Pun City

Fast Food Rankings: Roy Rogers

2011-03-26T21:39:00.003-05:00

3/9 brought the second day of Big East Tournament games. After getting to the Madison Square Garden area early, this blog set out to find some food. Pun City had sighted a Roy Rogers the day before, and set out to eat there (having never been to any of the chain's locations before).

What's this mean? Fast Food Rankings are Back!

Roy Rogers is a fast food chain based in Frederick, MD. Their first restaurant opened in 1968. This blog really doesn't know too much about them. A brief Google search shows that at least some locations do have drive thrus, so they meet Pun City criteria. One caveat is that Pun City has only been to one Roy Rogers. This particular Roy Rogers is combined with a Nathan's Hot Dogs, and is run by Riese Restaurants. This particular Roy Rogers was terrible.

Pros: Tough one here. One recalls there was plenty of seating available in the upstairs section. Seating is hard to come by in the Madison Square Garden area, so that was a bonus. Being in a location that offers other food options (in this case Nathan's) is good too. Pepsi products on tap was unusual, but a nice change of pace.

Cons: First, there was only one guy working at the Roy Rogers. This is surmountable in and of itself. Pun City ordered the Double Cheeseburger combo. The guy said, "Just move down to the register, they'll get you a drink." Pun City moved down to the register. No employee there. One minute passed by. No sign of another employee. Not even any noise eminating from the back of the restaurant to indicate there might be another employee. Pun City went back to the initial fry cook guy and was about to ask about his co-worker's absence, when the guy noticed this blog and said "No one there? I'll get him....MAX! CUSTOMER!" (muffled sound from back room). Fry cook, now turning to Pun City: "He'll be right there." Another minute or two passed by, no sign of Max. At this point, Pun City was seriously considering reaching around the machine and getting the soda for itself, but there was still the matter of paying for the food. Another minute passed and finally a Nathan's employee came around their counter and walked over to the Roy Rogers counter, getting the drink and taking this blog's payment. The cashier asked Pun City if it got the cheeseburger combo. Pun City said, "the double cheeseburger combo." At this point, the cashier charged this blog for the Double Bacon Cheeseburger. This wasn't noticed until later, but this blog figured it didn't have another half hour to kill to save 50 cents. Pun City believes the overall service falls under the category "horrible service."

Pun City moved upstairs to eat. They were in the middle of some remodeling or something, and there were giant tarps over one upstairs wall. The place has a huge open space without any tables, but there was plenty of seating available. Two police officers were upstairs, no one else was up there. Generally the place looked unkempt, but Pun City didn't really mind that much, and sat next to the tarp since that was the best spot for a backed chair. Nothing really too notable as far as atmosphere.

The double cheeseburger was terrible. The meat was too thick to really be palateable, and it was low quality meat as well. The fries were way too doughy, and too many had been punctured, which resulted in being saturated with grease to the point of inedibility. The bun wasn't even particularly good, although it was probably the best part of the meal. Well, except for the long-awaited Pepsi, of which there were no free refills.

Prices were very high, Pun City thinks it was around $7.00 for the combo. Granted, this was in New York City, so that's not as bad as in other markets, but this blog can only go on what it knows. Lack of free refills also a major strike against Roy Rogers, although other locations might not have this issue. Not particularly convenient to get to, unless you're in downtown New York or on the east coast.

Cripes, even their website stinks. Using the restaurant locator generally will freeze up their site.

Burger-Only Ranking: 2 out of 10 Fryers. This is being pretty generous. It is a lot of meat, so theoretically you get a lot of sustenance. The cheese and bun combo were alright, that might have carried the ranking above the minimum.

Overall Ranking: 1 out of 10 Fryers. Bad. Bad service, bad food, bad atmosphere, bad refill policy, bad cleanliness. Reasonably good location?

Pun City didn't give Roy Rogers a lifetime ban, because the employees seemed more apathetic than intentionally trying to mess with this blog, but Pun City definitely isn't going to be rushing back. Hopefully their other locations are better.

Want to see how Roy Rogers stacks up against the competition? Check out these other fast-food reviews courtesy of Pun City:

Bullets
Burger King
Culver's
Dairy Queen
In-N-Out Burger
Jack In The Box
McDonald's
Rally's
Sonic Drive-In
Wendy's
White Castle

Pun City's gotta get A&W in there too. Once this Big East trip wraps up, Pun City will post that.

Big East Tournament Trip, Day 2 (Part 2)

2011-03-20T11:05:00.002-05:00

Getting to Madison Square Garden, Pun City was figuring that one would enter the building somewhere around the iconic cylindrical part of the complex. Alas, this was not the case. Due to renovations, they only wanted fans coming in at the 7th Street entrance. Pun City circled the building twice (admittedly once just for fun, but still on the lookout for how to get in), and came up empty.

As it turned out, the entrance is on a completely different block than the cylindrical "arena" portion of the complex. Eventually this blog was able to track it down.

Entering the facility, this blog soon found out that its seat was in the extreme back row of the Garden. It wasn't a bad view, but it was further back than Pun City had envisioned. The 400 level, while higher, was possibly better seating, since the 400 level is all of the suites. Another point to note, for anyone visiting MSG, is that if you have a ticket out, the ushers will check it. If you keep it in your pocket, and just go where you want, they won't check it.

Overall through the tournament, Pun City was impressed with the ushers in general. They pretty much let you move down wherever you want, as long as you don't have your ticket out, and no one boots you from your seat. The few times Pun City did get booted from a seat, the ushers were polite about it. During a blowout, this blog was able to venture down to the 15th row behind the basket, so that worked out pretty well. Beyond this, just moving about 4 rows down from the back row gets a much better seat, as you are no longer behind the scoreboard.

Concessions are expensive. You could make the case that they're ridiculously expensive, but one thing to keep in mind is that all food in New York City is pretty high-priced. The cheapest item on the menu at MSG is a hot dog, for $5.75. Sodas begin at $6.00. Pun City's neighbors were ordering $8.75 beers pretty consistently. By comparison, outside the stadium, there's a White Castle 2 blocks away that this blog got 6 cheeseburgers, a large soda, and a sack of fries for $10.26. (This is usually in the $6-$8 range in the Chicago area).

Another unusual aspect of Madison Square Garden is its distinctive smell. It smells like a gigantic spilled beer. If it just smelled like a beer, that'd be alright. But it's a spilled beer, so there's some percentage of floor grime mixed in with the beer, which is generally unsatisfying. That said, you definitely know where you are when that smell hits you, and since you're watching good basketball (unless you watched the Knicks in the 7 years preceding this one), you may actually appreciate the smell, since you can associate it with other good things.

The games of the opening day of games, Connecticut beat DePaul, Rutgers beat Seton Hall in OT, South Florida beat Villanova on a last-minute collapse by the Wildcats, and Marquette beat Providence handily.

Notable happenings:

-Preceding the Rutgers-Seton Hall game, Pun City saw SHU cheerleaders handing out Seton Hall towels, and this blog happened to be wearing its Seton Hall hat, so it went over and grabbed one of those.

During the Rutgers-Seton Hall game, Pun City had moved down to the 200 level, around halfcourt. In the two sections in front of this blog, there were small groups of particularly boisterous supporters. One group of Rutgers fans was sitting to this blog's front left. A pair of Seton Hall fans was sitting to this blog's front right. One of the Rutgers fans was completely hammered, basically had his eyes at least partially closed the whole time, but still managed to be upright and recognize what was happening in the game (we'll call this guy "Totally Hammered Guy"). He had a particularly intense friend that seemed to be spoiling for a fight with SHU fans (we'll call this guy "Belligerent RU guy"). The Seton Hall guys also had a guy spoiling for a fight ("Belligerent SHU guy"), in addition to a preppy looking guy in a sportcoat that might not have been spoiling for the fight, but would have participated ("Preppy SHU guy"). The two groups shouted at each other through the game, mainly about how each school was better. Belligerent SHU guy was continually saying that SHU graduates make more money coming out of school, and I think Belligerent RU guy kept saying that SHU was a ripoff or something.

Anyway, eventually Belligerent SHU guy orders a beer for the totally hammered RU guy, and instructs the servicewoman to say something to the effect of "Have another one, I can afford to buy you this because SHU grads make more money than RU grads." Pun City gathered that this was the very edited result after the servicewoman refused to relay a few messages that Belligerent SHU guy had initially proposed. Much posturing ensued. The RU guys threw away the receipt, theoretically making it impossible to claim said beer, but once the beer purveyor arrived, the servicewoman recovered the receipt, and Totally Hammered Guy took the beer.

While all of this was going on, SHU squandered a lead they had no business giving up (8 point lead with 7:44 remaining), and RU pulled ahead by 3 late. Fortunately for the SHU guys, Jeremy Hazell hit a game-tying 3-pointer at the buzzer to send the game to overtime. This ratcheted up the trash talking between the two groups, at which point Belligerent RU guy approached the SHU guys, threw a beer at them (somehow not connecting with either of them), and challenged the pair to a fight. After the beer toss, Preppy SHU guy had kind of grabbed at Belligerent RU guy and ended up ripping a 6-inch hole in Belligerent RU guy's shirt's armpit area. At this point, Belligerent RU guy officially challenged the SHU pair to a fight in the concourse once the game was over (one would assume that Totally Hammered Guy would have been involved as Belligerent RU guy's ally in this theoretical fight). The SHU guys both happily agreed to this.

This was probably the only time the entire tournament that Pun City didn't see any ushers anywhere near its seats. After a long while, some eventually came over, but they hadn't come over because of the fight, and had to be notified of what had happened before they took any action. Their action was not particularly swift, only standing in the tunnel near the two groups. Belligerent RU guy made another couple threatening motions toward the SHU group (holding up his fist a couple times, then punching his other hand). The ushers didn't do anything at this point, either because they didn't see it or because they didn't think it was anything worth acting on.

Alas, there was not an epic throwdown in the concourse following RU's win. The two SHU guys had sort of ducked out early when they saw SHU was going to lose in OT, and because they had self-servingly "reported" the RU guy as threatening them, the ushers let them go. The ushers did converge on the RU guys after the game, but they might have just done so to separate them from the SHU guys, or it's possible they held them afterward to discipline them further. Pun City wasn't going to stick around to find out, so this blog apologizes for the anticlimatic ending there.

NCAA Picks and Logic, Day 3

2011-03-20T10:16:00.002-05:00

4 Kentucky vs. 5 West Virginia

Pick: Kentucky

Logic: Well, Pun City thought it'd be Clemson in this matchup, and Kentucky was way better than Clemson this year. That said, even with West Virginia in here, this blog would have chosen Kentucky. UK is super young, but they finished pretty high in the SEC, while West Virginia finished in the middle of the pack in the (admittedly strong) Big East. To an extent, Pun City thought that UK was just young and dumb enough not to know to lose this.

Result: Kentucky, in a close game.

Hindsight: Other than projecting the matchup wrong, this was a solid pick. Even with as young as Kentucky is, they have a lot of talent, and John Calipari has been using underclassmen the last few years, so he has increasing experience with this situation, and seems to be getting better at using those pieces correctly.

3 Connecticut vs. 6 Cincinnati

Pick: Cincinnati

Logic: Both of these teams were from the Big East, and neither would be intimidated. Cincinnati only had to play 2 Big East Tournament games, so they wouldn't be as worn out as UConn would be. Also, Cincinnati had a better conclusion to their regular season than UConn. Conversely, UConn had a better Big East Tournament than Cincinnati, but this blog was under the belief that 5 games in 5 days really might just serve to wear them out.

Result: Connecticut

Hindsight: Apparently it wasn't too big of a problem for UConn to come back on short rest. Cincinnati played them pretty tough, so it wasn't an absurd pick, but Connecticut did pull away in the end. This pick was somewhat critical, and losing dropped this blog quite a few pegs in its pool. For future reference, UConn seems like they go just deep enough to where the short turnaround wasn't an issue, and Jim Calhoun probably rested these guys sufficiently in the days leading up to the NCAAs.

2 San Diego State vs. 7 Temple

Pick: San Diego State

Logic: Pun City's initial impression was to take Temple here. After thinking about it though, this blog wasn't thinking that Fran Dunphy would go from zero NCAA wins in the last 10 years to 3 in the same tournament (actually 2 to this point, but SDSU replaced Temple's entire path following this game after a change). Another call to reason was that SDSU had played well all season, and did not have a late-season distraction. This combined with the fact that both Kahwi Leonard and D.J. Gay are tough matchups for any team (even a good Temple team with Juan Fernandez), led Pun City to the pick of SDSU.

Result: San Diego State in 2OT.

Hindsight: Pun City is glad that it thought about this one twice. Of all the games to have a change of heart on, this one definitely merited the review. Fortunately the result was in this blog's favor. Hopefully SDSU can handle Connecticut this week, seeing as UConn was supposed to be Cincinnati.

12 Richmond vs. 13 Morehead State

Pick: Vanderbilt

Logic: Morehead State would get one win, but 13 seeds don't win 2 games in the tournament. Vanderbilt would get past Richmond and then have an easier game waiting for them.

Result: Richmond

Hindsight: Oops. That first round game made Pun City pay. In fairness, only about 1 in 50 people had this pick right, so it's not something to beat one's self up about. Had Pun City guessed that Richmond would face Morehead State, the pick certainly would have been Richmond, since when two double-digit seeds face each other in the NCAAs, the result is just about 100% in favor of the better seed.

3 BYU vs. 11 Gonzaga

Pick: St. John's

Logic: Too lazy to switch this after SJU had the late D.J. Kennedy injury. Initially, Pun City thought SJU would have fewer distractions than BYU, as there hadn't been any late-season dismissals with SJU. As it turned out, they had a later-season "dismissal" proxy with that injury. If Pun City had switched brackets, it would like to believe it would have put BYU in here. In any case, it was still underrating BYU after they lost Brandon Davies. BYU looks very strong, and this blog would be surprised if they didn't handle Florida this week.

Result: BYU, blowout.

Hindsight: This was the Gonzaga team that was supposed to show up on Thursday. BYU was underrated by this blog, and Pun City will have to try and recalibrate its "dismissal impact meter" in the future.

1 Pittsburgh vs. 8 Butler

Pick: Pittsburgh

Logic: Butler is good, but Pittsburgh has a Final Four-caliber team, so they should be able to handle BU. The Panthers have more size, and any coaching differences weren't enough to mitigate that discrepancy.

Result: Butler, in one of the craziest finishes in tournament history.

Hindsight: No one really could be blamed for picking either team after seeing how close this was. The Panthers did look a little nervous in the first half, without that stretch they probably would have been up enough to render late-game issues irrelevant. This was probably the best team in Pitt's recent history, but Butler had a lot of experienced guys playing well at the right time.

4 Wisconsin vs. 5 Kansas State

Pick: Wisconsin

Logic: Well, first off, this was supposed to be UW vs. Utah State. That would have been a much easier win, this blog guesses. Beyond this, KSU had a great end-of-year run, but they didn't quite have the talent to matchup with all of Wisconsin's weapons. That, plus the coaching matchup was a complete mismatch, Bo Ryan is a significantly better coach than Frank Martin.

Result: Wisconsin, in a nail-biter.

Hindsight: During the pregame, Pun City thought that Wisconsin would play them close until the half, then gradually pull away in the second half, for about a 10-point win. This didn't happen, primarily due to a great effort out of Jacob Pullen. If Pullen doesn't hit his first 6 (mostly contested) 3-pointers, this probably would have played out as expected. That said, Pun City knew Pullen would be available, so for future games, maybe think about individual player's "result spikes" like this, although the pick was accurate, so maybe don't think too hard about that. (More than likely UW having Jordan Taylor and Jon Leuer vs. KSU's Pullen would have led to a UW pick anyway).

2 Florida vs. 7 UCLA

Pick: Florida

Logic: UCLA was good, but they weren't as good as Florida. Even though Florida was overseeded as a 2, they were much better than a 7, so while this might play out similarly to a 4-5 or a 3-6, Pun City figured Florida could be counted on for a win.

Result: Florida in a close game.

Hindsight: Yep, kind of had this pegged. Luckily this blog had made a point to watch a couple Florida games on TV later in the year. More UCLA knowledge would have helped, but the Pac-10 wasn't so good that a nuanced opinion was required.

NCAA Picks and Logic, Day 2

2011-03-18T23:07:00.003-05:00

Notable Picks, Day 2:

8 George Mason vs. 9 Villanova

Pick: George Mason

Logic: Mason was really tough this year, they had better athletes than a CAA team is supposed to have, and they won a tough CAA pretty handily in the regular season. Also, they were the favorite, as the 8 seed here. Villanova looked thoroughly unimpressive down the stretch, and this blog was convinced this trend was not reversible.

Result: George Mason, in a barnburner.

Hindsight: Again, seeing more CAA would have helped. This would have made the pick more educated, but Pun City probably would still have picked them. Villanova stinking down the stretch left too big of a stench to reasonably consider them, even though they looked tough early in the year. This pick was pretty well played, although Villanova played extremely well.

6 Xavier vs. 11 Marquette

Pick: Xavier

Logic: Xavier looked pretty unstoppable in the A-10. They have a good system and also went deep into the tournament last year. They should have been used to playing high level opponents. Marquette looked alright down the stretch, needing to play their way into the tournament for the last month (and doing so). But they had major weaknesses and a knack for losing close games. Additionally, this blog figured lots of people would pick them in its pool, and this would be a chance to get a leg up.

Result: Marquette going away.

Hindsight: Marquette probably could have been supported by similar "consecutive important game" logic that Morehead State got. Also, Pun City forgot these two teams played last year (early), and Marquette won, against what was a better Xavier team. Granted, Marquette was better last year too, but in general the change in the two teams was comparable. Also, they both knew about each other, and theoretically MU knew more about XU since they had won the first meeting. The lesson is that a team playing well that had beaten the exact team with similar personnel recently should get picked.

7 Washington vs. 10 Georgia

Pick: Washington

Logic: It didn't take much more than Pun City thinks Mark Fox of Georgia is a horrible coach. He's a good recruiter, but within games he seriously struggles. That and he hasn't exactly risen to the occasion in the tournament lately. Beyond this, Pun City had seen Washington play a few games, and they were decent. For whatever reason, this blog had a lot of faith in the Pac-10 this year, despite not really seeing many games out west.

Result: Washington, in a very close game.

Hindsight: Georgia's talent kept them in this game, but Washington ultimately had better coaching. Pegged pretty well, although some definite anti-Fox bias thought that Washington would win more handily than actually occurred. For future reference, if it's not going to be a close game, don't pick against Georgia.

8 Michigan vs. 9 Tennessee

Pick: Michigan

Logic: Tennessee had a lot of stinkers this year. Both teams have tough systems to prepare for on short notice; Michigan with their 1-3-1 zone and Tennessee with their uptempo offense and trapping defense. That said, John Beilein had made a great Elite 8 run with West Virginia, and while Bruce Pearl had gotten to the Sweet 16 with Milwaukee, this blog wasn't convinced that was any better. Basically the coaching matchup was a wash. What convinced Pun City to pick Michigan was that they had played very well down the stretch, and Tennessee was not impressive. The huge distractions Tennessee was dealing with (Bruce Pearl's probable upcoming firing) didn't help their cause either.

Result: Michigan in the biggest 8-9 blowout in history.

Hindsight: Tennessee's distractions were gigantic and ultimately got them crushed. Michigan was winning for most of the game, but not in blowout fashion until the second half. Huge distractions (player suspension, coach under investigation, player injuries) very overwhelmingly favor the opponent. Off the top of its mind, Pun City can think of Minnesota being under investigation, then losing to Gonzaga in the first round (roughly 2002?), this year's Tennessee team, St. John's losing DJ Kennedy this year, and a late injury affecting Purdue last season. Only Purdue was able to get out of the game with a win (and they somehow won two games, including one over a game Texas A&M team). If there's late negative news about a team, look for them to lose. (Another exception, though arguably not a fair comparison, is Purdue's suspension of Kelsey Barlow, but they had a 3 seed and were unlikely to lose, plus Barlow was replaceable, this blog would argue, as he was only playing 20 minutes a game - at any rate, Purdue won this year too). Maybe the rule should exclude Purdue, but only Purdue.

5 Arizona vs. 12 Memphis

Pick: Arizona

Logic: Sean Miller is a very good coach in general. Arizona won a tough Pac-10, and had Marcus Williams, a probable lottery pick this year. Memphis is coached by Josh Pastner, who U of A passed up in the process of choosing Miller. This blog doesn't really know how good of a game coach Pastner is, but it is wont to believe that he must be at or below average, seeing as he is known for his recruiting. Conference USA wasn't too great this season, and Memphis didn't strike this blog as being particularly disciplined when this blog was able to watch them. Based on seeding, Memphis needed to win their conference tournament just to get in to the tournament, so that was another strike against them.

Result: Arizona in a barnburner.

Hindsight: Not sure what, if anything, can be learned from this. It might have helped to see some of the Conference USA tournament games. Memphis going in to UTEP to get that title probably should have struck this blog as more impressive than it did. Arizona maybe didn't play as well as their ceiling would dictate this year, but this blog doesn't feel like it saw enough of their games to make that judgment. Pun City had Memphis underrated and Arizona either properly rated or slightly overrated, but as it turned out, not enough to pay for it.

7 Texas A&M vs. 10 Florida State

Pick: Florida State

Logic: Pun City had seen Texas A&M about 5 times this year on TV, and they really did not impress very much. Outside of their Duke game, this blog hadn't seen Florida State too much. It was known that Florida State had a pretty high ceiling, so they were capable of good things if they showed up, but obviously to be a 10 seed, they had to have struggled some this year as well. The pick was definitely dictated by Texas A&M not having too high of a ceiling, as well as it seeming like a rebuilding year for them in this blog's opinion.

Result: Florida State in a close game.

Hindsight: This was fairly on point. One fact this blog didn't know until after the game was that FSU had not won in the tournament since 1998. It's unclear if prior knowledge of this would have changed Pun City's pick, as an argument could be made that they were overdue, or that they were doomed to lose. FSU certainly had better athletes than Texas A&M did, but Mark Turgeon coached them to within a few points of this game.

8 UNLV vs. 9 Illinois

Pick: UNLV

Logic: UNLV was one of Wisconsin's few losses this season, and they had two top-10 teams in the Mountain West this season. Illinois was extremely inconsistent, Pun City believes not winning two games in a row over the last month and a half of the season. Even if Illinois's "good" team showed up, this blog didn't figure it was in danger of beating UNLV. The Rebels were likely to get a solid win.

Result: Illinois in a blowout

Hindsight: Whew, where to start here. First- UNLV hadn't won the Mountain West tournament on their home floor, so that should have been a red flag. (Primarily since they hadn't even finished 2nd). Second - UNLV was probably due for a loss in the first round, since they'd done better than expected during the last few tournaments. Third - While BYU and San Diego State were very good in their conference this year, UNLV hadn't actually beaten either of them, so that was some dumb logic in the first place. Illinois showed up with their good team, but Pun City is convinced that it hadn't thought through the UNLV evaluation well enough to deserve a win, even if Illinois's bad team showed up. This was a mistake in judgment, due to not reasoning out the UNLV evaluation thoroughly or accurately.

6 Georgetown vs. 11 Virginia Commonwealth

Pick: Georgetown

Logic: Two-pronged approach to the logic here. First, Georgetown just lost to Ohio University in a 3-14 upset last year, so they had to have learned from that, and it wouldn't happen again. Second, VCU had the short turnaround from Wednesday to Friday, needing to fly from Dayton to Chicago in between.

Result: Virginia Commonwealth, resoundingly.

Hindsight: The "it couldn't possibly happen two years in a row" argument fared very poorly this year. VCU benefited the way that Pun City had hoped that Clemson would benefit given the recent game, as opposed to Georgetown's one Big East game. John Thompson III, outside of his Final Four appearance, does not appear to be a good tournament coach. VCU came out of that tough CAA and had played meaningful games for a long period. An additional bonus, one to keep in mind, was that VCU was an 11 seed facing a 6 with the short turnaround, while Clemson was a 12 facing a 5. Low seed differential and keeping in game atmospheres (while GU did not) led to this win for VCU. Also there was probably a decent amount of the AAU "not intimidated" factor here, as VCU's guys were probably from the same areas that GU's guys came from.

Day 2, Big East Tournament Trip

2011-03-18T21:19:00.002-05:00

The first day of games, bringing the 9 through 16 seeds in to Madison Square Garden. This was the first time that Pun City had been on the New York subway system, and early on, it seemed very similar to Chicago. Some performers in the waiting area, but nothing of note on the train.

Another first was Pun City being in New York City. Overall it's extremely loud in the city. While Pun City had heard about this on World Of Jenks, this blog was still very surprised at just how loud it was everywhere Pun City went. This was very striking to this blog.

One thing this blog can get out of the way ahead of time is the set list for each Big East band, at least that Pun City could decipher:

Cincinnati: Livin' On A Prayer by Bon Jovi, Low Rider, All The Small Things by Blink 182, Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes, Five Minutes To Save The World by Madonna and Justin Timberlake, Cold Hard Bitch by Jet, Johnny B Good by Chuck Berry, Y'all Ready For This, Hey Baby (the would you be my girl version, not the Gwen Stefani version), Call Me Al by Paul Simon, Dynamite by Taio Cruz, and Rock and Roll Part II by Gary Glitter.

Connecticut: Holiday by Green Day, Johnny B Good by Chuck Berry, Poker Face by Lady Gaga, Knock On Wood by Joe Cocker, Proud Mary by Tina Turner, Theme from Rocky, Hey Baby (the would you be my girl version, not the Gwen Stefani version), Land of 1,000 Dances, Rock and Roll Part II by Gary Glitter, The Impression That I Get by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Y'all Ready For This, Take On Me by A-Ha, Woolly Bully, and Seven Nation Army by the White Stripes.

DePaul: Free To Be Real (that one from the diet commercials), Forget You by Cee-Lo, Sportscenter theme, Very Superstitious by Stevie Wonder, Free Ride, Thriller by Michael Jackson, and Dance and Shout by Shaggy.

Georgetown: Y'all Ready For This, Just Dance by Lady Gaga, Girlfriend by Lil Romeo, On To The Next by Jay-Z, and Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night by the Black Eyed Peas.

Louisville: Hold On I'm Comin', What Is Love by Haddaway, Theme from Blues Brothers, Jump Jive and Wail by the Brian Setzer Orchestra, Still Fly by the Big Tymers, So Hard by Rihanna, Stayin' Alive, Shattered Dreams by Offspring, When I Ruled The World by Coldplay, and Rock and Roll Part II by Gary Glitter.

Marquette: We've Got The Funk, Holiday by Green Day, Jump Jive and Wail by the Brian Setzer Orchestra, Land of 1,000 Dances, Proud Mary by Tina Turner, The Impression That I Get by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, the Theme from Blues Brothers, Rock and Roll Part II by Gary Glitter, Y'all Ready For This, What I Like About You, School's Out For Summer, Tequila, Call Me Al by Paul Simon, and Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes.

Notre Dame: Oh What A Night, Soak Up The Sun by Sheryl Crow, Jenny I've Got Your Number, Jeremiah Was A Bullfrog, Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborne, Eye Of The Tiger, I'm A Believer by Smashmouth, and Take On Me by A-Ha.

Pittsburgh: Back In Black by AC/DC, Eye Of The Tiger, Bad Romance by Lady Gaga, and Dynamite by Taio Cruz.

Providence: O When The Saints, Carry On My Wayward Son, Bad Romance by Lady Gaga, Angel Is The Centerfold by J. Geils Band, and Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborne.

Rutgers: Zoot Suit Riot by Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Thriller by Michael Jackson, All The Small Things by Blink 182, Beat It by Michael Jackson, Poker Face by Lady Gaga, Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborne, that "Down on the Corner" song from Forrest Gump, among other places, Y'all Ready For This, What I Like About You, Some Day Love Will Find You, The Impression That I Get by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones.

St. John's: That Foo Fighters song that goes "What If I Say I'm Not Like The Others...", Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborne, Thriller by Michael Jackson, Call Me Al by Paul Simon, Girlfriend by Lil Romeo, Jump On It, and that song that goes "Thanks for the memories even though they weren't that good...."

Seton Hall: Cleveland Rocks, Knock On Wood by Joe Cocker, Livin' On A Prayer by Bon Jovi, Bad Romance by Lady Gaga, Touch Me Baby by Tom Jones, Love Potion Number 9, O When The Saints.

South Florida: Jenny I've Got Your Number, Call Me Al by Paul Simon, Rollercoaster by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jump Jive and Wail by the Brian Setzer Orchestra, Angel Is The Centerfold by J. Geils Band, You Really Got Me, You Can Feel It All Over by Stevie Wonder, Thriller by Michael Jackson, and the Theme from Rocky.

Syracuse: CBS College Basketball Theme, We've Got The Funk, Sell Out by Reel Big Fish, So Glad You Made It, Sportscenter Theme, Call Me Al by Paul Simon, Y'all Ready For This, and Bad Romance by Lady Gaga.

Villanova: Theme from Blues Brothers, Just Dance by Lady Gaga, Hey Baby (I want to know...), and All The Small Things by Blink 182.

West Virginia: Dirty Deeds by AC/DC, Someday Love Will Find You, Come Out and Play by Offspring, Hold On I'm Coming, House Of The Rising Sun by Bob Dylan.

That's a big list there. Pun City supposes that's enough for one post. Day 2, Part 2, coming up next.

NCAA Pick Logic, Day 1

2011-03-18T11:05:00.002-05:00

Notable Picks and Lessons for Pun City's Future Picks:

5 West Virginia vs. 12 Clemson:

Pick: Clemson

Logic: No one really knew what advantage or disadvantage the 12s would have coming off of a Dayton opening round game on Tuesday. This blog's opinion was that it would help Clemson, having played recently, as opposed to West Virginia, who had been eliminated in their first Big East Tournament game. Pun City knew ahead of time that West Virginia is a tough team, but figured that Clemson would be in more of a "game mode" than the Mountaineers, who had played one game in 2 weeks.

Result: West Virginia

Hindsight: Early returns are that the Tuesday opening round game seems to be a disadvantage even for the 12s. Also, it seems like Bob Huggins doesn't have any issues getting his team ready to play first round games. The lesson would be to keep an eye on the other Dayton at-large team (VCU) to see if any team can compete given the short turnaround. Another lesson is that Pun City should probably overlook any anti-West Virginia bias it harbors (at least while picking), and that bias is sizeable.

4 Kentucky vs. 13 Princeton

Pick: Kentucky

Logic: While Princeton came out of a very tough Ivy League, it was unlikely that they'd have the firepower to keep up with Kentucky, who generally smokes their first round opponent, even though Pun City doesn't really think Kentucky is too great this year with the number of freshmen they use.

Result: Kentucky on a last-second shot.

Hindsight: Princeton was underrated, for sure. Without any "name" players, they still were pretty cohesive. While a Princeton pick would have been wrong, it probably would have felt reasonable. Pun City is fairly convinced it had Kentucky rated about right though. We'll have to see in further rounds, but this blog feels like it had this reasonably well-picked, despite not having seen Princeton this year.

6 Cincinnati vs. 11 Missouri

Pick: Cincinnati

Logic: Having seen Missouri only a couple times, and not having been too impressed with them (not to mention they barely made the tournament), Pun City was not ready to jump on their bandwagon. Cincinnati had looked strong in the late season (and Pun City had personally witnessed this with a road win at Marquette as well as a Big East Tournament win), and this blog was fairly confident in their abilities. Missouri's style, while difficult to prepare for, at least had 4 days to get prepared for, instead of 2 in the next round. Added in with Mick Cronin coaching UC, and his experience coaching a good Murray State team through OVC battles, this blog was fairly confident in the pick.

Result: Cincinnati, pulling away late.

Hindsight: This was pegged just about perfectly. We'll see how Cincinnati does in future rounds, but as of now it seems like Pun City had them rated well, and this blog definitely thinks it had Missouri figured out accurately.

7 Temple vs. 10 Penn State

Pick: Temple

Logic: 7-10s are critical in Pun City's pool, as all games are 1 point throughout the tournament. Going 0 for 4 on 7-10s will kill your chances. Fortunately for Pun City, this blog had seen multiple games of each of these schools. Temple looked very strong in the Atlantic 10, only losing consistently to Xavier. Fran Dunphy was very overdue for a win in the tournament, and this was most likely his highest seeded team. Penn State had to make a late run to get in to the tournament, but they were solid. This blog thought that Penn State never really seemed as dominant as Temple had, plus a slight coaching edge was held by Dunphy over Penn State's Ed DeChellis.

Result: Temple on a last-second shot.

Hindsight: Whew. Penn State really had a great shot at this one. Although they generally played from behind most of the game, and only tied it late, Penn State definitely could have pulled this out. To some extent, Pun City was lucky with this one, since it ended up being pretty close. That said, Temple's worst-case scenario was going to overtime if they missed the last shot. This blog would like to think that the "overdue Dunphy" factor is what ultimately won this game for Temple, and that was a huge factor in Pun City's pick, so this blog probably had that about right. The lesson is to keep watching the A-10, and Big Ten teams even if they look like marginal qualifiers.

7 UCLA vs. 10 Michigan State

Pick: UCLA

Logic: Michigan State had looked pretty bad for most of the year. They had been buoyed by a brutal schedule, which kept their RPI up, and a really weak bubble, which essentially locked anyone in that had an RPI above 30. UCLA competed strongly in the Pac-10 all year, and although Pun City didn't really get to see much Pac-10 this year, this blog did know it was a pretty tough conference, so this blog didn't fear calling their number in this game.

Result: UCLA, after just about giving away the game late.

Hindsight: Man, this felt pretty lucky in hindsight. Michigan State was down huge early, but had a +23 run in the second half to cut it to 3 right at the end of the game. Pun City only realized after the game was on TV that UCLA had a fat center, which is generally a big red flag for this blog. That said, this would have been another brutal loss to take, especially if both Princeton and MSU had been chosen.

5 Vanderbilt vs. 12 Richmond

Pick: Vanderbilt

Logic: Vanderbilt had just lost last year to Murray State in the first round. One would think that they'd have learned from that and wouldn't let it happen again. Pun City had seen Richmond about 3-4 times this year on TV, and never did they appear very good. They weren't especially great in the Atlantic 10, falling to 4th for most of the year, before winning the conference tournament to get in to the field. This blog assumed that they were out of wins, and Vanderbilt would be prepared and more talented.

Result: Richmond

Hindsight: Both had pretty equal talent. It's possible that Vanderbilt had not seen the Princeton offense earlier in the year. This actually overlaps well with Kentucky struggling against Princeton. The lesson is that southern teams don't run the Princeton offense much, so they probably will be unprepared to face it come tournament time. Kevin Stallings is such a good coach, this blog is perplexed that he hasn't gotten them to figure it out yet. Maybe Chris Mooney is just that much better of a coach.

