Sports
10 Early World Series Contenders to Watch: 2025 MLB Playoff Sleepers & Favorites
May 4, 2025; Anaheim, California, USA; Detroit Tigers outfielder Kerry Carpenter (30) celebrates with teammates after hitting a three run home run against the Los Angeles Angels during the sixth inning at Angel Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jonathan Hui-Imagn Images Sometimes, the World Series teams are two clubs that began establishing themselves as championship favorites by early May. While they weren’t yet leading their respective leagues, the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees were each 23-13 entering play a year ago today.
But most of the time, the eventual World Series combatants didn’t yet look the part by the first week of May.
Eleven of the 20 teams to reach the World Series in the last 10 full seasons were within five games of .500 through May 5 of their pennant-winning season. Four of those clubs — the pennant-winning 2014 Kansas City Royals (14-17) and 2022 Philadelphia Phillies (11-15), and the championship-winning 2019 Washington Nationals (14-19) and 2021 Atlanta Braves (14-16) — were under .500 on that date.
Only two World Series teams since 2014 — the curse-busting 2016 Chicago Cubs (21-6) and the 2018 champion Boston Red Sox (24-9) — had baseball’s best record through May 5.
All of which is to say: we may be surprised by who emerges in the World Series in late October. Here’s a look at five potential pennant winners in each league.
American League
Apr 22, 2025; Cleveland, Ohio, USA; New York Yankees designated hitter Ben Rice (22) celebrates his solo home run with right fielder Aaron Judge (99) in the first inning against the Cleveland Guardians at Progressive Field. Mandatory Credit: David Richard-Imagn Images Detroit Tigers (22-13): Disregard everything we said about World Series teams not looking the part before May 5. The Tigers, who lead the AL with a 2.96 ERA and rank second with a .755 OPS, are the most well-rounded team in the Junior Circuit and seem to have found a little bit of magic during last year’s surprising playoff run.
New York Yankees (19-16): The defending champs of a mediocre league have the first-month MVP in .400-chasing Aaron Judge and the first-month Cy Young in Max Fried, who is flirting with a Bob Gibson-esque ERA. And, well, that’s it. Brian Cashman will surely be active at the trade deadline, but the Yankees will only go as far as Judge, Fried and a little institutional memory can carry them.
Seattle Mariners (20-14): With eight straight series wins and a surprisingly potent offense, the Mariners have already offered plenty of reasons to daydream they can finally end baseball’s longest World Series drought and reach the Fall Classic for the first time. But we’ve all been teased before by the Mariners, whose path to late October will require figuring out life without Logan Gilbert and George Kirby for an extended period.
Not the Sacramento Athletics (20-16): The surprising Athletics are a long shot to keep this up over the long haul. But imagine Major League come to life with a team that makes the World Series after the owner purposely tanks his way out of town. And how delicious it’d be seeing Rob Manfred squirming and trying to convince everyone how great it is that the World Series is being played in a Triple-A park with a media center that looks like a shed you’d buy at Home Depot.
Texas Rangers (17-18): The Rangers, with the fourth-lowest OPS in the game, have already begun shuffling desk chairs by firing “offensive coordinator” Donnie Ecker and replacing him with Bret Boone. But Texas also has the fourth-best ERA in the AL, and you can never underestimate the possibility of Bruce Bochy, in the last year of his contract, going out in style by winning yet another World Series.
National League
May 4, 2025; St. Louis, Missouri, USA; St. Louis Cardinals second baseman Brendan Donovan (33) dives safely to home plate in the third inning as New York Mets catcher Luis Torrens (13) waits on the throw at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Tim Vizer-Imagn Images New York Mets (23-13): Like the Tigers, the Mets look like they found something magical during a stunning playoff run last season. It also helps that Pete Alonso is mounting an early Triple Crown run and that David Stearns has constructed a deep bullpen behind an effective yet thin rotation.
