Washingtonpost.com Sports Mobile: You Suck

(another bitch session by dinoterp)

I'm on my blackberry about 20 of the 24 available hours of the day. I have a top 5-6 sites that I hit on a regular basis and one of those is Sports section of the Washington Post mobile site (for reference: http://mobile.washingtonpost.com/item.jsp?key=sp). Although I appreciate being able to read some local articles on my phone, I'm going to call them out on the things about the site that suck in the hopes that somebody from the staff accidentally types the wrong URL for a legitimate site and ends up here. Also - don't confuse this blog with a referendum on the Post or the regular version of washingtonpost.com... I've got more and different gripes with those to be explored in later blogs. Let's start our spiral into bitching and complaining about the mobile site.

First of all, the content is updated about as frequently as the Skins make a smart front office move (bah dum ching!). Things are usually updated in the morning and maybe an article or two once during the day if something groundbreaking happens, and even then it's way after all of the major news outlets have thrown 400 writers on it. Worse, there's a bunch of content that's relatively static. There's been an article titled "Horton Working to Build on Rookie Season" in the Redskins section for about 5 weeks. I didn't want to read some crappy introspective piece on Horton then and I still don't want to read it now.

Second, there's no way to figure out who wrote the article before clicking on them. The only few sections where you can figure it out from the main page are Steinberg and any of the Insiders.  Can't I get a simple "Boswell: " intro on the headline? There's articles I only happen to click on, only to find that Wilbon is the writer and it's a genius column. Seems to me like that should be a selling point for that article, right? And this weekend we had a filly win the Preakness for the first time in 85 years, which was not only a juicy national storyline, but a LOCAL storyline... yet logging on to the mobile site on Sunday morning, I couldn't find a Beyer column. Seriously? Shouldn't his column be the ONLY thing on the site?

Next, every decent article is broken up into multiple pages. I understand the Post makes some money off of this, but for those who have experienced the mobile web, it is slow and sometimes spotty. Clicking on a headline with minimal guarantee of a good article, then having to click to the next pages or "read full article" is frustrating as hell. I know I read less articles because of this, which can't be what they are hoping for. I'm also now a metro rider and I've got a long haul trip. Verizon works on the metro, but the web is shaky and I don't have the luxury of clicking a thousand links and waiting for them to successfully load.

Finally, there's the text alerts.  Let me start by saying that in theory, this is a great service and there is some good information that comes from it.  But two things leave me scratching my head constantly.  The first is that they always make it seem like they have some scoop on the site.  But as stated in the first complaint above, the content is never updated.  The second is one that gets consistently mocked by me and my friends - the in-game and post game scoring alerts during Redskins season.  At halftime, I always get a text saying something like "Halftime.  Redskins losing to the Eagles 14-10".  Really?  No shit?  Wow, I can't wait until I get the next text at the end of the game letting me know the final score!  Are they fucking serious?  What Skins fan is going through the trouble to get real time text alerts on any Skins related sent to their phone... and isn't watching the game to know the score?  It's ridiculous.  I also can't tell you how many times I've suffered through a heart wrenching loss, only to get a text 10 minutes later that reminds me of the final score.  Thanks a ton.

Anyway, to wrap things up, I guess I can't complain since I pound that piece of shit site like 14 times a day.  Just seems like some easy improvements would make the whole thing a thousand times better and more useful.

Coming to Grips: Is DC a Sports Town?

This is a topic that has plagued me as a DC sports fan for many years. I'm finally letting go, coming to grips and owning up to it: Washington DC is NOT a sports town in any way, shape or form.

I'm an intensely competitive person and nowhere else in life does this manifest itself more in one area than in my following of local sports teams. I think at the root of it, I would never admit that anyone is better than me at something I felt I had some level of control over. This is probably why I lose sleep over fantasy football losses.

So what's the point? I hate when our local team lose on many levels, but it's especially tough to deal with losing to hated rivals. It kills me more than anything to think that the same meathead, jerkoff Eagles fan can drive down to DC, get a cheap ticket to a Skins game, mouth off in the stadium, pick fights, then ultimately say "I told you so" when the Skins lose in disasterous fashion yet again. This situation will be broken down in many blogs. But this one focuses on the inferiority of DC sports in one glaring way.

