The SoapBoxers

Colorado Rockies

Can the magic carpet ride continue? Huh – do you really think I’m going to throw my team under the bus? The Rockies dug themselves a huge hole early in the season, and played well enough the rest of the season to be on the cusp of the top record in the National League on Saturday. It didn’t happen, but they controlled their own destiny at that point.

The Rockies aren’t a team of superstars, though. There’s not a 40 homer slugger or a 20 game winner. In fact, there’s only one .300+ hitter – Todd Helton.

The team does have interesting depth, though. When catcher Chris Iannetta was struggling, Yorvit Torrealba provided some productive at bats. 24 year old Ian Stewart grabbed the starting 3B job from Garrett Atkins early in the year and hit 25 homers – but the former All Star Atkins was available as a right handed bat in the lineup. Brad Hawpe, Dexter Fowler, Carlos Gonzalez, and Seth Smith all logged quality time in the outfield.

On the pitching side, although nobody racked up more than 16 wins, all five starters won at least ten games, and all five also finished above .500.

The post-season is more of a sprint rather than a marathon, though, and the days off between series provide more rest than in the regular season – making depth less important.

Then there’s also the issue of the Phillies having a lefty heavy starting rotation to throw at us. Still, strange things happen in the post-season (remember that grand slame by, of all people, Kaz Matsui? Surely, you remember that, Evan) and I predict that the magic carpet ride does indeed continue! Rocktober redux, Rockies!

Philadelphia Phillies

Is Jamie Moyer a Hall of Famer? Ok, I’m stealing this ridiculous question from an ESPN.com poll earlier in the season. Sadly, half the people that that Moyer either was a HOF caliber player, or could grind his way in. In actuality, even if the septuagenarian (OK, he’s “only” 46) does get the 42 more wins he needs to get to 300, he won’t make it into the Hall of Fame – although he’d be a great candidate for the “Hall of Pretty Good for a Really Long Time and Cashed a Lot of Paychecks Along the Way.”

OK, my actual question. Is Charlie Manuel making a mistake by going with Brad Lidge as the closer? I understand that Lidge has been a fine closer over the course of his career. This year, however, Lidge has been bad, bad, bad. His BEST monthly ERA this year is the 5.91 he posted in July. Righties are hitting him, lefties are hitting him, his walk rate is up, his strikeout rate is down. Sure, he had 31 saves, but he also blew 11 save opportunities and was saddled with 8 losses (but, alas, not a single win). Are the bright lights of the post-season really the best environment for him to work out his issues?

St. Louis Cardinals

Are the Cardinals the best team in the National League? Pujols and Holliday are a formidable force in the heart of the lineup. On the pitching side, you could make a case that Adam Wainright and Chris Carpenter (or Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainright) should be 1-2 in the Cy Young voting.

You want leadership? How about John Smoltz on the pitching staff. Or manager Tony LaRussa and pitching coach Dave Duncan in the dugout. You want more supportive fans than the Busch faithful? You’ll be hard pressed to find them. St. Louis is a baseball town and darn proud of it.  My wife came to grips with this realization during a recent trip to St. Louis when she noticed that there were roughly 417 stores selling Cardinals merchandise for every one store selling Rams stuff.

I’d love to see the Rockies in the World Series, but I suspect that the Cardinals will emerge with the pennant.

Los Angeles Dodgers

Are the Dodgers toast? Yeah, stick a fork in them, they’re done. They stumbled to a 31-28 record after July 31 and very nearly coughed up the division title to the Rockies (who had trailed them by 15.5 games back in June).

This really hasn’t been the same team that burst out of the gates and established itself as the best team in baseball early in the season. Their rotation has been a bit in flux, and they’ll run up against Wainright and Carpenter in the first two games on the NLDS. I predict a quick exit for the Dodgers.

Wonder if the Dodgers are kicking themselves for not trading straight up for Jason Bay instead of Manny?  Interesting how Bay seems to get left out of conversations that center around how AL players always get better when they go to the NL – Bay hit 36 homers this year, in his first full season in the AL.

