Doug, I’d say you were a lucky SOB, but you didn’t actually get to meet Melissa Rycroft, so you’re not.

But… Merry Christmas from Toph, Jon, Christian and the rest of The Sports Bizzo contributors.

By Jon…

It’s been a long ass time since I’ve written something for the Biz. Not sure why. It’s not like I stopped watching sports. Christ, it’s football season.

I think I just lost touch with what the Biz was all about. It had been so long since I posted an article, that I forgot about the single greatest thing about writing for the Biz:

Finding out what awesome picture Toph was gonna put with my article.

You have to admit, Toph’s got an eye for subtlety and nuisance that is just unparalleled. Not to mention the tenacity to find exactly the right picture for the job.

Sometimes I even tried to fuck with him and write about really obscure things. Or a really abstract idea that no one picture could adequately convey.

He can’t be faded.

He’s unfadeable.

Every single time, he delivered.

What’s that, Jon? You wanna write about sports team in Austin?

HOT GIRLS ON SIXTH STREET!!!

Toph writes an article about sports in general? That’s kind of vague.

ASIAN GIRL IN A SCHOOL SKIRT PLAYING POOL!!!

I don’t know how he does it. He’s like those two guys in City Slickers who could name the perfect ice cream to complete any meal.

WOOF!!!

He just knows.

That’s really all I wanted to talk about with this article…but I do want to keep it sports-related. Here are some of my opinions on recent stories in the sports world.

Football is awesome.

Soccer is growing on me.

Baseball takes too long.

College Football is subjective.

Favre still annoys me.

NASCAR still baffles me.

And Fantasy Football is a cruel bitch.

Find a picture for that, Toph.

By Jon…

I should have written this last night, but I didn’t. It was freezing outside, no one was coming into work, and I had lots of time to think. The crossword puzzle I was working on was done with me, unwilling to budge, thwarting my search for simple answers to abstract ideas. Then the allergies took hold. I felt like ripping my nose off my face. Then my stomach turned on me, and I was done. I wanted nothing to do with anything. I just wanted to go home and curl up in bed. I finally got off work around 5:30 this morning, determined to plow through an article about something sports related to appease my very understanding editor, and then try to sleep off the sickness.

But I didn’t. I didn’t write the article. Instead I ate my breakfast and distracted myself with a brilliant, old game I remember from my formative years. The game’s called The Incredible Machine. The goal is to build Rune Goldberg machines to accomplish a simple task. Think Pee Wee Herman’s alarm clock/breakfast maker contraption from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. I spent about an hour playing while Sportscenter was on the TV.

The TV was muted. It’s always muted these days. Especially during the early morning Sportscenter. Is it just me or is the new Sportscenter Live show in the morning the worst?

I think insufferable is the word I’m looking for, but I can’t be sure.

Sportscenter Live is counter to everything Sportscenter has been about since I was a kid. Witty dialogue, highlights, and more highlights. The live show has half the highlights, a quarter of the witty dialogue and all of the fluff of Good Morning America. It pains me to listen to Sage Steele plow through highlight segments with the aplomb of the “Boom goes the dynamite” kid on a good day. No jokes, no flashy quips, just bumbling through whatever the teleprompter tells her.

Here’s what I’m getting at ESPN: I like the idea of a live Sportscenter. In fact, I was really into the idea when I first heard about it. I thought it would increase the interplay between the anchors, resulting in informative, and equally hilarious highlight segments. But on the mornings when you trot out Sage Steele, Hannah Storm and Josh Elliot as your starting lineup, well, by God, ESPN, I just wanna shoot myself.

Instead I mute the TV and watch my highlights in silence, which sucks for any number of reasons. I’m still watching it, which contributes to your ratings, which makes you more ad revenue, which makes your people upstairs think they must be doing something right, which means they keep trotting out Steele/Storm/Elliot every morning.

Da da da da da Dumb…

The Sports Bizzo Podcast 08.14.08

We interrupt the NFL previews for a BizzoCast.

Word up, Tom and Randy.

Email the Bizzo at TheSportsBizzo@gmail.com

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By Toph…

Have you heard the whole thing about China’s quest to get the most medals possible in the Olympics? I think Jon told me about in a podcast recently, and it borders on amazing, and insane. When you think of the Olympics, you think if Basketball, Track and Field, Swimming, Gymnastics, Boxing, Softball and then a whole lot weird sports no one cares about.

Enter the Chinese National Team.

Since they can’t win in the important sports, mentioned above (as seen in the drumming by Team USA basketball over China in the opening game, which was billed to be a game for the ages), China has decided to become a major player in the sports that receive little to no attention. This will boost their medals, and have them be the first country besides USA and Russia to lead the medal count in what seems like the last 72 years.

Here’s the question, China, who cares? Is your country supposed to rally behind the all-important Modern Pentathlon gold? (Actually, China has been abysmal in the Pentathlon). Besides Jon and I, with our alumni link to Texas Wesleyan University Table Tennis team (GO RAMS!), does anyone care that you’re going to dominate in the miniature tennis event? Or, will anyone weep when the Chinese National Anthem is played after receiving the gold in Badminton? (Actually, Japanese women just upset the Chinese favorites.)

Of course they won’t, but it’s not China’s fault that this idea is genius. I can’t for the life of me figure out why USA hasn’t done the same thing. Is it because we generally dominate at the medal count? We’re Americans for Christ sakes. Dominating is not just acceptable for us, it’s expected.

