President Bush to Appear on Deal or No Deal

President Bush appearing on NBC’s ‘Deal’. This is a meta moment. Two years ago Paul Weitz directed a farce called American Dreamz which had an unpopular Bush-like president appearing on a reality show to boost his image. Dreamz was a good idea for a staire, but didn’t quite have the guts to be as dark and truthful as Network. Still the fact that Bush has time to make appearances here and at the Nationals game earlier this month makes me think he’s more focused on waiting out the last months in office.

How to Train Like an Olympic Runner

NY Times: Changing Speeds to Go the Distance. Take that Bob Costas. Instead of the clichéd triumph-over-tragedy stories, the Times is writing about the mechanics of training. Today in text, graphics, and video they showed what a typical workout routine is for runner Sara Hall with tips for the non-Olympic runner.

Update: Since this is becoming a popular post, here’s a search listing on the NY Times’ site with all their sport profiles including swimming, cycling, and beach volleyball training.

Professional Athletes Pay Taxes in Every State They Play In

Jock tax: Competing in multiple states means more complex filings. The state of California apparently makes $100 million in taxes from visiting athletes. Typically I’m not to sympathetic about the tax burden of multi-millionaires, but this gets pretty ridiculous. I guess everyone wants to get a piece of the A-Rod deal. (source: TrueHoop)

Patriots 19-0 Super Bowl Gear Goes to Third World

NFL Gear Not Going To Waste. I’ve always wondered what happens to the losing team’s shirts and hats in the Super Bowl and other championship events. Apparently the Pats stuff went to a hurricane-torn region of Nicaragua, where it was worn by a girls soccer team that went on to win their championship. Kind of poetic.

Kid One of 2 Pick a Perfect Sweet 16 on ESPN.com

Johnny Gilbert’s Perfect Sweet 16. Some 3.5 million people submitted brackets on ESPN.com’s Tourney Challenge game and after this weekend’s upsets only 2 had all the sweet 16 finalists (nobody has a perfect one). One of them was this young boy, Johnny Gilbert, a Ohio State fan who says he got all his picks from reading the morning paper and reading up online. Way to go!