Best Invention Ever

As many of you know, I love to watch//read//think//talk//write about sports, and I have not done very much of that lately on this space, because I have been trying to use this space to share more theological thoughts, talks, and ideas. Every once in a while, though, all of these passions overlap, and today is just such a day. To begin, I want to turn your attention to google reader, which is an invention that does exactly what it promises. It delivers information and makes that information easier to access and use. Basically, google reader lets you subscribe to blogs you are interested in (which you can do without google reader), and keeps all of those blogs in one easy screen which updates as those blogs do. If you read more than two blogs this thing is an amazing time saver. I can do in one place, what I used to do in about 35, and I don't miss any updates. Beyond just placing my favorite blogs in one locale, they also give handy summaries of each new post (in some cases) which makes it easier to determine if I want to get into the post or not (this is super helpful for blogs with lots of new content). Aided by google reader, I am now able to scan a ton of blogs, on a ton of topics and themes (everything from sports, to theology, to comedy) and do it all relatively efficiently. In light of this I want to quickly post three links that I think overlap our areas of sports and theology.
1. Malcolm Gladwell's story on football, is one of the most stunning, horrific, challenging things I have ever read. Seriously. This story is enough to make hard/impossible to watch football again with a clean conscience. Read it at your own peril.
2. The best blog on my beloved Milwaukee Brewers is called Brew Crew Blog, and yesterday's post was one of the most transparent, accountable, pieces of sports writing you will see. This is one my favorite differences between blogs and print media or national experts (yes ESPN, I am talking about you). At the beginning of every season, all the experts make predictions for how the season will go, and almost always these predictions are awful. Occasionally ESPN and others are so bad that they joke about it, but nowhere will you see the same sort of honesty you read at Brew Crew Blog. Because the blog writers don't have to be experts, they can admit when they are wrong and actually look at the numbers. Advantage blogs.
3. In a sort of follow up to my post about Josh and Brett Favre, Bill Simmons (ESPN's Sports Guy) has maybe the best three paragraphs on the subject in his mailbag from last week. I would advise skipping right to the last question, unless you read Bill Simmons all the time, just before his picks, to read his thoughts.