Karapetyan’s brother Kamo had also been running by the lake when the trolleybus crashed into the water. An accomplished swimmer himself, Kamo dove in after his brother and joined him above the sunken vehicle. Using the trolley poles as guideposts, they descended 15 feet underwater to explore the position of the bus, whose bumper was buried in the lake bed. They circled the vehicle, searching for an open door or window that could serve as an escape hatch, but came up empty. Shavarsh decided he would have to break a window.
Shavarsh had followed the bus into the water almost on instinct, but he considered his own fate as he prepared to dive. He instructed Kamo to stay on the surface not only to retrieve the passengers that Shavarsh planned to haul up, but also in case he needed to be rescued himself.
Some time in 1994, Joe Kinnear picked up the phone and called Eamon Dunphy. Wimbledon had just finished in the absurdly high spot of sixth in the Premier League. This was not a position reserved for teams with no ground and a tiny fanbase.
Dunphy and Kinnear were old friends from their days playing together for the Republic of Ireland side during the late 60s and early 70s, a period when Ireland barely won a match.
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Despite possessing an accent that made him sound like a minor Only Fools and Horses character, Kinnear was in fact born in Dublin. This was something which was widely known and referred to in those days, much more so than it is now.
Kinnear told Dunphy that Wimbledon’s tennis loving Lebanese chairman Sam Hammam, invariably described as ‘colourful’ in newspaper reports, was looking to sell the club.
Then came a highly unorthodox suggestion. Would Dunphy be interested in helping the club upsticks and move the whole operation to Dublin?
I thought it was a great idea and I thought it was very doable because I thought Dublin could host a Premier League club and do so a lot more successfully than Wimbledon in South London.
Animated by the idea, Dunphy looked to get a consortium together to buy the club. He went to Paul McGuinness, the man behind U2, and two other friends of his in the music business, Tommy Higgins, the head of Ticketmaster in Ireland and Maurice Cassidy, the director of HMV here. The latter two Dunphy calls ‘football men’. McGuinness, most assuredly, was not a football man.
The evening began innocently enough. Rice, 27, and 26-year-old Janay celebrated Valentine’s Day at the Revel Casino Hotel in Atlantic City with two other couples, close friends who were a regular part of their social circle. They had dinner and wine, then went to the casino’s main bar, The Social, where they split at least one bottle of Patron Tequila, Rice’s favorite liquor. By 2 a.m., Ray and Janay were intoxicated and heatedly arguing as he followed her into a hotel elevator. According to two sources, the couple fought about the guest list for their upcoming wedding as well as text messages Rice had received that night from a young woman, a Ravens employee.
Bisciotti and Cass contend that, after the elevator doors closed that morning, they did not have a full picture of what happened until September. “It was our understanding based on Ray’s account that in the course of a physical altercation between the two of them he slapped Janay with an open hand, and that she hit her head against the elevator rail or wall as she fell to the ground,” the Ravens said in a statement Friday afternoon. But sources both affiliated and unaffiliated with the team tell “Outside the Lines” a different story: The Ravens’ head of security, Sanders, heard a detailed description of the inside-elevator scene within hours and shared it with Ravens officials in Baltimore.
I asked some experts to explain, to a layman, what sort of accomplishment it would be to go on a 10–0 run here. When not reaching for analogies from other sports—one grandmaster, in complete earnestness, likened it to pitching 100 straight innings of no-hit baseball—they invariably turned to Bobby Fischer. Fischer’s streak of 20 consecutive victories against grandmasters. Fischer’s mindblowing tournament performances. Fischer’s near-hallucinatory leaps of chess logic. Stumped for further superlatives with which to describe Caruana’s excellence, one chess expert resorted to the highest possible praise: Caruana, he said, was “Fischer-esque.”
The glaring contrast in Solo’s case is that while several football players recently accused of assaults have been removed from the field, she has been held up for praise by the national team. On Thursday she was even given the honor of wearing the captain’s armband in celebration of her setting the team’s career record for shutouts in its previous game.
The question is why. Celebrating Solo’s achievement right now is like allowing running back Adrian Peterson, who has been accused of child abuse, to continue to play for the Minnesota Vikings — and then awarding him the game ball for his next 100-yard game.
If that wouldn’t happen in the N.F.L., it shouldn’t happen in women’s sports, either.
From a sports fan’s perspective, there are events that can happen that you have never seen before. That’s one of my favorite experiences. It’s not that there is zero probability of that event happening; it’s that you don’t even place a probability on it happening because you never thought that thing could happen. The shot going in off the beach ball in the Liverpool match. Who would have ever guessed? It can be bad luck, too, like Paul George getting his foot stuck on the stanchion and breaking his leg.
The Dublin Dons, randomness in sport and Ray Rice: lt’s the week’s best sportswriting
In Grantland, Carl Schreck tells the remarkable story of soviet swimming champion Shavarsh Karapetyan, who saved a number of people from a sinking trolleybus back in 1976.
