Category: Sports

Mostly stuff about football…

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DOWNLOAD: Steelers 2008 Schedule for Outlook!

The NFL released the official 2008-2009 schedule today… and for the FIFTH YEAR IN A ROW (how time flies!) I’m proud to offer the Pittsburgh Steelers Calendar for Microsoft Outlook!

The jimcofer.com “Pittsburgh Steelers 2008 Schedule For Outlook” is compatible with Microsoft Outlook 98 or later. It might also work with Google Calendar or any other program that can import calendar events from CSV files. It has only been tested with Microsoft Outlook, however.

The calendar contains all preseason and regular season Steelers games as well as the name of the network airing the game. All times in the Steelers Calendar are for the Eastern (USA) time zone; a reminder is also scheduled for 8:00PM the day before each game. Fans of other (lesser) teams can also download the file and use it as a template to create a schedule for their favorite teams using any version of Microsoft Excel.

A SPECIAL NOTE: games marked with an asterisk (*) are flex-time games; their start times are subject to change without notice.

Just like the 2007 version of the calendar, I have three versions of the Steelers calendar available for download: the Steelers 2008-09 schedule only, the 2008-09 Steelers schedule with the NFL playoffs, Super Bowl and Pro Bowl, and a calendar with the playoffs and Super\Pro Bowls only. Pick your poison by clicking the appropriate link below:

Steelers 2008 Calendar
Steelers 2008 Calendar with NFL Playoffs
NFL 2008 Playoff Calendar only

(4KB each, and less than 1 minute to download on a 56k connection)

To import the calendar, follow these simple instructions. Make sure to read the all the directions below (especially the “Disabling Reminders” section) carefully before you begin:

  1. Download the file to your desktop and unzip.
  2. Open Outlook and select “File” > “Import and Export” > “Import from another program or file”, then click “Next”.
  3. Choose “Comma Separated Values (Windows)”, then click “Next”.
  4. Use the “Browse” button on the next screen to select the CSV file you unzipped in step 1.
  5. On the next screen make sure to select “Calendar” as the destination then click “Next” and “Finish”… That’s it!

DISABLING REMINDERS: If you wish to disable the reminders, open the CSV file in Excel and change the value of “reminder on/off” (column G) to FALSE for each game before you import the Calendar into Outlook.

TROUBLESHOOTING: If you try to import the Calendar but don’t see any of the games listed in your calendar (especially if you do not get any kind of error message), shut Outlook down completely (open Task Manager to make sure that OUTLOOK.EXE is not running) and re-open Outlook and try the import again.

VERSION INFORMATION: This file was tested on 15 April 2008 on a Windows XP Professional machine running Office 2007 and an XP Professional virtual machine running Office 2003. It was scanned with Active Virus Shield (Kaspersky 6.0.621) and found to be virus-free. It’s the exact same file I’ve used for past versions of the schedule, so it should work for just about everyone.

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BREAKING: Brett Favre Retires!

From here:

GREEN BAY, Wis. — Brett Favre has decided to retire from the NFL after 17 seasons.

FOX Sports first reported today that the Green Bay Packers quarterback informed the team in the last few days. ESPN.com said that according to Favre’s agent, Bus Cook, the quarterback told coach Mike McCarthy of his decision.

Cook said in a phone interview today with The Associated Press’ Jackson, Miss., bureau that Favre told him the news Monday night .

“Nobody pushed Favre out the door but then nobody encouraged him not to go out that door either,” said Cook.

He said Favre was tired and “the Packers have got future plans and whether those plans included Brett I don’t know. ”

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Silly Baseball Trivia

This is just about the craziest thing I’ve ever heard:

If you’ve ever watched a baseball game, you’ve probably seen a “bat boy”. Bat boys are like “field assistants” in baseball. When a batter hits the ball, he drops his bat and runs to first base. It’s the bat boy’s job to pick up the bat and take it back to the dugout. Bat Boys have other duties too, like cleaning equipment, fetching a new bat if a batter wants one, taking a fresh supply of baseballs to the umpire if needed, keeping beach balls and other debris off the field and removing foul balls from the field of play if they land near him. Every baseball game features two bat boys, one for the home team and one for the visiting team. Bat boys almost never travel with the team, so in most cases both bat boys are employed by the home team.

Bat boys are often male, and are usually between the ages of 16-20. Because bat boys are so young, and might need to miss games for school or family, teams have a “pool” of bat boys that they’ll call on for each game. Remember this point, OK?

