Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

Last week I published a story on a bizarre long-term catfishing scandal in the world of baseball blogging. I quickly heard from Max Joseph, cohost of the MTV show Catfish.

It turned out that LeBron James Did Ruin It For Me, Dammit, and in as direct a fashion as humanly possible, but that’s okay, it was a good game. However, it did reveal something troubling.

Welcome to Bad Quarterback Performance Of The Week, a recurring feature in which we celebrate the worst quarterback play the NFL has to offer.Read more...

Time for your weekly edition of the Deadspin Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. Today, we’re talking ghosts, cutting boards, wiping kid butts, and more.Read more...

Star Wars Battlefront II is off to a rough start with crummy lootboxes and unpopular unlockables. Thankfully, everyone’s favorite smuggler is living life with no reservations and isn’t afraid to show it.

Ah, tiebreaker scenarios: everyone’s favorite chaotic twist to a championship run. Baseball loved them so much, it went ahead and built it into the schedule. Yet some of the wildest tiebreaking calculus of the year occurred, out of all places, in the peaceful province of Prince Edward Island this weekend. Nothing …Read more...

When Susan Fowler rocked Uber’s world with a meticulous account of the company’s sexual harassment and gender discrimination issues, the ride-sharing service turned to its only female board member to help clean up its culture (and its image). Arianna Huffington was perfectly poised to position herself as the feminist…Read more...

“The Super Bowl has changed since we were last in it,” the late Dan Rooney told the Pittsburgh writer Jim O’Brien in January 1996, in the run-up to Super Bowl 30. “It has gotten a lot bigger. There’s more hype. To be quite honest with you, it is more Jerry Jones.”Read more...

After 18 years, Mike Golic (Big Mike) and Mike Greenberg (Little Mike) will conclude their ESPN radio show Mike & Mike on Friday and go their separate ways, though they’ll both remain at the network. Big Mike will start a new show with his son, Mike Golic Jr. (New Mike), and Trey Wingo, who is not a Mike. Meanwhile,…Read more...

The Philadelphia 76ers, who are maybe good, beat the Clippers, who are maybe bad, in Los Angeles last night, thanks to a big night from their big center Joel Embiid. The 7-foot-2 Cameroonian has been on a short minutes leash throughout his career, though his 32-point, 16-rebound performance against L.A. in a…Read more...

After just under a week of speculation of how the legal process would play out for a trio of UCLA freshmen caught shoplifting in China, LiAngelo Ball, Cody Riley, and Jalen Hill are on their way back to America. The group was released by Chinese police following their detainment for nabbing Louis Vuitton sunglasses;…Read more...

By physical appearance, you’d probably assume this chubby keeper playing for PS Sakiet Eddaier in Tunisia’s third division was something like a plumber or a short-order cook at a mid-tier chain restaurant. But judging by his frankly jaw-dropping tekkers, you’d be forgiven for thinking this rouletting-wizard was none…Read more...

For a limited time, Amazon’s offering BOGO 50% off 80 different Nerf guns and accessories, as long as they’re both shipped and sold by Amazon.com directly. So what are you still doing here?

Farmington High School won’t open until next year. When it does, it will serve the community in and around Farmington, a fast-growing city in northern Utah. But the school already has a mascot, the Phoenix. The mythical bird was chosen by a vote of area children; it beat out Farmers, Eagles, Firebirds, Silverback,…Read more...

Laurel Park hosted a memorial service over the weekend for Ben’s Cat. “It was just like a funeral for a person,” said trainer King T. Leatherbury.Read more...

There was nothing wrong with the Knicks getting all riled up over LeBron James’s assertion that the team would have been better off drafting Dennis Smith Jr. over Frank Ntilikina. It was even heartening to see young Frank get up in the King’s personal space last night, and to see Enes Kanter coming in to back up his…Read more...

There are $140 robotic vacuums. There are robotic vacuums that intelligently map your room for better pathfinding. There are robotic vacuums from name-brand companies. This is the first time a single robotic vacuum has checked all three of those boxes.Read more...