8 Butler vs. 9 Old Dominion

Pick: Butler

Logic: Butler was probably one of the top 10 best-known teams for this blog going in. Old Dominion wasn't especially well known, having only seen them win an early season tournament in the Virgin Islands (on TV). Pun City also knew Old Dominion won the CAA tournament, but they hadn't won the regular season, so this blog wasn't overly impressed with them. Butler on the other hand, Pun City had pegged. They struggled early, then collapsed in the middle of the Horizon League conference season, then made a late run. Pun City knew that the Horizon League tournament win in Milwaukee would have been huge, that's a tough place to play with the fired up crowd, which it would have been for the final. That win signalled to Pun City that Butler was firing on all cylinders, so they'd be a tough out in the NCAAs.

Result: Butler, on a last-second shot.

Hindsight: This was classic "high knowledge vs. low knowledge". This blog had high knowledge of Butler and thought they were good, so Pun City picked them. ODU definitely had way better athletes, but that probably happens with about 2/3rds of Butler's opponents. The last-second shot is a little deceptive, since BU goes to OT at worst in that scenario. But, ODU led for a good portion of this game, so they were no slouch. If there's any way to watch more CAA hoops during the year, do it.

4 Louisville vs. 13 Morehead State

Pick: Morehead State

Logic: Morehead State had Kenneth Faried, one of the top 5 or 6 players in the NCAA, and a hugely underrated player. This blog knew he would create huge issues for Louisville, a somewhat undersized team that certainly wouldn't have anyone to contain him. Also, the Ohio Valley Conference had been murder all year, so it wasn't like Morehead State hadn't seen a string of tough games before (Austin Peay and Murray State both provided ample competition for them this year). Even though Morehead hadn't won the conference regular season, they were able to get out of the OVC tournament with a bid. Louisville, while good, was in somewhat of a rebuilding year, that just happened to turn in to a great season. That said, they were young, and relied on two backcourt players to get the bulk of their offense going. They also were down huge to Marquette at home before making an epic comeback to win late, but this if anything turned Pun City off to them, because why are you down that far to Marquette in the first place? Probably the hugest reason this blog picked MSU though, was that both of these schools were from the same state. Any time you see a mid-major playing a high-major from the same state on a neutral court, you know the small school won't be intimidated. This is really their chance, so they'll be salivating. Furthermore, because they're from the same region, all of these guys have been playing their opponents in AAU through middle school and high school. Completely not intimidated.

Result: Morehead State on a last-second shot.

Hindsight: This pick was right, but the logic was bad. Louisville's Preston Knowles was injured in the second half, and missed most of it. Without that, Pun City doubts Morehead State wins. Additionally, this is not at all a misleading last-second shot, because if MSU misses that shot, they lose the game. This blog also came to find out that MSU's head coach Donnie Tyndall went to share notes with Louisville's Rick Pitino in the offseason, so the two programs had pretty good knowledge of each other. Pun City never knows what to make of that situation, it seems like the teacher and the student each win about half of the time. MSU definitely was not intimidated though, they salivated and won this one, so this blog was happy with the result.

5 Kansas State vs. 12 Utah State

Pick: Utah State

Logic: Kansas State started off the season very poorly. They also had dismissed a couple players in mid-year, at which point the team played very well. Utah State had a mystique about it. Stew Morrill won't go to early-season tournaments, or play anyone that doesn't give him a home-and-home, so their strength of schedule is always garbage. The underground opinion was that if Utah State had gotten the chance to play any of these major schools at home (or neutral court), USU would have won. Pun City hadn't actually seen USU play at all. While it did think that KSU was playing very well late, this blog wasn't overly impressed with Frank Martin's coaching, plus it's not often that player dismissals bode well for future results.

Result: Kansas State, near blowout.

Hindsight: Middle-Knowledge vs. Low-Knowledge, and Pun City picked the Low-Knowledge, despite thinking that KSU was playing well. This probably would have been tough either way. USU's going to win one of these eventually, especially with the number of seniors they always seem to have. Ideally in the future this blog would want to at least see a team once if picking them over a team that this blog has been impressed with. Really not a great pick, this blog feels lazy looking back at it.

6 St. John's vs. 11 Gonzaga

Pick: St. John's

Logic: St. John's has a great coaching staff, and two great players, so this blog figured they'd be in good shape playing Gonzaga, who hadn't impressed most of the year, although they played strongly late in the WCC and in the conference tournament. This blog hadn't seen as much Gonzaga as usual though. The Red Storm's DJ Kennedy had gotten injured in the Big East Tournament, but his prognosis wasn't illuminated to this blog until Tuesday night before the NCAA tournament. At this point, Pun City was too lazy to change 6 brackets to take St. John's out. Another factor was that Purdue had lost Hummel late last year, and they still played strongly in the NCAAs, so this blog was wary of switching out in case SJU would use that as inspiration. Also, SJU had a bunch of seniors that hadn't played in the tournament before, so this blog thought they'd be fired up.

Result: Gonzaga in a blowout.

Hindsight: Do what you can to make the switch. SJU's experience was primarily losing experience for the first 3 years. All the coaching in the world couldn't help them in this tournament, and the injury occurred too late for the team to adjust to their new roles. Gonzaga looked extremely strong, and apparently they had been that good late in the regular season and in the WCC tourney. Another tipoff should have been that SJU didn't do particularly great in the Big East Tournament, essentially home games for them, where they barely beat Rutgers.

That's all this blog's got for now. But Future Pun City: Keep these in mind.

2011 Big East Tournament Trip - Day 1

2011-03-16T22:42:00.008-05:00

This is somewhat of a shot in the dark. Obviously Pun City didn't publicize this trip too well, no preview or really a whole lot of lead time informing Pun City's friends either. But yes, this blog did go to a tournament this year, and it was the Big East, and it was awesome.

Monday, March 7th, flying from Milwaukee to Baltimore, then a 2.5 hour layover, then in to LaGuardia. At that point, this blog needed to take a bus across town to a hostel that this blog had reserved in advance.

Relatively uneventful day, with the exception of being this blog's first venture to a hostel. Pun City chose the hostel for several reasons. First off, you can't beat the cost. It was roughly $50.00 a night, which in New York is about rock bottom. This blog had reserved a 4-6 guy room (they require the same-gender room assignments), and for the first 4 nights, there were 6 bunks in the room. It's possible one of those remained unoccupied, or at least didn't have anyone there simultaneously to Pun City, but the room was pretty well-occupied.

This blog's roommates were from New Zealand, Japan, Spain, and France. This blog only talked to the New Zealander, which was somewhat surprising since you don't usually end up in the room at the same time while awake, much less while everyone else was awake. The other countries were derived from hearing introductions while trying to sleep.

Another sleep deterrant was that the room light was on when this blog got back for the night. Pun City at first assumed it was locked in that position for certain hours, but this was proven incorrect later in the trip. Each bed had an individual night light, so those really should have been used when moving about the room at night, not the overhead room light. (Eventually I think a few roommates caught the drift).

Upon further review, there was another event this evening. Pun City had asked the hostel security/concierge where the nearest sports bar was. The guy directed me to Amsterdam 106, a bar without signage on the corner of, you guessed it, Amsterdam and 106th. They have about 5 screens, but all 5 of them were tuned in to the Knicks game at the time. Pun City, not knowing any other venue, just went with it, figuring it could get those switched shortly. After walking in and seeing practically every seat filled, this blog asked a waitress if there was anywhere it could sit. She said yes, right on this barstool that already had a jacket on it.

Pun City was a little wary of the arrangement, but hey, she said it was alright. (It turned out that the jacket was the bar owners'). The waitress took this blog's order, and this blog then focused on getting the game switched over. The frazzled, weary bartender set Pun City up with a soda, and this blog asked her if she could switch one of the channels over to a college game. She said, "You'll have to wait for Paul, he knows how to do it. He's a regular, the remote is here, but it switches all the channels unless you do it right, and he's the only one that knows." Well, Paul ended up venturing in, and he obliged with the switch. One important part of the switch was that Pun City knew the DirecTV channel for ESPN, which this blog hadn't known until very recently, so that was a huge boost. Iona vs. Saint Peter's, the Metro Atlantic championship game, was on, and this blog was pleased to be able to watch it.

Paul asked this blog, "Is that THE Iona?" This question, in just about any other city, would seem very unusual, but Pun City remembered where this blog was sitting, and said, "Yeah, it is." Paul said, "How about that! I'm a Gael. I went to their middle school and high school." That was kinda cool. Shortly thereafter, Paul left. This was important, because Pun City thinks that he was the owner, or at least knew the owner enough to have some sway.

This blog's foreign waitress, who had a light grasp of the English language, was discussing something with the bartender soon after Paul left. It turned out that the short-order cook had cooked this blog's burger well done, and not medium as ordered. This blog wasn't too worried about it, but yes, would have preferred a medium, so this blog asked to have it redone. Well, apparently the order had either been entered incorrectly by the waitress, or put in the wrong order by the bartender, or just messed up inexplicably by the cook. Well, the cook seemed pissed when he noticed the issue. So much to the point that he stormed out of the building, seemingly for good. This pissed off the bartender to no end, as she was arguably the next in line to cook. Pun City didn't really mind waiting, since the hostel didn't have any TVs, so this blog figured that it would wait around and see what happened. After about 15 minutes, the cook walked back in and prepared the burger correctly. After some broken English apologies from the waitress, and an apology that doubled as a diatribe against the cook from the bartender, this blog got its food, assuring everyone that it really was no big deal.

The bartender ended up giving this blog the meal for free, and this blog believes that she did so at her own expense, forgoing her one free meal from the restaurant for the night. This blog had said they didn't have to do it, so Pun City gave a tip roughly the same as the cost of the burger and was on its way. After that, some sleep and preparation for a full slate of 4 games the next day.

Big 12 Tournament Trip: The Lost Levels

2010-03-27T21:22:00.004-05:00

This blog was re-reading its last few entries (in the process doubling its traffic), and it noted some random minutia that wasn't covered in this month's post series.

As noted in the comments, Pun City sat next to a KU fan named Mark for a lot of the games. He was one of the better and more knowledgable fans this blog has encountered at a sporting event. That was very cool. This blog has had that happen in the past, and it's one of the nice parts of these conference tournament trips - meeting other fans that have a great knowledge of the game, but are located in different geographic areas. Offhand, Pun City thinks of the Idaho fan in Anaheim that rebounded for this blog in the halftime contest, Rodney Carney's old high school coach in Memphis, the other dude (Terry maybe?) that gave Pun City a rundown of where to park and eat (also in Memphis), and the cool couple at Robert Morris that referred this blog to PNC Park (haven't gotten there yet, but it's on the list!).

Another point from the trip that has consistently occurred on previous trips was the following. This one needs a little background. In order to bring back these recaps, primarily the songs bands play, Pun City brings a notebook to all of the games. As one can imagine, this is a little unusual, especially in the stands. Generally, Pun City will have the notebook out and in hand while watching the games, taking an occasional note during the action. This inevitably piques the curiosity of another fan, if not multiple other fans. Over the years, this blog has been approached by many people while taking notes. Usually they pose one of the following questions: "Are you a scout?" "Are you a writer?" "Are you a player?" "What are you taking notes for?"

Pun City doesn't mind the questions, it's actually fairly cool. This blog will willingly answer any questions in this line, and this blog will answer truthfully, usually just explaining that this blog is taking notes to remember what it did on vacation each day. There end up being two groups of inquisitors -

1. The complete skeptic. This is pretty common. The conversation ends up being pretty short, usually something along these lines:

Inquisitor: "Who are you scouting for?"

Pun City: "Oh, (this blog isn't) a scout, (Pun City is) just taking notes to remember (its) vacation."

Inquisitor (in completely unbelieving voice): "Ohh, okay."

Later in the game, Complete Skeptic will occasionally comment after a good play for his team: "Put that one in your notes!"

Complete Skeptic came in to the conversation for some reason wanting to believe that he spotted a scout in the stands, and he then probably wanted to hear some "inside" information from the scout. Then the scout gives him this "made up" line, instead of striking up a conversation with the skeptic where he might give inside information, and skeptic is not really happy with the result. The skeptic chooses to let this reinforce his belief that Pun City is a scout, instead of allowing it to change his mind.

Pun City doesn't really care too much that Complete Skeptic thinks this blog is a scout, that's Complete Skeptic's prerogative. This brings us to the second type of inquisitor:

2. Cool Dude. Cool Dude is a little of a misnomer, since it can be a cool girl on occasion. Complete Skeptic has historically always been a dude though. Here's how the Cool Dude conversation usually goes:

Cool Dude: "Excuse me, I don't mean to bother you, but can I ask why you're taking notes."

Pun City: "Oh, (this blog) just takes a trip to a different conference tournament each year, and (Pun City) likes to take notes so that it remembers what happened while it was on the road."

Cool Dude: "Oh, that's pretty cool. Are you a writer?"

Pun City: "No, (Pun City) has a blog, but mainly it's just this blog's friends that visit."

Cool Dude: "Oh, okay, cool, I just was wondering if you were a scout or a writer or a coach or something since I saw you taking notes over there."

Cool Dude maybe had a guess ahead of time, but wasn't completely married to the idea of whatever the guess would be. That's cool though, it allows the conversation to progress beyond an interrogation stage.

This trip had both types of encounter, but the Complete Skeptic didn't make any snarky comments after the initial contact (this was good, a fairly tame Complete Skeptic encounter). The Cool Dude conversation was pretty cool. There was a group of friends sitting two by four in the row Pun City was in and the one immediately in front of this blog's row for the whole tournament. If this blog recalls correctly, some of them were rooting for Texas, and some for Oklahoma. Despite a first round loss for OU, and a second round loss for Texas, they all stayed for the rest of the tournament. This is a cool move, in Pun City's opinion. No need to let your team's loss wreck a good weekend of basketball.

In this case, Cool Dude approached this blog wondering what Pun City was doing, noting that he saw the notebook and also Pun City switching hats between games. His guess was that this blog was working for the Big 12 as a blogger for their official site. Not a bad guess, but alas, Pun City does not write in an official capacity. Cool Oklahoma Dude was very polite, not wanting to bother this blog, so Pun City appreciated that.

Politeness was a very common theme at the Big 12 Tournament. This was one of the only tournaments where this blog did not see fans getting accosted by opposing fans for wearing the wrong colors. This was pretty cool. If this blog had to guess, it was probably a price issue. Fans paid a good deal of money to get in to these games, and they were going for good basketball, not to get thrown out for being a meathead. But regardless of price, Pun City came away very impressed with the Big 12. This is a great tournament, if you ever get the chance to partake, it will not disappoint you.

Big XII Tournament Trip, Day 6

2010-03-23T19:52:00.003-05:00

Kansas won the final, knocking out Kansas State. A drive home would dominate most of Pun City's Sunday. To start off the day, this blog headed to the local Waffle House again. That place is awesome. The particular one Pun City visited (near Worlds of Fun in Kansas City, MO) had extremely good service. All of the employees that this blog encountered were very friendly.

As a final Waffle House meal, this blog got the $5.00 meal of 3 eggs (scrambled), and hashbrowns with two toppings (chili and cheese for this blog). Phenomenal stuff. The staff was nice enough to accomodate this blog's request of having a milk for one glass, but then refilling it with with soda thereafter. The Denny's Pun City visited earlier in the trip was not at all accomodating with the same request. It's possible a language barrier played a part in Denny's' unfortunate decision, but this blog will simply give credit where it's due, which is to Waffle House.

This was a great start to the day. This blog was heading toward Iowa City, to visit Carver-Hawkeye Arena on the University of Iowa's campus. It's a fairly long drive from Kansas City to Iowa City, that probably took around 5 hours. This blog had a Garmin GPS in the car for the ride. This was the first trip this blog had taken with a GPS and no co-pilot. As this blog approached Carver-Hawkeye, it couldn't see the arena anywhere. As it was a Sunday, the parking lots surrounding the arena were free. This blog still couldn't see the arena, but the GPS said it was there, so Pun City parked. What looked like a large indoor swimming pool was next to the lot this blog parked in. This blog somewhat guessed that the large indoor pool building might actually be the arena, so it tried to get in. (This blog needed to use the facilities anyway, so pool or no, Pun City was walking in).

After a number of locked doors, this blog got to a pair that was easy to open. Sure enough, it was Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Everyone enters at the top of the stadium. That's why it looks like a swimming pool, there's nothing on the roof, so one can see all the way through to the other side. The arena was undergoing renovations, and it wasn't easy to walk around the place. The upper concourse (and as far as this blog can tell, the only concourse) was blocked off on both sides of the entrance Pun City came in from. A single deck allowed this blog to walk down near floor level. Unfortunately, the few closest rows of the seating bowl are bleachers, and on this day, they were pushed up.

Realistically, this blog could have probably gotten down to the floor level and grabbed the rim on one of the hoops. Pragmatically, it really wasn't in the cards. Pun City would have had to climb down about 10 feet of bleachers, then head about 100 feet to the rim. If an employee noticed Pun City, this blog would have been close to "stuck in a well." The only way back to the seating bowl would have been to climb back up the 10 feet of bleachers. Definitely a slow getaway if that even were possible. The decision this blog made was that a) Pun City would most likely be back here at some point, it not being all that far away from this blog's home base, and b) Carver-Hawkeye is not historic enough to get busted over.

No big deal. It was cool to see that arena, and as it turned out, this blog was there during Todd Lickliter's last full day on the job. Should be interesting to see who Iowa hires as their next head coach.

During the drive in, Pun City had been trying to find a cool fast food restaurant to have lunch at. Ideally, since this blog had only had dessert at a Sonic Drive-In once this trip, Pun City would be able to find one around there. Alas, the Garmin wasn't coming up with anything anywhere near Iowa City or the route to Iowa City. Fortunately, this blog spotted one as Pun City was driving toward the stadium. After checking out the arena, Pun City headed to the Iowa City Sonic. At this point, it was almost 2:00 CST. Pun City hadn't needed to eat lunch yet, because of the Waffle House breakfast it had eaten (Pun City doesn't usually eat breakfast, this topic could probably merit its own post).

This Sonic stop marked the first time that this blog had ever been to a Sonic during happy hour. As a result, this blog got a half-price drink. The cranberry Coke was a bargain at twice the price. Also, this blog got some sweet fries and a cheeseburger. Very energizing stuff. The final stop of the tour would be Northern Illinois University, where this blog was hoping to see their Convocation Center.

The drive on I-80 across northern Illinois is pretty boring. Not bad, but a little boring. No real cities along the route, but it isn't all farmer's fields either. Definitely some varied terrain. This blog got to NIU in the late afternoon. As is always a risk, and primarily on Sundays, their basketball arena (The Convocation Center) was completely locked up. This blog tried absolutely every door on the building, though. The loading dock, exit only doors, service entrances, everything. They do a good job of locking up at NIU. At least they did this particular Sunday.

The place looks really nice, very new. It was a bummer that Pun City wasn't able to get in there.

The rest of the way home, Pun City heard the Selection Sunday announcements (as well as the end of the SEC title game and the Big Ten title game).

It was a pretty cool trip. This blog was happy to be home, but certainly happy that it had taken the trip.

Big 12 Tournament Trip, Day 5

2010-03-20T14:45:00.003-05:00

4th and final day of games. In this case, one game, just the championship. As a result, lots of time to spend away from the Sprint Center.

First on tap was a 9:30 AM tour of Kauffman Stadium, home of the Kansas City Royals. This whole setup was really cool. Pun City will rewind a little to illuminate you. When this blog decided on Kansas City for the tournament trip, it looked into possibly touring either Kauffman Stadium or Arrowhead Stadium (home of the Kansas City Chiefs). Arrowhead doesn't have tours, plus it looked like they were renovating this offseason, so no dice there. Kauffman does offer tours, but they didn't begin until March 15th this season, with the exception of group tours, which could be scheduled by appointment in the offseason.

Pun City had called the Royals to see if they had any group tours scheduled on the Friday or Saturday of this week, and to see if they'd allow Pun City to tag along with a group. The Royals employee that answered they had an 11:00 group tour scheduled, but they would be able to have Pun City tour at 9:30 (as they'd have a guide in the building anyway, with the 11:00 coming up). This was very cool. They did not have to accomodate this blog at all, but they not only did so, but went above and beyond by giving what amounted to a private tour. Very awesome, Royals.

The tour guide, whose name escapes Pun City (embarrassingly), was outstanding. She was also the Royals Hall of Fame curator, so she was very knowledgable on a lot of the Royals' history, in addition to much on how exhibits were constructed. All of Kansas City baseball was spotlighted in the stadium, which included turn-of-the-century teams, the Royals, Kansas City Athletics, Negro League teams, and even some Federal League teams. Very cool stuff. A major bonus of the private tour was being able to ask whatever questions this blog wanted, and getting them answered right away. This was a very good tour, even if it had not been private, and it was a really awesome part of the trip. This blog highly recommends either a Royals game or a Royals tour if you ever get the opportunity. Top-notch organization as far as fan-friendliness goes.

After the tour, Pun City headed over to Arthur Bryant's to get some ribs. The place is great, it's all about the food. A giant pile of rib tips, bread, and french fries covered this blog's plate, and was extremely tasty. This was the first place Pun City had visited that emphasized the "rub" on the ribs, and it was a good result. Certainly a little different than this blog was used to in the rib department, but great stuff.

Next up was a stop at the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. That was good, maybe not as great as this blog had hoped though. It seemed like this museum was primarily focused on communicating the story of the Negro Leagues in the form of written word on the wall, as opposed to a large amount of memorabilia. As Pun City knows a good deal of the written story already, the comparatively smaller amount of memorabilia was a little bit disappointing. That said, in hindsight, memorabilia from that era is hard to find, much less in good repair. It's entirely possible that the museum has most of the surviving memorabilia from the Negro Leagues, but there isn't very much that survives to this day. This blog would suggest going to the museum once, but this blog will probably not partake again. Of note, the caretaker of the souvenir shop was very nice and there are some very affordable deals to be had there. If you do go to the NLBM, make sure to go to the souvenir stand.

Two more stops happened between the NLBM and the Big 12 Final. One was to UMKC to check out their bookstore. It's a good bookstore for a school of their size, and Pun City got a hat there. Go Roos! Their bookstore was in their University Square, which housed (among other things) their cafeteria. They had a newsstand set up with free papers for students, including USA Today. Pun City really likes these stands, as it generally means free paper for Pun City. This one was a stand that required a student ID though, so that unfortunately excluded this blog from the proceedings. Kind of a bummer.

The final stop was at Crown Center, a mall at the Hallmark / Crayola headquarters. In this blog's opinion, this is a terrible mall. The food court was underwhelming, the entire place was definitely geared toward kids, and the two sports-related shops were extreme rip-offs that must either be surviving by having little to no rent or a very large amount of uninformed customers. Pun City has seen similar sports shops in the past, but this blog is always offended when it comes across a sports shop selling items well above their actual worth, preying on dumb customers.

It took about 15 minutes to determine that this mall was not the place for Pun City to be, so this blog moved on. On to the Big 12 Zone for picking up some final free stuff and then going in to the game. The Census stand wasn't there anymore, so this blog could no longer load up on their cool freebies like piggy banks and pens. This was probably alright, since this blog had done that a couple days in a row. Chick-Fil-A, in addition to having their normal shooting contests for either mini balls or Pez dispensers featuring their cow mascot, had a really timely giveaway on this day. Not only were they giving out coupons for free chicken sandwiches, but they were also giving away free chicken sandwiches. This, combined with Sunkist's ongoing free soda giveaway provided Pun City with a nice dinner - for free. Not too much to gather besides the free food and soda though, DirecTV was wrapping up their stand since they were about to distribute their grand prize (a TV and tickets to the final). Phillips 66 did have free keychains though, that worked out well. They had a flashlight on the chain, plus some extra batteries. A decent giveaway.

After the free food, it was time to enter the arena, and this blog went around the College Basketball Experience to get to the secondary entrance to the Sprint Center, which was significantly faster than trying the normal entrance. Kansas was playing Kansas State, which was probably a scalper's dream matchup. This blog was thankful that it had purchased tickets as early as it did, seeing as there were most likely prices around $150.00 for just the final at this point. About 75% of the stadium was filled with KU fans. This was a great effort by KSU fans to even get 25% of the stadium in their colors, since KU has one of the more rabid fan bases in the country.

Kansas rolled, putting the game out of reach at the 7:59 mark. Of note:

Kansas's band played "Fun, Fun, Fun," "Tequila," "Sing, Sing, Sing" (The Chips Ahoy 1,000 Chips Delicious song), "Crazy In Love," and "Shake That Thing".

KSU's band played "Smoke On The Water," "Sell Out," "Separate Ways," "Purple Haze," "So Glad You Made It," "Crazy Train," and "Rock and Roll Part II."

Very good trip. The next post will discuss the return home with stops at the University of Iowa and Northern Illinois University.

Big XII Tournament Trip, Day 4

2010-03-17T21:47:00.003-05:00

You might notice that there aren't any pictures with these posts. Now, wiseguy might say "Hah, there normally aren't, hadn't even noticed!" And, in fairness, wiseguy would be right. But in addition to Pun City's typical laziness, this blog also added to the picturelessness by somehow losing the camera. Either in Bramlage, Bramlage's parking lot, or around the Sprint Center.

A decent-sized bummer there. Anyway, got back to Kansas City and parked on the street this time. For some reason, Pun City thought this was a Saturday, so it just assumed it was alright to park on the street (given that the signs were only in effect for Monday through Friday also). Fortunately, this blog walked past a police department on its way to the arena, and there were a couple police employees taking a smoke break. Pun City asked if it was okay to park on the street if the signs said only Monday through Friday, and they sort of looked at this blog strangely and asked if it had hours posted. A brief discussion followed, where they probably thought Pun City was a little off, but eventually they decided that Parking Control doesn't work weekends, so this blog would probably be alright. In hindsight, this blog now realizes that the car was in a 2-Hour metered spot for about an hour and a half without any money in the meter. Although it was the last hour and a half of the week, (so workers probably weren't writing out a ton of tickets in this interval), Pun City afterwards realized it was at least a little lucky to have not received a ticket.

Semifinal games were set to have the top 4 seeds playing. This was pretty cool, especially since the 5 seed had gotten smoked by the 12 seed in the first round.

Before the games, Pun City checked out the Big 12 Zone again and grabbed a bunch more free stuff. Those Sunkists were a nice bonus right before entering the games each day, and this was no exception.

Kansas faced Texas A&M played in the first game, and the Aggies were definitely game, staying in the game until there was 6:12 remaining.

Of note: Texas A&M's band played what this blog thought was "Better Now," but this blog wasn't entirely able to decipher much of their songs this game. A main reason was that they played either familiar songs without familiar titles, or unfamiliar songs.

Kansas's band played Respect, Rock and Roll Part II, and The Final Countdown.

In the next game, 2 seed Kansas State faced 3 seed Baylor. This was the best game of the tournament, with the game finally out of reach for Baylor with 1:41 remaining.

Baylor's band contributed Ole Ole, Heartbreaker, Take On Me, a medley of the Imperial March and Kashmir, Kung Fu Fighting, and Eye of the Tiger. Pretty good stuff.

Kansas State's band played Someday Love Will Find You, Kiss The Sky, Everybody Loves Somebody, Rock and Roll Part II, Purple Haze (because they're purple, get it??), and The Final Countdown.

Big 12 Tournament - Day 4

2010-03-15T22:16:00.006-05:00

Day 3 of games. The first time there were less than 4 games. In Pun City's experience, this is an interesting dichotomy. On one hand, it's kind of nice to get a little break. Only having 2 games to watch is much less exhausting. You might not think that watching basketball games would really be exhausting, but it kind of gets that way, as one supposes doing anything for a 12-hour period can be. Another side is that you start to notice the games are coming to an end. If there are only four teams left, there isn't much culling left for the herd. To a certain extent, you feel like another game should be starting once the second one ends.

Overall, Pun City thinks it's a good thing though, for if it weren't for the last 2 days of conference tournaments, you wouldn't be able to enjoy the surrounding area as much. That's something Pun City was able to accomplish early on Day 4 of this year's trip.

For the first time in Kansas City, this blog did not start the day off with Waffle House. The main reason was that Pun City had a little road trip planned. Pun City was heading to Lawrence, Kansas, home of the Kansas Jayhawks (and Phog Allen Fieldhouse). If there was still time left, Pun City was going to go to Manhattan, Kansas and check out Kansas State's homecourt (Bramlage Coliseum).

Getting to Lawrence, Pun City found an information booth, and the friendly attendant directed me to a parking lot adjacent to the fieldhouse. Pun City parked ($1.00 per hour) and walked toward the facility. The attendant had mentioned that the lot would have a walkway directly to the arena, and this was accurate. Unfortunately, at least on the level this blog parked on, the doors to Allen Fieldhouse were locked. They also included signs stating something to the effect of "Allen Fieldhouse is a controlled facility and not open to the public on non-gamedays. Those entering Allen Fieldhouse without permission can be charged with trespassing."

That's pretty extreme. Having been to many arenas, Pun City feels qualified to say this is the most strongly-worded warning on any arena in the country. Most likely, they get a lot of hoops yahoos like this blog, so they probably choose to put the huge disclaimer on their doors to keep out at least some of the crowds. Realistically though, Pun City was doubtful that they'd really charge anyone with trespassing (unless the violator was really camping out or causing other problems).

Anyway, not really deterred by the huge signs, Pun City was able to find some open doors. Conveniently enough, the open doors were right next to an open gate to the court. The gate had another sign saying the court was closed, and Pun City heard workers in the court area. Pun City decided that inspite of the warning, and the workers, it should at least take a shot at grabbing the rim inside. Allen Fieldhouse is definitely one of the most historic (if not the most historic) arenas in the country, and coming this far to let a sign stop this blog would be a little weak. (Plus, Pun City had a pretty direct escape route and wasn't likely to get caught on foot unless the workers were former track stars).

Pun City entered the gate, walked on to the Allen floor, and looked up and around at the banners hanging from the rafters. It was pretty cool. For about 5 seconds. As Pun City was strolling inconspicuously toward the rim, one of the workers yelled down to this blog "The court is closed." Pun City responded, "Okay, thanks." Interrupting this blog, the same worker immediately said "The court is closed" again. It's possible he thought Pun City said "What?" but it's more likely he was trying to get me out of there as soon as possible. This blog obliged and walked out. Then Pun City stopped at the Kansas Hall of Champions (probably what it was called, anyway). That place was cool. A lot of history for all sports at Kansas, especially basketball, and the museum showed a lot of high-quality artifacts. Good stuff, Pun City recommends stopping in to that free museum if you get the chance.

On a recommendation, this blog checked out Free State Brewing Company in Lawrence for lunch. Sort of a weird sequence happened there. Pun City parked the car in a metered spot, but only had about 30 cents in change, so the meter only allowed about 24 minutes. Not enough for a sit-down spot. Pun City's first intent was going to be asking the hostess for change before getting a table. Unfortunately, Free State was pretty packed, plus the hostess and host seemed fairly impatient (though professional) and seated this blog as soon as it stated "one but..."

No worries, this blog will just ask the waiter for change. The waiter brought Pun City a water, and this blog ordered a soda and asked for the change to plug the meter. The waiter was cool with it, gave Pun City the soda and walked back with the change. This blog had a couple sips of soda, then walked out to go plug the meter. A quarter bought Pun City enough time to stick around for a normal (unrushed) lunch, and this blog walked back up to its seat in the restaurant. The table was empty. No water, no soda. Pun City looked around, thinking there was a small chance it didn't remember the route back to the seat correctly and was in the wrong place. As this blog was looking confused, a patron at the next table said to Pun City: "They tried to seat someone else at your table, so they cleared it. Your waiter stopped them though." Pun City then located its waiter and headed toward him, as he was near the water pitcher. As this blog approached him from behind, he turned around. Just as Pun City was about to ask what the deal was, he gave a knowing look that totally conveyed "Aren't my co-workers awesome?" Then he said, "I'll get you another soda, here's some more water."

The French Dip at Free State was good. Nothing amazing, but that may have been due to the fact that there was swiss cheese on the sandwich, and Pun City isn't a fan of that cheese. Their ice cream flavor of the day was something weird, so this blog decided to get a Reese's Sonic Blast at a Sonic.

Pun City then had about 4 hours to kill before this blog had to be back in Kansas City. The Lawrence to Kansas City drive is only about 30 minutes, so that wasn't going to do it. One idea Pun City had thought of was heading out to Manhattan, Kansas, home of the Kansas State Wildcats. This blog had heard that Manhattan was in the middle of nowhere, but Pun City was a little dubious of this. When looking at a map, the drive appears to be mostly interstate, with a very short jog on a state highway. Pun City found out that you should believe the hype with that one. The drive on the interstate is long (expectedly), but the jog on the state highway is also extremely long. It felt like you drove to the middle of nowhere on the interstate, then they decided that you were a little too close to civilization, so you should drive for quite a bit more.

Pun City was pleasantly surprised to find that Manhattan has a huge mall though. This blog would have probably went in if it wasn't on a time crunch. As it was, this blog headed to Bramlage Coliseum, "The Octagon of Doom." As this blog parked its car, it noticed a few other cars in the lot. Plus, people walking toward the stadium. This blog soon came to realize that a high school girls' tournament was in progress at the arena. Shucks. The entry fee was $7.00. That was a little steep, since Pun City wasn't going to be watching any games, and pretty much just wanted to check out the building. Oh well, you win some, you lose some, Pun City figured.

This blog was walking to a sidewalk between Bramlage and KSU's football stadium, with the sole intent of taking a picture of the football stadium at this point. But then, this blog noticed a set of double doors on a lower level of the basketball stadium. Might as well check them. Sure enough, they were open. Entering the facility, Pun City saw the basketball offices to its left, and an elevator to its right. This blog hit the up button on the elevator, and walked in, as no attendant was in it. (Not that there would normally be one, there almost certainly wouldn't, but Pun City didn't know what to expect, never having been there before).

Floors 1 and 2 were the only options. As this blog was on 1, Pun City hit "2" to go up. The elevator went up and deposited this blog in a VIP room next to the concourse. No one was really in the VIP room yet, so Pun City just walked out into the concourse, and was able to walk around and get to the seating bowl to take a couple pictures. That worked out awesomely, free entry and no hassles. (Obviously grabbing rim was out of the question, but at this point Pun City was ecstatic with just being able to see the interior of the building without having to pay).

The drive back to Kansas City was next, to see the Big 12 Semifinals. This blog will pick it up with its next installment.

Big XII Tournament, Day 3

2010-03-13T22:31:00.005-06:00

Day 2 of games.

Pun City had tickets for the games already, so this was nice. There wasn't much time to spare between waking up and going to the games.

