Blame it on Kade

So, I'm now looking for someone to go to New York with me. I'm aiming for the week of July 21-24, a Monday through Thursday. I want to go see Yankee Stadium before it closes for good after this season. My brother and I had been planning on going, but he's apparently bailing on me now. If I can get at least a couple more people, it'll be around 400-425 bucks a person for airfare and hotels for three nights. With four people, between 380-400 or so. Game tickets will probably be about 25 dollars each. I'd also like to see Shea Stadium if I'm going to be out there. This isn't really a "New York City trip" per se, I just really want to see the ball park before it closes. Most likely there'd be one day to just mess around NYC. Anyway, if you or someone you know (that I can get along with for three days) is interested in going, let me know pretty quick!

Bold Baseball Predictions... in hindsight

I was cleaning stuff out of my car today and found a baseball preview magazine I bought back in March. I don't even remember reading it when I got it, but I looked through it today just to test some of the "experts" picks. Anyway, since this is right at the mid-point of the season for most teams (the Cardinals played their 81st game tonight), and since I had absolutely nothing better to do, I decided to compare how the season was supposed to go with how it has gone, using my own "expert" analysis, opinion, and objectivity...

According to my Beckett magazine, and the 19 experts on espn.com, the overwhelming favorites to reach the World Series were the Detroit Tigers and New York Mets. Both made huge off-season deals to bolster already solid teams; the Tigers added slugging third baseman Miguel Cabrera & lefty Dontrelle Willis, and the Mets added arguably the best pitcher in baseball today, Johan Santana. After games are over on 6/27, both teams are 39-40 (and each has won at least 6 of its last 10 games to get to that record), and both are in third places in their respective divisions, a combined 8.5 games back. (Detroit and it's 137 million dollar payroll is only 2.5 games better in the standings than Kansas City. The Tigers outspent the Royals almost threefold this season). Meanwhile, the Mets have gained ground on the tumbling Phillies, who have lost 8 of 10.

Speaking of those mega-deals, Cabrera and Santana were the top vote getters for the six major awards according to the 20 espn.com voters for their respective projected awards. Santana got 13 of the 20 picks for NL Cy Young (Carlos Zambrano was second with 4), and Cabrera got 11 for AL MVP. No other player picked up more than 2 votes. Another Tiger young stud, Justin Verlander, was the projected AL Cy Young winner with 9 votes, 6 more than the next man, Roy Halliday. The other leaders were David Wright, NL MVP (9), Evan Longoria, AL Rookie of the Year (11), and Johnny Cuerto, NL ROY (5) narrowly edging Kosuke Fukodome (4). 

After today, the only likely accurate prediction will be Longoria, who's batting .272 with 15 homers and 46 RBI on the upstart Rays, who trail Boston by just .5 game. The other award winners at the mid point are 

NL MVP - Chipper Jones, Atl (.394, 16 HR, 46 RBI) - Chase Utley is probably just as valuable, but Chipper is batting 100 points better. You can't argue with that. Slight nod to Lance Berkman, but his team is already 12 games out and looks hopelessly lost.

AL MVP - Alex Rodriguez, NYY (.332, 15, 46) - Despite spending two weeks on the DL, A-Rod is the hottest hitter in the AL and keeping the Yanks afloat. Josh Hamilton gets the same recognition as Berkman. Special note here, A-Rod's numbers are almost identical to those of Albert Pujols, and he'd be about 4th on my list right now... goes to show the NL is having a much better offensive year.

NL Cy Young - Edinson Volquez, Cin (2.08, 10-3, 110 K in 99.1 IP) - There is no contest here... yet.

AL Cy Young - Cliff Lee, Cle (2.34, 11-1, 90 K in 103.2 IP) - Several players are almost as good, but none have been as consistent as Lee.

