You Sir, Are Not A Nice Person

I’ve come to the conclusion that rarely anything good can come from an online forum/message board/bbs whatever you want to call them (Says the guy spewing forth yet another blog onto the internet). Before I had come to this conclusion I saw a post several years ago that started to lead me there. The point was to rank something from best to worst, I won’t say what, but this person gave his list and then was immediately ripped apart. One person in particular was especially harsh questioning everything from his sexuality to his mental state. To the original poster’s credit his only response was sarcastic, immediate and to the point. “You sir, are not a nice person.” Of course after that the responder was chastised and attempted to defend himself, but the original poster’s response has always stuck in my mind, even three or more years later.

That retort comes to mind when thinking about Coach Pelini’s recent dealings with the media. As I write this, everyone seems to have moved on due to Jared Crick’s recent season ending injury. I’m still bothered by Pelini though and I am guessing after Minnesota, in a few weeks things will get really ugly really quickly afterwards.

I’ve made it a point, since early on in Pelini’s tenure, not to watch or listen to his press conferences. He never says anything, ever. I don’t think that’s an accident either. Except “Execute” he’ll use that word a million times. Is someone or some group struggling? Well they need to execute better. And if things are good,...well Pelini will say “We still weren’t as crisp as I’d like us to be.” So I try to ignore the conferences. The problem comes when Pelini is asked a question that can’t be answered with one of his two answers and he has a good ole’ fashioned grown up temper tantrum. When that happens I have to hear about it from some other source because not hearing about it would require me to live like Jodie Foster in Nell. Such is life in Nebraska.

The only reason I listen in before halftime is in the hopes he finally snaps and (literally) bites the head off whatever useless, high heel wearing, easy on the eyes sideline reporter chick snagged him to ask him stupid questions. That’s mostly because I despise sideline reporters. Instead he just falls back onto one of his two favorite answers as best as he can. I know that might come across as being hypocritical, but I don’t really count sideline reporters as “media” despite their press passes. They are just there to tell us about the most recent guy to turn an ankle and give frat boys and jocks someone to fantasize over.

That being said, is it Bo’s job to be all nicey nice with the media? Absolutely not! In fact, I would find bizzaro “Nice” Pelini to be pretty scary and perhaps even give me nightmares. Pelini is who he is. He doesn’t like talking to the media and he really can’t hide it. In that respect I can empathize. If I don’t want to be doing something, especially a social something, I suck at hiding my unhappiness. I just can’t do it.

On the other hand there is a difference in appearing unhappy and just plain being rude to people.
Around this part of the blog I had written out the entire Pelini/”T-Magic” saga, dating all the way back to the beginning of the 2010 season. However, I started to feel like I was being too hard on Taylor and saying what has been said a thousand times before around these parts, so I scrapped it. If you know me at all then you know how I feel about Taylor and there is no reason to repeat it here.

The thing I find amusing is that during the peak of the public outcry against Taylor I really didn’t have a problem with his play. What happened in Madison is exactly what I expected to happen, not only from Taylor but the entire team. Sure he threw three interceptions, but everyone knows by now that Taylor has trouble throwing the ball at times. What he did in Madison was exactly what you can expect from Taylor when we’re throwing the ball something like 14 out of the first 15 plays in the second half. That isn’t what he does well. What our team got from that is exactly what we deserved.

My main concern was with our defense. Up to that point we had given up 29 to Fresno State, and 38 to Washington. We had given up fewer points to 1-AA Chattanooga and Wyoming, but both seemed to move the ball at will at times even with a freshman quarterback. In fact, Wyoming’s freshman QB looked right at home against our defense. So after giving up 48 to Wisconsin,…yeah, Taylor wasn’t really a big deal to me.

What did bother me was how he behaved in the press conference the following Tuesday. He was combative and rude, much like his head coach….perhaps learning by example? The highlight of which was when answering a question about the media scrutiny he was receiving, he responded with something like, “It doesn’t matter what I say you guys are gonna rip me anyway.”