I've been to the "classic" sports towns such as Boston or Chicago. I've always hated our sports scene and the fact that out of town writers and radio hosts can come here and say things like "DC isn't a sports town." Over time, I've moved from denial towards acceptance, but never more than after game 6 of the Caps/Penguins series. I was stuck in a work function in Chinatown until the end of the 2nd period. With it not being all that late and the Caps on the brink of either bowing out to a hated rival or bringing the series back to DC for a knock down drag out game 7, I figured I'd have a hard time even getting into a bar.

What I found on 7th St was a ghost town. Heading from the Convention Center towards the Verizon Center, I first went into RFD, which was alomst completely empty besides a handful of Caps fans and a couple Penguins fans. Same thing at Fado. Same at Matchbox. Same at Clydes. I finally gave up and watched the end of the game next to a guy that let me sit at the empty barstool next to him with all the friendliness as if I asked if I could kick him in the crotch. And that was the scene. Now, my first thought was to take a step back and say "this is hockey after all". But I quickly shunned that. The Caps are ALL that we have right now. They are playing their biggest playoff rival. It's the clash of two superstars. It's win or go home. And I was in the best part of town, 20 FEET FROM THE ARENA that Game 7 would be played in.

Then it hit me: DC is not a sports town. If this was Chicago in the same circumstance, every bar would be jam packed, there would be people on the streets, and the guy I sat next to would not only have given me that barstool, he'd have bought me a drink, given me a high five, and now that I think about it - he wouldn't even be sitting!

So maybe acceptance is the right place to be. I'm not sure what difference it makes. It angers me because of the competitiveness. It angers me because people in the media say stupid shit like "DC is a transient town", completely dismiss a massive local fan base, and are somehow right. It angers me that I'm part of the problem. For example, I shake my head at the Nats attendance numbers and TV ratings, yet I'm not doing anything to change it.

The only way I can really wrap up this pathetic rant is to introduce what I'm calling the "Suicide Scale" and assign this fact a number. Loose values are something like:

1 = Breaking up with your high school girlfriend
2 = Losing your job
3 = Fashioning a noose while working as a bag boy after getting out of Shawshank after a multiple decade-long prison sentence
4 = Putting a shotgun in your mouth and closing your eyes
5 = #4, but after the Skins lose in OT of a playoff game after a botched gimme FG hold is run back for a TD, your car breaks down in the FedEx Field parking lot, and you come home to find Coach K banging your wife

I put this Coming to Grips at a 1.5.  It pains me, but in the scheme of things to want to kill myself over in the DC sports scene, it's not so bad.

Fantasy All-Star Lineup - Early Addition - Manny the Tranny

"I swear when I'm done with the prescription it will only be this big"

The first month of the MLB season is behind us and while the Nat’s and O’s battle to see who can lose 100 games first this year, the rest of the league continues to play baseball. In an attempt to divert attention from the pitiful state of my own fantasy teams I figured I’d give some love to the guys who are actually getting the job done so far this year. More to come on the overall state of fantasy baseball in America in the future, but for now without further ado I give you the early risers from this young fantasy season.

American League

C– Victor Martinez (Cle.) Solid stats across the board but don’t expect him to continue to bat near .400 for the rest of the year. Safe bet to keep this spot throughout the year unless Joe Mauer (Min.) comes on strong after missing most of the first month.

1B- Carlos Peña (TB) I don’t even want to say it, but are we nearing the point where the HR leader should be piss tested every month? I think we are getting close. Thanks Manny.

2B- Ian Kinsler (Tex.) Just doing what everyone expected him to do despite the fact that Josh Hamilton has been banged up and a shell of his ’08 self. Props to Aaron Hill (Tor.), he’s destined for the comeback player of the year award.

3B- Evan Longoria (TB) Seemingly this desperate housewife is the only trying to keep the MVP trophy from Pujols so far. Although Tampa has decided to only play their best ball against Boston and New York, they are setting up an unprecedented 4-teams race for the playoffs in the AL East if Toronto continues to overachieve. Sorry O’s.

