"Sports Onomatopoeia" w/ A.J. & Greg

Published Jul 5, 2024, 8:00 AM

Hello, Puzzlers! AJ has a new book out! You can order "The Year of Living Constitutionally" right now!.

Puzzling with us today: our very own Chief Puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska.

Join host A.J. Jacobs and his guests as they puzzle–and laugh–their way through new spins on old favorites, like anagrams and palindromes, as well as quirky originals such as “Ask Chat GPT” and audio rebuses.

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"The Puzzler with A.J. Jacobs" is distributed by iHeartPodcasts and is a co-production with Neuhaus Ideas. 

Our executive producers are Neely Lohmann and Adam Neuhaus of Neuhaus Ideas, and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts.

The show is produced by Jody Avirgan and Brittani Brown of Roulette Productions. 

Our Chief Puzzle Officer is Greg Pliska. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg.

Hello puzzlers, and welcome to the Puzzler Podcast the drizzle of Honey on your organic Greek puzzle yogurt. I am your host, A J. Jacobs, and I am here with the great Chief puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska.

Welcome Greg, Thank you Aj. I'm proud to be the greatest chief puzzle officer perhaps in the world or universe. Let's give it to yes, certainly the only chief puzzle officer. It does help in the world.

Yes, Like I am my parents' favorite son and my sister is their favorite daughter.

It works out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Well today you are not only a puzzle creator, but you're also an excellent puzzle solver. So I am going to put you to work in solving a puzzle that I have created. And this one I created because I thought about what is my favorite name of a sport? Ever, I was thinking ping pong because it's the only on a monopeaic name of a sport I can think of, And of course real ping pong players call it table tennis, right like our friend puzzlest Absolutely, it was a huge ping pong fan. It has a ping pong club in New York State, so there's a close link between ping between table tennis and puzzling. But I did look it up and I was like, how did it get an anomanopac name. Apparently there were contenders. It was also called whiff whaff okay good.

The way I play it, it's more than ping pong eactly.

And then there's flim flam, which sounds more like if you're a ping pong hustler.

Yeah, exactly, you're flim flamming people.

But ping pong is the one that's stuck.

I also just want to say I think of the ing sound as more metallic than the actual ping pong ball.

It's more.

Pock sound. I think we should call it pickpock.

All right, let's try it. Let's see if a catch is on.

It could be a new craze like pickleball and ping pong combined. Is pickpock nice?

I also think, you know, they changed from the hard bat to the sponge bat and the sound changed, so they probably should have changed it then.

Bat the hard bat.

Well I did. I wrote an article on a ping pong hustler named Marty Reeseman. Wonderful guy. He passed away, but he was but yes, so I learned the official terms and hard bat, and and he was hilarious because he thought the day they introduced the spongebat was the worst day in the history of ping pong or table tennis. He was very upset because you can spin it. It's it's much harder.

I see it ruined all of his hustling.

It's ruined all. It's much shorter, the rallies are shorter.

So he was a ping pong flim flam guy. What you're saying, flammer?

Okay, exactly, all right, But I was thinking, it is sad to me that there is only one sport with an anomonopac name. What if wouldn't it be nice?

Wouldn't it be nice other sports?

If only so I'm today We're going to start a movement to try to change the names of other sports to antomanopac. I'm going to give you a name and then you can tell me what you say. Okay, all right, And someone might be stretches, just so you know, but.

Well, ping pong, we've already established, is a stretch itself. So you're right, and with the traditions, very good?

Okay, are you right here? What if you went and go went to go see boing splash, boying.

Splash, boying splash. It's the way I play water polo is boying splash. But that's not what you're looking for. You're looking for diving.

Exactly, diving off the board.

Into the pool, boying splash.

Sometimes it's boying boying splash because true.

So yeah, sometimes it's boying splash. You're right, I said, yes, you need in the Olympic context.

That's true. I like yours. Yours is best.

I think this. You know, the Olympics are coming up this summer. This could be a whole new thing. We're gonna get whoever's broadcasting it this summer to use these terms.

It's definitely gonna take What about this one? What about this one? Clang pow pow pow. What would be clang pow pow pow. You go claw also in the Olympics.

Also in the Olympics, clang pow pow pow, clang pow pow pow. Not like pow pow pow clang, which would be some sort of target shooting games. Clang pow pow pow. I think I know what this is. I think I know what this is. In some cases, it could just be clang pow depending upon the competitors, and in others it could be clang pow, pow pow. Right exactly, this would be this would be boxing.

