Deadspin > Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise

If you were to rattle off a bunch of hypothetical hints that Dan Snyder could drop to indicate he’s selling the Washington Commanders, delaying signing bonuses until after a possible sale date would be No. 2 on the list. The first would be moving cheerleader try-outs before May 12, but considering the hot tub of…Read more...

When the WNBA tips off the 2023 season on May 19, it will be with two Black women head coaches on the sidelines of courts on which 79 percent* of the league’s players are Black women and other women of color. (This figure is accurate as of March 2023, when six of the WNBA’s 12 teams had more than 12 women on their…Read more...

Cam Newton has been a household name for over a decade. It comes with the territory when you’ve had the type of career he’s had. National championship, check. Alleged pay-for-play scandal, check. Heisman Trophy, check. No. 1 pick, check. Record-setting quarterback, check. Influential player on the culture, check.…Read more...

Yet another NHL team had to have an ado about their Pride Night and warmup jerseys this past weekend. This time it was the San Jose Sharks and goalie James Reimer. It was the same bullshit we’ve heard from others, though the Sharks put him on his own island to explain himself, which is half the battle, as they went…Read more...

The Sweet 16 is when the NCAA Tournament starts to feel less like an ear-splitting house party and more like an interpersonal kickback in the penthouse suite. The setting is more personal, the opponents are scouted more thoroughly and the quality of basketball gets upgraded significantly. The CBS and Turner crews are…Read more...

Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is never shy in front of the cameras, especially when it comes to self-promotion. We often hear from Dallas’ head honcho that he’s willing to do “whatever” it takes to win. That makes for a good sound bite to get the fan base excited, but when presented with those opportunities, Jones…Read more...

For those who want to be a multi-millionaire, the secret is not on LLC Twitter. Starting a business in which you give people personal and financial life advice on TikTok when both aspects of yours are in shambles will not result in a massive payout from advertisers. The easiest way to a life of riches is to do what…Read more...

I think maybe what I might take most out of the World Baseball Classic is its insistence on portraying the entire scope of the best moments, what makes baseball the most artful game.Read more...

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Penn State wrestler Aaron Brooks could have been another heartwarming story. He’d just won his third consecutive national title in the 184-pound division, he’s a devoted Christian and is brolic enough to take down a small polar bear, or at least a panda.Read more...

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Welcome to the 2022-23 Jackass Tournament! Thank you for voting in our hotly contested series of Twitter polls. Here are your results.Read more...

The last three decades have turned the St. John’s men’s basketball program from one of the most sacred brands in collegiate sports to an indifferent sigh. The Red Storm try to label themselves as New York’s college basketball team — the only non-low-major program inside America’s most populous urban area. Purists…Read more...

Yesterday’s El Clasico between Barcelona and Real Madrid, and Barcelona’s 2-1 win, is the perfect microcosm of where Barcelona is now. While they were much the better team, the win still came, in some ways, by the slimmest of margins. Marco Asensio’s apparent winner late was ruled out by him being no more than a foot…Read more...

A handful of weekdays on the sports calendar truly command Americans’ attention from coast to coast. Of course, one is Super Bowl Sunday, which results in National Hangover Day at work on Monday. Then there are the first two days of the Men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament. Games start at noon EST and employees hover…Read more...

One week into the NFL’s free agent signing period, the Baltimore Ravens have received zero offers for Lamar Jackson. The Ravens slapped the non-exclusive franchise tag on the former league MVP, which allows other teams to make him an offer that Baltimore can match. Thus far, all is quiet on the home front, which feels…Read more...

Once the Toronto Maple Leafs get Andrei Vasilevskiy’d in the first round again, it’s not like the angst level in the T.O. will fade all that much through the summer months. That’s because the Toronto Blue Jays have reached the same threshold as the Leafs passed a few years ago, where you go from young and promising…Read more...

Sunday was a big day for Sean Miller. In his first season, during his second stint at the school, Xavier men’s head basketball coach guided the program to its first Sweet 16 since 2017. And to get there, Miller had to beat a school that’s near and dear to his heart, the University of Pittsburgh — his alma mater where…Read more...

If you ever wonder why much of the world views Americans as arrogant and uninterested in anything that happens outside the United States’ borders, look no further than Keith Olbermann’s recent tweets about the World Baseball Classic.

This is the time of year in which sports fans should be primarily focused on the Men’s and Women’s college basketball postseason tournaments. The “amateurs” have put on quite a show that deserves attention this week.Read more...

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For those still clinging by their fingertips to the argument that their lack of interest in Women’s College Basketball is due to a lack of competitive balance, just let go and fall into the sea of bad takes. You folks can join the crowds who believe that Mens’ College Basketball is more fundamentally sound than the…Read more...

We tend not to appreciate things that don’t matter as much to us as it does others. If there’s anything more American than “I got mine,” I don’t know what that would be. That seems to be the trouble with the World Baseball Classic, even though with every iteration it seems to pick up more steam. There are just those…Read more...

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Lamar Jackson is not the only professional athlete with no agent. Last season there were 17 NFL players who represented themselves. The list includes Bobby Wagner, DeAndre Hopkins, and the highest-paid left tackle in the NFL, Laremy Tunsil.Read more...

Don’t count MVPs before they hatch. Nikola Jokić’s third consecutive MVP has seemed like an inevitability during the first three-quarters of the season. Jokić’s triple-double averages, improved offensive efficiency, advanced statistics, and Denver’s No. 1 seed in the Western Conference all appeared to tip the scales…Read more...

