Foreman drugged

How much seedier can boxing get? Even its golden era is now being tarnished, or perhaps it's always been tarnished, I mean Don King has been involved with this "sport" for a long time now. Professional boxing, cycling, or baseball, take your pick on which is the seediest. Oh yeah, then there's that whole criminal element to the NFL.... No wonder poker is doing so well these days. Professional, televised poker is actually much cleaner than the amateur game that has been played for years in dark corners across the America. Based on that theory, I wonder what the next big "sports" craze will be? (Help me out here, I can't think of one, but is there some other sport where amateurs cheat like hell, but if you were to clean it up and put it on TV, you could reduce the cheating? Thanks.)

Ralph

Greg Lemond

Has anyone been reading about this Greg Lemond thing? "I'm your uncle, and I'll be there tomorrow." Landis is hangin' out with people like this? I guess that tells you something about how competitive the cycling world is. These guys are sick. Landis, of course, is the former Amish guy who was apparently shunned for purusing a career in professional cycling, and then came back from a huge deficit to pull out the Tour a couple years ago (maybe it was last year) Anyhow, testing found this huge comeback was fueled by unusually high levels of testosterone, which makes sense, but, he's denying it.


Lemond is one of my favorite athletes of all-time; he also had an incredible cycling comeback. After becoming the first American to win the Tour, he was shot in a hunting accident, and came back and was so sucky, it seemed like his career was over and no top flight team would give him a job. He ends up with some rag-tag bunch, and proceeds to shock everyone by winning the Tour, capping it off with a record-setting time trial on the race's last day. His French rival at the time described him as "playing the chicken, when he is really a lion," as Lemond kept playing like he was shocked to be near the leaders and was just waiting for an inevitable falter, which never happened. Then, he came back and won the thing the following year as well, in a little more conventional fashion.

Anyhow, that was back when cycling wasn't quite as fucked up as it is now, or at least we didn't know as much. Now, it seems half the top riders are in trouble for doping and Lemond is being blackmailed regarding being sexually molested as a child. I would have to say cycling has now passed baseball as the most "fucked-up sport." Or, it's the European version of baseball -neither of which is a sport of course, as baseball is officially our national "pastime" and cycling's top race is actually known as a "Tour." That's what happens I guess when you get too deep into these things....

Cheers.



Ralph

Doral

This place is kind of nuts. They seem to play reggae 24/7 in the lobby. It's actually kind of nice. Right now, they're playing some version of Bob Marley's "Chase Those Crazy Baldheads out of Town." It's hot as hell down here, so it's probably appropriate I guess. Doral is located a few miles inland and you don't get that fresh breeze off the ocean that you typically get nearer to the coast in Miami. But the palm trees are nice, and as long as you don't move too fast, just kind of sway with the reggae, it's kind of relaxing.

Cheers.

Ralph

1973 continued

In 1973,

The A's won the World Series
Secretariat won the Triple Crown
The Dolphins beat the Redskins 14-7 in the Super Bowl in January....

Did anything else happen?
Yes, I was in kintergarten, Richard Nixon was president...hmmmm