That is it.

You're right, well done. I like that one.

Clang or ding the sound of the bell.

And then clang is a better sound for that, I feel.

I listened to it and have there There must have been one punch boxing matches before.

But one punch knockout certainly seem possible. Certainly seem possible.

All right, if you if you know it, then please let us know, all right, this one. I did find it was harder to do the mainstream sports because they did not have as on a monopeaic uh sounds in them. Here's a mainstream sport. Uh okay, squeak, squeak, squeak, swish.

Squeak, squeak, squeak swish. You know, when you started it, I thought, well, that's tennis, that's a player shoes on a tennis court. But it's not. I mean again, when I play tennis, there's a lot of swish involved. But in this case the swish is a good thing because this is basketball exactly.

I just loved you're right. The sound of basketball and tennis very similar. I love that squeak with tennis. I was thinking there's a lot of grunting.

I guess squeak yeak that captures basketball really accurately. Lots of squeak, squeak, squeak and swish.

All right, well let's go, let's go back to the sort of the Summer Olympics. I got two more for you. Okay, okay, ready. This one is a clink clink, clink, beep.

It's tittlely winks. Olympic. Tittly Winks is a big they're bringing it this year. It's a new addition to the sport this year alone. I think with flag football is going to be similar. Yeah, I did not know. That's well clink clink, clink, what again, clink clink, clink, beep, clink clink clink. Oh no, no, no, I know what it is. I know what it is. The beep is when you score a point.

Yeah.

Yeah, And there's a lot of clinking between the apays or the sabers or whatever you using. It's fencing. Wow, Olympic pressed.

That was not easy. I didn't think And yes, I don't know whether I didn't spend enough time figuring out whether that was pay.

Or it sounds like pay The clink clink sounds lighter than a saber, all right, Maybe it's a foil. Maybe it's foils. Foils would be the lightest ones, I think.

Well, I did watch a YouTube video of one where it didn't seem they clashed at all. They just like stand there and then poke each other and there was no.

So that's just like what my kids do all the time. They stand there and poke each other.

They are Olympic athletes in that respect. All right, so far, all of you, this is also an Olympic sport. It's a tough one. It's a tough one, but I feel that you're up for it. Are you ready? Here we go. Whush wush wush, bang bang bang, whush, wish wish bang bang bang. You can do it a couple of times. So what is that? What on a Monopa export is that it's not one that's filling stadiums. Let me just put it that way. But I always find it one of the most amusing summer.

Sport. Summer summer.

All right.

I was gonna ask if we could give a hint that it's a winter sport. We just have there. It is.

It is definitely it's the opposite of a summer sport. So if you know it or if you don't, please come back regardless, we would love to see you. And incidentally, we have a Instagram feed at Hello Puzzlers, and we put up fun puzzles there, so please go and we will see you here tomorrow for more puzzling puzzles that will puzzle you puzzlingly.

Hi, Puzzlers, this is your chief puzzle Officer, Greg Pliska here with the extra credit answer from our previous show. I played a game called Social medic with Joe Piazza, where every answer is one letter changed from the name of a social media site. Your extra credit clue was Jack Dorsey started this site as an alternative to Twitter, but for introverted people who don't really want to talk to anyone. That, of course is blue Shy, one letter different from blue Sky, Jack Dorsey's second social media site. Join us on any social media you want here at the Puzzler Podcast.

Thanks for playing along with the team here at the Puzzler with AJ Jacobs. I'm Greg Pliska, your chief puzzle officer. Our executive producers are Neelie Lohman and Adam Neuhouse of New House Ideas and Lindsay Hoffman of iHeart Podcasts. The show is produced by Jody Averragan and Brittany Brown of Roulette Productions, with production support from Claire Bidegar Curtis. Our associate producer is Andrea Schoenberg.

The Puzzler with AJ Jacobs is a co production with New House Ideas and is distributed by Hot Card Pasties. No I Rearrange Those Letters distributed by iHeart Podcasts.

If you want to know more about puzzling puzzles, please check out the book The Puzzler by AJ Jacobs, a history of puzzles that The New York Times called fun and funny. It features an original puzzle hunt by Yours Truly, and is available wherever you get your books and puzzlers. For all your puzzling needs, go visit the Puzzler dot com. See you there, m

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