et Page 1441 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
"The Referee," From <em>Soccer In Sun And Shadow</em>
From Eduardo Galeano's classic, now available as an ebook. We'll have excerpts throughout the week....
Overmatched, Costa Rica Can Still Make It Rough For Everyone Else
Do they have any shot? Not really. But that doesn't mean Costa Rica can't put the fear of God into the Group D favorites for a half or so....
Italy Great; Sky Still Blue
Regardless of how you feel about a shirtless, flexing Mario Balotelli, the luxurious follicles that sprout all around Andrea Pirlo's head, or Lorenzo Insigne's textbook giocatore look of prison-chic with a €1,000 weekly hair budget, Italy do not enter this tournament as a "sexy" team. Somehow, one o...
Did Delonte West Get A Raw Deal?
Over at Slate, David Haglund catches up with Delonte West, temporarily (he hopes) exiled to China for the sin of being branded mentally ill. It contains lengthy, honest (he doesn't know any other way to be) chats with West, in which the 30-year-old wonders aloud if maybe the problem's not in his hea...
Running Coach Fired For Running Boston Marathon
On Wednesday, April 23, Matt Aguero was terminated as the head track and cross country coach of St. Gregory's University in Shawnee, Okla. Unless you keep abreast of internal developments within NAIA sports, you probably missed the news. But hear me out now, because what happened to Aguero will be a...
There Was Yet Another Immaculate Inning Pitched Last Night
So this is officially some sort of trend. Last night, Garrett Richards struck out three straight Houston Astros on just nine pitches, tossing the fourth immaculate inning of the season. There has never been more than four such innings tossed in a single season—that number was last reached in 2002—an...
A Million Ways To Die In Japan: The Gonzo Splendor Of <em>13 Assassins</em>
Netflix Instant doesn't have to feel like a depleted Blockbuster in 1990, where you spend half an hour browsing hopeless straight-to-video thrillers before saying "fuck it" and loading up another Archer. Streaming services can be an absolute treasure trove, particularly if you like action movies, an...
Which Hockey Leagues Have The Most Fights?
The NHL has a lot more fights than, say, the NFL, but how does it stack up against other levels of hockey competition? To find out, Simon Garnier of Graph Zoo pulled data from the (hilariously '90s) site dropyourgloves.com and put together a neat graphic on "fights per game" across almost 100 active...
Former MLB Player, Manager, And Coach Don Zimmer Dies At 83
Don Zimmer, a presence in MLB who had most recently served as a baseball advisor for the Tampa Bay Rays, has died. He was 83....
My Anger Therapy
Here's an excerpt from Bosnian-American writer, MacArthur "genius" fellow, and Howler contributor Aleksandar Hemon's new e-book, The Matters of Life, Death, and More. It'll give you a little taste of how seriously this World Cup debutante nation takes its soccer....
Damn, Zach LaVine Can Jump
Former UCLA guard Zach LaVine worked out for the Lakers today, and it appears that he was out to prove that Andrew Wiggins isn't the only prospect in this year's draft who can jump really damn high....
The Stanley Cup Will Come Down To The Best Team Vs. The Best Player
The Rangers and Kings are in the Stanley Cup Final because of depth, since this is not basketball, where a small number of very good or great individual players can drag a team to postseason success. You need top-flight players to win championships in hockey, obviously, but just as necessary are low...
"The Manager," From <em>Soccer In Sun And Shadow</em>
From Eduardo Galeano's classic, now available as an ebook. We'll have excerpts throughout the week....
Dammit, Greece Are Going To Try To Win Ugly Again
Greece has a pretty good domestic league that produces a handful of pretty good players who represent their pretty good national team. In the gauntlet that is European international competition, pretty good usually isn't enough. This year, though, Greece made it through the fire to earn a spot in th...
Jon Singleton Homers In First Career Game, Gets A Gum And Gatorade Bath
Jon Singleton, the Astros' first base prospect with a left-handed swing that was built to launch homers, made his MLB debut last night. Things weren't looking so good at first, as Singleton started the game with two errors and two strikeouts. He made up for the rocky start in the bottom of the 8th i...
O.C.P. Now Stands For 'Opening Crap Pitch'
RoboCop threw out the ceremonial first pitch in Detroit today, and it was only marginally better than his latest movie. His appearance was supposed to coincide with an unveiling of the long-dreamt-of statue everyone wants to see planted in old Detroit, but alas, that didn't really come off, either. ...
50 Cent Says His First Pitch Was Awful Because He Jerked It Too Much
Remember when 50 Cent unleashed this atrocity of a ceremonial first pitch at Citi Field? He finally got around to explaining himself during a Reddit AMA he did today. ...
Playing For Keeps
Ah, yet another sure shot from our pals over at Longform. Dig this excerpt from David Halberstam's book about MJ, Playing For Keeps:...
Vidal Is A Goddamned Tank; Or Why Chile Can Go Far In The World Cup
Chile's most memorable World Cup story is actually how they missed out on the 1990 and 1994 tournaments. Yes, they finished third in 1962 and gave Spain all they could handle in the first knockout round in 2010, but besides those two Cups, they've only gotten out of the group stage once, when they a...
"The Fan," From <em>Soccer In Sun And Shadow</em>
From Eduardo Galeano's classic, now available as an ebook. We'll have excerpts throughout the week....