The Princeton Offense

Pete Caril, the head coach of the Princeton Tigers basketball team for thirty seasons, developed what is known as the Princeton Offense. The scheme calls for exceptionally well coached players to execute intricately designed plays with precision. Jason Garrett, the offensive coordinator for the Dallas Cowboys and a Princeton graduate, has a slight variant of this with my beloved Cowboys in which poorly coached players wander around aimlessly with 8:1 Super Bowl odds and "Yakkity Sax" playing in the background.

The Cowboys' offense has become stale and predictable. "Predictable" is a word more closely associated with the Eagles' offense, though I think "creepy" fits for them as well since Andy Reid usually opts to distribute candy to children from unmarked vans on third and short. He later challenges his ability to do so, and invariably loses.

I'm three games back of the leader in my picks league after a reasonable 8 win performance in Week 2. Home teams in bold:

San Francisco over Kansas City (+2.5)

I picked the Chiefs to make the playoffs before the season started. Granted, I made the pick in 2009, but still. I could have just acted like every economist and financial analyst of the last two years and said I'm "cautiously optimistic" about the Chiefs future. Why? Because if things go well, I can point to my optimism; if not, I will remind you that I was cautious this whole time anyway. I hate CNBC.

Baltimore (-10.5) over Cleveland

Josh Cribbs and Jerome Harrison are both questionable today, making a terrible offense even worse. Eric Mangini almost had a great coaching career – in his first season, he beat the Pats once and led the Jets to an unlikely playoff berth. After his second season was marred by a slew of injuries, his season three team started off 8-4 and beat the then-undefeated Tennessee Titans by 3 touchdowns in Week 12. Mangini was in commercials for cell phones in the tri-state area. Soon, Favre hurt his elbow, the Jets collapsed, and Mangini got fired. Now he's in Cleveland and he'll probably be fired after this season. Mangini will have won something like six games over two years by the time this season ends – making him the early favorite to be hired by Buffalo in 2012.

Houston (-2.5) over Dallas

I used to say that I would never pick against Dallas since I didn't want conflicting gambling/rooting interests. I looked through the rest of their schedule, and Dallas could finish 4-12 if they get a couple of lucky breaks, but 2-14 is more likely.

Detroit (-10.5) over Minnesota

Jason Whitlock and Bill Simmons have been pushing the idea that Favre would rather be in Mississippi than Minnesota. Since they are the only two sportswriters I read regularly, they hold a disproportionate amount of influence in the way I think about sports, barbecue and season 2 of "90210". Detroit is another reason for Clevelanders to feel crummy about their sports team. The Lions hired a hungry coach instead of a retread and have a nucleus of Stafford, Johnson and Suh around which they can build.

New England (-13.5) over Buffalo

Actually, Clevelanders can feel good that they aren't Bills fans. As Mark Schlereth might say, "(leans in quietly) chan gailey strikes me as a coach who has lost the hearts and minds of this football team. (loudly) THAT'S NOT HOW YOU WIN FOOTBALL GAMES IN THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE!!!!"

New Orleans (-4.5) over Atlanta

It's possible that the 2010 Falcons are like the 2009 Bengals – a team whose games I pick incorrectly for 15 games.

Tennessee over New York Giants (-3.5)

The Giants defense is horrible and I wouldn't trust Eli Manning to cover this spread or perform quadruple bypass surgery. Only one of these trust issues is relevant, but Eli and I should do trust falls just in case.

Pittsburgh over Tampa Bay (+2.5)

I think the Bucs changed the color of their pants, which is a huge reason for me to pick against them. If my Mark Schlereth Quote Generator is something like "(soft, pseudo-political statement dripping with morality transitioning into LOUD PSEUDO-POLITICAL STATEMENT DRIPPING WITH MORALITY!!!)" then my Jon Gruden Quote Generator is "(nonsense nonsense nonsense cliché cliché nonsense, Jaws?)". For example, "Guys, I'm not so sure that that the BUCS PANTS don't change…the CULTURE OF THAT LOCKER ROOM….Jaws?". Gruden used to be my favorite coach after his amazing work in Oakland and Tampa Bay, and I honestly hope that Jerry Jones throws $50 million at him or Cowher to come coach the Cowboys. But that doesn't change the fact that Gruden is the worst analyst on TV.

