via abcnews.com
Whitney Houston, who reigned as pop music’s queen until her majestic voice and regal image were ravaged by drug use, erratic behavior and a tumultuous marriage to singer Bobby Brown, has died. She was 48.

Publicist Kristen Foster said Saturday that the singer had died, but the cause and the location of her death were unknown.

*According to Guinness World Records, Whitney Houston is the most awarded female act of all time – 2 Emmy Awards, 6 Grammy Awards, 30 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards, among a total of 415 career awards as of 2010. Houston is also one of the world’s best-selling music artists, having sold over 170 million albums and singles worldwide.

**The last decade of her life (and myriad of issues), have been well documented, and I’ll admit – there were times when I just laughed off the struggle and the absurdity of the life that she was living… But when a friend sent me a text about her passing, I was really, really shaken up about it. This isht is sad. To see where she was, to where she ended up, is more than a tragedy. This woman had a gift, a gift that very few people in life ever get, but she still fell prey to the ills of society during some hard times. I’ll remember her as the woman in that first album cover, the woman who sang the greatest version of Star Spangled banner that I have ever heard, and the woman who had one of the top 5 voices in the history of popular music.

Anyways, its bad, real bad…. So Sad. Rest in peace.

Check out the Star Spangled Banner that she sang at the Super Bowl, during the Persian Gulf War. Its incredible…..

via USSoccer

CHICAGO (Feb. 7, 2012) – Former U.S. Men’s National Team defender Harry Keough, one of the key players on the U.S. squad that upset England during the 1950 FIFA World Cup, passed away on Tuesday at the age of 84 at his home in St. Louis.

“We are all saddened by the loss of such an important man in the history of U.S. Soccer,” said U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati. “Harry was a true pioneer, representing the finest of a generation of men and women who built the foundations for soccer in the United States on which we stand today. While his participation on the U.S. team that beat England in the 1950 FIFA World Cup remains a memory that fans around the world treasure, it is his lasting contribution to soccer in St. Louis and around the country as a player and a coach that will be his true legacy. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife Alma, and his children Ty, Colleen and Peggy.”

The National Soccer Hall of Famer was a member of the U.S. MNT in the 1940s and 1950s. He earned 19 caps for the United States, highlighted by the USA’s 1-0 victory against England on June 29, 1950, at the FIFA World Cup. Keough helped anchor a U.S. backline that kept a clean sheet against one of the tournament favorites.

Keough also played for St. Louis Kutis, which won the 1957 U.S. Open Cup and the National Amateur Cup six consecutive times between 1956 and 1961.

More on Harry Keough’s Passing At Age 84 after the Jump……

The St. Louis native made his U.S. MNT debut on Sept. 14, 1949, when the USA played Cuba to a 1-1 draw in a World Cup qualifying match. Keough also scored the USA’s lone goal during the team’s 5-1 loss to Canada in World Cup qualifying on June 22, 1957, in Toronto.

Keough served as the U.S. captain during the team’s World Cup opener against Spain on June 25, 1950. Four days later, Keough and the U.S. unseated England in one of the greatest upsets in World Cup history. Keough was in the starting 11 and the U.S. withstood a heavy England attack before Joe Gaetjens’ diving header in the 37th minute gave the U.S. a lead that held up the rest of the way.

Following his playing career, Keough became a coach at Florissant Valley Community College. He then took over as head coach of the St. Louis University soccer team in 1967, where he posted a 213-50-23 record before retiring from coaching in 1982.

In his first season with the Billikens, Keough’s team shared NCAA championship honors with Michigan State. Keough guided St. Louis to four outright titles during the next five years. Keough’s Billikens won national titles in 1969 (4-0 win against San Francisco), 1970 (1-0 win against UCLA), 1972 (4-2 victory against UCLA) and 1973 (2-1 overtime win against UCLA). The Billikens also advanced to the 1971 and 1974 championship games, and Keough’s six straight appearances in the championship final from 1969 to 1974 remains a men’s soccer record to this date.

Keough was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 1976, along with his other U.S. teammates from the 1950 World Cup team. Keough’s other honors included an induction into the St. Louis Soccer Hall of Fame (1972), the St. Louis University Athletic Hall of Fame (1995) and the NSCAA Hall of Fame (1996).

Keough is survived by wife Alma and his three children, Ty, Colleen and Peggy.

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via the guardian

The Nottingham Forest owner Nigel Doughty, who stepped down as the club’s chairman in October after a decade in the role, has been found dead at his home in Lincolnshire.

Doughty, who was 54, was discovered in the gym at his home in Skillington on Saturday. He is believed to have died from natural causes and police said there were no suspicious circumstances. Nottingham Forest said in a statement: “It is with enormous sadness that we announce the death of the club’s owner Nigel Doughty. The club would like to appeal for the privacy of Mr Doughty’s family to be observed at this sad time.”

More on this story at the guardian.co.uk

**Updated** Post title has “1000s” when it should be “100s” – sorry, fat-fingered that one.

via the guardian

(Reuters) – Seventy-three people were killed and at least 1,000 injured on Wednesday after a soccer pitch invasion in the Egyptian city of Port Said, in what a deputy minister called [it] the biggest disaster in the nation’s soccer history. Violence at football matches across north Africa has increased significantly since political unrest began sweeping the region more than a year ago, and one player described Wednesday’s riot as “a war, not football”.

