It's Inevitable

It's inevitable that as a college athlete when your four years of eligibility are done there WILL come a time when you sit back and think to yourself "Wow, I could have been better."

For some the thought can occur while sitting in the library writing a senior sem. paper while for others it may take a few years to come to this realization. But it will come to you.

For myself, I realized this after I played terrible on the second day at the Kutztown Spring Invitiational. Coach laid into me. I'll spare you the details of what was said because mainly I don't care to recall that conversation but what he said rang true (even if I didn't want to believe him at the time).

I hadn't been practicing as much as I should have been. But for good reason, there were a multifactorial (thanks Ben!) number of reasons why I was unable to get out to the course to practice yet that is no excuse. I SHOULD have been out there. I would have have better. And I know that.

After Kutztown, we had a one-day invitational up at Gettysburg two days later. I knew if I wanted to right this ship then I NEEDED to be out there working on the things that failed me at Kutztown. And I did just that. I spent two hours - by myself - chipping, lofting pitch shots and hitting a few longer irons at the course on an 85 degree day in late April in Westminster, Md.

It worked. I didn't play as well as I would have liked but I played better.

This is what I want to preach to my guys - and really to the rest of the student-athletes. I don't want them to come to the realization when they are 23 years old, done with college and working full-time. It's about having fun but it is also about realizing and striving to achieve your potential.

I don't want to see anyone have regrets. Granted I don't have any regrets to how my college golf career turned out, I do believe I could have been a better player on the course being five years removed. Hell I still re-live that day at the conference championship my senior year when I shot a 39 on the front after starting out bogey, bogey, bogey but completely shit the bed on the back.

It's tough to do because I was there but I want them to learn from my experiences and be better than me.

(Editor's Note: Head fake! I thought I was writing this about the student-athletes realizing their potential while they are in college not after they graduate, but in reality I actual wrote this about myself. Wow! I have a lot I need to work on. So let's get started!)

QR Codes

I haven't blogged in awhile but I figured now seems like the best time since I've got a lot of things on my mind. Most of good.

One of the things that I have been thinking about since Robb Modica brought it up was the use of QR codes. You know thse funky bar code squares you've been seeing around time? Well those are not one of those magic eye puzzles or decoration, it is a deliberate ploy by companies into generating traffic to their website.

Pretty smart huh?

But I know you're next question is how do that do that? Easy by way of your smart phone. It comes as no surprise that many of those in the 18-24 and 25-30 age brackets don't just have an Android, iPhone or Blackberry but they are always on it. Well marketing experts tapped into this idea, creating a little square barcode that automatically directs you to the company's website.

This barcode is known a a Quick Response code or simply QR code.

Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. picked up on this piece of technology, using it to "replace" game-day programs and drive more fans to their website. Also it helps the "Go Green" initiative by reducing the amount of paper and ink that is used. Sports Information Director Sam Atkinson noted that you can not cut people off cold turkey with paper programs so they still make a limited number of those but it is clearly evident what they want their fans to use.

When I first came across the email from Robb, I filed it away in my folder adequately titled "Robb" but the more I thought of it, the more I liked the idea. Hey our market is the 18-25 year olds plus their parents and all of them have smart phones.

Everything from rosters to updated statistics and schedule page for both schools can be accessed through one simple page on our website. I looked into the next step and was quick to find out PrestoSports has a QR Code generator through their website. Score!

Now the biggest thing is getting it out there. First step is writing the press release that says we are going in this direction then sending it out to our fans (aka staff, faculty and students) as well as their parents. Of course we can't cut off our poor elderly fans who still thinks a Blackberry is a fruit known for their antioxidants. The aim is to phase out the paper programs so that in the future all we have is a big sign with a QR Code on it that everyone scans when they walk in the door.

(To go back to my poli. sci. days this would be known as the "Goal Oriented Incremental Model". The long term goal is getting rid of the paper programs and generate more traffic to the website in hope for a website re-design. I know that will probably never happen but that's why it's the "Goal Oriented Incremental Model." Thanks Dr. Neal!)

I'm super pumped and ready to tackle this project!

Those Unusual Rules of Our Youth

Did you ever notice that there are some rules your teachers told you when you were younger that you cannot get out of your head know and looking back they just sound ridiculous? Maybe it's because we are older and we know right from wrong, look both ways before you cross a street, etc.

But here are something of the random rules from my childhood that I just thought of right now.

1. Don't go passed "the tree" or all the way across the playground behind the Cunniff at recess.
I can specifically remember there was a tree and could point it out if I was there and it was really so all the teachers and lunch ladies could keep an eye on us and didn't have to worry about any "runners." Also the far side of the Cunniff field was "off limits" because it was "too far." But yet that was the best part. There was this small tree that had a low branch sticking out where you could sit and talk with your friends.

