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.
Getty ImagesAn October ago, when the Red Sox emerged with their second World Series championship in four seasons, it became all the rage to compare the team with their ancient and honorable rivals from the Bronx.
The Red Sox, went the light and clever cocktail talk, were now the Yankees.
You know the drill: The Yankees were hardball's tough guys in the last days of the 20th century, winning four World Series titles in five years.
New century, new powerhouse: With the Yankees absent a World Series title since 2000, the Red Sox took over in the new millennium. When they take on the Los Angeles of Anaheim Angels in Game 1 of their best-of-five American League Division Series showdown Wednesday night out in Orange County, they will be making their fifth trip to the postseason in six years.
Twice they have been to the World Series, and twice they have wiped up their competition in neat, tidy four-game sweeps.
And now it has become popular for the nationwide sporting public to, you know, “hate” the Red Sox. The way they used to hate the Pittsburgh Steelers. And the Dallas Cowboys. And Notre Dame football.
And the New York Yankees.
But the Red Sox-Yankees comparison goes much deeper than that. Put aside the personalities and the tradition and the rivalry and the steady stream of postseason appearances, and here is an under-discussed comparison between the early-21st century Red Sox and the late 20th-century Yankees: Both teams have really cool, and talented, young players.
It's always easy to dismiss all those trips by the Yankees to the late October winner's circle as the product of an ever-available, ever-opening checkbook. And it is true: Whenever the Yankees have needed the latest shiny bauble swinging from the free agent tree, management has sounded like Will Smith in “Independence Day” the first time he got to ride the alien spaceship: “I have GOT to get me one of these!”
So they went out and picked up a Jimmy Key and a Roger Clemens here, a Wade Boggs and an Orlando Hernandez here, and, oh, baby, let the good times roll.
But roll back the videotape a few years to the early 90s, back to when longtime Yankees owner George Streinbrenner was voted off the baseball island by the game's commissioner, Fay Vincent. Liberated from having an owner with a habit for trading bright young prospects for the latest quick-fix veteran being offered by some out-of-the-running team, the Yankees' baseball ops staff pretty much said, “You know, we can actually build something here.”
So they held on to Derek Jeter. They held on to Mariano Rivera. They held on to Andy Pettitte. They held on to Jorge Posada. They held on to Bernie Williams. They held on to Ramiro Mendoza.
In doing so, the Yankees started winning lots and lots of championships.
Which brings us to the modern-day Red Sox. Put aside for a moment that the Sox will be underdogs going into their series against the Angels, this because the Angels happen to be really good and because Boston is banged up: Projected Game 1 starter Josh Beckett is on hold with an oblique strain, Mike Lowell is limping around with a bum hip and J.D. Drew has missed most of the past two months with a balky back. And don't forget that the great October warhorse of this generation, Curt Schilling, never even made it out of spring training this year and has indicated he won't play again.
While it is true that the Red Sox are a big-payroll team with a willingness to pay big bucks for the players they think can help them (including $36 million over four years for Julio Lugo), the new Sox, like the old Yankees, believe in developing their own talent.
Put another way: It's as much about cross-checking as it is about the checkbook.
Like one of those primetime network dramas that feels a need to introduce fresh, new characters each season, so, too, do the Red Sox bring us new kids for new campaigns.
Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein, after landing the gig back in November of 2002, stood before the Boston media and said, “We are going to be a scouting and development machine.”
It was all boilerplate. Like a politician on the campaign trail, promising lower taxes, better schools, more cops on the streets, etc.
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.
The Red Wings have finally started to embrace a record they've been chasing.