For the second day in a row, Pun City went to Waffle House. That place rocks. For Pun City's Wisconsin readers, it compares favorably to George Webb's. One might call it George Webb's with better deals and better chili. Also, Waffle House emphasizes hashbrowns as a key menu item. They're magnificent. Pun City went with plain hashbrowns once and hashbrowns covered in chili and cheese another time. Both were great. Their cheeseburgers were pretty good too, typical greasy spoon fare. Highly recommended.

Getting to the game site, Pun City had some time to go to the Ultimate Big 12 Fan Experience across the street from the Sprint Center. This is always something that Pun City hopes for: Free Stuff! As the Big 12 has a big, well-attended tournament, they have well-heeled sponsors giving away free stuff to promote their product. Among the sponsors were: Chick-Fil-A, United States Census 2010, DirecTV, Sunkist, and Phillips 66.

Awesome free stuff included: DirecTV "net head" hat for hitting a reasonable number of shots on their worse-than-carnival rigged hoops; Phillips 66 keychains (of the conference tournament logo and mini-flashlight variety); United States Census 2010 Cups, Piggy Banks, Pins, Pencils, Pens, and Crayons; Chick-Fil-A Pez Dispensors, cans of Sunkist Orange or Lemonade (diet available as well), and Chick-Fil-A free sandwich coupons (and free actual sandwich).

If a certain Ohio reader is interested in the free Chick-Fil-A sandwich coupon, Pun City can send that your way (this blog believes it expires 4/30/2010).

On the far side of the Big 12 Zone was the Kansas City Power and Light District, which was the unofficial party central (read: closest place to get alcohol). This part of the area was sponsored by Miller Lite and Boulevard Brewing Company. Among free stuff here were: Miller Lite Headbands, Wristbands, and t-shirts (alas, Pun City didn't catch any t-shirts); Boulevard headbands and foam fingers; and Sprint "rally towels." The rally towels were extremely weak. You had to give a name and e-mail address, and then you got a flimsy one-color towel that had no logos on it at all. Basically just a small towel of whatever color you wanted. Weak effort, Sprint.

Local radio stations were set up around there, Pun City got some cup for the Jennifer Aniston vehicle "W" there. Random yes, but hey, free cup.

Only the Nebraska-Texas A&M game was especially compelling, with the rule kicking in at the 2:02 mark. The other 3 games had at least 9:41 left on the clock when the game was effectively out of reach.

Like a pediatrician's waiting room, here are your Highlights:

Kansas's band played The Hey Song and Ghostbusters. KU recorded their 2,000th win in this game. That's a pretty cool milestone for this blog to have seen.

Texas Tech's band arrived late (presumably having been at the women's tournament 3 blocks up the road), and played Hey Baby and the Land of 1000 Dances.

Nebraska's band played Come Out and Play, Living on a Prayer, and Slow Ride.

Texas A&M's band played Respect, Hush Hush, the CBS College Basketball Theme, and Someday (by Rob Thomas). Don't quote Pun City on the Someday song, it might have been a different pop song that's out now.

Oklahoma State's band played Basket Case, Hold On (I'm Comin'), Call Me, and Rubberband Man.

Kansas State's band played Crazy Train, Proud Mary, and Hey Baby. KSU's dance team is known as the Classy Cats.

During halftime of the OSU-KSU game, the final of Sunkist's national Dickie V impersonation contest was held. 3 finalists got on the microphone and did their best Dick Vitale impression. Contestant #1 was pretty good but messed up in the last part of his delivery. Contestant #2 was alright, not as good as #1 though. Contestant #3 was great throughout, winning it in Pun City's eyes when he said "I tell you one thing Mista Nessler..." The crowd liked #3 best, but cheered for #1 as well. It seemed to most in attendance that #3 had the loudest cheers. They announced the winner, of course as....#1! Huh? A giant cascade of boos descended on to the court. #3 actually took it pretty well for losing out on $10,000 though, he really just waved his arms to encourage the booing after it had gone on for 10 to 15 seconds already.

Baylor's band played the CBS College Hoops Theme, Zoot Suit Riot, Crazy Train, The Final Countdown, and Workout.

Texas's band played William Tell and Hold On I'm Comin'.

An unusual feature of the Baylor-Texas game was that the ball repeatedly got stuck in the bottom of the net when it went through, prompting a need for a dude to climb up on a ladder and "fix" it at the half, mainly by stretching the bottom of the net horizontally to create a larger gap.

A very cool Day #2 of games, and Pun City headed to Denny's to eat something, as it had neglected to do this after Waffle House in the morning.

Big 12 Tournament Trip Day 2, Continued

2010-03-13T21:21:00.005-06:00

A little more time to post now that the tournament is over. Pun City will start back at day 2, which was really the first day of the games.

Arriving near the Sprint Center, Pun City was able to find a parking lot for $4.00 all day (near the corner of 9th and Holmes). Two minor problems that ultimately didn't dissuade this blog from parking there were: 1. It was a decent walk. Probably almost 2 miles. 2. Had to have exact change, since it was one of those money slot / no attendant lots. Fortunately, this blog had about $9.00 in quarters in the car, so the coin thing wasn't a problem. That was the first time Pun City had ever used such a machine for parking though. It worked fairly well, this blog would try it again.

After hiking to the Sprint Center, Pun City encountered the first scalpers of the day. They asked if this blog needed one, Pun City said yes, worst seat in the house. He showed Pun City a $32.50 ticket, and said $30 would work. Not wanting to miss out on the games, this blog just jumped on it, no questions asked. In hindsight this was probably stupid, and this blog would have had a decent chance to knock it down to $20, possibly even $10 if it was a little more patient. As a postscript, this blog gave him $40, and he only had one $5 and a lot of $20s, so he tried to give Pun City just the $5.00 and "call (the $5.00 he didn't want to give me) a tip." Pun City did say "Uh, no." and the dude got a $10 from his "supervisor."

One weird thing about scalpers is that they have supervisors on site. One wouldn't expect this, but it is definitely the norm. Pun City believes that the supervisors keep an eye on the general market (probably calling other supervisors in different areas around the arena) and pass down price adjustments to the subordinates.

Back to the day - Pun City had some time to kill, and also wanted to see about tickets to other games. This part of negotiations was much better than the inauspicious start this blog got off to. One guy (not a pro) had 2 tickets for the late games that night, Pun City offered $20.00 for one, and he said no since he wanted to keep the pair together. No problem, on to the next dude. This guy (again, not a pro) had a really good seat (like 2nd row, halfcourt) for the late games, and wanted $50.00 for it ($75 was face value). Pun City really just wanted to be in the building, so the quality of the seat was unimportant. This blog told him "It's a good deal, but (this blog doesn't) need that good of a seat." On to the next dude. A pro noticed that Pun City needed tickets to later sessions, and must have figured this blog wanted tickets to all sessions. This was accurate. He offered a full strip of lower level seats for $400.00.

This was a good deal, but there was negotiating to be done. Three things were working in Pun City's favor here: 1. Pun City didn't need lower-level seats. 2. Pun City didn't need tickets to the first session, as it already had those, and 3. It soon became evident that the all-session pass was a single ticket, which is tough to get rid of for a scalper.

Pun City said "(This blog)'ll give you $330 and you can keep Session 1." He said, "No way, you can get $200 for this one alone! (pointing to the semi-final that Kansas was presumed to play in to)". Pun City said "(This blog doesn't) need lowers, that doesn't make any difference for (Pun City). Plus (this blog doesn't) need one for Session 1." His response was to point out that Pun City could sell the Session 1 ticket. This blog replied, "No, (this blog doesn't) want to mess with that." Pun City began walking away, and he said "There's no way you're getting in there for $330." This blog replied, "Then go $350." He said something to the effect of "No, I can get almost all of that just with the semifinals." Pun City replied, "Kansas is going to lose and it'll be easy to get in to those semifinals." Dude must have been a Kansas fan, because he said, "No way! Who's going to beat them?" Pun City replied, "They're going to tank it so they can rest for the NCAAs." At this point, the supervisor must have heard enough, because he okayed the $350 price for sessions 2 through 6.

Not too shabby, $380 for all sessions. The cheapest tickets Pun City had seen for lower level seats online was about $600.00, so this worked. The cheapest tickets Pun City had seen for all sessions anywhere in the building were $420, so this was great.

Pun City was betting on the fact that they wouldn't actually sell that Session 1 ticket, so once this blog entered the building, it proceeded to the location of its Session 2-6 seats, and just stayed there. Sure enough, no one came to the seat, so Pun City got to sit in the lower deck for the whole tournament.

The first day's games weren't especially close, but it was good to see some new teams, bands, and fans.

Among the highlights:

Texas Tech's band played Take On Me, Sledgehammer, Land of 1000 Dances, Dirty Little Secret, Stacy's Mom, and Free Ride.

Colorado's band played Sell Out, Someday Love Will Find You, The Hey Song, Green Day's Holiday, Hey Pachucho, Crazy Train, Kashmir, and Soak Up The Sun.

Nebraska's band played That's The Way I Like It, Land of 1000 Dances, Any Way You Want It, Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire, Knock On Wood, and Heartbreaker.

Missouri's band played Eye of The Tiger (get it, since they're the Tigers!), Sweet Child of Mine, and Respect. Missouri's dance team is known as the Golden Girls.

Oklahoma State's band played Sell Out, Heartbreaker, The Hey Song, Rubberband Man (The Spinners version, not the T.I. version), and Call To Post.

Oklahoma's band played Hush Hush, a sweet re-arrangement of the Sportscenter theme, So Glad You Made It, The Hey Song, and Hold On Loosely. They also played Jim Ross's WWE entrance music a lot.

Iowa State's band played Hush Hush, Basket Case, Crazy Train, Sell Out, The Hey Song, Take On Me, and Kashmir. Also of note, Pun City saw Marquette transfer Scott Christopherson play in this game. Christopherson joins Ron Howard, Ryan Amoroso, and Karon Bradley as MU transfers that Pun City saw play at MU and in conference tournaments for their new teams.

Texas's band played Come Out And Play.

Up Next: Day 3.

Big XII Tournament Trip: Day 2

2010-03-11T00:21:00.003-06:00

Very eventful day today, probably way too much to cover in one post, definitely way too much to cover while just about falling asleep here.

High points:

- Pun City got tickets for the 2 sessions today, plus all the remaining sessions. This was below the StubHub prices Pun City had seen earlier in the year, so mission accomplished there.

- 4 relatively dud games today, the closest one was over with about 7:50 remaining.

- Ate breakfast at Waffle House, never having been before. Phenomenal!

- Tons of free stuff to be had at the Kansas City Power and Light District, and the adjacent Big 12 Zone (or something). Pun City will have some giveaways at its March Madness watch parties this year.

- Failed attempt at getting to Sonic Drive In tonight, reached it just after close.

Overall a great day, this blog feels fairly fresh for having seen 8+ hours of basketball, Pun City is going to get some rest though with another 4 games coming up tomorrow. Based on the first games, in tomorrow's Kansas - Texas Tech game, Pun City will be rooting for... a good game? Neither fan base was that impressive, plus Pun City only has NCAA shirts with Kansas logos on them, and nothing for Texas Tech (other than a newly acquired Big 12 shirt).

In game two, both Texas A&M and Nebraska would be cool to root for, not to mention Pun City's got apparel for both, but this blog will probably root for A&M.

Game 3 - Oklahoma State gets the nod over Kansas State.

Game 4 - Baylor gets the nod over Texas.

Hope to post tomorrow night! The night after the second 4-game day is always the most tiring though, so no guarantees.

Big 12 Tournament Trip: Day 1

2010-03-09T22:00:00.003-06:00

Good Evening. Pun City is reporting from its hotel in Kansas City tonight. It's been a long day, but a pretty good day.

This blog left Wisconsin at 8:00 AM, with plans to stop at 3 schools before winding up in Kansas City. In hindsight, leaving right as Milwaukee rush hour was in progress was not the brightest move in the world. Fortunately, after getting through that, Pun City didn't see any more traffic the rest of the day (a consequence of driving through western Wisconsin and Iowa, this blog thinks).

The first stop was the University of Northern Iowa, the newly crowned Missouri Valley Conference tournament champs. Visitor parking was relatively easy to find, and very cheap. 50 cents for an hour, that worked. T-shirts were on sale in the Union, so Pun City grabbed one for 10 bucks. The McLeod Center, UNI's basketball arena, is connected to their football stadium (and former basketball arena), the UNI-Dome. It was easily accessible, so Pun City walked in. This blog heard voices, but couldn't place them. Pun City was under the assumption that workers were in the tunnel under the bleachers. Oh well, this blog was able to walk on to the court and jump to grab rim, plus take a couple pictures. When leaving, this blog realized that the voices were actually coming from the catwalk above the arena, and the workers must have either not noticed or cared that this blog was on the court.

The hall that connects the two facilities has a Northern Iowa Hall of Fame and museum that is pretty cool. Pun City walked through that, then got to the dome, where it looked like a track practice was in progress. This blog was still able to get some pictures, so that worked out well.

This blog drove off to Ames, Iowa, to visit Iowa State University. Most of the drive thus far had been extremely foggy, and it probably got even worse this leg. It was bizarre in that you'd see nothing for 20 to 30 minutes, then all of a sudden a car silhouette about a quarter mile in front of you. A nice part about the drive was that Pun City had looked in to which call numbers would have sports radio along the route, so there was no need to constantly scan the dial. Made for a good amount less stress than some previous trips.

Arriving in Ames at about 2:45, and not having eaten lunch yet, Pun City made a beeline to a Wendy's. Good Double Stacks and fries, although the service was slow and they initially gave this blog Barq's instead of Pibb Xtra. Fortunately, they did correct the error. Pun City then went over to the ISU ticket office, on the off chance that they'd have some unused or returned tickets for tomorrow's Big 12 games. As expected, no dice on that. Because of a deluge, and a desire to get out of ISU fairly quickly, Pun City didn't make much of an effort to get in to their football stadium. This blog was right next to it though. On to Hilton Coliseum, their basketball arena.

The Coliseum was a somewhat tough nut to crack. First off, there was free parking near the arena, so that was appreciated. The difficulty was getting in to the building. Most arenas house the ticket office for the school, so one can just walk in to that part and proceed to the rest of the arena. No such luck here. As an extra hassle, there were workers setting up fencing around the perimeter of the arena. This blog isn't sure what the goal was with this fencing. It's possible they have an event there soon that they wanted to funnel foot traffic for, but it was too early in the setup process for this blog to make an educated guess.

After several tries, Pun City finally came across an entrance that was open. It seemed like some administrative offices are housed in the Coliseum, and the door near these offices stays open. This is good, but if one of the workers thought you looked out of place, you could get booted pretty quickly. Pun City kind of slinked past the windowed offices and went immediately to stairs that were marked with directions to "Main Concourse" and "Floor Level." First, this blog checked out the concourse. This was cool. The concourse was empty, so Pun City had free reign on it.

Looking in the seating bowl, this blog noticed the basketball floor was gone, and a bare concrete floor with large curtains hanging seemed to indicate a performance of some type was scheduled. There was a group of people on the floor talking, they were bunched up and all wearing street clothes. Pun City's best guess is that they were a stage crew working on preparing the arena for an event. That said, this blog has no idea. In any case, Pun City didn't want to get thrown out and intentionally avoided them.

Next up, it was time to try and get to floor level. Not wanting to be seen by the office workers, Pun City walked to the far side of the arena, then went down to floor level. Two problems became clear: 1. The basketball hoops weren't in storage on this side of the arena, and 2. The stage crew people were milling around on this side of the arena.

Unfortunately, there is no "floor concourse" that would allow one to walk around the outside of the floor level without being seen. This blog didn't want to be seen by the stage crew, so walking across the floor was out of the question. The best option was to go back the way Pun City came from, then navigate the main concourse to the office worker stairwell, then descend right next to the hoops. At this point, it seemed like the crew would be much more likely to notice this blog than the office personnel.

The assumption proved correct, and this blog was able to descend unnoticed (or at least un-yelled-at) near the hoops. As this blog got to floor level, it noticed that a maintenance worker was waiting for the elevator right along the route this blog needed to take. After quickly considering the situation, Pun City decided to just proceed as if it belonged here, and wave hello to the maintenance guy. A main factor in this decision was that this blog wasn't dressed too much differently than the stage crew group, and also that the maintenance guy wasn't security, so he probably wouldn't care. As this blog walked past, waved, and said "Hi" to the maintenance worker, he said "Yello" back to me. Worked out pretty perfectly. As such, Pun City accessed the hoop storage room, and grabbed collapsed rim. Very cool stuff.

To "cap off" the Ames stop, Pun City bought an ISU cap. That should come in handy tomorrow if this blog is able to get into the second session of games. (Iowa State plays Texas around 8:30, still no tickets for this blog).

A final stop was Drake University. This one worked out pretty well. First off, the bookstore had wristbands in the right size, so this blog picked up a pair. Secondly, the basketball arena (The Knapp Center) was accessible through the student rec center, and Pun City was allowed in as a visitor. Unfortunately, a women's team practice was in process, so this blog wasn't able to attempt a rim grab, but it was a great facility to see up close.

This is a fairly nice hotel, so Pun City expects to be able to update more in the next few days. Stay tuned to find out if any tickets can be had for tomorrow's two sessions. This blog sure hopes so, seeing as probable NCAA tourney teams Missouri, Oklahoma State, and Texas take the floor.

Lazarus

2010-03-05T23:20:00.003-06:00

Pun City is back from the dead. Chances are, not too long, and also not too prolific, but this blog is going on another trip, so Pun City may as well spread the word.

Among the high points of the trip:

Leaving Wisconsin on Tuesday, toward Kansas City. Stops along the way at Northern Iowa, Iowa State, and Drake. Destination Kansas City for the Big XII tournament. Number of tickets in hand? Zero! We'll try the scalping option. In this economy, Pun City thinks it can do alright. StubHub seems to have the cheapest option for all games at $415, and Pun City is convinced the street can do better than that. Should be interesting to find out anyway.

This blog is staying at another budget hotel. Will it be good, bad, or otherwise? Conference Tournament hotels have run the gamut in the past. Could be an interesting plot line.

Lots of good potential side trips, not as much non-game time to do these in. Options include: visiting Kansas State, Kansas University, UMKC, the Negro Leagues Museum, Arrowhead Stadium, some good mall options, and Arthur Bryant's, apparently one of the best rib places in the world. How many of these can Pun City take in?

Definite side trip to Kauffman Stadium. That should be great. As far as Pun City knows, it's going on a virtually private tour. Then again, this information is as of about a month ago, so it's easily possible that time slot filled up.

A new good camera. That will be nice. Not having to turn the thing off every 5 seconds of picture taking will be a bonus. This blog might actually get a few good photos to post as a result.

Sonic Drive-In. Iowa, Kansas, and Missouri are absolutely in Sonic territory, so this blog is looking forward to hitting Sonic for a couple meals at least. So awesome. Hopefully some other nice fast food options are around too.

Nightmarish Kansas City parking. Pun City has heard word of a lousy downtown parking situation in K.C. Hopefully there will be some nice options (or at least nice stories to relay) regarding the parking scene.

All this, not to mention a conference with about 7 solid NCAA tournament teams duking it out. Pun City thinks this will be an interesting trip. Go Milwaukee Panthers tomorrow, hopefully they can knock Butler out and get the Horizon League two teams in the tournament.

Very Quick Trip Recap

2009-03-16T22:02:00.003-05:00

Pun City took a trip last week. Saw the entire MAC Tournament and the NEC final. Some random thoughts:

1. How has the MAC fallen so badly? Akron won the tournament but looked thoroughly unimpressive. Pun City predicts a blowout first round loss for them in the NCAAs. Beyond this, UA beat up on Buffalo, the favorite in their title game. This blog remembers when the MAC was a force to be reckoned with, but they have some major strides to make before those days will return.

2. The NEC was a breath of fresh air before the slog that was the MAC semifinals and final. Robert Morris is a fairly small campus that was mostly closed down at 6:00 on a Wednesday. (Pun City assumes they had Spring break in process). In spite of this, their fans (and those of Mount St. Mary's, who made the approximately 4 hour trip) packed the Charles Sewall Center. Despite a high schoolesque arena, scoreboard, concession prices, and offensive output, the game and atmosphere were fantastic. This blog wishes it could see that type of a game all the time.

3. Thumbs up to the season ticket holders that this blog was sitting next to at RMU. They were really cool and welcoming of a visiting Brewers fan. This blog will try and heed their recommendation of visiting PNC Park in Pittsburgh in the near future.

4. Huge thumbs up to the RMU ticket office. Pun City wound up with a 2nd row, chairback seat. Maybe 1/8th of the actual seating structures actually had backs, and this one was the same price as a bleacher. Not to mention that sitting second row was a major bonus for an out of towner that was expecting bleachers at best, standing room only at worst. Pun City probably couldn't have chosen a better seat in an empty arena.

5. Thumbs down to MAC fans in general. Other than the overtime Akron-Toledo game (where Pun City was behind the Toledo bench amongst some UT managers), no one really got into the games other than to be obnoxious (Pun City is talking about you, Akron fans). One Bowling Green fan was halfway friendly to this blog, but for the most part, a lackluster tournament was not improved with lackluster fans.

6. Thumbs down to the economy. This blog got one free shirt and a couple free pens and pencils at the MAC, which was where it was thinking most of the freebies would be purveyed. The NEC chipped in with free towels, but Pun City believes that a more sound economy would have led to greater amounts of branded freebies from a higher number of corporate sponsors.

7. Pun City probably needs to think through its next trip's itinerary more than it did here. Aside from one day with only 2.5 hours of driving, this blog drove at least 5 hours each day. Needless to say, that got old. On a positive note, only one hotel night did keep expenses way down, so this goal was accomplished. Alternately, this blog had very gracious hosts, and Pun City can't thank them enough. If somehow Pun City has the option of cool hosts and maybe about 2 hours driving each day next time, that would be awesome.

8. Thumbs up to the Quicken Loans Arena and surrounding area. Quaker Steak & Lube was a sweet option to have in the arena, and a good "value" for ballpark food on their hotwings. Tower City Mall is an okay mall, but its location upgrades it to good. Being able to access a food court in between sessions was a plus, and kept this blog's food intake more varied than usual. (Well, than usual for trips).

9. Rockne's in Kent, Ohio was a decent spot to stop and eat while watching the Marquette-St. John's game. Service wasn't fantastic, but the huge burger was great, and the large number of televisions tuned to sports was cool. Kent State's campus hid their basketball arena, but their football stadium was good to visit.

10. Congratulations to Western Kentucky and North Dakota State for winning automatic bids to the NCAA tournament. For varying reasons, Pun City is a fan of each of these programs. Good work Saul and Big Red.

Horizon League First Round Note

2009-03-07T20:04:00.004-06:00

This blog hasn't posted in an absurdly long time, but Pun City was inspired, so here we go:

Pun City was on the scene when Milwaukee hosted a first round Horizon League tournament game versus Loyola-Chicago last Wednesday. It was pretty cool. The differences from the normal floor alignment were as follows:

1. Speedway replaced Adidas as the basket support sponsor.

2. Speedway signs adorned the 4 tunnels near media row.

3. Speedway decals were opposite the US Cellular Arena logos on the court.

4. UWM's band was shifted from directly behind the hoop to the far (non-bench/Panther tunnel) side of the student section.

5. Loyola's band, cheerleaders, and dance team were present. They were stationed behind the Loyola bench, but very close to the UWM student section.

It was great to see the Panthers play well one last time at home. It's now appearing unlikely that they'll play again. However, there are 4 postseason tournaments this year, so it's not unreasonable that they'd be able to get a bid in one of the NIT, CBI, or CollegeInsider.com tournaments.

Pun City is cautiously hopeful that UWM would get in to the CIT, because UWM is ranked 128th in RPI now, and theoretically the top 129 teams would qualify for the postseason. A major problem with this theory is that sub-129 teams are going to make the NCAA tournament, and probably the NIT, due to automatic qualifying. Oh well, gotta dare to dream.

Some songs played by each of the bands on Wednesday:

UWM - The Hey Song, If You Be My Bodyguard, Born To Be Wild, Roll Out The Barrel, La Bamba, and Jump (Van Halen).

Loyola - Let's See How Far We've Come (Matchbox 20), We've Got The Funk, Stacy's Mom, Holiday (Green Day), Jump On It, Angel Is The Centerfold, Ironman, and Hot Hot Hot.

It was a good effort by the Rambler band. Pun City is very hopeful for some more posts the next coupla weeks. Heading to MAC-land and hopefully NEC-land as well. Later.

Brewers to the 2034 Series!

2008-10-05T22:48:00.003-05:00

Thanks Brewers. That was awesome. Pun City was at the Brewer game on Saturday, and it was the most fun this blog has ever had at a baseball game. Such a positive atmosphere, so many fans that had suffered through the losing seasons, but not in Cubs-fan fashion where you can't walk three blocks without hearing how miserable it is having to deal with about 6 postseason appearances in the last 26 years. No, fans that had suffered through 0 postseason appearances in the same time span, but national media really only stumbled on that in the last week here. Whoa, the Brewers haven't made the playoffs in 26 years? Wow, huh.

So yeah, it was great to be at the party that was Miller Park on Saturday, and even though they couldn't pull it out today, it was an amazing run, and now there is sure to be clearance Wild Card gear around since retailers overstocked. Another 26 years before the next postseason appearance would be fine with this blog. It was a sweet run.

Favre Be It For Pun City To Comment

2008-07-14T17:55:00.000-05:00

As you may know, there's a certain retired Green Bay Packer that has been in the news a lot lately. The rest of the nation seems to care more about the Brett Favre saga than Wisconsin does, so for the rest of the nation's benefit, here's what your Average Wisconsin Joe is thinking.

Q: What do you think of this whole Brett Favre situation?

A: Messy, a tough situation for both sides. Both could have probably handled it better but at this point we mainly just want a resolution (as long as Favre doesn't end up with the Bears or Vikings).

Q: Do you want Brett Favre to comeback?

A: Yes, in general this isn't a problem. If it means coming back in division, that's not cool, but it seems like the Packers won't let that happen anyway (as they shouldn't).

Q: If Favre comes back to the Packers, would you welcome him?

A: Definitely.

Q: If Favre comes back to the Packers, should he start or should Aaron Rodgers?

A: Wisconsin doesn't care. Whoever gets the job done. While it would be weird to see Favre holding a clipboard, this is much better than seeing Favre on another team.

Q: If Favre played against the Packers, who would you root for?

A: Oof, rough. Both, as much as possible. Slight edge to the Packers if it's close in the end.

Q: What are you going to do with all the Favre retirement commemorative stuff they came out with?

A: From that perspective, Wisconsin is hoping Favre stays retired. It'd be somewhat reminiscent of all of the "County Stadium 1953-1999" memorabilia that came out, only to see County Stadium forced into service for 2000 as well. If Favre plays again, the large amount of memorabilia would be weird, and too overproduced to have any great value.

Q: Given the acrimony between Favre and Packer management, will Favre go into the Hall of Fame as a Falcon or a Raven?

A: That's not funny.

What is funny is this pun: The model said the internet gave her a lot of exposure.

No ESPNZone and No ESPN Make Pun City Go Crazy

2008-07-06T20:49:00.002-05:00

Continuing the Pun City trip, and in doing so, continuing March 12th. This blog had tickets to 4 women's games for the rest of the day, but hadn't been to Las Vegas before, so this blog wanted to check in to its hotel and check out the city for the evening.

Getting to the hotel was a little challenging. Mapquest routed this blog uniquely, to say the least. This blog ended up out in the middle of nowhere, passing an enormous junkyard until eventually getting some good directions from a gas station.

Pun City checked in fairly uneventfully, then headed back to the strip to check out some casinos. This blog had heard that the best sports book was at the Bellagio, and Pun City also wanted to check out the ESPNZone at New York, New York.

The Bellagio was alright, except this blog didn't get chips or tickets for cheap slots so it had to pay for drinks. If this blog had it to do over again, it'd put in some money for chips, then gamble just enough to be able to drink for free. Upon realizing the drinks weren't going to be free and the seats weren't completely comfortable at the Bellagio, this blog thought it'd be better to check out the ESPNZone and maybe get some dinner.

Unfortunately, the ESPNZone was closed for a private party. This was excruciating. Not only was this blog relegated to the lobby to watch Marquette's opening round Big East Tournament game, but there would be no food while watching. Fortunately Marquette won, so this blog decided to head back to the Thomas & Mack Center to watch the remaining women's games (and eat).

There was a definite advantage to coming back for these. First off, there was a new crew working the State Farm stand, so this blog got another wristband and a different pair of flip flops. Also, this blog got to see 4 more teams' bands perform, plus the game action was pretty good too.

The games didn't end until about 1:00 AM though, so this blog was a little out of it. Pun City got back to the hotel and wanted to find out the scores from other conference tournament games. This blog flipped on the TV and searched for sports. The first channel it found was Fox Sports Net, but it had something like "Best Damn Interview Blowups" or something like that, no highlights.

No worries, just switch to ESPN. Wait, where's ESPN? Everyone in the world has ESPN, why isn't it on the directory? How is there no ESPN!? Pun City logs on to their free WiFi, they say they have ESPN, but their site hasn't been updated since last year. Complaining to the front desk's late crew (so you know they're the best crew) revealed they did not have ESPN and hadn't for several months. Per the dude, it was a corporate decision. This blog highly doubts that Days Inn decided on a national level to exclude ESPN. But be forewarned, the North Las Vegas Days Inn doesn't have ESPN. This proved somewhat frustrating when trying to find scores at night, this blog had to rely on the internet or the very few times it would be able to track down The Final Report at night.

Very frustrating to say the least. On a positive note though, the place was easily within walking distance of a Jack-In-The-Box, and the route to the arena had several more Jack-In-The-Boxes plus a couple Del Tacos. Additionally, the room was pretty good with the exception of the TV.

Pun City always took for granted that hotels have ESPN. Let this blog tell you, it really hurts to miss ESPN when on vacation. A station that you can count on to display scores at all hours of the night is a good way to get a connection back home. When on the road, a lot of times the only "local news" you can get from the home front would be the home teams' scores. Since Fox Sports doesn't currently have a permanent "bottom line" similar to ESPN, count this blog as one of what should be many advocates for either ESPN in all hotel rooms, or Fox Sports Net coming up with a permanent score updating somewhere on screen. Let's make it happen!

Lockwoodn't You Know: Pun City Interviews An Up-And-Coming Director

2008-06-22T12:24:00.005-05:00

With Summer blockbuster season upon us, Pun City decided it'd be cool to post an interview with one of this summer's up-and-coming directors. You may remember Kyle Lockwood from such English projects as "Wild Wild Midwest" and... well, probably just that, if that. For those of you that weren't watching, this is the story of Jack Daniels fighting vampire desperados. But Kyle's back at it again later this summer (probably) with "Wild Wild Midwest II: The Legend Continues."

Pun City: How's production of Wild Wild Midwest II: The Legend Continues going?

Kyle Lockwood: Almost done with the script.

Pun City: Cool, cool.

Kyle Lockwood: I should be done with that by this weekend. Then I got to build one of the sets and get everyone's costumes together.

Pun City: Sounds ambitious, but cool. Is the vampire still in?

Kyle Lockwood: Vampire/demon...I don't think it matters what it is called.

Pun City: As long as it's nocturnal.

Kyle Lockwood: No.

Pun City: Hahahahaha.

Kyle Lockwood: I refuse to shoot at night, way too much work.

Pun City: So, the characters are just going to talk about what happened at night the next day?

Kyle Lockwood: Nothing is going to happen at night, everyone goes to sleep at sundown.

Pun City: But the nocturnal demon is going to be up though, he seems like he's pretty important.

Kyle Lockwood: Black vampires are allergic to the moon.

Pun City: Hahahaha, how are any of them around anymore then?

Kyle Lockwood: They hide from the moon.

Pun City: But the moon's out like 75% of the time, and they only go out at night, so they're extremely limited it would seem.

Kyle Lockwood: No, black vampires are dayturnal! They only come out when the moon isn't (out).

Pun City: Hmm, well then all of the main characters would be able to really attack him at night.

Kyle Lockwood: Well... they would have to find out where he sleeps.

Pun City: So the movie's going to focus on their quest to find where he sleeps, that's cool.

Kyle Lockwood: No, you're being difficult.

Pun City: This blog isn't sure it follows.

Kyle Lockwood: The movie is Jack Daniels versus evil demon trying to destroy the world (only during the daytime).

Pun City: That seems like a pretty poor idea, this blog means, if someone's trying to destroy the world, wouldn't they take advantage of the night also?

Kyle Lockwood: The demon isn't very smart....the ritual can only be performed at noon.

Pun City: Oh man, are you going to have the demon take an intelligence test to establish he isn't too bright?

Kyle Lockwood: Look...the time of day is irrelevant to the story.

Pun City: Oh, so you'll just film it some during the day, some at night then.

Kyle Lockwood: No... I'm going to film it when it is convenient for me and the cast to film. As long as there is enough natural light to see everything. If it would make you happy I can simulate the passage of time between one day and the next.

Pun City: So like, night vision cameras?

Kyle Lockwood: Night vision is kind of lame I think.

Pun City: This blog doesn't know, Pun City means, this blog saw this one video...

Kyle Lockwood: The whole movie takes place over the course of two days, so I will have a time lapse shot of the passage of time from one day to the next.....so you can be happy.

Pun City: Hmm. Can you get Night Ranger to perform in the soundtrack?

Kyle Lockwood: Who is that?

Pun City: It's an '80s band, they sing "Motorin'"

Kyle Lockwood: Never heard of it. The sound track is pretty much the last thing.

Pun City: Are you going to include songs that were performed at night?

Kyle Lockwood: Nope.

Pun City: Man, you're just trying to silence night.

Kyle Lockwood: I think the intro to the movie is going to be a Pink Floyd song.

Pun City: This blog thinks Pink Floyd generally performed at night.

Kyle Lockwood: Doesn't matter when they performed...

Pun City: Well you just said you weren't going to include songs that were performed at night.

Kyle Lockwood: I'm the director, and I can do what I want.

Pun City: Well of course, but it's just kind of confusing with the switching of opinions there.

Kyle Lockwood: Doesn't matter if you're confused...

Pun City: This blog doesn't follow.

Kyle Lockwood: Good.

Pun City: Cool, now everyone's happy!

Kyle Lockwood: Good deal.

There you have it folks. "Wild, Wild Midwest II: The Legend Continues" will probably be out on YouTube some time later this summer. Pun City will be sure to keep you posted on any developments.

Pun City Cruises Death Valley and the Prize Table

2008-06-12T17:49:00.007-05:00

March 12th, 6th day of the trip. This blog is omitting March 11th, since it can be summed up in the following paragraph.

Drove to Los Angeles, met Pun City's friend Josh for lunch, drove to Pepperdine's graduate campus and Long Beach State's campus, got average to below average Mexican food for dinner w/ Josh, crushed Josh in tennis, then crashed at Josh's anticipating a very early morning.

