Tag: Beer

WATCH: Wisconsin legend Michael Finley steals beer from Luka Doncic in viral moment

WATCH: Wisconsin legend Michael Finley steals beer from Luka Doncic in viral moment

Wisconsin legend Michael Finley is the subject of a viral moment after the Dallas Mavericks’ 124-103 win over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Thursday night.

The win clinched the Mavericks’ trip to the NBA Finals. As one would expect, the postgame mood was celebratory.

Related: Ranking all Big Ten basketball arenas from worst to first

That includes star Luka Doncic, who the viral video shows standing outside the locker room with his father holding a beer — that until Finley walked by.

The Badger legend subtly took the beer out of Doncic’s hand before turning around and acting as if nothing happened. The reposted video on X now has more than six million views.

Finley, now Dallas’ Assistant General Manager, played 17 years in the NBA including nine with the Mavericks (1996-2005). His NBA accolades include an NBA title in 2007, two All-Star appearances and a spot on the All-Rookie First Team in 1996.

He played at Wisconsin from 1991-1995 and retired as the program’s all-time leading scorer — a mark that was later broken by Alando Tucker. Finley’s Badger career included two First-Team All-Big Ten nominations and his No. 24 jersey being retired by the program.

The former Badger is now rising the ranks in the NBA front office world. There is no backstory to his viral moment, but it occurred under pretty good circumstances for him, Doncic and the Mavericks.

Dallas will face the Boston Celtics in the 2024 NBA Finals. Game 1 is scheduled for June 6 at 8:30 p.m. Eastern.

Contact/Follow @TheBadgersWire on X (formerly Twitter), and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Wisconsin Badgers news, notes, and opinion.

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Ranking (and grading) Athletic’s non-alcoholic beers, the best booze-less brews you’ll find

Simpler is better when it comes to booze-less brews, but Athletic’s got a stout that’s worth coming back to (and one that’s not).

Sober October is upon us, so a merry booze-less month to all of you who celebrate.

I, personally, don’t, but I can appreciate the sentiment. September is a celebration month for me, filled with football and Oktoberfests and delicious, malty beers. But on Sunday nights, after I’ve filed my last NFL story, I wind up craving a beer but have zero desire to once again tax my overworked liver or make Monday’s 6:30 AM wakeup any more difficult than it already is.

This is where Athletic Brewing Company comes in. The Connecticut-based company stood out amidst a crowded landscape by offering non-alcoholic offerings covering a wide variety of styles. Where before there may have only been Clausthaler or O’Douls, you now had the opportunity to find pale ales and stouts that carried lower calorie counts and virtually none of the booze.

That’s where I’ve been turning lately on those Sunday nights. It’s worked out well enough for me to make these rankings.

Athetic’s beers are graded on a curve; while they stack up well against traditional brews, they don’t quite get all the way there. And that’s all right, because in the land of non-alcoholic beers they mostly stand alone. As such, these grades consider both how true to the regular, booze styles they’re replicating are as well as the overall quality and taste of the beverage itself.

Also, the only brews to make the rankings are the ones I’ve personally tried and reviewed thus far. Expect this list to be updated as I expand my palate — and allow me to apologize if I haven’t gotten to your favorite yet.

Updated 5/25/24 with four new styles: Blueberry Mosaic, Emerald Cliffs, Personal Record and Wit’s Peak

Justin Thomas tried to chug a beer at a New York Rangers game and it didn’t go well

A for effort, D for execution.

The late, great Toby Keith has a song that goes, “I ain’t as good as I once was, but I’m as good once, as I ever was,” and it’s a thought that many of us in our 30s have when we try and do things that came naturally in our 20s.

I can only imagine a similar thought was going through the head of Justin Thomas on Tuesday night. The two-time major champion is having himself a week in the Big Apple. On Monday Thomas was a guest on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and attended a New York Knicks game. On Tuesday he went to a New York Rangers game and was put on the jumbotron.

As one does when holding a beer in front of tens of thousands of fans, Thomas attempted to down his drink in one swig (keyword attempted). The 15-time PGA Tour winner was off to a great start before he ended up wearing the last third of his beer on his shirt.

A for effort, D for execution.

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What are America’s most popular beers to fill your 2024 Super Bowl party lineup?

Make sure you load up on local beers, but if you want something both a) available and b) inoffensive, we’ve got you covered.

Throwing a good Super Bowl party isn’t just about having a properly massive television on which to watch the game. It’s about creating an environment from which you can absorb and process whatever nonsense Tony Romo spews toward the screen at the intersection of a quarterback’s throwing motion and his personal life.

The strongest among us can shake this off. The rest of us can find solace in malt, hops, yeast and water.

The Super Bowl provides a rare opportunity where Sunday night drinking isn’t just tolerated, but mostly encouraged. But putting together a beer lineup for your party can be an intimidating task given the vast array of choices on stocked shelves across the country.

[gambcom-standard rankid=”3011″ ]

And while the most popular beers in the U.S. aren’t necessarily the ones I’d pick, they’re a good barometer for a lowest common denominator brew that will keep the widest swath of guests happy. In order to figure out which beers fit that bill, I used YouGov’s consumer awareness index, which plots what percentage of poll respondents have heard of a certain beer and what percentage actively like said beer.

Here are the results.

How to build the perfect beer lineup for your 2024 Super Bowl party

Beer of the Week: Firestone Walker’s subscription box isn’t cheap, but hoooo buddy it’s worth it

If you like bold, heavy beers, that is.

Welcome back to FTW’s Beverage of the Week series. Here, we mostly chronicle and review beers, but happily expand that scope to any beverage that pairs well with sports. Yes, even cookie dough whiskey.

Firestone Walker’s Brewmasters Collective isn’t cheap. For a shade under $400, you get an exclusive membership in a tight knit club, discounts on purchases online and at the brewery, access to a rare beer library and — and most importantly for my purposes, a quarterly beer shipment straight to your home.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I’m not a Brewmasters Collective member. But the brewery occasionally surprises me with deliveries out of nowhere because I am living inside some kind of glorious coma dream as my family worries around me, furious I left no will. So around last November, this showed up at my door (after I signed for it and proved I am, in fact, a grown up).

At the risk of turning into a character from an insurance commercial, it’s a really nice box! I kept it! I’m gonna put stuff in it!

Here’s what was inside:

Five unique, boozy beers (well, four and a barleywine), a couple of boxes of curated cookies and a spiffy brochure explaining the contents and what other perks come with membership. There’s no doubt a lot of thought has gone into this subscription crate. And since it’s Firestone Walker, it’s a near certainty these beers are going to be good.

Let’s see if they’re $99.25 good.