My son is stick-handling a hockey ball on the hardwood floor in the family room, when I notice a skate wrench lying on the table. I say, “Why don’t you put that skate wrench in your hockey bag?” “Okay,” he says. “Why don’t you do it now, while you’re thinking about it?” “Okay,” he says. A couple minutes later, when he’s still stick-handling and the wrench is still lying there, I say, “While you’re thinking about it, why don’t you put that skate wrench in your hockey bag?” “Okay,” he says. “That’s the third time you’ve said okay, and the wrench is still there.” “I’m still thinking about it.” Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Sports
I’ll Take a Pass on the ‘Master’ Chorale
My dad asked me at Thanksgiving dinner if I wanted to bring my family along to an L.A. Master Chorale concert that he and my mom and my sister are going to next month. Tickets range from $24 to $68. I said, “There isn’t really anyone at my house who’d enjoy that. We’re philistines. In fact, to be honest with you, I’d be more interested in watching American Idol. Now, I’ve never seen American Idol, but at least it’s free and I wouldn’t have to leave my house. “And what’s with calling yourself the ‘Master’ Chorale anyway? What hubris! Who gives themselves a title like that? ‘Listen to us! We’re the masters of choral music!’ Oh yeah? Why don’t you just sing something and let people decide for themselves what masters you are. “I mean, if you play third base, you don’t tell everyone what a great third baseman you… Read more →
Hockey Moms vs. Soccer Moms
Hockey moms are pit bulls with lipstick. Soccer moms are cat burglars . . . Read more →
At the Lakers Game
My son and I went to the Lakers game last night, a pre-season game against Utah . . . Pre-game As we were walking in, he pointed out an Asian girl with a spiky-haired Asian guy wearing an Olympics jersey and said, “That guy with the Olympic jersey pulled a hotter Asian woman than you.” The girl was hotter than my wife is now, but not hotter than she was at that age. “You don’t know anything,” I said. “Mom was pretty hot.” “Yeah. Right.” Game Pretty good game! The starters played more than I thought they would. Andrew Bynum is back. He looked good! Jerry Buss was there. He looked terrible. Thirty minutes before the game, a guy rolled him out in a wheelchair to the end of the court. It took him several minutes to hobble from there to his courtside seat. My son said he had a… Read more →
Mommy’s Water
Roller hockey season is starting up again . . . I don’t know why but I was thinking about one of the moms from last year’s team — she brought bottles of water to the tournaments, some filled with actual water for her kid, and some filled with vodka for herself. To the untrained eye, they looked identical. I think she may have filled the vodka bottles to a little less than capacity so she could tell them apart. More than once I heard her saying, “Not that one, honey. That’s Mommy’s water.” Read more →
BYU 59, UCLA 0
OMG the UCLA bandwagon has crashed so hard, they’re still trying to identify the victims. Karl Dorrell must be high-fiving people till his arm hurts. FIGHT ON! Read more →
Chick’s vs. Dick’s
Last year, Dick’s Sporting Goods bought Chick’s Sporting Goods. According to the Orange County Register, the four Chick’s locations in Orange County, including the one in Tustin that I shop at, will all be replaced by Dick’s by the second half of 2009. I’m not happy about this. Oh, I know there are people who like Dick’s, and there are people who are 50-50 on the matter and can go either way, but there are also a lot of people like me who really prefer Chick’s. In fact, I’ve been doing Chick’s for so long that I don’t see how I’m ever going to get used to Dick’s. Read more →
Little-Known College Football Fact of the Week
Kentucky and Louisville play each other for the Governor’s Cup. Why the governor needs to wear a cup I don’t know, nor can I figure out why anybody else would want it. “Congratulations, boys!” the governor says, reaching into his trousers. “I’ve got a little something for you. And it ain’t fried chicken!” Read more →
Watching Olympic Women’s Basketball with a 10th Grader
The Australian team has some rather unfortunate-looking women on the roster . . . “Crikey!” the boy says. “Wot an oy-sore!” Read more →
