Tuesday Randomness

What up, peeps? Time for the random to flow from within...

--If you didn't hear my rant this morning, I am thoroughly pissed off at Showtime. They had a scheduled replay of the Castillo/Corrales fight from over the weekend, which my man Tyler McLellan (a huge boxing fan) told me was the fight of the year so far. I figure I've got to see this thing. There was a replay last night scheduled from 7-9 pm; now, since it was taped on Saturday, you would assume that they would fit the show into that predetermined 2 hour window, right? Wrong. I TiVoed it, only to come back late last night to find out I only got the first 5 1/2 rounds. I was furious. EDIT THE THING! Or extend the time window--either way, don't leave your viewers hanging out to dry like that. Ridiculous. From what I have seen, it is a great fight, though. I can't wait to see the ending.

--I bought Out of the Park Baseball 6 for my PC over the weekend. OOTP is a text-based baseball simulation game where you essentially take control of a team as its manager and try to build a winner. You don't actually control the players like you do in other baseball video games, you make the managerial and personnel decisions (in incredible detail). You deal with the entire minor league system, the 40-man roster, waivers, Rule 5 Draft, etc. If it's in baseball, it's in this game. It is amazingly addictive--making trades, dealing with disgruntled players, making decisions during the games--it's incredible.

I've taken over the Chicago Cubs, booting Dusty Baker out of the dugout and kicking Jim Hendry out of the front office. I made several controversial decisions right off the bat--I traded away Nomar, Kerry Wood, Jason DuBois, Ryan Dempster, and Todd Hollandsworth almost immediately. In return, I received Scott Kazmir (for Wood and cash), a boatload of prospects from St. Louis (for Nomar), and Wily Mo Pena (Dempster/DuBois).

The new Cub lineup:

CF: J. Pierre
2B: T. Walker
3B: A. Ramirez
1B: J. Morneau
C: J. Mauer
LF: G. Sizemore
RF: M.Cabrera
SS: B.J. Upton

P: M. Prior
P: C. Zambrano
P: G. Maddux
P: S. Kazmir
P: D. Willis

Manager/GM: P. Edmiston

So far, I'm 6-2 in my young season, with series sweeps over the Diamondbacks and the Brewers, but I just lost two straight to the Padres. I have added a section to the blog updating the team's progress (to prove how big a nerd I really can be).

--OK. Back to real sports. Mike D'Antoni, while a nice guy and a great story this year, should not have been NBA Coach of the Year. Shouldn't the Coach of the Year Award involve, I don't know, actual coaching? By his own admission, Mike D'Antoni merely gets out of the way and lets his team play. For the record, I think that's absolutely the right approach and is the best way for the Suns to win. However, when you compare the COACHING that D'Antoni did versus the job that Rick Carlisle did with Indiana this year, I don't think there's much comparison. D'Antoni had a relatively healthy team that used its talent to improvise and be wildly successful, while Carlisle's Pacers lost 421 games this year due to injury or suspension. Carlisle had to figure out ways to win using players like James Jones, John Edwards (not the former VP candidate), and David Harrison. Who? Still, the Pacers managed to not only compfortably make the playoffs, but they're still playing. Carlisle is my COY. Honorable mentions go out to Scott Skiles, Eddie Jordan, Nate McMillan, Gregg Popovich, and George Karl. Each of those guys did a wonderful job this season.

--I played paintball over the weekend. Here's two things I've learned about paintball: 1) Shooting someone with a paintball gun is hard. 2) Getting hit with paintballs hurts. A lot. Despite that, it's more fun that you could imagine--although my friends tend to take a sick pleasure in shooting for the groin area. That's not cool. I need to start wearing a cup, really. Paintball is an expensive hobby, too--guns and ammo are not cheap. Especially if you suck, like I do.

--Local TV sweeps month is here. Just so you know, sweeps months for TV are February, May, and November. Those are the times when ratings data is compiled and used to determine advertising rates for the next sales period. And that's why you see the crap start to flow; as stations try to figure out any way to grab a few more viewers, they do some stupid things--Fox 13 is the worst offender so far, with stories on "racist internet games" and "computer scams". Apparently, many times deals that appear too good to be true actually are, in fact, too good to be true. I learned that lesson when I was 6 years old. Al Deal and the Fox 13 I-Team are only now getting the memo. News Channel 3's Andy Wise (who I hear is On Your Side) is having some dude break into people's houses to show them how vulnerable they are to, uh, guys breaking in. Makes sense. UPN 30 is going to tell us if the Rapture is coming soon. My goodness. That's a great topic for local news. Sweeps month is incredible. Email me with any more good promos/stories you see.

Quick Hits:

--The Rapture may actually be soon, because Rob Fischer actually updated his blog. You won't believe the insight he's giving you! Things like: "The Incredibles is a fun movie with unbelievable animation." or "Desperate Housewives is a good show. Not only are there beautiful women, but humorous storylines." WOW! Huge opinions!

--I finally got a cell phone with a camera today. I'm officially cool. It took 25 long years, but I am officially coooool.

--Shaq should be the NBA MVP. To use an oversimplified argument, look at the Lakers without Shaq (utter and complete disaster) versus the Mavericks without Nash (won 6 more regular season games).

--Congratulations to the Cobra, Keith Parker and his wife Allison--Cobra told me yesterday that they are expecting their 4th child sometime in October. Cobra's got a great family and deserves all the happiness in the world.

--The more I think about it, the more I believe Anchorman is funnier than Old School. I also think that Ferrell's Robert Goulet is one of the funniest things in the world (as is Neil Diamond).

--I need to see the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I've read the entire series and it is one of my favorite works. I hope the movie compares favorably. I'm not terribly optimistic.

For no apparent reason, here are my 10 Funniest TV Shows of All Time:

1. The Simpsons
2. Family Guy
3. The Daily Show w/ Jon Stewart
4. Chappelle's Show
5. The Office (BBC version)
6. The Larry Sanders Show
7. Seinfeld
8. Mr. Show w/ Bob and David
9. Futurama
10. SNL (would be higher, but the bad sketches drop it down)

Peace.