New York Yankees

Will A-Rod finally get the post-season monkey off his back? A-Rod drove in 7 runs in a single inning on Sunday. Certainly a fine achievement, but it wasn’t in the post-season, so it really doesn’t count, huh?

Would you believe me if I told you that A-Rod has put up better career post-season numbers than Derek Jeter?

Well, if you use OPS – a stat that any people swear by – it’s true. A-Rod’s career post-season OPS is .856, Jeter’s is .845. Jeter has more than a few post-season series in which he put up less-than-stellar numbers – but the fact that he has so many post-season plate appearances (563, to just 170 for A-Rod) has simply given him more opportunities to shine – and that’s what the fans remember.

Enough about Jeter, though. Will A-Rod shine this post-season? Sure, why not? He’s a hell of a hitter – the law of averages is bound to swing his way.

AL Central Winner

Do the Tigers or Twins have a shot against the Yankees?

No.

Even if they didn’t have to face a team that won 17 more games than them during the regular season, the scheduling creates a huge disadvantage for them. Unlike one game playoffs in the past, there is no off day in between the one game playoff and the first game of the ALDS. So the team wins the game, jets off to New York, and then awakens to face the New York media before facing off against the Bronx Bombers with a depleted pitching staff?  Yikes.

This seems doubly unfair to the Tigers. They have absolutely no control over the scheduling conflict on Monday (Packers at Vikings on Monday Night Football), yet they suffer the consequences. I realize that the Twins won the right to host the one game playoff, but shouldn’t there be a stipulation that you have the ability to provide a venue on the specified date?

Note: This does, of course, assume that the Yankees choose to start their ALDS series on Wednesday, rather than Thursday. I can’t imagine why they would choose to give their opponents a day to recuperate – I wouldn’t.

Boston Red Sox

Is David Ortiz finished, done, kaput? Seriously, how can you ask this question? Are you still looking at his early season stats? The dude finished with 28 homers, 99 RBI, and within spitting distance of a .800 OPS. Those aren’t the fantastic numbers that we expect from Ortiz, but neither are they the dreadful numbers that we saw early in the year. From May 31 through the end of the season, Ortiz posted an OPS of exactly .900, with 27 homers in 368 at bats. Watch for Big Papi to have a strong post-season.

Angels

Did the Angels disrespect Nick Adenhardt? During the Angels’ celebration of their AL West title, some members of the team sprayed the jersey of Adenhart with champagne and beer. The 22 year old Adenhart was killed by a drunk driver after making his first start in April.

Honestly, it took me a second to even figure out what the fuss was. It was the fact that alcohol was a connection – being used both in the celebration and in the accident. However, I feel that Nick’s teammates were simply trying to include him in the celebration, much as they tried to include his memories in activities all season long.

I can never write more than a few sentences about Adenhart without getting choked up at the sadness surrounding his death. RIP, Nick.

Want more playoff coverage? Check out the SBNation blogs of all the playoff teams.

Rockies

My Colorado Rockies started the season 20-32. They had the second worst record in the National League, trailing only the dreadful Washington Nationals. Heading into Saturday’s game with the Dodgers, the Rockies’ record stood at 92-68. Not only was this the best in franchise history, but it also left the Rockies within striking distance of finishing the regular season with the best record in the National League. They simply need to win the final two games to surge past the Dodgers, claim the National League West title, and sail into the playoffs as the #1 seed.

Unfortunately, the Dodgers halted the six game winning streak of the Rockies on Saturday, handing them the loss that eliminated them from contention for the division title, relegating the Rockies to the role of wild card participant. While this is disappointing for a number of reasons (including the fact that we will not face off against Matt Holliday’s Cardinals in the first round), it is worth noting that the 2007 World Series participant Rockies also qualified as the wild card.

In my quarter century of following baseball, I have now been a fan of five playoffs teams – the 1984 and 1989 Cubs and 1995, 2004, and 2007 Rockies. While this is not a particularly strong track record, it does tend to magnify that magical feeling of the playoffs.

Shortstop Troy Tulowitzki has been a catalyst during the Rockies surge. Through June 6, Tulo was batting a lackluster .216 with 5 homers and 16 RBI in 167 at bats (.683 OPS). Since June 7 Tulo has pulled a complete 180 and hit .332 with 27 homers and 76 RBI in 377 at bats (1.038 OPS). In early June, nobody could have guessed that he was going to finish with 30+ homers and 90+ RBI.

