Author: PlayActionNews

Inside: Trading Micah Parsons was a loss for the Cowboys, win for the Packers, and another headline for Jerry Jones.This article is from Scoop City, The Athletic’s NFL newsletter. Sign up here to receive it directly in your inbox.Justifying the Micah Parsons trade“Don’t lose any sleep over it,” we were told. “Just part of the negotiation.”Jerry Jones was always quick to refute the idea that Parsons would be anywhere but Dallas. “I wouldn’t be standing here with you if I didn’t think we potentially had a great future with Micah,” he said in early August.The Athletic’s Michael Silver saw through the miscalculation for…

Justin Gaethje’s striking is seen as so “dangerous” that this man thinks even Ilia Topuria would be tempted to take things to the ground.Topuria is a couple of months into his reign as UFC lightweight champion, but considerable uncertainty still surrounds his first challenger.Since Topuria knocked out Charles Oliveira at UFC 317 to collect the vacant crown at 155 pounds, three names have been staking their claims for the first shot at unseating ‘El Matador’.In a bid to push himself above Arman Tsarukyan and Paddy Pimblett, Gaethje made the UFC a retirement ultimatum, threatening to walk away from the sport…

Raymond van Barneveld is among those through to the second round of the Flanders Darts Trophy, but England’s Michael Smith suffered a shock first-round exit. Van Barneveld came back from 2-0 down to knock out Belgian qualifier Xanti Van den Bergh 6-3, and will meet Ryan Searle on Saturday. Former world champion Smith was beaten by Belgian Mario Vandenbogaerde 6-5. Vandenbogaerde’s victory means he sets up a tie with Jonny Clayton on Saturday evening in the final game of the session.Mike De Decker, Kim Huybrechts and Vandenbogaerde were all also victorious on home soil on Friday evening, as all three Belgians won…

The Southern California bookmaker whose clients included Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter was sentenced Friday to a little more than a year in federal prison and ordered to pay $1.6 million in restitution.Mathew Bowyer, 50, of Orange County, pled guilty last August to charges of operating an illegal sports gambling operation, money laundering and signing a false tax return. Bowyer, who faced a maximum sentence of almost two decades in prison, received a 12-month and one-day sentence from U.S. District Court Judge John W. Holcomb.One of Bowyer’s well-known customers was Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s ex-Japanese interpreter, who stole…

Eric Raskin is a veteran boxing journalist with nearly 30 years of experience covering the sport for such outlets as BoxingScene, ESPN, Grantland, Playboy, and The Ring (where he served as managing editor for seven years). He also co-hosted The HBO Boxing Podcast, Showtime Boxing with Raskin & Mulvaney, The Interim Champion Boxing Podcast with Raskin & Mulvaney, and Ring Theory. He has won three first-place writing awards from the BWAA, for his work with The Ring, Grantland, and HBO. Outside boxing, he is the senior editor of CasinoReports and the author of 2014’s The Moneymaker Effect. He can be…

The time has finally come. Some of you have been drafting all summer (and spring, and winter…) Others are still trying to catch up on rookies and sleepers. All of us are still drafting this weekend (and Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday…). So after months of debate and talking in circles, the time has finally come to put a pin in it. Here are my last-minute rankings for your stretch-run drafts. Best of luck, and we hope you will stick around this season. 2025 fantasy football previews, projections, stats and more for every position from Rotoworld and NBC Sports. Get…

The NFL suspended free agent DT Isaiah Buggs for the first 10 weeks of the season, according to Friday’s personnel notice.Buggs has been seeking to return to the NFL since April when he had the remaining cruelty to dogs charge against him dismissed. He had domestic violence and burglary charges reduced in March, according to his attorney Greg Gambril, as part of a plea agreement whereby Buggs pleaded guilty to misdemeanor criminal trespass.Buggs, 29, has not played a regular-season NFL game since 2023 when he was with the Lions. The Chiefs cut Buggs June 24, 2024, after his second offseason…

Aug 29, 2025, 01:44 PM ETDiogo Jota’s No. 21 jersey with Portugal will be inherited by the late forward’s longtime friend and teammate Rúben Neves, head coach Robert Martinez said Friday.Martinez was speaking as he announced his first Portugal squad since the former Liverpool and Portugal star was killed alongside his brother André Silva in a car crash in northern Spain on July 3.”This is the first working camp without Diogo Jota,” Martinez said. “We know what Diogo meant to each of us, the impact he had on our lives. We want to honour his memory every day.- Liverpool pay…

If the San Diego Padres are going to win the NL West, they’re going to have to do it without Xander Bogaerts.The All-Star shortstop hit the 10-day injured list with a non-displaced fracture in his left foot, the team announced Friday. Triple-A infielder Mason McCoy was called up from Triple-A El Paso in a corresponding move.AdvertisementBogaerts sustained the injury by fouling a ball off the foot in Wednesday’s 4-3 loss against the Seattle Mariners. He stayed in the game, but subsequent testing apparently revealed the fracture.Per USA Today’s Bob Nightengale and the San Diego Union-Tribune’s Kevin Acee, Bogaerts is not…

Keith Thurman has a chance to become a two-division world champion.The former unified welterweight champion will challenge Sebastian Fundora for his WBC super welterweight title on Oct. 25 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Premier Boxing Champions confirmed Friday afternoon.AdvertisementFundora vs. Thurman will headline an Amazon Prime Video pay-per-view telecast.Fundora (23-1-1, 15 KOs) captured the WBC and WBO titles when he replaced Thurman to face Australia’s Tim Tszyu on late notice in March 2024. A horror cut suffered by Tszyu on his head limited his vision and aided Fundora to a split decision upset in a bloody…