Sports

(Editor’s note: This is excerpted from Mike Sando’s Pick Six of Dec. 18, 2023.)Sean Payton blasting quarterback Russell Wilson on the sideline, then suggesting he was merely upset about officiating, invited all sorts of speculation.It’s hard to fault Payton for losing his cool when officials wiped out a Broncos touchdown with an offensive offside call that seemed indefensible. As one former head coach put it, officials have “lost their minds” searching for penalties associated with Philadelphia’s tush-push plays.It’s just difficult to understand why Payton would funnel any of that rage toward his quarterback.GO DEEPERSean Payton downplays sideline flare up with Russell WilsonThe nature of Payton’s relationship with Wilson faded into the background during a five-game winning streak fueled b...

LAUDERDALE-BY-THE-SEA, Fla. — The Buffalo Bills have a new safety this season.He sometimes plays close to the line of scrimmage, even lining up in the gaps and banging helmets with interior linemen. They use him as a hybrid linebacker in a three-safety dime package. He has played free safety, strong safety, outside cornerback, inside cornerback, left linebacker and right linebacker. And more.Physically and mentally, he is being challenged, but he’s grateful, content and all in.The Bills’ new safety is Jordan Poyer. It’s the same Jordan Poyer who played for the team the previous six seasons, the only player in the NFL to have 500 or more tackles, 20 or more interceptions and 10 or more sacks in that time frame, a Bills captain for the fourth time, an Ed Block Courage Award winner in 2017, a...

It’s Jesse Lingard’s birthday. He turns 31 today and, at this stage of his life, he must realise it is not going to be easy shifting some of the perceptions that come from being a non-footballing footballer. For now, at least.Speak to Lingard’s former team-mates and they will talk about a guy who has been popular at all his clubs and played at a level, including a World Cup semi-final, that automatically commands respect among his fellow pros.But it is also a harsh reality that many others will be wondering how a player with Lingard’s record of achievement has spent so long without a club and seems less troubled by that situation than you might assume.Lingard last played competitive football in April, a two-minute substitute appearance for Nottingham Forest against his old club Manchester ...

There can’t be many footballers who have gone from playing for a military team to the cover of Vogue in a few months.But that’s just one of the ways South Korean striker Cho Gue-sung’s life has changed in the last year or so.Last year was a decent one for Cho. He joined Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors, one of Korea’s top teams, in 2020 but took a while to find his feet. He had been a defensive midfielder until only a few years before, moving up front to take better advantage of his 6ft 2in (188cm) height and pace, but he was still relatively young in the position.As Korean players sometimes do, he used his mandatory period of military service as a bit of a reset, and to help improve his physical condition. He joined Gimcheon Sangmu — a team comprised of players on military service that was in the s...

The 2024 WNBA Draft order is set. Indiana won the draft lottery Sunday, giving the Fever the first pick in what could be one of the deepest drafts in league history. Could is the operative word, as every draft-eligible senior in this class has the opportunity to return to college for a fifth season due to the COVID-19 bonus year given to every player who suited up in 2020-21.Indiana is the fourth team in the last decade to earn consecutive No. 1 picks after Seattle had the top selections in 2015 and 2016, Las Vegas had a three-year stretch of picking first from 2017-2019, and New York won the lottery in 2020 and 2021. The Storm won two titles with the duo of Jewell Loyd and Breanna Stewart, and the Aces have done the same with the trio of Kelsey Plum, A’ja Wilson and Jackie Young. The Feve...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — Tell me about your mom.Whoosh. Back to 1985. To the perfect family — Mom, Dad, older brother, younger sister — and their suburban Virginia home. Narrow driveway. Basketball hoop out front. That big window on your right when you walk in the front door, with a little ledge to sit on and peer out.And the soundtrack to this memory? Maybe an old soap opera, playing in the living room background; “General Hospital” was always Mom’s favorite. Or maybe a Jackson 5 record on the turntable. Or a ball clanking off the driveway rim, then bounce-bouncing across the street. Or, more likely, the soft snap of the net as the boy’s ball fell through.“Just a loving home,” Hubert Davis says, beaming. “Just … great.”Until it wasn’t. Until Mom — Bobbie Webb Davis — got that canker sore in he...

In 2017, Joye Lee-McNelis began writing her obituary.Where she was born. In the southern Mississippi community of Leetown.Preceded in death by. Then a blank space, not knowing if she would die before her parents.A note of thanks to her family, to the players she had coached, to the staffs she had worked with and the administrations she had worked for.McNelis had been diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. While thinking about her death, she focused on how her life would be remembered. Her husband, Dennis, thought she was crazy. She reassured him she wasn’t concerned about the act of dying. “I just want to plan it all out,” she told him. “There’s no need having you and our children worrying about it.” She wanted it to feel like a celebration.McNelis is now 61 and in her 20th season as Southern...

Raheem Mostert and Alec Ingold have been doubted by fans, opponents and even their own teams. It’s why they could never doubt each other. More information