Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

Happy Fathers Day, dads! Aren’t you glad this isn’t you?

After weeks of talk on Twitter, years of speculation, and hundreds of YouTube videos calling out pitchers for cheating, MLB has finally caught up with the times.

This season’s been historically injury-plagued, and it might only get worse as the NBA returns to normal this fall.

Baseball-Reference is the gold standard for record keeping in a game whose numbers are its lifeblood. The site that Sean Forman built has supplanted decades of encyclopedias, carving out a niche on the Internet as the most authoritative source for statistics to connect baseball’s past to its present. Any bar bet can…Read more...

There is no growth without pain.

Admit it. You woke up not knowing that NBA teams not currently playing could make trades during the playoffs. Don’t feel bad — a lot of people learned that today, in a startling way.Read more...

2022 will be Barry Bonds’ and Roger Clemens’ final years on the Hall of Fame ballot. The two baseball superstars of the ‘90s and ‘00s have garnered more and more votes each of their last eight years on the ballot — increasing their percentages from about 35 percent each in 2014 to approximately 61.5 percent each in…Read more...

Who wants to stage a fight at an NBA game next season? Any takers? I’ll let someone throw a few haymakers my way if it means I get tickets to a playoff game. I’ll take a signed Jayson Tatum or Mike Conley jersey. It can’t be that hard to fake a fight, right? The WWE scripts their fights all the time. So, come on!…Read more...

There’s nothing on Earth that gets stolen from more than Black culture. From our bodies being taken from Africa to every part of our identities being appropriated and fawned over, as infuriating as it may be, it makes sense that America would want to steal our joy, too. It’s why a white-ass team in a white-ass sport…Read more...

Former long-time Utah Jazz point guard and Hall of Famer John Stockton has appeared in an anti-vaccine documentary, saying things that you normally would say in an anti-vaccine documentary.Read more...

The New York Times just took a deep dive into Megan Rapinoe’s turn as a brand ambassador for Victoria’s Secret, which has been about as good for women’s empowerment as second-hand smoke.

The concept of sports gambling has gotten skewed in the past year. Now that it’s becoming legal in more and more places, you see Allen Iverson or Paige Spiranac in a dress that very well might cause her to cough up her soul (now word on how AI would fit into it) telling you about all the things you can bet on at a…Read more...

Brooks Koepka is really good at golf, and he’s really good at golf on the biggest stages. Since the 2017 Masters, he has played in 14 major championships. In those 14 appearances, he has won four, finished second twice, and placed in the top-10 in three more. Half of his 14 Majors appearances have been a top-10 finish…Read more...

The Donnie Nelson-Rick Carlisle era in Dallas is over... and it’s shaping up to be a real ugly divorce.Read more...

Less than a week ago, the second round of the NBA playoffs seemed like it was on its way to wrapping up quickly, with the 76ers and Nets looking far superior to the Hawks and Bucks, the Suns on the verge of sweeping the Nuggets, and the Clippers down 2-0 to the Jazz with no answers for Utah’s ability to go on runs.

The best you can describe Belgium’s situation as against Denmark was “awkward.” While a good portion of the Belgian squad is personally involved with Christian Eriksen,Thursday’s game was about Danish unity and recovery. This was clearly a catharsis for fans and players in red alike, a group that went through…Read more...

It’s only been two years, and Zion Williamson isn’t extension eligible until next summer, but we’re already looking ahead to one of the most important seasons in the history of Louisiana basketball.

Christian Eriksen will receive an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD), a heart starter device, days after his suffering cardiac arrest in a soccer game. The Danish player collapsed during the team’s opening match against Finland last Saturday in the Euro 2020 tournament.

Look at how we view the 2019 Toronto Raptors because a ball bounced in.Read more...

When the Chicago Bears traded up in the first round of the NFL Draft and selected quarterback Justin Fields out of The Ohio State University, Chicagoland felt cautiously optimistic that maybe they finally found the franchise quarterback that has long eluded them.

With Kawhi Leonard sidelined with an ACL injury, everyone rushed to their computers to rule out the Clippers in their series with the top-seeded Utah Jazz. Even though the series was tied 2-2, no one expected the Clippers to steal a game in Utah without Kawhi on the court. Much like my colleague Jon Helmkamp wrote…Read more...

Every year, companies get a chance to slap their brand on a college football bowl game. But late last night, Jimmy Kimmel announced that the new LA bowl will be named after himself.

If you’re an unvaccinated NFL player at the start of training camp, your experience will be vastly different from everyone else. And it will probably suck.Read more...

At this point, I’m pretty sure the Arizona Diamondbacks have angered a higher being. Twenty-two straight losses on the road — tied for the longest such streak in MLB history. Starting with a loss to the Miami Marlins on May 4, the Diamondbacks have yet to win a single game away from Chase Field, and Tuesday night was…Read more...

