Among many contenders, the MVP for the Horns is pitcher Austin Wood. As a reliever, he pitched 14 scoreless innings, including 12.1 innings of no-hit baseball, logging almost 170 pitches total. While it would have been a historic game to be at, it may not have been too exciting until the end. BC went 8-80 at the plate, and the Horns were just 20-91. Be sure to check Burnt Orange Nation for further analysis.
Also, I came across this at a Kansas Jayhawk blog. It takes a look at how to fix the college football playoff mess by implementing a Premier League-type system. There are a few flaws to the hypothetical situation, but I'm mostly in favor of something like this. It seems relatively simple and clear. However, I'm sure that any Tennessee fan would not take to being put in the Bottom Tier League behind East Carolina and Troy. Take a look, it's a good way to kill 30 minutes or so.
Yesterday, I hooked up my very old-school Nintendo to our guest room TV. This was exciting for me, because, while I'm not much of a gamer, I do love me some RBI Baseball and Tecmo Super Bowl, and because I spent many hours during my last two years of college playing against Brandon, Garrett, and Jake in these games. Good memories.
Because the 'music,' for lack of a better term, on these games is so annoying, me and my friends would always mute the TV and put my iTunes on shuffle to use as the backdrop for our virtual competition. Of course, being the nostalgic person I am, it immediately brought me back to the Burgh, sitting in Garrett's old dirty blue recliner, wasting the day away.
As I listened to the music in the background, it inevitably came across some songs by some bands that I hadn't listened to in a while. After my gaming session was over (I went 1-1 with the Cowboys in TSB, and 3-0 with the Tigers in RBI, thank you very much) I went to my computer to check out the websites for some of the bands I had sort of forgotten.
Much to my surprise and dismay, I found that four of the five bands I listened to the most in college are no longer performing together. Out of Greatness in Tragedy, The Feds, Something Corporate*, Flickerstick, and Blue October, only Blue is still a band. This is not entirely surprising, since they've had the most commercial success, and members of some of the other bands have moved on to new groups, but still. The music I listened to not that long ago can now only be heard on the computer, ipod, or a CD, as there won't be any new songs or concerts to look forward to in the future.
I can't tell you how much time and money I spent going to the shows of those five bands, especially the smaller-time GIT, and Feds, who played most of their concerts in north Texas. I'll never ever ever ever forget the rinky-dink concert those two played at, in all places, Coleman, Texas in some abandoned-looking junior high gym. The crowd was small, and the sound system was terrible, but both groups gave it their all, and put on an entertaining set. Afterwards, my friends and I went to eat at the lobby of the old hotel they were staying at. It's funny to look back on it now. Those guys, in our eyes, were absolute rock stars, no matter what their record sales or iTunes download number were, and to get to hang out with them after a concert that they must have absolutely hated playing, was a memory I'll never forget.
Of course, the best show I saw them play was five years (whaaaatt?!?!!?) ago at the Curtain Club in Dallas, at the Feds CD release party. Much different than the Coleman show, there was a packed house of rowdy fans, the bands sounded great, and the Feds played for two hours. One of the most memorable weekends of my life.
The Blue, Flickerstick, and SoCo concerts I witnessed were fantastic, but because they were more recognizable bands, it didn't seem quite as special to watch them, since they could sell out and put on a great show almost anywhere. Regardless, I literally got a pit in my stomach yesterday when I found out that Flickerstick had broken up a few months ago. I found out about the Feds plans to disband this past December and got the same feeling.
I don't listen to new music much anymore, as my radio is set to basically talk radio of the political and sport kind, and Christian music for commercial breaks. Because of this, I feel a disconnect between the bands I enjoy, and what's popular out there today. As much as I'd love to be hip and all, I don't see myself buying a Laday GaGa CD any time soon (You're welcome, by the way, for having "Mymymymymymy poker face" stuck in your head for the rest of the day). I guess I'll have to stick to old YouTube clips of these bands, since seeing them in concert is out the door. At least I'll always have one good memory of Coleman, Texas.
*I looked at SoCo's website, and it only said that the lead singer is now involved in another project, and there were no new tour dates, so maybe they're just taking a break, and haven't officially ended the band. If anyone knows for sure, leave a comment.
As promised, a semi-relevant post of thoughts and observations after a two-week whirlwind tour of Hawaii and Texas:
I love watching college baseball. The College World Series is one of my favorite televised sporting events. Unfortunately, for unknown reasons, the CWS is basically the only way a fan can watch college baseball. That being said, I was obviously happy to see the tape-delayed airing of UT's victory over Mizzou in the Championship game, and see them get the number one overall seed. Hope to see you in Omaha, Horns.
After two mostly sub-standard rounds, the Conference Finals have been superb. The play everyone will remember-if Cleveland comes back to win the series, that is-is Bron's game winner in game two. I'll especially remember it, because I was watching the game in a, umm, restaurant that shows a lot of sports games on the eve of my 25th birthday. The TV me and my buddies were watching was a regular, non-HD television, while the rest of the patrons watched on fancy, HDTV's on the other side of the establishment. For those of you who don't know, HDTV has about a three-second delay over non-HD's. Anyway, this came in handy, as we were able to effectively spoil the outcome before everyone else, as we began yelling, screaming, and generally raising a muck before everyone else saw the result. That was fun.
