title: Kidney stone disease

text: Calcium binds with available oxalate in the gastrointestinal tract, thereby preventing its absorption into the bloodstream. Reducing oxalate absorption decreases kidney stone risk in susceptible people. Because of this, some doctors recommend increasing dairy intake so that its calcium content will serve as an oxalate binder. Taking calcium citrate tablets during or after meals containing high oxalate foods may be useful if dietary calcium cannot be increased by other means as in those with lactose intolerance. The preferred calcium supplement for people at risk of stone formation is calcium citrate, as opposed to calcium carbonate, because it helps to increase urinary citrate excretion.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Aside from vigorous oral hydration and eating more dietary calcium, other prevention strategies include avoidance of higher doses of supplemental (since ascorbate is metabolized to oxalate) and restriction of oxalate-rich foods such as leaf vegetables, rhubarb, soy products and chocolate. However, no randomized, controlled trial of oxalate restriction has been performed to test the hypothesis that oxalate restriction reduces stone formation. Some evidence indicates magnesium intake decreases the risk of symptomatic kidney stones.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The mainstay for medical management of uric acid stones is alkalinization (increasing the pH) of the urine. Uric acid stones are among the few types amenable to dissolution therapy, referred to as chemolysis. Chemolysis is usually achieved through the use of oral medications, although in some cases, intravenous agents or even instillation of certain irrigating agents directly onto the stone can be performed, using antegrade nephrostomy or retrograde ureteral catheters. Acetazolamide is a medication that alkalinizes the urine. In addition to acetazolamide or as an alternative, certain dietary supplements are available that produce a similar alkalinization of the urine. These include alkali citrate, sodium bicarbonate, potassium citrate, magnesium citrate, and Bicitra (a combination of citric acid monohydrate and sodium citrate dihydrate). Aside from alkalinization of the urine, these supplements have the added advantage of increasing the urinary citrate level, which helps to reduce the aggregation of calcium oxalate stones.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Increasing the urine pH to around 6.5 provides optimal conditions for dissolution of uric acid stones. Increasing the urine pH to a value higher than 7.0 may increase the risk of calcium phosphate stone formation, though this concept is controversial since citrate does inhibit calcium phosphate crystallization. Testing the urine periodically with nitrazine paper can help to ensure the urine pH remains in this optimal range. Using this approach, stone dissolution rate can be expected to be around of stone radius per month.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: It decreases urinary calcium when combined with food rich in oxalic acid such as green leafy vegetables.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: One of the recognized medical therapies for prevention of stones is the thiazide and thiazide-like diuretics, such as chlorthalidone or indapamide. These drugs inhibit the formation of calcium-containing stones by reducing urinary calcium excretion. Sodium restriction is necessary for clinical effect of thiazides, as sodium excess promotes calcium excretion. Thiazides work best for renal leak hypercalciuria (high urine calcium levels), a condition in which high urinary calcium levels are caused by a primary kidney defect. Thiazides are useful for treating absorptive hypercalciuria, a condition in which high urinary calcium is a result of excess absorption from the gastrointestinal tract.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: For people with hyperuricosuria and calcium stones, allopurinol is one of the few treatments that have been shown to reduce kidney stone recurrences. Allopurinol interferes with the production of uric acid in the liver. The drug is also used in people with gout or hyperuricemia (high serum uric acid levels). Dosage is adjusted to maintain a reduced urinary excretion of uric acid. Serum uric acid level at or below 6 mg/100 mL is often a therapeutic goal. Hyperuricemia is not necessary for the formation of uric acid stones; hyperuricosuria can occur in the presence of normal or even low serum uric acid. Some practitioners advocate adding allopurinol only in people in whom hyperuricosuria and hyperuricemia persist, despite the use of a urine-alkalinizing agent such as sodium bicarbonate or potassium citrate.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Stone size influences the rate of spontaneous stone passage. For example, up to 98% of small stones (less than in diameter) may pass spontaneously through urination within four weeks of the onset of symptoms, but for larger stones ( in diameter), the rate of spontaneous passage decreases to less than 53%. Initial stone location also influences the likelihood of spontaneous stone passage. Rates increase from 48% for stones located in the proximal ureter to 79% for stones located at the vesicoureteric junction, regardless of stone size. Assuming no high-grade obstruction or associated infection is found in the urinary tract, and symptoms are relatively mild, various nonsurgical measures can be used to encourage the passage of a stone. Repeat stone formers benefit from more intense management, including proper fluid intake and use of certain medications, as well as careful monitoring.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Management of pain often requires intravenous administration of NSAIDs or opioids. NSAIDs appear somewhat better than opioids or paracetamol in those with normal kidney function. Medications by mouth are often effective for less severe discomfort. The use of antispasmodics does not have further benefit.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The use of medications to speed the spontaneous passage of stones in the ureter is referred to as medical expulsive therapy. Several agents, including alpha adrenergic blockers (such as tamsulosin) and calcium channel blockers (such as nifedipine), may be effective. Alpha-blockers likely result in more people passing their stones, and they may pass their stones in a shorter time. People taking alpha-blockers may also use less pain medication and may not need to visit the hospital. Alpha-blockers appear to be more effective for larger stones (over 5 mm in size) than smaller stones. However, use of alpha-blockers may be associated with a slight increase in serious, unwanted effects from this medication. A combination of tamsulosin and a corticosteroid may be better than tamsulosin alone. These treatments also appear to be useful in addition to lithotripsy.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL) is a noninvasive technique for the removal of kidney stones. Most ESWL is carried out when the stone is present near the renal pelvis. ESWL involves the use of a lithotriptor machine to deliver externally applied, focused, high-intensity pulses of ultrasonic energy to cause fragmentation of a stone over a period of around 30–60 minutes. Following its introduction in the United States in February 1984, ESWL was rapidly and widely accepted as a treatment alternative for renal and ureteral stones. It is currently used in the treatment of uncomplicated stones located in the kidney and upper ureter, provided the aggregate stone burden (stone size and number) is less than and the anatomy of the involved kidney is normal.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: For a stone greater than , ESWL may not help break the stone in one treatment; instead, two or three treatments may be needed. Some 80-85% of simple renal calculi can be effectively treated with ESWL. A number of factors can influence its efficacy, including chemical composition of the stone, presence of anomalous renal anatomy and the specific location of the stone within the kidney, presence of hydronephrosis, body mass index, and distance of the stone from the surface of the skin.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Common adverse effects of ESWL include acute trauma, such as bruising at the site of shock administration, and damage to blood vessels of the kidney. In fact, the vast majority of people who are treated with a typical dose of shock waves using currently accepted treatment settings are likely to experience some degree of acute kidney injury. ESWL-induced acute kidney injury is dose-dependent (increases with the total number of shock waves administered and with the power setting of the lithotriptor) and can be severe, including internal bleeding and subcapsular hematomas. On rare occasions, such cases may require blood transfusion and even lead to acute kidney failure. Hematoma rates may be related to the type of lithotriptor used; hematoma rates of less than 1% and up to 13% have been reported for different lithotriptor machines. Recent studies show reduced acute tissue injury when the treatment protocol includes a brief pause following the initiation of treatment, and both improved stone breakage and a reduction in injury when ESWL is carried out at slow shock wave rate.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: In addition to the aforementioned potential for acute kidney injury, animal studies suggest these acute injuries may progress to scar formation, resulting in loss of functional renal volume. Recent prospective studies also indicate elderly people are at increased risk of developing new-onset hypertension following ESWL. In addition, a retrospective case-control study published by researchers from the Mayo Clinic in 2006 has found an increased risk of developing diabetes mellitus and hypertension in people who had undergone ESWL, compared with age and gender-matched people who had undergone nonsurgical treatment. Whether or not acute trauma progresses to long-term effects probably depends on multiple factors that include the shock wave dose (i.e., the number of shock waves delivered, rate of delivery, power setting, acoustic characteristics of the particular lithotriptor, and frequency of retreatment), as well as certain intrinsic predisposing pathophysiologic risk factors.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: To address these concerns, the American Urological Association established the Shock Wave Lithotripsy Task Force to provide an expert opinion on the safety and risk-benefit ratio of ESWL. The task force published a white paper outlining their conclusions in 2009. They concluded the risk-benefit ratio remains favorable for many people. The advantages of ESWL include its noninvasive nature, the fact that it is technically easy to treat most upper urinary tract calculi, and that, at least acutely, it is a well-tolerated, low-morbidity treatment for the vast majority of people. However, they recommended slowing the shock wave firing rate from 120 pulses per minute to 60 pulses per minute to reduce the risk of renal injury and increase the degree of stone fragmentation.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Alpha-blockers are sometimes prescribed after shock wave lithotripsy to help the pieces of the stone leave the person's body. By relaxing muscles and helping to keep blood vessels open, alpha blockers may relax the ureter muscles to allow the kidney stone fragments to pass. When compared to usual care or placebo treatment, alpha blockers may lead to faster clearing of stones, a reduced need for extra treatment and fewer unwanted effects. They may also clear kidney stones in more adults than the standard shock wave lithotripsy procedure. The unwanted effects associated with alpha blockers are hospital emergency visits and return to hospital for stone-related issues, but these effects were more common in adults who did not receive alpha-blockers as a part of their treatment.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Most stones under pass spontaneously. Prompt surgery may, nonetheless, be required in persons with only one working kidney, bilateral obstructing stones, a urinary tract infection and thus, it is presumed, an infected kidney, or intractable pain. Beginning in the mid-1980s, less invasive treatments such as extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy, ureteroscopy, and percutaneous nephrolithotomy began to replace open surgery as the modalities of choice for the surgical management of urolithiasis. More recently, flexible ureteroscopy has been adapted to facilitate retrograde nephrostomy creation for percutaneous nephrolithotomy. This approach is still under investigation, though early results are favorable. Percutaneous nephrolithotomy or, rarely, anatrophic nephrolithotomy, is the treatment of choice for large or complicated stones (such as calyceal staghorn calculi) or stones that cannot be extracted using less invasive procedures.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Ureteroscopy has become increasingly popular as flexible and rigid fiberoptic ureteroscopes have become smaller. One ureteroscopic technique involves the placement of a ureteral stent (a small tube extending from the bladder, up the ureter and into the kidney) to provide immediate relief of an obstructed kidney. Stent placement can be useful for saving a kidney at risk for postrenal acute kidney failure due to the increased hydrostatic pressure, swelling and infection (pyelonephritis and pyonephrosis) caused by an obstructing stone. Ureteral stents vary in length from and most have a shape commonly referred to as a "double-J" or "double pigtail", because of the curl at both ends. They are designed to allow urine to flow past an obstruction in the ureter. They may be retained in the ureter for days to weeks as infections resolve and as stones are dissolved or fragmented by ESWL or by some other treatment. The stents dilate the ureters, which can facilitate instrumentation, and they also provide a clear landmark to aid in the visualization of the ureters and any associated stones on radiographic examinations. The presence of indwelling ureteral stents may cause minimal to moderate discomfort, frequency or urgency incontinence, and infection, which in general resolves on removal. Most ureteral stents can be removed cystoscopically during an office visit under topical anesthesia after resolution of urolithiasis. Research is currently uncertain if placing a temporary stent during ureteroscopy leads to different outcomes than not placing a stent in terms of number of hospital visits for post operative problems, short or long term pain, need for narcotic pain medication, risk of UTI, need for a repeat procedure or narrowing of the ureter from scarring.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: More definitive ureteroscopic techniques for stone extraction (rather than simply bypassing the obstruction) include basket extraction and ultrasound ureterolithotripsy. Laser lithotripsy is another technique, which involves the use of a holmium:yttrium aluminium garnet (Ho:YAG) laser to fragment stones in the bladder, ureters, and kidneys.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Ureteroscopic techniques are generally more effective than ESWL for treating stones located in the lower ureter, with success rates of 93–100% using Ho:YAG laser lithotripsy. Although ESWL has been traditionally preferred by many practitioners for treating stones located in the upper ureter, more recent experience suggests ureteroscopic techniques offer distinct advantages in the treatment of upper ureteral stones. Specifically, the overall success rate is higher, fewer repeat interventions and postoperative visits are needed, and treatment costs are lower after ureteroscopic treatment when compared with ESWL. These advantages are especially apparent with stones greater than in diameter. However, because ureteroscopy of the upper ureter is much more challenging than ESWL, many urologists still prefer to use ESWL as a first-line treatment for stones of less than 10 mm, and ureteroscopy for those greater than 10 mm in diameter. Ureteroscopy is the preferred treatment in pregnant and morbidly obese people, as well as those with bleeding disorders.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Kidney stones affect all geographical, cultural, and racial groups. The lifetime risk is about 10-15% in the developed world, but can be as high as 20-25% in the Middle East. The increased risk of dehydration in hot climates, coupled with a diet 50% lower in calcium and 250% higher in oxalates compared to Western diets, accounts for the higher net risk in the Middle East. In the Middle East, uric acid stones are more common than calcium-containing stones. The number of deaths due to kidney stones is estimated at 19,000 per year being fairly consistent between 1990 and 2010.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: In North America and Europe, the annual number of new cases per year of kidney stones is roughly 0.5%. In the United States, the frequency in the population of urolithiasis has increased from 3.2% to 5.2% from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s. In the United States, about 9% of the population has had a kidney stone.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The total cost for treating urolithiasis was US$2 billion in 2003. About 65–80% of those with kidney stones are men; most stones in women are due to either metabolic defects (such as cystinuria) or infections in the case of struvite stones. Urinary tract calculi disorders are more common in men than in women. Men most commonly experience their first episode between 30 and 40 years of age, whereas for women, the age at first presentation is somewhat later. The age of onset shows a bimodal distribution in women, with episodes peaking at 35 and 55 years. Recurrence rates are estimated at 50% over a 10-year and 75% over 20-year period, with some people experiencing ten or more episodes over the course of a lifetime.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The existence of kidney stones was first recorded thousands of years ago, with various explanations given; Joseph Glanville's "Saducismus Triumphatus," for example, gives a detailed description of Abraham Mechelburg's voiding of small stones through his penis' virga, attributing the issue to witchcraft.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Medical texts from ancient Mesopotamia, India, China, Persia, Greece, and Rome all mentioned calculous disease. Part of the Hippocratic Oath suggests there were practicing surgeons in ancient Greece to whom physicians were to defer for lithotomies, or the surgical removal of stones. The Roman medical treatise "De Medicina" by Aulus Cornelius Celsus contained a description of lithotomy, and this work served as the basis for this procedure until the 18th century.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Examples of people who had kidney stone disease include Napoleon I, Epicurus, Napoleon III, Peter the Great, Louis XIV, George IV, Oliver Cromwell, Lyndon B. Johnson, Benjamin Franklin, Michel de Montaigne, Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton, Samuel Pepys, William Harvey, Herman Boerhaave, and Antonio Scarpa.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: New techniques in lithotomy began to emerge starting in 1520, but the operation remained risky. After Henry Jacob Bigelow popularized the technique of litholapaxy in 1878, the mortality rate dropped from about 24% to 2.4%. However, other treatment techniques continued to produce a high level of mortality, especially among inexperienced urologists. In 1980, Dornier MedTech introduced extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy for breaking up stones via acoustical pulses, and this technique has since come into widespread use.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The term "renal calculus" is from the Latin "rēnēs", meaning "kidneys", and "calculus", meaning "pebble". Lithiasis (stone formation) in the kidneys is called nephrolithiasis (), from "nephro-", meaning kidney, + "-lith", meaning stone, and "-iasis", meaning disorder. A distinction between nephrolithiasis and urolithiasis can be made because not all urinary stones (uroliths) form in the kidney; they can also form in the bladder. But the distinction is often clinically irrelevant (with similar disease process and treatment either way) and the words are thus often used loosely as synonyms.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Although kidney stones do not often occur in children, the incidence is increasing. These stones are in the kidney in two thirds of reported cases, and in the ureter in the remaining cases. Older children are at greater risk independent of whether or not they are male or female.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: As with adults, most pediatric kidney stones are predominantly composed of calcium oxalate; struvite and calcium phosphate stones are less common. Calcium oxalate stones in children are associated with high amounts of calcium, oxalate, and magnesium in acidic urine.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Treatment of kidney stones in children are similar to treatments for adults including: shock wave lithotripsy, medication, and treatment using scope through the bladder, kidney or skin. Of these treatments, research is uncertain if shock waves are more effective than medication or a scope through the bladder, but it is likely less successful than a scope through skin into the kidney. When going in with a scope through the kidney, a regular and a mini-sized scope likely have similar success rates of stone removal. Alpha-blockers, a type of medication, may increase the successful removal of kidney stones when compared with a placebo and without ibuprofen.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Metabolic syndrome and its associated diseases of obesity and diabetes as general risk factors for kidney stone disease are under research to determine if urinary excretion of calcium, oxalate and urate are higher than in people with normal weight or underweight, and if diet and physical activity have roles. Dietary, fluid intake, and lifestyle factors remain major topics for research on prevention of kidney stones, as of 2017.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: The gut microbiota has been explored as a contributing factor for stone disease, indicating that some bacteria may be different in people forming kidney stones. One bacterium, "Oxalobacter formigenes", is potentially beneficial for mitigating calcium oxalate stones because of its ability to metabolize oxalate as its sole carbon source, but 2018 research suggests that it is instead part of a network of oxalate degrading bacteria. Additionally, one study found that oral antibiotic use, which alters the gut microbiota, can increase the odds of a person developing a kidney stone.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Among ruminants, uroliths more commonly cause problems in males than in females; the sigmoid flexure of the ruminant male urinary tract is more likely to obstruct passage. Early-castrated males are at greater risk, because of lesser urethral diameter.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Low Ca:P intake ratio is conducive to phosphatic (e.g. struvite) urolith formation. Incidence among wether lambs can be minimized by maintaining a dietary Ca:P intake ratio of 2:1.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Alkaline (higher) pH favors formation of carbonate and phosphate calculi. For domestic ruminants, dietary cation: anion balance is sometimes adjusted to assure a slightly acidic urine pH, for prevention of calculus formation.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Differing generalizations regarding effects of pH on formation of silicate uroliths may be found. In this connection, it may be noted that under some circumstances, calcium carbonate accompanies silica in siliceous uroliths.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Pelleted feeds may be conducive to formation of phosphate uroliths, because of increased urinary phosphorus excretion. This is attributable to lower saliva production where pelleted rations containing finely ground constituents are fed. With less blood phosphate partitioned into saliva, more tends to be excreted in urine. (Most saliva phosphate is fecally excreted.)


