Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

Freewheeling, fun Liverpool are beating up on Bournemouth* with yet another offensive explosion, and they ended a three-goal first half with a brilliant goal from Mohamed Salah, whose single-minded run through the box just overwhelmed his pair of defenders.

Wilfried Zaha was supposed to hit the big time five years ago. At 20 years old, the Crystal Palace striker had already racked up over 100 appearances in the English second tier, and he caught the eye of Manchester United. In 2013, the Red Devils signed him for a reported 10 million pounds.Read more...

The Oklahoma City Thunder narrowly topped the Philadelphia 76ers in an insane triple-overtime slugfest Friday night. You can imagine, they were therefore not at their most energetic Saturday night, playing the second leg of a back-to-back, in New York. Still, the Knicks, without Kristaps Porzingis, seem like the kind…Read more...

Last night in Brazil’s premier ‘500 Milhas de Kart’ event, two drivers were disqualified for engaging in fisticuffs after the pair had contact on track that ended with both of them stuck in the barrier with just 18 laps remaining in the race.Read more...

Cincinnati Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis, the second-longest tenured head coach in the NFL, is stepping down after this season to “pursue other opportunities,” according to Adam Schefter. Lewis is currently in the final year of his Bengals contract and reportedly has no desire to sign a new one. From Schefter’s…Read more...

I don’t have much to add to this. Tonight Ottawa shut out Montreal 3-0 in a centennial celebration game played outdoors in what looked to me like horrifically cold weather at Ottawa’s football stadium, but despite all the pomp and circumstance of the event Senators radio announcers Dean Brown and Gord Wilson just…Read more...

Add this clip to the Golden Tate mixtape:Read more...

At this weekend’s Holiday Bash Smash Invitational, some of the best in Super Smash Bros. Melee are coming together to play the last bit of competitive Melee before 2018. One player already has a moment he would probably like to leave behind come New Year’s.

Here’s some rapturous or possibly terrifying news for NFL fans of various affiliations: the Green Bay Packers have activated Aaron Rodgers from injured reserve.Read more...

We’re used to Gus Johnson unleashing Gusgasms, but Indiana’s overtime comeback to beat Notre Dame that improved their season record to 6-5 and knocked off the 18th-ranked Irish took the Fox announcer to another level.Read more...

Jazz center Rudy Gobert, one of the very few players in the NBA whose defensive work rises to the level of nightly spectacle, has suffered his second knee injury of the season, and will now be out another three to four weeks. This blows:Read more...

The hot stove may have taken a while to preheat, but it is now, um, cooking! New York Post baseball guy Joel Sherman is reporting that the Dodgers have acquired Matt Kemp from the Atlanta Braves, in exchange for Adrián González, Scott Kazmir, Brandon McCarthy, Charlie Culberson, and cash.Read more...

Borussia Dortmund claimed a 2-1 win over Hoffenheim today when Christian Pulisic juggled his way past Oliver Baumann in the 89th minute to score yet another game-winner for his side, keeping them in third place in the Bundesliga.Read more...

C.C. Sabathia’s free agency presumably got a lot simpler after the Yankees, who came achingly close to advancing to the World Series back in October, went out and snagged the reigning National League MVP. To absolutely no one’s great surprise, Sabathia would prefer to spend his age-38 season getting run support from…Read more...

Hanukkah is a delicious mess of a holiday.

Dustin Fowler made his MLB debut for the Yankees on June 29 of this year, at the Chicago White Sox. In the bottom of the first inning, Fowler tracked a fly ball into foul territory in shallow right field and crashed hard into the wall, injuring his right knee in the process and ending his season.Read more...

This might still be nothing. It seems to have started with a rumor circulating among wrestling types on social media, and then was reported by someone named Brad Shepherd Friday afternoon: Vince McMahon may be relaunching the XFL, the very, very failed football league that played a single season back in 2001.Read more...

