Thursday night notes
-Man, it's Thursday night and this is the first time I've had a chance to get to the PC since Monday. Work has been incredibly crazy this week. I've had about 1 hour to play Skyrim this week and that about sums up all of the gaming time I've had. Weekend is coming up soon, hopefully that'll mean some time for relaxation.
- One of the things that you have to worry about when a new platform is released is that the titles on older platforms will start to get neglected. That certainly looks to be the case with MLB12: The Show for the PS3. Removing franchise features from the console version so that you can spend more time working on the PSVita version? Um.. yeah, that's not a big win for the rest of us.
Considering the fact that online play for The Show has been terrible for the last few years and they're still not really addressing all of the issues there, it's just hard to look for much improvements in this years game.
- I have to agree with Bill Harris in his feelings about the rumor of Microsoft eliminating the ability to play used games in games for their new console. As much as I would like to see Gamestop reigned in... I don't want retail markets being the only ones that control the pricing for games. You could look at titles only dropping $10 to $20 each year after release. That would absolutely suck for gamers on a budget. If Microsoft tries this, they will kill their next console before it even gets off the ground.
- Congratulations to Prince Fielder (and sadly, Scott Boras) for making the deal that they did to send him to Detroit. He gave Brewers fans some great years and some absolutely terrific memories. I really hope that he plays incredibly well there.
- Lastly, don't know if you saw this, but the play made by the ballboy at the Australian Open today definitely deserves a look from everyone. Crazy reflexes there.
Tuesday notes
- Let's start with the Rose Bowl.
Any team that gives up 640+ yards on defense can't complain about losing the game.
The only questionable call that the refs made was the one at the end of the first half where Toon was knocked out of bounds, they stopped the clock, then started it again without blowing a whistle or anything. That was just a weird situation.
Oregon was clearly the better team and proved it on both sides of the ball.
People around here keep talking about Chryst's leaving being the biggest deal, but I think it's that Chris Ash is still going to be the defensive coordinator. The D was terrible this season and it cost them in their 3 losses.
- The Packers have earned their rest and need to take every minute of the next two weeks to shore up as much as they can with their own defensive issues.
It was great to see Flynn play as well as he did against Detroit though. That was a crazy fun game to watch.
- You can tell that it isn't a normal sports week because the Badgers are playing Michigan State tonight and it's getting zero coverage from the local media. Usually Izzo comes to town and people break out the torches and pitchforks.
Losing to Iowa at home will do that I guess. That was another ugly game due to horrific outside shooting. This team is poised for a 1st or 2nd round tournament loss. Mark my words on that.
- As far as gaming goes, I spent the majority of the weekend playing Skyrim. The game just sucks you in. One minute, I'm walking to a cave to handle a quest and the next, I'm mining ore out of a second or third cave that I found along the way.
All that and I haven't touched more than a few hours of the main story line. I did find a kick ass Deadra mace in a quest that let's me capture the souls of enemies if I kill them within 3 seconds. It's an evil weapon but cool as hell to use.
- Still planning on a Game of the year post. Just need to find the time.
- Have a great week.
NBA2K12 – $9.99 for the PC at Amazon
NBA2K12 - Download version at Amazon.com
This post is also a great way to remind you that if you use our Amazon search box, we get a shiny penny when you buy things. That does help us to be able to add more prizes to the yearly events. Just something to think about in the holiday season.
Monday night notes
- Let's deal with the BCS first.
They may have gotten two of the best teams in a game, but it's certainly not a game I want to watch. I only wish that most people would stay away from seeing it. It was a re-match that was pretty much destined to be replayed and that just seems wrong.
We do get some must read material out of the bowl game picture courtesy of EDSBS.com.
- Speaking of a highly anticipated bowl game, the Badgers did come away with a win in an incredibly entertaining Big Ten championship game on Saturday night. The ending wasn't nearly as exciting, winning on a running into the kicker call, as the end of the first game, but still it was a fun game to watch.
That sets us up for Oregon versus Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl and the over/under in that game should be like 80 or so. Both teams have great offenses and suspect defenses. Easily the best bowl matchup of them all.
- In other Wisconsin football news, Montee Ball was named as a finalist for the Heisman trophy and he was definitely a deserving candidate. Anyone in Wisconsin who thinks he's going to win is kidding themselves, but I'm glad that he got a chance to go. He was one of the top 5 players at the end of the year and earned his trip to New York.
