Caption Contest #1-Vegas

Gentlemen, welcome to the Hilton. After dinner, I will take you to where the Curling and Women's BB lines are made.

Over/under

2010 is a World Cup Soccer year!

Number of World Cup betting tickets that will be brought home by the group: 2.5.

Need advice

So I've gotten down the timing of watching sporting events while having to feed my daugther and rock her asleep. I'm able to hold the baby, bottle, and the remote all at the same time by buying larger bottles so I can hold with my neck so I can operate the remote. And I'm using this thing called a boppy to prop the baby up, making my weekends on the couch with the baby very enjoyable for me as I watch TV.

But the problem that I need help with is my reactions to these said sporting events. I'm kind of a loud guy when I'm watching sports that I have money on and something exciting happens, I can't control myself in my reaction. During this weekend alone, I woke up Morgan twice, while she was in my arms because of the following events:

1. Saturday late afternoon: Watching golf. Casey vs. Villegas. I have Casey. Morgan finally is asleep after 45 minutes of battling. TV volume turned all the way down. Trying to keep current with all the texting coming in from Wiz and Eric. Crazy match. They are in extra holes. Casey is about to be eliminated, but Villegas shanks his 2 foot par putt, pushing the match to go into the next day (reverse gooch worked). When he missed it, I jumped up (with baby in hand) and yelled in excitement. I couldn't control myself. I don't know who was more confused, my wife or Morgan. And the reactions where a little different. The wife saying WTF and the baby screaming like a terridactol.
2. Sunday early evening: US vs Canada hockey. Told Wiz to take the US, so my hockey reputation was on the line. Once again, the baby is asleep in my arms after 30 minutes of fussing around. I was good on the first US goal. I was even good on the second one. But the third one I freaked out and that woke the baby again. Ugh....

So how do you guys control your reactions when watching sports?

Tiger's got nothing on me....

Good evening, and thank you for joining me. Many of you on this blog are my friends. Many of you on this blog know me. Many of you have cheered for me or you've worked with me or you've supported me. Now every one of you has good reason to be critical of me for not blogging in sometime. I want to say to each of you, simply and directly, I am deeply sorry for my irresponsible and selfish behavior I engaged in. As Eric pointed out to me, my real apology to you all will not come in the form of words; it will come from my behavior over time. We have a lot to discuss; however, what we say to each other will remain between the two of us.

So what could pull me out of my posting drought? Yes Vegas. Only a couple of weeks away (2 paychecks to be exact) and I'm getting more and more excited. It seems a little quiet this year which makes some think that this year will be boring, but I'm actually kind of liking all the quiet. This year no arguments about room rates, Palazzo vs Mirage, girls coming or not, how much golfing, when is everyone going to leave, when is everyone going to arrive, and who is staying with who?

This year we have some key players not joining us. Kermit will be a no show for the first time in how many years? 3-4? Ira, who I can't decide whether he made a bigger splash with the group for his crazy craps play or his Megan's law friend, will not be joining us either. They will be joining the sidelines with our friend Micah who I guess still hasn't recovered from that one strange and lonely night at the PaiGow table. Are you ever coming back Micah?

The group is now down to a very strong 8. And finally it looks as if we will have 2 to a room, which come to think of it, might be a first. And we all seemed very focused.

Vegas Superstitions

OK, we are less than 4 weeks away from Vegas. 4 weeks! After this week, I need a week in Vegas, with my wife gone for a week in Europe and then coming back with the stomach flu. Nice.

So, to start off, what are our superstitions in Vegas? What I mean by this is - what will you (or won't you do) at the table? In the casino? You may call these "idiosyncracies", or "priniciples" - but you'll soon see what I mean..

