Some Days Are Good, Some are GREAT

BobLee
January16/ 2000

…. In the pantheon of “good days” yours truly puts yesterday (Thursday) squarely in the “Great One” category.  Certainly the Official National Unveiling of The Butch Era of UNC Football must be noted (and we will) along with “the navy pants brouhaha”  Meanwhile beyond Piscataway NJ there were events unfolding of global significance.  Down G-Vegas way “the post game” has replaced “the game” as the topic du jour.  Our buddy Ersky gets his hands dirty …. And, oh yes, a certain I-Legend achieves Paul Bunyon status.

  Kudos aplenty for The Traveling Tar Heels.  I stop short of imagining that the Top 100 Blue Chippers from sea to shining sea have overnight reordered their “short list” but Butch’s Boyz put on a very fine show indeed.  The Scarlet Knights circa 2008 will not be bowling this season.  Greg Schiano may not be the obvious heir apparent to the JoePa throne atop Mount Nittany.  But a big juicy W is a big juicy W is a big Juicy W.  If the “mo” coming out of Piscataway can be sustained in Kenan on Saturday next look for 1,000s of C-Blue Board Monkeys to be Yee-haaing from their tire swings.  Wal-Mart better stock up plenty of C-Blue to go with that Pirate-Purple …. bandwagoners could be in full parade mode.

   Yeah yeah but what about THOSE NAVY BLUE PANTS?  First it was white shoes …. now Navy pants.  Whats next?  A Tar Heel on the helmet?  Nothing but nothing is so near and dear to a board monkey’s heart than tweaks to a uniform.  OK, maybe “team entry music” but uni tweaks are BFDs for sure.  I like the navy pants.  I say that because (1) I do like’em and (2) I hope to really enrage the anti-navy contingent.   I don’t much care for Erin Andrews’ long hair.  Maybe Erin should try a Sarah Palin “pile-up”?

   Meanwhile downeast the celebration of ECU’s big victory over West Virginia was cut short by “the celebration of ECU’s big victory over West Virginia.”  It can now be revealed that those same EZU “hooligans” who rioted in The Carter over 25 years ago were cryogenically frozen in a secret underground bunker in Grifton.  Most of you probably thought those krazy kids from the mid 80s were now 45-50 y/o city fathers and stalwarts in the various communities east of I-95.  Nope, they froze those loonies and thawed’em out to re-hooliganize Dowdy-Ficklin last Saturday.

   Unbeknownst to many of us, there is a Fans’ Bill of Rights that specifically authorizes Extreme Jackassity in Moments of Extreme Euphoria.  Among my all-time favorite quotes from the Encyclopedia of Loonism was this gem from a Wuff-Loon in the early days of The Era of Chuck.  Chuck’s Pack won a big game over somebody, I think it was FSU, and, duh, the Wuff Loons went over the wall onto the C-F greensward.  Several of the celebrants were injured including one coed who suffered a broken arm.  That aforementioned Wuff-Idiot noted that “that’s the price you pay to have a big time football program”.  Prehaps not enough Pack fans were willing to suffer fractured appendages to keep The Era of Chuck in high gear.  “Broken Arms 4 BCS”  coulda been a catchy slogan.

   So anyhoo, delirious Pirate loons took to the Dowdy-Ficklin turf …. and ran into “a heapa trouble” from at least several Buford Pusser wannabees.  In truth it was only 1-2 over-aggressive security officers but for the purposes of properly building a mountain out of a molehill, lets imply that it was The Ohio National Guard fresh from Kent State in the early 70s.  Throw in the obligatory Bull Connor reference to satisfy the race-bait crowd and folks wanting to can really really smear everything ECU.  I choose not to.  ECU officials quickly moved to divert the armada of trial lawyers (“riot-chasers”) who showed up post-game to hand out bizness cards to any blood-stained rioters they could find.  Instead of appropriately dealing with the handful of “Barney Fifes on steroids” this quickly blew up into a Category 5 pile o’ crap.

   Then Friday (today) Conference USA levied a $10,000 fine on ECU for failure to employ proper crowd control to “preserve the integrity of the competitive venue”.  This is now known as “The Fuddy Duddy Rule” which Conf-USA has in its rulebook to insure that Drunken Jackasses do not charge onto playing fields after “big games”.  Being a “fuddy duddy” ourselves, we applaud Conf-USA’s “Fuddy Duddy Rule” and hope Little Johnny has a similar rule in his rulebook.  

