Marat Ryndin

Joined 10 months ago

• 3 articles written
• 11 comments posted

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Marat's Lineup

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Marat's Bio

I love writing in general, and writing about sports in particular, since it happens to be one of my biggest passions. I try to be as objective and logical as possible in my commentary, but not without injecting some humor into it.

My favorite sports are soccer, hockey and boxing. I follow them quite religiously. My favorite clubs include Liverpool, Arsenal, Barcelona and the Washington Capitals.

After graduating from the university with a degree in communications I had a stint as an NHL columnist / reporter for the second largest sports publication in Russia, Sovietskiy Sport and the internet portal Sports.ru, before falling into web design and information architecture as my main source of income.

I am originally from Riga, Latvia, but moved to the United States with the rest of my family at the age of 15 and am equally fluent in both, Russian and English.

Marat's Recent Articles

Marat Writes About

• NHL (3),
• Washington Capitals (1),
• Sergei Fedorov (1),
• Humor (1),
• Editorial (1)

The Short List What Marat thinks about sport's most pressing questions

• Favorite Athletes

  Currently it is Alexander Ovechkin, but if I were to include everyone it would be an extremely long list. Favorite of all time is still my fellow Latvian Arturs Irbe. Pavel Bure was my favorite skater. My favorite soccer players include Cristiano Ronaldo, Cesc Fabregas, Alexander Hleb, Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta, Alexander Kerzhakov and many others. You can see a trend here. In both hockey and soccer I like my players to be lightning quick and pretty much unstoppable one on one.

• Favorite Sports Teams

  Liverpool, Arsenal, Barcelona, Washington Capitals, Boston Bruins, Dinamo Riga (KHL). US, Russian, Latvian and Portuguese national soccer teams. Russian and Latvian national hockey teams. In the past: San Jose Sharks, Vancouver Canucks.

• Favorite Coaches

  Bruce Boudreau (Washington Capitals) is a brilliant coach as well as great person.

• All Time Sports Moment

  Dinamo Riga, against all odds, making the finals of the Soviet League playoffs in 1987-88 lead by the completely unknown at the time 18-year old rookie Arturs Irbe in net. The ultimate Cinderella story.

• Most Memorable Game Attended

  Latvia vs. Germany during Euro 2004 when we tied the mighty Germans. If not for a certain English referee named Mike Riley, who denied us maybe the clearest penalty kick of all time (even the German fans admitted it), we could have even won. Just a tie vs. Germany for a tiny country like Latvia, for which just qualifying for a major tournament was a miracle of miracles, felt like winning the World Cup. Not to mention that about 5,000 of us, Latvian fans, managed to drown out a crowd of 45,000 Germans for most of the match.

• Most Unbreakable Sports Record

  Gretzky's 92 goals in one season. The game has changed so much that unless another major change occurs no one will ever come close to that again.

• Ruth or Mays?

  Sorry, but I could not give a rat's butkus about baseball. I think it's a sport you have to grow up watching to truly appreciate. Since I did not I am of the opinion that lawnmower racing is far more exciting to watch. As such I do not have an opinion on anything related to baseball other than the one I've just stated.

• Unitas or Montana?

  Montana, but I'm biased because unlike Unitas I saw him play. I did not grow up watching football either, but learned to like it. I just wish that there were more than 15 minutes of actual game play in a 3-hour game. The way it is now is like watching 3 hours of commercials with a few breaks for football.

• Jordan or Russell?

  Jordan

• Gretzky or Orr?

  Orr

• Pele or Maradona?

  Pele. Both were amazing players, but Maradona's nutty personality is a turn off for me.

• Federer or Sampras?

  Federer

• Tiger or Nicklaus?

  Golf induces sleep in me.

• Schumacher or Senna?

  Senna (RIP)

• Pac 10, Big 12, Big 10, SEC, ACC, or Big East?

  While I like college hockey, football and basketball there are just so many hours in a day and you can't watch everything. Since I live in Boston and used to go to BU hockey games, I guess should say Big East.

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