Full disclosure, I'm not a big movie guy. Always been more of a reader to tell the truth, and when I do choose to veg out, it will be sports over a movie 9 times out of 10. Frankly I'd rather watch a well-done documentary than most of the films I see advertised from week to week, in my experience the truth is typically more entertaining than fiction. Well at least the cookie-cutter, appeal-to-all-demographics and keep-it-PG13-so-the-grosses-don't-suffer type of fiction that can be churned out in 2-hour increments for the short attention span crowd.
I'll avoid going too far down that rabbit hole, as a referendum on the current state of moviegoing wasn't the intent here. Certainly there have been plenty of movies I've loved in my life, and for those that I don't care for, avoiding the theatre or changing the station is easy enough. But what I have never understood, and become more perplexed by with each passing year, is the popularity of the Academy Awards.
Now award shows, by their very nature, are collective, self-congratulatory, circle jerks that barely register on my radar. Half the time they don't even select the consensus "best of" whatever it is their honoring. As mentioned earlier, the comeback to this is "just don't watch", and normally that's quite effective. But the Oscars have joined the Summer Olympics and the LeBron James free agency saga, among other things, in that rare realm of total ubiquity. They've infected every form of media for the last 48 hours, popping up in seemingly unconnected venues so frequently that the only escape was the sensory deprivation tank of my DVR.
I have to say, the appeal of this event is COMPLETELY lost on me. You might love movies, but this ain't movies. This is the subjective awarding of meaningless awards with no basis in anything other that self-promotion. With apologies to all the people who worked hard to win, the whole endeavor is basically a 3-hour infomercial for Hollywood. As if they needed another. What I'd love to see is a guy walk up there and say "I made a great movie, it was a great movie yesterday and it would still be a great movie tomorrow even if I wasn't standing here. While I appreciate the respect of some of you, many of your opinions don't make a damn bit of difference, as you're hacks. Thanks you and good night." Now that would be worth watching. Problem is I could just catch it on YouTube the next day and spare myself the other 179 minutes.
One thing about all this bother me more than anything: How come nobody ever gets mad at Hollywood? Athletes get the business all the time, slump a few games and all the sudden the boos start raining down. Corporate CEOs get absolutely skewered for their rewards, to the point where they could've been accosted in the streets at times over the last couple of years. Yet actors and movies execs seem to get off scott-free, no matter how much they make per film or how fast the ticket prices at the local cineplex rise from one year to the next. I think we'd all agree acting is a skill, anyone who's watched painfully bad acting would find that hard to deny, but it's also a skill in which you have scripted lines and unlimited takes to get it right. Any athlete or businessman out there would kill to have a second and third shot at a situation they just royally screwed up. Even schmucks like me could probably pick up chicks in decent numbers if we had a team of writers and multiple takes.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, this is reason #3,546 why sports are better than movies, authenticity.
So did I flip past a few times? Of course, but before you call me a fraud, hear me out. As I've said, was catching up on the DVR programming and sneaking the occasional glance at Knicks-Heat (still too conflicted to watch all of it), while at the same time DVRing the Oscars. Why DVRing you ask? Well that was because the hashtags on Twitter last night could be used as alerts for the appearance of female starlets in revealing dresses. Upon spotting one of these tags, I'd flip to the broadcast, immediately mute to avoid the mindless blather of James Franco, turn on the MLB app on my phone to catch a few moments of the dulcet tones of John Gordon calling the Twins spring training opener, then troll back for the racked-out lady in question. And if you failed to understand any of that, you do not have what it takes to participate in the full spectrum of today's media experience. Best go out and get a black and white TV with rabbit ears, you dinosaur.
Final thought for the Academy, good call on the hosts, why use comedians with improv and comedy skills, when you can have two actors used to scripted lines in a non-live setting. In an age where no one gets uniform agreement on anything, everyone seems to agree you screwed that up.
But I wouldn't know, because I never saw them...well except that last dress Hathaway was wearing, yowza.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Everybody's working for the weekend
A few random thoughts...
- Flipped by halftime of the NBA All-Star game, and I have to say, Rihanna looks like she would be well built for porn. Don't read to much into this thought, not casting aspersions on the young lady's character, just saying if the singing thing doesn't take off, she's got the equipment to be a fine matress actress. Sometimes you see pornstars, like that little pixie Charlie Sheen has been throwing down, and wonder about the physics of the whole thing. But I suppose if those folks at the Renaissance Festival can swallow swords, shouldn't read too much into this. All I know is I'd rather have a python wrapped around my neck than Rihanna's thighs if she were angry. Actually scratch that thought, could be fun, kind of like a reverse rodeo.
- What's the fascination with watching fat people on TV? I never got The Biggest Loser intrigue, and now there's this "Heavy" show that's basically doing the same thing? If you're fat and watch this show for inspiration, it's not working. How do I know? Because you're on the couch watching TV!!! I think a nation full of obese people sitting on their asses watching the morbidly obese struggle to lose weight qualifies as irony. And if you're thin and watch this stuff, that's like rubbernecking at a car crash, mind your business sicko. Maybe I'm just bitter because they stole the title of my autobiography for their show.
- Are you like me, when you are one of those infomercials for exercise equipment, and a hot chick is gyrating or bouncing up and down on a piece of equipment that's out of the frame, do you take a moment to imagine yourself as that piece of equipment?
- By my count, there are 10 types of weekends: 1. Bender (only plan is to drink from start to finish) 2. Sick (never leave the house, nor have the desire to) 3. Snow (want to leave the house, but can't, usually spend hours outside shoveling and end up with a sick weekend soon after) 4. Roadtrip (hitting the road with the buddies, goes hand-in-hand with the bender) 5. Event (wedding, birthday, other major centerpiece which things hinge around) 6. Long (a Friday or Monday off means all standard practices go out the window and zaniness ensues) 7. Overbooked (what should be fun stuff becomes un-fun because there's just too much of it happening) 8. Sneaky Friday (plan for a mellow weekend falls by the wayside in the face of an over-the-top Friday, shockwave affects everything) 9. Recovery (sometimes you've just gotta lay low and recharge the batteries) 10. Final Five (in a class by itself, more to come on this later)
- It's been a lousy winter, and people laugh at us idiots who live in Minnesota, but this Saturday my plan is to watch my Burnsville high school team play the hated Bloomington Jefferson Jaguars in a section semifinal at noon, catch the Sioux game on TV at 3:30, the hit up the Gopher game at 7:00. Frankly I feel that evens a lot of stuff out. Not everything, but a lot.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
It was a good run...
In the wake of the Carmelo Anthony trade, I was all fired up to write a post about one of the fundamental reasons I have trouble getting into the NBA, the fact that the individual player has been elevated so far above the team. One of my fundamental beliefs about sports is that you cheer for the name on the front of the jersey, rather than the name on the back. Sure I have certain players I enjoy watching, but in general it’s as simple as Us = Good, Them = Bad. If my favorite player on one of the current teams heads to a rival, they’re dead to me, plain and simple. Exceptions can be made in the case of a rare star stuck in a horrible situation, like Kevin Garnett, but typically our teams are in the running, so a guy leaving town is now a guy that could cost you the playoffs.
This emotional reaction is particularly strong when a franchise player forces his way off your team, driving down his value in the process. Although it may not be intended that way, it comes off as an ‘Eff you’ to every fan in town. Given the dynamics of the NBA, where one player can be the difference between contender and doormat, this situation is arising far too often lately. From LeBron’s circus to the recent development with Anthony, it’s clear that the old rules of building a team and being loyal to fans no longer exist in the NBA. Now I’m not so naïve as to say players in any sport truly care about the fans, a few do, most probably see us as a necessary evil. Frankly that’s fine by me, as long as you give 100% effort and sign a few autographs for the kids, I don’t give a rip what you think of me. But this thing that’s happening to professional basketball lately is about more than that, it’s about competitive balance and the ability of lesser teams to sign and keep players. This is troubling if you find yourself in a city that is not one of the few destinations that NBA players have deemed desirable.
Because at this rate, you’re basically down to five places that players are interested in playing: New York, Brooklyn (once the Nets move), Miami, Orlando, LA. Maybe Phoenix makes the cut. Beyond that, you are operating at a huge disadvantage, and the better a player on your team is, the less likely you are to keep him. To be clear, I’m not asking for a fix to this, and with 5 weeks left in one of the worst winters of my life, I totally get why no free agents would willingly come to Minnesota. I’m just asking the question: Why should I care about this league when the system is set up for my hometown team to fail? Sure it’s not an absolute, teams can beat the odds and find success, but every team that isn’t in one of the five places I just mentioned is operating with a degree of difficulty.
And how does it feel when you invest yourself in a team, then get told by its star to go to hell? Well for that, I will step aside and turn things over to Loserville reader Brent from Denver, and a comment he posted in the wake of Carmelogate:
MUST VENT:
Every kid finds out differently. You always know something doesn’t add up and you have your suspicions, but every kid has their moment where reality hits you so hard you can’t ignore it and go back to believing again. Mine happened when I rushed upstairs at my grandparents place to see what was so important that my uncle had to miss the visitor and all the presents. There he was pulling off the red suit and white beard.
Well, I had another one of those moments last night. You see, when I moved here, I quickly adopted the Nuggets as my number 2 team in the NBA. I told everyone who would listen that they were doing the right things and were on the way up. Most people laughed at me went about their day. But I love a rebuilding project (probably why I was actually enjoying this Wolves season for the first time in years), especially when I think they are being done correctly, so I kept watching and enjoying the rebuild while telling everyone “just wait, this team is going to be good”.
During that time, a certain 7-footer from the wolves had decided enough is enough and headed to Boston. I remember thinking, it is sad to see KG go, but this is for the best, the Wolves can rebuild and move on. But something isn’t quite right to see him go like this. Next, Pau Gasol was traded from Memphis to the Lakers to give Kobe a running mate for a Turkish goat herder and a Kia. That trade propelled the Lakers to beat the Nuggets in Western Conference finals in what turned out to be an entertaining year.
But how did Gasol get to the Lakers? That isn’t right. Then the Decision. Any even slight thoughts I had that my beloved small-market teams could make it should have gone out the window when his doucheyness took his talents to South Beach. But I decided that at least the one star that I like is more grounded and seems to like it here……………… WRONG. What are the Nuggets left with? They don’t know it yet, the fans here don’t know it yet, but they are the Timberwolves of 5 years ago. They will still win more games than the Wolves for the next year or so, but make no mistake, the organization has a long climb to get to where the Timberwolves are today. And yes, I realize how stupid that sounds, but it takes a lot of time and effort to get a roster full of young guys with talent.
