GUATEMALA CITY, Guatemala ? The left back problem persists for the US.
Carlos Bocanegra isn't the answer. Jonathan Bornstein ? fresh off a shocker against Paraguay ? can do no right in the eyes of the collected masses, even when he does (see: World Cup 2010). And Jonathan Spector, nope.
But down in Guatemala, the flank was solidified ? for a night, at least.
Greg Garza, Thomas Rongen's embattled, frequently maligned, first-choice fullback, had himself a sublime performance against Suriname on Tuesday night during the U-20s' opening match of the CONCACAF Championship.
We all know that soccer fans are a different breed than your typical, run-of-the-mill North American sports fan.
Part of that is just because of the nature of the game ? 90 minutes of constant action with no breaks can lead to a, shall we say, ?focus? that is often lacking at other stateside sporting events.
But another part of that is because, until very recently, there was no bigger outsider in sports than the North American soccer fan.
The Waste Management Phoenix Open is one of the few PGA events that has the feel of an NFL game or a NASCAR race -- not to confuse the two demographics, but both atmospheres have very similar qualities. Huge crowds will again be in attendance, despite weather so cold the pro-am was canceled.
TPC Scottsdale's par-3, 16th hole is the most exciting hole in golf with bleachers surrounding tee to green. It will serve as the Kodak Challenge hole for the week, which gives it an unneeded boost. Sit back and enjoy the party in Arizona, and keep an eye on these players.
The favorites for this week are familiar names who have started strong in 2011:
1. Phil Mickelson -- After a strong performance at Torrey Pines, Phil heads to another course that he loves. With two wins and nine top-10s at this tournament, he is the favorite to win this week. The former Arizona State player will need to tighten up his game off the tee, but his short game looks to be in order.
2. Dustin Johnson -- Any personal issues that Johnson might have been experiencing when he withdrew a few weeks ago are not affecting him. He was near the top in every major statistical category last week and finished with a final-round 66, which included no bogeys. With top-10s in both starts this year, it would be a surprise if he didn't make it three.
3. Hunter Mahan -- Last year's winner should be primed for a title defense. Mahan entered Sunday's final round last week in the last group, but a double bogey on the opening hole set the tone for day and he finished the Farmers T6. His win in Phoenix a year ago was highlighted by only 12 missed greens the entire week. If he can continue to hit his driver well, expect him to have a lot of birdie opportunities.
4. Rickie Fowler -- He came within one shot of winning here in just the sixth tournament of his rookie year. Fast-forward one year and the young star continues to look for that first Tour victory. Fowler didn't play as well as his T20 finish last week would indicate. Following his 65 on the easier of the two Torrey Pines courses, Fowler shot 2 over for the remainder of the tournament, but he should feel pretty comfortable this week.
5. Jhonattan Vegas -- It's probably a bit premature to be including Vegas in the short list of favorites, but the rookie has earned it. The Venezuelan entered the 72nd hole last week just one stroke out of the lead and a realistic opportunity for back-to-back wins. The most impressive aspect of his performance was his calm and confidence in a high-pressure home stretch. The FedEx Cup points leader looks like he belongs.
NEW YORK (AP) -- Duke Snider, the Hall of Fame center fielder for the charmed "Boys of Summer'' who helped the Dodgers bring their elusive and only World Series crown to Brooklyn, died early Sunday of what his family called natural causes. He was 84.
Snider died at the Valle Vista Convalescent Hospital in Escondido, Calif., according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, which announced the death on behalf of the family.
"The Duke of Flatbush'' hit .295 with 407 career home runs, played in the World Series six times and won two titles. But the eight-time All-Star was defined by much more than his stats -- he was, after all, part of the love affair between the borough of Brooklyn and "Dem Bums'' who lived in the local neighborhoods.
Ebbets Field was filled with stars such as Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges during that 1955 championship season. Yet it is Snider's name that refrains in the ballpark favorite "Talkin' Baseball.''
"Willie, Mickey, and the Duke,'' the popular song goes.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Justin Upton knows what it's like to be the No. 1 pick in the country, to reach the majors and struggle, to put the pieces together and be an All-Star, to then step back and have a disappointing season and to be on the trading block.
