Sunday, September 11, 2011

The football

Football, the game of American football as played today by high school, college, and professional teams grew out of rugby-style football which in the mid-1870s replaced a largely kicking game known as association football. Although initially played on village greens and on college fields, the first intercollegiate game took place on 6 November 1869 when Rutgers defeated Princeton 6–4 in a soccer-style game. Five years later, Montreal's McGill University playing at Harvard introduced rugby football, which would be rapidly adopted by eastern teams.
For the first fifty years of football, college teams enjoyed a virtual monopoly of what they called the gridiron the term applied to the football field because of the lines drawn at five-yard intervals. In 1876, students at Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and Yale met to form the Intercollegiate Football Association, all agreeing to play by rugby rules. Of the four schools, only Yale chose to re-main an independent. Nevertheless, Yale continued to meet with the other schools and played a crucial role in the adoption of new rules and in the popularization of American football. Beginning in the 1880s, the eastern institutions led by Yale played "big games" before large crowds in the New York and Boston areas. From 1880 to 1888, changes in the intercollegiate rules led to the transformation of British rugby into American football. The possession rule of 1880, which decreed that the team with the ball would keep possession if tackled, led to a series of further changes. The result was a game of physical contact and deception that had progressively less in common with rugby and association football.
The possession rule and the changes that accompanied it were associated with Walter Camp, a player for Yale in the late 1870s. A gifted strategist and promoter, Camp served as a coach or adviser to the Yale team from 1879 to 1910 and as the key figure on various rules committees. Through devices such as his All-America teams, he was also instrumental in making football a nationwide intercollegiate sport. Led by Camp, the handful of youthful rules-makers enacted the yards and downs rule three downs to gain five yards, numerical scoring, interference in front of the ball carrier, and tackling between the waist and the knees rather than above the waist. Players could move forward before the snap of the ball momentum plays, and push and pull the ball carrier through the defense mass play. As a result of these rules changes, football became noticeably rougher and by the late 1800s was criticized by clergy, newspaper editors, and some older college faculty and administrators for its dangers and brutality.

The Shooting


 The Shooting  is a 1966 western film directed by Monte Hellman, with a screenplay by Carole Eastman using the pseudonym "Adrien Joyce". It stars Warren Oates,Millie Perkins, Will Hutchins, and Jack Nicholson, and was produced by Nicholson and Hellman. The story is about two men who are hired by a mysterious woman to accompany her to a town located many miles across the desert. During their journey, they are closely tracked by a black-clad gunslinger who seems intent on killing all of them.
The film was shot in 1965 in the Utah desert, back-to-back with Hellman's similar western, Ride in the Whirlwind, which also starred Nicholson. Both films were shown at several international film festivals but it was not until 1968 that the U.S. distribution rights were purchased by the Walter Reade Organization. No other domestic distributor had expressed any interest in the films. Walter Reade decided to bypass a theatrical release, and the two titles were sold directly to television.The young woman is rude and insulting to both Gashade and Coley. She refuses to tell them her name. The three stop briefly in Crosstree. Gashade learns that Coin was seen there only a day or two before. As they continue traveling slowly through the hot desert, Gashade observes that they are being followed by a stranger dressed in black, Billy Spear Nicholson, who continues to keep his distance from them. Gashade sees that the woman appears to be signaling to the man. Coley makes attempts to talk to the woman but she continually taunts and insults him. She also repeatedly refuses to answer any of Gashade’s questions regarding the purpose of their journey.
At night, Spear suddenly walks into their camp and joins them. Hired by the woman as a gunslinger for reasons unknown, Spear is suspicious and hostile toward Gashade and contemptuous of Coley. He repeatedly threatens both of their lives. Gashade advises Coley to keep away from Spear.
                The woman rides her horse hard. When it dies of exhaustion, Coley gives his horse to the woman and Gashade allows Coley to ride with him. Later, when Gashade's horse shows signs of fatigue, Gashade tells Coley to join the woman on her horse, but Spear forbids him from doing so. The woman says that the journey would be much easier without Coley. She and Spear demand that he be left behind. Gashade reluctantly agrees, and he tells Coley he will come back for him soon.
The three see a bearded man (Charles Eastman) sitting in the middle of the desert nursing a broken leg. The man tells the woman that the person she is seeking is only one day's ride away. She leaves him a canteen of water. Meanwhile, the bearded man's lost horse is found by Coley. He mounts the horse, and rides back to the group. He charges Spear. Spear shoots him dead. Gashade buries his friend in the sand.
All of the horses die. The group runs out of water, but they still keep moving. Gashade sees Spear growing weaker and attacks him. After knocking him unconscious, Gashade grabs a large rock and crushes the killer's gun hand. Gashade walks after the woman, who is now closely following a man up the side of a rock formation. The man turns around and Gashade sees that the man is his look-alike brother, Coin. Gashade attempts to tackle the woman as she pulls out a gun and takes aim at Coin, but it is too late: Coin and the woman shoot each other dead. Gashade, lying next to the woman's corpse, whispers, "Coin." Spear stumbles aimlessly under the hot

