Inside the Playbook - NY Times

Found this interesting page on NY Times. It talks about the matchups for the playoffs coming up, some simple animations about how plays shake-out, etc. This is the kind of stuff I find interesting.

This graphic's fro m the NY Times website

No Punting

This is a good read about a successful HS team that refuses to punt, and they became the Arkansas 5A state champs.

Here is the link, . . . and the entire article:

http://highschool.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=892888

Kevin Kelley decided to flip football convention on its head after Pulaski (Ark.) Academy's second game of the 2007 season.

Never a fan of taking his offense off the field, the coach became miffed when his Bruins punted away to Pine Bluff (Ark.) Dollarway High only to see Pulaski allow an 80-yard touchdown on the return.

Associated Press
The "never punt" philosophy paid off as Pulaski celebrated a state title

"That was stupid," Kelley said. "We should've gone for it."

As a result, his 2008 team did not punt during 14 games. Such an unorthodox strategy may seem like lunacy, but it was successful: Pulaski won the 5A state title on Dec. 6.

Kelley's team only punted twice in 2007 − once as an act of sportsmanship to prevent running up the score − and never after that Dollarway game.

Kelley has reasons to go for it.

Keeping the offense on the field on fourth down allows for more creative play-calling. Third-and-long does not have to be a passing down. The Little Rock school can run the ball, throw a screen pass or use any number of formations. Defenses do not know whether to use a nickel or dime defense. And Pulaski's offense has less pressure on third down.

"We don't really worry too much about it," quarterback Spencer Keith said. "We just get as many yards as we can. We don't have to go for the first down."

If Pulaski converts on fourth down, it creates a momentum change similar to a turnover. Other high school coaches have told Kelley they would rather see his team punt.

The Bruins even avoid punting when the defense has stopped them inside their own 10-yard line.

"You can just tell people are in the stands thinking, 'You're an idiot,' " Kelley said.

Kelley supports this rationale with numbers analysis.

If Pulaski has a fourth-and-8 at its own 5-yard line, Kelley said his explosive offense likely will convert a first down at least 50 percent of the time. If it fails to convert, statistical data from the college level shows that an opponent acquiring the ball inside the 10-yard line scores a touchdown 90 percent of the time. If Pulaski punts away (i.e., a 40-yard punt with a 10-yard return) the other team will start with the ball on the 38-yard line and score a touchdown 77 percent of the time. The difference is only 13 percent.

An innovative and statistics-minded coach, Kelley had tinkered with eschewing the punting game since winning his first state championship in 2003. He became further emboldened after reading several studies, including "Do Firms Maximize? Evidence from Pro Football," by University of California-Berkeley economics professor David Romer. Kelley also examined ZEUS, a computer program developed by Chuck Bower, who has a doctorate in astrophysics, and Frank Frigo, a game theory expert, to model and predict football outcomes.

The Pulaski coach has adopted an unusual approach to kickoffs as well. About 75 percent of the time, he uses an onside kick instead of a standard kickoff. To illustrate why, Kelley again relies on numbers.

If his team does not recover the onside kick, the opponent likely will field the kick around its own 47-yard line. On a typical kickoff, the other team usually starts around the 33-yard line.

"You're only giving up 14 yards," Kelley said. "And you get a chance to get the ball."

Pulaski features seven different kinds of onside kicks, including bunching eight players on one side of the field and three on the other; faking the kick with one kicker while another player shifts over to kick to a vacated spot in coverage; clustering all 11 players before spreading out just as the ball is kicked; bouncing a hard kick off the turf for a jump ball and launching a "helicopter kick" by kicking a ball placed on the ground against the tee. The latter strategy causes the ball to spin like a helicopter's propeller and move like a curveball.

"Much like the punting situation, [the onside kick] becomes something the other team has to work on a lot during the week," Kelley said. "That's taking time from their preparation against your offense or defense. So it all works towards the common goal."

For Kelley's objective of winning games with a risky but aggressive offense, Pulaski had the perfect quarterback. Keith, who has received major interest from Louisiana Tech, Arkansas State and several Ivy League schools, could make defenses pay for not stopping the Bruins on fourth down. And if the other team scores off a short field because of a missed fourth-down opportunity, the unflappable passer could compensate by scoring points in a hurry.

Kelley called him the most athletic quarterback he has ever coached, and Keith set the state record with 5,308 passing yards this season. He also possesses the requisite accuracy for an offense that threw on about 45 of its 75 plays a game and averaged 570 total yards.

---

You can just tell people are in the stands thinking, 'You're an idiot.'

— Kevin Kelley, coach of Pulaski Academy

---

"It's a really fun offense," Keith said. "I wouldn't change it for anything."

A possible pre-med or pre-engineering student who scored a 30 on the ACT, Keith has the intelligence to master an intricate scheme, which features pre- and post-snap reads with receivers making adjustments based on coverage.

With Keith and several other impact players returning from his 2007 team, Kelley said he knew his team had the potential for a state title this year. When the media asked for his pick of the No. 1 team in Arkansas before the season, Kelley chose Pulaski and consequently received some heat.

"It was just confidence in my guys," he said. "I thought this might be one of the better teams we've ever had."

His prediction proved to be on the mark. Although Pulaski lost its first game of the season, 46-29, to West Helena, it reeled off 13 consecutive wins and avenged that Week 1 defeat with a 35-32 state title victory against the Cougars.

During the offseason Kelley will begin investigating different football strategies. He also plans to further study the punting game by analyzing specific instances where punting may prove statistically superior.

After Kelley searches through data, Pulaski may tweak its approach next year. His 2009 team could punt on occasion, or he may develop a new tactic that defies the norms of football but gives his team an edge.

"Just because something's always been done that way," Kelley said, "doesn't mean it should continue to be done that way."

Max Hall is Horrible

...and I apologize if I ever praised him at any point.

He'd better drastically improve during the off-season, get healthy, or something. Because this "most competitive person I've ever met" description about him we always hear needs to be qualified with "most competitive person I've ever met against teams that are no good."

There...I said it.

Oldest Guy To Play College B-Ball

A 73-Year-Old Gives Basketball a Second Shot

from the NY Times

BCS decides outcome of WWII

I'm going to take credit for this humerous article since I can't find the rightful owner. Finders keepers right?


BCS DECLARES GERMANY WINNER OF WORLD WAR II... US Finishes Ranked 4th

After determining the Big-12 championship game participants the BCS computers were put to work on other major contests and today the BCS declared Germany to be the winner of World War II.

"Germany put together an incredible number of victories beginning with the annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland and continuing on into conference play with defeats of Poland, France, Norway, Sweden, Denmark,Belgium and the Netherlands. Their only losses came against the US and Russia; however considering their entire body of work--including an incredibly tough Strength of Schedule--our computers deemed them worthy of the #1 ranking."

Questioned about the #4 ranking of the United States the BCS commissioner stated "The US only had two major victories--Japan and Germany. The computer models, unlike humans, aren't influenced by head-to-head contests--they consider each contest to be only a single, equally-weighted event."

German Chancellor Adolph Hitler said "Yes, we lost to the US; but we defeated #2 ranked France in only 6 weeks." Herr Hitler has been criticized for seeking dramatic victories to earn 'style points' to enhance Germany's rankings. Hitler protested "Our contest with Poland was in doubt until the final day and the conditions in Norway were incredibly challenging and demanded the application of additional
forces."

The French ranking has also come under scrutiny. The BCS commented "France had a single loss against Germany and following a preseason #1 ranking they only fell to #2."

Japan was ranked #3 with victories including Manchuria, Borneo and the Philippines.

Fans We Don't Want

Casey's seen, and the guy copied a guy who did it for Hitler as a Cowboys' fan, but still amusing

Genetic Test to Determine Sports Predisposition?

from: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/11/29/sports/30genetics.php

By Juliet Macur

Saturday, November 29, 2008

BOULDER, Colorado: When Donna Campiglia learned recently that a genetic test might be able to determine which sports suit the talents of her 2 ½-year-old son, Noah, she instantly said, Where can I get it and how much does it cost?

"I could see how some people might think the test would pigeonhole your child into doing fewer sports or being exposed to fewer things, but I still think it's good to match them with the right activity," Campiglia, 36, said as she watched a toddler class at Boulder Indoor Soccer in which Noah struggled to take direction from the coach between juice and potty breaks.