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Oxalate uroliths can occur in ruminants, although such problems from oxalate ingestion may be relatively uncommon. Ruminant urolithiasis associated with oxalate ingestion has been reported. However, no renal tubular damage or visible deposition of calcium oxalate crystals in kidneys was found in yearling wether sheep fed diets containing soluble oxalate at 6.5 percent of dietary dry matter for about 100 days.


title: Kidney stone disease

text: Various surgical interventions, e.g. amputation of the urethral process at its base near the glans penis in male ruminants, perineal urethrostomy, or tube cystostomy may be considered for relief of obstructive urolithiasis.


title: Lp space

text: In mathematics, the spaces are function spaces defined using a natural generalization of the -norm for finite-dimensional vector spaces. They are sometimes called Lebesgue spaces, named after Henri Lebesgue , although according to the Bourbaki group they were first introduced by Frigyes Riesz . spaces form an important class of Banach spaces in functional analysis, and of topological vector spaces. Because of their key role in the mathematical analysis of measure and probability spaces, Lebesgue spaces are used also in the theoretical discussion of problems in physics, statistics, economics, finance, engineering, and other disciplines.


title: Lp space

text: In statistics, measures of central tendency and statistical dispersion, such as the mean, median, and standard deviation, are defined in terms of metrics, and measures of central tendency can be characterized as solutions to variational problems.


