Thursday Skull Session

By D.J. Byrnes on April 3, 2014 at 6:00 am
61 Comments

Is there a better villain on television than Justified's Boyd Crowder? I say no. His greatness is something to which I aspire on a daily basis. Let's all try to be great today in our criminal plots and and endeavors.

D'ANGELO RUSSELL IS ON THE WAY. Five-star recruit and OSU signee D'Angelo Russell played in the McDonald's All-American game last night, and despite being subbed out early he got #bizzy with the time he had. (He finished with nine points on 4/6 shooting.)

If you aren't satisfied with the sampling size, Russell plays again tonight at 6 PM on ESPNU in the Dick's National High School Tournament. 

But yes, Thad Matta has got himself a playmaker in young D'Angelo; he will probably be inserted into the starting lineup when he arrives on campus. But don't take my word for it:

The thing I liked most about watching him play... he's silky. Only a couple of things are more enjoyable in sports than watching a basketballer dominate a game effortlessly.

It will be a refreshing break from this past year, when Ohio State's offense had about as much grace as two teens hooking up in the back of one of their dad's 1993 Nissan Sentra.

LEADERSHIP CLASSES FOR COACHES. Urban Meyer is known for making his players take classes on leadership. He even went so far as to bring in local speaker Tim Kight to lead the instruction last year.

This year, however, Urban has decided to mix it up. The coaches are taking classes as well. From CoachingSearch247.com:

“We’re doing something called ‘unit leadership,’” Meyer said at a press conference Tuesday. “I’m taking the approach last year this time where players are going through leadership training. This time, these last four weeks, our coaches have been. Once or twice a week, we go on a leadership seminar. Once again, Tim Kight teaches it.

“We’re teaching people to be unit leaders. We’ve got a systematic approach to how we’re going to fix this thing. It’s not broke. We didn’t finish The Chase.”

[...]

“The culture is not playing scared and timid and soft. If you’re going to make a mistake, you make it 4-to-6 (seconds) and A-to-B. I don’t know if I’ve ever addressed it as hard as I have this offseason. Certainly, we have addressed pass defense, but it’s too easy. Pass defense wasn’t very good. No, it’s more complicated than that.”

I love how transcripts from Urban's pressers always include gems like "I'm taking the approach last year this time" and paradoxes such as "We're going to fix this thing. It's not broke."

Then there's this glorious passage: "Certainly, we have addressed pass defense, but it's too easy. Pass defense wasn't very good. No it's more complicated than that."

WHAT ARE THESE RIDDLES YOU'RE SPEAKING, URBAN? The only thing I understood in those last three sentences was "Pass defense wasn't very good." That's big, if true.

MIKE BENNETT WEIGHS IN ON UNIONIZATION. Thanks to AngryWoody for this spot. Here's Michael Bennett in an article from Yardbarker:

“I don’t know the full reason behind their union. I don’t agree necessarily with football players being unionized. We don’t necessarily see the money, but we are getting a lot of benefit out of our scholarships. It just kind of seems silly to want to be unionized because we get a lot of stuff that people don’t get. Yeah, we don’t get the same opportunities, but we can get set up for life after football if we really want to. So it’s all about taking advantage of what you do  get. I don’t think the union is necessarily a great idea. Everyone wants to get more money all the time, but I mean we’re getting a good amount.”

Would you take more money tho, Mike?

“Yeah, it would be nice to get a little bit more, especially… I mean the cost of living is going up and I don’t think our stipend is going up, so I’d say a little bit more money is always nice but I’m not really in the business of trying to force people to do that.” 

A GOOD APRIL FOOL'S PRANK (FINALLY). Probably not as good as Bo Pelini smashing his player's cellphone and then fighting him in the hallway, but props to Washington's Chris Petersen for finding the boundary of alternative jerseys even KIDS THESE DAYS find laughable.



 FLORIDA STATE LOGO REDESIGN LEAKED. Poetically, this was spotted at a Tallhassee Wal-Mart (it's been a big week for Wal-Mart in my Skull Sessions) and later confirmed by Tomahawk Nation:

sigh

When I gazed upon this, the question that sprung to my mind was "Why?" But then I remembered the simple answer: WTFlorida

This will shock many, but I'm not real high on Native Americans and their symbols being used as logos because it usually leads to /facepalms like this. I also don't recall ever reading about the Seminole tribes rocking FSU-branded hair-feathers or that they were actually white guys.

And these are the geniuses overlording over college football right now. Save us, Ohio State 2014 football team. You are the rebellion's only hope.

THOSE WMDs. Jim Ross #longform... The unsurprising mugshot of the man arrested for doing donuts in Churchill Downs... Explain this, Dublin... All 2014 World Cup jerseys... Hulk Hogan and Fat Joe hang out!?... Richard Nixon's application to join the FBI... What people fight about on Wikipedia... Some of the best sentences in English novels... The persuasive case for profanity in print... Hunter S. Thompson for Sheriff... Replacing Daily Mail headlines with comments... 

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