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Qing the Week's Best: Happy Birthday, America
3 hrs ago | by 
CriticalFanatic
When a fractured testicle and A-Rod's marriage are the biggest stories of the week, you know it's time to begin the countdown to football. Here's what happened, or rather, what didn't happen this week in sports...
You didn't need me to tell you this, but there's not a whole lot going on this weekend. Tomorrow, Jon will be covering the Hot Dog Eating Contest (seriously) and we'll be posting sporadically throughout the weekend. We're actually going to try to separate ourselves from these computers. We're told that's healthy.
Enjoy your 4th. Happy Birthday, America and thanks for giving us a day off to celebrate such an occasion.
CriticalFanaticWhen a fractured testicle and A-Rod's marriage are the biggest stories of the week, you know it's time to begin the countdown to football. Here's what happened, or rather, what didn't happen this week in sports...- Fractured.Testicle.
- Star-Mangled Banner
- When censoring goes wrong Vol. 3,247.
- Don't hassle this Hoff.
- Cynthia and A-Rod, something, something, don't care.
- Two world records were shattered while I wrote this.
- Tom Crean impresses Bobby Bowden.
- Now we've got kids asking Kobe 'how Shaq's ass tastes.'
- Marshawn Lynch probably shouldn't get his license back... ever.
- Baron Davis will Boom Dizzle back in LA.
- Rachel, one of the many reasons to love this country.
You didn't need me to tell you this, but there's not a whole lot going on this weekend. Tomorrow, Jon will be covering the Hot Dog Eating Contest (seriously) and we'll be posting sporadically throughout the weekend. We're actually going to try to separate ourselves from these computers. We're told that's healthy.
Enjoy your 4th. Happy Birthday, America and thanks for giving us a day off to celebrate such an occasion.
This Is One Conspiracy Theory That Makes A Lot Of Sense
5 hrs ago | by 
100%InjuryRate
.jpg)
Take a look at this picture above. Anything about it seem weird to you? If you said, 'Coach K is sitting down' you're partly right. If you also said 'everyone's aligned by height except for Dwight Howard' you're also partly right.
But do you know why those two things are occurring in this photo? Here's a hint: Guess who's the one player on the USA Basketball team who isn't sponsored by Nike. Yep, Dwight Howard.
Darren Rovell of SportsBiz explains:
Nike claims that this was all pure coincidence, but you'd have to be a moron to believe that. This photo was clearly set up so both shoe companies blocked each other out.
Also let's keep in mind Nike spends hundreds of millions of dollars on these guys and they sponsor USA basketball, so there's no way they want another company's shoe appearing in a picture like this.
By the way, you may be wondering then why Dwyane Wade, who wears Converse, doesn't have his shoe covered. That's because Nike bought Converse for $305 million in 2003.
There's no hiding from this, Nike. You're clearly guilty here, you greedy pigs.
USA Basketball Team Photo: Artistic or Logo 'Conspiracy' [SportsBiz] via [Fanhouse]
Comments »
last by 
100%InjuryRateTake a look at this picture above. Anything about it seem weird to you? If you said, 'Coach K is sitting down' you're partly right. If you also said 'everyone's aligned by height except for Dwight Howard' you're also partly right.
But do you know why those two things are occurring in this photo? Here's a hint: Guess who's the one player on the USA Basketball team who isn't sponsored by Nike. Yep, Dwight Howard.
Darren Rovell of SportsBiz explains:
Coach K is sitting. When a team stands, a coach normally stands. Why is this significant? Because Coach K's left foot just happens to be blocking the adidas logo on Dwight Howard's left foot.So, in other words, it's a double block. Howard's blocking the Nike logo for Adidas, and Coach K is blocking the Adidas logo for Nike.
Every player is in height order, with the exception of Dwight Howard and Chris Bosh ... What does this allow for? It gives Howard an excuse to hold the ball and be the only player to not have his hand behind his back. This conveniently helps Howard cover the Nike logo on his shorts.
Nike claims that this was all pure coincidence, but you'd have to be a moron to believe that. This photo was clearly set up so both shoe companies blocked each other out.
Also let's keep in mind Nike spends hundreds of millions of dollars on these guys and they sponsor USA basketball, so there's no way they want another company's shoe appearing in a picture like this.
By the way, you may be wondering then why Dwyane Wade, who wears Converse, doesn't have his shoe covered. That's because Nike bought Converse for $305 million in 2003.