Don’t get me wrong, they were ripping him, but such is the life of a quarterback especially in a high profile place like Nebraska. Too much credit when things are good (See the media’s reaction to him after the first five games of last season, the media was talking Heisman!...idiots…) and too much blame when things aren’t so hot (like after the Wisconsin game).

In response to a similar question Pelini dug into an Omaha World Herald guy. This outburst was almost comical to me, I wish I could find the audio or video to these press conferences because this outburst was one of the better ones. After ripping the reporter, questioning his motives, pretty much asking him if he was bullying his quarterback in order to get a rise out of the kid Pelini says “thanks guys” and then ends the press conference. To me it was like a cursing a blue streak in church and then saying “Amen” solemnly at the end.

Since I first started writing this, the author of the anti-“T-Magic” piece that sparked all of this apologized in a pretty comical manner. I really wish he wouldn’t have. I really liked that the Omaha World came out with a “We’re not afraid of Pelini” article after their reporter was attacked, even if it was in the same tone as the anti-“T-Magic” article only instead of saying “Martinez better play better or else” it was “Coach Pelini better be nicer to us or else” at least that’s the impression that I got from reading it.

The point I’ve been working towards during my various attempts to finish this blog is that Pelini treats the media like a plague, like they are so beneath him. It’s hard to root for a guy like that. I get the impression he really doesn’t care for our fans either. His angry gesture towards the stands when we finished the first half against Ohio State with an interception that led to a field goal and the crowd booed. I think I would have too, not at Martinez but at the play call. I think everyone in the State of Nebraska thought “45 seconds left? Just sit on the damn ball and get into halftime” instead we call a play throwing deep over the middle into triple coverage and it’s intercepted and turned into a field goal for OSU. The situation couldn’t have been more aggravating because everyone in the state saw it coming a mile away.

Discussing the incident in yet another article I’m to lazy to link, he prefaced his statement that booing had no place in college football by saying that he respected the fans. I kind of doubt it, that’s just a feeling I get. I can’t really explain it. So it seems rather co-dependent of me to root for a guy that despises me. Sort of like that guy you knew in high school who kept asking the same girl out to every dance and she kept publicly humiliating him after every attempt. Sooner or later that guy is going to get the not so subtle hint and move on.

Same goes for Martinez, he just seems like “Not a nice person” as well. Zac Taylor, Joe Ganz, even Zac Lee (while the offense was collapsing around him), those were guys I could pull for. They played their guts out, hid injuries all season while being unfairly criticized, played every down (unless they got knocked unconscious) and above all else never added a goofy signature like “T-Magic” to the end of their text messages.

But this isn’t one girl we’re talking about here. This is an entire team and I will continue to root for my team and there isn’t anything Pelini can do to stop me. I know this goes against his often voiced black and white philosophy towards every aspect of life. “You’re either with us or you’re against us.” I couldn’t disagree more, you can’t just split life down the middle and call one half good and the other bad. Life is complicated and messy and….perhaps the topic for another blog….

So I’m not going anywhere, and neither is Coach Pelini. We do want the same things and to that end I guess we’re stuck with each other until well,…who knows…
I will say this, years ago when that giant blueberry of a coach was fired at Kansas, Jason Peter said on his radio show, “You can win as a coach while being a jerk, but the second things turn south you’re gone, and you’re gone fast, people will always be looking for a reason to get rid of you.”

I’m not saying Pelini will get fired soon (or ever for that matter, especially as long as T.O. remains the AD), but if it happens, it will be an all of a sudden, out of the blue, here one week gone the next kind of thing.

Maybe I’m being too harsh, maybe I’m being too mean, maybe I too am being “Not a nice person” but it seems to be going around here lately.
Go Big Red.

