Archives for August 2006

OSU Heisman hype underway

OSU FootballOhio State University has begun the Heisman campaigns for Troy Smith and Ted Ginn, Jr.

Visit Smith’s and Ginn’s web pages for stats, pictures, and two goose-bump inducing highlight reels.

15 days and counting…

You want drama?!?

Okay, now the situation surrounding [HWSNBN] has reached a Mount K-2 level of dramatic shame and hilarity. At this point, we’re confident that phones were ringing off the hook this morning in Hollywood, as producers scrambled to be first with a movie-of-the-week pitch for [HWSNBN]‘s life story.

In honor of that inevitable ABC/ESPN Sunday Night Movie, here are the actors we’d like to see playing the principal parts of [movie voice ON]:

“Maurice: Third Down and Life to Go …Go… go…

[movie voice OFF]

Main Cast

Male lead – Gary Coleman

clarettColeman
Whatchoo talkin’ bout, Tressel?!?”

Now hang on, I know, “he’s no football player.” Do you think a little detail like that will matter to Hollywood producers, anyway? Besides, what a perfect metaphorical casting choice for a character that overcomes obstacles along life’s path. And it’d be funny, cause Coleman is small and stuff.

Coach Jim Tressel – Ed Harris

tresselHarris
“On the contrary, gentlemen. I believe this is going to be our finest hour.”

Clean-cut, well dressed, doesn’t take crap from nobody.

AD Andy Geiger – Yogi Bear

geigerYogi
“Gee, Boo-Boo. Do ya think the NCAA would mind?!?”

Might have to go CGI on this one. But I’m sure Yogi could use the work.

Supporting Cast

Clarett’s Mother – Kathy Bates
bates
“Youuu playin’ the fooseball, Maurice?!?”

Yes, I know she’s caucasian. But she’s perfect. Nobody will ever think of another football mother without thinking of Bates.

Nick Mango, Clarett Family Attorney – Chris Kattan
maaaango

Nobody does Mango like Kattan. ‘Nuff said.

Hai Waknine, Jewish Mobster – Woody Allen
allen
“I-I don’t like violence. It gives me nausea. Makes me vomit; it’s so unhealthy. Now pay back the money or you’ll be swimming with the Gefilte fishes.”

Coming soon to an ESPN channel near you. Check local listings.

Friday Fun #3: Heisman Dark horses

Just about everyone’s top three Heisman hopefuls, going into the 2006 season, are Brady Quinn, Troy Smith, and Adrian Peterson. It’s very likely that the 2006 Heisman Trophy will be awarded to one of these three superhumans. But we’ve decided to take a crack and predicting the dark horse, the player that has just as big an upside as these guys do. We present the MotSaG’s Heisman dark horses:

Slyvester-Yon Rambo: Brian Brohm – A QB on the Top Ten Louisville squad that will put up huge offensive numbers in th Big East on a team with little other offensive help except a traitor of a RB who committed to Ohio State before turning his back on us and signing with Louisville… Plus, Louisville has no defense and will be forced to throw the ball A LOT.

Kenny Irons – A true RB star from the SEC will get lots of touches and has the opputunity to be on an undefeated Auburn team that could make a run at the National Championship game if he can help them run the table.

Zeke: Marshawn Lynch, Jr. RB, Cal – After missing two games last year and part of a third due to injury, he still ran for 1246 yards and 10 TDs. Cal is one of the teams being hyped with the possibility to overtake USC in the Pac 10. Lynch will play a huge role in determining if that happens.

Kenny Irons, Sr. RB, Auburn – The success of the team most of the time is a deciding factor on who wins the Heisman trophy. Auburn is set to have a good year which might help Iron’s chances of sneaking up in the Heisman race. Last year’s stats: 1293 yards & 13 TDs.

sportsMonkey: Marshawn Lynch, California – Even though Lynch sat out for two games last year with an injury, he still pulled off 1,642 all purpose-yards for the season. He has a 7.0 YPC average over his career at Cal.

