review Page 716 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

The NCAA is being dragged closer to doing the right thing
After a quarter century under their current bylaws, the NCAA will vote on a new constitution tomorrow at their convention that will peel their grip, knuckle by desperately grasping knuckle, off of the reins of college athletics regulation. Could it be that the NCAA is actually doing the right thing ...

So how will the NHL, official partner of PointsBet, Bally’s, and MGM Resorts, handle Evander Kane?
Gambling on your own team’s games has always been the biggest line to cross in team sports. It’s why Pete Rose is still out of the Hall of Fame and probably always will be (though, being pretty much the same unrepentant asshole he was on the field doesn’t help his cause much). While it’s certainly b...

Quit crying about official reviews — they gotta get the call right
Always get the call right....

Behold, a fun few moments of instant replay in baseball
Sometimes, instant replay is a real drag. It takes forever to review some minor call that doesn’t make that much of a difference anyway, the flow of the game is broken, and you wonder if we’d be better off without it, even if sometimes bad calls do get corrected, because even though they do, a lot o...

NHL West Preview: Some top-tier teams, but mostly trash
We move out West, which is probably the most top-heavy of the new-fangled, COVID-adjusted divisions this season. There are three genuine contenders here...and then a whole lot of trash. Colorado, Vegas, and St. Louis will feast on the chum on offer in this intra-division only schedule, and the race ...

NHL Central Preview: This division makes no geographical sense
For the sake of this season, Florida is apparently central, and Dallas is central even though it’s west of St. Paul and St. Louis, which are both in the west this year. This is truly the season of people throwing ducks at balloons and nothing is the way it seems. Whatever the odd alignments, this di...

NHL East Preview: The gang's all here
This division is loaded with veteran teams like Pittsburgh, Washington, and Boston that still expect to compete for the Stanley Cup, teams on the rise in the Islanders and Flyers, and teams bolstered by recent No. 1 overall picks like the Rangers, Devils and Sabres who are hoping to break through....

Lo! The NFL divisional playoff round draws hither
This crazy, six-game slate on Wild Card Weekend lived up to the hype, delivering history and upsets and exciting games, wire to wire. We now have a Divisional Round in the NFL Playoffs that includes the Buffalo Bills and the Cleveland Browns. Crazy, right?...

NBA Gambling Guide/Futures Bets to Make for the 2020-21 Season
For the first time in nine years, the NBA is rolling out its regular season with a late-December start date. Obviously, the current instance is sparked by far different circumstances than the lockout of 2011....

Forget LeBron & Giannis, these are NBA players who <em>need </em>to show out in 2020-21
Just as the headline reads....

Coastal Carolina is your national champion, don’t care what anyone says
If you look at Coastal Carolina’s season, it’s almost hard to believe that it was 2020. The Chanticleers’ run was remarkable, starting with a 15-point win on the road against a Big 12 school (Kansas, but still), and then a rampage through the Sun Belt Conference, with only one postponement — and you...

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 ...

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, NFC West: American Football’s Equivalent of the Group of Death
The NFC West may be one of the most exciting divisions in the league this season....

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, AFC West: The Home of the Champs and a New Football Town in Vegas
For many football fans, the AFC West standings are already a foregone conclusion....

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, NFC South: All Eyes on Tompa Bay & Brees’ Last Stand
Outside of Tom Brady stunning the sports world by joining the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the NFC South will be a key watch for plenty of other reasons....

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, AFC South: Who Will Emerge as This Year’s January Darlings?
The AFC South likely will not be a division at the top of most people’s radars to start the year....

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, AFC North: Young Guns and Scumbag Ben
This is yet another division that seems to be perennially up for grabs between a couple of teams, at least on paper, but unlike the NFC North, this division is fresh and exciting. A rookie quarterback! An MVP quarterback that Bill Polian wanted to convert to wide receiver! An annual dogfight to the ...

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, NFC North: The 'No One Else Wanted to Preview This Stale Division' Division
As usual, the road to . . . well, maybe not the Super Bowl, but at least the playoffs goes through Green Bay. And while Aaron Rodgers and the Packers aren’t as dominant as they once were, despite going 13-3 in Matt LaFleur’s first season as a head coach, no one else in the division has really steppe...

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, AFC East: Tom’s Gone. Who’s Got Next?
For the past two decades, the safest bet in sports was for the to win their division. Not anymore....

The Deadspin 2020 NFL Previews, NFC East: Can Anyone Break Up This Two-Horse Town?
There was a time not too long ago when the NFC East was considered one of the most competitive divisions in football. Over the past decade, the division has had two Super Bowl winners (Eagles, Giants), exciting Washington teams and the Dallas Cowboys. But the days of parity in the NFC East are over....