Evil Smitty

After bringing a puppy into your house you may find yourself doing things you never envisioned yourself doing. I could list all of them, but in this particular case it was purchasing a sweater for Roger. I swore I would never do that to a dog but he gets cold easy, and if he gets too cold he doesn’t go while he’s outside and if he doesn’t go outside the risk of an accident increases exponentially.

So there I am staring at a wall of really really girly looking things and halloween costumes for dogs to wear, questioning my manhood....when I see a sweater with a skull on it and think ‘that is WAY more up Rogers alley....’ this was after purchasing a black collar with white skulls and a matching leash.

That got me thinking though, what is it with my attraction to the darkside? Whether it be music (1,2,3), movies (1,2,3,4,5), tv (1,2,3) or even chicks (1,2,3). I always seem to be more interested in the black than the white. Does that make me evil? Evil all the way deep down?,...all the way to my molten nacho cheese core?

Joking about taking over the universe and ruling with an iron SmittyFist (tm) is one thing...but...could it be? Am I truly evil? Like most things in my life I over analyzed the crap out of this issue.

When all was said and done I remembered being in kindergarten or pre-school and all of us came wearing our Halloween outfits. I proudly reported to my mom afterward that my teacher said in response to my kick ass Darth Vader costume that “She wouldn’t want to meet me/him in a dark alley”. So I took away from that what you would expect a young little Smittyling (tm) to take from such an event. If I was Darth Vader I could potentially scare my teacher. Never mind that from my limited knowledge of Star Wars he is the evil ruler of the galaxy or something. (Am I right? my beloved nerd followers please help me out).

I also recalled that I didn’t always root for the bad guy, only in certain exceptions. Dr. Claw of inspector gadget comes to mind. I HATED inspector gadget, every episode he would accidentally blow up his boss with the secret message, his stupid niece would get kidnapped and the dog would save everyone and get zero credit for it.

I was only four but the repetitive plot lines got on my nerves. I wanted to see gadget get what was coming to him, just ONCE. Plus Dr. Claw had a cool voice and all you ever saw of him was his mechanical hand (also bad ass). His cry of “I’ll get you next time gadget! NEXT TIME!” was always awesome. I don’t know why I kept watching, maybe I was just hoping against hope that Gadget’s luck would run out and Penny would finally pay for being so stupid and getting kidnapped in EVERY episode.

Next would be Wile E.Coyote. Although you could argue he wasn’t very dark, he was definitely the antagonist of the cartoons he was in. He was a character I could identify with, very scientifically minded, always messing with gadgets that ultimately never worked and he almost never talked but when he did he sounded really smart. Poor guy, I really hated that road runner too.

Hmm...I’m starting to notice a theme,...seems like it may be my annoyance with the protagonist that is the issue here....

I’ve already touched on the big DV but as a child I think just the mask was bad ass enough, it made him look like the grill of a jet black hot rod. And his chest (at least I’m pretty sure) has buttons and lights on it. I don’t know what they do or what they are for, but as a kid,....”BUTTONS!!! AWESOME!!!”. I could sit around all day in my cool mask scaring my pre-school teacher. Ruling the galaxy and pressing random buttons conveniently placed on my chest. Perhaps taking a break every once in awhile to enjoy a Flintstones ice cream push-pop. And hell, I didn’t even mention his glowy sword thingy. Plus dictatorships are awesome, especially if you’re the dictator.

Next would be the Predator I’ve blogged about my movie monster of choice before (although perhaps not on this particular blog. I guess I enjoy the stealth, tribal culture and sort of sportsmanship that this species exhibits. The Predator species is unique to movie monsters in that they have no interest in you unless you are armed or are attacking them. Still seems kind of messed up that I’m really against hunting unless it’s by an alien who happens to be hunting humans. I could really nerd out here with all I know about them and what makes me like them, but I’ll spare you. I know what it’s like to be on the other end of a “nerd out”.

