In a shocking decision, Seattle Seahawks starting left tackle Russell Okung has announced he has fired his agent and will represent himself when he tests free agency next year. He hopes other players will follow.

In a piece published by Okung on The Players' Tribune, the former first-round draft pick says most players choose to be represented by an agent when it comes to contract negotiations because they haven't ever thought of an alternative. The 2012 Pro Bowler believes that he is "more than adequate" to handle himself without an agent and that "betting on himself" will pay off in the long run:

I know my worth. I can look at the market and go directly to a team without an agent and tell that team my worth. And I can do so with confidence because I've done my research, I've educated myself and I've questioned the answers I've been given.

And when it comes to reviewing the details of my next deal, I'll hire an expert — a lawyer or a sports attorney who understands the dynamic of football contracts — to read the paperwork. I'll negotiate a one-time flat fee that isn't dependent on the size of my salary.

While Okung is addressing his own specific situation, he later took to Twitter to clarify that his article wasn't just about him and that other players should follow suit:

The standard rate that NFL agents receive of a player's contract is typically close to 3%, the maximum allowed. While that may seem like nothing, for a player who will most likely sign a lucrative long-term contract after this season — assuming he remains healthy — it could be the equivalent to hundreds of thousands of dollars, possibly millions.

Before the 2010 NFL draft, Okung chose Authentic Athletix's Peter Schaffer to represent him as his agent, and the two agreed to a fee of 2.5%, according to Okung. The Seattle Seahawks then signed Okung, the No. 6 pick, to a six-year, $48.5 million contract— 2.5% of $48.5 million is $1.2 million.

Okung believes that 2.5% isn't worth the amount of work Schaffer, and other agents, do. He thinks today's average athlete has the necessary skills to act as his own agent and find a fair deal himself, without an agent to guide him:

You see, there's a new sort of athlete, and he's not just an athlete. He's a businessman and a living brand, a la Magic Johnson or LeBron James. He's a player who represents himself because he not only understands the market and his own personal value, but has the self-assurance and financial know-how to do so, too.

With free agency just a year away, Okung's situation has already made for an interesting story line.

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NOW WATCH: Mark Cuban: I Will Never Let My Son Play Football

A Detroit-area entrepreneur believes he has scored a touchdown with his new business idea. Or thrown a strike.

Actually, it's both.

Chris Hutt owns the Fowling Warehouse, a 34,000-square-foot repurposed industrial site in Hamtramck that's devoted to a football/bowling hybrid sport — fowling — he and some buddies invented while tailgating years ago at the Indianapolis 500.

The facility features 20 lanes, where players or teams try to be the first to knock down all 10 of their opponents' bowling pins by tossing a single football from a distance of up to 48 feet.

The game is not complicated, Hutt said, but it's not easy, either. In the Fowling Warehouse's first six months of operation, only 29 strikes had been thrown over 100,000-plus games.

There's another quick way to end a fowling match: A unique shot called a Bonk, which occurs when a player knocks the middle pin — and only the middle pin — off the board on the first throw. The other nine pins must remain standing.

According to Hutt, there are about 60 Bonks per month. Those who record one are allowed to "honk your Bonk," or sound a Great Lakes freighter horn at the bar. The sonic blast is deafening, Hutt said, but it lets "everyone know ... that you're the coolest person in the room."

Hutt's business, which also has a 175-seat beer garden and a stage for live music, has drawn big crowds on weekend nights. Some take advantage of a deal that allows unlimited play for $10 until closing at 2 a.m. Others reserve lanes for group play, up to 10 players per lane, in two-hour increments.

Peter Grace's third fowling excursion came on a recent Friday night, when he and about 20 others celebrated a friend's birthday.

"It's just a great place to hang out," said Grace, a 27-year-old from Detroit. "It's the best of both worlds. You're bowling and you're playing football at the same time."

Hutt, 46, said he eventually would like to expand his fowling empire.

"This will work in any major city," he said, "and we really want to target the college towns."

SEE ALSO: Uber is delivering free Chelsea FC jerseys to fans all over the world

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NOW WATCH: Marine biologist explains why the pro surfer attacked by a shark didn't actually get bit

Warning: spoilers ahead

John Cena is best known as a WWE superstar, but he also shows off some impressive acting chops in “Trainwreck.”

The Judd Apatow-directed, star-making vehicle for Amy Schumer (who wrote the screenplay), looks at the love life of a commitment-phobic New Yorker named Amy (Schumer), who finally meets her true love, Aaron (Bill Hader). But to get to that point Amy has to go through some losers and break a few hearts. A victim of the latter is Steven, an Adonis who thinks he’s found “the one” until a glance at Amy’s phone makes him realize the harsh reality.

Cena plays Steven as a sensitive, arthouse film-loving teddy bear looking for a soul mate (possibly of the same gender).

“I get the call that they want me to audition for this part, they really want a big guy,” Cena told Business Insider about going out for the role.

