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Boys Will Be 86-Year OldBoys
November 18, 2009
It got little attention even on the sports pages, but Bud Adams of the Tennessee Titans was fined $250,000 by the National Football League for his on-the-field outburst against Ralph Wilson and the Buffalo Bills. Is Bud Adams a criminal cornerback or gay-baiting running back? No, Adams is the owner of the Titans. He got the fine for flipping the bird at Buffalo Bills fans, players and fellow owner and WWII veteran Ralph Wilson, 91, after the Titans defeated the Bills 41-17 in a Toilet Bowl match up of 3-6 teams going nowhere. You can see this low point on video here. Adams, who is both an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation and a U.S Navy veteran, should know better. But hey&;why own a football team if you can&;t tell your rivals to fuck off?
Tags:Bud-Adams, NFL, obscene-gestures, Ralph-Wilson, Tennessee-Titans Posted in Sports, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment &;
Gay Undergoes Successful GroinSurgery
October 27, 2009
Yep, definitely the Headline of the Week. But at least it appears that the American Family Association&;s OneNewsNow has not only given world-class runner Tyson &;Homosexual&; Gay his name back, but is actually using the word &;gay&; and &;hate crimes&; together.
Tags:American-Family-Association, Tyson-Gay, Tyson-Homosexual Posted in Sex and Society, Sports | Leave a Comment &;
The Dodgers and theNavy
October 22, 2009
Now that the Dodgers have gone down the drain, again, I can share my highlight of their season. OK, it&;s a fat guy&;s delight, but my son and I enjoyed sitting in the All-You-Can-Eat right field section for the first game of the National League Championship Series at Dodger Stadium. Getting to our seats was a bit difficult, not because larger-than-life LA characters were blocking the aisle, but because a huge group of sailors and Marines were lined up outside the entrance. They held up their burden and made a gateway for us. Later, they unfurled the flag they brought.
My dad was in the Navy. My mother lived in a Brooklyn apartment building and frequently saw Dodgers Pee Wee Reese and Ed Head, who lived there too. My son wants a jersey, to honor Jackie Robinson (and the Dodgers who broke the color line.) Just wait til next year.
Tags:Dodger-Stadium, Dodgers, giant-flag, Jackie-Robinson, Los-Angeles-Dodgers Posted in Los-Angeles, Sports | Leave a Comment &;
Michael Vick may have visited stripclub!
July 24, 2009
Shocker&; Sometimes I feel despair at the puerility and sexual hypocrisy of the American media. Whatever you think of the guy, (dogfighting sucks) he&;s a guy, a guy who&;s been surrounded by swinging d**ks in the federal pen for the past 23 months. Go see some naked girls dancing? &;I dunno, Allen, I want to catch up on this CSI rerun&;&;
Tags:Allen-Iverson, dogfighting, Michael-Vick Posted in Sex and Society, Sports | Leave a Comment &;
NY Post Screws ErinAndrews
July 23, 2009
The NY Post is in its accustomed place, frolicking in the gutter. As everyone on the Internet knows by now, Erin Andrews of ESPN was violated by some scumbag videotaping her in her hotel room without her knowledge. Now the Post has piled on, actually publishing three naked pictures of her from the video. (I&;m not linking; find it yourself.) Confronted by ESPN, which banned Post reporters from appearing, the Post&;s gossip sleazebags posted the following &;defense&;; &;No one would have known that a sick voyeur had secretly videotaped ESPN reporter Erin Andrews nude in her hotel room, if the Mickey Mouse sports network hadn&;t sent a letter to an obscure Web site demanding that it take down its link to a fuzzy video of an unidentified blonde.&; In other words, ESPN created the &;news story&; by sending a cease-and-desist order to the scum posting the video. I&;ve defended Rupert Murdoch here before, but not now. In its own way, this is as bad as the Obama monkey shooting cartoon. Erin Andrews is not a Page 3 girl. This is a criminal violation, and the Post has made itself a party to it.
Tags:Erin-Andrews, ESPN, NY-Post, Obama-monkey-cartoon Posted in Rupert-Murdoch, Sex and Society, Sports | 2 Comments &;
The Decline of Style in theNBA
July 20, 2009
I&;m a big time pro basketball fan and I coach basketball to children at my local recreation center. I love the Lakers, even though I can no longer afford to go to the games and think Kobe is a terrible role model to youth. As a coach, I preach the team game, particularly defense. Nonetheless, I enjoy the style of the game, which is sadly declining. From Kevin Porter (the &;Little Drum Major&;) to Darryl Dawkins (&;Dr. Dunkenstein&;), who named his dunks, to the incomparable Dr. J and Clyde &;The Glide&; Drexler, players played with style in the past. Even Earvin Johnson got his nickname Magic for the things he could do with a basketball, like no-look passes. Before he was Earl the Pearl, people watching the young Earl Monroe at Philadelphia playground games chanted &;Black Jesus&; as Monroe pulled off one of his signature moves. In high school, teammates called Monroe &;Thomas Edison&; because of the many moves he invented. Now, it&;s just about effectiveness, not entertainment; Kobe Bryant is celebrated as the killer &;Black Mamba&; while LeBron James is the king of power. Style hardly appears in the All-Star game or even in the slam-dunk contest. Dwight Howard showed some style last year, style he failed to show against the Lakers in the Finals.
But this time, they let the little guy win. Today&;s race to have the most tattoos, or the fastest car, (driven by a gawky Polish center) is hardly about style. So does style equal selfishness? Perhaps&;but Earl Monroe and Walt Frazier, two of the most stylish guards ever to play together, combined for a pair of NBA Championships 35 years ago.
