This is not a bad summer for sports, unless you live in Seattle. From the greatest tennis match I didn't see to bad-ass baseball trades to a new Brand of free agency to the cheesiest cheesehead ever, there's been a lot of action and even more talk since I last mentioned sports. So even though my version of Sportscenter is the 50 second clip on Espn.com, you're getting my take whether you like it or not.
-Gotta start with Brett Favre. He's on the short list for most overglorified athletes of our generation along with Derek Jeter, Tiger Woods and Tom Brady. He's undoubtedly a great guy, genuinely nice and personable, but he relies too much on emotion and not enough on rational thought. In March he said he thoroughly thought through (say that 5 times fast) the entire season and couldn't see himself making it through the grind. Well nothing's changed, so Brett needs to trust his previous decision and not relent because he misses the sport. Perhaps he's too tough for his own good. The record holder for consecutive starts made can push through another brutal season at any age and just has no quit in him. Unfortunately, no comeback scenario remains that will not terribly tarnish his legacy. If he comes back, you're going to see an Atlanta Falcon or Chicago Bear throwing interceptions and giving depressed interviews.
-I know most people probably don't even know what this is, but Bill Simmons' podcast with James Blake was so disappointing. Simmons professes to be a reborn tennis fan who played the sport a ton as a teenager but I'm absolutely calling him out on his tennis knowledge. Blake is one of the most interesting interviews in all of sports - he's simply a great conversational, intriguing person - and Simmons totally failed to capitalize on this, instead berating himself over and over again for writing a shitty column (a fact that Blake couldn't care less about). Among the aspects of Blake that Simmons neglected to delve into, half of which he was probably unaware of, was Blake's experience as an African-American in a white sport, his rare facial-paralysis disease that took away 6 months of his career, his time at Harvard University, and his relationship with soccer player Heather Mitts. Simmons also talked about how "no one ever remembers what happens at the Aussie open" and I couldn't believe no one had informed Simmons of Blake's saga of a 5 hour match there a few years ago where he won the 5th set 19-17. The only redeeming part of the podcast was Bill shedding light on the close high school friendship of Blake and John Mayer.
-Rich Harden is Mark Prior 2.0. I'm rather stunned the Cubs took a chance on another power pitcher with great stuff and a history of arm trouble but they obviously felt they needed to combat the Brewers acquisition of CC Sabathia. If Harden had gone to any other team I'd think he'd have a successful career, but he's on a cursed team now and it's just a matter of time. I've also never been that sold on him ever since he coughed up the deciding 2 runs to the Red Sox in game 4 of the 2003 ALDS as a rookie. His stats have been inconsistent and while I do hope for a Cubs World Series this year, I don't see Harden leading them to one.
-This Elton Brand saga has blown up into chaotic hilarity. The real moral of the story is never to enter shady negotiations with a Dukie power forward after Cleveland's experience with Carlos Boozer (a situation far less dramatic than this one). I think I'm going to side with Brand on this one. When he declared for free agency, he's totally fair game and the Clippers just have to court free agents like anyone else. They shouldn't assume that signing Baron Davis will magically make Brand also come back. I do know that apparently Brand led the Clippers (and Baron) to believe that things will magically fall into place, but the Clippers were trying to outdo the rules of the free agent market and were instead outdone. Just like Cleveland and Boozer. For the record, I can't recall a single game I've ever seen Brand play, and I've seen 200 NBA games since he's been in the league. Not sure what that means but his arrival in Philly doesn't guarantee the 76ers anything.
-Did you know Brook Lopez and Michelle Wie were (are?) dating? According to my brother's ex-girlfriend from Stanford. I wonder where Jack McGeary fits into all this.
-Like I've mentioned to anyone who gives me the time of day, I'm sorely disappointed that the new Oklahoma City team is not considering the name "Bombers." The saga with that team leaving Seattle is also a depressing and annoying story that really destroys the purity in sports. A sports commissioner should really have the power to block that move, and no person who was thrilled to deprive Seattle of a basketball team should be allowed to be owner.
-I've talked about Olympic athletes to look out for at a work presentation. Without going over them in detail, this was the list I gave (before qualifications had taken place): Roger Federer, Michael Phelps, Guo Jing Jing, Asafa Powell, Usain Bolt, Kobe Bryant, Abubaker Kaki, Yao Ming, Wang Hao and Liu Xiang. Those are various athletes who will be getting coverage here in Beijing because they're good, and are probably familiar to Americans too with the exceptions of Kaki, Wang Hao and Guo Jing Jing and maybe Bolt. I'll go over them all some other post, but I also mentioned 3 other athletes: Dara Torres, Natalie du Toit and Oscar Pistorius. Du Toit and Pistorius are both amputees who may appear on able-bodied Olympic events and coincidentally both are South African. Du Toit was already a world class swimmer at 17 when a car ran into her and she had her left leg amputated at the knee. Competing without prosthetics, she's amazingly qualified for the Games in the 10k open water race. I think she was a sprinter before her injury and now specializes in longer distances. Pistorius was born without fibula and had his legs amputated. He hasn't yet qualified for the 400m sprint and probably won't run the requisite time of 45.95 to do so, but is likely to be put on the South African 4x400m relay team. He's been in a storm of arguments because his prosthetics are apparently more efficient than ankles and at times his height has changed as he simply makes his prosthetics longer. While he doesn't always come off as the most likable athlete, I don't think people should complain about his prosthetics unless they cut off their legs and try them on.
Torres creates waves of headlines and controversy on her own. She's a 41 year old swimmer who competed in the 1984 olympic games. That is not a typo. She's swam in 5 Olympics, missing 1996 and 2004, at least one of which because she was pregnant. She's qualified for events and now there are whispered doping allegations about her. This is undoubtedly just one of many steroid stories which will accompany these games but I think this story is circumstantial at best. Basically, if you're a 41 year old in a sport where teenagers set world records, and look like this people are going to ask questions. I think she's legit though because what kind of 41 year old mother would care enough to dope? Actually I don't want to know the answer to that question.
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