How to Alley-Oop

Base Stealing

War Dance Response Interview with Dominic Santiago

1.Hello Dominic, I know these aren’t the best of conditions, but I wanted to interview you, how are you?
“I’m alright I guess.”

2. What is it like living in these conditions in Patong?
“It’s one of the hardest things in the world for me to do.”

3. Do you think its right to have such young children fighting in this war?
“I don’t because I can relate and it’s hard enough already.”

4. What can you do to get your mind off the terrible happenings in your village?
“I usually play soccer and go to meet my friends and I also play music.”

5. How do you think that this war is going to affect your future?
“I will never be the same inside.”

6. What are the affects of the war on your family, and the families around you?
“We each take it a day at a time. We know that if we don’t stay calm, then it’s just going to get worse.”

7. Is this war, worth your life?
“This war is worth no one’s life. It’s wrong for anyone to endure.”









Village people in Patong, realize how much danger this is putting their children in. This is not an easy life to live; especially when it’s involving their children and them not having a chance to live safely. When the mothers see their children, they realize that they will never have a normal life at all. They won’t get the chance to attempt to live out their dreams. They will always be living in fear. When I heard that my heart stopped, because I saw the pain in her eyes. That just showed me what is going on is much more then a war between the Lords Resistance Army (LRA) and the village goers. It’s a war with them selves. As I was walking around the village in Patong, I realized that no matter what I do, this war is still going to be here tomorrow. It is a war that’s not worth anyone’s life and is wrong by every standard of life.

By:George Kitchen

As the World Cup Creeps Closer

You may think soccer is not an entertaining sport. However soccer is the most world-renowned sport and over 25 million people watch the world cup every 4 years. The only thing you might see is 22 guys running around kicking a ball, but these are the facts; every country attempts to qualify for the FIFA World Cup. They are split up into qualifying groups. These qualifying groups are split up geographically. Countries from each of the continents play each other with the hope of making it into this prestigious tournament which is the World Cup.
The first World Cup was played in 1930 in Uruguay and they won it. Next year’s World cup will take place in South Africa. This is the first time a World Cup has been held on the African continent. This traditional battle for the best soccer team in the world takes place every four years and this year’s line up is likely to become one of the most competitive ever.
The last World Cup was a heartbreaking rather slow-paced game between Italy and France when after overtime. It was at a tie, 1-1...the two best teams in the entire world came down to penalty kicks. All five of Italy’s penalty takers dished out wonderful shots and beat the French goalkeeper Barthez; whereas France’s penalty takers could not beat one of the best keepers in the world in the Italian Gianluigi Buffon. Buffon stopped a shot drilled at him by the Frenchmen David Trezeguet.
This year’s World Cup should be just as, if not more exciting with fan favorite teams such as Brazil and Spain and many others.
By: George Kitchen

Fighting in Hockey

Fights have been a big part of hockey for a long time; they are just an American tradition in hockey. Now the NHL is debating whether or not to ban fighting in hockey. Fighting has caused many injuries including concussions. The NHL wants to better protect their players but are they making an effort to protect their fans that live and breathe hockey fights. If hockey fights are banned the NHL will lose most and their entire fan base.
I think hockey fights should be allowed because it’s exciting when the guys are right at the glass in front of you and everybody is screaming their lungs out. It is great for American sports. People should support all of the fights in hockey because that is the reason that the National Hockey League still has the fan base that it does. I also think that the National Hockey League does not get the publicity it should. The fights may cause concussions but you don’t have to let it go to extremes but the referees do not have to stop the fights right away.

