1. “Obama arrived at 1 p.m. with his former personal aide Love and Robinson, who didn’t play this year, and a few other close aides. Obama chose Pippen on this team. I was the last pick by the president. Our team held a steady lead, with each of us taking turns rotating onto the court. The president wasn’t fooling around. He wanted to win and made sure the substitutions were done with a purpose (at one point I was ready to go in for Pippen, but he quickly said that didn’t make sense because of a need for size).
Obama played mostly at the point, looking to move the offense, rather than hunting for his shot. He was talking and leading on the court. The key to playing in this game is to play to your strengths. You don’t want to do things that draw too much attention. So, I made a few passes to cutting teammates that led to assists. There was also a force and a turnover. And finally, in the second half, with Pippen on the court, I drained consecutive buckets — a jumper and a 3-pointer. The president was quick to give me flak for blowing off a wide-open Pippen. But I was feeling the stroke. I then got greedy and took a contested shot and missed.
The president pointed out I had fulfilled my quota.”
2. “When you are leading the Tour, there are hard decisions to be made. It’s not always a nice business and during the 2012 Tour I couldn’t help feeling at times that Mark Cavendish deserved better than he got. Right from when he and Bernie [Bernhard Eisel] had been selected for the Tour in June, I think he had been very conscious of what people thought. From day one in Liège he had said in team meetings that he recognised we were going for yellow and that he was determined to be part of it in the same way I had been part of the picture at the world’s the September before.
His line was: ‘I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity to be in a British team going for the yellow jersey even if that means I’m not going to get a full lead out in the sprint.’ It was difficult listening to him say that, because the nice part of me wanted to stand up and say, ‘Sod it, Cav, we’ll lead you out at those stage finishes. I’ll try and ride for the yellow as well as support you when it comes down to a sprint.’ But the coward in me had to say, “Well, you know how this is, we can’t ride for the sprint every day; we had a goal at the start of the Tour and that has to be the priority.”
3. “All you can ever really hope for in wintry conditions is excitement. That’s all you ever want in any game but the aim is to achieve entertainment because of quality play, not simply because a game is tight. When you play in mud, you will get stuck — that’s inevitable. Dogged play is what we continually get in these club games across Ireland right now and that’s nothing to do with the players — it’s a by-product of negotiating the difficult weather. GAA sports don’t go well on soft ground… no more so than when sodden in rain and related biting elements.”
4. “For years, Alex Ferguson’s side set off for European trips the morning before the game. UEFA dictate that visiting clubs need to be in the city where the game is being staged 24 hours before the match – a rule which applied when United played Wrexham in the 1990-91 Cup Winners’ Cup, despite Wrexham being just 50 minutes by road from Manchester. The team usually arrived at their destination before training on the eve of the game in the match venue. Then they flew back to Manchester, arriving at various early hours depending on the destination. A far off trip like Istanbul can mean a 3am landing and back home at 4am.
Ferguson likes his players to be with their families as much as possible, but if players are being woken by their kids after two hours sleep at 7am it can be counter productive - as can sitting on an aeroplane for four hours after the game.”
5. “This is my last Jimmy Casper story. I’ve been writing about Jimmy for 15 years, and I’ve written about Jimmy in all his guises. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the promising neo-pro, the little sprinter who upstaged the world’s finest. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the flagging sprinter who struggled to get over the mountains of the Tour de France. Jimmy Casper the aging sprinter who rebranded himself a second-division star. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the lanterne rouge. I won’t be writing about Jimmy any more, for after 15 years in the pro ranks it appears he has come to the end. With no contract for 2013, Jimmy Casper is facing retirement.”
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1. “Obama arrived at 1 p.m. with his former personal aide Love and Robinson, who didn’t play this year, and a few other close aides. Obama chose Pippen on this team. I was the last pick by the president. Our team held a steady lead, with each of us taking turns rotating onto the court. The president wasn’t fooling around. He wanted to win and made sure the substitutions were done with a purpose (at one point I was ready to go in for Pippen, but he quickly said that didn’t make sense because of a need for size).