"I think it would prevent a lot of parental frustration," she said.

In health-conscious, sports-oriented Boulder, Atlas Sports Genetics is playing into the obsessions of parents by offering a $149 test that aims to predict a child's natural athletic strengths. The process is simple. Swab inside the child's cheek and along the gums to collect DNA and return it to a lab for analysis of ACTN3, one gene among more than 20,000 in the human genome.

The test's goal is to determine whether a person would be best at speed and power sports like sprinting or football, or endurance sports like distance running, or a combination of the two. A 2003 study discovered the link between ACTN3 and those athletic abilities.

In this era of genetic testing, DNA is being analyzed to determine predispositions to disease, but experts raise serious questions about marketing it as a first step in finding a child's sports niche, which some parents consider the road to a college scholarship or a career as a professional athlete.

Atlas executives acknowledge that their test has limitations but say that it could provide guidelines for placing youngsters in sports. The company is focused on testing children from infancy to about 8 years old because physical tests to gauge future sports performance at that age are, at best, unreliable.

Some experts say ACTN3 testing in its infancy and virtually useless. Dr. Theodore Friedmann, the director of the University of California-San Diego Medical Center's interdepartmental gene therapy program, called it "an opportunity to sell new versions of snake oil."

"This may or may not be quite that venal, but I would like to see a lot more research done before it is offered to the general public," he said. "I don't deny that these genes have a role in athletic success, but it's not that black and white."

Dr. Stephen Roth, director of the functional genomics laboratory at the University of Maryland's School of Public Health who has studied ACTN3, said he thought the test would become popular. But he had reservations.

"The idea that it will be one or two genes that are contributing to the Michael Phelpses or the Usain Bolts of the world I think is shortsighted because it's much more complex than that," he said, adding that athletic performance has been found to be affected by at least 200 genes.

Roth called ACTN3 "one of the most exciting and eyebrow-raising genes out there in the sports-performance arena," but he said that any test for the gene would be best used only on top athletes looking to tailor workouts to their body types.

"It seems to be important at very elite levels of competition," Roth said. "But is it going to affect little Johnny when he participates in soccer, or Suzy's ability to perform sixth grade track and field? There's very little evidence to suggest that."

The study that identified the connection between ACTN3 and elite athletic performance was published in 2003 by researchers primarily based in Australia.

Those scientists looked at the gene's combinations, one copy provided by each parent. The R variant of ACTN3 instructs the body to produce a protein, alpha-actinin-3, found specifically in fast-twitch muscles. Those muscles are capable of the forceful, quick contractions necessary in speed and power sports. The X variant prevents production of the protein.

The ACTN3 study looked at 429 elite white athletes, including 50 Olympians, and found that 50 percent of the 107 sprint athletes had two copies of the R variant. Even more telling, no female elite sprinter had two copies of the X variant. All male Olympians in power sports had at least one copy of the R variant.

Conversely, nearly 25 percent of the elite endurance athletes had two copies of the X variant — only slightly higher than the control group at 18 percent. That means people with two X copies are more likely to be suited for endurance sports.

Still, some athletes prove science, and seemingly their genetics, wrong. Research on an Olympic long jumper from Spain showed that he had no copies of the R variant, indicating that athletic success is probably affected by a combination of genes as well as factors like environment, training, nutrition and luck.

"Just think if that Spanish kid's parents had done the test and said, 'No, your genes show that you are going to be a bad long jumper, so we are going to make you a golfer,' " said Carl Foster, a co-author of the study, who is the director of the human performance laboratory at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. "Now look at him. He's the springiest guy in Spain. He's Tigger. We don't yet understand what combination of genes creates that kind of explosiveness."

Foster suggested another way to determine if a child will be good at sprint and power sports. "Just line them up with their classmates for a race and see which ones are the fastest," he said.

Kevin Reilly, the president of Atlas Sports Genetics and a former weight-lifting coach, expected the test to be controversial. He said some people were concerned that it would cause "a rebirth of eugenics, similar to what Hitler did in trying to create this race of perfect athletes."

Reilly said he feared what he called misuse by parents who go overboard with the results and specialize their children too quickly and fervently.

"I'm nervous about people who get back results that don't match their expectations," he said. "What will they do if their son would not be good at football? How will they mentally and emotionally deal with that?"

Reilly insisted that the test is one tool of many that can help children realize their athletic potential. It may even keep an overzealous father from pushing his son to be a quarterback if his genes indicate otherwise, Reilly said.

If ACTN3 suggests a child may be a great athlete, he said, parents should take a step back and nurture that potential Olympian or NFL star with careful nutrition, coaching and planning. He also said they should hold off on placing a child in a competitive environment until about the age of 8 to avoid burnout.

"Based on the test of a 5-year-old or a newborn, you are not going to see if you have the next Michael Johnson; that's just not going to happen," Reilly said. "But if you wait until high school or college to find out if you have a good athlete on your hands, by then it will be too late. We need to identify these kids from 1 and up, so we can give the parents some guidelines on where to go from there."

Boyd Epley, a former strength and conditioning coach at the University of Nebraska, said the next step would be a physical test he devised. Atlas plans to direct children to Epic Athletic Performance, a talent identification company that uses Epley's index. He founded the company; Reilly is its president.

China and Russia, Epley said, identify talent in the very young and whittle the pool of athletes until only the best remain for the national teams.

"This is how we could stay competitive with the rest of the world," Epley said of genetic and physical testing. "It could, at the very least, provide you with realistic goals for you and your children."

The ACTN3 test has been available through the Australian company Genetic Technologies since 2004. The company has marketed the test in Australia, Europe and Japan, but is now entering the United States through Atlas. The testing kit was scheduled to be available starting Monday through the Web site atlasgene.com.

The analysis takes two to three weeks, and the results arrive in the form of a certificate announcing Your Genetic Advantage, whether it is in sprint, power and strength sports; endurance sports; or activity sports (for those with one copy of each variant, and perhaps a combination of strengths). A packet of educational information suggests sports that are most appropriate and what paths to follow so the child reaches his or her potential.

"I find it worrisome because I don't think parents will be very clear-minded about this," said William Morgan, an expert on the philosophy of ethics and sport and author of "Why Sports Morally Matter." "This just contributes to the madness about sports because there are some parents who will just go nuts over the results.

"The problem here is that the kids are not old enough to make rational autonomous decisions about their own life," he said.

Some parents will steer clear of the test for that reason.

Dr. Ray Howe, a general practitioner in Denver, said he would rather see his 2-year-old, Joseph, find his own way in life and discover what sports he likes the best. Howe, a former professional cyclist, likened ACTN3 testing to gene testing for breast cancer or other diseases.

"You might be able to find those things out, but do you really want to know?" he said.

Others, like Lori Lacy, 36, said genetic testing would be inevitable. Lacy, who lives in Broomfield, Colorado, has three children ranging in age from 2 months to 5 years.

"Parents will start to say, 'I know one mom who's doing the test on her son, so maybe we should do the test too,' " she said.

"Peer pressure and curiosity would send people over the edge. What if my son could be a pro football player and I don't know it?"

Win Win!

Tonight was a win-win.

If we had won, we would have won and ruined Utah's season. Satisfying.

Since we lost, we still win since we get some conference BCS money--500,000 I think. Hey, I'm not proud, I'll take it.

Good luck Utah in your BCS bowl game. I feel sick. I was going to travel to that BCS bowel game no matter where it was and tell my grandkids about it. That was supposed to be our bowl game. I feel sick.

5 turnovers?!?!

BYU Basketball Online in High Def (Is there HD for internet streaming? If not BYU TV looks pretty darn close to HD)

For all your cougar fans out there, just wanted to let you know that BYU TV is showing some of the men's basketball games on the channel, and if you don't get the channel then you can watch it online at www.byu.tv or http://www.byutv.org/streaming/ (if you go to the latter link, just click on "BYU TELEVISION Tune In Now" right in the middle of the screen). The online quality is awesome (and no I'm not being sarcastic). I know BYU plays two more basketball games tomorrow (Friday) and Saturday, and both games will be online or on the channel. Enjoy.

