Varsity Kansas - The Blog

by joanna

I admit, I waffle on this subject. Some things bug me, others don’t.

Are you bothered by Usain Bolt after his 100 meters? (rather, during his 100 meters) I wasn’t. I was so blown away by how much he dominated the field and how easy he ran, that I was giddy along with him. Now I talked to one of my brothers last night, and he thinks Bolt is a big-time you-know-what. I just chalk it up to sprinters being sprinters.

What about the Jamaican woman who won the 100? Fraser. She was so cute with her huge, brace-filled smile, as she lifted her arms. I loved it. It was pure emotion. I love the athletes that race around the track with their flags on their backs — even if they didn’t get the gold.

Moving on. Let’s take Randy Moss’s little mooning incident several years ago. He faked that he mooned everyone after catching a touchdown. The commentator said that it was so horrible, they wouldn’t show a replay. Are you kidding me? Was it really that bad? I thought it was kind of funny. But then, I admit to liking creative celebrations. As much as I am not a fan of Terrell Owens, I liked the Sharpie incident, I liked the pom-poms.

Let’s take this closer to home: Southeast’s Adonis Gantt, as soon as the Buffaloes won the 6A title in March, a friend brought him a pen out of the stands, he took off one shoe, signed it and threw it, then he took off the other, signed it and threw it. OK or not?

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by joanna

I was up awfully early this morning to bring in my youngest son for surgery. He’s doing just fine, resting and he’s getting back to normal.

But I was pumped when I made it home in time to watch Team USA playing Argentina in the men’s semifinal. As I told everyone, the game started at 10:15 Eastern, so 9:15 a.m. our time. I was home about 15 minutes before the start, but the game never came on, never came on.

Finally I went to the laptop and found the game, midway through the second quarter. Yep, it’s halftime right now and NBC is finally showing the game. To make matters worse? They’ve got LIVE up in the right corner.

Talk about a crappy thing. I know KSN must be hearing it from people — it’s not their fault. But I just cannot come up with a logical explanation for this. Is the Today show that important? Is there really a bigger audience at 10:15 central than 9:15?

And putting LIVE up there is the most ridiculous thing.

In keeping with my not wanting spoilers, I won’t tell you the halftime score, but you can go to nbcolympics.com and watch it.

By J. Long

That Ricky Bobby.

If you ain’t first, you’re last.

This is one of the sayings from my favorite Will Ferrell movie, “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby” that is in the book of quotes that I keep.

I thought I’d bring this up because as I’m watching the Olympics, it’s amazing to me just how many gold medals that China has won. Though as of 2 p.m. today the medal overall medal count is USA 95 (G 29, S34, B32), China 83 G 45, S 15, B 22) and Russia 51(G 16, S 16, B 19).

I find it amazing that China has 45 gold medals compared to the United States’ 29.

There was a debate about what’s more important having more golds or finishing with more overall medals. I’m all about being well-balanced so you would think that would leave me to say overall medal count. Yet, what the Chinese athletes are doing is really telling. The record for the most golds in a non-boycotted Olympics is 75 by the U.S. in 1904. The most overall is 83 by the U.S. in the 1984 games that was boycotted by Russia and a host of other countries.

I watched a HBO Real Sports segment about how the young athletes in China trained and I was floored at how intense it was. They went-in while participating in their respective sports. It was kinda of scary. Reminded me a little of how the Russian was training in Rocky IV. Like losing isn’t an option.

In China, its pretty evident that they live by the Ricky Bobby philosophy. So which do you believe is more important?

By: J. Long

Pride and Passion:The African American Baseball Experience is a traveling exhibit that will be featured in 25 libraries around the United States from November 2008 and November 2012.

The exhibit will make an appearance at the Learning Resource Center of Fort Scott Community College however, a definite date has yet to be assigned. Library Assistant Susan Messer, who is the coordinator for the event said that she applied to get the event sometime after April of 2009, but hopefully during the school season.

It’s no secret that I’m a big supporter of learning about African American contributions to baseball. Two years ago, I had the opportunity to visit a different traveling exhibit and was taken-back by some of the things I’ve seen.

By J. Long

No, not the starting quarterback.

But something even more special.

Jeff Martin passed me this article on Chris Harper. Oregon will supposedly use a three-quarterback-system this season, which means that as a freshman Chris Harper would see some PT.

But he might not need that three-quarterback-system.

