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.
Kobe Bryant hit a baseline jump shot with 4.2 seconds left and the Los Angeles Lakers wrapped up a six-game road trip by holding on to beat the Raptors 94-92 on Sunday, their eighth victory in nine meetings with Toronto
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.
Eleven shots separated Phil and Tiger Sunday at Pebble Beach as Lefty secured his 40th Tour win. Jason Sobel had 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.
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.
APSometimes pitchers lose their release points. It happens to everyone, myself included. It starts out as a physical problem, but can turn into a mental one. All of a sudden, boom the control is gone. It leaves you sometimes and it’s just kind of something you learn to deal with.
I remember a game in Baltimore where I walked out of the bullpen and immediately couldn’t throw strikes, walking the first three guys I faced. I maybe threw a couple strikes to them, but I was all over the place.
I called time and called the catcher out, took a break to gather myself and just waited for the umpire to break us up. When he came out I told him “the mound is crooked.”
I was just trying to have some fun with it, and it worked. I calmed down and eventually got out of it.
In the mid-70s with the Twins, I remember a game when our shortstop Danny Thompson made back-to-back errors on routine grounders. Dave Goltz was pitching at the time. After the second error, Thompson called timeout and went out to Goltz on the mound. He said “hey, can you stop having them hit it to me?”
And that is sort of how you have to handle this sort of thing. If a mistake or error produces something negative, then it’s going to linger. If it costs you a game or a big inning, then it becomes magnified even more.
You have to treat it like you have two ears. You take everything in one ear, and let everything bad go right out the other. Get the negative stuff out as soon as possible, get it out of your mind.
PROBABLY JUST A BUMP IN THE ROAD
When you run into a problem like that where you can’t throw strikes or you can’t throw the ball to first, you have to put it out of your mind. The best way to do it is by practicing. If you’re a golfer and are having trouble putting, you go and practice your putting, and I’m sure Utley through all of this has taken more grounders than ever before.
I think Utley may have just hit a bump in the road, or perhaps he is playing hurt. But he has a long way to go to be put into a category with Knoblauch, Sax, Ankiel or any of the other players who have had such terrible problems. Knoblauch and Sax were throwing away routine grounders that were hit right at them. It’s not like Utley is going through something that bad. It’s not like he’s at the level where he can’t even play catch with somebody.
If that starts happening, that’s when you have a real problem.
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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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.
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.
After leading by 18 points in the first half, the Los Angeles Lakers were staring at a four-point deficit with less than two minutes to play.