Ahhh...back to March 12th. The Los Angeles to Las Vegas drive got off to a rocky start when this blog couldn't follow Mapquest's directions via nowhere, but a gas station clerk pointed Pun City in the right direction.

Driving through Death Valley is a little weird. It's not as unpopulated as this blog was led to believe. This blog is convinced that there aren't any points through the whole span where it would be tough to walk to the next exit for gas. Also, there are a number of "mini towns" spread through the whole stretch that make it pretty normal. Plus there's this (relatively) large town called Barstow that is the centerpiece of the drive.

The traffic problems led to this blog getting to Las Vegas a little late. The opening Men's 8-9 game between Wyoming and Colorado State was almost to halftime. Approaching Las Vegas was pretty cool, a lot of huge skyscraping hotels coming out of a flat desert area.

Within Vegas, this blog found it somewhat tough to navigate the Strip at anything over a snail's pace, but this was to be expected. The Mountain West or the Thomas & Mack Center had a few good ideas this blog is going to cover now, but keep in mind that these applied throughout the stay in Vegas, for future blog reference.

One cool idea was general admission tickets for everyone for sessions that were not expected to be well-attended. This included all women's games except for the championship, and the men's 8-9 game. So, for the 8-9 game, Pun City was in the front row (behind the hoop), which was a nice spot.

Another idea that worked out cool for Pun City was the tickets you got when you paid for parking. On this day, this blog got a red ticket to throw in the dash. The parking voucher was good all day, so you can come and go as you please, as long as you have a red ticket. Keep that in mind for the next post.

Colorado State, winless in the regular season, broke out some new shoes for the tournament and won over Wyoming in an upset.

Colorado State's new shoes did the trick.

This leads to the final cool idea from the Mountain West. They made All-Session pass buyers get seats for the women's games along with the men's tickets, so Pun City had tickets to 4 women's games if it wanted to go to those for the rest of the day. As it turned out, this blog only wanted to go to about 1 and a half, but it was a cheap option for killing time around Las Vegas.

The first move this blog made after the Men's game was to the State Farm Insurance table, where they had a spin-to-always-win table giving out branded merchandise. Pun City was going to do that, but first tried the Pop-A-Shot rig they had set up. The record was 42, and this blog was a little concerned it would fall well short. The woman working the stand taunted Pun City by saying a girl had set the record and that this blog wasn't going to beat it. But, this blog got 50, and for setting the record, they let me choose any of the available prizes, and this blog ended up with a wristband and a water bottle. Then Pun City spun the wheel and got some free flip-flops.

Given that this post is getting pretty long, Pun City is going to hold it right here. Next post should have updates on checking into a hotel (that was missing a little something), going to the casinos, and fast food dining.

USD Knows How To Party

2008-06-04T21:33:00.004-05:00

March 10th, 4th day of the trip. After a long night with double overtime on the 9th, it was good to sleep in. And for this blog's money, there's not too much better than spending a Monday in a warm weather town knowing that you'll be watching basketball all week instead of work.

Going to San Diego State University was cool, even though Pun City was denied in its request to check out the basketball court. The reasons for SDSU's awesomeness were multifold. First, it was a big campus, reminiscent of UW-Madison. Second, Pun City found a Jack-In-The-Box right next to campus. Third, SDSU has an awesome student union, including free pool, bowling, and ping pong. And lastly, because Pun City found ten bucks on the ground there.

Jack-In-The-Box was good, this blog tried out this new kind of self-service touch screen ordering system, that was kinda cool. (It also helped avoid a very probable language barrier, which was key).

Pun City then stopped at Enterprise to tell them this blog's Check Engine light had been on for 2 days, (they weren't concerned and attributed it to a gas cap being loose 2 days ago). Enterprise didn't have any cars available, they offered a minivan but Pun City was all too glad to keep the mid-size car at that point (especially with the upcoming drives to LA and Vegas).

The main event was going to happen this evening. Homestanding San Diego versus top-seeded, perennial champ Gonzaga. The two largest fan bases in the tournament. Cool in that this blog would see a pretty charged-up environment, as well as a sellout. Not as cool in that this blog was not going to be able to get any good seats. There was also a concern that USD fans wouldn't like seeing a dude with a Gonzaga hat there, and Pun City had no USD gear. (And furthermore, USD's bookstore was pretty weak. Pun City really tried to get some USD gear, but it was all pretty lame, and they were out of the slightly less lame items in this blog's size).

Gonzaga was used to the national spotlight, and when ESPN announcer Stephen Bardo entered through the tunnel, the Kennel chanted "Bardo, Bardo, Bardo...." Additionally, former GU star (and current LA Laker) Ronny Turiaf was in attendance, garnering similar "Ronny, Ronny, Ronny..." chants.

The game was very cool, with the Toreros grinding out the victory after going ahead by 8 with 7:04 remaining. The coolest part was the song the arena PA blasted after USD's win. Not "We Are The Champions," not "Praise You," by Fat Boy Slim, not even "One Shining Moment." The PA blasted, appropriately, "California Knows How To Party."

As Pun City was leaving the arena, it was walking next to a USD student who was calling an out-of-town buddy on the phone. His comments and level of excitement reminded this blog of the day Wisconsin qualified for the 2000 Final Four. Here's his statement as well as this blog can recall: "We Beat Gonzaga!"....."Yeah, we're going to the tournament now!" "Yeah, that's the big one, March Madness!" "It's gonna be a long night tonight, but it's so awesome, I can't believe we beat Gonzaga!"

Well put.

Rough, Perhaps Not as Rough as the Wonder Boys Though

2008-05-26T22:05:00.005-05:00

Xtreme Negligence again. Congratulations to frequent commenter Moike on his marriage. Really no time for a full-fledged blog today, but a good quote from an article this blog found:

"The wild game featured five technical fouls – four by ATU and one by UMKC. The Wonder Boys’ head coach Mark Downey was ejected in the first half and was given a third technical (during UMKC’s 20-0 run) for sneaking back into the arena."

Courtesy of umkckangaroos.com. Full article here.

Also, after some research, Pun City discovered that most games played at Madison Square Garden do not have online "Play-By-Play" accounts. A spokesman from St. John's University's athletic department claimed this was for two reasons.

One was that all workers at MSG must be from the labor union. This means that all host schools and conferences must use an MSG worker for the official scoring. The spokesman also claimed that the machine used to tabulate statistics at MSG was not programmed to produce a play-by-play account of the game, and that no such account exists.

This was proven incorrect when Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Todd Rosiak was able to provide this blog with a faxed copy of the play-by-play from Marquette's game vs. St. John's at MSG.

Pun City's interpretation is that MSG does have a system programmed to allow for a print version of the Play-By-Play, but this format does not easily convert to HTML.

Hopefully a full-fledged post or two coming up soon. Later dudes and dudettes.

Double Overtime Trumps A Potential Danceoff

2008-05-11T20:40:00.000-05:00

Pun City again apologizes for the extreme negligence. Back to the Conference Tournament trip. March 9th, the 3rd day of the trip.

This was a Sunday, and Pun City's host was free as well. She graciously offered to show this blog a "local beach" since she was heading there for a swim anyway. Seal Beach is a pretty good spot, this blog enjoyed the laziness the seals exhibited. Since the water was about 60 degrees and Pun City didn't have a wet suit (unlike its host), this blog chose to forego the Pacific, at least for more than a couple seconds.

After the beach, Pun City headed to Torrey Pines, a nearby golf course and home to the 2008 US Open. That was a pretty cool spot, the gift shop worker encouraged this blog to grab a couple free scorecards and golf pencils. On the way between the golf course and USD for the semifinal games, Pun City spotted an In-N-Out Burger. That's always a fantastic sight.

Free bumper stickers, location guide, and some very affordable burgers and fries were pretty sweet. Pun City hadn't gotten to an In-N-Out in a while, so this was a nice stop. It was also nice to be eating outdoors on March 9th.

At USD, the fans were primed for two semifinal matchups with the top 4 seeds. Gonzaga was taking on 4th-seeded Santa Clara, followed by #2 Saint Mary's vs. #3 San Diego. Gonzaga's huge crowd took to chanting "Where are your fans?" (Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap). The Geico Gecko was back with thunder sticks, however after handing them all out, the Geico crew found out they don't allow noisemakers in the Jenny Craig Pavilion. Whoops.

Despite shooting poorly, Gonzaga pulled out the victory, 52-48. San Diego's crowd was rowdy, and watching their team take their home floor in road jerseys since they were the lower seed. Saint Mary's was in control, leading by 15 with 14:59 remaining in regulation. The Gaels frittered away the lead, though, and USD forced overtime.

The overtime wasn't enough to settle it, so double OT commenced. By this time, Pun City was situated near the Torero dance team, who suggested that the game be settled by a "dance off." The amusing suggestion was not taken. However, the Toreros did close out the game in double overtime, leading by 7 with 1:45 left in the 2nd extra frame.

By this time, the arena was about half full, both teams were exhausted, and it was 2:00 AM Central, so Pun City was dragging. But a very cool final, Gonzaga vs. San Diego, would be taking place tomorrow night. This would be the most well-attended game of the tournament, given the huge fan bases involved with each of the finalists.

Pun City was looking forward to enjoying the title game the next day, and also looking forward to only having one game.

Eddie Sutton Ushered Out Like a USD Fan In the Pepperdine Section!

2008-04-30T22:09:00.000-05:00

Holler. To explain the header, unceremoniously (and see below). Day two of the trip, March 8th. Feeling a little more settled, this blog was looking forward to visiting Petco Park, home of the Padres, for a ballpark tour. Pun City headed to the ballpark district for lunch before the big tour.

This blog got tickets first, which ended up being unnecessary since there were only about 10 visitors on the tour. Once this blog had ticket in hand, this blog headed toward where it thought it had seen some restaurants. As it turned out, there weren't a ton of restaurants around. No worries though, it only takes one cool restaurant to be a success.

Basic Pizza was that cool restaurant. It is certainly the most minimalist restaurant this blog has ever visited. A concrete floor, a couple tables rising from the concrete, a concrete bar also coming up from the floor, 2 TVs and a stereo. Pretty badass. Also, a one-page menu where you choose a sauce (3 varieties), then toppings. No dollar signs on the menu and the largest decimal was "1.5" for a couple toppings. Very good pizza though, this blog polished off a cheese and sausage on red sauce. Got a chance to watch a couple games and the bartender was really cool and spinning some good music (Killers, Oasis, among others).

Sauntered over to Petco on a full stomach. Really awesome tour, had a very good host and got to see a lot of good behind-the-scenes areas. Among the good spots: the dugouts, a suite, the suiteholder's private restaurant, and the historic building that serves as the left field foul pole.

The tour concluded at the gift shop, and this blog decided it would pick up some postcards, only to discover.... no credit card. This blog wasn't overly concerned, but this is annoying. Pun City walked back to the start of the tour and the guide was kind enough to walk this blog back to all the tour stops in search of the missing card. The search proved fruitless, but in the midst of the walkthrough, it dawned on Pun City that it was possible Basic Pizza had the card since this blog isn't the most experienced when it comes to using those bill/card holders.

After getting back to Basic, Pun City found that the bartender had the card waiting and had tried to return it to this blog, only to discover Pun City was gone.

In any case, it was good not having to hassle with cancelling a card.

In a spur-of-the-moment decision, Pun City decided to run to San Diego State and try to check out the campus and arena. As it turned out, this wasn't a smooth move, and SDSU had a women's basketball game ending just as this blog arrived. The ushers were in no mood to let this blog see the floor, so Pun City resolved to come back on Monday.

The night's games were Santa Clara vs. San Francisco and host San Diego vs. Pepperdine. Santa Clara's student section was pretty large, so this blog had to move a little further out than it had been the night before.

Santa Clara won a barnburner, 51-50 on 2 free throws with 3 seconds remaining. This ended the coaching career of San Francisco's Eddie Sutton. No real fanfare about it, Pun City is glad it was there though, not too many others were either.

Above: USF Head Coach Eddie Sutton coaches his last game.

The Pepperdine-San Diego game had a pretty humorous scenario occur. Pun City was sitting near Pepperdine's section but not in it. This is an important distinction, because the extremely overzealous usher there would definitely not let anyone in that section without a ticket. Much to the usher's chagrin, somehow the 2 most obnoxious San Diego fans got tickets in this section.

Much hilarity ensued. Most of it centered on the two rowdies screaming at Pepperdine and their fans the entire game, Pepperdine's fans complaining and asking to have the guys' tickets checked, and the usher powerless to do anything since they were sitting (well, standing) in the right seats. All this while the usher was checking tickets for everyone that sat in the section, promptly booting about 90% of all comers. It was pretty comical, the rest of the arena had fairly even distribution of fans and there was this giant void in the Pepperdine section except for a cluster of Waves fans getting berated by the 2 most extreme Torero fans you could imagine.

San Diego rolled, the best sign in the crowd was one exclaiming "Mali-Booo!"

Pun City Ventures to The Whale's Vagina

2008-04-20T09:46:00.005-05:00

It's been a while here, so this blog figures it's time to share the trip experiences it had. As you may know, the plan was to head to the WCC tournament in San Diego, head up to Los Angeles for a day, then out to Las Vegas for the Mountain West Conference tourney.

March 7th was the first day of the trip. Here is its story.

Flew out at 6:10 AM Central, which was rough. Luckily for Pun City, Inspirational Website was gracious enough to give this blog a ride to the airport really freakin early. This blog was flying to Denver, then connecting to San Diego. Flights were pretty uneventful, which was good. Frontier Airlines came through in this case, which is weird considering they're about to file for bankruptcy.

This blog got to San Diego fairly early (about 10:00 AM), then got a rental car. Luckily they were out of economy cars at Enterprise, so this blog got upgraded to a Mazda 3 for free. This blog then went to see where it would be staying, which was very centrally located in the downtown area.

This blog then checked out the University of San Diego campus, figuring it would get the lay of the land before the night's games. This blog walked forever around campus, primarily looking for a bookstore that Pun City now believes was a misprint on the campus map. That wasn't the worst thing in the world, and this blog did get a bunch of exercise. Among the highlights was discovering that there is a common area where they have free newspapers. Pun City grabbed a USA Today and read it in the Mazda 3.

After casing the very hilly campus, this blog went back to where it was going to stay (a friend of Inspirational Website's condo). The host for the evening had yet to arrive, so this blog decided to walk around and try and find a restaurant. The initial goals were 1. A spot with affordably priced food and/or beverage; 2. Ideally a place to watch the game; and 3. A spot hopefully nearby.

A large amount of walking soon added another goal: somewhere to sit down. Pun City soon realized that there were not really any eating establishments within walking distance of the condo. Some Italian place that looked expensive, and a "deli" (glorified convenience store) with some lawn furniture set up on the street. This blog tried to find something else, it really did, but the "deli" won out. In the end, its proximity to the condo, seating, and available beverages ended up being the deciding factors.

Pun City sat for a while, topped off a lemonade, and strolled back up to the condo. This blog snoozed in the car for a while until the host called up and said she was there. Pun City initially had some trepidation with the arrangement, after all it was basically staying with a stranger. But the week's host turned out to be pretty cool after all. She went way above the call of duty and cooked up some chicken-pesto-noodle dish for dinner, which was very good. Soon after dinner, it was back to USD for the night's games, Loyola Marymount vs. San Francisco, and Pepperdine vs. Portland.

Despite being a "sellout," the arena was about 1/4 full and the 2 scalpers were selling tickets for under face value. Pun City was watching USF head coach Eddie Sutton intently, knowing this could be the final game of his illustrious career. (Sutton had come back for the 2nd half of the season, after USF's head coach had mysteriously "taken a leave of absence." He mainly deferred to his assistants, and it seemed like he was trying to audition Robert McCallum to be his replacement. (As it turned out, it didn't work, Rex Walters was hired between then and now).

San Francisco closed out the win, taking a 7-point lead with 6:32 remaining, then cruising to a 79-60 win.

Pepperdine then took out Portland. This game didn't have much. Of note were Jack Sikma's son playing for Portland as a freshman; Portland starting the only native Japanese player in Division I, and this blog noticing that Pepperdine's logo, when looked at from a certain angle, seems very similar to Miami of Ohio's.

Other points of note from "The Slim Gym," USD's Jenny Craig Pavilion:

-The arena served actual Mr. Pibb on tap. This wasn't Pibb Xtra, it was genuine Mr. Pibb. Pun City hasn't seen that in a long time.

-Pun City got a picture with the Geico gecko, plus a free caveman can cooler. (Geico was the main sponsor of the event).

-Despite having seats in the 2nd-to-last row, Pun City was able to sit in the 2nd row for both games, simply by finding the section where a non-playing team's fans belonged.

Ford Field's Football Format: Forgettable

2008-04-14T22:10:00.000-05:00

Good evening. Pun City's working on some exciting (well, to this blog anyway) research for The Rule. More to come on that. Let's just say of the 478 games this blog has looked at, only 18 had the rule broken. That's over 96% successful as yet. Still a good number of games to look at (over 5,000 were played this year), but a good start.

For now, even though this was the last trip Pun City took, this blog figured it'd be cool to share a letter it wrote to the NCAA, commenting on their choice of Ford Field as a venue for the NCAA Tournament, in particular with the "full stadium" layout.

To Whom It May Concern:

This blog recently attended the Men's basketball championships at Ford Field in Detroit (Sweet 16 and Elite 8 games). Having attended hundreds of live sporting events in this blog's life, Pun City can honestly say they were the worst seats this blog has ever had at any event. Pun City was in section 340, row 12. From this view, Pun City could not see the nets. Players were mostly indistinguishable in warmups, and uniform numbers were the only way of separating players once the game began. Referee's whistles and sometimes pep bands were not very audible, if at all. While $53.00 for 3 games seemed like a good deal on the surface, it somehow managed to be a poor value in the end, due to the poor game experience the seat location provides.

Beyond this, vast expanses of unused space on the lower levels existed. This seemed like an unnecessary waste of potential seating space, and seating space with a good view of the action at that.

Ushers repeatedly checked patrons’ tickets when entering my section. This struck Pun City as absurd given that no one would intentionally "sneak into" this lousy section. This blog understands the need to check tickets in most sections (primarily the lower level), but game personnel should be advised to employ common sense with some of the peripheral (read: worst) sections.

Multiple times there were game stoppages due to incorrect scoreboard readings (This blog believes both were around the 10:37 mark in the 2nd half of the Davidson-Kansas game). The problems were dealt with relatively quickly but this blog can't help but speculate these issues were caused by having the court configured as it was. (In the middle of a large space, possibly far from the power sources traditionally used at the facility, then raised up 3 feet above ground level).

The court configuration being above ground level struck Pun City as odd and unnecessarily dangerous, as more than one player had to jump off the high platform while chasing a loose ball. This blog's understanding is that the court was raised to improve sightlines, which is a good idea, but Pun City doesn't think that player safety should be compromised for this reason. On a personal note, from section 340, another 3 feet further from the action would not have made a difference. Having the coach on the same level as the players, as would be the case at all other Div. I venues except Minnesota and Vanderbilt, probably would have proven to be a more comfortable setup for the players and coaches also.

As per usual, event shirts were overpriced ($25.00 for a t-shirt), but in this blog's opinion there weren't even any good designs this year for the "all logo" varieties. Each shirt showed the Final Four logo and had some type of San Antonio theme. Pun City understands that the Final Four is often the event most people associate with NCAA basketball, however in this blog's opinion the regionals should have their own identity and not have to include Final Four images to hold up. At the very least, this blog would like the option of a more "generic" shirt that does not mention Final Four, much less has San Antonio imagery rammed down your throat when you're in Detroit, a city with its own unique identity. Pun City knows the teams are not decided until very close to the game date, but the site is chosen well in advance and there is such a large scale of shirts being made that this blog doesn't believe splitting into 4 different "backgrounds" on the shirt is too much to ask for each regional site to have its own graphic identity. Everyone knows the goal is the Final Four, if we want a Final Four shirt we can get that separately. (Or continue producing regional shirts with Final Four logos on them, but give the option of an event-specific shirt also, I would imagine the Detroit shirt would sell better than the San Antonio one).

That said, the individual team shirts (i.e. "Davidson Sweet 16") were well-designed and if this blog were in the market for one of those, it would not have had an objection purchasing one.

Pun City would highly recommend not using a configuration where the entire football stadium is used in the future. This blog's experiences at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis have been much more positive than the Detroit "full stadium" setup. As this blog is sure you are aware, the RCA Dome used bleachers and a divider to maximize one half of the football stadium instead of miscasting an entire football stadium as a basketball venue. Final Four patrons should not be subjected to such poor sightlines next year, especially since this blog believes they will undoubtedly pay more than Pun City did for my seats this year.

Another suggestion this blog would have is to show more consistent updates of other games being played. This is not a problem unique to Ford Field. At every National Championship event Pun City has attended (5 to date), fans are only able to see score updates when there is a break in the action. This blog believes that in venues like Ford Field and the RCA Dome, this is due to the lack of “auxiliary scoreboards” given the football configuration. In cases like these, Pun City would recommend specifying requirement of applicant stadiums with more flexible scoreboards (where they would be able to show necessary game information plus out-of-town scores), or using some of the back rows of seating to house temporary out-of-town scoreboards. Stadiums like the Bradley Center and the Palace at Auburn Hills either choose not to show out-of-town scores or are instructed not to, and Pun City feels this is a mistake. While the focus of event attendees is on the game in front of them, this blog would think almost everyone there wants to know what is going on in other games, and not just twice a half. While Pun City doesn’t know that this is an official policy, if it is, this blog has a hard time understanding the logic behind it.

Currently the only halftime entertainment at NCAA championship games is that provided by the cheerleaders, spirit squads, and bands of each school. This is good entertainment but Pun City believes there should also be some sort of promotional contest as well. The intermission gets to be pretty long and there is a lot of unused time where patrons have nothing to turn their attention to.

The security entering the venue was well-organized and this blog did feel safe at the venue, which was no small task given the neighborhood where the event was held. Concessions were bland and overpriced, but Pun City doesn’t think this was anything different than one could expect at any other venue (although the US Cellular Arena – a host for previous women’s championship events, and Kohl Center – host for previous men’s events have very good concessions). Elevator operators and workers at the fan assistance center were very nice. Pun City thought the facility did a nice job of getting all of their advertisements covered up for the game so that the NCAA and the game were showcased.

This blog will continue attending NCAA championship events but it looks forward to much better experiences in the future, and this blog would hope that you decide against continuing to use the “full football stadium” layouts. Feel free to contact Pun City if you have any questions.

Thank you for your time,

Pun City

Marquette "aBuzz" With Excitement

2008-04-08T19:52:00.000-05:00

Well, that was fast. Marquette hired Buzz Williams right away. A 5-day "search," which might have encompassed their entire campus, ended up picking Mr. Lightyear. He seemed like a good guy based on his press conference, but this blog is not thrilled with the hiring process. Not Williams's fault, granted, but here goes.

Number one - Okay, so you don't get Tony Bennett, Sean Miller, or Anthony Grant because they aren't interested. No one can blame you on that. That's a good reason to interview other candidates, like Wright State's Brad Brownell, Davidson's Bob McKillop, Southern Illinois's Chris Lowery, or Ohio State assistant John Groce. (As mentioned earlier on Pun City). By all accounts, it doesn't look like Marquette ever made any overtures toward these candidates. Which brings us to....

Number two - In five days, with most coaches in San Antonio for the Final Four and coaches convention, there's no chance they interviewed any of them. Buzz Williams may end up being a phenomenal coach. However, no one is of the opinion that Buzz Williams was a hot coaching name yesterday. There was no reason to move this quickly and "snatch up" Williams before someone else did. Pun City is not condemning the choice of Buzz Williams. Pun City is condemning the choice of Buzz Williams in 5 days without a national search. If they made the search, took another week, and still ended up with Williams, this blog would have been satisfied.

The 5-day "search" screams either "lazy" or "held hostage by 18-year-olds," depending on whether you believe they wanted to keep continuity by hiring an assistant with 9 months on the job; or if you believe they wanted to keep all of their incoming recruits at the expense of a better game coach. (Pun City would say Lowery, Brownell, and McKillop are all better game coaches. If they all turned MU down, be this blog's guest, hire Williams).

This blog has a hard time believing anyone came away from MU's search thinking, "That was really thorough." Oh well, Williams seems cool enough to take over. Problem is, if he's not at the level of some of the coaches MU didn't interview, then he's not likely to last his 6-year contract. Best of luck, Buzz Williams, Marquette didn't do you any favors.

Marquette-ch a rising star?

2008-04-05T16:06:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy month, but Pun City has been ridiculously negligent with the posts. Time to stop the bleeding. Hopefully this blog can get up some new stuff on its recent trips to San Diego, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Detroit, including a review of Del Taco.

Big news in the area is Marquette Basketball. Here's Pun City's thoughts on their plight:

1. Marquette has a coaching search going on to replace Tom Crean. The order of preference this blog would have had initially was 1. Tony Bennett, 2. Sean Miller, 3. Anthony Grant, 4. Bob MacKillop, 5. Chris Lowery, 6. Brad Brownell, 7. John Groce (Ohio State assistant). Current Marquette assistant Buzz Williams doesn't appear on Pun City's list for a bunch of reasons.

a) Very little head coaching experience. He coached one season at New Orleans, finishing 14-17. This iteam alone would not be enough to merit an interview at a major conference school, much less a hire.

b) The way he left his prior head coaching position. Basically just bailed on them after the season to take an assistant's job at Marquette. Pun City always thinks that leaving a head job for an assistant's job shows poor leadership. Leaving after only one season is even worse. Leaving the kids he recruited in the city of New Orleans is worse still by this blog's estimation.

c) Hiring a head coach only for the sake of continuity is short-sighted. On the surface it seems ridiculous to this blog that an assistant coach that has only been there for one season would provide realistic continuity anyway.

Several recruits seem to have expressed interest in being released from their national letters of intent. For some, it doesn't even look like hiring Williams would keep them in the fold. By hiring Williams you run the risk of mortgaging the future for the present. It's conceivable that Marquette would be willing to take this risk because they have a good opportunity to have a great season next year. If Dominic James, Jerel McNeal, Wesley Matthews, and Trevor Mbakwe return, they would have a very good nucleus. (Unfortunately, this blog realizes that Mbakwe's return is unlikely).

The ideal scenario would be hiring a very good "x's and o's" head coach other than Williams, then retaining Williams as a recruiting assistant. There has been speculation that Williams would not stay on unless hired as the head coach, so Pun City would caution Marquette fans against getting their hopes up. That said, MacKillop, Lowery, and Brownell would be fine choices for the job. The future of the program would be in good hands. With Williams as the head coach, Pun City does not have the same confidence.

Blink and you miss this Post

2008-03-12T00:16:00.003-05:00

Hey there, early wake up call tomorrow morning (6:00 AM PST), so Pun City will keep this short. The West Coast Conference tournament was sweet, now it's likely that 3 teams will make it in. This blog estimates Gonzaga at a 7 seed, San Diego at a 13, and Saint Mary's at a 10. Should be interesting to see where they all shake down. The reason for the early wakeup tomorrow is because this blog is going to the 8-9 game in the Mountain West Conference in Las Vegas, and is currently stationed in Los Angeles. So...hopefully this blog will have computer access there, but it would seem likely the only PC available will not allow access to Pun City. This blog sends its sincerest apologies. Hopefully a serviceable tournament preview will be able to be posted for you next Tuesday. For now, Pun City predicts a BYU victory in the MWC Tournament over UNLV. Yes, way out on a limb picking the 1 over the 2. Alright, later.

Carry On My Davidson

2008-02-27T19:50:00.000-06:00

Pun City had the chance tonight to watch Appalachian State visiting Davidson in a SoCon matchup. This blog was as surprised as anyone that this game was on TV, but Dish Network picked up the SportSouth feed and Pun City was immediately entranced. *Also note that it is no coincidence a Davidson article is popping up the day after this blog got a lot of Davidson traffic.

Most neutral observers don't know about Davidson. "Knowledgable" observers probably think of a typically gaudy overall record and have a vague concept of Dell Curry's son playing for them. Alas, it is people like this that win NCAA pools over fanatic rubes like this blog.

Stephen Curry is indeed the key cog in Davidson's machine, but he is definitely not a one-man show. Even though he's in the top-10 nationally in scoring, with 25.3 points per game. Even though his range is virtually halfcourt and in. Even if, when defenses come out to defend Curry, he just backs up and makes the longer shot.

The rest of the Team, contributing to Davidson's success, includes both inside and outside resources. For starters, there is some size to complement both Curry and point guard Jason Richards' outside shooting prowess. (Richards is 2nd on the team in scoring with 12.6 ppg). Thomas Sander, Boris Meno, and Andrew Lovedale form a 3-headed frontcourt monster and all average over 5 rebounds and 6 points per game. They're also all 6'8", which allows Davidson the flexibility to matchup physically with most teams in the country.

Tough matchups would be against teams like Georgetown or Connecticut where there is a skilled 7-footer. That said, it would be unlikely the Wildcats would end up having to face either of those schools until at least the 2nd round, as ESPN's Bracketology has Davidson currently slotted at a 12 seed, with Georgetown a 3 and Connecticut a 4.

It's easy to see why they were able to compete with Duke and North Carolina, two teams that don't currently have the luxury of a 7-foot behemoth.

For the game Pun City's currently watching, Davidson is very adept at outside shooting, 6 of 13 from beyond the arc at the half. This will definitely extend a defense, so without a good combination of a tall post player and ball-hawking guards, you're going to have problems with them.

This blog is realizing that definitely the most underrated player for DC is Richards. He leads the nation in assists per game and unless you root for a SoCon team, you've never heard of him before. His senior leadership from the point guard position is almost certainly the primary reason that Davidson stands where they are now and will be a great challenge for any postseason opponent. If for some reason the Wildcats don't make the NCAA tournament, a possibility that is unfortunately still out there because they weren't able to schedule a major conference school at Belk Arena or pull off the upset on the road in non-conference play - they will win the NIT.

That said, Pun City is fully confident that they'll continue their undefeated march through the SoCon through the title game and clinch the automatic bid. It would also be hard for the selection committee to omit a team with Davidson's talent level and experience, especially after a snub in 2005, even if they lost in the SoCon tournament. (Although, based on the 2005 snub, Pun City recommends Davidson at least lose in the final if they want to be sure).

Other Davidson points to note:

-Like a lot of non-majors, they know how to handle a zone. This doesn't always apply to major conference programs because there is a prevalence of major-conference schools that refuse to play zone. Smaller conference schools usually don't have the "come-uppance" and will pull out all the stops to get a win. This means a squad like Davidson has seen zone a lot, and their undefeated conference season means they aren't fazed by it.

-Davidson is a good but not great defensive team. They tend to gamble a lot defensively. This leads to a number of steals and easy transition baskets, but they will occasionally give up an easy bucket. Playing a disciplined team like a Wisconsin or Washington State will probably not help their cause in that they'd need to outshoot the disciplined team in a low-possession game without as many transition baskets as they may now be relying on.

-Depth is not a problem for Davidson. They boast a 9-man rotation where each player averages at least 12.9 minutes per game. A team like Tennessee might have ideas for running them out of the gym, but this blog is of the opinion this would not work given the longer TV timeouts during the NCAA tournament, in addition to DC's bench essentially being interchangeable parts with their starters (Curry and Richards excluded). Keeping Curry and Richards out of foul trouble will be important, but this seems very feasible given that the duo averages 2.4 and 1.7 fouls per game, respectively.

This blog is aware that coming out of the SoCon with the best RPI win being over #96 Georgia Southern is a tenuous position. This blog would like to believe their willingness to take on strong opponents will "Curry" favor with the selection committee. This blog would also like to believe that Davidson will make the issue moot by storming through the SoCon Tourney. If Davidson gets an NCAA bid, at-large or otherwise, Pun City predicts a first round win. If they can avoid the UConns and Washington States of the world in the second round, Wildcat fans will enjoy a sweet March to the round of sixteen.

NCAA Tournament Cheat Sheet - There Will Be A Test

2008-02-26T20:10:00.000-06:00

For those of you that read last week's post, the Northern Arizona option was knocked out for Pun City, so this blog will be heading to the Los Angeles area on 3/11 instead of Flagstaff. Shucks.

Getting down to the homestretch in the college basketball season here. The first conference tournaments begin March 4th. Checking the calendar, that's....next Tuesday. Seven days remain until the best part of the year. That's if you aren't including right now within the best time of the year, as the BracketBusters just concluded and regular season conference champions are being determined. Phenomenal time of year.

Speaking of regular season conference champions, arguably the most important regular season title is almost locked up. Cornell leads the Ivy League by 3 games with only 4 to play. Friday night they can seal the conference's automatic NCAA tournament bid if they're able to take out Dartmouth, who currently sits at 2-8 in conference (as opposed to Cornell's 10-0).

Cornell has rattled off 11 straight wins, their last loss coming at Duke by 14 on January 6th. They haven't really beaten anyone, Siena (90th in RPI) is their biggest win this year, but they certainly could surprise in the NCAA tournament, now projected as a 13 seed in ESPN's Bracketology (that's pretty high for an Ivy League school the last few years).

Some other news from mid-major land:

- Xavier is now ranked 6th in the country in RPI. This is very remarkable and they will be a major challenge for any opponent the rest of the way. They really should have beaten eventual national runner-up Ohio State last year in the 2nd round.

-Drake is 11th. They've really come out of nowhere to get there. Predicted to finish 9th out of 10 Missouri Valley Conference teams, they have found a way to win in 22 of their 25 games. Klayton Korver is their standout 3-point shooter and the brother of Utah Jazz player Kyle Korver.

-Butler is sitting 18th. This is a team that garnered a 5 seed last year and wound up in the Sweet 16.

-BYU is 26th. Pun City is going to see them at the Mountain West Conference tournament, so a more thorough report will be coming up then.

-Kent State 29th. The Golden Flashes usually make the tournament, but this year they'll probably make some noise, maybe not as much as their Elite Eight run of 2002, but Sweet 16 is not out of the question.

-Saint Mary's is 30th. This blog is checking them out at the West Coast Conference tourney, so you can expect a report on them thereafter.

-South Alabama is 31st. USA is probably the best team from the Sun Belt since Chris Marcus was at Western Kentucky. The Jaguars most likely will end up getting an at-large bid if they don't win the Sun Belt tournament. See last post as to why the Sun Belt conference might collude to have Western Kentucky or another school win the tournament final over USA given their probable at-large status.

-UNLV 32nd. This blog will report from Las Vegas roughly March 12th on them.

-Gonzaga 33rd. Pun City to report from San Diego roughly March 9th on them.

