Why Should the Buckeyes Even Bother?

As we work our way closer to the (mythical) National Championship game (sponsored by Allstate), it becomes clearer and clearer to this Buckeye fan that there's really no reason for the Men of the Scarlet and Gray to make the trip. After all, they're playing the SEC, and the SEC owns not only Ohio State, but all of the Big Ten (11), and playing the game is merely a formality to hand the SEC another crystal football.

OSU's record against the SEC in bowl games is pretty well noted, it's a giant 0-fer. Add in last season's whacking at the hands of the SEC in the championship game, and once again the theory of "why bother?" gets clearer and clearer.

Then the Dispatch prints this gem (as linked from the Ft Wayne Journal Gazette because I couldn't find the Dispatch's link), and it all becomes just more irritating. Now, our author for this commentary hails from Knoxville, Tennessee, so slight bias probably doesn't play into this. Listing the "Big Ten’s five most humiliating bowl losses to the SEC" is cute. But, as I found on this blog, the Big Ten is 8-7 in the last five years against the SEC in bowl games. But wait, they used THIS YEAR'S bowls as the 5th year, but none of them have been played yet. I checked the '02 season and found out why they didn't use it...Big 10 was 2-1 vs. the SEC that year, bringing the actually played five year total to 10-8 in favor of the big, slow, corn-fed, can't-hang-with-the-speed boys from up nort'. (And, oh by the way, in '02 the Big 10 won the National Championship. I believe this is where the obligatory, "ooooh, BURN!" goes.)

So, it appears the recent dominance isn't as tilted towards the SEC as the media zealots from south of the Mason-Dixon line would have you believe. Recent memory has the SEC whacking Ohio State 41-14, so our friends from down south have "what have you done for me lately" on their sides.

Now, here's where I'm going to diverge a bit, and maybe cause some controversy...

Ohio State happens to be playing LSU this season, not the SEC. LSU is a member of the SEC, but Coach Tressel doesn't have to prepare for the whole conference. Also, as it turns out, Ohio State lost to FLORIDA last year in the title game, not the whole SEC. Again, Florida is a member of the SEC, but not the whole conference. On that fateful night, Florida was far and away the better prepared team for the game, and how can you blame them...they had a month to hear how they didn't even belong on the same field. (Hmmm, that's sounding familiar...)

When we break away from the stereotypical ramblings of the media, we find out that Ohio State is taking on LSU. The constant focus on the conference match-up seems to be taking a little something away from both programs. We're about to see two of the best defenses the country has to offer this season, but the fixation is on Minnesota beating Arkansas in Nashville in '02. Oops, sorry that was five bowl seasons ago, the fixation is probably on Penn State beating Tennessee last year in Tampa. Crap, did it again...focus is on Wisconsin beating Arkansas in Orlando last season?

Sorry, fell into the conference comparison trap myself...

When we look at the two teams playing, we're looking at two pretty storied programs. They've faced each other twice, and LSU has never beaten Ohio State. They did tie in '87 in the first of the home and home meetings, but OSU won 36-33 in Ohio Stadium in '88. Each has their fare share of National Titles, LSU winning it more recently following the '03 season.

For this year's game, it's pretty much a given that it's a defensive battle and the team whose offense gets loose a couple times will win it. LSU is getting the nod in that category, as they have a bit more explosive offense than Ohio State. ("A bit more" is like saying Arrogant Bastard has "a bit more" flavor than Coors Light.) LSU is getting picked by most, is favored by Vegas, and is the Fan Pick on ESPN.com. But, they still have to line it up and play it, so a few things leaning in the Buckeye's favor...

- Anybody who thinks Jim Tressel will make the same mistakes in preparation as he did a year ago is kidding themselves. Jimbo will have the boys way more ready to go in 'Nawlins than in the desert.

- The underdog has a better record in the BCS title game than the favorite. And, oddly enough, the #1 team in the land is the underdog this time around.

- Remember the '04 Alamo Bowl? Ohio State beat Oklahoma State 33-7 and Ok. St. was a 1 point favorite. Cowboys head coach that night: Les Miles.

So, grab your beer and nachos and get ready to watch the Backed-in Bowl. The Backed-in Buckeyes from the Big 10 vs. the 2 loss Legit LSU Tigers. Should be a good one.

GROK Talk Slides

For all you who sat through my record timed performance of a GROK talk, here are the slides.


Pragmatic Programmer Sermon

I apologize for ripping through it, but the gift exchange loomed. The subject didn't really lend itself to Q&A real well, though I think all the points are important. If you haven't read/borrowed/stolen this book yet, do so today. For the time being, here's the list of tips from the book. I worked off about 20 of them.

Post GROK

A friend of mine recently purchased a restaurant in town. After the Quick festivities I headed there to discuss reworking his website. (I'm working for beer...it's a win, win.) This particular friend spent about 15 years in the local IT market, so he has some contacts.

While I was there a group of four guys strolled in to celebrate the end of the work week. Turns out these four guys were in IT, my buddy strikes up a conversation, since they were buying beer from him and all. They work for a small consulting firm (that I'd never heard of), and were very intrigued to find out that I was a developer. So, they asked the standard sales/recruiting questions...where are you, what do you do, etc. The requisite, "You don't sound so happy, here's my card, we'll pay you more," came out and I smiled politely.

