I'm not going to cry about why i'm leaving, or even give much of a reason why, beyond not having much time or energy to devote to it, and maybe the biggest reason, fox having so many tech issues.

on that note, i'd like to ask fox to at least allow me to look at my archived posts, so i can print off some of them.  i suppose i could search by category, but i already tried that, and after 23 pages of "CSIN" (which, by the way, is short for "Cuziffer Sports Inter Network"), i found 3 of the posts i wanted.  i know there are more, but i simply dont have the time or patience to search by category, not to mention some of the categories i used to use when i first started are no longer around, either because i decided not to use them anymore, or you decided they were somehow offensive.

i know this is probably too much to ask, but i thought i'd throw it out there anyway.

oh, and 1 more thing...i know you're busy and all, making sure nobody uses any non-PC words, but do you think you could rid the site of all those annoying people who keep advertising their "dating" websites?  yeah, i know, why should i care if i'm leaving, right?  well, there are alot of other people on this site who are fed up with them too.  if you had a clue, you'd realize these clowns are chasing away the people who made/make this site enjoyable.  are you seeing the connection here yet?

meh, nevermind.  just please fix it so i can get to my archives, and i'll leave you busy, overworked, underpaid people alone.

thanks!

- without devin hester, would anybody care about the bears right now?

- if GB manages to win in dallas (and look good doing so), and brett favre plays huge, will it all but lock up his 4th mvp award?

- the patriots can be beaten.  philly came close, but in the end they didnt have quite enough talent, and didnt make enough plays to finish them off.

- st. louis is an embarrassment to the nfl.  the dolphins are awful, but st. louis keeps finding ways to #### defeat from the jaws of victory.

- did kurt warner get hit in the head once too often?  a QB should never hold onto the ball as long as he did in his own endzone.  the fact that it was in overtime when he did it tells me he's almost qualified to play for the rams again.

- sal paolantonio wrote a book in which he rates joe namath as the most overrated QB in the history of the nfl, and brett favre 2nd.  while namath had 220 INT's to 173 TD's in 3762 attempts to favre's 430-something TD's and 200-whatever (yeah, i know he has that record too now), i dont quite get how favre is overrated.  and its not because i like the guy either.

at any rate, i never saw namath play, but i also never understood why he was considered a great QB either.  now that i know his stats, its mind-boggling to me.

- what's this deal about the packers and a "bounty"?  from what i understand, the DB's offered $500 to the DL if they held adrian peterson under 100 yards.  then all he11 breaks loose when peterson gets hurt on a tackle by al harris (a DB by the way).

i may have already said this, but if that little $500 dollar thing is a big deal, then no qb should ever be allowed to buy his o-linemen rolex watches for protecting his prima-donna butt all season.

- ohhhhhh raider fans...where are you?

- i read something somewhere that the bulls are distracted by the kobe trade talks.  it's not that they stink, it's just the distraction.  look, i'd buy the theory that scott skiles is purposely finding ways to lose in order to make john paxson feel he has to make that deal happen before i'd believe the players are just too distracted by the talks.

- some clown thinks the bucks should trade for stephon marbury as a 'steady veteran with leadership skills'.  i dont think this guy knows anything about marbury.

- the bucks beat cleveland, the lakers and dallas in a week.  still, people think mo williams wont pass (at least 2 double doubles in a 4 game stretch), andrew bogut cant rebound or defend (double digit rebounds in at least 3 games that i know of, and 3 consecutive games with 4 blocks).  what some people are starting to notice is that michael redd is improving his defense, rebounding and passing.  of course, a few others still think the only way milwaukee will go anywhere is if they trade him away.

- the knicks are still a joke, and nobody's laughing more than me.

- just when you thought the college football season couldnt get any wierder....mizzou and WVU are the top 2 teams in the country, and LSU, USC, texas and florida all have at least 2 losses.  if it stays the way it is now, and mizzou and WVU play for that NC, it might finally get the BCS to tweak the system, but it shouldnt.  it's their system, and having 2 teams that may not be attractive to tv audiences or advertisers is NOT a good reason to change it now.

