ale Page 119 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Red Sox thumpin’ grand slams at a historic rate
Kyle Schwarber’s second-inning grand slam put the Astros into an early 6-0 deficit that they would never get the chance to overcome, as the Red Sox piled on the homers in Fenway Park during a rowdy ALCS Game 3 on Monday night. The early clout was a morale boost at home — on top of the four runs it d...

Get ready, because the Mavericks are going to let you down big time this season
“They” said Dallas won the Trae Young/Luka Dončić 2018 Draft day trade. Yet, “they,” and everybody else, are still waiting on Dončić to win a playoff series, as Young was a twisted ankle away from playing in the NBA Finals....

Dave Roberts can’t help himself
The MLB playoffs can get pretty muddled between decisions and results. Rarely do they line up because... y’know, baseball. It doesn’t cooperate. Right decisions, wrong results, vice versa, the throughline is rarely consistent. But Dave Roberts has been at this for years now, so he certainly makes fo...

<em>Saturday Night Live</em> piledrives the NFL for the Jon Gruden emails, and also just for being the NFL
For those who weren’t sure if former Las Vegas Raiders coach Jon Gruden should be considered the dummy of the week, Saturday Night Live made its case for him to receive that honor. In the show’s Oct. 16 cold open, the show skewered Gruden and the entire NFL for eight minutes....

Tennessee fans act like toddlers, get away with it
Tennessee fans were so out of control on Saturday night, that they were warned if their behavior continued, the Volunteers would forfeit. ...

Good not being good enough is the Cardinal Way, apparently
Is the Cardinals’ “philosophy” hiring underwhelming coaching staffs?...

Someone get the Canucks an editor stet… err, stat!
When Alex Chiasson played for the Vancouver Canucks in their season opener on Wednesday night in Edmonton, his name was spelled correctly on the back of his jersey....

Eagles ship Zach Ertz to the Cards… but how much can he help?
Earlier today, the Cardinals continued to build their 2017 Pro Bowl squad by adding three-time Pro Bowler Zach Ertz to their roster. A.J. Green, J.J. Watt, and now Ertz? My goodness! Imagine if Larry Fitzgerald wanted to keep playing, 20-year-old me would be going absolutely nuts right now. ...

We were so close
You couldn’t really have asked for much more from the Dodgers and Giants, series or Game 5. What you want is it to be close and dramatic, and those boxes were checked. The stats for these teams are staggeringly close. 109 wins each going in, a season series that is now tied at 12, the run-differenti...

Dominique Wilkins is owed an apology and the only asterisk I’ll accept in sports
Dominique Wilkins is owed apologies from a lot of you people. ...

I’ve had it with relievers
Maybe I’ve rebelled against getting older as long as I can, and I’m coming to accept the hair growing out of my ears combined with the opinions that something in a modern sport isn’t as good as I remember. It’s weird, because I don’t remember having any attachment to relief pitchers of my youth. The...

32 teams need to hear this: There is no pitching formula for the playoffs
Many years ago now, baseball pundits and fans tried to come up with a “secret sauce” for success in the playoffs. It can be pretty infuriating to simply accept that the sport’s biggest prize is handed out at the conclusion of a tournament that is essentially random. There had to be a reason these th...

2021 NHL Previews: Flyers haven’t made a good move since acquiring Gritty
The Metro Division is jam-packed with teams who could disappoint. Sid and Geno are back for their 16th season in Pittsburgh, and the bottom has to fall out eventually. Similarly, Alex Ovechkin is 36 and coming off a career-worst 24-goal season. Carolina was one of the darlings of hockey last year, b...

Catching up with the NHL (We hardly had time to miss ya!)
The NHL is back on its regular schedule after two straight pandemic-curtailed seasons, and that means it kicks off right now, even though it still doesn’t feel like hockey season outside in most of North America....

2021 NHL Previews: Don’t believe the media, it’s over in Nashville
I’m not even sure the Preds are that highly thought of this year. It definitely feels that whatever cycle they were on has come to an end, and there was a temptation to put the Avalanche here, who look set for goalie-related heartbreak come May. But I’ve never missed an opportunity to completely sh...

NFL Week 5 Betting Primer: Best Over/Under, Spread, Teaser, and Prop Bets
Another week, another 3-1 showing. Life would be grand if this could somehow be the result through every single weekend....

NFL Week 5 returns us to the eternal question: Why are the London games always trash?
In 2021, there are two NFL games slated to play in London. The first is happening this weekend as the Atlanta Falcons take on the New York Jets. Now… you’re probably thinking to yourself, “Gee, that matchup sounds awful. If we’re really trying to expand the sport, why don’t we show London the absolu...

Thursday Night Football offers up Rams as ultimate ‘eye test’ for Seahawks
The NFC West is the best division in football. Don’t give me any of that AFC North business. I love the Browns and Ravens. I think the Bengals are on the upswing of their rebuild, but Cincy and the Steelers are still definitely not contenders in the AFC. Any team in the NFC West could win the confer...

What <i>are</i> the Yankees now?
I suppose one of the things that makes me feel old, one of the many things, is how I would perceive the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry versus someone who is 30 or under. I lived long enough in the era of the Yankees pissing all over the Sox to still have some base inkling toward that whenever these two lin...

Week 4 NFL Powerless Rankings: Jacksonville is not good
The 2021 NFL season is starting to pick up and we’re finally starting to get a clear picture of which teams are about that action and which teams are not. We can talk another day about the teams that are actually for real. This is about the teams that are not....