rio Page 130 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

NL West Preview: The Rise of San Diego, the reign of L.A.
With Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado, the Padres have the best left side of the infield in baseball and two MVP candidates to lead their lineup....

NL East Preview: Are the Mets good enough to topple the Braves?
You could make a definitive argument that the National League East is the strongest 1-through-5 division in Major League Baseball, so long as no one fucks this up....

Draymond Green and Tony Allen argue over title of NBA's best defender
Draymond Green is the greatest NBA defensive player ever, according to Draymond Green. ...

Tanks a lot! Rockets going from 44-28 to 11-28 is putrid, but not most historic NBA drop-off ever
On Feb. 4, the Rockets went to Memphis and beat the Grizzlies by 12 points for their seventh win in eight games, moving to 11-10 for the season. Certainly, Houston was outperforming expectations after trading away James Harden, but nobody knew how bad things were about to get....

Duke? UNC? UConn? Ranking the best NCAA national champs over the past 20 years
Selection Sunday will be the first time we’ve been able to fill out a bracket in two years. A lot has changed since then, especially in college basketball, as it’s been as upside down as the rest of the world is. Juniors and seniors are the biggest draws this season, as only a few freshmen like Okla...

The best national champion teams of the 2000s
As the NCAA Tournament returns next week after missing a year due to COVID-19, one of the conversations that have been hovering over the sport is when will the NBA get rid of the “one-and-done” rule....

Jonnu Smith is a solid, Gronk-esque addition for the Patriots
The Patriots were lost in the dark in the first year of their post-Brady era. The Cam Newton experiment didn’t work, in part because of his battle with COVID, and the roster proved to have incredibly uninspiring weapons to work with. In atypical fashion, Bill Belichick has stormed into the free agen...

The Warriors prioritizing Steph Curry’s ‘window’ is what’s wrong with sports today
It’s one of the oldest clichés in sports: There’s no “I” in team....

Sleep on Cam Newton at your own peril — Belichick is no dope, and Pats are far from irrelevant
Small sample sizes are perilous for any kind of analysis, but sometimes, it’s all you have to go on....

Deadspin Wayback Machine: A look back at some of sports’ great relics
One of the great things about sports is the comfort that they provide. While the world is always changing, sometimes at a pace that’s hard to process, sports are largely static. If you watch a football game from 50 years ago, there certainly are differences in strategy and the size and speed of the ...

Ravens’ 'spot and choose' overtime idea could revolutionize football
The Ravens are reportedly making a proposal to the NFL to change the overtime rules to a “spot and choose” system under which the winner of the coin toss would get to pick where the ball goes on the field and the other team would decide whether it wants to play offense or defense....

NBA is granting two-way players postseason-eligibility, per report, which could help some teams
Suddenly, depth may become even more important in this year’s playoffs. ...

The Jazz are legit contenders, and it’s not just about their ridiculous three-point records
The Utah Jazz could win an NBA title this season....

It’s important that the NHL tried Lake Tahoe, even if it didn’t work
It’s always funny, and easy, to laugh at the NHL and their constant failed plans. No league can step on a rake as quickly and thoroughly as this one. And there’s something truly symmetrical about Gary Bettman declaring the sun his enemy. But their “ski weekend” in Lake Tahoe was probably still worth...

Draymond Green points out problem with NBA and society
Draymond Green is speaking facts once again....

The 10 best players we missed out on playing with in NCAA College Football
It’s finally back. Now, we don’t know when it’s officially coming back, but it’s coming…at some point....

Another armada of soccer-playing Yanks is heading to Europe
The January transfer window closed yesterday — sometimes it closes in February, sometimes it snows in April — and a plethora of American players left their MLS digs behind for European riches. Some will be back, some are real longshots, some have very bright futures. The fact that this has become so...

Tom Brady has been to more Super Bowls than every franchise in the NFL except…the Patriots
Ten has always been a number of completion....

Why the hell did Matt LaFleur elect to kick a field goal?
With a Super Bowl berth hanging in the balance, down eight points to the greatest quarterback of all time, this year’s presumptive MVP under center, Green Bay Packers head coach Matt LaFleur opted to kick a field goal with 2:09 left in the game. It was fourth-and-goal from the eight yard line. ...
