Locker Page 20 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Watch this rugby coach throw the worst slap of all time
Rugby is a sport all about physicality. Never mind the uncontested conversion kicks, which only occur after all the scrums and tackling leading to the 5-point score. And nothing says you played a barbaric and physically demanding sport like proving your toughness in a fight. Enter Pote Human, head c...
Playoff hockey is stupid anyway
The NHL Playoffs gets its jollies from defying logic or explanation, and reveling in its unpredictability. That doesn’t mean it’s always a free-for-all, as hockey and its fans would have you believe. But it delves into the chaos and silliness more often than its brethren, that’s for sure....
This week in bad omens: Aaron Judge injures hip on 31st birthday
Unfortunately, the ethical standards of journalism prevent me from accepting any contributions, or gifts as a thank you for my work, so for those of you looking to Venmo me some beer money for my part in the New York Yankees overpaying Aaron Judge, all I ask is that you make a donation to a charity ...
The Detroit Lions are going for it — and why not?
When you have as many picks in the first three rounds of the NFL Draft as the Detroit Lions did — six in all — it’s easy to wager them like house money. Reach on a second-round running back at No. 12? Sure. Take a linebacker who wasn’t predicted in the first round of any of the 38,000 mock drafts? S...
How did the Milwaukee Bucks ever win a title?
I won’t pretend to be any kind of basketball expert, and my brethren here will spend the day breaking down the Milwaukee Bucks coughing up a curd-ridden hairball in the first round to the Miami Heat. But I know a deer caught in headlights look when I see one, and Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer spent a...
Let’s ban Minnesota sports teams from the playoffs
As you get older, all you really ask of sports is to keep you entertained and to provide something interesting to talk about from time to time. You want good teams playing a lively style, and you want them playing another team with perhaps a good story and some verve to them. At the very least, you ...
The worst is the villain — in this case Aaron Rodgers — getting away with it
We here on the shores of Lake Michigan have been eating it from our neighbors to the north, the Green Bay Packers, for 25 years or so. When it goes on that long, you really stop dreaming of revenge or the tables ever turning your way, and certainly of things evening out. But there’s always a faint e...
The Grizzlies sure are some whiny villains
I wouldn’t have thought giving someone a vanilla nut-tap on national TV and in front of 18,000 was actually a media conspiracy. I’m glad Memphis’ Dillon Brooks taught me better. ...
We regret to inform you that Phil Jackson kinda sucks
They say “never meet your heroes,” and while Phil Jackson was never a personal hero of mine, many did look up to Jackson, especially here in Chicago, where he led our beloved Bulls to six titles in the 1990s. During that time, when the United Center was brand spanking new and the near West side of t...
Sports claims just a little more of its soul
Though I’m from the Midwest, the Oakland Athletics were always a fascination for me. It started well before the Moneyball era. When I first became a baseball fan was the rise of the Mark McGwire-Jose Canseco A’s. Even beyond McGwire and Canseco, when the A’s would be on the national game…they just l...