Mickey Togs

Adolis García hit a two-run homer on Michael King’s first pitch of the 10th inning, and the Texas Rangers beat the slumping New York Yankees 4-2 on Friday night for their fifth win in six games.

New York’s offense again struggled in the absence of injured slugger Aaron Judge. The Yankees are last in the major leagues in batting average and runs in June, managing six hits or fewer in five of their last six games. They are 10-16 this year when Judge has been on the injured list, losing 10 of 16 since he hurt a toe. New York is 31-19 with Judge available.

The team’s other big slugger, Giancarlo Stanton, is hitting .096 since returning from a strained hamstring, going 5 for 52 with a pair of solo homers for his only RBI.

Texas leads the AL West and tops the majors in scoring and batting average.

García drove a hanging curve from King (1-4) into the left-field seats, giving him 17 homers and 60 RBI. King has struggled of late, with a 9.95 ERA in his previous five outings.

Joe Barlow (1-0) worked around a two-out single in the ninth, and Will Smith pitched the 10th for his 14th save in 15 chances.

At least on this night — though he hopes for many more — Max Scherzer looked like the future Hall of Famer whom the Mets made their $130 million man.

Scherzer saved his best start of the season and his longest as a Met for the defending world champs, silencing the Astros in an 11-1 laugher on Monday at Minute Maid Park that was well-timed for the star and his club.

The Mets (34-38) showed some hope to begin a six-game road trip that will go from Texas to Philadelphia. 

They have a pulse after winning just their fourth game in the past 15 and beating the Astros for the first time in their past eight  head-to-head matchups.

A pair of five-run frames helped. 

As did Francisco Lindor’s five RBIs. But the Mets have Scherzer — whose ERA fell from 4.45 to 4.04 — to thank most for the series-opening destruction.

For a third start in a row, the Mets staked Scherzer to a significant lead, but for a first time in that span he held it. Scherzer allowed just five base runners and one run in eight excellent and efficient innings. 

The loss of Aaron Judge clearly has impacted the Yankees’ offense, but the reigning AL MVP wasn’t the only slugger on their roster who previously has proven capable of carrying a lineup for lengthy stretches.

Giancarlo Stanton also had been one of those hitters earlier in his career — and when healthy, at times, with the Yankees — but he has been searching to regain any semblance of his timing and power stroke since returning from the injured list.

Stanton now is batting .119 (5-for-42) with 15 strikeouts over his first 12 games since making it back from a six-week hamstring absence. 

Those numbers include seven hitless at-bats with one walk and five Ks as the Yankees were swept — 6-2 and 4-1 — by the Red Sox in Sunday’s day-night doubleheader at Fenway.

“I just need to find my rhythm, pick the ball up a little sooner,” Stanton said between games. “The reps help, but at this time, I don’t have time to just take reps to get them under my belt. I need to make an impact when I’m in there, so I just need to figure it out.”

Stanton has not been the only lineup regular slumping since Judge was sidelined with a toe issue two weeks ago; Anthony Rizzo, DJ LeMahieu and Josh Donaldson also have been mired in pronounced skids.

“They’re gonna hit. Big G is gonna hit. They’re gonna get it rolling.,” Aaron Boone said. “We just gotta grind our way through it right now while we’re in a little bit of a struggle.”

The game was certainly an emotional roller coaster. The Cardinals jumped out to an early lead thanks to Nolan Arenado’s two-run bomb in the first, but Matthew Liberatore had a clunker and couldn’t make those runs stand up.

Paul Goldschmidt drove in a pair with a double while Brendan Donovan brought one in with a single. Paul DeJong and Jordan Walker also provided some power. What was left of their early lead was washed away by former Cardinal Tommy Pham’s two-run shot against Chris Stratton.

From there, it was a battle of the bullpens. And in the ninth, the Mets bullpen blinked first when Arenado took another former Cardinal deep in Adam Ottavino.

Jordan Hicks made things a little interesting, but got a double play to secure an 8-7 win for the Birds and their first series victory since late May against the Dodgers.

The Vegas Golden Knights, in just their sixth NHL season, defeated the Florida Panthers 9-3 Tuesday night in Las Vegas to win the franchise’s first Stanley Cup in five games.

