Archive for April, 2009
It’s 4:19, You Gotta Minute? (April 16th)
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• Stellar work by my comrades over at MYFO previewing and covering the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Well done, gentlemen [Melt Your Face Off]
• John Kruk looks all prim and proper with his new haircut [The Sports Hernia]
• Some chick that attends the University of Wisconsin-Madison is named Elizabeth Wrigley-Field. Much better than the name of my prom date, Bertha Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome. [SPORTSbyBrooks]
• Photographic evidence of Erin Andrews enjoying a greasy pork sandwich at Citi Field. No word on whether it was served in a dirty ashtray. She’s stewed, buttwad! Man, they don’t make characters like Chet Donnelly anymore. [Total Pro Sports]
• A touching “Today In KSGAY Herstory” moment is reflected upon – tears were shed, genitals were rubbed. [Kissing Suzy Kolber]
• Speaking of rubbing genitals, courtesy of J Koot over on Busted Coverage, a YouTube video of a Brewers fan rubbing his junk and shaking hands with unsuspecting Cubs fans. Believe me, if they’reCubs fans, that might be the fifth worst thing they have touched that day. [Busted Coverage]
You can try all you want, you’re not going to get many things past Eli Manning. The guy is as sharp as a friggin’ tack. Although, tacks aren’t really sharp when you think about it - they’re more pointy than anything. I guess I really don’t know how sharp Eli Manning is – people often say I rely too heavily on idioms – but I always tell them not to count their chickens before they hatch. I have the response to that accusation down pat.
Anyway, if there’s one thing Eli Manning understands, it’s football. For instance, he knows that you can’t complete a pass unless there is someone there to catch them:
“That’s what you want, a guy who can catch the ball and make big plays and get in the end zone.”
He was responding to a question regarding Braylon Edwards, but you can tell his Football IQ is off the charts if he can rattle off an answer like that off the cuff.
That’s the sort of benefits one gets from being born into football royalty. Myself, I would have guessed having a guy who could catch the ball would be far less important. I suppose that’s why he’s a millionaire quarterback and I’m eating dry ramen packets.
ELI: GIANTS WILL DO SOMETHING AT RECEIVER [New York Post]
Scratch that. I don’t want to give up my “indie blogger cred”, if you catch my drift. Without it and the perspective it affords me, those 10-15 daily page views S.O.B. gets would be trivialized. It’s like, they wouldn’t even matter anymore – I would just get caught up in the corporate machine, man – and I’m not digging on that, dude.
Nevertheless, great stuff from The Sporting Blog on ESPN’s “Blog Buzz” segment, which should have been aborted during the first trimester of its gestation.
Quoted from the Sports Business Journal in the The Sporting Blog’s post:
A new feature called “Blog Buzz” launches this morning on “SportsCenter,” giving independent bloggers a voice on ESPN programming for the first time. Blog Buzz, provided by Sports Media Challenge’s Buzz Manager, will supply to “SportsCenter” the top five sports issues being discussed each day in the blogosphere, as well as pull quotes from some of the posts.
Thanks, ESPN. I wasn’t sure what blogs I wanted to read without your guiding forceful hand leading dragging me along the way.
Venus Williams beat Sania Mirza 6-1 3-6 6-2 in the second round of the Family Circle Cup yesterday.
You might be asking yourself, why is this interesting or informative? And you may ask yourself, wouldn’t this be more newsworthy if Venus had lost?
And you may ask yourself…well…how did I get here?
And you may ask yourself, am I right? Am I wrong? And you may tell yourself, my god! What have I done?
Whoa, I had Talking Heads on the brain for a second. Apologies.
To answer the original question before I went all David Byrne on you, the interesting aspect of the match was Venus’ opponent, Sania Mirza. As you can see from the above photo, some would say the 100th ranked 22 year-old tennis player from India could be considered kind of a looker. You be the judge.
