Golf is the only sports that readily takes phone calls from fans complaining of rules violations, and does something about it. From Tiger Woods at the Masters to Sergio Garcia in Charlotte, maybe the PGA Tour should set up a dedicated 800-number. More»

Views from high above Churchill Downs once made for some of the best stories about the Kentucky Derby. But times have changed, and now writers are stuck watching the race on TV as high rollers take over what used to be the press box. More»

Wednesday's Bruins game was far from normal. In the first sporting event in the city since Monday's Marathon, heightened security, inspirational messages and an emotional national anthem dominated the night as Boston showed its strength. More»

I love the Boston Marathon. I love everything about it. Ordinary people cheer for ordinary people. Where else does this happen? It is a festival, a salute to the human spirit, and the price of admission is nothing. And then came Monday. More»

The big story on day one at the Masters was the 1-over round by 14-year-old Tianlang Guan. Sergio Garcia can relate. After all, the first-round co-leader used to be the next big thing in golf. Now, he's enjoying Augusta success while he can. More»

This was not one of Geno Auriemma's powerhouse operations of the past, when the UConn women stormed through an undefeated season or three. This team stuttered and stalled -- until instinct kicked in, just in time for another championship run. More»

Thanks to the extensive commercial slots during the NCAA tournament, we have become indoctrinated with the publicity for all sorts of products. One ad, however, got our full attention, if only for 30 seconds. More»

The NCAA women's tournament belongs to us, the people who can see beyond the pyrotechnics. This is our acquired taste. But if you haven't been introduced to the women's game this season, here are five reasons to watch the tourney. More»

Bobby Orr turned 65 years old on Wednesday, an uh-oh milestone, the long-time retirement age, but since he retired at age 30, he has been frozen as a hockey player ever since, his abilities sort of caught in a magical snow globe. More»

If you think hard you can remember that you have a lawn underneath the snow and muck. And watching Tiger Woods dominate the WGC-Cadillac Championship at Doral just serves as a strong reminder that spring is just around the corner -- and good things are yet to come. More»

The demise of the Big East over the last decade has ruined regional rivalries that make college basketball interesting. There are different reasons for the lack of interest in a school like Boston College, but mine is simple: I don't care about teams on its schedule. More»

The news that Dennis Rodman is in Pyongyang, North Korea, hanging out with the country's baby-faced dictator Kim Jong Un at this moment registers very high on the neighborhood Bizarre-O-Meter. Might even be a sports-page record. More»

The Tom Brady stat that interests me the most these days is 22,000 square feet. I suppose I should be paying more attention to that three-year, $27 million contract extension that the 35-year-old star signed this week, but it's just not as compelling. More»

Danica Patrick has done a lot for equality in NASCAR, but she's not the first woman to race at Daytona. In fact, decades before Danica, Louise Smith put together a memorable debut, in her own way, at the as part of a hall-fo-fame career. More»

Wrestling may not just be one of the original Olympic sports, but also one of the most equitable, with over 50 different nations taking home medals. And yet the IOC deemed that wrestling has no place in the games, at least in Rio. More»

Walt Sweeney -- who died this week at the age of 71 -- laughed at the pretentiousness that surrounded the NFL. For him, all of those halos had been knocked sideways long ago. This writer remembers a time when Sweeney's story was seldom told. More»

After his dominant win at Torrey Pines, Tiger Woods is second in all-time tour wins with 75, behind Sam Snead's 82. Is he on the way to topping that? Did the golf summer just get much more interesting? Or are all the good parts in the preview? More»

The celebration for the Boston Celtics' best win of the season lasted all of two minutes. The Celtics may have beat the Heat on Sunday, but on the same day they found out they'd lost All-Star guard Rajon Rondo to a torn ACL. More»

More than 50 years ago, a star Boston University high jumper went to Rome and received a harsh reaction to an Olympic disappointment. John Thomas died last week at 71, but he leaves behind a distinct legacy. More»

Bill Belichick's voice reveals no modulation, no emphasis. The listeners have to be here in case Belichick has been slipped some truth serum in pill form with his breakfast and decided to say what he really thinks about something, anything. This has never happened. More»

After a long, tiresome lockout, the NHL and players' association have reached a deal. But the idea that we can simply pick up right where we left off is a bit misguided. Listen up boys: We haven’t been paying full attention while everybody has been away. More»

No day in professional football is filled with more optimism than the day the new head coach unpacks his pencil box. All sins are forgiven. Hope is restored. And if it doesn't work out, if success doesn't follow? Well, change is the one constant. More»

Just like that, they've disappeared. Those pitching records and home run streaks. Those seven Tour de France titles. Those college coaching legacies. Gone. The most memorable sports moments of 2012 were all the ones that got erased. More»

According to the Mayan calendar, the apocalypse will be right when I'm watching the Beef 'O' Brady's Bowl, a game featuring two teams I know little about (Ball State and Central Florida), but which I'll have on TV because it's football. More»

