A cooooold Monday Night, and other stuff

Mike...the lady friend....do I know her? What's her name?

This post will have all sorts of ramblings, but first, I will report on the Monday Night Football game I attended tonight.

I'm very pleased with Drew Bennett and the fact that Billy Volek always seems to be looking for him in a 233 yard and 3 touchdown performance that sealed the deal in a key fantasy win that gives me 4th by myself going into the last week (the final playoff berth).

On that note, Drew Bennett made several incredible catches that were a pleasure to see live, and the second one where Volek threw the ball to the corner of the end zone to catch Bennett in stride I got to see very closely with end zone seats, which aren't the greatest by the way but they give you a good look at one end zone. You can't tell anything about the distance of a play from those seats. You really have to do math, knowing where the line of scrimmage is and where the next play ends to see what yardage was attained or lost.

Man, was it cold.

It snowed at some point, fleetingly, but it was quite a sight to see. Too bad it couldn't stick, and then we could have had a rare snow-covered field.

A pack of coupons in the cupholder of my seat contained a character that won an animated field goal competition, giving me $50 off of a new phone from Cingular should I so choose to take advantage (and knowing the mediocrity of my phone, should I be able to find one that is in a good price range I will)

Playing not to lose in a season where there is nothing to lose didn't befit the Titans as they ran three times after a fumble recovery at the Chief 15 and settled for the go-ahead field goal, which led to the Chiefs' game-winning drive aided by numerous penalties, including the ridiculous roughing-the-passer call. I know you can't review penalties, but one area should be open for it and that is to decide whether a player hit another player's helmet, because that's what they called but that's not what happened. Hell, Fisher said he was disappointed with the officiating in this game, and you don't generally get that from him. We all know, however, that the other factors of the game lost this one for the Titans--it just didn't help to have bad calls.

Nostalgia--Fisher versus Vermiel in a hookup that took place in Super Bowl XXXIV.

Billy Volek got murdered in this game, which shows the condition of the offensive line. According to Mike Keith after the game, had anyone else gotten hurt tonight they may have had to line up tight end Erron Kinney at tackle. I will say this, though. I saw at least three times where Volek could have thrown the ball to someone but he elected to take the sack. Maybe he didn't know he was in danger of being sacked and he was trying to let the play develop, but there were guys open that would have been great outs. I overheard someone say if McNair was in would have gotten three more touchdowns, and this guy kept rambling about it.

That guy had to be drunk, because he obviously didn't see how McNair played this year, unable to hit open receivers, unable to throw precise routes. If anything, the Titans would have had three less touchdowns considering the difficulty of the Volek/Bennett hookups. I will say Volek began to underthow in the second half, and Bennett began to have to climb cornerbacks or run back into the defense to try to get the catch.

Overall, fun game, 49-38, with that extra TD when the Titans tried to play Miracle-ball at the end and instead introduced the KC defense to another fumble (Chris Brown fumbled twice--he's kind of becoming a Mr. Fumbly-Pants) that was returned in end-of-the-game style for a TD.

Baseball...steroids. I must say that the records and currently-pursued records are tainted right now, but that's nothing everybody else isn't saying. I wonder, if the steroid issue becomes harsher, and it will--I'm not worried about that because if baseball doesn't do it, Congress will--will Barry Bonds at 41 be able to sustain a season without the enhancements (the question of whether he knew he was taking steroids or not is an incredible stretch of leeway for a star player...I mean, benefit of the doubt goes out the door here). I think it might be in the very least interesting to see if that's the case. And many teams in baseball may just walk him twice as much as his record-breaking walk season from this past season to make sure he doesn't get anywhere near Aaron's record anyway. As Aaron said, it's not the ability that was enhanced with Bonds. It was the endurance.

Hockey...as much as I like the sport and wish I had something to do with some free time now and then, especially with the Titans currently at 4-9, I must say I haven't missed it very much. At best, I am strictly a Predators fan who can't get excited about other teams playing, which makes my interest in hockey almost assuredly purely based on an "us-versus-them" mentality. It's going to hurt worse, though, when hockey is not around in February and March when sports are at their lowest interest level anyway. We all know what they need to do, but now it's ego and pride involved and that's going to get in the way of everything.

Basketball...hey, I heard Kobe Bryant has a beef with Karl Malone about Malone hitting on his wife. Hey, Kobe, let me add to the millions of voices who are already saying, "Hey, Kobe, you cheated on your wife, remember?" Kobe Bryant's wife...take note of the apostrophe and the "s" that follows "Kobe," which denotes the possessive case for apostrophe use--she's a possession. Kobe doesn't care about his wife, he only cares that she is his wife, and that if any shenanigans went on then it's as equal to him as someone keying his car.

You know, quietly, even with the brawl that occurred between the Pistons and Pacers that led all the sports headlines for a week, the NBA must be thanking the MLB and NHL for clouding their images because the NBA has really gone in the gutter this year. Latrell Sprewell saying he can't feed his family on the money he makes (by the way, when I hear the term "feed my family" I begin to conjure dark thoughts on the human population and how we would be better off without so much breeding--and I say this, giving Sprewell the benefit of the doubt, I'm glad he can't feed his kids. Maybe they'll die of starvation and we'll be rid of more Sprewells polluting the Earth), and the product...oh my gosh, the product is so bad. No one can make shots anymore. The excitement of the sport depends on long-range shooting, and if you disagree with me, then take into account the wonderful product the NBA was when Jordan was king and the beginning of that prosperity when Magic and Bird were going toe-to-toe seemingly every year in the 80's for a championship. Those guys weren't known for dunking, even though that can be an exciting play. They were known for their all-around play and their ability to hit beautiful jumpers when their team needed it.

So...yes, sports in general are all horribly mismanaged. In fact, many of our entertainments these days are horribly mismanaged. Movies and movie theatres are run by people who simply don't know what they are doing. Everything is geared towards the wrong thing. For instance, movie theatres, and I've worked for two large corporations in Carmike and Regal, believe this about making money and may lightning strike me if I'm wrong--they believe in the status quo. They believe, "We're making this much money, but we're spending this much money." The problem they try to solve is not, how can we make more money? but how can we spend less money? so as the status quo can realize larger profits. I believe this to be true with lots of corporations and this is why there are numerous layoffs that aren't necessary and people working for shit wages. What theatres need is a breath of life that make people want to come out--more people working, less wait for tickets and concessions, and better quality to film presentation, thereby making a customer want to return instead of getting pissed off or discouraged.

The fact is, a movie theatre company realizes, especially in a town like Nashville, is if you decide to go to another place, then you are likely to be visiting another theatre that the corporation owns, because Regal and Carmike hold key areas without competition from each other, except in Bellevue--and the reason why this town conforms to this greedy-corporation mentality is that if you live in Bellevue and have a bad experience at the Regal Bellevue 12 and decide that from now on, you're only going to the Carmike Bellevue 8, then you will fall into a trap because neither of those theatres can get the same movies as another due to the ridiculous "miles" rule which prevents competing theatres from showing the same product.. So, if you've decided that you will only visit one place, then you'll miss out on say, Titanic when it arrives at the "bad" theatre.

This is why I want to run my own theatre, in case my dreams of being a writer are never realized, and I would bring good people on board and we would show how it's done. Running a business, a good business, has to be more than watering down the product to unknowing customers.

Anyway, there's all my thoughts for the evening. Good night, er, morning, to all.