After last year's series between the Suns and Spurs, there were tons of media members and their flocks of sheepish fans hollering that San Antonio won because of the "unfair" suspensions of Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw for game five. For those unfamiliar, the NBA dishes out automatic one-game suspensions to players who leave the bench area during an on-court fight. Incidents like this have happened in the past and have cost teams' advancement into the playoffs. Still, every once and awhile, an incident like this occurs again, and the media, fans, and penalized players all act as if they never knew of this rule.
The funny thing is that Phoenix almost won last year's game 5 without Stoudemire and Diaw. This just gives sportswriters and armchair fans more reason to complain. This was an intense series between two established teams. Some people feel that the suspensions ruined it, even though it still went 6 games. In fact, there are some that strongly feel the Suns were going to win this best of seven series, even though they still managed to lose 3 games in that series when their roster was at full strength.
Well this year, the Suns and Spurs just happened to be matched up in the first round. To make things more interesting, this was a different Suns team that now included Shaquille O'Neal. Much like last year's series, it got off to a great start. The first game went into double overtime, which the Spurs eventually won. But then San Antonio won the next two games easily, putting the Suns on the brink of elimination. Phoenix took game 4 to avoid the shame of being swept, but proceeded to lose game 5 to end the series.
There's no excuses this year. Fans and sports writers just need to accept that the Spurs are a damn good basketball team and the Suns are not. Sure, Phoenix is the sexier team. They play a fast tempo and score lots of points. They got highly skilled point guard who dishes out tons of assists, and we all know how white people love assists. They also have an athletic big man who can dominate the paint. But they cannot match the Spurs' defense, and as the old cliche goes: defense wins championships.
And if you're wondering why I care so much about this, it's because I'm a big Spurs fan. No, I'm not a "front-runner." I started watching this team during the days of David Robinson, Dennis Rodman, Sean Elliot, Avery Johnson, and Vinny Del Negro (which is Spanish for Vinny of the Black).
Why the Spurs? I grew up in North Dakota and really had no geographical allegiance to any pro basketball team. I started really watching pro basketball around the age of 12. This was the time that Michael Jordan was in his first retirement. The first few NBA Finals I really watched were the Rockets-Knicks and Rockets-Magic back in the mid-nineties. Because I was pretty tall and played center on my basketball team, I became a big fan of all the great centers playing at that time. David Robinson was my favorite and who I identified with the most. He didn't have the fancy footwork of Hakeem Olajuwan or the freakish size of Shaq and Patrick Ewing. But he was athletic, ran the floor well on fast breaks, and blocked shots. This is what I took pride in doing well, too.
And so my allegiance to David and the Spurs began. It only grew with the addition of another great center/power forward, Tim Duncan. While I have adopted a new geographical allegiance with the Minnesota Timberwolves, I'll still be cheering for the Spurs when they are not playing my current home team.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Overflowing with Optimism
Despite the presence of a first round draft pick this weekend, people around here have been pretty damn giddy about the Vikings lately. Most of this has to do with the trade for Kansas City's Jared Allen last week. The Vikings aquired the NFL's sack leader of 2007 for a first rounder, two third rounders, and an exchange of sixth round picks. Combined with the indestructible "Williams Wall," the addition of Allen looks to make the Vikings defensive line the most feared in all of the NFL. And as all armchair fans will preach: a good defense starts up front. With increased pash rush coming from the line, the defense won't need to blitz as much. This will allow the linebackers and secondary to concentrate more on coverage and pass defense; an area where the Vikings struggled last year.
I've never seen such unrestrained optimism from Minnesota football fans and media. I feel I need to balance some of the optimism with a little glass-half-empty perspective. The factor that you can't control, and therefore don't weigh in to your Super Bowl speculation, is injuries. You have a league of full grown, 300 pound men smacking the piss out of each other for up to 20 weeks. If Allen or one of the Williams tackles gets injured, do the Vikings have the depth to cover that loss? The Vikings are also relying on young quarterbacking and recieving crews this season. The natural assumption is that they will all improve after another year of experience, but that's just an assumption. After all, did you track Troy Williamson's improvement through the past few years?
What I would be looking forward to after last weekend's draft and big trade acquisition if I owned a stake in the Vikings franchise is replica jersey sales. Here's a look at what I consider big names that the team should market:
Adrian Peterson - This is obvious. Rookie of the Year. League leading running back who puts up insane stats and rattles of jaw-dropping plays. Not only is he the face of the franchise, he also is widely recognized as one of the NFL's best new players. This will help in both local and national sales of his jersey.
Jared Allen - Not only is this guy the reigning NFL sack leader and an all-around engaging personality, but he also proudly wears the number 69. In fact, he even opened up a sports bar back in Kansas City that prominently displays the sexually suggestive number. This should be a big seller for the white male segment of Viking fans who can identify with another big white guy who wears a cowboy hat and has multiple DUI's.
John David Booty - The X-factor in jersey sales. If this guy ever becomes the starting quarteback, then they will sell through the roof. I think this will be a big hit amongst the female segment of Vikings fans. Just how the number 69 is bound to appeal to a bunch of immature, giggling guys; the name Booty printed on the back of a jersey would seem to appeal to immature, giggling ladies.
I've never seen such unrestrained optimism from Minnesota football fans and media. I feel I need to balance some of the optimism with a little glass-half-empty perspective. The factor that you can't control, and therefore don't weigh in to your Super Bowl speculation, is injuries. You have a league of full grown, 300 pound men smacking the piss out of each other for up to 20 weeks. If Allen or one of the Williams tackles gets injured, do the Vikings have the depth to cover that loss? The Vikings are also relying on young quarterbacking and recieving crews this season. The natural assumption is that they will all improve after another year of experience, but that's just an assumption. After all, did you track Troy Williamson's improvement through the past few years?
What I would be looking forward to after last weekend's draft and big trade acquisition if I owned a stake in the Vikings franchise is replica jersey sales. Here's a look at what I consider big names that the team should market:
Adrian Peterson - This is obvious. Rookie of the Year. League leading running back who puts up insane stats and rattles of jaw-dropping plays. Not only is he the face of the franchise, he also is widely recognized as one of the NFL's best new players. This will help in both local and national sales of his jersey.
