Happy Friday, and welcome to all the new readers who have signed up for our World Cup coverage!
Unfortunately, this could be the last-ever edition of Sports! The Newsletter. If the Knicks win Saturday night I will walk into the joyous riots on the streets of Manhattan and die happy. Don’t cry for me, it’s how I want to go. My final request is that nobody use footage of my body being ripped to shreds for a Kalshi commercial.
– Rodger Sherman
Today’s Lineup
A breakdown of how the Knicks keep smashing probabilities
Our first World Cup roundup … and it’s already weird!
The [NAME REDACTED] A’s know how to mash dingers at least
📈 The Comeback Kings 📈
My wife doesn’t watch a lot of sports, but she clearly understands the Knicks better than me.
It keeps happening like this: The Knicks go down by some huge margin, I get depressed and angsty, and she’ll be totally confused as to why I’m depressed and angsty. What’s the big deal? They’re gonna come back and win!
And I’m like … look, I appreciate you, I love that we’ve been watching these postseason games together, I know you’re trying to cheer me up, but nobody has ever come back from this specific deficit. They’re down by too much with too little time remaining. It’s essentially statistically impossible. I’ll be fine. They’ll win the next game.
And she’s like … why don’t you believe in them? They have Jalen Brunson!
And she keeps being right.
The Knicks came back from 29 points down to beat the Spurs in Game 4 of the NBA Finals, winning on an iconic OG Anunoby tip-in with 1.2 seconds left. Not only was this the largest comeback in NBA Finals history, it was the ninth-largest comeback in any NBA game ever.
This keeps happening. Wednesday was the second Knicks comeback from 20-plus points down in the fourth quarter in these playoffs alone, after they beat the Cavaliers from down 22 points with eight minutes left. And last year, they became the first team with three 20-point comebacks in the same postseason — pulling off two in back-to-back games to go up 2-0 on the Celtics, and then another against the Pacers.
The Knicks’ comeback prowess is unexplainable. I’m gonna try to explain it.
I promise, I am not just a homer making bold statements. I swear. The Knicks’ comeback stats are some of the most unbelievable I’ve ever seen in sports.
In this Finals alone, the Knicks have two of the top five comebacks in NBA Finals history — the 29-point comeback on Wednesday, and the 14-point comeback in Game 1.
Josh Dubow of the AP has a bunch of stats about the unlikelihood of what’s going on here: Teams trailing by 20 points in the fourth quarter of postseason games are 5-751 all-time. The Knicks have two of those five wins in this postseason. The Knicks actually have a winning record in playoff games when they’ve trailed by 20 points over the past two seasons at 5-3. Everybody else in the league is 4-71.
So how do they keep doing this? First reason: They are very good at basketball. It is easier to outscore your opponent by a lot of points in a short amount of time when you are very good at basketball!
Second reason: Jalen Brunson’s clutch performances have been near-impossible. In the fourth quarters of these playoffs, he’s averaging 9.5 points on 55 percent shooting (including 52 percent from three) and 92 percent from the free throw line. He also has a 38 percent usage rate. In plain English: He’s scoring at a 40-points-per-game pace with a level of efficiency that no player has ever kept up for an entire season, while also shooting the ball more often than any NBA player this year. That’s nuts.
Third reason: The mighty Wu-Tang Clan, whose halftime show empowered the Knicks to jump like Rod Strickland. The Knicks were plus-27 after Wu-Tang’s halftime performance Wednesday, giving Wu-Tang the third-best +/- in the Finals behind Karl-Anthony Towns and Jose Alvarado. Wemby studied under the wrong Shaolin monks.
But weirdly, what I think the Knicks’ comebacks come down to is … the same reason they were able to record some of the biggest blowouts ever. In these playoffs, the Knicks have three of the 50 biggest wins in NBA playoff history, including a 51-point win over the Hawks (the fifth-biggest playoff win ever), in addition to wins by 39 and 37.
What stood out to me from those wins: The Knicks just kept playing the same way, no matter the situation. On their shared podcast, Josh Hart talked about how Jalen Brunson was in the huddle, yelling about mistakes and maintaining intensity throughout those wins. And it worked. They went up 20, then they went up 30, then they went up 40, then they went up 50.
Here’s my theory: The key to turning 20-point leads into 50-point leads is wiring everyone’s brains to treat every situation exactly the same. The Knicks may seem like a volatile team because of all these huge point swings, but really those are due to a remarkably consistent on-court ethos.
That mentality clearly isn’t there yet for their opponents, who keep failing to build on 20-point leads. The Spurs have now suffered three late-game catastrophes, from Victor Wembanyama throwing the ball off his teammate’s back, to De’Aaron Fox attempting a needless layup when he should’ve tried to dribble out the clock, to Wemby missing two free throws.