Also, here is a link to BYU's schedule: http://www.byucougars.com/Schedule.jsp?SP=111 The schedule shows which games are broadcast on BYU TV.

And one final plug for BYU TV. They also have archives of True Blue (If you've never seen it you should definitely watch an episode) and highlights of recent football and basketball games.

Obamarama

I'll be outright and open on this: I'm not a fan of Obama. But this is the first major policy initiative of his that I can stand behind. What do you guys think? Do you dislike him throwing his influence around to change sports? Quiz Show helped shape some thoughts. But in general, I think the NCAA is a corrupt money-driven organization. You can say the same about our politicians. So do I really mind that the next President wants to improve (IMO) a horribly run NCAA? Not at all. This is the only thing I hope he can pull off in the next four years. My only fear though is if he does, it will significantly boost his possibility of reelection...

From an ESPN article:
Obama said he will use his influence to create such a [playoff] system.

"If you've got a bunch of teams who play throughout the season, and many of them have one loss or two losses, there's no clear decisive winner. We should be creating a playoff system," he told reporter Steve Kroft.

According to Obama's proposed system, eight teams would play over three rounds to settle the national champion.

"It would add three extra weeks to the season," he said at the conclusion of a wide-ranging interview. "You could trim back on the regular season. I don't know any serious fan of college football who has disagreed with me on this. So, I'm going to throw my weight around a little bit. I think it's the right thing to do."

How do you get an ACC team to lose?

So Casey can vouch for me, but I called this about three or four weeks ago. So how do you guarantee an ACC team will lose? Rank them in the top 25 (as always this also shows what a farce the ranking system is).

Week 12 (I've placed the rank team to the left not necessarily the home team):
#16 NC vs Maryland 15 - 17 LOSS
#19 Florida State vs BC 17 - 27 LOSS
#24 Wake vs NC State 17 - 21 LOSS

Week 11
*GT and NC were both ranked so don't count
#21 Florida State vs Clemson 41 - 27 WIN
#23 Maryland vs Virginia Tech 13 - 23 LOSS

Week 10
#15 Florida State vs GT 28 - 31 LOSS

Week 9
#18 GT vs Virginia 17 - 24 LOSS
#25 Florida State vs VTech 30 - 20 WIN

Week 8
#17 VTech vs BC 23 - 28 LOSS
#18 NC vs Virginia 13 - 16 LOSS
#21 Wake Forest vs Maryland 0 - 26 LOSS

Week 7
#21 Wake vs Clemson 12 - 7 WIN
#22 NC vs Notre Lame 29 - 24 WIN

Week 6
#20 VTech vs Western Kentucky 27 - 13 WIN
#24 UConn vs NC 12 - 38 LOSS

Week 5
#20 Clemson vs Maryland 17 - 20 LOSS
#16 Wake vs Navy 17 - 24 LOSS

Week 4
#23 Clemson vs South Carolina State 54 - 0 win but we are not counting DII schools
*both Wake and Florida State ranked

Week 3
No ACC Teams ranked with a game (this trend should have continued, but they kept throwing someone back in the rankings)

Week 2
#20 Wake vs Mississippi 30 - 28 WIN

Week 1
#9 Clemson vs #24 Alabama 10 - 24 LOSS
#17 VTech vs E Carolina 22 - 27 LOSS
#23 Wake vs Baylor 41 - 13 WIN

7 WINS and 14 LOSSES OVERALL
3 WINS and 11 LOSSES in ACC play
So the iron is particularly hot when you have a conference game and you are ranked...

And to evaluate those non ACC wins: Baylor (4-7), Mississippi (6-4), Western Kentucky (2-9 I thought they were DII, but they are independent), and Notre Lame (6-4).

But it begs the question (that was for Ben), why do the teams keep getting ranked? Is it because the team that gets ranked is really dominant and deserves to be ranked or because the ACC is a BCS conference and should have a team ranked so they keep throwing votes at the problem?

Invention

This may not revolutionize football, but I'm saying if someone has time, we could make some money. We need to invent a mouthpiece holder on football helmets. Half of football nowadays is seemingly style (see thin arm bands placed above elbows, etc), and the mouthpieces that connect to the facemask seem out of style; the detached ones seem in, and everyone spends half the time cramming there mouthpieces into their facemask.

MWC dominates the BCS

This has got to be a telling stat. The Mountain West Conference is 9 -4 against BCS conference teams this season.

The wins came against: Washington, Stanford, UCLA, Oregon State, Tennessee, Iowa State, Arizona State, Michigan, Arizona

The losses came from: Cal, Okalahoma, Texas A&M, Colorado

Now I'll admit that none of the wins came against any of the premier BCS teams; however, just to think that UNLV, who is 2-0 versus the BCS and 0-5 versus MWC teams, would have a better season playing in the Big XII or the Pac 10 is interesting. Also note that many of these wins were from the bottom dwellers of the MWC, which tells me that the MWC is definitely more balanced than many of the BCS conferences, and this year is superior to several of the conferences.

Of the Pac 10, ACC, and Big East there is only ONE team, one team from those 3 power conferences that has a team ranked higher than the top THREE MWC teams. Simply put, of the 30 teams that make up the Pac 10, ACC, and Big East; USC is the only team ranked ahead of BYU which is the THIRD highest ranked MWC team.

If the MWC doesn't deserve an automatic bid in the BCS when they have 3 teams ranked in the top 15 of the BCS, while ONLY the Big XII has more teams ranked in the top 15 than the MWC; then the BCS is an absolute joke. Okay, that's a foregone conclusion. But seriously, with statistics like this, how does the media conveniently and constantly forget about this conference?

Top 10 Fringe World Titles

As I am still in a funk from the BYU-TCU game, I figured I would post something that is the furthest you can get from football.

Greatest Sports Video Compilation Ever

I think we've all seen this, but it needs to be up on the blog for inspirational purposes.

BoSox

As I sit here and seethe over The-Game-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named, I want to write about something sports, just not what just happened to our beloved Cougs.

What do we think? Are the Red Sox of recent history the greatest postseason comeback sports team we know? I know they have a long ways to go to win this series, but let's look at things since 2004:

2004 ALCS - Come back from the "impossible" 3-0 to the Yanks and go on to win the World Series.
2007 ALCS - Come back from 3-1 to the Indians to go on and win the World Series.
2008 ALCS - Pull off the second largest postseason deficit in MLB history (7-0 in the 7th) to win the game.

Based on how the Rays are playing, I doubt the Sox will advance, but still...

Unrelated question: Why does Kevin Youkilis grip the bat the way he does?

BYU and the Kings

The Sacramento Kings old basketball coach apparently is a huge fan of Bronco Mendenhall and BYU. Eric Musselman has a blog and he has posted about the Bronco several times. Check it out: http://emuss.blogspot.com/

I doubt Phil Jackson or Jerry Sloan are BYU fans.

Go Cougs!!!

Someone at ESPN said what?

After I saw a sportscenter highlight a while back, that featured BYU, that was introduced with a montage of the Washington State game weeks after it was played, I was completly sure of the big network bias. I think they're just pissed that the MWC chose to have their own network for sports rather than sign with ESPN, but that's for another time. . .

I was very suprised that someone from ESPN actually gave the cougars a chance at the BCS National Championship game. (See the last section of the link)

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/notebook?page=iform0808&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab1pos1

"Hell?. . . is that you? Why is it cold in here?"

Poor Cubs Fans

Just saw this on eBay...a Cubbies fan auctioning his loyalty to the team!

Looks like it was removed. Good catch, Casey.

I was listening to Sportscenter while taking care of stuff around the condo today, and apparently this Cubs fan was "selling" his loyalty to the Cubs on eBay. I guess he was going to produce a video of him burning all of his cubs apparel, posters, etc and of him buying all new jerseys, etc for his "new" team of choice.

I guess when I think about it, the winner of that auction should get all of the guy's Cubs stuff, but I suppose it's his choice...

Worst Sportscaster Ever

This has been on the internet for a while, but a friend recently reintroduced it to me... absolutely hilarious. In a make-you-awkward-like-watching-the-Office sort of way.

