It's Time for Football!!

Will it be another big battle for the SEC EAST CELLAR?

Well, tomorrow it all begins. Put the kids to sleep, get the couch ready, and let's get something besides baseball rolling on Sportcenter. It's time for football season. Mississippi State kicks off the SEC season this year verse South Carolina. Steve Spurrier has never won in Starkville, and his last beating in Starkville lead to one of the most hilarious moments a year later. After State upset Florida in Starkville, the next year, Florida romped the bullies and Spurrier after the game said he scored the last touchdown for the waterboy. All that to say, I think Spurrier will have his first victory in Starkville this Thursday, but crazier things have happened. Let's play football!

To kick off the season, Alex and I made our prediction regarding the SEC, the SEC championship game, and the National Championship game. The predictions are as follows.

Alex's Picks
SEC EAST:
1) Georgia (7-1) - Richt seems to always get the best out of nothing. They can run the ball and play defense. This is a very tough year, I just think they will be last team standing.
2) Tennessee (6-2) - I think they will suprise alot and bounce back with a decent year. The Cal game will determine alot about them. Florida early, LSU late, and Georgia on road..they will lose 2/3
3) Florida (5-3) - I know every magazine has them winning the division, but no running game, poor offensive line--bad SEC combo
4) South Carolina (4-4) - Reality comes crashing downfor Spurrier
5) Kentucky (2-6) - same old same old
6) Vanderbilt (1-7) - Last year was there one chance
to go to a bowl, they blew it

SEC WEST
1) Auburn(7-1) - Loaded, but not like 2004. If KennyIrons gets hurt, they are in trouble
2) LSU (6-2) - They have talent to go undefeated, buta coach who will drag them down further each year
3) Arkansas (5-3) - Houston Nutt is coaching for hisjob, usually at his best there
4) Alabama (4-4) - No Brodie = No leadership = lesswins
5) Ole Miss (4-4) - I think Shaeffer could do somegreat things when ball is in his hand. Orgeron's system may come around this year
6) Miss. State (1-7) - They are bad...very bad

SEC championship: Auburn over Georgia, Auburn will revenge the regular season loss at home to Georgia ina close game.
National Championship: Ohio State over Auburn in BCS championship game

Brian’s Picks

SEC Final Standings

West
1) Auburn Tigers- Tuberville has got himself the best runningback in the SEC. If Brandon Cox can show some improvement from last year, the defense and the running game will do the rest.
2) LSU Tigers – The loss to Auburn in their SEC opener will be the difference.
3) Alabama – Kenneth Darby will do his best, but without Brodie or a 100% Prothro, the Tide will lose a few key games.
4) Ole Miss – My heart didn’t let me put them in 5th. The defensive line and offensive line are big question marks, but my love for Ole Miss boosts them above Arkansas and State.
5) Arkansas – The Nutthouse is going to be on the hotseat after this year
6) Miss. State – Croom’s defense will be solid this year, but no Norwood means no getting out of the SEC cellar. By the way, the Atlanta falcons got a steal in Norwood. That guy was unbelievable.

East
1) Florida – call me crazy, but I’m going out on a limb and saying that Chris Leake leads them to the SEC Championship game.
2) Georgia – The lack of experience at qb will keep them out of championship. Although rumor has it from Highland Park, Texas that Matt Stafford is the real deal.
3) South Carolina – Spurrier wins another upset against Tennessee and vaults them into another bowl game and third place finish in the East.
4) Tennessee- I might be wrong on this one, because honestly this could be the year things click for Ainge. I just wouldn’t mind seeing the Vols go down again this year. Fat Phil’s misery is my joy. Sorry Alex
5) Kentucky – Rafael Little will put the team on his shoulders and carry them past Vanderbilt.
6) Vanderbilt – another tough year for the “Dores.” Always might upset Ole Miss though.
SEC Championship Florida vs. Auburn – Auburn routs Florida as they have their eyes set on the National Championship.

Nat’l Championship Game
Auburn vs. West Virginia – Ok, I’m probably wrong, but didn’t want to go with Ohio State. Auburn wins the National title and at least gets some comfort from the NCAA debacle 2 years ago.

The SEC "half-decade" review

Before we do our preseason picks and stur up much agrivation and disagreement by our choices, I thought I would pause and look back at the first half of this decade. It doesn't seem like that long ago when we all got 'giddy' over the millineum new years day. Now the decade is half over, it's been pretty good...well, maybe that depends upon who your team is.


