As you have learned by now, there can be a sense of timing for the RJB’s selections.
Given how the RJB was traveling back and forth with settling in college students at the University of Arkansas and the University of Alabama, it knew this was the exact time to do it.
Southern Rock hit its peak in the 1970s with the monster group Lynyrd Skynyrd.
For those who kinda but don’t exactly know what Southern Rock is, it’s a mix of blues, country and rock.
Formed in 1964 in Jacksonville, FL Ronnie Van Zandt, Gary Rossington and Allen Collins headed the group that was actually known as My Backyard before it fiddled with names before settling on Lynard Skynard in 1969. Why was that name chosen? Well, that was because it was in “honor” of a P.E. teacher at their high school who enforced getting the boys in the high school to cut their long hair. Of course, the late 1960s and early 1970s, men with long hair was the ultimate fad.
The group hit its peak in the early 1970s with several major hits including “Free Bird” and “Three Steps”. Then there was the tragic plane crash in 1977 in Mississippi that killed Van Zandt and five others.
But the group was able to reform. Maybe not the way it was but it has had a presence on the scene.
The RJB’s two favorite selections from this band? The first one is obvious. With the Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa, the first one is arguably its biggest hit. At least it vies with Free Bird.
The second is a cover from a 1972 song recorded by J.J. Cale. Lynard Skynard’s cover is probably the most popular. The RJB loves it because of the brass.
Finally, Lynard Skynard was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.
****
True Story: When the yours truly was covering the Rangers in 1996, I was in New York to cover the Rangers first-ever playoff series against the Yankees. In a hotel elevator, I stepped into an elevator with several members of the group. But the I didn’t know it at the time until after they walked out and someone pointed that out to me and my colleague.
****
Surprise! WWHT remains on schedule and not Tuesday like I originally thought. We had a change in plans. After we got the Crimson Tide into her new place late Thursday and then settled everything else on Friday, Mrs. Razorback and I decided it didn’t make sense to remain in Tuscaloosa for another day. We headed back Saturday.
Sad to say good-bye. Tears were shed. But you’d rather have it that way then the other way. But she’s sharing a place with three other sorority members. And a sign that she was ready to get back was on Saturday morning was one of her friends arrived and immediately ran to her and jumped up and hugged her.
Good feeling. Now, Mrs. Razorback and I return to the empty nest after the unexpected 4 1/2 month return to the mid-2010s.
Cool side note: When at Full Moon BBQ in Tuscaloosa, it’s a place loaded with Alabama football memorabilia obviously. There was a great picture that featured Bear Bryant, Ken Stabler and Mickey Mantle. Picture was from the 1960s when Stabler was the QB and Mantle was nearing the end of his career with the New York Yankees.
****
This not the way to start WWHT of me wagging my finger and saying I told you so. But as I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions, we’re in a situation that the only thing known about the college athletics is that it’s fluid.
Really, it’s kind of like Texas weather. Do or don’t like what you’re experiencing right now? Wait 30 minutes for when it changes.
All you have to do is look at what happened to the chain reaction of events from last week.
>On Wednesday, the ACC opted for an 11-game schedule with 10 league games and one non-league game if any can be found. It also allowed Notre Dame to join for 2020 and compete in the ACC title game.
>The SEC then announced Thursday that it would go to a 10-game league schedule. There would be no non-league games. Consequently, Baylor’s opener against Ole Miss on Sept. 6 at NRG Stadium in Houston bit the dust.
>As a result the Big 12 suddenly canceled virtual media day scheduled for Monday two weeks after it postponed the event. With games like Baylor-Ole Miss and Texas-LSU history, the conference is now the last of the P5s to figure out how it wants to handle the season.
And all this was after the NCAA allowed schools to start their season on Aug. 29. That was the news starting the week.
Now if we have a season…and that’s a big if…it’s going to be one of the most disjointed events we have ever seen. Well, we were on the verge of having it anyway.
As is stands now, the 2020 college football season is going to be one big staggard start.