Moving Mountain West into BCS title picture

Great article depicting how the BCS isn't letting the best teams play...

read more | digg story

'Witchcraft' claim sparked deadly soccer riot

from CNN.com:

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) -- Accusations that a soccer player was using witchcraft during a match in eastern Congo sparked a riot that killed 13 people, a U.N.-funded radio station reported Monday.

Most of the victims were between the ages of 11 and 16, Radio Okapi said. They were suffocated as panicked crowds ran for the exits during the mayhem Sunday in Butembo in eastern Congo's North Kivu province.

Radio Okapi said police tried to control the violence at Matokeo stadium by firing into the air to protect their commander, who was hit in the head and wounded by fans.

The two local clubs involved were Socozaki and Nyuki System, the radio said.

Dozens of teenagers marched through Butembo's dirt streets Monday in protest, and the regional governor, Julien Mpaluku, paid a visit to the hospital.

Mpaluku said the government was investigating.

He made no mention of witchcraft, but confirmed that soldiers had fired into the air to calm angry crowds. The shooting prompted panic instead, which became fatal "when the crowds all tried to leave at the same time."

"Most of the dead were children, only two or three were adults," Mpaluku said.

North Kivu has been the epicenter of violence between Congo's army and rebels over the last year which has displaced hundreds of thousands of people.

Monson: RM debate only crops up when BYU wins

Interesting take on the debate over whether being returned missionaries is an unfair advantage for BYU football players.

read more | digg story

Another One

http://www.cougarfan.com/article.asp?ArtID=48813&URL=http://bleacherreport.com/articles/57903-bringham-young-and-the-mountain-west-conference-deserve-national-attention

BYU and MWC

Podcast about BYU and the MWC

Conference Rankings

http://realtimerpi.com/football/ncaaf_conf_Men.html

This website's stats backup my earlier post.

Kirk Hops on the Bandwagon...Sort of

MWC > PAC10

This weekend was a huge weekend for the MWC. At least it should have been, but of course all the ESPN losers will completely overlook this interesting fact.

The MWC played 4 games against the Pac 10, and guess what, the MWC won all 4 games. And on the entire season, the MWC has played 5 games against the Pac 10 and won all 5 games.

Washington, Stanford, UCLA, Arizona State, and Arizona were the victims. They may not be the powerhouse of the Pac 10, but neither are UNLV and New Mexico.

Later in the season a MWC team will also play Oregon State. But regardless, by my count the MWC dominated play against the Pac 10.

The BCS is weak, and this proves it. So someone again try and tell me either how the WAC is better than the MWC, when our conference won more games against BCS opponents this weekend than the WAC did in all of last year, or that the MWC is an inferrior conference to the Pac 10.

Holy Crap.

That was as close to a perfect game as these eyes will ever see.

BYU Defense

I'm sure I'm not in the minority thinking that BYU's defense is horrible; however, I came across an interesting statistic. The numbers don't change my mind that our secondary is terrible, but it does give me slightly more hope for the season.

BYU allowed Locker the fifth lowest number of yards (62), the third lowest yards per carry (3.4) and the second shortest long run (17) even though he had his second highest number of carries of his career (18).

And here's an important number left out of the article, Locker has started 15 games. So what do you make of these numbers?


ps. I got these stats from Dick Harmon.

Hockey Eh?

Read Here

This cracks me up. Bulgaria's women's hockey team lost a match 82-0. The part that kills me is they don't want to recogize the goalies amazing 57 saves. So funny because I just picture this fat girl sitting in as goalie and all 57 saves are the times she was actually hit by the puck. I bet she cringes remembering all 57 of those. So funny...

Armstrong to Compete in '09 Tour?

I was reading this article on ESPN.com (admittedly I haven't read the full thing), about Armstrong coming back for the 2009 Tour de France.

I don't know enough about the cycling landscape to know how this is being viewed. With the plummeting reputation of cycling (the result of disqualifications of famous riders due to doping charges, etc), the return of a star this big would probably help, but is it enough to help bolster cycling back to where it was? What if Lance competes and does horrible? How does he go about finding a team? Are there tryouts?

Ben? Nartker?

The Art & Science of Wheelchair B-Ball

I'll just make this easier and post a link to the NY Times story.

Game Changing Performance

http://promo.espn.go.com/espn/contests/pontiacgcp/

Vote for the Cougars for the Game Changing Performance of the Week.

30 feet = "High"

Let's be honest with ourselves here. BYU outplayed UW all day. Our defense looked bad, but our offense was unstoppable. If Harvey doesn't uncharacteristically fumble (considering he fumbled once last year) into the endzone then we win easy.

As far as "the penatly" goes, Locker broke a rule, which is not a new rule. It may be a dumb rule, but the rule was enforced. Which makes me wonder, if Locker would have been called on this in the 1st quarter would it have mattered? Of course not. Now suddenly college football is suppose to pick and choose when to call penalties like the NBA does? Last I checked 3 steps in the first quarter and 3 steps with 5 seconds left is still traveling and should be a turnover.

On top of that, all the ESPN losers that say he "flipped the ball over his shoulder" prove that they either didn't watch the game at all, so they should shut their faces; they are completely biased toward the BCS; or most likely, they are completely retarded.

And since when did a 30 yard field goal from straight on become a big deal? I wish UW would take some responsibility and realized that UW special teams lost the game not Jake Locker for throwing the ball.

Game 1 Thoughts

Just off the top of my head.

Second-half Fumbles A Good Thing

Despite the anxiety that a 27-17 lead against Northern Iowa caused me (I believe I blacked out at one point and had to be revived with an oxygen tank), I think the reason that it was closer than it should have been (our mistakes: fumbles) will serve us well for the rest of the season because they served as a reminder. I think if we had continued with the momentum we had in the first half and annihilated NIU, we would have gone into UW almost too confident. The fumbles reminded us that "yeah, we're good, and yeah, we have an extremely high-powered offense, BUT we still need to protect the ball no matter who the opponent is." I think it was good.

Pitta Better Than Harline?

This may have already been a point of discussion last year, and too early in this season to tell already, but Pitta was an absolute beast. Harline will forever be etched in BYU fans' minds because of the catch, and he was undoubtedly a beast at tight end, but I think Pitta will put up some crazy stats.

Other input? Thoughts?

Tomato

Not exactly a sport, but a good reason to visit Spain

Photos here

Too Good to Play?

Has anybody heard of this 9-year old baseball player?

Seeing as most kids that play little league baseball aren't going to make the pros, I'm guessing that at least part of what they should get out of playing little league is effort, perseverance, etc. Is banning this kid that "throws too hard" the solution? What does that teach the other kids? I'm assuming that he isn't intentionally aiming for kids; and, if he is this good, I'm guessing he's also accurate.

Or, could they just move him up to an older age group?

LPGA has Balls

How ironic is it that the league with the largest amount of "testicular fortitude" is lacking in the literal possesion of said physcial trait?

I applaud the LPGA Tour for coming out recently with plans for a new policy requiring all memebers with at least 2 years seniority on Tour to be able to speak enough English to conduct post tournament interviews, interact with playing partners at Pro-Am tours, etc. It's an American based tour and they have a right to set a standard of performance to be able to participate.

It's not politically correct from many angles. . . and it's really about money. If the sponsors hadn't complained about the lack of communication ability from players this would never be an issue. Money talks. . and in this case it speaks English. . . or enough to answer a few questions from Bob Costas and the golf channel. The lack of PC'ness, if you will, is one reason I like the move so much. I wish the gates leading into California echoed the same sentiment as past Presidents of the United States when they talked about integrating into American society and learning the language.

Three cheers for the LPGA for setting a policy they think will be good for their league without bowing to outside pressures. . . for now.

Agreed?

Further Proof

This chart is courtesy of Freakanomics. This chart shows how many golds per million inhabitants for the different countries. Not that this is definitively the way to say who "won" the Olympics. But I was wondering does any country appear a little suspicious? Any country standing out? Especially considering Bahrais Olympian says he is a Moroccan (I dont' know if Morocco can't compete or something that he competed for Bahrain).

Sex Symbols

The use of sex to sell sports is obvious (being a sports blog I had to bring sports in somehow), but now it is spreading to education... Just shameless...

Max Hall in NY Times

Feisty Quarterback Could Help B.Y.U. Crash the B.C.S.

