* Not talking about a person, though Donald Sterling might qualify. A friendly discussion/argument you can have nearly anywhere in the world? Which is the world’s No. 2 sport? Soccer is No. 1. The end. But what is No. 2? I am beginning to think it is basketball, which is played, to some extent, almost […]

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Diana Taurasi likely is the best player in the history of women’s basketball. And what does it say about U.S. women’s basketball when that best player, an American, will not play in the States this year? Taurasi is playing in Russia, at the moment, and when the season there is over, she will take time […]

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This comes up every four years. Or every four years after the U.S. national team has, at least, made the second round of a World Cup. Like this time around. “Is soccer about to make a breakthrough in the U.S.?” Will it be mentioned in the same breath as football and baseball and basketball? Or […]

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The United Arab Emirates didn’t come within a country mile of qualifying for Brazil 2014. For practical purposes, the UAE’s qualifying run in the Asian Football Confederation ended in late 2011, back when I was covering the team for The National. A home loss to Kuwait and then a road loss to Lebanon, which is […]

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A few days back I posted an entry about how I doubt I will be able to cheer for the U.S. national team at the coming World Cup, because I have developed an animus towards Jurgen Klinsmann, the coach who dumped Landon Donovan. That provoked some reaction, some of it more than a bit tart. “We don’t […]

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So, turns out I can feel this sense of “we shall never pass this way again” even at an Olympics I did not cover. I did 13 of these from start to finish, and I guarantee that nearly every journalist at an Olympics reaches a point, usually no later than the middle Sunday, when he […]

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So, the controversy over the women’s figure skating competition in Sochi. Korea’s Kim Yu-na, jobbed by the judges. Or was she? Maybe the Russian girl, Adelina Sotnikova, deserved the gold. The decision seems to have pivoted on this: Sotnikova performed the more athletic routine, with more jumps. Kim performed the safer routine, but also the […]

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Back to Opening Ceremonies, yesterday. In the final 10 minutes of the show, when famous Russian Olympians were handling the torch … the two most prominent guys out there saw their Olympic careers marred by defeats to … Americans. It made me smile. To wit:

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Well, OK. Make it a 9.8. That fifth snowflake didn’t bloom into a ring, early in the show. Mechanical malfunction of some sort. But otherwise, the Russians did well tonight with Opening Ceremonies for the 2014 Winter Olympics. Which came as a bit of a surprise, given the battering (see @Sochiproblems) Sochi 2014 had taken […]

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This is a big deal for Dubai and the UAE — winning a vote to stage the 2020 World Expo. No event of this magnitude has been awarded to the city or the country. So that would explain the thousands of people in the streets of Dubai, celebrating.

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