8:00 PM CSN Baltimore has video of Marcus Smith, a U.S. soldier who dressed as a minor league umpire to surprise his children at a Bowie Baysox game with a home visit from Afghanistan.
7:45 PM A Japanese Harley-Davidson motorcycle that was swept out to sea during last year's tsunami washed up on a shore in British Columbia last month. The bike's owner asked that the motorcycle be displayed at the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee as a memorial to the tsunami victims.
7:30 PM Buffalo Bills receiver David Clowneytweeted the results of his HIV test which came back negative. And to the critics of his decision to share his results, Clowney added: "Some people are Ridiculously stupid ... And can't see the bigger picture about things that are important in this world."
Although he’s been retired from professional wrestling since 1999, you’ll be happy to know that you can still keep tabs on The Ultimate Warrior — or just “Warrior,” I guess, through his blog, WARRIOR’S MACHETE. And what a magical treat it is. This week’s subject: Michael Jackson.
If you thought that a former pro wrestler might not have a lot to say about The King of Pop, you haven’t followed Warrior’s career. To call him a social conservative is putting it mildly; James Brian Hellwig, aka Dingo Warrior, aka Blade Runner Rock, was actually thrown out of the Young Republicans for being too radically conservative. After leaving wrestling, Warrior embarked on a career as a conservative public speaker; a career that pretty much ended in 2005 after his infamous “Queering don’t make the world work” comment during a speech at UConn.Read more…
Michael Jackson’s death has reverberated across the world, having untold and unexpected effects across the nation. For example, his death might be the best child support he could have ever offered as the children will “earn a tremendous amount of money over the next 12 to 18 months given the outpouring (of support through album purchases), and he won’t be spending.”
(”Beat it.”)
Even though Jackson once held the honorary chairmanship of an English soccer team, it’s unlikely David Beckham could have ever predicted that the passing of the King of Pop could likely mark the end of the ill-fated attempt by the Beckhams to take over America and raise the level of popularity of the sport on this side of the Atlantic.
When Michael Jackson died suddenly yesterday afternoon, media outlets the world over pored through their archives to find a unique angle on the pop icon’s death. Most of Jacko’s connections to real-world areas of interest like cars and sports were of the bizarre, whimsical variety (like his head-scratching speech to English soccer team Exeter FC). I mean, let’s face it, the guy was a human trainwreck, and we’re all gawking.
(Uhhhh…sure.)
But there’s one ongoing Michael Jackson storyline that could make some very serious waves in the world of sports. Anschutz Entertainment Group, the world’s largest owner of sports teams and venues (including the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings, the MLS’ Houston Dynamo and Los Angeles Galaxy, English soccer team Newscastle United, and stadia like the Staples Center), was also the company producing and bankrolling Jackson’s 50-concert “comeback tour.” Now, with no Jacko and no tour, AEG faces a whopping $500 million dollar insurance liability and over $85 million in ticket refunds. Sports fans -prepare to bend over and solve AEG’s problems for them.
As the world stops to mourn and eulogize for Michael Jackson (Iran? What Iran? Wake us up when Iran can moonwalk, pal!), we’d like to dial the Wayback Machine to 2002. Most of our readers had yet to be born - or maybe they had, we’re awful at math - so we’ll be the eyes and ears you never had, people.
(”Thumbs up for soccer! What’s soccer?”)
One of the weirdest things to happen in sports that year was Jackson’s appearance as the honorary chairman of the Exeter City Football Club. That’s in England, if you’re keeping score at home. In order to celebrate the beginning of the season, Jackson stepped to the microphone and delivered a speech (video after the break) that was vintage MJ, which may or may not be a good thing:
The Clippers’ selection of Blake Griffin with the first pick in the NBA Draft last night was a forgone conclusion, so most of the draft drama was centered around Spanish point guard sensation Ricky Rubio. Over the past couple of weeks, Rubio became one of the most fascinating prospects in draft history — he doesn’t want to play in a small market or a cold city, his agent didn’t let him work out against other humans (which led to the strange one-on-none workout in Sacramento), he still has a huge buyout in his European contract, and nobody can really agree about how good he really is (he could be the next Steve Nash or the next Dan Dickau, and neither scenario would be surprising).
In other words, Ricky seems to be rejecting Minneapolis as his future home. Any threat to not come to the NBA isn’t really financial leverage, since his contract is slotted based on his position in the draft. But he could be pulling this stunt to try and force a trade to a city that’s more to his liking, such as New York. He might also be wondering (like a lot of other people) why the Wolves took another point guard (Johnny Flynn) with the #6 pick. Here’s what Mr. Rubio told MARCA (via FANHOUSE):
“We are going to speak with the [staff] of Minnesota and see what’s happening, because, in some hours, we may be in Minnesota or in another place.”
He’s either expressing confusion over the Wolves’ intentions of keeping his son, or he’s basically telling them they better trade because there’s no way Ricky’s coming to play there.
After being drafted, ESPN’s Mark Jones asked Ricky to compare his game to that of a current NBA player. To which he simply replied: “I’m Ricky Rubio” (to the amusement of the MSG crowd). Scroll to the 3:20 mark of this video:
Surely I’m not the only person who thought of this when I saw the interview:
After Minnesota picked Flynn, it looked like Stephen Curry might fall to the Knicks, and it was no secret that he wanted to call MSG his home. But the Warriors didn’t get the memo and picked him, sending the Knicks fans on hand into depressed hysterics. It was only fitting that the boos rained down on Jordan Hill, who had no chance to win over the New York crowd in such a short period of time. At least he’s probably better than Renaldo Balkman.
