Lineup

FEATURES

NBA FINALS

32 Road toRedemption
Paul Pierce did much to rehab his image, leading the Celtics to a pair ofvictories
BY Jack McCallum

BASEBALL

38 A Jones forHitting
Chipper flirts with a magical mark
By Michael Bamberger

STANLEY CUPFINALS

44 FantasticFinish
The Red Wings' six-game victory showed how great hockey can be
By Michael Farber

HORSE RACING

48 BrownBagged
Another Triple Crown dream ended at the Belmont, as Big Brown labored tolast
By Tim Layden

SOCCER

52 Are You LikeMe?
I bet you are. I bet you hate soccer
By Chris Mannix

TENNIS

56 Beauty and theBeast
Two ways to win the French: the brute force of Nadal, the elegance ofIvanovic
BY L. JON WERTHEIM

Departments

6 Leading Off

14 Letters

18 Players
• Risky business in the NFL
• Remembering Jim McKay
• Kyle Busch's wild weekend
• First Person: Geovany Soto
• How to become a cardsharp

29 Faces in theCrowd

30 Just My Typeby Dan Patrick
• The Boston Knee Party

74 Point After
The life of a golfing gal: Even the courses that let me play don't feelwelcoming by Selena Roberts

Inside ...

70 The NFL
• Can Al Davis buy happiness?

72 Baseball
• The overpowering Brad Lidge

OpeningVolley

Ping-PongDiplomacy in 1971 led to the Beijing Games of 2008—but without two unlikelyheroes, the summit might never have occurred
BY ALEXANDER WOLFF Page 58

PHOTO

BOB ROSATO (JONES)

38 FOUR SIGHT Braves third baseman Chipper Jones, a career .310 hitter, was batting .420 at week's end.

PHOTO

FRANK FISCHBECK/FORMASIA BOOKS (PING-PONG)