Summary: The 90's were dominated by three teams (Florida, Tennessee, Alabama). All ten championships were divided between these three teams. The torch has been passed this decade to LSU, Georgia, and Auburn. The conference is deeper now, though there has been turnover at the top Tennessee and Florida remain competitive. Alabama has been crushed by probation. Lots of coaching turnover and turmoil. Spurrier had the guts to come back to a team in the same division as his beloved gators. The conference has gotten deeper and better with teams like Ole Miss having some good years, South Carolina becoming a team, and Arkansas still gives people problems. Yet, Vanderbilt and Kentucky somehow still suck...maybe they always will
Best Five Games:
5)Tennessee vs. Florida 2004 - loaded with controversy and drama
4) Ole Miss vs. Auburn 2003 - there's more to why this game was so great than just the drama of the game
3) Auburn vs. Georgia 2002 - David Greene's last heroics, 4th and 15
2) Ole Miss vs. LSU 2003 - Unless your inbred Cajuin, you were heartbroken for the rebs, b/c they should have won
1) Tennessee vs. Florida 2001 - #2 vs #3, shootout...Vols spoiled what was touted as the 'biggest game ever in the swamp'


Offensive Player of half-decade:
tie: Eli Manning (Ole Miss) and Cadillac Williams (Auburn)
runner up: Rex Grossman (Florida)
Defensive Player of Half-Decade:
David Pollack (Georgia)
runner up: John Henderson (Tennessee)

Biggest upsets:
Mississippi State/Florida 2004 - I think this was Sylvestor Croom's first SEC win, and the last straw on Ron Zook
Ole Miss/Florida 2002 - Ole Miss was unranked (i think) Florida was a Top 10 team
Tennessee/Georgia 2004 - Tennessee had been spanked the week before by Auburn, Georgia had embarrassed LSU, Georgia was ranked a 14 point favorite
Florida/Georgia 2003 - I know Florida seems to always win this game, but Georgia was lightyears better and somehow lost
LSU/Tennessee 2001- SEC championship game, Vols ranked #2 and had whipped LSU earlier in year, Vols were a 10 point favorite and blew their chance to play in national championship game

Best coaching moves:
1) LSU hiring Nick Saban (2000)
2) Georgia hiring Mark Richt (2001)
3) Florida finally pulling the chord on Zook
4) South Carolina not renewing Lou Holtz contract and recommending being committed

Worst Coaching Moves:
1) Florida hiring Ron Zook
2) Miss. State hiring Sylvestor Croom
3) Phillip Fulmer retaining his miserable staff
4) The Alabama Debacle
5) Bobby Lauder scandal at Auburn



You may agree or disagree on some of these. I feel pretty fair and right on with most of them. I stayed away from the whole David Cutcliffe/Ole Miss thing--b/c this is sweet emotion and i don't know what it was like to be an Ole Miss fan when he was coach. You just don't get invited to eat dinner at someone's house and insult the cooking, it' the southern way.

A Sunday Afternoon Chuckle

It was probably the boats fault.

One thing I don't understand is why car insurance for men is more expensive than for ladies. I guess it's our aggressive driving nature (an admirable trait of course), but from personal experience it seems women take the cake in accidents. These pictures affirm my suspicions.

The photos remind me of an incident back in my college days. I was walking across "the circle" on my way to class, when a college girl comes running at me hysterically pleading for help. Not knowing what to do, I simply braced myself for whatever was needed. My manly instincts kick in and adrenaline starts pumping. Am I going to attempt to fend off this girl from an angry boyfriend? Is she fleeing some stalker and I will have to jump in and negotiate peace...with a fist? Alas, my manly dreams went out the door as she ran past me towards someone else. Still wanting to hear what the problem was, I stopped to listen. She points towards the circle and gasps that she needs help PARKING HER CAR. And boy did she. Straight ahead was her red civic, blocking traffic around the circle (this was before Khayat's push for a "walking" campus...this incident might have been the reason for the push though). in an attempt to parallel park, the car was left almost perpendicular to the parking spot and jutting out into traffic. An impressive feat if only it had been her goal. All our (2) women readers out there, don't be offended, it's just a humorous story...but true.

All that too say, poking fun at woman's driving must mean its time for football season. (That connection made no sense, but I just wanted to say that college football is here). Sweet Emotion will reveal its SEC football picks this week, so prepare to voice your choices as well. It's time for football season! Or as Ole Miss sports marketing would say "All ABOARD THE REBEL EXPRESS."(how embarrassing).

