As someone who will likely never be into any sport to the degree that it would require actual conversation about it, I found some things online that made me laugh. They aren't all jokes, or I would have posted them in that slime ridden subforum full of "the ---fill in the blank---thread"s where most people don't even visit.
==============
Opinion - Pro sports suck
In twenty years, professional sports will be no more. . .and good riddance. I understand that pro sports are just entertainment now, but the product isn't even that good anymore. As the rise in popularity of recreational sports like hockey shows, those who haven't lost too many brain cells to Budweiser are waking up and realizing that participating themselves is much more healthy, and manly, that watching it on television.
Quite apart from the distastefully huge salaries grown men receive to play a game and the exorbitant profits made by owners who keep raising ticket prices and moving their teams every time the deal isn't sweet enough, the entertainment itself is getting a bit tired. Add to this the fact that pro sports are just so far from the average person's possible experience that it is impossible to relate to. It used to be that professional athletes were reasonably close in height and weight to the average guy on the street, so you could admire their skill, their devotion to their sport and their drive to win. Now professional basketball is an all but impossible dream for the vast majority of the population because of the average height. How hard is it for a seven footer to dunk anyway?
The quality of most professional sports in on the decline. Football is essentially a big multi-million dollar freak show. Each game features two opposing groups of steroid pumped mutants vying for a big cash prize. Winners get big contracts and endorsements while losers are left to eke out a life in a battered body. Ask Dick Butkis how many deep knee bends he does every morning. Sure it's fun to watch, in a sick sort of way ("Did you see how his leg bent back!"), but is it really that great a jump from pro football to American Gladiators or Ultimate Fighting Championship or even Roman gladiators? Players at every position warp their body shapes to fit their specific duty whether it be blocking or taking murderous runs at a quarterback with his back turned.
A Saturday Night magazine article made a convincing case a few months ago that now the best pure hockey and basketball is being played by women. This was not an average size and weight weekend athlete writer like myself, this was from John Wooden, coach of the UCLA basketball dynasty of the sixties. This is someone who knows basketball and longs for the days when half of all points scored weren't dunks.
The once proud Canadian tradition of hockey is now a bit of a joke. A Czechoslovakian team with four NHLers beat two teams full of gilded superstars. It seems that if you are big and you can skate, you are the perfect grinder for today's professional game. Hockey is now a giant pinball game where massive men hook and grab and neutral zone trap and dump and chase on a rink far too small for them. Women's hockey features archaic things like open ice passes and three person rushes and skating. Skating, who'd have thunk it?
I say, turn the tube off and get into the game yourself. Participation in sports is beneficial for all of the opposite reasons that armchair quarterbacks have coronaries at age 40. It's time to take back sports from the whining, coach choking, acne riddled machines and put the focus on popular participation.
====================
USC ENTRANCE EXAM- FOOTBALL PLAYER VERSION*
Time Limit: 1 Week
1. What language is spoken in France?
2. Give a dissertation on the ancient Babylonian Empire with particular reference to architecture, literature, law and social condition -OR- give the first name of Pierre Trudeau.
3. Would you ask William Shakespeare to
(a) build a bridge
(b) sail the ocean
(c) lead an army or
(d) WRITE A PLAY
4. What religion is the Pope?
(a) Jewish
(b) Catholic
(c) Hindu
(d) Polish
(e) Agnostic (check only one)
5. Metric conversion. How many feet in 0.0 meters?
6. What time is it when the big hand is on the 12 and the little hand is on the 5?
7. How many commandments was Moses given? (approximately)
8. What are people in America's far north called?
(a) Westerners
(b) Southerners
(c) Northerners
9. Spell -- Bush, Carter and Clinton
10. Six kings of England have been called George, the last one being George the Sixth. Name the previous five.
11. Where does rain come from?
(a) Macy's
(b) a 7-11
(c) Canada
(d) the sky
12. Can you explain Einstein's Theory of Relativity?
(a) yes
(b) no
13. What are coat hangers used for?
14. The Star Spangled Banner is the National Anthem for what country?
15. Explain Le Chateliers Principle of Dynamic Equilibrium -OR-spell your name in BLOCK LETTERS.
16. Where is the basement in a three story building located?
17. Which part of America produces the most oranges?
(a) New York
(b) Florida
(c) Canada
(d) Wisconsin
18. Advanced math. If you have three apples how many apples do you have?
19. What does NBC (National Broadcasting Corp.) stand for?
20. The Cornell University tradition for efficiency began when (approximately)?
(a) B.C.
