If we had to pick two things that would keep even an avid linksman off the courses this time of year, they would be the oppressive heat and the time commitment. Even in nice weather it can be tough to set aside a couple hours to hit a ball towards…
It’s been said that the toughest thing to do in football is beat a team three times. If that’s the case, then the Arizona Rattlers are lucky to be playing the San Jose SaberCats in the first round of the AFL playoffs. Although the SaberCats swept the Rattlers in their…
One of the best things about Major League Baseball is that its playoff system is so exclusive. With only a handful of spots available, a team really has to excel at something to even be in sniffing distance of the playoffs. The Arizona Diamondbacks don’t excel at pitching or hitting,…
Sports never seem to come back into fashion after they stop being popular. Competitive bodybuilding is a perfect example. It’s hard to imagine a bodybuilder today being a household name like Lou Ferrigno or Arnold Schwarzenegger once were. Nowadays some of the most successful bodybuilding organizations are the ones trying…
It’s hard to believe, but the Phoenix Mercury is still very much in the WNBA title hunt. Despite winning only four games during the first two months of the season, the Mercury is still within striking distance of fourth place — and the playoff seed that goes with it. If…
The Cardinals, the Sun Devils, and the Wildcats have given local football fans more reasons to be angry and nihilistic than happy. With all of the pain and suffering those teams have inflicted on loyal fans, the success of the Arizona Rattlers tends to get overlooked. They haven’t gotten much…
Something must be seriously wrong with Chase Field’s feng shui. Short of bad luck, this is just about the only explanation we can think of as to how the Diamondbacks have managed to play better while on the road for the first half of this season. The D-Backs woes at…
We struggle to think of a sports team that has cashed in on being bad more than the Chicago Cubs. The Cubs management has fielded a century’s worth of ringless and mostly hapless baseball squads while somehow succeeding in shifting the blame onto a goat. Cubs fans, for their part,…
The last Diamondbacks game we attended was in early May, when our boys took on San Francisco. Late in the third inning, Diamondback Gerardo Parra ripped a ball into right-center field, where it bounced over the wall and into the outstretched, overly tan arm of Dan Majerle, who caught the…
Corey Gaines must have insulted a fortune-teller during the off-season. The Phoenix Mercury coach has had a run of bad luck that started when forward Penny Taylor — one of the Mercury’s two star players — went down with a season-ending knee injury in April. It got worse when Diana…
Bob Melvin knows first-hand how rough the job market is. The last time Melvin coached a game at Chase Field (as the Arizona Diamondbacks’ manager) he left the stadium unemployed. Despite being just two years removed from winning the MLB Manager of the Year award, Melvin was unemployed for more…
If past performance could be trusted, the Phoenix Mercury would have nothing to worry about this weekend. In the last two seasons, the Tulsa Shock has exactly as many wins against the Mercury as your niece’s youth-league team does. It’s not just that Shock failed to win; they usually struggled…
It has not been a good month for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Injuries to key players, cold bats, and bad pitching have combined to knock the D-backs below .500. At the moment, the defending NL West champions seem more likely to finish in the cellar than as champions. The D-Backs can…
If there’s one thing that unites basically everyone between the ages of 21 and 40 — regardless of gender, color, or creed — it is the lingering regret that we pretty much all share for not appearing on a Nickelodeon game show at some point in our lives. No matter…
The last meeting between the Arizona Rattlers and the Chicago Rush proved true the old adage that football is a game of inches. On the game’s final play, the Rush recovered a live ball in the end zone for an apparent game-winning touchdown. As it turned out, the ball had…
So far, this year’s version of the Arizona Diamondbacks has been as scattered as Joaquin Phoenix on a promotional tour. The team started their first week hot by sweeping their division rival San Francisco Giants and stealing two of three from the Padres in San Diego. Unfortunately, the D-Backs followed…
We’ll never understand what makes us watch the NFL draft. No amount of football starvation can explain why we’re willing to spend hours watching a dude read off a bunch of names. And yet we still find ourselves glued to the television. If you can’t help but watch the draft,…
Living legends tend to live a little longer in baseball. This, perhaps, is why there was relatively little fanfare surrounding last month’s announcement that Atlanta Braves third baseman Chipper Jones would retire at the end of the season. The 40-year-old Jones has been in the majors for so long that…
Unless you count fake sports like horseshoes, slow-pitch softball is the most egalitarian of sports. In most other sports, success belongs to the people who have the most God-given talent. In the realm of slow-pitch, however, there’s a place on the field for everybody from highly trained athletes to completely…
When the Phoenix Suns hosted the Los Angeles Lakers last February, the Suns had nothing to play for but pride. The Suns weren’t scoring quite as well as they used to and, consequently, they weren’t winning nearly as often as they used to. The Suns managed to beat the Lakers…
For avid sports fans, March means one thing: putting five dollars into an office pool to fill out a college basketball bracket that will be worthless in three weeks. Chances are good that this year was especially vexing for serious bracketeers, whose month was likely ruined around the same time…
People tend to pay more to watch high-stakes sports games, but there’s something to be said for a baseball game with low impact. Sometimes it’s nice to be able to kick back with a cold brew, watch the game half-heartedly, and relax. With the MLB regular season starting next week…