an unwelcomed change of the guard

I have to confess that I was rather outraged when Channel 6 San Diego thought it was a good idea to replace the legendary Ron Burgandy with some blonde chick. I mean, first of all only a dude can properlly be a lead anchor (If you don't agree with me on this one, stop reading, you are not welcome on this blogsite)--second and most of all turnover sucks! I hate having turnover in something that I grow accustomed to. Imagine the outrage you would have felt coming home from work, sitting in your recliner with a beer to relax, turning on the news and the guy you've watched for years has been replaced by a chick! Well, thankfully i've never had to go through that (is someone working on the protest of Katie Couric doing CBS though? if not, I'm on it) but i am experiecing some frustration with the turnover in College football broadcasting this fall--it's alot. Many familiar faces are changing networks, times, and even leaving the business. It's annoying, i things the way they were. As far as i've read, the only crew that is staying put is that lousy chick who does the reject Big-10 game at noon on ESPN2. You grow accustomed to some of these announcers the way the people of San Diego grew accustomed to Ron Burgandy. Can't we all get them to just sign life-time contracts? Some of the major moves involve CBS's Todd Blackledge to ESPN, his replacement is the awful Gary Danielson form ABC. Ron Franklin, who is a legend to me, has been bumped to ESPN2. Keith Jackson is officially gone, and the atrosious Brent Musberger is ABC's 'go-to' tandem now. Here are some of the adustments:
http://community.foxsports.com/blogs/DD22/2006/05/25/ABC_and_ESPN_unveil_their_commentors_for_College_Football_in
http://www.collegefootballnews.com/2006/Columnists/MZ/GaryDanielson.htm

I hope there is some good chemistry, bad broadcasting can ruin a game (JP sports). But hey, on the bright side, at least there aren't anymore chick broadcasters!!

Anyone gonna miss a favorite announcer?? Who are best? Who are worst?

Screech can't catch a break

Maybe Being Zach's little nerdy friend wasn't so bad after all

Beloved Dustin Diamond just can't catch a break these days. First of all, he plays the somewhat lovable, somewhat annoying nerd of the Saved by the Bell crew. Second of all, apparently he hasn't found a job since his Saved by the Bell days. In a heartwrenching story, Dustin can't make his house payment and has resorted to a new low, even by his standards. To help with the payment, He is selling T-shirts online which say "save my house" on the front, and then "I paid $15 to save Screeech's House" on the back. The hilarious part is, the three "e's" on his shirt are not a misprint. NBC still owns the rights to the name Screech, and therefore Dustin cannot legally put it on a shirt. You can even step it up a notch and purchase an autographed shirt for $20(I guess his signature is only worth $5). Like I said, the guy can't catch a break.

But today, just when it looked like it couldn't get any worse, scientists decided it was their turn to take a stab at Screech. Scientists have now changed the definition of a planet, thus excluding Pluto from its 70 year planet status. What does this mean for Dustin Diamond? Only that now one of his most famous lines in Saved By the Bell can't even be used any more. Remember when Screech made up the word"mvemjsnup", to serve as a learning aid for that goshdarn, confusing solar system. Well, the genius, training tool is officially useless. Without Pluto, the word is simply "mvemjsnu". How terrible is that!

Lastly, I think Alex would agree with me. One more thing we are against are these new "activities" which ESPN deems as sports. The trend started with ESPN showing the Spelling Bee Championship. Now, they also show Dog Shows and other ridiculous programs. The other day, i saw the "sport" of speed stacking. Liza and I were laughing out loud as we watched the "color commentator" attempt to analyze a competitor's technique. I know everyone is waiting for football, but lets be serious, I hope no one is so desperate that they resort to speed stacking as a sport. There are numerous reasons speed stacking should not be a sport, but the first and only reason that matters is: A GIRL HOLDS THE WORLD RECORD. I am done talking about this, I've given it too much credit already. Here is a video of the sport. Thoughts? Impressive...yes, sport...No!

What we are about on this blog: Episode I

Thanks to Brian's popularity and technological updates, it has come aware to the two of us that our readers have grown beyond Brian and myself to like 3 or 4, and sometimes even 5. Since these readers are on different parts of the country, most people's connection to this blog is either through Brian or I, not both. So we thought we would pause and just take a minute to let you into our vault, and tell you about ourselves. To know Brian or I, you don't need to know our families, or where we grew up, where we went to school...none of that matters. What you do need to know is what we are about and what we are not about. Brian will be handling what we are about, but this is a small list of things we would go to war against:

