The war for more

The finals match the second-best team in the second-best division of the East with the best team in the best division of the West. And I'll tread no deeper into that water, because although I did count the total match points scored by each conference, I got the confusing sum of 40 vs. 39.5, and I don't know how that happens unless somebody was penalized for cheating, or something. On the other hand, I would find such a thing preferable to what they do in the National Hockey League, where there are, on average, more than two points (note to anyone who has never followed the NHL: traditionally, a win has been worth two points in the standings, and a tie one point, possibly because in pre-computer days not every newspaper could print "1/2" without difficulty or ugliness. In fact, I seem to face the problem even today on this very blog) awarded per game, because, as of a few seasons ago, or maybe a lot of seasons by now (time flies, and it's been flying for a long time, and I've pretty much lost all track of it), teams that lose in overtime still get a point in the standings, while the other side gets two points. Does this encourage, say, two teams locked in a tie late in the game, to try to postpone the decision till overtime? Well, it might, if hockey players are anything like sumo wrestlers. I was just reading "Freakonomics" (a non-fiction bestseller from 2005 by Dubner [a writer] and Levitt [an economist. Or maybe vice-versa]), and it reports that in the Japanese sumo league, wrestlers who finish the season at less than 50% are relegated to a lower division, and not only will they make far less money then than in the top league, but they also have to help bathe the top wrestlers, especially in washing their difficult-to-reach parts (by the way [hereafter "btw"], no homosexual demimonde double meaning is implied by my use of the word "top" in the preceding, any more than a higher-than-average incidence of homosexuality among sumo wrestlers is), and that, in season-ending matches between 7-7 records and 8-6 records, the 7-7's, on the cusp of relegation, score an amazingly high percentage of victories (which ought to make even clearer the fact that homosexuality among sumo wrestlers is no higher than the norm, and may in fact be lower. Btw, I don't believe that references to a particular famous Seinfeld episode are now so stale that they're fresh, so I'm not going to make one).

Contrary to my prediction of a couple of weeks, ago, "selfie" beat out "twerk" for Word of the Year. At least, according to the Oxford dictionary, it did. I don't know if they are the Rose Bowl* of WotY deciders, or if they're just first, in which case, they're the Blockbuster Bowl, or something. One article reports that "the most likely theory about the origin of (twerk) is that it is an alteration of work". If that is the general perception, then I am less surprised by Oxford's choice than I'd be if the more pungent portmanteau theory were the favorite one.

On to the match. I'll let the jumble speak. As usual, clicking on it makes it bigger.

* asterisked because I think I've overdone parentheticals today. Anyway, in the days before there was only one game that mattered at all, the Rose Bowl was hyped each year as the "granddaddy of them all".