Arch Manning is looking to do something neither of his famous uncles ever did: win a Heisman Trophy.

The Texas quarterback has opened as the favorite to win the 2025 Heisman Trophy at ESPN BET, sitting atop the oddsboard at +750.

A rising redshirt sophomore, Manning was the top recruit of the 2023 high school class and was the backup quarterback to Quinn Ewers for his first two seasons in Austin. Manning is widely expected to be the Longhorns' starter next season. The team is +500 to win the National Championship, trailing only reigning champion Ohio State (+450).

LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier is second on ESPN BET's oddsboard at +800. He aims to follow in the footsteps of Jayden Daniels (2023) and Joe Burrow (2019) to become the third Tigers quarterback to win the award in seven seasons.

Three more quarterbacks round out the top five: Tennessee's Nico Iamaleava (+1100), Clemson's Cade Klubnik (+1200) and Penn State's Drew Allar (+1200).

The first non-quarterback on the board is Ohio State wide receiver Jeremiah Smith (+1500), who dazzled during the Buckeyes' championship run in his freshman season. Another non-QB doesn't appear until Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love shows up at +6000.

While quarterbacks have won 20 of the past 25 Heisman awards, Colorado CB/WR Travis Hunter broke the mold for the 2024 season with his spectacular play on both sides of the ball, while Boise State RB Ashton Jeanty finished as the runner-up after a historic rushing season.

Hunter's triumph resulted in a big loss for sportsbooks.

The Duke Blue Devils host the first of two regular-season meetings with longtime rival, the North Carolina Tar Heels, on Saturday in a Sonic Blockbuster matchup on ESPN (6:30 p.m. ET).

North Carolina native Ryan McGee penned an open letter to the star freshman on behalf of his home state, where the two programs on either side of college basketball's storied rivalry are separated by only 11 miles.

Dear Cooper Flagg,

Congratulations on what has been a ridiculously great freshman season at Duke. At a basketball program that has long been an assembly line of legends, you have already managed to carve your name into the wooden framework of Cameron Indoor Stadium after only 20 collegiate games played.

You came to Durham with nearly unprecedented hype, as the nation's top recruit and already the presumptive No. 1 pick in the 2025 NBA draft. But you have lived up to the hype from the start, driving lanes, tossing up fallaway 3-pointers and throwing down backboard-rattling dunks in a campaign that will likely end with a truckload of Player of the Year awards sent back to your hometown of Newport, Maine.

But before we can cement your legacy, there is the matter of Saturday's scheduled contest against a neighboring team that wears a lighter shade of blue, making the 11-mile trek north from Chapel Hill to Durham. Yes, North Carolina, the flagship school of the state in which you now reside -- and the measuring stick by which your Duke days shall be forever assessed.

Forget that you turned 18 barely a month and a half ago. How you perform against the team from the other end of Highway 501 will tailgate you through every birthday you celebrate from now on.

And to be crystal clear here, kid, this isn't overtyped sportswriter hyperbole. Just ask those who once stood in your sneakers on that same court, most of them long -- very long -- before you were born.

"It's been 40 years since I played a college basketball game," Michael Jordan said. (Perhaps you've heard of him, Cooper?) "To this day, before people ask me about our national championship or our three ACC championships or ACC tournament wins, any of that, they ask, 'How did you did you do against Duke?'"

After pausing to make room for a Grinch-like evil grin while reflecting on his UNC days while at a NASCAR event (he's now a team owner) late last fall, the GOAT added: "By the way, the answer is that we did very well."

Very well, as in six wins to one loss -- which brings us, Cooper, to the other lonelier end of that yardstick.

"That one loss for Michael was the first win for me," Jay Bilas said. You definitely know that name, don't you, Cooper? He's the guy who is always talking about you on "College GameDay." He's also the fellow 6-foot-9 big man in all those photos wallpapering the museum in the Cameron Indoor lobby. No. 21, Bilas traded in SoCal for the South to be a member of Duke's ACC power-shifting 1986 Final Four team. (Though, in your defense, you might not recognize him in those team pics because he had hair back then.)

"I don't remember the score of many games I played in," Bilas continued. "But I remember the score of that one in 1984. It was the ACC tournament and North Carolina was ranked No. 1, but we won 77-74. I will always remember that score because when we got back to Durham, every car in town had a bumper sticker that read: DUKE BLUE 77, CAROLINA BLUE 74.

"That's how rare it was for Duke to beat Carolina back then. I remember us saying this shouldn't be such a big deal. This needs to be a normal occurrence."

Bilas, like MJ, grinned.

"And it has been."

Indeed, Cooper, it has. UNC leads the all-time series with 145 wins to Duke's 117, but that includes a 16-game winning streak that took place a century ago. Since 1978, the series has stood as Duke 57, UNC 49. Since 2003, it's Duke 26, UNC 23. And so far this decade, the scorecard reads UNC 6, Duke 5.