This has all brought me back to one thought: What exactly do I have to cheer for in sports now days?
NBA: Do I cheer for my T-Wolves or Nuggets to find their next “stars”? Why? If they do find them, they will be gone. Let’s just say that Kevin Love turns out to be the next great PF in the league. I am sure the Portland native who played his college ball in LA would be headed west shortly thereafter. So you get to cheer for your team to be average. You cheer for your team to have players good enough to entertain you, but not good enough to force their way out, and therefore not good enough to actually win anything of meaning. That is the most you can hope for.
MLB: HA! If you think the NBA is unfair check this racket out. People may watch to see David beat Goliath, but the fact is 9.5 times out or 10, the rock glances harmlessly off Goliath’s shoulder and he goes about pounding David’s head into the ground again and again. Ask the Twins or the Rockies.
NFL: This is the only real possibility, but there are 2 problems with this. 1) My team is the Vikings. 2) They could very well mess up the balance for smaller market teams in the next CBA.
NHL: Sorry, love it when I have a rooting interest, but it’s the NHL. May be time to find some new past times I guess.
THERE IS NO SANTA
Have to disagree with the takes on the NHL and MLB (at least to a degree), but I certainly get the despair.
There will always be disadvantages associated with following a small market team, and limitations placed on it, but the degree of leverage exhibited by players in the NBA is reaching a startling degree. I’d like to give it more of a shot, but every time I turn around, there’s another reminder of how exceptional my hometown team will need to be to overcome their disadvantages. Look no further than a certain point guard we’ve been waiting on for two years, who my gut tells me would’ve been in a New York or LA uniform about a month after he’d been drafted.
We're not asking for your pity, just an understanding of where some of us are coming from with this league. I try to give everything a fair shake, but at some point, you get tired of beating your head against the wall. No doubt some Nuggets fans are now gone, never to return, fool me once…
This emotional reaction is particularly strong when a franchise player forces his way off your team, driving down his value in the process. Although it may not be intended that way, it comes off as an ‘Eff you’ to every fan in town. Given the dynamics of the NBA, where one player can be the difference between contender and doormat, this situation is arising far too often lately. From LeBron’s circus to the recent development with Anthony, it’s clear that the old rules of building a team and being loyal to fans no longer exist in the NBA. Now I’m not so naïve as to say players in any sport truly care about the fans, a few do, most probably see us as a necessary evil. Frankly that’s fine by me, as long as you give 100% effort and sign a few autographs for the kids, I don’t give a rip what you think of me. But this thing that’s happening to professional basketball lately is about more than that, it’s about competitive balance and the ability of lesser teams to sign and keep players. This is troubling if you find yourself in a city that is not one of the few destinations that NBA players have deemed desirable.
Because at this rate, you’re basically down to five places that players are interested in playing: New York, Brooklyn (once the Nets move), Miami, Orlando, LA. Maybe Phoenix makes the cut. Beyond that, you are operating at a huge disadvantage, and the better a player on your team is, the less likely you are to keep him. To be clear, I’m not asking for a fix to this, and with 5 weeks left in one of the worst winters of my life, I totally get why no free agents would willingly come to Minnesota. I’m just asking the question: Why should I care about this league when the system is set up for my hometown team to fail? Sure it’s not an absolute, teams can beat the odds and find success, but every team that isn’t in one of the five places I just mentioned is operating with a degree of difficulty.
And how does it feel when you invest yourself in a team, then get told by its star to go to hell? Well for that, I will step aside and turn things over to Loserville reader Brent from Denver, and a comment he posted in the wake of Carmelogate:
MUST VENT:
Every kid finds out differently. You always know something doesn’t add up and you have your suspicions, but every kid has their moment where reality hits you so hard you can’t ignore it and go back to believing again. Mine happened when I rushed upstairs at my grandparents place to see what was so important that my uncle had to miss the visitor and all the presents. There he was pulling off the red suit and white beard.
Well, I had another one of those moments last night. You see, when I moved here, I quickly adopted the Nuggets as my number 2 team in the NBA. I told everyone who would listen that they were doing the right things and were on the way up. Most people laughed at me went about their day. But I love a rebuilding project (probably why I was actually enjoying this Wolves season for the first time in years), especially when I think they are being done correctly, so I kept watching and enjoying the rebuild while telling everyone “just wait, this team is going to be good”.
During that time, a certain 7-footer from the wolves had decided enough is enough and headed to Boston. I remember thinking, it is sad to see KG go, but this is for the best, the Wolves can rebuild and move on. But something isn’t quite right to see him go like this. Next, Pau Gasol was traded from Memphis to the Lakers to give Kobe a running mate for a Turkish goat herder and a Kia. That trade propelled the Lakers to beat the Nuggets in Western Conference finals in what turned out to be an entertaining year.
But how did Gasol get to the Lakers? That isn’t right. Then the Decision. Any even slight thoughts I had that my beloved small-market teams could make it should have gone out the window when his doucheyness took his talents to South Beach. But I decided that at least the one star that I like is more grounded and seems to like it here……………… WRONG. What are the Nuggets left with? They don’t know it yet, the fans here don’t know it yet, but they are the Timberwolves of 5 years ago. They will still win more games than the Wolves for the next year or so, but make no mistake, the organization has a long climb to get to where the Timberwolves are today. And yes, I realize how stupid that sounds, but it takes a lot of time and effort to get a roster full of young guys with talent.
This has all brought me back to one thought: What exactly do I have to cheer for in sports now days?
NBA: Do I cheer for my T-Wolves or Nuggets to find their next “stars”? Why? If they do find them, they will be gone. Let’s just say that Kevin Love turns out to be the next great PF in the league. I am sure the Portland native who played his college ball in LA would be headed west shortly thereafter. So you get to cheer for your team to be average. You cheer for your team to have players good enough to entertain you, but not good enough to force their way out, and therefore not good enough to actually win anything of meaning. That is the most you can hope for.
MLB: HA! If you think the NBA is unfair check this racket out. People may watch to see David beat Goliath, but the fact is 9.5 times out or 10, the rock glances harmlessly off Goliath’s shoulder and he goes about pounding David’s head into the ground again and again. Ask the Twins or the Rockies.
NFL: This is the only real possibility, but there are 2 problems with this. 1) My team is the Vikings. 2) They could very well mess up the balance for smaller market teams in the next CBA.
NHL: Sorry, love it when I have a rooting interest, but it’s the NHL. May be time to find some new past times I guess.
THERE IS NO SANTA
Have to disagree with the takes on the NHL and MLB (at least to a degree), but I certainly get the despair.
There will always be disadvantages associated with following a small market team, and limitations placed on it, but the degree of leverage exhibited by players in the NBA is reaching a startling degree. I’d like to give it more of a shot, but every time I turn around, there’s another reminder of how exceptional my hometown team will need to be to overcome their disadvantages. Look no further than a certain point guard we’ve been waiting on for two years, who my gut tells me would’ve been in a New York or LA uniform about a month after he’d been drafted.
We're not asking for your pity, just an understanding of where some of us are coming from with this league. I try to give everything a fair shake, but at some point, you get tired of beating your head against the wall. No doubt some Nuggets fans are now gone, never to return, fool me once…
Friday, February 18, 2011
Minor amusements/Major hatreds
First off, I'd like to announce that our long national nightmare is over, and I have been granted a postponement in my jury duty. This now frees me from the potential horror of missing the Final Five and reduces the likelihood I'll be escorted from the Dakota County government center in handcuffs by 500%.
Beware the Ides of February, they're just as tricky as the Ides of March and no quite ripe yet. Good chance they'll end up tasting like crap, like a rock-hard avocado, despite the presence of a sticker proclaiming it's ready to eat. But what has typically been the worst time of year to find yourself in Minnesota is decidedly mellower this year. Creeping despair is at a minimum, and the worst month of the year is strangely tolerable.
As I sit here, following a string of 50-degree days, the Twins pitchers and catchers have reported to spring training, we're exactly one month away from my personal favorite tournament in all of sports and last night our season ticket group gathered to draft Twins games for the upcoming season. In short, there's a lot to be pleased about. But there's also a lot about which to be perturbed, which is of course my specialty, so ti seems like a natural time for a bit of Love/Hate.
Love - Having the dates for my Twins tickets locked in.
I can now begin to truly look forward to the games and mentally plan out the accompanying events. First afternoon playing hooky from work to catch a matinee. 4th of July weekend, Saturday in the seats and Monday on the Budweiser roof deck. Couple of big White Sox tilts toward the end of the season. Nice to have those images to carry you through the doldrums, thank you Target Field. Long way to go, but can't wait for baseball season. Football is like a lion, kind of awe-inspiring, but if you're not careful it can turn on a dime and devour you. Baseball is more like a dog, faithful day-to-day companion that might occasionally s**t on the carpet, but won't maul you beyond recognition. I miss my dog.
Hate - All the Packer flags suddenly popping up on cars
Hey, you want to support your team, I'm fine with that, but in typical front-runner fashion, I'm starting to see those damn car window flags popping all over the place since the Super Bowl victory. And yes Packer fans, I know it happens with every team, but the fact so many people lacked the cojones to show their Packer Pride before they won it all is f**king weak. You crow about how great the team is, why were you afraid to publicly represent until now? Were you scared of getting your car keyed, but now that they've got a title, it's suddenly an acceptable risk? Part of living in enemy territory is taking your lumps, so I say if you want to put a lame flag on your car, it should be there permanently. Same deal with those flags people fly out front of their house. After all, how are the neighborhood kids going to know which house to egg if you don't give them a clue? And yes, if you're a Packer fan, I do support your house getting egged. If only because the punishment fits the crime so perfectly. I mean isn't an annual egging just what the doctor ordered for fans in enemy territory? Minor annoyance, a bit of cleanup, just the right amount of payback, only way it would be more appropriate is if they threw cheese. Keying your car does not have the support of this blog though, that would be way over the line. Nothing more chickens**t than f**king with a man's automobile.
Love - Making up nonsensical s**t
We all know that a full denim outfit is referred to as a Canadian tuxedo, right? Well the other day I got to thinking and began coining a few other tuxedo types:
Italian tuxedo - Full leather
Alaskan tuxedo - Head-to-toe fur
Minnesotan tuxedo - Gray sweatshirt/sweatpants
And yes, this came about because I was wearing the sweats at the time, it's actually a pretty stylish look.
