The Astigmatic Eye

This Day in Sports History - February 18

2007-02-18T09:00:00.000-08:00

2001 - NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt is killed in a crash during the last lap of the Daytona 500.
2001 - FBI agent Robert Hanssen is arrested for spying for the Soviet Union. He was ultimately convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

Some of my friends are big NASCAR fans so they started a fantasy racing league in 2001. I joined them and my top draft pick wound up being ... Dale Earnhardt. It wasn't a good way to start the year. I wound up getting laid off in July, then there were the terrorist attacks in September.

Hanssen has nothing to do with sports. I just happened to see the movie Breach last night. I wished that it focused more on Hanssen than the folks who brought him down, but such is life.

Births
1898 - Enzo Ferrari, Italian race car driver (d. 1988)
1927 - Luis Arroyo, Puerto Rico baseball player
1928 - Tom Johnson, Canadian hockey player
1931 - Bob St. Clair, American football player
1936 - Dick Duff, Canadian hockey player
1939 - Dal Maxvill, American baseball player
1945 - Judy Rankin, American golfer
1952 - Maurice Lucas, American basketball player
1960 - Andy Moog, Canadian hockey player
1967 - Roberto Baggio, Italian footballer
1974 - Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Russian tennis player
1974 - Jamey Carroll, American baseball player
1980 - Nikolai Antropov, Kazakh hockey player
1981 - Andrei Kirilenko, Russian basketball player

Deaths
1933 - James J. Corbett, American boxer
1998- Harry Caray, baseball broadcaster
2001 - Dale Earnhardt, American race car drive
2001 - Eddie Mathews, baseball player

Yesterday was a pretty high octane day for birthdays, Today is a pretty big day for feast days.

This Day in Sports History - February 17

2007-02-17T08:35:00.000-08:00

This Day in Sports History - February 17

Events:

1924 - In Miami, Florida, Johnny Weissmuller sets a new world record in the 100-yard freestyle swimming competition with a time of 52-2/5 seconds. They can do the butterfly faster nowadays.

1968 - The Basketball Hall of Fame was opened in Massachusetts

Births:

1908 - Red Barber, baseball announcer (d. 1992)
1930 - Roger Craig, baseball player and manager
1936 - Jim Brown, American football player
1948 - Rick Majerus, American basketball coach
1959 - Neil Lomax, American football player
1962 - Alison Hargreaves, British mountaineer (d. 1995)
(I consider mountain climbing a sport)
1963 - Michael Jordan, American basketball player
1964 - Buster Olney, American sports columnist
1968 - Bryan Cox, American football player
1972 - Philippe Candeloro, French figure skater
1976 - Scott Williamson, American baseball player
1981 - TJ Duckett, American football player

Michael Jordan and Jim Brown. That's a pretty high powered birthday list.

This Day in Sports History - February 16

2007-02-16T08:00:00.000-08:00

This Day in Sports History - February 16

Events:

1972 - NBA basketball player Wilt Chamberlain scores 30,000th point. (1991 - Chamberlain scores 20,000th time off the court)

2004 - Alex Rodriguez was traded to the New York Yankees, in a deal that sent Alfonso Soriano to the Texas Rangers. (Arod gets alot of undeserved flack. He may not perform as well in pressure situations as he does the rest of the time; although, that seems to be mainly a 2006 thing. But he performs so well generally that he's still one of the top players around.)

2005 - The National Hockey League cancels the entire 2004-2005 regular season and playoffs, becoming the first major sports league in North America to do so over a labor dispute. (A fun sport to watch, but I never really understood it. I remember the kids who played hockey when I was growing up had to wake up at 4 AM because that's the only way that they could get rink time. That, and the expenses involved, helped ensure that I would never play.)

Births:
1915 - Jim O'Hora, American college football coach (d. 2005)
1921 - Jean Behra, French Formula One driver (d. 1959)
1929 - Gerhard Hanappi, Austrian footballer (d. 1980)
1934 - Marlene Hagge, American professional golfer
1936 - Jill Kinmont, American skier
1943 - Brig Owens, American football player
1952 - Barry Foote, Major League Baseball player
1953 - George Martin, American footballer
- Lanny McDonald, Canadian ice hockey player
1954 - Michael Holding, West Indian fast bowler cricket
1958 - Oscar Schmidt, Brazilian basketball player
1959 - John McEnroe, American tennis player
- Kelly Tripucka, American basketball player
1964 - Bebeto, Brazilian footballer
1967 - John Valentin, baseball player
1967 - Keith Gretzky, former hockey player
1972 - Jerome Bettis, American football player
1976 - Eric Byrnes, American baseball player
1977 - Ahman Green, American football player
1980 - Ashley Lelie, American football player
1981 - Qyntel Woods, American basketball player
1983 - Tuomo Ruutu, Finnish hockey player

Death:
2006 - Ernie Stautner, German-born American football player (b. 1925)

Today In Sports History 2/15

2007-02-15T04:00:00.000-08:00

I made a Groundhog's Day resolution to revive Astigmatic Eye. But I've been running late like I have with my other resolutions. My plan is to post a daily look at that date in sports history. I'll be using various sources including Wikipedia. Without further adieu, here's the inaugural Today In Sports History:

1953 - Seventeen-year-old Tenley Albright becomes the first American to win the world figure skating championship.

1990 - MLB owners lock out the players

1998 - Dale Earnhardt wins the Daytona 500 after 20 years of disappointment.

2004 - Dale Earnhardt Jr. wins the Daytona 500 6 years to the day when his father won his only Daytona 500.

Births:
1895 - Earl Thomson, Canadian athlete (d. 1971)
1929 - Graham Hill, British race car driver (d. 1975)
1939 - Ole Ellefsæter, Norwegian cross-country skier
1940 - John Hadl, American football player
1948 - Ron Cey, American baseball player
1949 - Ken Anderson, American football player
1957 - Jimmy Spencer, American race car driver
1960 - Darrell Green, American football player
1964 - Mark Price, American basketball player
1972 - Jaromír Jágr, Czech hockey player
1973 - Kateřina Neumannová, Czech cross country skier
- Amy Van Dyken, American swimmer
1974 - Seattle Slew, American racehorse (d. 2002)
- Ugueth Urbina, Venezuelan Major League Baseball player
- Alexander Wurz, Austrian race car driver
1975 - Serge Aubin, National Hockey League player
1979 - Alenka Kejžar, Slovenian swimmer
- Josh Low, English footballer
1983 - Russell Martin, American baseball player

Death:
2002- Mike Darr, American baseball player

Alot of birthdays, but a slow news day other than that. It should pick up later on this week.

That's a wrap

2007-01-10T15:58:00.000-08:00

Here are the final 2006 stats and total career stats for the 9 QBs that I tracked:

Date	Name		Team	GS	Att	Comp	Pct
2003	John	Beck	BYU	4	145	73	50.34
2004	John	Beck	BYU	10	343	192	55.98
2005	John	Beck	BYU	12	513	331	64.52
2006	John	Beck	BYU	12	417	289	69.30
Total	John	Beck		38	1418	885	62.41
2004	Brian	Brohm	Loui	0	98	66	67.35
2005	Brian	Brohm	Loui	10	301	207	68.77
2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	11	314	199	63.38
Total	Brian	Brohm		21	713	472	66.20
2003	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	13	360	220	61.11
2004	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	11	353	198	56.09
2005	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	12	419	253	60.38
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	14	432	292	67.59
Total	Kevin	Kolb		50	1564	963	61.57
2003	Chris	Leak	Fla	9	320	190	59.38
2004	Chris	Leak	Fla	12	399	238	59.65
2005	Chris	Leak	Fla	12	374	235	62.83
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	14	365	232	63.56
Total	Chris	Leak		47	1458	895	61.39
2003	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	6	198	98	49.49
2004	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	12	366	213	58.20
2005	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	12	434	258	59.45
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	12	427	280	65.57
Total	Jordan	Palmer		42	1425	849	59.58
2003	Brady	Quinn	ND	9	332	157	47.29
2004	Brady	Quinn	ND	12	353	191	54.11
2005	Brady	Quinn	ND	12	450	292	64.89
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	13	467	289	61.88
Total	Brady	Quinn		46	1602	929	57.99
2004	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	4	144	73	50.69
2005	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	12	311	188	60.45
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	13	342	232	67.84
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		29	797	493	61.86
2004	Troy	Smith	OHSt	5	122	68	55.74
2005	Troy	Smith	OHSt	10	237	149	62.87
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	13	311	203	65.27
Total	Troy	Smith		28	670	420	62.69
2003	Drew	Stanton	MISt	0	3	2	66.67
2004	Drew	Stanton	MISt	7	220	141	64.09
2005	Drew	Stanton	MISt	11	355	236	66.48
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	11	269	164	60.97
Total	Drew	Stanton		29	847	543	64.11

At Espn.com, they show Scout Inc.'s Top 32. 4 QBs are on it: Quinn at 4, Russell at 7, Brohm at 13, and Smith at 28. This was before the title game, so I'm not sure how much Leak's stock and Smith's stock went up or down. Quinn has a lower completion percentage than the other 3, but he also started for four years; giving scouts more opportunities to observe him. If I understand David Lewin's work correctly, this probably means that the scouts aren't too high on the other four year starters like Beck, Kolb, or Palmer. It also means that teams may not have seen enough of Brohm, Russell, and Smith to form an accurate opinion of them.

