Extreme Ping Pong?
I was surfing through the channels this afternoon and on ESPN2 the had "The 2002 KillerSpin Extreme Table Tennis" tournament. They were just announcing the show so I had all these outrageous images of ping pong players (yes, I call it ping pong) throwing things at their opponents while hitting the ball over the net or the game being played on stilts or rollerblades.
As soon as it started... WOW! These guys playing were all over the place. They were slamming the ball so hard and fast that one player was as far as 10 feet away from the edge of the table and still returning the ball to the other side to his opponent.
As with all things, there was something about the tournament that I found amusing. They tournament was being held at the United Center Pavilion in Chicago. They had, from what I could see, around 6 tables set up on the floor and there were people in the seats... a lot of people! Now these people must be really like Table Tennis a lot to go want to watch it from that far away! I was watching it on TV and I had a hard time following the action. How in the world were those people in the "cheap seats" even see the ball shooting back and forth as fast as it was from a 100 feet and further?
As the players were introduced, they came walking out from wherever the basketball players come from underneath the arena with a lovely escort and strobe lights and smoke. I don't mean to lessen their standing as an athlete after all they are really good at what they do and they do break a lot of sweat, but come on! Smoke, lights and escorts? It's like football, boxing and basketball all wrapped up in one.
The male players were escorted by attractive ladies to the table while the female players were escorted to the table by guys from FLEX magazine or somethinlike it. These guys were huge, muscled and did I mention HUGE?
Anyway, I did enjoy the games they showed, I used to play the game quite a bit many pants sizes ago.

Song of the Day: "Spirit In The Sky" by Norman Greenbaum