#42

Q: Before MLB retired Jackie Robinson's #42 for the entire league, who was the last Philadelphia Phillie to wear it?

A: Toby Borland

See more fun facts about #42 in baseball over at Craig Robinson's Flip Flip Fly Ball.

Ruth HBP

Just in time for spring training, we have an interesting video of Babe Ruth getting hit by a pitch. His reaction is priceless.

Olympics

Is it only the American "medal trackers" like this one that seemingly base Olympic success on total medals won?

I guess it's a logical way of reporting the scores, but I think I'd rather see reported in a way that gives less credit to the 2nd and 3rd place athletes. In my system, I'd show most gold medals won and only that, because after all, it's about winning, right? "Wrong," you say? It's about competing? Fine. Let's assign a point score to the medals. 1 for bronze, 2 for silver, 3 for gold. See who comes out on top. Using that method it seems the standings stay largely the same, but at least the "total medals" nonsense is taken out of the equation.

USA - 70 pts
GER - 63
CAN - 61
NOR - 49
AUS - 30 (that's AustRIA)
S.K - 32
RUS - 26
CHN - 23
SWE - 23
SWZ - 21

Not much movement, but with this scoring South Korea jumps Russia for 6 (shameful) and the Swiss jump over France for 10th. Regardless, blasphemy or not I think Canada won the Olympics.

Local Olympians - Ben Agosto & Tanith Belbin

Ice Dancing

Rounding out this disappointing list of local Olympians are the pair of Belbin and Agosto, ice dancers. Though neither are from the area originally (Belbin is Canadian-American but competes as an American, Agosto is from Chicago), the pair have made their home in nearby Aston, PA, whose Ice Works ice rink is apparently some sort of figure skating mecca. Who knew?

Ice Dancing kicks off...sometime this week I'm guessing.

Local Olympian - Allison Baver

Women's Speed Skating

Speed Skater Allison Baver is from Reading, PA, which isn't exactly local to Philadelphia, but is worth noting here anyway if only because she's one of the few female Olympians you might consider hot. When she's not winning medals in her chosen sport, she can be seen elsewhere modeling...something, probably, and ending up on people's hackneyed "Hottest Olympian" lists. She's also got her own website at AllisonBaver.com, which most Olympians don't have.

Allison starts things off with the 1000m this Thursday at 1pm.

Local Olympian - Eric Bernotas

Men's Skeleton

Skeleton is the event that is pretty much the luge, but you go race headfirst down the track instead of on your back with your feet out front. So you'd have to be pretty crazy to get into a sport like that. From wikipedia:

A native of West Chester, Pennsylvania, Bernotas has Tourette syndrome and has suffered through alcoholism and depression.

Eric begins his quest for gold Thursday the 18th at 9:30pm EST.

Local Olympian - Johnny Weir

Johnny Weir - Figure Skating

If figure skating is more your thing, or if you just enjoy career ending face plants, Johnny Weir is your guy. Unlike Bobby Ryan, Johnny has been local for his entire life. From wikipedia:

Weir was born in Coatesville, Chester County, Pennsylvania to parents John and Patti Weir. He has a brother, Brian, who is four years his junior. Weir was raised in Quarryville, Pennsylvania, a town in southern Lancaster County. His family moved to Newark, Delaware soon after Johnny began skating at the age of twelve to be near his training rink and coach. In the summer of 2007, he moved to Lyndhurst, New Jersey and began training in nearby Wayne, New Jersey.

Do your thing, Johnny. Whatever that is.

2/14 Update: It seems Johnny is not without his share of drama, as he's received threats from anti-fur activists about his coats and has scrapped any plans to stay at a hotel while in Vancouver.

Get to Know a Local Olympian

The Olympics are a gathering of elite athletes competing in a wide range of sports, most of which none of us pay any attention to between Olympics. And although they are shoved in our collective faces on all of NBCs many networks in place of some of our favorite shows for two weeks, it usually takes a bit of motivation to watch at all, let alone root for anyone, even our home country.

So if you're someone who would rather root for an athlete from within an hour of your house, and you happen, like me, to be from Philadelphia, this is going to be the blog to visit for the next 7 or so posts.

USA Snowboarding

After careful deliberation I've finally decided that I'm fully on board with Team USA Snowboarding's decision to wear "jeans themed" snowboard pants and a red, white, and blue flannel jackets. Because when I think of America, I think of the blue collar amongst us, and when I think of the blue collar amongst us Shaun White immediately comes to mind as the perfect icon.

And look at that eagle patch! I want one!

