Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

In what can only be described as the smallest of hat tips to diversity and inclusion, U.S. women’s national team hockey player Brianna Decker was brought out to demonstrate the premier passing drill at the NHL All-Star skills event on Friday. While the league never bothered to show her demonstration on television, a…Read more...

LeBron James went down with a groin injury way back on Christmas Day. You cannot build, even in theory, a cast of teammates and a basketball ecosystem that wouldn’t suffer in the immediate aftermath of losing a player of LeBron’s prominence, but the young Lakers, at least in theory, should’ve been relatively fine.Read more...

Despite the best efforts of Norwich keeper Tim Krul to disrupt Billy Sharp’s focus before his penalty kick, the Sheffield United striker scored from the spot to give his time a 1-0 lead to end the first half of play. Sharp, one of the most prolific scorers at the senior English league level, ran over to the sideline…Read more...

In the 65th minute Sevilla’s La Liga match against Levante, the home squad appeared to have an all-but-guaranteed goal. Sevilla took the botched corner kick from their opponents and immediately started on the break towards their goal. Pablo Sarabia, who began the counter, made a quick pass to Wissam Ben Yedder, who…Read more...

Kenneth Faried entered the league as an undersized, but explosive, power forward whose tenacity on the glass, high-flying dunks and absurd athleticism seemed to make up for the fact that he didn’t have many other discernible skills on the court. As his skills diminished in value and power—coupled with the fact that he…Read more...

Alysa Liu became the youngest senior ladies figure skating national champion in U.S. history by defeating defending champion Bradie Tennell at the championships in Detroit on Friday.

As LeBron James looks to return to the court after a prolonged absence because of a groin injury, those closest to him are looking for someone other than Luke Walton to be the head coach of the Lakers. In an exchange on the Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective podcast, ESPN’s Jackie MacMullan said that LeBron’s camp…Read more...

“It’s not going to change a damn thing,” the President of the United States told an assemblage of news anchors at an off-the-record White House meeting some weeks ago. “But I’m still doing it.” To a certain extent, that groaning is just standard Trump shit—his signature all-caps triumphalism is balanced by an equal…Read more...

In his sixth go-round, former baseball pitcher Curt Schilling received 60.9 percent in the Hall of Fame vote. He’s on pace to get in within his 10 years of eligibility. (Though this blog argues for his induction, I don’t personally care if he does and hope he doesn’t. Why? Because fuck him, that’s why!)Read more...

This has been an agonizingly brutal week for digital media, with mass layoffs at HuffPost, Gannett, and as of Friday, internet juggernaut BuzzFeed. While it’s unclear at this time exactly how many employees BuzzFeed has let go, the numbers gleaned publicly suggest sweeping layoffs across multiple departments, with…Read more...

The Tampa Bay Rays announced today that they would become the first major American sports team to stop accepting cash at their stadium, forcing fans to either pay via credit card or something called a “Rays card.” This shift is roughly coterminous with their recent decision to eliminate 5,000 of their cheapest seats.…Read more...

By now, you’re probably sick of hearing about Rams cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman’s hit on Saints wideout Tommylee Lewis in the NFC Championship Game, which failed to draw a penalty flag that would have all but clinched the game for New Orleans. Since that play, everyone from current Saints players to aggrieved fans…Read more...

What still stands as quite possibly the most viscerally memorable match in the modern history of World Wrestling Entertainment took place 20 years ago this week at Royal Rumble ‘99. How much of a compliment that is depends on your perspective.Read more...

The U.S. government entered day 35 of its shutdown today. Hundreds of thousands of federal employees have not been paid in over a month, the airline industry is on the brink of total collapse, and the lines outside food banks get longer every day. Meanwhile, Louisiana Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who is getting…Read more...

Robert “Colonel Rob” Schaffner, an L.A. outsider art deity and the guy who got Heavy Metal Parking Lot to whatever masses it got to, is dead.

Rafael Nadal had booked his room in the final, with two whole days to ready himself for it. He drained the blood out of Stefanos Tsitsipas, just as he did to the last two kids trying to prematurely usher in the future. All Novak Djokovic had to do was wrap up one last errand today, and he didn’t dawdle, dropping only…Read more...

