How did we get here? Kyle Orton Now Bills Starting QB

Here's a timeline of the key events that have led to today's decision by the Bills to bench EJ Manuel in favor of Kyle Orton.

• April 2011: Bills draft cornerback (now a safety) Aaron Williams one pick ahead of Andy Dalton and two picks ahead of Colin Kapaernick 
• October 2011: Bills sign Ryan Fitzpatrick to a big contract - $24M in guaranteed money 
• Nov. 2011: Fitzpatrick starts sucking
• Sept. 2012: Bills trade for Tavaris Jackson
• June 2103: Bills cut Tavaris Jackson
• March 2013: Bills cut Fitzpatrick
• Early April 2013:  Bills sign QB Kevin Kolb who has a history of concussion problems 
• April 2013: Bills trade down in draft and then shock everyone by drafting E.J. Manuel from Florida State with the 16th pick in the draft.
• Early Aug 2013: Kolb slips on a rubber mat while switching fields on during a training camp session  and misses time - enabling Manuel to get a leg up in starting QB competition
• Late Aug 2013: Surprise! Kolb suffers a concussion and is eventually placed on IR, missing the whole season without ever playing a regular season snap for the Bills. 
• Late Aug. 2013: Bills sign Matt Leinart who lasts five days and one preseason game before being released. 
• Late Aug. 2013: Bills trade for Browns back-up Thad Lewis
• Sept. 2013: By default, Manuel is made the Bills starter. Undrafted rookie FA Jeff Tuel is the back-up. (Yes, somebody apparently thought this was a good plan. For the record, I, for one, did not.)
• Oct. 2013: With the Bills at 2-2 and beating the Cleveland Browns in a Thursday night game, Manuel gets injured and Tuel basically gives away the game. 
• Oct. 2013: Thad Lewis is named the Bills starter and they go 1-2 over the next three weeks.
• Oct. 2013: Bills sign Dennis Dixon 
• Oct. 2013: Lewis is injured. Tuel gets a start and predictably is terrible as the Bills lose to the Chiefs despite outgaining them 470-210 yards.
• Nov. 2013: Manuel starts 5 more games and isn't bad, except for a disastrous outing in Tampa Bay where he throws 4 interceptions and no TDs. 
• Dec. 2013: Thad Lewis closes out the season to allow Manuel's knee to rest
• July 2014: Bills enter camp with pecking order of Manuel, Lewis, Tuel, and Dixon.
• July 2014: After appearing in four games in two years for the Cowboys, Kyle Orton is cut. Apparently, Orton had planned on retiring but then realized he would have had to give back some of his signing bonus money. Note: Because he was planning to retire Orton did not participate in Cowboys offseason workouts.
• Aug. 2014: In an eerily familiar replay of the Lienart debacle, the Bills sign and release Jordon Palmer after a week, including an awful preseason outing, in which he threw three interceptions.
• Aug. 2014: Bills sign Orton to league's largest back-up contract, release Tuel, and then re-sign Tuel to practice squad
• Sept. 2014: Manuel gets off to shaky start; Bills at 2-2 name Orton the starter.

Royals, A's Pitching Match-Up: Who's the Big Game Pitcher?

Even though the Yankees aren't in the playoffs, I'm pretty stoked heading into the baseball postseason. I think, I've watched enough ball this year to be at least somewhat familiar with most of the teams that made it, and I think they are 10 very good teams. Indicative of this are a pair of intriguing pitching match-ups with the upcoming wild card games. On Tuesday, you have the A's and Royals squaring off, with Jon Lester for the A's opposing James Shields for the Royals. On Wed., it's Pirates vs. Giants with Edison Volquez for Bucs facing Madison Bumgarner for Giants.

Today let's focus on the Lester Shields match-up. Let's get this out of the way up front: For some reason, James Shields has earned the nickname "Big Game" James, obviously a homage to the great Laker forward James Worthy - who helped his team win like five championships. James Shields' teams have won zero championships, and his postseason numbers aren't even good. He's 2-4 with an ERA near 5 in 5 post season series.

In contrast, Lester, who the A's traded for midway through this year, at least in part for his stellar postseason work with the Red Soft last year, is 6-4 with a 2.11 ERA in 8 series over the course of four years. Okay, so who's the big game pitcher here? Plus, Lester beat cancer.

Both pitchers had very solid, good regular seasons, but based on post-season histories, you'd have to go with Lester heading into tomorrow night's game-at least as far as the pitching match-up goes. But, there's also a lot of other stuff going on. Neither the A's or the Royals finished particularly strong. Especially so for the A's who had like the best record in baseball until they made the trade for Lester, which everyone thought was great - except for the wheels came off their offense, which despite what the stat heads will tell you almost certainly had something to do with giving up force-of-nature Cuban star Yoenis Cespedes. in the trade.

Plus, we've got got A's general manager Billy Beane's famous "My shit don't work in the playoffs" history going against him, although this team in particular seems to have been constructed strictly for a postseason run.

So, here's my prediction: Beane's shit continues to not work in the playoffs and the A's are one and done. I'm not saying Lester is going to pitch bad, but here's the twist I think we'll see - James Shields will actually pitch himself up to his nickname - and thus earn it after-the-fact of it being given to him. Does that make sense? Probably not, but either does baseball half the time.

Good luck to everyone involved in the postseason!

J.J. Watt Wrecks Bills

There's a reason this guy is like one of the highest paid defensive players ever. He murdered the Bills yesterday. He was in the backfield all day, and I think he read he had something like nine quarterback hits. So, Manuel was on his ass a lot yesterday, but not sure that is an excuse for how badly he played. He did of course, throw the 80-yard pick-six to Watt the turned the game around and pretty must cost the Bills the win. That was a great play by Watt, but we all know he does those things, and Manuel kind of lofted it right to him. Of course, Manuel pretty much lofts everything - his lack of a fastball is killing us.

Yesterday, Manuel was 21-of-44 with two costly interceptions. Ex-Bill Ryan Fitzpatrick was any better on the other side, but he didn't need to be, as the Texans defense was pretty much able to secure the win. Then there was that play late in the fourth quarter when the Bills defensive player, linebacker Keith Rivers got the blame from the TV announcers, didn't jump on the Texans WR and it cost the Bills probably two minutes of clock time because the Texans guy was able to roll for a first down. What was that?

That said, did it really matter? Bills were putting together a nice drive near end, until Manuel threw a jump ball in the wrong spot and it was game over. I said earlier in the season, we kind of know what Manuel is. He's a big guy who can throw long floaters - and seems like a good dude. Question remains, is that enough to win in the NFL? Didn't look like it yesterday. Maybe he will get better - or maybe he doesn't have the tools. Marrone seems to have faith in him.

Next week we are at the Lions. Don't know a lot about the Lions, except that they have strong defensive line. This should be enough to stop the Bills run game and send us to our third loss in a row.

Finally, Bills-Chargers Review and Jeter

Sorry, got caught up on a road trip for work, to Birmingham, AL, and then some work-related writing and never got around to updating the blog with my weekly Bills review and update. Well, here it is: Bills sucked. Chargers tromped (yes, that's a word) them. I'll skip the details, but it was pretty much exactly how I projected it to play out. Bills secondary was overmatched by Rivers, and Manuel, well was just overmatched.

Coming out of the game, however, there is one question I'd like to see answered: Are the Bills that bad (the game was not as close as the 22-10 final indicated)? Or are the Chargers that good (they were after all coming off a victory over the World Champion Seahawks.) From the Bills' perspective I expect a lot to be answered this Sunday in Houston. Like the Bills, the Texans are 2-1 and coming off a bad loss. Of course the Texans are playing at home and have J.J. Watt. Then again, they also have Ryan Fitzpatrick.

I was really hoping this was going to be the week in which the Bills got some measure of revenge on Fitz for taking all that money from us and then mostly proceeding to stink - while actually playing pretty good before the contract. But that plan has been foiled I think by Fitzpatrick stinking up the joint last week vs. the Giants. Now the Texans truly know how bad he can be and will certainly take the game out of his hands. As a result, I think the Texans will win. And yes, I still think the Bills are headed for 5-11. Maybe a win this week will change my mind, but I've made my prediction and fully expect to go 4-0 on the season.

As for Jeter last night, that was remarkable. The way it ended reminded me of a Broadway play and the fact that the game was staged in New York made it seem all the more surreal. Congrats on a great career Mr. Jeter.

Oh yes, and how about ESPN suspending one of my favorite writers Bill Simmons for calling Roger Goodell a liar? What's up with that? Sounds like ESPN is pandering to, and being intimidated by the NFL - which is of course what Goodell wants it to. He's nothing but a bully and now ESPN has fallen prey to his tactics. I hope Simmons quits and starts his own gig.

Ray Rice vs. Adrian Peterson

The fundamental difference in the two cases (as I see it):

If a year ago, you asked Ray Rice if knocking out his fiancee in an elevator was wrong, he would say, yes, it would be. If you asked A.P. if giving his kid a (albeit severer) "whuppin'" was wrong, he would have likely said "no."

