new Page 1158 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Yankee Stadium:Ground Zero For All Things Pope-Y
As many of you know, Pope Benedict the Magnificent XI was in New York on Sunday to celebrate mass at Yankee Stadium with 57,000 Bronx old ladies carrying plastic rosary beads. It went well, as all who attended were happy and blessed and there were no assasination attempts or extremely violent protes...

The Patriots Plan On Doing The Faux Perfection Thing Again
It's a grand sports capitalist tradition to trademark a team's or an individual's achievements. Pat Riley grabbed "Threepeat;" Dennis Green, displaying a self-awareness we wouldn't have anticipated, snatched up "They are who we thought they were." The New England Patriots were all over this last ye...

You Know It's Baseball Season When Fat Yanks-Red Sox Fans Are Killing Each Other
Last week, the Red Sox and Yankees battled it out at Yankee Stadium. You might have heard about it. But we just today saw this shot above and, more to the point, the rather amazing video after the jump of a real, live Yankees-Red Sox fan fight....

New Jersey Devils Given New York Farewell
It's nice to see the NHL Playoffs' first round is filled with good-natured competitiveness. Certainly this is epitomized by the New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils — neighbors! — playing to a 5-3 Rangers victory, knocking the Devils out of the playoffs. And all Rangers fans can certainly apprecia...

Is Star Jones In Dwyane Wade's Five?
Chances are this isn't even remotely close to being true, but it's so preposterous and gross that it's at least somewhat amusing. The always reliable gossip site Mediatakeout is reporting that Miami Heat's injured forward Dwyane Wade is (blecch) now (plettch) dating (claggh) the saggy old remains of...

Dallas Versus New Orleans: The Mark Cuban Finally Has A Coronary Series
Over the next few days, Basket Bawful and Free Darko will be previewing each NBA Playoff series. Basket Bawful looks at the Western Conference today, continuing with the series between the New Orleans Hornets and the Dallas Mavericks, which begins Saturday....

Mark Littell, The Nutty Buddy, Is Completely Nuts
Two days ago, I emailed Mark Littell, former major leaguer and creator of the Nutty Buddy to see if he'd comment on that story I was working on about Flyers center Patrick Thoresen and the dangers of pucks (or anything) to the groin, etc. I told him (or, rather, the Nutty Buddy crack email team) tha...

Free Darko On New Orleans-Dallas
We're looking at every NBA Playoff series through the eyes of both Free Darko and Basket Bawful. Here's Free Darko's look at the New Orleans Hornets-Dallas Mavericks series. Your author is Bethlehem Shoals....

Goodbye, Isiah. We Shall Never Meet Another Like You
The NBA Playoffs schedule is all set, and we'll certainly be overflowing with coverage and discussion and all you might expect from your sports blog, but we really need to start today off with a eulogy. At some point today, if it hasn't happened already (and the ESPNews crawl seems to think so), Is...

Do Protective Cups Even Help Any More?
In Saturday's 5-4 loss to the Capitals, the Flyers' Patrick Thoresen attempted to block a shot with his body and ended up getting drilled with the puck. But, unlike the thousands of other times this occurs during a hockey season, Thoresen got hit with the puck right in the peach basket, which dente...

Counting Down Isiah's Final Hours
The New York Knicks' season ends tomorrow night, in Indiana, but the official/unofficial goodbye to Isiah Thomas was in the Garden last night, with the Knicks losing to the Celtics' second stringers. It's all coming to an end, Mal. Our Sports Human Of The Year has just a few hours left of employmen...

The Pope Should Wipe His Feet Before Entering Yankee Stadium
The Pope turns 81 years old today — 10 years older than John McCain, and just three years older than Julio Franco — and he's celebrating it in Washington, D.C. with President Bush. (What better way?) He will be celebrating mass at the new Nationals Stadium, which means we're going to assume Elijah D...

New York Now Free From The Menace Of Buried Cloth
There have been a little more than 9,000 unsolved murders in New York City since 1985; many of the victims buried in cement, do doubt. But thank God we've solved this case: The Yankees have dug up a Red Sox jersey on Sunday that had been planted beneath their new stadium by a construction worker. An...

To Watch Tonight
What to watch while patiently waiting for Tiger to turn it up a notch... • MLB: New York Yankees at Boston Red Sox. Sigh [ESPN] • Hockey: New Jersey Devils at New York Rangers and San Jose Sharks at Calgary Flames. [Versus] • Animation: The Simpsons. Thank god. [FOX]...

South Park, Cheating, And You
“In America, it’s OK to cheat as long as you cheat your way to the top.” What does Stand and Deliver have in common with Bill Belichick? South Park explains....

Observations From Opening Night At Shea
We attended our first baseball game of the season last night, a sloppy, ugly, slightly comical 8-2 Mets win over the Phillies. We tried to attribute it to a cold April night, but seriously, we're not sure the Phillies were actually wearing gloves....

Shea Stadium Fans Disagree With The Internet
As you might have seen by now, the Mets really were "Rick Rolled" yesterday with the playing of Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" at Shea Stadium. If they're going by crowd reaction to decided what the permanent winner is … it doesn't looks good for Mr. Astley....

Back When Men Were Men, And The Prose Was Purple
Slate's Robert Weintraub, like many of us, loves the old purple prose of early 1900s sportswriting, the Red Smiths, the Grantland Rices, the men who painted epic tales of warriors, grizzled combatants and lardywarks too manly to wear gloves. In an occasional series, Weintraub writes about the week's...

We Will Never Give Up Rick Astley
Last week, we encouraged everyone to vote for The Eagles Of Death Metal to be played at Mets games this year. We clearly backed the wrong horse; it appears Rick Astley has won the competition. Kind of....

Stanley Cup Preview: The Fours Meet The Fives
NHL Closer writer Greg Wyshynski previews the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals right up until they drop what is commonly referred to as "the puck."...