Sticky Wickets

I don’t much care for, or understand, a lot of international sports.  Granted, I understand Golf and hope for the best of luck for US players who play the game elsewhere… but I don’t see the need for much unrest if we have a streak of poor performances.

I was on ESPN.com the other day trying to find out a little info on the Seahawks.  I heard something on the radio about Sean Alexander getting injured and that he was going to be out for several weeks.  I am a fair weather sports fan – and I admit that.  After the Seahawks went to the Super Bowl last year though, it made me pay a little bit more attention to the team this year.  Too bad the referees ruined that game too.  Yeah, I said it.

Anyway, I was there on ESPN and there were a few articles about how US teams and players are sucking.  Tiger Woods didn’t win some Ireland Open, and blah blah blah.  It seemed like they were making a big stink about it, to which I simply say: “Maybe you should be paying them more.”  Do you know how much a home in B.F. Richville costs?  Millions!  And you expect these guys to make PAYMENTS!?  Of course their minds aren’t in the game.

There is one game I totally do not get at all, and that’s Cricket.  When I was in Dubai back some time ago there was the India vs. Pakistan Cricket Tournaments on every day.  I think this is one of the sports you have to teach someone when they are young, because even after five days of watching and listening to it play on and on and on and on… I still didn’t/don’t get it.  I learned a few terms, but didn’t understand what they meant.  So we did what any American in the Middle East would do (Andy and I), we went to Carfour’s (?) and bought a cricket bat!

Our “boss” a Pakistani, and one of the other guys traveling with us, an Indian tried to teach us how to play.  So we set up in the hallway of the apartment building, and used a racquetball to learn how to swing the bat.  One of us would play the Bowler (pitcher) while another of us would swing the bat.  Anyone else watching would chase down the racquetball as it careened through the hall, often coming to rest in the little elevator lobby.  It was tremendously loud; the sound of the bat striking the ball, and the one other person living on that floor would sometimes open and closet their door – to remind us that they were “at home”.

We knocked down a sconce-type light on each side of the hallway before we were done.  We never had runners or anything; we just bowled and batted the whole time.  In the end the cricket bat was too big to fit in any of our suitcases, so we left it in the apartment when we left.  Of course if it did fit in my luggage and I was stopped in the airport – I’d have to explain my affinity for corporal punishment.  DOH!

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