There's no hiding from this, Nike. You're clearly guilty here, you greedy pigs.
USA Basketball Team Photo: Artistic or Logo 'Conspiracy' [SportsBiz] via [Fanhouse]
| 5 |
The Budgets And Finance Meeting Just Got A Lot More Exciting
7 hrs ago | by 100%InjuryRate
.jpg)
Every year NFL rookies are required to go to a series of symposiums designed to help them with various life skills, like how to handle money, how to comport yourself, and how to deal with women in a respectful manner. Obviously the symposiums are working well because every year half the players in the NFL seem to be in and out of prison and the other half are broke. And don't even get me started about the domestic abuse problems.
Plus these are probably the first classes for these guys in years, since they never went to any in college.
So naturally, this next sentence shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Pro Football Talk is reporting that Aqib Talib, the Bucs' 1st-round pick, and Corey Boyd, the Bucs 7th-round pick, got into a full scale beatdown at the rookie "budgets and finance" meeting. The two had been jawing at each other all day, which I'm sure the lecturers loved, and it ultimately boiled over right in the middle of the session. Apparently Boyd wanted a higher tax rate for the wealthy while Talib was vouching for a flat tax. And of course fights are always how these disagreements are solved. Trust me, I know. I worked on Capitol Hill. Ted Kennedy has a right cross that you wouldn't believe.
Obviously this is a bit of a black eye for the NFL, having two rookie teammates brawling during a what is essentially a life skills session.
Also, as MJD at Shutdown Corner points out, even Pacman Jones and Chris Henry managed to get through the rookie symposiums with starting fights.
But hey, they seem like good guys. Talib’s draft stock fell due to repeated positive drug test results while at Kansas. Meanwhile, Boyd was suspended in 2005 and then said "I'm back, back like cooked crack" on TV after scoring a touchdown in 2006.
Should be action packed careers for Talib and Boyd. I'm sure Jon Gruden is thrilled.
The Budgets and Finance meeting is a good place to fight [Shutdown Corner]
Symposium sluggers identified [Pro Football Talk]
100%InjuryRate Every year NFL rookies are required to go to a series of symposiums designed to help them with various life skills, like how to handle money, how to comport yourself, and how to deal with women in a respectful manner. Obviously the symposiums are working well because every year half the players in the NFL seem to be in and out of prison and the other half are broke. And don't even get me started about the domestic abuse problems.Plus these are probably the first classes for these guys in years, since they never went to any in college.
So naturally, this next sentence shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Pro Football Talk is reporting that Aqib Talib, the Bucs' 1st-round pick, and Corey Boyd, the Bucs 7th-round pick, got into a full scale beatdown at the rookie "budgets and finance" meeting. The two had been jawing at each other all day, which I'm sure the lecturers loved, and it ultimately boiled over right in the middle of the session. Apparently Boyd wanted a higher tax rate for the wealthy while Talib was vouching for a flat tax. And of course fights are always how these disagreements are solved. Trust me, I know. I worked on Capitol Hill. Ted Kennedy has a right cross that you wouldn't believe.
Obviously this is a bit of a black eye for the NFL, having two rookie teammates brawling during a what is essentially a life skills session.
Also, as MJD at Shutdown Corner points out, even Pacman Jones and Chris Henry managed to get through the rookie symposiums with starting fights.
But hey, they seem like good guys. Talib’s draft stock fell due to repeated positive drug test results while at Kansas. Meanwhile, Boyd was suspended in 2005 and then said "I'm back, back like cooked crack" on TV after scoring a touchdown in 2006.
Should be action packed careers for Talib and Boyd. I'm sure Jon Gruden is thrilled.
The Budgets and Finance meeting is a good place to fight [Shutdown Corner]
Symposium sluggers identified [Pro Football Talk]
World Records Play Like Broken Records
8 hrs ago | by 
TheBigThree
When I was in grade school, I was an unadulterated dork. I dressed up as anything from Captain Kirk to Peter Pan during Halloween, and regardless of the fact that I’ve traded Captain Kirk for Captain Morgan and Peter Pan’s youth and innocence for Peter Pan’s peanut butter and jelly, I remember those days fondly. I was into math. I was into English. I was into history and I was into science.
But in 1996, I was into mythology. I was into speed. I was into thinking that Michael Johnson was Hermes.
