ThatKidInTheCorner

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January 31, 2005

AVP Line Extensions

In which I admit that AVP wasn't actually that sweet but hold out hope for additional product extensions

I really enjoyed AVP when I saw it this past summer (opening night, no less!). Sure, as a big fan of the two franchises in question, I was something of an easy mark. Naysayers told me it was just going to be tacky like Freddy Vs. Jason, but I wasn't having any of that. Jason and Freddy are downmarket slasher films that lucked into a series of unremarkable sequels; Alien and Predator are seminal science fiction landmarks that were having fun with their brands in a fun and engaging way.

And I did enjoy the film. Sure, the first half was, ahem, a bit slow, but once the Predators started to fight the Aliens, well, THE PREDATORS FOUGHT THE ALIENS. That was more than enough for me. I enjoyed it so much that I ran to the video store to rent it on the first day of its DVD release. Ugh. What a letdown. The first half didn't get any better, and the second half, well, once you know who's on whose side, it isn't so interesting (though it is worth nothing that the PREDATORS STILL FIGHT THE ALIENS). I had big hopes for more Alien-and-Predator sequels, but a second viewing left me unconvinced -- and worried that this film might have been equity-damaging enough to retire both franchises.

Still, if they can't get another theatrical release together, there is still plenty of pop culture and product licensing space for these characters to explore together -- especially if they really want to kill the franchises. Some suggestions:

AVP: The Sitcom: in Two and a Half Bloodthirsty Space Monsters, the Alien and the Predator are unlikely roommates who are entrusted with the care of a wisecracking nine-year-old girl, their long-lost cousin. Watch the Predator fume as alien larvae make a mess on his leather couch and later eat his cereal without asking! Watch the Alien try to deal with the advances of a gay co-worker while stifling her own desires to use the coworker as a host for her embryo offspring! And watch them both hustle to be on time for their cousin's dance recital without letting their bosses know they've skipped work! Only on America's Most Watched Network!

AVP: The Reality Show: the Alien and the Predator join the T-1000, Darth Maul, Pinhead, Chucky, and Tara Reid in an isolated mansion in the Hollywood Hills as they each attempt to conquer their overwhelming passion for bloodshed -- and learn a little bit more about themselves. Sparks fly when Darth Maul interrupts Pinhead putting the moves on Tara Reid in the hot tub, while the Alien and Chucky strike an unlikely alliance to get the T-1000 kicked out of the house...and the Predator reveals the details of his troubled relationship with his father. Only at the 10 spot!

AVP: The Broadcast Team: in a long-welcome upgrade to the Sunday Night NFL broadcast team, ESPN introduces the Alien and the Predator to the broadcast booth. After violently disemboweling Paul Macguire and Joe Theisman live on national television in the first quarter of the season premiere, they shock both network execs and viewers with a poised performance in the booth. All agree that their inhuman shrieking, passion for bloodshed, and random bellowing offer a charming balance to Mike Patrick's play-by-play skills, and mark a considerable improvement over the previous team. Ratings increase considerably and there is soon talk of the Alien and Predator replacing Al Michaels and John Madden on Monday nights.

AVP: Meet The Press: in an attempt to revamp the network and reach a new generation of viewers, CNN hires the Alien and the Predator for a Crossfire-style nightly debate program. The Alien's progressive social welfare (some might even argue socialist!) views offer an appropriate balance to the Predator's neocon agenda, yet their exchanges are heated without crossing the line to shrill. Tune in this week to listen to them debate President Bush's proposed changes to Social Security, and hear their ideas on the one issue they do seem to agree on: human disemboweling tactics to finally get tough on the insurgents in Iraq! The Alien and the Predator: the most trusted names in news!

AVP: I Love The 90s, Part Trois: the Alien and the Predator join Biz Markie, Joel Stein, Michael Ian Black and Kathy Griffin to reminisce and giggle at the music, movies, people and trends that made the 90s the most gangsta decade ever! This is the Alien and the Predator at their snarkiest -- though sometimes the joke's on them! Check out rare footage of the Predator's short-lived grunge outfit "Human Femur Necklace" and the Alien's TRL appearance. Got milk? Good! Then kick back with a nice tall glass, and a box of fat-free Snackwells and join VH1 for I Love The 90s: Part Trois, the series that, like the Alien massacring the colonists on RV-426, keeps going and going and....

AVP: The True Hollywood Story: sobering tale tracking the Predator's meteoric rise to fame, his tragic fall from grace, and the peace and contentment he's finally found in his relationship with God. Hear him discuss for the first time on camera his abusive childhood, his off-and-on addiction to painkillers, his embarassing appearance at the Golden Globes in 1993, his brief career as a Belgian pop star, his short-lived marriage to Paula Abdul, his experimentation with scientology, and his eventual conversion to Christianity and final reconciliation with his father.

Posted by thatkid at 11:32 AM | Comments (0)

January 29, 2005

We Can't Protect This House!

Nike does battle with Under Armour in its Nike Pro(tm) campaign

I imagine there must be nothing quite like the experience of being a start-up company that, following years of struggle and sweat to bring a successful product to market, finds their idea co-opted by their largest and most powerful competitor. You're at once both elated (Check it out! Our idea really was good! We're legit!) and horrified (Holy crud! Now that they took our cool idea, we're toast!).

Such was the lot of Under Armour last Sunday when Nike unveiled the launch campaign for its Nike Pro line of apparel. (Or should I pander even more obediently to the Nike marketing department and use the adjective "performance" in front of apparel?) Started by a former University of Maryland football player in 1996, Under Armour has forged a product line and brand around the principle of high technology/ high performance gear for high performance athletes. Since its founding, the company has expanded from the initial line of microfiber undershirts into six different product categories, and have signed equipment deals with numerous high-profile NCAA and professional teams, as well as several Hollywood studios (Under Armour appeared in Any Given Sunday, The Replacements, and the short-lived-but-dearly-missed Playmakers show on ESPN).

If none of this is ringing a bell (and if you don't watch a LOT of sports, it won't), then we can fast-forward to the brand-defining moment for Under Armour: their 2003 "We Must Protect This House" TV spot. The imagery was as stark as it was obvious -- a football team prepares for a game, washed-out colors tinted towards red and black, strapping their forms into torso-hugging superhero leotards logoed with the Under Armour crest, adolescently smacking each other in the head, all the while building to the climax of the entire team huddled around a lone figure (shot from above, of course) screaming to the heavens, "WEMUSTPROTECTTHISHOUSE!!!" Right. We must. Protect. This house. Where "protect this house" = "we should win our home games." All very serious, of course. The phrase was already floating across the neutral zone from "unattributable quote" to "full-blown sports cliche"; its commercial deployment only sealed the deal. Everyone now knew about protecting one's house, and if you were interested in protecting said house, you had better get some Under Armour.

