78 thoughts on “January 3, 2011: Another”

      1. I'm in the exact same boat today. The wife and I had a great weekend, but I laid down to go to bed at 11:30 yesterday night. Around 3:30am I finally dozed off.....I wanted to hit the alarm clock with a hammer aorund 7 this morning.

        1. 9AM-11:45AM (ish) for me, but at least I don't have a kid and/or a job to worry about, so I've got that going for me. Good luck today, buddy.

  2. http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/pcm_finder.cgi?request=1&sum=0&p1=loveke01&y1=2012&p2=birdla01&y2=1980

    Take a look. I know in my heart that the NBA is a players' league, that is, you win with players. But, it's not like coaching has no effect. We're seeing that in MPLS. If you remember last year, there were flashes of promise. But, that was mainy obscured by the Broken Biangle. I think we're seeing what can happen when a guy who knows what he is doing is given the reins.

    I wonder if Papa Glen is happy with that hire. Fans flocking to the arena. Team winning. What a concept.

    2. Using this tool I am a little bummed out to see the similarities to Corey Maggette and SCB.

  3. In case you're wondering how my family spends New Year's (sadly I don't think I made an appearance and all of this happened after our two-hour game of kickball outside in the rain/slush/snow replacing our usual game of boot hockey).

      1. Yes, it pays to have a close family friend who is ridiculously artistic; his camera seemed to be drawn to the poor dancing of Papa Young. Check out his Boundary Waters video linked on the right. It was picked up by some national blogs because it was so beautifully shot.

          1. My brother's wedding was the first one he shot and he's turned it into a side-job for fun.

  4. Greg Popovich:

    Asked about Rubio, and specifically how difficult it would be for him to adjust to American culture, Popovich's response was classic:

    "These guys, they travel around the world," Popovich said of international players such as Rubio and Ginobili. "They're more cultured than we are. Everyone acts like Americans are the ones ... we have sort of an arrogance about us. Like we're the cultured ones? Are you serious?

    "Have you watched TV lately? Have you seen what Americans do? How many languages do you speak? And you wonder how they're going to adjust to our culture? I hope they avoid it and keep their own!"

    1. I hope they get that straightened out right soon or SnP might completely break down. He's already lost it a bit, for some reason.

    2. There have been rumors--basically ever since he got good--that he would walk and go to a better team when his contract was up. Who knows what will happen now that they're getting better. This definitely seems like the kind of thing the front office shouldn't mess up, though. Give him basically a max contract and be done with it.

    4. -1 for sending me to Peter Vescey. He's beneath contempt. And I say that as someone who routinely sends you to Rick Reilly.

  8. [redacted]

    Actually, I don't really want to put this here. It's being taken care of anyway, so let's not get...too real in the CoC.

    Thanks to everyone. You know who you are. This site really has been bigger than just a website for me.

  9. I caught a few episodes of 'Archer' over the weekend (FX had a mini marathon). Its a show I tried watching before and didnt really like it. I must have caught an off episode because of man I changed my opinion of that show...its hilarious!

    1. It's not for everyone, surely, but yeah, it's pretty funny and the voice acting is excellent. Vulgar comedy shows often get lazy, but Archer's writers aim to remain witty even with the vulgar backdrop.

      1. Archer is a favorite of mine, probably exactly because it combines jokes you have to think about in with the more crass ones. New episodes next week and I can't wait.

  10. Which world class athlete said it?

    I've actually never liked sports, and I never understood how I became an athlete. I don't like working out; I don't like anything that has to do with working physically.

    2. Actually, come to think of it, this world class athlete has a very similar outlook as I do with my current job.

      1. Maybe so and that might describe a lot of us, but are you or have you ever been the absolute best in the world, no doubt about it, at what you do?

        1. How many people would ever know if they were the absolute best in the world at what they do? I'd venture to say that there are a lot of people who are very good at what they do professionally, but would rather be doing something else.

          1. It just seems that to be the very best takes a supreme amount of dedication... to not like it and wonder why you ever started doing it? Not exactly the profile of the typical greatest at what they do.

            1. Sure, though I question how much she's really thought about how she got to where she is. It seems in her case a big part of getting into tennis was probably her parents, in which case maybe she'd rather not admit (publicly or perhaps even to herself) that she's there because that's where parents pushed her to be. Her drive could have been to make her parents proud or just to prove that she's better than her sister.

              I guess I'm just trying to say that this seems like a pretty off-hand remark and I wonder if it really is an accurate representation of how she's felt about tennis throughout her life.

      2. It's all a matter of perspective. Perhaps you don't like your job, but you probably like providing for your family. Perhaps this athlete would rather be "sitting down or shopping," but this athlete enjoys the health benefits of a physically active lifestyle, which may be taken for granted here. (I might not like some of the public aspects of being a famous athlete, but I'm not especially a fan of sitting down for eight hours a day either.)