As for the espn.com picks,

- Cabrera - (.276, 11, 45) - started off horribly, has slowly started turning it around. Has stuck out once for every 5 AB's

- D Wright - (.285, 14, 62) - among the lead leaders in RBI's, but much like Cabrera, a slow start for both him and his team have him no where in the MVP discussion right now.

- Santana - (7-6, 2.93, 95 K in 103.2 IP) - getting no run support, Johan has already matched his loss total (6) from each of his two previous Cy Young campaigns.

- Verlander - (4-9, 4.49, 72 K in 102.1 IP) - started the worst among candidates listed, at 0-6, and has already matched a career high in losses. As good as his stuff is, I'd say he's a good bet to get back towards .500 by the end of the year.

As for team predictions, most picks were fairly accurate. Boston picked up 15 of 20 votes (the Yankees got the other 5), plus 2 votes for the Wild Card. Detroit and Cleveland each received 16 total votes, with the Tigers getting 11 to win the central and 5 for the WC, and Cleveland getting 9 and 7. Los Angeles (of Anaheim) picked up only 12 votes to win the west with Seattle surprisingly getting 8. Only the Chicago White Sox snuck in to steal just one vote, a Wild Card birth.

After today, Boston holds a .5 game lead over Tampa and are 6 games up on New York in the east. In the central, Chicago leads a red hot Minnesota Twins (10 straight wins) by half a game, followed by Detroit 5 back. Cleveland is in a free fall and are tied with the resurgent Royals at 7.5 games back in a surprisingly competitive division. In the west, LA leads Oakland by 4.5. Seattle is already 19.5 games back, and on pace to lose 104 games and finish 27 games worse than their espn projected record of 85-77. 

The NL hasn't been that surprising. In the east, New York, Atlanta and Philadelphia were all projected to finish within 3 games of each other, and right now that's right where they are, with the Phillies 3.5 games up on both the Braves and Mets. However, Florida is only a game back of first after being projected to finish last in the division and among the three worst teams in baseball. In the central, the Cardinals were picked to fight with the Pirates for last while Cincinnati was a darkhorse to win the division (even though the Cubs got 18 of 20 votes for 1st), but St. Louis trails Chicago by only 4.5 games while the Reds will be popular come trading deadline time, 13.5 back. If the west has yielded any surprises, it's that the Giants are only 5.5 back, not because they've been playing well, but because the division is the worst in baseball. First place Arizona has lost 7 of 10 and is 40-40 on the year.

At the halfway point, the Red Sox and Cubs own baseball's two best records. This could truly be a year of a record number of bandwagon jumpers. Let the anarchy begin!

LA Sooner Strikes Again!

This guy is pretty cool. On YouTube, his screen name is LASooner, and he always makes a highlight video from the previous year set to good movie soundtracks. This is kind of where I base a lot of my very general and basic ideas for videos. I think it's so much nicer than having some hip/hop song from some artist I've never heard of (with a stupid sounding made up name), "singing" some song that doesn't really have words... This just makes the videos come off much nicer. Plus, he always adds in the TV play by play to go along with it. I think that's a huge bonus, because, let's face it, play by play calls make the games (or is that just the play by play guy tooting his own horn?)

Anyway, if you have an hour or two to kill, go to LASooner's YouTube page and browse his videos. He has season highlight videos for OU since the 2000 season. 

