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The Carolina Hurricanes, after a long stretch of irrelevance, appear to finally be going in the right direction. They’re a young team with a lot of talent, and though they’re going to be sloppy at times (and their goaltending remains a mess), they should be a ton of fun to watch.Read more...

Three Thai tennis umpires have been banned for life after being found guilty of match-fixing and betting offenses at low-level tournaments, according to a release from the Tennis Integrity Unit, an anti-corruption group.Read more...

I know what you’re thinking. How can a penalty kick, even the most conceivably perfect one, be unique or memorable enough to be called the greatest? Trust me, you’ll think differently once you watch what Norik Avdalyan of Rubin Kazan’s reserve team did here:Read more...

Freddie Freeman earned himself a big chunk of the glory with his tie-breaking dong in Sunday night’s 6-5 Braves win over the Dodgers, but Atlanta might not have even been close to taking the lead in the sixth inning of Game 3 had it not been for the 20-year-old sensation Ronald Acuña Jr., who’s doing everything he can…Read more...

If anyone thought that the Colorado Rockies’ extra-innings victory in the wild-card game portended more exciting playoff action to come, those people were dead wrong. All that was true about that 2-1 win against the Cubs remained true throughout Colorado’s three-game sweep at the hands of the Milwaukee Brewers: nobody…Read more...

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The Rams stayed undefeated and extended their lead in the NFC West with a close-run 33-31 road win over the Seahawks, and it all ultimately came down to a matter of inches and seconds. Facing fourth down and about the length of a football with 1:39 left, the Rams sent their punt unit out onto the field. Seattle coach…Read more...

If you like to fill the void in your life with house plants, but don’t have a ton of space, sunlight, or gardening knowledge, succulents are the low-maintenance green things of your dreams. Today only, a bunch of different options from Costa Farms are on sale on Amazon, starting at just $13 for a couple of handsome…Read more...

Amazon’s Halloween candy Gold Box is includes great deals on a ton of different candies, which is perfect if you already bought a bag from the store for Halloween, but need a second one to eat yourself.Read more...

Thank you for your continued support of Deadspin. Onward.Read more...

The NFL appears to have completely abandoned its newly-instated helmet rule that caused loads of controversy in the first couple weeks of the preseason. No penalties were called on Tedric Thompson after he nearly took Brandin Cooks head clean off of his body late in the second quarter of Rams-Seahawks.

The Eagles went into halftime of their game agains the Vikings down 17-3, thanks in part to a roughing the passer penalty that prevented the Vikings from facing a third-and-long and set them up to score a touchdown right before the half.Read more...

Fat man touchdowns are one of the few remaining things about football that can bring me pure, unadulterated joy in a moment’s notice. Vikings defensive tackle Linval Joseph is the latest large lad to bring me such happiness. On a 1st-and-10 passing play, Stephen Weatherly was able to strip-sack Carson Wentz, knocking…Read more...

The back-and-forth shootout between the Giants and the Panthers was an entertaining spectacle where narratives seemed to go through entire life cycles multiple times, and each team’s season outlook changed by the minute. With 2:16 left to go in regulation, Graham Gano converted his third field goal of the day to put…Read more...

No team in the NFL has yet to prove themselves capable of slowing down Chiefs rookie quarterback Patrick Mahomes. The Jaguars might have had a shot at it today, if not for Blake Bortles.

The Lions beat the Packers today, 31-23. They got a bit of help from the Packers’ kicker, Mason Crosby, who missed five kicks that could’ve totaled 13 points.Read more...

The most anticipated game of the early NFL season was pretty one-sided. The undefeated Kansas City Chiefs and their high-powered offense have been dominating the supposedly impenetrable defense of the 3-1 Jacksonville Jaguars. Oddly enough, one of the more notable players of the game was not the league’s new darling,…Read more...

Maryland football players pressured athletic staff to remove a team booster who made insensitive comments about the death of Jordan McNair from the team’s charter flight to Michigan on Friday, according to a report from ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg. The booster is a local attorney in Maryland who decided to place the blame…Read more...

