Tues July 8: Countdown To Beijing and One Week Until All-Star Game

The Olympic trials are over here in the United States and over the next four weeks, the eyes of the world will slowly shift to Beijing. In exactly one month from now, the Chinese capital city of Beijing will host the world's best sporting event, the Olympic Games. So everyday until the opening ceremonies begin at 8:08PM local time on 8/8/08, NOW Sports Daily will preview every aspect of the games as possible, from the elusive matchups in each sport, to introducing you to several unknown sports like BMX racing, to how to watch the Olympics here in the United States.

Countdown to Beijing: 30 Days Left
With less than 31 days left until the Games begin, what better way to start the countdown than introducing you to the host city of Beijing, China.

The International Olympic Committee elected Beijing to host the Games of the XXIX Olympiad on July 13, 2001, beating four other cities in the bid to host the games: Osaka, Paris, Toronto and Istanbul. For the past seven years, China has been rapidly preparing for these games, which should serve as a "coming-out" party for a nation that has made great economic progress and prosperity.

In the process, the Beijing Organizing Comittee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG) has built 12 new venues, renovated 11 and built 8 temporary structures for a total of 37 venues that will host 302 events in 28 sports. Approximately 10,500 athletes from over 200 nations will take part in the competition.

Two venues that stand out the most are the Olympic Water Cube (Beijing National Aquatics Centre) and the Bird's Nest (Beijing National Stadium). The two venues will host aquatic and athletic events respectively. I can't really describe why they stand out better than these two pictures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Bird%27s_Nest_stadium%2C_May_2008.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/Beijing_National_Aquatics_Centre_1.jpg

I have never seen an exterior of a sports venue like those two, and they do truly make these Olympic Games unique, architecturally speaking.

Some basics regarding the games itself (just in case, I swear I'm not insulting your intelligence):

• Beijing 2008 will be held over a period of 17 days starting with the opening ceremonies on Friday, August 8 and will end with the closing ceremonies on Sunday, August 24.



• Competition will actually start two days before the opening ceremony on August 6, with preliminaries in the women's football (soccer) tournament.



• Some football games will be held in cities outside of Beijing and the equestrian events will be held in Hong Kong due to quarantine concerns. This will be the second time two separate nations will host Olympic events. The equestrian events were held in Stockholm, Sweden in 1956 while Melbourne, Australia hosted the rest of the Games.



• The modern Olympics began in Athens in 1896. The games during the VI, XII and XIII Olympiads have been cancelled three times to World Wars I and II.



• This will be the first Olympic Games to be broadcast entirely in high definition and expected to reach over 4 billion viewers around the world.



• The official slogan of the games is "One World, One Dream," the logo is entitled "Dancing Beijing" and there will be five mascots, each representing the five colors of the Olympic rings.

Those are just some basic facts that I throughout there. Each day leading up to the Games, I'll focus on one aspect of the upcoming Olympic Games. Tomorrow, for example, we'll look at NBC's coverage of the games as part of out "WHAT UP?! Media" weekly series.

All-Star Game Coming Up in One Week
New York City and Yankee Stadium will be hosting the baseball world next week with the 2008 All-Star Game. It's quite fitting since this is the last year in the history of the old Yankee Stadium before they move into the new Yankee Stadium. This is the first time since 1977 that the game will be held in New York.

The All-Star roster was announced last Sunday and taking a look at the starters, I don't see many surprises. Lots of Yankees and Red Sox players playing together, including Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez, both playing in their 12th All-Star Game. I can say that with how well the Rays are doing, its a little disappointing to see a lack of Tampa Bay players, though I guess the public hasn't gotten to know them yet.

The National League is a little more mixed with the Cubs having several more players in the game than other NL teams. The topic of choice right now seems to be about the Final Vote, where there is one spot left for each team, and five players in contention to capture that final spot, including Jason Giambi who is using his mustache as a campaign slogan to capture the final vote.

We'll talk more about the game as it gets closer to the first pitch. Meanwhile, if you're in New York check out these upcoming events:

• DHL All-Star Fan Fest, starting from Friday, July 11 until Tuesday, July 15 at the Jacob Javitz Center
  


• Taco Bell All-Star Sunday including the XM All-Star Futures Game and the Taco Bell Celebrities and Legends Softball Game


• State Farm Home Run Derby on Monday July 14


• All-Star Game on Tuesday, July 15.

Go to this link for more on the 2008 All-Star Game:

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/events/all_star/y2008/index.jsp


Other Notes:
Rumor has it that the NHL Winter Classic will be heading to the Midwest at legendary Wrigley Field where the Chicago Blackhawks will face the defending Stanley Cup champions Detroit Red Wings.
Check out the details:
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/35684-nhl-news-report-2009-nhl-winter-classic-information-announced



Schumacher wins Time Trial Stage 4 of Le Tour de France

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/sports/sports-cycling-tour.html?_r=1&ref=sports&oref=slogin



And finally, imagine having to play a playoff game only to find out that one of the players is ineligible to play. That was the case in Britain where the Cricket Twenty20 quarterfinal was postponed:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/counties/7492116.stm



And here is this week's PIC OF THE WEEK:


Felipe Trueba/European Pressphoto Agency
Rafael Nadal posing for photographers after his victory over Roger Federer in the men's final at Wimbledon on Sunday.


That's all for now, thanks for reading and come back tomorrow, we'll discuss NBC's Olympic Coverage and hopefully I can cram in something about the Tour de France.