Jared Allen - Not only is this guy the reigning NFL sack leader and an all-around engaging personality, but he also proudly wears the number 69. In fact, he even opened up a sports bar back in Kansas City that prominently displays the sexually suggestive number. This should be a big seller for the white male segment of Viking fans who can identify with another big white guy who wears a cowboy hat and has multiple DUI's.
John David Booty - The X-factor in jersey sales. If this guy ever becomes the starting quarteback, then they will sell through the roof. I think this will be a big hit amongst the female segment of Vikings fans. Just how the number 69 is bound to appeal to a bunch of immature, giggling guys; the name Booty printed on the back of a jersey would seem to appeal to immature, giggling ladies.
Friday, April 25, 2008
The "Whiskey Tastes Better..." Book Club
Being an unemployed schmuck, I have a lot of free time on my hands. I decided to keep my mind sharp by reading books instead of just random nonsense on the internet. I even got myself a library card. Here's the tabs on what I've been reading in the past couple of months.
Gangsters and Goodfellas by Henry Hill - This is basically an autobiography by the guy who was the main character in the movie Goodfellas, which is odd because the movie was based on a book called Wiseguy, written by Nicholas Peliggi who got most of his information from Henry Hill. So you got a movie and two different books that all tell the same story(I assume, since I have yet to read Wiseguy).
Anyhow, the entire first half of the book was a recount of everything I saw in the movie. It was still pretty interesting and gave a lot more information. It was well written, too. Everytime I started reading it, I felt like I was listening to Ray Liota narrate the entire thing.
The second half tells the story from where the movie left off. It details his life on the run in the witness protection program and talks about his struggles with his wife, family, girlfriends, and drug dependency. He also talks a lot about food and it makes me want to cook more. This guy loved to cook and later published his own cookbook.
American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis - Another book I picked up due to seeing the movie first. After reading this, I have a lot more respect for the people who made this movie. I mean, I respected them already and loved the movie, but it blew my mind after reading the book and seeing how well they adapted it to the screen. Most people get upset when they see a favorite book made into a movie because they fear it's going to suck like most movies do. But this was done so well.
The book can get a bit boring at times because just like in the movie, the lead character obsessively describes every material good in full detail. Sometimes it was nothing but full pages of descriptions of everybody's suits, ties, shirts, pants, shoes, jewelry, fragrences, and hair products. I know it's supposed to show Patrick Bateman's inhuman nature by caring more about what clothes people are wearing rather than caring about the actual person themselves, but it gets a little dry and repetitive after a while.
The pages of gory detail of how he tortures and mutilates some of his victims are a lot more interesting. It is very graphic, though. I found myself unable to put the book down once I started reading those chapters, but then felt a little sick to my stomach afterwards.
Heart of a Soldier by James B. Stewart - This book was lent to me by my roommate. Over a few beers one night, he started raving about it and billed it as a true story about a guy who "predicted 9/11." Immediately I thought this was asinine and I told him so, but he kept insisting that I just have to read it. So I eventually did. My motivation was to read it, thoroughly criticize the book, and call my roommate a dumbass for believing that nonsense.
Well, it turns out to be not that bad of a book. His "9/11 prediction" wasn't exactly how he hyped it. I was expecting the book to be about some whacko who is making this claim just so he can sell some books. It was actually about two soldiers, one American and one British, who meet and become instant friends. Their pursuit of adventure leads them both to military officer training and serving in Vietnam. Their lives get more interesting after the army, as one of them converts to Islam and voluntarily goes to Afghanistan just have the opportunity to fight against the Soviet Union.
Now about the "9/11 prediction", one of the guys in the book is given an assignment in his military officer training class to start World War III. He comes up with the idea to crash a cargo plane packed with explosives into the capitol building during the president's State of the Union address, effectively wiping out all of our nation's elected leaders. They also draw up similar scenarios to prepare for when one of them heads up a security team working in the World Trade Center. Not exactly a prediction, but more of speculation.
Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer - This book keeps with the current trend you may see of me reading books that are now made into movies. I have yet to see this film, though. It is rare that I actually read a book before going to see the film adaptation of the story.
Anyhow, I really enjoyed this book. Even though I feel I'm too smart(or too lazy) to be such a strong idealist, I still found the story somewhat inspiring. I'll probably never go to such extremes as to give up all of my possessions and vanish from mainstream society, but this book lets me know that I can. Much like Fight Club (another book/movie), this story has an anti-materialism theme. It makes me feel a sense of relief that if things don't work out the way I want it, I can just drive my car out west until I have to abandon it, light all of my cash on fire, and hitchhike to Alaska. Actually, I would try hitchhiking down south to Central America where it's a bit warmer. There also might be monkeys down there, which would be much more pleasant to encounter instead of giant grizzly bears up north.
*****
Currently reading: Intercollegiate Athletics and the American University by James J. Duderstadt
Gangsters and Goodfellas by Henry Hill - This is basically an autobiography by the guy who was the main character in the movie Goodfellas, which is odd because the movie was based on a book called Wiseguy, written by Nicholas Peliggi who got most of his information from Henry Hill. So you got a movie and two different books that all tell the same story(I assume, since I have yet to read Wiseguy).
Anyhow, the entire first half of the book was a recount of everything I saw in the movie. It was still pretty interesting and gave a lot more information. It was well written, too. Everytime I started reading it, I felt like I was listening to Ray Liota narrate the entire thing.
The second half tells the story from where the movie left off. It details his life on the run in the witness protection program and talks about his struggles with his wife, family, girlfriends, and drug dependency. He also talks a lot about food and it makes me want to cook more. This guy loved to cook and later published his own cookbook.
American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis - Another book I picked up due to seeing the movie first. After reading this, I have a lot more respect for the people who made this movie. I mean, I respected them already and loved the movie, but it blew my mind after reading the book and seeing how well they adapted it to the screen. Most people get upset when they see a favorite book made into a movie because they fear it's going to suck like most movies do. But this was done so well.
The book can get a bit boring at times because just like in the movie, the lead character obsessively describes every material good in full detail. Sometimes it was nothing but full pages of descriptions of everybody's suits, ties, shirts, pants, shoes, jewelry, fragrences, and hair products. I know it's supposed to show Patrick Bateman's inhuman nature by caring more about what clothes people are wearing rather than caring about the actual person themselves, but it gets a little dry and repetitive after a while.
The pages of gory detail of how he tortures and mutilates some of his victims are a lot more interesting. It is very graphic, though. I found myself unable to put the book down once I started reading those chapters, but then felt a little sick to my stomach afterwards.
