Summer Olympics: Anyone for Team Handball?

John LoGiudice — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 11:51:16 -0400

While I am not a huge Summer Olympics fan, there is one event I am glad to watch at 3 a.m., and that is Team Handball.

I drool and salivate when I am waiting for hockey to start during the Winter Games. However, the Summer Olympics aren't exactly my cup of tea; it is a dull collection of track events (yawn!), gymnastics (yawn!), and spoiled pro basketball players (HUGE YAWN!).

Usually during the endless Summer Olympics' coverage, I sit hoping and praying that there is a baseball game on somewhere. But I do have one exception, Handball. A fun game where six players on each team whale a ball at a poor defenseless goalie and dribble and bounce like so many kangaroos with A.D.D.

As a North American fan, I don't get to see this wonderful game all that much. I suspect a guy in Serbia or Italy might be reading this and going, "Does he understand anything about the game?" No, not really! But I do love watching it when I get the rare privilege to see it on NBC during their Olympics' coverage.

I know I have to put up with dull "human interest" stories about a marathon runner from Namibia who lost his family to hyenas and Bob Costas trying to show everyone that he didn't study Accounting in college (yawn!). But this sport is worth it.

The excitement of this game is infectious. The speed of the players leaping and passing is like something out of the Matrix. Why this game hasn't caught on this side of the Atlantic is a mystery to me, especially after trying to stay awake during the Arena Bowl.

I am telling every fellow Bleacher Reporter to give this game a chance, even if you have to sit through four hours of gymnastics waiting for it. Yes, a match between Kazakhstan and Croatia is not the blood match you have been dying to see. But give it a try.

Mets Fan Signs in with Natural Doubts and a Small History Lesson

John LoGiudice — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 08:25:17 -0400

New York fans are an incredibly fickle bunch. Rangers' fans bleed Broadway Blue. Yankee supporters have that "Got rings?" attitude. Knicks' fans chant like French revolutionaries at the guillotine for their latest coach's head. Islanders’ fans hide. Giants’ fans bask in the glory of winning 14-7, while Jets' fans show the world that they are actually smart enough to spell.

But Mets' fans are a breed apart. Metanistas are a species of doubters and with good cause. We sit here waiting for the sky to collapse because it often does. We are a lot like Cubs fans, but not jovial and lovable. Mets history is rife with mediocrity and choke-jobs at the end of the season.

Shea Stadium has rocked in the past, but more often it is easy to creep up to the front of the place and see the Mets lose yet again. It has been the concrete tomb that often is the last resting place of what started out to be a promising season then turned to grief long before the boys of summer left the Hamptons for their party colleges in Florida.

The Mets two great glory years were very different. 1969 was deemed a miracle and as unlikely as Switzerland mounting an attack on Russia and forcing them to eat cheese. The 1986 version was a hated team that fought with each other more than their opponents, and they didn't win the World Series so much as the Red Sox lost it

There is one person in the Hall of Fame as a Met: Tom Seaver, who we lost during the "Midnight Massacre" to the Reds for the likes of Pat Zachary. We watched admirably, but bitterly as Tom Terrific pitched a no-hitter in another uniform. A Mets' pitcher has yet to pitch one in the blue and orange.

Gary Carter is often cited as wanting to have been inducted with a Mets' hat on. Alas his plaque wears the "funky pinwheel" of an Expo in Cooperstown.

Mets fans don't even get a break here. We are the "Second Team of New York," which kills us. Mets' fans have to deal with Yankee fans everyday, even in our own homes. We hate Yankee fans. They are the crew-cutted conformists in our midst. Boring, glory hounds that are as much fun as a Freshman English course.

The Yankees represent all that Metanistas hate, winning (to the point of boredom) and a lack of humor. Mets fans do have one thing going for them: they have more fun at the game even when the Amazin's are down by eight.

This brings me to the point of this article. Do the Mets have a chance this year? Yes. They have solid pitching; Pelfrey is genuinely scary, Santana is just coming off of a complete-game gem, Wagner is all but automatic, etc.

The bench players are overachieving; Fernando Tatis has resurrected his career and Endy Chavez is showing the promise he did two seasons ago. As for the regulars, Jose Reyes is playing with more poise and maturity, Wright is a constant threat, and Carlos Delgado is almost at the point where he could replace Mayor Bloomberg.

Does this Mets' fan have any doubts? Heck, yeah. I AM a Mets fan after all. But nevertheless, you gotta believe.

Bleacher Report - Articles by John LoGiudice

Summer Olympics: Anyone for Team Handball?

Mets Fan Signs in with Natural Doubts and a Small History Lesson