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Off Topic 30 for 30

Discussion in 'Sunderland' started by Flash Gordon, Mar 21, 2020.

  1. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    Someone mentioned these the other day as a good sport substitute whilst there's nothing on and I've decided to watch them all. I've already seen about 15 of them previously, but I thought I'd start from the beginning and listen to the stories I'd never heard as well. Even the sports I have no interest in (Hockey and Basketball) have some fascinating stories. Here are my summaries of the first 2 episodes. Not anywhere close to the best in the series.

    Episode 1 - King's Ransom

    This is the story of Wayne Gretzky's trade from Edmonton Oilers to the LA Kings in 1988 which was completely unheard of at the time. It was probably the biggest trade that sport has ever seen with vast money, 2 players and 3 first round draft picks going to the Oilers in exchange for their star player.

    The documentary is interesting because it has all the key people talking about the deal from their perspective and of course none of them regret it, but on the face of it, it doesn't seem to have worked out for most of the key people.

    The Oilers have won 5 Stanley Cups in their history and 4 of them were with Gretzky. Gretzky won nothing with the LA Kings.The Kings saw their fanbase almost double overnight so perhaps they won to an extent.

    The real winner though seems to by hockey - The popularity of the sport took off after Gretzky moved to America, within a decade there were 8 new franchise teams, 3 of which were in California and Gretzky was seen as the big influence behind that.

    In true fan fashion, the fans still blame the former owner to this day and haven't forgiven him for the events that took place over 3 years ago. :emoticon-0140-rofl:

    6.5/10


    Episode 2 - The Band that wouldn't die

    The story of the Baltimore Colts marching band and how they carried on for 12 years without a team and helped to promote the eventual return to NFL in the city by marching all over America.

    It's almost a nice little story. It starts off with Jonny Unitas winning that first Championship in a huge televised game and almost starting the movement and popularity that would lead to the NFL. Then it goes on to the Colts leaving Baltimore in the middle of the night in 1984 to move to Indianapolis. Their owner was a drunk and an arse and you start to feel sorry for them. A community that had the heart of it ripped out. But the marching band kept on in good spirits and giving the people of Baltimore hope.

    Then we get to their "happy" ending in 1996 when they stole a franchise from Cleveland and left another community to have to suffer exactly like they had. **** them!

    5/10


    I love backstories behind historical sports events so feel free to contribute to the thread with any good documentaries or even books on sporting history, but I'm going to work through all of these over the next few weeks.
     
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  2. Ozzymac

    Ozzymac Well-Known Member

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    I've seen quite a few of them and most of them are very good.

    A couple of my favourites are:

    The Two Escobars
    Roll Tide/War Eagle
    Brian and the Boz
    I Hate Christian Laettner
    Phi Slama Jama - The part about how Hakeem Olajuwon ended up at Houston is unbelievable.
     
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  3. West stander

    West stander Well-Known Member

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    I really like Elway to Marino which is the story of the nfl draft the year they were drafted told by their agent. Really interesting I have to say.
     
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  4. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    The Two Escobars is superb, one of the best 2 or 3 in the entire series. I really enjoyed Brian and the Boz too. Haven't seen the other 3 yet.
     
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  5. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    That's probably my favourite that I've seen. Fascinating to see the politics behind the scenes and to look back with hindsight of what happened.
     
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  6. polyphemus

    polyphemus Well-Known Member

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    I've been using YouTube for some entertainment and spotted a run of reviews of the 70,s football seasons.

    Naturally I looked up 1972/3 Season.

    Younger members who might wonder just what the elderly codgers are going on about when they talk about Roker Park may like to watch this--



    Scroll forward to the Quarter Final against Luton (25 min) and get some idea of a packed Roker Park.

    As you can imagined I've watched the final 'once or twice' over the years but it still gets me.
    When Ian Porterfield scored I leapt out of my seat with a 'gerrrin yu bas***d', fist clenched.
    Just as emotional at the end as al those years ago.

    Whoever said that nostalgia isn't what it used to be should watch that Final.:emoticon-0102-bigsm
     
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  7. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    That looks brilliant. I'm only old enough to have experienced the last 4 years of Roker Park and the Roker End was a shadow of what it looks like there. Attendance of 52,000, fantastic!
     
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  8. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    Episode 3 - Who killed the USFL?