Two weeks for the price of one

2006-10-31T17:24:00.000-08:00

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

21-Oct	John	Beck	BYU	1	23	18	78.26
28-Oct	John	Beck	BYU	1	31	23	74.19
2006	John	Beck	BYU	7	229	162	70.74
Total	John	Beck		33	1230	758	61.63

21-Oct	Brian	Brohm	Loui	1	26	18	69.23
2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	5	137	83	60.58
Total	Brian	Brohm		15	536	356	66.42

21-Oct	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	30	20	66.67
28-Oct	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	34	22	64.71
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	9	297	200	67.34
Total	Kevin	Kolb		45	1429	871	60.95

28-Oct	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	28	14	50.00
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	8	201	124	61.69
Total	Chris	Leak		41	1294	787	60.82

21-Oct	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	30	19	63.33
27-Oct	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	37	21	56.76
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	8	269	183	68.03
Total	Jordan	Palmer		38	1267	752	59.35

21-Oct	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	45	27	60.00
28-Oct	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	25	18	72.00
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	8	303	193	63.70
Total	Brady	Quinn		41	1438	833	57.93

21-Oct	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	19	15	78.95
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	8	193	135	69.95
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		24	648	396	61.11

21-Oct	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	23	15	65.22
28-Oct	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	21	14	66.67
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	9	215	145	67.44
Total	Troy	Smith		24	574	362	63.07

21-Oct	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	37	27	72.97
28-Oct	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	22	10	45.45
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	9	237	144	60.76
Total	Drew	Stanton		27	815	523	64.17

Ouch! Saturday, against Indiana, Stanton was replced mid-game. I'm not sure if he was hurt or not.

Burning Down One Side

2006-10-16T18:39:00.000-07:00

I figured that I'd get this out of the way early this week. John Beck and Brady Quinn we're on bye this week while Brian Brohm returned from an injury. Drew Stanton got hurt during the Spartans-Buckeyes game, but should return next week.

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

2006	John	Beck	BYU	5	175	121	69.14
Total	John	Beck		31	1176	717	60.97

14-Oct	Brian	Brohm	Loui	1	37	20	54.05
2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	4	111	65	58.56
Total	Brian	Brohm		14	510	338	66.27

14-Oct	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	38	22	57.89
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	7	233	158	67.81
Total	Kevin	Kolb		43	1365	829	60.73

14-Oct	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	17	9	52.94
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	7	173	110	63.58
Total	Chris	Leak		40	1266	773	61.06

14-Oct	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	29	22	75.86
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	6	202	143	70.79
Total	Jordan	Palmer		36	1200	712	59.33

2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	6	233	148	63.52
Total	Brady	Quinn		39	1368	788	57.60

14-Oct	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	18	15	83.33
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	7	174	120	68.97
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		23	629	381	60.57

14-Oct	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	22	15	68.18
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	7	171	116	67.84
Total	Troy	Smith		22	530	333	62.83

14-Oct	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	16	8	50.00
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	7	178	107	60.11
Total	Drew	Stanton		25	756	486	64.29

Before I take off, get a load of Colt Brennan's stats. He's a junior at Hawaii and IIRC, June Jones uses that crazy run and shoot. I have no idea if he's a pro prospect (Timmy Chang set records for the Warriors), but he's got a QB name.

Running a little late here ...

2006-10-13T17:54:00.000-07:00

Let's get into last weeks results here:

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

7-Oct	John	Beck	BYU	1	21	16	76.19
2006	John	Beck	BYU	5	175	121	69.14
Total	John	Beck		31	1176	717	60.97

2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	3	74	45	60.81
Total	Brian	Brohm		11	473	318	67.23

7-Oct	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	31	24	77.42
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	6	195	136	69.74
Total	Kevin	Kolb		42	1327	807	60.81

7-Oct	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	26	17	65.38
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	6	156	101	64.74
Total	Chris	Leak		39	1249	764	61.17

7-Oct	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	32	25	78.13
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	5	173	121	69.94
Total	Jordan	Palmer		35	1171	690	58.92

7-Oct	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	37	27	72.97
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	6	233	148	63.52
Total	Brady	Quinn		39	1368	788	57.60

7-Oct	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	41	24	58.54
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	6	156	105	67.31
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		22	611	366	59.90

7-Oct	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	20	17	85.00
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	6	149	101	67.79
Total	Troy	Smith		21	508	318	62.60

7-Oct	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	35	20	57.14
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	6	162	99	61.11
Total	Drew	Stanton		24	740	478	64.59

In response to a question from last week about JaMarcus Russell, I'm not familiar with LSU so I don't know what system they use. I wanted to watch their game with Florida, but life got in the way. In any case, Russell has relatively few starts and this is a sign that he may be misrated come draft time.

Week 5

2006-10-03T20:17:00.000-07:00

First off, David Lewin showed up over the weekend in Football Outsiders mailbag
He had this to say about the QB projection system: The research tells us that scouts rarely miss on guys with high games started, the only exceptions being cases where they do not properly consider the importance of completion percentage (Cade McNown). Quinn will probably finish his career with a completion rate of about 59 percent. Typically quarterbacks above 58 or 59 percent are underrated by scouts, those with completion percentages below this threshold are over-rated, and those with completion percentages right at it are usually rated correctly.

And:...college system effects are one thing that the projection formula does not handle well (Tim Couch being Exhibit A). The only way the system accounts for college system effects is that teams try not to draft guys who are just products of their college system. Remember, the projection system only applies to first- and second-round picks.

With that in mind, let's look at the BMOC:

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

28-Sep	John	Beck	BYU	1	37	23	62.16
2006	John	Beck	BYU	4	154	105	68.18
Total	John	Beck		30	1155	701	60.69

Beck was back this week as the Cougars snapped TCU's 13 game winning streak.

2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	3	74	45	60.81
Total	Brian	Brohm		11	473	318	67.23

Brohm is still out for a bit; probably another month or so.

30-Sep	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	28	18	64.29
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	5	164	112	68.29
Total	Kevin	Kolb		41	1296	783	60.42

I didn't realize that the "l" in Kolb was silent.

30-Sep	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	20	14	70.00
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	5	130	84	64.62
Total	Chris	Leak		38	1223	747	61.08

His numbers look good, but I don't know enough about college football to tell if that's an Urban Meyer effect or not. He went from 59.4 and 59.7 as an underclassman to 62.8 and 64.6 the last two years.

30-Sep	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	26	18	69.23
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	4	141	96	68.09
Total	Jordan	Palmer		34	1139	665	58.38

30-Sep	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	38	29	76.32
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	5	196	121	61.73
Total	Brady	Quinn		38	1331	761	57.18

30-Sep	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	20	18	90.00
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	5	115	81	70.43
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		21	570	342	60.00

30-Sep	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	25	16	64.00
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	5	129	84	65.12
Total	Troy	Smith		20	488	301	61.68

30-Sep	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	24	15	62.50
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	5	127	79	62.20
Total	Drew	Stanton		23	705	458	64.96

Russell and Leak face off this Saturday at 3:30.

Class of '07

2006-09-28T17:26:00.000-07:00

A little late this week, but here goes: John Beck sat out with an injury; as did Brian Brohm

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

2006	John	Beck	BYU	3	117	82	70.09
Total	John	Beck		29	1118	678	60.64

2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	3	74	45	60.81
Total	Brian	Brohm		11	473	318	67.23

23-Sep	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	28	21	75.00
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	4	136	94	69.12
Total	Kevin	Kolb		40	1268	765	60.33

23-Sep	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	26	15	57.69
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	4	110	70	63.64
Total	Chris	Leak		37	1203	733	60.93

23-Sep	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	37	26	70.27
2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	3	115	78	67.83
Total	Jordan	Palmer		33	1113	647	58.13

23-Sep	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	36	20	55.56
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	4	158	92	58.23
Total	Brady	Quinn		37	1293	732	56.61

23-Sep	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	23	17	73.91
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	4	95	63	66.32
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		20	550	324	58.91

23-Sep	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	22	12	54.55
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	4	104	68	65.38
Total	Troy	Smith		19	463	285	61.56

23-Sep	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	22	9	40.91
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	4	103	64	62.14
Total	Drew	Stanton		22	681	443	65.05

Week 3

2006-09-18T19:25:00.000-07:00

Here we go, sports fans; results from "Separation Saturday": (QB, Games Started, Attempts, Completions, Percentage)

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

Date

Name

Team

Att

Comp

Pct

16-Sep	John	Beck	BYU	1	59	38	64.41
2006	John	Beck	BYU	3	117	82	70.09
Total	John	Beck		29	1118	678	60.64

They've thrown alot at BYU since I was a kid. I'm not sure if it's the mountain air or the lingering influence from LaVell Edwards. In any case, Saturday was a double overtime game.

16-Sep	Brian	Brohm	Loui	1	14	10	71.43
2006	Brian	Brohm	Loui	3	74	45	60.81
Total	Brian	Brohm		11	473	318	67.23

Brohm dislocated his thumb against the Miami Hurricanes and will be out 3-6 weeks.