Cincinatti over Carolina (+3.5)
Oakland over Arizona (-4.5)

I will not be watching either of these games

Philadelphia over the Los Angeles Jaguars (+2.5)

I can't wait for the Los Angeles Jaguars to play the Toronto Bills in London in Week 18 of the 2013 season. Thank you Roger Goodell for ruining everything.

Washington Redskins over St. Louis Rams (+3.5)

I think Sam Bradford has looked decent through two weeks, but then, so did Ryan Leaf. Ryan Leaf has become the Hitler of NFL quarterback comparisons. In politics, lazy media personalities will say things like "…and you know who ELSE did that?! HITLER!" Ryan Leaf had a brief stint as the starting quarterback in Dallas.

Indianapolis over Denver (+6.5)

Champ Bailey is hurt and the Broncos weren't good enough to beat the Jaguars. Since Week 6 last year, I can't think of a single thing that Broncos fans can be happy about unless, you know, they had a child or found a better job or something. Sports probably mean too much to us.

San Diego over Seattle (+5.5)

The NFL Network is currently airing an incredible miniseries in which they count down the Top 100 Players in NFL History. I know that the point of the list is to be more historic than accurate – in other words, for the entire body of work to serve as a celebration of the league's history and not a definitive list of excellence. Still, the only reason to make lists is to argue about them. And come on! Randy Moss and LaDanian Tomlinson in the mid-'60s??? The top two non-QB offensive talents over the last twelve years aren't top-30?

Randy Moss is the reason the '07 Patriots and '98 Vikings combined to go 34-3* including postseason play. The '07 Patriots are the highest scoring offense of all time…topping only the '98 Vikings. Brian Billick was the offensive coordinator in Minnesota in '98 and can thank Moss for getting him a job as the Ravens head coach (even though the Ravens' offense always sucked with Billick in charge). The search for the next Randy Moss is the reason Matt Millen drafted something like four hundred wide receivers with a top-5 draft pick. Packers GM Ted Thompson's mind-boggling refusal to pay Randy Moss market value is the reason Brett Favre left the Packers and ended up destroying his own legacy.

I meant to write something about Tomlinson as well, but that Randy Moss rant really took a lot out of me. I write when I want to write.

New York Jets
(+1.5) over Miami

Miami is a very good team. But the Jets' Week 2 win over the Patriots could act as a catalyst for this team to go on a winning streak or, at the very least, what Krusty the clown refers to as "the bender to end all benders". I love the Michigan Wolverines but I'm disgusted by Braylon Edwards's actions. Braylon should have done what all college kids do after a night out – namely, stumbled into WaWa at 5 am and purchased 3,500 calories worth of food. That and not driven.

Green Bay (-3.5) over Chicago

Mike Martz has been the recipient of a lot of love from the pundit class this week. Here are some things to keep in mind:

1. His wins came against Detroit (the Bears only scored 19 points) and Dallas (the Cowboys suck).
   
2. The Greatest Show on Turf was created by Dick Vermeil, not Mike Martz. Martz took Vermeil's roster and talent and turned it into Marc Bulger and zero Super Bowl wins.
   
3. The 2001 Patriots are clearly the least talented champion of the last 15 years. Martz played into Bellichick's hands by refusing to run the offense through Marshall Faulk – the league's MVP that year. I'm not taking anything away from what the 2001 Patriots did – they were a smart, gritty team which played the game the right way (vomits). But Martz's arrogance cost the Rams a second title.
   
4. After Martz left the Rams, he went 10-19 in two seasons as Detroit's coach before becoming the 49ers' offensive coordinator. Martz's Wikipedia page actually includes the quote "Martz lobbied for journeyman J.T. O'Sullivan" to be the team's quarterback. Again, this man does not have great judgement.
   

Last Week: 8-8
Season: 12-20

America’s Game

When I was 17, I invested a significant amount of money in a company which makes discount HDTVs. Seven months later, I learned that equity holders do not fare very well during bankruptcy proceedings and that many of these equity holders are subject to getting yelled at by their respective mothers. Mom is a big fan of portfolio diversification.