AL Central

In the AL Central, the Twins and Tigers were locked in a tight battle going into the final day of the season. The Twins were seven games out of first place on September 7, but a streak of eleven wins in twelve games between 13th and 26th brought them within striking distance of the Tigers.

On Tuesday, they had faced off against Detroit in a double header, with the Tigers protecting a 2 game lead. A sweep of the two games would have pushed the Twins into a tie for the division lead. The Tigers managed to win one of the games, keeping their advantage at two games. A win the next day pushed their advantage to 3 games with just 4 games remaining in the season. This was a nearly insurmountable lead.

Someone neglected to mention this fact to the Twins, who surmounted the lead by beating Detroit in the series finale and taking the first two games in a series against the Royals. Meanwhile, the Tigers lost games to the White Sox on Friday and Saturday. Heading into action on Sunday, the AL Central was dead even. If one team won on Sunday and the other team lost, the winning team would be in the playoffs. If the two teams both won or both lost, they would face off in a one game playoff to determine the division winner.

One game playoffs are typically played the day after the regular season concludes. However, in this case, Minnesota had won their right to host the game (via a coin flip) but there was a scheduling conflict on Monday night – the Vikings and Packers were scheduled to face off in a Monday Night Football game. This would push the game to Tuesday. The extra wrinkle was that their first round playoff opponents – the #1 seed Yankees – would get to decide whether the AL Division Series would begin on Wednesday or Thursday. The prudent move for the Yankees would be to choose Wednesday – forcing the winner of the one game playoff to fly to New York to play a game the next day and eliminating any possibility of rest for the pitching staff.

Of course, Sunday’s results could make this a moot point. So, what happened?

In Detroit, the Tigers jumped out to a 5-0 lead against Chicago and weathered a late White Sox rally to pull out a 5-3 win.  In the Metrodome, Jason Kubel  hit two early three run homers off Royals starter Luke Hochevar en route a 13-4 Twins victory.  The Twins have won 16 of their last 20 games and take that momentum into the one game playoff on Tuesday.  Will Tuesday be the final baseball game in Metrodome history, or will the ‘Dome feature post-season baseball once again?

I am not following the current battle in the USA where Barack Obama is putting in his health care plan.  I don’t know if and when it will actually happen.  For those who are against it (or even for it) here are some thoughts from someone who has known only universal health care.

Here is a quick summary of what is covered and what is not:

Covered:

• Hospital visits and all tests done at the hospital (CT Scans, x-rays, lumbar punctures, MRIs, etc.)
• All drugs administered at the hospital
• Visits/checkups to your general practitioner

Not Covered:

• Ambulance rides
• Prescriptions
• Doctor notes to give to your employer

I should note that for the ‘not covered’, ambulance rides and prescriptions are covered by many benefit plans through employers.  For instance at my work, ambulance rides are covered 100% and my prescriptions are covered 80%.  So even with those, you often end up not having to pay/pay a limited amount.  And if you are also covered by your spouse’s plan, their plan will usually cover the remaining 20%.  So really in the end, there is not much that requires payment.

Why do I like this so much?  Well for one, I like the fact that everyone can get health care.  It doesn’t matter your background, your income, etc. if you need surgery for an emergency you don’t first have to produce a credit card or insurance card to get what you need.  Second, I like that if I am in pain and am suffering, I don’t have to add the worry of money on top of it.  A serious illness can be so stressful and debilitating to a family, I could not imagine the financial burden on top of that.  I think back to my own recent hospital visit.  The doctor proposed to me a lumbar puncture as a way to confirm that there were no serious underlying issues going on with me.  If this test carried say, a $2500 bill attached to it, I highly doubt I would have went through with it.  But since it did not, I could go ahead with it and get confirmation that I had no serious internal stuff going on.  On top of this, as someone who makes an hourly wage (not on salary) being sick already cost me a day of wages.  That can be tough enogh for people to overcome let alone the double whammy of a big hospital bill too.

