Category: Sports

Fully one-quarter of the total time is remaining in the Argentina-Mexico soccer match and, with the score tied 1-1, the commenter on ESPN.com (the gamecast) says, “This is starting to look like it will go to extra time.”

Is there any other major sport where things seem so determined so early? Football teams rarely give up even if they are down by 17 at the start of the fourth quarter. Good basketball teams will fight back down six with 30 seconds to play. These too are uphill battles. Can someone explain the game psychology of soccer that seems to determine that similar comeback efforts are futile, even if only behind by one goal at half-time? This seems particularly strange in a sport where possession can change at any moment and a score takes just seconds.

Update: The game did, of course, go to extra time (overtime).

Tickets still available. Check out the prices.

Autobahn? Try auto gone.

Two English soccer fans couldn’t locate their rental car after a World Cup game in Cologne, ananova.com reported, even though they’d alertly copied down the street name where they’d parked — “Einbahn Strasse” — to avoid just such a problem. They learned the folly of their ways when they asked a policeman, who pointed out that “Einbahn Strasse” is German for “one-way street” and that every other street in inner-city Cologne boasts such a sign.

They finally found the car, with the help of police, a few hours later.

The Seattle Times: Sideline Chatter

Mark Cuban sums up.

Blame the refs if you want, but I believe you have to score more than one goal in three games to advance.

(The goal in the tie vs. Italy was an own goal by an Italian player.)

Update: The U.S. had four shots on goal in three games.

News report: “Mark Cuban, outspoken owner of the Dallas Mavericks, was fined $250,000 by the league Tuesday for ‘several acts of misconduct’ following his team’s Game 5 loss in the NBA Finals on Sunday in Miami.”

Mark Cuban is worth an estimated $2 billion. That’s “B” for billion. $250,000 to Mark Cuban has about the same relative value as $125 would have for someone worth only $1 million, or 12 dollars and fifty cents would to someone worth $100,000.

“I want to say something about Dwayne Wade, but I fear I may get called for a foul.”

Comment in sidebar to Bill Simmons’s great column on the NBA. If you saw Game 5 Sunday, you understand the comment. Wade shot 25 free throws. Game 6 tonight.

“You don’t have to run down that last stretch on a white stallion, you know, you could limp in there and say, ‘Thanks for the trophy.'”

Johnny Miller commenting during Phil Mickelson’s crash on 17 and 18 at the U.S. Open.

Here via Political Animal a little balance about yesterday’s USA-Italy match and the referee:

BBC comment on the red card against Italy’s Daniele De Rossi: “De Rossi disgraced himself with a sickening, needless elbow on Brian McBride and was given his marching orders.”

BBC comment on the red card against USA’s Pablo Mastroeni: “His two-footed, reckless lunge on Pirlo was deserving of a red card and left referee Jorge Larrionda with little option.” And the New York Times: “The officials’ guidelines call for red cards for two-footed cleats-up tackles.”

LA Times comment on both red cards against USA, including the second against Eddie Pope: “Although the U.S. questioned the calls, replays appeared to show that both were justified.”

Washington Post comment on the offside call against Brian McBride that negated a second half goal: “Afterward, McBride admitted that he was not only offside, but had screened goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon.”

Update: The Sports Economist disagrees — with a foul-by-foul inventory.

There have been revolutions to create socialism, democracy, and authoritarian dictatorship. But humankind has yet to fight a revolution to guarantee one of the most vital elements — if not the most vital element — of the good life. That is, a winning soccer team. If we were to take up arms for this reason, what kind of government would we want to install?

canada.com

Communist, Fascist, military junta or industrialized democracy? An interesting, if not altogether serious article that begins with the above paragraph.

Football’s governing body has explained why up to 1,000 Dutch fans watched a World Cup tie wearing no trousers.

Around 1,000 fans arrived for the Ivory Coast tie in their traditional bright orange trousers – but bearing the logo and name of a Dutch brewery.

To protect the rights of the official beer they were denied entry, so the male fans promptly removed the trousers and watched the game in underpants.

Fifa said an attempt at an “ambush” publicity campaign was not allowed.

Fifteen major companies have paid up to $50m (£27m) each for the right to be official partners at this World Cup.

The American firm Anheuser Busch, which makes Budweiser, won the exclusive right to promote and sell its beverage in the stadiums and other venues.

There has been a wider resentment in Germany that a US brewery has the exclusive rights in a country which prides itself on the quality of its beer and has very strict laws governing its composition.

BBC News

Source: The New York Times

Sixty-seven years ago today.

Back row: Honus Wagner, Grover Cleveland Alexander, Tris Speaker, Nap Lajoie, George Sisler, Walter Johnson.
Seated: Eddie Collins, Babe Ruth, Connie Mack, and Cy Young.
Ty Cobb is missing from the photo; he had missed a train and arrived late.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum was officially dedicated in colorful ceremony on June 12, 1939. The game’s four ranking executives of the period — [Kenesaw M.] Landis, [Ford] Frick, [William] Harridge and William G. Bramham, President of the National Association — participated in the ribbon-cutting. Of the 25 immortals who had been elected to the Hall of Fame up to that point, 11 were still living; and all of them journeyed to Cooperstown to attend the centennial celebration. A baseball postage stamp commemorating the occasion was placed on sale that day at the Cooperstown post office, with Postmaster General James A. Farley presiding.

Origins of the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

Check out the Babe’s socks. He was into the low-cut sock look long before anyone else.

It looks to me like he’s taken too big of a lead off third. What do you think?

Cardinals vs. Reds Monday night in the new St. Louis ballpark. Photo taken from the top of the Gateway Arch.