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Friday October 10th, 2003

2:39am; edited 10/10/03 3:53pm

Texas A&M vs. Baylor Preview

Right now, the buzz around campus is not so positive for the Ags. Everyone is still trying to deal with our 3 straight losses and I think everyone is so suprised by Baylor's out-of-no-where 42-30 upset of Colorado last weekend in Waco that they're making Baylor out to be a better team than they really are. Will A&M lose to Baylor...no. I don't even think it will be very close. The one thing that really helped Baylor knock off C.U. was the 5 turnovers the Buffs had, and if we turn the ball over 5 times then we too deserve to get it handed to us. Just remember that #4 Florida State lost to Louisville last year, so we know that every dog gets a bone sometime...Plus we're talking about a Baylor team who is a total of 2-37 in conference play since coming to the Big XII 5 years ago (an interesting note: Baylor's two conference wins have both been conference season openers--2002 vs. Kansas and last week vs. C.U.)...

Here is how the teams matchup using their season numbers:

A&M's Offense vs. Baylor's Defense

	TAMU	Baylor
Passing yds/game	212.6	201.3
TDs Passing	6	6
Rushing yds/game	173.4	159.2
TDs Rushing	9	9
Points/Game	25.4	23.8

Baylor's Offense vs. A&M's Defense

	tech	TAMU
Passing yds/game	181.8	251.0
TDs Passing	7	15
Rushing yds/game	135.8	170.2
TDs Rushing	6	7
Points/Game	22.4	33.6

Please keep in mind also that Baylor has played the following opponents in accumulating the statistics above:

• vs. UAB; L 24-19 @ Home
• vs. North Texas; L 52-14 Away
• vs. SMU; W 10-7 @ Home
• vs. Sam Houston; W 27-6 @ Home
• vs. C.U.; W 42-30 @ Home

It is nice to see that they've got a little home winning streak going up there in Casey Stadium....In all honesty, I don't have any grudge against Baylor, but I think that the Big XII missed an opportunity to kick them out of the conference from this past summer's front page basketball news (not because of the murder, but because of the lying and terrible coverup by the Athletic Dept.)....at least all the guys at t.u. who get into trouble get bailed out by their program's prestige (ex.1. RB Cedric Benson not knowing about the marijuana sitting on his coffee table; ex.2. 2B man Tim Moss getting into a fight and then running from Police; ex.3. SS Omar Quintanilla playing professionally in Mexico, but only getting a slap-on-the-wrist suspension instead of losing his eligablility)....The one thing I see that they have going for them is that their baseball team is really good, but then again so is Rice, and they seem to be doing fine in the WAC....When I raise the idea of BU's exit from the Big XII, people ask me, "Who will fill their place? You have to keep the conference balanced to have the Conference Championship game." I don't really care who we ask to fill in.....LSU, Arkansas, TCU....or even no-one for all I care; I mean we're the Big XII--arguably the top conference in any given major sport, it's not like we're asking a school to lower themselves to a crummy conference....

Our defense will have an opportunity to start digging themselves out of the hole they've been so furiously digging, and our offense should put up good numbers....

One note: Jamaar Taylor is 155 yards short of taking the All-Time Texas A&M Record for Career Recieving yards and he could easily do it with a big game tomorrow...if not, then next week at Nebraska...

Game 3 Preview: Cubs vs. Florida

Ok, tonight will be a match up between Mark Redman of Fla. and K-Wood....Kerry has been unstoppable thus far in the playoffs, but I'm a bit worried due to this week's Sport's Illustrated cover (his second of the season) and the infamous "SI Cover Jinx". Maybe his 2-0 record, 15.1 IP, 1.76 ERA and 18 K's so far during the playoffs should help me get over it....

Here are how the teams stack up against tonight's starters....

