Jameson's Sport Writing Portfolio

If you've been watching the NBA playoffs this year, you were graced with some great basketball matchups and series, including the breakout postseason campaign of Luka Doncic, Jamal Murray, Nikola Jokic, Jayson Tatum, and Tyler Herro. You'd think all this young talent would make for an exciting new generation of NBA players eager for a title shot. But then you wake up from your fantasy and realize this new wave of NBA basketball is never going to win a championship because of one man: Lebron James. Yes, he is the root of this parity problem the NBA is facing. Now, I know I'm not the person to criticize the NBA; I'm much more of a hockey fan and because I lack a hearty knowledge of current NBA stats and rosters, I've tried to avoid this subject, but I feel like I have to say something. The NBA is screwed. It's becoming washed up, unoriginal, and might I say, outright boring to watch now. How is it Lebron's fault you ask? Quite simple: he keeps finding his way ...

The Premier League in the 90s and early 2000s was lauded on the physical nature and rough-n-tumble style of play that made it so difficult for teams to play against one another. The lads from the pub would also become regular professional footballers and we got to see exactly how they would defend the opposition. They did it with tough and grit; taking fouls and smacking attackers in the hopes of not getting a red card. We used to applaud guys like Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand for their defensive prowess. In the 2010s and now 2020s, defense has all gone out the window. More teams in this summer's transfer windows haven't signed a single defender, save Man City's security of Ruben Dias from Benfica. They have all been desperate to boost their attacking power rather than solidify the backline. Just look at the transfers completed this window and you'll notice there is a significant cause for concern.  The EPL is now at a crossroads in identity. It is still considered t...

  Manchester United are going into another season without winning a trophy. They have failed miserably to even get a little bit of silverware in competitions they usually dominate. The FA Cup and EFL Cup semi-final losses will sting a lot because those were very winnable contests, and they choked them away. They've done it again in the Europa League semi-finals, falling to a strong Sevilla team that exposed the glaring gaps in quality in the squad. I am looking directly at you, Victor Lindelof and Harry Maguire. For once, the defeat was not David De Gea's fault. It's becoming even more clear United are not at the level they want to be. They are performing at 75%. They are getting the contributions from Bruno Fernandes, their new golden boy, but they have to find ways to score outside of the penalty area. You can't rely on taking penalties to take you over the line. Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford at least tried to score. This loss to Sevilla was the wake-up call the...

The month of August has given us a lot of things: absurdly hot weather, a potential federal ban of Tik Tok, more coronavirus cases, and of course, the NHL playoffs. Despite it being a weird format with a play-in group stage and a round-robin for reseeding the teams that already clinched before the pause of play in March. Yes, August is the hockey month. If you've seen how the qualifiers are going, you'd notice a weird trend: none of the top teams are making it into the next round. So far we have upsets of the Edmonton Oilers, Pittsburgh Penguins, Florida Panthers, and the New York Rangers. Edmonton and Pittsburgh's elimination raises eyebrows because they have the two best players in the world with Connor McDavid and Sidney Crosby. Nobody really cares about the Panthers because nobody cared about them during the regular season, but they at least tasted more playoff experience. All eyes were on the New York Rangers, a team on the cusp of emerging as a dark horse candidate fo...

For the first time in two years, Real Madrid has been crowned champions of Spain for the 34th time in their history. The Blancos were neck and neck with rivals Barcelona in the table until the Catalan club slipped out of contention following losses to Celta Viga and Osasuna. To say that Madrid are happy would be an understatement. During Zidane's tenure as manager of Real, the club has constantly battled Barcelona for trophies, everything from LaLiga to the Champions League; in the UCL, Real Madrid had the honors of three-peating from 2016 to 2019. What makes this league title even more special is that it was done by a Madrid squad a lot of pundits had written off as peaked. In fairness, those pundits were right to be skeptical. Real's best players were well into their 30s and were without Cristiano Ronaldo, but they played almost ageless. Sergio Ramos even netted a free-kick...not too shabby for a 34-year old center-back. Toni Kroos, Luka Modric, and Casemiro locked down midfi...