-Dayton is 35th. Their numbers are great in the computer, but since losing starter Chris Wright, they've been pretty bad in conference. As a result, even with a healthy Wright and potentially even better numbers, they likely stand to be out of the NCAAs without at least a conference tournament championship game appearance.

-Massachusetts is 37th. The Minutemen could step into the void Dayton stands to leave. Another possible collusion recipient if Xavier makes the tournament final. For the holistic view of the Atlantic 10, it would probably help the conference a lot if Xavier lost a few games to the Daytons and huddled UMasses of the world.

-Illinois State is 41st. They probably haven't done enough to garner an at-large bid. Their best win is against #50 Southern Illinois. Collusion conspiracy theorists might be on the lookout if ISU faces Drake in the MVC final.

-Saint Joseph's is 43rd. Their best wins are their 2 against UMass, so there's a good chance they'd leapfrog UMass if they end up with the similar resumes they have now. That said, they're definitely on thin ice.

-Davidson is 45th. They're probably one of the best teams in the country, they have just had some tough losses to very competitive opponents. A combined 10 points separated them from UNC and Duke. Those games were at Duke and on a neutral court vs. North Carolina. Put either of those games on Davidson's home court, and Pun City projects a Davidson victory. The problem is that they didn't win, so they probably need to win the SoCon's automatic bid.

-Stephen F. Austin is 47th. Huh? Stephen F. Austin is out of the Southland Conference, and has a road win at #27 Oklahoma. A 47 RPI from the Southland Conference is pretty remarkable. This is the same conference that produced Northwestern State in 2006, a team that upset 3rd-seeded Iowa in the NCAAs. They aren't realistically an at-large team, but they do seem like the kind of team that could make noise in the NCAAs.

On a final note, the trip to Ohio this past weekend was great. From a basketball standpoint, the teams Pun City saw, from best to worst, were Wisconsin, Ohio State, Virginia Commonwealth, Cleveland State, Akron, and Marist. Wisconsin is really the only team Pun City could see going 2 rounds in the NCAAs, but all are capable of going on a run for the automatic bids in their conferences.

Collude For The Underdog!

2008-02-20T20:48:00.000-06:00

Some college hoops notes:

The 3/11 idea of heading to Northern Arizona is looking bleak. Pun City needs Portland State to go 0-4 in conference to close out their Big Sky season, in addition to Northern Arizona going 3-0 to finish it off. PSU plays 4-8 Northern Colorado tonight in the first of these 7 games. The Flagstaff idea could hit the deck tonight, gametime is 8:05 CST.
The 3/11 idea of heading to Los Angeles is looking solid. A friend of the blog is around then and will be able to host. A possible return trip to Pepperdine and/or Cal State Fullerton may be on the horizon, as this blog was unable to get to their bookstores previously. Long Beach State is just a cool campus, so that might get added on also.
Pun City wishes UWM would be able to make the NCAA tournament, but that scenario would appear unlikely at this juncture. The Panthers almost certainly would need to get a win in Hinkle Fieldhouse against Butler, which seems unlikely at best.
One thing that Pun City has given some thought to recently is conferences sending a maximum number of teams to the NCAA tournament. Some say the Pac 10 could send 8, some say the Big East could send 8, you get the idea. Someone's bubble always gets burst though, when an unexpected team wins the automatic bid. This raises an interesting question: If Pun City were the conference commissioner for a conference like the Horizon League, would there be incentive to have your likely at-large bid team lose in the conference final? For instance, if UWM (with no at-large hopes this season) were facing Butler (very close to an at-large lock) in the final, would there be good reason to collude for a UWM victory, thus sending both to the NCAA tournament?

According to CNN Money, the NCAA distributes TV revenue to each conference based on the number of games teams from their conference have played in the tournament over the last 6 years. Having 2 teams in the tournament instead of 1 obviously produces more opening round games for a conference. The question to ask would be, would a team like Butler be significantly less likely to win their first round game if their seed suffered due to the loss?

Hypothetically, if a loss in the Horizon League title game would only drop Butler from a 5 to a 7 seed, and the Horizon would pick up UWM's opening game, would their expected number of games go up?

Well, yes. From 2002-2006, 5-seeds have a 10-6 record in first round games. 7 seeds have a 10-6 record also. So in either case, there's a 5/8 chance of 2 games for the at-large team in this hypothetical. Adding 1 game from the automatic bid and you have 2.63 as your expected value of games in the first 2 rounds. This is in opposition to the 1.63 if UWM loses.

The 3rd round is where the stats come back. 5 seeds are 10-4 in the 2nd round against either 4 seeds or 13 seeds (between 2002 and 2006). Conversely, 7 seeds are 6-9. So the expected value of the 3rd round would be 0.71 for 5 seeds that make it there (0.44 combining odds from 1st and 2nd round). Expected 3rd round value for 7 seeds that make it would be 0.4, with a combined odds of 0.25.

4th through 6th rounds of the NCAA tournament provide expected values of 0.125 for 7s and 0.21 for 5s.

Overall expected value for 5 seeds is 1.285 rounds, overall expected value for 7 seeds is 1.0 rounds. Over 6 years, allowing the "at-large" (Butler) team to win the game is going to net an extra 1.71 games for that team. Over one year, allowing the "auto bid" team (UWM) to win is going to net 1 sure extra game for the conference and 0.285 less games for the at-large. A net of +0.715 games every year, plus any bonus games the "auto-bid" team would pick up (13 seeds expect 0.224 extra games, essentially giving the conference 0.937 extra games every year).

So, Pun City isn't one to encourage collusion, but Conference USA, The Horizon League, the Missouri Valley Conference and maybe even the West Coast Conference would probably average about an extra 0.937 games' worth of revenue each year if they allowed a low-rated team to defeat their likely at-large team in the conference championship game each year.

Based on the CNN Money report, one game's worth of revenue translates to $6.25 million. Collusion has its benefits.

Pun City To Stroll Into The Wild Wild West

2008-02-11T19:14:00.000-06:00

Been too long here, struggling to find a good balance of posting / watching hoops / planning the upcoming madness / hanging out with friends.

But Pun City digresses. The last couple weeks had multiple major developments in determining the trip for this year. First off, Marquette’s ticket office, while still mostly useless, did forward this blog on to the Blue and Gold Fund. (That’s their booster club). It turns out the Blue and Gold club is really the group in charge of divvying out the seats. Once Pun City was able to speak with them, the ball started rolling.

The initial conversation determined a few relevant nuggets of information.
1. Marquette was allotted 500 tickets by the Big East.
2. Between 600 and 650 people applied for these tickets.
3. The club doesn’t use a pure priority-point-based system to determine the ticket recipients, it evaluates each individual donor’s giving history.
4. The Blue and Gold dude was cool with calling Pun City if it “won” and not billing this blog if it decided against taking the ticket.

As you can imagine, this was a big boost and gave Pun City an opportunity to piece together a decision, now that it had the option of passing on the Big East.

Looking into the two options, it boiled down to 1 awesome conference vs. 2 good conferences; 11 games vs. 15 games, 5 days vs. 8 days; and cold vs. warm. While a tough decision, Pun City eventually chose the western trip (West Coast Conference in San Diego and Mountain West Conference in Las Vegas).

Other big factors included that the west trip might be able to get the elusive Big Sky Conference included if Northern Arizona ended up winning the regular season title, and Pun City was unexpectedly able to procure West Coast Conference tickets without having to scalp them. As it turns out, it’s now looking somewhat improbable that Northern Arizona will actually win the Big Sky, but they are only 1.5 games back, and winning their game today that would bring them within a game of leader Portland State.

In any event, here’s likely what the trip is going to look like this year:

3/7, 6:10 AM. Flying out of Milwaukee. This will suck. Part of the reasoning behind this is that Pun City had to plan the trip pretty late, most likely limiting the number of available flights. Another reason is Pun City isn’t trying to customize its exact flight time and paying through the roof for it.

3/7, 8:25 AM. Connecting flight out of Denver. This is Mountain Standard Time, so will feel like 9:25 AM in Pun City.

3/7, 9:49 AM. Land in San Diego. Pacific Standard Time, feels like 10:49 in Pun City. After grabbing luggage and the rental car, Pun City has some time to kill. This blog could think of a much worse place to have to kill time than San Diego. One likely destination in this interval is the spot that this blog’ll be staying, one of the Inspirational Website’s friends’ place. A little unusual staying with someone this blog has never met, but should be cool as any friend of the Inspirational Website is a friend of Pun City’s. Additionally, grabbing lunch and possibly dinner will be a good option in here. San Diego does have Jack-In-The-Box, which is huge, in addition to either a Rally’s or a Checkers.

3/7, 6:00 PM. Now feels like 8:00 PM. Game is 5th seed vs. 8th seed. If the season ended today, that would be Portland vs. Pepperdine. Given the choice, Pun City would have a preference of Pepperdine for that one since they have a sweet campus and this blog was able to visit earlier this year.

3/7, Approximately 8:30 PM. Now feels like 10:30 PM. Game will continue to 10:30 PM Pacific, meaning it will feel like 12:30 PM after presumably waking up at about 4:00 AM. This will be the toughest game to get through. It’s the 6 vs. 7 game, and if the season ended today, that would be San Francisco vs. Loyola Marymount. Pun City will be wearing the Loyola Marymount shirt it got on campus for whatever game the Lions play in. This blog is hopeful its host will be okay with this blog cruising in so late.

3/8, 6:00 PM. After a day of possibly catching up on sleep and soaking up some sun, this blog heads back to the Jenny Craig Pavilion and shows up for the quarterfinals. This game is going to have the 4 seed against the 5-8 winner. For today, the 4 seed would be Santa Clara, Steve Nash’s alma mater.

3/8, 8:30 PM. The 3 seed takes on the 6-7 winner. Host San Diego would be the 3 if the season ended today. Chances are that Pun City will have checked out their campus and bookstore by this time and most likely will be rooting for them. That is, of course, unless Loyola has advanced to this point and Pun City can still rock their colors.

3/9, 12:30 PM. Petco Park offers tours at this time. Pun City is likely to attend one of these while in town, not sure exactly when, but this might be a good time. This blog actually has a few Padres hats so it’d be cool to have that on when visiting.

3/9, 6:30 PM. The 1 seed finally plays. The WCC gives their top 2 seeds byes into the semifinals. So, for this game, the 1 is taking on the 4-5-8 survivor. As of today, the 1 would be Saint Mary’s. Pun City is a fan since they’ve used Australians to power their way to the top.

3/9, 9:00 PM. And the deuce. Gonzaga as of today. Playing the 3-6-7 survivor. Pun City has a Gonzaga visor, so this will almost certainly be worn, if only because the Loyola shirt would be a little “overworn” at this point if they’d gotten through 2 rounds unscathed.

3/10, 6:00 PM. Championship game. This will pit the 1-4-5-8 survivor vs. the 2-3-6-7 survivor. So, you can imagine the drama there. Talk about arch-rivals. Haha, well hopefully it is Saint Mary’s vs. Gonzaga, that would be the best game. But any surprises would be cool, and an auto-bid coming from outside of that pair would actually be the most beneficial for the WCC as far as getting the highest number of NCAA tournament teams. This blog is hoping that at some point while in San Diego it also would have had a chance to visit San Diego State also. Given the large amount of time seemingly available prior to the first game each day, this blog thinks this possibility is imminent. Anything other than the games, USD and SDSU campus visits, and a Petco Park tour would be gravy.

3/11. Pun City has no idea what it will be doing this day. If by some miracle Flagstaff hosts the Big Sky tournament, this blog will definitely head out there. It’s a 7.25 hour drive, but that’s not too bad. Main problem with this idea is that Flagstaff is not likely to actually host the tournament, so there’s little chance this is actually what Pun City ends up doing. Another possibility would be visiting a friend in Los Angeles, but as of now, this blog hasn’t heard back from him and there’s no guarantee he’ll be in the area or free that day. Beyond this, Pun City could (maybe) stay in San Diego if this blog hasn’t overstayed its welcome, or head out to Vegas early (there is a women’s 8-9 game this blog has tickets to at 6:00). One supposes it could even go to Phoenix or Tucson and spend a day there. Definitely a lot to be determined about this day.

3/12, 11:00 AM. Mountain West Conference “play-in” game pitting 8 vs. 9 in Las Vegas. Today this would be a matchup of Wyoming vs. Colorado State. Both are pretty cool schools, Pun City would probably root for the Rams because their school newsletter is the Rampage and head coach Tim Miles used to have former Wisconsin assistant Saul Phillips on his staff at North Dakota State. After this matchup Pun City has some decisions to make. Tickets to all the women’s games were included in the package, so Pun City could see as much as 4 women’s games in sessions going from 1:30 to 6:00 and 7:30 to midnight. Realistically that seems like more women’s basketball than Pun City would be able to handle. But, sparse women’s crowds do often afford the opportunity of catching free stuff being thrown into the stands.

3/13, 12:00 PM. 1 seed taking on the 8-9 winner. Projected 1 seed would be BYU. This is kinda awesome since Pun City will be sitting in the BYU section. Despite not having any relevant apparel for the Cougars, Pun City chose to sit there because their ticket office is the class of the Mountain West. This blog has called them on several occasions over the last couple years and they have been nothing but helpful and courteous. Mad props, BYU.

3/13, 2:30 PM. 4 seed vs. 5 seed. Today this would be New Mexico vs. Utah. Pun City has a shirt from when Utah played in the NCAA tournament in Milwaukee, so that would be worn for the Utes’ games.

3/13, 6:00 PM. After an intermission that would probably involve a trip to the strip for dinner, the 2 seed takes on the 7. This projects to be UNLV vs. Air Force. That’s a really tough call for Pun City since this blog has hats for both schools. Hopefully they end up playing different teams.

3/13, 8:30 PM. The last game of the 4-game day is possibly going to be 3rd seed San Diego State against 6th seed TCU. The Aztecs will almost certainly be favored by Pun City because this blog would have visited their campus and Pun City doesn’t know much about the Horned Frogs.

3/14, 6:30 PM. 1-8-9 survivor vs. 4-5 winner. This could be BYU vs. Utah in an intra-state rivalry (surprisingly taking place extra-state). This is following 2 women’s games that Pun City has the option of taking in. Not sure how likely that possibility would be, but another option would be heading to a sports book to watch some other games. Pun City has received a recommendation of Mandalay Bay for this idea.

3/14, 9:00 PM. 2-7 winner vs. 3-6 winner. Should be a cool game, possibly ending up with hosts UNLV taking on San Diego State. A coaching matchup of former Big Ten coaches Lon Kruger and Steve Fisher.

3/15, 1:00 PM. Women’s title game. Pun City’s gotta check this one out, it’s just cool to see any team get an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, even if it is the less followed women’s tournament.

3/15, 4:00 PM. Men’s title game. The only certain bid that will come out of the Mountain West is going to be determined here. BYU and UNLV both have work to do according to ESPN’s Bubble Watch, and while it’s possible they could each get in even without winning the Mountain West tournament, they won’t be taking any chances with this tournament. On one hand, Pun City hopes they meet in the final here in that it would be a great basketball game. On the other hand, it would be a cooler story if Colorado State or some other dark horse comes out of nowhere and earns a stunning tournament bid.

3/15, Postgame. Pun City’s looking at a 6:20 AM flight the next morning, so the initial plan is to drive to San Diego and sleep at the airport. Maybe hanging out in Vegas a little more after the game ends (around 6:00 PM) is another good idea. This blog will find out. As with much of this trip, Pun City is going to play this segment by ear.

If anyone has any San Diego or Las Vegas suggestions or stories, feel free to chime in. Until then, Pun City is out.

Yes, You Do Need A Three. Here's why.

2008-01-30T18:56:00.000-06:00

Ron Franklin and Fran Fraschilla were calling the Oklahoma State - Oklahoma game last night and OSU trailed by 3 with 18 seconds left. Fraschilla argued that OSU did not need to get a 3 in this scenario. Inevitably, commentators make this statement in similar situations, and, also inevitably, this drives Pun City nuts.

Pun City has no empirical evidence for this argument, and doesn't claim that it will get any in the near future (or ever, really). So that caveat's out of the way, but this blog will attempt to attack this with logic.

When you are down by 3, and you have less than 40 seconds remaining, it is ridiculous to go for anything other than a three. In doing so, you either are choosing to A) Put the game in your opponent's hands; or, at best, B) Limiting your own effectiveness toward the end of winning the game.

Let's cover A, putting the game in your opponent's hands. This is the worst-case scenario. The reason Pun City is saying you are putting the game in your opponent's hands is as follows: going for a 2-pointer means that you have to rely on your opponent to make a mistake in order to even have a chance.

Hoops fans might already know the only mistake that would solve your immediate need (tying the game) would be your opponent fouling you on the 2-pointer. While possible, there are enormous obstacles to overcome in order to reach the goal of a tie. You either need to make a 2-pointer when you are being fouled.

A rundown of the possible scenarios:

Making a 3:

Immediate Scenario - Game Tied, Opponent has possession and less time (or overtime begins).

Possible Outcomes - Stop for overtime or possible win, opponent scores for loss.

End Result - Overtime is possible win or loss, regulation loss or win.

Positives - Maximum amount of time to get a player open for a 3-pointer. Game is tied. Opponent now has less time (if any) and needs to score instead of running out clock and receiving a foul. Could possibly steal in regulation and win. Getting fouled on the 3 is possible, could have 4-point play or make 3 free throws in this scenario as well. Overtime win a 50-50 preposition otherwise. Rebound basket possible, which could lead to all 2-point scenarios with less time.

Negatives - Opponent has the ball and can hold for last shot. Longer shot. Opponents know you are looking for a 3. Can possibly be down more than 1 possession if this fails.

Making a 2, getting fouled, and made FT:

Immediate Scenario - Game Tied, Opponent has possession and less time (or overtime begins).

Possible Outcomes - Stop for overtime or possible win, opponent scores for loss.

End Result - Overtime is a possible win or loss, regulation loss or win.

Positives - Shorter distance on the shot. Game is tied. Opponent has less time (if any) and needs to score instead of running clock and receiving foul. Steal for win in regulation. Overtime a 50-50 chance. Penetration could create open 3.

Negatives - Could get an offensive foul when trying to create contact. Relying on the opponent to make a mistake, also requires 2 shots. Opponents know you are trying to get fouled. Scenario requires a made shot while being fouled. Could possibly be down more than one possession if this fails.

Making a 2, getting fouled, and missing FT:

Immediate Scenario - Down 1, need rebound or immediate foul.

Possible Outcomes - Rebound and make for win, rebound and miss for loss, no rebound for loss.

End Result - Overtime highly unlikely. This is the shortest scenario, all-or-nothing.

Positives - Higher chance of winning in regulation among theses scenarios. Will not be trailing by over 1 possession after opponent's free throws.

Negatives - Could get an offensive foul when trying to create contact. Relying on opponent to make a mistake, also requires 2 shots. Opponents know you are trying to get fouled. Scenario requires a made shot while being fouled. Less time after opponent's free throws, still down. Possibly down 3 with less time than you began with.

Making a 2, no foul:

Immediate Scenario - Down 1, need rebound or immediate foul.

Possible Outcomes - Foul, Steal, Time expires for loss.

End Result - Foul shots either put you down 1, 2, or 3. Less time to score again, though possibly a shorter shot required. Steal creates game-ending possession, make for win, miss for loss. If opponent passes successfully and avoids your defense, time expires.

Positives - Very likely shot will be uncontested. Shorter shot. Will not be down over 1 possession after opponent's free throws.

Negatives - Relying on an opponent to miss free throws. Less time after opponent's free throws, still down. Possibly down 3 with less time than you began with.

Missing a 3, no foul:

Immediate Scenario - Down 3, need immediate foul, 2 missed free throws, and a 3.

Possible Outcomes - Foul, steal

End Result - Foul shots put you down 3, 4, or 5. Less time to score again. Steal or 2 missed free throws only chance at tying. 1 made FT and you lose.

Positives - None.

Missing a 2, no foul:
Immediate Scenario - Down 3, need immediate foul, 2 missed free throws, and a 3.
Possible Outcomes - Foul, steal
End Result - Foul shots put you down 3, 4, or 5. Less time to score again. Steal or 2 missed free throws only chance at tying. 1 made FT and you lose.
Positives - None.

Pun City believes that having the chance to "control your own destiny" and having the maximum time possible to run a play for a 3-pointer gives you the best (by far) chance to win the game. Relying on an opponent to foul you, turn the ball over in under 35 seconds, or miss excessive amounts of free throws is taking too great of a chance as compared to running a play for a 3-pointer. Maybe the odds of getting the 3 to go are 1 in 6. That's gotta beat the chances of each domino falling of made 2 (maybe 40%), getting a foul (maybe 20%, meaning you have an 8% chance of the combo), and/or getting the missed free throws or a turnover. Even if one of these comes through, it's gotta be less than an 8% chance to add to the 8% you have, plus the made 3 option gives you extra opportunity with the overtime, this blog estimates half a chance there, giving the made 3 a 24% chance as opposed to 16% on the house of cards going for 2 gives you. In conclusion, no Fran, you need to go for a 3.

Marquette's Ticket Office: Wait Some More!

2008-01-22T20:32:00.000-06:00

ESPN's Joe Lunardi has his Bracketology out, and one fun activity Pun City always likes to do is see what apparel this blog has that would be relevant with each of the projected seeds. Here's this week's sample:

1 Seeds:
Memphis - Hat, conference shirt, tiger paw
Tennessee - Nothing
Kansas - NCAA tournament shirt
North Carolina - Shirt, hat, wristbands

2:
Washington State - Shirt, hat, conference shirt
UCLA - 2 Hats, conference shirt
Georgetown - Hat, conference shirt
Duke - Hat, jersey, shooting shirt, wristbands

3:
Indiana - Jersey, conference shirt, warmup pants
Michigan State - Hat, conference shirt
Texas - NCAA tournament shirt
Wisconsin - 20 shirts, 14 hats, jersey, warmup pants, wristbands, shorts, sportcoat, conference shirt, NCAA tournament shirt

4:
Pittsburgh - NCAA tournament shirt, conference shirt
Marquette - 12 shirts, 8 hats, conference shirt
Stanford - Conference shirt
Drake - Conference shirt

5:
Vanderbilt - Nothing
Butler - Conference shirt
Mississippi - Nothing
Dayton - Jersey, hat, conference shirt

6:
Xavier - Hat, conference shirt
St. Mary's - Nothing
Gonzaga - Hat
Baylor - Nothing

7:
Notre Dame - 2 shirts, 1 hat, conference shirt
Kansas State - Nothing
Clemson - Nothing
West Virginia - NCAA tournament shirt

8:
Texas A&M - Nothing
Arizona - Hat, conference shirt
Villanova - Conference shirt
Arizona State - Conference shirt

9:
Oregon - Conference shirt
Purdue - Shirt
Rhode Island - Conference shirt
Massachusetts - Conference shirt

10:
Boston College - NCAA tournament shirt
Providence - Conference shirt
Illinois State - Conference shirt
Mississippi State - Nothing

11:
Ohio State - Shirt, jersey, hat, shorts, conference shirt
Miami - Wristbands
Cleveland State - Conference shirt
South Alabama - Conference shirt

12:
Akron - Nothing (Although, Pun City has tickets for their Bracket Buster game 2/23, so this may change)
San Diego State - Nothing
Connecticut - Conference shirt
Louisville - Hat, conference shirt

13:
Davidson - Nothing
Virginia Commonwealth - Shirt, conference shirt
Oral Roberts - Conference shirt
Siena - Nothing

14:
Stephen F. Austin - Nothing
Cal State Northridge - Hat, conference shirt
Utah State - Conference shirt
UNC Asheville - Nothing

15:
Austin Peay - Hat, conference shirt
Northern Arizona - Nothing
Cornell - Nothing
Hampton - Conference shirt

16:
Lafayette - Nothing
Quinnipiac - Nothing
Jacksonville - Conference shirt
Binghamton - Nothing
Southern - Nothing

So far, 44 of 65 teams covered. Assuming that the above listing is the exact field that ends up happening, there is still a chance Pun City's apparel options would be a better fit come tournament time. As noted above, there's a good chance Pun City would pick up some Akron swag in February. Additionally, Pun City's March road trip will either be to New York for the Big East tournament or out west for the West Coast Conference and Mountain West Conference tournaments.

If this blog heads west, there is a 99% chance it would pick up at least a conference shirt from each tournament. This would bring relevance to the San Diego State entry. Additionally, it would cover for any other bids the MWC or WCC picked up. (St. Mary's would be accounted for from the WCC as well).

Incidentally, Pun City actually has a shirt depicting all Big East teams already, so a New York trip would not help the cause of adding relevance to extra tournament teams. It would still be a sweet trip though.

On the trip note, this blog knows a few of you are out there wondering where Pun City will be going. It's still up in the air unfortunately, but could be resolved as early as tomorrow.

The Marquette ticket office just received the number of tickets they have been allotted from the Big East for the tournament, and tomorrow they hope to determine which applicants receive their tickets. Pun City would put its chances at around 50-50 right now. The unfortunate part of this situation is that this blog has repeatedly had its hopes driven upward only to find out another delay was going on.

The MU ticket office first stated that they would know in November who would be receiving tickets. This changed to December, then January. At the start of January, they said "a couple weeks, maybe 3." It has indeed become 3 weeks, and last week one representative told Pun City that it would be determined by Wednesday, and another said it would be determined on Monday. Well, obviously Monday was wrong. Today's rep said they were "hoping to get that figured out tomorrow," so that doesn't even guarantee a Wednesday answer. This blog is hoping that a response is delivered by Friday at the latest, this is beyond ridiculous as far as having to plan a trip on short notice. Luckily some of the tournament days coincided, but the disparate locales make for no other consolidation of trip resources (rental car, hotel, flight) being possible. It's a tough situation, there's a good chance Pun City won't order Big East tickets for a while now, so hopefully this blog wins this year and is able to check the Big East off of the list.

Running Diary: Saturday Hoops

2008-01-19T17:15:00.000-06:00

Watching hoops all Saturday long. Here's the recap:

11:00 - Games for the first time block are Villanova at Syracuse on ESPN and Notre Dame at Georgetown on ESPN Plus (WMLW - Channel 41 in Milwaukee). For some reason the audio is extremely low on the Plus feed. Probably a good thing with Bob Wenzel doing the game.

11:03 - Just got Wenzeled. Probably the first of many today. Wenzel, doing the ESPN Plus game of Notre Dame at Georgetown, in the pregame analysis, that he had all week to prepare for, describes Roy Hibbert in the following manner: "He of the multi-skilled guy."

11:11 - Georgetown up 12-7 at the first break, Syracuse trails Villanova 10-3. Syracuse, for all their whining last year when they missed the NCAAs, still refuses to go on the road during the non-conference slate. This year was a huge revelation when they (gasp!) went to Virginia to play a game. This year the injury bug has hit (Eric Devendorf and Andy Rautins out for the year), but they are playing pretty well, owning the 32nd-best RPI in the country.

11:14 - Syracuse now down 10-9 and on the line. Solid bounceback there. Getting back to the last post, Pun City's got warrennolan.com pulled up for today, that site is the best place for RPI statistics. It's free and has a ton of analysis. Highly recommended.

11:17 - Syracuse-Villanova has remained compelling enough that this blog hasn't switched back to the Georgetown-Notre Dame game yet. It's weird how you can tell a game's in HD even when you don't have HD on your television. It's like they clean off the lenses for HD and they don't make the effort for non-HD cameras. Not sure if anyone else ever noticed this.

11:20 - Commercials on both channels. Thinking about lunch. Could either make a frozen pizza, head to Little Caesar's for a pizza and breadsticks, or make some macaroni and cheese. There's a good chance friend-of-blog Wells will show up, might want to run this past him before Pun City makes a decision.

11:23 - Vicious airball by Luke Zeller of Notre Dame. If you recall last year's post about the Butler cheerleaders, one of them went to high school with Zeller. Pun City recalls him getting major playing time last year, but when this blog saw Notre Dame at Marquette this year, Zeller didn't seem to get on the floor too much.

11:25 - Notre Dame now up 17-16. They're playing pretty respectably on the road here after their first road trip was a debacle at Marquette, after which ND coach Mike Brey said he had to do a double-take to make sure it didn't count for two losses.

11:27 - Roy Hibbert has 13 of the 22 points for GU, they're up 22-17 after a sweet hook. This blog recalls a game 2 years ago where Hibbert dominated Marquette in the first half, then disappeared in the 2nd half because Georgetown went away from him. Have to keep an eye on him to see if he stays involved today.

11:30 - Villanova has different colors for the trim on their shoulders and collar. Powder blue on the left shoulder and collar, white on the right. A unique and somewhat bizarre look.

11:32 - Another thing about Syracuse's propensity to stay home. For schools that don't have football, Pun City understands the reasoning for scheduling a ton of home games (to a point). But Syracuse does have football. They aren't funding an entire athletic department with basketball. Now granted, they do earn a lot more money from home basketball games than normal schools would (as they play in the 20,000+ seat Carrier Dome), but they are compromising their possible NCAA earnings by getting a lower seed. If they would have gone on the road another couple times this year, they'd be in the top 15 for RPI, which really gives them a good shot at a high seed and all of its advantages.

11:36 - Georgetown now up 29-17. So much for Notre Dame looking respectable on the road.

11:37 - Just noticed an advertisement under the scorer's table at Syracuse. Something to the effect of "Not Just Good - Heluva Good". No idea what the product is, but that sounds like a natural ad campaign for the product. Nice work there.

11:38 - On the subject of scorer's table ads, Marquette had one for "O'Reilly Auto Parts" last weekend. Granted, the game was on national TV, but where is the nearest O'Reilly?

11:40 - Rockford, Illinois. This blog doesn't imagine it will be driving to Rockford to purchase auto parts, but if it did, it might need a lot more.

11:41 - Heluva Good is apparently a purveyor of cheeses and dips that caters to the tailgating crowd. Sho nuff.

11:43 - Roy Hibbert and Luke Harangody start jawing with each other. That would be a cool fight. Notre Dame now trails 31-19.

12:47 - Lunch hour in there. Georgetown-ND got out of control (Georgetown running away 62-42 now), Syracuse and Villanova got compelling, and Wells came over and we grabbed some Little Caesar's.

12:49 - Wells rockin' the paddle ball right now. Travelling Mercies Pastor got Pun City the Spiderman-brand paddle ball as a gift, and it's provided a good deal of amusement. Wells repeatedly getting denied in his quest for 20 consecutive paddles. Compares to last year's "totrejection.com" diversion while the tournament games were being played.

12:51 - Nova leads 66-63 with 4:36 left. Big 3 for Corey Fisher puts them up 69-63 with 4:00 remaining.

12:52 - Scottie Reynolds goes to the line with 3:21 left, hoping to end the game by "the rule's" definition. Just needs 1 of 3 free throws to do so. Wells succeeds in his quest for 20 paddles, ending with 22.

12:56 - Game over, Reynolds puts the Wildcats up 72-63 with 3:21 left. Syracuse would need a miracle.

12:59 - Wells notched a 44-hit effort on the paddle ball, "like getting to level 3 in Tot Rejection" says the triumphant paddler.

1:00 - Next on the slate will be Illinois at Purdue on ESPN, plus UTEP at Houston on CSTV. Could do a lot worse with those. At 2:30 there will be Maryland at North Carolina on ABC and Ohio State at Tennessee on CBS.

1:08 - Villanova, with a fast break dunk opportunity with 10 seconds remaining, makes the move to dunk, presumably gets yelled at by head coach Jay Wright, thinks better of the dunk, and in the process double dribbles. A Jay Wright coached team does not dunk in a blowout. It double dribbles.

1:11 - Illinois at Purdue on now. Doris Burke is the color analyst. Pun City isn't the hugest fan of her in this role. She was a great sideline reporter but this blog isn't convinced she adds a lot of analysis/knowledge to the men's game. We'll see though. Illinois up 6-0 early.

1:17 - CSTV's announcer, sounding very A/V club (just from an audio standpoint), says "I don't know if he knows they aren't worth 4 from there". Hoo-hah! Comic gold.

1:19 - Going to break in Houston, they show a fan with a 10-gallon hat, red sportcoat, cowboy boots and an unlit cigar in the front row. No, this is not a student. It's a booster, and the look is not intended to be humorous. Wow. Looked like a real life Rich Texan.

1:21 - Doris Burke kinda growing on me, she does have some reasonable insight despite having never played men's basketball.

2:05 - "If you leave him open from 2 feet out, he'll probably make that shot 9 times out of 10." - CSTV announcer.

2:13 - UTEP has a guy named Watts from Compton. That guy belongs at Long Beach State or something.

2:37 - Turned on the North Carolina-Maryland game on the small TV. Houston just clinched the win by way of "the rule," up 7 with 6:50 left. It was discovered that this blog broke the volume and the UHF stations on the small TV when trying to remove a stuck VHS tape last week. Closed captioning on VHF it is!

4:05 - UNC gets big-screen billing as Maryland was up by 10 and the gap has been closed. Sun is setting and haven't really even noticed the time slip past. UNC now trails 63-59.

4:06 - Oh yeah, Ohio State at Tennessee and Texas A&M at Kansas State are the other two games in progress. Neither is terribly exciting. So, the ACC wins out even though the network-to-local-back-to-satellite feed does look extremely washed out on screen.

4:08 - UNC ties it up at 64, Maryland seems to be running out of gas in the Dean Dome. Brent Musberger just told everyone they were an 18-point underdog.

4:12 - While flipping back to ESPN, the bottom scroll indicates an "Upset Alert" that says Maryland is tied with UNC with 7:18 remaining. Is that the ultimate jinx or what? Plus, what are viewers supposed to do here? Pun City believes they were expecting the "WHOA, SWITCH OVER TO ABC!!!" reaction, but that's a little unrealistic seeing as Maryland wasn't even winning at the time. Very bizarre scroll.

4:25 - To Maryland's credit, they've stayed in this game even after the jinx. Down 78-76 now with 1:59 left. UNC is getting to most of these loose balls now though.

4:26 - Greivis Vasquez on the line to shoot 2 with 1:19 left. This could make things interesting if he ties it up.

4:27 - And he does.

4:28- On a rebound of a missed UNC shot, they foul Maryland with 1:06 left.

4:29 - Maryland up 2 until Tyler Hansbrough hits a layup. Gary Williams gets a timeout with 43.4 seconds remaining. 28 seconds on the shot clock. Could be huge if Maryland can get a bucket this possession.

4:30 - With 21.6 left, Maryland goes up 2 on an Osby layup. 82-80 with 10.7 seconds left after UNC misses their first attempt and gets the ball out of bounds under the hoop even though they hit it out.

4:33 - 1.7 seconds left, a jump ball goes to the Heels. They're getting a lot of breaks here. This is exciting though.

4:35 - Maryland wins! Upset Alert!

