It's that time of year again. Inside Lacrosse has once again blessed us with its annual all-name team, compiling a list of the preppiest-named lax bros in the country. This year's list is an impressive one, and once again includes a collection of aristocratically named female players. We do have one quibble with the rankings though: How the hell did Ronjohn Dadd drop from second team to third team? For shame.

Here are some of our other favorites:

Ehret Faircloth
Draper Donley Jr.
Deemer Class
Elspeth McGarry (female)
Siobhan Stergis (female)

[Inside Lacrosse]

Jason Kidd's game-winning three-pointer put a massive exclamation mark on last night's Knicks-Nets game. Luckily, one enterprising fan with courside seats had his camera rolling when Kidd launched his shot, giving us the close-up view of the play you see above.

These kinds of videos are always fun, as they bring in a layer of atmosphere that gets lost in television broadcasts. This one has the added goodness of allowing us to watch Spike Lee's antics via something other than a five-second cutaway.

h/t netw3rk

You all worked your usual Photoshop magic with knocked-out Manny Pacquiao yesterday. Here's the best of your submissions.

via Om4r

via Mdubb

via prmulvihill

via HorrorX

via NicCageWearsYoFace

via Samer

via Greg Reese

via swank_basket

via schreib

via Sgt. Hammerclaw

via KidzPlay

via MikeBrown4199

And here is you winner, via Allison09. Email us at tips@deadspin to claim your prize.

According to Yahoo Sports, two members of Manny Pacquiao's entourage attacked photographer Al Bello because he was taking pictures of the knocked-out Pacquiao at the conclusion of Saturday's fight. Bello spoke to Yahoo, which also has photos of the incident, about the the alleged attack yesterday:

Bello said Pacquiao adviser Michael Koncz and assistant trainer Buboy Fernandez were punching and kicking at Bello as he was trying to photograph Pacquiao, who was face first down on the mat.

Bello jumped off the apron in an effort to avoid confrontation with the men.

"Had I not gotten off the ring, I have no doubt the two of them would have beaten the [expletive] out of me and I might have been seriously hurt," Bello told Yahoo! Sports.

It's understandable, maybe, that Koncz and Fernandez had an emotional reaction to seeing their friend get brutally knocked out and were feeling protective. But there's a reason Pacquiao was stretched out under bright lights with a photographer handy: He was making a shitload of money—some of which presumably went to Koncz and Fernandez—to participate in a spectacle. If you don't want people gawking at your pal's injury, tell your pal to find a career that doesn't involve people injuring each other in front of an audience.

It's not as if people weren't going to be able to relive Pacquiao's knockout over and over again anyway, with or without Bello. So back off, guys. Remember, when life turns your photo opportunity into a lemon, you can always make some photo lemonade.

Top photo by Al Bello, via Getty Images.

[Yahoo]

It's been a rough year for the Arlington Knights. The 3A girls basketball team from Indianapolis, Ind., is 0-5, averages 17 points per game, and has lost games by scores of 77-16 and 68-14. The season reached its nadir last night, though, when Arlington fell to Bloomington South by a score of 107-2.

And yet, Bloomington South's head coach, Larry Winters, insists that his team was not trying to run up the score. From the Indianapolis Star:

Winters said he understands the public reaction but that no effort was made to embarrass Arlington or run up the score. He only had nine Panthers players for the game and rotated four new players in every four minutes.

"I didn't tell my girls to stop shooting because that would have been more embarrassing (to Arlington)," he said, noting Arlington was playing an aggressive 2-3 zone. "We were not trying to embarrass them or run up the score."

Yeah, we're going to have to disagree with that. There is nothing more embarrassing than losing 107-2. Arlington's coach, Ebony Jackson, was understandably upset:

"No it's not OK but (Bloomington South coach Larry Winters) will have to live with that," she said. "If that's how they want to carry themselves, that's fine. I'm focused on me and mine and we'll just keep going."

The game was so lopsided that the two schools will likely cancel their next scheduled game against each other to save themselves from being involved in another debacle like this one. Sadder still is the fact that Arlington's two points came from two separate trips to the free-throw line. Jackson better have them shooting plenty of free-throws during their next practice. Fifty percent from the line is unacceptable.

