Sports Lovin'

The only genre, so to speak, of blog that may be more popular than the genre of, say, pop culture, is the sports genre. Yes, there are a lot of talking heads out there in sport-o-land, some of them better than others. You may have heard or read about the Costas NOW segment that aired in April in which Deadspin's Will Leitch, sports blog kingpin (or at least highlighted as such, even though Deadspin isn't really a sports blog in the traditional sense) was ridiculed and bullied by Buzz Bissinger, "print" sports writer (and also the author of the book Friday Night Lights which inspired the movie and television series of the same name...pop culture connection #1! Ding ding ding!) Obviously, we bloggers need to show each other some lovin' and cross those borders to show a unified front that, yes, the print is dying, and we as bloggers are all at least close to being as competent at what we do as the print. (Just ask Scott Templeton in Season Five of The Wire -- at least when we make stuff up, we don't get in trouble for it! Zing!) Therefore, to reach out to my brethren out there in the sports blogosphere, allow me to recount the recent news in sports land and put a pop cultural spin on it.

Kevin Love, Nephew of Beach Boy Mike Love and Owner of Color Me Badd-style Beard Comes to Minnesota.
The Minnesesota Timberwolves on Thursday night completed a midnight trade in which they sent their first round draft pick, O.J. Mayo (yes, another athlete named O.J. who played college sports at USC! Plus, mayo, which is also something you put on a sandwich. Also, O.J., orange juice, which is a beverage. The jokes could have been phenomenal, Timberwolves. ) to the Memphis Grizzlies (now there's a stupid team name!) in exchange for a few good guys and the draft rights of Kevin Love. Who is Kevin Love, you ask? He is, indeed, the nephew of Beach Boys member Mike Love. Whether he was around when the Beach Boys, minus Brian Wilson, showed up on "Full House" is a question that I as a pop culture blogger / Minnesota sports enthusiest, would love to have answered. Kevin Love also has an ugly (or ironic? or meta-awesome?) beard that can be pleasantly described as reminiscent of early 90s boy band Color Me Badd. Does Kevin Love wanna sex the Timberwolves up like Color Me Badd wants to sex us all up? I hope so...in a sports kind of way.


Marko Jaric, Potential Younger Brother of Thom Yorke, Gets Engaged to Supermodel, Skips Town.
The tragic part of the above trade, at least from a pop culture standpoint, is the loss of Thom Yorke-lookalike Marko Jaric. Marko basically looks like he may be Thom's younger, more athletic brother who was into sports and teased his older brother about his noodling around on old electronic drum machines as they grew up. Additionally, Marko's recent engagement to Brazilian supermodel Adrianna Lima will leave Minnesota out of the gossip rags in the months before the most hotly anticipated marriage between a mediocre NBA point guard who looks like that guy from Radiohead and a supermodel ever. Have fun with that, Memphis.



Chicago-area Baseball Managers Try Their Hands at Rap, Fail
We all know that Athletes + Music = Actors + Music -- of course, for every moderately succesful actor music crossover (like Scarlett Johannson + TV on the Radio + Tom Waits), there are 10 complete and utter embarrassments (Billy Bob Thornton + Jared Leto + Keanu Reeves + Music = Atrocities To Humankind). Athletes are about as succesful -- although on a different level. Sometimes when athletes tackle music, it's at least funny on many levels (like Shaq's recent forays into rap...personally, I'd rather not ask Kobe how his you-know-what tastes!) However, for Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox managers Lou Pinellia and Ozzie Guillen, rap music comes very naturally. NOT!

This entry was posted by Unknown, on Sunday, June 29, 2008. You can leave your response.