Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

The last time Emeka Okafor appeared on Deadspin as a NBA player, he was being escorted off a ride at Six Flags America in Maryland because he was too tall. He had turned 30 a little over a month earlier, and was at that time the starting center on a deeply bleak 29-win Washington Wizards team that also featured…Read more...

Steven Adams has an autobiography coming out this year with author Madeleine Chapman. The Oklahoma City Thunder center talked about it today when prompted, and it’s clear that he worked very hard on it.

Why on earth would the Jaguars sign the quarterback who has spent much of his four-year career doing shit like this—Read more...

French vaulter Baptiste Boirie gave us the highlight of the All-Star Perche pole vaulting competition this weekend, and he did it with a skateboard. He jumped 5.9 meters while using some help on his approach.Read more...

Here are some fun clips. For all intents and purposes, they might as well be the highlights of Zaza Pachulia’s 14-year NBA career.

For the first time since Pat Summitt stalked the sidelines, an SEC program has run the table throughout the regular-season conference slate, with Mississippi State completing its 16-0 run Sunday evening.Read more...

Twenty-year-old Frances Tiafoe came to Delray Beach as a wild card entry with a wild forehand. He left as the youngest American to win an ATP title since Andy Roddick got his back in 2002, and with an impressive pile of bodies in his wake. Taking down Juan Martin del Potro was the first omen of big things, but many…Read more...

Spurs point guard Patty Mills was shooting two free throws in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game in Cleveland when TV cameras picked up a fan heckling from the stands. “Hey Jamaican dog, they want their bobsledder back!” the fan yelled. “Hey Mills, Jamaica just called, they want their bobsledder back!”Read more...

After a couple years’ worth of flabbergasting player transactions that sent relatively young, increasingly talented, borderline world-class players from some of the best leagues in Europe and South America to the gilded shores of China, this season felt quieter, like maybe normalcy had finally reasserted its grip on…Read more...

As usual, NBC’s tape-delayed Olympic closing ceremony broadcast left much of the festivities on the editing room floor. More than 51 minutes, to be exact, or 40% of the overall show. Here’s some of what the Peacock Network decided was beneath you; a sped-up version of everything you missed is in the above video.Read more...

The best thing about Adolescence is that it eventually ends.

This weekend, featherweight hitters Jeremy Stephens and Josh Emmett met in the octagon and punched each other a whole bunch, before Stephens knocked Emmett out early in the second round and broke his orbital bone in three places. Emmett—whose entire game is based around landing meaty shots with his big right…Read more...

Here we have President Diaper, a fussy young infant who rarely sleeps through the night uninterrupted—and is known to be quite a handful during the daytime as well!—forced to listen for an agonizing 58 seconds as the governor of Washington state explains why arming teachers is a bad idea.

Cubs slugger Kyle Schwarber, the big burly lad who everyone loves, spent the offseason trying to get ripped. It appears that he succeeded:

Jets rookie linebacker Dylan Donahue was arrested early Monday morning after he crashed his car into a bus while driving the wrong way in the Lincoln Tunnel, according to Port Authority officials. Donahue crashed into the bus around 2:00 a.m. this morning, and four passengers were injured in the crash, although the …Read more...

Parents are an Olympic reporter’s gold mine, or anyway something like a lifeline. They are not what anyone would term an unbiased source, of course, but they can tell you what’s human about the superhuman athlete they’ve raised and shed light on their athlete’s otherwise invisible life away from competition. Their…Read more...

The Walking Dead, a show that has been on for as long as I’ve been alive, had its mid-season premiere (totally made-up thing) last night, and guess what? Fucking Carl ate it!

A Toyota Camry being used for a between-inning promotion got stuck in the outfield during a Houston Astros-St. Louis Cardinals MLB spring training game on Sunday. Just watch the family sedan awkwardly try to squeeze between the wall and a T.V. truck.

Tim Tebow, who is still playing baseball and apparently a threat to rise to the majors one day, has hurt himself:

A water-resistant Bluetooth speaker, a Nike clearance sale, H&R Block tax software, and more start off this week’s best deals.Read more...

Ronda Rousey’s first words in a WWE ring were “It’s hard to even know what to say.” It was not a good start to her wrestling career. They’re supposed to give you something to say!Read more...

Detroit’s Stan Van Gundy—one of the smartest and most quotable coaches in the NBA—got asked about the NCAA, and the Friday report about the FBI’s enforcement of recruiting violations, ahead of his Pistons’ game against the Hornets on Sunday. He took the opportunity to go in on the NBA’s free minor league.Read more...

Chipper Jones loves guns. Loves ‘em. He says he’s got five, including a shotgun and a rifle. (Though he says he prefers hunting with a bow because “it’s safer and more sporty.”) But even Jones says regular American civilians have no business being able to own assault weapons, like the AR-15 used to murder 17 people at…Read more...

When it comes to having a corner on the market, nothing really compares to Nike. And right now, take an extra 25% off their sale styles for both men and women, no code needed. Everything you could need for a good workout wardrobe is included, from apparel, to sneakers, to gear.

Newsflash: it’s cold in England. It’s also winter. And we’re not even talking about true cold, here: in the range of 32 degrees Fahrenheit, with overnight temperatures in the teens. Mehhhhhh. For point of reference, at the opening ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics, in Pyeongchang, temperatures fell below zero. How…Read more...

Hey, remember that unhinged interview Mirai Nagasu gave following her bafflingly poor free skate performance? The one where Nagasu framed the fucking Olympics as an audition for Dancing With the Stars? The one where she threw her teammates under the bus? What the hell happened there?Read more...

