By plotting his NFL comeback for a Raiders team that’s already given up on the city, Marshawn Lynch’s homecoming has the potential to be very awkwardIt’s been barely more than a year since Marshawn Lynch hung out his shingle as an Oakland clothier. This was during Super Bowl week in nearby San Francisco and the establishment of Lynch’s Beast Mode Apparel in Oakland’s downtown was a holiday of sorts. The city’s mayor, Libby Schaaf, declared the afternoon “Beast Mode Day”, a huge crowd filled the street outside the store and the running back himself cut a ribbon with a giant pair of scissors.It was a message that Lynch, who was born and raised in Oakland, was coming home after a...
MLB’s commissioner wants to modernize the league and that’s great. But he should focus on doing so behind the scenes and selling the sport in publicEven the most thick-skinned baseball fan can tire of being told that the game needs to change. Baseball is too slow. It’s too stuck in its ways. There are too many innings, too many relievers, too many pitches, just too much ... baseball, apparently, for the sport to compete for the public’s entertainment dollars going forward. “I’ve got nothing against relief pitchers,” the detractors say. “But they do two things to the game: They slow the game down and ... relievers have become so dominant at the back end that they actually rob action out...
The Colorado Rapids goalkeeper remains a significant figure in American soccer culture, even if his best days are well in the pastGoalkeeping was not the Colorado Rapids’ problem this weekend. That is scant consolation regarding a match that was won by Real Salt Lake with goals in the 85th and 88th minutes, but it’s all that’s on offer. On the pitch, Colorado’s problem is still a near pathological aversion to converting chances into goals. With any semblance of competent finishing, they would have quickly dispatched RSL. Instead, the match only offered the Rapids a 90-minute reprieve from thinking about Tim Howard.Yes, that Tim Howard. The erstwhile US goalkeeper was serving the first leg of his three-game suspension due to what...
Spaniard previously cast as a sore loser finally won a major after he made peace with defeat – and his victory shed light on the inherent futility of gamesmanshipIt’s one of the quirks of the English language that, if you didn’t know any better, you could imagine that the words sportsmanship and gamesmanship were synonyms. But, of course, they mean almost the complete opposite. Gamesmanship is the art of winning by underhand or devious means. It places victory above any code of gracious behaviour.Whereas sportsmanship entails an attitude that transcends winning and losing and instead places an emphasis on mutual respect and appreciation. In the pursuit of glory it refuses to compromise with the principles of fair play and a...
The Oklahoma City Thunder guard has carried his team on his shoulders during a record-breaking season. But is such excellence sustainable?Russell Westbrook doesn’t breathe; he takes air hostage. While such lines have been in the past reserved for Hunter Pence signs or Chuck Norris jokes, Westbrook has displayed such sangfroid for Oklahoma City Thunder that he has become a serious contender for the NBA’s MVP award. He might also have become the most interesting man in basketball.Perhaps more appropriately, Westbrook takes the ball hostage, playing the game with the heat of a thousand suns. This fury has driven him to break the NBA record for triple-doubles in a season. But in the NBA, over-exertion of stars has become a significant...