I'm not exactly sure how committed I am to actually doing this over the long term but the internet has proven to be a voice for just about anybody with access to a computer and in a day where "social networking", "status updating" and "posting" reigns supreme I figured it was about time to get in on some of the action.
I'm mildly, at best, interested in Facebook and LinkedIn. It's cool to hop on there every once in a while just to see what old friends are up to. However, I'm more into the email chains. I have to be honest, I love them. Now that I've got a smartphone? You'll be hard pressed to find me not checking email on it. There's always some crazy debate going on and with my group of friends I'd say 90% of the time it is sports related.
And that's where I've gotten this inspiration to start a blog - SPORTS. As much as I love email chains, I'm even more obsessed with sports. Now that the glory days of youth hockey and soccer are long behind me, I'll pretty much follow anything ESPN is throwing at me. I don't know if it's my competitive streak or my love of numbers and stats but I'm just drawn to sports like very few other things in my life.
I've created this blog to just talk sports from a fans perspective. Unfortunately (for me), I have zero insider knowledge of anything that is going on in any sport. Again, I'm just a fan with an opinion who wants to get it out there. I don't even really plan on making this too public so maybe it's just more of an avenue to express what I'm thinking. If someone comes along and wants to throw down on a topic, even better!
Now that I've laid the basis for my blog, let me throw out a few things so you know where I'm coming from:
1. Some of the most poignant first memories of my childhood are sports-related. From Scott Norwood's incredible "Wide Right" to crown the Giants Super Bowl XXV champs to Islander games in Section 305 with the guy in the last row yelling "10 minutes to goooo" every period to being a six-year old and playing soccer on a decrepit field behind a strip mall on Long Island, these are some of the things I'll never forget.
2. I'm an unwavering Islander, Giant, and Met fan. A unique combo for anyone who knows New York sports team affiliations (you're either Mets, Jets, Islanders or Yankees, Giants, Rangers). As much as I love my teams I absolutely loathe the other side. Apologies in advance for any rants or biases that will undoubtedly come up in the future.
3. I graduated from Notre Dame and am as loyal to my school as I am to anything else. Never a college football fan before enrolling there, it has since become my number one passion in the sporting world. Experiencing Notre Dame football is like nothing else and fall Saturday's are dedicated to nothing else but catching the game. Whether it means driving down to South Bend or watching it on TV, there has to be an extremely good reason as to why I'm not watching it.
4. I love hockey, love it. People can joke about hockey all they want. It may very well be the fourth sport of the "Big 4" in North America but to me, it's the best sport. Perhaps I'm biased because I played it for 17 years of my life but there's no denying the passion of a hockey player. There's a reason for the cliched phrase "he's a hockey player" when a player goes down with injury but returns to action without missing a shift - they are some of the toughest guys in sports. They are some of the most athletic too but it goes unnoticed for some reason.
5. This may tie in with my last comment but the Stanley Cup is the greatest trophy in American sports. Why you ask? Well for one, your name, along with the names of all your teammates, is forever etched in its silver rings after you hoist the holy grail. Most guys grow beards during their run to the Cup, a tradition started by my Islanders back in the early 80s. Moreover, I think hockey players care more about winning the Stanley Cup than other athletes care about winning their championship. You don't believe me? Watch the Stanley Cup clinching game in 2011 and tell me you don't get chills watching the pure elation grown men have lifting it over their heads in triumph. Even better, it's been that way forever - Cup Raise and No Words.
6. Tiger Woods is the man. Of course his "transgressions" that led to the fateful 2009 Thanksgiving Weekend "Crash Heard 'Round the World" cannot be condoned. But that's his private life and I don't care what the heck goes on in it. It's none of my business and it should be none of anyone else's business. I consider myself lucky to be around to watch the greatest golfer ever at his peak. Tiger is as cold blooded as it gets and I only hope that he returns to form in 2011. There are myriad reasons for his winless 2010 campaign but now that all the distractions are seemingly behind him, I fully expect Tiger to rededicate himself to absolute dominance. He turns 35 at the end of the month but I truly believe he's got another three years of greatness in him before all the young talent currently on the PGA tour gets a hold of the game.
7. The student-athlete is still around, just not in football or basketball. I find it comical to consider young men who enroll at football-factory and basketball-factory universities "student-athletes". College football and basketball are really the only two revenue producing sports a college might have and the kids who commit to play their respective sport are there for two reasons - to win a championship and to make the school boatloads of money. While some of the players take studies seriously, most are buried in laughable majors that don't get them anywhere post-graduation. For uber-talented basketball players who get to leave after freshman year, most don't even open a book second semester. Part of it might be their fault, part of it the university's fault but either way over the course of four years most guys are wayyyy more "athlete" than they are "student". Most of these players are not going pro and I just don't understand why they don't use their athletic gifts to help propel them towards success when they're done on the field/court.
8. Soccer will never be a domestic mainstream sport. Why? Because frankly, the product sucks. Try watching an MLS game after watching a game from the Premiership or La Liga or, even better, the Champions League. I did this after the World Cup, thinking I'd give the MLS a shot. Now, I love soccer nearly as much as I love hockey, but WOW! I lasted about 7 minutes before I had to change the channel. The US has the best leagues in the world in football, hockey, baseball, and basketball. As far as I can tell, it will never have the best league in soccer. Americans are used to the best and the MLS is just not offering it to them. On top of that, the internet and globalization has made it incredibly easy to follow European soccer so it comes as no surprise that what little domestic interest there is in "the beautiful game" is channeled across the pond to where the best players in the world ply their trade.
9. The NFL has a great thing going right now and I'm worried greed is going to get in the way and saddle its fans (of which I consider myself one) with football-less Sundays in 2011. If history is any indication, CBA negotiations are an 11th hour solution but with the increased attention towards injury and long-term health of its players, the NFL may find itself locked-out if it and its players cannot come to an agreement on what seems to be one of the prime issues in negotiations - expanding to an 18 game season.
10. Lastly (because that's where it belongs!) the NBA is a joke. Is anyone surprised David Stern is looking to cut salaries by 33% when the next CBA negotiations come around? The NBA is losing millions of dollars and has been for the last couple of seasons. Does it come as a surprise that fewer and fewer people want to spend their hard earned dollar on athletes who try, ohhh, about 25% of the time? Michael Jordan, one of the fiercest competitors ever, paved the way for the guys we see out there on the court today. Their athleticism cannot be downplayed but man are they over-payed and over-glorified.
I look forward to expressing my opinion and views going forward. Thanks for reading!
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