(b) A.D.
(c) still waiting
*You must answer three or more questions correctly to qualify
====================
Arizona Daily Wildcat
There are some things that small, feeble and weak, young columnists just should not discuss in a negative fashion to 35,000 testy college students. But I never claimed to be all that intelligent, so today I thought we'd discuss sports, and perhaps get around to my movement to have them banned from this country due to the fact that they promote - please try and look at this in the same unbiased and analytical fashion in which I do - stupidity.
Just to clear the waters before someone tries to poison the well, I'll tell you that I am not writing this anti-sports article solely because I can't play any sport - Sorry, that's a lie. I AM writing this because I can't play any sport. Granted, if I were paid $5.8 billion to throw a ball at a stick while grabbing my crotch and spitting better than anyone else, without any prerequisites concerning intelligence or the mastery of multisyllabic words, I would sacrifice any career I have at McDonald's in the future to pursue it.
But because I can't, I'll just write this.
Sports originated back in the Nordic countries with Vikings with names like "Eric the Pretty Damn Good Pillager" and "Olga Women Bigger than Her Own Home." But these were not the type of people that kids looked up to. These were the village idiot Vikings, the ones far too dense to pick up a trade as complicated as egg beating, or spitting. So instead, the wise man in the village sent them off to "Pillage, and destroy. Whatever you do, just please get the hell out of here."
Thus inventing the rules for the first ever organized team games.
In time, Viking egos would expand, and some Vikings would brag about how good their conquests were. Walking around the ship, one would be continuously subjected to lines such as, "Yeah, I raped me 25 women and a horse or two. Got some pretty good pillaging in there too."
This bragging would soon expand to outright attacks on other Vikings - "You call that maiming and torturing? I'll show you maiming and torturing!" - competition would set in, and born was the first ever sporting event.
In time, the games changed, but the essence was still there. Take football for instance (and if perchance anyone reading this plays football, allow me to express to you right now, and personally, the deep admiration I have for your playing abilities and the deep respect that has grown in me from the knowledge, that yes, at any time you so will, you could easily kill me). There's a sport that acts as channel straight back to Viking times. Take society's largest, densest people, place them in an arena, place a small oblong object in the middle and watch as several grown men beat the living shit out of each other in order to move the little object.
Then pay them each $46,345,456,098 for advancing society in this way.
I imagine that the first high-paid sports star was probably taken aback a bit when he first received an offer: "OK, let's make sure we are communicating clearly with each other. You want to pay me more money than any leading cancer-researching doctor, to throw this round ball through that circle, which by the way is fully twice the size of the ball, better than most other people, so that you can sit on your ass, drink beer and become irate when your, although I don't see what connection you have with them in any way, team loses? You got some more crack for me?"
Which leads me to my next big concern: sports fans. It's one thing to be a player, making this money and being personally disappointed when your team loses. It's another to be some fat, unathletic bozo sitting somewhere off in the sidelines with no relationship in any fashion whatsoever to the team or its players, becoming near-suicidal when your team loses in overtime. What we have here is some seriously misdirected energy. Take up a craft or something. Make God-awful hideous artwork that they have all over the campus, subjecting the seeing to torture, and contributing something to society.
When the Bulls won their third straight championship, people rioted. "Hey Martha, the Bulls won! Get my rifle!" I'll tell you that I certainly felt the need to cap the neighbors when they won.
I didn't get to nearly half of what I wanted to say (have you ever seen me do anything but bitch? My goodness, do I like anything?), so what you got to read was my condensed sports whining. It's possible, and I'm sure many of you will agree, that I'm just stupid, and sports does nothing but advance civilization. It's just that I have a hard time idolizing someone who spends their career playing games originally intended for children. Well, except bowling that is. Bowling is OK.
