mbl Page 59 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Rafael Nadal winning the French Open is still the most inevitable outcome in sports
Rafael Nadal’s dominance on clay courts is to be expected. When he enters Roland Garros, his path to the title is Jordanesque, Gretzky-like, Ruthian, or whichever GOAT athletes of the last century come to mind....

The last chapter of the greatest rivalry?
It’s a testament to their greatness that whenever Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic line up in a major, where everyone projects they might meet, everyone starts girding up for it. Be it the quarters, semis, or final, everyone knows to block out half a day and gather the supplies necessary. Because whi...

You’ll never guess who’s receiving more MVP bets than Rodgers and Mahomes combined
The hype train for the 2022 NFL season hasn’t just left the station, it leapt off the tracks, burst into the stratosphere, and started singing a collection of Tupac’s greatest hits....

Sasha Banks thinks Ronda Rousey sucks, too
The fallout from Sasha Banks and Naomi walking out of WWE Raw continued over the weekend. With this drip-fed style of news, the overall feeling is still that there’s something much bigger floating beneath the surface and has been there a while, and it may be some time, if ever, that we get to the re...

Roman Reigns has become stale, but does Vince even want a way out?
At the top, I should state that I’m all for anybody making their bag with putting their body at less and less risk. If Roman Reigns wants to continue to make his millions by wrestling only 20 times a year, you get that, my friend. If he wants to do it by removing all risk and and just going to make ...

Congrats, Browns, you weren’t inept <em>and</em> unethical
Congratulations are in order for Jimmy Haslam and the Cleveland Browns. The NFL’s independent investigation into former head coach Hue Jackson’s claims that the team paid him to lose games found “no evidence” to substantiate those allegations, proving that the team did not intentionally lose games b...

IDIOT OF THE MONTH: It’s pretty much downhill from here
Welcome, once more, to Deadspin’s IDIOT OF THE MONTH, in which we catalogue the most bleak recesses of professional athletics and mock them. Hooray!...

The NFL Draft becomes must-bet TV
Will it be Travon Walker? Aidan Hutchinson? Kayvon Thibodeaux? Whoever your gut is telling you is probably a safe bet — well, safer than most bets, anyway....

Tennis world puts hypocrisy on full display with Djokovic set to play Wimbledon
Priorities, right? Let’s ban all Russian and Belaruisan athletes who are blameless, even if they’ve spoken out on national television against soulless Vladimir Putin in Russia’s brutal ongoing war against Ukraine. But unvaccinated Novak Djokovic is allowed to compete at Wimbledon without getting a j...

Take Your Pick: The 32 best NFL first rounders at each draft slot since 2002
The NFL Draft is all about predicting the future. There are countless guesses as to which players will fit in a certain system or what position groups have the deepest talent pool that could affect where the league trends down the line. In preparation for those hypotheticals, most will look back at ...

You might want to close your sportsbook app for a few hours to watch this Netflix Tim Donaghy documentary when it comes out
Are you ready for FanDuel and Caesar’s Sportsbook commercials during your favorite sporting events to be followed by trailers for the Tim Donaghy story? If not, buckle up, because that is gonna be one helluva dichotomy as the big leagues dive into sports gambling in synchronized tandems, while we ge...

Let he who is without sin cast the hottest take
The NBA hasn’t had a real (or uncovered) gambling scandal since booking games became legal in more than select locations. Unless you count Scott Foster’s streak of holding down playoff teams that employ Chris Paul — which is currently at 14 games after the Suns’ loss to New Orleans in Game 2 on Tues...

Let them play!
A ban from the FIFA World Cup didn’t stop any needless aggression from Russia in its brutal war on Ukraine. Even those Russians brave enough to speak out against Vladimir Putin’s needless invasion have felt the consequences of the barbaric actions of the Russian army, like Fedor Smolov. As another h...

Can anyone fill the void left by Serena Williams and now Ash Barty?
Ash Barty’s retirement from professional tennis was a blunt instrument between the eyes of the WTA community. Barty was coupled with Naomi Osaka as the future of women’s tennis. At 25, she was coming into her own after winning the Australian Open in January, Wimbledon in 2021 and the 2019 French Ope...

The most dazzling tournament runs (by players who didn’t win it all)
One byproduct of college basketball’s March Madness’ 68-team, single-elimination format is it provides an avenue for players from programs major and mid-major to upgrade their stature. When certain players get their opportunity, they unlock a level few mortals can reach and sustain for multiple week...

Stone Cold Steve Austin to return for <em>WrestleMania</em><em></em>
The Texas Rattlesnake is likely lacing his boots up one more time. For the first time in 19 years, Stone Cold Steve Austin will hear glass shatter, walk out onto the entrance way to an ovation that would make Robert Plant jealous, and get his shtick to reverberate through a crowd like it’s 1998 for ...

Integrity is a funny word
The first rule for any professional sports athlete is that you can’t bet on the games. Technically it’s called Rule 21 and you can find it hanging in every Big League clubhouse. Pete Rose would walk past it every day for decades as a player and manager, paying it no mind, so his lifetime ban is the ...

Grambling State hires disgraced Art Briles as coordinator
In a horrifying turn of events, Art Briles is going to be employed on a college campus come fall....

What if Serena Williams did what Alexander Zverev did?
Before this week, for most sports fans, German tennis player Alexander Zverev’s name didn’t ring a bell. Others likely remember the domestic abuse allegations levied against him before the 2021 U.S. Open. But now, everyone should be aware as a recent video showed him cursing out an umpire and smashi...
