ericblum Page 3 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
After 30 years (!!), it is finally time for Venus Williams to call it a career
Unlike at this time last year, the central figure of the US Open isn’t a Williams sister. Serena’s matches were all appointment television, maybe because of the known stakes, being one of tennis’ all-time great’s last event. And Flushing lost its luster after Serena’s third-round exit, until the sta...
Texas Rangers' current slide is tanking their chances at postseason redemption
How the tables have turned. On Aug. 15, the Texas Rangers were riding high, 24 games over .500, and in cruise control to the playoffs, if not an American League West title. Aug. 15 now happens to be the last time Bruce Bochy’s team has won. The Rangers are on a seven-game losing streak, including an...
Predicting the AEW All In London card
All Elite Wrestling’s first show in the United Kingdom was supposed to be in July 2020. Due to obvious reasons, that didn’t happen. It took three years for AEW to finally run a show in England, but what a way for them to make a debut, with one of the largest crowds in professional wrestling history ...
The grunt work for Lionel Messi’s stay in South Beach is about to begin
Lionel Messi’s Major League Soccer debut is Saturday. Since signing for Inter Miami officially on July 15, he hasn’t actually played in a game for the league he intended to play in. The Leagues Cup and US Open Cup have taken his focus. All of the dazzling moments that have taken over North America h...
USWNT captain Lindsey Horan said the quiet part out loud
It started to percolate during the latest Summer Olympics, delayed a year to 2021 because of the pandemic. The United States women’s national team — the former two-time-defending World Cup champions — not only looked vulnerable, but they also appeared average. Not average for the Stars and Stripes —...
If Michigan's Jim Harbaugh gambit works, it will be a horrible look for the NCAA
Michigan football won’t have Jim Harbaugh on the sidelines for its first three games of the season, and it’s only trio of nonconference contests of the year before a possible bowl game. Yawn. Like it’ll matter. It’s part of the school’s self-imposed penalty for Harbaugh’s alleged recruiting violatio...
Aaron Rodgers and the familiar NFL faces in new places
After silly season, and training camps around the country are well underway, most of the big moves of the NFL year have already taken place. Those who hoped for greener pastures found what they believe is an upgrade from their last situation, despite no proof to the contrary, yet. Some of the bigges...
Women’s World Cup Day 23: It’s (probably) coming home to England
Sam Kerr got her first start of the World Cup. Possibly the best striker on Earth still wasn’t fully fit, but the Chelsea starlet at 80 percent is better than most in prime form. The Australian juggernaut scored one of the best goals of the tournament in the 63rd minute with her club teammate, Milli...
10 NFL teams everyone thinks will be good this season, but won't be
Every team had a great offseason. All those gaping, even-the-blind-can-see problems your favorite team had no longer exist. Here’s where a path to greatness starts. Of course for most, that won’t be true. The heavy hitters didn’t go away and until your favorite players get hit in the mouth, all the ...
Blindsided: Michael Oher claims he was never legally adopted by the Tuohy family in court filing
Michael Oher just finished a press tour for his new book. The preface discusses how he became a rarity — a famous offensive lineman — and how the 2009 movie that chronicled his journey to Ole Miss and the NFL, The Blind Side, made him well known beyond football circles. The film dives into Oher’s jo...
World Cup Day 21: This tournament will be remembered for how far the women’s game has come
We have our final four. When you get this deep into a tournament, anyone who’s not seen as chalk has done something grand, like Morocco’s men’s team last year and Colombia’s women’s team would’ve been this year. The South Americans entered as the lone surprise to make the quarterfinals. They benefit...
The latest league to try to compete with the NFL is already doomed
There’s no doubt the NFL is the most popular sports league in America, if not the world. Domestically, the second-place NBA isn’t even close to it. Trying to replicate the NFL’s mainstream success has been a bunch of offshoot professional leagues, giving opportunities to players several steps down f...
Wait, suddenly Philly fans are great?
It was only Michael Lorenzen’s second start with the Phillies since he was acquired from Detroit at the trade deadline. And he threw a spectacular no-hitter, no doubt about it. A whole 124 pitches, with none of them leading to a hit, was special. Lorenzen offered his thanks to everyone involved on h...
It shouldn’t be horrible for the next American to suit up with Chelsea
How American soccer players are treated in the Premier League has always been an interesting conundrum. Unless you’re a goalkeeper or somehow wind up at Fulham, heightened levels of scrutiny are at your doorstep that don’t appear in other top leagues around the world. There have been a few other saf...
Stanford is the most vulnerable school in college athletics because of conference realignment
The domino effect of Oklahoma and Texas leaving the Big 12 for the SEC (leading to the dismantling of the Pac-12 two years later) is a turn of events that would’ve been nearly impossible to predict. The catalyst for the Power Five’s west coast entry point being almost no more wasn’t UCLA and USC tra...
Kevin Brown’s suspension is a symptom of a much larger problem with journalism, team-owned outlets (UPDATE)
(UPDATE, 4:58 PM: Baltimore Orioles announcer Kevin Brown was reinstated by the team Friday and released this statement on Twitter: “Unfortunately, recent media reports have mischaracterized my relationship with my adopted hometown Orioles. The fact is that I have a wonderful relationship with the o...
World Cup Day 19: Colombia is now the lone hope for the Cinderellas
The bottom-right side of the World Cup knockout-round bracket was always a double-edged sword. More upsets happened in Groups F and H than any other, with powerhouses Brazil and Germany watching the final 16 play instead of competing among them. The quarterfinals are now composed of seven heavy hitt...
The budding rivalry between the Aces and Liberty is a massive win for the WNBA
Aside from the Connecticut Sun possibly playing spoiler, the current WNBA season has been conducted essentially known its champion resides in Las Vegas or Brooklyn. The Aces are putting together arguably the most impressive regular season in league history. But there’s always an asterisk. A road to ...