var Page 15 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Spain rules the day, but not final result
Spain did just about everything they wanted against Italy. They suffocated Jorginho out of the game, denying all routes to him from the defense and keeping Italy’s attack at bay through a pretty aggressive high press. They kept the ball for most of the game, and didn’t do that usual Spanish thing of...

No, the Lightning didn’t cheat
At some point in the next couple days, the Tampa Bay Lightning will win their second consecutive Cup. Could be tonight, or maybe the Canadiens have one last death rattle in them and send this series back to Tampa on Wednesday. It’s hockey, weird things happen, we’ve seen 0-3 comebacks, but here it’s...

Win or lose, Torrey Craig can get a ring
Torrey Craig is in a rare win-win situation....

First it was very much Spain, then it wasn’t, then it was, then it wasn’t, and now we don’t know what to think
I’ve been using the term “Spain’ing” a lot during Euro 2020, harkening back to the era before Spain was drenched in medals, where they would always squander any tournament despite fielding one of the most talented squads. They could find any way to lose back then, whether through simple malaise, or ...

What to know for the upcoming Olympic Men’s Basketball Qualifying
As the NBA playoffs continue, 24 national teams across the world are vying for the final four open men’s basketball Olympic berths. The tournaments will run from June 29 through July 4 in Canada, Croatia, Serbia, and Lithuania. ...

Jason Kidd's hiring in Dallas totally won’t backfire
What has Jason Kidd done to earn a third opportunity as head coach of an NBA franchise? I’m legitimately curious. All he did in his one year with the Nets and three and a half with Milwaukee was win one playoff series while consistently underperforming and failing to win a single division title. The...

Martin Dúbravka was so sick of Spain’s wastefulness he took care of it himself
Ever watch a game and you’re sure that one player out on the field just has their circuits short out for a second? Their brain becomes the rainbow pinwheel of frustration as things fail to load? It can happen to all of us. It just doesn’t happen to us on a stage quite as big as the one Slovakia’s Ma...

Rüdiger HUNGRY!
I bet, my fellow footyphiles, that we thought we were done with international tournaments including players nibbling on each other, what with Luis Suarez not involved in the European Championships and probably too old for the next World Cup. And Copa America has bigger problems, though I suppose we ...

Euro 2021: Can Poland rise to meet Robert Lewandowski?
No. What’re you, new? No one rises to the level of Robert Lewandowski. It’s Robert Goddamn Lewandowski. Dude just scored 40 goals in one league season, which is utterly insane. That’s after he scored 34 last year. Seventy-four motherfucking goals in two seasons in just the Bundesliga. That’s four se...

There’s never been a ‘bettor’ time to put money on Floyd Mayweather, even if he is a degenerate
Over the past 15 years, the tightest betting odds Floyd Mayweather has had for one of his fights has been -190 during his 2007 middleweight title bout with “The Golden Boy” Oscar De La Hoya. ...

Meet MLB’s All-'Never-been an All-Star' Team
Nowadays, it seems like every baseball player under the sun has been an All-Star at some point in their careers. In 2019, there were four AL second basemen selected for the Midsummer Classic. FOUR! In total, there were 75 players awarded All-Star recognition in 2019. In 2018, 73 players were named A...

Now the Leafs have the calamity they’ve always wanted
Because everything is outsized with the Leafs, the idea that they’ve been coughing up genuine chances at the Stanley Cup year-after-year has grown at the rate and scale of The Blob. Being the Leafs, everything around them is audibly multiplied by at least 12, so the sheer volume that is emitted from...

Top 5 NHL playoff saves of all time
We always remember the goals: Bobby Orr flying through the air, Ray Bourque scoring in the Stanley Cup Finals at 40 years old, and Matteau! Matteau! Matteau! Legendary moments. But what about the goals that didn’t happen? What about the goals that were snagged away with a flash of the leather or a f...

Seems like old times, eh Leafs?
By now you know the key points. The Toronto Maple Leafs haven’t won the Stanley Cup since 1967, haven’t been to the Final since then either, haven’t beaten the Canadiens in a series since their ’67 title clash, won their first division title since 2000 this season (thanks to being in the all-Canadia...

Deadspin's AEW 'Double Or Nothing' preview
Sadly, for the second straight year, AEW will not run Double Or Nothing in Las Vegas but in Jacksonville, Fla. I say that because I had tickets in 2020, and a Vegas weekend with the great wrestling unwashed sure would hit the spot right about now. Oh well! They say this one will have a full house at...

VAR isn’t the problem, the people using it are
The return of supporters to various terraces last week in the Premier League brought back some rites of soccer that we didn’t even realize how much we missed and cherished. The mocking of a shot well over or wide of the goal. The vitriol for a ref after a foul. The applause after a relatively simple...

Leicester found a new way to blow it, and their fans probably won’t care
The warping of European soccer and its priorities make judging Leicester City’s last week of the season decidedly foggy. Twenty years ago or so it would be easy. Win the FA Cup, finish fifth, that’s an unqualified success. But that’s not the world we live in anymore, and that’s what makes it so uncl...

Hockey is the dumbest sport
It’s funny (but not), and fitting, that in a week where we’ve spent a great deal of time talking about baseball’s old, drunk, incontinent demons still plaguing the youthful and logical, hockey strolls into the saloon, hitches up its belt, and says, “Oh, you think you’re stupid? I’ll show you stupid....

The biggest problem facing Jets rookie Zach Wilson right now is… his mom
Move over LaVar Ball, there’s a new MPP “most problematic parent” in sports, and her son hasn’t even taken a snap in the NFL yet....

A shoutout to memorable mom moments in sports history
None of the athletes we talk about would be where they are without their mothers, so to commemorate, here’s a list to honor some of the most memorable mom moments in sports history. It’s not necessarily a top 10, but a collection of highlights (and yes, one lowlight) to honor Mother’s Day 2021....