1)Barry Bonds - He barely retains the "image of God"
2)The WNBA - too many reasons why
3)College football fans who think their conference is better than the SEC
4)Michelle Wie - Please stop, by the way...She faked it http://www.sportsline.com/columns/story/9593269
5)Title IX - Brian and I can in good conscience say that we have never attended a female collegiant athletic event
6)Notre Dame Football - This is the "Lloyd Braun" of college sports (you know the kid you grew up with that really wasn't that great but all the other parents thought you should be like him). We despise it all, from Knute Rockne to Rudy to Rocket Ismail to Charlie Weiss...We wish only pain and suffering to them
7)Steve Nash winning 2 straight NBA MVP's
8)New York Yankees - they represent all that is soul-less and heart-less in the universe
9)The claim that USC actually won part of the national championship in 2003, and that in 2005 they were competing for 3 straight. If they had played in the SEC, they wouldn't have won a single one.
10.)The Chicago Cubs and their fans - Thank you Steve Bartman...Thank you
11)Vijah Singh - what a jerk
12)Celebrities who think because they are good actors it automatically
means they are experts in other areas such as politics--though we think Arnold was a great addition to California
13)Barbaro - he's a freaking horse
14)"anyone who takes away shots from Allen Iverson" on the list
15)The "Lifetime T.V. channel."
16)J.P. 11:30 games... The announcer would always say something like
"its gonna be a great game here in Starkville, MS... Undefeated
Georgia will have its hands full with the 2-7 Mississippi State
bulldogs coming up next.
17)ABC's college football pre-game crew (John
Saunders, Craig James, and big fat ex-Irish player)
18)the Heisman Trophy - Jason White, Eric Crouch, Ron Dayne, Charles Woodson, Gino Toretta, Ty Detmer....and anyone who played for Notre Dame
19)The WNBA!
20)Philadelphia Media, can't get over the whole TO
thing and they want Iverson out
21)Romantic Comedy movies, i don't know why they give
the 'comedy' title on end of it, also Dermott Mulroney
who appears in every romantic comedy
22)Hillary Clinton
23)Guy who whimped out and thought we needed maps
24)Cheerleading considered as a sport
25) The WNBA !!
26)The whole story and concept of the Titanic
27)Martha Burke
28)American Idol and all shows alike (ie Dancing with
> the Stars)
29)Ben Affleck...except in "Good Will Hunting"
30)Female sports broadcasters
31)People who voted for John Kerry and Al Gore
32)Trev Alberts
33)Katie Couric...ok, she's beautiful, but i protest her coming to CBS in the spirit and name of "Ron Burgandy"!!
34)- European Golfers
35) The WNBA!!!
36)Men who plan weddings
37)The idea of RSVP-ing to something, especially
weddings
38)No Name golfers who win Majors - Ben Curtis winning the British Open a few years ago would be like Temple winning the National Championship, only a disgrace
39)the first guy who thought it would be romantic to
put a diamond on a ring and therefore cost every man
thousands of dollars and months of sin saving up those
dollars
40)Humidity- makes september afternoon college football games almost
unbearable
41) Tom Cruise (but know we make a huge distinction
between the man and his movies)
42) Notre Dame Football -- We just really want to stress to you how disgraceful this evil entity is to 'sweetemotion'



I know this list is brief, but we had to do it on a wim. We may update this from time to time. This is a small picture of who we are, this is that deep well that comes to the surface for you to glance at from us. You may like this list or hate it. We hope this doesn't turn you away from us, but rather we hope you'll find some things on this list, nod in agreement, and say to yourself like we do...."now that is some sweet Emotion"


....Please let us know where it's 'sweet' or 'bitter' to you......

sincerely,

Brian and Alex

Gimmick Watch

Webster's dictionary defines "gimmick" as an attention-getting strategem or inducement. My friends and roomates through the years have noticed my love for gimmicks, and many have come aboard the gimmick train. The love for gimmicks might be a hereditary trait. My grandmother, Charlotte Peets, has been putting gimmicks in our stockings for years. However, she was to be topped only by my mother, affectionately known as the gimmick queen. When stores see my mom coming, they begin putting all their new products in the aisle. If it says "new" or "new look" on the box, my mom is going to scoop it up. Therefore, I've been raised on gimmicks, and what a joy they bring!

With that being said, I will use this blog every once in a while to alert our readers to new gimmicks on the market. I picked up one yesterday....Fruity Cheerios.

Gimmick Review: B -
Creative idea, great looking box, great namebrand, but the taste isn't that great. You would expect a fruit loops flavor, but instead it tastes a lot like Trix, but not as quality. Also, it doesn't even really change the color of the milk, which is always a plus in my book. It simply means you can drink the milk at the end and get the fine sugary taste.

Great Gimmick of the past:
Crystal Pepsi - I will never forget the day that Mom Sorgenfrei brought home the clear Pepsi. Mom calls everyone into the kitchen, "Gather around kids, your in for a real treat." Then she proceeds to unveil the crystal pepsi. It was a second Christmas for Mark and I. There we stood just staring at the fascinating new gimmick. It Looks like Sprite, everything in you tells you its going to be Sprite, that is until it hits those taste buds. I'm disappointed Clear Pepsi went off the shelves so quickly and so was Van Halen for that matter. He had a great rendition of "right now" to promote the product. The Sorgenfrei's were one family that gave Clear Pepsi a big thumbs up.

Future gimmicks to be covered: Nerd Ropes, the Pizzaz, and so much more. One of the many things that makes a Free Enterprise economy great - the proliferation of gimmicks.

