Welcome! This is an unapologetic, agenda-free zone. Just commentaries on current events that’ll move you to think, laugh, rage, and even cry.
Swimming This was the last day of competition. Michael Phelps insists it was his last too. Which constrains me to reprise what I wrote in this regard on the last day of competition at London 2012: He insists that he will now rest on his laurels, and who can blame him. But I fully expect… Read more.
Rugby Sevens I was too caught up in the excitement unfolding at the Swimming and Gymnastics venues last night to watch, let alone comment on, anything else. But I won’t pretend to have any real fondness for or understanding of this game, which is so barbaric it makes American Football look effeminate. Apropos of which, women… Read more.
Diving I indicated in my Day 2 commentary that there would be no reason to comment on this sport, unless a country disrupts China’s gold rush. Well, in the wee hours this morning, not one but two countries did just that in Men’s Synchronized 3m Springboard. Jack Laugher and Chris Mears of Great Britain won… Read more.
Here in part is what I wrote in 2009, when pictures of Olympic champion Michael Phelps toking on a bong that would make Snoop Dogg green with envy went viral: Of course, with all they have invested in, and can still make off, this greatest Olympian of all time, I suspect advertisers and USA Swimming and/or the… Read more.
Michael Phelps made quite a show of declaring his intent to retire after the 2012 London Olympics. Here, for example, is a definitive exchange he had with Anderson Cooper on the May 8, 2012 edition of 60 Minutes, the most widely watched news program in the United States: Cooper: What happens if your mom, you… Read more.
My regard for the media is such that it would not surprise me if they tried to hype the eating of a ham sandwich as an historic event. This essentially is what I think of the way they hyped the latest attempt by Diana Nyad to become the first person to swim from Cuba to Florida… Read more.
Swimming As much as I hate to, I feel obliged to begin the last of my Swimming commentaries on a sour note: I led the chorus of those questioning the remarkable improvement that enabled 16-year-old Chinese Ye Shiwen to blow away the field in the women’s 400m individual medley on Day 1. In the interest… Read more.
Here is what I published within hours after Ye Shiwen of China blew away the field in the women’s 400 individual medley on Day 1: [T]houghts of juiced-up East Germans came to mind when Sun Yang’s first-ever win for a Chinese male swimmer in the men’s 400m freestyle (shattering the Olympic record) was followed in… Read more.
Over the next 16 days, Olympic competition will be held in 32 sports – from Archery to Wrestling. But even though I shall be indiscriminate in my viewing (on TV and the Internet), I shall be very discriminating in my commenting here. (Incidentally, can somebody explain the appeal of Badminton, which seems to defy gravity by… Read more.
I am such a big fan of the Summer Olympics that I even tune in to watch competition in such dubious sports as Curling and Archery. So between network and online coverage I will probably watch more of the London Games (July 27 – August 12) than anybody I know. There’s no denying, though, that… Read more.
