Free Republic

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) -- FIFA has banned Uruguay striker Luis Suarez from all football activities for four months for biting an opponent at the World Cup, ruling him out of the rest of the tournament and the start of the upcoming Premier League season. The ban also covers Uruguay's next nine international games, which goes beyond the next four months and rules him out of next year's Copa America. FIFA also fined the Liverpool striker 100,000 Swiss francs ($112,000).

Tony Gwynn, the left-handed right fielder who starred at San Diego State and then for the San Diego Padres, passed away Monday morning after a four-year fight with salivary-gland cancer. Gwynn's death comes a day after he received a contract extension to coach the San Diego State Aztecs baseball team. The fifty-four-year-old San Diego legend had been on medical leave. The bowling-ball shaped hitting machine batted .338 in twenty major league seasons, all with the Padres. He finished with 3,141 hits. In addition to his eight batting titles, Mr. Padre also collected seven Gold Gloves patrolling right field. The fifteen-time...

Dan Marino has sued the NFL, claiming that playing professional football left him suffering from concussion-related injuries, Nathan Fenno reports for the Los Angeles Times. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia last week, according to the Times. Fourteen other players joined Marino in the suit.

Boston is trying to become the first city to provide health-care and educational rights to college athletes beyond what the NCAA requires. Legislation has been enacted or proposed at the federal and state level for a “College Athlete Bill of Rights.” But Boston City Councilor Josh Zakim has taken the unique step of going local. He filed a pair of ordinances Friday related to the educational and health rights for athletes who play college sports in Boston. Among the potential laws for Boston universities:

Wiping away tears before sharing a passionate kiss for the cameras, new NFL pick Michael Sam and his boyfriend were the picture of joy on Saturday. As the photograph of their embrace quickly spread across the internet, Sam celebrated being the first openly-gay player drafted to the NFL - and viewers wondered about the identity of his man. He has now been named as Vito Cammisano, a 23-year-old fellow University of Missouri alum, who starred on the school's swim team - and who apparently comes from one of the state's most infamous mobster families. Online records indicate that he is...

EARTH CITY, Mo. -- Michael Sam made history Saturday afternoon, as the St. Louis Rams made him the 249th overall choice in the 2014 NFL draft. The Missouri defensive end becomes the first openly gay player to be drafted in league history and seeks to be the first openly gay player ever to play in the NFL. Video of Sam receiving the call from the Rams and coach Jeff Fisher revealed the player's emotion while surrounded by friends, family and his boyfriend. "In a world of diversity we live in, I am honored to be a part of this," Fisher...

Johnny Manziel to Dallas?

National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver had no choice but to come down “hard” as some judged the punishment on Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling for his stellar racist performance, captured on audio tape. I laughed at the punishment. “Banned for life” on an 80-year-old man? Maximum NBA fine of $2.5 million for a racist billionaire’s conduct is equally laughable. Nevertheless, I believe Commissioner Silver would have imposed a greater punishment if allowed under NBA rules. Commissioner Silver’s press conference deserves no more than a C+ grade due to the lack of his leadership experience in the fight...

Fox News' host Bill O'Reilly has devoted many broadcasts of this TV show, "The O'Reilly Factor," to what he believes are problems in the black community. O'Reilly, who has blamed black crime on black, unwed mothers, interviewed Kentucky Wildcats basketball coach John Calipari last night about controlling his black players, notes Salon.com (video below). According to New York Magazine, during the interview, O'Reilly asked Calipari, "I don't know if you listen to this rap stuff and the hip-hop stuff, but it has coarsened. Has that changed their attitude? How do you impose discipline on kids who are gonna do what...

'Back then they had hoods. Now they have neckties and starched shirts'

Tiger Woods will miss the Masters after undergoing back surgery earlier this week for a pinched nerve that has been hurting him for several months, the world's No. 1 player said Tuesday on his website. It will be the first time in 20 years that Woods will not play in the event. The microdiscectomy was performed Monday by neurosurgeon Dr. Charles Rich in Park City, Utah. The statement said Woods will begin "intensive rehabilitation and soft-tissue treatment" within a week, and the goal is for him to return to competition "sometime this summer."