- i seen the score of the nebraska/colorado game on espn's bottom line and thought they accidentally put in a basketball score.  65-51?  i dont know how good either of their BB teams are this year, but i'll bet $10 one of those teams cant score as many points as their FB brothers.

- if OSU does manage to get into the NC game, who really believes illinois will get invited to the rose bowl?

- anybody see the cincinnati reds signing francisco cordero before it happened?  wow.  4 years, 46 million with an option for year 5.  man, the brewers could have really used him back, but i'm glad they didnt go insane and offer that kind of deal.

- so A-Rod can now earn up to $305 million total in his new contract if he passes each of the top 3 career HR hitters while still a member of the yankees.  so much for the idea that he wouldnt be able to get $30 mil/year without the help of an agent.

- i do find it ironic that so many in baseball...owners, GM's, bud selig's band of merry morons....continue to talk about how contracts are out of control, yet the owners keep giving the go-ahead on ridiculous contracts that GM's keep throwing around, and MLB continues to approve them.

 ACC

- currently 3 teams unbeaten in conference play (BC, Va Tech, Va).
- BC is 7-0, the other 2 are 6-1.
- Va and BC dont play each other, but Va Tech plays them both.
- FSU and The U (miami, for the uneducated....some of which are enrolled there) are mediocre this year.  pretty sad considering not many take the ACC seriously anyway.

Big East

-South Florida, Connecticut and Cincinnati sit in the top 3 spots.  this is football, not basketball, right?
- supposed powers Rutgers and Louisville are just trying to stay in the hunt at this point.
- WVU already lost to USF, so they'll have to win out and hope the Bulls lose twice in order to win the conference.
- is it time to fire dave wanttobemediocrestedt and replace him with mark may yet?

Conference USA

- does anybody care?
- could the cast from "we are marshall" beat this year's team?
- is east carolina a new state?  when does their state quarter come out?
- holy crow, there's another division too yet?  moving on...

Mid-American Conference

- another conference nobody cares about with 2 divisions.
- somebody might care if miami was the other miami, ohio added either "the" or "state" to their name, or any of the 3 michigans just went by michigan.  then again, the other miami and michigan are having down years, so maybe not.
- maybe if ball state changed it's name to "exposed b00by state" or something like that....

Pac 10

- arizona state is the only unbeaten team overall.
- UCLA is undefeated in conference play, but managed to lose to ND and utah, and look bad doing so.
- USC fans are jumping off the bandwagon faster than nebraska fans are jumping back on for hiring tom osborne as (reportedly) athletic director.  losing to stanford in average GPA is one thing.  losing to them on the football field is just embarrassing.
- california coughed up a golden opportunity to rub dirt in USC's wounds last weekend, and lost to oregon state....at home.

Sunbelt Conference

- a bunch of teams with the name of a state in them along with words like "north", "middle", "atlantic", and ____(enter city name after name of state and hyphen here).
- much like the Mid-Am and Con-USA, this conference could have more teams with really good records, except they keep agreeing to play powerhouses on the road every year.
- my favorite team in this conference is middle tennessee poly tech state.

Big 12 (or is it XII?)

- kansas is leading the north division.  another sign for the uninformed they believe they're looking at the basketball standings.
- missouri is 5-1 overall, but in 4th place because they're only 1-1 in conference play.
- oklahoma is 6-1.
- texas is 5-2, and in 5th place thanks to a 1-2 conference record.
- whose bright idea was it to put oklahoma and texas in the same division?
- nebraska cant win, so they fired their athletic director.  you would have thought the coach should have gone with him after 2 humiliating losses in a row.