(Though perhaps worthy of a separate posting, the trend in US consumer sports advertising towards more and more non-sports-related metaphors and product positioning is something I find pretty troubling. Though I understand that many athletes' celebrities transcend the boundaries of sports, watching a few big-budget soccer ads reminds you of just how far afield American sports imagery has wandered. Even the goofiest soccer ads -- and one of the best spots ever involves killer samurai robots -- are fundamentally about the game. That is, Nike, Adidas, etc., try to connect with the skill and joy of playing soccer. American sports ads? They tend to be about the personalities contained within the media context of sports -- Air Jordan, AI, King James, Michael Vick, T-Mac, Tiger, etc. -- and their sundry attributes, and very rarely about connecting with the consumer's experience of the actual sport or even game. But again, that's a longer conversation.)

Thus, it is a testament to Under Armour's success that sports equipment giant Nike has decided to co-opt both their product design and product positioning with its Nike Pro for Athletes line. In case you haven't seen the ads (they're in heavy rotation on sports TV and plastered all over espn.com), they feature sci-fi/ horror-movie style and almost-but-not-quite-familiar celebrity visages. We face the athletes in a bare, narrow, fluorescent-lit hallway, each squaring up to the camera in the chosen stance of their sport -- clutching a football, brandishing a baseball bat, staring down a hitter. We flash from athlete to athlete as the lighting strobes on and off. About two-thirds of the way through, we see interspliced images of, for lack of a better term, scary monsters of the dressed-up B-movie variety (skulls, scorpions, insects, etc. -- think City of Lost Children meets Nine Inch Nails meets that part in Willy Wonka when they're on the boat ride in the trippy tunnel) as each of the athletes' faces is replaced by a different mask, corresponding to each scary monster.

The athletes are, in turn, transformed from vaguely familiar (yet perfectly intimidating) muscle-bound dudes into the sorts of fellows you'd hope not to meet on a battlefield in Mongolia circa 1200 CE. There's erstwhile deodorant pitchman Brian Urlacher wearing a cube of barbed wire. There's LaDanian Tomlinson with three heads and two nasty antelope horns. There's Albert Pujols sporting the title prop from The Mask. There is Ben Roethlisberger become Destro-Skeletor (with a solitary elongated horn). There's Torii Hunter as a Venus Flytrap. And there's Mariano Rivera wearing Ray Stantz's headgear from Ghostbusters, though in this case it conjures up creepy scorpion associations. The spot then flashes the tagline: "For Warriors." Swoosh. The end.

I wish I could say that it was all amateurish and cliched, that Nike had failed in their attempt to subsume Under Armour's positioning. But no. The Nike ads are gorgeous. In my delirious game notes from the NFC Championship game in ALL CAPS is the phrase "FOR WARRIORS! HOW DO I PURCHASE!?!?!" The spot was fantastic the first time, and it's been fantastic ever since. Regardless of the actual product, the aesthetic is fantastic. The imagery is the perfect assembly of borrowed pop-culture signifiers -- visuals half-remembered from the detritus of schlock horror movies, reconstituted in an aggressive and uncomfortable form. We've seen the faces before in our nightmares, or at least what's been sold to us as what scary nightmares should look like. (And we won't worry about describing the line between those concepts -- too po-mo.) Even better, the half-remembered images are elegantly complemented by the half-familiar faces of the about-to-be-famous athletes involved. We've seen them on Sportscenter, but not in a commercial (except for Urlacher). And it totally works, both aesthetically and viscerally. "Put your game face on"? I was sold. Forget protecting the house: I wanna be a warrior!

Still, as slickly produced and executed as the campaign may be (and as punishing as it might prove to Under Armour's business), there is something very unseemly and distasteful about the exuberance with which the ad's theme is trumpeted. As if the war allusions and cliches tossed around by the sports journalists, commentators, and TV talking heads aren't enough, now we need the advertising to adopt a war motif as well? Though it's certainly been argued before, this ad is just the latest reminder of just how inappropriate war-related sports metaphors can be -- ESPECIALLY WHEN THERE'S AN ACTUAL WAR ON. (Missing your pro football violence fix this Sunday? Tune in to the Iraqi elections on FOX News! Carnage and destruction all the live-long day!) Yikes! The ads are beautiful, sure, but you can make beautiful advertising without some primal appeal to our lust for scary masks and broadswords. It's easy to forget that sports are entertainment, an escape from the scary results of real struggles, real wars. Win or lose, everyone gets to eat that night. No one's house gets blown up. When Under Armour co-opted the battle imagery, we could forgive them as an upstart trying to claw their way in; when Nike does it, we have to shake our heads and ask why they couldn't try a little harder. Not only are they plagiarizing the upstart's product and positioning, but they're doing it in an undeniably vulgar way. Nike, I shake my finger at you!

(If only I didn't so desperately crave Ben Roethlisberger's Destro-Skeletor mask for Halloween.)

Posted by thatkid at 4:05 PM | Comments (0)

January 26, 2005

Spring 2005 Course Selection

A complete and thorough listing of my classes at business school

Though I'm admittedly a bit saddened by the prospect of facing down my final semester of business school (and the attendant obligation to secure gainful employment!), my mood is buoyed somewhat by the exciting roster of classes I've assembled for this term -- included below with their catalog descriptions. Check it out, and I think you'll understand why I'm so excited!

B8945-003 High Performance Middle Management: among the school's most highly coveted classes, this course focuses on techniques and strategies for succeeding in organizational life during the crucial "first five years" following business school. Topics include micromanaging low-performing subordinates, the role of non-specific language in strategic communication(s), issuing thinly veiled threats in lieu of real-time feedback, taking credit for other people's work, non-obsequious agreement with superiors, pretending to be interested in colleagues' personal lives, and lowering spousal expectations of your attention(s) and interest(s) in domestic life. Recommended for those students seeking complicated titles within well-branded conglomerates.

B8304-005 Advanced Derivative and Option Analysis in Emerging Eastern European Markets: peopled principally by dipshits in french cuffs who had secured their banking job in the second week of September, this course focuses on the emerging field of creating complicated financial and investment products for immature financial markets. The course will take into account the various forces impacting performance in emerging markets, including the role of graft, the opportunities presented by unsophisticated legal structures, and the value of maintaining positive relations with local business moguls/ mafiosi/ warlords. Particular attention will be paid to the legal structures of off-shore shell corporations, and their specific role in creating asset-backed securities for the highly lucrative (but politically unpopular) human trafficking and arms dealing industries. Blackberry and/ or Treo (Model 650 only) recommended but not required.

B8702-007 Marketing Luxury Goods to Young Families on The Upper East Side: Workshop: this highly interactive, hands-on course will focus on the design and marketing of luxury goods for young investment bankers and their spouses on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Through a series of field trips and interviews with recent business school graduates, students will learn to gauge consumer interest in emerging fads and superfluous product introductions. The course will take a specific interest in identifying the anxieties of young parents and connecting those anxieties to the larger consumer tendencies among the selected demographic to "throw money at things they fear" and "buy whatever New York magazine tells them to." Particular attention will be paid to the seductive effect of otherwise outrageous and stupifying price points in driving purchase decisions among the consumers in question.

