Another Pre-Labor Day Sports Update Part 1

NBA

I’m not entirely sure I want to write this.  On the other hand, I can’t resist.  (On the other hand, you should have seen the stuff I deleted after two editing passes.)  There was breaking news last weekend that would affect the sports world that I ignored in my previous update last week.  I was done with what I meant to write about and didn’t want to hold it back to wait on a developing story.  I was also hoping it would just go away.  No such luck.  I’m not commenting on the news event (the shooting), just the sporting reaction. 

Before the NBA post season started, a WNBA player announced her retirement to dedicate her time to social justice.  She was roundly applauded.  However, when an NBA player said he wouldn’t play and didn’t think it was appropriate that the league play at all, ESPN couldn’t stutter out a counter-argument fast enough.  “No, no, no!  You must play! (We need the content!)”  So, they played.  (No, I’m not going to the trouble of naming the players mentioned.  Who cares who they are?)

A couple of days after the shooting, the NBA players suddenly heard about it and decided to do something (or were, more likely, told to).  Two teams decided they wouldn’t play their scheduled game.  Then in a player meeting, Lebron James and his Lakers, along with the Clippers (and maybe the Bucks), voted to end the season.  (Lebron just didn’t want to keep playing and lose in the finals again as usual.)  The other teams wanted to play and overruled them. 

To save Lebron’s face, they negotiated to take a couple of days off instead and then resume play, but only if racism was ended in this country.  Thankfully that happened, so they started playing again.  If electing a black president twice didn’t solve racism, I’m not sure how a bunch of basketball players quitting the NBA playoffs was going to do it either.  I’m sure the WNBA players wearing shirts with fake bullet holes didn’t help.  (That was real sign of good taste ladies.) 

The NBA had just had a racist incident right before all this happened.  A black player had racially insulted a white player on court.  Yeah, I’m shocked too.  I didn’t know there were any white players in the league either.  He’s European of course.  This led to the black player apologizing to the white player on court before the next game and the white player being forced to accept it.  The white player also scored over 40 points, had a triple double, and hit the game winning shot.  (No, I’m still looking up who the players are.  I don’t know them and I don’t care.)  If he’d used a gay slur, the black player would have had to have apologized for that too (it’s happened), so that’s sort of consistent?   

ESPN Radio

Just last week, I was crowing about a couple of flaming liberals being replaced by a hard sports guy over the air.  Well, that small victory didn’t last long.  ESPN Radio was curiously rooting on the cessation of the NBA season.  (So was I.)  Perhaps their poor ratings for the post season to this point were motivating them.  Maybe they wanted the season to end before it became more embarrassing. 

The new guy was hyperbolically calling this break, “Historic,” and comparing it to other noteworthy sporting events with black athletes like Jackie Robinson, Jessie Owens, and Mohamed Ali.  ESPN figured the news story was worth more than the teams actually playing.  We’ll never know.  Most of the players just wanted to get paid.  The Disney executives wanted content for ESPN.  I guess China wanted them to keep playing too.  They pretty much set policy for the NBA.  As big a sports fan as I am, I’ve definitively been able to put them and everyone involved in perspective now.  That said, I can’t wait to see what new protests they’ll come up with next.       

NHL

Of course, hockey had to get back into the social justice act.  They went from their slogan being, “We skate for black lives,” to “We skate for victory (and other stuff)” last week, back to black lives.  I don’t know if any games were postponed, but at least they stood for the Anthems (American and Canadian).  The game I watched on Saturday between the Bruins and the Lightning was pretty good.  It was game that best exemplified the old maxim, “I was watching a fight when a hockey match broke out.”  (I don’t have any commentary for the game.  I’m just so happy I finally found an occasion to use that line.)

