaedon Sharpe and Kai Jones’s big dunks in NBA Summer League action.

4. Nets Summer League player Nick Perkins’s ejection after playing just 74 seconds in the fourth quarter of a blowout.

3. The silly, fun way the Savannah Bananas game ended.

2. Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman miked up together on the field.

1. Adolis García and Randy Arozarena’s catches at the wall on the first two plays of the All-Star Game. 

SIQ

On this day in 1931, with a record crowd at St. Louis’s Sportsman’s Park that exceeded the number of seats in the stadium by more than 10,000, the Cubs and Cardinals combined to set which MLB record?

• Most doubles in a game
• Slowest nine-inning game
• Fastest nine-inning game
• Most home runs in a game

Yesterday’s SIQ: On July 11, 1976, the Braves held a dual promotional event that began with several couples getting married at home plate and concluded with which very different event?

• Pro wrestling
• Motorcycle racing
• Fire breathing
• Bull riding

Answer: Pro wrestling. The event was dubbed “Headlock and Wedlock Day.” According to The New York Times, nine couples were married before the game, and five wrestling matches were held after the Braves beat the Mets, 9–8.

According to author Dan Epstein, the event was originally billed as “Home Plate Wedding Day,” but new Braves owner Ted Turner had inadvertently scheduled a Georgia Championship Wrestling show at the stadium for the same day.

The dual promotion was one of several wacky stunts organized by Turner, who bought the team in January 1976. Other promotional events included ostrich races and an event where fans tried to collect cash dropped from a helicopter.