Category Archives: Editorial

Oct 25 2013
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Editorial, NCAA Football

I Got You Keith

Keith Price and Brad Dobbs chill after spring game

This entire article is an excuse for me to use this photo.

I swear, I think everyone’s favorite player is the backup quarterback.

The thing about team sports, is that in the game of football, the Quarterback gets all the credit, all the good, and almost all of the bad as well.

However, I do subscribe to the NabNoPa (best NCAA ’10 coach to ever live) rule of thought, “If you aren’t good enough to play, you don’t deserve to be on the field.” Is Cyler Miles good enough to play? I would say yes, he is in the program, but he isn’t good enough to start now. Otherwise he would have won the starting job in camp. This is Keith’s team – so buckle up and get ready for the ride.

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Apr 24 2013
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Editorial, NCAA Football

NCAA Punishments for Violations Need Change

Chip and Pete

There have recently been reports of both Auburn University and the University of Oregon having major violations with their football teams.  This allows us to revisit the punishment of vacated wins and scholarships being lost for sports programs, due to that being the most likely disciplinary action that will be taken with these schools. Both vacated wins and loss of scholarships  are the most ridiculous punishments possible. Vacating wins doesn’t do anything, but put an asterisk next to a season in the record books. Let’s take the 2005 National Championship Game for example. USC beat the crap out of Oklahoma 55-19. Now, technically no one won that game. The problem is we all remember that game. To say no one won that game is crazy. Vacated wins does nothing except take a trophy out of a case. All the players, coaches, fans and media know who won.

As for loss of scholarship, all this does is hurt a bunch of kids who had nothing to do with any of the violations. It also creates a trickle down effect that affects a few kids at the bottom of the scholarship offers pool, not the kids that have the talent to play at a Oregon or Auburn. It affects kids who probably wouldn’t even have a chance to play at the large school receiving sanctions. Let’s take a look at that USC example again.

USC lost ten scholarships per year for three years for the violations of the 2004-2005 season. That is ten kids that could have played at the top program in the country. Now, they have to go to elsewhere. That takes ten spots from ten other schools at the same level or just a step down from USC, for example: Texas, Oklahoma, Florida State and others.

Those ten spots continue to trickle down and take roster spots for kids who would have ended up at schools like Memphis, UAB, and Central Michigan.  This effect will work its way down to the Montanas and Portland States of the world. Moving through all teams, regardless of division, that can offer a full football scholarship.

There is a finite amount of scholarships that can be offered throughout college football. There are under 7,000 scholarships to the 225 FBS and FCS schools and there are over one million high school football players trying to earn that potential financial aid for education. You take ten scholarships away you aren’t taking them from the Andrew Luck and RGIII’s of the world, players of that caliber will receive a scholarship no matter what. This type of punishment is taking a scholarship from the kid who starred at a 2A high school and was going to go to Portland State. His spot was filled by the falling talent that got bumped off the better team and fell to the next best team.

The NCAA says they are punishing the school, but realistically they are punishing future kids. Even with the bowl bans, they are just taking away opportunity for kids that had nothing to do with the violations. If a kid cheated on a test in his first period class, you wouldn’t take it out on the second period class. You need to punish the one responsible. Make players pay back scholarships. Fine coaches, even if they have already left the school. Make the school pay back money. The schools and coaches are the ones who made the millions off the success of the team, not the student-athletes.

The easiest way to deal with these situations is to fine the school large amounts. Let them play in bowls still, but don’t let them collect the bowl money. Take their cut and spread it out to other schools in their conference or across the country. This doesn’t take away kids’ educations and opportunity to have the same fortunes as other football players. The fine will also take away the pointless vacating wins thing (which by the way, they should vacate losses too). It will also be determined by how much the school benefited financially off those wins. Money is the main reason these violations happen. Attacking the deep pockets of these programs would definitely get the attention of those in charge.

Start taking away the money and change will happen.

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Apr 09 2013
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Editorial, NCAA Basketball

Pretty Sure I was Right

How about that

How about that

Not that this is some sort of conclusion that results in me being right about this, I am going to go with a lot of evidence is pointing that way.

Every post on Instagram from my original post linked above as well as the tweets they came rolling in on have been deleted by our esteemed, upstanding pornographic movie star.

In the meantime, check out my book marks – I got some good ones up there.  I highly recommend The Verge.

Hrm.

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Apr 09 2013
3 Comments
Editorial, NCAA Basketball

Pretty Sure Siva Isn’t Hitting Up Porn Stars

This is a lesson in how to fake a celebrity texting/tweeting at you.  Warning, some of the links here are quasi #NSFW, depending on where it is you work I guess.