Because Upton's name has been in headlines for five years -- and his family's name for longer than that, thanks to his brother, B.J. -- it's easy to forget Justin is still just 23 years old, five months younger than last year's NL Rookie of the Year.
As the Diamondbacks try to snap their streak of two consecutive last-place finishes, they are trying to walk the fine line between hanging the hopes of the franchise on Upton and being patient with their young star's normal growing pains.
Last night, Pat Onstad made his second preseason start for the Black-and-Red following last week's announcement that he would be returning to the playing field. Playing 45 minutes in a 1-0 victory over the University of California Santa Barbara, Onstad is slowly regaining fitness as he competes for a starting job in United's goal.
With only two days remaining on the West Coast, the Black-and-Red are excited to return home to Washington for a few days before departing once more for the Carolina Challenge Cup on March 3 in Charleston, S.C.
Ronde Barber will make $4 million in 2011, presumably his last season in the NFL when he will be 36 years old. The St. Petersburg Times said the deal is one year for the cornerback, who is almost assuredly going to the Hall of Fame.
It's not too much to pay an aging corner. Besides the fact he can still bump and run, Barber will get one more big paycheck because he will bring some veteran leadership to a defense still building. He will be on the corner opposite Aqib Talib.
It is a fair deal for both sides because the Bucs do not have a starting corner waiting in the wings and they need to use their first round draft pick on a pass rushing specialist. They needed Barber as much as he wanted to get another season in before retiring.
The Bucs could have chased a free agent, but Barber is a safer bet. He still plays beyond solid.
The Times reported that Barber's money is guaranteed as long as he is on the roster before the season starts. That means he would have to break down physically. The team is not going to push him aside in training camp with second thoughts, not this guy.
"He brings a lot of leadership to our football team, as you know, on and off the football field,'' Bucs general manager Mark Dominik told The Times. "He's really learned how to train his body so he can play a long time. I think that's the most amazing thing about Ronde is that he can play out there on an island at his age and play at such as high level the way he did last year again.
INDIANAPOLIS -- Cam Newton felt the need to apologize, or at least explain himself, but he needn't have. The biggest star at the NFL scouting combine began his news conference by reading a prepared statement intended to explain his eyebrow-raising "entertainer and icon" comments from earlier in the week. He was contrite. He was humble. Then he folded up the piece of paper and started taking questions, and he was Cam. And that's when it got good.
Newton is confident. He is engaging. He has a superstar's smile and a well-earned belief in himself that should make teams feel better, not worse, about making him their quarterback. He wears the mistakes of his past with a grown-up's wisdom and perspective. He has all the makings of a potential icon, and an entertaining one. The only thing telling this kid not to strive to be awesome is the stodgy old NFL establishment that recoils against anything and anybody who's off-script. Newton should shrug it off and keep scrambling out of the pocket en route to greatness.
MARANA, Ariz. (AP) -- The slow road back for Tiger Woods took another detour Wednesday when he followed a clutch birdie with a shocking shot into the desert and lost to Thomas Bjorn in the first round of the Match Play Championship.
It was only the second time that Woods, the No. 3 seed, had been eliminated in the first round.
But this was stunning even to Woods.
Moments after he made an 8-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole to extend the match, he hit a 3-wood so far to the right that it landed in a desert bush. It took two shots just to get it back onto the grass. After badly missing an 18-foot bogey putt, he conceded to Bjorn.
"I blew it," Woods said.
Twice he had simple chips on the back nine and failed to convert them into birdies, losing his lead on the 13th and falling behind on the 15th. He missed a 10-foot birdie on the 17th that he figured he should make "every time."
NEW YORK (AP) -- Duke Snider, the Hall of Fame center fielder for the charmed "Boys of Summer'' who helped the Dodgers bring their elusive and only World Series crown to Brooklyn, died early Sunday of what his family called natural causes. He was 84.
Snider died at the Valle Vista Convalescent Hospital in Escondido, Calif., according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, which announced the death on behalf of the family.
"The Duke of Flatbush'' hit .295 with 407 career home runs, played in the World Series six times and won two titles. But the eight-time All-Star was defined by much more than his stats -- he was, after all, part of the love affair between the borough of Brooklyn and "Dem Bums'' who lived in the local neighborhoods.