• Jeff Reed, rocking an awesome hairstyle, at a Pittsburgh Pirates game. Frightening, man. [Busted Coverage]
• It’s somewhat old news now, but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Erin Andrews will be the sideline reporter on EA’s NCAA Football 2010. I look forward to playing with my Wii – I mean playing the game on my Wii – I think. [Awful Announcing]
• Evander Holyfield will retire from boxing in 2021. The press conference will take place in a food court and it will be attended by no one. Seems fitting. [Food Court Lunch]
• Chinese soccer coach Shen Xiangfu is in trouble after assaulting a player who allowed a goal. The goal really didn’t matter – the player allowed another goal a half an hour later anyway. [Sports Rubbish]
• YouTube goodness, courtesy of Deuce of Davenport:
Say it ain’t so! It’s hard to believe, but John Madden has retired from broadcasting, saying that “[i]t’s time. I’m 73 years old. My 50th wedding anniversary is this fall. I have two great sons and their families and my five grandchildren are at an age now when they know when I’m home and, more importantly, when I’m not…”
Good on you, Madden. Enjoy your retirement.
I do have one question: do you know how people always say that when they retire, they are going to buy a motor home and travel the country? I imagine Madden will retreat further and further into his own little world to a point where his wife will have to beg him to come out of his fort made out of pillows he constructed all by himself in the basement.
Yeah, that sounds about right.
John Madden Retiring [Deadspin]
John Madden retires from broadcasting [NBC Sports]
Most people neglect to remember that Woody Paige was once only known as a columnist for the Denver Post. Now, due to frequent train wreck-like appearances on ESPN, including his regular spot on Around the Horn as well as his long-ago (but not forgotten) sexual harassment lawsuit-fueled time on the World Wide Leader’s Cold Pizza; Paige has become more of a sideshow freak and the poster boy for Borderline Personality Disorder than respected print journalist. I may reveal myself to be in the minority when I admit that I actually enjoy his shtick – it’s irreverent and he always seems keen to the fact that his histrionic antics are regarded as lowest common denominator, Grade A buffoonery – and he could care less. I respect that.
It may come as surprise to many, but Paige still writes quite a bit for the Denver Post. And one of his frequent bits are his “Woody’s Mailbag” columns. In today’s mailbag column, Paige drops the bomb as to how he ended up the way he is:
To all those detractor trailers who write that I know almost nothing, you’re right. I was dropped on my head as a small child. That’s my excuse. What’s yours?
Finally, we know why. And knowing is half the battle.
Mailbag: Kenyon key for Nuggets [Denver Post]
Sexual harassment suit targets ESPN’s Crawford, Paige [USA Today]
Shawn Johnson, gymnast, contestant on Dancing With The Stars and the desired object of obsessive pedophile psychopaths the world around, received the Sullivan Award yesterday, which recognizes her for her achievements at the Olympics in Beijing last summer. The Sullivan Award, which is given out to the nation’s top amateur athlete, has never been bestowed upon a female gymnast.
“Being up there with all the other athletes and just hearing all the titles they kept listing off, I was like, ‘There’s no way.’ Then when they called my name. It’s the biggest honor there is. To be the first female gymnast, it’s just amazing. I’m so excited.”
Did they think talking about this was a good idea? Going public about a struggling Wang is likely to have serious repercussions – performance anxiety, for instance.
Further, I don’t mean to tell the Yankees how to go about doing their business, but most Wang struggles can be taken care of by simply going into the bathroom and rubbing one out before showtime. And be careful about giving your Wang too much extra work. It will only result in serious chafing problems down the road.
Just a piece of advice. It couldn’t hurt.
STRUGGLING WANG GETS IN EXTRA WORK [New York Post]
• NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs Recap: Tons of action last night as the seventh-seed New York Rangers shocked the Washington Capitals 4-3, the Pittsburgh Penguins hold serve to beat the Philadelphia Flyers 4-1, the New Jersey Devils shake off a late season slump in a 4-1 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes and the Vancouver Canucks hold on to beat the Saint Louis Blues 2-1 in the only playoff series to drop the puck in the Western Conference last night. [NHL.com Scoreboard]
• MLB: Tim Wakefield flirts with a no-hitter, taking one into the eighth inning as Boston took care of Oakland 8-2 and Texas completely dismantles Baltimore 19-6 on the strength of Ian Kinsler’s 6-6 night at the plate, including hitting for the cycle, the second player this week to accomplish that feat. [MLB.com Scoreboard]
• NBA: The NBA regular season is finally over and now the real season begins. Fourteen games last night ended the long march to the postseason. [NBA.com Scoreboard]
• No word on whether she also does that irritating “dragging her ass across the carpet” thing. A man in Spain has been charged with using veterinary equipment to perform breast and buttocks implants. Complaints about a botched boob job alerted authorities when a woman complained that she now had eight nipples. [Yahoo! News]
HOCKEY HOCKEY HOCKEY OH MY GOD NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE STANLEY CUP PLAYOFFS START TONIGHT!!!