Vegas captain Mark Stone had a goal in each period to lead the Golden Knights, who joined the NHL before the 2017-2018 season. 

The 31-year-old Stone becomes the first player since 1922 to net a hat-trick in a Stanley Cup-clinching victory, according to the NHL. 

After the game, each player took a turn, as is tradition, in hoisting the famed trophy.

“Unbelievable,” Stone said of the experience. “I just looked at my teammates’ eyes … One of the craziest feelings I’ve ever had. Just to know that I did it with my 25, 30 best friends makes it that much more special.”   

The Golden Knights’ offensive prowess was again in full display on Tuesday night at the T-Mobile Arena. The Golden Knights became the seventh team in NHL history to score five or more goals in three or more games of the same Stanley Cup Final series.  

IHOP is spreading more joy with its largest menu evolution to-date, featuring a selection of craveable items spanning across breakfast, lunch, dinner, and beyond. 

The new menu was driven by the brand’s research that identifies exactly what guests are looking for when it comes to IHOP’s menu – quality ingredients, options that meet the indulgent and lighter side of cravings, choice, and value.

As the leader in all things breakfast, IHOP continues to elevate and expand its offerings to ensure the brand is providing guests with quality ingredients. IHOP debuts its fresh take on Sweet & Savory Crepes, best-in-class Eggs Benedicts, juicy Ultimate Steakburgers with a new Four-Cheese Crisp, and the return of fan-favorite Cinn-A-Stack Pancakes crafted to satisfy guests’ cravings any time of day. 

The Denver Nuggets are NBA Champions!

The Denver Nuggets beat the Miami Heat Monday night to win the Championship. It was their first time making it to the NBA Finals. 

It wasn’t until this year that the Nuggets won the Western Conference — they lost in their four previous trips to the Western Conference Finals in 1978, 1985, 2009, and 2020. Two-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic led the team to the Larry O’Brien Trophy.

The Nuggets finished the 2022-23 regular season with a record of 53-29 — the best record in the Western Conference.

In the playoffs, the Nuggets defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves in five games before beating the Phoenix Suns in six games.

The Nuggets then swept the Los Angeles Lakers four games straight in the Western Conference Finals.

The Heat ended the regular season 44-33 before their surprising run as an eight-seed. They defeated the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals in seven games. 

Buck Showalter turned to the oldest trick in a manager’s playbook in an attempt to extract results from his under performing team.

After the Mets lost for a seventh straight game on Friday, Showalter held a closed-door meeting, during which he stated the obvious: the team needed to play better.

According to a person who was in the room, players were urged to “dig down deep” and find “another level of competitiveness.”

Maybe Showalter’s words resonated on Saturday or maybe the Mets were just fortunate enough to have Kodai Senga pitching and due for a rebound after the clunker he produced in his last start.

This one adhered to the offseason blueprint: Senga rolled into the late innings without much resistance and the bullpen held, allowing the Mets to snap their longest losing streak in four years with a 5-1 victory over the Pirates at PNC Park.

Senga fired a two-hitter over seven innings, allowing one unearned run. The right-hander struck out six and walked four, helping the Mets to exhale after Justin Verlander and Tylor Megill gave them short, ineffective performances Thursday and Friday. 

Without Aaron Judge, thriving is probably out of the question. But if the Yankees can survive until their captain returns, they would be thrilled.

In the Yankees’ first day of games since their best player was placed on the injured list, they survived by digging a hole and climbing out.

After fighting back but falling in a 6-5 matinee loss to the White Sox on Thursday, the Yankees responded by shutting down Chicago in a 3-0 victory to salvage a split of the day.

A sparser-than-usual Bronx crowd of an announced 40,659 watched the Yankees (37-27) play through an air-quality crisis that postponed Wednesday’s game.

The Yankees dropped a series to the White Sox (28-36) in part because a couple of veteran pitchers in Game 1 — Luis Severino and Michael King — allowed a combined four home runs. 

The final one was a two-run blast from Eloy Jimenez that gave the White Sox a seventh-inning lead they would not cough up.