Craps:
1. I always want to have a spot at the end of the table, preferably in the "straight out" position. Next best thing is to have a spot right next to the dealer (not the stickan). I'll do the hook ok. I really do not like the play when I am 1 or 2 away from the box man.
2. Open table? Hell yes! Absolutely.
3. I prefer to have the dealers on my left (and the boxman on the right) if I am at the head of the table.
4. I will not tip the dealers on the pass line anymore. In 2006, I think, I lost 12 straight pass line bets when I put something for the dealers on the line. No more. I will throw a dollar on the field on the come out instead of the line.
5. Within a roll, I will always throw the dice the same way. Right hand low, lef thand lob, whatever. Whatever I started with when I got the dice, I will not change. However, once I seven out and then the dice come back to me, I will change my method of throwing.
6. If I stumble or balk when picking up the dice, I will do a Ben Crane - set the dice down, reset, and start the routine over again.
7. Hitting chips at the end of the table? Hell yes! I even aim for them (if Wiz isn't there as a target).
8. I love the hard 4 and 10, don't bet the hard 6 and 8. This is foolish, I know....
9. Dice choice? I will pick two dice that add up to 8. If I don't have that (say, 3 1's, a 2 and a 5), I will jiggle the dice to get an 8.

Blackjack
1. I don't like to sit at 3rd base. Too much pressure. I actually love 1st base.
2. From about 2003-2007, I hated cutting. Now, I don't mind it so much. And I do believe in "thin to win".
3. I need to start asking for 2 less than I desire. For instance, if I have 14, I will ask for a 5. The cards can hear you, think you want a 5, and will give you a 6 or 7. Ha! I tricked them!
4. I love the long wipe of the hand across the cards to signify "stay" - especially if I have 20 vs a dealer 5. Really, Mr. Einstein? You are staying? Yes sir!
5. Unlike craps, I am a little leery of open blackjack tables.
6. Insurance? Mer is not on this trip to guide me. I am not a crazy zealot against insurance. I will take it when I have a feeling.

Pai Gow (Poker)
1. I pick up the 7 cards and try to place them in the same hand when I start winning. I will change hands on a losing streak.
2. I love the "Jeff Zahn" method of exposing one card at a time, and then letting a big sigh when the 7th card does not pair my hand, or fill a straight or a flush. This is from my dad who always, always did this when picking up his hand in bridge. The 13th card was never good for him.
3. I am not afraid to ask the dealer for help.

UTH
Still too new to have superstitions yet here. We will have to develop some on this trip. Unlike blackjack, I don't mind sitting at 3rd base. In fact, I will sit on the corners at this table.

Sports Book
1. One-stop shopping. I try to make one trip for a group of games. One trip to get 8 tickets.
2. I will order the tickets by tip-off time; earliest tip-off goes in front.

Roulette
1. I don't like sitting at the end of the table (near the column bets). Like to be as near to the wheel as possible.

Slots
1. If I have to, I will only play slots with a handle - and I will use the handle.

Two quick questions

Two questions that will make you think:

1. I am wrapping Freddie's brithday presents; one of the presents is a gift from Warren which is Chinese Checkers. Nice! On the box, it notes that it is "made in China".

Do the workers actaully know what they are making? Or do they have no clue what this bastardized game really is? Is this the equivalent of "Taco Bell" to Mexicans? Or Sbarro to Sicilians?

2. Was watching the women's downhill skiing and saw two horrific falls by some Europeans. (For clips, go here. ).

Is it bad that my first thought is:
"Hey - they crossed the finish line. I wonder what their time was? That last split must have been pretty bad".

They don't actually get a DNS for this, do they?

30 days away!

It's less than 4 weeks until Selection Sunday, and 30 days to Vegas. Let's start the ball rolling by our annual Bracketology posts, where we take the latest ESPN Bracket projection and pick games to fit in these pre-determined categories. Send ideas on for new cateogries - or requests to stops these insane posts - along.