title: Lp space

text: In penalized regression, "L1 penalty" and "L2 penalty" refer to penalizing either the norm of a solution's vector of parameter values (i.e. the sum of its absolute values), or its norm (its Euclidean length). Techniques which use an L1 penalty, like LASSO, encourage solutions where many parameters are zero. Techniques which use an L2 penalty, like ridge regression, encourage solutions where most parameter values are small. Elastic net regularization uses a penalty term that is a combination of the norm and the norm of the parameter vector.


title: Lp space

text: The Fourier transform for the real line (or, for periodic functions, see Fourier series), maps to (or to ) respectively, where and This is a consequence of the Riesz–Thorin interpolation theorem, and is made precise with the Hausdorff–Young inequality.


title: Lp space

text: Hilbert spaces are central to many applications, from quantum mechanics to stochastic calculus. The spaces and are both Hilbert spaces. In fact, by choosing a Hilbert basis , i.e., a maximal orthonormal subset of or any Hilbert space, one sees that every Hilbert space is isometrically isomorphic to (same as above), i.e., a Hilbert space of type .


title: Lp space

text: The Euclidean distance between two points and is the length of the straight line between the two points. In many situations, the Euclidean distance is insufficient for capturing the actual distances in a given space. An analogy to this is suggested by taxi drivers in a grid street plan who should measure distance not in terms of the length of the straight line to their destination, but in terms of the rectilinear distance, which takes into account that streets are either orthogonal or parallel to each other. The class of -norms generalizes these two examples and has an abundance of applications in many parts of mathematics, physics, and computer science.


title: Lp space

text: The absolute value bars can be dropped when is a rational number with an even numerator in its reduced form, and is drawn from the set of real numbers, or one of its subsets.


title: Lp space

text: The Euclidean norm from above falls into this class and is the -norm, and the -norm is the norm that corresponds to the rectilinear distance.


title: Lp space

text: The -norm or maximum norm (or uniform norm) is the limit of the -norms for . It turns out that this limit is equivalent to the following definition:


title: Lp space

text: For all , the -norms and maximum norm as defined above indeed satisfy the properties of a "length function" (or norm), which are that:


title: Lp space

text: Abstractly speaking, this means that together with the -norm is a normed vector space. Moreover, it turns out that this space is complete, thus making it a Banach space. This Banach space is the -space over }.


title: Lp space

text: The grid distance or rectilinear distance (sometimes called the "Manhattan distance") between two points is never shorter than the length of the line segment between them (the Euclidean or "as the crow flies" distance). Formally, this means that the Euclidean norm of any vector is bounded by its 1-norm:


title: Lp space

text: This inequality depends on the dimension of the underlying vector space and follows directly from the Cauchy–Schwarz inequality.


title: Lp space

text: defines an absolutely homogeneous function for ; however, the resulting function does not define a norm, because it is not subadditive. On the other hand, the formula


title: Lp space

text: defines a subadditive function at the cost of losing absolute homogeneity. It does define an F-norm, though, which is homogeneous of degree .


title: Lp space

text: Although the -unit ball around the origin in this metric is "concave", the topology defined on by the metric is the usual vector space topology of , hence is a locally convex topological vector space. Beyond this qualitative statement, a quantitative way to measure the lack of convexity of is to denote by the smallest constant such that the multiple of the -unit ball contains the convex hull of , equal to . The fact that for fixed we have


title: Lp space

text: The mathematical definition of the norm was established by Banach's "Theory of Linear Operations". The space of sequences has a complete metric topology provided by the F-norm


title: Lp space

text: which is discussed by Stefan Rolewicz in "Metric Linear Spaces". The -normed space is studied in functional analysis, probability theory, and harmonic analysis.


title: Lp space

text: Another function was called the "norm" by David Donoho—whose quotation marks warn that this function is not a proper norm—is the number of non-zero entries of the vector . Many authors abuse terminology by omitting the quotation marks. Defining , the zero "norm" of is equal to


title: Lp space

text: This is not a norm because it is not homogeneous. For example, scaling the vector by a positive constant does not change the "norm". Despite these defects as a mathematical norm, the non-zero counting "norm" has uses in scientific computing, information theory, and statistics–notably in compressed sensing in signal processing and computational harmonic analysis. Despite not being a norm, the associated metric, known as Hamming distance, is a valid distance, since homogeneity is not required for distances.


title: Lp space

text: The -norm can be extended to vectors that have an infinite number of components (sequences), which yields the space . This contains as special cases:


title: Lp space

text: The space of sequences has a natural vector space structure by applying addition and scalar multiplication coordinate by coordinate. Explicitly, the vector sum and the scalar action for infinite sequences of real (or complex) numbers are given by:


title: Lp space

text: Here, a complication arises, namely that the series on the right is not always convergent, so for example, the sequence made up of only ones, , will have an infinite -norm for . The space is then defined as the set of all infinite sequences of real (or complex) numbers such that the -norm is finite.


title: Lp space

text: if the right-hand side is finite, or the left-hand side is infinite. Thus, we will consider spaces for .


title: Lp space

text: The -norm thus defined on is indeed a norm, and together with this norm is a Banach space. The fully general space is obtained—as seen below—by considering vectors, not only with finitely or countably-infinitely many components, but with ""arbitrarily many components""; in other words, functions. An integral instead of a sum is used to define the -norm.


title: Lp space

text: In complete analogy to the preceding definition one can define the space formula_19 over a general index set formula_20 (and formula_21) as


title: Lp space

text: where convergence on the right means that only countably many summands are nonzero (see also Unconditional convergence).


title: Lp space

text: In the case where formula_20 is finite with formula_26 elements, this construction yields with the formula_27-norm defined above.


title: Lp space

text: For uncountable sets formula_20 this is a non-separable Banach space which can be seen as the locally convex direct limit of formula_29-sequence spaces.


title: Lp space

text: For formula_32 the formula_33-norm is even induced by a canonical inner product formula_34 called the "", which means that formula_35 holds for all vectors formula_36 This inner product can expressed in terms of the norm by using the polarization identity.


title: Lp space

text: while for the space formula_39 associated with a measure space formula_40 which consists of all square-integrable functions, it is


title: Lp space

text: The index set formula_20 can be turned into a measure space by giving it the discrete σ-algebra and the counting measure. Then the space formula_19 is just a special case of the more general formula_47-space (see below).


title: Lp space

text: An space may be defined as a space of measurable functions for which the formula_27-th power of the absolute value is Lebesgue integrable, where functions which agree almost everywhere are identified. More generally, let and be a measure space. Consider the set of all measurable functions from to or whose absolute value raised to the -th power has a finite integral, or equivalently, that


title: Lp space

text: That the sum of two -th power integrable functions is again -th power integrable follows from the inequality


title: Lp space

text: In fact, more is true. "Minkowski's inequality" says the triangle inequality holds for . Thus the set of -th power integrable functions, together with the function , is a seminormed vector space, which is denoted by formula_54.


title: Lp space

text: For , the space formula_55 is the space of measurable functions bounded almost everywhere, with (when μ(X)≠0) the essential supremum of its absolute value as a norm:


title: Lp space

text: formula_54 can be made into a normed vector space in a standard way; one simply takes the quotient space with respect to the subspace of functions whose p-norm is zero. Since for any measurable function , we have that if and only if almost everywhere, that subspace does not depend upon ,


title: Lp space

text: In the quotient space, two functions and are identified if almost everywhere. The resulting normed vector space is, by definition,


title: Lp space

text: In general, this process cannot be reversed: there is no consistent way to define a "canonical" representative of each coset of formula_61 in formula_47. For formula_63, however, there is a theory of lifts enabling such recovery.


title: Lp space

text: For is a Banach space. The fact that is complete is often referred to as the Riesz-Fischer theorem, and can be proven using the convergence theorems for Lebesgue integrals.


title: Lp space

text: Similar to the spaces, is the only Hilbert space among spaces. In the complex case, the inner product on is defined by


title: Lp space

text: The additional inner product structure allows for a richer theory, with applications to, for instance, Fourier series and quantum mechanics. Functions in are sometimes called square-integrable functions, quadratically integrable functions or square-summable functions, but sometimes these terms are reserved for functions that are square-integrable in some other sense, such as in the sense of a Riemann integral .


title: Lp space

text: If we use complex-valued functions, the space is a commutative C*-algebra with pointwise multiplication and conjugation. For many measure spaces, including all sigma-finite ones, it is in fact a commutative von Neumann algebra. An element of defines a bounded operator on any space by multiplication.


title: Lp space

text: For the spaces are a special case of spaces, when , and is the counting measure on . More generally, if one considers any set with the counting measure, the resulting space is denoted . For example, the space is the space of all sequences indexed by the integers, and when defining the -norm on such a space, one sums over all the integers. The space , where is the set with elements, is with its -norm as defined above. As any Hilbert space, every space is linearly isometric to a suitable , where the cardinality of the set is the cardinality of an arbitrary Hilbertian basis for this particular .


title: Lp space

text: The dual space (the Banach space of all continuous linear functionals) of for has a natural isomorphism with , where is such that (i.e. ). This isomorphism associates with the functional defined by


title: Lp space

text: The fact that is well defined and continuous follows from Hölder's inequality. is a linear mapping which is an isometry by the extremal case of Hölder's inequality. It is also possible to show (for example with the Radon–Nikodym theorem, see) that any can be expressed this way: i.e., that is "onto". Since is onto and isometric, it is an isomorphism of Banach spaces. With this (isometric) isomorphism in mind, it is usual to say simply that is the dual Banach space of .


title: Lp space

text: For , the space is reflexive. Let be as above and let be the corresponding linear isometry. Consider the map from to , obtained by composing with the transpose (or adjoint) of the inverse of :


title: Lp space

text: This map coincides with the canonical embedding of into its bidual. Moreover, the map is onto, as composition of two onto isometries, and this proves reflexivity.


title: Lp space

text: If the measure on is sigma-finite, then the dual of is isometrically isomorphic to (more precisely, the map corresponding to is an isometry from onto ).


