Shut the Pie Hole

The Sochi Games are now over and, quite frankly, they were pretty dull for me. There was perhaps two break-out stars of the event for the USA, Mikaela Schiffrin, the 18-year old skier and TJ Oshie from the St. Louis Blues and the US Hockey team.

At least Schiffrin won a gold, but it wasn’t Oshie’s fault that his team didn’t win any particularly with his inspiring effort in the shootout against the Russians.

I suppose if we take some of the newer X-Games type events there was more to celebrate. We did sweep the podium in one event, but the French even did that in one of them too, so that took a bit of the excitement away from that. 

 

We stunk in speed skating, short track, figure skating, curling, hockey and basically anything that had ice involved with it. We couldn’t jump, run or shoot on skis either (Biathlon, Cross Country.)

But for some odd reason we found enough people to sit on, or in, a sled and go downhill pretty fast. Gee…what an athletic set of accomplishments there.

Our ski team did do rather well with Schiffrin and Ted Ligety taking home gold medals. In an event where competitors only get two chances to head down a hill for about a total of two minutes, that is quite notable.

But how did we end up in 4^th place overall in the medal count? I think, given the fact that we really only placed that high because of the newer events that were contested were included, this was an overall performance similar to the days when it was an upset any time one of our athletes took home a medal. Our team clearly took a step back this time around with the most disturbing performances coming at speed skating.

We didn’t even hit the podium ONE time in speed skating. Twelve events overall and not even one bronze. 

However, we weren’t the only nation with problems on the speed skating oval. The Netherlands brought in a team that dominated in a way never seen before. They took home 23 medals in that event with 8 golds of the 12 awarded. The next closest teams were Russian and Poland with three and only 4 other teams even picked up at least one medal. Even Canada only had 2 medals in that event. 

The Dutch had 7 medals total in 2010 and we had 4. 

So kudos to the Dutch for that performance. Now we need to send some spy drones over there to see what they did and figure out how to do that for our country in South Korea in 4 years.

How the hell, by the way, did South Korea, that well-known winter wonderland, get an Olympic Games winter bid? I still can’t figure out how Sochi did. It’s not even close to a place where anyone would think of to go for winter fun besides the fact that there are the Caucus Mountains in the background. 

Sochi is one of the warmest places in Russia.
Naturally a place for Winter Games

I watched a bit of the Costas interview with Nancy Kerrigan last night. Overall the subject didn’t interest me but during the parts that I watched I was impressed with Kerrigan’s take on the whole matter of how she was attacked 20 years ago by Tonya Harding’s boyfriend, Jeff Galooley, or whatever his name was.
Kerrigan was graceful, thoughtful and forgiving and much more so than anyone would have given her a right to have been. There was no lingering animosity or resentment and I thought it quite admirable. 

That Costas though…again this week he launched into a political rant about Russia and their past. I think that given the fact he opened up that can of worms he was in a no-win situation. He was vilified for not talking about the violent communist “past” (ahem, ahem) so he went ahead and did it.

But as I mentioned here earlier, he never should have started talking about politics at all. It’s a sports production where athletes from all over the world come to compete in games not debate politics.

Regardless of where someone stands on present or past-day Russia and Vladimir Putin, it was just RUDE to go into Russia and bash it. I don’t care if Putin hates gays or anything else of the sort; for two weeks that has to get put aside because the world was the guests in that country. 

That’s like getting invited to a holiday party and bad mouthing anything that your host has done in the past or is doing in the future; if you accept the invitation, you go and keep your pie hole shut and be as gracious of a guest as you can be in the circumstances. 

That’s it for now.

Stay on Your Feet

It's great to see Al Michaels at the anchor desk of the Olympics. He is, of course, the man who called the legendary game between the Soviet Union and the USA in 1980, which the Americans won.

Today I just watched him interview one of the goalies from that USSR team, Vladislav Tretiak, know as one of the greatest goalies in the world of all time.

