Sports Illustrated May 2023

MAY 5, 1973 KENTUCKY DERBY After falling to last place early, Secretariat chased down his 12 challengers one by one, running each quarter faster than the previous one. His time of 1:592/5 is still the Derby record. MAY 19, 1973 PREAKNESS STAKES Once again, Secretariat fell behind early. Once again, he accelerated mid-race and breezed to a 21/2–length victory in 1:53—his second course record of the Triple Crown season. JUNE 9, 1973 BELMONT STAKES Jockey Ron Turcotte stole a peek at the clock—and at history—shortly before his mount completed a preposterous 31-length victory in 2:24, still the U.S. record for 11/2 miles run on dirt. As Nack would write, “Rarely in sport has a game’s most brilliant competitor risen at precisely the right juncture in history—at the perfect coordinates of place, occasion and time—and seized the day by…

IN GAME 7 of their ferociously fought second-round series against the Celtics last spring, the Bucks made a calculated gamble: They were going to let power forward Grant Williams shoot. Milwaukee’s bigs—mostly Brook Lopez, as well as Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis—all but ignored Williams whenever he was on the perimeter. If Williams was planted in the corner, Lopez would stay on the block. If Williams set a screen, his defender would drop toward the paint to cut off Boston’s perimeter stars. The result? Williams attempted a Game 7–record 18 threes, making seven of them. As a team, the Celtics hit 22 threes that day and blew out Milwaukee en route to the conference finals. This regular season, the Bucks conspicuously changed their base defensive coverage. A team that had consistent success…

▶ Preseason odds are to be taken with a grain of salt. All sorts of things can derail a season: injuries, trades, bad chemistry, worse luck. Felt pretty good about dropping some money on the Nets to win the NBA title before the season at +750? Kyrie and KD—that’s enough firepower, right? Well, at last check Brooklyn—following its fire sale—was +20000. While the Nets have undoubtedly been the biggest flop, a few teams have substantially improved their odds. Here are four that have boosted theirs the most. ▶ NUGGETS (preseason +1600, now +750). After suffering a gentleman’s sweep in Round 1 last year against the Warriors, Denver has been atop the West for much of the season. ▶ SUNS (preseason +900, now +550). The acquisition of Durant made Phoenix—which was +1700 at the…

WATCH TED LASSO Apple TV+ The writers on Ted Lasso aren’t afraid to drop in a musical reference here or there. And when you do hear one, chances are it was put there by a guy on the writing staff. “It’s all the boys,” says Brett Goldstein, who plays gruff player turned assistant coach Roy Kent and is also a writer. “It’s me, Jason [Sudeikis], Brendan Hunt, Joe Kelly, Bill Lawrence. I think the women on the writing team are like, yeah, but the boys are like, la-la-la.” So imagine Goldstein’s delight when he found out that Hannah Waddingham—who has been nominated for an Olivier Award (the West End’s equivalent of the Tony Awards) three times for best actress in a musical—had been cast as Rebecca, the owner of AFC Richmond.…

▶ The premise of Ted Lasso is, of course, that the eponymous American football coach is to run a soccer team in England despite having no knowledge of the sport. In the pilot, his assistant is seen reading the book Inverting the Pyramid, by Jonathan Wilson. In the Season 3 premiere, Lasso is thumbing through a copy of his own. First published in 2008 and since revised, the incredibly insightful Pyramid is, indeed, the best place to start for anyone looking to better understand soccer tactics. So what’s it like for the author to see his book on TV? Well, he hasn’t, because he’s never seen the show. “I don’t actually watch much TV outside of football,” says Wilson, an SI contributor. But he is aware of the phenomenon. “It’s…

WATCH ONE OF THE most recognizable figures in boxing history, George Foreman has been at the center of some of the sport’s most dramatic moments. But many of those moments are familiar: No matter how well the story of the Rumble in the Jungle is told, for instance, it’ll never top its treatment in the 1996 doc When We Were Kings. Directed by George Tillman Jr., Big George Foreman tells the champ’s rags-to-riches story, beginning with his being discovered by Doc Broadus while in the Job Corps. Khris Davis is a convincing Foreman, but Forest Whitaker (above, left) delivers the movie’s best performance as Broadus—who himself rose from a humble start as the grandson of an enslaved person—offering a reminder that sometimes the subject and the star of a biography aren’t…