B8890-002 The Economics of Highly Addictive Products: while recent regulatory and legal decisions have stunted the development of some sectors of the addictive products industry, the success of the legal pharmaceutical industry has spurred unprecedented scholarship in the economic analyses and implications of highly addictive products. Topics will include the impact of chemical dependence on the price elasticity, supply shocks from competitive "illegal" narcotics, and econometric analysis of advertising-driven shifts in the consumer demand curve. Though the course is inherently technical in nature, it will feature visits from guest speakers, including several actual "addicts," who will discuss their passion for lethal toxins and addictive narcotics (both legal and illicit).

B8522-001 Globalization And Its Impact On The Underclass At Home And Abroad: with all the recent media attention given to issues of globalization, this course will attempt to offer a thorough and unbiased approach to global trade and its effects for consumers and workers both in the developed and developing worlds. The course will focus particular attention on low-income consumers in the West and workers in the developing world, and their differing perspectives on trends in outsourcing, particularly in the manufacturing sector. Topics will include why making sneakers for pennies makes more personal and economic sense than child prostitution, the value of "little fingers" in high-end carpet production, how labor unions at home and abroad hurt consumer choice, and why your outsourced job at the mill helps keep everything cheap at Wal*Mart.

Posted by thatkid at 4:56 PM | Comments (0)

January 24, 2005

Eagles Viewing Post-Game News Conference

News, notes, and reactions from the living room after the big game

The following is the complete transcript of the post-game news conference conducted in my living room following the Philadelphia Eagles' 27-10 defeat of the Atlanta Falcons in the NFC Championship Game, in which the team advanced to their first Super Bowl since I was 4. I watched said game. On a large television. At a bar.

TKITC: First, injuries. Had a tough time with some of the snacks and bar food. Wings in particular. Having some minor GI issues, but nothing that should keep me sidelined for too too long. Going to talk to the doctors regardless. I may have also gone a little overboard with the mozzarella sticks, but I took my cheese drug, so we're not sure what the problem is there. Again, the doctors will give you a complete report later in the week, but if I had to guess, I'd say it was the wings.

The time is yours.

How did it feel to watch the Eagles advance to the first Super Bowl of your adult life?

TKITC: Well, I mean, obviously [smiling], it feels pretty good. Pretty good. I still haven't achieved my ultimate goal, which is to watch the Eagles win a Super Bowl, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy this. Especially in the context of the past three years. You know, we've tried different things in the past. Watched from the basement for the St. Louis game [2001]. Didn't work. Went to the Tampa game [2002], and you all remember how that went. Tried the basement again for Carolina [2003], and just felt like [pause] we really needed to try something different this time. So we went to the bar around the corner. And despite the fact that we'd lost the Pittsburgh game there earlier in the year, it's tough to argue with its mojo now.

Can you talk a little bit about your strategy going into the game?

TKITC: I think it all really started with preparation. I knew I was going to be nervous before the game. Jittery. But I was hungry from eating a light dinner the night before. At the same time, I knew that I just had to take what the defense was giving me and stay within myself. So my plan was that I would do some buffalo wings [as part of the much ballyhooed "Two Pitchers and Free Wings Special" at the local bar] and sip on a beer and see how things went. Also I had a bloody mary. But I didn't do the full brunch or a burger or anything -- I needed to be flexible for a big feeding at the end of the game.

That's very interesting. All season long, you've been known as an excellent third-quarter fan. Can you talk about the adjustments you made at halftime that may have impacted your performance in the second half?

TKITC: Well. Yeah. Yeah. [Pause.] We knew it was going to be important to manage the wing specials properly. We lost track of the wings in the second quarter, we just thought it was important to go on the record with more wings, especially since our group swelled to about nine people by the second half. We needed the wings. We did. So we pounced on the pitchers, pounced on the beer, and it really started to work for us.

Can you give us some insight into how you approached the matchups in the game? Specifically containing Michael Vick?

TKITC: Very early on, it became apparent that the Falcons were running my offense from the 2000 version of NFL Blitz. That is, roll the quarterback to one side of the field, look for a quick option pass to the opposite side, and if it's not there, try to take off running. The key is running everything through the QB, and not being afraid to run. Obviously, the Eagles must have exchanged gameplans with my roommate, because they did a great job bottling that up.

Can you talk a little bit about the fans who were sitting in the corner? The ones who were rooting for Atlanta?

TKITC: You know [chuckling], it's funny. On the way to the bar, we passed an older gentleman who definitely stared at us. And it really got to me. It did. But then I thought, "He's just an old guy. Probably just curious about why these people were wearing so many officially licensed NFL products at this hour in the snow. Probably didn't even know there was a game on." So when I sat down at the bar, I scribbled a little memo to myself in my notebook that said "No one is looking at you funny." And that really stuck for me. [Pause. Very serious.] It did. So every time those guys in the corner would cheer, I would just look down at my notebook and circle those words. Again and again. It was very important for me to remain composed and not start a fight with a stranger over our conflicting professional football allegiances. It would have only hurt the team. We couldn't afford a dumb penalty like that.

We noticed that some of you got pretty choked up during the post-game celebration. How was that for you?

TKITC: It's a very emotional moment. It is. And when you see someone like Donovan McNabb crying -- though he later denied it like a nine-year-old boy who didn't want his friends to know he'd been bawling -- it really moves you. It does. That's all I'll say about that.

Not to get ahead of ourselves, but have you thought at all about your opponent in the Super Bowl, the Patriots?

TKITC: We got a chance to see a lot of that game, and the Patriots are a great team. They are. But what stuck out for me was Deion Branch. HUGE game for Branch. Huge. He caught deep balls, he ran the ball -- just devastating. And I thought, this was the player that I thought I was getting when I drafted him in three fantasy leagues last August. But no, Belichick buried him on the injury list all year, and never really even told us what was wrong with him [shaking his head]. I mean, that's just total crap -- I ended up playing some just horrendous guys at receiver because of that. Guys like [discount MIN WR] Kelly Campbell and one of those random dudes on Jacksonville [Troy Edwards]. So it goes without saying that I'm looking for some payback in the Super Bowl.

Finally, speaking of the Super Bowl, any chance we'll see you in Jacksonville?

TKITC: [laughing] We'll have to see. We'll have to see. $2200 is a lot of money for a ticket, you know, but stranger things have happened. I mean, the you-know-whos actually won the World Series, so who knows.

Posted by thatkid at 9:55 PM | Comments (0)

January 21, 2005

Are Fifteen Yards Worth A Trip To The Super Bowl?

Dare the Eagles deploy the KillShot on Michael Vick? It worked for the Ravens and the Panthers.

Eagles fans are paranoid about this Sunday's NFC Championship game. And with good reason. We've been here three times, and we've lost three times. It hurts our feelings to lose. All we want is the chance to win the Super Bowl. That's all. And I'm sure I'm speaking for a lot of people when I admit that I'm terrified that the Falcons will do the same thing that the Panthers did last year -- go for the early KillShot on our best player, Donovan McNabb.

