Good Morning, Stumpers!

You know what they say about Tuesday, right? It’s a great day to debate who would win in a fight between 2 pros and 10 amateurs! Well, the fine folks over in ROMANIA put their money where their mouth is and sanctioned a 10 vs 2 bout in the Octagon! Before you scroll and see who won, think about it…who wins? We’ve got a great Stump for you today!

Today’s Rundown

Everything you’ll get from today’s edition, and more:

• 🥊 10 Amateurs vs 2 Pros in ROMANIA! Wow!

• ⭐️ The state of the All-Star game!

• 🏈 We’ve got serious rumors in CINCY!

• 🎶 Old Reliable for Song OTD…Mac!

On This Day

On This Day…

🏒 Canada On Top of Hockey World

When you really think about it, it makes sense that Canada was a dominant force in the early days of Olympic Hockey. Heck, they created the sports. But I had no idea that they were THIS dominant!

On this day in 1928, Canada retained the Olympic ice hockey title when they defeated Switzerland, 13-0, in the Gold medal game in St. Moritz. Talk about a big-time performance in a big moment for Team Canada.

🧠 Test your sports knowledge…

Yesterday’s Trivia Answer: (C) Gerald Ford! An All-American at the University of Michigan, Ford took a coaching position at Yale while earning his degree in law! Now THAT’S an American President! Grit!

Before We Dive In…

👀 Here’s Yesterday’s MUST-See’s

• 🔥 Canada’s MacKinnon on Team USA: ‘We could beat those guys’

• 🏒 USA with an EARLYY strike! Only 35 seconds in!

• 🎤 Mic drop from expected NFL No. 1 pick Cam Ward

• 🏀 Cooper Flagg OH ME OH MY!

The Hot Stove

Boxing

🥊 10 Amateur vs. 2 Pro’s in Romania

What to know: I stumbled across this yesterday on my X and just didn’t know how I could, with a good conscious, leave this out of today’s edition.

Most guys, at least the guys I know, have had this argument at the lunch table in middle school or high school to some degree. Could 2 pro fighters defeat 10 amateurs? Well, the good country of Romania has finally answered the question for all of us.

The two pro’s won. But after watching the video, I seriously question the strategy of the amateurs. They just attack all at once and create a big mess. Anyone who sat at those lunch tables know that you want to tire out the big guys. You have to go in waves! Always bringing in fresh fighters in groups of two. And you HAVE to separate the pros from each other. When you bunch up in one space you let the two pros just throw hammers and when they connect, there goes one of the amateurs.

You need to distract, smoke screen them. Pull their attention one way, and BOOM you’re in there on the other side. It has to be clinical, almost like Army running the triple option. Death by a million paper cuts. As you lose fighters, you’re chances go dramatically down, that’s why you have to be in and out. A pack of hyenas taking on a lion. I could go all day with the metaphors.

I’m disappointed in these 10 guys, but I have to give the pros their flowers. What they did was legendary. Dennis Anghel and Alex Greuceanu, you guys are bad ass!

Emergency Address

🚨🚨The State of All-Star Games Across Major Sports

What to know: We’re just a few weeks removed from the NFL Pro Bowl, and now a few days removed from the NBA All-Star game as well as the 4 Nations showdown between USA and Canada, so let’s dive into this a little bit more.

It’s not breaking news that the fans don’t love the state of the current NFL Pro Bowl and NBA All-Star game. Let’s start with the Pro Bowl from a couple of weeks ago. Do you remember how that went down?

Exactly. Neither do I! Didn’t watch a second of it until I saw some clips of it on Instagram of the accuracy comp between QBs. It’s crazy that by far, the biggest league in the country has one of the worst Pro Bowl formats. It’s a flag football game, and some of the most talked about moments the day after are from the tic-tac-toe kicking competition. I mean, I can’t lie, that one was pretty cool, but maybe we can figure out a way to get some more juice leading up to it!

