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They stand a pretty good chance of playing in South Africa next year.
Mun In Guk scored the only goal Wednesday to help North Korea move a step closer to a 2010 World Cup berth with a 1-0 win over Saudi Arabia in Asian qualifying.
It was a deserved victory for the nation that made its only appearance at the World Cup in 1966. The three points gives North Korea seven from four games to share the Group 2 lead with rival South Korea, which plays third-place Iran later Wednesday.
With the top two teams from the group to qualify directly for South Africa 2010, Saudi Arabia is fourth with four points and in danger of missing out on the Cup for the first time since 1990. The United Arab Emirates trails in the standings.
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North Korea next hosts the United Arab Emirates on March 28, when Saudi Arabia travels to Iran.- Associated Press
It is good North Koreans are getting better at soccer. A few years ago they tried to kick a referee after a game and missed.
Based on Mark McGwire’s luck with the Baseball Writers of America, I think it is safe to say Tejada won’t ever make the Baseball Hall of Fame now. From AP-
All-Star shortstop Miguel Tejada has pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about the use of performance-enhancing drugs in professional baseball.
Tejada was the American League’s Most Valuable Player in 2002 while playing for Oakland. He now plays for the Houston Astros.
The misdemeanor charge of making misrepresentations to Congress can lead to as much as a year in jail. But federal guidelines call for a lighter sentence.
The case stems from Tejada’s statements to House investigators in 2005 when he denied knowing anyone in baseball who used performance-enhancing drugs.
Tejada got himself in this spot with his own words and actions. The first thing a person who has committed a crime should do when questioned by the police, is ask for an attorney. Of course if they were smart enough to know that, then they may not have broken the law in the first place.
I bet $5 Tejada doesn’t spend a day in jail. As for MLB, I don’t expect the shortstop to get anything more than a slap on the wrist.
He had an eight-year NFL career and played in three Super Bowls. RIP
Mel Kaufman, a linebacker who played in three Super Bowls with the Washington Redskins and was a former scout for the NFL team, has died. He was 50.
Kaufman died in his Santa Margarita home Saturday night, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo announced Monday. An autopsy was scheduled for Wednesday.
He played on Washington’s victorious Super Bowl teams in 1983 and 1988, and in the 1984 title game, when the Redskins lost to the Los Angeles Raiders. He scouted for the Redskins in the 1992 Super Bowl, when they beat the Buffalo Bills.
A defensive team leader and team captain with the Redskins from 1981-88, Kaufman was a starting linebacker on NFC championship games in 1982, ’83 and ’87. He started 78 of 91 games after making the team as a rookie free agent in 1981.
Kaufman was limited to six starts in 1988, his last season, after a shoulder and neck injury. After retiring, he was a scouting supervisor for the Redskins through 1998.
Kaufman had been working as linebackers coach at Cal Poly since last spring, and he helped guide the Mustangs to an 8-3 record, a Great West Conference title and their second NCAA FCS playoff berth.
He played on the school’s Division II national championship team in 1980 and was a member of its athletic hall of fame.
“It’s a tragedy. He was a good man and a compassionate man,” said former Cal Poly coach Rich Ellerson, who became Army coach in December. “I pray that the stress of the coaching business wasn’t a contributing factor. He was just a good guy, a passionate guy, a Mustang.”
Kaufman had been out of football for about 10 years before he was hired 11 months ago at his alma mater. During that time, he worked at a family owned moving and storage company in Los Angeles, as a mental health counselor, and coached football, basketball and baseball at Masada High in Gardena, Calif.
“We took a bit of a chance with him because he hadn’t coached before at this level, but there were a lot of compelling things in his background as a player and scout, as well as who he was as a person,” Ellerson said.
Kaufman and defensive back LeCharls McDaniel, who also played for the Mustangs’ 1980 national championship team, both were signed by Redskins general manager Bobby Beathard as free agents after a workout at Cal Poly in 1981.
“He was very cerebral, didn’t make very many mistakes and brought a lot of life to the team,” Beathard said.
Funeral arrangements were pending.
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Too bad trotters and pacers don’t race at Churchill Downs*. From Harnessracing.com-
Two Perretti Farms yearlings have been named in honor of New Jersey state legislators Jennifer Beck and Joseph Malone.
Beckretariat, named for Senator Beck [R-12], who is from Red Bank, NJ, is a pacing filly by Rocknroll Hanover out of the broodmare Sweet Smilin’ Lady.
Muscles Malone, named for Assemblyman Malone [R-30] of Bordentown, NJ, is a son of trotting stallion Muscles Yankee and out of the broodmare Malexandria.
Both yearlings were bred at Perretti Farms in Cream Ridge, NJ and, according to Perretti spokesman Bob Marks, they will both be for sale in the fall. (NJ SBOA)
How long before a yearling is named Super Obama? There was a famous trotter named Super Bowl 30 years ago.
*- I was making a joke. Churchill Downs is not named after Winston Churchill.
Is it for real this time?
Without the tearful public ceremony that accompanied his retirement announcement from the Green Bay Packers just 11 months ago, quarterback Brett Favre has told the New York Jets he is retiring.
Best of Mike and Mike
Chris Mortensen and Ed Werder break the news that Brett Favre is retiring from the Jets. Plus, Steve Phillips on A-Rod and Bob Knight on college basketball.
More Podcasts »
Favre had instructed his agent, James “Bus” Cook, to inform the Jets on Wednesday that he is retiring. Jets team executives and coach Rex Ryan confirmed the retirement in a statement, saying they talked to Favre on Wednesday morning about his decision.
“I have great admiration for him as a player and a person. I wish him only the best in his life after football,” Ryan said.
