NERDS AROUND TOWN
Nerds Around Town: More Sharks, concrete in sewers and Jon Stewart
Jun 12, 2019, 6:47 am
Art by Jesus Rodriguez
Born with a comic book in one hand and a remote control in the other, Cory DLG is the talent of Conroe's very own Nerd Thug Radio, Sports and Wrestling. Check out the podcast replay of the FM radio show at www.nerdthugradio.com!
Hey Nerds!
It's Wednesday and I just realized, we can do this, let's attack this week like a wild animal.
GOOD DEED OF THE DAY
Father's Day is this weekend. Family can be a confusing thing, with ups and downs and twists and turns and sometimes you're mad at someone and sometimes you're not. Sometimes it's just been too long and now you're not talking to the person you meant to. Family can be confusing, but it's family and there's nothing like it. Some people can't be with their loved ones for various reasons and some people will never be with their loved ones, so if you see your family or if you can see your family, then go see your family. Tell your Dad happy Father's Day. #NerdsUnite
ARE WE DONE YET?
So I'm a huge nerd, I love me some pop culture. Seriously, I love all things nerdy. I love a great movie about wizards or super heroes or dinosaurs or robots or super heroes, I don't care, love it all. Can I tell you what I don't like though? Fan Theories. Some of them are neat and all, and sometimes one comes out that's really fun, but most of the time they are just such silly nonsense. There's one going around about Endgame where the reason Strange doesn't say if this is the right time line or not is because he knows if he says something they'll lose. No Duh. If Tony knows they might win he'll keep waiting for something to happen and he won't be able to stop Thanos in time. This didn't need to be said, this isn't even a fan theory, it's implied by them winning. There isn't any need to then say, he couldn't tell him or it wouldn't happen. OBVIOUSLY. Tony you die but we win, oh wait, now you don't die and we lose… oops. Seriously? That's a fan theory? Are you sure that isn't just a fan watching the movie? Come on.
ANOTHER SHARK MOVIE
So apparently they're making a sequel to 47 Meters Down. Because the world demanded it? No honestly I think it was a relatively cheap movie to make (around $5 million) and brought in good money (making over $62 million), which is every movie's goal. Mandy Moore is enjoying a great moment thanks to This Is Us and the movie was wisely marketed just enough to get on people's radars and it made everyone a good payday. This second movie features more angry sharks and hot girls in bathing suits, this time they find a sunken city and begin exploring it and find a shark in it with them. That's kind of a cool idea except for the whole, a shark has to eat a lot of food, ssssooo what was it eating first? Anyway, marine biologists tell you that sharks are good and people are their friends and they don't eat people but my eyes say, they'd eat me if they could.
Seriously?
File this one under, "stupid" but London is having to ask people to not pour concrete down sewage pipes. There is currently a blockage the weight of a blue whale and a football field in length deep in the Victorian era portion of the sewers that is made of concrete. Apparently people regularly pour concrete down their drains? I'm not sure what the logic of that is, but there it goes. Deep down the waste hole and no one ever finds it again, oh wait. Yes they definitely do. It's going to take months to chip away at this thing and will require trucks to constantly pump away the raw waste so as to not drown the workers. What exactly was the thought process with people on this one? They literally just poured concrete down the drains, I honestly don't know what to make of that.
NOT THAT YOU ASKED
Jon Stewart's moment on Capitol Hill yesterday was beautiful and amazing and no one in congress saw it. Five of the 14 members of the House Judiciary subcommittee were there for the speech, the rest couldn't be bothered to listen to him speak up on behalf of 9/11 first responders. 9/11, remember "Never Forget", remember how patriotic everyone got? Remember how everyone hugs flags and respects soldiers and everything we all do is patriotic? How dare that quarterback take a knee! This is service, this is patriotism, there was no lower moment in recent American history and yet only 5 of the 14 members of the House Judiciary Subcommittee saw fit to be there for the first responders. FIVE. That's a shame, Houston's Sheila Jackson Lee was one of the members who skipped as well as Veronica Escobar, Sylvia Garcia and Louie Gohmert all while representing Texas, that's a shame.
I'm going to jump out and wish you guys a great Wednesday and remind everyone to be kind to each other and try a little harder to have a great day! I'm coming back Thursday and we'll be bringing more good times your way. Feel free to check out my digital short story The Wilson House or buy a shirt from Side Hustle Ts where some proceeds help fight cancer or listen to Nerd Thug Radio. Thoughts, complaints, events and comments can be sent to corydlg@gmail.com.
