Qualify or Not to Qualify?

Charles Jackson and Braylon Heard are 2 Husker football recruits that didn’t score high enough on their SAT or ACT’s to qualify at the University of Nebraska. I never took the SAT but I did take the ACT and I was severely hung over and a horrible high school student in general. I did barely enough to get by all 4 years. Yet I scored plenty high enough to qualify to go to a low standard academic school like NU. So, speaking from experience, if you cant score high enough to qualify at Nebraska where the N on our helmet really does stand for nowledge, you don’t belong getting any kind of scholarship. People will post comments like “those tests don’t mean anything” or “those tests are racialy bias” (whatever the hell that means) but we are talking about a free ride to go to college and you cant pass a simple test like the ACT? Is’nt that what JUCO’s are for? Go learn how to study first. If Im wrong please correct me. But save the excuses I already listed because Im not buying either of those, especially the racist excuse. I’m also aware that its a BIG 10 standard score not just NU’s standard. And Im as big a Husker fan as their is so its not a school or conference bashing blog.

FYI-Braylon Heard qualified in time to be on campus last fall. Jackson just failed again in January and the last time I read about him failing last year that was his 3rd try so hes at least failed 4 times already. Ridiculous. The kid dont belong in college let alone a scholarship of any kind.

OWH CAN BITE MY &*%^$#^&

After years of online loyalty, after years of posting comments to stories when their comment area wasnt 2nd rate or even 3rd rate but total garbage and after years of reading stuttering idiots like Shatel or Lee who is more worried about his image to the east coast press douches then covering the states only D1 football school, the Omaha World Herald (omaha.com) is going to a pay site. Well I say screw you OWH. And by the time you realise no one will go to your site anymore don’t expect me to come back because I hate your greedy 3rd rate newspaper ass.

 

Sorry, not my most intelligent blog ever but I needed to vent after getting shut out of reading an article that had 2 errors in the 1st paragraph only to be interrupted by a huge pop up ad telling me to pay to find more errors. Be glad I’m past my serious hate for Colin Cowherd or the state of Texas. Those would have been so very ugly….

Steve Pederson Still Haunts Husker Athletics

In 2006 the University of Nebraska was looking for a new basketball coach after the failed run of Barry Collier (89-91 6 seasons 0 tourney bids), current Butler Athletic Director and former Butler head coach. Collier followed, who I consider to be the most accomplished basketball coach in Husker history, Danny Nee (254-190 14 seasons 5 tourney bids). Some would argue that Moe Iba (106-71 6 seasons 1 tourney bid) or Joe Cipriano (254-196 17 seasons 0 tourney bids) were equal or better, but 1 tourney invite in 23 combined seasons is enough for me to disagree. To this day I can’t believe that Husker nation had become so spoiled by the success of Nee that he was fired after his 1st bad season in 14 years. There were rumors that Nee was not friendly when his contract talks were coming up but there had to be something else that was never made public. Especially when his best job after Nebraska was Oral Roberts and is now totaly out of basketball.

Never the less, Collier was a huge failure and produced some of the most boring teams in the history of college basketball. But why Collier was hired in the first place made sense. He was successful at the mid major level for a long period of time (196-132 11 seasons 3 tourney bids) and showed solid and proven recruiting ability. He was a hot commodity at the time and at a football school with average basketball facilities it’s not easy to convince a hot coach to take a job with those negatives combined with zero hoops tradition. So when Steve Pederson made the announcement that he had hired Doc Sadler, UTEP head coach coming off a tremendous season by a lot of schools standards especially a lower level mid major like UTEP, it was met with positive fan reaction. He was described as a guy with a lot of character and charisma. Right away I could see none of those things. To me he came across as unsure of himself with the charisma of a used car salesmen. But I put my blinders on and accepted what I was told by the local media and Pederson.