New Team / Old Helmet, Pads

The only thing in pro hockey rarer than the penalty shot is the awkward game or so in which a recently traded goalie is forced to wear his former team's colors on his pads and facemask until he has time to order new gear.

Above you see new Maple Leaf goalie Jean-Sebastian Giguere clearly wearing a facemask that supports the Anaheim Ducks.

The Sedin Twins

And now for some hockey news. The Flyers lost last for the 6th time in the last 7 games. Part of the reason they lost? Vancouver's Sedin twins (seen above), who I think are one of the most interesting stories in professional sports.

The Swedish Sedin twins, Henrik and Daniel, have literally played on the same hockey teams for their entire lives. When both were considered Top 10 Prospects in the NHL's 1999 draft, the twins made it clear that they would be happiest playing together. This was not surprising news. There have been many sets of brothers in professional sports throughout the years, most of which I'm sure would have loved the chance to play together. The draft system, however, makes that difficult when the two players are top prospects. The Sedins made history anyway when they more and less convinced the Canucks to make several pre-draft trades to ultimately end up with the 2nd and 3rd overall picks which they of course used to draft the brothers who have played together in Vancouver ever since. According to most NHL sources, the two all-pro's play (on the same line, of course) with more chemistry than any other pairing in the league. On July 1st, 2009 the brothers negotiated identical 5 year/$30 million contracts to stay together with the Canucks. The two may very well end their careers on the same team and as one of professional sports' coolest stories.

Seriously, What's Up With Sammy Sosa?

I have no idea, but I don't like it one bit.

HERE'S an article about the topic featuring a link to a video in which Charles Barkley wears makeup to mock Sosa on live television.

Sports Talk Rules

During the Eagles' Super Bowl campaign of 2004 I discovered sports talk radio. I was drawn to it because a team I rooted for was close to winning a championship for the first time since 1993, and I wanted to feel like I was sharing the experience with other fans even though I was living at college with fans of other teams from Boston and New York. I continue to listen even today, but with far less enthusiasm and with a disposition that makes me much more likely to shut it off mid-call or shout obscenities at callers. Here are some things that callers do that make me cringe:

1. Talking about their own sports career - I have a feeling that Brian Westbrook's concussion isn't anything like the one you suffered playing pee wee football in the 4th grade. There's just no way any civilian's own meager sports career should ever come up in the context of comparison when discussing professional sports. It's embarrassing.

2. Making bets with the host - This is only okay if it's invited by the host, which of course it rarely is. But rest assured people do this all the time.

3. Bringing up "money" and "greed" - This may annoy others less than it does me, but I feel as though part of the deal of being a fan of any professional sports team is that in exchange for your entertainment you have to allow yourself to be forced into the conceit that athletes make millions of dollars and don't care about you or your city. Calling a sports talk show to complain that athletes make too much money is a sign that maybe you should just stop...you know, being a fan.

These last two are similar:

4. Telling the host "hey, I'm the guy..." - About that time you guys ran into each at a book signing in 1998. This unabashed man love and need to be personally recognized--by a sports talk host--is truly embarrassing.

5. Asking the guest if he remembers something - In this example the guest is usually an athlete or coach. Last Thursday I heard a guy ask Larry Bowa if he remembered a posterboard sign that he made during the 1980 World Series. This kind of--again--need to be personally recognized by people is just something I'll never understand. Sorry dude, Larry meant to remember that sign, but when he looked for a pen to jot it down while he was in the dugout during the WORLD SERIES he couldn't find one so he continued on LIVING HIS LIFE.

USFL Documentary

I happened to catch part of ESPN's new documentary, Small Potatoes: Who Killed the USFL when it aired last week, and I was impressed.

It's not that it's necessarily great film making, though it was produced by the guy who made The Bronx is Burning. It's just that the film manages to make interesting this football league, the USFL, that I never knew existed despite some of the big names associates with it and despite how relative recent it all took place (early to mid 80s). For the first twenty minutes I swore I was watching a mockumentary with really good CGI for historical footage. But no, it's all real. So real, in fact, that Steve Young, Doug Flutie, Jim Kelly, Herschel Walker, and other future NFL stars all glowingly reminisce about their time spent in the league. Burt Reynolds owned a team!

Anyway, it's worth checking out. Quick spoiler alert, though, the answer is apparently Donald Trump.

Buddy's Watching You

In honor the Eagles' big win over Kansas City today, I bring you a video I am sad to know exists.

HERE we have the 1988 Eagles performing a rap song called "Buddy's Watching You," which they recorded for charity. I know these professional sports raps were all the rage in the mid to late 80's after the 1985 Bears recorded the Super Bowl Shuffle, but I've always been proud to know my beloved Philadelphia teams had wisely steered clear of such nonsense....until now.