Hate - How I Met Your Mother
Well maybe hate is too strong a word, but after 6+ years of watching this show, things are starting to wear a little thin. The writing is still clever enough, cast will always be funny, and the recent episodes have been pretty steady, but how many times can you put the lead character five feet from his future wife without having him meet the friggin broad? To date they've walked in the same St. Patrick's Day parade, he's dated her roommate, they've been in the same classroom together, the incidents are piling up, yet still no intro. Memo to the writers, it's a funny show, you're doing fine, stop straining credulity with all of these near-misses. It doesn't add anything and I'm becoming annoyed, to the point I find myself trying to guess the ages of the future kids the narrator is always talking to and work backwards from 2030 to determine when the show will finally wrap up. Current guess is 2014 or 2015, depending on how ratings hold up. As it is, I will keep watching, because I've invested too much time to not see how it all ends. Unfortunately, after all this buildup, you just know whatever resolution that's offered is going to fall short. Just don't wuss out Inception/Sopranos style and leave things open-ended, we're on to that crap. You try to tell people you're stimulating debate and imagination among viewers, but in reality, you couldn't come up with a good resolution. That's not only BS, it's weak storytelling, Hemingway would've kick your ass if you tried pulling that nonsense.
Love/Hate - NHL Western Conference parity
On one hand, it's cool to have so many teams in the mix for playoff spots, on the other, your driving me nuts with all the points being handed out. Either stop giving away a point for losing in OT, or go to the Olympic system of 3/2/1 for regulation win/OT-SO win/OT-SO loss. At the moment a team on a 4-game win streak is picking up maybe two points in the standings, because apparently just showing up gets you something in this league. A 5-way tie from the #3 to #8 seed is not an indication of a competitive league, it's an indication of a ridiculous way of determining standings. And yes, some of my bitterness is coming from the fact the Wild won something like 13 or 17 and barely budged. I don't understand what's going on here.
Hate - Scott Baker
Here we go, day one and your arm is already sore. Teams set their rotation for the postseason, Scott Baker sets his list of excuses for the regular one. I can already picture it now, Twins spring training 2012, and I'm reading the sentence "Baker attributed his struggles last season to a nagging elbow injury that bothered him all season, but he insists he's healthy now and expecting a bounce-back year." Let's just move on before I get angry.
Love - Countdown to the WCHA playoffs
Three weeks left to go and a few interesting battles are going on. At the top of the conference, you've got North Dakota, Denver, Duluth and Omaha all within two points of each other, fighting it out for a crucial top-2 spot that keeps them out of the quarterfinals at the league tourney. Further down the standings, Wisconsin, Colorado College and Minnesota are battling for the last two home-ice spots in the first round of the playoffs. Should be a fun final three weeks, starting off tonight in Madison with the Gophers and Badgers squaring off, hopefully MN brings their 'A' game, rather than the 'C+' version we've seen so many times this year. Interesting little tool here where you can predict the final standings: http://siouxsports.com/hockey/whatif/
For the record, here's my attempt.
Team GP Pts
UND 28 41
Denver 28 40
UMD 28 37
Nebraska-Omaha 28 37
UW 28 30
UMN 28 29
CC 28 27
SCSU 28 24
AA 28 23
Bemidji State 28 22
Mankato 28 22
MTech 28 4
Hate - NFL Labor negotiations/Vikings stadium talk
Call me when you've got a resolution, otherwise I don't want to hear it. Every day more news emerges that tells us absolutely nothing about either situation. All I know is, I'm tired of hearing it. For the record, I think that NFL (and frankly all pro sports) owners are full of s**t about the money their losing. Any enterprise that claims to be taking it in the shorts financially, but won't let anyone take a look at it's books, gets my BS alarm humming big time. So with that backdrop, give the players a bigger cut of the dough and for f**ks sake Wilf, pony up some cash to cover a roof. I'm not under the illusion that keeping the Vikings around is some great boon to quality of life in this state, but I do know if they leave, we will be giddy at the prospect of spending twice as much to get a replacement team 5 years from now. That's how this stuff always plays out, and if you disagree, I'll just say "Minnesota Wild" and end the argument. To the anti-stadium crowd, I know it stinks to feel like a billionaire is basically treating you like the fat guy in Deliverance, but it is what it is. Millions of people care passionately about the Vikings, and they're going to get what they want. You don't have to like it, but try not to take it so personally.
Beware the Ides of February, they're just as tricky as the Ides of March and no quite ripe yet. Good chance they'll end up tasting like crap, like a rock-hard avocado, despite the presence of a sticker proclaiming it's ready to eat. But what has typically been the worst time of year to find yourself in Minnesota is decidedly mellower this year. Creeping despair is at a minimum, and the worst month of the year is strangely tolerable.
As I sit here, following a string of 50-degree days, the Twins pitchers and catchers have reported to spring training, we're exactly one month away from my personal favorite tournament in all of sports and last night our season ticket group gathered to draft Twins games for the upcoming season. In short, there's a lot to be pleased about. But there's also a lot about which to be perturbed, which is of course my specialty, so ti seems like a natural time for a bit of Love/Hate.
Love - Having the dates for my Twins tickets locked in.
I can now begin to truly look forward to the games and mentally plan out the accompanying events. First afternoon playing hooky from work to catch a matinee. 4th of July weekend, Saturday in the seats and Monday on the Budweiser roof deck. Couple of big White Sox tilts toward the end of the season. Nice to have those images to carry you through the doldrums, thank you Target Field. Long way to go, but can't wait for baseball season. Football is like a lion, kind of awe-inspiring, but if you're not careful it can turn on a dime and devour you. Baseball is more like a dog, faithful day-to-day companion that might occasionally s**t on the carpet, but won't maul you beyond recognition. I miss my dog.
Hate - All the Packer flags suddenly popping up on cars
Hey, you want to support your team, I'm fine with that, but in typical front-runner fashion, I'm starting to see those damn car window flags popping all over the place since the Super Bowl victory. And yes Packer fans, I know it happens with every team, but the fact so many people lacked the cojones to show their Packer Pride before they won it all is f**king weak. You crow about how great the team is, why were you afraid to publicly represent until now? Were you scared of getting your car keyed, but now that they've got a title, it's suddenly an acceptable risk? Part of living in enemy territory is taking your lumps, so I say if you want to put a lame flag on your car, it should be there permanently. Same deal with those flags people fly out front of their house. After all, how are the neighborhood kids going to know which house to egg if you don't give them a clue? And yes, if you're a Packer fan, I do support your house getting egged. If only because the punishment fits the crime so perfectly. I mean isn't an annual egging just what the doctor ordered for fans in enemy territory? Minor annoyance, a bit of cleanup, just the right amount of payback, only way it would be more appropriate is if they threw cheese. Keying your car does not have the support of this blog though, that would be way over the line. Nothing more chickens**t than f**king with a man's automobile.
Love - Making up nonsensical s**t
We all know that a full denim outfit is referred to as a Canadian tuxedo, right? Well the other day I got to thinking and began coining a few other tuxedo types:
Italian tuxedo - Full leather
Alaskan tuxedo - Head-to-toe fur
Minnesotan tuxedo - Gray sweatshirt/sweatpants
And yes, this came about because I was wearing the sweats at the time, it's actually a pretty stylish look.
Hate - How I Met Your Mother
Well maybe hate is too strong a word, but after 6+ years of watching this show, things are starting to wear a little thin. The writing is still clever enough, cast will always be funny, and the recent episodes have been pretty steady, but how many times can you put the lead character five feet from his future wife without having him meet the friggin broad? To date they've walked in the same St. Patrick's Day parade, he's dated her roommate, they've been in the same classroom together, the incidents are piling up, yet still no intro. Memo to the writers, it's a funny show, you're doing fine, stop straining credulity with all of these near-misses. It doesn't add anything and I'm becoming annoyed, to the point I find myself trying to guess the ages of the future kids the narrator is always talking to and work backwards from 2030 to determine when the show will finally wrap up. Current guess is 2014 or 2015, depending on how ratings hold up. As it is, I will keep watching, because I've invested too much time to not see how it all ends. Unfortunately, after all this buildup, you just know whatever resolution that's offered is going to fall short. Just don't wuss out Inception/Sopranos style and leave things open-ended, we're on to that crap. You try to tell people you're stimulating debate and imagination among viewers, but in reality, you couldn't come up with a good resolution. That's not only BS, it's weak storytelling, Hemingway would've kick your ass if you tried pulling that nonsense.
Love/Hate - NHL Western Conference parity
On one hand, it's cool to have so many teams in the mix for playoff spots, on the other, your driving me nuts with all the points being handed out. Either stop giving away a point for losing in OT, or go to the Olympic system of 3/2/1 for regulation win/OT-SO win/OT-SO loss. At the moment a team on a 4-game win streak is picking up maybe two points in the standings, because apparently just showing up gets you something in this league. A 5-way tie from the #3 to #8 seed is not an indication of a competitive league, it's an indication of a ridiculous way of determining standings. And yes, some of my bitterness is coming from the fact the Wild won something like 13 or 17 and barely budged. I don't understand what's going on here.
Hate - Scott Baker
Here we go, day one and your arm is already sore. Teams set their rotation for the postseason, Scott Baker sets his list of excuses for the regular one. I can already picture it now, Twins spring training 2012, and I'm reading the sentence "Baker attributed his struggles last season to a nagging elbow injury that bothered him all season, but he insists he's healthy now and expecting a bounce-back year." Let's just move on before I get angry.
Love - Countdown to the WCHA playoffs
Three weeks left to go and a few interesting battles are going on. At the top of the conference, you've got North Dakota, Denver, Duluth and Omaha all within two points of each other, fighting it out for a crucial top-2 spot that keeps them out of the quarterfinals at the league tourney. Further down the standings, Wisconsin, Colorado College and Minnesota are battling for the last two home-ice spots in the first round of the playoffs. Should be a fun final three weeks, starting off tonight in Madison with the Gophers and Badgers squaring off, hopefully MN brings their 'A' game, rather than the 'C+' version we've seen so many times this year. Interesting little tool here where you can predict the final standings: http://siouxsports.com/hockey/whatif/
For the record, here's my attempt.