- The last thing I have to say about Wisconsin today is in regards to the game against Marquette the other day. I said it a few weeks ago, they're too reliant on the outside shot. When they go cold, they'll lose. I have no idea how this team could pull out a game where they make 5 of 19 three pointers. They just don't have their offense really worked out yet. Thankfully they have almost a month until the Big Ten season starts.
- Back to football, I don't know that I could say anything about the Packers play this year that hasn't already been said. Watching the game last night, you just never get the feeling that they're going to lose. I'm sure this is how Patriots fans felt in '07, as it just doesn't seem like defenses have any answers for what the offense is doing.
The defense played a pretty poor game, but by the end they were missing 3 starters. If Woodson, Hawk, and Bishop come back this week, hopefully they can start playing better for the playoff run.
It was nice that they won the NFC North last night, but they need three more wins to clinch home field advantage throughout. Plenty more meaningful games to play.
- Rocksmith arrived late last week and I spent a good deal of time with it on Friday and Saturday. I don't feel like I'm on the way to becoming a rock god, but it sure as hell is fun to play. Although I do have to say that power chords are pretty much my undoing at this point. I just don't have the ability to move my fingers that much yet. I'll keep at it though.
Thursday notes
- When you don't hit your shots, you don't win games. That's pretty much what happened with Wisconsin last night in their game against North Carolina.
I was quite impressed by their ability to take a team that was scoring in the 80's and hold them to 60 though. I think if they can continue to play defense that well, they could really make a run this year.
- So, I have a guitar (Dean Vendetta XMT,) Amp (Line 6 - Spider IV 15 Watt,) and Rocksmith is set to be delivered today. I'm sure I'll be a rock god in no time.
All kidding aside, the amp has a tuner built in, so I was able to use that to tune the guitar last night and start taking a few online lessons and learn just how hard it is to play the guitar. I knew that before, but it wasn't until I tried to move from one power chord to another that I finally realized how much work I'll have ahead of me before I'll feel really comfortable playing.
What was nice though, was the fact that even though I was terrible and it was still fun to play. If the Badger game wouldn't have gotten in the way, I would have certainly spent a few hours with it last night. I know what I'll be doing over the weekend now.
- It's the last game of the regular season for fantasy football, so make sure you make your roster moves and lineup changes today if you have anyone playing in tonight's games. Dan has locked down the #1 seed in his conference, but only two teams have been eliminated from the playoffs as of the final week. You have to love that.
- Really glad to see Mike Leach back coaching again in college football. I truly believe that he got railroaded due to Craig James' ability to use the network he works for to amplify the story of what happened to his son.
All that aside, glad that the crazy pirate is back and I'll be looking to watch at least one or two Washington State games next year as a result.
- Have a good rest of the day.
Monday notes
- Please, please, stop telling us that you need to retire to spend more time with your family, then come back one year later to a much bigger contract.
If you don't want to work at that place any more, just say you felt that it was time to move on. I'm so damn tired of hearing these guys lie all the time about putting their families above their jobs, when it's quite clear that their families are clearly playing second fiddle to the job they are trying to attain.
Urban Meyer may be the nicest guy in the world, and I'm sure he'll do incredibly well at Ohio State, but I just hate crap like this.
- Speaking of Big 10 football, with the divisions shaking out as they did, I think this game has to be the one rematch that people would like to see most this year for deciding who will go to the Rose Bowl.
Couldn't ask for a better game to end the year in the Big 10.
- Big college basketball game coming up this week for Wisconsin as well, as they travel to North Carolina as part of the Big Ten/ACC shootout matchup thing.
The Badgers played well against BYU the other day, but I'm worried about a team that relies on outside shooting as much as they do. If they have a day where they don't shoot well from the arc, they will lose ugly. I have a sneaking suspicion that will be the case on Wednesday. Just a feeling.
- In gaming, I'm still powering through The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. My daughters sat by me on Sunday for an hour while I struggled with a puzzle in one of the dungeons in the game. You know you love your kids when they say something like, "Daddy, why are you here again? Can't you figure it out?"
All you can do is breathe deeply and ask them to walk away.... heh.
- Speaking of other humorous kids moments, my eldest daughter woke me up on Sunday holding a clump of hair in her hand. She informed me that our 4 year old decided to start cutting her own hair.
