This Time It's Personal...

This past weekend Notre Dame handily defeated a pretty darn good Navy football team. I should know - I was there, and I was never really worried. So after a convincing win over a good team on the road I expected Notre Dame to move up at least 1 spot in the rankings, considering some teams had the week off, others lost, and some others were played pretty close. I was wrong. For the second week in a row, Notre Dame was jumped by a team that did not play after Notre Dame had won. Last week it was Florida, this week California. Once is ignorance, twice is personal...

After Florida jumped the Irish last week head coach Charlie Weis complained about the polls and wondered how a team "home eating cheeseburgers" could jump a team that played and won. That appears to have been a mistake, one for which the pollsters were more than happy to punish him, as the exact same thing occurred this week.

Since arriving in the college ranks Weis has been labeled as arrogant and aloof - that, combined with Notre Dame's reputation as being arrogant and aloof, being an independent, and having their own contract with NBC seems to have created some animosity in the college football world. I posted here a few months back about an article that said many coaches were rooting against Notre Dame in the Penn State game simply so that Weis would get his comeupance from fan-favorite Joe Paterno. Apparently, those coaches and pollsters are now doing what Paterno could not and are taking out their bias in a much more direct manner - via the polls. Folks will say this shouldn't matter because the Irish didn't move positions in the BCS, but remember, the AP and Coaches polls are both part of the BCS equation. If Notre Dame continues to be punished in those polls, it will eventually affect their BCS standing.

I've long been a fan of the college bowl system and the AP and Coaches polls. Mainly because when it got down to it, they were pretty accurate and objective. That is no longer the case. Pollsters are obviously attempting to punish Notre Dame where it hurts most - in the wallet...

OVERPRICED SPACE-ROOMBA AWAITING MORE BULLSHIT ORDERS

Mars Rover Beginning To Hate Mars

PASADENA, CA—After nearly three years of nonstop data collection, Spirit has begun transmitting obscene gestures and confusing rants.

I know a lot fo you probably read The Onion from time to time, which is really one of the funniest web sites around. However, this article made me laugh harder than I have in a long time. Honestly, I really do love space exploration. I used to read all about it when I was younger, considered aerospace engineering as a step to being an astronaut, know all about the obscure history (did you know the Soviets had a moon shot ready to beat Apollo 11, but the rocket blew up on the launch pad), and I even bought Tom Hanks' DVD set From the Earth to the Moon!

Thus, I closely followed the development, launch and landing of Spirit and Opportunity. But that was 3 years ago! It really is funny that these things are still rolling around the surface of Mars doing useless science, and engineers are posting riveting mission updates such as this epic, "Spirit Clears Away Dust, Gets New Software Upgrade." It is even funnier that there is a crew of highly educated scientists holed up in some bunker/mission control, living life based on Martian sols. That's right, they only work when it's daytime on Mars. Since Mars has a longer day than Earth, that makes for some pretty interesting work hours!

Alright, enough joking around. Read the article and laugh your butt off. Then, look forward to the next big space mission that doesn't include some rich dude shelling out $20 million to waste a seat on a rocket to the ISS. The new NASA launch vehicles are in development, and real space exploration will resume in the next 2 decades: Moon return by 2018 and Mars missions in the planning stages.

Heroes

The Hiro Nakamura of the future.

I don't know if any of you guys have been watching this show, but it's freaking awesome. I'm hooked on it like Whitney Houston on crack. NBC took an idea that everyone loves, comic book superheroes, and essentially turned it into a TV drama. The acting is very good, and they have a few people you'll recognize as well.

What's going on is that regular Joe's on the street are finding out they have super powers. Some are more super than others, but all are pretty cool. However, these people aren't going out and fighting crime like Spidey and Superman, they are trying to maintain their normal lives. However, there is a super-villain as well, though we don't know exactly what powers he has, and he is currently just starting to interact with the Heroes.

Here now is a run down of the Heroes and their powers:

Claire Bennet - a cheerleader from Texas, Claire is pretty much indestructible. In one episode, she wakes up and is cut open on an autopsy table. Pretty gross stuff. You may have heard the taglines of the show - "Save the cheerleader, save the world."