Cena admits that he was hoping to prove to the casting director that he could do more than play a hulk of a man. It turned out he didn’t have to do much convincing.

“There’s Amy and Judd sitting there,” said Cena of his shock when he got to the audition and saw the director and star waiting for him. “We did stuff in the script and then they were like, ‘Let’s mess around,’ and we did some improv. From there they called me back for another audition, and then they called me back for a table read, and the rest is history.”

In a movie filled with R-flavored funny moments, Cena doesn’t waste time to get in on the fun. The first time we see Steven, he and Amy are having sex which leads to him hilariously trying to talk dirty to her, but instead only spouts weight-training lingo.

According to Cena, the script originally had Steven being more physical with Amy in the scene.

“We had dress rehearsals and I was throwing around this stunt coordinator in crazy sexual positions that I was going to do [with Amy] on camera the day we filmed,” Cena recalled. “But then it came down to [Steven] not knowing how to talk dirty and being sexually confused, and I’m actually very happy with that.”

Cena said what was kept for the scene comes mostly from what he and Schumer did while improvising on set.

Cena shows his improv skills once more in a movie theater scene where a drunk Amy instigates a fight between Steven and another patron. Cena, who does his fair-share of banter on WWE, has a natural flow as he dishes out some great lines. One of the most memorable is after the guy says Steven looks like Mark Wahlberg — “I look like Mark Wahlberg ate Mark Wahlberg!” Steven exclaims.

But it’s when Amy and Steven leave the theater that Cena shows a surprisingly impressive dramatic side.

Having already seen her phone, which is filled with messages she has with other men, Steven opens up to her, voicing his hurt as he thought she was going to be his “CrossFit queen.”

“It got me to do a lot of stuff I’m not known for,” Cena said of the role. “I got my chance to throw my sense of humor out into the world, and at the same time play this hulky guy who’s a softy, which in real life I’m a very emotional guy.”

Cena is not new to movies, but his past roles have been tough-guy characters in films like “The Marine” and "12 Rounds." 

However, Cena hopes this is just the start of showing audiences a different side. Along with developing projects, he knows he needs to work on films where he doesn’t stretch himself too thin.

Though Cena promises not to leave the WWE anytime soon, he’s not taking a break from movies either. We will see him again on the big screen this holiday season in a bit part he has in the Amy Poehler/Tina Fey comedy “Sisters.”

“I play a tattooed-up drug dealer, so a different look than how you see me on Mondays being the goody two-shoes white knight,” he said.

Watch Cena in action in the “Trainwreck” red band trailer (warning: NSFW).

SEE ALSO: LeBron James is actually a really good actor in the new comedy 'Trainwreck'

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Floyd Mayweather Jr.'s next opponent will be 31-year-old welterweight Andre Berto, according to a report from TMZ Sports.

While the September 12 fight hasn't been confirmed by Mayweather's camp or a network, Mayweather has mentioned Berto's name in the past.

Berto also tweeted that he was excited to "be in the running" to fight Mayweather.

The boxing world isn't exactly jumping for joy over this next fight. If the report is true, it may confirm a popular theory about how Mayweather wants to end his career — with an easy opponent, allowing him to retire undefeated.

Mayweather is 48-0 after a unanimous, 12-round victory over Manny Pacquiao. While Mayweather has suggested his next fight may be his last, some people think he will go for two more easy fights to retire 50-0.

Mayweather's father and trainer, Floyd Mayweather Sr., told David Mayo of MLive that Floyd "just wants to get a couple of easy fights." Mayweather Sr. said he told his son he should just retire if that's the case. He also said he thought judges and analysts would soon turn against his son's defensive, evasive fighting style.

No victory is ever guaranteed, but Berto seems like a safe opponent for Mayweather. Berto is 30-3 during his career but is just 3-3 in his past six fights. In one fight Berto lost to Robert Guerrero, whom Mayweather has beaten.

As ESPN's Dan Rafael noted, a Mayweather-Berto fight "pales in comparison" with potential fights with Amir Khan and Keith Thurman, two other fighters who were in the running to fight Mayweather. Rafael mentions that CBS potentially airing the fight instead of a pay-per-view (PPV) medium is seen as a "goodwill move" after Mayweather's fight against Manny Pacquiao didn't live up to expectations with a price of $100 on PPV. Some people also believe a Mayweather-Berto fight wouldn't drive in PPVs.

Bleacher Report's Kelsey McCarson writes that Berto has "no business" being in the ring with Mayweather:

He is athletic but hardly skilled. He is not ranked among the top 10 welterweights in the world by either Ring Magazine or the Transnational Boxing Ranking Board. He has suffered losses to middling contenders Victor Ortiz, Robert Guerrero and Jesus Soto Karass. He possesses no attribute as a fighter that would lead any sane person to believe he'd be anything but a glorified sparring partner for Mayweather on fight night.

