Sometime after 10:30 on a Thursday morning in May, after he’d had his cup of coffee, Dick Trickle snuck out of the house. His wife didn’t see him go. He eased his 20-year-old Ford pickup out on the road and headed toward Boger City, N.C., 10 minutes away. He drove down Highway 150, a two-lane road that cuts through farm fields and stands of trees and humble country homes that dot the Piedmont west of Charlotte, just outside the reach of its suburban sprawl. Trickle pulled into a graveyard across the street from a Citgo station. He drove around to the back. It was sunny. The wind blew gently from the west. Just after noon, he dialed 911. The dispatcher asked for his address.
“Uh, the Forest Lawn, uh, Cemetery on 150,” he said, his voice calm. The dispatcher asked for his name. He didn’t give it.
“On the backside of it, on the back by a ‘93 pickup, there’s gonna be a dead body,” he said.
“OK,” the woman said, deadpan.
“Suicide,” he said. “Suicide.”
“Are you there?”
“I’m the one.”
“OK, listen to me, sir, listen to me.”
“Yes, it’ll be 150, Forest Lawn Cemetery, in the back by a Ford pickup.”
Even though I no longer live in the listening area, I still tune in to WBBL– “West Michigan’s Sports Leader”– from time to time when I want a dose of local perspective on Michigan-based teams, and I did so this morning, expecting to hear “Bakita & Bentley,” the station’s usual morning show. I heard Ray Bentley, but the other voice was one I didn’t recognize. At first, I assumed it was someone filling in for the show’s usual lead, Bret Bakita, but as the conversation between Bentley and “Doc” continued, I began to get the feeling that the two were working on developing a more lasting rapport between each other and with the listening audience. Bakita was never mentioned as being out sick or on vacation. Before leaving for work, I found this story, which confirmed that Bakita had left the show and the station.
This isn’t the death of Pat Summerall— the voice of the NFL, along with John Madden, for a generation– or even the departure of Paul Finebaum from WJOX— the temporary silencing of the voice of the SEC– but Bret Bakita was WBBL, and WBBL was West Michigan sports radio. He joined the station in early 1994, and he was the most prominent on-air voice across the station’s programming for the nineteen-year period that ended in late February of this year. Keep reading…
For the most part, everyone did what they were supposed to do yesterday, with a few exceptions. Some of the highlights:
Despite some fight from Valparaiso and surrendering turnovers in spades, Michigan State pulled away to a win in the tournament’s opening game.
Newly anointed Gonzaga nearly blew their opportunity and almost became the first #1 seed to go down in the first round, escaping with a win over a Southern team that would not go away.
Harvard University, which has so little going for it, finally found some success in the realm of sport, securing its first tournament win with an upset of #3 New Mexico.
New Mexico State also lost yesterday, making this article really sad.
Colorado State’s win over continually hapless Missouri was a yawner…until it wasn’t!
When will we stop underseeding the Pacific Twelve? Oregon pulled one of the least surprising 12-5 upsets ever by knocking off Eddie Sutton-less Oklahoma State, while #12 Cal eked one out against #5 UNLV.
As usual, I got greedy with underdogs in the early rounds, so the dispatching of UNLV and Belmont wasn’t too kind to my ALDLAND bracket. (If you’re a junkie, you can see the updated standings here. We’ll do a deep analysis after the first two rounds are complete.)
As reportedeverywhere yesterday, Bret Bielema is leaving his head coaching position at Wisconsin to become the head coach at Arkansas.
Bielema’s in his seventh year at Wisconsin, and he took the Badgers to a bowl game every year. When Wisconsin appears in the Rose Bowl this January, it will be the school’s third consecutive trip to Pasadena. Ten or fifteen years ago, a record and trajectory like this would cement the forty-two year-old Bielema’s (68-24 career record) destiny to become a legendary coach at Wisconsin and a top-echelon coach in college football’s historic conference. Today, it makes him plan B for a 4-8 team that went 2-6 in conference and itself lacks a consistent historical conference and regional identity.
