crystal Page 1 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Are these Clippers Kenough?
It’s Oscars Week, which feels like as good a time as any to draw up the NBA storylines and characters which could double as Oscar nominees. Next up are the L.A. Clippers and the 2024 season possibly being the culmination of their decade of prosperity....
Is trouble brewing for the USWNT?
It’s been mostly quiet on the Western front for the USWNT since last summer’s World Cup full-body dry heave. A couple of friendlies to send off legends, a couple more to close out the year with no stakes, and an easy start to the Women’s Gold Cup last week with resounding wins over the Dominican Rep...
Advice to sports media people: Hype any team but the Clippers
There are certain teams as a sportswriter that you simply should not trust. Despite the way the Detroit Lions are playing, their fans won’t hesitate to tell you a size-14 steel-toe boot is about to drop at any moment. We all know what tortured souls I’m talking about so let’s spare them further angu...
John Fisher might not have the money to move the A’s to Vegas
There’s generally little hope for fans when it’s already been announced that their team will move to another city. That hope evaporates more when a league approves it, as MLB has done with the A’s move to Vegas. And yet, there’s always a sliver of light that can’t be extinguished when an owner is so...
The USWNT exits the World Cup on the cruelest margin
The symbolism of the final moment can’t be shoved off. The USWNT’s Alyssa Naeher can’t do much more to keep the final penalty out. But sometimes…the bear eats you....
Has the rest of the world finally caught up to the U.S. Women's soccer team?
For those used to the United States women’s national team dominating the globe, this edition of the Women’s World Cup has come as a shock. Those who don’t tune in every four years expected turbulence, but the level of bumps and lumps the Americans have taken in Australia and New Zealand has already ...
Former USWNT star Carli Lloyd is never hesitant to remind everyone she was the star
The bane of sports analysis, especially when it comes to soccer in a nation that has become too mature in its fandom of the sport to accept this kind of drivel, is to default to claiming something unquantifiable as the reason a team won and a team lost. “Wanted it more” is a phrase you hear all too ...
World Cup Group B Preview: It’s time for Sam Kerr to take this itty bitty world by storm
We spilled some ink in these parts about Mallory Swanson by herself making the USWNT a threat to win the World Cup, before her unfortunate injury. But the US isn’t the only team with a player who is capable of grabbing a short tournament by the haunches, and the co-hosts Australia may have the bigge...
The USWNT better not have any centerbacks get hurt
We wondered out the USWNT would heading into the World Cup without Becky Sauerbrunn. The starting lineup should be ok, but how would Vlakto Andonovski answer the question of the eroded depth without the captain around? It would appear he’s decided to not answer it at all. ...
Becky Sauerbrunn’s absence at the World Cup hurts more in the heart than on the field
The women’s World Cup continues to be a battle of attrition, even if it doesn’t start for another month. All the major powers are heading to Australia and New Zealand next month, seemingly with one hand tied behind their back, either through injury or strife within their programs (Canada and Spain)....
Aaron Judge is the king, but not for the reasons some New York dips**t thinks
It’s going to be a month of this. Aaron Judge has 50+ homers by Sept. 1, one of the very few to accomplish said feat. And with all baseball records, there are going to be self-appointed gatekeepers who have decided it is their purpose to keep the hordes at bay from sullying something sacred. There i...
For one moment, Carli Lloyd had it all
It’s strange. For all the absolute world-class players the USWNT has had, and still does, we still think of them as a “team.” Maybe that’s a testament to their absurd depth, and their dedication to being the best as a unit, that we rarely single one out. Megan Rapinoe may have won Player of the Tour...
The WNBA just finished a legendary season — now they have to address the drama the Atlanta Dream and Phoenix Mercury created
What if I told you that a hometown kid would come home and help deliver a championship to their city — for a franchise that has never won a championship — against the very same team that prevented that hometown team from winning a title seven years ago?...
The USWNT is put out of its misery
The U.S. wouldn’t have had much argument if they’d eaten it against the Dutch. And if Lieke Martens had hit the penalty that Jessie Fleming did today, instead of her tribute to English penalty taking, they probably would have. They can feel a little more hard done by losing this game to Canada, givi...
The USWNT never got out of second gear, but was that by design?
At the top, it should be stated that there were plenty of reasons for the U.S. Women’s National Team to never take their foot off the brakes this morning against Australia. Going balls-out wouldn’t have won them the group, with Sweden getting their gimme against New Zealand at the same time. No matt...
Arsenal Are Imploding
What should’ve been, and what almost was, a desperately needed victory instead became more reason for acrimony and turmoil. A floundering Arsenal hosted Crystal Palace on Sunday, and after jumping out to a 2–0 lead early on, the Gunners threw away their advantage and wound up settling for a draw. Fr...
Of Course Tyreek Hill Got A Contract Extension
When news broke that the Kansas City Chiefs signed wide receiver Tyreek Hill to a contract extension earlier today, NFL reporters confirmed what everyone following the sport should have suspected for some time. The team did what professional sports teams do with such news, issuing a press release pa...
Crystal Palace's Patrick van Aanholt Scores Late Winner To Bring Down Toothless Manchester United
It appears that no matter how hard they try, Manchester United are unable to shake the fact that mediocrity is now a staple characteristic of the once-dominant (if that even means anything anymore) club. Case in point is the fact that the focus of this summer’s transfer window was to bolster the def...
Tyreek Hill Says Punching His Three-Year-Old Son In The Chest Was Just Boxing Lessons
Tyreek Hill spoke to assembled media Sunday at Chiefs training camp, his first public comments in several months. The criminal investigation into Crystal Espinal’s allegation that Hill broke his son’s arm is inactive; the NFL’s parallel investigation could not determine whether Hill had violated th...
The New Tyreek Hill Audio Doesn't Contain Any Answers
On Monday, 610 AM in Kansas City published a fuller version of audio first obtained and reported by KCTV-5, in which Chiefs wide receiver Tyreek Hill can be heard telling his fiancée, Crystal Espinal, “You need to be terrified of me too, bitch.” The extended audio, to my ears, wasn’t newsworthy. It ...