Some seasons will start Aug. 29. Others will start Labor Day weekend. Others will start later.
The Big 12 presidents are scheduled to meet Monday and vote on a new-look schedule. Stadium’s Brett McMurphy reported over the weekend that the 9-game only format was unlikely. However, the league could be looking at a 9-game schedule with a non-conference home game or allow conference members to determine how many home games that could be played. The future of the championship game was unknown.
In Baylor’s case, it could try and seek a game with an ACC opponent. However, the Bears would have to travel somewhere out East to play at the team’s campus and then meet the medical protocol requirements. That doesn’t sound too appetizing.
Let’s just for a moment imagine that the Big 12 decides to go with a 10-game schedule, nine league games and then one non-conference opponent. If that happens, Baylor basically has two opponents to pick from between Louisiana Tech and Incarnate Word. Those games are scheduled for Sept. 19 and Sept. 26 respectively.
Should the conference follow suit with the other leagues and start in late September and only allow one non-league game, Baylor could pick from either of those two programs. If the conference allows teams to play two or three opponents before conference play starts, then it’s pretty well set up for Baylor to stick with those two opponents.
Other regional teams like SMU, Tulsa and Houston are in a holding pattern as well. SMU has its traditional game with TCU. But Monday’s vote could alter that. Tulsa has a game at Oklahoma state. But Monday’s vote could alter that. Houston lost its game at Washington State on Sept. 11 as the PAC 12 went league only. Now, if Baylor decides to find a different opponent and asks Incarnate Word and/or La Tech to move, a one-off with Houston could happen. Travel is easy. It’s up and back the same day more than likely. But if the aforementioned games involving SMU and Tulsa get pushed, those could be alternatives.
Frankly, my guess is as good as anybody’s. And no fan, alum or follower should be angry, upset and feel like the athletic leaders have no clue what they’re doing. People in positions of authority really don’t have the right answer because there isn’t one.
Assessing the health risks against being able to play a game or season is delicate at best. MLB is off to a wobbly start because apparently some players weren’t following the protocols very well and some series got postponed. Thank you Miami Marlins. Time will tell if they will get made up. The media piled on with stories that the season could be canceled as early as Monday. Then commissioner Rob Manfred had to come out and put that down.
The NBA’s bubble seems to be doing OK down at Disney. Pundits will point to that model as the best way to go through something like this. There have been some outlier players who wandered away. Overall, it’s a plan that’s keeping this going.
The bubble appears to be a good idea as far as a football team is concerned. If you keep the team in the same setting where it trains together, studies together and eats together and away from the rest of the campus, it would suggest that’s the best way a season could be a season. The players have been tested. They’ve been around each other. Maybe this type of herd immunity works or seems to be working. Obviously, the transmission rate could escalate playing another team (that team’s results would be known leading up to the game). But there are risks in everything. Football is a bigger challenge than basketball because there nine times as many players on the roster.
Then there’s the value of a dollar involved. These athletic departments need the TV revenue in the worst way because so many are hemorrhaging with cuts, furloughs and layoffs. The college game can survive a season with few or no butts in seats. The money from season ticket sales, concession sales, parking and others is a hit but not a catastrophic one. College athletics would need a lifeline with no TV money coming in.
It’s really easy for people to look ahead, prognosticate, forecast and speculate. But all that solves is just talking for the sake of talking and resembles someone sitting in their favorite hair stylist’s chair and gossiping.
Even Texas in the heart of the summer occasionally gets that cold front.
****
I’m really not concerned about what the PAC 12 players are demanding from the league or they will boycott the season. Whatever legal advice they are receiving is nothing but a bully tactic designed to create shock wave headlines.
This is the same thing that happened at the University of Texas when the players made a bunch of demands including the abolition of “The Eyes of Texas.’’ Well, that was pure negotiations. And when you start high, you’re eventually going to have to come to the middle.
