Jonathan Bailey

Those who follow college basketball may remember that a Rice University basketball player, Jonathan Bailey, was stabbed to death in a bar fight in College Station, Texas in April, 2007.

In the interest of full disclosure, it must be stated that we knew Jon Bailey personal

ly.  Jon was a member of a big, loving family, who walked on at Rice as a soph

omore, after putting together an outstanding application to transfer to the school from Texas State.  He had known Willis Wilson, then the coach of Rice basketball, now an assistant at Memphis, for many years, having attended his camps as a kid, and Wilson encouraged him to come to Rice.

Jon was a thoughtful person, both personally and academically.  He cared for his mother and brothers more than anything else–that was the first thing one noticed.  Quiet in class, he nevertheless more than kept up with the philosophical discussions that come with being in humanities classes at one of the country’s most challenging universities.  Jon said he wanted to be President. People believed him.

On the court, Jon was the first off the bench to congratulate a teammate.  While he didn’t play much at Rice, his minutes on the court–even in shootaround–were clearly filled with joy, which he passed along to teammates and spectators alike.

In 2007, he and his twin brother Janson were celebrating their birthday at a bar in College Station. A former Marine and veteran of Iraq, Ronald Andrew Johnson, was also in the bar that night, with his friend Michael Fuller.

After that, the undisputed facts are these:

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EDIT: Joannie Rochette skated a free program that was far and away better than her short. We would have revised our expectations, but that would be cheating…but we were neither surprised nor disappointed in her scores.  Hurray for Joannie!

We’d like to do Joannie Rochette a favor, and discuss her skating. K?

Nobody was talking about Rochette before her mom’s tragic death a few days ago from a heart attack.  This is not because she’s not a good skater–she finished fifth in Torino, ahead of Kimmie Meisner–but because…well, we hate to say this right now, and clearly so does everyone else, but short program just isn’t on the level of the other medal contenders.  She IS a good skater, and we feel terrible about her mom, but her choreography isn’t at the level  Her footwork sequences in the short were pretty good, and her jumps weren’t under-rotated or anything, but comparing her spins to Mirai Nagasu’s or the rest of her choreography to Mao Asada’s is silly…they’re just not on the same plane. She did have by far the best dress, though. By far.

If Joannie pulls off a clean freeskate, she’ll have won the hearts of the judges and the crowd, especially since she represents Canada.  But she won’t make the podium, even though she’s currently ranked #2 in the world. We just don’t see it.

Our guess: fifth? seventh? in there.

Restaurants are thriving. Tourism is at an all-time high. The weather is gorgeous, although maybe not for a winter Olympics.

But not all of Vancouver is happy that the Olympics is there.  First of all, there’s the crowds: one woman quoted in a New York Times article waited five hours to see an exhibit of medals at a local museum.  Then, there’s the late-night partiers.

But the biggest issue is probably going to be footing the bill.  The Olympic Village was orgiinalyl to be financed, built on city land, and then Vancouver would sell it to a condo developer, turning a profit.  And then the financing fell through, and they had to borrow money to finish it.

Also fallen through? Sponsor GM, and the resort where some of the ski races are hosted, which is up for auction.  Vancouver is currently optimistic that it’ll break even financially, but that includes 434 million provided by the Olympic Committee to help complete the village.

So don’t move to Vancouver…we’re thinking your taxes will go through the roof.

Last night, we had some serious multi-tasking to do, and some of it involved going to the movies. We figured we’d watch some highlights this morning on ESPN.

As our fave fat yellow guy says, D’oh!

ESPN’s down, folks.  We recommend NBC for figureskating highlights (analysis later tonight here.) and the fabulous blogosphere for everything else. Stay tuned…

Photo credit : RACHEL FLATT

Rachel Flatt’s photo, which we got from her Twitter feed is:

A. A heartfelt portrayal of a worldwide icon

B. A creatively shot night scene

C. Amazing: the torch is actually working!

Del Bosco right before the crash (AP PHOTO)

Brand new sports, like brand new Olympic sites, are bound to have a few glitches.  But what’s a coupl;e crashes (or a stalled out Olypic torch) matter in the face of innovation and world solidarity? Well, not much, unless the crashes are as ridiculous as what happened in yesterday’s new Olympic sport, Ski Cross.  Ski Cross involves four men skating at once, including jumps and tricks and…ow.

The twists and turns of the course gave skaters several possible routes, and Christopher Del Bosco, who was in line to win a bronze medal, didn’t take the one a sane person would have (assuming, of course, that a sane person chooses to become a ski cross athlete, which honestly seems unlikely to us…).

