Missouri Sucks

Movin' to Miami, gonna eat a lot of ORANGES

2007-12-04T13:13:00.001-05:00

Apparently, not very many people agree with Tim and me that Kansas deserves a shot at a national title. Well, Howard Schellenberger, Florida Atlantic's head coach, voted Kansas second. You may remember Schellenberger from his bizarre one year stint at Oklahoma in the 90s (when OU stunk - that was weird wasn't it?), but he also built the Louisville and Miami football programs, which is a good thing I guess.

I'm not angry about KU not playing for a title; the point wasn't that KU was one of the two best teams, but that the system is arbitrary and stupid, and that everyone would love to have a playoff. I give up though, this is what we have. KU has smart people that know how the game is played, and they can schedule with the BCS in mind. Next year, KU goes to South Florida in September, and will play Texas and Oklahoma. That's plenty, now they just have to win all those games.

But the system is stupid right? Last night the Patriots pulled out a late win to clinch a place in the "Super" Bowl, likely against Dallas. Other potential match-ups are the Indianapolis Colts and Green Bay Packers, which would showcase two of the better quarterbacks in the league; the San Diego Chargers have grabbed control of the AFC West and will likely face the Seahawks, though a game with a fellow AFC team like the Jaguars is possible. See how stupid that would be? Oh well.

KU got a great deal. The Jayhawks are going to the Orange Bowl, a game that means a ton to its fanbase, is played in primetime all by itself on January 3rd, and is in fabulously warm Miami. One of my first memories of KU football was at an ESPN Thursday night game against Cal back in 1992. When KU scored early in the game, oranges flew out of the stands and onto the field, as (very optimistic) KU fans were hoping for a Big 8 championship and the automatic trip to the Orange Bowl (KU finished 8-4 winning the Aloha Bowl, the only bowl Glen Mason was allowed to attend for some reason). For some reason, the Big 12 champ now goes to the Fiesta Bowl, and the ACC champ goes to Miami. Nothing is sacred.

I know Mizzou fans are screaming (more than usual at least) that KU completely benefited from this "screwed up" system. I have seen Mizzou fans posting on the Miami Herald website, on Virginia Tech football message boards, the Kansas City Star, and of course their own and KU message boards. They're all screaming about KU's fraudulent selection to the Orange Bowl. You guys are retarded. Mizzou's beef isn't with Kansas (any more than usual at least), who at 11-1 deserves to be in. Your beef is with the stupid BCS, just like everyone else. Illinois is in the Rose Bowl, and MU beat them head-to-head. Yes, MU also beat KU, but Illinois has 3 losses! Three! They're Texas Tech with a win over an overrated Ohio State (but I repeat myself). West Virginia is the biggest bunch of chokers in the world, why are they in over Mizzou? Winning the the Big East gets an automatic bid? Why, because they beat UConn and Rutgers?

Besides, once you steal an election in Kansas that determines whether or not that state will allow people to own other people, which then leads to several years of bloodshed in that state, as well as a massive war throughout the continent, you have to wait at least 200 years before bitching about your football team being shafted by Kansas. So, come back in 2070 Mizzou fans.

Why did the Orange Bowl select Kansas? I don't know. Why did Robert E. Lee abandon his brilliant defensive war at Gettysburg and send a massive frontal assault across a mile of open ground against a superior Union force that had the high ground? Why did Hitler invade Russia knowing that Napoleon tried the same thing, and despite being the most brilliant military mind in Europe, had his French Army utterly destroyed? Why did the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor when the key to the US Navy, its aircraft carriers, were safe and out at sea? I don't know why these things happen, I'm just grateful that things worked out for the best.

I'm tired of Mizzou though. It's as if KU fans are obsessed with Mizzou, without regard for their own team, and vice versa (hahaha my blog is called Missouri Sucks I'm obsessed hahahah). KU is going to a great bowl. Mangino gets a month with his team, which is just gold. They have a great chance to build huge momentum to take into spring practice and into next year. With the Border War game at Arrowhead, and a huge game with #3 Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl, KU will have gained a ton of experience in playing big games at neutral sites in front of a nationwide television audience.

I watched Mangino's television show last week, after the Mizzou game, and came away feeling great about the team. Mangino was clearly not happy. He's not sitting on 11-1. He's scheming about how to beat Mizzou. It has to kill him that he's lost the big game two years in a row. He repeated a few times that KU just wasn't able to get pressure on Chase Daniel, which killed KU. He knows he doesn't have the defensive line that he needs, and I bet he fixes that by next year.

So we have a month until the game. We'll look at Virginia Tech, we'll look at the past season, and probably some recruiting. There's also some basketball going on I think, so maybe we'll cover that as well.

BCS BS

2007-12-02T11:22:00.000-05:00

Guest blogger Tim told you this would happen with this post. He knew this would happen. He was so worked up about it, he had to volunteer a long post about the Ohio State nonsense. I'm sure the fact that he is a Michigan alum has nothing to do with his feelings on the Buckeyes.

This BCS crap makes me angry. When it was other schools getting the shaft, I didn't really care as much. Sure, maybe last year Michigan deserved another shot, but they lost to Ohio State. Auburn was undefeated in 2004, as was Utah. But I watched Southern Cal, and they seemed to be the best team.

That's why this is insane. People all over the country watch the games and write articles and blogs on who they think is the better team. This happens in every sport. All sports have so-called power rankings and endless speculation by sportswriters.

But in college football, those opinions determine the championship. Do I think Georgia or LSU would beat Kansas? Honestly, yes. I think they would be too much for the Jayhawks. But I want to see the game so I know Georgia is better. This isn't some hypothetical discussion where we're comparing the 1985 Bears to the 1989 49ers. These teams exist! They are all sitting around right now! We could, you know, get them on airplanes, sell tickets, and have them play each other!

Where is the tradition poll posted?

The greatest thing is Kansas gets hosed. Usually there's a good excuse to exclude the team the voters don't think should win the title. There are two other teams with one loss, for example. Or, there are three or more undefeated teams, so the people can pick who they want. But this year, KU will just get flat out ignored. What, KU has one-loss and plays in a BCS conference? We don't care, screw you.

But KU hasn't played anyone! This is true. But KU's loss was to top 10 Mizzou at a neutral site. Side note: nice job against Oklahoma! Really broke my heart to see you fall down like that after your fine victory and classy celebrations last week in Kansas City.

Ohio State gets a free pass, because they have history. What the fuck is that? Is this Europe? We don't have inherited titles here in America, oh Lord Tressel of stink Columbusland. Since Archie Griffin went to OSU, they get ahead of KU in line? Gale Sayers will come to your house Archie and kick your ass.

For the record, here's Ohio State's schedule:

Win over Youngstown State (7-4 - Gateway Conference) 38-6
Win over Akron (4-8 - MAC) 20-2
Win @ UW (4-8) 33-14 (currently winning at Hawaii)
Win over Northwestern (6-6) 58-7
Win @ Minnesota (1-11) 30-7
Win @ Purdue (7-5) 23-7
Win over Kent State (3-9 - MAC) 48-3
Win vs Mich State (7-5) 24-17
Win @ Penn State (8-4) 37-17
Win vs. Wisconsin (9-3) 38-17
Loss to Illinois (9-3) 28-21
Win @ Michigan (8-4) 14-3

The wins @ Michigan, vs. Wisconsin, and @ Penn State are at least as good as any win KU has. I think Ohio State should be in the title game, against KU. Can't say KU deserves to be in over Ohio State, but can't really say that Ohio State deserves to be in over KU either.

Which win really separates Ohio State from Kansas? @ Penn State? Come on. Would Penn State go to Stillwater and win? Would Wisconsin? Who knows?

Play it off you morons. It'd be the biggest deal ever. I promise. 8 teams, 16 teams, don't care. You'd have 7 games that matter, rather than one title game and a bunch of consolation bowls like now. Take the 6 conference champs (Big 12, Big East, Big 10, ACC, PAC 10, SEC), and two at-large. There'd still be plenty to write about loser writers. Who gets the at-larges? Hawaii? Kansas? Georgia? Missouri?

Sadly, it'd probably be Florida picked. The best 3-loss team in the history of football.

I'm Sorry Todd Reesing

2007-11-27T14:30:00.000-05:00

I suppose as a blog that owes its identity to the undeniable fact that Kansas is better than Mizzou, I must show up and comment on the game this past weekend. I would say that KU may have lost the battle and will win the war, but the game of the century just played was called the Border "War", so I guess we did lose the war.

I'm not sure we made any specific predictions here, but mine would have been about 35-34 KU, which is about what we got. But, here's a video of some exuberant predictions in the parking lot before the game.

I'll spare the sour grapes (Why was Reesing wearing gloves for the first time this year, and just happened to grossly underthrow two balls that resulted in crucial turnovers? Why did formerly dependable Scott Webb miss two field goals, leaving us at zero at the half and definitely without any momentum? What the hell was up with playing a neutral game that could've been played in front of 52,000 KU fans? Why did we not have just one more timeout, which would have left KU 1:15 instead 20 seconds to make the game winning drive?) and say that Mizzou was simply the better team Saturday night. Chase Daniel was perfect, and the Tigers didn't turn the ball over, while KU did twice.

Where were the red leggings KU usually wears? More political correctness nonsense? At least the fans were prepared...

I'm not sure about the Arrowhead deal. I had a great time in the parking lot, after the hour plus wait to get in, but I would have had the same amount of fun in Lawrence, or more. And I definitely did not like sharing the stadium with Mizzou people, or having to leave with them celebrating, or having to get out of Arrowhead.

Certainly did not feel like the 70-30 split KU fans were told to expect by AD Lew Perkins, but that may have been because MU got off to a great start and KU was a bit deflated early. But it was closer to 50-50 than 70-30. Here's a video of me not feeling the crowd on the way into the stadium:

Ok, I am sure. It was a retarded move. Play the game on the campuses. If I wanted to sit with thousands of Mizzou fans I'd go to a road game. I don't like road games, I like games in Lawrence. Plus, anything that helps Carl Peterson is just necessarily evil. I will never attend another KU game in Arrowhead. Unless I'm in town next year for Border War. The team still deserves support, even if the KU administration is retarded.

I do admit to having some bad thoughts about my team as KU went down 21-0 and then 28-7. I was calling for a series of Kerry Meier after the second pick Reesing threw. Nothing against Todd, I just felt that he was rattled and maybe Meier could change the tempo. But Reesing came out and rallied Kansas to within a touchdown with 2 minutes and change left, which included a naked bootleg dive into a couple of Mizzou defenders for the touch. I also leaned over to my brother and said at one point, "I'd rather be 8-4 and win this game." I'm sure that's not true, but perhaps 10-2 with this win? Oh yeah.

11-1, though, is an amazing accomplishment for this team. Missouri is good, no doubt. Everyone had a great year. Need to go and get some better athletes on the defensive line, a bit more depth on the offensive line, and maybe an explosive weapon like the Tigers' Jeremy Maclin. Another year of recruiting, a year to build the offense to Reesing's strengths, develop Meier as an all-purpose weapon, we should be good to go next year. At least we're not home for the holidays, like the Wildcats are!

We did get to do the Rock Chalk, but only the pre-game version. Overall, the game sucked. Maybe next year. More on the bowl game picture later when the depression lifts (just kidding, I'm not really depressed, but I don't want to write a bunch about potential bowl games four weeks from now when KU just lost the biggest game in their history).

The BCS is Terrible, or, Why Jayhawks Should Hate Ohio State

2007-11-27T11:20:00.000-05:00

By Tim Slovik

Note: If both West Virginia and Missouri win out, them my argument is only half-valid. However, the valid portion was valid last year, is valid this year, and will be valid until there is no more BCS stupidity, so read on.

Ah, my poor fellow victims of BCS madness. Struggling through a season, accomplishing goal after goal, never truly believing that it would happen, yet poised to take that step to National Title triumph, the Kansas football program will take the BCS shaft up the rear.

I know what that feels like. Last season, I screamed my lungs out watching my Number 2 Wolverines lose to the Number 1 Buckeyes. Only, it wasn't for the national championship. It was the final regular season game, and it was for all the marbles. Despite the fact that Michigan and Ohio State were easily proving to be the best two teams at the time, the voters considered Michigan's one and only loss (since it was late in the year) enough to push them down in the rankings, and let another one-loss team - Florida - rise up for the spot in the title game (and in searching their hearts, most voters would tell you that the reason to put Florida ahead in the rankings was to avoid a UM-OSU rematch for the title game). Looking back it might seem foolish to suggest that Florida didn't belong there... but if not for the ridiculous BCS system we would never be having such foolish discussions in the fist place.

Like many a team before them, Kansas has played a great season but will not be playing for the national championship. Sure, if they could have proven it on the field by beating out the competition they'd definitely be there. And if monkeys had wings, there'd be a witch with a pretty big army of the damned things looking for some ruby slippers. But we're talking about reality. And THIS reality has NO undefeated team which will play for the ultimate in Sears' glass football trophies.

Let's not take this opportunity to discuss how Hawaii is undefeated. I don't understand how a team can do MORE than win every game they play. However, I DO understand that if your schedule includes the prep school down the road, or some really tall eighth graders, you don't get to play in the title game. Not yours.

This situation only further fuels the argument of which I'm about to make, that the system is broken.

Back to the title game. As it stands, West Virgina and Missouri will play if they win out. They are both "1 loss" teams, and if playing for the championship, will have won their respective conference championships. So... okay... I guess we could live with that sort of title game. Two teams that have only lost once, and through attrition have gotten to the top of the heap. We'll think of them as teams who've not screwed up yet... except for the one time they each already lost...

But the real problem begins when one of these teams loses. And in a year where the top two rankings have been squandered repeatedly, a year where Appalachian State wins at the Big House, and a year where Kansas is even in the title hunt to begin with (no offense)... you KNOW that one or both of those teams will lose, and the BCS will prove to be the gigantic sham that everyone knows it is.

WVU has a relatively easy road in beating Pitt, so let's assume for a moment they win. That leaves Missouri to beat the one team who already knocked them out, who is favored, and who had the tradition of smacking them around year after year in general dominance in the Big 12 - the Sooners. I don't watch a lot of Big 12 games - I'm a Big 10 man - but if I learned anything from Drew over the years... it's that Missouri Sucks. They'll lose and that makes me want to cry.

Because that means Mr. Sweater Vest and Co. will be returning to the title game.

The Ohio State Buckeyes will play West Virginia for the title. Why? Because they are a one loss team. Through attrition, they've stuck around long enough to be at the top of the heap. Sounds a lot like West Virginia, Missiouri... and... oh, wait a second. There's another one-loss team? Who?

Yep, the Jayhawks.

"But the Jayhawks haven't beaten anybody," I keep hearing. That's amusing. Who did the Buckeyes beat? The Big 10 underacheived as it's been doing the last few years. And a strangely disheartened (and thoroughly injured) Michigan didn't put up any fight, so just who did the Buckeyes beat to deserve to play in the title game? I say OSU-KU push on this one.

How about losses? Kansas loses a rivalry game, on a neutral field, under intense pressure, to the current NUMBER ONE team in the country. Ohio State lost at home, to Illinois, to Ron Zook for God's sake. 'Nuff said.

But Kansas isn't the Big 12 champion, so they shouldn't play for the national title, right? Nebraska got to do it a few years back. They got the shit kicked out of them by Miami, but that's not the point - they got to play. The argument of the BCS has always been "the best two teams" not the "best two conference champions." In a season where everyone loses ONE game, shouldn't the teams with losses to better opposition be considered ahead of those who lost to lesser competition? What does it matter if the loss was the last game of the year or the first game? If you're better than everyone else 11 out of 12 games a year, you should probably be playing for a championship.

Having said all that, if Missouri or West Virginia lose, Ohio State will get the spot. So WHY SHOULD THE BUCKEYES PLAY AND NOT KANSAS?!?!?

WHO FREAKIN' CARES!?!?! It could all be settled with a GOD-DAMNED PLAYOFF!!!

College football doesn't need ridiculous matchups on the field for the sake of supporting this system designed only to line the pockets of the athletic directors. College football needs a playoff now more than it has EVER needed one before.

I don't want to hear ANY excuses about the difficulties for the schools or the athletes. Division 1-A (or whatever the hell they are calling themselves now-a-days), Division II, and Division III HAVE PLAYOFFS. They determine which team is champion on the field amongst the top teams. ALL the top teams.

I don't want to hear that a playoff will reduce the significance of the regular season. Are you kidding me? If you've ever been to a college football game, you know that for the three and half hours you watch that game, it IS the season. A loss that would devastate a team by knocking them from contention for the title would only motivate them to up their game and keep themselves in the hunt for the playoffs. Essentially, the football could IMPROVE.

I don't want to hear that it could be unfair for the unbeatens to be forced to play some teams who've already lost. C'mon... seriously? We rarely have the nice package of two undefeated teams. Either there are three undefeated squads, or there are 5 one-loss teams. Is it fair for an undefeated team to lose to a one-loss team in the finale and despite losing the same number of times, NOT be a champion? None of it makes sense.

I also don't want to hear that the same arguments about getting the top two slots (and hence a chance for the title) will just be reiterated for getting into the top 4 spots, or 8 spots, or 16 spots. No one will care that the 9th best team in the country got shafted. WE DO CARE that one of the top two teams gets shafted.

And I certainly don't want to hear that the full season is really like one big, long playoff. Bullshit. If it was, then the best teams would play on the last game of the year. And we wouldn't be left wondering, what if this team played that team, etc., etc., etc.

College football needs the best teams to play one anther in a post-season tournament. Keep the bowls, use them as part of the tournament, do whatever you have to do, but let the top teams play against one another to determine a freakin' champion. I'm sure the revenue in doing so could offset the loss of the current stystem if the NCAA marketted the thing correctly. Not that I'd expect them to do that.

And what if BOTH Missouri and West Virginia lose this weekend? Ohio State will play one-loss Kansas right? Wrong! They'll face two-loss LSU! I won't go through the explanation... but if the voters don't let a "non-conference champion" play in the big game, they'll have to move down the list to VTech and LSU, and since LSU destroyed the Hokies, they'd get the nod. This ASSUMES they win their conferences. Oh, I DID just go through the explanation. How ridiculous is this getting? And how much easier would it be to just have a playoff?

Why not let the two teams with the best uniforms play for the national championship? How about the teams with the best quarterbacks? Hottest cheerleaders? What standards are we using to rank teams anyway? How many rules and sub-rules and unwritten considerations need to be placed? The BCS has changed itself over and over again to get it right. The AP Poll isn't even considered in the numbers any longer. We've heard about too much power to computers, too much power to humans...

WHEN? OH WHEN are we going to have ALL the power with the players... on the field?

Be upset Jayhawks. Be very upset that your season has been lost in a broken system, and the Buckeys might steal your moment in the spotlight. But more importantly, when recalling this season, and wondering if you could have beaten West Virginia or Ohio State or Oklahoma for that matter... remember that there could have been a way to see those games, and there could be a way to have true champions.

Missouri, Opressors of States' Rights!

2007-11-21T00:09:00.000-05:00

By Chris Thompson

It’s great to be back on this blog. I guess my last one was so successful, it brought the blog to a standstill for a year. But I’m back to offer some quasi insightful historical jargon to Border War week.

I was extremely excited to see that KU made the cover of Sports Illustrated, but I am a little miffed. Just like Todd Reesing was left out of the photo, my family and I were crudely cropped out. If the photo had extended just a few inches further, you would have seen us clearly as a bunch of dots just above the section 41 sign. (See photo for detail). I guess the editors at SI don’t care about who they hurt.

But one thing I did like about the cover, besides the obvious fact that KU football is on it for the first time ever, was that Sports Illustrated straight up called it the Border War - none of this Lew Perkins and Mike Alden PC sensitive Border Showdown stuff. Yes America is in a war, but if we had to stop using the word war to describe things during times of conflict we’d never be able to talk about any history. And what would sports announcers use to fill the void if they were not able to use the cliché of war when describing football. “Yes Kirk, the linemen down there are really battling it out in the trench… wait I mean they are aggressively contesting each other while playing football which is just a game.”

I think the Border Showdown should be changed because I still find it too offensive, because a showdown reminds me of an old west shoot out at High Noon. It should be called “The Football Game between two neighboring states that respect each other tremendously and in no way is it comparable to any armed conflict past or present.” But all this worrying about calling it a war is superfluous. Why? BECAUSE WE ACTUALLY FOUGHT A WAR!

Now get ready for a good old rehash of the Civil War, mainly Bleeding Kansas. I’d like to address a movement that is en vogue among Missouri fans nowadays. They think that the University of Kansas should not have the name Jayhawks, because it is reflective of a group of free state soldiers that defended Kansas from invading forces and ran raids into Missouri. They like to call them “terrorists,” which drives me nuts in and of itself. Missourians can’t believe that we could have a mascot represented of a group of people who killed innocent civilians. Now I would like to dismiss their accusations as completely false but there were a few raids into Missouri where Jayhawkers in their red leggings killed civilians. Nowhere near the amount of Kansan civilians that were killed by Missourians, but sadly they did do it.

However, if you were to not honor American soldiers who killed civilians while fighting a war, you could never celebrate any veteran’s participation in war. No war in American history has been fought without civilian casualties. Am I justifying the killing of civilians? No, but sometimes it is either a side effect of war or a necessity. What if a school were to have a mascot named the Bombers, honoring the brave men of World War II that led raids into Germany and Japan, would we denounce that and call them terrorists? American bombers in World War II purposefully targeted civilians to ensure victory. American bombers killed millions of civilians in World War II. Ever hear of the fire storms in Dresden and Tokyo, and, oh yeah, the atom bomb? But would you ever walk up to a World War II veteran and call them a terrorist for these acts? I wouldn’t.

The thing is you have to be fighting for a more just cause than your opponent. Civilian casualties are a sad part of warfare, but in modern war it is a side effect of wiping out cruel institutions such as slavery and Nazism. So I am proud of the Jayhawkers. It is sad that they killed a few dozen civilians to protect our state from invaders and slave masters, but it was part of a just cause. Killing over 150 people, including women & children, in defense of a state’s right to hold and own other people just seems a little more vicious.

While were on the subject of state’s rights, let us turn to the hypocrisy of Missourians claiming the Civil War was not fought over slavery, but was actually fought for "States' Rights" (a common claim amongst southerners during the War). I’ve never quite understood this argument. The tyranny that the South was facing after the 1860 election was that of a popularly elected government.

How can you call the government a tyranny simply because it is not representative of your views? There will always be a minority in a democracy. It might have helped had the Southerners not split the Democratic party by geographical sections, but you know whatever. But how does a president win the popular vote and the electoral vote and then be called an oppressive administration all before he gets into office? Seven states seceded before Lincoln was sworn in. When did the administration even have time to start oppressing people?

And Missouri especially should never stand by the state’s right argument. Because I can think of no better assertion of a state’s rights then its right to come into existence. When Kansas was given the right to choose whether it was to be free or slave, the Missourians oppressed democracy in the worst way. The first election of the new Kansas Territory in 1854, to elect a representative of the state, was marred by Missourians getting whiskeyed up and coming into Kansas to stuff the ballot boxes. They felt due to their proximity to the Territory it was their right to ensure it held the same values they did, even though the voters held no property in Kansas.

The Border Ruffians as they came to be known harassed any one going to the polls in that first election, and if found to be against slavery voters were taunted and not allowed to vote.
This was of course the start of the conflict between Missouri and Kansas. Not all migrants to Kansas were abolitionists; they just were not in favor of slavery taking hold. It’s hard for immigrants to find work when unpaid forced labor is their competition. So I ask which is more tyrannical and oppressive of state’s rights, a freely, legitimately elected president who does not share your values nor is even in office yet, or a phony state legislature with ballot boxes stuffed by non-residents who are imposing their values on a budding state?

The sad thing is that all this posturing on the Civil War, which was apparently fought over 140 years ago, will do nothing to help Todd “Sparky” Reesing and the Jayhawks win on Saturday. Nor will it do anything for Chase “Bugger Eater” Daniel and The Slaver… I mean Tigers.