Team GP Pts
UND 28 41
Denver 28 40
UMD 28 37
Nebraska-Omaha 28 37
UW 28 30
UMN 28 29
CC 28 27
SCSU 28 24
AA 28 23
Bemidji State 28 22
Mankato 28 22
MTech 28 4
Hate - NFL Labor negotiations/Vikings stadium talk
Call me when you've got a resolution, otherwise I don't want to hear it. Every day more news emerges that tells us absolutely nothing about either situation. All I know is, I'm tired of hearing it. For the record, I think that NFL (and frankly all pro sports) owners are full of s**t about the money their losing. Any enterprise that claims to be taking it in the shorts financially, but won't let anyone take a look at it's books, gets my BS alarm humming big time. So with that backdrop, give the players a bigger cut of the dough and for f**ks sake Wilf, pony up some cash to cover a roof. I'm not under the illusion that keeping the Vikings around is some great boon to quality of life in this state, but I do know if they leave, we will be giddy at the prospect of spending twice as much to get a replacement team 5 years from now. That's how this stuff always plays out, and if you disagree, I'll just say "Minnesota Wild" and end the argument. To the anti-stadium crowd, I know it stinks to feel like a billionaire is basically treating you like the fat guy in Deliverance, but it is what it is. Millions of people care passionately about the Vikings, and they're going to get what they want. You don't have to like it, but try not to take it so personally.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Why do they call it V-Day? Because V-J Day was taken...
So it's Valentine's Day again, seems to happen every year around this time, and not surprisingly, I don't have much going on. This may have been disheartening under normal circumstances, but yesterday was a 45-degree gift from God that (hopefully) drilled the first stake into the heart of one of the most brutal winters in recent memory and put me on permanent cloud nine. Feeling pretty bulletproof at the moment, short of the Vikings blowing a winnable NFC Championship game in the immediate future, things are good. Ain't nothin gonna break my stride, can't nobody hold me down, no no, I got to keep on movin.
Would I prefer to be going out with some lady this evening? Of course, but that's like saying I'd prefer to be 20 pounds lighter, who wouldn't be? Instead the state we find ourselves in is always the cumulative result of our past decisions and sacrifices. You don't want to pay no 50 cents for no Coke? Well then, you ain't gettin no Coke. More to the point, you spend 364 days a year opting for sports and beer, don't spend day 365 lamenting where it all went wrong. Just be happy you don't have to spend money on flowers and say a silent prayer that all your friends reap the benefits of the time they put to things. Particuarly the married guys who need it most.
Because all is not lost for those of us that find ourselves alone on Valentine's Day, far from it. A couple important points to remember:
Everyone is paired up, so mathematically there have to be just as many lonely women out there as men (Less the allowance for all those amazing women out there who decided to celebrate the holiday by giving their significant other a menage with an unattached female friend. Sadly we have to assume that lesbian couples are offset by gay couples for a net impact of zero, reality bites.)
The only known cure for lonliness is alcohol (At least to a point, then the cure caves in upon itself causing a negative spiral, but that's between you and that sturdy-looking beam in the garage)
So, employing the logic here, there should be a bunch of bummed-out ladies flocking to bars in search of whatever companionship they can find this evening. Sure they might be the bottom of the barrel, but if you're contemplating this line of thinking, chances are you aren't exactly the prize in the Cracker Jack box. Matter of fact, it's very possible you may be a hideous chud. But being alone on Valentine's Day is as fun as sober on St. Paddy's, so you've got that working in your favor here.
All you're going to need is a line to break the ice, so I offer a few of my faves:
1) You know, if we head back to my place, you can deduct cab fare home as a charitable contribution. (Works well with the tax-savvy crowd this time of year)
2) If dislike isn’t going to stop millions of married couples from sleeping together tonight, why should it stand in our way?
3) You wouldn’t happen to be a college hockey fan, would you?
4) The upside is, I’d be much more appreciative than the guys you typically take home
5) I hope to be worth fleecing in a divorce settlement once I finish my master’s degree, mind if I call you Wife #1?
6) So how long have you been dancing?
7) Should we just agree to pretend being in a bar alone on Valentine’s Day isn’t a major red flag for both of us?
8) Sure, I might be a loser, but come with me to this Wolves game and I'll look better by comparison
9) Did I mention I have a blog?
10) Can I buy you a drink? Or 12?
Now you should be ready to hit the town, godspeed and good luck.
Would I prefer to be going out with some lady this evening? Of course, but that's like saying I'd prefer to be 20 pounds lighter, who wouldn't be? Instead the state we find ourselves in is always the cumulative result of our past decisions and sacrifices. You don't want to pay no 50 cents for no Coke? Well then, you ain't gettin no Coke. More to the point, you spend 364 days a year opting for sports and beer, don't spend day 365 lamenting where it all went wrong. Just be happy you don't have to spend money on flowers and say a silent prayer that all your friends reap the benefits of the time they put to things. Particuarly the married guys who need it most.
Because all is not lost for those of us that find ourselves alone on Valentine's Day, far from it. A couple important points to remember:
Everyone is paired up, so mathematically there have to be just as many lonely women out there as men (Less the allowance for all those amazing women out there who decided to celebrate the holiday by giving their significant other a menage with an unattached female friend. Sadly we have to assume that lesbian couples are offset by gay couples for a net impact of zero, reality bites.)
The only known cure for lonliness is alcohol (At least to a point, then the cure caves in upon itself causing a negative spiral, but that's between you and that sturdy-looking beam in the garage)
So, employing the logic here, there should be a bunch of bummed-out ladies flocking to bars in search of whatever companionship they can find this evening. Sure they might be the bottom of the barrel, but if you're contemplating this line of thinking, chances are you aren't exactly the prize in the Cracker Jack box. Matter of fact, it's very possible you may be a hideous chud. But being alone on Valentine's Day is as fun as sober on St. Paddy's, so you've got that working in your favor here.
All you're going to need is a line to break the ice, so I offer a few of my faves:
1) You know, if we head back to my place, you can deduct cab fare home as a charitable contribution. (Works well with the tax-savvy crowd this time of year)
2) If dislike isn’t going to stop millions of married couples from sleeping together tonight, why should it stand in our way?
3) You wouldn’t happen to be a college hockey fan, would you?
4) The upside is, I’d be much more appreciative than the guys you typically take home
5) I hope to be worth fleecing in a divorce settlement once I finish my master’s degree, mind if I call you Wife #1?
6) So how long have you been dancing?
7) Should we just agree to pretend being in a bar alone on Valentine’s Day isn’t a major red flag for both of us?
8) Sure, I might be a loser, but come with me to this Wolves game and I'll look better by comparison
9) Did I mention I have a blog?
10) Can I buy you a drink? Or 12?
Now you should be ready to hit the town, godspeed and good luck.
Friday, February 11, 2011
2011 "My Guys"
It's February and not much is going on. All the teams I root for are fair-to-middling, winter's icy grip continues it's hold on the upper Midwest (although it's supposed to get to 35 this weekend, holla!) and no holidays or special events loom in the near future, save for bankers and government personnel. Based on all that, it seems the perfect time to select a new set of My Guys for 2011.
In case this hasn't been explained previously (it's been a long year and I've spewed a ton of drivel, can't remember what all has been covered), a My Guy is a less-heralded player on each of your favorite teams that you enjoy the play of and tag for future success. Why less-heralded? Because the point is to pick a guy who has potential, but has not produced to the point where everyone is on the bandwagon. The best player on a team can't be a My Guy, because he's everybody's guy. I'm mean I suppose you could walk around talking him up, but then you'd just be one of millions. The idea is to make a call before success is obvious, once a player has arrived, he's off the My Guy market.
It's also pretty weak to be targeting a top draft pick in basketball or football, that's a pretty stout limb you're going out on. My rule of thumb is to stay away from any Top 5 picks in basketball and Top 10 picks in football, because odds are those guys will have some decent run if your team has any idea what it's doing. This rule is of course null and void if popular opinion is decidedly against the player in question, or if you have a really annoying buddy/co-worker who goes on and on about the wrong choice being made. In other words, you know somebody like me. Hockey and baseball draft picks are exempt here, as the long lead time makes it much more of a crapshoot.
All of this is not to say that your chosen My Guy needs to achieve All-Star status, or something similar, to validate the pick. To the contrary, many a great My Guy has simply been a productive and likable player who helped the squad win games. One of my all-time favorite My Guys was Doug Mientkiewicz, of early-90s Twins fame. Sure he was never anything great as star players go, but he slapped together a great 3-year run as a .300-hitting, Gold Glove-caliber first baseman on division winning teams. That's really all we need out of the deal.
In fact once one of your My Guys truly hits the big time, it's time to move on. Sure you can enjoy the moment, the fact that you liked this guy from the jump and had a correct read on his potential is something to celebrate. But now that he's been embraced by the masses and you're going to have a lot of company in touting his skills, it's time to find a new project to root for. The reverse situation also works, in that sometimes we swing and miss on a My Guy, eventually needing to sever ties. It's my personal opinion that this shouldn't be done too lightly, as the ups and downs are part of the process when following young players. You can't just turn tail and run because things aren't moving as fast as you'd like. I took a lot of heat for defending Delmon Young during his first two seasons as a Twin, and look at him now! It's important to remember than any player truly fitting the definition of a My Guy takes time, so give it the requisite time before switching things up.
But sometimes it's clear things are going nowhere, and at that point it's acceptable to admit you misjudged things and move on. If you're 2+ years in and a guy never plays, or stinks up the joint every time he does, then it's probably time to cut bait. Getting released by the organization is also a pretty solid signal that things aren't going to turn around any time soon. Case in point about the proper timeline is current Vikings My Guy Phil Loadholt. As a former lineman myself, the big uglies always have a special place in my heart, and Phil is bigger/uglier than most. His career started off strong, but last season his performance took a big step backward, much like every other member of the Vikings offense. Am I discarding my boy Phil in favor of some hotshot #12 draft pick they could make this spring? Heck no.
(And for the record, I'd be saying the same thing if I'd gone with the other choice I was debating versus Loadholt for a Vikings My Guy, CB Asher Allen. Even though Allen has proven to be a catastrophe so far, to the point of me coining the phrase "AA drive me to drink" in describing his play. What can I say? I liked him at Georgia. It's only been two years, he can turn this thing around.)
So that's about the gist of the My Guy situation, but as I look around the local sports scene, I'm realizing that I need to re-tool. Some of My Guys have arrived, some of them have (literally) departed, and now there are some prominent holes in the roster. But before looking forward, a quick trip down memory lane:
Hits:
Delmon Young (2008-2010 Twins) - My most prominent success. Had faith in young Delmon while he was swinging at everything in sight and patrolling the outfield like a horse on roller skates. Now with his breakout season in 2010, it's time to move on down the road, continued success Del.
