Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

Real Madrid and Portugal striker Cristiano Ronaldo has reportedly settled his tax fraud charges with Spanish authorities, agreeing to pay $21.7 million, or approximately €18.7 million, to stay out of prison and receive only a suspended two-year sentence. Ronaldo’s achievement breaks the tax evasion mark set by his…Read more...

Kick off your Friday with deals on a 4K monitor, 3D printers, a waterproof speaker to bring to the pool, and more.Read more...

Last night, Los Angeles Clippers forward Sam Dekker tweeted how proud he was to be white, sparking a feud between two Twitter users that culminated with the Dekker-defender buying his adversary an airline ticket to Los Angeles so they could punch each other about it. It is truly as stupid as it sounds, but let’s go…Read more...

It’s only been a few days since MLB umpire Tom Hallion introduced the phrase “our ass is in the jackpot” in a leaked video that contained full audio of a 2016 Terry Collins ejection. While we’re still no closer to understanding why Hallion used the word “jackpot” instead of something more normal like, “Our ass is on…Read more...

After the first round of the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills in Southampton, New York, there was a four-way tie for the lead between Russell Henley, Ian Poulter, Dustin Johnson, and Scott Piercy, all of whom shot a one-under 69. After 18 holes, Shinnecock had yielded just four scores under par while enacting various…Read more...

I find myself more impressed than anything by EPA head Scott Pruitt’s venality. Sure, the man is corrupt. But he’s corrupt in ways no one had ever even conceived of before! The man’s unflagging creativity in graft is inspiring, in its gross way, and his drive is something to behold. For the rest of us, there simply…Read more...

The true summer months are fast approaching. If you have a camping trip planned and need to replace some gear that’s maybe past its expiration date, this Coleman Gold Box is for you. Tents, sleeping bags, coolers, camping chairs and more are discounted, with everything coming in under $130 (even this 6-person instant…Read more...

My Pillow makes our readers’ favorite pillows, and Amazon’s is offering a rare deal today that should help your wallet rest easy.

That photo up there of a jacked 40-year-old Mike Bibby comes via the Sacramento Kings, and it is extremely disturbing! Nothing in Bibby’s career in the NBA suggested he would someday look like a professional wrestler. He was a crafty and slight guard, a lean guy. Look at him here, standing next to teammate and fellow…Read more...

Skip Schumaker spent the first eight of his 11 years in the majors playing for the St. Louis Cardinals, where he was teammates with, among others, career-Cardinal Adam Wainwright. Schumaker retired in 2016, after stints with the Dodgers and Reds, and is now the first base coach for the San Diego Padres.Read more...

Marcin Gortat is a fine NBA player. He’s been one of the NBA’s best screeners for about a decade; before a relatively recent age-related decline in athleticism he was an underrated defender and rim protector; he’s a wizard at timing his movement towards the hoop to preserve and maximize the narrow passing lanes that…Read more...

The 2018 World Cup has now commenced. Just because the USMNT blows and didn’t make the tournament, that’s no reason for you not to pay attention to the best sporting event on the planet. Here’s everything you absolutely must know about Group E, all in one neat little video.Read more...

Former NFL tight end Kellen Winslow Jr., who was arrested last week in San Diego on suspicion of burglary, has reportedly been arrested again in San Diego, and the charges this time are much more serious: they include nine different counts, among them kidnapping with intent to commit rape, and forcible rape.Read more...

The 2018 World Cup has now commenced. Just because the USMNT blows and didn’t make the tournament, that’s no reason for you not to pay attention to the best sporting event on the planet. Here’s everything you absolutely must know about Group D, all in one neat little video.Read more...

THE WORLD CUP IS HERE AND I GOT THE FEVER BABY. IT’S A MONTH OF FOOTBALL WITH 64 MATCHES AND WHAT EVEN ARE VIDEO GAMES WHO CARES.Read more...

With the question of LeBron James’s free agency destination settled once and for all—he is for sure headed to the Lakers and the Knicks and the Nuggets this summer—the other hopeful teams around the NBA have got to be feeling like their chances of also landing LeBron are shrinking by the hour. One of those hopefuls …Read more...