Oh, you don't remember the KillShot? That was when Donovan McNabb was tripped behind the line in the second quarter by Mike Rucker and absorbed a nasty late hit from Panthers linebacker Greg Favors. McNabb was on his back with his legs doubled up over himself when Favors dove into the underside of his legs and crunched McNabb's knees into his ribs, tearing his rib cartilage. McNabb is a tough guy, and he tried to play through it, but he was hurt. He left the game for a series, got shot up with a painkiller, came back, threw three picks, and didn't end up finishing the fourth quarter. The hit from Favors -- who later insisted that it was a clean hit and he didn't hear a whistle -- ended the game. No penalty was called. McNabb didn't complain. That was it. Game over. Panthers advance to the Super Bowl.

The Panthers weren't the first team to deliver the KillShot in a conference championship game. In 2001, 340-pound Ravens defensive tackle Tony Siragusa threw himself on Oakland QB Rich Gannon, driving him into the turf and separating Gannon's shoulder. Late hit. Fifteen yard penalty. $10,000 fine from the NFL. But no more Gannon, and no more Raiders. The Ravens advanced and eventually won the Super Bowl.

So why can't the Birds do it? Why not look for the KillShot on Vick? Is it not worth it? The Falcons best player is Michael Vick. Against the Rams in the divisional round, the Falcons looked like some scary NFL version of the University of Oklahoma circa 1985. The cliche with those old OU teams was that just couldn't prepare for their speed. Same with Vick. He's just faster than everyone else. In the entire league. With Vick at the helm, the Falcons know have a puncher's chance to win this game. Without him, they're getting pounded. One player stands between the Eagles and the Superbowl. With so much on the line, why not go for the KillShot early? Why isn't anyone talking about this?

As much as I don't want the Birds to lose, I can't imagine rooting for the KillShot. The Eagles I grew up with, the Buddy Ryan Eagles, would have gone for the KillShot. I mean, that was their whole thing: the Bodybag Game against Washington, the abusive Monday Nighter against the Oilers, the freakin' bounties that Ryan allegedly put on opposition kickers. Those Eagles really wanted to hurt people, and we know that Eagles fans aren't above rooting for that.

But I think the current administration is just too principled for the KillShot. These guys have class -- and maybe that's their problem. Andy Reid's Eagles are a study in consistency and patience. Andy Reid doesn't just want to win, he wants to win playing his game, his way. Same with McNabb, who even seems to be avoiding running the football because he doesn't want to be pigeon-holed as a running quarterback. They're better than the KillShot, and they want to prove it. But maybe the nice-guy approach needs to be benched this week in favor of some ruthlessness. It might be time to bare the teeth and get serious about the violence. Maybe even fly Buddy up from his mythical horse farm in Kentucky for a pre-game pep talk -- complete with a schedule of cash prizes for injuring select Falcons players. For Eagles fans, those fifteen yards would be more than worth the trip to Jacksonville.

I just don't think these Eagles will do it. And that's probably a good thing. (Unless they lose.)

Posted by thatkid at 1:38 PM | Comments (0)

January 20, 2005

The Inevitable Opening Salvo of Suckiness

In which I go back to school for the last last time, and am reminded why most people don't like MBAs

Went to the first class of my final semester as a grad student this morning. I was pretty fired up for the class in specific, and relatively enthusiastic about returning to school in general. It's the final semester and I have a great roster of classes -- this term would be all about thinking and learning. It would be chill.

But no.

Twenty-eight minutes into the ninety-minute class, following a brief introduction and survey of the course syllabus, the professor asked the class if there were any questions. A hand shot up.

"Yes?"
"I have a question."
"Go ahead...."
"Will the exam be take-home or in-class?"

ARGHGRH!! AHGHAGH!!! UHGHGUGHJGGUHGAHG!!!!!!!
UGHYTEHRYHHGGG? GGUSHETSHJSH??? SHSHGIFGOIHO!!!!!!!
&@#$@&#%!!!.....IUGHHGUHGUH!!!!!
(This is me having a seizure.)

This is it. Our final semester. No potential employer is going to ask you about your grades. No one cares. We're here to learn and enjoy. That's all. Soak it up. After this semester, we'll be vomited back into the job market for the final time. We will literally never have it this good again -- so sit back and enjoy. BUT NO! All this poltroon can come up with is a question about the exam format, and, more specifically, the implicit request that the exam should surely be a "take-home" test and that anything more would be ridiculously burdensome. UNBELIEVABLE. I was embarrassed. For her, for all of us. Is this really the best we can do? Is this it?

Ugh. And the worst part is that the poltroon in question went to the same place for undergrad as I did. She is absolutely brand-damaging for said undergraduate institution, let alone my current education brand (which, in all fairness, I don't take as seriously because the exercise of b-school is a bit vo-tech for my tastes). Unreal. I felt like marching her over to the admissions office and demanding to know precisely who was responsible for her. WHICH ONE OF YOU DID THIS? WHO? WHO?!?!?!?!

And then I remembered that there's a reason why most people don't care for folks with MBAs. And I can't say that I blame them.

Posted by thatkid at 12:13 PM | Comments (0)

January 19, 2005

Through The Wire

It seemed realistic, but not that realistic

Among the many charms of HBO's The Wire (now on hiatus -- BOOOO!) is the detailed realism offered in its portrait of the big-city drug trade. Beyond focusing on the power struggles among the rival drug gangs or the drug dealers' relationships with their community (both legitimate and criminal), The Wire offers a view into the quotidian mechanics of selling drugs in Big City America. Viewers are shown the drug-dealing supply chain starting from the sourcing of The Package through the intermediate distributors all the way down to the street-level retail trade, complete with the local managers, their muscle, and their middle-school runners. Though the details serve mainly as a backdrop for the dramatic action, they're nonetheless a fascinating, if not essential, element of the show.

Much of the detail apparently comes from creator David Simon, whose prior life (before he became an HBO "Series Creator" artiste) included a book chronicling the West Baltimore drug trade called The Corner. This we knew (though we haven't yet read the book). What we didn't expect was just how dead-on some of the details actually are -- and how much influence the show has on the folks it's allegedly portraying.

Did Carmelo Anthony play on Avon's team against Prop Joe's crew?: there was something of an argy-bargy a few months back when an underground DVD featuring NBA superstar Carmelo Anthony surfaced in West Baltimore. The scandal was that the DVD was something of an extended warning from a drug kingpin regarding his disapproval of snitches. Hmmmm. Carmelo apparently was featured rather innocently, but it certainly doesn't flatter him to show up in some drug dealer's instructional video for beating down police informants. Perhaps the most interesting part of the story, beyond the West Baltimore connections with Carmelo, were the names of some of the folks involved:

In August 2003, a federal grand jury indicted Stewart and 31
co-defendants for their alleged involvement in the drug trafficking
enterprise. Agents also seized more than $90,000, handguns and four
luxury vehicles -- including Stewart's $100,000 Mercedes-Benz CL.

"It was a huge case," said Anthony Barksdale, acting chief of the
city's organized crime division, who spearheaded Operation Arizona.

That's right -- Anthony Barksdale, same as The Wire's first family of drug distribution. Pretty nifty.