16-Sep	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	31	27	87.10
2006	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	3	108	73	67.59
Total	Kevin	Kolb		39	1240	744	60.00

16-Sep	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	25	15	60.00
2006	Chris	Leak	Fla	3	84	55	65.48
Total	Chris	Leak		36	1177	718	61.00

2006	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	2	78	52	66.67
Total	Jordan	Palmer		32	1076	621	57.71

UTEP was on a bye last week

16-Sep	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	48	24	50.00
2006	Brady	Quinn	ND	3	122	72	59.02
Total	Brady	Quinn		36	1257	712	56.64

The oft-maligned Chris "Kelly" Leak has better numbers than Quinn so far.

16-Sep	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	35	20	57.14
2006	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	3	72	46	63.89
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		19	527	307	58.25

16-Sep	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	30	21	70.00
2006	Troy	Smith	OHSt	3	82	56	68.29
Total	Troy	Smith		18	441	273	61.90

16-Sep	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	25	16	64.00
2006	Drew	Stanton	MISt	3	81	55	67.90
Total	Drew	Stanton		21	659	434	65.86

See you next week, if not sooner. I may put some other info up here at Astigmatic Eye.

Week 2

2006-09-10T13:41:00.000-07:00

All 9 Quarterbacks started this week:

Name School GS Att Comp Pct

9-Sep	John	Beck	BYU	1	21	16	76.19
Total	John	Beck		28	1059	640	60.43

9-Sep	Brian	Brohm	Loui	1	29	16	55.17
Total	Brian	Brohm		11	459	308	67.10

9-Sep	Kevin	Kolb	Hou	1	42	24	57.14
Total	Kevin	Kolb		38	1209	717	59.31

9-Sep	Chris	Leak	Fla	1	29	19	65.52
Total	Chris	Leak		35	1152	703	61.02

9-Sep	Jordan	Palmer	UTEP	1	50	33	66.00
Total	Jordan	Palmer		32	1076	621	57.71

9-Sep	Brady	Quinn	ND	1	36	25	69.44
Total	Brady	Quinn		35	1209	688	56.91

9-Sep	JaMarcus	Russell	LSU	1	20	13	65.00
Total	JaMarcus	Russell		18	492	287	58.33

9-Sep	Troy	Smith	OHSt	1	27	17	62.96
Total	Troy	Smith		17	411	252	61.31

9-Sep	Drew	Stanton	MISt	1	31	23	74.19
Total	Drew	Stanton		20	634	418	65.93

Thanks to Brian for reading and thanks to Jason for writing This Week In Milford.

Week 1

2006-09-04T07:59:00.000-07:00

Here are the stats for the BMOC 9 the first weekend; along with their running totals:

Date Name Team GS Att Comp Pct
2-Sep John Beck BYU 1 37 28 75.68
Total John Beck 27 1038 624 60.12

3-Sep Brian Brohm Loui 1 31 19 61.29
Total Brian Brohm 11 430 292 67.91

2-Sep Kevin Kolb Hou 1 35 22 62.86
Total Kevin Kolb 37 1167 693 59.38

31-Aug Chris Leak Fla 1 30 21 70.00
Total Chris Leak 34 1123 684 60.91

31-Aug Jordan Palmer UTEP 1 28 19 67.86
Total Jordan Palmer 31 1026 588 57.31

2-Sep Brady Quinn ND 1 38 23 60.53
Total Brady Quinn 34 1173 663 56.52

2-Sep JaMarcusRussell LSU 1 17 13 76.47
Total JaMarcusRussell 17 472 274 58.05

2-Sep Troy Smith OHSt 1 25 18 72.00
Total Troy Smith 16 384 235 61.20

2-Sep Drew Stanton MISt 1 25 16 64.00
Total Drew Stanton 19 603 395 65.51

Mobile Quarterbacks

2006-08-24T18:12:00.000-07:00

SI.com has an article on mobile QBs; including the two Big Ten ones I'm following: Troy Smith and Drew Stanton. Video links are included.

Also, the San Jose Mercury News is ranking the QB corps for 119 Division I-A schools.

Keller On The Move?

2006-08-22T15:01:00.000-07:00

It looks like Sam Keller will not be the starting QB at Arizona State. ESPN has him transferring to Nebraska.

Keller would have one season of eligibility left and would succeed senior Zac Taylor as Nebraska's starting QB in 2007.

Looks like I won't be tracking him this year.

Meet The Quarterbacks

2006-08-12T20:09:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I posted here at the Astigmatic Eye. This fall, I thought I'd start a project. David Lewin wrote an article at Football Outsiders about rating college quarterback prospects. (A more detailed version of the article is found in Pro Football Prospectus 2006. ) Basically, he found a high correlation between games started in college and completion percentage (also in college) and future NFL success. This works for QBs selected in the first or second round. It is not good for determining success for QBs selected in later rounds. I refer you to the linked article or the book, but, from what I understand, the more games a QB starts in college, the more reliable the assesments will be of NFL scouts.

Anyways, I thought that it would be a good idea to track some top QB prospects over the 2006 college football season. Being from Connecticut, I gravitated to the pro game growing up instead of the college game. I had chores to do on the weekend and usually did them on Saturday and watched the NFL on Sunday. I selected eight seniors and David recommended two juniors who may declare for the draft. I got attemption/completion stats from Yahoo Sports, but I had to find the Games Started from team media guides. Cstv.com was invaluable for finding those. Now, I doubt that there will be more than four or five QBs selected in the first two rounds of the draft, but it's good to look at too many rather than too few. For all I know, Brady Quinn may be assumed body and soul into heavenly glory if he leads Notre Dame to the national championship in January. That would drop him off teams draft boards.

Here are the ten, in alphabetical order:

John Beck, BYU Sr.
I probably jinxed Beck by making him the coverboy of this post.

Year		Team	GS	Att	Comp	Pct
2003	Beck	BYU	4	145	73	50.34
2004	Beck	BYU	10	343	192	55.98
2005	Beck	BYU	12	513	331	64.52
Total	Beck		26	1001	596	59.54

Brian Brohm, Louisville Jr.

2004	Brohm	Loui	0	98	66	67.35
2005	Brohm	Loui	10	301	207	68.77
Total	Brohm		10	399	273	68.42

Sam Keller, Arizona State Sr.

2003	Keller	AZSt	0	43	23	53.49
2004	Keller	AZSt	1	71	42	59.15
2005	Keller	AZSt	7	264	155	58.71
Total	Keller		8	378	220	58.20

Kevin Kolb, Houston Sr.

2003	Kolb	Hou	13	360	220	61.11
2004	Kolb	Hou	11	353	198	56.09
2005	Kolb	Hou	12	419	253	60.38
Total	Kolb		36	1132	671	59.28

Chris Leak, Florida Sr.
Leak can also run a bit.

2003	Leak	Fla	9	320	190	59.38
2004	Leak	Fla	12	399	238	59.65
2005	Leak	Fla	12	374	235	62.83
Total	Leak		33	1093	663	60.66

Jordan Palmer, UTEP Sr.
He's got a brother who's pretty good, too.

2003	Palmer	UTEP	6	198	98	49.49
2004	Palmer	UTEP	12	366	213	58.20
2005	Palmer	UTEP	12	434	258	59.45
Total	Palmer		30	998	569	57.01

Brady Quinn, Notre Dame Sr.
I've gone from dislike to ambivalence to acceptance and even fandom of Notre Dame over the years. Some of this stems from BC moving to the ACC (I sorta rooted for the Eagles on and off over the years. One of my sisters was in their pep band years ago.) But mainly it gave me a common rooting interest with alot of my friends who are ND fans. Plus, Charlie Weis is a dead ringer for my buddy Admiral Will, aged twenty years.

2003	Quinn	ND	9	332	157	47.29
2004	Quinn	ND	12	353	191	54.11
2005	Quinn	ND	12	450	292	64.89
Total	Quinn		33	1135	640	56.39

JaMarcus Russell, LSU Jr.

2004	Russell	LSU	4	144	73	50.69
2005	Russell	LSU	12	311	188	60.45
Total	Russell		16	455	261	57.36

Troy Smith, Ohio State Sr.
I have no beef with the Ohio State University. One of my cousins went to veterinary school there. But the definitive article as part of the name irks me.

2004	Smith	OHSt	5	122	68	55.74
2005	Smith	OHSt	10	237	149	62.87
Total	Smith		15	359	217	60.45

Drew Stanton, Michigan State Sr.

2003	Stanton	MISt	0	3	2	66.67
2004	Stanton	MISt	7	220	141	64.09
2005	Stanton	MISt	11	355	236	66.48
Total	Stanton		18	578	379	65.57

I plan to track these ten quarterbacks each week and update their numbers accordingly. If anyone else shows up as a top prospect, I may add them. For now, let's review their totals:

	Name		GS	Att	Comp	Pct
Total	John	Beck	26	1001	596	59.54
Total	Brian	Brohm	10	399	273	68.42
Total	Sam	Keller	8	378	220	58.20
Total	Kevin	Kolb	36	1132	671	59.28
Total	Chris	Leak	33	1093	663	60.66
Total	Jordan	Palmer	30	998	569	57.01
Total	Brady	Quinn	33	1135	640	56.39
Total	JaMarcus	Russell	16	455	261	57.36
Total	Troy	Smith	15	359	217	60.45
Total	Drew	Stanton	18	578	379	65.57

Quinn actually has the lowest completion percentage of the 10 at the moment. But Leak and Kolb are the only ones to have started as many games. I have no clue how to project 2006 completion pct, but QBs should still continue to improve in their early 20s and only Beck threw more often last year than Quinn. Stanton completes close to two out of every three passes. But, and someone who's more of a college fan can correct me if I'm wrong, the Spartan's run a spread offense. That may inflate his completion percentage.