title: Lp space

text: The dual of is subtler. Elements of can be identified with bounded signed "finitely" additive measures on that are absolutely continuous with respect to . See ba space for more details. If we assume the axiom of choice, this space is much bigger than except in some trivial cases. However, Saharon Shelah proved that there are relatively consistent extensions of Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory (ZF + DC + "Every subset of the real numbers has the Baire property") in which the dual of is .


title: Lp space

text: Colloquially, if , then contains functions that are more locally singular, while elements of can be more spread out. Consider the Lebesgue measure on the half line . A continuous function in might blow up near but must decay sufficiently fast toward infinity. On the other hand, continuous functions in need not decay at all but no blow-up is allowed. The precise technical result is the following. Suppose that . Then:


title: Lp space

text: Neither condition holds for the real line with the Lebesgue measure. In both cases the embedding is continuous, in that the identity operator is a bounded linear map from


title: Lp space

text: The constant appearing in the above inequality is optimal, in the sense that the operator norm of the identity is precisely


title: Lp space

text: where is scalar, has finite measure and formula_72 is the indicator function of the set formula_73, for . By construction of the integral, the vector space of integrable simple functions is dense in .


title: Lp space

text: More can be said when is a normal topological space and its Borel –algebra, i.e., the smallest –algebra of subsets of containing the open sets.


title: Lp space

text: Suppose is an open set with . It can be proved that for every Borel set contained in , and for every , there exist a closed set and an open set such that


title: Lp space

text: If can be covered by an increasing sequence of open sets that have finite measure, then the space of –integrable continuous functions is dense in . More precisely, one can use bounded continuous functions that vanish outside one of the open sets .


title: Lp space

text: This applies in particular when and when is the Lebesgue measure. The space of continuous and compactly supported functions is dense in . Similarly, the space of integrable "step functions" is dense in ; this space is the linear span of indicator functions of bounded intervals when , of bounded rectangles when and more generally of products of bounded intervals.


title: Lp space

text: Several properties of general functions in are first proved for continuous and compactly supported functions (sometimes for step functions), then extended by density to all functions. For example, it is proved this way that translations are continuous on , in the following sense:


title: Lp space

text: Let be a measure space. If , then can be defined as above: it is the vector space of those measurable functions such that


title: Lp space

text: As before, we may introduce the -norm , but does not satisfy the triangle inequality in this case, and defines only a quasi-norm. The inequality , valid for implies that


title: Lp space

text: is a metric on . The resulting metric space is complete; the verification is similar to the familiar case when .


title: Lp space

text: This result may be used to prove Clarkson's inequalities, which are in turn used to establish the uniform convexity of the spaces for .


title: Lp space

text: The space for is an F-space: it admits a complete translation-invariant metric with respect to which the vector space operations are continuous. It is also locally bounded, much like the case . It is the prototypical example of an F-space that, for most reasonable measure spaces, is not locally convex: in or , every open convex set containing the function is unbounded for the -quasi-norm; therefore, the vector does not possess a fundamental system of convex neighborhoods. Specifically, this is true if the measure space contains an infinite family of disjoint measurable sets of finite positive measure.


title: Lp space

text: The only nonempty convex open set in is the entire space . As a particular consequence, there are no nonzero linear functionals on : the dual space is the zero space. In the case of the counting measure on the natural numbers (producing the sequence space ), the bounded linear functionals on are exactly those that are bounded on , namely those given by sequences in . Although does contain non-trivial convex open sets, it fails to have enough of them to give a base for the topology.


title: Lp space

text: The situation of having no linear functionals is highly undesirable for the purposes of doing analysis. In the case of the Lebesgue measure on , rather than work with for , it is common to work with the Hardy space whenever possible, as this has quite a few linear functionals: enough to distinguish points from one another. However, the Hahn–Banach theorem still fails in for .


title: Lp space

text: The vector space of (equivalence classes of) measurable functions on is denoted . By definition, it contains all the , and is equipped with the topology of "convergence in measure". When is a probability measure (i.e., ), this mode of convergence is named "convergence in probability".


title: Lp space

text: The description is easier when is finite. If is a finite measure on , the function admits for the convergence in measure the following fundamental system of neighborhoods


title: Lp space

text: where is bounded continuous concave and non-decreasing on , with and when (for example, . Such a metric is called Lévy-metric for . Under this metric the space is complete (it is again an F-space). The space is in general not locally bounded, and not locally convex.


title: Lp space

text: For the infinite Lebesgue measure on , the definition of the fundamental system of neighborhoods could be modified as follows


title: Lp space

text: The resulting space coincides as topological vector space with , for any positive –integrable density .


title: Lp space

text: Let be a measure space, and a measurable function with real or complex values on . The distribution function of is defined for by


title: Lp space

text: Under the convention that two functions are equal if they are equal almost everywhere, then the spaces are complete .


title: Lp space

text: is comparable to the -norm. Further in the case , this expression defines a norm if . Hence for the weak spaces are Banach spaces .


title: Lp space

text: A major result that uses the -spaces is the Marcinkiewicz interpolation theorem, which has broad applications to harmonic analysis and the study of singular integrals.


title: Lp space

text: As before, consider a measure space . Let be a measurable function. The -weighted space is defined as , where means the measure defined by


title: Lp space

text: As -spaces, the weighted spaces have nothing special, since is equal to . But they are the natural framework for several results in harmonic analysis ; they appear for example in the Muckenhoupt theorem: for , the classical Hilbert transform is defined on where denotes the unit circle and the Lebesgue measure; the (nonlinear) Hardy–Littlewood maximal operator is bounded on . Muckenhoupt's theorem describes weights such that the Hilbert transform remains bounded on and the maximal operator on .


title: Lp space

text: One may also define spaces on a manifold, called the intrinsic spaces of the manifold, using densities.


title: Lp space

text: Given a measure space and a locally-convex space , one may also define a spaces of -integrable E-valued functions in a number of ways. The most common of these being the spaces of Bochner integrable and Pettis-integrable functions. Using the tensor product of locally convex spaces, these may be respectively defined as formula_95 and formula_96; where formula_97 and formula_98 respectively denote the projective and injective tensor products of locally convex spaces. When is a nuclear space, Grothendieck showed that these two constructions are indistinguishable.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Lucas Alan Cruikshank (born August 29, 1993) is an American YouTuber and actor who created the character Fred Figglehorn and the associated "Fred" series for his channel on the video-hosting website YouTube in late 2006. These videos are centered on Fred Figglehorn, a fictional six-year-old who has a dysfunctional home life and "anger management issues".


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Lucas Alan Cruikshank was born on August 29, 1993, and raised in Columbus, Nebraska, where he attended Lakeview High School. He is the son of Molly Jeanne (née Duffy) and Dave Alan Cruikshank. He has five sisters and two brothers.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Cruikshank, while testing character ideas, created the Fred character in a Halloween video, and uploaded it to a YouTube channel that he had started with his two cousins. Upon the success of Fred, he started a video series, and set up the Fred channel in April 2008. By April 2009, the channel had over one million subscribers, making it the first YouTube channel to do so, and the most subscribed channel at the time. In December 2009, Cruikshank filmed "", which aired on Nickelodeon in September 2010. Nickelodeon created a franchise surrounding the character, and began producing the sequel in March 2011. "" aired on October 22, 2011, also on Nickelodeon. In 2012, "" aired, consisting of twenty-four 22-minute episodes, and a third movie called "".


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: In the Fred series, Cruikshank promotes various products and movies. He is seen using a Zipit, as well as his own products and T-shirts. In addition to promoting his own movies and albums, Cruikshank has also promoted the movies "City of Ember", "Year One", and "Adventures of Power", and the artist Kev Blaze, by featuring in his song "Watch How I Do This".


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: He made a guest appearance as both "Fred" and himself on Nickelodeon's "iCarly" in "iMeet Fred", which first aired on February 16, 2009.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Cruikshank appeared in the "Hannah Montana" episode "Come Fail Away", which aired December 6, 2009. He appeared at the 2009 Teen Choice Awards as well as the 2010 Kids' Choice Awards presenting awards to winners off-stage. In 2011, he appeared on the Cartoon Network Hall of Game Awards and in an episode of "Supah Ninjas". In 2012 and 2013 he starred as the lead in the Nickelodeon television show "Marvin Marvin", as an alien "teenage" boy adjusting to human life.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Cruikshank was originally a part of JKL Productions, a group comprising twins Jon and Katie Smet and Lucas Cruikshank, their cousin. Cruikshank formally left the group and deleted his individual videos. In January 2009 he set up his own channel, called "lucas", in which he appeared as himself. Between 2013 and 2014, Cruikshank partnered with Jennifer Veal to produce a series of videos on the channel, which was renamed "Lucas and Jenny," adding to the duo's popularity. After Jenny left the channel in November 2014, Cruikshank reverted the channel name back to "lucas" and continued to release vlogs. In April 2019, Cruikshank's channel name was changed to "Lucas", and currently sees over 3 million subscribers as of 2020.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Cruikshank made an appearance on Brandon Rogers' "Four Million Subscriber Freakout" video after the latter gained four million subscribers as of June 2018.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: Cruikshank came out publicly as gay in a YouTube video released August 20, 2013, saying, "I'm gay. I feel so weird saying it on camera. But my family and friends have known for like three years.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: I just haven't felt the need to announce it on the Internet." Cruikshank met his current boyfriend, Australian model Matthew Fawcus, "from afar" at a gay club, and the two were introduced by fellow gay YouTuber Kingsley. The pair have been dating since March 18, 2013.


