The prognosis for our teams in action...
Men's volleyball vs. Japan
This will be a sweep. We are flying high. We should get the job done.
Women's soccer vs. Japan
A tough proposition, but we beat them before, so this should be a chance to get it done again.
Baseball vs. China
Our manager should be fired if we don't roughhouse them, let alone go through by the mercy rule.
Softball vs. China
See above. But this team is always worrisome. This should not be an issue.
Basketball vs. Germany
Are you kidding me? This will be another thumping.
Water Polo vs Germany
Tough contest, but we should be able to get the job done.
Women's field hockey vs. Great Britain
Of all the team matches, this one worries me the most because we will coming into that match as underdogs. But hey, we took New Zealand to school, so we should have the mindset that anything is possible.
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ohhhhh the futility!!!
Alicia Sacramone's Olympic run got even worse. She ended up finishing fourth in the women's vault. Bless her heart she must be feeling like wrist-slashing might be ritual for her.
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The student, Phil "The Dome" Dalhausser and the master, Todd Rogers, make easy fixins of David Klemperer and Eric Koreng, 21-13 and 25-23. Could a meeting with the Georgian-Brazilians of Jorge "Geor" Terceiro and Renato "Gia" Gomes? Or is it a meeting with the Dutch power duo of Richard Schuil and Reinder Nummerdor?
Stay tuned.
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It's hilarious to see some of the Russian and Chinese would-be female competitors stumble on the unforgiving floor. Looks like I now know why Russia didn't medal in the team competition.
As for the tears from the Chinese, I feel vindicated. That's for one-upping us in the team competition. You gotta save some of the golds for the others, i.e. us.
Hmph.
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Many detractors (some of them who are clearly biased in degree or another) say that Romanian gymnastics is dead.
Poppycock. We know better. Or at least, Sandra Izbasa knows better. Her gold-medal winning performance in the floor exercise validates the fact that Romania is not dead when it comes to their relevance in the gymnastics world. Girls like Sandra won't let that happen, at least not on her watch.
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Unbelievable. Terrence Trammell could not finish his heat in the men's 110m hurdles. He must have injured himself, popped a ligament or something. Bad luck.
Here's hoping this type of incident doesn't send his life in the wrong direction (though it probably will).
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So Liu Xiang of China fails to finish his heat in the 110-meter hurdles.
I'm like, "Who fucking cares!?" Apparently the 1.3 billion people in China do, but not me. I mean, come on, China is still ahead of us by 16 gold medals, even though we barely lead them in the total medals.
Not a big deal to me, but for me, it would be a big deal if one of the USA hopefuls fails in forgettable fashion. Besides, at least they still have Ji Wei.
Riiiiiight?
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Here's something that is a big deal, in my view. In women's table tennis: Yang Fen, representing the Congo-THE CONGO, of all countries-defeats Crysti Huang in the preliminaries, 4 games to 2.
At first I thought, "Is this a joke!?" But after a while, I Determined that the world must have exploded, as the Ouran Host Club ending theme implied. This is the Congo we're talking about here. It's not very often that someone from this country bests one of our players. In fact, it's rare.
I am sick to my stomach after seeing this. For Stephanie Huang, this has to be one of the crappiest days of her career, if not her life. To lose to someone from a country like the Congo (not the country formerly knows as Zaire, the OTHER Congo) is like a number-16 seed beating the number one seed in one bracket of a basketball tournament.
Could this Yang Fen be to the COngo as Oussama Mellouli is to Tunisia and KIrsty Coventry to Zimbabwe-the next Africa Small Country Hero? Stay tuned. This result validates our suckitude in ping-pong. I'm going to have to wait for the day that beer pong is an Olympic sport.
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I've seen upsets left and right, but I didn't think that Australia would pull a blowout or two in men's basketball. Lituania was 4-0 heading into this match, and Australia, who also qualified for the knockout stages...is 2-2. And the Boomers are thumping this team.
Forget March Madness, how about August Anarchy?
The thing that worries me is a similar letdown by the USA against Germany. While convention wisdown is calling for that NOT to happen, one would think that for the Germans (who are elimanted from the knockout round), anything is possible. And rightfully so.
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Poor Laura Bennett. Ugh. She finished fourth in the women's triathlon behind Emma Snowsill, Vanessa Fernandes, and Emma Moffatt. Both Emmas are from Australia, Vanessa is from Portugal.
She might as well finished last. Laura wouldn't have stood a chance in the women's 10,000 meters.
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