- 07:03 PM
- 04/19/24
Laver was amazing and probably would have won many more Grand Slam titles had he been able to compete from 1963 to 1967 after he turned pro. However. When Laver won his Grand Slams, 3 of 4 of the Grand Slam tournaments were played on grass, and there were not legions of European clay court specialists priming their whole year toward the French. Current players run a much greater gauntlet on their way to a Grand Slam. In return for tons more money, they have to beat better players and survive a more grueling schedule. That Sampras was able to end the year at #1 six times in a row tells me he is one of the best if not the best ever. Having a checklist of tournaments a "greatest" player has to win doesn't work. Sampras never won the French but made the semis. Lendl, one of my favorite players ever, made it to the Wimbledon finals but never won. McEnroe never won the French, neither did Connors. Borg never won the US Open. All of them had other superior accomplishments that outweigh these flaws in their resumes.
posted by neuroshred at 03:36 PM on September 14, 2002
Armstrong's stage win is cool but not surprising. The press has been trying to make the Tour more exciting by questioning Armstrong's readiness. There's no evidence that Armstrong's riding has waned. There's no reason he should have been leading until today, yet the press has been predicting the end of his reign because he was not wearing the yellow jersey. Pretty absurd.
posted by neuroshred at 12:39 PM on July 18, 2002
Many athletes in lower profile sports are successful at older ages. Of the elite players in my sport, I'm one of the younger ones at 36. Last year I won two world championship titles. It can be done, but there are lots more aches and pains. With Sampras and other aging tour players, the grind of playing year-round wears the body down. In the June 27 print edition of Tennis Week, ATP trainer Bill Norris said there were no tour players who were free of injury. Agassi had the luxury of a few mental breaks from the sport, and he's still going strong. Sampras drove himself for years, and he's lost the edge.
posted by neuroshred at 02:32 PM on June 27, 2002
Well said, somethingotherthan. I was shocked at Agassi's loss and that it was in straight sets. At least Agassi's still a player to be feared. Pete is an almost guaranteed win for those who go up against him early in tournaments. There's something to be said for a great player preserving his myth of invincibility. Pete needs to get out before it gets embarrassing.
posted by neuroshred at 04:20 PM on June 26, 2002
Well said, jacknose. Bad officiating goes both ways. All the players can do is make their shots.
posted by neuroshred at 09:51 PM on June 03, 2002
I'm glad the Lakers won, and I feel the Kings' pain. This was a thrilling series. The Lakers winning in overtime was a perfect ending for me.
posted by neuroshred at 11:38 PM on June 02, 2002
For info on getting involved in bobsled, go to USA Bobsled if you're in the US. There is a general email link at the bottom of the homepage, and there are email links to each of the coaches in their bios in the Coaches section. If you go to Lake Placid, you can pay to take a bobsled run - but you don't get to drive. You'll probably be able to do the same in SLC once the Games are over.
posted by neuroshred at 11:43 AM on February 24, 2002
There are dozens of "new" sports out there, if by new we mean not covered often by the media. My favorite is freestyle flying disc (sorry for the crappy-looking website), but I'm very biased because it's my sport. The road to the Olympics is a long one, and since the Olympics want to eliminate sports the road just got a lot more bumpy. Ultimate took its first step this summer when it was added to the World Games, a lower-profile international sports festival.
posted by neuroshred at 06:19 PM on February 22, 2002
I saw the piece on Khadka this afternoon. When I see these heartwarming stories, my first question is "which world class athlete didn't get to go to the Olympics so this guy can be here?" In Khadka's case, it sounds like he actually met some qualifying standards, but limiting the number of competitors per country means contenders get left out every time, while less talented athletes from obscure countries get to participate. I would much prefer to see all the best athletes going at it for the gold than seeing some terrified guy snowplowing down the downhill course.
posted by neuroshred at 03:37 PM on February 14, 2002
I love the SimulCam footage. They had one last night that showed Bode Miller passing another top skier in the second slalom of the Alpine Combined. It showed very clearly just how good Miller's run was.
posted by neuroshred at 01:56 PM on February 14, 2002
She may not have won a singles tournament, but she's won a few grand slam doubles titles and had earned her way into the top 10 before her injury last year.
posted by neuroshred at 11:03 AM on February 14, 2002
The head of the International Skating Union is giving a press conference right now on MSNBC. He is VERY defensive. His answers are very evasive. He's hardly even admitting that there have ever been judging issues in the sport. He's the wrong spokesperson for their sport. He makes it sound like they are hiding something.