When people talk about Monaco, the images that come to mind are beautiful, yacht-filled waters, Formula 1 races, and exuberant amounts of wealth heading into one tiny city-state near the southern French border. However, what many people don't know is the success AS Monaco had in the footballing world. There was a point in time where it was believed Monaco could emerge as the next big French football club. They had a spree of fantastic success from 2016 to 2018, where they knocked English powerhouse Manchester City out of the Champions League in the Round of 16, they dethroned PSG as the champions of France in 2017, and developed a world-class talent in Kylian Mbappe. After 2017, the sky was the limit for Monaco. The House of Grimaldi and Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev invested millions of Euros into the club in hope of creating a dominant squad that could match the size and success of their rivals, PSG. So, why did it all come crashing down? How did Monaco, on the verge of b...

Summer is here, yet this feels like a weird dream. Coronavirus has pretty much halted anything fun, so sorry MLB fans, you won't be getting the chance to watch your favorite teams at the ballpark with a hot dog and Budweiser. Trust me, I miss it too. The one thing that keeps me entertained during this pandemic is the amazing amount of soccer available to watch. With MLS's return to play, the universal game continues to show its determination to bring the show to fans everywhere. Also with football comes the summer transfer window, though this is a weird one. Normally, players would be off on holiday or prepping for preseason tournaments; this year, they are still playing and some deals are already worked out. Three surprises have graced the football world so far. First up is Timo Werner to Chelsea. I guess I'm eating my words when I said in my Bundesliga Return blog that Werner to Liverpool was pretty much a done deal and there was nothing that could stop the German striker...

Zlatan Ibrahimovic is one of the greatest strikers of modern European football. A staggering physical presence combined with impeccable ball control and striking skills, Zlatan dominated the early 2000s as one of the most-coveted attackers in football. He's one of a few players to play for three of Italy's Serie A's "Big 5" clubs, won multiple Puskas, FIFPro, and individual league honors throughout his illustrious career and even dominated American soccer in his late 30s. He also brought incredible international awareness to Swedish football. Yet, there is one major prize Zlatan had ample chances to win but never captured: the Champions League. Despite being on superstar teams, some of them stockpiled with talent, Zlatan remained without a Champions League trophy well into the twilight of his career. How? Why? What kept one of the best strikers from hoisting the European Cup? To understand the persona of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, I'll use a reference from Diego Mara...

If you're like millions of people around the globe, cabin fever has probably set in horribly and you can't wait for the day when you can go on the street without worrying about catching a deadly disease. If you're a sports fan, you've already got some sort of release with the return of the UFC two weeks ago and now in Germany, Bundesliga soccer is back. As a soccer fan, I can't say I've really paid attention to the Bundesliga this year, despite this being one of the most competitive seasons to date. From Saturday to Monday, eight matches were played across the country in desolate venues. The eerie playing atmosphere was fun at first but now most fans realized this could be the norm for quite a while and that is unnerving to some. Nevertheless, it was good to see live soccer for the first time and we were treated to some incredible matches, equipped with high goal-scoring and socially-distant celebrations. The Bundesliga is back, but this is a matter of healt...

The 2020 NFL Draft was a weird enough experience in itself, you know with all the inter-connected Zoom calls; watching team coaches, general managers and owners basically pick players from their living rooms with their kids watching their beloved parents, hard at work, carefully selecting which stud college football prospect fills a role desperately needed within the team roster. At times, watching the draft made me wonder whether the GMs were making the call or whether their kids were putting in their two cents. More often than not, the audience waited for Roger Gooddell to announce the pick after it had been a solid ten minutes before they even went to the commissioner's live feed. Yea, it was an interesting NFL Draft, to say the least, but what really made this draft a must-watch were the picks made by the Green Bay Packers and Philadelphia Eagles in the first round and the second round, respectively. Instead of addressing serious...

Joe Thornton is one of the greatest natural hockey players to ever grace the ice. He was gifted with incredible vision and passing abilities, with the talent to set up goals from ridiculous angles. He is one of the biggest point producers in NHL history and one of a handful of players to win scoring titles for two different teams. With all his talent, size and skill, Thornton had a lustrious NHL career, but even with all of these accolades, he was never able to win hockey's most coveted prize: the Stanley Cup...why? Even before he was an NHL player, Thornton's legacy in hockey lore was cemented early on. In his junior hockey years, he was a member of the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds on the Ontario Hockey League, a sort-of small market team for Canada's junior leagues. In his second season with the Hounds, Thornton posted 123 points. Only at 18 years old, the St. Thomas, Ontario native was a lock for the NHL. He put small-town Canada on the map not only being from a small...