Next up, the NBA All-Star game. It does suck that we never really get the greatest shooters and dunkers facing off against each other in the 3-point and Dunk contests. It seems like it’s become more of a pride thing rather than true contests to see who is the best dunker in the league. Can you imagine if we had Ja, Ant-Man, Zion, Aaron Gordon, and Zach Lavine all under the same roof at the same time?!? The roof would probably blow off the place! Unfortunately, the weekend is far from that. Even in the finals, Sunday night, there was ZERO competitiveness! Yeah, I get it. Injury risk is a real thing, but it brings me to this final point…

HOCKEY! Man oh man if you watched the match-up between USA and Canada, you saw an absolute spectacle! It was a full-on WAR on the ice that mattered to every single person who participated. We’re not talking about any average players either, we’re talking about the best players in the league!

There’s something about territorial matchups that brings out competitive juices in everybody. A true USA vs The World in basketball, or maybe an NFL game based off of college conferences, those could both do some serious numbers!

Hey, just a thought, we’ll see what happens!

NFL Offseason

🏈 The Rumor Mill is Churning in Cincy

What to know: After another disappointing season in Cincinnati, the Bengals enter the offseason with some, allegedly, high hopes. At least, financial high hopes.

The team is going to attempt to pull off a trifecta, signing wider receivers Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, along with defensive end Trey Hendrickson, to long term deals. Who knows if they can actually do this, but it seems like internally they are under the assumption that they are going to go BIG after their guys.

The most controversial is Tee Higgins. The talented WR is obviously good enough to be THE wide receiver for any team in the NFL, and he should expect to receiver that kind of money this offseason. The Bengals, however, are not afraid to use their franchise tag on Higgins if no long-term deal is reached by the March 4 tag deadline. However, we’ve seen in previous years how star players respond to getting the tag, and they usually aren’t excited about it. Many hold out.

Ja’Marr Chase, coming off a season where he led the NFL in receiving yards, touchdowns, and receptions, will be looking to become the highest paid WR in the NFL, and deservedly so. That being said, it may shake out that Cincy has two of the top 5 paid WRs in the NFL. Boy, that’s a lot of pressure to produce.

On the defensive side of the ball, Hendrickson led the NFL in sacks last season and has been a corner piece of an otherwise not so impressive defense. He’ll surely ask for the contract of an elite pass rusher, which in today’s market, would be north of $30 million a year.

All in all, that’s a lot of money. Especially for a team that has other needs that need to be filled. On the flip side of this, Cincy surely has the talent to be a Super Bowl team, especially if all three return. Oh, the life of a NFL front office executive.

Quick Hitters

• 👀 Rafael Devers won’t give up 3rd Base to Alex Bregman easily

• 💸 Geraldo Perdomo and D-Backs reach 4-year, $45M extension

• 1️⃣ Auburn tops AP Top 25 for 6th straight week

• 😠 NBA All-Stars unhappy with game “pauses”

What We’re Watching

🏀 NBA is officially in it’s All-Star Break, games will return Thursday!

🏒 4 Nations Finals are set for Thursday!

🏀 College Basketball ranked action:

• Men’s: Nova @ UConn (6:30 PM ET), (8) Texas A&M @ (22) Mississippi State (7:00 PM ET), (6) Houston @ Arizona State (9:00 PM ET)

• Women’s: (20) Oklahoma State @ Utah (9:00 PM ET)

⚽️ International Futbol!

• Champions League: AC Milan vs Feyenoord (12:45 PM ET - FEY leads 1-0), Benfica vs Monaco (3:00 PM ET - BEN leads 1-0), Atalanta vs Club Brugge (3:00 PM ET - CB leads 2-1), Bayern Munich vs Celtic (3:00 PM ET - MUN leads 2-1)

The Moment You’ve Been Waiting For

Can’t thank you enough for sticking to the end of this thing we call The Daily Stump. If you know anybody who might want this bit of daily juice in their life, send them this link, it would go a long way. Appreciate the hell out of you all!

Trees may get chopped. Stumps hold strong 🌴