SS- Michael Young (Tex.) If the Rangers had any starting pitching whatsoever the AL would be at their mercy. As of now they have one of the most exciting batting orders in the league and when Hamilton is healthy and Chris Davis comes around there are 6 guys who could hit 30 ding-dongs. I’m getting on their bandwagon a year early but if I was forced to watch one AL team all year it would probably be these guys.

OF- Jason Bay (Bos.) Manny who? Once this bastard got out of the city where dreams go to die he remembered why he loved baseball like Jimmy Dugan.

OF- Nick Markakis (Bal.) One of two early bright spots from the O’s outfield, between Nick and Adam Jones they have crossed the plate 61 times already this year while driving in almost 50. Besides Boog Powell’s BBQ Mr. Markakis is probably the best reason to go to Camden Yards these days. Nick’s Yaya and Papu must be so proud.

OF- Carl Crawford (TB) The second most exciting offense to watch in the AL is fueled by Mr. Crawford’s wheels. Stealing 6 bags in a game last week was just plain rude. He could have gone Rickey Henderson and pulled the 6th bag out of the ground and no one would have been able to say anything about it.

SP- Zack Greinke (KC) Undoubtedly the biggest storyline of the early season outside of Manny’s female fertility drug use is Greinke’s rise from mediocrity to dominance. So apparently this guy saw a psychologist in the off-season who diagnosed him with depression and some other frivolous made up disorder, this led to the Quack giving him magic pills and therapy that have resulted in more unhittable pitching than the kid from Rookie of the Year. Let’s put the odds of this sort of thing into perspective for a minute. In my life this would be like getting my self-deprecating cries for help diagnosed as depression, and months later becoming the best lawyer in the District only to have Brooklyn Decker leave Andy Roddick in the hopes that I would grace her with my presence. Ha! That bitch wishes.

SP- Roy Halladay (Tor.) Looks like the Yanks bought the wrong arm from Canada. Roy is probably the safest bet to play at this level throughout the year.

SP- Mark Buehrle (CWS) Vintage Buehrle, look for him to come down to a earth a bit but winning 15+ is not at all out of the question. What is this 2005? Next thing you know Mike Vick will be a starting QB in the NFL. Wait, what’s that? He just signed with Minnesota? Oh no, that’s next month.

RP- Frank Fransisco (Tex.) You can’t do much better than going 9 for 9 on save opportunities and not allowing a run. He could stand to lose a pound or 50 though.

National League

C- Bengie ‘The Eternal’ Molina (SF) Hi, Im Bengie Molina. I’m 35 and I continue to produce despite the lack of talent around me. My back hurts.

1B- Albert Pujols (St. Louis) I’m starting to this that Sportscenter cyborg commercial was not a joke. How are you only 29? I feel like you’ve been around for the last 15 years. Clearly the early MVP favorite, again.

2B- Chase Utley (Phi.) Does anyone remember when he was supposed to miss time this year? Well, so much for that. Who else did you expect to be the best 4-man in the NL, Brandon Phillips?

3B- Jorge Cantu (Fla.) As much as I wanted to play favorites and give the nod to Mr. Walk-Off (Ryan Zimmerman) and his 25-game hit streak I couldn’t ignore the 3 HR, 10 RBI advantage in 23 less at-bats. And as for Cantu’s astronomical start, well I’m not administering drug-tests in fantasy baseball but if we were…Thanks Manny.

SS- Hanley Ramirez (Fla.) Simply put, I want to have his babies. He’s basically LaDanian Tomlinson 3 years ago in fantasy football. If you somehow have him in a keeper-league you should consider believing in God.

OF- Alfonso Soriano (Cubs) The self-proclaimed hardest working man in baseball is teasing Cubs fans into thinking he is going to produce for a full year again. I think you can actually get Vegas odds on what his season ending injury will be this year? My money is on an MCL tear or the clap.

OF- Andre Ethier (LAD) Good start Andre; however you just lost a key part of the best outfield in the league (Manny). Look for Matt Kemps numbers to jump and Ethier’s to level off with the disappearance of the Tranny named Manny.