Nothing you are about to read should be construed as any sort of signal that the Bulls are now good. They are not. They’re bad. They’re so bad, in fact, that this run of good play, now, in December, might actually be a bad thing for them. Tanking incentives are about to change, and the Bulls, desperately talent-poor,…Read more...

The investigation of Lorenzen Wright’s murder seven years ago has taken another turn: fresh on the heels of the arrest of Billy Turner in Memphis, police in California have now arrested Sherra Wright-Thompson, Lorenzen Wright’s ex-wife, in connection with his death, according to the Commercial Appeal.

Panthers owner Jerry Richardson is being investigated by his own team for allegations of workplace misconduct, as first reported by ESPN’s Jim Trotter. The team acknowledged the investigation in a statement minutes later.

For evidence of the contagious nature of laughter, just watch this video of Spanish-speaking West Ham players Javier Hernández and Pablo Zabaleta telling each other pun-heavy jokes in English. Note how they and you, the viewer, melt into giggly puddles even though they very clearly don’t have the slightest clue why…Read more...

The Force Awakens was fun on its own merits, and thrilling in a nostalgic sort of way, and the fresh Star Wars youths were charming and compelling where they were supposed to be (Rey and Finn), and darkly charismatic where they were supposed to be (Kylo Ren), and absurdly good-looking and sexy where they were supposed…Read more...

Did you catch LeBron James having a cool little whispering-into-your-shirt party with Lonzo Ball after the Cavs beat the Lakers last night? The two convened shortly after the game finished. It was there, in front of a bank of cameras, that James schooled Ball on, uh, something for a few seconds. Ball nodded his assent…Read more...

Gianluigi Donnarumma is a teenaged, homegrown superstar-in-the-making who plays for one of the biggest clubs in the world, AC Milan. In terms of fan adoration, these facts should put him somewhere on the spectrum between “Spurs fans who’d let Harry Kane make love to their mothers if it would make him just a little bit…Read more...

Okay, so the Jets’ offense didn’t turn out to be historically awful this season, as I said it had a chance to be. Shoot me. Hell, the Jets even have five wins, which is ... something, I guess. But it still took a grand total of 13 games for their offensive coordinator to cop to saying, Fuck it, let’s go home.

The Oklahoma graduate who said that Sooners running back Rodney Anderson raped her has released a statement, one day after local prosecutors said they would not charge Anderson. Courtney J. Thornton issued the statement using her name, which is why Deadspin is identifying her.Read more...

If you are like most NFL fans, you were surprised to learn on Facebook yesterday—or the day before that, or last week—that a NFL team was preparing to declare bankruptcy due to, uh, the entitled and ungrateful thugs and the kneeling during the national anthem and the veterans there’s so many and you really do more and…Read more...

When Arizona State hired Herm Edwards to coach their football team earlier this month, they planned to retain both offensive coordinator Billy Napier and defensive coordinator Phil Bennett from the previous staff. It was an unusual move, since most coaching changes involve entire staffs turning over, but Edwards…Read more...

Tomorrow, the undefeated Georgetown Hoyas will play their one-time conference rivalry Syracuse (8-1) in Washington, D.C. It will be the first real test they’ve faced all season, considering their opponents so far have been Jacksonville (4-7), Mount St. Mary’s (3-7), Maryland Eastern Shore (3-8), Richmond (2-8), Maine…Read more...

What you see above is Texans quarterback Tom Savage experiencing what’s known as the fencing response after getting his head slammed into the ground, as obvious a sign of a brain injury as there can be. His Sunday should have ended right then and there, and yet just a few minutes later, Savage returned to the game.…Read more...

Now that the weather’s nice enough to exercise outdoors (or at least tell yourself that you will), Nordstrom Rack’s running a pretty solid sale on Adidas apparel and shoes for men, women, and kids. It’s a good time to stock up on basics to throw on for the gym, or running errands.Read more...