I haven't wagered with real money since. Still, my friends and I pick every NFL game against the spread for fun each week. Last year, I picked 13 of 16 games correctly in Week 17 to complete an improbable run to the league championship. I was clearly affected by some sort of championship hangover, since I started out 2010 with a Week 1 record of 4-12. It's early in the season, but I am in last place by six games.

Chris Berman had a running joke where he picked Buffalo to play San Francisco in the Super Bowl every year for nearly two decades. I shy away from easy predictions because few predictions are correct anyway, and it's better to be thought provoking than correct in this context (did I mention my stock portfolio went to $0?). My two bold predictions for the 2010 NFL season have been with me for over a month now, though admittedly they are being posted a week late. One seems smart and the other doesn't.

1. The New England Patriots will miss the playoffs.
   

   
   

   This prediction is already looking weak. The Pats have the chance to reassert themselves as the class of the AFC if they stomp Rex Ryan and the Jets this Sunday. Rex, like his father Buddy, is a great defensive coach with an inability to develop potent offenses. Also, each has the first name of a dog. I expect Sparky Ryan to take over the Browns by Week 6.
   

   
   

2. The Washington Redskins will make the playoffs.
   

   
   

   Bill Simmons is the most popular sportswriter in the country, and the fact that I am calling the Skins my sleeper team 7 days and one victory after he did makes it seem as though this prediction is unoriginal. Nobody denies this.
   

   
   

   But, I've been touting Washington's chances all offseason. Last year, they lost 3 games in a row to the Eagles (up 10 in the 4^th quarter), Cowboys (lost 7-6 as Washington's kicker missed 2 easy FGs) and Saints (up 10 with 2 minutes left). I figured Shanahan and McNabb are enough to swing those close games in Washington's favor, as well as rectify embarrassing losses to Kansas City, Detroit and Carolina. And even if Alex Barron is the best player on their team so far, at least this prediction still has a chance of being right.
   

   
   

   On the other hand, Rex Grossman is the backup QB, and he sucks at being QB almost as much as I do at picking NFL games. Week 2 (home teams in bold):
   

Arizona (+6.5) over Atlanta

Atlanta is getting a lot of love from prognosticators and, presumably, Ron Mexico. I don't want to pick the Falcons primarily because they are an incredibly boring team to watch. At least with the Cardinals, I can remember how awesome the Kurt Warner/Larry Fitzgerald Kennedy connection was. I can even remember how awesome the Jake Plummer/Frank Sanders connection was. But the most exciting offensive sequence in Falcons history was three plays with Deion Sanders in 1992.

Cincinnati (+1.5) over Baltimore.

Ray Rice looks amazing and will get plenty of red zone touches, unlike last week. You'd have to be a complete moron to turn down a trade of Ray Rice and Jeremy Shockey for Jamaal Charles and Jermichael Finley. I hope my fantasy football trade counterparty is reading this. Seriously though, that is a completely fair trade.

Kansas City (+1.5) over Cleveland

If Jake Delhomme can't play, Seneca Wallace will start for the Browns. Wallace was the league's MVP from 2006-2008 as he led the Cowboys to a record of 55-2 with three titles over that time period. Madden used to be awesome.

Dallas (-8.5) over Chicago

Alex Barron and Jason Garrett are worth 14 points to the other team. So really, this spread is Dallas by 22.5. Still, despite my pessimism for my favorite team's 2010 chances, I hate picking against my own rooting interest.

Philadelphia (-3.5) over Detroit

I hope Matthew Stafford is healthy if only because he looks like chubby Matt Damon.

Green Bay (-13.5) over Buffalo

Last year's Saints and the 2007 Patriots used to beat bad teams at home by at least three touchdowns. If the Packers can't do that, then…it means nothing because championships are decided in February. But, ESPN has a lot of airtime to fill, so there. I think the only way that ESPN could entertain me at this point is if I could watch a video of Mark Schlereth reacting to the news that the Bengals signed Manny Ramirez to be their tight end. "THIS MAN HAS NO RESPECT FOR THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE!!!!!"

