Friday, July 13, 2012

Unused Bermanesque Nicknames

Anyone who is familiar with Chris Berman knows he has a proclivity for corny player nicknames.  Whether it is one as simple as Ben "Winter" Coates or a lengthier one like Jake "Day Light Come and I Want to" Delhomme, it never fails in the cheesy factor.

My disdain for Berman is well-documented, with something as recent as the last blog post that details how obnoxious of a baseball announcer he is.  On NFL Sunday Countdown, his sentences are so verbose to the point where the pitch of his voice lowers so much and he begins to sound like Jiminy Glick.  Regardless, he has a knack for coming up with a nickname for nearly every player.

Notice how I said nearly every player.  This brings us to the premise of the article.  Nothing New on the News has unearthed some archived Chris Berman type nicknames. They are mostly pop culture or intellectual references, so if you do not understand it, click on the hyperlink within the name.  They do not fail in terms of lameness.  Take a look:


NBA


Al-Farouq Aminu Acid

"Marvin the MarShon" Brooks

Sasha Pavlovic's Dog

"General" Greivis Vasquez

Omer "The Iron" Asik

Hasheem "We Got" Thabeet

Brian "Itzy Bitzy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot" Scalabrine

Danny "Walker, Texas" Granger

Aaron Afflalo the Leader

Jonny "In Like" Flynn

Kirk Hinrich Maneuver

"Bismack my Bitch up" Biyombo

Trevor "Thick" Booker

"She"Nene Hilario


MLB


Andre Ethier Said Than Done

Robinson Canó He Dit-int

Jayson "For What It's" Werth

Dan "This Could Get" Uggla

Xavier "My Fair" Nady

Mark Buehrle Bird Gets the Worm

Jordany Valdespin Me Right Round


NFL


Stephen "When the Moon Hits your Eye like a Big Pizza" Paea

Matt Roth IRA

Josh Sitton on the Toilet

Sam "Ya" Hurd

Anquan Boldin Retriever

Jeff Saturday Night Fever

Joseph "Live and Let" Addai

John Kuhn Skin Cap

Haloti Ngata gonna work here anymore (:25 seconds in)

Tim Fugger?  I hardly know her!

Kyle Orton Hears a Who

Zane "Meet the" Beadles

Roy Heluuuuuuuu!

Jason "Idiot" Avant

Thomas DeCoud d'état

Barrett "How" Ruud

Brandon Saine in the Membrane


Tennis


Novak ""Is Wayne Brady Gonna Have to" Djokovic?


Monday, July 9, 2012

It's the Least Wonderful Time of the Year

Could there possibly be a worse time of year for sports than All-Star week of baseball?  The NBA just concluded its exciting season a few short weeks ago, hockey a few weeks earlier, and this is the doldrums for the NFL season.  This is one of a pair of three week stretches where there is honestly no football to talk about besides over-hyping how certain UDFA's did while playing non-contact football.  Some of the more fringe sports like tennis and soccer wrapped up major events prior to this week, with soccer concluding its Euro Cup and tennis with Wimbledon.  Lastly, while we're afforded the benefit of this year being an Olympics year, it still is a little ways away.

For starters, All-Star games in general are pretty terrible.  Nothing is worse than the Pro Bowl, which makes paddy cake look like the UFC.  Defense in the NBA All-Star Game is about as foreign as Borat Sagdiyev.  Finally, incompetency hit an all new high in the 2002 MLB All-Star Game when Bud Selig, Mr. Incompetent himself, declared the game a tie.  Tom Hanks's character Jimmy Dugan famously exclaimed to Evelyn Gardner  in A League of their Own, "There's no crying in baseball!" Maybe he should've told Bud Selig, "There no tying in baseball!"


The Monday night before is the 364th best sports day of the year.  That's me being nice because I'm not counting this year as a leap year.  Could there possibly be a worse announcer for baseball than Chris Berman?  To take it a step further, is there anything worse than a Home Run Derby announced by Chris Berman?  Do you realize how many times he excruciatingly said, "BACKBACKBACKBACK..." tonight?  The guy sounds like the Cadbury Easter Bunny when he incessantly says that.  Don't believe me? Here's a clip:



Maybe we can just get him to announce the HR Derby next year instead. Would anyone notice? 

Finally, Wednesday has got to be the dullest sports day of the entire year.  There's no baseball games scheduled and like I mentioned above, no other legitimate sports have any games or events on the docket.  God forbid I open a book (I thought that's why I graduated college?).  Wednesday is probably the one day of the year where I actually would want to work.  For now, however, I'll be checking out of life and setting my mental alarm (pop!) for Thursday.