With that in mind I’ll close this with Beetlejuice. This is a case where I think if anyone else besides Micheal Keaton played Beetlejuice it would have been a forgotten movie. Every utterance, mannerism, action, facial expression is dead on. I got to the point where I would do a spot on impression of him to make my best friend at the time laugh.

As an adult I still love the movie. It has that classic Tim Burton look. From the winding checkered hallways bridging the afterlife waiting room (that alone is a brilliant concept) to the land of the living, to the mother’s creepy scuptures, to just the way the house was remodeled. The movie has lots of memorable quotes of course, but one of my all time favorites in ANY movie would be when the mother is leading the family upstairs to confront the ghosts in the attic.

"Lydia, I have a chance to teach you something here. You have got to take the upper hand in all situations or people, whether they're dead or alive, will walk all over you." -Delia Deetz

Thinking back now, I think that was my first exposure to a goth chick and I’m pretty sure I liked it. I’m also wondering if my interest in model trains was sparked by the town model in the attic which then spun me into an interest in trains. That would have been right around the age when all the train stuff started....Who knows...couldn’t have hurt it.

There are other examples, I didn’t talk about Jaws, or the Cobra faction of GI Joes, or Skeletor, but I think I’ve provided enough examples.

Wrapping this up, do I think I’m evil? I don’t think so, but I suppose that’s entirely an opinion thing. I do know that I look good in black....black with buttons on my chest. Buttons I can push and scare my preschool teacher with.



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(edited by: Dave Fosbinder)
(Posted by: Jamie the SB Secretary)

U Shaped Fall

It was a beautiful late summer day. The kind of day where it’s room temperature out with a light, gentle breeze. I was doing what you would be expecting me to do on such a rare occasion,....indoors watching Arena football with a shades drawn to prevent unwanted glare on the tv.

The game itself was amazing, probably the best game of the year, and fittingly so as it was the Arena Bowl. But that is a story for another day. About the time I was asked to help my parents get the neighbor’s horses back into their field. I know it’s a strange task to be asked to help with out of the blue, but this is my parents we’re talking about. They are masters at coming up with unbelievably random tasks:

“We’re building a house for the goats by the lagoon”

“Dad is welding together a plow for his jeep”

“We’re dividing the goats’ field in half so they don’t jump in the truck cab every time we get the boat out”

“We took out the window well to the basement so we could throw firewood directly into the basement for the furnace” - of course you are mom and dad...of course you are..

I mean I love my parents to death, but they really suck at slacking.

So I wasn’t the least bit surprised when I was suddenly hauled off to corral horses. Just a normal day at my parents’ house. “The neighbors aren’t home and the horses were out and...” my mom explained. To which I thought ‘of course they are mom, I’ll be there in a sec’. I was more interested in this task though as I love horses and this could make for a good blog......oh if I only knew....

When we arrived at my parents’ neighbors’ house I saw this in their backyard.

Even though these neighbors live on an acreage it was still odd seeing full grown horses grazing only a few feet from a modern home.

At first things seemed to go okay, my dad instantly reverted back to his farm boy roots and was getting the horses moving no problem. I relied on my basketball playing days “Stay between the ball and the hoop” or in this case, the horses and escape. With a little effort, some good basketball defense on my part and a few “He-YAHs!” (accompanied by some impressive cowboy hat waving) from my dad and the horses were moving toward their goal no problem.

The first few were in when the second batch went into the wrong field, I’m not sure what was wrong with that field, but that caused cowboy dad to have to go after them. He left my mom in charge of keeping the first batch of horses in the correct pen and me in charge of the oldest, most stubborn horse. I don’t think he’d moved an inch since operation “Neighbor Horse Corral” had begun.

My dad yelled recommendations from the previously mentioned “wrong field”. The first such suggestion being to give the old horse a slap on the ass. I’m a city boy, but I know not to stand behind the horse. Still I was still nervous about doing so. So first came the tentative nervous slap. Followed by harder slaps as I got less and less nervous. The horse meanwhile, didn’t move a muscle. Aside from the muscles associated with chewing the grass of this forbidden backyard. ”Give him a kick” my dad yelled in between strings of four letter expletives directed at the horses in the “wrong” field.