Update from the Scripps National Spelling Bee: A kid who thinks Denver will beat Cleveland in the Finals and admits that his sister is a better speller than him just spelled acmonital. Impressive.
Next favorite part of game two: Talking about how The Shot will soon become one of those cool "Amazing" commercials, and about seven minutes later seeing this. Cue the chillbumps.
If only the Rangers could get some pitching, they may be a decent team. Wait, what?
My not-so-bold NBA Finals prediction: Lakers over Magic in 6. Kobe gets his, and LeBron gets out (In one more year, that is)
Update number two from the Spelling Bee: Erin Andrews just interviewed the 13-year favorite. In the least surprising turn of events ever, he sounded like he had never talked to a girl. Ever.
Lastly, and this is just an observation. I don't want this to turn into a political blog or discussion, but I had to bring this up. I saw this video the other day on TV. It's of the Prez going to a small, mom and pop type burger joint in Virginia, apparently in an attempt to show everyone that he's just a regular guy, like you and me.
Not to get all Hannity on everyone, but a basic cheddar cheeseburger, medium well? A request for spicy Dijon mustard? For all the talk of how Obama is the nation's first 'cool' president, he sure can come across like a gigantic nerd. Yeah, I said it.
Well I've been back on the mainland for about a week and haven't blogged anything. I don't have anything interesting to add right now, but I will say that I'd like to go back on an earlier comment from this here blog.
I said that I'd like to see Kobe win a ring without Shaq. While this would go a long way in cementing his place in history, any admiration I have for 24 has gone out the window after watching the Rockets/Lakers series last week. Joey Halbert warned me about Kobe's diva-ness after my statement, but I paid it no heed at the time. Kobe is, beyond question, the most selfish, whining, crybaby in professional sports and I hope that BronBron dee-stroyyss him in the Finals if Melo doesn't get to it first.
In closing, I found the perfect date night for Zach Allen and Luke Reeves: Notre Dame and The Yankees, together at last.
Hang in there folks, I'll get into posting relevant thoughts once this jet lag finally wears off. Out.
Update from Oahu: If you want to see what I look like with a bit of a sunburn, head on over to Our Happy Life. More pics to come in the future, stay tuned loved ones.
Long story short: My parents saved up on frequent flyer miles to take me, Kayla and my brother to Hawaii for his (my brother's) graduation gift. For various reasons-gotta find a job-he isn't going. Oh well, thanks for graduating, Reid, I'm getting a sweet gift because of it.
Since I won't be around for a week or so, I'll leave you with a few links to occupy your time.
Let me be the first to say that I'm not an A-Rod fan. He's obviously a very talented baseball player, and has/had the potential to go down as one of the greats, before all the events of the past three months or so.
However, I feel like I've got to defend him just a little for some of the new allegations that are coming up. Selena Roberts, the reporter who broke the story that Rodriguez failed a PED test while with the Rangers, has now come out with accusations that he may have begun using steroids while in high school, as well as tipping off opposing players in hopes of getting a return tip later in games.
Obviously, if these allegations are proven to be true, anything ARod does for the rest of his career-and everything he's already done, for that matter-cannot be taken seriously, and all of his accomplishments will be looked upon as not being legitimate. The problem I have with all of this, quite honestly, is the fact that, after making these allegations and putting them in her book, Selena Roberts has decided that she will not testify in court against ARod. I clearly don't know a lot about the way the law is set up in these circumstances, but since approximately 60% of the readership of this blog is a recent graduate or almost graduate of law school (congrats on that, by the way guys) I was hoping I could get some help with this situation.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but it doesn't seem right to me that Roberts can make allegations, namely that he used in high school and tipped off opponents during games, and not back them up in court, which I assume will happen, as Rodriguez would/should file a defamation suite.
From what I understand, Roberts claimed that Rodriguez may have used in high school. That's pretty serious stuff, in my opinion, to claim that a 17 year old may have used illegal substances, and then not be willing to back it up with clear evidence. Also, from what I understand, the test that Rodriguez failed in 2003 was supposed to be confidential, and there are apparently 103 other players who failed, but who's names have not been released.
Basically, none of that seems kosher to me. I know ARod has been a target for criticism ever since signing for a gazillion dollars with Texas in 2001, but that shouldn't give people the right to come out with (possibly) unfounded allegations against him, or rat him out for doing something that over 100 other ballplayers did, making him a poster-boy for everything that is wrong with baseball, a modern-day Barry Bonds now that he's been chased out of the game.
Again, I'm no expert, but help me out here. Is it alright to make these accusations and not testify in court? Why is it fine to talk about ARod's PED use when he's clearly not the only one to use, just the wealthiest? Please, throw me a bone, I'm confused.
Yesterday, I hooked up my very old-school Nintendo to our guest room TV. This was exciting for me, because, while I'm not much of a gamer, I do love me some RBI Baseball and Tecmo Super Bowl, and because I spent many hours during my last two years of college playing against Brandon, Garrett, and Jake in these games. Good memories. 
