Looks like they are having fun

One of the things I have enjoyed about watching the Olympics is the numerous sightings of members of the US Basketball team (Redeem Team is a stupid, stupid name) at various events. When Michael Phelps was dominating the first week of the Olympiad you were going to see shots of his family and then shots of LeBron James, Kobe, D-Wade or some other NBA superstar who were taking in one of the great athletic achievements in recent memory. J-Kidd, LeBron, D-Wade, Kobe have been sighted watching the American beach volleyball team of Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh dominate the competition on the way to the finals.

I think it is great that these guys have decided to take in some of the events. I never recall seeing any players at events in the 2004 Games, they may have been there but a camera never showed them. I think a primary reason for them being seen around is Coach Mike Krzyzewski encouraging them or telling them to get out and enjoy themselves. I can almost guarantee that 2004 Olympic coach Larry Brown would never allow his players to enjoy the Games and this fundamental difference in philosophy can be boiled done to one thing. As everyone knows Coach K is Duke’s coach and stands for all that is good with sports and Larry Brown went to North Carolina and played under Dean Smith…enough said.

Hey everyone pay attention to me

Just read this interesting article about Jennifer Lopez’s appearance on Good Morning America. I will paraphrase but you should read this, she is training for a triathalon in Malibu 6 months after giving birth and thinks what she is doing is more newsworthy than what Michael Phelps did at the Olympics. Hate to break it to you Jenny from the block but no one really cares that you are training for a triathlon and even if the Olympics were not going on most people could find a number of more newsworthy items to follow than yours. I guess she needs the attention because she has not been relevant since…since…since, wait when was she ever relevant?

Least Favorite Movie Scenes - The Godfather

Mixing it up today by showing a scene I always hate to watch from one of my favorite movies. The Godfather has been one of my favorite movies since I first watched it in 8th grade. I read the book first and then watched the movies and I was hooked. I devoured everything I could about The Godfather movies and even sat through the wretched third Godfather. The first two are American cinema classics and both won Best Picture Oscars. I go back and forth on which Godfather is my favorite, I love Part II because of the Vito storyline and I think Al Pacino is at the top of his game in his portrayal of Michael, but then Part I has Marlon Brando in his Academy Award winning role as Vito and my favorite character Sonny Corleone played by James Caan. I knew Sonny was going to get killed because I read the book and you know it is coming in the movie when his temper gets the best of them but you hate to watch it even if it is an iconic moment in the movie.

Aquaman

Now what am I going to watch? The first week of the Olympics was awesome from watching the opening ceremonies at the house of the Waxy family to watching Michael Phelps win his 8 gold medals. This is the first Olympics since 1996, that I can remember being excited to watch and all of that is due to Michael Phelps.

It has been a must see TV to watch Phelps swim. Most of his races he won going away, he even won the 200m butterfly with his eyes closed because his goggles had filled up with water. But the races that everyone will remember years from now were the epic wins in the 100m butterfly and the 4×100m freestyle relay. Phelps won the 100m butterfly by .01 of a second

and it took an epic comeback against the French by anchor Jason Lezak to win the 4×100m relay.

If Phelps would have won all 8 medals easily I think his achievement would still be discussed but because he won by the slimmest of margins in a couple of them it adds to his greatness because he did one thing we love to see all athletes do, he performed under pressure. His comeback in the 100m butterfly is similar to Jordan hitting the game winner, Tiger knocking in the putt on 18 or David Ortiz hitting a walk-off homer. It will be what is remembered most about these Olympics.

Favorite Movie Scenes - Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Redford and Newman were two of the most popular actors in the 60s and 70s and when they starred in two movies together they were both extremely popular. The first one was the 1969 western Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The movie is peppered with some great banter between the two stars and the great character actor Strother Martin has a great bit part in this movie. There were a number of scenes to pick, the final shoot-out against the Bolivian army, any scenes involving Strother Martin but I chose the most famous scene from the movie and it is the end of the chase between Butch, Sundance and Joe LeFlors and other trackers out to kill the two for robbing trains. The entire chase sequence is about 20 minutes but this is the last part where Butch and Sundance have to choose between fighting or jumping. Even in this situation they keep up with their witty repartee.

