blu Page 9 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Maybe the Rangers don't suck anymore? Baseball's most unpredictable team looks great right now
I can’t think of a more apropos recent example of a roller coaster during baseball’s regular season than this year’s Texas Rangers. In the month of August, the Rangers were viewed both as the American League’s leading contender to make the World Series and also had a large swath of their fan base th...

Mike Babcock is seemingly at it again, though it's surprising he knows how to use AirPlay
Hockey doesn’t even need to start to be stupid, especially when it comes to a needlessly recycled coach like Mike Babcock. If you don’t recall Babcock since he got fired from the Leafs, you may remember him from such episodes as making Johan Franzen’s life an utter hell or tricking Mitch Marner into...

Predicting the AEW All In London card
All Elite Wrestling’s first show in the United Kingdom was supposed to be in July 2020. Due to obvious reasons, that didn’t happen. It took three years for AEW to finally run a show in England, but what a way for them to make a debut, with one of the largest crowds in professional wrestling history ...

Did Rogers Centre kill Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s power?
Whenever the post-mortem is compiled on this Toronto Blue Jays season — they’re still very much in the hunt for a wildcard spot — it won’t be hard to find culprits for how they didn’t quite manage to take the next step from a good team to a power that most in Ontario were expecting (feels like a the...

Jerry Reinsdorf emerged from his crypt long enough to fire White Sox GM, VP
Not to turn this morning wake-up companion into Chicago White Sox Daily, but it’s a slow time of year. We’ll get through this together, I promise. ...

Big Ten athletes should be on the hunt for NIL deals with airlines
Soon, Big Ten teams from the Midwest and East Coast will have a “West Coast road trip,” like they do in the pros, and vice versa. But unlike professional athletes, these players won’t be getting compensated for their “jobs,” and some of them will be on commercial airplanes as they fly across the cou...

Kenyan Middleton told his truth about the White Sox, and suddenly his name was off the scoreboard
Keynan Middleton gave his opinion about his time with the Chicago White Sox. He told ESPN’s Jesse Rogers that he felt the organization lacked discipline and personal accountability. His stories about players napping in the dugout and missing practice sessions were corroborated by teammates. Now a me...

Who’s up for a non-NBA pro athlete slam dunk contest?
Everyone loves a good slam dunk contest. It doesn’t matter if it involves NBA players, college athletes, or dudes from the neighborhood. If those involved are talented, creative highflyers, folks will gather around to enjoy the festivities. Obviously, the NBA owns the crown when it comes to spectacu...

Deadspin predicts the Women’s World Cup
How was the USWNT’s Megan Rapinoe being thrust into the forefront of sport and society while helping the United States women’s national team lift a second straight World Cup title four years ago? No matter how long ago it feels, the next edition of the global showcase is here, with 32 teams competin...

Sports are awesome, but the business is fascinating
Something about summer in America will always feel more like the true transition of the year as opposed to New Year’s Day. The holiday has so much pomp and circumstance that it’s difficult to take the time to truly reflect on the year, and it is also very cold in much of the country. During the summ...

Saudi Arabian money is bleeding into the sports world
In 2017, one of the top chess players in the world announced she wasn’t going to play at the World Championships this year in Saudi Arabia. Anna Muzychuk cited the conditions that women would have to play in on her Facebook post, she explained she didn’t want to be accompanied by a man when she trav...

The New York Yankees are running out of numbers to issue
The New York Yankees have a long, storied history, with 45 players being inducted into the Hall of Fame. The Bronx Bombers have also retired the numbers of their greats — players and managers, including some that aren’t in Cooperstown. All in all, the Yankees have retired 22 numbers — including from...

Screw a PGA Tour card, let me get that tax-exempt status
The recent turmoil on the PGA Tour is enough to give a guy acid reflux, but who can blame them? They tried to concede defeat to the LIV Tour only to spark the government intervention they’d hoped would happen when Greg Norman was poaching their best players, and now that sloppiness and spotlight mig...

US Open pits the face of the PGA against one of LIV's top blood money takers
The merger between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf Tour doesn’t have to wait long to see some corporate synergy, as one of the PGA’s four major tournaments, the US Open, tees off this week in California. Possibly the biggest cash cow on each side of the debate won’t have to wait long to get reacquainted w...
![Toronto Blue Jays players didn't want Anthony Bass participating in Pride Night [Update]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/1b3517cbd6ff244321890a0ed9d0fd2b.jpg)
Toronto Blue Jays players didn't want Anthony Bass participating in Pride Night [Update]
Anthony Bass should have learned to stay off of social media — and perhaps pitch better— as he was DFA’d by the Toronto Blue Jays on Friday afternoon....

Lionel Messi is the only person who can move tickets like Taylor Swift
This article is a veritable dream for those enslaved (or in love) with SEO-driven content. Taylor Swift and Lionel Messi in the same headline? If I could fold in the Los Angeles Lakers, New York Yankees, and Dallas Cowboys, I’d be up for a $10 Starbucks gift card. While I’m not ruling that out — I n...
![Alek Manoah has been so awful the Blue Jays sent him to the rookie circuit [Update]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/24a6964601a11ab80c478c4a478a38c6.jpg)
Alek Manoah has been so awful the Blue Jays sent him to the rookie circuit [Update]
A 30,000-foot view of the Toronto Blue Jays so far this season wouldn’t detect any huge problems. The offense, while maybe not tearing a hole in the Earth or indeed time as might have been predicted, is still 11th in MLB in runs. Bo Bichette is second in batting average, Vladito is bashing the shit ...

The Columbus Blue Jackets hate their players
In the discussion of most irrelevant franchises in North American sports, the Columbus Blue Jackets would be high on the list, if not on top of it, if anyone could remember them enough to add them. You’d think they’d take some inspiration from one of their former fellow whos-its, the Denver Nuggets,...

The San Diego Padres are the first to get out of their Bally Sports TV deal
In a few years, baseball TV will look very different. We’re getting a glimpse now, thanks to Bally Sports missing a payment to the San Diego Padres, essentially ending their rights deal. MLB is stepping in already, and starting later today MLB is taking over the broadcasts for the Padres. And of cou...

Which MLB hot starts through Memorial Day are here to stay?
We’ve reached Memorial Day, the first real milestone of the MLB season. The first seven weeks or so don’t decide who makes the playoffs, but it gives us a pretty good barometer. But which (at least somewhat surprising) starts are here to stay?...