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This story appears in ESPN The Magazines October 17 Great Debates Issue. Subscribe today!IF YOU WATCH sports, you cant escape Pitbull.There he was during last seasons NBA playoffs, his Bad Man carrying viewers to nearly every TNT commercial break. All June long, Pitbull occupied the Copa América after recording the official song of the tournament, Superstar, this coming after he recorded We Are One, the official song of the 2014 World Cup. And there he was at the Final Four, doing his signature rapid-fire fist-pumping while shouting the occasional word at the crowd during the Capital One JamFest.The world, as it is right now, is often overwhelming in the worst ways. Sports are an escape. And sometimes that escape is a bald rapper from Miami, sweating through a soft linen shirt while breathing heavily, pumping his fist and, along with it, pumping up the hopes of the crowd. It seems like an easy thing to show up sweaty, loud and overexcited to a roomful of eager fans. Yet if you or I did this, the room wouldnt shift for us, beyond perhaps an incredulous side-eye.Theres no debate: Pitbull is the new king of the stadium-shaking anthem despite being, for all intents and purposes, not particularly skilled as a musician. He is, in many ways, the musical equivalent of a bucket of popcorn: unsurprising and unexciting but somehow essential to an otherwise thrilling night. Because of his ability to latch on to any sporting event with 15,000 people and a budget, Pitbull comes off less as a fan of the games and more as an opportunist gaming the fans.What Pitbull lacks in musical skill, he makes up for with marketing savvy, in making a song so overwhelmingly infectious that it ends up being the sports anthem of the moment. But there is, perhaps, even greater skill in making the moment last. Most bands and artists can do this only once. Macklemores Cant Hold Us had its time in 2013, then it faded. If artists are lucky, like the White Stripes with Seven Nation Army, your sole anthem might have a life in arenas that spans decades. But Pitbull takes it further. He channels the energy of the experience, becoming the living embodiment of the moment before the moment. Hes transcendent: a performance artist who becomes the sports anthem himself.Despite his hypervisibility, Pitbull hasnt had a gold album in his past four outings, the closest being 2012s Global Warming, which peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard 200. In October, Pitbull is slated to release a new album, Climate Change. Its teeming with big-name guests: Drake, Meghan Trainor, Bruno Mars, Jennifer Lopez. Even with all of this, the buzz is still hushed. It seems, then, that Pitbull, at only 35, has made his bed. The anthem artist, not the album artist. We look to him when we need a reason to get pumped up and for little else.When the Cavs were down 3-1 to the Warriors in last seasons NBA Finals, it was hard to remember that LeBron James had a face other than the crying Jordan, endlessly affixed as his internet avatar. And then LeBron did what we knew he could do, because LeBron knew who he was: a player capable of leading a team to an NBA title.Pitbull is not LeBron James. One is a world-class athlete, and one is a somewhat failed rapper-turned-endless-party-starter. On top of their shared meme-ability, though, the lessons of LeBron and Pitbull are chapters of the same book. At his core, Pitbull knows who he is too. He takes the punches and the punchlines and hes still there, his comically large aviator sunglasses catching the stadium lights and shining.I dont know if Pitbull even likes sports. But in his own way, Pitbull is perfect for the world of sports. Hes everything we encourage our heroes to be. Thick-skinned, resilient, self-aware but not so self-aware that it becomes self-pitying. Despite enough of us throwing up our hands, exasperated, sighing, How did this guy get here again? Pitbull gets the last laugh. Your friends probably cant name more than two Pitbull songs, if any. But hes found a way in, playing his own brand of frantic, repetitive pop-rap to stadiums full of screaming fans. Are they his fans? Not entirely, but when the screams are that loud, does it matter?Emotions dont always simply surface from within us; sometimes someone has to carry us to them. Pitbull has it figured out. In his world, the quality of the music is a footnote to what the music can do. Its a place where people are already at the brink of excitement, just looking for someone to push them off the cliff.Like your friends, I could not sing a verse from a Pitbull song either. But Ive been in a stadium when the lights go down and a Pitbull song comes on, and I knew something good was coming, and I threw up my hands along with my neighbors.Pitbulls most notable ad lib is ?Dale! -- a Spanish word with multiple translations that all reach for the same sentiment: Lets?go ... Lets do this ... Go ahead! Its a word that, more than anything, gives permission to exhale and be free. We need more of that in sports. We need more of that everywhere. cheap jerseys from china . The Masters champion and winner of last weeks Australian PGA has a three-round total of 14-under 199 at Royal Melbourne. "Im in a really good position for tomorrow," Scott said. china jerseys nfl . Halifax beat the Saint John Sea Dogs 7-5 on the strength of two goals apiece from Nikolaj Ehlers, Matt Murphy and Brent Andrews. Jonathan Drouin also scored and had three assists while Zachary Fucale made 17 saves for the Mooseheads (16-8-0), who led 6-1 after two periods. http://www.cheapchinanfljerseys.org/ . 8 Iowa State on Saturday, sending the Cyclones to their third consecutive loss. The Longhorns (14-4, 3-2) got their biggest win of the season with their third in the row in the Big 12. wholesale nfl jerseys online . Galatasaray said in a statement on its website Monday that Mancini signed a three-year contract and will be paid 3.5 million euros for the upcoming season, with his salary upped to 4. cheap nfl jerseys . Paul Pierce couldnt believe he missed at the end. Young scored a season-high 26 points to spark a huge effort from the leagues most productive bench, and Los Angeles beat the Brooklyn Nets 99-94 on Wednesday night after blowing a 27-point lead. LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- The Russian mens quadruple sculls team has been disqualified from the Rio de Janeiro Olympics for a doping violation, and will be replaced at the games by New Zealand, world rowings ruling body announced Thursday.The World Rowing Federation says that trimetazidine, a banned substance, was found in a urine sample given by rower Sergei Fedorovtsev in an out-of-competition test on May 17.He competed a week later at the final Olympic qualifying regatta in Switzerland, where Russia finished first to qualify for Rio.As Fedorovtsev, who won a gold medal in quadruple sculls at the 2004 Athens Olympics, had provided a positive doping test, the federation said that the results of all competitions in which the rower participated after 17 May 2016 are therefore automatically disqualified.New Zealand, which finished third behind Russia and Canada in the qualifying event, will replace the Russian crew in Rio. Canada also qualified by finishing second, joining the top eight crews who secured their Olympic places at the 2015 world championships, held in France.The disqualification of the rowers is just the latest doping scandal involving Russia ahead of Rio.ddddddddddddussias track and field athletes have already be banned from competing for their country for a systematic doping system that operated from the top down and tainted the entire team.The IAAF, tracks world governing body, upheld a ban on Russias track and field federation, but left open a tiny crack that would allow any individual Russian athletes who have been untainted by doping and have been subjected to effective testing outside Russia to apply to compete in the games.Russia, along with Kazakhstan and Belarus, also faces a possible one-year suspension from international weightlifting competition following the retesting of samples from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics.The International Weightlifting Federation said the final decisions on whether the countries will be allowed to compete at Rio will be made after the International Olympic Committee makes a definitive ruling on the retests.Russia is one of six countries that have already had some of their quota places for Rio withdrawn by the IWF. 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