Nathan Petrelli - Congressman who can fly.

Peter Petrelli - Brother of Nathan, we just found out that he mimics the powers of any other hero he is around.

Niki Sanders (played by Ali Larter) - has an alter-ego she can't control. The alter ego is extremely strong and very brutal. Kind of like the Hulk, especially since the alter-ego only comes out when she's threatened.

Isaac Mendez - when he's high on heroine (and they show him with the spoon and needle), he can paint the future. His superpower is quite expensive. He just painted the death of Claire Bennet, and so we had the tagline again.

Hiro Nakamura - can bend space and time. He can teleport and move through time. He's still working on refining this ability.

Matt Parkma - the wuss of the show, and a cop to boot, he can hear people's thoughts. He also was beat down already by the bad guy.

Unlike Lost, this story can continue indefinitely because you can always come up with new villains and new heroes in a show like this. I'm excited about this because there can be lots of mini-stories for each hero, and also an over-arching story they all participate in, which is exactly what is happening.

It's a fun show, and so far it has had a small stupid factor. Plus, it's fun watching how these superheroes live their lives and use their powers. Hiro Nakamura was at a casino stopping time and winning lots of money, and Isaac Mendez writes a comic book about the superheroes mentioned above, though he didn't know they were real people.

If you don't watch it or haven't seen it yet, I recommend checking in on it - Mondays at 9PM. Also, every week NBC plays the most recent episode online at NBC.com. It's a great way to kill an hour if you have other things going on Monday night.

Don Criqui Rules

The NBC Contract. That phrase alone is enough for any Notre Dame fan to understand what you're talking about. It's the deal that shook down the thunder on the college football landscape back in 1993 and has provided us with the joy (and agony) of watching every Irish home football game for 13 years. This is the deal that essentially forced the concept of the Superconference with a championship game, and caused the conference shuffle that we have seen in the last 10 years. Notre Dame recently extended that contract through 2010, a shrewd deal for both parties as our team can't get any worse than the last 10 years!

However, it may be time to rethink some aspects of this contract. The product put on the air is Notre Dame. Don't you think Notre Dame should have some control over that? I am talking about the declining production value of the games. Does anyone remember the LAME electric guitar version of the fight song that NBC used for as long as I can remember? Thank God they finally got rid of it! Does anyone remember the original broadcast team? I do - Dick Enberg and Bill Walsh. Those guys were awesome! Who do we get now? Pat Haden, a damn USC grad, and Tom Hammond, who wishes he was calling the Kentucky Derby instead. I am so sick of listening to these losers every week. Can't we get somebody better? If ABC runs a merry-go-round in the booth for Monday night football based on ratings, that tells me something. NBC could improve ratings by hiring a better team.

Who cares if the guys are pro-ND. Hell, lets get some graduates! Does NBC really need to keep up an illusion of impartiality when it comes to these games? Face it, we're in bed together. Notre Dame knows it, NBC knows it, and the rest of the country sure as hell knows it! I'm not asking for John Madden and Al Michaels. I want them to bring in Don Criqui!!!

The Westwood One radio crew of Don Criqui and Alan Pinkett is awesome. Criqui graduated form Notre Dame, and we all know Pinkett did. I always loved Criqui's NFL calls. I listened to some of the UCLA game broadcast this weekend on Sirius while taking Ali to the airport. I also read numerous reviews about it afterwards. Apparently, Criqui and Pinkett were ABSOLUTELY RAILING on the Pac 10 officials throughout the game! That is awesome! They were holding Abiamiri on EVERY SINGLE PLAY, and Criqui pointed it out again and again. That's what I'm talking about.

The capper is Criqui's call of the final TD to the Shark. This call is F-ing amazing! It makes me jump up and cheer every time I listen to it. And so I present to you in all its glory, the Westwood One Radio Call of that play. Just listen to the excitement. We need that in the booth!!!