2007 Oklahoma Sooners (Part 1 of 3)

2007 Oklahoma Sooners (Part 2 of 3)

2007 Oklahoma Sooners (Part 3 of 3)

Peoria Ridge - 6/26

Kade and I played the good ol' P-Ridge today. I hate playing out there. I never ever shoot well out there (not that I really shoot any better at other courses, but still...) That course seems to intimidate me, for some reason. But, I had a gift certificate still from Valentine's Day, so we decided to go. Normally when I play out there, I start off horrible, then manage to string together a few good holes for a decent back nine to salvage a score in the upper 90's or low 100's. (I told you I was a stud!). However, today, I nailed a drive down the middle of #1 (a par 5), then hit a 5-wood dead straight to within about 75 yards, and had an easy wedge to the green. My birdie putt stopped about an inch short, leaving me a gimme par. I was literally an inch from being under par for the first time in my life. Had I made that putt, I probably would've walked off the course and never played again, ending my golf career with that one shining moment of (semi-) glory. Anyway, I had a birdie opportunity on #2 as well, a chip from the fringe on the backside of the green, and managed to make bogey after my par putt missed short. (The greens were in terrible shape and the speeds were very hard to read). I played around bogey golf for the next 5 holes, then on #7, I hit one of the more remarkable shots I've ever hit.

I drove with a 5-Wood (the hole is a short par 4) about 200 yards and off to the right, between the cart path and a fence that marks OB, in the rough, and about 20 feet shy of the creek. Guarding said creek are a line of huge, tall trees, probably 75 feet tall. So, after debating my options of a) turning left and punching out into the fairway (the sensible thing to do) and b) using a sand wedge and trying to clear the trees with something straight up in the air, and I decided on c) none of the above, and went with the 'Tin Cup' mentality of "grip it & rip it." I took a pitching wedge and hit the ball straight up in the air, carried the trees and hit the back side of the green, about 125 yards on the fly. This was remarkable for a couple of reasons. 1, I usually don't get that much air under my PW that fast. It was almost like trying to hit the ball out of a silo. 2, I usually don't carry my PW more than 100 yards, and when I do, it's because I've bladed it and it never gets more than probably 20 feet off the ground. To hit it that high, that straight up, and that far, was nothing short of remarkable (for me, anyway). The ball left about an inch deep divot and bounced about 4 feet, stopping about 50 feet from the pin. I got in in two for my par. 

The rest of the round, I pretty well lollygagged my way to some unremarkable bogeys and even a couple pars here and there. We really didn't keep score very accurately on the back nine (or really even that correctly), but I carded a really bogus 92. I hit 48 on the front nine, which was actually legit (I fell apart on holes 4-6 and 8). 

Anyway, with my finances on lock down in preparation for saving for a Yankee Stadium trip in about a month, that's probably the last golf I'll be getting to play for a while. Maybe I'll find something else to entertain you all with (both of you!) for a few weeks.

Top Sooner Plays & Games of the 00's

Soonersports.com is running a couple of fan polls to determine both the 10 best plays and games from OU football in the current decade. For the most part, the choices are good. You simply pick your favorite 10 from 20 possible games/plays. The only play that I wish would've been on the list (that's not) is the Derrick Strait INT return against Nebraska in 2000, that proved to be the door slammer for the Sooners against the #1 Cornhuskers. In my opinion, that was the most important game in (recent, at least) OU football history, because it put OU back to #1 and showed that the Sooners were back. Another I would've liked to see was Garrett Hartley hitting a 49 yard FG to force a second OT against Baylor in 2005, or DeMarco Murray's busted play 92 yard (and 5 second) kickoff return against Baylor in '07.

Anyway, here are my top 10 plays, and why I may think so. As soon as I find the final poll, I'll show those too. The polling for top 10 games has already closed, so I'll post the final results as they're announced.

Top 10 Plays

10. Mark Bradley (2004) OSU TD tip & run - Had he caught it initially, he probably wouldn't have scored. But after deflecting it, the defenders flinched and he raced down the sideline.

9. DeMarco Murray (2007) Texas hurdle - Showed he's potentially the most explosive player in the nation after hurdling his own blocker then outrunning the Texas D for a 65 yard score

8. Andre Woolfold (2000) Nebraska juggle - Tips a Josh Heupel pass twice before reaching his left arm out and catching it while laying on his back.

7. Adrian Peterson (2004) OSU Spin & gone - Took a simple run right up the middle, spun away from one tackle at the line of scrimmage, then said bye bye to the Cowpokes. The signature moment from his Heisman runner up year.