What I do know is that wearing Jayhawks across their chests does not make my football team supporters of terrorists. I could see their point if we were the University of Kansas Radical Jihadists. And this were our mascot (see right). But sadly it’s not, so it leads to one logical conclusion: Missourians are idiots. How was that for a childish way to end a post?

There are no words...

2007-11-20T14:10:00.001-05:00

Ok, maybe there are some words.

Border War, border war, border war BORDER WAR!

After surviving Iowa State (thanks for coming down Cyclones, you were accommodating guests as usual), we can all officially do what we've been doing since KU left College Station with a win to go to 8-0: thinking about the game against Mizzou.

Of course, KU has no chance in this game. Why? Because Mizzou played Oklahoma! How can Kansas compete with that? The Jayhawks played BAYLOR! Baylor is no good!

What's interesting, however, and a fact that seems to be conveniently left out by Mizzou fans, is that THEY LOST THE GAME! Yes, Oklahoma in Norman is a tough game. There's no shame in losing that game. We'll ignore for now the Colorado game when Oklahoma decided to take a nap in the fourth quarter - always a sign of a great team, and also ignore last weekend's 34-27 loss at the hands of Texas Tech in Lubbock - a more defensible loss considering OU's all-star QB Sam Bradford was injured and couldn't play most of the game. It is also a sign of a great team when they completely fall apart after an injury, especially on defense (apparently Bradford was also a key player in the Sooner defensive backfield).

So, Mizzou lost to Oklahoma, a team much better than anyone KU has played. They even led late in the game! That's almost worth a championship! Of course, there was another time that Missouri led a highly regarded opponent late in an important game...

This is known as the "Mouse that Roared" argument. "The Mouse that Roared" was a book and a 1959 movie about a tiny European country that figures out the best way to economic development is to lose a war to the United States, which will result in generous economic assistance from the Americans to help rebuild the country. In the movie, the country accidentally wins the war, resulting in some 1950s hilarity. Missouri luckily collapsed after leading OU and was outscored 18-7 in the fourth quarter, which fulfilled their plan.

The Wall Street Journal also ran a story about the rivalry this morning, which is interesting. The best part is the following quote from a former Tiger football player:

"It's enough to start former Missouri player Brandon Barnes, who is African-American, wondering whether Tiger fans are "hating the Jayhawkers for something I might celebrate." But then he remembers the time that Jayhawk fans threw ice at him and footballs at the Missouri team bus."

Just a fabulous fabulous sentiment. Hmmm, maybe it's odd that I, as an African-American, support the fans that use the burning down of the free state capital as a rallying point. But this one time a KU guys threw some ice at the bus. Screw KU. Although I suppose the ice hitting the bus was a more tangible attack than some old Civil War stories, as obviously there are no racial problems in Missouri today - I bet it's been nothing but reconciliation and outreach since 1865.

We'll have more about the historical background of the 1850s and 1860s surrounding the conflict. Oh, we may also have some sort of football analysis. But I wouldn't count on it...

3, 2, 1 (uh oh, there go the Ducks)

2007-11-15T22:56:00.000-05:00

Kansas (10-0, #3)
Loss: What? They haven’t lost to anyone? Weird.
Wins: vs. Central Michigan (6-4) 52-7; @ Kansas State (5-5) 30-24; @ Texas A&M (6-5) 19-11; @ Oklahoma State (5-5) 43-28
Remaining schedule: this week vs. Iowa State (3-8); 11/24 vs. Mizzou (9-1, #5) in Kansas City; possible Big 12 title game – likely vs. OU

Not since the 1900s has Kansas been atop the college football world as they are now. I bet you didn’t know that Kansas was the dominant Midwest football power back then. I sure didn’t know. I mentioned Buddy Owens yesterday in talking about Oklahoma, but there are quite a few other notable Jayhawk football personalities from the olden times. Look out! Lots of ancient history – scroll down or prepare to be bored!

John H. Outland went to KU, and played both football and baseball in 1895 and 1896. Outland was the founder of the Kansas Relays. Outland is the namesake of the Outland trophy, given to the best offensive lineman in football.

Fielding “Hurry Up” Yost coached one year at Kansas in 1899 and going undefeated, Yost left to coach Stanford briefly, and then went on to coach at Michigan and start their fantastic football tradition. He was at UM from 1901-1926 (going 165-29-10). Yost invented the position of linebacker, and co-created the first ever bowl game, the 1902 Rose Bowl. He also invented that MEE-she-gan thing. He’s probably the most important American of the 20^th century for coming up with bowl games.

Here’s the schedule for the 10-0 1899 team (thanks to College Football Data Warehouse, which has a fabulous collection of team results, polls, pretty much everything). Gotta love the big win over Missouri in Kansas City to cap off the year.

9/30 W 12-0 Haskell Institute (KS) Lawrence, KS
10/7 W 35-0 Washburn (KS) Lawrence, KS
10/14 W 29-6 Ottawa (KS) Lawrence, KS
10/21 W 29-5 Drake (IA) Lawrence, KS
10/28 W 18-0 Haskell Institute (KS) Lawrence, KS
11/4 W 29-0 Ottawa (KS) Ottawa, KS
11/11 W 35-0 Emporia St. (KS) Emporia, KS
11/18 W 36-20 Nebraska Lincoln, NE
11/25 W 23-0 Washburn (KS) Lawrence, KS
11/30 W 34-6 Missouri Kansas City, MO

I bet that second match-up with Washburn was exciting!

The aughts were then the time of Coach A.R. “Bert” Kennedy (53-9-4), who put together the following seasons:

1904: 8-1-1 (lost to Haskell, tied Colorado)
1905: 10-1 (lost to Colorado in Denver)
1906: 7-2-2 (lost to @ SLU, @ K-State, tied Mizzou 0-0)
1907: 5-3 (lost @ Washburn, home to Nebraska, and @ SLU)
1908: 9-0 (beat Mizzou 10-4 in KC) – Missouri Valley Champs
1909: 8-1 (lost to Mizzou 12-6 in KC)
1910: 6-1-1 (lost to Nebraska at home 6-0, won @ OU 2-0, tied Mizzou 5-5 at KC)

KU had an 18-game winning streak, which started in 1907 with a 4-0 win over Mizzou and ended with a loss to Mizzou in last game of the year in 1909.

After 1910, Kennedy was no longer the coach, and I haven’t been able to figure out why. Apparently he coached at Haskell for awhile. I can understand losing Yost to Michigan, but losing your coach to Haskell? I was hoping KU fired him after the home loss to Nebraska in 1910 so I could make up a whole curse thing. When your chasing your first title in a century, you need a good curse story right?

Kennedy was also a dentist for 60 years in Lawrence, so someone out there must have gone to him for a teeth cleaning. If you did, let me know why he quit coaching. His son Ted Kennedy (no not that one) lives in Lawrence, and Tom Keegan at Lawrence Journal World wrote a column on him, but didn’t say why he quit coaching.

KU still hasn’t played anyone this year, but it doesn’t matter, as they haven’t lost to anyone. I’m having hard time deciding on how I feel about the Jayhawks right now. Should I enjoy the fact that KU is 10-0 and will have their best season in over a decade (and there were some bad seasons in there, especially while I was attending school – 1998 to 2002)? Or do I get wrapped up in thinking about winning the whole damn thing, and risk being disappointed in a crushing manner?

I think it’s time to throw myself into it – KU will beat Mizzou! I hope.

Outlook: Win out and will be in the title game. Will it happen? Does Dorothy crush the wicked witch with a house? She does do that right?

Oregon (8-1, #2)
Loss: vs. Cal (6-4) 31-24
Wins: vs. Houston (6-4) 48-27; @ Michigan (8-3) 39-7; vs. Fresno State (6-4) 52-21; vs. USC (8-2, #11); vs. Arizona State (9-1, #8) 35-23
Remaining games: Thursday night @ Arizona (4-6); 11/24 @ UCLA (5-5); 12/1 Civil War vs. Oregon State (6-4)

Well, as I sit here the Ducks are getting smoked 24-11 to Arizona in the second quarter, with their great Heisman candidate QB Dennis Dixon injured and out of the game. Things look grim. Hopefully Dixon can get back in the game and maybe lead the Ducks back.

But if he doesn’t, here comes #2 for the Jayhawks!

Oregon is definitely a nouveau riche program, with Nike dollars pouring into Eugene from alum Phil Knight. The Ducks are also home of the oddest uniforms, but they seem to have their stride. They actually look pretty good tonight (other than the whole football playing part of the game).

Uh oh, make that 31-11 Arizona.

Oregon went to the 1963 Sun Bowl, but then was absent from postseason play until 1989, when they beat Tulsa 27-24 in the Independence Bowl. Since then, however, the Ducks have been to 13 bowl games, highlighted by a breakthrough appearance in the Rose Bowl in 1995 (lost to Penn State), followed up by a 1996 Cotton Bowl (lost to Colorado).

Oregon probably should have gotten a shot at the 2001 title, but were instead sent to the Fiesta Bowl. That was the year that Nebraska got annihilated at Colorado on Thanksgiving weekend 62-36, but still went on to play Miami for the “title”, and got smoked. Oregon finished with one loss and ranked #2.

Oregon has three good wins this year – at Michigan, and at home over USC and Arizona State. If Kansas loses and Oregon wins out (looking dimmer and dimmer as Oregon is sacked out of field goal range at the end of the first half), the Ducks would likely be in the title game.

Outlook: Barring a second-half rally, Oregon is cooked.

This just in! Ryan Leaf’s younger brother is playing QB for Oregon, and Ryan is on the sidelines! The Ducks have no chance! They do get a FG, now 31-14.

LSU (9-1, #1)
Loss: @ Kentucky (7-3, #23) 43-37 OT
Wins: vs. Miss. St. (6-4) 45-0; vs. Va. Tech (8-2, #10) 48-7; vs. South Carolina (6-5) 28-16; vs. Florida (7-3, #12) 28-24; vs. Auburn (7-4) 30-24; @ Alabama (6-4) 41-34.
Remaining games: this week @ Ole Miss (3-7); 11/23 vs. Arkansas (6-4); possible SEC title game – likely vs. Georgia (8-2, #9) or Tennessee (7-3, #20) – slight chance it will be Florida

Bayou Bengals! Death Valley! Halloween night 1959 - Billy Cannon returns a punt to beat #3 Ole Miss! They have numbers on the five-yard lines!

The Tigers have tradition. They have two national titles – 1958 and 2003 (split with USC). I don’t understand why they share both the Tiger mascot and the Death Valley thing with Clemson. I bet there’s some fun bourbon-fueled southern boy arguments over which school is the rightful owner of the “Death Valley” moniker. No offense to Clemson, but I think LSU is more intimidating over the last decade or so.

My favorite LSU game was in 1997, when they beat #1 Florida in Baton Rouge 28-21. LSU kept running over them: like 5 running backs got hurt, but it didn’t matter. Kevin Faulk was killing the Gators, and after he got hurt big fatty Cecil Collins came in and kept rolling. I think I really hated Florida, as they usually beat Florida State, which I had some weird rooting interest in for awhile. I think it was because they wear those sweet helmets with the arrows on them (I talk about uniforms entirely too much don’t I?).

So, LSU is the greatest this year, blah, blah. I don’t think they’ve played all that great, but man they have talent. Glen Dorsey is a beast on the defensive side.

Dixon is done, the Oregon coach just told Erin Andrews so. And yes, Erin looks nice.

LSU gets tons of credit from the start of the season when they killed a decent Mississippi State team and a good Virginia Tech team. Since then, they’ve seemed bored and beaten their SEC opponents, mostly at home (Florida, Auburn, and South Carolina). I’m not sure that Auburn and South Carolina are much better than, say, Texas A&M and Texas Tech. Better coached? Definitely. More talented? Not by much.

LSU better be careful with Arkansas, but they should win that one. The only real test left is the SEC championship game. Georgia’s been playing really well lately, but they may not get a shot at the Tigers. Tennessee can win out and be in the SEC title game, as they hold the tiebreaker with a win over the Dawgs (both teams have two conference losses). I think Georgia gets in though, and gives LSU a good game, but falls short.

Outlook: Win and they are in the title game. I think they’ll do it.

National Championship: LSU vs. KU.

Who wants a TITLE?

2007-11-14T22:50:00.000-05:00

There’s far too much going on with KU football; it’s hard to know what to think or write about. KU won over Oklahoma State last Saturday, playing at night, on ABC, with Brent Mursberger and Kirk Herbstreit on hand. The Jayhawks are now 10-0 and ranked #3 in the BCS poll. QB Todd Reesing is being seriously talked about being invited to New York for the Heisman ceremony (I don’t think anyone really believes he could actually win it at this point).

Today I’m just going to look at the national title picture, starting with Arizona State, Ohio State, West Virginia, Missouri, and Oklahoma. Tomorrow we’ll do Kansas, LSU, and Oregon.

We’ll look at each team with a decent shot at the thing, and what they’ve done so far, and what they have ahead. I’m not going to get worked up about KU being behind one-loss teams right now; there’s too much football to be played. If KU wins their next two games, then it will be time to start really looking at who should be in, and, by then Oregon and LSU (or anyone else for that matter) could have 2 or more losses.

As Bobby Bowden said about the national title race, right after his team lost their first game of the year, “These things tend to sort themselves out, and we just go sorted out.”

Current BCS rankings:

1) LSU, 9-1
2) Oregon, 8-1
3) Kansas, 10-0
4) Oklahoma, 9-1
5) Missouri, 9-1
6) West Virginia, 8-1
7) Ohio State, 10-1
8) Arizona State, 9-1
9) Georgia, 8-2
10) Virginia Tech, 8-2

Here are the BCS Bowls these teams are fighting for. If a team slotted to go to a certain bowl is instead in the title game, they are replaced with an at-large team.

Rose Bowl – Jan. 1, 4:30 pm ABC (Rose Bowl)
Big Ten champion vs. Pac-10 champion
Sugar Bowl – Jan. 1, 8:30 pm, New Orleans (Superdome)
SEC champion vs. at-large
Fiesta Bowl – Jan. 2, 8 pm FOX (University of Phoenix Stadium)
Big 12 champion vs. at-large
Orange Bowl – Jan. 3, 8 pm FOX Miami (Dolphin Stadium)
ACC champion vs. at-large
National Championship – Jan. 7, 8 pm FOX, New Orleans (Superdome)

Setting aside #10 Virginia Tech and #9 Georgia, since a team with two losses is not going to play for the title, there are eight teams alive in the championship hunt. Recent precedent says that a undefeated team out of a non-BCS conference doesn't get in the title game (see Boise State in 2006, Utah in 2004), so Hawaii (9-0, #16) and Boise State (9-1, #18) have no shot at the title game either. The winner of their game, however, on 11/23 in Hawaii, will likely play in a BCS game.

Outside looking in

Arizona State (9-1, #8)
Loss: @ Oregon (8-1, #2) 35-23
Wins: vs. Cal (6-4) 31-20; vs. UCLA (5-5) 24-20
Remaining games: 11/22 vs. USC (8-2, #11); 12/1 vs. Arizona (4-6)

ASU is a program that has had limited success in the past. Jake the Snake Plummer led the Sun Devils to the Rose Bowl in 1996 with a perfect 11-0 record, before dropping a heartbreaker to Ohio State 20-17. In the Sugar Bowl that year, one-loss Florida beat undefeated Florida St. in the “championship game.” If Arizona State had held on, they would have had at least a share of the title. I was definitely cheering for Arizona State, as they were a team I hadn’t really seen before, and they wear what I think are quality uniforms (probably top 10, maybe top 5 in college football). When the Snake led them to a score with about 2 minutes left, they led 17-14, but Ohio St. drove the length of the field for the winning touchdown. Having your team give up a last minute touchdown drive with the national championship in their grasp has to be high on the list of gut-wrenching sports moments.

Now, the Sun Devils are back on the national stage. Dennis Erickson is alive! He escaped from his NCAA-mandated prison term in Idaho (nothing against the Vandals) and is again coaching in the Pac-10! Erickson is in his first year after Dick Koetter was fired last year. The Koetter deal was odd, as he had ASU in bowl games 4 of his last 5 years, but they were crappy bowls. Erickson will have your team in a BCS in a year or two, but will bail on your team shortly thereafter, or will leave your team on probation, or more likely both.

Miami under Erickson won titles in 1989 and 1991, but had 3 years of probation after Erickson bailed for the Seahawks. Erickson also led surprising Oregon State to an 11-1 record in 2000, a share of the Pac-10 title, and a total destruction of Notre Dame 41-7 in the Fiesta Bowl. The Beavers were a close loss to Washington from perhaps being champs. He then left for the 49ers.

The Sun Devils were in the top 5 after starting out 8-0, but dropped their big game with Oregon. That’s as good of loss as anyone, but their best win is against 6-4 Cal, who started out strong but is now a major disappointment. ASU's only remaining chance to impress anyone is against USC, which won’t be enough.

Outlook: ASU only gets in if they are one of only two one-loss teams. That’s unlikely.

Ohio State (10-1, #7)
Loss: vs. Illinois (8-3, #19) 28-21
Wins: vs. N’Western (6-5) 58-7; @ Purdue (7-4) 23-7; vs. Mich. St. (6-5) 24-17; @ Penn St. (8-3) 37-17; vs. Wisconsin (8-3) 28-21
Remaining game: this week @ Michigan (8-3, #21)

Does anybody want to read about Ohio State? Good, because I don’t want to write anything. But I guess I will give a little bit. They lost two title games last year to Florida, it is a gigantic university with a gigantic stadium, and they have a gigantic rivalry with the Wolverines.

The Buckeyes have 5 national titles, with the most recent coming under current coach Jim Tressel in 2002. That team featured Chris Gamble playing both ways, a clear rip-off of what Charles Woodson had done for Michigan in the late 90s. Maurice Clarett was the star freshman running back, who is now a star freshman cell phone thief. That was the bizarre story of last year, as I woke up hazy on New Years Day to hear that Clarett had spent his night sticking people up for cash and cell phones. Dude, the iphone wasn't even out yet!

My memories of Ohio State are mostly connected to my uncle Don, who went to grad school at Ohio State (KU undergrad of course). Several times while I was growing up Ohio State went undefeated and would then lose their last game to arch rival Michigan, and my uncle would go nuts on John Cooper. I never understood his anger, as Ohio State was always pretty good and much better than KU. But looking at Cooper’s record, he was 2-10-1 against Michigan and a 3-9 record in bowl games. Ouch. Check out the Buckeyes’ record going into the Michigan game and the result in those games in the following years: 1993 9-0-1, 28-0 loss in Ann Arbor; 1995 11-0, 31-23 loss in Ann Arbor; 1996 10-0, 13-9 loss in Columbus; and 8-0 in 1998 before losing at home to unranked Michigan State on the way to an 11-1 record.

This year, that loss to Illinois killed Ohio State. They have no marquee wins and a home loss. Illinois isn’t terrible, but it’s probably the worst loss of all the teams here (OU losing @ CU is probably as bad though). A win over Michigan isn’t going to impress anyone either. Some real funky stuff will have to go down in the Big 12 for Ohio State to get to the title game, which also applies to West Virginia. Either KU or Mizzou would have to lose this weekend, or lose to a Oklahoma team with more than one loss (or Texas) in the Big 12 championship game. Otherwise the winner of the Big 12 triumvirate challenge will be ahead of Ohio State. Or LSU and Oregon would both have to lose.

Outlook: Slim chance, still Big 10 title and a Rose Bowl berth to play for, and the Buckeyes will probably be able to get up for Michigan.

West Virginia (8-1, #6)
Loss: @ South Florida (7-3) 21-13
Wins: @ Maryland (5-5) 31-14; vs. Miss. St. (6-4) 38-13; @ Rutgers (6-4) 31-3; vs. Louisville (5-5) 38-31
Remaining games: this week @ Cincinnati (8-2, #22); 11/24 vs. UConn (8-2, #24); 12/1 vs. Pitt (4-5)

I have a friend from law school that went to West Virginia, and one day I yelled at him while we were talking football “Major Harris! Major Harris!” He was very excited about my knowledge of Mr. Harris - apparently Major Harris is a legend in Morgantown still today. Major Harris was definitely my first memory of West Virginia football, as he led the Mountaineers to an 11-0 regular season record in 1988 before losing to undefeated national champs Notre Dame (boy, those words sound odd together these days) in the Fiesta Bowl. The way I remember it, West Virginia had an outside shot at winning the title, as Miami had only one loss (by one in South Bend), but maybe they could’ve gotten a split title at least.

I researched what Harris did after he played at WVU, and I think this sentence from wikipedia sums it up nicely: “Harris played one season in the Canadian Football League with the British Columbia Lions before spending parts of the next five years in the Arena Football League, where his 429 rushing yards in 1991 stood as a single-season league record until Michael Bishop ran for 459 yards in 2005.”

Major Harris and Michael Bishop. Interesting.

This year’s team is near the top of college football for the third straight year under Coach Rich Rodriguez. Quarterback Pat White and halfback Steve Slaton led West Virginia as freshmen in 2005 to an 11-1 record and a wild 38-35 win over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. Last year, West Virginia’s first loss was to Louisville (only team to beat WVU in 2005), and then lost in an upset to South Florida.

The loss to South Florida this year hurts even more, as it has kept the Mountaineers from being at the top of the BCS. White was also injured in the first half, and the usually stout West Virginia offense struggled in the second half without him. It is a loss that is respectable, but not as good as it looked at the time (isn’t weird talking about losses as being “good”?), with South Florida losing three games since.

Outlook: See above. A lot of things need to happen. Here's a cheerleader:

Can make a pretty good argument (if they win out)

Missouri (9-1, #5)
Loss: @ Oklahoma 41-31
Wins: vs. Illinois (8-3, #19) 40-34 in St. Louis; vs. Texas Tech (7-4) 41-10; vs. Texas A&M (6-5) 40-26
Remaining games: this week @ K-State (5-5); 11/24 vs. Kansas (10-0, #3) in Kansas City; possible Big 12 title game – likely vs. OU

Missouri has a football team?

I’ll have a lot more on Mizzou leading up to BORDER WAR! Until then, I’m just going to leave them alone, except to give a little warning to the Tigers:

Beware!

Outlook: Mizzou wins out they are in the title game, unless both Oregon and LSU both win out. Then Missouri will be left out in the cold to whine, just like in 1960 (scoreboards never lie fools!).

Sorry about the ugly meth chick, here's a real picture of a Mizzou Golden Girl:

Just kidding again (but the Mizzou dancers are really called the Golden Girls! I bet I'm the first to make fun of that!) Here's a real girl:

Oklahoma (9-1, #4)
Loss: @ Colorado (5-6) 27-24
Wins: vs. Tulsa (7-3) 62-31; vs. UT (9-2, #13) 28-21 in Dallas; 41-31 Mizzou (9-1, #5); vs. Texas A&M (6-5) 42-14
Remaining games: this week @ Texas Tech (7-4), next week vs. OSU (5-5); possible Big 12 title game vs. KU/MU winner

Something I just learned, OU’s football history begins with a former KU football player. Bennie Owen was the quarterback of the 1899 Kansas team that went 10-0. He was coach at Oklahoma from 1905 to 1926, compiling a 122-54-16 record. Oklahoma now plays at Owen Field, though there is some other stupid name for the stadium. Good looking guy too:

Bud Wilkinson was the coach in the 1950s, and had the famous 47 game winning streak, which was snapped of course after Sports Illustrated ran the famous cover with the caption “Why Oklahoma is Unbeatable.” OU has seven national titles: 1950, 1955, 1956, 1974, 1975, 1985, 2000.

The 2000 team is definitely the most interesting to me, and not just because it was under current coach Bob Stoops. It kind of came out of nowhere, and had Mark Mangino as offensive coordinator. Sounds kind of familiar, doesn’t it Jayhawk fans? It really was no less surprising than KU’s run this year, and only isn’t remembered as such because it was by a team wearing jerseys that say “Oklahoma.”

