US PresswireThe Washington Wizards are now the winners of seven games after taking down the Portland Trail Blazers 124-109 Tuesday night. That's only the third road win of the season for the Wiz. The Blazers' demoralizing loss brought other bad news to Portland as well: an injury to the team's leading scorer, LaMarcus Aldridge.

The Oregonian reports that Aldridge, who was just named to his first All-Star team, was out of the game with an ankle injury less than two minutes into the contest.

The Blazers take on the Golden State Warriors Wednesday and Aldridge didn't travel with the team for the game even though X-rays came back negative on the ankle, the Oregonian reports.

"We kind of took a slap in the face when LaMarcus went down," forward Gerald Wallace said, according to the paper. "It was kind of a shock for us. To see our leader, the head of our team, screaming in pain, it kind of put us on our heels, and they got going."

The 26-year-old Aldridge, who has been with the Blazers since joining

US PresswireThe Baltimore Ravens came one dropped ball short of going to the Super Bowl this year and now the team is ready to start negotiations with quarterback Joe Flacco to keep him around for a few more years, NFL.com reports.

The word from the site is that the two sides are scheduled to begin talks on a contract extension at next week's NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis.

The 27-year-old Flacco,  picked 17^th overall in the 2008 draft, will become a free agent after this season. This past regular season found him throwing for 3,610 yards and 20 touchdowns with 12 interceptions.

"We'll see how it goes," Flacco said at season's end, NFL.com reports. "If it goes, it goes. If it doesn't, it doesn't."

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US PresswireForward Danny Granger is the leading scorer for the Indiana Pacers, averaging 18 points a game, but he'll likely be sitting out when the Eastern Conference's sixth-place team takes on the Cleveland Cavaliers Wednesday night. That's not good news for Indiana, which is looking to stop a four-game losing streak.

Granger sprained his left ankle at the end of the first quarter in the Pacers' 105-90 loss Tuesday to the Miami Heat, according to the Indianapolis Star, but coach Frank Vogel is hoping that Granger can be back in the lineup against the Cavs, anyway.

If the 28-year-old Granger, who was selected with the 17^th overall pick in the 2005 draft out of New Mexico and made it onto the All-Star team back in 2009, can't make it onto the floor Wednesday, the Pacers will start Dahntay Jones in his place, the Star reports.

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US PresswireCarolina Hurricanes left wing Tuomo Ruttu was one of the hot names on the trade market leading up to the Feb. 27  deadline, but the phone calls asking about him have likely stopped.

TSN reports that Ruttu has suffered an upper-body injury that will keep him out for three or four weeks for the NHL's worst-ranked team.

Even though the 28-year-old Ruttu, who becomes a free agent this summer, was coveted by other teams, the word from TSN is that he might not have been moved before the deadline, anyway, since he "was said to be in the process of negotiations with the Hurricanes on a new contract."

Ruttu has 17 goals and 13 assists in 57 games this season.

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US PresswireThe Edmonton Oilers are the second-worst team in the NHL right now (behind only the Carolina Hurricanes) and soon-to-be free-agent right wing Ales Hemsky has been rumored to be likely a goner from the squad before the Feb. 27 trade deadline.

However, TSN reports that the 28-year-old who has spent his entire career with the Oilers would not like to be dealt and would instead like a long-term deal with Edmonton.

"I think [a long-term deal is] important for everybody," Hemsky said, TSN reports. "It's your life. The security you can have signing a long-term deal, that's probably the best option you can do. I've been here for a long time, for 10 years and worked hard to become a free agent."

As TSN points out, Hemsky hasn't missed one of the 532 regular-season Oilers games that have been played since he joined the team. In that time, he's scored 118 goals and notched 301 assists. This year, he has four goals and 20 assists.

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US PresswireMomentum for a deal between the Pittsburgh Pirates and New York Yankees that would send A.J. Burnett to western Pennsylvania "stayed strong" Monday night, according to the New York Post.

"The teams remained apart both on dollars and the type of prospects that would be included," the paper reports.

The Post notes that the Yanks are also talking to two other teams about Burnett as well, but clearly see the Pirates as the best match for the righty.

The Pirates are up for paying $10 million of the $33 million owed to Burnett over the next two seasons, the paper notes, and will send the Yanks two prospects. The players being offered aren't very exciting to the Yankees at this point, the paper notes, but the team would be more open to such players if the Pirates were willing to shell out more than $13 million of Burnett's salary.

With six other starters on the roster, the Yanks would like to unload Burnett before the season gets underway.

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US PresswireNew York Giants running back Brandon Jacobs is 29 years old and would like to return to the Super Bowl champs next season, but if the team decides not to keep him onboard, he says he's open to joining the New York Jets, according to the New York Times.

The paper notes that Jacobs restructured his contract last offseason in order for the team to be able to keep fellow running back Ahmad Bradshaw around. Bradshaw ended up with 171 carries for 659 yards and nine touchdowns on the season. Plus, he got to score the Super Bowl winner. Jacobs finished out the season with 152 carries for 571 yards and seven touchdowns.

"It wasn't drawn out on a paper and scripted not to give me carries," Jacobs said, according to the Times. "It's just the way things went. No one is against me. No one wanted that to happen. We were getting beat most of the time. We had to go to the air. Ahmad didn't get that many carries either."

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US PresswireThe Oakland Athletics are likely busy celebrating their signing of Cuban defector Yoenis Cespedes, but the team might soon be adding another player to the roster.

ESPN reports that the A's are in conversations with the Texas Rangers about trading for reliever Koji Uehara. Oakland is also talking to free-agent reliever Mike Gonzalez, the site notes.

Uehara went 2-3 with a 2.38 ERA and 85 strikeouts over 65 innings pitched for the Baltimore Orioles and Texas Rangers. However, he had a rough postseason, letting in five runs in 1.1 innings pitched, earning him a 33.75 ERA and forcing the Rangers to not place him on the World Series roster.

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