The Legend and Legacy of Cookie Gilchrist

 Goes something like this - Cookie was an oversized personality. According to his obit (he died in 2011), "When he was playing in the Canadian Football League in the 1950s, Gilchrist owned a company that installed industrial lighting and trumpeted it with trucks emblazoned “Lookie, Lookie, Here Comes Cookie.”

Cookie also:

• Was listed at 6'3", 250 lbs, and barely wore any pads when he played
• Played fullback and kicker in this rookie season for the Bills and reportedly wanted to be paid two players' salaries because of this.
• Also played on defense (as well as his two aforementioned positions) while playing in Canada. 
• Was the first 1,000-yard rusher in AFL history and ran for more than 950 yards four years in a row
• Reportedly took tons of speed when he played
• Showered during halftime of games
• In a division clinching win over the Patriots in 1964, he ran over a Patriots safety, then walked up to a defensive end and said "You're next." Every Bill in a 1964 highlight video I saw seems to recount this story.

Did Gilchrist like playing in Buffalo? I'm not sure. He reportedly compared it to slavery. He had been very happily playing for Toronto in the CFL, in a city he loved (apparently for its lack of racial prejudice), when the Bills purchased his contract. He clashed with Bills coach Lou Saban and was even kicked off the team once for insubordination (refusing to enter a game) but the players begged, and he apologized, and Cookie was let back on the team. However, at the end of 1964, the Bills traded him to the Broncos. It didn't help that he was known to bellyache about his salary, which turns out to have been pretty prophetic, seeing how the Bills were recently sold for $1.4B dollars - so Cookie in retrospect, was probably worth significantly more (in the long run) than he was being paid at the time. After all, he was one of the pillars on which the AFL was built.

Think about it. AFL owners each invested a  $25,000 franchise fee, plus expenses, to create teams that are now (some 50-plus years later) all apparently worth well over $1B. That's a great ROI.. And yes, television helped, but the players still had to put on a show, and Cookie was instrumental in that show.

I mean, how many leagues have since tried to emulate what the AFL did and force a merger with a more established league to gain all the benefits (including television contracts) associated with it? I think the AFL was by far the most successful at this - although the ABA and WHL certainly had some success - but football is football and I don't think any of the AFL franchises folded, like they did in those other rival leagues. There have even been two failed football leagues, the WFL and the USFL since the AFL-NFL merger.

Yes, Wilson took some risks and ponied up significant cash - he even loaned money to help keep other franchises afloat, so he deserves his returns, I guess. But, remember, guys like Cookie helped establish the AFL as a viable competitor to the NFL, which eventually forced the merger. According to one retrospective, "Cornerback Booker Edgerson, a former Bills teammate, said Gilchrist was 'just as good and maybe even better' than Jim Brown. 'He and Jim had the same outstanding abilities to play the game.’"


And Cookie had no easy row to hoe. After starring in high school in the Pittsburgh area, Cookie was reportedly told by Paul Brown to skip college and try out for the Browns. Unfortunately, 18-year-olds were not allowed to play in the NFL at the time (apparently this fact had escaped Brown) so Cookie was sent away with his college eligibility burned. That is how he ended up in Canada for several years prior to his being "bought"  by the Bills.

Gilchrist is somewhat notorious for being excluded from the Bills' Wall of Fame, apparently over his frequent contract disputes. But, based on the recent sale price of the Bills, I'm here to say Cookie was right! He clearly deserved more money, and now that the team has been sold from the ownership which had the dispute with him, please give the man his due honor! Ring him up!

Thanks.

Bills Win -Prognostications on Target

First of all I want to apologize to Dr. D, all Vikings fan, and perhaps to anyone associated with the Minnesota professional football club for my comment/prediction related to the Vikings stomping the Rams in Week 1. I merely said, "Of course, it is the Vikings, so I am sure you are holding your breath until some sort of disaster strikes. " Which was promptly followed by Adrian Peterson being suspended for child abuse and the Vikings getting stomped by the Patriots - who, in the Vikings defense I guess, were coming off a loss and apparently rarely lose immediately again after such an outcome. Either way, it was a bad day for the Vikes, and I feel I may have knowingly jinxed them in the same way I jinxed the Yankees last night by repeatedly saying how bad Kelly Johnson was, while at the same time telling my kids he would certainly turn around and do something to help the Orioles - which he indeed did with a walk-off double.

To further enhance my prognostic credibility, I will remind you that I correctly called the Dolphins a good match-up for the Bills, which they certainly seemed to be in an easy 29-10 win for the Buffaloes yesterday. We seem to have the 'Fins number and have now posted three wins in a row over them, including two relatively dominant home performances - and we really don't dominate games that often.

The one revelation yesterday for me was the sparkling play of Sammy Watkins. Don't get me wrong, I knew Watkins had the potential to be good - which is why I wasn't totally against the Bills seemingly ridiculous decision to pay a king's ransom to move up and draft him this year. From my standpoint, he was only one of a handful of for-sure impact players available, and the Bills weren't going to get one at number 9 - where they sat before maneuvering with the Browns to get to number 4, giving up next year's first round choice in the process. The only misgiving I had was that Watkins would be wasted because of QB E.J. Manuel's inability to throw.

Manuel didn't look great throwing the ball yesterday, and clearly missed an open Watkins on what should have been a TD in the first half, but Manuel was good enough, and he managed to connect with Watkins 8 times for 118 yards and a TD. And Watkins looked like he was open on almost every play as the game went along. He made it look easy - and that kind of stuff helps.

True test of how good the Bills are will be coming up at home Sunday vs. Philip Rivers and the Chargers, who are coming off a win over the World Champion Seahawks. Bills have the advantage of being in the Eastern time zone vs. a West Coast team, but I don't like a veteran heady QB like Rivers against the Bills relatively inexperienced secondary - although Corey Graham was great (he's not inexperienced) for the second week in a row vs. Miami. And although Bills did mostly shutdown Dolphins TE Charles Clay (7 catches, for a mere 31 yards), which was a nice change -maybe having LB Nigel Bradham back after 1 game suspension helped with that -  I'm a little wary (to say the least) about Kellen Winslow - I mean Antonio Gates - who burned the Seahawks for the 3 TDs yesterday.

So, Bills are playing at home, but as the weather should be nice, I'm not sure how much that will help. I'm not saying I know a whole lot about the Chargers, but have seen them play at least a couple times in last few years, and unfortunately, I like them to knock the Bills from the ranks of the unbeaten next Sunday. But, I'll still be cheering for Bills and hoping I get this prognostication wrong!

What 1973 Was Like

So, one of the running themes for this blog (at least a little while back) was my affinity for the year 1973, which is when my memory pretty much dates back to. I turned six that year and I remember O.J. rushing for 2,000 yards, the A's winning the World Series, Watergate, Secretariat winning the Triple Crown, and probably more. I really enjoyed the U.S. version of the TV series, Life on Mars, for example, which involved the main character being transported back to some version of 1973 - when he was also a little kid, but in this version he is also an adult.

Anyhow, something I wonder about is how my vision of the world and life has been shaped by coming of age in that seminal (for me at least) year. Well, here's an honest-to-God quote I came across in a book I am reading about the early-to-mid 1970s Texas Rangers baseball team. "The so-called hippie attitude was reaching its zenith in 1973 and, although the lens on my retrospective processes might be a trifle blurred, it seemed then tat almost everyone tended to agree that life was too short and therefore should be enjoyed to the maximum extent." (The author goes on to contrast that to the 90's attitude of fear and today says wellness is considered on par with godliness.)

I'm not sure, but I think that might say a lot about why I live life like I do.

Cheers.

Ralph
 

Vikings Knock Off Rams, 34-6

The Minnesota Vikings got off to a good start on Sunday, defeating the St. Louis Rams by a score of 34-6. Head coach Mike Zimmer racked up his first win and Matt Cassel turned in a solid performance, going 17 of 25 for 170 yards, two touchdowns and no turnovers. Cassel completed 68 percent of his passes for a near 7-yard average per attempt. He had a 113.8 quarterback rating. Former Packer wide-out Greg Jennings had six catches for 58 yards and a touchdown. Cordarrelle Patterson continues to look good for the Vikes. He lined up in the backfield and ran 67 yards for a touchdown. He led the team with 102 rushing yards. The Vikings totalled 186 rushing yards, with Adrian Peterson running for 75 yards. On defense, the Vikings had two interceptions, one returned for a touchdown and another that led directly to their first touchdown. Minnesota also had five sacks. Everson Griffen, Harrison Smith, Linval Joseph, and Tom Johnson all played well on defense. Next up for the Vikes: New England.

Ray Rice, Donald Sterling & The Power of Video

I was at a conference last week where one of the topics was auto-understanding of video - and how we can use info captured from video to help complete transactions. For example, let's say you have something wrong with your car and instead of taking it to the mechanic, you are able to open up your hood, take a video of everything running, and have some sort of auto-analysis done that can determine what you need to do. You are then directed to Web sites where you can order the parts....This may be somewhat far fetched - but actual real world use cases include automatically analyzing face taken on video at airports for matches against dangerous persons databases.