John Blake preceded Stoops as coach and had the following seasons: 1995 - 5-5-1, 1996 - 3-8, 1997 - 4-8, and 1998 - 5-6. Stoops in his first year, 1999, was 7-5 and lost to Mississippi State in the Independence Bowl.

In 2000 Oklahoma entered the season ranked #19 in the AP poll, and shredded UTEP, Arkansas St, and Rice in the non-conference (similar to KU this year). This is where the 2007 KU/2000 OU comparison falls apart a bit, as OU played some highly ranked Big 12 teams, something KU has not had the opportunity to do this year. OU won the Red River Shootout over #11 Texas (63-14), then won the next week at #2 K-State (41-31), and after a bye week, beat #1 Nebraska in Norman (31-14). OU eked out a win in Big 12 title game over KSU 27-24, then beat an overrated Florida State 13-2 to win the title. K-State was good that year, and beat Tennessee in Cotton Bowl to finish 11-3. Nebraska was 10-2, losing only @ OU and @ K-State (thank god they fired Solich! Hahaha.)

Of course, if KU beats MU and OU in back-to-back weeks, they would have a similar run.

This year’s Sooners have that bad, bad loss at Colorado. It’s an interesting debate between OU and Mizzou, and hinges on the stupid whose loss is better question. Mizzou claims to be better, as they have a “better” loss – at Oklahoma. Of course, Oklahoma won the head-to-head match-up. I’m thinking OU fell asleep in Boulder with a lead late, and are the better team since they, you know, WON THE GAME against Missouri. And Missouri, a 10 point loss is not that close of a loss - try to stay within one score of a team if you're going to crow about the loss later.

Outlook: Gotta win out and hope for help from someone to jump Oregon and LSU. Possible that a win over a highly ranked Kansas (or Missouri I suppose) could leap them over the Ducks.

Best team in the country with three losses: Florida Gators! Yeah, I just had some pics that seemed a shame to waste...

Just shut up, Boston, we hate you

2007-11-10T11:54:00.000-05:00

Just a quick little note - I read this column from Bill Simmons this morning and was flabbergasted. It's little more than a bitch-fest about the officiating in the Colts-Patriots game, and how the Patriots were screwed by having "95 percent of the borderline calls" going against them.

Really Bill? This is what you use your enormous reader audience to write about? That your favorite football team had bad officiating in their game? A game they won? The Patriots beat the Colts on the road to remain undefeated and he bitches that bad calls made the game closer than it should have been. What a joke. Every fan in the history of the world has bitched about the officiating after every game, and has said the game wasn't as close (or closer if on the losing end) as the score showed.

He couples this bizarre rant with a synopsis of the movie Victory!, which just adds to stupidity of the whole thing. Because the NFL is unfair to the poor Patriots just like the Nazis were unfair to Pele, in a fictional movie. I don't know what can be said about that...

Simmons also went on and on early in the NFL season about how bad Herm Edwards is, and consistently ranked the Chiefs last in the NFL. I don't think the Chiefs are great, and Herm hasn't won any Super Bowls, but worst in the NFL? Herm doesn't deserve to be called out as an especially bad head coach - hell, he took the Jets to the playoffs multiple times.

Simmons just watched Hard Knocks and was convinced Herm had no clue. Because he, as a sportswriter, knows far more about running an NFL team than Herm. Clearly, writers can criticize those who run sports teams, but to rip apart Herm based on his personality and mannerisms seemed rather arrogant and superficial. Herm is a bit strange, but he is a former player and a young African-American man who probably knows how to relate to Dwayne Bowe and Larry Johnson better than most...

That's a whole lot to say that Bill Simmons makes me mad. I don't think I can even cheer for Too Tall P Squared (Paul Pierce) in good conscience as the Boston Bandwagons roll through the NBA.

Update: I'm not the only one who read this column and was wowed by its stupidity. Kissing Suzy Kolber trashes him, and some other blog defends him because the whole point of Simmons is to write stupid columns about Boston (pretty weak defense if you ask me).

Two-way stars and national championships: Charles Woodson, Chris Gamble, and now Aqib Talib?!

2007-11-09T13:51:00.001-05:00

It is not often that something happens to you that has never happened before in your entire life, something that completely shakes up your routine and the way you've lived your life. This past year there many memorable events in my life: celebrating my first wedding anniversary with my beautiful wife (that's us on the right eating lobster in Maine) by taking a wonderful driving tour of New England and Quebec; passing the bar exam to become a licensed attorney; being the best man in my younger brother's wedding; celebrating the 60th birthday of my father, a man I love and admire greatly; and attending my little nephew Dominic's (photo to the left) first birthday party.

Those were all wonderful events. But none are what I'm talking about. What I am talking about is the opening of the University of Kansas basketball season. Sure, that's happened every year since 1898, but this year was the first since 1989 that I didn't notice. Usually by the time of the second exhibition, every KU fan is fired up and ready to go. So was it a new sense of resposibility? Nope. A maturing process leading me away from the trials and tribulations of 18-21 year-old kids? Hardly. I'll get to the point, it's this guy and his team...

The KU football team is ranked #4 in the BCS, and has a chance to play for a conference championship, maybe even win the conference, maybe even...ok I won't talk about that yet. I'll let Michael Wilbon say it instead, "Kansas will go undefeated, and will play for the national championship." That was on PTI on November 8, 2007, and was high on my list of things I never thought I'd hear. Old smelly man Tony Kornheiser said "No way!"

After scoring 76 (seventy-six!) points on Nebraska to move to 9-0 for the first time since the 2nd century (BC, Athens and Carthage were tough road games I bet), KU fans could not care less what Kornheiser thinks. This week ESPN is pimping KU all over the place, as the KU at Oklahoma State game is the national ABC game on Saturday night (for most of the country, but here I will get the amazing BC-Maryland game!). It's just a bit cool to see KU football splashed all over the place.
Let's take a look back at my awesomeness in predicting this break-out season. I was optimistic in 2005, when I contemplated Kansas becoming a player in the Big 12 here, after their first victory over Nebraska since 1969. What seemed to be hubris then looks a little more prescient now doesn't it? Leading up to the Iowa State game in 2005, I noted here that Bill Snyder's retirement might open up the Big 12 a little more for KU (hit), as would the inevitable firing of Gary Pinkel at Mizzou (miss). Leading up to the 2006 season, I predicted KU to go 10-2 here. I was just a year early; KU missed winning 8-9 games in 2006 by the narrowest of margins, with backbreaking last minute breakdowns against Nebraska, Baylor, A&M, and Toledo.

So, clearly I predicted this 9-0 start that has everyone else shocked. My brother, however, likes to point out that when you predict 10-2 every year, eventually you'll be right. I say, one, many people thought Mangino would never win 10 games, and two, shut up and deal with my Amazing Kreskin skills.

Difference Makers
Aqib Talib is a Sports Illustrated cover guy (even if it's in the upper little corner), and was featured in the New York Times as well (check out the NY Times article on Kansas high school power Smith Center as well while you're there). At the one game I've been able to attend in person, the thrilling 62-0 thrashing of SE Louisiana, we commented on how Talib never stops talking; as soon as he took his helmet off it was clear he was yapping. I bet he's really talking now (except maybe he was quiet for a sec after those two TDs that Nebraska wide receiver Maurice Purify scored over him). Talib most likely will take the cash and move on to be a difference maker in the NFL. He has a daughter with a KU sprinter, and has already singed a letter of intent with Magino for any future sons they have, so KU should be able to replace him in about 20 years.

Here's a couple of highlights from Talib's year so far:

Mark Magino has gone from funny fat guy to funny fat guy who wins, and has really hit the national spotlight. I hope he's too busy building his program to read all the stupid blogs about him (and I'm putting the likelihood of that at, oh, maybe 100%). Mangino became a youtube star for berating freshman Raymond Pendleton for taking a penalty for diving into the endzone. Deadspin.com has Mangino jokes prominent in their rotation of content, most notably here (making fun of the Lawrence Journal World picture of Mangino captioned by "Mangino: Cupcakes served their purpose"), and here (a full pictorial). everydayshouldbesaturday.com has also noticed that Mangino is rather large.

But anyway, Mangino has years of experience working under Snyder, OU head coach Bob Stoops, and as the guy in Lawrence and has become a first-rate talent evaluator (both players and coaches), as well as a top-notch game-day coach. The new offensive coordinator Ed Warriner seems to have done a great deal, but having a QB like Todd Reesing has obviously helped.

Defensive tackle James McClinton (junior) will be a first-team all Big 12 selection, as will left offensive tackle Anthony Collins (also a junior). It will be interesting to see how many out of the McClinton, Collins, and Talib trio come back for their senior season. The offense has been productive, only struggling a bit to score on the road against Colorado and A&M. A pair of running backs, Jake Sharp (sophomore) and Brandon McAnderson (senior), have filled in nicely for the graduated Jon Cornish.

The defense is improved, with junior linebackers Joe Mortenson, Mike Rivera, and James Holt all settling in nicely as second-year starters. The secondary was horrific statistically last year, but cornerbacks Chris Harris (freshman) and Kendrick Harper (junior college transfer - junior) have done a good job splitting time opposite Talib. The lackluster pass rush, which contributed to KU's poor defense against the pass last season is not much better other than McClinton, and remians a concern.

Is success sustainable?
For the years that I've followed the KU football team, it's always been a given that KU cannot be a consistent contender. Of the many KU fans that I've talked to, no one has ever said "KU really should be a perennial top ten team." We simply hope that KU can win 6 or 7 games and go to a bowl. This makes sense when the team hasn't done that but four times in the past 20 years or so (this year will be #5). But there is no reason why this must always be true.

Nebraska and Oklahoma are so different from Kansas, it's obvious that KU could never field a program like OU and NU. Or not. Kansas has a population of about 2.7 million people. Oklahoma has more with 3.6 million people, and Nebraska less with 1.7 million. Sure, pure population is not the whole picture. But is there really that big of difference - what, they play high school football in Oklahoma and Nebraska but skip Kansas? We've heard about the "corn-fed o-linemen" up at Lincoln for years, but do wheat-fed kids not block as well? I think they play some football in Hutchinson, Dodge City, Liberal, Wichita, and even in wimpy Johnson County.

You know what else? Nebraska used to stink. It's true, in the 1950s they weren't good. Kansas was good, real good, at points in the late 1950s and in the 1960s (Gale Sayers! Gale Sayers!). Other programs have gone from nothing to powers - Wisconsin, Florida State, Miami (FL), and Virginia Tech are good examples. KU has the money to do it, they have the coach to do it, and there are enough players in the region (plus Texas rejects!) to do it. Plus, Nebraska, K-State, and Colorado are all playing catch-up at this point.

I don't feel like ruining a perfectly good day by talking about that team to the east of Kansas, so we'll just ignore them for now...

Jason King, the former beat writer for KU at the Kansas City Star, wrote about all of this as well for Yahoo! sports, under the headline Kansas Revival. King should know well how far the program has come as he covered the ineptness of the Terry Allen regime. But King also highlights how the administration was far from helpful as well. Having never been close to college football and how a program is run, it is hard to know what all goes into running a successful program, but even I can understand what it means for the football team to have their own offices, training facilities, and practice fields right next to the stadium, rather than taking a bus to a facility shared by all other teams. Football deserves it as well, because a successful football program means a lot more money for everyone.

Losers
Here's a couple of videos in honor of the formerly dominant (ha) K-State football team. Be careful, my mother says the second one is "vulgar."

Early Season Basketball

2007-11-07T23:29:00.000-05:00

It's college basketball early-season play! That means meaningless tournaments on ESPN, and Duke blowouts. I've compiled the early television schedule of those tournaments for you here. We have the CBE Classic, with final rounds in the new Sprint Center in Kansas City. There's the NIT of course, finishing up in Madison Square Garden, as will Coaches vs. Cancer. The Maui Invitational is a little down this year, with Duke headlining.

Monday, Nov. 12
7 pm espn2 - New Mexico St. @ Duke
9 pm espn2 - Wisc-Green Bay @ Ohio St. (nit)
11 pm Youngstown St. @ UCLA (CBE Classic)

Duke playing a typical tough early game, though Kansas seems to have taken some lessons from the Blue Devils with a full slate of weak teams in the Fieldhouse. Lots of money at the gate with no return game plus easy win is the key formula for top teams. This is probably why KU doesn't play Wichita St., but they should.

Tuesday, Nov. 13
7 pm and 9 pm espn - second round NIT match-up: likely either St Joe's @ Syracuse, or Columbia/Del. st @ Ohio State (match-ups projected)
10:30 pm espn2 - Weber State @ UCLA (projected match-up) cbe classic

Pretty lackluster group of games, but a good chance to see some notable freshmen. Syracuse is interesting this year with guards Eric Devendorf and Paul Harris, and also features freshman Donte Green, a 6'8" 210 lb. power forward out of Maryland, who was the second-rated PF by Scout.com (behind only K-State's own Michael Beasley!). Freshman Johnny Flynn is a local kid, a 5-star point guard out of Niagara, NY. I bet Iona is glad he choose Syracuse (it seems Iona is always playing Niagara for the MAAC title in one of the first Championship Week games). Harris is from Niagara Falls, NY, so there seems to be tons of upstate talent. Or at least two guys.

Ohio St. has no one I have ever heard of, and I saw them play 20 times last year. So they lost a little bit of their team, but they have a 5-star as well - PF Kosta Koufos (great name), from Canton, Ohio (yes, he's white).

UCLA has all-world Kevin Love this year, the 6'9" PF out of Oregon, but will probably be without PG Darren Collison, who injured his foot or something in practice. Everyone of note except Arron Afflalo is back for the Bruins.

Here is the Pre-season NIT bracket

Wednesday, Nov. 14
10:30 pm espn2 - second round nit match-up: Utah @ Washington or UTEP/Texas A&M-Corpus Cristi @ Texas A&M

TAMUCC has the longest initials in the NCAAs, and regular A&M has new coach Mark Turgeon and 5 star C freshman Deandre Jordan, but not Acie Law IVIMCIX anymore!

Thursday, Nov. 15
7 pm and 9 pm espn2 - coaches vs. cancer semis at madison square garden, projected match-ups: OU vs. Memphis, UCONN vs. Gardner Webb (upset Kentucky 84-68)

Oklahoma should be better if Jeff Capel has a clue, which he seems to. Memphis is great, with freshman superstar PG Derrick Rose, who thought about going to Illinois, and then ran away like every other great Chicago player. Don't know much about UConn, but PG AJ Price didn't steal any laptops this year, so that's an improvement.

Here's the Coaches vs. Cancer bracket

Friday, Nov. 16
8:30 pm espn2 - Cancer Final

Wichita State is playing in the Paradise Jam in the Virgin Islands this week as well, and opens with a pretty good match-up with Baylor on Nov. 16. Baylor is supposed to be decent this year, if no one murders anyone.

Paradise Jam bracket

Monday, Nov. 19
Maui Invitational
2:30 pm espn2 Chaminade v. Marquette
5:00 pm espn2 LSU vs. Oklahoma St.
[7 pm - espn2 Maryland v. UCLA cbe classic semi]
9:00 pm espn2 Princeton vs. Duke
11:30 pm espn2 Arizona St vs. Illinois

Duke, Duke, duke, dook, Duke, Duke, blah, blah, second round loss, Duke, blah blah.
Maryland, sweaty Gary Williams, 2002 was lucky bullshit, Maryland Turtles, blah blah.

Maui bracket

Tuesday, Nov. 20
7 pm espn Marquette vs LSU/OSU - Maui semifinal
9:30 pm espn Duke vs. ASU/Illinois - Maui Semifinal
10 pm espn2 CBE Championship Maryland/UCLA vs. Mizzou/Mich St.

CBE Bracket

Wednesday, Nov. 21
2 pm espn2 Maui 5th place game
4:30 pm espn2 Maui 3rd place game
7 pm espn2 NIT Semi - Texas a&m vs. Washington (projected)
9 pm espn2 nit semi - Ohio St. vs. Syracuse (projected)
10 pm espn Maui championship game

Friday, Nov. 23
12:00 am espn2 San Diego vs. Southern Cal - Anaheim Classic
3 pm Mississippi St./UC Irvine vs. So. Illinois/UT Chat. - Anaheim Classic
4:30 pm espn NIT 3rd place game
7 pm espn2 NIT championship

This is a really terrible tournament, USC and a bunch of dumpy west coast teams; what, was Gonzaga really too busy?

Anaheim Classic bracket

Saturday, Nov. 24
12:30 am espn2 Miami(oh)/So. Alabama vs. University San Diego/USC - anaheim classic

The OJ Mayo journey continues. I really wish this insane freshman PG had ended up at K-State. Would've been entertaining.

Sunday, Nov. 25
8 pm espn Arizona @ Kansas
9 pm espn2 Anaheim Classic Semi
11:30 pm espn2 Anaheim Classic Semi

I may have more to say about Kansas basketball at some point, but probably not on this day, which is right after the KU-Mizzou football game at Arrowhead.

Monday, Nov. 26
7 pm espn2 Wake Forest @ Iowa

Wake coach Skip Prosser died last summer, which was really quite sad. Not expecting too much from either of these teams.

Tuesday, Nov. 27
7 pm espn Georgia Tech @ Indiana
7:30 pm espn2 Minnesota @ Florida State
9 pm espn Wisconsin @ Duke
9:30 pm espn2 Purdue @ Clemson

Indiana is interesting, with the Denim Master Kelvin Sampson again in trouble for making too many phone calls to recruits. Is Kelvin that cool to chat with that it's worth it to him to call these kids all day? Do they really want to talk to him? Anyway, freshman PG Eric Gordan signed with Illinois, then said, uh, nevermind. That's funny.

Wisconsin will try to score more than 20 points in the first half. They averaged at least 30 a game last year, and spent most of the year in the top 5, which was, well, dumb. Purdue's got a pretty solid program; Clemson, FSU, and Minnesota are not on my radar this year for any reason.

Wednesday, Nov. 28
7 pm espn NC State @ Michigan State
7:30 pm espn2 Illinois @ Maryland
9 pm espn North Carolina @ Ohio State
9:30 espn2 Virginia Tech @ Penn State

Ah, the stupid ACC-Big 10 match-up. Overrated versus overexposed. Roy Williams is so great, may he rest in peace.

Thursday, Nov. 29
9 pm espn2 Oregon @ Kansas State

Michael Beasley! Bill Walker! Yes! Basketball school!

I hate K-State.

Area teams
Just in case you want to attend some games that don't involve KU (yeah right)...
Coaches vs. Cancer at OU in Norman
Nov. 8
OU vs. San Francisco
Denver vs. East Central Oklahoma
Nov. 9 - Winners

I hear East Central is real good this year.

CBE Classic at Plaige (mizzou) Arena
Nov. 12
Missouri v. Central Michigan
Fordham v. Central Missouri
Nov. 13 - Winners

Nov. 19
Sprint Center, Kansas City, MO, projected match-ups:
7 pm - espn2 Maryland v. UCLA
9:30 pm - Missouri v. Mich. St.
Nov. 20
Championship - winners on espn2 10 pm

Big 12/Pac-10 Men's Basketball Series
Television - Fox Sports, check your local listings!

For some reason, the KU-Arizona game is not part of this "challenge". I think I'll go ahead and count it, and ignore that sweet Iowa State - Oregon State game.

Thursday, Nov. 29 -
Oregon at Kansas State
Oklahoma at USC

Friday, Nov. 30 -
Washington State at Baylor
Iowa State at Oregon State

Saturday, Dec. 1 -
Washington at Oklahoma State
Missouri at California

Sunday, Dec. 2 -
Arizona State at Nebraska
Stanford at Colorado
Texas at UCLA
Texas A&M at Arizona

And just for reference, KU and WSU schedules:

Kansas schedule
Nov. 09 v. La-Monroe
Nov. 11 v. UMKC
Nov. 15 v. Washburn
Nov. 21 v. Northern Arizona
Nov. 25 v. Arizona
Nov. 28 v. Florida Atlantic
Dec. 02 @ Southern Cal
Dec. 05 v. Eastern Washington
Dec. 08 v. DePaul
Dec. 15 v. Ohio in KC Sprint Center
Dec. 18 @ Ga. Tech
Dec. 22 v. Miami (OH)
Dec. 29 v. Yale
Jan. 05 @ Boston College
Jan. 08 v. Loyola (MD)
Jan. 12 @ Nebraska
Jan. 14 v. Oklahoma
Jan. 19 @ Missouri
Jan. 23 v. Iowa State
Jan. 26 v. Nebraska
Jan. 30 @ K-State
Feb. 02 @ Colorado
Feb. 04 v. Missouri
Feb. 09 v. Baylor
Feb. 11 @ Texas
Feb. 16 v. Colorado
Feb. 23 @ Oklahoma State
Feb. 27 @ Iowa State
Mar. 01 v. K-State
Mar. 03 v. Texas Tech
Mar. 08 @ Texas A&M
Mar. 13-16 - Big 12 Tournament, Sprint Center, Kansas City

Wichita State team schedule
Nov. 13 8:05 pm - v. Arkansas Pine Bluff
Nov. 16 6 pm v. Baylor in Paradise Jam, Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S.V.I.
Nov. 17 or 18 Paradise Jam
Nov. 19 Paradise Jam
Field includes: Monmouth and Notre Dame is WSU's end of bracket, Ga Tech, Charlotte, Winthrop, and Illinois-Chicago other side
Nov. 24 8:05 pm - v. Wyoming
Nov. 29 8:05 pm - @ Appalachian State
Dec. 04 8:05 pm - v. Maryland Baltimore County
Dec. 07 8:05 pm - v. Texas Arlington
Dec. 15 8:05 pm - @ UMKC
Dec. 19 8:05 pm - v. LSU
Dec. 22 8:05 pm v. UAB
Dec. 29 8:05 pm v. Drake
Jan. 01 8:05 pm v. Illinois State
Jan. 05 8:05 pm @ Bradley
Jan. 08 7:05 pm @ Missouri State
Jan. 12 8:05 pm v. Creighton
Jan. 16 8:05 pm @ Illinois State
Jan. 19 3:05 pm @ Southern Illinois
Jan. 23 8:05 pm v. Northern Iowa
Jan. 26 8:05 pm v. Bradley
Jan. 29 9:05 pm v. Missouri State
Feb. 02 8:05 pm @ Creighton
Feb. 06 8:05 pm @ Evansville
Feb. 09 8:05 pm v. Indiana State
Feb. 13 8:05 pm @ Northern Iowa
Feb. 16 7:05 pm v. Southern Illinois
Feb. 19 7:05 pm @ Indiana State
Feb. 22 TBA Bracket Busters
Feb. 26 8:05 pm v. Evansville
Mar. 01 8:05 pm @ Drake
Mar. 06-09 Mo Valley Tournament - St. Louis "Arch Madness"

Into the Belly of the Beast

2006-11-19T17:58:00.000-05:00

A special report from our reporter on the spot, Mr. Chris Thompson...

This weekend I get a voicemail from my sister Debbie. She is cutting out on the message, but I catch something about going to Columbia, because someone has tickets. I assume she is talking about when she came to Kansas for Thanksgiving that someone had tickets to the KU-MU football game. It turns out my brother-in-law Brian, who is the Sports Information Director for Stetson University in Orlando, is in Columbia this weekend with Stetson’s basketball team. They are playing in a tournament with Mizzou, Army and North Carolina A&T. Brian can get free tickets if I wanted. Not thinking Missouri basketball is very high on my list, I am a little hesitant. But I haven’t seen Brian in a long time, and it is a Division I basketball game, so I decide to go. What else was I going to do sit at home and watch Damon Huard suck against the Dolphins? (Bye-bye QB controversy.) Besides it will be interesting to see Columbia, for the first time, and you have to know your enemy.

So I set out on Sunday morning and headed into crazy Missouri. I have traveled through the state quite a few times, but usually give it a passing glance and that’s all. This time I would get to see Missouri, and really experience what it is these people I hate are all about. Once passing KC, I start getting into real Misery. After Independence, MO, on I-70, there starts to be billboards for “Fireworks!” and “Adult Videos” about every other mile. I am not exaggerating. I got that feeling that I used to get when we’d drive down West Kellog in Wichita heading out to Kicks. You don’t see a whole lot of bad things happening, but a feeling of dirty sin just cloaks around you. The “Fireworks!” signs beat out the “Adult Videos” signs by a large margin. I can only assume this is so because Missourians like to watch stuff get “blowed” up. Maybe that’s why they are always blowing up their meth labs.

