Archive for Basketball
Reports indicate that tennis star Maria Sharapova and her professional basketball player beau, Sasha Vujacic, have scheduled the date for their nuptials after an 18-month engagement and a courtship that has spanned over two years.
The very fashionable couple have decided to hold their wedding on Nov. 10 in Istanbul, Turkey, where Vujacic, a former NBA player who had stints with the Nets and Lakers, is currently playing professional basketball for the Anadolu Efes Basketball Club.
An interesting story indeed about the impending union of two professional athletes, but what I found most entertaining about the news is the oddly worded report from the National Turk (by way of The Big Lead) which features some perplexing facts about the locale of the ceremony. What follows is a sampling:
Sharapova and boyfriend Vujacic are in a relationship since 2009. The couple initially wanted their wedding to take place in May or August 2012, but decided to be wed in Istanbul this November.
Former La Lakers player Sasha Vujacic plays since 2011 for Turkish giants Anadolu Efes, the couple stayed in Istanbul as Maria Sharapova visited Turkey and Istanbul last October for TEB Paribas WTA Championships.
Sharapova said then she loved Istanbul but also added that the number of stray dogs in Istanbul saddened and upsetted her.
Yeah, few things are better able to set the romantic mood that is expected at a wedding than roaming packs of stray dogs meandering their way through ceremony. Nice.
And lastly, given the location of the wedding as Istanbul, here’s They Might Be Giants, because I have no choice but to make the reference.
Fin.
Yeah, I know how you dirty-minded internet denizens can be, so I am well aware you had little choice but to click through and see exactly what goes down in the aforementioned video. But instead of what you secretly hoped the video would feature, instead it is renowned dunkmeister TDub dunking over a backwards-facing Michelle Beadle, everybody’s favorite SportsNation personality. But then again, when Colin Cowherd is the only other option, it’s really not that impressive to be everybody’s favorite.
Still, impressive hops on this guy. And as a man of taste, class and refinement — really — let me just add that I’m relieved they had Miss Beadle face away from oncoming dunker. Although had he not cleared her head, we probably never would have seen that video anyway.
Hey, that’s not how basketball courts are supposed to look!
Leave it to those Germans to do something completely crazy and come up with this totally whacked out basketball court which juts up in lumps in several spots and has lamps scattered about its surface. Weird stuff.
Details regarding the court located at the Occupational School Center in Munich, Germany, from Inges Idee (via Ball Don’t Lie):
A regulation-sized basketball court was erected on the grove-like forecourt of the school building of the occupational school. The court consists of a soft orange-red tartan covering and two normed baskets and seems to be forced over the grid of the lamps that have been set up. The playable court has been “morphed” as in a 3D program on a computer and looks like the grounds of a rollercoaster, with heights and depths and calm and dynamic zones. The resulting paradox, which moves between a normative set of rules and pleasurable, anarchic change, requires creative engagement for its use.
Man, I imagine playing a game of basketball on this court would create the same sensations as playing on a normal basketball court while tripping on acid. Not that I would know, but I bet if we asked, Bill Walton could fill us in on the trippy similarities. Keep on truckin’, Bill.
[H/T Ball Don't Lie]
Ouch. This is a particularly brutal dunk attempt by a vertical leap-challenged basketball player during a game at Kandahar University in southern Afghanistan. As you can see, his efforts not only came up short, he also hung on the rim and his body’s subsequent momentum caused him to come crashing down in a bone-crunching heap of ill-coordinated humanity.
But back to the title: Afghan Men Can’t Jump. It would be kind of like My Giant-White Men Can’t Jump hybrid buddy film. Can we get Wesley Snipes to sign on to it if I wrote-up a script treatment? Okay, maybe not Wesley, what with him being incarcerated and all, but how about Woody Harrelson? Too blazed on ganja? Okay, how about Billy Crystal? Not interested? Huh. I wouldn’t have wanted him anyway. Excuse me for a moment…
(picks up imaginary phone) “Grace? Could you get Gheorghe Muresan’s agent on the phone for me? Super.”
