The Sports Report: It’s unanimous -- Shohei Ohtani is the AL MVP

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From Sarah Valenzuela: Shohei Ohtani seemed like his own biggest competition most of the year. Not even a season derailed by injuries that affected his two-way abilities could have stopped him from winning his second American League most valuable player award.

“I think the balance of pitching and hitting was really good,” Ohtani said in Japanese on MLB Network’s broadcast Thursday. “I think I was able to do that at a higher level. I wasn’t able to play until the end, and I think that might be my only regret.”

Ohtani won the award, given by the Baseball Writers Assn. of America, by a unanimous vote. Texas Rangers teammates Corey Seager and Marcus Semien finished second and third in the voting, respectively.

Ohtani won his first MVP award in 2021 and finished second in 2022. He is the first player in MLB history to be a unanimous MVP twice. Ohtani’s latest award caps a season in which he was also named AL Outstanding Player, in the Players Choice awards, and won his second Silver Slugger award.

“Congrats on an epic year and well deserved MVP,” Angels outfielder Mike Trout, a three-time AL MVP, tweeted Thursday. “Proud of you, brother!”

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Unanimous winners of the AL MVP award:

Hank Greenberg, Detroit (1935)
Al Rosen, Cleveland (1953)
Mickey Mantle, New York (1956)
Frank Robinson, Baltimore (1966)
Denny McLain, Detroit (1968)
Reggie Jackson, Oakland (1973)
Jose Canseco, Oakland (1988)
Frank Thomas, Chicago (1993)
Ken Griffey Jr., Seattle (1997)
Mike Trout, Angels (2014)
Shohei Ohtani, Angels (2021)
Shohei Ohtani, Angels (2023)

Multiple AL MVP award winners

Three times
Jimmie Foxx (1932-33, 1938)
Joe DiMaggio (1939, 1941, 1947)
Yogi Berra (1951, 1954-55)
Mickey Mantle (1956-57, 1962)
Alex Rodriguez (2003, 2005, 2007)
Mike Trout (2014, 2016, 2019)

Two times
Hank Greenberg (1935, 1940)
Hal Newhouser (1944-45)
Ted Williams (1946, 1949)
Roger Maris (1960-61)
Robin Yount (1982, 1989)
Cal Ripken Jr. (1983, 1991)
Frank Thomas (1993-94)
Juan Gonzalez (1996, 1998)
Miguel Cabrera (2012-13)
Shohei Ohtani (2021, 2023).

UCLA VS. USC FOOTBALL

From Ben Bolch: One play remained. Rivalry revelry was assured.

UCLA was bludgeoning USC at the Rose Bowl a quarter of a century ago.

Ahead by three scores, taking a knee or running up the middle would have been the humane thing to do, even against those terrible Trojans.

Cade McNown leaned into the huddle and relayed the play. As the clock ticked below 20 seconds, the Bruins quarterback stepped behind center and took the snap. He faked a pitch and took off in the other direction, no one there to protect him.

It was a naked bootleg, and a timeless kick in the rear.

“I mean, I still f— hate Cade McNown,” former USC fullback Petros Papadakis said this week with a hearty laugh.

No one on the Trojans’ sideline found any humor in it on that warm afternoon in November 1998. Scrunching his face in disgust, USC coach Paul Hackett yelled for someone to wallop that barbaric Bruin. Safety Rashard Cook finally complied, bringing McNown down at the end of a 23-yard run that completed UCLA’s 34-17 victory in unsavory fashion.

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CHARGERS

From Jeff Miller: His team had just beaten its L.A. rivals, the Chargers pushing their win streak to four and reveling in the postseason berth clinched along the way.

Brandon Staley stood before the assembled media inside SoFi Stadium and talked about the good things suddenly happening all at once.

“A big thing that we’ve been emphasizing is just the finish in our football team,” he said, “and finding our best here down the stretch.”

Ten-and-a-half months later, Staley now is facing daily ridicule that’s emphasizing he might be finished.

From that New Year’s Day to this Thanksgiving week, Staley’s Chargers have been foiled by a questionable decision, an historic playoff meltdown and a defense that’s become increasingly difficult to defend.

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LAKERS

From Helene Elliott: The Lakers had fallen 24 points behind Sacramento through three quarters Wednesday in the second game of a back-to-back sequence, but coach Darvin Ham wasn’t ready to concede and move on to the next game in their tightly compacted calendar.

Ham sent out starters LeBron James, Anthony Davis, Cam Reddish and D’Angelo Russell, along with Austin Reaves, to begin the fourth quarter. It was worth a shot, Ham figured, to see if they could cut down on their turnovers and throw the Kings off by going to a zone defense. Maybe they could rely on their competitive instincts to get back into a game they had never led.

“I told them at the break at the end of the third, we’ve got about four or five minutes to see if we can do something and dig into this lead, minimize the deficit,” Ham said.

