51 posts tagged “sports”

As promised, it's time for some mid-week links:

• In honor of tonight's All-Star Game, as well as all the recent hoopla about San Francisco Giant Tim Lincecum (including a Sports Illustrated cover story that called him"The Freak"), you can check out video of his trés efficient pitching style right here.  (Link via Kottke)
  
  
• I'm still getting myself ready for the Beijing Olympics (sadly, as a spectator and not as a team handball player), and part of my preparation involves reading about the tricky politics of being an athlete from Taiwan.  Oh, sorry, that's Chinese Taipei.
  
  
• Atheist and journalist Jeffrey W. Haws runs a very cool blog called The Atheocracy.  In this provocative post, he discusses what it would mean if science somehow proved that God existed.  Among the possibilities: God is uncaring, or incompetent, or even sadistic.  Whether you agree or not, it's interesting reading.
  
  
• According to a BBC News headline that, er, grabbed my attention: M&S [that's department store Marks & Spencer, of course] "defends 'tax on bigger bras.'" Really.  When I visited the site, it listed several "related" stories, too, including one about Shakira's bra and another about a woman who tried to hide an iguana in one.  One has to keep informed, you know?
  
  
• Stop, You're Killing Me! is an exhaustive website for lovers (like me) of mystery novels.  The site lists over 2,500 authors with—and this is absolutely crucial when you're starting a new series—chronological lists of their books.  Here, for instance, is the page for one of my favorites, comic mystery writer Joan Hess.  (Link via Citizen Geek)

• Do you have Olympic fever yet?  I do, and I'm feeling all nostalgic about Olympic baseball and softball, since it looks like this is the last time they'll be official Olympic sports.  In those sports, and others, the host nation gets an automatic berth in the Olympic tournament.  This NYT article on China's baseball team suggests, well, that the Chinese aren't taking their chances too seriously.  Oh, and American baseball-isms don't translate into Chinese all that well.
  
  
• If you're wondering whether a website is down, or if the problem is with your own set-up, Down for Everyone or Just Me? may be the answer.  Warning, though: The site always tells me that Amazon is down.  (Link via NYT)
  
  
• It looks like the Discovery Channel is going to devote a little attention to beer.  Isn't it about time the Food Channel offered up an entire series on beer?  I'm available for hosting duties....
  
  
• Planet Earth is running out of indium.  And several other elements, including gallium, hafnium, and even zinc.  There's not much copper left, either.  If you like TV screens, solar panels, and computer chips, this is bad news.  (Link via Kottke)
  
  
• Do you like your murder mysteries to have, er, a spiritual bent?  Then check out Clerical Detectives.  I'm going to check out the Rabbi Small mysteries.  (Link via Thousand Voices)

I have a backlog of cites, so look for a very special midweek-edition of Weekend Reading soon.  If I get my act together....

Yes, I was there for the debacle, and this is how I survived:

1. The game starts at 3:55 p.m., the hottest time of the day during the hottest time of the year, because Fox Sports has made this its Game of the Week.  During a steamy walk from the subway (no air conditioning on my subway car!) to the ballpark, I curse Fox.  I arrive just as an Italian-American man—it's Italian Heritage "Night," according to several signs and the scoreboard—is butchering the national anthem.
2. Since I know Adam Eaton is pitching, I head right to Brewerytown.  I have a feeling I'm going to need help cutting down down the heat- and Eaton-induced crankiness.
3. My friend is already in our seats, puzzled by my arrival just at game time.  That's so unlike me, he says.  A sweaty 300-pound man is in the seat next to me.  Oh my.  I plot our escape to empty seats.
4. The D'backs score two in the top of the first.  Our seats our still in the shade, but the sun is moving toward us fast.  I think about asking the usher about the policy for fans who can't fit in their own seats.
5. Shane Victorino hits a two-run homer in the bottom of the third, tying the game.  To celebrate, my friend and I move over a couple of seats.  In just a few more minutes, our row will be in the sun, though.
6. Eaton collapses in the fourth, giving up a two-out double to D'backs pitcher Randy Johnson(!), a career .126 hitter.  I boo, puzzling my friend again.  That's unlike you, too, he says.  By the end of the long, long inning, the D'backs are ahead 10-2, Eaton is in the dugout, R.J. Swindle is our pitcher, and my seat is fully in the sun.
7. We score two more runs in the bottom of the fifth.  Victorino likes the heat, apparently, hitting another homer.  It's too hot, and we're too far behind, though, for me to take much pleasure in Victorino's efforts.
8. In the sixth inning, my friend says he's never seen me sweat so much.  He goes for bottled water.  I try to imagine cold-stream waterfalls.
9. The Dasani helps, but the SPF-70 sunscreen on my arms and legs is glistening.  I touch up the sunscreen on my face.  Our seats suddenly smell like a nuclear piña colada explosion.
10. I snag a Minute Maid frozen lemonade from a vendor.  This is the first time during the season that a vendor has graced our section with frozen lemonade.  What's up with that, Phillies?  That frozen lemonade is one of my favorite things.  On the planet.  The first couple of bites are close to a religious experience.
11. The frozen lemonade has saved me.  The next few innings slide by, scoreless.
12. A co-worker visits us in the ninth inning.  She thinks we're taking the heat well.  I try to act cool, literally, but I know it's all the Minute Maid's doing.
13. The game ends, and I'm disgusting.  I'm wet, from sweat and sunscreen.  No one sits anywhere near me on the subway or train rides home.  I'm an outcast.
14. I eventually arrive home, just as darkness is falling.  I need to take a shower, obviously, but I have to sit down.  Very, very tired.  I fall asleep.  I have a dream involving frozen lemonade.  The next thing I know, it's 9 a.m. on Sunday morning.  Wow.