It seems especially difficult to find good news for undocumented immigrants right now, but here is something nice. Thanks to intense community involvement and legal push-back, Louisiana’s undocumented students will now be able to play high school sports in the state, after a deeply unpopular rule—which required that…Read more...

Here’s a good resolution, if you’re the sort of person who resolves to do good and healthy things and then maintains any hope of actually doing them: Resolve to divide your waking hours exactly and only between doing things you should be doing, and doing things you want to be doing.

The Chicago Bears were double-doinked out of the playoffs by placekicker Cody Parkey, who then made an appearance on Today before anyone really had a chance to start feeling sorry for him. The Bears brass seemed pretty pissed about Parkey going on TV, and now he is officially on the hot seat:

A United By Blue sitewide sale, a bluetooth beanie, and reusable cable ties lead off Friday’s best deals from around the web.

In an otherwise disappointing 2019 recruiting class for a USC football team coming off a 5-7 season, wide receiver Bru McCoy was the undisputed gem. A five-star ranked by some as one of the top 10 players in the country, the California native McCoy, together with fellow wideout Kyle Ford, was primed to be part of an…Read more...

Rajon Rondo has spent much of his career trying to find new ways to make himself the most annoying person on the court. It’s impressive, then, that after 12 years in the NBA he still has ideas as fresh as this one:

Ultra sustainable brand United By Blue has unleashed their bi-annual end-of-season sale unto the world, and it’s just as good for the environment as it is for your wallet. Through February 3, take up to 40% off United By Blue’s entire site — including their super warm bison-insulated outerwear, just in time for a…Read more...

Sara Nelson, the leader of the Association of Flight Attendants, gave a speech this week calling for a general strike by organized labor to end the government shutdown. Is America’s aviation at risk of grinding to a halt—or falling apart? According to Nelson, we are already teetering on the edge of chaos.Read more...

As much as your dog prefers to smell like butt, he’s probably overdue for a bath. In fact, he’s probably been due for a long time now. But if you live in an apartment and don’t have easy access to a hose, a regular shower or sink isn’t really the right tool for the job. At least not without the Waterpik Pet Wand.

The Knicks are having quite a time. They’ve got the longest active losing streak in the NBA, at seven games, and they’ve lost a nightmarish 22 of their last 25, stretching all the way back to November 27. To the extent that the Knicks can be said to have had any chemistry at any point in the 21st century, that…Read more...

Steven Adams is a big heavy metal-looking Kiwi monster who does cool basketball things all the time, and this season he’s played his way into serious All-Star consideration by being efficient as shit and co-anchoring one of the NBA’s best defenses. Mostly he’s stayed pretty chill through all this, but the good times…Read more...

This evening, the NBA announced the starters for the forthcoming all-star game, players selected by fans, the media, and, most importantly, their fellow NBA players. There were no undeserving selections, as Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kawhi Leonard, Joel Embiid, Kyrie Irving, and Kemba Walker will start for the East, while…Read more...

Late Thursday afternoon, Benjamin Watson put out an all-too-serious complaint about the blown pass interference/unnecessary roughness call the Saints didn’t get in the NFC Championship matchup against the Rams. In a screenshot posted on Twitter, Watson called on commissioner Roger Goodell to step in and, at the very…Read more...

The Denver Broncos’ season is over and their coaching staff has mostly been filled out, but the protracted fight over which of owner Pat Bowlen’s children will take over the team is still raging on. The lucky kid will either be Bethany Bowlen Wallace or Brittany Bowlen. It will most certainly not be Pat’s son John…Read more...

We see a lot of deals around the web over on Kinja Deals, but these were our ten favorites today.

Thierry Henry’s managerial career is not off to the best start. The former Arsenal legend took over at AS Monaco in France’s top division back in October, with the club in the relegation zone following the firing of former manager Leonardo Jardim. Henry’s task was straightforward, if not easy: keep the side up in…Read more...

While most subscription streaming services are competing to snap up rights to live programming in an effort to attract paying viewers, Sports Illustrated, a publication that simply can’t compete with broadcast giants like ESPN or NBC Sports, has bought the rights to show replays of Liverpool matches, according to a …Read more...