Cubs vs. Mark Redman

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	SO	BA	OPS
K.Lofton	6	0	0	0	0	2	.000	.000
M.Grudz.	3	1	0	0	0	1	.333	.667
S.Sosa	3	1	0	0	0	1	.333	.667
M.Alou	3	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
A.Ramirez	5	1	0	0	0	1	.200	.533
Simon/Karros	0/3	0/2	0/0	0/0	0/1	0/0	.000/.667	.000/1.667
Gonzalez/Martinez	8/2	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	4/1	.000/.000	.111/.000
Miller/Bako	5/0	2/0	1/0	0/0	1/0	2/0	.400/.000	1.000/.000

Marlins vs. Kerry Wood

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	SO	BA	OPS
J.Pierre	8	1	0	0	0	2	.125	.489
L.Castillo	12	4	0	0	1	1	.333	.883
I.Rodriguez	7	2	0	0	1	3	.286	.804
D.Lee	11	1	1	0	0	4	.091	.322
Cabrera/Lowell	5/5	0/2	0/1	0/0	0/0	3/1	.000/.400	.167/.900
J.Encarnacion	18	4	7	1	3	5	.222	.675
J.Conine	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
A.Gonzalez	5	0	0	0	0	3	.000	.167

Here is how each starter has faired at ProPlayer Stadium during their careers....

Pitcher	GS	W-L	IP	H	R	ER	HR	SO/BB	ERA	BAA
K.Wood	2	2-0	15.0	5	2	2	0	13/10	1.20	.114
B.Penny	15	6-4	100.2	85	36	31	6	85/27	2.77	.227

*These numbers are regular season only

Go Cubs!

A Bit Late??

In yesterday's Battalion, there was an article written about Rush Limbaugh's comment he made about Donavan McNabb....NEWSFLASH--That happened on Sunday, September 28th and Rush resigned the following Wednesday....8 days before you wrote the article....two Sports Illustrated magazines have hit the news stands since then....thanks for keeping us up-to-date on current events....

Thursday October 9th, 2003

1:14am

Game 2: Cubs 12 v. Marlins 3

• Game 1
• Game 2

Wow, this one was pretty much the exact opposite of G1....High scoring blow out with a Cubs win v. extra innings high intensity win for the Fish....Mark Prior is awesome, although not quite as dominating as He was in his last start...I'll take it though.

Here is His line from G2:

Dec.	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K	ERA	GSc
W	7.0	8	4	3	2	5	2.57	54

And overall for the post season:

Record	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K	ERA	AGS
2-0	16.0	10	4	3	6	12	1.69	68

I fell like I owe an apology to Alex Gonzalez (of the Cubs). I've made mention of how much Alex sucks on this site on a number of occasions and he's pretty much shoved it all down my throat this postseason. He's currently hitting .381 (8-for-21) with a double, 4 HRs, 7 RBI, and a 1.435 OPS in the 7 games since the "Second Season" has started. Wow!

I can't tell you how happy I am that Sammy is getting hot (2 HRs in the last 2 games)...he changes how teams throw to the hitters around him when he goes on his tears and the Cubs see quite a few more W's....

Other Postseason Notes

• Pat pointed out to me that every time Mike Timlin warms up for Boston, Alan Embree does the same...it's like they're tied together
• Fox's Virtual Manager is terrible...."Are dynasties good or bad for baseball?" or "Who has the best starting pitching among the teams still playing?"....what does "manager" have to do with those q's? I thought Virtual Manager was started to see if the audience would take the pitcher out of the situation he was in, or if you'd pitch to so-and-so in this situation....
• I really like the Official Playoff Sweatshirts that the teams are wearing
  

  So I went to MLB.com to see about ordering one...$49.99...for a $9 sweatshirt...kiss off Bud "Lucifer" Selig...

