Scooters are canceled, plus a sports agent and an unsolved murder

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Good morning! Hide your best player today. Coming up: 

Technicalities: MLB’s 2-wheeled troubles

I need to express an old-man sentiment, one that’s festered within me for years: I loathe electric scooters. I recoil every time I travel to a city where they are popular, with sidewalks and plant beds awash in discarded lanky little vehicles.

Also, as a new-ish dad, I always think about how dangerous they can be. Anyone, in any state of mind, can just pick these things up, tap a few buttons and cruise the streets. Does this make me old? Just sane?

I don’t know, but I do know MLB teams, now more than ever, agree with me. 

Andy McCullough wrote a great story yesterday on this specific matter, which rose to the forefront in the wake of Giants center fielder Harrison Bader’s season-ending accident last month. The gaffe, as our story explains, could have an actual long-term effect on baseball. 

Two points:

• Teams have worried about these scooters for years now. It’s easy to incur an injury, of course, but moreover, the use of electric scooters isn’t exactly covered in a standard MLB contract, which generally just forbids players from “high-risk activities” and playing other competitive sports.
• San Francisco could terminate the rest of Bader’s contract. And, as the league and its union embark on a testy negotiation for a new collective bargaining agreement, the inclusion of scooter- or e-bike-based injuries could become part of the CBA going forward.

The big issue? Scooters are wildly popular among players. Read the full story for more.

News to Know

Murray wins Vikes jobKyler Murray will be the starting quarterback for the Vikings in Week 1, sending 2024 first-round pick J.J. McCarthy to the bench. The story is as much about Murray, who landed in Minnesota this offseason, as it is about McCarthy, whom the Vikings chose to be their signal caller last season instead of re-signing Sam Darnold. The latter went on to win a Super Bowl in Seattle as McCarthy struggled in 10 starts while dealing with injuries. Now McCarthy is a backup.

ESPN’s Miller chargedNFL Draft analyst Matt Miller was charged with a misdemeanor in connection with a June crash that led to the amputation of his left arm and, in subsequent days, an intense public audit of his charitable contributions. Miller is on leave from ESPN and is the subject of an investigation by the Missouri attorney general’s office. Read our full story.

Field of 68 returnsAfter a nine-year hiatus, we will once again get 24 straight hours of men’s college basketball to begin the season, thanks to the Field of 68 network. ESPN scrapped the concept in 2017, and Field of 68, which launched during COVID-19, is finally bringing it back on Nov. 2. See the details here.

More news:

• At Colorado, football coach Deion Sanders finally opened practice to fans and media. The catch: No one can say anything about it.
• The Yankees received $2.6 billion in a financing deal with a private equity firm. More in our full story.
• Amazon took down counterfeit versions of Phil Steele’s annual college football preview magazine after the author complained about them. Feels like sacrilege.
• A card shop in Rhode Island landed a Cooper Flagg trading card that could fetch $5 million. Read more.
• Sky guard DiJonai Carrington said her post Saturday, which read “WHITE PRIVILEGE” and came after Carrington was ejected for a flagrant foul on Indiana’s Sophie Cunningham, wasn’t about Cunningham at all. See her comments.
• Tottenham Hotspur’s owners are exploring a bid for the NBA Europe team in London.
• Update on a story from yesterday: USA Swimming CFO Cory Hilliard resigned following his arrest on allegations he embezzled money while working for the University of Colorado’s athletics program.

📰 Find more news here 24/7.

Serious Matters: New light on a decades-old murder

Before reading this investigative story, published today, I had no idea or memory of a man named Michael Blatt. Maybe it’s an age thing — I was born in 1989, around the time this entire saga occurred — or a volume issue, in that the sports world has produced countless stories in the 35-plus years since. 

Thus, the story walloped me. Two quick takeaways: 

• Blatt, now 80, built himself into somewhat of an NFL super agent in the 1980s, brashly making deals and talking loudly about them to anyone and everyone. His success, and ambition, led him to be the Seahawks’ interim general manager, with an eye on the full-time job.
• Then, the job slipped away, and Blatt’s past gurgled up. A former business partner, Larry Carnegie, claimed to friends he helped dissuade Seattle from hiring Blatt full-time. Carnegie and Blatt had a messy falling-out prior to this. 

Months later, Carnegie was dead, murdered viciously via crossbow. Blatt was tried twice for the crime, with hung juries both times. But many think Blatt got away with murder, and the crime remains unsolved. Wild, wild stuff. 

Read the gripping tale today. It’s great work. And if you’d rather watch a video, click below:

Watch Guide

📺 Soccer: Paris Saint-Germain vs. Aston Villa3 p.m. ET on Paramount+This is the UEFA Super Cup, which pits the previous Champions League winner against the Europa League victors. Don’t take this too seriously, as these teams’ stars are still returning from World Cup duty. But it’s still a trophy at stake. 

📺 MLB: Mariners at Yankees7 p.m. ET on ESPNWe’re back for another night in the Bronx, and the game is still meaningful for both teams. Will Warren starts for the Yanks tonight after being subject to one of the stranger trade deadline sagas.

📺 WPBL: Queens vs. Firebells7:30 p.m. ET on ESPN+Let’s make it a full baseball evening. The Queens are tops in the league right now at 3-1. Check this out if you haven’t yet.

Pulse Picks

Amar’e Stoudemire will enter the Basketball Hall of Fame this weekend. But at one point, over 20 years ago, he was a secret talent, so good that the Suns decided to hide him. 

Who’s freaking out this NBA offseason? Zach Harper has answers. 

Michael Silver chatted with new Giants coach John Harbaugh and came away convinced the G-Men will be better, immediately, this year. Compelling. 

To be clear, Ralph Russo wasn’t talking about the best college football teams ever when he wrote this story. But he did proclaim last year’s Indiana team as the most legitimate national champion ever. See if you agree.

The sprinting stroller dad is here. Rebecca Tauber scored an interview with Stephen Biebelhausen, who still seems shocked about becoming a world-record holder. 

Jeff Bezos, Liverpool owner? We explained what’s really going on at one of the world’s biggest soccer clubs. 

Most-clicked in the newsletter yesterday: Candace Buckner’s excellent column on the tense moment in the WNBA. 

Most-read on the website yesterday: ☝️