So that is a summary of the good things.  Are there negatives?  I am sure there are, just like with most things in life.  But in my opinion, the positives outweigh the negatives any day.

Last Week:
Straight Up – 12-8 ATS: 11-9

For the Year:
Straight Up – 51-21 ATS: 36-36

Back to level par on the spread picks for the year.  Most of the upsets did not pan out…so I will take a stab at a few more this week.

Thursday

Colorado @ West Virginia (-17.5) – Too many points, Colorado is overmatched but will make it a decent game.  WV- 35- COLO 21

Friday

Pittsburgh (-6.5) @ Louisville – This one scares me for some reason.  Upset special?  Lousiville 24- Pitt 21

Saturday

Michigan @ Michigan State – Mich State feels disrespected.  Go Green!  Misch St 27- Mich 24

Northwestern @ Purdue (-6.5)  – Seems like the boilermakers will go big here.  Purdue 35-  NW – 20

Kansas State @ Iowa State (-3.5)  -eeessh…battle of the bottom of the Big XII North.  IA St 35- K St 17

LSU @ Georgia (-3.5) – How bout dem Dawgs!  GA- 17- LSU 14

Penn State (-6.5) @ Illinois – Penn State still stinging after last week.  JoPa will have em ready to play.  Penn St 30- Illinois 24

Washington @ Notre Dame (-13.5) – Jake Locker only wins big games at home.  ND pads another easy win but closer than you might think.  ND – 28- Wash -24

North Carolina State (-1.5) @ Wake Forest  – Wake has to do it sometime for me.  WF- 21- NC ST – 21

USC (-6.5) @ California – Antoher intriguing matchup.  Is USC overated?  Is Cal underated?  USC – 28 – Cal 21

Oklahoma (-7.5) @ Miami – Too Many points..Miami in a close one.  They are a different team at home.  The U – 28- OU 24

NFL

Detroit @ Chicago (-10)  Big spread for the Bears but they will harras Stafford early and often.  Bears – 28 – Lions 17

Tennessee (-3) @ Jacksonville – Who thought these teams would have just one combined win between the both of them.  Tenneseee 17- J-ville 14

Baltimore (-1.5) @ New England – The Ravens are the REAL DEAL – Balt – 24- NE 21

Dallas (-3) @ Denver- Cowboys still have not played a complete game..until this week.  Cowboys – 35- Denver 14

Cincinatti (-6) @ Cleveland – Derek Anderson is the savior for the Browns.  CLE – 24- CIN 21

New York Jets @ New Orleans (-7) Match up of the week.  Blitzing won’t frustrate Brees.  Saints 35- Jets 17

St Louis @ San Francisco (-10)  Wow big number..will Frank Gore Play?  Rams cover but lose.  SF- 28 – STL 20

San Diego @ Pittsburgh (-6)  This is a fishy number to me…superbowl hangover?  Pitt 21- SD – 17

Green Bay @ Minnesota (-3.5)  The one we have all been waiting for.  This one should go down to the wire.  Green Bay 21- MN 20

Marie Tiller heard the crunch of gravel announce the arrival of a car on the long lane to the Tiller home.

Marie poked her head into the living room.  “Hey, guys, they’re coming.  Everyone be on their best behavior”.

Her husband Jeff turned off the TV and pulled himself out of the recliner.  Seven year old Mark jump up excitedly and ran to the kitchen.  He had been chattering all week about the chance to meet his brother’s new girlfriend.  Seventeen year old Sarah grinned at her brother’s exuberance and follow him into the kitchen, exhibiting a much more restrained  manner.

The car doors slammed shut, and a moment later, the screen door creaked.  Andrew and Beth entered the house, and the gaze of four sets eyes were upon them.

“Hey everybody.  This is Beth.  Beth, this is Mom, Dad, Sarah, and Mark.”

Beth, a tall, attractive brunette, smiled nervously.

“Supper’s ready,” announced Marie.  “Everyone, find your seats.”

Jeff settled into a seat at the far end of the table, leaving the head of the table for Marie.  Andrew and Beth sat next to each other on one side of the table, and Mark quickly jumped into the chair on the other side of Beth, leaving Sarah as the lone occupant on the other side of the table.  Andrew stifled a laugh – it definitely appeared as if his little brother had a crush on Beth.