Errr, I think this has something to do with the difference between "descriptive" and "normative": as a viewer, I always assumed that all the details on the drug trade offered by the show were nuggets taken from real-life observations. More than that, given the time it takes to get a script to the screen, even for a TV show, I assumed that all of the techniques and methods employed in the show were old news by the time I watched on a given Sunday night. Ummm, not exactly. Check out the details in this little nugget that dropped on Monday:

While announcing a crackdown on Friday of a cocaine ring, police said their investigation was hampered by the suspects' habit of switching cell phones — a technique for evading electronic eavesdropping they picked up from TV.

"Believe it or not, these guys copied 'The Wire,'" one of the investigators, Sgt. Felipe Rodriguez, said at a news conference. "They were constantly dumping their phones. It made our job so much harder."

Yikes! You're telling me that the show was actually helping the drug dealers avoid the cops? Those guys need to get Freamon on the job, no? And in case there was any doubt where they got the idea to dump their burners (dump their burners!), it turns out that the drug dealers were steady viewers:

While doing business by cell phone, the suspects often spoke to each other about "The Wire" after it aired on Sunday nights, Rodriguez said. Some of the officers listening to them also were fans.

"If we missed anything, we got it from them Monday morning," the sergeant said of the television show.

Could that be any more postmodern? The cops who use a wiretap to catch criminals are featured in a television program about cops who use a wiretap to catch criminals are able to glean information about said television program in the process of using a wiretap to catch criminals. Deconstruct that!

Posted by thatkid at 4:37 PM | Comments (0)

(Two) NFL Stats I Want To See

And which I might calculate myself if I was so moved (and found myself with a lot of free time)

Somewhere in the babbleplex of last weekend's NFL talking-head analyses, I heard some commentator state that the Indianapolis Colts need to focus more on defense in the coming year because "70 percent of their cap money is devoted to offense." Hmmmm. This is very interesting. Hadn't heard someone drop a number like that before. And it set my wheels a-turnin'. Where did he get this data? Could I get this data too?

And that's when I realized I now had two (2) NFL statistics that I really really wanted to see:

(1) Pig-pile fumble recoveries: before getting to the salary cap thing, I really want someone to break out a season or two's worth of film and tell me what percentage of loose balls and fumbles that are consumed by the pig pile (I dunno if that's the official term, but it seems to be what Madden calls it when there's a fumble and a bunch of dudes pounce on the ball, requiring four officials and a solid three to four minutes worth of sorting out and peeling off before we know who has possession of the ball) are recovered by the defense. That is, I want to know how often the defense recovers the ball at the bottom of the pile, because it seems like they end up with it a solid 75 percent of the time. (And I only say 75 percent because I can't remember the last time the offense ended up with the ball and want to play it relatively safe in my estimation.) My hypothesis is that when the ball is at the bottom of the pig pile, it's a free ball -- whoever had it at the beginning is unlikely to have it at the end, because there's going to be a fight, and the fight doesn't have any rules (we hear rumors of eye-gouging and testicle-twisting). Therefore, in a fight with no rules, the more desperate side will likely win. A lost fumble is a crushing blow for an offense -- and the mere sight of the loose ball has to trigger feelings of defeat and loss. It also must subconsciously create scenarios of blame and finger-pointing: why did that pretty-boy QB/ RB/ WR/ TE fumble the damn ball? After all our hard work? For the defense, however, a recovered fumble is a triumph; it's one of the biggest plays the defense can make, and is lauded as such. More importantly, all eleven defenders are in on the play -- they're ALL excited to get the ball, and will all go after it like crazed lunatics. Thus, I would argue that since the defense is much more interested in recovering the fumble than the offense, it is very likely that they recover the fumble in the pig pile an overwhelming percentage of the time. Or, in sportscaster cliche, the defense "just wants it more." Now I just need some data to test it.

(2) Salary Cap Versus Performance by Position and Unit: admittedly inspired and emboldened by the baseball sabermetrics stuff, I would really like to see salary cap numbers by position and side of the ball for each team, and try to measure efficiency versus dollars spent. That is, as an NFL GM, you have a finite number of dollars to allocate each year. How you choose to allocate them is up to you, but you need to address your offense, your defense, and your special teams. Drilling down one more level, you then have to allocate by position; roughly speaking, this means QBs, RB-WRs, and line on offense, D-line, linebackers, and secondary on defense, and returners, general special teamers, and kicking specialists on special teams. With those numbers, you should then be able to compare each team's salary cap allocation to selected Key Performance Indicators (KPIs for the MBA geeks in attendance) for each unit: yards gained, yards surrendered, points scored, points given up, passing versus rushing, etc etc, and arrive at some general conclusions about (a) which teams spend their dollars most efficiently by position and by unit, and (b) which allocation strategy will produce the best results (that is, the most wins). I'm led to believe that something close to this analysis exists here at Two-Minute Warning, but I haven't been able to find it. I'll post a link to anything I do find.

Anyhoo, I'll stop now, with the caveat that for all my blather about the stats and whatnot, my favorite part of the game is really just the sanitized violence of it all. There. I said it. Read into that as you will.

Posted by thatkid at 11:37 AM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2005

Where Else Would I Learn About Broad Social Trends?

Time does what it does best: come up with a silly name for a loosely defined trend!

Today's mail included the most recent (dated January 24, 2005) issue of Time. Beneath the double-sided cover-wrap hawking the latest edition of the Time Almanac and adjacent to a promise to reveal "The Truth About SOCIAL SECURITY" was the cover splash: "Meet The Twixters, young adults who live off their parents....They're not lazy...THEY JUST WON'T GROW UP." Twixters. Right. They're not Tweens...they're not Hipsters...they're the Twixters! Ignoring for a moment the mystery of exactly how these issues of Time continue to find their way to my mailbox (as I have never actually paid them for a subscription...I think it has something to do with some sort of credit-card come-on from a few years back), the cover story did lead me to pause for a moment in admiration. Say what we will about the general relevance and/ or market niche of the weekly newsmagazine in the Internet Age, but we cannot deny the flair of the Times and Newsweeks of the world in doing one specific thing: identifying and naming extremely generic and broad social trends.

Remember how they taught us what a yuppie was? Or how to wear flannel and be part of grunge? Imagine that you'd been surrounded by people who'd forsaken bread and pasta in favor of six helpings of bacon at each meal -- without the newsweeklies, you might not have know about the Atkins craze!