It only takes a matter of hours after becoming a soccer fan to hear the term, “Spursy.” It only takes a couple more after that to completely understand that. It refers to Tottenham Hotspur and that no matter the situation, or the seeming unlikeliness, something weird will happen to the club, and in a bad way. While…Read more...

The Dallas Cowboys got their man. Not the player many fans might be thinking of, but they targeted a wide receiver and got him. Per ESPN, the Cowboys have acquired Brandin Cooks from the Houston Texans for a fifth and sixth-round draft pick. Not a steep price at all for a receiver once considered one of the best young…Read more...

Alabama is the perfect villain for so many reasons, and I’m not even referring to the Brandon Miller situation. Fans of college athletics would’ve inevitably found a reason to hate this Crimson Tide squad, and if they couldn’t find one, they’d have created one. People are so sick of seeing the football team win that…Read more...

The Minnesota Timberwolves’ season from hell continued Friday night as they lost to the Chicago Bulls in double overtime and may have lost Anthony Edwards for the remainder of the regular season to an ankle injury. There hasn’t been an official update from the team. Edwards returned to the bench in a walking boot…Read more...

No one wants their dirty laundry aired on national television, especially not on the Turner network of channels during March Madness. But Charles Barkley did just that — only he was the one doing the rinsing, scrubbing, and air drying. The Chuckster revealed that he used to clean his own NBA uniforms by showering in…Read more...

I have a question for both college and NBA basketball fans: When was the last time a team won anything with a low-post big man as their No. 1 option? Purdue’s Zach Edey is going to take home a treasure trove of hardware, and lucky for him, he’ll be at his place of residence to make sure no one poaches any trophies off…Read more...

Alright, things are heating up for those of you who understand the concept. The big-name debates largely rolled on with a couple of alliterative exceptions as Rest vs. Rust and Nature vs. Nurture were ousted.Read more...

Now that my undefeated record of picking No. 13 seeds or lower in the NCAA Tournament publicly is still intact after Furman’s victory over Virginia on Thursday, I’m deciding to not rest on my laurels and tell you all about another prediction I made earlier this week. For fans of Deadspin’s Agree to Disagree video…Read more...

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When you’re so incredibly talented at something, it tends to give you a false sense of confidence in other areas of your life. Perhaps no one in a star’s inner circle wants to be cast out so they evolve into yes-men, or a player’s competitive drive makes them believe anything is possible. I’m not a sports psychologist…Read more...

Every year a group of players enters the NBA playoffs with the weight of their legacy on their shoulders. And every year, all but one player exits bearing even more weight than they went in with. This season is no different, despite the unprecedented parity in the league. So we’ve pinpointed the players, both veterans…Read more...

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Whether you call it irony or coincidence, the best team playing during college basketball’s biggest moment during a month that’s dedicated to the history of women makes too much sense. Yes, we all think of the men’s game when we think of March Madness. And yes, the men’s game brings in all the money. But, commerce and…Read more...

That’s the question for one-half of 95.7 The Game’s Morning Roast in San Francisco. Great Drake impersonation, getting all in your feelings after being called out for posting a Tweet about Andrew Wiggins’ personal issue — an issue he wants to keep private. Why go through the trouble of getting worked up after the…Read more...

If you’re like me — an NBA fan who pivots to college basketball for a few weeks in March — the best part of the NCAA tournament is the unknown. What I don’t know about draft stock, a coach, a player, a team, or anything, makes the discovery all the more entertaining.Read more...

On Mar. 1, the Los Angeles Police Department Protective League — the local union — presented a proposal. The rank-and-file officers desire to limit the types of calls to which they provide a response. Two of those types of calls include mental health and welfare checks. On Wednesday, the Los Angeles City Council…Read more...

Ja Morant will be back on the court next week at some point. Which is good…maybe? One gets the sense that no one around him is really looking out for him, including his employer. But the NBA has a lot of money invested in him, so they need to rehab his image but do so quickly so he can get back on the court and remind…Read more...

One of the first thrilling finishes of the 2023 NCAA Tournament also gave us our first March Badness play to consume in the form of Virginia’s stunning 68-67 loss to the Furman Paladins. Clad in Willy Wonka purple, Furman earned their golden ticket to the tournament for the first time in 43 years, after winning the…Read more...

When there’s a way to have a trash take on sports, enter Keith Olbermann. This time, it’s about the World Baseball Classic, because what matters most to Mr. Olbermann is the Major League Baseball season, as the yearly league is much more important to those who don’t see value in the global tournament. Odd flex, but OK.

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In a year devoid of a dominant blue blood or player, college basketball stayed in the headlines for the worst reasons. Preseason No. 1 UNC whiffed on the season and missed the tournament entirely. Gonzaga is relying on a normal supply of veteran talent, but is less interesting to watch for casual fans without a…Read more...

I get it. I totally get why Jimmy Butler reportedly gets under the skin of his teammates. He had a point when he was with the Minnesota Timberwolves. Those young players needed to have enough energy to not get mauled by him at practice. But what happened recently is worthy of the NBA bringing the amnesty clause back…Read more...

The debate about fighting in hockey has always been overly loud for what was actually being debated, if debate ever even took place. One side of it always tended to be pretty shrill. The natural evolution of the game to a speed and skill one has lessened fighting to a rarer and rarer occurrence on its own. Teams are…Read more...