rot Page 16 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Remembering Curly Neal And The 10-Year-Old's Birthday Party That I Thought Was Going To Be At Yonkers Raceway
When I heard Curly Neal had died last night at 77, my heart sunk....

Seattle Sounders Advance To MLS Cup, Rewarding Fans Who Stood Up To Those In Power
After a season of fighting MLS’s draconian Code of Conduct, Seattle Sounders fans can celebrate a berth in the MLS Cup. Following Seattle’s 3-1 victory over LAFC, the Iron Front flag will surely find its way into the league’s final match of the year, much to the chagrin of those who desired profits ...

LeBron James, One Day After Tossing Daryl Morey Under A Bus: "I Won't Talk About It Again"
LeBron James finally spoke on Monday about the outsized controversy surrounding Daryl Morey’s deleted tweet supporting pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. LeBron’s position was weak and transparently cynical, and he took a justified beating for sharing it, and ultimately spent part of his Monday ...

Juan Soto And Miles Mikolas Swear The Crotch-Grabbing Antics Are All In Good Fun
It was only a matter of time before a pitcher decided to respond to Juan Soto for, well, being Juan Soto. In the top of the fifth, after forcing the 20-year-old Nationals stud to ground out, Cardinals pitcher Miles Mikolas looked over at Washington’s dugout as Soto trotted over and aggressively grab...

Members Of Congress Ask Adam Silver To Suspend NBA Activities In China
A day after NBA commissioner Adam Silver released a statement wondering whether everyone couldn’t just get along and enjoy some hoops, eight members of Congress, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ted Cruz, signed a letter to Silver condemning the the NBA’s response to the controversy over Dary...

Panicked <i>First Take</i> Host Initiates Commercial Break As Stephen A. Smith Brings Up Israel-Palestine Conflict
At the tail end of First Take’s extended discussion today about the ongoing debacle between the NBA and China, Stephen A. Smith had one final take he wanted to get off. He began auspiciously, if not with his trademark eloquence: “I would remind you that, throughout this world, one of the things that...

Adam Silver Issues Statement Meant To Appease Everybody; China Doesn't Buy It
NBA commissioner Adam Silver has released a second public statement regarding the controversy over Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey’s tweet in support of Hong Kong pro-democracy protests, and the Chinese government’s punitive response to the tweet....

Hong Kong Soccer Fans Turn Their Backs And Boo Chinese National Anthem
Fans at Hong Kong Stadium turned their backs on the Chinese national anthem prior to a World Cup qualifying match against Iran on Tuesday, bringing the long-running pro-democracy protests to the sporting world, per the Associated Press. The fans not only turned their backs, but also held up signs wi...

Brian Moran Makes MLB Debut, Immediately Strikes Out His Brother
2019 is the final year of 40-man rosters in September. Beginning next year, teams will only be allowed to max out at 28 players. There is a lot we won’t miss about the bloated rosters, chief among them four-hour games extended by countless pitching changes made possible by a team carrying 600 reliev...

Nice Forehand, Dude
Maybe a little close to the body, but his head stayed down, and the weight is transferring nicely. Looks like Dominic Thiem’s old racket....

There Is No Ethical Dissent Under Capitalism
It’s safe to say Jay-Z, to some extent, takes cues from Colin Kaepernick. Jay-Z has expressed his admiration of the former quarterback before, once calling him an “iconic figure.” In the aftermath of Kaepernick’s black-balling from the NFL for his peaceful protest of police killing unarmed black men...

The Olympics Are Coming To Tokyo, And So Is The Movement To Kill The Games Forever
TOKYO, JAPAN — In the lobby of the Marunouchi Nijubashi Building, which is undergoing final preparations to host the 2020 Olympics, a robot is on patrol. A combination of information kiosk and surveillance camera, the robot stops directly in front of me. It has the word ALSOK plastered across its ne...

American Fencer, Hammer Thrower Protest On Medal Podium At Pan-American Games
Two American athletes used their literal platforms on medalist podiums at the Pan-American Games in Lima, Peru to draw attention to social injustice in the United States. Fencer Race Imboden displayed his protest on Thursday in the form of taking a knee, while hammer thrower Gwen Berry raised her fi...

Protective Netting Saves Gio Urshela And A Fan From Collision After Terrific Catch
Just a couple of days after Mets right fielder Jeff McNeil turned into Spider-Man thanks to the new extended netting in Chicago, Gio Urshela, the other New York team’s third baseman, used the netting at Yankee Stadium to snag a foul ball without toppling into the stands, saving himself and one lucky...

Jeff McNeil Made A Sick Catch Thanks To The White Sox's New Nets
In June, the Chicago White Sox became the first MLB team to announce that they would expand protective netting all the way to the foul pole. During today’s Mets-White Sox game, New York right fielder Jeff McNeil used the Chicago ballpark’s recent addition to make a beautiful, innovative circus catch...

Maybe The Yankees Should Not Allow Masahiro Tanaka To Face The Red Sox
Yankees pitcher Masahiro Tanaka got the start Thursday night in the first game of an important four-game series against the Red Sox. The series probably has more juice for the Red Sox than for the Yankees—the Red Sox sound like they might be a couple bad days away from shifting into seller mode as t...

Expanded Protective Netting Is Coming To Major League Baseball, One Stadium At A Time
The Chicago White Sox announced Tuesday that they will extend protective netting at their stadium all the way to the foul poles this summer. They will be the first of 30 MLB teams to make the move all the way to the outfield wall, but certainly not the last....

Nick Kyrgios Says He's "Fucking Done" During Tantrum, And It's Hard Not To Believe Him
Of all Nick Kyrgios’s many many many many tantrums, the one he unleashed today at the Italian Open was his most over-the-top display yet. On the heels of a brutally honest interview with tennis writer Ben Rothenberg, in which Kyrgios admitted winning tennis matches doesn’t make him happy, that he do...

Let's Remember Some Guys: Thurl Bailey's Eyewear And Other Fleer NBA Guys
In many of the moments in the Let’s Remember Some Guys videos in which I appear to be successfully remembering various guys, I am in fact remembering the basketball cards that I once had on which they appeared. There are some instances in which this is not the case, but many of these people played t...

Ole Miss Players Kneel During National Anthem In Protest Of Pro-Confederate Rallies Happening Near Campus
Ole Miss players K.J. Buffen, Terence Davis, Luis Rodriguez, Bruce Stevens, Devontae Shuler and Breein Tyree knelt during the playing of the national anthem before their team’s game against Georgia on Saturday. The reason that these athletes—who hadn’t done an on-court anthem demonstration before—ch...