The only non-regular-season game among those came in the 2022 Final Four, when the Heels ended Mike Krzyzewski's unparalleled coaching career in the biggest conceivable way.

But Mr. Flagg, what you need to understand before Saturday evening's tipoff has nothing to do with records, stat sheets or series winning streaks (though it's worth noting that UNC has won two straight). This game is much bigger than that. This is about emotion. About bragging rights. About the ripples sent forth from the Triangle throughout the Old North State, from the Appalachians to the Outer Banks, its epicenter being the numbers that you and your teammates do or do not stamp onto those stat sheets in your two wintertime meetings with the Heels.

Duke-Carolina is about old men sitting in booths at barbecue joints, the Methodist dressed in one shade of blue asking the Presbyterian donned in that other Azul hue, "Well now, what the hell happened to y'all Saturday night?" Then promptly pushing the check across the vinegar-stained Formica, as tradition demands.

Be forewarned, dear freshman Flagg, that a countless roster of your fellow first-year players have been thrust into the Duke-Carolina spotlight, both willingly and accidentally.

Zion Williamson was a freshman the night of Feb. 20, 2019, when 36 seconds into the UNC game at Cameron, his right Nike sneaker exploded like it had been rigged by a Hollywood special effects unit. In 2007, when Duke's Gerald Henderson's elbow broke Tyler Hansbrough's nose, it further opened the fracture between Durham and Chapel Hill. The image of the UNC center's blood-covered face is the Old North State's equivalent to Rocky Balboa screaming "Adrian!" -- but it was Hansbrough vowing revenge on Henderson, who was, yes, a freshman.

And those old-timers in their barbecue booths still tell the tale of Feb. 4, 1961, the day often singled out as the moment the rivalry became more than just a basketball contest. UNC's Larry Brown -- do an internet search for that name, Cooper, he became a very big deal among hoops coaches -- was driving the length of Cameron court in the closing seconds, trailing Duke 81-75. He was guarded by Blue Devil ace Art Heyman, who spit at Brown and grabbed at him for a purposeful foul. Brown reacted by throwing the ball at Heyman and then throwing fists.

The UNC bench, then located along the baseline, reacted by jumping Heyman en masse. The Duke bench reacted by running across the building to protect their All-American while students poured onto the floor, punching anyone in pale blue. Among those later found guilty of making it all much worse much faster were, yes, freshmen players from both teams, in attendance as fans during a time when they weren't allowed to play yet.

Also, Mr. Flagg, it would behoove you to not pay much attention to the current win-loss records of your respective teams. Yes, Duke has lost only twice and will host Saturday night's game as the second-ranked team in the land. And yes, North Carolina is scuffling at 13-9, ranked seventh in the ACC after dropping three of its past four, and there is increasing noise from those who sport Tar on their Heels that it might be time to part ways with UNC hoops hero Hubert Davis after four seasons at the helm of his alma mater.

But Davis himself will be happy to explain how "throw the records out when these two get together" is no mere sports cliché when, well, these two teams get together. During Davis' junior year of 1990, twice the Tar Heels faced Duke as the higher ranked team -- and lost both times. Then they met in the ACC tourney title game, where Duke was ranked ahead of Carolina ... and lost.

"People remember the game when we lost to them in the 1984 ACC tourney, but we had to play our asses off not to have lost to them just the week before," Brad Daugherty recalled. "We were No. 1 in that game, too, and they pushed us to two overtimes before we finally put it away. I think it had been nearly 20 years since Duke had won in Carmichael [UNC's longtime arena] and I remember seeing all the old lettermen there that night looking at us like, 'Y'all better not be the ones that blow this streak!' Thank goodness we didn't."

And, Coop, before you take the court for the latest installment of this rivalry do yourself a favor and dig out the game film of this same contest in this same building almost exactly two decades ago, not too long before you entered this big blue world.

It was Feb. 2, 1995. Duke was bad. Like, the only real blemish on Krzyzewski's post-earliest-seasons kind of bad. The Blue Devils went 2-14 in the ACC. It was all so awful that when Coach K had to miss a chunk of the season for back surgery, he decided not to return at all. But in very typical Heels-Devils fashion, it might be the best game ever played in your new home. Rasheed Wallace, Jerry Stackhouse and the No. 2 Heels unleashed a dunk contest to take a 17-point lead, but Duke rallied to force overtime. At the end of the first OT, with the nation scrambling to find the brand-new ESPN2 on their cable systems, Jeff Capel -- yes, the coach at Pitt -- smoked a desperate heave from midcourt to force double OT and ignite Durham into delirium.