Antoine Griezmann is famously a huge basketball head (though he’s much less well-versed in other aspects of American culture...), so it wasn’t totally surprising when he announced yesterday that he would reveal his long-awaited choice of whether to stay at Atlético Madrid next season or leave for Barcelona via a TV…Read more...

The Tijuana Toros and Monterrey Sultanes got after it last night after Toros infielder Jose Guadalupe Chavez collided with Sultanes catcher Angle Chavarin on a play at the plate.

In the least surprising bombshell you’ll read about this week, the Skins have admitted that nobody’s actually waiting for season tickets, despite an alleged waiting list that owner Dan Snyder used to claim had 200,000 people.Read more...

A Russian lawmaker warned that Russian women should not have sex with non-white foreign men during the World Cup because they could get pregnant and end up with children who would be discriminated against in Russia, according to a Reuters report.Read more...

And now, the latest news from the Denver metro area: a portable toilet went to go meet the Sky Gods. It paid tribute to its former home on Earth by spraying a fine mist of odious liquid into the windy summer air.

Last week, the biggest story in pro wrestling was the civil trial victory of CM Punk (real name Phil Brooks) and Colt Cabana (real name Scott Colton) over WWE ringside physician Dr. Chris Amann, who was suing them for defamation. When Punk left WWE in 2014, he aired all of his grievances, especially the medical ones, …Read more...

It’s probably too strong to say Poland are enjoying their own Golden Generation, on par with the likes of France and Belgium, but the current iteration of the squad is looking better than it has since the mid-80s.

There are a few sporting events throughout the year that attract even the most casual of fans, just because they’re so big and so important. Like the Indy 500, Daytona 500 or Monaco Grand Prix, the 24 Hours of Le Mans is one. If you’ve committed to watching cars for 24 hours straight this weekend, here’s what you…Read more...

Michael Porter Jr. was once considered one of the clear best two or three prospects in the 2018 NBA Draft, but with one week to go before draft night, concerns about his long-term health that have trailed him all season are becoming more pronounced. Despite playing just 53 minutes for Mizzou last season after…Read more...

The 2018 World Cup has now commenced. Just because the USMNT blows and didn’t make the tournament, that’s no reason for you not to pay attention to the best sporting event on the planet. Here’s everything you absolutely must know about Group C, all in one neat little video.Read more...

Lakers! No, Knicks! No, Nuggets! No, elsewhere, but definitely not Rockets! The LeBronWatch ‘18 news is coming fast and furious these days, but you can all probably stand down because Lakers owner Jeanie Buss tweeted a cryptic tweet that maybe could if you squint be a clear sign that LeBron James is due to take his…Read more...

The Japanese national team is built around an extremely solid core group of 30-somethings who have all proven themselves at the highest levels of European soccer. This is probably their last shot at World Cup glory, though they have a steep road ahead of them if they want to qualify past Colombia, Poland, and Senegal.…Read more...

Oof. We figured this Saudi Arabia team would be bad, the worst in the tournament even, but we didn’t expect that. Russia just curb stomped their Saudi opponents by a score of 5-0 in a beating even uglier in real life than it looks on paper.Read more...

This week, Patriots head coach Bill Belichick wrapped up the team’s voluntary OTAs a little early as a little treat, and he also set up an off-the-field activity for his players. (Maybe that’s the damage control required when a former player says it sucked to play for you and trade rumors about one of your best…Read more...

Despite regularly producing players who are good enough to play in top European leagues, Senegal will be making just its second-ever World Cup appearance this year. This is good news for fans who want to see extremely cool players do extremely cool things, because there are some fun guys on this squad. The only…Read more...

Discipline and rhythm and mental gruel are just a few of the things that make tennis such a compelling sport. Two players blasting crosscourt forehands at each other until one of them finally blinks and throws in a down the line shot or a drop shot that could set one of them up with a winner—it makes you grit your…Read more...