Heart of a Soldier by James B. Stewart - This book was lent to me by my roommate. Over a few beers one night, he started raving about it and billed it as a true story about a guy who "predicted 9/11." Immediately I thought this was asinine and I told him so, but he kept insisting that I just have to read it. So I eventually did. My motivation was to read it, thoroughly criticize the book, and call my roommate a dumbass for believing that nonsense.
Well, it turns out to be not that bad of a book. His "9/11 prediction" wasn't exactly how he hyped it. I was expecting the book to be about some whacko who is making this claim just so he can sell some books. It was actually about two soldiers, one American and one British, who meet and become instant friends. Their pursuit of adventure leads them both to military officer training and serving in Vietnam. Their lives get more interesting after the army, as one of them converts to Islam and voluntarily goes to Afghanistan just have the opportunity to fight against the Soviet Union.
Now about the "9/11 prediction", one of the guys in the book is given an assignment in his military officer training class to start World War III. He comes up with the idea to crash a cargo plane packed with explosives into the capitol building during the president's State of the Union address, effectively wiping out all of our nation's elected leaders. They also draw up similar scenarios to prepare for when one of them heads up a security team working in the World Trade Center. Not exactly a prediction, but more of speculation.
Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer - This book keeps with the current trend you may see of me reading books that are now made into movies. I have yet to see this film, though. It is rare that I actually read a book before going to see the film adaptation of the story.
Anyhow, I really enjoyed this book. Even though I feel I'm too smart(or too lazy) to be such a strong idealist, I still found the story somewhat inspiring. I'll probably never go to such extremes as to give up all of my possessions and vanish from mainstream society, but this book lets me know that I can. Much like Fight Club (another book/movie), this story has an anti-materialism theme. It makes me feel a sense of relief that if things don't work out the way I want it, I can just drive my car out west until I have to abandon it, light all of my cash on fire, and hitchhike to Alaska. Actually, I would try hitchhiking down south to Central America where it's a bit warmer. There also might be monkeys down there, which would be much more pleasant to encounter instead of giant grizzly bears up north.
*****
Currently reading: Intercollegiate Athletics and the American University by James J. Duderstadt
I like the idea of hockey
As mentioned in an earlier post, I enjoy reading the blog entitled Stuff White People Like. I find lots of eerie parallels with the items on their list and my own life. The one that inspired this post today was item #80: The Idea of Soccer. Except in my case, it would be hockey instead of soccer. I still think soccer is pretty lame and not even a trip overseas will change my mind. But let me explain why I like the idea of hockey and not just hockey by itself.
I grew up in rural North Dakota. We had a little outdoor skating rink in the winter, but no indoor facilities to play year round. As a kid, I'd goof around and play some pond hockey with friends after school in the winter. But we never had any official games, coaching, or suitable equipment. Even if we did have all of that, we would never have had enough kids to form a team.
In small schools, you barely have enough athletes to put together a solid basketball and wrestling team during the same season. These two sports dominate the winter in North Dakota small towns. If they started a hockey program at these schools, all three sports would see a decline in quality players. So I never was exposed to playing organized hockey. I played baseball, basketball, and football; three sports which I now watch and follow with an obsession today.
Not to say there's no hockey in North Dakota. There is. But it's only played at the larger Class A schools that we don't compete with in sports. And of course, there's UND college hockey. But I never really watched it on television because I didn't really know or understand the sport. The closest I got to watching hockey back then was when I'd play Blades of Steel on Nintendo (and later, Stanley Cup for the Super Nintendo).
These are the reasons why I never really liked hockey. Now on to how I grew to like the idea of hockey.
It started with my move to college in Minnesota, the self-proclaimed State of Hockey. I got a job working down at the Xcel Energy Center where the Minnesota Wild played. I started to see the loyal following that this sport has in the Twin Cities and feel the excitement.
This excitement was compounded when the Gophers won the NCAA championship in men's hockey my freshmen year. I watched the game, but mostly I was just chatting with friends while the TV was on and only looking at the screen when I would hear the foghorn blast after a goal was scored. After they won, my friend Elliot and I took to the streets of Dinkytown. We celebrated by singing the Rouser multiple times that night with drunken students while we constantly ran to avoid clouds of tear gas that the police were shooting at us. We finally found a good place to hang out and watch the chaos unfold while a female friend of ours would sneak into a frat house and bring us out drinks. This night ensured the idea of hockey would forever be held in the highest regard in my mind.
In the following years I would start to recognize Friday and Saturday nights in the winter as hockey nights. If I was hanging out with friends at my apartment, the TV was always on in the background with the Gophers game. I even check scores, standings, and schedules just so I can sprinkle "The Wild won last night," or "The Gophers got a big series with St. Cloud State this weekend" into my conversations. It makes me feel superior when I talk to my friends back at home who went to NDSU and didn't have a college hockey team. I even went as far to consider buying a U of M hockey jersey, and I still might do it.
Yet I really don't like hockey as much as the idea of it. I don't know if I'll ever really follow a hockey team the way I religiously read every news tidbit about basketball, football, and baseball teams. I can sit down and watch an entire game, but at the end not be able to give any type of insightful analysis of what I just saw. But I still like the idea of hockey, and maybe someday it will click with me. Until then, my biggest hope is that we win another championship with the Wild or Gophers so I can watch another riot.
I grew up in rural North Dakota. We had a little outdoor skating rink in the winter, but no indoor facilities to play year round. As a kid, I'd goof around and play some pond hockey with friends after school in the winter. But we never had any official games, coaching, or suitable equipment. Even if we did have all of that, we would never have had enough kids to form a team.
In small schools, you barely have enough athletes to put together a solid basketball and wrestling team during the same season. These two sports dominate the winter in North Dakota small towns. If they started a hockey program at these schools, all three sports would see a decline in quality players. So I never was exposed to playing organized hockey. I played baseball, basketball, and football; three sports which I now watch and follow with an obsession today.
Not to say there's no hockey in North Dakota. There is. But it's only played at the larger Class A schools that we don't compete with in sports. And of course, there's UND college hockey. But I never really watched it on television because I didn't really know or understand the sport. The closest I got to watching hockey back then was when I'd play Blades of Steel on Nintendo (and later, Stanley Cup for the Super Nintendo).
