Premier League referee David Coote has been suspended pending a full investigation after a video was circulated on social media that appeared to show him making disparaging remarks about Liverpool and their former manager Jürgen Klopp.

Two clips were posted on an account on X in which Coote is apparently sat on a sofa next to an unidentified male, who asks questions about Liverpool and Klopp.

If the video is verified as being genuine, Coote -- who was the referee for Liverpool's 2-0 win at home to Aston Villa on Saturday -- would appear to have no future as a top-flight referee. There will be no further update from PGMOL, the refereeing body for English football, until the investigation has been completed, but Coote will be unavailable for selection as a referee or a VAR during this time.

Coote, 42, has been a Premier League referee since 2018 and took charge of the 2024 Carabao Cup final between Manchester United and Newcastle. He was a FIFA-listed official between 2020 and 2022.

While not on a UEFA list as a referee, he has, alongside Stuart Attwell, been a lead VAR and was appointed to Euro 2024.

It is unclear when the video was filmed, but there is reference to Coote being the fourth official on a Liverpool game earlier in the day and COVID social distancing.

When asked about Liverpool's performance in the game, Coote replies "Liverpool were s---."

The referee is then asked about Klopp, to which he responds: "C---, absolute c---."

Asked why he has this opinion, Coote adds: "Aside from having a right pop at me when I was reffed them against Burnley in lockdown, then he accused me of lying and then just had a right f---ing pop at me. And I've got no interest in speaking to somebody as f---ing arrogant. So I do my best not to speak to him. [James] Milner's all right."

Coote officiated a 1-1 draw for Liverpool at home to Burnley in July 2020

What suggests the video was filmed during lockdown is that Coote then shows a picture of him in a mask on the touchline at a Liverpool game, and says: "You can see me there with [a] mask on. COVID, gotta be done. Social distancing, right? We're 10 metres apart."

Coote then adds in another apparent reference to Klopp: "But, oh my god. German c---. F--- me."

The individual sat alongside Coote then said: "Long story short, Jürgen Klopp's a c---, Liverpool are all f---ing bellends, and we hate Scousers."

The second, shorter video sees Coote say: "Just to be clear, that f---ing last video can't go anywhere, seriously."

The other person then responds: "He's a Premier League referee, let's not f---ing ruin his career. Let's face it, we're good blokes but we can't ruin a bloke's career, we're not that bad. Also he's a f---ing legend. So let's not ruin his career."

ARLINGTON, Texas -- After Sunday's loss dropped the Dallas Cowboys to 3-6, pass rusher Micah Parsons was asked what he would tell people wondering whether Mike McCarthy would be the head coach in 2025.

"That's above my pay grade, if Mike's coach again next year," Parsons said. "All coaching aside, Mike can leave and go where he wants to. Guys I kind of feel bad for is guys like Zack Martin and guys who might be on their last year, on their way out, because that's who I wanted to hold the trophy for.

"You want to win games and do great things with those type of legends who put in more time and work than Mike McCarthy ever did. So those are the kind of guys that I have so much sympathy and hurt for."

Martin, 33, is the longest-tenured Cowboy, a first-round pick in 2014 and a nine-time Pro Bowler. He is tied for the most first-team All-Pro selections in franchise history with seven with Hall of Famers Bob Lilly and Randy White.

He is in the final year of his contract and battled through ankle and shoulder injuries for most of the season.

McCarthy is in his 18th year as an NFL head coach, has 170 regular-season wins and a Super Bowl victory to his credit. He helped the Cowboys to three straight 12-5 seasons in 2021-23 but could not advance past the divisional round.

Like Martin, McCarthy is in the final year of his contract.

Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones reiterated a point after the 34-6 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles that he has made before: "I don't believe we'll make a coaching change during the season."

The Cowboys are not out of the playoff hunt, but they likely will not have Dak Prescott for the rest of the season. He is traveling to New York on Monday to see a specialist about the partial avulsion of his right hamstring. Surgery is expected to take place Wednesday.

Jones said he would take into consideration all of the factors of what has gone wrong this season, including the number of injuries. Parsons returned to the lineup against the Eagles after missing four games with a high left ankle sprain.

"My criteria has always been, 'How we're playing. Do we have an edge? Are we fundamentally competitive? Are we competitive when we're down?' Those kinds of things," Jones said. "Not as much obviously, the score. What does Bill [Parcells] say? You are what the score tells you you are? But still you look at all of those things and there's no fairness.

"Let me be real clear. Nobody's trying to be fair here. We're trying to win a game. And so those are the things I'm looking at to help be a part of decisions that could help us win a game. There's no joy here without winning games, and I'm very regretful to our fans. Very."

Not only is McCarthy on the final year of his deal, so is the entire coaching staff.

"There's a lot of options," Jones said when asked about other options for change. "Whether or not they change the equation for the positive, that's the issue. And so there's a lot of things you can do differently, but that wouldn't necessarily bring a positive result."

Detroit Pistons guard/forward Ausar Thompson has been cleared to play by the NBA's fitness panel, sources told ESPN.

Thompson, the No. 5 pick in the 2023 NBA draft, has been sidelined since March by a blood clot issue and will now begin ramping up, participating in full-contact practices for the first time in eight months and preparing to make his season debut in the near future.

Both Thompson and Los Angeles Lakers 7-footer Christian Koloko dealt with blood clots and received clearances from the league's fitness-to-play panel.

Thompson averaged 8.8 points, 6.4 rebounds, 1.9 assists and nearly one block per game in 63 contests as a rookie for the Pistons last season. He was one of three rookies with 50 steals and 50 blocks in 2023-24, along with San Antonio's Victor Wembanyama and Oklahoma City's Chet Holmgren.

He became one of four rookies in Pistons history to record 50 blocks and 50 steals, joining Andre Drummond, Grant Hill and Terry Tyler.

The Pistons are off to a 4-7 start to the season under the new leadership of president of basketball operations Trajan Langdon and coach J.B. Bickerstaff. A year ago, it took the Pistons until Jan. 15 to reach four wins en route to a 14-68 record.

IN THE FOURTH row of bleachers inside a gymnasium on the UNLV campus, Duke men's basketball officials -- including coach Jon Scheyer -- are struggling to contain their excitement.

In the row just ahead of them, Kelly and Ralph Flagg look on in awe as their 17-year-old son Cooper is dominating a scrimmage against the best basketball players in the world.

It's July 8, and the 6-foot-9 Flagg is playing for the USA Select Team, a squad of mostly NBA players who, in the spirit of tradition, serve as a training camp appetizer for Team USA before the Olympics. But Flagg is not an NBA player. He is the first collegiate player in a decade to join the Select Team, but he isn't a collegiate player either -- not yet anyway.

Flagg is four months removed from leading the Florida-based Montverde Academy boys' basketball team to its eighth national championship, and he is four months away from his debut at Duke University. In this interregnum, Flagg is five years younger than Team USA's youngest player, Minnesota star guard Anthony Edwards, and he is four years younger than LeBron James' NBA career (21). And he is playing against them both, along with Stephen Curry, Anthony Davis and a who's who of NBA stars who, a month later, will claim a gold medal at the Paris Olympics.

For now, Team USA is caught in the fourth quarter of a neck-and-neck scrimmage against the Select Team, led by Flagg, who, quite simply, is putting on a show. He drills a corner 3 against a closing Davis, who hangs his head in frustration. He sinks a turnaround jumper over Boston's Jrue Holiday, one of the game's best defenders. He crosses over Davis and swishes a side-step 3-pointer from the right wing, igniting a sequence that's about to burn lava-hot across social media.

After the swish, Team USA turns the ball over, and Flagg finds a teammate for an open 3-pointer. As the shot goes up, Flagg anticipates the miss, sprints toward the rim, leaps and finishes the midair putback while being fouled by Bam Adebayo, giving his team a 69-68 lead with two minutes left. He has 6 points in 20 seconds.

On the sideline, his Select teammates erupt from their seats. Around the gym, media, NBA officials and Team USA officials collectively turn to the person next to them to reaffirm that what they're seeing isn't a mirage.

Team USA holds on to win by one, and Flagg finishes with 17 points on 6-of-10 shooting, including 2-of-3 from 3-point range, plus 2 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals and 1 turnover. James taps Flagg on the butt while a medical official tends to a Z-shaped gash in Flagg's right arm. "He looks like a hell of a player," Suns star Kevin Durant, who missed the scrimmage because of a calf injury, said afterward. "He's 17 years old coming in here playing like a [veteran] almost. No emotion. Just going out there and doing his job. That's a good sign."

Team USA officials grow even more excited about the prospect of Flagg being a foundational piece of their future. "He checks so many boxes, it's scary," Sean Ford, the USA men's national team director, told ESPN.