Oregonian reporter John Hunter is convinced that Harper could be the key to the Ducks success offensively this season. Though Harper will be a quarterback at Oregon Hunter says he will play a more all-purpose roll.

Nagging injuries to other players have forced Bellotti to use Harper not only at quarterback this fall but also at running back and receiver. He is the X-factor. Wherever he lines up, he represents the biggest threat to score. The original plan was to use the dynamic Harper in goal-line situations, as Florida used Tim Tebow in his freshman season.

“He’s a little different package than the other young men at the position,” Bellotti said of Harper. “He’s a great runner. He’s able to not only set up blocks, but make people miss. He’s making progress (as a passer), not to the point where he’s going to scare records in passing, but he could get us through a game in that regard.”

I never saw Harper play, but from what I heard he was the truth.  I was a little skeptical about him being the X-factor though. So I made a call to someone close to the situation and he cosigned. He said Harper made  some spectacular plays during practice and that they loved what they saw. However, he will stay at the QB position.

Considering Harper’s size and speed, having him do some of everything is a good look. And looking at the rise of  Tim Tebow - who Harper is often compared too - he could do some major things.

by joanna

I ask this question because this is what I’m faced with when it comes to the Olympics. Do I want to know how Jeremy Wariner did in the 400 now — it just happened — or do I want to wait until I’ll see it, via tape-delay on NBC?

I want to see it via tape delay. I admit. I think I’m one of the weird ones. I do. I think most people are heading to the internet to check out the results when they happen. I understand that.

It happened yesterday when I heard my co-workers talking about Usain Bolt winning the 200 and in what time. I was fuming inside — knowing that I was wrong to be fuming. It’s just like, if you tape The Office but don’t watch it before the next morning, can  you really ask that other people don’t talk about it? No. (I’m a very introspective person, thus I realize, most of the time, when I’m wrong.)

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by joanna

I talked to Maize senior Garrett Gould yesterday about his trip to Chicago and his pitching at Wrigley Field for the Under Armour All-Star baseball game. (I should have had this up on the blog last night, but I had to watch the men’s 200-meter final. I knew the result, but it was an epic race regardless.)

Gould gave me a breakdown of how the weekend went, and he touched on how he feels that football has started and he’s not playing.

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By J. Long

So I was sitting here looking at college football preseason stuff and one thing that I’ve always been intrigued by is the notion of a  “Preseason All-American.” I understand that for many people it’s a way to learn about who to pay attention to during the season. But, i just think that for the most part it’s a way for media people to say look, I told you so-n-so would have a great year.

Yeah, in case you didn’t know, some media people can be real know-it-all’s. LOL.

Well in the spirit of all of that, I’ll give you guys the chance to do the same. I’ll list a couple of questions and you can answer them. At the end of the regular season, I’ll post the name of the person who got the most right.

Maybe I’ll even think of a nice little prize. Only one entry per person.

AREA PLAYERS ONLY

QB with the most passing yards?

Best team Defense?

Team with the most wins AGAINST TEAMS WITH A WINNING RECORD?

The number of touchdowns Blake Bell will have after the first three games? (Opponents: Heights, Northwest, South)

How many 150 yard games will Southeast’s Joseph Randle have?

Who will have more rushing yards in the October 3rd meeting of Southeast and Northwest, Randle or Demarcus Robinson?

Player with the most touchdowns?

The teams that will finish 1, 2, and 3 atop the city league? (In order)

Number of wins Derby will have at the end of the regular season?

Team that has the biggest increase in wins from last year?

by joanna

A reader passed along the news that something was up with Romero Cotton, the former four-time wrestling champ and football player at Hutchinson. I checked it out and found this story on the Hutch News’ Web site.

Not sure what happened here, but I haven’t seen any follow-up, either. Cotton signed to wrestle at Nebraska.

by joanna

I happened to notice that there were some schools with questionable schedules. A game open here or there. One school told me they were waiting to see if an opponent was approved or not.

So I checked kshsaa.org to see what schools were approved or not. This is what I found at the state association’s site. It’s an interesting list because they are school names you just don’t see very often. Like Manhattan Flint Hills Christian and Manhattan Flint Hills Job Corps Center.

Then there’s the Wichita schools, like Northfield School of the Liberal Arts. I’m familiar, of course, with Sunrise and the two homeschools — Defenders and Wichita Homeschool — but I wondered where Word of Life was.

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