The reason that transaction part of the equation is important is because I was at a document management conference, which mainly discusses better handling the documents used in transactions. It's my view that as smartphones and their cameras continue to improve, we will begin to rely more on their abilities, instead of documents, to complete transactions. Typing text into an app is one thing, but being able to take a picture or video and submit that is even easier and more powerful.

Why is that? Video is more powerful than words in today's society. Let's take the cases of Ray Rice and Donald Sterling. From this ESPN story on the Rice incident: "The source said that Rice admitted to the Ravens from the start that he was guilty of striking Janay and, for the most part, accurately described what they eventually saw on the video. But the brutality of the assault when seen on the security video made a different impression."

So, here's the deal:

• Story comes out about Rice beating up girlfriend/fiancee. 
• Rice gets suspended for two games.
• People get up in arms and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell stiffens NFL's domestic abuse policy
• But nothing more happens to Rice
• Video comes out showing what Rice admitted to
• Rice's team (Baltimore Ravens) terminate his contract and league suspends him indefinitely

In my opinion this is very similar to what happened with Clippers owner Donald Sterling, when the tape came out with him making all those racist comments to his ex-girlfriend. As far back as 2006, Bomani Jones wrote this article for ESPN's now defunct Page 2, entitled "Sterling's Racism Should be News." Yet, in spite of this, big name athletes and Coach Doc Rivers signed with the Clippers. Then, they acted all surprised when the audio recording (sorry, no one uses tape anymore, do they?) came out this spring. Apparently, nobody in the mass market pays attention to print anymore!

Which brings me back to my point about multi-media being so much more powerful than text. Armed with today's and tomorrow smartphone and other computing equipment, I fully expect the upcoming generation to marginalize textual communication in favor of multi-media stuff. Although, quick quips and meta data will keep text alive as a complementary form of communication!

Bills Take Down Bears in OT

The Buffalo Bills pulled off what, to most experts at least, seemed like an improbably win yesterday in Chicago - on the opening Sunday of the NFL season. The Buffalo squad won 23-20 in OT, with the highlight of the game being this wonderful Fred Jackson stiff arm of overwhelmed Bears' white safety dude. That play set up the game winning field goal.

Otherwise, the Bills primarily took advantage of Bears mistakes - three turnovers to be specific, and a solid running attack - as well as some timely EJ Manuel completions to stay close. Defense wasn't bad, but it clearly missed The Legend in the middle of the field - especially on shorter pass plays. Manuel's accuracy seemed like a problem again, although he did complete 16-of-22 passes. To their credit - his receivers, in particular Mike Williams and Robert Woods that I can remember, made a couple of key leaping catches to keep drives alive. Manuel is a big dude and has decent pocket presence, but he seems to float the ball out there too much. I think he might not have confidence in his accuracy, so he is trying to aim the ball a bit too much. Luckily, it seems his receivers seem to have adjusted to high floaters, although Sammy Watkins was disturbingly quiet.

I don't know what this win means for the rest of the season. My first instinct says that the Bills will still go 5-11 and this was an early desperate win by a desperate team. I mean they had to be motivated by all the bad press they have been getting about the preseason and then, of course, you had the shouting match and the f-bombs exchanged between Head Coach Doug Marrone and some members of the Bills front office in practice last week leading up to the game. This kind of turmoil/tension can sometimes be a good thing and if used correctly can lead to an "us against the world/nobody believes in us" mentality that is great for fueling the fire of a football team.

Of course, I'm not sure how long using this type of motivation can last, especially, when you consider how little depth the Bills have. So, while it was a nice start, I'm not sure that level of play is sustainable. Plus, the Bears were a good match-up, with their suspect run defense, and Cutler's reputation for making untimely (Fitzpartick-esque) mistakes - which were both on display Sunday. (That, and the Bears didn't seem to be taking the Bills too seriously, as evidenced by Brandon Marshall's laughing after his early fumble.)

That said, next Sunday at home vs. the Dolphins doesn't seem like such a bad mach up either. My buddy Mike, who is a huge Dolphins fan, stopped by later in the afternoon to get a scouting report on the Bills. He said the Dolphins pass rush and running game dominated in their win over the Pats. For whatever reason, I'm not overly worried about the pass rush, although reportedly (even aside from Mike's opinion), it's pretty good. For some reason, I think Manual's size and calmness in the pocket will neutralize it's advantage. And I think our D-line backed up by Brandon Spikes is solid enough that we will hold up okay vs. the run. And if we can pressure Tannehill close to how we did last year...Also, our secondary, led by a solid game from free agent pick-up Corey Graham, looked pretty solid on Sunday.

So, maybe we can pick-up a second win, as long as we can run the ball with our trio of strong backs - Jackson, CJ Spiller, and new guy  Dennis Dixon. And that would put the Bills at 2-0, which would be a nice start and maybe bring me some more optimism. But, we will see.

Montero for Pineda Saga Continues

(Remember the '80s pseudo metal band SAGA and their hit song [Tonight I'm] On the Loose?) Anyhow, the whole Jesus Montero for Michael Pineda trade that the Yankees made with the Mariners a couple years ago, continues to play out with unexpected and bizarre consequences for everyone involved. Pineda, after missing all of last year with an arm injury (after reporting to camp overweight) has come on strong recently for the Yankees, but only after suffering a back injury which followed a suspension due to his reliance on pine-tar in cold weather games.

Despite Pineda's problems, it still looks like the Yankees got the better end of the deal, as Montero, a once ballyhooed power hitting prospect, has struggled mightily for the Mariners. Coincidentally, he also seems to have weight problems, which apparently led to a recent confrontation with a scout, involving Single A baseball and an ice cream sandwich.

Stories like this make you wonder if both these teams didn't realize these guys had issues before trading them and were laughing about sticking someone else with their problem. Well, the joke's on who now?

Amazing Night at the Uht

Yes, it was the last buck night of the season, and yes, we got pretty drunk, and no I didn't spend a lot of money to get pretty drunk, so that was all good. And it was beautiful out, and we watched the last 5 innings from the first row directly behind home plate...and the Seawolves, after giving up 7 runs in the top of the first inning, yes, Bowie's first nine hitters all reached base, the Seawolves came back to win 10-7. Amazing game.

Couple of notes:

• Erie starter Wilsen Palacios got his 9th win of the season, despite giving up 7 earned runs in the first. He threw 101 pitches and came out after the fifth, by which time the Seawolves had scored 9 earned runs off the Bowie starter.
• Dean Green and Stephen Moya, Erie's two best hitters, went a combined 7 for nine, with Moya mashing 3 doubles, and Green hitting a home run. Both are lefties. Moya now has 102 RBI in 127 games. Seems like a likely Sept. call up for the Tigers. His downside seems to be 152 strikeouts and only 20 walks. Not sure how that will play in the major leagues.

Oh, yes and Jim Kelly is being critical of the Bills quarterback play, and I really couldn't agree with him more. He echoes my thoughts the EJ is a bright and nice guy, and everyone seems to like him, but on the field, he is just not (yet?) getting the job done. 

Some Sympathy for O.J.

I know the man is a killer and all, and currently serving time for attempted armed robbery, but hear me out. (Also, if we can have a Stones' song called Sympathy for the Devil, can't we have a little sympathy for a man who is a human being - albeit a very flawed one, but therefore cannot possibly as completely evil as the devil?)

Anyhow, here's the O.J. legend has I understand it: He grew up in San Francisco and ran with a pretty rough crowd as a kid. After a childhood bout with Rickets that led some doctor to tell him he would always be handicapped, he grew into a physical stud and was a star running back in high school. His grades weren't great so he went to a junior college in Los Angeles, where he starred and made JC All-American. He was offered a scholarship to USC - one of the prime national football programs in the heart of Los Angeles, where once again he starred. So, now he's getting national attention, hobnobbing with movie and TV stars in LA, starting to dabble in acting - life is good.

Then he gets drafted by the Buffalo Bills. As you may know I'm a Bills fan, but was this really fair? I mean to take a guy from San Francisco, who went to college in LA and place him in Buffalo - on a terrible team - to start his career. No wonder he went crazy. In no other career but pro sports do you not get to pick the city you want to live and work in after going to college. Would OJ have been happier if he could have played for the LA Rams and stayed near Hollywood and acted part time? Absolutely.

I remember my grandfather, who lived in Dunkirk NY (down the road from Buffalo about a half hour or so) saying OJ couldn't wait to get out of Buffalo when the season ended and back to CA. At the time, (I was like 7) I thought he was a jerk. But now, having been around a bit, I can totally understand. Buffalo is nothing like Southern CA or San Fran. No wonder OJ wanted to get home.

