MJLiverock

I don't think I said it at the beginning of the year but I could see where someone would have said it. Bohannon had regressed each year until this year. He really surprised me by turning things around this year and stepping up his shooting percentage and his defense. Taylor was pretty bad at shooting last year so going into this year he was still relatively a question mark. Hughes took and missed a lot of long threes last year as the shot clock ran out, this year he seemed to really make a lot of those same shots. Remember those long scoring droughts of last year as the team tossed up brick after brick from behind the arc in the waning moments of the shot clock? This year they were much better at making them and they seem more aggressive in taking it to the hoop with Leuer and Nankivil actually getting some dunks and even an occasional alley oop. The team still struggles versus a zone defense like versus MN and NW. At the beginning of the year I thought this team would be anywhere from 4th to 6th in the Big 10. I got in a number of discussions/arguments with people who thought I was crazy not to pick them in the top 3 because "Bo always gets in the top 3". I have been critical of his recruiting lately and still think the team is in trouble next year and the following year due to weak recruiting classes last year and this year.. Honestly, the team has exceeded my expectations a bit this year because Bohannnon shot much better and Taylor really improved to match his recuiting status as Mr. Basketball of MN. I still am not sold on Evans or Brusewitz being offensive threats at all. Rob Wilson is the enigma that could improve like Taylor next year. Berggren still can't see the floor even after redshirting and even during blowouts except the final minute. He was fairly hightly touted so maybe he can improve for his sophomore year of eligibility and not become another Gavinksi or Markolf. Dukan is a little intruiging since he may have been a late bloomer a la Leuer or a Wilkinson but I don't have high expectations for Anderson.

Both my wife and I actuallly like the plot and story of the movie. We felt the story moved along without what seems like filler in many 3 hour movies (First Incredible Hulk movie I'm looking at you) . The story gave enough background on the setting/science/why they are there, who these people are that I felt I understood the story without going into so much detail that I started questioning everything. Enough to entice me and allow my suspension of disbelief if you will. In addition to the story, part of the movie going experience is the visuals othewise just go see a play on a black stage. This movie nailed it on the visuals, I wouldn't even bother with the 2D version in the theatre, I've seen clips in HD on my TV at home right after we saw the movie in 3D at the IMAX and there was absolutely no comparison to how visually stunning the 3D version was. This wasn't 3D like many movies where 2 seconds of a ball coming at you or some forced images are embedded in the movie every 15 minutes. It was beginning to end better than any 3D done before. The movie was everything I expected and more since they didn't make the plot so full of holes or full of filler that I was bored . My wife was skeptical of the movie and came out ranking it as one of the best theatre experiences she has had. She is not a big Scifi fan but does indulge me on a few movies of that genre. Sure I pretty much knew how it would end but part of me had just enough skepticism that just maybe it would end differently so that I was intrigued up until the end. I don't think the plot was some revolutionary storytelling that has no comparisons but there really aren't all that many movies that provide that level of originality, including many Oscar winning pictures. We also both liked that the characters were portrayed by non A-List mega stars. Some movies seem to lose their way or the characters just aren't believable or likable when the mega stars are featured. This movie didn't need Tom Cruise or Tom Hanks or Leo playing the hero. Plenty of movies filled with stars leave me thinking the movie plot took a backseat to making sure each star got enough screen time no matter how forced it seemed. I realize people have different tastes but I don't see why a movie has to be full of dramatic prose dialogue flowiing from an actor playing one of the sterotypical Oscar nod roles of addict, insane, disabled, destitute, gender reversal, or historical figure in order to be considered a good movie. Neither do slow plot liines mean a great movie to everyone, I'll admit two movies I found absolutely dreadfully boring were Gosford Park and the English Patient both of which win or are mentioned among great films by the "critics". I went in knowing the type of films they were and I can really get into a slow developing dramas but these two left me bored to tears. Or the Cohen Brothers, The Man Who Wasn't There, absolutely soul sucking boring.

