da Page 348 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Longtime underdog Alabama set to take on perennial powerhouse Cincinnati in CFP
After his comments yesterday, I have to wonder whether Alabama linebacker Will Anderson has considered a career in comedy. I mean, only if this whole football thing doesn’t work out for him. It’s only the Crimson Tide he plays for, after all, so I wouldn’t really be putting all my eggs in one basket...

2021 Rookie Quarterback Rankings: Have the Texans found their new quarterback?
It’s Week 16 of the NFL season, and our rookie quarterbacks are now in the home stretch, with some living up to the hype and others not so much. Now let’s look at how last year’s draft class fared in Week 16....

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....

IDIOT OF THE YEAR #8: Rob Manfred, who got everything wrong
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:...

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....

Week 16 NFL Powerless Rankings: Jacksonville is still real bad
Welcome to this week’s NFL Powerless Rankings. The end of the NFL season is near, and we know all the cellar dwellers at this point. So, let’s check out the worst of the worst from Week 16....

Week 16 Takeaways: If your holiday season was dampened by your favorite NFL team, buck up, 2022 just might return some holiday cheer
As I gather myself after watching the Insecure series finale, I’m also confronted with the fact that the 2021 NFL season is also nearly complete. Of course there’s a five-week postseason awaiting us football fans, but less than half of the NFL teams will play in that tournament. Fans in Chicago, New...

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 ...

IDIOT OF THE YEAR: 40 of the dullest tools from 2021's shed
Happy holidays, you filthy animals, and welcome to Deadspin’s annual IDIOT OF THE YEAR extravaganza. Within these hallowed slides are 50 of the year’s least bearable dorks, whose transgressions range from “just kinda silly,” to “dangerously stupid,” to “Trevor Bauer.”...

High-profile QBs hitting the college transfer portal
In 2019, The Athletic reported that there was a 75 percent chance that a top-50 quarterback recruit would transfer schools if he didn’t see playing time in his first two seasons. And if he did see playing time — still a 45 percent chance he would choose to move elsewhere. The college quarterback eco...

Some great wrestling matches from the year that was
That time again. This year’s list feels a little more genuine, as wrestling (outside of Japan at least) was able to get out of the TV-studio era and back in front of the crowds it so desperately needs. Whether that was or is a really good idea at the moment, we’ll save for another time. Trying to ju...

2021's most inspiring sports figures
Just a few short years ago, there was a push for athletes to be nothing more than mute entertainers. Luckily enough, they refused to “shut up” or “stick to” whatever sport they played....

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...

The best from bowl games with non-New Year’s Six names
Making fun of lesser bowl games is easy and fun. Do we really need a Boca Raton Bowl? Or a LendingTree Bowl? Or a Gasparilla Bowl? Or a Cameilla Bowl? Or a Hertz Bowl? Or a Guaranteed Rate Bowl? (Only one of those is fake.) No, probably not. The answer to “Who’s better: Eastern Michigan or Liberty?”...

Get a grip, Jerry, Ezekiel Elliott is a role player these days
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and his delusion about the team knows no bounds. We’ve seen this over the years, and Jones reminded us of this during an interview on 105.3 The fan in Dallas earlier this week. ...

Malik Monk’s cryptic tweet is absolutely about him still being in health-and-safety protocol, right?
Los Angeles Lakers guard Malik Monk is still in health-and-safety protocol and appears to be a bit bored. Monk has not has not played in a game since Dec. 12. He had reportedly tested out of health-and-safety protocol last Thursday, and would’ve only missed one game, but then there was a change in p...

Inter Milan lost their two best players and manager but might win Serie A again anyway
It is not agreed upon defending-your-title strategy to watch one’s manager, and one of the best in the business in Antonio Conte, walk out the door in a huff mere weeks after said title due to disagreements over the financial planning. Though to be fair, that is kind of Conte’s finishing move. Still...

Thursday Night Football, Week 16: San Francisco vs. Tennessee in 2021 finale
It’s a battle of hot and cold teams fighting for postseason positioning tonight as the 49ers travel to Tennessee for the final Thursday Night Football matchup of the year. The 49ers have averaged over 28 points per game over their last four. Meanwhile, the Titans have averaged under 15. The Titans c...

IDIOT OF THE YEAR 2021: Cole Beasley, Enes Kanter, Ron DeSantis, and more doofs
Happy holidays, you filthy animals, and welcome to Deadspin’s annual IDIOT OF THE YEAR extravaganza. Within these hallowed slides are 50 of the year’s least bearable dorks, whose transgressions range from “just kinda silly,” to “dangerously stupid,” to “Trevor Bauer.”...