Tretiak was very, very complimentary of the USA team from back then. It was truly a graceful, humble man who was sitting there with Al. Tretiak had actually been taken out of that game after the first period by the Soviet coach, something I would have struggled to remember even though I watched all of that game.

I also watched this years Russia-USA game in its entirety. The USA won it in dramatic fashion in an 8-round shootout. The USA's JT Oshie did the honors after scoring in his turn and then getting the chance to shoot all 5 of the extra shots.

The Americans didn't really deserve to win that game, in my opinion though. The Russians scored what looked like a game-winning goal with about 4 minutes left to play. But it was overturned after a video review revealed that the goal was off of it stakes and therefore made the goal no good. In the NHL the goal would have counted but not in international play. Further analysis still nullified the goal, but that rule is sort of odd given the distance that the goal was actually displaced.

Oshie, it should be noted, when someone said he was a hero, quickly shot back that he wasn't a hero, but those who wear camo(flage) were the real heroes. True, so true. Wait until he gets home to play for the St. Louis Blues when the Games are over this year. He'll get great rounds of applause and deservedly so.

Our speed skaters are taking a big dump in their events. There is concern that the uniforms they are wearing, designed by Under Armor, were failing the skaters. However a change of uniforms didn't seem to help and, as far as I can see, we are without a victory in that event.

I know figure skater Jeremy Abbott is all pissed off because people are getting all over him for falling in a second event in which he competed,

But I hate to tell him that America is pissed that he fell twice. We send a handful of competitors there and we expect them to stay on their skates.

While I do like the new snowboarding events in the games, I do struggle with events that are judged. I always have....that includes figure skating, gymnastics, diving and the like. I can't suggest a better way to deal with figuring out who is the best, I just don't care for the human element in judging.

One of the new snowboarding events which is great is the snowboard cross, which is a race between 5 or 6 boarders down the hill with jumps and curves. That has great action including great falls which, sad to say, I like to watch...sort of like car racing.

I did just watch the Brazilian two-woman bobsled team take a major crash. If you have an On Demand feature you can find it there. But all I could think of was, "of course this is a disaster in the making. Its like the Jamaican bobsled team. We know a country like Brazil isn't going to field a competitive sledding team."

Head Meets Wall at 100 mph

Our sledders have done rather well. It does make me wonder how I could personally do in the Luge or the Skeleton. Im 250 lbs; I could break some major speed records, if not a few walls along the way.

I haven't watched the Today show during these Olympics so far. So I have been spared the idiocy of Savannah Guthrie. Perhaps this week I'll take a glimpse.

There has been controversy about Bob Costas' political observations while he was able to host the prime-time shows. The debate was over what he was actually debating during those discussions. But the idiots who are debating what he has been saying are missing the whole point. The political conversation have NO PLACE in these broadcasts about sports. We can talk all day about Vladimir Putin and Syria and Communism and how Obama loves it. We don't want ANY talk about politics from those who are political wonks.

I do love the actual coverage of the Games so far though. I can see every single play and every inch of every course is covered so we don't miss anything. With HD and super slow motion in ND its spectacular. They are even using drones with cameras, a much better use of drones than what Amazon plans to use them to do.

There are still ass clowns out there talking the weather in Sochi and that because its warm there right now that global warming is still something to deal with as a global community. Meanwhile 49 states in the US have snow on them right now.

I read a bunch of other idiots saying that arctic ice is melting and screwing up the jet stream which is why heat is now causing cold. Of course, that leave out the actual fact that arctic ice is increasing but lets not even talk about that.
Someone needs to prove to me that if I light a fire I can create ice with it. Because that is what these jerkoffs actually want us to believe.
But THEN please tell me how more warmth is going to be bad for the world. Keep in mind that these alarmists are concerned about a ONE degree average rise in temperature in the next 100 years.
Right about now, I think about 5 of the 6 billion people on the planet will take that one degree ANY time.
Idiots. Its time to call these Al Gore fans exactly what they are...idiots.