Separated at Birth: NFL Edition #4

Bears quarterback Jay Cutler is like the two-face from that one episode of Seinfeld. Sometimes he's on the cover of Michigan Avenue looking clean and athletic, but most of the time he looks tired, fat, and unfortunately a lot like notoriously ugly (but funny) comedian Eugene Mirman.

Separated At Birth: NFL Edition #3

Now that Aaron Rodgers of the Green Bay Packers is finally out of Brett Favre's shadow, I can finally share that I think he looks like BJ Novak (The Office's Ryan Howard), and people might actually know who I'm talking about.

Novak, by the way, plays a small but important role in this summer's Inglorious Basterds which is very much worth seeing.

Story Time:Lax Bros

Warning: This story contains sweeping generalizations.

Lacrosse is a sport rich white people invented* to feel good about their athleticism when they realized their success in real sports like basketball and football was starting to decrease. As such, it attracts all kinds of guys who couldn't hack it in other sports but desperately need a sport to obsess over and pretend to excel in, though nobody outside of their small legion of lacrosse buddies will ever care. These guys are "lax bros," and they are a special breed. I admit all of that despite it being my own most successful sport and my ticket to a nice college I would not have otherwise known about. I was not a lax bro.

I played D3 college lacrosse at a school expensive enough that the prep school lacrosse "Brantford Winstonworths" who could afford paying full tuition greatly outnumbered myself and the rest of the public school shmoes with federal assistance. Before college I had avoided these "lax bros" by attending a high school ghetto enough where nobody dared dressing or acting like those "bros" you see up top for fear of getting their asses kicked. However, I knew the bros existed from camps and summer leagues I attended out in the rich neighborhoods. After committing to college I was given the choice to "live with other lacrosse players" or not live with them. I knew without much thought that I couldn't share communal space with a lax bro, so I chose NO and took some crap for it at practice in the fall. The joke was on me, it seemed, since I was housed with two football players instead. But my roommates turned out to be smart, normal guys and I had a great couple of semesters as a result. For more information on what a "Lax bro" is and why I would avoid living with my teammates, keep reading.

A friend pointed me towards this video called The Ultimate Lax Bro which mocks the nature of most lacrosse players I've ever met. It's a little "inside" and not particularly funny, but that's because lacrosse bros are some of the worst human beings imaginable, so finding this video funny means you've had to endure their shenanigans. I feel like I made this video. Why didn't I?

Lax Bro Facts
Lax Bros look like the above picture: Fact (that's a real picture by the way, two real identical lax bros photographed in their natural habitat)
Lax Bros often have names like Brantford Winstonworth: Fact (my favorite is Xander Froworth)
They wear pastel colors when they go out to party: Fact
They bring their lacrosse stick almost everywhere: Fact
Wear their various practice jerseys everywhere: Fact
They have ridiculous hair and wear flat-billed hats: Fact
Flips flops?: 30 pairs
Wear "hey look at me" sunglasses, sometimes neon in color: Fact
Lax Bros love to "party": Fact
There's better than a 75% a lax bro went to prep school: Fact
Lax Bros, regardless of their skill, own multiple sticks: Fact
The list goes on...

*I am aware that native Americans technically "invented" lacrosse, but we're talking here about American lacrosse as it is experienced today. The indians never wore aviator sunglasses, and I'm pretty sure+ their games of lacrosse ended in death for the losing team.

+I'm not pretty sure at all.

New Era makes the official 59Fifty hats that all Major League baseball teams wear. For the most part players all wear these hats the traditional way, forwards with a nice curve of the brim. Why, then, is it impossible to find anyone else who can wear the hat this normal way? Most people seem to wear it flat-billed and cocked to the side and with the stickers still on. What a ridiculous look!

In fairness, I'm not even sure New Era makes it possible for us non-baseball players to wear these hats correctly anymore. I can't seem to find a 59Fifty that fits my head or doesn't make me look like Toad from the Mario series. Nowadays I'm forced to settle for the less authentic "Flexfit" hats, and I don't like it one bit.

Marco Scutaro

Baseball fans are all abuzz today after the Blue Jays' Marco Scutaro turned a walk into a steal of second base against my beloved Phillies yesterday.

I haven't seen a player do that since the Orange Team in Westbrook Park Little League "drafted" two mustacioed "12 year olds" back in 1996.

Watch it happen to professional baseball champions in high definition, HERE.

The Phillies went on to be swept by the visiting Blue Jay's who had previously not won an inter-league game all year. Just embarassing.