Why he could win: Easily one of the top three RBs in the country. One of the veterans on his team, which gives him the “leadership” opportunities that the Heisman voters love to see. USC is rebuilding, so the state’s expectations are being transferred to the Bears. And no Leinart or Bush to compete against (for media attention) this year.

Why he’s a long shot: Cal has to replace three starters on the offensive line. If they aren’t up to the talent of last year, it could impact Lynch’s numbers. Lynch is also in the same camp as many other great football players around the country – how does he get the media to stop slobbering over ND’s Quinn and Weis.

el Kaiser: Michael Bush – My pick isn’t going to make to S-Y Rambo happy, but he’ll get over it. I’m going with another Lousiville boy. Now that the other Bush has vacated Touchdown City for New Orleans, Mike can take up residence with his 24 TDs from last year. As S-Y Rambo mentioned, Louisville is going to put up some serious offensive numbers, and most of them will be going through Bush. The weak Big East should give Bush plenty of room to run, and if he has a break-out game in an upset of West Virginia, look out. His biggest hurdle is going to be his team mate, Brohm. He’ll have to seriously outshine him in every game to be considered, but I think he can do it.

I look for him to be big in both the Miami game and the WVa game as well, surprising everyone and being invited to the Downtown Athletic Club.

So those are our dark horses. If I was a betting man, I’d still go with the top three, but these guys deserve a serious look.


Wasn’t a darkhorse

2006-2007 Buckeye Men’s Basketball Schedule Announced

Gren Oden 2 I realize it is football season and not many people, especially in Columbus, care about basketball right now. I promise this is the one and only time I will mention the upcoming basketball season (until football is over). I just had to give some credit to Thad Matta and Gene Smith for trying to make basketball matter in Columbus. Sure basketball will always be secondary to football in this town, but with this year’s recruiting class (highlighted by Greg Oden) and newly released schedule, there is reason for fans to get excited.

Thad MattaThis year’s schedule includes non-conference games against North Carolina, Cincinnati, Tennessee, and defending national champ Florida. These games will give tOSU basketball program national exposure. It has been said by Matta and others in OSU’s basketball circle that they are interested in building a basketball powerhouse at Ohio State. This is not a one season get all the publicity you can and who cares what happens next thing. Matta is building something special for the present and the future. Matta said the schedule was made with long-term goals in mind:

“This is an incredibly challenging schedule for our young basketball team,” Matta said. “We will be short-handed and inexperienced in the beginning. But I believe the competitiveness of who we are playing, where we are playing and when we are playing will make us a better basketball team in the long run.”

There will be plenty of time and the right (not football) season to discuss much more OSU basketball. I wanted to give a shout out to Matta for doing an amazing job and the new schedule provided that opportunity. Forgive me for interrupting your football reading.

Changes with the LBs

OSU FootballRemember our Linebacker preview from a few weeks ago? Yeah, so maybe we were a little off. The O-Zone is reporting a few tweaks to the two-deep for the linebackers:

According to linebackers coach Luke Fickell, the depth chart at linebacker has James Laurinaitis as the number one middle linebacker, Marcus Freeman as the leo linebacker, and John Kerr at the will linebacker. Laurinaitis is backed up at middle linebacker by Larry Grant, Freeman is backed up by Curtis Terry, and Kerr by true freshman Tyler Moeller. Ross Homan, who was considered to be challenger for a starting position, has been out a week with a hamstring problem. Fickell described Moeller as “someone you notice, someone that when the ball get to the line of scrimmage, he’s always there.”

I wonder what prompted the changes? I’ve always thought Kerr would be a quick middle linebacker, maybe more suited for the outside, but putting him at will linebacker is an interesting move. Laurinaitis at middle linebacker is even more interesting. John KerrI guess he bulked up some and got stronger. He is a big guy to begin with, so I don’t see it being a problem with him in the middle. Backed-up by Larry Grant is good to see. At least we almost got Freeman right!

Another thing that surprises me is the absence of Austin Spitler from the two-deep. We are big on Spitler here at MotSaG, so color us surprised to see true freshman Moeller backing up Kerr, not Spitler.

