Article:20080623 Manny Stiles' Sportsune Cookie

Intro:

Welcome to Manny Stiles ' Daily Weekday Column:

"Sportsune Cookie" – where you get zero percent of your USRDA of bull feces. But zero is still a percent!



Sport is a simile inside a metaphor wrapped in an allegory
Video clips of highlights crack me up!

Every television station and web outlet does it.... the "highlight".

Often these highlights are "the most amazing plays of the day".

They more often than not are extremely meaningless in the grander scheme of the actual event.

If I had a dollar for every "highlight" I've seen that didn't impact the outcome of the game in the slightest bit, no one else would have any money.

Worse yet is the "shit luck" highlight. You know, the play where the athlete just "throws it up" and WHAMMO, it works! The "lucky" play, "the prayer", the "never see that again in a million years" play.

Is it interesting? Sure. But if it doesn't mean crap as far as the outcome, don't try to sell it to me like it Crème brûlée. Freek coincidences happen all the time. It's why lotteries get won routinely and also why lightning strikes people more often than lotteries are won.

We need to demand a NEW type of highlight as viewers and fans of sport! We need to see the REAL play that changed the game MORE OFTEN than the sportsporn highlight. Because the "highlights" we get are too often innocuous. They are "pop", they are "Sugar", they are simply explained away with "Watch this" and placed to catch the gleam in the viewer's eye.

If it were up to the dorks that edit and mass distribute the "highlights", every game would end in a home run, not a field goal. Every crosscheck would be a three pointer and every double play would be a triple play.

I can't COUNT how many times I watched a video recap of a game where they showed 5 clips of a team pulling off spectacular plays only to have it followed by "but they lost the game".

Give me the bases loaded, rally-ending double play in the one run game over the crazy foul pop catch in a 12-2 blowout. Give me the 12 yard run that gets the first down to ices a close game rather than the 75 yard punt return that had two clipping penalties that weren't called in the 35-17 game. Give me the free throws that weren't missed that clinched a playoff berth over the halftime halfcourt heave in the Clippers - Sonics game.

Give me substance over flash. Give me importance over meaningless. Give me skill over shit luck.

Give me SPORTS, not just "entertainment". I want athletes, not circus clowns!!!

It's gotta end, Big Media... you're suffocating your audience and keeping the general population in a state of unaware passivity - then again... I guess that is your goal anyway.

Pre-emptive Maneuvers
Ominous - the Nuggets have told Carmelo Anthony's agent that they won't trade try to him.... anymore.... for now.

Cubs - White Sox - Wow. This "supposed" World Series matchup really blew as much as the wind in Second City, eh?

College World Series - Call me "crazy" but I'm rooting for the Bulldogs. Don't look now, but Bulldogs are now the 10th most popular breed of dog after 75 years of NOT being in the top 10. Bulldogs are the second most registered dog breed in Los Angeles in 2007. Oddly enough it's not in the top 10 most popular breeds in Atlanta (Georgia's largest city).

And here I was rooting for Yale the whole time!!!

Speaking of NCAA Baseball - Where would we be right now with a BCS-type CWS??? Some variety of LSU and Miami or Florida St. - doesn't that fit the flavor of a BCS?

What's the Deal Iowa?' - between the flooding, tornadoes and the triathalete dying and an IndyCar race to promote corn growing - what the eph in the name of Radar O'Reilly is going on?

I wish they'd legalize hemp production so they could farm that for ethanol instead (it would use a LOT less resources than corn for production) and have a race called the Hemp Growers 420...

Am I the only one wondering why there isn't a "Hog Slaughterer's 500" race? Pork Bellies rule the World, after all!!!

Olympic Qualifying - so there wasn't shit on TV this weekend sports-wise (the hottest, most impossible to venture outdoors weekend in Arizona) so I had to settle for Olympic qualifying and having my kids imitate the divers and gymnasts while simultaneously preventing another "Run for the Stitches" - a.k.a. The parent equivalent of the Kentucky Derby without the fun Hats or Mint Juleps....