Same thing here. This is what the PAC 12 players demanded everything in the tweet below. The first reality is that they’re not going to get everything they want. And they better realize that. If they don’t, then they’re playing ball in Fantasy Land.
It will get resolved. They’ll have to give some. The league and universities will work with them. Just understand there’s a shock value to these kinds of stories. Once that wears off, then things will go in a normal pace.
****
Now, some mentions from Baylor…
>Baylor women's tennis achieved 2020 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) All-Academic Team status for the fifth-straight year and 16th overall, and four student-athletes earned ITA Scholar-Athlete awards as announced Monday by the ITA.
To be named an ITA All-Academic Team, a program must have a team grade point average of 3.2 or above (on a 4.00 scale), all student-athletes included should be listed on the institutional eligibility form, and all varsity letter winners should be factored into the cumulative team GPA for the current academic year.
Livia Kraus, Alicia Herrero Linana, Daria Rakitskaya and Angelina Shakhraichuk were each named ITA Scholar-Athletes, which requires a grade point average of at least 3.5 (on a 4.00 scale) for the current academic year and for the student-athlete to be listed on the institutional eligibility form.
Kraus achieved the honor for the third-consecutive year, while Herrero Linana, Rakitskaya and Shakhraichuk are first-time honorees.
> Baylor was one of 67 Division I baseball programs to earn the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA) Team Academic Excellence Award for having a team GPA over 3.0, the organization announced Wednesday.
As a team, the Bears boast a 3.41 GPA for the entire 2019-20 academic year. The Bears have earned the prestigious team honor all five seasons under head coach Steve Rodriguez.
Baylor is one of two Big 12 programs to receive the award, joining Oklahoma State.
Baylor set a program record with a 3.27 GPA for the fall term, followed by a 3.54 for the spring, the highest term GPA on record.
Seventy-two percent of the BU roster earned Big 12 Commissioners Honor Roll selections for having a GPA of 3.0 or higher during the fall semester with 100 percent of the team receiving the same honor in the spring. The Bears led the Big 12 with 19 Academic All-Big 12 selections back in May.
Let’s make it a great week!
Given how the RJB was traveling back and forth with settling in college students at the University of Arkansas and the University of Alabama, it knew this was the exact time to do it.
Southern Rock hit its peak in the 1970s with the monster group Lynyrd Skynyrd.
For those who kinda but don’t exactly know what Southern Rock is, it’s a mix of blues, country and rock.
Formed in 1964 in Jacksonville, FL Ronnie Van Zandt, Gary Rossington and Allen Collins headed the group that was actually known as My Backyard before it fiddled with names before settling on Lynard Skynard in 1969. Why was that name chosen? Well, that was because it was in “honor” of a P.E. teacher at their high school who enforced getting the boys in the high school to cut their long hair. Of course, the late 1960s and early 1970s, men with long hair was the ultimate fad.
The group hit its peak in the early 1970s with several major hits including “Free Bird” and “Three Steps”. Then there was the tragic plane crash in 1977 in Mississippi that killed Van Zandt and five others.
But the group was able to reform. Maybe not the way it was but it has had a presence on the scene.
The RJB’s two favorite selections from this band? The first one is obvious. With the Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa, the first one is arguably its biggest hit. At least it vies with Free Bird.
The second is a cover from a 1972 song recorded by J.J. Cale. Lynard Skynard’s cover is probably the most popular. The RJB loves it because of the brass.
Finally, Lynard Skynard was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.
****
True Story: When the yours truly was covering the Rangers in 1996, I was in New York to cover the Rangers first-ever playoff series against the Yankees. In a hotel elevator, I stepped into an elevator with several members of the group. But the I didn’t know it at the time until after they walked out and someone pointed that out to me and my colleague.
****
Surprise! WWHT remains on schedule and not Tuesday like I originally thought. We had a change in plans. After we got the Crimson Tide into her new place late Thursday and then settled everything else on Friday, Mrs. Razorback and I decided it didn’t make sense to remain in Tuscaloosa for another day. We headed back Saturday.