2. Don't run/walk up the grass hill in front of the school
Another arbitrary rule at the Cunniff that in my six years years there I never figured out why we couldn't walk across the grass. It was easier. But then again when you think of it, if over 300 kids ran across the grass it would terrible - almost like the hill in front of the Lowell. The grass in front of the Cunniff still looks in good shape considering all the elements.

3. Don't cut through the cemetery
I'd used walk home from school with a friends and can remember being told not to cut through the cemetery despite other kids cutting through to get home quicker. Never really understood this rule then and still don't 15 years later.

4. You couldn't enter school before the "proper"time when you were in middle or elementary school
I can see not allowing the young kids in the building before eight but middle school kids. Isn't that the age when you are trying to give them a tad bit more responsibility? Maybe let them in so if they need to meet up with a teacher before school they can do so? But also I do see many teachers are probably prepping for the day, running around the school making photocopies and they don't want to accidentally bump into any students.

5. The purpose of "two-by-two's" while walking to "Move Up" Day at the high school or on the Washington, D.C. trip in middle school
Was it really that hard to count the kids? Couldn't you just do it by homeroom? "Ok, Mr. Cedrone are your 22 students all here?" "Why yes they are." It wasn't bad at first but then it got to be really tiresome and drawn out. We were walking "two-by-two" to dinner and the game room at the hotel, which was literally across the parking lot. We were in eighth grade I think we all knew how to cross a street at that point in our lives.

6. Slides are for going down not up
Really? I find myself saying this to kids now but really what's the problem with going up the slide? If there is no one waiting to come down and if you're paying attention there should not be any major reason why you can't go up the slide.

7. Don't jump off the swing/don't twist in the swing.
Another two things I say now and have heard on the tot lots around Watertown while growing up. Twisting is fun that is why all kids like to do it. Heck I even twisted in the swing. I know some people think that kids' hair or finger can get caught in the chains but that never happened to me, not once. I've also jumped off the swing. It's not something I encourage because sometimes it doesn't feel so good when you land hard on your feet - or if you're unlucky your butt - but you learn from your mistakes. Let them twist!

8. Remember how in middle school you could only go to your locker at certain times of the day and if you needed something you had to take it with you if were not able to get back to your locker during one of those three "special" times during the day. Like the lockers would all freeze shut between second and third period or fifth and six. Looking back on it, it was because they didn't want to crowd the hallways and were probably trying to teach us to be efficient with our time and take the books we needed for not just the class we were going to then but the next class afterward.

9. Not walking on the cat-walk to go to music
I was always taught in my geometry class that the shortest distance between two points was a straight line but yet when I tried to get to band practice in high school I had to take the long way because Mrs. Connors would always scream from the gym below to "get off the cat-walk." I thought that's what the cat-walk was there for, to get to the music department quickly that way none of us would be late say if we were coming from science on the other side of the building.

The Pre-Twitter Generation

Could you imagine what we would have done if Twitter was around when we were in college?

All those van rides back from Rutgers, Mt. Holyoke, Bucknell, etc. and the randomness that we all talked about it. Who can forget Pokey and Kell rocking out to Bohemian Rhapsody on the way back from Mt. Holyoke? Or even that conversation that led to this blog? How much of that would have been posted on Twitter when we got back to The Hill or that instant if the smart phone was around back in 2003?

Not that I don't love social media. I think it's great but it takes a lot out of those meaningless times when it's just you and four of your teammates plus coach, who is probably speeding all the way back to get out (I'm kidding coach). Whatever happened to the old saying "what happens in the van, stays in the van?"

Nowadays all of the bonding is posted on Twitter, Facebook, 4-Square for the whole world to see. But do we really want that? Don't we as a society what some aspect of our life to only between us and a select group of people?

Maybe. But then again I'm coming from one of the original Facebook generation when you had to have a .edu email address to register and sometimes even that was not enough. As it seemed the rest of the higher ed world was on Facebook back in 2003-2004, McDaniel was not, maybe it something to do with the fact that not many people knew about it or knew that it was formerly called Western Maryland. But the second we got it, it felt like we were a part of something exclusive that not many others could be a part of. To quote Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerburg from The Social Network, "it was exactly like getting punched. You had to know the people to get get past your own page." Now anyone and everyone has an account.

As The Dominos Fall

It was inevitable that I would eventually throw my two cents into the fountain with regards to the war-zone over at 4 Yawkey Way.