The U.S. is in trouble. Sure, our top qualifiers were good but man did the losers who didn't make it SUCK.

I'm not a diving or gymnastics judge by any means, but when I can CLEARLY tell who ephed up and who didn't, and how far apart the bad is from what we have as out best - that's not a good sign. Our top-top talent isn't so much better than the other numbskulls who wasted my time airtime with their efforts that it makes me fear that the "rest of the world" is prepared to shove our noses in it.

We've made it popular to be popular while the rest of the world is practicing being "good".

Fort Night!!! - I'm actually excited about Wimbledon!@!!

I'm merely curious to see if Rog can pull of #6, but I am entranced at what could happen on the women's side. Sorry, but female tennis is more entertaining to me than men's. I'm excited to see how it shakes down on the women's side more than the men's. Plus, I'm not gay and even ugly women who are good at their sport are sexy to me!

I blame Gabriela Sabatini for first getting me hooked on women's tennis.

R.I.P. Scott Kalitta - As a kid I watched more TNN (which turned into what we now call "Spike") than I probably should have. Sure, I was obsessed with fishing, but then the racing events sucked me in because cable sucked worse then than now (believe it or not, it's true!!!). When I was a kid, I convinced my Dad (who had connections with a World Record-holding motorbike drag racer) to take me to Maple Grove raceway near Reading, PA for a twofold purpose: to see Bigfoot up close and personal, but also to see the drag races firsthand. A guy named Connie Kalitta won first place in the "nationals" that weekend. Connie just happens to be Scott's dad.

But I actually welled up when I first heard Scott Kalitta had died. I was in a state of "damn it!".

Those guys know what they're getting into each time they race, but it still sucks.

My condolances to the family and friends.

I can smell it coming - a four home run game is COMING, dammit!!!

UEFA vs. U.S. - If every state had it's own soccer team vying for a title in an all out battle like they do in Europe (keep in mind, Europe is roughly a simlar size to the contiguous states) I still wouldn't give a crap. Sorry, it's just not that interesting!

Somewhere - The next Harold Minor just learned how to properly fill a plastic grocery bag.

You know what makes me feel ill? - ESPN's BLATENT disregard for respecting the name "Titletown". Seriously, ill....

Namedropper
It's not something I pride myself on. It's more of a feat of astounding, gifted memory plus sheer luck and circumstance than anything worth bragging about but I can name drop all day if I had to. Keep in mind, I come from a big, wide family of weirdos and freeks.

I'm probably the freekiest of them all - Guess What? The guy who calls himself "Manny Stiles" is actually a freek!!! (Yes, "freek" with twice the E and none of the A)- I'm the only one in my family tree to be an Uncle to my Cousin so the tree actually circles around thanks to me (through marriages, not blood - so technically it's not disgusting!)! But I'm also the biggest lover of sports by far so all my "relatives" share their experiences, incidents and coincidences in the realm of sport with me. So I get lots of names to drop.

Again, it's not something I'm proud of, it's just a small world, that's all - for instance: My Mom's close friend from her elementary school days was Kevin Bacon's elementary school teacher - "six degrees" and so on...

But as stupid as it is... it's still fun to play, so I'll chuck these in here every so often - a game called "Name Dropper" - 100% true and 200% pointless and dumb.

Here we go...

My former ex-brother-in-law - who is from Venezuela - (I did a KICK ASS report on Venezeula in 5th grade) has a cousin who is also Ozzie Guillen's cousin. She (the cousin, not my ex-brother-in-law or Ozzie) was raised by Ozzie and then later married Freddy Garcia (which is when the then-not-yet ex-brother-in-law first "name dropped" to me - I guess he thinks more highly of Garcia than Guillen!) This would all be very interesting if, you know... he wasn't now my EX brother in law. Nonetheless... this game is dumb to begin with!

