none of these sports seem twee... Maybe I don't even know what the term means anymore. Foosball, if it were a professional sport, would be the most twee sport. therefore, my vote is with soccer.
― richie aprile (rockapads), Thursday, 4 March 2010 05:17 (fourteen years ago) link
yeah, when you think about it a sport that involves hurling a spinning projectile with all of yer might at another human being who's carrying a big heavy stick with the intent to strike the projectile and send it hurtling towards other human beings (which is what baseball essentially is) is anything BUT twee.
― Tommy Wiseau's Ass, Can You Hear Me? (Eisbaer), Thursday, 4 March 2010 05:21 (fourteen years ago) link
pretty lightweight projectile, you wanna try cricket.
― take me to your lemur (ledge), Thursday, 4 March 2010 09:52 (fourteen years ago) link
aren't you supposed to send it away from other human beings?
― Luz, a saucy taco slinger (hmmmm), Thursday, 4 March 2010 10:04 (fourteen years ago) link
Yeah, plus once the ball is in the air it basically turns into a game of tag.
― Fetchboy, Thursday, 4 March 2010 13:34 (fourteen years ago) link
The literature associated with the game of baseball is extremely twee. Pete Hammill made a fool out of himself in the New York Times last week in a review of the new Willie Mays book.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 14:25 (fourteen years ago) link
Unlike soccer, there's very few compound fractures in baseball.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:02 (fourteen years ago) link
Moises Alou would beg to differ.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:19 (fourteen years ago) link
As would Jason Kendall and Cesar Cedeno.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:21 (fourteen years ago) link
Also in baseball, you dont get guys who act like they just got mowed down by sniper fire when they are barely touched, like soccer players who are trying to draw penalties. That kind of wimpiness totally turns me off to the sport.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:22 (fourteen years ago) link
That kind of shit is creeping into basketball thanks to the likes of Manu Ginobili, who probably played a lot of soccer as a kid.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:23 (fourteen years ago) link
Not wimpiness, deviousness
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:27 (fourteen years ago) link
Ergo not twee
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:28 (fourteen years ago) link
Diving isn't wimpiness, Bill, it's just cheating. The same soccer player who's rolling on the pitch in the 'throes of agony' one minute is whistling happily to himself the next minute after breaking someone's ankle.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:28 (fourteen years ago) link
society is lying in the gutter, with a compound fracture, inflicted by a youth
― queen of the rapping scene (acoleuthic), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:30 (fourteen years ago) link
Still think it was creepy for Wenger to put Eduardo in the game after Ramsey's leg got broken.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:32 (fourteen years ago) link
the youth is then given a medal, as society is taken behind a wall and shot
― queen of the rapping scene (acoleuthic), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:32 (fourteen years ago) link
this is ridic soccer should not be in this poll
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:33 (fourteen years ago) link
Surely you know there's no more society worth talking about, dear boy.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:34 (fourteen years ago) link
― call all destroyer, Thursday, March 4, 2010 10:33 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
You're right, no one in his right mind would call this a major sport.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:37 (fourteen years ago) link
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, March 4, 2010 10:27 AM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
Looks like a pussy move from where I sit. Therefore, twee.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:38 (fourteen years ago) link
Bill Magill, arbiter elegantiae.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:41 (fourteen years ago) link
He's all-man, that Bill Magill
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:42 (fourteen years ago) link
crying after breaking someone's leg is pretty twee
― The smile on my face, disguises the case, I bury the truth deep down in (ken c), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:58 (fourteen years ago) link
^^^true
― queen of the rapping scene (acoleuthic), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:59 (fourteen years ago) link
http://www.espnstar.com/servlet/file/405035_33_preview.jpg?ITEM_ENT_ID=405035&COLLSPEC_ENT_ID=10&FILE_SERVICE_CONF_ID=33
― The smile on my face, disguises the case, I bury the truth deep down in (ken c), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:59 (fourteen years ago) link
Who, Shawcross? I thought he was maybe crying about his England chances being imperilled. THAT would be pretty twee.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 15:59 (fourteen years ago) link
In fact, it had the opposite effect, Capello said "I must have that legbreaker in my team" (in Italian)
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:00 (fourteen years ago) link
Pour encourager les autres
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:02 (fourteen years ago) link
I find it hard to believe that macho, sports-type American males actually approve of baseball with all the guys in tight pants and little caps scampering about.Have you actually seen baseball pants recently? More often than not they're baggy like pajamas. It's football pants that are skin tight.