And he was drafted in 1969, which is only a few years after the legendary Bills back Cookie Gilchrist had been complaining about racial prejudice in Buffalo after having played for several years in Toronto. And, as I said, the team stunk. Luckily Lou Saban, who had coached to Bills to some titles in the Gilchrist era, came back to town, recognized OJ's talent and built a team around him. So, from a career standpoint, OJ ended up having success, was loved in Buffalo, and even found time to do some acting in the offseason. But I'm sure this all put a good deal of stress on him that could have been alleviated if NFL rules had just allowed him to stay on the West Coast. I'm not saying all this made him a murderer, but I'm sure it didn't help....On the other hand, maybe if he had stayed in CA with all the crazies, he would have flipped sooner!

Wild at Heart

So, last night, I watched the first part of this really entertaining film called Wild at Heart. This film was recommended to me way back when I was still in college I think. It came out in 1990, so this was certainly plausible. For whatever reason, I never had occasion to watch it, but saw it was being included on some cable channel as part of a Nicholas Cage retrospective, which was kind of fascinating in itself.

First off, Wild at Heart is directed by David Lynch. I have never really watched too much David Lynch, but his work is always being praised by people whose opinions I respect, including the great Charles Bukowksi, so it was probably time I gave something of his a full-fledged try. And Wild at Heart was definitely worth it. A lot of good energy, sex, music, sexual energy, sensual energies, one liners, style, etc. And Nick Cage really does a great job personifying all this.

Which brings me back to my thoughts on a Nick Cage retrospective. Valley Girl, which came out in 1983, was also part of that retrospective. That was Cage's first major role and turned into a cult classic, which we, as high schoolers at the time, loved. I'm sure I saw it more than once. I watched the second half of it the other night and it seemed kind of stupid, but Cage is certainly the strongest player in the movie.

Move forward seven years to Wild at Heart and he is really still bringing it, with the help of David Lynch of course. By that time he had also made Raising Arizona with the Coen Brothers, not to mention being the nephew of Francis Ford Coppola. So, Cage certainly had the opportunity to learn from some top notch and innovative directors.

He made some other mildly interesting flicks in the early 1990s, before really hitting a home run with the role of the drunk lead in Leaving Las Vegas, for which I believe he won the Best Actor Academy Award. As far as I'm concerned, it's been all downhill for him since. I think I've seen him in three entertaining movies since: Adaptation, Con Air, and Gone in 60 Seconds, but while they were all fun movies, Cage didn't have same energy be brought to his early flicks. What happened to it? Probably life just wore him down. I know he had a highly publicized bankruptcy and was said just to be making movies just to pay his bills for awhile. Cage's bankruptcy was always a bit confusing, because, as often happens in these cases I guess, you find yourself wondering how somebody that could be so good at something like acting (which you are assuming, perhaps incorrectly takes some intellectual ability) be so bad a managing their money.

Anyhow, I guess I'll just enjoy the rest of Wild at Heart and stop wondering about what happened to Nick Cage. At least he gave us a few good movies, which is more than most people can say.

Great Bukowski quote on women & relationships

This is one I hadn't come across before. From his collection of short stories "Tales of Ordinary Madness." I had never read this one before and checked it out recently as an electronic resource from the Erie County Public Library, which is a pretty cool process in itself. I check it out as a Kindle book and it took me to the Amazon page, which enabled the book to be delivered directly to my Kindle Reader.

Anyhow, here's the quote, which is from the story "Would You Suggest Writing as a Career?" "Christ, there were women everywhere and half of them looked good enough to fuck, and there was nothing you could do - just look at them. Who'd ever devised such as awful trick?...Which one did you pick? Which one picked you? It didn't matter and it was all so sad. (Editorial comment by RG: A very Kouacian move, invoking 'sadenss'.) And when the picks were made, it never worked, it never worked for anybody, no matter what they said."

Current State of Newspapers

Great quote from Michael Kinsley in a Vanity Fair article on the evolution/extinction of traditional newspapers: "One of the major aggregators, who has taken an old property and made it profitable for the first time in a century, took me on a tour of his new aggregation facility, somewhere deep in the Maryland suburbs, where rent is cheap. It was a pathetic sight. Dozens of recent college graduates—paid 75 cents an hour—sat chained to their computers grinding out blog items, while editors stood above them with whips, shouting, `Blog, you worthless scum. Blog more. A dozen new items by lunchtime or there’ll be no day-old pizza for anyone. Blog, I tell you,' and so forth." 

Thoughts on Ralph Wilson's Passing

I took a trip last to San Diego a couple weeks ago, and it threw me way off my planned posting schedule. Really took a lot out of me flying back and forth across the country. Even if I did get stuck in SD for an extra day and have spend a day working frhom a friend of mine's porch which located right on the water on Coronado Island - Well, I have to admit that part was pretty sweet.

Headed to Orlando this week. Not really one of my favorite places for a conference - too sterile - same event was held last year in New Orleans, which was a great location.  But anyhow, to catch up on a few things.

Obviously Bills owner Ralph Wilson has died. And while that's certainly sad, he was 95, and unfortunatley was probably as responsible as anyone for the Bills not making the playoffs for the past 15 years. He had a bad habit of hiring really old GMs like Marv Levy and Buddy Nix -perhaps because he could relate to them - but those guys couldn't compete in today's NFL. There were certianly a lot of positive stories on Mr. Wilson's passing- and derservedly so. I really liked this Peter King tribute (King is a great writer.) There was another article I read that pretty much served to remind people that Wilson certainly wasn't a saint and that be got very rich leveraging public funding (as many NFL ownsers have) for a stadium named after him. I won't even get into the fact that he couldn't get along well enough with Bill Polian to keep the architect of our greaterst era of success on board.

A former Bills writer used to refer to the stadium as "Negligiant Owner Stadium," which probably sounds pretty bad now that Wilson has passed and everyone has these great memories of him, but still...On the plus side, Wilson did apparently feel loyalty to Buffalo, which many owners don't feel toward their home cities. He seemed to understand the concept of a team as a public trust. We may not be so lucky now that new owners are on the horizon. That said, it's apparently unrealistic (due to lease obligations) to expect the Bills to move before 2020, so Buffalo certainly has time to get a plan together to keep the team there. Heck, maybe it would be more profitable someplace else, but I don't think it does badly in Buffalo. We're not Jacksonville.

That's probably plenty to chew on for now. Hope to have more to post on other stuff soon.

Cheers.

We're the Millers

Finally watched this fairly entertaining comedy yesterday. Not that it was on my list of things to do, but my wife and I both like fairly raunchy obnoxious (think Hangover - which this was compared to on the box, so how could I not get it) comedies and this definitely qualifies. I had rented the Blu-ray from Family Video on Saturday along with a kids/family movie. We had managed to watch the intriguing but somewhat didactic  Khubma the night we got it, but had We're the Millers sitting around for a few days until we got rid of the kids long enough (which basically meant until we stayed up late enough) to watch it. Glad we waited because it was certainly not appropriate for kids - or at least it made me uncomfortable to watch it with them - although I'm certain my 15-year-old watches/has watched worse with his friends.

This was the second straight movie I've watched where Jennifer Aniston plays kind of a bad girl role, and I find her very entertaining in this mode. Maybe it has to do with her playing against the caricature of her that is often portrayed in the media - remember how she was pitted as the good girl against Jon Voight's daughter in the whole Brad Pitt sage? Anyhow, Aniston delivers these off color roles with a solid deadpan that may just be lack of acting ability - but I find her style kind of funny. Plus, she is still hot for someone close to my age.

The previous funny role I saw her in was the perverted dentist in Horrible Bosses, where I thought she held up pretty well next to Oscar winners like Jamie Foxx and Kevin Spacey, who were also in that underrated comedy. Apparently there is a Horrible Bosses 2 coming out this year which I'm kind of excited about. SNL veteran Jason Sudeikis is in the Horrible Bosses movies and also plays a solid lead in We're the Millers. He's like a Peter Pan pot dealer that is forced to grow up through his tribulations with this fake family - Aniston is a stripper he hires to play his wife in order to help him cross the border with an RV full of weed. Yes, it's a ridiculous premise, but they kind of pull it off and there are genuinely funny lines and scenes and that enable you to suspend your disbelief long enough to enjoy the flick - I think.

Anyhow, have a great weekend.

Congrats to Clippers on Big Win

over Phoenix who they have had some trouble with so far this year. Matt Barnes had a big game 28 points, including 18 in red-hot third quarter when the Clippers took the lead by scoring 37 points. Blake Griffin also had another huge night, including clutch turnaround jumper after Suns had pulled within three with a couple minutes to go. He banked it in - reminded me of Tim Duncan. Speaking of clutch and turnaround, DeAndre Jordan continued his amazing turnaround season with 17 boards. He's averaging 14 rebounds per game, after averaging just over 7 last year. Doc Rivers is being given credit for turning him around. Jordan was also clutch last night, with a big block of an attempted lay-in with less than a minute to go and Phoenix down by 5. He then grabbed the rebound and made both free throws (he's a career 43% shooter from the line) at the other end to ice the game. Chris Paul had kind of an off night, although he did have 9 assists. Jamaal Crawford and J.J. Reddick both sat out.