• Since we're talking about Lucifer, I heard today on the radio that since the playoff ratings are up, Bud is considering making a second wildcard team in each league and then the two WC teams play a 3 game series to determine the "true" Wild Card. Then on top of that, he wants to make all 3 remaining rounds to be a best-of-7! Hey Bud, why don't we call the "true" WC champ the "Best of the Teams Not Able to Make the Playoffs Before I Came Into Charge" or we could just invite the D-Rays or your Brewers just so their fans can not come to the park for another 3 games....just because something is good, it doesn't mean we need more....the reason the ratings are high this year is because you have the Cubs, Red Sox, Yankees, & Braves, 4 of the top 5 "Big Market" clubs playing against Barry Bonds and the feel good Marlins....I promise you this won't happen every year, so don't go screwing up the greatest game on the planet any more than you already have....money grubbing moron....Someone really needs to impeach this guy....

What I've Been Expecting

Every year after the tt game, our school newspaper (The Battalion), gets a letter or two from a student or alum of tech who are ashamed of the expected things that occur during the weekend. Here's the first one of the year:

Classless behavior at Midnight Yell

I'm currently a freshman at Texas Tech. Friday night I went over to the Buddy Holly statue to experience Midnight Yell with the Aggies. I noticed two things during my visit: an enormous amount of pride that the Aggies display for their school and classless behavior portrayed by my fellow Red Raiders.

A large group of Red Raiders came to "crash" the Midnight Yell for the Aggies. Not only did they disgrace our school, they disgraced our athletic program and most importantly their parents. If that couldn't be enough, the cops had to make an arrest.

Rude hand gestures and crude behavior made me ashamed to associate myself with the school I'm currently attending. What happened to being "good sports?" After the display that I witnessed by my fellow classmates on Friday night, it makes me even more thankful that my time at Tech will be short before I go on to join a school full of class.

To the Aggies I say, not only did you bring your pride for your school with you, you also brought good sportsmanship and Texas hospitality as well. I look forward to being part of your family soon.

Justin Garrison
Texas Tech student

Thanks Justin, I'm glad that it's not just everyone except red raiders who see the problem....

Mike's Rants

For those of you who haven't stumbled across Mike's Baseball Rants, I highly recommend his site...but I warn you that his rants are sometimes a bit wordy in the naughty department....My favorite part of Mike's site is when he does commentary for the weekly Joe Morgan chats that appear on ESPN.com...Here's a taste of some of his other thoughts:

Do you get the impression that baseball has become a second-class sport as playoffs are foisted off on ESPN2 while ESPN proper airs college football of all things. I'm surprised Mia Hamm and the women's world cup or whatever it is didn't bump the playoffs to the ESPN News channel. Well, maybe if the Americans hadn't lost in the semifinals…

Fox seems to see the playoffs as a means to promote ad nauseum the new season of 24-how did the president recover so quickly anyway?-and for passing off Jeannie Zelasko, a performer better suited to wacky zoo openings and hard-hitting jibes with the weatherman on the local news, as a real sports reporter. Well, she did have that earth-shattering piece on the history and breadth of the Billy Goat, Bambino, and Red Baron curses. And she did have her hair and her wooden expression shellacked especially for the postseason.

Boy did he hit that right on the head or what?

Wednesday October 8th, 2003

1:20am

Happy Birthday

I'd like to wish my fiancé, Jennifer, a happy birthday today....Have a great day!!

Game 1: Cubs 8 vs. Marlins 9 (11 innings)

• Game 1

I'm not going to talk about this game too much...Mark Guthrie should be added to the list of pitchers that I wouldn't let pitch to my brother's high school team due to fear of a 5 run inning....already on that list: Antonio "Blow every save opportunity I get, and look like an old fat man while I'm doing it" Alfonseca, Todd Jones, Jay Powell, Jeff Juden, and Yorkis Perez....If you want a recap, check out the ESPN GameTrack....My only question is this:

In the Marlin's 9th inning, on the ground ball to Mark Grudzielanek at second base, I totally understand that the base runner running from 1st to 2nd was not called out on the tag because Mark had no possession of the ball...that's not what gets me. What I want to know is, can the base runner (in this case Juan Pierre) still run outside of the base path even if Grudz. does not have the ball to tag him? If a batter hits a single to left field and instead of running directly to first base, he runs a V towards the pitcher's mound on his way to 1st base, isn't he called out because he left the base path? If he is, then Pierre should have been called out because he stepped 2-3 feet onto the infield grass while jumping out of the way of the "tag". If he is out, then the Marlins do not score their 8th run and Sammy's HR in the Cub's half of the 9th inning should have won the game, not tied it.

