A pair of reserves at third base have already been chosen to join the American League All-Star team in Texas next week, but there’s another choice with a strong argument and living quarters nearby. Josh Smith is batting over .300 the past two months and ranks in the top 30 in baseball in batting average (.292), OPS (.829), and doubles (19), which is second in the AL. He adds the versatility to play multiple infield positions, with 22 of his 82 games played at shortstop and the rest at the hot corner. Unfortunately for Smith, 26, the position is well-stocked on the AL roster. Rafael Devers (Red Sox) and Isaac Paredes (Rays) are in as reserves behind American League starter Jose Ramirez (Guardians). Smith helped spare the Rangers without Josh Jung in the first half, but he might not g…

Let us now embark on a tortuous NFL offseason journey that includes all of our favorite dummies and involves a starting quarterback trying to challenge two-thirds of First Take to an “octagon fight.” Raiders head coach Jon Gruden was recently asked about the possibility of selecting Kyler Murray with one of his team’s handful of first-round picks. Gruden said that Drew Brees’s success led him to reevaluate his somewhat parochial views towards smaller QBs, and that Murray was good at football. Given Derek Carr’s struggles last season and his occasionally combative relationship with Gruden, this led to speculation that Carr’s days with the Raiders could be dwindling. Yesterday, First Take host Max Kellerman connected those dots: “Carr didn’t want it. Gruden knows they g…

Today, we’re talking about doctors, the Mariners, capture the flag, being followed, and more. Your letters:Stosh: It could be that this has always been the case, but it definitely seems like only horrible people excel in the world today. Does it pay to be a pleasant person? It does. I know it doesn’t feel that way at the moment, but you can take cold comfort in the fact that history has often been kind to morally repugnant shitheads. It has, indeed, always been the case. I know Trump is in charge and that Trump is the world’s most hideous man, but people older than you and me have lived through the ascent and prosperity of plenty of other god-awful humans. That doesn’t mean you should use the Sackler family as a template for your own existence. The system really is set up so th…

It requires a pretty deep trust in the Browns’ incompetence to believe that their attempt to trade with the Bengals for A.J. McCarron was really undone by their own inability to file simple paperwork in a timely manner. Trust in the Cleveland Browns’ incompetence is pretty well-placed trust, sure, but some people were apparently still left looking for other answers—like, say, the possibility that the Browns intentionally fucked this one up in order to screw with the Bengals? Nope. Cleveland’s executive vice president of football operations Sashi Brown would like you to know that there was no strategy or intelligence of any kind behind this mistake. To those who would accuse them of foul play here: “That’s wholly untrue… To sabotage a trade just wouldn’t make any sense,�…

The Stacks is Deadspin's living archive of great journalism, curated by Bronx Banter's Alex Belth. Here are the best stories we published on it this year. My Dinner With Ali By Davis Miller | I'd been waiting for years. When it finally happened, it wasn't what I'd expected. But he's been fooling many of us for most of our lives. Read… Great Men Die Twice: Muhammad Ali In Decline By Mark Kram | Two years after that last fight, Ali seemed as mystified as everyone else as to why he hadn't ended his career earlier. His was living with his third wife, the ice goddess Veronica, in an L.A. mansion, surrounded by the gifts of a lifetime—a six-foot hand carved tiger given to him by Teng Hsiao-ping, a robe given to him by Elvis Presley. Fatigued, his ha…

Game 1 of the World Series is tonight, which means that it's time for you to read a lot of things about the Giants and Tigers so that you can sound smart when talking about the series at work. Here is what we've had to say about the Giants and Tigers this year. Which Will Prince Fielder And Miguel Cabrera Reach First: 600 Combined Homers Or 600 Combined Pounds? And with Cabrera signed through 2015, each member of the tandem needs to average a mere 11.7 home runs per season, while gaining 6.9 pounds, for them to reach the fabled 600 mark. Read » Delmon Young Is By Far The Worst Player To Ever Win The ALCS MVP Granted, Young's career isn't over yet, but he hasn't done anything more notable than allegedly committing a hate crime. The highest WAR he's ever…

For many of you, the day after Thanksgiving requires you to put on your best Gap sport coat, head out to the local beef-and-beer drink your way through a high school reunion. Sometimes, the outcomes are disastrous. Heed these warnings Back in 2008 during the Thanksgiving holiday a few of my high school friends and I decided to visit the local tavern for a couple drinks like most college age kids, since the group was back together for the weekend. We'd been doing this for the past few years checking out old classmates to see who got fat, who got hot and to try to run into some of the girls that got away. Well that year some of the kids from our old high school that I wasn't really friends with decided that it would be a good idea to have a charity bar crawl to honor one of thei…

data-mm-id=”_h1qr1mtp8″>Green Bay Packers fans have stormed Southern California and taken over this week's game between their beloved Packers and the Los Angeles Chargers. It's yet another embarrassment for the Chargers who, in their third year in Los Angeles, can't seem to find enough fans to pack a 25,000-seat stadium. Check out some of the ridiculousness from today:The #Packers take the field to thunderous applause. Welcome to L.A.mbeau Field. #GBvsLAC pic.twitter.com/fT4awY3BGA— Derek Togerson (@DerekNBCSD) November 3, 2019Comparing the ovations for the Packers and Chargers here in LA. pic.twitter.com/ddj5B8SAGM— Rob Demovsky (@RobDemovsky) November 3, 2019Looks like 95% Packer fans out in Lambeau west @packeverywhere #GBvsLAC pic.twitter.com/LgitOPSehX— Hogg (…

data-mm-id=”_0tgmxa1h1″>The Super Bowl has finally arrived, and we here at The Big Lead have some bold predictions for it. The Chiefs Stifle the Niners' Ground Attack The Chiefs have the 29th-ranked run defense in the NFL by the yards per game metric. But in their last five games, they've only given up more than 100 yards once, and the most they've given up in that timespan is 122 to the Raiders. They kept Derrick Henry to double-digit yards in the AFC title game, something very few teams have managed to do this season. So they keep it up and surprise everyone by holding the Niners to less than 150 yards total rushing. Chris Jones will be a monster and the Chiefs rely on their sideline-to-sideline speed to keep the run game in check. — Liam McKeone Jimmy Garoppolo More …

data-mm-id=”_x8wdz3yis”>The top-seed Los Angeles Lakers did the thinkable on Saturday night when they eliminated the eight-seed Portland Trail Blazers from the first round of the Western Conference playoffs. The Lakers won four consecutive games in such a convincing manner that the outcome seemed incredibly obvious from the start. And yet…From the minute it looked like the Blazers would make a run at the final spot in the Western Conference, people were coming forward to proclaim them a huge obstacle for the Lakers. Charles Barkley said the Blazers could / would beat the Lakers before the season even resumed. And he wasn't alone. As the Blazers blazed through the seeding games, beating the Grizzlies and taking Game 1 of the Lakers series, the Portland bandwagon filled up quickly…