But his kids - my nephews and nieces are still related to Ozzie Guillen. I'm no genealogy wizard (My Mom is, however) but my kids are related to Ozzie which means I'm essentially inclined to hate Jay Mariotti!!! YOU DON'T MESS WITH FAMILY, JAY!!!! (Plus it also means that Guillen is even more distantly related to Princess Diana through me via my Great-Grandmom, based on my Mom's extensive research - did I say "wizard"?). So I'll "see" if I can pull some strings (in a super-lazily and ultra-hesitant effort) to get an interview and ask Ozzie why the town of Chicago's obsessive sports fans suck so much! It'll be fun and 100% based on real life events; nothing made up!!!

Kids make the BEST sports fans
There's no denying that my kids get a slightly dangerous dosage of sports in their daily lives. Whether it's playing games, watching games, attending games, watching Mommy and/or Dad play sports or even something as simple as video games.... my kids are every bit as sports nuts as their parents.

It's not something me and Wifey force on them, it's something that they enjoy, understand and on many occasions DEMAND!

So this new section is dedicated to the fanship of children. I was born to be a Dad, and my kids were born to love sports!!!

So my daughter has been on a "sports games on Playstation" kick lately. After beating Dora's Journey to the Purple Planet, she was looking for some new experiences - thus NHL Hockey!!! That led to an obsession with Ducks and Sharks and my son's telling me "I'm tough. I'm a hockey player"... after all, the boy gets sucked into whatever his big Sis becomes obsessed with (seemingly she becomes obsessed with something new every other day).

This weekend's obsession was "ESPN 2K5 basketball".

I changed all the settings so the CPU was really crappy and so all the User abilities were superhuman. Naturally, she wanted to be the Suns and I hooked the game up, showed her some simple moves, which buttons to use and she went out and won her first game against the Pistons (because "they're from Michigan" - she pays too much attention sometimes) by a mere 98 points... 102 -4.

No, those are the proper settings for a newly celebrated 5 year old, I think.

After she played a couple games, winning each one disgustingly, I sat her down and had "the Talk" with her...

I said to her "Pookie, you don't have to like the Suns just because Dad and Mommy do. It's ok if you like your own teams" as I began to show her more teams. She agreed as I thumbed through the teams and explained what each of their names were and in which cities they play.

Little brother, the 2 year old, a.k.a. "Bubbas" was enamored by each team that had some semblance of blue in it (his favorite color, of course) while Pookie took more to the animal logos.

She settled on liking the "Deers" and the "Bees". You know, the Milwaukee Bucks and the New Orleans Hornets. I set it up so the game was Bucks vs. Hornets and let her have at it...with the Hornets as the home team. She was thrilled by the ballin' bee logo at midcourt!

The Deers kicked the piss out of the Bees - but only 65-8 since TJ Ford spent so much time dribbling on top of the bee logo (good think "back court" was turned off!).

After the game I asked her if the Bucks or Hornets were her new favorite team and reassured her that it was OK to like teams on her own.

She responded "No, I like the Suns. I like Mahray Stoumired and the Grillah"

I laughed knowing there's NO WAY she'd ever turn her allegiances against the Phoenix Gorilla!!!

But she might have to adapt if Amare gets dealt this summer!

Post-Emptive Maneuvers
I dropped my second class of the Manny Stiles' Hall of Famous on the 'chair this weekend, but don't for a second think I forgot about Rugby, Volleyball, Polo, Badminton, Horseshoes, Wallyball, Curling, Biathalon, Water polo, Roller Derby, Spearfishing, Checkers, Ping pong, Irish Road Bowling, Skeet Shooting, Baton Twirling, Rochambeau, Cherry Pit Spitting, Spelling bees, Yodeling, Kayaking or Archery... Because I didn't!!!

