Well…I have been thinking about this since the race yesterday where Danny Wheldon was killed…and I can’t shake the feelings that the world is a little darker today without Danny in it….I always enjoyed watching him race and seeing his huge smile when he won Indy….to have him leave behind a young family just makes it that much worse…as I said earlier it brought back feelings I had in 1966 when the first driver a 13 year old kid had ever idolized was killed in an unimportant F2 race in Hockenheim, Germany. Jimmy Clark, “The Flying Scotsman” died when a tire came apart and his car went off into the forest that lined the track. I don’t know what else to say except rest in peace, Danny….
Category Archives: Sports
Haven’t done a sports one in a while….
Well….it’s been a couple of weeks or so since I did one on sports so I guess it’s time to go over a few things….one really cool thing that happened this weekend was all four of the teams that I regularly follow won..Michigan, the Tigers, the Lions, and Man U…but the greatest one was the Michigan win where they scored the winning touchdown with 2 seconds to go…and they beat Notre Dame which was just a huge bonus….and then we have the Tigers who have won 11 in a row and are 11 1/2 games up with the magic number being 6…and they are making me smile when I see them play…the Lions even survived their huge mistakes on defense to beat Tampa….but they should have beaten them by at least three touchdowns….I can’t wait to see how they do this week….
But, right now..or in about an hour…Man U plays a match in the Champions league against a team I’ve never heard of so it may be another rout…8-0 would be nice with another hat trick by Rooney or Chicharito….maybe more later….or maybe not…I did get 5 resumes out today….and I’m feeling better so maybe things are looking up? Oh, and I caught up with this one so maybe things are getting better…
How about a little more sports?
Well….it was a strange day in Michigan sports yesterday and I thought I’d comment a bit….first, the Michigan football game was a chance to see if the Brady Hoke era is going to be better than ole Rich Rod and, at first glance, they do look better but I still cringe every time they are on defense…I think Michigan did figure out later in the game that you can’t give a good quarterback time to set up and throw…once they started to bring the blitz on almost every play, Western’s offense stalled…and scoring two touchdowns with the defense in one game was a neat little bonus. The big thing yesterday, though, was the Tigers come from behind victory over the Sox with two homers in the bottom of the ninth…coming back from being down 8-1 to win it 9-8….6 1/2 games up on Cleveland and still playing….it has been a fun summer watching them some…I think this is the first year in a long time that I have actually been looking forward to seeing the games…
No Red Wings or Lions today….
Gonna do one on sports in a little while…
Well…wasn’t planning on doing two of these today so the prospect of three is a welcome surprise….I’ll be back later to talk about some sports….even soccer just to warn you..
Okay…had to read the rest of the online papers and now I’m ready to go with sports for a little while…I am going to start with soccer since the EPL is now in full swing and my team, Manchester United, is at the top of the standings and looking like they are going to be the one to beat again this year with their 8-2 pummeling of Arsenal this past weekend…there are lots of new faces on the team that I haven’t seen before and the youngsters seem to be taking over which looks like a good thing. And, Wayne Rooney is looking better than I’ve seen in a long time…I’m not sure if they even need Berbatov anymore….Oh, I did find out something about Rooney that I thought had happened…he spent 50K on hair transplants over the off season…looks kind of strange to see him with hair…
Next….I have been getting sucked in to watching baseball again with the Tigers 6 games in front and playing well….I get nervous when Valverde comes in for the last inning, even though he has saved 40 games in a row….there is always some drama that happens that he works out of but sometimes it’s not pretty. I think they did well to get some help for Verlander when they traded for Doug Fister from Seattle…he looked great in his last start but I find it weird to have someone who 6 foot 9 playing baseball….I’ve always thought of baseball as the refuge for guys like me…just normal height…..I will keep watching and hoping we make the playoffs and they get off Leyland’s back…
What can you say about the Lions? I’ve been hoping for a good team since I was little…that was the last time they were any good….well…they did make the playoffs once in the 90′s I think….I do have to temper my enthusiasm a little and I should know that they will probably disappoint me by not living up to their potential….but, Stafford has looked remarkable in the first three preseason games and someone mentioned in the paper the other day that if we go back to the last four games of last season, the Lions have won 7 in a row…..is it okay to hope just a little? It would be so cool to finally see them in the playoffs with a real chance to win….
I was going to do a Red Wings part of this one….okay, I think I will….it was really hard to see Kris Draper and Chris Osgood retire this summer…they were two of my favorite Wings and such underrated players….It is nice that they will both have places with the Wings in management and again shows the class of the entire organization….I wonder if it is the Ilitches that make both the Tigers and Wings such class organizations….if I ate fast food, I’d want to go out to Little Ceasars to support the family for what they’ve done for Detroit and our teams…I am going to savor this season a pay close attention when Nick Lidstrom plays since this will probably be his last one….it will be quite weird to not have number 5 on defense…but I guess things do have to change…
USA, USA, USA….
Well…just finished up with one of the most exciting soccer matches I have ever seen….the USA women just beat Brazil in PK’s after overtime…and they scored the final goal to send it to PK’s in the second minute of added time after the two 15 minute overtimes….the latest goal ever scored int he history of the sport…men or women…I am now really excited for the next one…the semifinal in a couple of days….but the refs almost jobbed us with disallowing a PK save that was perfectly legal and sending one of our women off with a red card….and it was not even much of a foul…but a win is a win and I am a little concerned that there will be a letdown in the next game….but, I am going to enjoy this one for a while….go USA!
