Rotoworld: Oregon RB LaMichael James and Oklahoma State WR Justin Blackmon among top 10 players who are being overhyped for the 2012 draft.
SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
The Detroit Red Wings equaled an NHL record with their 20th straight win at home, beating the Philadelphia Flyers 4-3 Sunday night on the strength of Johan Franzen's tiebreaking goal early in the third period.
PBT: Boston's Rajon Rondo continues to be named in trade talks, which is madness. The Celtics guard creates offense and makes everyone around him better, which was evident in Sunday's win over the Bulls.
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.
Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods greeted their Sunday pairing at Pebble Beach with optimism. But the day would end happily only for one.
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.
Zambia has won the African Cup of Nations, beating pre-tournament favorite Ivory Coast 8-7 on penalties in a dramatic final at Stade de l'Amitie.
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.
AP
Jason Giambi sure picked a lousy time to finally come clean.
Mired in a deep slump, his team in an even deeper funk, Giambi could have been excused for doing what he’s been doing so well the last few years — collecting more money than some small countries have while pretending that the whole messy steroid thing never really existed.
So it was a bit surprising to hear Giambi’s de facto acknowledgment the other day that, yes, he was juiced and that he and baseball owe everyone a big apology for the sins of the past.
Actually, Yankee fans are more concerned with the sins of the present, which in Giambi’s case centers around the fact he has just five home runs and only one hit in his last 26 at bats. There’s more than a few New Yorkers who wouldn’t mind making a midnight run for some human growth hormone if it would get his bat going again.
While they’re at it, maybe they can find a miracle drug to repair an aging pitching staff that gets even older when the $28 million man arrives in the next week or so to earn his money six innings at a time. Yes, Tyler Clippard helped ease some of the sting of a weekend series gone bad at Shea Stadium, but there’s only so much a rookie pitcher can do.
Giambi sat quietly in the dugout Sunday night, waiting to be called upon to pinch hit if necessary. It wasn’t because the Yankees got a good performance from Clippard and some timely home runs to avoid yet another embarrassment against their cross-town National League rivals.
Giambi is making $20 million a year, so maybe he felt it was his duty to make some noise at a time when his bat was so silent. Or maybe he couldn’t sleep at night knowing the only controversies in the Bronx were whether Roger Clemens should be allowed to come and go as he pleases and whether Joe Torre and Brian Cashman should simply go.
Either way, he didn’t do himself any favors by telling USA Today that he was “wrong for doing that stuff,” which was either an admission that he used steroids or that he put itching powder in Derek Jeter’s jock.
To complicate matters, Giambi followed it up by doing something baseball officials seem to believe is even worse — he said everyone in the sport should have apologized for either allowing the use of steroids or putting itching powder in Jeter’s jock.
Giambi, of course, has apologized before. He spent an entire press conference prior to the 2005 season saying he was sorry, though he never really explained what he was sorry about. Besides, hitting lots of home runs means never having to say you’re sorry to Yankees fans.
SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
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Zambia has won the African Cup of Nations, beating pre-tournament favorite Ivory Coast 8-7 on penalties in a dramatic final at Stade de l'Amitie.
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The Red Wings have finally started to embrace a record they've been chasing.