These are the reasons why I never really liked hockey. Now on to how I grew to like the idea of hockey.
It started with my move to college in Minnesota, the self-proclaimed State of Hockey. I got a job working down at the Xcel Energy Center where the Minnesota Wild played. I started to see the loyal following that this sport has in the Twin Cities and feel the excitement.
This excitement was compounded when the Gophers won the NCAA championship in men's hockey my freshmen year. I watched the game, but mostly I was just chatting with friends while the TV was on and only looking at the screen when I would hear the foghorn blast after a goal was scored. After they won, my friend Elliot and I took to the streets of Dinkytown. We celebrated by singing the Rouser multiple times that night with drunken students while we constantly ran to avoid clouds of tear gas that the police were shooting at us. We finally found a good place to hang out and watch the chaos unfold while a female friend of ours would sneak into a frat house and bring us out drinks. This night ensured the idea of hockey would forever be held in the highest regard in my mind.
In the following years I would start to recognize Friday and Saturday nights in the winter as hockey nights. If I was hanging out with friends at my apartment, the TV was always on in the background with the Gophers game. I even check scores, standings, and schedules just so I can sprinkle "The Wild won last night," or "The Gophers got a big series with St. Cloud State this weekend" into my conversations. It makes me feel superior when I talk to my friends back at home who went to NDSU and didn't have a college hockey team. I even went as far to consider buying a U of M hockey jersey, and I still might do it.
Yet I really don't like hockey as much as the idea of it. I don't know if I'll ever really follow a hockey team the way I religiously read every news tidbit about basketball, football, and baseball teams. I can sit down and watch an entire game, but at the end not be able to give any type of insightful analysis of what I just saw. But I still like the idea of hockey, and maybe someday it will click with me. Until then, my biggest hope is that we win another championship with the Wild or Gophers so I can watch another riot.
Sunday, April 20, 2008
So It Begins...
Last week, new plans for a football stadium to be built in Los Angeles were released. Coincidentally, the model prominently displays the color purple in the stadium seats. Before reading too much into that, know that the guy who is building it, billionaire Ed Roski, Jr., is also a part owner of the Lakers and Kings, both whom feature the color purple in their logos and uniforms.
But the obvious thought is that this will put pressure on the state of Minnesota to figure out their stadium situation soon. I assume this stadium is pretty much a done deal since it's privately funded and there won't be the hassle of going to the California state legislature for public money. The Vikings are also fixing to be out of the Metrodome by 2011. They'll either be playing in the Gophers' TCF Bank Stadium while a new Vikings stadium is being built in downtown Minneapolis, or they will be playing in a different city and state.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out for a number of reasons.
First, I am anxious to see what team will actually be relocating to Los Angeles. The article mentioned not only the Vikings, but the Chargers, Jaguars, and Saints as other potential suitors. All of these teams are located in smaller media markets with less than desirable stadiums. If the Vikings do leave the Twin Cities, it does not necessarily mark the end of NFL in our state. The Twin Cities area is the 15th largest television media market in the United States. San Diego is the 27th largest. Jacksonville is 49. New Orleans is 53. If the teams in these cities can't get new stadiums built, then they'll keep looking to relocate. The Twin Cites would now be the largest market without an NFL team, making it the most attractive option.
The second thing that I'm interested in seeing is how Vikings owner Zygi Wilf uses this to his advantage. Being located in the 2nd largest TV market would be attractive, but ultimately you can build a state-of-the-art new stadium anywhere in this country and it will sell out every Sunday. I think he'll use the new stadium in LA as leverage to pressure the state into funding a new stadium here in Minneapolis. If it works, then great. We'll be seeing a new football venue here. If not, then I wonder if he actually will make the move or if it was just a bluff. Or maybe another team will make the move to LA and destroy his leverage while he's still lobbying for a new stadium here.
Last, I wonder if Edward P. Roski, Jr.'s new stadium will signal the end of publicly financed sports venues. Will cities all over America collectively show some backbone and now point to Los Angeles when team owners are asking for public money to fund stadiums? I hope this is the case. While I love pro sports and going to games in shiny new ballparks, arenas, and stadiums; I still feel like there should be a better way of getting these places funded privately.
As it stands, the total cost of the proposed Vikings stadium is about $1 billion total. Zygi Wilf is opposed to the idea of a retractable roof, but the Metropolitan Sports Commission wants it because it will enable them to use the stadium for more than just football and bring events such as the Final Four or Superbowl back to Minnesota. The cost of the retractable roof is about $250 million, or a quarter of the total stadium cost. In a perfect world, the Metropolitan Sports Commission would fund the cost of the roof with public money, and Zygi would pay for the rest of the stadium.
I guess we'll see what happens. Like I said, it will be interesting.
But the obvious thought is that this will put pressure on the state of Minnesota to figure out their stadium situation soon. I assume this stadium is pretty much a done deal since it's privately funded and there won't be the hassle of going to the California state legislature for public money. The Vikings are also fixing to be out of the Metrodome by 2011. They'll either be playing in the Gophers' TCF Bank Stadium while a new Vikings stadium is being built in downtown Minneapolis, or they will be playing in a different city and state.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out for a number of reasons.
First, I am anxious to see what team will actually be relocating to Los Angeles. The article mentioned not only the Vikings, but the Chargers, Jaguars, and Saints as other potential suitors. All of these teams are located in smaller media markets with less than desirable stadiums. If the Vikings do leave the Twin Cities, it does not necessarily mark the end of NFL in our state. The Twin Cities area is the 15th largest television media market in the United States. San Diego is the 27th largest. Jacksonville is 49. New Orleans is 53. If the teams in these cities can't get new stadiums built, then they'll keep looking to relocate. The Twin Cites would now be the largest market without an NFL team, making it the most attractive option.
The second thing that I'm interested in seeing is how Vikings owner Zygi Wilf uses this to his advantage. Being located in the 2nd largest TV market would be attractive, but ultimately you can build a state-of-the-art new stadium anywhere in this country and it will sell out every Sunday. I think he'll use the new stadium in LA as leverage to pressure the state into funding a new stadium here in Minneapolis. If it works, then great. We'll be seeing a new football venue here. If not, then I wonder if he actually will make the move or if it was just a bluff. Or maybe another team will make the move to LA and destroy his leverage while he's still lobbying for a new stadium here.
