Target Centermass

Category: Sports

  • Almost EmBearrassed!

    When does a victory feel like a kick-in-the-gut defeat?

    Texas A&M faced the Baylor Bears at home today, and the Ags came from behind to barely eke it out in overtime 16-13.

    Still, a win is a win, but this Aggie team has mucho work to do.

  • Rita Forces Texas A&M to Move Game

    Hurricane Rita is still in the Gulf of Mexico and already its effects are being felt at my alma mater.

    Texas A&M has moved Saturday’s football game with Texas State to tomorrow night at Kyle Field.

    Fox Sports Net will televise the game.

    A&M President Robert Gates says fans not living in the College Station area should not try to attend the game — because no hotels will be available.

    A number of hurricane evacuees are expected to be staying in the area.

    Ah, but this certainly brings to mind memories of the “Hurricane Bowl” in 1988 during my undergrad days. I still believe Bama was scared of a team that was about to rebound from a rough start.

  • Major League Lacrosse Completes 2006 Expansion

    Well, this sucks.

    Major League Lacrosse, the premier professional outdoor lacrosse league, has secured its three remaining expansion cities to join Los Angeles for the start of the 2006 season, according to MLL Founder Jake Steinfeld. Major League Lacrosse will expand to include teams in Chicago, Denver and San Francisco in addition to Los Angeles, which joined the league on March 9, 2005.

    L.A., Chicago, Denver and San Fran are the picks to bring the five-year-old MLL westward and grow from six teams to ten. The scuttlebutt was that Dallas was a leading contender. It certainly would have made sense, as the sport is booming in the area and across the state. Plus, the new stadium built in suburban Frisco for Major League Soccer’s FC Dallas seemed a perfect facility for the sport.

    The league plans to add two more western teams for the 2008 season, and the leading cities are Dallas and San Diego. Or so the obviously unreliable rumor mill says. Should the professional level of the sport finally arrive in the Lone Star state, count me in on season tickets. ‘Til then, I’ll just spend the next two seasons stewing bitterly.

  • Seventh Heaven

    Armstrong’s last ride ends with victory

    One last time, on the podium against the backdrop of the Arc de Triomphe, the cancer survivor who became the greatest cyclist in Tour de France history slipped into the leader’s yellow jersey Sunday. This time, it was the winner’s jersey, for an unprecedented seventh consecutive year in the world’s most grueling race.

    […]

    It was the end of Armstrong’s amazing career, and in retiring a winner he achieved a rare feat in sports — going out on top. He said his decision was final and that he walks away with no regrets.

    “I’m finished,” Armstrong told a motorcycle-borne TV reporter as he rode a victory lap of the Champs-Elysees, waving to the crowds and accompanied by another rider waving the Stars and Stripes.

    On Monday, he’ll be on a beach in the south of France, “with a beer, having a blast,” he said.

    Simply the best. I’ll wager that beer is going to be mighty tasty.

  • Looking Around the News

    Army recruiting up for June but still down for year

    The Army cut into its recruiting deficit slightly in June but still faces a daunting battle to meet its annual goal of 80,000 new enlistees.

    Army recruiters enlisted 6,157 new soldiers this month, 507 more than its goal, Army officials said Wednesday.

    The June surplus breaks a string of four straight months in which the Army missed it goals by wide margins.

    A big Hooah! to those who have recently answered the call.

    Arroyo sends her husband into exile

    Gloria Arroyo, the president of the Philippines, yesterday announced that her husband was being sent into exile, amid growing pressure on her leadership. She did not say how long Jose Miguel Arroyo would remain abroad or where he was going.

    Keep treading water, Gloria. You’re heading towards a well-deserved reckoning.

    Storms hamper US chopper rescue efforts

    US military officials say they fear all 17 troops aboard a special operations helicopter are dead after hostile fire downed the craft in a rugged mountain ravine in eastern Afghanistan.

    If those aboard were confirmed killed, the crash would be the deadliest blow yet to American forces in Afghanistan, already grappling with an insurgency that is widening rather than winding down.

    The officials said they knew of no communications from the crash site, accessible only by foot.

    Stormy weather hampered rescue efforts after the MH-47 helicopter crashed on Thursday while ferrying in reinforcements for troops already on the ground pursuing al-Qaeda militants near the border with Pakistan.

    My eternal gratitude to those aboard in uniform, and my best wishes to their loved ones for closure and my sorrow for their losses.

    US signs formal defence pact with India

    India and the US have signed their first formal defence pact since the US imposed sanctions on India following its 1998 nuclear tests.

    The 10-year agreement promises enhanced military co-operation, including joint weapons production, technology transfer, patrols of Asian sea-lanes and collaboration on missile defence.