I am headed to Mizzou aiming for a 2:00 tip-off, but my sister Debbie calls me half-way there and informs me the game starts at 4:00. With time to spare I pull off in Sweet Springs, MO to get something to eat. I got off there because they had a Sonic, and I thought America’s Drive-In would be a good place to get something I could bring in the car. However, Missouri apparently has the world’s only Sonic with no drive-in. You have to go in and order. As I sit in there for nearly 20 minutes waiting on my complex order of a cheeseburger w/ fries, and listen to some locals talk about their huntin’, I grimace at their sign that says “America’s #1 Drive-In.”

Continuing on, I get to Columbia at what was initially tip-off, but now is not. I call Brian and try to find his hotel. I am incapable of finding it, so I tell him I will just meet him at the stadium. This extra time gives me a chance to drive around Columbia and see what it looks like. As I am driving around the area that I thought was where Brian’s hotel was located I passed a run-down hotel, that has a pick-up up on blocks, a dirt parking lot, window-unit A/C’s, and is advertising rooms for $15 a night. I think about snapping a photo of this and saying that all of Columbia looked like that. But sadly its not true. It’s a nice looking town. They have an old, nineteenth century downtown just like Lawrence. Theirs is nice, but I am sure it was built quicker, what with all that free/forced labor, but you know whatever. Also their bar district is adjacent to campus, which is cool. Other than that, there’s not much to Columbia.

I started towards the stadium and found Paige Arena. There seemed to be plenty of parking up near the arena, which is located next to the Hearnes Center and the football stadium, however all of that parking was permit only. So I got booted back across the street to a parking garage. I thought ‘Well this will be fun to get out of after the game.’ That, I find out later, is a dumb worry. I sat in my car and listened to the end of the Chiefs game. Then 45 minutes before tip-off I started walking to Paige Arena, oh it’s actually called Mizzou Arena I guess. I had to fight through the crowd walking to the arena, which consisted of me and one other guy.

Paige Arena is located on Champions Drive . . . I guess some people consider Big Eight Conference Championships as the ultimate. They did win all of seven in the 50 years Norm Stewart was there. And I guess they don’t like playing those 4 other teams that are now in the league. Some of us could actually put our arena on Champions Drive, but that’s neither here nor there.

I get my tickets and I head inside. Their arena is extremely nice, sadly. It is equipped with luxury boxes and is brand new. My ticket is directly behind Stetson’s bench. As I enter the arena I immediately spot Brian down on the bench. We greet and chat about various things. He informs me that Stetson has all of two players that have played D-1 basketball before. Looking at their roster, they have one upperclassman on the entire team. I ask him what he thinks their chances are. He tells me that if they can handle Mizzou’s full court press, they should be able to keep it respectable, if not they will lose by forty. With this prediction I head to my seat and allow Brian to get back to work. There is still 30 minutes before tip, so the empty arena does not seem all that strange to me. I am slightly worried that some booster will claim I am in their seat and I will have to move. These worries are quickly deemed ridiculous. As empty as the arena was when I walked in is how empty it stays. There were no more than 1500 to 2000 people there. Later when the attendance is announced as 4400, even the Mizzou student section laughs.

The student section, which calls itself the Zou Crew, get it?, has about 15 rows full by game time and that’s it. The famed Antlers are present though. Brian described them to Stetson’s coach as Cameron Crazy wannabes who are really just rednecks. My seat is very close to the student section and I hear the taunts of the Antlers all game. Their favorite target on Stetson is a guard named Chris Thomas who is missing his index finger on his left hand. They don’t really have any clever comments they just remind him it is missing. Anyways he drains a three in their face and dunks on an alley-oop. Their other taunts are just sad. For Stetson guard McMillian… “McMillian… McSucks” is what they come up with. And my favorite, for a forward named Okafor “Okafor plays like Okafive!” I am at a loss. They are just sad.

Mizzou’s intro for their starting line-up consisted of an animated video. A tiger comes out to half-court, and begins to run around the computer-generated Paige arena. Interestingly he runs with both his front paws and back paws sticking together. And he doesn’t seem to move all that well. Eventually his two paws jerk forward and hit a basketball into the hoop which explodes. This sends the student section into an ear-piercing 15 decibel cheer. Brian says to me at halftime, “I think Dominic (his two-month-old son) could have drawn a better tiger.”

The game starts and Stetson forces a few early turnovers and hits some shots and goes up early. I think, This is cool. Mizzou can’t hit the broadside of a barn so they never can establish that fearful full-court press. It is the Stetson Hatters who apply the pressure and continue to stay in the lead for most of the first half. Mizzou finally figures out to get the ball to Kaleon Grimes, their one big post man, and he pulls the Tigers back in front. But the Stetson coach quickly switches to zone to stop the post man. It works and the Hatters go ahead again. Halftime score: Stetson 27 Mizzou 25. I tried to hide my smile but I can’t. This is Stetson. A team in the Atlantic Sun Conference, and they are beating Mizzou, which, remember, considers itself a basketball school, at halftime in front of a Paige Arena that is less than a sixteenth full. As a Jayhawk, I am in heaven.

Sadly, Mizzou pulls it together in the 2^nd half and starts to pull away from the Hatters, and win 66-45. Their new scorer this year is Matt Lawrence who can shoot the 3. He has played three games this year and already surpassed his season total from last year. The second half is not as fun. The Tigers look pretty good against this formidable foe. The best thing in the second half was the Missouri dance squad which is named the Golden Girls. They had a nice routine, but during the middle Blanch and Rose got in a fight and then Sophia broke it up by chiming in with a humorous punch line. Really? You named your dance squad after a mediocre late ‘80’s sitcom about geriatric women?

The game ends and Mizzou receives their trophy for winning the John Thompson Foundation Classic. (Does John Thompson know they are using his name?) Yes, Mizzou had a trophy celebration for winning their tournament. And Grimes was named MVP, which the student section starts chanting, “M-V-P! M-V-P!” At this point I even feel embarrassed for them.

So that was the game. I got a good laugh out of the sparse crowd and the fact they were trailing a small school at half-time. I had a good time seeing Brian again. The experience was great. I hope you all get a chance to visit Paige Arena the next time you have a chance. There will be plenty of open seats for you.

Go Chiefs (and Seneca Wallace makes an appearance!)

2006-11-08T19:33:00.000-05:00

What is more exciting than Iowa State quarterbacks in the NFL? Nothing, that's what. With MissouriSucks favorite Seneca "tearing" it up in Seattle, and Sage Rosenfels throwing 3 tds for the Texans in a loss to the Titans this past week, Cyclone fans must be going nuts. Except for the fact that their current team is a joke, and their coach is probably going to be fired. Also, we will be addressing soon the various athletic teams at the University of Kansas, but anyway, on to the real news of the day.

What has Trent Green ever done for the Chiefs? I mean, other than the 4,000-yard seasons, the 300-yard 3 touchdown games, the Pro Bowl appearances, and generally being the best quarterback in Kansas City since Len Dawson, what has Trent Green done for the Chiefs? I know that guy Joe Montana played in Kansas City, and he was fantastic, but it was only for two seasons.

I guess that’s why the KC and national media are clamoring for Damon Huard to remain the starter, because the Chiefs are an unprecedented 5-3. Trent Green has never won games with the Chiefs, except for 2003 when they won 13 games and last year when they won 10. So clearly, only Huard can make this offense run. Only Huard can hand the ball to the baddest man on the planet, Larry Johnson, and throw easy passes downfield to Tony Gonzalez with 8 defenders in the box trying to somehow slow Larry down.

Enough of the tongue-in-chief reverse viewpoint narrative, it’s confusing even me: TRENT GREEN SHOULD START FOR THE CHIEFS. That’s all.

I have nothing to say against Damon Huard, as he’s done well. But he’s done nothing that Trent could not have done. Week 2 the Chiefs went to Denver and lost a game 9-6. This was a “good” game for Huard, as he did not lose the game by pulling his pants done and running backwards. I don’t know what the expectations were, but the Chiefs scored six points. That’s not good. Denver is not great, they give up points to teams with, oh, I don’t know, Pro Bowl quarterbacks!

Admittedly, the game plan was limited against Denver, and Huard has gone on to play much better in the following weeks. But what have the Chiefs really accomplished? They beat a hobbled Seattle team at home, beat a good San Diego team at home, and beat a decent Rams team on the road. Good run? Yes. Are those games the Chiefs have won regularly for the better part of the past two decades? Yes again. A much better defense of playmakers led to the wins against San Diego and the Rams, the best of the wins. AND LARRY JOHNSON IS REALLY GOOD.

Larry Johnson Larry Johnson Larry, Larry Johnson Johnson Larry Larry!

So here’s the way to play that will lead directly to a playoff run. I know, because I am an experienced and respected NFL coach. Next week KC goes to Miami. Start Huard. This game feels like a loss. The second week in a row on the road is always tough in the NFL. Miami has a lot of confidence after beating Chicago. So, after this, KC has the Raiders in KC. Start Green. My mother could start and we’d beat the Raiders. And yes, my mother is a pretty good running quarterback, but Trent should be able to get this done. It gives a shot of energy with the crowd welcoming back Trent, and should allow him to get his poise and rhythm back against a terrible Oakland team.

Then we get Denver at home on Thanksgiving, and hopefully Trent is ready to go. If Trent was crap against Oakland and doesn’t practice well, go back to Huard with some “Trent’s just not ready on a short week, the effects of the concussion just won’t let him go…” bs, and play the rest of the year with Huard.

The good news is I trust Herm Edwards. Maybe that’s crazy, but I think he can handle this. Chiefs go 11-5 and lose in the divisional playoffs.

KU stinks

2006-10-07T17:34:00.000-04:00

That's all. They suck, suck, suck.

Red is a bad color for heavy corn farmers

2006-10-06T23:31:00.000-04:00

For werewolves, it is a full moon. For crazies in Detroit, it's October 30, Devil's Night. The Incredible Hulk went crazy when he ate spinach (or something like that). The good Dr. Jekyll transformed into the evil Mr. Hyde when he had 'vainglorious' thoughts. For me, the one day of the year that I lose complete control is the day that the University of Kansas plays the University of Nebraska. When I see masses of boring people in red with corn emblems, I get angry. The smugness just radiates. And they bring ALL their friends to Lawrence. I never saw a victory over Nebraska in the more than 15 years that I regularly attended football games. We did win last year, but I still hate them.

(Last year, I addressed KU's miraculous win and the many, many, many frustrating losses here.)

I sat down to watch the game in an empty apartment. Serendipitously for my marriage, my fine wife was out with friends for the evening. I really didn't expect a victory, but at least a competitive showing. Nebraska is not so bueno, and KU had impressed me with their talent at the Toledo game, if not in their composure. Ok, they had no composure, and pooped their pants in a very winnable game.

The game started out really well for the Jayhawks. It was actually the worst possible start – true freshman Anthony Webb bit on a double move on the second play of the game and was toasted for about a 75-yard touchdown. I think he may have been a little excited. "Sheesh, they're a lot of people here at this game!" And they all had a good laugh thanks to you Anthony! I think Mr. Webb will be a good player, but sure wasn't on that play.

Then Adam Barman stepped in as the savvy senior leader he is and made sure Webb's mistake didn't kill the Jayhawks. On a very makeable 3rd and 1, he dropped back and threw the ball right to the Nebraska safety. Nicely done. Maybe a little Jon Cornish off-tackle for the yard and the first down, allowing everyone to take a breath and relax a bit would have been nice, but a turnover works well.

After Nebraska went out and threw some incompletions, they punted and stuck KU at the one. Barman then runs a sneak to get some inches as the Fox sideline reporter George Hamilton reports that Cornish may be injured. So, everything looks really good at that point. Then it gets better! Barman drops back, and throws the ball up in the air for whomever may want to catch it. Nebraska does! And they quickly score.

The game then got really interesting, as you all know. I can sum it up with the following: KU dominates, piles up yards, and scores about every third time they get into the red zone. Nebraska does nothing on offense, but gets two more LONG touchdown passes when our guys look, well, stupid.

Then, overtime, and a loss. My phone is across the room, the chair is on its side and the cushion is nowhere to be found, and the neighbors believe I've killed 3 cats. But no permanent damage! The phone works and the police don't come! All is safe until next year (or until KU craps out in the NCAA tournament - but we're going all the way this year!).

Truly a heartbreaker. Kansas football in a nutshell. Gayle Sayers is turning in his grave. What, he's not dead? What was that Brian's Song all about?

So, KU may be good. Nebraska may suck. We'll see tomorrow. A&M comes to town. I'll say 8-4 and off to the insight.com bowl.

"Don't throw, don't throw, oh damn..."

2006-09-20T19:10:00.000-04:00

So college football is in full swing, and with the Chiefs in their usual early season swoon, we must pay homage to the hedgerows, Hail to the Victors, and the Rock Chalk chant. What better way to do so by taking a trip to Toledo? That’s what I thought too.

The journey began at 10 am or so. The night before I had celebrated a fellow law student’s birthday and watched the West Virginia v. Maryland game. Since law students rarely drink, and do so only moderately when they do, I had no problem getting up and getting started on a 8-hour road trip. But I couldn’t help but think back on the night before, and think maybe it was a bad idea to tell my Latvian friend, who happens to be Jewish, that it may have been better if Russia had not rolled over the German army so quickly at the end of WW2. He pointed out that it had really worked out better for him as the Germans would have likely wiped out his whole family. I’ve really got to do some reading on this Hitler guy, he may have been an asshole.

Oh, but West Virginia is nasty. Major Harris, take a seat. There’s a new hero in Morgantown. Steve Slaton is a bad man. He had 195 yards on 21 attempts for a gaudy 9.3 yards a carry. Maryland sucks, but West Virginia is fast and has Vince Young, Jr. at quarterback. Too bad their schedule has them playing Wichita State 10 times. They’re going to get shut out of the championship while going undefeated, and that sucks.

But enough about West Virginia Cletus! On to Toledo. So my gallant friend Tim Slovik agreed to ride along and to suffer through D-2 football (his words, not mine). He even paid for his own ticket! What a trooper. On the long drive, we had plenty of time to analyze the important issues of the day. We agreed that Star Wars Episodes I through III stink, except for the last 20 minutes of Episode III. And no one has made a really kick ass movie about Satan. Maybe a movie version of Anne Rice’s Memnoch the Devil would work.

We eventually found our way to the Glass Bowl, the home of the illustrious Toledo Rockets. We felt a little nervous about walking up to the stadium with our Kansas shirts walking with a couple of thousand Toledo people. There was not another KU person to be seen. But once we got to the stadium, there were quite a few. So we relaxed a bit.

KU football is at a crossroads. Mark Mangino has a new $1.5 million a year deal. That’s some grip when you live in NYC, and that’s some serious grip in Larry. You can buy a lot of Mad Greek gyros with $1.5 million, and it’s clear that Mangino has done just that (face! There’s your fat joke). He’s taken us to two bowls in the past three years, which sounds good, but the bowls sucked. We got trounced by NC State in the Tangerine Bowl, and beat Wichita State (this is my code word for shitty college football team that doesn’t deserve mention) in the Fort Worthless Bowl. And it would be nice to win a road game, which we did not do once last year.

Getting into the stadium was a bit of a pain. We circled the thing a couple of times before we found will call and our gate. One of my friends bailed on the last minute, so we sold her ticket to Cletus for $5 for a nice loss of $25. The stadium itself was quite nice. A bit like a high school stadium, which when I pointed that out to Tim, he said, well, that’s what it is. Ha. But really, it was like a really nice high school stadium.

One end was a bowl, which they filled with the students. Without a giant ass track around the field, the stands are quite close to the field. They did give out thunder sticks, which should be a punishable offense in my opinion. The stadium was built out of sandstone looking stuff, and probably held 30,000. It was fairly full, but certainly not sold out.

We sat down in our section, which was around where most of the KU fans were. We were in about the 20^th row behind the KU bench at about the 40 yard line. It was really great to have such close seats. We were high enough to see the whole field, but close enough to hear some of what was being said on the sideline, especially when the coaches would yell. Very cool. We had a couple sit down next to us right after kickoff that were KU people. The guy reeked of Jack Daniels. What a jerk, who drinks a bunch of whiskey before a college football game? He wanted to fight these two dorks with KSU hats on (yeah, who knows?), so I thought it might be a long night. But he settled down and all was good.

On the first drive of the game for KU, we rolled down the field and Kerry Meier ran in a touchdown. I like Meier a lot. He played with a lot of poise and threw the ball much better in the second half. I think we have a very good team that is bigger and faster and better than any KU team I’ve seen since Mason’s team. We just totally crapped our pants. Meier was a part of that with his picks, but I don’t really blame him for them. We’ll get to those though.

The highlight of the first half was when Rodney Allen, senior defensive end, had a clear shot at the Toledo QB and failed to bring him down. He came off and got an earful from Mangino. He then took his helmet and chucked it at the bench and stomped up and down the sideline. It was cool. Some KU students sitting behind the bench then yelled him encouragement and Allen got very fired up.

The other key moment of the first half was Aqib Talib (or Muhhamad Ali the terrorist from Saudi Arabia as the Toledo fan behind me called him, I wanted to point out that he was actually from Texas but instead just let it go) limping off the field and heading to the locker room, which was quickly and predictably followed by Ronnie and Donnie Amadi watching a hail mary pass go over their heads for a Toledo touchdown. This just confirmed the knot in my stomach. When you dominate, ok, or just outplay, a team and you don’t put any distance between you and them on the scoreboard, you set yourself up for, oh, I don’t know, mind numbingly dumb calls that lead to turnovers that get you beat.

At halftime we stood in line in a steel cage type thing to get a pretzel, which led to the question of who designed these concession stands, Heinrich Himmler? Two Nazi references in one post, what a deal! We also stood in line with the KU cheerleaders as they bought old pieces of cheese pizza, which led to the question of can’t we get these kids a per diem? Come on Lew, there’s 19-year-old girls in skirts without proper sustenance! Then there was some fireworks at halftime too (the rocket pictured at left didn't get launched, it's just a statute).

The second half featured the Toledo quarterback getting repeatedly Trent Greened, and was knocked out of the game at one point which led to the backup Toledo QB coming in with the ball on his own one-yard line and predictably getting sacked for a safety. KU’s defense was dominating Toledo (who had no first downs in the second half and about 10 yards), and the offense was moving the ball just a little bit at a time. Surely we could just stay cool, keep our lead, smack the Toledo QB around, and kick a couple of FGs when you have a chance. Where’s Herm Edwards when you need him? Then Drew goes home happy with a dominating defense and a young promising QB.

But no, offensive coordinator Nick Quartaro hates freedom, puppies, and winning with defense. Much could be said if it was Meier who made bad throws, but you can’t make the calls to throw dangerous passes when you’re deep in your own territory and you can’t make dangerous passes that cost you points! But whatever, I hate my life for a few days and then I’ll watch the South Florida game.

Mr. Slovik, however, thinks the Rock Chalk chant is boring, that our mascot looks like a big cartoon bird (featured at left with the B-team Erin Andrews Heather Cox), and that waving the wheat is dumb. I told him he is dumb. But we had a good time.

Up next… the tour continues in Ann Arbor (what, the game is in South Bend?!).

Fantasy Draft Guide

2006-08-25T17:57:00.000-04:00

I hate fantasy football. But I started a league anyway. So I thought I'd put my thoughts on the upcoming season on here, with my suggestions for whom to pick.

Wide receivers

Steve Largent – Doesn’t get nearly the credit he deserves as he plays in Seattle, Canada. They don’t even put their games on television. Since they switch leagues every three years they have a hard time getting a real following. Probably the best ever white Republican receiver.

Carl Nesmith – The first of several defensive players that I expect to be a force on offense, even if they won’t actually get you any “fantasy points,” whatever those are. Although he hasn’t played any football in several years, and has never played at the NFL level, I expect a breakout season for the “Butcher”, a former University of Kansas star. Also a good friend of former junior college back-up punter Nick Becker.

Tamarick Vanover – You know how you feel after that tenth bong hit of the night at 4:30 in the morning? When you’re suddenly so stoned you’re sober again, even though you can’t feel your feet? Yeah, me neither. But that’s what happened to Tamarick in training camp this year – he smoked himself all the way back to awesome. Sure, he’s a risk, but remember that punt return for a TD to beat Denver in OT? That was awesome.

Running Backs

Ronnie Lott – Doesn’t even play running back, but he hit that one guy real hard that one time so I’d pick him real early. Or was that Steve Atwater? Sterling Sharpe?

Priest Holmes/Marshall Faulk – these guys on the injured reserve are better than half the league.

Maurice Clarrett – Oh man. Despite the character issues, I expect 1500 yards and 20-plus touches. They may just not be the type of touches he wants! Burn! I was going to try and get through this without a prison anal rape joke. Damn.

Quarterbacks

Chip Hilary – Another former KU great who’s set for a breakout season. After a stellar senior season in which he was honorable mention all Big Six and runner-up MVP in the Oahu Hawaii Pi Phi Jeep and Eagle Bowl, Chip has been preparing for the NFL over the past 15 years selling cars and lifting weights with DeAngelo Evans.

Gabe Mervosh – This is for you NHS kids reading this. God, I’m cracking myself up thinking about the quarterbacks North High trotted out during my time. Remember when the 4’10” kid named Bobo played about 2 games at quarterback? What made it even sadder was that he beat out Nick Museousky. You know that had to hurt. It was all downhill after Matt Peterson.

Aaron Brooks – After dominating the NFC and winning dozens of games for the Saints, Aaron is looking for a new challenge in the AFC. With Randy Moss to throw to, don’t be surprised if he throws for 30 TDs. If Brooks is still there after the first round, I’d be shocked. Ok, ok, I can’t keep a straight face anymore. What are the odds that Art Shell eats Brooks after he throws 4 interceptions in the first half of the season? I’d say 3-1.

Tight Ends

Hmm, there really aren’t any funny tight ends out there. Keith Cash? Mark Bavaro? He was pretty funny. I always enjoy when Kellen Winslow declares himself god on a football field and then proceeds to cut off his own hand in a bizarre accident.

Players to avoid:

Ladainian Tomlinson – Sure, he may have been dominant the last few years. But remember what happened to Christian Okoye? After some great seasons, Marty ruined him. That’s probably what will happen to Ladainian this year, so you shouldn’t pick him.

Kimble Anders – I have to disagree with Chris on this one. I think he’ll have a hard time getting enough touches to be great this year competing with Greg Hill, Donnell Bennett, Barry Word, and Harvey “The Neck” Williams for playing time.

Trent Green – DEAD MAN WALKING!

Back from the dead

2006-05-23T21:37:00.000-04:00

Well, much blood was split, but I emerged stronger.

You may have noticed that posts stopped after early March. After much discussion and comment on the NCAA basketball season, this site went eerily quiet after the tournament started.

I think you all know what happened, but in case you were stuck in a Guatemalan prison or incredibly drunk (or both) for the past three months, I'll recap. The stupid Jayhawks lost in the first round. Again. To Butler. Or was it Baker? Oh right, the Bradley Saluki Irish Bulldogs.

I'll save the recriminations and justifications. It happened, it sucked all the joy out of writing about sports, and I resigned my position. Not even the Wichita State Shockers run to the Sweet Sixteen, which I correctly predicted, could make it any better. Especially after WSU went 1 for 7.890 from 3 in losing a winnable game against media sweetheart George Mason.

But as Dr King said, we must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope. So I'm back. I'm recovered, the pain has faded. Brandon and Julian are coming back (not that they really have anywhere to go this year), and Bill Self's patented late signing super star recruit system worked again this year. Last year we got Rush, this year we got 6'9" Darrell Arthur out of Dallas, the second-rated power forward in the nation. He'll be joining the team this fall along with Sherron Collins, the number two prep point guard (stinky UNC got both the No. 1 PF and PG in Brandan Wright and Tywon Lawson respectively).