Since I'm on a long holiday weekend, you're getting the week's reading a little early.

• In my opinion, Mary Carillo is the best tennis announcer on television.  This weekend, of course, she's covering the Wimbledon finals for NBC.  She's too artful to say anything negative about grass-court tennis during this fortnight, and all that serve-and-volley tennis is definitely fun.  But grass-court tennis can be a little too much about power and quick points for me.  And apparently for Carillo, too.  A few years ago, she explained—in a piece called "Living Life on Clay"—why she wanted her children to live like clay-courters.  Here's a taste:
  
  

  [M]y wish for them is to dream in different languages, to build a character that translates well everywhere in the world. I want them to live their lives as though they were playing them out on clay.

  . . . .

  There is great comfort in consistency-always having someone, or something you can trust.

  Life demands great discipline and deep daring.

  And a fatigued mind makes bad decisions.

  Don't get easily depressed. It's amazing what a stout heart and a nimble mind can do if you're resilient enough to stay the course.

  The reward is the journey.

  Read the whole thing. It's one of the most literate, moving pieces I've seen a TV sports journalist produce.

• ChaliceChick of The Chaliceblog has actually printed up an FAQ sheet to hand people who ask about her new SmartCar.  Really.  As I said in CC's comments, it's brilliant.
  
  
• Would you like to see how the Humpdome was transformed over a few hours from a baseball to a football stadium?  Of course you would.  And when you're impressed with photographer John Loomis's work, you'll want to check out his portfolio.  Loomis blogs, too.
  
  
• Everywhere, I suppose, men can't be trusted on the internet to give their correct ages, heights, and—euphemism alert—"intimate details."  We now have confirmation from Pakistan, anyway.  (NSFW?)
  
  
• Tell me I don't need this wallet, or this one, or this one.  But, er, if I was going to buy one of these wallets I don't need, which one should it be?  Advice, please.  Oh, wait.  What about this one?  (Link via Josh Spear)

Well, I'm writing it at the end of this weekend, but here's what captured my attention this week:

• Fittingly, since we're in the middle of the Wimbledon fortnight, a NYT article looked at all those strange on-the-court habits of the top tennis players.  Novak Djokovic bounces the ball up to 25 times before the ball toss, and Maria Sharapova tucks hair behind each of her ears.  But my favorite?  The way Rafael Nadal obsessively towels off between each point.  And, then, of course, there's the way he's always digging his clam diggers out of his, er, butt crack.
  
  
• When I was a kid, I resisted—fiercely—the afternoon nap.  I didn't understand why grown-ups wanted to waste any part of the day.  Now, I'm downright grateful for this advice from the Boston Globe on the art of napping.  (Link via SteveP)
  
  
• Before Bloomsday gets too far away from us, this accurate, but oh-so-brief summary of the plot of Ulysses sure made me smile.  (Link via Prettier than Napoleon, who wonders why Joyce captivates some of us so)
  
  
• Speaking of little obsessions, this NYT article on casino chip collecting was sort of fun.  But I don't really need one more excuse to love Las Vegas.  That place has gotten under my skin.
  