P.S. Ole Miss received a #75 ranking from SI. Ouch!

What we're really after....

Being a true SEC fan can really lead to some intense discussions. Opposing fans never really see eye to eye on much. Most fans are blinded by their own ambition, every loss is b/c of mistakes your team made--not because the other team was just better. Most true SEC fans tape all their teams games, and then re-watch them during the week. If it's a win, you start watching as soon as College Gamenight is over and you've gone through 3 cups of coffee so you can see Reece Davis and Mark May give 3 passing comments about your team. If it's a loss, you usually need a day of NFL to sober up and recover before you can watch the tape. You watch criticizing almost every offensive call, never giving credit to the opposing defense. The offensive coordinator should be tared and feathered, and that supposed 'blue chip' true freshman QB should start the next game. For those of you who aren't real SEC fans, this is just a glimpse into what our weekends are about. I havn't even brought up the amount of call-in radio broadcasts we listen to.

C.S. Lewis once said "All men's natural desires are to be loved and to feel significant." Nothing could be truer of college football fans. While we do live and die by the win/loss column, i'm suggesting that it's all motivated for attention to feel significant. Think about it...We invest almost as much stock into the actual game as we do into the media's reaction to the game. If your team had huge win, what tops it off is too see the continued highlights and praise given by the Gameday crew. As fans, we don't just want the win--we want it to be all over sportscenter, in SportsIllustrated, and hopefully this will lead to an eventual visit of the gameday crew to your campus. We don't want to just win, We want everyone in the nation to know we WON!! Still don't believe me? Relate to this:

1) Has it ever soothed a loss when you see the gameday crew talk about your game and say your team was "robbed" or "cheated" or "should have won"---

2) Ever been outraged that your team didn't appear in SportsIllustrated the next week following a huge win or great performance?? I've sent in many letters to the editor concerning this, my profanity usually keeps me from being published.

3) Doesn't your hatred for Notre Dame partly derived from the absurd attention they get from all of the media?? Let me let you in on something...NBC...it stands for "Notre dame Broadcasting Company"

4) Are you mad when the CBS crew or ESPN crew doesn't think your team has a chance to win the game today, if your like me, you don't just want to win, but you want to shut up the idiot who thinks you've got no chance.

5) After a win, how many hundreds of Internet pages do you read to see who's saying what about your team, what they did and what they might do the next week.

You see, we're really after ESPN coming to our campus and saying "This is the greatest place to see College Football!!!" We want to be significant, and you know what...it's OK. I'm not sure how we should deal with this or what should come of all of this media frenzy we hope loves us---but I do know this...Sports Illustrated's College Football Issue was just released and Tennessee is nowhere to be found in it. I'm outraged and working on my letter to the editor as we speak!!!!

Our famous readers

Dr. Robert Hardison of Memphis, meet Mr. Robert Hardison of Jackson.


After work today I decided to have a little fun before dinner. I sat down and googled some of our celebrity readers names to see just who else in the world has that name. Just for kicks and giggles here is what I found.

Bo Johnson is the art director for various "hit" movies such as "John Tucker Must Die" and "28 days"

Robert "Gray" Hardison is an Obstretics and Gynecology doctor in Memphis, TN. Nice! A sharp looking guy at that. Mark, have you ever had any runins with ole Dr. Hardison?

Robert Russ is an animation character developer for such movies as "The Incredibles" and "Monsters Inc.
Good work Robert, didn't know you had such creativity in you. I mean Sully was a pretty creative character

Andrew "Drew" Cleland - or should I say Dr. Cleland - is the associate professor of physics at University of California, Santa Barbara. Our Drew has an MBA from Millsaps College thank you very much.

David A Black is an award-winning journalist, novelist, screenwriter, and producer. Yes he even has the middle initial of "A". No word yet on whether the "A" stands for Albritton like our very own Med School graduate David Albritton Black.

David Luter is apparently the president of Arkansas Seed Dealers Association. What makes this even better, his name is found on the website for Big Cedar Lodge (A Peets Family Trip destination). He gives a great quote about the great "staff" of Big Cedar Lodge. David, did you fill out a comment card when we were there 8 years ago? Bo, this guy could probably buy lots of tassles from you in the furniture world.

Brian Sorgenfrei is the property manager of the YMCA in Kokomo, Indiana. Its good to know there is another Brian Sorgenfrei out there, and even better to know that he manages the property of a YMCA. No confirmation yet on what I look like, but hopefully I'm the guy at the top of the Header.

Alexander Watlington is well, there is no other alex watlington. However, I did find him on someone else's blog.

Mark Sorgenfrei apparently was in the military at some point.

