Happy Tuesday everyone, and welcome to your morning Skull Session. Dear Real Life,
I know it's been a while since we talked, but since we're about to spend much more time together I thought this was a good opportunity for a chat. You know? Have a nice open dialog where we can be free to exchange ideas and opinions, honestly, and without reservation.
So, with that said, I gotta tell you man: knock it off, you are distracting me from college football.
Moving into a new apartment? Okay fine, Real Life, it happens. New job? Starting to test my patience a little. Huge trip? Now you're pushing it. I thought we had this all worked out, man. I would sit in my underwear for 18 hours a day while constantly refreshing my Twitter feed, and you would basically just ignore me until after Urban Meyer was eventually hired as the new OSU head coach. We had a good thing going.
But you ruined it! Ruined it with your "opportunities" and "new experiences." A sense of accomplishment? Money? Feh! A College Football Fan cares not for these things. All I wanted was a ringside seat for watching an FCS team come within two touchdowns of beating another FBS team, or cheering on a rogue reporter as he attempts to goad Mike Vrabel into cursing on live tv. That's it! Now what if my newfound obligations force me to miss Lou Holtz farting on ESPN? What if I find myself working for the sake of others rather than obsessing over the average turnover margin of WAC vs SEC matchups? What then? How will you compensate me, Real Life? With a sense of pride? Personal integrity? Hope for the future?
I doubt that very much. In the meantime, I'll still be here, doing my usual Eleven Warriors duty in between teaching kids, but mostly mourning the loss of my ability to make thousands of snide comments about crappy ESPN shows that air during normal working hours.
In Happier News
“That’s what you expect from a Buckeye,” said coach Lovie Smith, who coached linebackers at Ohio State in 1995. “He had a lot of different opportunities coming in, and he chose us. “He’s a good football player. We want to get the players in game-type situations, and he’s making the most of it.
“We all noticed him tonight.”
The "he" in this case is of course everyone's favorite Dane this side of Hamlet, Mr. Dane Sanzenbacher. Apparently Sanzo has been doing more than his fair share of silencing the doubters as practices begin in the NFL, to the surprise of absolutely no one. Two things I want to point out here: First, I had no idea that Lovie Smith used to coach at OSU. That is pretty cool. Secondly, this report specifically mentions that Dane had "...enough quickness to create separation," which is funny to me because most scouting reports on the dude made sure to mention that he had neither adequate quickness OR the ability to create separation.
My point being that in reality, him being undrafted was about 95% due to measurables rather than actual talent. There's probably a book to be written on the inability of pro scouts to see beyond their personal preference for specific heights and weights at certain positions, and Dane will probably provide enough evidence throughout his career to fill up several pages of footnotes for that book. Best of luck to that guy.
You Put Your Hand Upon My Hip, When You Dip I Dip We Dip Bearcat fans don't like touching. I get that. Being a stoic midwesterner myself, I too am not a huge fan of any sort of physical affection. I fully expect my future wife to understand and accept the fact that our first night as a married couple to begin and end with a firm handshake followed by 8 hours of sleep in separate beds.
But seriously guys, you gotta love a good ol fashioned manly chestbump. Yes, I realize that it may be unseemly when your team is down by 24 with 3:05 left in the game, but as coach Butch Jones points out, there is science behind chest bumps. Science. And you can't argue with science.
I Found Out By Carrier Pigeon That You Were Doggin' It The NCAA has a lot of very dumb, archaic rules, which often gives people the impression of an organization "established in the 50's and stuck in the 70's," as our good friend Jimmy D likes to say. And one of those rules that exemplifies this is that of coaches not being allowed to view the "voluntary" workouts that take place during the summer.
On a certain level I can understand the idea behind the rule. On another, less stupid level, I question the rule on several grounds, such as: Are we still pretending that these workouts are voluntary? Does anyone really think that the information doesn't get back to the coaches anyway? How often is this rule broken? Is the answer to that anything other than "always"?
The funniest part of this story is JoePa casually admitting he broke this rule, not caring about that he did, and knowing the NCAA won't do anything about it. Joe Paterno kicks ass.
A Reminder Don't forget guys, Eat Too, Brutus 2k11 is coming up this October 29th, and as luck would have it, not only is that the alt uni game against Wisconsin, but it's also Homecoming! All in all it should be an awesome time and a great chance to donate to a great cause, so don't forget to head on over to the official page here on 11W and get signed up!
ALSO in case you missed it, we are running a campaign with the always excellent City Barbeque; bring in the printed out coupon here, and you'll get 11 ribs for 11 bucks. Keep in mind that a full rack is 12 ribs, which normally runs you 19.99, so it is definitely one steal of a deal. Also you'll be pioneers of a sort in that you'll probably be among the first people in history to have printed off a coupon you got from a college sports blog that you then used to purchase ribs. Congratulations!
N! K! O! T! B! There are no words (but the image above sums it up pretty well):
