ball Page 506 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Steve Ballmer Wasn't Too Fazed About Jeanie Buss Secretly Calling Him "Ballz"
Clippers owner and shrieking enthusiast Steve Ballmer is riding high these days. His Clippers managed a respectable rebuild without ever going into the tank; Kawhi Leonard jumped ship from a championship squad to join his outfit, and brought Paul George along for the ride; and Thursday he shared wit...

The Colts Are Afraid Of Andrew Luck's Leg Pulling A Kevin Durant
Colts quarterback Andrew Luck has already been through several circles of injury hell, and lost roughly a jillion years of his career to a devastating shoulder injury. Right now he’s recovering from a little old calf injury suffered during the spring, but after joining the rest of the world in watch...

Maybe The Yankees Should Not Allow Masahiro Tanaka To Face The Red Sox
Yankees pitcher Masahiro Tanaka got the start Thursday night in the first game of an important four-game series against the Red Sox. The series probably has more juice for the Red Sox than for the Yankees—the Red Sox sound like they might be a couple bad days away from shifting into seller mode as t...

The Robot Umpire Is Moving Up In The World
The Atlantic League announced Tuesday that their experiment with an automated strike zone will continue for the remainder of the season, starting Thursday night. The system mostly worked; players and managers were happy with it; even the umpire who gave it its inaugural run at the Atlantic League Al...

Minor League Baseball Team Claims Blue Lives Matter Flag Patch Is "Not Political"
The Aberdeen Ironbirds, a Class-A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles, defended the Blue Lives Matter flag patch on the back of their jerseys on Wednesday. The team claimed that they aren’t a political statement, but a way to honor two sheriff’s deputies killed in February of 2016. ...

MLB's Proposed International Draft Is Half Insult, Half Fantasy
Major League Baseball has wanted to institute an international draft for a long time, but they’ve never succeeded at convincing the Major League Baseball Players Association that they, too, should want an international draft. The reasons owners want an international draft are the same that players w...

Lorenzen Wright's Ex-Wife Pleads Guilty To Facilitating His Murder
Nine years after the death of ex-NBA player Lorenzen Wright, one of his two accused killers has pleaded guilty to his murder. In Shelby County court in Tennessee on Thursday, Sherra Wright—Lorenzen’s ex-wife and mother of his children—agreed to a deal that would see her serve 30 years in prison for ...

College Softball Coach Dismissed After Sexually Harassing Player Through Text Messages
A softball coach at Bemidji State University in Minnesota has been dismissed from the program after being placed on a leave of absence earlier this year. The reason? According to a Bemidji Pioneer report, Rick Supinski was found by the university to have engaged in inappropriate behavior around the ...

Why Your Team Sucks 2019: Oakland Raiders
Some people are fans of the Oakland Raiders. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Oakland Raiders. This 2019 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here....

Every Team Sucks, But Not In The Same Way
Somehow, in wild defiance of everything that has ever given order to the universe, NFL teams will begin playing preseason games in the next week. Straight up full-dress, pads-on football games, one real NFL team against another, the whole thing. Or not quite the whole thing—the recognizable players ...

The Night The Dodgers And Pirates Decided To Hold Their Brawl Off The Field
Sagging through the dog days, the Dodgers needed a jolt. Luckily, they had an ideal jolter in their clubhouse. Reggie Smith wasn’t the same player he’d been even recently, his damaged shoulder leaving him unable to throw and limiting him to pinch-hitting duty in every one of his 20 appearances throu...

Earl Thomas Says He Doesn't Regret Flipping The Bird At Pete Carroll
Safety Earl Thomas starred in one of the more iconic images from last year’s NFL campaign when he shot a middle finger toward his own sideline and head coach, Pete Carroll, while being carted off the field after breaking his leg. Now, months later, Thomas says he’s still glad he did it....

Enes Kanter Claims Turkish Embassy Bullied A Mosque Into Canceling His Basketball Camp
In a statement released Wednesday night, Boston Celtics big man Enes Kanter claims that his very public criticism of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his regime has cost him one of his summer basketball camps. In the statement first shared by New York Daily News reporter Stefan Bondy, Kant...

Do Some Trades!
Do you see this? Do you see this? I do not care about the Rockies recalling Yency Almonte and I never will. I do not get my hopes up in the last week of July, the depth of the dog days of a long, long baseball season, over the possibility of call-ups and 40-man roster moves. I am here for the trades...

Pirates Broadcasters Load Up Their Diapers Over Dumb Unwritten Rules Violation
The Pirates got pounded to hell by the dreaded Cardinals Wednesday night, eventually losing by the score of 14–8. The score manages to misrepresent just how lopsided the game was—the Cardinals scored nine runs in the second inning and chased two Pirates pitchers before the end of the fourth inning. ...

Report: TNT Will Finally Get Rid Of Those Sloppy <i>Players Only </i>NBA Broadcasts
Bad news for people who believe the events of an NBA basketball game are best accompanied by the inane, runaway chit-chat of Dennis Scott and Kevin McHale: TNT has apparently decided to axe its Players Only broadcasts and presumably will reintroduce competent play-by-play commentators to all future ...

Like Many College Football Coaches, Chris Petersen Can't Talk About The Transfer Portal Without Hedging
It’s no secret that most college football coaches hate, or at least distrust, the transfer portal—maybe not so much the portal itself as the idea of their players getting slightly more autonomy—and media day is the perfect time to get these petty grievances out in the open so everyone can learn what...

Steve Ballmer Appears To Be In Heat While Introducing Kawhi Leonard And Paul George
The Los Angeles Clippers held an introductory press conference today for new players Paul George and Kawhi Leonard. Also on stage was team owner Steve Ballmer, known for being shiny, red, and het up while courtside at his team’s games. In a sense, this is charming: Ballmer’s one of the team owners w...

The NFL Plans To Actually Enforce The Helmet Rule This Year
Soon after the NFL rolled out its controversial new helmet rule last year—which aims to penalize lowering the head to initiate contact on avoidable hits—the league realized it needed more time to figure out how to implement it, and for players, coaches, and officials to adjust to it....

Rays Put Pitcher At First Base, Nearly Destroy The Tender Fabrics That Hold Together The Game Of Baseball
A crucial AL East game between the Rays and the Red Sox ground to a screeching halt in the eighth inning on Wednesday afternoon after the Rays pulled some lineup shenanigans with their relief pitchers. Lefty Adam Kolarek got the first out in the inning, at which point the Rays brought in right-hande...