The Kampen Game
(2) Purdue v (15) Coastal Carolina

The Wiz Heart Attack Game
(8) Missouri v (9) Clemson

The Collective Hold Your Breath Game
(8) Maryland v (9) Old Dominion
(note: Could also be the Micah Broken Bone game)

Layup's 5-12 Lock
(5) Wake Forest v (12) Marquette

Eric's Ohio Underdog Game
(4) BYU v (13) Kent St

Layup's $1000 on the Money Line Game
(4) Vanderbilt v (13) Northeastern

The 7-10 game no one cares about
(7) Richmond v (10) Florida St

Jay's Thursday 9 am 1st upset of the tournament
(7) UNLV v (10) Rhode Island

Wiz's ACC Lock
(8) Illinois v (9) Georgia Tech

The Virginia is for Lover's Game
(6) Butler v (11) Virginia Tech

The Game only Eric cares about
(7) Northern Iowa v (10) Dayton.....too perfect

The Random over/under game for Laura to have action on
(4) New Mexico v (13) Oklahoma St

Mike's Philly Cheesesteak Game
(5) Temple v (12) St Mary's

The Leland "I might as well flip a coin...I'd do better" game
(3) Wisconsin v (14) Weber St

Let's All Go Crazy in the Cabana for this possible 2nd round Game:
(1) Syracuse v (8) Maryland
followed by
(2) Purdue v (7) Xavier

20 years ago today

I read that today is a special day in the sports world - 20 years ago today, on February 11, 1990, Buster Douglas knocked out Mike Tyson in the 10th round to become the undisputed Heavyweight champion of the world. It still remains the biggest upset in boxing.

Two thoughts come to mind:

1. This is one of those sporting events that you recall exactly where you were when it happened or heard the news of the event. I'm not talking about events in which you have an interest in - hell, I can tell you where I was for every game of the 2001 Cleveland Browns season - but events that you don't have a real rooting interest, yet captivates you.

Over the past 25 years or so, there aren't many "special" events that fall into this category. Off the top of my head:
- 1986 World Series
- 1986 Masters
- 1989 Princeton v Georgetown
- 1990 Douglas v Tyson
- 1991 World Series
- 1994 Stanley Cup
- 1996 Masters
- 1997 Masters
- 2001 World Series
- Super Bowl 36 (Feb, 2002)
- Super Bowl 42 (Feb, 2008)

Others?

Where was I? It was late Saturday night in my dorm room, I think about 1 am or so. I was a freshman. We were probably drinking wine coolers or some God-awful concoction like Wyler's Cherry Kool Aid and Jack Daniels*. And then I heard the news of the Boxing upset.........

2. But how did I get the news? It was 1990, and it was 1 am. The dorm room did not have cable. Our rooms were wired for the internet - Case was the first college campus to provide all students with a "fiber-optic" internet connection - but there was no espn.com or anything. News, sports stories and others could be read off of usenet - but stories on Usenet were at least 1 hour behind real time.

So how did I find out the news of Tyson's loss?

Well, remember "Dial-a-Phone"? This was a service from the phone compnay where you can call a number, punch in a four digit code, and get the latest news, sports, weather, and so forth on the phone? You had to listen to a 30-second advertisement for a law firm, or for a car dealership ("The Showcase of Beautiful Cars....Hal Artz.....5930 Mayfield"), or some such nonsense. Then you got a 90-second recap of your requested topic.

I would call this every 30-60 minutes on the weekend - I think I was in a fantasy NBA league, for God's sake, and I was still a big Sacramento Kings fan at that time. So the Kings were probabl playing late, I was trying to get an update (or a final) at 1 in the morning.....

...and that's when the news of Tyson's upset came across.

Was this a joke? How do you verify? There was no breaking news on the TV- again, we didn't have cable. They weren't going to break into SNL - or, worse "Showtime at the Apollo" to tell viewers that Tyson lost. I stood there, dumbfounded. I told some people in the dorm - half didn't care, and half thought I was joking them.

Looking back at it, this story must seems completely insane. However, this was cutting edge technology in 1990. Breaking news by touch tone phone!


* - I swear, this is the actual drink that made me sick for the first week of Freshman year.

The definition of unexpected

After putting the kids to bed tonight, I turned on the TV and started playing one of the TiVo'd episodes of "The $25,000 Pyramid". Yes, with my new iPhone and the Direct TV app, I can make sure I don't miss any reruns of the Pyramid!

I was half-paying attention when I heard...

"This is The $25,000 Pyramid!!

