of Page 197 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Dallas Stars coach benches rookie before homecoming game in front of friends and family
Twenty-three-year-old Riley Tufte got called up to the Dallas Stars’ roster last week to play for their fourth line. He saw a few minutes of playing time in victories against the Flyers and the Red Wings, but the big game for him was going to be his homecoming to face the Minnesota Wild in his home ...

Joe Biden thinking about declaring diplomatic immunity, err, boycott of Winter Olympics
When politics and sports collide, people tend to lose their shit. “This is supposed to be my happy place!” “How dare you use your platform to speak out against racism!” “Loud noises!”...

Sean Payton agrees with you about NFL officiating this season
For any NFL fans out there who think that officiating hasn’t been at the level it should be, you are not alone. Earlier today, New Orleans’ Sean Payton was interviewed on the Dan Patrick Show and he was asked about how long it takes him to get over a loss. Payton responded that it usually takes abou...

The WNBA unveils new playoff format
The WNBA announced a new playoff format today that will increase the number of potential games in the tournament and completely get rid of single-elimination games. It will remain an eight-team playoff, with teams seeded based on overall standings over a 36-game regular season, but the first- and se...
![Ref allegedly uses N-word during Tennessee high school basketball game [UPDATED]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/2caaeeea486c3f05f6b12ba0b82d0bc2.jpg)
Ref allegedly uses N-word during Tennessee high school basketball game [UPDATED]
The story out of Smyrna, Tenn., on Wednesday night appears to be both rage-inducing and fairly self-explanatory, but there’s a lot more that needs explanation, and a lot of questions that need answering. ...

These pretzels are headed for your face if you anger Matt Stafford’s wife
Don’t make Kelly Stafford angry. If you do then you might find a salted, carb-loaded treat coming your way. A person who attended Monday night’s Los Angeles Rams-San Francisco 49ers matchup at Levi Stadium told TMZ that Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford’s wife threw a soft pretzel at a fan. The witn...

Even WWE wrestlers think <em>Survivor Series</em> sucks
Generally, the fall has always been the downtime on the WWE calendar. Before SmackDown on Friday nights became the A-show, WWE was happy to cede the floor to Monday Night Football and let its booking from September through the end of the year get even lazier and more banal than it normally is, which...

Back to the future with the USFL
Mullets, mom jeans, the United States Football League — you’d be forgiven for thinking you woke up back in the ’80s this morning. Fox Sports announced its sponsored relaunch of the short-lived league, scheduled for the spring of 2022. With an eight-team, two-conference model, spring football will re...

A review of this week’s <em>Man in the Arena: Tom Brady</em> coming up as soon as I find literally anything else to watch
I don’t know how TV critics (like Alan Sepinwall) do their jobs when they’re forced to watch awful shows. How many spinoffs of rich people behaving poorly can you honestly consume before low-brow insults from high-class people lose their effect?...

Los Angeles County lawyers are still making Vanessa Bryant suffer
There’s a lot going on in California. The Golden State Warriors are on fire. Anthony Davis thinks the Lakers “suck.” And the Staples Center will be called the Crypto.com Arena starting on Christmas. Maybe that’s why more people aren’t focused on what’s still happening to Vanessa Bryant. ...

If an athlete buys an ownership stake in a team and no one knows it, does it make a sound?
What’s the point of owning a sports franchise if you can’t make irresponsible trades, overpay role players, furtively watch from a dimly lit owner’s box or make Roger Goodell eat shit?...

Brett Favre still owes cash in Mississippi boondoggle
Brett Favre is now on the other end of a handoff, as the Office of the State Auditor in Mississippi has given the attorney general’s office the go-ahead to try to get back the nearly quarter of a million dollars that the Hall-of-Fame quarterback owes his home state....

Marcus Stroman cuts the Yankees instead of his hair
The Yankees’ policy on personal appearance has long been worthy of mockery, and mockery it has received, for decades, going back to Don Mattingly’s appearance on The Simpsons, when Montgomery Burns kept telling the first baseman to cut his sideburns....

Adam Silver doing his best Vince McMahon impression in NBA’s new deal with UAE
I’m not sure what’s more obvious: A media outlet taking the NBA to task for a multiyear partnership with the United Arab Emirates, or the inevitable controversy that will come of it. It doesn’t take long to unearth copious amounts of dirt about the UAE’s record and ongoing pursuit of human rights vi...

The NBA future is... WOWZA!
The NBA has never felt younger and more reliant on up-and-coming stars than it does today. Teams are beginning to utilize the draft more and more. We’ve seen plenty of tank-a-thons by teams in the last five years, and these efforts have panned out to varying degrees. For some, it has materialized in...

Actually, Carlos Correa has a point about Derek Jeter
Astros’ shortstop Carlos Correa is one of the biggest names on the 2022 free agent market. The two-time All-Star and former Rookie of the Year is fresh off the first Gold Glove of his career. With several rumors linking Correa to the New York Yankees, it was only a matter of time before comparisons ...

Cris Collinsworth peers into his crystal ball, sees New England playing in Super Bowl LVI
NBC Sunday Night Football color analyst Cris Collinsworth stepped out on a limb Monday on Twitter when he willingly offered up his Super Bowl prediction and strongly implied that the Patriots make it back to the big game this year....

How will the College Football Playoff Committee shock and upset everyone tonight?
It’s Tuesday, which means it’s College Football Playoff rankings day, which means the CFP committee is getting ready to royally screw things up again, because that’s how this works....

A-Rod, listen close, if you want your baseball career to end with the ultimate honor, you need to stop the cheating
Come on A-Rod, for once you’re on everyone’s good side. We’re ignoring the year-long ban from baseball for performance enhancing drugs and not raising any stink about you bringing that stain to America’s pastime when we turn on ESPN and Fox baseball broadcasts. J.Rod was cool while it lasted. We wer...

2021 Rookie QB Rankings: The Mac Daddy rules
We made it to the 10th week of the NFL season, and rookie quarterbacks are always front and center, with some living up to the hype and others not as much. With that, let’s look at how the 2021 rookie class fared in Week 10....