Look out, goose!Read more...

So it’s a torn meniscus and likely surgery for Jimmy Butler, after he crumpled to the court Friday night:

Of all the ways of failing to medal in a grueling 30-kilometer cross-country race, Austrian Olympian Teresa Stadlober certainly discovered the most excruciatingly regrettable: She got lost. She took a wrong friggin’ turn and got lost. Per the Associated Press:Read more...

The Warriors pounded the bejeezus out of the Oklahoma City Thunder Saturday night, to the tune of 112-80. 80 points is the fewest scored in a game this season by the Thunder, and 32 points is their biggest margin of defeat. It was a wipeout: the Warriors won every quarter, and held the trio of Russell Westbrook, Paul…Read more...

Many teams debuted their fresh new players during kickoff weekend for stage two of the Overwatch League, but the one that made arguably the biggest impact had been on the roster for a while. It just wasn’t until these last few days that he got to show why he earned a spot on the Philly Overwatch squad.Read more...

The Charleston Southern Buccaneers toppled Winthrop Saturday, 78-75, in a game I can’t imagine anyone reading this blog actually cares about. It was an upset, on the road—the Buccaneers came into the game 13-15 overall and 8-9 in Big South play, while Winthrop entered in second place in the conference, at 18-10…Read more...

Two-time Olympic open swimmer Haley Anderson knows a thing or two about buoyancy, but how does she feel about the buoyancy of, say, Olympic curler Matt Hamilton? Or Aja Evans? Or the relative merits of the Williams sisters versus the Knowles sisters? It truly takes an Olympian to bring clarity to these important…Read more...

It is not an exaggeration to say that Damian Lillard’s heroics in the fourth quarter of Saturday night’s Blazers-Suns tilt rescued both teams: the Blazers are smack in the middle of the West’s dense playoff pack; meanwhile the Suns, had they won, would’ve gone from having the worst win percentage in the NBA—prime…Read more...

For exclusive videos, pictures, and more, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and Instagram. Send us your confidential tips at tips@deadspin.com, call our confidential tips hotline at (347) 746-8471, contact our writers directly, or use our anonymous SecureDrop system.Read more...

ESPN basketball analyst and lifelong Pac-12 maven Bill Walton reacted in disgust when asked by Dave Pasch to respond to the news that Arizona coach Sean Miller was caught on an FBI wiretap arranging a $100,000 payment for recruiting purposes, calling the scandal an incident on par with the Malice at the Palace, a…Read more...

Dominoes are falling at Arizona as a result of the FBI investigation into recruiting violations at NCAA schools: Sean Miller might be out at Arizona—he is for sure not coaching the team tonight against Oregon—and now star recruit Shareef O’Neal is apparently withdrawing his commitment to the school:Read more...

Kerri Walsh Jennings is a five-time Olympian volleyballer and three-time Olympic gold medalist. Here her expertise is directed to the task of ranking things, including the volleyball potential of other U.S. Olympians, and other people whose names are some form of “Kerri.” Enjoy!Read more...

Ah, now here is a sensible way to write a contract: make sure you include in there some significant monetary incentive for behavior that breaches the terms of the contract.Read more...

Daniel Berger is currently tied for 10th at the Honda Classic in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. I would like for you see the hilarious mess he made of the par-5 third hole today, so that you can appreciate with me the sheer unlikeliness of him saving par:Read more...

Welp.Read more...

The NBA’s Western Conference is a tangle: the third-seed Spurs are ahead of the 10th-seed Jazz by just 4.5 games; those Spurs have managed to win just three of their last 10 games, and while they’ve been swirling in rare drama having to do with Kawhi Leonard’s injury status, those Jazz have won nine of 10; the…Read more...

When he was just a pasty nerd, out here defrauding investors and exponentially increasing the price of important drugs, I feel very certain that I could’ve taken Martin Shkreli. Now I am less sure, and let me tell you, it’s a sickening feeling:Read more...

I remember Charles Tillman as a fun player with a preternatural gift for causing turnovers, and though I have never been a Bears fan, I remember rooting for him personally out of appreciation for his mastery of the forced fumble and the defensive touchdown. Those were happy times, and like virtually all the other…Read more...

Jimmy Butler—the Timberwolves’ leading scorer and best player, and the NBA’s leader in minutes per game prior to the All-Star break—went down in a crumpled heap in the third quarter of Minnesota’s Friday night loss to the Houston Rockets. It looked like a non-contact injury, and Butler had to be helped off the floor:Read more...

Update: Sold out.Read more...

A brilliant eighth-end hammer delivery by U.S.A. skip John Shuster turned a 5-5 nailbiter into a 10-5 lead that the Americans held onto through the final two ends en route to beating Sweden 10-7 and claiming their first-ever gold medal in curling, and only the second medal ever for the U.S. in the sport.Read more...

Ester Ledecká, who basically won Super-G in alpine skiing by accident on a pair of borrowed skis, claimed gold in her primary event as the Czech sailed to the finish of the snowboard parallel giant slalom well ahead of silver medalist Selina Joerg.

ESPN reports tonight that FBI wiretaps of conversations between Sean Miller and sports agent runner Christian Dawkins caught the Arizona head coach discussing a $100,000 payment to lock up then-recruit Deandre Ayton, now a star freshman for the Wildcats.Read more...

Over the past few months, Vice has been subject of a series of damning claims, with current and former women employees saying the company’s workplace culture has frequently been toxic for them, and accusing specific executives—including president Andrew Creighton, chief digital officer Mike Germano, and Jason Mojica,…Read more...