If you check my profile I have some pictures taken from the Diamond box seats just beyond the first base bag along the RF line. I bought the tickets on Ebay a couple years ago for a Sunday game (JJ Bobblehead). The seats were row 2 I believe. Face value was $96 iirc, but I think I paid $75/each. I think the best part was pre game when all the Brewers were hanging out and stretching just a few feet away from us. Braun, Hart, and Weeks signed a bunch of autographs for kids when they first came out and when CC walked by I could have almost touched him, he was a huge, huge man.

ESPNews is in HD on DirecTV, it is what I watch in place of SportsCenter. I used to watch SportsCenter everyday, and back in college multiple times a day. But since they went away from showing so many of the highlights and adding all the things mentioned like intereveiws, actors, fluff pieces I lost interest. When ESPNews went HD it became much better in terms of highlights and with the multiple news boxe on the sides and bottom, s a great way to catch information. I think the only time I watch ESPN now is for live sporting events. I never liked any of the PTI, Around the Horn stuff and now the NFL and MLB network studio shows are so much better than the ESPN NFL/MLB shows that I really have no reason to watch ESPN for anything but the games.

If only those games would be run on FSN-WI on DirecTV. and not pre-empted for Bucks' games in the Spring.The WMLW games are typically on the DirecTV, just not on the regular 669 channel. If you search or push the red button and check the listing under the score box it will find the WMLW game for you.

I too like the skiing but since the skiing is usually held during the day they have to show it tape delayed in primetime and often a lot of people already know who medaled and the networks get complaints about not showing enough live events. I know I have had to change the radio station a few times driving home from work to avoid the excited announcer having to tell me who one the day's events. I knew Vonn had fallen in the combined because it was on the radio and I knew Miller got a gold before getting home to watch the events. I now know to just change the channel as soon as they start talking olympics.

They do as much multi casting during the winter Olympics because I just dont' think there are nearly as many events in comparison to the summer. I have the Olympics app on my phone and it shows each days scheduled events and most have been aired. Lately all there is during the day is curling, hockey, and skiing, all of which have been on some channel or another. The figure skating may not appeal to the demographic of this message board but it is probably among the highest ratings for the Olympics if not the highest rated event. Figure skating events in non Olympic settings draw pretty good audiences and even Dancing With the Stars (gag) gets big audiences. Heck, even I would rather watch figure skating than curling any day. Hot women in skimpy outfits with the chance of wipeouts vs. shuffleboard on ice is no contest. Edit: The U.S. Figure Skating Championships in late January were the highest rated non NFL sporting event on cable or broadcast TV during the week they aired. http://sportsmediawatch.blogspot.com/2010/01/ratings-rise-for-us-figure-skating.html

It makes sports sense because they can double or more their TV revenues without lowering competition and without comprimising academic standards. It really is that simple. The athletic department doesn't give a hoot how big the endowment is, that money is totally seperate from their budget. If the size of the endowment mattered one bit to the athletic department then NW wouldn't play in a high school gym. Texas athletics make a lot of money now but if switching to the Big 10 gives them an additional $10-$15MM per year why wouldn't they look at it? Rarely does any shcool, business or person, turn down more money no matter how much they already make.

Endowments aren't just a function of how "academically respected" a university is, but also how big and how rich the alumni base is and how aggressive the investment managers are with the investments. For instance, Harvard's $35B endowment fund, was very aggressive in investing the money and at one point in early 2009 they were down $8B just due to investment performance and warned they expected it to get worse. Some endowment's include athletic donations, some don't. But key is the grants for specific research which are usually tied to professors and not the size of the endowment or athletic conference affiliation.