Wil Esco of Bad Left Hook broke down Berto's recent fight against Josesito Lopez, noting that Mayweather would dismantle Berto with the same style Lopez used.

This has been a frequent criticism of Mayweather, as some people believe he has chased easy, safe fights to preserve his record. His fight against Pacquiao took so long to develop that Pacquiao was clearly on the back end of his career by the time it came to fruition.

With Mayweather now ending his career, he has a chance to be one of the few champion boxers to finish his career undefeated, and it seems he may be going for easy opponents to ensure that legacy.

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NOW WATCH: Everything you didn't know about Manny Pacquiao's incredible life outside of boxing

Jordan Spieth did not win the British Open, but he still took home $460,000 for his fourth-place finish, pushing his season total to a whopping $9.2 million.

While Spieth is still well behind Tiger Woods' $109.8 million in career earnings on the PGA Tour, Spieth is well ahead of Woods' pace. With 11 tournaments left in the season, Spieth will almost certainly break Woods' record for most earnings in a single season, $10.9 million set in 2007.

More jarring is their career earnings (not counting endorsements). At 21, Spieth has already earned $17.4 million on the PGA Tour. Woods, 39, had $2.9 million in career earnings at the same age. At this pace, Spieth will destroy Woods' record for most career earnings.

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The historic 1996 Chicago Bulls championship team

Outside of a few posts on Twitter, DeAndre Jordan has remained relatively quiet since backing out of his verbal agreement with the Dallas Mavericks to re-sign with the Los Angeles Clippers two weeks ago.

Early Tuesday morning, Jordan finally broke that media silence by writing a blog post on "The Players' Tribune," where he admitted he struggled with the "intense pressure" of free agency.

"As everyone knows, I struggled with it. It was nine or ten days of intense pressure. Every night I would have a different scenario in my head, of the city and team where I thought I would fit best," Jordan wrote. "I had several meetings with teams and even more conversations with my family and friends. I kept thinking about what it really meant to be 'home' and I would go back and forth."

In a video accompanying the blog post, Jordan says he initially considered backing out of his verbal agreement, and return to the Clippers Monday morning – just three days after he committed to sign a four-year $80 million contract with the Mavericks:

"I woke up Monday morning feeling like there was something missing, something that I didn't do, something that wasn't covered. And that's when I started to begin to have second thoughts. I feel like we've all made decision in our lives where we've had second thoughts about things and have gone back and had to revisit a situation. And I definitely feel like this is one of those times for me."

In a separate post on "The Players' Tribune," Clippers power forward Blake Griffin claims the entire "fiasco" was actually "super boring." Griffin said he was already in Houston having dinner with Jordan Tuesday night – before the emoji-filled scene took place Wednesday– and he was initially there to just talk and console his friend.

The next day, Clippers owner Steve Ballmer, and several players, flew to Houston to meet with Jordan at his home. Griffin says the news reports floating around that the Clippers were "holding Jordan hostage" were overblown, and, in actuality, the majority of the evening wasn't spent barricading the doors and windows, but rather watching TV and playing video games.

"To be honest, the whole thing was pretty boring. It was like a super laid back family party," Griffin wrote. "Some people were watching TV. Some people were playing video games. After a while, I hopped in the car and drove aimlessly around Houston for an hour just to kill time. When I got back to the house, we were sitting around waiting for 11 p.m. so DeAndre could officially sign."

By changing his mind, and backing out of his deal with the Mavericks to re-sign with the Clippers, Jordan had spurned Mavericks owner Mark Cuban and forward Chandler Parsons in the process. In the immediate aftermath, Cuban refused to refer to Jordan by name, and Parsons described him as "scared" and called the whole ordeal "unethical and disrespectful." 

While he praised Cuban, and coach Rick Carlisle, Jordan admits he didn't truly give it "all of his thought" when he agreed to join the Mavericks, and says he regrets letting down an entire franchise upon reevaluating his decision.

"The most emotional part of the entire process was when I decided I was going to stay because I knew I had to upset, and let down, a whole different fan base, and that definitely got to me," Jordan said. "At the end of the day we're basketball players and these great athletes, but we're also human. And we make mistakes, we have emotions and feelings just like everybody else."

Jordan will answer questions from the media Tuesday afternoon when the Clippers hold a press conference for Jordan and their other notable free agent acquisitions, Paul Pierce and Josh Smith.

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The historic 1996 Chicago Bulls championship team

Skylodge Adventure Suites allow you to sleep fully among nature, in a transparent capsule that hangs off the side of a mountain. 

Video courtesy of Natura Vive

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The Atlanta Hawks, Los Angeles Clippers, Milwaukee Bucks, and Philadelphia 76ers each unveiled new uniform changes for the upcoming season – and now the Indiana Pacers just blew them all out of the water.

Pacers point guard George Hill announced on Twitter Tuesday morning that the team will wear exact replicas of the fictional Hickory High School basketball jerseys, made famous by the cult-classic movie "Hoosiers." The uniform will be an alternate as part of the NBA Pride Collection. The Pacers will wear the uniform on select game days.