Big 10

- embarrassing.
- michigan loses to Apple dumpling the first game of the year and drops from #5 to out of the polls.  then they lose to oregon and people are wondering if they'll win any games this year.  now they're tied for 1st in the conference at 3-0, and tied for 2nd overall at 5-2.
- this was supposed to be a down year for ohio state, but they're 7-0 (3-0) and currently ranked #1 in the country.
- wisconsin and penn state had dreams of going undefeated and perhaps getting a shot at the national title game.  both teams are 5-2 (2-2) and both lost to illinois.
- iowa is terrible, but managed to hold illinois and their high-octane offense to 6 points, and win 10-6.
- another year, another collapse by michigan state.  maybe you should try starting slow next year.
- minnesota is who we thought they were...not any good.  they will beat wisconsin though.

iNDependants

- notre dame is 1-6.
- army, navy and western kentucky all have better records.
- notre dame cant even manage a better record than 3 teams who annually play the big boys, have tough entrance requirements, and generally just arent known as traditional powerhouses, unlike the fighting (or should i say whimpering?) irish.

SEC (the greatest conference ever......EVER!)

- south carolina and kentucky are #1 and 2 in the east division.
- tennessee, georgia and florida are #3, 4, and 5.
- LSU is #1 in the west.
- i thought arkansas was supposed to be a contender this year?
- i believe every team in the SEC is ranked, just because this conference is that good.

WAC

- hawaii is 7-0 (4-0)
- 3 cities with "state" attached to their name.
- does anyone care about boise state anymore?
- does anyone care about this conference, since hawaii plays all their games at like 2 a.m.?

what's it all mean?

- it means nobody seems to want it.
- it means parity is alive and well in college football.
- it means the Big 10 had every chance to prove they werent a conference on the decline, and could have had 3 teams undefeated this year, only to puke all over themselves.
- it means that when ND, michigan, nobody from the SEC or Pac 10 is undefeated, the whole thing becomes a toss-up.
- it means ohio state, boston college and south florida are taking advantage of the opportunity given to them.
- it means those same 3 teams better not blink, or we could end up with hawaii vs. a 2-loss SEC team for the nat'l championship.
- it means this post is unbelievably long, and i'm going to stop now.

vick

hey, vick defenders.  tell me again how he's really a good guy (and smart), and has only made 1 mistake.

remember, the dogfighting thing was about 7 years in the making, not a 1 time brain cramp on his part.

i seen one guy defend vick's pot smoking by saying it's still not as bad as boozing.  well skippy, that may be true, but keep in mind vick is awaiting sentencing on federal dogfighting charges (in case you're not getting the point, that means this is about the worst time he could have picked to test positive for mary jane).

and lets not forget the state of virginia is now going after him (although the grand jury or the prosecutor dropped the ball somewhat) for the same dogfighting ring.

how dumb is this guy?

milwaukee bucks

did i miss a memo?  is the nba starting a JV league (besides the NBDL) or something?

since july, they've signed jake voshkul, awvee storey, samaki walker, michael ruffin and royal ivey.

if any of these guys contributes anything to this team, i'll be shocked.

wisconsin badgers (football, what else?)

i dont know who they think they are, but they need to wake up and fast.  as it stands right now, their most recognizable player (by virtue of performance) is the punter, ken dabauche.

p.j. hill?  he's alright, but not the force we need him to be.

tyler donovan?  he's solid, but struggled against iowa.

the defense?  oh boy, where do i start?  they looked better against iowa, but keep in mind they were missing 3 playmakers due to injury (or suspension) and 2 more got hurt during the game.

an undefeated michigan state comes to town on saturday.  maybe nobody on the current team remembers, but michigan state embarrassed wisconsin back in '04 when the badgers were 9-0 (maybe it was 8-0) and ranked #5 in the country.  wisconsin didnt win another game that year.  that's your motivation piece brett beliema...now worry about that instead of complaining that some of the sell-out crowd arent wearing red shirts.

just noticed this, and i'll offer a couple tidbits of my own...

kellyscott wrote a post about speeding up the game of baseball.

i've offered suggestions in the past, but here are a couple more...for ALL sports.