OF- Raul Ibanez (Phi.) I don’t like his face or his creepy flavor savor but I hate him less than I hate Shane Victorino so hats off you crazy bastard. Ryan Braun (Mil.) and Carlos Beltran (NYM) are right on the heels of all three of these early stars. Look for them to own these spots in the next couple weeks and not look back.

SP- Johan Santana (NYM) Silly how consistent he is. Silly. Not to mention how his name rolls off the tounge.

SP- Dan Haren (Ari.) 3-3 record is deceiving for how well he is pitching. Nobody but Johan is better in the NL and the record will indicate that by the end of the year.

SP- Chad Billingsley (LAD) Slipping past Tim Lincecum’s homeless looking ass, Chad has been unbeatable for L.A. Let’s hope he didn’t punch things with his throwing hand Carlos Quentin style when he got the news about Manny.

RP- Johnathan Broxton (LAD) Flamethrower has struck out 25 while saving 8 games for the once darling Dodgers. Look for this title to go to K-Rod before long.

If you find your boys on this list just hope they don’t peak too soon like Jessica Simpson otherwise they might find themselves mounted by Tony Romo before Independence Day.

Two unrelated stories. First the Internet has obviously begun to take itself too seriously. Not only have the powers that be allowed this site to be created but just yesterday some 17-year-old threatened the life of Alex Ovechkin on a site with even less credibility than this one and people actually took it seriously. The message was on a goddamn chat board and if this kid were at all serious, A.O. would have beaten him to death with his dick and then had the KGB turn his remains into taco meat. No need to arrest the kid just put him out on the ice and let him try to carry out his dream.

Secondly, I’ve received a few requests to expand this site’s ramblings beyond the umbrella of DC Sports. While I’d love to take a lyrical dump on teams from other cities I will try to avoid doing such for as long as I can. Talking about your city’s sports is like talking about your family. If your grandpa is a big piece of miserable shit of course you can say so but the second someone from outside your family calls him out you are ready to kill. The same goes for sports. I can bash my own family but I will try to avoid bashing yours…unless that city is Philadelphia of course.

Now, I'm off to watch the Caps steal game 4. I did not appreciate Malkin’s attempts to mock A.O.’s celebrations. He will pay with his blood. Sticking by Caps in 6.

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Crosby is a B!tch

Posted by dinoterp:

Standing in the crease while Caps defenders refuse to push you out and waving your stick around until you score doesn't make you a great player.  It could just mean that you're a good player going up against a lazy/soft/mediocre defense.  Celebrating a goal after you score is great - assuming you aren't still down 1 in the playoffs with 30 seconds left in the game.  Complaining to the refs that fans are celebrating a hat trick from a superior player is a bitch move:

After the first wave of hats came a second wave, prompting Crosby to speak to the referee about the long delay. "People kept throwing hats," Crosby said. "And I was just asking if he could make an announcement to ask them to stop."

Should we be surprised?  Crosby was prematurely annointed the savior of the NHL and ran with it.  Little did he know, a gritty, likeable, "guy's guy" from Russia would come along shortly thereafter... that oh-by-the-way is more talented... and take his crown.

Let's look at some more facts about Crosby and Ovechkin.  Maybe typing their names into Google images is the way to go (try it for yourself, let me know which one is a giant douche)?  

Let's start with Crosby:

1. He has the facial hair of a pre-pubescent gang member:

2. He's had more than his fair share of homoerotic photos taken of him:

3. He's a loser

4. He plays in Pittsburgh - where evil is smelt and men leave, reside in the DC area, and go to away games at FedEx field - presumably to get away from the horrific women of that awful city.

5. The NHL has gone out of their way to make his picture not look like he's a zero:

6. That picture looks eerily familiar to another huge bitch - JJ Reddick:

The fact remains that we're dealing with a primadonna that is getting his panties in a bundle that there's a better all around human being playing for his rivals.  And the implosion of over time will be fun to watch.  But not as fun as the career of one Alex Ovechkin.

Here's all you need to know about #8:

Case closed.  Enjoy the show.

