Return of the Mack The Sixth Cents XII

It's been a long time, eh? Long time. I definitely don't think this will become weekly or even monthly thing again, but when you have a sports week like we did you just can't pass up the opportunity for good stories. And I've actually been trying to write this since last weekend, so if I'm a little behind on the stories, well, bite me. Here goes...
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1. Snowed Out

Miami football has gotten off to a very rough start this season. Of course, playing your first two games against Big Ten schools is pretty much suicide so it wasn't completely unexpected to be at or around .500 right now. But 0-5? Are you serious?

After being snowed out on October 14th, yes, SNOWED THE FUCK OUT IN THE MIDDLE OF OCTOBER, Miami finally got our first win of the season that Sunday afternoon against the University at Buffalo. No, that is not a typo. The University AT Buffalo. Morons.

Anyways, a 38-31 road win, it's about time. Of course, we followed that up with a loss to Akron this past weekend and our record fell to 1-7 (1-3 MAC.)

The good news? Senior Wide Receiver Ryne Robinson is now the all-time leading receiver in Miami history. Congrats dood.
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2. Please don't confuse us with THAT Miami....ever again.

"The U" continued it's tradition of being the biggest douchebags in college football over Friday the 13th weekend. If you haven't heard already, and how could you not have, part way through the 3rd quarter of the game between the Miami Hurricanes and Florida International in the Orange Bowl, a brawl broke out.

And I'm not just talking a little skermish either. Benches cleared. Guys took off their helmets (how stupid is THAT!?) and hurled them at each other. Another player was stomping on a guy that was on the bottom of a pile. Yet another player, who was not even in uniform due to an injury, was swinging his crutches at people. This was insane.

If you haven't seen the video yet, well, that's disturbing by itself. Go ahead and turn the sound up though. Have a listen to former Hurricane wide receiver, and now former color commentator, Lamar Thomas. Biggest. Thug. Ever. Here is his police record:

• Arrested and jailed for aggravated battery for attacking his pregnant fiance with a deadly weapon.
• Arrested for violating probation.
• Detained for brandishing a handgun and threatening suicide, prompting authorities to check him in to a mental institution.
• Did jail time for again violating probation related to the battery charges, when he was arrested for choking his fiancee. His six-month old son was present at the scene.

Now, as I get up on my soapbox, the part that really eats me up about the entire episode was the punishment handed down by Miami. I think FIU did a nice job as they kicked the two main guys off the team and suspended 16 others indefinitely.

Miami? One guy (the helmet swinger) was suspended indefinitely. One guy (Thomas, the announcer) got fired. 12 other players were suspended for ONE DAMN GAME. Against Duke.

The president of the university came out and said that she thinks the punishment is justified and strong enough. She also said that she didn't watch the tape because it would have made her mad. WHAT? Does the judge ever just decided arbitrarily without hearing the evidence? I would suggest not.

"It is hoped that the actions taken by Miami, FIU and the conferences will send a message that such behavior is not tolerated." The was a statement from the NCAA. Personally, I don't see the message when you suspend them for one game that a few high school teams could win.

What happened is a disgrace to not only college football, but academic institutions in general. If you ask me, anyone that was throwing punches should be suspended for the remainder of the season. Miami should be suspended from postseason play (FIU sucks, so this wouldn't effect them.) Larry Coker needs to get fired because he's clearly lost control of his players. In fact, the only decent thing he's done was that 34 straight wins to start his career with Butch Davis' players.

The bottom line is that this has been the culture at "The U" for almost two full decades. Just now, AFTER THIS MELEE, they are instituting a zero tolerance policy. You have got to be kidding me. Something needs to change and someone needs to teach these players a lesson.
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3. Seeing Red.

How about those Cardinals? Left for dead at the end of the regular season, almost nobody had them picked to beat the Padres. Nobody had them picked to beat the Mets. Now they are tied 1-1 in the World Series and coming home for three games, the first two being started by guys named "Carp" and "Soup."

Everybody knows I'm an Indians fan and that I live a couple of blocks from Wrigley Field, home of the Cards biggest rival, but St. Louis could very well make my year in baseball. The sport has been dead to me since the Indians fell out of the race in May and the Cubs have been downright dreadful to watch. I've been to two games this year, by far the lowest total number of baseball games I've been to in one season since I was in high school.

I've always had a bit of a problem converting to the Cubs because I have liked the Cardinals as my number two team (favorite NL team) since I was a kid. The two teams are making it increasingly difficult right now. If the Cubs get A-Rod, that might convince me for good. I can't stand that guy. In the meantime, I actually starting watching some baseball this October, which is something I haven't done much of this summer.

