Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. Can you believe Katie Ledecky had a 14-year winning streak end this weekend?
In today’s SI:AM:
🏈 How Caleb Williams turned things around
⚾ Dodgers still scuffling
🏀 NBA teams with worst schedules
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Time to restart the Hall of Fame clock?
Aaron Donald’s potential return to the NFL is starting to look a lot less hypothetical.
Donald worked out with the Rams at their practice facility on Sunday in what was officially listed as a “tryout” on the NFL’s transaction report. It’s the second time this month that the future Hall of Famer has taken the field with his former team as he weighs coming out of retirement.
Renewed speculation that Donald might make a comeback first started percolating in early June, the day after the Rams pulled off a blockbuster trade to acquire superstar pass rusher Myles Garrett from the Browns.
“If Aaron decides he wants to dust them off at the age of 35, I bet you he could still do it at a pretty high clip,” Rams coach Sean McVay said at Garrett’s introductory press conference on June 2.
A Donald comeback became far less theoretical when he took the field on Aug. 4 for a workout with pads and a helmet. McVay was asked about Donald in his press conference following Saturday’s preseason game and said that the team is not rushing Donald to make a decision.
Donald, who turned 35 in May, hasn’t played since the end of the 2023 season. He went out on top, as he was named first team All-Pro for the eighth time in his 10-year career. His somewhat premature retirement raised eyebrows at the time, but he wasn’t hounded by constant comeback speculation until the Rams added Garrett. The prospect of joining Garrett to form one of the best pass rush duos of all time might be too tempting for Donald to pass up, though.
The Rams might not be rushing Donald to make a decision, but the calendar is not in his favor. If Donald wants to get any full-speed reps in a game environment before the start of the regular season, he has less than two weeks to end his retirement and sign in time to play in one of the team’s remaining two preseason games (Aug. 22 and 27). The deadline for teams to cut their rosters down to the regular-season 53-man limit is Aug. 30.
It’s clear from the way McVay and others in the Rams organization have spoken about Donald that the decision is entirely up to the player. The team would welcome him back if he decides he wants to suit up, even if it has been nearly three years since he last took the field. If Donald does feel comfortable being on the field after such a long layoff, then why wouldn’t he want to join a Super Bowl contender and team up with another of the greatest defensive linemen of his generation?
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The top five…
… things I saw yesterday:
5. Noah Cameron’s changeup to strike out Mike Trout and finish off a complete-game, one-hit shutout. It was just the eighth complete-game shutout in the majors this season and the fourth one-hitter. Cameron, a 27-year-old Royals starter, is just the fifth different pitcher to throw at least 115 pitches in a game this season. (Dylan Cease did it twice.)
4. A great play Royals second baseman Michael Massey to take away a hit and preserve Cameron’s no-hit bid in the sixth inning.
3. Thomas Müller’s goal for the Vancouver Whitecaps on a rarely seen indirect free kick inside the penalty area. (Here’s some more info on this uncommon soccer oddity.)
2. Rafael Devers’s home run into McCovey Cove on a pitch that was way outside the zone.
1. Avery Patterson’s perfect assist and Clarissa Larisey’s difficult finish to score for the Houston Dash. Here’s another angle of Larisey’s one-touch finish. She also scored the winning goal on a header in stoppage time.
