- 11:22 PM
- 05/22/13
| Member since: | August 16, 2011 |
|---|---|
| Last visit: | May 22, 2013 |
Etrigan has posted 19 links and 445 comments to SportsFilter and 0 links and 3 comments to the Locker Room.
Olympics drop wrestling for 2020: The International Olympic Committee has dropped wrestling from the list of "core" sports as of the 2020 Games. The shocking decision would mean that the sport, which had 18 events for men and women at last year's London games, is off the program for the first time since 1900.
posted by Etrigan to olympics at 01:11 PM on February 12 - 26 comments
HoboJacket: Some MIT guys have a... great? idea: buy clothes from schools you hate and give them to the homeless. They get warm, and you get the chance of seeing someone begging for spare change in a Bulldogs jacket. Is this a brilliantly terrible idea or a terribly brilliant one?
posted by Etrigan to culture at 11:08 PM on November 28 - 6 comments
Comment-shifting: I appreciate the efforts by mods to make threads out of hot topics in the Huddle. Perhaps they could include notations of such on the story and the affected Huddle, just to allay any confusion? For example, on the Seahawks-Packers story linked above, something like (Editor note: The first 22 comments were relocated from the Monday Huddle.) and (Editor note: 22 comments from this Huddle were relocated here.) in the Huddle itself. (Also, I apologize for the broken link -- the system is putting slashes before my quotes.)
posted by Etrigan to editorial policy at 05:11 PM on September 25 - 3 comments
The Best Deal Ever Is Not Good Enough: We discussed the Silna brothers six years ago, but there's a new wrinkle in the saga of the biggest money giveaway in sports history. Ozzie and Daniel Silna, owners of the ABA's St. Louis Spirits, negotiated a deal when the NBA absorbed four other ABA teams in 1976 -- one-seventh of TV revenues from those four ABA teams, forever. This has made them somewhere between $240 and $300 million, but they're suing for a chunk of international broadcasts and the NBA TV network, ideas no one had thought of 36 years ago.
posted by Etrigan to basketball at 09:57 PM on September 07 - 2 comments
One At Bat: "Of the almost 17,500 people to play in Major League baseball, Adam Greenberg is the only player to have his career end on the very first pitch. In fact, according to Major League rules, Adam’s debut only counts as a plate appearance, not an official at bat. Our goal…to get Adam Greenberg the official at bat he deserves."
posted by Etrigan to baseball at 08:21 PM on September 06 - 6 comments
Boy, talk about a guy who just never had a chance. Between being on the Jaguars and... well, that was pretty much it, actually. Just "being on the Jaguars" killed what could have been a really good career.
posted by Etrigan at 06:55 AM on May 16
The Broncos didn't complain because they had Manning coming in. The Jets didn't complain because they're a bunch of dysfunctional losers.
So basically, Tebow couldn't lead a good team enough to make them (not players nor coaches nor management) want him even as a backup, nor a bad team enough to make them (not players nor coaches nor management) want him even as a backup. Maybe he isn't actually the leader you think he is.
Admittedly, I've never thought much of "leadership" in football, for a variety of reasons, but I can't see Tebow as an exemplar of the form.
posted by Etrigan at 07:27 AM on May 14
Any individual as devoted to religion as he is is taught to constantly spread the word of God.
People are taught all kinds of wacky-ass things in the name of religion, and freedom doesn't mean I don't get to (at least) roll my eyes when they do those things.
Maybe it's the leadership qualities he seems to show when he is on the field and given a chance that can somewhat compensate for his lack of skills.
I can't really speak to whether he shows leadership qualities, but was any Bronco vocal about seeing him go? Has any Jet expressed displeasure at his departure? (I don't remember either of those things happening, but I don't live in either of those media markets, so I wouldn't have heard as much about it as I did about Titus Young getting cut)
posted by Etrigan at 08:17 PM on May 13
He's probably the most polarizing athlete alive today, so strong love/hate on either side is to be expected.
