Battle of Gaugamela

On this day--or perhaps tomorrow--Alexander the Great and his Greeks and Macedonians shattered the army of the King of Kings and sent Darius III running, thus delivering the knockout blow to the Persian Empire.

This sounds odd from a Greek, but if you were going to be taken over, Persians were pretty good overlords.  Other than a prohibition on human sacrifice, they let you keep your religion and your language, though you had to speak some Persian to communicate.  Other than be there when they needed you for the army, it was a pretty good set up.

Ironically, Alexander was using Persia as his model for a world empire.  He wanted to be on the top instead of having any non-Alexander there.  Alexander was trying to create a world empire for everyone, even encouraging his officers and men to take Persian wives. 

He had said on many occasions, once to Carthage itself, that after reaching the eastern edge of the world in India, he was going west along the North African coast and along northern side of the Med back home after unifying everything.

Confidence or trash talk?  I am still impressed.

Alexander vs the Romans.

That would have been something!

Not how to handle it

Another penalty coming...

There comes a time in every athlete's life where he or she realizes that they can't do it anymore.

Serena Williams hit that point and she made a fool out of herself.

Berating the ref (been there, done that on the receiveing end), is not a smart idea and it leads to more penalties (done that too and tossed people out of the game).  It was a stupid thing to do and she dishonored the sport and herself.  Referee Carlos Ramos did not back down and even the classless baying mob of a crowd did not deter him from his duty. 

If you act like a moron, you will treated like one.

At least she tried to make amends to Naomi Osaka at the awards ceremony, but some of her classless fans booed Ms Osaka.

No matter, we know who won and who lost.

Serena lost more than a tennis match.

She lost a lot of respect.....

...for herself.