v Page 2784 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
If You're In NYC Tonight, Come Hear Some Good Writers Talk Boxing And Soccer
It's time for another edition of Gelf's excellent Varsity Letters reading series. This month's slate features former Washington Post staffer and veteran boxing writer William Gildea, the author Theresa Runstedtler (who has written about boxing legend Jack Johnson), and GQ's Mark Kirby, who will disc...
Craig James Is Broke And Asking His Former Campaign Donors For Money
After leaving his cushy ESPN studio job in order to make a quixotic run for the U.S. Senate from his home state of Texas (a senate run, by the way, that featured unapologetic gay-bashing), Craig James is broke and looking for handouts from his former donors....
Visual Confirmation That Mario Seneca Is The Most Sensitive Umpire In Baseball History
Last night, we told you about minor league umpire Mario Seneca, who ejected the music guy/college intern working for the high-A Daytona Cubs for playing "Three Blind Mice" after a questionable call. Today, video of the incident has surfaced (thanks to the Daytona Cubs themselves) and it confirms o...
Was This Disgraceful Olympic Boxing Match Fixed?
Knockdowns are exceedingly rare in Olympic boxing. Japan’s Satoshi Shimizu knocked down Azerbaijan’s Magomed Abdulhamidov five times in the third and final round of their bantamweight bout yesterday. And yet, the judges scored the round in favor of the one who spent more time on the canvas than on ...
Olympic Photographer Forgets To Remove Lens Cap, Can't Figure Out Why He Can't Take Pictures
A moment of levity yesterday, as one sad-sack photographer struggled to work out why he couldn't get some good closeups of eventual all-around gold medalist Kohei Uchimura. After 10 solid seconds of checking his camera, a revelation: the lens cap was still on. We've all been there, guy....
NBC Says They Cut Memorial Tribute To Save Time, But They Replaced It With Something Two Minutes Longer
The bullshit continues to flow from NBC's mouths as they attempt to justify slicing an entire portion of Friday's London Olympics opening ceremony from their tape-delayed broadcast. That portion included a tribute featuring two dead U.S. servicemen and a requiem for victims of the 7/7 terror attack...
MLS Defender's First Career Score Was This Miraculous, Game-Tying Goal In Injury Time
If anyone ever openly doubts the idea that it's better to be lucky than good, show them this video of Sporting KC defender Kyle Miller, who used his head in a most fortuitous manner Wednesday night, scoring the injury-time equalizer in a friendly against Stoke City of the Premier League. Even bett...
Chinese Diver Wins Gold, Is Finally Told That Her Mother Has Cancer And Her Grandparents Died A Year Ago
Wu Minxia took gold in the 3m synchronized springboard, and in doing so became the first woman in history to win three consecutive Olympic golds. Sustained success like that comes at a price—in Wu's case, a life entirely devoted to training, cut off from the outside world....
No One Is Saying Whether NBC's Olympic Streaming Is A Success
NBC coughed up more than $1 billion to air these 2012 Summer Olympics and it's going to squeeze every last revenue dollar out of its investment. That means constant tape delays, tons of commercials, overly creative editing, and jingoism galore. (And you can probably forget about seeing anything inte...
How A Career Ends: Dominique Moceanu, America's Youngest Gold-Medal Gymnast
Tell Me When It's Over is an interview series in which we ask former athletes about the moment they knew their playing days were over. Today: Dominique Moceanu, the youngest American, at age 14, to ever win an Olympic gold medal in gymnastics. Moceanu was part of the Magnificent Seven—along with Sha...
Disgraced Badminton Player Announces Retirement, Blames Poor Performance On Injuries
One of the eight badminton players who was disqualified from the Olympics for match-fixing is fighting back against those allegations, while also announcing her retirement from professional competition. ...
Gore Vidal's First Love: The Baseball Star Turned War Hero
As of Wednesday morning, administrators at Rock Creek Cemetery in D.C. hadn't heard yet whether Gore Vidal would actually be filling the burial plot he reserved there for himself some years ago. But Vidal, who died yesterday in Los Angeles at 86, has a couple reasons to get shipped back to his boyho...
Gregor Blanco's Diving Catches Are Becoming Even More Impressive
This is getting to be old hat for San Francisco Giants fans. First, Blanco became a folk hero in SF for saving Matt Cain's perfecto with an incredible late-game diving catch. Blanco put forth a more impressive version of that feat Wednesday night, with less inherent drama but way more bodily extens...
Minnesota Vikings Punter Chris Kluwe Is Here To Take Your Questions
OK, gang. As promised, Chris Kluwe is ready to take shit from you. He's at the Vikings' training camp in Mankato, Minn., waiting on food and hoping a thunderstorm doesn't knock down the dorm the team's staying in. Ask him anything about anything by firing away down in the discussion below. ...
NBC's Local Affiliates Don't Understand How Spoilers Work, Either
On Monday NBC inadvertently spoiled the result of a race they had yet to broadcast by showing its winner celebrating in a promo for the following morning's Today show. It seems its local affiliates aren't quite getting how to play the tape-delay game, either. Here's a clip from last night's 6 p.m....
Joe West Gets Clobbered Upside The Head, Starts Bleeding, Does Not Break Into Song
It was a tough night behind the dish for Joe West, who got knocked hard in the ol' noodle by the follow-through of Carlos Lee's swing. The game was delayed for a few minutes while West was attended to by the Braves' medical staff. Sadly, as far as we know, he did not pass the time by humming a few...
This 90-Year-Old Pole Vaulter Is Much Better Than You
The BBC spent some time in Jonesboro, Ark., where 1984 Olympian and USATF hall of famer Earl Bell runs the training program that produced two-thirds of America's pole vaulters in London. Another familiar face around the facility is Earl's father William, who just turned 90, and can still soar with...
Gore Vidal's <em>Myra Breckinridge</em> Became One Of The Weirdest Movies Ever Made
Gore Vidal died yesterday, and though he appeared as an actor in a few movies—he played a professor in With Honors, an evil futuristic fellow in Gattaca and, most memorably, as Tim Robbins' lefty opponent in Bob Roberts—he'll be remembered, in a movie sense, as the guy responsible for Myra Breckinri...
Join Us Tonight At 10 For What Should Be A Lively Discussion With Minnesota Vikings Punter Chris Kluwe
Aside from being an NFL punter, Chris Kluwe is many things. Video gamer. Picture of calm. Maker of parodies. Defender of punters everywhere. Gawker comment troll. And at 10 p.m. (EDT), Kluwe will be right here taking questions directly from Deadspin readers. The floor down in the discussion will be ...
Rob Van Dam Ate A Whopper Off The Ground: More Wrestler Run-Ins
Inspired by the saga of "Wrestling Superstar Virgil," we continue with readers' encounters with the titans of the squared circle. If you've had your own run-in with pro wrestlers past or present, e-mail us, subject line "Virgilbag."...