📰🏟️ CFB is back
Plus: NFL eliminates Pro Bowl Games…
Good afternoon. The top sports stories of the day are at your fingertips. Let’s rock and roll.
—Kyle
1) College football is officially back in action
The college football season begins tonight with a flurry of FCS games, with FBS action kicking off on Saturday with 8 games for “Week 0.”
- Saturday’s slate includes TCU-North Carolina (held in Dublin, Ireland), Virginia-NC St., Stanford-Hawaii, UNLV-Memphis, and #14 USC-San Jose St.
- Most college football teams will kick off the following weekend, when marquee matchups include #11 LSU-Clemson, #4 Notre Dame-Wisconsin, #17 Washington-Washington St., and #9 Ole Miss-#24 Louisville.
2) NBA free agent Jonathan Kuminga joins T-Wolves
Kuminga, the Warriors’ #7 pick in the 2021 draft, agreed to a 2-yr, $12.4M deal with Minnesota that includes a player option for Year 2.
- Kuminga, 23, reportedly turned down a 3-yr, $36M+ offer from the LA Lakers to instead join Anthony Edwards, Rudy Gobert, and new T-Wolves acquisition LaMelo Ball.
- Kuminga’s new $6.2M/yr salary with Minnesota is far below his previous 2-yr, $48.5M contract with Golden State (and later Atlanta), but allows him to test the FA waters again next offseason.
More minutes beats more commas for Kuminga
🌐 WEB GEMS
Interesting things to click
😳 “I feel like I took a freakin' gummy”: Inside the chaos of NFL players returning to college football.
😡 It goes down in the DMs: MLB player poll reveals a modern toll of legal gambling: Threats, messages, and encounters.
🔢 Ranking NFL divisions: NFC West, North battle for supremacy in 1-8 ranking ahead of the 2026-27 season.
3) NFL finally pulls the plug on Pro Bowl
The NFL is eliminating the Pro Bowl Games beginning with the 2026 season, ending both the AFC-vs.-NFC game and the newer flag-football event.
- While the game format is gone for the first time since 1938, the league will still give out Pro Bowl honors to 88 NFL players annually in late December.
- It comes amid fading fan interest in the NFL’s all-star game, and a surge in player opt-outs resulting in alternate Pro Bowlers like QBs Tyler Huntley (658 YDS, 2 TD, 3 INT) and Shedeur Sanders (1,400 YDS, 7 TD, 10 INT).
4) Cubs’ PCA blasts umps after blown balk call
Chicago Cubs OF Pete Crow-Armstrong, the leading NL MVP candidate, had to be restrained in the 6th inning of last night’s 2-0 loss to Arizona, after umpires missed a balk by Diamondbacks SP Eduardo Rodríguez.
- Umpire crew chief Alfonso Márquez later acknowledged the missed call, which would have brought PCA home from 3rd base for a 1-0 Cubs lead.
- “I saw four umpires miss a pretty obvious play,” Crow-Armstrong told reporters at his locker afterward, later adding: “I think they find new ways to screw something up every day.”
See the play and PCA’s reaction
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