I’ve been on the record for years detailing why I believe Charles Barkley is the worst person to put in front of a microphone whenever anything of substance needs to be discussed. I’ve also been on the record for saying that I believe Barkley is the greatest power forward that’s ever played the game of basketball, and…Read more...

The Mets saw their lives flash before their eyes last night, as Jacob deGrom turned the Cubs into a mush to feed grandpa for three innings, and then abruptly left the game with shoulder soreness. This is after the flexor problems he’d had before, as well as the other nagging issues he’s been dealing with all season,…Read more...

While he won Coach of the Year this year, his second such accolade, it becomes clearer and clearer that Tom Thibodeau’s greatest accomplishment was as assistant head coach: getting those Boston Celtics teams around whatever roadblocks Doc Rivers threw in front of them to win that one championship and nearly get…Read more...

The NBA playoffs have been a brutal war of attrition, with nearly every team left standing dealing with injuries to star players. The Los Angeles Clippers are no different — Kawhi Leonard reportedly has an ACL injury and is out indefinitely. Much like how Kevin Durant was thrown into the fray without Kyrie Irving,…Read more...

LeBron James is Big Mad.

Have you ever messed up an easy task — like decorating your dining table for guests but then realizing the pieces on the table aren’t symmetrical? Then, in a desperate attempt to fix your mistake, you accidentally knock over all the plates, breaking your fine china and leaving you a slobbering mess? No? Just me? Well,…Read more...

I’ve almost always been a Trevor Bauer defender. I don’t approve of his online harassment of women. No one should. It’s awful. However, I have taken Bauer’s side in other moments of his career. Baseball old-heads bashed him when he threw a gameball over the center field fence in a fit of rage. I was right there to say…Read more...

It’s always difficult analyzing or discussing Paul Pogba. I’ve found myself on both sides of it just in the past year or two. How good was he at Juventus? Isn’t it easier to play when Claudio Marchisio is doing some of your running and Andrea Pirlo is there to spread passes to you? Maybe, but eight goals and 12…Read more...

We’ve never seen Kevin Durant do it on his own. It’s often felt like he needed a complementary piece to excel — or at least that’s the prevailing stigma. In Oklahoma City, he had Russell Westbrook and James Harden. In Golden State, he was second to Steph Curry. Sure, he has his ring (for which most people rip him,…Read more...

Every year, some worthy players are left off the three different All-NBA teams and Twitter goes into an uproar. Sadly, what makes it even worse is that now these All-NBA selections are impacting player’s money. Just ask Donovan Mitchell and Jayson Tatum, who are undoubtedly two of the Top 15 players in the league but…Read more...

Yes, billion with a b.

To: New York NBA fansRead more...

Ughhhhh.

Tyler Glasnow isn’t wrong that Major League Baseball has done a poor job in executing its crackdown on sticky stuff.

The Bucks might still win this series. Getting harder to see how, as Kyrie Irving could be back for Games 6 and/or 7 and James Harden might actually gain the use of a second leg. And even if neither of those things happen, they still found a way in Game 5. And it’s not that Giannis Antetokounmpo was bad last night, as…Read more...

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has been fighting for more than 50 years.Read more...

As the MLB season marches on, the Hot Stove heats up. The trade deadline is still a month-and-a-half away, but the rumors have already started flying. Names are being dropped. Fans are giving hot takes, and MLB clubs straddling the line between playoff contenders and pretenders are trying to decide whether or not they…Read more...

There’s little question that Xavien Howard is one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL. He had 10 — TEN — interceptions last season. He’s a corner any team would be lucky to have. Fortunately for Dolphins fans, he’s theirs, in theory, until after the 2024 season. He is, however, not real happy.

On Monday, the NFL posted a video teasing a forthcoming announcement in regards to their Madden 22 cover. The social media post suggests that the announcement will be shared at 10 a.m. Thursday.Read more...

I bet, my fellow footyphiles, that we thought we were done with international tournaments including players nibbling on each other, what with Luis Suarez not involved in the European Championships and probably too old for the next World Cup. And Copa America has bigger problems, though I suppose we can’t rule it out.…Read more...

If you thought having a massive soccer tournament switched to a country governed by a corrupt dickhead in the span of less than two weeks was a really bad idea, well you can pat yourself on the back. You were right. Copa America has been everything we sadly thought it would be and it’s only three days old.

After Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and George Floyd had all been murdered, and before Jacob Blake got shot in the back seven times, the NFL began its 2020 season on a Thursday night in Kansas City, where the limited number of fans in the stands decided to boo a moment of unity.

Apparently nobody has any idea what’s going on with the quarterback position in New England, as different reporters at the same practices are saying different things. The Patriots took Michael McCorkle Jones with the No. 15 overall pick in April’s NFL Draft, and still have incumbent Cam Newton under contract for one…Read more...

Everyone has a wallet… right? Well, apparently not.