I don't know the official rules on something like that, but I am curious....

Cubs v. Marlins Game 2 Preview

This is going to be a match up between Mark Prior and Brad Penny. The Cubs need to win this game, whether Prior throws like He normally does or not. The way I see it, Prior and Wood will not go perfect through the entire playoffs...hence they won't win the necessary 4 games to advance by themselves, so we have to get a win from either Clement or Zambrano and then get 3 of 4 from Wood and Prior.

Here is how the Fish and the Cubs look against the starters during their careers:

Cubs vs. Brad Penny

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	SO	BA	OPS
K.Lofton	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
M.Grudzielanek	15	3	2	1	1	1	.200	.600
S.Sosa	10	2	2	1	1	2	.200	.700
M.Alou	9	5	0	0	1	0	.556	1.222
A.Ramirez	12	4	1	0	1	0	.333	.750
Simon/Karros	0/10	0/2	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/1	.000/.200	.000/.473
Gonzalez/Martinez	9/2	4/1	1/0	0/0	3/1	0/0	.444/.500	1.178/1.500
Miller/Bako	5/5	0/0	0/1	0/0	0/1	1/1	.000/.000	.000/.167

Marlins vs. Mark Prior

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	SO	BA	OPS
J.Pierre	3	0	0	0	0	2	.000	.000
L.Castillo	2	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.333
I.Rodriguez	3	1	0	0	1	2	.333	1.000
D.Lee	3	0	0	0	0	2	.000	.000
Cabrera/Lowell	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	.000/.000	.000/.000
J.Encarnacion	6	2	1	1	1	0	.333	1.167
J.Conine	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
A.Gonzalez	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000

Here is how each starter has faired at Wrigley during their careers....actually its how Prior has done during His career because Penny has never started at Wrigley Field....

Pitcher	GS	W-L	IP	H	R	ER	HR	SO/BB	ERA	BAA
M.Prior	24	11-6	163.0	136	63	57	19	206/41	3.15	.224
B.Penny	0	0-0	0.0	0	0	0	0	0/0	0.00	.000

*These numbers are regular season only...Remember Prior's game last Friday at Wrigley

Let's Go Cubs!!!

Updates

I've updated my "Random Thoughts" page as well as an item or two to the "Things Dog Has Eaten" page, and I always update my Terrence Murphy link after each Aggie Football game, so check those out...

Tuesday October 7th, 2003

12:47am

Welcome to Aggieland

Starting Sunday night and continuing through Monday, thunderstorms surged through Bryan/College Station. For those newcomers to Texas A&M, I’d like to give you this piece of advice for your first fall here. The rains will start in October and continue through mid-November. After about one week of rain, the cold will arrive.

This advice I give is very valuable—Go buy a good umbrella, not one of those $.99 ones, a nice big $15 one. Raincoats are nice, but you’ve got to have a big umbrella. Also, go buy your sweatshirts and fuzzy hats right now, before it gets cold and the stores sell out. You’re going to want a nice Texas A&M sweatshirt, and the good ones go fast.

Don’t waste any time doing this because these events will occur and when they do, you don’t want to be the one soaking wet and shivering….trust me, I know from experience.

Aggie Football

I have come to a startling conclusion, and I didn’t realize this until my roommate, Pat, asked me about it. During my 3 ½ years here at aTm, our football team just hasn’t been very good at all. Our school prides itself on great school tradition, especially when it comes to Aggie Football, and if you read this site, you know that I am one of those people who takes our football pretty seriously.

