Valley Chai » Incorrigible Sportsholic

India Now Exports Pitchers

spandana — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:15:39 +0000

oh the only pitchers we know of india come filled with beer. but in what looks like a publicity stunt, major league baseball drafted two desis to pitch for pittsburgh pirates baseball team.

the selection was done by an open competition called “million dollar arm” (check out their page on how to throw a pitch here). whether this will bring back “playing base” to india, who cares. but it will surely bring some $$ into the country, and zee tv will have another game to broadcast than the sorry-looking ICL.

Total Paisa Vasool

spandana — Mon, 05 May 2008 19:31:15 +0000

even in IPL cricket, indian players are going in for value-pricing. 17 of the top 20 players (in terms of production on the field vs. player contract value) are indian players. check out the complete rediff story. very soon someone will start playing the moneyball.

As Genuine As It Gets

spandana — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 12:42:57 +0000

i thought he was a clinger while he played on for the last 4-5 years while people were overbearing on him to quit, but i now no why.

you must be divinely blessed to have a job and a career you just can’t peel away from. for those that are in india.. brett favre retired after playing in the NFL league (american football) 17 seasons without missing a game. won championship once, was the ‘most valuable player’ 3 times. he was reported to have taken pain-killer drugs just to play in thhe game.

watch the clip in it’s entirety. the gritty fellow throws the ball like a cannon, plays like a kid, wins like a champion.

truly blessed.

No Monkeying Around, This is Indian Cricket

spandana — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 04:51:19 +0000

one thing the aussie and the world knows but doesn’t really GET it, is that sachin is a god and cricket is a religion in india. it’s beyond a religion in india.. whereas religions devide india, cricket UNITES india.

so harbhajan singh calls somebody a monkey. the tough guy symonds suddently gets all soft and goes about complaining?? imagine an american basketball player going ‘wassup, dog?’ on an indian guy? calling someone a dog isn’t a going to represent street-talk in india. a suspension in that case would be laughed at. that’s exactly whats happening. except desis aren’t laughing – this isn’t funny.

check out prem panicker’s take. he’s pretty even keeled about things like this. also check out crickinfo‘s take on aussie media’s coverage calling for ponting’s head. these talented bastards have taken the ‘gentlemen’ out of the ‘gentlemen’s game’.

Cricket Over Plusmo

spandana — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 17:44:25 +0000

checked out plusmo after an alum (Ro?) sent out a help-wanted ad in our alumni mailing list. sounded cool, and it did cool things. but later discovered that cricinfo had a cool plusmo gadget called MobiCast for mobile phones. installed it on my blackberry 8800, works like a charm. the best ball-by-ball user experience so far., better than indiatimes and rediff gadgets. check it out

right now, indian seamers are chocking pakistan top order.

Championship Triple Crown : Phoren Influence?

spandana — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 22:06:23 +0000

indian sport scene is on a roll. though i’ve been in bangalore only for the last 2 months, it’s easy to get sucked into my old favorite sports. hockey has a special place in my heart, mainly because that’s the closest i got in competitive play (i played for a couple of seasons for the Palo Alto Field Hockey Club). anyway, checkout the recent successes:

Asian Hockey Championship : joaquim carvalho (portuguese) brought the coaching that greg chappell couldn’t.

World Twenty20 Championship : dhoni and team won by playing ‘khul ke‘. dhoni is a self-confessed admirer of aussie cricket and adam gilchrist.

World Chess Championship : viswanathan anand was the lone shining star of international success in the dismal indian sport for over 15 years. he reminds us again who the flag-bearer of indian sport is. bravo!
* special mention world snooker champion pankaj advani is riding high – check out his play

the root of the resurgence is clearly the exposure to world-class sports and corporate sponsorship: both of which are growing by leaps and bounds. in a perverse way, expertise in steroids from balco would complete the picture

The New India – World Beaters!

spandana — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 16:26:45 +0000

it’s been a long time coming since Kapil’s Devils won the 1-day version of cricket world cup back in 1983. that was for my dad’s generation. i heard shabana azmi mention the other day that 50% of india’s population is 25 years of less old. so this one’s for that half.

that was a team of rag-tag players knit together under us vs. world chip on their shoulders. some were supremely gifted (kapil included) and some were not so (amarnath, for example) – but every single person delivered to their abilities, and they played with no other agenda but to play good cricket. cut to today, it’s quite the same. dhoni’s boys aren’t the top of the line players, but they had much the same qualities. from pathan’s sheer talent to joginder singh’s grit, from yuvraj class to yusuf pathan scrappy play, each player did what they had to do, what they could do.

it was early diwali and fire crackers were booming well into the night, and television pretty much was blanketed with coverage of celebrations. it’s kind of like post-election coverage when the returns start streaming in. i got glued into TimesNow, CNN-IBM, ESPN/Star Sports, and AajTak channels to take in the excitement around the country. funny thing is the coverage from chennai showed bunch of baffoons singing rajini songs. brought me a chuckle. the general routine for the TV shows is to camp out near the players’ homes and interview their parents. throw in one of the ex-players (preferably from the 1983 batch) and a foreign player and you have a show going.

things seem to going india’s way these days. low inflation, rupee appreciation, global expansion and sport success seem to be amplifying the general country’s mass psyche. all of a sudden those 50% 25-year-olds think they can beat the world. much like the new team india.

Yuvraj Singh’s Majestic Sixer-Parade

spandana — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 11:25:18 +0000

it was a rare occasion that wife i get to watch tv together, so when we were glued to india batting in the t20 game against england last night, i was thinking this is special. and special it turned out to be!

First six – i was thinking, it’s about time they started swinging the bats.
Second six – wow yuvy is going for it. awesome!
Third six – you can see he is angry. you can see broad is shaken.
Fourth six – yuvy looks in a daze. you know next one is going to be in the air. everything is eerily similar to a pitcher on the mound on piching his 9th inning of a no-hitter. no word from dhoni, no mid-crease chit-chat. the batsmen stay at their crease, dhoni playing imaginary defensive blocking shots, yuvy dazed a bit more. he isn’t checking field position, adjusting his gear.. nothing.
Fifth six – you know it’s a catch or a six.
Six six – a weary smiile on yuvy’s face. a warm hug from dhoni. my wife screamed so loud kids almost woke up

it’s very refreshing to see bats doing their job, finally. refreshing to see the absence of good old word of caution and guidance from the captain to his ‘boys’. pure and simple, bat going after the ball with the best man left standing tall, after all.
58 in 16 balls. never thought that was possible in international cricket. never thought i’d see it live.