The other strange development of the night was Brandon Jennings‘ last-minute decision to not attend the draft at the advice of his agent, who seemed uneasy about letting his client end up like Rashard Lewis, who famously slid way down the draft board while TV cameras watched his every emotion. Well, as it turns out, Jennings went 10th to the Bucks, then decided to show up a few picks later to get his photo op with David Stern. Now, if Jennings turns out anything like Lewis, he wouldn’t have cared when he was drafted.
HOOPSHYPE has a good recap of the draft up, and Kings fans are going to need to steer clear of hairdryers and bathtubs after reading that they’ve got the next Larry Hughes on their hands. The suit of the night, without a doubt, belonged to James Harden:
(Mustard suit + bowtie = smooth)
There were some other things going on in the sports world last night, including the resolution to one of the stupidest athlete spats in recent memory. With the Yankees heading to Queens for a weekend series with the Mets, the tensions between Francisco Rodriguez and Brian Bruney once again became back page news. But the NY DAILY NEWS reports that it was all settled last week, when Bruney sent a clubhouse attendant over the Mets clubhouse to apologize to K-Rod on his behalf. I was accused of some anti-Yankee bias in my original post about this matter, but really, c’mon, sending an attendant to apologize for you? How lame is that? I would’ve loved to see that exchange at K-Rod’s locker.
A lot of major league pitchers struggle, and a lot are sent to the minors to work through their troubles. But few actually go to their team and ask to be sent down, like the Pirates’ Ian Snell has done. Snell is 2-8 this year with a 5.36 ERA and awful 1.624 WHIP. He had actually been throwing better as of late, but said he thought it was best for the team to be sent down because he was bringing too much negativity to the team. I can’t decide if this is an alarming lack of confidence and perseverance on Snell’s part or a refreshing selfless decision done in the interest of helping his team and his own career. Regardless, Snell has actually been slightly better this year than last, when he had a 5.42 ERA and even more god-awful 1.765 WHIP, and he threw a full slate of 31 starts. Here’s what Snell told the PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE’s Dejan Kovacevic:
“I don’t want to point fingers and make excuses. I just made a better decision for myself, my career and my life.” I asked what he needs to do: “Nothing. You guys don’t understand it unless you played baseball. You don’t understand it, and the people at home don’t understand it. I’m just going down there, get my thoughts together and do well.”
I think he just needs a hug, not a stint in AAA.
Before we get to today’s links, I feel like taking a few minutes to watch the “Smooth Criminal” video again. There’s no doubt that Michael Jackson was a weird dude, and possibly a perv on such a level that he doesn’t deserve our grief. But is it so bad to spend a day remembering why we loved the guy? All that other stuff will come back around soon enough.
Now let’s get on with those links:
• Ever wonder who that lady is who gives the draft picks their hat before they walk over to meet David Stern? Wonder no more.
• Darko Milicic has been freed by the Grizzlies…and is going to the Knicks in a swap for Quentin Richardson. It’s crazy to think that Darko’s still just 24 years old, and Mike D’Antoni thinks he can resurrect Darko’s career (well, his career was never really alive).
• First, the Dolphins sold their stadium naming rights to Jimmy Buffett, and now Gloria Estefan has bought a piece of the team. I’m told there are currently no plans to start calling the team the “Sound Machine.”
• Vijay Singhattempted to bail accused swindler Allen Stanford out of jail, but was told he couldn’t because he isn’t an American, according to CNBC’s Darren Rovell. This is like the first time I’ve ever heard about Vijay being a really generous guy, and it’s to someone who probably stole a bunch of money from him.
• According to this AFP story, “Gay clocks wind-aided 9.75″ at the US Track and Field Championships. Miss California is unimpressed.
• Frank Thomassays he’s “close” to retiring, which will be news to the one person in the universe who doesn’t already think that Frank Thomas is retired. That person being Frank Thomas, of course.
• A man has now been arrested in connection with Karen Sypher’s plan to extort cash from Rick Pitino. Why was Lester Goetzinger so willing to help out in this scheme? Were sexual favors involved or something? Oh, actually, they were.
• Wimbledon’s in full swing, and a rising star you might want to keep an eye on (or both your eyes on, really) is Caroline Wozniacki out of Denmark. She’s the #9 seed and has advanced to the third round. Here she is enjoying some time off the court:
TMZ reports that Michael Jackson has died. The self-proclaimed King of Pop apparently suffered a cardiac arrest at his Los Angeles home Thursday afternoon.
The site says paramedics arrived at Jackson’s home but could not revive him. He was later taken to a hospital where further resuscitation proved unsuccessful. The 50-year-old entertainer leaves behind three children.
Team introductions are a chance for the home team to get fired up. However, the ORLANDO SENTINEL says that the Jacksonville Jaguars took a different approach yesterday when coming out for their game against the Tennessee Titans, actually setting their mascot on fire. Apparently Jaxson de Ville got a little too close to the pyrotechnics as the team charged out of the locker room, causing his stuffed ears to go up in flames.
Luckily, he was able to rush off the field and get put out before he did his full impersonation of Michael Jackson shooting a Pepsi commercial. (I guess that makes him the Jackson-Ville Jaguar. Get it?) But I think it’s safe to consider your mascot bursting into flames as a bad omen, and perhaps it was as the Jags blew a 14-3 halftime lead and fell to the Titans, 24-14.
Nothing like a UFC event to bring out the celebs, and last Saturday’s UFC 84 was no exception. Why, here’s someone whose star is shining so bright, they have to cover up so they don’t blind the other fans in attendance:
We’ll give you three guess as to who this mystery guest is.