Without getting into the content of the article (the basics = more and more people in their 20s are forsaking Marriage And Kids by age 22 in favor of job-hopping, moving around a lot, and having sex with lots of different people, which, ahem, shouldn't come as too much of a surprise to anyone who's within three decades of their 20s), it does clue you in a bit to the market for the newsweekly. That is, it isn't so much for breaking news, and it certainly isn't for a younger demographic. Sure, each of the big newsweeklies can boast a few venerable columnist types who can offer us some in-depth analysis or insider dope on the major political happenings of the past week, but in terms of new information, the weekly format seriously restricts the amount of new information that each issue can offer. This has always been the case, of course (we've had newspapers for a few hundred years), but the proliferation of Internet news, the 24-hour cablers, and an overall media environment that gobbles up and chews out stories in hours rather than days means that the newsweeklies sit even farther away from the stories that occupy the day's agenda than ever before. So, if it's tougher to do news in a meaningful way, there's plenty of room for lifestyle pieces, opinions about which products are most worthy of consumption, and broad social commentary about large demographic trends -- all aimed for a market that is decidedly suburban and middle-income. (Also, don't forget the quarterly issue with the word "Jesus" or "God" on the cover. Those do well too.) We could say that the evolution of the newsweeklies fits into the broader transformation of the product that is The News, and that other similar big news brands will be forced to admit that they're lifestyle magazines as well (New York Times, we're looking in your direction), or we could just say that the marketing department won, and that the editorial direction of Time is dictated by subscription growth and advertising revenue. That is, give 'em puff pieces on the latest anti-aging treatments and advice on the best new cell phones, and we can all collect nice paychecks and buy flat-screen TVs.

Either way, if you want to make sure you're up on the latest manufactured buzzwords and names for exciting new demographic groups, then get thee a Time subscription! Or at least pretend to apply for a credit card.

Posted by thatkid at 4:27 PM | Comments (0)

January 17, 2005

Their Library Beats Your National Parliament Building

In Which I Return to Seattle for the Second Time in Five Months

Right. So over my first 28 years I had been to Seattle exactly 1.2 times (where the vaguely defined 0.2 of a visit will refer to an ill-fated business trip that involved hopping into a rental car at SEATAC and high-tailing it to Portland). Then, over the past five months, I go to Seattle twice, once on leisure and once as part of a legitimate business jaunt. Good stuff both times through -- I really can't say enough about the land of lattes. My highlights:

Pro Sports For The People: Got a chance to check out the Sonics take on the Clip Show at Key Arena. Very solid experience. The tickets were reasonably priced, refreshments were ample and creative (lots of tricky microbrews available at the arena -- more on the microbrew thing later), we were officially upgraded to the lower bowl midway through the second quarter by a Sonics employee (which denied us the opportunity to unofficially upgrade ourselves) and the crowd was young and vibrant. I think it must be my big-city East Coast home that leads me to think of a young crowd at a sporting event as extraordinary; I'm too used to normal folks being priced out of the market by the corporate types.

It's on the water; that means "eat the fish": though it doesn't necessarily fit into my larger theory on fast food (briefly summarized, said theory argues that as you move east to west in the continental US, the burgers and mexican food get better, but the pizza and sandwiches get worse), the seafood is absolutely the way to go in the greater Seattle-Tacoma metro area. I did very well with some fish tacos at some fresh-mex franchise as well as some shrimp and salmon at a proper dinner.

Speaking of food-and-drink, VELCOME TO HOUSE OF BEER!: while the rest of the country has moved on from the fancy craft beer fad (and beer in general), you can still walk into pretty much any bar in Seattle and be confident that you won't recognize 98 percent of the beers on the menu. Tempting as it was to trot out the Sam Adams routine, I mostly did in Seattle what I do in every other bar I walk into -- order one of my two signature drinks: (1) "I'll have what he/ she's having" or (2) "Make that two of those."

Not purple and pink, but not bad: in terms of nifty public architecture, you really can't say enough about what Seattle's got going on. In addition to the Paul Allen-funded fantasy castle that is the Experience Music Project, Seattle also has a phenomenal new public library, courtesy of celebrity architect Rem Koolhaas. Really impressive stuff. The funny thing is that you try to chat up the locals about how beautiful their city is, and specifically their public infrastructure and architecture, and all they can tell you is how they don't have good public transportation. Right. Trust us, Seattle, your shiny buildings are a lot cooler than some crappy light rail system that no one will want to ride anyway.

In case you were thinking of taking a shot at him: got the tour of the MSFT Redmond campus from a friendly older gentleman driving a shuttle bus. After he shared some details on the drainage system on the company soccer field ("Same as they have in the Seahawks stadium") and the total number of buildings ("70 and counting!"), I fed him the softball question that I just assume everyone asks: where is Bill Gates' office? "Oh, well that would be Building X, on the Yth Floor." Pause. "But you'll never make it that far" comma he added ominously, before filling me in on the details of the security system ("They have cameras everywhere, more than Vegas"). And here I thought I might drop in for a cream soda and some video soccer!

Didn't make it back to Tacoma, though. Sigh.

Posted by thatkid at 6:25 PM | Comments (0)

Fredex Delivers on Sundays (At Least At Press Conferences)

The Sultan of Slot Makes PTI!

The most recent version of the Philadelphia Eagles, especially their head coach and star quarterback, make an honest and concerted effort to be bland, boring, and nondescript in their formal dealings with the media. Press conferences, soft-focus TV sitdowns, newspaper interviews -- all feature slightly different riffs on the standard "We're gonna play 'em one game at a time/ Just happy to be here" family of sports cliches. Which, given the jealous and often vicious intentions of the Philly sports press, is a pretty wise plan. Just say enough to get through the interview, and don't give the jackals anything they can sink their teeth into.

Of course, the arrival of TO this summer turned the vanilla-press-conference paradigm on its head a bit, and we've seen glimpses of joy (or at least chuckles) at some of the press conferences and interview sessions from both Coach Reid and Number 5.

And then there's The People's Champ, Freddie Mitchell (!).

Not only did he enjoy a huge game on Sunday (2 TDs, one a fantastic play off a deflection -- and it could have been 3 TDs if he hadn't fumbled on the goal line), but he backed it up with an absolutely virtuoso performance in the post-game press conference. Though they showed some of the snippets as part of the ESPN highlight package, Freddie's sublime interview genius DEMANDS that one watches the whole video -- if only to marvel at his bowtie and Indiana Jones fedora getup. The interesting thing is that he was paired with Eagles RB Brian Westbrook on the podium (a quiet, humble guy if there ever was one). Maybe the most hilarious thing about the whole press conference is that the assembled newshounds may have actually crossed the "laughing with/ laughing at" line with Freddie; that is, I think they were actually laughing AT him. Loudly. Some highlights:

On the last time he had such a busy game:
"Last time I had a game like this? Goes back to UCLA, Fiesta Bowl, 9 catches 185 [laughter from press -- I guess you just don't hear guys quoting their old college stats that frequently] against Wisconsin."

Is it hard to come in and make plays?
"I'm a special player [laughter from assembled press, unclear if Freddie was in on the joke here]....I want to thank my hands for being so great [laughter gets louder, and I want to believe Freddie knew he was being cute]."

How do you feel about stealing the show?
"I'm trying to take a humble approach....I want to say hi to all my new friends out there [more laughter]."

Were you a centerfielder at UCLA?
Yes. [Healthy pause.] One of the best [scattered chuckles -- of COURSE he was one of the best!].

Finally, they asked Westbrook what they'd need to do next week -- and at this point, even humble Brian was in on the act:
"We just have to go out, play our game, get Freddy the ball, and win."