6. Rocky Calmus (2000) Florida State Weinke fumble - Calmus stepped up and nailed a scrambling Chris Weinke deep in FSU territory late in the 4th quarter of the Orange Bowl, causing a fumble that would immediately lead to the game's only touchdown.

5. Mark Clayton (2003) Texas YAC - Catching a slant from Jason White, Clayton quickly ran out of room on the left sideline before stopping on a dime, juking twice, then cutting back to the right before scoring all the way in the right corner of the endzone.

4. Adrian Peterson (2005) Tulsa spinorama - Ran around the right side before blowing up a linebacker, spinning out of a tackle, running backwards three steps, then spinning and sprinting into the endzone for the nail in the coffin TD.

3. Torrance Marshall (2000) Texas A&M INT Return - Saved the season for the resurgent #1 Sooners, picking off Mark Ferris and running it back 35 yards (with the help of a Rocky Calmus clip) for the go-ahead TD late in the 4th Quarter.

2. Roy Williams (2001) Texas Superman - After a Longhorn mistake, Williams soared over a low block and landed on Chris Sims just as he brought his arm back to pass. The ball fluttered into the hands of Teddy Lehman, who took two steps into the endzone.

1. Renaldo Works (2002) Alabama snake run - Williams has the most memorable play on this list, but Works has the most impressive. Taking a screen pass, Renaldo weaved his way through the Tide defense before hurdling a tackler downfield and getting the Sooners a first and goal late in the 4th quarter of this classic game.

TOP 10 GAMES SINCE 2000

10. 2003 - OU 20 - Alabama 13

9. 2000 - OU 41 - Kansas State 31

Holiday Hills Golf Course - Branson, MO

So, after thinking for a while, I'm trying to decide what all I really want to write about on this blog. One of my favorite things to do is play golf, so I'm going to share a little about my golf experiences and the different courses I get to play. 

Today, I played Holiday Hills Golf Course in Branson. We tried going out yesterday, but after four hole we had to postpone it until today. I was hoping we'd get to finish yesterday so we could play Thousand Hills today (we're staying right on that course). 

This was one of the shortest courses I've ever played. I was with my uncles and my cousin Kellie, and today was her first golf outing, so we played from the white tees (the second shortest out of four). The longest are the golds, then blue, white and red. From the white tees, the course played just under 4800 yards, and is a par 68 with five par three's and one par five. This is also the only course I've ever seen that has back-to-back par three's. This course does that twice, with the 130 yard #6 followed by the 110 yard #7, and the gorgeous downhill 118 yard #16 and the 140 yard #17. After four holes, we decided to team up into a 2-man scramble to speed up the round due to a lot of people out on the course. 

Holiday Hills is a pretty nice course. It's challenging, but not punishing. On most of the holes, hitting in the rough can lead to a very manageable next shot. The course has some beautiful settings, especially with the hills and the creek that winds through the holes. The carts have GPS screens in them and tell you exactly how far you are from the front and back of each bunker, water hazard, and also the dimensions of the green and the distance to the pin, no matter where you are on the hole (or surrounding holes). My favorite holes were three of the par three's (2, 6, and 16). Most of the 4's were all pretty similar.

Some highlights of the course, and my round:

Hole 2 - I hit a sand wedge over the water to within 10 feet, then tapped in for birdie on this 86 yarder.

Hole 6 - I skied a 7 iron up over the water and left the biggest divot of my life on the lower tier of the green. The greens took on a lot of water from last night's storm and then a short steady rain shower today, so big divots were common.

Hole 9 - The only par 5, it played about 465 today. We took Larry's drive (mine went hopelessly right into some guy's front yard), which was about 160 yards. I hit a 5 wood about 200 yards that bounced just into the rough on the right side, then nailed a pitching wedge straight up over a tree and onto the green. We then four putted for a fantastic 7.