Ebbets Field was filled with stars such as Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges during that 1955 championship season. Yet it is Snider's name that refrains in the ballpark favorite "Talkin' Baseball.''
"Willie, Mickey, and the Duke,'' the popular song goes.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) -- Fiesta Bowl chief executive John Junker has been placed on administrative leave while officials investigate allegations of improper political campaign contributions and expense reimbursements by bowl employees.
Bowl organizers said Monday in a news release that an independent investigation is being conducted by a special committee of the board of directors consisting of retired Arizona Supreme Court Justice Ruth McGregor and Fiesta Bowl Directors Jim Bruner and Steve Whiteman.
The board doesn't have a definitive timeframe for when the investigation will be completed.
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- Pau Gasol had 18 points and 11 rebounds, Kobe Bryant scored 17 points and the Los Angeles Lakers extended their cushion over Oklahoma City in the Western Conference standings by beating the Thunder 90-87 on Sunday.
Andrew Bynum added 16 points and 10 rebounds, but the Lakers weren't able to simply overpower a Thunder team that added Kendrick Perkins for interior toughness but won't get him in the lineup for a couple weeks.Lamar Odom missed a pair of free throws with 10.9 seconds left to leave the door open for Oklahoma City, but Kevin Durant and James Harden each missed 3-pointers from the top of the key in the closing moments.
Russell Westbrook led Oklahoma City with 22 points and Durant scored 21. The Thunder were held to a season-low 31 second-half points in suffering their first three-game losing streak of the season.
When doctors told Hampton point guard Jerica Jenkins that she had cancer, she cried for a long time that April day.
It's an understandable reaction, even more so for a high school freshman, which she was at the time of the diagnosis of Hodgkin's lymphoma.
That day ended, and, so too did Jenkins' tears, as it's coming up on seven years since that day, and she hasn't wasted any water on her cancer.
"I was shocked," said Jenkins, a 5-foot-4 junior from Lancaster, Tex. "I didn't believe it. I was 14. I was like, 'There's no way I have cancer.' I just couldn't believe it. I cried right then. Then, I realized that I had to deal with it and move on."
There were enough tears to go around that first day when Jenkins got the diagnosis two days after a biopsy. She and her mother cried and prayed, and then got after beating Hodgkin's, a lymphoma with a relatively high treatment rate, if detected early.
PHILADELPHIA, Miss. - Marcus Dupree left here destined to be the greatest football player ever. He returned over the weekend as a pro wrestler looking for a new start.
There he was, a burly grandfather all dressed up in Oklahoma red, dropping make-believe elbows on pretend bad guys. Somehow you knew Dupree's long strange journey would end like this, sharing a bill with characters like the Krypt Keeper and the Albino Rhino.
The rasslin' extravaganza on the outskirts of town pretty much lived down to expectations. The surprising thing was the main attraction didn't.
That's great, but most of us figured he would want more out of life at age 46. It's hard to imagine Tom Brady happily swinging a folding chair as Gisele Bundchen sits ringside. But you and I and Tom and Giselle aren't from around these parts.
Most of us look at Dupree and see a story in search of a happy ending. Saturday night's event was billed as "REDEMPTION."
How could it be found chasing clowns around a wrestling ring at the Neshoba County Coliseum?
The last time Dupree performed in front of a hometown crowd was Nov. 13, 1981. He scored his 87th career touchdown for Philadelphia High, breaking Herschel Walker's national record. You probably know the rest of the story.
Dupree signed with Oklahoma. He made second-team All American as a freshman and gained 239 yards in an abbreviated Fiesta Bowl appearance. Conflicts ensued. When Barry Switzer gets on you for a lack of discipline, you know you have issues.
Dupree left Oklahoma, signed with the USFL and injured his left knee. He came back five years later for a couple of nondescript seasons in the NFL.
Major League Soccer's love of conferences will be tested in 2011 by a balanced 34-game schedule, which makes the separate standings pointless, and the addition of two clubs in the Pacific Northwest.
It addressed the second problem on Friday, announcing that the Houston Dynamo will shift to the Eastern Conference after five years in the West.
Each conference will have nine clubs, thanks to the arrival of the Portland Timbers and the Vancouver Whitecaps.