In the mood for Crew food

CrewCrew playersThe Columbus Crew found themselves in an early led yesterday after a Sebastian Rozental goal, scored on a penalty kick in the 23rd minute. Rozental took the penalty shot after Real Salt Lake’s Willie Forko interfered with Thomas during a streak down the endline towards the RSL goal. After conferring for what seemed like an eternity, the officials decided on the penalty kick, and Rosental booted it past the RSL netminder for… blah BLAH, blah blahblah blah blahblahblah.

Last night was “Buck-a-Brat” night at Crew Stadium.

When a buddy called me up with an extra ticket to a Crew game, my first question to him was, “Is it on Wednesday?” Crew home games + Wednesday evenings = 100 pennies per grilled pork-veal product. Four quarters for a juicy, full-size Bob Evans bratwurst. Ten dimes per ticket into temporary Midwest heaven. With stadium mustard on the side.

pigcow product
Four dollars for dinner. Thirty-six dollars for beer. Welcome to the Midwest.

According to the Columbus Crew Media Relations dept., a total of 302,680 brats have been sold on summertime Wednesday evenings at the stadium. Now, if the average pig weighs 200 pounds, and the average brat contains a quarter pound of pork (with some baby cow thrown in), then over 302,680 brats, that works out to something like eleventy billion pigs that have sacrificed their lives for deliciousness.

Mmm… sacrificed pigcow product.

Oh, the Crew? Yeah, they lost. I think.

OSU’s night practice venue changed?

There are a lot of people excited about watching the Buckeyes practice this coming Monday night. Planned to be held in the Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium, the coaching staff probably expected a moderate crowd of hard core fans and their offspring. With the hype and expectations of fans this year, I don’t know what they were thinking. Opening the practice to the public is one thing. But throw in an autograph session before practice starts and free parking and you’re asking for problems. There’s now way they can fit everyone that shows up in the Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium.

The JOMS has a capacity of about 10k people. That’s approximately how many people will show up before 10 AM (the autograph session doesn’t start until 7). So now it appears that the powers that be have wised up and changed the practice venue. It looks like it will now be held at The Horseshoe. I haven’t found any links to the change, so I may be completely wrong here, but it might be something to keep in mind if you’ve been on the fence (either way) about going to the practice. It should be a good time and a great chance to see how the Buckeyes are progressing.

Okay, that was fast. BuckeyeXtra.com has confirmed the change:

The location for Ohio State’s open practice and autograph session Monday night has been changed to Ohio Stadium, the OSU department of athletics announced today.

The event originally was scheduled to be held in Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium. The change is being made to accommodate the large number of fans expected to attend.

Gates will open at 6 p.m., and a one-hour autograph session with the players and coaches in the stadium concourse will start at 7. Practice will follow at 8 and continue until about 9:45.

The Owens stadium has a capacity of about 12,000, including standing room. The original plan was that if that figure was reached, the gates would be closed.

Autograph seekers will be limited to one item per player.

Make or break for Lllloyd?

LLLLoydAs the season nears, more and more pressure is being placed upon Lllloyd Carr to have a breakout season. For instance, Tom Dienhart predicts that the coach will need to beat OSU and/or win a BCS birth to keep his job.

It’s a tough call. Usually, when a coach is on the hot seat, there’s a clear-cut reason why. Most of the time it’s because he’s not winning, like Zook at Florida. Sometimes it’s because he’s lost control of his team, like Cooper at OSU.

For Lllloyd, there’s a plethora of possible reasons for his recent lack of success. Some fans will claim that he’s just a victim of bad luck; that a season and a half full of devastating injuries limited his options. Some claim that the game has changed, but the coach hasn’t – pointing out the “basketball on grass” style of football so prevalent now in the Big Te(leve)n, but not practiced by Carr.