Sad to say good-bye. Tears were shed. But you’d rather have it that way then the other way. But she’s sharing a place with three other sorority members. And a sign that she was ready to get back was on Saturday morning was one of her friends arrived and immediately ran to her and jumped up and hugged her.
Good feeling. Now, Mrs. Razorback and I return to the empty nest after the unexpected 4 1/2 month return to the mid-2010s.
Cool side note: When at Full Moon BBQ in Tuscaloosa, it’s a place loaded with Alabama football memorabilia obviously. There was a great picture that featured Bear Bryant, Ken Stabler and Mickey Mantle. Picture was from the 1960s when Stabler was the QB and Mantle was nearing the end of his career with the New York Yankees.
****
This not the way to start WWHT of me wagging my finger and saying I told you so. But as I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions, we’re in a situation that the only thing known about the college athletics is that it’s fluid.
Really, it’s kind of like Texas weather. Do or don’t like what you’re experiencing right now? Wait 30 minutes for when it changes.
All you have to do is look at what happened to the chain reaction of events from last week.
>On Wednesday, the ACC opted for an 11-game schedule with 10 league games and one non-league game if any can be found. It also allowed Notre Dame to join for 2020 and compete in the ACC title game.
>The SEC then announced Thursday that it would go to a 10-game league schedule. There would be no non-league games. Consequently, Baylor’s opener against Ole Miss on Sept. 6 at NRG Stadium in Houston bit the dust.
>As a result the Big 12 suddenly canceled virtual media day scheduled for Monday two weeks after it postponed the event. With games like Baylor-Ole Miss and Texas-LSU history, the conference is now the last of the P5s to figure out how it wants to handle the season.
And all this was after the NCAA allowed schools to start their season on Aug. 29. That was the news starting the week.
Now if we have a season…and that’s a big if…it’s going to be one of the most disjointed events we have ever seen. Well, we were on the verge of having it anyway.
As is stands now, the 2020 college football season is going to be one big staggard start.
Some seasons will start Aug. 29. Others will start Labor Day weekend. Others will start later.
The Big 12 presidents are scheduled to meet Monday and vote on a new-look schedule. Stadium’s Brett McMurphy reported over the weekend that the 9-game only format was unlikely. However, the league could be looking at a 9-game schedule with a non-conference home game or allow conference members to determine how many home games that could be played. The future of the championship game was unknown.
In Baylor’s case, it could try and seek a game with an ACC opponent. However, the Bears would have to travel somewhere out East to play at the team’s campus and then meet the medical protocol requirements. That doesn’t sound too appetizing.
Let’s just for a moment imagine that the Big 12 decides to go with a 10-game schedule, nine league games and then one non-conference opponent. If that happens, Baylor basically has two opponents to pick from between Louisiana Tech and Incarnate Word. Those games are scheduled for Sept. 19 and Sept. 26 respectively.
Should the conference follow suit with the other leagues and start in late September and only allow one non-league game, Baylor could pick from either of those two programs. If the conference allows teams to play two or three opponents before conference play starts, then it’s pretty well set up for Baylor to stick with those two opponents.
Other regional teams like SMU, Tulsa and Houston are in a holding pattern as well. SMU has its traditional game with TCU. But Monday’s vote could alter that. Tulsa has a game at Oklahoma state. But Monday’s vote could alter that. Houston lost its game at Washington State on Sept. 11 as the PAC 12 went league only. Now, if Baylor decides to find a different opponent and asks Incarnate Word and/or La Tech to move, a one-off with Houston could happen. Travel is easy. It’s up and back the same day more than likely. But if the aforementioned games involving SMU and Tulsa get pushed, those could be alternatives.
Frankly, my guess is as good as anybody’s. And no fan, alum or follower should be angry, upset and feel like the athletic leaders have no clue what they’re doing. People in positions of authority really don’t have the right answer because there isn’t one.