UNC won the game. But Capel won your new school's hearts forever and ever, amen.

Who knows, Cooper Flagg? Perhaps you have your own Capel moment. Or Hansbrough moment. Or MJ ... or JJ Redick ... or Austin Rivers ... or fill-in-the-blank with your all-time favorite blue note.

Just know this, Mr. Maine Man. Whatever you think you know about college basketball's greatest rivalry, forget it. Because all of those who dribbled before you thought they knew, too.

"The only thing you really need to know is that this is bigger than you think, and it is certainly bigger than you," said Christian Laettner, perhaps the most simultaneously loved and loathed hoopster who ever hit the court for this series. A series that, despite all of his otherworldly success (see: Four Final Fours, two national titles and the Dream Team), he posted a 5-6 record against UNC.

"To say you played in the Duke-Carolina game is the most amazing privilege," Laettner added. "To say you won it, and won it several times, that's the gift that keeps on giving for the rest of your life. And the ones you lost, you still replay in your head."

We'll see what mark you leave on this rivalry come Saturday, Coop.

Sincerely,

Everyone in the state of North Carolina

MIAMI -- Terry Rozier declined to answer questions Friday about the investigations by federal prosecutors into unusual betting patterns surrounding his play in a game when he was with the Charlotte Hornets in 2023.

Rozier, now with the Miami Heat, is linked to the same probe that led to former Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter being banned for life from the NBA, facing criminal prosecution and eventually pleading guilty to committing wire fraud.

Porter is awaiting sentencing. There has been no indication that Rozier is under criminal investigation, and he has not been charged with a crime.

"On advice from counsel, I can't answer any questions about that matter," Rozier said Friday. "So, I won't."

The Wall Street Journal on Thursday first reported the investigation surrounding the Hornets-New Orleans game involving Rozier on March 23, 2023. Rozier left the game after 9 minutes and not only did not return -- foot discomfort was the reason cited -- he did not play again for the Hornets that season.

The NBA said it has previously looked into the Rozier situation and did not find that any league rules were broken. It confirmed Thursday that there is an investigation by the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District of New York, and the league said it is "cooperating with that investigation."

Rozier -- averaging 12.1 points per game this season -- will continue to play for the Heat, per usual. Miami opens a road trip at San Antonio on Saturday.

"His status is still the same," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said when asked about Rozier's place with the team on Friday.

Rozier said he's "in a great headspace" and that he does not anticipate any issues being able to focus on playing, even with the investigation now having been revealed publicly.

"It's kind of always been easy. It's kind of been my life," Rozier said. "You know, once I get in between them lines, I can block out anything. So, it'll be pretty easy for me. I'm around a great group of guys. We've got a great locker room, great staff, so it's easy for me."

In that March 23, 2023, game, Rozier finished with five points, four rebounds and two assists in that opening period -- a productive quarter, but well below his usual total output for a full game.

Posts still online from that date show that some bettors were furious with sportsbooks that evening when it became evident that Rozier was not going to return to the Charlotte-New Orleans game after the first quarter, with many turning to social media to say that something "shady" had gone on regarding the prop bets involving his stats for that night.

Some sportsbooks offered Rozier prop bets -- his totals for that night were generally set around 21.5 points, six assists and four rebounds -- that day, then took them down hours before the start of the Charlotte-New Orleans game. It was not clear why that happened, and some bettors wondered aloud why that unusual move had taken place. Rozier was not listed on the team's injury report going into the game.

Prop bets are wagers where bettors can choose whether a player will reach a certain statistical standard or not during a game

Rozier, 30, is in the third year of a four-year, $96.3 million contract.

Porter's ban came after a similar investigation into his performance and prop bets. The Porter investigation started once the league learned from "licensed sports betting operators and an organization that monitors legal betting markets" about unusual gambling patterns surrounding Porter's performance in a game on March 20, 2024, against Sacramento.

The league determined that Porter gave a bettor information about his own health status prior that game and said that another individual -- known to be an NBA bettor -- placed an $80,000 bet that Porter would not hit the numbers set for him in parlays through an online sportsbook. That bet would have won $1.1 million.

Detroit Pistons center Isaiah Stewart has been suspended one game without pay after picking up his sixth flagrant foul point of the season, the NBA announced on Friday.

Stewart received a flagrant foul 2 and was ejected with 8:45 remaining in the second quarter of the Pistons' 133-119 loss to the Indiana Pacers at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Wednesday. Stewart entered the game with four flagrant foul points.

Stewart will serve his suspension when the Pistons host the Dallas Mavericks on Friday.

Coincidently, the Pistons had planned to honor Stewart by giving away a bobblehead of his likeness to fans attending Friday's game. The Pistons told TMZ Sports they plan to go through with the giveaway, as the promotional schedule is locked in once the schedule is released.

