Kesler/Solo: What Were They Thinking?

I’m pretty sure you’ve all seen this picture of hockey player Ryan Kesler already. But do you know where it’s from? It was taken for the “Body” issue of ESPN magazine that comes out today, which also features naked photos of other athletes, including the beautiful US Women’s National soccer team goalie, Hope Solo.

I would think most folks would be a bit nervous about posing for photos like this, but Kesler has spoken to the media saying he ‘had a great time’ doing it. Here’s how I imagine Kesler’s inner monologue as the photo shoot unfolded:

Wow, it’s stormy up here on Mount Olympus with all the other Greek gods. Look at the sky! No wonder it feels so humid. I’m getting really warm, I think I’ll just take this robe off....okay...much better. You know what? I don’t know why, but I have this weird desire to move this giant boulder over here. I think I’ll just lean on it a little and see if I can budge it....hey what was that small crash over there to my left? Is that a middle aged soccer mom who just dropped her binoculars? Who let her in here?

Now here's soccer star Hope Solo's picture:


Solo doesn’t look like she’s having a great time. What’s happened to her eyes? Is she turning into a vampire? She is really lovely, and super fit, so I think they could have got a better picture. As a female athlete, I know she wants to look strong, and beautiful, and fierce – it’s not like I thought she should have been posing in some coy, soft porn shot with oversized goalie gloves providing privacy or something - but instead, she just looks kind of angry to me. It’s like she’s thinking:

Crap. Why are they making me speed skate, naked and barefoot, over to the other side of this room to retrieve my clothes?

This is one of the cover shots for the magazine. The alternate shot they took of Solo had her standing naked in someone’s front yard, watering the lawn. What the hell? Who came up with these ideas? And why stop there? Why not get her nakedly opening pickle jars?

Maybe I’m just jealous of Solo, she of the ripped abs and poetic name; and I’m clearly biased, as a heterosexual female – but I think Kesler’s picture is better. This time even I'll agree- hockey wins.

Blind Soccer

As soon as I start to feel wistful and wimpy and sorry for myself for not getting to play soccer, my sister sends me this link about blind soccer players. There’s a World Blind Football Championship played every few years (this year Brazil was the winner). It’s really inspiring to watch and makes me feel exceptionally guilty for complaining about my temporary injury.

If you’re like me, and wondering ‘how on earth would blind soccer work?', I’ll give you the short version. The players use a ball that has bearings in it so they can hear it coming. There’s no throw-ins, and they play on smaller fields. The goalies can see. (In the clip I watched, the goalies seem perhaps even more psycho angry when they got scored on than some of the FIFA World Cup goalies – I guess you feel like a pretty serious knob when you can see, and you’re using a smaller net than usual, and a blind player can still score on you. I even saw one goalie score an own goal. Hee hee.)

It’s all very carefully edited on youtube, of course, so we don’t see what must be part of it-- the moments when everyone is standing around and no one has the ball. (The sighted goalie has to stay in his goalie box, otherwise, I’d imagine he’d be tempted to run up and swipe it from people all the time.) I was at first a bit disappointed that I saw only individual scoring efforts—you know, someone dribbling up with the ball, and dekeing around the defenders by himself to score, rather than give and go passes—but then I had to remind myself dude, they’re blind. It’s easy to forget because they’re very good.

If I was in charge of blind soccer, there’s only a few things I would change. First of all, why must they wear those masks that look like they’ve been cut out of sanitary pads? I understand the idea of wearing a mask, naturally, because some blind people have slightly more sight than others and this could provide an obvious advantage, but can’t they make the masks cool and black, like something Batman might wear? It would be much sexier. Also, the trophy they win in the end – does it have to look like a clear glass vase someone picked up at the dollar store? I know they’re blind, but they just won the blind World Cup. Let’s give them an actual trophy. And lastly, let’s not spray them with champagne in the end, when they do win. The poor fellows just stand there kind of sadly, getting wet, because they can’t see enough to know how to escape the spray, and they’re not frolicking in the joy of it, they’re just putting up with it.

Otherwise, it’s all good. You should watch it.