On Sunday during a game, the NHL announced the winner of their Hockeyville competition.  It’s $150,000 given to a minor league hockey facility along with a preseason exhibition NHL game.  I’d heard that El Paso was one of the four finalists.  At work, an e-mail went out on Friday asking people to vote.  I admit that I was sort of expecting El Paso to win, since their pitch video referenced the Wal-Mart shooting.  Still, there was some natural tension as the commissioner took the winner out of the envelope to give it to El Paso.  Having been there for a game, I can say that no other fans were more deserving and no other facility was more in need.  The arena owners will apparently first allocate the money to fixing the hole in the roof.

NFL

Just a little note, on a Mexican station on Sunday I ran across a Dallas Cowboys training camp broadcast.  The Cowboys are training at AT&T Cowboy Stadium right now.  The Mexican network had their own announcers there dressed in rather natty sponsored Cowboy polo shirts.  I’ve heard someone else say that the Cowboys are Mexico’s team.  There might be some agreement there right up until they start kneeling for the Mexican national anthem. 

 

Part Two

Sketches: Somebody else's sketches for a change

Yes, this is some more flogging for Ilya Kuvshinov.  I showed his Eternal artbook to a co-worker.  She loved it and was inspired to make a couple of sketches.

She said she liked his drawing with the penguin, so I drew a fairly quick sketch of it and gave it to her.  After seeing her coloring, I suggested she color it.  She basically re-drew my sketch and added the color and made it way better.

Here's an original by her.  Isn't it adorable?

I suggested we both draw the same picture to see how we worked.  She picked a Pinterest image of a Tiefling (or maybe a Succubus or something else with a demonic tint.)  I was amazed that she drew basically random lines on the paper and then connected them into a great drawing.  

   

My attempt used standard drawing construction techniques and, of course, came up crap.  (Though still kind of cute.)  She was at least impressed I could knock this out quickly and turn construction lines into something coherent.

Sketches: More of My Colored Ilya Kusvshinov

More Ilya Kuvshinov sketches with coloring.

I thought this one turned out well, but the colors are pretty light.

This one might have turned out the best of the bunch, but I kind of wish I'd made my own color choices instead of going with the original colors.

Ooh, I shouldn't have used a charcoal stub on this one.  I keep trying to use charcoal.  Every so often, I make a nice drawing, but mostly it's a disaster, but I keep trying.

Sketches: Colored Ilya Kusvshinov

I feel like I'm cheating, since I'm essentially re-posting my drawings, but this time they're in color.  Unfortunately, the colored pencils I'm using were kind of light.  (I guess that's my fault for not pressing hard enough.)  At least, I adjusted the contrast on the pencil scans to make them darker.  (Also, my inking skills are as questionable as the pens I've been using to ink.)

Once again, I'm trying to get the most out of my investment an Ilya Kuvshinov art book.  When I sat down to color, I suddenly realized that he mostly used light pastels and straight black and white coloring.  I mostly went with something close to his choices, but had to diverge in places.  Maybe I should have gone with my own choices.

This one may have turned out the best using Ilya's color scheme.

The original was black and white.  I definitely made some bad choices for mine.  This was the last one I did and I rushed it.

The color choices I made on this one turned out much better.

Pre-Labor Day Sports Update Part 2

Part 1

ESPN Radio

I have to take a moment to gloat about this.  Usually when I mention something that pissed me off on sports radio, it involves these two a-holes on in the morning on ESPN Radio.  Even with a guest host in for one of them, it was just as bad.  The regular and the guest explained how ESPN’s audience had dropped during their wokness a couple of years ago (the Colin Kaepernick incident) and the current nonsense (all driven by presidential politics).  People just didn’t want social lecturing with their sports.  Well, they explained, you’re GD going to get it anyway!  You’re all a bunch of racists for not watching and listening to this.  What’s wrong with you people in the audience!

I could barely believe what I was hearing.  Apparently, neither could management.  A few weeks later, these guys were finally taken off the air.  They gave them a final show which was unsurprisingly salty and bitter.  I can understand.  Certainly they thought they were good soldiers in The Agenda’s war against America.  This was nothing but a betrayal for them.  The new replacement show has just focused on sports as far as I’ve heard.