Flagg is projected as the No. 1 pick in the 2025 draft, but one Western Conference scout told ESPN, "He would have been the first pick in the 2024 draft as well."

After the scrimmage, Flagg is mobbed by reporters. He says it's an honor to play against Team USA. He calls them incredible talents.

"They were just playing good team basketball, playing the right way, moving the ball and just picking their spots," Flagg says, a simple quote that, in reality, serves as a window into ideals that are marrow-deep for him.

Before the scrimmage, Kelly, Ralph and Matt MacKenzie, Flagg's trainer, weren't sure how Flagg would play. They did know he had long excelled against players far older. As a third grader, he faced sixth graders. As a sixth grader, he faced former college players. As an eighth grader, he faced current college players. He received his first college scholarship offer before entering high school. He dominated across Maine, then New England, then along the East Coast, then nationally, then even for the USA junior national team in Spain. But as word spread, it was often met with skepticism. Only one Maine-born player had ever been drafted into the NBA -- and that was in 1984. A white American player hasn't been drafted first overall since Kent Benson in 1977.

The superlative ways in which Flagg's game is described, even by him and those closest to him, matches a long-held trope of white NBA players -- that he "plays the right way," "makes the right play," "plays the team game." In conversations with people across the basketball landscape, including with talent evaluators at the highest level of the game, it's clear Flagg's game transcends those characterizations.

Still, disbelief over his rise has followed Cooper Flagg, about his age, his race, the small town where he's from. At every stop, from private trainers, to legendary coaches, to scrimmages, to national tournaments, he has faced test after test against older players, bigger players -- all designed to define a ceiling, a future, whether he belonged. For the past decade he has passed them all, consistently turning skepticism into awe -- fueled by lessons from one of the greatest NBA teams of all time.

"There's disbelief about him because he's just that good," one Western Conference executive said.

Back in Las Vegas, as Kelly, Ralph and Mackenzie leave UNLV, with Flagg trending nationally across social media, they know something has changed: that there has been a collective realization about how good their son really is. "We have lived by the philosophy that if you're the best player in the gym, you got to find a new gym," Kelly Flagg told ESPN.

Then, they laugh. For as surreal as it all seems, it also feels normal.

"It's been this way," Kelly said, "his entire life."

ON A LATE October morning, Earl Anderson idles in his pickup truck outside a two-story home in Newport, Maine. Autumn has painted the lawn with a coat of sunset-colored leaves that shimmer from an overnight rain. The home is a light brown, wood-framed farmhouse, with a two-car garage and a curving, paved driveway, where a metal pole rises from the earth on one side. Atop the stand, for years, stood a backboard and a rim, but they are gone. "I wonder what happened to them," Anderson says. He shrugs.

This, he says, is where Flagg grew up.

Then Anderson drives the 3.1 miles up a thoroughfare known as "Moosehead Trail" toward Nokomis Regional High School, where he coached Flagg his freshman season. Students fill the hallway as Anderson enters the gymnasium. On a far wall, a state championship banner from that season is displayed; not far from it, another banner honors Flagg being named the Maine Gatorade Player of the Year. In a trophy case outside, the Gold Ball that the team won shimmers under the light, next to the game ball from the title-clinching game.

"I had never seen anyone like that," Anderson said, "including in college basketball. And he was only 15."

It's high praise from Anderson, who has coached basketball in Maine for more than four decades, and it's more remarkable still, he said, when considering Flagg and his family are from a town with a population of about 3,200, about 25 miles west of Bangor along I-95, the key ribbon of interstate bisecting the state.

Newport is small enough that Kelly likes to joke that you could blink and miss it. "It's a place for people who are on their way to somewhere else," Anderson said.

In a house 3 miles away from the one where she would one day raise Flagg, Kelly fell in love with the game. She was 7, and shot on a backyard basket affixed to a shed by her father, Dan Bowman, who rebounded for her; they played so often that the backyard grass faded into dirt, and he'd park a car nearby and turn on the headlights so they could play into the night. Dan was a multisport athlete who played baseball, soccer and was a 6-foot-3 sharpshooter in basketball.

And when he wanted to instill deeper lessons about the game, he turned to the Boston Celtics.

Dan grew up a die-hard, and the family spent Sundays in the 1980s crowded around the living room box-set television, turning down the volume and turning up the radio so they could hear Celtics broadcaster Johnny Most narrate the action. "Those are my first memories," Kelly said. A life-size poster of Larry Bird hung in the family kitchen. She developed an up-and-under move like Kevin McHale.

And the 1985-86 team: five future Hall of Famers in Bird, McHale, Robert Parish, reserve Bill Walton (the NBA Sixth Man of the Year that season) and head coach K.C. Jones, who had won eight titles with the team as a guard during Bill Russell's heydey.

Those Celtics finished 50-1 at home -- 10-0 during the playoffs and an NBA-record 40-1 during the regular season. They posted a 67-15 record and crushed Houston for the Celtics' 16th NBA title. They were 19-2 against teams with 50 or more wins and had a 20.3 average scoring margin in series-clinching games. Bird won his third straight MVP and second Finals MVP.

Kelly was spellbound. They led the NBA in rebounding and 3-point field-goal percentage and ranked second in field goal percentage and assists. YouTube clips are devoted to their passing prowess -- the ball rarely hitting the floor, players constantly giving up good shots for great shots.

"That was the most pure form of the game in my mind," Kelly said. And it framed her worldview about how to play it. Like her father, she attended Nokomis, where she became one of the state's best players. She then starred at the University of Maine, which upset Stanford in the 1999 NCAA tournament during her senior season.

After college, the 5-foot-10 Kelly walked into a block-shaped armory built in 1941 and spotted Ralph Flagg, who was a few years older, 6-9 and, Kelly thought, rather cute. He, too, had attended Nokomis before going on to play at Eastern Maine Community College.

Soon after, they started dating. When they played against each other, he couldn't stop her up-and-under move. "She was pretty deadly with that," Ralph said. "And a fierce competitor."

As a wedding present, they received a flowering crabapple tree, and they planted it right next to the driveway, where they soon erected a basketball hoop. They started a family -- all boys, first Hunter, then twins, Ace and Cooper.

Kelly coached the Nokomis varsity girls team, and her boys grew up in the gym. At 5 years old, Flagg and Ace -- each about a foot taller than other boys their age -- executed basketball drills. When Flagg was in second grade, Kelly and Ralph petitioned for Flagg to play on a recreation team in Newport, and he joined, soon playing against third and fourth graders. In his first game, Kelly recalled, Flagg scored more than 20 points and grabbed more than 15 rebounds. He soon started playing against fifth and sixth graders.

In third grade, just before Christmas, Kelly and Ralph bought DVDs of the 1985-86 Celtics. Flagg would lie on the living room floor in front of the TV and watch the games on a loop, one full game after another. They later saw him looking up YouTube highlights, and they bought more DVDs -- on Larry Bird, on Bird versus Magic Johnson. "Did we want that to influence the way my kids learned the game and saw the game?" Kelly asked. "Absolutely." Kelly and Ralph would point out how Bird was the star and could score whenever he wanted, but look how he dove for loose balls, set concrete screens, found open teammates.

Flagg would nod along, playing the DVDs one after another, hour after hour.

SOME SEVEN YEARS ago, Andy Bedard stepped inside the YMCA gym in New Gloucester, Maine. Bedard was Maine basketball royalty, leading his high school to a state title, then playing at Boston College and the University of Maine. He knew Kelly, and she had told him Flagg was developing fast.

Bedard, who was putting together a traveling team in Portland, Maine, decided to see for himself.

Inside the gym, Bedard was struck by how advanced the 10-year-old Flagg seemed -- how he could put spin on the ball when executing a layup so it bounced off the backboard just so, or how he'd add some spin on a bounce pass to slow the ball down so a teammate could catch up. There were little nuances that seemed advanced for a fourth grader.

By then, Flagg was playing all the time.

He'd ask his mom to unlock a nearby gym for him. In the winters, Ralph snowblowed the driveway or Flagg shoveled it himself. Kelly and Ralph watched from a window as Hunter, Flagg and Ace played, giving it 30 minutes -- tops -- before one of them punted the ball and charged into the house, slamming the door, furious. "Someone was always bleeding," Kelly said.

Flagg and his mom played one-on-one in the driveway, and she dominated. "She never let him win," said Camryn King, a childhood friend. As Flagg grew older, she struggled to beat him. "The last time we played was fifth grade," Flagg said, "and it was the first time I was up -- 7-6 -- and then she tore a meniscus in the driveway, so then we never got to play again."

