Westsidewill - Wild Off The Air

I’m sitting here watching the Olympics again, and I’m going to be honest I’m getting pretty tired of watching sports I don’t understand. I see gymnastics is on again, I wouldn’t say I’m watching that, but I think we are gonna win individual gold. Neato!

I think we are going to win Gold and Silver? Yet we lost the team one? That doesn’t make any sense at all. That’s like having Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen in their primes and NOT winning any titles, that just didn’t happen man. So what is the moral here? The individual parts were greater than their sum.

Anyway on to sports that I actually think are neat, the sprints are starting up soon, and the Men’s basketball team beat the crap out of Greece (that was payback for us), but it really doesn’t mean anything if we don’t land the gold.

And how racist is Spain? Honestly, if they aren’t chanting terrible words at soccer players who aren’t white, they are making fun of the Chinese:

Let me be clear not all Spanish are racist, but some clearly are. And who actually thought taking that picture would be a good idea?

The Olympics are slowly starting to not make any sense at all!

In fact the only thing that makes sense is Phelps winning his 6th gold medal. 6 down 2 to go!

That’s all I got,

The Nooge

So as I sit here this morning I am watching the Men’s Olympic Basketball game of the U.S. Vs. China. Here are some quick observations for those of you who aren’t up this morning to watch the game:

- The U.S. Jerseys are white, and so are the names on the back.

- This game is pretty close coming into the third, with roughly 6mins left the U.S is up 14. Not exactly a blow out, but I chalk this one up to China and their home court advantage.

- I enjoy hearing Doug Collins just say some of the dumbest things. For example, when talking about LeBron James, “Can you imagine what kind of running back he would have been?” Yeah Doug, a 6′8 running back, it’s not like he’d just be open to take shots all day, and I’m sure Lebron is fast for an NBAer, but in terms of NFL not sure he can run.

- Watching the Halftime report I learned the Yao Ming isn’t even the #1 selling jersey in his country, he’s #6. (The Chinese people love Kobe)

- The clips they showed of the jersey fashion shows kinda cracked me up. First they had a run way for different NBA jerseys, but at the end they all just started dancing. Maybe they wanted to show with the freedom of no sleeves any dance moves are possible.

- A few game thoughts: The Chinese fans seem to love the NBA guys, it’s not that huge a home court advantage for China. Chinese fans love when their guys shoot the 3, I kind of feel bad because they sound so disappointed with it clanks off the rim.

- The Red and Yellow of the Chinese jerseys kinda makes them look like they are team McDonalds. Tell me those colors aren’t the exact colors that Ronald McDonald wears.

- On the subject of a strange color scheme the orange and yellow ball makes me kind of think I’m watching some weird slamball contest

- And my final thought, it doesn’t seem like the U.S. will ever lose, but it also doesn’t have the feel of a “dream team”. I expect the Gold here, but it’s really just not show time enough for me. Anywhoo, I’ll be dropping Olympic coverage as I see fit throughout the games (And trust me I’ll study women’s volleyball and other events super hard!)

Enjoy the Games!!!!! This one’s over as I type U.S. is up 26 through 3, I’m out.

The Nooge

I saw/read this story on ESPN a few days ago, and while I know everyone on this site is not necessarily a big sports sports fan, this is the type of experience that just tugs at your heart strings a bit. So rather than me butcher another man’s story, I’ll provide a copy of the link.
Basically, the story is about Louis Mulkey, a firefighter and basketball coach in South Carolina who died while responding to a fire, and how the team he had been coaching went on to the state championship game as Mulkey had predicted years earlier. But rather than spoil the ending to the story, I’ll let you watch for yourself.
I found the video, which was originally run on ESPN, on YouTube. However, my readers (do I even have readers?) know of my penchant for not figuring out how to embed videos into my post. So here’s the link for part 1, and for part 2.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

One love,

Matt