phelps

so, the 2019 MLB season is finally underway... the Seattle Mariners won the first 2 games of the year against Oakland played in Japan (9-7 the first, 5-4 after 12 innings and 4 and a half hours of play the second)... but all the headlines are for the great Ichiro Suzuki, one of the best players in the history of the game, the best Japanese for sure and the Nation's real living idol, who announced his retirement... https://www.mlb.com/news/ichiro-in-lineup-for-opening-series-finale https://www.mlb.com/news/20-amazing-facts-about-ichiro-suzuki-s-career-c275107436 particularly emotional was the moment when he left the field for the final time, with all of his teammates coming off the field and letting him take the final standing ovation of a packed Tokyo Dome (and ideally, of all the baseball fans in the world)... https://www.mlb.com/cut4/is-ichiro-the-most-beloved-player-in-baseball-history https://www.mlb.com/cut4/kikuchi-cries-saying-goodbye-to-ichiro p.s. and yes...being a great fan of Ichiro, I also cried like all those fans on the stands and many players on the field...

last night was quite an interesting hockey night around Europe... in particular, in the Swiss NLA the record for the longest match in the history of that league was broken, as SC Bern won game #6 of their quarterfinal series in Geneve against HC Servette 3-2 after 3 OT, with the game-winning goal coming after 117 mins and 43 seconds of play (basically, 2 full matches...just a couple of minutes less than that)... p.s. SC Bern were leading 2-0 with 46 seconds to play in regulation and Servette made a miracle to score twice in 17 seconds to tie the game and force the OT..unfortunately, once again they couldn't complete their amazing comeback and they finally lost the entire series 4-2 and are out of the NLA playoffs... details and highlights of this amazing hockey game, here: https://www.sihf.ch/de/game-center/national-league/#/bestof//asc/page/0/2019/3002 meanwhile the series between HC Lausanne and SC Langnau Tigers is the only NLA Playoffs quarterfinal match-up going to game #7 (tomorrow night @ 8 p.m. CET)... in the KHL, at the same time, the Western Conference semifinals both came to an end in 5 games only... and this time no surprise happened...CSKA Moscow and SKA St.Petersburg were the heavy favourites and CSKA Moscow and SKA St.Petersburg are the 2 teams who are going to play for the Conference title... Western Conference, Semifinals recap CSKA Moscow (#1) b. Dynamo Moscow (#5) 4-1 (4-1; 0-1OT; 4-0; 2-1; 3-2) SKA St.Petersburg (#2) b. Lokomotiv Yaroslavl (#3) 4-1 (1-0; 6-1; 1-3; 3-1; 5-4OT) and also in the Eastern Conference we have 2 series that today could end in 5 games only, with Salavat (#6 seed) surprisingly in the lead 3-1 in the series against the no.1 seed Avtomobilist and Avangard (4) also on the verge of upsetting the better seeded Barys Astana (2)... and speaking of the Avangard vs Barys series, just look at this unbelievable goal by Maksim Chudinov of Avangard from behind the center ice line (but Karlsson...)... https://video.khl.ru/events/876041?locale=en

1) yeah, I know he was born in Greece...but I wrongly thought (I don't even know why?) his heritage was from Cameroon...instead his parents are actually from Nigeria... 2) I'm not sure, too...but if you ask me, I just can't stand Harden's attitude on the court nor I like his style of play...moreover, Milwaukee at the moment have a better record than Houston (and yes, I know they play in the Eastern Conference meanwhile Houston are in the more competitive West, but still)...so the final choice it's quite easy to me... 3) nice video...

wow! I didn't know that BF have a professional player (even if "professional" is quite a word for an obscure independent league in Japan)... however, if only they wanted, African teams could start shopping in the US, because there they could easily find some good players with some African heritage... not that there are many stars with those origins, but for sure in the hidden world of the minor leagues there are a lot of reasonably good players...

I'd be very, very surprised if the African team qualifying to the Euro-African Olympic Qualification Tournament aren't the South Africans...

2019 World Skate SLS Pro Tour: Dates and Locations Dates & Locations of the 2019 World Skate SLS Pro Tour are now available: the best skaters in the world will ride from London to Los Angeles till the World Championships in Mexico City. Stop 1: London, May 23-26 Stop 2: Los Angeles, July (Date Tba) World Championships: Mexico City, September 18-22 All these stops will define the ranking of the Season #1 for the Street Skateboarding Qualification to Tokyo 2020

the Greek (from Cameroon) Freak is gonna get it!