Nobody in the NFL feels, acts or plays better than New England at this time of the year. Never has that been truer than Monday night, when Tom Brady and the Patriots continued their December dominance by blowing out the Texans at home. More»

The backup quarterback is always the most popular person in the cities of losing team. Of course, the Jets have found a way to take this to the extreme, not only through Tim Tebow, but now Greg McElroy. Welcome to the NFL's annual dance. More»

Thirty years after making his coaching debut in middle school girls basketball, Brian Kelly has reached the pinnacle of the college profession. From his roots at small schools in Massachusetts, Kelly has Notre Dame playing for a national title. More»

Brad Keselowski was fined $25,000 for having his cell phone with him on Sunday during the AdvoCare 500. The idea of a NASCAR driver with a cell phone in his car seemed as bizarre as, oh, a director of the CIA who couldn’t hide a secret relationship. More»

The missing quality to all of the Veterans Day celebrations at sports events over the weekend once again was veterans. Did anyone else notice this? Times have changed, and long gone are the days of Ted Williams serving. Well, except for Bernard James. More»

A lot has happened over the last 18 years, since Kevin Garnett jumped straight to the NBA from high school. Fourteen All-Star Games, a championship, nearly 1,300 games, an awful lot of money. And yet, somehow, the big guy hasn't changed a bit. More»

What Felix Baumgartner proposed to do was free fall back to Earth, FASTER THAN THE SPEED OF SOUND, becoming the first man to break the sound barrier OUTSIDE A PLANE. He did it on Sunday, safely falling 24 miles. I wanted to buy him a beer. More»

Former Detroit Lions great Alex Karras led a more famous life in Hollywood than he did on the football field. He was the guy America thought he was -- funny, a good friend, a competitor. But then the Karras everyone had come to know quickly started to fade away. On Wednesday, Karras died from a combination of kidney disease, heart disease, stomach cancer and dementia. More»

Peyton Manning had been at Gillette Stadium with other people at other times. He had dressed in the same locker room, clacked down the same hallway in his cleats, entered the same field. But things are different now. He wasn't making history now. More»

Tony Romo is 32 now and in his 10th year in the league. Nights like Monday, with five interceptions, aren't supposed to happen anymore. He should be running the show, playing percentages, cutting corners and taking what the defense gives him. Maturity should have set in by now. More»

The Red Sox are in the American League East basement. The entire season has been a bust, a waste, a flat-out baseball disaster. The team hit levels of futility that hadn't been seen in 30, 40, 50 years or more. This can't be how the franchise envisioned celebrating Fenway's 100th birthday. Can it? More»

The civic statue has become the true Hall of Fame. The best of the best stand on a street corner somewhere close to home, inspiring future generations as they pass by. Rocky Marciano is now one of those, in his hometown of Brockton, Massachusetts. More»

Hours after losing his brother in a motorcycle crash, Torrey Smith blocked out all the noise to turn in one of the best performances of his life in a win over the Patriots. But the hard part begins today. And tomorrow. When there's no football on the schedule. More»

Gary Bettman has been commissioner for three NHL lockouts, an amazing record for a professional sports executive. You would've thought after the first one in 1994-95, and especially after losing the entire 2004-05 season, that he would've done everything in his power to avoid another. More»

A lot has happened since I wrote a book with Jim Calhoun in '99. He leaves UConn with three NCAA championships, four Final Four appearances, 1,253 games coached and 873 wins. He was controversial at the end, but that's far from his legacy. More»

Tom Brady is football's Joe DiMaggio. He goes to the right places at the right times, does the right things, is married to one of the most beautiful women. He is not the most athletic, but he is the bestest and … stop the presses! Tom has a boo-boo! More»

With his induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame on Friday, Reggie joins Cheryl Miller for the only brother-sister combo in any major athletic hall of fame in the country, possibly the world. Maybe this means they're finally even. Maybe. More»

Paul Ryan did not run a marathon in 2:50, as he originally claimed. In fact, he ran nowhere close to such a time. The fallout from his gaffe has been interesting, but there's one person I would like to hear talk about the subject: Jock Semple. More»

I've found that most sights in sports that make me nervous -- the first turn at the Indy 500, the prizefighter being pummeled, the big hit in football -- become less threatening with time and repetition. But not this. This was the first time I had ever seen cliff diving. More»

For a kid from the snow belt of New Jersey to even make it to the big leagues is an amazing story. To become an All-Star as a 21-year-old rookie and draw comparisons to Mickey Mantle -- that's the stuff of dreams. But it's now Mike Trout's reality. More»

The Red Sox shipped a trio of former All-Stars and a utility player to the Dodgers for … not much. Sure, they would've loved to have gotten more, but there was more to it than that. This was a cleansing for the Sox. A purge. This was a new start. More»