Recent Comments
I picked VARgentina pre-tourney to win it all in a bracket challenge as well as on Kalshi, so I have a few hundred potential earnings rooting for VARgentina. Otherwise, Go England since I'm visiting there in September.
Carini also finished 2nd
Dube took 2nd
Miller won his 4th Fargo Title
Konopka finished 7th in Consolation
Wurster finished 5th in Consolation
McMullen lost in Consolation Rd of 32
Coluccio lost in Consolation Quarterfinals
Allez Les Bleus!
I disagree. Cards for diving is the best rule and that was embarrassing levels of bad diving. 0 contact. Dove forwards. Rolls around screaming for about 5 barrel rolls. Card his ass.
Jason Dube seeded #8 looking just as skrong taking out #1 seed PSU commit Shepherd in the last second of their match then TF 10-0 #4 seed Collins heading to the finals
Miller Carini and Dube have advanced to Finals
Wurster lost in Semifinals
Konopka lost in rideouts in Quarterfinals
I was convinced for about 6 whole days after that game that we could win the natty that year. Then we played East Caroline at home and things were clarified after that lol.
Mario Carini seeded #11 looking skrong as he takes out #3 seed Maximus Dhabolt then he takes out #2 seed Lucas Boe
control what you can, practice harder and get better.
I think this was the greatest thing I learned from tennis growing up. There are 5 billion things on any given day that you can't control but you can control what you eat, how you sleep, what you practice, how you respond when things go wrong, what you do on a rain delay, etc etc
Individual sports don't get the praise they should IMO.
This was such a good read.
The idea that a former accomplished professional athlete would enroll his kids in club sports, in America, in this time period, is unfathomable. IMO that's thing that really illustrates the cultural difference.
Great discussion and FWIW I'll also give my cents.
We just finished with daughter's at home sports career with sons' prior to that.
We spent a God awful amount of $$ and MANY weekends/days away with travel volleyball.
The amount of money, politics, drama involved was shocking. And I'd do it again.
I was able to spend a lot of bonding time with family, met some awesome people along the way that we consider family.
I greatly support sports for kids. But I do believe the system is a racket.
My daughter was able to benefit and is one of the few that has gone on to Div 1, SEC. The coaching was baseline BAD and confrontational, injurious (except for a few that we are grateful for). But, there is really no other way for a kid who dreams of playing at a high level to get there. If you dont play club, you'll not make the high school team, and/or get recruited.
So they've got you.... and they know it.
But my mantra to my kids was always 'control what you can, practice harder and get better.' We have a home gym and got lessons on the side from good coaches and it worked out.
I will say that once you get to the 3rd rail of Olympic sports and the development program there is a clear political bias that benefits those in control and NOT the overall success of the teams. The best players DON'T get chosen for the developmental tracts and we have underacheived compared to what we likely should, (like mens soccer as noted)
Yeah I'm team anyone but France. But they are the strongest looking team imo.
Konopka, Miller, Carini, Dube and Wurster have advanced to the quarterfinals
Fortier fell in Round of 64
Coluccio was up but got pinned in Round of 32
McMullen also fell in Round of 32
Why turn down a job that gives you the freedom to explore new places in a way that you can't in the US? It's basically study abroad as an adult (I have a bunch of friends who did the expat thing for some piece of their adult professional life - with one exception, almost no one I've met regrets it).
Not necessarily more affordable, but I recommend something for your kids that you know and have opportunity to enjoy...yep 'nator, it's fishing!
I was ok with the decision.
Dream semifinal lineup.
Rooting for anyone but France. Though they do look like the favorite
I was just talking about Europe. Rugby definitely has a sizeable world wide appreciation
FIFA beating corruption allegations challenge: impossible
I'm all for punishing embellishment and diving but that's unbelievably harsh by VAR and the ref. VARgentina getting all the breaks they could ask for here and the Swiss were starting to look menacing.
Just throw VAR out the window and trash it too many awful decisions
Seattle?!
1. Mostly agree. 2. There was contact, but it was after he dove. 3. The pain may have actually been genuine (if you've ever been leg whipped at speed, you'd know - and slow-mo does no justice), though I'm sure he embellished. 4. He should absolutely get a yellow card for diving - you want diving out of the game, penalize it harshly. 5. What was harsh, is the fact he was already on one yellow, so the second yellow disqualifies him for the rest of the game (and, should they win, the next one).
That's when you start to wonder if the first yellow was really warranted. I don't remember how he got the first one, tbh. Some of the refs in this tournament have given out cards like candy. Others haven't. Others, still, have been a bit one-sided (Paraguay not getting any yellows while France picked up 3 or 4 is absolutely nuts). I do think that there should be changes to how VAR is applied in regard to penalizing players. I think refs should be forced to only give out cards in real time, based on what they see on the field. VAR can ONLY be used to take a card away if it is determined to have been given erroneously.
Now, the tricky part with the Embolo incident is that the precedent had been set by the situation with Team Ream - that in a tackle that involved one player sliding in and another simulating and the ref erroneously awards the sliding player a yellow card, and then upon review, decides the yellow card was incorrect and then instead decides to award it to the simulating player - that forced the hand, IMO. I think most refs, given the context of the game, would have taken away the card, and maybe, at worst, awarded the free kick to Argentina but not given Embolo his 2nd yellow in that moment. But the precedent had been set. I think VAR rules need reform. I felt bad that Embolo's World Cup ended in that manner. On the other hand, he dove, and I hate that shit, get it tf out of the game. At least, it looked like he dove, in slow motion. There is a chance, albeit slim, that he did genuinely trip or lose his balance and happened to get caught on the leg on the way down and tried to sell it. Either way, that embellishment is embarrassing. I think at the end of the day, I wanted Argentina to lose but Embolo screwed up by trying to get more out of it than was warranted. I don't hate the decision. But it was harsh. Even if it was right, it was still harsh.