Hole 13 - Played 369 today, and I finally crushed a drive that played perfectly left-to-right into the fairway right at 100 yards short of the pin.

Hole 14 - My drive sliced into the very start of the #15 fairway, which came up 135 short of the pin, but about 35 feet uphill. I hit a 7-iron pin high just to the fringe.

I'm hoping to hit Peoria Ridge sometime this next week. I played Miami Golf & Country Club a couple weeks ago, I'll try to post on it sometime in the next couple days. Hopefully I'll be able to hit a few more courses this summer.

22 Holes for the Price 18

I'm in Branson for the weekend with the fam. We went to golf at Holiday Hills today, a pretty nice golf course just east of Lake Taneycomo. We got to the fourth hole when a storm blew in and they blew the siren, so we headed back to the clubhouse and waited out the lightning, but the rain never stopped. We just got a rain check and decided to try again tomorrow. Too bad, too, it ruined my fantastic round of +11... through 4 holes. (8 on each of the three par 4's and a birdie on the par 3 2nd hole). More updates later!

This is exactly why I hate the Cubs

(click on the headline to read the related story)

Freakin bandwagon jumpers. I've jumped on a few in my lifetime, most recently the Celtics, but when I did jump on one I didn't pretend to be a die-hard fan, and if they won or lost, I thought "oh well."

I think it's inevitible to jump on a few BW's in life, but it's funny how quickly those BW's turn into semi-trucks of domination that everyone outside that particular city (or group of states, e.g. "New" England) grow to hate that team after it wins a couple championships. For example, look at Boston. 6 years ago, the Red Sox couldn't beat the Yankees, and the Patriots seemingly came out of nowhere to slay the mighty Rams. Now, the Pat's are the most hated team in sports (even without the whole spying fiasco - and, no, I don't like putting "-gate" on the end of every sort of controversy) and the Red Sox have been the most dominant baseball team of the past half decade. Rooting for either of those teams now isn't "jumping on the bandwagon," it's just simply being a sheep and following the crowd.

I think if you're going to pick a team to inexplicably root for (one nowhere close to your location or home), you should adhere to a few guidelines. I give you a point/counterpoint for examples.

1) It's OK to pick a team because of one player, provided you keep rooting for that team after said player retires. I started rooting for the Packers in the mid-90's because I was sick of all the crap the Cowboys players got away with, and plus, I needed to break away from a team simply because my dad rooted for them (which isn't necessarily what you should do... sports are a bond. but that's another post.) I loved Brett Favre, so I started rooting for Green Bay. He's now gone, and I'm ready for the Aaron Rodgers era (or year, whatever it turns out to be). I'm sticking with my green and gold.

1) (counterpoint) Did anyone outside of Chicago a) root against the Bulls in the mid-90's, and then b) root for the Bulls after Jordan retired? I'll give this counterpoint a counterpoint of its own. When team management dismantles a team and basically lets it slide into mediocrity, it's ok to abandon the team. Or at least pick a team that's worth rooting for. (See the Florida Marlins).

2) If you're going to pick a team to jump on, pick one that hasn't been there before and is on the rise with a legitimate shot to be built into a winner in the next few years (regardless of if it's possible they'll win because of how stacked another team may be). Pick someone like the Tampa Bay Rays, or the Cleveland Cavs, or even my beloved Browns!

2) (counterpoint) Don't pick someone who has had 100 chances to win and still hasn't ever gotten there (cough cough, Cubs, cough cough). I know, they've won a series, but was anyone alive when they did?

There are a variety of ways and reasons a person can root for a team that's half the country away and be a legit fan. I like the Yankees because I grew up hearing the fairy tales about Mickey Mantle from my grandpa, who grew up with the Mick in Commerce back in the 30's and 40's. A guy I went to OU with is a die-hard Virginia Tech fan because his family is from Virginia. G-Spence is probably more devoted a Dodger fan than most of the whole of SoCal. Geographics don't matter, but if you decide to start rooting for a team, just remember to stick with them. Unless it's the Cubs. You should switch now... I won't even say a word to you about it. It'll be the like Prodigal Son returning home.