1. how about starting the games within 5 minutes of the top of the hour?  seriously, every time i tune in for a game that is supposed to start at 7:05, it's nearing 7:15 before the first pitch, kickoff, tip, or what have you.

i swear when i tuned in to watch wisconsin vs. iowa at 7 pm on saturday it was past 7:20 before the game actually started.  why?  because even though we're forced to suffer through half an hour (or more) of pregame, we have to suffer through most of the same stuff again before they can actually start the game.

2. since we're already in the habit of announcing who the sponsors are, no more 2+ minute commercial breaks.  this is one thing i have noticed seems to be changing a little.

when there's a possession change, they aren't going to their normal 2 minute breaks.  they have about 30 seconds for the teams to change personnel, then the play clock starts and the game resumes.

but lets take it one step further.  eliminate all 2 minute breaks (even for timeouts...wtf needs 2 minutes to figure out what play to run?  the teams never hurry to the sideline, and the 2 minute timeout turns into a 3 minute timeout.

30 second timeouts are plenty long enough.  besides, most timeouts are called to a) avoid a delay of game penalty, b) stop the clock at the end of the half/game, c) freeze the opposing kicker, or d) one side or the other has the wrong personnel or a bad mismatch they dont want to be exploited.

get announcers who can speak, and talk about the game only.  i'm a firm believer in that the NFL (especially) could speed things up if the announcers cut down on the useless information they continue to feed us.

john madden is a problem all by himself.  he cant spit out something that is actually relevent to the action on the field in less than 45 seconds.

in baseball, we're statistic'ed (new word i just made up, and it's already copyrighted) to death.  we've got OPS, OBP, BA W/RISP, WHIP, ERA, etc etc etc.  apparently the players figure the announcers are giving all this information between every pitch, because they're always calling timeout to delay the next bit of action.

the only problem is, what i've been hearing from the announcers all too often is complete silence.  there are times when i'm listening to the game in my car, and milwuakee is losing (at home), i'm convinced my reception was lost after 10-15 seconds of complete nothingness.  finally bob uecker comes back and lets me know there's going to be a pitching change (oh great, another 10 minute gap in the action).

________________

enough of that.  time for my pet peeve of the week

in week 1 of the NFL, the patriots were caught cheating, and the jets had to have been involved in how the league found out.

the following week, the jets were accused of cheating by baltimore coach brian billick.

kind of ironic, dont you think?

then in week 2, denver coach mike shanahan called time out a split second before oakland snapped the ball in what would have been the game-winning FG by sabastage jankanowski (yeah, i could spell his name right, but what fun would that be?).

oakland coach (and high school senior) lane kiffon was miffed.  on the actual attemp, jankanowski missed and denver pulled out the win.

so, what does oakland do?  well, they turn right around and pull the same stunt on the cleveland browns on sunday.  what happened?  same thing that happened to them the week before.  the kicker "made" the first attempt, but the timeout supposedly had been called prior to the snap.  on the second attempt...clank.

the point is, if someone does something to you and you dont like it (or it's considered illegal or cheating), you look pretty bad in my book when you turn around and do the exact same thing to the next guy.

...and i'm putting the NFL on notice to change the rule allowing coaches or players to call timeout from the sideline to freeze the kicker when the teams are all lined up and ready to snap the ball.

astros pitching

cubs fans (and a few others) are claiming cecil cooper is intentionally trying to help the brewers win the division by starting 3 rookies against them.

he skipped roy oswalt so he could be with his wife for the birth of their child.  his team is also out of the race, and he's looking at players for the future.  he's also hoping he gets the term "interim" removed from in front of his name and become the permanent manager of the 'stros.

