Pi Day

Happy Pi Day! Here’s one from my archive to mark the occassion:

Niles-Joyal claims to have memorized 13,141 digits of pi – the number, typically shortened to 3.141, that represents the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. This day, he is attempting to set the Harvard record by reciting a rather poetic number he has never reached without making a mistake: 3,141.

“I’m gonna take a minute to calm myself,” Niles-Joyal, a Boston College senior, says before starting. “I don’t want to misspeak, which has been a tendency of mine.” Last year his rookie bid in public pi reciting was stopped short at the 612th digit when he said 9 when he meant 6.

The full story, here.

Good writin’

Good friend Kevin Armstrong writes at SI.com about the “best” newspaper sports department of all time: the 1970s Boston Globe. I can’t really argue with this, particularly given the names that come up on the list: Gammons, Ryan, McDonough, etc. But I can offer one alternative: the 1990s Kansas City Star.

The columnists: Joe Posnanski and Jason Whitlock. If you’re a sports fan, you know them. Can you say that about any other small-market’s sports columnists?

The reporters: Wright Thompson (ESPN.com’s best writer), Jason King (Yahoo’s college football and basketball guy), Dick Kaegel (now with MLB.com), Mechelle Voepel (women’s bball at ESPN), and Ivan Carter (Wizards beat reporter for the WaPo).

That’s my vote. Any other nominees?

And a related note: it appears SI just redesigned its site today. Take a look, and compare to, say, ESPN or Yahoo Sports. The biggest difference? When I load up SI, I have to scroll down before I get any actual news. Hopefully they change that…

On/Off Switch

The Big Picture is the best photo feed out there. And it’s always nice to see the best get even better. Having the images fade out was a stroke of simple genius.

Lots of shadow

Here’s hoping this doesn’t violate fair use laws (Hey AP, I’m not making any money here). I saw the photo below, care of the Boston Globe’s great Big Shots sports photo blog:

And I’m sure I’m the only one who thought, “Man, wouldn’t this be cool…”:

Let me know what you would have done to this picture in the comments.