title: Lucas Cruikshank

text: One of Lucas' brothers, Jacob, also makes videos on YouTube. They regularly collaborate on videos, and have also collaborated on a podcast.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Thomas Billington (5 December 1958 – 5 December 2018), best known by the ring name the Dynamite Kid, was a British professional wrestler.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Trained by former wrestler "Dr Death" Ted Betley, he competed in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), Stampede Wrestling, All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), and New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). With his cousin Davey Boy Smith, he was also known for being one half of the tag team The British Bulldogs.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington is considered by many, including Bret Hart, to have been one of wrestling's most influential in-ring performers, having increased the level of athleticism involved in the art, bringing together styles from Britain, Mexico, Canada and Japan.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington was born in Golborne, Lancashire, England. He had two sisters and a younger brother named Mark. His father Bill and uncle Eric Billington were boxers in their youth and his grandfather Thomas Billington was a bare-knuckle boxer. He was a member of the Billington family. One of his ancestors James Billington was also a wrestler.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Academic work was not a priority to him, but he was drawn to sports at his comprehensive school; his adherence to it, particularly wrestling and gymnastics, helped him develop a relatively small but powerful and agile shape. In addition, he had also received training in boxing during his formative years, which helped instill toughness in him before his career.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington was trained by former wrestler "Dr Death" Ted Betley after a meeting at his fathers work introduced the two. Dynamite Kid made his debut working in 1975 for Max Crabtree. Kid's first match filmed for TV was taped 30 June 1976 in Lincoln (and transmitted 30 October by which time another match against Pete Meredith had been filmed and screened) saw him lose by technical knockout to veteran heel "Strongman" Alan Dennison after injuring his throat on the top ring rope. However, Dennison was so impressed by the technical skill of his young opponent that he refused the win and consequently changed his ways and became a blue-eye and a friend of Kid.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: During his early days, he won the British Lightweight title on 23 April 1977, and the Welterweight title on 25 January 1978. He was also instrumental in starting the career of then-Judo star Chris Adams while still competing in the UK, was scouted and moved to Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1978.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Dynamite made a big impact in his matches for Stampede Wrestling with the increasingly popular Bruce Hart and rookie Bret Hart. Despite differences between them due to comments Dynamite Kid made about Stu Hart in his autobiography, Bret still regards him as "pound-for-pound, the greatest wrestler who ever lived." Dynamite Kid began taking steroids in 1979, when Big Daddy Ritter, aka the Junkyard Dog, introduced Billington to the anabolic steroid Dianabol. Billington was also introduced to speed during his stay in Canada by Jake Roberts.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: After doing big business in Canada, Dynamite was booked on his first tour of Japan, working for International Pro Wrestling from 19–25 July 1979. Stu Hart and Stampede Wrestling switched their business relationship from IPW to New Japan Pro-Wrestling shortly after Dynamite's first tour, and he wrestled for New Japan from 4 January 1980 to 2 August 1984. Perhaps the most memorable matches that came out of Dynamite's run in New Japan were from his now legendary feud against Tiger Mask; Tiger Mask's debut was against Dynamite, in which Tiger Mask shocked the wrestling world by gaining the victory over Dynamite. The two would compete against one another several more times in a feud that is often credited as putting Junior Heavyweight wrestling on the map, as well as setting the standard for future generations. Both the NWA and WWF Junior Heavyweight titles were vacated after Tiger Mask was injured by Dynamite Kid in a tag match on 1 April 1983. Dynamite and Kuniaki Kobayashi competed for the vacant titles, but no winner was decided. On 21 April 1983, Dynamite and Tiger Mask met for the vacant WWF Junior Heavyweight Championship, but no winner was decided after the match ended up as a draw three consecutive times.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In 1983, Kid made his debut to the United States working for Pacific Northwest Wrestling where he feuded with Curt Hennig. Eventually he won the NWA Pacific Northwest Heavyweight title from Hennig on 7 September. A month later he dropped the title from Billy Jack Haynes. Then in November he teamed up with The Assassin and won the Pacific Northwest Tag titles from Curt Hennig and Buddy Rose. A month later they dropped the belts to Hennig and Scott McGhee.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: On 7 February 1984, Billington captured the WWF Junior Heavyweight Championship by winning a tournament in New Japan Pro-Wrestling; although it was a WWF Title, it was primarily defended in Japan. He defeated Davey Boy Smith earlier in the tournament, and would go on to defeat The Cobra in the finals.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Dynamite Kid made his WWF television debut on 29 August 1984, where he and Bret Hart defeated Iron Mike Sharpe and Troy Alexander in a match eventually shown on 15 September 1984, on the Maple Leaf Garden broadcast. In 1985, Billington would end up teaming with Davey Boy Smith as the British Bulldogs, while Bret would turn heel and team with Jim Neidhart as The Hart Foundation, and it led to matches between the two teams that usually ended in No-Contests. On 7 April 1986, accompanied by Captain Lou Albano and Ozzy Osbourne, the British Bulldogs won the WWF World tag team title from Greg Valentine and Brutus Beefcake at WrestleMania II.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Dynamite Kid would suffer a serious injury in a tag-team match that took place in December 1986 in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, against Don Muraco and Bob Orton, Jr. and several wrestlers including Roddy Piper, Junkyard Dog and Billy Jack Haynes would substitute for him when tag title defenses were made. While recovering in the hospital from back surgery, Billington would later recount that Bret Hart showed up and stated that Vince McMahon had sent him to get Dynamite's tag belt; Billington refused. Shortly after checking himself out of the hospital (against doctors' orders), Billington met with McMahon, who requested that the Bulldogs drop the tag titles to the team of The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff; Billington refused, saying that he would only drop the belts to The Hart Foundation.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: McMahon acquiesced and at a TV taping on 26 January 1987, The British Bulldogs wrestled a match to drop the titles to The Hart Foundation; the match would air on 7 February edition of WWF Superstars of Wrestling. The match itself was an odd sight, as Dynamite could barely walk due to back surgery. Dynamite was knocked out by Jimmy Hart's megaphone early in the match, avoiding him having to wrestle much in the match for story purposes. From that point forward, the Bulldogs would not be a top-tier team anymore, and while they would not become straight jobbers, they would mostly wrestle to double disqualifications, double countouts or time-limit draws against the top teams in the WWF.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington was known for being a tough guy and for his stiffness as a worker. Mick Foley reported that, when he and Les Thornton (another British wrestler) wrestled the Bulldogs in a tag-team match early in Foley's career, Billington manhandled him so badly in the ring that he tore a ligament in Foley's jaw with his signature Hook Clothesline, preventing Foley from eating solid food until his recovery. Outside of the ring, WWF-champion Randy Savage once specifically asked for him to watch his back when he went drinking in a hotel bar frequented by NWA wrestlers, including Ric Flair. He was also involved in heated backstage fights with Jacques Rougeau, one of which led to Rougeau hitting him with a fistful of quarters as he opened a door holding a cup of coffee, knocking several of his teeth out. Billington claimed the Rougeau incident was not the final straw that drove him to leave the WWF, but rather a dispute with WWF management over the issuance of complimentary plane tickets, over which he resigned from the company on principle and which to his surprise in retrospect, Smith followed suit.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: The Bulldogs wrestled their last WWF match at the 1988 Survivor Series. Although their team would win the match after team captains The Powers of Pain (The Barbarian and The Warlord) eliminated the last remaining opponents The Conquistadores, the Bulldogs had earlier been eliminated when Billington had been pinned by Smash of the tag team champions Demolition.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: After leaving the WWF, the Bulldogs returned to Stampede Wrestling to win the International Tag Team Titles. The Bulldogs also competed frequently in All-Japan Pro Wrestling where they were paid $20,000 each by Giant Baba, along with the liberty of choosing which tours they wanted to participate in. Upon returning to Stampede, the Bulldogs were involved in a feud with Karachi Vice over the Stampede International Tag Team Championship. However, by February 1989, Dynamite became involved in a brutal feud with Johnny Smith after Johnny interfered and attacked the Dynamite Kid, before cutting his hair. In May 1989, the Bulldogs split up in Stampede, but remained a team in AJPW. Over in Stampede, the Bulldogs feuded with each other, with Dynamite forming The British Bruisers with Johnny Smith and Davey Boy Smith teaming with a young Chris Benoit.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In 1990, Davey Boy Smith abruptly withdrew the Bulldogs from AJPW's annual World's Strongest Tag Determination League by returning to the WWF, and fabricating a story to the All-Japan office that Billington was in a serious car accident and was unable to compete. Back home in the UK, from 1991 onward, he would regularly appear for local promotions All Star Wrestling and Orig Williams' BWF where, due to his WWF success, he was a headline attraction this time around. Since Davey Boy Smith had trademarked the term "The British Bulldog" during the Bulldogs' previous run in WWF, he decided to return to the WWF as The British Bulldog, and would send people to the United Kingdom to warn the promoter every time a flyer was distributed promoting Dynamite Kid as a "British Bulldog".