    This is probably another middle of the road documentary if it wasn't for the main protagonist. It's a story that I guess most won't know, unless you're a hardened NFL fan from the early 80's. The USFL was a rival league formed to play American football in the spring. It surprised me when I saw the names of the 3 star players - Jim Kelly, Steve Young and Herschel Walker. All HOF NFL stars who chose this league first. Burt Reynolds was a general partner of one of the teams as they first started out with modest numbers in year one.

    But everything changed in year 2 and 3 when a certain Billionnaire bought the New York Generals and started to spend big money and bully his way across the league. He tried to take on the NFL and move the league to the fall. Most franchises and owners didn't have the audience or money to compete with the NFL, but this owner seemed to be greedy and selfish . It seems that he couldn't get into the NFL racket so he tried to beat them and sue them instead. The league turned into his own agenda and ultimately he crumbled. That man was Donald Trump.

    It's interesting because the documentary took place before he became President, it contains interview material from him in a style that we know all too well by now and a few dissenting voices against him.

    7/10
     
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  9. Ozzymac

    Ozzymac Well-Known Member

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    I must admit i enjoyed that episode. It's true the old saying that a leopard can't change it's spots.
     
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  10. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    It was just another example of his behaviour and language being somewhere between bullying and threatening. You know that he's the exact kind of person to use his power or wealth to "make life hard for you" if you don't see things his way.

    It was remarkable that he'd convinced himself that it was the other owners to blame, and was quite abrupt when receiving questions he didn't like.
     
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  11. Gatesy

    Gatesy Well-Known Member

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    Thanks for that Flash. Just watched the trailer on IMDB, it shows the 88 Summer Olympics and it's definitely getting added to my watch list. Are you watching it on Youtube or Netflix, Prime etc?
     
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  12. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    I suspect it will be on Youtube. I have some apps on a firestick through which I can watch them. The one about the 88 Olympics is called "9.79".
     
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  13. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    I watched another documentary this morning - Diego Maradona.

    It's directed by the man who did the Senna film a few years ago. I really enjoyed it, some great footage of him. The story didn't dig deep enough for me, but it was still a fascinating insight. It's far too simplistic to define him as a villain due to the Hand of God and drug use. It's hard to imagine how anyone could cope with his Napoli experience. What a player though.
     
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  14. Gatesy

    Gatesy Well-Known Member

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    I suspect I have a similar 'app' <cool>:cheesy:
     
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  15. Kittenmittons

    Kittenmittons Well-Known Member

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    30 for 30 is amazing. Bill Simmons I can take in small doses but some of them are great.

    The legend of Jimmy the Greek and Run, Ricky, Run! are two of my favourites.

    Watch this if you get a chance too. One of the best, if not the best:

     
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  16. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    Episode 4 - Muhammad v Larry

    I'm a big fan of Ali so I've seen a lot of documentaries and films on him. What's really good about this though is that it focuses on one fight. Ali's comeback fight at the age of 40 against the world champion. It's easy with hindsight to see the significance of this right on Ali's health. An interesting, but sad story. 7.5/10

    Run, Ricky, Run is an excellent episode. I think I've seen most of the American Football ones, but not much else so I'm going through them one by one.
     
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  17. The Norton Cat

    The Norton Cat Well-Known Member

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    Watched that Saturday morning. Very sad to see. You can see him slowing down even across the footage they show. Great piece of filmmaking though
     
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  18. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    Most of the footage feels like he's trying to convince himself that he's still got it, I wonder how badly he needed the money, because I think he looked like he knew he wasn't good enough anymore.

    It amazes me that we still see people today complaining about fights being ended early. Ali should be a warning as to what can happen if they're not (not that this alone caused his problems of course).
     
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  19. The Norton Cat

    The Norton Cat Well-Known Member

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    It certainly does feel like that. It's sad to see him in that state. There are even one or two shots where he looks like an old man, even at 38.
     
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  20. Flash Gordon

    Flash Gordon Well-Known Member

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    Episode 5 - Without Bias

    I have no interest in Basketball so this was a completely new story to me but its one of the better documentaries I've watched in this series. About the College Basketball start Len Bias who was talked about in the same circles as Michael Jordan and was drafted 2nd overall, who had a drug induced heart attack and died at the age of 22.

    It's interesting not only about the story itself and the effects it had on his family, team and university, but also about how it was one of the factors that led to the American drug laws that stand today.

    A very interesting fact in the film was how one of the "experts" was found later to have falsified his education and he was not a pharmacist at all, yet his "expert opinion" influenced decision makers to impose lengthy prison sentences for people caught in possession of small amounts of crack cocaine and led to America's racist drug policy which has only started to balance out in the last 10 years.

    8.5/10
     
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