Anyhow, that's my Clippers report. Remember, they used to be the Buffalo Braves! Cheers.

Milbury Blasts LaFontaine

So, I guess it's nothing new, but last night, I'm watching the Stars beat the Sabres (not surprising) and between periods NHL NBC commentator Mike Milbury goes off on Pat LaFontaine for resigning from his position as president of hockey operations for the Sabres after less than three months. Apparently LaFontaine was upset that the Sabres traded star goalie Ryan Miller, which doesn't make too much sense (for LaFontaine to be upset over) because everyone assumed Miller was going to walk at the end of the year anyhow - when his contract was up. Maybe he had told LaFontaine something else.

Either way, LaFontaine is now gone, as well as Miller, as well as former captain Steve Ott, and Sabres are in full rebuilding mode, which I thought was the plan anyhow. Of course this all leaves my favorite coach Ted Nolan somewhat in limbo. The Sabres were supposed to announce a contract extension for him, but then called off the press conference where that was supposed to be announced. LaFontaine and Nolan had been friends from LaFontaine's days as a player.

At least the Sabres under Lafontaine brought in an apparently competent GM in Tim Murray - who executed the Ott and Miller trades to fairly favorable reviews.

Milbury, who has a reputation for being bombastic, went off on LaFontaine for running away when things got tough, which apparently Milbury also accused him of doing in a former job with the Islanders. It doesn't help that Milbury apparently had something to do with the Islanders front office at the time. Milbury also basically accused Nolan of disloyalty by not coming out 100% in favor of the organization and instead moping, and maybe drawing back on his contract extension agreement, in the wake of LaFontaine's exit. Get 100% behind the organization or get out, was the effect of what Milbury said.

Of course, Nolan's (who also has some history with the Islanders) stock is sky high after his impressive work with the Latvian team at the recent Winter Olypmpics (and it all comes back to that). Anyhow, that's my report for Sabre-land, which is now in full soap opera mode. At least they are entertaining off the ice!

Another Reason to Love Olympic Hockey: Tuukka Rask Hangover

Tuukka Rask denies hangover caused him to miss Olympic semifinal: That was a headline that moved like a week ago - I can't believe I missed it. You have the Stanley Cup-winning goalie missing a semifinal game against his country's (Finland's) arch-rival (Sweden), because he had been out too late the night before. Although he denies it, it makes sense. He was able to bounce back the next day and shut out the U.S. in the bronze medal game, which might be tougher to do with the flu.

And from what I read, the Olympics can be a very big party. And the games were played in Sochi, which, from all accounts seemed like a good place to tip a few after hours. And, a friend of mine who spent some time in France once told me that Fins like to tip more than some other nationalities...

So, there are clearly reasons to believe that Rask may have enjoyed a few too many the night before the scheduled semi-final game. Could Finland have beaten Sweden with him in goal? Tough to say as the back-up, from what I recall played pretty well - but we will never know. And Canada may have been the ultimate beneficiary as they then got to play a depleted Swedish team in the final - due to injuries and an untimely suspension for the use of an allergy medication. Oh well, if anyone knows about drinking and hockey it's Canadians, so they probably deserved to win. Maybe it was even Rask's Canadian friends from the NHL who took him out that night to "soften him up," - a strategy Dominique Wilkins apparently employed in his days with the Hawks and discusses on this episode of the Bill Simmons' B.S. Report.

Yet another potentially great Olympic memory.

Early Yankees Spring Training Game Observations

• Just wantched Nune and Beltran  go back-to-back
• Tenaka threw two solid innings yesterday
• So did CC
• So did Koruda
• A kid named Adonis Garcia from Cuba went 3-4 today. He is in his late 20's and had some great stats in Cuba before defecting. He is listed at 5-9 or 5-7, depending on the source, and 190 lbs. Listed as a CF. Apparently broke his wrist last year and then had a rough year at Scranton. Maybe he is ready to break out ala Puig.
• Word is that Michael Pineda is throwing well and will pitch  Friday: http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article/mlb/yankees-pitcher-michael-pineda-confident-as-spring-progresses?ymd=20140302&content_id=68570312&vkey=news_mlb

What does this all mean? Likely not much. But it is spring, and as they say about hope and enternal.

Conflicted About Recent Request for $12M in State Funding for the Uht

 "City of Erie Requests $12M in State Funding for the Uht" Yes, this is the type of headline appearing this week in the local paper that makes you do the proverbial double-take. As in "WHAT????" $12 million for improvements to an already beautiful ballpark. And, then when you realize it's state money, oh well, that's not so bad. Of course, when you consider again that you are a taxpayer in this state...Okay so maybe those weren't your reactions, but they certainly were mine.

And then there is this bit from the story in the paper, "The planned improvements at the ballpark, which is managed by the Convention Center Authority, include new enclosures; expanded concessions; a team store; elevated decks and the expansion of corridors at the stadium; an exterior marquee; a larger children's area; and new lighting and walkways. 'Uht Park needs all of these improvements,' said Roger Richards, a Convention Center Authority board member who heads its Strategic Planning Committee."

Alright, I don't know about you, but I'm not sure any of that stuff is really "needed." I mean I was at the park at least a half dozen times last year and I never remember thinking, "Wow, I wish there were more concessions (maybe more variety) or a better exterior marquee."

Those were my initial thoughts at least. Digging a little deeper, apparently Erie Insurance is building or has built a five-level parking garage somewhere in the area, at a cost of $11.2 million, which the city has submitted as the majority of the matching funds required to get the funding from the state. The Convention Center Authority has pledged to put up the other $800,000. So, basically, for the a total of $800,000, the Convention Center Authority, with the backing from the city, is hoping to get $12.8 million in improvement money for Uht Part from the PA State government (as well as use of the parking garage I'm assuming, so maybe we throw another $11.2 million on top of that). I guess that is a good deal for us, although why the taxpayers of PA are funding improvements at a ballpark that only serves Erie (as well as the teams, primarily the Seawolves, that play there) is beyond me. A lot of the conflicts associated with municipal funding of stadiums utilized by privately owned teams are addressed in Gregg Easterbrook's wonderful book about football - The King of Sports. I can't recommend this book more if you are fan, like I am, of all things football, but sometimes find yourself questioning, "why?"

Anyhow, I guess I hope we get the money because if we don't some other equally, or even more, nefarious project somewhere else in the state likely will, but seriously....ah well, I guess I should just shut up and enjoy the Uht!
 

Otters Blow 3-0 Lead; McDavid Scores Highlight Reel Goal

So, I'm kinda embarrassed about it, but last night was the first time I saw the already legendary Connor McDavid in action. McDavid, who now has 20 goals and 60 assists, on the season was great. He scored a highlight reel goal on a breakaway in the first period  (Link is to Youtube video. McDavid's goal is at about the :22 mark) to give the Otters a 3-0 lead. Here's how the Otters' Web site described it: "Connor McDavid was sprung through the neutral zone on a pass from Darren Raddysh. McDavid entered the offensive zone, turned defenseman Brady Austin inside out, and beat Patterson on the phenomenal individual effort to give Erie a three goal lead."

Unfortunately, it was all downhill after that, as the Otters got tired and/or lakadaisical and were outshot 12-6 in the second period - enabling the streaking London Knights to tie the game. London then scored on a power play with less than a minute left in the game to win 4-3. Kind of a big loss as Erie was one point ahead of London in the standings going in, and while Erie has been slumping, London has won like eight in a row.

Anyhow, it was nice to see McDavid, who is the presumptive top pick in the 2015 NHL draft, which means he was one more year in Erie (and then maybe many in Buffalo)! Hope to see him many more times.

Great night for D-10 Playoffs; Otters at Home Tonight vs. London

Amazing night of basketball in D-10 last night. McDowell smoked Prep for AAAA title, while East beat Oil City to advance to AAA final. Meantime, Farrell came from way down in the fourth quarter to knock of SV and spoil a potential East-SV AAA title match-up. SV still has chance to advance to states with win over Oil City in third-place game.

So, one night after having the opportunity to attend the very exciting Prep-McDowell game - full house at the Hammermill Center/Audi, I'm heading to see the Otters for first time this year, against the London Knights, who I am told are coached by ex-NHLer Dale Hunter - a great fighting scorer type, who also has Ty Domi's kid on the team - apparently another scorer/fighter type. A great week of sports for me (love it when my buddies call me up with extra tix.) Looking forward to seeing Connor McDavid and hopefully the rest of the Otters on the ice tonight.

New MLB Plate Blocking Rule Confusing

The new MLB rule designed to prevent homeplate collisions, is somewhat confusing, at least in its initial form. It's an experimental rule designed to limit plate collisions. Apparently, there would have been too much retraining of catchers required in too short a time period to completely eliminate collisions. But, to me the way the new rule is worded leaves too much discretion in the umpires hands and could lead to a hit first, ask questions later approach by base runners.