The Boxing


            Records of Classical boxing activity disappeared after the fall of the Western Roman Empire when the wearing of weapons became common once again and interest in fighting with the fists waned. However, there are detailed records of various fist-fighting sports that were maintained in different cities and provinces of Italy between the 12th and 17th centuries. There was also a sport in ancient Rus called Fistfight. As the wearing of swords became less common, there was renewed interest in fencing with the fists. The sport would later resurface in England during the early 16th century in the form of bare-knuckle boxing sometimes referred to as prizefighting. The first documented account of a bare-knuckle fight in England appeared in 1681 in the London Protestant Mercury, and the first English bare-knuckle champion was James Figg in 1719 This is also the time when the word "boxing" first came to be used. It should be noted, that this earliest form of modern boxing was very different. Contests in Mr. Figg's time, in addition to fistfighting, also contained fencing and cudgeling. On 6 January 1681, the first recorded boxing match took place in Britain when Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle and later Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica engineered a bout between his butler and his butcher with the latter winning the prize.
Early fighting had no written rules. There were no weight divisions or round limits, and no referee. In general, it was extremely chaotic. The first boxing rules, called the Broughton's rules, were introduced by heavyweight champion Jack Broughton in 1743 to protect fighters in the ring where deaths sometimes occurred.Under these rules, if a man went down and could not continue after a count of 30 seconds, the fight was over. Hitting a downed fighter and grasping below the waist were prohibited. Broughton also invented and encouraged the use of "mufflers", a form of padded gloves, which were used in training and exhibitions. The first paper on boxing was published in the late 18th century by successfulBirmingham boxer 'William Futrell' who remained undefeated until his one hour and seventeen minute fight at Smitham Bottom, Croydon, on July 9, 1788 against a much younger "Gentleman" John Jackson which was attended by the Prince of hese rules did allow the fighters an advantage not enjoyed by today's boxers: They permitted the fighter to drop to one knee to begin a 30-second count at any time. Thus a fighter realizing he was in trouble had an opportunity to recover. However, this was considered "unmanly" and was frequently disallowed by additional rules negotiated by the Seconds of the Boxers.] Intentionally going down in modern boxing will cause the recovering fighter to lose points in the scoring system. Furthermore, as the contestants did not have heavy leather gloves and wristwraps to protect their hands, a certain amount of restraint was required when striking the head
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The Hockey


