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By Larry Fine/Reuters
Kris Jenkins buried a buzzer-beating three-pointer to lift Villanova to a thrilling 77-74 upset victory over North Carolina in the U.S. college basketball championship game in Houston on Monday.
It was a fitting end to a springtime single-elimination competition known affectionately as ‘March Madness’ for its regular upsets and last-second victories.
Posted on April 5, 2016
By Jim Coffman
Everyone picking the locals to go to the World Series, you guys are aware that the Mets’ pitching remains the same? And that means it isn’t just a little better than the Cubs’? But don’t feel bad, North Side Baseball Club. The Mets’ pitching is way better than anyone’s.
The Cubs have a better lineup but if New York’s unbelievably young crew of power arms pitches like it did down the stretch into the postseason last year, having a superior lineup will matter about as much as it did for the Cubs in the playoffs last year.
Posted on April 4, 2016
By Roger Wallenstein
It’s not really the gooey descriptions like “the verdant expanse” or “emerald jewel,” the “lush outfield” or the “symmetry of the diamond.”
No, it’s more like Williams, Mantle, Berra, Aaron, Feller, Ford, Pierce and Miñoso, the men who left indelible impressions on the boy.
It’s the mustard smell, the iron pipes with layers of yellow paint surrounding the box seats, the non-descript scoreboards listing the results of the other seven games. It’s not rap, but the organ belching “Roll Out the Barrel,” and Whitey the Field Announcer telling us to “Get your pencils and scorecards ready.”
It’s the vendor hawking “Hey, Lemonade,” and the men in the left field stands stacking an ever-expanding snake of empty beer cups, a live monument representing their prodigious thirsts when no one focused on their ability to drive home.
What’s noteworthy is that the games, moments, personalities and milestones of 50 to 60 years ago provide more clarity to someone my age than those of the ’80s and ’90s when work, family, health and stability interfered with the attention one could pay to the sport. Even now White Sox pinch hitter deluxe Smoky Burgess (1964-67) occupies a clearer presence in my long-term memory than the team’s DH in 2005 – it was Carl Everett – when they somehow won the whole shebang.
Posted on April 4, 2016
By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes
MAKE. FANBOY. CUBS. MEDIA. STOP. Plus: Our World Series Predictions, In Which Neither Of Us Pick The Cubs; As The Blackhawks Suddenly Turn; The Magnetic Derrick Rose; Bears Sign More No-Name Linemen; Media Mistakes Activity For Genius; Let She Who Generates More Revenue Earn More Money; Cheaters Prosper!; and The Everton Minute.
Posted on April 1, 2016
By The World Surf League
Two years after injuring herself at the break, the Californian surfed her way to a redemptive win.
Posted on April 1, 2016
By James Walker and Robert Bellamy/The Conversation
For Major League Baseball teams, spring brings the promise of a better year. For the baseball media, it means putting their expertise to the test and forecasting player and team performances.
Most of these forays into the future will be quickly forgotten, and for baseball’s prognosticators, the public’s amnesia is fortunate: they’re prone to swing and miss with great frequency.
In fact, last season featured some of the most surprising final regular season standings in the last 60 years – at least, when compared to how the media experts envisioned things panning out.
Posted on March 31, 2016
By Dan O’Shea
The White Sox have invested in a 37-year-old shortstop coming of the worst year of his career. Should you do the same?
Jimmy Rollins held virtually no fantasy value in 2015, and sat on the free-agent sidelines most of the winter until the Sox signed him in February. In his prime, he surpassed 20 HRs and 30 SBs in the same season four different times, making him an annual resident in overall top 20 fantasy rankings. Even as recently as 2014, he hit 17 HRs and had 28 SBs, delivering near-top-tier fantasy value at the shallow position of SS.
Yet, he has shown his age in recent years via a plummeting BA and OPS (.224 and .643, respectively, last year were both career-lows) and games missed due to injuries. When the Sox signed him, it seemed like a decent investment in veteran help and a hedge bet while they waited for younger talents like Tim Anderson, Carlos Sanchez and Tyler Saladino to fully develop and claim infield jobs.
Posted on March 30, 2016
Another Beachwood Special Report
The local fanboy press corps went gaga when Joe Maddon arrived at spring training one morning in a hippie van, but that’s nothing compared to what the Cubs skipper has planned for the regular season, the Beachwood has learned. On tap:
* On the home opener against the Reds, Maddon will parachute out of Air Trump One onto home plate to meet the umpires with his lineup card.
* Maddon will make his first trip to the mound at Wrigley to change pitchers on a hoverboard that explodes into flames.
* Maddon will arrive for the April series against the visiting Brewers through a tunnel dug from the Murphy’s Bleachers, dressed as El Chapo.
* Maddon won’t even show up when the Padres come to town in May, managing the game via Skype from Harry Caray’s.
Posted on March 29, 2016
By Jim Coffman
First, a quick women’s basketball note (we will begin today’s regularly scheduled Blackhawks column shortly): DePaul bowed out of the NCAA tournament with an 83-71 loss to Oregon State at a regional semifinal in Dallas on Saturday.
The Blue Demons did a good job limiting the scoring of Oregon State’s powerful 6-6 center Ruth Hamblin, but she was still a force in the middle with nine rebounds and three blocked shots to go with her 13 points. And while DePaul was busy doubling Hamblin down low, Beaver guard Jamie Weisner was going off from the outside, totaling a career-high 38 points.
Every time it looked like DePaul might mount a rally, Weisner drained one of her career-high seven three-pointers to make sure her team stayed comfortably in front. The Blue Demons finished the season with 27 victories against nine defeats and are looking forward to next season, when they lose only two seniors from a talented roster led by junior guard Jessica January.
Posted on March 28, 2016
By DePaul Athletics
DALLAS – DePaul battled back, but time ran out on the Blue Demons’ comeback as they fell 83-71 to second-seeded Oregon State on Saturday in the NCAA regional semifinal.
For the third straight game, Jessica January led DePaul’s offensive effort with 20 points with seven coming in the final 10 minutes. The junior eclipsed the 20-point mark for the fifth time in her career including in DePaul’s final two games of the season.
Jacqui Grant tied a season-high with 15 points, Mart’e Grays added 14 and Chanise Jenkins added 10 points.
Posted on March 28, 2016
