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: Syracuse is among a solid group of No. 1 seeds in our latest tournament projections, but the middle of the pack is much more murky.
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 fileIn the interim, the pitching staff, led by starters John Lackey, Kelvim Escobar, Bartolo Colon and Jered Weaver, keeps the Angels in games and atop the AL West with a 49-30 record.
And there’s Guerrero. Imagine a Latino Gary Cooper who is even more reticent than the aw-shucks legendary thespian and you have the heart and soul of the Angels’ lineup. When he became a free agent after the 2003 campaign after playing eight seasons with the Montreal Expos, he was the perfect match for a low-key club in the shadows of both the city of Los Angeles and the Dodgers’ franchise.
The fact that Moreno was the first Latino owner of a major league club appealed to Guerrero. The slugger warmed to the idea of a team that would make a concerted effort to expand into the Latino market, especially behind an owner who was a marketing whiz and who had made his bones in billboards.
Guerrero has been quietly awesome. His English isn’t great, and therefore he isn’t featured on ESPN or other outlets as often as gabbier players. He is Manny Ramirez without the eccentricities and without the benefit of playing for a club with a storied past and a fanatical following in the Eastern media corridor. Guerrero’s home now is in a sprawl of suburbia near Disneyland, just off a major freeway.
He has a lifetime average of .325. Only once in the past nine seasons has he hit fewer than 30 homers; that came in 2003, his last year in Montreal, when he was slowed by a back injury that threatened to scare off potential free-agent bidders and hit only 25.
This season, besides leading the club in average, he’s also tops in on-base percentage (.424) and slugging percentage (.565). Although some of his teammates have been hot lately, Guerrero appears to be on that temperature setting permanently.
He is on duty to protect Anaheim, even if he has to do it by himself.
SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
HBT: Prince Fielder is gone and Ryan Braun will likely miss a third of the season because of a failed PED test. Can Milwaukee stay in contention until he gets back?
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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.
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.
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.