st Page 453 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

What’s to be done with these Los Angeles Dodgers?
You kind of knew it was over for the Dodgers the minute they acquired Lance Lynn. Lance Lynn? This is the Dodgers, for Christ’s sake! When they need help in the rotation, they go get Zack Greinke, or Yu Darvish, or Max Scherzer. They shop at the supermarket that plebs like you and I aren’t even allo...

The NBA is right about load management for the wrong reasons
OK, it’s time for Devil’s Advocate corner: The NBA’s stance on load management is a good thing, but not for the dumbass reasons Joe Dumars presented Wednesday. If you missed it, the executive vice president of basketball operations said there’s no proof that load management prevents injuries. Maybe,...

ESPN cuts pay during COVID, inks Pat McAfee for $85M, vax jokes with Aaron Rodgers
Dancing with the devil is a personal choice. But when the heat from that tango singes others, it becomes a problem. Some ESPN employees have to be burning mad over how they lost money due to pay cuts during the COVID-19 pandemic, all for the worldwide leader to spend almost $100 million for Pat McAf...

Troubling texts between former, current MSU trustees shed new light on Mel Tucker sexual harassment allegations
A string of text messages between current and former Michigan State University trustees show musings on how to smear the victim, lingering questions about how the school handled the sexual harassment allegations against Mel Tucker, speculation about revenge, and a suggestion that the MSU Board of Tr...

Brian Snitker was asleep at the wheel again
The symmetry is almost startling. It was three days short of being the exact date, one year later. Brian Snitker didn’t have an itchy enough trigger finger, or just fell asleep, and the Phillies teed off on a starter that shouldn’t have been on the mound. Which pivoted the division series to a 2-1 P...

In a move that shocks no one, Kansas barely gets a slap on the wrist from the NCAA
Did anyone expect a different result? ...

Jared Goff is playing like the best quarterback in the NFL
Jared Goff’s time with the Detroit Lions began the same way that it ended with the Los Angeles Rams, disappointing. By Week 7 of his first season with the Lions, Dan Campbell looked at the media, took a deep breath, and criticized Goff during a postgame press conference. At that point in the season,...

AEW <i>and </i>WWE fans were winners this time around
For all the noise about “WWE vs. AEW” and whatever that means to everybody, they don’t really go head to head on our screens very much. WWE pulled NXT off of Wednesdays when it mostly got its brains beaten in by the burgeoning AEW Dynamite. AEW has struggled on the Saturday nights that WWE runs a Pr...

Luka Dončić let the NBA down this week
The first-ever international exhibition on Sept. 8, 1978, is immortalized for the defending NBA champion Washington Bullets’ loss to Maccabi Tel Aviv by the score of 97-98. Since 2000, when the EuroLeague was founded, NBA teams are 75-17 against Europe’s top teams in exhibitions. Or 17-75 if you wan...

Give Georgia its due respect, and you might (think you) have a chance
Following a couple of games in which the Georgia Bulldogs looked semi-vulnerable, Kirby Smart’s team put it on now No. 24 Kentucky to the tune of 51-13. It was such a lopsided victory that it left UK coach Mark Stoops with an aftertaste no amount of Listerine will wash out. While I understand his fr...

Tuesday night should’ve been only celebratory for this Texas Rangers fan. It wasn’t
Last night should’ve been pure, unadulterated joy. I haven’t been shy when it comes to the Texas Rangers and writing about my favorite baseball team. It swept the 101-win Orioles and advanced to the American League Championship Series for the first time in a dozen years. I was a sophomore in college...

Fine, you want a prediction? The New Jersey Devils will win the Stanley Cup
Stanley Cup picks in October are dumb. We have no idea who will be hurt, what the trade deadline will do, what goalie will have an existential crisis (Jakob Markstrom), or what goalie will channel the Arc Of The Covenant and turn their also-ran into a threat (Igor Shesterkin). It’s a long goddamn se...

Michigan TV network fires sports director for Mel Tucker ‘analysis’ that read more like PR work
Last Thursday, sports reporter Audrey Dahlgren had a very bad day, by journalistic standards. After attorneys for Mel Tucker, the recently fired head football coach at Michigan State, released 98 pages worth of text messages sent by Brenda Tracy — an anti-rape advocate who filed a Title IX complaint...

Hopefully, Anthony Richardson’s rehab includes a tutorial on how to slide
Anthony Richardson has never been so lucky to get injured in his life. The Indianapolis Colts’ rookie QB has been operating on pure talent and instincts over the first four starts of his career. He’s tallied seven TDs total — tied with C.J. Stroud the lead among all rookie QBs — in essentially 12 qu...

What Travis Kelce and Aaron Rodgers can debate instead of the vaccine
After Aaron Rodgers referred to Travis Kelce as Mr. Pfizer, Kelce fired a return grenade at Rodgers, whose team is owned by a pharmaceutical magnate. Rodgers’ idea to resolve this once and for all was inviting Kelce onto his Pat McAfee Show home turf to debate the vaccine along with Robert Kennedy J...

Now comes the tricky part for the Orioles
It’s awfully easy, and too easy, to point at an up-and-coming team like the Rangers that spent a lot of money to augment the players they developed from within and say that’s the reason they clobbered an up-and-coming team like the Orioles that did the exact opposite, basically only adding the decre...

Looks like the Vikings are throwing in the towel, ready to trade Kirk Cousins
After a Week 5 loss to the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs, the Minnesota Vikings are off to a 1-4 start and seem to be throwing in the towel. On Monday, news broke that the Vikings are now “more open” to trading quarterback Kirk Cousins. On Tuesday, more news out of Minnesota shed ...

A lot of NFL teams tanking for Caleb Williams already have a QB
If you’ve found yourself noticing more bad football than usual in the NFL, you’re not wrong. After five weeks, there are seven teams with one win or fewer, and none of them are the New York Jets, Houston Texans, or Washington Commanders. The New York Giants, Minnesota Vikings, New England Patriots, ...

Here’s why Cristiano Ronaldo is back in court over 2009 sexual assault claim
The next time someone tells you that sexual assault allegations “ruin a man’s career,” you only have to point to Cristiano Ronaldo. It’s been nearly five years since the German outlet Der Spiegel published what it purported were leaked documents between Ronaldo’s attorneys regarding an alleged sexua...

Behold the Skate Men — NHL Season Preview: Western Conference
Let’s keep it rolling. You can see our Eastern Conference preview from yesterday here....