I feel like I sound like an idiot when I’m writing about the Knicks. Every two days you open up your inbox and I’m like “my favorite team is winning because they are a Perfect Basketball Team and possess an Ideal Sports Mindset, which has allowed them to have The Greatest Playoffs Anybody Has Ever Had, while their opponents are crumbling because they are mentally weak.”
BUT IT’S TRUE. IT’S TRUE. NOBODY HAS EVER DONE ANY OF THESE THINGS BEFORE. THEY’RE TOUCHING GOD EVERY NIGHT OUT THERE. THE ONLY LOGICAL REACTION IS TO GO OUT TO THE STREETS AND JUMP UP AND DOWN WITH 10,000 STRANGERS AND RIP A FIRE HYDRANT OUT OF THE GROUND WITH YOUR BARE HANDS. THAT WATER BELONGS TO EVERYBODY. KNICKS IN FIVE.
So yeah. I’m actually dialing down my thoughts here. I promise to write as effusively about your team if they have The Greatest Playoffs Anybody Has Ever Had!
🇲🇽 Mexico 2, 🇿🇦 South Africa 0
The World Cup got off to a weird start, with more straight red cards (three) in this one match than in the entire 2022 World Cup (two, although there were also two double-yellow ejections in Qatar.) You’re probably thinking, “damn, must have been a crazy violent game!” but … not really. Two of the red cards were for pretty meh infractions. It’s unclear whether this was just an official savoring his moment on the world stage or a sign of a strictly officiated Cup to come.
🇰🇷 South Korea 2, 🇨🇿 Czechia 1
This was the good stuff. Czechia went up 1-0, but South Korea came back and won on an 80th-minute goal by Oh Hyeon-gyu. Czechia’s biggest weapon might be defender Vladimír Coufal, who created the team’s best chances through the sheer power of his booming throw-ins. Their first goal was from a header off a long throw, and they nearly equalized on another long throw in the 82nd minute. Long throws have become a legit threat in recent years; a player who can chuck the ball as powerfully as Coufal can turn any run-of-the-mill out-of-bounds into a corner kick.
What the FOX?
On Wednesday I hinted that maybe you should watch the Telemundo broadcast instead of FOX. Thursday’s games gave us two more reasons to try the Spanish feed.
Ahead of the first match of the World Cup, FIFA put on an opening ceremony featuring Shakira. (It’s her fourth World Cup appearance, tying her with Maradona and Pelé, among others.) FOX, oddly, opted not to show this, instead sticking with their talking heads discussing the United States’ lineup from a studio setup at an empty SoFi Stadium in LA. Telemundo, of course, did show the opening ceremony.
It was one of the most bizarre choices in sports broadcasting history. FOX paid $500 million to broadcast this World Cup, an event whose biggest selling point is global spectacle. FIFA gave them a global spectacle, and FOX declined to broadcast it. Who in their right mind would rather listen to Alexi Lalas than Shakira????
And during the actual games, FOX used the in-game hydration break, which has been scheduled midway through each half, to show more commercials, while Telemundo stuck with the games and let their commentators speak. Even if you don’t speak Spanish, watching whatever is happening in the stadium is significantly more interesting than watching an ad.
American World Cup Moment of the Day
The Tartan Army has arrived stateside. Here’s a video posted at 7:06 a.m. by a groggy, but amused, Bostonian of his new Scottish neighbors busting out the wake-up bagpipes:
It’s Scotland’s first World Cup since 1998, and they’re gonna make it count from sunrise well past sunset. The biggest issue so far: The plane to Boston ran out of beer.
🎰 Jackpot! 🎰
Written by Aidan Weiss.
Las Vegas has become a hotbed for professional sports over the past decade, with the current Stanley Cup finalist Golden Knights and three-time WNBA champs Aces putting their roots down in 2017. (And the NFL’s Raiders in 2019, laughably less successfully than those first two.) Now the city will be getting baseball too, with the [NAME REDACTED] Athletics planning to move to town before the 2028 MLB season.
The Athletics left Oakland in the most miserable way possible following the 2024 season. They left years before their new Vegas stadium would be ready, and are in their second of three scheduled seasons toiling out of Sacramento’s AAA stadium. They’ve made only tepid attempts to embrace their temporary home. The Athletics are literally refusing to tell us where they play. They don’t even have a City Connect jersey because there’s no city to connect to. Vibes are bleak.
We thought we had identified every bad thing about the team’s move to Las Vegas … but we may have found another one: Las Vegas might be a terrible place to play baseball. And not for the reasons you’d expect!