Where are you when we suck? Analyzing the phenomena of the “bandwagon fan"

Celebrities are a painful reminder of the damage caused by bandwagon fans

As long as there has been sport there has been bandwagon fans. The drawings of Paleolithic men etched on the walls of caves tens of thousands of years ago depicted these rituals. According to Encino Man the first bandwagon fans consisted of brutes and women folk who only became admirers of Encino Man after he hath whooped his neighbor’s ass in a skull-bashing contest. Despite the fact that he lived alongside these pioneers of fair weather they ignored his existence until they wanted to be a part of his path to glory. Fast-forward 20,000 years and not much has changed. Enter, our modern day caveman, Alexander Ovechkin. A.O. has brought the District out of a sports coma in a big way. People who have been avoiding sporting events for years now have a reason to return to the stadiums, excuse me one stadium, and those who never thought they would see a winner in our Nation’s capital are starting to whisper about the possibility of a world championship. All and all it’s a phenomenal time to be a Caps fan. Perhaps that’s why there are so many Caps fans sprouting up all over the world. As much as I’d like to analyze our Euro fan-base the focus of this note is on the North American phenomena of the bandwagon fan, I couldn’t possibly do the stein -chugging, soccer-loving hooligans of the world justice because of my lack of first-hand interaction with their crazy asses.

If you call a true sports fan a bandwagon fan, you might as well kick a pigeon in front of Mike Tyson because you’re going to die. Nothing conjures up the pain and suffering of a die-hard fan like being grouped together with the people who have not been losing sleep over your teams loses for the past umpteen years. This is a bigger sin than calling a Tar Heel fan a Dookie, or a Buckeye fan a Wolverine. You just don’t do it. Thus, we must all have some means of recognizing die-hard fans from those who are just along for the ride to avoid unnecessary homicides and the like.

Because the Caps are our shiny, new toy and our inspiration for this article we will use their current situation as an example but you can fill in which ever team you like because there is at least one in every sport, each season (SEE for example, Tampa Bay Rays, Jordan’s Bulls and Boston anything). The Caps are not your typical bandwagon team. They did not come from obscurity and their success has been building since the NHL got back from its little lockout in 2004-05. Thus, these fans may be harder to pick out than the Rays fans that filled Tropicana field for the World Series last year with stickers on their brand-new, flat-billed ball caps. Although trivia about retired players and current rosters may immediately expose some bandwagon fans, the intelligent ones will be privy to this information thanks to the Internet and will be more prepared for your inquisition than a Soviet spy. Thus other avenues should be traversed. More efficient identifying questions focus on tricking the bandwagon fan and catching them in their web of lies. Casual conversation spliced with misinformation will let you know if you are dealing with a true fan or a poser. I real fan will not hesitate to interrupt you and correct information about a player or the team while a bandwagon fan is likely to let it slide assuming that it is just “something they missed in their Google search.” Wearing 3 Al Iafrate jerseys and a Don Beaupre blocker won’t shield a bandwagon Caps fan from this type of exposure. The same can be done for most teams but this becomes inherently more difficult when dealing with expansion teams.

Luckily the DC area only yields one team that resembles an expansion team, that being the Nats, and any poor bastard who roots for them knows that only bandwagon coming to town is anytime soon is the one with 100 loses on it. Overall bandwagon fans are relatively harmless but they should be identified so that they do not tarnish the images of our illustrious fan bases. Such a tragedy would occur if a loudmouth bandwagon fan (oxymoron) gets himself into a showdown with a true fan from an opposing squad. Upon viewing such a slaughter, a true fan should not hesitate to be the third-man-in on the altercation and should worry about bashing the bandwagoner at a later time. If such an accident occurs without intervention it should immediately be deleted from the memory bank like the Chinese do for the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. In general I don’t have much of a problem with bandwagon fans, they pump revenue into the sports I love and they separate the maniacs like me when they fill the stadiums.