December is a crowded month for pro wrestling in New York City. Ring of Honor has their annual Final Battle at the Hammerstein Ballroom, Evolve and local promotion House of Glory both have major shows, WWE has its annual Christmas week event at Madison Square Garden, and so on. The weirdest event of New York’s most…Read more...

Kristaps Porzingis removed himself from last night’s 111-104 win over the Nets after a non-contact injury to his left knee. He tweaked it once in the first half and then left the game in the third quarter after re-aggravating it on this play.

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The 10-day countdown to Christmas has begun. If you need to finish up some gift shopping, check out discounts on a Dewalt multi-tool, a PS4 Slim 1TB Star Wars Battlefront II Bundle, our readers’ favorite VPN service, and more.Read more...

Late last month, Juventud de Pergamino hosted Independiente de Chivilcoy in an Argentine lower-division match. During the game, the head referee showed a Juventud player a justified red card. This event sparked a massive brawl in which a number of Juventud players and fans attacked the three referees, beating them…Read more...

Alexander Tretiakov is one of the best skeleton riders in the world, but he will not be in Pyeongchang. His 2014 gold medal was stripped for doping, and he was banned from all future Olympics. So today’s IBSF World Cup race in Innsbruck, Austria, might just have been his last chance at a major medal. It went poorly.…Read more...

Yes, yes, you’re probably more interested in LeBron vs. Lonzo (James 25-12-12 despite a slightly off shooting night, and tied Larry Bird for sixth all-time with his 59th triple-double; Ball’s was overall very good, with 13 points, 11 assists, and eight boards, but six turnovers), or what James said to Ball at…Read more...

Click through for the ultra-slow-mo of a play the rules say never happened after being called back due to penalty:Read more...

When it comes to having a corner on the market, nothing really compares to Nike. And right now, they’re giving you a super rare discount on full-price (and sale items). Use the code HOLIDAY20 and take $20 off any order of $100 or more. Everything you could need for a good workout wardrobe is included, from apparel, to…Read more...

A fan sank a half-court shot during tonight’s Hawks-Pistons game by just heaving it with a technique vaguely reminiscent of what one might use to toss a shot put—and you know what, it worked out just fine, and he won $10,000 for it, so you can’t really make fun of him for it! Them’s the rules.Read more...

A blockbuster media consolidation deal announced this morning sees Fox handing over nearly its entire empire to ESPN’s corporate parent Disney, with the exceptions of Fox News and the national Fox Sports networks FS1, FS2, BTN, Fox Deportes, and Fox Soccer Plus. Disney will now possess 22 Fox Sports RSNs that hold…Read more...

Colts tight end Brandon Williams was carted off the field at the start of the second quarter tonight. While the play responsible was not itself anything especially out of the ordinary, Williams has spinal stenosis, which can make any football injury scary and ended his college career when he was declared medically…Read more...

Ex-UFC heavyweight Tim Hague died this summer two days after getting knocked out by Adam Braidwood in a boxing match. Hague, who was 34 at the time of his death, had been working as a teacher and was supposedly retired from boxing when he took the fight against WBU heavyweight champion Braidwood on a few weeks notice.…Read more...

I’ve found, personally, an inverse correlation between how interesting an institutional power squabble is and how significant the institution in question is. A power squabble at the highest levels of a large national government, for example, is not really interesting; it will very often be terrifying or complicated,…Read more...

Thank you for your continued support of Deadspin. Hope the holiday parties are going well for everyone.Read more...

A report published today by the Boston Globe details sexual harassment and gender discrimination at ESPN, including a former SportsCenter anchor feeling forced to stay on air while she was having a miscarriage so as not to jeopardize her job and another sending shirtless pictures of himself to a younger female…Read more...

Luka Doncic is an 18-year-old Slovenian who plays for Real Madrid in the Euroleague; a 6-foot-8 do-everything phenom; a feverishly touted 2018 prospect; and a bad, bad man. Just look at what he inflicted on poor Victor Claver in today’s game versus FC Barcelona.

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