I have supported Doc for 5 years, 2 months and 7 games but after game number 8 of this season, a 1 point win against Florida Gulf Coast, I decided to do a some in-depth research into Doc Sadler and his coaching career. When Wake Forest or Oregon, 2 BCS confrence schools, look more athletic than my huskers I don’t question it too much even though I believe a good coach in his 6 th season should have at least equal quality athletes. But Florida Gulf Coast, who was in its 1st season of existence at the D1 level, has better athletes and plays us to a 1 point game at home even a couch potato like me knows that’s not right. When I started my research I was unsure who the AD was in 2006 but the farther I got the more, without having verified it yet, I knew the AD had to be Steve Pederson. Sadler had only been a head coach at the D1 level for 2 seasons which means he had his great seasons with the previous coaches (Billie Gillispie, future Kentucky and Texas A&M coaches) players. His 2nd season was the year UTEP made their tourney run and they had no freshman or sophomore contributors. UTEP went 14-17 the very next season after Sadler left for NU. So Pederson hired Sadler based on 2 seasons of D1 experience and absolutely zero proof that he could recruit players that have the talent to contribute on a mid major team let a lone a BCS schools. And nothing in almost 6 years of the Sadler era shows that he can be anything more than an average coach. With a huge upgrade in facilities coming in 2013 that will rival even the North Carolina and Kentucky’s of the college hoops world, its time to get a coach that has the ability to use these resources. The “football school” excuse is no longer acceptable when you see Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio St. in your own conference not only consistently win, but make national championship runs and final four appearances. Its time for Doc Sadler to be fired. Its time for Nebraska basketball to not only be relevent in its own conference but nationally relevent and to eliminate the last remnants of the horror that was the Steve Pederson era.

TOP SCI-FI SERIES OF ALL TIME

1) FIREFLY-2002 Fox 14 episodes

Another series canceled to soon by the Fox Cartoon Network that will allow the Cleveland Show to run for 99 episodes and counting. To me FireFly had every quality I love in a Sci-Fi series. It can be a little to cutesy at times, but the casts chemistry and writing are as good as it gets. It has a huge cult following. Ever seen a movie (Serenity 2010) produced off a 14 episode series canceled 8 years earlier? If you haven’t seen your missing out.

2) Stargate Atlantis-2004 to 2009 Sci-Fi Network 100 episodes

One of 3 series created from the 1994 movie Stargate staring James Spader. Similar to FireFly in that there is great character chemistry and quality writing. And one very cool difference from most series is that it takes place in a different galaxy then earths. But what made this series really work for me was 3 fold. (1)Character Lt. Colonel John Sheppard (Joe Flanigan) may be the best hero/leader type in any series ever. His mix of humor and tough leader qualities were perfectly balanced, which is very difficult to write and perform. (2) Death. LOL. That’s right, the writers and producers weren’t afraid to keep things fresh by killing off major characters. Some series will knock off one semi-major character and bleed your emotions for an entire season or 2. But in Atlantis, the danger of the missions made the possibility of death very real. And unlike most series, where the main players will continuously come seconds from dying 4 dozen times a season, in Atlantis they died and didnt comeback (couple alternate reality/dream episodes prove me wrong but only 2 or 3). (3) The bad guys were truly scary. Wraith were like a mix of vampires and bugs that fed off the energy of humanoids. humans evolved from primates and wraith evolved from bugs only found on the wraith home planet. They would hibernate and allow for planets to populate and then go feed. This made it impossible for those planets humans to learn, develop technology and defend itself. One major plot line was the Atlantis teams attempt to keep the wraith from finding earth while trying to defend the underdeveloped human planets of that galaxy. Very scary and very clever characters. Maybe scariest TV series bad guys ever.