4:36 - Questionable play as Tyler Hansbrough had a 3-pointer to win that. Pun City supposes beggars can't be choosers with 1.7 seconds left though.

4:38 - Apparently UNC allows fans to walk on the court on their way out. About 7 consecutive fans take the opportunity to wave to the camera while the postgame interviews are going on. Pretty amusing.

4:41 - Whoa, ESPN scrolls another "Upset Alert," this time showing the final in Chapel Hill plus USC beating UCLA. The USC-UCLA outcome is unexpected. That could end up being the signature win USC needs to make it into the NCAAs.

4:43 - Watching the tail end of KSU-Texas A&M. Kansas State up 9 with 8:02 remaining, so this is over by the rule. If KSU coach Frank Martin ever had a movie written about him, John Tuturro would definitely star.

4:45 - Wells is out. Plan is to head out to Maxwell's later in the evening. That should provide a bunch of screens to view games on simultaneously. This was intended to be our "warmup" for March Madness, but this is a little more intense than March Madness. When the tournament is going on, there's usually a break right now until 6:00. During the regular season, there's no such break and a ton more games, not to mention more stations to keep track of.

4:51 - Speaking of which, Pun City just signed up for March Madness On Demand. Highly recommended for anyone that might want to watch one out-of-market game during the tournament. There's no sense in having a lag time on these games when they're showing. If you're interested, cbs.sportsline.com with a login allows you to reserve your spot. Don't say Pun City didn't remind you.

5:10 - Probably a good stopping point here, Pun City's going to watch Clemson at Duke. Pretty awexome scene they just showed: The UNC-Maryland game was being displayed on the scoreboard at Cameron Indoor Stadium, and when Hansbrough missed the last-second shot to lose the game for UNC, the entire gym erupted. Clemson fans were high-fiving Duke fans, everyone was happy. Pun City would have to imagine that Maryland is a lot of these fans' 2nd-favorite team. Enjoy the games! (Pun City knows it does).

"The Rule"

2008-01-08T16:58:00.001-06:00

Good evening. After posting on Sunday, this blog realized that it hadn't done a post on "the rule." Part of the reasoning is that most of this blog's 4 readers have heard Pun City talking about it on the street. But, in any case, for posterity, Pun City's going to post it here too.

This rule applies to men's college basketball games. There's a good chance that some variation of it could apply to other sports, but since Pun City knows college hoops best, and initially created it to be applied to the sport, this blog is sticking to just college hoops.

The rule states that if a team is leading by more points than there are minutes remaining on the game clock, and the lead in question is greater than 6 points (2 possessions), then the game is over and the team that is leading will win. A key part of this is that the minute column of the game clock is all that is considered, so if Cornell is leading Yale by 8 with 7:52 remaining, that game is over.

As you may note, this rule is not 100% effective. Matter of fact, scroll down to the previous post and you'll see an example where this rule was broken. But it's roughly 99.5% accurate, which is pretty cool. This certainly means seeing a "rule-breaking" game is truly extraordinary. This blog thinks it has only seen about 5 of such games in person, dating back to 1999. Pun City can't think of a single time a road team was able to break the rule, but definitely two occasions where the game was at a neutral site and the rule was broken. So, you heard it here, earth-shattering news, home teams with big leads win a ton.

In any case, tracking the rule can add another dimension to some blowout games, and tracking the rule being broken can help quantify how huge a comeback is. This blog isn't recommending it, but for those of you that like to bail on games early (where are you going that's more important than a college basketball game?), you could conceivably use the rule to determine a time to leave. Marquette leads Savannah State by 14 with 13:22 remaining? That game's over. Don't leave though, you could be missing some rule-breaking history.

This blog's cruising to the Marquette-Seton Hall game tonight, hopefully there's some rule breaking going on.

UWM Panthers Show The Heart of a Champion

2008-01-06T18:25:00.000-06:00

A sports story that was inexplicably buried on the 6th page of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and nowhere to be found nationally, was that of the UWM Panthers' victory over the Detroit Titans on Saturday. This is a story that should not remain obscured.

Panther fans may know that this was the 4th game UWM was playing without the services of Torre Johnson, formerly their leading scorer and arguably their best player at the time. Johnson was unceremoniously booted from the team after being charged with "Substantial Battery - Intend Bodily Harm," as listed on Wisconsin Circuit Court access.

Coinciding with the removal of Torre Johnson was the demotion and suspension of freshmen Tim Flowers and Kevin Johnson, in addition to junior Roman Gentry leaving the team for personal reasons. Both freshmen had been key components in the UWM rotation earlier in the year, with Flowers actually starting 8 games. Gentry was also a contributor, starting 4 games for the Panthers this season.

Fortunately for head coach Rob Jeter, the Panthers still had 10 players plus redshirt Brad Garrett. And these remaining players have taken to playing a strong team game, eschewing personal goals for that of the team. Unexpectedly, the Panthers had beaten Wyoming, Central Michigan, and Wright State heading into Saturday night's game. Their RPI had soared from a season low of 216th to 174th. The Panthers were showing that a team concept can produce amazing results. Even if their overall talent level had fallen off, their attitude quotient had risen through the ceiling.

Then came Saturday night's game. Playing Horizon League rival Detroit, a team that had also kicked its best player to the curb (Brandon Cotton), Milwaukee found itself in an early hole. The Titans' 2-3 zone was causing the Panthers fits, and a cold shooting night (32.1 percent from the field) was not helping.

With 6:43 remaining, UWM trailed 48-34. After 3 resilient games, it seemed as though the Panthers' run would come to an end. Rob Jeter set up a full-court press in a last-ditch effort to raise the number of possessions for the remainder of the game. Something clicked. The Panthers immediately went on an 11-0 run, pulling within 3 with 4:52 remaining. The Titans were being stifled by the press, and leading scorer Jon Goode was obviously running out of steam. The run was temporarily sidetracked, as Detroit pulled ahead 53-49 with 1:45 left.

No one could have blamed the Panthers for running out of gas here, but the raucous crowd picked them up, and some untimely Detroit fouls allowed 3 UWM free throws to cut Detroit's lead to 53-52. 44 seconds were left, and Detroit owned possession of the ball. With 26 seconds left, Deonte Roberts deflected the ball loose, about 10 feet away from any player. The ball came to rest near half court on the floor. Ricky Franklin, playing in jersey number 34 after getting blood on his usual number 5, dove to the ground and slid for at least 7 feet on the floor, undoubtedly acquiring some floorburn but also reaching his goal, the loose ball. Detroit tied him up, forcing a jump ball. Possession went to Milwaukee with 22 seconds remaining. Milwaukee would have one last chance to complete the comeback.

Detroit's defense clamped down, forcing the Panthers to run the clock further down than they would have preferred. With 4 seconds left, Deion James handed off to Paige Paulsen well beyond the arc, about 32, 33 feet out. It was as good of a shot as the Panthers could muster, unguarded but too deep for a normal possession. Paulsen fired with 2 seconds remaining and willed in the bomb, setting off a wild celebration. A deflated Titan squad missed the obligatory full-court heave attempt, and the appreciative Panther squad high-fived and hugged the entire front row on their way to the locker room.

This had to be one of the most exhilarating games in college basketball this season, a frantic come-from-behind victory in front of a small (3,410) but supportive crowd.

Jeter summed it up best with his post-game comments, saying "The last part of that game really shows how far we have come as a team. That last little scramble for the ball ... it looked like Ricky (Franklin) dove about 15 feet to finally get to that ball. I'm just so proud of the way they won the game. They went after it and they won it."

The last four games should make any Panther fan proud. Here's hoping for many encores to come.

Pun City In 2008: Feel Free To Call It A Comeback

2008-01-01T19:09:00.000-06:00

The U62 Telethon is on the air!

Always wanted to say that. Paraphrasing Stanley Spadowski, Pun City is back on the air. Sorry for the delay. Lots to cover here, so let's get cracking.

From the pun front:

People from Texas can be a bit Austintatious.

From the Tecmo front:

This blog finished up its Tecmo Super Bowl season where Pun City was trying to get every team to wind up 8-8. Some unexpected results there. First off, this blog was indeed successful in getting each team to 8-8. From there, Pun City had noticed/been informed by Ronk Romens that point differential was the second tie-breaker. Once Pun City was in week 17, it tried for some point differential ties as well. There were some successes on this front, including some nail-biters.

The first game of week 17 was Kansas City versus the Los Angeles Raiders. The Chiefs were sitting at +183 on the point differential, and 8-7 in record. The Raiders were 7-8 in record, +85 in point differential. So....doing the math for you, if the Raiders beat the Chiefs by 34, the two teams would tie in both record and point differential. Fortunately Pun City was able to pull off the feat, and after all other games were played, the AFC West Division standings showed the following lines:
1. Rai 8-8
1. KC 8-8
2. SD 8-8
3. Den 8-8
4. Sea 8-8

Similar ties were able to be accomplished in the AFC East, where the Bills and Dolphins tied at 8-8 and +90, and this blog was also able to get the AFC Central champion Pittsburgh Steelers to +90 on differential also.

In the NFC East, the Giants and Eagles tied at +79, and though the NFC West race wasn't close with the 49ers winning by 163 points, the NFC Central was close going into the last game. The Green Bay Packers were taking on the Minnesota Vikings. If Green Bay was able to beat Minnesota by exactly 30, the Vikings would fall into a tie with the Chicago Bears at +121. Leading by 27, the Packers gained possession of the ball on the 50 yard line with 45 seconds remaining, and proceeded to run off 29 ineffectual seconds, advancing only to the 39. Pun City knew that 16 Tecmo seconds was not very much, but figured there was just enough time for one pass play. Don Majkowski found a streaking Ed West down the sideline, who caught the ball with 2 seconds remaining and ran out of bounds at the 11 yard line with 1 second remaining. From there, Chris Jacke hit a 28-yard Field Goal to clinch the Bears-Vikings tie. After checking the game statistics, Pun City let the fireworks ensue.

Tecmo aficionados know that the "division champion" graphics normally show up when a team clinches the division based on record. With all teams having the same record in this season, that wasn't going to happen. Another quirk of Tecmo is that it will wait until a week is completely over before declaring any tie-breaker division champions. Given this knowledge, Pun City knew that all six division champion graphics would be appearing in sequence, and this blog would find out a) If Tecmo could handle a 3rd tie-breaker, and b) Potentially what that was. There was also a good possibility of finding out c) How to put out a fire started by a smoking Nintendo.

As it turned out, the screen flashed across Buffalo Bills, Pittsburgh Steelers, Los Angeles Raiders, New York Giants, Minnesota Vikings, and San Francisco 49ers as division champions; with the Miami Dolphins, New York Jets, Kansas City Chiefs, Philadelphia Eagles, Chicago Bears, and Detroit Lions as wild cards.

This meant that indeed Tecmo Super Bowl can handle a 3rd tie-breaker, and it turned out to be total points scored. Pun City enjoyed the project, but getting two teams to have the same number of wins, points scored, and points against is a tough nut to crack.

Lastly, from the college basketball front:

This blog was at the Marquette-Savannah State game in Milwaukee's Bradley Center last Saturday. This was fun, but just prior to the game this blog had some business to do. Pun City had been listening to the Wisconsin-Texas game on the radio on the way down, and was very much interested in tracking the result. The Bacardi Club in the concourse was a huge disappointment and was not showing the game on any of their 3 flatscreen TVs. Fortunately, just down the hall, a normal cathode ray TV was displaying the game. A crowd had gathered around the screen, probably about 15. The group swelled to about 20 before the end of the game. What followed was a pleasant surprise for Pun City. As you may be aware, Marquette and Wisconsin are arch-rivals, so Pun City was expecting at least a minority of the watchers to be rooting against the Badgers. This wasn't outwardly noticeable, however. And when Michael Flowers hit the game-winning shot to put Texas away with 2.7 seconds remaining, the entire group let out a genuine, giant cheer. Maybe they were just happy that Marquette's RPI was being raised, maybe they found Wisconsin to be the lesser of two evils, hopefully they were happy for the state of basketball in Wisconsin, but Pun City is happy to report that they cheered. Mad props Marquette fans.

Co-pundrum

2007-11-20T22:08:00.000-06:00

Sorry dudes and dudettes, Pun City is going on a little hiatus due to some real world work needing to get done before the end of the year. That's on the real, yo. Ideally this blog will get some mini posts up on occasion, and this blog realizes that a semi-college-basketball blog going on hiatus at this time in the year is really crushing, but duty unfortunately calls.

For tonight, a scene from the US Cellular Arena as UWM took out South Dakota State:

An SDSU player with 4 fouls scored a breakaway dunk, but then slapped the backboard to punctuate the effort.

This act, not surprisingly, resulted in a technical foul, which doubled as his 5th personal. After UWM's Paige Paulsen made the first free throw, the PA announcer relayed the information: "That's the fifth personal for (the player)" (HORN)

This was followed up by a lone voice in the UWM student section yelling out "Dipshit!"

Pun City thought that was a good summary of the undisciplined move. Happy Thanksgiving.

College Basketball Conference Tournament Reviews

2007-11-13T21:46:00.000-06:00

Good evening, this blog is loving the return of the college hoops season! Having ventured to 14 separate conference tournaments since 2004, this blog figured it would write up some grades (mainly Bs) for each of the tournaments, as well as some commentary.

Tournament: Atlantic 10
Year Visited: 2007
Location: Atlantic City, pre-determined
Weather: Shitty. 30s and blizzard followed by 40s and windy
Ticket Cost: $300.00 for 11 games
Seat Location: 2nd Row
Free Stuff: Pontiac "spike bag," Geico winter hats and cups, Atlantic City pens, Salt Water Taffy, Atlantic 10 bottle

Good tournament, quality of play was high, sent 2 teams to the NCAAs. Fans generally friendly, sweet venue in Boardwalk Hall. Unfortunately fairly expensive for food and lodging. Close to malls. Average of $27.27 per game on tickets not bad. Was able to get a hat for 10 bucks the last day of the tourney. If it weren't for the weather and the crappy hotel, this could have been a lot more fun. Overall Grade: B

Tournament: Atlantic Sun
Year Visited: 2004
Location: Nashville, (rotates), pre-determined
Weather: Balmy. 60s and sunny
Ticket Cost: < $50.00 for 7 games (Pun City went to 3)
Seat Location: Front Row
Free Stuff: Foam distractor from Troy State's boosters

Quality of play was low, but intensity was great. Saw a miracle 11-point comeback by Troy State over Georgia State within the last 3:00. First-ever exposure to Central Florida's awesome fight song. Very new arena (Curb Events Center) at a scenic campus (Belmont). First come-first served seating. One high school-esque concession stand, those are great for the prices. Was able to get a hat for 5 bucks the last day of the tourney. $16.67 per game is awesome, especially since it could have been better if Pun City went the all-session route. This blog would have liked to have spent more time there, but feels it got the gist of it. Overall Grade: B

Tournament: Big Ten
Year Visited: 2006
Location: Indianapolis, (previously rotated), pre-determined
Weather: Unseasonably awesome. 70s and sunny
Ticket Cost: $50.00 for 1 game
Seat Location: Upper deck. Moved to 2nd of 3 decks for 2nd half.
Free Stuff: National Guard towel, t-shirt; Big Ten beads, AT&T ball, 7up cans

Pun City tacked on the Big Ten to a 3-conference trip. It was not a great move in hindsight. The amount of free stuff and great location of Indianapolis were nice consolations to this blog being dead tired the whole day. Ticket cost hurt. Having to drive 6 hours after the game ended at 5:00 and work the next day hurt more. Pun City would love to get to this whole tournament some time instead of just seeing the final while worn out. This is weak, but Pun City thinks it's only fair: Overall Grade: Incomplete

Tournament: Big West
Year Visited: 2005
Location: Anaheim, pre-determined
Weather: Expectedly great. 70s and sunny
Ticket Cost: $50.00 for 7 games (Pun City went to 3)
Seat Location: 10th row. Moved to front row for 2 games.
Free Stuff: Discount at ESPNZone and Disneyland. Pun City won a basket with Big West pencils, cheese, crackers, Mickey Mouse lawn ornament, Disneyland blanket, wine glasses, Disneyland book, concert tickets, and an ESPNZone gift card in a halftime contest.

Cool tournament. Quality of play was high, sent 2 teams to the NCAAs. People were friendly, winning the halftime contest was huge. Interesting venue, this blog doesn't think it hosts too many sports outside of just this tournament. $7.14 per ticket is a good deal, although the final alone cost $25.00 and this blog's cost was actually $16.67 per game. Conveniently across the street from Disneyland, although this blog didn't partake. Overall Grade: B

Tournament: Colonial
Year Visited: 2007
Location: Richmond, pre-determined
Weather: Great. 50s and sunny
Ticket Cost: $50.00 for 11 games
Seat Location: 8th row in the corner
Free Stuff: VCU Ball, Richmond Press Gazette Newspapers and pencils, GMU Pom, Army bag, Health Center Stress ball, Massager, Tape Measure

Probably the ideal tournament. Very high quality of play, very intense games, lots of free stuff, friendly people. George Mason lasting the entire run of the tournament and more than justifying this blog's asking for (and receiving, thanks Moike) a GMU jersey was a huge plus. The Richmond Coliseum is a decent venue, although in the middle of nowhere as far as retailers. Pun City enjoyed its stay in Richmond, a very underrated town. Ridiculously awesome price of $4.55 per game is groin-grabbingly amazing. Overall Grade: A+

Tournament: Conference USA
Year Visited: 2006
Location: Memphis, pre-determined
Weather: Great. 60s and sunny
Ticket Cost: $150.00 for 11 games
Seat Location: 15th row, halfcourt
Free Stuff: UAB towel, various pompoms (Memphis, UAB)

A pretty cool tournament. Level of play high with 2 NCAA teams. Sold out atmosphere when Memphis played. Empty when they didn't. $13.64 per game a good value. Memphis is an awesome town, primarily downtown. Extremely friendly people. Unfortunately no real sponsors with freebies coupled with expensive concessions. Although, getting food outside the arena is much better anyway (albeit not cheap either). Half-bizarre, half-awesome FedEx Zone is a little surreal but of note. Fans can play FedEx-themed games there, fun and corporate, so a double bonus there. Tickets checked like crazy. Overall Grade: B

Tournament: Horizon
Years Visited: 2004, 2005
Location: Milwaukee, based on seed, very challenging to plan
Weather: Lousy. 30s, brisk
Ticket Cost: $20.00 for 1 game
Seat Location: 5th row and 30th row, UWM student section
Free Stuff: UWM pom pom

Only a one-bid conference. Play very intense. Extremely drunk crowd. Fun to see the intensity up close from the student section, A-Sun is the only other comparable tournament where Pun City has had access to a student section. Not very corporate because of the late-determined site. This blog would really prefer a neutral site with some corporate sponsorship, but there is something to be said about a sellout crowd blowing the roof off, even if it isn't too cool for the visitors. This blog would like to catch the full tournament some time, but it's tough to do especially when Pun City road trips it each year. Overall Grade: B-

Tournament: MEAC
Year Visited: 2007
Location: Raleigh, pre-determined
Weather: Great, as Pun City figured. 60s and sunny
Ticket Cost: $15.00 for 2 games
Seat Location: 3rd row, halfcourt
Free Stuff: KB Home cup, pen and ball, MEAC pin, Navy pen, lanyard and ball

This blog only got to two games, so not ideal, Pun City realizes. Pun City would have liked to have stayed around Raleigh longer. Also lacking was that they were the opening round games so very few fans were in attendance. Definitely a cultural experience, the vendors in the hall made it seem like an outdoor market brought inside. This was pretty cool though after Pun City finally tracked down a MEAC Tournament shirt. Quality of play was very low. Rivalries were intense but this was mainly in the cheerleading and band departments, not on the floor. This blog wouldn't mind catching the full tourney some time, but it's not a priority. Overall Grade: B-

Tournament: Mid-Continent (Now Summit League)
Year Visited: 2006
Location: Tulsa, pre-determined
Weather: Great. 60s and sunny. Maybe even a little hotter some days.
Ticket Cost: $50.00 for 7 mens games and 7 women's games (Pun City went to 4 Mens and 3 Womens)
Seat Location: 2nd row, behind basket
Free Stuff: Ice cream snacks (3 times), Mid-Con t-shirt, Western Illinois t-shirt, JJ Jumper beads

Good tournament. Watching the womens games wasn't as bad as this blog figured it would be. Plus, it was a good time-killer in Tulsa. In fairness though, Tulsa has a few things to do, so killing time wasn't needed too much. Hosted by a high school, concessions at high school prices, which is awesome. This blog remembers getting a hot dog, chips, and a soda for the same price as a Missouri Valley Conference soda. $7.14 per men's game and $3.57 ($3.57!) per any game is a heck of a deal. Only 1 NCAA bid, but games were intense. Pun City watched Chicago State complete a miracle comeback. Trailing 52-39 with 9:32 left, the Cougars went on a 24-5 run and won 75-66 in regulation. Over 4 points per minute is a nice clip. No vendors around the arena, but easily catchable giveaways in the sparsely attended day games made up for it and then some. Overall Grade: B+

Tournament: Missouri Valley
Year Visited: 2006
Location: St. Louis, pre-determined
Weather: Great. 60s, somewhat windy.
Ticket Cost: $80.00 for 9 games
Seat Location: 40th row, moved to 2nd row for 3 or 4 games
Free Stuff: MVC pens, National Guard t-shirts and wristband, State Farm "spike bag," coffee mug, radio, and calculator

Great tournament. 3 NCAA bids, probably should have had 4 and made a case for 5. Crazy fans, excellent freebies. Concessions way expensive and unfortunately only one mall with food options within walking distance. $8.89 per game is a great deal, especially for this quality of basketball. Pun City liked St. Louis a lot too, really a good spot. Overall Grade: A-

Tournament: Ohio Valley
Year Visited: 2004
Location: Nashville, pre-determined but rotates
Weather: Great. 60s and sunny.
Ticket Cost: $20.00 for 1 game
Seat Location: 32nd row
Free Stuff: None

Pun City was only there for one game, didn't have a chance to take it all in. Only one bid. Gotta do it: Overall Grade: Incomplete

Tournament: Pac 10
Year Visited: 2005
Location: Los Angeles, pre-determined
Weather: Great. 70s and sunny.
Ticket Cost: $240.00 for 7 games (Pun City went to 3)
Seat Location: 50th row
Free Stuff: Game Programs, Foam ball and basket from Cooper Tires

High quality of play. Ushers horrible. Ticket prices steep, although Pun City brought that on itself a bit. Concessions way way ridiculously high. Arizona fans are jags. Parking way high. Overall Grade: D+

Tournament: Sun Belt
Year Visited: 2004
Location: Bowling Green, KY, pre-determined but rotates
Weather: Good. 60s (it was night time).
Ticket Cost: $25.00 for 1 game
Seat Location: Upper Deck, moved to 2nd row
Free Stuff: Foam brick, mini ball, Sun Belt cup, Nokia cup

Only went to one game, extremely friendly people, one-bid league, would have liked to have stayed longer. The amount of free stuff compared with how long Pun City was there is a lot in hindsight. EA Diddle Arena is a great arena. Grade would probably improve after a second visit, but Pun City's tired of the incompletes. Overall Grade: B-

Tournament: WAC
Year Visited: 2005
Location: Reno, pre-determined but rotates
Weather: Great. 70s and sunny.
Ticket Cost: $50.00 for 4 games
Seat Location: 50th row, moved down to 20th row for 1 game.
Free Stuff: Mini ball, WAC Towel with credit card signup

Good quality of play, intense games. 2-bid league. Fairly nice but crazy people. Pun City was tired from a long overnight drive for these. Lawler Events Center is a cool venue. Reno seems worth visiting again. Probably would be cool to catch this one in its entirity some time. Overall Grade: C+

How To Stop the Super Tecmo Bears

2007-11-06T20:12:00.000-06:00

Good evening, sorry about the lacking posts last week, it was a busy one. This is the first post in hopefully a series dedicated to defending against/effectively using each playbook in Tecmo Super Bowl. The first team Pun City has chosen to profile is the Chicago Bears. Here goes.For the purposes of this post, we're going to label each of the plays above. Top row is A, B, C, and D. Bottom row is 1, 2, 3, and 4.

Defending when playing the computer: The Bears are actually really a tough nut to crack here. Normally, Pun City likes to choose a play that will go in one direction, so that it would be able to choose a defender that can defend the other direction. For instance, one could choose Play 1 and take a defender near the top of the screen, thus neutralizing Play C because you know that your drones have 1 covered. This is the problem with the Bears though. Because Neal Anderson is such an effective runner (dude can destroy you), you really have to be extra cautious here. All things considered, Pun City would not recommend choosing either Play C or Play 1. Pun City would actually choose Play A. The reasoning behind this is as follows: First off, Jim Harbaugh is a pathetic quarterback in the game. If he beats you, they earned it. Secondly, Play A is very easily devastating, Anderson breaks that thing for huge gains a lot. Thirdly, the other three running plays are at least containable without having called them. As far as positioning, when the formation is the one in Plays A, D, and 2; this blog would choose one of the middle linebackers, then run between the guard and the center in an effort to stop Play D and also get to the quarterback for play 2 (as you know, you called play A, so that's neutralized). When the formation is the one from B, C, and 1, this blog would take the upper linebacker (Right as listed on the game). This way you can take away Play C. You're a little susceptible to Plays B and 1, but Play B doesn't usually go for a ton of yards since Muster is slow, and Play 1 usually fails because Harbaugh sucks (as do the Bears receivers). For the formation in Plays 3 and 4, you are kinda screwed having picked Play A. But, you're only screwed insomuch as Jim Harbaugh is able to complete a pass. So, maybe 50% of the time for an average of about 8 yards. With the formation in Plays 3 and 4, just take your best pass rusher. You know it's going to be a pass play, and you know you picked a run play, so it's just a matter of who can get to Harbaugh quickest and force him into a lousy throw.

Defending when playing a human: Definitely a lot more theoretical here. If this blog were a human, and picking plays to use against other humans, it would alternate between A, C, D, 2, 3, and 4. Play 1 takes too long to develop given the marginal benefit of the 3-route, 5-yard-route play. Play B isn't likely to work against a human since Muster isn't fast enough. The positioning ends up being the same as defensing the computer. You pretty much have to pick one of those 6 each time, hopefully basing each choice on the down and distance. This playbook is very tough to stop given the variety of plays (and speed of plays) from each formation. Fortunately, it is entirely unlikely that the pass plays will beat you like other teams' would. Pun City would place the highest priority on stopping Anderson, so plays A, C, and D would be the main ones this blog would call. Getting burned on a pass play is a tough way to lose, but your opponent will have earned it.

So that was the Tecmo Bears' playbook in a nutshell. This blog also has a new link for those of you checking the actual website. It's under "Inspirational Blog" on the sideline, a fairly cool site. But you can't see it in Facebook, so you'll have to actually check out the real live Pun City site to notice this. But enjoy, Pun City likes it so far. Over and out.

Let The Pun Shine

2007-10-30T20:05:00.001-05:00

No regular post tonight, it was too nice of a day so Pun City was soaking up all the punshine.

Here's a brief pun to hold you over.

The two Christmas trees exchanged boughs in a well-attended marriage ceremony.

Tecmo Super Favorites: AFC

2007-10-23T21:00:00.000-05:00

Good evening. Pun City was at an open practice for UWM tonight so there isn't a great deal of time here. But this blog does some alright work under pressure.

In a perfect world, Pun City would have drawn up a scouting report on how to defeat a specific team in Tecmo Super Bowl, as the first part in a 28-part series. This will wait for another day, Pun City needs to put some good effort into this, some pictures and bigtime research are in order for that.

In place of that, Pun City is going to rank teams in each Tecmo Super Bowl division, from the most preferred to play with, to the least-preferred. For tonight, the AFC:

AFC East

1. Bills
2. Dolphins
3. Colts
4. Patriots
5. Jets

The Bills, while very easy to win with, are mainly fun due to all-purpose monster Thurman Thomas. Three rushing plays with him plus a great receiver, not to mention the Bills' tough defense with about 4 quick guys you can use interchangably makes for a sweet team. The Dolphins are good with the Marino to the Marks Brothers (Duper and Clayton) combo, plus highly underrated John Offerdahl, for this blog's money the best Left Inside Linebacker in the game. The Colts are fun based on their offense only. That defense is just brutal, one of two reasons they lost the Super Bowl (the other being the 49ers). But the offensive effort they need to win is fun to apply. Patriots are just absolutely impossible, moreso than the Colts. Luckily they faced the Bears in the Super Bowl. For some reason, Pun City just hates the Tecmo Jets. They weren't good in the 1990s, and they drafted poorly, and they were from New York. That's just insurmountable in this blog's book.

AFC Central

1. Oilers
2. Steelers
3. Bengals
4. Browns

Oilers are the greatest show on Tecmo turf. Add awesome Ray Childress on defense, and you've got a fun team to play with. Additionally, Lorenzo White sucks so you don't even have to try to run with them, just use their 4 awesome pass plays over and over. Steelers really are rough but having Dwight Stone, a top-2 kick returner on Tecmo, and Greg Lloyd, a more than serviceable linebacker, makes for a reasonably good team even if they have no offense. The Bengals have a very tricky playbook when you're playing against them, this is helpful against other humans. James Francis is an underrated linebacker also. Browns are good enough to win with, but nothing is too amazing about them winning. Even though they suck, they were a real life playoff team in 1989 with the same core of players, so it doesn't come off as very impressive. Too thankless to like playing with them.

AFC West

1. Chiefs
2. Seahawks
3. Raiders
4. Chargers
5. Broncos

This blog grew up going to the Chiefs' training camp, and having Christian Okoye and Derrick Thomas on the same team, plus a solid passing attack, just makes for a good bit of fun. The Seahawks are another all-pass, no-run, no-defense team, except they can consistently win since they have a sweet passing playbook. The Raiders are amazing, almost a little too easy to win with though, even though everyone should be able to use Tecmo Bo at some point in their life. Marion Butts makes the Chargers pretty cool, given they have 3 running plays for him and he is somewhat of a one-man offense, though Billy Joe Tolliver's bullet throws are also amusing. The Broncos are actually a great deal of fun, they'd probably be 1st in the AFC East, but this is a sweet division. John Elway being waaaaay worse than in real life and Bobby Humphrey only having two rushing plays ends up knocking Denver behind the Chargers, but barely.

So there you are, this blog's favorites in the AFC. (And least favorites, for that matter). Thoughts for the week: Go Rockies and congratulations to Jamie and Travis!

Big Girls Don't Cry: The Slideshow!

2007-10-16T20:46:00.000-05:00

Haven't done a hyperlink translation in a looooong time, so here we go. Pun City decided to shorten this one up by making longer links this time, it way shortened the writing process and might actually be easier to follow now. This translation is explaining exactly what Fergie meant when she wrote "Big Girls Don't Cry." Enjoy!

Da Da Da Da
The smell of your skin lingers on me now
You're probably on your flight back to your home town
I need some shelter of my own protection baby
To be with myself and center, clarity
Peace, Serenity
I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I've got to get a move on with my life
It's time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
The path that I'm walking
I must go alone
I must take the baby steps 'til I'm full grown, full grown
Fairytales don't always have a happy ending, do they?
And I foresee the dark ahead if I stay
I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I've got to get a move on with my life
It's time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry
Like the little school mate in the school yard
We'll play jacks and uno cards
I'll be your best friend and you'll be mine Valentine
Yes you can hold my hand if you want to
'Cause I want to hold yours too
We'll be playmates and lovers and share our secret worlds
But it's time for me to go home
It's getting late, dark outside
I need to be with myself and center, clarity
Peace, Serenity
I hope you know, I hope you know
That this has nothing to do with you
It's personal, myself and I
We've got some straightenin' out to do
And I'm gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I've got to get a move on with my life
It's time to be a big girl now
And big girls don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
Don't cry
La Da Da Da Da Da

Midnight Madness: Now Served Between 7 and 10

2007-10-11T21:16:00.000-05:00

Pun City was visiting New Glarus, WI earlier this week with limited interweb access so as a result there was no post. Sorry for the lack of notice, this blog is sure that in excess of 1 Tuesday night was ruined.

As a result of being gone for so long and not having much prep time, Pun City is going to draw up a short preview of its upcoming weekend, which will be the opening practice for college basketball teams across the country.

On an action-packed Friday night, Pun City plans to drive to Madison for Wisconsin's opening practice. Work ends at 4:30, drive takes roughly 1 hour and 45 minutes. Picking up Pun City's grandma so she can take in the festivities alongside Pun City. Hopefully catching some decent action and a good preview of the season to come. Most likely not getting any autographs since this blog's supply of Wisconsin trading cards has dwindled over the last couple season-ticketless years. In any case, hoping to get a good hour of watching in before taking off.

The goal is to make it back to Milwaukee in time for UW-Milwaukee's opening practice, where players will be introduced at 10:00 PM. Hopefully the drive is only about 1 hour and 30 minutes by that time of night, and also hopefully Pun City is able to meet up with a couple friends that are also hoops fans.

Saturday night, tragically, Pun City's buddy has a bachelor party. This is very poorly timed given that Marquette has their first open practice that day. With the bachelor party starting at 7:30 PM though, Pun City does have an opportunity. Gates open at 6:45 and free shirts are being distributed to all attendees. It's a freakin' sweet shirt, so this blog is going to make a run at it even though this blog is going to have to miss the practice. Then a dead sprint up to Sheboygan to play some laser tag or hit in a batting cage with some friends.

Probably a little more intense than needed, but it's been since April that this blog has had any dose of College Basketball, so it's time to start mainlining it!

Fast Food: Rank Something Different

2007-10-02T18:13:00.000-05:00

Dairy Queen is a fast-food chain based in Minneapolis, MN. Their first store opened in Joliet, IL in 1940. While primarily known for their ice cream treats, DQ fits the necessary qualifications for review in this blog: 1. Chain restaurant. 2. Drive-thru. 3. Serve cheeseburgers. 4. Don't have to call ahead to get a reasonably fast meal.

Pros: A fantastic place for ice cream. Pun City will often trek there just for a Blizzard, which is good stuff. Ice cream cakes are pretty decent also, pretty good soda selection, offering Wild Cherry Pepsi, Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Mountain Dew Code Red, and Mug Root Beer, among others. (This blog seems to recall Pibb Xtra being available at some locations, in addition to Cherry Coke). Lots of locations near this blog, very convenient in that respect. The chicken finger basket is a classic, the Texas Toast included isn't very expensive for them, but extremely tasty with the butter they put on it. Very filling also, the chicken and fries really make for a big meal. Offering chili dogs is a good move, they've checked that one off the list. Service has been very good all around in this blog's experience. In summer, DQs are usually ice cold, which is nice. French fries are very good, usually include a good amount of salt. With over 5700 locations, Dairy Queen is usually convenient.