It was in a blog somewhere about the TV revenues but it does make a lot of sense that the TV revs for the Big 10 schools would be much higher than what Texas gets, even with them getting a more than equal share. They blog's numbers do make inherent sense, espicallly if you found the $20MM reference for the Big 10 schools. Think of it this way, the Big 12 TV contract probably generates its ad rates based on the populations of states like: Kansas: 2.8MM Nebraska: 1.8MM Oklahoma: 3.6MM Colorado: 4.8MM Missouri: 5.9MM Iowa: 3.0MMM Non Texas population = 21.9MM Texas: 24.0MM Now the Big 10 (besides owning its own Network) generates its TV money or ad rates based on states with populations of Michigan: 10MM Ohio: 11.5MM Pennsylvaina: 12.5MM Illinois: 12.9MM WI: 5.6MM Minnesota: 5.2MM Indiana: 6.4MM Iowa: 3.0MM with the Hawkeyes being much more popular than the Cyclones 67 Million potential viewers Without Texas, the Big 12 covers a bunch of states that have populations much much smaller than the TV audiences a Big Ten team can reach. Obviously not everyone in the big states watch but a lot do, and even if every person in the non Texas Big 12 states watch football and basketball, the Big 10 states can match those numbers with only 30% of people watching. No wonder they have to pay Texas more than an equal share since the population of Texas is larger than all the other states combined. As far as not having problems generating revenues goes, I would think that would still be the case. They will sell just as much apparel and tickets. They would just stand to make another $10MM or so from TV than they already do. I don't know how the Big 12 shares bowl revenues, a lot of conferences, the Big 10 included just divy up all the Bowl money between the teams after expenses are deducted. This would probably mean even more money for Texas since the Big10 would add a championship game adding a few million more to the TV money to split amongst the teams and the Big 10 Bowl divy would be at least as big as the Big 12 payouts. The BCS money is hit or miss, depending on if two teams from one conferencemake it to the BCS but the Big 10 also has a tie in to the CapOne bowl which has the highest payout of non BCS games. Not to mention the historical tie in to the Rose Bowl which has beeen the highest payout BCS game other than possibly the Championship Game.

Money is the reason why Texas would make the switch. I read somewhere that the Big10 teams (which split TV money equallly) each rake in somewhere between $20 Million and $24 Million in TV revenues. The Big 12 shares their TV money unequally, giving Texas, more than an equal amount, but it still only pull in something like $11 Million to $13 Million for Texas. It makes sense given the population area covered by the Big10 is probably higher than the Big 12 with fairly empty states like Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and sharing Iowa (and actually having the much less popular team). Texas has two rivals, Oklahoma and Texas A&M, they could easily make them their two non conference games and schedule a cupcake for the third. They really don't have big historic rivalry with anyone else in the Big 12. Texas is large land grant research institution much like the Big 10 schools, it fits academically very well. This is important, because the voting on who to let into the Big 10 isn't up to the AD's, but the University Presidents who will want some academic criteria to fit. This is why schools like Louisville and Cincinnati have no real shot. They don't have the academics to satisfy that side of the equation, nor really doing much for the TV exposure side of the ledger. To me the only schools that really make any sense are Texas, ND, Pitt, Missouri, and Rutgers. And probably in that order for my tastes. ND is smack in the middle of Big 10 country but they supposedly have a big national following that could increase TV revs, Pitt is sort of already in the area but would probably do almost as much as Missouri for TV rev since St. Louis is already on the edge of Big 10 country anyway. Rutgers brings more NJ and NY marekts but I just don't know how popular Rutgers is in the NY market.

I don't know if anyone else saw it, I didn't see it mentioned here, but MLB Network had a special 1 hour show dedicated to the top 50 prospects in the minors or at least still having rookie status in the majors for 2010. I DVR'd the show a few weeks ago but just got around to watching it. The only Brewers to make the list were Lawrie at around 26 IIRC, and Escobar at either 12 or 14. I think Michael Brantley was in the upper 40's. It was a decent showing with the studio guys talking a little more than just a sentence about one or two of the guys out of the groups of 5 they revealed at a time. It was a little sad to see how few Brewers prospects are highly regarded, there just aren't that many guys in the upper levels yet in comparison to some of the teams with 3 or more guys in the top 50. I guess I wouldn't quibble with the ratings systems that put the Brewers minor leagues in the lower half of baseball, at least not until some of the pitchers start having success in AA or higher and some the hitters start showing something in AAA to give hope credence to the success or improvments shown in lower levels.

So by that logic I guess hot dogs are more popular in NY because the last time I was there I paid like $6 for a crappy street vendor dog that costs about $3 in Madison. They must love hotel rooms there as well because my closet sized room at the Sheraton in Manhattan was just under $400/night. The pure lack of understandiing of economics in these arguements baffles me sometimes. I would argue back that the Yankess must have terrible fans because they have a metro area that is 15x the size of place like Milwaukee yet there were empty seats at games. For a team like the Brewers to draw 3 million fans with a metro area of a million people means on averge each person has a go to to 3 games. For the Yankees to draw 3 million fans only about a quarter of the people even have to go to one game.