People see me as a bandwagon jumper here, but that's not it. If the Cardinals win, I won't claim that one of my teams won a championship. I just hope they win. I hate Detroit, as I hate most things that come from That State of North. In all honesty though, what is there to like about this team? Kenny Rogers jacked up a cameraman last year. He may or may not have cheated in game two, but it was extremely suspicious. And either way, he lied about it afterwards. He claims that the umpires did not ask him to wash off his hands. Funny how the umps claim they did, and he came back out with a clean hand in the second inning.

Aside from Kenny Rogers, I also can't stand Carlos Guillen. To be fair, I think I despise all baseball Guillens. I also despise Magglio Ordonez and his soul-glo mullet. Sean Casey is a piece of crap too. I'm so glad the Indians dumped him on the Reds back in the day. Todd Jones, their closer, is also a self-admitted cheater. Frankly, the only thing even remotely likeable about this team is their chain-smoking old grandpa manager. And I don't even like him! He managed the stupid Marlins to a victory over the Tribe in the 1997 fall classic.
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4. Do the Double (and no I'm not talking about Fred Smoot)

The Chicago Fire kicked off our playoff season on ABC Sports this past Sunday with a 1-0 home victory over the New England Revolution in the two-match aggregate goal opening round series. Game two is at 6:30 CT on Saturday, October 28th in Foxboro. The lone goal of the match was a perfect strike by Justin Mapp off a free kick from 22-yards out. We are well on our way towards a second championship of the season (the double.) Saturday's game won't be on national TV unfortunately, but can be caught at The Globe Pub, just east of Damen on Irving Park. This will be the official viewing party for the game. A few people from our front office will be there as will our supporter's section. I doubt I will attend as this is the big halloween night in Chicago. We'll see.

In other MLS action this weekend, D.C. United won on the road at the New York Red Bulls 1-0. Western Conference favorites FC Dallas took down the Colorado Rapids on the road in game one of that series by the score of 2-1. Finally, Chivas USA won at home 2-1 over the 2nd seeded Houston Dynamo.
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5. On a more personal note

MM Arsenal was booted from the playoffs of our men's league when only nine of us showed up for our final match. Way to go out with a bang guys.

After last week's relationship report, things with the afforementioned forbidden fruit have gone a full 360 degrees. We started seeing each other and things looked promising, now they have gone back down the drain. As much as I like her, and as much as I want this to work, and as much as I'm willing to try....I just don't know how much more of the roller coaster I can take. the good news, no more home games (unless DC loses it's series to NY and we hold on against New England.) This would will certainly free up my calendar.

I also got my first chance to play on the field at TOYOTA PARK on Friday the 13th. We hosted the Corporate Cup, my new initiative. For our first year, not bad, we broke even. We had eight teams and played on the stadium field for about 4 hours that afternoon in the bitter cold. I played with Toyota since they didn't have enough players and scored four goals in five matches on our way to a 3rd place finish. (Note: we had to throw the semi-final because there were staff on the team.)
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6. Obligatory reference to THE Ohio State University

The Buckeyes are the unquestioned #1 team in all of college football right now and I really don't care what the computers say. We are hurt a bit because our big non-conference road win this year was against Texas, who has played some of the worst teams in college football. The simple fact is this, when That School Up North comes to Columbus in November, all bets are off. This will almost certainly be a match-up of unbeatens and could be a 1-2 BCS match-up. Further, this could be a better game than any other team in the country would give the Bucks. I hope USC and Arkansas each lose a couple of games because I would really like to see an Ohio State-Auburn clash in Glendale. That is, in my opinion, the only other team that could crack us.

The Heisman belongs to Troy Smith. How Brady Quinn managed to steer himself back into the picture about the awful game he had against Michigan is beyond my comprehension. It just doesn't make any sense. That's not to say Troy hasn't struggled this year, the Penn State game was a nightmare. The difference is simple, Troy's leadership kept the Buckeyes in the game and then, just like that, he came up with one HUGE play to put the game on ice. You will never see the #10 in the silver helmet put up a line like this (24-48, 234 yards, 3 TD, 3 INT.) To be honest, it looked even worse than that.

One more point of Ohio State dominance: Can we lay off the Bucks young defense already? Eight weeks into the season and we are in the top 3 in the nation in scoring defense, allowing just 8.25 ppg. That's incredible when you factor in the road games at Texas and Iowa. Also remember that 20 of the 66 points allowed have come in the fourth quarter when the game was clearly already over with. Keep the starters on the field, which the good ole sweater vest would NEVER do, and we're looking at an unbelievable 5.75 ppg allowed. In fact, watch the replays of the two big road wins and you'll notice that Jimmy keeps the boys fresh by getting his youngsters and back-ups playing time in the first half. This is also how we can send almost our entire D to the NFL and come back and dominate the way we have.

Not bad for a unit that lost nine starters from a year ago, huh?