Pat asked me what our record was over the time we’ve been here, and I honestly didn’t know. I did know that we haven't finished a season ranked in the Top 25 since 1999, my senior year in high school. When I looked up the actual stats, I was initially surprised, but after thinking about it for a minute I really wasn’t. I’ve been here for 41 games and over that time span our record has been 23-18 (.561 winning %age):

• 2003: 2-3 (2-1 at Kyle Field)
• 2002: 6-6 (3-4 at Kyle Field)
• 2001: 8-4 (5-1 at Kyle Field)
• 2000: 7-5 (4-2 at Kyle Field)

If we take out this season, to give us 3 full seasons to work with, we find that our record is 21-15 (.583)and 12-7 (.632) at Kyle Field. I did all the math, and there has not been a 3-year time period where A&M has had such a low winning percentage since 1983-1985...a 17 year time span.

3 Year Period	Wins	Losses	Ties	W%age	at Kyle Field
2000-2002	21	15	-	.583	12-7
1999-2001	23	13	-	.639	15-3
1998-2000	26	12	-	.684	16-2
1997-1999	28	11	-	.717	18-0
1996-1998	26	13	-	.667	15-3
1995-1997	24	13	-	.649	14-4
1994-1996	25	9	1	.714	14-4
1993-1995	29	5	1	.829	17-1
1992-1994	32	3	1	.889	18-0
1991-1993	35	5	-	.865	18-0
1990-1992	31	6	-	.838	17-0-1
1989-1991	27	9	1	.730	16-1-1
1988-1990	24	12	1	.649	15-2-1
1987-1989	25	11	-	.694	15-3
1986-1988	26	10	-	.722	16-2
1985-1987	29	7	-	.806	17-1
1984-1986	25	10	-	.714	17-2
1983-1985	16	16	1	.485	14-6

Kyle Field

From the mid-80's and all through 1990's, Texas A&M was almost unstoppable at home in Kyle Field. During the 90's, A&M had the 4th best record at home in the nation at 55-4-1 (only behind Florida St., Nebraska, and Florida). In fact, the loss to a 0-4 Colorado team in 2000 (my freshman year) broke up our 22 game home winning streak. Since I've been here in '00, we've lost some VERY close games at home, that if we had won would put our record right back up into that elite school range that we had in the 90's.

2000

Colorado

In 2000, during that Colorado game, we twice in the 4th quarter we had the ball inside the CU 10 yard line and couldn't punch it in for a TD and had to settle for 2 field goals (one of those possessions was a 1st and goal on the 2 and we made attempted 3 passes instead of giving the ball to Jamaar Toombs our 3 yard guarantee specialist). We lost 26-19.

#1 Oklahoma

Our loss to Oklahoma was very similar...eerily similar...1st and goal on OU's 10-yard line and we get it to the 4-yard line after 2 plays, leaving us with 3rd and goal on the 4. We throw 2 incomplete passes and give up the ball, and the game to the eventual National Champs, OU by the score of 35-31. Toombs was having a HUGE game in that one also, but we didn't give it to him...

2001

#5 t.u.

In 2001, we lost only to our archrivals, #5 ranked t.u. This was a good game, but very frustrating. The score was tied 7-7 going into the 4th quarter and t.u. scored after a very poor punt by the Aggies, which left t.u. standing on our 35-yard line. Two possessions later, Aggie QB, Mark Farris was picked off and the ball was returned to the Aggie 12-yard line setting up the final score for t.u. which sealed the deal for the longhorns, 21-7

2002

#7 Virginia Tech

This game was lost after only giving up 13 points and a measly 258-yards of total offense to a very very good V-Tech offense. Dustin Long made his first start of his career and gave up the ball on an interception on V-Tech's 31-yard line, which was later magnified by the fact we had only 156-yards of total offense. Reggie McNeil made his NCAA debut and threw an interception on our own 12-yardline which set up a second field goal for V-Tech. We lost 13-3...This loss was a killer considering the exceptional job our defense did, if we could only score in the end zone.

texas tech

This was a 48-47 overtime loss...our fill-in place kicker missed two extra points, the first of which was with 1:40 left in the game which is why this one went to O.T. in the first place. The second was in O.T. which cost us the game....