Here’s where it gets weird: although bat boys are not officially “members” of any team, they still wear a standard baseball uniform on the field. In the case of minor league teams, the home team’s bat boy wears the home team’s home jersey, while the visiting team’s bat boy wears the home team’s road jersey. Got that?

But here’s what doesn’t make any sense at all: in Major League Baseball, the visiting team’s bat boy is required to wear the visiting team’s jersey. And because every team uses a pool of bat boys, a visiting team has no idea which bat boy will be assisting any given game. Which means that every road team must bring along a couple dozen of their uniforms for the bat boy, since they have no idea which boy will assist them.

As if that weren’t confusing enough, there’s little uniformity between teams when it comes to the bat boy’s uniform. Some teams give their bat boys plain uniforms without a number or name on back. Others have uniforms with “Bat Boy” on the back, like a player name. Others say “Batboy” on them, so apparently MLB can’t even decide on how to spell the position! Still others skip the issue by putting “BB” on the back as a number. And some teams give their bat boys “player numbers” that are the last two digits of the year (2007 = 07). This was all well and good from the 1970s to 2009, since no player uniforms have any of those numbers. But in 2010 they’ll face a problem, since “10” is a legitimate player number.

Who knew the world of the bat boy could be so complicated?

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The New NFL Logo

This is one of those things I meant to post a long time ago, but just got around to now:

This past August, the NFL unveiled its “new” logo. I say “new” ‘cos it’s only an update to the existing logo, as opposed to a completely new design. Here it is:

NFL Logos

What do you think? I like it. It’s a nice update to the existing logo (which dates from 1980). I also like the darker shade of blue. In any case, the updated logo was unveiled before the current season, but won’t make its official debut until the 2008 draft in April. Read all about it from USA Today here.

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Just… Wow!

The following picture appeared in last week’s issue of The Sporting News with the caption “Yes, this is an actual picture from a Florida Marlins game”. Even with that caption, I thought it was a joke. Maybe it was a picture of batting practice, or of some special event (a school field trip, maybe?) and the Sporting News guys were just being funny?

Marlins\Nationals

Come to find out, they were being serious. It’s an actual picture from September 12th, 2007, when the Marlins hosted the Washington Nationals. Florida won 5-4 in 12 innings, and this page about the game at Yahoo! News says that “[t]here were about 400 fans on hand when the game started Wednesday afternoon and the announced attendance was 10,121. The Marlins have the smallest total attendance in the majors.”

400 people? That’s sad. Even sadder? Ushers wouldn’t allow people to move up to better seats, even though there were thousands of empty seats available.

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The Ravens Almost Pull It Off!

Holy crap! Hooooly crap! Did anyone catch the Patriots\Ravens game on MNF tonight? The Ratbirds brought it to the Pats, and were in the lead with as little as 50 seconds left in the game. New England managed to put one in the end zone to take the lead 27-24 with around 45 seconds left. The Ravens got the ball back, and managed to toss a Hail Mary that was caught at around the 3 yard line. Unfortunately for the Ratbirds, the receiver was tackled immediately as the clock ran out.

My God – that was, in my humble opinion, the best game of the year so far. It was one of those games that you keep on tape so that the next time your wife\girlfriend asks you “why the hell do you watch so much football??” you pop the tape in and watch her start yelling and screaming too!

I sure hope that the Steelers coaches were watching the game (you know they were!). If Troy comes back the Steelers have a good chance at beating the Pats next Sunday!

EDIT: By the way… karma’s a bitch, ain’t it Cleveland? Haha.. Suck it, Brownies!

Kellen Winslow

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Evel Knievel dead at 69!

CLEARWATER, Fla. – Evel Knievel, the red-white-and-blue-spangled motorcycle daredevil whose jumps over crazy obstacles including Greyhound buses, live sharks and Idaho’s Snake River Canyon made him an international icon in the 1970s, died Friday. He was 69.

Knievel’s death was confirmed by his granddaughter, Krysten Knievel. He had been in failing health for years, suffering from diabetes and pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition that scarred his lungs.

Read more here. It’s a sad day for those of us who were little boys with bicycles and Big Wheels in the 70s.

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Thank Goodness!

Georgia Tech fires Gailey after subpar season

“ATLANTA – Georgia Tech fired coach Chan Gailey on Monday, two days after his sixth straight loss to rival Georgia ended a disappointing season.

Athletic director Dan Radakovich called an afternoon news conference to discuss the football program. A person familiar with the situation, speaking on condition of anonymity because an official announcement had not been made, told The Associated Press that Gailey would be dismissed after six seasons as the Yellow Jackets coach.”