deadspin.com | Sam Fels

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

Bob Nightengale keeps trying to rehab Trevor Bauer

Sometimes, there’s no choice but to cover a vile person in sports because they are doing something that can’t be ignored. Trevor Bauer is not that, but that didn’t stop Bob Nightengale from auditioning to get on his payroll, next to Rachel Luba, whatever it is she does other than be the occasional b...

by Sam Fels|Trevor Bauer

|Mon Mar 11 2024

Say what you want about the NBA, it still values its titans

For all the misguided complaints about the melodrama that can be the NBA at times, or the claims that its “wokeness” will be its ruin, or how the league beats itself up over load management or whatever else, it still offers something that none of the other three non-NFL leagues can. And that’s regul...

by Sam Fels|the NBA

|Fri Mar 08 2024

The Golden Knights are trying to build the wall

No, not that wall. Calm down, Jethro. ...

by Sam Fels|Noah Hanifin

|Thu Mar 07 2024

USWNT win the most CONCACAF game ever

We realize the enormity of saying “the most CONCACAF game ever,” as this particular region of the soccer world is literally where people throw ducks at balloons and nothing is the way it seems. Just about anything can happen when the North and Central American Federation is in charge, and boy did it...

by Sam Fels|United States Soccer Federation

|Thu Mar 07 2024

The Avalanche have gone full Freddie Four Fingers

The NHL trade deadline has gotten into high gear a couple days before Friday afternoon’s deadline, so let’s roll through the highlights of what’s already gone down....

by Sam Fels|Kroenke Sports & Entertainment

|Thu Mar 07 2024

The Oakland A’s want to build the Sydney Opera House

Leave it to the A’s and John Fisher to be three months late on the renderings for a ballpark that still feels like it has a better chance of being built in Narnia than it does in Vegas, and then to have it leak out a day after they meant it to:...

by Sam Fels|Champions League

|Wed Mar 06 2024

The Devils waited too long to make a change

It was only slightly over a year ago that New Jersey Devils fans were apologizing en masse to Lindy Ruff. They had called for his head early last season, and then when the Devils caught fire they all were ready to admit they had egg on their face. New Jersey would go on to the second round of the pl...

by Sam Fels|Martin Brodeur

|Tue Mar 05 2024

The Rangers have a big, dumb sideshow: Matt Rempe

It was natural to think the New York Rangers “got it” after they traded in the misguided clenched jaw ways of Gerrard Gallant behind the bench for the usually up-tempo ways of Peter Laviolette after the Devils essentially skated them out of the building last spring in the first round. The Devils wer...

by Sam Fels|Matt Rempe

|Tue Mar 05 2024

Russell Wilson, the most sound and fury signifying the most nothing

One can’t help but wonder if Russell Wilson had just thrown that last pass in Super Bowl 49 into the third row how the rest of it might have played out. Seattle would likely have had consecutive Super Bowls, he’d be a god in the PNW, and perhaps everyone would have had more patience for the mountain...

by Sam Fels|Russell Wilson

|Tue Mar 05 2024

AEW's Sting sendoff was perfect in so many ways

Darby Allin crashed some 20 feet through a plate of glass onto the floor, spent a good five to 10 minutes having ringside medical staff picking shards out of his back, leaving Sting to perform his last-ever comeback and win, and it might have only been the third or fourth best match on the card for ...

by Sam Fels|Sting

|Mon Mar 04 2024

deadspin.com | Sam FelsLiverpool pulled another rabbit, but its pixie dust might only last a week

While I really shouldn’t let my frustration with how MLB has sullied their regular season into my soccer coverage, it was hard not to think about how Rob Manfred just discarded those moments during the regular season that portended to more down the line as I watched Darwin Nunez dig out a Liverpool ...

by Sam Fels|Liverpool

|Mon Mar 04 2024

The Penguins lasted longer than they were supposed to

In the salary-cap era of the NHL, no team gets to go out on their shield, really. The Datsyuk-and-Zetterberg era of the Wings fled to the Eastern Conference, took a couple first-round beatdowns, and then slipped into the playoff-less ooze that the organization only might just be emerging from. Ovech...

by Sam Fels|Kyle Dubas

|Mon Mar 04 2024

The Colorado Rockies have crushed Kris Bryant's soul

For the most part, fans these days accept that a player signing a generational wealthy contract with a team is more than enough of an end to itself. Few players, out of the very few who make the majors at all, get to take the opportunity of free agency and set themselves up for the rest of their car...

by Sam Fels|Kris Bryant

|Fri Mar 01 2024

This may upset Rob Manfred, but starting pitchers are not ever going to be what they used to be

It’s easy to say that MLB gets too caught up in its past and tries too hard to be the game it once was. A major part of baseball’s charm is its connection to its past. While the other sports don’t look anything like they did even 20 or 30 years ago, baseball doesn’t ever move too far from what it’s ...

by Sam Fels|Rob Manfred

|Fri Mar 01 2024

An ode to the enigma that was Paul Pogba

With the news that Paul Pogba has been suspended for four years (pending appeal), it almost certainly ends his career. Should he have to serve the full four seasons, he’ll be 35 and not have played in forever. The question of whether he’s a legend or left far too much on the table would depend on wh...

by Sam Fels|Pogba

|Fri Mar 01 2024

NHL could learn from new women's hockey league playoff and draft formats

The PWHL has accomplished a lot even though it’s only been in existence for a few months. It has set records for attendance. It has sealed the cracks in women’s hockey that had formed. It has given momentum to women’s hockey below the international level, which had been stuck in neutral thanks to sp...

by Sam Fels|NHL

|Fri Mar 01 2024

Are we doing this with the Winnipeg Jets again?

The Winnipeg Jets are in first place. The Jets have a legitimate shot at the Stanley Cup. They have the league’s best goalie, they have depth scoring. They can win a track meet if opponents want to play that way. They can grind out chances along the boards and in the corners if that’s what’s asked. ...

by Sam Fels|Winnipeg Jets

|Wed Feb 28 2024

MLB teams can get their old jerseys back as long as they annoy Nike and Fanatics

While see-through pants have been the talk of spring training so far, that might not matter as much to fans (at least non-evangelical ones, Woe to Cardinals Nation), as fans don’t tend to want to buy the pants the players are wearing. Maybe you’ve got use for baseball pants in your everyday life, an...

by Sam Fels|Nike

|Wed Feb 28 2024

Deadspin presents the Two-Thirds Through the Season NHL Awards

After working up a third of a season award post just so my editor would have something to publish during the Holidays, it only seems right that we do an equally meaningless one with some teams having cracked 60 games played. No, 82 doesn’t divide evenly by three, and there really isn’t a distinctive...

by Sam Fels|NHL

|Tue Feb 27 2024

Is trouble brewing for the USWNT?

It’s been mostly quiet on the Western front for the USWNT since last summer’s World Cup full-body dry heave. A couple of friendlies to send off legends, a couple more to close out the year with no stakes, and an easy start to the Women’s Gold Cup last week with resounding wins over the Dominican Rep...

by Sam Fels|United States Soccer Federation

|Tue Feb 27 2024

home › author › samfels27