needed

Odell Beckham Jr. is exactly what Tua Tagovailoa needed for Dolphins’ offense odell,beckham,jr,is,exactly,what,tua,tagovailoa,needed,for,dolphins,offense,sbnation,com,front-page,nfl,dot-com-grid-coverage

On: June 25, 2024 By: admin

Now in the twilight of his career, wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. joins the Miami Dolphins, a franchise desperate to win their first playoff game since 2000. Is Beckham the missing piece for Miami’s offense? Probably not, but he can still be very good for them.

Beckham is no longer an offense’s North Star, one to shoulder the load of an offense. He hasn’t been for some time now. That’s not to say he won’t help a Dolphins offense brimming with talent, that finished second in the NFL in points in 2023. His skillset fits their high-flying attack, and he proved last season with the Baltimore Ravens he can contribute.

The ability to create separation is still Beckham’s hallmark. His agility remains a staple of his game, complementing his route running. He brings dynamic cuts in his breaks that still shake defenders and find him in the open field. His one-step slant continues to gash cornerbacks and the speed to take it the distance.

Beckham finished 2023 with 35 receptions for 565 yards and three touchdowns. He also drew repeated defensive pass interference flags due to outmaneuvering defensive backs, forcing them to clutch his jersey and impede him with the ball in the air. He remains an artisan in route-running.

Beckham won’t be the figurehead of the Dolphins’ offense. That goes to wide receiver Tyreek Hill, who is shattering defenses in ways no other can. But as a complementary piece beside Hill and Jaylen Waddle, he’ll bust single-coverage cornerbacks.

In space or in the red zone, Beckham’s lethal in single coverage. Against the Seahawks in November, Beckham carved up Tariq Woolen with ease and gifted Ravens backup quarterback Tyler Huntley an easy floater to the back corner.

Defenses will struggle to contain the trio of Hill, Waddle and Beckham. And that’s not including tight end Durham Smythe, or the Dolphins’ one-two punch running back tandem Raheem Mostert and De’Von Achane.

And, as always, Beckham brings pizazz. He brings arguably the widest catch radius in the NFL. He brings highlights and wizardry.

Beckham has playmaking left in the tank. His “drop off” — if you want to call it that — still has him as a viable receiving threat. In an offense where Beckham is given easier matchups due to the outstanding playmakers surrounding him, there’s a high likelihood he’ll flourish.

The third receiver for Miami last season was Braxton Berrios, who went for 27 receptions, 238 yards, and a single touchdown. It’s not hard to imagine OBJ eclipsing those numbers in 2024, even with Berrios still on Miami’s roster in 2024.

Lando Norris needed ‘balls out’ final lap to beat Max Verstappen lando,norris,needed,balls,out,final,lap,to,beat,max,verstappen,sbnation,com,front-page,formula-one,2024-formula-one

On: June 22, 2024 By: admin

Immediately after qualifying on Saturday at the Spanish Grand Prix Lando Norris stated that it took a “perfect lap” to beat Max Verstappen. Norris pipped the Red Bull driver by two-hundredths of a second to capture the second pole position of his career, putting him in position to score his second victory of the season.

Moments later at the FIA Press Conference, the McLaren driver went even further, outlining how his final lap needed to be “balls out” to beat Verstappen.

“I mean, we’re always close. I don’t think any practice was split by more than a tenth between the top five,” described Norris. “So I was expecting the same as that, and I think it was. Probably Max was always two and a half tenths ahead of everyone, both Q1 and Q2 in the runs we did. And we did three laps, you know, we did three runs, four runs in the end altogether. So you do four laps throughout the whole of qualifying. But every time was like missing a little bit to Max and a lot of it was high speed.

“So I knew for the final lap, I’ve got to go balls out and do it, you know. And I managed to get that little bit, like that, you know, 200ths, 300ths, 400ths that I was needing to get out of Max I managed to get. So I’m happy the risks paid off and for all of it to come together when I needed it most was great.”

Norris elaborated on how good it felt to put together that kind of lap, in that moment and on that stage.

“I mean, I’m probably going to get back and Jarv [Andrew Jarvis], my engineer, is going to tell me that I’ve messed something up, but I think it’s so tricky nowadays, with the car and the [tires], and we’re pushing so much, just to put everything together,” outlined Norris. “You might be able to do half of it once and half of it another or mix it up, but to kind of put all of it right at that limit is very tricky and I’m sure every driver would say the same. So very rewarding when you do and when you do it and end up on pole because of it, it’s even sweeter.”

“It feels great, yeah. I mean, poles always feel good, and it’s the second one in my career. I mean, I’ve had two Sprint race poles, but I don’t regard that at all as a pole position. So, yeah, this is the second one of my career. It’s been a while since Sochi, all the way back then, so… Yeah, it feels great,” continued Norris. “I mean, it was an amazing lap.