THN   publishes 34 regular issues and seven special magazines per year - the Season Opener, People of Power and Influence, Future Watch, Draft Preview, Season in Review, the Best of Everything in Hockey, and the Yearbook, listed as the top-selling hockey annual in North America. It is available through subscription in North America and Europe and digitally to the rest of the world. THN is also available at many newsstands in North America. The magazine principally covers the National Hockey League NHL, relying on local beat writers to cover each team. Smaller sections in the regular issues cover minor league, junior, college, and international hockey.In 1997, The Hockey News commemorated their 50th anniversary with a list of the 50 top NHL players of all-time. The rankings, which heralded Wayne Gretzky as the best player in the history of the NHL, were determined by a panel of judges that included past and present NHL general managers, coaches, and players, as well some of the most eminent members of hockey media. The following year, THN expanded the list and published it as a book: The Top 100 NHL players of All-Time. Their list again featured Gretzky as the top player. The top ten players, in order, were: Wayne Gretzky, Bobby Orr, Gordie Howe, Mario Lemieux, Maurice Richard, Doug Harvey, Jean Beliveau, Bobby Hull, Terry Sawchuk and Eddie Shore.
Ten years later, in 2007, THN came out with a list of revised list in The Top 60 since 1967, which limited the rankings to players solely of the NHL's post-expansion era. In addition to accounting for the ten years that had passed since previous rankings, editor-in-chief Jason Kay explained that the list was revised to exclude the pre-expansion era due to the fact that most analysts are not able to put the early NHL into sufficient context, adding that the original Top 50 publication "relied heavily on historical and statistical information to bring players of bygone eras into perspective."In 2008, the THN staff participated in the selection of the IIHF Centennial All-Star Team.In 2010, THN released a revised list of the top 100 players of all time, except this time it was top 20 players per position.Editor in Chief - Jason Kay; Senior Special Sections Editor - Brian Costello; Senior Writer - Ken Campbell; Associate Senior Writer - Ryan Kennedy; Writer/Columnist - Adam Proteau; Managing Editor - Edward Fraser; Copy Editor - Ronnie Shuker; Senior Associate Art Director - Erika Vanderveer; Web Editor - Rory Boylen; Video Producer - Ted Cooper.People who have held the Editor in Chief position in the past include TSN broadcaster Bob McKenzie no relation to the founder and TSN producer Steve Dryden.

The Golf


The  Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) played host to a fund-raising friendly round of golf dubbed as “Friends of Coast Guard, Golf for a Cause” last Nov. 15, 2001 at the Orchard Golf and Country Club in Dasmarinas, Cavite.
According to Vice Admiral Reuben S. Lista, the golf tournament was held to raise funds for the purchase of K-9 dogs for the  Philippine Ports Authority and PCG. Held on Lista’s birthday, the tournament attracted more than 80 golf enthusiasts coming from the different areas of the maritime sector. “We intend to form a mutual canine dog unit of the PPA and PCG,” Lista said.  
Lista said that the K-9 dogs were purchased by the PPA and trained in sniffing and sensing bombs, harmful chemicals, drugs and deadly firearms to protect passengers and enhance maritime security.These security measures were in consonance with the global trend to thwart terrorism from the public.Lista likewise said that a PCG special operations Group, together with the police unit of the PPA, is tasked to train and maintain these special K-9.
“This is also the very reason why he asked the different golf organizations to provide seed resources to maintain this special unit excluded from the approved PCG budget,” Lista added.
The golf tournament, which teed off at exactly 7:00 in the morning, was a brainchild of Lista himself and supported by the different maritime golf organization and organized by Captain Rosendo Roque, Commodore Athelo Ybanez and LTJG Troy Cornelia.Other sponsors include Petronade Phil. Inc., Herma Shipping and Transport Corp., Eduardo and Marissa Alvarez, Orix Metro Leasing and Finance Corp., PCGA Lighterage Corp., Joe Baltazar of the 126 Squadron, MIS Maritime Corp., Kaizen Export and Import Business, Bombardier, Harbor Star, Tenix Phil. Inc., Jeffrey Cheng, Sulpicio Lines, Capt. Nieto, Ruben Lista Jr., among others who gave donations for door and raffle prizes. 
              Lisha also extended his warmest thanks to the sponsors and organizers who made the tournament a success during the awarding ceremonies which was held at the Dean Conrado Benitez Hall in Orchard Golf Course. Eng r. Nelson Ramirez said that fund-raiser of a birthday was a noble way of serving the public of PEG.“It  was very noble for Vice Admiral Lista to conduct a fund-raising on his birthday for a noble project and make the birthday gift givers donors to a noble cause like the creation of a canine unit,” Ramirez explained.
He said that in this kind of tournament, everybody wins, even the public who will be served by the purpose.
 