Shortly after Hill's announcement, the Pacers released a full statement:

"In a unique collaboration, MGM and the Indiana Pacers will bring one of the all-time great underdog stories, Hoosiers, to the NBA hardwood. For the 2015-16 season, the Indiana Pacers will be introducing the Hickory uniform as part of the NBA Pride Collection to be worn on select regular season games. The Hickory uniform is a tribute to the rich tradition and history of basketball in the State of Indiana and will serve as inspiration to fans everywhere that no matter how improbable the challenge may be, amazing things can be accomplished through teamwork, determination, heart, and hustle."

Here are some more pictures of Hill wearing the new Hickory uniforms:

More pictures have been uploaded to the team's website.

We can only hope that "Space Jam" star, and Charlotte Hornets owner, Michael Jordan will now open talks with Warner Bros. to acquire "Tune Squad" uniforms for his team to wear.

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The historic 1996 Chicago Bulls championship team

J.R. Smith's gamble on himself hasn't worked out as expected.

Smith opted out the final year of his contract with the Cleveland Cavaliers, worth $6.4 million, to hit free agency this summer. However, he has lingered on the market perhaps longer than he, or anyone else, expected.

According to Joe Vardon of Northeast Ohio Media Group, Smith is expected to meet with the Cavaliers this week to talk about a new deal, and is prepared to take less than what he turned down on his player option.

Smith told Vardon that other teams offered what he was looking for — $7-9 million, reportedly — but that they didn't offer the winning situation he has in Cleveland. As Vardon notes, the only teams left with cap space to give Smith a raise are the Portland Trail Blazers (who reportedly spoke with Smith before talks fell apart) and the Philadelphia 76ers.

Though the Cavaliers have Smith's Bird Rights and thus, could offer him a pay raise, Smith has little bargaining power here. He doesn't have an offer for more money from another team to threaten Cleveland, and the Cavaliers are already rocketing into the luxury tax, so they'll be hesitant to give Smith anything more than $6.4 million due to the tax penalties.

Unfortunately for Smith, he timed his free agency poorly. He may have gotten offers for more money following the regular season, when he became an important shooter and fourth scoring option for the Cavs after being traded from the Knicks. However, he played poorly in the postseason, starting with a two-game suspension for hitting Jae Crowder of the Boston Celtics, and shooting just 31% in the Finals.

His value decreased, and while teams threw around big money this offseason in preparation for the salary cap spike next summer, Smith probably could have opted in, outperformed his last contract, then entered free agency when more teams have more cap space.

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NOW WATCH: This mesmerizing video of Chinese students jumping rope in unison is going viral

Portugal defeated Tahiti 5-3 in the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup final to claim their second championship. But things might have been different if the match had not been played on Sunday.

Tahiti played the match without their captain, Naea Bennett, who sat out the game because he is Mormon and does not work on Sundays, according to Tahiti Nui Television.

Bennett was the team's second-leading scorer, having hit the back of the net five times in just four matches including two goals in Tahiti's win over Italy in the semifinals and another two goals in their 5-4 win over Iran in the quarterfinals. The latter match included this amazing bicycle kick goal.

According to the Tahiti Nui Television report, fans begged Bennett to reconsider. However, the move did not come as a surprise as the 38-year-old Bennett had previously missed Tahiti's group stage match against Paraguay, which also fell on a Sunday.

Back home in Tahiti, Bennett's participation with his club team is less problematic. According to the Church of Latter-Day Saints, Bennett's teams at times have had numerous players who were Mormon and the teams are never asked to play on Sunday, something that began with Bennett's father, a local soccer star who converted to Mormonism as an adult.

“Everyone in Tahiti knows the story of [Naea's] father, Erroll Bennett. As a young man, Erroll was the best soccer player in Tahiti, maybe the best player in the South Pacific. He was taught about the Church and wanted to be baptized. The missionaries taught Erroll about keeping the Sabbath day holy, but all of Erroll’s soccer games were on Sunday. He felt that if he and his wife were to be baptized then he would have to give up playing soccer ... Erroll Bennett’s decision did not go unnoticed. After all, soccer was by far the most popular sport in Tahiti, and he was the star of the top team. He had pressure from his extended family, from his teammates, and from those who ran organized sports. But once Erroll was baptized and told his team that he wouldn’t be playing on Sunday anymore, sports officials began to make changes to make it possible for Erroll to continue playing. They rearranged sports schedules, moving the Sunday games to nights during the week.”

This was Tahiti's first Beach World Cup final. Interestingly, in 2013, they lost in the semifinals. Had Tahiti won that match, Bennett would have been able to play in the final. While this year's tournament was held in Portugal, the 2013 World Cup was played in Tahiti and the final was played on a Saturday.