Kelly is proud that she still boasts an undefeated record against her son, but she could see the same fire burning within him. "He gets that from me," she said.

Bedard started coaching Flagg, and, soon, they were playing teams across New England. Bedard coached, Kelly served as an assistant coach, and they both agreed on their philosophy: They would preach team basketball. "The backbone of who we were, our identity and how we played, came from that," Bedard said.

Soon, Ralph and Kelly were driving their boys an hour-and-a-half to Portland, Maine, for practices several days a week. Flagg would lie down in the backseat, his face cupped in his hands, watching those Celtics DVDs.

"That was our go-to watch the entire drive," Ace said.

By sixth grade, Kelly, believing Flagg needed more advanced training, reached out to Matt MacKenzie, a former wing at Husson University in Bangor who had become a private trainer. At his Bangor half-court gym, MacKenzie began working with Flagg three times a week, showing him footwork drills, how to play through contact, how to play between the mid-post to the 3-point line. But MacKenzie soon realized Flagg already knew most of those concepts. "He was much further along than high school players, even college players," MacKenzie said.

He was 11 years old.

FLAGG WAS RETURNING to the gym night after night to shoot 500 additional shots. MacKenzie knew another test was needed.

So he reached out to a friend, Ja'Shonté Wright-McLeish, a 6-4 sophomore guard at the University of Maine.

MacKenzie told him he had a young player -- a 6-foot-6 eighth grader -- whom he wanted him to play. Wright-McLeish was skeptical, but he figured he'd help MacKenzie as a favor. MacKenzie provided a directive: Don't take it easy on the kid. Go hard. Be physical. Bully him.

In their first game, Wright-McLeish did just that. He stripped the ball. He blocked Flagg's shot. He initiated contact. "I played a little dirty," Wright-McLeish told ESPN. Flagg departed the Bangor gym, fuming. "He came back a couple days later," MacKenzie said, "and he looked at me and he goes, 'That's never going to happen again.'"

Flagg and Wright-McLeish faced off again -- and it wasn't close.

"He was very mature and willing to learn," Wright McLeish said of his first impression of Flagg. "Also, that for his age, he has the size and length to be a problem wherever he goes in the future."

Soon after, in the fall before Flagg began his freshman year of high school, MacKenzie called a former NBA player he knew, Brian Scalabrine, a 6-9 forward who played 11 seasons in the league and won a 2008 title with the Celtics.

They talked regularly about young players in the area. Scalabrine had begun coaching his own kids and was tied into the hoops scene in Boston. There, Scalabrine ran an intense pickup game, featuring local AAU players and others who were about to join the college ranks. It was a "nasty" environment, Scalabrine said. Physical play. Tons of trash-talking. Scalabrine had been retired from the league for several years, but he still played, too.

MacKenzie told Scalabrine about Flagg, who, at 13 years old, was now getting the upper hand of college players in local workouts.

Scalabrine was skeptical. He knew trainers often talked up the players they worked with. "Get the f--- out of here," Scalabrine said. "Ain't no way." But he liked MacKenzie and thought he was a straight shooter.

"Bring him down here," Scalabrine said. "I'll get him into the gym to play against some of Boston's best."

IN THE BOSTON gym, Scalabrine warned his players about a 13-year-old coming in from Maine.

"He's going to destroy you guys," Scalabrine boomed.

Flagg walked in the gym after a four-hour drive, and on the game's first play, found himself trapped with the ball at the free throw line, a defender draped over him. He pump-faked, threw the ball toward the backboard, took two steps, jumped, caught the ball and thundered a dunk with his left hand. The gym fell silent.

"I got something for your ass today!" Scalabrine screamed at his charges.

It was just one play, but it piqued the curiosity of the other players of what more he could do. Scalabrine felt the same. And Flagg soon showed them. In one instance, he threw a 75-foot crosscourt seam pass to the opposite corner that arrived at the exact same time as his teammate's feet. Scalabrine laughed. His pass timing, Scalabrine later said, reminded him of LeBron James.

Scalabrine ran Flagg through the "eight-second game" -- a full-court game with eight seconds on the shot clock. It is a grueling exercise, forcing players to make quick decisions with little time. On a good day, a player's team might win a game or two. But Flagg won again and again. "He ... f---ing ... dominated," Scalabrine said, emphasizing each word.

They spent two hours in the gym that night, and Scalabrine told Flagg he was going to be in the NBA. He believed he'd play in the league for 10 years. Would he be a Hall of Famer? An All-Star? "That's up to you and how hard you want to work," Scalabrine told him. "But I know for a fact that you're an NBA player."

Despite his age, Scalabrine -- mirroring Flagg's coaches through the years -- noticed Flagg's advanced timing on blocking shots, how he'd disrupt passing lanes, how he possessed a rapid first and second jump for rebounds. On offense, he saw his deft passing and his versatile ability to score from midrange and around the rim. At 13, he'd established a rare two-way game.

Sources across the basketball world began to agree, despite a narrative that persists about white players and the stereotypes around their play and attributes -- that they make up for a perceived lack of athletic ability in other ways.

Flagg would prove this long-standing trope to be shallow and inaccurate, one Eastern Conference executive said.

"It's an interesting narrative because it will inevitably be racially tinged. 'This is the great white hope that knows how to play the right way, and all these other Black players are playing selfishly,'" the exec said about how Flagg's coverage might play out in the media. "I know there will be commentary on that."

"Europeans are white and they've been balling for years," said another Western Conference executive. "I guess it's just we haven't seen an American-born white dude projected this high in a while. Chet [Holmgren] is pretty damn good though. He's probably the best American-born white dude in the league at the moment. I don't recall it ever getting brought up much with him, for what it's worth -- and he had some buzz going No. 1. Just not as much as Cooper."

The exec continued, calling Flagg a "fantastic talent" and said he conjures thoughts of Kevin Garnett and Anthony Davis with his ability to block shots and switch on defense. Flagg, he said, would instantly become one of the best two-way players in the NBA.

"He does have very good handles for a power forward," the executive said. "Good footwork, and he plays his ass off. There's no question he's going to be a good player in the NBA, but the question is how good."

Said another Eastern Conference executive, "I have heard very little doubt about the kid. Everyone around Cooper has raved about him for three years."

Months later, Scalabrine ran Flagg through a drill that Dallas Mavericks star guard Kyrie Irving employs at the end of workouts -- often known as the "Kyrie finishing drill."

Irving completes a series of challenging acrobatic shots around the rim from different angles, jumping off one foot, or the other, or both, aiming high and low off the backboard, spinning the ball in different ways. The drill helps explain why Irving is such a master around the basket, able to finish in traffic and off either foot and with either hand. But it is an exhausting drill, requiring about 120 made shots in a short amount of time. The first time Flagg tried it, he completed it in about five minutes. The next time, Scalabrine believed Flagg could complete it in just under five minutes.

He completed the drill in 2 minutes and 17 seconds.

"His learning curve is like nothing I've ever seen before," Scalabrine said. "Now, I haven't been around every single high school player growing up, but I'm telling you -- there's not a challenge that he's not going to be able to overcome."

Scalabrine called Ford, the USA men's national team director.

"Sean, I'm just telling you," Scalabrine said. "We don't know each other, but he's a unicorn."

Ford has taken these types of calls over the years. Sometimes they pan out, like the time he got a call about a teenager named LeBron James. But in many instances, they don't. Ford listened and did a quick search on his phone. Flagg seemed legitimate, but he was so young, 13 years old. Ford reached Kelly and said that Team USA would have a minicamp for the junior national team in the spring of 2022 and that maybe there would be an opportunity for Flagg to attend.

Ford knew Maine wasn't necessarily a hotbed for basketball talent. But Scalabrine seemed so sure, so emphatic.

Still, Ford wondered, how good was Cooper Flagg, really?

AS ANDERSON DRIVES through Newport, he looks ahead and reveals what basketball means to his state.

"It's what binds these communities together," he says.

When people think of Maine, he said, they don't think of basketball; they think of hockey. But not every school has an ice rink. They're expensive, require extensive upkeep. Basketball, on the contrary, is cheap. All you need is a ball, a hoop and some sneakers. And when winter in Maine rolls around, and people are isolated, one of the few ways they can form a sense of community is to gather in a heated gym and watch their kids play.

Regional high schools are fed by nearby local towns -- Nokomis Regional High School is fed by eight others -- and when the state tournament rolls around and teams vie for a chance at the coveted Gold Ball, the towns travel en masse to watch their teams play; the last one to leave being expected to turn out the lights, as the saying goes. Locals compare it to Hoosier Hysteria in Indiana, only without the hype.

