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Greenberg: Can Grady Sizemore rescue the White Sox from infamy?

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Greenberg: Can Grady Sizemore rescue the White Sox from infamy?

CHICAGO — Early in the first dugout news conference of his interim managing career, Grady Sizemore was asked lightheartedly whether he ever envisioned being the Chicago White Sox manager back when he was an All-Star outfielder for a division rival.

Now that certainly would be an oddly specific career goal for a guy from Seattle who was playing in Cleveland, but who knows, maybe he really liked the smell of grilled onions and the taunts of angry, liquored-up fans.

In any event, that’s where his life has taken him: managing the White Sox as they try to escape the throes of baseball infamy.

Sitting next to him was the Sox general manager Chris Getz, who was drafted by and debuted with the White Sox. I don’t think he ever dreamed of taking Kenny Williams’ job back when he was manning second base for the club.

But as the Chicago Cubs and White Sox started the second leg of their crosstown series, the reality is Getz is in charge of the worst team in baseball and Sizemore is in charge of managing it (while Getz looks for someone more experienced to do the job full time).

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It’s not ideal, but hey, it’s not all milkshakes and hot dogs on the South Side.

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Sizemore’s tenure began much like the Pedro Grifol one ended — with a loss. When Sizemore made his first pitching change in the third inning, the Sox were scoreless and down by six runs. The Sox rallied, but the Cubs ended up winning 7-6.

With 44 games left, what is left for the Sox (28-90) to accomplish this season? Well, that’s easy. Win 15 games.

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Some teams strive to make history. The White Sox need to avoid it.

The 1962 New York Mets have the modern baseball record for futility with 120 losses and the Sox need to finish with (at least) one fewer defeat. They don’t want to tie the Mets and they most definitely don’t want to finish with 121 losses. Sure, 119 losses would tie them with the 2003 Detroit Tigers for the AL’s worst mark, but no one uses that Tigers team as shorthand for the “worst ever.” A lot of people outside of Chicago (and Houston) forget the White Sox won a World Series in 2005. No one will forget this team if they lose 121.

The Sox get picked on a lot, both locally and nationally, for their many, many embarrassing failures, but ducking historical mockery should be the goal for the last seven weeks.

They already dodged the all-time record for consecutive losses in a season. Now comes sidestepping the season record.

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They didn’t get off to a good start at silencing their haters Friday, but after this two-game set with the Cubs, they get … uh-oh … the New York Yankees. Yeah, it’s not going to be easy.

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Before Friday’s game against the Cubs, Getz reiterated what he said the day before after he mercifully fired manager Grifol after a slower-than-expected 89-190 start to his managing career — that he’s not overtly focused on the ’62 Mets. However …

“I don’t think anyone in this organization wants to be associated (with) a record we could potentially have,” Getz said.

So though it’s not an organizational mandate to avoid 120, it’s not a goal.

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“There is always something to play for in this game,” Getz said. “Grady and I have talked about that at length. We want our players to play for something greater than themselves.”

In theory, a 15-29 run over the last seven weeks isn’t asking for too much. But for this Sox team, it just might be.

After all, they have only won 28 times in 118 tries. There’s not much to go on to believe they can make even a modest run. After a 3-22 start, they went 12-12. But then they lost a franchise-record 14 straight games.

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Given the state of the team — with Erick Fedde in St. Louis, Garrett Crochet’s remaining innings growing fewer, a lineup that doesn’t score runs and an often-calamitous bullpen — it’s hard to envision them catching a spark, let alone fire.

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But again, 15 wins in 44 games. It’s not like asking them to even have a winning month, something they haven’t sniffed this season.

So can Sizemore, who as a Cleveland player once famously dropped a fly ball in late September 2005 that helped the White Sox clinch a division title, be the spark the team needs? Judging by his career record of talking to reporters, he’s not going to give any Knute Rockne speeches. But the players know Sizemore was a gamer and an All-Star. He’s 41, but he looks 10 years younger. They seem to respect him. Imagine if they knew about his history as a Cleveland sex symbol.

“Great attitude, great energy and we’re excited,” veteran first baseman Andrew Vaughn said.

In reality, it’s not about what Sizemore specifically brings. Change itself, a new voice, a wake-up call, could help this team end the season with a shred of dignity. That’s the idea anyway.

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Getz fired three coaches along with Grifol, but Sizemore has two bench coaches and incumbent pitching coach Ethan Katz to help him finish the season. This is all new for him. He was a $15 hourly intern for the Arizona Diamondbacks at this point last year and used his connections with Josh Barfield, now Getz’s assistant GM, to land a job on the Sox coaching staff this year.

