The scary "Sopranos" mobster showed up in Beijing, cunningly disguised as an American pole-vault coach.
Paulie Walnuts has been located! You may have thought that the scary, anxiety-attack-prone mobster had disappeared forever when “The Sopranos” went off the air. But he showed up last night in Beijing, cleverly disguised as U.S. pole vaulter Jennifer Stuczynski’s coach, Rick Suhr. And after his cameo appearance last night on NBC’s prime-time broadcast, it ain’t just the FBI who’s going to be gunning for Walnuts, I mean Suhr. Suhr’s post-meet chat with Stuczynski may represent the most unempathetic debriefing since Achilles stripped Hector naked and dragged him around the walls of Troy.
All Stuczynski had done was win the silver medal against one of the greatest and most dominant female athletes in the world, Russia’s Yelena Isinbayeva. NBC barely showed the pole vault competition at all, which was a bummer, since the final in Athens was one of the greatest track and field showdowns I’ve ever seen. If it hadn’t been for Isinbayeva, you wonder if they would even have given it as much play as they did. Recognizing a babalicious Slavic long-stick-wielder when they see one, NBC gave the glamour-puss Isinbayeva a few minutes of soft-feature time, during which she basically said, “Hollywood, come get my hot Russian ass!” Anyway, Isinbayeva won the gold for the second Olympics in a row, and set another world record, which she can apparently do at will. No one is even in her league. Which means that if you’re a woman pole vaulter, winning silver is the most you can realistically hope to do.
So you’d think that Suhr would have had a few celebratory words for his charge, a pat on the back, a little smooch. But no.
The camera focused in on Suhr, in the stands, lecturing Stuczynski, who was a few feet away on the track. As we roll the transcript, visualize a kind of meat-faced, Dan White-looking guy with a New Yawk accent who never smiles.
“It’s the same old same old. You’re losing takeoff at the big heights. What are you gonna do? You gotta learn to keep takeoff. You got caught at that meat grinder. I did not — and I told 10 people — I did not want to be caught in that meat grinder between 65 and 80. You had to though. You weren’t on, you know, your warmups didn’t go well, you went 55, you got caught up in that meat grinder. What are you gonna do. [shrugs] What are you gonna do. [looks off to the side] You didn’t have the legs. Her legs are fresh. Hey, it’s a silver medal though. Not bad for someone who’s been pole vaulting for four years.” [No smile. Looks down at his BlackBerry. Stuczynski walks away.]
Ah yes, that venerable “beatings will continue until morale improves” school of communication. But what are you gonna do.
Suhr, a former champion wrestler (why is that not surprising?) discovered Stuczynski and turned her into a star, and his pole vaulters have won 11 national championships, so he obviously knows what he’s doing. What are you gonna do. And anyone who’s played competitive sports has probably had a coach like Suhr, a hard-ass who doesn’t do nice — and whose method turns out winners. What are you gonna do. And later, we heard Stuczynski saying she wanted to go celebrate with her family and coach, so either their relationship isn’t that bad or she’s suffering from Stockholm syndrome. What are you gonna do.
But still, if I were Suhr, I’d avoid certain parts of New Jersey. There are some guys there who are looking for Paulie Walnuts, and the resemblance is just a little too strong. And if somebody whacks him by mistake, you just know what he’s going to say as he lugs the body down to Satriale’s Pork Store for disposal.
You got caught in that meat grinder. What are you gonna do.
Gary Kamiya is a Salon contributing writer. More Gary Kamiya
The South Korean city beat out Munich and Annecy, France
The South Korean city of Pyeongchang was awarded the 2018 Winter Olympics on Wednesday after failing in two previous attempts.
Pyeongchang defeated rivals Munich and Annecy, France, in the first round of a secret ballot of the International Olympic Committee.
Needing 48 votes for victory, Pyeongchang received 63 of the 95 votes cast. Munich received 25 and Annecy seven.
The Koreans had lost narrowly in previous bids for the 2010 and 2014 Olympics.
Pyeongchang will be the first city in Asia outside Japan to host the Winter Games. Japan held the games in Sapporo in 1972 and Nagano in 1998.
Korean delegates erupted in cheers in the conference hall after IOC President Jacques Rogge opened a sealed envelope and read the words: “The International Olympic Committee has the honor of announcing that the 23rd Olympic Winter Games in 2018 are awarded to the city of Pyeongchang.”
The vote totals weren’t immediately released.
A majority was required for victory, meaning Pyeongchang received at least 48 votes among the eligible 95 voters.
It was the first time an Olympic bid race with more than two finalists was decided in the first round since 1995, when Salt Lake City defeated three others to win the 2002 Winter Games.
Had no majority been reached in the opening round, the city with the fewest votes would have been eliminated and the two remaining cities gone to a second and final ballot.
