Archive for December, 2011
Given the free agent isn’t now under contract with any NBA team, The American Hockey League’s Syracuse Crunch, the minor-league affiliate of the NHL’s Anaheim Ducks, thought it would be a nice gesture — not to mention a nice bit of publicity for the team to boot — to offer poor Kris Humphries a job within the organization.
From the Crunch’s web site (via Puck Daddy):
Humphries, a native of hockey hotbed Minnesota, saw his life and marriage to Kardashian become a running national joke during his regular appearance on the E Network’s ‘Keeping up the Kardashians’ popular reality series.
“We would welcome Kris Humphries to Syracuse, where unlike Hollywood there are no paparazzi within hundreds of miles and he could reclaim his privacy and self-esteem,” said Syracuse Crunch General Manager Vance Lederman. “Being from Minnesota, Humphries will surely enjoy the hockey and feel right at home in the cold, gray, dismal weather we experience this time of year in Central New York.”
Jeez, way to sell the exotic location of Syracuse. And as a Minnesotan, I take great offense to the way this Lederman fellow characterizes the wonderful weather we enjoy here during the winter months — it may be cold and gray, but it certainly is not dismal. It also keeps the riffraff out, kind of like how people from Seattle have tricked people into thinking it rains there all the time.
Yet I have to agree with Lederman’s assertion that being a native Minnesotan guarantees that Humphries is a hockey fan: if you’re not and “They” find out, you’re banished to North Dakota.
Anyway, according to the release, the team will allow Humphries access to their “state of the art training facility,” not to mention a certified personal trainer will be available to Humphries “as he attempts to earn a spot with a NBA team.” Let’s hope for the best, right? The guy deserves a break and spending a month or two in Syracuse is far better than being married to that hump-butted hussy.
The Crunch’s fan base will also have an opportunity to get in on the action, as the team is selling six-packs of tickets to games on Dec. 16 and Dec. 17 for $72, a nod to the length of Humphries’ union with Kim Kardashian. Once again, far better than being married to that hump-butted hussy.
Awesome. One question: where’s the esteemed Chairman? I’m sure he is just off camera and is in the process of doing back flips before landing in his seat and proceeds to say, “So now America, with an open heart and an empty stomach, I say unto you in the words of my uncle: ‘Allez cuisine!’”
The back story from uwishunu.com (via The700Level):
Charlie Manuel and Morimoto dined together yesterday at Morimoto on Chestnut Street. The occasion came about stemming from an auction prize from Morimoto’s fundraiser for Japan back in June of this year. The auction winner won lunch with Charlie Manuel and Morimoto. The meal was prepared by the Iron Chef himself in the restaurant’s open kitchen, with guests looking on. No word on how adventurous an eater Charlie is.
Seriously, that must have been quite a thrill for the fans. If I had to pick, Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto is definitely my favorite of all the Iron Chefs. Better than that Cat Cora. Really, what’s up with her?
Yeah, that’s pretty much all I got on this one. But here, check this out: while perusing Iron Chef America Chairman Mark Dacascos’ Wikipedia page (always reliable), I discovered that he isn’t really Takeshi Kaga’s nephew. I bet he’s not even an accredited chairman, either. Alton Brown: how can you allow these lies to persist?
(head asplodes)
Damn you, ESPN, damn you to straight to hell for unleashing this atrocity upon an innocent population.
If I was attempting to imitate Rick Reilly’s tired schtick, I would make a stupid pun and then say that watching this was as painful as a double root canal. If I were to try to act like Skip Bayless, I would, uh, say something totally idiotic at an unreasonably high decibel level while flailing my arms about like a madman.
[Grazie (I think), SportsGrid]
(image via Cosby Sweaters)
When we last heard from Bill Cosby discussing the Rapture of Tim Tebow, it was in this video where it seems Mr. Cosby insinuates that he believes Tim Tebow can control the weather.
Well, Cosby is back at it and he doesn’t disappoint. Speaking with The Christian Post, here’s what Cos had to say about his admiration for the Denver Broncos quarterback:
CP: I understand you’re a dedicated football fan and I recently saw a video of you encouraging Tim Tebow as he encounters public criticism. Why do you like him?