This week, the A's have been making some attempt to establish a new home with a six-game “homestand” at the ballpark for their AAA affiliate, Las Vegas Aviators. And the games are cartoonishly dinger-heavy. The Athletics and Brewers combined for 22(!!!!) homers in their three-game set this week. Will the Athletics’ Vegas home be Coors Field 2.0?
Game 1 finished with a preposterous score of 15-14 in 12 innings in favor of Milwaukee, in which the two teams combined for 11 home runs. The Athletics bounced back, winning the second game 7-5 (five more A’s homers), and the rubber match 4-3 (three more).
Despite the bad vibes surrounding every other aspect of the team, the A’s actually have a ton of great young hitting talent right now. Reigning Rookie of the Year first baseman Nick Kurtz gets the headlines, but shortstop Jacob Wilson finished second in AL ROY voting last year behind his teammate, catcher Shea Langeliers is a bopper, and left fielder Tyler Soderstrom has some pop too.
Kurtz and Soderstrom had three homers apiece in the series (Soderstrom CRUSHED two lefty-lefty dingers in the first game), and Langeliers had a 421-foot bomb in Game 1 as well.
However, it was the unexpected players getting the job done for the A’s in this series. Game 1 also saw homers from utilityman Zack Gelof and a pinch-hit shot from backup catcher Jonah Heim, who was cut by Atlanta earlier this season.
Heim’s home run was hit 94 miles per hour at a 48-degree launch angle. That is a routine flyout in every other stadium. I mean literally: the ball wouldn't have left any other stadium. According to Statcast tracking, Heim's deep flyball would have been a home run in zero MLB ballparks:
The Brewers have the fourth-lowest team ERA in MLB even after this nightmare of a series, so it wasn’t like the A's were playing a coach-pitch Little League opponent. And Milwaukee ranks 28th in home runs as of this writing, but even they got in on the action, hitting seven homers of their own.
The dinger onslaught could have been a fluke, or something specific to this minor league stadium … but it might also be a Las Vegas baseball phenomenon. Vegas will have the second-highest elevation of any MLB park (slightly over 2,000 feet) and it’s in the middle of the desert, where it’s always hot and dry — conditions that help baseballs fly farther.
Baseball America calculated the best hitters’ parks in minor league baseball. The Las Vegas ballpark is second, despite a large outfield. Notably, the rest of the top five (Albuquerque, El Paso, Amarillo, and Vegas’ closest neighbors in Reno) have similar conditions to Vegas — all located over 2,000 feet of elevation, all in the Southwest where it’s hot and dry.
While the A's Las Vegas stretch is halfway done, guess who comes to town for the last three games? Colorado! I’m sure Rockies pitchers usually like road trips because they can get out of the elevated air, but they'll find no solace in Sin City this weekend.
🏃 War Eagle World Record 🏃
The NCAA track and field championships are happening, but why settle for being the best in college when you can be the best in the world? Auburn’s Ja’Kobe Tharp set the world record by running a 12.75 in the 110m hurdles on Wednesday:
The record had stood since 2012, when Aries Merritt ran a 12.8 a few weeks after the London Olympics. It’s the first world record set at an NCAA championship since 1976 … and it wasn’t even in the final! These were the prelims! We’ll see if he can break his record (and oh yeah, win an NCAA championship) Friday afternoon.
🥎💣 Welcome to the league, goodbye to that ball 💣🥎
Just a couple weeks after setting the NCAA single-season home run record, Megan Grant made her pro debut in the AUSL, and hit the longest homer in league history.
They didn’t say how far the previous longest home run in AUSL history went. No need! I saw the video, and that’s definitely the longest homer in league history!
On Deck is written by Aidan Weiss and Rodger Sherman.
🤠🗽 Spurs-Knicks 🗽🤠
Knicks lead 3-1. Game 5 Saturday, 8:30 p.m. ET in San Antonio (ABC)
Victor Wembanyama looks tired. San Antonio’s big man has played 40 minutes a game in these Finals after averaging 29 during the regular season, and it seems to have affected his shooting. He’s down to 43% on the series, a far cry from his 56% regular season numbers. Simply put, the Spurs need MVP Wemby if they want to win these next three.
🎰⛈️ Golden Knights-Hurricanes ⛈️🎰
Carolina leads 3-2. Game 6 Saturday, 8 p.m. ET in Las Vegas (ABC)
After a two-goal lead was relinquished in each of the first four games of the series, Carolina went up 3-1 in Game 5 and just … hung on to win 4-2?! I didn’t know they could do that. Carolina has also scored four goals or more in every game so far. Vegas goalie Carter Hart needs to be better.
