The Jets and the Giants play the final preseason game tonight and nobody gives a shit. It used to be a big deal in the NFL-AFL days. Even in the 1970's it was big stuff. But the Giants have been so dominant and the Jets have sucked so hard that it doesn't matter anymore. All the juice goes out of a rivalry like this if the teams play too many times.
I mean everybody hates on Rex Ryan and Mark Sanchez so even the Jets fans hate their own team. They just want to see their new draft pick quarterback who seems to suck like a real Jet.
It's like the Mets and the Yankees. The Mets and their fans get all excited about these games and the Yankees just want to win so they can get to the World Series.
At least football is almost here.
17 comments:
I root for injuries.
Plus it's always fun to watch the bitter lesbian's incomplete pass face.
Speaking of the Yankees, we stopped in Cooperstown today and toured the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
It was a perfect day--blue skies, temps in the 70's, low humidity. Lots of visitors, but not super crowded. Many families driving their kids to college, like us, so there were plenty of teenage boys who had played baseball, accompanied by their dads (and moms). As an athlete who has gone on to other things (mostly mid-distance track), my son had a lot to say about modern vs. old-time baseball players and their play and conditioning. He is actually a seriously knowledgable sports fan in general, so this was an occasion to talk to ol' Dad about stuff I didn't have a clue he knew anything about.
Cooperstown is a gem. It's touristy, obviously, but they do a good job. It's an historic, attractive tasteful little town. (It reminds me something of Woodstock, VT.) And the Hall of Fame Museum itself is great--informative, dignified but fun. It really captures something about baseball that makes it great. The surrounding area is also absolutely beautiful. The drive from Oneonta was spectacular. A lot of upstate New York is like that.
And there was plenty in the Hall of Fame Museum to warm the hearts of Yankees fans. Also Red Sox fans. In fact, the only true-to-life, full-size figures of players there are of Babe Ruth and Ted Williams. But it's a large place with a huge amount to see, and you could really spend a couple of days exploring everything.
On to Ithaca tomorrow.
BTW, the above is handing an extended straight line to Trooper.
I count four or five things to have fun with.
Agreed, Tim. Cooperstown is a great place to visit. My parents took me there for a week-10 days when I was about 12.
I liked the Farmer's Museum as well.
God...is Rex Ryan really as dumb as he acts?
I mean--I consider him a complete moron, but he continues to amaze me with the depths of moron-hood he plunges.
Putting in Sanchez behind a second or third string OL? Which means Sanchez (the NFL's token Mexican't) hurts his throwing shoulder....and Geno Smith throws three INTs.
And how is it that Geno throws 3 picks but the Jints can only score 3 touchdowns? Looks like Eli must be rounding into midseason form.
TTB had the true HoF experience. My dad took me there when I was 10, and it was like a pilgrimage.
It's trite but true that the soul of baseball is fathers and sons playing catch (h/t Donald Hall). Cooperstown is a perfect place to get in touch w/ that. I've never been to Canton or Springfield, but I'd be surprised if they have anything like the same vibe. Kids don't usually come of age w/ their dads running blind-side blitzes at them.
That's why fans about who gets into the baseball HoF w/ a passion that's unknown for other sports.
IMO, at least.
Er, why fans argue about....
Still on a high from today's Sox-Dodgers game.
Fuck Carl Crawford and his stupid neck tat.
Went to Cooperstown as a kid but remember little. I need to get back. I've been to Springfield, pretty cool. Akron is on the list but behind Cooperstown and the Bowling Hall of Fame.
Didn't know there was a bowling HoF, nick. Where is it?
Do they have separate wings for 10-pin and candlepin?
I like upstate New York. Cooperstown is fun. Ithaca is beautiful.
But the Jets beat the Giants (granted it does not count) but still...
Chip S is absolutely right about dads and sons.
I'm far from an adequate baseball player, but there must be at least a dozen old baseballs scattered in the blackberries and weeds in the woods behind our house. There's the old pitchback under the deck, the metal slowly corroding and the rubber net straps beginning to break. There are a couple of broken wooden bats in the basement, along with a few dented aluminum ones, all next to the framed Manny Ramirez poster, the 1912/2004 Red Sox team poster, a couple of used gloves, one of Dad's old gloves, and 2 or 3 ash wood baseball bat blanks Dad was going to turn, but never got around to, and a bag of balls on a hook on the wall.
My son is in the next hotel room on his way to college. We've seen lots of sons on their way to college in upstate New York on this trip. I'm sure most of them have similar collections from half a dozen years ago in their basements and backyards. My son drifted away from baseball to swimming and then track, sports he was much better at. But baseball was where he really began to learn that sports, among other things, took skill, dedication and practice.
My wife tells me she disagrees with the Woodstock, VT comparison. Cooperstown and Woodstock superficially resemble each other, but Woodstock oozes wealth, while Cooperstown, similarly preserved and about the same size, is a shrine to something broader, deeper, and perhaps more pure than comfortable tourists looking at pretty Autumn leaves and taking in the local Yankee color.
Oh, my. Broken bats and old gloves. The slowly growing entropy of the pitch-back. Tools no more, but madeleines forever.
I can't think of a better off-to-college trip than the one you're on, TT. But the rear-view mirror may get a little foggy as you're leaving Ithaca.
Heck, I'm getting a little homesick just from reading your comment.
I took the family on a vacation once - Maryland to RI, west to Mark Twain's house (nice pile o' brick, for sure), skipped Springfield, then on to Cooperstown, where we had a great time.
We stopped in a museum near there to see the Cardiff Giant - poor boy was shattered, then to Letchworth and on to Niagara Falls.
Then we went to Toronto and west to Lake Huron.
But back to the point at hand - the HoF - we had a good time there - I particularly like the bats used by the players in the old days.
I have a number of old bats around the house, one of them is a Lou Gehrig model - that sucker is hefty, and I turned a bunch of them out of ash for my sons. They never really took to the sport, in fact my youngest excelled at soccer. I should have recognized then that he would turn out to be a communist.
I also have a bunch of old mitts from the '40s and '50s - I think I might try to sell them on eBay. They sure aren't doing me any good - I stopped playing even softball in my 40s. Talk about losing a step - I lost a whole staircase.
And by now I am pretty much over the game altogether. I do listen to the Durham Bulls games on the radio - that is still a nice thing to hear on a summer evening, but the rest of it has nothing to do with the game I remember as a callow yute.
Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio indeed!
Chip, The PBA Hall is in Arlington. There's also a generic one in St. Louis. I grew up on duckpin. I never knew about candlepin until I moved to Wi. There were some candlepins in Milwaukee and a local TV station had a live show every Saturday up until the mid 80's.
Duckpins! I've heard of them, but never seen an actual duckpin alley.
I've never understood the appeal of candlepins for people over the age of 12. I'd rather knock those little sticks over by throwing that ball at them than roll the silly little thing down the alley.
I used to watch the candlepin tourney every Saturday with my grandparents on ...I think it was channel 5 out of Boston, maybe channel 7.
My grandfather also liked to watch regular bowling on ABC's Wide World of Sports. As far as I know, he never bowled in his life though.
I grew up in a small town. We had a duck pin alley. I used to bowl every Saturday. WBAL used to televise duckpin tournaments.
First time I bowled at a regular alley I was all "You only get two rolls to knock those pins down?" Seemed insufficient.
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