And last but not least, Ryan Davis apparently is a 6'o" 261 pound DT and wears #92 for the Idaho Vandals. Unfortunately Ryan didn't contribute much to their 2-9 season, but its his big senior season coming up. So maybe he can turn things around for the Vandals.

Well, it's good to know what our other selves are up to out there. I bet the Kokomo, Indiana YMCA is the best looking "Y" in the country. Maybe I'll get to see it one day.

p.s. for all you conspiracy theorists out there, NASA cannot find the original Neil Armstrong landing on the moon video.
You guys are sad.

Ole Miss Football and C.S. Lewis

Who can forget the most awkward, dissatisfied look from this guy when he showed off his Chargers uniform.

Sorry about the blog problem over the weekend. I'm sure our 4 regular readers were in quite a bind. Anyway, proud to say, a tekkie chat room helped me out and I'm glad there are people smarter than me out there. I remember trying to learn Java with Bo Johnson right down the hall at Ole Miss and well....thats another story for another day.

As football season approaches, I am more and more reminded of how dissatisfied I am at the end of every football season. Yes, most of that dissatisfaction probably stems from being an Ole Miss fan. I mean we are coming off a nice 3-8 season. However, if I'm honest, never once has a season finished and I felt satisfied. The Eli Manning senior season brought a little joy. But at the same time who wasn't irate over Nichols missing 2 key field goals in the LSU game, or us losing to Texas Tech while giving up 7000 passing yards. I'm getting upset just thinking about the LSU game. Every season ends, and we either look back and discuss what could have been, or look forward and talk about what might could be.

Now don't get me wrong, I hope we make it to the SEC championship one day, some day. And you better believe I will be there. But, I've said many times, lets just make it to Atlanta and I'll be satisfied. I'm lying to myself. If we make it to the SEC championship, I'll think back and wonder what would have been if we hadn't lost to SMU. I'll get mad at the BCS and talk about how we could have won the National championship if there was just a playoff system. The funny thing is, I was at the Texas/USC national championship game last year (thanks to my father in law...just in case he reads this blog), and following the greatest game I've ever seen, Texas fans began discussing next year. "Will Vince stay? How will we be without him?" It was one of those moments I realized how we are always yearning for something more, something bigger.

C.S. Lewis in his book Weight of Glory makes these comments. "Now, if we are made for heaven, the desire for our proper place will be already in us, but not yet attached to the true object, and will even appear as the rival of that object....If a transtemporal, transfinite good is our real destiny, then any other good on which our desire fixes must be in some degree fallacious, must bear at best only a symbolical relation to what will truly satisfy." I almost refuse to comment further on this quote at risk of messing with the genius of Lewis...but I will. Lewis nails it on the head. Of course we will never find true satisfaction in a sinful, fallen world. We are made in the image of God (Gen 1:27) and what we are made for, where our true destiny lies, is living in perfect communion and worship of our God and Creator. According to Lewis, a great apologetic for heaven is the simple fact that we are never fully satisfied here. We were built for something more.

With that being said, isn't it interesting how we cope with the unsatisfaction. Lewis again says, "we are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, likme an ignorant child who wants to go on making muc pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased." In other words instead of turning to Christ, and finding true satisfaction in the only place I am fully known, fully forgiven, fully approved of, and fully loved (I Cor.13:12), I seem to turn to other things that were never meant to bring full/ultimate satisfaction. Sex, drink, Nintendo, sports and jobs of course are not sinful or evil. However, when we look to those things to bring full satisfaction, they simply cannot bear the weight of our hopes, desires, and dreams. In one sense we are far too easily satisfied, but in another sense, deep down inside we all know we were built for much more.

It should make those who are in Christ yearn for the day that full satisfaction will be found. The day that sin is wiped away and when "now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known (I Cor. 13:12). The great joy we experience when we engage in late night talks with friends, or experience the thrill of victory, or fill in the blank should simply point us forward to the new heavens and the new earth.

All that to say, I sure do hope we make it to the SEC championship soon. I went to practice friday, and it was nice to see a quarterback hit some receivers in stride. Now, the receivers didn't necessarily catch the ball, but thats another story. We are making proper steps. Let's go Rebs.

p.s. Mike Espy is on an NFL team? Are they crazy?

Nintendo No-No's

Lets face it, I played a lot of video games growing up. I don't get to play too much anymore, but thats OK. Trust me, I had my fair share of Nintendo time growing up. I'm sure plenty of people have played more hours than me, but I've accrued enough hours in my lifetime to intelligently comment on the unspoken rules of Nintendo.

The unspoken rules of Nintendo are those laws that regulate your gaming experience. They really don't have to be written down, because they are written on man's heart. Everyone instinctively knows that if these rules are broken, a fist fight is rightfully coming your way. Speaking from personal experience, I've seen tempers lost, grudges held, and punches thrown when these rules are ruptured.