Matt Birk (1999-2000 Vikings) - Big redheaded center, who came to the team via St. Paul and Harvard? There was no way I wasn't liking this guy. Even had some common acquaintances, interned for the same guy at Prudential a few years apart and I actually got Birk's player tickets his rookie season. He went on to Harvard and the NFL, I went on to the University of North Dakota and a crappy sports blog. So I guess you could say the similarities stopped pretty abruptly at some point.
Cal Clutterbuck (2007-2009 Wild) - Again, some things are just obvious, who's not going to like a guy named Cal Clutterbuck? Throw in the fact that he made a name for himself as a rookie with big hits all over the ice, and that's a My Guy waiting to happen. Had to go another direction this season though, decision TBD, just too much buzz around ol Cal these days.
Misses:
Onterrio Smith (2003-2004 Vikings) - To say the self-proclaimed "Steal of the Draft" didn't exactly pan out would be an insult to pans everywhere. Promising first couple of years was derailed by failed drug tests and a little thing we like to call The Whizzenator, fun period in Vikings history there.
Eddie Griffin (2004-2006 Wolves) - A favorite college player at Seton Hall, I was intrigued when he came to the Wolves and showed some flashes of the talent that made him a top draft pick. Unfortunately things never totally clicked on the court and off the court, he was a total trainwreck. What? Too soon?
Marcus McCauley (2007-2008 Vikings) - Remember this name? I might be the only one who does. At any rate, we needed cornerbacks and I thought this guy was the ticket. Remember watching him in a few college games at Fresno St (he was there for their short period of relevance) including an epic battle with USC, where he picked off Matt Leinart and took it to the house. Hey, it was a weak period in team history, I was reaching for whatever.
Hit and Miss:
Devoe Joseph (2008-2010 Gopher basketball) - I still maintain that Devoe was My Guy before he was everyone else's, going back to his freshman season when he was just the bit player who occasional got crazy hot from the outside. Everything seemed to be coming together at the end of last season, I figured this year would be a victory lap before moving on next season, but instead everything fell apart.
To take stock of the current situation, I've currently got a Vikings Guy (Loadholt), but lack My Guys in every other setting:
The Timerberwolves Guy choice is an easy one, as Wayne "Duke" Ellington fits the bill perfectly; under-the-radar, loved his game in college and believe he could thrive if they would JUST GIVE HIM A CHANCE!!!
Wild Guy is also pretty simple, going with rookie Marco Scandella, a former World Juniors standout who was playing fairly well before getting hurt this season. Not really very many good candidates on this team, lot of midrange types who can't exactly be classified as up-and-coming. Doesn't exactly bode well for the future, but whatever.
New Gopher hoops Guy midstream is going to be Chip Armelin, who seems like a lock to either become an exciting high-wire act, or get bounced out of the university for grades/discipline issues. Austin Hollins looks like the better bet at this point, but sure things aren't what this is about, Armelin's My Guy.
Fighting Sioux? That would be like picking between children, every guy's My Guy.
Which brings us to the Twins, and a darn tough decision. Was a Duensing fan, but he's already shown too much and surpassed My Guy status. Danny Valencia has similarly jumped the shark with the buzz he's generated. The middle infielders both merit consideration, but one is a perpetual disappointment and the others an unknown foreigner. Not to be xenophobic or anything, but I prefer my My Guys to speak the local tongue. Even the butchered form practiced by the likes of Carlos Gomez is fine, just tough to get fired up about quotes through a translator, you know?
So where does that leave us? With a bunch of reclamation projects by the looks of things. Many a bounceback year expected from this Twins club and one of those guys could've fallen enough in the public's eyes to reclaim My Guy potential. Sure, Morneau and Nathan are off limits, multiple All-Stars don't fall back into the category, but how about Denard Span and Jason Kubel? Acceptable to consider either one of them a potential My Guy? I think so.
So henceforth, Jason Kubel is the official Twins My Guy of Loserville. Here's hoping he throws things back to 2009 this season, and I'm not regretting this choice while watching him flail away at another outside curve from a lousy lefty a few months from now.
In case this hasn't been explained previously (it's been a long year and I've spewed a ton of drivel, can't remember what all has been covered), a My Guy is a less-heralded player on each of your favorite teams that you enjoy the play of and tag for future success. Why less-heralded? Because the point is to pick a guy who has potential, but has not produced to the point where everyone is on the bandwagon. The best player on a team can't be a My Guy, because he's everybody's guy. I'm mean I suppose you could walk around talking him up, but then you'd just be one of millions. The idea is to make a call before success is obvious, once a player has arrived, he's off the My Guy market.
It's also pretty weak to be targeting a top draft pick in basketball or football, that's a pretty stout limb you're going out on. My rule of thumb is to stay away from any Top 5 picks in basketball and Top 10 picks in football, because odds are those guys will have some decent run if your team has any idea what it's doing. This rule is of course null and void if popular opinion is decidedly against the player in question, or if you have a really annoying buddy/co-worker who goes on and on about the wrong choice being made. In other words, you know somebody like me. Hockey and baseball draft picks are exempt here, as the long lead time makes it much more of a crapshoot.
All of this is not to say that your chosen My Guy needs to achieve All-Star status, or something similar, to validate the pick. To the contrary, many a great My Guy has simply been a productive and likable player who helped the squad win games. One of my all-time favorite My Guys was Doug Mientkiewicz, of early-90s Twins fame. Sure he was never anything great as star players go, but he slapped together a great 3-year run as a .300-hitting, Gold Glove-caliber first baseman on division winning teams. That's really all we need out of the deal.
In fact once one of your My Guys truly hits the big time, it's time to move on. Sure you can enjoy the moment, the fact that you liked this guy from the jump and had a correct read on his potential is something to celebrate. But now that he's been embraced by the masses and you're going to have a lot of company in touting his skills, it's time to find a new project to root for. The reverse situation also works, in that sometimes we swing and miss on a My Guy, eventually needing to sever ties. It's my personal opinion that this shouldn't be done too lightly, as the ups and downs are part of the process when following young players. You can't just turn tail and run because things aren't moving as fast as you'd like. I took a lot of heat for defending Delmon Young during his first two seasons as a Twin, and look at him now! It's important to remember than any player truly fitting the definition of a My Guy takes time, so give it the requisite time before switching things up.
But sometimes it's clear things are going nowhere, and at that point it's acceptable to admit you misjudged things and move on. If you're 2+ years in and a guy never plays, or stinks up the joint every time he does, then it's probably time to cut bait. Getting released by the organization is also a pretty solid signal that things aren't going to turn around any time soon. Case in point about the proper timeline is current Vikings My Guy Phil Loadholt. As a former lineman myself, the big uglies always have a special place in my heart, and Phil is bigger/uglier than most. His career started off strong, but last season his performance took a big step backward, much like every other member of the Vikings offense. Am I discarding my boy Phil in favor of some hotshot #12 draft pick they could make this spring? Heck no.
(And for the record, I'd be saying the same thing if I'd gone with the other choice I was debating versus Loadholt for a Vikings My Guy, CB Asher Allen. Even though Allen has proven to be a catastrophe so far, to the point of me coining the phrase "AA drive me to drink" in describing his play. What can I say? I liked him at Georgia. It's only been two years, he can turn this thing around.)
So that's about the gist of the My Guy situation, but as I look around the local sports scene, I'm realizing that I need to re-tool. Some of My Guys have arrived, some of them have (literally) departed, and now there are some prominent holes in the roster. But before looking forward, a quick trip down memory lane:
Hits:
Delmon Young (2008-2010 Twins) - My most prominent success. Had faith in young Delmon while he was swinging at everything in sight and patrolling the outfield like a horse on roller skates. Now with his breakout season in 2010, it's time to move on down the road, continued success Del.
Matt Birk (1999-2000 Vikings) - Big redheaded center, who came to the team via St. Paul and Harvard? There was no way I wasn't liking this guy. Even had some common acquaintances, interned for the same guy at Prudential a few years apart and I actually got Birk's player tickets his rookie season. He went on to Harvard and the NFL, I went on to the University of North Dakota and a crappy sports blog. So I guess you could say the similarities stopped pretty abruptly at some point.
Cal Clutterbuck (2007-2009 Wild) - Again, some things are just obvious, who's not going to like a guy named Cal Clutterbuck? Throw in the fact that he made a name for himself as a rookie with big hits all over the ice, and that's a My Guy waiting to happen. Had to go another direction this season though, decision TBD, just too much buzz around ol Cal these days.
Misses:
Onterrio Smith (2003-2004 Vikings) - To say the self-proclaimed "Steal of the Draft" didn't exactly pan out would be an insult to pans everywhere. Promising first couple of years was derailed by failed drug tests and a little thing we like to call The Whizzenator, fun period in Vikings history there.
Eddie Griffin (2004-2006 Wolves) - A favorite college player at Seton Hall, I was intrigued when he came to the Wolves and showed some flashes of the talent that made him a top draft pick. Unfortunately things never totally clicked on the court and off the court, he was a total trainwreck. What? Too soon?
Marcus McCauley (2007-2008 Vikings) - Remember this name? I might be the only one who does. At any rate, we needed cornerbacks and I thought this guy was the ticket. Remember watching him in a few college games at Fresno St (he was there for their short period of relevance) including an epic battle with USC, where he picked off Matt Leinart and took it to the house. Hey, it was a weak period in team history, I was reaching for whatever.
Hit and Miss:
Devoe Joseph (2008-2010 Gopher basketball) - I still maintain that Devoe was My Guy before he was everyone else's, going back to his freshman season when he was just the bit player who occasional got crazy hot from the outside. Everything seemed to be coming together at the end of last season, I figured this year would be a victory lap before moving on next season, but instead everything fell apart.
To take stock of the current situation, I've currently got a Vikings Guy (Loadholt), but lack My Guys in every other setting:
The Timerberwolves Guy choice is an easy one, as Wayne "Duke" Ellington fits the bill perfectly; under-the-radar, loved his game in college and believe he could thrive if they would JUST GIVE HIM A CHANCE!!!
Wild Guy is also pretty simple, going with rookie Marco Scandella, a former World Juniors standout who was playing fairly well before getting hurt this season. Not really very many good candidates on this team, lot of midrange types who can't exactly be classified as up-and-coming. Doesn't exactly bode well for the future, but whatever.
New Gopher hoops Guy midstream is going to be Chip Armelin, who seems like a lock to either become an exciting high-wire act, or get bounced out of the university for grades/discipline issues. Austin Hollins looks like the better bet at this point, but sure things aren't what this is about, Armelin's My Guy.