To be fair, Arkansas was a top-five team last year, and had Bobby Petrino and his mistress not crashed his motorcycle, the Razorbacks probably would’ve contended for a national championship this year. Instead, another former Big Ten head coach rode the Hogs hard into the ground. (Then again, he’s got an acknowledged history of that.)
As much as Bielema’s decampment to Fayettville reflects the diminished stature of the Big Ten and affirms the completed rise of the SEC (and it’s hard to imagine the former’s recent expansion to fourteen teams didn’t play a role here), one has to wonder whether the Big Ten’s realization that the SEC is college football’s premiere conference actually indicates that we’re at some point on the downside of Peak SEC.
Whatever Bielema’s decision indicates about the state of college football, one thing seems clear: any complaints from the new Hog coach about recruiting tactics are going to fall on deaf ears in SEC land.
Nothing is weather until it’s New York City weather, which means that, as of sometime today, we have ourselves some weather. Somehow unsurprisingly, the indomitable Clay Travis has himself a man on the scene, reporting live from the south shore of Long Island. Somewhat surprisingly, there has been a dearth of Point Break references being made, so that’s something we collectively need to work on. And while the Frankenstorm/Hurricane Sandy caused the main presidential candidates to take a break from the campaign trail, it didn’t stop sports this weekend.
Saturday was a tumultuous day in college football’s top 25, with undefeateds Ohio and Mississippi State taking their first losses of the season, Wisconsin losing to Michigan State in overtime, Oregon State losing to Washington, Florida losing to Georgia, USC losing to Arizona, Rutgers losing to Kent State, and Michigan losing to Nebraska. Although not technically an upset, Notre Dame surprised most people outside of South Bend by beating Oklahoma in convincing fashion. The Georgia win is significant because it dashes the order that was starting to distill in the highly competitive SEC East. The Arizona win is significant because 1) aren’t they really bad??, and 2) it weakens Oregon’s strength of schedule, because the Ducks were relying on a win against USC to buoy their BCS ranking that continues to fall despite an unbroken series of mathematically mind-boggling wins.
In the NFL, the Lions beat the Seahawks by scoring touchdowns in both halves of the game, and even daring to take a lead in the first half. The Falcons preserved their position as the NFL’s only undefeated team by beating the Eagles, a team where the only constant now seems to be the walrusness of Andy Reid’s mustache. (Reid fired his good friend and defensive coordinator Juan Castillo during Philadelphia’s bye week last week, and after yesterday’s game, Michael Vick said that Reid was contemplating a change at quarterback.) In a real accordion-style game, the Giants went up 23-0 on the Cowboys, then went down 24-23, before coming from behind in some technical sense to beat Dallas, 29-24. Andrew Luck led the Colts to an overtime victory against the Titans, the Broncos beat the listless Saints by twenty, and the Bears survived a scare from the visiting Panthers, beating Carolina by one.
Finally, the sad World Series came to an end last night when the Giants beat the Tigers 4-3 in the tenth inning of game four. It’s San Francisco’s second championship in three years. More on that later in the week.
Football is underway at all levels, which means that this weekly roundup/preview post is back.
College football’s second week portended less excitement than its opening week, and yet there seemed to be more surprising results this week than last. In particular, two teams with a lot of preseason promise took big hits on Saturday. The Wisconsin Badgers fell out of the Top 25 and fired their offensive line coach after a loss to Oregon State in which the traditional running power generated only thirty-five yards on the ground. Arkansas’ drop from the rankings was even more precipitous, as the Razorbacks lost to Louisiana-Monroe. Michigan, fresh off a no-show against Alabama, nearly lost their home-opener to Air Force, while Clemson nearly doubled up Ball State to stay undefeated, a status they’re likely to carry into their meeting with #5 Florida State in two weeks after facing in-state lightweight Furman this weekend. Michigan State also stayed undefeated with an easy win over Central Michigan, while Vanderbilt fell to 0-2 at Northwestern in a game I attended and more about which I will writehave written.