Jalopnik Elon Musk’s Alleged Response To Tesla Racism Complaints: ‘Be Thick-Skinned And Accept Apology’: Report | Kotaku GameStop ‘Temporarily Pauses’ Unlimited Used Games Program | io9 Don’t Expect Man of Steel 2 Any Time Soon | The A.V. Club W…Read more...

Tennessee State defensive end Latrelle Lee was kicked off the team and then kicked out of the university altogether, after twice punching the Tigers’ head strength coach T.J. Greenstone during Saturday’s game.

At $8 per month for Prime members, Amazon Music Unlimited was already more affordable than Spotify Premium or Apple Music, but Amazon’s sweetening the pot for new members by offering three months for just $1, for a limited time.

Tonight’s first half between the Knicks and Cavaliers inspired a bit of feeling that the Knicks might really be here: that their young talent could gel well enough to take down a top-tier talent like Cleveland, that Frank Ntilikina could be bold enough to shove LeBron around a little, that the team could show this…Read more...

The ever-incredulous Mike Francesa is following through on his promise to step down from his daily hosting gig on New York’s WFAN when his contract expires next month. Now we know his replacements—plural, because how could one person alone possibly carry on the, ah, unique legacy of Francesa.Read more...

LeBron James and Enes Kanter briefly got into it in the closing seconds of tonight’s first quarter—a scuffle that was quickly broken up and didn’t result in much, but it did give us these beautiful photos of the incident captured by Elsa of Getty Images.Read more...

General awareness of personal and social context is typically very important for any older white man who would like to go around quoting Notorious B.I.G. lyrics. Like, the below tweet was not a great context for former New York Post NBA columnist Peter Vecsey to try out this one:Read more...

Here’s a little refresher on the myth of Sisyphus, for all those in need of one: King Sisyphus was greedy and a generally terrible guy, one whose terribleness peaked with a plot to murder his brother and seduce his niece. He finally met his downfall when he spilled one of Zeus’s secrets for his own personal benefit,…Read more...

A group of NFL team owners have sent Jerry Jones a cease-and-desist warning and threatened to “punish him” if he keeps at his quest to block commissioner Roger Goodell’s contract negotiations, according to a report from the New York Times. Jones has recently been butting heads with the six owners who serve on the…Read more...

The Logitech Harmony Hub is one of the best Alexa-compatible accessories out there, and it basically comes with a free Echo Dot right now.

For the first time since 1958 and only the second time ever, the Italian national team will not qualify for the World Cup. A 0-0 draw with Sweden in the second leg of the European play-off round sealed their fate, after the Azzurri lost 1-0 in the first leg on Friday.

Kotaku EA Cuts Star Wars Battlefront II Hero Costs After Widespread Anger | io9 Everything That Happened in Inhumans, for Those of You Who Wisely Stopped Watching After the Premiere | The A.V. Club The George Takei sexual assault story just keeps getting worse | Vitals What You Should Know Before Trying a Ketogenic…Read more...

This is the week of the World Tour Finals, the year-end event wherein the best eight players on the men’s tennis tour all beat each other up and figure out who is the best one. This year the crew includes both Roger Federer and the highly regarded Roger Federer cover band that performs under the name Grigor Dimitrov.…Read more...

Sad to say, but this man had the most successful Sunday of anyone wearing a Giants jersey.

Here’s some helpful advice from me, a guy with a surface-level interest in esports, to you, the pro gamer: Use your real name instead of some gamer handle.

Once the rage subsided within the proud hearts of American soccer fans in response to the USMNT’s humiliating failure to qualify for next summer’s World Cup, the feeling that settled in has been one of profound sadness. Mostly, this sadness has centered on what was stolen from us—namely, the opportunity for the entire…Read more...

If the Internet were the hotel from The Shining, you would find teenaged twin YouTubers haunting every single hall.