See you in a couple of weeks, if not earlier.

Latin Night

2005-11-12T05:27:00.000-08:00

Skip Mars and Eric Airey and a coupla other guys like Sancho Jones would save all of their empties in an unused wall locker in Skip’s room. When the locker was full, they’d return all the empties and have a Latin Night. No, this had nothing to do with Ricky Martin or Selena. These were toga parties, straight out of “Animal House.”

They wanted to keep their soiree’s from getting out of hand, so they usually only told a few guys. Women were a different story. The more, the merrier. Anyways, Friday, some pencil neck dweeb freshman named Joe Sykes found out about their plans for a Latin Night that evening and pretty much told the whole campus.

About eight, George and I walked up to Loyola Hall where the party was, looking very Caesaresque in our togas. George even had a green camouflage headband on, like a wreath, in his hair.

“Nero! Tiberius!” Eric greeted us, “So glad you could join the evening’s festivities.”

“Just call me Caligula.” I replied.

“Fine. Vino, Vidi, Vinci!”

Skip and Eric and those guys were pissed off at Sykes for inviting the whole peninsula. Vengeance was on their minds. Eric was a dirty trickster par excellence. Had he been born 25 years earlier, he would have been working with G. Gordon Liddy and the Plumbers.

There’s this girl they all know, Lola something-or-other, who Sykes had a crush on. So they got her to come on to Sykes and lure him into what appeared to be an empty room. Sykes, thinking that he was going to get some, got ambushed by four toga-clad dudes, instead.

I had just finished off a funnel o’ Natty Lite and it was for me to bleed the dragon. So I walk into room where Sykes just got waylaid. Sykes lunged at me and nailed me in the jaw with a left. Today, I saw him with a cast on his left arm. It turns out that he broke his left hand when he punched me. I didn’t remember any of this.

As the night went on, things got more beery. Some guys brought in a Pizza Hut sign that they stole off some delivery driver’s car. Marv Aschenbach, who delivered for Pizza Hut, showed up a little later. It was his sign they stole. Anyone else would have been pissed, but not Marv. He was a 6’5” Mellow Mountain.

There was some asshole at the party from Monterey Peninsula College who showed up around one. He thought that he was King Shit. He could bench 400 pounds; he could drive a golf ball 300 yards; he hit .425 last season. I got sick of his shit. I was running a lot back then, so I challenged him to a mile race; in togas.

The track was just up the hill from Loyola Hall. Everyone who was still awake came up to see the race. It was a quarter-mile track, so the race was four laps. Marv waved a flag and Mr. Wonderful and I were off. I was leading after two laps and was starting to pull away when I started feeling nauseous. I had to pull over and throw up. The townie overtook me, but I was keeping up.

There was half a lap to go and he was about to pull away. I figured my only chance was to trip him. The crowd was cheering me on. It was my crowd. But when I went to trip him, I step on his toga and it came off. He ran the last hundred yards totally naked. Then he blew chunks all over the track. It was one of the most memorable sights I’ve ever seen.

Frank Ryan : From Paschal to Pascal

2005-10-04T18:19:00.000-07:00

So far, I've talked about Blanda Numbers. I've also talked about Erdos Numbers. (I recently read a little bit of The Man Who Loved Only Numbers* and found out that Erdos is pronounced something like "air dish", FWIW.) For those who don't know (most of the Earth's population) a “Blanda Number” is assigned to a football player based on the fewest team-season links necessary to connect them with quarterback-kicker George Blanda; holder of the NFL record for most seasons played. An “Erdos Number” is given to academics based on the fewest auctorial links necessary to connect them with the prolific Paul Erdos.

Thanks to Craig Burley and Sean Forman, I have found someone who has both a Blanda Number and an Erdos Number. He is retired quarterback, Paschal HS (Fort Worth, TX) alum, and mathematics professor Frank Ryan. Rather than recap Ryan's life, I'll direct the readers to the Wikipedia article on him. (Wikipedia is one of the handful of websites that I visit almost every day.) Anyways, Craig tells me that Ryan'sBlanda Number is 2 - Ryan played with Zeke Bratkowski on the '61 Rams and Bratkowski played with Blanda on the '54, '57 and '58 Bears. Professor Forman has access to the American Mathematical Society database and he told me that Ryan's Erdos Number is 3:Frank B. Ryan coauthored with Andrew M. Bruckner, Andrew M. Bruckner coauthored with Roy O. Davies, and Roy O. Davies coauthored with Paul Erdös.

Simon Singh has introduced the concept of Erdos-Bacon Numbers, which combine Bacon numbers with Erdos numbers. Well, I'd like to unveil the Erdos-Blanda Number. If you add Ryan's Blanda and Erdos Numbers together, you get an Erdos-Blanda number of 5. As far as I know, Ryan is the only person that has a finite Erdos-Blanda Number.

Incidentally, although Ryan is retired, he is teach a course on Einstein, Relativity, and Scientific Belief at the Institute of Lifelong Education at Dartmouth this fall.

* I have a bad habit of picking up a bunch of books from the library and starting most of them, but finishing only relatively few.

Mogadishu Boogie

2005-09-18T18:39:00.000-07:00

This happened a few years ago. So forgive me if the details are sketchy. After I got back from Somalia, I used to hang with a group called the Go Nowhere Gang. We weren’t called that because we were losers, mind you. It was just that we could never agree on somewhere to go, whenever we got together. On a typical Saturday afternoon, we would meet at the Frat House and try and figure out where to go to lunch. No matter what place we named, someone would have an objection.

“Let’s go to General Tso’s.” I would suggest.

“No gook food.” Redbeard or someone else would reply.

“How about Chili’s?” That was Tom.

“Chain bars are out.” The Fro was anti-chain bar. He was always wanting to go to the Alamo anyways, so we never asked for his input.

It usually went on like this for half an hour before we finally wound up going to the Alamo after all. It was the lowest common denominator. No one really liked it (excepting the Fro), but no one vehemently despised it either. Therefore it was always our default hangout.

Anyways, one of the GNG hangers on was a guy named Beane; Beane the Machine, we called him, At least to his face. Me and Redbeard and Tshimanga privately referred to him as Busey because he had a Gary Busey face; after the motorcycle accident. No one knows where he came from. He just sort of attached himself to our gang. It was like a tapeworm attaches itself to the host’s stomach. Wherever he went, he showed up. Tshimanga always suspected Hogan of tipping him off to our plans, but that was never proven.

It was a cold February Saturday afternoon and that meant one thing; college hoops. Also, that evening, Chewbaccalypse Now was playing the Agora and we wanted to catch that show. So, we decided to go to Belcher’s in Hartford to catch the Uconn-Georgetown game. Belcher’s was owned by a retired Army general and still is one of the more successful bars in Hartford, which ain’t saying much. A bunch of us, including Redbeard, Tshimanga, the Ransoms, and yours truly went to catch the game. We were planning on watching it then hanging around Hartford for the CN show. Then Busey came along for the ride.

The game, which UConn won handily, started at 2 PM and ended a couple of hours later. That meant that we had several hours to kill before the concert. We also had to find some way to ditch Beane. After the game, Tshimanga, Redbeard, and I headed down Pearl Street toward the Tobacco Valley Brewery to grab a few more drinks. Beane tagged along with us. As we walked in Beane mentioned that he had to go to an ATM machine to get more cash. That was when the escape began. The three of us walked in one door of the crowded brewery, then immediately walked out the exit and started running away from our parasite.

As we jogged up the street, Redbeard asked, “Where to next?”

I suggested the French Quarter. It was another popular Hartford watering hole and clear on the other side of downtown. Which meant it was maybe five blocks away. So, we went to the French Quarter and grabbed a couple of drinks. No sign of Beane the Machine. We had already consumed a few pitchers while catching the b-ball game, so I was getting pretty hammered; and hungry. I headed outside to a hot dog cart and bought a dog. After wolfing it down, I went to reenter the bar. A burly bouncer stood in my way.

“How was that hot dog?” He asked.

I replied, ”Pretty good. It really hit the spot.”

“Good, because I’m not letting you back in,”

“What??”

“You’re too drunk.”

Meanwhile, at the Ransom house, Joe and Jim were settling in for an afternoon smoke and a Star Trek flick. There was a pounding at the door. It was Beane and he was pissed off.

“Those fuckers ditched me, man!”

So I stood out there in the cold, waiting for Tshi and Redbeard to exit. Eventually, they did. By this time, they were pretty cocked and I was starting to sober up. Our next stop was the Amtrak station across the street. For some reason, Tshi thought that it would be a good idea to call his brother Mosi in Virginia Beach. We made a drunken phone call to him near the Greyhound desk. I don’t think that any useful information was exchanged in that call.