“Honestly, it was my best lap by a long way. I pretty much put the whole lap together, so I got a nice slipstream. I think probably my best corner around the lap, every single part of it put together. Max was a bit ahead in Q1, Q2. I knew I had to kind of do something perfect in Q3 to do it. And that’s exactly what I did. So I’m pretty happy that I managed to pull off probably my best lap that I’ve done probably ever.”

As we outlined earlier today after diving into the data, Norris secured pole position with a strong performance in Sector 1 and into Sector 2. While Verstappen was stronger on the straights, particularly the long straight coming out of Turn 14 and back to the start/finish line, Norris built a lead during that earlier portion of the track, and Verstappen could not make up the difference.

Capturing pole position is one thing, but can Norris win on Sunday?

The McLaren driver certainly believes he can.

“I don’t have any concerns,” added Norris. “I mean I’m excited. It’s a long run down to Turn 1. It’s probably one of the places you don’t want to start on pole, but it’s an opportunity for us to go out and try and win a race you know.

“We’ve not done loads of long running. We’ve done a bit and I think we were close, as it always has been. I think tomorrow is not like this car is way quicker. I think between Mercedes, ourselves, Red Bull, Ferrari, there’s eight cars that could have probably been on pole today and that have a chance of probably winning the race tomorrow,” continued Norris. “So it’s about making the least mistakes, similar to today, and just trying to execute another good race that we normally do.”

He might need to go “balls out” yet again to pull off a win on Sunday.

Kyrie Irving fell flat in NBA Finals when Mavericks needed him the most kyrie,irving,fell,flat,in,nba,finals,when,mavericks,needed,him,the,most,sbnation,com,front-page,nba,nba-playoffs,nba-finals,draftkings

On: June 18, 2024 By: admin

It’s going to be another trip around the sun before Kyrie Irving gets a chance at his second NBA championship, and he only has himself to blame. This was his opportunity, his moment to cement a legacy that exists outside of LeBron James. Now after a horrific NBA Finals series against the Celtics, it’s difficult to argue for much beyond Kyrie being in the “Hall of Very Good.”

There was only one game in these NBA Finals where Irving played like himself at all, and that was Game 4 — which the Celtics treated like a rest day so they could close out the series in Boston. In the games that mattered Irving was such a non-factor that he was rarely the 3rd, or even 4th best option on the Mavericks. His stats outside of that Game 4 speak for themselves.

31-of-81 from the field (.382), 7-of-23 from three (.304), 4.75 assists per game, 8 turnovers.

Even if we include back in Game 4, the only contest where he was even a shadow of himself, Irving still finished the 2024 NBA Finals by scoring 99 points on 99 field goal attempts. A mediocre performance for a middling point guard, let alone someone who is often hailed as one of the best players in the NBA.

To be fair, Irving’s talent speaks for itself. He’s one of the best iso scorers not just in the modern NBA, but that the game’s ever seen. Kyrie’s blend of jaw-dropping handles paired with an ability to score anywhere on the floor is the reason that night-in-night-out he could go off for 50 at any given moment if a team doesn’t have a way to stop him. The problem is that while Irving might be one of the best improvisational ball handlers in basketball, if he’s met with so much as a stiff breeze he’s rendered unable to adjust and change his game to compensate for how opponents try to stop him.

Entering the NBA Finals here was no doubt this was going to be a tough series for Dallas on paper. They didn’t match up great against the Celtics’ defensive-focused backcourt of Jrue Holliday and Derrick White, while simultaneously not having great options to handle Jayson Tatum and Jalen Brown. Still, there was the ever-present hope that the Mavericks could actually do this, because we’d been conditioned to overlook the defensive deficiencies of Kyrie and Luka Doncic, instead focusing on their scoring prowess.

This season for the Mavericks was defined by Luka and Kyrie, and neither really rose to the occasion in the finals. There’s no question Doncic struggled at times against the Boston backcourt, but he wasn’t a liability on the court the same was Irving was.

Dallas is Irving’s fourth stop in his career, and the third where he was brought in as “the missing piece,” only to fall apart in the Finals. Only twice in his career has Irving managed to play with the same level of regular season success in the postseason, and both came with LeBron James in Cleveland when they won a ring in 2015-16, and returned to the finals in 2016-17.

It’s unclear what’s next for Kyrie Irving, because he remains one of the most mercurial players in the NBA. There is a path forward for Dallas, but it requires work. They have to find a reliable scoring option in the front court, and need to get tougher defensively — both of which are possible. However, these NBA Finals showed once more that a team can’t count on Irving to be the man to get them over the hump. There’s also a pattern of behavior here that when the work gets to be too much, Irving is just as likely to demand a trade than stick around for any retooling.

At this point that’s Kyrie Irving’s legacy: One of the best regular season players to ever step on the court.