Category: Sports

Against The Stream

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Saturday dawned, cool and crisp, autumn having finally made its official appearance in these Southernmost parts. Here summer begrudgingly lingers, sending forth its last waves of punishing heat even as the leaves suddenly turn brown (and only rarely yellow or red) and begin their free-fall toward the welcoming ground. Young and old alike consider this disorderly sequence, and the many dark, discouraging signs that surround us in these trying times, and we long for that first refreshing blast of cool. It perks us up. It gives us hope.

Among the pleasures of the past two days was the chance to sit on the banks of the Tennessee River and watch Number One and his University of Alabama teammates compete in their first regatta of the season.… Read the rest

Spread Eagle, We Hardly Knew Ye

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Last Saturday night we were in Montgomery, so the Auburn-Arkansas game was blacked out, PPV only. I’d been following the game online and when I realized that Auburn was trailing–and driving–with minutes left, I yelled for Number One to follow me to the car so we could listen on the radio.

With first and goal inside the 5, at home, I just knew Auburn was going to gut it out. When they failed to score on 4th and goal, Number One and I, rather than celebrating wildly, just looked at each other, shocked and speechless.

When the Hogs intercepted Kodi Burns’ last pass, I thought about the many people I knew in that stadium, dear friends all, and I looked at Number One and said, “You know, I’m actually starting to feel a little sorry for them.”… Read the rest

Monday Morning Meltdowns

It’s Monday, and hopefully yours is off to a good start. But if it’s not, perhaps I can lend you some much needed perspective with a few Monday morning meltdowns gleaned from fan boards and blogs over the past couple of days. First up, an Ole Miss fan accepts the inevitable:

“We are not today, tomorrow, next week, next century in a position to be competing for conference or national championships in any sport. Period. End of Story. Take it to the bank. Put it in your pipe and smoke it. We can be competitive, but not champions.”

Over in Hawgville, things aren’t any better:

“Yet here we are again, after yet another blowout, and the same old yada,yada,yada.

… Read the rest

I Pray For John Parker Wilson

I’ve written several times about the curious intersection between football and religion, here, here, here, and most recently, here.

And now some more grist for the mill.

I just want to know: Was that sign put up before or after the Gator loss to Ole Miss?

Seriously, though, Jesus admonished us to not pray on the street corners. Does a Church of Christ marquee sign count? Yeah, Tim, get us a win every week and don’t let Jesus (and us) down while you’re at it. Nah, that’s not pressure.

Speaking of Churches of Christ, Nashville has one on just about every street corner.… Read the rest

Today Is Eyegal’s Born Day

Although we celebrated this occasion last week with a getaway to Nashville, you might recall I had to cut that short in order to help with the financial bailout plan (that went well, didn’t it?) and the Georgia game (’nuff said).

The bailout plan is still up in the air and now Nick is calling me about Kentucky (good grief, man, don’t you have a staff?), so I’m pretty blasted busy. Fusioneers, please help cover my back by sending some birthday love to Eyegal in the form of a comment or at least a good thought.

Gotta go. Sarah Palin just called–debate prep.… Read the rest

Transformation

Q: How long does it take a too-cute-for-his-own-good, 7-year-old soccer scoring machine…

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…to transform into a fearsome, I’ll-never-dribble-to-his-side-of-the-pitch-again, warrior-god defender?

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A: About 10 years.

And here’s the other thing: If you blink, you’ll miss it.

Number Two is thrilled to have this well placed elbow in the back shoulder charge as the signature image of his senior and last year of competitive soccer. The special, tie-dyed  “third jersey” that they made just for that Memphis tournament is the crowning touch.

BTW, Number Two is considering Lipscomb, Harding…and Auburn.

Yeah, I know.

… Read the rest

On Living A Quiet Life, Part II

Warning: The following photo is considered by some to be like a Playboy magazine in that it must be kept behind the counter and away from curious, roving eyes:

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No really, I’m not kidding.