He went from intern to “major-league coach” in a year. Now he’s a big-league manager. What a year.

“It still hasn’t really sunk in,” Sizemore said before the game. “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night. Just too excited, too anxious. Still doesn’t feel real.”

I’m sure it felt a little more real after watching Crochet give up four homers in 2 1/3 innings. That’s the White Sox’s version of a cold shower, and if there’s a counterbalancing Sizemore Effect, maybe it takes a few games.

Neither Sizemore nor the players I talked to would take the bait about trying to avert infamy. And of course, if they knew how to win, we wouldn’t be talking about this streak.

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Do you know how odd it is to ask questions about the 1962 Mets? Losing 100 games is difficult for even the worst teams. Imagine losing 120 in one season.

The trade deadline is over. Grifol is out. There is nothing left but winning those 15 games.

“Just like when you’re playing, all you can really focus on is what you can control,” Sizemore said. “My focus is not on outside factors or records of other teams, it’s on the guys. What can I do to put them in the best possible position to succeed? Focusing or worrying about outside factors is just a waste of time.”

So was this White Sox season. The very least they can do is not end it as the worst team in baseball history.

(Photo: Griffin Quinn / Getty Images)

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Law firm fighting for women’s sports in SCOTUS battle comments on ruling possibly impacting SJSU trans lawsuit

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Law firm fighting for women’s sports in SCOTUS battle comments on ruling possibly impacting SJSU trans lawsuit

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A law firm leading the charge in the ongoing Supreme Court case over trans athletes in women’s sports has responded after a federal judge suggested the case’s ruling could impact a separate case involving a similar issue. 

Colorado District Judge Kato Crews deferred ruling in motions to dismiss former San Jose State volleyball co-captain Brooke Slusser’s lawsuit against the California State University (CSU) system until after a ruling in the B.P.J. v. West Virginia Supreme Court case, which is expected to come in June. 

Slusser filed the lawsuit against representatives of her school and the Mountain West Conference in fall 2024 after she allegedly was made to share bedrooms and changing spaces with trans teammate Blaire Fleming for a whole season without being informed that Fleming is a biological male. 

 

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Meanwhile, the B.P.J. case went to the Supreme Court after a trans teen sued West Virginia to block the state’s law that prevents males from competing in girls’ high school sports. 

The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is the primary law firm defending West Virginia in that case at the Supreme Court, and has now responded to news that Slusser’s lawsuit could be affected by the SCOTUS ruling. 

“We hope the ruling from the Supreme Court will affirm that Title IX was designed to guarantee equal opportunity for women, not to let male athletes displace women and girl in competition. It is crucial that sports be separated by sex for not only the equal opportunity of women but for safety and privacy. Title IX should protect women’s right to compete in their own sports. Allowing men to compete in the female category reverses 50 years of advancement for women,” ADF Vice President of Litigation Strategies Jonathan Scruggs said.

Slusser’s attorney, Bill Bock of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports, expects a Supreme Court ruling in favor of the legal defense representing West Virginia, thus helping his case. 

(Left) Brooke Slusser (10) of the San Jose State Spartans serves the ball during the first set against the Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Oct. 19, 2024. (Right) Blaire Fleming #3 of the San Jose State Spartans looks on during the third set against the Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym on October 19, 2024 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. ( Andrew Wevers/Getty Images; Andrew Wevers/Getty Images)

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“We’re looking forward to the case going forward,” Bock told Fox News Digital. 

“I believe that the court is going to find that Title IX operates on the basis of biological sex, without regard to an assumed or professed gender, and so just like the congress and the members of congress that passed Title IX in 1972, allowed this specifically provided for in the regulations that there had to be separate men’s and women’s teams based on biological sex, I think the court is going to see that is the original meaning of the statute and apply it in that way, and I think it’s going to be a big win in women’s sports.”

The Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared prepared to rule in favor of West Virginia after oral arguments on Jan. 13. 

Slusser spoke on the steps of the Supreme Court on Jan. 13 while oral arguments took place inside, sharing her experience with a divided crowd of opposing protesters. 

With Fleming on its roster, SJSU reached the 2024 conference final by virtue of a forfeit by Boise State in the semifinal round. SJSU lost in the final to Colorado State.

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Slusser went on to develop an eating disorder due to the anxiety and trauma from the scandal and dropped out of her classes the following semester. The eating disorder became so severe, that Slusser said she lost her menstrual cycle for nine months. Her decision to drop her classes resulted in the loss of her scholarship, and her parents said they had to foot the bill out of pocket for an unfinished final semester of college. 

