Ugly high school fans

At my first job after college in Fremont, Ohio, I liked to cover football games sitting in the stands rather than the press box ... better for my back, closer to the fans. I remember one team we covered, St. Joseph Central Catholic, had one parent who paced around the field during the game, listening on the radio. Couldn't understand it.

Now I can. When Will, God willing, becomes involved in competitive athletics, and I'm not coaching - especially on the high school level - I'm not going to be able to take it. Not just the nerves, but the fans. There are some really disgusting human beings in the stands during high school sporting events.

Take tonight. Our local high school hosted a conference rival in their homecoming game, and Jana, Will and I made the 500-yard walk to the field for the game. The home side of the bleachers was packed too full to find a spot for three, so we sat on the line separating the two cheering sections, in front of some opposing fans. Nothing we haven't done before.

First play of the game, our star running back - who I believe is getting recruiting letters from the UW staff; every week or so a Badger game recap addressed to this kid is posted on the bulletin board outside the coach's office - rips off about a 40-yard run. This sets off the guy sitting behind me on a rant that is probably still going on now, as he drives home after his kid's team lost 57-13, and continued when he put on his mesh hat with "Scotch" in big block letters and flips on that Larry the Cable Guy movie.

"Well what do you expect, they've got adults playing!" Many of our starters have been starting since they were sophomores, and this kid has been playing varsity since he was a freshman, so it does seem like he's been around for awhile. But nothing shady. "Hell, they ought to let me put on my jersey and get out there."

After our guy's next big run, the guy lets out a sarcastic "Nice run, young man!"

Then: "No wonder it's 21-0, they're playing adults!"

Then, after a touchdown: "Pfsts!"

Then: "I wish (the guy's son) would just lay that kid out, just plant him on the ground."

"I can't believe the WIAA is letting him play, he's been in high school for six years."

Then, the guy next to him chimed in. "I bet if he plays in college he'll only make it for two years."

Then our kid got shaken up, and as trainers worked on him on the sideline: "See, his teammates don't even like him. They didn't even want him on the team."

The visitors did not have many on-field highlights - after beating us the last two years, they seem to be in a bit of a rebuilding mode - but even the few they did have were not cheered for their boys' success, but for our kids' failings on a given play. As far as I could see, our kid wasn't showboating, trash talking, or anything like that.

Every once in awhile, Will - dressed, like me, in our team's colors and clearly cheering for this kid - gives the guy a look like, You should be in timeout!

After about eight minutes of this - yes, all this happened in about eight minutes of action - Jana took Will to get popcorn, and I became that Geek Who's Listening to the Game on the Radio, mainly to block out the guy. After Jana and Will got back, the guy was still going, and since Jana is the type to get in people's face at the theater if they're talking during a movie (and I love her for it), we moved so as not to become an interesting sidebar to Homecoming '07.

Here's the scary part: some of the things the guy was saying sounded like things that have come out of my mouth before, just with different names and uniform numbers. Specifically, I thought of how mad I got during the Badgers' loss to UNLV in the NCAA tournament in March. If I had a dime for every time "f#$@ing grad student" came out of my mouth in reference to the Rebels' star point guard, I'd buy some brand name dental floss, the nice stuff with extra wax. Also last March, I may have called Michigan State's star guard a skinhead; will have to check with Andy, Nick and Dad on that one. On more than one occasion when bemoaning the Brewers' fade in the pennant race this fall, I referenced the Cubs' "$8 billion payroll" and "their leadoff hitter that makes more than our entire lineup." All of these are either excuses, or ways of demeaning your conquerors, even if it is just in your own eyes. At first they may be a little bit clever or funny, but as they are repeated they just sound bitter and mean.

The big differences are:
1. I'm usually at home in front of my TV when yelling this stuff, not potentially sitting next to these guys' family.
2. I realize I sound like a jackass when this horrible persona emerges, and I'm working on it. I swear, Dad. Best behavior in Indianapolis this year.
3. This is the big one: the guy was yelling at and disparaging a high school kid, not a pseudo-professional athlete generating millions of dollars for his school and used to being scrutinized by a large number of fans and media. The guy sounded like he really hated this kid. A high school kid, who was shooting hoops at a local park with friends last Saturday at dusk when I went for a run after the Badger game, just like we did at that age.

If you've made it this far in the post, bravo. Please share with the group (cheap therapy) your irrational rants that you may have felt bad about later, if only to make me feel better.

This is what just several weeks of blogging has done to me - instead of moving away from this jerk, I hung in there to gather more of his lines for use in this post. That and the popcorn.

Wisconsin-Illinois predictions

Have a few minutes before the Iola-Scandinavia homecoming parade starts - day care takes Will and the kids down to watch, and it's fun to watch them ... the parade, not so much. Wanted to throw out some predictions for tomorrow's game.

