Rex Hudler

Well Joe Morgan has gotten off to a great start in the 2006 season. Five pitches into the season he is already wrong. Buehrle goes 2-0 on Sizemore on two pitches away. He then throws three straight pitches up and in (the last generously a strike) to strike him out. Morgan promptly says it was a great pitch because all of the other pitches were outside and that was the first one in. What the hell?? What game is he watching? I know this doesn't mean squat, but to say something so confidently that is so wrong less than five minutes into the season irks me!

I do know that BJ Lamura is back and veteran Mark Quinn is on the roster.

Read somewhere the following week will be the songs of Queen. Take that for what it is worth.

I couldn't get in last night or today.

Anybody know of a good site where you can get schedules/results from different teams throughout the years? This is one time where google isn't helping me very well.

I agree that country will not be a problem for Chris this week. He'll find something up tempo like Garth and do it well. I'm not much of a country guy (okay, I really hate it) so I don't know of specific songs, but I can see him doing well. Could this week be a problem for Mandisa or Paris?

It didn't surprise me that Lisa is gone tonight, but I believe it should have been Bucky. Bucky is just plain average at best. His song last night fit his abilities, but he's just not good, has no stage presence and has no star quality whatsoever. Either Bucky really does have some support since he wasn't in tonight's bottom 3 OR, as I have long believed, AI is somewhat fixed. By that I mean, I don't have any faith in their bottom three each week. I don't buy that the three they put up there are the three with the least votes. Until an independent 3rd party releases the votes each week, I will never believe it. AI has an interesting habit of (strategically, I think) placing an unexpected wild card in their "bottom 3". I completely believe it is done strictly as a way to create buzz and get more people to vote and more people to talk about the show. I do agree with ss2k about the show becoming boring and the often too similar. I did find it funny that one week Simon compliments Chris as "the only contestant we have ever had that has refused to compromise" to the next week saying "you have got to try something new". They have done nothing but kiss Chris' ass when he turns everything into a rock song and all of a sudden, he does a little Creed and they turn on him. Judges one week will tell a contestant to stick with what they do well, then the next week they tell them they were too safe. I watch because they have talent and I have none musically. I enjoy seeing people get a chance to succeed on a national stage like that. But in the last few weeks, no one has really blown me away.

Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Fudge Brownie... Doesn't get any better!

As far as Sampson goes, I prefer to wait and see what will happen. The choice doesn't immediately spark happiness, sadness or anger. I'm not too worried about the "violations". He has recruited well in Oklahoma. The cupboard in Indiana and the surrounding states will be MUCH more full. I don't think he will feel compelled to recruit JUCO's all the time, but Dean Garrett and Keith Smart proved doing so on a limited basis can pay off at IU. Once he is introduced, I will support him fully and look forward to the next few months. Hopefully, he can keep Vaden and White at IU and bring a new excitement to Hoosier Basketball. Go Hoosiers!!

Aboz, while I agree with you that Alford wasn't the best choice for IU, I think you are way off on the reasoning above. Alford could have united IU's fan base and brought excitement back to the program. I have several friends - and I have even gone in and out with this - who just haven't really cared about IU basketball the past few years. They don't go out of their way to watch games like they used to and are basically blase about the whole thing. Alford could have immediately helped bring those fans back and created an excitement across the state. That would have allowed him to recruit the state. Not that he is "Steve Alford" but that he is (would have been) the Head Coach at Indiana with an immediatly unified fan base. That, along with his father's contacts with HS coaches across the state, would have definitely helped him recruit kids to IU. He could have been the beginning of having HS kids wanting to play for Indiana, and grade school kids dreaming of playing for the Hoosiers. That would have been the key. Asking why Alford's name wasn't getting Indiana kids to go to Iowa is not even close to the same. It is not a fair comparison. It's what he could have immediately created at IU, along with his personal involvement in one of those National Championship banners that would have allowed him to recruit the state. I definitely think Alford would have had a positive immediate impact. But my fear is whether he would have been able to sustain it. If he had problems winning, or seemed to be going backwards, then all of the above would crash and burn as fast as it was rebuilt.

I still think the blame here goes to the Sox more so than the Score. The MLB team has final say so on who is hired and the Sox should have had more input. This is a new deal with the Score and the Sox should have set up to have more control. Then again they may have and they may have this was the best way to go.

Lotsa rumors flying....... who the hell knows what's going on. Here is a pretty good piece from Terry Hutchens blog on that very thing....

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Mar 25, 2006 -> 07:29 AM) Whatever you say. You just pulled out all the cliches that prove how overrated he is, since no one ever says he was a good player. Dude was blessed by the talent around him and by the fact he was an average point guard at the college level. Oh, and 'Nova is toast next game. Florida is going to smack them down inside similarly to what BC did, and Florida's guards can actually hit some shots. No one ever says he was a good player? Cliches? Dude, get off the crack and make some sense. Or at least use some of the money you spend on that stuff to buy a clue!

QUOTE(whitesoxin' @ Mar 25, 2006 -> 05:58 AM) 47-23 in the free throw category...Wow that is bulls*** Why is that bulls***?? I'm so tired of people looking at free throw discrepancies and automatically assuming its bulls***. The numbers don't mean squat.

QUOTE(Rowand44 @ Mar 25, 2006 -> 03:44 AM) Bitter? Nova played like complete dog s*** and won that game. They might have got that bad game out of their system, they can win this thing as easily as anyone at this point. Nah, Villanova sucks. Any smart basketball fan would know that. I mean they have been lucky as hell 28 times this year!