If you’re still listening to your TV through its built-in speakers, listen up: This highly-rated Sony sound bar and wireless subwoofer for just $91 right now, an all-time low, and over $100 (!!!) less than usual. In fact, I don’t think we’ve ever seen a sound bar with a discrete wireless subwoofer for under $100, let…Read more...

Carlos Beltran announced today on the Players’ Tribune that he is retiring from baseball. This ends a 20-year career in which Beltran made nine All-Star games, hit 435 homers, stole 312 bases, and accumulated 69.8 WAR. Thanks to his position as an elder statesman on this year’s Astros, he’s also finally a world…Read more...

While the Notre Dame Fighting Irish were getting their asses kicked by the Miami Hurricanes on Saturday, a passel of fans reenacted the scene on the concourse of Miami’s stadium near sections 129 and 130. All was technically peaceful, until an offscreen Miami fan flung a beverage at the dude in the hat, at which point…Read more...

Perhaps Boris Diaw left the country too soon, but it was hard not to be happy for the roly-poly polymath, ambling into the sunset with his ring, bound for better wine and pastries.

Last year, we held the first annual Deadspin Awards, a bad awards show celebrating the worst (and a few of the best) things in sports. The show featured us packing far too many people into a small and poorly air-conditioned venue, and exactly one celebrity cameo. This year, we are happy to announce that the second…Read more...

In a game of musical chairs, what do you do if someone gets to the last chair before you? Do you try to remove them from the chair, or do you, as this Maryland basketball fan did, remove the chair from them?

Australia and Honduras are currently in the midst of a two-leg playoff for one of the last available World Cup spots. The two sides played to a scoreless draw in San Pedro Sula last week, and they’ll meet again in Sydney on Wednesday for the rubber match. Tensions are obviously high between the two teams, and this…Read more...

After two months of solid, boring victories against bad teams by margins of multiple scores, Wisconsin football finally played a game worth watching. And they made the most of it. Facing their first ranked opponent of the season (the soon-to-be-unranked Iowa Hawkeyes), the Badgers dominated, allowing a little bit of…Read more...

The Steelers have put together a strong portfolio of touchdown celebrations this season, but they had a bit of a stumble Sunday against the Colts. After receiver Juju Smith-Schuster scored in the third quarter, he celebrated by reenacting one of Week 9's NFL fights. Smith-Schuster portrayed Jalen Ramsey as teammate…Read more...

According to the Washington Post’s David Nakamura, Donald Trump asked Chinese president Xi Jinping to look into helping out UCLA freshmen LiAngelo Ball, Cody Riley, and Jalen Hill, who were arrested last week when they were caught shoplifting from high-end luxury stores.

After the Cavs escaped the clutches of the league-worst Mavs—it was a two-point game with 36.8 seconds to go—LeBron James decided to offer a compliment so narrow in scope that it could reasonably be interpreted as an insult:

Mariano “Squishy” “SquishyMuffinz” Arruda’s Cloud9 team only finished third at this past weekend’s Rocket League season four finals in Washington, D.C., so Mr. Muffinz will have to settle for what might be the best single shot ever made in competitive Rocket League history.Read more...

We’re four days away from the first Star Wars video game story since Star Wars Kinect, but few people are talking about what Star Wars Battlefront II’s campaign might look like. Instead, the internet discourse has been all about microtransactions, and players feel so ripped off that they’ve granted publisher EA the…Read more...

Red Sox outfielder Mookie Betts on Sunday bowled a perfect game at the World Series of Bowling, a Professional Bowlers Association tour event. The two-time All Star—who ESPN called a “bowling aficionado”—told ESPN he’d estimated it was his 10th perfect game in his life (but his first at a PBA event).

“Look at the dumb thing this idiot tweeted” feels like a very circa-2013 blogging approach, but there are times to make exceptions. So look at the dumb thing Aubrey Huff tweeted:Read more...

10. Took a really long shower. Not a Silkwood shower were he furiously scrubbed his skin, but one of those 40-minute-long soapless showers where you just lean up against a wall letting the water hit your back while you ponder the inescapable vastness of the void.Read more...