Free Republic

...Anything that isn’t bolted down is being used as a weapon by fans on both sides of the clash.

Ranked No. 1 in the nation and having dominated their way through the Grand Canyon Region, the Cochise College women’s rodeo team will join the men’s team at the College National Finals Rodeo in Casper, Wyo., starting on Sunday where, on paper if not in the dirt, the Apaches appear to be the team to beat. The women’s team is ranked tops in the nation by a wide margin points-wise. They boast two of the top three ranked All-Around cowgirls in the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association (NIRA) in No. 2 Janey Reeves and No. 3 Georgia Diez. Diez is also...

French riot police have charged with batons and fired teargas on England fans in the old port of Marseille, in the third day of violence ahead of Saturday evening’s tie with Russia. After a relatively peaceful morning, violence erupted around 3pm. Around 60 riot police marched on fans as they congregated outside bars and hotels on the harbour. It was unclear what sparked the tactic, but some fans responded by hurling bottles at the advancing police. One man, believed to be English, appeared to have been knocked unconscious. A witness said that the victim had been kicked repeatedly in the...

Excitement is building among Russian soccer fans ahead of the UEFA 2016 European Championship in France, which begins on June 10. Leonid Slutsky’s men open their Group B campaign on June 11 against a talented young England side at Marseille’s Stade Velodrome. 

Russian bookmakers are clearly not especially optimistic about their team’s chances of beginning the tournament with three points, with Russia at 4-6 to emerge victorious and group favorite England at 1-9 on to win. “It’s clear that this team [England] is one of the favorites for Euro 2016,” Slutsky told Sport Express on June 4, adding that while...

The NBA just announced it's partnering with GLSEN, the leading gay activist educational organization – an organization whose radical activism dates back more than a decade. How do the players really feel about this ... especially those with conservative Christian (or Muslim) values? It wasn't enough for the NBA to celebrate the coming out of Jason Collins, although he was only a marginal player in the league, although his identical twin brother was not gay, and although his long-time girlfriend was surprised to learn he was gay. It wasn't enough for the NBA to slap players with stiff fines for...

After the recent death of famous champion heavyweight boxer Muhammad Ali, liberals, blacks, and even conservatives have flooded social media with praise for the sports legend. However, one African woman is wondering if blacks who are mourning his loss have lost their minds — and it’s all because of one thing most are too star-struck to realize. Mona Walter is an ex-Muslim Somali activist who is determined to expose what her former religion has done for 1,400 years and is planning to do to Western countries. After immigrating to Sweden when she was 19, she was given the opportunity to...

The opening game of the 2016 European Championship gets underway on Friday night in Paris, with hosts and favorites France taking on relative European minnows Romania. France are expected to kick off the tournament with a victory and, given the crop of world stars at their disposal, could turn on the style and set down a marker for their rivals. France captain and goalkeeper Hugo Lloris faced the media on Thursday and admits he and his teammates are facing the most important tournament of their careers. “I won’t hide the fact, this morning, we felt something different because we left...

Iceland have just a two in 1,000 chance of being crowned victors of the imminent UEFA Euro 2016 football finals, according to a new statistical model by Goldman Sachs economists. Using such factors as previous match performance, goals scored and conceded, and current international rankings, the economist team has put together a ‘stochastic’ analysis of how likely each competing country is to reach certain stages of the competition.

Joe Bruno on Boxing – Muhammad Ali is Not a Hero. Muhammad Ali passed away Friday night, June 3, 2016. I wrote the article below around the year 2000. I got to know him fairly well in the 1980’s, when I was Vice President of the Boxing Writers Association. He was a real friendly man, and we had several nice conversations about what I have written below. Still, his death doesn’t change what he was, and what he did early in his career. It is with a sad heart that I stand by what is written below. It’s just the...

A “Brave New World": Commissioners of sports leagues are just as infected as the leaders of media, business, government, higher education and the other pillars of our society After five decades, the World Golf Championship will move next year from the National Doral golf course in Miami, Florida to a golf course in Mexico City. Since the Doral course is owned by the certain GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, this decision smacks of political correctness. At least most objective observers would surmise that politics played a role in this decision; however, such a motive was denied by PGA Commissioner Tim...

