Braves shelve cap with controversial logo

As the controversy over Native American imagery in sports churns on, there have been two new developments regarding Major League Baseball -- one showing where the sports world may be heading on this issue, and another showing that it hasn't gotten there yet.

The big news is coming out of Atlanta, where the Braves have just announced that their 2013 batting practice cap will not feature the team's "screaming Indian" logo after all. This follows a storm of reaction after a December Uni Watch column, which exclusively reported that the team was planning to use the Indian head design. The team has now backed off of that plan.

Interestingly, the report on the Braves' site says the Indian head cap "was one of five proposed designs," and that the final decision "had not been made before the potential hats were leaked" by Uni Watch. In other words, the Braves are claiming that they were never committed to the Indian head cap to begin with. But that doesn't ring true. The Indian head cap has been shown for months in the official MLB Style Guide and is still shown there right now. It's also shown in the new New Era catalog. All signs indicate that the Braves fully intended to go with the Indian design until the recent controversy caused them to have second thoughts.

It will be interesting to see if a similar chain of events follows in Cleveland, where the Indians have come out with a T-shirt that's sure to raise some eyebrows. Here's the deal: Majestic has just unveiled a new line of retro-styled T-shirts and sweatshirts. The one for the Indians features the old-school Chief Wahoo caricature that even hard-core Tribe fans will find hard to defend.

Will we see another backlash? Stay tuned.

Database breaks down NFL team spending

While the NFL’s salary cap may create one of the more even playing fields in professional sports, it still leaves room for organizations to make choices. Should they spend more on offense or defense? Are special teams a priority? A new interactive database by Guardian US shows it’s not necessarily the teams who spend the most overall who make the playoffs, but it's important where you spend it.

As general managers around the league plan for next season, perhaps they should take note that all 12 teams in the playoffs this year had something in common: they each spent at or above the league average for players on either offense, defense or special teams. Seven of the 12 teams spent above the league average of $53.6 million on offensive players. The $53.5 million average for defensive players was exceeded by five playoff teams, and 5 teams met or exceeded the special teams average of $4.1 million. Only one playoff team spent above average in all three categories: the San Francisco 49ers.

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ESPN's Photos of the Weekend: Feb. 8-10

This weekend saw an epic game. Now brace for an epic gallery, one that contains the best images from the past few days -- including college basketball, NBA, NHL and ... pond hockey? Oh yeah, it's in there.

Photos of the Week: Feb. 8-10

DeMarco Murray just wants good recruiting

While DeMarco Murray admits to being a big-time sports gamer, one place you won’t find the Dallas Cowboys running back is online.

“I’m more of a franchise guy in ‘Madden’ and a dynasty mode guy in ‘NCAA,’” said Murray, minutes before competing in Madden Bowl XIX in New Orleans. “I don’t want to play anybody online. I just like to sit by myself and run my teams my way.”

His latest acquisition?

“I’m playing as the Cowboys and I just signed Jermaine Gresham to play receiver,” he said. “He’s doing pretty good so far.”

To Murray, though, he actually prefers to play EA Sports’ “NCAA Football” franchise over “Madden,” even though fans constantly tweet at him how good his character is in the NFL game.

“People on Twitter are always telling me I’m a beast in ‘Madden,’” Murray said. “So that always gets me excited to play. But to me, if I had to pick one just game, it would be ‘NCAA Football.’ The excitement of recruiting players, to me, that’s better than just signing somebody in ‘Madden.’ Everyone has their favorites, but I like the whole process of scouting players, recruiting them to your school, and how you’re able to build your team with the types of players you want.

“A lot of people just want to play fighting or war games, but I stick to sports on my Xbox. Give me a good recruiting class and I’m a happy man.”