⚾️🏟️ Men’s College World Series ⚾️🏟️
Starts Friday at 1 p.m. ET, and runs through June 22 in Omaha (ESPN)
We’re rooting for the two teams making their MCWS debuts, West Virginia and Troy. West Virginia could be a contender for the Jello Shot championship, although Ole Miss already has a commanding lead. (If only this were the moonshine challenge …)
🏏 Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup 🏏
Starts Friday, runs through July 5th in England
Australia has won six World Cups, while nobody else has more than one … but England won the last time it hosted in 2009. Unfortunately, Team USA fell one spot short of qualifying ☹️
⚽️🌎 WORLD CUP 🌎⚽️
🇶🇦 Qatar 🇶🇦 vs. 🇨🇭 Switzerland 🇨🇭
Saturday, 3 p.m. ET in Santa Clara (FOX/Telemundo/Peacock)
Qatar actually qualified for this World Cup, coming off their only previous appearance in 2022 when they got an auto-bid as the hosts. (It didn’t go well; they were outscored 7-1.) Switzerland hopes to take the next step this go-around; they made the knockout rounds in the last three competitions but failed to win a do-or-die game.
🇧🇷 Brazil 🇧🇷 vs. 🇲🇦 Morocco 🇲🇦
Saturday, 6 p.m. ET in New Jersey (FOX/Telemundo/Peacock)
Juiciest matchup of the weekend. Morocco went the farthest any African nation has ever gone when they made the semis in Qatar, but Brazil is always a powerhouse. Interestingly, Brazil limped through qualifiers and would’ve needed to win the intercontinental playoff under the 32-team system. What Brazil squad will show up?
🇭🇹 Haiti 🇭🇹 vs. 🏴 Scotland 🏴
Saturday, 9 p.m. ET in Foxboro (FOX/Telemundo/Peacock)
First time in a while for both these nations, with Haiti’s last World Cup appearance in 1974 while Scotland’s was 1998. We’ve got a soft spot for Haiti after they qualified without playing any home matches. You think stadium security will let fans bring bagpipes into the stadium?
🇦🇺 Australia 🇦🇺 vs. 🇹🇷 Turkey 🇹🇷
Sunday, 12 a.m. ET in Vancouver (FS1/Telemundo/Peacock)
World Cup after dark! Turkey got third at the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and haven’t made it back since. This is the United States’ group … we’ll need more info, but Team USA would slightly benefit more from someone winning this game rather than a draw, per The Athletic’s simulator.
🇩🇪 Germany 🇩🇪 vs. 🇨🇼 Curaçao 🇨🇼
Sunday, 1 p.m. ET in Houston (FOX/Telemundo/Peacock)
We’ve got an NFL-style spread here: Germany is favored by 3.5 goals. They’ve won four World Cups, while the Curaçaoans are playing their very first World Cup game. Hope they can keep it close!
🇳🇱 Netherlands 🇳🇱 vs. 🇯🇵 Japan 🇯🇵
Sunday, 4 p.m. ET in Dallas (FOX/Telemundo/Peacock)
A 4 p.m. Sunday kickoff in Jerryworld. They are, in fact, closing the blinds.
🇨🇮 Cote D’Ivoire 🇨🇮 vs. 🇪🇨 Ecuador 🇪🇨
Sunday, 7 p.m. ET in Philadelphia (FS1, Telemundo, Peacock)
Potentially the most important game of the weekend, as these teams are almost certain to finish the group between Germany and Curaçao in the standings. Whoever takes second is through, while whoever finishes third will need points. I know pre-World Cup friendlies aren’t important … but this Ivorian team actually beat France 2-1 last week!
🇸🇪 Sweden 🇸🇪 vs. 🇹🇳 Tunisia 🇹🇳
Sunday, 10 p.m. ET in Monterrey (FS1/Telemundo/Peacock)
Sweden feels similar to the United States, with “best generation” talk and questionable defense. We’ll see if it comes together against Tunisia, who literally did not allow a goal in World Cup qualifying.
Over the past few months we’ve been getting help from Aidan Weiss. You may have noticed that he’s been writing some of the “On Deck” sections, but mainly he’s been helping with behind-the-scenes stuff. Aidan is gonna go enjoy his summer now, but first I wanted to let everybody know about his podcast, 450 Dead Center in the Mornings.
You know how this newsletter is a roundup of all the sports stuff in the world? The podcast is a 10-to-15-minute roundup of all the baseball stuff that happened last night. It’s very useful for baseball casuals like me who want to know what’s going on without spending three-plus hours a night locked in on MLB.TV. Check it out!
Thank you for reading and for your support!
⚙️ I write roundups about the NFL, college football, college basketball, and the Olympics. You can turn individual sports on or off via ‘Manage Profile’ in the top-right corner.
💬 I love reading your comments! Feel free to leave one here.
😎 Enjoy this column? Become a Sports! Enthusiast for $5 a month.
🔔 Was this sent to you? Well then, here’s your link to subscribe.