Our next stop was some place called the Mission. It was a precursor to those all-night rave clubs that now make up alot of Hartford’s nightlife and nightdeath, for that matter. All these tripped out kids were in there. So were we three hayseed drunks. Redbeard didn’t like the way the place was decorated and proceeded to rearrange the furniture. Tshimanga started goosestepping to the house beat. I was standing next to the bar when the Goth in charged approached me.

“Excuse me, but you and your friends will have to leave.”

“Why.”

“Your drunk.”

“This is a fucking bar, you’re supposed to drink!”

“Sorry.” He lisped back at me.

We were pretty drunk. And by now it was almost ten o’clock, so we decided to mosey over to the Agora for some jamming rock and roll. Sure as shit, when we got there Beane was waiting for us in the parking lot.

“Where were you guys, man? I lost you over at the Tobacco Valley.”

The four of us proceeded into the club. After a couple of shots of whiskey to warm myself up, I was plastered. It was a good show, according to Redbeard. I don’t remember. I saw some hot little number dancing by the stage and proceeded to stare at her the rest of the night through a drunken haze. Eventually, we went home and passed out. God, how I miss those days!

Sync The Pink

2005-09-11T19:26:00.000-07:00

I'm sure that some of you guys have heard of the Dark Side of the Rainbow phenomenom. I tried playing Dark Side of the Moon while watching The Wizard of Oz about a year ago, and I'll admit that it was neat. But I thought that the CD went better with Full Metal Jacket.

I'm not sure why I'm bring this up right now, other than the fact that I just had Psycho on in the background and it supposedly goes well with The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking...

Blade Runner synced with Wish You Were Here sounds interesting, but I'm not really a sync guy. I'd have to change my wardrobe and my interior decoration.

Archive.org is Fun!

2005-09-11T13:03:00.000-07:00

Top 10 Centers of the Hollywood Universe as of March, 2001:

Lee, Christopher (2.599102)
Steiger, Rod (2.603871)
Pleasence, Donald (2.622512)
Heston, Charlton (2.631406)
Sutherland, Donald (2.632921)
Quinn, Anthony (2.642023)
Mitchum, Robert (2.644926)
Winters, Shelley (2.647239)
Welles, Orson (2.647869)
Hopper, Dennis (2.648639)

Top 10 Centers as of today:

Steiger, Rod (2.678695)
Lee, Christopher (I) (2.684104)
Hopper, Dennis (2.698471)
Sutherland, Donald (I) (2.701850)
Keitel, Harvey (2.705573)
Pleasence, Donald (2.707490)
von Sydow, Max (2.708420)
Caine, Michael (I) (2.720621)
Sheen, Martin (2.721361)
Quinn, Anthony (2.722720)

I dig archive.org (a/k/a The Internet Wayback Machine). Keitel, moved up 12 spots from the 17th best center in 2001 to the 5th best now. That's one Bad Lieutenant!

WARGS.COM

2005-09-10T14:05:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across this page today. WARGS stands for William Addams Reitwiesner Genealogical
Services. The most complete part of the site covers ancestries of US political figures. It's pretty interesting if you're into genealogy. Howard Dean is distantly related to Elvis Presley. Laura Bush is distantly related to Deadball-era baseball player Sammy Strang. The ubiquitous Kevin Bacon* shows up a couple of times. Check it out for yourself. Baseball fans may dig this detailed genealogy of Bret Boone.

* Simon Singh, a science non-fiction writer who I enjoy, was written about Erdos-Bacon Numbers, which combine Bacon numbers with Erdos numbers. I may work on Morgan-Bacon numbers or Blanda-Bacon Numbers. For instance, Larry Bird's Blanda-Bacon number is 8 (Blanda #6 + Bacon #2) and his Morgan-Bacon number is 5 (Morgan #3 + Bacon #2). But that's a project for another day.

Demolition Man

2005-09-08T18:33:00.000-07:00

" I'm a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doom
I kill conversation as I walk into the room
I'm a three line whip, I'm the sort of thing they ban
I'm a walking disaster, I'm a demolition man"

My buddy The White Rhino enters demolition derbies in his spare time. This dragon wagon was entered in an event at the Waterford Speedbowl over Labor Day Weekend. Tonight, he derbied at the Hebron Harvest Fair. He did well, but he overheated and didn't make it out of the first heat. I may check him out in Smashtoberfest. In fact, I may donate a wreck for him to drive. Stay tuned....

The Golfing Bear

2005-09-01T05:38:00.000-07:00

(NOTE-This is my first piece of writing. I sent it out to some Army buddies of mine and they liked it. One suggested that I send it to the New Yorker. I did, but alas, it was rejected. One of my friends has been working on and off adapting it into a screenplay. Enjoy.)

Located in picturesque Monterey, California, Our Lady of Angels College was founded in 1922 by the good Jesuit fathers. The campus is on the site of an old Spanish fort overlooking Monterey harbor. It’s a small college. (Enrollment was a little under a thousand when I attended during the late 80’s.) The school has one mission: to give future diplomats and spooks a relatively inexpensive and Spartan college education. (It was only later that I realized that the Jesuits liked to have an in with foreign policy wonks for reasons of their own.) The only majors are area studies (Soviet [or Russian, nowadays], Latin American, Middle Eastern, etc.) Every one minors in International Relations. OLAC also has the best Division III track team (the Avengers) on the Left Coast. Due to the fact that it had a higher pregnancy rate than Calcutta (OLAC went co-ed in 1967), it was often referred to as “Open Legs Academy.” There is a bronze statue of an eagle at the bottom of the campus, near the bay. It is often said that the eagle will fly when a virgin graduates from OLAC.

Fr. Francis Powell, S.J. was and still remains the dean of OLAC. This is in spite of a big scandal that occurred when I attended concerning his falsified academic credentials. He’s a tough one-eyed priest from Hell’s Kitchen and has managed to overcome accusations of sexual impropriety, as well.

Nick Nefsick and I had a regular thing on Wednesday night. We'd go to Steinbeck's because the old man there wouldn't card us. (Author’s Note – I was legal by this time, but Nick was still 20.) One time, we were playing eight-ball and Nick said, "You know, Rex, we're graduating soon."

"Yeah, I know. Four and a half weeks to go in this beautiful hell-hole."

"We need a souvenir from Monterey; something big."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. Maybe the sign in front of the Lone Cypress or something like that."

"Yeah, we'll get something."

Later on we went to the student union. It was country and western night, or, what I called "Redneck Night." I never really dug Merle Haggard or Waylon Jennings, but I had a good buzz and didn't give a fuck. Besides, if you were too cocked to get home any other way, they had a van that would take you back to the dorm. We called it the drunk bus and towards the end of the night, it became the chunk bus.

While we were at the student union, Nick and I ran into Pete Barrett. Pete was a freshman on our floor. He was sort of a gloom rocker. You know the type; all black clothes, hair dyed pitch black, clove cigarettes. The whole nine yards. Nick was talking to him. Somehow they got around to talking about our plan to get a memento of Monterey before we left.

"That sounds pretty cool," Pete said, stubbing out his Djarum. "But if you really want to make an impact, we should steal something and put it in front of the Administration Building."

The crowd in the Student Union was all decked out in shitkickers and ten-gallon hats. They were all screaming along to "Family Tradition." I wasn't sure I heard Pete right.

"Wait a minute! We're not impact players," I shouted, "Besides, Father Powell will have our asses if we pull something like that."

"Assuming we get caught," Nick interjected, "That ain't gonna happen. The security guards here couldn't catch a cold."

"The Soviet Studies building has a bust of Stalin in one of the classrooms." Pete said. "I'll bet it would look really nice on the front steps."

"Oh, yeah!" I almost died laughing, " Andrei Sakharov is supposed to give a speech tomorrow. I'll bet he'll get a kick out of it."

"How do we get in?" inquired Nick.

"An old Mexican cleans the place 'til about ten-thirty. He usually leaves the doors unlocked when he's there." replied Pete, "I know. I stole a couple of finals from there last semester."

“Will the bust fit in a duffel bag? I’ve got one in my car.” I said.

“Yeah, it should.” Pete paused. “What do you guys think? Do you wanna go for it?”

“Sounds cool, dude!” laughed Nick, with a demonic grin.

I thought about it for a few seconds. “What the fuck. Let’s make Powell’s day.”< style=""> “Are you sure this will work?” I asked Pete.

“Natch. This is how I was able to get my Russian I midterm.”

But as we drove towards the building, we saw that Sloat Street was jammed with fire trucks. Shit! I thought. This wasn’t uncommon. Guys get drunk; they pull fire alarms, and split.

“I tell you what. Fuck Stalin’s bust and let’s get out of here.” Nick said. “I’ve got a better idea, but it’ll take a little planning. Let’s go to Mr. Wang’s.”

“Mr. Wang’s!” Pete shouted, “What the hell are we going there for?”

“Hey man, I’ll explain later. Just shut up and drive.”

So we drove a couple miles until we got to Mr. Wang’s. It was an ordinary looking raised ranch. I had never been there before, but I had heard of it. It was a jack shack; an S&M club where rich perverts went to get their rocks off.

A huge gorilla with a baseball hat and a Fu Manchu approached us as we exited Pete’s car. “Hey Nick!” he said, “Nickster! Long time, no see!”

“Eat me, bitch!” cackled Nick, “These are my friends Pete and Rex from out of town.”