So one minute I’m laying on the couch watching arena football eating nachos, the next I am kicking a horse next to a brand new house I’d never been to before and seeing no results. Really just a normal visit to my parents, but the oddity of the situations I find myself in at my parents never ceases to amaze me.

As my futile kicks continued I noticed my mom was starting to “lose contain” on the horses in the “correct” field (my mom never played basketball obviously.....). Before the horse made a break for it I made the decision I was going to have to get over there and prevent the horse from getting an easy layup into freedom. Sure enough he took off, I started to run, up hill, tripped and landed collarbone first, sliding up hill on said collarbones for several feet. I’m told my feet almost touched my shoulder blades causing my out of shape body to form a perfect “U” shape. Everyone stopped what they were doing to yell inquires as to my condition. The horse was gone, out to the front yard and down the hill towards the road and out of sight.

I was more embarrassed than anything. I do think that if it hadn’t rained the night before and the ground hadn’t been so muddy I may have broken some things, but then again if it hadn’t been so muddy I might not have slipped...

I got up right away as though if I got on my feet quickly enough everyone would forget the epic fall I had just achieved.

As my dad successfully got the horses in the “wrong” field to the correct field he assured us that the escaped horse would be back as horses are pack animals. ‘Makes sense’ I thought as I looked down at my shirt which looked like it had the world’s largest underwear poop streak stains on it. (I should have taken a picture).

Dad got the my (pick one, the or my) stubborn horse in, apparently you need a cowboy hat and a goatee in order to get a stubborn horse moving. Or I’m guessing that is the case as that’s all that appeared different about my dad’s technique as compared to mine.

So all of the horses were back in and a good thing too as we found out later (as my dad suspected) the fields around the house were filled with alfalfa which would have killed the horses somehow. It’s like their kryptonite or something. /shrug I admit I don’t know much about horses, and almost as little about Superman.

I had no further lingering injuries from my fall. Which will from now on be know as “The ‘U’ Fall” in Smitty family lore. This story will be brought up at every Smitty family gathering for many many years to come. And I’m perfectly okay with that for some reason.

I wasn’t as sore the next day as I thought I would be. I did have lower stomach problems from when my legs came crashing down to the grounded right on my belt buckle and keys.

Still if you had told me “Yah, you’re going to be in traction after helping your parents chase horses on a hill you’ve never been too” I wouldn’t have been surprised. Just another exciting visit to the Smitty ‘Rent’s house (tm).

Mini Blog: My Bad

My deepest apologies. It’s a hectic time of year for me and this year especially so. With the start of football season, fantasy football drafts and leagues to get started and organized and so forth. But this year I also recently got a puppy, I have actually been working on my basement (I’ll pause while you come to grips with such a strange twist on reality) so I’m finding it hard to write and stuff.

But I hope to have a blog I’ve been working on for some time out this week. So stay tuned.

2011 Arena Bowl

As I write this, this years Arena Bowl is about to start in about a half hour or so. Why write this now? Because I plan on watching the game tomorrow, and I’m assuming all my readers (hi mom) aren’t going to watch the game anyway, so I can safely prognosticate all over this blog (ewww! Not on the rug! gross!).

Last week Arizona beat Georgia at home, I watched the replay of that game on the web. One of the radio announcers for Arizona sounded as if he was annoyed by everything and I mean EVERYTHING, fans, players, officials, Sirius satellite radio, when the game cut for commercial....you name it, he was whining about it. He really got on my nerves....I really didn’t have a point about that, just felt the need to mention it. You suck Arizona color commentator guy!