Karapetyan’s brother Kamo had also been running by the lake when the trolleybus crashed into the water. An accomplished swimmer himself, Kamo dove in after his brother and joined him above the sunken vehicle. Using the trolley poles as guideposts, they descended 15 feet underwater to explore the position of the bus, whose bumper was buried in the lake bed. They circled the vehicle, searching for an open door or window that could serve as an escape hatch, but came up empty. Shavarsh decided he would have to break a window.
Shavarsh had followed the bus into the water almost on instinct, but he considered his own fate as he prepared to dive. He instructed Kamo to stay on the surface not only to retrieve the passengers that Shavarsh planned to haul up, but also in case he needed to be rescued himself.
Conor Neville of Balls.ie remembers the failed plans to bring a Premier League club to Ireland in the shape of the Dublin Dons back in 1996.
Some time in 1994, Joe Kinnear picked up the phone and called Eamon Dunphy. Wimbledon had just finished in the absurdly high spot of sixth in the Premier League. This was not a position reserved for teams with no ground and a tiny fanbase.
Dunphy and Kinnear were old friends from their days playing together for the Republic of Ireland side during the late 60s and early 70s, a period when Ireland barely won a match.
Despite possessing an accent that made him sound like a minor Only Fools and Horses character, Kinnear was in fact born in Dublin. This was something which was widely known and referred to in those days, much more so than it is now.
Kinnear told Dunphy that Wimbledon’s tennis loving Lebanese chairman Sam Hammam, invariably described as ‘colourful’ in newspaper reports, was looking to sell the club.
Then came a highly unorthodox suggestion. Would Dunphy be interested in helping the club upsticks and move the whole operation to Dublin?
Animated by the idea, Dunphy looked to get a consortium together to buy the club. He went to Paul McGuinness, the man behind U2, and two other friends of his in the music business, Tommy Higgins, the head of Ticketmaster in Ireland and Maurice Cassidy, the director of HMV here. The latter two Dunphy calls ‘football men’. McGuinness, most assuredly, was not a football man.
ESPN’S Don Van Natta Jr. and Kevin Van Valkenburg give a detailed account of how the Ray Rice scandal unfolded.
The evening began innocently enough. Rice, 27, and 26-year-old Janay celebrated Valentine’s Day at the Revel Casino Hotel in Atlantic City with two other couples, close friends who were a regular part of their social circle. They had dinner and wine, then went to the casino’s main bar, The Social, where they split at least one bottle of Patron Tequila, Rice’s favorite liquor. By 2 a.m., Ray and Janay were intoxicated and heatedly arguing as he followed her into a hotel elevator. According to two sources, the couple fought about the guest list for their upcoming wedding as well as text messages Rice had received that night from a young woman, a Ravens employee.
Bisciotti and Cass contend that, after the elevator doors closed that morning, they did not have a full picture of what happened until September. “It was our understanding based on Ray’s account that in the course of a physical altercation between the two of them he slapped Janay with an open hand, and that she hit her head against the elevator rail or wall as she fell to the ground,” the Ravens said in a statement Friday afternoon. But sources both affiliated and unaffiliated with the team tell “Outside the Lines” a different story: The Ravens’ head of security, Sanders, heard a detailed description of the inside-elevator scene within hours and shared it with Ravens officials in Baltimore.
Seth Stevenson in Slate recalls one of the greatest achievements in the history of chess, which took place at the Sinquefield Cup this year.
I asked some experts to explain, to a layman, what sort of accomplishment it would be to go on a 10–0 run here. When not reaching for analogies from other sports—one grandmaster, in complete earnestness, likened it to pitching 100 straight innings of no-hit baseball—they invariably turned to Bobby Fischer. Fischer’s streak of 20 consecutive victories against grandmasters. Fischer’s mindblowing tournament performances. Fischer’s near-hallucinatory leaps of chess logic. Stumped for further superlatives with which to describe Caruana’s excellence, one chess expert resorted to the highest possible praise: Caruana, he said, was “Fischer-esque.”
US women’s team goalkeeper Hope Solo may be facing domestic violence charges but we have turned a blind eye, according to Juliet Macur in the NY Times.
The glaring contrast in Solo’s case is that while several football players recently accused of assaults have been removed from the field, she has been held up for praise by the national team. On Thursday she was even given the honor of wearing the captain’s armband in celebration of her setting the team’s career record for shutouts in its previous game.
The question is why. Celebrating Solo’s achievement right now is like allowing running back Adrian Peterson, who has been accused of child abuse, to continue to play for the Minnesota Vikings — and then awarding him the game ball for his next 100-yard game.
If that wouldn’t happen in the N.F.L., it shouldn’t happen in women’s sports, either.
Pacific Standard’s Noah Davis talks to author David Sally about the importance of randomness in sport.
From a sports fan’s perspective, there are events that can happen that you have never seen before. That’s one of my favorite experiences. It’s not that there is zero probability of that event happening; it’s that you don’t even place a probability on it happening because you never thought that thing could happen. The shot going in off the beach ball in the Liverpool match. Who would have ever guessed? It can be bad luck, too, like Paul George getting his foot stuck on the stanchion and breaking his leg.
Dublin footballer Jonny Cooper injured in early-morning stabbing
Danny Higginbotham tells a tale about one of Roy Keane’s rants
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