Nick wins another one…
Well….I forgot that the NHL awards were on last night…they were on Versus, after all, and I hate that channel with all of my being since I missed almost half of the Stanley Cup playoffs that were on it. What are the people that run the NHL thinking when they moved any games to that little channel? But that’s not what this is about…I just found out that Nick Lidstrom won the Norris trophy for the leagues best defenseman last night for the seventh time in his 20 year career, tying him for second on the all time list! I feel so fortunate to have watched him for his entire career and to have him back with the Wings for one more season….I have to agree with the team mates who have called him the “perfect person” since he is as good off the ice as he is on it….so, congrats, Nick, let’s do it again this year!
Let’s go Red Wings!
Well…this has got to be one of the most exciting days in sports for us folks here in Michigan with our Wings taking on the Sharks in Cali later today…I don’t know if I thought this day was possible when they started out with three losses but the comeback has been one of the most nerve-wracking, exciting, examples of teamwork I have ever seen. We love our Wings, but this performance, win our lose tonight, will keep me smiling throughout the summer but will be tinged with some sadness because we all know that it will be Drapes last season, and possibly Nick’s too. It is so great that I will be able to see this one and have the chance to listen to Ken and Mickey one more time…or maybe a lot more times, who knows? I will be back to add to this one as the day goes on and I get even more geeked than I am right now…don’t know if that is possible….
Okay…I think you’ve figured out by now that I won’t be doing a political one today….oh, there was one thing that I wanted to comment on…John McCain had an editorial in the Washington Post today where he calls…nope…going to make this a new one…look up
One thing I failed to mention was the fact that this will probably be Ozzie’s last year with the Wings, too, and I know that many fans never really warmed to him…but, you win two cups, doesn’t that deserve respect? I think so…more later…it’s later….this is going to be an all Red Wings night with Tuesday’s game being replayed at 6 and then a full hour long Red Wings Live at 8…then the game at 9…I hope I remember it since I’m going to get started with K for HH and that is going to make it a long night and a Friday I’m not looking forward to….but you do have to pay to play…
The Red Wings Sweep…
Well…should have gotten to this one earlier in the day but, as you know, my brain has not been working as well as it should and I’m not sure of the reason….I really hope it’s not the slow decline that is supposed to come with age….it could be staying up late to watch the Wings or it could be the couple of cocktails…or I could be dying and I don’t know it…wouldn’t that be ironic…eat right, take care of yourself, get plenty of exercise and die anyway….okay, don’ know how this one got away from me…let’s get back to the Wings. It looked close for most of the game last night even playing without Hank and Frantzen but then the Wings had some hockey luck and a couple of good bounces and put the game away with about 4 minutes left. We did get some reasonable goaltending from Howard but he still let in three which is something we won’t get away with in the next round. Finishing our series first with a sweep is going to help with the injuries since we should get about 8 days off before the next round starts…but any time we have that long of a layoff I feel a little concerned that we’ll have to shake off the rust and the second round teams very seldom let you get away with that. On that note, I’m going to go through hockey withdrawal over the next couple of days and Netflix should be the tonic to help me cope. On to the second round!!
One last thing…it was just such a cool sight to see guys that were pounding on each other a few minutes earlier shake hands in the center of the rink after the game and even cooler was the salute the fans gave the Coyotes since it may have been their last game in Phoenix…possibly moving back to Winnipeg where they used to be the Jets…
Let’s Go Red Wings! 3-0
Well…if you read this morning’s post, you’ll remember that I promised to do a Wings update today and this is it…I forgot to do the one I promised after the third game but it probably wouldn’t have been that good anyway the way my brain has been working lately…so, I’ll give it a try now and see what happens. The boys are up 3-0 with the last game being one of the best I’ve seen them play this year…and Phoenix is becoming pretty desperate with being so far behind, hitting Nick a couple of times that looked a lot like cheap shots…it’s one thing that Phoenix doesn’t understand, though, when you start messing with Nick or Pavel, the rest of the team just steps up even more and it showed with two goals in the first three minutes in the last game. I am a little disappointed that Hank has been out for the whole series but the rest of the guys have stepped it up; especially Pavel who I would pay to see practice…just one of the best forwards in the game today and I’d take him over Ovechkin or Crosby any day…..I do have mixed feeling about today’s game, though, since G has tickets for Friday’s game if there is one, and I predicted they would win in five; that would leave me with no hockey to watch this weekend….that said….sweep, sweep, sweep, let’s get the brooms out boys!
Red Wings update 2-0
Well…this one should not have been as close as it was…the Wings won 4-3 but when they were up 4-1, they just about quit playing and went into cruise mode…just like they’ve done all year but today they were fortunate that they upped their level of play just enough to win at the end. I think the refs were trying to help Phoenix get back into in with the bogus calls for two penalties on us that gave them two scores. We almost lost Frantzen again and he ended up with 23 stitches in his face from getting slammed into the boards…I don’t understand why Kronwall didn’t make Doan pay for it later in the game but I guess it’s okay…don’t want to lose any more players after losing Hank. Pavel put on a show for us again today with a shot that no one else but he could make…and the rebound was hammered home by Helm….good to see him get another playoff goal. Now we move on to Phoenix for Monday’s game and it is going to be a chore since they don’t start until 10:30….looks like nap time Monday aft…Go Wings!