ward Page 13 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

The Minnesota Timberwolves are the NBA’s best redemption story
The Minnesota Timberwolves’ bounce back from their 2023 nadir has been the NBA’s most remarkable redemption story. The Association may have discontinued its Comeback Player of the Year award, but the Twin Cities’ finest would deserve consideration if that were not the case. Before October, the outlo...

Ranking the major sports networks from most elitist to Fox Sports
Prestige and journalism shouldn’t go hand-in-hand together. Sure, there are outlets with enough history and money to have ethics departments, fact-checkers, and paying subscribers, but the omnipresent tier — the ones controlling the rights to the big sports — are cost-cutting corporate slugs like th...

We need to talk about MLB's ugly new uniforms
By now, you’ve probably seen the pics of MLB players posing in jerseys and pants that look like little more than toilet paper draped to fit a human form. The uniforms are designed by Nike and manufactured by Fanatics, who appear to be doing a really great job of cornering the market on sports mercha...

5 increasingly unhinged solutions to the NBA All-Star Game
As the NBA has observed its golden era of efficiency proliferate from more streamlined offenses to load management run amok, elements of the league have fallen by the wayside. Marquee hoopers play fewer minutes, fewer games and now they barely expend energy or cross halfcourt during All-Star Weekend...

Who is Mr. Franchise for each NBA team in the 21st century?
Michael Jordan will always be synonymous with the Chicago Bulls. Same thing for Magic Johnson with the Los Angeles Lakers and Larry Bird with the Boston Celtics. But since the turn of the 21st Century, some teams have gone a decade without a face of the franchise (think the Detroit Pistons and Orlan...

As the Thunder return to contention, let's not forget the Supersonics
The Oklahoma City Thunder have executed one of the shortest rebuilding periods in NBA history. Since the breakup of the Kevin Durant/Russell Westbrook pairing, leading into the current Thunder 2.0, only lasted three seasons of extreme tanking. Those losing efforts netted them the sixth pick in the ...

The NBA dunk contest is crapshoot that lacks star power
NBA All-Star Saturday was a hit once again, but one of the main events may have missed the mark. The slam dunk contest at one time was the highlight of the entire weekend. Now it’s hit or miss, year-to-year, whether we’ll be talking about it for weeks or if it’ll be forgotten by Monday afternoon. Th...

Jordan Poole has been revealed; Kyle Kuzma loses his marbles; Steph Curry nails 100-footer from tunnel
If every NBA player were awarded a mulligan season in their career, this would be the one Jordan Poole would choose to erase and make sure no one ever spoke of again. Entering the 2023-24 campaign, Poole’s first in Washington, there were high hopes of what could be alongside Kyle Kuzma. We’re just a...

Minnesota is giving off that sham No. 1 seed vibe that the Utah Jazz had a few years ago
Next to the OKC Thunder, the Minnesota Timberwolves have been one of the biggest surprises of the NBA campaign. They’ve been in control of or hovering near first place in the Western Conference for much of the season. But we may have seen a little bit of foreshadowing brought to us by Clippers star ...

Forget Nantz and Romo, give us SpongeBob and Patrick in the booth every week
If yesterday’s Super Bowl LVIII extravaganza — from the pregame to the broadcast to the game itself — left you a little cold, you were definitely watching the wrong broadcast. Sure, nothing changes the fact that the entire game consisted largely of trading field goals and then ended exactly how we k...

This might have been the worst year ever for Super Bowl commercials
The dirty little secret about Super Bowl ads is viewers can watch them before the Big Game, with companies (presumably) wanting to stretch the impact of their most expensive spots of the year. Why anyone would seek out commercials before they’re forced to watch them, I have no idea, but, uh, yeah, i...

Everything you missed before and during the Super Bowl
If you didn’t tune in to the Big Game until after the action started on the field, have no fear. All you missed was one of the worst pre-game shows in the history of television, laden with so much craven advertising that the Puppy Bowl looked like it was on PBS by comparison. We had a bizarre Sunday...

Super Bowl LVIII: Forget the moneyline, make these prop bets instead
This is the Super Bowl made for gambling. The American Gaming Association estimates that Americans will wager a combined $23.1 billion on the Big Game this year, up from $16 billion year-over-year. Whether it’s your first time betting on the big game or you’re a seasoned vet, you don’t want to be pl...

Lamar Jackson and the players to win multiple NFL MVP awards
Thursday night’s NFL Awards dinner put Lamar Jackson in elite company. The Baltimore Ravens quarterback became just the 11th signal-caller to win multiple AP NFL MVP Awards. Jackson snuck in past Brett Favre and Patrick Mahomes to become the second-youngest multi-time MVP winner behind Jim Brown. In...

The NBA trade deadline was a bit of a dud, but here's a look at who won and who flopped horribly
After last year’s insane trade deadline, which featured Kevin Durant being dealt to the Phoenix Suns, this year brought a bunch of smaller, shrewd moves that moved teams into contention. We have tracked the trades and broken them down by time-tested winners and losers rubric to track how the day wen...

The non-Mahomes, Purdy players to watch in Super Bowl LVIII
You know the big names of this Super Bowl matchup already. There’s no need to talk about Patrick Mahomes and Brock Purdy anymore, treating a 53-on-53-man matchup like it’s a one-on-one boxing match. We’ve gotten enough coverage of the Travis Kelces and the Christian McCaffreys of this game. ...

Vince McMahon, John Laurinitis accused of covering up alleged rape
Vince McMahon, already facing a bombshell sexual assault and trafficking lawsuit, is also being accused of covering up the alleged rape of one of his former female talents — who later died by suicide — as well as sexually harassing her....

Why would the UFL release its schedule during Super Bowl week?
There’s strength in numbers, but bad planning can weaken anything. When the XFL and USFL officially announced their merger as the UFL in December, it was to expand pro football in a country that’s obsessed over the game....

The most outlandish Super Bowl LVIII prop bets
This is going to be the biggest Super Bowl for gambling in recent memory. The American Gaming Association estimates that Americans will wager a combined $23.1 billion on the Big Game this year, up from $16 billion year-over-year. ...

Of course Travis Kelce wasn’t going to the Grammys, but imagine the reaction if he did
Travis Kelce didn’t miss too much on Grammy night 2024. Los Angeles is not the most fun place to be when an atmospheric river is parked over it like the alien ship in Independence Day. Gloomy and wet is not how Southern California is usually described. While there would have certainly been a damper ...