Last, I wonder if Edward P. Roski, Jr.'s new stadium will signal the end of publicly financed sports venues. Will cities all over America collectively show some backbone and now point to Los Angeles when team owners are asking for public money to fund stadiums? I hope this is the case. While I love pro sports and going to games in shiny new ballparks, arenas, and stadiums; I still feel like there should be a better way of getting these places funded privately.
As it stands, the total cost of the proposed Vikings stadium is about $1 billion total. Zygi Wilf is opposed to the idea of a retractable roof, but the Metropolitan Sports Commission wants it because it will enable them to use the stadium for more than just football and bring events such as the Final Four or Superbowl back to Minnesota. The cost of the retractable roof is about $250 million, or a quarter of the total stadium cost. In a perfect world, the Metropolitan Sports Commission would fund the cost of the roof with public money, and Zygi would pay for the rest of the stadium.
I guess we'll see what happens. Like I said, it will be interesting.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Blogroll!
I've added a couple new links to my "Stuff I Like to Read" and I figured I'd go ahead and give my two faithful readers a rundown of what all of this nonsense is. Here we go!
AOL Fanhouse - This is pretty much where reading sports blogs began for me. Actually, I take that back. I started reading a blog by Dan Shanoff, who used to have a daily column called "The Daily Quickie" over at ESPN.com's Page 2. "The Daily Quickie" was a fun read because he just gave a quick line or two about every major sports story of the day. His blog gives him more freedom to expand on his thoughts, and I eventually became too irritated about some of his asinine opinions.
The good that came out of this is that he would link to a bunch of other blogs, including the AOL Fanhouse. The Fanhouse is a giant conglomerate of bloggers that cover just about every major sport. I don't even go to ESPN for sports news anymore, because these guys are on top of every major sport story and more.
Common Sense Has A Voice - This a leftist political blog written by my friend Josh "Swany" Swanson. He's a small town North Dakota guy like myself. He did work for the Ed Schultz talk radio show and is now in law school at Creighton. As you can imagine from a law student, he does pretty good research on the stuff he writes about and provides good insight. That doesn't stop him from posting the occassional fiery tirade every now and then.
Every Day Should Be Saturday - This blog is probably the most popular college football blog out there. This guy does more than just regurgitate the news. He adds a lot of different things to make his blog more about entertaining the readers. Notable, recurring posts include USC head coach Pete Carroll's Facebook page updates and Mustache Wednesdays.
EDSBS is also notorious for keeping track of what they call "The Fulmer Cup". This is a scored, offseason "competition" to see which football program can rack up the most points for players getting in trouble with the law. Currently, Missouri holds the lead.
Gopher Gold - This blog is run by the three reporters at the Star Tribune who cover Gopher sports. Unfortunately, Chip Scoggins and Myron Medcalf, the two guys who cover football and men's basketball, rarely post updates. When they do, it's usually just a preview of the article that is running in tomorrow's paper.
Roman Augustoviz, however, does an excellent job of covering men's hockey and often posts about wrestling, women's hockey, women's basketball, and other non-major sports at the U. If you want good, in-depth reporting on any of these sports, Roman is your guy. He updates constantly, too, with a new post almost every day.
Gopher Illustrated - This is the Rivals.com affiliate for Gopher sports. It mostly covers mostly recruiting and a lot of their articles and info require a subscription to access. I am one of those nerds who has a subscription. The guys running the site provide daily updates from recruits all across the country, and this isn't even their day job. It's a pretty interesting process to follow.
Idealism Never Goes Out of Fashion - One of the new links, this is a personal blog written by my friend Becca, who is currently studying in New Zealand. Her rants and muses vary in topic, ranging from party planning to the complexities of online shopping outside of the United States. Regardless of the topic, her posts are often quite detailed and written exactly how she speaks, which is sometimes hard to do well.
I'm o.k., I'm all write - This is another personal blog written by another personal friend, Elliot. Elliot and I were roommates one fateful semester at the U. We had some pretty good times, which included watching downloaded Simpsons episodes, drinking cheap vodka, and playing Star Wars: Dark Forces simultaneously on both the computer and Playstation. All good things must come to an end, and the gooder these things are, the quicker they end. That semester lead to me being put on probation due to poor grades and Elliot being suspended due to poor grades. These were dark times, my friends.
The sun came up the next day, though, and we're both doing fine. He's now happily married and back in school with on new focus on his passion of writing. His updates have been slower lately, but when he does post, he also has a good portion of devout readers for a personal blog. They usually have entertaining comments to keep checking during down times.
MinnPost - Another new link, this is an independent newspaper here in Minneapolis. The columnists seem to be pretty entertaining and insightful, but the thing I like most about this site is an article called "The Daily Glean". Similar to "The Daily Quickie" I mentioned earlier, this is a quick rundown of all the major local news stories of the day. It's almost like reading the transcript from a local news TV broadcast, except it contains links to the original stories so you can get more detail.
Paging Jim Shikenjanski - An oddly titled Gopher sports blog that mainly focuses on basketball (Jim Shikenjanski was a former Gopher basketball player; as to my knowledge, I don't believe Jim Shikenjanski is the author of this blog). This guy gives pretty solid analysis on basketball, but his posts on football are of the average talk radio blowhard variety. He's going to be ending his blog and starting up his own Gopher sports news site soon, so this should be pretty exciting.
Randball - Very entertaining sports blog and quite surprising for being affiliated with the Star-Tribune. Michael Rand just seems to spit out all of his thoughts straight through his fingers and onto the keyboard of his computer. This just seems the way that blogs should be written. Just un-edited thoughts spewed everywhere with no need to make anything look pretty.
Stuff White People Like - I never really understood "redneck humor" a la Jeff Foxworthy and Larry the Cable Guy. Sure, I grew up in a small rural town with people who may fit some of these jokes, but ultimately these comedians were simply making fun of white people who were poor and uneducated. It just came off as mean more than anything.
Along comes this humor blog to finally stick it to the upper-middle class white people. It's pretty damn amusing, and I find myself reading posts thinking either a) It's funny because it perfectly describes me, b) It's funny because it perfectly describes people I know, or c) It's funny because I was briefly offended and said, "Well, not all white people like that particular item," before realizing that that's what a stereotype is.
Sunday Morning Quarterback - While a lot of sports blogs just regurgitate news and try to add a funny quip or picture to compliment the story, this guy actually does some pretty hardcore statistical analysis. And it's pretty good, too. I've tried to run some of these stats to try and prove something else and then e-mail it to him, but he covers just about every base.
