BASEBALL
Josh Ockimey, who played parts of two seasons with the Portland Sea Dogs, hit a pair of home runs against his former team to lift the Reading Fightin Phils to a 6-4 win in an Eastern League game at Hadlock Field on Saturday.
Ockimey hit a two-run home run in the first inning and hit another two-run shot in the eighth after the Sea Dogs had rallied to tie the game in the bottom of the seventh.
Hudson Potts was 3 for 3 with two doubles and two RBI for Portland.
Chris Murphy started for the Sea Dogs and allowed two runs on three hits, while striking out 10 and walking three in six innings.
BASKETBALL
NBA: The Philadelphia 76ers were fined $50,000 by the NBA for violating league injury reporting rules in failing to disclose Joel Embiid’s participation status in an accurate and timely manner.
Embiid returned Friday night after missing the first two games of the Eastern Conference semifinals against Miami because of a right orbital fracture and a mild concussion. He had 18 points to help Philadelphia win 99-79 and cut it series deficit to 2-1.
SOCCER
PREMIER LEAGUE: Chelsea will be sold to a consortium fronted by Los Angeles Dodgers part-owner Todd Boehly, ending 19 years of ownership and lavish investment by Roman Abramovich until the Russian oligarch was sanctioned and forced to offload the English Premier League club over the war in Ukraine.
The sale price of $3.1 billion for the reigning Club World Cup winner and 2021 European champion is the most lucrative ever for a sports team worldwide but Abramovich cannot receive the proceeds, which he hopes will go to a foundation for the victims of the war. A further $2.2 billion has been committed to invest in Chelsea’s teams and stadiums after two months of rapid negotiations to sell the west London club since Russia invaded Ukraine.
After several rival bids were rejected, Chelsea said on Saturday that buyout terms were agreed with a consortium that features Boehly along with Dodgers principal owner Mark Walter, Swiss billionaire Hansjorg Wyss and funding from private equity firm Clearlake Capital.
The Premier League must approve them as the new ownership and the government has to sign off under the terms of the license that allows Chelsea to continue operating as a business through May 31 while being one of Abramovich’s frozen assets.
On Saturday, Chelsea’s prospective new ownership watched Romelu Lukaku score his first English Premier League goals in 2022 before the team collapsed to 2-2 against Wolverhampton, leaving work still to do to wrap up Champions League qualification.
• Burnley’s relegation woes deepened after losing to Aston Villa 3-1 in the English Premier League for the team’s first defeat under interim manager Mike Jackson.
Steven Gerrard’s Villa did both Everton and Leeds a big favor by ripping Burnley apart. Emi Buendia made the most of only his second start since February with a goal and an assist after coming in for the dropped Philippe Coutinho.
• Watford became the second team to be relegated from the English Premier League after losing at Crystal Palace 1-0.
Even if Roy Hodgson’s team won at Selhurst Park, it was still highly likely to go down. But survival was no longer mathematically possible after Wilfried Zaha’s match-clinching penalty in the 30th minute.
• Brentford scored two early goals in a 3-0 victory over Southampton to boost the club’s hopes of a top-half finish in its first season in the English Premier League.
Pontus Jansson and Yoane Wissa scored within a minute of each other.
• Manchester United lost its fifth straight game, losing 4-0 to Brighton.
With just one game left this season – at Crystal Palace in two weeks – United has little to play for in a fifth straight season without a trophy.
MLS: Erik Hurtado scored the equalizer for the Columbus Crew in a 2-2 draw with the New England Revolution in Foxborough, Massachusetts.
Hurtado’s tying goal came in the 89th minute for the Crew (3-3-4). Derrick Etienne had an assist on the goal.
DeJuan Jones and Adam Buksa scored one goal each for the Revolution (3-5-2).
The Revolution outshot the Crew 11-7. Both teams had four shots on goal.
Matt Turner saved two of the four shots he faced for the Revolution. Eloy Room had two saves for the Crew.
AUTO RACING
NASCAR XFINITY: Justin Allgaier put JR Motorsports in victory lane for the third consecutive week in the Xfinity Series by winning at Darlington Raceway.
Allgaier ended a 34-race winless streak when he passed AJ Allmendinger to start a two-lap sprint following a caution and cruised the final 2.7 miles to give team owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. another victory in NASCAR’s second-tier feeder series.
FORMULA ONE: Ferrari stormed to the front of the grid for the inaugural Miami Grand Prix as Formula One championship leader Charles Leclerc and teammate Carlos Sainz Jr. locked up the front row in qualifying.
It’s the first time Ferrari will lead the field to green in the United States since Michael Schumacher won the pole at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 2006. It’s the first front row this season for Sainz, who has been outqualified by Leclerc in all five sessions.
TENNIS
MADRID OPEN: After defeating his idol Rafael Nadal in the quarterfinals on Friday, 19-year-old Carlos Alcaraz rallied to beat top-ranked Novak Djokovic 6-7 (5), 7-5, 7-6 (5) after more than 3 1/2 hours on Saturday to reach the Madrid Open final.
He will face defending champion Alexander Zverev, who defeated Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-4, 3-6, 6-2. The second-seeded German player converted three of his five break opportunities to clinch the victory in nearly two hours in match that ended after 1 a.m. local time.
In the women’s final, Ons Jabeur of Tunisia won her biggest career title by defeating Jessica Pegula of the U.S. in three sets.
Jabeur, the first Arab woman in the top 10, won 7-5, 0-6, 6-3 for her second career title.
GOLF
PGA TOUR: Keegan Bradley shot the lowest score for the second straight day, a 3-under 67 that gave him a three-day total of 8-under 202 and a two-shot lead over Max Homa at the Wells Fargo Championship in British Open weather on a U.S. Open-style course.
EUROPEAN TOUR: Thorbjorn Olesen finished eagle-birdie to shoot 3-under 69 and take a three-stroke lead into the final round of the British Masters in Sutton Coldfield, England, as he bids for a first win in four years.
The Danish golfer broke a four-way tie for the lead on Saturday after almost holing his approach from 242 yards on the par-5 17th hole. He tapped in from two feet for a second eagle of the day and holed a birdie putt from 23 feet at the last.
Olesen was 11 under overall, with third-round leader Hurly Long (73) and Marcus Armitage (70) the nearest challengers on 8 under. American Chase Hanna was part of a five-man group a further shot behind after shooting 66, the lowest round of the day at the Belfry.
CYCLING
GIRO D’ITALIA: A storming time trial from Simon Yates saw the British rider win the second stage of the Giro d’Italia while Mathieu van der Poel kept hold of the pink jersey on Saturday.
Yates, one of the title favorites, clocked 11 minutes, 50 seconds on the 6-mile individual time trial through Budapest, Hungary, that included a steep uphill finish. Van der Poel, who won Friday’s opening stage, was last down the ramp and the Dutch cyclist came close to claiming a second successive stage win on his Giro debut but finished three seconds behind Yates.
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