NY Times: Longing for the Return of Dueling Pistol
The New York Times picks out 10 past Olympic events that should be brought back. The title focuses on Dueling Pistol. Although they have that as #4 on the list, not sure if it was supposed to be a ranking. Dueling Pistol was in the 1906 Olympics but did not involve shooting people, just a dummy.
The sports range from the crazy long (12 hour bike race, cross-country run) to legitimate (softball, cricket). Maybe then I’d finally understand cricket. I’m still at the point where I was on board with Family Guy making fun of it in their season finale. It’s not on Hulu yet but it pointed out that it made no sense who was wearing helmets and someone hit the ball out of the park but they had no idea if that was good or not. Finally, there are some odd ones (tug of war) and odd looking ones (2-handed javelin).
Of the 10 on the list, one stands far above all the rest: 200 Meter Swimming Obstacle Course.
6. 200-meter swimming obstacle race, 1900
How to make the 200-meter freestyle more exciting? Make the competitors climb a pole, swim under a row of boats and clamber over another row of boats.
Now, that’s in 1900. The possibilities are endless with underwater cameras. When imagining it, I just have trouble resisting turning the event into Wipeout, The Challenge, or Ninja Warrior.
Found on Uni Watch.
During the On Deck series, Phillies were all over the place. This video has all sorts of cool things: Ryan Howard selling tickets and Victorino doing Phanatic Run the Bases. Hunter Pence sang Happy Birthday, and so did J-Roll …
Amazing job by the Phillies. I haven’t been to an On Deck game in a while. I remember it was at the Vet against the Orioles. There was none of this.
Found at mlb.com.
At least someone picked each of the Final Four participants, meaning one person selected Louisville. Kentucky was the favorite at the start and they look to have a path to the title. Ohio State was the only one of the four to not be picked to win the title. Likely due to the Penn State leanings of many of the participants. I made the bold pick of Missouri to win it all, so I was done real quick.
See the entire ICH Pick Distribution.
I’m fascinated by Opening Day starters. I think a team announcing its Opening Day starter should be a bigger deal with a grand unveiling. I guess the problem is that anyone worthy of a big show would already be the assumed Opening Day starter.
Imagine my excitement for a headline like this from Rob Neyer: Bruce Chen Tabbbed As Royals’ Opening-Day Starter This is the perfect example for the reason that my hopes of grand announcements is flawed. How many Royals fans want an event that tells the world their best pitcher is Bruce Chen?
Now, BC wasn’t exactly terrible last year at 12-8, 3.77. To me, his 2-ish seasons with the Phillies jump to mind first. In 31 whole games started, he piled up a 7-9, 4.28. In 2000/2001 that was average on average teams.
I was curious to see what Royals fans have had to put up with over the past few seasons. At least they had some Greinke, right? As always, Baseball Reference is awesome. We’ll start from 2000:
Jeff Suppan for 3 years, Runelvys Hernandez (haven’t thought about him in a while), Brian Anderson, Jose Lima, Scott Elarton, Gil Meche for 3 years, Zack Greinke, and Luke Hochevar last season. Poor KC.
Some other things …
Minor League Guy plays for the Cardinals. Well done by both the play-by-play guys for being funny but not too mean to the rookie. Also, an amazing job by the graphics guy to throw the graphic together.
Honus Wagner card up for auction. If I ever become rich, I’m not sure I’d waste money on flashy cars and boats. But probably will spend on houses and suites at sporting events. However, that one thing that money would not matter … this card.
Finally, 49 things you should know about Jamie Moyer.
Ice Cream Helmet
Gym Class Lineup – You can set your lineup now for the next game, April 4th, Cardinals in Miami. I’d have to go with OF being the closest matchup between Beltran and Morrison.
Tony Reali injures his finger hitting the mute button
Not Reali. Of all the people I want to get injured on ATH, Tony is at the bottom of the list.
I haven’t watched in so long, I’m not even sure who the few I liked were and who is still around. I think most of the ones I liked got hired by ESPN and now appear on SportsCenter and their other shows.
Danny O'Brien's Academic Prospectus – Black Shoe Diaries
1) PSU might be getting a new QB (the coach’s son?) who would clearly be the Bridge to Hackenberg.
2 (and more important)) We have a masters program in Rural Sociology? Can I do another Masters? Actually, I’d prefer Suburban Sociology.
Puck Drawn – Columbus Re-Brand
The post kicking off the competition blames the Blue Jackets branding for most of their problems. Makes sense. Puck Drawn does these sorts of competitions a lot and has all sorts of cool jersey and logo concepts. So while I have no connection to Columbus, and you probably don’t either, still, check it out.
The next contest is for a redesign of any current team.
New Soul Jerseys
Oh, right, the Philadelphia Soul still exist. After that cancelled season, I don’t think anyone cares about the Arena league, not that it was huge before (hence the cancelation). Not only are they still around, they have new jerseys I guess, and they look like the Carolina Panthers, which is not a good thing.
I had to look it up, but I was correct in thinking the Soul won the season before the cancelled year. That was 2008. The cancelled year was 2009. That surprised me, that there have been 2 seasons since they came back, 2012 will be the 3rd. I don’t need to tell you, but the winners those years were the Spokane Shock (2010) and Jacksonville Sharks (2011).