Where was I? Oh...by the way, Sochi is a resort city in Russia on the Black Sea. It's not known as a winter city with average daily highs in February of 50 degrees and average daily lows in February of 36. So its 45 degrees there today and people are blaming humans for the snow melting.

Sochi, home of the 2014 Winter Olympics

Some of what these competitors are doing simply aren't natural though. The height they are getting in skiing and snowboarding are just begging for incredible accidental deaths. I was watching a video of extreme activities that included motorcycles, cliffs, parachutes and other things and places where humans test the limits of sanity. I was sick to my stomach just watching some of it.

I do wonder why we....oh come on, I just watched Lindsay Jacobellis fall again in the snowboard cross. That makes it three Olympics in a row. She was way in the lead too.

Faye Gulini stayed on her feet though, but only managed a fourth place.

So I wonder why we take some events that only take a minute to complete and only allow one run to decide the winners, like in speed skating, but the curlers play 9 one-hour games in the round-robin part of the contest. It doesn't make any sense.
Lugers get 4 runs...that seems about fair. Why does a speed skater only get one shot at his/her race? SEND ME THE ANSWER PLEASE!

That's it. I'm just really bored. My life is kind of sucking right now so I am just sitting here in need of some release, so that was it.

Done

Loo-Gie

Now the US is in 6^th place in the medal count as of this writing.

One of our winter Olympic heroes, Shaun White, finished in 4^th place in the Halfpipe ending his chance to be the first American to win gold in an event in three straight Olympics. That will leave speed skater Shani Davis the remaining hope for that particular achievement.

I have to wonder what the 4^th place finish will do for White. He has an estimated net worth of 20 million dollars now, of course coming from endorsement deals. But now that he passed up competing in the Slopestyle and bombing in Halfpipe, does that revenue stream dry up for him? I think he still may have another event to go but if he fails to win Gold there and I’m a businessman looking to use him to endorse something I’m thinking that I have a potential bargaining chip right there that could secure his services for a whole lot less.

A friend of mine and I are now thinking about getting a Curling team together for 2016. We are both hooked…for different reasons, but still we are getting in it. He wants to be part of it because he is a great bowler and after watching some of it understands the game better.

Here is why I am hooked…

Anna Sidorova

Oops. Just got word the Shani Davis is back at bargain rates for promotional work now also.

We did finally get a medal in the sled competition. (Luge to be precise...pronounced LOO-GIE in my house.) 

Erin Hamlin became the first US luger (LOOGY ER) to win an individual medal in this event. That's pretty awesome. We finally found someone who can sit in a sled and go downhill very fast.

I was having a debate on a recent Dungeon of Manlove taping about the Olympics. I asked the following question, “What do you think is the over/under number for arrests made by Russian authorities for gayness at the figure skating competition? My number is 3.”

While clearly tongue in cheek, our resident gay cast member, Chinky Twinky….lol…its his own nickname, took offense. Why, suddenly, this particular topic hit home, but nonetheless it did.

He said not all figure skaters were gay, which…I think…is obvious.

But one of the other guys around the table said we never see anyone like Marshal figure skating to which CT said, “But there are all sorts of big guys like Marshal who **** it in *** *** $%$%$%.” To which I said, “Leave the name Marshal out of this conversation and give me a number.”

CT went on to argue that figure skating was a great sport and that I could never do a triple axel.

That much is true. Because I could never see how it was possible to squeeze my 250 lb body into anything like this….

And if I did there would be a massive fabric explosion that would give wardrobe malfunctioning a whole brand new meaning.

Yes, we all know that all male figures aren’t gay….right?

Yes, we all know that it takes years and years of practice and that we send the best our country can produce to compete.

Yes, we know that Russian authorities only arrest those who propagandize gayness to children, or something like that. 

But then we found out why CT was so defensive when he said, “Hey buttmunch, I was a figure skater when I was a kid.”

Up my over/number to 4.

Done