The NFL Season
The NFL posted their 2005 schedule today. In case anyone is wondering, I am rooting for Joe Gibb’s team in Washington. No, I don’t like the owner, but I can’t blame him. He had to be begged to buy the team.

Of course, it’s only 2.5 months until the American Bowl in Tokyo. You know where I’ll be Aug 6… asleep. I love football, but the time lag is too much for the kid. Michael Vick is great. Peyton Manning is great. Giving them a free trip to Tokyo to play 15 minutes is great. I’ll be sure to think of the market share in Asia as I roll over in bed at 3am.

For me, the season begins on Aug 13th in Charlotte. Will we have a decent quarterback? Will the defense show up? How badly will we miss Champ Bailey (salary cap casualty last year) AND Smoot (traded this year)? Has Gibbs gotten the gist of free agency?

Personally, I question the signing of Santana Moss, especially as he didn’t report to voluntary practices. I know, they’re voluntary. In this case, I consider it as voluntary as a root canal, and so does Gibbs.

Newspaper coverage
I’ve talked about the local paper here before. With Creighton University playing for the Sweet 16, the front page of the Sports section has photos of Callahan with the tagline, “Huskers look to retool Defense”. Creighton was on page 4.

I do not, however, miss the News & Observer. It has been appropriately dubbed the Blues and Disturber by critics for several years. I do not understand the editorial policy of hammering the local university, I have always assumed that this policy is what passes for news in the UNC-Chapel Hill journalism school.

Give me real sports news like my old local paper does. Sure they have problems, but they cover local high schools, the local AAA Baseball team, the Baltimore Ravens and the Washington Redskins, the new Washington Nationals, and college sports in several states, even smaller colleges like Coastal Carolina. (Who incidentally hired Buzz Peterson as coach. Think UNC-CH basketball when they didn’t have a winning season.)

Oh well. I do what I can to keep up with the indoor footbal team, the AA Baseball team, the USHL and college hockey teams, in addition to the other university in Nebraska with a football team. Thank goodness for RSS feeds.

This relates to football because there is ZERO Washington news out here and I’m too cheap to buy a Season Ticket from the cable company. Until then, I have to rely on the official site, and that is about 25% marketing by volume. (Caution: Contents may settle during shipping.)

Link Crazy
On a tangent, not sure why today is a link heavy day. Just seemed the thing to do.