Tags:Darryl-Dawkins, Dwight-Howard, Earl-Monroe, Magic Johnson, NBA, NBA-loss-of-style Posted in Lakers, NBA, Sports, Uncategorized | 2 Comments &;
Famous Jewish SportsLegends
April 17, 2009
The tribute to Jackie Robinson (and the inane coverage of baseball&;s &;progress&; in getting more American black players) got me thinking about how much each ethnic group cherishes its athletes, although all too often they are malefactors. Jews are as guilty as any other ethnic group, although Airplane the movie claims &;Famous Jewish Sports Legends&; is only a pamphlet. Still Jews obsessively obsess over &;their&; athletes, like the one and only Jew in the NBA today, Jordan Farmar (does he &;look Jewish?&;) Sadly, Jews like other ethnic groups seem much more interested in even the vaguest athletic connection rather than that much more important &;hall of fame&;&;Jewish Nobel prize winners, of whom there are at least 178.
Tags:Airplane-the-movie, Jews-in-sports, Jordan-Farmar, Nobel-prize Posted in Sports | Leave a Comment &;
Jackie Robinson RealityCheck
April 17, 2009
It&;s great that baseball is honoring Jackie Robinson with a rather surreal day where all players (thanks to Ken Griffey Jr.) wear . But Jackie Robinson never got to play in his hometown. Probably the greatest 4-sport athlete that Pasadena and UCLA ever produced, he was a Brooklyn Dodger through the winter of 1956. They then traded him to the hated Giants and he retired, missing the team&;s move to Los Angeles at the end of the 1957 season. Most likely, it wasn&;t racism. As they say in The Godfather, &;it&;s only business.&;
Tags:Jackie-Robinson, Los-Angeles-Dodgers Posted in Sports | Leave a Comment &;
Lakers and Clippers, A Tale of TwoCities
April 3, 2009
Like many in Los Angeles, I became a Clippers fan because I could no longer afford Lakers games. But the Clippers were also, a couple of years ago, a promising team&;I had $15 seats with my sons the night the Clippers beat the Nuggets and vaulted into the second round of the playoffs! Sadly, things have changed, and only for the worst. I tried to buy Laker playoff tickets today, and they sold out in minutes, even the $215 American Express seats that were too rich for my blood. (That&;s nothing; seat prices go up to $3500.) And the Clippers? I just received a 0.10 offer from the Clippers for the last few games of this lost season. Of course there&;s a catch, but still, check out the un-NBA-like cheesiness of the dime photography.
Fast Break Friday: One Deal. One Chance. Right Now.
Get ready! At 2:00pm (PT) the clock starts ticking! Today&;s limited-time Fast Break Friday offer features 10-cent tickets! Buy one center section seat for $12 ($23 off!) and get the second ticket for only $0.10! This Dime Deal is only available from 2:00-4:00pm so sign up or log in to myClipper NATION to take advantage of this exclusive low-price deal. Two hours only!Link: Click here
Fast Break Friday Now!
Previous Week&;s Fast Break Friday Offers
Tags:Clippers, Lakers, Los-Angeles-sports, NBA-basketball Posted in Sports | Leave a Comment &;
Manny Ramirez Today&;s BabeRuth?
September 26, 2008
Larger than life, carrying a team on his back and a fan (and kid) favorite? That&;s Babe Ruth&;s legend. Indeed, a Google search for Babe Ruth+larger than life pulled up 51,000 references. Manny Ramirez may just be today&;s Babe Ruth. Until he came to the Dodgers, I never paid attention to Ramirez, first playing in obscurity in Cleveland, then with the hated Red Sox. (I grew up on Phil Rizzutto&;s sly reference to the background roaring on the radio &;And the Yankee fans begin their rythmic chant&;&; as they screamed &;Bos-ton sucks!&;) But LA has fallen in love with the alleged pee-er on the Green Monster, the dreadlocked free spirit who helped the Dodgers win the Western Division, as only the second player ever to drive in at least 50 runs in each league in a single season. Ramirez&; personal numbers are there for a Babe Ruth comparison as well; at 36 he&;s hit 527 home runs and driven in more than 1700. And like Ruth, he&;s quarreled with the manager, fought for more money and done some dumb things; they call it &;Manny being Manny.&; But one of the most affecting parts of the Ruth legacy was his affection for kids. &;Babe Ruth, a big kid himself, had a soft spot for disadvantaged children,&; writes Harvey Araton in his farewell to the house Ruth built. There&;s a Paul Gallico story of Ruth hitting baseballs to kids all day at Jones Beach, and his promising to hit a home run for a critically ill Johnny Sylvester in the 1926 World Series is well known. Manny? Here&;s the LA Times&; supposedly hard-boiled TJ Simers: &;Consider what Manny Ramirez has meant to the kids at Mattel Children&;s Hospital at UCLA. When he arrived, he agreed to pledge so much money for home runs, RBIs and hits, asking the Dodgers to take the money out of his paychecks &; more than $36,000 already going to the kids at the cancer ward. Ramirez met with a group of kids from Mattel&;s a few days ago and received a painting by Ashanti, one of the youngsters who has been contending with cancer. It now hangs prominently in his locker.&;
Tags:Babe-Ruth, LA-Dodgers, Manny-Ramirez, Phil-Rizzutto, T.J. Simers Posted in Sports | Leave a Comment &;
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