Some even claim that there is no problem whatsoever. A popular missive from UM fans in most online forums is that across their five losses, UM only lost by a total of 21 points. Of course this ignores the fact that the team was only three snaps away from having a 4-7 season… as two victories came in OT and one came in the final second of the game against Penn State.

Combining the two arguments into one big picture, UM lost five close games, while squeaking by another three with a victory. Whichever way you look at it, having eight nail-bitingly close games in a season is a problem for any coach in Division I-A, especially more so for the one sitting on the treasure chest up at Ann Arbor.

Throw in the fact that the best recruits in the state of Michigan have been splitting to other schools before the ink is even dry on their high school diplomas, and it’s no wonder that Lllloyd finds himself on the hot seat.

I believe that this is the season when we really find out who coach Carr is. He’s already reshuffled his coaching staff, which is usually the final act of a coach who’s been given one last chance. I’m not sure his fate resides on an arbitrary goal, like 10 wins or a BCS berth or a victory against Sweater Vest, but on an overall impression of how he wins or loses. It’s one thing to suffer a loss from a better team (OSU 2005), but it’s another thing to repeatedly find ways to beat yourself (Notre Dame 2005).

My personal prediction is that UM “returns to form” this year. I wonder what state of chaos the national title picture would be in if UM and OSU met on November 18th, both undefeated…

Link roundup #2

Some links from the past week or so in sports:

Cleveland’s Travis Hafner has tied Don Mattingly’s record for number of Grand Salamis in a season – 6. He’s got two months to get the record all to himself.

Ex-Trojan LenDale White spit on the wrong person at Tennessee’s practice last week – Buckeye Donnie Nickey. If you get a chance, watch the video over at ESPN. It’s educational — at USC you can attend “Win Friends and Influence People 101” taught by Robbie Alomar, where you learn, among other things, the lost art of spitting on people. At OSU, you learn life-long lessons, like how a football helmet can be used an assault weapon.

You might have heard this before, but the Buckeyes are rebuilding their defense. Defensive Coordinator Jim Heacock says there’s still work to do. He does have positive news about Mike D’Andrea and says MotSaG favorite Vernon Gholston is looking good.

Alex Boone, after a brush with the law earlier this year, came clean about his drinking problem. And by problem, we mean drinking more beer in a day than a family of four drinks water. In a week.

And finally, we’ll let James Laurinaitis sum up what the next 18 days are going to be like while we wait for College Football to start:

James Laurinaitis
Someone wake me up September 2nd

Cinci is hangin’ on…

RedsIn the background of all the craziness going on here in Ohio – the Rambo-esque incident with [HWSNBN], all the Browns’ preseason injuries, and the criminal behavior of some Bengals players – the Reds are quietly continuing their struggle for a NL wild card spot.

Ryan Freel diving catchRyan Freel is one exciting player to watch. I’ve found myself turning off the radio (where I usually keep tabs on the Reds games) and turning the TV to FoxSports, just to see what Freel will do next. Earlier this week, he made one of the best plays of the year against the Cards, going horizontal from a full run and doing a belly flop on the warning track to catch the ball. John Fay at the Cincinnati Enquirer said:

It is not hyperbole to say it was the greatest catch in the history of Great American [Ballpark]. The Reds won by six, but The Catch came at a time when the game could have gone either way.

You can see this awesome highlight here, and here is Freel’s highlight reel for the game. (Both vid clips in Windows Media format, credit & copyright MLB).

Freel’s a bit of an odd one, too… when asked about his famous catch, he told a MLB reporter:

“I thought it was pretty neat watching that play. ‘That was a good catch, Ryan,'” Freel said. “The midget in my head is named Farney. ‘Hey Farney, I don’t know if that was you that caught the ball, but it was pretty good if it was you.'”

What was that about Farney?

“He’s the little guy in my head who I talk to, and I talk to him,” Freel said. “Everyone thinks I talk to myself, so I tell them I’m talking to Farney.”

Um, alright.

The Reds dropped a tough game last night against the Phillies, but they are still at least a half-game ahead of anyone else in the wild card race. Groovy.

Image credit & copyright: Associated Press