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956 Worldwide

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Everything posted by 956 Worldwide

  1. His destiny in life always involved holding Serbs’ heads underwater in one way or another.
  2. I’ve done a self-inventory and it turns out I am overly invested and have inappropriately strong feelings about the outcomes, organization, and analysis of spectator sporting events that have no tangible impact on my own life.
  3. My understanding from when I went to the 1996 Olympics is that they don’t want winners to be standing on a podium and hearing their anthem as crowds are heading to the exit.
  4. The Olympics desperately needs a cull and not additions. A few principles I’d go with. Starting with most important, being an OG event trumps all. 1. Any original (as in Ancient Greek) event is safe if it’s already in. Wrestling and boxing stay, you don’t get to drop the OG events. 2. If there’s a higher and more prestigious international venue, it goes. This sucks because I like the sports, but still. We have the World Cup, we have Majors, we have Grand Slams. The games need to be without a doubt the best athletes, if you consider sitting out the games in a sport that means the Olympics aren’t the venue for the sport. 3. No animals. Bye equestrian. Bring back chariot racing and we will talk. Modern pentathlon gets a waiver because it’s got four other disciplines and the test to be a Napoleonic courier is super cool— no arguing that. But horse dancing has to go. 4. If there are two versions of a sport in the games, the older and more prestigious stays. Goodbye 3x3, table tennis, beach volleyball, etc. Time to winnow adjective sports that are more like recreational activities than Olympics worthy. 5. If there are “judges” vice “referees,” it needs to go. We can grandfather in gymnastics and ice skating to keep the ratings up, but breakdance and artistic swimming and the like gotta go. 6. Finally calories expended. There’s gotta be a cutoff. I love you shooting and archery, but that’s an impressive skill and not athleticism. Combine it for modern pentathlon or biathalon and we are cooking.
  5. Yeah, it’s one of the most demanding and athletic sports around but I agree it’s hard to watch.
  6. That story is about a broken person struggling with the long-term impacts of trauma at a young age, hard drug use on cognitive function, and no actual consequences to prompt a course correction or lead to a complete crash. It’s tragic and sad even if it means he is a person completely unsuited to any position of responsibility or authority.
  7. The script has flipped wildly on that because as a kid in the late 80s and early 90s the popular image of eastern bloc women athletes was for sure East German swimmers and burly tennis players, but by early 2000s they were the standard bearers for pulchritude in sports. Call it the Kournikova and Sharapova effect. And sports science and training has changed. Male athletes look a lot different because of how they train than they did in the 1970s and 1980s and so do the women. And on the dark side sports “science” is more sophisticated and focused, it’s not just massive doses of anabolic steroids.
  8. I think there’s a lot going on here. First of all, the overlap between “crazy fit young person at the peak of their physical ability” and “attractive” is always going to be pretty significant on the Venb diagram. Second, I think worldwide we are seeing a boost in participation in sports for girls and women. Even in the 1990s, the active but girlie girls in HS gravitated to cheer and maybe tennis or dance and sports was less socially cool. That’s changed and it’s awesome, and also countries are investing more in girls sports, so there are more athletes and opportunities. Which is super cool. Finally because of the exposure and power of brand building, a lot of these athletes are acutely aware of the benefit to showing off their fitness and charms. That shows in everything from the preferred uniforms to the warmup routines to the makeup and hair and nails. These ladies know that the right photo or TikTok can mean lots and lots of sponsorship opportunities and many go prepared to seize them. In the past it was kind of a point of pride for jock girls not to be girly and now it’s the opposite.
  9. This is playing Barbies for dudes.
  10. Now this is some real straight uncut enshittening. Your Facebook feed is a cesspool of insane AI slop because Facebook itself is paying Indian teenagers to post images of starving Jesus getting eaten by bugs. And of course, Zuck is one of the drivers of AI as the future. https://www.404media.co/where-facebooks-ai-slop-comes-from/
  11. I guarantee you he’s trying to make up a racist nickname and is instead messing up the capital of Uganda. (Kampala).
  12. We are ahead by two golds now. And yeah, Amit Elor crushed it, she might be the most dominant athlete at the games. China is going to keep racking up in diving and there’s some table tennis but these last few days are friendly for us. Would be nice if swimming hadn’t underperformed.
  13. Um, Slava Ukrainii! Gold medal for Yaroslava Mahuchikh in high jump!
  14. So many reasons for this and as a former amateur boxing dilettante it makes me bummed. We are still the world leaders in boxing medals. USA boxing is shambolic and poorly organized at the amateur level. At the pro levels, the continual pursuit of short term business before long term health of the sport. It’s so fucking hard to get into and watch the fights if you’re not already a fight fan, fighting on cable is mostly dead. The local circuit is on life support because of so many other entertainment options. The focus of amateur boxing is in the nations of the former Soviet Union and eastern bloc, where there are organized and funded governing bodies and where coaches and promising athletes get a government salary and living. That does not exist here. The crack up of the Soviet Union brought more countries to the table. It’s important and invested in at the state level. Boxers used to be very well paid relative to other pro athletes. It’s a hard life and way to make a living and if you’re an athletic kid with a mean streak you can go other routes. In a prior generation, Miles Garrett is facing Maxx Crosby in an MSG title tilt. MMA and other real combat sports are more accessible and fixed in the culture and more accessible for the kid who wants to try things out. As a parent, you feel a lot better putting your 12 year old in BJJ versus lacing up the gloves and trying on some CTE. Latinos keep the sport alive in the U.S. and since amateur boxing switched to points instead of rounds. But they are training their fighters for pro fighting. Mexico is maybe the world’s overall great fighting nation but only has two gold medals (both 1968). They’re training to prizefight from their first day in the gym.
  15. The source for this is the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister. There was a call and a discussion about a plot, but if the Russians had that level of fidelity on what it was, there’d be no need to call us. If Rybakov isn’t lying (unlikely), it was the right call. An attack on the head of state of a nuclear power would be extremely destabilizing.
  16. Got real guanciale and good pecorino romano and decided to make rigatoni amatriciana tonight.
  17. Watching that video all I can think of is Ferrell as Neil Diamond on “Storytellers.”
  18. If the teams face-off straight up across generations, this is the correct answer. The 1983 Daingerfield Tigers are the most dominant team to lace up cleats. They averaged 39 PPG in 1983 and had three 1000 yard rushers. They allowed 8 points all year and two of those were a safety.
  19. I keep it in the fridge and freeze it if it’s close to expiry and I don’t have a plan to cook it.
  20. Sealed honey will not go bad unless it’s contaminated with something. They’ve found honey in archaeological sites that’s perfectly edible.
  21. One thing to think about is that while predators will frequently give up and go find another easier meal if they catch something that fights back too much, prey animals will often decide you have to get got if they think you’re a threat. I’d likely choose 200 pound wolf over angry 200 pound hog or goat although both will fuck me up.
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