It’s All Just Monopoly $$$$…. and

BobLee
August13/ 2014

So now we officially have The Power Five AND a ruling in “the O’Bannon Case”.   Is the world a better, saner place yet?

America still hangs from tenterhooks to see who will start at QB for the Browns ???  Really?  Only one more pro jock (Greg Oden) has smashed his girl friend in the face since Stephen A was suspended, but, hey it’s only been a week.

And I have found a new guy to add to Jack, Jack and Mitch.  His name is Jericho Quinn.

My mamma said “an inch isn’t very long unless you add it to the end of your nose.”  I think she probably heard that from Mark Twain or Pliny The Elder.  The topic drawing that down home aphorism involved “amounts”.

If you had not heard that Ken “The Investigator” Wainstein charged $900+/hour would you have blinked if he “only” charged $400/hour?   I say “yes”; every feigned outrage comment at Ken’s rate would have been uttered at $400 as at $900 so why not go for the $900?   $400/hour is still more than most folks make and pretty much no one not named “Little Carol” or Tom is going to take his report seriously anyway.

Hitler asked his generals “Is Paris Burning” and they lied saying “yes mein Fuhrer” when it wasn’t.   Skeptics (of which there are a few) will ask “Is The Old Well burning?” and if it’s not then the four-year incoming artillery barrage will simply continue.   As with all wars, the only winners are the folks that make the ammunition.

Now one week into The Power Five Era and the term “cost of attendance” is a new buzzword on all the monkey boards.   The same cross-eyed goobers who don’t understand the infield fly rule or what a “cover corner” is can now demonstrate their colossal ignorance discussing “cost of attendance”.   Sports is great at adding new layers of universal misinformation.

As all the devilish details of The Power Five are sliced and diced ad infinitum, don’t waste too much energy on’em.   At the end of the day alls you really care about is (1) beating your hated rival(s) and (2) being a liitle bit better than whatever you consider your school’s “comparables”.   If that doesn’t happen then do as you do now – blame the refs….. Johnny Swofford…. or your current AD or Chancellor or Brd of Trustees.

Whether your school of choice’s annual cost of attendance is $2500 – $5,000 – or $20,000 will not matter one iota to you but you will pretend it does.   For the record; “cost of attendance” will be determined by multiplying the cost of a pair of Dr Dre’ Beats headphones by the price of a large pepperoni & green pepper pizza at your Domino’s franchise then divided by the circumference of Kim Kardashian’s butt on opening day of the upcoming FB season.   Lee Corso will measure Kim’s butt on the first GameDay show and tabulations can begin.  Schools will have the option of using Kim’s butt or Beyonce’s.

Players can opt for a one-time cash payment or the cash equivalent on credit at their school’s campus parking office.

The only tangible change in The Power Five Era for local ACC schools is the likelihood of enduring Savannah State playing “your school” on a 100 degree September Saturday just became statistically zero.   “Cupcakes” as OOC opponents is now about as verboten as onions on ice cream.   Schools with too many cupcakes will be celebrating Christmas In Shreveport.

Power Five ADs are already computing individual power ratings for other Power Five schools to determine “easy wins”.   Early reports have Wake Forest, Iowa State, Illinois, Mississippi State and Colorado as everyone’s most desired OOC opponents.

IF the NCAA get froggy and hits The Flagship with a sledge hammer limiting The Fighting Fedorians to ten schollys/year and then only very slow Cauc kids with 1400 SATs, look for Bubba’s phone to ring a lot looking for a game.  Also, they won’t be “The Fedorians” for much longer if that happens.

As for all the revenue being projected for The Power Five, that’s all Monopoly $$$$ not unlike Ken’s hourly rate.   You’re not paying it nor are you getting it.  The price of bottled water at “your stadium” is the only cost you need to be concerned with.

How much does Clayton Kershaw make on each pitch?  Who cares?

Olympic Sports will start disappearing within three years or morphing into club teams with participating students paying a fee to participate.  Most of you won’t care when/if that happens.

If your Power Five school is not already “an annual top twenty” FB school, the odds on it becoming one now is about as likely as Ol’ Roy having Fats Thomas as a Facebook Friend… or even knowing what a Facebook Friend is.

In The Power Five Era the already rich programs will get richer and the rest will continue to (1) blame referees and (2) change ADs and HFCs every five years or so.

Teams will continue to only be as good as their 3rd string O-lines and embattled Head Coaches will continue to change O or D Coordinators to buy themselves “one more year” of being embattled and/or maligned.

It should take ADs about one more week to realize they can beat the O’Bannon Rule simply by NOT merchandising individual players.   If there is no revenue from merchandising individual players there is no violation.

♦ ♦ ♦

In the literary fiction world of action-adventure heroes the primary icons of the past twenty years are Jack (Reacher) – Jack (Bauer) – Mitch (Rapp) – and John (Rambo).

The second tier of these “men of few words and high bad guy body counts” might be Scott Harvath (Brad Thor), Dewey Andreas (Ben Coes), Sir Alex Hawke (Ted Bell) and Alex “Arcadian” Hunter (Greig Beck).  Matthew Reilly’s Scarecrow is a little-known fave of mine too.

You know I’m an Audible.com guy, not a traditional “reader”.  But read or listen should not detract from the testosterone overload of the plots and their heroes.  Yes, I realize you have your own little-known favorite and you’re free to keep him / them.

NOTE:  I put all the Clive Cussler books in their own category.   I read all the Dirk Pitt’s years ago.  I prefer Juan Cabrillo and the crew of The Oregon these days.

Yeah, I know many of you like Gabriel Alon.  I keep trying but those books are “too Euro” for me.    But I’m glad you like them.natseccover-210

I’ve found a new one that meets all my criteria to join that aforementioned pantheon. His name is Jericho Quinn and his creator is Marc Cameron.  I stumbled on Marc and Jericho about a week ago and am finishing up Book Three in the four book series.

Jericho Quinn is closer to Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp than any of the others.  I REALLY like this guy.

Because Jericho’s adventures are fairly new I definitely recommend reading them in order.   Go to Marc Cameron’s website for the chrono-order.   Each new book builds on the previous ones with new characters and reappearing villains.  “See one… think Two”.

As has been the case since 9/11, the bad guys tend to either be of the Islamo-terrorist persuasion…. and/or “in a cartel”.  Politicians and bureaucrats are pretty much all corrupt and conniving.   As with all literary gendre there is a formula to these stories.   If you are too intellectual to simply read (or listen) to be entertained, choose something else.

Will I be going to see Expendables 3?  Absolutely, won’t you?

♦ ♦ ♦

If you didn’t keep checking back on that last column, the comments/responses got pretty “froggy”.  You might wanna go back and check’em out.  LINK!

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