In an e-mail to ESPN’s Ed Werder, Favre indicated he had no regrets about finishing his career with the Jets rather than with the Green Bay Packers franchise he represented for his previous 16 NFL seasons. He specifically praised Jets GM Mike Tannenbaum, team owner Woody Johnson and fired coach Eric Mangini — and even mentioned Thomas Jones and Kerry Rhodes, both of whom were publicly critical of Favre after the team’s collapse in the final month of the season prevented the Jets from making the playoffs.
Favre wasn’t the first athlete to retire and then unretire and he won’t be the last. The chance for further glory or more monetary riches, causes men and women alike to give it another try. It is sad when some of them keep playing well past their prime, and end up tainting what was a great career. Favre didn’t get to that point, but could have if he continued to play. Good luck in retirement.
She has to be considered one of the favorites for the gold medal at the Olympics in Vancouver next year. From the Chosunilbo-
Korean figure skating icon Kim Yu-na clinched the gold in the women’s single competition at the International Skating Union’s Four Continents Championships.
Kim won 116.83 points in the ladies’ freestyle final in Vancouver, Canada Friday local time ranking on the top with the total score of 189.07 in the competition. This follows setting a world-record short program performance of 72.24 points on Wednesday.
In the beginning of the performance on Friday she pulled off a combination of a triple flip and a triple toe loop although she fell once in her attempt to do a triple loop jump.
Ranking second was Canada’s Joannie Rochette and Japan’s Mao Asada last year’s champion came in third.
Yu-Na has had a history of great short programs but not being to follow it up in the free skate part of the competition. She is one of the two or three top candidates for the gold next year. If Yu-Na does win it, will she inspire South Korean girls to take up the sport like Se Ri Pak did in regards to golf over a decade ago? My own opinion is that it won’t on a comparable scale because of the limited amount of skating events and slots for skaters in them. There won’t ever be 45 South Korean skaters competing in ISU events like there are on the LPGA Tour in a given year.
Curiously I just completed a web fiction story inspired by Yu-Na Kim and this old post of GI at ROK Drop. A young man in New Hampshire who wants to make his college hockey team and fails. He visits a magic shop where the owner sells him a wishing object. All he wanted to be was a better hockey player and skater. Instead he ends up a South Korean figure skater(Not Yu-Na Kim) in his hometown training for the Olympics. To get out of the spell and become a better hockey player himself, the young man must help the female skater improve also.
Before that story I rarely paid this sport and knew diddly about figure skating. Now I will probably watch the women’s competition at next year’s Olympics. It will be interesting to see if Yu-Na can bring home the gold.
She won 13 tour events including the US Women’s Open. RIP
Betty Jameson, one of the 13 founding members of the LPGA Tour in 1950, died Saturday, the tour said. She was 89.
The tour did not give the cause of death.
“As a result of Betty’s elegant ambition, generations of women have benefited from her dedication, vision and sacrifice,” LPGA Tour commissioner Carolyn Bivens said.
“We are very sorry to lose her. At the same time, we celebrate her life and her remarkable spirit.”
Born May 9, 1919, in Norman, Okla., Jameson won the 1932 Texas Publinx title at 13, took the Southern Championship at 15, and won consecutive U.S. Women’s Amateur titles in 1939 and 1940. She won the 1942 Western Open for the first of her three major titles, and completed her amateur career with 14 victories.
Jameson turned professional in 1945, won the U.S. Women’s Open in 1947, and took the Women’s Western Open in 1954. She finished her LPGA Tour career with 13 victories.
Jameson was inducted to the Hall of Fame of Women’s Golf in 1951, and became one of six inaugural members of the LPGA Tour Hall of Fame in 1967 — the LPGA Hall of Fame chose to recognize 1951 as the retroactive date of her induction.
She also was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame, Women’s Sports Foundation Hall of Fame, and was recognized during the LPGA’s 50th Anniversary in 2000 as one of the LPGA’s top 50 players and teachers.
Jameson and the 12 other LPGA Founders were honored in 2000 with the Commissioner’s Award in recognition of their role in furthering the cause of women’s golf.
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What is so controversial that golfer Anna Rawson felt a need to apologize? From the Sydney Daily Telegraph-
AUSTRALIAN glamour girl Anna Rawson said she was trying to promote golf in a radio interview in which she referred to past female players as “dykes”.
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She came under fire for her poorly chosen comments aired by NOVA 5AA in Adelaide on Wednesday.
“The tour has got so much better with so many young stars and great players,” Rawson told the radio station in an interview arranged by her father Jim. “But the mentality unfortunately amongst the media and the industry hasn’t changed.
“They still think we’re at 25 years ago when the tour was full of, you know, a lot of dykes and unattractive females nobody wanted to watch.”
Rawson is talking about how the media perceives players on tour. Why should she come under fire?
The word Dyke isn’t considered a slur against a female homosexual. Many lesbians use the word to describe themselves and others.
“I could never be with a woman, because I’m just fascinated by what men can do with their bodies that we can’t,” she said before admitting: “This interview will definitely get me in trouble.”
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“I was making a reference to how I feel society sees women’s golf as a whole. I don’t believe that. I wouldn’t want anyone to think that was my opinion and I am sorry I said that, definitely.
“I was making a reference to how women make seven times less than men on the course and 20-to-25 times less on the sponsorship front. It’s amazing how women’s golf has grown and we have many great young players out here, yet society and the media haven’t really caught onto that.
“That’s what I was talking about, I wasn’t talking about my opinion at all.”
So she can’t ever be a lesbian(I can’t either) and she says the usually lazy media can’t or won’t portray ladies golfers correctly today and the differences in prize money. Was any of this off the mark? No, so why the controversy?
Political correctness run amok. BTW that really is Rawson in the photo above. If you want to see more, I suggest a google images search.
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