        1. Benoît Assou-Ekotto, who plays for Tottenham Hotspur, said , in part, this of his playing career:

          I’m lucky and appreciate what I have, but football is just a job, a means to an end... there are more important things in life than kicking a ball around... Yes, I play for the money but then doesn’t everybody who gets up in the morning and goes to work? They do it to provide for their family.

          [Source]

          1. I do think that athletes generally don't get enough credit for how much less enjoyable it must be to play sports as a profession rather than as recreation, and that the day-to-day grind of being a professional athlete isn't all it's cracked up to be.

            On the other hand, I agree a lot more with his sentiment "I'm lucky and appreciate what I have" than I do with "football is just a job." No job is really "just a job." Some jobs pay millions, some pay minimum wage. Some jobs can be lifelong careers, others are hard to sustain past a certain age. Some jobs carry more health risks than others, short-term and long-term. There are probably better jobs out there, but there are a lot worse jobs out there, too.

            1. I see what he's saying. I got into acting because I love acting so much that it never felt like a job. Then I crossed over to film and TV, which is super boring, and when I get a call saying I have to be on set at 5am for a 15-hour shoot, it sure feels a hell of a lot worse than a job (particularly since I'll spend 12 of those 15 hours doing nothing besides occasionally running my lines, and another two and a half standing and waiting for lights, props, and marks to be set).

              1. But on the other hand, you're not worried about a mine collapsing on top of you, either. Like I said, it's a matter of perspective.

                1. I have perspective. I'm just saying that I'm in a profession that a lot of people figure to be lucrative, glamorous, magical and without stress, but it's the opposite of all four of those things (besides the first, if you're one of the tiny percent of people who make it big).

              2. (particularly since I'll spend 12 of those 15 hours doing nothing besides occasionally running my lines, and another two and a half standing and waiting for lights, props, and marks to be set)

                Sounds like you need a netbook of some sort to allow you to play werewolf hang out at the WGOM kill some time between takes.

                    1. I will be trying very, very hard to get him involved. I have no idea which episodes he's supposed to be directing, though, and I half-expect that to fall through (just like the whole show; I won't be comfortable until I'm on set).

  11. Who said it on Dale Murphy:

    His refusal to take a day off (not to mention his clean living) may have led to a steeper, quicker decline. But he still represented a whole era of Braves baseball.

    Yep, that clean living will do you in over time.

    3. Many world class athletes die young due to overtraining. Football players are the most obvious example, although a lot of that also comes from brain trauma. Long distance runners are also up there--they do not age well. I haven't though as much about how this affects the lifespan of an athletes career. There is probably a fine line between pushing hard enough to become elite and pushing so hard your shorten your career significantly.

  12. If any of you have some leftover Christmas scratch and would like to buy the best baseball cap or jersey you've ever worn, check out Ebbets Field Flannels, which is running a clearance while merch lasts. Due to licensing, EFF only can produce authentic old PCL, other minor league, Negro League, and Cuban League teams' gear, but the quality is excellent (I've been to their store in Seattle and was blown away by the quality of all the merch). I previously have ordered a Minneapolis Millers cap EFF made to 1950s team specs out of incredibly soft wool, with satiny lining (sadly currently discontinued). I also have a (discontinued) 1939 St. Paul Saints jersey made by EFF, which was cut out of old-school wool flannel and has an incredible embroidered baseball centennial patch on it. There are currently several different Millers and Saints items in stock, if you're looking for something with a Minnesota connection, but for those in the WGOM diaspora you might look to see if EFF makes any items honoring teams from your current communities. In addition to caps and jerseys, EFF makes dugout and grounds crew jackets (you can get a Nicollet Park grounds crew jacket!), some fantastic old-school hockey sweaters (paging FTLT - Buffalo Bisons bottle cap jersey ahoy!), and a select few old football jerseys.

    This time around I picked up a couple T-shirts and a 1940s Havana Lions cap, a tribute to Mrs. Hayes' Cuban grandfather and his favorite childhood team.

  14. I can't wait until the Caucuses are over because I'm tired of getting up to answer the phone, only for it to be a robo-call. Don't these candidates realize I'm incredibly lazy when I want to be, and that getting up and running to the kitchen to get the phone is a hassle?

    1. I just hope the caucuses don't interfere with traffic in northern Iowa tomorrow, where I will be driving.

      1. I am really pleased to be out of North Sioux, if only because I haven't been subjected to all the commercials for the last six months.

        1. That must be nice. We have a recall thing going on so I'm still being subjected to plenty of political ads right now. Blagh.

        2. There are so many reasons I was to be glad to move away from Sioux City seven years ago, but that was a big one.

    1. I have to say, I would have expected my wife to have gotten some stage fright in front of those 30-40 people that were there had I don't something so foolish.

  17. Iowa Caucus is tonight. Some of my Iowa friends posted this video on Facebook. It cracked me up. NSFW language.

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