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NOW WATCH: This mesmerizing video of Chinese students jumping rope in unison is going viral

Synergy Sports Technology released it's latest evaluation on players' NBA Summer League performances, and, according to their research, the most efficient player wasn't No. 1 overall pick Karl-Anthony Towns. It wasn't D'Angelo Russell, nor Jahlil Okafor. In fact, the most efficient player at NBA Summer League wasn't even drafted this year.

According to Synergy Sports Technology, it was NBA D-League veteran Justin Dentmon (not including Oleksiy Pecherov, who played in just a single game).

Dentmon, who will turn 30 this September and stands at just 6-feet tall, went undrafted in the 2009 NBA Draft after a 4-year career at the University of Washington. And while he's dominated the NBA's D-League in the past — he was named the 2012 MVP and received an All-Star selection a year later — his spotty NBA career consists of just eight games played with three different teams.

In those eight games, he averaged nearly 12 minutes per game, and shot just 33 percent from the field and 14 percent from behind the arc to put up only 3.3 points-per-game. While Dentmon has failed to make a lasting impression with his lackluster NBA regular season play, he was still able to dominate some of the league's best young players in Summer League.

Dentmon averaged 17 points on an astounding 56.5 percent from the field, and 54.5 percent from the three-point line, as well as draining 94 percent of his free throws. He also registered one of the highest points-per-possession scores at 1.4, according to Synergy Sports Technology.

Dentmon was able to drive to the hoop:

He showed that he could successfully shoot off the dribble:

And he was able to catch and shoot the three-point ball with absolute ease:

Despite his prolific shooting and playmaking ability, it's unlikely Dentmon will be on an NBA team's opening day roster. His NBA dream is fading fast, but Dentmon told AP's Tim Reynolds that people shouldn't count him out just yet.

"The door might be halfway closed, but it's not closed yet. When it closes, I'll stop," Dentmon said. "It's been the right time for some other people. It hasn't been my time yet. It's coming. I believe that." 

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The historic 1996 Chicago Bulls championship team

Robert Griffin III did not fair well in Mike Sando of ESPN Insider's quarterback rankings, in which Sando polled NFL coaches and evaluators and had them place starting quarterbacks into talent tiers.

35 NFL "insiders, who all chose to remain anonymous, partook in the survey, weighing in on each quarterback and the tier they assigned them. Griffin ranked 28th of 32 quarterbacks, with 30.5% change in rating from last season, when he was 19th.

One offensive coach was blunt in his analysis of RGIII, placing him in the fifth and lowest tier. 

"Five, and there's no coming back," the coach said. "He is done. The reason is, the injury slowed his legs, and his ego will not allow him to hit rock bottom and actually grind his way back up the right way."

As Sando noted in his introduction and explanation of the tiers, "Tier 4 is typically reserved for unproven starters or those who might not be expected to last in the lineup all season. Voters used the fifth tier sparingly."

A personnel director also said Griffin's problems are more than just physical:

"To get better in this league, you have to have a degree of humility. Griffin sees himself like Peyton, in that light. When he looks in the mirror, he is seeing things that everybody else is not seeing. That is why I was surprised when they gave him the fifth-year [option] and said it was an easy decision."

Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota, two rookies without a minute of NFL experience, were both ranked higher than Griffin.

Sando notes that one GM did put Griffin in tier two, saying he thinks Griffin is still adjusting to a new offense and making his way back from injury.

After a stellar rookie season, Griffin tore his ACL in the playoffs and has battled injuries and consistency issues in the following two seasons. Washington seems to be taking the long-view with him, however, picking up his $16.2 million fifth-year option and naming him the starter.

If Griffin can make strides over the next two seasons, Washington could be smart for sticking with him, but currently, the rest of the NFL has soured on him. 

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The historic 1996 Chicago Bulls championship team

Former FIFA vice president Jeffrey Webb was forced to hand over "a treasure chest full of items" in order to post his $10 million bond, and secure his release from custody, this past weekend, according to multiple news outlets.

Webb, who also served as president of CONCACAF, reportedly provided 11 luxury watches, 10 properties, three cars, and his wife's diamond wedding ring, among other items in order to secure his bond. According to the Associated Press, Webb turned over:

• 11 luxury watches – five of which are Rolex watches, as well as a Cartier Roadster, Hublot, Breitling, Panerai, Royal Oak Offshore and Luminor Marina
• 10 properties – none of which are named
• Three luxury cars – a 2015 Ferrari, a 2014 Range Rover (in his wife's name), and a 2003 Mercedes-Benz
• One diamond wedding ring – provided by his wife
• One diamond bracelet – provided by his wife
• One diamond and pearl necklace – provided by his wife
• One pair of pearl earrings – provided by his wife
• One pair of long-hanging diamond earrings – provided by his wife
• 401k account in his wife's name – provided by his wife
• His wife's partner equity interest in a company whose name was redacted – provided by his wife

Webb was indicted, along with eight other high-ranking FIFA officials, by the US Justice Department for his role in the much-publicized FIFA corruption and bribery scandal. He pleaded not guilty to bribery and racketeering charges in federal court Sunday, and was released following his arraignment, according to LA Times' Kevin Baxter.

