Jason Terry Gets to Keep His Tattoo

Even before the 2010-2011 NBA season began, Jason Terry seemed already smell the victory. The Dallas Mavericks' shooting-guard self confidently tattooed his right bicep with the picture of Larry O'Brien trophy. Jason Terry also promised that he will remove the tattoo if Mavs fails to be champion. Now, with his team beat Miami Heat by 4-2 in 2011 NBA Finals, it seems that Jason Terry gets to keep his tattoo.

“I definitely know that it will hurt worse if I have to take this thing off than it did putting it on,” Terry told ESPNDallas.com.


The Dallas Mavericks' sixth man made the tattoo as a symbol of his personal goal as well as that of the team’s. But being very superstitious athlete, Jason Terry will see the tattoo as bad luck if the Mavs don’t win the title and have it removed.

In this NBA Finals, Jason Terry became important key in Dallas Mavericks' victory. The team know that they can't just rely on Dirk Nowitzki to scores points. In the sixth and final game, Terry scores 27 points, the highest for the game.

It looks like Jason Terry tried hard to avoid the shame of having to remove his tattoo.

Ana Ivanovic In-Game Rituals

Series of injuries after her victory in 2008 French Open made Ana Ivanovic get used to failures in every tournaments where she was participating. Although she's now fully recovered, Ana Ivanovic still hasn't been able to back to her best performance.

At this moment, she makes it through to the 4th round of 2010 US Open Grand Slam, by defeating Virginie Razzano 7-5, 6-0. She looks strong during this tournament, and matches her best performance in US Open that she achieved on 2007. Former no. 1 WTA player, as of August 2010 Ana Ivanovic is ranked world No. 40.


What people might don't know, Ana Ivanovic is a very superstitious tennis player. She has a habit of not stepping on the lines of the court, because she believes that doing it will brings her bad luck.


Does her habit has an effect to her bad performance? We can't be certain of that, but I think she needs to neglect this ritual, because how can Ana Ivanovic focus to hit the ball if her eyes so busy in watching where she's gonna step? She needs to be more confident without doing this weird ritual.


Another one of Ana Ivanovic's habit when inside the match is to bounce the ball exactly four times before she serves. This one might help her concentrate and I guess nothing wrong with it. While for outside the match ritual she usually eats at the same restaurant every night before the game.

Raymod Domenech is An Astrologer, Not Football Coach

Raymond Domenech is a retired French footballer and the current manager of the French national football team. He is also a very superstitious man and has a penchant for astrology, which very much affecting the way he chooses the players for his squad.

Based on the astrological sign, Domenech sees Scorpio as a negative aspect when he picks his side, because it's supposed to clash with his own (Aquarius). That's why he left Robert Pires for 2006 World Cup while Pires actually still in his best form in Arsneal.

Domenech also admitted that he avoids players with Leo sign in defensive position, because they tend to show off and careless.


It seems that it's not just down to players' form, as Domenech states that "all parameters have to be considered and I have added one by saying there is astrology involved".

Although France never won any major tournament under his leadership and his strategy often criticized by public and medias, Raymon Domenech managed to become the most capped coach in French football history. He taking charge for 76 games before this 2010 World Cup, surpassing the records of Michel Hidalgo in the 1970s and 1980s.

French football legend, Eric Cantona, once said that Raymond Domenech is the worst French leader since Louis XVI!

Whatever result France had in this 2010 World Cup, his contract won't be renewed.

Can The Chalk Toss Helps LeBron James Beat Celtics?

Led by this year MVP, LeBron James, Cleveland Cavaliers will fight against Boston Celtics in the eastern semi-final of NBA playoffs. To defeat this 17 times NBA champions, Cavs need all the help that they can get, and King James pre-game ritual might one of the answer.

Before every game, LeBron James always toss the scorer's chalk into the air. It's still unknown what the motive behind James' chalk ritual, some would say that this for boosting his confidence. While others might say that this ritual shows his arrogancy and disrespectful for his opponents, thus should be banned. Well, if Nike even used this ritual as their ads campaign theme, I guess there is nothing wrong with it.




Chalk Toss History

Apparantely, LeBron James is not the first NBA player who started this ritual. Michael Jordan did it every game in front of Johnny Redd Kerr before every game as a sign of respect, appreciation, and also to powder his hands.