Marie set the spaghetti and meatballs on the table.

Mark immediately scooped up two meatballs and a large helping of spaghetti in an effort to help Beth.  Most of the food landed on her plate, but one of the meatballs bounced free and splattered onto Beth’s blouse before finding a final resting place on the floor.

“Oh, Mark, look what you’ve done!” exclaimed Marie.

“But, but, I was just trying to help,” explained Mark, on the verge of tears.

“It’s OK, Mark,” said Beth, in a soothing tone.  “I’m sure the stain will come out.”

“Well, I want to get to work on the stain immediately to make sure that it does.  Sarah, take Beth upstairs and find her a different blouse to wear.”

Sarah and Beth went upstairs.  When they returned in a few minutes, Beth was wearing a clean white blouse and a big smile.  Marie was happy to see that Andrew’s girlfriend wasn’t phased by the accident.

“Hey, Mom, I’ll go work on the stain so that you can spend some time with Beth.”

The crisis had been averted and everyone sat down to enjoy the spaghetti and meatballs.  The dish was a longtime family favorite, and it seemed that Beth also enjoy the pasta and garlic bread.  Mark was on his best behavior during the rest of the meals.  He was a good kid, but sometimes he just allowed himself to get a bit too excited.

When they finished supper, Beth and Sarah volunteered to do dishes, and Marie happily agreed.  Marie could hear the two girls chattering as they washed and dried the dishes.  In the living room, Andrew regaled them with crazy tales from his first town months at college.  Marie couldn’t imagine living in the midst of thirty thousand young adults.  She suspected that Andrew’s tales were only scratching the surface of the college shenanigans.

When the dishes were done, everyone went back to the kitchen table and Jeff got down the Trivial Pursuit game.  Not surprisingly, Mark wanted to be on the same team as Andrew and Beth.  Marie, Jeff, and Sarah formed the other team.  The game was close throughout, with Andrew, Beth, and Mark emerging victorious.  Marie noted that Beth’s strengths – Entertainment and and Geography – were perfectly suited to Andrew’s weaknesses in those areas.  Marie looked forward to many more games of Trivial Pursuit with Andrew and Beth in the future.

Recently, we switched from cable to a combination of DSL and DirecTV.  The DSL is working out OK so far – no service interruptions or anything like that.

What about DirecTV?

Installation

Our tech showed up in the early afternoon.  Very friendly guy.  Pretty quickly, it became apparent that this isn’t going to be a simple installation.  Our current wiring won’t support the requirements of DirecTV.  Since we have a finished lower level (also known as “no access to wiring”), this means drilling new holes.  Note: if you’re in the market for a house, consider drop ceilings.  They make things easier.

The installer thought that our house was a condo and asked questions about what type of installations were allowed.  I assured him that the house is not a condo, but a zero-lot-line house (known as a duplex in many areas), and that there are no restrictions.  We then discussed the option of placing the dish on the roof or on a pole in the ground.  We get snow during the winter, so we opted with a ground-based unit to allow easy snow removal.  Two other guys show up to install the dish and run the line (underground) from the dish to the house.

The rest of the installation was pretty smooth, and the installer gave us a crash course on the remote before he left.  (This wasn’t the last time we’d see him, though – he left his drill charger behind and would have to return to pick it up).

Billing

Billing did cause some frustration.  My wife was quoted a certain introductory price and was told that there was an additional rebate that would drop the price lower.  In actuality, the rebate could not be used in conjunction with the introductory price.  After reading bunches of fine print, it seems that the people my wife talked to were confusing the details of two different promotions.  Probably an honest mistake, but still frustrating.

We’re also locked into a 2 year contract – there was no contract with cable.

NFL Sunday Ticket

We have the NFL Sunday Ticket.  My wife is pretty happy about this, because she can watch her Rams.  We’re ever so slightly outside the local area for the Fox station that covers the Rams – about 10 miles.  I haven’t taken much advantage of Sunday Ticket because I’m boycotting Brett Favre’s stay with the Vikings.  Dump Favre and put in Sage Rosenfels.