Cosby: I like what’s happening in Denver. The beauty of what I see is that Tebow speaks his mind. When we look at the settling of this country we see a Bible in hand and God. Every Thanksgiving has God and the peacefulness of gratitude. It was important when the Twin Towers were hit and the sorrow with them that the first thing Congress did was sing “God Bless America.”
There are thus people in the media and business who after an athlete does something will give them a bum rush. Mr. Tebow is someone who the media has picked on. ESPN found all sorts of athletes and experts to say this young man is not a good football player and that the other starting quarterback is better. They said his footwork is awful and that he is a freak or something that couldn’t play at all. People are Tebowing, Tebowing and Tebowing but Tebow won’t allow people to focus on what he has done and has not done. He just states the glory of being out there and the privilege of playing. He tells them how his team plays and succeeds and the way he does it is almost biblical.
While Mr. Cosby has every right to express his opinions and he does make some extremely valid points, I do, however, have to take issue with a few of his comments. Obviously, I cannot recall every single thing every single person has ever said about Tim Tebow, but I certainly don’t recall anyone — at least the so-called experts — ever saying he’s a freak. And referring to Tebow’s play as “biblical”? I have only one thing to add:
Jello Pudding.
"Sexual Chocolate. They play so fine, don't you agree?"
To help numb himself and alleviate the pain of the heartbreaking loss the Miami Heat suffered in the NBA Finals to the Dallas Mavericks last June, Dwyane Wade attempted to soothe the pain inside him by watching one of his favorite films: Coming To America. Randy Watson appreciates the mention.
From a recent appearance Wade made on Miami’s 790 The Ticket (via Sports Radio Interviews):
“Well mine was a little shorter. How I dealt with it? Obviously I was sick. It took me a long time to go to sleep, but I stayed in the bed without moving until about two o’clock and around two o’clock my kids kept banging on the door and I could tell they wanted to go play basketball. What I did was I texted myself and I said can you bring me something to eat? Then I put on ‘Coming to America’ and I watched ‘Coming to America’ on my computer and that’s my favorite movie. It’s the greatest comedy ever. It’s my favorite movie. So after ‘Coming to America’ went off my kids knocked on the door again and they said ‘Dad and I want to go outside and play basketball.’ I said let’s go. At about three o’clock the next day I had to move on with my life. I had to understand the kids – it didn’t stop for them. I had to go and be daddy.”
Awesome. Not a finer film to drown one’s sorrows in and emerge with full-fledged Soul Glo, as it were. To quote Sweets, “That boy’s good.”
Finally, for no other reason than I feel like it, here’s Louie Anderson (as Maurice) in my favorite scene from the movie:
And that’s when the big bucks start rolling in. Ha.
Woe to You Oh Earth and Sea
for the Devil sends the beast with wrath
because he knows the time is short
Let him who have understanding
reckon the number of the beast
for it is a human number
its number is six hundred and sixty six.
(cranks Iron Maiden’s “Number of the Beast”, resist urge to begin Tebowing upside down)
[Grazie, TweetsCenter]
Falcons defensive end John Abraham had an utterly dominating performance Thursday night during Atlanta’s 41-14 blowout win over the Jacksonville Jaguars, finishing the game with the impressive stat line of 4 tackles, 3.5 sacks and 2 forced fumbles. Due to Abraham playing completely out of his mind, it made perfect sense for the NFL Network to want to interview him during their post game wrap-up, so they trotted out Alex Flanagan to speak with him.
Unfortunately, this provided a window of opportunity for Abraham’s fellow defensive lineman, Ray Edwards, to steal the show by dumping a Gatorade bottle on his teammate’s head right in the middle of the interview. Watching Edwards wait for the perfect moment to douse Abraham is perhaps the most amusing part of the video.
Abraham, to his credit, remained perfectly composed and completed the interview as if nothing happened, something which Alex Flanagan wasn’t able to do as she commented that the water or whatever it was “got on her notes here.” But to her credit as well, she rolled with it as well and took it in stride. Consummate professionals, those two.
And just to put a tidy little bow on the story, I would be remiss not to mention that Ray Edwards is the same guy who had this portrait painted of him and his girlfriend. Any time Ray Edwards is brought up, that portrait should always be part of the story, no matter how much of a stretch is needed to work it in. Oh, and he also got punched in the wiener by former teammate Jared Allen earlier this season. Yeah.
