Two big recent developments in my life:
- Cauliflower rice... who knew? It solves all inadequacies of home-made regular rice and the taste and texture is indistinguishable.
- The Immortal Irishman by Timothy Egan. I did not know the legend of Thomas Francis Meagher before purchasing this book. I have 50 pages left, and it's already a shoe-in for my Best Reads of 2018 List (to be published Michigan Week in November). Anyone who enjoys American history will like this book.
ICYMI:
- Five things NFL scouts will watch closely at tomorrow's Ohio State Pro Day.
- Kelsey Mitchell: Team first 'til the end.
- In Sampson James, the Buckeyes netted a major running back. Here's the case to add another to the 2019 class.
- Looking ahead to the 2018-19 men's basketball team.
- Reserve your (or your business’) spot next to the life-size statue of Woody Hayes coming to Newcomerstown!
Word of the Day: Martinet.
NEUTRAL SITE PAYDAY. Neutral site out-of-conference regular season games strike against the heart of what makes college football great. But they've proliferated in the era of the $1 million+ coordinator because they pay.
For an example of this, look no further than Ohio State–Texas Christian, set for Week 3 in the concrete shrine to Jerry Jones' Ego. It was originally supposed to be a home-and-home.
Gene Smith, to his credit, has generally eschewed regular season neutral site games, sticking to home-and-homes as God intended. This is a case of peer pressure and a 75-year-old billionaire shaking $10 million at both programs.
Former Ohio State assistant athletic director Martin Jarmond discussed it in April 2017 with Tipp City's most famous son, former Eleven Warriors beat writer Eric Seger:
“The Cowboys approached TCU probably a year ago [2016] and wanted to move their home game to Jerry World,” Jarmond said. “At the time they approached us and we weren’t interested. They came back again and came back again and finally, we entertained it because TCU, mutually we agreed to go there. And they were going to pay us to go there.”
I'm not happy about it. Unfortunately the opinions of crotchety bloggers aren't factored into these decisions.
Fortunately, it will bring other benefits to my team beyond a boost to a bank account that's not in my name.
From landof10.com:
For the Buckeyes, playing TCU in Texas has two benefits. First and foremost, it gives Ohio State a game against a quality opponent where a win could establish the Buckeyes early as a College Football Playoff contender. The Buckeyes’ win against Oklahoma in 2016 vaulted Ohio State into playoff contention and kept the Buckeyes there even when they didn’t win their own division. The Horned Frogs are coming off their third 11-win season in the last four years and were listed 16th in ESPN’s “way-too-early” Top 25 rankings for 2018.
Additionally, playing in the Dallas metro area offers Ohio State a chance to keep its recruiting foothold in Texas. The Buckeyes signed three of the top 6 Texas recruits in the Class of 2017 according to the 247Sports composite rankings, and the Class of 2019 also could be an excellent haul.
If tramping Texas Christian in Arlington leads to the next J.K. Dobbins or Jeffrey Okudah, then I will switch my opinion to this neutral site game being good overall. That remains to be seen, but Texas coach Tom Herman, who you might not know founded MENSA, the organization for geniuses, definitely won't like the Buckeyes playing in the Longhorns' cabbage patch. That's a worthy reward in of itself.
WOODY'S PUNCH... IN PERSPECTIVE. Sports play funny tricks on the human mind. For example, if Jim Harbaugh came off the bench and slugged an ACC player during a bowl game in which his team trailed, Ohio State fans would gleefully assassinate him with memes, as would be our right by the rules of blood conquest.
But apply that scenario to Saint Woody Hayes... well, Charlie Bauman had it comin'.
Former Buckeye great Doug Donley explained why to Eleven Warriors' Michael Citro in August of 2014:
"I still didn't think much about it. After the game, Woody got us in a huddle and kind of told us a story as to why all that happened. He said (Charlie Bauman's ancestor) killed his great, great grandfather in the Civil War. And he said that's why he punched him. He had it coming. We all kind of looked at each other like, "Wow."
Bet Bauman's ancestors regretted that move when they watched a senior citizen flood their descendent on national(?) television.
Ohio State football historian Jack Park provided further context during a recent speech at the Hall of Fame Luncheon in Canton.
From cantonrep.com:
Parks, a staunch apologist of the Hayes legacy, told a crowd at Tozzi’s on 12th that Ohio State officials chose the worst possible way to fire the coach: On an airport runway the day after the game.
Invoking the name of a long-ago Ohio State president, Park said, “William Oxley Thompson is probably the only person who has done more for Ohio State than Woody Hayes.”
The day after the firing, Hayes was visited in his Columbus home by two past players, one of them Archie Griffin.
“They were there 12 hours that day,” Park said. “They never once talked about the incident. They talked about his career, about life, about World War II.
It's a shame the podcast wasn't around in 1978. A recently retired Hayes and Archie Griffin talking World War II would have done numbers.
THE OTHER KIND OF PHISH. My friend works IT at Ohio State. He says you can get anyone to click on anything if the email includes a Block "O" in the header.
You might think this is only a problem for older people. As the university recently proved, phishing attacks can just as easily phell tech-savvy students.
From Owen Daughtery of The Lantern:
In an effort to educate students on the threat phishing emails pose, the IT Risk management office started a campaign Jan. 31 that sent fake, university-produced phishing emails from phony, sometimes humorous, email addresses to see how many students fell for the emails.
Phishing emails are a strategy used by hackers who send emails from what appears to be a trusted entity, such as Ohio State, in an attempt to gather sensitive information from the recipient.
[...]
Of the thousands of emails sent to all students that contained unverified links meant to trick recipients, almost 19 percent were clicked on, Mayse said, a significant rate that shows firsthand the threat phishing emails pose to the Ohio State community.
Don't click on links from strangers with seven numbers in their address. And surely don't go skipping across the internet tossing your social security number around like Johnny Appleseed sowing oats.
The last thing you want is a Ukranian teenager liquidating your bank account during an internet shopping spree. That's a mess that takes years to clean up.
HIGH STREET = HIGH RENT. The size of Ohio State means there will always be wealthy parents willing to pay a premium price to house their precious offspring in an apartment not on the verge of being condemned.
With High Street's inevitable devolution into a suburban shopping plaza, that dictated the arrival of developers looking to exploit a market that turns over every year. Their construction, which surely included nothing but the finest materials, has come home to roost.
From dispatch.com:
Advertised rents range from $799 a month for a room in large, multi-bedroom apartments to $1,569 for a one-bedroom apartment occupied by one person.
By contrast, off-campus single apartments can be found for less than $800 a month and two-bedroom apartments for less than $1,200.
“These are really ramping up the price point,” said Wayne Garland, owner of Buckeye Real Estate, one of the largest campus-area landlords.
Take a tip from a pro, students: Live east of Summit Street. It builds character and several feral cat colonies call it home. No one-bedroom annually rented to college students is worth $1,569 a month in Columbus.
THOSE WMDs. Yaks help remove 200,000 pounds of trash from Mt. Everest... The forgotten victims of America's opioid crisis... 13 reasons to believe in aliens... I'd be an 'A' student if I could just read my notes... Sports culture in Los Angeles or the best selfie culture in America?