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Johnny Smith would end up taking Davey Boy Smith's spot in the World's Strongest Tag Determination League, and the duo (known as the British Bruisers) continued to compete in All Japan Pro Wrestling. The duo managed to capture the All Asia Tag Team Championship, but the partnership was short-lived; the years of steroid abuse (including an incident in which he used horse steroids), working a high impact style, and cocaine usage caught up with Billington as he suddenly announced his retirement on 6 December 1991, immediately after the Bruisers defeated Johnny Ace and Sunny Beach at Nippon Budokan in Tokyo. He returned to Japan as a special guest with Lord James Blears on 28 February 1993, and claimed that he was going to send his 17-year-old brother to All Japan's Dojo, but it wasn't realized. He returned again for a tag team match with Johnny Smith on 28 July 1993, and was planning to promote an All-Japan show in his country in 1994, but it wasn't realized either.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Before embarking on another All-Japan tour, he visited Dan Spivey and stayed in his home in Florida for a week, while Spivey went on holiday. When Spivey came back, he and Billington took hits of LSD, which resulted in Billington coming close to death twice in one day, but he was revived with adrenaline shots by paramedics both times.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: His final wrestling match took place on 10 October 1996, at a Michinoku Pro event called "These Days". The match was promoted as a "Legends of High-Flying" six-man tag featuring Dynamite paired with Dos Caras and Kuniaki Kobayashi against The Great Sasuke, Mil Máscaras, and Tiger Mask. Dynamite's body had degenerated to the point where he was "practically skin and bones", as the bottom portion of his tights were very loose. In the end, Dynamite delivered his trademark tombstone piledriver on Great Sasuke, leading Dos Caras to powerbomb Sasuke for the pin. While at the airport to return home on the next day, Dynamite had a second seizure (the first one was in 1987) and was sent to the hospital immediately.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In 1991, he was divorced from his first wife Michelle Smadu (the sister of Bret Hart's then-wife Julie), with whom Billington had one son and two daughters (Marek, Bronwyne and Amaris). Following the end of his marriage to Michelle, he moved from Canada back home to Golborne with his parents. There he married for a second time to a woman named Dot; with her he had three stepsons; John, Steven and Mark. Before his death Billington had two granddaughters, Miami and Taya. He is now survived by two more grandchildren, Madix and Harlow.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington was a close friend of Wayne Hart. When Billington was living in Calgary they co-owned an apartment together where they lived with their respective girlfriends.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington had several violent interactions with fellow wrestlers. One such event was with Bruce Hart, in which Billington broke Hart's jaw.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Another was while in WWF, where wrestler Jacques Rougeau Jr. felt that Billington had bullied him and punched Billington in the face with a fist holding rolled up quarters, knocking out Billington's front teeth.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In 1997, after having a great deal of complications he was experiencing with walking due to the large number of back and leg injuries he suffered during his career, Billington lost the use of his left leg. Using a wheelchair for mobility, he was cared for by his second wife, Dot. Billington was told he would never be able to walk again. Harley Race, the inventor of the diving headbutt (a move Chris Benoit also used frequently), stated prior to his passing that he regretted ever inventing the move due to its ostensible causation of spinal problems, concussions, and that it may have contributed to Billington's disability. In addition to his paralysis, Billington also suffered from heart problems. In November 2013, Billington reportedly suffered a stroke.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In 2015, he was named in a lawsuit filed by WWE after the organization received a letter from him indicating that he intended to sue them for concussion-based injuries sustained during his affiliation with WWE. He was represented by attorney Konstantine Kyros, who is involved in several other lawsuits involving former WWE wrestlers. Billington's lawsuit was dismissed by US District Judge Vanessa Lynne Bryant in September 2018.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington died on 5 December 2018, his 60th birthday. The exact cause of death remains unconfirmed, but the BBC report of his death placed it in the context of the above-mentioned health issues.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington's British training, combined with an aerial arsenal honed during numerous tours in Japan, influenced a generation of later wrestling stars, especially those normally associated with Stu Hart's "Dungeon". A follower was Chris Benoit, who idolized Billington while growing up and adopted a similar moveset that included the swandive headbutt and the Snap suplex.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: In October 2014, Billington was presented with a lifetime achievement award at Gloucester Leisure Centre by Superstars of Wrestling UK.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: The playable character in the Mat Mania/Mania Challenge/Exciting Hour arcade games of the mid 1980s named "Dynamite Tommy" frequently is presumed to be modeled after Billington. In fact, the artwork for the game features the character wearing a championship belt which is almost exactly like the WWF Junior Heavyweight Championship which Billington held.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: Billington's nephews Thomas and Mark have become professional wrestlers, having been trained by Marty Jones and have formed a tag team, The Billington Bulldogs.


title: Dynamite Kid

text: On 16 September 2021, Vice TV aired (as part of their series "Dark Side of the Ring") a retrospective of Billington's life, both in and out of the ring. Included in that program are interviews with Dynamite's widow, daughters, and wrestlers Dan Spivey and WWE Hall of Famer Mick Foley.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Jeffrey Allen "Skunk" Baxter (born December 13, 1948) is an American guitarist, known for his stints in the rock bands Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers during the 1970s and Spirit in the 1980s. More recently, he has worked as a defense consultant and advised U.S. members of Congress on missile defense. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of The Doobie Brothers in 2020.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Jeffrey Baxter was born in Washington, D.C., and spent some of his formative years in Mexico. He graduated from the Taft School in 1967 in Watertown, Connecticut, and was a self-described preppie. At Taft, he played drums in an upperclassmen band, King Thunder and the Lightning Bolts. He enrolled at the School of Public Communication (now College of Communication) at Boston University in September 1967, where he studied journalism while continuing to perform with local bands. His freshman roommate was blues musician James Montgomery.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter joined his first band at age 11. While still a high school student, he worked at Manny's Music Shop in Manhattan in 1966. At Manny's, Baxter met guitarist Jimi Hendrix, who was just beginning his career as a frontman. Later, Baxter claimed to have sat in with the Hendrix-led band Jimmy James and the Blue Flames, when the regular bassist could not make the show. Moving to Boston to attend college, Baxter worked as a guitar technician and amplifier repairman at Jack's Drum Shop on Boylston Street.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter first reached a wide rock audience in 1968 as a member of the psychedelic rock band Ultimate Spinach.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter joined the band for "Ultimate Spinach III", their third and final album. After leaving the band, he played with the Holy Modal Rounders and backed singer Buzzy Linhart. By this time, he was using the moniker "Skunk," although the nickname's origins have been kept secret by Baxter.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: After the breakup of Ultimate Spinach, Baxter relocated to Los Angeles, finding work as a session guitarist.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In 1972, he became a founding member of the band Steely Dan, along with guitarist Denny Dias, guitarist-bassist Walter Becker, keyboardist-vocalist Donald Fagen, drummer Jim Hodder and vocalist David Palmer.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter appeared with Steely Dan on their first three albums, "Can't Buy a Thrill" in 1972, "Countdown to Ecstasy" in 1973, and "Pretzel Logic" in 1974. He contributed the guitar fills and signature solo heard on the group’s highest charting hit "Rikki Don’t Lose That Number."


title: Jeff Baxter

text: While finishing work on "Pretzel Logic", Baxter became aware of Becker and Fagen's intentions to retire Steely Dan from touring and work almost exclusively with session players. With that in mind, Baxter left the band in 1974 to join The Doobie Brothers, who at the time were touring in support of their fourth album "What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits".


title: Jeff Baxter

text: As a session man, he had contributed pedal steel guitar on "Vices" as well as "South City Midnight Lady" on its predecessor, "The Captain and Me". Baxter's first album as a full member of the group was 1975's "Stampede". He contributed an acoustic interlude ("Precis") and significant turns on slide and pedal steel guitar.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: While preparing to tour in support of "Stampede", Doobie Brothers founder Tom Johnston was hospitalized with a stomach ailment. To fill in for Johnston on vocals, Baxter suggested bringing in singer-keyboardist Michael McDonald, with whom Baxter had worked in Steely Dan. With Johnston still convalescing, McDonald soon was invited to join the band full-time. McDonald's vocal and songwriting contributions, as well as Baxter's jazzier guitar style, marked a new direction for the band. They went on to continued success with the 1976 album "Takin' It to the Streets", 1977's "Livin' on the Fault Line", and particularly 1978's "Minute by Minute", which spent five weeks as the #1 album in the U.S. and spawned several hit singles; Baxter's work on the album includes an extended solo at the end of the closing track "How Do the Fools Survive?".


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter has continued working as a session guitarist for a diverse group of artists, including Willy DeVille, Bryan Adams, Hoyt Axton, Eric Clapton, Sean O'Bryan Smith, Gene Clark, Sheryl Crow, Freddie Hubbard, Tim Weisberg, Joni Mitchell, Ricky Nelson, Dolly Parton, Carly Simon, Ringo Starr, Gene Simmons, Rod Stewart, Burton Cummings, Barbra Streisand, and Donna Summer. He has worked as a touring musician for Elton John, Linda Ronstadt, and Billy Vera and the Beaters.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In 1982, he featured on Spirit's album "Spirit of '84," released as "The Thirteenth Dream" outside of the US.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In 1984, Baxter played keyboards with Bobby and the Midnites' Bob Weir, Billy Cobham, Bobby Cochran, Kenny Gradney ("Tigger"), and Dave Garland at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, New Jersey. That same year, he produced and played guitar and synthesizer on the band's album "Where the Beat Meets the Street" on Columbia Records.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In 1990, Baxter joined John Entwistle, Joe Walsh, Keith Emerson, Simon Phillips and relatively unknown vocalist Rick Livingstone in a supergroup called The Best. The group released a live performance video in Japan before disbanding. He also produced two albums for the hard rock band Nazareth, and also produced albums for Carl Wilson, Livingston Taylor, The Ventures, and Nils Lofgren. He was producer on the 1982 Bob Welch album "Eye Contact". In 1991 Baxter also produced a documentary video, "Guitar" (Warner Brothers VHS and LaserDisc), in which he travels the world and interviews guitarists he admires. In 1994 he performed on the video game "Tuneland".


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In the spring of 2003, on a whim at the invitation of close friend and former roommate Larold Rebhun, a recording and mixing engineer, Jeff offered to play guitar and pedal steel on two songs ("55 Chevy" and "Cowboy Boots and 501's") written and recorded at North Hollywood recording studio Glenwood Place by United States Navy SEAL Curt Campbell. These tracks were released on the "Nature of the Beast" album under the name The Eclectic Beast Band.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter continues to do studio work, most recently on tribute albums to Pink Floyd and Aerosmith. In 2012, he appeared on keyboardist Brian Auger's "Language of the Heart", and The Beach Boys' "That's Why God Made the Radio". He also occasionally plays in The Coalition of the Willing, a band comprising Andras Simonyi, Hungarian Ambassador to the United States; Alexander Vershbow, US Ambassador to South Korea; Daniel Poneman, formerly of the United States National Security Council and later the Obama Administration's Deputy Secretary of Energy; and Lincoln Bloomfield Jr., former United States Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs. On June 19, 2007, Baxter jammed with former White House Press Secretary Tony Snow's band Beats Workin' at the Congressional Picnic held on the White House South Lawn.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: JBL's Peter Chaikin interviewed CJ Vanston about his collaboration with Baxter on their forthcoming album "Skunk."