For as beloved as basketball is, the state hasn't produced a ton of top-tier talent. It's been 40 years since the Nets drafted Maine-born Jeff Turner 17th overall in 1984.

When Flagg joined 650-student Nokomis for his freshman year, his legend in the area was well known, and his new teammates -- including his older brother, Hunter -- were eager to have him and Ace aboard after struggling for several years. "He was playing with a bunch of seniors, and you could clearly tell that he was the player they looked up to," Anderson said. Anderson, the coach, had known the family for years. He'd watched Kelly's father, Dan, play. He'd watched Kelly play. He had heard about Flagg, but he'd never seen him in person -- until November practices began.

There were times when Anderson would watch him and think of Larry Bird. It was a touchy subject for people who had grown up with those Celtics teams, who worshiped Bird, and who were loath to bestow such praise on anyone else. But he was the player they often came back to, and Anderson saw parallels in their story. Bird's hometown of French Lick, Indiana, was small; so was Newport. They were both 6-9. They impacted the game on both ends. They're obviously both white.

Flagg had a Fathead poster of Bird in his living room, which had been painted green and white. People knew of Flagg's appreciation of Bird, and Ralph would hear snickers on social media from people saying, 'Oh, Flagg never saw Larry Bird play." It made Ralph laugh. "That's all we watched -- constantly," he said.

Before the season, Kelly had told Anderson that the hype around her son was growing, and that the attention would be high. Anderson soon saw it himself. Every gym they played in was packed. Lines formed around the block for autographs. Newspapers published feature stories. College coaches -- including UCLA -- rang Anderson with interest. Nokomis rolled to a 21-1 record. Flagg averaged 20.5 points, 10.0 rebounds, 6.2 assists, 3.7 steals and 3.7 blocks. In the state championship game in March 2022, he scored 22 points and grabbed 16 rebounds in a 43-27 win and raised the Gold Ball afterward. He became the first freshman to be named the Maine Gatorade Player of the Year.

The following month, Flagg traveled to New Orleans for USA Basketball men's junior national team's three-day minicamp in New Orleans. The team met in the Pelicans' practice facility, and Ford looked on, curious about Flagg, who was the youngest player there.

Bedard was present for the minicamp too. There were 46 players in the gym. Bedard reported back to Kelly, Ralph and MacKenzie after the first day that Flagg was the best one there. Ford agreed. Flagg was selected as one of 12 players to represent Team USA at the 2022 FIBA U17 Basketball World Cup in Spain in July 2022. Again he dominated, averaging 9.3 points, a team-high 10 rebounds, 2.9 blocks and 2.4 steals. In the gold-medal-clinching game, he tallied 10 points, 17 rebounds, eight steals and four blocks. "He was so, so good," Ford said. He was named to the all-tournament team. He was 15 years old.

After his freshman season, Flagg and his brother Ace made the decision to level up again, this time by transferring to Montverde, the Florida-based private prep powerhouse that has produced 11 first-round NBA draft picks in the past decade, including four in 2021.

AT MONTVERDE, FLAGG played under Kevin Boyle, who had coached a slew of future NBA players -- Kyrie Irving, Cade Cunningham, Ben Simmons -- and knew that Flagg entered Monteverde as a top prep prospect on a team flush with them. "He's the best kid in the country, and there were a lot of times he was our third-leading scorer," Boyle told ESPN.

In 17.8 minutes per game, Flagg averaged 9.8 points, 5.2 rebounds, three assists, a team-high 2.2 blocks and a team-high 1.6 steals in his first season.

In early July 2023, Flagg traveled to North Augusta, South Carolina, and rejoined his AAU team led by Bedard and Kelly -- named Maine United -- for Nike's EYBL Peach Jam tournament. The event was held in a 120,000-square-foot facility 6 miles from the Augusta National Golf Club, with NCAA coaches in attendance, including Scheyer. Scalabrine had reached out to Scheyer after the pickup game outside Boston.

"He's as good as any high school player that I've ever seen," Scalabrine told him. "I know it sounds crazy, but you've got to recruit this guy. He'd be a perfect fit for Duke."

Scheyer had never recruited anyone from Maine. But a year later, he was watching Flagg in person. "I remember the court, I remember where I was sitting," Scheyer told ESPN. "And here's this kid, blocking everything. Some of the plays he was making at 15, it just jumped off the page at you. His instincts. His athletic ability. His skill." He tried to think of a comparison, but couldn't.

"He's different from anybody I've ever recruited," Scheyer said.

On the first day of the tournament, Flagg wasn't shooting well, and an opposing coach quipped about it. After assisting on three straight plays, he looked at the opposing coach. "I don't need to score," he said. "All I need to do is win."

His team won -- and continued to win, as Flagg, averaged 25.4 points, 13 rebounds, 5.7 assists, and 6.9 blocks in seven games. He posted triple-doubles in three straight games. In one, he tallied 38 points, 16 rebounds, 12 blocks and six assists. In another, he notched 37 points, 12 rebounds, 10 blocks and six assists. The more they won, the more the crowds swelled. LeBron James pulled Flagg aside. Carmelo Anthony attended several games. Chris Paul approached Maine United's coaches and told them how much he was loving the team's run. He'd been watching their games on his phone, he said. "I love the way you all play," Paul told them. He said he was teaching his son, Chris Jr., then a middle school player, to model how he played after them. He asked if he could meet Flagg and Ace, and, of course, they obliged.

It was a busy summer -- with Flagg also attending Stephen Curry's basketball camp in San Francisco and Jayson Tatum's camp in St. Louis. In August 2023, Flagg reclassified to the 2025 draft class, fast-tracking his path to the NBA.

NBA talent evaluators were intrigued, noting his 7-foot wingspan, uncanny timing on blocking shots and abilities on both ends -- though some have said his shooting mechanics need work. "He's probably going to need to improve considerably as a shooter, which, given his age, could very realistically happen," one Eastern Conference executive said. "But even without progress on his shooting or individual offensive game, he will be an NBA starter and have a huge impact on winning in the league. He's a guy every team would love to have. That part is a very easy projection."

In October 2023, Flagg announced via Slam Magazine that he would be attending Duke, choosing it over UConn.

Earlier that summer, MacKenzie and Flagg had traveled to Durham, North Carolina, for a two-day unofficial visit. On campus, former Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski welcomed them into his spacious office. He showed them his Olympic gold medals and other achievements from his illustrious coaching career. They talked for about an hour, the 16-year-old Flagg remaining stoic and composed. Toward the end, Krzyzewski told him, "The way you carry yourself is very impressive. You remind me of a player I coached on Team USA, and that's LeBron James." Flagg nodded politely but said little else. "He's not somebody who gets starstruck by any means," MacKenzie said. "I've never seen him in a situation where he's rattled or starstruck."

Sitting in his office at the Eastern Maine Sports Academy, MacKenzie shows a photo of himself, Flagg and Krzyzewski from that visit. On an opposite wall hangs a framed Bird jersey and a section of the high school floor that Bird played on in French Lick.

Bird had inspired MacKenzie, just as Bird had inspired Flagg. MacKenzie thinks about how Flagg is inspiring others in Maine. He is working with a 6-8 player who idolizes Flagg. "He just turned 15," he said.

MacKenzie walks toward the court, standing before a space that they plan to transform with mementos from Flagg's rise and whatever follows, wherever his career may lead.

"I want the kids to come and see what's possible," he said.

He imagined the future.

"I can't wait to see what basketball looks like in Maine in 20 years."

A FEW DAYS later, MacKenzie stands next to Kelly and Ralph at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, North Carolina, to watch Flagg play his first regular-season game as a member of the Duke Blue Devils.

It's 6:15 p.m. on Nov. 4, and Flagg is warming up alongside his teammates. He looks down the court, and a wave of childhood memories comes rushing back.

Duke is hosting the University of Maine. Flagg grew up making the 30-minute trek with his family to watch the Black Bears play in Bangor. He became a fan and even envisioned himself playing there.

Now, he's standing on the opposite end of the court with his Blue Devils teammates, beneath banners honoring the school's iconic history and players, deep tournament runs and five national championships.

Duke warms up in front of the visitors bench, and behind it, dozens of Maine fans and alumni who made the trek from Bangor to Durham stand in Black Bears shirts and sweaters and hats, snapping photos and videos of Flagg, one of their own. Flagg's twin brother, Ace, who plays at nearby Greensboro Day, a prep school, is among them; the week before, Ace committed to play basketball at Maine next season.

On the opposite end of the court, two rows behind the Duke bench, Kelly wears a blue Duke sweater and seems to recognize a familiar face with every passing minute: someone from her alma mater, or someone who had traveled from Maine. She shakes as many hands and delivers as many hugs as a presidential candidate, beaming the whole time.

