Mason Rudolph leads Titans to first win of season, 31-12 over Dolphins after Will Levis is injured

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — Mason Rudolph led seven scoring drives after starter Will Levis left with a shoulder injury, and the Tennessee Titans beat the Miami Dolphins 31-12 on Monday night.

Rudolph threw for 85 yards and completed 9 of 17 passes in relief of Levis, who attempted just four passes before running and diving for a first down on Tennessee's second drive and coming down hard on his right throwing shoulder.

He stood on the sideline with his helmet but didn't return.

Nick Folk made field goals of 53, 52, 47, 51 and 29 yards for the Titans, who won their first game of the season. Running back Tyjae Spears took a direct snap and ran it in for a 7-yard touchdown. Tony Pollard had a 4-yard touchdown run to go with 88 yards on 22 carries.

Tyler Huntley, who signed with the Dolphins on Sept. 17 off Baltimore's practice squad, ran for a touchdown and had 96 passing yards. But the Dolphins' offense continued to struggle without Tua Tagovailoa, who remains on injured reserve with a concussion.

Huntley was named starter on Saturday, as No. 2 quarterback Skylar Thompson nurses a rib injury.

Huntley brought the Dolphins (1-3) within 10 when he scored on a 1-yard run with 3:40 left. He was intercepted on the two-point conversion attempt, and the Titans recovered the ensuing onside kick.

Huntley was called for intentional grounding in the end zone on Miami's last effort at a comeback, adding two more points for the Titans.

Tyreek Hill was held under 50 yards receiving for the third straight game with 23 yards on four catches.

Titans receiver DeAndre Hopkins was also quiet with two catches for 31 yards.

Levis threw for 25 yards with an interception before the injury.

Linebacker Emmanuel Ogbah intercepted Levis and secured the ball between his knees to end a promising opening drive for the Titans.

The Dolphins gave it right back when Huntley threw a backward pass to Hill that went off the receiver's finger tips. It was initially ruled an incomplete pass but after review, it was overturned to a fumble that Tennessee recovered.

That was the first takeaway of the season for the Titans, who entered the game with a minus-7 turnover differential.

It was also the first of numerous miscues for the Dolphins: two players in motion at the snap multiple times, uncharacteristic drops by playmakers and an overall inability to sustain drives.

A puzzling sequence happened just before halftime. Miami got the ball after forcing a punt with about a minute left in the second. Defensive tackle Calais Campbell got a hand on the ball as Ryan Stonehouse tried to boot it away. Linebacker Duke Riley then tried to grab the bouncing punt but appeared to lose it in a scrum.

After a lengthy review, officials ruled that Tennessee touched the ball first, giving the Dolphins possession.

They did nothing with it, instead handing it back to the Titans after Huntley couldn't corral a bad snap.

Rudolph then moved the Tennessee offense into field goal territory and spiked it with 1 second left. Folk made his third field goal of the night.

It all led to loud boos coming from the crowd at Hard Rock Stadium as the Dolphins headed to halftime trailing 9-3 and were held without a touchdown for the eighth straight quarter.

The Dolphins have not led a game at all this season. Their only win came in the opener on a walk-off field goal by Jason Sanders. Sanders made kicks of 44 and 56 yards.

INJURIES

Titans: NT Keondre Coburn left with a knee injury in the first quarter and did not return.

Dolphins: RB Jeff Wilson Jr. injured his knee in pregame warmups and did not play. ... LB Jaelan Phillips left in the third quarter with a knee injury and did not return. Phillips, who suffered a torn Achilles tendon last season, hit the turf several times when he went down and threw his helmet in frustration.

UP NEXT

Titans: Have a bye Sunday, then host the Colts on Oct. 13.

Dolphins: At Patriots on Sunday.

AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl

Miami Dolphins quarterback Tyler Huntley (18) celebrates his touchdown with tight end Jonnu Smith (9) during the second half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Brennan Asplen)

Miami Dolphins quarterback Tyler Huntley (18) goes after the ball after a bad snap during the first half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Miami Dolphins place kicker Jason Sanders (7) kicks a field goal as punter Jake Bailey (16) holds the ball during the first half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Brennan Asplen)

Miami Dolphins linebacker Emmanuel Ogbah (91) intercepts a pass during the first half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Brennan Asplen)

Miami Dolphins wide receiver Jaylen Waddle (17) talks to wide receiver Tyreek Hill (10) during the first half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Tennessee Titans linebacker Kenneth Murray Jr. (56) grabs Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill (10) during the first half of an NFL football game, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Brennan Asplen)

Tennessee Titans quarterback Mason Rudolph (11) aims a pass during the first half of an NFL football game against the Miami Dolphins, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Tennessee Titans running back Tony Pollard (20) runs the ball during the first half of an NFL football game against the Miami Dolphins, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Tennessee Titans safety Amani Hooker (37) goes after Miami Dolphins quarterback Tyler Huntley (18) during the first half of an NFL football game, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Tennessee Titans quarterback Mason Rudolph (11) aims a pass during the second half of an NFL football game against the Miami Dolphins, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

NEW YORK (AP) — Pete Rose, baseball’s career hits leader and fallen idol who undermined his historic achievements and Hall of Fame dreams by gambling on the game he loved and once embodied, has died. He was 83.

Stephanie Wheatley, a spokesperson for Clark County in Nevada, confirmed on behalf of the medical examiner that Rose died Monday. Wheatley said his cause and manner of death had not yet been determined.

For fans who came of age in the 1960s and ‘70s, no player was more exciting than the Cincinnati Reds’ No. 14, “Charlie Hustle,” the brash superstar with shaggy hair and muscular forearms. At the dawn of artificial surfaces, divisional play and free agency, Rose was old school, a conscious throwback to baseball’s early days. Millions could never forget him crouched and scowling at the plate, running full speed to first even after drawing a walk, or sprinting for the next base and diving headfirst into the bag.

Major League Baseball, which banished him in 1989, issued a brief statement expressing condolences and noting his “greatness, grit and determination on the field of play.” Reds principal owner and managing partner Bob Castellini said in a statement that Rose was “one of the fiercest competitors the game has ever seen” and added: “We must never forget what he accomplished.”

A 17-time All-Star, the switch-hitting Rose played on three World Series winners. He was the National League MVP in 1973 and World Series MVP two years later. He holds the major league record for games played (3,562) and plate appearances (15,890) and the NL record for the longest hitting streak (44). He was the leadoff man for one of baseball’s most formidable lineups with the Reds’ championship teams of 1975 and 1976, with teammates that included Hall of Famers Johnny Bench, Tony Perez and Joe Morgan.

But no milestone approached his 4,256 hits, breaking his hero Ty Cobb’s 4,191 and signifying his excellence no matter the notoriety which followed. It was a total so extraordinary that you could average 200 hits for 20 years and still come up short. Rose’s secret was consistency, and longevity. Over 24 seasons, all but six played entirely with the Reds, Rose had 200 hits or more 10 times, and more than 180 four other times. He batted .303 overall, even while switching from second base to outfield to third to first, and he led the league in hits seven times.

“Every summer, three things are going to happen,” Rose liked to say, “the grass is going to get green, the weather is going to get hot, and Pete Rose is going to get 200 hits and bat .300.”

Rose reached 1,000 hits in 1968, 2,000 just five years later and 3,000 just five years after that. He moved into second place, ahead of Hank Aaron, with hit No. 3,772, in 1982. No. 4,000 was off the Phillies’ Jerry Koosman in 1984, exactly 21 years to the day after his first hit. He caught up with Cobb on Sept. 8, 1985, and surpassed him three days later, in Cincinnati, with Rose’s mother and teenage son, Pete Jr., among those in attendance.

Rose was 44 and the team’s player-manager. Batting left-handed against the San Diego Padres’ Eric Show in the first inning, he smacked a 2-1 slider into left field, a clean single. The crowd of 47,000-plus stood and yelled. The game was halted to celebrate. Rose was given the ball and the first base bag, then wept openly on the shoulder of first base coach and former teammate, Tommy Helms. He told Pete Jr., who would later play briefly for the Reds: “I love you, and I hope you pass me.” He thought of his late father, a star athlete himself who had pushed him to play sports since childhood. And he thought of Cobb, the dead-ball era slasher whom Rose so emulated that he named another son Tyler.

Baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth, watching from New York, declared that Rose had “reserved a prominent spot in Cooperstown.” After the game, a 2-0 win for the Reds in which Rose scored both runs, he received a phone call from President Ronald Reagan.

“Your reputation and legacy are secure,” Reagan told him. “It will be a long time before anyone is standing in the spot where you’re standing now.”

Four years later, he was gone.

On March 20, 1989, Ueberroth (who would soon be succeeded by A. Bartlett Giamatti) announced that his office was conducting a “full inquiry into serious allegations” about Rose. Reports emerged that he had been relying on a network of bookies and friends and others in the gambling world to place bets on baseball games, including some with the Reds. Rose denied any wrongdoing, but the investigation found that the “accumulated testimony of witnesses, together with the documentary evidence and telephone records reveal extensive betting activity by Pete Rose in connection with professional baseball and, in particular, Cincinnati Reds games, during the 1985, 1986, and 1987 baseball seasons.”

In August 1989, at a New York press conference, Giamatti spoke some of the saddest words in baseball history: “One of the game’s greatest players has engaged in a variety of acts which have stained the game, and he must now live with the consequences of those acts.” Giamatti announced that Rose had agreed to a lifetime ban from baseball, a decision that in 1991 the Hall of Fame would rule left him ineligible for induction. Rose attempted to downplay the news, insisting that he had never bet on baseball and that he would eventually be reinstated.

In the beginning, it was all about the game. He was a Cincinnati native from a working-class neighborhood whose father, Harry Francis Rose, like the father of Mickey Mantle, taught his son to be a switch hitter. Rose mastered his skills with a broom handle and a rubber ball, thrown to him by his younger brother, Dave.

Pete Rose graduated from high school in June 1960. He flew to Rochester, New York, two days later, and then rode a bus some 45 miles to Geneva, home of the Reds’ level D minor league team. By 1962, he had been promoted to level A, in Macon, Georgia. He batted .330 and vowed to displace Reds second baseman Don Blasingame in 1963, telling a reporter “I’m going to be on his heels.”

Blasingame was with the Washington Senators by midseason and Rose was a phenomenon: “Charlie Hustle,” Yankees pitcher Whitey Ford reportedly called him, mockingly, after watching him hurry to first upon drawing a walk in spring training. Rose hit .273 as a rookie and, starting in 1965, batted .300 or higher 14 out of 15 seasons. He was so dependable that in 1968, the “Year of the Pitcher,” he led the league with a .335 average, one of three batting titles.

In his post-baseball life, he did make it to a few honorary associations. The Reds voted him into the team’s Hall of Fame in 2016, the year before a bronze sculpture of Rose’s iconic slide was unveiled outside of Cincinnati’s Great American Ball Park.

Rose the man was never inducted into Cooperstown, but his career was well-represented. Items at the Baseball Hall include his helmet from his MVP 1973 season, the bat he used in 1978 when his hitting streak reached 44 and the cleats he wore, in 1985, on the day he became the game’s hits king.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB

FILE - Former Cincinnati Reds player Pete Rose waves to fans after being introduced during the Reds Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, July 15, 2023, in Cincinnati. (AP Photo/Darron Cummings, File)

FILE - Former Philadelphia Phillies player Pete Rose tips his hat to fans during an alumni day, Aug. 7, 2022, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

FILE - Former Philadelphia Phillies player Pete Rose tips his hat to fans during an alumni day, Aug. 7, 2022, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

FILE - Cincinnati's Pete Rose watches the ball sail toward the right field bleachers in fourth inning of twi-nighter nightcap against the Dodgers in Cincinnati, Sept. 24, 1969. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - Former Philadelphia Phillies player Pete Rose at a baseball game, Aug. 7, 2022, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

FILE - Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds in action at the bat against the Atlanta Braves in Atlanta, Aug. 2, 1978. At left is Atlanta catcher Joe Nolan. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds in action at the bat against the Atlanta Braves in Atlanta, Aug. 2, 1978. At left is Atlanta catcher Joe Nolan. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - Philadelphia Phillies' Pete Rose slides to third base during a baseball game against the New York Mets in Philadelphia, June 3, 1981. (AP Photo/Rusty Kennedy, File)