Archive for Minnesota

The Morning After: Thoughts From Last Night

// November 5th, 2009 // No Comments » // Minnesota, Uncategorized

img_3790There is not a lot that can cheer me up the night that the Yankees win the World Series.  Puppies, my girlfriend, that’s the short list.  For the rest of the population, near-gratuitous photos of scantily clad bar-goers does the trick.  For that segment of America, I have you covered.  Here’s what you missed last night, aside from all the Yankee “Fans” coming out of  hiding for the first time this century.  Hooray Bandwagon!

Jazz

// October 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // Minnesota, Uncategorized

 

The Lowest Of Lows: Injured While Celebrating

// September 14th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Minnesota, Uncategorized

Epic Fail

The NCAA has always had a stranglehold on fun.

I’ll save the “Amateurism is a joke” post for another day; what I’m talking about is the celebration factor. NCAA — No Celebrating At Anytime.

In my time at UConn, unfortunately I did not have the opportunity to do many touchdown dances. After the one touchdown I did have (ah, I recall it fondly), I was too surprised by my

own good luck to even consider anything flashy. Who really wants to see a fat white guy dance anyway? But, I digress.

Until this weekend, I thought it was foolish. If someone earns a touchdown,

let ‘em dance, spike, and sache themselves into the SportsCenter Top 10, or at least YouTube lore.

But then, after watching the UConn-UNC game this weekend, I thought to myself, “Hmmm, maybe the NCAA is right,” after a UNC player went down in his post-touchdown jubilation. It wasn’t until I got online and read this, that I was inspired to write this post:

“UNC’s Zack Pianalto dislocated his fibula after catching the tying touchdown. He caught his cleats wrong on the turf as he celebrated.”

Celebrations do seem to be incredibly detrimental to a football playe’rs health,

so I decided to do a little research on football players that have been injured celebrating.

Bill Gramatica

Probably the go-to example of how not to celebrate your accomplishments, the kicker tore his ACL after a meaningless field goal. Kicking a field goal: good. Six months of rehab: bad.

Ted Ginn Jr.

In the 2007 BCS title game, Ginn returns the opening kickoff 93 yards for a touchdown. He would miss the rest of the game after he injured himself celebrating in the end zone with his teammates.

Ohio State went on to lose the game, and Jim Tressel sobbed himself to sleep clutching his sweater vest.


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Blount Versus Hout: Add Your Own Soundtrack

// September 5th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Minnesota, Uncategorized

In addition to writing for sites like NESN and DEADSPIN, I’ve also chosen a slightly more glamorous career path: bouncing.  On my shift Thursday night I got lucky; from my post I had a clear view of the Oregon v. Boise State game.  The only problem was that, with the DJ spinning the hits, there was no soundtrack to the game.  Boise States dominance, I had to fill in what the talking heads at ESPN were probably saying.  Which wasn’t difficult, as you might imagine—  Tim Tebow, a few Phil Knight references, and then something about “smash mouth football”

And then, at the end of the game, I got to watch Oregon’s LeGarrette Blout sucker punch Boise State’s Byron Hout.  Connecting on some sweet, sweet chin music.  This was probably the highlight of my night, instead of watching guidos swing on each other at closing time, I got some HBO quality entertainment, during NCAA Primetime.

And I got to add my own soundtrack—the only thing that came to mind was that scene from Major League, where Rick “Wild Thing” Vaughn squares off with Willie “Mayes” Hayes—with Bob Uecker giving the call…

“Hayes swings and misses. I don’t know Monte, it looks like Vaughn is carrying his left a little low. This could hurt him in the later rounds. ”