Paul Winogradoff

Hot takes that no one really cares about.

[Paul Winogradoff @therealpwino]

@KnicksMuse -16 but #positive lol

[America @america]

Those who openly hate America do not belong in public office representing it.

[Kobi @UTDKobi]

Our hate for Argentina is making us ignore things like this. If it happened the other way around, everyone would be talking about it

It’s football, moments like this happen. But the outrage only seems to appear when it’s Argentina

[The Italian American Civil Rights League @TheIACRL]

Zohran Mamdani wants to ERASE Italian Americans.

First, he denied our permit for Unity Day 2026.

Now, he is excluding Little Italy as a recognized location all together on the map.

Italian Americans BUILT NEW YORK CITY. Not third world Ugandans,

We stand AGAINST COMMUNISTS!

[CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ @CBSSportsGolazo]

"I think the technology is ultimately good, but the way we're using it could be improved."

@MikeGrella10 wants to see more consistency when it comes to VAR 🖥️

[MAZE @mazemoore]

@NYCMayor Probably would have mentioned if the guy had been a white Christian.

[Matt Van Swol @mattvanswol]

@NYCMayor Why didn't you share the name of the attackers, Zohran?

[Gain of Fauci @DschlopesIsBack]

BREAKING: USA comes back from huge deficit to defeat Belgium 5-4 after receiving four surprise mail-in goals at 3:00am

[Rit Holtzman @BenRitholtzNBA]

Just to state it for the record and to appreciate Jalen Brunson:

Next season Mitchell will make $10M+ more than Brunson.

In 27-28, Mitchell will make $20M+ more than Brunson.

Can’t overstate how that changes the math for 2 win-now teams trying to build rosters around stars.

[Aakash Gupta @aakashgupta]

In Germany, a talented 14-year-old earns his club money. In America, his parents pay the club $15,000 a year.

That single inversion explains why "we will not" is the most accurate line ever written about US soccer.

FIFA built a global system for this. Training compensation and solidarity payments send a cut of every transfer fee back to the clubs that developed the player, from age 12 onward. Develop one future pro and your academy gets paid for a decade. Barcelona's La Masia, Ajax, every Bundesliga academy runs on this logic. The kid is the asset.

US Soccer refuses to enforce those rules. When Seattle's Crossfire Premier claimed its $60,000 share of DeAndre Yedlin's transfer to Tottenham, it got nothing. Claims on the Dempsey and Bradley transfers died partly because the federation couldn't even produce the youth training records.

So American clubs earn zero dollars when a kid turns pro. They earn when a kid enrolls. Which makes the parent the customer, and the product is whatever keeps the parent writing checks: travel tournaments, hotel weekends, $500 showcase events, private training at $100 an hour. Elite pathways run $8,000 to $20,000 a year. A comparable academy spot in Italy costs about 120 euros.

Follow the incentive one level deeper and it gets darker. A club dependent on fees can't cut its weakest paying players, so rosters optimize for retention over development. The scouting pool shrinks to families who can afford the cliff, which appears around age 11, exactly when development matters most. The country runs a talent filter sorted by household income instead of ability.

Every four years someone proposes fixing this. The proposal always requires the people profiting from the $15,000 model to vote themselves out of business.

They will not.

[NotKennyRogers @NotKennyRogers]

Not so fast, Belgium.

The city of Los Angeles still has another 29 days to count all the goals from tonight's match.

[NYJ Matt @NYJ_Matt]

6,500 people died building stadiums after Qatar won the bid for the 2022 World Cup

I think that decision might be a little worse than overturning a bad red card

[FOX Sports @FOXSports]

Zlatan speaks on Flo Balogun's suspension being lifted

@Ibra_official

[Coach Cam @CamJordan4Fins]

Not only does Zlatan believe there never should have been a red card, he believes the reversal should have been made SOONER. You expect me to believe twitter losers over Ibra?? 😂😂

[Wilson F. Ball🇺🇸🇦🇷 @WillyFoosball]

“This leaves all further actions open.”

Same lil bro. Try it.

[Ellen Carmichael @ellencarmichael]

The most interesting part of the red card saga isn't the ruling. It's how differently Americans and Europeans process the idea that they might have been wronged.

Europeans are fundamentally different from Americans in one particular way: they expect life to be aggravating and at times unfair. It's just a fact of moving through the world. I joke that in Europe, the customer is always wrong. You didn't read the fine print. The only pharmacy in town is closed every other Tuesday for three hours, and even if the times weren't posted, that's still your problem. Too bad if you want the bill, because the waiter's on his union-mandated half-hour smoke break, and you're just going to have to wait.

To quote the great Mark Knopfler: sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug. There's something freeing in that. Things are less in your control, so there's less angst in managing your expectations.

In America, things couldn't be more different. We simply can't accept a wrong left unrighted.

The flight attendant sneezed handing you a drink on your one-hour flight? 15,000 frequent flyer miles. Didn't like your appetizer? A replacement is on the way, and the whole course comes off the bill. There's a reason our interstates are lined with trial lawyer billboards.

Europeans have turned complaining into a continental pastime with no expectation that the universe owes them a remedy for their grief. You gripe about the train being late, your friends nod solemnly and everyone goes back to their apéro. In America, we launch a full-blown investigation of the train system, sue the government (and its contractors) that allowed for the tardiness and hold a Congressional hearing on the state of national infrastructure.

So to an objective observer, the red card shouldn't have happened, and VAR was a travesty. To Americans, our star player shouldn't be unfairly banned from a match we couldn't afford to lose for a card he so obviously didn't deserve.

Who cares that FIFA used a little-used reversal to fix it. Who cares that other people are mad about it. We. Were. Wronged. It was unjust. It must be corrected. We would accept nothing less.

Europeans waxing poetic about the sanctity of the game are, of course, talking about a governing body whose last tournament host was decided via confirmed cash bribes — one that imposed dress codes on women, shrugged off widespread allegations of modern slavery and reconfigured the entire tournament calendar to suit the host country. Which is exactly the point. If you've made peace with all of that, at least enough to watch the tournament four years later, a probationary suspension isn't actually a scandal.

Maybe that's the real divide. Over millennia, Europeans have made peace with being the bug. Americans have never once considered it, and apparently, we're not about to start now.

[Robert J. O'Neill @mchooyah]

These guys sound WAY different when you wake them up at 2am. Shhhhhhh……🇺🇸

[Paul Winogradoff @therealpwino]

@TommyBeer And hit free throws and the occasional 3P… Really not a bad pickup at all. Thinking we’ll see a lot more small ball with Mo at 5. At the least, get to the deadline in a position to make a move. #NYK

[MAZE @mazemoore]

Bill Clinton, the guy who gave this speech at the SOTU, is bashing ICE on America’s 250th birthday.

The Democrat party has fallen so far.

[SleeperKnicks @SleeperKnicks]

REPORT: After inking Andre Drummond, the Knicks could still look to bring back Jordan Clarkson, per @IanBegley.

Additionally, the Knicks could add Jonas Valančiūnas as a 3rd-string C.