w Page 5175 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Live Blog: Paraguay Vs. Trinidad & Tobago
Paraguay has been a big disappointment, losing two games 1-0 and already having been eliminated. Meanwhile, the plucky Trinidadians — Toboggans? — look unlikely to make the next round; they need a convincing victory and a blowout loss by Sweden against England. But that's more than perhaps they ex...

The Secret Way To Handicap The World Cup
So as you might have noticed, we've been doing some fun photo montages to preview the World Cup live blogs. And we always run a photo of a couple of fans. Or, as one friend put it, "I am enjoying this trend whereupon 2 countries playing each other are contrasted with a 'hot chick' and a 'doofus.'"...

Maurice Drew Doesn't Hate Your Nerd Ass That Much After All
If case you didn't remember, former UCLA running back (and now Jacksonville Jaguars rookie) Maurice Drew had been implicated in the Los Angeles Denny's incident in which Bears safety Ricky Manning and pals beat up a guy for using a laptop. (We're sure this happens to Cuban all the time.)...

Hirshey: Viva Espana!
David Hirshey will write regularly during the World Cup....

Live Blog: Germany Vs. Ecuador
Ecuador has been one of the more pleasant stories of the tournament, upsetting Poland and cruising past Costa Rica in their first two games. This is, obviously, the real test, with the Ecuadorians facing host Germany. The winner takes the top seed out of Group A, and if there's a draw, it's good n...

To Watch Tonight
What to watch as the house actually does start to clean itself ... • College baseball: World Series, Rice vs. Miami (Fla.). It's Rice, you see ... RICE! [ESPN2] • MLB: New York Yankees at Philadelphia. We'll be watching this from a JetBlue airplane, and we're still going to hear the boos. [ESPN] • S...

Live Blog: Spain Vs. Tunisia
You probably can't tell from that picture, but the guy in it is a Spain fan who is inexplicably wearing a Spider-man costume. (Oh, by the way: Can any comic book fan out there explain why the hyphen is in there? It's really annoying.) We can't, for the likes of us, figure out what Spain's soccer t...

Meet The Mets!
Now that the New York Mets have taken a firm grapple of the National League East, you know what that means. It's time to PARTY! Yeah!...

Let Us Now Read From The Book Of Dwyane
Christ loves basketball, of that we're certain. But there is no clue in the scriptures, as far as we can tell, as to which city Jesus would have preferred; Dallas or Miami. We can't really picture Him in either place, quite frankly. But we did find this over on Dave Barry's blog, so all of you Da ...

The Mick's Memorabilia Sampling
As a followup to our Mickey Mantle item from Friday, a reader sends us this baseball currently up for sale by the auction site "History For Sale."...

Live Blog: Ukraine Vs. Saudi Arabia
People tend to like us to find "sexy" pictures of soccer "babe" fans, wearing little "clothing" and painting their "faces." But, try as we might, we were unable to find any sexy photos of Saudi Arabia fans. (We also had trouble with Iran and, unusually, Brazil. Odd.) We apologize....

Howard's Boner (Or, Why Refs Are A Natural Male Enhancement)
Another reason that it would have been more fun to live in the early 1900s rather than now — also on the list: speakeasies, jalopies, no Internet — is the fact that they used the word "boner" to describe embarrassing mental missteps. We wish this were still true today; we'd have Buckner's boner, W...

Live Blog: Switzerland Vs. Togo
So you know, folks: Togo is not out of this yet. You think you can count on Togo, but you can't: You just can't....

To Watch Tonight...
• NBA. Mavericks @ Heat, Game 5. Your last chance to see 19,000 people clad entirely in white. Unless you're attending some sort of a massive Klan convention soon. 9:00, ABC. • MLB. Red Sox @ Braves. Schilling looks for his 10th win. John Smoltz looks for someone on his team to get a damn hit every ...

Checking In At The World Cup...
Brazil 2-0 Australia. It might just be me, but does Brazil seem a little but underwhelming thus far? They seemed lethargic in their 1-0 win over Croatia, and all anyone could talk about afterwards was Ronaldo's apparent tubbiness, and Australia really gave them all they wanted today. They do not l...

Good, Old-Fashioned Recreational Drugs
Since the talk of steroids and HGH can be so tiring, I thought it might be fun to get back to the basics... you know, marijuana, LSD, cocaine, that sort of thing. It's not brand new, and I believe it originally appeared in a special sports issue of a magazine called Frank 151, but if you haven't see...

Live From Kaiserslautern
I've got a couple of live reports from fans who were in Kaiserslautern for the USA/Italy World Cup match yesterday. First, at The Third Leaf, is this photo essay-ish look at the atmosphere surrounding the game. To say that it looks like a hell of a lot of fun would be an understatement....

To Watch Tonight...
• Stanley Cup Finals: Carolina @ Edmonton. Carolina with another opportunity to close it out. Boy, I've really ignored that one, huh? Sorry. 8:00, NBC. • College Baseball: NCAA World Series, Game 4: Miami vs. Oregon State. I wonder if Dennis Erickson will be watching this one, feeling all torn-up in...

A Closer Look At Jorge Larrionda
I don't often blames losses on officiating. And I'm not doing that here, either, particularly since there was no loss to speak of, and sure, both the Italian and United States sides have complaints. But there is plenty of controversy concerning red-card happy official Jorge Larrionda of Uruguay. ...

I Suspect Mafia Involvement
Okay, not really. But given the credibility of top Italian football officials at the moment, I think it's fair to let the mind wonder. The ref in the United States/Italy game was handing out red cards like they were commemorative souvenirs....