After the National Title game tonight, a porn star named Jenna Shea (apparently she hasn’t gotten around to launching her website) started tweeting out how Peyton Siva was hitting her up via text, saying how he wanted her & things of that nature.  You can see the twitter posts here, which are screen shots from her Android phone (gross) which she posted to Instagram (key for later)

So naturally, as most would – I clicked to links to see what he had allegedly said to her.

The first thing that threw me off on this is that Peyton (at least in his media side) is very devout and always talks about his girlfriend.  Could that be just a media persona?  Sure.  I am just speculating really based on what has been published and what is going on up here.

But a lot of this really doesn’t add up.

  • First off – the contact name and phone number.

The first thing I checked was the area code, which yes – that is a Louisville area code.  That would seem to be pretty straight forward.  However, I have had my phone since high school and I haven’t changed my area code to 206, as I stay loyal to the 253.  That aside (who knows, he could have changed it) it is ridiculously easy to just change a contact name to what you need it to be for screen shot purposes.

For example:

Apparently Peyton Siva hit me up tonight too.

Apparently Peyton Siva hit me up tonight too.

I added the hearts for effect, but you really can change anyone’s name here to what you want it to be and just have that person text you.  I did this from my wife’s phone (I changed her name back, but I thought about leaving it as Peypey <3 <3 to mess with people)

  • The pictures & the convo

Considering Peyton is a heavy user of Instagram and also a super popular athlete, I decided to give the old Google Search a try with “Peyton Siva Shirt Off”.  Here are the results if you don’t want to do it yourself.

Interesting, one of these photos looks pretty familiar

Interesting, one of these photos looks pretty familiar

Unless Siva’s camera roll on his phone just happens to be something that is near the top of Google Image searches of him, something tells me that this photo is on the internet somewhere, and lo and behold, it is in 2 places.

First off, and the one I am going to go with where she didn’t find this image (but looks like there are plenty others if she wants to continue to extort college seniors) is here on KSRcollege.com (wut) and then the most probable and obvious place she would find Peyton Siva selfies…his own Instagram.

So there's that

So there’s that

The image that took me a little longer to find was the one of him heavily filtered, hunched over showing off that six-pack.  I had to dig through the depths of his Instagram, but I found that one too.

He also is a selective cropper

He also is a selective cropper

He clearly didn’t want that pr0n star going after the wrong dude, so he made a few edits.  Also, again – pretty easy to edit around on a phone (hell, a crop tool is built into iOS, and while I haven’t used Android in a while, I am going to bet large sums of money that it either exists or you can get an app to crop) to make this what you need it to be for a little attention-grabbing spotlight.

So with all of that being said, check out what Peyton sent to me tonight!  This scoundrel!

I went Lennay on him

I went Lennay on him

I snagged another selfie that Jenna didn’t choose and decided to send that to myself.   Either way, there are some things I can’t straight away explain (the phone number, it is a Louisville area code, but with Google Voice, I could have an area code of pretty much any place I wanted, again, NOT HARD) and the times the texts were sent.

A few of them would coincide with times he would have been on the court cutting down the nets tonight, but it is just as probable that these texts weren’t sent today or tonight.  I did some quick research on the Galaxy S3′s text window if it displays back dates like iOS does when you look at older convos (it will time stamp with the date as well) but I really didn’t want to get that deep into it, because I think what I got so far makes it pretty obviously fake.

So Peyton, I don’t know if it is even worth addressing, but you might want to make your social media accounts private.

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Feb 10 2013
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Editorial, MLB

Being a Twitter Troll

Get Pwnd

Get Pwnd

Twitter is an amazing thing.  For the first time basically in history, you can chat with anyone who is on Twitter just by mentioning their name.  Now, they may not respond or even read it – but they do receive a notification that you, for all intensive purposes, tapped them on the shoulder.

A pretty common thing is for now “Joe Common Man” – in this case, Raphael @GrapesOfRaph here asking Arian Foster a question as to why he isn’t in the gym 24/7 when the season is over.  But of course Arian Foster would be in the gym at all moments of every day after the season is over, amirite?  I guess this is a valid question – but since the internet is intrinsically full of trolls, it’s phrased in a condescending parent tone.  As if Arian even owed this twat a response – he did respond by telling him that he takes a few months off of probably one of the most physically demanding sports in the world.