Creepy People

I am sure you have all seen the reports that John Mark Carr - of Jon Benet fame - has moved in with his father in an Atlanta suburb. Not surprisingly, the neighborhood has found out and is freaking out. I don't blame them. The guy hasn't been convicted of anything so he doesn't have to register as a sex offender with any local or state agencies, but hopefully the public will never let him out of its sight and we will always know where this creepy person lives - hopefully far away from my home.

Sadly, however, there are still 16 other creepy people living within one mile of my home. 16! Within one mile! Eek. You can do your own check of registered sex offenders in your area...here's the link to mine in FL (with creepy photos, detailed description of offenses, and specific addresses). Y'all know where I live, if you want to enter my address. I won't post it here for the creepy people to find.

http://offender.fdle.state.fl.us/offender/Search.jsp

I will have to do some re-con this evening because I am worried that some of these addresses are actually in my apartment complex. Good lord. And these are only the creepy people we have already caught.

Have You Ever Seen These Two People Together??!!

Have you ever seen the famous ESPN gambling analyst "Hammering" Hank Goldberg and the newest Heffernan in the same room at the same time? Why am I asking this question?

At my office we have an NFL pick-em league where every week you pick which NFL teams will win based on confidence points. We have had this league for the last 2 years, and for the last 2 years I have won the league exactly twice out of roughly 32 games. The interesting aspect of my 2 victories is the fact that for both victories I didn't make the picks, Liz did! In fact, her picks for this most recent week of NFL games can only be described as amazing. Please see the standings:

As you can see not only did she pick every game right, she also nailed the points for the Monday Night game to take home the victory! Everyone knows a Broncos - Ravens game will be a defensive dogfight! Kudos to Liz for beating the crap out of stupid CBOT workers.

Battlestar Galactica

The fall TV season is in full swing again. I am very pleased to find the number of "reality" shows has dwindled, and there are a lot of new interesting dramas on this season. I actually can't watch too many of them, but decided to give Studio 60 a shot. So far, so good.

However, one of the best shows on television debuts its 3rd season tonight - Battlestar Galactica. I caught on about midway through the 1st season of this show and have been hooked ever since. The Friday night time slot is usually a death blow to a show, but this suits BSG just fine. Being on SciFi also helps with reairings throughout the week. I can't really put my finger on why this show is so great, but I can say this - it certainly is. Everyone that watches it loves it, from sci-fi fans to regular folks to critics.

I think the strength of the show lies in the fact that it isn't just about outer space and a war with Cylon robots. That is only the premise. BSG uses that background as a canvas with which to explore fundamental human qualities. Past episodes have dealt with religion, politics, the black market, family issues and even abortion! I don't know how the writers pull off these topics on a sci-fi show, but they continue to so. After the bombshell ending of season 2, I can't wait to see what's in store this year.

A couple tips to all those considering watching. The miniseries that started the show, as well as seasons 1 and 2 are all available on DVD - right up to tonight's episode. It's a great way to catch up, especially if you have Netflix or Blockbuster. There is also a "Story So Far" recap available online at SciFi.com that covers the highlights. For those who are already fans, make sure you check out the Webisodes available at SciFi.com. They cover the resistance movement on New Caprica since last season's finale. A great lead in to the new season.

Watch this show! It's worth the hour!

Google Calendar is Awesome

If you guys are using Gmail, and if you aren't you should be, then you should also use Google Calendar.

It's easy to set up, you can keep track of your schedule from anywhere, and you can add other people's calendars as well. I set up my own and also track an ND football calendar so I don't forget about any games. Give it a try and look me up.

Planting The Flag

I was there. Colin was sitting right next to me. September 18, 2005. Michigan State comes to South Bend and shows Charlie Weis why emotion is such an important part of college football, to the tune of a 44-41 OT loss. That game was brutal, and the flag planting at the end of the game was absolutely classless. Michigan State players, fans and its coach John L. Smith should be embarrassed by such a poor display of sportsmanship. Why a gang of ND players didn't pound them is beyond me.

