Category Archives: Sports

March Mid-Major M’Insanity!

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The month of March is here, evidently, which brings along with it the NCAA College Basketball tournament. This annual sporting event inspires thousands of unfortunate torso paintings, and turns office workers across the nation into amateur bookies. It sends the public into a collective, oh I don’t know, madness one might say. I wish there were some alliterative way to describe the tournament and the frenzy that spreads across the nation in its wake.

Maybe, Spring Psychopathology? Yeah, that rolls off the tongue.

Of course, most of the tournament berths are already sealed up through conference championships or bribery, and even the majority of the remaining teams to be selected won’t exactly come out of left field. But the NCAA always picks a few so-called mid-majors, schools you probably haven’t heard of unless you went to them or have a severe
gambling problem.

Betting on any small school is a dicey proposition. Everyone likes a Cinderella story, but
the likelihood of West Ass Crack Teacher’s College going anywhere in the tourney is minimal at best. Unless Billy Packer thinks it’s a travesty that they were picked for the tournament in the first place. In that case, the team should at least make it to the Sweet Sixteen.

Still, it’s fun to dream of king-killers, because hey, we all want to murder monarchs, right? This Sunday, the NCAA will finalize the tournament spots in an event known throughout the land as “Weekend Winnowing”. Here’s a few of the small-school squads who just might make the cut.

East Mississippi A&M: Once known for having one of the best small-school programs in the country, EMA&M was scandalized in 1991 when it was discovered that their point guard was actually a Holstein. The school argued that having cattle in its starting five was actually a disadvantage, but the NCAA still banned the school from the tournament for five years, and the cow was sold to Black Angus. EMA&M is now back to its winning ways, and extremely difficult to beat on its home court, mostly because that court doubles as a kill floor.

San Quentin State: This school prides itself on giving troubled youth a second chance. Failing that, third, fourth and fifth chances are equal as common for its student-athletes. Their most versatile player is Deshawnjames Williams, who usually plays center but is also used as a shooting guard when he brings a glock onto the court. Jamatador Oneill is the team’s leading scorer (37 ppg, 17 confirmed kills), but he gets into foul trouble often. During the Penal Conference final, Oneill T-ed out early in the second half when he stabbed an opponent in the throat as he took a free throw.

Lancaster County Community College: Champs of the Mennonite Conference, the only one to still use wooden peach crates for baskets. Their most feared player is 6′ 7″ forward Ezekiel Schmidt, whose 31.7 ppg average is even more impressive when you consider that he must run up and down the court in suspenders and leather shoes. This may be the last chance for LCCC to crack the tourney, as many of its best players will soon be lost to the NBA Draft, and to rumspringa.

Tompkins Drama School: Their point guard is in love with the head cheerleader, who doesn’t know she’s carrying another man’s baby. Their center’s toughest opponent is himself. What their forward doesn’t know about their shooting guard could kill them both. And their coach is carrying a deep, dark secret that could tear his school apart–if his wife doesn’t destroy it first. But put them together, and this ragtag group of misfits will leave it all out on the court, where they just might have…the right stuff. Unless they pull a Big East team in the first round; then they’re dead.

Boffo’s Clown College: BCC is known for its tough brand of play. Few opponents can score from the post when their sophomore Pinky employs his unstoppable Squirting Flower defense. It doesn’t matter much on the court, but the school is also renowned for having the smallest team bus in the NCAA.

Monsanto Institute of Technology: MIT has created a near-perfect basketball team, literally. Using DNA samples from NBA legends and a patented genome extraction and self-replication technique, the school grew its starting five in large, fluid-filled vats that mimic the conditions of the womb. This procedure has drawn condemnation and protests from nearly every single political and religious leader in the world , though it has eliminated all suspicion of recruiting violations. Freshman 32XJ7 is a standout for his flawless three-point shot and the unnerving, soulless cast of his eyes.

Pointless Nostalgia Pt. 1 – The 1988 TWIB Spring Training Special

New Site Update: Don’t bother clicking on any of them YouTube links below, ‘cuz they ain’t gonna work. This post is here for historic purposes only. I’m hoping to get the non-baseball stuff reposted at some point, but there’s so much stuff to do here that I would not hold my breath.