Stewart was also fined $50,000 for making inappropriate and objectionable gestures following his ejection. Stewart also stands to lose $86,207 in salary for missing Friday's game, according to ESPN's Bobby Marks.

The 6-foot-8, 250-pound Stewart is averaging 5.4 points and 5.8 rebounds.

Late in Rickey Henderson's career, his Seattle Mariners teammate Mike Cameron would reach for the bus microphone as the team lumbered from airports to hotels, and he read aloud some of the recent achievements of his fellow players from the media relations notes.

Maybe someone was about to hit a round number -- 400 career RBIs, 500 strikeouts. In comparison, though, Henderson's numbers were otherworldly, Cameron recalled. It was as if Henderson were an alien designed to play the earthly game called baseball, and to look great doing it.

During Henderson's 25-year career, he played 3,141 games with 671 teammates, for 15 managers, against 3,099 opponents. Henderson's prolific production is indelible: The goal of the sport is to score the most runs, and Henderson did that 2,295 times -- more than anyone, ever.

And yet as incredible as Henderson was for his accomplishments as a player -- for stealing a record 1,406 bases, for hitting with power, for his physicality -- he was almost as renowned for his personality, his style, his irrepressible confidence and devotion to each game.

Henderson died on Dec. 20, five days shy of his 66th birthday, and this Saturday, he will be honored in a celebration of life at the Oakland Arena.

Those who knew him are saturated with stories about the Hall of Famer, about his devotion to excellence, his acumen, his persona and those moments when he transcended the sport. "The legend of Rickey Henderson still lives on through the numbers of the game," Cameron said, "and the legendary stories."

Here are just a few.

The art of the steal

In 1988 -- although similar conversations undoubtedly took place throughout the 1980s, a decade in which Henderson wrecked conventional managerial strategy -- then-Baltimore Orioles manager Frank Robinson said before a game in Oakland that he told pitchers and catchers to not even bother attempting to keep Henderson from running if he got on base.

"Why should we even try to throw him out? We're never going to get him, and we might throw it away trying to get him," Robinson said. "Don't even try to get him. He's too good."

Of course, Henderson walked to start the first inning that day, and stole second ... without a throw.

Former Texas Rangers manager Bobby Valentine landed similarly. "We used to talk about two outs, nobody on, ninth-place hitter at the plate," Valentine said of a hypothetical game situation. "Walk him, hit him, let him get on first base [in front of Henderson] because it just wasn't fair when Rickey got on first and no one was on in front of him. It wasn't fair to the catcher."

"He was unbelievable in the '80s. Oh God. Rickey stopped the game with everything he did. He stopped it walking to the plate. He stopped it when he'd take a pitch. He stopped it when he hit a pitch. He stopped it when he got on base. He was wonderful to watch, except when you knew he was beating your ass."

Manager Tony La Russa had Henderson in his dugout across seven seasons -- but also saw from across the diamond.

"I managed my first 10 years against Rickey, and managing against Rickey was terrorizing. You care about winning the game, as we all do, you were so nervous in a close game, a one-run game, up one, down one, tie game, and in my lifetime, the most dangerous player of our time was Rickey Henderson. He had this miniscule strike zone. If you threw it in there, he'd hit it. If you didn't throw it in there, he'd walk, and it was a triple. He would walk, steal second and third and score on a weak ground ball. We called them Rickey Runs."

Cameron had always been a base stealer in his rise to the majors and felt he understood the art, but Henderson gave him a more enhanced view. With a right-hander on the mound, Cameron had been taught to look for the collapsing right leg as the first move. Henderson narrowed that focus: the back heel. With left-handers, watch the left shoulders.

Raúl Ibañez recalled how Henderson seemed to have the tell on every pitcher's pickoff -- some bit of body language that betrayed whether the pitcher was going to throw the ball to the plate, or to first base. And if a pitcher appeared whom Henderson had never seen before, he would go to the end of the first base dugout and watch until he found the tell.

If Henderson played in this era, former manager Buck Showalter said, "with the rules we have now, he would steal 200 bases. ... There was a science to what he was doing, he knew exactly how many steps it took to reach second base. And you never knew when he was going. Runners always have a slight bend to the knee right before they were going. Rickey's knee never buckled. He's the only one I've ever seen who was like that."

La Russa noted, "They did everything they could to not let him beat them. He was a marked man. All the different strategies to beat him -- waiting him out, slowing him down on the bases -- he defeated all of them. People tried to intimidate him. My favorite phrase is the one I used years ago: 'You can't scare him. You can't stop him.'"

How he saw the game -- on and off the field

Henderson's stance at the plate was unique, a low crouch that turned his theoretical strike zone into the size of a QR code. "I just remember how difficult it was to make a tough pitch to him with his small strike zone," All-Star pitcher Roger Clemens said.