I have heard excuse after excuse since that day from Sparty. First, that these were younger players who didn't know any better. WRONG! Seniors and a co-captain were a part of this event. How about MSU was ticked that ND didn't give up the megaphone trophy awarded to the winner each year. WRONG! The award is never given out at the game, and the flag planting occurred the second the game ended.
How about payback for ND doing the same thing the previous year. WRONG! This was never even suggested in articles and blogs after the 2004 game or any other game in the past. Finally, surely John L. Smith would never condone such behavior. WRONG! An on-camera interview during the game had this gem regarding his feelings about the flag, "My boys didn't know where the 50 yard line was. That's what really bothered me!" What a total a-hole!!! I almost broke my TV when Brent laughed at the comment. Muskberger needs to be shot.

The other issue is that of motivation. Both teams denied that the event provided any motivation to the other team. MSU attempted to deflect the flag incident by claiming Weis stated that he would never lose to Michigan State again. Did Weis say it? I don't know, but I'd be willing to wager a few hundred that he did. So what. Promising your boosters that you'll do well? What a big slight against poor, disrespected Sparty! John L. said the flag incident was not in his teams mind. Weis refused to admit it was motivation.

However, after our remarkable comeback victory, 3 things became clear:

• First, Weis now understands the power of emotion with his team. The Michigan game last week finally drilled home that lesson to Charlie. Never again will we go into a game with the cold, business-as-usual attitude of the NFL. Weis obviously used the flag-planting as a motivational tool, although he will never admit it to outsiders.
• Second, Weis is all class. After our emotional victory, our players and coaches walked right to our fan section and sang the Alma Mater. No flag plantings or showboating of any kind.
  
• Third, John L. Smith has zero class and and his players reflect that. After the game, three of his players immediately stood at the 50 yard-line standing guard against a possible Irish flag planting. What does this tell me? That Smith actually had a gameplan for losing. That he absolutely used the flag planting as motivation.

In summary, John L. Smith has no class, is a liar, and is a terrible coach to boot! Sparty will collapse again this season after losing their "Super Bowl," and Smith will get the pink slip he so much deserves. What a great victory. This picture circulating the web summarizes my entire argument. CLASSIC!

Why So Quiet??

So Teresa and I were in attendance at the ND-Michigan game Saturday. And after the Ndukwe INT and following ND TD, there was little to nothing to cheer about.

A few things that I did note seeing the game "live":

1. Our WR's played AWFUL! McKnight and Samardzija were not running their routes. They were half-assing it all over the field. Brady overthrough McKnight several times because Rhema did not run out the routes. Also, McKnight dropped at least 3 balls, maybe more. I believe the "stone-hands" crew out there made Brady look even worse than he really was.
2. The OL is about as consistent as- well, they're not. They dominated Michigan at times, and then looked as porous as Colin's old underwear.
3. Darius Walker and Price (the punter) were the only good Irish players. Walker didn't get many rushes, but he did well with the short passes to him out of the backfield. Price probably stopped Michigan from scoring 100 pts because he was punting so damn well.
4. Our defense got tired. Yeah, Terrail Lambert got smoked several times, but we stopped Michigan when it was necessary and gave our offense a shot. But no first downs in the first and third quarter left our defense on the field too long and they were tired and prone to mistake and easy pickin's by the Michigan offense.
5. Lloyd Carr out-games Charlie Weis. Other than the special teams battle, Charlie got beat everywhere else. Lloyd Carr humbled Charlie like no one else. God I hate saying that.

During the fourth quarter, I've never heard Notre Dame stadium so quiet. The Michigan fans, maybe 500 strong sitting in the top stadium behind the south end zone started a chant of "Why so quiet" during a timeout. The remaing 65,000 ND fans (because at least 14,500 had left by this point), sat in unresponsive silence because there was no comeback to that chant. We got whooped and we knew it, and Michigan knew it. Those 500 fans could be heard clear as day in my seat in the north end zone. It was like there were 40,000 of them. "Why so quiet?" they asked? Because we were shown we're still not a national championship contender.