Then they sent over one of their developers, at least they introduced him as such. He struck up a very non-technical discussion about the .Net Framework, PHP, MySQL, and some other buzzwords. I managed to not laugh uncontrollably, and continued to smile politely. Honestly, as soon as he attached "Framework" to .Net, I was done. I would have easily been the most senior person in their shop...probably by a few years. Then it hit me: Do I want to be the mostest seniorest person in a very junior body shop, or a senior member of the development environment I am currently a member of?

Without gushing too much...I'm not going anywhere. The IT talent collected around me at this point is amazing, and Quick keeps bringing it in. The whole, "We'll pay you more!" argument is intriguing, but how much more would it take? I'm in a pretty good position at this point. The advancement within the group is no easy task, but the advancement professionally is as good as it gets.

Winter beer clunker

On the recommendation of a coworker I recently purchased some Winter's Bourbon Cask Ale. This coworker proclaims himself to be a beer fan, so I took his advice...even after hearing him say, "It's a product of Anheuser-Busch."

Should've stopped myself there. This stuff pedestrian at best. It's semi-flavorless with a hint of beer taste and some spices. Nothing stands out about it. At all.

So, big thumbs down to Winter's Bourbon Cask Ale. Your money is much better spent on Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale.

Your money is much better spent on Blatz, for that matter...

Porters and Stouts

I'm a pale ale, IPA, gimme-all-the-hops-you-got kind of guy. But it's winter, and Todd reminded me today it's time to get into porter and stout mode. So, following Brendan's hockey practice tonight, he and I swung into the nirvana that is the Giant Eagle beer cooler.

As any young padwan would do, Brendan immediately asked, "Dad, are we getting some Dead Guy tonight?" His learnings at such a young age warmed my heart...guessing it wouldn't warm his mother's heart the same way. Just a guess on my part...

Since I was on a mission for porters and/or stouts, I had to fore go my son's excellent suggestion. I roamed the beer cooler for a while and settled on some Young's Double Chocolate Stout and a selection from the Rogue brewery, their Mocha Porter. The Rogue brew didn't disappoint, and though I'm not a huge fan of porters, this one is quite tasty. The Young's, though, oh my. I had forgotten how good this beer was. The first sip was all chocolate, and it only got better from there.

Not to be missed in tonight's rundown is there was already some Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout in the fridge. Barley's in downtown Columbus made me a fan of Russian Imperial Stout, and I rate theirs better than the bottles from the good folks at the North Coast Brewery. After the first one from Barley's I was convinced they measured the alcohol content in it by proof rather than by volume. However, short of bringing my next growler home from Barley's, Old Rasputin fits the bill.

So far, the shift into porter and stout mode is going well. I'm sure some Christmas brews, such as some Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale, will be in order as well.

Intro to ASP.Net AJAX Slides and Code

Before Thanksgiving I gave an intro to ASP.Net AJAX presentation at Affinion and Nationwide, and would like to thank those that attended. As promised, and better late than never, here are the links to the slides and the code samples. The code samples include the javascript callbacks that I did during the presentation.

Code Samples

Slide Deck

Again, thanks to those who attended.

Fox Sports can't spell "BCS"

So, two years ago when Fox bought the BCS and we all knew it was the first sign of the apocalypse was upon us, I didn't know how far they could sink. Watching their broadcasts of the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta, and BCS Title games last year was painful. (Ohio State's pole-axing aside.) The pre-game crap was recycled from their NFL and MLB broadcasts, and their whole approach to the broadcasts seemed to be: "This is our first time with college football, it must be the first time for you, too, Mr. Viewer!"

But tonight, they took their idiocy to a whole new level...

First off, they give us a 40 minute BCS "selection" show...as if they could somehow match the similar show that takes place in March...and give us one "selection" in the first 25 minutes of the show. Never mind that the BCS isn't a "selection," it's a computer program that says who's automatically playing in the BCS and what openings remain for the top 12 teams to play in one of the BCS games. This year the "selected" teams were Illinois, Hawai'i, Kansas, and Georgia. Everybody else got an automatic bid, and most of the automatic bids go to very specific bowl games...which is where Fox cranked the retardery up to 11.

They followed a pattern of announcing one team for a couple bowls, then later announcing the other. This was after announcing who got the automatic bids...of import here is that Ohio State had the automatic bid from the Big 10. The Fox goes on to announce the Rose Bowl match up of USC and a mystery team, who after a couple commercials is revealed to be Illinois.

So, let's recap what's gone through any college football fan's mind by this point...

1. "God, I wish this was still on ABC."
2. "Ohio State is the Big Ten(11)'s automatic bid."
3. "I should turn to ESPN, but I can't...avert...my...eyes..."
4. "Illinois is going to the Rose Bowl. Good for Illinois."
5. "Looks like the Buckeyes are back in the title game."

Now, after we've all arrived at number five in the list above, Fox assumed we'd barely gotten to four thank to our lack of any formal education. So, in order to hold our attention, they announce that UGA is going to the Sugar Bowl, which removes the suspense about where LSU will go, so they go ahead and tell us LSU is in the title game against...they put up a question mark!! Some UNKNOWN team is going to play LSU!! "There's only one slot left!!" says Joe Fan, "I wonder who it could be?!!? Oh, come on, Fox, please, please reveal that team!!"

Finally, they revealed that the mystery team was Ohio State, and completed their assault on the intelligence for the average college football fan. I can hardly wait for their coverage of the games, now.