The Basketball


                             Basketball,“They lost to Panama, man. Panama!”This was true. Earlier in the day, what little chance Canada had at capturing a spot at the 2012 Olympics had been squandered. Our hopes crushed at the hands of Panama. A squad that boasts only one NBA player,Gary Forbes of the Denver Nuggets. Forbes tore into Canada, scoring 39 points while consistently finding his way into the paint and creating scoring opportunities for his teammates.With the loss Canada was granted an exodus from FIBA Americas Tournament in Argentina. A 10-team tournament in which the top-two teams are granted a position in next year’s Olympics, while the teams that finish third to fifth get another qualification shot at FIBA World Olympic Qualifying Tournament.For Canada, the Americas Tournament was a chance to return to Olympic play for the first time since the Sydney Olympics in 2000.After the game, the floodgates opened. Fans called for Leo Rautins’ head. (Rautins has been the national head coach for the past six years.) They wanted to know where Steve Nash was (he was at soccer practice, where Tristan Thompson was, where Jamaal Magloire was, where Samuel Dalembert was, and where, ultimately, the sense of national pride was.They have a right to be upset. Canada’s basketball team has meddled only once in the Olympics. And that was at the Berlin Games in 1936. Currently the national team is ranked 23rd in the world. That’s three spots below Iran, four spots below Croatia, and five spots below New Zealand.There is NBA talent on the roster, we've come a long way since Bart Simpson and Milhouse suited up for us, but it’s far from the best product that could be on the floor.Just hours after the game, and in obvious response to the turn of events, an emotional Leo Rautins announced his resignation as head coach.“The players have given me everything that I’ve asked but I think for the benefit of this program going forward, a new voice in the locker room will be the best thing,” he said in a post-game conference call.“We have to, in our country, look at playing for the national team as an honor and something that is very special.”
And there is hope that message will resonate with the next generation of talent. The potential of Canada’s program is arguably the best it’s ever been, with the likes of Thompson, Kevin Pangos, Myck Kabongo, Andrew Wiggins, Khem Birch and Kyle Wiltjer waiting in the wings. Not to mention Kelly Olynyk, Cory Joseph and Jevon Shepherd who all played well in spurts during the tournament. The future of the program is in capable hands and with basketball being the fastest growing sport in the nation for children aged 5-14, there is reason to believe that the momentum could continue to build.But right now, it’s not pretty.With the elimination, the national team will enter a state of rebuilding. Their next meaningful game won’t be until 2013 when they attempt to qualify for the 2014 World Championships. The silver lining being that the down time will allow the program to focus on developing a younger and more potential-laden core of talent, recruit a new coach and build a stronger foundation for future success.The talent that is in Canada’s system has the potential to elevate the team’s international standing, and hopefully finally provide Canadians with a reason to give a damn. But until that happens, we are stuck pointing accusatory fingers and attempting to place blame.

