replacement Page 1 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

NFLPA voices safety concerns over replacement refs
The NFL Players Association and NFL Referees Association have responded to the potential use of replacement officials this season by voicing concerns about player safety.,ESPN reported earlier this week that the league has begun compiling a list of replacement referees -- mostly from the low-college...

Report: NFL to begin hiring replacement referees
With talks stalled between the league and the referees' union, NFL owners reportedly have authorized the hiring of replacement officials.,League sources told ESPN on Sunday that owners are "alarmed" by the current state of the negotiations with the NFL Referees Association.,The NFL has compiled a li...

Chargers' Jim Harbaugh had cardiac ablation, hip surgery
Los Angeles Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh said he's in top shape after undergoing cardiac ablation and hip replacement surgery in the offseason.,"The doctors can't find anything wrong with me. A-grade," Harbaugh said Tuesday.,Harbaugh, 61, said in mid-October that he previously underwent ablation...

Adrián Beltré leads baseball's 2024 Hall of Fame class
Adrián Beltré, Todd Helton and Joe Mauer are headed to Cooperstown. ...

The National League Cy Young race is kind of a mess
With one month to go in the MLB season it’s generally about the time that not only playoff spot chases become pretty clear, but so do individual award chases. If not a clear winner, as one might find with the AL MVP, then at least a couple of candidates have separated themselves and voters at least ...

Mookie Betts, not Ronald Acuña Jr., is the NL MVP
We’d all be better off if every MVP award was simply renamed, “Player Of The Year,” as it would save us a very annoying and tiresome debate about what “valuable” means. It gets doubly so in baseball, where we still haven’t quite escaped what numbers people should pay attention to, and what is overbl...

The Tampa Bay Rays can sure beat the tar out of awful teams
You can only play who is on the schedule. That’s an axiom as old as baseball, and it’s mostly true. The Tampa Bay Rays got to start their season with nine games against MLB’s kids with mittens pinned to their jackets year-round, and they’ve done all they can do. Which is to beat the ever-loving piss...

Did the Guardians win the Francisco Lindor trade?
Perhaps the biggest bane of modern baseball is most teams’ aversion to keeping the biggest stars in the game, or even having them in the first place. Only a few teams are willing to pay the best players what they’ve earned, and everyone else is looking for ways to move them along as soon as the play...

Please stay healthy, Byron Buxton
It’s become part of the rhythm of a baseball season. Mike Trout will tweak something, or leave a game early, and every baseball fan will sigh, and wonder why they can’t have nice things. We all feel deprived of something when Trout misses a large chunk of time. This will also happen whenever Shohei ...

The Phillies OF should probably wear their helmets in the field, too
When in the NL East, and having designs on competing to win it, the natural conclusion is that you’ll have to score a lot of runs to do so. Fair enough. The Braves are still here, Ronald Acuña Jr. is going to be healthy (enough), A team also can’t expect Francisco Lindor to be in a constant state of...

LaMonte Wade Jr. got an MVP vote? Explain yourself
Come here. Sit down. Let’s have a talk. I’m not angry, just disappointed....

MVP debates make my ass weary
I’ve come to the conclusion that a big part of being a member of the baseball media is just justifying your existence. Which is why they spend most of the time turning stuff into a debate that isn’t really a debate. Nothing is worse than individual awards, where distilling what “valuable” means has ...

The AL Cy Young race is kinda trash
Now that we have a full baseball season again, after 2020’s season-in-a-can, we can get to choosing our award winners on normal calibrations. Thankfully, Shohei Ohtani made the AL MVP choice academic by having the most unique and unmatched individual season in baseball history. Pretty easy to hand h...

Marcus Semien is an MVP candidate again, and you probably didn’t notice again
Discussing the MVP race in the AL is the definition of wasting time these days. It’s going to be Shohei Ohtani’s award in a unanimous, what’re-you-new-around-here kind of vote. He’s simply done things for a full season never seen before, and when you do that, you win the MVP. ...

The Packers-49ers Game Featured A Replacement Ref-Level Blown Call
Packers-49ers was the most entertaining of Sunday's slate of NFL games, but it featured one moment that elicited flashbacks to those dark days when the replacement referees were screwing up games left and right. ...

Replacement Ref Who Blew Packers-Seahawks Was Mostly Concerned With Looking Decisive
The Golden Tate hail mary Monday Night clusterfuck was one of the all-time national NFL stories, but everyone moved on fairly quickly. The regular referees came back next week, the standings weren't permanently affected (though the loss gave the 49ers home field against Green Bay in the playoffs), a...

On Further Review, Roger Goodell Fucked Up This NFL Season From End To End
Cowboys-Redskins was the biggest matchup of the year, a win-or-go-home game for two division rivals. It turned out to be the most-watched regular-season sporting event in 15 years. But one familiar face was missing from the FedEx Field suites: commissioner Roger Goodell, who found something else to ...

Demaryius Thomas Dressed As A Replacement Ref For Halloween
The regular officials have been back for five weeks now, making Broncos WR Demaryius Thomas's replacement ref outfit just as timely as the 37 Gangnam Style costumes you saw on Saturday. But we'll never not highlight a Halloween costume that has the potential to garner an NFL fine (Thomas appears to ...

Ed Hochuli's Crew Got The Full CBS Starting Lineup Treatment, Complete With Stating Where They Attended School
How excited was CBS for the return of union officials? Ed Hochuli's crew did the full Super Bowl-style intros before tonight's Jacksonville-Cincinnati game; the officials even said where they went to school. It was cute, but a little weird; after all, we're already back to booing these guys. [CBS]...

The Scab Who Blew The Seattle Touchdown Call Now Wants To Get Paid For Interviews
You remember Lance Easley, yes? Side judge who signaled "touchdown, Seattle," overruling his colleague and singlehandedly becoming the biggest reason the lockout ended when it did. It's not often someone gets famous for being bad at his job, but if Lance Easley is going to be bad at his job, he migh...