Tiger Woods?
I would argue that Tebow is the most polarizing athlete when it comes to his playing. There are people out there -- I'm related to at least two of them -- who really do think he'd make a great QB, if he found a coach willing to mold a team around him. His evangelical Christianity is also polarizing, but you could take that away and you'd still have that argument over whether he's any good.
On the other hand, no one thinks Tiger Woods is an overrated golfer; he's just a dick. Ditto Ray Lewis, who we all may recall is a fairly off-the-field polarizing figure on this board, but I don't recall anyone who's willing to say he's not a Hall of Fame player. I mean, shit, if you're talking off-the-field polarizing, OJ is still alive.
posted by Etrigan at 07:16 PM on May 13
"Hey, don't blame me, white Christian SEC fans, I'm doin' everything I can here!"
posted by Etrigan at 09:14 PM on May 12
The strikeout-but-not-really scoring rule is one of the Great Baseball Things.
posted by Etrigan at 10:06 AM on May 11
This week in the Oh Are You Fucking Kidding Me statistics race: "[Jose] Fernandez became the first starter younger than 21 to throw at least seven scoreless innings with nine strikeouts and one hit or fewer allowed since Kerry Wood did it in May 1998."
posted by Etrigan at 08:38 PM on May 06
Ricardo Portillo, the referee, has died.
posted by Etrigan at 11:02 AM on May 05
No team has ever won a playoff game after getting rid of Tim Tebow.
Florida's 2-1. Clearly, the Jets just need to give him a degree.
posted by Etrigan at 02:58 PM on April 29
the #1 pick was from Central Michigan, for gods' sake
Hey now. Let's not speak ill of my alma matter.
I wouldn't dare to speak ill of John Locke's school either, but the Chips don't often put guys in the first round.
posted by Etrigan at 03:20 PM on April 27
The same skills you need to be good at something are the same skills you need in order to judge if somebody else is good at that thing.
If that were the case, the Charlotte Bobcats would be on their fourth straight NBA title run.
However, I think you're close -- the same skills you need to be good at something are the same skills you need in order to judge whether you're good at that thing. Jerry Jones isn't good enough at running a football team to even have an idea of how bad he is at it.
I don't get how someone could be as business smart and football stupid as Jerry Jones. He doesn't have the personnel evaluation skills to build an team.
The "cone" in football is incredibly narrower than it is in virtually anything else (even other sports). In no other field of human endeavor is a 23-year-old made into one of the 45 people responsible for the success or failure of a multi-million-dollar enterprise immediately after being one of the 85 people responsible for a significantly less heavyweight enterprise (the #1 pick was from Central Michigan, for gods' sake). Teams expect to be able to cull the approximately 2,000 FBS football players who graduate each year (and that's not even counting the top 100 or so FCS players) into the top 200-plus to draft. There is no team -- hell, there is no coach that doesn't have a Total Draft Bust in the rear view mirror somewhere, and there are very few teams that don't have a Total Draft Bargain who came out of nowhere.
I'm not saying that Jerry Jones isn't bad at personnel evaluation, but very few people are good at it, and there's significantly more luck than skill in even the best drafter's history.
posted by Etrigan at 11:01 PM on April 26
This is a team that just gave Tony Romo a blank check. They don't really think they need anything as badly as everyone else does. They're the Cowboys, after all. They're always one or two unlucky breaks away from the Super Bowl.
posted by Etrigan at 09:09 PM on April 26
I'm in favor. The home-plate collision is one of the worst (on-field) things about baseball.
Doesn't hurt that the Tigers won anyway.
posted by Etrigan at 07:46 AM on April 25
Ah, okay. And the discount would be applied in the form of rebates, rather than at the pump, so they could just say, "Yeah, your rebate was $50,000 for this month" rather than the $100,000 it should have been.
posted by Etrigan at 01:46 AM on April 20
SportsFilter: The Thursday Huddle
The Chip Kelly backlash makes it to the Oregon Legislature.