Categories
Seattle Mariners

Odds and Ends: Ichiro goes bananas

Ever since we heard about Ichiro Suzuki’s out of character behavior every year at the All-Star Game, we thought something about the story sounded a little fishy. Well, we were right. As it turns out, Ichiro was accidentally exposed to the blast of a test detonation of a gamma bomb as a child. The effects were startling, making him a baseball machine, but also creating an emotional and impulsive alter ego. When anger or frustration set in, the transformation occurs. So, please, whenever around Ichiro, don’t make him angry. You wouldn’t like him when he’s angry.

In other news…

[D.C. Sports Bog]: Colt Brennan is a system QB…and a dork

[FoodCourtLunch.com]: Super Bowl halftime performer odds are released

[Kissing Suzy Kolber]: `Joe Simpson’s Daughter Touching Company’ and other snazzy fantasy football team names

[IntentionalFoul.com]: LeBron says the USA is as good as gold

[Chicago Bull]: Would you want to wrestle a Long Wang?

[eTrueSports.com]: “Brett, who is this Purple People Eater that keeps texting you?”

[Sportaphile.com]: Wow, has it really been 25 years and day since this…

[Bugs & Cranks]: We thought it was just passion, but cocaine is much more reasonable

[SimonOnSports.com]: We did much better on the “What Bra Size Do I Wear? Erin Andrews Edition”

[Fanhouses Boxing]: Wait, we missed the World Chess Boxing Championships again?!?

[The Zone Blitz]: A tour of Pac-10 stadiums, Google Earth style

[Mr. Irrelevant]: Redskins bust out the big balls to practice for upcoming Wipeout tryouts

[The Big Lead]: Last night’s minor league baseball rumble from a fan’s POV

[ABC News]: Ricky Williams is all over this article

[Blue Monkey Disco Party]: Bet you don’t have these cards in your collection

[Our of Right Field]: Remember this guy?

[Metacafe.com]: Some call it a prank, we call it a GREAT day

And finally, dude, use your star power!

Categories
New York Giants

Giants’ Super Bowl rings get jacked in Ocean’s Eleven-style job

All, and we mean all, the odds we’re stacked against the New York Giants this past season, but they overcame, shocking the world by defeating the undefeated Patriots in the Super Bowl. Well, after all their hard work, some of the fellas don’t even have there championship bling to show for it.

Local police are investigating a robbery in Attleboro, Massachusetts, in which $1 to $2 million in gold and diamond jewelry was stolen over the weekend, including New York Giant Super Bowl rings, designed in conjunction with a consortium of Giants players and high-end jeweler Tiffany & Co.

According to local press reports, the burglars disabled the alarm system at E.A. Dion Inc, cut a hole in the roof and lifted a 1,000-pound safe through the ceiling, fleeing with it. The theft was discovered Sunday when an employee arrived at the store.

Police said there were no suspects and declined to comment further.

The white gold New York Giant Super Bowl rings are set with 1.5 carats of diamonds and designed to be big, seen 10 tables away at a restaurant.

According to reports, it’s the biggest heist in Attleboro’s history and ranks just behind the Memphis heist of Pau Gasol by the Lakers for the country’s largest robbery of 2008.

Links:

[IndexOnline.com]: Jewelry Robbers Nab Super Bowl Rings

Categories
New York Giants

Jeremy Shockey finally lets us know how he feels about the G-Men

Jeremy Shockey has always been a little on the controversial side, continually opening his mouth and inserting his foot directly inside. However, Shockey has been silent since his Giants won the Super Bowl without him, shocking the undefeated Patriots. But we all knew that golden silence wouldn’t last for long and on Saturday, he let his true feelings come out, clearing the air in an interview with Steve Serby from the New York Post.

“Everybody said that I agreed to get traded and that I would welcome a trade or that I’m unhappy. . . . But you can’t find one article that had my direct quote, except from an anonymous source or from this person or from that person, OK?” Shockey was saying yesterday at the POWERade Pro Challenge for children and heat-stricken media at Flushing Meadows Corona Park.

That was the good news.

It doesn’t mean Shockey and the Giants don’t desperately need to sit down and clear the air.

His broken leg isn’t 100 percent yet and his broken relationship with some member or members of the front office requires immediate healing.

To wit: why was he watching the Giants shock the Patriots from a skybox?

“And the truth is, I went to the Super Bowl game to go watch my team play; the Giants wouldn’t let me sit on the sidelines with my teammates – I was forced to sit up in a box,” Shockey said.

I said to Shockey: “And that ticked you off.”

