houston Page 12 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Preseason NFL Powerless Ranking: Here's the bottom of the barrel
It’s football season again and this time of year most sites give you their weekly power rankings. But here at Deadspin, we go against the grain, so once again we’re bringing you our Powerless Rankings for 2022. This season we’ve even got a season preview of the teams you can expect to be pulling up ...

The Astros scandal is the gift that keeps on giving
Every time I try to get out, the Astros’ cheating scandal of 2017 keeps pulling me back in! Whether it’s new information coming out that perhaps other teams were conducting similar schemes, new video footage detailing how José Altuve likely never participated in the team’s sign-stealing shenanigans,...

The DH could solidify the Dodgers’ transformation into the First Order
The perception of the National League to fans of AL teams is that of inferior baseball, due largely to the (until recently) absence of the designated hitter. This kind of bias happens in other sports, but it’s mostly unproven generalizations like the Western Conference is finesse basketball compared...

The NFL’s biggest revenge games of 2022
The 2022 NFL season is just over two weeks away from kicking off, and this year will see a host of big game rematches from last year. The league isn’t wasting any time giving teams the opportunity to avenge crucial losses or rejection by players. So, here’s the list of some of the biggest revenge ga...

Is it time to worry about the Yankees?
Well no, not for you and me. Chances are, unless you’re in the tri-state area or grew up there, you could give a flying fuck whether the Yankees’ six-week stretch of “meh” really means anything. But considering how the world works, you almost certainly know someone from the tri-state area who, at so...

Are there timelines anymore?
The MLB trade deadline has passed, and for the most part, it was the usual story. It’s not really Haves and Have-nots anymore, because any team can and should be a Have considering the immense wealth every MLB team has even before opening the gates. It’s more Wants and Want-nots. So the Wants, like ...

Deshaun Watson gets just six-game suspension
Six games, that’s it....

The NBA found its pretense to probe the Philadelphia 76ers
Over the last few years, jilted NBA Governors have raised a bigger stink over their players mingling with other teams’ representatives before the free agency period has officially begun. In 2019, the NBA passed stricter tampering rules, including an increase in the maximum fine for tampering to $10 ...

Max Scherzer is just crazy enough to be right?
Max Scherzer being a little too intense for his own good has rarely been in question. He would tell you his intensity and downright borderline psychosis when on the mound is what makes him the surefire Hall of Famer that he is. One wonders if that’s true. But that’s how he is. No changing it now. ...

You’re never going to guess who’s pushing the Yankees for AL supremacy
Hopefully, you’ve been watching enough baseball to know the answer to that headline isn’t the Red Sox. At 61-32, and now only 2.5 games behind New York for the best record in baseball — courtesy of a doubleheader sweep — the Houston Astros are in a position to make the second half interesting....

The A’s lone All-Star was set to fly commercial to LA — until a division rival saved the day
Being an All-Star is a good feeling, or at least I’d think so. Clearly, I’ve never been named an MLB All-Star, but the confirmation that you are in fact one of the game’s best players, getting to line up alongside several legends, and have that star next to your name on your Baseball-Reference page ...

John Wall got a Brinks truck full of money from a bad team, now he gets to join a contender in LA
The Houston Rockets and John Wall have agreed to a buyout of his contract where he’ll take a pay cut of about $6.5 million. That’s not a bad deal considering Wall just sat out an entire season and made over $44 million to do so....

New lawsuit alleges Texans enabled and facilitated Deshaun Watson’s sexual misconduct
As gross as it is that any organization would protect a member at the expense of a victim, it’s also way too common. We’ve seen it in sports, in the NFL with the Washington Commanders and USA Gymnastics with Larry Nassar. We’ve seen it in television with Fox News and Bill O’Reilly and Roger Ailes. W...

Steph-mania has seeped into the WNBA
If it were not already apparent that Steph Curry is the popular kid who dictates whether 10th graders one- or two-strap their backpacks, fans needn’t look no further than the WNBA for proof. I debated if Sabrina Ionescu hitting a game-clinching 3 and striking the Steph “night night” pose against the...

Mark Appel never gave up, and we should all take notice
Nearly a decade after being selected No. 1 overall in the MLB draft, RHP Mark Appel will make his major league debut at 30 years old for the Philadelphia Phillies today....

It's actually OK to root for the Astros' Yordan Alvarez
I’ll admit it. I’ve done it. I’ve rooted for the Astros post-sign stealing scandal. It’s not a habit or anything. When it’s between blatant cheaters and Atlanta, there’s still too much of me that hates Chipper Jones and the whole racist taunt thing to have pulled for last year’s champs in the World ...

Top candidates fit to manage Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani
Two weeks ago, the Los Angeles Angels were on top of the world. They had the best record in the AL West. Mike Trout was healthy and playing at the level we’ve come to expect. Shohei Ohtani had gotten off to a rocky start on the mound, but he’d lowered his ERA to an incredible 2.82 after his May 18 s...

Thunder, Magic luck out in a top-heavy NBA draft
After three years of embarrassing tanking, GM Sam Presti and the Oklahoma City Thunder have returned to relevance. They came into the NBA Lottery with the sixth-best odds at the top pick in the 2022 NBA Draft and ended up with the second pick in the draft. The Orlando Magic won the first pick and wi...

How is Justin Verlander still doing this?
Justin Verlander served notice to those sleeping on the Houston Astros and their 39-year-old ace: He’s all the way back. ...

So the James Harden-Ben Simmons trade looks like a dud
Upon hearing the news of any trade, the first reaction is to think about which team won the trade initially. In the NBA court of public opinion, that distinction usually goes to the side that obtains the more prominent name or superstar player. With Ben Simmons (and others) being traded for James Ha...