This is exciting. Both Arthur and Collins, I believe, will be improvements over guys on last year's team. Point guard Russell Robinson and our troika of front court players (Kaun, Jackson, and Giles) are nice players, but they kinda stink in the area of putting the basketball through the hoop, which some say is an important part of the game. Replacing some of their minutes with quicker players who can score may, I don't know, improve the team.

NBA
Pistons over Mavs. In six. Kobe is a punk.

Football
The fall is a ways away, but after our awesome win over Nebraska was awesome. Here's the schedule, with head in the clouds predictions.

9/2 vs. Northwestern State W
9/9 vs. LA-Monroe W
9/15 @ Toledo W
9/23 vs. South Florida W
9/30 @ Nebraska L
10/7 vs. Texas A&M W
10/14 vs. Oklahoma State W
10/21 @ Baylor W
10/28 vs. Colorado W
11/4 @ Iowa State L
11/18 vs. K-State W
11/25 @ Missouri W

Final record 10-2, slaughtered in the Cotton Bowl by some SEC school.

I will be at that Toledo game. Look for me on ESPN2 that night.

The Royals suck. That should wrap it up.

Elementary school fight songs!

2006-04-09T02:12:00.000-04:00

Here's mine:

Panthers at OK
Sing to the tune of "The Pink Panther"

We're black and gold,
We're Panthers brave and bold;
our school's OK-hey-hey-hey.
We work, we play, do everything all day,
and that's OK!
OK's our school we think it's really cool and that's our rule-hu-hu-hu-hule.
Every year's a better year for us;
We're Panthers at OK...
Panthers at OK...
Panthers at OK...Yea!

Purple is not a flattering color Paco

2006-03-06T14:41:00.000-05:00

Is there a game less enjoyable than the KU at K-State game? I know KU always wins, but I never really like this game. It's just full of tension from being overwhelming favorites, and I'm always aggravated by the lunacy that is present in the KSU fan base at this game. Maybe it just reminds of KU-Nebraska football games too much (damn, why did I go to the OU game this year and not the NU game?).

The important thing is that KU, with the complete choke of Texas losing at Texas A&M, clinched a share of the Big 12 title with its win over KSU. This is KU's 6th title in 10 years of Big 12 basketball, which is nice. I remember sitting in Allen as an undergraduate and looking at the Big 12 title banner (at KU you don't put up a banner for each title, you just add the year to the title banner to save room) and being depressed at all how empty it was. They had to put up a new banner for conference titles after the name change from Big 8 to Big 12, and we were stuck on 1997 and 1998 for a long time. Finally in 2002 we won again, celebrating like crazy after we beat Iowa State at home to clinch the title. Now we've added 2003, 2005, and 2006, so it's filling up nicely. And there's no asterisk to indicate the last two are quasi-legit, since co-champs OU last year and Texas this year beat us head-to-head. But I think that's fair, since those teams didn't have to play us in Allen due to the unbalanced scheduling, another reason I hate the Big 12...

Did anyone see the UNC-Duke game on Saturday? How absurd it is that the Duke fans get better coverage than the KU game? For those of you who missed the ESPN insanity, the Duke-UNC game was on ESPN, ESPN2 (with an overhead cam), and ESPNU (just the Duke fans). Yuck. All this while on ESPN FullCourt, they scheduled the Indiana at Michigan game only an hour and a half ahead of KU/KSU game. While two of the FullCourt channels had nothing on. That makes sense. Assholes.

If Doug Gottlieb ends up dead after this weekend, don't be surprised. He's questioned the Duke-centric approach twice. After the game he called out the "floorslappers" (his words) for being underachieving wusses. Then Sunday night he railed against the other talking heads on the college hoops tonight show (whatever it's called) that Duke with an ACC tourney loss should not be a number 1 seed. The other guys were visibly nervous and kept looking around for the armed men that were coming to take Doug away.

It's championship week so I have to go get ready (need cheeseballs and sprite!) Here's more on the Royals from Chris, and a blog about KU that's really good, probably even better than mine (in the sense it has new stuff everyday) - unbelievable I know.

New Content! New Content!

2006-02-28T16:04:00.000-05:00

“I’m so excited, I’m so excited . . . I’m so scared!”

This week is dedicated to Jessie Spano and pill addictions worldwide. There are people all over this country being torn apart by caffeine addictions, but probably a couple less thanks to Aaron Spelling and his timely messages on SBTB. But if Jessie was the smart one, why was she struggling with geometry as a senior? Doesn’t geometry consist of triangles having 360 degrees and the Pythagorean theory?

If you don’t know what any of that means, just say a word of thanks and move on you melon head.

There’s a glut of things to deal with, so I’ll break it down with hyperlinks for you. First, the Baseball World Classic kicks off sometime in the next couple of weeks. If you miss the Italy-Venezuela game in pool play you’re just crazy. But yes, I will be watching so you do not have to. Baseball has elicited zero excitement in me yet, but I do want to link to Chris Thompson’s very funny post on the K-Mart Royals. It can be found here. Also, my brother-in-law will be announcing a Los Angeles Dodgers spring training game, so look for more on that in the upcoming month.

The Olympics are over and I didn’t kill Dick Button or Bob Costas! There’s always a reason to smile isn’t there? The Olympic diaries are here.

But the important issue is that this week will see the beginning of March, which means we have to talk about college hoops. So here you go.

As you all know, in fashion you can be in one day, and out the next. Project Runway – the runaway hit!

Shockers' shocking championship shocks the world

2006-02-28T15:57:00.000-05:00

Mark Turgeon wins the cup! For those of you who are not from Wichita or currently residing therein (and are you missing out – it’s the Sacramento of the Midwest!), Mark Turgeon is the current head basketball coach of the Wichita University Shockers (which is officially Wichita State University, but I just unilaterally changed it – simply saying Wichita sounds much better than Wichita State, WU is better than WSU; look at Memphis – they dropped the State and went from Penny Hardaway’s stopover to a top 5 team). Turgeon is from Topeka, Kansas, and played point guard for KU as a short little white kid (which is what he is). But most importantly, my sister, the Erin Thompson, grew up modeling her basketball career on Mark Turgeon. Oh yes, while the rest of us wanted to be Danny Manning or Paul Pierce, Erin wanted to be a 5’9’’ slow backup guard.

Actually Turgeon was a solid player for Larry Brown (Erin – not so much of a solid player). At least she didn’t want to be Jeff Gueldner.

Turgeon took a laughably bad program to a Missouri Valley regular-season championship. Wichita has also locked up a tournament bid (yes, I’m calling it, even a first round loss in the Valley tournament won’t keep the Shockers out). The last time Wichita was in the NCAAs was 1988 under former Dean Smith assistant Eddie Fogler (what else happened that year in college basketball, it reminds me of something...). The following year my father bought all-session tickets to the Valley conference tournament. The first night, in their first-round game, playing at home, Wichita lost. So we spent the next two days watching thrilling match-ups like the Drake Bulldogs against the SIU Salukis! Fogler left after that year (maybe, I’m really just guessing, I was only 9), and Wichita sucked for the next 15 years.

I loved that tournament anyway for two reasons. One, I got a mini-basketball, and two, I saw a guy dunk a ball that then hit the guy in the head and went back up through the rim (which does NOT count as a field goal).

The point is that winning the title is quite an accomplishment. For the NCAAs seeding-wise I think they’re looking at a 7. Win the conference tournament, and maybe a 6, but I don’t think so. The bracketbuster loss to George Mason doesn’t look so great, as Mason ended up sharing the Colonial title with UNC-Wilmington (but don’t sleep on Wilmington either!) I like Wichita to win that first round game, but don’t be too high on the rest of the Valley teams in the Dance. And don’t believe the hype – 3 Valley teams will get invites unless a weird team wins the conference tournament. Forget this 4-5 bids crap. Northern Iowa is garbage.

The OTHER basketball team in Kansas

Good teams don’t lose games by 25 points. Oh, except on the road in conference to top 10 teams. It was ugly watching KU get blasted by Texas, but entirely predictable. Texas is big up front, and forward LeMarcus Eldridge is lottery-pick good. You don't think Texas remembered the ass-whipping KU put on them in Lawrence last do you? Now KU just needs to tank either the CU game or the K-State game to escape the dreaded 5 seed. Although I don’t think it really matters until the Sweet Sixteen, and I’m just praying they make it that far.

I don’t know that there’s really anything else to say about the Jayhawks this week. Julian Wright is good. Giles and Kaun played soft and need to get meaner on the boards. Brandon sucked, and should come back to KU next year and win the title. This is the slow week before the really fun stuff – Championship Week!

The Big East tournament is going to be unreal. I don’t think I’m going to be allowed back into my folk’s house after saying that, but it’s been sneaking up on me for a couple years. The first time was out of necessity two years ago, living in Seattle. The Big East tournament is on ESPN in its entirety, and no one carried the early rounds of the Big 12 tourney. And I found myself enjoying the games! The Horror! Then last year, you had West Virginia coming out of nowhere to win the conference and end up making a run to the Elite 8. This year you’ll have several top 25 teams, as well as some big-time schools like Cincy and Louisville playing desperate. Hopefully we’ll get the rubber match between Nova and UCONN – two schools looking very 2001 Duke-Marylandish.

OK, moving past my new found love for all things Big East – poor George Washington got BAD news with the injury of forward Pops Mensah-Bonsu (who, if he can return and lead GW deep into the tournament, could challenge God Shamgod’s 1998 performance in leading Providence to the Elite 8 for most valuable guy with a weird name). GW is still a mystery to me though. I’m thinking second round loss Gonzaga-style (won’t that be a fun flameout this year with Morrison crying over his insulin?), but a St. Joe's-style Elite 8 run is possible too.

Here’s your breakdown by league:

SEC – sucks. Florida and Tennessee way over-hyped (I know, last week I called out Tennessee as a team to beat). LSU is VERY good though (Glen Davis is no longer a mustached white guy Houston Astro – he’s a black guy averaging a double-double!).

PAC 10 – better than the SEC, but with no Final 4 threat. Go with first round wins for UCLA, CAL, Zona, and UW, but no further.

BIG 10 – Ohio State is good. The rest are not title threats, but probably better than the rest of the major conferences.

ACC – who knows? UNC is good, Duke is good, the rest not so much.

Do not pick Bucknell to win this year. They will be beaten soundly in the first round. Do pick Utah State or Air Force if they get in the field.

Germany wins Winter Olympics, but Italy still refuses to give them their northern territories

2006-02-28T15:53:00.000-05:00

Can you bitch about the media bitching without being a hypocritical bitchy member of the media? What’s that? No one reads this but my sister?! Well, that’s good, then I can bitch about the media!

Why is the American media so incredibly stupid about sporting events that don’t involve the traditional American sports? They’re always shocked when Americans don’t win, and they are the only ones in the world who expected the American athlete of the day to do well. Chief examples in the past games is Bode Miller.

I’m going to defend this guy. He said stupid things, yes. But he’s said them for years. He just didn’t realize that this time people were listening. He’s stated that he skis as fast as he cans, knowing he’s either going to fall down or win. So what did he do? He went out and didn’t finish most of his races. The only shocking result was his 5^th place in the downhill, where after a fast time on the tougher upper part of the course Miller appeared to coast a little on the bottom and finished out of the medals.

So this is shocking right? I mean, he was on the cover of Time and Sports Illustrated! He’s a huge choker! He OWES us medals! Five of them! AHHHHHHHHHHHH! What’s that? He’s only the third ranked overall skier on the World Cup circuit? And what’s more, Miller’s not ranked in the top 5 in any event other than the combined this year.

Of course last year Miller was the top overall skier in the world and ranked number one in the super-G and second in downhill and giant slalom. And he won two silvers in Salt Lake. So yeah, it’s disappointing that he didn’t win anything this year. But is it really shocking that he didn’t do as well in Europe as he did in the States? And during a year that his performance has obviously dropped off after the tremendous (and possibly draining) accomplishment of winning the overall title last year, the first for an American in 30-some years?

Shockingly, there were skiers from other countries competing. Including some from a country that has had a couple of good skiers over the years, and happens to be somewhat close to Italy – Austria. You don’t think they were fired up after sucking in the USA in ’02? In front of basically home crowds in mountains they’ve known since they were old enough to stand? Oh yeah, the best skier in the world happens to be Austrian – Benjamin Raich. Oh you hadn’t heard of him? NBC ignored him? Well, he was second behind Bode last year and has a commanding lead this year on the World Cup circuit. His two golds just came out of nowhere didn’t they?

Anyway, here’s the highlights of the rest of the games.

First weekend

Opening ceremonies – oh there were weird people dancing and doing weird things to music. Haha, laugh at the Euros. But you watch for the march of nations. This is where you get to see all the flags and the outfits of every nation. But most importantly, you get to laugh at the warm weather countries that have like 3 athletes. Stupid Tunisia, cower at the power of the American skiers and skaters!

The first day of competition was a day of sports Americans REALLY don’t care about (e.g. biathlon). But the Americans did win one gold to start it off, with Chad Hedrick winning the 5000 meters speedskating. And we were introduced to Shani Davis (notable becuae he’s black! In the Winter Olympics!) Little did we know then all the excitement we’d get later in the games from the speedskaters (assholes).

NBC also showed us how they were going to handle the games as well, which was pretty much terrible. First, even if you don’t see the results earlier in the day, it’s hard not to figure out what happened. If it’s after 10 pm, the American won, ok? Something very weird and false about the commentary too. “Well Dan Jansen, if Hedrick can get a fast first lap in he could win the gold (hehehe)!” “Yes that’s true, but it’s very suspenseful!” They also show maybe three competitors. You get no sense of the competition developing at all. Just not good sports coverage.

Sunday was better. We have the halfpipe, the coolest sport in the world. Yes, when this first started I thought it was stupid. Just some bullshit the Americans threw in there to win some medals (we swept the medals in Salt Lake). But this is real competition. There are a lot of athletes doing this now. I was prepped for this event, having watched the X-Games (my new favorite thing), which were in Aspen just a couple of weeks before the Olympics. Shaun White had won his fourth X-Games in a row (and he’s only 19 I think) and was therefore the heavy favorite.

His day started rough though, as flubbed his first jump in his first qualifying run. So the pressure was on for the second run, as White had to have a clean run to advance to the finals. White toned down his run and landed everything to advance. At the bottom, he made exaggerated motions of wiping sweat off his forehead. What’s this? An Olympic athlete making a smart strategic decision AND having fun? Crazy. In his interview immediately following his run (a great part of halfpipe that should be incorporated into all events), White admitted he was more nervous than he had ever been, and was actually honest.

In the finals White did what he does best, which is go higher than everyone else and board cleaner than everyone else. In that interview White said he thought the judges were looking for that, and everyone trying to do crazy stunts and screwing up the landings just looked like crap. This kid’s instant analysis is better than any sports’ commentary I’ve ever heard at the Winter Olympics (Dick Button watch your back!).

A Fin interceded and screwed up the American sweep of the medals, but that seemed to only make the event more legit. After White found out he won, his family rushed out and White was choked up in his interview, which was a genuinely nice moment. In his later interviews White said he hoped his medal would help him pick up Sasha Cohen, which led to a great interview of Cohen by Bob Costas where he repeatedly asked her if she was going to hook up with White, while Sasha was noticeably flustered.

The first Sunday also featured the South Koreans taking their revenge on Apolo Anton Ohno in the 1500 meter short track race, taking gold and silver while Ohno did not advance to the finals. Thank god for that. Now maybe our nations can be allies again. The best part of this sport was when Ohno “cheated” to win gold in Salt Lake, and the South Korean soccer team paid homage to this when they scored on the USA in the ’02 World Cup by imitating a speed skater. You score in the World Cup, the premier athletic event of modern times, and your first thought is short track speedskating? Bizarre, but not as bizarre as Ohno needing 100 cops when he visited South Korea for a competition. Read that sentence again.

The rest of the competition

Other highlights were the Latvian miracle on ice, where they tied the United States. I still enjoyed the hockey, even though we sucked. Our final game in pool play against Russia was a great open game, with Russia winning 5-4. We also made a good comeback against the Fins in the quarters before losing. My adopted Czechs beat the Slovaks in a divorce court throw down, and also beat the Russians for the bronze, which totally makes up for 50 years of occupation and oppression.

Sasha’s cute, but choked. My fiancée says the same about Jeremy Bloom. Curling would be great if there was lots of drinking involved. Ohno won a gold later in the 500 meters and two bronzes (including one in the thrilling "mill around the ice like it's couple skate time at the school skating party" relay event). Don’t you think Shani Davis was really just Dave Chappelle making fun of the Olympics? How do you become a biathlete? Are you just not good enough at cross country so you decide to pick up shooting or do kids in Norway grow up loving this sport? Why isn’t basketball in the winter games, which is when everyone plays it?

Eight in a row and we’re all saved.

2006-02-14T14:17:00.000-05:00

But first, what the hell is going on in the Big 12 (I refuse to use the official Big XII – it’s stupid)? I think conferences are always cyclical, but this is a bit different. The current state of the Big 12 is bad bad, and it's due to the bad management of key basketball programs.

Missouri is the big one. Once a cornerstone of the conference, Missouri has slipped to the bottom. No longer are they consistently ranked and in the NCAAs. Anyone who pays any attention to the league knows what has happened there in the past ten years, so I don’t feel like running down all the infractions and embarrassing waste of talent. Instead, I want to just look at what happened when Snyder was hired and Norm (was) retired. Of course, I haven’t actually spoken to anyone involved so this is pure conjecture.

I think the Roy Williams hire and his success led to the disaster that was the Snyder era. This story from SI in 1999 sums up the attitude of the team when Snyder was hired and really shows what was wrong from the start. First, Snyder was 32 and this was his first head job. Williams was successful in his first head job, but his path was very different from Snyder’s. Williams was not a Carolina great as a player, he started at the bottom at Carolina and worked a dozen years or so there as a coach with other talented assistants and of course Dean Smith, who has more wins than any other coach in the history of college basketball (and you KU fans that "hate" Smith for the Roy stuff, you are RETARDED, and that's all I'm saying about that for now). Snyder was a hotshot player for Duke and got that ex-player spot, which I think is probably more often going to be undeserved than spots earned by coaches who weren't stars as players.

To step into Mizzou with the idea that you're going to bring hot shot recruits and uptempo basketball is stupid. First, a young unproven coach is not going to bring enough talent into Mizzou to make up for not playing any defense. Snyder got talent for sure, but not that much. You're simply not going to go into Allen and outrun Roy, or take soft undisciplined teams into Okie State or OU or many places and win. We all saw what happened: high expectations, no defense, lots of 3s, and 6th place finishes.

K-State is the other problem. Their athletic department has done nothing but run the basketball program down in some misguided view that football "dominance" requires ignoring the other sports. Running off Dana Altman was bad, hiring Tom Asbury and Woolridge was worse and worser.

At OSU it's unclear what's happening. Eddie Sutton is slightly crazy, but his teams produced, actually getting to some Final 4s and often being highly ranked. My feeling is that it's a mistake to hand the team to son and heir-apparent Sean Sutton, who's proven nothing. I think he should've gotten a head job somewhere (Oral Roberts or Tulsa perhaps, though I don't know their coaching situations over the past 5 years) and gained some seasoning.

As for the rest of the league, Tech sold their souls for a few NCAA tournament appearances, Patton does as well as he can there in Boulder (but he's nuts as well), Wayne Morgan is a disaster. I think A&M with Billy Gillipsie and Baylor with Scott Drew have the best young coaches. Barnes is an ass, but obviously knows what he's doing. And Self's doing fine.

The lesson? The Big 12 stinks, and it's all Mizzou and KSU's fault.

But to the game last night. Hard to watch for sure. OSU is in a bit of disarray, but has some talent. Looked very physical as well. Impressive to watch Julian Wright get better and better. The guys always play with incredible enthusiasm; last night they kept their cool and knew their layups would eventually start falling.

Seriously though, this team has to value the ball more. They throw the ball away all the DAGGUM TIME. I think the problem is that these Big 12 teams are so bad they're not being punished for it, and they're not learning to value every possession. The one thing that helps is Julian and Mario throw high-risk/high-reward passes, so they're either TOs or we get an easy bucket. I don't know what the math is, but I gotta think that more shots and lower TOs, even if we shot a lower percentage, would mean a more productive offense. Instead of 20+ turnovers, if we could be around 15 then that's an extra 5-6-7 shots a game at least. Plus, it takes away the opponent's transition game as there won't be as many run-outs off of Mario's lob passes off the shot clock.

I think the NCAAs is a toss-up, of course. It's all match-ups - if we get a west coast team like gonzaga or UCLA as the higher seed I think Elite 8. If we get a Big East team we're done. West Virginia, G-Town, Nova, and of course UCONN, would all kill us, they're just way too tough to turn the ball over against 70 times like we like to and win. We go 4-5 minutes without scoring and turning over the ball 5 times they'll be up by 20 on us. Of course, this would be in the Sweet Sixteen, where a loss wouldn't be all that surprising or disappointing.

Teams playing well right now: Ohio State, Tennessee, North Carolina, the above Big
East teams, Duke, UT.
Unkowns: Zags, Memphis, George Washington, Florida.
Overated: PAC 10, OU, Illinois, Mich. State.
Done: Mike Davis and Indiana.

Decision time

2006-02-08T18:28:00.000-05:00

We're currently in an editorial conference deciding whether to write about how bad Mizzou has turned out to be or how right we were about Julian playing ahead of Moody. Stay tuned!

NINE points?! NINE!

2006-01-17T14:03:00.000-05:00

Two in a row to the slavers, and no Keith Langford broken foot to cry about.

So I want to be rational and mature about this. KU has taken much better and mature teams into Columbia and lost to worse Missouri teams. Thomas Gardner went off in the long tradition of going off against KU, think Anthony Peeler, Askia Jones (26 in K-State’s last win in Allen in ’94), Melvin Booker (32 points in a win over #2 KU at Allen, also in ’94). Gardner’s 40 was as good of a game I’ve seen in Big 12 play.

Hell, one of Roy’s best teams (no Debbie, not his best, that would be Drew’s 16-0 in the Big 12 Final Four ’02 team, but that’s another column…) went to Mizzou in '97 and lost their only regular season game, and to a Mizzou team that was barely a .500 team. That ’94 team highlighted above did this team one better, losing to both MU and KSU at home (although I’m sure this group can still surpass them with a home game against MU still forthcoming), and they still ended up in the Sweet Sixteen (Mr. Ostertag meet Mr. Robinson, yes, go ahead and shake his hand).

But this is bad. Bad, bad, bad. That ’97 team was coached by Norm. This is Quin Snyder. And WE HAD A NINE POINT LEAD WITH UNDER TWO MINUTES. The game was over. I was celebrating, had cracked open a beer, and was thinking how we’d turned the corner. The coaching was bad. How about not having the 50% free throw shooter Christian Moody (is booty) in the game? Maybe a double team on Gardner to force him to pass? Just maybe? I mean, letting him shot over Robinson was brilliant and all, but perhaps we want someone else taking those shots at the end of the game? And a box-in-one with Hawkins on Gardner? Good god.

The only thing stopping Gardner was Quin’s bizarre move to sit him down for periods of the second half, allowing KU to make their big run. But I’m sure Quin knew KU would melt down, allowing the game to go into overtime and Snyder knew he should keep Gardner fresh for the OT. Right.

But let’s be positive. So that means the first half is out, as is the last two minutes. But the first 18 minutes were as good as KU has played this year. Welcome to Kansas Mario, it’s nice to see you. The switch went on for him definitely. Rush was Rush. Good, not great. I don’t see him in the NBA next year. He’d likely develop better there where he’d be pushed every day, but I think he needs another year to get into the first round. Robinson is our point guard, and that’s finally settled.