  
• Dustin Fenstermacher is a talented photographer.  Be sure to check out his gallery of images from the cat show.  Highly recommended!  (And I'm allergic to cats.)

My buddy and I hit the ballpark last night for some more interleague action (that still sounds dirty to me), this time involving the California Anaheim Los Angeles (insert eye roll here) Angels of, ahem, Anaheim.  The Phillies had almost no offense.  Manager Charlie Manuel finally gave the apparently exhausted Chase Utley a night off, and the rest of the Phillies line-up seemed to have nothing to offer.  The Phils lost, 6-2.

In the seventh inning, when there were already two outs, the Phils did manage to score two runs to tie the game.  Jayson Werth hit a solo homer.  A few minutes later, Pedro Feliz doubled, sending Chris Coste—who had walked—home.  Eric Bruntlett, who was subbing for Utley, ended the rally with a baserunning mistake, but it wouldn't have mattered.  The Angels roughed up Phillies starter Brett Myers, as well as reliever Chad Durbin, in the eighth.  The fans, disgusted at the fourth straight loss, streamed out.  Not me, though!  I hung tough, until the final out.

Myers, by the way, pitched fairly well for most of the game.  He gave up two solo homers to Vladimir Guerrero early in the game, and I guess I wasn't absolutely shocked that Manuel sent him out to pitch the eighth.  In retrospect, though, that was a mistake.  Myers got two outs and then gave up a two-run homer to Erick Aybar (who?).  Myers is a real puzzle this season.  He'll be pitching really, really well, and then, suddenly, he gives up a home run.  Then he's back to pitching well..and then, suddenly, well, you know.  He's given up a league-leading 23 homers already this season.  Ouch.  And that's our opening day starter, you know?  Ouch, again.

But I have to put the blame here pretty squarely on Manuel.  With the game tied in the eighth, Myers—whose pitch count was nearing three digits—should've come out.

But on to more important things.  I got to the game extra early so I could stand in the long, long, long line at Tony Luke's for a roast pork sandwich.  Damn, it was delicious—all moist and meaty.  It might've been the best thing I've eaten all year.  It's certainly the best thing I've eaten at the ballpark this year, and that's high praise because I love those crab fries from Chickie's and Pete's.

I don't have time to do it justice right now, but remind me to go on a real tear sometime about baseball teams that change their names to something silly.  Yup, I'm thinking about the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.  But I'm also thinking of you, too, Tampa Bay Devil Rays.  Bay Rays?  That is so dumb.

I think I need another roast pork sandwich right about now.

This week's collection of what interested me:

• It's not clear who the author is, but this long essay dissecting the last episode of The Sopranos is pretty darn impressive.  Are you persuaded?  (Link via Kottke)
  
  
• This NYT article explains where you can find some Gaelic football and hurling in the NYC area.  I'm keeping that in mind.  By the way, if anybody knows of any hurling or Gaelic football action in the Philly area, let me know.
  
  
• Also in NYT's "sports" coverage: hunting feral hogs.  Really.  (Note to Yankees: Not many Southerners actually spend their time doing something like this.  I swear.)
  
  
• At FILE Magazine, you can—and should—see a gallery of photographs by Massimo Cristaldi.  "Refinery Flock" consists of some amazing images of a flock of birds converging on a refinery.  If you like "Refinery Flock," and you will, you'll want to check out Cristaldi's online portfolio, too.
  
  
• R. Pollack, a (soon-to-be-ex) teacher in Jackson, Mississippi, tells how the student body collectively reacted to the administration's undue concern about what a group of boys wore one day.  "[I]t's symbolic middle fingers all around," Pollack writes.  Power to the people, you know?
  

On Monday night, I visited the ballpark for a little interleague action (is it just me, or does that sound kinky?) between the Phillies and the Red Sox.  It was a weird night.  There were storms in the area, and rain—or worse—seemed like a certainty.  When I sat down in Section 108, about three seats from the foul line in right field, the wind was whipping around me and stadium detritus was flying everywhere.  But as game time approached, the wind settled down some, and the dark clouds that remained never dropped any rain.