Pyeongchang had been determined to win in the first round after its previous two defeats. The Koreans had led in each of the first rounds in the votes for the 2010 and 2014 Games but then lost in the final ballots to Vancouver and Sochi.
Pyeongchang, whose slogan is “New Horizons,” campaigned on the theme that it deserved to win on a third try and will spread the Olympics to a lucrative new market in Asia and become a hub for winter sports in the region.
The Korean victory followed the IOC’s trend in recent votes, having taken the Winter Games to Russia (Sochi) for the first time in 2014 and giving South America its first Olympics with the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro.
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The Olympic skier pays homage to the famous cinematic crotch shot on the cover of ESPN
Olympic gold-medalist Lindsey Vonn has recreated that scene from “Basic Instinct” on the cover of ESPN magazine. And by “that scene” I do mean the one in which Sharon Stone infamously flashed her naughty bits to the world. It’s the magazine’s movie issue — why ESPN has a movie issue, I do not know — and it boasts a bunch of athletes reproducing classic film scenes. The headline accompanying the saucy cover photo is, wait for it, “Back to Basics.” Funny, I thought the magazine’s Body Issue — which came out just a few months ago and features exquisitely athletic naked bodies — was a return to “basics.” But it doesn’t get any more basic, or base, than paying homage to the most famous crotch shot in cinematic history.
Tracy Clark-Flory is a staff writer at Salon. Follow @tracyclarkflory on Twitter. More Tracy Clark-Flory
Record number of athletes to be tested prior to 2012 games
London Olympic organizers say a record 5,000 doping tests will be carried out at the 2012 Games.
The local organizing committee has signed a memorandum of understanding with Britain’s anti-doping body and will implement the testing program under the authority of the International Olympic Committee.
London 2012 director of sport Debbie Jevans says the size of the testing program will give a “strong message that drug cheats are not welcome at the London Games.”
UK Anti-Doping will train anti-doping officials and assist them during the event to carry out a 10 percent increase on the 4,500 tests conducted at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
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The gold medal winning hockey team boozes it up on the ice and sparks condemnation
Canada’s women’s hockey team has scored quite the controversy by daring to celebrate their win against the U.S. on Thursday by sipping beer, guzzling champagne and smoking cigars on the ice. After the fans filtered out of the stadium, the ladies returned to the rink still in uniform with gold medals draped around their necks. They laid on the ice, poured champagne in each other’s mouths and soaked up the Olympic glory. Their revelry hardly would have garnered any attention, except for one minor detail: there was an Associated Press photographer on hand to capture it all on film.
Now, the International Olympic Committee has reportedly written a letter to the Canadian National Olympic Committee “to find out a few more details,” and the team has issued a public apology. What’s the big deal, you might ask? For one, 18-year-old team member Marie-Philip Poulin was snapped holding a beer, and she’s just under the legal drinking age in British Columbia. OK, so that’s inappropriate, I guess — only, in her home of Quebec, the drinking age is 18. Are people really that scandalized that someone just weeks away from her 19th birthday was caught imbibing in Vancouver after winning an Olympic gold medal?
I suspect not. Judging by the online chatter over the “incident,” the age issue is but one more complaint shoveled onto the pile. Primarily at issue is that some perceive it as a display of poor sportsmanship, which I find kind of hilarious for two reasons: 1.) Ice hockey is one of the most impolite professional sports around (within five minutes of the first men’s hockey game I attended, two players had already resorted to fisticuffs on the ice), and 2.) Have these people never witnessed the hooting, hollering, fist-pumping, champagne-popping, and exclamations of “I’m goin’ to Disneyland!” at, like, any major sporting event?
I hate to be predictable, but I gotta say it: I suspect there’s also a definite undercurrent of sexism here. For example, one blogger wrote:
My question is: Why ‘ladies’ play men’s sports and look so awkward (unlady like) in the process? Being a woman is all about being a woman (grace, softness…). Figure skating is by all standards a women’s sport, as we witnessed yesterday in Kim Yu-Na’s performance. Simply brilliant.
So ladies, make an attempt to look like females, stay away from men’s sports, don’t try to be like men, you know, that’s what the men are for.
Aw, I think he’s scared of the big bad lady athletes. Poor dude — we just aren’t used to seeing women engaged in such stereotypically manly celebration. Not only are they drinking beer, they’re also chugging champagne and smoking cigars. Looking through the photographs, you can almost hear their self-satisfied guttural belches — and, you know what? It makes me swoon in full-blown girl-crush mode. I mean, my cheeks actually ache because every time I catch a glimpse of those snapshots, I grin uncontrollably. Now these are some women I’d like to grab a beer with.
Why don’t all the haters take a note from these Canadian ladies: Grab a Molson’s and chill out, eh?
Tracy Clark-Flory is a staff writer at Salon. Follow @tracyclarkflory on Twitter. More Tracy Clark-Flory
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