Chicago Cubs (22-14): The Cubs are averaging a whopping six runs per game, which puts them on pace to finish with the most runs since the 2000 White Sox (978). They also lead baseball with a plus-69 run differential despite playing 30 games against over-.500 teams — by far the most in baseball. Pretty, pretty good.
Los Angeles Dodgers (24-11): The billion-dollar pitching staff fell apart almost as soon as the season began, but the Dodgers still have the best record in baseball because they are still the Dodgers. As always, the season will come down to Dave Roberts trying to MacGyver his way through October while everyone else gets the credit.
San Diego Padres (23-11): It’s now or never for the Padres, whose days of spending big in a small market are probably over following the death of owner Peter Seidler. But no team other than the Dodgers is as complete as San Diego, which leads the majors with a 2.73 ERA and has an early NL MVP candidate in Fernando Tatis Jr.
Cincinnati Reds (18-18): Here’s a long shot in a loaded NL. But nobody mixes and matches better come October than Terry Francona, the Hall of Fame-bound manager looking for one more Fall Classic trip. If the Reds can squeak in, they’ll be a team nobody wants to play — especially if Cincinnati can build some momentum with a wild-card series win.
Sports
Knicks and Nuggets Blow Big Leads: What Went Wrong in Game 2?
Roughly 5,000 feet of elevation separate Denver and New York City.
Still, gravity works the same regardless of where one stands. Just ask the NBA teams in both towns.
“You get too high, and you get, I don’t want to say cocky, but feeling yourself,” Nuggets guard Tim Hardaway Jr. said.
That sensation went south on either side of the country Monday night.
After squandering sizable leads that would have cemented commanding 2-0 advantages in their respective first-round playoff series, the Nuggets and Knicks now find themselves bracing for a fight.
Should their opponents ultimately have their number, Denver and New York will look back with disdain on 19 and 14. Those were the Game 2 cushions the teams coughed up as the No. 3 seeds in the Eastern and Western Conference.
“It’s a game we should’ve won,” Knicks guard Josh Hart said. “In the playoffs, we can’t give away games.”
Be that as it may, the Knicks did just that against the Atlanta Hawks. They controlled the outcome for much of the night and took a 12-point edge into the fourth quarter after leading by as many as 14.
Then New York shot 5-for-22 from the floor in the final 12 minutes compared to 10-for-15 for Atlanta. Fighting through vulgar chants from the Madison Square Garden faithful, Hawks star CJ McCullom scored six straight points down the stretch during one key sequence on the way to a game-high 32.
“In that fourth quarter, you could tell [the Hawks] were playing with a level of desperation,” Knicks coach Mike Brown said. “There were four 50-50 balls, and they got three of the four. We always use that stat to gauge the level of aggression in a game. In that fourth quarter, their aggression stepped up.”
New York’s melted at the same time. How many late possessions saw the Knicks pass or hold the ball around the perimeter before settling for subpar looks from 3-point range? The Knicks went 3-for-11 from deep as part of their flop.
Denver led the Minnesota Timberwolves by 19 points early in the second quarter before crumbling. The Nuggets still were ahead by three points to start the fourth quarter but a combined 2-for-12 shooting effort from pillars Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray in the final 12 minutes took a toll.
“I feel like we had the game in hand, and then we just didn’t make our shots,” Murray said.
As with the Knicks and Hawks, the reversal of fortunes stemmed both from the hosts’ miscues and an outstanding effort from a visiting player, as Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards had 30 points.
“Great leadership, positive,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said. “He recognized he needed to get into attack mode and get downhill a little bit more. He did that.”
The Knicks and Nuggets no doubt sensed the need to amp up their own urgency as things started slipping away Monday.
That neither could act upon it didn’t signal the end for either New York or Denver, of course. But now there’s unnecessary added weight for the climb back to the top.
Sports
Pistons seek return to identity vs. Magic after Game 1 shocker
Apr 19, 2026; Detroit, Michigan, USA; Detroit Pistons forward Tobias Harris (12) is defended by Orlando Magic guard Desmond Bane (3) in the second half during the 2026 NBA Playoffs at Little Caesars Arena. Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-Imagn Images After an exceptional regular season, this wasn’t the start to the NBA playoffs that the Detroit Pistons envisioned.