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter appeared on the TV sitcom "What's Happening!!" in the two-part episode "Doobie or Not Doobie" (1978) as a member of the Doobie Brothers.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter worked on the animated TV series "King of the Hill " in 1997, composing songs for three episodes: "Peggy the Boggle Champ", "Hank's Unmentionables Problem", and "Square Peg". Also in 1997, he worked on two other TV series as a composer: "The Blues Brothers Animated Series" and "The Curse of Inferno". He composed for "Shelley Duvall's Bedtime Stories" TV series episode "Bootsie Barker Bites/Ruby the Copycat" in 1993, the "Pee-wee's Playhouse" episode "Tons of Fun" in 1987, and the "Beverly Hills, 90210" episode "The Green Room" in 1990. He is credited on the movie soundtrack for the feature film "Roxanne" (1987) as writer and producer for the songs "Party Tonight" and "Can This Be Love". Other credits include music for "Class of 1984" (1982): "You Better Not Step Out of Line" and as a performer on "Suburbanite". He appeared in the film "Blues Brothers 2000" and can be heard on the cast album.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter has appeared in a number of documentaries, including "Jan & Dean: The Other Beach Boys" (2002), "The History of Rock 'n' Roll" (1995), "American Bandstand's 40th Anniversary Special" (1995), "Emerson" (2013), "Turn It Up!" (2013), "" (2007), "Overnight" (2003), "The Doobie Brothers: Let the Music Play" (2012), "The Making of 'Blues Brothers 2000' " (1998) and "Guitar" (1991).


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter fell into his second profession almost by accident. In the mid-1980s, his interest in music recording technology led him to wonder about hardware and software originally developed for military use, specifically data compression algorithms and large-capacity storage devices.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: His next-door neighbor was a retired engineer who had worked on the Sidewinder missile program. This neighbor bought Baxter a subscription to "Aviation Week" magazine, provoking his interest in additional military-oriented publications and missile defense systems in particular. He became self-taught in this area, and at one point wrote a five-page paper that proposed converting the ship-based anti-aircraft Aegis missile into a rudimentary missile defense system.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: He gave the paper to California Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, and his career as a defense consultant began.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter received a series of security clearances so he could work with classified information. In 1995, Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Curt Weldon, then the chairman of the House Military Research and Development Subcommittee, nominated Baxter to chair the Civilian Advisory Board for Ballistic Missile Defense.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter's work with that panel led to consulting contracts with the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. He consults for the US Department of Defense and the US intelligence community, as well as defense-oriented manufacturers such as Science Applications International Corporation, Northrop Grumman Corp., General Dynamics, and General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc. He has said his unconventional approach to thinking about terrorism, tied to his interest in technology, is a major reason the government sought his assistance.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: "We thought turntables were for playing records until rappers began to use them as instruments, and we thought airplanes were for carrying passengers until terrorists realized they could be used as missiles," Baxter has said. "My big thing is to look at existing technologies and try to see other ways they can be used, which happens in music all the time and happens to be what terrorists are incredibly good at."


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter has also appeared in public debates and as a guest on CNN and Fox News advocating missile defense. He served as a national spokesman for Americans for Missile Defense, a coalition of organizations devoted to the issue.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: In 2000, Baxter considered challenging Representative Brad Sherman for the 24th Congressional District seat in California before deciding not to run.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: Baxter was a member of an independent study group that produced the Civil Applications Committee Blue Ribbon Study recommending an increased domestic role for US spy satellites in September 2005.


title: Jeff Baxter

text: This study was first reported by "The Wall Street Journal" on August 15, 2007. He is listed as "Senior Thinker and Raconteur" at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, and is a Senior Fellow and Member of the Board of Regents at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The 2008 NBA Finals was the championship series of the National Basketball Association's (NBA) 2007–08 season and conclusion of the season's playoffs. In this best-of-seven playoff series, the Eastern Conference champion Boston Celtics defeated the Western Conference champion Los Angeles Lakers, 4–2, winning their first title since 1986 during the Larry Bird era and 17th overall. This series was held from June 5 through June 17, 2008.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: 2008 marked the first time since (and last prior to ) that the top seeds from both conferences met in the Finals and the first time since 2003 that any top seeded team played in the NBA finals. The Lakers appeared in the Finals for the first time since and a record 29th time overall. The Celtics appeared in the Finals for the first time since and second-best 20th time overall.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The 2008 Boston Celtics championship team was famously led by the organization's "Big 3" in Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, and Kevin Garnett, and was the first season the triumvirate played together. Prior to acquiring Allen from the Seattle SuperSonics and Garnett from the Minnesota Timberwolves in a blockbuster 7-to-1 player trade, Boston had won just 24 of its 82 games in the 2006–07 NBA regular season. The formation of the All-Star trifecta in the summer of 2007 positioned the new-look Celtics as a popular favorite to win the 2008 NBA Finals.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Going into the series, the Celtics had won the most championships of all-time with 16, and the Lakers were second with 14. The two most successful teams in NBA history looked to renew a longstanding rivalry 21 years after their last Finals meeting in 1987. They narrowly missed meeting each other in 2002, when the Lakers advanced to the Finals and went on to win, but the Celtics, who led 2–1 in the Conference Finals, eventually fell to the favored New Jersey Nets 4–2. This was the 11th time the teams met in the championship round; the Celtics won eight of their previous ten Finals meetings against the Lakers, winning in , , , , , , and —the Lakers won in and .


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics' 66–16 record gave them home court advantage over Los Angeles (57–25). This was the first time since , when the Chicago Bulls beat the Utah Jazz for the championship, and the only time in the 2000s that an Eastern Conference team had the home court advantage. This was also the first NBA Finals series since 1998 to not feature Tim Duncan (1999, 2003, 2005, 2007) or Shaquille O'Neal (2000, 2001, 2002, 2004, 2006).


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Rodd Houston narrated the Boston Celtics' championship season documentary on NBA Entertainment. The made-for-TV version of this documentary is narrated by Kevin Harlan.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics were making their first NBA Finals appearance since a six-game loss to the Lakers in 1987. Over the next 20 years the Celtics would suffer through several lean years, not making the playoffs in nine of those years. Following the dissolution of the team's original "Big Three" through the retirements of Larry Bird and Kevin McHale and the departure of Robert Parish, the Celtics suffered through several tragedies such as: the passing of Reggie Lewis in 1993; a franchise-worst 15-win 1996–97 season; the ill-fated hiring of head coach Rick Pitino; and the deaths of franchise patriarch Red Auerbach and former player Dennis Johnson, which culminated in a 24-win 2006–07 season, highlighted by a franchise-worst 18 straight losses.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The 2007 off-season saw Celtics GM Danny Ainge acquire Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett to join franchise star Paul Pierce. This new formation was widely regarded as the most talent the Boston Celtics team possessed since the duo of Antoine Walker and Paul Pierce graced the floor of the TD Garden in the early 2000s. The newly formed 'Big Three,' joined by second year point guard and future all star Rajon Rondo, led the Celtics to a dramatic 42-game turnaround, finishing with 66 wins. In the playoffs the Celtics were pushed to the brink by the Atlanta Hawks and Cleveland Cavaliers, and despite not winning on the road, they managed to prevail in a pair of Game 7s on their home court. The Celtics would finally break their road woes in a six-game win against the perennial Eastern Conference powerhouse Detroit Pistons, earning their first finals berth since 1987.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: After losing to the Pistons in the 2004 NBA Finals despite a talent-laden roster, Phil Jackson abruptly retired. Soon after the Lakers decided to rebuild by trading away Shaquille O'Neal to the Miami Heat for Lamar Odom, Caron Butler and Brian Grant. The 2004–05 season saw the Lakers miss the playoffs for only the fifth time in team history. Even though he had written a book called "", going as far as calling Kobe Bryant "uncoachable", Jackson returned to the Lakers for the 2005–06 season. Jackson and Bryant would patch their differences, but after a pair of first-round exits, Bryant demanded, but later retracted, a trade in the off-season.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers' 2007–08 season saw the team win 57 games, along the way adding Spanish forward Pau Gasol in mid-season while Andrew Bynum was recovering from a mid-season knee injury. The Lakers eliminated the Denver Nuggets 4–0, then the Utah Jazz 4–2 and then dethroned the erstwhile defending champion San Antonio Spurs 4–1 in the conference finals, making their 29th NBA Finals appearance.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Paul Pierce scored 15 points in the third quarter to give Boston the lead for good, and Kevin Garnett paced the Celtic attack with 24 points and 13 rebounds including a powerful two-handed putback dunk late in the game. Kobe Bryant had 24 points.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Pierce apparently injured his knee by falling awkwardly on Kendrick Perkins' leg, and was taken off the court in a wheelchair. Despite what Pierce's reaction suggested was a highly debilitating injury, he returned to action minutes later to raucous cheering from the crowd. Pierce admitted during coverage of the 2019 NBA Finals that he just had to use the bathroom. He soon hit two three-pointers on consecutive offensive possessions that gave Boston the lead for good and finished with 22 points. It was later dubbed by some as the "Wheelchair Game".