Jamaican Juice

Someone had to say it. There is no way. Things don't happen like that for a whole country without it being a little too coincidental.

So first piece of evidence...no one from Jamaica has ever won the 100m. They win the mens by a landslide (we'll get to that) and the women sweep. Suspicious?

Second, the woman who won took second at world championships and that was it. No prior accomplishments in the women's 100.

Third, no country has ever swept the 100 since 1912 (back then only like five countries competed anyways).

Fourth, Bolt jogged the last twenty meters or so and could have posted a much faster time. As it stands he broke the record by 5 hundredths of a second. Since 1990 the most anyone had broken the record by was five hundredths of a second. And they gave it their all. None of this, "oh I'm winning by a full second I better slow it down" type garbage.

Fifth, Bolt has been running the 100 for a year.

So as much as I want to be amazed by Bolts greatness, common sense prevents me from giving any congratulations. This is about as obvious as Bonds blasting homers as he turned 40. In a similar fashion, I can't congratulate China on their women's team medal with the girls fresh out of diapers (although mad props for the men, they were amazing).

I'm not saying Bolt (or rather the country of Jamaica) will get caught, but this is definitely Balco ... on steroids.

Dolphin Kick Gives Swimmers Edge

Found this on www.npr.org. Interesting stuff about the "dolphin kick" that Olympic swimmers use.

Some Olympians Dissatisfied With Religious Center

I won't fully post because it's a bit long, but if you're interested:

Some Olympians Dissatisfied With Religious Center

They interviewed an LDS guy; at least for a bit.

Cougars, Utes expect to compete for MWC title, BCS berth

My only question is: How are the Utes in this discussion?
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http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/preview08/news/story?id=3529952

Few football rivalries around the country combine the fierceness of the gridiron with the passion of religion like BYU and Utah, and this year their rivalry could have an impact of national proportions. No Mountain West team has accomplished an undefeated, BCS bowl season since Utah in 2004, but the Cougars and Utes have the rosters and the schedules to be the conference's hope in the BCS standings.

The schools have battled on the football field for 86 years -- or 112 if you go by Utah's records -- but few outside know the depth of the rivalry and the contempt each team has for the other. That could change this season as the finale on Nov. 22 could mean the difference between an undefeated record and BCS berth.

"In the state, [the rivalry] is one of the most fierce things I've ever witnessed of any of the places that I've coached," BYU coach Bronco Mendenhall said. "There isn't a gray area here. No in-between. You're either a BYU fan or a Utah fan."

During the early part of the season, Utah has a chance to make a name for itself with games against Michigan and Oregon State, while BYU will face Pac-10 foes Washington and UCLA. Those are important stepping-stones toward gaining momentum and prestige heading into a Mountain West Conference that BYU has swept each of the last two seasons, including dramatic wins over Utah during the final games of the season.

But as great as BYU has been over the last two seasons -- 11 wins in 2006 and 2007 -- the Cougars have never generated as much buzz as they have this preseason. As luck would have it and in true rivalry fashion, Utah, which won eight of its last nine to finish 9-4 last season, returns almost all of its starters and is attempting to wrestle the spotlight away from its neighbors to the South.

It's easy to dismiss this rivalry because it doesn't have the immediate pizzazz of an Alabama-Auburn or a Florida State-Miami, but it's as rich in tradition and as heated as any rivalry in the country.

The game is often referred to as the "Holy War" because of BYU's affiliation with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and because Utah is owned by the state, the whole week leading up to the contest tends to take on a church vs. State undertone.

"I think one of the reasons that makes the rivalry so fierce is both teams are having success, No. 1, but the second thing is any time you have religion or faith into any topic, it would be similar to politics, the emotions that it brings out in people are just unreal," Mendenhall said.

During the opening contest between Utah and Brigham Young Academy in 1896 there was a full-scale brawl in the stands. BYU actually dropped football from its program for the next 26 years.

In the 1990s there were more brawls -- some between fans, some between players and some between players and fans. In 1998, BYU linebacker Derik Stevenson attacked a fan in the crowd who was harassing his father. A year later in Provo, a Cougar fan jumped out of the stands and attacked a Utah male cheerleader who was running around the field with a Utah flag after a Utah touchdown. The cheerleader proceeded to beat the fan until police separated the two.

The violence moved from the stands to the message boards and every year each campus braces for the defacing of property by the opposing school's fans. Even Utah coach Kyle Whittingham endures scrutiny because he graduated from BYU, which only adds to the intense nature of this rivalry.

"I don't think there's anything friendly about it," Mendenhall said. "[Utah] Coach Whittingham and I, I think, have a professional relationship and one of respect. But that's the extent of it.

"Both of us have to be careful how we describe [the rivalry] because no matter what we say it will end up with someone taking it out of context. You really can't make the rivalry bigger than it already is."

These teams are 9-9 in the last two decades and 10 of the last 11 games have been decided by a touchdown or less.

In last year's game, BYU quarterback Max Hall found receiver Austin Collie for a 49-yard gain on fourth and 18 with 1:34 remaining in the fourth quarter. Harvey Unga rushed for an 11-yard touchdown with 38 seconds remaining to give BYU a 17-10 win.

BYU returns almost all of its offense from a year ago and is ranked No. 17 in the preseason coaches' poll. BYU also holds the nation's longest winning streak at 10 games.

Whittingham said this year's offense is the deepest he's had in his four seasons with the program. The Utes were decimated by injuries last season, but all of those players are back and the young players who stepped in now provide depth.

If these schools are as good as most predict, the game on Nov. 22 could be one that has fans and non-fans alike glued to their televisions, giving the Mountain West a much-needed boost in prestige both by BCS schools and within the non-BCS.

"In a perfect situation, that's the ideal scenario, to have that game come down to the championship every year," Whittingham said. "That's what college football's all about. When you have the opportunity to decide a conference championship against your No. 1 rival, I don't think it gets any better than that."

2 in 1

To begin, let me just say I LOVE Jonathan Horton. I can’t get enough of this guy, as Jenna observed, I have a serious man crush. Not only is this guy a sick gymnast (he stuck everything yesterday), he’s proud as hell to be an American. This guy was trying to single handedly bring down communism in the gym. Every time the camera is on him he’s yelling “Go USA!” He’s like a GI Joe, minus 9 inches. I’m all about the team/school/country spirit and I’ve never seen anyone who had more of it than this dude.

Next, and completely irrelevant, is China dominating the shooting events. They’ve won 5 medals out of 7 events. First off, I hardly consider shooting to be a sport. It requires no endurance, speed, nor strength. All you need is accuracy. But doesn’t darts and pool only require the same attribute, accuracy? So shooting shouldn’t be an Olympic sport just like darts and pool aren’t. Second of all, how are we not dominating shooting? Are there not more killings with guns in the USA than in any other 1st world county? And how many gun totting hillbillies do we have running around West Virginia, capable of shooting a bee in flight from 100yards? Not only is the USA gun crazy but China is completely opposite. Guns are outlawed in China! No public citizen is allowed to have a gun. So where on earth are they learning to use these things? I don’t care how embarrassing it might be to have a shooting team comprised of Pacman Jones and Larry the Cable Guy, let’s put the right to bear arms to use.

GO USA!

NY Times: "Let the Games Be Doped"

From The NY Times. Nartker wrote on a different angle of doping or PEDs or whatever. No "blueberries in their shorts" analogies. Unfortunate:
__________

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/science/12tier.html?8dpc

Let the Games Be Doped

By JOHN TIERNEY
August 11, 2008

Once upon a time, the lords of the Olympic Games believed that the only true champion was an amateur, a gentleman hobbyist untainted by commerce. Today they enforce a different ideal. The winners of the gold medals are supposed to be natural athletes, untainted by technology. After enough “scandals,” the amateur myth eventually died of its own absurdity. The natural myth is still alive in Beijing, but it’s becoming so far-fetched — and potentially dangerous — that some scientists and ethicists would like to abandon it, too.

What if we let athletes do whatever they wanted to excel?

Before you dismiss this notion, consider what we’re stuck with today. The system is ostensibly designed to create a level playing field, protect athletes’ health and set an example for children, but it fails on all counts.

