PARIS -- Mario Balotelli may lose count when he adds up the number of people he has to prove wrong this season. Sergio Aguero Jersey .Among them, a former Liverpool stalwart who openly mocked the controversial strikers move to French side Nice.It is nearly one year since Balotelli scored a league goal, embarrassing for someone who once talked himself up as a Golden Ball winner.If selected on Sunday, he will look to end his drought in the home match against bitter southern rival Marseille, although Nice coach Lucien Favre is unsure whether he is ready.Things are going very well but well see if he plays, Favre said Friday at a pre-match news conference. Hes very positive, hes listening.Nice is Balotellis smallest club in a stop-start career that saw him grab headlines as a mesmerizing 17-year-old for Inter Milan.Pace, power, poise, skill, heading ability, strength back to goal and composure: Balotelli had absolutely everything.Except temperament.Balotelli is like Russian roulette, said Marseille defender Rod Fanni, who could face him on Sunday. Everythings good if his heads in the right place, everything wrong if his mind is elsewhere.In recent years, Balotellis antics off the field have become his trademark, not his performances.Since his last league goal -- for AC Milan against Udinese on Sept. 22 -- the 26-year-old Italian has netted only twice in the Italian Cup against third-division Alessandri.There have been some highs, however.In one of his best games for Manchester City he looked unstoppable when scoring the first two goals in a 6-1 hammering of Manchester United in October, 2011. On the final day of that season, in arguably the most telling contribution of his club career, his wonderfully composed pass set up Sergio Agueros last-gasp winner against Queens Park Rangers -- clinching the title and depriving United of it.Within two months, Italy reached the final of the 2012 European Championship, with Balotelli scoring both in the 2-1 semifinal win against Germany. That season is arguably when he peaked -- sad considering he was 21.Although he did well for Milan over the next two seasons, with a good return of 26 league goals in 43 games, he plummeted after joining Liverpool as a replacement for Barcelona-bound Luis Suarez in the summer of 2014.Over the past two seasons, he has mustered two league goals -- one in 16 games for Liverpool and a terrible return of 1 in 20 when loaned back to Milan. It seemed normal when former Italy coach Antonio Conte left him out of his Euro 2016 squad.Hardly the stuff of a Golden Ball contender, which was not lost on former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher. He derided Balotellis move to Nice, saying on Twitter that a free transfer was still over the odds.Carraghers sarcasm aside, one fact is hard to ignore: Balotelli is entering what should be his peak years at a mediocre French club.Ending up there, given all the clubs he could have played for ... it must have hurt his pride, Fanni said.Liverpool, Milan and city-rival Inter have won 15 European Cups between them, but Nice won the last of its four league titles in 1959 and its last trophy was the French Cup in 1997. Stars like Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Suarez have graced Milans clubs and Liverpool.The biggest name to play for Nice is Frenchman Just Fontaine -- the record scorer for a single edition of the World Cup with 13 goals -- and that was 60 years ago.Whether Balotelli can grab the spotlight in Nice -- for the right reasons -- is a very big question.He has a lot of rebuilding to do, physically but also in terms of the runs he makes, his movement, Favre said. He hasnt played in friendly games and its a long time since he played a match.---This story has been corrected to remove reference to Carragher as teammate in the 2nd and 17th paragraphs. Pablo Zabaleta Jersey . "It doesnt get any better than that," Giambi said. "Im speechless." The Indians are roaring toward October. Giambi belted a two-run, pinch-hit homer with two outs in the ninth inning to give Cleveland a shocking 5-4 win over the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday night, keeping the Indians up with the lead pack in the AL wild-card race. Nahuel Guzman Argentina Jersey . The incident occurred at 19:56 of the second period of the Kings 4-2 road win over Edmonton on Sunday. Nolan punched Oilers forward Jesse Joensuu in the jaw in front of the Kings goal during a scrum. http://www.argentinasoccerauthentic.com/Fernando-Gago-Copa-America-Jersey/ .com) - Following a late-game loss to the reigning NBA champs, the Toronto Raptors will look to sustain their recent high-level play as they travel to Indiana to take on the Pacers. SPRINGFIELD, N.J. -- Every two years, as the Ryder Cup nears, American golf fans go through a miserable cycle.We talk ourselves into believing this time our team will to rise to the occasion, that well have good chemistry, that our captain will put together a coherent strategy, that our stars will shine and our role players will contribute.Every two years, we get humiliated. Its deflating and depressing.Sure, weve won Ryder Cups twice in the past 20 years (in 1999 and 2008), but thats out of 10 chances. The Europeans always seem to have better chemistry, their captain is always outfoxing our captain, and their players play loose and fearless. Its no coincidence. They are better at team golf than we are. We now