Happy Fourth of July: Baseball, Wimbledon Finals Preview and US Olympic Trials

Happy Independence Day, readers! Today's post is all about the United States of America, namely USA's only hope in Wimbledon (the Williams Sisters), the U.S. Olympic Trials, and America's favorite sport, Baseball.

A Classic Rivalry in the Bronx
Red Sox-Yankees always seems to bring out the best of baseball. This classic rivalry allows us to reacquaint ourselves with the game down to the small details. When it comes to Boston-New York baseball games, we seem to make comparisons everywhere, from the ballpark to the pitching to how players swing the bat. Baseball always has several layers of analysis, which feel the airwaves from the commentary that broadcasters make between plays.

In Thursday's game, the first of four in this series, it was a completely one-sided affair. The Yankees were "embarrassed" as Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester pitched a five-hitter, his best outing since his no-hitter against the Royals back in May. Andy Pettite gave up seven runs while the Yanks failed to score any and team manager Joe Giraldi held a 30-minute closed-doors meeting.
You can only wonder what Giraldi's feelings were after the game. Most likely, his feelings were the same as the Yankees fans that were at the stadium last night.

Nothing much to say other than the Yankees played a flat game, for more information on last night's game, the NY Daily News has you covered:
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/yankees/2008/07/03/2008-07-03_jon_lester_throws_complete_game_yankees_.html

So we move on to today, and as I'm writing this, the Yanks are tied with the Red Sox at 3 runs a piece. So far the most memorable part of the game was how that ball stayed on top of the wall after Johnny Damon ran after it. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go check out sportscenter or MLB.com. I'm sure video will be online soon. It's a play that is sort of hard to type out in words.

Anyway, aside from yesterday's game, surely there will be some fireworks between these two teams as the series plays out. Although the Yankees have been struggling this season, there are some pretty tight matchups between the two teams, especially offensively with the two teams having similar batting averages and on-base percentages. The Yankees have been on the losing end though since they've been allowing more runs that they should have (overall 4.22 ERA).

So enjoy baseball, especially this weekend, it only seems right to accompany your beer and hot dogs with a good American game.

Willams Sisters To Collide At Ladies' Final
There will be an American champion this summer across the pond at Wimbledon. Both Williams sisters won their semifinal matches yesterday in straight sets. Venus defeated fifth seeded Elena Dementieva while Serena defeated Chinese player and wild card Jie Zheng. Both fought tiebreakers in the second set before winning their match.

Before I move on, I just want to credit Jie Zheng for her play in yesterday's semifinal. Zheng made the match interesting, especially in the second set when she held serve. I can't help but saying that her presence in the semifinal and the story surrounding her was a nice feel-good story for the tournament. Chinese players are rarely seen as successful singles athletes on the tour and considering that she was a wild-card who wrote her way into the tournament, and that she came from the region hit hard by the Chinese earthquake earlier in the year, she's the type of athlete that tends to captivate audiences. And with China hosting the Olympics in a month, she is certainly one to watch at the Olympics. You can bet your dumplings that the Chinese will root for her heavily.

But it will be an all-American final featuring the Williams sisters. Venus is looking for her fifth title while her sister Serena is looking for her third. Venus is the defending champion and I'd like to say that she has the edge over her sister only because she had to face Elena Dementieva in the semifinals while Serena has faced relatively little competition except Mauresmo and Zheng. Both only faced one seeded-player in their road to the final. Honestly, I think that tomorrow's match should be close. If Serena wins, it should be because she is a little more fit and healthy than Venus, given that Venus has had some minor problems with her hamstring.

The Williams sisters will also be playing in the ladies' doubles final after their semifinal win earlier today. And it will be a Roger Federer vs. Rafael Nadal final again on Sunday. For more, log onto http://www.wimbledon.org/en_GB/index.html.

UPSETS HEADLINE OLYMPIC TRIALS
There were surprises both at the track and at the pool. In Omaha, Nebraska, Brendan Hansen, two-time world champion in the 200m breaststroke and bronze medalist in that event in Athens, will not represent Team USA in the 200m Breaststroke Event in Beijing. He shockingly finished fourth at the trials, though he will still go to Beijing and participate in the 100m Breaststroke.



It's the drama of the trials that make them very exciting to watch. It doesn't matter how many medals you won in the past or how successful you are in the event. If you can't be a top finisher in the trials, you can't go to the Olympics. It's kinda cruel, but somewhat fair. If anything, I wish NBC devoted more time to them though I am happy with the coverage that we're getting now on cable and online.

Meanwhile, in Eugene, Oregon, Jeremy Wariner, the world's top runner in the 400 meters, lost to LeShawn Merritt at the U.S. Olympic Trials. Though he still will go to Beijing, it was shocking to see one of the best 400m runners, who usually dominates his races, place second. Yesterday's race showed that Wariner may be losing his edge and needs to train a little harder to overcome runners who might be ahead of him. Usually, Wariner has the lead off of the last turn and just kicks his way away from the rest of the field. But yesterday's race was unique in that Wariner was in a position that we rarely see him in.

Here was Wariner after the 400m Final, thanks to Letsrundotcom:


But Wariner does move on to Beijing and if anything, the fans of track and field win because we get to see a little bit of a rivalry in Beijing between Wariner and Merritt.

TOMORROW...
So enjoy the fireworks, both on the field, on the track, the court and the pool. Oh yeah, and in the air too. Have a great Fourth of July and hope you'll comeback tomorrow, when we'll talk more baseball, tennis and Olympic trials.