Matteo MarchiLiterally one week ago, Ben Simmons was one of the most celebrated players in the NBA. The Sixers guard couldn't shoot, but the gleeful narrative was that it didn't matter—his passing, penetrating, and post-up games were all so strong that he was the odd NBA guard who didn't need a jump shot. I believed it. The numbers backed it up—he averaged 16 points, eight boards, and eight assists in his rookie campaign. LeBron called him “Young King.” Julius Erving called him “once-in-a-lifetime.” The Washington Post wrote about how his rookie season was actually better than Lebron's. Then, in the first round of the playoffs, he completely dominated the Heat, nearly averaging a triple-double (18.2/10.6/9.0) and 2.4 steals while shooting 50 percent in a five-game series. To quote CBS: “Rookies are not supposed to do this. There is supposed to be at least some kind of learning curve. Simmons is special.”
Again, that was one week ago.
Then Brad Stevens and the Boston..

Jared C. Tilton/Getty ImagesNothing Phil Mickelson does on a golf course should ever, ever, EVER surprise anybody, not with more than two decades of swing pyrotechnics as reference for Lefty’s wizardry. The same holds true for anything that comes out of Mickelson’s mouth. He’s part William Shakespeare, part Mark Twain and part John Grishom when it comes to answering interview questions.
The combination of “do” and “say” was on display again Sunday at the Wells Fargo Championship when Mickelson made an all-world par on the 18th hole at Quail Hollow Club to cap off a closing 69 for a T-5, his fifth top-five finish in 2018.
Mickelson was smack in the fairway off the tee only to push his second shot left of the green. The ball wound up in a precarious lie against the rocks by the stream beside the putting surface, but Mickelson didn’t break a sweat. He popped up the shot to 20½ feet of the hole—a remarkable effort give what he was facing. Naturally, he rolled in the putt, and authored a vi..

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) Jason Day birdied two of his final three holes Sunday for a 2-under 69 and a two-shot victory over Aaron Wise and Nick Watney in the Wells Fargo Championship, his second victory this year.

After squandering a three-shot lead on the back nine, Day rolled in a 20-foot birdie putt on the 16th hole and then effectively won the tournament when his tee shot on the 230-yard 17th hole crashed into the flagstick and settled 3 feet away. He was the only player to make birdie on No. 17 at Quail Hollow in the final round, and it staked him to a two-shot lead.

Wise, a PGA Tour rookie, saved par on his last two holes for a 68. Watney made a 59-foot birdie putt on the last hole for a 69 and his best finish in three years.

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Day finished at 12-under 272 and returns to the top 10 in the world.

Tiger Woods was never a factor. He failed to make birdie in the final round of a PGA Tour event for only the second time in his career, and the first since the ..

THE COLONY, Texas (AP) Sung Hyun Park converted a clutch shot to turn around what had been a disappointing year.

Park chipped in for birdie from behind the green on the par-4 18th hole to close out a 5-under 66 in the second and final round of the weather-abbreviated LPGA Texas Classic, good for a one-shot victory.

”The beginning of the season was pretty frustrating, since I missed two cuts, and I felt pretty upset inside,” Park said. ”But after today’s win, I just feel like everything – everything just kind of disappeared.”

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The sweet-swinging 24-year-old South Korean, the highest-ranked player in the field at No. 5, ended up needing that chip to drop to survive a late charge by Lindy Duncan, who birdied her final three holes for a 64, the low round of the tournament.

Park finished with a two-round total of 11-under 131 for her third career victory and first since last season, when she was named rookie of the year and shared the player of the year award..

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) Jason Day shot a 2-under 69 on Sunday to win the Wells Fargo Championship by two strokes over Aaron Wise and Nick Watney, his second victory of the season.

After squandering a three-shot lead on the back nine, Day’s tee shot on the difficult 230-yard par-3 17th hole crashed into the flagstick and settled less than 3 feet away. He made the putt to take a two-shot lead, becoming the only player to birdie the hole in the final round.

Day finished at 12-under 272.

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Tiger Woods was a non-factor, shooting 74 to finish 14 shots back. He failed to make a birdie in the final round of a tournament for the first time since 2014.

THE WOODLANDS, Texas (AP) Bernhard Langer won his first PGA Tour Champions event of the year when he saved par on the final hole for a 2-under 70 and a one-shot victory in the Insperity Invitational.

Langer had to rally from as many as four shots behind in the final round at the TPC Woodlands. He birdied two straight holes around the turn, added birdies on both par 5s on the back nine and then had to scramble for par.

Paul Goydos (68) led for much of the back nine until a bogey on the 18th hole. He tied for second with Jeff Maggert and Bart Bryant, who each had a 69.

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The 60-year-old Langer won for the 37th time on the PGA Tour Champions, which trails only Hale Irwin’s 45. It was Langer’s fourth win at the Insperity Invitational.

Ireland's Paul Dunne and Gavin Moynihan win the Golf Sixes, which connected again with fans and made for an exciting departure from regular European Tour events

ST. ALBANS, England (AP) Ireland won the second edition of the European Tour’s innovative GolfSixes tournament as Gavin Moynihan and Paul Dunne beat the French pair of Romain Wattel and Mike Lorenzo-Vera in the final on Sunday.

The Irish overcame the England Women’s team of Charley Hull and Georgia Hall 2-0 in the quarterfinals of the six-hole matchplay event, then beat South Korea in the semifinals, with Moynihan chipping in for a birdie on the first playoff hole.

Moynihan and Dunne then defeated France 2-0 at Centurion Club to secure the first prize of 100,000 euros each. That almost doubled Moynihan’s career earnings on the European Tour, for just two days’ work. The 23-year-old player has not made a halfway cut in eight events this season.

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The European Women’s team of Mel Reid and Carlota Ciganda lost to Australia in the quarterfinals. But the fact that both women’s teams, who were rank outsiders, advanced from the group stage was a boost for the wom..

Saturday was a day of absolute daggers across the sports world, the most notable one being when LeBron James ripped out the hearts of every player on the Toronto Raptors roster. Yet still, that may not have been as bad as what happened in Philadelphia, where the Sixers rained confetti down on their fans to celebrate forcing overtime.
Harsh? Sure. Maybe the confetti guy thought Marco Bellinelli's last-second shot was a three-pointer, but it's still a terrible look for Philly, a proud sports town that was on top of the world just a few months ago, and now has sunk all the way back to the bottom. As nine-point favorites in their own building, the Sixers fumbled the ball away multiple times with the game on the line, eventually leading to a crushing three-point loss and now a 3-0 series deficit that will be too much to overcome. To make matters worse, Sixers star center Joel Embiid was nearly killed by Jayson Tatum in the process.
With the game tied at 81 late in the fourth, Tatu..

THE WOODLANDS, Texas (AP) Bernhard Langer plodded his way to an even-par 72 on Saturday, good enough to maintain the lead at the Insperity Invitational as the leaderboard bunched up behind him.

Langer was at 9-under 135 and had a one-shot lead over three players after he followed up his course-record-tying opening-round 63 by making just two birdies and two bogeys at The Woodlands Country Club. The second bogey was especially painful, following his birdie on the par-5 15th with a missed 2-footer on the par-3 16th.

”It was a tough day, Langer said. ”The wind was up and the pins were difficult at times. I played really good for the most part, but I just did make as many birdies, and I missed that really short one there … three-putted from 12 feet or so. That one hurt. I didn’t take advantage of the par 5s, either. I just didn’t get much going.”

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The 60-year-old German, a three-time winner of the Houston-area event, is seeking his first victory of 2018 after..