posted by neuroshred at 01:09 PM on February 13, 2002
I'm not claiming any of the judges cheated. I'm claiming that they botched the job last night. The NBC commentators are no slouches. An Olympic gold medalist. A choreographer of Olympic medalwinning performances. If you listen to their remarks before the judges scores were revealed, there was no doubt in their mind who won. There are serious flaws in a system that ranks teams rather than scores them, and figure skating's system is worse than that. It's supposed to rank teams, but they add in mandatory deductions as though the performances are scored. Which is it, scored or ranked? It's a seriously flawed system. It needs to be changed, but the sport is so set in its ways that it won't happen.
posted by neuroshred at 10:41 AM on February 12, 2002
If he were just skating to avoid disqualification, he would have lurked behind the other skaters to stay out of traffic. He didn't. He was in the pack, pretending to compete, and he began cheering for his friend even before the race ended. Keep in mind, at the time Ohno had a winning streak of something like 16 races. He could have won it on a whim. I don't know whether he should be disqualified, but I'm not rooting for him. Maybe he should have to give his gold medal prize money to the guy who didn't make the team.
posted by neuroshred at 09:40 AM on February 11, 2002
As I put together a sports site in 1999-2000, I envied Quokka's bankroll and access to big events, but I wasn't a fan of their sites. They looked good, but they didn't work. Have the wrong computer or browser? Sorry, you couldn't use their sites. They seemed so in love with their style that they forgot about the user.
posted by neuroshred at 11:08 PM on February 10, 2002
The problem for me is not with internet coverage but with non-live TV broadcasts. Ever since I saw the moguls results from Nagano online, tape-delayed TV coverage hasn't cut it for me. Even in SLC, where live coverage would be expected, the results are widely available online hours before NBC bothers to broadcast the events. I'd like to see more elegant live internet coverage, like IBM provides for the grand slam tennis tournaments. This year's Olympic site automatically reloads the schedule and results pages so often I can't even scan the standings. IBM's tennis coverage offers an option for streaming scores, stats and still pictures.
posted by neuroshred at 10:58 PM on February 10, 2002
I prefer to root for athletes I know something about and identify with, but when all else fails, I tend to root for the home team, which for me is the US. Some of my favorite athletes in this Olympics aren't from the US. Unless they are in a tight dual with an American athlete, I fear they will be edited right out of the broadcast. "Billy Jones from Kansas finished a heartwarming 42nd in slalom. Oh yeah, and some European won the gold. U.S.A, U.S.A., U.S.A."
posted by neuroshred at 06:56 PM on February 08, 2002
I remember Bonnie Blair complaining about clap-skates at the Nagano Olympics. Rather than sounding wise, she sounded like a whiner who didn't want her world records broken. Technology in sports is not new. Downhill ski races have been determined for years by the talents of the ski waxers. The pole vault was revolutionized by fiberglass poles. Then again, as the article says, Kenyan runners continue to dominate without bells and whistles. If the equipment conforms to the rules of the sport, and if it's made available to athletes according to the rules of the sport (some of the technologies in this article aren't), I don't have a problem with it. Athletic talent will generally win out. I'm more concerned that an athlete can get DQ'd for taking cold medicine, or worse, that an athlete can get DQ'd for someone slipping cold medicine into his meal.
posted by neuroshred at 10:18 PM on February 05, 2002
The local news showed footage of some of the banned moves. They were not offensive. How will they classify the basic one-armed lift in pairs where the only point of contact is the guy's hand on the girl's crotch? That one is far more suggestive than the footage I saw.
posted by neuroshred at 07:23 PM on February 05, 2002
"I hope she misses the cut. Why? Because she doesn't belong out here."
It's not about whether men should play in the LPGA. The LPGA is a gender-protected division. By separating itself from the main tour on the basis of sex, the LPGA is saying "we can't compete on an equal level." If the PGA wants to claim to have the best golfers in the world it should redefine itself as an Open division that welcomes men and women. Coming from a sport with no men's division - everyone competes against one another unless they choose to enter a women's division - this is a no brainer. If everyone can earn their way onto the tour, the tour winner gets to call him/herself the best golfer. They've taken the first step - inviting Annika to play the Memorial, which makes a high profile statement that everyone is welcome as long as they compete on the same tees. Now the male pros just have to stop getting freaked out over the possibility they'll lose to a girl.