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They’ll be watching in Canada, not just because of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, though the NBA’s scoring champion and MVP favorite who plays for Oklahoma City surely helps lure in fans who are north of the border.
They’ll be watching from Serbia and Greece, the homelands of Denver star Nikola Jokic and Milwaukee star Giannis Antetokounmpo. Alperen Sengun will have them watching Houston games in the middle of the night in Turkey, too. Slovenian fans will be watching Luka Doncic and the Lakers play their playoff opener at 2:30 a.m. Sunday, 5:30 p.m. Saturday in Los Angeles. Fans in Cameroon will be tuned in to see Pascal Siakam and the Indiana Pacers. Defending champion Boston features, among others, Kristaps Porzingis of Latvia and Al Horford of the Dominican Republic.
Once again, the NBA playoffs are setting up to be a showcase for international stars.
In a season where the five statistical champions were from five different countries, an NBA first — Gilgeous-Alexander is Canadian, rebounding champion Domantas Sabonis of Sacramento is from Lithuania, blocked shots champion Victor Wembanyama of San Antonio is from France, steals champion Dyson Daniels of Atlanta is from Australia, and assists champion Trae Young of the Hawks is from the U.S. — the postseason will have plenty of international feel as well. Gilgeous-Alexander is in, while Sabonis and Daniels (along with Young, obviously) could join him if their teams get through the play-in tournament.
“We have a tremendous number of international players in this league,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this season. “It’s roughly 30% of our players representing, at least on opening day, 43 different countries, so there’s much more of a global sense around our teams.”
By the end of the season, it wound up being 44 different countries — at least in terms of countries where players who scored in the NBA this season were born. For the first time in NBA history, players from one country other than the U.S. combined to score more than 15,000 points; Canadian players scored 15,588 this season, led by Gilgeous-Alexander, the first scoring champion from that country.
Gilgeous-Alexander is favored to be MVP this season. It'll be either him or Jokic, which means it'll be a seventh consecutive year with an international MVP for the NBA. Antetokounmpo won twice, then Jokic won three of the next four, with Cameroon-born Joel Embiid of the Philadelphia 76ers winning two seasons ago.
“Shai is in the category of you do not stop him,” Toronto coach Darko Rajakovic said after a game between the Raptors and Thunder this season.
In other words, he's like a lot of other international guys now. Nobody truly stops Jokic, Antetokounmpo and Doncic either.
And this season brought another international first: Doncic finished atop the NBA's most popular jersey list, meaning NBAStore.com sold more of his jerseys than they did anyone else's. Sure, that was bolstered by Doncic changing jerseys midseason when he was traded by Dallas to the Los Angeles Lakers, but it still is significant.
The Slovenian star is the first international player to finish atop the most popular jerseys list — and the first player other than Stephen Curry or LeBron James to hold that spot in more than a decade, since soon-to-be-enshrined Basketball Hall of Famer Carmelo Anthony did it when he was with New York in 2012-13.
“We’re so small, we have 2 million people. But really, our sport is amazing,” fellow Slovene Ajsa Sivka said when she was drafted by the WNBA's Chicago Sky on Monday night and asked about Doncic and other top Slovenian athletes. “No matter what sport, we have at least someone that’s great in it. I’m just really proud to be Slovenian.”
All this comes at a time where the NBA is more serious than perhaps ever before about growing its international footprint. Last month, FIBA — the sport's international governing body — and the NBA announced a plan to partner on a new European basketball league that has been taking shape for many years. The initial target calls for a 16-team league and it potentially could involve many of the biggest franchise names in Europe, such as Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City.
It was a season where four players topped 2,000 points in the NBA and three of them were international with Gilgeous-Alexander, Jokic and Antetokounmpo. Globally, time spent watching NBA League Pass was up 6% over last season. More people watched NBA games in France this season than ever before, even with Wembanyama missing the final two months. NBA-related social media views in Canada this season set records, and league metrics show more fans than ever were watching in the Asia-Pacific region — already a basketball hotbed — as well.
FIBA secretary general Andreas Zagklis said the numbers — which are clearly being fueled by the continued international growth — suggest the game is very strong right now.
“Looking around the world, and of course here in North America," Zagklis said, "the NBA is most popular and more commercially successful than ever.”