Tennessee (-5.5) over Pittsburgh

Every few years, Tennessee goes 13-3 and loses to Baltimore in its first playoff game. We're overdue.

Miami (+5.5) over Minnesota

The longest kick I ever made in a game was a 58-yarder with Olindo Mare to beat the Vikings.

Carolina (-2.5) over Tampa Bay

Guys! I found a great website where we can stream this game! WE WILL NOT MISS THIS SHOWDOWN!!!

Seattle
(+3.5) over Denver

Bill Belichick's coaching tree sucks, though at least Josh McDaniels is now the leading candidate to be Kansas City's 2011 water boy.

Oakland (-4.5) over St. Louis

Oakland is terrible, but my guess is that an interception-return touchdown will allow the Raiders to cover the spread.

Jets (+1.5) over New England

The Jets offense sucks. But there's no way that Brian Schottenheimer and Rex Ryan are dumb enough to try to run the offense through Mark Sanchez again. If the Jets run the ball 30 times – which they can do effectively against the Patriots – their defense is good enough to win the game.

San Diego (-7.5) over Jacksonville

The Jaguars will probably be playing in Los Angeles by 2013 anyway, so this is a crosstown rivalry as far as I'm concerned. The Chargers used to remind me of the Dallas Mavericks or Phoenix Suns – incredibly talented, fun to watch teams with charismatic superstars and a history of heartbreaking playoff losses. With the loss of Tomlinson, the Chargers are now the Suns without Nash or the Mavs without Dirk. No longer any reason to pull for them.

Houston (-2.5) over Washington

I wish the Texans played the 49ers this week in the Chick-Fil-A Preseason Hype Bowl, because the Texans would crush San Francisco and finally validate all the preseason love. I'm on the bandwagon.

Indianapolis (-5.5) over New York

I'm not picking against Jim Caldwell. Caldwell's career record in September is 4-1, and you just can't argue with those numbers.

New Orleans (-4.5) over San Francisco

At first, I thought this line said Saints -45, in which case it might make sense.

Last week: 4-12

Season: 4-12

Hiatus

To both people who read this: on hiatus since June due to work, but I'll be back in late August with more updates.

If a blog falls in a forest and no one reads it, does it make a sound?

Ocean City, Maryland

I used to enjoy having being younger than most of my friends. For some reason, as a child, I assumed this meant that I got to live longer even if it meant being shorter and skinnier than my peers. Obviously, this was pretty dumb reasoning. Being younger than all of your friends stops being fun right after your 20^th birthday.

My friend Dan and I are the last in our group of friends to turn 21. This means that while everyone else gets to go to bars, Dan and I recreate my social life from age 11 to age 16. Basically, I have enough time to start a Madden franchise and play through the 2027 season. As an aside, I always hated how Madden allows players to take storied franchises with deep ties to the local community – such as the Packers or Steelers – and move them to hundreds of locations in the country, including Puerto Rico…but not to any cities in New Jersey. Yes, the geniuses at EA Sports will allow you to take the Giants and move them so home games are played in Yellowstone National Park or something, but I can't move the Jaguars to Newark.

Another friend of mine, Jon, came up with a list of the worst possible fake IDs which one can use. This was inspired by a story of a time that this kid we both knew actually took a novelty McLovin ID from a Superbad promotion and used it at a bar, and the bouncer thought it was so funny that he let the kid in. Jon's list included:

1. A Dominique Wilkins jersey
   
2. The limited edition director's cut of the movie 21, in which a talented group of misfits from MIT takes on Vegas…and wins! (spoiler alert)
   
3. An index card with the number 21 written in Sharpie. *must have charisma and/or moxie to get away with this one
   

Neil, previously mentioned in my recap of the Toronto Spring Break trip, turned 21 over Memorial Day weekend. Dan, Mike, me, Nate, Neil and eight of Neil's high school friends chipped in and rented a house in Ocean City, Maryland to celebrate. As mentioned, Dan and I aren't 21 so our weekend was considerably tamer than the ones everyone else experienced. Still a great trip though.

