obituaries Page 1 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Charley Pride, Negro Leagues veteran and country music trailblazer, dead of COVID complications
You know Charley Pride, the country singer. The three-time Grammy winner recorded over 40 No. 1 hit country songs and became the genre’s first Black superstar. But before his music career, Pride was a professional baseball player....
Rafer Johnson, Olympic legend, actor, and tackler of RFK’s assassin, dead at 86
Rafer Johnson, one of the best athletes of his time, died Wednesday. He was 86....
Nobody threw shade better than Alex Trebek
It had become a weird sort of canon in Alex Trebek’s career that he was TV’s Mr. Nice Guy — the unimpeachably friendly face of a cherished institution....
Joe Morgan, championed by the analytics he hated, passes away at 77
Most old-time baseball men hate sabermetrics for fear of their own legacy. They’ll never admit that, but it’s what’s at the heart of it. That pretty much spreads to every industry, where the way we used to do it is obviously better than the way we do it now (and sometimes that’s true). That somehow ...
Jerry Sloan, Hall Of Fame Jazz Coach And All-Star Bulls Defender, Dead At 78
Legendary Utah Jazz coach Jerry Sloan, a basketball titan on and off the court, died on Friday, the team announced. He was 78....
Steve Dalkowski, Inspiration for Nuke LaLoosh of ‘Bull Durham,’ Dead At 80 Due to COVID-19
Steve Dalkowski, a towering figure in minor-league lore whose legendary arm strength was matched only by his lack of command, died earlier this week, his family announced. He was 80....
Hall-Of-Fame Boxer Pernell "Sweet Pea" Whitaker Dead At 55 After Being Hit By A Car
Former professional boxing champion Pernell “Sweet Pea” Whitaker was killed last night in Virginia Beach. According to police, Whitaker was crossing a busy intersection around 10 p.m. when a car hit him. He died from his injuries at the scene. He was 55....
Gabriele Grunewald, Who Defied Cancer By Racing At The Highest Level, Dies At 32
Former U.S. track and field champion Gabriele Grunewald died yesterday at 32 years old, a decade after she was first diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. Despite her diagnosis, Grunewald competed professionally in the middle distances at the highest level for six years after she graduated college i...
Le Anne Schreiber Could See It All Coming
There is no other way to say it: Le Anne Schreiber was a titan of journalism....
Dan Jenkins Had It
My relationship with Dan Jenkins goes back decades, and it is a simple one. He wrote words and I read them over and over again. I have no strained connection with him that would somehow label me as more blessed or important for knowing him. I know people I like very much who knew him, that’s all. I ...
Dead Sports Fans Should Get A New Bit
Maybe you’ve seen the story about the lifelong Buffalo Bills fan who passed away last weekend, and in his obituary requested six Bills players to serve as pallbearers “so they can let him down one last time.” ...
This Obituary Is Ruthless
The Redwood Falls (Minn.) Gazette published the above paid obituary on Monday, both online and in print. Sometime Tuesday, the paper deleted the obit from its website. The Schunk and Dehmlow families seem to have some unsettled business, though I suppose this is one step toward a resolution....
Dwight Clark Dies After Battle With ALS
Dwight Clark, the two-time Super Bowl-winning receiver for the San Francisco 49ers and the man who caught “The Catch,” has died at age 61, according to a tweet signed by Clark’s wife, Kelly....
Martial Arts Master Jhoon Rhee, Who Taught Bruce Lee To Kick And Gave Muhammad Ali A New Punch, Is Dead
Nobody will bother Jhoon Rhee again. If anybody ever did, that is....
Browns Owned From Beyond The Grave By Disgruntled Dead Fan
Well, you knew this was coming: the Cleveland Browns have been owned by another dead person....
Let's Remember A Cat
It is with great sadness that I inform you of the death of Skeeter Duffy, baseball’s most notable fat cat and one of its best. Matt Duffy—presently in the Rays’ organization and previously the Giants’ third baseman—announced the passing of his beloved fatso due to illness this weekend at the age of ...
Ben's Cat, The Horse No One Believed In When It Counted, Is Dead<em></em>
Laurel Park hosted a memorial service over the weekend for Ben’s Cat. “It was just like a funeral for a person,” said trainer King T. Leatherbury....
Sid Catlett, Star Of The Greatest High School Hoops Game Ever Played, Has Died
Sid Catlett, a former NCAA star and brief NBA player who always regarded a high school hoops game as his sporting peak, is dead. Catlett was 69 years old....
Renowned Climber Hayden Kennedy Commits Suicide After Girlfriend, Fellow Pro Inge Perkins, Dies In Avalanche<em></em>
Last Saturday, Inge Perkins and Hayden Kennedy were six miles into a backcountry skiing hike up to the top of Imp Peak, a mountain in Montana’s Madison Range, when they triggered an avalanche. The slide was 300 feet long and 150 feet wide at a depth of one to two feet, and both Perkins and Kennedy w...
Rich Piana Lived As Big As He Was
Many people die as they live. There are the Reinhard Heydrichs who go out feeling the same pain they caused in their lives run through their urethras before the light flickers out, the King Fahds who sit in luxury as their hearts murmur then finally flatline, and the Michael Jacksons who perish in c...