Tag: sports

Order has been restored in the NBA

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It’s no secret that I’m not really a fan of the NBA. I often cite things like the emergence of thug-like behavior of many of today’s players, the fact that so many players are greedy and no longer care about winning as long as they’re getting paid top dollar, and the presence of primadonna pretenders that completely derail what a team sport like basketball is really supposed to be.

And then we have incidents like the Donald Sterling racism scandal and subsequently the completely misguided fake support of the Los Angeles Clippers to put way too bright of a spotlight onto the NBA, but the NBA naturally doesn’t care; and they didn’t mind, because exposure equals dollars, and fake or not, people poured an influx of cash into the Clippers, regardless of reasoning.

However, in spite of my indifference towards the NBA, there’s always been one thing that I’ve remained a fan of throughout the years: the San Antonio Spurs. As clichéd as it sounds, it’s because the Spurs play the game in a manner in which I respect and admire, and win in spite of the ever-changing (for the worst) environment of the league around them by doing such. They’re often cited as being a boring team, but frankly I don’t care; I love the way Tim Duncan has banked in ugly jumpers for the better part of the last two decades, and the way Manu Ginobili regularly deceives the opposition almost for no other reason than the fact that he looks white (he’s Argentinian).

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Atlanta and the pursuit of professional soccer

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Long story short: Atlanta was awarded a Major League Soccer team.  They will become the 22nd team in Major League Soccer.

This is cool and all, and I’m all for Atlanta having more professional sports teams.  But I can’t help but feel mixed feelings about the whole end game as a whole, and question whether or not they’ll actually succeed.  If the end result is an embarrassing sell and relocate, like the old NHL Atlanta Thrashers, then honestly I’d rather this not come to fruition at all, because although many believe it’s better to try and fail than to not try at all, in this case I think it’s questionable to try, if there’s too much uphill struggle.

Simply put, I do believe there’s a massive uphill challenge of starting a Major League Soccer team in Atlanta.  Sure, Atlanta is a major market in the country and major markets should be represented in as many ways as possible, but this all goes back to the unfortunate circumstance that, Atlanta is a football town, first and foremost, full stop.

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Happy trails, Rashard Mendenhall

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Long story short: NFL running back, Rashard Mendenhall retires.  He’s 26-years old, which is still considered young enough in NFL age, but has a lot of methodical reasons for walking away regardless.

It doesn’t really matter what sport it is, I always have this sense of admiration for guys who walk away when they really didn’t have to, and walk away on their own terms.  Maybe it’s the fact that in present time, professional sports are put on such an insurmountable pedestal, and there’s something about a professional athlete looking at their respective league and saying “nah, I don’t need you anymore,” that brings it down a peg or two.  Or maybe it’s the fact that they simply don’t see professional sport and the riches it can provide as a true means to an end, and that they can live their lives without it that seems somewhat admirable.  Either way, when guys retire on their own terms, most of the time I’m in agreement and respect their decisions.

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Sports befuddle the educational pecking order

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I don’t watch a whole lot of ESPN, despite the fact that I fancy myself someone interested in sports, because I think ESPN is basically for the most part utter garbage. But when I’m at the gym, and I’m running on the treadmill, I like to have distractions; I have music playing through my iPhone, but occasionally it helps to have some visual distraction as well. And since all the treadmills come equipped with personal televisions, it’s fairly convenient to seek something to watch to help pass the minutes.

Unfortunately, the gym’s television programming is limited to like nine channels, and at any given time, four of them are Wendy Williams, two are the Kardashian show, the others are chintzy intolerable mid-morning talk programming, and then there’s ESPN. If I’m really lucky, it’ll be a day in which the E! network decides to air old episodes of Saved by the Bell, but for the most part, I end up having ESPN on, because Hannah Storm or Jade McCarthy are easy on the eyes, but then I turn the television off when Stephen A. Smith shows up.

Long story short, I admit that I watch a little bit of ESPN. And in that little bit of ESPN, I’ve noticed something that a lot of other people have probably already noticed long before I did, but whatever, I’m writing about it now.

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Caption says it all

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It’s no secret that when it comes to college sports, I have a team in Virginia Tech, no matter how disappointing they are in football, no matter how mediocre they are in basketball, and no matter how much of a non-factor they are in baseball. However, I have another team that I favor pretty often: whomever is playing against Duke.

Last night, North Carolina defeated Duke, which the fact of that alone is pleasing, but the visuals that accompanied the discovery of such news were absolutely abhorring. After the clock wound down, the people of the Dean Dome stormed the court.

The University of North Carolina stormed the court after defeating Duke in men’s basketball.

Now I believe that there is a lot of importance in the act of storming the court (especially when it’s after defeating Duke), but in addition to the importance of doing it, there’s as much meaning behind in when storming the court isn’t done.

UNC is one of the few basketball programs in the country that should absolutely never storm the court upon defeating Duke. They’re supposed to be Duke’s greatest rivals; equal, if not better, having a superior educational program and students and alumni of a higher class.

Doing it might have seemed cool and like a great idea at the time, but it’s probably going to have some petty, obnoxious (and very much white) repercussions. Articles (again) about opponents storming the court on Duke by the Duke studentpubs, and heaven have mercy on all UNC fans if Duke wins the rematch on March 8 in Durham, because retribution will be insufferable and cringeworthy when Duke fans storm their own court in defeat of Carolina.

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Atlanta sports fans and the importance of antagonists

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For the vast majority of the game, his back was to the field, and he instead was facing his fellow attendees in the stands instead of watching the game transpiring on the actual field itself.  Repeatedly, he would pace back and forth through the mostly-empty row of seats in which his own ticketed seat was located, and seek out fans wearing gear of the opposing team.  Whenever he located one, he would either pantomime that he was watching them, make a throat-slashing gesture, puff out his Atlanta Falcons sweatshirt, or all of the above, among a few other taunting gestures, like the “loser” L on the forehead gesture.

It did not matter if those he taunted were grown adults, or young children.  If they were wearing the other teams’ colors, they were fair game for taunting.  A grown man, taunting young children, and essentially calling them losers.

This wasn’t just an Atlanta Falcons fan; this was a typical Atlanta sports fan.

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This “gamers as athletes” is going a bit too far now

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

The guy on the left is Shin-Soo Choo.  Shin-Soo Choo is a Major League Baseball player, and an extremely talented one at that.  Aside from that, Shin-Soo Choo is something of an international hero, as he has been a chief member of the Korean National Baseball team that enjoyed moderate successes in tournaments such as the World Baseball Classic as well as the Asian Games.  Shin-Soo Choo is considered a genuine five-tool player; he hits very well, he hits with power (read: home runs), plays excellent defense, has a great throwing arm, and runs very effectively.  It is safe to say that Shin-Soo Choo is the most talented and successful Korean-born Major League Baseball player in history.

The guy on the right is Dong-Hwan Kim.  Dong-Hwan Kim plays Starcraft for a living.  He sits at a computer for a living, staring into a monitor, playing a video game.  The only physical thing he really demonstrates is dexterity with his fingers, or as those in such a scene like to refer to as “Actions per minute (APM)” which is basically just how good a guy is at repeatedly clicking a mouse and a few keys on the keyboard.

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