As a side note I really don’t think there should be many rules of fandom outside of loyalty. I have no problem with you rooting for the Yankees, 49ers, Bulls and Duke basketball if that is where your allegiance has always been. Also if you want to have sex with Carlos Mencia, you just go ahead, I’m not here to judge you. The reasoning for the teams you root for is immaterial. I don’t care if it was your dad’s team or your grandma bought you a jersey when you had your first nocturnal emission. Your teams are your teams but you better be prepared to stick with that team forever, barring a short list of exceptions like: team relocation, growing up in a city that didn't field a team for a specific sport or marrying into franchise ownership which no one reading this blog will ever have to worry about. If you aren’t an athlete or a professional gambler and you only root for individual athletes kill yourself.

For anyone who is concerned that someone close to them may be a bandwagon fan or may be on the verge of becoming one please read this Bill Simmons article from a few years ago which lays the groundwork for bandwagon prevention and intervention. Also, if you are more proactive you could just put a plastic bag over his head and whisper, “Goodnight sweet prince.”

And for your daily dose of pleasure. I know where amazing happens. As always, Hail.

Rocking The Red and Unleashing The Fury Moscow Style

I've been lucky enough to see some great games in person over the past few years. I was there when, after the Redskins blocked a Dallas last second field goal attempt, the great Sean Taylor scooped up the ball, ran through a face mask penalty and set up the Skins' game winning kick. I saw Ryan Zimmerman christen the Nationals' new ballpark with a walk off home run. I watched the Terps football team beat Miami and Florida State in back-to-back weeks. I was even able to enjoy the Lee Greenwood classic "Proud To Be An American" at the Army vs. Navy football game in Baltimore. I've seen game winning 2-minute drills, monster dunks, grand slams, and half court shots. But nothing I have ever seen in the world of sports can compare to being at the Verizon Center last night where I had the privilege to witness Alexander Ovechkin scorch three pucks past the Penguins' dumbfounded goalie.

Being that I'm a Washington sports fan I haven't had many chances to see any kind of playoff games over the years, but for once the stars aligned and I got tickets for "Caps vs. Pens Part II: Gary Bettman's Wet Dream" with some friends. There was a buzz in the air around the Verizon Center and you just knew that with these two teams anything was possible. The first period went by and while it was exciting to be there it wasn't the psychotic frat party from hell that I always hoped I'd get to see. The Pens had the lead after that bitch Sidney "The Anti-Haberdasher" Crosby slipped a goal under Varlamov's pads and the Pens fans were feeling a little too good about themselves. I was nervous that after watching game 1 on TV that there'd be no way for game 2 to compare. In my mind the final score would end up being 1-0, because, like I said before, I'm a Washington sports fan.

But over the next two periods, despite Andy Sandberg's stunt double eventually getting the cheapest hat trick in the history of men whacking things with sticks, Alex The Great transcended the game. With two rocket one-timers Ovie tied it up and then gave the good guys the lead. With each of his goals the atmosphere in the Phone Booth intensified as Caps began to swell with pride while the invaders from Pittsburgh sunk deeper into their seats. When the Unleash The Fury video was played with around 5 minutes left I was literally shaking with excitement and no one was in their seat. The stage was set for Alex The Great to grab the reins and and cement his place as the best hockey player alive. On a fast break past my former favorite Capital, Sergi Gonchar, #8 unleashed the fury in the form of a redonkulous slap shot over Fleury's outstretched glove.

Total euphoria. Total excitement. It didn't matter that Crosby would eventually swat his 3rd goal in with 30 seconds left (I'll admit that he's a better player than I've given him credit for in the past, but he's no Ovechkin) because this was The Ovie Show. Every time Ovie's skates touch the ice you get the feeling that you're going to see something amazing. The Redskins seem lost in the abyss, the Wizards probably won't rise above mediocrity any time soon, and the Nationals are the Nationals, but with Ovechkin and the amazing supporting cast of Mike Green, Alexander Semin, Nicholas Backstrom, Brooks Laich, and now Simeon Varlamov, just to name a few, you might start to believe that we could all be rocking the red for a long time. Of course this series could easily blow up in our faces and the summer could come sooner than we hope, but either way this team is bringing passion back to DC and I for one couldn't be happier.

Oh yeah, suck it, Don Cherry.