review Page 721 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Peru Just Might Have Enough To Make This Their Lucky Year
This is the first World Cup since 1982 for Peru, but that doesn’t mean they’re here just to play three games and go home. After weathering an absolutely cutthroat cycle of South American qualifying and earning a spot in a group from which they’re favored to place second and advance, Peru are poised ...
France Have All The Talent In The World, They Just Need To Figure Out How To Use It<em></em>
France are one of the four or so teams coming to Russia for whom anything less than a World Cup title will be a disappointment of sorts. I mean, look at their roster. It just oozes talent, with Champions League experience across the board and the depth necessary to fill in for anything from an unfor...
Morocco Are Back In The World Cup After 20 Years And They Mean Business
Hearing the name of the country of Morocco probably doesn’t conjure images of soccer greatness. It’s understandable. The Moroccans have gone 20 years—five whole World Cups—without making an appearance on the sport’s biggest stage. But while Morocco’s national team hasn’t covered itself in much sport...
Cristiano Ronaldo And The People He Shares His Country With Will Not Win The World Cup
Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal won the 2016 European Championship, so they’re not not likely to make a deep push in the World Cup. Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal will likely advance out of their group, alongside Spain, and they could make it even further into the knockout rounds with some luck. But ...
Iran Have The Right Type Of Squad To Shock The World
Iran almost had it....
Will Luis Suárez Do Something Crazy Stupid Or Crazy Awesome At This World Cup?
Uruguay have what it takes to mount another charge deep into the latter stages of the World Cup like the one they made to the semifinals in 2010. They still have one of the very best defensive fronts in the game. They still have a steely midfield capable of swatting away incoming attacks, and have b...
Saudi Arabia Have The Honor Of Being The Shittiest Team In The World Cup
In truth, I know next to nothing about the Saudi Arabia national team. Which actually doesn’t matter much, because apparently they really suck....
Egypt Are A One-Man Team, Which Is Fine If That One Man Is Mohamed Salah
Mohamed Salah’s injury could not have come at a worse time. Liverpool’s newly anointed superstar was wrapping up a dream club season that featured 44 goals in 52 appearances and culminated in Kiev with a shot at ending Real Madrid’s Champions League dominance. Instead of capping a perfect season by ...
Russia Might Be A Threat To International Democracy, But They Are Nothing To Fear At The World Cup
We’ve finally made it! After four long years, the greatest sporting event on the planet has returned!...
On Further Review, Video Review Ruined Game 1
The challenge is to leave aside, even if just for a second, the question of whether it actually, truly was a charge or a block....
<i>Varsity Blues </i>Can't Decide How It Feels About The Cult Of High School Football
Varsity Blues works as long as you don’t think about it too hard. Which, I readily admit, probably means it works exactly as well as intended....
<i>White Men Can't Jump</i> Is A Lot Of Fun Masking What Appears To Be A Pretty Debilitating Gambling Addiction
If there’s a moral to be gleaned from White Men Can’t Jump, it’s that that if someone carrying many hundreds of dollars in cash—without a wallet in sight—challenges you to an expensive bet, it’s probably because they know something you don’t. I realize people relied on paper money more back in the ’...
Gregg Popovich Won't Coach Spurs In Game 3 Following Death Of His Wife
The San Antonio Spurs have announced that head coach Gregg Popovich will not be with the team for tonight’s playoff game against the Warriors. Last night, the team announced that Popovich’s wife, Erin, had died at the age of 67 after battling an illness....
A Timely And Exhaustive Preview Of The 2018 NBA Playoffs
Ah, casual sports fan: We meet again. The 2018 NBA playoffs begin this afternoon! How the hell will you know what is going on in the games, other than like a bunch of sweaty dudes bouncing a ball and throwing it through a pair of rings, if you don’t have some 10,000 words of preview and analysis to ...
Kim Jong-il Liked<i> Bend It Like Beckham </i>And So Should You
With apologies to anyone who was hoping my earlier two reviews were the result of being an all-around miserable person who is incapable of enjoyment: I really liked Bend It Like Beckham!...
<i>The Sandlot </i>Is Full Of Little Shitheads And<em></em> Terrible Baseball Advice
Over the weekend, The Sandlot turned 25 years old. Major League Baseball is celebrating the anniversary of its release throughout the season with theme nights at nearly all of the stadiums. (The Brewers went above and beyond with their homage.) Despite growing up a devoted baseball fan—with aspirati...
The Most Fun Thing About Every Baseball Team This Year
There has, over the past several months, been plenty of conversation (and a few official rule changes) directed to answering the question of what baseball needs. Games need to be faster, or extra innings need to be spicier, or broadcasts need more mentions of launch angle. The spike in home runs is ...
MLB Season Preview: What You Need To Know For 40 Minutes Of Marlins Baseball
Aw shit yeah, buddies, it’s Opening Day! The good kind of Opening Day, too. One of those classics on which all 30 teams—well, except for the Nats and Reds and Tigers and Pirates, because their games have already been postponed—play on the same day and it’s non-stop baseball. I do have one piece of b...
<i>The Mighty Ducks </i>Is A Mediocre Movie With An Utterly Unsympathetic Protagonist
I’m not nostalgic for your favorite sports film, because I probably never saw it the first time around (unless it’s A League Of Their Own, which even I know is a goddamn masterpiece). There’s no grand explanation for this gap in my cinematic literacy; I was too young for some of the classic sports ...
<i>Annihilation</i> Will Creep You All The Way Out
If you saw the trailer for Annihilation and got hyped to watch Natalie Portman spend the movie kicking ass with a machine gun, mowing down monsters while dispensing action-movie cliches, you won’t get what you want. If you read Jeff VanderMeer’s novel, on which the movie is based, and expected a fa...