pearlman Page index.xml - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Magic Johnson and the Showtime Lakers not liking HBO’s <i>Winning Time</i> is what made it so good
On Oct. 1, 2006, Marlo Stanfield infamously told a security guard at a grocery store on Monroe Street in Baltimore, Maryland, “You want it to be one way. But it’s the other way.” Who would have known that 17 years later, the words from one of the most important characters from HBO’s best show — The ...

<i>Winning Time</i> is the latest casualty of David Zaslav’s sports media bloodbath at WBD
On Monday, the guillotine hovering over HBO’s Winning Time finally dropped when the series joined a growing collection of shows canceled by the network. Declining ratings and criticism from its stars, who insisted that Adam McKay’s Lakers series based on Jeff Pearlman’s biographical account, turned ...

<i>Hard Knocks</i>: These magic tricks were more interesting than Aaron Rodgers or the Jets
A break from the Aaron Rodgers Variety Hour was needed at the start of the second episode of Hard Knocks. There is plenty of footage of him being chummy, playful, and even the passive-aggressive side of him that surely gets old with his coworkers after a while. The New York Jets and HBO viewing audi...

Donald Trump's 10 best sports moments
Donald Trump has been officially indicted by a grand jury and is currently being processed in a New York Court house. That means that soon, we’ll learn what, exactly, Trump has been charged with and we might even get a mugshot (oh please, oh please). ...

That time Bo Jackson tried to kill Kevin Seitzer
In the summer of 1986, Bo Jackson and Kevin Seitzer played side-by-side on the Memphis Chicks, the Kansas City Double-A farm team. And although there wasn’t any noticeable animosity, the men — now teammates on the 1988 Royals — shared little in common. Unlike Jackson, blessed by the Gods to be an at...

Cale Gundy is the latest example of white America’s obsession with the N-word
For Eve, it was the forbidden fruit. For Cale Gundy, it was the N-word. Entitlement is the downfall of people who aren’t satisfied with having everything....

<em>Winning Time</em> ‘The Swan’ a review
For Americans, but specifically African-Americans, 1991 was a hell of a year....

Let’s talk the Lakers, the Magic and HBO's '<em>Winning Time'</em><em></em>
Before the Los Angeles Lakers drafted Earvin “Magic” Johnson with the first overall pick in 1979, the league was on the verge of a fate worse than death — irrelevancy. ...

Magic wants no part of scripted series about the Showtime Lakers
It’s a shame that Magic Johnson wants no part of this new HBO series about the Showtime Los Angeles Lakers of the 1980s. The trailer for Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty, was released in early December, and the series will debut on HBO Max in March 2022....

USFL may be back, but without the fool who ruined it the first time
In case you missed the news, the USFL is back!...

Don’t expect the upcoming Lakers docuseries to be the next <em>Last Dance</em>
2022 will be the “Year of the Lakers.” Not on the court, necessarily, but definitely on our television screens....

Which team played the villain role best?
With the Houston Astros now wearing the crown as the most hated team in professional sports — as indicated by the chorus of boos and piercing screams of “CHEATER!” that rang through the Oakland Coliseum (whatever ridiculous name it has today) last night on Opening Day (ahh… welcome back baseball, an...

Before Trump tried to tank democracy, he tanked the USFL
When it comes to Donald Trump and all the batshit-crazy, Jonestown-esque nonsense he’s pulled over the past four years, the word “unprecedented” is often attached....

Brett Favre's Vikings Had A "Bounty" Program Too
This excerpt from Gunslinger: The Remarkable, Improbable, Iconic Life of Brett Favre by Jeff Pearlman is reprinted with the permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Buy it here. ...

Greatest Inbounder, Dumbest Guy, And Other Unsung Heroes Of Showtime
My interview with Jeff Pearlman, author of Showtime: Magic, Kareem, Riley, and the Los Angeles Lakers Dynasty of the 1980s, which was recently excerpted on Deadspin. We spoke about Pearlman's complicated portrait of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the "historically dumb" Mark Landsberger, why Kurt Rambis was t...

Did Ya Hear The One About The '84 U.S. Hockey Team?
Over at SB Nation Longform, Jeff Pearlman details a miracle put on ice:...

Jeff Pearlman Interviews Tyler Kepner
Tyler Kepner, the talented lead baseball columnist at the New York Times is interviewed by Jeff Pearlman....

Should Steroids-Era Sportswriters Be Kept Out Of The Hall Of Fame Voting?
Jeff Pearlman has an interview up with Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci, one of the most accomplished baseball writers working. It's long and covers numerous subjects, but it only addresses steroids in two areas: Verducci's groundbreaking 2002 cover story on PEDs in MLB, and whether hindsight makes...

Mike Ditka Is Angry About The Walter Payton Book He Hasn't Read
I'd bet all the money in my pockets against all the money in yours that Mike Ditka hasn't read Jeff Pearlman's revelatory biography of Walter Payton, which was excerpted in this week's Sports Illustrated and which has the Chicago media scurrying to find any old Bear willing to glower at a book he ha...