Of course this makes his day (which is sad in it’s own right) and then brags that Arian has responded to his stupid question and brags about the fact that he is up by 7:00am, like most productive humans are.  Raph, as I now will call him, is so excited about this response, he responds back to Arian.

This time, as if he knows he is paying attention – he switches to polite mode with an “understandable” and then goes on to say that he wasn’t sure when he did start and that he is a huge fan of his in Boston.  Of course, signed with #namaste.  I won’t go into the yoga hashtag at the end, but if our boy Raph here was really interested in his workout routine, he might have just asked that instead of that twat tone he used to illicit a reaction in the first place.

Then, my internet athlete hero Brandon McCarthy then steps in.  McCarthy is awesome because he regularly puts these douches on blast which unleashes the gates of internet troll hell on the moron who started it in the first place.  The best part is, it ends predictably as these usually do with the original offender backing down from internet scorn (probably not expecting anyone to reply, but when they do – all hell breaks loose).

You can read the rest of the convo, where my boy Raph here backpeadals with the “don’t they know what they get when they sign up for Twitter” (nice) and the “I remember when I took Twitter seriously”.  Raph – you did when Arian RT’d you.  You went as far as seriously bragging about it. (#leeeeggggoooooo)  To close it out, you weren’t just asking a question – you got what you wanted, and you got what you deserved.

I tweeted at Raph asking if he should be spending his time studying (according to his profile, he is a student at BC, graduation year of 2015) instead of tweeting.  He didn’t reply (I didn’t expect it).

Long story short – don’t troll for RT’s then back down.  It’s sad.

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Jan 24 2013
3 Comments
Editorial, NFL

NFL Moneyball – Is the Tight End the Position to Exploit?

Note – this was written by Josh Deceuster, a friend of the blog, a friend of ours and all-around good guy.  You can find him on Twitter @joshmtd (give him a big follow) along with his work here on YouTube.  After I read his fanpost on The Daily Norsemen, I asked if he would want to do a version for the Hawks.

Billy Beane Meme

_____

The biggest misconception I had about “Moneyball” was that I thought it was all about
money. I am not a baseball fan and hearing about it from friends and media always seemed like
a nice little story, but not something that would apply to football. The salary cap and spending
floor/ceiling would be enough to keep teams from trying a similar system in the NFL. Of
course, that was when I only saw Moneyball as a formula for spending money on your roster.
Moneyball is really about exploiting the market.

Everyone wanted to copy the Yankees, so the A’s exploited the player market to find
guys other teams were missing in their quest to duplicate successful franchises. The NFL also
has its fair share of copycats. Often many teams adjust their rosters trying to be like the most
recent Super Bowl winner or the hot team for the last few seasons. This creates similar market
conditions that Moneyball used to help the A’s, so now it is about finding where to exploit
said markets. Instead of thinking of the market solely as acquiring talent, let’s take a look at
exploiting how the roster to put together.

If the market is roster spots, the NFL is primed for a Moneyball-style takeover. Or at
least, prime for experimentation. Most NFL teams carry the same number of quarterbacks,
receivers, pass rushers, cornerbacks, etc. when making up their 52. The biggest shift on most
rosters depends on what your team’s defensive scheme or whether the GM likes having more
of a specific position on the roster. Receivers, however, are pretty uniform across the board.
Every team is looking for the same specific talents to play X, Z, & Y. This is where teams could
exploit the player market to their advantage.

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Oct 25 2012
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Editorial, MLB, NCAA Football, NFL

Straight Up Rant – Insane Hyperbole

Pablo Sandoval goes yard in Game 1 of the World Series

Pablo is the New Reggie

I didn’t catch much of the World Series game last night. Since the Mariners are not in it (and probably won’t ever as long as current ownership is around) I admittedly will just give a glance on Twitter and let my phone tell me how it went.

So with that being said, I went to Twitter to see how many strikeouts Justin Verlander had already racked up while I was working on some of the biggest trades in fantasy football history. Much to my surprise, Pablo Sandoval had taken Verlander deep two times.

That is an impressive feat. Verlander, outside of King Felix is one of the most dominant pitchers in the game right now. Pablo Sandoval (and for the most part, most of the Giants lineup) is not the most dominant of anything in comparison to the rest of the league right now.

So yeah, I was a little surprised. It’s not like Sandoval is terrible, if anything – a pretty decent 3B/1B that can throw with both hands (Wikipedia!). He has hit no more than 25 HR’s in his career, and alternates between the teens and the twenties in each of his 4 years.