Dear God, please no Bon Jovi all of their music sounds like they just changed the words a bit from their Slippery When Wet album of 25 years ago. They are like the original Nickleback. I can't even tell one song from another when Bon Jovi plays anymore. As far as Cure, Radiohead, or Coldplay go I would say it's a football game please have someone who plays upbeat music not depressed or meloncholy tunes.

Hate the idea. 64 is plenty, just because a few 5th place teams from major conferences don't get in there is no reason to water it down. With 96 would the top 32 get a bye so the first round would be a bunch of teams seeded 9+ being playing on Mon. Tues. Wed? They would almost have to play those games at the home court of the higher seeded team unless they expected the winning team to spend the whole week at the site. A nine vs. 24 game, 10 vs 23, etc. really doesn't seem any better than the NIT tourney and those games really arent' that interesting except the fans of the schools involved. Attendence at 1st round games now is fairly spotty unless it basically a home game for one of the teams. The Cinderella stories would drop off as some of the smaller schools had to beat one more major to advance to the 64 round. Seeing a team like VMI knock out a Duke in round 1 versus VMI playing a 5th place team from the Pac10 in round one or even losing just so we can see the middle of the pack big school play a top team just doesn't carry the fun underdog rooting fandom that makes the NCAA tourney great.

I think it is a forgone conclusion he will end up with the Cardinals if anywhere. Supposedly he stood up a recent Cardinals/LaRussa function and told the crowd he would play for free if the Cardinals gave him a chance and then when it became a reality that he could get a spring invite he said he would play for league minimum for them because he has to pay for his kids college, not that the players union would let a guy play for free anyway. To me that reads he wants to be Cardinal and would have to be overwhelmed (read paid well) to play elsewhere.

Why are people so excited about having more lefties? Don't righties tend to hit lefties better and aren't their more righties than lefty hitters in the league? I know I for one love it when the Brewers face a LH pitcher, I can' t imagine the heavy RH Cub lineup and the Cardinals with Pujols and Holliday are too worried about a LH pitcher, especially one who walks as many guys as Davis.

But again DiceK was expected to completely dominate and according to some ESPN analyst's a question of how many Cy Young's he would win. I would say he has been a disapointment if domination was expected for that huge posting fee and contract. I acknowledge it was more than Strasburg but as a free agent one would expect a higher payout than a draftee since the draftee is basically stuck signing with the team unless he waits another year while the free agent has theroetically all the teams bidding for his service. Who knows what Strasburg may have gottenn on a completely open market or what any number one pick would get any year if teams wanted to just buy first round talent vs. spending money on bonuses for later round guys.

Strasburg is going to get $15MM over 4 years from the Nationals or about $3.75MM per year guranteed with his bonus. Chapman is going to get about $5MM per for 5 based on that $25MM for 5 year rumor. Being an international free agent sure is nice in comparison but not totally ridiculous given his potential. It's a little more than last year's number one pick but cheaper than the Dice K payment.

I am sure the money factor is the major reason why guys are "babied" or brought along slowly in addition to probably finding it just works better in the long run, making sure guys have better control, better stamina, etc. sort of the of return on investment idea mentioned above. I would however be careful in comparing the injuries or blown out arms of yesteryear to today. The medical advances of today versus even the 70 or 80's have changed what is a career ending injury. Just think about Tommy John surgery which up until that at the time risky procedure all of the guys with elbow injuries like that were pretty much done as a pitcher. Today the league is littered with guys who have had 1 Tommy John procedure, imagine how many of today's pitchers would either be done or would have missed signigicantly more time or just never been the same again without this one new procedure. I have no idea how many guys have benefitted from newer shoulder procedures although that one still tends to be tough to overcome.