When the game begins, she removes her sweater, revealing a T-shirt featuring Flagg's likeness. It shows an image of him in a commercial with New Balance, which signed him in August and has multiple factories in Maine. Ralph, sitting next to Kelly, wears the same shirt, as does MacKenzie, who sits beside Ralph.

Maine plays tough early on but is clearly overmatched by Duke, which, along with Flagg, features two other players -- forward Kon Knueppel and center Khaman Maluach -- projected as lottery picks in the 2025 NBA draft. Flagg assists on two of Duke's first three baskets but doesn't make his first shot until finishing a driving layup with 6:25 left before halftime.

A sellout crowd looks on, eager for a highlight. With 3:25 before halftime, he provides one. Flagg catches the ball on the right wing, receives a screen from a teammate, then explodes down the lane for a thunderous one-handed slam.

Duke jumps out to a 17-point lead in the first half and, despite spirited runs by Maine to keep the game close, expands the margin to 29 in the second. Duke's defense defines the contest, as the Blue Devils hold Maine to 25% shooting after halftime. In his debut, Flagg finishes with 18 points, a team-high seven rebounds, a team-high five assists and three steals in nearly 30 minutes. Duke wins 96-62.

In the locker room, Flagg sits in his jersey, with a Gatorade towel over his legs -- he recently became the first men's college basketball player to sign with the brand -- as reporters surround him. He is asked about impacting the game even though he shot 6-of-15 from the field.

"It's kind of just something that's always been a part of my game," Flagg said. "It's just trying to impact it in a lot of different ways."

Maine coach Chris Markwood praises the hometown son after the loss.

"It's an amazing story," he said. "If you knew where he was from, how small of a town it is. ... It's a storybook thing that's going on right now. And the whole state is fully behind him, excited for him, rooting for him."

After speaking to reporters, Flagg departs the locker room and returns to the court, still in his jersey. It's 9:30 p.m. now. The stands are empty, and arena officials have already swept and cleaned. But a crowd of 30 remains -- friends and family from Maine.

There is Kelly, Ralph, Ace, MacKenzie and others who made the trip. People hug Flagg, shake hands, chat and linger.

MacKenzie's 5-year-old daughter, Lennie, bounds toward him, wearing the New Balance shirt featuring Flagg's likeness, and he picks her up. She wants to race him to the baseline, she says.

He happily agrees. They begin, and she takes off, full speed. As she nears the baseline, he slows down, letting her win. She throws both hands in the air and shouts in glee. They all file out of the building and into the cool night at just after 10 p.m., two hours before the start of an Election Day that Flagg can't yet vote in.

BACK IN LAS VEGAS after the scrimmage against Team USA, Flagg walks through a back entrance and sits in a conference room, still wearing his jersey. He looks at the gash on his right arm, near the elbow.

"It'll scab over in a couple days," he said.

Online, the buzz about his performance is spreading. As he sits back in a chair, he says his versatility at his size comes from his parents not forcing him to play the center position even though he was often the tallest kid on the court. It allowed him to gain more experience on the perimeter, he says, to add more facets to his game. He thinks of his basketball belief system, and how it ties back to those principles that his parents preached, straight from those 1985-86 Celtics.

"Just watching how that team played," Flagg said, "that's kind of how I try to model myself playing on every team that I've been on."

His parents' nudging, and their efforts to point out how those Celtics played, helped shape him, he says. He doesn't say Bird was his favorite player growing up, because Bird wasn't playing then, but he does call Bird his "favorite legend to look up to."

Even now, he says he tries to emulate Bird. "His vision -- it was unreal, the way he passed the ball. And then he was scoring, playing defense. He was just doing everything."

Bird isn't the only player Flagg closely followed. He also admires Durant and, in particular, the 2017 Golden State Warriors -- another powerhouse team that moved the ball with elite efficiency and dominated en route to an NBA championship.

But while numerous coaches and basketball observers continually said that how Flagg played -- how complete his game was -- seemed unique, he doesn't feel that way.

"There's players that do make all the right plays," Flagg said. "Especially someone like LeBron, for example. He's the type of player that just makes all his teammates better and is making the right play."

He also doesn't believe that style is becoming extinct.

"If you look at the Celtics this past year, I mean, prime example," Flagg said. "Their biggest thing was fighting for the great shot in every possession. So I think to look at a team like that, it still is the road map. It's still the right way. Nothing will ever beat that. Playing one-on-one basketball doesn't win games. Playing as a team, for sure, does."

He has seen the mock drafts that project him as the No. 1 pick. And when asked what that means to him, he interrupts.

"Nothing at all," he said. "I mean if you look at the last 10 mock drafts, I bet only a couple of 'em have the top 10 anywhere near correct."

Early on in life, he says, part of his motivation was to prove that Maine could produce great players, because there was always skepticism that it couldn't.

"I felt like I had something to prove and I always use that to help just keep my head down," he said, "but I think I'm just trying to represent the state in a good way more than trying to prove something at this point."

As he thinks back to his past, Flagg looks forward. He rises from his chair, exits the conference room and begins to walk down a long, crowded hallway in the Bellagio. Top stars from Team USA walk through. There's Durant. Then there's Devin Booker. Then Anthony Davis. Each time one of them rounds a corner and comes into view, a throng of people waiting behind a red velvet rope scream and shout. There are pleas for autographs, for selfies.

Flagg follows the same path as those stars, but as he nears the people behind the velvet rope, it's quiet. They don't seem to know who he is -- yet.

Tampa Bay Rays shortstop Wander Franco was arrested Monday in San Juan de la Maguana, 100 miles west of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic after what two police sources said was an altercation Sunday in the parking lot of an apartment complex in which guns were drawn.

Police sources confirm that Franco and an unnamed woman are being held for questioning following the incident.

Franco, who was placed on indefinite administrative leave from Major League Baseball on Aug. 22, is due to stand trial in the Dominican Republic on Dec. 12 in a separate case involving charges of sexual abuse, sexual exploitation against a minor and human trafficking, which could result in a sentence of up to 20 years.

Franco, 23, was placed on MLB's restricted list in July, sources had told ESPN, after prosecutors in the Dominican Republic accused him of having a sexual relationship with a then-14-year-old girl.

He is also under an MLB investigation under its domestic violence, sexual assault and child abuse policy until the case is resolved.

The court summoned Franco and the mother of the girl for the trial after an investigation that opened in 2022. The case will be heard by a panel of three or five judges.

Franco cannot leave the Dominican Republic under his bail agreement as he awaits the trial, but he is free to travel within the country, police confirmed.

Police also said that Franco would be free to carry a gun should he have a license to carry one and have said weapon registered. Police could not confirm on Monday whether Franco had met either of those requirements.

The Rays gave Franco an 11-year, $182 million extension in 2021, just 70 games into his major league career.

He made the All-Star team for the first time in 2023.

For just the third time since 2012, the teams with each league's best regular-season record met in the World Series. What if that happened every year?

For decades, that was how Major League Baseball worked. The best players on the best teams went from the top of the standings on the final day of the regular season directly to a yearly opportunity to write the October narrative in the World Series. With every addition to the postseason since it expanded to four teams in 1969, the odds of the best teams being the last two standing have gotten a little longer. The format has controlled the narrative.

The stories we remember about a season are largely driven by the structure that it employs, intentional choices made by the league's designers about the schedule, the alignment and the playoff field. From 1903 through 1968, there was only one possible way to play in the Fall Classic. Thus, the narratives about a big chunk of baseball history are told through that prism. It's a prism that hasn't been applicable very often during the wild-card era.

Today, we're playing a little what-if. What if the dynamic that was in place for the American League and National League all those years -- no playoffs but simply pitting the two first-place teams against each other in the Fall Classic -- never changed?

Yes, baseball would have still added teams over time and moved teams into different markets and such, but the World Series would remain the domain of the league's two pennant winners. Everyone else goes home once the game meter hits 162.

The 2024 Los Angeles Dodgers-New York Yankees showdown reminded us just how big the matchups could feel, and the alternate realities that emerge in these scenarios over recent years are as rich in possibilities, both for the changed regular seasons as well as the World Series. What's lost is everything that happened between the end of the regular season and the start of the Fall Classic -- no wild-card games, no division series, no championship series. That's a lot of dramatic moments lost to oblivion, which we must bear in mind.

Obviously, the stories we'd remember about each season would be very different, but would they be better or worse? Keeping our focus on the current four-round playoff era, let's rewrite recent baseball history.

Note: Numbers in parentheses represent league rank by won-lost record, not playoff seed. Where needed, ties were broken based on head-to-head results.

