Around the Nation board

[pumkinattack]

My diligence is severly lacking when I post, but fair enough.

[OxyBob]

What I really wanted to do was defend Gladwell and refute any suggestion that's he's this effete intellectual who's writing's as they related to something so manly as football should just be thrown out because of the writer.  Gladwell has defended the game of football before and I think he makes good points.

Is NFL writer Peter King of Sports Illustrated also a sissy who is full of manure and should not be taken seriously? Is Carson Palmer?

"The truth of the matter is ... somebody is going to die here in the NFL. It's going to happen.''

-- Cincinnati's Carson Palmer, in my quarterback roundtable discussion this week in Sports Illustrated.

I found that comment chilling, to say the least. The other quarterbacks at the table -- Ben Roethlisberger, Matt Ryan, Tony Romo, Aaron Rodgers -- didn't dispute Palmer's words, and when he said them, the table got very quiet. They know. They feel the same thing happening in this game, too. And the fact that this statement has gotten zero traction in the last four days tells me something that all of us should find frightening: People read that line and just said, Yup, someone's going to die. We accept that. Now bring on football, dammit!

I gathered the five quarterbacks after their Friday round of golf at the celebrity golf tournament at South Lake Tahoe in mid-July. [If you think that was easy, for my next trick I'm going to pull a rabbit out of this MacBook Air.] It was a loose group. The light beer flowed, and it was the kind of scene you wish could have lasted five hours, not one. And so occasionally, a Roethlisberger would grab his phone and text someone, or chat with Rodgers about something that happened out on the course, but when Palmer said what he said, the table got quiet and everyone listened.
...

"Guys are getting so big, so fast, so explosive,'' Palmer said. "The game's so violent. Now that they're cutting out the wedge deal on kickoff returns, those guys [are] coming free, and at some point somebody is going to die in football. And I hope it's not anyone at this table, and I hope it doesn't happen, obviously. Everyone talks about the good old days, when guys were tough and quarterbacks got crushed all the time, but back in the day, there weren't defensive ends that were Mario Williams -- 6-7, 300 pounds, 10 percent body fat, running a 4.7 40."

"The game has changed, the game is getting bigger, faster, stronger, and there needs to be more protection. If I weren't a quarterback, I would be mad about the rules. If I were a safety or a defensive back, I would be mad about the new rule that you can't hit your helmet above their shoulder pads or whatever it is because it does take some of the ferociousness out of the game, but somebody is going to get seriously hurt, possibly die."

OxyBob

[pumkinattack]

Malcolm Gladwell is a touchey-feeley intellectual whose writing appeals to other touchey-feeley intellectuals and who likes to assemble in his writing a bunch of obscure facts which he somehow relates to a certain selected subject, thereby intimating or reaching an off-beat conclusion about the subject not taking into account its essence. In short your correspondent believes Gladwell is a sissy who is full of manure and should not be taken seriously.

Isn't this the quote you wanted to use before yours, Bob? 

[OxyBob]

Malcolm Gladwell is a touchey-feeley intellectual whose writing appeals to other touchey-feeley intellectuals and who likes to assemble in his writing a bunch of obscure facts which he somehow relates to a certain selected subject, thereby intimating or reaching an off-beat conclusion about the subject not taking into account its essence. In short your correspondent believes Gladwell is a sissy who is full of manure and should not be taken seriously.

Isn't this the quote you wanted to use before yours, Bob? 

Indeed.

OxyBob

[TGP]

any one know when the ecac bids (i.e., opportunities for schools to elect to participate - assuming they qualify) "come out"?

[gordonmann]

TGP:

I believe schools have a chance to submit for ECAC bids this week.

[TGP]

TGP:

I believe schools have a chance to submit for ECAC bids this week.

thx gordon.  frank rossi posted an update on the east boards.  thursday is the deadline. 

[Purple Heys]

What I really wanted to do was defend Gladwell and refute any suggestion that's he's this effete intellectual who's writing's as they related to something so manly as football should just be thrown out because of the writer.  Gladwell has defended the game of football before and I think he makes good points.

Is NFL writer Peter King of Sports Illustrated also a sissy who is full of manure and should not be taken seriously? Is Carson Palmer?

"The truth of the matter is ... somebody is going to die here in the NFL. It's going to happen.''

-- Cincinnati's Carson Palmer, in my quarterback roundtable discussion this week in Sports Illustrated.

