Fantasy baseball analyst Dalton Del Don delivers a fresh batch of waiver wire considerations as we kick off Week 10.
Author: Michael
A lengthy European season is coming to a close this week with the Europa Conference League and Champions League finals, meaning the transfer rumor mill is starting to churn.
And without any major international tournaments this summer, the transfer market will be at the forefront of soccer news this summer.
Here is a roundup of the week’s biggest transfer rumors from around the world:
Lionel Messi
The biggest domino to fall this summer will be the newly crowned World Cup champion.
The battle between the pitcher and the hitter is the ancient core of baseball. Everything in this team sport emanates from that one-on-one duel at 24 paces contested an average of 76 times each game. The odds are stacked in the pitcher’s favor. The pitcher initiates the action. The hitter does not know what is coming. Measured by keeping the batter off base, the pitcher wins 68% of these duels.
But what if the hitter knows what’s coming? The ancient balance flips.
Minicamps get underway this week, and that gives us plenty to get to in this week’s Takeaways …
Mac Jones sure looks like he’s the Patriots’ starter. I was out at New England’s OTAs last week, and if you dropped in there from Mars and I asked you who the first quarterback was, I don’t think you’d have much problem figuring it out. Jones was taking snaps from starting center David Andrews during early walkthrough periods. He was with the first group in just about every drill. He was with the monied skill-players during seven-on-seven work.
Viktor Hovland won a significant victory and a $3.6 million prize, but that didn’t keep him from supporting a teammate’s U.S. Open dream.
Charles Oliveira has not tasted victory in the Octagon since May 2022.
He seeks to change that at UFC 289.
Oliveira (33–9, 1 NC) fights in the 289 co-main event against Beneil Dariush, a lightweight bout with title ramifications. A win for Dariush (22-4-1), who is looking to extend the streak to eight, would give him a title shot against reigning champ Islam Makhachev—the man who defeated Oliveira in October for the belt.
The loss to Makhachev ended a remarkable 11-fight win streak for Oliveira.
Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post
Nikola Jokic had a big scoring night in Game 2 of the NBA Finals, and that’s exactly what the Heat wanted.
Nikola Jokic’s superpower on the basketball court is that he always makes the right play. At 7-foot, 280 pounds, Jokic is one of the biggest and strongest players in the NBA, but the first thing associated with his game is his passing. The two-time MVP is the best passing big man ever, and even that might be underselling him: this is a floor general on par with Chris Paul, Jason Kidd, and the other greats to play the game.
The Bengals are being really thoughtful about how they’re handling their offseason program. Last year, coming out of the Super Bowl against the Rams, and facing the shortest offseason in NFL history, Zac Taylor made the decision to lop two weeks off the team’s program to give his players extra rest. It worked so well for everyone last year that Taylor decided to do something not identical, but awfully similar this year.
The details …
• Teams are allowed 10 OTA practices, which include the three that are generally allotted for a mandatory full-squad minicamp.
NBA fans don’t seem to be fans of the NBA’s new in-season tournament, and they made their feelings clear on Twitter on Sunday night. NBA commissioner Adam Silver made an appearance on NBA TV on Sunday night ahead of Game 2 of the NBA Finals between the Heat and Nuggets to discuss how the tournament will work with Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Grant Hill.
Silver explained the tournament was inspired by soccer leagues that stage in-season competitions.
No baseball is worth faceplanting while holding your child.
Hey dads of the world: Don’t do this.
What NOT to do as a dad #ncaabaseball #ncstate #campbell #ColumbiaRegional #espn #foulball #ouch #poorkid pic.twitter.com/QxNhybqGBq
— Avi (@MrDargies) June 4, 2023
Now look, I’m sure baseball dad meant well. I’m sure he thought “I’ll grab a baseball for my son,” but when you’re holding a child you have one specific job: Don’t hurt the child. There are no other priorities at that point.