Remember those gold shoes? They glided across the grounds of Atlanta that year, putting on an air of invincibility. He owned the 400m. He defined the 200m. He became an American legend whose reputation has been subsequently secured as clean. For those three summer weeks, he was more than an Olympian—he was a bona fide Olympic god. To me and many others, the man was, indeed, the god of speed, donning footwear worthy of only a deity.
But here’s the thing about those gold shoes—they didn’t help him win the 200m, nor the 400m, nor anything else. Those gold shoes were a perhaps playful and perhaps ironic symbol befitting an athlete whose natural skill transcended his time. Now, instead of the gold shoes on the gold feet, we have the sleek swimwear on the sleek bodies. And this swimwear is not for show.
Jerry Greene of the Orlando Sentinel characterized the $500+ Speedo LZR (pronounced “laser”) Racer as “a full-body suit made from a seamless fabric that has the hydrodynamic characteristics of shark skin.” People from NASA worked on this thing. Since its introduction to swimming in February, 19 long-course and 4 short-course world records have been set. All but one record-holder wore the LZR. We might as well start handing out jet-packs to basketball players and Iron Man suits to running backs.
U.S. Olympic swim coach Mark Schubert said, “I wouldn't be surprised to see every world record broken at the Games, and hopefully we’ll get a big percentage of those.” Read that again: “…every world record…” There’s no other word to describe the LZR other than “tragic.” It’s fine for technology to supplement the athlete; for example, golf clubs have become more powerful and accurate. However, as the golf clubs have become bigger, so have the golf courses on which the golfers compete. It used to be a 250 yard drive on a 400 yard Par 4. Now it’s a 300 yard drive on a 450 yard Par 4. It’s becoming ever closer to a 350 yard drive on a 500 yard Par 4. The technology has advanced in golf, as have the athletes and the golf courses. It’s a perpetual progression that every facet of the game has undergone in mostly proportional fashion, not just driving the golf ball.
In swimming, the 50m freestyle is the 50m freestyle. The pool cannot be made to include barracudas as obstacles. As such, the meaning of what it is to be a “world record-holder” has been diminished, because the viewing public is entirely justified in wondering, “What would Mark Spitz have done in a Speedo LZR Racer?” This technology does not merely supplement the swimmer—it completely enhances the swimmer in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. If every competitor wears the LZR at the Olympics, fine. Perhaps the playing field will be as level as it was sans-LZR, but the records will not mean a thing.
How is this swimwear different from steroids? In today’s ‘roid-laden competitive culture, there are those who would question the integrity of sprinters Tyson Gay and Usian Bolt, arguably the top two 100m competitors on the planet. Here’s an unassailable statement: if Gay and Bolt are someday found to be juicing, their records mean nothing. The steroids don’t merely supplement the sprinter—they completely enhance the sprinter in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. And on we ago again in the same vein as the LZR should be approached.
I like swimmers who swim and sprinters who sprint. Give Michael Phelps a regular Speedo. Give Ben Johnson nothing but a weight room, a track, and Gatorade. Let’s see what these guys can do when the records are determined by the athletes and not the supplements. Unfortunately, any hope of such days hasn’t really existed in quite some time, and any sliver of hope that still lives is as good as dead.
That ten year-old boy in me still thinks that Michael Johnson is Hermes. And no matter how fast anyone sprints from here on out, he will never be supplanted. In this culture, the race is no longer sacred. Hermes never needed a syringe.
Comments »
last by 
TheBigThreeWhen I was in grade school, I was an unadulterated dork. I dressed up as anything from Captain Kirk to Peter Pan during Halloween, and regardless of the fact that I’ve traded Captain Kirk for Captain Morgan and Peter Pan’s youth and innocence for Peter Pan’s peanut butter and jelly, I remember those days fondly. I was into math. I was into English. I was into history and I was into science.
But in 1996, I was into mythology. I was into speed. I was into thinking that Michael Johnson was Hermes.
Remember those gold shoes? They glided across the grounds of Atlanta that year, putting on an air of invincibility. He owned the 400m. He defined the 200m. He became an American legend whose reputation has been subsequently secured as clean. For those three summer weeks, he was more than an Olympian—he was a bona fide Olympic god. To me and many others, the man was, indeed, the god of speed, donning footwear worthy of only a deity. But here’s the thing about those gold shoes—they didn’t help him win the 200m, nor the 400m, nor anything else. Those gold shoes were a perhaps playful and perhaps ironic symbol befitting an athlete whose natural skill transcended his time. Now, instead of the gold shoes on the gold feet, we have the sleek swimwear on the sleek bodies. And this swimwear is not for show.