The Wizard of Odds - If you want every little tidbit of college football news from around the country, this is the place to go. This guy doesn't write a lot of original content, but he scours just about every major newspaper website for any article or column that's related to college football. I like to start my day off with this one.
TNABACG - The title of this blog used to be "The National Anthem Before a Cubs Game", but is now simply TNABACG with the appropriate tagline "Minnesota sports, poorly acronymed". The writer, Jon, used to be a columnist for the Minnesota Daily. His blog covers just about any Minnesota sports related news and is updated about three times a day.
I was once given a shout out on that blog because I shared an interesting article with him in the comments section. Unfortunately, I was to lazy to sign in with my blogger account and just gave the simple, mostly annonymous moniker, "Chris".
Curses! This could have drawn hundreds of new readers to my blog. Oh, well. I don't want to get too big too soon.
Twins Ballpark 2010 - The writer started this blog shortly after legislation was passed to fund the new Twins ballpark. He has posted on numerous subjects and relentlessly followed the process of getting this stadium designed and built. He showed up to public meetings and sent lots of feedback to Twins officials from himself and his readers. He came up with the idea of transplanting a flagpole from a local VFW in Richfield to the new stadium. What's the significance? That flagpole was originally the flagpole at the old Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington before that venue was demolished to make way for the Mall of America. He communicated his idea to the right people and they liked it.
There haven't been too many updates recently, because not a whole lot is happening except for the actual construction. But if you find this sort of stuff interesting, I recommend going back and reading his first post and continue on to learn about the entire process. It's good reading.
*****
If you have ever wondered what kind of nonsense my brain is absorbing on a daily basis, that was it. I hope you find it enlightening.
AOL Fanhouse - This is pretty much where reading sports blogs began for me. Actually, I take that back. I started reading a blog by Dan Shanoff, who used to have a daily column called "The Daily Quickie" over at ESPN.com's Page 2. "The Daily Quickie" was a fun read because he just gave a quick line or two about every major sports story of the day. His blog gives him more freedom to expand on his thoughts, and I eventually became too irritated about some of his asinine opinions.
The good that came out of this is that he would link to a bunch of other blogs, including the AOL Fanhouse. The Fanhouse is a giant conglomerate of bloggers that cover just about every major sport. I don't even go to ESPN for sports news anymore, because these guys are on top of every major sport story and more.
Common Sense Has A Voice - This a leftist political blog written by my friend Josh "Swany" Swanson. He's a small town North Dakota guy like myself. He did work for the Ed Schultz talk radio show and is now in law school at Creighton. As you can imagine from a law student, he does pretty good research on the stuff he writes about and provides good insight. That doesn't stop him from posting the occassional fiery tirade every now and then.
Every Day Should Be Saturday - This blog is probably the most popular college football blog out there. This guy does more than just regurgitate the news. He adds a lot of different things to make his blog more about entertaining the readers. Notable, recurring posts include USC head coach Pete Carroll's Facebook page updates and Mustache Wednesdays.
EDSBS is also notorious for keeping track of what they call "The Fulmer Cup". This is a scored, offseason "competition" to see which football program can rack up the most points for players getting in trouble with the law. Currently, Missouri holds the lead.
Gopher Gold - This blog is run by the three reporters at the Star Tribune who cover Gopher sports. Unfortunately, Chip Scoggins and Myron Medcalf, the two guys who cover football and men's basketball, rarely post updates. When they do, it's usually just a preview of the article that is running in tomorrow's paper.
Roman Augustoviz, however, does an excellent job of covering men's hockey and often posts about wrestling, women's hockey, women's basketball, and other non-major sports at the U. If you want good, in-depth reporting on any of these sports, Roman is your guy. He updates constantly, too, with a new post almost every day.
Gopher Illustrated - This is the Rivals.com affiliate for Gopher sports. It mostly covers mostly recruiting and a lot of their articles and info require a subscription to access. I am one of those nerds who has a subscription. The guys running the site provide daily updates from recruits all across the country, and this isn't even their day job. It's a pretty interesting process to follow.
Idealism Never Goes Out of Fashion - One of the new links, this is a personal blog written by my friend Becca, who is currently studying in New Zealand. Her rants and muses vary in topic, ranging from party planning to the complexities of online shopping outside of the United States. Regardless of the topic, her posts are often quite detailed and written exactly how she speaks, which is sometimes hard to do well.
I'm o.k., I'm all write - This is another personal blog written by another personal friend, Elliot. Elliot and I were roommates one fateful semester at the U. We had some pretty good times, which included watching downloaded Simpsons episodes, drinking cheap vodka, and playing Star Wars: Dark Forces simultaneously on both the computer and Playstation. All good things must come to an end, and the gooder these things are, the quicker they end. That semester lead to me being put on probation due to poor grades and Elliot being suspended due to poor grades. These were dark times, my friends.
The sun came up the next day, though, and we're both doing fine. He's now happily married and back in school with on new focus on his passion of writing. His updates have been slower lately, but when he does post, he also has a good portion of devout readers for a personal blog. They usually have entertaining comments to keep checking during down times.
MinnPost - Another new link, this is an independent newspaper here in Minneapolis. The columnists seem to be pretty entertaining and insightful, but the thing I like most about this site is an article called "The Daily Glean". Similar to "The Daily Quickie" I mentioned earlier, this is a quick rundown of all the major local news stories of the day. It's almost like reading the transcript from a local news TV broadcast, except it contains links to the original stories so you can get more detail.
Paging Jim Shikenjanski - An oddly titled Gopher sports blog that mainly focuses on basketball (Jim Shikenjanski was a former Gopher basketball player; as to my knowledge, I don't believe Jim Shikenjanski is the author of this blog). This guy gives pretty solid analysis on basketball, but his posts on football are of the average talk radio blowhard variety. He's going to be ending his blog and starting up his own Gopher sports news site soon, so this should be pretty exciting.
Randball - Very entertaining sports blog and quite surprising for being affiliated with the Star-Tribune. Michael Rand just seems to spit out all of his thoughts straight through his fingers and onto the keyboard of his computer. This just seems the way that blogs should be written. Just un-edited thoughts spewed everywhere with no need to make anything look pretty.