The Volleyball


Volleyball is an Olympic team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.
The complete rules are extensive. But simply, play proceeds as follows: A player on one of the teams begins a 'rally' by serving the ball tossing or releasing it and then hitting it with a hand or arm, from behind the back boundary line of the court, over the net, and into the receiving team's court. The receiving team must not let the ball be grounded within their court. They may touch the ball as many as three times. Typically, the first two touches are to set up for an atrck, an attempt to direct the ball back over the net in such a way that the serving team is unable to prevent it from being grounded in their court.The rally continues, with each team allowed as many as three consecutive touches, until either a team makes a kill, grounding the ball on the opponent's court and winning the rally; a team commits a fault and loses the rally. The team that wins the rally is awarded a point, and serves the ball to start the next rally. A few of the most common faults include The ball is usually played with the hands or arms, but players can legally strike or push short contact the ball with any part of the body.
            A number of consistent techniques have evolved in volleyball, including spiking and blocking because these plays are made above the top of the net, the vertical jump is an athletic skill emphasized in the sport as well as passingsetting, and specialized player positions and offensive and defensive structures.On February 9, 1895, in Holyoke, Massachusetts (USA), William G. Morgan, a YMCA physical education director, created a new game called Mintonette as a pastime to be played preferably indoors and by any number of players. The game took some of its characteristics from tennis and handball. Another indoor sport, basketball, was catching on in the area, having been invented just ten miles sixteen kilometers) away in the city of Springfield, Massachusetts, only four years before. Mintonette was designed to be an indoor sport less rough than basketball for older members of the YMCA, while still requiring a bit of athletic effort.
The first rules, written down by William G Morgan, called for a net 6 ft 6 in 1.98 m high, a 25×50 ft 7.6×15.2 m court, and any number of players. A match was composed of nine innings with three serves for each team in each inning, and no limit to the number of ball contacts for each team before sending the ball to the opponents’ court. In case of a serving error, a second try was allowed. Hitting the ball into the net was considered a foul with loss of the point or a side-out except in the case of the first-try serve.After an observer, Alfred Halstead, noticed the volleying nature of the game at its first exhibition match in 1896, played at the International YMCA Training School now called Springfield College, the game quickly became known as volleyball it was originally spelled as two words: "volley ball". Volleyball rules were slightly modified by the International YMCA Training School and the game spread around the country to various YMCA

The Cricket



Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the runs scored by the batting team. A run is scored by the striking batsman hitting the ball with his bat, running to the opposite end of the pitch and touching the crease there without being dismissed. The teams switch between batting and fielding at the end of an innings.
In professional cricket the length of a game ranges from 20 overs of six bowling deliveries per side to Test cricket played over five days. The Laws of Cricket are maintained by the International Cricket Council (ICC) and the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) with additional Standard Playing Conditions for Test matches and One Day Internationals
Early cricket was at some time or another described as "a club striking a ball (like) the ancient games of club-ball, stool-ball, trap-ball, stob-ball". Cricket can definitely be traced back to Tudor times in early 16th-century England. Written evidence exists of a game known as creag being played by Prince Edward, the son of Edward I Longshanks, at Newenden, Kent in 1301 and there has been speculation, but no evidence, that this was a form of cricket.

        A number of other words have been suggested as sources for the term "cricket". In the earliest definite reference to the sport in 1598, it is called creckett. Given the strong medieval trade connections between south-east England and the County of Flanders when the latter belonged to the Duchy of Burgundy, the name may have been derived from the Middle Dutch crick, meaning a stick crook; or the Old English cricc or cryce meaning a crutch or staff. In Old French, the word criquet seems to have meant a kind of club or stick. In Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, he derived cricket from "cryce, Saxon, a stick". Another possible source is the Middle Dutch word krickstoel, meaning a long low stool used for kneeling in church and which resembled the long low wicket with two stumps used in early cricket. According to Heiner Gillmeister, a European language expert of Bonn University, "cricket" derives from the Middle Dutch phrase for hockey, met de (krik ket)sen , "with the stick chase". Dr Gillmeister believes that not only the name but the sport itself is of Flemish origin.