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   Over at UNC System HQ, Friday was a “bad day” for our buddy Erskine.  EB found himseld twixt “a rock and crooked politicians” over the Mary Easley Mess.  NCSU Provost Larry “What rule?” Neilsen had, unbeknownst to everyone except Lady Mary and Mike’s Pals on the NCSU BOT, agreed to pay Lady Easley $170,000 for a job valued, at most, at $30,000.  “An intern with a Day-Timer” could fulfill Mary’s $170,000 “job” (cough, cough) but hiring that intern could not repay the Easleys for various and sundry political favors that NC’s lame duck gubernatorial embarrassment has doled out to his BOT buddies …. Most notably to a “real piece of work” named McQueen “Quik Lube” Campbell McQueen is Mikey’s real estate “inside trader” cohort and NCSU BOT appointee.  

   The Mary Mess was pulled off WITHOUT Erskine’s advance knowledge and in direct violation of UNC System policies …. because it violates pretty much every tenet of honest business dealing.  Men like Clinton and Easley use men like Erskine as “integrity shields”.  Men like Erskine get involved w/ Clinton and Easley-types hoping to “make a difference”.  Some days they can.  Other days they cannot.  This was a “cannot day”. ….. sigh, sob.

    On Friday Erskine was forced to (TAA DAA!) put “lipstick on this pig” by keeping a straight face while he mumbo jumboed Mary’s revised-on-the-fly job description.  Apparently now, in addition to “booking speakers” she is also in charge of keeping alligators out of The Brickyard and dusting off Lou Pucillo’s plaque in Reynolds Coliseum.  Keep in mind that Erskine Bowles HAS A BOSS – The UNC Board of Governors headed by Ms Hanna Gage (a wealthy Democrat contributor herself!).  Erskine did what he was told to do.  Madame Gage should be ashamed of herself. 

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   Your humble correspondent is in Missouri this week for the 100th Anniversary of The Univ Missouri Journalism School – the FIRST J-School in America.  Over 2,000 MU J-School notable alums and journalism poobahs are on-hand …. and one bearded rogue with a twinkle in his eye.  I’ll report on the overall state of American Journalism at a later date but for now …..

   Yesterday I attended a symposium on The Present / Future of Sports Journalism.  ESPN hosted the session.  An auditorium crammed full (over 500) to hear a panel consisting of NCAA poobah Miles Brand, MU’s AD, Sportscenter’s John Anderson, Sonya Steptoe of the Knight Commission and several national sports journalists.  Believe it or not “the Internet” was discussed.  Actually “the Internet” dominated the two hour session.  Who knew ???? …. “the Internet” has effected sports journalism …. NOOOOO, can’t fool these folks!

   It was going along pretty well until about the 1:45 mark when one of the panelists recognized me in the audience.  Quicker than you can say “It’s the legendary BobLee ” I was an ad hoc member of the esteemed panel.  Since the entire room had an affiliation with the state of Missouri I thought it only fitting to announce “Tyler Hansbrough sends his regards to all his fellow Show-Me Staters.”  One of Kid’s J-School classmates was in the audience and texted her …. “your dad just took over the room”.  You can imagine her response.  Indeed, it was a seminal moment in American journalsm history.  

   I proceeded to do 10-minutes of zingers about board monkeys and the looney fringe and Ol’ Roy & The Jayhawk Sticker.  You can imagine that ORW ain’t real popular at Mizzou.  When order was restored my pal Big Jim Sterling headed the security detail getting me out of the auditorium.  Big Jim whispered “I think you just joined Chase Daniel and Carl (Edwards … Jim’s step-son) among the famous sports guys in Columbia.”     

   Sunday night Mizzus and I are having dinner with the President of the Missouri University system.  All in all ….. “a pretty good week”.

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 Who did ORW have to out-recruit at Mizzou to nab Tyler?

I discussed “that guy” with the MU AD after the session !!!

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  I purposely have not mentioned that at 12:10 ET on Thursday my Wile E. Coyote zinger on Joe Biden was broadcast to 20,000,000 God-lovin’ Americans.  The Platinum Pals went nutz since I had prepped them it might happen.  We’re trying to keep the incendiary political stuff over in the secret clubhouse.  

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