Cameron once asked him how he could hit so well from that stance. "That's how Rickey see the game," Henderson replied. "I see the game small."

Everything Henderson did on the field came with his own trademark style. When he thought he hit a home run, he'd pull the top of his jersey -- pop it. He ran low to the ground, moving with peak efficiency, and slid headfirst, like a jet landing on the deck of an aircraft carrier. He'd catch routine fly balls swiping his glove like a windshield wiper.

And the panache carried off the diamond, too. Cameron recalled how Henderson always walked into the clubhouse beautifully attired. Dress slacks, silk dress shirt tucked in. When Cameron and teammates went to Henderson's room to play cards or dominoes, he would greet them at the door wearing the hotel robe and slippers.

"He had his flair," La Russa said, talking about the time he managed against him. "It didn't bother me as long as it was normal and natural. What bothered me is when he would get on first, steal second and third, and score on a ground ball. That's what bothered me.

"His schooling was limited," La Russa continued. "He did not have a classic education. He talked in the third person. People did not understand. Rickey's IQ is not just a baseball IQ. Rickey is a very intelligent guy. If you're around him, you realize how smart he is."

Henderson didn't talk a lot during games. "He might've talked to the umpires more than [to] anyone else," Mariners teammate Alex Rodriguez noted. And his interaction with the umpires was more of a monologue, as longtime umpire Dale Scott remembered. If Henderson disagreed with a strike call, he was apt to say: "Rickey don't like that pitch." Then he would move on and concentrate on the next pitch.

Henderson was ejected 11 times over his long career, and nine of those were about disagreements over the strike zone, but he was not a serial whiner, Scott said he thought. "He never went goofy on me," Scott said. Whether he was at the plate or on the bases, he talked to himself -- maybe to push himself, maybe to heighten his focus. A pitch could be thrown outside and Henderson might say out loud, 'Rickey's not swinging at that.'"

He was a challenging player to umpire, Scott recalled, because of his speed, his acute understanding of the strike zone and the way he crouched in his stance. Bill Miller, who was in his early days as an umpire as Henderson's career neared its end, guesstimated that Henderson probably had more high strikes called on him than anyone because of his setup at the plate. When Scott worked the bases, he knew every infield ground ball hit off Henderson's bat carried the potential of a bang-bang play at first, and every time he reached base, there were bound to be pickoffs or close safe/out calls on attempted steals, with Henderson crashing into bases to beat throws.

'Fueling the machine'

Those around Henderson were awed by his incredible physical condition and the methods he used to stay in shape.

Tim Kurkjian once asked him how he got so strong. "You must lift weights all the time," Kurkjian said.

"Never lifted a weight in my life," Henderson said. "Pushups and sit-ups. That's all."

Cameron backed this up: "I never saw him lifting weights. The prison workout: Pushups and sit-ups. And a hand grip."

Showalter said, "I was driving home from a spring training game and I saw Rickey leaving a vegetable stand with three bags of vegetables in his arms," Showalter said. "He took immaculate care of his body, I don't think he ever drank. He didn't eat at McDonald's; he went to a vegetable stand. He was fueling the machine."

"He was a very physical runner and slider," Showalter said. "He had different gears. He was like an airplane coming for a landing, leaning forward while accelerating. The end of the runway was the bag. I never saw him slide off the bag. He took a beating with all the sliding he did. Guys tried to pound him on tags. They'd block the base. He'd just smile at them as if to say, 'You can't hurt me.'"

In A.J. Hinch's rookie season, 1998, he wore No. 23 and Henderson wore 24, so they lockered next to each other. At the All-Star break, they happened to be on the same flight to Phoenix. "I hear him call out with his raspy voice and his cackle for a laugh," he recalled. "I sit in the aisle seat in the exit row and Rickey is in the window seat. We land in Phoenix, and as we get off, Rickey asked me where I was going. I told him my girlfriend is at baggage claim, to pick me up. He said, 'No, why are you walking? Rickey doesn't walk. Rickey needs to save his legs.'

"So we were there for five minutes. Ten minutes. Twenty minutes. Almost half an hour, and then a courtesy cart came to get us at the gate. He wouldn't let me leave so he could save his legs. That was his way of teaching me to be a big leaguer."

La Russa said, "It is remarkable how often he stayed off the disabled list with the pounding he took. What I learned is that when Rickey said he couldn't go, he couldn't go. When he could feel that his legs were getting tight, they were vulnerable, he would take a day off. It wasn't that he didn't want to play, he knew his legs and body well enough that it was smarter to give them a day for sure. I learned to appreciate that."