Oh. Versus, huh? Well, beggars can’t be choosers.
• NHL: Philadelphia Flyers at Pittsburgh Penguins [Versus, 7:00 EST] This series is gonna be good.
• NHL: St. Louis Blues at Vancouver Canucks [Versus, 10:00 EST] A perfect nightcap.
• Of course, check your local listings for any regional broadcasts. I reckon most of you could have figured this out on your own but this is the internet.
And that’ll do it. No need to go into anything else on tonight. For those of you who don’t have Versus, read a book or something.
Nighty night.
It’s 4:19, You Gotta Minute? (April 15th)
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• Jim Nantz appeared disinterested and disappointed that Angel Cabrera won The Masters. It probably has something to do with the time he walked in on his wife getting a train run on her by the Argentinian national soccer team. I heard he bitterly wept as he masturbated. [The Big Lead]
• Washington Capitals stars Alexander Ovechkin and Mike Green and others do crazy things to their hair in anticipation of the playoffs. Crazy cats. [D.C. Sports Bog]
• Headline: “Hulk Hogan Could Have Been Another O.J.” Well, duh. He was in Rocky III, Mr. Nanny and Suburban Commando, among other classics of the cinema. Oh, did they mean something else? I haven’t really been keeping up with current events. [Caught on the Fly]
• Ben Gordon of the Chicago Bulls was sporting a bandage on left arm after a freak “scarf catching on fire from a burning candle” accident. That’s why men shouldn’t wear scarfs – well that and we look like fancy boys when we do. [SPORTSbyBrooks]
Do you know those ideas that you come up with your buddies after a night out drinking? They always seem brilliant in their simplicity at the time but rarely do you ever act upon them. That’s a good thing.
Too bad that little mechanism that most of us have in our brains that tells us we’re better off not going through with such foolish activities must not have been functioning properly in the minds of five Villanova students who were arrested outside of Lincoln Financial Field early this morning for breaking into the stadium and attempting to steal a seat and a five foot sign from a souvenir stand.
First of all, yikes. Big ups to First Cuts for finding the video.
As you can see, Alecia Davis from something called “Hollywood 411″ got the chance to interview Bryant on the set. Rumor has it that things got a little crazy when Vanessa Bryant, with her children in tow, stormed onto the set immediately after the interview. Evidently, she didn’t take too kindly to Ms. Davis’ probing questions regarding Kobe’s television viewing habits, and she went off:
“Fuck you! How dare you ask Kobe about Kobe’s television viewing schedule! You didn’t say you were doing an interview! Fuck you! You fucking bitch. You have no journalism ethics! Fuck you! You bitch – “
Okay, that didn’t really happen. But it wouldn’t surprise you if it had, would it? That Vanessa Bryant is thirty-one flavors of crazy. She’s like the Baskin-Robbins of instability.
Kobe Bryant Is Street … Sesame Street [First Cuts]
CHILD ABUSE??? KOBE BRYANT’S WIFE YELLS AND CURSES IN FRONT OF HER LITTLE DAUGHTERS [Media Takeout]
Busted Coverage has unearthed video of a Calgary Flames fan sucker-punching a Phoenix Coyotes fan. Oh, and the Coyotes fan was being restrained in a headlock by a security guard during said punching. I guess Todd Bertuzzi’s sphere of influence on the Flames organization spreads beyond Calgary’s locker room.
Helluva cheap shot though. It reminds me of what my grandfather always said, “If you have a chance at a cheap shot, you take it.”
I should point out that my grandfather was a stinking drunk and he was referring to dressing up as a woman for Ladies’ Nights at bars. Come to think of it, I don’t remember ever seeing my grandfather not dressed in drag. Maybe it was my grandmother, but that would mean by grandmother fought in World War II. Nothing makes sense anymore.
The point remains valid, though.
Video of the melee (in 4 parts!) after the jump. There is no sound but it is expertly narrated. It’s like a moving comic book!