..."These refugee athletes have no home, no team, no flag, no national anthem," said IOC president Thomas Bach. "The invention of this refugee team is to give them a home in the Olympic village together with all the athletes around the world."

Clip from ringside coverage of the Trump-Clinton Heavyweight Championship Fight (hearing echos of Howard Cosell): Round Four. Trump comes out swinging and hitting Hillary with a furious barrage. He hits her her square in the jaw with, "She has got to go to jail." He goes to her midsection with, "She's guilty as hell." She's hardly laying a glove on him. She's looking dazed a little confused. There’s the bell to end round four. We’re between rounds early in the fight and Hillary already looks exhausted. She’s in her corner making gestures almost like Roberto Durán did when he said,...

Bobby Wood was a shy 14-year-old from Southern California when he came to Germany with big dreams. It didn’t take long for that to turn into a nightmare, though, because Wood didn’t speak a word of German, couldn’t fathom how cold and dark the country and the people could be, and didn’t get any respect as an American coming from a nation with such little soccer history. Fast-forward nine years and Wood, now fluent in German, has emerged as one of the country’s hottest young forwards after scoring 17 goals for second-tier Union Berlin — most-ever by an American in...

When police officers sing the national anthem before a sporting event, it is nothing more than “staged patriotism” that divides communities, argues Howard Bryant in a column in ESPN The Magazine. “Policing is clearly one of the most divisive issues in the country – except in the sports arena, where the post-9/11 hero narrative has been so deeply embedded within its game-day fabric that policing is seen as clean, heroic, uncomplicated. Following the marketing strategy of the military, police advocacy organizations have partnered with teams from all four major leagues to host ‘Law Enforcement Appreciation’ nights, or similar events,” Bryant...

ABC as usual is showing the race. First time the race has been sold out in a while. 3 to 400,000 will be there. Weather is said to be fine for the race.

You Need to See This Tribute to the Victim’s of Michael Vick’s Dog Fighting Ring By Diana Beth Miller - May 23, 2016 Dog fighting has been around for decades. We once may have thought of this practice as one of those faraway, unmentionable “sports” that takes place in the dark recesses of abandoned buildings with less-than-stellar characters at the helm. But, when news broke of an American football quarterback, Michael Vick’s, horrendous practice of dog fighting within the confines of his “luxury” home and property, people were not only shocked and stunned, but also extremely angry that this high-profile...

Australia's players looked relaxed during training at the Stadium of Light on Thursday as they prepared to put a spanner in the works of England's Euro 2016 preparations. The Socceroos are in Sunderland ahead of Friday night's friendly clash with Roy Hodgson's men, a game in which all of the focus is on the home side. But while Three Lions boss Hodgson finalises his plans for France this summer, Australia are aiming to go under the radar and claim what would undeniably be a surprise victory.

Fourteen-year-old Lance Thompson of Carlisle, Pa., has spent the last several years of his life with one goal in mind – competing in the 2020 Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo. As an Olympic trapshooting hopeful and honor student, Thompson maintains an intense, disciplined schedule that includes shooting up to four days a week during the school year and living full time at a training center during the summer. This arrangement allows him to train every day when school’s out. While living at the training center he stays with one of the team members, a 25-year-old female shooter, in an efficiency...

Jill Ellis officially announced her 25-woman United States Women's National Team roster ahead of a two-leg series against 2011 World Cup Champions Japan. Anytime the USWNT and Japan square off, fans know it brings incredible goals, saves, and moments that last a lifetime. However, this two-game series is more a gauge for Ellis to see who will make the final 18-woman roster for the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. The USWNT faces Japan on June 2nd at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park in Commerce City, Colorado (7 pm MT on FS1) and then three days later on June 5th at FirstEnergy Stadium...

Golfing legend Jack Nicklaus on Saturday praised presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, saying that his candidacy has turned the country “upside down.” “I like what Donald has done,” he said in an interview with CBS’s “Sunday Morning.” “He’s turning America upside down, he’s awakening the country. “We need a lot of that,” he added. Nicklaus said that Trump’s “not stupid” and that he will eventually learn to be more polished like other politicians. “I like the guy. He’s a good man and if he’s the one that’s on the ticket, I’ll be voting for him,” he said.