Media Rant
Pop culture is fun and all, but there comes a point when the people that share their words for others really need to stop beating the pile of previously beaten to death mules.

Too many references I've read over the past week made me think - "HELLO!!! It's 2008 here. We're wondering why you refuse to join us!!!"

It's a clear sign that traumatic happenings that were never dealt with, people refusing to let go of when they almost felt "cool" or a lack of adaptability are over-running your psyches and bleeding into your output. Face reality, get yourselves a current calendar and wake up from the dream "in which" you can't let go...

Get a grip, purveyors of spew... the rest of us aren't living in your past. We're too busy keeping up with the race to die while you're stuck in a pace that is long dead. The PAST.

Ever wonder?
That if we changed a current "day" to have 10 hours with 100 minutes that were made up of 100 seconds each, a new second would be .864 of our current second. Of course that would change every game that's run by a method of time but a baseball game would be under an hour long...

After all, everyone complains how long an average baseball game is... (while ignoring that an average NFL game is still much longer.)

WTMF Sports
Channel Manny Presents:

W.T.M.F. Sports with your host, Manny Stiles!

Brought to you by InstaDeath non-Energy Drink

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Reporting on Monday, June 23rd... Manny Stiles:

MS - "You know what's always easier when someone else does it? Everything. But first, our top story..."

Everything happens in cycles. Expect Canada to be a leader in Camel Polo within the next 5-10 years...

The Adventures of ManRays
Today's "Ray of the Day" is...

Evan Longoria...

"Dirtbag" went yard for #12 on the season in a loss to the 'Stros...

The Rays finally lost a home series for the first time in... it's been a while -eh, YOU look it up, I don't wanna.

Honorable Mention - David Price - last year's #1 overall pick was demoted to Double A. The newest Montgomery Biscuit better not get too comfortable - it won't be a long visit!

Next Up - at Miami against those other Fish. The Sunshine State Rivalry reignites!!!

(BTW - as a person that lives in Arizona, let me snicker defiantly at Florida calling itself the "Sunshine State")

Go Rays!

10
1 – Barry Bonds 2 - Kobe Bryant 3 - Michael Jordan 4 - Kevin Garnett 5 - Michael Irvin 6 - Jerry Rice 7 - Dennis Rodman 8 - Allen Iverson 9 - Terrell Owens 10 – Mike Gminski

A Picture is worth 1000 players traded for one (or close to it)
Not much needs to be said about this guy... He didn't do much of anything. At least not enough to be said about him anyway! He was the first player in MLB history to hit 2 HR in the first inning of a game - that's it... that's his career highlight. He's tied for 443rd on the all time HR list at 143 lifetime dongs... that's more than I had, for sure.... so he's got me there!

JuTMYSY4 will be happy to hear he's managing Lancaster's very own Barnstormers.

http://barnstormers.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/vonhayes1.jpg

Dr. Commento Answers the Questions
ATQ – Friday's 10 was athletes that reside in the Phoenix Metro area (or in the case of Mike Tyson, did)

LASB - "Oh joy- the 13 win Clippers playing at the L.A. Sports Arena in the heart of South Central... That way if your a Clips fan you can be disappointed by the product, the facility, the neighborhood, and if your lucky you can be car jacked, robbed and beaten all in the same night - just to top it off"

But it still beats being a Knicks fan the past five years, right?

Strike a Prose
Bored crazy on a hot summer day

monsoon  a tune  us sitting in a room  flip, flip, flip  through the channels of nothingness  visual distress  on the floor  ''are you bored? ''

I write with my write hand  the right man  just wanna make it tight, man  nonsense, anti-sense  bullshit is eloquence  payback or recompense  ''did I just gain an eigth sense? ''

bring it back  pull up the slack  jack the motherfacker  grab his backpack  stabbing time  with reason and rhyme  ''just pay me, bitches!  pay me now! ''

summer, thunder  hot, hot, hot  break it up  these channels of nothingness