2012: A Bryce Harper-Yankees classic

Actual World Series: (3) San Francisco Giants over (7) Detroit Tigers

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: New York Yankees vs. Washington Nationals

What's gained: The gains in the regular season would have been considerable. In our alternate AL, the Yankees won the pennant by one game over the Athletics and two over the Orioles and Rangers. The Yankees were four games back of Texas on Labor Day, so it would have been a torrid stretch run that put the Bombers over the top. Going into the last week of the season, six teams would have been mathematically alive, and one of them would have been the real-life pennant winner, Detroit.

The final days of the season would have been epic. The Yankees beat Boston three times in a row to hold on to the flag over the A's, who won their last six games only to fall short. In doing so, the Athletics nudged aside the Rangers, whom they swept to end the campaign. In the Yankees' clincher in Game 162, Robinson Cano went 4-for-4 with two homers and six RBIs in a memorable 14-2 drubbing of the Red Sox. By the middle innings, it would have been clear: The Yankees win the pennant!

The NL stretch run would have been almost as dramatic. The Nats edge the Reds by a single game, with the Braves and real-life champion Giants finishing four back. Everyone else would have been eliminated entering the final week. That pennant race would have also been decided on the final day.

The Series would have been a juicy matchup featuring current and soon-to-be superstars. That Yankees team had Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Andruw Jones and CC Sabathia, among others, though Mariano Rivera was injured. The Nationals, seeking a franchise-first championship, had two emergent young stars: budding ace Stephen Strasburg and a 19-year-old rookie named Bryce Harper who was playing in his first World Series.

What's lost: The Giants-Tigers World Series pitted the two eventual MVPs -- Buster Posey and Miguel Cabrera -- against each other. Bruce Bochy, without the expanded playoffs, would not only lose this title in a classic-format universe -- he'd lose all four of the championships he has won.

In the regular season, we would have lost the AL Central race in which Detroit edged the White Sox by three games and led them by just one game with a week to go. We would have also lost a pair of semi-close races for the second wild-card slot in each league.

2013: Red Sox-Cardinals remains

Actual World Series: (1) Boston Red Sox over (1) St. Louis Cardinals

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same

What's gained: Before 2024, this was the last full season that yielded a one-versus-one World Series matchup. So our alternate reality season ends up in the same place. The biggest changes in narrative would have been the September chases in both leagues.

In the AL, only three teams are alive entering the final week, and the focus is on Boston's one-game lead over Oakland. The Red Sox hang on despite losing two one-run games at Baltimore to finish the season. The Athletics are eliminated in Game 161, losing 7-5 in Seattle thanks to a two-homer, five-RBI outburst from Brad Miller.

Over in the NL, the final week is operatic. Five teams are alive with seven days to go, and they are all within 2 games of each other -- the Braves, Cardinals, Dodgers, Reds and Pirates. The Cardinals were five back of Atlanta on Labor Day but have been coming on strong down the stretch. With no margin for error, the Redbirds win their last six and 10 of their last 12. The clincher comes on the final day with a 4-0 whitewashing of the Cubs.

What's lost: Cleveland, Texas and Tampa Bay all finished within a game of each other for the two AL wild-card slots. The Rangers and Rays tied for the last spot and in the classic format we would have lost the Rays' 5-2 victory in a tiebreaker, a victory that featured David Price's complete-game win. Also, in the playoffs, we lose Detroit's five-game win over Oakland in the ALDS. The Tigers won Game 5 behind a gem from Justin Verlander, who went eight two-hit innings with 10 strikeouts.

In the NL races, nothing too dramatic would have gone by the wayside. However, in the classic format, the Pirates would still be stuck in a long postseason drought. When the Pirates earned a wild-card slot in 2013, as they went on to do in 2014 and 2015 as well, they made the playoffs for the first time since 1992. In the classic format, the drought would stretch back to 1991, but the upside is that Pittsburgh owned the NL's best record in both 1990 and 1991, and thus would have seen a pair of Barry Bonds-led pennant winners in those campaigns.

2014: Mike Trout(!) vs. Bryce Harper

Actual World Series: (5) San Francisco Giants over (4) Kansas City Royals

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Los Angeles Angels vs. Washington Nationals

What's gained: Both leagues would have featured uncrowded races in the season's final days. In the AL, the Angels held a 2-game edge on the Orioles with a week to go. In the NL, Washington led the Dodgers by the same margin, though the Cardinals were still alive at 4 games back. The Angels and Nationals both ended up winning by two games, and neither pennant was still up for grabs on the final day.

With pennant race drama somewhat muted in 2014, the focus would have been on the amazing individual matchup in the World Series, which would be remembered as the Mike Trout-Bryce Harper World Series. Trout, 22, won his first MVP that season, though his 2012 and 2013 seasons were even better. In real life, 2014 was his only playoff appearance; but in the classic format, that would have come in the Fall Classic. That particular albatross is one he would have shed long ago.

Harper would be making his second World Series appearance, though 2014 wasn't his best season. Early injuries and struggles left him with just three homers through the end of July. However, Harper caught fire after that, hitting 10 homers over the last two months, and would have been firing on all cylinders by the time the clash with Trout came to pass. This year's Aaron Judge-Shohei Ohtani hype would have included something like "the best World Series superstar matchup since Mike Trout and Bryce Harper a decade ago."

What's lost: The Royals and Tigers would have been out of the running, their AL Central battle lost. Kansas City, which won the pennant as a wild card, would still be working on a long playoff drought. Its amazing comeback in the epic wild-card game against Oakland would never have happened. And not only would Bochy lose another title, as mentioned, but the Giants would not be a three-time champion in the 2010s. Indeed, they might still be looking for their first San Francisco title. But maybe not -- stay tuned.

2015: An in-state Fall Classic

Actual World Series: (1) Kansas City Royals over (5) New York Mets

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Royals vs. St. Louis Cardinals

What's gained: For 2015, we have to begin with that World Series matchup. Thirty years after the first I-70 Series, the Cardinals get a chance for revenge. St. Louis skipper Mike Matheny would have been managing in the Series against the team he eventually managed. But you have to wonder: Matheny only managed St. Louis for two more full seasons after 2015. If he had led the Cardinals to another World Series (in addition to 2013), would it have been longer?

In the AL pennant race, four teams were alive entering the last week, with the Royals and Blue Jays tied for the lead. They were still tied entering the final weekend, on which Toronto lost two straight at Tampa Bay. The Royals grabbed the lead on the second-to-last day, beating Minnesota behind a gem from Yordano Ventura. Meanwhile, the Jays lose a gut puncher on a two-out, two-run game-winning single by the Rays' Tim Beckham against Toronto closer Roberto Osuna. Kansas City wraps it on the final day, beating Minnesota again to finish the season with a five-game winning streak.

The 100-win Cardinals cruise to the NL pennant despite being shut out in their last three games during a sweep in Atlanta. St. Louis had the NL wrapped up before that series began but, obviously, the Cardinals would not have entered the Fall Classic matchup against the red-hot Royals on a good note. The Cubs and Pirates faded, but they were both within striking distance of the Cardinals going into the last week.

What's lost: The rise of the Cubs would have been a hot story in any context. But in real life, Chicago earned a wild-card spot and advanced to the NLCS, losing to another hot story in the pitching-rich Mets. The Matt Harvey phenomenon? Much less muted on a fifth-place team out of the running by the middle of September.

There would have been a lot of good playoff baseball lost. The Mets beating the Dodgers in a five-game NLDS, with Jacob deGrom shining in the clincher. The Royals' come-from-behind ALDS win over Houston, gone. Kansas City's dramatic six-game ALCS win over Toronto, poof.

We also would have lost a seminal what-if: Had the Mets not made the playoffs, then Harvey would not have been on the mound in the ninth inning of the last game of the World Series. Would his career have turned out differently had that never happened?

2016: The Cubs vs. ... ?

Actual World Series: (1) Chicago Cubs over (2) Cleveland

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Cubs vs. TBD (Cleveland or Texas Rangers)

What's gained: A crowded AL pennant race would have gone to overtime. As of Labor Day, six teams would have been in the running, all within 6 games. By the time we hit the final week, that number was down to four, with the Red Sox and Rangers tied for the lead, 1 games ahead of Cleveland, and the Blue Jays clinging to hope, down 5 games.

With the pennant race reaching its crescendo, Cleveland ran into bad weather in Detroit. Their game on Thursday, Sept. 29, is washed out and can't be made up until the day after the regular season. This happened in real life. Texas finished a half-game ahead of Cleveland for the AL's top seed, but since the Rangers owned the rulebook tiebreaker, and tiebreaker games aren't played just to determine a seed, the makeup game was never played.