JuJu Smith-Schuster caught his second touchdown of the year in the first quarter today. To celebrate, he got down on the ground, where James Conner acted as a midwife to help him give birth to a football.Read more...

Odell Beckham Jr. said a lot of not so nice things about his Giants teammates in an interview that aired on ESPN this morning. The Giants kicked off their game against the Panthers not long after, and so far Beckham’s biggest contribution to the game was not of the positive variety.

The much-anticipated “game of the season” between Liverpool and Manchester City was an utter snoozefest with fans already checking out at halftime. The closest scoring opportunity either team had throughout the entire match came at 84 minutes when Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk committed an unwise tackle on…Read more...

Panthers safety Eric Reid is playing in his first game of the season after being signed by Carolina on Sept. 27. Before the game started, Reid dropped to one knee during the customary playing of the national anthem, a symbol of protest against racial inequality in America.

In a Sunday NFL Countdown segment called “Odell Unfiltered,” Giants receiver Odell Beckham Jr. gave an interview alongside Lil Wayne to ESPN’s Josina Anderson about how the season has gone so far. Simply put, it hasn’t been great for the NFL’s highest-paid wide receiver. In the interview he explains what is holding…Read more...

If yesterday’s strike from Gylfi Sigurdsson was evidence of the kind of goal that can be produced by individual brilliance, then today’s game between Arsenal and Fulham provided an example of the sorts of wonders a team that’s perfectly in sync can conjure.Read more...

The NBA season doesn’t start for another nine days, but J.R. Smith and Marcus Smart are already back on their bullshit. In the first quarter(!) of last night’s Cavs-Celtics preseason game, Aron Baynes and J.R. Smith got into a scuffle when Baynes appeared to try and pull a Kelly Olynyk on Smith’s shoulder. After Smith…Read more...

Yankees catcher Gary Sanchez had an awful year. He endured multiple stints on the DL, hit .186/.291/.406, and played unsustainably bad defense behind the plate. If the Yankees hadn’t made the playoffs we might be settling into conversations about whether the former rookie sensation still has a place on the team. Those…Read more...

Around this time last year, Mike Pence pulled one of the corniest political stunts imaginable when he walked out of a 49ers-Colts game early because he wanted to take a stand against the players kneeling to protest police violence and racial injustice who were supposedly “disrespecting” the troops, flag and anthem.

An hour or so before Khabib Nurmagomedov went ballistic at UFC 229, another Russian fighter was putting on a dominant performance. Heavyweight Alexander Volkov worked Derrick Lewis for 14 minutes and 40 seconds, using his superior length to tag Lewis whenever he wanted and staying out of range when Lewis tried to drop…Read more...

Of all the insane and ridiculous things that happened in the immediate aftermath of Khabib Nurmagomedov’s victory over Conor McGregor at UFC 229, perhaps nothing was more absurd than UFC president Dana White’s shock and disappointment.

After 15 or so boring minutes of complete control, Khabib Nurmagomedov ended Conor McGregor with a brutal rear naked choke in the fourth round of their highly anticipated title fight at UFC 229. Conor got his ass ground into the fence as Khabib talked shit to him for three-plus rounds, reclaiming a little dignity by…Read more...

The Golden State Warriors and the Sacramento Kings played the NBA’s first game in Seattle since 2008, when the team was relocated and rebranded as the Oklahoma City Thunder. To the optimistic former Supersonics fan, this could be interpreted as a sign that the NBA is looking closely at the northwest market to put the…Read more...

Saturday’s game between Missouri and South Carolina was a meteorological shitshow. Nothing in the game really encapsulated just how bad the rain in Columbia was like Missouri quarterback Drew Lock failing to see that his intended target on a screen pass had slipped and fallen, and throwing the ball straight to a South…Read more...

Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz’s alter-ego “New Kirk” made a scintillating return to the football field on Saturday just over halfway through the second quarter during a fourth-and-goal opportunity for his Hawkeyes. The play call was a bizarre formation that lead to Iowa doubling its lead over Minnesota.Read more...

