rod Page 61 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Which team played the villain role best?
With the Houston Astros now wearing the crown as the most hated team in professional sports — as indicated by the chorus of boos and piercing screams of “CHEATER!” that rang through the Oakland Coliseum (whatever ridiculous name it has today) last night on Opening Day (ahh… welcome back baseball, an...

The ones that do the least during games make the most money. No wonder baseball is America’s pastime
When I was in elementary school, we used to take annual field trips to the old Tiger Stadium. One year, Detroit was playing the Royals. I remember those blue jerseys. Our school was sitting in the outfield and somebody who wasn’t in our group pulled a beach ball out from nowhere. It eventually bounc...

Negro League researcher Cam Perron talks about his new book, the Negro Leagues, and the times to come
In a profile over the summer, I asked Cam Perron what he’s up to next. At the time, the young Negro Leagues researcher, whose work of documenting players’ service time led to their receiving MLB pensions, was operating his memorabilia business and working on a book set to hit shelves in 2021....

Pats O-lineman Justin Herron lauded for helping to stop a sexual assault in Arizona
Justin Herron was exercising at Kiwanis Park in Tempe, Arizona, late Saturday morning when he heard screams. They were coming from an elderly woman who was being attacked by a 30-year-old man, later identified as Kevin Caballero. According to eyewitnesses, Caballero pushed the 71-year-old retired sc...

Warning: Lakers’ repeat chances will explode in 3...2...1...
The Los Angeles Lakers aren’t repeating as NBA champs....

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....

Jeremy Lin warned the sports world about #StopAsianHate, then a white terrorist killed six Asians in Atlanta — are you paying attention yet?
Far too often in America, racism is thought of as something that only Black people endure. But, as history and the present have always proved, hate has no color....

Can properly kicked, as Andy Dalton will not fix a single problem for the Bears
The Chicago Bears are officially the Bad News Bears of the NFL. Their free-agent signing of quarterback Andy Dalton was hardly a solution to this franchise’s ongoing QB dilemma....

Drew Brees’ legacy is secure, but what is it exactly?
Tampa Bay announced Brees’s retirement before he ever did. While someone with the career of Brees wouldn’t want to go out on his back like he did in the Divisional Round this past January, it was clear that he was past it that afternoon. Brees hadn’t been particularly good, or up to his usual standa...

On the anniversary of sports shutting down due to COVID-19, what have we learned about sports, the virus, and ourselves?
It’s been a year since NBA player Rudy Gobert smeared his hands on reporters’ microphones at a press conference and then tested positive for the coronavirus. A year of lockdowns and masking and handwashing and flouting mask-wearing protocols....

The day it all fell apart: Deadspin talks to journalists all over the sports world about what they remember when everything shut down
A year ago today was our last “normal” day. At least in the beginning. Only we didn’t know it....

Kansas rids itself of another boil on its ass, this time in the shape of Jeff Long
It was the only logical conclusion, probably should have happened weeks ago, but there’s still some spiritual affirmation with the news that Jeff Long was shitcanned as Kansas’ AD....

How might COVID-19, and tight playoff races, impact this year’s NBA trade deadline? We asked around
The NBA trade deadline is on March 25. It’s reasonable to anticipate ample movement in a standard NBA season, but because of COVID, we’re obviously in unique times. Are teams going to be hesitant to make moves while pushing for the playoffs because of the lingering disease and all that comes with it...

Julius Randle is the perfect New York Knick for right now
Kristaps Porzingis was great, but he wasn’t Julius Randle....

A few thoughts on Shaq’s AEW ‘Dynamite’ appearance
Shaquille O’Neal is a better wrestler than he is a TV analyst....

COVID could make next FIFA international window a bigger mess than usual
The club vs. country fight is a long and storied one in soccer, with clubs always more than a little peeved about releasing the players they’re paying millions to travel to different training schedules and medical staffs, for games they aren’t compensated for. Players getting hurt on national team d...

Here are your Idiots for the month of February
It’s the return of Deadspin’s IDIOT OF THE MONTH awards, as we continue to cull the newswires for idiots from all over the sports world. Fresh off the smash hit The Top 50 Idiots of 2020, and the idiots of January, we bring you February’s Idiot Kings....

The Lakers proved they’re not roadkill, and LeBron reminded Zlatan who the hell he is
They’re going to be juuust fine. ...

LeBron James just blew any chance of winning the MVP this season
That didn’t take long....

Stop trying to make Nerds vs. Fun happen in the NBA, too
Let’s get this out of the way immediately: if your reaction to seeing Anthony Edwards’ dunk last week was to complain that it was “all over Twitter” but also note that he was 0-for-7 on three-pointers, you’re either an idiot, a serious killjoy, trolling for attention, or some combination of the thre...