-Jefferson has a big game. Illinois has a good corner that I think is going to limit Swan.
-PJ is going to carry the ball 40 times, or at least I hope so, because that will mean we're either winning or close. But I'm not predicting a 200-yard game or anything like that; as much as J Leman looks like a linebacker cliche/prototype (in the same sense as AJ Hawk or Brian Urlacher) - distinctive haircut, interesting name, talks a good game - I think the fellas are motivated to establih the run game after they took PJ out of last year's game, and Leman is held in check.
-Any runs that aren't from PJ will come from Gilreath or Beckum on end-arounds, and if they go single back when PJ is resting, it'll be Pressley or Rentmeester as the lone back for pass protection.
-Crooks is back this week, should help the running game, should be an upgrade over Mickey Turner.
-Ike has a shutdown game - on Benn?
-Casillas does a good job shadowing Juice Williams, but Hodge and the safeties struggle to contain Mendenhall.

It seemed like I had more thoughts than this while drifting off to sleep last night ... will add them later.

The fact that Illinois is favored in this one is getting a lot of play nationall, and it should because this sort of thing doesn't happen often. That, plus the fact that Illinois dominated us for a half last year in Madison, should provide all the motivation the Badgers need.

Wisconsin 26, Illinois 22

You need awesome lessons

Tonight's episode of The Office reminded me of something Olson whispered to me about 10 years ago, either drunkenly or just using his keen sarcasm:

"The key thing to the future, it's going to be big, Taps, you'll see - the computer!" This while we worked on the Greenfield computer in the Cardinal offices.

Good to see Michael Scott fighting against that inevitable future. Makes me feel a little bit better about my current career path.

Tonight's episode was another too-longer, not-enough-laugher - we'll give it a C+ - but you can bet your ass a million losers like me went right to their keyboards after the show and typed in http://www.dundermifflininfinity.com/. But even that strangely funny faux commercial gave way to disappointment - what, you need to be a myNBC member to login and see this site? I'm not that big a loser!

(Interesting aside: type in http://www.dundermifflin.com/, and you get an automatic redirect to http://www.5minuteswithwichita.com/, and I'm not ready to go there yet.)

Best moments of the show:
1. Andy's line to Jim: "... well, then you need awesome lessons."
2. Angela to Dwight: "I can't look you in the eyes." Dwight: "Look here (right above the nose), it's an old sales trick."
3. Jim's screen showing the original DM website - under construction, coming Christmas 2002.

It was interesting that Carell had one of those freak-outs he does so well, I don't remember him ever doing that on the show before. Him driving into the lake was terrible, it's like something Homer Simpson would do ... but Homer is animated and has done that every week for 18 years. Come on guys, let's not go there.

Was it just me, or did Creed look like Christopher Walken?

Warrick gets the Bone: Thoughts on the Jefferson hit

Robby Jansen, in a comment earlier today, pointed out a passage from Lucas's meandering story on the state of the Big Ten in general that deserves its own post. The passage pertains to Nehemiah Warrick's hit on Kyle Jefferson during Saturday's Wisconsin-Michigan State game. The embedded clip above only shows a replay; this link shows the play as it occurred and about two minutes afterward (wouldn't allow embedding).

... It's just too bad some of his Big Ten fraternity brothers are oblivious to player safety because of their own macho ego trips. Take Michigan State defensive coordinator Pat Narduzzi, who awarded "the Bone'' to safety Nehemiah Warrick for his helmet-to-helmet hit on UW wide receiver Kyle Jefferson. Never mind that the hit was illegal and the Spartans should have been penalized 15 yards, at the very least. The Bone, a real bone, is a team symbol and Warrick gets to carry it around for a week, according to the Detroit News.

It's one thing for television's Neanderthals to pay homage to an illegal hit, but coaches should be above such things. When Michigan State's head coach Mark Dantonio was asked about Warrick's hit on Jefferson, he told the Detroit News, "He (Warrick) put his shoulder on him, I felt. It was shoulder. It was body-body.'' Dantonio may have a vision for his Spartan program. But he needs to get his eyes checked.

My thoughts after seeing that replay 100 times:
-Warrick did not intend to lead with his helmet on Jefferson, but that's how it ended up. It's a fast game. Since intent can't be factored into a call, it should have been a penalty.

-Even if Warrick's intent wasn't malicious, it is inappropriate for the MSU staff to reward him in such a manner that might become public. Maybe a reserved shout-out in a film session, but to give this guy an award after he gave a guy a concussion and making his body go limp for a moment is perverse.

-I think it was Maguire who had the dumbest reaction among the TV guys. It was something like "Why is the crowd booing? It was a clean hit!" Never mind that he was wrong on the second point, and he seems to realize that about five seconds later, but it took one of his partners to point out "I think the crowd is booing the Spartans' reaction to the play while Jefferson lies on the turf."

