ned Page 40 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Michael Pineda Again Isn't Discreet About His Pine Tar, Gets Ejected
The last time Yankees pitcher Michael Pineda faced the Red Sox—on April 10—he clearly had pine tar on his hand. No one on the Red Sox brought it up, and the Yankees won. Tonight, Pineda again used pine tar, slapping on his neck before the second inning. Red Sox manager John Farrell spoke up this tim...

Ten Sports We Want To See In A Mall
Tonight the Drake Relays will stage the fifth annual Mall Vault, which features the nation's best pole vaulters pole vaulting in a mall. Here are ten other sporting events that we want to see contested in a mall:...

The Greatest Season In NBA History*, Brought To You By DeAndre Liggins
The play above—what looks like an afterthought in LeBron James's 61-point outburst against the Bobcats—represents the sole meaningful play of #14 DeAndre Liggins's season. Spending most of the year in D-League, Liggins was signed by Miami late in February and released in mid-March, appearing in just...

Kevin Edson's Family Writes A Poignant Apology To Boston
Kevin Edson, the man arrested and charged for allegedly placing a backpack at the Boston Marathon's finish line Tuesday night, was arraigned in court today. Edson will undergo a mental competency test at Bridgewater State Hospital. Today, his family published a letter in the Boston Globe, apologizin...

Man Who Left Bag At Marathon Finish Line: "It's Symbolism"
Kevin Edson, the 25-year-old man who was arrested by Boston police after placing a backpack at the finish line of the upcoming Boston Marathon, was arraigned in court today. Based on the Boston Globe's report on the arraignment, it looks like Edson is a mentally ill man who thought his odd display w...

Here's The Guy Charged With Leaving Bags At Boston Marathon Finish Line
This is the 25-year-old Boston man who allegedly left two backpacks at the Boston Marathon finish line Tuesday night and got himself arrested for his troubles. His name is Kevin Edson, though he's now apparently going by Kayvon. He is, or was, a student at Massachusetts College of Art and Design. ...

Spring Beers, Ranked
Good news: No matter how you do your seasonal accounting, it's definitely spring now. You're already kinda bored with baseball, you've got mud in previously undiscovered orifices, and your favorite fair-weather hot dog stand will come and go before Dick Vitale screams at you again. Furthermore, I so...

A Major League Pitcher's Guide To Doctoring A Baseball
The old saying says that it's not illegal if you don't get caught. In baseball, sometimes it isn't illegal even if you do....

Michael Pineda Was Cheating And No One Cares
"It's just dirt, nothing to see here" was Michael Pineda's general reaction to being accused of glopping up the heel of his hand with some unknown substance in a strong pitching performance against Boston last night. It clearly wasn't dirt. But was it cheating? That depends on whether you listen to ...

Michael Pineda's Not Being Discreet About The Pine Tar On His Hand
Yankees pitcher Michael Pineda doesn't seem to be hiding the visible splotch of stuff on his throwing hand. It appears to be pine tar, as NESN color commentator Jerry Remy noted. (Remy wasn't happy.)...

Flowchart: How To Know Which <em>The Returned</em> You Are Talking About
If you want to start a really confusing conversation with someone, ask them if they have ever heard of The Returned....

Which NCAA Scorekeepers Give Out The Most Assists?
Over on FiveThirtyEight, Carl Bialik has an interesting article on how NCAA assist rates vary from court to court, since scorekeepers are given considerable leeway in deciding what counts as an assist and what doesn't. Ken Pomeroy tackled the same subject back in 2007, and both identified Sam Housto...

Ned Yost Lacks Object Permanence
Let's set the scene. Yesterday's Royals-Tigers game, top of the eighth, two outs, and the tying run on second, and Alcides Escobar at the plate for Kansas City. Alcides Escobar was, by multiple respectable metrics, the single worst hitter in baseball last year. Manager Ned Yost allowed Escobar to hi...

Canned Beer Is The Best Beer
Although I've recently moved into an apartment with three ceiling fans, seven windows, and a bedroom door, I do not consider myself a wealthy man. But every Thursday, my wife comes into a little bit of money, and if I time the transaction just right, I can occasionally buy something useful before sh...

Skyline Figures You'd Like Blue Noodles Under Your Diarrhea Sludge
Would you get a load of that horror. I mean lean on in here and get a nice big load of it. That is a pair of tubs of pasta, dyed red and blue by Louisville's Skyline Chili locations as a... what? celebration? like hell! ...of the upcoming Louisville-Kentucky Sweet 16 matchup. Because Skyline Chil...

So Close, ESPN Data Team
You usually can't calculate free throw percentages in your head, but 680/1,000 is pretty easy. There are plenty of perfectly reasonable explanations for why this happened—maybe the counting and rate stats update at different speeds?—but still, whoops....

Irish Beers, Ranked
St. Patrick's Day is tough on a civic-minded, humanist boozebag. I love New Year's Eve and Thanksgiving Morning and Arbor Weekend and all the other "amateur hours" that too many self-proclaimed sophisticates haughtily dismiss, but Paddy's Day comes soaked with complications beyond the rivers of glit...

Brutal Hockey Fight Ends With A High Five And A Hug
This is a hockey fight happened in the Ligue Nord-Américaine de Hockey, a semi-pro league that we last checked in on when a guy got his face slashed open by a skate. The fight begins with Joel Theriault and Gaby Roch pummeling the crap out of each other while heavy metal music plays throughout the ...

When England's Greatest Genius Took Over England's Best Team
If there's one sports novel you should read, it's probably The Damned Utd, David Peace's 2006 account of Brian Clough's disastrous 44-day tenure with a Leeds United side that detested him as much as he detested them. On one level it works as a meticulous, if fictional, reconstruction of a crucial pe...

Colorado Avalanche And Imagine Dragons Team Up For Dumb Music Video
Dammit, Avalanche. Making a good hockey hype video is not the hardest thing in the world. All you need is a decently edited highlight reel backed by a song that has, like, drums and guitars and stuff. You can even use a song from a band as insipid and annoying as Imagine Dragons! Any song will work...