[Indy Star]

Goddammit, @MLB. Why did you have to do this? It's bad enough that you are already one of the worst Twitter accounts in sports, but why did you have to take a perfectly good internet meme, one that plenty of people were having fun with, and murder it with a bullshit tweet like this?

That doesn't even make any fucking sense! What does the IKEA monkey have to do with baseball? What do the Reds have to do with the IKEA monkey? How can the IKEA monkey respond to this call to the bullpen if it is not holding a phone? You can't answer any of these questions, because this is a stupid meme that you have created. A very stupid meme. It's not even original, either. This is how you do a good call-to-the-bullpen meme.

God, you are the worst.

Thank you for your continued support of Deadspin. We're checking out a bit early today because we have some celebrating to do with the newly married Tim Burke. It's gonna be a time! Malinowski will be here to keep you guys company.

Well here's something you don't see every day. About midway through the fourth quarter of last night's Nets-Raptors game, Nets forward Kris Humphries stepped to the line to shoot two free-throws. Pretty standard stuff. That is until referee Courtney Kirkland comes flying in and tries to stop Humphries from shooting his second attempt by physically blocking his shot. Maybe just blow your whistle next time, Courtney. That's kind of what it's there for. Also, that was a foul. Got him all over the arm.

[Hypervocal]

On Tuesday, the St. Louis Cardinals traded infielder Skip Schumaker to the Los Angeles Dodgers for some guy named Jake Lemmerman. Who is Jake Lemmerman? The baseball record says he's nobody special, a 24-year-old utility infielder who's put up decent numbers in the minors and profiles as a solid backup. But that's not the only evaluation of Lemmerman's talents: In college, he made the legendary Duke Fuck List as "Subject 7." Let's review the scouting report, shall we? (Click images to enlarge)

Strengths: Executes the cutoff perfectly. Weaknesses: Inconsistent release point.

Strengths: Alertness, activity. Weaknesses: Tries to do too much.

Strengths: Quick hands. Weaknesses: Chases Everything.

Overall, we think the Cardinals got themselves a hell of a player.

h/t Emeritus

Josh Hamilton is officially an Angel after agreeing to a five-year, $125 million deal with the team. The Angels now have a lineup that is built around the best player in baseball in Mike Trout, and two guys who are still capable of claiming that title as their own in Albert Pujols and Josh Hamilton. The rest of the lineup isn't anything to sneeze at, either.

Of course, Hamilton comes loaded with potential pitfalls. He was notoriously brittle during his time in Texas, and there is always the threat that his personal life will take another turn downward. Still, Hamilton can hit the shit out of the ball and the thought of him and Pujols getting to hit behind Mike Trout is a frightening one. This team should score a ton of runs.

Hamilton's contract isn't even all that outrageous, either. Remember, Jayson Werth will be making $20 million in 2014, and Nick Swisher is looking for a contract of equal size. It's unlikely that Pujols and Hamilton will ever truly live up to the combined $50 million that the Angels will be paying them, but who cares? They are going to hit and the team is going to be fun as hell to watch.

The Yankees finally made their big free-agent splash this week, when they signed Kevin Youkilis, an aging third basemen with bad hips, to fill in for Alex Rodriguez, their incumbent aging third basemen with bad hips. OK, maybe it was less a "splash" than a "thud." Youkilis was terrible last year, putting up a career low .745 OPS. He wasn't even the Yankees' first choice at third base, falling behind strikeout-and-error machine Mark Reynolds and longtime part-timer Eric Chavez. Red Sox fans are wailing about another of their heroes going to the Bronx, which is a little much, given that Boston dumped him off on the White Sox in midseason last year. Youk is old and creaky and on the downslope of his career. In other words, he'll fit in just fine with the 2013 Yankees.

So far, the Yankees have lost four of last year's top eight position players in terms of WAR to free agency or serious injury. Nick Swisher, Russell Martin, and Chavez have moved on to other teams, and Alex Rodriguez will likely be out until June after undergoing hip surgery. And we haven't mentioned Derek Jeter, who is now 39 years old and is trying to recover from a serious ankle injury in time for opening day.

