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 three goals as the New York Rangers beat Philadelphia 5-2 on Saturday for their seventh straight win over the Flyers.
Jeremy Lin hit a free throw with 4.9 seconds left to overcome a dreadful second half and lift the New York Knicks to their fifth straight victory, 100-98, over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
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.
CFT: Jordan Jefferson makes it clear he wasn't happy with LSU's game plan in the Tigers' BCS Championship Game loss to Alabama.
Move over, Hollywood and NFL types, golf's two real A-listers take center stage Sunday at Pebble Beach, both in need of a win.
The United States swept favored Switzerland out of the Davis Cup on Saturday when Mardy Fish and Mike Bryan beat Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka 4-6, 6-3, 6-3, 6-3.
Luis Suarez's refusal to shake hands with Patrice Evra overshadowed Manchester United's 2-1 win over rival Liverpool that lifted the defending champions to first place in the Premier League on Saturday.
Marlies Schild of Austria won her sixth World Cup slalom of the season Saturday after overall leader Lindsey Vonn and defending champion Maria Hoefl-Riesch crashed out in the opening run on the windy Pyrenees course.
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.
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'I'm in shock' Aug. 31: Andy Roddick and Gillis Muller discuss their stunning match at the U.S. Open. |
NEW YORK - The worst birthday of Andy Roddick’s life ended with three straight tiebreak losses and a shocking first-round exit from the U.S. Open against a player making his debut in the tournament.
Roddick, the champion two years ago and the No. 4 seed this year, fell 7-6 (4), 7-6 (8), 7-6 (1) on his 23rd birthday Tuesday night to Gilles Muller, the first man from Luxembourg to compete in the Open.
The 22-year-old Muller, ranked No. 68, outhustled, outmaneuvered and, most astonishingly, out-aced Roddick 24-17 to claim his second huge upset of the summer. In his first Wimbledon, he beat French Open champion Rafael Nadal.
Asked how he managed to dismantle Roddick, Muller replied sheepishly, “I have no idea.”
“For me, it was just unbelievable to come out here today,” Muller said. “I told myself to enjoy it and I did every minute.”
Roddick hated every minute of it after blowing a 5-2 lead in the first set and a chance to serve out that set at 5-3. From then on, Roddick was frustrated by the left-handed Muller’s canny mix of angled groundstrokes and serves, his blend of speeds, and his amazing ability to hit line after line.
Roddick flung his racket to the ground, dropped it another time in disgust, and kept chomping on a towel during changeovers. More than a few times he stared at the lines where Muller’s shots landed, as if not believing his eyes, or watched the replays on the giant screen atop the stadium.
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“I don’t really remember a loss where I’ve felt this bad afterwards,” Roddick said. “I love playing here. I probably had the best practice week I’ve ever had in leadup. It just didn’t translate tonight. ... I’m in a little bit of shock right now, to be honest. I’d give anything to go back four hours right now.”
Muller didn’t serve as fast as Roddick but that didn’t matter. Roddick couldn’t figure out how to break him in the tiebreaks and in the last two sets. Rather than asserting himself, Roddick looked flat as Muller dictated the match and forced the action, running up 65 winners to Roddick’s 39, though making 33 unforced errors to 15 by Roddick.
“I took some risks and maybe sometimes I was also lucky,” Muller said.
If ever a player deserved a turn of good fortune, and earned one by dint of hard work, it’s James Blake. To see him play so beautifully and with unfettered ease in a straight-sets takedown of former finalist Greg Rusedski in the afternoon was to watch a man who summoned a reservoir of inner strength from a year of unrelenting misery.
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Backed by his friends and many fans chanting “James! James!” in Arthur Ashe Stadium, Blake served a 131 mph ace to reach match point, then ripped a backhand passing shot to beat the No. 28 Rusedski, 7-5, 7-6 (3), 6-3.
Blake won his first tournament in three years on Sunday in New Haven, Conn., not far from where he grew up in Fairfield. It was a victory, a few weeks after he reached the final in Washington against Andy Roddick, that showed how far Blake had come since his lowest moments — when he lay in a hospital bed with a fractured neck last spring from a freak accident on court; or when he later contracted an illness that affected his sight and hearing and temporarily paralyzed part of his face; or when he watched his father dying of cancer last summer.
The United States swept favored Switzerland out of the Davis Cup on Saturday when Mardy Fish and Mike Bryan beat Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka 4-6, 6-3, 6-3, 6-3.
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Jeremy Lin hit a free throw with 4.9 seconds left to overcome a dreadful second half and lift the New York Knicks to their fifth straight victory, 100-98, over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
Doron Lamb hit a 3-pointer with 3:18 left to put No. 1 Kentucky ahead to stay, and the Wildcats took a big step toward a Southeastern Conference regular-season title by beating Vanderbilt 69-63 Saturday night for their 17th straight win.
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.
