sports Page 321 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Nebraska football: Holding onto dead traditions since 1999
One of the saddest traditions in college sports is on hiatus as Nebraska football suspended its home game custom of releasing balloons after the first Husker score. For a long time, children could barely get to their seats before letting go of the plastic, red helium-filled orbs. Now, Big Red faithf...

Twitter crowdsources Charles Barkleyâs greatest hits
Charles Barkley: 11-time NBA All-Star, three-time gold medalist, and, uh, professional comedian? After a tweet this weekend about Barkleyâs legendary sense of humor blew up, short, laugh-out-loud clips of the Inside the NBA analyst have started appearing in droves on Twitter. The original has over 3...

Is the NHLâs Presidentsâ Trophy curse real?
The Florida Panthers breezed through the first round of the playoffs and then got bounced from the second round so fast we barely had time for the annual discourse about the Presidentsâ Trophy and whether itâs a curse for a teamâs Stanley Cup hopes....

The Nuggets are Kroenkeâs side piece, but still, a little more effort could go a long way
The Denver Nuggets are an NBA executive factory. Some of the best front-office talent in sports has come through that organization, and hopefully thatâs because they have a development system like the San Antonio Spurs, because they continue to lose talent. On Monday the Minnesota Timberwolves hired...

The Grizzlies and Heat reacted completely differently to plays where their stars were seemingly injured
Acting like youâve been there before might be clichĂ© in the world of sports, but it really is the only way to operate for some franchises. For other organizations, itâs a few words some lame old guy threw together ages ago....

Craig Berube and the St. Louis Blues canât even bring themselves to say racists are bad
Iâm used to things turning ugly when the St. Louis Blues are involved. Itâs St. Louis, after all. The NHL must be praying that the Avalanche punt them into space in Game 5 so they can continue to pretty much ignore everything thatâs gone on here. Itâs what the league does best, considering that Davi...

Jets and Lions fans battle for delusional offseason preeminence
Two teams who had top four picks in the 2022 NFL Draft and still have long histories of imbecilic incompetence are getting loads of love for their offseasons. If you listen to the way some media personalities present it, the Detroit Lions and New York Jets have a chance to not send their fans into a...

The Dallas Mavericks turned into pumpkins
When I wrote the Dallas Mavericks were a mess earlier this season, it was right after they traded one terrible contract in Kristaps PorziĆÄŁis for two terrible contracts in Spencer Dwindiddle and Davis Bertans. My argument was not that the Mavs had made the wrong move in ditching the Latvian bum. Nor...

The NFL is hosting a useless âdiversityâ program for Black coaches this week in Atlanta
This week, the NFLâs spring meetings are happening in the same city â Atlanta â in which the league tried to throw a sham of a âworkoutâ for Colin Kaepernick just three years ago....

Nazem Kadri kept it in check, the Blues reverted to type and got it shoved where it belonged
At the top, this isnât some kudos party for how Nazem Kadri reacted to the racist threats he received from Blues fans after Game 3. This is just about his response on the ice, and weâll get to some deadbrained hockey reaction to the more serious stuff in a second. ...

HBO's going to show us the Arizona Cardinals imploding in real time
HBOâs âHard Knocks,â covering the preseason and training camps, can step aside as HBOâs premier network docuseries. âHard Knocks In Seasonâ is where the true drama lies. In training camp, everyone is upbeat and pollyannaish. Emotions are more volatile during the season when expectations ram into rea...

Jason Kiddâs flippant attitude toward the Mavsâ playoff fines shouldnât come as a surprise
The Dallas Mavericks theme song should be Drakeâs âIn My Feelingsâ for the remainder of the playoffs. That is, because head coach Jason Kidd is all in his feelings over the team being (repeatedly) fined for bench violations. Kiddâs team has been hit three times by league authorities during this post...

Hey Roger Goodell, when does Dan Snyder get the Pacman Jones treatment?
Theyâre talking about it. I guess thatâs the best we can expect from the apex predator capitalist group known as the NFL team owners. ...

Baseball doesnât want Tim Anderson around
âYou know⊠I donât know, to be honest.â...

Winning fourth ring and first finals MVP would quiet critics and crush many narratives surrounding Stephen Curryâs legacy
On the cusp of returning to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2019, Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors find themselves in prime position to silence critics. With a 3-0 lead, the Warriors are all but guaranteed to have a spot saved for them on June 2 when the Finals begin. Winning a four...

College football teams have always bought players
The Nick Saban-Jimbo Fisher feud is a microcosm of the two schools of thought in college football right now. Texas A&M beat Alabama for the top recruiting class in the nation this year and one coach, Saban, was none too pleased, saying, âA&M bought every player on their team.â...

Kylian MbappĂ© is PSGâs only hope
Letâs be fair, it isnât much of a sacrifice or even a hard choice to make more money than a lot of countriesâ GDP and live in Paris. Itâs a pretty sweet deal, and something 95 percent of the world would opt for (with the other five percent either already living there, making millions somewhere bette...

True Basketball Crime: Andrew Wiggins delivered the coup de grace to Luka and the Mavericksâ season
Entering this series, Luka DonÄiÄâs heft, weight and skill were expected to overwhelm Andrew Wiggins. Instead, Wigginsâ capstone moment in his jewel of a playoff series came during Golden Stateâs 109-100 victory at the expense of the 23-year-old DonÄiÄ....

If the Lightning canât choke you out, Andrei Vasilevskiy will
The narrative, the easiest one to reach for which is generally what most hockey observers want to do before hitting the bar, is the two-time defending champ Tampa Bay Lightning must be playing great defense because the Florida Panthers have scored just three goals in three games. And while thatâs no...

Old Football Man hates those sissy rules that protect players
Cue the âold man yells at cloudâ Simpsons headline â Hall of Fame coach Bud Grant, who turned 95 yesterday, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he thinks the âboringâ parts of football, including fair catches, kneels to end the game, and touchbacks, should be removed from the game. Now, to you an...