But these are the Yankees! They'll just go out and spend a lot of money and make some trades and retool their lineup overnight, right? Here comes Josh Hamilton! Oh, nope. Here comes Michael Bourn! Not exactly. Aside from grabbing Youkilis, the Yankees are expected to re-sign 39-year-old Ichiro Suzuki, find themselves a serviceable catcher, and then stand pat. The team even seems intent on getting its payroll under the $189 million luxury-tax threshold in order to reap financial benefits offered in the new CBA. (Only for the Yankees does austerity mean spending $12 million for a player who had 1.3 WAR last year.)

What this means is that the Yankees are in position to have a very tired, very old lineup next season. They are essentially relying on Robinson Cano and a bounce-back year from the now-29-year-old Brett Gardner—a mere youth compared to the rest of the roster—to be the wind underneath the offense's arthritic wings. Perhaps the plan is to save money and make a run at a few guys in 2014 free-agency class. Until then, there's going to be a whole lot of creaking and limping going on in Yankee Stadium.

Torii Hunter should be feeling good these days. He's coming off of a terrific season and he just signed a two-year, $26 million contract with the AL champion Detroit Tigers. Not bad for a 37-year-old outfielder!

And yet, Hunter couldn't help but unleash some bitterness upon hearing that his former team had splurged on Josh Hamilton to the tune of $125 million.

Ease up, Torii. You were great last year, but that .389 BABIP had a lot to do with that.

The video above was released by the Philadelphia police department tonight. It depicts what the police say is three men getting into an argument on the SEPTA El train about the Bulls-76ers game that took place in Philly on Wednesday night. The two men by the door of the train can be seen arguing with another man who is off camera at the start of the video, but eventually comes into frame just before the train stops. After exiting the train, one of the men who was by the door turns around and shoots the man he was arguing with in the stomach.

Philadelphia police are currently looking for the shooter.

After his team suffered yet another disastrous loss, this one at the hands of the New York Knicks, Kobe Bryant had some thoughts to share with Yahoo's Adrian Wojnarowski about how his team can bounce back from its dreadful start:

"A lot of responsibility is going to fall on me and Pau [Gasol], but we need Metta [World Peace]," Bryant told Yahoo! Sports. "Metta has a big presence on this team. I really encourage him to take that role head on – and to be an enforcer with it. But Metta, he's done it before. We've won before together."

Bryant stopped in the hallway on the way out of a 116-107 loss to the Knicks, his eyes widening and his voice – scratchy, tired from a night, from a season, of screaming – became a little louder, a little surer when he said again, "It has to be the guys who have done it before."

He let that hang there for a moment – who have done it before – and finally smirked and said, "Metta's just as intense as I am, and he's got a lot of that psychopath attitude that I do.

Right. If the Lakers are going to turn it around, they need their core players—Kobe, Pau, Metta—to come through. And... wait a minute. Kobe left someone out of his plans, didn't he? Someone who's the biggest, most athletic, and second-highest paid person on the team. Is Kobe using a Jordanesque passive-aggressive motivational tactic on Dwight Howard now? Or is he just making a down payment on assigning the blame?

[Yahoo]

From the Daily Iowan comes the story of six University of Iowa students, all of whom are on the school's baseball team, living in a house that is apparently super haunted. "Oh big deal, what did someone get the chills one night and now they are scared of ghosts?" is something you might be thinking right now. Well stop thinking that, because these dudes are dealing with some Paranormal Activity type shit in that house.

First, the basic stuff:

"We've lived here over the past two years," junior pitcher Aaron Smit said. "But over the past few months, we noticed things getting a little bit weird. We had a kid in here who thought he saw a ghost - a shadow in a form of a human."

That experience made Smit, and the rest of his roommates, think about some other not-so-normal things that have happened in their residence before.

"We thought about how [baseball player Taylor Zeutenhorst] said he saw a little girl in his bedroom," Smit said. "There was a time in the morning where someone was slamming the door, and we heard sprinting up the stairs. Everyone assumed it was me, but I told them I was in bed."

OK, so not all that scary yet. That could all easily be explained away as the result of a few hyperactive imaginations. Except a hyperactive imagination doesn't steal your fucking underwear while you are sleeping:

And on two separate occasions, girlfriends of players have had underwear removed from them while sleeping, even though they were wearing pants. Each time, the undergarments were discovered in another place.