Neilson’s Year in Sports TV Advertising
What I found most interesting was the spend of the wireless carriers on sports advertising. You’d think beer would be at the top, things like DirecTV make sense. But wireless? That’s not really strongly tied. Sure there are some apps, and some carriers have deals with leagues, but I’ve never seen them as very much of a draw of one carrier over another. I think it has to come down to sports being the perfect demo that wireless carriers are going after. AT&T must be convinced of that, they doubled Bud Light’s spend.
Saints Bounty
I’m assuming this will be the top story for a few days. Kind of strange. Was anyone surprised by this? I find it hard to imagine this is the only instance in the league. Whatever the harsh punishment winds up being, it should take care of the practice.
London 2012 Ball
I have an odd interest in soccer balls for big events. Of course, the World Cup and Olympics are about it to me for big events.
Before the last World Cup, the NY Times had a great interactive page chronically the balls over the years. How good? I remembered it existed. After looking through, it’s clear no other ball should be used besides the 1970 checkered. But I could be talked into some laces, like 1938.
Nats Take Back the Park
I have to imagine everyone who is upset by the number of Phillies fans invading DC already goes to those games. Now this campaign limits who can buy to DC area residents (based on credit card address). This may get a few more Nats fans instead of Phillies. However, the Nats haven’t been around long enough that the majority of DC residents are Nats fans. There are tons of O’s and Phillies fans. I’ll be curious to see if anything is different, I’m guessing it won’t be noticeable. Although, more Nats fans might make the locals feel like they have some backup, so maybe things will be a little more feisty.
Finally, it’s the 50th anniversary of Wilt’s 100 point game. Fans at the Sixers game got some of the court (my sister just texted me her piece of the court). A great post about the pieces of court on Uni Watch. I forgot to make the Warriors connection. Wilt played for the Warriors when they were in based in Philly. One more link, philly.com’s story of the 100-point game. That’s a really good read as well. I didn’t know the Eagles played a game before the Warriors game. Yes, the football team played basketball, which apparently was common. I haven’t been to philly.com in a while, so I’m glad Philly Sports History posted it on Facebook.
Grantland on the Big 5
Saying this is probably my favorite read on Grantland since it started says more about how weak I’ve found the site. This is a solid overview of the Big 5 with plenty of Drexel teasing.
Pirates #34
The Pirates traded for AJ Burnett, but they already had a #34. A pretty good #34. Andrew McCutchen had that number. What did he ask in exchange for the number? A college fund for his daughter, who isn’t due for a few months. Maybe not as exciting as Kruk and Mitch, but very cool. (Kruk told the story on Letterman, I couldn’t find the video.)
NBA Ratings
Kind of surprising NBA ratings are up after the lockout. My only guess is that people like the games more often. The Sixers are playing well and are 4th in the league for both percent and actual increase in viewers.
Big League Chew
I found a blog all about candy because of this post and it is one in-depth piece of work. Working at a baseball field as a teenager and having snack bar privileges meant a lot of Big League Chew for me. I can’t think of a better design. You could decide exactly how much gum you were in the mood for. During those boring days at work, that amount was an entire bag. After those days, we’d take a little break from the BLC, a whole bag at once is a lot of sugar. Takes a while for that to work itself out.
Finally, good bye Dr. Saturday. Ok, not entirely. Dr. Saturday is a Yahoo blog, Matt Hinton left and he’s all I’ve known of Dr. Saturday. I’m sure the new blogger will be alright, but I’ll be on the lookout for where Matt winds up next.
These were back-to-back in my Twitter feed.
First, Nate Silver …
Then, MLB …
It’s like the same thing repeated. Obviously, teams are at different points in their signing process, so these shouldn’t be compared. But just the fact that they posted so close to each other, and the A’s would never have the chance to sign Price, makes it somewhat interesting.
A while back (3 years ago) I did a Fives listing the teams that are most important to me. My list then:
1. Phillies
2. Penn State Football
3. Flyers
4. Eagles
5. Sixers
It’s not too often that these rankings are actually tested. Sometimes the Phillies and Penn State have games at the same time but that matchup is easily decided by the importance of the game. If the Phillies game has any importance, it will win.
Today is a more interesting matchup. The Flyers in the Winter Classic and Penn State in their bowl game. Thankfully, the Winter Classic was delayed two hours so there isn’t much of an overlap anymore. Still, it got me thinking, and I think the Flyers should pass Penn State on my list.
There is something to be said for the importance of each game.
Winter Classic: In Philly for the first time. The alumni game was so cool. 24/7 has been awesome. Important game against the Rangers.
Ticketcity Bowl: Penn State bowl game. Interesting matchup with Houston.
On the negatives.
Winter Classic: Regular season game.
Ticketcity Bowl: It’s called the Ticketcity Bowl. It doesn’t mean very much for the future of the team.
Head-to-head, the Winter Classic wins. I think the Flyers also move up to #2 in my rankings. I’d rather see them win the Cup than Penn State with the BCS. That might have something to do with the low likelihood of Penn State winning a championship along with the terribleness of the BCS.
The best hope of Penn State retaining that #2 spot: keeping Tom Bradley as head coach.