3)Star Trek Enterprise-2001 to 2005 UPN 99 episodes

This is the last of the 18 year run of back to back Star Trek series that takes place in 2151 and follows earths 1st warp 5 ship, Kirks, Picards Enterprise. Basically its the story of how the Star Trek world began. Before 2151, earth had never made it out of its own galaxy. It covers our 1st contact with life from other planets with our alliance/friendship with the much more advanced Vulcans. Their are 2 major plot lines. (1) How the Vulcans treat us like children and basically hold our hands and only give us technology as they feel we are ready. Several episodes are spent proving the Vulcans wrong and discovering that the real reasons they slowly share technology with us. They fear us because we advance/evolve quicker then any race they had ever seen despite our emotions and we actualy save their butts many times. They also fear us because the last race/planet they had similar relationship with turned evil and became enemies of the Vulcans. The science officer on Enterprise is of course Vulcan, Sub Commander T’Pol. T’Pol, despite her vulcan ears and eyebrows, is very, very, very hot. T’Pol is played by Jolene Blalock and spends every episode in tight clothes (sorry lady readers). (2) Another major plot is our defense of Earth against our 1st enemy, the Xindi. The Xindi are really cool aliens that come from a planet that has 4 species evolve where 99% of all known planets have one just like earth and it humans. There are a Reptilian species, Aquatics, Human and Bug species that look like praying mantis’. The Xindi exist in an area of space called the expanse. The Temporal Cold War is what ends up being the main reason for any of the Xindi vs earth plot lines. Sounds confusing but thats because I suck at writing. To me, this is the best Star Trek series of them all. Scot Bakula (Quantum Leap) plays, in my opinion, the best captain in the series other then Kirk of course. But Im very much in the minority in liking this series. Pretty much all Star Trek junkies, Trekies, feel this is the worst of the Star Trek genre. When I watched it back in 2001 I remember liking it but feeling like it misses something and maybe got a little boring at times. But when I watched it on NetFlix and was able to watch several episodes at a time I enjoyed it much more.

4)Stargate SG1-1997 to 2002 Showtime 2002 to 2007 Sci-Fi Network 218 episodes.

The original Stargate series. Very good in all the important areas but the main character Lt Colonel Jack O’neill (Mcgyvers harry Dean Anderson) is so damn cutesy its tough watching several shows in 1 sit down unlike my top 3. Other then that its worth a watch and has some really cool plots.

5)Battlestar Galactica-2004 to 2007 Sci-Fi Network 75 episodes

Would be rated higher had it finished better and had higher budget. Loved the storyline of the destruction of earth and only 50,000 humans left in the universe. The whole series is spent looking for another planet to live on and the constant battle with the man created Cylons. Guess what I liked most about it was that it was the 1st sci fi series that was very dark and sad. Would have gave FireFly a run for its money as #1 had it been more diverse and moved past the Cylons and developed some other enemy and characters.

6)Stargate Universe-2009 to 20011 Sci-Fi Network 40 episodes

Dark series in the mold of Gallactica. Worth a watch good character development even in only 40 episodes. Canceled because general public is mostly a bunch of shallow people that dont want to think to hard about anything. Could have been great series.

7)Warehouse 13-2009 to Present Sci-Fi Network 39 episodes

Doesnt take place in space but I like the character chemistry and the artifacts and the warehouse they are stored in are very cool. Low budget and writing is average but worth a watch and hoping for improvement.

8)Star Trek Next Generation/Deep Space Nine Late 80′s till late 90′s

Both series were decent and if your a Trekie your going to enjoy. Nothing special to me but fun watchs if you love space series in general not just Trek

Worst-Star Trek Voyager-who cares when and what channel. Gave true chance and watched 15 or so episodes. Got worse as it went along. Im in the minority here again. Most Trekies loved this series. I know some of you will say its because the captain is female and she’s not attractive. And you would be partly right. The idea in general as well as the writing and plot lines just sucked. But they could have at least made the captain slightly pretty. If Im suppose to believe she can man handle male characters twice her size when men cant manhandle other men twice their size at least make her attractive or Brigette Nielson sized amazon like. Just sucked all the way around.