I also watched the Jacksonville Sharks take down the Georgia Force a few days later. I felt bad for Georgia, fighting the good fight with a back up QB. A QB with a huge gash on his hand butterflied up to try and control the bleeding. Georgia looked as if they were fighting an invisible wave of relentless energy from both the other team and the fans. All to try desperately to stay in the game against the Sharks who seemed to score with ease.

Those Shark fans got on my nerves though. One of them actually reached over the boards in the end zone and grabbed onto a Force player and HELD him there....all in the noble pursuit of trying to steal a game ball....you sir, are a douche. Thanks to him Jacksonville got a 15 yard penalty against them, but who knows how far the Force player could have run without being held by some drunk in the stands. There were a few more fan interruptions in the game, but that one really pissed me off.

Expect another blog venting my annoyance of grown men, most of whom are older than I am, fighting/scratching/clawing/knocking little kids over to get a football in an indoor or arena game or a foul ball in baseball. I just don’t get it....more on that another time though.

Anyway back to that game.... The rowdiness/loudness of the crowd added to the general feeling of inevitability of a Jacksonville win. I had that feeling about last year’s Arena Bowl in Spokane whose arena is cleverly referred to as “Deaf Valley” due to the loudness of the fans. They seem a little better behaved though, so they have my respect.

The Sharks fans obviously do not, but Jacksonville is going to Arizona for the Arena Bowl, so they’d have to live without their fans “Help”. This continued sense of inevitability of a home team playoff win is why I might end up rooting for the Sharks.

Another mark on the side of Jacksonville is Aaron Garcia. Aaron is like the Brett Favre of the Arena League (minus all the interceptions, yearly annoying retirement talk and text messaged photos of his weiner) and he is going to to the Arena Bowl for the first time. He’s been around for 14 years and never been to an Arena Bowl despite holding about every record the league has. He’s on the short side (which is why he was never NFL material I’m guessing) but he’s one of the toughest S.O.Bs to ever play ball. He’s the kind of guy you can’t help but root for.

On the other hand Arizona is one of the few Arena League originals that has managed to stay around and intact after all these years. The others being Tampa Bay and Orlando. So it’d be good to see an old school team like them win the championship.

So who do I think will win?

Jacksonville just played a game on Monday in Jacksonville and has to fly all the way across the country to play on the road today (Friday). Arizona has the best record in the league but almost blew a huge lead against Chicago and played uninspired at times. Trandon Harvey is a question mark for them as well. He was mysteriously absent during their victory against Chicago.

I’m guessing based on the game being in Arizona I would pick them to win, but wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t. To summarize, I don’t see a clear winner and I don’t even know who I’ll be rooting for. But that’s arena football for you, and I wouldn’t have it any other way, especially for the Arena Bowl, what a way to end the season.

Blogging Blind

I promised everyone (all none of you) that I would write a non-sports related blog. As I start this I have no topic, I have no outline, I have no embarrassing bathroom related incident in mind. In other words, I am blogging blind. Ooooooo! That’s a better title, brb...fixed.

Okay, I asked everyone to vote on my first blog topic, no one actually did. My mom attempted to, but suffered some technical difficulties, 3 others ‘voted’ in the comments section but never sent an email as requested. I hate to split hairs like that, but those were the rules folks.

The consensus seemed to be people wanted me to write about my unfortunate incident with water leaking from stuff in my basement and giving me a brand new phobia of slowly dripping water from unexplained sources. I actually started that blog before realizing that it was neither funny nor all that interesting, perhaps I should have made something up about slipping in the freshly leaked water and busting my ass. My loyal readers (mom) would really like that.

I think mostly I just wanted to use this sentence “My laundry room was taking on water like a very slightly wounded submarine”. Other than that I really didn’t have much to go on. This became all the more prevalent as I rounded the corner through paragraph number two in the now ill faded and incomplete “Leaking Water” blog....perhaps I’ll release it as some sort of B-side on a single or something....bloggers can do that right? No? Well crap!