it seems to me that he's actually putting the team in front of his own personal goals (becoming permanent manager) by using rookie pitchers down the stretch.  if he were trying harder to get the manager's job, he wouldnt be doing this.  so the claim of him doing his former team a favor would mean he's intentionally screwing himself out of a job.  i dont buy that.

tank johnson

dallas is desperate.  apparently the bengals are over the NFL cap limit on convicted felons, so they were out of the running for his services long ago.  i think dallas actually got an exemption to this rule, possibly due to the mistake of thinking mike vandershank was a clutch kicker last year.

at least they got him cheap.

eric gagne

for all the grief some brewer fans believe scott linebrink has brought us, (or octavio dotel...by going on the DL....for the braves) i'm sure glad we didnt get this guy.

if boston ends up finishing behind the yankees, he's going to be the primary target for why it happened.  i mean, other than the yankees playing ridiculous baseball of late that is.

some brewer fans actually thought gagne should be our closer next year, at whatever price it would take to get him.  they think francisco cordero's 6 blown saves is bad, but somehow all of gagne's choke-jobs in the past 6 weeks have been written off as him being put "in impossible situations."

tony larussa yanking a rookie after 1 inning

'atta way tony.  give the kid a chance to show he belongs with the club next year, then yank him after he swings at a 3-0 pitch and pops out to CF.  as it stands now, you're leaning toward retiring at the end of the season.  but somehow, you want to send this kid a message that "if you want to play next year, you better do what I tell you to do, or you arent playing on this team."

it's one mistake, and with all the trouble a certain other young star had a few years back (i think his name is rick ankle or something like that), is it really a good idea to get in this kid's face about swinging at a 3-0 pitch, then benching him after 1 inning?

i guess that's why you're considered such a great baseball mind by many, but by many others, not such a great manager.

O.J....where to start?

from what i heard this morning, it sounds like the guy who told O.J. about his stuff was setting him up from the get-go.  he just happens to be the guy who also taped the shouting match between O.J. and the people who had possession of the goods.

it also sounded like O.J. went charging into the room with some "buddies" who posed as police officers, waiving guns and pushing people against the wall.

if all this is true....the first thing i have to say is, if the stuff really did belong to O.J., shouldnt he have called the real authorities and had them check into it, instead of baring in with people claiming to be the police?  sure, after all that has happened with O.J. and the legal system, they probably would have laughed at him and hung up, but he still should have tried before opting to take the law into his own hands.  at least then i would sort of understand why he did it this way.

donovan mcnabb

can you just shut up?

i'm sorry, but why is now a good time to start whining that black qb's get criticized more than white qb's?  for starters, if you think any black qb is criticized more than rex (white guy) grossman, think again (or once).

david carr?

peyton manning before he finally got to, and won, the super bowl?

his brother eli?

joey harrington?

nevermind about all those guys for a minute.  the time for you to complain about being overly criticized is not when you're playing like garbage, but when you are playing well (meaning making plays, even if the team doesnt win), and people are still on your case.

you managed to forgive T.O. (or maybe that's changed again too now), but everyone else who has criticized you is just being mean.

cry me a river, and i'll p!$$ you a stream.  start playing like a top nfl qb again, and all the talk will stop.  until then, grow thicker skin, start wearing ear plugs, quit reading the newspapers, and say "no comment" whenever the media starts grilling you on your performance.

chuck-e-buckets weis

do the honorable thing, and resign as head coach of notre dame, and give them their money back.  personally, i'm thrilled to death ND stinks this year, but when an 0-3 team gets more headlines than just about all the undefeated teams, it's time for change.

the school was stupid for giving you a 70 year contract for 10 billion dollars, but at the rate you're going, they wont win another game until 2174.  we're 3 games into the season, and you want to "start over."  it doesnt work that way....not even for notre dame (i hope).

it's ok though, i'm sure the BCS will still hand you a berth on a silver platter if you go 0-12.  after all, i'm sure your strength of schedule will be 2nd to none.