The journal Nature, in an editorial in the current issue, complains that “antidoping authorities have fostered a sporting culture of suspicion, secrecy and fear” by relying on unscientifically calibrated tests, like the unreliable test for synthetic testosterone that cost Floyd Landis his 2006 Tour de France victory. Even if the authorities manage to correct their tests, they can’t possibly keep up with the accelerating advances in biology. Some athletes are already considering new drugs like Aicar and GW1516, which made news recently when researchers at the Salk Institute used them to quickly turn couch-potato mice into treadmill champions with new, strong muscles.

“There’s a possibility that athletes in this Olympics will be using these drugs,” said Ronald Evans, the leader of the team at Salk, who has been fending off inquiries from athletes about these drugs. He has advised the antidoping authorities on how to detect these drugs, but whether they’ll be able do it competently this Olympics is far from clear.

The authorities will have even less of a chance of catching athletes who move beyond drugs and hormones to “gene doping” — inserting genes in their DNA that could increase strength and endurance without leaving telltale chemicals in the bloodstream.

There’s no proof that this would work, but that won’t stop competitors. As Science News reported, a track coach in Germany was caught looking for Repoxygen, an experimental virus used to insert a gene into DNA.

So what we have now is not a level playing field. The system punishes some innocent athletes and rewards others with the savvy and the connections not to get caught. The more that the authorities crack down on known forms of enhancement, the more incentive athletes have to experiment with new ones — and to get their advice from black-market dealers instead of doctors.

If athletes didn’t have to cheat to win, they and society would be better off, says Bengt Kayser, the director of a sports medicine institute at the University of Geneva. In a 2005 article in The Lancet, he and two bioethicists argued that legalizing doping would “encourage more sensible, informed use of drugs in amateur sport, leading to an overall decline in the rate of health problems associated with doping.”

In the British Medical Journal last month, more than 30 scholars signed a statement supporting an article co-authored by Dr. Kayser calling the current system a failure that needs to be changed. The article also criticized the medical authorities for undermining their credibility with “prophylactic lies” that exaggerate the dangers of drugs like anabolic steroids based “on scant evidence tainted by a misguided moralistic motivation to protect sports.”

No one denies that there are risks in taking drugs like anabolic steroids, and there is wide agreement that minors shouldn’t be allowed to take them (or other performance drugs). But the popular fear of steroid use by adults is based in large part on a few sensationalized cases, like the news articles blaming steroids for the fatal brain tumor of Lyle Alzado, the former football player.

“You’d be on firmer scientific ground blaming his brain cancer on beer drinking,” said Norman Fost, a professor of pediatrics and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin. “The claims of the common fatal or irreversible harms of anabolic steroids are without any medical foundation. There’s no reason to think the risk of injury or death is as high as the risk from simply playing sports like football or baseball.”

It’s possible, of course, that gene doping or other techniques could turn out to be much riskier. But is that a reason to ban them? Society has always allowed explorers and adventurers to take risks in exchange for glory. The climbers who died on K2 this month ascended it knowing that one climber dies for every four who scale it.

If elite adult athletes were allowed to push the limits of human performance in return for glory, they might point the way for lesser mortals to coax more out of their bodies. If a 50-year-old sprinter could figure out how to run as fast as her 25-year-old self, that could be useful to aging weekend warriors — or any aging couch potato.

I’d like to see what would happen if someone started a new anything-goes competition for athletes over 25. If you have any ideas for how to run it or what to call it — MaxMatch? UltraSports? Mutant Games? — submit them at nytimes.com/tierneylab. Maybe fans would object to these “unnatural” athletes. But maybe not. The fans, after all, include people with laser-corrected eyes, chemically whitened teeth and surgically enhanced anatomies. Not to mention the pharmacopeia coursing through our veins.

We all know the body can be improved. We all know Olympic athletes have the highest-functioning bodies in the world. They can call themselves natural, just as they used to call themselves amateurs, but at some point that claim may seem the most unnatural thing of all.

UCLA's Olsen Hurt -- Again

I swear, this guy is more brittle than Samuel L. Jackson's character in Unbreakable.

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http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=3528767

LOS ANGELES -- UCLA quarterback Ben Olson will have surgery on his broken right foot, an injury that's expected to keep him out for at least two months.

The decision was announced Monday -- a day after the left-handed senior learned he had fractured the fifth metatarsal in his foot for the second time in four months. The surgery will be performed Tuesday, when Olson will have a screw placed in his foot to assist in the healing.

Olson is expected to miss at least five games. Kevin Craft, a transfer from Mt. San Antonio College, and redshirt freshman Chris Forcier are expected to compete for the Bruins' starting quarterback job.

UCLA opens its season at home against Tennessee on Sept. 1. First-year coach Rick Neuheisel said the Bruins will need to have a starter in place at least a week before facing the Volunteers.

Olson was injured when he faked a handoff Saturday before taking a misstep. It was just the latest in a long time of injuries.

"I knew something was wrong," he said in a teleconference call. "I was hoping I only tweaked it a little bit. It's definitely been tough. You're not able to accomplish the goals you set. It's very frustrating because it seems every year that my progression as a quarterback has been halted by injury. But whining and complaining about things and asking 'Why did this happen to me?' does no good. You have to push forward."

Olson said he expects to return to action this season.

"It's a crushing blow to the young man," Neuheisel said. "He put so much time and effort into the program, it's just unfortunate. Sometimes you have a hard time understanding why things happen."

Patrick Cowan, who took over when Olson was sidelined by injury last season and was expected to be the No. 1 quarterback, had surgery after injuring his knee in spring practice and will miss the season.

Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press

Future of Cycling

Since there has been a dearth of posts about endurance sports here, I thought I would comment about a great story from the recent Tour de France.

As you may or may not but should know, Floyd Landis won the 06 Tour de France, was found to have synthetic Testosterone in his blood (after an important stage win), and was stripped of his title. A while ago, Floyd Landis lost his appeal to the Court of Arbitration for sports. Now, Landis has maintained his innocence throughout the process meaning that he is a liar, or that he is the victim of foulplay. Interestingly, the Court of Arbitration has 3 judges, and the 1 dissenting judge noted:

"as this case demonstrates, even when an athlete proves there are serious errors in a laboratory’s document package that refute an adverse analytical finding, it will be extremely difficult for an athlete to prevail in these types of proceedings. Therefore, it is imperative that WADA Accredited Laboratories abide by the highest scientific standards." and "Given the plethora of laboratory errors in this case, there was certainly no reliable scientific evidence introduced to find that Mr. Landis committed a doping offence."

I would not discount the possibility of foulplay given that the French hate americans for dominating their sport, and that the anti-doping police are run by the French and target Americans 25-40% more than anyone else (I just made up that statistic arbitrarily, but it would be hard to disprove! See http://byudalton.blogspot.com/ for more arbitrary statistics). Cycling is holy and beloved to the French. It would be like a French football team beating our superbowl champs each year.

I'm not going to talk about Landis' case. I want to talk about a new American cycling team Slipstream. They were organized and committed to competing cleanly. Most pro teams are tested 10x a year--team Slipstream is tested about once a week. They are tested not only for illict drugs, but their hematocrit and hormone levels are also tracked to make sure there are no abnormalities.
They have been racing around the US and doing very well for years. This year they were invited to compete in the Tour de France, one of only 3 non-ProTour teams to get in. And even more amazingly led by an awesome cyclist Christian Vandevelde, they placed 5th overall, the top American team at the tour.
They are now sponsored by Garmin and Chipotle, and they are a team to watch. They could respresent the future of cycling and endurance sports, which is as much about changing the culture as it is about not doping.

This is a great article from Outside magazine about the team. Take a read:


http://outside.away.com/outside/culture/200807/cycling-doping-slipstream-1.html

Artificial Exercise?

I know this is a long clip to listen to, but I found it super interesting. Here's the description, at the very least:

Could popping a pill turn you into a long-distance runner? Researchers report that they have identified two signaling pathways that are turned on in response to exercise — and that artificially turning those pathways on in mice produced rodents with much greater endurance.

Link: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93158262

Team Hoyt

I'm not into the marathon/ironman stuff, but this is one of the best stories I've seen in a while.