I know a lot of Southern Baptist and Church of Christ men really like Sarah Palin and think she would be a great President Vice President, but would they typically let her speak during their services or teach a class with men present?

What’s that you say? Well, okay then, how about pass a communion tray? Hmmm…serve food at a church potluck? That’s what I thought.

And on another front of the Culture War, the same people who “stumbled” over the retro Starbucks mermaid logo are back again, and this time the Duke Blue Devils are in their crosshairs (h/t Greg):

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Okay, I think they’ve really crossed some kind of line this time.… Read the rest

Cognitive Dissonance, Or, OMG, Sarah Palin Wears Houndstooth!

Cognitive dissonance. For me, it could be simply defined like this:

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(A tip o’ my houndstooth fedora to DU for contributing to my *cough* “research” into the true nature of Sarah Palin’s refractive error)

Steady, Mike, steady…

No wonder Palin/McCain has a 24 point lead in Alabama. Then again, it could be just all the conservatives who live here. After all, everybody knows a “true conservative” would never support Obama.

Well, on to The Game. I just want my loyal Arkansas readers to know that I love you. I really do. But here’s the plain, unvarnished truth: If Bama brings their A-game, it could get ugly quick (ask Clemson).… Read the rest

9.55

That’s how fast a group of physicists have calculated Usain Bolt would have run in the recent Olympic 100-meter final had he not started celebrating and thumping his chest with 20 meters to go (he still ran 9.69, a new world record).

I don’t know about that, there are a lot of assumptions there as the article points out, but if he really would have ran 9.55 I’d bet that would surely eclipse the longevity of Bob Beamons’ 29 ft. 2.5 inch mark in the long jump which stood from 1968 to 1991.

Bottom line, whatever it is that you’re doing, people, run through the tape.… Read the rest

R, Rol, Roll, T, Ti,Tii…Oh, Never Mind!

You know me, I always come back from T-town with a story or two.

There were so many Auburn fans in Tuscaloosa last Saturday you’d have thought it was Iron Bowl weekend. They were driving around with their orange and blue flags, holding up their very premature 7-finger salute, and generally hootin’ and hollerin’ like it was feeding time down at the ol’ trough. Since they were playing the Bulldogs in Starkville and had a 6:00 pm start time as well, they were passing through around lunchtime on their way to their game. And what a game that turned out to be!… Read the rest

Good Tidings

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You never know whether Good Bama or Bad Bama is going to show up for a game. We lucked out Saturday night as we watched Good Bama, who had been on vacation against Tulane last week, thrash Western Kentucky 41-7 from our nosebleed seats atop the north end zone. We learned that if you just close your eyes and think cool thoughts, it feels just like you’re sitting in one of those fancy-pants air-conditioned skyboxes.

We saw lots of Tide touchdowns from a very balanced run/pass attack (freshman running back Mark Ingram, by the way, is the real deal), and the lone Hilltopper touchdown was the first scored on the defense this year.… Read the rest

Hairy Mascots and Hurricanes

I’ll be headed down to T-town with Number Three Son tomorrow to watch the Crimson Tide take on the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers. My parents-in-law lived in Bowling Green, KY from 1997-2004, so I had the opportunity to watch WKU play many different sports over the years, and I even saw one of their football playoff games in 2002, the year they won the I-AA national championship. It’ll be interesting to see what kind of progress they’re making as they continue the transition to big boy ball.

I’m all for progress as long as it’s not at the Crimson Tide’s expense. It shouldn’t be that close, but with our still relatively young crew, you never know.… Read the rest

Northern On My Mind

Call me crazy, but for some reason I’m overcome with the urge this morning to dress in plaid, let my beard grow out a bit more, finally make that pilgrimage to Moosefest and watch old episodes of one of my all time favorite TV shows, Northern Exposure.

Speaking of which, here are a few soothing scenes from Wassila Cicely, Alaska.

As we enter into this season of college football and all-out culture war, maybe Alabama and Auburn fans, yea, even Republicans and Democrats can agree on one thing:

Dancing with your honey is a good thing.

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… Read the rest