The front court is a mess. I have an undying hatred for Moody (the player not the man, he's doing what we would all like to do, good student, blah blah blah). The blown free throws hurt, but it goes way beyond that. I just don’t think he has a shred of athletic ability, and that he NEVER makes a play on the defensive end and can’t rebound anything that doesn’t hit him in the hands. Why not Darnell Jackson at the 4, and Giles/Kaun at the 5? Moody and Wright off the bench…but whatever. Just pick some kids and let them play! Opps, I was being positive wasn’t I? So that Fort Worth Bowl was good, wasn’t it…

I suppose I’m spoiled. Kids my age think it’s only ok for KU to miss the Dance after a title and due to some Larry Brown shenanigans-induced NCAA sanctions. But then again, UNC missed two Dances (including an 8-20 season) and won the title shortly thereafter. And I’ve heard during Ted Owens’ reign we sucked regularly…so which will this be? Likely somewhere in between, but hey, at least Self can recruit.

Devastatingly pathetic

2006-01-16T21:38:00.000-05:00

Someone call me when Moody and Self are gone and it's safe to watch again. I'd say more but I'm busy vomiting.

I come not to bury Bill Self...

2005-12-08T21:47:00.000-05:00

So it's 15 degrees outside, it's finals time, and the Jayhawks stink. I'm not gonna be that guy that gets all emotional about a bunch of 19 and 20-year-olds, but ok, I guess I actually am.

First, however, I wanted to talk about the Bowl season (shocking, I know). It is, of course, the best time of the year. So here's the lineup, take a look and get familiar with it, make your plans accordingly. We'll be talking much more about it soon. Also, I found this piece in the NY Times on Texas Tech head coach Mike Leach quite interesting (free registration required).

I don't think I need to go into many details about the basketball KU has played this year. It's really a quite simple formula, just dust it off after the game and spare yourself the trouble of reading about the game elsewhere:

"So and so looked really good in spurts, but in the end the Jayhawks didn't have enough. Turnovers from Jeff Hawkins hurt, and the freshmen were inconsistent. Somebody on the KU staff wore a terrible suit, and someone else told the opponents to fuck off."

That last part really only happened in the Nevada game. I have it on good authority (someone on Tigerboard) that Nick Fazekas said "Kansas ain't shit", to which assistant coach Joe Dooley said "Fuck you". The latter was clearly seen on ESPN after the game, the former was not. Not that it matters, even if Fazekas said it I don't see how Dooley was upset as it's almost certainly true right now.

Then there's the shadiness in shady Larrytown. We pulled the Larry Brown with Mario Chalmers and hired his father Ronnie (it's not shady - he was moving to Lawrence anyway and has a great basketball mind - right). But the best is Darnell Jackson. Darnell who you say? Well he's not playing right because he was given benefits (including a "loan") by a KU supporter in Oklahoma. Let's not be surprised, he was a high school pal of JR Giddens. The alum (well known and mocked for his poetry about KU basketball) apparently didn't realize he wasn't allowed to pay college players. I make that mistake all the time.

The NCAA handed down a nine-game suspension to Jackson, which came from the eligibility committee (or "cabinet" as it's called on the NCAA website). The infractions committee is still looking at self-reported violations from last year, and it's not clear to me if this would be something they would also consider as they decide penalties. If only I knew someone who had experience dealing with these things, someone who worked for the NCAA enforcing these rules for years, like maybe an uncle..., but alas, I do not...

And now there's this: KU: NCAA probe of Rush "no issue".

All together, it's crappy time for KU basketball right now. Honestly though, I remember the days of Kirk "Captain Insano" Hinrich and Drew "Puddin' Head" Gooden trying to play their first year, and it was ugly. I don't think anyone thinks that Brandon Rush and the rest won't get their games together, likely sooner than later. The kids who won the title last year also went to the NIT their freshmen years. The tide will turn, or I'll just start watching the NBA sooner than April.

Seeing the guys go down in flames in Maui did remind me of some good times. Those early season games when you'd say, we're playing who?, and then promptly KU would go out and lose to them. Here's my favorite early season kicks in the dick:

Temple 73, KU 59 - December 1, 1993. Oh yeah, in the Fieldhouse. KU was ranked number 2 going into this game, and got hammered. I remember thinking oh man, we lost to Temple. But apparently they were ranked number 7 going into this game, and Aaron McKie scored 24. I don't think that was a bad team.

Ball State 93, KU 91 - November 19, 2001. This was on my birthday, I hadn't remembered that. I do remember watching this game in Lawrence in the afternoon excited for the first real game of the year. KU had struggled through the previous couple of years, but after a good run to the Sweet Sixteen the year before, we thought we were loaded. Which of course we were, as we ended up in the Final Four. But everyone cramped this whole game, and Aaron Miles fell over and his man strolled to the goal for the winning score. I threw a box really hard and then was ok.

Iowa 85, KU 81 - December 8, 1998. I was a freshman. It was the first real game of the year in the Fieldhouse. So where was I? Sticking 3 tons of greenery into wire frames and guarding a turkey from Thetas. Ahh, the pledge days were great. But there was free booze, and, Thetas. Regardless, this is the game that killed the home winning streak, and let everyone know that Paul Pierce was not on the team anymore.

Long Beach State a bunch, KU less - date unknown. Did I dream this game? I can't find a box score anywhere. But I know LB State came into the Fieldhouse and handed us our rears. Anyone else remember this? I hate to think I still get upset about a game that never happened.

There have been, I suppose, a couple of good early season wins as well. Would you like to hear about them? Yeah!

LSU/UNLV/St John's, preseason NIT 1989 - in Roy Williams' second year we suddenly all realized that he might be able to coach a little. The year after the title I think Roy got a free pass - I was too young to read the message boards then, so maybe I just missed the criticisms, but I think with the title hangover, Manning and Brown leaving, and the probation few expected Roy to win right away. So, KU just went out and beat Shaq and Chris Jackson's (later know as Ayman al-Zawahri) #2 LSU team, and then #1 and eventual champ UNLV. In the final KU knocked off the Redmen (oh wait, the Red Storm, bleh) in Madison Square Garden for the preseason NIT title (and what a meaningful title it is).

KU 73, Cal 56 - November 19, 1993. Now this was a birthday. The same weekend KU beat Mizzou in football in Lawrence as well. I attended both game - thanks Lee and Susan. This was the first time I saw Jacque Vaughn in person. I remember him "out dueling" Jason Kidd, but the box score says Vaughn had 4 points, 2 assists in 18 minutes while Kidd had 22 and 6 in 39 minutes. I guess my memory was a little off. I do remember Jason Kidd being the best player I've ever seen in the Fieldhouse, and I don't think that memory is off. The full length bounce pass assist? Oh yeah, you remember that...

KU 81, UMass 75 - December 3, 1994. The inaugural Wooden Classic! At the Anaheim Pond! Did you know that John Wooden stopped in Lawrence and worked odd jobs on his way west? He helped build giant soul catchers in the sky as well, and built quite a theocracy in modern-day Utah (I think I got some cult stories mixed in there). UMass was #1, with Lou Roe (whatever happened to him?) and Marcus Camby. Camby scored 2 points, while Raef had 18, and KU won. It's always great to beat #1, but why does KU ALWAYS lose the first game they play after being ranked #1? And it would usually be the Big Monday game the same day the polls came out, so you couldn't enjoy it even a day...

KU 90, Arizona 87 - December 2, 1997. I have somewhat mixed feelings about this game. Zona won the important game the year before, and then KU comes back the next year and beats them in a fairly meaningless game in December. March! That's when you need to win, but since this is about early season wins - What a win! Raef brought us back from a weak first half and crushed in the second, ending with 32. It was part of the Great 8 (what marketing wizard came up with that one?) in Chicago.

Paul Pierce's team 20, opponents 18 - sometime in the September, 2000. Early in the school year, my friend Steven Wayne came into his house where I was hanging out with the news that KU was scrimmaging in the Fieldhouse. So of course we went down, as KU's football team that year (hold your breathe) was not very good.
We went upstairs and sat in the chairbacks where we never get to sit and watched the guys run the court. Roy was there, but couldn't instruct as practices hadn't started yet. Cheno was there with Kenny Gregory and Luke Axtell. Roy's favorites were there playing as well: Drew Gooden, Nick Collison, and Kirk Hinrich. After a couple of games, there was some commotion as someone as came strolling in with his luggage in tow: Paul Pierce. I was slightly excited. Here's how Steve describes it:

"The trinity were in attendance. I remember Coach Williams calling Nick, Drew and Kirk over individually to meet Paul. It seemed as though he wanted them to see where Kansas basketball could take them. In a sense, it was a passing of the torch moment. Little did I know that both Nick and Kirk would be good players in the league. Drew (ed's note: Drew Gooden, not me) is still stupid sometimes, but he's playing a lot so I guess he's alright. Billy Thomas was there and very out of shape, but played well. I remember being very excited about some floppy-haired kid from Texas whose name I have since forced myself to forget. It's just too painful to think how good that team could have been if that fucker could hit a shot. Kenny has some show-time breakaways and, as always, Frankenstein - errr - Chenowith sucked ass. I can't remember who Paul hit the shot in before the classic line, but for some reason, I think it was Kirk. I know it was fade-away three from about 26 ft. on the north end."

The classic line and the shot he's talking about? Well, the first game Paul ran in was close down to the end. Paul of course drilled the winning shot. Afterwards, Paul walked back towards midcourt with his hands in air and shouted "Still never lost a game in this place!"

It was awesome and hilarious. And that's the best early season game I ever saw, with about 4 people watching.

Are you going bowling? WE’RE going bowling.

2005-12-04T13:44:00.000-05:00

brian luke, I never doubted you.

Friday night before the KU-ISU game I frantically searched my digital cable guide for a way to see the game. I got the feeling I had to see this game – both for my enjoyment and for yours, the faithful reader. The pay-per-view channels were of no help, however, as they didn’t list which games they would have the next day. After a half-hour, I was ready to give up. Then I realized the game was on Fox Sports. This should have been obvious: the only Big 12 game on and Fox always carries a game. Except in DC, where there is usually a thrilling match-up between Hofstra and Delaware, or Howard and James Madison (I’m not kidding - these are the games we get, unless we’re unlucky and have to watch Maryland) that preempts the early Big 12 game. The point is that this time I got to watch the game. From start to finish. On TV. And KU won. This was the first time this had happened since…maybe the Aloha Bowl in ’95?

Going into the game we knew that Nebraska had drilled Colorado, which was exactly what I didn’t want to have happen. Iowa State thus knew they could clinch the Big 12 North division title. Obviously that was before I realized the Cyclones were SCARED. With a title on the line last season they choked one away to MIZZOU at HOME, so it should have been clear KU had a great shot at home (I think I’m done with the all-caps now).

Suffering through the various ESPN shows at 11 am EST I said a word of thanks that I never bothered waking up at 10 am central to watch this crap. I won’t spend too much time on this, but I just want to make clear that ESPN sucks at a lot of things (Baseball Tonight is obviously always exempted when we’re discussing the suckiness of ESPN), and Gameday is now one of them. I’ll make an exception for Chris Ford, who is OK. Lou Holtz is a train wreck. Desmond Howard? If Desmond is going to be on, then clearly Rocket Ismail has to be on. I’m not sure why, he just does.

And Trev Alberts. Oh boy. We’ve been spared this guy this year because he quit. He got pissed and didn’t show up early in the year, as he didn’t feel he was featured enough on the show. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahha. Ha. How do you think the producers reacted when they heard that. I bet they laughed.

But this morning I’m feeling mad love for Herbstreit, as he picks the Jayhawks. Fuck yeah, fuck you Corso. I don’t think Herbstreit had any idea why he picked KU, but whatever. After the UT fiasco I’ll take any respect KU can get.

So we finally get to noon and Fox comes on with a shot of Memorial Stadium, and announce that its in the 60s and the sun is shining. I know you bastards in Lawrence were happy; I think most of us have sat through rain and 30s in late November for games.

I don’t remember the names of the announcers – I didn’t take notes. Forgive me. They’re not bad. That’s my overall impression. They certainly weren’t good, but they weren’t bad. They know both teams. They seem to know what KU has done this year and what they need to do on offense and defense. I haven’t seen Iowa State this year so I wouldn’t have noticed either way, but they knew about Iowa State’s giant Ed McCaffrey (white WR) player - Todd Blythe, and they know that the young QB will run a little, and doesn’t turn the ball over. Which he doesn’t, until the second half…

So the game starts like all games this year. Interceptions and solid defense. Throughout the first half the announcers discuss the wind almost non-stop. Talking to Chris, our on-the-site reporter: “What? The wind? UMmm, it’s fine.” So I’m guessing it wasn’t that much of an issue, and the color guy was a fool, especially since most of the big throws in the second half were “against” the wind.

Clark Green ran the ball a lot in the first half. Without success. The defense is looking fabulous. And then our defense forgets that you’re allowed a safety in the football game. I don’t have tape so I don’t know what defense we were in on ISU’s long td passes, but it sure had our corners in tight man-to-man. I think this is something KU must do, relying on Charles Gordon (junior from California, all Big 12 kick returner - first team, defensive back - second team, and wide recevier - honorable mention) andAqib Talib (redshirt freshman from Texas, honorable mention defensive back) to shut down the WRs, allowing the linebacks and safeties to play aggressive and close to the line of scrimmage. But it does not work against Ed McCaffrey. Once, I understand, he's tall, but the second time that kid just kinda shrugged Gordon off and scored, I thought maybe a double team might help (where the hell is the safety?). So we’re down 14-6 and it’s not looking great, but obviously when you’re only down eight…

We’ve got to have a score. I’m in a total negative mood, as the color man has convinced me that the players can hardly stand up against the wind, let alone score. Then Swanson completes a fantastic pass to the tight end for a big gain. Derek Fine is a good player. But Swanson is injured! Oh Christ, Brian Luke’s coming in. The horror! The horror!

I swear that I’ve always said that Brian Luke is a fabulous player, and I’m sure no one can say differently, except for the 1,000 people in section 105 at the OU game in Arrowhead.

But Brian Luke on the first play gets 8 yards on a scramble, down to the goal-line. And he, after much discussion, scores the touchdown on 4^th down. I see Brian Luke laying in the endzone with the ball and, I think, most of his torso is across the goal-line, but the refs call it down and give the ball to ISU on downs, FOX goes to commercial with the change of possession, and I’m swearing up and down in my empty apartment. Chris calls with a game report: the call is under review! I tell him Luke is easily in. That’s when you realize the greatness of the remote reporter. The call is reversed, Bob Davis convinces Max (congrats Max for retiring, best idea you’ve had in awhile) that it probably is an easy call to go for the 2, and the game is tied. “Well Bob, that sure was a good play by that young man. Now the Jayhawks will be on defense…”

And ISU scores in 2 plays (not really 2, but not very many) and we’re dead. But Brian Luke does it again!, throwing 2 touchdown passes down the stretch (the first one is dropped, defense gets the ball back, we score). OT looks good for us: our kicker (sophomore Scot Webb from Tulsa [go Union High, beat Jenks]) nailed a 48-yarder in the first half and Luke is playing well (I have to admit, I had written “and Luke is hot” there but then I changed it).

Regardless, the kick is good. Kansas wins in overtime. I’m excited. The fans tear down the posts again. I hate to be pithy, but I think you should not tear goalposts down after 3 of your 6 wins. Especially not Iowa State – why? Makes no sense. Unless we’re starting a tradition of tearing down goalposts after every victory: that I could support.

Now it’s time for the Bowl! We get to talk about what bowl we might go to, who we might play…this is fun, this is what fans of real football schools get to do this time of the year, rather than starting to pine for March in November and discussing which freshmen should be getting more minutes (Chalmers). By the way, does anyone know when KU’s basketball season starts?

SportsIllustrated.com predicts KU playing in the Independence Bowl against Florida. I doubt this will happen, but I have to chastise AD Lew Perkins, Rick Plumlee of the Wichita Eagle and Jason King of the KC Star for saying that it would be a terrible idea for KU to be in that game, and that the Fort Worth Bowl is better for us. Come on! I mean, ok, I understand the logic. Let’s win a bowl, we can drive to Dallas, whatever. I’m fine with the Fort Worthless Bowl. But to say it’s a better deal than playing Florida in the Independence is insane. People watch the Independence Bowl. People watch Florida. I would actually want to see that game. It’s like seeing Oklahoma play South Carolina – traditional power against an up-and-comer. I would think Florida would kill KU, but I think I’d like to see what happens, and I bet so does the team.

But I’m going to Dallas (Fort Worth?) to see the Bowl game. And that will be fun.

And Brian Luke, never listen to the critics, I had your back the whole time.

A game that actually matters (don't be jealous Jayhawks)

2005-11-18T15:43:00.000-05:00

As fun as it would be to rehash the Nov. 26th Iowa State at KU game again, I thought I'd have someone write a little about a rivalry game that has had national and conference title implications many times. And yes, it is the Big Ten, but we'll forgive them for that. So here's Tim, a Michigan grad, on this weekend's Ohio State (8-2, 6-1, ranked #9) at Michigan (7-3, 5-2, #17) game.

I sure know the Wolverines versus the Buckeyes… oh wait!

This is it, the Granddaddy of ‘em all…

Oh wait!

That’s Keith Jackson’s Rose Bowl, in which no Big Ten Champion will be playing this year. Oddly enough it looks as though the last two teams to smack us silly in Pasadena will be playing against each another for the national championship in a few weeks… and in the very same bowl game. It’s strange that out of the 2004, 2005, & 2006 Rose Bowls, only three teams have played in the game. Each one twice. I don’t know when the last time that happened…

Oh wait!

From ’91-’93 only Michigan, Washington and Iowa played in the game. But Washington played three times, Michigan two, and Iowa once. So I don’t know if that counts. But it’s not like teams keep playing the exact same bowl game year after year…

Oh wait!

The three years right before that, only Michigan and USC played. Well, at least there was no Big 12 team. ..

Oh wait!

Gotcha, there really wasn’t a Big 12 team involved until Nebraska in 2002. But I digress… For Michigan fans, the Rose Bowl is no longer our concern. All we want to do is make sure that we win the Big Ten Championship…

Oh wait!

Actually, as Wolverine fans, we’ve already been through the ringer. After early setbacks against the Badgers, Irish, and Gophers (fucking Gophers? Damnit!) we were pretty much ready to flush the season down the toilet. After the thrilling victories against MSU, Penn State, and Iowa we were excited again, but to be honest at this point it was only to spoil other teams’ likelihood of reaching the top of the Big Ten Standings. So really, all we want is to make sure that Ohio State does NOT win said Championship. So this game will decide it all once again…

Oh wait!

Not exactly, the game that means the most IS being played in Michigan, only it’s not in Ann Arbor – it’s in East Lansing. Penn State has a chance to win the Big Ten outright by beating the schizophrenic Spartans. A win and the championship belongs to the Nittany Lions. Oddly enough though, they’ve had troubles inside the glove-shaped state on numerous occasions, against both of the real schools who there. No offense Grand Valley State, but c’mon, you suck. So the big game is in East Lansing…

Oh wait!

Both games could play out to give us a champion. Should the Spartans fire themselves up before hand (and that is NOT a pun about burning couches in East Lansing) and can keep themselves out of the sheep pastures (that IS a reference to sheep fucking – I am a Wolverine you know, and we don’t talk about the Sparties without bringing it up at least once) then they have a chance to play spoiler. After all, it wasn’t that long ago that Drew Stanton was going to win the Heisman…

Oh wait!

He was playing crappy teams. MSU sucks. But if they win, all the marbles come back to Ann Arbor. Should the Buckeyes win in that scenario, they win outright, but if the Maize and Blue show up, it’s a three way tie, with Michigan holding the tie-breakers over all (insert your favorite: Penn, Ohio, Michigan) State University. So we’d be off to the Rose Bowl…

Oh wait!

We’ve already covered that. Winning the Big Ten gets you the non-Rose Bowl bid, but we can join a three-way tie for the championship… of one conference… that didn’t really meet expectations this year… and has demonstrated how parity could destroy college football. So we’d better get to the game itself. Since Michigan is powered by Jim Harbaugh, Tyrone Wheatly, and Desmond Howard, we should be good to go…

Oh wait!

We’re going with QB Chad Henne, RB Kevin Grady, and WR Steve Breaston. I’ll admit, they’ve found something in recent weeks that works. Grady has stepped up big time as a freshman for the injured Mike Hart, who last year stepped up big time as a freshman (echo, echo, echo). Breaston has shown a few play-making flashes. Honestly though, Buckeye fan should be more afraid of him returning punts then catching passes. And Henne has found some rhythm after a very shaky start. But, weren’t we supposed to be an unbelievable offensive machine this year? All these freshmen and other young players coming back. Good thing there’s no sort of curse on second year players. You know, nothing that people refer to after the freshman year of a potential let down. Nothing ever jinxes you during your sophomore year…

Oh wait!

Sorry, too easy. As for the Buckeyes, I don’t pay attention to them. I don’t like to know who the players are. I don’t want to know who’s good, bad, or ugly. They are a unit, a unit I despise wholly and thoroughly – wanting only to see their defeat at the hands of the Wolverines. I tell you, I pretended that I didn’t know who Eddie George was. I thought Chris Gamble was a fictional draft choice from my latest season on Madden. I don’t believe that Maurice Clarett even exists. Actually, I think most people are on board for that one. In any event the rivalry is always fun (as long as we win), always exciting (as long as we win), and always reminds me of why I’m a football fan (as long as we win, if we lose I drink heavily). This year, I’m going to pick the Wolverines to keep it close, and smack the bitches up. 31-26. If the game becomes “meaningless” after a Penn State win, give us 6 more points. We’re strange like that. Now I’m off to think about our Coach’s game plan. Good think ol’ Bo still steers the ship after all these years…

Oh wait!

Seneca Wallace is NOT walking through that door

2005-11-16T13:30:00.000-05:00

What is the state of KU football in the Big 12 these days?

Over the weekend, KU (5-5, 2-5) was annihilated 66-14 on national television by the consensus number two team in the country, the University of Texas Longhorns. A year after being the talk of college football for a weekend by nearly upsetting the Horns and then complaining about the officiating, KU got smoked by a far superior team, giving the media a good “KU talked smack last year and made Texas mad, and stupid KU got killed for it. Serves them right.” Even though, and I say this as a blindly loyal fan, the offensive pass interference on the Charles Gordon’s big first down was a bad call, and Mangino was correct in saying, “You know what this is all about, right? BCS. That's what made the difference in a call in front of their bench. Dollar signs.”

Dollar signs. Plastics.

It doesn’t matter.

The biggest game of the year is on Saturday November 26 against the Iowa State Cyclones (7-3, 4-3). A win in that game sends the ‘Hawks to their second postseason appearance in three years. This may be pedestrian to schools like Michigan, or Alabama, but for a school that has been to a total of 9 bowl games, it would be a bit meaningful.

Monday night news came out of Manhattan, Kansas that makes this game even bigger. The old man of the plains Bill Snyder will step down at KSU, leaving a bit of uncertainty in that program and certainly not helping the Wildcats' recruiting for this year or next. KU has a chance to put itself into a good situation to be a player in the Big 12 North Division for the decade ahead. Now, a loss doesn’t totally kill us. But a win would be HUGE, like Mangino huge.

The postseason is big for several reasons. First, it allows the team an extra month to practice, which means the off-season will be that much shorter. This is crucial for KU going into a transition year next year. The talent level, in my opinion, will be as good as it’s been in Lawrence since the mid-90s (not saying much), but it’s young and inexperienced talent. Outside of the pressures of the regular season, those practices could be used to work the hell out of the young guys and get them ready for spring practice. Linebacker Mike Rivera will be a sophomore and needs to start thinking about how he will replace the playmaking and leadership of the trio of departing senior linebackers Banks Floodman, Kevin Kane, and Nick Reid. On offense, quarterback Kerry Meier and wide receiver Marcus Herford (who will be a redshirt freshman and a sophomore respectively) have to be ready to go from day one; this extra month could be crucial for them.

Secondly, it gives the program momentum in terms of recruiting. With uncertainty at Kansas State and Missouri (Gary Pinkel can’t last too long losing to KU every year) the time is ripe for KU to start picking up recruits over those two teams. A win in a bowl on television, along with the victory over Nebraska that got nice play in the media should propel KU to a level of respectability with coaches and young players that they have not had before.