When I asked our youngest about this, she informed me that her hair was getting in her eyes and she wanted to fix it.
The sad part was that she actually did a really good job. She wet her hair down and had cut a straight line across her bangs. When my wife got home she did a bit of touch up to finish it.
It's so hard to punish your kids for something when they actually do a good job.
- Speaking of dealing with children, Dan was complaining to me about the scoring system in the fantasy football league again...
For a guy in 1st place in the league, he sure complains about his team quite a bit.
- Lastly, the NBA is coming back. Um, yeah.
- Have a good Monday
Tuesday notes
- A bit of advice to Jerry Sandusky, if you're going to go on national television making a plea of innocence to Bob Costas... Try not to have an awkward 15 or 16 second pause when you're asked about whether or not you're sexually attracted to young boys.
I have to commend Costas on his interview skills though. An interview such as that one is an incredibly difficult one to handle. He asked tough questions and great follow ups.
Moving on...
- Don't believe that the Packers have played a more complete game than the one that they put together last night... and they still made plenty of offensive line mistakes and fumbled on a punt return. Still, you can't complain when you beat a division rival 45-7.
Plenty of tough opponents remain on the Packers schedule, but their offense is playing remarkably well and a 3 game division lead is always a good thing with 7 games to go.
- Speaking of football, I would like to thank the Vikings for stopping James Starks from scoring a late game meaningless touchdown that allowed me to win my fantasy game last night and go to 8-2 on the season. It's hard to believe my team has done this well, when I have only outscored my opponents by 50 for the season. Still, I'm not going to complain.
Only 3 more weeks before the playoffs, so make those last moves count.
Oh, and pay no attention to the playoff brackets that are created by the game. Currently it has teams from opposite divisions playing in the first round. I'll be re-adjusting it so that the top for teams from each division make the playoffs and are seeded from there.
- As far as gaming goes, Skyrim has been eating up quite a bit of my time as I navigate through the initial city that you travel to.
One of the problems that I had with Oblivion was the leveling system and having no idea what way was the best to grow your character. For example, I apparently went up 5 level during the first quest that I tackled with my character, but had no idea if it was a good idea to advance all the levels at once, or if there was a reason why I would want to wait and move up a level at a later time. I'd hate to think that I'm a few hours into the game and I've already made a mistake that would impact my character for the life of the game... but I'm going to stick with it either way.
I guess this is just one of those games where they really want you to buy the strategy guide, as you can tell it's just going to be a massive world that you're going to be taking on.
- Lastly, looking like no season for the NBA. It's just so hard to pick a side between billionaires and millionaires who can't split 3 billion dollars.
Whatever will we do without having to watch the pick-and-roll be run for 48 minutes?
Wednesday notes
- Well, now I guess we can step away from the events at Penn State and get back to normal events.
- Last night I had a chance to finish up the campaign for inFamous 2 (for the record, I was a good guy.)
I have to say that I was surprised at the ending and the choices that the game allowed you to make. Definitely one of the more surprising endings that I can recall in quite some time. Not sure that I'll be going back to complete the game as an evil bastard now, but it has been fun to run around the city zapping street musicians... damn harmonica players.
- With the NBA Players association deciding not to take the owners last offered deal, and seeing highlights of an exhibition game last night, I wonder why the players don't just start a barnstorming league at this point. Create 6 or 8 teams of superstars and travel the country playing in non-NBA owner owned venues and build up the public interest in seeing them play real games.
Sure there would be high costs involved with doing something like this, but right now, all you have is people thinking that rich people are not happy about how much money they are getting.
Give people some games (for very good prices) and they might think a bit better of you.
- Considering my run on all things sequels in gaming lately, I'm having a really hard time with buying Skyrim this week. Uncharted 2 is sitting next to my TV begging to be complete, along with Killzone 2, Resistance 2, and other games from the past few years like Oblivion, and addons to games I have already finished like Undead Nightmare for Red Dead Retribution and Episodes from Liberty City for Grand Theft Auto 4.
Perhaps waiting a few weeks for prices to continue to drop would be for the best.
- As part of the most recent Humble Bundle I had a chance to start playing two indie games that were new to me, The Binding of Isaac and Blocks that Matter.
The Binding of Isaac is definitely a strange game with a very twisted story and plays as a combination of the Legend of Zelda and Robotron. For the price, it's very interesting, and incredibly challenging. You only get one life, and when you die... it's back to the beginning of the game. Unforgiving would be one way to describe it.
