Some Random Thoughts on Pierre Luc-Gagnon and Chaz Ortiz Winning the 2008 Dew Tour Titles
This weekend, I caught NBC’s and USA’s coverage of the street and vert finals in the 2008 Dew Tour finals in Orlando, Fla. Here are a few scattered thoughts on the whole proceedings:
– The “play-by-play” guy was less than stellar. In fact, he sucked. Badly. He didn’t know much about skateboarding and only seemed to get in the way. They would’ve been better off just letting Chris Miller talk the whole time. The only time the announcing was decent was when Jason Lee and Chris Pastras popped by the booth. And at one point when Andy MacDonald (I think it was Andy Mac, at least … it might’ve been Bucky … it was definitely one of those old coots) bailed on a trick, P-B-P guy talked about Captain Ahab going down with the ship. I’m no Moby Dick expert, but I don’t think Ahab actually did go down with the ship. Sheesh, what a shite analogy.
– Chaz Ortiz might have deserved the title, but P-Rod did a ton more switch tricks than he did. Consistency trumps complexity, apparently.
– No doubt that PLG deserved the vert title, however. In fact, it wasn’t even close. He had the best three runs of the night, period. Any one of them should’ve earned him the title. At least justice was served in that sense.
– With street contests, would they ever think about having clusters of skaters “jam” on the same obstacle, as opposed to one dude on the course the whole time (stuff like “Slaughter at the Opera” was awesome to watch because it was non-stop action). There’s just a whole lot of down time when it’s just one guy on those huge “street” courses.
– Ryan Sheckler looked like he was going to cry. OK, that was an exaggeration, but as soon as that no-name am posted a decent score and bumped Sheckles from the top six, you knew he was going to press on his final run. And he tanked. Honestly, it was awkward. Sheckles just might want to quit skateboarding. It was tough to watch. And then he just stormed off afterwards like a beeyotch. To the shrieks of hundreds of adoring young ladies, naturally.
– Ultimately, I guess this is still skateboarding’s marquee contest series. And I guess I’m still kinda sorta thankful that it even exists. Any day you get to watch skateboarding on TV is a good day. But it can be improved upon. Tons.
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