Veteran Quarterback, Alex Smith has just recently announced his retirement after his 16th season in the NFL. The quarterback out of Utah was picked No. 1 in the Draft getting selected by the San Francisco 49ers. He spent some time on the 49ers before joining the Chiefs in 2013. Smith had made three Pro Bowl appearances as a player of the Chiefs. Then, in 2017 joined the Washington Redskins, now known as the Football Team.

Julian Edelman recently announced his retirement from the NFL. What many people fail to realize is the impact he had on the league while he was in it. He paved the way for athletes that weren’t highly recruited out of high school and even helped in the battle of anti-semitism in the NFL. Although things like this may go unnoticed, his postseason statistics are something you can’t help but notice.

For decades, women throughout the world have struggled with the concept of equal pay for equal work. This is an issue in business, medicine and sports, among others.  The U.S Women's Soccer Team (USWST) is taking a stand because of the equal pay movement. The men get paid around $10 million more  than the women do for the same roles.

There is always talk about athletes and coaches, however, the NHS student sport managers do not get enough attention. Sports have a lot of extra work that the coaches usually take care of, but there is so much that they need extra help. For the past few years the NHS has had student managers for the sports teams. This year, sophomore Madison Walsh is the manager of the girls varsity and JV basketball team. Sophomore Mia Dipiano is also a manager for the wrestling team.  

The Washington Football Team, until recently, was known as the Washington Redskins. But in July 2020, they were forced to change their name because it was racist to Native Americans and inappropriate to some people. Many people wrote letters to the NFL to change the Redskins name. The Washington Football Team had to find and change their name quickly, they had a few names in choice but were still thinking.

The verdict of Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd influenced the world. It showed many to have faith in justice admidst injustice in our society.

Many NBA players are competing in the MVP ladder. This week has fulfilled fans in on who should be in this year’s MVP race. Players like Nikola Jokic, Giannas Antenkumpo and Damian Lillard are giving us a show. All three players have been averaging a high stat ladder, supporting their team and putting them on their backs. 

Tiger Woods has been through many injuries and rough paths through his career. Tiger Woods was involved in a single car, car accident may have been the worst of them all. This happened on February 23, 2021, and Tiger Woods was found by the emergency services on the side of the road. The police found out that he had prescription drugs in his system. The crash caused severe injuries that resulted in a subsequent trauma surgery.

On March 25, 2021, it was announced that Oscar Frayer, just days after competing in the NCAA March Madness Tournament as a forward for Grand Canyon University, tragically passed away from a car accident in Lodi, California. Frayer’s sister, Andrea Moore, and their family friend had also passed away as they were in the car with Frayer at the time.

Every year during the month of March a college basketball tournament takes place that is called March Madness. This is the tournament where teams from all over the country from each college that is able to participate in this tournament come together and play games to see who is the best college. This year there have been many upsets in this tournament that has left people shocked. The tournament began on March 18 and ended on April 5.

Spring sports started in the first week of April, however, due to COVID-19, the spring season got pushed back because winter sports started in January. It is now April and baseball, softball, spring track, tennis, crew, golf, and lacrosse are all starting up. COVID-19 is still a problem all coaches are thinking about so there are still precautions being taken. 

Back before any NFL games were even televised, football was a completely different sport. Players played a more physical game as there were no rules to protect players. It favored the players who played hard nose football and didn’t let up for anything. A perfect example of that is the pre-Super Bowl era Chicago Bears. A team that dominated by any means and made sure they won no matter the circumstances however as time went on, the NFL began to put player protective rules in place.

Tiger Woods is a golf icon at the peak of his career, but it wasn’t always pretty for him. Tiger Woods has had multiple back surgeries and multiple knee surgeries, that affected his game completely because those are major body parts used in a golf swing.  HBO premiered the documentary, Tiger, on January 10, 2021. It looks at Woods' highs and lows of his career. 

On Saturday, January 23 Conor McGregor fought Dustin Poirier and the fight was definitely one to watch as part of the Ultimate Fighting Championship lightweight. According To the official UFC fighting website, “Conor McGregor came out with a bang but so did his opponent, his opponent might have just made a little more effort.”

The Chiefs and the Buccaneers were battling in Super Bowl 55 on February 7, 2021. The Kansas City Chiefs and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were both the best teams in the regular season. When they played each other on November 29, 2020 it was a close game but the Chiefs came on top. Fans watching were expecting an amazing game from both the greatest quarterbacks in the league right now. Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs are one of the greatest offensive teams in history.

The NHS basketball season started on January 11, 2021. Since then, the teams have been taking many precautions to stay safe from COVID-19. Just recently, some players and coaches had gotten sick and the season had to be stopped for two weeks. Unfortunately, both the girls and boys teams were shut down and quarantined. 

The Pro Bowl is an All Star game played for the NFL before the Super Bowl. The NFC and the AFC teams play against each other with players voted by the fans. Since 1951, it's been a tradition to play the Pro Bowl. Players are excited to compete against other all star players. It was an exciting tradition to see. This year's pro bowl was different. Covid-19 infections have been spreading nationwide and have prevented the game from being played.

As fans and players head into the NFL offseason, many things are uncertain. Some of the league’s best wide receivers hit the market as unrestricted free agents while many teams are just a wide receiver short of being Super Bowl contenders. Along with that, many teams are fielding trade offers for their quarterbacks as almost a dozen teams are in need of a quarterback.

The Nutley girls basketball team has started and is ready to get right into the season. Everyone that's involved is very excited for this to start considering the team was not sure if it was going to commence. All the girls are very excited that this is starting, although there's a lot of things they need to do to keep safe during COVID-19. We are all doing our part to keep safe. The coaches are also doing everything they need to keep safe because we do not want to see the season get shortened because someone gets sick.

There were some major events that did not happen because of COVID-19; the Summer 2020 Olympics was one of them. The 2020 Summer Olympics were postponed until the summer of 2021. This was the first time any Olympic games were interrupted since 1944. With the Summer Olympics only being a few months away now, they are scheduled to take place in Tokyo on July 23rd until August 8th. However, how will things be different with COVID-19?