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers, who had had home court advantage throughout the first three rounds and had not trailed a series in that same time, now had to do without both luxuries for the first time.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers jumped out to an early 15–8 first quarter lead, but the Celtics answered with a 10–0 run at the start of the second quarter and ended the first half with a 54–42 lead.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics held a 24-point lead with less than eight minutes to go in the 4th quarter before the Lakers cut the lead to two points with 38.4 seconds to go with a 31–9 run. Paul Pierce and James Posey then closed out the game with two free throws each. The Lakers had a chance to cut into Boston's four-point lead with 14 seconds left, but the possession resulted in a shot by Saša Vujačić that was blocked by Pierce. Kobe Bryant finished the game with 30 points and 8 assists.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Leon Powe, a second year bench player, scored 21 points on 6–7 shooting from the field and 9–13 from the line in 15 minutes of play, including back-to-back dunks in the last minute of the 3rd quarter. Over the course of the game, Leon Powe shot 13 free throws while the Lakers shot 10.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Despite injuries suffered by Pierce (sprained knee) and Kendrick Perkins (high ankle sprain), both players started in Game 2 and appeared to be mostly unhampered by the injuries, especially Pierce who finished with 28 points.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Boston finished the game 27-for-38 from the line, while the Lakers were 10-for-10. Some analysts viewed this as favorable treatment toward the Celtics, while others noted that a difference in playing styles may have led to the discrepancy, and that the actual foul discrepancy was only 28–21 in favor of Boston.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers won game 3 on a strong shooting night from regular season MVP Kobe Bryant, who scored a series-high 36 points, leading the Lakers to their first win of the series and adding to their undefeated streak at home in the 2008 postseason. Saša Vujačić scored 20 points in 28 minutes, Paul Pierce had a poor shooting game, making only two of his 14 field goal attempts. Kevin Garnett also had trouble shooting, finishing with only 12 points. Ray Allen was the only member of Boston's Big Three that scored over 13 points, with 25.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers jumped out to a 35–14 lead after the first quarter, which was the largest first-quarter lead in NBA Finals history. The Lakers held their ground for most of the third quarter, leading by as many as 24 points. However, the Celtics went on a 21–3 run to end the third quarter, closing the deficit to only two points (73–71). With 4:07 remaining in the fourth quarter, the Celtics took their first lead in the game when Celtics' reserve Eddie House made an jumper. With House's shot, the Celtics were in the lead for good. The Celtics' victory in Game 4 was the largest comeback in the NBA Finals since .


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics bench outscored the Lakers bench 35–15, 29 of those points coming from House and James Posey. Kevin Garnett finished with 16 points and 11 rebounds in support of Allen (19) and Pierce (20).


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: As in Game 4, the Lakers jumped out to an early lead, leading 43–24 with 11 minutes to play in the second quarter. And as in Game 4, the Celtics came back, taking a 62–60 lead behind the strong play of Paul Pierce.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers finally regained their composure, outscoring Boston 24–18 in the 3rd quarter. In previous games, the Lakers were outscored by Boston in the 3rd quarter (22–31 in Game 1, 19–29 in Game 2, 17–25 in Game 3, and 15–31 in Game 4) by a total of 43 points (73–116).


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers built a 14-point lead in the 4th quarter, but the Celtics again came back with a 16–2 run to tie the game at 90. With less than one minute left in the game, the Celtics had the ball with the Lakers leading 97–95. Pierce beat Bryant off the drive, but Bryant knocked the ball out of Pierce's hands from behind. Lamar Odom picked up the loose ball and passed downcourt to Bryant for a breakaway dunk, giving the Lakers a 99–95 lead. The Lakers went on to win 103–98, sending the series back to Boston.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Kobe Bryant had 25 points, to go with five steals. Pau Gasol contributed 19 points, 13 rebounds and 6 assists, Odom 20 points and 11 rebounds. For Boston, Pierce had a memorable 38 point effort, but outside of Allen (16 points) and Garnett (13 points and 14 rebounds) did not receive enough support from his teammates to clinch the championship at Staples.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: As for the odds stacked against the Lakers to come back from a 3–1 deficit, Jackson said, "We're young enough and dumb enough to do this."


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Entering Game 6, the Celtics set a record of most playoff games played in one season, with 26, breaking the previous record of 25 set by both the 1994 New York Knicks, whom Celtics Coach Doc Rivers played for, and the 2005 Detroit Pistons, both of whom lost in their respective finals in seven games (Knicks in , Pistons in ). However, for the 1994 Knicks, the first round was a best-of-five. Since the NBA Finals used the 2-3-2 format from 1985 until 2013, no team has ever won the last two games on the road.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: After a rocky first quarter, the Celtics dominated the rest of the game. Maintaining a lead of more than 25 points, the Celtics' Big Three performed phenomenally, while the whole team smothered the Lakers' offense with their tight defense. Boston dominated in numerous statistical categories, including rebounds (48–29, with a 14–2 disparity in offensive boards), turnovers (7–19), steals (18–4), assists (33–16) and blocks (4–0). Five Celtics finished in double figures. Ray Allen hit seven three-pointers to tie what was then the Finals record (which he subsequently broke during the 2010 NBA Finals against the Lakers during game two), Rajon Rondo had an all-around spectacular performance (21 points, 8 rebounds, 7 assists, 6 steals), the Celtics only turned the ball over seven times and set a Finals record with 18 steals, and every Boston player who saw action scored.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The 39-point margin of victory was the largest ever in an NBA championship-clinching game, breaking the old record of 33, also set by the Celtics over the Lakers in Game Five of the 1965 NBA Finals, 129–96. This lead was close to the Finals point-spread record set in Game 3 in where a Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls team beat the Utah Jazz by 42 points, 96–54. The Celtics also improved their overall record against the Lakers to 9–2 in Finals meetings, beating them in the Finals for the first time since 1984.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: This was the Celtics' 17th championship, their first since , extending their record for most NBA championships won by a single team. All this capped off the Celtics' best regular season (66–16) since their previous championship season in which they went 67–15. It was also a sense of relief, as the Celtics set an NBA record for most playoff games ever needed to win a championship, with 26, surpassing the previous record of 24 by the Lakers in .


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics' win was also seen as an addition to the recent success of Boston-area sports teams, following the wins by the New England Patriots in Super Bowls XXXVI, XXXVIII, and XXXIX (2001, 2003 and 2004 seasons) and the Red Sox's World Series wins in (death of the Curse of the Bambino) and . Later, the Bruins would win the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals, the Red Sox would win two more World Series titles in 2013, and in 2018, and the Patriots would win three more Super Bowls XLIX, LI, and LIII (2014, 2016, and 2018 seasons).


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics won this series by winning Games 1, 2, 4, and 6; coincidentally, the last time the two teams met in , the Lakers won that series in identical fashion. It was also the same identical fashion when the Celtics won the NBA Finals in before this championship.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: Produced by ESPN, the Finals were aired on ABC in the United States for the sixth consecutive year. This was also Michele Tafoya's final Finals appearance before resigning before the 2008–09 season. As an NBA Finals sideline reporter, Tafoya was later succeeded by Doris Burke, Rachel Nichols, and Malika Andrews.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: In the 2008–09 season the Celtics raced to a 27–2 start, the best through 29 games in NBA history, until that fateful finals rematch against the Lakers on Christmas Day ended a franchise-high 19-game winning streak. Then days after the All-Star Game Kevin Garnett injured his right knee, and was lost for the season. The Celtics won 62 games, but the absence of Garnett affected the team as they were eliminated in seven games by the Orlando Magic in the Eastern Conference Semifinals.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Lakers rebounded to win 65 games in the aforementioned season, then proceeded to win the NBA title in five games over the Magic. Even though another mid-season injury to Andrew Bynum threatened their title drive, he did come back late in the season. The Lakers became the first team since the 1988–89 Pistons to win the NBA Finals after losing it in the previous year.


title: 2008 NBA Finals

text: The Celtics' 17th championship raised the total of major professional sports championships in Boston to 32, and it continued a string of championships for the city this decade. The NFL's New England Patriots won the Super Bowl in 2001, 2003 and 2004, and nearly won a fourth on Super Bowl XLII, only to have a perfect season denied by the New York Giants four months earlier. Major League Baseball's Boston Red Sox won their second World Series title of the decade eight months earlier, adding their total to seven. With the NHL's Boston Bruins winning the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals, the city of Boston became the first city to win championships in all four major sports in a seven-year span. The city's total title tally now stands at 38.


title: X Japan

text: Originally named , they released their debut album "Vanishing Vision" (1988) on Yoshiki's own Extasy Records one year after finalizing their line-up including bassist Taiji, lead guitarist Hide and rhythm guitarist Pata. They achieved breakthrough success in 1989 with the release of their second and major debut album "Blue Blood". Following 1991's "Jealousy", Taiji left the band in early 1992. He was replaced by Heath and the group changed their name to X Japan before producing the mini album "Art of Life" (1993), which is composed solely of the 29-minute title track. In 1995 the group dropped most of its original visual kei aesthetics in favor of a more casual look and released "Dahlia" (1996), which like their two previous albums debuted at number one. X Japan performed their last concert at the Tokyo Dome on December 31, 1997, making it the last of five consecutive sold-out New Year's Eve concerts the group held at the stadium.


title: X Japan

text: After ten years, X Japan reunited in 2007 and recorded the new song "I.V.". Over the next two years they performed several concerts, including their first overseas show in Hong Kong, and formally added Sugizo as lead guitarist in place of Hide, who died in 1998, before holding a North American tour in 2010. In 2011, the band went on their first world tour throughout Europe, South America and Asia. Shortly after reuniting, work began on their sixth studio album. During its ten years of production, several release dates were announced, but it remains unreleased despite Yoshiki's claim of its completion in September 2018.


title: X Japan

text: X Japan has released five studio albums, six live albums, and 21 singles. In 2003, HMV Japan ranked the band at number 40 on their list of the 100 most important Japanese pop acts. In 2007, "Rolling Stone Japan" ranked "Blue Blood" number 15 on its list of the 100 Greatest Japanese Rock Albums of All Time. In 2017, "Loudwire" named X Japan the Best Metal Band from Japan. It has been reported that X Japan has sold over 30 million records.


title: X Japan

text: In 1977, Yoshiki and Toshi formed a band called Dynamite in their hometown of Tateyama, Chiba, when they were just 11 years old. Dynamite changed its name to Noise in 1978, while they were still in high school. At this time, Toshi played guitar and they had a singer named Kurata. In 1982, Noise disbanded and Yoshiki and Toshi formed a new band, they named it X while they tried to think of another name, but the name stuck. X began to actively perform in the Tokyo area in 1985 with a frequently changing lineup. They originally attempted to pitch in with Japan's underground punk movement, but the band did not fit in with it as they were considered too commercial and flamboyant. Their first single, "I'll Kill You" was released on Dada Records in June and the band contributed "Break the Darkness" to the sampler "Heavy Metal Force III" in November, which also featured a song by Saver Tiger. In November 1985 bassist Taiji (ex:Dementia) joined X, though he left the group shortly thereafter.