“Words can’t explain,” he said.

I asked him: “What is your relationship with the front office right now?”

“That’s between the management and myself,” Shockey said.

I asked him: “Do you want to and expect to play for the Giants this year?”

“Tough questions,” he began. “I’m not the Giants front office, because they feel like they have to tell the world about things that happened . . . when it’s a situation like this that’s so severe, you don’t leak it in the media. I’m not ever going to be a leak, its a team. But they feel like they’re obligated to put their feelings in the media, which really hurt my family and myself, with the things I’ve done for them.”

Shockey said he had texted yesterday morning with co-owner Steve Tisch.

“I consider him a father figure to me – and he would never betray me, like some other people that are there,” Shockey said.

I asked him: “Would you welcome a trade?”

“I’m not saying that – no comment,” Shockey said. “Whatever’s happened between the Giants and myself is gonna stick between the Giants and myself.”

I asked him: “Will you be at minicamp?”

“I plan on fulfilling my contractual obligation but the No. 1 thing that I’m going there for is to be with my teammates (who) I miss so much,” he said.

When he arrived, wearing a black POWERade T-shirt and shorts, he had offered a statement: “I’m here for POWERade, fellas, and the statement I would like to make about the Giants and the speculation in the offseason is that whatever happens between the upper management, the lower management, the owners, any management, is gonna stay between my representation and them. Unlike the Giants, I’m gonna be quiet. They’ve released multiple things about myself and if you look back into the media, there’s always a source. Well I’d like to know who the source is, and we’ll go over here and we’ll deal it out ourselves because I haven’t said one negative thing towards the Giants.”

Finally, Jeremy has decided to keep his yapper shut and let his actions and representatives do his talking. This really shows a huge step forward in maturity.

Links:

[Fox Sports]: Shockey breaks post-Super Bowl silence

Categories
New York Giants

Odds and Ends: Giants tap Sierra Leon dry for their SB ring


Championship rings just keep getting bigger and bigger and blingier and blingier. Apparently, the New York Giants have no plans of discontinuing the trend because their Super Bowl ring will probably have to be delivered in wheelbarrow. The ring has a whopping 1.5 carats of diamonds and, as Michael Strahan put it, is a “10-table ring,” meaning it can be seen from 10 tables away in a restaurant.

There was some discussion about maybe one of the rings was too big,” said center Shaun O’Hara, who was among group of players and team executives who designed the ring with officials from Tiffany and Co.

“I threw out the fact that it was a big win, it was a huge win, so the ring should be designed accordingly,” O’Hara said. “Michael said it best when he said he wanted a 10-table ring. I think everybody is going to be very pleased with the design. It is very clean, very classy, but at the same time it is very strong.

O’Hara forgot to mention gaudy, blinding and heavy as hell.

In other news…

[MySanAntonio.com]: NBA vs. NCAA hoops. The debate rages on.

[The Sports Point]: Even Moises Alou thinks Bartman deserves a break.

[NewsOK.com]: Reactions on Sean Sutton and the end of his Oklahoma State coaching career.

[MMAJunkie.com]: Don Frye and his moustache work a new MMA promotion.

[TheStar.com]: No Nazi sex scandal is going to keep Max Mosley from doing his job.

[The House of Smack]: “The 10 Lamest Sports…Ever.” How did Finger Jousting not make the list?

[Steroid Nation]: Florida man photoshops his head onto Bill Romanowski’s body.

[KansasCity.com]: Wilt Chamberlain could soon be coming to a post office near you.

[CBS3.com]: Sorry ladies; Andy Roddick is off the man meat market.

Categories
NFL General

Forget a pool; we want Super Bowl XLII in our backyard

This world is full of incredibly creative and talented people, but sometimes their skills get utilized in the wrong ways. For instance, here’s a clip of some dudes who could probably get any jobs they want when it comes to design, art, modeling, etcetera, etcetera. But instead they spent who knows how many hours recreating the Pats/Giants Super Bowl in their backyard. Good thing for time-lapse video.

Don’t get us wrong, we’d love to have something like that complimenting our backyard landscape, but with the spare bedroom looking like The Shoe, we’re kind of afraid it might be just a wee bit overboard.

Categories
NBA General

Charles Barkley is burning… his savings

Before the Super Bowl, the population of New York were the only people on the planet to even give the Giants a fighting chance against the undefeated Patriots. Of course, after the shocking upset, everyone suddenly became a Monday morning quarterback, claiming they knew all along Eli would march to victory. Well, Charles Barkley is no different from the rest of us, but he chooses to blame ESPN for his horribly expensive bet gone bad.

