data-mm-id=”_0gnku8oj0″>The New York Yankees were supposed to be one of the best, if not the best, team in baseball entering this season. But if recent events have taught us anything, it's that fate can turn on a dime and counting chickens before they're hatched is to mock god. Okay, perhaps that's a bit dramatic. Yet there are hundreds of thousands of pinstripe enthusiasts waking up in the Tri-State area this morning with a film of dread and apprehension on their skin after the Yanks bumbled themselves to a loss against the Blue Jays in a minor-league park. With only 19 scheduled games remaining in this duct-taped summer, New York finds itself occupying the 8th spot in the American League playoffs. They are two games behind Toronto for second in the AL East. A triumvirate of teams is nipping at their heels with the Baltimore Orioles, Detroit Tigers, and Seattle Mariners all within two games. It is not time to panic, of course, as the hunters include two teams that were supposed to flirt with 100-loss seasons and the Mariners, who figure to cool off at some point. But it is time to be very concerned as another bad week of baseball could doom the Yankees and result in the unthinkable: watching the postseason from home. New York is mired in a 5-14 stretch, which in a normal year would be nothing more than a blip. This year it's a third of the season. Gary Sanchez has been indefinitely benched. An all-or-nothing offense has been routinely nothing as of late and runners are being stranded in confounding numbers. What was supposed to be a league-leading unit for run creation is floundering near the mean. The pitching hasn't picked up the slack either. Or the defense. Simply put, they Yankees are struggling in all facets of the game. And brand-name is not protecting them from incurring the results. If there's a bright side, it's that they'll get ample opportunity to erase the deficit with the Blue Jays. The two teams have eight remaining dates. Of course, if Toronto proves to have the Bronx Bombers' number this abbreviated year, it will likely be curtains for any World Series or meaningful October baseball hopes. The Yankees find themselves at a farm club upstate. They'd better get busy winning or they, like so many city pets before them, will find doom in those pastures.
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data-mm-id=”_mmp59c2x3″>Ernestine Sclafini, the wife of Skip Bayless, wrote a book about living with a man who is obsessed with sports. The book has been available since September, but she is still out there pounding the pavement promoting it and letting ladies know how to deal with dudes who love sports. Last week she was on Undisputed with Skip and Shannon. View this post on Instagram Ladies, here's my secret to getting through those long, torturous sports games ? . I had so much fun on #Undisputed with my hubby @SkipBayless and @ShannonSharpe84! Who would like to see me on the show again someday? . In the meantime, be sure to pick up my book, "BALLS: How to Keep Your Relationship Alive When You Live with a Sports-Obsessed Guy" … perfec…
data-mm-id=”_r6fb7y3eg”>MLB commissioner Rob Manfred has come up with a handful of terrible ideas on how to get a younger audience more engaged with baseball, including implementing a pitch clock, forcing relievers to throw to more batters and, most recently, adding more teams to the playoffs and allowing teams to choose who they're playing on live TV. Turns out the best idea on how to get people more engaged has been right under their nose the whole time. Today, Cubs stars Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant were mic'd up during the Cubs Spring Training game against the Angels. The result was pure greatness. Here's a little friendly banter between @KrisBryant_23 & @ARizzo44 to brighten your Monday. pic.twitter.com/3wGE0vpFh1— Cut4 (@Cut4) March 2, 2020While every player…
data-mm-id=”_4vk0mmlzm”>Tyrod Taylor has yet again found himself in a familiar spot. Three years after getting forced out of Buffalo for first-round pick Josh Allen and two years after getting ousted from Cleveland for first-round pick Baker Mayfield, he holds the top spot on the Los Angeles Chargers depth chart with first-round pick Justin Herbert sitting behind him. For now, that is. Given Taylor's journeyman career as a solid-at-best QB who will be 31 when the season starts, most assume it's a foregone conclusion that Taylor will be replaced at some point in 2020 by Herbert, the man the team selected in hopes of finding a new face of the franchise. NFL Network's Mike Silver disagrees, and said as much today, explaining why he believes Taylor will be under center for a…
data-mm-id=”_bdvfj2u60″>With the NBA set to restart their season on July 30 down in Orlando, there's much to be both excited and very nervous about as a fan. Basketball is back, but coronavirus is not going away and while the league can do everything it can to make players feel safe, testing positive for COVID-19 will be a fear looming over everyone. Some players, at least, are feeling nervous enough about the whole endeavor that they may choose not to play. Adrian Wojnarowski reported on Thursday that a "growing number" of players who are concerned about going down to Florida to participate in the playoffs. "There are players— and a growing number of players— who have more than a hesitation about going in to that bubble."@wojespn on the growing unrest amon…