Going forward, every NATO member state must step up and carry its share of the burden. — President Barack Obama, March 26, 2014 On Wednesday, addressing an assembly of young Europeans, President Obama issued a challenge. Faced with a resurgent Russia, he said, and in view of the shaky global economy, Europeans must spend more on defense. His sentiment is well founded. Let’s be clear: EU defense spending is woefully inadequate. Excluding Britain, France, Germany, and perhaps Italy, the EU states are fundamentally incapable of full-spectrum operations. And the military of America’s greatest ally, the British, is being forced...

Navy football player Will McKamey, who has been hospitalized since collapsing at practice three days ago, has died while in a coma. He was 19. The academy says the freshman running back from Knoxville, Tenn., died at the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore on Tuesday with his family by his side.

Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly is preparing for another surgery related to his oral cancer. ... On her personal website, Kelly’s wife wrote that “the cancer’s back, aggressive, and starting to spread.”

Education Secretary Arne Duncan on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday said it was “worth considering” giving student athletes a free graduate school education in addition to the free ride they already get for undergrad. “Yeah, I think that’s really important. People talk about helping them graduate from college. Yes, they should do that, but M.B.A., you know Master’s, PhD, having some ability for the rest of your life to go back and get education. I think that’s something worth considering. Some folks are talking about the medical expenses long term. I think that’s a fair question on the table,” Duncan...

The former England ace was filming a jungle expedition for the BBC which will be aired before the World Cup finals in Brazil this summer. Becks, 38, will be seen camping out in the rainforest, fishing for food, cooking and also coming face to face with some of the native wildlife. But he was ordered not to go swimming. Along with piranhas, a nasty eel-like creature called a Candiru, nicknamed the “vampire fish”, lurks in the waters of the River Amazon. They are hard to spot as they are transparent and if they target a male swimmer, they can enter...

A couple of years ago, the basketball team I root for, the University of Michigan, had a player named Zack Novak. Everybody loved his story. He was slow and pudgy coming out of high school, recruited by nobody, and offered a spot at Michigan. Turned out he could play, at least some. He was only six foot three, but he played power forward, compensating for his lack of size and skill with unrelenting effort. He graduated from the business school and became team captain. If you watch college sports, you know the kind of player I’m talking about. Right: a...

"Who am I to judge?" makes a triumphant entry in the American subset of the College of Cardinals, in an interview granted to the highest-rated political debate program on US television, to be broadcast tomorrow: Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York praised University of Missouri football star Michael Sam for coming out as gay, saying he would not judge the athlete for his sexual orientation. "Good for him," Dolan said in an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press" airing Sunday. "I would have no sense of judgment on him," Dolan continued. "God bless ya. I don't think, look, the same...

A transgender man is suing a strength competition for $2.5 million after CrossFit denied him the right to compete against women. Chloie Jonnson, who was born male, wants to test his brawn against female athletes in the CrossFit Games, a grueling series of contests designed to find the world's most fit competitors. When a female rival raised questions about Jonnson being considered a woman, CrossFit said he must compete as a man. Jonnson had a sex-change operation in 2006 and is legally recognized in the state of California as a woman. Incensed, he filed a $2.5 million lawsuit against the...

Former Oklahoma and Dallas Cowboys coach Barry Switzer has been a pretty harsh critic of Texas A&M quarterback and possible No. 1 draft pick Johnny Manziel. On Thursday, Switzer took that criticism to a new level. In an interview with WNSR Sports Radio in Nashville, Switzer was asked if he were an NFL coach, would he draft Manziel? Switzer begins by saying he “loves his ability, Johnny can play,” but out of nowhere Switzer brings race into the equation. "I've always said I'd never recruit a white quarterback,” Switzer said. “The only way I'd ever recruit a white quarterback to...