At first glance, Eric Thames’ thick build and stern facial features – including his trademark, creative facial hair – give him an intimidating look. His upper body resembles that of a superhero, with tattoos running through distinct arm lines created by bulging muscles on his large frame. Upon talking to him, though, you realize that not […]

Rating: 9/10 On April 5, 2011, a Toronto Maple Leafs loss officially ended their playoff run. Almost like clockwork, the Toronto Sun began a series on what’s wrong with the Leafs in the next day’s paper. The regularity of this kind of sportswriting, where a columnist takes it upon themselves to explain why a team’s […]

And then there were 12? Twelve teams in the increasingly inaccurately named Big Ten, that is. For the 2011 season, the Nebraska Cornhuskers will be joining a conference that was already saddled with a misnomer thanks to the addition of Penn State in 1990. In the process, they’ve made college football’s conference names look even […]

For the second straight year Team Canada arrived home from the IIHF World Hockey Championships with the bitter taste of a quarter-finals exit in their mouth. Historically, Canada has not dominated the spring championship, as they have captured just five gold medals since professionals began playing in 1976. Conversely, it is rare for Canada to be shut-out of the […]

Baseball has been full of surprises this year. Francisco Liriano threw a six-walk no-hitter despite having never thrown a complete game in his career, Manny Ramirez abruptly retired, and after starting the season 0-6, the Tampa Bay Rays sit atop the AL East. One that nobody saw coming was the Cleveland Indians owning baseball’s best record at […]

Russell Westbrook is sitting on the court, head lowered, arms resting on knees. It’s the end of the second overtime in Memphis and the game is going to a third overtime. He’s tired and it’s not hard to see why, he’s been on the court almost the whole game. Before it’s over, he’ll end up spending […]

Growing up just north of Pittsburgh in Gibsonia, PA., Brandon Saad idolized the Penguins’ multitude of offensive dynamos — the likes of Mario Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr and more recently Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. It’s ironic then that Saad, the 19th ranked North American skater and top-rated U.S. prospect on Central Scouting’s final rankings for the 2011 NHL […]

The social media juggernaut that is Twitter has caused a great many NFL headlines of late, but just how many of these headlines have come about solely as a result of the ongoing lockout is debatable. There’s a school of thought that ESPN and other mainstream sports sites are grasping at anything even remotely resembling news to fill the […]

Under a minute remained in the Detroit Red Wings’ season. The San Jose Sharks, up 3-2 in the third period of Game 7, were resisting another possible comeback. Having already overturned a 3-0 deficit, the Red Wings were ready to claw back into one last game. Pavel Datsyuk scored minutes earlier to bring the Red Wings to within […]

It is with great sadness that we discuss yesterday’s passing of legendary Hall of Fame slugger Harmon Killebrew at age 74. Since last Friday’s announcement that Killebrew would be stopping treatment in his fight with esophageal cancer and entering hospice care, there has been an outpour of support for the famed Minnesota Twin. For those new to […]