have two decades of evidence to back it up.You know how we can change that this time?We can start by putting Brooks Koepka on the team.We dont need a task force to figure this out. Captain Davis Love III should get on the phone Monday with the 26-year-old Koepka and tell him to take off as much time as he needs to let his ankle heal. Tell him there will be a spot waiting for him at the end of the FedEx Cup Playoffs, whether he has enough qualifying points or not.Dont even make him sweat it. Because what Koepka did in the PGA Championship, finishing T-4 with an ankle so swollen and painful he could barely walk earlier in the week, was nothing short of inspiring.On Tuesday, we all tried to talk him out of playing, Koepkas caddie Richard Elliott said. He was nearly in tears on Tuesday. On Wednesday, he decided to give it another nine holes. We found different strap for him, and he was able to kind of grit it out on Thursday. On Friday, he got some momentum going. I think the pain kind of caught up to him in the end, but it was all guts. He worked his ass off in rehab. It was unbelievable.If the rain hadnt forced most of the leaders to play 36 holes on Sunday, its possible Koepka might have made a run at Jimmy Walker and Jason Day. He was right there after three rounds, 2 shots off the lead. But over the last nine holes, he could barely push off his right leg. He was spent. Elliott said the pain finally caught up to Koepka, and he still managed to birdie two of the last four holes to shoot 70.To go from barely hitting balls on Saturday to finishing top five, Ill take that, Koepka said. Im kind of numb right now. It hurts, dude. I dont even feel my foot.Koepka, who grew up in West Palm Beach, Florida, is a golfer by profession, but he looks more like a football player. You could sneak him into a Miami Dolphins locker room and no one would blink. And if you want to know the truth, he approaches golf with a similar mentality: aggressive and fearless.Last year at the Open Championship at St. Andrews, when rules officials from the Royal & Ancient were insisting players continue on during the third round even though the wind was whipping in excess of 35 mph, Koepka stood his ground and got into a heated discussion with the official on the seventh green.According to someone who witnessed the exchange, the official, a Scotsman, became annoyed when Koepka admonished him and failed to address him by his proper title. Fernando Gago Argentina Jersey. am a sir, the rules official allegedly said. And you will refer to me as such when addressing me. I dont give a f--- who you are, Koepka responded. Im not playing until my ball stops oscillating. We could use that kind of mentality in the Ryder Cup at Hazeltine this September. If that sounds boorish and ungentlemanly, ask yourself this: How have our previous strategies worked out? How much fun is it watching European players soak themselves in champagne every two years, while our team is reduced to shanking our captain in a media conference?Day might be the most talented golfer on the planet, and he is a nice guy whom everyone admires. But every week, he lets us know when hes not playing at 100 percent. Its a cold, a muscle tweak, the flu, or any one of a dozen other maladies.Koepka played the entire week of a major with an ankle that looked like a turnip, and he downplayed his agony at every turn. (He said the injury occurred right after the U.S. Open in June, when he rolled it taking an awkward step.)Maybe it isnt fair to Day to contrast them, but you have to admire Koepkas toughness because other players did. It wasnt until it was over that he explained he thought there was a 70 percent chance he was going to withdraw.We went from me just trying to move my foot like I was drawing the alphabet to putting a band on it, to eventually trying to balance on one foot, Koepka said. Its stupid, but thats what it took.Koepka should have been on the United States Presidents Cup team that went to South Korea in 2015. He was the 12th-ranked player in the world at the time, ranked higher than seven other Americans who did make the team, but he didnt have enough FedEx Cup points to automatically qualify, meaning he needed Jay Hass to add him as a captains pick.Haas instead picked his son Bill, Mickelson and J.B. Holmes when Jim Furyk was injured. It wasnt a travesty -- the U.S. hung on to win -- but it wasnt exactly forward thinking as we try to improve the state of team golf in America.In all likelihood, Koepka secured a spot on the squad this week. Because the PGA Championship was worth double Ryder Cup points, Koepka moved into fifth place in the rankings, up from ninth. But only the top eight players automatically qualify after the Barlcays.Before his injury forced him to withdraw from the WBC Bridgestone and miss the Open Championship, he was ranked third and cruising. But miss a few weeks, and you can tumble down the ranking fast.Koepka said hed already spoken to Love about his ankle and expected to have another conversation next week. For now, hes slated to play in the Travelers Championship next week in Connecticut.I wont need a pick, Koepka said.Thats exactly the mentality we need if were going to have any chance to avoid another shellacking at the hands of the Europeans. Lets pair Koepka and Patrick Reed together right now, ask them to set the tone, and see what happens. 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