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Continuing this year’s Champions League tradition of first-leg beatdowns followed by second-leg borderline meltdowns, Liverpool lost to Roma today by a score of 4-2 but still won the tie. They will now meet Real Madrid in the final in Kiev on May 26th.Read more...

Canadian Senator David Adams Richards, a relative newbie in the upper house, took the time on Tuesday to give an official, on-the-record speech to his colleagues featuring a pretty spicy sports take: American announcers are ruining hockey.

It’s placement time in Overwatch and, as you’re reading this, players are haunting the servers like cursed ghosts forever bound to relive their past lives. After ten seasons of this, players have noticed an unnerving and demoralizing truth: a lot of the time, players’ competitive rankings turn out to be basically…Read more...

Video replay in soccer sucks, but goal line technology is great. The biggest advocate for the introduction of this tech in Ethiopian soccer is probably the referee of this weekend’s Defence Force vs. Welwalo Adigrat match, since it probably would’ve saved him from getting fed this fist sandwich:Read more...

Reliever Jordan Hicks, who plays for some crummy team, threw record-setting gas Tuesday night against White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson. Five of the six pitches in that plate appearance were above 101 mph, and the pitch at the top of this post came in at 102.0 mph, the fastest this season. Anderson couldn’t handle it,…Read more...

Of the many queasy revelations in Juliet Macur’s story in the New York Times today about the Washington Redskins’ sketchy-unto-sleazy treatment of its cheerleaders, the most mind-boggling concerns a trip to Costa Rica in 2013. Five cheerleaders told Macur that the team had them serve as escorts for male sponsors and…Read more...

When it comes to preparing a wheel for a NASCAR pit stop, the goal is a lot like the reoccurring theme Goldilocks kept stumbling upon—the glue holding lug nuts on the wheel can’t be too brittle or too syrupy. It has to be just right, or else it could become a competition disaster.Read more...

There is no such thing as a LeBron Stopper. There are LeBron Inconveniencers, and if you are one of them, and have eaten a well-balanced meal and hydrated deeply and prayed to all the relevant deities, you might “hold” LeBron to a triple-double and 26 points on 40-percent shooting, as the Raptors did last night. As…Read more...

A little more than a year ago, New Yorker writer Maria Konnikova announced that she was diving into the world of professional poker as a new player, all for the purpose of writing a book about her experiences. Yesterday, PokerNews reported that the actual writing of the book is on hold because Konnikova, under the…Read more...

Welcome back to Let’s Remember Some Guys, a web video series in which I attempt to remember things about the various podgy stache randos and big-swinging galoots who filled out the baseball card sets of my youth. When last we did the Remembering thing, I was mostly defeated by the collection of mustachioed lotharios…Read more...

If, after watching Bayern Munich’s appalling display of simultaneous superiority and ineptitude that granted the evil white empire of Real Madrid entry to the Champions League final, you found it a little difficult to maintain the furious, righteous anger in your belly once you saw the agonizing, tear-streaked faces…Read more...

Familiarity breeds contempt, yes, but also, contempt breeds contempt. The Capitals and Penguins would dislike each other even if they didn’t meet four times a season and then again seemingly every spring, but the prolificity of the rivalry gives the bad blood the time and exposure it needs to ripen into an exquisite…Read more...

While disgraced former Michigan State and USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar is serving prison time for what will likely be the rest of his life after sexually abusing hundreds of young girls and women, his former boss at MSU, William Strampel, is currently facing criminal sexual conduct charges of his own. And…Read more...

The Warriors facing the Pelicans in the second round means that two notorious shit-stirrers will be on the court together, and even if the series result is lopsided, the antics of Rajon Rondo and Draymond Green will compensate for it in entertainment.Read more...

Kolten Wong is currently batting .203 at the plate and .000 in post-game celebrations. Last Thursday, Dexter Fowler was responsible for a thrilling 4-3 comeback win for the Cards with a walkoff base hit in the bottom of the 13th. Wong went to douse Fowler with the water cooler, but he completely blew it.