Our special guests....

from '227', Jackee Harry! "

Wait, what?
This I gotta see......

Logistics Homework

The discussion on whether to expand the NCAA tournament from 64 (or really, 65) teams to 96 fascinates me. Most of the discussion focuses on whether the tournament should be diluted with the extra 32 marginal teams. Some are focused on whether the 32 best teams should have a bye.

I'm focused on the scheduling - how in the hell would this work, especially for TV?

Right now, a 64 team tournament means 6 rounds - 2 rounds per weekend, and it's done in 3 weeks. It's perfect. If we add another round into the tournament, how exactly would this be done?

Let's start at the end, first.
And let's use actual dates. This year, selection Sunday is on March 14; the first weekend is March 18-21; the second weekend is March 25-28; the championship is scheduled for Apr 5.

- Would CBS still require the championship game to be played on the first Monday in April (Opening Day Monday)? If it is any later, you get into Masters week (starting Thursday, Apr 8).
- So if we are set with the final 2 on the Monday, Apr 5, this means the semis are on Sat, Apr 3.
- Are we still set on the final 4 figured out on Sun, Mar 28? If so, why?
If so, now we have to add an extra set of games in a two week period, from Mar 14-28.

A couple of notes here:

- Each region would not have 16 teams, but 24. There would be 10 (not 6) games played in the prelim rounds to get to the sweet 16 (4 games in Rd 1, 4 games in Rd 2, 2 games in Rd 3). Would we play 2 of those regions on Wed-Fri-Sun - and then the other 2 on Thu-Sat-Mon?
- If you don't want to play the 3rd round games on the Monday after, then you have to start Tuesday and play Tue-Thu-Sat and Wed-Fri-Sun. But - is it fair to announce the bracket on Sun, Mar 14 and then force 16 teams to play on Tue, Mar 16? Is it fair for Virginia to be in Charlottsville on selection Sunday and then be forced to play a Round 1 game in Spokane on Tuesday afternoon? I say no.

- I think the earliest teams could actually play is Thursday. Thursday Mar 18 would be round 1. Thu-Fri would have 16 games each, and get 96 teams down to 64. Then we would be at 32 teams by the end of Sunday, with another 16 games played on Sat and Sunday. Now where the hell are we putting an extra round of games?

- If the above assumptions are true, this means we need three rounds - from 32-16, 16-8, and 8-4 - from Mon Mar 21 until Sun Mar 28.
- Would Round 3 - to get from 32-16, containing 16 games - need to be played on Mon-Tue, Mar 21-22. Ugh. This would mean moving the excitement of today's round 2 and putting it on a Monday-Tuesday. I would hate this.

- OK, move Round 3 to Thu-Fri, Mar 24-25. Then this means the Sweet Sixteen games are Sat-Sun, Mar 26-27.......but then this means the regional finals would be played on the following weeknights, Mon and Tue, Mar 28-29? We would have a doubleheader on Mon and Tue night. Do we want this?

OK, that's a lot of rambling - but do you see the point? What assumptions are wrong above - and what aspect of this "perfect" tournament will change if we move to 96?

Here's my solution....

- The final should not be on Monday - but move it back 2 days until Wednesday, April 7.
- Have the national semis played as a doubleheader (7 pm ET and 9:30 pm ET) on Monday, April 5.
- Have a quadruple header at the same location on the current Final Four Saturday (April 3). 8 teams - 4 games - starting at 1 pm, 3:30 pm, 7 pm and 9:30 pm. Can you imagine what an orgy this would be? This would actually make a "final four" ticket worth something.
- With this solution, the first two weekends would be the same. The only drawback is that the top seeds (seeds 1-8) would only play once on opening weekend.

Thoughts? There are no good solutions here...only mine.

An Awkward Moment

Actual phone conversation with Leland last night:

Leland: Hello?

Me: Hey. You called me earlier. What's up?

Leland: Can you talk? Where are you at?

Me: I'm at karate.

(long, long uncomfortable pause)



Leland: Um, you aren't actually doing Karate, are you? Cause if so, I want pictures of you in the white karate suit.....