Monday Grab Bag: The return of normal service

Now that the most boring week ever is behind us (a week so devoid of anything useful to watch that the country actually started paying attention to womens soccer and non-Tiger golf), we're back onto the summer grind for the next seven weeks.  Baseball!  Labor Disputes! Recruiting News!

Well, 1 out of 3 aint bad.

Today in the bag I'll be looking at what the hell happened to "Our Girls" in Germany yesterday afternoon, more shocking recruiting developments out of Texas, community roster updates for NCAA 12, and the light at the end of the NFL labor dispute tunnel.

Click below for the bag...


 
We now know how Brazil feels - A week ago, when the US womens national soccer team stunned Brazil in extra time and PK's to squeak into the World Cup semi-finals, it sure felt good to be an American soccer fan.  Now, having watched Japan turn the tables by throwing an even greater comeback in our collective faces, in a title game no less, I can only think one thing: the sporting gods are cruel.

Yep, that about sums it up.

Twice the US found themselves up a goal with time seemingly on their side only to see Japan twice snatch victory from America's grasp.  Then, in penalty kicks, which I have never found as odious as other soccer observers, the US played the England to Japan's Germany, choking in the penalty shootout and allowing Japan to walk away with a rather anticlimactic 2-2 (3-1) win in penalties. 

A few at ESPN lost their heads, commenting that this victory will help soothe Japan's national pain over the Fukishima nuclear disaster (this is patently ridiculous, like saying the Hockey Gold in 1980 got the US through an oil crisis and a dark patch in the Cold War; nice story, but a Hollywood-ized version of history).  In reality, this was simply a happy (for Japan) upset over the heavily favored Americans, not a nation saving event. 

For the US, it's been a long 12 years since the best national team in the world brought home a title, and the squad will have to wait until 2015 for another crack at the apple.


Deep in the heart of TexASS  - Contrary to popular perception, the move from the Big XII to the Pac-12 has seemingly had no effect on CU's recruiting in the football capital of the US.  In fact, it's been even better than before.  Maybe some Texans are as sick of that state as the rest of us are... 

Over the past week Embree and staff got verbal commitments from 2 recruits hailing the lone star state, WR Peyton Williams and DE Victor Irokanski, to bring the Texan total to 5 of 11 total commits so far.  In barely 8 months on the job, Ebree has been able to either land or earn commitments from 9 Texans.  To put that in perspective, it took "he-who-must-not-be-named" 5 years to get that many into black-and-gold. 

Sure, all 5 might not stay committed to Dear Old CU come February, but the efforts of Embree and staff (*cough* Bobby Kennedy *cough*) in Texas have been plenty impressive.  Hailing from Texas isn't a sure sign of greatness, but it isn't simply coincidence that the best high school football is played there.


A virtual Juda Parker sighting - EA Sports NCAA football is always a flawed product, and this year is no different.  Regardless of how much time and effort the production team behind the game puts in, the shipped product will always disappoint for one simple fact: they can't use named rosters.  While the rosters are unnamed, they do closely resemble the actual rosters for every team, especially for high profile squads like Ohio State and USC.  There's currently a court case inching its way through the appeals process, which could even lead to completely randomized rosters in every collegiate game.  Boo to that. 

Semi-related: Ralphie finally made it to the virtual gridiron.  She even boots on of the runners as the team takes the field.

I'm sympathetic to both sides: buying naming rights could financially cripple the series, and the money would ruin the convenient hypocrisy of the "amateur" status of collegiate athletes; conversely, people should be paid for use of their likeness.  The point is, I really don't care who wins, I just want real rosters, updated too, "in the game."  There's just something wrong with playing as "HB #5" when I could be playing as Rodney Stewart.

That's where community rosters come in.  I used to have to spend hours adjusting the rosters, naming players, adding un-accounted for freshman (like DE Juda Parker), moving players around, and completely re-doing some stats.  Nowadays, with the internet (which I hear is a series of tubes), I can just download rosters that someone else spent the time working on.  This sidesteps court cases and any effort on my part.  Straight into Speedy's Heisman campaign for me!


Our long national nightmare is almost over - Two weeks ago I was talking with a guy who "works in football," and he laughed at my postulation that the NFL strike was not long for this world.  He said, "You've been reading too much 'Pro Football Talk,'" and "there's still way too much ground to cover; we'll still be at this for a while."  Seems like little uninformed me was right as the lockout appears to only have til the end of this week before the NFL grinds into gear once again.

I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: There's just too much money on the table.  The only thing rich people like more than money is the ability to make even more money.  You can't do that if football isn't being played.  Unlike the NBA, where the owners were possibly losing millions each year, everyone in the NFL was making that sweet, sweet money.  There was no way that a simple labor dispute was going to get in the way of that continuing.  Back to work, boys!


Happy Monday!