This brought back memories of that Packer game a few years ago where Warren Sapp laid a ferocious, clean block on Chad Clifton during an interception return, nearly separating his leg from the rest of his body, and then running around the field celebrating. In the replay, Warrick didn't look like he was celebrating too much, and his teammates' congratulations did not seem over the top.

Football is a game played on adrenaline (at least that's what people who have played tell me), and it's natural to be pumped after a big hit. Warrick surely didn't think he had potentially severely hurt Jefferson, just as Sapp didn't. But after the game is over, the film has been watched, show some respect and maybe even regret for the big hit and your victim. Again, not placing blame on Warrick here, but some on those around him.

Two additional notes:
-Doesn't Jefferson's mug shot, with the headband, make him look like a basketball player? He's built more like one anyway ... sort of like Randy Moss. He kind of looks like Rip Hamilton, minus the horrible cornrows.
-The two YouTube clips referenced in this post have about 170,000 views between them. Guess these two are household names now.

Baseball playoff predictions

Yesterday a friend from work asked me what I thought of the upcoming baseball playoffs, and for some reason I said "I like the Angels." Even before they laid an egg tonight, I had changed my mind. So here goes:

American League
Red Sox over Angels in 4
Indians over Yankees in 3
Indians over Red Sox in 6

National League
Phillies over Rockies in 5
D-Backs over Cubs in 4
Phillies over D-Backs in 7

Indians over Phillies in 5.

I think Fausto Carmona (above) is like K-Rod in '02 and Beckett in '03 - a power pitcher introducing himself to the nation on the big stage. And this team won a very good division with a horrible year from Hafner, who is due; the only lefty of note among potential opponents is Pettitte. Hamels, Francis, Hill, and Lilly would be tough from the NL.

This will never happen, and shouldn't, but wouldn't it be great if the playoffs could be seeded 1-8 regardless of league? All four of those AL teams are vastly superior to all four NL teams; as the Cards showed last year, that doesn't mean much.

These NL teams are terribly shallow. For instance, I picked the D-Backs to beat the Cubs, even though I couldn't name one Arizona starter past Webb and Dougie Davis; can't name a Phillies starter past Hamels; know Francis and Fogg from Colorado. I know the Cubs pretty well, but that's only because they played the Brewers 45 times this season.

When were they all good? From Mr. Pintens

Last week I made a reference to the fact that the Badgers and Brewers have really never been good at the same time during our lifetime, and if you lump the Packers into the discussion it becomes an even trickier needle to find in the proverbial haystack. Leave it to Craig Pintens to find out that, for one more reason, 1982 was awesome.

Great job on the blog. I usually check it out once a day on the RSS feed. I know you had brought up when the Packers, Brewers, and Badgers have had a winning record in the same year. Well it really wasn't too hard to research when all the teams involved have collectively sucked for the majority of our lifetime, but we are looking at high times right now.

The last time all three had a winning record was 1982 as the Pack went 5-3-1 during the strike year and the Badgers (Al Toon and Wright or too early?) went 7-5. The only other time since 1975 was 1978 with the Pack going 8-7-1 and 5-4-2.

Most normal people could give two sh!ts about my five minute research project, but I needed a slight diversion today.

Keep up the great work and keep the Bucks basketball and starting up of the professional women's soccer chatter to a minimum as I don't think your audience cares.

Thanks for the research and kind words, Craig, they are appreciated. The over/under on when Randy Wright's name would first appear in my blog was two weeks, so we're a little early there. From that team, which beat Kansas State in the soon-to-be Poulan Weedeater Independence Bowl for the first bowl victory in school history, other stars were Tim Krumrie (above - his tackles totals were ridiculous for a noseguard - still holds the school record for solo tackles), Darryl Sims (got to know him a little when he was an assistant at Oshkosh), David Greendwood, and Matt VandenBoom. That was actually Toon's first year playing, only had 30-some catches.

(Aside: searching for an image of Randy Wright I discovered that there is in fact an adult movie actress named Randi Wright, who sometimes goes by Randy Wright - probably for the Wisconsin release of her flicks.)

All I remember about the Packers that year was Jan Stenerud kicking OT field goals and Lynn Dickey hobbling around the field throwing bombs.

The Brewers in '82? Anything memorable there?

Next topic: Why did Briana Scurry start over Hope Solo in goal for the U.S. in its World Cup semifinal loss to Brazil? Discuss.

Badgers' defensive leadership

Will mentioned Jim Polzin's story today about the lack of leadership on the UW defense. It's a good read, and as questions came up while reading it Jim answered them later. My thought is that it's not so much about leadership as it is about experience - different things that come with playing a lot. Is it a lack of leadership when Hodge overruns pursuit of a ball carrier and leaves a cutback lane open, or when Carter takes a bad angle to a tackle? It's experience.