“Hey dudes, I’m Ken.” The behemoth introduced himself. “If you guys are here for what I think you’re here for, follow me inside.” Pete and I raised our eyebrows at Nick, but he just laughed. What was Nick getting us into?

Anyways, this monster Ken leads us into the basement where there was a tall Oriental chick in a bikini.

“Remove your clothes!” she barked, like a drill instructor. We just stood there. Then she grabbed a cat o’nine-tails and got right in my face. “Listen here! You’re a maggot, a motherfucking maggot! You will do as I say, and do it quickly!”

I almost pissed my pants, but we all stripped to our skivvies. “Very good,” Miss Chin said, mockingly. “Now get in the chairs.”

Behind us were several barber chairs. As we sat down, Ken strapped us in, laughing. “Now comes the good part.”

Our Asian dominatrix went to a cabinet and took out a bottle of Jose Cuervo. She approached Nick. “Tilt your head back and open your mouth.” She poured almost two and a half shots of tequila in his mouth. “Now hold it in your mouth until I tell you to drink it, little man. And you better drink it all!” Then she spun the chair around quickly a few times. “Swallow!” she commanded.

Pete’s turn was next. I watched his face turn lime green after he drank the concoction. Then I was up at bat. “You’ve been a bad boy, haven’t you?” our cruel hostess taunted, “You know what happens to bad boys.” The Cuervo flowed into my mouth. “You know what happens to slimy earthworms when they’re bad. Shake your head, yes or no.” Then she grabbed my head and shook it: up, down, right, left. Then the chair spun for what seemed like an eternity. “Drink!” she screamed, “Drink your castor oil!” I swallowed the tequila. The chair felt like it was still spinning. “You bitch!” I shouted.

Everyone else started laughing. “Tequila Spinners;” said Nick, “They get you every time.”

We were all pretty hammered when we left Mr. Wang’s. Nick knew that steroid stallion, Ken, from some gym they went to. After our attempt to seal Stalin’s bust had been foiled, Nick thought it would have been cool to get some weird sex toys and sneak them into Father Powell’s office. But Ken wasn’t hip to the idea. He did, at one point, work at a place on Del Monte that made wooden statues. He said that it would be pretty easy to sneak in there and grab one. There were no dogs and the gate was always unlocked.

So here was the plan. We’d go back to Long Hall and pick up my Buick Le Sabre. It had mobster-spec trunk space. Pete would drive us down towards Del Monte. Nick and I were pretty strong, so Pete would have to be our getaway driver. Pete would drop us off about a block away and circle around. Nick and I would grab a statue and Pete would pick us up in front of the place.

Pete dropped us off on a side street and we walked to the sculpture yard. We went by an all-night gas station when Nick started fucking around with one of the pumps, pointing it at me. “Bang! I got you!” He laughed.

“Knock that shit off!” I glared at him; “We’re on a mission. Don’t compromise it.”

When we got to the yard, we suddenly realized that wooden statues are pretty large and heavy, especially if you’re inebriated. The only one that would fit in my trunk was one of a golfing bear. We started to drag it toward the street when we discovered that even this statue was too heavy. Nick tripped over something.

“Shit! I fucked my arm up.”< “Let’s get out of here. We’ll meet Pete on the street.”

But when we got to the street, Pete was nowhere to be found. We started running down the Del Monte, hoping to see my Le Sabre. Instead, we saw two police cruisers approaching us. “If they stop you, tell them that we’ve missed our ride and we’re heading back to Fort Ord before curfew!” I shouted. But it was too late. One cop picked Nick up. The other picked me up.

As the cops drove us to the police station, I sobered up more quickly than I ever did in my life. The pucker factor was way off the meter. I was not under arrest, the police officer told me, I was being held for questioning. The gas station we cut through had been robbed three times in the past week and they were staking it out. One of the other officers saw Pete swerving down the street in my car and nailed him for DWI. This cop saw our whole escapade from his cruiser.

Officer Davis, the cop’s name, led me to a holding cell. An old Mexican lay on the floor, snoring. Will this become a familiar sight to me? I had an internship with the State Department that summer. I probably fucked that up. You needed a security clearance for that. I was too worked up to sleep and too tired to think. I just sat there for what seemed like hours.

Fifteen minutes later, a burly sergeant walked in, “Mister Varno, please follow me.” He grumbled.

He led me into an interrogation room. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Nick being led into the next room. I sat down and the sergeant left the room. I heard a sound from coming from the wall. Rat-a-tat-tat. Nick was using the old tap code that Civil War POWs used. Again, rat-a-tat-tat. I reached over to respond, tat-tat. Another police officer entered the room.

“You OLAC guys think you’re funny with that tap code.” He growled. “I want you to tell me what happened tonight. Not what you want me to believe, but what really happened. Remember, you’re friends are giving statements also, and they better jibe.”

Not one to lie to the cops, I recounted the nights events. Fortunately, it concurred with what Pete and Nick told the other cops. The police had called the sculptor about the incident and he decided not to press charges. “He said that he didn’t want to ruin your futures.” The desk sergeant explained, “You owe him a big apology. I highly suggest you stop by there after classes tomorrow."

Amazingly, no one caught wind of our fiasco at school. Rumors and gossip usually flew at light speed there. After school, Nick and I stopped by the sculptor’s to apologize. “You should have come by an hour ago!” the old man said. “When my workers found out what happened last night, they said that I was a fool not to press charges. ‘Damn their futures’, they said. ‘Those kids at OLAC are a bunch of spoiled bastards.’ So I called the police to file charges. They should be making out warrants for you right now. Now, you two come here apologizing.”

“The golfing bear, the statue we tried to take, is it still for sale?” I asked.

“Well, yes. It’s a little roughed up, but I can fix it up with about an hour’s work.”

“How much is it?”

“$400.”

“What if we buy it from you. Could you drop the charges?”

“I don’t see why not. I have nothing against you boys and you came down like gentlemen and apologized.”

“I’ll get my checkbook. It’s in the car.”

Thus, Nick and I were proud owners of the golfing bear. Of course, he never paid me the $200 for his share of the bear. A few of the guys at school found out about our little adventure because one of the cops told one of the campus security guards, who told Eddie Pasco. Eric Airey was pissed because we didn’t include him. Hey, it was one of those spur of the moment things. In the end, we gave the bear to Pete.

(Authors note: A few years later, when I was in Saudi Arabia, I ran into this guy named Andy Garrett. He was OLAC ’90. I told him the story about the golfing bear. He knew of it. “Oh yeah, that bear! So you’re one of the guys who stole the bear. When Pete Barrett’s class graduated, they had a beach party at Asilomar. They had a fire and at the end of the night they put the bear on, sort of like a funeral pyre. I never knew where it came from.

They cremated my golfing bear. It was just as well.)

More Bad Craziness at Lake Hootchiecootchie; Combating the Spanish Connection

2005-08-22T18:12:00.000-07:00

NOTE - I wrote this back in 2001 after reading a story in the Wall Street Journal about a guy who killed a deer with his bare hands. I tried to picture how a beatnikesque Joe Friday would have tackled the case.

The story you are about to read is based partly on actual events, partly on conjecture, and partly on bullshit that I heard around the watercooler. All names have been changed on advice of our attorney, Rod Fitzwell.

Among the many units of the U S Department of Agriculture is the Animal and Plant Health Services. It safeguards the health and quality of animals and plants and protects the consumer by means of federal and state meat and poultry inspection. Through the efforts of their hard-working men and women, Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy or, as it is more commonly referred to, “Mad Cow Disease” has not been a problem here in these United States. More recently, the Animal and Plant Health Services has banned the importation of Spanish Clementine oranges. It took these steps to prevent an infestation of the Mediterranean fruit fly after Medfly larvae were discovered in crates of the fruit in four states.

But this didn’t stop the laws of supply and demand. Desperate “juicers” still needed their orange fix. And there were plenty in the Spanish underworld willing to start a black market for the contraband Clementines.

All Souls Day. Seven forty-five AM. My partner Phil Mateleven and I were assisting the Interagency Major Crimes Unit with their War on Citrus. We were setting up a buy for some of the forbidden fruit with two guys from Barcelona when a call came to my desk.

“IMCU,” I answered.

“Yes. I’m looking for Lieutenant Mack Donald.”

“Speaking.”

“This is Nancy in Commissioner Selig’s office. The Commissioner would like to see you right away.”

“Why? Is someone rebroadcasting baseball games without his express written consent?”

“No, I’m with the police commissioner’s office. He says it’s urgent.”

Eight thirty-eight. Mateleven and I are waiting in the commissioner’s office at the Wierdsville Hall of Justice. He takes his coffee black. I prefer iced tea.

“Mack!” Commissioner Selig boomed in his basso profundo voice, “I need you and Phil to take care of something important for me.”

“Sure, commish. What’s shaking?”

“I want you guys to look into a killing that took place over by Lake Hootchiecootchie.”

“A homicide at Lake Hootchiecootchie. How come I haven’t heard anything about it?”

“Because it wasn’t a homicide. The victim was a young buck-“

“Was it an accident?”

“No! The victim was a buck. Buck! A deer, a male deer!”

“Isn’t it hunting season right now?”

“It’s rifle season, but this deer was beaten to death.”