[via SportsGrid]
Finally, an appearance in a magazine by someone from the sports world that makes sense and I can fully support. I’m looking at you, People.
With that in mind, well done, Gentlemen’s Quarterly. Here’s to your savvy publishing skills. So, on that note, allow me to go out on a limb with this outlandish request:
Hey, magazine publishers, here’s a thought: More Gina Carano. Thank you.
For more photos, video and to read GQ’s Gina Carano interview, go here.
[Grazie, Guyism]
Disgraced former Penn State defensive coordinator and accused child rapist Jerry Sandusky reportedly will be joining the likes of Prince William and Kate Middleton, Gabrielle Giffords, Charlie Sheen on People‘s “Most Intriguing People Of 2011″ list in an issue that will hit newsstands on Dec. 16. Should be quite a read.
According to USA Today‘s Game On!, the issue will also feature a “Hall of Shame” list. Sadly, allegations of showering with boys and allegedly molesting and raping them under the guise of a trying to help them through a charity isn’t quite up to snuff with the antics of Hank Williams, Jr. and Lindsay Lohan, whose actions qualified them for the “Hall of Shame.” Guh.
Boy, this issue of People would make a mighty fine compliment to the upcoming “The Year In Sports” issue of ESPN The Magazine. Delightful holiday reading. Maybe I’ll buy issues of both for my new house guest. He’s an ex free-base addict, and he’s trying to turn around, and he needs a place to stay for a couple of months.
[BAD IDEA]
It’s funny because she’s horribly uncoordinated. She looks like an intoxicated gerbil.
Sure, it’s a relatively old video, originally uploaded back in late August, but it’s new to me, not to mention pretty amusing. Sure, it’s not about sports…unless I attempt to make a “Tim Tebow Walking On Water” joke, which I won’t. I guess I just did. But didn’t.
What were we discussing?
[H/T Off the Bench]
Regular readers of the Sportress of Blogitude may have noticed that yesterday, I awarded a profoundly lame joke Rick Reilly unleashed on the Twitter masses with the “Sad Trombone.” Well, today, Reilly was back at his Twitter-based skullduggery with the above weak attempt at witticism in the area of lame-brained humor. Yeah, it’s pretty stupid. “Hahahahaha! Larry King is old! And to compare Tebow calling someone lucky would be totally like Larry King calling a person old! Because he’s old! HARF! HARF! HARF!”
And for that idiotic attempt at a joke, I award Rick Reilly: the Price is Right losing horn:
He really deserved it.
Sergio Garcia went a bit overboard — as did his club, in a manner of speaking — with a bit of temper tantrum during his opening round of the Thailand Golf Championship on Thursday at the Amata Spring Country Club in Chonburi. After a particularly awful tee shot on the par-3, 8th hole after hitting his first tee shot into the drink, Garcia, again clearly unhappy with the results, angrily threw his golf club into the lake just off the tee box. But don’t worry about Sergio: his sponsor will provide him another club.
The outburst shockingly didn’t help Garcia get his game back on track, as he finished the day with a 4-over 76, bad enough that at round’s end, he was tied for 100th place out of the field of 130 golfers. Ouch.
Professional golfers: they’re just like us! As long as “us” implies a membership in the subset of golfers who have no control over their emotions on the course and cannot help but violently throw their golf clubs after bad shots as if it was the club’s fault, not theirs. I have played 18 a time or two guys like that, although most golfers have as well. Me? I rarely throw my clubs. I suspect that after I hit a terrible shot — which is often — it would do me far more harm than good to discover I can throw my club further than I can hit a golf ball with it. Yeah, I’m a duffer.
Wait. What? In the latest example of Tebowmania having gone completely off the cliff and free-falling into abject absurdity — seriously, is this what it was like when The Beatles landed on Plymouth Rock during the British Invasion (I might be mixing up historical events a bit there) — a group of athletes at a Long Island high school have been suspended — no, not for completely inappropriate and disgusting hazing rituals or for drug and alcohol use — for the heinous act of Tebowing. Will somebody please think of the children?!?!