Mike Tyson was a predictable boxer. Michael Jordan was a predictable basketball player. Tom Brady is a predictable football player. It doesn’t matter how hard you study. If you’re not good enough, you will lose. That’s the predictable part.Read more...

Jets defensive back Jamal Adams had a little fun—or thought he was having a little fun—by delivering the boom on his division rival’s mascot Pat Patriot at the Pro Bowl festivities Wednesday. It was a solid hit, and the person in the suit played it off like everything was okay.

About an hour into Paris Saint-Germain’s Coupe de France match against Strasbourg yesterday, Neymar was clowning on his inferiors with his imperial dribbling skills, as is his wont. Strasbourg midfielder Moataz Zemzemi must’ve taken Neymar’s casual demonstration of superiority personally, because he then lashed out in…Read more...

Rafael Nadal gored YouTuber Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-2, 6-4, 6-0 today. Their Australian Open semifinal match took just 1:46, but in that span the winner erected a monument to one of tennis’s historic shots: the Rafa banana forehand. Above is as pristine a specimen as has ever appeared in nature.Read more...

There is a scene near the start of Joshua Oppenheimer’s award-winning 2012 documentary The Act Of Killing in which Japto Soerjosoemarno—the leader of far-right paramilitary group Pancasila Youth—is being interviewed on a golf course about his role in the Indonesian genocide of 1965-66. As he’s warming up for a drive,…Read more...

Let us now embark on a tortuous NFL offseason journey that includes all of our favorite dummies and involves a starting quarterback trying to challenge two-thirds of First Take to an “octagon fight.”

After 113 games with the Knicks, 94 of them in the starting lineup, Enes Kanter was hit with his first DNP Wednesday night. That 114-110 loss to the Rockets had plenty to gawk at, including David Fizdale’s “fuck this, what the fuck are you doing” ejection, James Harden’s unassisted 61 points, P.J Tucker’s sudden…Read more...

There are three automotive truths that I consider indisputable. First, nobody looks good in a head sock and an open-faced driving helmet. Second, nitrous does not automatically mean warp speed. And third, no matter how many drifting videos, movies and events you’ve seen, you will always be ass at it the first time you…Read more...

The spiritual sequel to Dwight and Stan isn’t as consequential as the original, but it’s nonetheless compelling.

In the late 1980s, the makers of L&M cigarettes were looking to diversify. They settled on an old idea, something cigarette companies began doing in the late 19th century: Trading cards. In 1990, the company split its business and moved its sports card division into a company called Impel Marketing.Read more...

My exact moment of religious conversion on Naomi Osaka came while watching her play Karolina Pliskova from a few feet away in Indian Wells. Pliskova was and still is a spindly winner machine, and she sent balls bounding into the corners with no desire to see or deal with them ever again. Osaka was doing the same…Read more...

There’s no sense in waiting for it at this point. The New England Patriots, who have been shitting up the mid-winter for sports fans throughout this entire terrible millennium, are not remotely close to going away, not any more than, say, measles or famine are close to going away. They’re a problem, but one that gets…Read more...

Last season, the NWSL’s Sky Blue FC limped its way to a 1-17-6 record, landing at the bottom of the league table with a whopping -31 goal difference. Despite having USWNT star Carli Lloyd, the 2018 Sky Blue season was the worst in league history: nine total points, “beating” the previous record of 11, set by the 2016…Read more...

ESPN’s Seth Wickersham has a new story out detailing the internal dysfunction that has plagued the Cleveland Browns throughout Jimmy Haslam’s ownership of the team. There’s all sorts of good reporting in here that explains what kind of owner Haslam is and how the Browns have been a franchise at war with itself, and…Read more...

A 65" Vizio TV, melatonin supplements, and an air fryer lead off Thursday’s best deals from around the web.

It is glaringly obvious that Dutch midfielder Frenkie de Jong is one of the most exciting prospects in world soccer today. While I and most others writing about him now, after the hotly contested courtship that involved pretty much all the game’s biggest clubs finally came to a close when Barcelona announced yesterday…Read more...

Hockey players can’t stop doing weird things with their mouths, and P.K. Subban might be the latest victim. At the end of the second period in an eventual 2-1 win for his Predators over the Golden Knights on Wednesday, the Nashville defender very visibly claimed that he was bitten on the finger while grabbing hold of…Read more...