A few days ago, somebody commented on a post of mine telling me that he had nominated me for a Liebster Award. Naturally, I assumed it was spam. But I went to his blog and read the post where he accepted his award and nominated myself and another blogger for whatever this award was. There were a bunch of rules that went along with it which he posted that made the award seem like one of those awful email chains, but unlike those, there were no bogus consequences listed if I didn’t accept the award. At the very least, it seemed a genuine compliment that he thought my blog was worthy of any award at all.

So I looked up the Liebster Award on Google and found a ton of interesting results – look it up yourself if you don’t believe me. It turns out that this award is an unofficial welcome from the blogosphere to new bloggers. It’s been around since 2007 and while the rules have slowly changed over the years, it’s pretty legitimate. The award is meant to help bring attention to the “best new blogs” and is meant to help them earn new followers and readers by linking them to other blogs. So in other words, the chain is only meant to help the bloggers out, opening up their readership. Even if only a few people click on the links to the other blogs, it’s worth it if it brings in new faces to the site.

Despite all this, I wasn’t planning on accepting this award because I didn’t want to answer the ten questions asked by my nominator. However, over the last few days I have reconsidered. With my viewership going into a post-World Cup slump recently, before picking up a bit yesterday, I decided I needed to thank him for representing all those reading my blog and appreciating it. I owe it to all my readers to respond to this gesture. So I accept the Liebster Award, and thank James Bromley for nominating me. (The link to his blog is here: jamesbromleyblog.com)

So without further ado, I plan on following the rules of this award, continuing the tradition of welcoming new writers to the blogosphere.

The rules of this award are as follows:
1. Thank the person who nominated you and link to their blog.
2. You must answer the 10 questions given to you by the nominee before you.
3. You must nominate your favourite blogs with fewer than 200 followers and notify them of their nomination.
4. You must come up with 10 questions for your nominees to answer.

James Bromley has given me the same questions he was asked, so I will now answer those.

1) Where is your favorite place?

I’d be inclined to say Fenway Park, home of my beloved Boston Red Sox. It’s a beautiful ballpark and some of my favorite memories have happened there.

2) Who is the best Bond?

I can’t say I’m the biggest James Bond fan, but I have liked Daniel Craig in the role in the two Bond movies I’ve seen. I’ll go with him.

3) Name three things that you are proud of.

I am proud of my sports writing achievements, both with this blog and at my college newspaper. I am proud of my ability to continue to stay motivated every day as I write multiple posts for this site. It’s tiring at times, but I couldn’t imagine stopping unless I absolutely have to. And I’m also proud of being from the Boston area and going to the One True School.

4) What was the last thing that made you laugh?

I laugh often. Some would probably say I laugh too easily. But I enjoy being happy. I certainly laughed last night when I was out golfing with my friend. I remember one instance when he pointed out how I instinctively put tees behind my ear after I tee off. I laughed at that one.

5) Do you do any regular exercise/sport?

I play pick-up soccer and basketball pretty often, and I have played a lot of tennis over the years.

6) Do you have any pets?

Nope. Never have, never will.

7) What would you do in the event of a zombie apocalypse?

I really have no idea. I’d probably surrender pretty quickly. I don’t do well with zombies.

8) What was the last book that you read and enjoyed?

I typically do more writing than reading, but in my English classes last year, I particularly enjoyed reading Ernest Gaines’s A Lesson Before Dying.

9) What annoys or irritates you?

Sports wise, it annoys me when players don’t take accountability for any transgressions. It’s okay to make a mistake, but you have to be able to own up for it.

10) If there was a movie of your life, what would it be called and who would play you?

I don’t think my life would make for a very interesting movie. But it could be about living with many severe food allergies. So I guess it would be called 100,000 Lightly Salted Rice Cakes. I was once told that the late Gregory Peck would play me in a movie. I don’t know why, but I’ll go with a young version of him to play me in this hypothetical situation.

Now comes the time for me to nominate three other blogs for this award. Obviously, they don’t need to accept this by making a similar post on their blogs, but they should feel free to continue the tradition. I hope that they at least appreciate the gesture. These are three of my favorite blogs to read, and I would like to get them a few extra readers if nothing else. If they want to accept, they should comment on this post and I’ll tell them what their questions will be.

Play the Advantage – This was my favorite blog to read every day during the World Cup. It’s a commentary on referees, but taken to a level I never knew possible. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable read.

Observation Blogger – There’s a lot of great sports content on here both about baseball and soccer. Definitely worth checking out.

Heart Beats Football – This is a wonderful blog about a wide variety of soccer stories, but specifically about France and French players across the globe. I really like the writing style of this one.

I’ll let them know I have nominated them, and hopefully they’ll accept. But overall, this award is about recognizing other great blogs and these are three deserving of attention. So please check them out.

I will get back to regular sports content before the day is over. But I felt I had to acknowledge this award, because I really appreciate my readers welcoming me to the blogosphere.