Nebraska

We blew a 17 point 3rd quarter lead...We missed an easy field goal early on and in the fourth quarter gave Nebraska the ball on our own 35-yardline on a terrible, 14-yard punt. Then we threw two interceptions on our last two possessions, one of which led to a Nebraska TD...the last one they needed in a 38-31 victory.

Missouri

We failed to score from the 1-yard line late in the second quarter, and it came back to haunt us...After a 17-3 halftime lead, Missouri let us back into the game and actually went to O.T. with us where we threw an INT and lost 33-27.

2003

I'm not even going to talk about the Pitt game, if you want to read about it check out my original post from after the game...

Needless to say, we've been a few key plays away from great records, but we're not getting it done. From what I'm reading in chat rooms and in the papers, Old Ags and the media feel that the current 12th Man isn't doing a good job and that's why we're losing. Well that's a load of crap. I'll admit, the 12th Man hasn't been up to standards, but that is not the reason we're losing. We're losing because we can't stop the opponents in the second half and we turn the ball over in key situations. From what you just read about our home losses, you should agree with that.

Monday October 6th, 2003

3:04am

Joy In Wrigleyville

• Game 1 Chi 4 v. Atl 2 (Cubs 1-0)
• Game 2 Chi 3 v. Atl 5 (tied 1-1)
• Game 3 Chi 3 v. Atl 1 (Cubs 2-1)
• Game 4 Chi 4 v. Atl 6 (tied 2-2)
• Game 5 Chi 5 v. Atl 1 (Cubs Win!! 3-2)

That was the scene back in Chicago after the Cubs defeated the Atlanta Braves to advance to the National League Championship Series.

Kerry Wood once again, stepped up and made things happen tonight, going 8 innings while allowing only 5 hits and one run while striking out 7.

What a game and what a series that was! I'm so happy that the Cubs are going on! They will start the next series vs. the Marlins on Tuesday night at Wrigley Field in Chicago. According to ESPN.com, Carlos Zambrano will be on the mound for the Cubs, and Josh Beckett will be throwing for Florida. I wish it was Prior v. Beckett because that would be a match up of two of the best young guns in all the land. Anyways, here is how Zambrano and Beckett have fared against their opponents during their careers:

Cubs vs. Josh Beckett

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	BA	OPS
K.Lofton	1	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
M.Grudzielanek	1	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
S.Sosa	6	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
M.Alou	3	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
A.Ramirez	0	0	0	0	0	.000	.000
Simon/Karros	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	0/0	.000/.000	.000/.000
Gonzalez/Martinez	1/4	1/3	1/1	1/0	1/0	1.000/.750	5.000/1.500
Miller/Bako	3/2	1/0	1/0	1/0	1/0	.333/.000	1.667/.333

Marlins vs. Carlos Zambrano

Batter	AB	H	RBI	HR	XBH	BA	OPS
J.Pierre	6	1	0	0	0	.167	.452
L.Castillo	2	1	0	0	0	.500	1.167
I.Rodriguez	6	2	0	0	0	.333	.667
D.Lee	5	2	0	0	0	.400	.900
Cabrera/Lowell	4/3	1/0	1/0	0/0	0/0	.250/.000	.750/.000
J.Encarnacion	6	1	0	0	0	.167	.333
J.Conine	2	1	0	0	0	.500	1.000
A.Gonzalez	6	2	0	0	1	.333	.833

Here are how each starter has done at Wrigley Field during their short careers:

Pitcher	GS	W-L	IP	H	R	ER	HR	SO/BB	ERA	BAA
C.Zambrano	15	5-6	105.0	94	38	35	5	84/46	3.00	.249
J.Beckett	1	0-1	6.0	10	6	6	1	6/4	9.00	.417

It is going to be a good series, and I think that the old saying, "Pitching and defense win in the playoffs" will prove to be 100% accurate for this series. The Cubs have to keep the Marlin's running game to a minimum because that is where they expose opponents, on the bases. They’ll also have to figure out how to slow down Pudge Rodrigez, because he is 90% of why the Marlins got past San Francisco. It's going to be a fun week....Go Cubs!!!!

