… At 6-foot-8, Parker is a rare combination of size and smooth scoring ability. The Milwaukee Bucks had drafted him to be part of their frontcourt of the future, pairing him alongside an athletic-yet-raw specimen who had began a late journey to organized basketball — in Greece — by the name of Giannis Antetokounmpo.
The Bucks have rarely tasted the postseason in recent years but the duo of Parker and Antetokounmpo wasn’t meant for instant success, nor was the hiring of former All-Star player Jason Kidd as the team’s head coach. Rather, these were moves based on a long-term vision made clearer by seemingly limitless potential.
But there are some sounds you can’t forget, and the pop of ligaments contorting unnaturally is one of them. Just 25 games into his rookie season, Parker’s attempt to help realize that potential was torn apart by an ACL injury. Milwaukee’s dreams of a bright future would have to be put on hold or, worse, permanently dashed..
… This pre-draft period is definitely going to be difficult. I’m going to try my best not to read all the tabloids or hear all the naysayers. I’m going to try to focus on me. I know I’m going to get completely pooped on this entire process, so I’m going to try my best not to let it get in my head.
I hate that they put so much weight on height, weight and 40. That doesn’t make a good football player. The fact that they put so much money on that blows my mind. I want to make the most of this opportunity and do the best I can do, but I know at the end of the day I’m a football player. I’m not going to measure 6′ 3″ and weigh 245 and run a 4.4-second 40-yard dash. That’s not who God intended me to be. Those aren’t the blessings He placed on my life. He blessed me in other areas, like the drive to go to work every day. People watching my tape is where I’ll make a lot of my money. I’m proud to say that. I’d much rather be the guy who is a good football player who doesn’t run a 4.4 than be the guy who is 6′ 4″ and runs a 4.3 and sucks at football.
… One of the enduring allures of the build-up to the NFL draft comes from the emergence of players like Kpassagnon, a small-school wonder who suddenly captures the attention of the draft community. His presence isn’t a surprise to the men who spend 12 months a year scouring the country for prospects, as all 32 teams went through Villanova to study him this year.
But if there was a moment when a darling of the scouting community went mainstream, it happened at the Senior Bowl’s official weigh-in. During the awkward annual exercise, players are trotted out shirtless and wearing tights in front of executives. Kpassagnon has just 4% body fat, and his abs appear to have abs. So when he appeared before the masses, multiple NFL personnel men reported an audible gasp amid the crowd.
Runner's World, Sweat Science blog, Alex Hutchinson from
When Nike announced last month that three of its athletes would seek to run a sub-two-hour marathon this spring, the image that leapt to mind for many people—me included—was of a giant science experiment. But not all science takes place in the lab.
This week, the Breaking2 team is in Kaptagat, Kenya, where Olympic champion Eliud Kipchoge is training for the sub-two attempt. Next week, they’ll head to Ethiopia to work with two-time Boston champion Lelisa Desisa; then they’ll continue to Madrid, where half marathon world record-holder Zersenay Tadese is currently training.
The goal of the trip is, in part, scientific. Each athlete has been training with a GPS watch and a heart-rate monitor, and uploading their data nightly for analysis by the Nike’s NXT Generation Research team. The researchers will meet with the athletes and their coaches to share their insights. Apparel, shoe, and biomechanics experts are also on the trip, with enough prototypes to fill a matatu.
… Arena, who is now 65, helped turn raw college talents such as Omar Gonzalez and Gyasi Zardes into international regulars during his time in L.A. In 2009, Arena persuaded Gregg Berhalter to join him with the Galaxy. Berhalter, a former U.S. defender and current Columbus Crew coach, mentored Gonzalez.
Berhalter doesn’t believe Arena will overlook deserving, young talent.
“His intensity hasn’t wavered at all,” Berhalter said. “He still knows how to motivate young players. His strength is getting players to perform. That’s clear. He still has that, definitely. He gives young players trust. He gives them backing. And he’s not afraid to put them on the field. Sometimes coaches hesitate to play young players, but Bruce has never done that.”
Mark Dantonio isn’t making excuses for Michigan State’s 3-9 season this year. He knows he can’t.
Two weeks ago, Dantonio was part of a coaches panel at the AFCA Convention in Nashville, and the topic was discipline. Near the end of the presentation, Dantonio got blunt.
“The worst thing you can say to any coach is that you have an undisciplined football team, and there is no accountability,” he said. “We’re all tying to strive for that.”
The All-Star goaltender for Phoenix knew other teams were playing while he and the rest of the Coyotes were enjoying a week off. He filled his time by sledding with his kids and not doing too much of anything.