Here is Webb's release order (via Deadspin):

Jeffrey Webb

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NOW WATCH: Watch what happens after FIFA's Sepp Blatter has a wad of cash thrown at him

After missing out on a chance to win the British Open with a disappointing bogey-par finish in the final round, Jordan Spieth seemed to take his missed chance at history well.

On Monday night he flew back to the US with a group of American golfers that included Zach Johnson, the Open champion. They hopped on a private jet, keeping the Claret Jug well protected (via Johnson's caddie Damon Green):

On Tuesday Johnson went on "The Dan Patrick Show" and talked about the trip:

"We actually flew home together last night. It was fun. It was fun. It was interesting. We had a bunch of guys on the plane and a bunch of friends and family, my wife, clearly, and my caddie. A bunch of other individuals too — Horschel, Dufner, Jimmy Walker, Webb Simpson, Harris English. Good friends. It's strange, our sport may be odd. We try to beat other's heads in but when it comes down to it we're going to be the first to applaud and share in the moment."

It looked like a great time. Spieth might not have won, but at least he got to drink out of the Claret Jug:

Spieth has had a borderline unprecedented degree of success at his age. As a result, he hasn't had to deal with adversity. It'll be fascinating to see how he bounces back from this in the next few months. While drinking on a private jet with the guy who beat him in the Open doesn't tell us much about how he'll react to what happened at St. Andrews when he gets back on the course, everything we've seen so far suggests he'll do just fine.

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NOW WATCH: This mesmerizing video of Chinese students jumping rope in unison is going viral

In just the second year of a 10-year, $200 million contract, Robinson Cano was looking like a bad investment by the Seattle Mariners.

After a solid first season last year, Cano was struggling mightily this season, batting a career-low .248 with an on-base percentage of .289 through June.

Cano had been struggling since last September, and said part of it was due to a stomach parasite that he contracted. Though he got treatment for the parasite, he was left with acid reflux disease, which he said made him feel bloated and nauseous at times, affecting his physical performance.

However, over the last month, Cano has steadily improved, and in his seven games since the All-Star break has suddenly caught fire and begun to look like the player the Mariners thought they were getting.

In July, Cano is batting .352 with a .399 OBP, a .655 slugging percentage — almost double his season average from April to June — and a 1.029 OPS (on-base plus slugging). Those numbers have been buoyed by a red-hot streak since the All-Star break, where in seven games and 19 at-bats, he's hitting .421, with a .476 OBP, .947 SLG, and 1.423 OPS. In that same seven-game span, he also has three of his nine home runs, six RBIs, and perhaps more importantly, only three strikeouts.

It's difficult to pinpoint exactly how Cano has managed this turnaround. Cano hasn't gone in-depth about his health or his turnaround, other than saying he's improved mentally at the plate:

"I’ve hit balls hard, but when you start getting hits, it’s different. There’s less thinking for you. You aren’t thinking about what you are doing wrong and what you have to do to get hits. To be able to come through in that situation when we’ve been having trouble with men in scoring position, especially myself, is big."

Beyond that, Cano's turnaround could just be a matter of luck.

Cano has struggled with plate discipline all season. According to Fangraphs, on the year, he has 67 strikeouts to just 19 walks, a .28 walk-strikeout ratio, with a 17% strikeout rate and 34% swing rate at pitches outside the strike zone. These things haven't particularly changed — in July, his walk-strikeout ratio is .25 and he's still swinging at 33% of pitches outside the strike zone.

As Chris Towers of CBS Sports notes, Cano seems to have some better luck at the plate. He's hitting the ball slightly harder, with an exit velocity of 92.5 miles-per-hour, 18th best in baseball, up from 90.6 miles-per-hour. Towers also notes that through much of the season, Cano was hitting the ball hard, but right into the ground or at fielders. Since June 17, is groundball rate has fallen from 58.2% to 43.7%, meaning he's getting elevation on the ball to match his power.

Mike Petriello of MLB.com similarly recognizes that while Cano was hitting hard all season, he's now getting more elevation on the ball. In the past month, Cano's average launch angle has improved from 6.79 degrees to 9.14 degrees. This could be the primary reason behind his sudden uptick in home runs, as he's hit seven of his nine total in the past month.

Thus far, there hasn't been any concrete reasoning for Cano's resurgence. The Mariners are only 43-51 and are 10.5 games back in the AL West — it's unlikely they can make a run for the playoffs at this point. However, Cano's turnaround bodes well for the future, particularly when they've invested so much in him.

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It is no secret that today's golfers on the PGA Tour are earning far more money than golfers did 20 years ago and many point to the popularity of Tiger Woods as the No. 1 reason. However, while Woods almost certainly has impacted winnings, his overall impact is probably being overstated by those who feel the Jordan Spieths of the golf world — with his enormous career winnings already— owe everything to Woods.