It was a fun night.  The Phillies went ahead early, and they stayed there.  The crowd was into it, and there was, of course, some extra the-world-champions-are-here excitement in the air.  Ryan Howard was in top form, hitting two homers and a triple(!), and Cole Hamels pitched well for seven innings.  The Phils won, 8-2.  (Unfortunately, the Sox took last night's and this afternoon's games.  Ugh.)

As I said, I had a close-up view of the foul line.  My seat also put me in a prime position to boo, lustily, Red Sox rightfielder J.D. Drew, who famously dissed Philadelphia when the Phillies drafted him in 1997.  The crowd was united in its disdain for Drew, and I felt, well, especially Philadelphian as I booed him, too.

* * *

Last night, I did something completely different: I attended a performance of Thornton Wilder's Our Town at the Arden Theatre.  It was well-acted and well-staged.  I was particularly taken with Rebecca Blumhagen and Peterson Townsend as Emily Webb and George Gibbs.  And Eric Hissom was delightful as the Stage Manager.

Probably the best part of the evening was Act II, which, of course, climaxes with the wedding of Emily and George.  The Arden staged Act II in Philadelphia's historic Christ Church—right next door.  I love Christ Church's old, rigid, high-backed pews, and I loved having some non-religious and non-touristy excuse to be in one of those pews for awhile.

I love Our Town and its reminder to pay attention and to live life fully.  But Act III, "Death," sure left me in a mood—after what had been a long day of landlord, work, and commuting problems.  I suppose, though, that a day like that is a good day to be reminded about what's important—and what's not.

What caught my attention this week? 

• Shaving is something I just don't do very well.  My dad never taught me how to use a straight (hmm) razor.  And when I've tried on my own, I've left the bathroom bloodied and bandaged.  I surrendered long ago to the electric razor and the imperfect results it provides.  So this Philadelphia Inquirer article on shaving as "the new hot skin-care market" caught my eye.  And having read it, I think I'll be scheduling an appointment soon at Shaving Grace Barbers:
  
  

  "Most guys don't prepare their face at all," said Michael Sgarra, a co-owner and barber at Shaving Grace in Exton, which offers beer on tap, a pool table, and professional shaves and haircuts (way more than two bits.) "Some are dry-shaving in the shower. Some just use soap. It's pretty horrible."

  At Sgarra's shop, the process begins with a series of hot towels to open the pores and soften the hair. Then they put on a pre-shave oil, another series of hot towels, hot foam and shave twice."

  Shaving Grace sounds like the best place on Earth.  Beer, pool, and getting a shave?  I'm in.  And according to Shaving Grace's website, I can even get a massage there.
  
  
• This isn't entirely shocking for me, but a NYT article notes that same-sex relationships are more egalitarian than opposite-sex relationships.  Notably, "[t]he egalitarian nature of same-sex relationships appears to spill over into how those couples resolve conflict....  [According to one study, same-sex couples] tended to fight more fairly than heterosexual couples, making fewer verbal attacks and more of an effort to defuse the confrontation."  Also, belligerence and domineering were less common in same-sex relationships.
  
  Cool!  Now just exactly how do I get myself one of those relationships?!
  
  
• What a great gig!  Peter Meehan, who usually writes the "$25 and Under" reviews for the NYT's Dining Section, traveled to 12 ballparks around the country to sample the food.  And it sounds like a lot of it was pretty darn good.  Meehan really liked the offerings at our very own Citizens Bank Park, especially Chickie & Pete’s crab fries, already my favorite; Tony Luke's roasted pork; and the Schmitter—a sandwich built with cheese, salami, cheese, beef, and more cheese.  I have to remember to get a Schmitter at some point this season....
  
  And if I'm ever in Seattle's Safeco Field, I'm going to have an Ichiroll, a spicy tuna roll named (duh) after the veteran centerfielder.
  
  
• This week, I particularly enjoyed Sushicam's photographs of a commuter train and some big fish.  And Daily Dose of Imagery showed us the smart, apt advertising used on the streets by Toronto's World Wild Short Film Festival.  Ha!
  
  
• And, of course, it makes sense to end with A Cheese Map of Canada.  Enjoy.

On the Line

I'm sure some of you—and by "some of you," I actually mean my parents—are wondering how I finished in the Tennis Channel's Racquet Bracket. Well, pretty dang good, actually. When I last updated you bragged, I was in 21st place. I later dropped down to 23rd at one point, but the semifinals pushed me back up to 16th. Except for failing to predict upstart Gael Monfils's place in the semis (which almost no one else did, anyway), my choices were pretty much spot-on from the quarterfinalists onward.

