ant Page 201 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

It’s the summer of Grant!
The NBA Playoffs were not nearly as kind to Grant Williams in 2023 as 2022. However, the summer has been his oyster, specifically this month. He spent Independence Day weekend at the event of the summer — Michael Rubin’s White Party. A couple of days after mingling with A-Listers, the Boston Celtics...

The sports world takes sports betting more seriously than violence against women and racism — go figure
Greg Hardy got to play football again. Antonio Brown keeps hanging around. Donald Sterling and Robert Sarver made millions after selling their teams. The NCAA keeps making billions off the backs of unpaid teenage Black basketball players in March. Pete Rose still can’t get into the Hall of Fame — ma...

The 15 Most Valuable Professional Sports Franchises
This story was corrected and revised on July 6, 2023. ...

Well, that’ll about do it for the Angels
There was always a Hail Mary aspect to this Anaheim Angels season. It’s been as close to a foregone conclusion that Shohei Ohtani is tail lights after this season, thanks to the Angels’ lack of success, perceived incompetence, and the $700 million that the team up I-5 is almost certainly readying fo...

Damian Lillard and James Harden need to exchange travel plans
The two superstars residing on the NBA’s bustling trade block have their bags packed. Damian Lillard has been hinting at Miami as his preference for weeks while the mutual interest between Harden and the Los Angeles Clippers is hard not to notice. Check back in a year and Harden may change his mind ...

Philadelphia should be ready to move James Harden along to the highest bidder
Here we go again with another episode of should he stay or go. This time featuring the Philadelphia 76ers and former NBA MVP James Harden. The bearded baller opted to pick up the last year on his current contract, which will pay him over $35 million for the 2023-24 campaign. While there have been ru...

The $100M questions for the NBA free agents who cashed in
Before anybody evaluates contracts or shouts that Fred VanVleet is overpaid from the mountaintop, let’s take a moment to congratulate all of the free agents who just guaranteed themselves and their families generational wealth. Tyrese Haliburton, Jerami Grant, Desmond Bane, Kyrie Irving, Cam Johnson...

Maybe Kyrie Irving believes in the Suns' rotation after all
It turns out that Kyrie Irving, the NBA’s foremost flat earther does believe in the Suns’ rotation. So much so that he’s considering joining it. At least that appears to be the case if there’s any veracity to Bleacher Report’s Kyrie code talker Chris Haynes’ report on the 31-year-old free agent’s sc...

Taurean Prince finds out about own free agency from Woj tweet
Adrian Wojnarowski’s sources inside front offices might be a little too eager to share with him. ...

The Spurs like to mess with us, but it would have been unwise to use Victor Wembanyama to do so
Look at the San Antonio Spurs doing their part to properly sell the NBA. For a time there was a chance that Victor Wembanyama might be making his handful of NBA Summer League games in Sacramento and not during the league’s big event in Las Vegas....

We have a new Michael Jordan gambling-related conspiracy theory
Michael Jordan’s sale of his majority stake in the Charlotte Hornets to Melvin Capital founder Gabe Plotkin prompted a new strain of conspiracy theories pertaining to the relationship between MJ’s purported half-billion dollars in stock losses due to the GameStop meme-stock short squeeze in January ...

Connor Bedard’s impending Chicago arrival needs the proper context before it’s overhyped
It’s Connor Bedard Day. The long-sought-after Canadian is more popular than Justin Trudeau (although I’m not exactly sure how high of a bar that is these days) will be selected No. 1 overall by the Blackhawks during tonight’s NHL Entry Draft. Any other move from Chicago with the top overall selectio...

NHL Draft: Who is going to take hockey's Sidd Finch?
The NHL Draft, which takes place tonight and tomorrow, isn’t quite the NFL Draft. Most of the players taken won’t show up for a season or two with their NHL teams. It’s also not the MLB draft, where it’ll be a long time either and everyone spends those middle years going off Twitter videos from vari...

Team USA Basketball needs to bring back multi-year commitments
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And if it does break, fix it the same way you did after you originally broke it. Grant Hill, this is for you....

DeAndre Hopkins is the latest pass catcher Bill Belichick wants from the department store
Once again, Bill Belichick is shopping for No. 1 wide receivers at Ross. Which is not to say that it’s impossible to find good clothing there. Customers simply have to be willing to pour through the racks and try on a lot of clothing— especially tops — if they want to find a Randy Moss at 60 percent...

Damian Lillard’s tune appears to have changed since April
I’ve heard that the Pacific Northwest is gorgeous. Waking up every morning with a spectacular view can do wonders for self-esteem. Maybe the view of the luscious greenery surrounding whatever palatial estate that $40 million per year can buy in the Portland area, makes it difficult for Damian Lillar...

Now I can die peacefully as I’ve seen a Kenny Omega masterpiece live
Every sports fan has a checklist of things they have to see in person. These days it probably involves Shohei Ohtani. Maybe Connor McDavid turning some poor schmuck on a third pairing into unrecognizable goo (I saw him do it to Duncan Keith). LeBron in person maybe. The timeless ones are seeing a ga...

NewCo is a perfect nondescript moniker for the PGA Tour-LIV partnership
If you were looking for evidence of the PGA Tour’s reluctance to partner with the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund, just take a gander at the new name of the proposed new company. May I present to you: NewCo. It’s as if one, if not all sides, said “Let’s get this over” before hashing out the deta...

The off-putting history of Spencer Strider, and the incredible weirdness of the NHL Awards
I won’t pretend what follows makes any sense. It is simply a matter of taste, and my tastes have warped and mutated often into a territory I can no longer explain. If you’re an Atlanta baseball fan, Spencer Strider is a titan walking among men. Cobb County probably has dubbed it “Strider Day,” a gam...

The lazy man’s guide to Victor Wembanyama slander
If I have to hear one more TV, personality, or Twitter bird squawking about the NBA’s top draft pick, Victor Wembanyama, missing a couple of perfunctory jumpers between photo shoots, I am going to throw myself in front of Shaq next time he barrels toward Inside the NBA’s video board....