Blocks that Matter has been a very fun puzzle type game to play as you acquire various blocks with your character and re-assemble them to escape from each level. The trick is that when you reconstruct your blocks, you have to do so in the form of a tetromino. That adds an interesting challenge level to the game as well.
You also get Voxatron in it's current alpha state as part of the bundle, and all you have to do is spend more than $5.10. Well worth it for those titles.
- Have a good rest of the day.
Wednesday notes
- Oh, well. Brewers lost due to Marcum's inbility to throw strikes and when he did.... he threw them on counts where he was ahead and should have been throwing to avoid contact.
Here's hoping Wolf (and players like Morgan and Weeks) can finish off the D-Backs tonight.
- I already have 4 hours into Fairway Collector's Edition. Man, that game is crazy addictive. It does seem to be quite a bit harder than the last game, if that sort of thing interests you.
- My early time with NBA2K12 has been spent in the MyPlayer mode so far and I've been a bit frustrated with the goals that have been given to my player.
Just to let you know how my player started up, he finished with a A- rating in the rookie challenge game that defines where you will be drafted.
Once you're in the regular season (I was drafted by Golden State at number 11) you get goals for each game. The goals, in my case, weren't all that difficult... but they didn't give me enough time to actually complete them all. For example, they'd give me a goal of 'get one defensive rebound,' but then only leave me in the game for 2 minutes before pulling me for the remainder of the game.
My hope is that my playing time will increase as the season goes on and that will take care of the issue. Otherwise it's going to be pretty damn hard to find a spot in the lineup.
- The downloadable edition of NBA Jam was released yesterday by EA, anyone pick it up?
- Lastly, there is a HUGE Gran Turismo 5 update coming out in the next few weeks that will be adding in-car views for all cars, new cars, new tracks, game loading, in race saves, and support for Logitech's top two wheels (the G25 and G27, which I happen to own.)
What's crazy about the update is that it will be totally free. They've added a ton of features since the game came out and they've done it all without adding any additional cost to the user.
Developers such as Polyphony Digital should be lauded when they support their games for as long as they have.
The game just dropped to $39.99, so if you've been at all interested in the game, now is a great time to pick it up.
- Have a great rest of the day.
Quick Tuesday night notes
- I caught a nasty sinus cold over the last day or so, so I've been pretty much out of it for the day. Here's what's on my mind today though.
- Fairway Collector's Edition is awesome. Easily as good and just as addictive as the first game. I played over 40 hours on the first version of the game and can easily see that repeating itself this time around.
- No more undefeated teams in the Fantasy Football league, and that's a great thing. Glad to see that kind of balance early. 5 teams with 3-1 records and 6 teams with 2-2 records. 11 teams within 1 game of first place? Good stuff.
- Game 3 for the Brewers and Diamondbacks. Amazing to think that the Brewers could move on with a victory tonight. I like Marcum on the mound tonight though. He's been great on the road (8-3) and the team has played better on the road of late.
It would be nice to see them finish off the series today and then get some rest and watch the remainder of the series between the Cards and Phillies. That's my hope any way.
- Started messing around with NBA2K12 last night, but haven't had nearly enough time to play it yet. I'll post some more thoughts on it in a few days.
- Enjoy your night!
Monday morning notes
- Easily the best sports weekend here in Wisconsin. Brewers take the first two games of the NLDS playoffs against Arizona (The place was electric on Saturday.)
Badgers put a beating on Nebraska on Saturday night.
And the Packers whup up on the Broncos today.
Personally, I'm exhausted (and also coming down with a cold) but enjoyed every minute of the whole weekend.
Hopefully Marcum is able to put together a good start on Tuesday and the team keeps hitting like they did today. Fear the beer.... fear the beer.
- As for the Badger game... this team just doesn't look like it will ever be stopped on offense. They have so many talented players and Russell Wilson looks better every game. The schedule is very, very favorable for Wisconsin and if they just keep on winning good things could happen. Stay away from injuries and it should be a special year.
- The Packers? Great googily moogily. I thought they were going to hang 50 something on Denver. The offense is just crazy good. I'd like to see the defense play a bit better, but when you score 49, you can give up a few points and still be ok. The Atlanta game next week could be a big one. I'm sure they're still smarting from the thumping Green Bay put on them in the playoffs last year.