Today, of course, the finalists were No. 1 Roger Federer and No. 2 Rafael Nadal. My pick was Nadal, who—despite Federer's obvious prowess on other surfaces—has just dominated clay-court tennis for four years. If Federer somehow managed to defeat Nadal, I was going to tumble to 639th place, passed by many of R-Fed's supporters. If Nadal won, I was going to move up to 12th, picking off the handful of Federer supporters who were ahead of me. As you surely know by now, Nadal won.

Finishing in 12th place is way beyond anything I could've imagined, really. After all, there were 3,737 entrants. In my mind, doing "very well" would've meant finishing in the top several hundred. Finishing 12th?! Zowie!

That said, I can't help but feeling the tiniest of stings for not finishing in the Top 10. Tennis Channel awards prizes to the top 10 finishers. Finishing sixth through 10th was worth a Tennis Channel t-shirt. Truthfully, I don't really care about the $500 first prize or the tennis racket that goes to second place. But I started to really want to win one of those t-shirts.... Golly gee, Tennis Channel, finishing 12th out 3,737 isn't even worth a t-shirt? Now, I guess, I know how it feels to finish on "the bubble" at a poker tournament, just out of the money.

Doing well in the Racquet Bracket affected my spectatorship habits. My tendency, probably like yours, is to root for an underdog, at least when I have no preexisting rooting interest in a player. But this particular Racquet Bracket changed that—or, at least, doing well in this Racquet Bracket did. While ordinarily I might've written off my picks and rooted for who/whatever felt good at the time, the success got to me a little bit. Instead of rooting primarily for underdogs, I started hoping more to be right, which meant, of course, that I was often rooting for the favorite that I'd picked days in advance.

This reminds me of a recent Arizona State University study, which concluded that office March Madness pools can actually decrease enjoyment of the basketball itself. "Once a person has committed to a predicted outcome, he's set himself up for the possibility of looking like a fool. In other words, the fear of losing (known as 'anticipated regret') may actually feel worse than losing itself," the researchers said. "Peoples' worry about losing the bet tends to spoil the event for them."

I felt a little bit of that these two weeks, particularly today. Ordinarily, I wouldn't have rooted for Rafael Nadal during this tournament. He seems like a nice kid, and I'd absolutely like to meet him. But he's had a lot of clay-court success already. In a normal year, I'm sure I would've been rooting—match after match, probably—for an upset of Nadal. Even today, when he was facing the No. 1 player, Nadal was actually the favorite. It's beginning to look, after all, like Federer will never win the French Open. And if I hadn't had that Racquet Bracket pick tugging at me, I'm sure I would've been rooting for "underdog" Federer today.

But the rational part of me had picked Nadal in the Racquet Bracket, and that's where my rooting interests landed. It felt weird, I have to say. I was rooting for Nadal, but self-consciously so.

I'm not much of a gambler, but all this has me thinking a little bit about sports betting. I know some sports bettors say that putting a few bucks on a game causes them to get into the event a little more. Those Arizona State University researchers would probably hypothesize that the bets actually decrease the bettors' enjoyment of the event because of the stress of possibly losing money. I suppose, perhaps, that there might be a "sweet spot," where a bettor has risked just enough to make things interesting without causing him to worry too much about the result. I bet that sweet spot's hard to find....

Anyway, and I've written about this elsewhere before, I think fans tend to gravitate to underdogs because it's a relatively no-risk adventure. If the underdog loses, well, that was to be expected. But if the underdog wins, there's a lot of excitement to be had for what was a low-risk spectating preference. The opposite, of course, is true for rooting for favorites. If you root for the favorite, you lose face when an upset occurs. And there's often little emotional excitement to be gained from a favorite. After all, if the favorite wins, well, it should have.

I'm probably not going to give up on my fantasy tennis games. At this point, the contests are still, I think, just helping me focus attention on something I love. In other words, maybe I'm near the sweet spot for adding stress/excitement to my tennis spectating. But this is something I want to be watch. If I get so wrapped up in the fantasy games that I start losing interest in the actual games, it's absolutely time to stop.

For now, though, I finished 12th! Woo hoo!