One down, but there’s still plenty of SWJ sports jerkoffs out there.  One is on Fox Sports Radio, an infiltrator reject from ESPN Radio.  I was disgusted enough by ESPN once to listen to him.  (It’s a lower power station and hard to listen to.)  He started off by condescendingly explaining to his audience that they’re all a bunch of racists, NFL ratings are going to go up this season even with the kneeling, that sports will now be all social justice, that Trump was going to lose, and that you’ve all lost and you’re going to have to get over it and embrace everything.  I’m kind of hoping a BLM mob breaks into his studio someday and kills him on the air because he’s white and rich.  

Local sports talk isn’t much better.  Steve Kaplowitz had on his baseball expert Jay Jaffe last week on KROD’s Sportstalk.  Jaffe was thrilled about Fernando Tatis Jr. doing so well, because baseball was “too white” to be popular.  I’ve had a theory that soccer won’t be really popular in this country until the sport is dominated by large black men.  This Jaffe guy more-or-less sideways agrees with me apparently.  Liberal thinking is that all athletic scholarships and all high-paying sports jobs should go to black men.    

In a similar but less racist fashion on an ESPN baseball broadcast, one of their experts commented that Mike Trout had had a bad game that night.  This was why baseball wasn’t popular: their star players don’t always perform well every night.  It’s like he’d never seen a ball game before.  So much for professional sports commentary.    

Monster Truck Jam

Here, we’ll get into motorsports.  NBC broadcast a Monster Truck Jam this Saturday.  I tuned in out of curiosity, but ended up enjoying it.  It’s quite the spectacle.  The gigantic trucks do big jumps, balance on this front wheels, balance on two side wheels, roll over, and bleach smoke and fire.  It’s a real crowd-pleaser.  There’s a natural toy tie-in for the kids.  In person, it must be awe inspiring.

NHRA

Here’s another event that probably works a lot better in person.  At least you’re saving your hearing by watching at home.  There were still a restricted number of fans allowed at the Indianapolis event and FOX Sports continually emphasized masks, social distancing, and cleaning hands as they ruthlessly promoted the Cold Agenda.  If you’re broadcasting sports you’re either pushing the Cold or BLM. 

FOX at least stuck with the whole event this time, though it ran over three and a half hours.  My favorite, Leah Pruett, did a bit better at the event than previous ones I’d watched.  The big showdown turned out to be the Pro Stock Motorcycles between a first time finalist and Angelle Sampey, who hadn’t won in a couple of years.  Angelle took it even after an impromptu repair at the start line before the race.

  

NASCAR

NBC finally broadcast a race last week, as opposed to dumping it off on NBCSN.  It was the first time with the road course at Daytona for the NASCARs.  Except for a couple of drivers who had run the 24-hour sportscar race, none of the rest of the field had ever driven it.  There wasn’t even any qualifying or practice. 

The race turned out to be pretty clean and entertaining.  My judgment might be a bit biased since Chase Elliot won.  Even better, there was little in the way of social justice, Bubba, nooses, or even cold coverage during the race.  There were fans in attendance, I think.  The stands are so cavernous, a small number of fans can get lost in the picture.  Camera shots panning by occasionally showed a crowd in a section, but then didn’t on the next pass by.

 

Indy 500

It was a couple of months late, but here was my favorite race of the year, Indy.  Inexplicably, there were no fans present for the race.  NHRA has been racing in Indianapolis the last two months and had fans there.  NASCAR has been allowing fans at their races for an even longer period of time.  IMS is so huge, you could put thousands of people there and not have any of them within shouting distance of each other.  I have heard no explanation for this decision.

Ask Roger Penske.  He bought the place from Tony George and the Hulman family earlier this year.  He might have reconsidered if he could have seen the future.  Penske had made a bunch of fan-centered renovations to IMS after the purchase.  According to a newspaper article I read this morning, so much of most teams’ sponsorships were tied to this race, they had to run it at some point no matter what. 