Sunday October 5th

6:24pm

A&M 28 vs. tt 59

Box score

Yesterday had the potential to be an awesome sports day for me. I sat on the couch for somewhere in the neighborhood of 9 hours taking only a 30 min. break to run to the store for more coke and to Dominoes for dinner. I went to bed last night feeling disappointed and embarrassed but there were two games on that were really exciting (Marlins/Giants & Red Sox/A's, I'll get back to those in a bit).

Brief Recap

texas tech lit us up. Simple as that. We were not able to stop their offense and we just couldn't keep up with their scoring barrage. tech's 59 points was the most ever given up by A&M to an opponent.

Symons

B.J. Symons (whose name I've been spelling incorrectly up to this point) threw for his 3rd straight 500 yard game. He left the game with 11:48 left in the 4th quarter after going 34-for-46 for 505 yards and, a Big XII record, 8 TDs. His backup, Sonny Cumbie, stepped in and threw for an even 100 yards on 9-of-13 passing.

Defense

#19 Jaxson Appel once again led the Aggie defense in tackles with 8. In fact, the first non-DB on our tackle list is #95 Mike Montgomery (DL) coming in at #5.

Offense

I was happy with the way our offense moved the ball. #16 Reggie had a quiet 214 passing yards to go with his 50 rushing yards, and #25 Courtney Lewis was 9 yards short of another 100-yard game and had two more TDs.

I'm not sure where the option went this week after it being quite successful against Pitt last week. I only remember seeing it run 2 or 3 times, and once it resulted in a #25 Courtney Lewis TD.

We also did a really good job of spreading the ball out. 10 players caught passes with #2 Jamaar Taylor leading the way with 3 receptions for 89 yards and a TD. Although I am a bit biased, I'd like to see #5 T-Murph get the ball a bit more (he had one reception for 32 yards and 4 kick returns for a total of 77 yards).

Turnovers

Once again, we fumbled a punt which directly led to points by the opponent. We have to get better at this because we're just handing our opponents a very short field every time and putting ourselves in a bigger hole after they score.

Complaints

I'd like to take this time to correct the announcers from the game. During the course of the game, the sideline announcer was talking to B.J. Symons and B.J. made a comment that went something like this, "We're going to put 70 up on them tonight". He was referring to scoring 70 points. The announcers went on to praise him for being confident but not cocky. That's not cocky? If Shaq said the Lakers were going to score 175 points against the Bulls, you're telling me he wouldn't get headlines across the nation screaming at him for being cocky? You don't praise a kid for saying things like that, just like you don't cut to commercials showing a TD scored earlier in the game while a college player is taunting his opponent. By doing that, you're just encouraging it to happen again....And while I'm on the topic, the tech players showed how classless they really are after having not one, but two taunting penalties called against them. You score your TD, flip the ball to the ref, and high-five your teammates....watch Barry Sanders highlights, he knows how to do it correctly.

Also, what's the deal with the accidental whistle stopping us mid-play and then saying "Oops, didn't mean to blow that, you can try it again". That is two weeks in a row! This week #16 Reggie was on his way to a 35-40 yard run when he was stopped and last week it cost us a TD. Get your heads in the game refs!

Thank Goodness

The one thing that stuck out in my mind as being something to be thankful for, and I noticed this during their game vs. NC State, is that we don't have glittery sparkles on our helmets. What's the deal with that?

In Conclusion

I went to bed very disappointed and sad, but I wasn't AS angry about our loss as I have been the last two weeks (yeah, that is 3 L's in a row). I don't know if I'm getting better at watching the game as a football fan and not an Aggie who has blinders on, or if I just deep down inside don't think we can win? Next week is Baylor at Kyle Field, and that should be refreshing....but wait, is that correct? Baylor beat a Big XII team this weekend (Colorado; 42-30)....uh oh.

tech, you flat out beat us, simple as that....but I still hate you.

