Silva: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for NFC teams.
SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
Ryan Callahan scored for the fifth time in four days and defenseman Ryan McDonagh snapped a second-period tie to lift the New York Rangers to a 3-2 victory over the Washington Capitals on Sunday.
PBT: Jeremy Lin wasn't his hot self on Saturday, but he still led the Knicks to victory.
Arc's five up, five down: After No. 11 Michigan State's 58-48 upset of No. 3 Ohio State, you'd be a fool to discount the Spartans' national title chances now.
Miami coach Al Golden says the worst is behind him, but his headaches figure to continue now that former booster Nevin Shapiro, now in jail, says his involvement with the Hurricanes program will result in stiff penalties.
Golf's dream pairing - Woods and Mickelson - is on the course in the final round at Pebble Beach. Jason Sobel has hole-by-hole reports.
The United States completed a 5-0 rout of Switzerland in the Davis Cup on Sunday, with 19-year-old Ryan Harrison and John Isner winning closing singles matches.
Euro Roundup: First-place Manchester City won 1-0 at Aston Villa on Sunday on Joleon Lescott's goal in the 63rd minute, maintaining its two-point lead over Manchester United in the Premier League.
Tessa Worley of France fought off gusting winds to win a second consecutive World Cup giant slalom Sunday in the Andorran Pyrenees. Overall leader Lindsey Vonn was more than a second behind and finished eighth.
Robins: It’s the Year of the Dragon on the Lunar calendar, and this Chinese influence could extend to it also being the year of the Pekingese on the green carpet at the 136th Westminster Dog Show on Tuesday.
Getty Images fileEpstein elected to make no deals at the July 31 non-waiver trading deadline, figuring the talent he had could keep the Red Sox in contention. Alas, young pitching talent such as Jon Lester, Jonathan Papelbon, Craig Hansen and Manny Delcarmen started tiring and growing ineffective seemingly as soon as the deadline passed.
Injuries hit harder post-deadline, too: catcher Jason Varitek, who has been out since deadline day (he might be back by Sept. 1), and left fielder Manny Ramirez, who is missing time while getting his ailing left knee examined. And most scary for the Red Sox, on both a team and human level, is slugger David Ortiz’s recurring irregular heartbeat, which put him in the hospital this week. He could be back soon, sidelined for the rest of the year, or done with his career — right now, nobody knows.
The result is, the Boston Red Sox field lineups these days that look more like the Pawtucket Red Sox. Against Oakland Monday, one-third of the batting order consisted of players who had just come to Boston in the last two weeks, and not because a pennant-contending team stacked up on talent. The lineup included Eric Hinske, dumped by Toronto, and Pawtucket call-ups Carlos Pena (dumped by Detroit) and Dustin Pedroia.
The starting pitcher, Kason Gabbard, had just celebrated his one-month anniversary in the big leagues. No wonder Boston has scored exactly one run in its first two games of the Oakland series.
If Epstein is to take credit for the building the 2004 champions, he must take blame for what has happened in 2006. Sure, he can’t control the injuries, but he’s made some assumptions — I have enough starting pitching, my young players are ready — that just haven’t panned out. His team is ninth in batting average and 11th in ERA (though first in fielding) — it’s a wonder the Red Sox are still over .500 with those numbers.
Epstein’s apparent desire to dump Wells (not a problem in and of itself, given his performance this year) for a younger player should tell Red Sox fans that another Series run isn’t happening anytime soon. Maybe the youngsters that struggled this year will get things together next year.
But the primes of their careers are years away — if they come at all.
Epstein didn’t suddenly get dumb, but his deals are making a monkey out of him. At this rate, Red Sox fans had better start preparing for the possibility of the next Series title coming, say, in 2090. 2004! 2004!
SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
DeMarco: Plug in a well-heeled ownership group and negotiate one of those mega-bucks TV deals that are going around, and the Dodgers could become the west coast version of the New York Yankees or Boston Red Sox.
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Wesseling: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for AFC teams.
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Silva: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for NFC teams.