Flag On The Play! Playoffs May Shift Focus From Football's Fumbles
For years, the great brouhaha in college football was its lack of a real playoff. But at last we have one — the four qualifying teams to be announced Sunday. The irony is that the erstwhile playoff...
View ArticleDeford: It's Hard To Write A Christmas Story About Sport
Several years ago, I wrote a sports Christmas story. It was about a greedy basketball superstar who, imbued with Yuletide cheer, helps save his small-market franchise. A big-time producer wanted to...
View ArticleCrowning The 33rd-Best Football Team In America
So, we finally have our first official college football championship, and something like 50 million or so fans will be watching to see whether Oregon or Ohio State is the 33rd-best team in the country....
View ArticleThe Tennis Court Offers A Good Lesson For The NFL
More than half a century ago, there was a best-selling book — and then a movie — titled The Ugly American . The title was a twist, because the plot featured attractive Americans who were, however,...
View ArticleDear Aging Athletes: Say Hello To Goodbye
When Fred Astaire was 69, he gave up dancing, explaining: "At my age, I don't want to disappoint anyone, including myself." All great athletes should keep that quotation up on their bathroom mirror. Of...
View ArticleDeford: NCAA Fans Continue To Drink Deeply Of The (Sports) Spirits
OK, after an eight-year investigation, the NCAA hit Syracuse University and its basketball coach, Jim Boeheim, with all sorts of penalties for academic and recruiting violations. Normally in sports...
View ArticleNews From The Charity Stripe
It's the venerable custom in tennis and golf for the crowd to be still and quiet when players hit their shots. Now, since even ordinary baseball batters have some success hitting against 98 mph...
View Article'Borland Effect' A Fumble For Football? Deford Says It Will Pass
Once again, the question of the NFL's pre-eminence — even existence — has been raised with the retirement of Chris Borland , a very good player, who has walked away from the game and millions of...
View ArticleBruce Jenner's Long History Of Clearing Hurdles
In an interview airing Friday on ABC, Bruce Jenner is expected to announce that he is transgender, though he has made no such acknowledgment. As the public awaits his presumed revelations, Jenner is...
View ArticleBoxing Fans Shift Focus To Small Men, Big Money
It was long an article of faith among sport cognoscenti that nothing in athletics approached the sheer electric drama and glamour of a heavyweight championship fight. Well, if you missed it, they had...
View ArticleThe Other Sacred Thing Tom Brady Squashed: Sportsmanship
Sport may be dismissed as inconsequential child's play, but there is, in counterpoint, the ideal that sport is our best model for human fairness and equality — a Garden of Eden with competition. But,...
View ArticleFor Love Or Money: Fans And Businesses Flock To Fantasy Sports
In the famous Disney movie, a carpenter named Geppetto longed to have a son. He carved a puppet of a boy, and, wouldn't you know it, the wooden Pinocchio magically became a real child. Fantasy games...
View ArticleDeford To Hollywood: Ban Boxing Movies
Some people wanna ban boxing. I just wanna ban boxing movies. You get the feeling sometimes that Hollywood still thinks Joe Louis is heavyweight champion and boxing is still top-tier popular? Yes,...
View ArticleWhy Is There An Extra Point In Football, And Do We Need It?
On Wednesday, in honor of footballs that are inflated, we must discuss extra points. The NFL is monkeying around with the extra point again. You think it should? Do you have a better idea? Do we even...
View ArticleYogi Berra, The Ultimate In Athletic Americana
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST: Yogi Berra died last night at the age of 90. In remembrance of his passing, let's go back 10 years and listen to a commentary Frank Deford...
View ArticleNBA Dares To Speak Out On Gun Violence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPcZo-f6Fhc It's an incident largely forgotten, but in 1964, the NBA — then a struggling fourth-string major league — finally got its All-Star Game on prime-time TV. The...
View ArticleRose Is Banned From Baseball, But What About Accused Steroid Users?
We start 2016 with a command: that the subject of Pete Rose and the Hall of Fame is over, finis, kaput forever and ever. As sure as we will no longer discuss whether Lindsey Graham or George Pataki can...
View ArticleSoccer, The Normal-Sized Player's Game
Much as we talk about certain financial institutions that may be too big to fail, you can be absolutely certain that the one organization in the whole wide world that truly fits that definition is...
View ArticleAfter Years Of Mediocrity, The Dallas Cowboys Have The NFL's Best Record
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit DAVID GREENE, HOST: OK, let's stay in Texas now, where after two decades of futility, the Dallas Cowboys are back on top of the NFL. And commentator Frank Deford...
View ArticleBaseball's Proposed Changes Are 'Not So Good,' Says Frank Deford
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: With a new baseball season just around the corner - new baseball season - there are some proposed new rules aimed at making America's...
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