Cameron once asked him how he could slide headfirst throughout his career without getting overwhelmed by the pounding, and Henderson held up his hands. His fingers pointed in different directions "and looked like spiderwebs," Cameron said. "I don't know how he hit so well, with his hands beaten up like that."

There was a game in that 2000 season when Henderson's back was sore, Rodriguez recalled, and the Mariners played into the bottom of the 13^th, with Henderson due to hit leadoff. "He would go an entire game and not say a word to anybody," Rodriguez remembered. "The top of the 13^th ends, and I'm hustling to the dugout to get ready to hit, and Rickey waves me down."

As Rodriguez related the memory, he moved into an imitation of Henderson's distinctive voice, as so many of his teammates and friends do. "Hey, hey, Rod," Henderson said to Rodriguez, mixing in his trademark third-person usage of his own name. "Listen -- Rickey's back hurts. I'm going to walk, and I already talked to [David Bell] -- he's going to move me over. Make sure you get me in. Rickey don't get paid for overtime."

Facing a young Roy Halladay, Henderson singled. When Bell dropped a bunt, Henderson beat the throw to second. Rodriguez singled to load the bases, and then Edgar Martinez ended the game with another single. "Now that's what I'm talking about!" Henderson said happily, as the Mariners celebrated. "Now let's go get in the hot tub."

Henderson, the teammate

When Henderson was traded from the New York Yankees back to the Oakland A's in 1989, Henderson "was very conscious of the perception that he was not a great teammate -- an 'I/Me' guy," La Russa recalled. "He was very sensitive to the perception that he was egotistical. He was expressive to the point that he was all about the team. That perception was totally shot. When he came to our team, he made a great team the greatest team ever. We divided the pressure around here.

"Talk to anyone he played with, and he played with a lot of teams, there wasn't a superstar part of his attitude in the clubhouse, the dugout, the planes, on the buses, He was beloved. When you hear noise in the clubhouse, it was Rickey laughing, he was always in the middle of everything. That truth is not always recognized by fans. Before he played for us, I had no idea he was that way. You see all the flair. But he never played the superstar card with his teammates."

Henderson was traded to the Toronto Blue Jays in 1993, joining, among others, Paul Molitor. "There are guys, when you play against them, that you don't care for them, their act or their gait," said Molitor. "When Rickey came to Toronto, I changed 180 [degrees] with him. We had a pretty good team when he got there, but I found that he loved to be a part of a team, he loved to win. He made no waves whatsoever."

Ibanez idolized Henderson while he grew up, mimicking the way Henderson caught and threw as one of the very few major-leaguers who batted right-handed but threw left-handed, and during the 2000 season, Ibanez played with him. "One of my favorite teammates I've ever had," Ibanez said. "Hilarious. Thoughtful."

Ibanez often watched Henderson in batting practice, working through his swing among teammates like Edgar Martinez, making adjustments, sometimes talking to himself. "Rickey is trying to hit like Edgar," Henderson once said. "Rickey can't hit like that."

Henderson's pronunciation of Ibanez's first name always included an emphasis on the 'h' sound in the middle -- Rah-houl -- and Ibanez remembers him being open with advice, and instilling confidence from his own bottomless well of it. "Once you get the opportunity," Henderson rasped to Ibanez, "you're going to hit, Rah-houl."

Young players loved Henderson, recalled Bruce Bochy, who once managed Henderson when he played with the San Diego Padres: "Rickey would play cards and dominoes with them before games, and on the plane." When the Padres acquired All-Star slugger Greg Vaughn before the 1997 season, and in those days before the National League adopted the DH, Bochy was concerned about how Henderson would handle the situation -- two very accomplished left fielders. "I bring Rickey into my office to tell him about the box I'm in," Bochy remembered. "He looked at me with understanding and said, 'That's OK. All Rickey ask is that you let him know when he's playing the night before."

Problem solved.

Henderson's communication with Piniella was a little different. Among his players, Piniella was known as a hard-ass, to the degree that Cameron's instinct to run on the bases was curtailed to preempt a possible chewing out from his manager. When Henderson arrived, Cameron recalled, it was his presence that loosened Piniella, the two of them jabbing verbally at each other while those around them laughed. At one point during the season, Piniella gave Henderson a couple of days off, and Henderson lobbied for a return to the lineup. "Hey, Sweet," he called out to Piniella in the dugout, using Piniella's nickname. "Rickey don't know about two days off. Rickey's legs are good."

"They should be good," Piniella retorted with some friendly sarcasm. "You couldn't move before." Henderson "was the only one," said Cameron, "who could talk s--- to Lou."

It wasn't always clear to some of Henderson's teammates if he actually knew their names. Hinch played with Henderson in Oakland, and later in Hinch's career, when he was with the Kansas City Royals and Henderson was with the Boston Red Sox, some of Hinch's teammates doubted Henderson would remember him. "So here we are at Fenway Park about to go out for pregame stretching telling Rickey stories," Hinch wrote in a text response, "when Roberto Hernandez" -- the Royals' closer -- said there's no way Rickey knows my name."