The commissioner filled us in on the rest of the details. The suspect, a housepainter named Slats Jablonski, was being held over at the county lockup. Under the state’s Uniform Wildlife Code, Section 5682985-0X, he was looking at a $2,000 fine, five days in jail, and loss of hunting privileges.

“Lieutenant,” Selig continued, “you have to help me on this one. Jablonski’s attorney called Congressman Gladhandler and he’s putting the screws on the department.”

“I’ll do what I can, Bud.”

Nine forty-seven. Phil and I question Jablonski in one of the county lockup’s institutional-gray interrogation rooms. A burly man in his early forties, he claimed that the killing was in self-defense.

“I swear, lieutenant, I tried to scare the deer away but it came charging at me? What would you do in my situation?”

“Mmm-hmm,” I mumbled, “this buck was small. It only weighed 150 pounds. You’re over 200. It wouldn’t have harmed you.”

“You’re not much of an outdoorsman. Are you, copper?”

“No sir.”

Jablonski recounted the incident. Around noon on Tuesday, he was looking for stray fishing lures along the shore of Lake Hootchiecootchie. After hearing stirring in the brush along the bank, he turned around to see a deer staring at him. He tried to scare it away, but the buck charged him.

Catching it by the antlers, Jablonski drove the young six-pointer into they lake. He hung on and eventually the deer fell. He applied a scissors hold and whacked it with chunks of driftwood, gouging an eye in the process.

Then, after putting a headlock on the deer, he garroted it with his belt. “You’re Slats’ bitch now!” He screamed.

The battle apparently over, Jablonski walked back to his stepside parked a quarter of a mile away. He hadn’t gone far when he heard something behind him. Wheeling around, Jablonski saw the deer, belt flapping at his throat, drawing a bead on him. He snatched the belt and pinned the deer. There was a two-by-four lying nearby. Slats used it like a hammer beating the deer’s head repeatedly until it finally expired. Then he loaded it into the bed of his truck.

There were no eyewitnesses.

One fifteen PM. Mateleven and I went to the Medical Examiner’s office over by Mercy Hospital. The coroner was Doctor Wendy Churchill. Since she had no knowledge of veterinary forensics, Harry Dobbs DVM was called in.

“Lieutenant, Sergeant. It’s good to see you. I spend most of my time investigating infectious diseases in wild animals. However, the Fish and Game Department will occasionally request a necropsy when poaching is suspected.”

“This isn’t a poaching.”

“Indeed, it isn’t. I read Sergeant Mateleven’s preliminary report. The necropsy corroborates Mister Jablonski’s story. But there’s more.” Dobb’s motioned at a set of X-rays. “Look here. This is the left hind leg. The bone is shattered so badly that it tore through muscle. And over here, on the right side of the pelvis, more broken bone. This suggests that this deer was the victim of an automobile accident.”

“So?” I asked.

“Lieutenant Donald,” the vet explained, “Deer in the wild usually flee when humans come near. The main exception to this rule is when bucks are in rut. That’s their mating season. But judging by this buck’s baby teeth, it’s eighteen months old and too young to rut. That rules this theory out. However, injured and sick deer have been known to defend themselves if they feel threatened.”

Geez! Ask a guy what time it is and he gives you the history of watch making. Dobbs continued.

“The significance of the lower body traumas is that this deer was injured prior to his fatal encounter with Jablonski and, therefore, more prone to attacking humans.”

I looked over at Mateleven. “Phil, call all the departments in the Lake Hootchiecootchie area. See if there were any car versus deer incidents recently.”

“If there were, it might clear Jablonski.”

“Exactly.”

Three twelve. Phil and I hit paydirt with a call to the Hootchiecootchie Shores PD. On Monday, a motorist named Kevin Semft had been driving to work on Lakeshore Road. About a half mile from the spot where Jablonski had his wrestling match with the buck, Semft heard something slam into his minivan. He stopped and saw a deer with antlers shuffling off the road, dragging its hindquarters. The damage to the minivan was in the ballpark of two large.

Slats Jablonski was cleared of all wrongdoing. The Fish and Game Department issued him a “highway kill” permit under Uniform Wildlife Code Section 5632975-0W. This permitted Jablonski to keep the animal. Because of the necropsy the only extant portion of the deer that remained were the antlers. Jablonski mounted the antlers on a plaque along with the belt used to kill the young buck.

Cristobal Pizzarro and Hernando Guevara y Martinez were arrested for smuggling banned agricultural products into the United States; a federal offense. Tried and convicted in US District Court, the case was later thrown out on appeal.

I’m Lieutenant Mack Donald and this has been Wierdsville, man!

Evicting The Bad Lieutenant

2005-08-20T16:12:00.000-07:00

My buddy TV Erik sometimes chides me for not reviewing movies at the Netflix page, Well, I decided to start reviewing them. Last week, I saw The Bad Lieutenant for the first time and found it disturbing, yet very interesting.

(Synopsis and review from the New York Times)

The narrative is quite minmalist, perhaps impressionistic. It reminds me of Open Water from a couple of years ago in that respect. We know nothing about how the Lieutenant got where he was or even his name.

I understand that Admiral Will is a fan of the movie. And my buddy Hugo reccomended this movie years ago. In any case, one thing that attracted me to the film was Harvey Keitel. Man, I'll watch most anything with him in it.

The next flick that I saw from my Netflix queue was Diner. I may write something about it here, I may not. But I will say this: Netflix gives me the opportunity to view alot more DVDs than the corner video store used to.

7 Down

2005-08-20T16:04:00.000-07:00

NOTE - This is a short story I wrote a few years ago. I decided to try and revise it this summer but haven't got around to it yet. One of these days, I'd like to get some crime writing published, be it fiction or non-fiction. Enjoy.

The waiflike blonde reporterette faced the camera. She began to speak. “Local fisherman Hal Cahill was the first to discover Jordanna Zweig’s mutilated body this morning, shortly after eleven. Zwieig, a 23 year-old hairstylist, was last seen Saturday afternoon as she was leaving her job at the Wild West Salon in the Buckland Mall. Although State Police have not confirmed anything, her killing appears to be the work of the Mall Rat. This would be the seventh killing since February linked to the serial killer. The State Police nicknamed him the Mall Rat because all of his victims were last seen alive at Hartford area malls. So far, very few clues…”

“Nance, can I grab another Molson, please?” Irv Townshend’s voice drowned out the news report from the TV overlooking the Alamo Bar. He was seared next to Roger DeCarlo, the proprietor who was working on his third crossword puzzle of the day. Both men were in their mid-thirties. Roger was a former NFL place kicker. In his former life, Irv was a naval officer in the Gulf War. Although Rog was a self-proclaimed “acrossianado”, he was not above seeking an occasional clue from a friend. Irv, whose brain was a font of useless knowledge, was usually more than happy to oblige.

“Hey Irv,” said Roger, “What was the name of the first sub to cross under the North Pole? It’s eight letters and starts with an ‘n.’”

“Dude, that was the Nautilus.” Irv replied.

“Thanks, much. I knew that I could count on an old salt to solve that clue.”

“Actually, I already did that puzzle this afternoon. There’s something real freaky about it. Are you almost finished with it, Rog?”

“Everything except the lower right hand corner.”

“Cool! Check this out. The puzzle actually makes reference to the latest Mall Rat killing.”

“Get the fuck out, Irv! It does not.”

“It does too.” Irv pulled a yellow highlighter out of his shirt pocket and marked three words. “Look. 55 Across – Severed, 28 Across – Beauticians, 7 Down – Limbs. Severed beauticians limbs. That’s eerie, man!”

“Aw, c’mon. That’s got to be a coincidence, Irv. These crosswords are syndicated from New York or Chicago. Plus, this was printed before the police found this Zweig chick’s body.”

“Actually, the Monday and Wednesday crosswords in the Courant are done by some freelance guy name Matt Dawson. He’s probably local. And the fact that this crossword puzzle was printed before the body was discovered indicates, to me, that this Dawson guy either murdered the girl or knows who did.”

“You watched too many Colombo episodes growing up. If your hare-brained theory is correct, then Dawson probably inserted clues to the other killings in his earlier puzzles.”

Irv stroked his chin, thoughtfully. “I have about a years worth of Courants bagged up over at my condo. We could go through them and see if Mister Dawson has dropped any more clues about the Mall Rat.”

“What do you mean by we, Irv? I have a wife and daughters that I have to go home to.”

“Yeah, but the puzzle addict in you wants to do this. Look man, I’ll make a friendly wager on this. You give me fifty if there’re more clues in the puzzles, I’ll give you fifty if there aren’t.”

“Make it a hundred.”

“Deal.”

The Alamo closed down for the night around one. Roger followed Irv to his condo by the industrial park. It was a clear autumn night. The cloudless sky sucked up any remaining heat from the earth. All of the trees on the roadside had been stripped down to their skeletons. T. S. Eliot was full of shit. November is the cruelest month. At least it is in New England.

In one of Irv’s closets, he had bags upon bags of newspapers. The two went through the bags and clipped out all the stories about the Mall Rat. Since the killings started back in February, they had to go through a lot of stories. They taped them into an old notebook, like it was a junior high current events project. Then, they took all the Tuesday and Thursday papers. These contained the solutions to the Monday and Wednesday puzzles. Each guy grabbed about half the solutions and went through them to see if they contained hidden messages.

