Month: October 2009

All-night cinema: SportsAngle wishes you the sublimest of Samhains

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 Come on, like you don't spend your free time making images like these
Though sports is definitely what this site does best, Halloween is the official holiday of SportsAngle.com. There’s simply something to be said for a day in which it’s completely acceptable to more closely represent who you are visually, even if it’s sort of macabre – or in my case, completely and totally macabre.

As a special Halloween present, SportsAngle presents its top 10 favorite horror movies as of right now. This list could very easily be very different by this time next year, but why not live in the now? All of these films come highly endorsed, and I’m presenting it a day early so you can hit up your local Best Buy and load up for the holiday.

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Kings of New York? Jay-Z the wrong choice for Yanks’ pregame anthem

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Jay keeping it gangsta with his sweater and Kate HudsonIf you’ve been reading, you know SportsAngle is largely in tune with the hip-hop community. (As recently as this month, I shook hands with the great Ghostface Killah) So I watched with keen interest as the Yankees announced that Jay-Z – who has carved out more and more of a presence in sports lately as part-owner of the Nets and celebrity friend of LeBron James – would perform his new song, Empire State of Mind, at Game 1 of the World Series.

And I’m here to tell you the Yankees made a lousy pick.

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Putting it bluntly: Philly’s repeat talk not just smoke and mirrors

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As evenly matched a Series as we've seen in quite some time

The Yankees are one of the most talented teams I’ve seen in a long time – as well they should be. They already had the best leadoff hitter, closer, and arguably the best hitter in baseball, and they spent a cool $425 mil to add the top two free-agent starters and the best free-agent position player on the market. That is what you call economy in motion.

What I’ve been surprised about is their ability to come together as a cohesive unit. Their chemistry appears better than I’ve seen from a Yankees team in years. I doubt Jeter truly likes personalities like Nick Swisher and A.J. Burnett, but I’m sure he’s learned to love the loosening-up affect they’ve had on the clubhouse, what with all the pies in the face and whatnot.

But they’re about to run into a Phillies team that is even more cohesive, that makes more sense, that has more of an identity. And that has just as much talent. Here are the factors I see affecting the World Series, which I believe will be a very close affair.

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The Afternoon After: NFL’s embrace of Big Ben – the clock – illogical

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Here’s my weekly roundup of what I saw in football, starting with the latest nonsensical idea from a league commissioner. This turned into The Day After (thanks, day job).

English fans get ready to watch a sport they likely don't understand -- which puts them on the same level as Eric Mangini

Professional sports leagues constantly want to expand their horizons. The thinking is that the more people in more places that see your brand, the bigger market there is to sell jerseys and such. I get that.

But now I hear that the NFL may eventually want to move a team to London, and I think it’s an ambitious but preposterous sentiment.

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Irving recruitment shows benefits – and ills – of social media’s impact

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Window into a teenager's thoughts

For better or for worse, the amount of access fans have has truly changed in big-time college basketball recruiting, and social media is a major reason why.

In the past, high school stars were relatively elusive figures. We rarely got to see them play, much less know very much about them before they showed up to be big little men on campus as freshmen.

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Defending champs have not yet nearly had their Phil of success

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Celebrations such as these have become routine in Philly

I sold the Phillies short this year mainly because I think it’s so hard to repeat in baseball. It hasn’t happened since the Torre Yankees about 10 years ago, and then before that the Blue Jays of the early ‘90s. Three separate teams repeated in the ‘70s, but that’s back in the early stages of free agency when it was far easier to hold onto a good team once you’ve built one.

But I underestimated the Phillies – anticipating their demise at the hands of the red-hot Rockies in the divisional round – and I really shouldn’t have.

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The afternoon after: Saints may be ready to make The Leap

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As per usual, my look at the weekend’s football games from a decidedly untrained eye, as evidenced by last week’s eulogy for the career of Tom Brady.

Now THIS must have been a scintillating conversation

It’s no secret that the Saints are currently the best team in football, as evidenced by their demolition of the previously unbeaten Giants. But just how good are they? What is the limit to their potential success?

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NFL getting catty about Dolphins bringing fun, innovation to the sport

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One of the Dolphins' four quarterbacks -- of sorts -- flings it past notorious Wildcat critic and league substance abuse policy violator Calvin Pace What is it they say, that you fear what you don’t understand? Well, it’s apparent that the entire NFL is terrified of the Dolphins’ Wildcat offense.

They just don’t get it. They don’t get why it works, they don’t get why the Dolphins are so insistent on using it, they don’t get why the media is so fascinated by it. And they absolutely don’t get why they simply can’t stop it.

But it’s not just the Wildcat they fear, it’s that they’re facing a threat to their comfortable status quo, that they might have to adjust their stodgy status quo.

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The afternoon after: Peyton reigns in late chapters of tale of two QBs

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Here’s my weekly look at the weekend’s football games. Remember: I don’t claim to actually know anything substantive about the sport.

Leading the pack A few years back, Peyton Manning and Tom Brady were the unquestioned kings of a sport in which quarterbacks are put on a pedestal. They were two golden gods with golden arms, leaders of men that handled thundering herds of massive men with a deft sidestep and a flick of their powerful wrists.

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