24 May 2008 @ 5:02PM >> Today’s Quote of the Day comes from the Richard Vance, a coach at Provo High School in Utah.

Coach Vance’s students were competing in a javelin competition when a newspaper photographer wandered into the area.

A javelin thrown by one of the students went through the photographer’s leg and had to be cut to pieces before he could be taken to the hospital.

The coach’s reaction?

One of the first things that came to my mind was, “Good thing we brought a second javelin.”

24 October 2007 @ 7:48AM >> Say it ain’t so, Rudy.

The Red Sox? The Red Sox?!? Anything but that!

27 October 2005 @ 9:36AM >> Last year, the Red Sox won the World Series for the first time since 1918. This year, the White Sox won for the first time since 1917.

From this Yankees fan’s perspective, the best thing about the White Sox winning this year is that they’re not the Red Sox. Congratulations, Chicago!

12 August 2005 @ 10:02AM >> The Tallahassee Democrat reports:

Florida State needs a victory in court to keep its Seminoles nickname without suffering potentially damaging penalties to many of its teams.

[...]

The NCAA [...] will not allow such nicknames or symbols to be on team uniforms or clothing in NCAA postseason competition beginning Feb.1. There would be no such ban for the regular season. FSU and Illinois were among at least 18 schools determined to have “hostile or abusive” nicknames, symbols and mascots.

That rule will not affect FSU’s football team - the school’s most visible team and biggest moneymaker - because the NCAA does not have a championship format for that sport. Other sports, including baseball and softball, regularly host NCAA postseason competition.

“We’re not going to change the name - that’s not an option,” [Florida State University President T. K.] Wetherell told the Tallahassee Democrat Friday evening. “We would not do that.”

Wetherell, who was angered by the decision, said he had it in his mind “to paint (the Seminole logo) three times as big on the field (at Doak Campbell Stadium).”

Apparently, Florida State’s president wasn’t the only one angered. So was Max B. Osceola Jr,. a Seminole Tribal Council member:

Osceola said the Seminole Tribe of Florida disagrees with the NCAA’s decision and determination that FSU’s nickname and symbols are “hostile and abusive.” Osceola was also concerned that his tribe was not approached by the NCAA regarding the matter.

“It’s like history - they left the natives out,” Osceola said. “They have non-natives telling natives what’s good for them or how they should use their name. You have a committee made up of non-natives telling people that they can not use a native name when you have a native tribe - a tribal government, duly elected and constituted - that said they agree with Florida State.

“There are some names, like the NFL team the Washington Redskins - that’s derogatory. Those are abusive and hostile but not this.”

6 July 2005 @ 2:18PM >> London edges out Paris for the 2012 Olympics. This apparently came as a shock to the French:

Paris had been the front-runner throughout the campaign, but London picked up momentum in the late stages with strong support from Prime Minister Tony Blair.

One blogger, noting that two of the Olympic Committee voters were Finnish, speculates that outrage over the French President’s recent comments may have tipped the scales away from Paris towards London. Right before the Olympic Committee voting took place, Jacques Chirac offended both the British and the Finns by declaring their food terrible and that their poor culinary skills were grounds to distrust them as people.

As a New Yorker, I must say I’m relieved that the Olympics won’t be coming to my home town. To me, the Olympics seems like an endless parade of fringe sports that nobody cares about until the hype machine kicks into high gear every few years. Then all of a sudden, we’re obsessed for a few weeks with various sports so contrived that they could only have been invented by people trying—and failing—to prove that all the good sports hadn’t yet been created. But don’t listen to me, I’m just an old grouch trapped in a young person’s body who is happy that years of Olympic construction won’t be tying up traffic in a city already known as the gridlock capital of the world.

21 March 2005 @ 9:39AM >> The adrenaline of the upset over Kansas did not manage to propel Bucknell beyond the second round of the NCAA tournament, but I hope the Bison basketballers appreciate just how well they’ve done. Never before has Bucknell won an NCAA tournament game; in fact, never before has any Patriot League team won a tournament game. Congratulations, guys!

19 March 2005 @ 12:06PM >> Congratulations to the basketball team of my alma mater, Bucknell University, for their stunning upset victory over Kansas in the NCAA finals tournament. Go Bison!

28 October 2004 @ 8:37PM >> To all the Red Sox fans, congratulations. I remember how good the Yankees victory felt in 1996 after being deprived since I started watching religiously in 1981. I can only imagine this is even sweeter for you given the history of the Sox. Enjoy.

(Although, as a Yanks fan, I’m not so sure how I feel about the Red Sox winning the World Series on my birthday. I’ll try not to take it personally.)

22 October 2004 >> As a Yankees fan, few things provide greater satisfaction than beating the Boston Red Sox in the playoffs. There is simply no greater rivalry in sports, period. And when the Yanks won the first three games against the Red Sox, another trip to the World Series seemed inevitable. Never in the history of baseball had a team bounced back from a 3-0 deficit in the playoffs. The Red Sox making a comeback like that—especially against the Yankees—is precisely the sort of thing that the Curse of the Bambino is meant to prevent.

The last time the Boston Red Sox won the World Series was 1918. Back then, the Yankees hadn’t even won one. The Red Sox were the Yankees of that era... until, that is, they traded Babe Ruth—the Bambino—to New York. This set up the fabled Curse, and during the 86 years since the last Red Sox championship, the Yankees have won 26.

If you know any Red Sox fans, you probably recognize that their whole identity stems from the continual pain and misfortune of their chosen team. It’s what binds them together. It’s the source of their pride as a beaten-down people who never give up hope. Bad luck has plagued them on the brink of victory so many times that it seems cliche to recount them: Bucky Dent’s home run in 1978; Bill Buckner’s biffed ball in 1986; Aaron Boone’s game-ending home run last year.

All these incidents prove The Curse: the Boston Red Sox are not meant to win the World Series.

But this year, maybe The Curse is dead. All the momentum is with the Red Sox. Anything less than a World Series victory—after such a stunning comeback—would be a great disappointment. But what if the Sox win? What if the constant denial of their ultimate victory—the very thing that gives those fans their exalted status as a persecuted minority—suddenly wasn’t there? What if, five years from now, the Red Sox were just another team that recently won a World Series, like the Florida Marlins or the Arizona Diamondbacks?

There would be nothing that makes the Sox special anymore. Might as well tear down Fenway Park, move to the ‘burbs and play in some modern megadome stadium with astroturf.

The Curse may still play itself out. Historically, the Gods of Baseball seem intent on slapping down the Red Sox only after their hopes have been raised to the highest possible level. But if there’s any year that the Sox will win the World Series, this is it. And if they do, Boston fans will have earned their party. But when they wake up, and the hangovers loosen their grip, will Red Sox fans rub their eyes and realize the mystique that’s defined them for nearly a century is gone? Will victory eventually leave them feeling emptier than defeat?

Maybe they finally did reverse the curse. Then again, shattering the identity of Red Sox fans everywhere might be a curse of its own.