Anyway, Del Bosco ended up gushing blood and losing his medal in the process.  In fact, crashes–some of them dramatic–marred six of sixteen races that took place yesterday.

So, what’s the percentage on winter sports injuries? We understand that some of the point of the Olympics, especially the winter variety, is the constant pursuit of stronger-faster-harder-better.  Where do we stop?

It’s been forty years since Title IV revolutionized school sports by making it unlawful not to offer the same number of sports opportunities to women as to men at all levels of education.

That was good news, and now we have some more. The increase in girls’ athletic activity that was heralded by the advent of Title IX is linked by several studies tp a 7% lower rate of obesity twenty to twenty five years later. (While this may not seem like a lot, no other public health or fitness related initiative can show such a correlation.)

Here’s to girls on the field, on the court, and in the pool!

An international judge has issued an arrest warrant for Floyd Landis, best known as not-Lance-Armstrong. The case involves computer hacking at a doping lab in France. The judge wants to question Landis about hacking dating back to 2006, according to ESPN. This is the lab that uncovered the elevated testosterone levelsin Landis’ samples and was thus responsbile for stripping him of his 2006 medal, by the way.

Interestingly, the hacked files came to the attention of the lab and the judiciary because Landis himself told them…when he tried to use them in his defense in a hearing about the doping. He claimed his files had been altered, causing people in the know to check the computer trail. And, in fact, they had.
As Homer Simpson once said, d’oh!

Landis, who is still cycling, says he has not yet been served with a warrant. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out. but we’re entering definite Movie of the Week territory, here….

Yao Ming rocking the China vote. People starting who can’t play. The hype for the NBA All Star Game has been…odd, to say the least. And now, honestly, we have NO reason to watch it, because Kobe Bryant isn’t playing, and neither is Alan Iverson.

Kobe isn’t a surprise–he hasn’t played in the last three games with an ankle injury. Iverson is, at least to us, though. He’s missed five games because of an illness in the family. One of his young children is sick, and while the family hasn’t released a statement, it must be something serious. The NBA comissioner is in charge of selecting injury and personal leave based replacements, and he’s selected Jason Kidd, who will make his tenth All-Star appearance, to replace Kobe in the starting lineup. New York’s David Lee will start for Iverson.

So, that leaves Bryant, Iverson, Chris Paul, Brandon Roy, and likely Monta Ellis out of the game? Yep, not watching…

This came to us via a Mass-based relative, if that wasn’t clear.

Sox fans, enjoy…

OK this isn’t about pink hats, per se. But there’s hats in it for sure, so bear with us.

Andre Dawson, who will be entering the Hall of Fame this year, is a die-hard Cub.  Dawson played for the Chicago Cubs from 1987-1992, winning an MVP trophy even though the team was in the cellar that year.  He’s actually the only player to do that playing for a team in last place, by the way.  Hiss lugging p-ercentage with the Cubs, .507, is the fourth highest in team history (which, when you think about it, is a lot more exciting than if he were fourth in, say, Rangers or Rays history.)

So, Dawson should be headed in as a Cub, right? He’s made it clear that’s his choice, and the stats and achievements he had with the Cubbies are more than adequate.  Instead, however,  he’ll head into Cooperstown as an Expo.  The Montreal team (which is now the Washington Nationals), is the team Dawson came up with.

The HOF used to let people pick their hats, but Wade Boggs changed all that when rumors flew that the Rays offered to pay him to wear their hat.  At the time this was perfectly allowed, and rather than ban it, the Hall of Fame simply decided they would now decide who gets to wear what hat.

We understand the issue that has to do with payment.  Money + baseball player = generally bad, when the money coming in is anything besides straight up salary.  One isn’t quite to Black Sox territory here,  but the slope is a slippery one.

Of course, this could lead to some icky little issues, baseball politics-wise.  For example, let’s say Clemens makes the Hall of Fame.  We’re guessing he’d avoid the whole stupid Yanks-Sox-Jays (Jays? Really?) issue, and choose to go in as an Astro, since that’s his hometown team.  But clearly the guys at the Hall aren’tt aking sentiment into account, if Dawson’s case is anything to go by.

This isn’t the only issue with the Hall of Fame–there’s that whole big performance-enhanced elephant in the room, for starters.  But if history is to be served well by the museum at Cooperstown, players’ preferences should be just as much a part of it as they were when they demanded trades and signed contracts.

The players, after all, are the point, right?

the answer isn’t going to surprise you, so we’ll go ahead and put it right out there.  Three little–powerful–words.  These words make the world go ’round, and you’ve probably heard them before.  They’re the subject of poets, of playwrights, of songs and epic tales.  People have lived and died for them.

The words?

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