playoffs Page 118 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Martavis Bryant Buttcatch Vindicates League That Still Doesn't Know What A Catch Is
Martavis Bryant’s buttcatch is one of this season’s most spectacular plays, but we’ll forgive you if you missed it due to falling asleep or having any of a hundred better things to be doing at 10:15 on a Saturday night. This being the NFL, we fully expected officials to declare it incomplete. How ha...

Jeremy Maclin And J.J. Watt Both Leave Game With Injuries On The Same Play
J.J. Watt, who’d just spent a little bit on the sideline right before this play nursing a groin injury, had to stop his rush halfway through due to a flare up. Right after he went down, Chiefs lineman Eric Fisher got a cheap shot in on the neck of a defenseless Watt. Watt went into the locker room, ...

Chiefs Open NFL Playoffs With 106-Yard Knile Davis Kickoff Return
The Houston Texans’ plan to leverage home field advantage and an at-times terrifying defense fell through when they allowed Kansas City’s Knile Davis to return the game’s opening kickoff 106 yards for a score. ESPN Deportes’s Álvaro Martín captured the shock almost as well as the vacuum-like sound o...

Marvin Lewis Is Probably Boned (Again)
The Bengals looked like they’d nab a first-round bye in the playoffs, until Andy Dalton broke his thumb. Cincinnati finished with a 12-4 record and the third seed. The team hoped that Dalton could come back for the postseason, but today, the quarterback was officially ruled out for Saturday’s game....

Here's Your Ready-Made NFL Officiating Conspiracy Theory
In the wake of a string of very visible officiating blunders—and a perceived increase in the number of zebra screw-ups—the NFL this week announced a potentially big change to its postseason procedures, one that will expand the types of disputed calls on which officials will be allowed to consult the...

The Royals Won By Betting On The Mets To Botch The Job
I felt a little insane listening to the Fox booth lavish praise on the Royals for Eric Hosmer’s dash home to score the tying run on Lucas Duda’s bad throw. “Brilliant baserunning?” Did they see that throw? If Duda doesn’t peg a beer vendor, Hosmer is out and the game is over. ...

Terry Collins Made The Right Call On Matt Harvey And Still Screwed Up
It was a Mets season that began with, and briefly threatened to founder upon, questions of how many innings Matt Harvey would be allowed to throw, and for how many innings he’d be able to be effective. In the end, Harvey threw 216 innings—the most ever for a pitcher coming off of Tommy John surgery—...

Didier Drogba, Still An Innovator, Inventing New Ways To Play The Sport
Didier Drogba is in the twilight of his career, but that hasn’t stopped him from innovating. Look at this ingenious technique applied during Montreal’s playoff win against Columbus tonight. Magisterial! ...

Idiot On The Field Invades Pitch At MLS Playoff Match, Gets Sacked
A lot of idiots have made their appearances at RFK Stadium, but it was one Idiot whose pitch invasion interrupted today’s D.C. United-New York Red Bulls and led to the hooligan getting sacked—in the American football sense of the term....

¡Es Insano! Timbers Advance In MLS Playoffs After Breaking Physics In PKs
Portland Timbers are moving on in the MLS playoffs after defeating Sporting Kansas City in a wild match that required eleven rounds of penalties—with the winner being scored by, and then saved by, Timbers keeper Adam Kwarasey....

The Royals Don't Miss
If you’re looking for one stat that neatly explains the Royals’ Game 2 victory over the Mets, it’s this one: Out of the 94 pitches Mets ace Jacob deGrom threw in his five innings, the Royals only swung and missed at three of them....

Rochester Fox Station Cuts To Local News During 14th Inning Of Game 1
The people running Fox’s broadcast of Game 1 of the World Series weren’t the only ones who had problems last night. WUHF, the local Fox affiliate in Rochester, New York, inexplicably switched over to the local news in the middle of the 14th inning....

Only One Other Royal Was Told About Edinson Volquez's Father's Death
When Edinson Volquez came out after six innings, his wife and children were waiting for him in the clubhouse. GM Dayton Moore gave them the use of the manager’s office, where they could be alone and discuss whatever they needed to. It still isn’t clear whether Volquez knew yet that his father had di...

There Are Still Several More Innings Left To Play
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Daniel Murphy Makes No Sense
“I can’t explain why the balls keep going out of the ballpark,” Daniel Murphy said after his MLB-record sixth consecutive playoff game with a home run, “but they do.” ...

The Royals Have Reopened The Blue Jays Sign-Stealing Controversy
A playoff series is always improved when one team is willing to talk some mess between games, so we thank the Royals for dusting off the old “The Blue Jays steal signs!” conspiracy theory....

That Troy Tulowitzki Ejection Sure Was Strange
MLB is lucky last night’s Royals-Blue Jays game was a victory for the Jays, because if the Royals had pulled ahead late and Troy Tulowitzki hadn’t been there to bat in the bottom of the ninth, all of Canada would be calling for home plate umpire John Hirschbeck’s head....

The Blue Jays Bludgeoned the Royals In Just Two Innings
The Royals traded for Johnny Cueto to be their postseason ace, and in the deciding Game 5 of the ALDS he was exactly that, giving up just two runs across eight innings in the 7-2 victory. The Royals didn’t need Cueto to be that good tonight, but they did need him to avoid pitching putridly. He wasn’...

TBS Postgame Show Features On-Air "Motherfuck"
As a cable channel, TBS is legally free to broadcast whatever foul language it likes. We can’t imagine sponsors are too happy to hear “motherfuckin’” on the MLB postgame show, though....
