cia Page 117 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Changes are coming to the NFL scouting combine that are long overdue
Today is one of those days in which the NFL has made a good decision. It doesn’t happen often. The decision to add an extra game to the schedule in a sport that can cause brain damage, during a world-wide pandemic, might be a short term financial win, but it’s making the product worse and is ethical...

Dirk Nowitzki is the GOAT for the Mavericks and will soon have his jersey retired
The Dallas Mavericks aren’t wasting any more time. They will honor the GOAT of their franchise on Wednesday when they hang Dirk Nowitzki’s No. 41 jersey in the rafters of the American Airlines Center in Dallas....

Give DeMar DeRozan his flowers for putting the Bulls in first place
What a three-game stretch for the fifth-leading scorer in the NBA, DeMar DeRozan. Mr. Anti-analytics has been letting his mid-range shot fly all season, propelling him to a scoring average of 26.9 points per game. With 28 points and six assists on Monday DeRozan was the Chicago Bulls’ leader in poin...

Welcome to Russell Westbrook's world: A place where turnovers and missed shots don’t matter
Russell Westbrook had another stinker Sunday against the Timberwolves, although the Lakers won, 108-103. Westbrook nearly had a double-double with points and turnovers in this game. Russ scored 20 but had nine turnovers in the process with only five assists. After the game, Westbrook clapped back at...

There’s no getting around it, the NFL despises women
There was a time in my life when nothing was as exciting as the start of the NFL season, the Bears season, here in Chicagoland....

The fight for the USMNT’s #9 spot moves to the European theater
As it’s always been (and sometimes it feels always will be) that the one big hole on the US Men’s international team is the one up top, a central striker. You never want to be in a place where you’re wondering if there’s any way to make Jozy Altidore 10 years younger. It’s Jozy Altidore, after all. ...

Changing the World Cup to every two years could (but won’t) help soccer’s have-nots
Changing the World Cup to a biennial event is an awful idea. That’s not the most groundbreaking statement, but I wanted to put it bluntly because that’s the point I want you to remember from the rest of this. And if FIFA president Gianni Infantino is to be believed, and the move has a majority backi...

IDIOT OF THE YEAR #2: Aaron Rodgers, ‘immunized’ from absolutely nothing
Welcome to Deadspin’s IDIOT OF THE YEAR festivities! Nos. 50 through 11 are available for your enjoyment here. And our top 10 thus far:...

Magic wants no part of scripted series about the Showtime Lakers
It’s a shame that Magic Johnson wants no part of this new HBO series about the Showtime Los Angeles Lakers of the 1980s. The trailer for Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty, was released in early December, and the series will debut on HBO Max in March 2022....

LeBron James sets his sights on Kareem’s points record you never thought would be broken
Remember, LeBron James is not a pure scorer, so we’ve been told since his high school days. What was supposed to make his game special was his once-in-a-generation athleticism to go along with his Magic Johnson-like court vision. James dunking on the world and launching passes from one side of the c...

NFL shortens COVID quarantine period, confusion ensues
Under new guidelines, symptomatic players and staff will only sit out five days ...

Out of shape? James Harden says absolutely not after returning home for Christmas to pound on the Lakers and Clippers
Christmas at home might be the turning point in James Harden’s 2021-22 season. The Brooklyn Nets played at Crypto.com arena against the Los Angeles Lakers on Christmas Day, against the Los Angeles Clippers on Dec. 27, and in between those two games, Harden’s high school in Lakewood, Calif., retired ...

Draymond Green and Karl-Anthony Towns in war of words over Russell Westbrook comments
During a recent Twitch interview with Adin Ross, Minnesota Timberwolves big man Karl-Anthony Towns was asked his opinion on Russell Westbrook and kept it 100. Towns and Ross were on the topic of stat chasing, and Towns, while also praising Westbrook for being a great player, did acknowledge that he ...

It’s fine if Sergiño Dest and Weston McKennie move in January
There was a feeling of triumph when USMNT fans first heard that American players had landed at some of the biggest clubs in the world in 2020. It was something of an arrival, not just for the players themselves but the US program as a whole. When you can place players at Barcelona and Juventus, you’...

IDIOT OF THE YEAR #7: Kyrie Irving, who dunked mercilessly on rational thought
Welcome to Deadspin’s IDIOT OF THE YEAR festivities! Nos. 50 through 11 are available for your enjoyment here. And our top 10 thus far:...

Lakers on their way to wrong kind of history
Injuries and the novel coronavirus have played a role in it, to be sure, as has the fact that they’re now up to 22 players used this season and it’s not even January, but the Lakers stink....

Monday night's Bulls-Hawks game showed how Omicron is owning the NBA
Just two days after the Omicron variant ruined the highly-anticipated Christmas Day lineup that the NBA unveiled months ago, the Chicago Bulls traveled to Atlanta to face the Hawks in a game that had the communications staff of both teams Googling the names on their rosters....

Shaq has a Christmas gift for you, Candace Parker, and anyone else who thinks he can’t shoot
For the avid NBA fan, the stars shined brightest during the league’s Christmas Day slate of games, even if there were a few missing in action thanks to covid. Retired NBA stars even joined in on the action over the holiday weekend and got their shine on as well. Lakers legend and NBA on TNT analyst ...

Check it out: The reason we know what players get paid
Just before Major League Baseball’s lockout began, the Mets signed Max Scherzer to a three-year, $130 million contract, a $43.3 million annual average that set a new record and also set a talking point for the labor dispute to come....

Centers aren’t extinct, they’ve just evolved
As humans, we tend to eulogize the extinct with reverence. The Dodo Bird. The Rocky Mountain Locust. The Golden Toad. And why wouldn’t we? It was us who eradicated these precious, sentient creatures. Some theorists would argue it had to do with their inability to adapt. But what if things are adapti...