Robert Griffin III was the star of the NFL’s first Sunday of 2012, while Andrew Luck found himself grouped with more pedestrian rookie QB starters Brandon Weeden and Ryan Tannehill. The always-overhyped Jets turned in the surprise team performance of the day, a 48-28 win over Buffalo. The Lions, who have an official drum line, came from behind to beat the Rams in the last ten seconds of the game, and Peyton Manning returned to form in an ultimately convincing win over Pittsburgh.
Today really isn’t a big day, and most of the weekend’s football games were duds, but there were a couple notable exceptions.
Saturday day was pretty slow around the college football world, but things picked up Saturday night, when two unbeaten teams, Wisconsin and Oklahoma, put their perfect records to the test and failed to preserve them. In East Lansing, Michigan State made it two in a row against the Badgers. Wisconsin dominated early, but the Spartans seized the momentum and the lead, which they held for most of the game. In typical MSU fashion, though, their attention lapsed and Wisconsin was able to tie the game at 31. With no time on the clock, QB Kirk Cousins threw a Hail Mary (or “Rocket” pass in Dantonio terminology– we always seem to learn the names of his game-winning plays) to the endzone that bounced off B.J. Cunningham’s face and into the waiting hands of Keith Nichol, who muscled it across the goal line for the walk-off score:
That game finished in time to watch Texas Tech complete its victory over Oklahoma, a game the Red Raiders mostly dominated, although the Sooners threatened to make it interesting late, after most of their fans had left. (Vanderbilt wrapped up a homecoming win against Army before both of these games.)
On Sunday, the Lions dropped their second straight game and looked a lot like their old selves. Speaking of which, I saw former Lion QB Dan Orlovsky on the sidelines in Indianapolis during their loss in New Orleans, which made me think that, of the three defeated NFL teams– Indianapolis, St. Louis, and Miami– the Colts may actually be trying to lose all their games. Orlovsky has to be a better option than Curtis Painter. He certainly was a serviceable player for the Lions last year, and Painter is not that. The Rams are suffering from critical injuries at QB and RB, and the Dolphins, who need Andrew Luck most of these three, really just are that bad. But Jim Caldwell’s decision to go with Painter over Orlovsky supports the notion that Indy is tanking this, although they really are pretty bad all on their own too. On the topic of rookie quarterbacks, Cam Newton turned his record-breaking stat parade into a win for Carolina, and Tim Tebow did what Tim Tebow now does, apparently, in his first start for Denver, coming from behind to beat the aforementioned and still hapless Dolphins in Miami.
In hockey, the Washington Capitals dealt the Detroit Red Wings their first loss of the year in a 7-1 Capitals home win.
Following the lead of the $5 million football coach, athletics directors may be next to hit the college sports salary jackpot.
ADs average about $450,000 at the NCAA’s top-tier schools, according to a USA TODAY analysis, rivaling the pay of many university presidents. But at least five ADs make more than $1 million, and since August 2010, at least 10 public schools have given their AD’s pay raises of $75,000 or more.
USA Today’s cover story on the topic is here. The paper also provided a breakdown of the top 120 schools’ ADs. The top ten, ranked in descending order by total pay:
Sometime after 10:30 on a Thursday morning in May, after he’d had his cup of coffee, Dick Trickle snuck out of the house. His wife didn’t see him go. He eased his 20-year-old Ford pickup out on the road and headed toward Boger City, N.C., 10 minutes away. He drove down Highway 150, a two-lane road that cuts through farm fields and stands of trees and humble country homes that dot the Piedmont west of Charlotte, just outside the reach of its suburban sprawl. Trickle pulled into a graveyard across the street from a Citgo station. He drove around to the back. It was sunny. The wind blew gently from the west. Just after noon, he dialed 911. The dispatcher asked for his address.
ALDLAND 