Finally, it means a lot in terms of money. It would help Lew Perkins, the money-grubbing Kansas athletic director, raise those millions he’s looking for to build a state of the art football facility, which is absolutely needed to stay up with Missouri, Nebraska, Colorado, and the rest of the Big 12. Interest would go up, and ticket sales would go up.

Dollar signs.

The game will also tell us a lot about Mangino. A win solidifies his job and makes everyone rest easy during the off-season, feeling good about the personnel running the team. It would also give the program needed continuity, which helps the current players and with getting young players into the program. A loss will make everyone think about the listless offensive performances in losses to a bad K-State team in Manhattan and a somewhat resurgent Oklahoma team in Arrowhead.

What about the game itself? Having seen Iowa State play, hmm, zero times, the only thing I could do is read about their past games and compare scores, which is about useless. Regarding KU, I would be surprised if they came out and laid an egg like they did in the KSU and OU games earlier in the year. They are undefeated in Lawrence this year, with wins over Mizzou and Nebraska (two bowl teams). Should be a perfect chance to make a statement about the quality of the program.

Everyone get on board, it's Poulan Weed Eater Bowl time! God knows we'll need something to get excited after Arizona hands us our ass in Maui...

Previous Kansas Bowl Appearances…
’48 Orange Bowl KU 20 Ga Tech 14
’61 Bluebonnet Bowl KU 33 Rice 7
’69 Orange Bowl Penn State 15 KU 14
’73 Liberty Bowl NC State 31 KU 18
’75 Sun Bowl Pitt 33 KU 19
’81 Hall of Fame Bowl Miss. St. 10 KU 0
’93 Aloha Bowl KU 23 BYU 10
’95 Aloha Bowl KU 50 UCLA 30
’03 Tangerine Bowl NC State 56 KU 26

Power shift on the Plains?

2005-11-10T10:34:00.000-05:00

It's been an eventful week for the Kansas sports fan. I'll start with the good news and move on from there. Please, no evolution jokes.

Kansas defeats Nebraska
I can't tell you how unfair life is. I've sat through several horrific KU games against Nebraska. The first that I recall was 1993 in Lawrence. That's when I learned two important lessons. First, Nebraska has much better football fans than Kansas. I was shocked that there were so many Cornhusker fans. Second, Kansas hadn't beaten Nebraska since 1968, that seminal year. My hopes for a victory were somewhat dampened by my father's quizical look and my mother's laughter in reaction to my expression of said hope.

Perhaps it was my youthful exuberance that carried the Jayhawks that day, as we led much of the day behind solid defense and the hard-nosed running of June Henley. A touchdown as time wound down put the score at Nebraska 21 KU 20. It those days we didn't need no stinking overtime, so the extra-point would have given us a tie. Regardless, needing the victory to keep any hope of a bowl alive, Glenn Mason went for two, but forgot to have Henley on the field. Allegedly this confused the Huskers, but one of those confused defenders was in perfect position to knock down the pass attempt and perserve the Husker victory. That team was undefeated and went to the Orange Bowl, where they missed a field goal at the end of the game and lost to Florida State 18-16, thus narrowly missing an undefeated championship season.

Then there was the next home game in 1995, with Kansas coming in ranked in the top ten and with one loss. I was hopefull that day, but Nebraska brought a professional team in and murdered us. Of course, that team went on to win their second national championship in a row behind Tommie Frazier (still the best college player I've ever seen).

Halloween 1999 I was a sophomore at KU. There was a keg at 916 Illinois (the official Thompson Lawrence residence) and life was good as Kansas led much of the game. But of course, we lost. I was young and drunk anyway.

Why is life unfair? I fly to Kansas to see a big upset, but which game did I choose? KU-OU. Bad decision.

Still, I'm extremely happy about the victory. It was more appropriate this year, as it was not such an upset as an indication that our program is passing Nebraska's, at least for the moment. It sets up a home game with Iowas State in the final weekend of the season that could give KU its sixth win - making Mangino's team bowl-eligble for the second time in three years (I'm ceding this weekend's game with Texas).

Basketball season starts
We lost to Bucknell. In the first round. JR Giddens got in a brawl, was stabbed, and charged with assault and battery. It's been a bad year for the Kansas basketball team.

When they finally tipped off against Fort Hayes State (the 51st state), it finally gives the good people of Kansas something else to talk about. I'm not going to analyze the game as I didn't see it, and it was an exhibition against a division II team. I'll hold off until after the Maui Invitational, when we'll face Arizona and then either Arkansas or Connecticut, all of which will be broadcast on ESPN. I'll then be able to give a more informed opinion.

Here's what I think we'll need for a successful season:

Jeff Hawkins (Senior)/Russell Robinson (Sophomore)/Mario Chalmers (Freshman) - these will be our primary ball handlers. They'll need to be solid on defense and keep our turnovers down. With such a young team we'll need our guards to be smart and efficient - these guys are the key to keeping our offense somewhat effective. I think they'll need to score about 20 points a game between them and around ten assists and less than five turnovers. Hawkins and Chalmers must also provide us with outside shooting. Hawkins is money from the outside against private Christian schools in Texas (5-7 3-pt fgs @ TCU in 03, 5-5 @ Baylor 04), but has yet to show it consistently elsewhere. And Chalmers is a freshman.

CJ Giles (Sophomore)/Sasha Kaun (Sophomore)/Christian Moody (Senior) - Don't think we'll see Moody as much this year as last with the improvement (hopefully) of the two sophomore big men. I think we're going to need 25 ppg and over 10 rebounds combined from this group to be effective. I also don't know about their passing; turnovers could be a concern here.

Brandon Rush - this freshman will have to be effective for us. He's going to be the third ball-handler when he's on the court and will be key for KU to be able break the press against high-pressure teams like Oklahoma. We're also going to need rebounding from him at the three - maybe around 5 a game. If he can score around 10 as well I'd say he had a succesful season. Ideally, he'll be able to grab boards and start the break himself.

Everyone else -
Freshman Julian Wright needs to give us minutes off the bench as the power forward, or possibly as a starter. I don't think we need his scoring - but we need him to not turn the ball over, pass, and rebound. Micah Downs, also a freshman, will have to give us some outside shooting off the bench. I don't see anyone else playing significant minutes. That gives us a rotation of nine players - somebody may drop off as the year goes on.

Priest Holmes out for the year
For the third time in the past four years, Holmes is shutting it down early. Here's the brightside: it's early and we have time to adjust. Keep repeating: Larry Johnson. Here's where that draft pick pays off. I think he give us enough that I'm not going to change my predictions of a 10-6 record and a wildcard spot. The bigger concern injury-wise is the status of tackle Willie Roaf and corner Patrick Surtain, both listed as questionable for this week's game with the Bills. Roaf is KC's best offensive lineman and perhaps their best offensive player - we can't be successful with Jordan Black protecting Trent Green's backside. Surtain is our best cover man - he simply has to be there for our blitzing defense to have any success.
I have a feeling that the Priest Holmes era is over. We'll see how it goes...

Nintendo games with Trent Green and Marty Schottenheimer

2005-11-07T01:20:00.000-05:00

The AFC playoff picture is a bit cloudy. Shockingly, as the expert analysts state every year in every sport, there are a couple of good teams (Steelers and Colts) and a couple of bad teams (Texans and Browns) and a bunch of teams in the middle. Isn’t it amazing how there’s always a washed-up quarterback to give us this gem. Half the analysts will say this, and the other half will go with the exact opposite cliché of “parity”. Thanks, so helpful. Some teams are good, some are bad, and sometimes the bad teams beat the good teams. WOW.

Now that I’ve complained about that, I will give you the same discussion. There will be, however, two small differences. First, this discussion will what you could term as KC-centric as it will look at the AFC mostly through the lens of what the season will entail for the Chiefs. Second, I will assign each AFC team a Nintendo game to represent it.

Tanooki Mario sucks
Nintendo ruled the 80s. Now known as NES due to the later systems that Nintendo put out, the original Nintendo revolutionized video games and launched the current multi-billion dollar industry. I believe that the NES should only be called “Nintendo”, as it far outshone the later versions that the Nintendo company put out (with only N64 MarioCart challenging the original for pure entertainment value). Nintendo was only dethroned by the Sony Playstation in the 90s. The Sega Genesis could perhaps be considered an equal to Nintendo on the back of Madden, FIFA, and Sonic, but I’m not willing to give it a superior rating.

There are obviously innumerable Nintendo games, but I’m only going to highlight those games that I have personal experience with. I’m sure there are others that may be worthy that I simply have not experienced. Alas, I am limited by my own perceptions: we are all but poor souls chained in a cave perceiving shadows on the wall…

Just Terrible

Houston Texans (1-7) / BattleToads
I don’t know why, but I always feel terrible for quarterbacks drafted high in the first round that turn out to be just terrible. Jeff George was the first – drafted number one and he just never won consistently. I don’t know why it bothers me so much, I suppose it’s like watching a movie where a character just completely embarrasses themselves and it’s physically uncomfortable to watch. That’s how I feel for these types of picks that just turn out to be busts – embarrassed for them, embarrassed for the men who drafted the losers, it’s just uncomfortable for everyone…

Yes, we’re talking about you David Carr. Looking back, it was obvious this would happen. Remember when his Fresno State team beat like Colorado and a couple of other middling BCS teams and everyone was like, oh damn, Fresno State’s gonna screw up the BCS, what a story, what’s gonna happen?! Then they lost two or three games later in the year and then it dawned on everyone, oh yeah, they’re just a decent WAC team (or whatever hell conference they play in out there [yes, I know it’s the Mountain West {or is the Big West?}]). But David Carr parlayed it into being the number-one draft pick. And now, he sucks. I know, he gets sacked every other pass attempt, but still, he hasn’t really shown a lot. So he joins the embarrassingly sucky quarterback club, with Tim Couch, Akili Smith, Ryan Leaf, Joey Harrington, and Rick Mier.

It’s somewhat amazing that the second team in Texas is always such an also-ran. The Texans are the most irrelevant team in the NFL. The Oilers weren’t champs or anything, but at least they were relevant with the “House of Pain”, Warren Moon and Heywood Jeffries, and it was really cool when Buddy Ryan punched that guy. But the Texans? Who cares?

BattleToads was the Texans of Nintendo games. A good concept – battling amphibians (or are they reptiles?) – that borrowed a lot from earlier concepts (Oilers for the Texans, Ninja Turtles for BattleToads), but ended up mostly sucking. This game was not as boring as some other games were, but it just never really delivered anything. I’d put it in, play a couple of levels, and then just turn it off. It wasn’t clear what the goal was, and there was a stupid stage involving repelling down into endless well. Any game with stages that prominently featured the possibility of dying by falling off a rope is just frustratingly dumb. And then I never played the game again. It was irrelevant. Like the Texans.

Chiefs related tidbit: The Chiefs began their existence as the Dallas Texans in the old AFL. Most of you should know that…

Predictions:
Remaining W’s: Arizona, @ San Fran.
Remaining L’s: @ Indy, KC, St. Louis, @ Balt., @ Tenn., Jax.
Final Record: 3-13
Possible Spoiler Game: 11/20 vs. Kansas City – Texans beat the Chiefs in Arrowhead last year. If Houston wins at home this year they would put the Chiefs’ playoff hopes in serious doubt.

Tennessee (2-7) / Batman
Should struggle for the next 20 years after the bullshit Music City Miracle.
IT
WAS
A
FORWARD
PASS.

Please do not argue. It’s not even really close.

Instant Karma’s gonna get you. Plus, Jeff Fisher is too busy in his second career as a NASCAR driver. Who do you think you are? A Superstar? Right you are…

I had great hopes for Batman the video game. But the game was frustratingly difficult. First, the different weapons are stupid. The punch was next to useless; the boomerangs were not something Batman would use; and the pistol shot rocket things rather than bullets. The expanding fireball was cool it annihilated everything, but you could only use it a couple of times. The sticking to walls jumping thing also was out of character for Batman as it was something Spiderman does. Batman just flies or attaches a wire to the ceiling and shoots up with a wire.

I don’t think I ever advanced beyond the second level with some stupid acid drips. And I’ve never watched more than a fraction of a Titans game. So Batman the crappy Nintendo game meet the Titans the crappy NFL team.

Predictions
Remaining W’s: San Fran, Houston.
Remaining L’s: Jax, @ Indy, Seattle, @ Miami, @ Jax.
Final Record: 4 -12
Spoiler games: 11/20 Jax, 12/18 Seattle (NFC playoff implications). I have a hard time keeping the Jaguars and the Titans straight. The Jaguars’ physical black quarterback is Leftwich right? I think the Jaguars are better this year, but the Titans could win at home (which is Nashville right?).

And we all shine on…

Cleveland Browns (3-5) / Rad Racer
Ohhhh, so sad, Baltimore stole your team. Try holding a lead against the Broncos in the last two minutes, losers. Build a new stadium lame-os. I never liked the Browns. I was not sad when they left. But then they came right back! Unprecedented! And they're still shitty…

But I did always like Eric Metcalf.

The current team I’m rather neutral on. They fired Butch Davis after some mediocre years. The Chiefs did get their luckiest win of all-time a couple of years ago during their completely fraudulent 9-0 start, with the defensive limeman taking his helment as the Chiefs got the ball into Cleveland territory on the last play of the game on a broken play completion to an offensive lineman, resulting in a penalty, which allowed the Chiefs to kick the game-winning field goal. That was cool.

Regardless, the Browns are no bueno. I like the Michigan rookie – Braylon Edwards. I don’t know that Romeo Cornell is ready to be an NFL head coach. This year? They’re a non-factor.

How rad was Rad Racer? Not very. First, you were never really racing anyone. It was solely against the clock. So the other cars were pretty much irrelevant. Sometimes though, and get this, they would switch lanes to try and cause you trouble. This game required almost constant turning, which wore the hell out of your thumbs. And it was a hard game. After playing a game like this for a couple months, it shouldn’t be that difficult to beat. But I don’t believe I ever beat Rad Racer.

The good parts of the game were that you could change the song and it had a 3D-setting. There were about three songs, but still a cool concept that early in the video game era. The 3D-setting pretty much didn’t work. If you pressed select the graphics would switch to the “3D” and the game came with glasses. I think they developed the game solely to market the 3D, which wasn’t any good. That’s why this game is the Browns.

Predictions
Remaining W’s: Tenn, @ Minn.
Remaining L’s: @ Pitt., Jax, @ Cincy, @ Oakland, Pitt., Balt, @ Miami.
Final Record: 4-12
Possible Spoiler…12/4 host Jacksonville – Jaguars have a somewhat anemic passing offense this year, so Cleveland could give them a run at home. Most likely though, not.

Teams somewhat Sucky, somewhat Unlucky

Buffalo (3-5) / DragonWarrior
The Bills are like the Buffalo Bills of football. Oh wait they are the Bills. Thurman Thomas can’t find…nevermind.
I think the Bills are ok. They play in some cold-ass weather. They make the playoffs a lot, they had the Juice and Flutie. They’ll be back. I thought they looked quite good against the Pats last week and should have won the game. McGhee is a great back, solid receivers, solid defense. Kelly Holcomb just isn’t an NFL quarterback.

Chiefs tidbit: they killed Joe Montana in the AFC championship game and dashed the Chiefs’ best shot at the Super Bowl in a couple of decades.

I could write a novel about DragonWarrior. I spent hours upon hours playing this game, but it’s something I’m not proud of. My brother thought this game was the stupidest of all-time, and he may have been right.

So why was it so addictive? It’s in the same vein as Dungeons and Dragons and Everquest and all those other addictive for weirdos fantasy games. There’s something cool about wandering around fighting different creatures and getting different weapons. Everyone loves ancient weapons like swords and bow and arrows. The moment when you find the hidden door behind the throne and beat down the DragonMaster? Oh yeah, highlight nation.

So why is DragonWarrior the Bills? Because I feel like the Bills fans probably feel about the Bills how I feel about DragonWarrior. They invested years and years into the team, felt great when Frank Reich came back to beat the Oilers in the playoffs, all those Super Bowls…and they NEVER won it all. Probably kinda seems like a waste of time…

Predictions
Remaining W’s: Carolina, @ Miami, New England.
Remaining L’s: KC, @ San Diego, Denver, @ Cincy, @ Jets.
Final Record: 6-10
Spoiler: 11/13 KC, 12/11 New England – I think they split these two home games. They had New England on the ropes, and it being a divisional game makes it slightly more heated. Therefore, KC a loss, NE a win. Could easily go the other way.

Baltimore (2-5) / Ninja Turtles Arcade Style
I strongly dislike this team. I dislike Ray Lewis, and I think he’s overrated. There’s no one in the world who would not be overrated with the hype he gets. And he watched someone get stabbed and killed, and bailed out. I don’t really know the exact story, but I’m gonna make an assumption that when that kind of shit goes down, and you get charged with murder, there was some decent evidence that you did something inappropriate. But yes, he was acquitted.

Jamal Lewis was not acquitted. He spent his off-season in JAIL. And you wonder why he’s having a down year? Because he was in PRISON.

I hate all the Miami players they have. I hate how they call it the U. One of my favorite college games is still the Sugar Bowl when Alabama under Gene Stalling (1992ish? – I should look it up…) kicked the crap out Miami for the title.

And they have a stupid nickname. The Ravens? I know, I know, the whole literary reference. I respect that. I appreciate what Edgar Allen Poe did. The imagery he used, the use of the fantastic and the supernatural introduced an element that was sorely lacking in American literature. But I feel like Ambrose Bierce did it as well and did it better. Not to mention the Russian writers like Pushkin and Gogol with equally impressive tales of the supernatural. And the Raven is probably the weakest Poe work anyway. Like Lisa Simpson said, I guess people were easier to scare back in the day.

Chiefs Tidbit: The year following their Super Bowl victory, the Ravens signed ex-Chief QB and goat Elvis Grbac to “upgrade” from Trent Dilfer. The franchise has been pretty much junk since.

The first Nintendo Ninja Turtles was actually fairly sweet, but it was ruined by the arcade game that was pretty much the shit. I didn’t go to the arcade much as a kid, but this game was at the skating ring, and we went there at least twice a year for school trips. When the decline in public education is discussed, I think that the school trip to the skating ring (or is it rink? I’ve never understood that either…) as part of the problem, at least in Wichita, Kansas. The point is that’s where I played this game and it was cool. Four people could play, because, yes, there are FOUR ninja turtles. It was just pure fighting. Half the time you couldn’t tell which turtle you were and would just push buttons.

The Nintendo game wasn’t as good because there were only two controllers. Sure, there was the thing that allowed four controllers, but that thing was like the pad you could run on, or the glove you could box with, it might as well not existed for us. No one was going to buy those things for us…

Ed Reed and Ray Lewis look like turtles.

Predictions
W’s: Cincy, Houston, Green Bay, @ Cleveland.
L’s: @ Jax, Steelers, @ Cincy, Minnesota, @ Denver.
Final Record: 7-9

Big Games: 11/20 Pittsburg, 11/13 @ Jax – played the Steelers tough last week in Pittsburgh, and the Jaguars will have a hard time scoring points. But damn, Anthony Wright sucks.

NY Jets (2-5)
I actually feel for the Jets this year. There’s not a better back in the game than Curtis Martin. Ok, maybe there’s one. LaDanian Tomlinson. And right there with Martin is Mr. Alexander, from Alabama. Remember Shermin Williams at Alabama? I swear that guy played there for ten years. So, I’ll go LT number one, and then Martin and Alexander. As much as it kills me, I don’t think Priest is up there anymore. He’s great, but he’s injury prone, and I’m not sure how much he has benefited from the scheme and the line of the Chiefs (much like Denver backs). But he has been amazing to watch.

The Jets were done in week one when it was obvious that Chad Pennington couldn’t throw ten yards with the injuries he has. And then their backup went down and they’re back to throwing Vinny out there. Just not going to work…

Ninja Gaiden II was a fun game that didn't really go anywhere. Like the Jets.

Predictions
W’s: New Orleans, Oakland, Buffalo.
L’s: San Diego, @ Carolina, @ Denver, @ New England, @ Miami, New England.
Record: 5-11

Close to not being crap…
Oakland (3-5) / Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
I know that a lot of you Nintendo kids probably liked Zelda. If you did please send me a note about what the hell you’re supposed to do in that game. I never got more than 15 minutes into it. There’s the stupid part where you walk through the grass and stab the little bad guys, but then it’s a lot of walking around. It’s a great concept – DragonWarrior (see below) style strategy stuff but where you actually get to do the fighting. Two games in one! But like I said, it was lost on me.

That’s why the Raiders are Zelda. They are always a great concept. Oh, Jerry Rice and Tim Brown together – they should be good! Oh, Randy Moss! But we’re still no good!

(Yes, it’s true, the Raiders were in the Super Bowl recently. What’s that? Oh, I don’t know the last time the Chiefs were in the Super Bowl, I wasn’t born yet. Shut up.)

Predictions
W’s: Denver, Miami, Cleveland, Giants.
L’s: @ Washington, @ San Diego, @ Jets, @ Denver,
Record: 7-9

Miami (3-5) / Bases Loaded II
Can you really blame Ricky? He thought he had all the money he could need. He didn’t want to deal with people anymore, didn’t want to learn plays and get drilled once a week anymore. Plus, he was high a lot. I think his decision making was slightly flawed. So now he’s gotta get his 8 mill back. It’s all good with me Ricky.

I think the Dolphins are going to be really good soon. I like Nick Saban as a coach, and I think Ronnie Brown will be a great back. They already have the defense. Another year of good drafting and they should be right there in a no longer so tough AFC East.

Bases Loaded II is a solid game that just wasn’t quite there yet. It was fairly fun, but the technology wasn’t there to make a really good baseball game yet. You couldn’t choose the type of pitch you threw, but could mix it up pretty well with different speeds and different locations. You could always fool the computer when running the bases. The computer could not make a play in a rundown, it would always screwup. So free runs were always available if you could get on base.

They didn’t have real teams on the game either, which was highly dissappointing. You had to be generic teams with generic players. And I swear I saw a brawl once after a someone was hit by a pitch, but I could never make it happen again. I certainly tried, I must of beaned 300 hitters trying to provoke a fight.

But the reason this game is the Dolphins is that you’d have to be Ricky to really enjoy it. The season took FORVER to play through to the playoffs, so you’d always lose the password or interest before the end of the year. If you had some Ricky-quality herb you might be able to stay interested long enough. And they had this weird biorhythm charts that indicated how well your players would play that you’d need a Ricky-inspired new age medical degree to understand.

Predictions
W’s: @ Cleveland, Jets, Tennessee.
L’s: New England, @ Oakland, Buffalo, Jets, @ New England.
Final Record: 6-10

Possible Wildcards

Kansas City (5-3) / Super Spike Volleyball/World Cup Soccer
Man, it’s been tough to be a Chiefs fan. I know, you’ve heard me whine about the Royals already. The Chiefs are much better than the Royals. The Chiefs go to the playoffs; the Chiefs are relevant. But they always choke in the divisional home playoff game.

But tonight, I don’t care. The Chiefs swept the Raiders with a stunning 27-23 win for their fifth in a row against Oakland. The win keeps us (yeah, I’m calling the Chiefs us, I play for them) one game behind Denver with a home game against the Broncos still upcoming and also keeps us a game ahead of San Diego – who you gotta think is going to be our main competition for a wild card.

Chris Berman loves Dick Vermeil for his call to go for it with five seconds left and no timeouts from the one yard line. I have to say I think it’s a stupid call against any team other than the Raiders. Only the Raiders would let Larry Johnson dive in for the easy score with the game on the line.

I am a bit worried about having to go to the last play against Oakland at home in Arrowhead. I feel like Trent Green has been a little out of synch with the team from missing time for his father’s death, but he’s played very well in such a difficult time. His dad was young, you really have to feel for him and the way he’s come to work is admirable.