To me the hall of fame represents a museum and list of the greatest players of each generation. Since I really started following baseball in the early to mid 80's, pretty much all of my favorite players from the time I was 12 on to now have been subjected to the steroid scope and the whole era is full of tainted players. I am fine with just voting in the players regardless of steroids or not since pretty much everyone should be suspected, pitchers, hitters, skinny guys, hulks, superstars, scrubs, it doesn't matter, all types of players used. Putting McGwire, Clemens, Bonds, etc, in the hall doesn't make me think less of Hank Aaron, he played in a different era and was a great player. The greats of the 80's, 90's 00's that dominated the sport are also great players. Maybe raise the standard a bit like say just 500 HR's isn't automatic for that era but still acknowledge the best players of the era. There have been all sorts of different eras of baseball from dead balls, to higher mounds, to lowered mounds, DH's, big ball parks, etc. This will be the steroid era but Bonds, Clemens, McGwire, etc. still dominated their era. Guys like John Kruk who claim to be clean weren't going to make the hall anyway so it isn't like they are being kept out by steroids. My point ends up being just put in the best of the era, call it the steroid era, and move on the next generation of stars.

I have never understood the appeal of Leno, never found him funny at all. I love Conan but can understand how his humor is not appealing to some. I think he is less written joke funny and more delivery and off the top of his head funny. Getting Any Richter back on the show is great. Leno seems like a robot reading cue cards that are just not that funny. Leno's interaction with the band seems forced and again, not funny and no comparison to Conan and Andy. I do agree that Leno must appeal to some, it must be the an older demographic. I am 36 and have never found him funny, but I know my Dad always liked Carson and Letterman but now goes to bed before any of these guys come on TV. The failure of Leno at the 9PM slot makes me question how he would do at 10:30 given his older demographic audience who may not stay up to watch but then again the younger demographic has pretty much been seduced by cable and the internet so the "Late Night" after the news time slot has a lot more competition since it has never been the only option for me and the even younger crowd. When NBC moved Leno to 9 I remember then citing his older audience would like it because it was an earlier slot, but apparently not enough to give up whatever drama CBS throws up against it at 9 PM.

The Wii will be the next device added to Netflix list of streaming machines this spring. There is a NY Time article about it and if you go to Netflix site you can request a free disc to allow the streaming once it is available in the spring.

The frustrating part of this is J.M. Gold, Nick Neugebauer, Jeremy Jeffress, Mark Rogers, etc. Jeffress and Rogers have time left but the Brewers have had their share of young guys flaming out.

Ender if you read my post I included Braun and Fielder that met or exceeded expectations so I think that pretty much explains why I included them. It is just a rebuttal to the idea that there were all these injuries and bad luck that hurt the team rather than just not having good enough players. I litterally am not surprised they had the worst staff in the National League and many others are not either for the reasons I cited above (no depth which is always needed, young inexperienced guys, older not so great guys, losing 300 innings of ace pitching who went deep into games saving the pen, etc.) Like I said I wouldn't put a 6.5 ERA on some those guys but 5.5 sure, which isn't good. Career history and average are one thing but expecting each and every year as a guy gets older like Suppan or Looper or is highly variable like Bush or even young like Gallardo and Parra can easily throw those expectations of hitting career averages out the window. I would expect Looper and Suppan to perform below their career averages from here on out as they are in the decline phase of their career. Bush is getting further and further away from his promising first year as a Brewer and has stacked in a couple of pretty bad stretches so expecting him to be a 4 ERA pitcher or something is too optimistic in my view. Sure I am probably more pessimisstic than overly optimistic but for some of these guys but in my view the trend is not their friend. Same goes for guys like Hart or Hall. Hart has not been trending well and his getting further and further away from looking like the All Star first few months he had a couple years ago. Hall has been on a slide for a long time now and I can't see why not being surprised he was terrible should shock anyone. These are both guys that had relatively short periods of succes followed by equal or longer times of not producing and looking bad while doing it. Seems like scouts figured out how to pitch to them and/or the early success was just a hot start. There are always going to be guys who miss expectations and guys that exceed them. The Brewers in my view had one offensive spot that fell well below expectations in Hardy. They had Lopez whose numbers had to be as good or better than any one could have reasonably expected out of Weeks. They had McGhee and Counsell exceeding most expectations for 3B/utility. The offense ended up about where expected, even better than I would have expected had someone known how bad Hardy would be in 2009. The pitching was terrible as a lot of people expected.