playoffs Page 45 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

We’ve seen enough of the NFC East this season, NFL, please adopt WNBA playoff structure
We all know bad the NFC East is this season. They are the butt of all the jokes....

What the NFL's postseason expansion talks suggest
The NFL jumped into the flying-by-their-ass pool Monday by reportedly discussing expanding this year’s playoffs to 16 teams. This coming after they expanded it to 14 already, and they may just jump over that this January without ever trying it....

Toxic pride is the NFL’s biggest obstacle to a much-needed playoff bubble
One of the biggest topics among some coaches, players and others throughout the NFL is a simple question: Will there be a bubble for the playoffs?...

This is where the Dodgers get to be the Dodgers
It’s rare when a team is favored to win a series when down 2-1. But then teams that are down 2-1 aren’t usually the Dodgers. Hell, the Dodgers might have still been favored before Game 3. After putting up 15 runs in the span of six outs over two games (four in the 9th of Game 2, 11 in the 1st of Gam...

Kevin Cash continues to win by knowing how to lose
The Astros-Rays matchup for the right to head to Texas (boy, that makes it sound like a pyrrhic victory) has a lot of angles to it. It’s the league’s best contact team in the Astros vs. one of the worst in the Rays. It’s a bullpen full of darkness-bringers in Tampa versus one made up of guys who sou...

MLB Playoffs gets signature moment in 'Bellinger-robs-Tatis' — the problem is sport doesn't have enough of them
You knew it as soon as you saw it. It’ll be a play that MLB will try and dine out on for years to come. ...

Division Series playoff preview: Where the hell are we?
Baseball has gotten back to the playoff rounds we remember, sort of. The wild card round, which everyone thought was going to produce some real chaos and be totally unfair, only threw up one true upset: the Marlins beating the Cubs, because the Cubs can’t hit fastballs, which seems like it’s on the ...

In Fernando Tatis Jr., baseball finally has a must-see TV star
The storylines are plentiful as MLB’s Division Series kickoff today....

The Heat is off in NBA Finals; Time is a flat circle in WNBA Finals; Central teams all spit bit in MLB playoffs
The Lakers and Heat did indeed play a basketball game...

MLB’s day of 'madness' an excellent showcase of 2020 baseball* (*not necessarily a compliment)
When the powers that be dreamed up this expanded playoff system/money hunt for baseball’s season-in-a-can, this was the day they were probably thinking of most. The full March Madness treatment in September, with playoff games from noon until past midnight with no break (hell, even the NCAA Tourname...

It’s time to ban the A’s and Twins from MLB playoffs
Major League Baseball began it’s playoff key party yesterday, with all the American League wild-card series kicking off. And while this season has been weird/a farce/an abomination to the sport and really all logic (if you lean that way), there was something exciting about having a day full of baseb...

Padres’ Clevinger could be lost for the postseason, and that sucks
Because it’s 2020, the most fun team in baseball just has to take a gut-punch to its title hopes....

Steven Stamkos gets his Willis Reed moment
The “Willis Reed Game” has grown in proportion as an epic through the decades, as these things tend to do as the years tick off. By this point, it wouldn’t be a surprise if a lot of younger fans assume that Willis Reed hobbled out of the Knicks locker room missing a leg, hopped around for 65 points,...

Jalen Rose's Breonna Taylor shout-out takes ESPN to commercial break
Sorry ESPN, Jalen Rose ain’t sticking to hoops....

Finally, The MLB Playoffs Will Look Like Baseball
It’s been a mangled, peeps-in-the-chili baseball season, and anyone who tries to tell you different is either selling something, thinks the sky is green (not when it’s actually been orange), or is just clinging to one of the pillars of their life so desperately in order to believe that something, an...

This is What Happens When You Piss Off LeBron
Earlier this summer, “The Last Dance” gave the world a look at how Michael Jordan used every slight, real or perceived, as motivation....

Let's Enjoy the Celtics' Implosion. Plus, the Yankees Continue Hitting Homers Like Crazy
The Celtics’ season is going down the toilet....

Expanded Playoffs Suck, But Here’s a Way to Fix It
Rob Manfred says this season’s expanded baseball playoffs are likely to remain in place for 2021 and beyond, and everybody hates it....

Islanders Learning There Just Might Not Be Anything They Can Do
Buzzer-beaters are supposed to be the territory of the NBA’s Orlando bubble, but the Tampa Bay Lightning moved the phenomenon 2800 miles to the Northwest on Wednesday night. Nikita Kucherov capped off the Bolts’ best offensive foray of the night by scoring off Ryan McDonagh’s cross-ice pass with jus...

Against the Heat, are the Bucks Really Better Off Without Giannis?
When Giannis Antetokounmpo, the reigning NBA MVP, caught a pass driving into the lane from Eric Bledsoe at the start of the second quarter of Game 4 in the Eastern Conference semifinals, many thought that was a guaranteed layup....