19 ways for soccer to become more popular in the U.S.

Soccer has had major trouble gaining traction as a spectator sport here in the United States. I'm not sure why. I mean who doesn't love a non-contact sport with scores around 2-1 and 1-0 where fans internationally tend to maim one other, as well as the police? Since I'm nothing if not helpful to those people in need of some assistance, I came up with 20 19 ways for soccer to get a stronger foothold in the consciousness of the American sporting public.

20. Find the most glamorous and famous soccer player in the world and contract with him to play soccer for an MLS team.

19. This one's easy. Fix it's international image by having it's fans stop stabbing, killing and rioting.

18. If you just can't pull that off, then just let people bring whatever weapon they want into the stadium. It'd make for great TV.

17. Let these guys do game analysis.



16. Change the name of the game to Human Foosball.

15. Don't EVER let this happen again... EVER...



14. Don't let this guy ever coach professional soccer again.



13. Hire these guys (or these guys) to handle all injuries.



12. Require all female soccer goals to be celebrated in this fashion.

11. Put the players in pads and helmets and let them hit and tackle each other.

10. Make Bianca Gascoigne the official spokesperson of soccer. Either her or Amanda Cicchini.

9. Hot female refs.

8. Even better... naked hot female referees.

7. If male referees are still allowed, let players hit them in the rocks when they disagree with them.



6. Score goals this fast every game.



5. More Ines Sainz.

4. Female streakers on the pitch every game.



6. Sign the homeless to play games.

5. Play the games, but just show the WAGs on TV.

4. Female soccer players in bikinis (or short skirts or bodypaint).



3. Even better.... topless female soccer players.



2. And a few more topless female soccer players wouldn't hurt.



1. Aw, hell, why stop there. Nekkid female soccer players would be the bomb.

If soccer follows these 19 suggestions, I have no doubt that withing a few short months, American sports fans will be tuning in to their matches and flocking to their stadiums in droves. Either that or just strap some binoculars on all the players. Glad I could help.

Top 10 most gruesome pro wrestling injuries

Not really sure what possessed me to do this post. I think that maybe it was the fact that I was talking to my wrestling guy over at Epic Carnival about WrestleMania and Floyd Mayweather and I got to wondering what would happen if "Money" got hurt during one of the skits. Anyway, I did some looking around and came up with some really nasty stuff from various pro wrestling outfits. Warning: some of these are realllly hard to watch... Enjoy!

Wow. This was not done well at all...


Brock Lesnar about kills someone...


Why Brock Lesnar doesn't wrestle anymore. Broken neck anyone?


At least he hurt himself as well...


Speaking of hurting yourself... Hayabusa!


Remember Chris Benoit? Before he murdered, he broke necks...


Randy Savage, obviously high on something to do this...


Speaking of having to be high to do something...


Dude reportedly broke his neck with this one... awful to watch...


And probably the most gruesome one of all... Psycho Sid... oh my...


So were you able to stomach them all in one sitting? If you did, wow... you have a cast-iron stomach.

Just goes to show you that no matter how staged something is, there can be nasty consequences. Good luck, Floyd!

And I know there were plenty of ECW, XPW, backyard wrestling and the like I could have shown, but I tried my best to stay away from the gimmick matches and stick with more flukey injuries rather than staged acts of insanity, in case you were curious.

UPDATE: Okay, I had to add one more... it pays to come back to on205th.com!!



Big ups to the handsome John Barbera, who was responsible for most of these clips.

Top 10: Baseball Oddities

Gepetto here.

With baseball season right around the corner, I thought it would be good to take a look at some of the stranger moments in the game. We're all used to seeing the Cubs choke, the Devil Rays lose, or the Toronto Blue Jays cry about their division placement. Let's look at some of the unexpected, shall we?

#10

Pay attention!

#9

Bunting for a triple? Only the Cubs.

#8.

If you're going to charge the mound, you had better make sure the catcher can't stop you.

#7.

People still care in AA, and apparently also smoke crack. Bonus points for the rosin grenade.

#6.

Who uses an eephus pitch? Bonus: He gets the K.

#5.

Being outside of America only means the Red Sox will overpay for this guy.

#4.

Throwing the ball back at the batters' head? OK.

#3.

I'm not much of a physics guy, but I'm pretty sure rounded objects don't do that.

#2.

Losing in a college game? Try this!

#1.

Randy Johnson winds up, and detonates a bird with his fastball. Easily the strangest thing...ever.

Top five NFL offseason moves that would be nigh

Nigh. It essentially means nice. Well, actually, it does mean "nice". Anywho, you can look that up for yourself. And because this place has been dripping with lesbian goo for the past few days, I thought I'd at least lob some sports action your way. Not that lesbian goo isn't cool. With that in mind, the top five free agent signings I would like to see this offseason, but that probably have no chance of happening.

5. Daunte Culpepper to the Vikings - Someone has to tutor Tavaris Jackson, right? And why not a player in the same mold as Jackson, except overrated and washed up? And by "tutor" I do in fact mean "teach how to wield a double ended dildo on the open ocean."