“It’s been great,” Smith said. “I’ve got to spend some quality time with my family, my kids. Nothing crazy, pretty chilled and pretty relaxed.”
A five-day bye week for each team is a new wrinkle added to the NHL this season so players can get a breather during the second half of a grueling, 82-game grind. The players’ union negotiated for it last year in exchange for agreeing to the 3-on-3 tournament that replaced the traditional All-Star Game.
In some circles, Ben Hogan is credited with “inventing practice.”
Hogan was one of the greatest golfers of the 20th century, an accomplishment he achieved through tireless repetition. He simply loved to practice. Hogan said, “I couldn’t wait to get up in the morning so I could hit balls. I’d be at the practice tee at the crack of dawn, hit balls for a few hours, then take a break and get right back to it.”
For Hogan, every practice session had a purpose. He reportedly spent years breaking down each phase of the golf swing and testing new methods for each segment. The result was near perfection. He developed one of the most finely-tuned golf swings in the history of the game.
There is a widely believed myth that human error causes some 90% of car accidents. Ninety percent of all accidents are blamed on human error. That is not the same as caused by people.
The real cause of most accidents is an engineering mentality that favors automating whatever we can and leaving people to fill in the gaps. This forces people to behave according to the machine’s needs and on its terms: Things people are bad at. And when people are asked to do things they are bad at, they do them badly, which leads to accidents.
One frequent cause of difficulty is distraction, as if distractibility were a human failure. It isn’t. It’s a design problem. People are not distractible: We are curious and attentive to changes. These are positive virtues for living in a world filled with uncertainty, novelty, and unexpected events. They lead to clever insights, creativity, as well as resilience in the face of unexpected events. But these very virtues are labelled as undesirable when they take place in an environment where people are forced to pay attention to dull, tedious environments for long periods, forced to be continually attentive, and highly precise with repetitive activities, things people are known to do poorly. It’s time to reset the entire framework for how we construct technology.
Sports Medicine Research: In the Lab & In the Field from
The Australian Institute of Sport and Australian Medical Association collaborated to release a position statement on concussion in sport. The document reviews what a concussion is, how to recognize a concussion, medical assessment of concussion, modifying factors, managing concussion, long-term consequences, and education. The authors also provide a list of key points for coaches, parents, and athletes as well as a list for medical practitioners – with a special emphasis on “If in doubt, sit them out.” The statement is accompanied by an overview of the literature, other concussion resources, and a list of concussion research priorities.
The NCAA Sport Science Institute and leading scientific and sports medicine organizations have developed best practices for athletics departments and sports medicine staff to use as they implement concussion diagnosis and management practices on their campuses. The best practices serve as an update from 2014 guidance and include additional recommendations for the management of return to activity following a concussion.
The NFL has been criticized both for the amount of money it has donated for head trauma research and trying to manipulate how it is spent.
But at least it has donated.
The NHL has not given money to any of the four centers leading research into neurodegenerative diseases, specifically the question of why so many football and hockey players develop chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), USA TODAY Sports has found. Boston University, North Carolina, the National Institutes of Health and the University of Western Ontario all were asked for details about which sports organizations have helped fund their research, and the NHL was not mentioned in any of their responses.
Leaders of the NFL Players Association are preparing a proposal that would amend the sport’s drug policies to take a “less punitive” approach to dealing with recreational marijuana use by players, according to the union’s executive director, DeMaurice Smith.
The proposal will be presented to union’s board of player representatives, Smith said Tuesday. If it is approved by those players, Smith said, the proposal will be made to the league. The NFL would have to agree to any changes to the drug policy, which is negotiated and jointly administered by the league and players’ union.
The proposal to modify the manner in which the league deals with recreational marijuana use would, if it is delivered, come as the NFLPA’s recently formed pain management committee separately studies the issue of marijuana use by players as a pain management tool and whether that should be permissible under the drug policies.
It is the first time that drugs have been found to improve chess performance under rigorous scientific conditions. The results of the ground-breaking study have been published in a leading scientific journal.
The growth of sports analytics has made professional teams more and more reliant on proprietary data and algorithms, which are only valuable so long as they remain unknown to competitors. Teams are, however, relatively poorly equipped to protect these secrets. This chapter reviews five options available to teams looking to protect their secret information: league rules and norms, nondisclosure and noncompete agreements, trade-secrecy law, criminal law, and information-security efforts. None of the legal options are perfect, since breaches can be difficult to detect and legal remedies expose teams to unwanted publicity and risks of further breaches. Teams, then, should focus their efforts on building robust security systems to prevent problems from arising in the first place. The chapter concludes by discussing trends that are likely to increase the importance of information security in professional sports.