If it’s any consolation to Manchester United supporters these days, the biggest and most gloried franchise in the world’s other leading team sport is in an even greater state of dysfunction.

The Denver Nuggets secured a play-off berth for the first time in six years after a 114-105 win against the Boston Celtics.

Although he would be lambasted after The Decision, with people in his hometown of Cleveland so scorned they’d burn his Cavaliers jersey, history has proven that LeBron James made the right call that summer of 2010 by opting to join the Miami Heat.

Larry Campbell has played with everyone from Bob Dylan to BB King. In advance of his Cork gig with his wife Teresa Williams, they tell Ed Power about their contrasting backgrounds.

Much discussion this last week of Tipperary’s defeat at the hands of Galway in the NHL final, with the size of that losing margin - 16 points - the main issue being raised over and over, writes Michael Moynihan.

LeBron James led the Cleveland Cavaliers to a 128-96 win over the Detroit Pistons in the NBA.

LeBron James is edging closer towards the summit of the NBA all-time top scorers list with 27 points in the Cleveland Cavaliers' 114-84 win over the Miami Heat.

Even here in his homeland a lot of us have little idea how respected he is.

This could be the move that puts the “games as art” debate to rest. Spike Lee, who directed Inside Man, Do the Right Thing, and 25th Hour, is to take charge of NBA 2K16’s career mode.

For a while there, it seemed like the NBA player of the year vote deciding the regular season’s Most Valuable Player would devolve into an alphabet soup of stats, highlights and what “valuable” really even means.

Per Mertesacker believes Arsenal’s trip to Manchester City this weekend will be a "big test" of their top-four credentials.

After a World Cup summer, perhaps it was always inevitable the topic of injuries would overshadow the first three and a half months of the Premier League season.

There are those who reject the concept of International Rules and then there is Finian Hanley.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have endured a wretched time in the NBA so far this season with their playoff hopes hanging by a thread in a poor Eastern conference.

Most basketball fans with even the slightest bit of self-respect become worn out pretty quickly by whatever the New York Knicks are selling.

They have a phrase in American sport: “the Face of the Franchise”.

It was a good weekend for two of the greatest, most divisive athletes in the world.

Rihanna partied with NFL players at a pre-draft bash.

At first the words seemed to trip nonchalantly from the mouth of Walter ‘Clyde’ Frazier, a basketball analyst for whom loquaciousness is a job description.

When the members of the LA Lakers team that won the 1971-72 NBA title got together last year to reminisce about the good old days, one question dominated the event: would there ever be a season like theirs?

At the end of last year this column took up the cudgels again in the GAA statistics battle, invoking Jorge Luis Borges in an effort to stimulate the debate.

Back when I met Dave Hopla last March, he told a story which gives an insight into Kobe Bryant.

Many Irish in the US would love to return for Christmas, but some can’t risk it, writes John Riordan in New York

The most high profile rebranding of a US sports team of the past decade needs all the help it can get and the Brooklyn Nets ticked two important boxes this week: they beat the New York Knicks on Monday night and got into a fight in Boston on Wednesday.

All-Ireland finalists Mayo have been hit with a €10,000 fine for not travelling to New York for the final of the Connacht FBD League last month.

Americans like their team sports to be reduced to duels, the battle of stars who are more often than not defined by recent form.

Mary-Kate Olsen is reportedly dating Olivier Sarkozy, the half-brother of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy.

Sometime, somehow, sports professionals ceased to be real people.

I’m writing this as my old friend Bill O’Herlihy reads a laundry list of names to Eamon, John and, yes even, Ronnie Whelan.

Last November, less than 24 hours before he would utter those infamous words to Patrice Evra, Luis Suarez posed for photographs with one of the world’s most famous athletes, who also happens to double up as one of his bosses.

PICK OF THE DAY

JETLAGGED he may be after a flight home to London from the States, but Simon Garfield can still summon enough energy to talk, to engage, and to condemn.

Manchester City boss Roberto Mancini was at a loss to explain his side’s defeat at Everton this afternoon.

WHEN Eddie Hogan emigrated to New York in 1985, he was leaving behind a different kind of famine.

LeBron James will be out of contract with the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2010 and speculation about his future has already reached fever pitch, writes Simon Lewis.

Anxious Americans expressed mixed feelings today as they watched the first shots of the long-awaited war with Iraq.

Patrick Ewing has announced his retirement from basketball after a 17-year career.