Ah, that Grace. Great gal. But seriously, imagine it: Muresan’s triumphant return to the silver screen. I can picture him now in Bad Dunking Afghan Man’s role. Now, if that pitch doesn’t drum up some production money in Tinseltown, I don’t know what will. I guess we’ll just have to round out the rest of the cast down the road. Minor issue, I assure you…
[H/T The Dagger]
In a reprehensible bit of timing – what with it being March Madness and all – crews from the Delaware Department of Transportation began taking down basketball hoops in two neighborhoods in the city of Claymont that they say are in violation of the state’s Clear Zone Law “which prohibits hoops, trees, shrubs and other objects from being within seven feet of the pavement’s edge in subdivisions.” Owners of the basketball hoops which violated the law – eight in total – were originally ordered last fall to to take them down themselves but those who did not would have to foot the bill for crews to come out. As one might expect, the defenders of hoops freedom from these two neighborhoods were not going to allow the DOT to remove the hoops without incident, as protesters prompted the crews to call in the Delaware State Police to serve as escorts.
One protester in particular was not going to go down – literally – without a fight. The wife of resident John McCafferty actually climbed up on top of the basketball hoop in a move reminiscent of tree activists who attempt to stop loggers from cutting down trees. That’s right: if they were going to take the hoop down, they were taking down Mrs. McCafferty along with it. And guess what? Her risky gambit proved effective.
For those of you who have been around the sports blogosphere for some time most assuredly have previously encountered Nightmare Ant, the moniker bestowed upon the terrifying beast by J.E. Skeets, whom many of you know as the former editor of Yahoo! Sports NBA blog Ball Don’t Lie editor and current editor of The Basketball Jones. Once upon a time, Skeets was also a contributor at Deadspin and it was during that time way back in 2007 when he unleashed Nightmare Ant (who is actually the mascot for the Fort Wayne Mad Ants) on an unsuspecting and unprepared public.
Well, folks, Nightmare Ant is back taking over the tubes once again. Courtesy of Pro Basketball Talk (by way of Tirico Suave) comes the following video where Nightmare Ant reveals the activities which occur around the Mad Ants’ offices on a typical day.
A commercial for the Australian National Basketball League (NBL) is being hammered by players in the league as well as the media for being grossly inappropriate and possibly racist. The commercial depicts players from the NBL playing hoops throughout the house and in one scene, Taj McCullough, an African-American player who is a forward for the Sydney Kings, jumps into bed between a white couple and starts cozying up to the wife. Hoo boy.
The NBL issued a statement regarding the commercial, which has been running on something called The Ten Network for weeks, where they defend it as “lighthearted and fun.”
I managed to track down a grainy version of the commercial on YouTube. Judge for yourself.
In the interest of “cultural sensitivity,” “special arrangements” were made and members of a cheerleading troupe were forced to wear black leggings and oversized t-shirts for their performance during the FIBA World Championship game between Iran and the United States in Istanbul, Turkey on Wednesday so as not to offend the delicate and conservative sensibilities of Iranian dignitaries in attendance.
Said Patrick Baumann, secretary-general of the International Basketball Federation (via Universal Sports):
“We want entertainment to be part of the basketball game. If it needs a little bit of adjustment that is fine with us,” he told a news conference.
“It is a balance between respecting the culture and making sure basketball delivers all the pace, excitement and entertainment that goes with the World Championship.”
What? No proactively-dressed cheerleaders dancing in an overtly-sexual manner? What exactly is the point, then? You know what? I don’t want to live in a world where it is unacceptable for gals to shake their moneymakers to Top 40 hits in a sexually-charged manner, much to the delight of the horndoggers in attendance. With that in mind, I guess I should not go ahead with that job transfer to Yemen, huh?
Cheerleaders cover up for Iran vs. United States [Universal Sports]