We also found out that the channel that allows you to watch 8 different NFL games at the same time is NOT part of the standard NFL Sunday Ticket package.  I’m not sure how much we would use this anyway, but this seems a bit crazy.  Seriously, the Sunday Ticket is pricey enough – throw this in.

Baseball

We didn’t get MLB Extra Innings this year because the pro-rated price wasn’t worth it, with just a couple of weeks left in the regular season at the time.  I was hoping this might be part of the promo package we got, but it wasn’t.

I have been able to catch my Rockies on a variety of stations, though.  We’re getting the regional Fox Sports Net channels.  Sometimes the games are blacked out, sometimes they aren’t.  I haven’t figured out the logic behind this yet, so I basically flip the TV on and hope for the best.  I’ve caught more games in the last 2 weeks than in the rest of the season combined – the Rockies were NEVER on TV with my cable provider.  Right now I’m watching Rockies vs. Brewers on FSN Wisconsin – complete with  commercials for Piggly Wiggly.

We also get MLB Network, which we didn’t get with our cable provider.  I really, really like this.  It’s like ESPN, but with the non-baseball stuff filtered out.  Pretty cool …

DVRs

The DVR we had with the cable provider wasn’t the greatest.  It seemed to hold between 50 and 80 hours of shows, and also exhibited some bad behavior from time to time.  At least once a week,changing channels would slow to a crawl, and we’d have to pull the plug overnight and plug back in.  This was the recommended fix.  There were also problems with recordings from one particular channel – the local NBC affiliate.  Shows from that channel would not allow the basic DVR functions (rewind, fast forward).  This seems really strange, as I assumed the recordings were just data streams, and that the DVR device wouldn’t even be able to differentiate between shows from various channels.

We have two DVRs for DirecTV, each of which should hold about 200 hours of shows (we don’t have HD – this would be less with HD).  One of them is quickly filling up with Rockies baseball games.  I need to take some time to nab  a few forensics shows, too.  So far, no weird occurences.  Hooray.

The ability to program the DVRs over the internet is cool.  I haven’t used this for anything important yet, but did test it, just as a proof of concept.  It works as advertised.

Miscellany

My alma mater’s game are only covered by the cable company (a channel that the company owns), so I won’t be seeing many of their games.  That’s a bummer, but getting baseball is a fair trade.

When I went to return my cable equipment, there was a security guard at the cable office.  The place actually got robbed a while ago.  I guess a lot of students pay their cable bill in cash.  I’m not sure how there weren’t 100 witnesses, though – the place always seems to be somewhat busy.

Director Roman Polanski was arrested on September 27^th during a trip to the Zurich film festival, where he was to be given a lifetime achievement award for his work.  The United States will attempt to extradite him in relation to the rape of a 13 year old girl in 1977.

The prosecution alleges that Polanski gave the girl champagne and a partial Quaalude after a photo shoot and then had sex with her.  Clearly, this was wrong, and I won’t attempt to convince you otherwise.

However, I do believe that it is time to drop the case against Polanski.

Polanski plead guilty to engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.  After serving 42 days in prison undergoing a psychiatric evaluation, Polanski expected to be sentenced to time served and probation, per the terms of his plea deal.  When the judge told Polanski’s attorneys that he would send Polanski to prison and have him deported – contrary to the plea deal – Polanski fled to France, where he has resided for the last 30 years.

Judges do have the right to overrule plea agreements if they feel that they are not a fair resolution to the case.  Many times, I would be OK with this.  However, in this particular case, the victim of the crime has repeatedly stated her opposition to the judge’s intentions, and has even filed paperwork asking that the case be dropped.  Bear in mind that the victim is no longer a fragile 13 year old girl, but a 45 year old woman.  She has had 32 years to think about this and form an opinion – this is not some off-the-cuff comment.  If she wants the case dropped, perhaps we should listen to her.  I do not believe her statements are financially motivated – she reached a financial settlement with Polanski decades ago.

