The Buckeyes kicked off this evening and look very sharp. With the exception of a special teams miscue–everything is running like a well oiled machine.
Pryor appears to have grown and matured as a QB. The Buckeyes speed is also markedly improved.
Rubbing salt into an open wound in Cleveland. Stupid “fan”….
Though the crowd has been kind to the Misguided Little Brother who has attended some of the NYY-CLE games…that is except for Slider (the mascot) who gives him grief.
As I mentioned in my previous post–today’s World Cup final was quite disappointing.
The Spaniards, while effectively shutting down the Dutch machine had very little to show for it in terms of offense. The Dutch on the other hand seemed to have no real plan except for physically obstructing the Spaniards. The first half was largely forgettable.
The second half had a few sparks, but it too was largely forgettable.
The game seemed like an early round match–not a Wold Cup Final!
Wow…Paul the Octopus correctly picked another game in the World Cup!
By some quick math, the odds of him having picked all of Germany’s games + the final correctly is something in the neighborhood of 0.4%!
Too wierd.
/Otherwise the FInal sucked in terms of quality for final matches IMHO. The first half was a complete snoozer. Okay, the Spanish had the pressure on the first 15 minutes or so, but then they laid off.
OKay, save for the Medical/Healthcare sector–stick a fork in the City. With LeBron’s departure for South Beach it’s done for.
(I guessed he’d leave)
Quite interesting to read my Facebook feed. Between unhappy Clevelanders and Ex-Clevelanders and the delusional Knicks fans who thought they were getting him.
(Best post so far is the report of a dented fridge)
One would’ve expected the country behind the war strategy of the Blitzkreig to be prepared…but nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
Seriously though–the Germans looked extremely flat and the Spaniards extremely potent. The fact that the Germans only managed 5 shots all game is quite stunning to say the least!. Was this the same German squad that routed both England and Argentina? There was no counter attack, nor was their open play in the midfield.
Credit though to Spain for their perseverance in the game.
The Germans destroyed Argentina today. The early goal totally knocked the Argentinians off balance and then the Germans went to work.
Whomever is responsible for the Germany’s strength and conditioning coaching has done an amazing job. The Germans absolutely looked fast, fit and fresh the whole 90 minutes.
The Blitzkrieg showed the vulnerability in the Argentine defense–and I”m very surprised that Messi failed to score a single tally this whole cup.
In the later game, the two penalty kicks in two minutes sequence was crazy! Although later in the game, Spain finally cracked Paraguay’s stingy defense for the deciding goal. Spain-Germany in the Semis…should be a good one.
Two great games today. I”m going to have to watch the full replays online.
The Netherlands finally showed up when it counted and knocked off Brazil! From the parts of the second half I saw, Brazil looked disoriented/discombobulated (even before going down to 10 men).
The Ghana-Uruguay game–that has to be one of the craziest game ending sequences ever in soccer. What will the (game-winning?) handball come to be known as? Just wow!
My brain also strangely missed the sound of the vuvuzella….that changed after about oh 5 seconds of hearing it.
That means the 2006 finalists–Italy and France are both headed home (the latter even had to fly coach class!). Italy looked rather pathetic this tournament–not like the Italian teams of years gone by. Their play in the first two games was rather week, and today’s game their defense was simply caught snoozing. Well done by Slovakia.
In the Japan-Denmark game–the Japanese had some awesome goals! The first free kick should’ve been saved from that distance. Still it was a beautiful shot. Same with the second free-kick goal. Definite highlight reel material.
Landon Donovan has just permanently cemented his place in the history of US soccer.
(Audio from Univision–since their broadcaster has quite a bit of trademark emotion and flare).
A coworker of mine, who dislikes US Soccer (it’s a result of his being hart broken by Paul Caligiuri’s “shot heard around the world” against his native Soca Warriors.. He even went so far as to wear a green shirt in support of Algeria today. Needless to say, this afternoon the most common refrain from him was “Damn Landon Donovan”.
I can’t be the only one who has been surprised by the less than stellar performances being put forth this World Cup by some of the traditional powerhouses. For example, Italy and France just don’t seem like their normal selves. Are they just underplaying? Has age caught up? Even Brazil doesn’t appear to have it’s usual rhythm going for it. I’m torn on the Germans and the Spaniards performances too. The third games will be more clarifying for these two teams.
The Argentinians look very sharp, unlike their coach, who seems to have packed on quite a bit of weight since his playing days. (Still has the hair going for him). The Netherlands has a highly technical game going for it as well. The Portugese today were like the Harlem Globetrotters against the North Koreans. I’m sure the Univision announcer was exhausted from his “Gooooool” chants by the end of that one!
The simultaneous games start tomorrow….This is where it’ll get good.
The game I was most looking forward to today was from the “Group of Death”: Ivory Coast-Portugal. What a let down though. Just shows how unpredictable soccer can be.
In the later game from the group, Brazil only beat North Korea 2-1! In a game that I joked with a co-worker should be like the Harlem Globetrotters vs. the Washington Generals–it went into the Half as a scoreless draw! Brazil should have scored more–and it’s shocking that NK got on the board!
I don’t much care for boxing–as it’s rather dull in my opinion (in contrast to other sports)
Nonetheless, out of curiosity I turned into the Cotto-Foreman fight this evening.
From the get-go it seemed like Cotto was in total control. Foreman’s punches weren’t powerful enough (especially by comparison).
That being said–Foreman showed that he’s got a huge set of cojones deciding to continue to fight after having his leg go out from under him. At that point the fight was all but over—but he went on for another 1+ rounds!