I was watching the race with dad.  We missed most of the pre-race to go out and get a pizza.  (Certainly, I’ll make that trade.)  We were also watching the race on dad’s new 40” TV.  Actually, last week’s Daytona race was the first sport we’d watched on it, but I think this race was more impressively displayed on the bigger screen. 

The first thing we saw was Ryan Hunter-Reay making a speech before the driver introductions.  He said how much they missed the fans and couldn’t wait to have them back next year.  This would be a continuing theme for the afternoon.  Danica Patrick was admittedly looking good in the pre-race as a commentator.  I’m not sure what’s currently going on in her love life, which is what most of her fans are interested in.    

A probably local doctor sang the Anthem with another doctor accompanying him on piano.  It was very well done.  The Air Force Thunderbirds made two flyovers, one during the Anthem and another with an air show starburst after Back Home in Indiana.  (The Air Force and the Space Force, both sponsored cars today.)  Up on the victory podium, Penske again officially said how much they wished the fans were there and gave the command to start engines.  Is it just me, or did the Corvette Stingray pace car look a whole lot like a Ferrari?  Heresy!

There were actually some enterprising fans at the track.  There was a large tailgate going in the parking lot.  One fan had rented a tree for $400 at a house that had a clear view of a corner.  Yes, he even put up a treehouse to sit in.  The track director had made an unprecedented proclamation that any fan who had a consecutive race attendance streak going could still count this race as long as they watched it somewhere. 

You can maybe tell that I was taking notes for this event.  However, I’m going to condense what I wrote.  (I can’t believe I’ve already written this much.)  Marco Andretti won the pole, but Scott Dixon quickly passed him to take the lead.  He would dominate much of the first half of the race.  The first wreck happened on Lap 6 with a right front brake explosion, which caused the tire to catch on fire.  The next accident happened on Lap 25 with a car slapping the wall and catching on fire. 

The current Indycar design features an enclosing windshield.  When I first saw it, I’d worried a bit about how easily drivers would be able to get out quickly in the event of a fire, and right off the bat, here were two fires.  The answer was unfortunately, not easily.  Track safety officials are going to need to be real quick getting to damaged cars.

Teams were testing out various strategies after the wrecks, but there are no winning strategies this early in the race, only losing ones.  Around Lap 90, there was a spin on a restart at the front of pit lane.  Another driver lost control trying to avoid the spin and slammed very hard into the pit wall.  Amazingly, he was okay. 

By Lap 103, Dixon and Alexander Rossi were swapping the lead.  They were taking turns breaking the air to increase their gas mileage.  Unfortunately on pit road, Rossi collided with Takuma Sato and was assessed a penalty that sent him to the back of the field.  Rossi made some impressive moves, but ended up being the next wreck on Lap 144.  Now legitimate fuel mileage strategies would come into play.

The winning move of the race happened during side-by-side coverage during a commercial break.  It seemed fairly innocent.  Taku made a nearly uncontested pass of Dixon on the front stretch with 26 laps to go.  Neither were leading at the time, but the two cars that were, were going to have to pit.  Dixon’s team was convinced Sato was going to be too tight on fuel to keep up a fast pace up front.  He’d have to slow down to finish the race.

Before 10 laps to go, Dixon made move to retake the lead on the front stretch.  Sato held a line that kept him from easily doing it.  This may have been a feint to get Sato to either block and be penalized or to get him to use up more fuel.  Lapped traffic then came into play.  Sato had to slow down, which may have helped his mileage.  Dixon, though, was not catching up. 

With five laps to go, Indy had its final twist.  The worst crash of the day saw a car plowing into the tire barrier at the end of the pit lane wall.  A live camera shot actually caught the end of the wreck.  The driver was sent to the hospital, but he did pull himself out of the car and step away, before promptly sitting down on the track.  The hero of this race was undoubtedly chassis manufacturer Dallara and track safety improvements.     