“Whenever we get stops, we take care of the ball, we’re usually fine. And I know the amount of scoring that we have on our team, particularly those five guys that finished for us, so you’ve got to give them a chance to see what they can do.”

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CLIPPERS

From Andrew Greif: Three weeks into the NBA season, only two teams have yet to win a game decided in the final minutes.

One is the Washington Wizards, a rebuilding team for whom struggles were predictable.

The other is the championship-aspirant Clippers, whose inability to close out close games is but one of several issues contributing to a 3-7 start, including six consecutive losses.

The Clippers are 0-5 in games within five points in the last five minutes, the NBA’s self-defined “clutch” time. Even Memphis, which owns the league’s worst record, owns two such wins — including outlasting the Clippers by four on Sunday.

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FORMULA ONE IN VEGAS

From Sam Farmer: Sin City is ready for a Formula One redo.

After 41 years, Formula One racing is back in the splashiest of ways with the Las Vegas Grand Prix and a course that runs down the Las Vegas Strip, as opposed to the flop of a first try from 1981-82.

That version was held in the parking lot of Caesars Palace and in sweltering heat.

There’s a three-year contract for the current race, which starts at 10 p.m. PT Saturday and finishes at 1 a.m. PT Sunday, although F1 has agreed to support the race for at least 10 years. Las Vegas officials are hoping for a “lifetime partnership.”

A look at some of the curiosities and challenges surrounding the event:

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KINGS

Kevin Fiala had a goal and an assist, Anze Kopitar scored on the power play and the Kings halted the Florida Panthers’ five-game winning streak with a 2-1 victory on Thursday night.

Cam Talbot made 30 saves, and the Kings won in their own building for the second time in eight games.

Sam Reinhart scored for the third straight game, Sergei Bobrovsky allowed two goals on 26 shots, and the explosive Panthers were held to their lowest scoring output since being shut out at Minnesota in their season opener on Oct. 12.

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Kings box score

NHL scores

NHL standings

THIS DATE IN SPORTS

1956 — Syracuse beats Colgate 61-7 behind halfback Jim Brown. Brown sets an NCAA-record for points by an individual player in a single game by scoring six touchdowns and kicking seven extra points for 43 points.

1959 — Syracuse’s Connie Dierking becomes the first player to foul out of a game in the first quarter, as the Nationals beat Cincinnati 121-116 at New York.

1968 — The “Heidi” television special starts on time and cuts off the NBC broadcast of the Oakland-New York Jets game in the final minutes, leaving viewers in the dark and unaware that the Raiders score two touchdowns in the last minute for a 43-32 comeback victory.

1981 — Bill Cartwright of the New York Knicks ties a 20-year-old NBA record by hitting 19 of 19 free throws in a 124-110 loss to the Kansas City Kings.

1990 — David Klingler of Houston throws an NCAA-record 11 touchdown passes as the Cougars trounce Eastern Washington 84-21. Klingler completes 41 of 58 passes for 572 yards and ties the NCAA record for touchdown passes in a season with 47.

1991 — Detroit offensive lineman Mike Utley suffers a spinal injury on the first play of the fourth quarter of a 21-10 victory over the Los Angeles Rams and is left paralyzed from the chest down.

2000 — Jason Kidd has a dubious quadruple-double — 18 points, 12 rebounds, 10 assists and 14 turnovers in the Phoenix Suns’ 90-85 loss to the New York Knicks. The turnovers tie the NBA record set by Atlanta’s John Drew on March 1, 1978.

2001 — Lennox Lewis knocks out Hasim Rahman in the fourth round to get back his WBC and IBF heavyweight titles. Rahman’s championship reign of 209 days is the shortest in heavyweight history.

2004 — New Orleans ties an NBA low by taking just two foul shots in a 95-84 loss to Phoenix.

2007 — Martin Brodeur becomes the second goalie in NHL history to win 500 games by stopping 26 shots in New Jersey’s 6-2 win at Philadelphia. Patrick Roy won 551 games in his career.

2013 — Jimmie Johnson wins his sixth Sprint Cup championship in eight years. Johnson, who needed only to finish 23rd or better to wrap up the title, finishes ninth.

2013 — Sebastian Vettel wins the U.S. Grand Prix in easy fashion, setting an F1 season record with his eighth straight victory behind another blistering drive that gave the field no chance to catch him.

2014 — Amber Orrange makes a go-ahead jumper with 1:38 left in overtime and the tying three-pointer with 1.4 seconds remaining in regulation, sending No. 6 Stanford to an 88-86 victory against top-ranked Connecticut to snap the Huskies’ 47-game winning streak. UConn, which went 40-0 last season, loses for the first time since falling to Notre Dame in the 2013 conference tournament.

Compiled by the Associated Press