By: Ryan Leib

The Unknown Sport of Sprint Car Racing

There is a sport that no one is aware of except for a couple thousand people scattered throughout the world. This sport is heavily adored in small portions of the world but is unknown to many. This sport is known as sprint car racing and if you ask most CEOs, they probably have no clue what you are talking about. As it turns out sprint cars are just not good enough for regular TV coverage which is utterly wrong. Sprint cars blaze at speeds of up to 160 miles per hour and slide into the corners of half-mile dirt tracks across the world leaving spectators breath- taken from the great racing. Tell me when you ever will see that in a Formula 1 race.
Sprint car racing has been around since the 60s and has evolved a lot through the years. They have become a lot lighter and faster which enables the cars to fly through the dirt and provide some very exciting racing. Anybody that goes to sprint car races will tell you that they would watch the winged sprints ten times before they would go watch a boring 500 mile INDY car race that no one passes except for on restarts. This is what really has me confused about why an unexciting INDY or F1 race will be on every weekend but sprint car races make it to TV maybe once a month on select television programs. As a an avid sprint car fan, it really ticks me off to see an F1 race on with very little passing and excitement that is live and then watch a sprint car race on TV the next week that I saw three weeks ago in person.
Many sprint car fans like me are questioning this as well. It’s a great sport but sprint cars truly aren’t made for the television market. It’s very unfortunate but sprint car racing doesn’t have the amount of beloved superstars that F1 racing and Indy racing have. You can meet a lot of racing’s best in a local Wal-Mart in town. Does this make it wrong? Heck no I would much rather meet a great sprint car driver in the local retail store and have a good conversation with him or her than have to wait in a two- hour line to meet some INDY superstar that really does not care about the person but just cares about getting to the next autograph to get on their million-dollar private jet to go home. Sprint car racing is a great sport it just does not have the lavish luxuries that come with racing the big-time asphalt tracks around the country.
Personally, I could care less about all those luxuries. When I watch a race I want to see a good race with a lot of passing and action. It really does not matter what you make at the end of the day. I can pay 13 dollars to go to a local sprint car race and love life for 4 hours. I do not need to pay a couple hundred dollars to watch an unexciting race with no passing. Whether, sprint car racing is as popular as INDY or F1, it does not matter. If you show the sprints on TV, people will begin to like it. As a person living in Pennsylvania, I advise you if you want to go have a lot of fun watching a sprint car race, go to a local sprint car race at a dirt track near you. You will have a blast without having to empty your pockets for no reason. I go to William’s Grove Speedway on some Friday nights and Lincoln Speedway every Saturday night. Like I always say dirt’s for racing; Asphalt’s for getting there.

The Art of an NFL Field Goal Kicker

The job of a field goal kicker in the NFL is an odd job. The kicker can be a hero or a zero depending on what he does on maybe a maximum of six plays. People love kickers when they do well and kick long field goals but hate them when they miss the uprights. It is no doubt the oddest job in football. A glorious but sometimes horrible job, the kickers have an interesting but odd place in football.
First, kickers are different because their immense size difference from the other players. If you look at a linebacker compared to a kicker, there is an obvious size difference. The linebackers are huge guys that can be 6, 8” and can be up to 300 pounds. However, kickers are little guys that may be six feet tall and may get to 180 pounds if they are lucky which definitely makes the kickers look like elves from the average football player.

Next, kickers make an odd fashion statement in football. Next time you have the chance, take a look at the kicker’s feet. These days, kickers wear two different colored shoes. An obvious odd thing to wear out on the football field, kickers are just a little different. There were also a few kickers that kicked without any shoes at all. Also, while the average football player has a helmet with at least three bars on their facemask that cover at least most of their face, field goal kickers wear helmets with little facemasks that usually have two small bars and cover a little bit of their face which looks very awkward in the NFL.

However, what would the NFL be without field goal kickers? Without kickers there would be no last-second game-winning field goals that decide a lot of games. The kickers sometimes only come into the game for five or six kicks but those five or six kicks can decide a game. This adds a lot of excitement to the game and would take a lot out of the game if field goals weren’t part of the game. There is no doubt that field goal kickers have a weird place in the NFL but without them, the league would not be what it is today.

Also, have you ever tried to kick a 50 yard field goal? It is not an easy thing to do. Most field goal kickers are expected to kick these every Sunday. In fact, in 1998, Jason Elam, the kicker for the Denver Broncos tied the record for the longest field goal kicking a 63 yard boot. Most people can barely get the ball off the ground which shows how much skill these kickers must have to do what they do. It is not an easy job but somebody has to do it and kickers are arguably a very important part of the game. They kick balls farther than most people can dream of. It is an odd job in the NFL but it is definitely an epic one.


Here is also some of the crazy music that the elf-like kickers like to listen to.