What the shit? And they were wearing pants, too! The ghost took off their pants, removed their underwear, and then put their pants back on. That is horrifying. Oh, these ghosts are also capable of draining one's life force:

One of the more peculiar stories comes from a room in the attic of the house. Kenyon, a junior catcher who has lived in the furnished attic all year, said that for whatever reason, there were times he couldn't find the energy to leave his bed or his room.

"I never wanted to leave the room. I had no motivation," he said. "I usually have high energy. I would get depressed - be in there moping around, wondering, ‘What the hell am I doing?' "

Other teammates who have lived in Kenyon's room in the past have told him they experienced similar things and feelings of exhaustion while in the room.

A team of paranormal investigators came to the house and confirmed that one of the spirits in the house was in fact sapping Kenyon of his energy on a daily basis:

"I don't think he was trying to take his energy to be mean," Benter said. "Sometimes, to get attention, they take energy. It can be harmful to people; they can get ill or be overcome with severe depression. I don't think this one meant it to be harmful, but some do."

Nope. Not OK with any of this. Not OK with any of it at all.

[Daily Iowan]

As everyone is aware, at least 27 people were killed in a school shooting in Newtown, Conn. this morning. Unsurprisingly, many writers and commentators who usually operate exclusively within the world of sports have reacted to this horrifying news by discussing the details or expressing opinions about gun laws or mental-health issues. It's a perfectly normal reaction on a day when sports seems especially peripheral.

But no amount of shock or tragedy can stop the braying morons of the Internet from issuing their rulings about which people can discuss which topics. Here is who is being told to stick to sports today:

Before leaving last night's game against the Lakers with an ankle injury, Carmelo Anthony scored 30 points in 23 minutes. And that was after he had a relatively cold second quarter, hitting only one of his four shots.

That first quarter, though, captured what makes Anthony so intoxicating as a player. In those 12 minutes he went 8 for 9 from the floor, hit three three-pointers, made three free-throws, and grabbed three rebounds. Here's how his points unfolded in the first quarter:

• 11:33: 25-foot three-point jump shot
• 10:35: 25-foot three-point jump shot
• 9:36: 25-foot three-point pullup jump shot
• 5:58 21-foot pullup jump shot
• 5:28 misses 18-foot jump shot
• 5:20 16-foot jump shot
• 3:58 driving slam dunk
• 1:26 driving layup (draws foul)
• 1:26 free throw 1 of 1
• 0:58 draws foul, hits two free-throws
• 0:33 17-foot jump shot

• This is a pure scorer is doing exactly what he was built to do, the kind of performance that can make you think that Anthony will never miss another shot. He will, of course, and that causes pure scorers like Anthony to be viewed suspiciously by NBA fans. The pure scorer tries to seduce us, to convince us that a basketball game can be won simply by shooting the ball with no remorse. In the end, though, the pure scorer almost always betrays us.

  But last night, and throughout this season so far, Anthony has been turning that idea on its head. The knock on Anthony has always been that he needs to evolve into a more complete player, one who commits to passing and rebounding and playing defense as much as he does shooting the ball. Sacrifice some points to fill the rest of the stat sheet. Share some opportunities with your teammates. In the midst of his best season as a pro, Anthony has evolved, but not in the way that he has always been urged to. The scorer has just become a better scorer than he's ever been before.

  So far this season, Anthony's rebounding rate is in line with his career average. His assist rate has dropped dramatically, to its lowest point ever—7.05, less than half of last year's 15.03 rate. His usage rate, meanwhile is the highest it's ever been. And his 20 field-goal attempts per game is his highest mark since the 2009-10 season.

  Yet Anthony is also having his most efficient year ever, carrying a career-high 24.05 PER. He isn't just shooting more, he's shooting smarter. He's up to 27.9 points per game from last year's 22.6. And oh, right: The Knicks have the best record in the conference at the moment.

  Anthony's signature shot, in the past, has been the midrange jumper, usually on an isolation play after a series of jab steps. It was fun to watch him operate with that method at the elbow—shaking his defender enough to get a shot off, even though everyone knew the shot was coming—but it didn't always lead to the most efficient scoring opportunity.