Cons: Very underwhelming cheeseburgers. The meat, while a generous portion, is a lower grade than this blog prefers. This is a disappointment for a place that sells the combo of burgers and ice cream, usually you can't go wrong with that combo. Lots of extra condiments that you have to let them know to remove, not used to special orders for that and the service will suffer when you make these requests. Some DQ locations have limited menus, while in Atlantic City, this blog encountered one of these that only served BBQ beef and chili for their "hot eats." Perhaps because of the amount of sugar and dairy served, Pun City has found most DQ locations to be very sticky. It also seems like workers have a hard time keeping up with all of the customer's spills. In the winter, DQs are usually ice cold, which is uncomfortable.

Burger-Only Ranking: 4 out of 10 Fryers. Buns are good, less standard condiments, better meat, and this would move up a lot. Also, less emphasis on crazy fireburgers and crap like that, just hone in on a good regular burger. It doesn't even have to be great, just solid and people will go to DQ over better burger purveyors just because they can have some good ice cream for dessert at Dairy Queen.

Overall Ranking: 6 out of 10 Fryers. Given the reasonably-priced, quality ice cream, in addition to the chicken and chili dog options, the lack of a good burger is somewhat forgiveable. Room for improvement on cleanliness, pricing could be a little better in general, consistently offering 3 dark non-diet sodas would also add some value. It's rare when a Dairy Queen ever has a cool "theme" inside, it'd be nice to see some character in these. Also, using styrofoam would be a good way to help keep food at optimal temperatures without freezing all of the customers.

Want to see how Dairy Queen stacks up against the competition? Check out these other Fast-Food Reviews courtesy of Pun City:

Bullets
Burger King
Culver's
In-N-Out Burger
Jack In The Box
McDonald's
Rally's
Sonic Drive-In
Wendy's
White Castle

Shuffle Off To Buffalo

2007-09-25T18:36:00.000-05:00

Since this blog is mainly just a copycat of a bunch of other blog's ideas (come to think of it, the entire internet is like that too), Pun City decided to copy this and act as though this blog was a celebrity or something. If you were too lazy to click on the link, celebrities are interviewed and asked to comment on/explain what random songs come up on their iPod in front of the interviewer. Here goes:

Lindsay Lohan, "Disconnected"

From her first album, this blog picked up the CD (Speak) in a Sheboygan KMart while killing time waiting for its friends to arrive and host a party. It's a pretty solid song, Pun City is of the opinion that Ms. Lohan is an underrated singer. That might be a good way for her to salvage her career actually, just put out a bunch of albums and stop acting. The song isn't the best on the album (this blog prefers First), but very listenable.

Mesu Kasumai, "White Wedding (Psh Yeah Right)"

This blog was surfing the web and found a site that had a few Nintendo-inspired keyboard beats you could download for free. It didn't look like they had gotten permission from the original artists so all the titles have some offset comment like that, or rhyme with the actual title, like "Hang up the phone now" instead of "I think we're alone now". Pretty solid imitation of the original, this blog doesn't mind when these come up.

Fat Boy Slim, "Kalifornia"

Pun City bought this album after hearing a couple Fat Boy Slim songs and loving them. The whole CD (You've Come A Long Way, Baby) is really consistently good. This might actually be the worst song on the album but it's still a good exhibition of Mr. Slim's skills. It goes a little long, (almost 6:00), but if you're in the right mood it's alright. Not sure what the message of the song is, most likely some type of drug-related topic but Pun City mainly listens for the beats.

Jay-Z, "Justify My Thug"

Pun City went out and bought The Black Album primarily due to the fact that 3 radio songs were out already, plus Jay-Z had indicated he was going to retire right after it was released. The CD actually holds up though, he got a lot of good producers on it and he's a great writer, bringing a great style to the lyrics and flow. The coolest part of this song is when he says he's the "Michael Schumacher of the rap rocka" (or something to that end). That a rap artist would have even heard of Schumacher is pretty cool, and hearing that name in a rap is pretty awesome.

Rihanna, "Don't Stop The Music"

Pun City picked up this CD (Good Girl Gone Bad) only for the song "Umbrella," which this blog knew would become extremely annoying in a short period of time. Pun City loves those type of songs. Great stuff. But this song isn't too bad, some nice tracks in the background make it pretty uptempo, this blog really can't complain. As a side note, all of these songs that have come up are producing pretty mild reactions. Pun City thinks this section of the iTunes shuffle is either the "mundane" or "run-of-the-mill" grouping.

The Lupins, "Take"

Alright, now we're getting somewhere. Like a lot of people, this blog bought the Dumb and Dumber soundtrack just because it wanted to hear the "Boomshakalaka" song that was featured in the previews and actual movie. Problem was, you couldn't tell what its title was and you just got it since it was probably one of these unheard-of songs. Well, alas, that song was nowhere to be found on the actual Soundtrack CD. All was not lost though, Take, among other songs on the CD, is a pretty good listen, providing a lot of good quotes, such as "You can have my Foghat shirt." Pun City does enjoy listening to this song, but it's probably one of those "memory" songs, where what it's associated with increases the value of the song.

Avril Lavigne, "Sk8er Boi"

This one's just a classic, very mainstream, very overplayed, extremely listenable and catchy. That's right up this blog's alley. All you have to do is say "see ya later boy" and someone's going to have that stuck in their head for the next hour, hour and a half. Plus it also talks about someone screwing up. For whatever reason, Pun City likes songs that talk about messing up or longing or stuff like that. That's just how Pun City rolls, this blog guesses.

Ace Of Base, "Cruel Summer"

Talk about a brilliant song. Ace Of Base took this song and made it their own. Pun City loves remakes, and this one is a gem. It weeded out all the crap of the original and presented this magnificent effort. Putting horns in the background, a drum machine, possibly a keytar, you can't ask for more than that. Also a song about longing, just a beauty all around. Probably in the top 25 or at least top 100 songs this blog has heard.

And there you are. That was actually pretty cool, hopefully it turned out as good as Pun City thinks it did. This blog is guessing not everyone's going to share those opinions on these songs, but that's cool, it's a free country. Over and out.

Pun City On The Defensive

2007-09-20T20:00:00.000-05:00

Tecmo Super Bowl is often just as fun when one is on the defensive side of the ball as when one is playing offense. Three consecutive sacks setting up 4th and 42 for the offense, winning in overtime on a safety, forcing 3 fumbles in a game, all of which were brought back for touchdowns. These are great reasons for Pun City often preferring the defensive side of the ball.
This blog came to several conclusions when analyzing Tecmo defensive statistics. First off, the computer rules the Interception rankings, while Pun City rules the other metrics, mainly sack-related. There are a number of reasons behind these. Let us examine:

-Interceptions occur at an extremely higher incidence for the computer as opposed to Pun City. There are a bunch of reasons for this. Among quarterbacks with at least one attempt, the overall average number of attempts per season for each was 181.92. Pun City's average was 125.49. Pun City's average is so low because Pun City completes more passes on average (72.9% to 58.6%). More complete passes leads to more yards and less need for more passes. As we explored previously, Pun City's QBs get injured at a much higher rate than the computer, so a higher percentage of throws were made by backups. Backups aren't as good and therefore throw more interceptions. The computer isn't as good and therefore throws more interceptions. The computer plays the computer for almost all games. Pun City plays the computer for all games, but is hampered for a couple other reasons.

-Computer QBs hang on to the ball longer and are less prone to running. This leads to a ton more sacks for Pun City as compared to the computer. This also means less throws actually get made against Pun City, meaning less interceptable balls.

-Pun City normally calls running plays when defending against the computer (for a number of reasons). Anecdotally, this blog has seen evidence implying that calling pass plays leads to a higher chance of interceptions.

-Pun City calls more plays accurately than the computer. For whatever reason, the computer doesn't guess plays right very often. Even when it does, Pun City can sometimes find the open man anyway. When a play is called accurately against the computer, there is a much higher likelihood of a sack instead of an interception.

-Pun City has a sneaking suspicion that the computer makes up some phony stats for games when it plays against itself. Through 8 weeks of the attempted 8-8 season where Pun City is playing every game, the most interception return yards for one player is at 17. Interception returns both for and against Pun City are very challenging to get any significant yards on. Very suspicious that the totals just happen to be pretty high when Pun City isn't involved in the game.

So, the lessons are: humans get more sacks, computers get more interceptions.

Tecmo doesn't keep track of some awesome statistics that wouldn't be necessary in real life (due to their rarity), but are a good measure on the game. Safeties, Blocked Extra Points, and Fumble Recoveries for Touchdowns are some that Pun City can manually track without a great deal of extra effort.

A final note is the statistic of "Points Prevented." Pun City invented this stat and based it only off of Blocked FGs and Blocked Extra Points. The number is the sum of the points that would have been accumulated had the kick gone through the uprights as opposed to being blocked by the player in question. It's kind of a cool way to see how helpful a player was outside of his normal defensive statistics. With that, here we go:

Records Set By Pun City:

Sacks: Lawrence Taylor, 99
Fumble Recovery TDs: Tim McKyer and Lemuel Stinson, 3
Safeties: Lawrence Taylor, 34
Blocked Extra Points: Derrick Thomas, 8
Blocked Field Goals: Lawrence Taylor, 4
Points Scored: Lawrence Taylor, 68
Points Prevented: Lawrence Taylor, 17

Records Set By The Computer:

Interceptions: Dave Waymer, 16
Interception Return Yards: Richard Johnson, 250
Interception Return Avg (min. 2 Interceptions): Eugene Robinson, 55.3
Interception TDs: 24 tied with 2

Hopefully that post was worth the wait, sorry for the delays on it. Until next time, hut hut hut hut hut hut hut hut hut hut hut hut.....

Made Ya Look!

2007-09-19T22:42:00.000-05:00

We're going to delay the post another night, Pun City compiled the stats for a sweet Tecmo blog, but it doesn't have enough time to do a write-up justice.

Please refrain from breaking kneecaps in the interim.

Thank you for your time.

Good night and godspeed.

Eggstreme Post!

2007-09-18T22:39:00.000-05:00

Hey, full post will be delayed a night, this blog was busy for the evening.

Here's some puns to tide you over. Over easy that is:

Eggsactly how do you expect to make the grade?

With more time in the morning, your chances of eating a balanced breakfast rise eggsponetially. Much more than when you're scrambling.

Are these pans reggulation size or what?

The chicken coop is run in a very eggalitarian manner.

In order to find the best chicken feed, they've run reggression testing.

That's all Pun City's got for today, back tomorrow with a better post. Hopefully it doesn't lay an egg.

The Hardcore, Psycho, Nitro Survey In A Can!

2007-09-11T20:24:00.000-05:00

What up. This blog knows that not all (okay, both) of you are on MySpace, which means that you don't get subjected to about 3 extra surveys a week.

This blog will occasionally partake in one of those, but Pun City figured it'd be cooler to create its own survey, instead of taking the surveys "the man" wants Pun City to take.

So here it is, feel free to jump in on the comments with your answers. Bonus points to anyone that can identify what the title's referencing:

Repost this with your answers! This survey peers deep into your soul!

1. If you were a club sandwich, how much guff would you take from two punk mail packages?

Absolutely none. Club sandwiches have proven themselves as postal experts.

2.If you were a shrimp sensation at Applebee’s, would you be sautéed, crisp fried, or fire grilled?

Personally, sautéed. Butter is awesome.

3.Who is your favorite Fantana?

Probably Sophia

4. Are you familiar with the 1-3-5 rule? If so, share a story of it being violated.

Definitely. This blog recalls in high school a math teacher was in the 2, which was probably the worst place to go, since no one else was there. Pun City went to the 5, and shortly thereafter someone else came in, and they were forced to use the 3, really a mess.

5. Whose country is this?

This is ouuuuuurrrrr country!

6. Is your love of lobster about to be indulged in more ways than you can imagine? If so, how many ways is that going to take?

Pun City doesn’t foresee this happening. That would take at least 7 ways though.

7. Can you hear me now?

Yeah, but how about in the bottom of that well?

8. What about the Red Sox?

You paint an interesting question. Obnoxious fans.

9. Which Brewers pitcher needs to be more consistent?

I don’t know, all of them?

10. Which Brewers pitcher needs to be more consistent RIGHT NOW?

Steve Woodard

11. Are you gellin’? If so, how so?

No, especially not feloniously.

12. How often do you force the vastness of your cell phone’s network into conversation?

Never, that type of jag move seems reserved for sadistic Cingular pitchmen.

13. Where’s the beef?

Far from the tofu section at Sentry.

14. What is your favorite third-world country?

Trinidad and Tobago

15. How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?

Three

16. Did you have a color in mind?

Yes

17. Which banner does Marquette REALLY want to raise to the rafters of the Bradley Center?

Pepsi Blue and Gold Classic.

18. Would you purchase a product that was advertised as “Initially Good”? If so, what type of product?

Yes, something like A & W root beer or RC Cola

19. Which event had more historical implications for you: Chili’s Margarita Madness 2007 or The 2007 Women’s NIT?

This blog's gotta go with Chili’s Margarita Madness 2k7 on this one. The traffic jams were at least half a car deep.

Jianlian-g Story Short...

2007-09-04T19:12:00.000-05:00

Man-yi Milwauk-yi-area readers were intrigued by the saga of Bucks number one pick Yi Jianlian. The following is Pun City's take on the situation, from beginning to end.

Jianlian yi-nitially refused to work out for the Bucks, their most recent scouting was at an yi-vent in Qatar where Jianlian's Chinese team had played. Yi-ven without having seen Jianlian in the pr-yi-ceeding couple weeks, Milwaukee took him with the 5th overall pick.

This was very un-yi-xpected. Jianlian had yi-mplied that he wasn't going to agr-yi to terms with the Bucks if they drafted him. Naturally, pand-yi-monium ensued. Yi-rroneous reports from China yi-ndicated that Jianlian would never sign with the Bucks. This threatened to become an yi-nternational incident. Commentators thought Jianlian's d-yi-mands were too much, given that only a few NBA cit-yi-es were capable of m-yi-ting his r-yi-quest of playing in an area with a s-yi-gnificant Chinese population. Was Jianlian trying to be yi-vil? There threatened to be an yi-mpasse in n-yi-gotiations.

NBA Commissioner David Stern was asked to interv-yi-ne, but like Jianlian, he was yi-vasive when asked to comment on the yi-ssue. This was going to b-yi-come a ver-yi political situation, the American and Chinese yi-conomies were both going to be yi-nfluenced by the n-yi-gotiations.

Jianlian only had a few options though.

1. B-yi-come a Buck by signing with them.

2. D-yi-mand a trade to another team, find a team willing to give the Bucks an yi-ven trade, and play for them.

3. Play in another countr-yi next year, in which case his rights would still be owned by Milwaukee, m-yi-ning he'd have the same pr-yi-dicament next yi-r.

4. Sit out an entire year, then r-yi-enter the draft next year, most likely falling b-yi-low his current value, possibly becoming yi-rrelevant in the process.

Obv-yi-ously the Bucks would pr-yi-fer option one, given the choice. They put all of their yi-fforts into convincing Jianlian to sign, yi-ven sending owner (and US Senator) Herb Kohl to m-yi-t the rookie and his jianlian-tourage.

Stunningl-yi, after s-yi-rious talks were held, the two sides reached an agr-yi-ment. Bucks management was yi-lated. Bucks fans were rel-yi-ved, as Milwaukee's first round pick hadn't been a mistake. Plus, after a few months, they'd had yi-nough. It wasn't yi-sy, but after promising Jianlian would play at l-yi-st 20 minutes a game, the Bucks got their man. Now Jianlian can only hope that he yi-clipses expectations and b-yi-comes a rook-yi of the yi-r candidate.

Man, if this blog got paid 5 cents for each one of these, it'd be making so much bread, since it'd have a pun-per-nickel. Pun Cit-yi will l-yi-ve you alone now.

Armchair Quarterback Stats - Tecmo Super Bowl

2007-08-28T19:16:00.000-05:00

Last week's post worked pretty well, not too much notable information from the 8-8 season yet (this blog lost a game to the Bears when playing with the Bucccaneers, so it will need to play with the Buccaneers again during the rematch, that's been the only hiccup), so this blog is going to draw up some more Super Tecmo nuggets it discovered while playing a season with each team. This week, statistics on the Quarterbacks:

-Easily the most oft-injured quarterback was Randall Cunningham (QB Eagles), who had 9 injuries and was out a total of 70 quarters. A distant second and third were Don Majkowski with 6 injuries and 46 quarters, and Billy Joe Tolliver with 5 injuries and 49 quarters.

-The only backup quarterback to get injured was Marc Wilson. This was probably because he was the only backup QB to play the whole season. This blog didn't want to suffer through any Steve Grogan games. Grogan, while infinitely better in real life, was somehow worse than his backup Wilson on Super Tecmo Bowl.

-3 QBs returned onside kicks for TDs. Rodney Peete did it when Pun City was controlling him, and Randall Cunningham and Steve Walsh did it for the computer.

Records Set By Pun City:

Completions: Dave Krieg, 175
Touchdown Passes: Jim Everett and Wade Wilson, 61
Fewest Interceptions: John Elway, 1 in 150 attempts
Average Yds. Per Attempt: Warren Moon, 24.2
Completion Percentage: Jim Kelly, 86.7%
QB Rating: Jim Kelly, 292.7
Rushing Attempts: Randall Cunningham, 134
Rushing Yards: Randall Cunningham, 1603
Yards per carry (min 80 carries): Randall Cunningham, 11.9
Rushing TDs: Randall Cunningham, 31
Points: Randall Cunningham, 186

Records Set By The Computer:

Passing Attempts: Don Majkowski, 281
Most Interceptions: Don Majkowski and Bernie Kosar, 32
Passing Yards: Warren Moon, 4542
Fumble Recovery TD: Dan Marino, 1
Combined Yards: Warren Moon, 4813

Next time this blog revisits Tecmo Super Bowl, there will likely be a look at the defensive side of the ball. Kickers and Punters might be up as well. For the time being, enjoy this awesomely pun-tastic commercial:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=aL6ysSActVU

Pun City's Tecmo Run: 26 for 28 Titles (Darn Colts and Cardinals)

2007-08-21T21:23:00.000-05:00

Pun City just finished its 28th season of Tecmo Super Bowl, taking a turn with each team in the game. Lots of results to report, some interesting, some not. We here at Pun City aren't too keen on the whole "editing" fad, so you get to enjoy the Writer's Cut of the information. Away we go...

Overall Record: 420-28-0 (.938) in the regular season, 81-2-0 (.976) in the playoffs, for a total of 501-30-0 (.944) overall.
26 Super Bowl titles, the Colts lost to the 49ers in the Super Bowl, the Cardinals lost to the 49ers in the NFC Title Game.
The tie for the most injuries went to John Stephens and David Meggett with 23 each. Stephens, however, was injured a total of 168 quarters (42 games) as compared to Meggett's 140 quarters (35 games).
Total injuries in the game for 28 seasons: 1152, for a total of 7665 quarters (1916.25 games)
If injuries were completely random and split evenly amongst all teams in the game, the expected amount of injuries this site's teams would have suffered would be 42 for 274 quarters.
Pun City would say that the game's internal computer is a jackass though, and as a result this blog's players suffered 112 injuries for 735 quarters.
This blog believes this occured for a few reasons. One of the ways the game tries to "even out" the human advantage is to injure key players when humans like this blog win too often or by too wide of a margin.
This blog's style of play also probably contributes to the higher incidence of injuries. Pun City will go to the bench without an injury or stay with a hot bench player after the original starter has returned. For this reason (among others), 13 players suffered their only injury while Pun City was controlling them. Within those 13, there were 3 players that suffered their only two injuries while under Pun City's leadership.

Single-Season Records set by Pun City:

Carries: Johnny Johnson, 211
Rushing Yards: Thurman Thomas, 1989
Yards Per Carry (min 80 carries): Thurman Thomas, 13.4
Rushing TDs: Johnny Johnson and Marion Butts, 39
Yards Per Catch (min 16 catches): Mark Carrier, 54.6
Receiving TDs: Sterling Sharpe, 33
Kick Return Average (min 16 returns): Dwight Stone, 29.9
Kick Return TDs: Dwight Stone, 9
Punt Returns: Kendal Smith, 31
Punt Return Yards: Kendal Smith, 380
Punt Return Average (min 10 returns): Vai Sikahema, 19.5
Punt Return TD: Mel Gray, Craig Heyward, Tony Martin, 1
Onside Kick Return TDs: Cleveland Gary, 3
Points: Marion Butts, 306

Single-Season Records set by the Computer:

Receptions: Jerry Rice, 78
Kick Returns: Sammy Martin, 90
Kick Return Yardage: Gaston Green, 1720
Receiving Yards: Jerry Rice, 2117
Yards From Scrimmage: Thurman Thomas, 2639
All-Purpose Yards: David Meggett, 3207

There's some more analysis to be done actually, this blog hasn't summed totals yet so this blog could have a lot more posts where this came from. In the meantime, another Tecmo project is underway: this blog is attempting to have every team finish 8-8 in the next season by attempting to win every game (only 8 times per team). Hopefully that goes well, through 8 Week 1 games it has been a success. Only 448 to go.

Long Beach State, Pepperdine, and USC: Pun City's Top Picks in the LA Area

2007-08-14T22:25:00.000-05:00

Pun City is back with a recap of the California trip. (Yeah, very creative, point noted).

Thursday this blog flew from Milwaukee to Memphis to Los Angeles, thinking that a Sports Illustrated would be able to amuse Pun City for the whole trip. The Sports Illustrated lasted roughly until Memphis.

This blog wrongly thought that there were enough articles that Pun City missed, and that these would entertain this site the last leg of the trip. After paging through the whole magazine, there had maybe been one article this blog hadn't read, so it took about 3 air miles to find out this blog wouldn't have much to do the rest of the ride. Adding to the problem was that the seating layout did not lend itself to this blog trying to sleep.

All was not lost, however, as this blog had grabbed a Los Angeles city map in Milwaukee so there was now a chance to study the map. This blog realized that Loyola Marymount, one of the 7 planned college destinations, was right next to LAX, where Pun City was flying in to.

This fact, combined with some last-minute plan changes, led to Pun City heading directly to LMU right after picking up a rental car (Chevy Cobalt, pretty solid, decent amount of leg room). LMU's campus is pretty cool, lots of white mission-style buildings. This blog was able to get into their gym, but a seemingly closed cheerleading practice was in session, so Pun City wasn't really wanting to get yelled at this early in the journey. Not surprisingly, the basketball rims were also off-limits since the cheerleaders were on the court. 0 for 1 on that front. Bookstore was open, however, so this blog got a shirt. 1 for 1 there.

Got some In-N-Out Burger, then visited this blog's friend Becky, who was temporarily displaced to a hotel. We were able to go to some Western Saloon place and get an appetizer and a drink. Shortly after, this blog drove over to friend Josh's place and stayed over there for the night (as would be the case most nights of the trip).

Friday this blog woke to news that Josh would be able to hang out all day, which was a surprise as this blog had expected him to be working all day. This was cool though, since he was alright heading to college campuses for the day, which not everyone would be down with.

The first Friday stop was Cal State-Northridge. Pretty solid campus, smaller but a really good Union and the basketball stadium had palm trees lining the entrance. Also of note was the orange grove at the campus entrance. This blog was able to grab rim (1 for 2) as the gym was empty and the hoop was collapsed. Also cool was the bookstore was open (2 for 2) and this blog got a hat.

Above: Displaying the crazy vertical it takes to hang on the rim at Cal State-Northridge.

Next up was UCLA, which really had a magnificent campus. Tucked into it was Pauley Pavilion, a hoops mecca but not the flashiest building this blog has ever seen. As a side note, having been to Cameron Indoor earlier this year, these two places prove that you can have one of the most breathtaking indoor stadiums without having a flashy exterior.

Pauley was open, and this blog was again able to grab rim (2 for 3), this time it was collapsed again. The bookstore was also open (3 for 3), and this blog got some wristbands.

Above: Pauley Pavilion, set up for Volleyball.

The last campus for Friday was USC, which ended up being this blog's favorite campus. A brand new arena, an abundance of shaded areas, lots of brick buildings and an attractive student body contributed to the high ranking. Pun City and Josh got into the Galen Center (USC's new basketball facility), setting off an alarm in the process. None of the workers even flinched at this, apparently they'd had a lot of false alarms. The arena looked really cool with its 6 windows letting light in, and the brand new floor looked pretty cool too.

Unfortunately, no basketball hoops were in sight, collapsed or otherwise, so this blog went rimless, bringing its total to 2 for 4 through Friday's visits. The bookstore was open (4 for 4), but this blog isn't a huge USC fan and didn't see any huge bargains that necessitated a purchase.

Friday night this blog went to the Angels-Twins game with Becky and company, and Angels Stadium, the game, and the postgame fireworks were all pretty awesome.

Saturday this blog was able to check out UC-Irvine, Cal State-Fullerton, and Long Beach State on its own. Irvine's gym was closed, so no rim there (2 for 5); however their bookstore was open (5 for 5), and this blog got a shirt. Irvine has a good campus, almost reminiscent of North Carolina's, with rolling hills and a lot of sunshine.

Cal State-Fullerton, on the other hand, was another story. While the gym was open and this blog was able to grab a collapsed rim again (3 for 6), the bookstore, visitor information booth, and practically everything else was closed up, leaving this blog 5 for 6 in the bookstore department. The fact that most of the state-run university was closed on a Saturday combined with an unshaded, small, fairly lame campus earned Fullerton the distinction of worst campus on the trip.

This blog went to Long Beach State without a lot of expectations. Josh had said that it was a pretty dull campus, and the place does look dull from one street. Looks were rather deceiving, however. Once on campus, Long Beach State is pretty impressive. Their student union has a pool in the middle of it, their basketball stadium is a giant blue pyramid, and there's tons of green spaces, shade, and some fountains here and there. The pyramid was hosting an AAU tournament, so unfortunately no rim grabbing (3 for 7), but the bookstore was open (6 for 7), and this blog picked up a t-shirt.

Above: Yet another reason why Long Beach State is awesome.

Saturday night this blog went with Becky to Dave and Buster's, and after struggling for a while found its niche at a trivia game. Sunday morning both Becky and Josh expressed interest in heading to Malibu to see Pepperdine's campus. This was cool, since Pun City wasn't expecting to get in an 8th campus on this trip. While the bookstore wasn't open on a Sunday (understandable), their basketball court was open, and this blog grabbed rim on a fully-extended hoop for the first time on the trip. This left Pun City 6 for 8 on bookstores and 4 for 8 on rims grabbed. Not too shabby.

By the way, Pepperdine's campus deserves special mention as perhaps the most picturesque campus in America, just amazing views of the Pacific and not far from a state park that has some amazing mountains. All this combined with a near-Olympic-sized (if not Olympic-sized) pool and a fantastic tennis facility. Oh, plus the basketball court is brand new and all of their facilities look to be very well-maintained.

So there you have it, big ups to pretty much everyone but Fullerton, Irvine could open up their basketball court but that's about their only knock, and Long Beach is really underrated. So let that be a lesson to you.

We're Number One! For High-Stepping Pizzas!

2007-08-08T22:54:00.000-05:00

Pun City checked out Google today, and this blog is proud to announce that it is now #1 on the charts for all of the following searches:

1. high-stepping pizza

2. "high-stepping pizza"

3. high-stepping pizzas

4. "high-stepping pizzas"

(Feel free to check for yourself)

Thanks to the readership, Google, and any formulas and programmers that made this day possible. Pun City pledges to continue being the web's leading source for all of your high-stepping pizza needs, and for any high-stepping pizzas you might also need information on.

Here's a cool link:

http://www.joesportsfan.com/cardCollection.php

And above is a picture of a pizza that would probably leave you high-stepping away.

A LAX Effort

2007-08-07T22:38:00.000-05:00

Alright, this blog is copping out a little tonight due to a long late tennis match and an upcoming trip. Did someone say upcoming trip? Whoa, wouldn't everyone like to know the proposed itinerary of said trip? Yes? Awesome!

Thursday - Flying to Los Angeles via Memphis. Because Memphis is on the way to LA from Milwaukee, right? Anyway, getting into LA around 5:00 and driving to Friend #1's place. Hopefully some In-N-Out or Jack In The Box that night.

Friday - For most of the day, need to entertain Pun City's self. This blog ideally would like to get to Loyola Marymount, USC, UCLA, and Cal State-Northridge. The impetus is on this blog to finish as many schools as possible by around 5:00 since Pun City and friends are going to the Angels-Twins game that night at 7:00 and would like to get there early to check out Angels Stadium.

Saturday - Pun City starts the day with Friend #1, but Friend #1 then has a wedding that afternoon/evening to get to. It would be cool to get to UC-Irvine and Cal State-Fullerton at some point on Saturday. For the afternoon/evening, the plan is to get to Friend #2's place and then head to Dave & Buster's. This blog's never been, but it sounds pretty fun. Staying the night at Friend #2's.

Sunday - Open day. Could go to San Diego, also maybe Malibu, or just chill in LA and get to a mall or something. Any schools this blog hasn't cleaned up already would be a nice addition here. Or if this blog is in San Diego or Malibu, getting to the University of San Diego, San Diego State, and Pepperdine would be cool. Long Beach State would be a nice spot to visit at some point, although...

Monday - Getting to the home of the Dirtbags would be a good pickup here. Not flying out until 12:15, so this blog doesn't think it'd be too much to ask, especially considering Long Beach isn't ridiculously far from LAX. Flying through Minneapolis this time, a little closer to a direct flight as compared to the Milwaukee-Memphis-LA flight.

That's all this blog's got for now, gotta get some rest before another big showdown/throwdown tomorrow night.

High-Stepping Pizzas: You've Come To The Right Place

2007-07-31T21:08:00.000-05:00

Pun City is back and feeling much more "above the weather" today. And at 102 degrees Farenheit, per the Walgreen's thermometer in Grafton, that's saying a lot. Let's get it started with some links.

First is a site the Marketing Sensei recommended, break.com. A lot of great videos there, this blog was a fan of this particular link:

http://www.break.com/index/urban_shoplifting.html

Pun City also stumbled across this growing site, which has a fairly comprehensive selection of commercials:

http://www.splendad.com/

Now, on to some ridiculousness. This blog often gets visitors coming from weird searches. Among these searches are such unique and varied phrases as "Pun City" (#1 out of 2 million, baby!); "commercial Ronnie Lott boy howdy" (#4 of 30,000+); and "webcamzz.com" (depends on the engine, usually top 5 of maybe 20).

Well, Pun City checks this out (Pun City is pretty self-aware for a website), and it thinks it's cool to have some poor bastards coming in here, not knowing what to expect. But this blog thought it would like to be the champ of all kinds of searches. Random searches, pointless searches, confounding and useless searches. For instance, this blog wants to be known as your source for the following:

High-stepping pizzas. This blog wants people to come here and find out relevant facts about high-stepping pizzas. People wearing pizza costumes aren't often seen high-stepping, but this blog thinks we need more of that. Pizzas, for the most part being inanimate, don't get up and high-step on their own. This blog found out that high-stepping while carrying a pizza isn't too challenging, but is way fun.

Deion Sanders, who made his name playing a couple sports and high-stepping after interceptions, also had a famous commercial where he pitched Pizza Hut with Jerry Jones. That most likely was the greatest moment for high-stepping pizzas, for this blog's money. (With the possible exception of when this blog high-stepped down its hall with a pizza last week, that was a great moment just in general world history though, so Pun City isn't sure if it qualifies).

This blog has three goals now:

Goal 1 - Find some picture of a pizza high stepping.

How about we get this guy to high-step?
This guy seems like a little bit of a pizza poser, but if this blog got him to high-step, that might tip him over to full high-stepping pizza status.
This dude's a complete idiot, no one needs to see that high-stepping.
While not a pizza, Pun City will advocate seeing this girl high-step. Or pretty much do anything, for that matter.

Goal 2 - Become the leading source for "high-stepping pizzas" on a major search engine.

There's only like 697 competitors out there, none of which have provided the type of high-stepping pizza coverage Pun City has here. The amount of high-stepping pizza coverage here puts all other websites to shame.

Goal 3 - Earn the top mark.

Pun City won't be content to just break the top 10 of "high-stepping pizza" searches. This blog's goal is to blow through the number 1 spot and have Google consider adding a number zero spot because of the dominance Pun City will eventually hold over all other high-stepping pizza "destinations."

While other seemingly inane and offbeat search keywords were considered, this blog sought out high-stepping pizzas, because Pun City sees the potential there. Pun City knows that high-stepping pizzas are one of the biggest issues facing Americans today. Pun City believes that YouTube Debate questioners should be asking Mike Gravel what he is going to do to promote the use of high-stepping pizzas in the plains, then asking Duncan Hunter how he plans to stop the scourge of high-stepping pizzas in our forests. (The correct answer to both questions, of course: Appizzament).

So now you know another tenet this blog stands for, and you can go out and spread the word to all of your friends that are seeking more information on high-stepping pizzas.

And if you get the chance, click on Pun City's link after searching for high-stepping pizzas.

Satellite Bob: The Man, The Myth, The Legend

2007-07-24T19:48:00.000-05:00

Good evening, Pun City's a little under the weather this evening, but it's going to see what it can do. Shouldn't be a problem though, this entry writes itself....

Last Wednesday, Pun City, after a 5-month wait, finally ended up getting satellite installed at the Condo. (Or Condotel as it is sometimes called). The process was somewhat of an ordeal, however the story ends up being priceless.

The first introduction Pun City had to technician Bob was over the phone. He seemed a little informal, but guy's a satellite installer, not a consierge.

Later Wednesday, Pun City got to meet Bob in person. Pun City swears that these details are factual. Bob was wearing a 96.5 WKLH t-shirt with the sleeves ripped off. The shirt dated to approximately the late 1980s and was worn to the point of translucency. Another part of his ensemble was a pair of fairly short shorts, with a pattern reminiscent of Zubaz but not exactly that style. Oh yeah, and those were also translucent.

Completing the look was a hairstyle that went to about mid-back (2+ feet long), very wavy and slightly greying.

Details of Bob's life were sketchy. He used to work for the Brewers "until (he) decided to grow his hair out." He was also in possession of a gigantic drill, with a $300.00 bit that was capable of 1-inch round holes and probably was about as long as Bob's hair. He had gotten this from "the guy that got him into the satellite business, and then screwed him out of $240,000 - it's a long story." "The one thing that was good was that he only used top-of-the-line equipment. Personally, I would never get this."

Pun City didn't pry beyond this info. Bob seemed to be missing an entire decade somewhere, as the following conversation happened:

Bob (looking at Pun City's 1994 World Series ball): "Nice, what year was it, '91, '92?"

Pun City: (Gives quizical look)

Bob: "That the Brewers went to the World Series?"

Pun City: "82."