Cubs 4 vs. Braves 6

• Game 1 Chi 4 v. Atl 2 (Cubs 1-0)
• Game 2 Chi 3 v. Atl 5 (tied 1-1)
• Game 3 Chi 3 v. Atl 1 (Cubs 2-1)
• Game 4 Chi 4 v. Atl 6 (tied 2-2)

This game was just not meant to be for the Cubs....I was excited because Gary Sheffield wasn't going to be starting after getting hit in the hand by Mark Prior the night before, but that didn't seem to matter. Chipper Jones broke out the whoopin' stick and went 2-for-3 with 2 HRs and 4 RBI. Eric "Lurch" Karros countered with a 2 HR game himself, but both of his HRs were solo jobs. It's too bad the umpire missed the call at first base for the 3rd out in the previous inning when there was a double play. The replay was very inconclusive whether the runner was safe or out and if we can't tell in slow-mo if he's safe or out, then it was obviously pretty close in real life. I was always told the tie goes to the runner....am I wrong? Anyways, Karros HRed to start the next inning, and it should have been a 3 run shot.

Going into the 9th, down by 3, Randall Simon PH and doubled off of John "Mr. Playoff" Smoltz to start things off. Damion Miller then doubled to right center to drive in Randall and I thought we had a chance with no outs and the top of the order coming up. It wasn't to be....Kenny Lofton K'ed, Grudz. popped out to RF, and then came Sammy, who hit a shot to straight away CF. When he first hit it, he didn't look like he got it all, but neither did Chipper on one of his so everyone, including myself, thought he'd just tied it up. It was caught by Andrew Jones on the warning track. A tough loss for the Wrigley Faithful, but the series goes on to Atlanta.

I'm officially starting the "I hate Robert Fick Club". What on earth was he thinking running down to first. He was running to first after hitting a dribbler to the pitcher's mound and Kyle Farnsworth made a great play to get the throw to "Lurch" over at first. Fick was arriving at 1st just as "Lurch" stretched up for the ball, and as The Cubs Reporter describes, he "tomahawk chop(ped)" Karros causing his glove to fall off. Thankfully, the umpire was on top of things and made the correct call and Fick was out. My question is this, "Why wasn't Fick ejected?" You can't just go around attacking the fielders while you're on the base paths, even if you're not in the base path (the replay showed Fick running almost on the grass to the inside of the baseline--clearly out of the runner's box). Hopefully there will be a fine or suspension waiting for Fick because that was just dirty....and a note to Mr. Fick: "I hope you're not starting in Game 5, because Kerry Wood is pitching and he throws really hard, and you just painted a target on the earpiece of your helmet.

I'd also like to take this time to ask Mr. Thom Brenneman of Fox, "Since when was FRANCO pronounced with a soft "A"?" Is it not Frank-o?

John Smoltz really looked like he was hurting after getting Sosa out, so we'll just have to see how that turns out.

It'll be K-Wood v. Mike Hampton for the clincher....Go Cubs!

Marlins vs. Giants

I'd like to take this time to congratulate the Florida Marlins for being the first team to advance to the second round. I, along with many others, didn't think the Marlins could do it, but we were all wrong. I didn't realize that since Jack McKeon took over in May, the Marlins had the best record IN ALL OF BASEBALL....they mentioned that during the broadcast of the game.

If you noticed, I had the Giants picked in both my "Realistic" and "Wishful" brackets, but after I posted them, I was thinking, why didn't I pick the Marlins in the "Wishful", because I really don't like the Giants. I didn't and it's too late to change, but I was happy about the Marlins win.

Game 4 was a really exciting game, and I'm glad I watched it. Ending with a play at the plate....wow, you can't ask for much more than that.

I glad that Pudge gets to advance to the next round and they're a really exciting team to watch...

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