Bill Clement : Table Tennis :: Oil : Water
by curt
First, some background: Bill Clement played in the NHL for 11 years, and even made the All-Star roster. He now provides commentary and analysis on ESPN and ABC for hockey and charges $5k-$10k for corporate/motivational speaking events. I can respect his hockey playing/analyzing prowess and will concede that he has general speaking talent (although I can't verify this personally). However hockey is not table tennis.
Admittedly, I didn't have much of a problem with his commentary at first. Although it didn't give me any extra knowledge of the game, it was servicable. After watching the second game, though, hearing that that China dominates table tennis after every third point was getting a bit old. Also, you only need to say "Zhang Yining is the No. 1 seed" three or four times for me to understand that she's the No. 1 seed.
What particularly bothers me, though, is a comment he made as Zhang was wrapping up her game 4 win to take the match: "Zhang Yining is the mongoose of table tennis."
...
Mongoose!? What!?
A quick Google (NASD: GOOG) search provides this quote: "The mongoose, then, is a clever little creature with a deadly ability to look after itself in the wild. Let us respect it for its power while admiring it for its lovable antics."
I can understand a need to be clever and deadly (metaphorically speaking) in sporting events, but I still wouldn't use "lovable antics" to describe Olympic athletes.
Posted on August 19, 2004 | Comments (0)
New Basketball League
by kmikeym
Anyone heard of International Basketball League? I read a short article about it on Portland Bizjournals. I beleive that Mikal Duilio is also the founder of Peaceful & Recreational Athletics, Inc, which runs Portland Basketball and Portland Football (a flag football league).
(from journalstar.com) Mark Duilio, 35, is a native of Indianola, Iowa, and a graduate of Iowa State. He founded PortlandBasketball.Com in 1992 and has scheduled and coordinated more than 55,000 basketball games and trained more than 100 basketball officials. He also owns and operates PugetSoundBasketball.Com, a league in its first year of operation in Seattle.
Posted on August 18, 2004 | Comments (4)
Round One Victory!
by josh
They lost. They lost bad. They lost bad to a team that is not expected to medal. In the first game of the Olympics!
Carlos Arroyo looked like a bona fide star. Puerto Rico's inside defense made it impossible to get to the hoop. USA's shooting was unbelievably bad. Why don't we have any shooters on the team? Get college players! They can shoot!
Start working that twenty into your budget, Steve.
Posted on August 15, 2004 | Comments (2)
Just a Taste
by steve
After a long hard season tonight, for the first time, I am tied for 1st place in my fantasy baseball league. This is my first season playing fantasy baseball. I spent the first half of the season in the middle of the pack. About 3 weeks ago my dudes made a push towards the front of the pack, where about 4 teams have seperated themselves from the rest of the pack, but we languished solidly behind the first place team(The Gas House Gorillas). In the last week I have been inching up, closer and closer, and tonight, I reached the precipice, I felt that I had good players, and that things would turn, around and they have, plus I feel I have made moves when necessary. This feels great. I don't think I have the best team in the league, and probably won't finish first, but I'm super amped just to have reached the top this late in the season. I'd like to thank Andrew Peterson for all the advice, help, and consultation through the season. I'd also like to personally thank I. Suzuki (Andrew didn't have much faith in you, but I did), T. Hafner, E. Chavez (great job rebounding from the injury, buddy), V. Martinez, C. Pavano, M. Tejada (MVP in my book), C. Wilson, D. Graves, B. Looper, F. Garcia, and W. Mo Pena (on your first night with me , tonight, you hit those two HRs tonight when I really needed it ).
Wish me luck dudes. Go Uncle Green Lazers.
Posted on August 15, 2004 | Comments (2)
The World Comes Together....and I Wager.
by j_john
The Olympics game officially begin tomorrow in Athens, the birthplace of the Modern Olympics. With much more focus on terror threats, doping scandals, and Athens deep struggles in getting things prepared in time, I'm trying to get really excited about how special the Olympics are, even in these times of sponsors being able to control what people eat, drink, wear at the games and when there have been scandals about payouts and fixing the determining the cities for the last few Olympics. The Olympics really are special, so many sports that rarely get coverage, so many countries, and most of the athletes are there for the love of it and competition instead of money.
So, I thought, what is the best way I can honor the specialness of the Olympics and get myself excited about the games....WAGERING, of course! Some good old fashion betting always makes something more special. I have bet Josh Berezin a solid 20 bucks that the good ole USA will take the gold in basketabll, which should be interesting considering the NBA all star laden Americans underachieving in the last few years (including a dismal 6th place finish in the 2002 World Basketball Championships). Needing even more excitement I turned to ESPN.com for some good old fashioned Fantasy Olympics!!! Fantasy Olympics, dudes. How deep is that?
The Olympics soccer competition actually started yesterday (because it takes a long time to play a soccer tournament) with the US women taking out the host Greeks, but the big news was today when the Iraqi soccer team pulled off a huge upset and beat the Portuguese 4-2. Iraq who was not expected to even be in the Olympic competition were huge underdogs to the Euro 2004 runner-up Portuguese, who had maybe the biggest young soccer star in the world on the pitch in Manchester United's Christiano Ronaldo. Finally something to celebrate for the Iraqi people. Iraq becomes my sentimental favorites to win the soccer competition in Athens. I mean, how amazing is it that they even were able to send a team.
Go Olympics!
Posted on August 12, 2004 | Comments (0)
Kickers 2 : 1 Silverbacks
by curt
I went a USL match between the Kickers of Richmond (Virginia) and the Silverbacks of Atlanta this weekend. The Silverbacks were triumphant over the Kickers in their first two match-ups of the season, but they just couldn't hold it together Sunday night.
The Kickers scored the first goal less than 2 minutes into the game because their striker was unmarked, and for the rest of the first half, Atlanta played like they were gun shy. The ball rarely made it into the offensive zone because everyone wanted to play defense. The second goal came on a penalty kick. The penalty also marked one of the Silverbacks' second yellow card of the match, leaving Atlanta to play a man short the rest of the game.
Richmond almost scored a third time in the first half, but the ball bounced of the post and Atlanta was able to clear before the Kickers could get a rebound.
The second half marked a new beginning for the Silverbacks. They returned to the field with new-found energy (I'm sure the coach had some choice words in the locker room), and despite being a man short, they were able to control the ball much more than they had in the first half. They still had trouble getting set up for shots, but they managed to keep Richmond from having much time to set themselves up.
The Silverbacks only goal came from a penalty kick, and it almost didn't. The shooter kicked the ball almost straight at the keeper. The ball bounced off the keeper's chest, but he couldn't hold on, and the shooter was able to get the rebound and put the ball into the net.
The last 15 minutes was a solid back-and-forth as the Silverbacks looked for an equalizer and the Kickers tried to clinch the victory.
There was a brief scuffle amongst the players, but the referee separated the groups. I was surprised no one was carded for the altercation. I was also surprised how many substitutes were allowed -- there were at least five, maybe six, which is a significant departure from World Cup rules, which allow only three per game.
Overall, I would call it a decent soccer game. Not one I will soon forget, but that's mostly because my ass still hurts from sitting on the concrete stands for over 90 minutes.
Posted on August 3, 2004 | Comments (1)
