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August 24, 2008

Spanish Men’s Basketball Team Loses

It would take a lot for me to get behind a team led by Kobe Bryant, but the Spanish men’s basketball team made that possible. They already demonstrated that they are losers when the Spanish Basketball Federation’s decided to pose for the advertisement shown below and they just confirmed it by falling to the “Redeem Team” from the United States, 118-107. The Spanish women’s tennis team was also documented performing the same gesture; their photo was an impromptu gathering, not for an ad campaign. Classy.


Photo is public domain.

July 5, 2005

Tour de France: Team Time Trial Tumult

Watching the team time trials in the 4th stage for the second time, I can’t help but think that a CSC teammate intentionally nicked Dave Zabriskie’s back tire at around the 1.5 kilometer mark so that he would lose the yellow jersey. Zabriskie is not the leader of Team CSC; that would be Ivan Basso and there is no way they would let Zabriskie in his first year with the team continue to lead in the general classification for long. Call me cynical, but this is a sport filled with intrigue and détente, and the team mainstays probably thought it was time for Dave to take a back seat.

Am I jumping to conclusions here? Any readers in tune with the politics of international cycling? It is strange to me that out of the nearly 200 riders, only Zabriskie wiped out. Zabriskie fell to 9th in the general classification, and Basso is right with him at 10th.

Meanwhile, Team Discovery rode the fastest team time trial in tour history, garnering the yellow jersey for Lance Armstrong.

June 11, 2005

Kokomo Kid Knocked Out

My moniker was the cause of Stacia Firebaugh’s demise at the Scripps National Spelling Bee earlier this month. Mapquest shows me that there are six Kokomo’s in the United States (one each in Arizona, Colorado, Hawai‘i, Indiana, Missouri, and Texas), and one of my first homes on Maui was in Kokomo. Despite the song, there is no city, town, or beach named Kokomo off the Florida Keys, but since the Beach Boys recorded this tune, hotels and restaurants with the name have popped up in Florida. My Kokomo (emphasis on the second syllable, unlike how I assume the mainland locations to be pronounced) was not considered a beach town, as it was Upcountry Maui, which Darren Y.K. Chang fittingly calls the Montana of Hawaii.

February 24, 2005

Collect Them All

Bill Parcells has a thing for drews, this much is obvious now. It seems his obsession started off with Drew Bledsoe when he was with the New England Patriots. When Parcells went to the Dallas Cowboys, it wasn’t long before he longed for another drew, and he even raided the Yankees’ farm system to get Drew 2.0, Henson. Overlooking Brees in San Diego, Parcells has gone retro by bringing Bledsoe back into the fold.

What will be the master strategian’s next step? Well, no one can really tell what Bill Belichick will do next, but here are the next drews that Parcells may consider:

Parcellsbledsoe

Parcells thinks it’s really funny when he yells “Drew!” in the quarterback meetings and both Bledsoe and Henson turn their heads. He thought that up around the same time he was thinking up new racial slurs.

February 6, 2005

My Tribute to the 100/442nd

GoforbrokeSince the NFL didn’t have any representatives from the 100/442 Regimental Combat Team as part of their tribute to the Greatest Generation for the Superbowl pre-game, I post here to recognize them.

  • 100/442nd RCT became the most decorated unit in U.S. military history for its size and length of service
  • 18,000 individual decorations for bravery
  • 9,500 Purple Hearts
  • Seven Presidential Distinguished Unit Citations

442There were so many Purple Hearts because they were sent on the most dangerous missions. These Nisei (second generation Japanese Americans) fought for our country despite the prejudice and civil rights violations they experienced back home.

January 28, 2005

Why Bow Ties?

First it was Ron Jaworski, then Sean Salisbury. It is a growing epidemic on ESPN: bow ties. Both former quarterbacks provide solid analysis (Jaworski more so than Salisbury, of course). However, I can not take anyone seriously if they are wearing a bow tie without a tuxedo. This is because the primary donners of this attire are as follows:

Krusty

  1. Playboy Bunnies
  2. Clowns (Krusty can pull it off, however.)
  3. Mr. Winkle

This fashion trend has me fit to be tied, but I’ll bow out of making any further comments.

January 23, 2005

Angst Climate Pattern Shifts

LaagoniaLa Agonía, or “The Agony,” an enigmatic climate system of sports futility that previously plagued the New England region and Pennsylvania, has seemingly consolidated itself above Pittsburgh.

No one understands the intricacies of La Agonía, not even foremost expert Dr. William Patzert, oceanographer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab. Dr. Patzert’s research delves mainly into proving that the oceans of the world regulate the workings of this phenomena, as well as examining how the major sports interact under its influence. “The baseball ramifications of Agonía in Boston have been profound and extensive over the course of nearly a century,” says Dr. Patzert. “But, in those intervening years, basketball and hockey were largely unaffected. We have some evidence that football subsystems are able to disperse Agonía, supported by recent events in Massachusetts. Conversely, it seems that baseball fluctuations have a lesser effect, as witnessed by the lack of corollary football success in Arizona, California, and Florida.”

Other researchers have refuted the oceanic origins of La Agonía, positing global electromagnetic fields as the source of tumult. Gary Glatzmaier, professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Santa Cruz, claims that “the fluid dynamics of the earth’s core and the resulting electromagnetic forces impact regional team performance more than bodies of water.” Furthermore, Glatzmaier theorizes that La Agonía might actually be more localized than previously believed, and cites the malaise of the Minnesota Vikings as proof. “Of course, the size of an Agonía-affected area will vary over time. We’re currently seeing the centering of the East Coast Agonía over Pittsburgh, where it used to spread far enough the east to encompass Philadelphia.”

Several owners of major sports teams are anxiously awaiting future data these scientists release. “If there’s anything that can stem the tide of our crushing defeats in the postseason, we need to have it. We need to know how to counteract this thing,” says Red McCombs, owner of the Minnesota Vikings. “We might even consider combining funding for further research with Dan Rooney [Pittsburgh Steelers owner]. Something must be done to stop La Agonía.”

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