- Just about peed myself when I saw this news today. In case you don't want to click on the link... Arrested Development is coming back to TV and making a movie.
And just because... here are the chicken dances from the show.
- Lastly, I should have my copy of NBA 2K12 sometime this week. I'll be curious to see how well the game sells when it's pretty likely there won't be a season. Actually, playing the game is better than watching it... so it won't impact me much.
- Have a great week.
Wednesday notes
- Well, I had a great time at the Brewers game last night and got to see another nice win and terrific pitching performances from both starters.
I hope that everyone could see that the the magic number that I posted yesterday was done in jest. Seriously, until the magic number is around 10... there is no point in even looking at it. You can't blame Brewers fans for being excited though. We, as fans, haven't had a team that was playing this well at this time of year in almost 30 seasons. We're going to be a bit goofy about it.
One thing that astounded me was the fact that the Brewers have gotten 76 quality starts out of their staff to this point, which means that their starters have given them at least 6 innings of pitching and allowed no more than 3 runs in 62% of their starts this year. That's a great number that shows the kind of consistent pitching that this team has had this year.
Looking back, 3 of the last 4 World Series champions all had at least 84 or more quality starts in a season and the Brewers are on a pace for 100, which would just be crazy, considering people don't even consider this to be one of the top 5 pitching staffs in the game.
You have to tip your hat to Doug Melvin because of the work that he did to bring in Marcum and Greinke, and for acquiring K-Rod, because everything has really clicked for the team since he got there.
- One thing that I definitely learned from last night's game is how hard it is to get a good picture, even with a decent camera.
You have to get so damn lucky to catch the ball or the player at the exactly right moment.
I probably annoyed most of the people sitting near me due to the fact that I took over 400 pictures during the game last night but I was happy that I did get, what I thought, was a great shot of the game winning hit.
Probably my biggest issue was that I was so far away from home plate (probably 250 feet, at least) and the lighting that you have to deal with at an indoor game. Hopefully for my next game I'll be quite a bit closer and can get a lot more shots. (I'm sure that will entertain you all... heh.)
- Lastly, if you haven't had a chance to read the Yahoo Sports investigative report on the activities of a booster at Miami from 2001 to 2010, you really should. It's an amazingly in depth article, with a crazy amount of detail, about the benefits that were given to players and coaches over that period of time, and the way that the university turned a blind eye on the whole thing.
As Patrick Hruby (friend of the blog) writes today, hopefully this will be one of the last straws that breaks the back of amateurism in college athletics.
The fact that Miami's AD (who was one of the biggest critics of USC during the Reggie Bush issues) was part of some of this just makes the irony so rich.
End the crap and figure out a way to start paying the kids.
Monday notes
- That sure was quite a weekend for the Brewers as they got a sweep over the Cardinals and moved into first place in the NL Central for the first time in 2 years.
They wouldn't have been able to do it without the, NL Player of the Week, Prince Fielder though. In the last 10 games, he has hit 8 homeruns, 7 of which have given Milwaukee a lead and the 8th tied up a game. That's pretty amazing stuff.
Very early in the season, but still, encouraging to see them win a series like that against a rival.
- I know it's a smaller story, but I'm sure you've been following it...
There has been a bit of discussion in the last week or so about how baseball is looking to re-align itself in the near future to get 15 teams in each league. Not really sure how to feel about this except for the fact that baseball really needs to try and do something to balance out interleague play schedules. Here's part of the reason why.
St. Louis gets K.C twice, then the Blue Jays, Orioles, and Rays.
Milwaukee gets Boston, Tampa, Minnesota twice, then the Yankees.
I can understand why the natural rivalry games are in there, so that's a wash, but why can't they figure out a way for all of the teams in the division to... oh, I don't know... play the same teams in the other division, like every other sport does?
There's so much to like about baseball, but the unbalanced schedule, and scheduling in general for it, sucks.
- There was no jumping around or yelling in excitement or anything like that, but I was very happy that the Mavericks beat Miami last night in game 6 of the NBA finals.
The reasons why people dislike the Heat are myriad and there is an incredibly good chance that they will be back in this position again if the league plays again next year, but for now everyone can sit back and enjoy the fact that the King's coronation will have to wait for at least another year.