Things I Hate

Back in August my buddy Sean gave me the task of blogging about something I hate. Since I can easily go from annoyed to hate in a matter of seconds this left me with a ton of things to chose from. Even Sean, knowing me as well as he does, had several memories to draw from when giving examples of what he expected. I actually wish he hadnt mentioned my serious distain for people who smack there lips and tongue between thoughts because that is definitley the thing that annoys me more then anything else. Seriously, how can you not know your constantley making that disgusting noise every 3 seconds? Its like a cross between some slob eating with his mouth open and fellatio. But since he did bring that one up I decided to go with something he and I probably havent discussed over a pitcher of beer or 4 (and tomato juice for the elder Seans tummy).

Ever hear the expression “A win is a win”? Well, I hate that expression with a passion. Sure, in war or other life threatening situations I would agree and Im sure there are a few others. But in every other way it disgusts me. For example, last winter a group of friends and I would often have after hours parties at one person or anothers home. One thing we always did, besides drink of course, was play a game. The game was created by this particular nights host, Steve. Steve was the man child, moron husband of a good friend of mine. The game was stupid, my german shepards could design a better game but how do you tell your good friends man that? Besides it was about the party and we would always have something worth winning dangeling out there so it would become very competitive. Each of us had things like free meals, bottles of expensive liqour or gift certifecates from where we worked to throw in the pot. Now, like I said the game was created by a total simpleton and had many flaws but the biggest was that if you followed a very simple pattern and you went first you would always finish in the top 2 no matter what. Only myself, our friend John and the game creators wife had figured this out right away. Eventually we told everyone, including the game designer and we all did it when we were lucky enough to go first. But after a couple weeks I saw it as cheap and very lame way to win and wouldnt do it. Instead I tried to come up with other ways to get the W and didnt mind that everyone else kept doing it. Except for John. John was the exception because I knew from having hired him to be my second in charge at work that he was capeable of winning without taking the cheap road. It also wasnt an attribute I was happy to see in my right hand man. The others either didnt pay enough attention to care or were like Steve and not capeable of an original or clever thought. Now I dont know what made me crazier, that he would be such a little biatch and always take the cheap way or that no one else seemed to care. The acceptance of his lameness made my ass itch. So I decided, not yet intoxicated I should mention, to call him out. Thud! The females came down on me hard. I was Lou, the over competitive boss that had to win. But that wasnt it at all. I tried to explain that it should disgust them because he wasnt retarded like they were and he should at this point be trying to challenge himself instead of taking the pathetic way to victory over idiots. But even stupid people get insulted. John, who was only in his mid 20′s at the time, responded with “Its about the win dawg”. Had he left “dawg” out of it I probably wouldnt have punched him and ruined the night but that comment and the smug look on his face made me psychotic. I still dont regret the punch only the fact that I didnt ask him to remove the cig from his mouth before dropping him like a sack of potatoes. Another example of this mentality I see all the time is in the video game world. I often play games like Battlefield or Madden football as a way to spend time with my son and I often go online and play against people from across the country. Now you might think most of those people online are 12 or younger but in a lot of cases they are adults. In fact I have formed some pretty good friendships with several guys that are even older then my friend Sean that have lasted over ten years. And when we get a new game anything goes. But after a couple weeks or so all the cheap ways to score TD’s or get kills become unacceptable to us. Unfortunately the rest of the country doesnt share our views. There will be many players who have 10 times the game time played/experience who will always use these cheap ways and even worse, they glitch. Now how is any of that fun? Dont they feel pathetic or at least bored? Absolutely not. I have tried to understand but all I can come up with is that they are so insecure that being good at something, even something so insignificant as a stupid video game is big for them. And over time I realised that John, despite being smarter and more capeable then the average person lacked self esteem. He till this day refuses to acknowledge that Im right only saying that Im a hater. So now, even though it still makes me insane I dont bother to say a word. I just look at the burn scar on my right index finger and remember how good it felt to turn that smug douchebag look on Johns face into his go night night face.