(I am a Nintendo loyalist, so the following rules and examples come from Nintendo but can probably be applied to other game systems.)
The unspoken rules of Nintendo are broken when the following takes place:

9) Pausing without warning during the middle of the action. Torrent made this rule famous. At the worst possible moments he would pause the game and say "hold on now, gotta scratch my nose." Again, the punishment might just be yelling, but its about respect. Penalty = a dirty look, followed by a scream if it happens more than once.

8) Looking at another person's controller. Always unprofessional to break this rule. But in a game like Tecmo Bowl, the guilty party at least deserves to be yelled at. Peering at somebody's play in Tecmo Bowl was devastating. With only 4 plays to choose from, how could it not be? Kurt Cooper calls this technique paddle peeking. Penalty = a good yelling at.

7) When playing a cooperative action game, you kill your own teammate on purpose. The accidental kill always happens, but when you can't resist the urge to line up that target on your teammate and pull the trigger...thats poor. Penalty - a refusal to play with you again.

6) Refusing to play again when you are the champion. Everyone knows how this goes. Sure it might just be a minor infraction, but it is annoying. Case in point, at the A-frame in college, Nathan Michaels and I were reigning champs in Mario Tennis. Nothing made people more angry than when we refused a challenge. We would say things such as "gotta study sorry, I'm just worn out, etc." Penalty for infraction = name calling and/or banging on the your bedroom walls until you agree to play

5) Taking a teammates life without permission in Contra. Granted this rule applies only to one game, but it was the greatest cooperative play game of all time. Everybody broke this rule once in their life. Your angry because your partner has 17 lives left and you've had a horrible game. You simply press "start" and your back in the game. Everybody has done it, but its still downright wrong. Penalty = a quick jab in the arm

4) Throwing a controller. This was never a pretty site. Usually the controller was tossed right after a devastating loss or a wide open missed layup in NBA Live 95. The victim would scream at the TV screen, blame the game, and then smash the controller onto the ground or even worse into the wall. Thankfully NES controllers were invincible, but I was guilty many times of this infraction. Always had to be a little more careful when the analogue stick came out on the N64 controller. Pentalty = mom usually came into the room and made you quit playing if "your going to act like that."

3) Exploiting a glitch in a game. Sports games were almost always the culprit here. In football games the guilty party would find one or two "unstoppable plays" and run them on every key down. It would get my blood boiling. The all time greatest illustration of this rule was in the classic NES basketball game "Double Dribble." There was one 3-point shot from the corner that went in almost everytime. If you exploited it, congratulations, but its still poor. Penalty = usually a warning from the opposing player for first offense, after 3rd, 4th, etc. it was gradually worse. Yelling turned to screaming, which turned to controller throwing and then usually ended in a form tackle.

2) Pulling out the controller of your opponent. When this happened it was bad news. A person would be losing a game and would jerk the plug of the opponents controller straigh out of the system. Leaving the opponent helpless and mashing his buttons, the culprit would throw a quick touchdown pass and begin celebrating. Penalty = automatic punch in the face and calls for a redo....and here comes mom to break it up.

1) By far the most horrific rule break came when a person turned OFF THE GAME IN ANGER to prevent the soon to be winning player from getting his due satisfaction. This was completely uncool, and nothing made me madder. Right when you were about to revel in your victory and celebrate, the screen would go blank. The smiles of victory turned to sneers of hatred. This rule infraction was illustrated in college by my good friend and roomate Harvey Edwards. I was beating him in NBA Jam on the Super Nintendo when all of a sudden, visibly frustrated he reached over and pulled the game out of the system while the power was still on (double infraction). The light blinked on and off on the system and the screen turned blue. Then in utter disbelief I watched as he opened our front door and tossed out the game. I stood up only to see my beloved NBA Jam cartridge skid across the black asphault. Needless to say, I think I said something about him being ridiculous, stormed up to my room and harbored bitterness. Penalty = An all out, drop the gloves brawl.

I'm sure there are other rules and stories out there, but these were a few that I think everyone can relate with. Feel free to share any of your own.

best basketball movie??

Again riding on the coat-tails of Brian, and Gray's blog about best football movie i thought i'd bring this up. While I wasn't there in Memphis (and from the sounds of it, i wish i was), I was there in panama city when Brian broke out the hickory jersey (we also went by hickory since we were a hodge podge of interns) and made me one for the black-top tournament. Following Allen Iverson's philosophy of shooting as many shots as possible, we rode Brian's back to the championship. I don't think we would have won it though were it not for the constant Hoosiers quotes being thrown around. The game went on forever b/c u had to win by two, when we up like 17-16 dying for this to end we got the ball, huddled up (Carlton took a quick puke break) and Brian looked at us all with our hands on our knees and simply said "I'll make it." ---and He did. I think i cried that afternoon, just like everytime I see Dennis Hopper in the hospital say "...and Son, kick their butts."


