What.A.Dick.

http://www.dallasnews.com/video/index.html?nvid=345818&shu=1

Video link. This is unbelieveable. Ryan Moats, who happens to be a running back currently on the Houston Texans roster, was pulled over by Dallas police for running a red light, just as he was arriving at a hospital (with his wife and other family memebers) to pay last respects to his on-virtually-her-last-gasp-dying mother-in-law.

The dirty copper- whom Bokolis won't do the honor of naming; he's Bubba- pulls him over and keeps him there for 13 minutes, scolding and threatening him and brandishing his weapon (unseen). Of course, the mother-in-law had expired by the time he finally arrived to see her.

I'd like to think that Bubba was sharp enough (I know...stop right there) to, as they say, put two and two together- blinkers on, racing towards a hospital, people disregarding his directives- and figure out that the may be something more going on than some asshole running a red light.

So, is this cop utterly incapable of critical thought or, racial overtones aside, was he just being a dick? Even in Texas, people aren't that obtuse, right? It didn't even register when Moats' wife just bounced.

Of course, Al Sharpton should be arriving any minute to call for Bubba's head. Indeed, it wouldn't be irrational to think that Bubba may have taken a little extra pleasure from doing this to a Black dude. Cop haters and still others may think he's such a dick that he should be shit-canned.



I'll tell you straight up; Bokolis doesn't think much of the vast majority of cops. I bristle at the idea of police, but understand that it is necessary to have these fuckers around. That said, they're not exactly the best and brightest we have...these are some dumb muthafuckas, even the cool ones.

The vicious cycle is that you're not going to attract the best and brightest when the job pays like it does and they spend their days around other scumbags. It's a decidedly unfulfilling job. The best part of that job is retirement, more of an incentive to play prevent defense than to work.

More soberly, Bubba does give a black eye to all the decent cops. Moreover, there is nothing in that video that indicates that Bubba has the skill-set necessary to be an effective police officer. Even after the fact, he thinks he handled it appropriately.

Ryan Moats showed a lot of restraint as Bubba pissed on his dignity. Still, because he wasn't able to expedite matters, the end result was that he wasn't able to say goodbye to his mother-in-law, which was kind of the whole point. Everybody gather around now, Bokolis will explain how you get a cop's brain in gear.

Moats, disregarding Bubba as his wife did, could have walked directly in view of the dash-cam and explained how, because he really has a dying mother-in-law in the hospital, "You're going to look like the world's biggest douchebag when this goes public." Climbing on the hood, calling Bubba a dickhead for effect and/or mentioning that he plays in the NFL are optional.

If Moats were as cynical as I, he could have waited until just before walking away from his 13-minute brow-beating to explain how, because he's in the NFL and people would want to know the circumstances of the evening, this was bound to get out...and when it did, Bubba was going to be, as Tony explains to Seidelbaum, working in Alaska, so dress warm.

You Can't Drink All Day If You Don't Start in the Morning

As in 12:01 AM. I had to stop so I could go to work...possibly an argument for Proposition 317. Actually, I'm against it because traffic was light this morning. I may have still been loaded on the way in this morning. Thankfully, they don't have checkpoints set up at 7 AM. As I always tell people, the best way to push off for the rebound and not get called is to push off before the shot, when the dude isn't ready and the refs aren't looking. When I wasn't boxing them into the pole, that's how a cat of average height like myself would get the rebounds on 6-3 muthafuckas.

Normally, I don't go out on St. Paddy's Day, as it is a designated amateur night. But, since I'm taking off the rest of the week, I'm about to resume festivities.

Shall we dance?

The only thing that makes college BB any less fucked up than college football is the tournament. But, not by much.

So who got snubbed? Who got a tug-job? The Big Picture offers Arizona vs St. Mary's vs Wisconsin. St. Mary's was denied because...small schools don't travel well, do they? I mean their fans' travel capacity, which could (smirk) have had something to do with it. It's not much of a surprise that one of them (Wisky) wound up in Boise, where it wasn't already sold out (when I looked for tickets a few weeks ago) and the other (Arizona), as a proven draw, was sent East. Don't forget, it's a circus.

I'm sort of an apologist for Arizona. But, you'll have a hard time convincing me that the Big Ten should have 4 teams in the dance, much less 7. As explained above, it is because they travel well, as, not only are their alumni all over the country, people that live in Big Ten country need little reason to want to get the fuck out of there for a few days.

