General

The Best Animated Sports GIFs Of 2010, Numbers 10 Through 6

Jan 4, 2011, 4:54 PM UTC

10. what

This is one of the most well-known GIFs of 2010, and yet we still have no answers. Imagine if, rather than simply sticking his tongue out, Michael Jordan started doing this every time he drove to the net. Nike would immediately change its logo. At Foot Lockers everywhere, store clerks wearing disgusted expressions on their faces would lock their arms straight, run down the aisles, and knock every pair of Air Jordans off the shelves, after which they would be collected, bulldozed into a giant pit by a man wearing a gas mask, and set on fire.

Glen Davis should not be discussed by NBA announcers. He should be narrated by David Attenborough. Hold on a minute, we may be on to something. I would pay cash money to hear David Attenborough narrate an NBA game and I am not even joking.

9. Chicharito’s foot-to-face goal

(Found here, suggested by our own Jason Kirk)

Soccer offered us no shortage of spectacular GIFs in 2010, but I’m going with this one because I doubt many have seen it, and because I don’t remember ever having seen this before. Chicharito of Manchester United kicks the ball off his own face and into the net, which, if intentional, would be the most metal moment in the history of soccer.

If it weren’t for soccer, would anyone ever have uttered the phrase, “now that’s what I call using your head”? It’s like the phrase, “let’s talk turkey!” The supposition is that “let’s talk turkey” is a colloquialism along the lines of, “shoot the breeze” or “chew the fat,” but it is only -- only -- used when someone’s about to share fun factoids about the consumption of turkey. Language! Whoops, I mean, sports!

8. About 9,000 words in this picture

(Click image to view. Via 30fps)

This may as well be an animated Hieronymus Bosch painting. There is so much happening. From left to right, here is what I believe each of these folks are saying, to the best of my lip-reading ability.

“Ha! Heyyyyyy!”
”Yeeeeeaargh!
“F*** you! F*** you! Heyyyy!”
“What happened? Heyyooooooouuuoouuuuhohohhhhoh!”
“F*** you! F*** you! F***!”
“My wheelbarrow is broken!”
“Brother is leaving to join Napoleon’s army! Who shall look after Mother?”
“O! Lord Grimsby has annexed my farm!”
“FLIPPIN’ YANKEES, KID!”

7. The sad Browns fan

I spent a long time considering whether this should be No. 1 on this list. I’m not sure why I’m not putting it there. It’s one of the most poignant GIFs we could ever hope to come across.

This man, let’s presume, is a lifelong Browns fan. He looks old enough to have seen season after disappointing season. He’s seen his Browns cruelly wrested from the city of Cleveland, only to return and continue to lose.

Forty years ago, wearing a Browns sweater knit by his grandmother, he ran circles around his family’s living room clutching a football he got for Christmas. Stop rough-housing, his mother said. Keep it down. Stop being a wildman. He never did. This morning, he drew eye black on his face and strapped a snout on his nose and neatly donned his floppy ears.

It was not a gradual falling out between this man and his Browns. It came in an instant, a tornado winding through his soul, flicking planks of wood from what used to be his barn, reducing his crops to roots and dust. Will he remove his snout?

Do you think he remembers that he is wearing it? Is he still awake?

6. Stephen Strasburg bends the universe as he sees fit

When you saw Ubaldo Jimenez’s pitch included in this list, you may have been expecting this one. This pitch was thrown during Stephen Strasburg’s first major-league start. Jeff Sullivan simply posted this and said, “Good luck everybody.“

As I said before, I don’t remember ever seeing so much slack-jawed gawking at pitch movement. This is the GIF I sent to my friends who don’t like baseball (most of my friends). If you don’t like baseball, that’s fine, and I understand. At the least, though, we should be able to appreciate the moments at which it’s at its most terrible and beautiful.