With a victorious local press conference in hand, Freddie takes his show national this afternoon with the boys on PTI for the "Five Good Minutes" segment. Look for an update should Freddie offer any additional insights into the specifics of his specialness as a player.

Posted by thatkid at 4:05 PM | Comments (0)

January 12, 2005

The People's Champ Speaks!

Errr, I hadn't heard "The Sultan of Slot"

I'm beginning to feel borderline ashamed by the frequency of my Philadelphia Eagles-related posts. Not that I post that frequently (I don't). And not that there's anything wrong with blogging about one's preferred entertainment product(s). (There isn't.) It's just that when I do post, it seems to be about the Eagles. But what with the playoffs and my ticket to said NFC Divisional Playoff this Sunday, The Birds are monopolizing more than their fair share of my Internet time. (So there.)

[N.B.: I have refrained from posting about The History of the Eagles DVD set, their playoff marketing campaign ("One Team, One City, One Dream") AND Bringing The Heat, journalist Mark Bowden's (of Blackhawk Down and Killing Pablo fame!) account of the 1992 Eagles season. So far.]

Anyhoo, one of the big stories heading into Sunday's game is how effectively Eagles receiver Freddie Mitchell will fill in for missing superstar Terrell Owens. Though Mr. Mitchell has enjoyed, ahem, limited success in his first three seasons with the Eagles, he has never lacked for confidence (even if it reeks of insecure posturing). Mitchell sat for an interview with the Eagles web site today. As loyal Fredex fans might expect, hilarity ensued:

PE.COM: Any current travel plans?
FM: I'm going to go to Africa to see Virginia Falls with (actor) Jaleel White and (Major League Soccer's) Freddy Adu. We're going to Freddy's hometown. We're going to go see where he was born. That's all I do is travel. I like to see how different cultures are.

That's right. Freddie is looking forward to going to Africa with Urkel. And Freddy Adu. They'll discuss the different spellings of their first names on the plane! "All I do is travel." Personally, in terms of Eagles wide receivers, I preferred the kind where all they did "was catch touchdown passes." Even if they did have serious drug problems.

Also, Freddie discusses country line dancing(!), Mariah Carey(!), and his upcoming cameos on various TV shows(!!!!). All that's missing is some extensive third-person self-referencing. Pure genius!

Posted by thatkid at 8:38 PM | Comments (0)

January 9, 2005

The Wisdom of Cliques

In which we explore the collective intelligence of the folks who pass through my apartment

James Surowiecki's nifty new book The Wisdom of Crowds (buy it here) opens with the story of the 1906 West of England Fat Stock and Poultry Exhibition. Among the featured attractions at the exhibition was a contest where visitors could wager on the weight of an ox; the contestant with the guess closest to the actual weight of the ox would win a prize. In attendance at the Exhibition was an eighty-five-year-old scientist named Francis Galton, who wanted to use the guesses from the contest to prove some points about the intrinsic failings of democracy; specifically, he wanted to show that the average contestant didn't know very much at all. Galton was then as shocked as anyone to discover that the average contestant's guess (that is, the arithmetic mean of all 787 guesses) was 1,197 pounds. The actual weight of the ox was 1,198 pounds. The crowd was almost exactly correct.

Pretty cool stuff. Surowiecki's book is chock full of examples of how collective decision-making (that is, harnessing the power of a group of people) routinely outperforms single decision makers, from financial markets to pro football point spreads to predicting which films will win Oscars. Emboldened by the book as well as a course I had taken in Behavioral Finance (for a good overview of this nascent field, check out this site), I wanted to see if I could recreate the uncanny effects of collective wisdom in my apartment.

The premise was fairly simple. At the end of November, I filled a glass jar with jellybeans and posted instructions next to the jar: write your name and guess on a slip of paper, closest guess to the actual number of jellybeans as of January 1, 2005 wins a dinner cooked by yours truly (a prize of almost inestimable value!). We get a fair amount of traffic in our apartment (especially around the holidays) and I figured that we would be able to generate a decent sample size. In the interest of increasing that sample size, we were lenient about multiple guesses from single contestants -- the only requirement for multiple entries being that you couldn't guess again if you could remember what you guessed the first time. In terms of strictness and scientific precision, the contest was admittedly amateur hour, but given the simplicity of the premise and the thinking behind it, I figured that (even with all the sloppiness involved) we might still create some good data.

In total, our jar of jellybeans yielded 31 total guesses from 22 different people. (I was hoping to get 50 guesses from almost that many people; I guess we're not as popular as we thought. Sigh.) A number of different methodologies were employed, with those who chose a more scientific approach inspiring more than a few "What's the formula for the volume of a cylinder?" conversations. Of the 31 guesses, the highest guess was 3,417 (complete with extensive scratch work in we assume the hope of securing partial credit!) and the lowest was 123. The average (mean) of the 31 guesses was 712.5, while the median guess was 593 -- implying that most of the guesses were below the average, but that the average was increased by outliers on the high end. The standard deviation of the 31 guesses was just short of 577; only the maximum and minimum guesses sat outside one standard deviation of the mean.

The actual number of jellybeans in the jar was 745. The winning guess, 732, was actually very nearly dead-on. The winning guess was also the only guess that outperformed the average of 712.5. Only six of the guesses were within one hundred jellybeans of the actual number. True to the promise of The Wisdom of Crowds, the average of the guesses was more accurate than all but one of the individual guesses.

Obviously, the experiment wasn't perfect. The sample size was pretty tiny, and allowing multiple guesses per entrant compromises the results a bit. In an ideal world, we'd have solicited tons of guesses and forbidden people from entering more than once. All that said, the collective wisdom effect actually ended up working out! The average guess turned out to be pretty close to the actual number, despite all the experimental fuzziness. Vindication was ours -- our clique is just as individually dumb and collectively intelligent as the folks at the 1906 West of England Fat Stock and Poultry Exhibition! (We also, on average, have more teeth.)

Posted by thatkid at 8:33 PM | Comments (0)

January 5, 2005

Hot Teams With Great Chemistry They're Not

Which of the Birds' potential opponents in the divisional playoff boasts the biggest jerkface? It's a tougher call than you think.

The time is set (Sunday January 16th, 1 pm), the location is set (glamorous Lincoln Financial Field in South Philadelphia), and the opponent has been narrowed to one of three teams (the Seattle Seahawks, the St. Louis Rams, or the Minnesota Vikings, pending the outcome of the Wild Card games) for the Eagles divisional playoff game next weekend. While the team has earned some time off by securing the best record in the NFC and the #1 seed for the NFC playoffs, the fans (for whom the supporting of football isn't quite as physically demanding as the playing of football) are ravenous for more football, and specifically, more competitive Philadelphia Eagles football -- something we haven't seen in three weeks. Instead, we are left sitting on our hands, scouring the Internet for Eagles-related articles we may have missed, and wondering (a) which potential opponent the Birds will face and, more importantly, (b) which potential opponent we would most like to face.