Thursday 12:15 pm – 2:15 pm

Technically, not part of the trip, but this time period certainly affected my travel plans. I had to drive my friend Ojus to the Department of Motor Vehicles to update his license since he too had recently turned 21. The DMV remains a model of efficiency matched only by Comcast's tech support and the Philadelphia Eagles' 2-Minute Drill. I had intended to leave Jersey by 1:00 pm but was delayed nearly two hours.

Thursday 3:30 pm – 8:00 pm

The Drive. If I were John Elway, I would just capitalize everyday verbs so I could make them feel epic, though I guess at some point they begin to look like titles to Seinfeld episodes (The Deal, The Fix-Up, etc.). Thank god the annoying writers from Friends didn't work in sports journalism in the 1980s, or Elway's exploits would all have titles like The One With the Drive or The One With No Regard for His Body, First Down Denver.

Unlike Elway, I actually went into Baltimore. I had to stop there on my way south in order to pick up a friend. The first thing I saw from the highway was the shipyard made famous by Season 2 of The Wire. Baltimore on its surface doesn't seem so bad – nice skyline, sparkling football stadium, plenty of waterfront areas. But I guess the genius of The Wire was exposing the corruption and urban decay that lurk slightly below the surface – even though tourists like me are completely oblivious to it.

Thursday 9:00 pm – 12:00 pm

I left Neil's and went to my cousin's for dinner and to watch Game 5 of the Suns-Lakers series. For the past decade, I would mark the end of the season for a given league in two ways. First, the season was pretty much done the day Nets or Cowboys were eliminated. But, I would breathe a sigh of relief and consider the season truly over once the Lakers and Eagles were prevented from claiming the championship. Once those teams were out, I could enjoy the rest of postseason play stress free.

Why? Because for most of the past decade, the Nets and Cowboys have sucked. Dallas was great in 2007 and the Nets were decent in a crummy conference for two years, but that's three seasons out of a total twenty combined NFL and NBA years where my teams had a realistic chance of winning a title. In contrast, the Eagles and Lakers are something like fourteen for twenty in terms of combined contending seasons. And I don't hate the Patriots as much as the Eagles because New England wasn't beating Dallas by forty points twice a year for ten years.

So, I was rooting pretty hard for the Suns. Thank god Ron Artest provided me with the following two quotes over the next three days; otherwise I'd be legitimately bummed out by his Game 5 heroics:

"Say Queensbridge!" – to Craig Sager after the game.

"Growing up in New York, if you called someone for charging, you knew someone was getting stabbed after the game." – from a SportsCenter report on how Phil Jackson wanted his team to draw charges in the Finals.

Friday 9:00 am – 2:00 pm

We wake up early to pack and head to the beach. The Friday before Memorial Day is one of the busier traffic days of the year, so we knew ahead of time it was going to be brutal. One of my few talents is the ability to fall asleep during any car ride, which means that instead of being awake for five miserable hours, I went to sleep and woke up at the beach. One of the special features to an extended edition Lord of the Rings DVD said that Elijah Wood used to fall asleep all the time on the set. Again, I really didn't have a social life from age 11 to age 16.

Friday 3:00 pm – 8: 00 pm

I paid something like $39.99 for two slices of pizza before eight of us got a pickup football game going at the beach. I hadn't gunslinged in several months, but gunslinging is a lot like riding a bike – assuming that the bike has no brakes and maybe one tire inflated. In short, I was awful. Still a fun time though.

Mike, who was previously named Gunslinger of the Year for his decision to drive from Philadelphia to Disney World for the night, is a high roller. As the rest of us were putting our groceries away and determining bedding arrangements, Mike called some beach company and began a spirited defense of his title as Gunslinger of the Year. The conversation went as follows:

Mike: Hi, how much does it cost to rent jet skis?

[inaudible response by the other person on the phone]

Mike: Oh ok, thanks. I'll keep you posted. [hangs up]

Jetski would make a great last name for someone from eastern Europe.

Friday 8:00 pm – 9:00 pm

We went to dinner. Ocean City, Maryland is nice, but not as nice as Ocean City, New Jersey. A lot nicer than Seaside though.