Assessing the health risks against being able to play a game or season is delicate at best. MLB is off to a wobbly start because apparently some players weren’t following the protocols very well and some series got postponed. Thank you Miami Marlins. Time will tell if they will get made up. The media piled on with stories that the season could be canceled as early as Monday. Then commissioner Rob Manfred had to come out and put that down.
The NBA’s bubble seems to be doing OK down at Disney. Pundits will point to that model as the best way to go through something like this. There have been some outlier players who wandered away. Overall, it’s a plan that’s keeping this going.
The bubble appears to be a good idea as far as a football team is concerned. If you keep the team in the same setting where it trains together, studies together and eats together and away from the rest of the campus, it would suggest that’s the best way a season could be a season. The players have been tested. They’ve been around each other. Maybe this type of herd immunity works or seems to be working. Obviously, the transmission rate could escalate playing another team (that team’s results would be known leading up to the game). But there are risks in everything. Football is a bigger challenge than basketball because there nine times as many players on the roster.
Then there’s the value of a dollar involved. These athletic departments need the TV revenue in the worst way because so many are hemorrhaging with cuts, furloughs and layoffs. The college game can survive a season with few or no butts in seats. The money from season ticket sales, concession sales, parking and others is a hit but not a catastrophic one. College athletics would need a lifeline with no TV money coming in.
It’s really easy for people to look ahead, prognosticate, forecast and speculate. But all that solves is just talking for the sake of talking and resembles someone sitting in their favorite hair stylist’s chair and gossiping.
Even Texas in the heart of the summer occasionally gets that cold front.
****
I’m really not concerned about what the PAC 12 players are demanding from the league or they will boycott the season. Whatever legal advice they are receiving is nothing but a bully tactic designed to create shock wave headlines.
This is the same thing that happened at the University of Texas when the players made a bunch of demands including the abolition of “The Eyes of Texas.’’ Well, that was pure negotiations. And when you start high, you’re eventually going to have to come to the middle.
Same thing here. This is what the PAC 12 players demanded everything in the tweet below. The first reality is that they’re not going to get everything they want. And they better realize that. If they don’t, then they’re playing ball in Fantasy Land.
It will get resolved. They’ll have to give some. The league and universities will work with them. Just understand there’s a shock value to these kinds of stories. Once that wears off, then things will go in a normal pace.
****
Now, some mentions from Baylor…
>Baylor women's tennis achieved 2020 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) All-Academic Team status for the fifth-straight year and 16th overall, and four student-athletes earned ITA Scholar-Athlete awards as announced Monday by the ITA.
To be named an ITA All-Academic Team, a program must have a team grade point average of 3.2 or above (on a 4.00 scale), all student-athletes included should be listed on the institutional eligibility form, and all varsity letter winners should be factored into the cumulative team GPA for the current academic year.
Livia Kraus, Alicia Herrero Linana, Daria Rakitskaya and Angelina Shakhraichuk were each named ITA Scholar-Athletes, which requires a grade point average of at least 3.5 (on a 4.00 scale) for the current academic year and for the student-athlete to be listed on the institutional eligibility form.
Kraus achieved the honor for the third-consecutive year, while Herrero Linana, Rakitskaya and Shakhraichuk are first-time honorees.
> Baylor was one of 67 Division I baseball programs to earn the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA) Team Academic Excellence Award for having a team GPA over 3.0, the organization announced Wednesday.
As a team, the Bears boast a 3.41 GPA for the entire 2019-20 academic year. The Bears have earned the prestigious team honor all five seasons under head coach Steve Rodriguez.
Baylor is one of two Big 12 programs to receive the award, joining Oklahoma State.
Baylor set a program record with a 3.27 GPA for the fall term, followed by a 3.54 for the spring, the highest term GPA on record.
Seventy-two percent of the BU roster earned Big 12 Commissioners Honor Roll selections for having a GPA of 3.0 or higher during the fall semester with 100 percent of the team receiving the same honor in the spring. The Bears led the Big 12 with 19 Academic All-Big 12 selections back in May.
Let’s make it a great week!
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