- Now that the basketball playoffs are over, hopefully we'll get a Boston win tonight so that we have all of the sports world focused on a 7th game in the Stanley Cup finals. I don't think it's too much of a stretch to think this will happen considering the fact that the Bruins outscored Vancouver 12-1 in the first two games in Boston.
- In the movie world, I took my girls to see Kung Fu Panda 2 over the weekend. I had a pretty good idea of what they were trying to do with the film, but I just felt that it wasn't executed all that well. It was a decent film, but nowhere near as good as the first. The girls enjoyed it though, so at least there was that.
Then last night I sat down and watched the new version of True Grit last night with my wife. Damn. That was an incredibly well done movie. Some of the imagery in that film will be sticking with me for quite some time. I don't know how, but Jeff Daniels keeps getting better and better every time I see him, and his portrayal of Rooster Cogburn was flat out brilliant.
Sadly, I've never seen the original, but after watching this one, I really have to do that soon.
- Lastly, in gaming I started playing inFamous 2 which is just as good as the first.
The only annoyance that I've found thus far relates to the user created levels. Thankfully they show up on your map with a different type of marker because after you play the actual campaign or mini-missions, you'll really want nothing to do with the user-created ones. Even the missions created by Sucker Punch just feel hollow compared to the actual game itself.
Perhaps they'll get better as time goes on, but if that's a reason you were interested in the game, you'll end up disappointed.
Tuesday notes
- Well, Nintendo sure does make a lot of people say... "Huh?" after their conferences.
I have no idea how good the Wii U controller will be because I haven't really seen how well it can be used for actual games.
I saw a tweet from Patrick Hruby yesterday wondering how good the controller could be for sports games. Honestly, the only thing I could think of was to be able to use the Wii U controller as a 'psuedo-GPS/binoculars' for a golf game where you could point it at the screen and get a view of the green to line up your next shot. Maybe in a football game it could function as your coaching interface, like we had on the VMU back with NFL2K. It's possible that you could handle defensive shifts for your fielders in a baseball game via the touch screen as well. You could use it for all sorts of pitching statistics in a baseball game (Inside Edge type data) as well. Beyond those type of applications though, it seems like it would have very limited options in sports games.
Having said all that, some of the demos did seem interesting. Since we have a year until the release though, I think we'll have more than enough time to hear about how developers are going to push the device and see if it's actually worth our time and money.
- Want to hear the most disturbing thing about E3? NCAA Football 12 isn't being shown at the EA booth. When the game has 1 month before release and almost certainly has to be hitting gold status in the next few days, and you're not showing it to the general public... you're going to have some pretty spooked fans.
I'd love to hear an explanation for this one.
- My daughter's graduation ceremony went off without a hitch, but the thing that was the most disturbing to me was seeing the sign that said 'Class of 2023.' Man, if there is something that makes you feel old.. it's seeing things like that.
- As Dan said, the ability to see videos of the upcoming 3DS games on your system is quite nice. Hopefully they'll push new videos at somewhat regular intervals.
Along with those I tried out Excitebike 3D and I'll give you the IGN review. If you like free games and liked the original Excitebike, I'd grab Excitebike 3D. For some reason, I thought they were adding something other than 3D to the gameplay... but it's just the old Excitebike. Still, it's free, so if you have a 3DS, be sure to grab it.
- Glad to see Capuano pitch well last night for the Mets, but it's too bad that the Brewers pen had to blow the game after Prince hit his 15th in the 6th inning to take the lead.
As I said in the comments section, the Brewers still have the 3rd best record in the NL, so they just need to keep pitching as they have and the hitting should be good enough to get them their fair share of wins.
Also, I didn't wear a Brewers t-shirt last night. So, the loss should be entirely blamed on me.
- Since I was in my rehab chair after the Brewer game, I had a chance to watch the 4th quarter of the NBA finals again.
I know that Lebron is a terrific talent, but I can't recall seeing a situation where a guy like that didn't want the ball in his hands to take a shot when it really mattered in a game. He passed up so many shots in the 4th quarter that it was almost laughable. Dirk looked like death and still managed to take the ball into his hands to control his teams fate but Lebron just faded into the background every time that the Heat needed a big shot, while Dwayne Wade continued to look like the stud for Miami. That was astounding to me.
Even with the win tonight, it seems like the Heat have a pretty advantage in the series. Having the last two games at home, even if you're trailing, is a big deal. I'm still pulling for the Mavs, but things look good for Miami.