President Donald Trump’s Department of Education determined in January that SJSU violated Title IX in its handling of the situation involving Fleming, and has given the university an ultimatum to agree to a series of resolutions or face a referral to the Department of Justice. 

Among the department’s findings, it determined that a female athlete discovered that the trans student allegedly conspired to have a member of an opposing team spike her in the face during a match. ED claims that “SJSU did not investigate the conspiracy, but later subjected the female athlete to a Title IX complaint for ‘misgendering’ the male athlete in online videos and interviews.”

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SJSU trans player Blaire Fleming and teammate Brooke Slusser went to a magic show and had Thanksgiving together in Las Vegas despite an ongoing lawsuit over Fleming being transgender. (Thien-An Truong/San Jose State Athletics)

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SJSU Athletic Director Jeff Konya told Fox News Digital in a July interview that he was satisfied with how the university handled the situation involving Fleming.

“I think everybody acted in the best possible way they could, given the circumstances,” Konya said. 

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Myles Garrett cited for speeding a ninth time, an elite pass rusher seemingly always in a rush

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Myles Garrett cited for speeding a ninth time, an elite pass rusher seemingly always in a rush

Myles Garrett is in a hurry to become the greatest pass rusher in NFL history. The Cleveland Browns All-Pro defensive end set the single-season sack record in 2025 and has cracked the top 20 career leaders after only nine seasons.

“I’m going to take that down, and I prefer I take it down in the next five years,” Garrett told Casino Guru News last month.

Off the field, however, his urgency to get from point A to B is a problem. He’s accumulating speeding tickets at an alarming rate.

On Feb. 21, Garrett was handed his ninth speeding ticket since his NFL career began in 2017. He was cited for driving 94 mph in a 70-mph zone on Interstate 71 between Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio.

The citation from the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office says Garrett was driving his green 2024 Porsche at 1:35 a.m., returning home after attending a Miami of Ohio basketball game in Oxford.

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Body cam footage shows the officer telling Garrett that she kept the charge under 100 mph so that a court appearance wouldn’t be mandatory. Garrett reportedly still holds a Texas driver’s license — he attended Texas A&M — and told the officer that he did not have an Ohio license.

Cleveland Browns’ Myles Garrett wears a jacket displaying his girlfriend Chloe Kim before the women’s snowboarding halfpipe finals at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy.

(Lindsey Wasson / AP)

The officer wrote that the famously affable Garrett was “kind and cooperative,” and that drugs and alcohol were not a factor.

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Garrett’s need for speed flies in the face of his persona. He has written poetry since high school, peppers social media with inspirational sayings and donates time and money to several charities.

His girlfriend is two-time gold-medal-winning U.S. Olympic snowboarder Chloe Kim, for whom he wrote a poem he shared on social media: “You enrapture fools to kings, and exist without a peer, put on this Earth for many things, but our love is why you’re here.”

Verse hasn’t slowed his roll. On Aug. 9 he was cited for ticket No. 8, clocked at 100 mph in a 60-mph zone in a Cleveland suburb a day after the Browns returned home from a preseason game at Carolina.

Garrett’s seventh ticket followed a frightening crash in 2022. He flipped his gray 2021 Porsche 911 Turbo S off State Road in Sharon Township and he and a female passenger were injured. He was cited for failing to control his vehicle due to unsafe speeds on what had been a slick roadway.

A witness told a responding police officer that Garrett’s vehicle went airborne, took out a fire hydrant and rolled three times. Garrett sustained shoulder and biceps sprains and was sidelined for the Browns’ game that week against the Atlanta Falcons. His companion was not seriously injured.

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Cleveland television station WKYC reported that in September 2021 Garrett was stopped twice in a 24-hour period — for driving 120 and 105 mph. The infractions occurred on Interstate 71 in Medina County, where the speed limit is 70 mph, and he paid fines of $267 and $287.

A year earlier, Garrett was cited for driving 100 mph in a 65-mph zone of Interstate 77 — again while driving a Porsche — and paid a $308 fine. He accumulated his first batch of speeding tickets in 2017 and 2018, and the police reports recite similar circumstances: Garrett driving well over the speed limit, cited without incident, paid a nominal fine.

The piddly fines certainly aren’t a deterrent. Garrett, 30, and the Browns agreed to a four-year contract extension in March 2025 that made him the highest-paid non-quarterback in NFL history at the time. The deal pays the seven-time All-Pro more than $40 million a season and includes more than $123 million in guaranteed money.