Dinner was key since it was the last time I ate a vegetable until Monday at 9:30 pm. In fact, renting a beach house and living with a group of friends is both a lot of fun and incredibly disgusting. For example, my friend Nate claimed he was happy he showered on Sunday morning because it was the exact midpoint of the trip. It was his only shower over 3 days.

When you're at a beach house, a lot of little things that make life livable get taken for granted. For example, no one buys any antibacterial soap. Many people will seek to be magnanimous and state that they will buy some the next time they go on a 7/11 run, but it never happens. Meanwhile, the only groceries we bought were all pseudofoods – Ramen, hot dogs, etc. We would have been better off just pouring salt in oil and drinking it. So to recap, your hands are going to be encrusted in filth because no one buys soap and you're going to be eating nothing but material that put the "stuffs" in foodstuffs. And yet I keep coming back.

Saturday 1:00 pm – 6:00 pm

More football and lounging on the beach. My ankles and knees were killing me from running on the sand all the time. Andre Bynum recently had 70 milliliters of fluid drained from his knee, which are almost two shots of knee fluid with which Ron-Ron can chase down that Hennessy at halftime.

There was a radio blaring 808s and Heartbreak in front of a sign that said Free Magic Show. I don't know what the magician was getting at here.

Saturday 8:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Dinner at a kebab place on the boardwalk. Still no sight of a vegetable. Six or seven of Neil's high school friends came up for the night, which relegated me to the bench. Still, I did a solid job of bailing out failed jokes and staying out of the way – a good performance from a hustles/intangibles standpoint. This was me.

Saturday 11:45 pm

An extra large coffee is purchased.

Sunday 1:00 pm – 6:00 pm

I hung out with our neighbor for a bit and then headed to the beach. I think what bugs me the most about political commentators on Fox and MSNBC (no one watches CNN, whose programming now consists mainly of John King reading assorted Twitter feeds at you) is the insistence on grouping people into monolithic demographics. Nascar dads, soccer moms, the key backgammon seniors block of western Ohio.

The neighbor I met would have made a pundit's head explode. He drove a pickup truck and cursed at the Volkswagen we saw driving by our shared building. But he wasn't religious or into sports. He didn't attend college and worked as a contractor. He didn't hate the government.

Anyway, by Sunday, my diet had consisted of nothing but pseudofoods. I don't know how the hot dog eating contest is legal. The winner usually eats around 60 hot dogs, which comes out to something like 660 grams of fat. This is equivalent to nearly 30 KFC Double Down sandwiches. Identity politics are pretty awful.

I soon spent $60 on boardwalk games trying to win a Brandon Jennings jersey. No dice.

The boardwalk, as required by law, had many of those stores where you can buy t-shirts of things like Calvin wearing a Redskins jersey peeing on the Cowboys logo. Strangely, these stores were also selling tons of sweatshirts with the Monster drink logo. I don't wear energy sweatshirts though, since they make me jittery.

Monday 10:00 am

The drive home begins. Very bittersweet that the weekend was ending – most of us begin work in the days right after Memorial Day, so it was a de facto end to summer vacation.

Monday 6:00 pm

We arrive at Neil's house eight hours after leaving the house. Memorial Day traffic was a dagger, but luckily I fell asleep for most of it.

Monday 9:22 pm

I arrive at my home in New Jersey 223 miles away from Neil's house. As the announcer in N64's Star Wars Episode 1: Podracer would have said, "It's a new course record!" Have I mentioned that I had no social life between the ages of 11 and 16?

Monday 9:30 pm

I eat a vegetable.

Graduation

Pollen¸ Jerry Bruckheimer, and college seniors are all known for coming up big in the middle of May. Yesterday, I attended my cousin's graduation from Rutgers University in New Jersey.

I have a passion for solid offensive line play and sound logistical planning. The Rutgers graduation committee did an excellent job organizing an efficient ceremony for several thousand students and their respective families. Parking was not only ample, but also supple and firm.

The ceremony had all the familiar trappings of a graduation. The phalanx of graduates' seats was flanked by a parenthesis of foldable plastic chairs in which sat their impeccably dressed parents.