So, then whose interest is the district attorney representing?  Certainly not the victim’s, since she wants the case dropped.  Perhaps you could make the case that he is representing society, to make sure that Polanksi does not reoffend.  However, this appears a bit unlikely at this stage in Polanski’s life.  I’m not saying that it’s impossible, but I’d be very surprised to see this.

Polanski has lived a life with incredible peaks and valleys.  He grew up in Poland and was sent to the Krakow Ghetto by the Nazis during World War II.  Both of his parents were sent to concentration camps; his mother died in Auschwitz.

In 1969, his pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, was savagely murdered by members of the notorious Manson Family as part of a slaughter at Polanski’s home (Polanski himself was out of town at the time of the murders).  Tate was stabbed sixteen times as she was held down and begged for her assailants to spare her life and the life of the unborn child.

In the midst of this tragedy, he has woven together a masterful career.  Polanski is the director of Oscar winning films Rosemary’s Baby, Chinatown, Tess, and The Pianist, as well as many other critically acclaimed movies.

Image via Wikipedia

For fear of talking too much about the University of Nebraska Football team, I have abstained from writing articles about them this college football season … until now.

One of the signs at the Memorial Stadium reads: Through these gates pass the greatest fans in College football.  Not many who have been to Lincoln for a game since 1962 would argue that fact.

A very remarkable event took place in Lincoln, Nebraska this past Saturday.  The Nebraska Cornhuskers hosted their 300th consecutive sell out football game.

To just about everyone outside of Nebraska, this seems like a whole lot to do about nothing.  I mean what the hell is there to do in Nebraska anyway other than on football Saturdays?  It is a boring state to drive through on Interstate 80, not a lot of people live there … they have the only Unicameral legislature in the country … so what is the big deal?

Nebraska Football is one common thread that brings the entire state an identity.  On the National scene, people from all over the U.S. recognize “Nebraska” and “Cornhusker Football” as one and the same entity.  It is truly something that the people of Nebraska take great pride in.

It all started in 1962 … and not at the beginning of the season.  The upstart Cornhuskers under then first year head coach Bob Devaney sold out Memorial Stadium and promptly were beaten by the Missouri Tigers.  But before he was done, Devaney had built a national powerhouse of college football.  A perennial winner.  He won two National titles, and Tom Osborne would later add three in four years.

Next closest on the sell out list … The Fighting Irish of Notre Dame, but they are about 15 sold out years behind as their current streak stands at 207 … that helps to put it into context.

The Cornhusker faithful endured some harsh times of late in what the locals call “The Bill Callahan Era”.  The first non-bowl season in a couple generations.  The first losing season since, well … Bob Devaney came to town.

But the people still came … (insert your voiceover of James Earl Jones in Field Of Dreams here …)

People will come Ray, They’ll come to Lincoln for reasons they can’t even fathom. They’ll come into Memorial Stadium, not knowing for sure why they’re doing it. They arrive looking for the Huskers, all as innocent as children, longing for the past. Of course, we won’t mind if you look around, buy a Fairbury Brand Hot Dog or a Runza you’ll say. It’s only $4 per person. They’ll pass over the money without even thinking about it: for it is money they have and Valentino’s pizza they lack … And they’ll walk up to the bleachers and sit in their short sleeves on a perfect fall afternoon. They’ll find they have reserved seats somewhere in the South end zone where they sat when they were students, and cheered their heroes. And they’ll watch the game, and it’ll be as if they’d dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick, they’ll have to brush them away from their faces … People will come, Ray … The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been the Cornhuskers. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers; it has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But the Cornhuskers have marked the time. This field, this game, is a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again. Ohhhh, people will come, Ray. People will most definitely come …

Congratulations Nebraska on truly a remarkable achievement. Not the victory, but the action; Not the goal, but the game; In the deed, the glory.

On August 12th, an employee of Rocky Mountain Bank sent a spreadsheet with 1300 names, address, and social security numbers to a GMail (Google email) address. Unfortunately, the person sent it to the wrong address. The data was apparently unencrypted (this is a conclusion that I have come to, based solely on RMB’s subsequent actions).

The bank employee sent another email to same address, asking the recipient to contact the bank, and also to delete the file without opening it.