And maybe racquetball.
==============
BLAH......sports
Jo
==============
Opinion - Pro sports suck
In twenty years, professional sports will be no more. . .and good riddance. I understand that pro sports are just entertainment now, but the product isn't even that good anymore. As the rise in popularity of recreational sports like hockey shows, those who haven't lost too many brain cells to Budweiser are waking up and realizing that participating themselves is much more healthy, and manly, that watching it on television.
Quite apart from the distastefully huge salaries grown men receive to play a game and the exorbitant profits made by owners who keep raising ticket prices and moving their teams every time the deal isn't sweet enough, the entertainment itself is getting a bit tired. Add to this the fact that pro sports are just so far from the average person's possible experience that it is impossible to relate to. It used to be that professional athletes were reasonably close in height and weight to the average guy on the street, so you could admire their skill, their devotion to their sport and their drive to win. Now professional basketball is an all but impossible dream for the vast majority of the population because of the average height. How hard is it for a seven footer to dunk anyway?
The quality of most professional sports in on the decline. Football is essentially a big multi-million dollar freak show. Each game features two opposing groups of steroid pumped mutants vying for a big cash prize. Winners get big contracts and endorsements while losers are left to eke out a life in a battered body. Ask Dick Butkis how many deep knee bends he does every morning. Sure it's fun to watch, in a sick sort of way ("Did you see how his leg bent back!"), but is it really that great a jump from pro football to American Gladiators or Ultimate Fighting Championship or even Roman gladiators? Players at every position warp their body shapes to fit their specific duty whether it be blocking or taking murderous runs at a quarterback with his back turned.
A Saturday Night magazine article made a convincing case a few months ago that now the best pure hockey and basketball is being played by women. This was not an average size and weight weekend athlete writer like myself, this was from John Wooden, coach of the UCLA basketball dynasty of the sixties. This is someone who knows basketball and longs for the days when half of all points scored weren't dunks.
The once proud Canadian tradition of hockey is now a bit of a joke. A Czechoslovakian team with four NHLers beat two teams full of gilded superstars. It seems that if you are big and you can skate, you are the perfect grinder for today's professional game. Hockey is now a giant pinball game where massive men hook and grab and neutral zone trap and dump and chase on a rink far too small for them. Women's hockey features archaic things like open ice passes and three person rushes and skating. Skating, who'd have thunk it?
I say, turn the tube off and get into the game yourself. Participation in sports is beneficial for all of the opposite reasons that armchair quarterbacks have coronaries at age 40. It's time to take back sports from the whining, coach choking, acne riddled machines and put the focus on popular participation.
====================
USC ENTRANCE EXAM- FOOTBALL PLAYER VERSION*
Time Limit: 1 Week
1. What language is spoken in France?
2. Give a dissertation on the ancient Babylonian Empire with particular reference to architecture, literature, law and social condition -OR- give the first name of Pierre Trudeau.
3. Would you ask William Shakespeare to
(a) build a bridge
(b) sail the ocean
(c) lead an army or
(d) WRITE A PLAY
4. What religion is the Pope?
(a) Jewish
(b) Catholic
(c) Hindu
(d) Polish
(e) Agnostic (check only one)
5. Metric conversion. How many feet in 0.0 meters?
6. What time is it when the big hand is on the 12 and the little hand is on the 5?
7. How many commandments was Moses given? (approximately)
8. What are people in America's far north called?
(a) Westerners
(b) Southerners
(c) Northerners
9. Spell -- Bush, Carter and Clinton
10. Six kings of England have been called George, the last one being George the Sixth. Name the previous five.
11. Where does rain come from?
(a) Macy's
(b) a 7-11
(c) Canada
(d) the sky
12. Can you explain Einstein's Theory of Relativity?
(a) yes
(b) no
13. What are coat hangers used for?
14. The Star Spangled Banner is the National Anthem for what country?
15. Explain Le Chateliers Principle of Dynamic Equilibrium -OR-spell your name in BLOCK LETTERS.
16. Where is the basement in a three story building located?
17. Which part of America produces the most oranges?
(a) New York
(b) Florida
(c) Canada
(d) Wisconsin
18. Advanced math. If you have three apples how many apples do you have?
19. What does NBC (National Broadcasting Corp.) stand for?
20. The Cornell University tradition for efficiency began when (approximately)?
(a) B.C.
