Sully Baseball Daily Podcast -August 5, 2016

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I know it isn’t Sunday, but I am doing a request anyway.

@sullybaseball thoughts about bringing baseball back to the Olympics https://t.co/FUaIlS3ixc

— Strictly Baseball (@strictlybba11) August 4, 2016

Olympic Baseball will always be running an uphill battle because the best players in the world won’t necessarily be playing it.

It is a pass the torch episode of The Sully Baseball Daily Podcast.

Dernard Span, Brandon Finnegan, Francisco Lindor, Drew Smyly, Ian Kennedy, Nolan Arenado, Ji-Man Choi and Ryan Vogelsong  all added to their totals for Who Owns Baseball yesterday.

See the updated listing of WOB on MLB Reports

 

Olympic Hockey is everything the WBC wants to be… but can never acheive

How big was today’s win in Vancouver by team USA over the Canadian hockey team?

My wife, who is hardly a hockey fan, read that and said “Wow!”

And it was indeed a wow. A tense game which Red Wing Brian Rafalski playing for Team USA became the offensive hero.

Devil’s captain Jamie Langenbrunner provided some offense for USA while Penguins star Sidney Crosby scored for the Canadians.

Caps star Alexander Ovechkin plays for the Russian team as does Evgeni Nabokov of my San Jose Sharks.

Anaheim’s Teemu Selanne plays for Finland. Detroit’s Nicklas Lidstrom plays for Sweden. Former Hart Trophy winner Jaromír Jágr plays for the Czechs.

And those are just a few of the NHL stars that this casual hockey fan recognizes.

The biggest names are on the ice… and they are playing full speed. The intensity of today’s game was enormous and it wasn’t even a medal game!

I wonder if Bud Selig was watching. I am guessing he was. I am sure he looks at this and says “Why can’t the World Baseball Classic be more like this?”

And sure, it would be great to see an American team filled with all of the American superstars…

And a Domincan team playing at full strength and full speed.

And a Venezuelan team playing one brand of baseball while a Japanese team plays a different kind.

But this is just one thing hockey will have over baseball.

Remember how the WBC actually unfolded: Many star players saying “thanks but no thanks.” Stadiums 2/3 empty. Indifferent fans. And with the exception of Ichiro, all of the marquee superstars mercifully back with their teams by the finals.

And lest we forget the level of play! Pitch counts. Players going at half speed. Pitchers “trying to get their work in” during potential elimination games.

The Olympic medal actually means something, unlike the WBC trophy (which I am dubbing the “Selig Cup.”)

Be thankful hockey fans that you get a tournament like this. It is unique. It is special.

And it ain’t happening in baseball.

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Women’s Curling Is Awesome

Yeah, I watched women’s curling with other people at the office today. And I don’t apologize for it either.

It was awesome. Me and my other office mates were hooked.

Yeah it is basically shuffle board on ice.

Sure, it was probably started by a couple of drunk people who brought a big rock and some brooms to a frozen pond and now people can call themselves Gold Medal Olympians based on their sweeping abilities.

But I guess the beauty of the Olympics is getting hooked on sports that you would never have noticed.

Oh, and speaking of beauty did you SEE the women curlers?

They are cute!

I had no idea curling had any sex appeal, but it does.

Liudmila Privivkova of Russia?

Stella Heiss of Germany?

Moe Meguro of Japan?

These two from the Danish team who could be twins?

Look, far be it for to tell NBC how to cover the Olympics… but in 2014 when the Winter Olympics head to Sochi, Russia… play up the Women’s Curling a little.

It’s fantastic!

article_url = location.href;article_title = document.titlI should note that the most beautiful woman I associate with curling is actually my wife.

On our first date, we met at Kettle of Fish, a bar in Greenwich Village. When we met, the TV was on showing a curling match at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.

So forgive me for romanticizing curling.