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Mar 25, 2006 -> 03:34 AM) My most hated college athlete of all time is Mateen Cleaves. He was a average college player who just dribbled down the floor and passed it off to his amazingly awesome supporting cast. But since he was a leader and made wide open 3's that I could make, he's a "great". I cannot stand that, and the worst part was he had little talent and played his ass off with hustle. He was like an annoying white guy, but nobody wanted to hate him since he wasn't white. I coulda played point guard on those MSU teams with the talent they had. /rant Dude, sometimes I wonder if you really believe your own s***! "I coulda played point guard on those MSU teams". Ha ha f***ing HA Cleaves was a great college player because he was a winner. He helped make those players better by getting them ball in the right places at the right times. Cleaves could control the tempo as well as any PG in college I can remember. It didn't matter if teams wanted to run or slow it down, Cleaves could control the game. He wasn't the most athletically talented player, nor the greatest scorer, but those things aren't always the most important for a PG. Cleaves was a smart player that knew how to win. He hustled his ass off and didn't try to do more than was needed. Sometimes a player is great because he doesn't try to be a big time scorer. Lots of teams are talented, but they don't all win. Cleaves at the very least was a gamer that knew how to win. He has an NCAA Title to prove that.

QUOTE(RockRaines @ Mar 24, 2006 -> 08:55 PM) The players should get free stuff considering how much money they bring the school and those stores anyway. Scratching my head here.... How in the hell do the players bring money to cell phone stores? Not sure how a player playing for a school should entitle them to free or discounted cell phones or accessories. Educate me.

That's bulls***. Gonzaga outplayed IU pure and simple. If IU wasn't hitting miracle 3's late, the Zags would have won by 20. It had nothing to do with the referrees that IU lost that game. IU stopped Morrison and Gonzaga still scored 90 points. They play better D than anyone is giving the credit for and they are not a one-man show. They may not make it to the Final Four, but they are a better team than anyone one here wants to give them credit for.

Which is why I wouldn't give it much validity... In theory, they could be talking to his representatives without having any direct contact with Coach Few and that would be legal. I don't think that is the case, but you never know.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Mar 22, 2006 -> 07:51 AM) Where is Gene Honda Civic to tell us that Alford to Indiana is still a lock btw? My guess for the final 2 for Indiana as of now is Gillespie from A&M and that Whitman guy that Mark Cuban likes. And I find it pretty funny that Alford wants to dump Iowa for Misery....says all you need to know about the Iowa basketball program. Where did it say he wants to dump Iowa for Missouri? It said he has agreed to talk to them. Just because one interviews, does not mean he is offered or accepts the job. And all it says about the Iowa basketball program is that Alford is about one bad year from being fired, so him checking out his options would be a smart thing if you ask me.

QUOTE(greasywheels121 @ Mar 22, 2006 -> 01:26 PM) I like the guy a lot, and I'd love to see him make Robert Vahhden play ohhfense down in the pohhst. However, he's too much of a health risk. He really hasn't done much to improve that since he left Utah, and Indiana's looking for a coach that can stay long-term. Think of how big Vaden could get with Majerus leading the training table. Ha ha I think they will bring in Wittman and either Crean or Gillispe. But I still think that Calipari could be a dark horse to emerge over the next two weeks. My favorite of the above 3 would be Crean or Wittman over Gillispe.

I'd say 8 out of 10 times the tourney is the place to be. It gives a school the most exposure, even if they lose in the first round. You never go into the tourney (unless you are a 16 seed) expecting to lose. You always think you have a chance, and that probably includes the 16 seeds now. The only time I would say it could be better in certain circumstances where you have a young team and playing an extra 4-5 games could give it the extra experience it needs to make a run the following year. Ask any coach and he would choose the tournament every time, but that's not to say a run in the NIT could not be beneficial for a team.

That's a pretty old list aboz. I do like the fact that Brad Brownell was listed, although I think there is zero chance he is actually on the radar. Great guy and hopefully he will be ready for a big-time job soon, but the time is not right for him and IU right now. I am totally guessing, but I think you might to start to hear more about John Calipari in the coming week or two. I don't know a lot of detail about him personally, but he has definitely won. My guess is the list gets narrowed (although we will never see it in print to prove me right or wrong) to Alford, Wittman, Crean, Montgomery, and a surprise candidate or two. I would categorize Few, Gillispe, Turgeon, etc. in that surprise category.

QUOTE(AddisonStSox @ Mar 20, 2006 -> 11:26 PM) My question, as posed by ESPN's Doug Gottlieb: If Alford is such a big name in the state of Indiana, a name capable of grabbing the state's top talents, how come he wasn't able to get those same recruits to Iowa? That's pretty easy if you think about it. There is no comparison. The concept is to get the right guy to bring the state together. To bring back pride in the program. To bring the program back to the elite. Doing that will make players want to play for Indiana University, not for said coach. the right coach can make that happen and it involves much more than just a dynamic guy fast talking high school kids. It's all about getting back to where these kids dream of playing for IU, not a specific coach. THAT is what people think Alford can do at Indiana. That is not something he could do with Indiana kids at Iowa. Whether he can handle the total program the way it needs to be, I am not sure. But I do think his name (and his dad's amongst HS coaches) would hold a great deal of weight in the state. It won't be a matter of him immediately getting the best kids from day one, it will be a matter of him getting the right ones to help take the program where it needs to go. Then he can almost have his choice of in-state talent, but that won't happen overnight. Remember, Bob Knight didn't win with JUST Indiana kids. He also recruited Illinois and Ohio extremely well. Whether Alford is the right guy or not is a totally different discussion. But the answer to your question is pretty simple. It's like comparing apples to oranges.

QUOTE(aboz56 @ Mar 20, 2006 -> 11:30 AM) Nope, the hot name right now is the Wichita State coach but I've also heard his dream job is Kansas. Which would make sense because he played there. My bet is it doesn't end up being one of the "hot names du jour"