As he often does during Inside the NBA, a show designed to bait its hosts into late-night ramblings, Charles Barkley got to talking shit last night. Specifically about Warriors forward Draymond Green:

Bayonetta might be too strong to live forever as a Super Smash Bros. character, but she’s been a fantastic addition to the cast for at least one reason: players have a ton of fun with her, sometimes even at their own expense.Read more...

The version of the Golden State Warriors that dispatched the Spurs in five games and cruised to a blowout Game 1 win against the Pelicans is a fine NBA team. One that, if not destined to, certainly looked capable of winning the title while being led by top-five NBA player Kevin Durant. The version of the Golden State…Read more...

MILFORD, Mich.—On the surface, Diane O’Nions lives in luxury. The suburban Detroit subdivision she has called home since 2005, The Oaks at Beach Lake, showcases beautifully crafted homes that sit on sprawling plots of land with sloping lawns and intricate landscaping. And bottled water. A lot of bottled water. Cases…Read more...

Last week, the Steelers took Oklahoma State quarterback Mason Rudolph in the third round, and they seemed convinced the draft’s sixth-ranked passer is their guy for the future. Starting QB Ben Roethlisberger, who is just the biggest fucking baby and rarely wanted to plan beyond the upcoming season when Landry Jones…Read more...

Free agent safety Eric Reid has filed a collusion grievance against the NFL and retained Mark Geragos, the same attorney who is also handling Colin Kaepernick’s collusion lawsuit. Reid began kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial inequality and police brutality during the 2016 season, and he continued…Read more...

Hundreds of people attended the annual March for Immigrant and Workers’ Rights in Seattle yesterday. They were met by a counter-protest organized by the Proud Boys, a far-right organization for sad white men. That should be all the context you need to enjoy this video:

We’ve seen our fair share of USB power receptacle deals, but this $16 2-pack from iClever is the most affordable deal yet. Half the things you plug in these days probably plug into USB, so it just makes a ton of sense to install these around your house. Just make sure you know what you’re doing. Just use promo code…Read more...

I’m not here to argue that the Raptors’ collapse in Game 1 of their second-round series against the Cavaliers is proof that their 59-win season was totally hollow and that they are in fact fraudulent pretenders unworthy of the No. 1 seed and should be expelled from the NBA so that no one ever again has to spend…Read more...

Okay, so socks aren’t the most fun thing to buy, but when it comes to technical materials and form factors, it can be a jungle out there. What style is best for hiking compared to rock climbing? Do you even need socks if you’re fishing? Backcountry’s 20% off sale lets you decide what kinds of socks you need from…Read more...

The Orioles are the worst team in the American League by record—8-20, tonight’s ongoing game against the Angels not included—and by just about everything else, too. (See: a collective OPS of .673.) Here’s a play from tonight that sums all that up pretty well: Pedro Alvarez running into Chance Sisco and laying the poor…Read more...

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Noted Toronto fan (and former failed basketball player) Drake stirred a little beef with Cleveland bench goon Kendrick Perkins during tonight’s Raptors-Cavaliers Game 1. It started with some words at halftime...Read more...

After jumping out to an early lead, the Raptors caved and let the Cavaliers take a Game 1 victory in overtime tonight, 113-112.Read more...

With 1:07 to play in tonight’s Caps-Penguins Game 3, which was tied at three, Alexander Ovechkin delivered a stellar game winner on a two-on-one to put Washington up 2-1 in the series. And he did it by batting a puck from mid-air and into the net in the signature style of his rival Sidney Crosby. (Sure he hit the post…Read more...

At a panel discussion on college sports this week, as reported by USA Today, basketball player Nigel Hayes said that he discussed boycotting a 2016 game with his Wisconsin teammates to protest the NCAA’s failure to properly pay its athletes.Read more...

Washington Capitals bruiser Tom Wilson, after escaping discipline for knocking Pittsburgh’s Brian Dumoulin out of Game 2, made his presence felt again in Game 3 of their series tonight. As Penguins forward Zach Aston-Reese tried to take the puck out of his own zone near the benches in the second period, Wilson lined…Read more...