However, in the classic format, it would have been. Had Cleveland won that makeup game in Detroit, it would then have played the Rangers in a tiebreaker for the AL pennant. Thus we might have gotten our Cubs-Indians World Series after all -- and arguably in a much more dramatic fashion. Meanwhile, the Red Sox missed a chance to really muddle the end-of-season waters by losing two straight one-run games at Fenway Park against Toronto to finish the campaign.

As for those Cubs, they pretty much made a shambles of the NL, so there was zero pennant-race drama down the stretch.

What's lost: Once again, dramatic wild-card races drew our eyeballs as the season wound down. As with all seasons like this, where the wild-card races are the closest ones, our attention drifts to the middle of the standings. The Mets and Giants edged St. Louis by one game for two NL slots, while Baltimore and Toronto held off Detroit and Seattle in the AL. There weren't any division races with even a semblance of drama in 2016, so all the down-the-stretch attention was fixed on the wild cards. This would not have been the case in the classic format.

As for the playoffs, we had just one series go the distance. That was in the NLDS, where the Dodgers eked past the Nationals, winning Game 5 4-3. That was the game where Kenley Jansen threw 2 scoreless relief frames and Clayton Kershaw got the last two outs for what remains his only career save.

The real drama was the 2016 World Series -- which we might well have gotten in any format.

2017: Sign-stealing Astros lose their crown

Actual World Series: (2) Houston Astros over (1) Los Angeles Dodgers

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Cleveland vs. Dodgers

What's gained: Who knows what would have become of the Astros' sign-stealing scandal, but we can at least say this: After losing an epic pennant race against Cleveland, Houston would not have had the chance to win a tainted championship. Instead, Cleveland would have gotten perhaps its second straight shot at ending its title drought.

The AL race would have largely been a two-team battle between Cleveland and Houston, but it would have been an all-timer. On Labor Day, the unofficial start of the stretch run, Houston led by three games, but Cleveland was in the midst of its 20-game winning streak, ending up going an incredible 33-4 to finish the season.

Still, Houston was also hot, as the Astros went 14-3 to end the season. With both teams losing their second-to-last games, it would have come down to the final day, with Cleveland holding a one-game edge. Cleveland beat Chicago 3-1 to clinch, riding a solid start from Josh Tomlin and 3 scoreless innings from the backbone of that team, its bullpen. Final standings: Cleveland 102-60, Houston 101-61.

The NL was down to a two-team race between the Dodgers and Nationals by Labor Day, but L.A. pulled away from there, cruising to a pennant and into a rematch of the 1920 World Series.

What's lost: Frankly, not much. The Red Sox and Yankees went to the wire in the AL East, though both made the postseason. Neither would have joined the Cleveland-Houston derby in a classic format. The race for the NL's second-wild card came down to the finish, with the Rockies edging the Brewers by a game.

The playoffs in 2017 featured a lot of close, tense matchups, so losing those would be tough. The Yankees overcame a 2-0 deficit to beat Cleveland in five, then dropped a classic seven-game series to Houston in the ALCS. The Cubs beat the Nationals in a five-game NLDS series, winning the finale 9-8.

Mostly though, we never would have gotten that Astros-Dodgers World Series. Whether or not you consider that a loss depends on how jaded you feel about it, given the Houston scandal. But at the time, that seven-game classic was one of the better Fall Classics in quite awhile.

2018: An MVP matchup on the biggest stage

Actual World Series: (1) Boston Red Sox over (3) Los Angeles Dodgers

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Red Sox vs. Milwaukee Brewers

What's gained: Well, first of all you have the Brewers' first NL pennant, their only other World Series appearance coming when they were still in the AL. With a pennant comes the chance at a championship, so perhaps the Brewers would no longer be one of the five franchises without one.

More certain is that the Brewers would have earned that shot by winning a tremendous NL pennant race in which they overcame their bitter rivals to the south, the Cubs. Chicago and Milwaukee played in a tiebreaker for the NL Central title in 2018, but in the classic format, that would have been a winner-take-all game for a berth in the World Series.

The race would have been about more than those two teams. Going into the last week, six NL clubs would have been alive, with the Cubs leading the pack, 2 games up on Milwaukee. Chicago didn't collapse but instead the Brewers caught fire, winning their last seven to get into that tiebreaker which, of course, they won.

The Red Sox ran away with the AL pennant but perhaps the lack of drama on that side would have been outweighed by a World Series matchup that featured the two eventual MVPs in Mookie Betts and Christian Yelich.

What's lost: To say the Red Sox ran away with the AL in the classic format is true -- going into the last week, the Astros -- at 6 games back -- were the only other contender still mathematically alive. But the Yankees and Astros joined the Red Sox as 100-game winners in 2018 and neither would have made the playoffs in a one-seed-only scenario. Still, Boston lost just two games in rolling over both teams on the way to the Series.

In the NL, we would have lost a second tiebreaker game, as the Dodgers had to beat the Rockies to determine the NL West champion. We also would have lost the outstanding, seven-game NLCS in which the Dodgers beat Milwaukee.

2019: Now we get our Astros-Dodgers showdown

Actual World Series: (4) Washington Nationals over (1) Houston Astros

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Astros vs. Los Angeles Dodgers

What's gained: While the classic format would have prevented the 2017 Astros-Dodgers pairing, we would have gotten it here, and it would have been a clash between teams that combined to win 213 games. Again, we can't know how this matchup might have been colored by the Houston scandal, which didn't break until after this World Series. But at least the matchup itself would have been untainted.

The Dodgers and Braves are the only serious NL contenders, and even that race would die out by the last week as L.A. pulled away. The real story would have been on the AL side.

The AL featured three 100-win teams in 2019, the Astros, Yankees and Twins. The pennant race boiled down to those three by Labor Day, when the Yankees and Astros were tied, with Minnesota four games back. By the final week, the Twins were barely alive at six games behind, but the Yankees were just a half-game back of Houston, both teams with 102 wins.

That set up an intense conclusion but, alas, the Yankees faded in the final days, losing four of five at Tampa Bay and Texas. Houston won six of its last seven contests, and 12 of its last 14, to seize the crown -- its first during the period covered in our revised history.

What's lost: The Cardinals finished two games up on Milwaukee to win the AL Central, though the Brewers still got in as a wild card. Neither would have been in the running in a revised format. Milwaukee had to fend off the Mets, Diamondbacks and Cubs for that second wild-card slot.

The eventual champion Nationals, the top NL wild card, would never have sniffed the postseason in the classic format. Whether or not this means the Expos/Nationals franchise was still seeking its first title depends on how our alternate-history 2012 and 2014 World Series came out, as Washington would have represented the NL in both of them.

2020: Dodgers-Rays remains

Actual World Series: (1) Los Angeles Dodgers over (1) Tampa Bay Rays

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same

Look, we all know there is a lot we'd change about 2020 if we could, in baseball and beyond. Insofar that the 2020 MLB season can be redeemed, it is arguably redeemed because despite a 16-team bracket, the best teams actually ended up in the World Series, and the clear best team that year -- the Dodgers -- won it. Beyond that, there's not much to be gleaned about that season.

2021: Do Giants finally win their first title in San Francisco?

Actual World Series: (5) Atlanta Braves over (3) Houston Astros

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Tampa Bay Rays vs. San Francisco Giants

What's gained: Here's a Giants pennant gained via the classic format but, alas, it's too late for Bochy, as this was Gabe Kapler's club. The Rays win their second straight AL pennant, giving them another shot at exiting the zero-titles club.

Starting with the AL, the Rays would have had this well in hand by the middle of September. The Astros, Yankees, Red Sox and White Sox -- the other teams that made the real-life AL playoffs in 2021 -- all were within hailing distance of the Rays, but it wasn't that close. Tampa Bay ended up five games better than Houston atop the AL.

In the actual NL that season, the Giants and Dodgers staged a memorable battle to win the NL West, with San Francisco (107) winning by a single game over L.A., making the Dodgers one of the best-ever second-place teams. That still would have been the case in the classic format but the stakes would have been higher -- first place, or nothing. The teams' last head-to-head game that year was Sept. 5, which would have seemed like a tremendous lost opportunity at the time. At 4 games back on Labor Day, the Brewers had hopes of joining this sprint but soon faded.

This might have been a World Series in pursuit of firsts -- the Rays trying to secure the franchise's first title; the Giants perhaps trying to win their first championship since moving to San Francisco. Don't forget -- their 2010, 2012 and 2014 titles never happened.

However, the Giants also finished with the NL's best record in 2000, so that would have been another shot at winning it. It also would have been Bonds' third Fall Classic, after his two alternate-history pennants in Pittsburgh.