Let the Games Begin

Let me be clear and upfront with my bias; I don't really care for professional sports. There are some amazingly talented individuals and historic moments in professional sports. But the "love of money" spurns me away from the pros. I don't care to fully define the term now, but let Donaghee, Notre Lame (yes its even in college football but not nearly as much), NY Yankees, Latrell Sprewell, Balco etc. serve as examples of different aspects of it. But again this is not where I'm headed...

For me the summer months are void of sports. Not only are summer sports lame (cue Casey to pipe in about baseball being the purest, most holy form of sport), but summer television is horrible (America's Got Talent is the #1 program..are we kidding?). My bunny ears only get five channels and I try to limit TV time so I'm really not complaining too much. But when the wife is trying to cue up another session of Oprah its nice to have a game to challenge with.

So my sports season runs from the first game of college football to the end of March Madness. But thanks to the Olympics, the sport season starts some three weeks early. And given Chinas handling of things, more drama than a steamy soap opera may be in store... Let the Games Begin!

(photo courtesy of AFP, but I grabbed it from the economist, which begs the question, when is the blog going to send me onsite for photography?)

Senior NFL

Jenna took me to lunch today at a pizza joint, and since I no longer have ESPN I was sort of pumped to watch some sports during my break, except the only sport that rivals the WNBA in worthlessness was on - the Senior PGA.

Now I'm not a big golf fan but I still respect the sport. But why does this league exist? When you're broken down and you can't swing the wrenches with the best of 'em, join a rec league or do charity events, but become a Senior Professional? What is that anyway?

I can't think of any other sport that has a Senior league. There's no Senior MLB or NBA, but maybe that's what we need. What could possible be more exciting than a group of 65 year old terds throwing around the pigskin with one Ray Lewis in the group, ie Jack Nicklaus. One man who somehow preserved his youth and just enjoys lighting up the geezers even though he could still hang in the NFL.

But seriously, since that will never happen why not atleast make the sport somewhat relevant and have the Senior PGA strictly play against the LPGA. Wouldn't that be cute, Michelle Wie paired up with the Golden Bear? And she probably still couldn't make the cut.

Casey wanted a gruesome photo...enjoy

Fall Practice

Many college football fans are gearing up for the start of the season. Fall practice is just around the corner and the fans are pumped! I however hate fall practice. Nothing could be worse, and from a fans perspective, nothing good comes from it.

I used to be one of those fans, who couldn't wait to read about developments that occurred during the days practice, and to listen to the player's interviews. I understand where the enthusiasm comes from, but let me explain to you why this is the worst time in all of college football.


There are only 3 things that happen during practice-

1) We hear that an individual player is "improved" during the offseason and is better than ever.
My rebuttal to this is, it's all relative. Okay so he is better than he was, but hot much better? or you think he's better because you got worse? or I'm just saying he's better because he's my teammate and I can't say that he didn't get any better or that he is worse?

2) We hear the score of the scrimmages-
As my good friend Matt Bauman (ILB, Jr, BYU) pointed out, "fans only want to hear that the offense is doing well. If the defense shuts out the offense, then the offense has problems." BYU for example is suppose to be stacked on offense, but during spring ball, there were a few occasions where the inexperienced defense, shut the offense down. But for some reason this does not mean that the defense is solid, it just means that the offense isn't as good as advertised. When a team is playing itself there is no winner. Why do we care when the offense kills the defense, or the defense shuts down the offense? How is any of that good news?

3) INJURIES!!!
The worst part of fall practice is that critical players get injured on a regular basis. I brace myself before reading articles that recap the practice for fear of reading that Max Hall broke his foot. Practice never ends with a player healing miraculously, and if miraculous healings were happening they'd be at BYU first! But they're not so don't dream of it.

So before you get all pumped for football to start next week. Take a cold shower and realize that the status of your team can only get worse between now and the first game. Follow me and avoid reading the fall camp updates and spare yourself the torment of learning of your team's self destruction on the practice field.


PS. JD was suppose to add a picture of some gruesome injury to this post, but obviously he's slacking.

Real NBA players in Europe

We all know that wannabe-NBA players end up in Europe, but this is very interesting. Josh Childress has decided that he wants to play in Europe and now Ben Gordon (another legit NBA player) is mulling this as well.

Gordon won't rule out move to Europe

Posted: Tuesday July 29, 2008 07:45AM ET

Ben Gordon won't set any artificial deadlines to get a new deal done. A restricted free agent, he could sign a one-year tender offer from the Bulls and then become an unrestricted free agent next summer. Born in England, Gordon doesn't rule out following Josh Childress' lead and signing with an overseas club. "Definitely, it's a possibility with the Euro being so strong. Josh did it. It just depends on what the individual wants or what he can put up with. I'm from London, so it's definitely something that seems like it would be interesting. But ideally I'd like to be here playing in the States for the team that drafted me."

Who knew that an ailing American economy would have such far reaching effects.

Proof Professional Athletes Know More than Sports

So a couple of random points here...

I read the post I'm going to share in the actual ESPN magazine and after a quick search I found it online. Which begs the question (that was for Ben)... if they are going to post the article online why spend all the money on printing? I don't really mind because my subscription to ESPN the magazine came by way of airline miles (I actually have so many magazines some get thrown directly in the trash). Further proof that the magazine industry is having issues I guess.

To explain the title, you know how when election rolls around celebrities (actors probably more so than athletes) are suddenly political experts. Put them in an academic debate and they'd probably be convinced they won. Understanding how to handle money, I bet similarly they know they are aces.

So the article I thought was an interesting quick read is here (I'm not about to do the fancy make it look nice like Josh just did below):

ESPN the Magazine Story

I was shocked by the basis of the article:

"Filing for bankruptcy is a long-standing tradition for NBA players, 60% of whom, according to the Toronto Star, are broke five years after they retire. The other 40% deliver the Toronto Star."

Do you think the stars are more likely to end up bankrupt or these are the more pathetic players? I think its probably about the same odds for both. I guess one financial truism I've been thinking about is that its not how much you make but rather how good you are at managing your finances or more your spending. But I don't want to delve into finances much since this is a sports blog...

What do you do as a washed up athlete? Seems tough to make it unless you have enough celebrity like landing a sports anchor spot...

Sex Determination Test for Olympics

Everything below was taken from the NY Times:
________________________________

July 27, 2008, 2:43 pm

Lab Ready for Sex Tests for Female Athletes

By Jason Stallman

Beijing Olympics organizers have set up a gender determination lab to test female athletes suspected to be males, China’s state media reported Sunday.

Experts at the lab, located at the Peking Union Medical College Hospital, will evaluate cases based on their external appearance and take blood samples to test hormones, genes and chromosomes, said Prof. Tian Qinjie of the college hospital, according to the Xinhua news agency.

Gender verification tests emerged in the 1960s when Communist countries in Eastern Europe were thought to be using male athletes in women’s competitions. The tests were used at the Olympics for the first time at the 1968 Mexico City Games.

The concept has drawn criticism over the years, largely because certain chromosomal abnormalities may cause a woman to fail a test, even though it gives her no competitive advantage. Also, if a female athlete fails a test she must have a physiological examination, which many consider invasive and a privacy violation.

The ethical implications of the test and the notion of reducing female athletes to their sex chromosomes led to the International Olympic Committee’s decision in 1999 to stop requiring chromosome tests for every female Olympian; now the organizing body has the authority to arrange for gender verification if it is called into question.

At the 1996 Atlanta Games, eight athletes failed the tests but were all cleared by subsequent examinations. Santhi Soundarajan, a middle-distance runner from India, was stripped of an Asian Games silver medal in 2006 after failing a gender verification test.

What do you think? Is the possibility of male athletes posing as women in the Olympics great enough to warrant such testing? Or are these tests inappropriate?

Strength of Schedule

I was going to post this as a comment under Hauser's post, but I decided to get my first post out of the way and expound on my thoughts, so JD, start booking that ticket.

While at training in Cleveland, I met a girl who attended the University of Florida. She immediately informed me that Florida had "amazing academics and athletics." I nodded my head, while simultaneously trying to control my gag reflux. After she started throwing out numbers I politely reminded her that not only did BYU's accounting school dominate Florida's, but that BYU's basketball AND football team finished better than Florida did last year. She shut up pretty quick after that. But the next day she had a friend of hers debate me about how Florida is sooooooooooooo sick. After reminding them that I'm don't have a vote on the polls, they just decided to throw out the whole strength of conference bull shiz.