"I tried to convince him and the others that my locker was next to his. I had scored a lot for him as the nine-hole hitter and him leading off. I had flown with him. I had worked out in the offseason with him at the complex. Yet they were not convinced. Roberto put his money where his mouth was and told me he had $1,000 if Rickey referred to me by name when we went out there. I asked if it counted if he used any initial -- JP, DJ, PJ, AJ, any of them. Roberto said, 'Nope, has to be A.J.'"

"We head out and I go directly to left field and give Rickey the bro hug in front of Roberto and he says, 'A.J., my man, how are you?' HE NAILED IT. When I got back to my locker, I had 10 $100 bills in my chair."

He might not have talked much with teammates during games, but he was talking constantly -- in the direction of fans, to himself. Playing center field, Cameron could hear Henderson at his position, just talking out loud: Hey, hey, hey! Baby!

Henderson was a leadoff hitter through his career, but Cameron would see him in the clubhouse only minutes before a game, finishing a game of spades, or pluck. "Never in a hurry," Cameron remembered. And then he would start to stretch. Cameron, batting second, once called out to his friend from the on-deck circle as the home plate umpire began to look for the first batter: "Hey, Rick, they are ready for you!"

Henderson responded smoothly, "The game don't start until Rickey goes to the plate."

Henderson's place in history

During Henderson's chase for Lou Brock's record for career stolen bases, the two became friends. "Close friends," Brock said. "I really liked Rickey. I loved how much he cared about the game, about winning."

When Henderson broke Brock's record, he famously pulled third base out of the ground, held it toward the sky and proclaimed, while being interviewed on the public address system at the Oakland Coliseum, "Today, I am the greatest of all time!"

That was not the plan.

"Together, Rickey and I wrote a speech that Rickey was supposed to read after breaking the record," Brock told Tim Kurkjian 20 years ago. "He said he would carry it in his uniform pocket, and have it ready for when he broke the record. When he broke the record, he got caught up in the emotion, and just said what he said."

Brock, who was not angry or upset, called Henderson after the game.

"Rickey, the speech?" Brock asked. "What happened to the speech we wrote?"

Henderson said, "Sorry, Lou, I forgot."

This was on May 6, 1991. Henderson's career continued for another dozen seasons.

According to stats guru Craig Wright, Henderson drew 2,129 unintentional walks, the most in history. An amazing 796 times, he drew a walk to lead off an inning, almost 200 more than any other player. There are 152 players in the Hall of Fame elected as position players who played in at least 1,500 major league games. Sixty-eight of them (45%) drew fewer intentional walks in their careers than Henderson did just leading off an inning. "And one of them," said Molitor, "was in the bottom of the ninth in Game 6 in '93."

In that Game 6 of the World Series, Henderson and the Blue Jays trailed the Philadelphia Phillies 6-5. Henderson walked. Paul Molitor singled. Joe Carter hit a walk-off three-run homer.

Late in the 2001 season, Henderson closed in on Ty Cobb's record for runs scored, and Padres teammate Phil Nevin wanted to be the guy who drove him in. Nevin missed opportunities, and in the first inning of the Padres' game on Oct. 4, 2001, Henderson flied out. Nevin -- the Padres' cleanup hitter -- told Henderson he should get himself on base the next time and he would drive him in.

"You missed your chance yesterday," Henderson responded. "Rickey is going to drive Rickey in, and I'm going to slide across home plate."

In the bottom of the third inning, Henderson pulled a ball that hit off the top of the left-field fence and caromed over the wall, a home run -- the 290^th of the 297 Henderson hit in his career. With teammates gathered at home plate to greet him, Henderson slid into home plate, feet first.

"He was so misunderstood because of the speech he made after breaking Brock's record, when he said, 'I am the greatest,'" Nevin said. "People thought he was a selfish guy, who couldn't remember anybody's name. But he was a great teammate."

Said La Russa: "With Rickey ... there's no doubt you can get to that greatest list of all time, with Willie [Mays] and Hank [Aaron], and Rickey is right in the middle of it. He is right on that club. That's his greatness. He compares to all of them, Babe Ruth, all of them."

Said Valentine: "He's the best player I've ever seen. Up close and personal, in the late '80s, my goodness, how could anyone be better? I don't know how anyone could be better."

Henderson played his last major league game on Sept. 19, 2003, and was voted into the Hall of Fame in 2009. Twenty-eight writers did not vote for Henderson.

Myth and legend

The stories about Henderson were voluminous, with some of them seeming improbable, incredible. Henderson made an appearance on ESPN's morning radio show "Mike and Mike" and was asked about the veracity of a handful of the legendary anecdotes -- a game of true or false.