He set the NFL single-season sack record with 23.0 last season, surpassing the 22.5 accumulated by T.J. Watt and Michael Strahan. Garrett has 125.5 career sacks, averaging 14 a season, a pace that would enable him to break Bruce Smith’s career record of 200 in five years.

“That is definitely on my mind to go out there and get,” Garrett said. “That’s a goal I’ve had for years now since college.”

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Garrett has declined to discuss his driving habits.

“I’d honestly prefer to talk about football and this team than anything I’m doing off the field other than the back-to-school event that I did the other day,” he told reporters after ticket No. 8 in August, referring to a charity appearance.

“I try to keep my personal life personal. And I’d rather focus on this team when I can.”

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Keith Olbermann under fire for calling Lou Holtz a ‘scumbag’ after legendary coach’s death

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Keith Olbermann under fire for calling Lou Holtz a ‘scumbag’ after legendary coach’s death

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Former ESPN broadcaster Keith Olbermann once again incited backlash on social media Wednesday after he called late legendary college football coach Lou Holtz a “legendary scumbag” in an X post on the day Holtz was announced dead. 

“Legendary scumbag, yes,” Olbermann wrote in response to a clip of Holtz criticizing former President Joe Biden in 2020 for supporting abortion rights. 

Olbermann received scathing criticism in response to his post on X.

 

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“You’re a scumbag that needs mental help,” one X user wrote to Olbermann. 

One user echoed that sentiment, writing to Olbermann, “You’re the real scumbag here. Lou Holtz had more class, integrity, and genuine decency in his pinky finger than you’ll ever show in your lifetime.”

Another user wrote, “You’re a grumpy, lonely, Godless man. All the things Lou Holtz was not.”

Keith Olbermann speaks onstage during the Olbermann panel at the ESPN portion of the 2013 Summer Television Critics Association tour at the Beverly Hilton Hotel July 24, 2013, in Beverly Hills, Calif.  (Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)

Olbermann has made it a pattern of sharing politically charged far-left statements that are often combative and ridiculed on social media, typically resulting in immense backlash.

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After the U.S. men’s hockey team’s gold medal win, Olbermann heavily criticized the team for accepting an invitation from President Trump to the State of the Union address. Olbermann wrote on X that any members of the men’s team who attended the event were “declaring their indelible stupidity and misogyny,” while praising the women’s team for declining the invitation.

In January, Olbermann attacked former University of Kentucky women’s swimmer Kaitlynn Wheeler for celebrating a women’s rights rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court during oral arguments for two cases focused on the legality of biological male trans athletes in women’s sports.

Former Notre Dame football coach Lou Holtz listens before being presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House in Washington, D.C., Dec, 3, 2020.  (Doug Mills/The New York Times/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“It’s still about you trying to find an excuse for a lifetime wasted trying to succeed in sports without talent,” Olbermann wrote in response to Wheeler’s post. 

In 2025, Olbermann faced significant backlash after posting (and later deleting) a message on X aimed at CNN contributor Scott Jennings, that said, “You’re next motherf—–,” shortly after the assassination of conservative influencer Charlie Kirk. 

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Holtz was a stern supporter of President Donald Trump, even saying in February 2024 that Trump needed to “coach America back to greatness!”

Near the end of Trump’s first term, shortly after former President Joe Biden defeated him in the 2020 election, Trump awarded Holtz with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award of the United States. 

After Holtz’s death was announced Wednesday, several top GOP figures paid tribute to the coach on social media. 

Those GOP lawmakers included senators Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala.; Todd Young, R-Ind.; Tom Cotton, R-Ark.; and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; representatives Greg Murphy, R-N.C.; David Rouzer, R-N.C.; Erin Houchin, R-Ind.; and Steve Womack, R-Ark.; and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis; Indiana Gov. Mike Braun; U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon; and Rudy Giuliani.

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Lou Holtz, former Notre Dame football coach, addresses the America First Policy Institute’s America First Agenda Summit at the Marriott Marquis July 26, 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc)

At the time of publication, prominent Democrat leaders have appeared silent on Holtz’s passing, including prominent Democrats with a football background. 

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who worked as an assistant high school football coach; Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., who was a recruiting target for Holtz in 1986 as a college prospect; Rep. Colin Allred, D-Texas, who played in the NFL; and Rep. Kam Buckner, D-Ill., who played football for the University of Illinois, have not posted acknowledging Holtz’s death. 

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