Obama played mostly at the point, looking to move the offense, rather than hunting for his shot. He was talking and leading on the court. The key to playing in this game is to play to your strengths. You don’t want to do things that draw too much attention. So, I made a few passes to cutting teammates that led to assists. There was also a force and a turnover. And finally, in the second half, with Pippen on the court, I drained consecutive buckets — a jumper and a 3-pointer. The president was quick to give me flak for blowing off a wide-open Pippen. But I was feeling the stroke. I then got greedy and took a contested shot and missed.
The president pointed out I had fulfilled my quota.”
Man! ESPN’s Andy Katz got to play in Barack Obama’s election day pick-up basketball game again this year! And Scottie Pippen was there!
2. “When you are leading the Tour, there are hard decisions to be made. It’s not always a nice business and during the 2012 Tour I couldn’t help feeling at times that Mark Cavendish deserved better than he got. Right from when he and Bernie [Bernhard Eisel] had been selected for the Tour in June, I think he had been very conscious of what people thought. From day one in Liège he had said in team meetings that he recognised we were going for yellow and that he was determined to be part of it in the same way I had been part of the picture at the world’s the September before.
His line was: ‘I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity to be in a British team going for the yellow jersey even if that means I’m not going to get a full lead out in the sprint.’ It was difficult listening to him say that, because the nice part of me wanted to stand up and say, ‘Sod it, Cav, we’ll lead you out at those stage finishes. I’ll try and ride for the yellow as well as support you when it comes down to a sprint.’ But the coward in me had to say, “Well, you know how this is, we can’t ride for the sprint every day; we had a goal at the start of the Tour and that has to be the priority.”
The Guardian ran a few extracts from Bradley Wiggins‘ upcoming book. This piece focuses on his relationship with sprint king Mark Cavendish.
3. “All you can ever really hope for in wintry conditions is excitement. That’s all you ever want in any game but the aim is to achieve entertainment because of quality play, not simply because a game is tight. When you play in mud, you will get stuck — that’s inevitable. Dogged play is what we continually get in these club games across Ireland right now and that’s nothing to do with the players — it’s a by-product of negotiating the difficult weather. GAA sports don’t go well on soft ground… no more so than when sodden in rain and related biting elements.”
Shane Stapleton inspects the state of the pitch at Eircom SportsHub.
4. “For years, Alex Ferguson’s side set off for European trips the morning before the game. UEFA dictate that visiting clubs need to be in the city where the game is being staged 24 hours before the match – a rule which applied when United played Wrexham in the 1990-91 Cup Winners’ Cup, despite Wrexham being just 50 minutes by road from Manchester. The team usually arrived at their destination before training on the eve of the game in the match venue. Then they flew back to Manchester, arriving at various early hours depending on the destination. A far off trip like Istanbul can mean a 3am landing and back home at 4am.
Ferguson likes his players to be with their families as much as possible, but if players are being woken by their kids after two hours sleep at 7am it can be counter productive - as can sitting on an aeroplane for four hours after the game.”
Andy Mitten explains how Alex Ferguson has changed up United’s pre-European trip routine this season in a bid to keep his players fresh.
5. “This is my last Jimmy Casper story. I’ve been writing about Jimmy for 15 years, and I’ve written about Jimmy in all his guises. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the promising neo-pro, the little sprinter who upstaged the world’s finest. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the flagging sprinter who struggled to get over the mountains of the Tour de France. Jimmy Casper the aging sprinter who rebranded himself a second-division star. I’ve written about Jimmy Casper the lanterne rouge. I won’t be writing about Jimmy any more, for after 15 years in the pro ranks it appears he has come to the end. With no contract for 2013, Jimmy Casper is facing retirement.”
A farewell. James Startt writes about one of the men in the peloton who knows about both life at either end of the pack.
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