Jerry Greene of the Orlando Sentinel characterized the $500+ Speedo LZR (pronounced “laser”) Racer as “a full-body suit made from a seamless fabric that has the hydrodynamic characteristics of shark skin.” People from NASA worked on this thing. Since its introduction to swimming in February, 19 long-course and 4 short-course world records have been set. All but one record-holder wore the LZR. We might as well start handing out jet-packs to basketball players and Iron Man suits to running backs.
U.S. Olympic swim coach Mark Schubert said, “I wouldn't be surprised to see every world record broken at the Games, and hopefully we’ll get a big percentage of those.” Read that again: “…every world record…” There’s no other word to describe the LZR other than “tragic.” It’s fine for technology to supplement the athlete; for example, golf clubs have become more powerful and accurate. However, as the golf clubs have become bigger, so have the golf courses on which the golfers compete. It used to be a 250 yard drive on a 400 yard Par 4. Now it’s a 300 yard drive on a 450 yard Par 4. It’s becoming ever closer to a 350 yard drive on a 500 yard Par 4. The technology has advanced in golf, as have the athletes and the golf courses. It’s a perpetual progression that every facet of the game has undergone in mostly proportional fashion, not just driving the golf ball. In swimming, the 50m freestyle is the 50m freestyle. The pool cannot be made to include barracudas as obstacles. As such, the meaning of what it is to be a “world record-holder” has been diminished, because the viewing public is entirely justified in wondering, “What would Mark Spitz have done in a Speedo LZR Racer?” This technology does not merely supplement the swimmer—it completely enhances the swimmer in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. If every competitor wears the LZR at the Olympics, fine. Perhaps the playing field will be as level as it was sans-LZR, but the records will not mean a thing.
How is this swimwear different from steroids? In today’s ‘roid-laden competitive culture, there are those who would question the integrity of sprinters Tyson Gay and Usian Bolt, arguably the top two 100m competitors on the planet. Here’s an unassailable statement: if Gay and Bolt are someday found to be juicing, their records mean nothing. The steroids don’t merely supplement the sprinter—they completely enhance the sprinter in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. And on we ago again in the same vein as the LZR should be approached.
I like swimmers who swim and sprinters who sprint. Give Michael Phelps a regular Speedo. Give Ben Johnson nothing but a weight room, a track, and Gatorade. Let’s see what these guys can do when the records are determined by the athletes and not the supplements. Unfortunately, any hope of such days hasn’t really existed in quite some time, and any sliver of hope that still lives is as good as dead.
That ten year-old boy in me still thinks that Michael Johnson is Hermes. And no matter how fast anyone sprints from here on out, he will never be supplanted. In this culture, the race is no longer sacred. Hermes never needed a syringe.
| 9 |
So Long, Sonics
9 hrs ago | by 100%InjuryRate
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In tribute to the now Oklahoma bound Sonics, here are the 11 best players in Sonics history. [Brahsome]
There's a shoe conspiracy afoot for the USA basketball team. [Fanhouse]
Your jersey of the week. A Dodgers coconut bra. [Home Run Derby]
Faceless people in the Wimbledon crowd, literally. [With Leather]
10 things more likely than a Brett Favre retirement. [The World Of Isaac]
Getting caught up with Rick Ankiel. [The Legend of Cecilio Guante]
The Bucks' GM talks to a blog. [Brew Hoop]
Wayne Gretzky's daughter is kind of hot. [The Big Lead]
100%InjuryRateIn tribute to the now Oklahoma bound Sonics, here are the 11 best players in Sonics history. [Brahsome]
There's a shoe conspiracy afoot for the USA basketball team. [Fanhouse]
Your jersey of the week. A Dodgers coconut bra. [Home Run Derby]
Faceless people in the Wimbledon crowd, literally. [With Leather]
10 things more likely than a Brett Favre retirement. [The World Of Isaac]
Getting caught up with Rick Ankiel. [The Legend of Cecilio Guante]
The Bucks' GM talks to a blog. [Brew Hoop]
Wayne Gretzky's daughter is kind of hot. [The Big Lead]
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