m Page 6588 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Dirk Exorcizes Some Demons
The NBA Closer is written by our Canadian weekend maestro J.E. Skeets. When he's not busy scouring the box scores or wearing skinny ties, he can be heard on The Basketball Jones daily podcast. Enjoy....

Shall We Ever See The Likes Of Cam Again?
We do not claim to be experts in the field of NFL general management, but we'd have to think when your team just went 1-15, and Bill Parcells just became your new boss, you're not long for this world....

Introducing The College Basketball Closer
Starting today, the College Basketball Closer will be written (more or less) daily by Jonah Keri. Jonah's work has appeared in a bunch of different publications, including ESPN.com, Baseball Prospectus, the New York Times, the New York Sun and YESNetwork.com. E-mail your questions, comments or Clare...

About Last Night
What you missed while taking a huge lead in the 2008 Trailer Park Darwin Awards race ... • Fiesta Bowl: All Er Nuthin' ... Oklahoma! Stoops to trickery, falls to Les Miz 48-28. • NHL: On a Cleary day, you can see forever ... Red Wings 4, Stars 1. • NFL: 49ers' shakeup doesn't include Nolan. Or, it d...

In Praise Of The Patriots (Kind Of)
So we're about to make a confession here, and we're not happy about it. We were watching that Patriots-Giants game last Saturday night, and after Randy Moss caught that ridiculous touchdown pass from Tom Brady, something terrifying occurred to us: We were rooting for the Patriots....

To Watch Tonight
What to watch as you honor Drew Brees, the best quarterback ever ... • College football: Fiesta Bowl, Oklahoma vs. West Virginia, at Glendale, Ariz. (8:15 p.m., ET). Too much excitement to fit on one chip. [Fox] • College basketball: Rutgers at South Florida (7 p.m., ET); Penn State at Northwestern ...

Introducing io9, For The William Gibson In You
We are proud (and, yes, goaded into) to introduce a new Gawker Media blog: It's called io9, and it's about science fiction. That's right: It's a whole blog devoted solely to science fiction. Don't even pretend you're not interested....

Meet Your Three Pick 'Em Winners
We'd like to take a brief moment to congratulate R. Flemming, L.M. and Adam Hall for finishing first in our Pants Party Pick 'Em Group. They each had 179 points to tie for first out of 1,575 entries...

Inside The Mind Of Baseball HOF Voters
The next class of the Baseball Hall of Fame will be announced next Tuesday, and it should be a tight squeeze for a few folks. How seriously are the Hall of Fame voters taking this historic election?...

Tomorrow Night, We Join The Varsity Letters Crew
So, it's now January 2008, and you know what that means: It's time to unleash self-deprecating but subtly (?) self-aggrandizing posts reminding you we have a book coming out in exactly 20 days. And tomorrow night, we'll be reading from it....

Brian Billick's Last Days
We have made no secret of our enduring love of The Dugout, both in its original incarnation and its current, non-expletive form at AOL Sports. But you think these guys just know baseball? Pshaw....

Boy, Is China's Face Red
OK, this is pretty hilarious. During a televised ceremony to launch China's television station for the Bejing Olympics, CCTV-5, famed Chinese broadcaster Zhang Bin was ambushed by his wife, who burst onto the stage and accused him of an affair....

Witness The Pagentry Of The International Bowl
It can't be easy to promote the International Bowl in Toronto. It's Rutgers vs. Ball State, smack in the middle of a bunch of bowls that actually, you know, matter. (Well, kind of.) How do you sell it? How do you make people want to watch?...

Our On-Site Report From The Ice Bowl
Jack Kukoda is a native of Buffalo, NY and is a writer for the Onion News Network. He lives in New York City now. And he was at the outdoors Sabres-Penguins game yesterday and files this most amusing report....

The Confusing Red Sox, Past And Present
• Are Mike Lowell and Derek Lowe that difficult to tell apart? [Out In Center Field] • Which Super Bowl champion would be best for the stock market? [The Serious Tip] • A weird new NCAA RPI rule change that no one knew about. [CSTV] • The progression of Colt Brennan's hair. [SportsWrap beRecruited] ...

The Dregs Of Week 17
The Mighty MJD's Smorgasbord runs every Monday, except for today, when it runs on Wednesday. Do enjoy....

Child About To Become Somewhat Less Smelly
When we were a kid, we had a T-shirt that said "I Root For Two Teams: The Cardinals And Whoever Plays The Cubs." We found this shirt incredibly clever when we were 10, and we wore it pretty much every other day. But couldn't hold a candle to 11-year-old David Witthoft of Connecticut....

Patriots Fans Are Deranged, Buxom
A lot of people say that they're Patriots' fans, but how many are willing to bare their breasts for the cause? (No, not you, sir; please sit down). Sorry if I'm late to the party with this, but I've only just heard of wannabe actress Cheryl Ling, who is better known as the topless Patriots superfan ...

ESPN's Featured Comment Of The Day
ESPN scoured its message boards this morning to find its wittiest, boldest, most enlightening comment, and chose this one above all others ......