Update 02.16.07: Deadspin gave a shoutout to this post, which was quite awesome of them. Unfortunately, I think that attention attracted the decidedly unawesome attention of MLB Advanced Media, who sent me a copyright infringement notice via YouTube. I totally understand that we have to respect MLB’s intellectual rights. After all, I wouldn’t want to interfere with the inevitable theatrical release and DVD transfer of a spring training preview from 19-friggin-88. *sigh*

The Wife wants it on record that she said MLB would crack the whip on me. I doubted her. “Why the eff would MLB give two shits about a spring training preview from 19 years ago?” She is less naïve than I, I suppose. Mea culpa.

Long story short, I’m afraid I had to remove said video clips. I’ve left the rest of the post as is so you can imagine the anachronistic hilarity. Also, the old ads are still viewable, as long as no one rats on me to the Gibraltar singer with the White Afro.

* * *

I find the days following a big snowstorm to be worse than the actually event. The roads are a mess and they’re filled with angry, dirty piles of plowed snow. You need a canoe to cross most intersections thanks to the enormous lakes of smashed melted snow that ebb at every street corner. And everyone in the city is really pissed off. Usually, you think a sweaty day is the kind that gets folks all hot and bothered. But climes like this can be just as bad for the collective mood. After you’ve been smashed against a thousand other dripping, angry commuters on the bus and/or train, you’re just as ready to start a fistfight as you’d be during an August heat wave.

No matter. My thoughts are warm, because pitchers and catchers have
started to report to Florida. I’m also told that there are some insane
teams that train in Arizona. I can neither confirm nor deny this.

On Friday, the Mets will be in Port St. Lucie (at least the ones that pitch and catch) and we will be that much closer to Opening Day. An Opening Day when the team will have to watch the 83-win Cardinals get their World Series rings. Hopefully, that will get their blood boiling to set up an ’86-like rampage through the National League. I don’t ask for much from the universe, but can Jose Reyes’ first hit of the year be a line drive off of Albert Pujols’ knee? Or at least Scott Spiezio’s chin-snatch? I thank you in advance, unseen powers.

Continue reading Pointless Nostalgia Pt. 1 – The 1988 TWIB Spring Training Special

Up the Middle with Skitch Hanson

Lots of stuff has been going on in the sports world lately, and the one-man editor’s board of Scratchbomb can’t cover it all. So we’re delighted to welcome Skitch Hanson to our fold. You may know him as the author of the highly popular syndicated sports column “Up The Middle,” the six-time winner of the AP’s Fence Sitter Award for “Writing Least Likely To Offend Anyone”. You may have read his best-selling books “Your Eight Heavenly Visitors: The Afterlife Made Easy!” and “My Saintly Mentor”. You may have seen him on ESPN’s “SportsCranks,” where he’s often seen debating against his “urban”
counterpoint, b-ball pundit Hoops Washington. Without further ado, here’s Skitch.

It’s Super Bowl Week, and everyone who’s anyone is in Miami. Since I’m somebody, that’s where I find myself now. My employers at the syndicate have put me up at the Jupiter Best Western, a mere 2 hour drive from Dolphins Stadium. Perks abound for media types like myself. For instance, you know what the breakfast buffet in the hotel has? Those tiny little poppy seed and orange muffins. All you can eat.

I love tiny muffins.

But I am not in south Florida for muffins. I am here for Super Bowl XLI. The Colts versus the Bears. These two teams have never faced each other in a championship game. But there’s an even bigger first that will happen for the first time on February 4th.

A first so big it warrants a one-sentence paragraph.

Possibly even a sentence fragment.

This Sunday, for the first time in the history of the NFL, both Super Bowl teams will be coached by Afro-Americans. Those two coaches are Lovie Smith of the Chicago Bears and Tony Dungy of the Indianapolis Colts. And typing out their full names and team names has allowed me to fill precious column inches.

Precious, precious column inches.

Continue reading Up the Middle with Skitch Hanson