American football has been the victim of ever-increasing creeping tweeness since the late '70s when they changed the rules to make it almost impossible to defend against the pass - to the point where a defender even looking like he might have brushed against the pass receiver will draw a backbreaking penalty flag. And offensive blocking got much easier to do. And they really cracked down on late hits & any move that might frighten the quarterback. Still, concussions do happen, and the persistent low level impact intrinsic to the sport still rattles players' brains, so it's not all bad. (See the recent TIME magazine cover story). I acknowledge that the concussions threaten to take the word "twee" out of consideration, but the sport is relatively dainty compared to the '50s, '60s version.
― Josefa, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:05 (fourteen years ago) link
American football has been the victim of ever-increasing creeping tweeness since the late '70s when they changed the rules to make it almost impossible to defend against the pass - to the point where a defender even looking like he might have brushed against the pass receiver will draw a backbreaking penalty flag.
yup. the West Coast Offense is kinda twee, when you really think about it.
― Tommy Wiseau's Ass, Can You Hear Me? (Eisbaer), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:11 (fourteen years ago) link
aside from how cutesy or kooky a sport is, sporting tweeness = the mystical privileging of sport as great healer and scale of justice - NFL does this more than any other imho
― queen of the rapping scene (acoleuthic), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:13 (fourteen years ago) link
typing that and coming to the conclusion that football does this more than baseball really proves my point re: "people who aren't voting baseball do not understand American sports"
― Bunsen burner, bubbles, IT'S ALIVE! whaaaaa-? (HI DERE), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:17 (fourteen years ago) link
tbf i haven't seen a huge deal of either but i reckon i've got more of a handle on nfl so maybe baseball is like that but with brass knobs on
― queen of the rapping scene (acoleuthic), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:18 (fourteen years ago) link
nfl is just a hilarious 5+ month soap opera imo
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:23 (fourteen years ago) link
ha!
― Mr. Que, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:24 (fourteen years ago) link
and really what i mean by that is it is not really romanticized in the same way baseball is. it is also still an evolving sport and baseball has more or less been the same for a long time.
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:25 (fourteen years ago) link
The popular narrative of baseball in U.S. history, especially wrt 'simpler times' and racial integration is amongst the most saccharine things in an already cloying American context.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:26 (fourteen years ago) link
i think a big difference between football and baseball is, yeah, the way writers romanticize the geometry of baseball, the history, the statistics, to the point where writers/announcers of baseball games are sometimes talking about almost abstract stuff. football doesn't have any of that. (except for those slo mo NFL films)
― Mr. Que, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:28 (fourteen years ago) link
Otoh, no sport has even come close to self-aggrandizing and romanticizing itself than the NFL with NFL films. It is a genre unto itself; sui generis.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:28 (fourteen years ago) link
nfl films is amazing tho--i don't even know how they get some of those shots.
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:34 (fourteen years ago) link
Tim Burton... 3D...
― Tom D (Tom D.), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:39 (fourteen years ago) link
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, March 4, 2010 11:26 AM (12 minutes ago)
I agree with this. I dont understand the whole romanticizing of the game's past. Again I cite Pete Hammill's embarrassing article in last Sunday's Times Book Review.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:41 (fourteen years ago) link
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, March 4, 2010 11:28 AM (12 minutes ago)
But NFL Films gets a pass, becuase they are fucking awesome.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:42 (fourteen years ago) link
Pro football was integrated before baseball was - you never hear about that. Look up Kenny Washington, Woody Strode, Marion Motley, Bill Willis.
― Josefa, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:42 (fourteen years ago) link
NFL films set the standard a long time ago for technical prowess in documentary cinema.
― La religion est une fatigante solution de paresse (Michael White), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:42 (fourteen years ago) link
and that's not even considering Brett Favre's annual "am i really gonna retire now?" spiel during the off-season.
― Tommy Wiseau's Ass, Can You Hear Me? (Eisbaer), Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:45 (fourteen years ago) link
"but the sport is relatively dainty compared to the '50s, '60s version...."
I would add the '70s as the most violent decade. You had the advent of the longer pass after the AFL-NFL merger, along with the growing sophistication of zone defenses. The combination of these two things led to complete and utter bloodshed in the defensive secondary, culminating in the tragic paralysis of Darryl Stingley.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:46 (fourteen years ago) link
NFL Films is indeed great, but the NFL has sort of conspired to perpetuate the idea that pro football didn't exist before NFL Films started (1963) or even before the first Super Bowl (1967). It's a weird propaganda move. And of course they never acknowledge that there were other pro leagues at various times.
― Josefa, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:47 (fourteen years ago) link
And if you had 1970's rules combined with the size, speed and athleticism of today's NFL players, there would be at least one death a season.
― Bill Magill, Thursday, 4 March 2010 16:48 (fourteen years ago) link