Look in our society, and explain to me why we’re not racking up gold in the Handball? Last year we saw the Patriots score Eff-You TD after Eff-You TD, and it was accepted. For the rest of us, it really hurt, but for those guys in New England, it was awesome. The same goes for guys like T.O., Chris Paul, Shaq, the Celtics, the Yankees, and the Cowboys. It’s not just that these teams win, it’s that they make a mockery of the competition. It’s why Steve Spurrier was known for running up the score, and running up his salary. We adore winners.

Our economy is bad, our country doesn’t believe in its President and jobs are being cut all over the States – the last thing we want to see is our best asset (complete sports domination) go by the waste side. Which is why we must win, and win gold. Losing to China is not an option.

USA USA USA……

The Sports Bizzo Podcast 06.24.08

Toph being in New York didn’t stop this podcast from happening. Although, maybe it should have.

For odd reasons, here’s the only link I can recall needing – Johan.

In other news, The Bizzo is iPhone functional, with a sexy iPhone page.

You can also email us at TheSportsBizzo@gmail.com or add us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/TheSportsBizzo

Late.

PS… The girls above are athletes for a university somewhere… somehow…

By Jon…

One of my favorite movies, High Fidelity, begins with the line, “What came first, the music or the misery? Do I listen to pop music because I’m miserable, or am I miserable because I listen to pop music?”

That line, in all its brilliance, makes for a perfect segue into my post today. What came first, the interest or the video game? Did I start watching soccer because I bought FIFA 08, or did I buy FIFA 08 because I started watching soccer?

I still really don’t know the answer but, either way, it’s happened. What I do know is that they compliment one another well, the game and video game. I bought the video game on a whim the other day while Ed was buying “The Deadliest Catch” video game. I had just started my new job which puts cash in my pocket on a nightly basis. I was there. The game was there. And sure as hell, there was $50 in my pocket.

So I bought it. It just so happened that my purchase coincided with the Group stage of Euro 2008. The game is frustrating in a number of ways, mainly the lack of a career mode, a staple in most sports games. The other frustrating part: I have no clue how to play soccer. Okay, I know how the game is played. I know what offsides is, I know the rules, but I haven’t clue how the game is actually played. Strategy. Plays. Substitutions. The nuances of the game. It makes for frustrating gameplay, for sure. I was getting routinely smoked on the Amateur skill level.

So I put it down for a few days.

In my time away from the game, I found myself thinking about how to get good at FIFA 08. I kept seeing the game in my head. It was eerie. It was like when I played Scrabble or Yahoo! Literati for a solid few months in college. I found myself zoning out on the road trying to rearrange the letters of the signs on the freeway. But that’s Scrabble. That’s words. I like words. I don’t like soccer.

Do I?

It started with a few Sportscenter Top Plays. “Well, that looked pretty nifty,” I thought. And then I found myself logging on to ESPNsoccernet.com, and reading up on Euro 2008, until finally I said, “Screw it, I’m watching Croatia-Turkey and I don’t care who knows it.”

I tuned into the game around the 18th minute. Nil-nil. “Alright, it’s early. Of course, they haven’t scored yet. No worries. Just tune in and learn.” And I did. I learned some of the nuances of the game, like when looking for someone to pass it to, find the guy who has the most space to run. And, just as in American football, you don’t pass it to the guy, you pass it to where he’s going to be, or where you’d like him to end up.

Sounds simple, I know, but these are things that escaped me when thinking about Soccer. You have to understand, I swore off soccer in Kindergarten. I played one year, and I’d say on the low end, I got hit in the face with the ball 10 times. Granted, I didn’t know what I was doing, but I definitely didn’t like getting hit in the face with a soccer ball.

Back to Croatia-Turkey, though. It went through all of regulation, and the first extra period. Nil-Nil. I’m not gonna lie, for about half of that time, I was outside on the phone. Kinda bored, catching up with old friends. But I came inside just in time. It was at the 115′ mark in the second extra period (At some point during the game, I decided I was a Croatia fan. They had a young coach who looked like a cool, British dude I went to college with. That’s seriously why I decided to root for Croatia).

In the 118th minute, the Croatians had a scoring chance that looked like it may have been thwarted, but then the Turkish keeper came way out to make a play on the ball. The Croatians made an extra pass, catching the Turkish keeper way out of position, and scored. The Croatian faithful went crazy. Their coach was sprinting down the sidelines, hands in the air, in a suit that looked strangely similar to the one I wore for First Confession in the 2nd grade.

Stranger still, I was smiling with my hands in the air because the Croatian national team scored. I’m not even entirely sure where Croatia is. I know it used to be part of Yugoslavia, but I’d have trouble pointing it out on a map. And yet, here I was cheering for them like I was from there.

And then a funny thing happened. With two minutes left, and the commentators all but proclaiming a Croatian victory, the Turkish goalie booted it 3/4 of the way down the pitch, bounced off one guy, right to a Turkish player, who turned, fired and scored.

Oh my God, I’ve been watching this for two hours and nothing happened. And then in the the last two minutes, both teams scored. And the Turks literally scored with almost no time left. It was like a buzzer beater in basketball, except you have no idea when the buzzer is going to go off.

Sadly, my Croatian brethren squandered the match when it went to a shootout. Two of their top players shanked their attempts, and the fourth one had his shot blocked by the Turkish keeper to seal the victory for the Turks.

All in all, it was totally worth the two hours I spent watching it. As an added bonus, I was able to apply some of my new found knowledge of soccer in a couple games of FIFA 08.

Granted, I still have it set to amateur, but, hey, you gotta start somewhere.