Houston built their championship team on talented youngsters and undervalued castoffs. Other teams are now asking if it’s worth investing in superstarsEven before the last out was made, Carlos Correa proposed to his girlfriend and the Houston Astros poured their champagne a serious question had to be asked in the front offices of nearly every other Major League baseball team.Who needs the big free agent? Related: Astros' Carlos Correa wins World Series, proposes to girlfriend ... gets a yes Related: Is Dodgers v Astros the first all-computer World Series? Continue reading...
Wednesday’s Game 7 between the Astros and Dodgers has the potential to exceed even 2016’s beguiling combination of rich storylines and see-saw scoringGame 7 (* if necessary).Of course it’s necessary. The greatest sporting events do not come with caveats, and it feels right that a World Series as evenly-matched yet helter-skelter as this one should end with the built-in drama of a title-decider at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday. Related: The greatest World Series Game 7s of all time Related: Baseball no longer a supergiant but it is still the most American of sports Continue reading...
Woods has endured another troubled year culminating in pleading guilty to reckless driving but he is remodelling himself as a mentor as well as a competitor as he plots his latest returnWhatever else Tiger Woods may have developed during his latest lengthy absence from competitive golf there appears a new willingness to display a sense of humour.That Woods privately does a sharp line in wit has been insisted upon for years by those who know him, and the 41-year-old has raised smiles by offering thanks to “the committee of one for picking myself to play” in the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas at the end of November. Woods essentially hosts the tournament, managed by one of his companies, and...
Tom Brady is as brilliant as ever at 40. But the Patriots are one bad tackle away from mounting a Super Bowl challenge without a reliable quarterbackWe should know better than to question Bill Belichick’s football genius. It’s almost exactly one year since the New England Patriots head coach traded linebacker Jamie Collins to the Cleveland Browns in exchange for a third-round draft pick. It’s a move that still defies conventional thought 12 months on. Collins appeared at the Pro Bowl months earlier after recording five forced fumbles, five sacks and 51 solo tackles in the 2015 regular season. “The best defensive player we’ve got, the most athletic guy on the team,” is how former Patriots team-mate Dont’a Hightower described...
Despite a string of controversies the NFL commissioner’s ability to generate money for owners helped protect him. But now their patience is wearing thinHow odd would it be if, after a tumultuous decade of debacle and debate in Roger Goodell’s NFL, the one to bring down the commissioner turns out to be Donald Trump?For the first time in his tenure the Goodell’s job is in danger and the uncertainty has come swiftly. Just weeks ago Goodell was on the verge of a five-year contract extension worth more than $100m. The new deal was believed to be certain, an affirmation that although Goodell has irritated many of the league’s owners and is wildly unpopular with fans, those same owners believed he...