pie Page 39 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Jack, The Georgetown Bulldog, May Need Knee Surgery
At eight years old, Jack is no spring chicken. But he recently injured his leg jumping to the couch, and is going for a second opinion to see if surgery will be required. Not a great day for the Hoyas, who won a tournament bracket based on tuition. Not a great day for Jack, because he's a Bulldog an...

A.J. Burnett's Single Greatest Contribution To The Yankees Will Live On
There's still a month before the season begins, and already the Yankees have been able to replace A.J. Burnett's value to the team. No, it's not a WAR-level replacement player. Ha! That's a good joke. I wish I'd thought of it....

Glory Days: I Was Paul Pierce's Nightmare (In A Game We Lost By 58 Points)
Sports greatness takes place all the time, all over the country. Sometimes, as with our own Tommy Craggs, those moments of triumph are preserved forever, even if it's on a crappy videotape that's been forgotten about and no one's watched it for years. In this occasional series, we'll show the vid...

Shabazz Napier Downed Villanova With This Buzzer-Beating 30-Footer In Overtime
After a game marked by ineptitude by both teams (especially in the waning moments of regulation) UConn guard Shabazz Napier shocked the home Villanova crowd with this extra-long-range game-winning three-pointer. The best part, of course, is that it gave us an "ONIONS!" from Bill Raftery. [ESPN]...

ESPN.com Passes Along Kessel-For-Nash Rumor, As Reported By Fake Pierre McGuire Twitter Account
ESPN's rumor section is a place to find some of the more out-there trade possibilities, so we don't go in expecting everything prophesied to come true. We just kind of hope that when a blockbuster trade possibility is floated, the source is a real person....

Looking For Love On Valentine's Day At Westminster
I have a girlfriend and a cat, and at Westminster I feel like I'm cheating on both. When's the last time you fell in love at first sight? When your heart and soul was completely handed over within seconds of meeting someone? When you and a complete stranger fell into a slobbery make-out session, wit...

Here's A Video Of Dogs Saying "I Love You"
Originally published Feb. 14, 2011....

Handjobs, Butt-To-Butt Action, And Other Sex Secrets Of The Champion Show Dog
For his new book, Show Dog: the Charmed Life and Trying Times of a Near-Perfect Purebred, Josh Dean spent more than a year following a champion show dog named Jack, a young Australian Shepherd. In the following excerpt, Jack—who is owned by a single mother from Pennsylvania named Kimberly Smith—trie...

If You Missed The Puppy Bowl (Or Want To Relive It) Here's Your Highlight Reel
Here's Animal Planet's Puppy Bowl (which mostly sucked this year, thanks to a Disney tie-in and no beagles) compressed to about a minute. No, there aren't any halftime show highlights featuring kittens. The real Super Bowl halftime will feature plenty of that. [Video from Animal Planet. Music is ...

David Backes, Blues Captain, Flew His Plane 700 Miles To Rescue Three Stray Dogs
Via Fox 2 St. Louis, we now have the most endearing story of 2012. David Backes is a good hockey player. They don't have to do good work to stand out. But Backes is the captain of the St. Louis Blues—they're good too, mind you, with the second-highest point total in the Western Conference—and he h...

Donte Whitner Knocked Pierre Thomas Out Cold With This Helmet-To-Helmet Hit
Legal? According to the NFL. Safe? Smart? You make the call. [Fox]...

Rick DiPietro Has Surgery, Out For—Ah, You Know How This Goes
This time: the dreaded sports hernia. Prognosis: back for training camp. Record: broken....

Rick DiPietro Gets Injured While On Injured Reserve
The Islanders' $4.5 million third-string goaltender was sent home to see the doctor after he suffered a lower body injury, even though he's already been on IR for a month. [Newsday]...

The Year In Animals Running Onto The Field, Adorably: A Video
Humans weren't the only creatures invading our sporting events this year. There was the squirrel that interrupted an NLDS game, the fluffy owl who is sadly no longer with us, and a strangely high quantity of dogs running around soccer pitches. Here are some of our favorite animal trespassers from ...

Four Players Since Week 10 Have Won Defensive Player Of The Week After Facing The Jets
The Daily News points out a common thread in one of the NFL's weekly awards:...

Bryce Harper Named His New Puppy "Swag"
Did you know Nationals wundertool Bryce Harper protects his Tweets? Luckily, Nats Enquirer is here to relay to us that Harper received an adorable chocolate Lab for Christmas, and promptly named it Swag. They're totally off to the park to pick up chicks. [Nats Enquirer]...

Recruit Says Bruce Pearl Sent A Beautiful Girl To Tell Him To Attend Tennessee
Small forward Jordan Adams is one of the many prospects out of Oak Hill Academy, and ESPN has him ranked as the 50th best recruit in the nation. He's going to UCLA in the fall, but they weren't the only ones who were interested: Bruce Pearl, while still at Tennessee, apparently called in the service...

Football In The Dark Is An Illuminating Thing
We're doing a season-long NFL roundtable with our friends at Slate. Check back here each week as a rotating cast of football watchers discusses the weekend's key plays, coaching decisions, and traumatic brain injuries....

Because Bringing Your Dog To An English Premier League Match Makes Complete Sense
I suppose it's possible this Sunderland fan celebrating Nicklas Bendtner's opening goal over QPR at Loftus Road has a service animal of some sort, but I'm pretty sure seeing-eye dogs aren't meant to be tossed around like this poor pup. Sunderland won in a 3-2 heartbreaker. [BBC]...