Angry politicians and sports officials decried a lack of security at the match between Port Said team al-Masry and Al Ahli, one of Egypt’s most successful clubs, and blamed the nation’s leaders for allowing – or even causing – the tragedy. Wednesday’s trouble flared at the end of a match when al-Masry beat Al Ahli 3-1.

“This is unfortunate and deeply saddening. It is the biggest disaster in Egypt’s soccer history,” Deputy Health Minister Hesham Sheiha told state television.

Witnesses said trouble broke out when Ahli fans unfurled banners insulting Port Said and an Ahli supporter descended onto the pitch carrying an iron bar. Al-Masry fans reacted by pouring onto the pitch and attacking Ahli players. They then turned to the terraces to attack Ahli supporters. Most of the deaths were among people who were trampled in the crush of the panicking crowd or who fell from terraces, witnesses said.

In addition to the dead, health ministry officials said that more than 1,000 people were injured, some from a stampede in the stadium.

There is a ton of television coverage of the riots hitting the interwebs… we found some, take a look at this absurdness after the jump…..

via LA Times:

A family member of Don Cornelius arrived at his Mulholland Drive home in Encino on Wednesday morning and found the “Soul Train” creator with a gunshot wound to the head, authorities said.

He was rushed to Cedars Sinai Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead, according to law enforcement sources.

His death is being investigated by the Los Angeles Police Department and L.A. County coroner’s office. The sources said detectives think it was a self-inflicted gunshot wound but stressed they are still investigating.

Check out some classic Soul Train moments after the jump…..

via Reuters

Etta James, the singer who found her greatest success with the 1961 hit “At Last,” died Friday morning due to complications from leukemia. She was 73.

James, who was hospitalized in May for a life-threatening blood infection, had been diagnosed with dementia, leukemia and hepatitis C. In December, James’ manager told Entertainment Weekly that the singer was in the “final stages of leukemia.” A month earlier, she released what she said would be her final album.

Born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles on January 25, 1938, James began her music career early, receiving her first professional vocal training at five and forming a doo-wop group, the Creolettes, in her early teens, after her mother relocated her to San Francisco. After renaming themselves the Peaches, the group scored a hit, “The Wallflower (Dance With Me, Henry),” which reached  No. 1 on the rhythm and blues chart in 1955.

More on Etta James – R.I.P. after the Jump……

The singer signed with legendary Chicago-based label Chess Records in 1960, scoring a string of hits including “If I Can’t Have You” (a duet with Harvey Fuqua) and “My Dearest Darling.” It was the 1961 ballad “At Last,” however, that solidified her place in the music world. Piled high with violins and other string instruments, James’ stirring version of the Mack Gordon and Harry Warren tune became her signature song, and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.

Though more hits — including “Something’s Got a Hold on Me,” “Stop the Wedding” and “Pushover” — followed, James’ career became hampered by a heroin addiction that led to multiple stays in a psychiatric hospital and rehab facilities, as well as arrests. In 1972, she and husband Artis Mills were arrested for heroin possession; Mills took responsibility, serving a 10-year jail sentence.

James would struggle with substance abuse throughout her life, undergoing treatment for a painkiller dependency in her later years.

James also generated headlines in 2009, when she opined during a Seattle concert that Beyonce Knowles — who played James in the 2008 film “Cadillac Records” — should “get her ass whipped” for performing “At Last” for President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at the Neighborhood Inaugural Ball.

She later said she was joking, but that she was hurt she wasn’t asked to perform. Asked by the New York Daily News if she could have performed it better, she responded, “I think so. That’s a shame to say that.”

The music kept coming. In 2009, James performed “At Last” on “Dancing With the Stars,” and her final album, “The Dreamer,” was released by Verve Forecast in November.

James was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1993, and received six Grammy awards, including a 1994 award for Best Jazz Vocal Performance for her album “Mystery Lady,” and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003.

James is survived by her husband Artis Mills and her two sons, Donto and Sametto, who had performed with their mother since 2003, on drums and bass guitar, respectively.

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via Complex

‘Nine days ago Sarah Burke hit her head at the base of a superpipe at Park City Ski Resort in Utah during training; she’d been in a coma ever since. This morning, shortly after 9 a.m., Burke passed away from injuries sustained during the fall.

Burke played an instrumental role in getting women included in competitive action sports, and was set to be a leader for the Canadian freestyle skiing team in the sport’s first appearance in the Olympics in 2014. She won Winter X Games gold four times, medaled four other times, and was the first woman to land 720s, 900s, and 1080s in competition. She has left an imprint that will set the course of the sport for years to come.

When Burke fell, she ruptured her vertebral artery, one of four main arteries to the brain, causing her to go into cardiac arrest and subsequently slip into a coma. Although surgery on Jan. 11 successfully repaired the intracranial hemorrhage, the lack of oxygen and blood during cardiac arrest did irreversible damage, resulting in her death. At her previous request, her organs will be donated and go towards helping others in need.

I had the privilege of speaking to Sarah on the phone the morning of the accident, and she was one of the most positive, easy-going people I’ve talked to. Clearly, the sport of freeskiing has lost one of its leading lights. Please keep her family, friends, and the entire action sports community in your thoughts.’

via Guardian