The evidence to support Woods's impact is pretty simple and compelling. Woods won his first major championship in 1997, when he won the Masters in a record-breaking performance and took the sports world by storm. After that, prize money on the PGA Tour immediately skyrocketed, as represented by the average winnings for the top 200 golfers.

But like many things, the story is not nearly that simple.

Let's compare the average winnings on the PGA Tour to the average salaries during the same time period in the NFL, NBA, and Major League Baseball. All four show a sudden increase in 1997, give-or-take a year. 

In other words, the on-field/court/course earnings for all pro athletes in major sports leagues started to accelerate in the late 90s, not just on the PGA Tour.

And why did they all start to accelerate at about the same time? Simple, national television revenue. More money was being pumped into all sports and a lot of the money was going to the athletes.

This doesn't mean Woods is not a factor at all. If we look at the four years leading up to 1997 and the first four years after Woods' first major, winnings/salaries increase greatly in all four sports but they increased at a faster rate in golf. Both the PGA Tour (2.7X) and MLB (2.5X) had the rate of increase nearly triple over the next four years, as represented by average increase average salaries. Meanwhile, the salary-capped sports, NFL (1.7X) and NBA (1.5X) showed slightly slower rates of increase.

But again, how much of the difference between the PGA Tour and the others can we attribute to Woods? It is a lot easier to add 30% to average winnings of $378,000 on the Tour in 1997 than it is to add 30% to the average NBA salary of $2.2 million in the same year.

Should Spieth thank Woods for his bank account? Certainly, just like every athlete in every major pro sports should thank the stars of yesterday. 

But Spieth can probably thank sports television in general more. Chances are, PGA Tour winnings were going to skyrocket whether Tiger Woods was winning tournaments or not. 

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Former ESPN and Grantland writer Bill Simmons is heading to HBO in October, the network announced Wednesday.

He'll have a talk show starting in 2016, and he'll also develop video podcasts and features on HBO platforms.

Some more details on the "multiyear, multiplatform" deal from HBO's press release:

HBO will be Simmons' exclusive television home. The overall agreement, which begins in October, provides for a comprehensive partnership on a variety of platforms between the network and Simmons. Among the elements of the new deal will be a talk show set to premiere in 2016 that will air on the main HBO service, as well as the digital platforms HBO GO and HBO NOW. Topical and spontaneous, the show will feature stories and guests from across the sports and cultural landscapes. Simmons will also have a production deal to produce content and assets for the network and its digital platforms, delivering video podcasts and features. In addition, Simmons will be consulting with HBO Sports, working closely with HBO Sports president Ken Hershman on non-boxing-related programming, including the development of shows and documentary films for the network.

ESPN decided not to renew Simmons' contract in May. He hasn't appeared on any ESPN platforms or talked about it since. He tweeted HBO's original intro after the deal was announced:

Simmons started as a sports columnist, gaining a massive following on ESPN before starting the sports and culture website Grantland. He has also become increasingly involved in production. He helped get ESPN's acclaimed "30 for 30" docuseries off the ground, cohosted "NBA Countdown," and had his own show called "The Grantland Basketball Hour."

HBO has always been one of the top destinations for sports documentaries. The network has also dabbled in sports talk shows, to varying degrees of success.

Simmons made around $5 million a year at ESPN.

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San Francisco 49ers new head coach Jim Tomsula had a rocky road leading to his first head-coaching job.

In a wonderful profile of Tomsula from SI's Emily Kaplan, Kaplan reveals Tomsula's long, winding journey to the NFL, which began with an up-and-down post-college career.

Tomsula bounced around from job to job, some high-paying, some not, before getting his coaching career started at his alma mater.

After graduating from Catawba College, a Division II school in North Carolina, he instead began a six-figure job in Greensboro, North Carolina, selling medical equipment.

However, he was unhappy with the job and began working as an assistant coach at Charleston Southern for just over $9,000 a year. He worked side jobs to make some extra money. Eventually, the lack of income sent him to Pittsburgh where he worked for a food distribution network. He again wasn't happy, and his wife encouraged him to follow some of the college coaching offers he had been receiving from DII and DIII colleges.

Kaplan explains that Tomsula's wife and kids moved to Florida while Tomsula began an assistant coaching job at Catawba, where he lived out of his car:

In 1997, Julie took their two daughters, Britney, 4, and Brooke, 2, to stay with relatives in Florida while everything they owned was put in storage. And so began the year that Tomsula lived in a car, a red Cadillac given to him by his Uncle Tic. Tomsula drove the 430 miles down to Catawba and became an unpaid volunteer assistant at his alma mater, charged with strength and conditioning. He slept in parking lots and cleaned himself up in the locker room. To combat loneliness, he kept a black lab and a cat as roommates. Tomsula hung his suits in the back seat, right above the litter box.