Fighting Sioux? That would be like picking between children, every guy's My Guy.
Which brings us to the Twins, and a darn tough decision. Was a Duensing fan, but he's already shown too much and surpassed My Guy status. Danny Valencia has similarly jumped the shark with the buzz he's generated. The middle infielders both merit consideration, but one is a perpetual disappointment and the others an unknown foreigner. Not to be xenophobic or anything, but I prefer my My Guys to speak the local tongue. Even the butchered form practiced by the likes of Carlos Gomez is fine, just tough to get fired up about quotes through a translator, you know?
So where does that leave us? With a bunch of reclamation projects by the looks of things. Many a bounceback year expected from this Twins club and one of those guys could've fallen enough in the public's eyes to reclaim My Guy potential. Sure, Morneau and Nathan are off limits, multiple All-Stars don't fall back into the category, but how about Denard Span and Jason Kubel? Acceptable to consider either one of them a potential My Guy? I think so.
So henceforth, Jason Kubel is the official Twins My Guy of Loserville. Here's hoping he throws things back to 2009 this season, and I'm not regretting this choice while watching him flail away at another outside curve from a lousy lefty a few months from now.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Civic doody
Man, I don't know what I did to irritate a higher power lately, but the world certainly seems to have it in for me. Yesterday a jury duty summons showed up in the mail, which isn't that big a deal, and would only qualify as a minor annoyance, but for the fact that my term of service coincides with the WCHA Final Five. Pardon my French, but this is total f**king bulls**t, and I'm pissed.
How do they pick the absolute worst possible week on the calendar for me to be stuck in a courtroom? It's like somebody is intentionally messing with me here. Not only is it the best sports weekend of the year, there are day games Thursday and Friday that just can't be missed. Of particular concern is heading back into court on Friday morning after hitting the night game on St. Paddy's Day. Doesn't take a crystal ball to figure out that I won't be in tip-top shape for that one, and something tells me judges would tend to frown on jurors showing up slightly under the influence.
Obviously me serving jury duty that week is wholly impossible, in fact I refuse to even entertain the notion. Never dealt with this particular aspect of the state, but I'd like to assume they're reasonable people. Famous last words, I know, but a simple one month delay should really not be a huge deal, right? I hope? Gulp.
Just gotta find the right angle here, let's see. Apparently you have to tread lightly in these situations, as this guy found out. I'm certainly going to shoot for something less in-your-face than what this gentleman attempted. But how do I make it subtle enough to avoid jail, while still guaranteeing my freedom that particular week? Do I just tell them I can spot guilty people on sight, and don't have time to be worrying about evidence? Do I offer the opinion that being in a courtroom in the first place is probably a good sign you did something wrong? Explain that my religious beliefs endow God alone with the power to judge, ergo jury duty is a form of blasphemy? They'd have to respect that, right?
Anyway, I've gotta do something, because this situation is UN-AC-CEPTABLE. Period. Wish me luck.
How do they pick the absolute worst possible week on the calendar for me to be stuck in a courtroom? It's like somebody is intentionally messing with me here. Not only is it the best sports weekend of the year, there are day games Thursday and Friday that just can't be missed. Of particular concern is heading back into court on Friday morning after hitting the night game on St. Paddy's Day. Doesn't take a crystal ball to figure out that I won't be in tip-top shape for that one, and something tells me judges would tend to frown on jurors showing up slightly under the influence.
Obviously me serving jury duty that week is wholly impossible, in fact I refuse to even entertain the notion. Never dealt with this particular aspect of the state, but I'd like to assume they're reasonable people. Famous last words, I know, but a simple one month delay should really not be a huge deal, right? I hope? Gulp.
Just gotta find the right angle here, let's see. Apparently you have to tread lightly in these situations, as this guy found out. I'm certainly going to shoot for something less in-your-face than what this gentleman attempted. But how do I make it subtle enough to avoid jail, while still guaranteeing my freedom that particular week? Do I just tell them I can spot guilty people on sight, and don't have time to be worrying about evidence? Do I offer the opinion that being in a courtroom in the first place is probably a good sign you did something wrong? Explain that my religious beliefs endow God alone with the power to judge, ergo jury duty is a form of blasphemy? They'd have to respect that, right?
Anyway, I've gotta do something, because this situation is UN-AC-CEPTABLE. Period. Wish me luck.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Are we there yet?
Barreiro led off his show today with two questions:
How could things get worse for Vikings fans?
What's the worst part of the team's current state?
My answer to question #1:
5 words: Brad Childress, Super Bowl Champion.
In a sense he’d just be another name on the list, but unlike Dungy, Billick and Tomlin, who’s coaching talents are plainly obvious, Childress winning would be proof positive of the curse hanging over this franchise.
And #2:
You can’t even play the “one piece here, one there” game with things in their current state. We are nowhere, the Lions finished ahead of us, there is no light and the tunnel has collapsed.
The past week in review.
The Gopher hoops team followed up a terrible loss at Indiana by getting blown out against OSU. Excusable to get killed by an undefeated, #1 squad, but it hammered home the point that this team is going nowhere. Not entirely their fault, certainly a lot of lousy luck involved the past two seasons. But luck is what it is, and this is unraveling into one of the more disappointing seasons in recent memory.
Wild are mediocre to the point where they should probably just change their name to the Minnesota Mild. Win one, lose one, win one, lose one is becoming a familiar pattern. The product is more watchable than it was in the first few weeks, but it still isn't good enough to elevate them among the current logjam in the Western Conference.
Wolves are better than last year, but their record is worse, go figure. Wake me if Rubio ever shows up and isn't a bust.
I accompanied a group of Gopher hockey fans to Duluth and watched them drop 3 of 4 points to the Bulldogs, pushing the team into the bottom half of the standings. Although it didn't sting on a personal level, I bring it up to illustrate just how many things are going wrong around here at the moment.
Green Bay wins the Super Bowl in a year where the Vikings finish in last place. And they did it with half their team on IR. And it doesn't appear they're going anywhere for a long time.
As for the game itself, I thought it was very entertaining. Sure there were some moments of poor execution, and I really would've liked to see the Steelers pull it out, but in the end I feel like I got my money's worth. Some big plays, some solid defensive stops, role players and backups stepping up, good football game that was worthy of the title Super Bowl. To be honest, I'm less bummed than I was watching the Saints win last week.
My coping mechanism for all this is to declare February 7th, 2011 as "Rock Bottom Day" in Minnesota sports history. The has got to be as low as we can sink. For my sake and that of all my fellow fans, I can only hope that I'm correct.
How could things get worse for Vikings fans?
What's the worst part of the team's current state?
My answer to question #1:
5 words: Brad Childress, Super Bowl Champion.
In a sense he’d just be another name on the list, but unlike Dungy, Billick and Tomlin, who’s coaching talents are plainly obvious, Childress winning would be proof positive of the curse hanging over this franchise.
And #2:
You can’t even play the “one piece here, one there” game with things in their current state. We are nowhere, the Lions finished ahead of us, there is no light and the tunnel has collapsed.
The past week in review.
The Gopher hoops team followed up a terrible loss at Indiana by getting blown out against OSU. Excusable to get killed by an undefeated, #1 squad, but it hammered home the point that this team is going nowhere. Not entirely their fault, certainly a lot of lousy luck involved the past two seasons. But luck is what it is, and this is unraveling into one of the more disappointing seasons in recent memory.
Wild are mediocre to the point where they should probably just change their name to the Minnesota Mild. Win one, lose one, win one, lose one is becoming a familiar pattern. The product is more watchable than it was in the first few weeks, but it still isn't good enough to elevate them among the current logjam in the Western Conference.
Wolves are better than last year, but their record is worse, go figure. Wake me if Rubio ever shows up and isn't a bust.
I accompanied a group of Gopher hockey fans to Duluth and watched them drop 3 of 4 points to the Bulldogs, pushing the team into the bottom half of the standings. Although it didn't sting on a personal level, I bring it up to illustrate just how many things are going wrong around here at the moment.
Green Bay wins the Super Bowl in a year where the Vikings finish in last place. And they did it with half their team on IR. And it doesn't appear they're going anywhere for a long time.
As for the game itself, I thought it was very entertaining. Sure there were some moments of poor execution, and I really would've liked to see the Steelers pull it out, but in the end I feel like I got my money's worth. Some big plays, some solid defensive stops, role players and backups stepping up, good football game that was worthy of the title Super Bowl. To be honest, I'm less bummed than I was watching the Saints win last week.
My coping mechanism for all this is to declare February 7th, 2011 as "Rock Bottom Day" in Minnesota sports history. The has got to be as low as we can sink. For my sake and that of all my fellow fans, I can only hope that I'm correct.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Super Bowl Homeboy
Ever notice how much good baseball managers and good bartenders have in common? Charlie Manuel, Lou Pinella, Ron Gardenhire, Jim Leyland, don’t they all kind of remind you of your favorite grizzled barkeep? Ron Washington even looks like he’d be right at home in a seedy strip joint where he doubles as the dancer’s blow connection. Maybe I’ve watched too many episodes of Cheers, but I find it very easy to picture any of these fellas throw a towel over their shoulder and start polishing glasses while spinning a yarn about their whore of a second wife.
Even the skills of the two positions are fairly similar: Ability to listen to people’s problems, offer counsel, deal with volatile personalities, use funny stories to break the ice in a tense moment or pass the time on a slow night. I mean sure, baseball acumen is one area the would need some work, but otherwise, wouldn’t your average veteran tap jockey have 90% of the job down pat? In the age of sabermetrics and info at your fingertips, I think some struggling team should man up and give an interim shot to the next hotel barman they connect with on a roadtrip.
But I digress, and my apologies for that, just been watching too much hot stove news this week and baseball is creeping back into my brain. For most people though, that kind of in-depth hardball analysis is a little much during the first week of February. Attention is focused on one of the greatest spectacles in sports, the Super Bowl, which returns for the 40-somethingth time this week. It’s an epic matchup to be sure, Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Green Bay Packers, two of the most iconic franchises in sports squaring off for the title. On a personal level, I can’t remember the last time I was this excited to sit down and watch the big game. Basically this is the Bizzaro Rex Grossman Super Bowl.
With the chatter preceding the game so often outweighing the game itself, it’s nice that this year has provided something of the opposite. Sure there’s still a ton of talk, just not so much that it’s swamped all forms of media with the same tired storylines. I suppose Jay Cutler is to thank for that in part, being that he served as the lightning rod diverting attention from the big game for most of last week. Tough to recall any player who wasn’t on a winning team getting that much ink leading up to Super Bowl week. I’d also like to thank the cosmic powers that be for not putting Michael Vick in this game, as his presence would no doubt have us neck deep in redemption tales at the moment. Or Rex Ryan, filling the airwaves with nonsensical bombast that would just make my hatred towards him grow.