The Sticky Balls


 Sticky Balls. This awkwardly named concoction has been labeled the “toy of the century” and rightfully so. After the Rubik’s Cube, this is perhaps the only toy in the 21st century that delivers hours of endless fun. A set of highly moldable, foldable and flexible magnetic balls, Sticky Balls is amazingly addictive and will appeal to children as well as adults.
When it comes to toys, simplicity is the key. For all the bells and whistles of modern toys, it is the simple designs that still capture our imagination. Think of classic toys like the Rubik’s Cube or plastic Army Men. Amazingly simple, without any complex moving parts or intricate designs, these became popular because anyone could play with them, regardless of age group.Sticky Balls fits perfectly into this category of toys. Its design is deceptively simple: just an array of small magnetic balls that cling on to each other with ease. With this basic premise, you can use these Sticky Balls to create myriad shapes: from hollow spheres to 3-D stars and Bucky balls.Sticky Balls are technically called “neodymium” or “rare earth” magnets. These are about 10 times more powerful than common refrigerator magnets. Only a few facilities around the world can manufacture these magnetic balls, such is the complexity of the technology involved. These are dual polarity magnets, so they will stick to each other, no matter the polarity. Additionally, because of their magnetic power, they tend to make solid, stable shapes. This, of course, lends them perfectly for use as Sticky Balls are the perfect way to put your creative powers to use. You can make any imaginable shape with these balls. Spheres, cylinders, 3-D sculptures, and even useful objects such as a pen stand or a box can be made within a few minutes. You can also invent games such as ‘Fridge Darts’ or use these balls as regular fridge magnets. 
The possibilities are truly endless.Sticky Balls are small and portable. Whether it is a plane, a bus, or a doctor’s waiting room, you can carry these magnetic balls around with you for endless fun. Children as well as adults love them for the open-ended gameplay they offer that challenges the imagination and provides a perfect outlet for creative energies.For $14.99, you get 108 magnetic balls + another set of 108 balls free. Along with that, you get a small carry bag, a ‘Mastery’ DVD that includes various tips and tricks, and a ‘Shape Maker’ to help you make more complex shapes. Sticky Balls also come with a 100% money back guarantee, so you can order these with complete peace of mindSticky Balls are indeed a revolutionary toy, one that will capture the imagination of adults and children alike. Portable, simple, without batteries or complex moving parts, this is an inexpensive toy with limitless possibilities.

The Jumpman


Jumpman is a platform game written by Randy Glover and released by Epyx in 1983. Originally developed for the Atari 400/800, versions were also released for the Commodore 64, Apple II, and IBM PC.
  The object of the game is to defuse all bombs in a platform-filled screen. Jumpman defuses a bomb by touching it. According to the story, these are placed on Jupiter by terrorists. Jumpman can climb up and down ladders, and of course jump, and there are two kinds of rope each allowing a single direction of climbing only. Hazards include falling, "smart darts" small bullets that fly slowly across the screen, but when orthogonally lined up with Jumpman, greatly speed up and shoot straight in his direction and other hazards that are unique to a certain level.Points are awarded for each bomb defused, with bonus points available for completing a level quickly. Jumpman's game run-speed can be chosen by the player, with faster speeds being riskier but providing greater opportunity to earn bonus points."Jumpman" was also the original name used for Mario in the 1981 arcade game , which featured several elements such as the ladders and levels aspects that would appear in Jumpman. Randy Glover has stated that Donkey Kong was the original inspiration for Jumpman, although it is not clear that the naming commonality is anything but a The "jumpman logo is used by Nike to promote its Michael Jordan-related merchandise, including the famous and successful Air Jordan brand of basketball shoesThe Jumpman logo is a silhouette of a studio photograph of Jordan performing a ballet move, not an actual dunk as many believe.Beginning in 1985, the Jumpman photo or logo always accompanied "Jordan" branded products, even when the only word displayed on the product was "Jordan".The Air Jordan III, released in 1988, was the first Air Jordan shoe to feature the Jumpman logo, replacing the "Wings" logo, which had been a feature of the Air Jordans I and II. This model was one of the most popular ever. The Jumpman logo would retain a fairly consistent look throughout the Air Jordan line's history, except on the Air Jordan VIII, on which it was reminiscent of a peace sign. In 1993-94, Nike ran a series of Air Jordan commercials pairing Michael Jordan with Warner Brothers' own Bugs Bunny. As a tie-in, Nike created a line of merchandise which featured a spoof of the Jumpman using Bugs' silhouette, combined with a "Hare Jordan" caption. This led to the film Space Jam.coincidence.