Priest was also out injured. I don’t know what to think about Priest right now with Larry Johnson playing well enough to be a star. I think it may be time to switch the roles a bit, with LJ getting at least half the snaps rather than the third he has been getting up to now. I still love Priest’s pass catching and his blocking. And he’s no slouch running the ball either – smart, strong, and he SCORES TOUCHDOWNS. Regardless, I’d like to see them splitting time and playing well, and I think they will be soon.

The defense looks better too. I did not get to watch the game today, but Randy Moss had one catch for seven yards. Sure, it was for a touchdown, but one catch for seven yards? That’s not bad. Jared Allen and Derrick Johnson have something we’ve been missing since Derrick Thomas: speed. It’s good to have some of that on defense.

But, we’ve yet to win a game we’re not supposed to win. So we’ll see. I’d like to see us win the next two on the road against Buffalo and Houston to set up a showdown with New England at Arrowhead. That’d be exciting.

Speaking of exciting that brings us to Super Spike VBall and World Cup Soccer. Why these games were on the same cartridge I don’t know. Why did Carl Peterson draft Larry Johnson in the first round with Priest Holmes on the team and the league’s worst defense? I don’t know, but I like it.

Super Spike has fun game play and a simple set-up. You picked your guys and then played against the other guys. There was the American circuit and the World Cup act, a good selection of guys you could play with, and the gratuitous Nintendo boob shots. It was also a great two-player game. And you can make stars with your hands for super blocks or super spikes for a special thrill of excitement.

And World Cup I remember for two things: the ability to knock the opposing players out and the super shots. You could be real nations like Brazil or Germany, and each team had its own special super shot you could fire up. We would mostly try to know out all the other players on the field so it looked like they were all massacred. Great stuff.

Predictions
W’s: @ Buffalo, @ Houston, New England, Denver, Cincy.
L’s: @ Dallas, @ Giants, San Diego.
Record: 10-6
Big games: 11/27 vs. New England (just because it’s the defending champs), 12/4 vs. Denver (revenge game and possibly for the AFC West crown), 12/24 vs. San Diego (what better way to celebrate baby Jesus?).

San Diego (4-4) / Ducktales
Man, Antonio Gates is tough and LaDanian Tomlison is the best player in the league. So how is this team going to miss the playoffs? A weak defense and a lack of a secondary receiving threat. Or maybe they kick the Redskins and Broncos asses and win the AFC West. But I don’t think so.

I’m going leave the Ducktales cartoon out of this, except to say that it was one of the most influential shows of my youth. But the game was good. Enough secret rooms to keep things interesting, five very different levels, and difficult enough to be challenging but also beatable. But what was up with the statue heads that became cakes in the Transylvania level?

Predictions
W’s: @ Jets, Buffalo, Oakland, Miami, @ Kansas City.
L’s: @ Washington, @ Indy, Denver.
Record: 9-7
Big game: obviously the division games with Denver and KC, but also 11/27 @ Washington. Interesting cross-conference match-up that San Diego cannot afford to lose.

Cincinnati (7-2) / Super Mario Bros.
The Bengals helped get me hooked on the NFL and the original Mario Bros. got me hooked on Nintendo, and at about the same time as well. The Super Bowl in January 1989 between the 49ers and the Bengals was such a good game. My sister Debbie was such a big Niners fan (and Bulls fan – yeah, yeah) so I obviously was for the Bengals. I also licked Icky and the Icky Shuffle (but how could you not be?). So when the Bengals got a big kick return for a touchdown I thought I had it over Debbie. But then I learned why people talked about Joe Montana a little bit differently than every other NFL player as he marched them down and won it. I was pissed off at the time, but I don’t remember why I cared about the Bengals then as I haven’t since.

Mario Bros. I only liked to play straight through. I always thought there was something a little dishonest about warping to the end. Also wasn’t as much fun. But couldn’t damn Toad tell you that the princess was in another castle before you spent all that time taking down Boozer?

Predictions
W’s: Baltimore, Cleveland, Buffalo.
L’s: Indy, @ Detroit, @ Steelers, @ KC.
Record: 10-6
Big game: 12/4 @ Steelers.

Jacksonville (5-3) / Jaws
Bryon Leftwich looks like Jaws.

I think the Jaguars will sneak into the playoffs on the back of a weak schedule. They have to play Indy twice, but they should pick up easy wins against the two weak sisters (sorry that’s slightly misogynistic) of their division – Houston and Tennessee. First round loss.

If you can drop bombs on the jellyfish you get more conch shells! The best part of this game is the ending. It’s unbelievably frustrating. They give you some strobe lights to “shock” Jaws out of the water, which doesn’t make sense, and then you have to stab him with your boat. All this despite having a minisub with missiles and a plane that can drop bombs. I guess they were getting repaired.

Predictions
W’s: Baltimore, @ Tennessee,@ Cleveland, San Fran, @ Houston, Tennessee
L’s: Indy, @ Arizona
Record: 11-5

Division Champs

New England (4-3) / Mike Tyson’s Punchout

I don’t care about Teddy Bruschi. I don’t think he’s being selfish. I wish him well.

So moving on, why is New England not so good this year? Or are we being fooled again? I think it’s the latter. They’ll win this weak division. They still have probably the best quarterback in the AFC (or one of the best two) and one of the best running backs with Corey Dillon. They definitely have the best coach and they’re the two-time defending champs. I don’t really want to talk about the Patriots. I’m kinda annoyed they’ve won three titles. I don’t hate them like I hated the Cowboys when they where winning titles, but still, they’re slightly dull…

Unlike Punchout. Punchout is the champ of Nintendo games. From the slightly inappropriate stereotypes (Glass Joe the pussy Frenchman, Soda Popinski the drunk Pole or Russian, and the Hippo guy fat native from Fiji guy) to Little Mac’s endless training runs in his pink sweats. But seriously, it isn’t like Nintendo games needed time to load did they? Why the 5 minute scene of Mac running with the fatty trainer guy on the bike? It was just a lot of fun to fight all the different guys – and it wasn’t really that repetitive. I can still play this game for an hour without being bored. Having your friends yell things like “Duck” when Piston Honda II or the Sandman was pounding Mac’s face was fun too.

Predictions
W’s: @ Miami, New Orleans, NY Jets, Tampa Bay, @ NY Jets, Miami
L’s: Indy, @ KC, @ Buffalo
Record: 10-6
Big game: Indy tonight – should be good. I really don’t know what to expect, but I’m going with Indy (I guess).

Denver (6-2) / Tetris
I’m not sold on Denver this year yet. I still feel that Plummer is basically a crappy quarterback, and they haven’t proven much on the road yet. With all three divisional road games left as well as a trip to Dallas – this could be a 10-6 team on the outside of the playoffs. But if they get homefield advantage, they should be very tough to beat.

Oh yeah, Denver’s got the system. Hold the hell out of people and ran past them. But really, you have to respect the line play and the running scheme that the Broncos have year after year. It’s like they have a bunch of blocks that you just have to fit together in a certain way but in a way that avoids leaving holes while listening to Russian music…

Oh wait, that’s Tetris! I don’t know if there’s a simpler game or a better game. I think that tells us something about life doesn’t it? That I’m easily entertained…

Predictions
W’s: NY Jets, @ Dallas, Baltimore, @ Buffalo, Oakland.
L’s: @ Oakland, @ KC, @ San Diego
Record: 11-5
Big game; @ KC, 12/31 - @ San Diego – should be a great way to end the year.

Pittsburgh (6-2) / Super Tecmo Bowl
If you’ve watched football in the last ten years you know about the Steelers. They run the ball and give up no points and win at home. Etc., etc.

Super Tecmo Bowl made Madden possible. It let you be any team in the NFL, and it KEPT YOUR STATS AND STANDINGS. This is was just huge, and made it the most entertaining game ever made at that time.

The only problem is that every Madden and NCAA football game made since is better. Unlike Mario 3 or Punchout, it just doesn’t stand up still. But it was first, and it was revolutionary.

Predictions
W’s: Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago, @ Minnesota, @ Cleveland, Detroit
L’s: @ Baltimore, @ Indy
Record: 12-4.

Indy (7-0) / Super Mario 3
Indy shows you that good things come to those who wait – they’ve kept this team together long enough for a defense to finally emerge. I don’t think Indy goes undefeated, but I think they’re likely in the Super Bowl. Payton, ho hum. Not much to write about.

Mario 3 brought it all together though. After the disaster of Mario 2 (why was I throwing things at the dinosaur’s head?), this game vindicated Mario and sent Toad and Princess back to the supporting roles they should be playing. The map screen and the ability to collect items brought in new elements that have become ubiquitous in video games today. I loved the hammer bros. suit, but what was up with the Tanooki suit? You could become a statute – what a weapon! Stupid.

Predictions
W’s: @ New England, Houston, Pittsburgh, Tennessee, @ Jacksonville, Sand Diego, Arizona.
L’s: @ Cincinnati, @ Seattle
Record: 14-2.

Playoffs -

Wildcard Round:
New England over Jacksonville
Denver over Kansas City

Divisional
Pittsburgh over Denver
Indy over New England

Championship
Indy ties Pittsburgh

Kansas 13 Missouri 3

2005-10-29T16:12:00.000-04:00

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Border War

2005-10-29T10:52:00.000-04:00

It's the big week that will explain my blog title. Well, yes young sir, it does pretty much explain itself. But, this is a testimonial of how I interpret it. Missouri sucks in a special way for every individual, just as everyone takes a different lesson from Star Wars: A New Hope.

It's homecoming. And the Jayhawks are playing the Mizzou Tigers. And I hate Mizzou.

Crimes against humanity
But I'm not going to write about the 19^th century atrocities committed by Missourians. After all, only a few thousand of them OWNED other people, and only a few thousand crossed across the border into the Kansas territory to steal an election and foist an immoral and illegal constitution onto the citizens of Kansas, thereby attempting to usurp a couple centuries of progress in self-determination and political freedom, not to mention dragging an emerging world power into one of the most bloody and fratricidal wars the world had ever seen.

Speaking of violence, there's no reason to mention the couple of raids on Lawrence, Kansas, the former capital of the Free State Kansans (the only ones with any political legitimacy) and current home of the University of Kansas. This includes that infamous Missourian William Quantrill's massacre of 150 men in Lawrence on August 21, 1863. But, as any proud Missourian will tell you, they never seceded and were indeed Unionists - a fact I am sure those Kansans shot and burned will find most reassuring.

Tyus Edny just stole Norm Stewarts walker!
Also, as it is football season, it's not really important to talk about the disaster that is Missouri basketball. It's cool that they would be ranked in the top ten in the early 90s, beat Kansas with players like Anthony Peeler and Doug Smith, and then crap out against anyone else when it really mattered. Seemed strange to me, that KU would beat big-time opponents on national television, and occasionally advance to the Final Four, but Missouri (who beat us!) couldn't do shit. But then my mom explained it to me: "They suck; they're choking little bitches." Maybe those weren't her exact words, but close enough...

Quin Snyder. Right.

And I don't even want to think about the goddamned St. Louis Cardinals. Bat your pitcher eighth one more time Larussa, you might win the World Series. How many times does this guy win 100 games without bringing home the prize? Putz.

Brian Luke (Brian Luke!) shredded your team
But anyway, the reason we hate them is because their football team and fans are LAAAAAAAAAAAAAME. They are the Tigers. How many teams are the Tigers? I suppose it's not as generic as Wildcats, and they couldn't in this day and age be honest and call their team the Bushwackin' Slavers. Oh, it makes me mad to think of the thousands who come into my town in their horrible black and gold Tiger getups. I'll punch them if I see them.

Underachieving is what Missouri does best. They talk and talk and talk about how they're a football school, and their best year is what? 8-5 and a Poulan Weedeater Bowl (man, I love crappy bowl games - bowl week is fun, except for all the crappy MAC teams that play in those games - why do they get 35 bids?). I guess THIS is the year that Brad Smith wins the Heisman.

In a couple of hours they will play the game. We've taken two in a row, and we've got them in Lawrence. Fatty McFat Magino's job depends on winning this game (don't kid yourselves - it really does). Despite all this, and God I hate to say this, but I saw this Kansas team, and I don't think they have a prayer of beating anyone in the Big 12...

Oh yeah, it's Mizzou - they'll choke. KU 24 MU 17.

Shameless Bill Simmons rip-off of the week that's really just mocking him but only because he has the job I really want but I quit the Journalism school to study international relations and the prisoner's dilemma...

Have you guys been watching Laguna Beach? I mean, Kristen is totally awesome in a 90210 old person meets Melrose Place and The O.C., but then again LC is hot like when the Red Sox hit the Pesky poll and then a wrestling match broke out with the Clippers and then I wrote a book with Jimmy Kimmel who I mention all the time like anyone cares, but gawd Boston is cool like my wife who I only acknowledge by an annoying and dehumanizing nickname that I made up for her, but holy shit Keanu Reeves is a bad actor that I secretly have a (wait for the terribly lame fake word) mancrush (there it is!) on.

Gambling on the Patriots is awesome! But couldn't Paul Pierce try a little harder?

Being a Royals fan is like being born blind and with no legs.

2005-10-20T12:21:00.000-04:00

I’ll qualify that because it kind of offends even me. Being a Royals fan in the world of baseball is similar (not literally) to being severely handicapped in the real world. It really sucks, but it sucks so bad that no one really bothers to pick on you.

I was introduced to the Royals during the “Golden Age” of Kansas sports. This was a time period similar to the era of Pericles in Athens, when the Athenians ruled the known world with the most powerful military and best culture of the time. It does not bode well for me that neither Athens nor Greece has come near to that level in a couple of millennia. The Royals won the World Series in 1985, and my first memory of baseball was watching them in the ALCS against the Blue Jays that same year. The Golden Age ended in 1989 with the aftershock of Wichita State winning the College World Series, with two Final Four appearances by KU in 1986 and 1988 coming between the baseball titles - the ’88 KU team winning the title. Throughout this era, the Royals were a legitimate contender, with players like George Brett, Bo Jackson, and Bret Saberhagen, amongst others.

What is it like now? The Royals only appearance in the press this year was when they threatened the Major League record for consecutive losses. KC ended its streak at 19; the American League record was safe at 21, held by the Baltimore Orioles (the National League Cleveland Spiders set the Major League record at 24 in 1899). Is it worse to almost set the record, therefore losing at being the worst loser, or to actually set the record? I go with not setting the record, as it’s always better to be anonymous than infamous. I think.

Where did the losing start? I’ll give my recollection on it. Please be aware that I was five-years-old when they won the World Series, but I believe I understand the franchise better than those running it. Most Royals fans point to the death of the rich and generous Ewing Kauffman in 1993 as the beginning of the end, as KC was competitive until then. But that’s crap. It started before then.

Say it Ain’t So Bo
Bo Jackson played for the Raiders. This was unfathomable to me as a child. How can someone play for the Royals and the Raiders? I think it’s an inherent part of human nature for people to split the world into two sides – us and them. This begins at the earliest age on relatively simple levels but continues throughout life in varying degrees of complexity.

I’ll explain my world as a child to you in terms of these dichotomies: there’s my Royals against the Athletics and the Yankees (everyone else is somewhat neutral), my Chiefs and the Raiders and Broncos, my USA against the USSR (kind of the ultimate), my Republicans against Democrats, my Ford and then all other cars, my Coke against Pepsi, my Jayhawks against Missouri and K-State. Some of these have changed (Athletics to White Sox, USSR to Al-Qaeda, don’t care about car brands), but some have not (Pepsi still sucks, Raiders and the Broncos suck, and Missouri definitely sucks [by which I mean the University of Missouri in Columbia, as the Royals and the Chiefs play in Missouri, which is a dichotomy that almost blew up my young worldview]).

The point is that Bo was on both sides. He would crush homeruns for the Royals, and then destroy the Chiefs a month later as one of the best backs in football with the Raiders (special recognition to SuperTecmoBowl Bo, who has been widely recognized as the greatest Nintendo football player of all-time). It was as if Bo was a fighting Wolverine (Red Dawn) and then was in Top Gun trying to shoot down Merlin. Plus, Al Davis is way more evil than Gorbachev. The world could not support this clash; this crossing of the streams. The inevitable occurred: Bo destroyed his hip playing football. What could have been one of the greatest baseball careers in history was trashed by the typical three-year career of the NFL running back. I remember the day when the Royals released Bo. I was shocked. I had no idea his injury was so serious – just devastating news, both for the Royals and for my plan to fund my education with my 1987 Topps Bo Jackson rated rookie card.

The Curse of the Davis Brothers (who weren’t really brothers)
Before this happened, there were other signs as well. 1990 was going to be the year that the Royals overtook the A’s. We had the lineup, with Jackson, George Brett, Danny Tartabull, the immortal Willie Wilson. We had the pitching: Saberhagen, Mark Gubizca, and Kevin Appier were all frontline starters. The year before the Royals had won 92 games and finished second to the World Champion A’s (I had to look up the number of wins). And, we added Storm and Mark Davis. Storm (this name is kind of a harbinger of doom) was a starter for the A’s, and the Mark had had a monster year closing for the Padres (winning the Cy Young award). And the Royals went out and sucked that year. We didn’t even play .500 ball, and finished sixth out of seven teams in the old AL West. The Davises sucked, which began a decade of signing and trading for players that performed horribly for KC. After this horrendous year, Bo was injured.

Thus began the end of the era of good baseball in KC. Bo sold his soul to the Devil (Al Davis) and I have suffered because of it since. But I still love Bo. He just made a bad choice. And John Schuerholz left after 1989 to be the GM for the Braves. Maybe that’s why our signings sucked that year. After all, Schuerholz has only had teams dominate the majors since 1980 when he joined the Royals.

Ok, so it wasn’t inevitable that the Royals would go from one of the best franchises (oh yes, it’s true, they were) to one of the worst (ok, ok, the worst). Many people contributed to this sad decline. As my father has often stated, nothing in the history of the world has been proven so clearly and indisputably as the fact that those running the Royals are BAD at their job.

Fuck Chuck Knoblauch (and Juan Gonzalez, and Chili Davis)
The signposts of a proud franchise declining were slowly checked off (never lost 100 games – opps, never finished last – opps), forgettable manager after manager cycled through (Bob Wathan, Hal McRae, Tony Muser). Bad signing followed bad trade (Saberhagen traded for Kevin McReynolds, Keith Miller, and Greg Jeffries – a two-time Cy Young winner for Who, Who, and Who).

I’d heard the stories of the old KC A’s being a farm team for the rest of the league (e.g. Roger Maris to the Yanks for a song), but never imagined I’d see it happen again. The Saberhagen deal was just the beginning. Heard of Johnny Damon? Carlos Beltran? Jermaine Dye? Yeah, that’s what would be the best outfield in baseball. But KC, in its wisdom, opted to trade them for Neifi Perez, Roberto Hernandez, and Mark Tehan amongst others. Guess what? Yep, they all suck.

I could rant about being a small-market team, where greed and TV revenue rules the league. But what’s the point? Oakland’s not terrible. Minnesota is OK. Whatever the economics of the game (which are definitely unfair) – the Royals suck.

Nosotros Creemos
Like a last meal before being executed, the Royals opened 2003 with a big winning streak and were in FIRST place at the All-Star break. This coincided with two Final Fours in a row for KU – 2002 and 2003. Could it be a new era for Kansas of greatness? The gods responded clearly NO. KU choked away the title game to Syracuse by hitting less than 50% of their free throws, and the Royals floundered down the stretch. Charismatic manager Tony Pena became asshole annoying manager overnight. His catch phrase became a mockery of all us, and he resigned after having several affairs in KC putting him in precarious situations. Believe it! Surprisingly effective Jose Lima reverted to particularly horrible Jose Lima (Lima Time is over).

But, it took a long time for this to sink in. We’re a little isolated in Kansas, and I hung onto the idea that the Royals were a first rate team just going through a tough time much longer than the position was tenable. To paraphrase Rick Pitino: George Brett is NOT walking through that door, and neither is Willie Wilson. Not even Buddy Biancalana is going to be walking in. Linda Cohn openly mocks the Royals on ESPN – Linda Cohn! She of twelve toes! I finally realized the truth with this year’s losing streak, when the Royals were also threatening Detroit’s all-time losingest year when they dropped 119 games in 2003. Counting out the number of wins needed to avoid this kind of forces you to realize, wow, we suck.

We’re the new Tigers.

Recruiting is for nerds.

2005-10-18T15:00:00.000-04:00

And for schools that suck at football. Only in places like Lawrence, Kansas are sports fans ecstatic after the football managed to score three points in a brutal loss to a regional rival for the second consecutive week. The reason? Sherron Collins, a high school senior in Chicago, decided that he would attend the University of Kansas next year and play ball for Bill Self.

Momentum on this decision had been building for weeks. Now, I know none of the people involved. I live hundreds of miles away. My opinions are based entirely on what people have been writing, anomalously, on the message boards of the two main contenders for Mr. Collins’ services: Phog.net for the Jayhawks, and illiniboard.com, the clearing house for the Fightin’ Illini of the University of Illinois.

Illinois sucks. I must stop for a moment and make that clear. Not as much as Missouri, but they suck. After Self left Illinois to coach at KU, a quasi-rivalry has risen between U of I and KU. I say quasi because the teams haven’t actually played a game against each other since Self came to KU. This rivalry exists purely on the level of shit talking between idiots like me who care enough to read (and those even dumber – to post on) these message boards. But enough back story. The Illini suck.

So, for weeks the buzz from those in “the know” has been Collins to KU. Usually, enough gossip one way or another is enough to indicate what’s up, both in politics and sports. Collins was thus in Lawrence for his official visit to KU, which was timed to coincide with the festivities that accompany the first official practice for the KU basketball team.

Now, I’m going to speculate as to why Collins committed. I was in Lawrence on Friday, the same day as Collins. It was 85 degrees, sunny, calm, and absolutely gorgeous. This alone isn’t enough, but I believe it helps KU immensely. KU has low expectations just like a bad politician. Here’s the view of the state of Kansas: flat as a pancake (true), terrible weather (sometimes true), no ocean (definitely true), and no culture (kinda somewhat true). So, with these views of Kansas in mind, a recruit shows up for their visit. Someone with good foresight put the campus of KU on the only hill in the state, along one of two rivers in Kansas, and in one of the few places with trees. Coupled with historic buildings and the money of a big time university in town, and Lawrence is actually quite beautiful. Especially on gorgeous spring and fall days, when most recruits visit. Therefore, one of the few liabilities of the program is completely neutralized, just like a politician considered retarded gets points by showing up at a debate and speaking in complete sentences. Thus, a trip to Lawrence is really an advantage when other programs have been telling recruits how bad it would be to live in Kansas.

That’s the first reason. The second is the fact that 16,000 plus go to that Late Night practice. And it’s on ESPN (ok, ESPN2, but still). For PRACTICE, we’re talking about PRACTICE (thank you AI). It’s loud, and there’s banners, and there’s basketball alum, like Wilt, Danny Manning, and Paul Pierce. Not as great as Jordan et al at NC, but good. And you know all your games will be on television, most on ESPN and some on network TV. Everyone wants to be famous.

Third, Bill Self is cool. I was eating a hamburger at Jefferson’s on Mass (the main street in Lawrence – the “downtown” if you will [and I did]). Bill Self walked by, and he was just strollin’. With Self was one of last year’s recruit Julian Wright, who was also a highly-ranked prep player from Chicago, wearing a shirt that said “Lottery Pick”. They make an impression.

Women. That’s the final reason. I think there are seriously underrated hot girls in Lawrence. There are the blondes from Minnesota, Jewish girls from Chicago, and Southern girls as well. And I’m guessing those boys on the basketball team get what they want. And they can party with them – you can drink and get high from day one on campus, and no one’s going to give you shit unless you start a fight.

Collins is the fifth five-star recruit to commit to KU in two years. I welcome him, and the others: the scoring point guard Mario Chalmers out of Alaska, the Mike Dunleavy clone out of Seattle Micah Downs, Mr. Wright mentioned earlier, and Brandon Rush, a 6’8” swingman with 42” vertical.

That’s why no one cares that KU football absolutely sucks.