Was it true, Henderson was asked, that he once called Padres GM Kevin Towers and said, "This is Rickey calling on behalf of Rickey, and Rickey wants to play baseball"?

Henderson's grinned and replied, "False. I like that."

When Henderson checked into a hotel, was it true that he sometimes checked in under the pseudonym of Richard Pryor? "Yes," he confirmed. "[Also] James Brown, Luther Vandross."

In the early 1980s, the A's accounting department was freaking out because their books were off by $1 million -- and as the famous story goes, Henderson had taken a $1 million bonus check and framed it without cashing it, and hung it on the wall in his house. Was this accurate? "That's true," Henderson said, laughing.

There was a story that Henderson fell asleep on an ice pack in the middle of August, got frostbite, and missed three games. "Yes, that was with Toronto," Henderson said. "I was icing my ankle."

His final days

Last year, in La Russa's last serious conversation with Henderson, the player asked his former manager: "What record did I obtain that you never thought was possible?" La Russa replied, "'3,000 hits.' I didn't think, with all his walks, that he would get to 3,000 hits. You don't want to walk him. But if you throw a strike, he hits it on the barrel for a single, double, triple or home runs."

Last year, Cameron and Nevin attended games in those last days of the Oakland Coliseum. When Nevin bumped into him, Henderson greeted him warmly -- "Hiya, Phil!" -- and talked about how much he enjoyed getting to know Nevin's son, Tyler, who played 87 games with the A's last season. Henderson, Nevin recalled, "still looked like he could put a uniform on."

Late in the season, Brent Rooker, Oakland's All-Star slugger, approached Henderson in the clubhouse, where he was playing cards, and told him he had heard an interview with a longtime writer who opined about the best player he had ever covered. "Who was it?" Henderson asked.

"It was you," Rooker said.

Henderson replied, "Well, who else would it have been?" And for Rooker, it was an affirmation that Henderson's swagger, his confidence, was indomitable. "He carried that same aura about him all the time," Rooker recalled, "and he was a blast to be around."

In early December, longtime Padres hitting coach Merv Rettenmund died, and some of Rettenmund's friends and former players scheduled a gathering in San Diego. The expectation was that Henderson would attend. But just before the event, Henderson spoke to a former teammate and mentioned that he had been fighting a cold and hadn't been feeling well. "I haven't had a cold in 15 years," Henderson said.

Soon thereafter, Henderson was gone.

"I never saw him have a bad day on a baseball field," Cameron said. "To get a chance to play with someone of that nature.

"The joy. It was crazy. It was special."

Jacob Fearnley beat former world number four Kei Nishikori 6-3 6-3 on his Davis Cup debut to level Great Britain's first-round tie with Japan.

The 23-year-old, who beat Nick Kyrgios in the Australian Open earlier this month, has risen to 77 in the world rankings from 646 over the past 12 months.

The British number three continued his rise against Nishikori to level the qualifier at 1-1, following Yoshihito Nishioka's 7-5 6-1 victory against Billy Harris in Miki.

The tie will be decided on Saturday, when Fearnley takes on Nishioka and Nishikori faces Harris in a reverse of Friday's singles matches.

British duo Neal Skupski and Joe Salisbury play Yosuke Watanuki and Takeru Yuzuki in the doubles.

British number one Jack Draper pulled out of the tie in order to continue his rehabilitation from a hip injury.

Cameron Norrie, the British number two, withdrew with illness and his replacement, Jan Choinski, also pulled out.

Former winger Chris Ashton believes England will see Sam Prendergast's inexperience as an "opportunity" in Saturday's Six Nations opener.

The 21-year-old Leinster fly-half will be making his championship debut having won his three previous caps in November.

After the retirement of Johnny Sexton following the 2023 World Cup, Munster's Jack Crowley wore the number 10 jersey for every minute of last year's Six Nations.

The 25-year-old started against the All Blacks and Argentina in the autumn but has since had to make do with a role as a replacement.

"The inexperience of Sam might be an opportunity," said Ashton on BBC's Rugby Union Weekly.

"You're so used to having someone there for Ireland who is so experienced.

"We're going back 20 years, [Ronan] O'Gara, Sexton, you're so used to having someone there who is experienced and can lead a team.

"Sam is 21-years-old, so if you're looking for a chink somewhere, a target for your team, you're going to go for the fly-half, aren't you?"

While predicting Ireland's fly-half debate will be a "close contest for years to come", Ashton likens Prendergast's style to that of Sexton, who has been in the side's camp in a mentoring role.

"The way he looks, the way he plays, is so similar to Johnny Sexton," he added.

"The way he operates, those wraparound passes, there's so many similarities there."