Drastically switching topics, as late summer turns to even later summer I am reminded of the dreaded “going back to school thing”. Back during my school days I always hated school, hated getting up early, and pretty much hated everyone AT school, but two things about “even later summer” I always enjoyed, the return of football and fresh back to school supplies. As I promised a non-sports related blog I will skip the first thing and move on to the second. I always had a plan, a well organized plan, armed to the teeth with three ring binder paper, folders, and fresh pencils. All of this fell by the wayside in little to no time, as the realities of day in day out school set in and I became lazier and lazier about my plans. But every year at this time I thought things would be different, THIS would be the year I stayed organized and got straight A’s and...what? I have to get up early AGAIN?! @#$# it I’m just gonna shove my homework in THIS folder,...that’s good enough, I’m 9, I got shit to do! These legos aren’t gonna spread themselves all over the floor of my room on their own you know? And the Princess? She’s screwed unless Mario and I come and get her and she’s always in the last Castle you look you know?

This yearly scenario has mostly eluded me in my adult life the only lingering symptom is my inability to enter and exit Office Depot/Max (I can never remember which is which, but does it really matter?) without daydreams of a well organized filing system, everything in it’s place and perfectly put away and easy to find and.....screw it, I’ll file it later....

There, not bad for blogging blind eh? As for the not too distant future you can expect another sports blog (sorry it’s Arena Bowl Preview time) and the after that the Bieber blog which I know you’ll love. After that I’m not sure where I’ll head, perhaps I’ll finally vent publicly about the locker room behavior at the gym I belong to.

For right now though, I just need to file this in the correct google docs folder and label it and.............screw it I’ll just email it to Dave to edit.

AFL Playoffs: Round 2

Looks like I was 3-1 with my predictions. My Preds did exactly as I thought they would. Not a close game but not a blowout either. Not as many penalties as I though they would commit, still a lot by any normal teams standards, but not bad for them. I blame coach Pat O’Hara...speaking of which......

Penalties and fumbles are usually the sign of bad coaching and I was never really high on Preds Coach Pat O’Hara, I was hoping he would get let go. Low and behold I just visited the AFL site to double check the brackets while writing this and apparently he’s been fired, dismissed, @#$^ canned outta there. I am somewhat pleasantly surprised as they made the playoffs both years he was head coach but the Preds always seem to be winning in spite of him instead of because of him. Hopefully they don’t hire some total gomer and can keep things going next year for hopefully their 20th straight visit to the AFL playoffs in their 21 years of existence.

Sorry,...got a little sidetracked there...back to the prediction recap

My only miss was the Georgia/Cleveland game as I said in my blog predictions thingy, “I could see this one going either way”. So good for Georgia for picking up a win on the road, tough to do anytime, but especially in the playoffs.

Thankfully Chicago knocked Dallas out of the playoffs, they earned the right to be rooted for by me for the rest of the playoffs and for the foreseeable future, although I can’t see myself being too disappointed if #1 seeded Arizona knocks them out in the Conference Championship round.

Arizona did beat the defending champ Spokane Shock in the first round but it was a close one. I would have liked to have been able to see that game, certainly less painful than watching my Preds lose. Before I go around gloating at my prediction skills I believe I said something like “I’ll flip a coin and go with Arizona as they are the home team” so just got lucky on that one.

Now to conference championship predictions, I’ll take Arizona over Chicago, although a Chicago upset wouldn’t surprise me. I haven’t seen that much of Chicago this year, but what I’ve seen of Arizona I’ve really liked. But this is arena football, anything can happen.

On the other side I see Jacksonville keep on trucking past Georgia. This one would surprise me a bit as I’ve never really been big on Georgia all year, but they just keep hanging around, I see that ending for them this weekend though.

So there you have it, I’m looking in the magic Smitty Crystal Ball (tm) and seeing a Jacksonville/Arizona Arena Bowl this year.

I promise I am working on a non-sports related blog,...thanks to everyone who suffered through another sports blog.