(b) A.D.
(c) still waiting
*You must answer three or more questions correctly to qualify
====================
Arizona Daily Wildcat
There are some things that small, feeble and weak, young columnists just should not discuss in a negative fashion to 35,000 testy college students. But I never claimed to be all that intelligent, so today I thought we'd discuss sports, and perhaps get around to my movement to have them banned from this country due to the fact that they promote - please try and look at this in the same unbiased and analytical fashion in which I do - stupidity.
Just to clear the waters before someone tries to poison the well, I'll tell you that I am not writing this anti-sports article solely because I can't play any sport - Sorry, that's a lie. I AM writing this because I can't play any sport. Granted, if I were paid $5.8 billion to throw a ball at a stick while grabbing my crotch and spitting better than anyone else, without any prerequisites concerning intelligence or the mastery of multisyllabic words, I would sacrifice any career I have at McDonald's in the future to pursue it.
But because I can't, I'll just write this.
Sports originated back in the Nordic countries with Vikings with names like "Eric the Pretty Damn Good Pillager" and "Olga Women Bigger than Her Own Home." But these were not the type of people that kids looked up to. These were the village idiot Vikings, the ones far too dense to pick up a trade as complicated as egg beating, or spitting. So instead, the wise man in the village sent them off to "Pillage, and destroy. Whatever you do, just please get the hell out of here."
Thus inventing the rules for the first ever organized team games.
In time, Viking egos would expand, and some Vikings would brag about how good their conquests were. Walking around the ship, one would be continuously subjected to lines such as, "Yeah, I raped me 25 women and a horse or two. Got some pretty good pillaging in there too."
This bragging would soon expand to outright attacks on other Vikings - "You call that maiming and torturing? I'll show you maiming and torturing!" - competition would set in, and born was the first ever sporting event.
In time, the games changed, but the essence was still there. Take football for instance (and if perchance anyone reading this plays football, allow me to express to you right now, and personally, the deep admiration I have for your playing abilities and the deep respect that has grown in me from the knowledge, that yes, at any time you so will, you could easily kill me). There's a sport that acts as channel straight back to Viking times. Take society's largest, densest people, place them in an arena, place a small oblong object in the middle and watch as several grown men beat the living shit out of each other in order to move the little object.
Then pay them each $46,345,456,098 for advancing society in this way.
I imagine that the first high-paid sports star was probably taken aback a bit when he first received an offer: "OK, let's make sure we are communicating clearly with each other. You want to pay me more money than any leading cancer-researching doctor, to throw this round ball through that circle, which by the way is fully twice the size of the ball, better than most other people, so that you can sit on your ass, drink beer and become irate when your, although I don't see what connection you have with them in any way, team loses? You got some more crack for me?"
Which leads me to my next big concern: sports fans. It's one thing to be a player, making this money and being personally disappointed when your team loses. It's another to be some fat, unathletic bozo sitting somewhere off in the sidelines with no relationship in any fashion whatsoever to the team or its players, becoming near-suicidal when your team loses in overtime. What we have here is some seriously misdirected energy. Take up a craft or something. Make God-awful hideous artwork that they have all over the campus, subjecting the seeing to torture, and contributing something to society.
When the Bulls won their third straight championship, people rioted. "Hey Martha, the Bulls won! Get my rifle!" I'll tell you that I certainly felt the need to cap the neighbors when they won.
I didn't get to nearly half of what I wanted to say (have you ever seen me do anything but bitch? My goodness, do I like anything?), so what you got to read was my condensed sports whining. It's possible, and I'm sure many of you will agree, that I'm just stupid, and sports does nothing but advance civilization. It's just that I have a hard time idolizing someone who spends their career playing games originally intended for children. Well, except bowling that is. Bowling is OK.
And maybe racquetball.
==============
BLAH......sports
Jo
Q