- Lastly, Craig sent me a video link of a hit that Tim Thomas put on Henrik Sedin in the last game.
Being a goalie, I really disliked what he did. My main reason for feeling that way is the fact that, as a goalie, you can't be hit by other players without them taking a penalty. To be fair then, you shouldn't be able to hit other players either.
There is something to be said for playing the puck and defending your space, but he was doing neither of those. The player no longer had the puck and he just hit him to hit him. He wasn't playing as a goalie anymore, he was just a hockey player trying to hit a guy coming near the goal.
What he did wasn't a penalty, but it certainly wasn't something that I, as a (incredibly low level) goalie, would every think of doing to another player.
Hopefully Game 4 tonight will be a clean affair, but I really doubt that based on what we've seen in the first 3 games.
Monday notes
- Not sure how many of you are as silly superstitious the rest of you are about sports, but from Friday to Sunday, I wore a Brewers t-shirt (a different one every day...just in case you were wondering) and they won each game by a single run.
Today they get a chance to go for a 4 game sweep of the Marlins, who are a pretty good team as well. Even if they don't win today's game, they have a 4-2 road trip at this point, which is remarkable considering they were 8-17 on the road before this last trip.
Next weekend is the big test though as the Cardinals come to town. They just got done taking a series from the Cubs and won 2 games on walk off homers from Pujols. Should be a fun series.
- Well, we have E3 starting up today with EA, Microsoft and Sony's big press conferences. Apparently Microsoft's list of titles that they will be showing has leaked and, at least to me, it's not all that impressive of a list. And now their own site is listing Halo 4 and a remake of Halo: Combat Evolved. Maybe I'm jumping to a conclusion there, but there really isn't anything on that list that's really grabbing me. We'll see more in a few hours, I guess.
I'll post my thoughts on all three of the conferences later today, along with anything else that might be worth covering.
One thing that will almost certainly be a theme this year? Remakes... lots and lots of HD remakes.
- Back in the early 90's, I got into collecting comics due to the fact that I acquired a job working for a distributor called Westfield Comics. It was just simple data entry stuff, but eventually I got a job working at one of their retail locations in town and I started reading a ton of stuff. In fact, I have 4 long boxes filled with comics from that time... that I know don't have any value. Such is life.
Over the last few years, I've heard a ton of great things about a series called Y: The Last Man and so I went to the library and grabbed a few of the graphic novels to see what the hype was about.
I have to say that I was amazed about the book. For those of you that don't know what happens, there is some sort of plague that impacts the world and kills off every mammal with a y chromosome. No men, and no male animals to continue breeding their species.
The one man that survives is an amateur escape artist named Yorick Brown and the series follows him and the people trying to help him uncover what happened and how they might be able to save the human race.
It's really been an incredible read thus far and I just can't wait to see what happens to Yorick, Hero, 355, and Dr. Mann. Great stuff, I highly recommend it.
If you have any other suggestions of books to take a look into once I'm done with it, pass them along.
- While I was sitting in my rehab chair yesterday, I made myself watch the 4th quarter of game 3 of the NBA finals. Here's what I came away with.
* Sloppy passing is due to "great defense." At least 2 or 3 times in critical situations you'd see players make horrible passes for no real reason. Some real ugly stuff.
* Jason Kidd is a TERRIBLE defender. He was on Dwayne Wade for the entire 4th quarter and only once raised his arms to try and get a hand in Wade's face. Nearly every shot Wade took was uncontested. How that guy was guarding one of the best players in the game is beyond me.
* The last 10 minutes of the game took 35 minutes. One stretch of 3 minutes took almost 15. Painfully slow to watch.
After all that, I just came to the conclusion, yet again, that the NHL Finals is a much better product for sheer excitement at the end of a game when the outcome is in doubt.... but you knew I would say that already.
- Lastly... I had a chance to try out the Duke Nukem Forever demo and I was disappointed to see that it was the same one that I had heard that journalists have been playing for the better part of the last year.
Graphically, the game is not all that impressive, even with the settings set to the max, and the gameplay.. from the early segments didn't really do anything to stand out either.
Still, the Duke vibe is there. I'll be curious to try out the full version of the game, but it seems clear that the main reason that it was being held back... even after all these years... was because of the fact that it isn't as good as some of the other games out there in that genre. A games personality can take you part of the way... but can't cover up all of the flaws.
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