Some, that eternally unidentifiable group of others upon whom lazy writers heap scorn, find graduation ceremonies to be excruciatingly boring events. I am not some. Specifically, I was looking forward to the speech by Eric Knecht, the President of the Rutgers Class of 2010 and the only scheduled student speaker. Public speaking isn't difficult in and of itself. But, Knecht would have to balance obligatory graduation day platitudes against the pressure of saying something interesting and memorable. His introductory speaker, a vice dean, approached the podium to give a short introduction on the class president.

Knecht's biography was remarkable. A summa cum laude graduate, Knecht has also chaired or founded several university organizations and will be teaching underprivileged children in Washington, D.C. this fall. If he were from "right here in hard-workin' northeast Ohio", he could have been part of a presidential candidate's stump speech. The parents in the audience were impressed. An awed murmur of "woahhhh" swept through the crowd with each successive fact the vice dean told the crowd. The introduction ended and the class president neared the microphone.

When the home team in basketball falls behind by, say, fifteen points and goes on a run to cut it to two, the crowd gradually crescendos. Still, they wait for the exclamation point – the three pointer that triumphantly marks the home team finally taking the lead – in order to explode into happy delirium. Sometimes, this shot misses. Twenty thousand people simultaneously groan ("ohhhhhh") and the announcer says something like "they woulda blown the ROOF off if that had fallen!"

Thanks to his glowing introduction, the class president approached the stage essentially having cut the lead to two. The crowd was firmly in his pocket. We were waiting for the exclamation point.

The exclamation point never came. It was soon clear that his speech, by his own design, could not have had one.

First, he gave the standard remarks alluding to their first days together as a class in fall 2006 and mixed in some tepid but crowd-friendly jokes about dining halls and Facebook. Pretty safe material, but Knecht's a natural speaker whose delivery was effective nonetheless. Soon, he took an enormous risk for which I must give him a lot of credit.

He talked politics. And, he did not equivocate. Knecht forcefully stated his convictions in blunt language, convictions which were soon transmitted over two enormous video boards and dozens of loudspeakers. He did not hide, and though the speech was well received and he earned a warm round of applause, I couldn't shake the feeling that many of the same parents who were "ooh"ing during his biography were made squeamish by hearing Knecht's political views on this particular stage.

I was pretty squeamish as well. I don't really care what a person's political views are, but most political statements are couched in arrogance and feigned piety. As soon as Knecht started talking about 2008, I had a feeling he would start talking about politics. Much like male nudity in a Judd Apatow movie, I knew it was coming, and I knew I was going to be uncomfortable, I just didn't know when.

Michael Jordan was once asked by a Democrat why he didn't make political statements. Jordan replied, "Republicans buy sneakers too." Knecht didn't care. He gave his speech the way he wanted to and earned a well-deserved round of applause, even if it meant forfeiting a chance at a standing ovation.

After Knecht's speech, students who had earned awards or scholarships were recognized for their achievements. Seventeen students had a perfect grade point average. Winners of department level awards, such as the Arthur C. Cope chemistry prize, stood up. My favorite was the one student who received the Geroge Washington Carver Award for Excellence in Peanuts.

Later that night, my freshly graduated cousin, his family, and my family all went to dinner. His father, my uncle, is like a cross between Rodney Dangerfield and Vito Corleone. His medical empire in central Jersey is wildly successful and he is regarded as one of the top immunologists in the state. His word is law and he has inspired loyalty bordering on devotion in those who work for him. Still, he never met a fart joke he didn't like.

Most first generation immigrants from India were taught British English as schoolchildren, which means they refer to "math class" as "maths", likely a shortened form of "mathematics". This extra "s" presumably migrated from Rutger University, which is what my uncle's friend repeatedly called the home of the Scarlet Knights.

I'm happy to be incubated in college for one more year. Good luck, class of 2010.

Late Registration

Broadstreetrun.com indicated that interested runners could register for the titular race by March 31^st, though by now enough time has passed that I can't remember all the details and the site may have in fact said April 1^st. At any rate, I logged in on March 27^th, which should have given me enough of a buffer to register for the race in time.