That confrontation coupled with Hauser's post got me to thinking about the legitimacy of that claim. First of all there is a cyclical component to conferences that you just can't ignore. An entire conference can be soft but it can avoid expose by the fact that 2/3 or more of their games are against common opponents. And the other side of the argument is that many teams in the BCS conference schedule play terrible teams for their nonconference games.

Nebraska for example scheduled Western Michigan, San Jose State, and New Mexico State for their nonconference opponents. Last year Nebraska won 5 games. Now are you telling me that if BYU or another good nonBCS team couldn't beat those three teams and win 2 out of 9 games against the Big XII?

Another example: Louisville. Everyone was so high on them. They won 6 games last year, and played Murray State, Middle Tennessee, and Utah (whom they lost to by the way). Now I'm positive that BYU could beat those 3 teams and win 3 more games in 9 chances against the Big East.

How about another: Iowa. They have scheduled Maine, Florida International, and mighty Iowa State.

Okay one more: Indiana. Western Kentucky, Murray State, Ball State, and Central Michigan.

Since I know your enjoying this I'll share my favorite: Kentucky. They finished well with 8 wins. And they play the likes of Norfolk State, Middle Tennessee, and Western Kentucky. Okay, and then they split with the games in the SEC that included Ole' Miss and Vanderbilt.

Ohh, this is a good one, I can't pass this up. Ole Miss, won 3 games last year against Memphis, Louisiana Tech, and Northwestern State. They lost the next 9 games against the rest of the SEC. I only wish that BYU had the chance to play 9 games against BCS opponents each year.

Last one, I promise: Arkansas- They played Troy, North Texas, Florida International, and Chattanooga on their way to winning 8 games. I hardly doubt that if BYU played those 4 bums, then split with 8 SEC teams that they'd get any recognition at all.

I could go on, but I'll spare you.

Now here is my beef with Notre Dame's schedule. Some years their schedule truly is very difficult, but other years this is what it looks like. (The number represents the number of wins that opponent had last year, and keep in mind that for most of those teams, that number includes a win over Notre Dame). The thing about Notre Dame's schedule that is so deceiving is that they play a few a lot of schools with a good name which makes it appear like it's tougher that it really is. By my account, they play 4 good to great teams, and 8 average to below average teams. I see BYU winning at least 9 games against this schedule (my prediction marked with the *)

SDSU 4 *
Michigan 9 * (mainly this year since UM is completely reloading and is probably going to struggle)
Michigan State 7 *
Purdue 8
Stanford 4 *
North Carolina 4 *
Washington 4 *
Pitts 5 *
Boston College 11
Navy 8 *
Syracuse 2 *
Southern Cal 11

TOTAL = 77

BYU's opponents had a combined 74 wins last year, and that number isn't inflated like Notre Dame's schedule due to the fact that we beat all of the teams we played minus 1, which takes a number out of each of their win columns.

So to sum up my rant; the BCS is a worthless. and the strength of schedule garbage doesn't hold water for the BCS schools. All you have to do for the media to treat you like a powerhouse is beat 4 weak nonconference games, win 3 conference games against the weaker teams in the conference, then win a bowl game and BAM! 8 wins, and you are legit. I don't want to hear any more strength of schedule crap. No team would fair well if they had to play, USC, Georgia, Oklahoma, West Virginia, OSU, and Virginia Tech every year. But sure, play two of those teams and then 10 mediocre teams and it's manageable. And my last point - BYU IS SICK. We could compete in any conference. The argument that BYU couldn't "hold it's own in a BCS conference" just doesn't hold water. Not only would we be entitled to play 4 of the weakest teams in all of football, but we'd only have to win 3 or 4 additional games against even the bottom tier BCS teams to "compete". Really doesn't sound all that difficult. Now obviously BYU wouldn't be satisfied with just "competing" so give us 9 chances at BCS teams every year and you'll see we'd be sitting in a similar place.

There'll BEANO ten wins

I was listening to sports radio this afternoon as I was driving back to work and Colin Cowherd had Beano Cook on the show. I generally like listening to Beano, but I have to draw the line at this comment and emphatically disagree. He believes that ND will go 2-1 in their first three games and finish the season with 10 wins. I am sorry, but there is no way that is going to happen. The elite athletes do not go to Notre Dame. Charlie Weis is not that great of a Coach, and Notre Dame plays too many games against too many average-to-great teams.

Notre Dame will finish the season over .500, but will not win 10 games...

...There I said it.

Homeless World Cup

Anybody heard of the Homeless World Cup? They've even got a documentary.

That's right. They had some qualifying matches over the weekend in DC, and I missed it. US qualifying is taking place, and they'll play against other international teams in Australia for the bragging rights of the unemployed.

Qualifications? You bet there are some. Players must:

• Be male or female and at least 16 years of age at the time of the tournament
• Have been homeless at some point after the previous year's World Cup OR
• Make their main living income as a streetpaper vendor OR
• Be asylum seekers (who have neither positive asylum status nor working permit)

I was musing to a friend the other day that whenever one of my teams isn't playing well, I usually yell out something like "Man...they're playing like a bunch of bums!" Now, I guess someone could take offense to that remark...

One final note to this hastily composed entry: Not that I lack confidence in any of our fellow countrymen, or national pride, but I got money on the Brazilians.

ESPN's Face of the Program

Ivan Maisel, a senior writer at ESPN.com and College Football nut, has been compiling a "Faces of the Program" wrap-up, identifying who he feels is the 'face' of college football programs around the nation:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/face/index

Ivan's choice for BYU:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/face/team?teamId=252

ND Football on NBC

NBC is resigning Notre Dame football.

I understand that's it's been tradition for a while now, but why would they re-sign Notre Dame games? Is it because their ratings went through the roof because everyone enjoys watching ND lose so much?

A Level Playing Field

I think it’s time to see how high man can really jump; or if a human being can physically break 9 seconds in the 100 meters. I would love to know if the 3:20 mile would actually make a man’s heart stop working like all the “experts” said would happen to the first man to break 4:00. (I’m fairly confident it worked out ok for that Roger Bannister guy. . .) Even that crazy redneck family in the backwoods of nowhere would slip off the couch to adjust the bunny ears if they knew that every conceivable athletic record was about to be shattered by today’s best athletes.

How would this happen, you say? By the governing bodies of sport stepping up to the plate to stop the butt injecting, pill swallowing, blood transfusing, clear and cream rubbing suckers that are ruining fair competition, that’s how. Let’s pick a date. My son Dallin’s 3 year birthday is fast approaching on August 1, so that’s my pick. On August 1, 2008 all banned substance lists will be abolished and every PED on the market (open or black) is now completely legal. No more wasted money on testing; no more inconvenient raids on athlete’s houses out of season to catch them with their pants down; no more perjury cases. All is fair in athletic competition.

The people with the scrilla -- which happens to be the ones competing -- will always stay a few steps ahead of the ones doing the testing. What’s the point!? Marion Jones and Barry Bonds never tested positive for anything other than snaggle teeth and arrogance respectively, but who’s going to bet their monthly salary, let alone their lunch money, that this duo wasn’t taking? I’m an avid American cyclist, yet I don’t know that I can look anyone in the eye and say that Lance and Floyd (tangent . . . who on earth names their kid Floyd anyway . . . can a baby actually look like a Floyd coming out of the womb?) never juiced up in some fashion to win a combined 8 Tour de France titles.

I would venture to say that a large majority of professional athletes have a, “I will do anything to win” attitude. You will not stop the cheating by drug testing and suspensions. As Mr. Conte from BALCO alluded to a few years back, there will always be another chemist brewing up some magic, undetectable substance that will give athletes the edge they are looking for.

The only way to truly level the playing field is to open the flood gates to new world records. Bring em on! Can you say entertaining television? Who wouldn’t want to see some freak of nature with blueberries in his pants line up to run the 200 meters faster than a motorcycle? Count me in. Have them sign a waiver admitting their stupidity for risking their life for money and glory, and let the games begin! Make sure their families have good life insurance and IRAs maturing and let’s call up Guinness to make it official.

I think it’s time to give the public what they deserve, a level playing field.