Stuff White People Like - I never really understood "redneck humor" a la Jeff Foxworthy and Larry the Cable Guy. Sure, I grew up in a small rural town with people who may fit some of these jokes, but ultimately these comedians were simply making fun of white people who were poor and uneducated. It just came off as mean more than anything.
Along comes this humor blog to finally stick it to the upper-middle class white people. It's pretty damn amusing, and I find myself reading posts thinking either a) It's funny because it perfectly describes me, b) It's funny because it perfectly describes people I know, or c) It's funny because I was briefly offended and said, "Well, not all white people like that particular item," before realizing that that's what a stereotype is.
Sunday Morning Quarterback - While a lot of sports blogs just regurgitate news and try to add a funny quip or picture to compliment the story, this guy actually does some pretty hardcore statistical analysis. And it's pretty good, too. I've tried to run some of these stats to try and prove something else and then e-mail it to him, but he covers just about every base.
The Wizard of Odds - If you want every little tidbit of college football news from around the country, this is the place to go. This guy doesn't write a lot of original content, but he scours just about every major newspaper website for any article or column that's related to college football. I like to start my day off with this one.
TNABACG - The title of this blog used to be "The National Anthem Before a Cubs Game", but is now simply TNABACG with the appropriate tagline "Minnesota sports, poorly acronymed". The writer, Jon, used to be a columnist for the Minnesota Daily. His blog covers just about any Minnesota sports related news and is updated about three times a day.
I was once given a shout out on that blog because I shared an interesting article with him in the comments section. Unfortunately, I was to lazy to sign in with my blogger account and just gave the simple, mostly annonymous moniker, "Chris".
Curses! This could have drawn hundreds of new readers to my blog. Oh, well. I don't want to get too big too soon.
Twins Ballpark 2010 - The writer started this blog shortly after legislation was passed to fund the new Twins ballpark. He has posted on numerous subjects and relentlessly followed the process of getting this stadium designed and built. He showed up to public meetings and sent lots of feedback to Twins officials from himself and his readers. He came up with the idea of transplanting a flagpole from a local VFW in Richfield to the new stadium. What's the significance? That flagpole was originally the flagpole at the old Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington before that venue was demolished to make way for the Mall of America. He communicated his idea to the right people and they liked it.
There haven't been too many updates recently, because not a whole lot is happening except for the actual construction. But if you find this sort of stuff interesting, I recommend going back and reading his first post and continue on to learn about the entire process. It's good reading.
*****
If you have ever wondered what kind of nonsense my brain is absorbing on a daily basis, that was it. I hope you find it enlightening.
Monday, April 07, 2008
Enter Blandman
Lately I've been reading some of the nonsense posted on the message board at GopherIllustrated.com and getting pretty fired up about it. It then leads me to write a long, drawn-out post in response. After I post, I punch myself in the groin for not have posting it on this blog instead. Then a week later I decide to re-post it here anyway.
This time it's not about sexual assault, but an equally polarizing subject: what song should be playing as the football team takes the field? As you can imagine with a message board full of presumably white guys who like football, Metallica was an overwhelming favorite, with a bunch of other songs by watered down rock bands. Below is what I had to say:
Instead of just listing off every crappy song I've ever heard on 93X, I thought I'd give a little insight towards this subject.
First, the Gophers always take the field first to the sound of a cannon popping (provided by our very own Cannon Man), which triggers an eight count drum cadence and finally leads to our school's fight song, The Minnesota Rouser. This is the song we should always enter with because it's entirely unique and no other Division 1 college or NFL team enters the field to that song. So we got that going for us, which is nice.
Now the subject of this thread should read "POLL: This is what the Gophers should wait in the tunnel too..." because that is when they usually crank something over the speakers. I noticed last year that they had a video playing during this time, too. I like where their head is at on this one, but it was very poorly executed. I don't even remember what song was playing, but the video with clips from the movie "300" and players/coaches awkwardly trying to fire up the crowd was just awful. To start, they should scratch that video and make a new one using that "We Will Make History Again" clip and maybe add some more game highlights from the past and present. It really can't be that difficult. That annoying hipster punk on those "Hi, I'm a Mac" commercials leads me to think anybody could put this together.
Onto the music, where things get a little more tricky.
As mentioned before, they will enter the field to the cannon, drums, and Rouser. During the time waiting in the tunnel, the idea is to build some excitement and tension in the crowd. A song that begins with a slow crescendo and adds layers of instrumentation accomplishes this task. A lot of those orchestra movie scores and rock songs mentioned in the previous thread fit this mold. It's not too difficult to find songs that fit this criteria.
Where it gets more complicated is finding a song that will seamlessly transition into the cannon/drum cadence/Rouser. A lot of the songs mentioned have great intros and great build-up, but there's really no place to stop the CD and strike up the band without it sounding like someone in the sound booth or leading the band missed a cue. I mean, AC/DC's "Hells Bells" is a great song that really gets the blood pumping, but there's no real peak to that intro. It just levels off.
There are three songs I saw discussed that would work:
1. Metallica's "Enter Sandman" - Kind of a no brainer. The part to transition from CD to band would be right before all the parts come in unison to play that main riff. The drum beat goes to cut time and crescendos just before it. It really is perfect.
I wouldn't choose this one, however, because it's too easy. Any former jock under the age of 35 has taken the field of play with this song blasting at some point. You hear it in arenas and stadiums everywhere. I generally scoff at college teams that play this as an intro and call it "tradition"(I also laugh and shake my head at Wisconsin when they play "Jump Around"; again, you hear this song in just about every arena and stadium, but for some reason, those morons at UW think they are special for being the only ones to take the lyrics literally).
2. Refused's "New Noise" - This isn't a really a well known, mainstream rock song, but it has been used every now and then on TV sports broadcasts. I also recalled it was on the soundtrack for the "Friday Night Lights" movie. It is a killer intro and it has a perfect transition spot right after the lead singer belts out "Can I scream?!" or something like that. I can't really tell what he's saying.
But as aerosk83 mentioned in that post, it has a long pause right before the lead singer comes in which might be too much. It's a cool effect when you're listening to it at home on your CD player, but that effect would be lost in a stadium full of 50,000 yelling fans.
3. Korn's "Blind" - This may be my favorite choice. I am surprised that you don't hear it more at sporting events. It has an eerie build-up with those cymbals and dueling guitars that peaks with the lead singer belting out "ARE YOU READY?!". The obvious transition spot would be right after that.