Texas kicker Cam Dicker forgot he was a freshman on Saturday and absolutely nailed a 40-yard go-ahead field goal to give the No. 19 Longhorns a 48-45 lead over No. 15 Oklahoma with nine seconds left in regulation. Texas looked as though it would win the game with ease, entering the fourth quarter up 45-24. But the…Read more...

José Mourinho will likely survive another matchweek at Manchester United thanks thanks to an incredible comeback led by players who have few reasons to play hard for their manager.Read more...

Ben Mason has become my personal hero. It’s already great enough that he has chosen to be a fullback in the Big Ten, but he’s decided to crank his likability up a notch and a half by embarrassing defenders on national television like he’s a projected first-round halfback.Read more...

Clayton Kershaw pitched a two-hit gem last night for the Dodgers, blanking the Braves over eight strong and efficient innings of work. It was easily the best postseason outing in Kershaw’s decidedly snakebitten playoff career, as he needed just 85 pitches to dispatch 24 batters. After Ronald Acuña smacked a double on…Read more...

The NFL’s senior vice president of officiating, Al Riveron, admitted in a Twitter video that the officials of the Browns-Raiders game made the wrong call in the fourth quarter when it appeared that Derek Carr fumbled the ball, and Larry Ogunjobi had a straight shot to the end zone. The refs blew the play dead because…Read more...

After Hall of Famer Junior Seau took his own life as a result of CTE in 2012, at age 43, his family chose to sue the NFL individually instead of participating in the broader settlement that has become a nightmare for players with football-induced brain trauma. Six years later, the league has finally agreed to pay the…Read more...

Everton beat Leicester City this morning, thanks in part to Leicester beef man Wes Morgan getting himself sent off after a series of bad tackles. But the man who carried the day was Everton midfielder Gylfi Sigurdsson.Read more...

You aren’t as young as you used to be...concerts these days are just too dang loud. Luckily, Eargasm makes special earplugs that attenuate sound evenly, preserving the fidelity of the music you’re hearing while reducing its volume. They even come in an aluminum case that you can keep on your keychain.Read more...

The U.S. Center for SafeSport banned swimming coach Sean Hutchison on Friday for what its documents called a violation of policies by “digitally penetrating a minor, receiving oral contact from a minor, and engaging in sexual intercourse all with an athlete whom he coached.” That swimmer is Ariana Kukors-Smith, who…Read more...

Oakland A’s fan John Spencer had a rough night on Wednesday, when he saw his team get clobbered in the wild card game by the Yankees and then had beer poured all over him. His sad plight was captured on video, and it reverberated with a nation now wearily accepting the prospect of yet another Yankees run in the…Read more...

I’m writing this blog from a weird airport bar while drinking the smallest $12 glass of wine I’ve ever seen, feeling both relieved and very stupid. Earlier today I was supposed to take a flight from JFK to Seattle to visit one of my college roommates. Our other college roommate was flying in from D.C. and we were…Read more...

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According to a report from the Baltimore Sun’s Talia Richman, there is video footage of Jordan McNair’s final practice with the Maryland football team, footage that could potentially help illuminate the circumstances of his tragic death from heatstroke.Read more...

There’s a rather elemental question at the heart of mixed martial arts: who would win in a fight between a dominant wrestler and a fearsome striker? It’s a question the sport has been asking for two decades, and one that, by its nature, will never be convincingly answered, because it depends on the wrestler and the…Read more...

On Friday, Senator Susan Collins, in a 43-minute speech, announced she will vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. “He has been an exemplary public servant, judge, teacher, coach, husband, and father,” she said.Read more...

In April 2017, German newsmagazine Der Spiegel reported that Cristiano Ronaldo in 2010 reached a $375,000 settlement with a woman who said he raped her in a Las Vegas hotel in 2009. The story barely made a ripple in the sports world, even after Der Spiegel followed up the initial story a week later by reporting on the …Read more...

In the past week, we’ve been inundated with information about Dr. Christine Ford’s allegations about Judge Brett Kavanaugh. And while we have seen (and been prevented from seeing) a great deal of new material, as well as their highly personal testimony, it appears that few minds were changed. Democrats found Ford’s…Read more...