Good thing this weekend’s All-Star game isn’t in Las Vegas this year, the Chuckster might go bankrupt at this rate.

Links:

[The700Level.com]: Charles Barkley drops “about $400,000” on the Super Bowl

Categories
New York Giants

Tiki Barber "helped" the G-Men win the Super Bowl, just ask him


It’s not that we give a flip about the Patriots, but we just aren’t particularly fond of the Giants. So, when New York pulled off the upset on Super Bowl Sunday, we were hit with a tidal wave of mixed emotions. In the end, we found what gave us solace was 1.) knowing Jeremy Shockey was injured for the big game and could take absolutely no credit for the shocker, and 2.) Tiki Barber must have wanted to jump right in front of a moving bus. Well, believe it or not (we say not), Barber claims to be cool with missing out on getting a giant ring. But, at the same time, it sounds to us like he’s expecting one in the mail at any moment.

I feel great joy for them because I know in a lot of ways I helped a lot of guys on that team,” Barber said. “I know Brandon was someone who benefited from me being there; even criticizing someone is a way of getting them to think about themselves.

After all, it was Barber’s stern words for Tom Coughlin that got the ball rolling. But Tiki doesn’t need to tell you that because apparently he’s not the only one drinking his own Kool-Aid.

Last summer, a current Giants veteran, who is a member of Coughlin’s advisory board of players, confirmed the effectiveness of Barber’s outspokenness in an e-mail message. Under the subject line of “Miss U,” the message read:

“You would be happy to know all your work paid off for us. Tom has been unbelievably cool this year. Took us bowling last night instead of meetings and just been joking around and busting on guys all the time. You would be impressed by his transformation.

And Eli Manning’s MVP trophy; Tiki might be responsible for that too.

I asked Barber if he thought his criticism of Manning helped prod him out of a shell. “I don’t know, cause Eli doesn’t pay attention, ” Barber said laughing. “In this case, it made him stand up and I guess become aware.

Links:

[Awful Announcing]: Tiki Barber Finally Says What We All Know He Was Thinking
[NYTimes.com]: For Barber and Giants, a Parting, Then an Embrace

Categories
General Sports

"Chunk of Love" – You can say that again!

Shaq is totally confusing us. One minute he’s on the bench with the Heat, the next he’s heading to Phoenix for a physical. And sandwiched in-between the two, Shaq strangely spent some time as a horse jockey. (Poor horse.) Apparently, he didn’t stick with that career endeavor because there was some serious jealousy and hostility going on in the locker room. Turns out the horses aren’t the only ones hung like horses.

Categories
NFL General

The Pats are bummed, but Nevada sports books: You are the biggest losers!


Besides Eli Manning going down in history as a Super Bowl MVP – we’re still shaking our heads in disbelief – a whole lot of other people found themselves in unexpected position following Sunday’s shocker. Mainly bookies that lost a ton o’ greenbacks when the Patriots didn’t pull through with perfection.

Nevada sports books lost a record $2.6 million on Super Bowl bets when the Giants defeated the Patriots 17-14.

Nevada Gaming Control Board analyst Frank Streshley said large amounts were bet on the money line that the Giants would win outright. Payouts on those bets were as much as 4-to-1 because the Patriots were such heavy favorites.

Sports books handled just over $92 million on the game. That was the third-highest amount ever, but down for the second straight year.

Of course, the easiest money made all weekend was our little wager that New Yorkers couldn’t celebrate without committing random acts of vandalism. Yup, somebody’s finally getting Rock Band!

Dozens of young New York Giants fans jumped on the hoods, trunks and tops of cars and buses along the parade route through lower Manhattan yesterday, partly marring an otherwise joyous event designed to celebrate the football team’s Super Bowl victory.

At least four different incidents were caught on videotape around the intersection of Reade Street and Broadway.

During one of them, youngsters ganged up on a yellow taxi and smashed its windshield with their elbows despite a woman’s efforts to pull them off the car.

Links:

[KTVU.com]: Super Bowl Upset Costs Bookies
[NewsDay.com]: Arrests for vandalism made during Giants parade

Categories
NFL General

Terry Bradshaw sets the stage for a good ol’ "That’s what she said"

When we first heard that Terry Bradshaw dropped an F-bomb during the Super Bowl pregame show, we were like “Whoa! Dude! How’d we miss that?” Then we realized that FOX‘s coverage started at like 3:30 a.m., so then we were like “Whoa! Dude! How’d we miss that?” *Sigh* We really have no lives.

Hey, it could have been a whole lot worse.