El Niche Cache

May 4, 2020

May 03, 2020

Yoza, haere mai to the Monday and kia kaha to your energy. We’ve always been pretty damn chuffed with our musical selections at the Niche Cache, so make sure you tune into all the musical stuff we share because it’s way better than any radio bullkaka.

Music stuff’s found ‘ere: theniche-cache.com/loungin

There are also six videos on the watch page, six new videos every day. Just random shit that someone might find interesting: theniche-cache.com/watch

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Scotty’s Word

One of the videos on the Watch page, is Cliff Curtis playing the role of Pablo Escobar in ‘Blow’ from 2001. Curtis is from Rotorua and it’s obviously bonkers that a Maori dude from Rotorua was speaking spanish and doing Escobar fings, although we know that Curtis has been in all sorts of big time movies. That’s what we’re working with here in the case for Aotearoa being the best sporting/creative nation in the world, kg for kg.

Sports is obvious, the creative stuff maybe a little less obvious. Either way, I reckon we take this for granted and part of our duty for the Niche Cache is to keep Aotearoa’s amazing sporting/creative excellence front and centre.

I’ve yarned plenty about NZ Warriors in recent emails and now they’re officially over the ditch, preparing for the NRL season to get back underway. There was a slight issue with Nathaniel Roache, who was left behind in Aotearoa due to those pando symptoms and as far as the importance of this, Roache was out of action mid-way through last season with another major knee injury and I highly doubt Roache would have played NRL footy in the next few months.

There’s no shortage of NZ Warriors hooking depth, especially with Kodi Nikorima making way for Chanel Harris-Tavita to start those diabolic two games to start this season. Wayde Egan started those games, Nikorima off the bench and Karl Lawton was lurking, giving the Warriors three hookers who could contribute at the NRL level. The reserve grade (Canterbury Cup) team for their one game of the season had Temple Kalepo and Sean Mullany in their 17, Kalepo starting and Mullany off the bench.

Kalepo and Taniela Otukolo - who was the main hooker for the SG Ball (under 18) this year - are beastly dummy half prospects, similar to Manase Fainu without the alleged stabbing stuff. That’s a lot of hooking depth, not to mention Jazz Tevaga and Tyler Slade who could plug a hole if required and then there is Roache who is kinda always injured.

To take this a step further, here are some stats for Egan and Nikorima in those two games earlier this year…

Round Tahi

Egan: 59mins, 1 dummy half run for 2m, 37 tackles, 1 missed tackle.

Nikorima: 27mins, 10 tackles, 1 missed tackle.

Round Rua

Egan: 58mins, 1 try assist, 2 dummy half runs for 14m, 32 tackles, 6 missed tackles, 1 kick.

Nikorima: 29mins, 1 try , 3 dummy half runs for 21m, 16 tackles, 4 missed tackles.

That basically translates to hookers who barely run and often missed tackles, which is in perfect alignment to the Warriors horrible performances. While Roache may be part of a deep list of Warriors hookers and also often injured, I can’t pretend that either Egan nor Nikorima did anything of note with their opportunities.

Currently listening to the new Jay Worthy x Harry Fraud EP ‘Eat When You’re Hungry Sleep When You’re Tired’. The whole EP is live every where, so groove on out.

And this is pretty cool…

Des Buckingham@DesBuckingham

Behind the scenes || Our NZF Men’s National U20 & U23 teams development of playing style and culture on and off the pitch over the past two years courtesy of @ConnorJClements @TotalFootballNZ @NZ_Football

8:01 PM · Apr 1, 2020

25 Reposts · 160 Likes

Wildcard’s Notebook

Joseph Parker’s name seems to be all over the place in these pando times. Seems like he’s making news every couple of days either thanks to his fantastic little lockdown vids and his precariously placed career situation. He’s a dude who shapes to come out of lockdown in a better place in basically every aspect. This is already something that I’ve written about recently but I’ve absolutely loved getting to see a different side of Parker’s personality through all of this. It feels like he’s come to a place where he’s comfortable in showing off his silly side, his friendly side, his genuine self, which is a beautiful thing compared to his regular flirtations with trash talking leading up to pretty much all of his big fights. That never felt right from him, you never quite believed it when he looked down the camera and promised to knock so-and-so out. A more genuine Joseph Parker without the posing is going to lead to a more impressive fighter in the ring. I’m convinced of it.

Anyway, everybody’s talking about Joseph Parker lately and old mate Mike Tyson’s gotten himself some headlines too after that cheeky little video of him demolishing the gloves... coming soon after he expressed a desire to get back in the ring for charity. His power and speed there is seriously impressive for a 53 year old... but chill, winston. Let’s see what those fists are doing in round ten. Hence ‘twas rather embarrassing to see Joseph Parker being asked on the telly about the prospect of fighting an unretired Tyson. Come on.

Especially since there’s a dude who hit just as hard as Tyson, who had an extremely similar style albeit without the size to fully capitalise on it... though he came bloody close... and this dude is six years younger than Tyson plus he also happens to be a Samoan New Zealander. I’ve been thinking a lot about David Tua lately. Dan Rafael tweeted something out about him a few weeks back, calling him the best heavyweight he’d ever seen who didn’t win a world title. Tua did get himself into the mix when he fought Lennox Lewis but the crutch of his career was that at 5’10 he always struggled to foot it with the bigger lads. Lewis did to Tua what Anthony Joshua did to Joseph Parker (but less cynically) and simply outboxed him through the rounds, making sure not to slip up and allow Tua’s cannonball left hook into the action.

He followed that by losing in similar fashion to Chris Byrd less than a year later (with a KO win over Danell Nicholson in between) and after that while he did beat Fres Oquendo as well as getting a draw with Hasim Rahman in a rematch it was pretty much over for him as a title contender. Which might not have been the case had he topped Byrd but so it goes. He had a couple comebacks, including the Fight of the Century vs Shane Cameron (still the top PPV fight card in NZ history), but nothing that caused ripples at the top of the division.

It’s funky comparing Parker and Tua because for all their similarities they’re also very different fighters. Parker is much more well-rounded in his abilities but he lacks the KO power that made Tua so terrifying. Combine the two and you’ve got an all-timer. That’s the thing with Tua, he could be outboxed for most of the way but he knew what his strengths were (aka his strength) and with an iron jaw and that left fist he could absorb the blows for as long as he needed until he spotted that opening and he was like a shark with blood in the water. I dunno how well he’d far in the modern era. There’s nobody with the expertise of a Lennox Lewis but then at the same time it’s like a necessity these days to be at least 6’3 as a heavyweight so Tua’s size would have been a big hurdle. So if Mike Tyson does want to do the exhibition thing then good luck to him, who cares, but it’ll always be a travesty that we never got that Tyson-Tua back in the day.

And while you’re here, feast upon the righteous fury of Idles live at Le Bataclan. The proliferation of legit full length performance vids on the ‘tube during the pando has been immense, like there’s too much excellence to possibly get through. Right now I’ve got open tabs of a Frankenstein play with Benedict Cumberbatch and the latest weekly Grateful Dead live show offering (Closing of Winterland ‘78) and I don’t even know where I’m gonna find the time. But this Idles show is the one I wanna highlight. One of the most vital rock bands of our current time, unceasingly invigorating. Just remember never to fight a man with a perm.