data-mm-id=”_vb109l93d”>Baylor has had to cancel Saturday's football matchup with No. 18 Oklahoma State as the Bears are suffering a major COVID-19 outbreak. At last count, 28 players have the virus, while 14 staff members have also tested positive per the latest results. This is a disaster for Baylor and will be the third game the Bears have been forced to reschedule this year. And, additionally 14 #Baylor football staff members also positive as of latest test results.— David Smoak (@DavidSmoak) October 12, 2020All-in-all, Baylor has 32 athletes with active cases and 29 of them are symptomatic:Baylor's latest COVID-19 update reveal 32 active cases, with 29 of them symptomatic. https://t.co/fxKLQOP43j— Bruce Feldman (@BruceFeldmanCFB) October 12, 2020Baylor was supposed t…
data-mm-id=”_d39hunljx”>I think we can all agree the last 12 months have been crazy, and that extends to the sports world. College basketball, one of the sports hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic, has faced a ton of challenges. It could face more come tournament time, as a number of blue-blood programs could miss the NCAA Tournament. Some programs have adapted well to a world without fans and with stringent testing protocols, while others haven't. Gonzaga and Baylor are thriving, while a number of traditional powers are limping along. With an abbreviated non-conference schedule to start the season, some blue bloods were never able to get things going and are now on the outside looking in at tournament time. As things currently stand, Duke, North Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas, Michi…
data-mm-id=”_bbfm35fw5″>Spring training is underway and Major League Baseball's new pitch clock is causing all kinds of chaos. Both pitchers and batters are being penalized for not going about their business fast enough as the push to speed games up and cram more action into tighter windows has hit the ground running. And to be quite honest, I hate it. I hate the pitch clock a lot. Instead of enumerating the reasons completely, let me throw out the idea that it's an anathema to the entire spirit of the game out there to see if it lands.After the initial rage over incidents like the one below passes, though, it's easy to see through the fog and concede that, ultimately, this initiative will be a net positive, even if its neccesity is very much up for debate. Bottom of the…
data-mm-id=”_4rusblzw9″>Donald Trump is back on the campaign trail and remains the GOP front-runner for the 2024 election despite facing indictments in multiple cases. On Tuesday he was in New Hampshire giving a speech and apparently the room was really hot. And I don't mean people were fired up, I mean the temperature was borderline unbearable. That led to Trump complaining about the air conditioning in the building. Watch both videos below:I didn't include the act out portion that came after pic.twitter.com/3pIOvuVDIK— First generation home renter (@InternetHippo) August 8, 2023Trump was in Windham, New Hampshire, where the weather is in the 80s with humidity in the high 60s or 70s. Combine those temperatures with a room full of people and some broadcast TV lights and I&#…
data-mm-id=”_q7z3tv42c”>Justin Herbert is dealing with a fractured middle finger on his left hand. He originally hurt the finger when it got caught in the helmet of a Las Vegas Raiders player during the Chargers Week 4 victory. Over the last couple weeks he's tried various combinations of casts and wraps and gloves to try to protect the finger, but for the team's Sunday Night Football game against the Chicago Bears, Herbert just taped that sucker up so he would spend the game giving everyone the finger. Chicago Bears v Los Angeles Chargers / Joe Scarnici/GettyImagesHerbert is sporting a hard plastic splint underneath that wrap according to Melissa Stark. Not that it's been an issue. Herbert completed all six of his passes on the Chargers opening drive, capping it with a …
data-mm-id=”_j3qnb67mn”>Every guy likes to think he wouldn't be the dude who ends up going viral because he swings and misses at a exploding ball as part of a gender reveal party or whatever. It happens to plenty of other people but surely it would not happen to him. "I'd hit that out of the park," is the thought that occurs to every man in existence when watching such a gender reveal gaffe. But if even David Ortiz misses, well… it's hard to really believe that anymore. On Monday night, Ortiz was having a gender reveal party and got a nice softball down the middle to take a cut at. He completely, utterly, and totally whiffed. It didn't even seem like he got close, which led to an amusing scene of Ortiz bending over to grab the ball while the blue confett…