This was not because he wasn't a sports fan, as noted earlier, he had worked for the Brewers. Pun City can only assume that 1982-1991 was a blur for him.

This is not to say that Bob does not stay busy. Despite never wearing hats, he does have a collection of hats he receives as gifts - "only stuff you can't buy." Among the hats he owns are a florescent orange Alabama hat (the band, not the state); and a "Girls Gone Wild" hat he got for working on the sound for one of their videos. That's right, this guy was part of the production crew for a Girls Gone Wild video.

Some other gems from Bob:

On his 1500-piece Guitar Pick collection: "That puts Hard Rock Cafe TO SHAME!....I mean, they've got guitars and outfits and stuff, but..."

"We're a noon to midnight business. Call in the morning, you're DEFINITELY getting voicemail. Call at 11:00 at night - not too late, I'll pick up."

On a picture of 3 bikini-clad women on the back of one of Pun City's Sports Illustrateds: (craning neck to get a better view) "Nice! You gotta appreciate good art!"

Entering the condo for the first time: "I've gotta you-know-what like a racehorse! Can I use your facilities?"

Same topic: "I was going to just go outside on a tree but I figured that you guys might get in trouble if anyone saw that."

So there you have it, this guy was (and is) pretty legendary. We all should be able to meet a Bob-like personality at some point.

A.J. Romens is Back: More Like Superman or Tupac?

2007-07-17T20:02:00.000-05:00

Editor's note: (And this blog uses the term "Editor" very loosely) - Former Phonograph editor A.J. "Ronk" Romens is back tonight with a topic of great concern. Enjoy!

Thanks to Brian for letting me guest blog. There’s some stuff I need to talk about…

So, there’s this girl who doesn’t wear any pants.

I first encountered her about three weeks ago. She was moving into the downstairs apartment in a friend’s building. I was over there to view a couple Quantum Leap episodes. You see, I’m unemployed and I’ve been spending the summer trying to watch the entire NBC series featuring Scott Bakula and Dean Stockwell… I am getting off track.

When I arrived, she was moving a couch and other large objects out of the apartment, with the help of an apparent roommate and some older company. She was lifting, squatting, bending over and all the other required motions for moving things, and she was doing them all pantsless.

Let me describe exactly what she was wearing. The top half of her was covered in one of those empire shirts. I am no expert in today’s fashion, but I have seen many females wearing these tank-top-type shirts that start out tight around the chest-region (nothing wrong with that) then become loose and flow-y, as if to cover up a pregnancy or a doughnut habit.

These shirts are popular these days. All the girls are wearing them. This one girl, however, was wearing it as a dress.

Fortunately, this girl is not a washed up skank-lebrity, so she was wearing underwear.

After thinking about this for some time, I concluded that she must have taken off her pants because they were too cumbersome to the moving process. I saw her point and decided that my upcoming move would also be done pantsless. Anything for comfort and efficiency.

Then, last week, I encountered her again. She was again wearing the same kind of clothing, and, of course, sans-pants. But this time, she was not moving anything. Instead, she was eating shish cabob with some friends in front of the building. She was sitting on the steps in front of the stoop and her left knee was about a yard away from her right knee. And in between: the blinding glare of unobstructed pink underwear.

As I approached to walk by her and enter the door, her position didn’t change. I tried not to stare, but a display like that is like a car-accident and a solar eclipse happening simultaneously in your back yard. You have to look.

So now I am at a loss why she refuses to wear pants. Is she a hippy? An exhibitionist? Trying to start a new fashion trend? I have no idea. Maybe I don’t want to know.

In other things eating away at my mind:

-- I think I figured out how to build a death-proof airplane. First, take that giant 500 seat Airbus plane, and remove all but 8 seats. This will be the passenger area. Next, protect the passenger area in a roll cage made out of solid titanium and other hard things. Finally, make the rest of the plane “crumple zone.” While the pilots would die in a horrible crumpling tragedy, at least the eight passengers would be safe. Average ticket price on this airplane: $150,000.

-- There should be a reality show like NBC’s “Age of Love” that features 40 year old women, 20 year old woman, and one “Wild Card:” a mature-looking 15 year old girl that could send the reality show’s star to a federal penitentiary for 20 years. That would be compelling television.

Thanks a lot to Ronk for stopping by, hopefully he can do that again. Pun City would like to go on record as saying it is a strong proponent of the "Wild Card" suggestion but a much stronger supporter of pantsless girls.

Pun City Reserves The Conference Room

2007-07-07T21:56:00.000-05:00

Had a chance to cruise NCAA Basketball sites this weekend, found some interesting links.

This isn't really a link, but Pun City might be "breaking" the story that the West Coast Conference is holding their Conference tournament in San Diego for 2008. This will be at the Jenny Craig Pavilion on the campus of the University of San Diego. This was confirmed with a representative from the WCC office over the phone last week.

BYU was one of the first schools in the country to release its non-conference schedule Here.

The Atlantic Sun announced Lipscomb will host the next two Atlantic Sun Men's Basketball championships here. Lipscomb is in Nashville, also home to Belmont, which hosted the 2004 and 2005 tournaments. Additionally, the A-Sun announced they would have streamed broadcast of their athletic contests available online, though it's unclear if it will be set up where the games are free like the Horizon League, or must be subscribed to for a price, like the Missouri Valley and SoCon.

Binghamton was announced as the host of the 2008 America East Men's Basketball tournament, at least until the title game, when it will go to the highest seed's home court (which could potentially still be Binghamton, Pun City supposes).

At this point this blog is strongly considering heading to a West Coast Conference - Mountain West Conference (with possible Big West or Pac-10 sidetrip) swing. The main problems with this trip would be the dearth of WCC tickets available to the general (read: non-10-year-season-ticket-holding) fans; and the potential expense of staying in San Diego and Las Vegas. WCC tickets would almost certainly need to be scalped, but this blog has seen a number of those games broadcast the last few years, and the only games that actually sell out would be those involving Gonzaga. It would be a mildly risky gambit going down there without tickets in hand, but this blog can't imagine missing too many games considering that there's a lot of "empty-seat supply" available down there.

A bonus would be that the Los Angeles (or Anaheim) side trip would be a fairly cheap side trip thanks to this blog's access to possibly free lodging for the evening. Pac-10 seats might not be too cheap though, which is why this blog might be apt to go back to the Big West instead (as you may know, this blog has been to both the Big West and Pac-10 previously, so no additional conference would be added on that particular "bonus" swing).

Other bonuses would include this blog's first trip to San Diego and Las Vegas, as well as the relative ease of getting good Mountain West seats (a very good value as far as conference tournaments are concerned). Beyond this, California is good for an In-N-Out Burger stop or three, plus Jack-In-The-Box.

In a total non-sequitor, here's a picture of Dirk Nowitzki playing tennis:

On a non-conference note, this blog found the following link to an outstanding Ronnie Lott and Joe Montana commercial from a few years back. Try and name the product it's advertising before the screen tells you, Boy Howdy it's a tough one.

Also of note, for those of you that enjoyed Phonograph - Pun City plans to have Phonograph creator AJ "Ronk" Romens stop by for a "guest blog" within the next few weeks. Possibly as early as next week. Pun City is handing over full editorial control to Ronk for whenever he stops in, so you never know what we might get from that, although one would guess whatever he comes up with should appeal to the audience (almost certainly more than this blog normally does, anyway).

Pun City's Celebrity Encounters and Strange But True Confessions

2007-07-02T23:05:00.000-05:00

This blog is headed to the Weird Al Yankovic show at Summerfest tomorrow, so Pun City figured it would put one up a day early. Two sources of inspiration here: one was a MySpace "survey" asking for 10 random facts about you. The other was an article/post on si.com where they were talking about encounters with famous people, in particular athletes. Without further ado:

10. This blog enjoys the music of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and Hilary Duff. It's good stuff, have a listen some time.

9. Pun City has never exceeded 5 dates with the same girl. This might be common in the blogging community, but them's the breaks.

8. This blog sometimes prefers taking statistics to actually playing video games. Playing is often the means to the end of the statistics.

7. While working for Enterprise Rent-A-Car for two summers, this blog found over $20.00 in change in the rental cars each summer.

6. This blog was once accosted by a man playing church league softball for calling a ball that had hit the plate a strike. All balls that hit the plate are strikes. The ball clearly had hit the plate. This blog was a volunteer umpire pressed into duty 2 minutes before the game. Key words here: volunteer, accosted, and church league.

5. This blog's most recent video gaming system is Playstation 1. The NES and SNES are good enough for now. But this blog is waiting until they create a system where the graphics are better than real life.

4. Pun City has a hat and shirt rotation that matches up 223 hats with 223 shirts. This blog grabs the next one up in the closet every day, as detailed here. On Sunday, a Wisconsin Basketball shirt came up in the order. This was notable in that Pun City was headed to Marquette basketball season ticket renewal. After arriving in full Wisconsin regalia, the MU workers told this blog "You are about 90 miles east of where you need to be....." "Argh! It's, like, blinding! Ahh! Red shoes!" Once the initial pleasantries were dispensed, Pun City had a seat and awaited its appointment time. Minutes later, a female worker emerged from the back with a Marquette t-shirt. She presented it to Pun City, saying "We're going to ask that you wear this in to the appointment, because otherwise they're going to rip you to shreds in there." This blog graciously obliged, now knowing that the t-shirt order is self-sustaining.

3. Pun City doesn't eat breakfast. In college, this blog found out that it was a huge waste of time. It also noticed that gaining weight is easier when you eat breakfast. Pun City is a firm believer that breakfast is the least important meal of the day.

2. Pun City has attended 14 of 30 NCAA men's basketball conference tournaments in the last 4 years. The goal is to get to all 30 in Pun City's lifetime.

1. Pun City was half of the first (and still only) doubles victory for Grafton tennis at the WIAA state tournament.

Athletic encounters:

This blog has had brief encounters with quite a few athletes and coaches in its time. This blog didn't play against any famous athletes head-to-head, but was able to meet a few for a few minutes.

1. Homer and Bryce Drew - Both were at the Mid-Contenent Conference tournament in Tulsa, OK, watching Valparaiso's women play and this blog approached them for autographs. Homer was very gracious and amiable, every bit the gentleman that his public image projects. Bryce was on his cell phone but was happy to sign and as nice as you can be while talking on a cell phone yet still addressing the autograph seeker.

2. Marcus Allen - Kansas City Chiefs training camp in River Falls, WI. One year Pun City's brother and this blog asked him for an autograph just as he had refused a group of about 15 regular autograph hounds. In fairness to them, he said he couldn't, although he seemed to wish that he hadn't turned down the group and probably wouldn't have if he had known we were there. The next year, this blog was able to get his autograph. Pretty nice guy.

3. Joe Montana - Also Chiefs training camp. Very elusive, would never sign for any more than the bare minimum it took for him to get from his dorm into the meal hall. This blog realizes he had a lot of demand for his time, but that was a little poor.

4. Jim Larranaga - Cinderella George Mason's head coach, at the CAA tournament in Richmond, VA. He was in a concourse watching a game prior to GMU's matchup later in the day. This blog handed him a jersey and asked for his autograph. He nodded and signed in blue on the green part of the jersey, thus obscuring the autograph. (This blog had hoped he'd sign on the white number, but oh well). A very brief encounter, for as affable as he seems in the media, he came across as very introverted during this particular meeting.

5. Shane Battier - Hotel lobby in Indianapolis, IN during the 2000 Final Four. Duke was not in the Final Four, he had just completed his junior season. This blog believes he was in town for a summit on collegiate athletics as a student-athlete representative and probably as an NABC All-Region team rep. The hotel was hosting a pep rally for Wisconsin's fans. He had to get through the crowd to get to his destination, and was working the crowd very well, giving high fives and saying something to the effect of "Alright Wisconsin! Go get 'em!" He seemed pretty cool to be doing that when other student-athletes (like Brian Cardinal and to a lesser extent Marcus Fizer) and head coaches (like Steve Fisher and especially Bob Huggins) just shuffled past trying to avoid all fans. Cool guy, Pun City's a fan.

Pun City: The Mash-Up!

2007-06-26T21:49:00.000-05:00

This blog doesn't have a specific topic tonight, so Pun City is just going to be a bunch of odds and ends.

First off, reiterating this from the Update on the last post.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAwKrSVKAr4

Secondly, a bonus link that this blog thought was pretty good, primarily if you like Mike Tyson's Punchout or any of quite a few old school Nintendo games:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiBER4iVwCw

Pun City has just completed the 27th of 28 regular seasons within Tecmo Super Bowl. All teams except for the Cowboys (and the Cardinals' playoffs) have been played. Here are some updated stats:

-Easily the best team is the 49ers. Current regular season record stands at 339-93-0.

-Best team in the AFC is the Bills. Regular season record is 308-124-0.

-Pun City playing with any team is a better option though, Current regular season record stands at 404-28-0.

-Worst team in the game: New England Patriots, 111-319-2.

-Worst team in the NFC: Atlanta Falcons 136-295-1.

One could make a case that the "worst" labels are misnomers or skewed at best. Each of those two teams are in the same division as their conference's best teams. Having to play in those divisions where you face a tough schedule every year helps contribute to the bad record. (Or...the 49ers and Bills have inflated records because they have cream puffs like the Patriots and Falcons on their schedules twice a year?...Hmmm).

-A somewhat interesting phenomenon with the ties in this game. A significant amount of correlation exists between how bad a team is with how many ties they have. There have been 18 ties in the 27 seasons. Only 3 of those ties included a team that has the best (or 2nd-best) overall record within its division. Twelve of the ties included a team that has either the worst or 2nd-worst record in the division. The other 3 included teams with the 3rd-worst record in the division, and neither of these involved teams was in a 4-team division (meaning that 3rd-worst was also not 2nd-best).

-Tony Eason and Tom Tupa are the only backup QBs that have not played yet. All other backup QBs were either pressed into service due to a starter's injury or were just used because this blog knew they'd work better than the starter. (Or Pun City just got sick of the starter blowing throws/games and figured any change is good).

-The game will not injure any Tight Ends unless a human is using them. Even then, it's really tough. Eric Green and Keith Jackson were the only TEs to get hurt, and those are 2 of the better TEs in the game.

-This blog has a strong suspicion that a team's best player tends to get hurt when a human is in control of them at a much higher rate than if the human were not controlling them. This blog is going to wait until after all seasons have been played to make a definite analysis, but that's the hypothesis Pun City is going with.

Pun City saw a cool show last Friday at Senor Java's. Check out Gabe Krebs live if you get a chance. Krebs's next show is an open mic 7/13 at the same venue in Saukville (7:00 maybe? Senor Java has a MySpace page if you want specifics).

In conclusion, this blog is happy that Paris Hilton was freed earlier this week. Hopefully she can get back in the studio and crank out some more hott tracks. Pun City will snatch them up if they get made.

Pun City: A Winner Even With Stupid Human Tricks

2007-06-24T22:00:00.000-05:00

Good evening. It's been an interesting week.

Wednesday morning, on my way to work, 99.1 WMYX, a Milwaukee radio station, was taking calls on their morning show for people with stupid human tricks. The winner would get a guaranteed audition with CBS 58, a Milwaukee TV station that would send the tapes in to The Late Show with David Letterman. Letterman's producers would then judge the submissions and potentially invite you on to the show. This blog knows a few stupid human tricks, 3 of which are really unique, so Pun City figured it would call in.

The Jane and Kidd's show producer liked the thought of 3 tricks, so he said he'd call back since they were about to go to a break. He called back in around an hour and they taped an interview with this blog. Both deejays seemed to like Pun City and they had this blog hang on the line so they could potentially call back and have Pun City on as a finalist Thursday. This blog was taking off Thursday afternoon anyway, so it asked for the whole day off and was fortunately granted as much. Pun City was then called back and told it was indeed a finalist.

Thursday morning was pretty cool, got to go on Jane & Kidd's show on 99.1 WMYX. They had Van McNeil, an afternoon deejay and major David Letterman fan, in to judge. The other finalists this blog was up against were a double-jointed white trashy woman and a huge tattooed guy that had trained his Scottish Terrier to carry a bowling ball. (The call had been for both stupid human tricks and stupid pet tricks).

Had a decent interview with Jane and Kidd, demonstrated the stupid human tricks (one-handed clap, an eye trick Pun City has been encouraged to call "the eye-brator", and sucking this blog's upper lip flush with its nose). Van was freaked out with the eye-brator, he'd never seen that one before, plus the one-handed clap played well on the radio. Pun City had been the first one to go.

The double-jointed woman had the standard double-jointed tricks, bending her thumbs back to her wrist, fingers all the way back, did the dishrag thing where she grabbed it with both hands and rotate her shoulders all the way around without letting go. This blog can't do that, but tons of double-jointed people can, and even more people have seen that.

Scottish terrier guy had us go outside and the dog pushed the ball around for a minute, then found the holes and carried it for a few seconds. The guy then had it go to the bathroom (#1) while carrying it. Dude seemed pretty proud of the #1 part of it, apparently had just trained him to do that the day prior. Everyone else just kind of thought it was weird.

We went back inside, they hadn't had their camera for this blog's segment so they re-shot a similar interview, this time for their website. All of the above-mentioned segments had been taped first, then aired about 4 minutes later on the radio. The next segment was live, however, and none of the contestants had been informed of what Van was about to say.

He made a comment about how he'd seen double-jointed people before but it was a good talent. He then said that he was still freaked out by the eye-brator, and then said he didn't see too many dogs carrying around bowling balls. (He was working from left to right in the sound booth, in the order the contestants were standing). At this point, Pun City was figuring he was going to give the win to the dog, since everyone loves a dog, and this blog was thinking there was no shame in losing to a dog in this case. But then Van says "But you know what, I gotta give it to (Pun City)."

That was pretty cool. Decades of using stupid human tricks vindicated. As it turned out, all 3 of the contestants got to audition privately, but it was still cool to be the winner.

Saturday this blog had to go to a car dealership where CBS 58 was holding the auditions. This blog had briefly spoken to a station representative earlier; WMYX had said that 58 would be calling Pun City, but no call had been made by 4:30 on Friday. This blog called 58 and spoke to the rep, who was unaware that he was supposed to be calling the 3 of us. It wasn't a huge deal since this blog pretty much knew the relevant information; however this was the first time this blog became aware that Letterman's producers would not be there in person.

This wasn't ideal, but whatever. This blog went to the dealership Saturday and it was a strange scene. A combination of overbearing TV personnel, overbearing car salesmen, people with weird talents, and perhaps strangest of all, people who came just to watch the festivities. This blog was waiting a little while and saw the bowling ball guy, and a dog that hadn't quite learned a trick where it plays dead after hearing "bang". There were a couple other strange tricks, one involving whistling like a bird and one person using her mouth as a trumpet. This blog appreciated the effort of those two, but it really doesn't think those are especially unique or difficult. Hopefully they aren't too much competition.

This blog went, and the 58 guy must have liked it because he encouraged Pun City to continue the tricks for a longer duration after the first run-through. The assembled crowd did have a big round of applause for Pun City after it went, so this blog is crossing its fingers. No way of knowing for a while here, so this blog is going to have to let you know if it gets a call some time down the road.

UPDATE: The video has been posted for WMYX, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAwKrSVKAr4

It didn't pick up the eye trick very well, but the other two are good.

Roach Hotels and New Daylight Savings Time: True March Madness

2007-06-19T22:34:00.000-05:00

Final Trip Recap (Recap #10), March 10th, 9th day of the trip. As promised, literally and figuratively a lot of ground to cover. First off, on 3/10, this blog got to check out an extremely expensive mall along the Boardwalk. It's probably within 2 blocks of Boardwalk Hall, but this blog had avoided it because it looked small and overpriced.

This day, Pun City had some extra time though, and found out that it was way off. The mall is large and overpriced. Deceptively large actually. Three levels of ridiculously expensive stores, including a Fila that was passing itself off as "high-end". This blog doesn't know, maybe that's their business plan these days, but it seems really weird coming from a company that sells low-quality shoes.

After going through the mall and mainly window shopping since this blog wasn't going to be getting anything at Coach or Nieman Marcus anytime soon, this blog headed to Boardwalk Hall's "Fan Zone" to watch as much of the Wisconsin-Illinois Big Ten Semifinal as it could. Pun City was fortunate in that the Badger game was on the in-house TVs. Also fortunate was that those suckers are effectively locked on any channel they're set at because the channel changer is locked up and the Best Buy-supplied plasmas didn't have any buttons on them. So this blog just sat back, relaxed, and enjoyed the game as fans around it kept futilely trying to switch to either the Big East or SEC games in progress. This blog was almost laughing at them until some gambling addict got the arena control supervisor to open the lock and the channel changed. Not awesome. Luckily Wisconsin had virtually clinched it by then and they did end up pulling through. However, this blog wasn't thrilled with George Washington's fans based on this poor representative.

George Washington did pull the win out though, a pretty competitive affair where the game was in doubt until around 4:41 remaining. Coach Karl Hobbs celebrated just in front of this blog's seat with the Colonials' fans.

After the Atlantic 10 final finished, this blog headed over to a casino sports bar and caught some more games on TV, then ventured back to the hotel. As always when it came to this hotel, things got interesting then.

1. On cue, the room key didn't work (typical).

2. This blog headed to the good ol' front desk to retrieve a new one. While Pun City was there, this blog figured it would ask for a wake-up call.

2a. This blog knew it was going to be a a rough going asking for the wake-up call, because the dude had missed 2 out of 3 calls previously.

2b. Adding to the problem is that it was Daylight Savings Time. Not just any Daylight Savings Time, mind you, but the first Daylight Savings Time since they switched the date.

3. Dude doesn't speak English well, and acts like he speaks it worse. There is very little chance he's going to understand Daylight Savings Time. If he does understand, there's really no way of knowing.

4. This blog needs a 4:00 AM wake-up call. This will seem like 3:00 AM with the "Spring Forward". If this dude blows the wake-up call, Pun City isn't going to naturally wake up at that time.

4a. Let Pun City emphasize the NEEDS part of that "This blog NEEDS a 4:00 AM wake-up call" sentence. There's a huge drive ahead, and then a flight to catch. Granted, there's a little wiggle room in there for travel time and possible extra gate-clearing time built in, but it would be very easy to oversleep this by 3 hours.

Did you ever NEED a miracle but the only way you're getting it is from one of, if not the most, incompetent, ill-equipped, miserable jaghole you've ever met?

After an extremely long and frustrating conversation in which the dude seemed convinced at multiple times that Pun City wanted 2 wake-up calls, the dude showed a thorough misconception of Daylight Savings Time, and made it clear that he did not have an automated system for the wake-up calls. It was probably about midnight, so this blog seriously doubted dude would be awake to make the call, but dude repeatedly assured Pun City that the wake-up call would be made and that this blog didn't have to worry. He said this in a voice that made Pun City feel convinced that this dude wanted Pun City out of his office above all else. At this point, this blog was tired, knew that it had a long day ahead, and chose sleep over arguing with some Indian idiot that might actually be helpful.

Needless to say, this blog set its phone alarm. And its watch alarm.

April 11th, 10th day of the trip - 4:00 AM. Feels like 3:00 AM. Watch alarm goes off. Shortly thereafter, the phone alarm goes off. Pun City wakes up. This blog finishes packing, washes up, and gets ready to check out and go. It's probably 4:15. No wake-up call.

This blog is checking out anyway, so it figures it's going to let him have it. Here's a rough paraphrasing of the conversation:

Pun City: (This blog) was supposed to have a wake-up call at 4:00, why didn't this happen?

Idiot: It's not 4:00 yet.

PC: It's 4:15!!! (Pun City) just explained this to you last night!!

Idiot: Why would I give you a wake-up call at 4:00? You're checking out now.

PC: What?! Wait, WHAT?! It's 4:15 RIGHT NOW! You were supposed to give (Pun City) a wake-up call FIFTEEN MINUTES AGO!

Idiot: You didn't ask for that, I can only give you one wake-up call.

PC: (Pun City) DID ask for that! I only wanted one wake-up call! Last night, we talked about it for 10 minutes! You said not to worry about it!!

Idiot: (shakes head)

PC: (Completely exasperated and just astonished anyone could be this dumb): "You have (Pun City's) keys. This is all you need for (this blog) to check out, right?

Idiot: Yes

PC: So we're good, we're done?

Idiot: Yes

PC: Fine.

Stunning. Just stunning. How can anyone stay in business with that little grasp on the English language? How can anyone stay in business with that little grasp on common courtesy, common sense, and rudimentary intelligence? This blog finally just left so that it wouldn't have any of the stupidity rub off on it. Frankly, this blog was just ecstatic that it didn't have to deal with him anymore.

Long ride back to Richmond, Virginia, this time without having to deal with Washington DC's rush-hour traffic (since it was a Sunday). On the way up, while running late, this blog had noticed that the University of Maryland was on the route between the two cities. There wasn't nearly enough time to stop then, but today there was a little extra time. This blog was able to check out the Comcast Center, home to Terrapins basketball, and even got to go out on to the floor.

They also had the floor from Cole Field House, Maryland's old home stadium that was where Texas Western beat Kentucky for the NCAA title featured in "Glory Road".

The trip moved on to the Richmond Airport, sat in the Sam Adams Lounge for a while, eventually succeeding in getting the bartender to switch from Meet The Press or something over to basketball. Shortly in to that, it was time to fly out from Richmond to Chicago, where Pun City would have a layover during CBS's Selection Show, and then a flight back to Milwaukee thereafter.

At O'Hare Airport in Chicago, this blog settled in at the Chili's, which was the first place this blog could find with TVs. CBS was on already, so this blog just sat back and enjoyed as they listed the top seeds.

During a commercial break, a woman wearing fur approached the bartender. This blog could only hear the bartender asking "Is that local fox?"

This blog assumed he was asking her about the fur coat. Turns out it was "Is that local Fox?" that he was asking. She wanted NASCAR on. No. Frickin. Way.

The highest-rated, most-watched, most-relevant part of March Madness, and you are switching over to some Snoozecar Race? The woman said we could switch it back, she just wanted to see who was winning. This is fair, alright, cooler heads prevailed.

But wait. Some rube trying to score points with the woman jumped on the Nascar bandwagon and said we should just leave it there. That was it. This blog had already closed its tab there so it had no real claim (other than common sense, which clearly had no value at this bar) to switching it back to CBS, so Pun City immediately bolted the scene in search of more sane pastures.

Pun City found refuge in some type of family diner that had the Selection Show on, just before a table was being cleared. This blog didn't care, Pun City just sat at the table with its notebook scribbling down the brackets, even with a heap of dirty dishes in front of it.

No white trash Nascar monger, horny idiot, or stack of crum-ridden plates was going to prevent this blog from knowing what the brackets were. Especially since it would have relative "communication silence" for the Chicago-to-Milwaukee flight.

In the end, this blog was able to get the brackets filled, hear some analysis, and laugh at Syracuse's exclusion before the flight, during which Pun City looked for possible upset potential. The picks made that night led to an eventual 8th-place finish in this blog's pool, which wasn't too bad given the large number of high-seeded teams that lived up to their seeding this year. This concludes the Pun City Trip 2007, hope you enjoyed it.

Pouring a Forty For This Blog's Homie, Paris Hilton

2007-06-12T22:49:00.000-05:00

First off, as has been this blog's recent trend, Pun City is going to regurgitate another website's recommendation and give this link to an extremely hilarious video clip:

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/Paris%20Hilton%20Jake/video/x27niv_paris-hilton-jake-byrd?from=rss

Now that the link-o-the-week is out of the way, this blog can move back to the trip recap.

Previously, on Pun City....

...and Scene.

Trip Recap #9 - March 9th, 8th day of the trip. The night before, this blog had gotten back to the hotel and inserted the room's keycard into the door. (Yes, the room had keycards, this blog was as stunned as anyone, but hold that thought...). Inconveniently enough though, for the second night in a row, the keycard didn't work. Also, the backup keycard did not work.

After last night's card not working, and several minutes of being accused of rubbing the magnetic strip against my credit card's magnetic strip, the hotel had courteously provided two non-working keycards as a sign of good faith. This time, armed with both keycards as proof of the recurring, inexcuseable problem, this blog marched into the nice moron's, er, hotel manager's office. The following is an approximate transcript of the conversation:

Pun City: "Hey, the keycard didn't work again. Actually, neither of them did."

Moron: "Did you rub them against each other?"

PC: (Shaking head, lifting hands skyward, and using 'Goddammit, we've been through this before, and why would anyone do that anyway?' face) - "No."

M: "Did you have them next to a credit card?"

PC: (Visibly incensed): "Ugh! No!"

M: "Oh, well, it's too cold for them to work, here's a new one."

AAAAAAHHHHH! Why would you even accuse the customer of doing something ridiculous like that if you were just going to use the cold excuse anyway? You had the cold excuse built in, this blog probably would have just let it go! Fricking Jaghole!

Customer's always right, eh?

Not at Absecon's Rodeway Inn. This blog would like to clarify so that Pun City is not involuntarily libeling the other Rodeway Inn in Absecon, which this blog briefly stopped at thinking it was this blog's lodging. The one at 200 E White Horse Pike, which is technically in Galloway, is the problem one. There are a couple others on E White Horse Pike that this blog can't vouch for. The one this blog briefly stopped at gave good directions to the lousy one.

This blog does seem to recall the wake-up call actually happening at the requested time this day, so that was a surprisingly good start. That gave Pun City some time to head over to Hamilton Mall. This was a solid mall. Lots of sports offerings in the mall, this blog was pleasantly surprised by a store called "Fadz" in the mall. This blog is equally surprised by how little information there is about the retail outlet online. If you can find something, let Pun City know, because this blog came up empty.

In a final non-basketball note, this blog inadvertantly used a full-service gas station. This blog didn't even know it was full-service until some dude came out of a booth and asked how much this site wanted in the tank. Since this blog would have preferred to pump its own gas, and the guy didn't speak too much English or do anything notable, this blog didn't dole out a tip.

The games of the day were Xavier vs. Rhode Island; and Saint Louis vs. George Washington. GWU slashed SLU, and Rhode Island beat the #1-seeded Musketeers. During the Xavier game, this blog struck up a conversation with a guy sitting in a nearby group. He was wearing an Illinois shirt and somewhat rooting for Xavier. He was there with Xavier fans but not really a Xavier fan himself. He asked what Pun City was doing there after this blog told him that it was a Wisconsin fan. This blog told him that it was just travelling alone and that every year Pun City just packs up and heads to a bunch of conference tournaments. After digesting that for a minute, the Illini fan smiled and said, "That's every guy's dream!" He then proceeded to tell everyone in his group what Pun City was there for, and it was some pretty good vindication for this blog's odyssey.

Some band notes:

Xavier's band played Jet's "Cold Hard Bitch," Europe's "Final Countdown," Smashmouth's "I'm A Believer," the theme from Blues Brothers, and Low Rider.

GWU's band played Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody," Journey's "More Than A Feeling," and a medley of "Owner of a Lonely Heart" and "Smoke On The Water".

The SLU-GWU game ended up being Brad Soderberg's last game as coach of the Billikens. This blog sort of wishes it had seen Rick Majerus coach them, but this blog imagines it will probably get to see him coach live sometime soon given Majerus's affinity for the Milwaukee area and the number of teams in the area.

Next Trip Recap should be a good one. The Rodeway Inn manager's piece-de-resistance, the Atlantic 10 final of Rhode Island vs. George Washington, a drive back to Richmond to catch a flight, a stop at Maryland's Comcast Center, Selection Sunday madness, two flights and 3 airports. Two days, one game, and a whole lot of other stuff going on. Don't miss it, this blog plans on Next Tuesday. Hopefully a post in between there on other stuff.

Absecon's Rodeway Inn: Quaint And Shit

2007-06-05T22:22:00.000-05:00

Trip Recap #8 - March 8th, 7th day of the trip. On the one hand, very glad Pun City didn't have to drive, especially considering the fiasco from the day before. On the other hand, not the greatest night's sleep. As alluded to in last week's post, this blog was staying at a dump.

After checking in late the night prior, this blog went to its assigned room, and flipped the light switch. Only one of two bulbs was working. Not a huge deal, but a bad omen. Grabbed the remote, hit the "On" button for the TV. Didn't work. After a brief inspection, this blog discovered that the batteries from the remote were gone. Also not a great sign. This site went into the bathroom and discovered that it had all kinds of muddy footprints in it. Ridiculous. This would not stand.

The Indian-American clerk was soon informed of this substandard room. He seemed very unsurprised by this development, but suggested that Pun City could have another room. This was acceptable for Pun City. The new room had none of the fantastic amenities from the first room, but did feature an eclectic collection of circa-1950s furniture, none of which was matching and all of which seemed to have been purchased second-hand or retrieved from a dumpster.

This blog saw a sign advertising free WiFi at the hotel, which was stunning since this represented a piece of technology about 30 years newer than any other technology at the place. As this blog had come to expect, however, the WiFi didn't really work. As with all other problems at the hotel, the service staff was happy to put up a major language barrier instead of fixing it right away. Or at all. All manner of excuses and blame were provided though, free of charge. "It's too cold out." "You need to have it closer to the signal." "Just turn it on, it should work."

Whatever dude. Just give me a wake-up call tomorrow at 11:00 AM.

Fast Forward to 10:00 AM on May 8th. "HOUSEKEEPING!!" This motel had to have a staff of about 4. Probably all family. Despite this seemingly easy line of communication, apparently it was not intuitive that an 11:00 wake-up call would imply a sleeping hotel guest at 10:00. So much for getting extra sleep. Oh, and there was no wake-up call at 11:00 AM. (This blog was already up, but come on, aren't those things automated?)

Urgh. More to come on that one, it doesn't get particularly better.

Xavier vs. Dayton was the game of the day to start with. Xavier Head Coach Sean Miller was pretty fun to watch. Dayton had a player make an awkward motion that could have arguably been a travelling violation. No call was made however, despite Miller's protests of "That was a travel!!" Minutes later, Dayton put up a shot that was most likely a long 2-pointer, but there was some question on whether it was a 3-pointer and the play was reviewable. Miller asked why the referees were huddled around the television monitor, and was told they were "checking to see if it was a 3". At this point, Miller exclaimed, "Well, can you CHECK to see if that was a travel before??"

The refs took exception to this remark but did not assess a technical. Xavier did win however, at which point their students rained a taunt on to the Dayton fans, chanting "Wright State's Dancing!" (clap, clap, clap-clap clap). (Wright State is of course the crosstown rival of Dayton).

In later games, Rhode Island beat Fordham in a battle of the Rams, Saint Louis upset #1 seeded UMass (major bonus since UMass had waaay worse cheerleaders); and George Washington defeated Saint Joseph's. Toward the end of that game, GWU's students chanted "We killed the Hawk!" This roused the SJU faithful to chant "The Hawk Will Never Die!"

A very fun day after leaving the hotel, this blog will pick it up back at the hotel next time.