ratt Page 5 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights


Too Much Is Just Enough: <em>Guardians of the Galaxy</em>, Reviewed
1. The best thing about the Marvel movies, to my eyes, is how self-aware they are without ever getting too winking about it. Captain America and Thor are excellent at this, playing off their leads' lunkheaded, uber-wholesome charm, but 2012's The Avengers—still the best Marvel film, and one of the...


Block Party: <em>The Lego Movie</em>, Reviewed
1. The Lego Movie is way more fun than it has any need to be. Though it never quite reaches the lunatic levels of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, it has that film's same hellzapoppin' zeal, that willingness to go anywhere for a joke and that absolute insistence that it must never, ever slow down. The Lego ...

Unarmed Former Florida A&M Player Shot Dead By Police
Jonathan Ferrell, a former safety at Florida A&M, was shot and killed by North Carolina police early Saturday morning, apparently after seeking help after a car accident. Ferrell was unarmed, and the officer who fired the fatal shots has been charged with manslaughter....

Girl Survives Bear Attack, Is Cooler Than Most Bears
We've got a little change of pace for this week's Bear Friday entry. Today's story features not a bear, but a 12-year-old girl who survived a bear attack and also happens to be the coolest 12-year-old girl ever. ...

Patterson and Talese: A Good Combination
Kip Stratton edited a collection of Grover Lewis' journalism and wrote a book of poetry about Sam Peckinpah. He also wrote a good biography of Floyd Patterson, who we covered here recently. I interviewed Kip last summer and he talked about Patterson and Gay Talese:...

Local Reporter Hilariously Demonstrates How To Survive A Bear Attack
The good folks at WJAR in Providence, R.I., do not want you to get eaten by a bear. So they sent Julie Tremmel and a cameraman out into a dark field and had them film a very helpful guide to surviving a bear attack. The key to survival appears to be making crazy eyes....

Why'd It Have To Be Snakes?
Gordon Wright, another lover of classic sports writing, suggested this fun piece of work by Jeff MacGregor. From Sports Illustrated back in 1998, dig "Snakes Alive!"...

Two Campers Save Man From Vicious Bear Attack
Next time you start to feel sorry for a bear because it's being exploited by some weirdos for other weirdos' entertainment, just read this sentence: "I could feel his teeth against my skull."...

This Is Why You Should Have A Snake-Venom Kit With You In The Woods
Big Daddy Lawler is a fellow who hosts an outdoors show every Saturday morning on a radio station in Thomasville, Ala. On his Facebook wall yesterday, Big Daddy posted a story and a photo from a reader named Chad, who on Sunday had been bitten by a rattlesnake. We've cropped the photo above, but you...

The Flames Just Made The Most Inexplicable Trade Of The Year
Brian McGrattan is no catch: the journeyman brawler has bounced around from team to team, and up and down from the AHL, since the lockout. So when the Predators waived him, he cleared easily. He was assigned to their AHL affiliate yesterday. This morning, Calgary traded for him....

A Suffocating Triumph: <em>Zero Dark Thirty</em>, Reviewed
1. I've always thought the best compliment you can give a movie is that, while it's playing, you forget not only that you are watching a movie, but also that you are a person with a life that was going on before the movie and will continue going on afterward. These are the transformative films, the ...

Why Texas State Got A 16th-Place Vote In The AP Poll
For the time being, the Texas State Bobcats are the only team to be undefeated in their FBS history. Sure, they're just 1-0 all-time, joining the WAC this season after 23 years in the I-AA/FCS Southland conference. But that one was a stylish one. It was a 30-13 walloping of Houston, in Houston, that...
![Murder At The Kentucky Derby [UPDATE]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/17lsx3t1ztkxijpg.jpg)
Murder At The Kentucky Derby [UPDATE]
Unfortunately that is not the name of the next Sue Grafton novel. Word out of Lexington is that a man's body was found in a barn behind Churchill Downs after the running of the first leg of the Triple Crown last night. A spokeswoman for the Louisville police, Alicia Smiley, confirmed that the death...

Panthers Somehow Blame Devils Fans For Ruining Rat-Throwing Tradition
Before their 1995 home opener, a rat entered the Panthers locker room—and was promptly killed with a slapshot by Scott Mellanby. The legend took hold, and as Florida made a finals run, the "rat trick" was born. After Panthers goals and wins, fans would throw hundreds of rubber rats onto the ice....

The Making Of “Homer At The Bat,” The Episode That Conquered Prime Time 20 Years Ago Tonight
On Feb. 20, 1992, more American homes tuned into The Simpsons than they did The Cosby Show or the Winter Olympics from Albertville, France. A foul-mouthed cartoon on a fourth-place network bested the Huxtables and the world's best amateur athletes. Fox over NBC and CBS—its first-ever victory in prim...

The Dodgers Seemingly Want Their Fans To Stop Beating People Into Comas
Six days after a San Francisco Giants fan was brutally beaten outside Dodger Stadium, former LAPD Chief William Bratton has been hired to review security at and around the park. Said team owner Frank McCourt, Bratton will "lead a top-to-bottom review of our current practices and make recommendation...

The Ugly, Racially Charged Fight Over A Confederate Mascot. In Vermont.
My small Vermont hometown has made the national news circuit on just a handful of occasions since I was a kid: the Bush-Cheney arrest warrant, the public nudity ban, the closing of the nuclear power plant, the annual cow parade, and the time my high school retired Colonel Reb as our mascot....

A Reminder That College Hockey Players Can Be Dumb Jocks Too
An NHL prospect and a college teammate got together for a little reunion, and did what any old friends would do: they climbed a roof, and chucked everything not nailed down in the house into the street....