Now clearly we are all in agreement that Hoosiers is best basketball movie of all time, I would even argue best sports movie. There just havn't been that many good basketball movies like their have been football movies (unless your from the Bronx or West Philly and only wear 'AndOne' clothes). So what follows in the footsteps of Hoosiers??????? Please contest or agree:

2. The Pistol

3. Glory Road

4. White Men Can't Jump

5. Hoop Dreams


I'm really unsure about most of that, but I think i do stand pretty firm on 'The pistol' being #2. Still, Hoosiers is legendary. How amazing was it in the 1991 Final Four When Coach K quotes "After he makes the second free-throw" in the last time-out. If the DVD "The Answer" qualifies in this category, we have to re-think everything though.

Clutch City

I'm Giving the Ball to That Man.


I hate to post so quickly after Alex's incredible post (its worth clicking down to read), but I'm going out of town and had to tell our 5 readers about an article. Since Alex has been talking about clutch performances with Tiger Woods, this article fits right in. Its a terrific article comparing the clutch performances of Larry Bird and David Ortiz. First of all, Bill Simmons makes a reference to the NBA superstars video. I mean what Jr. High aspiring basketball player didn't watch that classic video on summer afternoons with nothing else to do. Second of all, Simmons makes a Jimmy Chitwood reference. Lastly, the paragraph about Bird being so good that he experimented in games is unbelievable. The guy decided that he was going to score only with his left hand in one quarter. That's the kind of thing your older brother does to you when he has hit puberty and you're still a little scrawny squirt just trying to score a bucket. Its a good read, check it out. I for one have to go with Larry Bird. Maybe if Ortiz keeps this up for awhile longer, we'll reconsider. But its hard to dethrone Larry when it comes to clutch performances. I will probably make some people angry, but I'll take Bird over Jordan in the clutch. Now if we want to compare Dominique (The Human Highlight Film) Wilkins and Larry Bird, we're talking a different story. Any thoughts?

I wish I had a muni....

I must say i read Brian's post on "the muni" with great enthusiasm and envy. And since we are still in the golf season (it officially takes a back seat to college football on labor day weekend, but will get some props for the Ryder Cup) I thought i would share my one of my own stories to pay homage to "the muni". The day before my wedding was one of the craziest days of my life, or of anyone's life. But for this post I'll share our experience on the golf course. We were searching for a cheap place to play through the yellow pages when my brother-in-law mentioned this place that he and I had driven by one time that was 30 miles outside of Macon, GA in a little town called Haddock. Haddock has one intersection, a stop sign, gas station which also serves as a grocery store, and a baptist church. We drive up to this place and first of all can't tell where the supposed driveway ends and the golf course begins. We walked up to this little red shack where two men, both obviously living off of social security and weighing a good 295, were sitting on this porch swing widdiling wood. As we approached them they didn't get up or move, just asked how they could help us (one of my friends thought that we needed directions somewhere), we said "yeah, we wanna play golf". In absolute shock, the larger guy who was wearing a budweiser trucker hat responded "are you serious?" He said great and then took us in what was apparently the 'club house'. I said we have 15 guys and we want all of your carts, he said "great, I think about 60$ will cover it." Also you should know that out of the 15 of us, i think we only had about 6 sets of clubs...that didn't bother this guy at all. We started to tee off and soon everyone's shirt came off, then the shorts came off. Once we realized that we were about the only ones who'd been out there in a long time, several of my friends played the round in just golf cleates. The golf was fun till we got to the 4th hole and there was no 'hole' on the green, apparently the greens keeper blew it. So we just decided for that hole if you got it on the green, it was good. The rest of the day consisted of a lot of Indiana Jones stunts with the golf carts and a lethal game of cart polo on the driving range. My friend Jackson (who was buck) started it by driving straight onto the range and wacking balls at the rest of us. The funny part about that was it was right in front of the "clubhouse" and those guys just kept on widdiling wood, never said a thing. Imagine seeing 10 of your golf carts driving around in a dog fight wacking dangerous balls aimlessly. Most people would stop you for a law suit, i don't think they knew what one was? So after a long morning of this, we came back and turned the carts in and thanked what was aparently the club pro and his first mate 'the greens keeper'. We were hellians that day, a nightmare to any lover of golf, disdained by all country-club men everywhere---yet as we were walking out the door the guy said "Thanks for coming!...tell your friends about us." Oh, and we did.


That was definitely a memorable golf experience, but nothing like "the muni". If i ever make it down there to Jackson, right up on my priority list will be to bring $6 and go add "the muni" to my golf resume. But until then, i'll work on my tan so i can play shirtless!