4. David Carr to HellBaltimore - Oh, nevermind. Brian Billick's gone. Hell will suffice then. Dood cost me a lot of time and pride last year.

3. Boss Bailey to the Broncos - Bailey and Bailey is the new Gumbel and Gumbel. Only much less white.

2. Asante Samuel to the Giants - Because f*ck Bill Belichick, that's why. And I enjoy irony.

1. Randy Moss to the Carolina Panthers - Actually, this one has a "decent" chance of happening. And by "decent I mean "double ended"...er, "one in five million".

The 20 greatest TV show intros of all-time

You know how some TV shows have opening credits that are so cool they might actually be better than the show itself? Or how some shows have songs that really set the show up and get you fired up to watch it? There have been many classic TV show openings and lots of memorable theme songs, but I got to wondering, what was/is the coolest opening montage/intro theme ever done for a TV show? I searched around the Net and did some jogging of my memory and came up with 20 I think you'll like (10 are under honorable mention).

Feel free to argue with my choices or the order in which they appear, but one thing you can't argue is just how awesome these openings were. Discuss which one was your favorite and please don't hesitate to mention any show opening you think I omitted in the comments section below.

10. Get Smart: For sheer the coolness of it, this opening was hard to beat.


9. The Incredible Hulk: One of the best opening lines ever.


8. Hawaii Five-O: The music, the waves, the scenes, awesome.


7. Miami Vice: Jan Hammer was the master of the theme song.


6. Batman: Man, I used to sit each day and pray that the Batgirl character would show up in the opening credits.


5. Cheers: Yes, I want to be where everybody knows my name.


4. The Sopranos: Possibly the best opening song for a TV show ever.


3. Spider-man: This made me wish I had Spidey senses.


2. The NBA on NBC: I had a hard time making this #2. A real hard time.


1. The Six Million Dollar Man: Was there ever a cooler opening montage? The crashing spaceship, the classic quotes. This was truly a masterpiece. Steve Austin (the Bionic Man, not the wrestler) was the man.


Honorable mention: Sanford & Son, The Addams Family, Speed Racer, COPS, The Jeffersons, Baywatch, G.I. Joe, Welcome Back Kotter, Knight Rider, and Underdog.

The 22 Worst Dunks Ever*

(* At least of those that appear somewhere on the Internet.)

In honor of the NBA Slam Dunk Contest's revival thanks to Dwight Howard and Gerald Green, let's have a look at what the Bizarro Dunk Contest would look like. I proudly present the dunks that would have scored a perfect 0. (Magic, however, would have have still talked for 45 minutes about each one of them, with 98% of what he said being unintelligible, while Darryl Dawkins, despite no logical reason for doing so, would still have given them all 9's.)

13. Travis Outlaw with the airball dunk!


12. Tony Parker for the ... guh!


11. Qyntel Woods three-sixtyyyyy... no, not you.


10. Bonus points for almost being killed.


9. And even more bonus points.


8. Throw it down, big man!


7. Face off the glass!


6. Props are fun!


5. Dunk over... er, into... a pretty girl!


4. Kid dunks... his leg?


3. Head off the rim!?


2. Big air!


1. Dunk off a chair!


Honorable Mention: Julian Wright, LeBron James, Some white dude, Adonal Foyle, Brandon Griffin, In the snow, Some kid on a ramp, Yet another white dude, and finally, Ricky Davis.

And boom goes the dynamite.

The 50 Hottest Women of Sports

Recently PopCrunch compiled what they feel is the definitive list of the hottest women in sports. This list is quite similar to another one we discussed a while back done by CO-ED Magazine. As we did with that list, we'll take a look at who PopCrunch put on their list and where.

50. Daniela Hantuchová: WAY too low on the list.

40. Danica Patrick: I like her, but this is probably about right.

38. Francesca Piccinini: An Italian volleyball player with a nice rack.

29. Michelle Wie: No. No. No.

28. Posh Spice: ???

25. Milene Domingues: Ronaldo's ex-wife, a good soccer player, babe.

24. Laure Manaudou: Wanna see her naked?

23. Stacy Keibler: Hot, but barely qualifies in my book.

18. Anna Rawson: I told you how I feel here.

17. Kristina Lum: Synchronized swimming is awesome.

12. Niki Gudex: Pro mountain biker babe.

9. Amanda Beard: Too high on the list.

3. Allison Stokke: Way too high.

2. Bia e Branca: Twin synchronized swimmers! Should be #1.

1. Anna Kournikova: What sport does she play again?

While I must beg to differ with players' significant others being included, overall, it is a tremendous collection of tuna and well worth a visit.

Top 25 Sexiest Female Athletes of 2007

CO-ED Magazine recently published a list of who they considered the top 25 sexiest female athletes of 2007. I can’t say as I agree with all of them, but here’s my pick: Anna Rawson (#25 on their list. Huh?). She may or may not be worth a shit as a golfer, but who cares? Actually she’s pretty decent as a golfer too, I guess.

Among the others they had on their list were Amanda Beard, Ashley Force, Maria Kirilenko, Natalie Gulbis, Anna Kournikova, Maria Sharapova, and Allison Stokke.