“Irv, the newsprint fumes must be getting to me. I’m starting to see messages in these puzzles. Check out June 13^th. 5 Down – Guillotine, 45 Down – High School, 71

Across – Cheerleader. Two days later they found Sandy Clinch’s headless body over in the Wethersfield Meadows.”

“Yeah, on March 7^th I have Barmaids Torso Removed. That was probably Patty Gonzales. All they found was her skull.”

“Man, this is one sick fucker. What’s he trying to do? Build some ideal woman out of these different parts?”

“Not only is he sick, he’s a cocky mofo, too. On October 12^th he taunts the police. Six of the entries make these two sentences: ‘Crime Spree Remains Unsolved. Detectives Idiots.’”

By now, the sun was starting to come up. “What do we do now, Irv?”

“I don’t know about you, but I’m getting some shut-eye. Let’s gather this shit together after we wake up and take it to the State Police Homicide Unit.”

State Police Major Brian Boyle was in a foul mood. There had been a serial killer on the loose in Greater Hartford for nine months and his unit had made no progress in tracking him down. It had to be a him. The prototypical serial killer was a sociopathic white male in his mid-twenties or early thirties. Meanwhile, he was catching hell from the brass, the press, and the general public. He was pacing in his office on Thursday afternoon, when his AA knocked on his door.

“Major, there’s too gentlemen here to see you. It’s about the Mall Rat.”

“Of course it’s about the Mall Rat!” he bellowed, “Every crackpot in central Connecticut is playing Sam Spade, thinking they’ve solved this case that we pros haven’t been able to crack.”

“Shall I send them in?”

“Sure, go ahead. What do I have to lose?”

Irv and Roger entered the major’s office, gave him the notebook, which contained the newsclippings and puzzles, and explained to him what they discovered. Boyle just sat there, glaring at the two.

“Why don’t you go down the hall and see Detective I Don’t Give A Rat’s Ass and Lieutenant I Could Care Less. Of all the crackpots theories I’ve heard this is the worst. Everyone around here thinks they’re Sherlock Freakin’ Holmes or something. Get the hell out of my office!”

The two amateur sleuths were taken aback by Boyle’s reaction. They left his office and were heading out of the State Police barracks. Irv and Roger were almost at the front door when they saw a young man in a three-piece suit pick up a phone. “Hello, this is Detective Matt Dawson.” He answered. Both Irv and Roger almost fainted.

They were still shaken up as they drove east on I-84. “No wonder Boyle didn’t want to see our evidence.” Roger said. “It implicates one of his very own detectives. That’s kind of like finding out that the Pope is a devil-worshipper.”

“Yeah,” replied Irv, “This Mall Rat case gets weirder and weirder. First, we find out the killer is publishing clues in the paper, then we find out he’s a cop. What do we do now?”

“I don’t know about you, but I’m laying low for a while. I think that I’ll disappear down to my brother’s place in D.C. before Boyle decides do make me disappear for good.”

Three days later, there was a house fire in South Windsor. The fire consumed ninety percent of the house and

killed the one resident. His name was Matt Dawson. The Fire Marshall found no evidence of foul play.

Is George Blanda the nexus of the football universe?

2005-08-20T15:58:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, some Craig Fass and two of his buddies at Albright College in Pennsylvania invented a popular game about the actor Kevin Bacon. The object of the game was to start with an actor or actress and connect them with Bacon in the fewest links possible. People are linked if they appeared in the same movie. A “Bacon Number” was assigned to the actor based on the fewest links necessary to connect them with Kevin Bacon. For instance, Telly Savalas was in “Kelly’s Heroes” with Donald Sutherland. Sutherland appeared in “Animal House” (and “JFK”) with Bacon. Therefore Sutherland has a Bacon Number of 1 and Savalas has a Bacon Number of 2. In fact, the game has inspired the Oracle of Bacon website at the University of Virginia. The Oracle uses imdb.com as a database for its actor and movie data.

This isn’t an entirely new concept. Since the 1960s, sociologists have suggested that every person is connected to every other person through an average of six acquaintances. Paul Erdos, a prolific Hungarian mathematician, invented the Erdos Number. Every academic who collaborated on a paper with Erdos was assigned an Erdos Number of 1. Every co-author of these collaborators has an Erdos Number of 2. And so on, and so on. The Erdos Number became the forerunner of the Bacon Number.

Four years ago, I wrote an article at Baseball Primer (now Baseball Think Factory), suggesting that Mike Morgan was the center of the baseball universe. It turns out that I was wrong. Since then, Sean Forman has added an Oracle of Baseball section to his www.baseballreference.com website, and it has been shown that the most linkable baseball player is either Early Wynn or Bobo Newsom (any baseball player can be linked to Bobo in five links or less, while there are 87 that require 6 links to get to Wynn.) In any case, Bacon isn’t the best center of the Hollywood universe. Rod Steiger is. I think that I failed to account for the fact that Mike Morgan is a recent player. So, while he (or Rickey Henderson) may eventually become the center of the baseball universe, he ain’t there yet.

When it comes to football, I think that I have the center of the universe pegged and I think that I found a way to prove it. I’m sure that many folks would guess George Blanda off the top of their heads. The quarterback/placekicker had a 27-year career that neatly straddled the middle of pro football history. Ever since I wrote that Morgan article, I’ve thought that Blanda would be the perfect choice for the center of the football universe. But I couldn’t think of a way of proving it. Then, a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon the http://www.databasesports.com/ website. I don’t know much about the site (it may be a Justin Kubatko project, but I’m not sure), but it has listings for all players, not just skill players. It may be feasible to run a query of the database to determine who the most linkable and least linkable football players are. I’m no database expert, but I know that there may be some out there who are football fanatics and may try to tackle (no pun intended) this project.

Just fooling around with Blanda, it only takes three steps to get him to 2004 (Blanda played with punter Ray Guy, who played with Howie Long, who played with Tim Brown.) It only takes four steps to link Blanda with George Halas as a player (Blanda played with Sid Luckman who played with George Musso, who played with both Red Grange and Bronko Nagurski, who both played with George Halas.) So, the recently retired Brown has a Blanda Number of 3 while Papa Bear’s Blanda Number is 4.

Let’s play the “Blanda Game” with a couple of Hall of Famers. Jim Thorpe played with Mickey McDonnell on the 1928 Chicago Cardinals. McDonnell played on the AAFC Miami Seahawks in 1946 with Lamar Davis. Davis played on the 1949 Baltimore Colts with Y. A. Tittle. Tittle and Blanda were teammates the next year on the Colts. Thorpe’s Blanda Number is less than or equal to 4. (There may be a quicker link. I haven’t done exhaustive research on this.) Steve Young has a Blanda Number of 5. Young played on the 1985 Tampa Bay Bucs with Steve DeBerg. DeBerg was the QB in San Francisco when O. J. Simpson was a Niner in 1978. One of O. J.’s teammates on the Bills his rookie year was Tom Flores. Fred Biletnikoff chain-smoked for the 1966 Raiders when Flores played there and later was a longtime teammate of Blanda’s.

So, is George Blanda the nexus of the football universe? Crawling the Databasefootball data may determine whether or not he is. Blanda has around 450 teammates in 1100 teammate-seasons. The other candidate that comes to mind is Earl Morrall. Morrall played for 21 seasons with 6 different franchises. I’m not sure what the record for most franchises played for, but it may be held by Tillie Voss. Voss played for 11 teams in the 1920’s, but I’m not sure what the franchise continuity was in those days. Voss was too early in pro football history to make him that linkable, in any case. Morton Andersen, and Gary Anderson have both been kicking since I started high school, but they are two recent in football history to link quickly to the real old-timers. Kickers, punters, and quarterbacks seem to be prime candidates for connecting other players. There are a few linemen with lengthy careers. But a lot of them seem to stay in one place for their careers.

JUST FOR FUN

Kevin Bacon has a Blanda Number of 3. Kevin Bacon was in In the Cut (2003) with Julius LeFlore. Julius LeFlore was in Rocky III (1982) with Carl Weathers. Weathers was a linebacker for the Raiders in 1970 and 1971.

Paul Erdos, arguably, has a Blanda Number of 7. Erdos and Hank Aaron both received honorary degrees from Emory University the same year. Aaron played with Dennis Menke for the 1965 Milwaukee Braves . Denis Menke played with Hal McRae for the 1972 Cincinnati Reds. Hal McRae played with Bo Jackson for the 1986 Kansas City Royals. Jackson played with Howie Long on the Los Angeles Raiders. As mentioned above, Long was a teammate of Ray Guy who was Blanda’s teammate.

Larry Bird has a Blanda Number of 6. Bird played with Danny Ainge, who was a Toronto Blue Jay third baseman before joining the NBA. Ainge was a teammate of Dave Stieb, who later played with Bo Jackson. And so on and so forth.

I'm back!

2005-08-20T15:47:00.000-07:00

After a year and a half hiatus, I decided to start another blog. Previously, I wrote Baseball History and Pigskin Ponderings but I hope to have this one cover other topics, as well. I recently finished up a short biographical piece on Jim Willoughby for the Boston chapter of SABR and decided that, hey, maybe I can start writing again. Stay tuned.