Well, Sandoval would later do something that not many have done, as that is hit three HR’s in a game. Immediately, in a game 1 World Series game in which the Giants were well in the lead, Twitter starts to roll with “Mr. October” to describe his performance.

No. Not at all – Sandoval is not Reggie Jackson. I would be willing to go out on a pretty thick branch and say he won’t ever be a good as Reggie. Won’t be as clutch as Reggie was. Sandoval will turn this into a contract I am sure, but so did Mark “Hittin” Whiten did that and so did Mike Cameron. This crazy hyperbole blows my mind – and you will hear it all the time.

Watch Big-10 football on Saturday morning on ESPN. Chances are, it will be between Indiana and Illinois, two irrelevant programs in the country. Why they are on in Seattle I will never know (I do, but go with me here) but you will hear that half of the players will be compared to Big 10 greats. “Man, this QB is just like Terrell Pryor (faint praise)” after a decent scramble.

No. He won’t even be the next Antwaan Randle-El. He won’t even get drafted. This guy would be lucky to be Kurt Kittner.

Randle El Throws Against the Seattle Seahawks

Ok, maybe being him isn’t so bad.

Another one is “This guy is one of the best in the country at XYZ” – no, that guy is not. He is good at it in that particular game, but nationwide? Give me a break. There are 10 guys nationally that are probably better tacklers. This guy is praying for a combine invite playing linebacker for Iowa State.

Sometimes they are things that people could care less about. So what if the punter from Northwestern is “one of the best in the game” in coffin corner punts. Not only in itself that is fairly inane, this guy is not thinking about how his ability to coffin corner is going to nab him am illustrious career as a punter who gets cut every three years after his minimum league deal is done.

He is going to be a doctor. He just kicks because his school is getting paid for and he likes the new Under Armour jerseys (which admittedly, are pretty sweet).

Knock the comparisons off. Just because your guy made a great catch, he isn’t Steve Largent. He is probably more like Joey Galloway.  No, probably the next Brian Robiskie.

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Oct 01 2012
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Editorial, NCAA Football

Glad You Could Make It

Century Link Field - UW vs Stanford

Word is this place holds 65,000+

I am going to keep this one short and sweet.

If you weren’t at the UW vs Stanford game last Thursday, you missed out.

This was the first time in a long time that the defense played inspired football.  They held down a Stanford offense (which admittedly is NOT the same as last year) that has amassed over 1,000 yards on the ground over their last three meetings to less than 100 yards.

The defense created turnovers.  They kept the team in the game.  However, this isn’t a game recap per-se.  You can read all you want about this on ESPN, considering this was their only game that night.

What I am going to write about is the nearly 10,000 empty seats that had a great view of this victory.

Listen, I get it.  Tailgaiting isn’t the same at Century Link.  Heck, it doesn’t even exist.  The game atmosphere that you would get at Husky Stadium, with the RV’s, the BBQ’s and the games of beer pong are much  more spread out.  There isn’t a “Montlake Lot” and the closest thing to it has a condo high rise going in on it.

Getting there isn’t as easy in comparison to Husky Stadium.  You have to park far away.  Sure, there are light rail and bus options, but those aren’t that good unless you are downtown already.  That’s a mindset that is going to change though as Hansen Palace is erected where the fabled Dreamgirls now stands.

It’s a Thursday.  6:00p.  I get that too.

My point is – make an effort.  Stanford was ranked coming into Seattle with an unproven quarterback an a couple of shaky (and one solid) win under their belts.  They were ripe for picking, and guess what – they got literally picked.

The schedule is setting up favorably now, even if the Huskies take a few tumbles against Oregon & USC.

USC is the next home game.  Let’s sell it out.

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Jun 23 2012
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Editorial, General Sports, NBA, NHL

My Letter to the Seattle City Council & King County Council

The only way that our elected officials know how you feel is to reach out.  Take the time to put together your thoughts and send an email.  Head to sonicsarena.com for how you can show your support.

____

Dear Mr. Larry Phillips & Seattle City Council,

I wanted to reach out to each of you as members of the Seattle City Council and also Mr. Larry Philips, my county council representative to voice my support of the arena proposal that has been put forth my Mr. Chris Hansen and his group supported by Mr. Steve Ballmer, Mr. Erik Nordstrom and Mr. Peter Nordstrom.

I will not hide my bias, I am a huge Seattle sports fan and also a supporter of bringing back the Sonics and the opportunity for the NHL to come to the Pacific Northwest.

However, I find that this is a bigger opportunity than just an arena & some professional sports teams.  This is an opportunity for unparalleled private investment into our beautiful city that will not only be a source of civic pride, but opportunities for small business to be created and thrive year round.

