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When dealing with any kind of upper management at a job, the smartest thing you can do is to get it, whatever “it” is, in writing. That’s the hard lesson that Juventus midfielder Emre Can learned this week: The Germany international claimed that he was promised a spot in his club’s Champions League roster as recently…Read more...

Some people are fans of the New England Patriots. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the New England Patriots. This 2019 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews here.

Folks.... FOLKS. The NFL season starts tomorrow night. In just over 24 hours, it will once again be time to bathe ourselves in scalding NFL action. Are you ready for the big hits? The big throws? The big runs? The bashing and bruising? If you are not yet ready for these things, allow best-coach-in-the-world and valued…Read more...

Here’s a chicken-or-egg question to puzzle over for the next several weeks, until Oklahoma faces a ranked opponent: Was Sooners quarterback Jalen Hurts completely underutilized at Alabama, or is head coach Lincoln Riley an unequivocal offensive genius? In Hurts’s debut game for Oklahoma on Saturday, in the Sooners’…Read more...

Catalan cops seized over 40 cannabis plants from a rooftop near Barcelona yesterday thanks to information from an unexpected source: a TV helicopter broadcasting this month’s Vuelta a España. Stage 8 of the race finished in the town of Igualada on Saturday, and as the race made its way through the city streets at the…Read more...

Let’s get something out of the way up front: Ray Magliozzi hates cars. And not in a my-car-is-a-pain-in-the-ass-and-it’s-always-breaking kind of way (though there is some of that too), but in a they’re-killing-the-planet kind of way. “How could you not?” Ray told me earlier this year. “They’re ruining the fabric of…Read more...

Summer camp season is over, but that just means that you can buy Taylor Stitch’s popular Camp Shorts on sale, and enjoy them next year. Combining the cotton of everyday around-town shorts with the ripstop fabric of technical shorts, they’re built to take a little bit of a beating outdoors, while still looking good…Read more...

Roger Federer has done it all on the tennis court, except one thing: retire from a match due to injury. If he were ever going to do that, however, Tuesday night in Queens was the time and the place. After the fourth set of his U.S. Open quarterfinal match against 78th-ranked Grigor Dimitrov, Federer had to go to a…Read more...

When Jessica Howard entered the world of gymnastics in 1987, she was three years old and wore a pink leotard adorned with poodles. She would go on to become a three-time national champion and later serve on the board of USA Gymnastics. The experience would nearly kill her.

Early in the Ezekiel Elliott contract negotiations, Stephen Jones swore that whatever the team agreed to with its 24-year-old star running back, it wouldn’t be a record. “We’re damn sure not going to be a market-setter,” Jones said, before explaining, a little cryptically and a little ironically, that his stance was…Read more...

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Serena Williams, without breaking a sweat, obliterated Qiang Wang 6-1, 6-0 in the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open Tuesday night. She’s now just two match wins from the 24th major title she needs to tie Margaret Court’s record. The first of those will have to come in Thursday’s semifinals, where she’ll face No. 5 Elina…Read more...

My God, the Mets. Phew. The hell they entered Tuesday night is a special, Mets-only hell. There are excruciating losses, and then there’s watching in horror as a sure-fire victory leaps out of the bag and lays waste to the dwindling hopes of your fading season.Read more...

Every time an outfielder tracks a ball to the outfield wall, there’s a small but not insignificant chance of something violent happening. Perhaps not quite on the scale of the outfielder in the baseball blooper reel from The Naked Gun, but danger is inherent anytime someone sprints toward a wall, especially if they…Read more...

A couple of explanations for this very strange, uh, “base hit” in the first inning of tonight’s Giants-Cardinals game. One: Paul DeJong, being a very science-minded fellow with sincere, demonstrated interest in the way external forces affect the trajectory of a baseball, figured out a split-second before everyone else…Read more...

A Brazilian team of Guys—led by Anderson Varejão and Leandro Barbosa—took down the reigning MVP in the group stage of the FIBA World Cup in China on Tuesday, and winning head coach Aleksandar Petrovic will never let the Greek Freak hear the end of it.Read more...

A group of racist Italian soccer fans spoke up Tuesday to offer a defense of the character of another group of racist Italian soccer fans, in the wake of an ugly scene over the weekend featuring a player being showered with monkey noises during play. The twist here is the people doing the defending are super-fans of…Read more...

Brooklyn Nets forward Rodions Kurucs was arrested on Tuesday and charged in Brooklyn Criminal Court with attacking his then-girlfriend earlier this summer, per the New York Daily News.Read more...

Months ago, fans had Saturday circled as one of the wildest pro wrestling days of the year: All Elite Wrestling’s All Out pay-per-view event would get the bulk of the American attention, but that day also featured dueling events from New Japan Pro Wrestling and WWE in the UK. There was so much going on, in fact, that…Read more...

We see a lot of deals around the web over on Kinja Deals, but these were our ten favorites today.Read more...

What’s up YouTubers, welcome back to Da Zone, the exclusive home of Canelo Alvarez, but somehow also the exclusive home of a deeply embarrassing fake boxing match.

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater is now 20 years old. It’s a milestone that means a lot to a whole lot of people—Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater was a watershed moment in video games, a sports game that captured the imagination of skaters, non-skaters, and fans of Goldfinger’s “Superman” alike.Read more...

Today, we’re talking about doctors, the Mariners, capture the flag, being followed, and more.

Most NASCAR tracks have incredibly well-documented histories compiled throughout the ages. Even if you’ve never heard of it, someone somewhere definitely has. Well—except for the mysterious Air Base Speedway in Greenville, South Carolina.Read more...

