Greatest Shot Ever?!?- Compare and Contrast

So the Olympics have been really enjoyable so far to watch here in Thailand, except for the fact that good TV coverage here is lacklustre. At least it is not as bad as other countries of note. It's great I can rely on the free IOC YouTube channel for extensive highlights of events-or so I thought. After hearing about the 'amazing shot' by the Aussie's to tie the game against France yesterday I obviously wanted to check it out. Surely such a marquee moment would be on the IOC channel? Nope (well not easy to find at least). Of course the IOC wouldn't show the exciting stuff, just more of this:

(Zero penalty points if you can watch the entire video, congrats on the medal by the way Mark).

Note: I did eventually find the highlight on the official channel but I can't use it in my blog due to copyright infringement- good old IOC.

So I checked stuff.co.nz to see if they had footage. They did but due to terrible regional copyright restrictions coming in, I don't have access to videos because I am outside of New Zealand. I checked out the New Zealand Herald website and the same result. However the headline of the article on really caught my eye for its -"Olympics- Is this the greatest basketball shot ever?" Now to be fair the subsequent article (written by the Associated Press) never discusses this contentious statement so it must have come from the staff at the Herald. Obviously it is an attention grabber, a stunt to get more people to read the article. Any person who has followed basketball  or even just a casual sports fan though would realise that this statement is rash to say the least. I would just plainly call it lazy, sensationalist "journalism". When you use superlatives like "greatest" you better make sure the shoe fits. Compare and contrast the following:

First the Aussie's (Belinda Snell) shot- note that that still LOST the game (notice though the Aussie commentator can't count):



Now HERE is a game winning shot :



Or these ones:



And what about all these crazy shots- surely some of these deserve the superlative- "greatest" beside their name NZ Herlad?

There is also this nifty wee game winning fling:



These are all fantastic nominees for "Greatest Ever Shot" but my favourite so far is actually two shots. Down three points with 10 seconds left this US college team scores six points to win the game with two improbable shots:



 I'm sure most of you will agree with my judgement that the Australian shot is not the "greatest shot ever". In fact the question should have never been asked in the first place. The Media should do some research before throwing superlatives around which aren't even close. It would be great to hear your thoughts on what your greatest shot in basketball was and for what reason.

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Hope your enjoying the games as much as I am.

Peace

Steve Nash: NBA Legend/Film Maker/Comedian

Steve Nash is a man of many talents, I have recently discovered. He has athletic skills that your average 38 yr old NBA player doesn't have, leading the NBA in assists this year was no mean feat. Now that he has been traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, he can continue to work on his other passions in life- film making and comedy. Nash, may seem like any serious, mellow Canadian but beneath his sullen expressions, is a self-deprecating comic genius. It gave me a new found admiration for Nash watching these videos, I hope you enjoy them as much as I did:


Serious Driver:







Serious Model:

Serious Trainer:







Serious All-Star:

Serious Jedi:

And finally- Serious Laker: