From AlterNet:

21 wins in 22 games. An improbable run to the World Series. One of the hottest streaks to end a season in the history of the game. And not two pitchers the average fan could even name. Ladies and gents, your Colorado Rockies: a team performing what even an atheist could call a baseball miracle. And “miracle” is an appropriate term for a team that riled the baseball world last year by claiming that filling the dugout with Christian players would grease the skids to greatness.

Last year the Rockies went public with the news that the organization was looking for players with “character.” And according to team management, “character” means players who have chosen Jesus as their personal Lord and manager. “We’re nervous, to be honest with you,” Rockies general manager Dan O’Dowd said at the time. “It’s the first time we ever talked about these issues publicly. The last thing we want to do is offend anyone because of our beliefs.”

Rockies chairman and CEO Charlie Monfort took it further, saying, “I think character-wise we’re stronger than anyone in baseball. Christians, and what they’ve endured, are some of the strongest people in baseball. I believe God sends signs, and we’re seeing those.” The team took some heat for its statements, especially when former players spoke of having their lockers searched for dirty magazines and feeling pressure that you had to be down with the God Squad to feel part of the team.

Read more…

Well, now we know the rest of the story. Boston is really the team that the big man upstairs backs. Going by names alone, I would have guessed the California Angels of Anaheim in the Los Angeles area would have been the favorite…Boston swept the holy Rockies winning the World Series last night. Perhaps the supreme being was busy righting some other injustices and simply forgot “his team?” One thing is certain, we’ll never know. Thankfully, the baseball season is over.

BTW, if you want more proof that Boston is the favorite, watch the last two minutes of the Boston College/Virginia Tech game last week or any Patriots game this season….

NREL published an interesting paper this month exploring the dynamics of renewable energy supply and demand. The conclusion of the report was demand, driven by fiat (renewable portfolio standard) and choice (voluntary renewable power supply) were likely to exceed supply by as much as 8,000,000 MWh by 2010.

Chart of Supply vs. Demand for Renewables


One other item of note, in the table below, you can see the impact of capacity factor. Note the nameplate installed MW of wind vs. the output of MWh. Then compare that to geothermal, you’ll see that significantly less nameplate capacity of geothermal leads to a disproportionate output of MWh. This is due to capacity factor.

Table of Renewable Electricity Generation Sources 2004

The cream rises to the top.

Guess we now can say with certainty, the SEC is grossly over-rated. This is a league of one lucky team LSU surrounded by mediocrity. That Kentucky loss isn’t looking so good now, eh? Mark it down, the SEC will be lucky to have one team without 2 losses by the end of the season. Conversely, Oregon, Boston College, Kansas, Arizona State, and Ohio State are for real. There’s still alot of football to be played, no doubt. But why don’t we confine our talk of “good” teams to the ones who actually win on the field rather than coast on media bias?

OSU Opponent Watch

• Youngstown State (5-4) – Played Northern Iowa away, lost 13-14. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss.
• Akron (3-5) – Played Buffalo away, lost 10-26. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss.
• Washington (2-6) – Played Arizona at home, lost 41-48. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss.
• Northwestern (5-4) – Played Purdue away, lost 17-35. Conclusion: Expected Loss.
• Minnesota (1-8) – Played Michigan away, lost 10-34. Conclusion: Expected Loss
• Purdue (7-2) – Played Northwestern at home, won 35-17. Conclusion: Expected Win
• Kent State (3-6) – Played Central Michigan home, lost 32-41. Conclusion: Expected Loss
• Michigan State (5-4) – Played Iowa away, lost 27-34 in 2OT. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss
• Penn State (6-3) – Played Ohio State at home, lost 17-37. Conclusion: Expected Loss
• Wisconsin (7-2) – Played Indiana at home, won 33-3. Conclusion: Expected Win
• Illinois (6-3) – Played Ball State at home, won 28-17. Conclusion: Expected Win
• Michigan (7-2) – Played Minnesota at home, won 34-10. Conclusion: Expected Win

Buckeye opponent’s records after the 8th week, 57-49. After 6 weeks of conference play, Ohio State and Michigan have no losses and are in contention for the Big 10 championship. With every other team in the conference having at least two losses, the Big 10 Championship and a BCS berth will come down to November 17th Ohio State at Michigan. Should be a good one. Many Buckeye opponents suffered bad losses this week, the most surprising was Michigan State’s late meltdown against Iowa after having the game firmly in hand for 3 quarters.

Quick Hits from Around College Football

For the first time this season, all of the undefeated teams survived, not that they weren’t tested. These are the undefeated survivors; give them credit for standing tall when others are losing games they should win: Arizona State, Boston College, Ohio State, Kansas, and Hawaii.

Projected BCS Top 5: Ohio State, Boston College, LSU, Oklahoma, and Arizona State.

Game of the week? Texas beat Nebraska 28-25, scoring 28 points in succession late in the game.

Mismatch of the week? Toledo destroyed Northern Illinois 70-21.

My Special Top 12 rankings: (Why Top 12? That’s where you need to be to get into BCS contention.)

1. Ohio State – Destroyed Penn State.
2. Boston College – Inspired 4th quarter comback against Virginia Tech.
3. Arizona State – Rallied past California in the second half.
4. Kansas – Held off Texas A&M.
5. Oregon – Beat USC.
6. West Virginia – Dominated Rutgers on the road.
7. Oklahoma – Bye week.
8. Missouri – Held on against Iowa State.
9. LSU – Bye week.
10. Connecticut – Upset South Florida.
11. Michigan – Thumped Minnesota.
12. Hawaii – Hung 50 on New Mexico State.

My Special Bottom 5 rankings: (Why bottom 5? If you finish there you should be relegated to I-AA) Marshall got a win this week and leaves the Bottom 5, for now.

1. Notre Dame – 1-7 this season. Bye week.
2. Florida International – 0-8 this season. Lost to Arkansas.
3. Utah State – 0-8 this season. Lost to Louisiana-Tech.
4. Colorado State – 1-7 this season. Lost to Utah.
5. Minnesota – 1-8 this season. Lost to Michigan.

In the coming week I’ll post an Wisconsin/OSU preview, a game review of Wisconsin/OSU, and a Weekend Update Sports edition.

Ummm. Well, it would be difficult to be more WRONG in a game preview than I was this week. I thought this would be a tight, low scoring game. What we got was a blow out. The score doesn’t reflect how dominating the win actually was due to a late collective brain cramp allowing a TD on a kickoff return. In my defense, I did say that I thought it could be a blowout, I just didn’t choose to predict that. And, in reality, I didn’t expect it. I’m very happy to have been wrong.

The Good

• The Offense. This was the best overall offensive performance this year. Against a live, good defense, a large and loud hostile crowd, on the road at night with a 20 mph wind. That’s alot to overcome. They were sharp!
• The offensive line. Boeckman had all day to find receivers. Only one stupid penalty. The running game was working. 460 yards, 203 on the ground. Wow.
• Todd Boeckman. Here’s his stat line: 19-26-253 1 int, 1 sack, 3 TDs. His best game as a starter by far.
• Third down. The Bucks converted 12-15 and 1-1 on fourth down.
• Mo Wells. I’ve been tough on him, but he had a great game. 13 carries for 56 yards, but the main contribution was blocking. He picked up blitz after blitz. He ran hard and effectively too. Chris Wells may have better stats, but Mo was a man tonight.
• Place kicking. In a 20 mph wind, kicks were deep and 3-3 on FGs including a 50 yarder.
• Turnovers. The defense rattled Morelli and was hitting hard all night. The highlight was a pick-six by Malcolm Jenkins.

The Bad

• The Defense. Looked sluggish, bit on play-action all night long. Feels bad to say a unit that held an opponent to 10 points at home “bad” – but relative to their standards, there was room for improvement.
• The D Line. Didn’t hold the point of attack and let the offensive line get through to the linebackers.
• Kickoff coverage. It’s late in the 4th quarter, the team has absolutely dominated a good Penn State team at home. Special teams allow a 96 yard kickoff return for a touchdown narrowing the margin of victory. A major brain cramp.

The Ugly

• Officiating. Missed catch and TD on official review. OSU got away with a push off on a TD catch and two obvious pass interference calls. PSU was tackling the D line all night and got called once for it. This was as poorly an officiated game as I’ve seen this year. Generally though, the bad calls evened out – it was at least uniformly bad.
• Production values. Balloons floating in the camera view, missed plays occluded by down markers. Repeated audio intrusion by sideline reporter when not intended. Fluff material not really related to the game. It’s bad, and getting worse this season.

In the final analysis, despite any complaints, this was a dominating win. Go Bucks!

A recent Ipsos/Associated Press poll (Conducted October 16-18, involved telephone interviews with 1,013 adults and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points) revealed that 19% of Americans believe in witchcraft and spells…But the fun doesn’t stop there, 1 in 3 Americans believe in ghosts. In a CNN article about the poll, a man revealed that he shot a ghost when he was 10 years old only to discover a bullet hole in his new white shirt and angry parents!

Here’s the kicker, 48% of Americans believe in extra-sensory perception (ESP) – the ability to acquire information by paranormal means independent of any known physical senses or deduction from previous experience.

Despite numerous claims and scientific tests, there is no credible, repeatable evidence that such phenomena exist.

Now for the sad part of the story, more people believe in ghosts than believe in President Bush. The latest AP/Ipsos poll show a 31% favorable rating for Bush while 34% of American’s believe in ghosts and 48% believe in ESP. That has to be a legitimate haunting feeling for us all…