In particular I think the second comment associated with the rule is particularly vague: (From an ESPN story): "unless the catcher is in possession of the ball, the catcher cannot block the pathway of the runner as he is attempting to score." The runner shall be declared safe if the catcher violates that provision. In addition, it is not a violation "if the catcher blocks the pathway of the runner in order to field a throw, and the umpire determines that the catcher could not have fielded the ball without blocking the pathway of the runner and that contact with the runner was unavoidable."

Later in the story it says Orioles catcher Matt Weiters would "like to get clarifications from Major League Baseball on exactly what is and isn't permitted." I agree.

Yanks could face FSU QB Winston

In spring training game scheduled for today: http://m.espn.go.com/mlb/story?storyId=10512225. Winston, of course, won the Heisman and led his team to BCS title this fall. He's also a Yankee fan. Go figure.

Happy Tuesday.

Yankees Once Traded a Bigot for a Racist

Yes, this all happened in the madcap world that was the MLB in the late 1930's. Check out Steve Wulf's entertaining piece on former ball player Jake Powell and his quote about beating (well, you know)s with a black jack to stay in shape in the off-season. Back then apparently you did need to Twitter to go virile!

Winter Olympics over - Baeball around the Corner

Going to miss the Winter Olympics. They only come once every four years, and this is probably good, as I don't know how much skiing, ice skating, bobsledding, and even hockey I can watch, but it sure is fun when it comes around. The colors of the uniforms and the scenery are a big help. I mean who doesn't enjoy watching a Swedish All-Star hockey team in bright yellow with three blue crowns on their chest, battle the red-and-white Canadians and their maple leaf insignia?

Baseball season is just around the corner. Major League training camps have already started. I'm trying to get my coaching house in order. Looks like I am going to be managing the Post 11 NWPA Junior Legion team this year, taking over for a guy who did a great job last year. I got to coach last year,  a job which was pretty much gravy: you show up and do baseball stuff. Now, I have to do some admin/paperwork stuff as well. Ugh. But, what are you going to do? We have a good group of kids and are hoping to have a great season.

Still some confusion over what I'm going to do for Little League/Junior League for my boys. There was some serious doubt about whether Erie Little League was going to be functioning this year, but that seems to have been alleviated. I guess there is a Facebook site up there, but I can't seem to find it. So, I guess we'll see. One of the guys I coached with  last year has already said he is going over to MYAA, which is something I am considering, despite my history with Erie - but I still want to go with Erie. Let's hope we can get our proverbial stuff together!

Finally, just finished up a great book by the outstanding sportswriter Roger Kahn -  A Flame of Pure Fire: Jack Dempsey and the Roaching '20s. Dempsey seemed like a great character to write about, but then again, maybe it was Kahn's great writing the portrayed him that way. Everything in the book was well crafted - up through the acknowledgements at the end!

Kahn is best known for his The Boys of Summer portrayal of the 1950s Dodgers, which was published in the early 1970s. I tried reading it on the recommendation of a friend, maybe when I was in junior high. Maybe because I am a Yankees fan, or maybe I was just too young to grasp it, but I didn't really enjoy it nearly as much as my buddy did. But, then, maybe 15 years ago, another buddy of mine gave me a signed copy of The Era, 1947-1957: When the Yankees, the Giants, and the Dodgers Ruled the World, and I loved it. It was apparently published in 1993. The Dempsey book was published six years later, and I also immensely enjoyed that. So I don't know. Maybe I'll go back and read Boys of Summer or maybe I just like Kahn's later writing.

That all said, like the 2014 Winter Olympics, I am going to miss hanging out with Jack Dempsey and his colorful 1920's set.

Cheers.

Have a great week!

Ralph

Physicality Wins Postseason NFL Football

Well, it at least helps a lot. The last three Super Bowls have been won by the Seahawks (last night) preceded by the Ravens, and the Giants. Non of these three squads would be what you call finesse football teams. They all featured physical, strong defenses, and more or less older-school offenses. All three champions' offenses could run the ball - with the Giants and Ravens also specializing in the deep ball, while Russell Wilson is a bit more of a "West Coast" offense guy, who is still a very physical with his ability to run and throw absolute bullets on shorter passes.

Let's just ignore the physicality of the defenses, which is somewhat obvious, and look at the quarterbacks for a minute. Wilson, Flacco, and Eli Manning were all relatively younger guys, with Eli, at 31, the oldest of the three. Tom Brady last won the Super Bowl when he was 27. Granted, he's been in a couple Super Bowls since, but it seems that in general youth prevails in the playoffs these days. Aaron Rogers, Ben Roethlesberger and Aaron Rogers have both enjoyed tremendous postseason success under 30, and while Payton Manning and Drew Brees seemed like veterans when they won their Super Bowl titles, each was still only 30. (Going back 10 years, you start to run into Brad Johnson and John Elway, who were older, so we'll restrict our argument to the last 10 years.)

Colin Kapernick probably needs to be mentioned here, as well. After somewhat struggling, as Wilson did, during the 2013 regular season, Kapernick acquitted himself nicely with two wins in the playoffs - and, in light of the Super Bowl, the close loss to the Seahawks in the NFC championship game cemented the contention that the 49ers were the second best team in the NFL this year. Kapernick is interesting because he is a very athletic quaterback who was chosen as the the starter over the less athletic, but solid Alex Smith. While Smith was let go and enjoyed a fine regular season with the Chiefs (probably better statistically that Kapernick's), his team was one-and-done in the playoffs, while Kapernick's went 3-1 for the second straight year. Russell Wilson, meanwhile, is now 4-1 in the playoffs for his short career.

Bottom line is that the key to playoff/ultimate success in the current version of the NFL seems to be a strong, physical defense, and a strong, younger, physical quarterback. Which isn't really too different when you think about from the formula the Stillers used to win four Super Bowls back in the 1970s.

Somewhat Tragic, Ironic Marathoner Story

Sad story here, but somewhat ironic as well I guess. It seems this 84-year-old woman died a day after completing the New York City marathon in November. She was even interviewed by Al Roker on the day she died. She apparently fell, hit her head, had it bandaged and then finished the race. Doesn't exactly say why she died - but basically, she went to bed with a bump on her head...alright, I know this is not supposed to be funny.

So, is this a tragic or a glorious end, or a tragic-glorious way to die? Apparently, she loved running. From a 2008 interview, post NYC Marathon, " “When I crossed that finish line in Central Park, I just knew this is what I would do the rest of my life,” [Joy] Johnson said. “Running makes you feel good. It’s energizing."

So, if it's true that dying doing something you love is the best way to go, it seems like she went out well. Something I've always thought about since my father in law died of a heart attack playing tennis a few years back. 

Christmas Season 2013-2014

Very good Christmas - New Years season this year. 10 reasons why:

1. Didn't really drink too much on any single day. Probably had equivalent of 6 drinks or so on New Years Eve, spaced out over several hours. But felt pretty good for the couple weeks.

2. With the exception of
   a.) a flu bug that hit me the Sunday before Christmas - but unlike three of my family members (and several other people I talked to) I didn't end up throwing up. Big plus :). And I was only sick for about a day and a half - a much shorter duration than others. Took some serious bed rest of about 20 hours, but the virus eventually was overcome.
   b.) woke up with a cold a week later, the Sunday before New Years. That also took about a day and a half, at least, before I started feeling better but still am feeling some aftereffects. Nonetheless, on both cases, I seem to have healed quickly, which makes feeling normal feel all that much better.

3. Rod Hockey:

Family got a new Stiga set from Santa. Loads of fun for everyone. Much higher tech than the Munro early 70s version we have been using.

4. Great 15th annual New Years Eve party- (also my son's 15th birthday). Solid bunch of guests. Good food, company, cheer, and foosball - not necessarily in that order.

5. Majestic Chili Dogs: Maggie picked up a quart for NYE party. Ate with champagne at midnight!

6. Lot's of snow - yeah, it's a pain but great fun too for sledding, skiing and even street hockey!

7.  Blu Ray player. Yes, finally got a good one, hooked it up to my stereo and can start catching up on those movies I've missed because I wasn't satisfied with the picture my old DVD player was giving me. Watched Goon last night - great, stereotypical sports movie with some fun hockey stuff thrown in.

8. Kids liked their XMas gifts - always a big plus.

9. Great New Years Day with absolutely nothing on the schedule. Did some skiing at golf course, cleaned up after sed party, watched some football with neighbors - went to bed!

10. Great nights out at Maggie's brothers for XMas, Maggie's Mom for XMas eve, and the Petrone's for Friday night games and conversations. Thanks for the hospitality.

Cheers all and have a great 2014.

All-time College Football Top 15

Top 15 College football programs from my perspective - a bit biased and limited of a kid who grew up in Western PA, Catholic, and came of age (as a sports fan) in the 1970s, but still follows sports today - with renewed interest (thanks to sons?)after burning out on it a couple times earlier in my life, including after working for three-plus years as a sports writer:

1. Alabama Crimson Tide
2. USC Trojans
3. Notre Dame Fighting Irish
4. Ohio State Buckeyes
5. Michigan Wolverines
6. Nebraska Cornhuskers
7. Oklahoma Sooners
8. Texas Longhorns
9. LSU Tigers
10. Penn State Nittany Lions
11. Florida State Seminoles
12. Miami Hurricanes
13. Florida Gators
14. Clemson Tigers
15. Georgia Bulldogs

Jumping on Marrone

I really hate to do it before he loses his first game as a Buffalo Bills' head coach, but Doug Marrone really needs to be called out for the current QB situation in Buffalo. His decision not to bring in another QB, following presumptive starter and rookie E.J. Manuel's knee injury could prove to be really boneheaded. Yes, it appears the Bills are counting on Manuel to be recovered from his procedure in time to start Week 1, and, for Marrone's sake, I'm hoping this is a lock, because if Manuel is not ready, we're going to end up with either RFA Tim Tuel or a recently signed street free agent (Matt Leinart or Thaddeus Lewis) at QB. None of those three options are good, if you ask me.

Why Marrone didn't move sooner to sign another QB when Manuel went down, and presumably knowing Kolb's history of concussions, remains a mystery to me. I wasn't aware of Kolb's history when news of Manuel's surgery first broke, but I still thought it an odd/risky move not to bring in another veteran QB to at least hedge our bets. Marrone did not. Instead he went all in with who he had and then a week or so later found himself scrambling to find a back-up QB who now has only two weeks to learn the system before opening day. This could lead to disaster if Manuel can't go or re-injures knee during Week 1 game vs. Pats.

We really don't need a blowout loss at home vs. Pats to start season - as I fear our long-suffering fans would quickly become disgruntled. But, Pats have well publicized problems of their own, so at least we go that going for us.

Anyhow, good luck Bills and Doug Marrone heading into Week 1. Hope it all works out, although our margin for error is looking pretty thin at the moment.

Greek golds to Heroes

From the introduction to Robert Fagles' translation of the Illiad. Intro. was written by Bernard Knox "Such people the Greeks called "heroes;" they recognized the fact that they transcended the norms of humanity by according them worship at their tombs after death. Heroes might be, usually were, violent, antisocial, destructive, but they offered an assurance that in some chosen vessels  humanity is capable of superhuman greatness, that there are some human beings who can deny the imperatives which others obey in order to live."

This all reminded me Raskolnikov, the ax murder's thinking in Crime and Punishment.

Just thought I had to put that on the record somewhere.

Maybe Pineda Trade Will Work Out

With the news today the the Mariners have sent the potentially great Jesus Montero down the the minors, last year's preseason trade for Michael Pineda doesn't look so bad for the Yankees anymore. Montero is a catcher who can't catch, but had a great reputation as a slugger. Unfortunately for the Mariners he hasn't been slugging either. Maybe the Yankees knew something....

But, then again, you have to wonder what the Mariners knew when they gave up the 6'7" fireballer Pineda. If you remember, he reported to the Yankees camp overweight last year and then came down with a shoulder injury that required surgery. Over a year later, Pineda is finally throwing again and reports are that he's almost ready for a minor league rehab assignment. Whoopee!

Seriously though, he was fairly good in his first full season of big league pitching at age 22, posting 173 strikeouts vs. 55 walks with a Walks & Hits per Innings Pitched (WHIP) of a very solid 1.099, although as to be expected because he pitched for Seattle, his home numbers were slightly (although not that much) better than his road numbers. Another promising indicator is that his minor league strikeouts/walks/hits numbers were slightly better than his major league numbers - so it appears he's been fairly consistent.

Now all Pineda has to do is comeback fully from shoulder surgery, which is something that others have certainly done, but we shall see. At least it doesn't seem like we really missed out on anything by giving up Montero for him.

Allosourus vs. T-Rex - new dinosaur modeling

So, if you know me, I've always been a big fan of dinosaurs. It's even my belief that as the once dominant creates of the earth, dinosaurs represent the forebearers of the human race. But that's a conversation for another day.

It's also been my observation that Google News, which I try to peruse several times per week, if not daily, gives an inordinate amount of coverage/links to dinosaur stories in its science section. This another reason I like Google.

Today's featured dinosaur article discussed the eating habits of the Allosourus' vs. the Tyrannosourus Rex. For background, the Allosaurus lived 155 milion to 150 million years ago during the late Jurassic period, while the T-Rex roamed the earth during the late Cretaceous period, about 85 million to 65 million years ago. T-Rex was about 30% longer and weight about three times as much as the Allosourus.

A few quotes from the engaging article:

• "'People think of it as a smaller, earlier version of a T. rex, but it was successful in a very different way,' said Eric Snively, an Ohio University paleontologist."
  
• “'Allosaurus really was better at certain things' than T. rex, Snively said. 'It was quicker at striking prey and more efficient.'"
  
• "'T. rex was extremely powerful and had a very large head, huge teeth and large … muscles, which sounds great and is,' Witmer said. 'But that comes at a cost, meaning it was difficult for the T. rex to move its head around with great speed and control. Allosaurus had a much lighter head.'”

All great stuff. The information they came up with was based on computer-generated studies that take into account soft tissues and not just bone structure. The articles call these computer generated dinosaurs the "future of paleontology," replacing the old bone-centric models that have been used historically.

Hunter S. on Kentucky Derby

Great second look or whatever they call it on Grantland, on a 1970 Hunter Thompson story by Louisville native Hunter Thompson on the Kentucky Derby. There is some commentary from Hunter's sidekick and cartoonist Ralph Steadman. The story originally appeared in some counterculture publication, which I guess you had back them. Here's a link to the entire story.

To tease you, here is a quote from it (It's Thompson talking to Steadman, who is from England, about the sketches he keeps drawing and giving to people.): "Fuck England," I said. "This is Middle America. These people regard what you're doing to them as a brutal, bilious insult. Look what happened last night. I thought my brother was going to tear your head off."

And so forth....

Bills Draft 2013

Just want to go on record as saying that I am in favor of the Bills drafting E.J. Manuel of Florida State in the first round this weekend. Think his strong arm, good size, and mobility make him a project that new head coach Doug Marrone thinks he can build into an all-pro - or at least a Pro Bowler. Marrone obviously felt he had gone as far as he could with his college QB Ryan Nassib of Syracuse.

I read a scouting report (that unfortunately, I can't seem to find the link to) where a couple Florida State watchers were really questioning Manuel's football aptitude - not his intelligence or work ethic, just his feel and innate understanding of the game. Not sure how much of an issue this is, but obviously something Marrone feels he can work with. We'll see. Proverbial upside potential is huge. Downside is that Marrone swings and misses, and I don't know that he has a back-up plan in place at the moment, but if he's really a good coach I would expect him to develop one. Remember the  Cowboys drafted Steve Walsh and Troy Aikman early on in Jimmy Johnson's career. Only one worked out. (For more on playing the odds keep reading.)

Also, this signing of D'Rick Rogers could be huge. For those of you who didn't click on the link, or haven't heard of him, he was an all-SEC receiver as a sophomore, but has had some pretty serious off-the-field problems (drugs and fighting I think are two of them) and pretty much got kicked off the Tennessee team. He transferred to Tennessee Tech and had a pretty good year this year - don't know who his QB was - including one game in which he had over 300 yards receiving.

Now, Rogers may or may not work out - but the reason the move is great for the Bills is because it's so sound from the process standpoint. What am I saying? Well, if you know me, I am definitely a fan of the Moneyball approach (I was an early Bill James reader in junior high) of exploiting what I'll call "market opportunities." (Moneyball is mainly about market inefficiencies, but this is something a little different.) Basically, we all know the Bills have trouble attracting prime veteran free agents due to their history of losing and probably location - without overpaying them. So, it's going to be very tough to build a team that way - as I think we kind of saw in this offseason. The draft is one way they can build, and it is weighted toward losing teams, so that helps. But, where else can Buffalo gain an edge over more successful franchises? I would think in recruiting UFAs like Rogers, because they see a chance to gain valuable playing time in Buffalo that they might not get anywhere else. I mean, seriously, Rogers could theoretically step in and start opposite Stevie Johnson next year. At least, I'm thinkin' that's what he was thinkin'.

So, great move by Buffalo, and hopefully some of their other UFAs went through the same thought process. Because, as I said, Rogers might not work out, but the plan in our player development should be to assemble as many highly rated prospects as possible and assume some will work out and some won't. Obviously, the more you have, the better chance of developing more better players. And as the guy on the AT&T? commercials, more is better, isn't it?

Kevin Kolb Sets Sights on Super Bowl

Really. You mean to tell me the erstwhile (love to use that word) Cardinals signal caller said he signed with the Bills because he wants to win a Super Bowl. This blogger blames multiple concussions Kolb has suffered throughout his career. Yes, that's what we've become...