The "Are you ready" thing also fits because that is what the announcer shouts during the marching band's pregame show right before they play the Rouser while in the block M formation. Perhaps some folks would even be duped into thinking the Metrodome announcer is the one belting out the phrase both times. I know my mom would.
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Very Bad Things
I'd like to be serious for a moment and discuss the sexual assault trial of former Gopher football player, Dominic Jones. Just before the beginning of the trial, there was a message board thread at GopherIllustrated.com discussing the subject. As these things go, the discussion was pretty heated as posters started bickering about legal procedures, morals, and the typical douche-bag male response to rape allegations: "The girl was probably just upset because he didn't call her back the next day or something."
If you want to get yourself good and pissed off, go to their message board and find the thread labeled "Dominic Jones". Actually, I sort of helped get this thread going early on by posting this article and drawing comparisons between the defense attorney in this trial to Gordon Bombay before he was sentenced to community service and had to coach a kids in hockey team in the movie The Mighty Ducks. After reading the ensuing flame-fest, I calmed myself and posted this response below:
Wow, if this doesn't get your blood boiling on a Tuesday morning. Forget all about the lawyers, judges, and football team for a second. Put yourself in this situation as one of these guys. You're hanging out in your apartment with 3 other guys and two girls. One of the guys starts a drinking contest and gets the two girls to play along. One of these girls ends up taking 8 shots of straight vodka filled to the rim of the shot glass. This guy then retreats to his bedroom with the other, not-so-full-of-vodka girl.
This leaves three guys sitting with one very, very drunk girl. Imagine you are one of these guys. At what point would think it would be a good idea to take turns having sex with this girl? Would you be the one to suggest it to everybody? Would you do it if somebody else came up with this idea? How about if this lady "consented" and asked you to do this? In your clear-minded, stone-sober state, would you want to go "run the train" on young lady who you just watched knock down 8 shots of vodka?
Hypothetically, let's say you would. Afterwards, you have to call in her friend to help her to the bathroom where she can't even keep balance while sitting on the toilet. Then after hauling her to the couch and letting her pass out, would you think it would be a brilliant idea to call up another one of your friends and tell him that you have a girl at your place who's "putting out"? Then to cap off your night of genius ideas, you decide to record your friend on camera when he comes over and performs these acts on a girl who couldn't even walk a couple hours ago.
That was just a quick recap of the case report. Again, I ask you to forget all about the legal processes, football suspensions, and all the previous bickering and flaming in this thread. Does this sound like something you would do and feel good about? Does it sound like something that you would be OK with your friends doing? Would you just shrug it off if this happened to your daughter, sister, or any other female you care about?
So that was my lecture I gave to a bunch of strangers online. I should have really been more self righteous and arrogant, because my post really didn't get any response. Apparently you have to be a complete ass if you want attention on an internet message board.
Anyhow, the trial is going on right now and there are some new tidbits of testimony that come out each day. Still, nothing new has been revealed to make me believe that Dominic Jones is innocent. He may be proven not guilty, but that still doesn't make you innocent. He made the biggest mistake of his life that night, and he will have to carry that with him every where he goes. And to Keith Massey, Alex Daniels, and EJ Jones (the other players mentioned in the case report): fuck you guys, too. The only reason why you all aren't on trial is that the aspiring porn director, Alex Daniels, didn't pull out his cell phone video camera earlier that night.
Booze and sex is a very dangerous combination. I've had my nights where I decided to combine the two, and I'm very fortunate that nothing bad happened. But it could have.
If you want to get yourself good and pissed off, go to their message board and find the thread labeled "Dominic Jones". Actually, I sort of helped get this thread going early on by posting this article and drawing comparisons between the defense attorney in this trial to Gordon Bombay before he was sentenced to community service and had to coach a kids in hockey team in the movie The Mighty Ducks. After reading the ensuing flame-fest, I calmed myself and posted this response below:
Wow, if this doesn't get your blood boiling on a Tuesday morning. Forget all about the lawyers, judges, and football team for a second. Put yourself in this situation as one of these guys. You're hanging out in your apartment with 3 other guys and two girls. One of the guys starts a drinking contest and gets the two girls to play along. One of these girls ends up taking 8 shots of straight vodka filled to the rim of the shot glass. This guy then retreats to his bedroom with the other, not-so-full-of-vodka girl.
This leaves three guys sitting with one very, very drunk girl. Imagine you are one of these guys. At what point would think it would be a good idea to take turns having sex with this girl? Would you be the one to suggest it to everybody? Would you do it if somebody else came up with this idea? How about if this lady "consented" and asked you to do this? In your clear-minded, stone-sober state, would you want to go "run the train" on young lady who you just watched knock down 8 shots of vodka?
Hypothetically, let's say you would. Afterwards, you have to call in her friend to help her to the bathroom where she can't even keep balance while sitting on the toilet. Then after hauling her to the couch and letting her pass out, would you think it would be a brilliant idea to call up another one of your friends and tell him that you have a girl at your place who's "putting out"? Then to cap off your night of genius ideas, you decide to record your friend on camera when he comes over and performs these acts on a girl who couldn't even walk a couple hours ago.
That was just a quick recap of the case report. Again, I ask you to forget all about the legal processes, football suspensions, and all the previous bickering and flaming in this thread. Does this sound like something you would do and feel good about? Does it sound like something that you would be OK with your friends doing? Would you just shrug it off if this happened to your daughter, sister, or any other female you care about?
So that was my lecture I gave to a bunch of strangers online. I should have really been more self righteous and arrogant, because my post really didn't get any response. Apparently you have to be a complete ass if you want attention on an internet message board.
Anyhow, the trial is going on right now and there are some new tidbits of testimony that come out each day. Still, nothing new has been revealed to make me believe that Dominic Jones is innocent. He may be proven not guilty, but that still doesn't make you innocent. He made the biggest mistake of his life that night, and he will have to carry that with him every where he goes. And to Keith Massey, Alex Daniels, and EJ Jones (the other players mentioned in the case report): fuck you guys, too. The only reason why you all aren't on trial is that the aspiring porn director, Alex Daniels, didn't pull out his cell phone video camera earlier that night.
Booze and sex is a very dangerous combination. I've had my nights where I decided to combine the two, and I'm very fortunate that nothing bad happened. But it could have.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)