Team USA should’ve lost to Turkey in their second group-stage game today at the FIBA World Cup, and though they were handed a 93-92 win by some last-second incompetence, the victory may have come at a price. On the very last play of overtime, Jayson Tatum sprained his ankle after throwing a pass and running into the…Read more...

The upcoming NFL season will be the 20th since Dan Snyder purchased the Washington Redskins from the estate of Jack Kent Cooke in May of 1999. To mark the anniversary, the Washington Post has a state-of-the-franchise story up today, sort of a report card for Snyder’s first two cartoonishly dysfunctional decades owning…Read more...

Some people are fans of the Los Angeles Rams. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Los Angeles Rams. This 2019 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.

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After a summer full of rumors and whispers, the winner of the Neymar sweepstakes is his current and future club. Paris Saint-Germain, the plucky, oil state-backed underdog, fended off the overtures from both Barcelona and Real Madrid until the death, only celebrating Neymar’s continued residence in France when the…Read more...

Up to 70% off select UGG styles, a $25 Menlo Club Box, Intel Gamer Days Deals on Amazon lead off Tuesday’s best deals from around the web.Read more...

The Butterfly Effect is the idea that a solitary flap of a butterfly’s wings will eventually result in a hurricane halfway across the globe. In the interests of moving forward as a society, and because I don’t think I’ve seen a butterfly in, like, four years, I believe it is time to retire this term and go with…Read more...

It’s never a good sign when, a few days out from the start of the NFL season, reporters are asking a head coach questions like, “So, are you guys even going to try to win a game this year?” That’s the line of questioning Dolphins first-year head coach Brian Flores faced after his team traded Kenny Stills and Laremy…Read more...

Every time a dangerous wildfire breaks out somewhere in California, fire crews race to battle it. Incarcerated people play a major role in this effort; the state has about 2,600 incarcerated people fighting wildfires under the state’s fire camp program. Over the past four years, the state has had trouble recruiting…Read more...

Chace Numata, a catcher in the Detroit Tigers organization, died Monday from injuries he sustained in a skateboarding accident early Friday morning. He was 27 years old.Read more...

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On Friday night, Daniil Medvedev prevailed in his third-round U.S. Open match against Feliciano Lopez, and then he dedicated his post-match interview to trolling the fans in attendance, the majority of whom had spent the match vociferously rooting against Medvedev. The Russian played in front of another hostile crowd…Read more...

Since arriving in Houston, Bill O’Brien has been on a mission to consolidate power and become both the team’s head coach and general manager. He prevailed in a power struggle with former GM Rick Smith, then did the same with Brian Gaine, who the Texans cut loose this summer and will still be paying through 2023.…Read more...

This is an urgent communiqué from the American Wonderteen Identification Department: Though we have not yet officially identified a player capable of inheriting the title of Wonderteen from Christian Pulisic, various candidates are being strongly considered. One such candidate is 19-year-old striker Josh Sargent, who…Read more...

A deal on AirPods with Wireless Charging Case; red, white, and teal Instant Pots; and a Thermapen Mk4 sale lead off Monday’s best deals from around the web.

Alex Rodriguez undoubtedly knows more about baseball than I will ever know about anything, and so I choose to take the following clip not as cause for concern, but as encouragement. After all, if one of the greatest players in baseball history can have a thought this inane about the game, then I shouldn’t feel so bad…Read more...

While last night brought reports that progress is being made in Ezekiel Elliott’s holdout with the Cowboys, Melvin Gordon’s standoff with the Chargers produced much more grim news. According to Chargers GM Tom Telesco, it’s looking increasingly likely that Gordon has played his last game with the team.

Romelu Lukaku is two games into his career with Inter Milan, and his arrival in Italy should be received as a blessing by Italian soccer fans. Here is one of the most talented young strikers in world soccer, who could very easily be playing for a top-flight club in England or Spain, instead choosing Serie A as a…Read more...

Dodgers pitcher Dustin May was able to walk off under his own power on Sunday after getting hit in the face with a line drive off the bat of Diamondbacks first baseman Jake Lamb. The comebacker, which Statcast clocked at 91.6 mph, trickled into shallow left field after making contact with May, and resulted in a…Read more...

You can really tell that Jackson State’s mascot is a valued part of the team—or the person inside the suit feels that way, at least.Read more...

For the second time in Toronto, and the third time in his career, Justin Verlander let out a victorious yell near the pitcher’s mound as his teammates mobbed him to celebrate him throwing a no-hitter. This latest one came in a 2-0 victory against the Blue Jays and was sealed when third baseman Abraham Torro’s throw to…Read more...

It’s not often that NFL roster moves are a match made in hell, but that seems to be exactly the case with Kiko Alonso getting traded from the Dolphins to the Saints. In exchange for Alonso, Miami received linebacker Vince Biegel, according to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport and Tom Pelissero.

The battle for Neymar’s future is on hiatus for now, as the Brazilian winger will remain at Paris Saint-Germain because the French club was unable to reach an agreement with Barcelona, according to multiple reports.Read more...

Former Eagles and Bills running back LeSean “Shady” McCoy will reportedly have a reunion with his former Philadelphia coach, Andy Reid, in Kansas City as the Chiefs have signed him to a one-year deal, $4 million deal ($3 million guaranteed), according to multiple reports. McCoy had been in Buffalo for four seasons…Read more...

With just over two minutes left in the game, Oregon was tasked with stopping an Auburn offense that had slowly but surely built momentum for itself throughout the second half from getting into field goal range. It wasn’t the easiest of challenges, as the Tigers returned a punt to their 40-yard line, but the Ducks…Read more...