Reeling from a stunning Game 1 loss in which only two players reached double figures, the Eastern Conference’s top seed heads into Game 2 Wednesday against the visiting Orlando Magic facing early pressure to reset the best-of-seven series.
The eighth-seeded Magic controlled the opener from the start, never trailing and leaning on a balanced offensive attack. Paolo Banchero led the way with 23 points while Franz Wagner scored 11 of his 19 in the fourth quarter to help close out the 112-101 win.
For Detroit, the issue wasn’t just the loss — it was how it happened. The Pistons never established their defensive identity and struggled to find consistent offense beyond star guard Cade Cunningham, two areas that will be central entering Game 2.
“It starts, always, with us defensively,” said Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff. “When you go back and watch the film of that (game), we weren’t ourselves defensively. The telling tale is typically when we play them, they go to the free-throw line a ton.
“… We went 38 (times) but they went 19. So that means we weren’t playing our brand of basketball, being physical, being handsy, being aggressive. That kind of sets the tone for us.”
Offensively, the Pistons leaned on Cunningham, who scored 39 points, but got little other support — scoring their fewest points in nearly three months, since a loss to the Phoenix Suns on Jan. 29. Detroit will need more help from All-Star center Jalen Duren, who was held to just eight points and seven rebounds in Game 1.
“They came out ready from the jump,” Duren said. “We didn’t really meet their intensity. They’ve been playing with their backs against the walls the last few weeks, so they were already kind of already rolling. I think we just got to do a better job meeting that intensity.”
Duren said the Pistons remain confident despite the loss, which extended their home playoff losing streak to 11 games, the longest in NBA history.
“We know the type of team we are,” Duren said. “We feel like we’re the better team. We know that we’ve just got to make adjustments and come out smarter, come out playing harder.”
Orlando coach Jamahl Mosley said he has talked to his team about not becoming too overconfident coming off Sunday’s win.
“It’s one game at a time,” Mosley said of his message to the team. “It’s the reality that, yeah, you did get the Game 1 win, but now you have to go and figure out how to get a Game 2 (win). There’s going to be, obviously, the positive talk about what you’ve done, and thinking there’s reasons to celebrate, but at the end of the day, it’s one game, and that’s the most important piece that we’ve talked about: just taking it one game at a time.”
Banchero said the team has received the message, and he believes the key for the Magic is to play defense like they did in the opener.
“I thought we were on a string, just communicating, talking out coverages,” Banchero said. “I think it’s just going to continue to take that, being aggressive, being the aggressors on defense and just not trying to give them much. Obviously they’re going to make shots, but just not trying to give them any free looks.”
–Field Level Media
Sports
Lynx star Napheesa Collier (ankle) targets June for on-court work
Mar 2, 2026; Brooklyn, NY, USA; Unrivaled Co-founder Napheesa Collier at Barclay’s Center. Mandatory Credit: Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images The Minnesota Lynx said Tuesday that star forward Napheesa Collier’s rehab from left ankle surgery is “progressing as expected,” and she could resume on-court activities in early June.
The team plans to release updates on Collier’s progress when available.
The timeline means Collier will miss, at minimum, the first month of the WNBA season, which begins May 10 for the Lynx.
Collier underwent surgery on her ankle on March 24 after sustaining a severe injury during the 2025 playoffs. Per reports at the time, she sustained a Grade 2 tear of three ligaments in the ankle and a muscle in her left shin on a collision during Game 3 of the playoff semifinal series vs. Phoenix.
Collier, 29, averaged a career-high 22.9 points and shot 40.3% from 3-point range to go with 7.3 rebounds, 3.2 assists, 1.6 steals and 1.5 blocks per game last year. The back-to-back WNBA Most Valuable Player runner-up, Collier is a five-time All-Star and earned MVP honors in the 2024 Commissioner’s Cup final and the 2025 All-Star Game.
–Field Level Media
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