 

Takuma Sato won the race under caution.  Indycar does not have a Green/White/Checker Overtime rule and there were too few laps left to red flag the race and restart it.  Moreover, the tire barrier would probably need a lengthy repair.  This was Taku’s second Indy win.  Over in Japan, the people there would be waking to the news of his victory.  The new Victory Lane elevator was used for its first Indy 500 winner.  At the top, a heavily bearded David Letterman gave Taku a big hug and blessed him for giving him another victory as a team owner.    

It was another great race.  The unnecessary lack of fans only spoiled the ambiance, not the drama.  Takuma and the other drivers deserved a round of live applause.  Honestly, I’m not sure when I’m going to be writing again.  I was mostly just venting for these two posts.  That’s not really worth my time to write about.  We’ll see what happens next.  Hopefully, current events don’t step in to ruin any more of this year’s sports.

Pre-Labor Day Sports Update Part 1

I think I meant to do this after Labor Day, but with the Indy 500 this weekend, this seemed like a better time.  Admittedly, this is going to be more sports social commentary than recapping the action.  I have not been taking notes while watching sports.  I’m still on hiatus from writing. 

MLB 

Since the last time I wrote, my schedule has changed back to working at night, instead of during the day.  I’m personally ambivalent about the change, but it has allowed me to watch quite a bit more baseball, which is an upgrade in that respect.  The downside is that I don’t know what to do with myself during the day before I go to work.  I had no idea I was writing so much before.  Apparently, that was most of what I used to do.  Instead, I’ve been drawing.  I’ve already posted some sketches.  I’ll be posting some more after this.

After the debacle of MLB’s opening weekend social justice extravaganza, they mostly settled down to just broadcasting the games.  They’ve tried some unsubtle BLM sign placement at times.  One was a white guy in a BLM t-shirt strategically placed for a constant camera view during a FOX national game.  The A’s have put a BLM logo on their mound.  (Most teams have put additional advertising there.)  The damage has likely already been done to their ratings.  At least MLB has been smart enough to basically stop the messaging.  The NBA’s continued BLM flogging is killing their playoff TV viewing.

I’ve been able to watch parts of several games every night at work.  One night, I saw four games, including two walk-off wins.  MLB.TV, MLB Network, FOX Sports AZ (Diamondbacks), FOX, ESPN, and FS1 are all showing games at night during the week.  When the season is over, it’s going to suck and get real boring. 

I’ll just comment on a couple of game items.  The “Slam” Diego Padres have been awesome lately.  They hit grand slams in four consecutive games.  No other team has ever done that.  A potential coincidence was that they were playing the hapless Rangers at the time.  Fernando Tatis Jr. caused a small unwritten rules controversy by hitting one of those slams on a 3-0 count with the team already up big late.  I have no opinion.

On the weekend, a Mexican station has been showing games on Saturday and Sunday.  Unfortunately, the Sunday game usually conflicts with seeing dad, but I’ve been able to see the Saturday night games.  Tonight, I saw my first Braves home game.  They’ve already had to change the name on their stadium.  I guess their sponsoring bank got bought out.  Their mascot, Blooper, is the only one I’ve seen working a game.  You could see him in the background heckling Bryce Harper of the Phillies whenever he came to bat.

WWE

Still the most entertaining sport this summer.  If you say that it’s not a competition and that the outcomes are predetermined, why do you watch the NFL?  The closest the WWE has come to any social justice messaging was having a bunch of BLM-like thugs attack their performance center in a riot.  I wasn’t able to quite follow that storyline, but I think some wrestler was behind it.  They have moved their matches to an arena with a bunch of video screens in the stands with video camera views of fans in the audience.  Interesting concept. 

MLS

I’m certain this will be the only time I ever mention Major League Soccer.  They allowed a few fans at one of their matches and proceed to kneel in front of them during the Anthem.  The crowd promptly booed and then chanted, “USA!  USA!”  Afterward in an interview, a player referred to their own fans as “disgusting.”  Apparently, they’d embarrassed them in front of the other team.  Meanwhile, I’ve noticed in Mexican soccer, they’ve superimposed fan cam videos in the stands for their broadcasts.