Buffering…buffering…buffering…

When I logged in, I was greeted by a banner at the top of the page. It said that the race was full and that registration was now closed. I don't blame the organization charged with managing the race at all; the original notice probably said "…until March 31^st or until race reaches capacity" and I misread it. Plus, the race was May 2^nd, which was during the peak of finals-related stress. So, it's been a fun six weeks or so, but my failure to register on time doomed my chances for a spot in the race.

It is difficult to come up with something interesting to say every day without becoming stale or repetitive. I thought about standardizing the column by creating a few fields – say, Music Listened To, Miles Ran, Noticed – and updating them every day. But, I think it cheapens the writing when an occasionally amusing gimmick is used as a crutch, though since everything I write is based on run-on sentences and the 1994 NBA season, I don't know that there's much quality left to corrupt.

After taking roughly two weeks off from moving in order to deal with classwork, I've started running again since moving home. The past few days I've ran between four and five miles.

Lingua Pura

Language can be hilarious:

1. I was gunslinging some conversation at an attractive woman when she said "she had to run to the ATM machine." I told her that she was being redundant, because the M in ATM already stands for "machine". Thanks to my hilarious knack for stomping all over my own game, we didn't speak after that.
   
2. At a recent barbeque, a girl told us how her globe-shaped earrings were based on the planet earth. I didn't understand she meant planet earth and not Planet Earth, because any earrings that involve 6 months of time lapse photography and Sigourney Weaver must be taken seriously.
   
3. Writers of TV shows such as Lost like to make characters read books so that they can add depth, hoping that viewers like me will go "Literature! Wow! They mean business!" For example, a recent episode had one character read Of Mice and Men, which makes sense because parts of the sixth season have been like getting shot in the back of the head by your best friend.
   
4. A few of my friends were trying to figure out – without looking it up – when Catcher in the Rye was set. One person thought it was the 1920's, another the 1980's. I blurted out "you're way off, it's set in the future!" but I said it with such pinache and perfect timing that I expected to get a solid laugh out of it. Crickets!
   
5. Pitchfork, the hipster music website, actually started a review with the following passage:
   

   "Akira Kosemura's entrancing Polaroid Piano is my favorite ambient-inclined piano record from Japan since Radicalfashion's Odori, which it often resembles in faded miniature"
   

   
   

   I guess they were embarrassed that someone actually thought it was a good idea to write like that, because the current version of the review deletes that line. I had to look up the cached version of the page to find the line. It was such pretentious writing that it was seared into my memory.
   

The comedy in language has been successfully mined by entertainers from Larry David to Randall Munroe. Munroe is best known for his comic strip XKCD, which often comments on the link between romantic angst, Fourier transformations, and Venn Diagrams.

Tony Soprano once said "'Remember that time?' is the lowest form of conversation". I thought he was being an idiot – I love to talk about old times with friends. But, I guess he meant that eventually the words get stale and you have nothing left to talk about.

I don't speak with some of my close friends from high school anymore. Not that we had a falling out or wouldn't enjoy spending time with each other now. It's just that over time, the stories atrophy. You run out of things to talk about and become trapped in a prison of "how're classes going?" conversations.

The language and structure of sports films had grown depressingly stale, but this changed in recent years. I love movies like The Replacements in which a scrappy group of misfits comes together to beat the more handsome and better funded villains. But, films like The Wrestler remind me of Raging Bull in that they are sports movies that require the viewer's focus and attention and not just an ability to fight through quicksand. I don't know how my Quest to run Broad Street is going to end. There are no square-jawed, arrogant runners taunting me, and no out of my league romantic interest for me to win. Just a lot of dirty laundry and lower back pains.

Day 15, March 16 2010: 2.5 miles

Day 16, March 17 2010: 8.0 miles

Day 17, March 18 2010: 3 miles

Day 18, March 19 2010: 2.67 miles

Day 19, March 20 2010: basketball

Day 20, March 21 2010: basketball

Day 21, March 22 2010: basketball

Day 22, March 23 2010: 2.0 miles

Day 23, March 24 2010: basketball

Day 24, March 25 2010: rest

Day 25, March 26 2010: rest

Day 26 March 27 2010: basketball