Watching Olympic Equestrian with a 10th Grader
“Dum dee dum dee dum. Let’s go for a pony ride!” Read more →
Brush With Greatness: Postscript
I told my wife this story . . . it turns out she doesn’t know who Sugar Ray Leonard is either. “I know Muhammad Ali and Joe Foreman,” she says. Read more →
Brush With Greatness
You’ll never guess who I saw at the Juice It Up in Aliso Viejo: Sugar Ray Leonard, the famous boxer! He was in line in front of me with a couple of his kids. I wasn’t sure it was him at first, so I discreetly asked the college-age girl at the register, “Was that somebody famous?” “Who?” she asked. “The guy in front of me. That was Sugar Ray Leonard, right?” The name meant nothing to her, but another gentleman in the shop assured me that it was really him. Interesting fact: Leonard’s wife, who was waiting outside the shop, is not very attractive. You might think that the great Sugar Ray Leonard’s wife would be much hotter than, say, my wife, but such is not the case. Not even close. Is it possible that Roberto Duran had just caught a glimpse of Mrs. Leonard ringside when he uttered his… Read more →
George Carlin, 1937-2008
To paraphrase George Patton: Carlin, you magnificent bastard! I read your books! I also bought his videos and saw his live shows! I don’t know who’s ever been funnier, really . . . CNN has an obit, and Fox Sports has wisely reprinted “The Difference Between Baseball and Football.” Read more →
Overheard
Related Links Whistle disparity in Game 2 leaves Lakers feeling foul — ESPN.com Read more →
More Words and Phrases I’m Sick Unto Death Of
Serial Entrepreneur — I hope there’s a special place in hell for people who refer to themselves as “serial entrepreneurs.” What the heck is the difference between an entrepreneur and a serial entrepreneur? I suppose Bill Gates is an entrepreneur and e.e. cummings’ Uncle Sol was a serial entrepreneur — farmer, chicken farmer, skunk farmer, worm farmer. Length — For some reason, people who talk about basketball now describe players as having “great length.” Nobody says, “He’s very tall.” They say, “He’s got great length.” News flash: People don’t have length. They have height. They even have width. But they don’t have length — except at birth and shortly thereafter, when we measure them lying down because they can’t stand up yet. Describing a basketball player as having “great length” is as uninformative as saying, “He’s a tall black guy with long arms.” Read more →
Hockey Practice
I was watching my son’s roller hockey practice last weekend . . . during a scrimmage, he skated the puck up the rink, faked the goalie to the right, then snapped a shot into the top left corner of the net. “Oh my gosh!” I yelled to anyone within earshot. “Just like I taught him!” A few minutes later, he got a pass in front of the net and one-timed it so high and hard that if not for the protective netting around the top of the rink, I don’t know where it would have come down. “I didn’t teach him that,” I said. Read more →
Political Analysis from a 9th Grader
“It’s too bad Hillary Rodham Clinton’s name isn’t Hillary Rodman Clinton,” my son says. “Maybe she could rebound from her current situation.” Read more →
79 More
In memory of Heath Ledger, here’s a list of 79 more stars killed by drugs . . . Read more →
Rick Neuheisel
UCLA has hired Rick Neuheisel as its new football coach, replacing Karl Dorrell. UCLA people love this guy. They’ve been blowing Neuheisel’s meat whistle ever since the announcement. As a USC man, I say this: Great hire! Neuheisel will fail for all of the reasons listed here. Excerpt: “Neuheisel’s one great genius turns out to be his ability to make people think he’s a genius.” FIGHT ON! Read more →
Rose Bowl 2008: USC 49, Illinois 17
The conventional wisdom in recent years has been that USC has trouble defending spread offenses and mobile quarterbacks, like Illinois’ Juice Williams. I’m not sure that’s true. They’ve had trouble defending some mobile quarterbacks — Vince Young, Dennis Dixon — but so has every other team in the country. We took it to a real personal nature because we wanted to figure the spread-thing out, defend it really well and take the mystery out of it. We practiced so beautifully that it had to work out well. That’s a big deal. A really big deal. — Pete Carroll A total systematic beatdown. FIGHT ON! Read more →