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Youthful Enthusiasm
This year’s NBA playoffs provide a stern challenge to the conventional NBA wisdom that youth, sooner or later, crack under the weight of the intense media scrutiny and high fan expectations, and that the veterans will come out ahead. I’ve always doubted the conventional wisdom, and not just because it’s what I do for a…
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Putting It All on the Line
Football fans going through withdrawal pains get a much needed fix this weekend when the madcap mayhem known as the NFL draft arrives to dominate center stage of the sports world. What with hours upon hours already spent on draft previews and mock drafts, as well as round the clock coverage on ESPN, the draft…
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NBA Playoffs Off to Upsetting Start
Pat Riley was always fond of saying that a playoff series doesn’t begin in earnest until the road team wins a game; his rationale is that home court is a huge advantage in the NBA. Riley probably liked the action this weekend in the NBA playoffs; four road teams won. The first round of the…
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Playoff Fatigue
David Halberstam wrote many great—and long—books, most notably Playing for Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made, but my favorite of these is The Breaks of the Game. He spends the 1979-80 season with the Portland Trail Blazers. The glow of their legendary 1977 title team had just faded, and what was left was…
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NBA Losers–The Story So Far
The big winners in the NBA’s annual 82-game marathon are either jockeying for playoff seeding or tweaking their rosters for the two-month sprint to a title. Lesser winners, like point guard Devin Harris of the New Jersey Nets, are probably clearing space on the mantle for a Most Improved Player Award, and the fan base…
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When Boxing Was King
The three boxing matches between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier were the most galvanizing sporting events of the 1970s. They took on a cultural significance that readily transcended the world of sports. Each man became an icon with contrasting images. Ali—brash, articulate and handsome, easily won the war for the hearts and minds over the…
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Hammerin’ Hank
When I was growing up in Chicago, my father took me to a lot of baseball games. Some were just your typical father-son outings, others were special. We might have been on our way to Wrigley Field or Comiskey Park, but in my dad’s eyes we were off to see greatness in action: Willie Mays…
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The Real Reason UNC Won
When the matchup for the finals in the NCAA men’s basketball championship was set between the University of North Carolina Tar Heels and the Michigan State Spartans on Saturday night, one analyst after another began counseling fans to ignore the Tar Heel-Spartan game on Dec. 3 at Ford Field. In that game, UNC ran out…
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Baseball: A Season Preview
Baseball gets its 2009 season underway this weekend, and rather than break out a crystal ball about all 30 teams, let’s look at a few key flashpoints. There won’t be a “this year’s Rays.” Last season, the Tampa Bay Rays stunned the sports world by going from a perennial cellar dweller, 66-96 in 2007 for…
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A UNC-UConn Final Makes the Most Sense
For years—decades really—I’ve drifted away from college basketball. As I lamented a year ago, it wasn’t the same game I watched as a kid and as a young adult. It was exciting, no doubt, but the quality of play had declined. I still watched, but the thrill was gone for me. This season, I came…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
