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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. 

NEW YORK — Former UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski takes on interim champion Yair Rodriguez in a unification match in the main event atop the UFC 290 PPV card on Saturday night, July 8th. 

Hoops Cabaret (48 West 33 Street), called the world’s sexiest sports bar, will be showing the fight live on its numerous HD TVs and huge Mega-Tron Video Wall. The Hoops Cabaret girls will also host one of their famous After-Party events.

Volkanovski is currently MMA Fighting’s No. 2 ranked pound-for-pound male fighter in the sport. He’s looking for his fifth consecutive title defense after falling short against Islam Makhachev in his bid for two-division glory this past February. To do so he’ll have to get past Rodriguez, who captured the interim title with a second-round submission of Josh Emmett.

Co-headliner on the card is Brandon Moreno defending his flyweight strap in a rematch against Alexandre Pantoja.

Located just one block from Madison Square Garden, Hoops Cabaret combines the fun of a sports bar with the excitement of a gentlemen’s club. It’s a great place to watch all sporting events. “Come make it rain on all the sexy girls,” said Hoops girl Nadia. “And don’t miss the after-party, it’s sure to be amazing.” 

HOOPS Cabaret and Sports Bar

Highly Recommended

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.”  

Seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady is reportedly “in deep discussions to become a limited partner of the Las Vegas Raiders,” sources with knowledge of the situation say.

The reported move would be Brady’s second partnership with Raiders owner Mark Davis, having previously acquired an ownership interest in the defending WNBA champion Las Vegas Aces in March.

“NFL legend Tom Brady is in deep discussions to become a limited partner of the Las Vegas Raiders, potentially his second foray into a partnership with Raiders’ owner Mark Davis on a professional sports franchise in less than two months.” 

Brady is set to become FOX Sports‘ lead NFL analyst beginning after the conclusion of his playing career, but has publicly stated that he won’t start until 2024, taking the next year to spend time with his family and prepare for the job. The San Mateo native is the NFL’s all-time passing leader for yards and touchdowns, as well as quarterback wins, among numerous other records.

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 off season 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. 

The Atlanta Braves came back against the New York Mets for the third time in the series, completing a dramatic sweep against the NL East rival as the Braves walked it off, 13-10, in ten innings. 

As Atlanta improves to 38-24, the Mets drop their sixth straight game and continue their free-fall in the NL East standings.

An Ozzie Albies three-run home run sealed the deal after an Orlando Arcia homer in the bottom of the ninth was enough to force extra innings.

The rivalry continues to get more and more one-sided. After seeing several fans and media members react poorly to the first two games of the series, it will be interesting to see the fallout from the completed sweep. 

On the Mets broadcast, the postgame show brought up phrases that you never want to hear as a fan like “there’s a lot of season left,’ or “if things don’t turn up, changes need to be made.” 

To make matters worse for the Mets, this is the first time in their history that they have lost 3 consecutive games games when they held a 3-run lead. They’ve been playing baseball since 1962.

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.