Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis

An Arcade Tournament, a dark horse candidate that we didn't even handicap this morning, wins the day. Chad Jennings has the details. The team will participate in three events: skee ball, pop-a-shot basketball, and an Indy racing game.

Former NC State basketball player Andrew Brackman is the odds-on favorite for pop-a-shot. But the big fellas rarely do well from the charity stripe, so we may see a surpise contender emerge.

Side-arming lefty Royce Ring presumably would have the advantage in skee ball, but given Mo's control it wouldn't surprise me if he bullseyed every toss.

Jesus Montero's father is a mechanic, and Jesus dabbles in engine building, so I would imagine he has the inside track for Indy racing. I just hope A-Rod has learned his lesson and doesn't try to text while he's racing.

Poor Joba is stuck home with flu like symptoms, but he'll likely have some good games there to keep himself entertained.

Friday Afternoon Link Party

It's Friday and I'm pressed for time, but here are a few links to explore before the preview for tonight's game goes up. You don't want to see how they were made:

Our pal Joe at RAB explores the tendency for people to criticize the effort baseball players seem to put forth, inspired by this post at the Yankee Universe.

Tim Marchman takes a pretty thorough look at how many hits Derek Jeter might end up with when it's all said and done. Craig Calcaterra reacts to the final two paragraphs of Marchman's article which implies that Jeter still has something left to prove and suggests he doesn't.

Big League Screw has a great piece on Alfredo Aceves that tracks his journey from Mexico to the Majors and declares him "The Most Interesting Man in the Bronx". Well worth the read.

"My feeling is you ought to be ashamed of yourself if you get physically tired of playing baseball because it shouldn't be that physically taxing" If this doesn't illustrate the difference between baseball and football, I fear nothing ever will.

There are a lot of ways to show how awesome the Yankees offense has been this year. Here is one. And here is another.

Be glad you didn't have to sit through "The worst hall of fame speech... ever".

The Yankees will be honoring those who lost their lives during the attacks of September 11th with a ceremony before the game tonight.

New Stadium Insider has the low down on the weather and how it might affect tonight's game.

What To Do Tonight...

The Yankees aren't on, and we are all lost... I know. Here are some options:

• Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee - ABC, 8-10PM - Bathe in the social awkwardness, bask in Erin Andrewsocity. If that's too boring, watch Cheap Seats make fun of a bunch of them from the mid 90's.
  
  
• Game 5 of the Cavs vs. Magic series - TBS, 8:30 - 11-ish - Do or die for Lebron, should make for some interesting television.
  
  
• Jeff Beck: Live At Ronnie Scotts - Palladia HD, 7-9 - Oh, it's almost over? Get lost in his clips on YouTube. There's an hour and a half special on the legendary 1967 Monterey Pop Festival on immedately following as well. The movie Woodstock is on from 8-12 on VH1 Classic if that doesn't suit your fancy. 
  
  
• REAL Sports - HBO 9-10 - Interview with a rep from the NFLPA, a piece on some afeminte bull riding brothers form Spain. You might want to turn off before the horse slaughtering part at the end, though.
   
• Dodgers vs. Cubs - MLBHD, 8 - 11-ish - Two great franchises squaring off at Wrigley and... aw, fuck. Bob Costas calling the game? Nevermind. 
  
  
• An hour long re-run of The Office - NBC, 10 - 11 - Hey, it's better than a first run of 90% of the other bullshit that's on TV.
  
  
• Hit some golf balls at Randall's Island - That's where I'm headed, anyway. See you tomorrow, bright and early. 
  
  

The Worst Halftime Show Ever

From Deadspin comes footage of by far the worst halftime show ever:

The Oklahoma City Thunder turned that concept on its head when they recently hosted a Houdini-style underwater escape act. Kristen Johnson is a professional escape artist whose specialty is getting out of handcuffs and leg irons while being fully submerged in a tube of water. Since that one trick is more thrilling than anything the Thunder have done on a basketball court this season, they booked her for the January 16th game against Detroit.

Let's just say things didn't go as planned. It took her longer than anticipated to get out of the handcuffs and ended up having a seizure before she was pulled from the tank. Video below.

[Warning: The video gets disturbing around the 3:00 mark]

Today Was Not a Great Day for Boston College

I am sure there will be more said about this tomorrow, but since Will had been on a rant and I just purely dislike all things Boston, I thought I would mention that today was not BC’s finest day. First, they fire the head coach of the Football team, and then the #24 Golden Eagles lose on the hardwood to Harvard at home. Not to mention it was Harvard’s first win ever over a ranked team. Can’t say I am complaining though.