Pegula Sports & Entertainment—the company that owns the Buffalo Bills, Sabres, and several smaller New York sports teams—announced the resignation of its president, Russ Brandon, on Tuesday. According to the Buffalo News, Brandon’s resignation came following “an internal investigation into Brandon’s workplace behavior…Read more...

A consistently reliable rule of baseball is that the closer your runners are to home plate, the better chance you have of scoring in a given inning. But what if this isn’t always true? Bear with me on this one.Read more...

A Florida man interested in karate is alleged to have found an elusive and illegal target for his kicks: bird faces. Last week, the Orlando Sentinel reported that Rocco Joseph Mantella was arrested for “practicing karate” by kicking swans in the head at a park in downtown Orlando, and further details of his…Read more...

Want to stream the NBA playoffs, or the reboot of Trading Spaces? They’re both included in the $35 base package of DIRECTV Now, and so is a free Roku Streaming Stick when you prepay for a month.

If ever there were any doubt that Real Madrid are the luckiest team in the history of the world, this staggering gaffe by Bayern Munich’s Sven Ulreich that set up Karim Benzema for the easiest goal he’ll ever score in his life should remove all doubt:Read more...

Forty male gymnasts in Brazil have come forward and said that gymnastics coach Fernando de Carvalho Lopes sexually abused them during their careers, according to a report that aired on aired on Brazilian television Sunday night.Read more...

Houston sports radio station SportsTalk 790 has reportedly fired one of its hosts and suspended another, and it’s not exactly clear why.Read more...

The WWE held a major event in Saudi Arabia, and is now suffering the repercussions. Who could ever have predicted?Read more...

U.S. Olympic speedskater John-Henry Krueger announced on Monday that he is joining his brother on the Hungarian Olympic team, ending a lengthy spat between U.S. Skating and the Krueger brothers.

Time for your weekly edition of the Deadspin Funbag. Drew’s gone! We have guest hosts. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. Today, we’re talking about video review in sports, ethics in takeout dining, and more.

Professor Trevor Bauer is at it again. The Indians pitcher and science knower weighed in on a question to Driveline Baseball founder Kyle Boddy about whether the Houston Astros’ pitching staff could be using some sort of illicit substance to increase their spin rate:Read more...

Coming into this postseason Al Horford’s playoff reputation never really stood out. He spent most of his career on a series of Hawks teams that were doomed by be steamrolled by LeBron James every spring. In the 17 times he met James in the playoffs, he only won one game, and that was on his 15th try. Horford has never…Read more...

This week at the Munich Open, the Frenchman Gael Monfils was due to play his first match since that “back injury” at Indian Wells. Getting to Germany was the first step. That should be the easy part, since the dude lives in Switzerland. But on an April 28 flight from Geneva to Munich, Monfils learned the risks of…Read more...

So far on Let Me Show You My Pogs, we’ve reviewed pogs that were based on licenses: The NFL, Bad Boy Club, and O.J. Simpson. (Though, sure, O.J. didn’t get any royalties.) But pogs were big enough in the mid-1990s that some manufacturers created their own characters. One of those was Jetty Eddie, ostensibly a surfer…Read more...

Tony Nimmons, a black chair umpire, is suing the U.S. Tennis Association for racial discrimination and is seeking reinstatement to his USTA position as well as compensatory damages, according to a complaint filed Friday in federal court for the Eastern District of New York. The lawsuit was filed after the Equal…Read more...

Twins pitcher Lance Lynn, who’s gotten off to just a cosmically bad start to the season with an 8.37 ERA, had some unlucky shit happen to him in Monday’s 7-5 loss to the Blue Jays. Caught in a bases-loaded jam, Toronto infielder Lourdes Gurriel Jr. got away with this tiny little swinging-bunt RBI single:

Last night’s Game 1 between the Celtics and Sixers was a pretty good time. Terry Rozier looked like fuckin’ Chris Paul out there and Joel Embiid was unstoppable and Jayson Tatum did some cool whirly-bird moves that made me go, “Ooh! Nice!” But what I was most excited to see was the late-game introduction of Celtics…Read more...

Nobody will bother Jhoon Rhee again. If anybody ever did, that is.