  This year, Anthony has traded many of those mid-range jumpers for shots at the rim and three-pointers. With 5.6 three-point attempts per game, he's averaging one whole attempt more than his previous career high, and he's hitting 42 percent of them. He's taking 6.8 shots at the rim per game, his highest level since coming to New York. His attempts in the 16-to-23-foot range—the low-efficiency part of the floor—are at a career low 4.6 per game.

  Instead of working on setting up his teammates, Anthony has dedicated himself to setting up Carmelo Anthony. Gripe if you want. Evolving on his own terms, he's getting better and better at putting the ball in the basket. And that's the object of the game.

"Take That Nigger Off The TV, We Wanna Watch Football!": Idiots Respond To NBC Pre-Empting Sunday Night Football | NBC pre-empted the first quarter of tonight's 49ers-Patriots game to show President Obama's speech at the Newtown memorial for victims of the Sandy Hook shooting. As you might expect, many football fans didn't take kindly to this. Read »

Former ESPN Outdoors Producer: "Most Of The People I've Met From The NRA Don't Believe The Bullshit They're Selling" | These chocolates don't look alike; they're flavored differently; and they're made by three different confectioners. What they have in common is that they're all little effigies of Santa Claus. That, and that they're goddamn terrifying. Read »

Kevin McHale And Kevin Garnett Shared A Tearful Hug After Last Night's Game | The traditional postgame handshakes turned into something more when McHale and Garnett greeted one another at mid-court. Read »

Brit Olympics Hero Jessica Ennis Leaves Kate Middleton Hanging On Awards-Show Handshake, Sparks National Outrage | The drama of a pregnant Kate's emergence became multiplied, though, when SPOTY runner-up and London Olympic heptathlon champion Jessica Ennis didn't return Middleton's offered handshake onstage. Read »

San Francisco Chronicle: David Stern Schedules Games On Christmas Because He "Celebrates Hanukkah" And "Has No Real Feel For Christmas In The First Place" | This particular criticism of Stern is not so much "tinged" with anti-semitism as it is basted in anti-semitism. Read »

Mike Lupica's Pro-Gun-Control Essay On Today's Sports Reporters Makes Bob Costas Sound Like A Right-Winger
| Lupica, breaking from the program's traditionally neutral political tone, attacked the state of gun control in America during his closing Sports Reporters essay. Read »

Report: London Fletcher's Family Involved In Altercation With Cleveland Fans, Aunt Suffers Heart Attack
| According to the family, "Cleveland police used Tasers during the incident, which resulted in the arrest" of two of Fletcher's cousins, Hasaan Robinson and Douglas Robinson as well as an unnamed nephew. Read »

Yesterday, running back DeMarco Murray joined the vaunted fraternity of Dallas Cowboys players who have had their butt cheeks put on display to be ogled by the masses when a routine tackle in the third quarter turned into an all-out pantsing. This is now third naked Cowboy ass we've seen this season, which will assuredly be remembered as the Year Of The Naked Cowboy Ass.

Zenit St. Petersburg, one of the most successful teams in the Russian Premier League, recently signed two players of mixed ethnicity. Hulk, a forward from Brazil and Alex Witsel, a midfielder from Belgium, are the two darkest skinned players on the team. Landscrona, a fan club of the team, released a letter on its website bemoaning the arrival of Hulk (pictured above) and Witsel because the absence of black players is an important part of maintaining the "national identity of the club." It's cool though, Landscrona is totally not racist. They say so in the letter. (Translated text via Google Translate):

We are not racists, and for us, the lack of black players at Zenit is an important tradition, which emphasizes the identity of the club and nothing more. Due to its preservation, Zenit in the world of football has its own identity

Here's a tip: Anytime a statement begins with "We are not racists," it means that whatever thoughts are about to follow those words are incredibly racist. It gets worse, as not only does Landscrona think that not having black players on the team is important for the team's identity, they also see it as a tactical issue:

In addition, most of the championship takes place at a sufficiently severe weather. In these circumstances, technically players from warmer climates can be difficult to fully disclose his football talent.

Oh dear. Well, on the bright side, at least this is just a small minority of fans expressing a radical opinion. I'm sorry, what's that? Oh, Landscrona is the team's largest fan club, you say? That's a drag.

[Landscrona]
[Guardian]