Cutter Gauthier drama comes to head in Philly; Tennis world has 'gross' moment; NFL gimmicks finally fall short

The NFL season zips by, which might be one of the hundreds of reasons it remains our national religion. There isn’t really time to get bored with it and everything that happens in it feels truly important. Which means any team that can string a few good weeks together has turned some mythical corner that we wouldn’t assign to an NBA or NHL or MLB team for a couple of months. Which means genius gets amplified even when it’s maybe just a gimmick. It might even take over a season and a half. - Sam Fels Read More

There isn’t a lot of leverage for any player who gets drafted in our four major sports. Football players aren’t going to sit and do nothing for a year. High school baseball players, or even college juniors, can go back to school. Basketball players don’t have even that much. - Sam Fels Read More

Ever since I got older than college, I have felt that college sports are a cesspool that should have been abolished long ago. At least the major ones. If the NBA and NFL want a developmental league, let them pay for it. But there are some pulls from childhood that never go away, including the one from Ann Arbor, Michigan. No, I didn’t go to UM. With my grades, I wouldn’t have gotten in there even if my last name was “Ford.” (And that’s with my mother having graduated from there). Thanks to the location of the other half of the family though, I spent a good portion of my childhood in Ann Arbor (if you’re a grad and ever ate at Red Hot Lover’s/Chicago Dog House, you know). So I grew up a Michigan fan, and I grew up knowing what Ann Arbor smells like, feels like, in the fall. - Sam Fels Read More

It’s one thing when a sport either ignores or is oblivious to whatever is surrounding a certain player or individual. It’s quite another when they know and just don’t care. Such is the case with this week’s announcement that the ATP Tour players had chosen Alexander Zverev to their players’ council. - Sam Fels Read More