The bank has not heard back from the email recipient, so they asked Google to disclose the GMail account holder’s personal information, so that they could initiate another form of communication with the person.

Not surprisingly, Google denied the request. The bank then went to court to get a court order to get that information, as well as having the account deactivated. Here comes the crazy part – a judge actually agreed!

Let’s do a sanity check here. What crime has this person committed? Um, none. It’s not a crime to be the recipient of unintended email. The person didn’t hack into the bank’s system or anything like that. There is exactly one person at fault here – the person who sent the email. If the same information had been sent through the postal service, would the bank have asked the postal service to suspend mail service?

There is the distinct possibility that the person doesn’t even realize that they have received this email. If they use “whitelists” to restrict their email to pre-approved address, the bank’s email would not have gone into their inbox. Even if the person did see the email, it’s very possible that they suspected a phishing scam and deleted both emails immediately. If the exact same thing happened to me, I would assume a phishing scam. I get a lot of emails that appear to come from banks.

Even if the bank’s request had some sort of merit, I’m not sure exactly what they intend to accomplish by having the GMail account deactivated, other than attempting the punish the recipient. If the bank thinks that the person hasn’t viewed the email yet, I could understand them requesting that Google simply delete that one email from the person’s account. I’m not saying they would be right to do this, but I could understand the logic.

If the person has already viewed the email, then this action will not accomplish anything. If the recipient wanted to take some action with the spreadsheet – such as forwarding to all their friends – then the horse is already gone. Not much point in closing the barn door. If the person already deleted the document, then the action also won’t accomplish anything.

Most disturbing is that this creates the opportunity for abuse of process. What is to prevent companies – or individuals – from “accidentally” sending emails to competitors and then going to court to deactivate the email account of the competitor?

In my opinion, a lot of today’s judges do not have the background to understand some of today’s technology. This is not the first situation where a judge has made a strange decision on a matter related to technology. As technology continues to advance, this is going to become even more of a problem. I would propose the creation of an agency that judges could consult in order to get an accurate and unbiased exlanation of how certain technologies work. This would, of course, have to be at taxpayer expense … but isn’t the cost of miscarried justice even worse?

What did you miss over the weekend?

• Friday feature the lack of fiction in No Fiction Today
• Johnny Goodman made his football picks
• Saturday featured a look inside Kosmo’s brain (pretty scary, huh?)
• Tyson explained his absence on Sunday

So it’s been a while…much too long. I give many thanks and apologies to Kosmo for his understanding and ability to fill the spot in my absence.

The main reason for my absence was the combination of a brutal migraine/sinus infection which kept me on the sidelines from pretty much everything for about three weeks. Migraines have run in the family a long time, back at least three generations. I remember the losing battles my mom had with them, often spending days laying in darkness and trying not to throw up. Well, this was my first official taste of a migraine and I really hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.

I do have to give some props though, props to our health care system. Hospital overcrowding is an issue just about everywhere, and many bad things have occurred as a result of patients waiting too long. Well on the Friday morning I decided that I needed to head to the Concordia hospital, the main reason I was not looking forward to the trip was because of the anticipated wait time. It’s bad enough my head felt like it was caving in, thinking about then having to sit in an uncomfortable waiting room for a few hours made it even worse. So one can imagine my surprise when I arrived at the hospital to find an EMPTY waiting room! I really thought I was in bad shape and that I must be hallucinating. So I gave my information, went through triage, and went right in to my own room. Within half an hour I had a consult with a doctor, blood work drawn, and plans to get a CT scan done. When that came back clear, we discussed and then executed a lumbar puncture. Meds were brought promptly, I had regular visits from nurses, you name it. Percocet was a highlight of the day. All in all, it was pretty unbelievable, especially considering a friend of mine went to the Grace hospital within the next week and waited over six hours to see an MD.

I really consider myself fortunate for the quick and effective treatment I got, and it really makes me sad that hospitals get slammed so badly when obviously most of the people there are trying their best to give patients proper and prompt care. I am also fortunate this is only the second time I’ve needed to go to the hospital for care in my life. And I am most fortunate for the fact that after this whole experience, I am not thousands of dollars in debt. I’ll talk more about that next week though!