The league's reasoning? Houston was the eastern-most club in the Western Conference. Done and dusted.
The move splits the Dynamo with in-state rival FC Dallas (mostly to the north, but slightly to the west), but it won't affect the number of times they'll play each other this season.
Houston's Eastern sojourn may be short. With Montreal entering the league in 2012, MLS will be forced to have one conference with 10 teams and another with nine. Houston easily could return next year, or wait until the 20th club (MLS is targeting New York City), joins the league. At that point, conferences will matter because the schedule will be unbalanced.
Either way, the Dynamo likely won't be spending too much time in the East, and they may not mind. Although the new conference offers shorter flights, it hasn't been as kind on the field. Houston has earned just 1.357 points per game against Eastern foes over the course of its five regular seasons, compared to 1.646 points per game vs. Western teams. .fanhouseButton {margin:2em 0;} .fanhouseButton a:link, .fanhouseButton a:visited, .fanhouseButton a:hover, .fanhouseButton a:active {background-color:#dd2829;color:#FFFFFF;font-size:18px;padding:0.3em 0.6em;text-decoration:none;} .fanhouseButton a:hover {background-color:#000000;}
The most recent existing team to switch conferences was Sporting Kansas City, which moved east in 2005.
The problem created by the balanced schedule, unfortunately, remains one that fans will have to live with in 2011. MLS has committed to determining its playoff participants based on conference standings, in part to avoid the embarrassment of seeing a Western team win the Eastern title for a third straight year.
That means the sixth place team in one conference might stay home this fall while the fifth place club in the other moves on, even if it boasts a better record playing the exact same schedule.
It's unfortunate, but it should be temporary. Unless MLS finds a way to add a 13th month to the calendar, it will return to an unbalanced schedule in 2012. At that point, conference standings will be meaningful once again.
It may seem like just weeks ago that the baseball season ended, but, believe it or not, Spring Training is here.
If you're like the rest of us at FanHouse, you can't wait for the season to begin. We've got you covered until opening day arrives.
It's the FanHouse 15, a countdown of the 15 most talked about, blogged about, tweeted about, sensational stars of America's pastime. Who will be number one?
A grand jury in a suburb north of New York City Monday declined to indict a police officer in the death of Danroy Henry, Jr., a Pace University football player shot while driving his car outside a bar in the Westchester County town of Thornwood.
Henry's father and his lawyer said they were not surprised by the decision and vowed to take the case to the United States Department of Justice and to pursue a civil suit.
"My faith was never in district attorney (Janet) DiFiore," Danroy Henry, Sr., said in a telephone conference call. "Our faith is in God. We were hoping she would surprise us but we had no faith in her."
Henry died a week before his 21st birthday and a few hours after the homecoming game from wounds caused by bullets fired from the gun of Aaron Hess, a police officer in Pleasantville, N.Y., who responded to a call to quell a disturbance in a parking lot after 1 a.m. on Oct. 17.
Although Henry was not involved in the fighting, Hess shot him from the hood of Henry's moving car. Police and witnesses disagreed as to whether police had told Henry to move his car or if Henry's actions put the officer in danger.
In a prepared statement, DiFiore said the grand jury of 23 persons heard testimony from 85 witnesses, including two passengers in the car with Henry and also from Hess, who testified without protection of immunity from prosecution. More than 100 exhibits were admitted into evidence at a proceeding which began on Jan. 10.
The Waste Management Phoenix Open is one of the few PGA events that has the feel of an 
NEW YORK (AP) -- Duke Snider, the Hall of Fame center fielder for the charmed "Boys of Summer'' who helped the 
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- 
INDIANAPOLIS -- 
MARANA, Ariz. (AP) -- The slow road back for 
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- 
When doctors told Hampton point guard Jerica Jenkins that she had cancer, she cried for a long time that April day.
Major League Soccer's love of conferences will be tested in 2011 by a balanced 34-game schedule, which makes the separate standings pointless, and the addition of two clubs in the Pacific Northwest.
A grand jury in a suburb north of New York City Monday declined to indict a police officer in the death of Danroy Henry, Jr., a Pace University football player shot while driving his car outside a bar in the Westchester County town of Thornwood.