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Jimmy Butler went nuclear and evaporated Milwaukee's title aspirations
Monday night’s pandemonium was indicative of the Miami Heat’s Jimmy Butler era. Grinding and persevering have defined the Heat for the last four seasons. When the odds are against him, Jimmy Buckets rises to the top of the food chain, but Game 4 was the capstone in his postseason cap. In the pantheo...
Redefining what it means to be a unicorn
“Unicorn” is up there with “new normal” and “positionless basketball” as far as terms I would love to see removed from my brain. Any big man with guard skills is dubbed a unicorn, and we’re led to believe the NBA is a mythical universe populated by elves, dragons, and wizards. Well, technically the ...
The Isiah Thomas-Michael Jordan beef still going strong decades later
I guess if Michael Jordan gets to remain bitter about events from 40 years ago then everyone else from that time should be granted the same courtesy. In 2021 it was Scottie Pippen — promoting his bourbon and book — who was publicly critical of Jordan. Since the NBA 75 Greatest Team gathered at the 2...
The Great Debates tournament: GOATs galore in the final
It’s time to crown a champion — or at least pretend like we don’t know who is going to win this tournament. Michael Jordan vs. LeBron James is the question of our times, like when West Coast vs. East Coast was the fulcrum point of the Golden Age of Hip-Hop. If I could bottle whatever it is that lead...
The Great Debates tournament: Final Four
The Final Four is here, with a bunch of heavy hitters and a No. 8 seed that, technically, is a heavy hitter as well. Jordan-LeBron, cats-dogs, Biggie-2Pac, and The Rock-Stone Cold are the last debates left standing, and we’re going to lose at least one more 1 seed, and possibly two if The People’s C...
The Great Debates tournament: Elite 8
We have arrived at the Elite 8, and this round is going to be a good old-fashioned slobber knocker....
The Great Debates tournament: Sweet 16
It’s Sweet 16 time. The primaries are over and it is time for the general election. In real-life debates, this is about the time when candidates would be making disingenuous retorts about each other’s bad-faith arguments....
The Great Debates tournament: Round of 32
Alright, things are heating up for those of you who understand the concept. The big-name debates largely rolled on with a couple of alliterative exceptions as Rest vs. Rust and Nature vs. Nurture were ousted. ...
Deadspin presents: The Great Debates tournament
Welcome to the Great Debates bracket, where we’re trying to find out what is life’s greatest argument. The queries below have stumped philosophers, presidents, priests, and peasants alike. They’ve inspired books, memes, Twitter threads, and even entire fields of study....
JJ Redick and Kendrick Perkins are becoming ESPN’s new debate-show circus
JJ Redick looks like he’d rather be receiving a colonoscopy than embracing the debate on First Take. Redick joined ESPN after retirement, riding the success of his podcast The Old Man and the Three, and initially seemed like an odd fit for First Take. However, the more he strikes a nerve with his co...
Nuggets’ All-Star power outage is either disrespect from the league or a playoff omen
Nikola Jokić’s season has been one for the ages. The Denver Nuggets are first in the West, first in offensive efficiency, Jokić is a god according to almost every analytics metric as well as the runaway favorite to become the first MVP in three consecutive seasons since Larry Bird ran the table betw...
The best and most memorable Super Bowl ads of all time
Every year, people tune into the Super Bowl to watch the two best teams in the league give everything they have to win the game and hoist the Lombardi Trophy. Companies, on the other hand, fight each other for those elusive and expensive moments of airtime to promote their brand. Everyone in the wor...
When it comes to load management, Steph Curry says it's not the players who want it
The gentrifiers of Brooklyn caught a raw deal on Monday night. The Los Angeles Lakers are in New York on a back-to-back, meaning that LeBron James and Anthony Davis were only going to play one game. People who purchased tickets for the Brooklyn Nets game received the short end of the load management...
Clemson guard’s ‘balls exploded,’ internet giggles
I’m here today to tell you the tale of how, allegedly, a Clemson basketball player’s “balls exploded.” However, what I’m really doing is trying to write enough dick jokes to hit 200 words so this blog post can get picked up in Google search before 15,000 other sites post it. So, my apologies to Brev...
NBA All-Star Draft a change for the better
For sports fans who believe that NBA basketball has been “too playground” since Larry Bird retired in 1992, this year’s All-Star game is doing the opposite of reaching out to those fans....
Lillard nominating himself as the second-best shooter in NBA history was the ultimate heat check
Damian Lillard’s Trail Blazers career has reached an inflection point where his legacy is solidifying. We feel it, fans feel it, the record books are feeling it and Dame is sensing it. On Monday night, Lillard eclipsed Clyde Drexler to become the franchise’s all-time leading scorer. Lillard’s career...
Alexander Ovechkin, the 'GR8 One'
Alexander Ovechkin is the best pure goal-scorer in NHL history. That’s not up for debate. The longtime Washington Capital hasn’t been hockey’s best player for years, but his ability to put the puck in the back of the net is nearly as good as it was 15 years ago when he scored 65 goals during the 200...
Hey Adam Silver, glossy new trophies won’t fix the NBA’s regular season
They say millennials are obsessed with trophies, but our elders have been expanding the ones propping up that industry. Commissioner Adam Silver’s quest to revitalize the regular season’s infrastructure has been his pet project for almost his entire eight-year stint. One day after Kawhi Leonard expr...
World Cup Diary Day 18: Croatia, Argentina advance in penalty kicks
As extra time started, neither Brazil nor Croatia showed any urgency. The weight of a FIFA World Cup quarterfinal entering the additional 30 minutes-plus after going scoreless in the contest’s original time could’ve been swapped for the rhythm of a Tuesday exhibition. World Cups are how every countr...