Connor Carroll, one of the two students suspended by Riverhead (N.Y.) High, said that he, his brother Tyler and classmates Wayne Drexel and Jordan Fulcoly only did the impromptu act of Tebowing “out of respect for Tebow, and because Tebowing is the new thing to do.” Makes sense. And while the two student athletes were the only kids suspended by the school, some 40 students, after seeing the four strike the pose, took part, causing a bit of a traffic jam in the school’s hallway, an apparent violation of the school’s rules. Their leadership in the spontaneous homage to Tebow, along with the fact that they received prior warning, appears to be the reason behind why only the two boys received their respective in-school suspensions.
Said Connor Carroll (via Prep Rally):
“The administration told us that our Tebowing was blocking the halls and could potentially cause a riot, because they were growing in number and if the wrong kid gets pushed a brawl could ensue,” Carroll told Prep Rally. “We had no idea that we could get suspended for such a thing. It was a joke between a group of friends that took a life of its own. We figured at the most we would just be told to stop.”
Seriously, I don’t know what’s crazier: that people are so obsessed with Tebowing or the fact these kids got suspended for doing it. Strange days are upon us friends.
In any event, it is abundantly clear that persecution of the disciples of Tebow hath begun. Remember, Tebowites: They may take your right to engage in Tebowing, but they can’t take…YOUR TEBOWWWWWWWWW!!!
In what sure is to be the viral video from the NBA today — unless some other player one-ups Blake Griffin’s seated mid-court shot from the other day by slam-dunking from their butt — above is Kobe Bryant putting on an impressive shooting display by making ten consecutive three-pointers from beyond the arc. Nice. Apparently, one of the best shooters in the NBA can shoot the basketball.
If only Chris Paul were on the Lakers and the NBA hadn’t nixed that trade. Imagine CP3 feeding Kobe the rock in real live NBA game action and shot after shot going in. And it would have been good for the Lakers for Kobe to drain shot after shot after shot, because if you recall the details of the trade (Pau Gasol shipped to Houston and Lamar Odom off to New Orleans) there wouldn’t have been any Lakers big men around to rebound any of his missed shots. Yeah.
[via]
(image via People)
Tim Tebow recently took part in an extensive interview with Steve Serby of the New York Post. A myriad of topics were discussed, and of course, a series of questions about his faith, his family, his competitiveness and so on and so forth were posed. For instance, Tebow’s favorite single childhood memory is “The day I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior” (of course). Tebow also said that when opposing players like to trash talk him, his customary response is “God bless you,” or if he’s really ticked off — and wait until read this — he really loses it, flies off the handle and claims that he “might even throw out a ‘Jesus loves you.’” How scandalous.
All in all, and not surprisingly, during the lengthy interview, Tebow managed to incorporate some variation of the word “bless” six times, mention God four times and invoked the name Jesus only twice. Once again, not surprising and since the questions were posed in such a manner to elicit a response of that tone and subject matter, there is no problem with Tebow mentioning and championing his faith.
But that stuff is all run-of-the-mill, typical Tebow-ish responses we have come to expect. But towards the end of the interview, we were finally afforded a glimpse behind the curtain of faith, piety and religion for an inside look at Tim Tebow: The Regular Guy, as Serby probes Tebow’s mind to discover the pop culture leanings of the enigmatic star:
Q: Favorite movie?
A: Braveheart.
Q: Favorite actor?
A: Will Smith.
Q: Favorite actress?
A: Jennifer Aniston.
Q: Favorite entertainer?
A: Rascal Flatts.
Q: Favorite meal?
A: Mom’s homemade tacos.
Least. Shocking. Answers. Ever. One could make the argument with its gratuitous violence, Braveheart appears to be an odd choice, but the fact that fervent Christian Mel Gibson directed and starred in it balances the scales in a manner of speaking. One that does kind of throw me for a loop is the fact that Jennifer Aniston is his favorite actress. I mean she’s talented, beautiful and generally non-controversial, but something strikes me as strange about that one. I cannot say why I believe this, but for some reason, I would have suspected his favorite actress would have been Betty White or that rapping grandma from The Wedding Singer or someone along those lines. Much more wholesome.