NHL

Hockey initially had their players standing for the Anthem, which included the Canadian Anthem.  Then NBC got a hold of them demanded social justice.  A couple of players kneeled at a game.  One confused player even did it during the Canadian Anthem.  Canadian viewers likely had a confused reaction, “What’s up with that, eh?” 

During an intermission period of a game, they had a black actor/singer/whatever lecture all the players and viewing audience on how racist they all are and how disadvantaged he was.  This was certainly the case.  Here he was all rich and famous and me, and probably most of the people watching, didn’t know who the F he was. 

The NHL was flashing a “We skate for black lives” sign during games.  This weekend, they changed it to, “We skate for victory.”  I don’t know if there’s more to the message, if it means anything or is just a playoff marketing slogan.  In any case, they no longer seem to be pushing The Agenda.

UTEP

Briefly, I thought there was a possibility of seeing live Volleyball or even Women’s Soccer (damn, I’m desperate, aren’t I?).  Up until Friday, Conference-USA had not canceled their fall sports.  Perhaps me and Ron could maybe go to a game in El Paso and see UTEP volleyball.  (It’s not a total betrayal.  Their coach was a former Aggie assistant coach.  Their graduate assistant is a former Aggie star player.)  Unfortunately, under New Mexico’s current quarantine rules, I’d be under house arrest for two weeks if I went out-of-state to go (unless I could call it a business trip). 

By Friday, it didn’t matter.  Their conference went ahead and canceled volleyball and soccer.  Football, meanwhile, is still going forward.  The Miners have a full schedule, albeit including several FCS teams.  I don’t know if I’m desperate enough for live sports to go and see bad college football, but end the quarantine and who knows?  On a slightly related note, the El Paso Locomotive will be allowing a limited number of fans for their games in Southwest University Park.  For their sakes, here’s hoping there’s no kneeling.  Most of their players are international anyway.  Why would they care about American social issues?

Part 2

Artifacts: Mike's Classic Computer Museum

So here at work three of my co-workers alternate on being here from week to week.  (I'm here everyday, because I'm more essential.  Or, all of my work has to be done in person.  What's my job here in Data Processing?  I handle paper.)  Anyway, Mike taken his time at home to build some models and restore some classic computers. 

First up is a Mac SE.

Next to the Mac is a TRS-80 Model 4.  Mike found this one in a dumpster.

The juggler animation is displayed on an Amiga 500.  The Amiga was the computer of choice of our favorite anthropomorphic skunk, Sabrina.  The large keyboard is an Apple II+.  I learned BASIC on an Apple II in high school.  The keyboard on top of the Apple is an Atari 800 XL.

Also in this picture is a Mac Mini.  (I can't see it either, but I'll take Mike's word on it.)  He got it from his brother, who in turn got it from a teacher. 

And, there's a dog.

Mike also said that he has a working Pong game, unfortunately he didn't have a picture.  My friend, Ron, has a working Intellivision.  We got it to work for a bit, but then it may have overheated.  We haven't plugged it in since.   

Well I'm impressed.  Mike also has an impressive computer lab in a galley-like room in his home.  He also has a chemical lab.  Really.  I'd love to post some pictures and videos he's shown me from his experiments, but fear an FBI interview afterward.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Ports Okinawa, Hong Kong, Philippines, and SF

The Ranger's tour went to Okinawa.

They visited Hong Kong.

The carrier went to the Philippines. 

Finally, the Ranger headed back home for a warm welcome.

This is a bit of downer, but the yearbook ends with a remembrance of the crew members who died on the cruise.

These are the end pages showing the ship's full tour.

This also brings us to the end of these posts.  This book was a really tremendous artifact to have had.  After taking the pictures, I did give it to a co-worker.  She thought her father would be interested in it, as he was a sailor during this time period.  She reported back that he was enraptured looking at the book.  At one point, he did serve on board the Ranger on another tour.  He said he'd try to find a way to find Seaman Rhodes or his family with his veteran's contacts to pass it along. 

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Ports Japan

Much of the Ranger's tour was spent around Japan.