Even the best tales get beaten into the ground, and none of those tales were all that good to begin with. Instead I get to hear a bit of Ben Roethlisberger contrition (call it Vick Lite), some injury updates and a whole lot of complaints about the weather in Dallas, and I’m pretty much fine with that. Because the angle I want to discuss is unique, so unique in fact that I can promise you it will only be discussed here, for no other reason than no one else knows the people being discussed. To the rest of the world, the is Packers-Steelers, but in my world, the more pressing issue is Nick vs. Jay.
Nick and Jay are my two best buddies from college, the former is a Packer fan, the latter roots Steelers. I met these guys on the first night in the dorm and have pretty much been hanging out with them ever since. They are cousins who behave like brothers, minus the whole physical violence aspect. I’ve traveled to Europe with Jay, was in Nick’s wedding, they’ve seen me high, low and all points in between, and after a decade of dealing with my“unique” personality, still pick up the phone when they see my name on the caller ID. Believe me, that takes heart.
So what do you do when two of your best friends are on opposite sides of a game this big? Well the obvious answer is try to get them together in the same place, preferably after several hours of drinking, and spend 3 hours as a fly on the wall, observing and inciting in equal measures. Sportsfan 101 there. But who do I root for is the question, who deserves it more and should garner my support? (Not that it’s any great prize, as history indicates, but still)
The easy answer is rooting for Jay’s Steelers, as a Vikings diehard like myself should see a Packer loss this Sunday as priority #1, above all else. But delving into things deeper makes it more complicated, forcing me to evaluate things through what I consider the gospel of fan loyalties, Bill Simmons “Rules For Being A True Fan” in a tale-of-the-tape style comparison.
First, we start with the basics, where did this all come from?
18. If you live in a city that has fielded a professional team since your formative years, you have to root for that team. None of this, "The Bengals weren't very good when I was growing up in Cincy, so I became a Cowboys fan" crap.
No issues there, as these guys are both from Fargo, and geographically free to pick the team of their choosing. When I first met them, I was put off that they weren’t Vikings fans, but then it was explained to me how a lot of animosity toward my favorite squad developed as a result of the Purple being forced upon them. Too many times in our formative years, a Vikings-Lions tilt would preempt superior games as the regional option. In the pre-Sunday Ticket days, that had to be a bitter pill when the rest of the country was watching Niners-Giants. I have to admit, I could identify with that sentiment.
So Jay became a fan of all things Pittsburgh, other than basketball of course, where he settled on the Knicks (Points for not choosing the Bulls, more on this later). When the Pirates decided winning wasn’t for them and packed things in, his baseball loyalties traveled with Barry Bonds to San Francisco. Perfectly defensible for several reasons, among them following a transcendent superstar and the fact that the team gave up on him before he gave up on the team. Also easy to accept, due to the fact that the Giants weren’t exactly what you would call a front-runner with their 30+ year championship drought.
Jay is a diehard in every sense of the word, in fact watching one of his teams struggle is the only thing that can crack his calm exterior and make him act like a lunatic. I love seeing this in people…mostly because it reminds me of me. At that thought, Jay will no doubt be seeking out some kind of therapy posthaste.
Nick has been a bit tougher to peg, but like Jay has not done anything to give the impression that he’s taking the easy way out. His most diehard allegiances lie with Fighting Sioux hockey (Holla!) and the Chicago Cubs. One is local, the other putrid, nuff said. The NFL on the other hand has always been a bit more free-form, and although he will sometimes chafe at the suggestion, no one can quite recall him being a Packers loyalist prior to the early part of this decade. In fact it was a running joke between Jay and I the first few years we knew each other, which team will Nick pick this year?
But I can tell you two important things: He never trash talked in favor of another NFL squad and never made reference to “my” team doing something. Since confirming himself as a dedicated Packer fan, he has never waffled, and is now just as deranged about his team as the rest of us. This is all important because:
19. Once you choose a team, you're stuck with that team for the rest of your life ...
If there had been any sort of St. Louis Rams fetish, any Ravens gloating or Patriot gear popping up in that timeframe, well then all bets would be off. As far as I can tell Nick might’ve been a bit late to the party, but he has stuck to his guns since he cast his lot, and for that has earned my respect. Even if he made a terrible choice.
Interesting sidenote from Simmons on this one for Jay to consider
• If you're between the ages of 20-40, you're a fan of the Yankees, Cowboys, Braves, Raiders, Steelers, Celtics, Lakers, Bulls, Canadiens and/or Oilers, and you're not actually from those one of those cities ... well, you better have a reason that goes beyond "When I was picking a favorite team as a kid, they were the best team, so I picked them."
Steelers you say? Very interesting. Frankly I disagree with the Godfather here, because outside of a slew of championship game losses, what great reward had the 30-year old Steeler fan wrought before the run of the last 5 seasons? Sure, this piece was written in 2004, but if you were under 35 at that point, did you really get to experience the Steelers Super Bowl Era? I’d say maybe you got in on the tail end at best, any younger and all you’ve got to show is the 1990s, which pretty much resembled what the Vikings have done the past decade. Some moments of fun for sure, but ultimately too much pain.
And speaking of pain, now that we’ve traced the lineage of our two combatants loyalties, the question really comes down to: Who needs it more?
This is really the only reason I struggled with this thing, because it's so important. If there’s one thing I hate in sports, it’s triumph with no tragedy, like the Carolina Hurricanes winning the Cup after not even being in existence long enough to unpack the movies crates. The struggles of opposing fanbases are what makes it tolerable to watch other teams win, a bunch of people collectively playing the “wait ‘til next year” card until out of nowhere, it finally is. That’s why I was excited to watch the Giants win last fall, and why I could stomach the Saints winning last year’s Super Bowl, somewhere out there are some dedicated fans who deserve their day in the sun, and I’m usually happy (grudgingly in most cases, but happy still) to see them get it.
Despite his history of heartbreak, Jay is riding an unbelievable wave of success this decade. From the Penguins getting the greatest player on the planet and winning the Cup, to the Steelers capturing two titles in 5 years, to the Giants finally breaking through in the last World Series, the guy is on an incredible run. Now I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve it, his time as a guest of Loserville is well-chronicled. The aforementioned 90s, which featured not only the aforementioned Steelers struggles, but the repeated agony of the Knicks near-misses. The 2002 World Series, when the Giants coughed up certain victory. The list is long and storied.
But when is enough redemption enough? I mean people rooted for the Patriots for a few years at the beginning of this decade, back when they were the plucky underdogs. Now? Everyone hates them because they’ve been the face of dominance for 10+ years. It’s possible that Jay may have similarly jumped the shark in this regard, at the least, he would do well to remember another item from the list of rules:
12. After your team wins a championship, they immediately get a five-year grace period: You can't complain about anything that happens with your team (trades, draft picks, salary-cap cuts, coaching moves) for five years. There are no exceptions. That's just the way it is. You win the Super Bowl, you go on cruise control for five years. Everything else is gravy.
Now a question, fair and impartial reader. If earlier this postseason, a friend of yours took a cell phone video of you agreeing to never complain about football again, should your team win the Super Bowl, what would you do? Would you laugh at your friend’s foresight and stick to that agreement, now that your team sits on the doorstep? Or would you quibble about details, being that a certain team was mentioned and your squad never faced them, getting you off on a technicality?
In my opinion, it is unwise to tempt fate by pursuing the second course, and anyone who found themselves facing this dilemma might be wise to consider the karmic implications it could carry. Just sayin.
So here is where I’m left, as one of the hopeless masses, but the question is not settled, which way do I lean?
15c. If one of your best friends loves a certain team that has a chance to win a championship, and your team is out of the picture, it's OK to jump on the bandwagon and root for his team to win it all. That's acceptable. Like Temporary Fan status.
We’ve got tradition and history on one side, balanced by a significant title drought on the other. Both guys have a slew of bad beats in their lifetime (Nick’s list centers around the Bartman/Alex Gonzalez game, a series of Sioux heartbreakers I can’t discuss because I don’t want to break down and the 2007 NFC title game) and neither one breaks any of the crucial “Don’t be a douche” trifecta rules:
15. If your team defeats a good friend's team in a crucial game or series, don't rub it in with them unless they've been especially annoying/gloating/condescending/confrontational in the days leading up to the big battle. You're probably better off cutting off all communications in the days preceding/following the game, just to be safe.
15a. Along those same lines, if your team squanders a crucial game/series to your buddy's team, don't make them feel guilty about it -- don't call them to bitch about the game, don't blame some conspiracy or bad referee's call, don't rant and rave like a lunatic. In the words of Vito Corleone, you can act like a man. You have plenty of time to bitch in private.
15b. If your buddy's team loses an especially tough game, don't call him -- wait for him to call you. And when you do speak to him, discuss the game in a tone normally reserved for sudden, unexpected deaths.
Both guys would enjoy a win, and both are deserving of one as dedicated fans, but in the end, a leopard can’t change his spots. So I'd add one more rule to the list and say "Upon no circumstances can temporary fan status apply to a hated rival".
Then I'd say F**K THE PACKERS!!!
And the Nick would breathe a sigh of relief.
Bottom line is I can handle going either way, as long as the game is compelling. Sure I’ll take a bit of extra grief from the world’s only gay Packer fan here at work, but that would be a small price to pay for an epic matchup. I’m sure I can count on either one of my friends to adhere to the most important rule, as far as the title-less among us are concerned:
14. Just because you supported a team that won a championship, it doesn't give you the right to turn into a pompous, insufferable schmuck. Remember this.
P.S. Packers (-3) are still the pick though, no way you’re getting off that easy!
Even the skills of the two positions are fairly similar: Ability to listen to people’s problems, offer counsel, deal with volatile personalities, use funny stories to break the ice in a tense moment or pass the time on a slow night. I mean sure, baseball acumen is one area the would need some work, but otherwise, wouldn’t your average veteran tap jockey have 90% of the job down pat? In the age of sabermetrics and info at your fingertips, I think some struggling team should man up and give an interim shot to the next hotel barman they connect with on a roadtrip.