The Game of the Century

November 25, 1971, Thanksgiving Day. That is the day of the greatest college football game ever. The teams were #1 Nebraska and #2 Oklahoma, both teams were 10-0 and whoever won was going to win the Big 8 title and have a great shot of winning the national championship.  The game was played in Norman at Owen Field.  ABC was broadcasting the game nationally and at the time it was the most watched college football game ever.  I am not going to go into great detail about the game but Nebraska won 35-31, getting a touchdown in the final two minutes to win, but the game is most remembered for this punt return by Johnny Rodgers:

Although Nebraska and Oklahoma had been rivals for years this game made the rivalry national. Every year Nebraska and Oklahoma played on Thanksgiving or the day after Thanksgiving and every year both teams were highly ranked and vying for the Big 8 championship. The rivalry peaked during the Osborne and Switzer years and Switzer was the one of the few coaches that Osborne would finish with a losing record against.

Once Switzer left Oklahoma in disgrace the Sooners floundered. Coaches that succeeded Switzer did not want to have any association with the troubled past and Oklahoma football suffered because of it. The teams still played the day after Thanksgiving but most of the time Oklahoma was outmatched and the rivalry suffered.

When the Big 8 teams merged with the Texas schools from the defunct Southwest Conference some big changes were made. Besides the conference championship the biggest change was the removal of the Nebraska/Oklahoma game. Now the teams would play a home/home every two years instead of playing every year the day after Thanksgiving. Nebraska’s forced rivalry game would now be Colorado, who had some decent teams in the late ’80s and early ’90s but they never got to the point that they were considered Nebraska’s rival, at least not for Nebraska fans and who can argue with a record of 46-17-2 against the Buffs. Kansas State also tried to lay claim as a rival but when you lose for close to 30 straight years you are immediately removed from consideration.

I started thinking about the traditional powerhouse schools like Nebraska, Oklahoma, USC, Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio St, Alabama and Texas. Each of these schools has an epic rivalry. Auburn/Alabama, Ohio St./Michigan, Oklahoma/Texas, USC/Notre Dame. Even some of the nouveau riche schools like Miami, Florida St, Florida have rivals. Nebraska, the program 4th all time in wins with 808, does not have an epic rivalry game and no Colorado does not count. I never understood why the Big 12 did not keep the Nebraska/Oklahoma game, they should have followed the SEC’s lead when they went to two divisions, keep the rivalry games. UT/Alabama is still played every year and the same thing should have been done for Nebraska/Oklahoma.

Favorite Movie Scenes - The Quiet Man

This John Wayne movie is my favorite. It is directed by John Ford and probably has Wayne’s best performance. It also includes Maureen O’Hara, Victor McLaglen, Ward Bond and a great performance by Barry Fitzgerald. The score is top notch and of course the countryside of Ireland is a character as well. It really is a beautifully directed film and features so many fine performances that I highly recommend it for anyone. It also includes one of the great fight scenes in movie history. Not only is the fight scene great but it is the lead up to the fight that I love and the music plays a big part of that.

It is getting closer

Football season is getting closer. Kids are starting practices, the pros have played the first pre-season game and the college coaches poll is out. Georgia is #1, after a strong finish last year and returning all of their key players. With so many tough opponents in the SEC it is going to be tough for the Bulldogs to run the table, but if they are near the top of the BCS even with a couple of losses, the strength of the SEC will almost guarantee them a shot to be the SEC school that destroys Ohio State in the BCS championship game.

I always like to watch videos of my favorite college team (10% of a dollar if you can guess who that is) to get fired up for the upcoming season. While looking at some of the great plays of my favorite team’s past, I came across one of the sickest punt returns and blocks I have ever seen. This is from the Backyard Brawl between Pitt and West Virginia a couple of years ago.