Kevin Garnett also started this way back when he was with the Minnesota Timberwolves. He used to go to the table stand and stand on it sometimes and throw the chalk in the air after he put it on his hands and the T-Wolves fans used to cheer and Garnett would yell to get the crowd pumped up.

Well, maybe because King James is NBA main selling figure at this moment, they will even banned other players to not doing this ritual.

Sorry, but KG has done this even before you played in the NBA, James

NFL Players Pregame Ritual

Some athletes need to encourage themselves before playing in the match. This so-called pregame rituals sometime looks very hilarious to us, but to the player can greatly affects their performance. Lots of them competed under performance when they were unable to did one of their rituals. Check these NFL players pregame ritual:

John Henderson

The Jacksonville Jaguar's defensive tackle, John Henderson, has a trainer slap him as hard as they can. Just watch the video above and see Henderson get worked up into a raving lunatic. You can imagine what he's gonna do to his opponents after being slapped like that.

Brian Dawkins

The Denver Broncos Brian Dawkins plays like a mindless psycho, and when you see the way he warms himself up, you can see why. He will stalk the end zone before a game, pacing back and forth, not talking to anybody, except for the ball. Yeah right, Dawkins has an intense one-on-one session with a football before the game, to get himself and the ball ready to go.


Brian Urlacher

Brian Urlacher, Chicago Bears linebacker, eats exactly two chocolate chip cookies prior to every game. Not one, not three, two.


While other players do their ritual during the game, or after every touchdown. Take example with Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger points to the sky after every touchdown, in honor of his mother. And Ray Lewis, Baltimore Ravens linebacker, of course does his traditional dance prior to games.

Athlete's Fear Factor

Dennis Bergkamp

Dennis Bergkamp always has more fatigue than his teammates when Arsenal have to plays an away games in English Premiere League or Champions League. It was not because he trained too hard for the game, but because he spent much more time in the road.

He has an aviophobia, the fear of flying. That's why even if his team have to play across Europe, he still choose to travel by land. This where he got his nickname, "The Non Flying Dutchman".

Bergkamp had this phobia not since he was born. It started in 1994 when he was flying with his Dutch teammates to prepared for 1994 USA World Cup. His plane had an engine failure that made them has to wait in the airport. The rumor that there was a bomb in his plane made Bergkamp won't fly anymore.


The other athlete who has this phobia is Kareem Rush, former LA Lakers player.

Venus and Serena Williams

When in the field, these William's sister never affraid to face any opponents. They look very strong and seem can beat anyone. But in real life, they had a nemesis, that is horror movies. When they're watching horror movies, they're always closed their eyes almost at every moments of the movie.

Want to accompanying them when they're watching a horror movie?

Andy Roddick

Okay, Andy Roddick's phobia was not cool at all, it doesn't even have a medical term. He is affraid of eater bunny! Not just the real bunny, he's even fear man in a bunny costume, or pictures of eater bunny in magazines.

The funny thing is, he doesn't affraid of real rabbit. He used to have a rabbit pets.

David Beckham

What's David Beckham's fear factor? He has an OCD (obssesive compulsive disorder) where he can't stand to watch something messy. He arranged his clothes according to their colors, put bottles in refrigerator according to thier heights.

When he saw three can of beers in the fridge he has to get rid one of them, because three is an odd number. In a medical term Beckham's phobia is called ataxophobia.

Derrick Rose

Chicago Bulls's guard, Derrick Rose, very affraid of needle. Once when he was in the college playing in NCAA, he had an injury in his head. When the doctor said that his wound need to be sew, he was crying outloud and dash out from the locker room. He was calmed down when the doctor promised not to sew his wound.

Andre Agassi

Up until this moment, Andre Agassi has a arachnophobia, the excessive fear to spider!

Tevez and number 32

Maybe lots of Carlos Tevez's fans are wondering, why he always wears jersey number 32 ?

And I have found a speculative answers about Carlitos' jersey number:

* Apparently Carlos Tevez believes that famous players should wear different numbers, doesn't want to be another 9 or 10, and 32 is a play on his idol Michael Jordan who wore the 23 jersey during his Basketball career.

* Tevez choose number 32 as expression of gratefulness when West Ham United have finally reached an agreement with him on 31 August 2006, as we all know that he had a contract problem with his previous club (Corinthians).