We are the champions!

So, my co-ed softball team, Bearskin Fitness Center, just won the Spring Co-Ed league. Just thought I'd pass that along. We went 13-1 on the season, with our only loss coming via forfeit because the league president didn't tell us what time we had to show up for a make-up game last week. So, now we're off to the summer league in two weeks!

Those Plucky Little Redbirds

Some of you may know that I've been a die-hard St. Louis Cardinals fan all my life, and that I'm always one of those obnoxiously-positive minded fans who always thinks his team will find a way to win no matter what the odds (I just a video of myself from an episode of 'The 5th Quarter,' from my senior year at OU where I literally flipped a coin to decide my pick for the 2005 OU-Texas game... Texas won the game 45-12 and went on to win the national title and be one of the better teams of all time...). Also, baseball is my favorite sport and by February of each year I'm totally jonesing for the National Pastime to get started.

All that being said, come February and March of Ott-8, I was ready for August and OU football without so much as seeing my beloved Cards play a game. Carpenter and Mulder each were recovering from major surgeries and expected to miss half the season. Pujols was hurting and said that even a minor injury would make him choose season ending surgery to his elbow which has hampered him for a few years now. There were guys on the roster with names like Skip, Wellemeyer and Lohse. We replaced a legendary GM by the free-agency era standards. And, unfortunately, Al Hrabowski was still in the broadcast booth.

Now we're in June, and Pujols (the game's best hitter) and Adam Wainwright (our steal we got for JD Drew) are both injured, Carpenter and Mulder have hit snags in their rehabs, guys by the names of Boggs and Pirisi have started games, and Yadier Molina (the most underrated catcher in baseball) got knocked unconscious last weekend and is sitting out a few games). And, yet, entering play today my St. Louis Cardinals, a team picked higher than only the lowly Pirates in the pre-season by most of the baseball minds, is just 3.5 games back of the "mighty" Chicago Cubs team picked by most to go to the World Series for the best record in the National League. And it's not like the NL Central of the past few years (St. Louis won the division in '06 with 83 wins) Only three teams in baseball (the Cubs, Red Sox, and Angels) have better records than the Cards.

Skip Shumaker has become the sparkplug at the leadoff spot that everyone claimed the Cards lost when they didn't re-sign David Eckstein. He's third on the team in hitting and OBP (.309 & .373, respectively), and second in runs scored (43). That's what a lead-off hitter should be doing. Plus, he's been a solid left/center fielder. Rick Ankiel has been a beast in CF, high lighted by his two ungodly throws he made to third base in one game against the Rockies. His hitting has dropped off a little the past 2-3 weeks as he's been hampered with a knee injury, but he's easily the come back player of the year. The platooning middle infielders have been pretty good. No all-stars, but certainly no slouches either (Adam Kennedy, Brenden Ryan, Cesar Isturis and Aaron Miles). And Troy Glaus has everyone forget about the "third-base cancer" otherwise known as Scott Rolen.

Then there's Ryan Ludwick. If he stays this productive all year and the Cardinals stay in the playoff hunt all year and he doesn't get legitimate MVP consideration, I'm asking Arlen Spector to get involved and find out what shady things are going on.

All that being said, this is one of the most compelling baseball seasons I've experienced in a while. If the Cardinals flirt with winning 90 games (which they're totally on pace for), Tony LaRussa should be the unanimous pick for Manager of the Year.

Thats... all I got.

Yo yo

So, I'm rocking the blogspot now. This is my alternative spot to basically just say whatever is on my mind or what I'm thinking about or whatever life has thrown my way. I'm keeping my blog on myspace for my deeper writings and things of that nature. Anyway, here goes!