GI being GI

Last night the Cross Point softball team played in the 1st round of our season ending tournament.  We started off strong this year, sprinting to a record of 13-3.  Then vacation season hit us. Each week we were putting out a new line-up and we faltered down the stretch losing 6 straight games, despite this we still made the tournament.

Of course the early going we had some jitters and went down quickly in the first but so did our opponents.  The next inning we started hitting like we did in the beginning of the year and put a couple of runs on the board and we held them again. Our defense was playing solid and it seemed that our offense was ready to erupt.  The next inning it did, we got a runner on and I came up. I had not been hitting well from the left side of the plate and  had switched back to righty in the last game we played.  With the first pitch I was glad I had made the switch.  I took the ball for a lengthy ride over the left center field fence and our offense started rolling. We ended up winning the game 14-10 and were on to the 2nd round later that night.

We never got a chance to play because the rain that held off for our game started up once the second games got underway.  This was no light drizzle it started coming down in buckets and the rest of the night’s games were called and rescheduled for tonight.  The fields were soaked and after a friend of mine got a call from his wife, I found out the inside of my car may be in bad shape as well.  I had left my driver’s side window down.  Our captain made sure that we would be there for tonight and after we got that out of the way I sprinted to my car like the greatest RB ever Jim Brown. I got in and the driver’s seat was soaked, along with the floor, underneath the seat, the steering wheel. You get the idea. After this mistake I felt like Manny Ramirez, had a great night at the dish but will be remembered more for doing something stupid.

The Mick

There are many great rivalries in sports, Duke/North Carolina in college basketball, Michigan/Ohio St in college football, Red Sox/Yankees in baseball and of course France/conflict. I am a fan of three of these, Duke, the Red Sox and conflict. Being a fan of any of these you quickly learn to have a dislike for anyone on the other side. There may only be one exception to this and that is Mickey Mantle.

Yesterday my Dad, the reason I am a Red Sox fan, and I shared a few emails about this subject and since he grew up when the Mick was the most popular athlete of the day he agreed. Mickey is a big reason why so many boomers are fans of the Yankees. My father-in-law is a great example. He has lived his whole life in Indiana and it is because of Mantle he became a Yankee fan. There was just something about the country boy from Oklahoma who hit the towering home runs that appealed to people, kids especially.

After DiMaggio and his “sparkling” personality retired, Mickey Mantle became the center fielder for the Yankees. Of course he had a lot to live up to because some people will tell you that DiMaggio was the greatest player since Ruth, of course this is wrong. DiMaggio could not hold a candle to Ted Williams. Mantle struggled early in the New York spotlight and the shadow of the player he replaced. But he succeeded of course and was the center piece of another Yankee dynasty.

So why do I like Mickey Mantle even though he played for the hated Yankees?  Well one I had not been born yet. The second one is how bad the Red Sox were in the ’50s and ’60s when Mantle was at his peak, he was not part of Yankee teams that inflicted pain like the teams in 1949 and 1950.  Because of this the bad talk about him from Red Sox fans does not seem as great as it is for DiMaggio, Bucky Dent, Aaron Boone and of course A-Rod.  The third is the “what might have been?” question about Mickey’s career.  Just about every season in his career was affected by injury. If he had been healthy his whole career, his numbers would be astronomical and no steroid taking former lead-off hitter would come close to approaching his home run totals.  The fourth is what happened after his career. The years of hard living affected Mantle and he had to seek treatment for alcoholism and eventually  had to have a liver transplant.  He also became a born-again Christian and in the last year of his life he apologized countless times for the way he acted as a young man.  Bob Costas gave the eulogy at Mantle’s funeral and I think he hits it when talking about a hero and role model:

“In the last year of his life, Mickey Mantle, always so hard on himself, finally came to accept and appreciate the distinction between a role model and a hero. The first, he often was not. The second, he always will be. And, in the end, people got it.“

So there you go a die-hard Red Sox fan admitting to liking a Yankee, but like I said can you really not like Mickey Mantle?