Either way, something along those lines is missing, and it wasn't missing last year even though Casillas, Levy, Ike and a couple others were starting for the first time.

Will meets A-Rod?

Will just texted me a little while ago and said A-Rod had just walked into the sports bar he's at. Where is this magical place - Toots Shor's?

So what happened when you confronted him about his past October shortcomings? Details, buddy!

Big Ten thoughts

Thanks for all the comments, guys, I'll try to respond tonight before Weeds and Californication.

Having watched five weeks of the season, two weeks of Big Ten play, this is how I see things shaping up:

Contenders
Ohio State: Good team, but not as good as their recent juggernauts. Average passing game. Will lose at least two games.
Wisconsin: Defense is nowhere near as good as expected, offense might be better than expected. Best special teams in conference, can't be overlooked.
Michigan: Flawed - let's not forget those first two games - but still loaded with talent and character ... at least that's what Corso and Herbstreit keep telling us. (An aside: if Mike Hart played for, say, Missouri, would he be a Heisman candidate or being mentioned in the same breath as some of the all-time great running backs? He's a good back, one of the better ones in the conference and nation, period. PJ's every bit as good. I'll write this clearly for the search engines: Mike Hart is overrated. OK Elijah, you got my back, right?)

Could sneak in
Illinois: Maybe a little bit better than anticipated, probably a year from being scary good. Mendenhall, in my opinion, is the best RB in the Big Ten. They should be ranked. This is about the time, though, when Zook at Florida started losing games he shouldn't.
Michigan State: They've got some nice pieces. I say they beat either Michigan or Ohio State, maybe both.
Purdue: They seem good, but who knows? Still think Painter has some stinkers left in him.

Sun/Music City/Motor City Bowl-bound
Penn State: Could sneak into the Could sneak in group with that defense, but an 0-2 start is tough to overcome. Couldn't take advantage of Michigan still peeling itself off the mat.
Indiana: Glad we get them in Madison. Ike-Hardy (if Ike's tummy is better) is one of the best one-on-one matchups we'll see this year.
Iowa: Biggest disappointment in the conference. Bodes well for UW in recruiting wars. Should Ferentz have left while his stock was at its peak? Or are they in for another great run, and these lean years are like the Badgers' '94-'96?

Terrible, terrible teams
Northwestern: It'll be interesting to see how much time Fitzgerald to get things turned around. Loss to Duke was arguably more embarrassing for the conference than Michigan's loss to Appalachian State.
Minnesota: I see two potential wins here, Northwestern and North Dakota State, although NDSU is apparently pretty good, so they may go 1-11. And those uniforms Saturday night? Looked like their team bus crashed into a mustard factory.

Packers are 4-0 - whoulda thunk it?

It seems bizarre that the Packers could have started 3-0 heading into a game at Minnesota and still been flying under my radar, but with the Brewers finally in a pennant race and the Badgers in the top 10, that's been the case. After today's win over the Vikings, I'm not sure that will be possible.

Consider that something like 83% of teams that start 4-0 make the playoffs. Doesn't that actually seem low? Consider that the Bears and Vikings are both 1-3. Can they come back with such putrid QB play? Consider that Favre is playing better than ... how long has it been? How's he doing it with no running game and pedestrian receivers?

Other thoughts:

-The Vikings' D is tough, real tough, and getting 23 on them is a solid performance. Peterson is also tough, real tough, but as noted in a story I read earlier this week, his running style could lead to a brilliant but brief career. Both deserve better than Kelly Holcomb and Tavaris Jackson.

-Bubba's playing well, isn't he?

-Is there a unit in the league more underrated than the Packers' D line? KGB tied Reggie's team sacks record today, and he doesn't even start. The first round DT isn't even active.

-Little bit worried about Jarret Bush at nickel corner.

-The non-existent running game reminds me of the '92 team. I went to a game at County Stadium that year with Adam and Gerry Wagner, Favre's first year - was Harry Sydney the feature back then? - and Brett threw about 15 2-yard hitches to Sterling Sharpe. Some went for 2 yards. Some went for 8 yards. That was the running game. It will be again this year.

-That lost fumble near the end of the game reminded me of the Dayne fumble against Northwestern at the Camp in '96, a game that will live in infamy for all of us that were there that day.

-Question for Vikings fans: will Bollinger ever be more than a mop-up/emergency guy? And what's Erasmus James' status, didn't hear his name today.

-Larivee was at his worst in the fourth quarter. After the TD to put us up 23-9 midway through the quarter, he explodes with his "There's your DAGGER" trademark line that I can't stand. I turned to Jana and said "Way too early, six minutes left, anything can happen." And it almost did. Many of couldn't wait until Jim Irwin retired and someone else took over ... be careful what you wish for.

Really looking forward to attending next week's game.