Olympic bling from Beijing
- So, Michael Phelps... what are going to do for an encore? You could start by buying Jason Lezak a Porsche.
- Baseball and softball are no longer worthy to be called Olympic sports, but synchronized swimming and rhythmic gymnastics or, as KJ calls it, "that Cirque du Soleil thing" stay? Well, plug my nose with a rubber clip and tie me up with a ribbon.
- Nothing against beach volleyball and certainly nothing against our two gold medal-winning teams, Misty May-Treanor / Kerri Walsh and Phil Dalhausser / Todd Rogers but... NBC sure aired a surfeit of beach volleyball, didn't they?
- There's a reason why the two Americans competing in the modern pentathlon finished 19th and 21st: They're the only two people in the United States who know what the modern pentathlon is.
- Congratulations to my former schoolmate we were students at Pepperdine at the same time Terry Schroeder for coaching the U.S. men's water polo team to a silver medal. I still think the game would be more fun with horses.
- Call me crazy, but I believe the members of the Chinese diving team possess the mutant power to separate water molecules telepathically. That's the only way I can figure that they can make so little splash.
- Speaking of diving, Laura Wilkinson reminds me of my friend Phil's wife. I don't know whether Jane dives, though.
- Most appropriately named athlete: Usain Bolt. It's absolutely usain how fast that guy is.
- I don't know what happens to rifleman Matthew Emmons during the Olympic three-positions rifle event, but he's gotta be seeking therapy after blowing a gold medal on his final shot in two consecutive Games.
- Probably no competitor in the Games overcame more painful and immediate personal tragedy than U.S. men's volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon, whose father-in-law was killed, and his mother-in-law seriously wounded, in a random act of violence while touring Beijing. I'm sure that a gold medal is small consolation, but I'm glad Hugh got one anyway.
- Hey, Dara Torres: Way to represent for the over-40 crowd. Children of the '60s rule!
- I hope that decathlon gold medalist and unofficial "World's Greatest Athlete" Bryan Clay doesn't go all crazy with the plastic surgery in later life, like a certain predecessor who shall go nameless here. (***cough***BruceJenner***cough***)
- Needing a dose of graciousness: American speedster Jeremy Wariner. Who tinkled on your cornflakes, Jeremy?
- Two words for the French 4x100 meter freestyle relay team: Crush this.
- Happiest guy to win a bronze medal: David Neville, who dove across the finish line to place third in the men's 400 meters, and afterward beamed like a six-year-old at Christmas.
- It's amazing and more than a trifle tragic to realize that, 20 years after she set them (and nearly a decade after her death), the late Florence Griffith-Joyner still holds the women's world records at both 100 and 200 meters.
- Of course the Kenyans and Ethiopians dominate the distance races. Those guys run farther than that just to find breakfast.
- I thought the American gymnasts, women and men, showed beaucoup class throughout the competition. Shawn, Nastia, Alicia and the rest are welcome to come hang out with my daughter anytime.
- Way to go, Redeem Team, for living up to the hype.
- Our local hero, cyclist Levi Leipheimer, bagged a bronze medal in the men's time trial. You go, Levi!
- My daughter KM, ever the horsewoman, was thrilled when the U.S. equestrians (including KM's heroine, Beezie Madden) won the team-jumping gold. This bugs me, however: Why do the riders get the medals when the horses do all the work?
- Dunderhead of the Games: Cuban taekwondo competitor (I'm No) Angel Matos, who kicked a referee in the face after getting disqualified for overextending an injury timeout. Enjoy the lifetime ban, loser.
- And of course, the Chinese gymnasts are all 16. In dog years.
Labels: Aimless Riffing, Listology, Random Acts of Patriotism, Ripped From the Headlines, Sports Bar
2 insisted on sticking two cents in:
I'll try not to comment on every point you made, but here are my thoughts as I was reading your post:
About Michael Phelps/Jason Lezak: That's almost exactly what I was thinking.
About baseball and softball being dropped: You forgot about synchronized diving. I mean, WTF?
About the over coverage of beach volleyball: I love watching them. I think they are awesome. I would have liked watching a softball or baseball game even more. I only got to see clips, so if it was on somewhere, I couldn't find it.
About Hugh McCutcheon: That story was huge here in Minnesota because his inlaws are the owners of Bachmann's, which is a big name in florists here. Also they are/were very good people and big time philanthropists. My heart broke for him every time he was interviewed and yet, I'm sure that his father-in-law would have wanted to do exactly what he did in staying to finish out his dream at the Olympics.
About Dara Torres: Amen!
About the American gymnasts: They were absolutely the classiest and most gracious group of Olympians. Especially Nastia.
About the idiot taekwondo dude: What a freaking idiot. I hope he enjoys a life of sifting through other people's garbage because he isn't fit to deal with people.
Are you saying that you don't like watching statuesque woman jump around in bikinis? I mean if you are there's not anything wrong with that I suppose.
Call me crazy, but I believe the members of the Chinese diving team possess the mutant power to separate water molecules telepathically. That's the only way I can figure that they can make so little splash.
That and there just so dang tiny.
I read that athletes who win silver suffer from depression because they compare themselves to the golds whereas bronze medalists compare themselves to all the athletes that won nothing. Interesting.
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