Schedule of Events Thursday, March 28th Men & Women's Individual Kata, Eliminations & Repechages Men & Women's Individual Kumite, Eliminations & Repechages, All Weight Classes Friday, March 29th Men & Women's Team Kata, Eliminations & Repechages Men & Women's Team Kumite, Eliminations & Repechages Saturday, March 30th Men's Individual Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches, Categories: +84kg, -84kg, -75kg (early morning session) Women's Individual Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches, Categories: +68kg, -68kg, -61kg, -55kg (early morning session) Men's Individual Kumite, Gold Medal Matches, Categories: +84kg, -84kg, -75kg (late morning session) Women's Individual Kumite, Gold Medal Matches, Categories: +68kg, -68kg, -61kg, -55kg (late morning session) Men & Women's Individual Kata, Bronze Medal Matches (early afternoon session) Men's Individual Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches, Categories: -67kg, -60kg (early afternoon session) Women's Individual Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches, Categories: -50kg (early afternoon session) Women's Team Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches (early afternoon session) Men & Women's Individual Kata, Gold Medal Matches (late afternoon session) Men's Individual Kumite, Gold Medal Matches, Categories: -67kg, -60kg (late afternoon session) Women's Individual Kumite, Gold Medal Matches, Categories: -50kg (late afternoon session) Women's Team Kumite, Gold Medal Matches (late afternoon session) Sunday, March 31st Men & Women's Team Kata, Bronze Medal Matches (early morning session) Men Team Kumite, Bronze Medal Matches (early morning session) Men & Women's Team Kata, Gold Medal Matches (late morning session) Men Team Kumite, Gold Medal Matches (late morning session)

Karate EKF European Championships 2019 Guadalajara (ESP) - 28 March 2019 - 31 March 2019 Official Website

Schedule of Events Saturday, April 6th Men & Women's Junior Individual Sabre Sunday, April 7th Men & Women's Cadet Individual Sabre Monday, April 8th Men & Women's Junior Team Sabre Tuesday, April 9th Men & Women's Junior Individual Foil Wednesday, April 10th Men & Women's Cadet Individual Foil Thursday, April 11th Men & Women's Junior Team Foil Friday, April 12th Men & Women's Junior Individual Epee Saturday, April 13th Men & Women's Cadet Individual Epee Sunday, April 14th Men & Women's Junior Team Epee

Fencing FIE Cadet & Junior World Championships 2019 Torun (POL) - 6 April 2019 - 14 April 2019 Official Website

2019 World Cup, Stage #2 (Acapulco, MEX) Mixed Team Trap Gold: Australia 1 (Laetisha Scanlan & James Willett) Silver: United States 1 (Kayle Browning & Brian Burrows) Bronze: Great Britain 1 (Kirsty Barr & Matthew John Coward-Holley)

I understand your point, but people should know at least the basic rules before watching... by the way...let's move on and give a look at tonight's Mixed Trap competition... with quite a few pairs still to complete their qualification round, Turkey (Safiye Sariturk & Tolga Tuncer) and USA 1 (Kayle Browning & Brian Burrows) with a score of 149/150, followed by Italy 1 (Jessica Rossi & Giovanni Pellielo) with a score of 148/150 are already sure of a spot in the final... the remaining 2 places among the top 5 are still to be determined, but France 1 (Carole Cormenier & Antonin Desert) and Australia 2 (Penny Smith & Mitchell Iles-Crevatin) have a provisional advantage over the other crews...if they don't miss more than 1 shot in their last series, they are sure to make the final...with 2 or more misses, they put in play a few other teams once again...

and the Playoffs Preliminary Round is over also in Sweden and Finland... in the SHL, it only took 2 games to both reigning champions Växjö Lakers and HV71 to beat their rivals... Växjö won 3-2 (after OT) at home and 4-2 on the road against Örebro HK, meanwhile HV71 took care of Rögle BK by winning 4-1 at home and 4-3 (after OT) on the road...therefore, no decisive games #3 were needed... on Thursday, March 22nd, the SHL quarterfinals (best-of-7 series) will start with these pairings: Färjestad BK vs HV 71 Luleå HF vs Växjö Lakers HC meanwhile on Friday, March 23rd, the remaining 2 series will start: Frölunda HC vs IF Malmö Redhawks Djurgårdens IF vs Skellefteå AIK in the Finnish Liiga, instead, both series of the Preliminary Round went to the decisive game #3...and in both cases the home ice advantage played a decisive role... so, the 2 teams that qualified for the quarterfinals are Lukko (2-1 in the series against JYP, 4-1 the result of game #3) and Ilves Tampere (2-1 the series against SaiPa, 4-2 the final score of game #3)... the Liiga Quarterfinals (best-of-7 series) will start tomorrow, March 21st, with the first 2 pairings: Pelicans Lahti vs HIFK Helsinki TPS Turku vs HPK Hämeenlinna the remaining 2 series, instead, will start on Friday, March 22nd: Kärpät Oulu vs Ilves Tampere Tappara Tampere vs Lukko Rauma p.s. last night, "my" Ambrì-Piotta was eliminated (1-4 the series score) by HC Bienne/Biel in the quarterfinals of the Swiss NLA...I'm so sad....I just can't stop crying...