After all these years, it's JUST occurred to me how, because they let so many teams in from the same conference (7 each from the ACC, Big East and Big Ten), they have to seed so that teams from the same onference don't wind up on the same side of a regional.

Given that no Big East team is seeded lower than 6th, they must have drawn a line in the sand at 7 teams. They probably could have dumped a couple of more teams into the dance. It's definitely pandering. This is like one of those family gatherings, where instead of your serviceable cousins (you're allowed to rut 2nd cousins, right...right?), you get stuck having to dance with your, old, fat aunt; every year, she looks older and fatter, but you can't get out of it. The Big Ten is your old, fat aunt.

In any event, I don't see the logic of letting at-large teams directly into the tournament while two conference champions have to win a play-in game. It should be Arizona vs Wisky (or similar) on Tuesday night.

So, how do we fix this? Let in more teams, of course. You can let in teams from smaller conferences that may have dominated the regular season, but faltered in the conference tournament, and some teams from mid-majors. That will surely take the total up, out of bitching-range. The third best team from a small conference, a middling mid-major, the 8th place team from the Big 10 can't say shit, because none can viably claim that they are better than one another.

Structure the tournament like the English FA cup, where the top teams don't play the opening rounds. I would have 76 teams in total. The first round starts with 24 teams. The second round would be 32 teams; 20 teams added to the 12 survivors. For the third round, 16 teams would be added to the 16 advancing from second round. The fourth round would be 16 more teams added to the 16 advancing teams, making for a 32-team, 5-round knockout stage.

That renders useless the already-pointless conference tournaments, which only reward the slackers for getting hot at the right time. I've also added two rounds to the dance, yet reduced the top teams' workload by one round. The bracketology douchebags at the worldwide leader will be jerking off all over themselves.

The Tournament and some Ancient History

The computer caught a virus. I've been busy. I can't really do this shit at work any more. Y'all saw the Bowl, right. We're still not sure that Santonio Holmes (never mind whether he should have been penalized for his LeBron>Garnett>Jordan talcum powder bit) came down in bounds...and the tuck rule should have applied to Warner's fumble...as well as a 15 yard penalty for taking off the helmet. I don't have that kind of Hate in me any longer.

Ancient history out the way...I wouldn't have covered regardless...(pause, memory jogged) oh yeah...I had Cards 3, Steelers 0, muthafucka. For shits and giggles (these pools are not my thing), we quickly filled up a pool (about 15 dudes and 10 birds (the birds stayed upstairs, of course, but came down for the endgame). When it was 20 - 14 and the Cards had the ball, I told the room that the safety and the TD were coming. The punt was downed on the one. I get the safety. But, I knew I was sunk when Fitzgerald broke free with so much time. The Cards hadn't made a defensive stand all year.

Oh yeah, and I dominated my once-a-year dabbling at rugby for fairies. 25-45 for about 260 (only a 60-yd field, but I hit 3 50-yard passes), 3TD 2INT and made 3 picks on D, one to the house. I would have hooked up your fantasy team like a muthafucka. All right, now the ancient history is out the way.

It's that time of year when we all get the unofficially sanctioned chance to fuck off at work...NCAA Tournament pools. The enterprising sort might, as was suggested, have told himself that this was going to be the year he would follow college hoops to fill out kick-ass brackets. I tried that one year, nailed 14 out of the last 15 games, and still didn't win. I've since decided that the bragging rights and caysh aren't worth it.

But I did catch the last 5 minutes and first four OTs of last night's 'cuse - UConn epic. We were post-gamin' at some joint, only planning to hang out until midnight. My homeboy's bird works in a SBUX {{location redacted}} close to the bar. My buddy drives them both home, in exchange for some complicated drink. I don't know the name of it; if a strawberry daquiri is a pink pussy, this was, like, a Palestinian pussy or some shit.

With the game running past closing time, my (unemployed) homeboy calls up his bird and tells her to walk over to the bar- pimp hand, right?- under the pretense that three of us were 'cuse alumni. My buddy had on an orange sweater, so it was plausible. I appreciated the pimp-hand move, so I asked my homeboy if she comes home each day saying, "Bitch, where's my dinner?" He replied that he does the asking...nice!

She comes walking in (probably around the 3rd OT) with SBUX goodies. My buddy would have sat through 10 OTs, but I was bailing after the 4th, no matter what (I was tired from the previous night's bender). They all followed my lead. My homeboy immediately told me that his bird thanks me for getting my buddy to leave. I told him, next time, she knows who gets the coffee. I could have used it, as I just about made it home.