...

Tomsula sold carpets for commission on the side. The next season, he became a salaried coach. His wife and daughters joined him, and Tomsula moved his family into a $650-a-month fishing cottage 25 miles away from campus. They didn’t have heat.

Tomsula is remarkably laid-back about the period, telling Kaplan, "Ah, the homeless period. Everyone makes it out to be a bad thing, but it really wasn’t."

Eventually, he got an offer from the 49ers to work as a defensive line coach in 2007 after working in NFL Europe. He signed a four-year, $3.5 million contract to become head coach this past offseason, according to Kaplan.

Read the entire profile here >

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We are less than 10 days away from Major League Baseball's trade deadline and the one team that will have the biggest impact on what will happen, the Detroit Tigers, are the big unknown.

The Tigers, who were one of the favorites to win the World Series before the season, now find themselves 10.5 games back in AL Central. They also have two roster-changing players in pitcher David Price and outfielder Yoenis Cespedes who would be very popular trade targets.

Complicating matters is that the Tigers are just 4.0 games out in the Wild Card race and owner Mike Ilitch is 86 years old and may not want to give up on the season.

Bob Nightengale of USA Today gave us our first sense of what the Tigers might be thinking, reporting that they will indeed be "sellers" and will look to trade Price and Cespedes since both will be free agents after the season.

“The Tigers, barring a veto from owner Mike Ilitch, are going to surrender and be sellers within the next 10 days ... The Tigers, according to several people inside and outside the organization familiar with their strategy, plan to put ace David Price and power-hitting outfielder Yoenis Cespedes on the trade market.”

This would be huge for the trade market. Price and Cespedes would easily be two of the best players available to contenders looking to upgrade.

This would also have a huge impact on other teams looking to trade players, especially a team like the Cincinnati Reds and their ace Johnny Cueto who is also a free agent after the season. Without Price on the market, Cueto is the best starting pitcher available. However, the emergence of Price as an available pitcher, combined with health concerns for Cueto, now means the Reds will likely have to wait to make a trade as other teams first target Price.

And yet, despite the report, it is still not clear if the Tigers will indeed trade Price or if they are simply preparing to do so in case they decide to make a move later on. This was the sentiment put forth by others, including Ken Rosenthal.

Buster Olney on his ESPN "Baseball Tonight" podcast echoed this along with his guest Jayson Stark:

Olney:“[The USA Today report] is slightly different than what I've heard, slightly different than what I have reported ... Where the Tigers are now is that they are preparing two different paths. One is, if they are going to go ahead and try to continue to make the playoffs and two, the alternative path being that at some point they may decide to actually look to make moves in earnest and Price and Cespedes would obviously be at the top of their list.”

Stark:“I think it would be an exaggeration to say the Tigers are sellers right now. I do not think they are there yet.”

Still, Stark spoke with people in the Phillies front office, a team that also has a coveted starting pitcher in Cole Hamels, and “they believe David Price is [available].”

Another option for the Tigers and owner Ilitch is to keep Price and hope to re-sign him after the season. But as Stark points out, the Tigers have $105 million committed to just five players next season, including Miguel Cabrera, Justin Verlander, and Victor Martinez, and all five will still be under contract with Detroit in 2017. Price would likely add $30+ million per year to that and that is probably too much, especially since the Tigers let Max Scherzer walk as a free agent last year under similar salary demands.

In other words, how the entire trade deadline shakes out may depend on how the Tigers play over the next seven or eight days and everybody else is just going to have to wait.

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SpringHill Entertainment, the production company owned by LeBron James and his longtime business partner Maverick Carter, has entered into a parternship with Warner Bros., the Wall Street Journal reports. 

It's an intriguing move that advances LeBron's plan to build an entertainment business. It also comes a week after "Trainwreck" — the Amy Schumer movie in which LeBron co-starred and drew positive reviews — made an impressive $30 million at the box office.

But for a lot of people born sometime between 1980 and 1990, this is a big deal for one reason: Space Jam 2.

In 2012 LeBron tweeted at a fan saying he wanted to make a sequel to the 1996 classic — which stars Michael Jordan and tells the story of a team of Warner Bros. characters who have to save themselves from enslavement by beating a team of monsters that have recently stolen the powers of NBA players.

That sounded like wishful thinking at the time, but in the years since, "Space Jam 2" has seemingly come closer and closer to reality. In 2014 Deadline reported that a LeBron-starring sequel was in the works, though LeBron denied it:

There's still an IMBD page for it though, for whatever that's worth. 

Since Warner Bros. owns "Space Jam," the SpringHill partnership has reignited the rumors. ESPN's best LeBron reporter Brian Windhorst says Hollywood execs want to do the movie:

In addition, Warner Bros. has filed for new Space Jam trademarks:

The original Space Jam made $90 million at the box office. It's still the highest grossing basketball movie ever.

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