Let’s hop in Doc’s DeLorean DMC-12 and spin backwards about four months when Boston re-claimed the moniker “Title Town” following the Bruins’ game seven, 3-0, victory over the Canucks on June 15^th. The Hub of the Universe was back. Front and center of all the sports talk in the country after brushes with glory only to have it snatched away by the Giants (07), Lakers (10), Rays (08) and Angels (09).

Sox were clawing their way back from a 2-12 start to the season. Talks were reportedly “progressing” giving Pats fans hope they would be able to see #12 in the fall. The B’s looked like the big bad Bruin’s form the 1970s. Life was good then.

Now let’s flash forward back to the present day. We are still the talk of the sporting nation but for all the wrong reasons.

The Patriots were very un-Patriot-like in their last game against Buffalo, witnessing three things that almost never happen to a Patriots team. Not “finishing the game” as they are preached to do by their mastermind Bill Belichick, who we also saw “lose it” on the sideline. And Tom Terrific was not so terrific in the second half, throwing four interceptions for the first time since 2009 in a 38-34 loss in Indianapolis.

Fast-forward a few days when the Sox were in the end stages of destruction. We joke about “hitting the panic” button but this time there was no kidding around. They never threw the note back to Chief Quimby. In fact, the season ended the same way it began, dismal and embarrassing to everyone who shells out the money to go to the games.

If losing a 3-2 lead in the bottom of the ninth in Baltimore while the Rays, simultaneously making their miraculous eighth inning comeback to force extra innings to claim the Wild Card wasn’t bad enough, then things were about to get worse.

There no if’s and’s or but’s about it. Terry Francona was not coming back for 2012. As Dan Shaughnessy wrote in today’s Boston Globe, “don’t buy spin, Tito was fired,” while that was partially the case it was nowhere near the whole story. Sure the Sox brass were not going to pick up his option for next season but Francona was not coming back even if the Sox found a way to muddle through the post-season and win the World Series despite a 7-20 month of September.

The best manager in the history of the franchise looked absolutely burnt.

You could see it after the game Wednesday night/Thursday morning and then in yesterday’s press conference. He was done and it was not the type of tired look after you just played a 162-game season. He was cooked and in a slow-cooker I might add.

During his eight years in Boston, Tito had the backs of all his players and protected them from unjust and unwarranted criticism yet some of those same players were unwilling fight for him. They completely disregarded any and everything he said (i.e. the team meeting in September), questioned moves he made (see David Ortiz) and thought they were above it all (see “starters drinking in the clubhouse”). It was the players yet it, who have a sense of entitlement and had been coddled since they were the best players on their Little League teams not Francona. And Tito was done. Who could blame him?

And the hits just keep on coming – if only they came in the month of September. Apparently Theo Epstein wants out after speculation came out that the Sox were allowing the “Boy Wonder” to talk to the Cubs. Red Sox ownership has since squelched that rumor, according to NECN Saturday night. But it does beg the question: is it true?

It does not surprise me one bit. Everyone knows that Epstein and Larry Lucchino do not see eye-to-eye. He was already willing to leave once before (in 2005) but was persuaded to come after John Henry and Tom Werner told him he would no longer have to report to Lucchino. Think about that for a second, the typical person, in sports, a General Manager reports to is the president but the relationship between the two is so strained they cannot even work together.

Much has been made of Epstein’s colossal free-agent failures such as Edgar Renteria, J.D. Drew, Julio Lugo, Daisuke Matsuzaka, John Lackey and Carl Crawford but they all fail to recognize he did re-vamp the farm system. True Jon Lester and Kevin Youkilis were Dan Duquette guys but it was Epstein who saw the potential, and relented to package either of them away in deals. He has drafted Dustin Pedroia, Jacoby Ellsbury and Daniel Bard as well as utilized the farm system to bring in guys like Victor Martinez and Adrian Gonzalez.

It is not inconceivable to think he can’t work in a small market. He never had the chance to and for all we know he could be Tampa Bay’s Andrew Friedman and keep re-stocking the system every year. Just think for a second, maybe it wasn’t Epstein who wanted to go after Matsuzaka or Lackey. The owners may have been feeding it into his ear, “here’s the money go spend it” for a big name, flashy player such as Carl Crawford. Last winter the second they signed Crawford, after already trading for Gonzalez, they became the talk of the town and were instant World Series favorites.

Let's bring one more thing to the table. Epstein is not under contract. Remember he never signed a contract when he returned so he does not need the Sox permission to talk to anyone. He is technically an "at-will" employee thus keeping the speculation that he will walk away to the Cubs open, at least for the time being.

It is such a shame things had to turn out this way, spiraling from championship glory to a city of dysfunction in the span of less than four months.