What's lost: Braves history would look a lot different in the classic format. They'd lose this title, which means Freddie Freeman would have just won his first ring -- with the Dodgers. However, get this: Atlanta finished with the NL's best record nine times in 12 years between 1992 and 2003. They actually won four pennants (and one title) during that span, but it could have been so much more.

The only playoff series that went five games was the Dodgers' NLDS win over the Giants. But if we'd have had that long, head-to-head scramble between them for the NL pennant, we wouldn't have needed that.

2022: Astros-Dodgers II

Actual World Series: (1) Houston Astros over (6) Philadelphia Phillies

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Astros vs. Los Angeles Dodgers

What's gained: A long time to analyze the pending Astros-Dodgers rematch from alternate 2019. The teams won 217 games between them this time, and both enjoyed sizable leads in their respective leagues over the final weeks.

What's lost: The first six-seed in a World Series, for one. The first five-versus-six seed LCS as well -- the Phillies and the Padres. The Mets and Braves tied for the NL East title with 101 wins -- no tiebreaker games in the new format, a shame -- and rather than moving into the bracket, they both would have finished 10 games back of the Dodgers. The down-the-stretch fixation on the race for the NL's third wild card -- Philly beat the Brewers by a single game -- would have been lost.

2023: Ronald Acuna Jr. starts 40/70 club, meets O's in October

Actual World Series: (4) Texas Rangers over (6) Arizona Diamondbacks

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Baltimore Orioles vs. Atlanta Braves

What's gained: A great World Series pairing. The Braves, riding Ronald Acuna Jr.'s historic season, and the title-starved Orioles, with young stars Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson, among others. Both teams won over 100 games during the regular season.

Both leagues would have featured two-team races. The Orioles and Rays duke it out into the final week, though Baltimore wraps things up with a couple of days to go. The Braves and Dodgers go toe-to-toe in the NL, but Atlanta is able to keep L.A. at arm's length down the stretch.

What's lost: The Rangers' first title would never have happened, as neither World Series entrant would have sniffed the postseason. The three-team race in the AL West, the one in which Seattle was left without a playoff slot, would have not happened. The seven-game ALCS in which both the Rangers and Astros went perfect on the road would not be a thing. Arizona's seven-game NLCS win over the Phillies would also be gone, so we'd have lost two winner-take-all pennant clinchers.

2024: The East Coast-West Coast showdown we just saw

Actual World Series: (1) Los Angeles Dodgers over (1) New York Yankees

No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same

What's gained: Sometimes, even the format can't get in the way. Although, this is a season in which the alternate-reality regular season is greatly enhanced by the classic format.

The only down-the stretch dramas we had involved teams that won 80-something games. The Royals, Tigers and Mariners comprised one of those races, all for two of the three AL wild-card slots. The Mariners also had a shot at the AL West crown, won by the 88-win Astros. The NL was the same story, with the Diamondbacks left out of an NL wild-card spot in the three-team derby with the Mets and Braves.

In the classic format, there would have been six AL teams within 5 games of the lead on Labor Day, while the NL would have had five teams within six. It would have made for an awfully fun September. By the last week, we would have been down to two in the AL (Yankees by 2 over the Guardians) and four in the NL (all within four games).

Entering the final weekend, we would have had the Yankees with a one-game edge over Cleveland, and the Dodgers one game up on the Phillies.

What's lost: A very good postseason, including the Mets' run, the Royals and Tigers advancing to the ALDS, the great Dodgers-Padres NLDS -- all of it, vanished. And it does feel like a loss, but how much of that is because, as fun as the journey might have been, we still ended up with the matchup so many wanted in the first place?

We also wouldn't have gotten that epic day-after-the-season, on which the Mets and Braves played their memorable makeup doubleheader, giving Francisco Lindor the platform for his clinching homer that is one of the signature moments of his career.

After the extraordinary 42-37 defeat by Australia, Steve Borthwick's win record as England head coach stands at exactly 50%, with 13 wins from his 26 matches in charge.

It is a middling record which stacks up unfavourably compared to his two predecessors, Eddie Jones (73%) and Stuart Lancaster (61%).

But there is context to add. Borthwick is rebuilding the team after relying on an experienced core of players at the Rugby World Cup last year.

The likes of Owen Farrell, Courtney Lawes, Manu Tuilagi, Billy Vunipola, Kyle Sinckler, Ben Youngs, Danny Care and Jonny May - mainstays of the past decade - are no longer available. Any rebuild takes time.

And while England have lost five of their past six matches, all of those defeats have been against top-level opposition and all have come down to a single score.

These are the caveats that explain why Borthwick retains the full support of the Rugby Football Union. As far as the RFU is concerned, Borthwick is in for the long haul and was recently handed more power than any England head coach before him.

However, the capitulation at the hands of the Wallabies will have tried the patience of even the most loyal England fans. It was England's sixth loss in 10 matches in 2024. They are now down to seventh in the world rankings.

In the immediate aftermath of Saturday's game, captain Jamie George spoke of the "external noise" that would accompany the defeat and the need for the squad to "stay tight and keep believing".

With the double world champions South Africa rolling into town next week, how Borthwick and England react will be critical.

England's two statement victories under Borthwick - Argentina at the World Cup and Ireland in the Six Nations - both came with the side written off. They will again be underdogs against the Springboks, yet there is still every chance England can push them close.

But there is plenty to fix. While the defence looked in good nick against New Zealand, it was markedly porous against the Wallabies.

Borthwick pointed to his side's loose ball-handling and contact skills as a reason why, but the constant flux in the backroom team - something Borthwick would have been desperate to avoid - cannot be helpful.

England have had three different defence coaches in the past 12 months, with Joe el-Abd taking over at the end of September. None of this was part of Borthwick's plan.

While George insisted England's tactical plan is clear, the team still looks caught between two identities.

Marcus Smith has started England's last five games - and was excellent against Australia - but plays in a different way to the more experienced George Ford, who was Borthwick's man through the Six Nations and may well have started on the summer tour of the New Zealand if he had been fit.

Stylistically, the team switched from a kick-first gameplan at the World Cup to a more expansive approach during the spring, but the man at the heart of that revolution - scrum-half Alex Mitchell - has missed the two autumn openers.

Borthwick has put his faith in Smith, but only up to a point, bringing Ford on in the final quarter in both games this November in an attempt to close the games out.

Boos rang around the Allianz Stadium when it looked like Smith was being taken off against the Wallabies - he was actually moved to full-back - and number eight Ben Earl admitted afterwards England were testing the patience of the supporters.

The two Test matches this month have been excruciatingly close; England have been the width of a post and a fumbled kick-off away from winning both games.

But those are the margins at the highest level, and there is no coincidence the best sides in the world manage to get over the line in similar circumstances.

And while England are not flush with caps, there is still enough experience in the set-up. Supporters will quickly tire of talk of learning lessons if the lessons are not being learned.

It was telling Borthwick took on a very different tone in his interviews after the Australia defeat compared to a week prior.

Last weekend he praised his side and stressed the quality of the All Blacks; this time he was visibly angry at his side's inaccuracy and poor decision-making, as England were hooked into a loose game that played into Australia's hands.

With South Africa tuning up for Twickenham by battling past Scotland, Borthwick will know more than anyone how much better England will have to be if they are to compete with the best team in the world and lighten the mood around Twickenham.

A Turkish court sentenced a former top-flight football club executive to more than three and a half years in prison on Monday for attacking a referee on the pitch at the end of a league game last season.

Former Ankaragucu president Faruk Koca punched referee Halil Umut Meler in the face after the final whistle of a 1-1 draw in a Super Lig game against Caykur Rizespor last year.

Meler, who fell to the ground, was also kicked in a melee that occurred when fans also invaded the field after Rizespor scored a last-minute equaliser on Dec. 11, 2023.

The incident had caused global outrage and prompted the Turkish Football Federation to suspend all league games for several weeks.

The court in Ankara convicted Koca of "intentionally wounding a public official" and sentenced him to three years and seven months in prison, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The court also convicted Koca of threatening the referee and of violating laws aimed at preventing violence in sports but suspended the sentences.

Three other people who were also on trial for attacking the referee, were sentenced to prison terms ranging from one to five years, the agency reported.

Koca, who resigned as club president soon after the incident, is expected to appeal the verdict. He was briefly jailed last year before being released on bail.

Earlier, lawyers representing the defendants requested their acquittal, claiming that they had committed the crime under "unjust provocation," Anadolu reported.

Ankaragucu was fined 2 million Turkish Lira ($59,000) and forced to play five home games without fans.

The referee was briefly hospitalised with a small fracture near his eye.