coronavirus Page 4 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Ben Sasse Writes Deranged Letter to Big Ten
There are a lot of things going on in this country right now. America is the laughingstock of the world after being unable to contain the COVID pandemic, largely because a non-insignificant portion of the population has decided to believe anti-vax Facebook posts over actual science. We’re in the mid...

LeBron Plants Seed of Failure by Once Again Throwing Teammates Under the Bus
For all we know, LeBron James could be right....

No One Is Cheering Against Sports, Idiots
With alarming spikes in COVID-19 erupting all across America, I had hoped that the “sportswriters are cheering against sports!” mouth-breathers on social media had slunk back from whence they came. Alas, yesterday sports talk radio host Danny Kannell, in the tradition of great minds like Clay Travis...

NFL Opt-Out 2020: Here's Every Player You Won't See This Year
While MLB sorts through various positive COVID-19 cases in its league, and the NBA hunkers down in a theoretical bubble in Orlando to finish its season, the NFL — even while agreeing to cancel its preseason — has made it clear the ball will be snapped under the bright lights this fall....
![Division III Had No Problem Shutting Down Championships. What’s the Hold-Up for D1? [Updated]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/w8vzwnwfhmh9jj5f5eqe.jpg)
Division III Had No Problem Shutting Down Championships. What’s the Hold-Up for D1? [Updated]
The NCAA Division III Presidents Council’s decision, Wednesday, to cancel all fall sports championships for the 2020-21 school year in what could foreshadow the fate of larger divisions....

The Mourning After: Canes Eliminate Rangers, Plague-Ravaged Marlins Blank Orioles
We’ve had our first ejection out of the NHL bubble, as the New York Rangers never came close to beating the Carolina Hurricanes and have hence been punted out of Toronto. I hope they line them outside the hotel and loudly shut the gate behind them as all the players of the teams still competing watc...

No, Really. The NFL Has a Lou Williams Rule
Foresight can be invaluable, especially for a league that’s always its own worst enemy....

Baseball's 2020 Playoff Plans Are Simultaneously Absurd and Perfect
Major League Baseball’s plan for this fall, an expanded postseason in which 16 of 30 teams have a chance to win the World Series, is patently ludicrous....

Pac-12 Football Players Use Their Platforms To Promote #WeAreUnited Message, Demand Better Treatment
Since the #WeAreUnited letter released via the Players’ Tribune, Pac-12 players have come out to publicly support the letter written by a collection of conference athletes....

Rating Each League’s Virtual Fans
With all the leagues that had to restructure their schedules or create a completely new tournament now back in action, we’ve seen various ways of trying to incorporate fans into the TV presentation. All leagues want you to know just how much they miss you (or your money), and how welcome you (or you...

Yoenis Cespedes Opts Out but Doesn’t Tell the Mets
Yoenis Cespedes went missing in action this afternoon, sparking a brief panic and outpouring of concern for the Mets slugger’s safety — but now, it appears he chose to opt out of the season without first letting team management know....

Adam Silver’s NBA Fiddled for Three Weeks as Thousands Died in Florida
It’s a good time to be a professional basketball propagandist....

A Farcical Stroll Through an All-New York MLB Season (Including the Brooklyn Dodgers!)
Listen, this whole idea is ludicrous, BUUUUUT just hear me out …...

Rob Manfred is in Over His Head, And He Knows it
If baseball is a symbol or microcosm of our nation at large, as baseball writers like to constantly tell us while finishing their Weetabix, then it scans that both of those entities are lacking leadership at this moment. Rob Manfred has no clue what to do, because his only directive — making sure th...

Why Didn’t the Phillies Get a Vote Sunday?
The main problem of MLB’s “strategy,” such as it was, for playing this season was that it depended on baseball people. It depended on sports people. And in the world of sports people, the binary has always been, “Playing = good, not playing = bad.” Which is how MLB got into this mess....

Are You Watching, NFL?
It’s a day we all suspected, if not outright knew, would come....

Nothing Wrong With Some Magic City on the Way to an NBA Championship
The lure is real....
![Despite Marlins Outbreak, Commissioner Rob Manfred Has No Plans to Stop Season [Updated]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/wyxkriuykr10rkfwdahj.jpg)

Baseball Can’t Even Get Started Before It Gets Stupid
MLB was probably hoping to get through its showcase opener, the defending champ Nationals vs. the marquee franchise Yankees, without any indication of just how stupid and dangerous this all is. But when it comes to looking stupid, no one puts MLB in a corner....

How Will Joel Embiid Stop Himself From Coughing Before Each Free Throw?
Habits and superstitions are as much a part of the NBA experience as deception and dysfunction are in the White House. However, with COVID-19, everything has changed. There are certain aspects to players’ games that must be addressed....