Fabbrizi has missed 6 shots out of 30, Yu only 5...they weren't tied at that mark...

2019 World Cup, Stage #2 (Acapulco, MEX) Men's Individual Trap Gold: James Willett Silver: Ahmed Zaher Bronze: Yu Haicheng Olympic Quota: Egypt, China

but bib number is determined by qualification score (and following shoot-off, if they're tied at the end of the regular 125 targets), which makes it fair at 100%...

to the final... James Willett, 125/125 (= qualification WR)* Yu Haicheng, 124/125 Sebastien Guerrero, 124/125 Massimo Fabbrizi, 124/125 Ahmed Zaher, 124/125 * = already secured a quota place for Tokyo 2020 to the shoot-off for the last place in the final (all of them with 123/125)... Matthew John Coward-Holley Nathan Hales Khaled Almudhaf Paul Pigorsch Jan Borkovec Kynan Chenai no one of those guys have already earned an Olympic Quota Place...they are all eligible to get one...

having said of the news of the day, in any case to me the most important thing is that tomorrow it's the day... Seattle Mariners and Oakland A's in fact will open the 2019 season with their first 2 official games of the Regular Season, facing each other tomorrow and Thursday (h.10.35 a.m. CET both times) in Tokyo at the legendary Tokyo Dome... this would also be a farewell tour for the Japanese living legend, Ichiro Suzuki, the most successful and beloved Japanese player ever (back as an active player just for these 2 games)... after this exciting appetizer, the official Opening Day is scheduled for next week, on Thursday, March 28th... I just can't wait for tomorrow morning...

Machado and Harper waited until the end of their old contract before they hit the free agent market and then sign the 2 new most lucrative contracts in Baseball history (before today)... Mike Trout, arguably the best player in Baseball right now, didn't take that much time...he was already enjoying his 6-year 144 million US $ contract with the Los Angeles Angels...and he could have done it until the end of the 2020 season... but he might have thought that this Spring of 2019 was not so easy to repeat in terms of available money, so he decided he'd rather re-negotiate his contract well before it expired so to grant himself and his heirs a wealthy future... so, today he signed with his current team a 10-year contract extension, which leads to a new 12-year deal, worth good 426.5 million US $... this is of course the new record in US sports history... https://www.mlb.com/news/mike-trout-angels-deal

most likely...actually, pretty sure... right now, James Willett is the only man finishing his qualification round with 125/125 (= equalling the qualification world record)... with such score, of course his sure to make the final (actually, nobody cam match him today...so, he's also sure to start as the highest rank in the final)... and he's also the only man still in contention who already secured his quota place for the Olympic Games before this week... following the Australian, Sebastien Guerrero is the only other guy who already completed his effort with a helpful score...he hit 124 out of 125 targets and therefore he's also safe among the top 6... then there are 4 other guys ( Yu Haicheng, Kynan Chenai, Massimo Fabbrizi and Ahmed Zaher) with a score of 99/100 after 4 series, who could still tie the Frenchman at 124 and also earn a spot in the final... so, everything is in their hands...should all of them hit a perfect 25/25 in the last series, the starting field of the final would be set... should instead 1 or more of those 4 guys miss 1 (or more) targets, everything would get open once again, as we already have the 2 Britons Matthew John Coward-Holley and Nathan Hales stuck at 123/125 and many more shooters (8, if I'm not wrong) who could also match that score...

her name is Justine Delmas...and she was born in 2005, but I couldn't find the exact date... however, she swam 2.29.73 in the 200m Breaststroke as her best performance...very, very good, but not so impressive, imho...

no, they are against our mentality... normally, we use the world cup results to make an internal ranking, but the last word is always the Technical Director's one...he basically can choose whoever who wants (if you remember, in Rio Jessica Rossi was there after Silvana Stanco earned the spot for Italy...and there were a few arguments about it, but still nobody even tried to change the TD's decision as it's his role to take this difficult and sometimes painful decisions)...

Australian and Hong Kong record holder Kenneth To dies at the age of 26...R.I.P. https://swimswam.com/australian-and-hong-kong-record-holder-kenneth-to-dies-at-26/

I read somewhere that he could well take a bye for the entire european/world season, going to race later in the year in the US outdoor championship, once he recovers from the foot injury...