I found that comment chilling, to say the least. The other quarterbacks at the table -- Ben Roethlisberger, Matt Ryan, Tony Romo, Aaron Rodgers -- didn't dispute Palmer's words, and when he said them, the table got very quiet. They know. They feel the same thing happening in this game, too. And the fact that this statement has gotten zero traction in the last four days tells me something that all of us should find frightening: People read that line and just said, Yup, someone's going to die. We accept that. Now bring on football, dammit!

I gathered the five quarterbacks after their Friday round of golf at the celebrity golf tournament at South Lake Tahoe in mid-July. [If you think that was easy, for my next trick I'm going to pull a rabbit out of this MacBook Air.] It was a loose group. The light beer flowed, and it was the kind of scene you wish could have lasted five hours, not one. And so occasionally, a Roethlisberger would grab his phone and text someone, or chat with Rodgers about something that happened out on the course, but when Palmer said what he said, the table got quiet and everyone listened.
...

"Guys are getting so big, so fast, so explosive,'' Palmer said. "The game's so violent. Now that they're cutting out the wedge deal on kickoff returns, those guys [are] coming free, and at some point somebody is going to die in football. And I hope it's not anyone at this table, and I hope it doesn't happen, obviously. Everyone talks about the good old days, when guys were tough and quarterbacks got crushed all the time, but back in the day, there weren't defensive ends that were Mario Williams -- 6-7, 300 pounds, 10 percent body fat, running a 4.7 40."

"The game has changed, the game is getting bigger, faster, stronger, and there needs to be more protection. If I weren't a quarterback, I would be mad about the rules. If I were a safety or a defensive back, I would be mad about the new rule that you can't hit your helmet above their shoulder pads or whatever it is because it does take some of the ferociousness out of the game, but somebody is going to get seriously hurt, possibly die."

OxyBob

Somebody already has died...maybe not instantly after the moment of impact...but most assuredly Darryl Stingley had his life ended as a result of the hit on the football field that left him a quadriplegic.

"On April 5, 2007, Darryl Stingley died at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago after being discovered unresponsive in his home. His death was attributed to heart disease and pneumonia complicated by quadriplegia.  The Cook County Medical Examiner listed Stingley's cause of death as an accident."

[frank uible]

The American Football Coaches Association  tracks direct and indirect football related deaths at all levels of play on an annual basis. Current annual deaths (at an aggregate of single digits per year) are far down from the 60s and 70s.

[TGP]

TGP:

I believe schools have a chance to submit for ECAC bids this week.

thx gordon.  frank rossi posted an update on the east boards.  thursday is the deadline. 

This just in - Hobart is foregoing the opportunity to play in the ECACs due to budget constraints.  I am not surprised by the decision, but disappointed nonetheless - especially for the SR class.

[ADL70]

Keith you mention CWRU in the Program Turnarounds, but how can you leave them out of the Top 10, yet include two teams with NO playoff appearances?

CWRU wins 1999-2006--34  wins last three seasons--29   playoff record 1-2

[Upstate]

From 1999-2002 SJF won a total of 11 games...

Since then they've had 3 10+ win seasons, 3 seasons of 7+ wins and 6 straight trips to either the NCAA's or ECAC's...

[K-Mack]

how can you leave them out of the Top 10, yet include two teams with NO playoff appearances?

You really want to know? I researched several more teams than made the top 10, but CWRU and SJF were not among the teams I had remembered as consistently awful enough for me to back and look.

Both very valid suggestions. All the Ten Bests are open for discussion.

[altor]

This may not belong here, but I couldn't figure out where else to put it.

Why isn't Linfield on the list of teams on the front page that are already in the tournament?  They are 5-0 with one game to play in the NWC.  They have already defeated Willamette and Menlo (the two teams with one loss).  I just don't see how Linfield has not already clinched the AQ in that conference?

[Ralph Turner]

This may not belong here, but I couldn't figure out where else to put it.

Why isn't Linfield on the list of teams on the front page that are already in the tournament?  They are 5-0 with one game to play in the NWC.  They have already defeated Willamette and Menlo (the two teams with one loss).  I just don't see how Linfield has not already clinched the AQ in that conference?

Here is the Linfield press release saying that the Wildcats have clinched the NWC AQ.

http://www.linfield.edu/sports/release.php?id=3168

(Must have been an oversight...    )