The last time the world turned its attention to an international soccer tournament, the Euro 2016 was marred by bands of violent Russian hooligans who spent a portion of the tournament, held in France, attacking fans from other countries. And as the World Cup kicks off in Russia, there’s good reason to worry that more…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...

The World Cup: truly a tradition unlike any other, except I guess for the Olympics which it is kind of like in the sense that a bunch of people who only care about a thing every four years suddenly care about it so much. Most of the world, of course, cares about soccer a great deal all the time, but the two people…Read more...

Here we have a highlight reel brimming with the exploits of Olivier Rioux, a 12-year-old basketball player who is said to stand at 6 feet and 9 inches. Since most 12-year-olds are not 6-foot-9, you can probably guess how this is going to go for Rioux’s poor opponents:Read more...

Nordstrom’s Clear the Rack sale is back! Plus, pick up savings on a 4K projector, a bunch of tools for Father’s Day, and more of the best deals from around the web.Read more...

Serbia’s proud history of cultivating the talents of exceptional soccer players is only surpassed by their inglorious history of choking in embarrassing fashion once those exceptional Serbs all get together with the national team. This Serbian team is even more stacked than usual. Hopefully that talent will finally…Read more...

Gizmodo Cops Are Predictably Pissed About Apple’s Plan to Turn Off USB Data Access on iPhones | Jalopnik This Test Shows Why Tesla Autopilot Crashes Keep Happening | Kotaku Ninja Takes Two-Day Break, Loses 40,000 Subscribers | Lifehacker The Tiny, Essential Google Tricks for Way Better Search Results |Read more...

Happy World Cup day! The real competition begins today. Not the soccer; the psychic animals.Read more...

When the Mets stuck Jacob deGrom with his second loss of the season on Wednesday afternoon, it was their 10th defeat in 11 games. DeGrom, who has been the best starting pitcher in the National League, allowed just one earned run and struck out seven over seven innings. The Mets didn’t get a hit off Mike Soroka over…Read more...

Juan Soto is a boy with a man’s bat. With his two–home run night in the Bronx on Thursday, the 19-year-old Nationals outfielder became the fifth youngest player in baseball’s live-ball era with a multi-homer game, and the list (Danny Murphy, Mel Ott, Ken Griffey Jr., Andruw Jones) puts him in some pretty damned good…Read more...

If you have any home improvement projects on the docket, Amazon’s running a pretty great deal on power tools, today only.

A peaceful Bark in the Park event at the Dodgers’ Double-A affiliate took a turn for the better when an almost impossibly good doggo saw that the humans were throwing baseballs left and right out there, with none of his fellow four-legged buddies stepping up to do the dang retrieving:Read more...

We’ve got ourselves a near donnybrook! Hands nearly thrown! Faces nearly smashed! Scores nearly settled!Read more...

Michael Wilbon, a grumbly shithead who’s spent the better part of this millennium actively torching his own hard-won relevance, has now weighed in on LeBron James’s impending free agency. You may be surprised to learn that Wilbon—who has made it clear multiple times that he thinks D.C. is a “terrible” “minor league”…Read more...

Jordan McNair, a 19-year-old sophomore offensive lineman for the University of Maryland football team, died Wednesday, two weeks after he was hospitalized following an incident at a team workout on May 29. Terps athletic director Damon Evans announced McNair’s death in a statement released Wednesday evening.

The LeBron James free agency news is coming hot and fast now. Some important things have already been settled: LeBron is definitely joining the Lakers; LeBron definitely wants the city of Houston to sink into the ocean forever; LeBron is definitely joining the Knicks. Also something about Scottie Pippen. It’s rare…Read more...

Michigan State interim president John Engler wrote in an email that he believed Rachel Denhollander received a “kickback” for being the leading voice in the case built against convicted serial sex abuser Larry Nassar.

The 2018 World Cup kicks off tomorrow. Just because the USMNT blows and didn’t make the tournament, that’s no reason for you not to pay attention to the best sporting event on the planet. Here’s everything you absolutely must know about Group B, all in one neat little video.Read more...