In this space on Saturdays, I do a weekly round-up of sorts: Sifting through what I wrote that you might have missed during the week, what I’ve been reading and watching myself, and some other fun things that have been going on.
Here are the things I wrote or podcasted about during the previous week, sorted in descending order by quality, popularity and/or current relevance.
⚽ 2026-27 English Premier League Tracker 📈 - Ahead of the 2026-27 Premier League season, I put out this EPL odds aggregator that combines multiple markets into a consensus set of probabilities to be relegated, finish high in the table and/or win the championship.
🏀 Russell Westbrook Collected So Many Stats, He Broke Them - Following Russ’s retirement, I took a look back at how he weaponized the triple-double to win an MVP and rewrite the NBA record books — while simultaneously altering how we evaluate the box-score (and exposing its ultimate limits).
⚾ The White Sox Are a Miracle - Just a few years after squandering their future core, hitting rock-bottom and piling up triple-digit-loss seasons, Chicago has pulled off an unbelievable turnaround to top the AL Central — doing it with a revamped roster literally featuring zero players from their 2021 core.
⚾ Are the Tigers Having the Most Confusing — and Secretly Consequential — Season Ever? - Apparently I’m obsessed with the AL Central… Anyway, despite trading Tarik Skubal at the deadline and hovering below .500, Detroit boasts elite underlying metrics that have kept them right on the fringe of the wild-card race — making them one of the most bizarre, streaky and maybe disproportionately consequential teams in modern baseball history. (I explain in the piece.)
⚾ Seattle and Toronto Played an October Epic. A Year Later, They’re Sharing an Epic Drop-off. - A year after staging an instant classic in the ALCS, both Seattle and Toronto are suffering through massive hangovers marked by embarrassing on-field blunders, historic individual HR drop-offs and rapidly-dwindling playoff hopes. What happened?
⚾ MLB’s Trade Deadline Somehow Made Everything More Confusing - Instead of clarifying who was good or bad through buying and selling, the trade deadline only muddied the MLB waters further, leaving baseball with a historic logjam around the wild-card cutline as we head toward the stretch run.
🏁 Did Joey Logano just go from Chase bubble to title contender (again)? - At NASCAR, I dug into how Joey Logano turned around a nightmare start to his season — going from nearly out of the playoff bubble back to a legitimate championship threat after a big win at Richmond to cap a dominant seven-week stretch.
🏁🎙️ Podracing: Somehow, Joey Logano Returned - In this week’s Podracing, Tyler Lauletta and I talked about Joey’s win and recent hot streak — and how another title for the No. 22 would be arguably the most vindicating title in NASCAR history. Then we pivoted to look ahead at the “Magic Mile” in New Hampshire, where Logano might do more damage… but not if Denny Hamlin, Ryan Blaney or Christopher Bell have anything to say about it.
Here were my favorite items of the week from Scoreboard, my daily newsletter for Sherwood News…
🏁 On Kimi Antonelli’s rise in the F1 odds…
🏈 On the NFL’s most popular international-game sites…
⚾ On the legacy of the late Tommy John…
⚽ On how Arsenal compares with other preseason EPL favorites…
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A collection of articles (with a heavy focus on my fellow Substackers), videos and other media that I enjoyed and/or found thought-provoking over the past week. I don’t always 100% agree with or endorse what’s linked here… but that’s also sort of the point.
⚾ “We Still Don’t Really Understand Value. Or Do We?” by ritmica
⚾ “His Name Is Tugboat. He Throws an ‘Invisiball.’ And Now He’s a Major-Leaguer.” by Jared Diamond
⚾ “The Glow Is Off at Shortstop” by Tom Verducci
⚾ “How to Supply a Productive Outfield Without Paying for One: Lessons from Tampa Bay” by Sean
⚾ “The Missing Piece in the Braves’ Pitching Lab Is Velocity” by Lindsay Crosby
⚾▶️ “Alcohol, Drugs, Strippers & Dingers - The ‘93 Phillies INSANE Run To The World Series” by Press Box Chronicles (Jeff Pearlman )
🏈 “What Exactly Makes a Good NFL Kicker and Punter?” by Ray Carpenter
🏈 “Which Types of Passes Drive NFL Offensive Efficiency?” by Robbie Marriage
🏈 “Can Kentucky football become the next Indiana?” by Craig Meyer
🏈 “Offseason Deep Dive: Notre Dame Defense” by Michael Bryan
🏈▶️ “Peyton Manning in High School: Isidore Newman vs Episcopal 1993” by YurView - Gulf South Sports (In honor of his son Marshall’s HS debut)
⚽ “The Cost of Europe: Why Manchester United may pay a price for finishing third” by Michael Caley
⚽ “What ‘Ted Lasso’ gets right about the lack of resources allocated to women’s soccer” by Asli Pelit
⚽ “American Owners Spent Years Buying Football. Now They're Starting to Sell.” by David Skilling
🏀 “Holy Patches: The jersey patch wave taking over college athletics” by Ben Carloni
🏀▶️ “Which NBA teams deserve more National TV games?” by Kofie Yeboah
🏒 “NHL Revenue Sharing Overhaul Explained: How the New CBA Changes the Money Game for Rich and Poor Teams in 2026-27” by Mark Scheig
🏁 “Getting an IndyCar race in downtown Washington, D.C. took many complicated turns” by Adam Kilgore
🏁 “What a gap year means for Connor Zilisch and Hendrick Motorsports” by Nate Ryan
🏁 “Hendrick Motorsports Secures Its Future” by Aaron Bearden
⛳ “Candid point/counterpoint on LIV’s value” and “Hovland’s satisfaction never guaranteed” by Bob Harig
🤠 “What the Mavericks/Stars Legal Resolution Might and Might Not Mean” by Robert Tiffin
8/20/17 Condensed Game: STL@PIT (First Little League Classic)
“Speak Like A Child” by Herbie Hancock
Filed under: Weekly Round-up
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