olympics Page 104 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Costas Out: There Should Be Better Gay Athlete Stories
Bob Costas, pocket-sized television sports reporter and popular feud instigator, gave a long, detailed interview to AfterElton.com as to why NBC neglected to make a bigger story out Australian diver Matthew Mitcham's gold medal victory, since he was the only openly gay man at the Games. NBC had alre...

Game-Worn US Olympic Basketball Jerseys Up For Auction
Bidding is up and running now and will continue until September 30. But break out the checkbooks and keep adding zeroes. Already Kobe Bryant's jersey has nine bids and is up to $1,600. Women's team jerseys will also be up for auction. Surprisingly, they aren't fetching as high of bids now. You can'...

Pole Dancing: The Next Olympic Sport?
One of the major concerns of the IOC over the past few years has been how to garner interest in the Olympics among today's youth. There's been a trend to try and make Olympic sports a bit edgier. For instance, BMX racing and Snowboarding are now featured and there's been some discussion around skate...

Mad Physicist Analyzes Effects of Usain Bolt's Olympic Showboating, Carl Lewis Thinks It's Juicy
Usain Bolt is the fastest man in the world. He made the competition look silly during the 100-meter finals in Beijing and cruised so easily to victory that he was celebrating before the race was even over. Wondering how sick the speedy Jamaican's time could have been had he given it 100 percent thr...

Women's Hockey Needs To Adopt A 60-Goal Mercy Rule
Confidence booster for every athlete anywhere in any sport: You may be bad, but you're not as bad as the Bulgarian women's hockey team. In a 2010 Winter Olympic qualification tournament in Latvia on Saturday, Slovakia beat Bulgaria 82-0. I'm not up on my history in that part of the world; what did t...

Olympic Cyclists Demand Apology From USOC
Remember the US cyclists who were forced to apologize after wearing face masks upon arriving in Bejing? They're now demanding an apology from the USOC. ...

Irish Sports Minister Doesn't Believe A White Man Will Ever Break 10 Seconds in the Hundred Meters
For shame, Marten Cullen, for shame. In the wake of the 2008 Olympics Ireland's sports minister is tired of the country focusing on sports that they clearly can't win. Instead he wants to bring business to bear on sports via the competitive advantage of nations theory. What kind of sports should Ir...

A Little Olympics Snafu Down In The Control Room. Push The Button, Frank
One of my favorite Mystery Science Theater 3000 lines came during the movie City on Fire, when, as a woman is gong into labor, Crow T. Robot yells: "Get a catcher's mitt!" It's hard to believe that it's been eight years since MST3K was canceled on the SciFi channel; but for about four hours during t...

The Beijing Bureau Says Goodbye
The Olympics have ended, yet our three young lads who dutifully covered them for Deadspin for the past month are still there. They've requested a farewell post. Here it is. Things are pretty quiet here at the Bureau now that the Olympics have (mercifully) ended. Media organizations around the world ...

The Accredited Leave, Sun Still Shines (Sort Of)
The Olympics have mercifully ended and they were in China. And we are proud to welcome back our Deadspin Beijing Bureau, our own trio of correspondents living in China and reporting on everything they see, Olympics related and otherwise. They are winding down their coverage, obviously. The day after...

Oh Fidel, You Crazy Nut
Fidel Castro may be on death's door, but he's not going to miss Olympic tae kwondo. And our favorite father figure in fatigues says that Angel Matos was perfectly justified in kicking one of the other judges in the face after a disqualification on Saturday. ...

Michael Phelps Making It Rain With Endorsement Loot
Michael Phelps, not even unpacked from Beijing, has already purchased a $1.69 million condo in Baltimore, complete with rooftop terrace, private screening room and robot butlers. (The latter wasn't in the online listing; I just threw that in there). Of course Speedo has already promised him a $1 mil...

Conclusion Of Olympic Games Includes More Baffling Insanity
It all began when five terrifying mascots were introduced to the world in November of 2005, and now, with the extinguishing of the Olympic torch, the games of the 29th Olympiad have concluded. Whew. OK China, you've got some sweeping up to do, so we'll leave you to it. But before we depart, may we j...

Dream A Little Redeem With Me
Heading into the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, the United States men's national basketball team had two goals. First and foremost, they wanted to win a gold medal. That is, after all, the primary mission of any Olympic quest. The secondary objective, though, was no less important to the psyche of eve...

Take Us Home, Oh Mudda Fadda; Take Us Home from Beijing
So, yeah. This is it. Tonight's the last night of co-ed Rings summer camp and tomorrow our parents will be here to pick us up and take us home and we'll spend all our time with our old steady sports and we'll promise to write about swimming and gymnastics and equestrian events but we never will, so ...

So About Those Judged Olympic Sports We All Love...
Rudel Obreja, a Romanian technical official for the international amateur boxing body (AIBA), was suspended Friday for holding an "unauthorized" press conference Friday. This is AIBA/IOC terminology for "talking too much", especially considering the topic Obreja chose: "That One Time a Couple High-R...

Barry Bonds Cannot Stop Destroying Sports All Over the World
Out here in the West, the third and final part of the Bob Costas-Jacques Rogge tête-à-tête has just wrapped up on NBC. In this section (loosely labeled "Etcetera"), Costas asked Rogge what killed softball and baseball for the 2012 Games. Rogge eventually mentioned the domination of both sports by a ...

Deadspin Interview: ESPNsoccernet's Lindsey Dolich
Lindsey Dolich has been documenting women's soccer for ESPNsoccernet and ESPN the Magazine in a freelance manner for about a year and has been the Ron Jaworski of these Olympics, breaking down each strategy and player in a highly detailed fashion that is instantly accessible to the casual soccer fa...

Hail Britannia at the Appropriate Intervals in a Civil Manner!
Britain's Olympic successes shall be winging their way back to the Empire shortly to the waiting arms of the loving mother country. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has promised a "tremendous reception" on Monday when they pitch wheels down to Heathrow's new Terminal 5. Only one problem, naturally: Briti...

Nike's US Division Defeats Nike's Spanish Division at Company Picnic
Jesus H. on a medal stand. While you were sleeping, the United States and Spain put on an offensive show that impressed the inventors of fireworks themselves. Both teams combined for 225 points in a mere 40 minutes of action that moved so quickly that the paint on the hardwood melted. The United Sta...