But I digress, and my apologies for that, just been watching too much hot stove news this week and baseball is creeping back into my brain. For most people though, that kind of in-depth hardball analysis is a little much during the first week of February. Attention is focused on one of the greatest spectacles in sports, the Super Bowl, which returns for the 40-somethingth time this week. It’s an epic matchup to be sure, Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Green Bay Packers, two of the most iconic franchises in sports squaring off for the title. On a personal level, I can’t remember the last time I was this excited to sit down and watch the big game. Basically this is the Bizzaro Rex Grossman Super Bowl.
With the chatter preceding the game so often outweighing the game itself, it’s nice that this year has provided something of the opposite. Sure there’s still a ton of talk, just not so much that it’s swamped all forms of media with the same tired storylines. I suppose Jay Cutler is to thank for that in part, being that he served as the lightning rod diverting attention from the big game for most of last week. Tough to recall any player who wasn’t on a winning team getting that much ink leading up to Super Bowl week. I’d also like to thank the cosmic powers that be for not putting Michael Vick in this game, as his presence would no doubt have us neck deep in redemption tales at the moment. Or Rex Ryan, filling the airwaves with nonsensical bombast that would just make my hatred towards him grow.
Even the best tales get beaten into the ground, and none of those tales were all that good to begin with. Instead I get to hear a bit of Ben Roethlisberger contrition (call it Vick Lite), some injury updates and a whole lot of complaints about the weather in Dallas, and I’m pretty much fine with that. Because the angle I want to discuss is unique, so unique in fact that I can promise you it will only be discussed here, for no other reason than no one else knows the people being discussed. To the rest of the world, the is Packers-Steelers, but in my world, the more pressing issue is Nick vs. Jay.
Nick and Jay are my two best buddies from college, the former is a Packer fan, the latter roots Steelers. I met these guys on the first night in the dorm and have pretty much been hanging out with them ever since. They are cousins who behave like brothers, minus the whole physical violence aspect. I’ve traveled to Europe with Jay, was in Nick’s wedding, they’ve seen me high, low and all points in between, and after a decade of dealing with my
So what do you do when two of your best friends are on opposite sides of a game this big? Well the obvious answer is try to get them together in the same place, preferably after several hours of drinking, and spend 3 hours as a fly on the wall, observing and inciting in equal measures. Sportsfan 101 there. But who do I root for is the question, who deserves it more and should garner my support? (Not that it’s any great prize, as history indicates, but still)
The easy answer is rooting for Jay’s Steelers, as a Vikings diehard like myself should see a Packer loss this Sunday as priority #1, above all else. But delving into things deeper makes it more complicated, forcing me to evaluate things through what I consider the gospel of fan loyalties, Bill Simmons “Rules For Being A True Fan” in a tale-of-the-tape style comparison.
First, we start with the basics, where did this all come from?
18. If you live in a city that has fielded a professional team since your formative years, you have to root for that team. None of this, "The Bengals weren't very good when I was growing up in Cincy, so I became a Cowboys fan" crap.
No issues there, as these guys are both from Fargo, and geographically free to pick the team of their choosing. When I first met them, I was put off that they weren’t Vikings fans, but then it was explained to me how a lot of animosity toward my favorite squad developed as a result of the Purple being forced upon them. Too many times in our formative years, a Vikings-Lions tilt would preempt superior games as the regional option. In the pre-Sunday Ticket days, that had to be a bitter pill when the rest of the country was watching Niners-Giants. I have to admit, I could identify with that sentiment.
So Jay became a fan of all things Pittsburgh, other than basketball of course, where he settled on the Knicks (Points for not choosing the Bulls, more on this later). When the Pirates decided winning wasn’t for them and packed things in, his baseball loyalties traveled with Barry Bonds to San Francisco. Perfectly defensible for several reasons, among them following a transcendent superstar and the fact that the team gave up on him before he gave up on the team. Also easy to accept, due to the fact that the Giants weren’t exactly what you would call a front-runner with their 30+ year championship drought.
Jay is a diehard in every sense of the word, in fact watching one of his teams struggle is the only thing that can crack his calm exterior and make him act like a lunatic. I love seeing this in people…mostly because it reminds me of me. At that thought, Jay will no doubt be seeking out some kind of therapy posthaste.
Nick has been a bit tougher to peg, but like Jay has not done anything to give the impression that he’s taking the easy way out. His most diehard allegiances lie with Fighting Sioux hockey (Holla!) and the Chicago Cubs. One is local, the other putrid, nuff said. The NFL on the other hand has always been a bit more free-form, and although he will sometimes chafe at the suggestion, no one can quite recall him being a Packers loyalist prior to the early part of this decade. In fact it was a running joke between Jay and I the first few years we knew each other, which team will Nick pick this year?
But I can tell you two important things: He never trash talked in favor of another NFL squad and never made reference to “my” team doing something. Since confirming himself as a dedicated Packer fan, he has never waffled, and is now just as deranged about his team as the rest of us. This is all important because:
19. Once you choose a team, you're stuck with that team for the rest of your life ...
If there had been any sort of St. Louis Rams fetish, any Ravens gloating or Patriot gear popping up in that timeframe, well then all bets would be off. As far as I can tell Nick might’ve been a bit late to the party, but he has stuck to his guns since he cast his lot, and for that has earned my respect. Even if he made a terrible choice.
Interesting sidenote from Simmons on this one for Jay to consider
• If you're between the ages of 20-40, you're a fan of the Yankees, Cowboys, Braves, Raiders, Steelers, Celtics, Lakers, Bulls, Canadiens and/or Oilers, and you're not actually from those one of those cities ... well, you better have a reason that goes beyond "When I was picking a favorite team as a kid, they were the best team, so I picked them."
Steelers you say? Very interesting. Frankly I disagree with the Godfather here, because outside of a slew of championship game losses, what great reward had the 30-year old Steeler fan wrought before the run of the last 5 seasons? Sure, this piece was written in 2004, but if you were under 35 at that point, did you really get to experience the Steelers Super Bowl Era? I’d say maybe you got in on the tail end at best, any younger and all you’ve got to show is the 1990s, which pretty much resembled what the Vikings have done the past decade. Some moments of fun for sure, but ultimately too much pain.
And speaking of pain, now that we’ve traced the lineage of our two combatants loyalties, the question really comes down to: Who needs it more?
This is really the only reason I struggled with this thing, because it's so important. If there’s one thing I hate in sports, it’s triumph with no tragedy, like the Carolina Hurricanes winning the Cup after not even being in existence long enough to unpack the movies crates. The struggles of opposing fanbases are what makes it tolerable to watch other teams win, a bunch of people collectively playing the “wait ‘til next year” card until out of nowhere, it finally is. That’s why I was excited to watch the Giants win last fall, and why I could stomach the Saints winning last year’s Super Bowl, somewhere out there are some dedicated fans who deserve their day in the sun, and I’m usually happy (grudgingly in most cases, but happy still) to see them get it.
Despite his history of heartbreak, Jay is riding an unbelievable wave of success this decade. From the Penguins getting the greatest player on the planet and winning the Cup, to the Steelers capturing two titles in 5 years, to the Giants finally breaking through in the last World Series, the guy is on an incredible run. Now I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve it, his time as a guest of Loserville is well-chronicled. The aforementioned 90s, which featured not only the aforementioned Steelers struggles, but the repeated agony of the Knicks near-misses. The 2002 World Series, when the Giants coughed up certain victory. The list is long and storied.
But when is enough redemption enough? I mean people rooted for the Patriots for a few years at the beginning of this decade, back when they were the plucky underdogs. Now? Everyone hates them because they’ve been the face of dominance for 10+ years. It’s possible that Jay may have similarly jumped the shark in this regard, at the least, he would do well to remember another item from the list of rules:
12. After your team wins a championship, they immediately get a five-year grace period: You can't complain about anything that happens with your team (trades, draft picks, salary-cap cuts, coaching moves) for five years. There are no exceptions. That's just the way it is. You win the Super Bowl, you go on cruise control for five years. Everything else is gravy.
Now a question, fair and impartial reader. If earlier this postseason, a friend of yours took a cell phone video of you agreeing to never complain about football again, should your team win the Super Bowl, what would you do? Would you laugh at your friend’s foresight and stick to that agreement, now that your team sits on the doorstep? Or would you quibble about details, being that a certain team was mentioned and your squad never faced them, getting you off on a technicality?
In my opinion, it is unwise to tempt fate by pursuing the second course, and anyone who found themselves facing this dilemma might be wise to consider the karmic implications it could carry. Just sayin.
So here is where I’m left, as one of the hopeless masses, but the question is not settled, which way do I lean?
15c. If one of your best friends loves a certain team that has a chance to win a championship, and your team is out of the picture, it's OK to jump on the bandwagon and root for his team to win it all. That's acceptable. Like Temporary Fan status.
We’ve got tradition and history on one side, balanced by a significant title drought on the other. Both guys have a slew of bad beats in their lifetime (Nick’s list centers around the Bartman/Alex Gonzalez game, a series of Sioux heartbreakers I can’t discuss because I don’t want to break down and the 2007 NFC title game) and neither one breaks any of the crucial “Don’t be a douche” trifecta rules:
15. If your team defeats a good friend's team in a crucial game or series, don't rub it in with them unless they've been especially annoying/gloating/condescending/confrontational in the days leading up to the big battle. You're probably better off cutting off all communications in the days preceding/following the game, just to be safe.
15a. Along those same lines, if your team squanders a crucial game/series to your buddy's team, don't make them feel guilty about it -- don't call them to bitch about the game, don't blame some conspiracy or bad referee's call, don't rant and rave like a lunatic. In the words of Vito Corleone, you can act like a man. You have plenty of time to bitch in private.
15b. If your buddy's team loses an especially tough game, don't call him -- wait for him to call you. And when you do speak to him, discuss the game in a tone normally reserved for sudden, unexpected deaths.
Both guys would enjoy a win, and both are deserving of one as dedicated fans, but in the end, a leopard can’t change his spots. So I'd add one more rule to the list and say "Upon no circumstances can temporary fan status apply to a hated rival".
Then I'd say F**K THE PACKERS!!!
And the Nick would breathe a sigh of relief.
Bottom line is I can handle going either way, as long as the game is compelling. Sure I’ll take a bit of extra grief from the world’s only gay Packer fan here at work, but that would be a small price to pay for an epic matchup. I’m sure I can count on either one of my friends to adhere to the most important rule, as far as the title-less among us are concerned:
14. Just because you supported a team that won a championship, it doesn't give you the right to turn into a pompous, insufferable schmuck. Remember this.
P.S. Packers (-3) are still the pick though, no way you’re getting off that easy!
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