Bills Making Headlines

Can't believe the Bills are relevant nationally, for the first time, well I guess since Trent Edwards started us 5-1 in 2008 before we collapsed. I'm hoping this year's team is fundamentally sounder. We seem to move the ball well, both through the air and on the ground - a good sign, of course if Freddie or Fitz goes down, all bets are off. And, our run defense seems much improved. As for the pass defense - four interceptions yesterday (off Brady of all people) was great, but you can't expect that every game. I'm thinking a pass rush is going to have to emerge at some point, for us to make the playoffs. We'll see....Merriman had like one pressure yesterday, on something like 40 attempts by Brady - so he was certainly not his old "Lights Out" self. I guess we can just continue to outscore people...

Cheers.

Ralph

At Least You're not a Bills Fan

From Bill Barnwell's daily update (of the current NFL free agent frenzy) on Grantland:

"Say a word for the Bills, who have to spend about $30 million or so to hit the salary floor by the end of this season. They started their arduous trek to the basement by giving 30-year-old cornerback Drayton Florence a three-year deal worth $15 million. They're sort of like the Panthers, but they don't even have the ability to woo most of their own free agents into re-signing for ghastly sums of money. Expect Donte Whitner to follow Paul Posluszny out the door. Some mid-tier free agents with a high tolerance for cold weather are about to become very happy people."

Vikings sign McNabb

Since, I see Dr. D. is reading the blog, I thought I'd solicit his thoughts on his Vikings latest veteran QB signing. While Donovan McNabb is probably a better guy than Brett Favre (although T.O. might not think so), I really don't know if you are going to be able to capture the same magic that Favre did with the Vikings a couple years ago. McNabb was kind of a washout with the Redskins last year - although he did have several good to great years with the Eagles. The Eagles, of course, seem like they can put anyone under center and make them a good QB - A.J. Feely, Kevin Kolb, and Michael Vick have also enjoyed success - albeit in shorter runs than McNabb - under Andy Reid at Philly.

What tools does Minnesota have to help McNabb succeed? Well, they just lost Sidney Rice as a free agent, and most people considered him to be their best receiver. I guess you still have Percy Harvin, who looks like he can ball a little. And T.O., Ochocinco, and Moss are all out there as free agents...I think it might be a long year for McNabb. (He does have A.P. to hand off too at least.)

McNabb's signing fits with a long-time Vikings tradition of utilizing veteran QBs vs. developing their own talent. In order, there has been Joe Kapp (from the CFL), Fran Tarkenton (started with the Vikes, but then traded to Giants before being brought back), Tommy Kramer (their own guy), the Denny Green era, which brough Jim McMahan, Warren Moon, Randall Cunningham and Jeff George into town, Dante Culpepper (their own guy), Favre and now McNabb. What does this say?

Reviving the Blog

Maybe...or maybe I just needed someplace to jot down this one thought. Since the original concept of a blog was some sort of on-line diary - was that it, a Web log complete with links - I guess it is serving its purpose.

Anyhow, I came across this post by Chuck Klosterman on Edgar Winter today and while it is your typical solid Chuck K. post (Chuck K. rocks - and he spent some time in Akron), it is even better because Johnny Winter, Edgar's brother, played 8 Great Tuesday's last night. Fairly remarkable show. Johnny, who like Edgar is an albino, is mentioned in this article as being one of the 100 greatest blues guitarist of all-time and he certainly rocked last night. It was your typical beautiful Tuesday night on the bay, temperature in the 70s and a somewhat cool breeze blowing in - certainly a welcome respite from the recent heat.

Johnny looked like he was about 90 years old and sat down most of the time, while playing. He actually had to be helped off the stage (and probably on I'm assuming, but I didn't see it). I was all hyped for a solid blues show, but didn't really get into it until I went down near the stage and stood like 50 feet and front of him and watched. It was mezmorizing. He actually stood up for a version of "It's All Over Now" and then closed things out with an absolutely smokin' version of Dylan's Hightway 61 Revisited. Great stuff (and all for free. He's playing at a bar in Cleveland tonight and tix are $40 a pop) and I wanted to tell someone about it - Klosterman really - but dammit, for some reason, they make it really hard to find the writers' e-mail addresses on Grantland. Find that very annoying.

Anyhow, there's a post for you -whoever stumbles up this.

Cheers.

Ralph

Moss Back With Vikings

Interesting post here on how the Pats were a better money team before Moss. Not sure I buy all of it, because other things changed for the Pats, like their defense got a lot worse, but still it makes many good points about Moss coming up short in the playoffs. Of course, I was the guy who predicted the Brady-Moss combination would be a disaster. Well, now the Patriots have traded Moss before they won any Super Bowls with him....well, I still think I was kind off base, but maybe not as bad as it initially looked when Brady and Moss teamed up to break the single season passing TD record in Moss' first year.

While I might not have agreed with the Pats bringing Moss in when they did, I certainly agree with their decision to get rid of him now. I thought he was much less effective last year than he had been in the past and really seemed to be coasting/heading downhill this year. Maybe moving back to Minnesota will cause him to reinvest himself in the game. We can only hope Favre is properly motivated to motivate Moss (as well as himself) or it's going to be a long season up on the plains of Minnesota. (Or maybe it won't really matter how motivated Moss is. Maybe he's just too old to be an elite receiver, based on the way he plays the game.)

It's no secret that Moss' contract is up after this year, and I think the Patriots really were leaning against resigning him. Funny thing is, if Favre doesn't come back next year (or the Vikes don't get another top-notch QB), I can't see why he would want to sign with them/they would want to sign him. This means that despite the trade, Moss will likely be a free agent next year. He has about 12 games-plus playoffs to proof he's still worth top dollar.

Joique Bell signed by Eagles

I don't know that it can get any worse, but the Eagles have signed one of my favorite Bills players off the practice squad. If you want to see how good Joique Bell is, watch this video. It's incredible. Granted, he's playing for Division II Wayne State (one of their opponents is Mercyhurst), but you got to love this kid's running style. He was apparently too slow to get drafted, but lit it up in the Bills first two preseason games, before fading and getting dropped to the practice squad.

Well, the Eagles saw enough in him to add him to their active roster, which means he's no longer a Bill. If recent trends hold true, Bell will likely go on to be, if not a star, a very good player in the NFL. After all, both Jets safety Jim Leonhard and Saints cornerback Jabari Greer were undrafted free agents "discovered" and developed by the Bills, before being allowed to leave the team as free agents, because they apparently weren't good enough to play for us, but now play key roles on championship caliber teams. Jason Peters was another UFA that we developed into a Pro Bowl player, but then decided we didn't want to pay and traded to the Eagles.

With brilliant personnel decisions like these, it's no wonder we're turning into a laughinstock for the league.

Bills Train Derailed...

Well, we all know the Bills stink, but here's the latest. It's from the stat geek Football Outsiders site-an article discussing the slew of quarterback benchings after only the second game of the season. It includes this great line about our now deposed starter Trent Edwards: "The question that coaches need to ask themselves before making a move: He's Derek Anderson. He's Matt Moore. He's Trent Edwards. What did you expect?"

And this sterling endorsement of our new starter Ryan Fitzpatrick: "Edwards is being replaced by Ryan Fitzpatrick, who's ranked 36th, 35th, and 36th in DVOA over his three seasons with significant playing time and has to rank as one of the worst quarterbacks in the modern era to get 23 starts." Yup, that's now our guy. The question now becomes, can the Bills win a game?

Outdoor TV

Seems to be the latest trend - what with the new digital projectors and flatscreen TVs that are extremely portable - not to mention that ability to stream Internet video through wireless connections. I think this is a good thing. Beteween Thursday and Sunday, I watched most of three football games outdoors (on video, not to mention that two grade shool games live on Saturday - I think I've OD'd on football). No doubt this outdoor viewing will become more difficult come November, but for now, the barbeque and beer sitting in the cooler sure is nice.



Ralph

Ford Winstar Recall

If you have Ford Winstar, year 1998 to 2003, you want to call the local Ford dealer and get your rear axle replaced. Ours cracked about 90% of the way through a couple months ago. I went online to do some research before taking it to the garage and found the federal government was doing an investigation on these vehicles. Apparently, the axles have a slight U-shape to them, and in states like ours (PA), where there is moisture and salt on the road most of the winter, this causes the axles to corrode. When these things reach 100,000 miles or so, they have a tendancy to crack.

As I said, we luckily (thanks to my wife's observation of the way the van was riding) caught ours before it snapped, because that can be both dangerous and ruin your tires. I drove my van down to the garage at about 10 mph and got a new axle put in for like $600, which is a lot cheaper than I read some other people paid.

Regardless, Ford issued a recall on these vehicles last week. I called Champion Ford in Erie, and they told me to come in for an inspection and bring the receipt. They said Ford will be sending us a check. Note: I have not heard from Ford yet that there is a recall, I just happened to see the story on-line. I guess I'm saying, don't be afraid to be proactive on this (and you suppedly get a free rental while they are doing the repairs.)

Cheers.

Ralph