    Signing the “strategic framework on defence” in Washington, Pranab Mukherjee, Indian defence minister and Donald Rumsfeld, his US counterpart, said the two countries, whose military ties had been negligible until the terrorist attacks of 2001, had “entered a new era”.

    This is one I really need to give a more in-depth look.

    Biggio makes his mark as Astros rip Rockies

    Craig Biggio homered and set the modern record for being hit by pitches, and Roy Oswalt pitched seven scoreless innings for his fourth straight win to lift the Houston Astros over the Colorado Rockies 7-1 Wednesday.

    Biggio was hit on the right elbow in the fourth inning by Byung-Hyun Kim, breaking Don Baylor’s post-1900 record of 267 times hit by pitches. Biggio calmly turned and trotted to first as he had so many other times, but this time he pointed to the ball and asked the ball boy to send it back to the Astros’ dugout as a keepsake for his years of pain.

    267? That’s taking “taking one for the team” well past its limit.

  • Israeli Troops Commandeer Palestinian TV

    A strange tale of Palestinian abuse at the hands of soccer-mad Israeli soldiers has surfaced.

    Israeli soldiers barged into a Palestinian home and commandeered its television room so they could watch an international soccer match, an Israeli television station reported.

    Footage on Channel 10 television showed broken furniture and windows in the room where the report said the troops watched Wednesday’s Champions League final in Istanbul between AC Milan and Liverpool.

    The family said the soldiers caused the damage.

    “I was walking in the street and eight soldiers asked if we have TV and satellite,” said Anan al-Zrayer in the West Bank city of Hebron.

    “I said ‘yes,’ and told them we don’t have Israeli channels. (After they entered the house,) I gave them the remote control and they carried out a search. We were kicked into another room,” he said.

    The Israeli army said it would look into the allegations and if they were found to be true, disciplinary action would be taken against the soldiers.

    If true, this is just plain wrong for at least two reasons. Innocent Palestinians should be secure in their own homes and soccer is boring.

  • Rockets Take Game 6

    101-83.

    After blowing a halftime lead and trailing at the end of the third quarter, the Rockets blow it wide open in the final stanza to live to fight another day … and keep my interest in this NBA season alive until at least Saturday.

    Now, back to blogging.

  • Rockets-Mavs Game 6 Halftime

    Rockets lead 52-45 in a must-win.

    Let’s blog.

  • NBA Calls Possible Halt to Target Centermass

    There may be no blogging tonight, as I have tickets to the Rockets-Mavs game two.

  • ‘Monday Night Football’ Heading to ESPN

    So ends one of the supposed constants of my entire football-watching life, as Monday Night Football departs from ABC.

    “Monday Night Football,” a television institution that over 35 years has helped transform the NFL into a prime-time ratings draw, is leaving ABC and moving to ESPN beginning with the 2006 season.

    The NFL’s new broadcast deal also brings football back to NBC for the first time in six years. NBC will take over the Sunday night games currently broadcast on ESPN.

    The “Monday Night Football” move to cable is expected to cost ESPN $1.1 billion per year over eight years, two sources familiar with the deals told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

    NBC will get the Sunday night package for $600 million over six years, according to the sources. The network will also get the Super Bowl in 2009 and 2012 as part of the deal, one of the sources said.

    The move will leave ABC as the only major network without NFL football. “Monday Night Football” has been a pillar of ABC since the games began on prime-time in 1970, when Howard Cosell anchored the show. “Monday Night Football” stands as the second-longest running prime time network series, trailing CBS’ 60 Minutes by two years.

    Perhaps it’s also time for 60 Minutes to move to another network, perhaps one with a credible news division.

    The move to ESPN keeps the Monday Night Football brand within the umbrella of The Disney Company. Disney owns both ESPN and ABC.

    “From the Disney perspective, it was a smart move for ABC by moving out of football and having ESPN move into Monday nights,” said George Bodenheimer, president of ESPN and ABC Sports.

    The NFL will continue to show all cable games on free, over-the air television in home markets. That means local stations will carry ESPN’s Monday night games in the cities of the teams involved.

    Last month, NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue said that the Monday night move was a strong possibility. ABC, which has been losing money on the package despite high ratings, had been balking at the NFL’s asking price.

    […]

    The NFL is still considering an eight game late-season package of Thursday and Saturday night games on cable and satellite. Tagliabue has said the NFL’s own new network could show some or all of those games.

    It’s bad enough that Disney has opted to kill off the ABC-MNF tradition. The NFL is pushing the limits of stupidity with its consideration of expanding to even more Thursday and Saturday night games, risking over-exposure and increased competition with the superior product that is college football.