It's very easy, as a neurotic fan who's been disappointed by your pro football franchise of choice on more than one occasion, to be nervous about the playoffs right now. The Birds haven't played a competitive game in a while, and we really don't know what they're going to look like without TO. (NB: We fear that they'll look like the team that lost the NFC Championship game a year ago and should have lost to Green Bay in the Divisional Round.) Are we being set up for disgrace and despair yet again?

And then you take a look at the teams they could play in the Divisional Round, and you realize why the Eagles will be favored by at least 4.5 points in that game. Not only did all three of the teams involved stumble into the playoffs (two needed gift wins from teams playing their second-stringers, the third got in after losing in Week 17 to a team with a losing record), but all three are boasting a Grade-A jerkface that simply has to be crippling them internally. None of these teams look like the Patriots from 2001 or the Panthers from 2003 -- focused underdog teams that are all on the same page and are playing their hearts out. Nope. All three of these groups have a serious jerk at a key position -- so jerky, in fact, that it's something of a struggle to decide who is the worst. The nominees:

Seattle Seahawks, Shaun Alexander: on fourth and one from the one yard line, with his team needing a touchdown to win the game and earn a home game in the playoffs, the Seahawks call a quarterback sneak. TOUCHDOWN! Seattle to host playoff game! Hurrah! Only it turns out that Seahwaks RB Shaun Alexander was a yard away from sharing the NFL rushing title, and had he gained that yard, he would have rushed for the most yards in the NFL this year. Note that this is also a contract year for Mr. Alexander. After the game, Alexander explained, "We were going to win anyway. We were on the freakin' goal line, and I got stabbed in the back." As you might expect, the media aren't letting this one go quietly. Go team!

St. Louis Rams, Mike Martz: a few weeks after telling reporters that backup QB Chris Chandler "held the team hostage" by, I suppose, not being a good enough player(?), Martz's life was apparently threatened by offensive lineman Kyle Turley, such that security needed to be summoned to escort Turley from the building. Right. But after an unimpressive gift win against the Eagles' second- and third-stringers and a missed FG by the Jets, the Rams are in the playoffs and Martz is telling everyone what a genius he is (again)! Nothing cements leadership like blaming those who work for you when things go wrong!

Minnesota Vikings, Randy Moss: with a few seconds remaining in the Vikings Week 17 game against Washington, and the team needing to recover an onside kick in order to have a chance to win the game and secure a playoff spot, Randy Moss took off his helmet and headed for the locker room. Right. The team's best player left. Before the game was over. The quotes after the game were absolutely priceless. From coach Mike Tice: "I understand his frustration, but we can't let our frustrations make us make poor decisions of poor judgment." (No indeed. Those are the worst sorts of decisions to make.) From wide receiver Marcus Robinson: "I wasn't too much worried about it. That's Randy Moss. He can do basically what he wants to do. Definitely, he did what he did." (Yes. He definitely did.)

Of the three, I actually think that Alexander is the most defensible. I mean, it's pretty selfish, yes, but this is a contract year for him and the delta in the money Mr. Alexander will be able to demand based on that one additional yard ("NFL Rushing Champion" is worth a lot of money to certain NFL general managers) might actually be significant. It helps the brand. Bashing your players/ employees when times are tough is bad news no matter what business you're in, as is quitting on the people you work with. Bad, bad news. Playing hard and then running your mouth and being selfish afterwards? Not so sweet, but not crippling. Mr. Alexander, you're the least jerky jerkface of the three! Congrats!

From a macro level, nonsense like this doesn't really matter all that much. NFL Football is about total strangers pushing each other around on television for a couple hours, and team chemistry and whatnot doesn't usually matter if you're better at pushing people around than the other team. Still, sometimes it does matter, and sometimes teams with the right chemistry get hot and end up beating teams that were expected to be superior at pushing people around (see above: Patriots and Panthers). But at least Eagles fans can rest assured that they won't be facing one of those sorts of teams with the exciting chemistry; if they lose, it'll be because they got pushed around.

Posted by thatkid at 4:31 PM | Comments (0)

January 4, 2005

And Starring JB As Himself

A Jack Russell terrier moves in for a week -- with predictably hilarious results!

Fittingly coinciding with the turn of the new year, my sitcom existence enjoyed a pretty cool season finale episode this past week. As longtime viewers of the show certainly know, we traditionally end the fall season with our big New Year's Reunion Show, in which we bring back all of your favorite guest stars from previous episodes for the very special two-hour New Year's Bash Spectacular (we do something similar in the spring as well). Yet unlike previous finales, this year's episode boasted a few shocking twists: we eschewed our traditional road trip to central New Jersey for a location in NYC, and we had a dog for a week.

A dog! I did not have a dog (or any sort of pet) growing up. Neither did any of my close childhood friends, though some did have cats. If anything, I was always a little wary of dogs; I would guess mostly because a rather large German Shepherd bit me when I was like ten. So in re: dog maintenance and upkeep, I'm something of a rookie. I've always enjoyed dogs -- if nothing else, they do an excellent job of filling in quiet moments during the day -- but I can't say I've ever really understood why people got so excited about them. Thus, the dogsitting assignment upon which our sitcom embarked a week ago was precisely the sort of fish-out-of-water/ new-roommate situation that always creates fantastic comedy!

Luckily, our dog for the week, JB, was quite the talented guest star. JB was exactly the sort of dog that our show demanded. And by that I mean he was "as close to perfect as an animal who doesn't speak English could be expected to be." Over the course of the week, I think he barked once. (Once!) We can admit that he looked pretty confused the first time a large take-out order arrived ("Is there really a different sort of food in every single one of those little tasty-smelling packages?"), but he never crossed a line. He didn't chew anything he wasn't supposed to (though he gnawed the hell out of a soccer ball that was sacrificed to the cause), and was friendly, loving and cuddly towards everyone he met. Which is saying a lot, since the apartment pretty much turns into a hotel around New Year's. And yet, not a sound or even an awkward moment from JB, despite the fact that there were extended periods where no fewer than ten people packed into the apartment. Pretty good stuff, JB, pretty good stuff.

Of course, it didn't hurt that he had full roster of people available to to (a) pet him and coo at him, (b) tell him that he was a "good dog," (c) let him cuddle up on their lap, and (d) feed him the scraps of a week's worth of take-out (lots of delicious bacon and red-meat treats -- though all were careful to observe the no-chocolate rule). If the little guy could have managed to play a decent game of Winning Eleven, I could have mistaken him for an extra roommate.

(JB is apparently "good with people." You don't say. In a crowded episode, with lots of subplots and supporting characters, JB undoubtedly stole the show. Every single person that met JB fell in love with him -- there were even a number of semi-serious dognapping threats. By the end of the week, I was convinced that JB would have made a killing selling dogs around here. A killing.)

But, alas, the season, and JB's star turn, must come to an end. We can hold out hope that JB will come back and visit us again in the not too distant future (you're always welcome here, JB), or we can think about making a dog a regular cast member. We'll miss you, JB -- see you in syndication.

Posted by thatkid at 12:21 AM | Comments (0)