My main point of reference for this is Pizza Professional, a small, independently owned pizzeria in Pioneer Square.

It’s a place now that I have been going for the last two years, before Seattle Sounders soccer games and before Seattle Seahawks home games.  It started off as a small, unassuming storefront near Occidental Park, providing pizza slices and drinks to those making their way to sporting events at Century Link Field.  Not much to look at, it was a few tables, a big pizza oven and an owner that never forgets a face.

As the Sounders became an instant success, more home dates for a new team along with the Seahawks & Mariners started to create built-in business of patrons that have allowed him to modernize and expand his business, serve more people and become a staple in the community for those who make their way to sports events throughout the year.  Now brimming with customers, “Pizza Pro” continually has a line out of the door, and in empty storefronts across the street, construction has begun on other potential success stories.

Small businesses like this can create jobs for people of all skill levels & ages, and also give those willing to take the calculated risk of starting their own business a great platform & increased chance of success with a virtually year-round traffic flow.

While the arena would be the centerpiece of this deal, the ripples will be felt by all as an area of our city is rejuvenated with new purpose.

This also doesn’t mean that existing industry has to suffer at the expense of this plan.

I am not here to debate the merits of traffic in the SoDo area as it relates to the Port and this arena plan.  I leave the detailed analysis to professionals that have been contracted to study how this proposed arena district can coincide with another catalyst for jobs, the Port of Seattle.  This should not be an either/or proposition – if anything, this is another opportunity to inject dollars, either public or private to infrastructure improvements so that both can take advantage of what our city has to offer – world-class entertainment & quality of life along with a deep-water sea port to drive the import & export industry.

Seattle should continue to strive to expand key assets such as the Sounder train, light rail and KC Metro bus service to efficiently and safely move patrons from all areas of the county to events, and make these viable alternatives for all county residents to take to events.  Seattle should also strive to give the port what it needs to keep high paying jobs that support families throughout the region and keep Seattle as a viable location for container ships & other sea transport.

All options should be on the table for both the port and the arena district, and the promise of improved infrastructure for both industries which only will continue to make Seattle and the surrounding region a more desirable place to live.

This is a moment for King County & the City of Seattle to make an investment in itself for the future, backed by an unprecedented private investment.  As a resident of the city of Seattle and King County, I urge you all to work with Mr. Hansen to make this proposal a reality.

Regards,

Brad Dobbs

*address redacted*

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May 18 2012
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Editorial, MLB

Umps : Not the Guardians of the Game

Lawrie argues with the ump after a bad strike 3 call

Sir, I don’t understand why you are calling balls as strikes. Sir? SIR!

Lawrie got hosed by a hoser.

That’s the Canadian way to put it, and he got the short end of the stick with an umpire that felt he needed to prove something by not enforcing the rules of the game that are written, but by the “unwritten rules of the game” in which he has direct control.

If you haven’t seen it – feel free to Google on Bing “Brett Lawrie hits ump with batting helmet” – an unfair query considering what happened, but I bet it will give you the result you would be looking for.

On a 3-1 count, Lawrie takes a pitch clearly out and away, and while the ump was figuring out how to call a ball, Lawrie headed to first base.  The delayed call and trot resulted in a strike call.  Lawrie, visibly upset, headed back to the batters box where the next pitch call had already been determined.

Lawrie should have known this and swung at that next pitch regardless, but he didn’t, thinking that the ump might have a shred of integrity and make the right call as outlined by the rules of the game.

However, not allowing to be “shown up”, he gets rung up on another ball call that sent him into a rightful rage.

Watching this exchange sent me into a rage.  Now, I don’t condone throwing batting helmets (only because as an Eastside Rainier, one of the only hits that felt solid during wood bat month I tossed my helmet after my line-out was caught by the center fielder and hurt my neck in the process), and I don’t condone hitting the umpire.  He clearly meant to throw the helmet, but he didn’t  mean to hit the ump.  Either way he did which lead to his ejection, but the whole situation could have been avoided.  You know how?

Call the game correctly.  It was a ball.

Any ump or ref that takes matters into their own hands in order to show people that they are in control of the game are doing the opposite of what they are paid to do.  Nobody pays to watch umpires make wrong calls on purpose and limit talented players from entertaining us with base hits, home runs and bean balls.  Lawrie probably didn’t learn anything from the exchange besides that ump has no business making calls in the first place.

Players are always going to argue balls and strikes, and people are going to get tossed for these arguments.  There was no argument here.

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