I couldn't help myself...   :)

Subject: Beating vs Discipline

Judge gives 7 year old right to decide

Seattle, WA (AP) - A seven-year old boy was at the center of a King County courtroom drama yesterday  when he challenged a court ruling over who should have custody of him. The boy has a history of being beaten by his parents and the  judge initially awarded custody to his aunt, in keeping with child custody law and regulation requiring that family unity be maintained to the highest degree possible.

The boy surprised the court when he proclaimed that his aunt beat him more than his 
parents and he adamantly refused to live with her. When the judge then suggested that he live with his grandparents, the boy cried and said that they also beat him. After considering the remainder of the immediate family and learning that domestic violence was apparently a way of life among them, the judge took the unprecedented step of allowing the boy to propose who should have custody of him.  

After two recesses to check legal references and confer with the child welfare officials, the judge granted temporary custody to the University of Washington Husky Football team, whom the boy firmly believes are not capable of beating anyone.

Michael Crabtree, famous slayer of all things Longhorn and one of the best wide receivers in college football last year, is apparently upset that he isn’t getting paid as well as Darrius Heyward-Bey.  From Yahoo! Sports:

“In April, the cross-bay San Francisco 49ers rejoiced when the Raiders selected wide receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey(notes) seventh overall. It allowed the Niners to select Michael Crabtree(notes), a pass-catching machine out of Texas Tech, at No. 10. Predraft hype rated Crabtree higher than Heyward-Bey.

Now the Niners’ dream pick has turned nightmare. In a convoluted strategy, Crabtree is threatening to sit out the 2009 season by negotiating off mock drafts which didn’t occur rather than the real one that did.

Crabtree has decided that he shouldn’t have to be paid less because – based on all the made-up, predicted drafts – Al Davis made a mistake. He wants to be paid more than Heyward-Bey, demanding his contract reflect that it was actually he who was the higher selected receiver.”

Some are hailing this as groundbreaking, an innovative way to get paid what you are actually worth regardless of where you were picked.  I think most people would agree however that perception is NOT reality, and while the NFL rookie pay scale is largely based on the perception of an individual team, this is the first time that an individual player has demanded to be paid based on mock drafts and media speculation. 

Let me count all the ways that this is stupid:

1. It hurts his professional career.  There is no substitute for game experience to keep yourself in shape and ready to contribute, so sitting out a year is only going to make Crabtree a worse wide receiver next year.  Add that on to the public perception hit Crabtree will take with many front offices and it’s questionable that he’ll even get drafted anywhere near 10th.  If he actually goes through with this bluff, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say he will be lucky to see an NFL field in the next several years.
2. It hurts financially.  I don’t know exactly what his salary is supposed to be, but he’s demanding at least the amount of money the Raiders gave Howard-Bey, $23 odd million for five years.  Assuming Crabtree gets anything NEAR this, considering he was only three picks later, he’s throwing away a literal fortune by sitting out a year.  Anyone who’s taken a high school economics class knows that the key to making money is to invest or save as early as possible.  How much more money would Crabtree end up with at age 60 if he had started investing $20 million (for example) at age 20 instead of $23 million at age 21? Say he invests 1% of his salary from age 20 to 26, then never touches the money again. At an interest rate of 4% he will end up with $55 million at age 60, not bad.  If he manages to get the contract he wants just one year later, with the same parameters he will end up with $52 million, also not bad.  But that’s assuming everything goes perfectly for him.  Say he waits a year and then, due to public image and questions about character, gets drafted late in the first round and only gets $8 million for five years, then using those same investment parameters he will only end up with $21 million by age 60.  Basically, Crabtree is taking a huge gamble in his financial future by not taking the guaranteed money.  I guess you could look at it like “$21 million at retirement ain’t so bad” but again this is assuming that he has sound financial habits – how many players do we hear of that went from millionaire to hobo after the paychecks stopped coming?
3. It hurts his reputation.  I know a lot of athletes don’t really care that much if they are liked, but surely many of his fans are upset that their favorite athlete is being so greedy and arrogant.  Whether or not he ultimately cares if people buy his jersey, I’ll guarantee you his endorsement providers do.  Is Nike or Gatorade going to put this guy on TV? Maybe, but you don’t see many so-called divas on prime time commercials.  Keyshawn, TO, Michael Irving, Jeremy Shockey… more likely to be starring in reality TV shows on VH1.  I know in my mind Crabtree just went from “talented and exciting new prospect” to “arrogant and unproven fool.”

Hopefully some good comes out of this.  If the 49ers hold firm (please don’t cave in!) and Crabtree ends up going through with his bluff, well then he’s an idiot in my opinion.  I suspect in the end he will give in and play for San Francisco, and all of this will have been just some stupid fan ranting on a blog.  I personally hope this all blows out of control and the NFL will do something about their crazy rookie pay scale.  Either way, Michael Crabtree has lost a fan.

When I roll out of bed on most days, I start my morning with a balanced breakfast (chocolate frosted sugar bombs, topped with sugar) and the morning edition of SportsCenter. It's a welcome part of my morning routine

Advertisers do a lot of market research, and they've decided that as a viewer of this edition of SportsCenter, I need the following things:

-Cash for Gold
-A free credit report
-CDs telling me how to perform basic computer tasks
-Credit card debt relief
-To join a class action lawsuit regarding mesothelioma
-NutriSystem
-A free credit report
-Anything being pitched by Billy Mays (RIP -- by the way, my favorite tweet ever last weekend, from Matt Sussman: "A new Billy Mays infomercial? Is he Tupac?")
-Short term health insurance (actually I kinda need that right now, thanks college-to-work transition)
-To watch other ESPN programming

I'm just not buying it.

Now, if only I could find out where I can get all three credit bureau reports for free...

ESPN's college football live is in the middle of a 50 states in 50 days promotion. During the show they pick a state (Or two, or half a state, depending on the size) and interview analysts, players, coaches, ect. to talk about the upcoming college football season. For example, today was the second half of their focus on Texas and Mike Leach of Texas Tech on to talk about the season.

Anyway, Tomorrow (Wednesday) is Idaho and Hawaii day and Friday is Washington day. They are also having sportsnation vote on various things here. This is probably going to be very Husky-centric, but it'll be nice to see the "Experts" talk about how bad they think WSU is going to be. ESPN College Football Live airs at 12:30 on, well, ESPN. Here is the full schedule.

Our young and most colorful upcoming coug icon has faded into the pacific and has yet to be heard from. No one seems to know Where's DeAngelo. The Coug Center must have coug contacts in most key transportation hubs, medical facilities, and direct ties to the team and athletic staff, yet there seems to be a shut down on news about Where's DeAngelo. 

You cougs that have seen, heard of, or know  Where's DeAngelo,  please post on the Coug Center what you know. With your help I'm sure we'd be able to piece together and track down Where's DeAngelo.

Hey site editors, I have a request for you.  Not that I want to emulate anything Husky specifically but would it be possible to get a schedule up like they have at the UW SBN site?  It has the dates of all the football games along with links to the SBN sites (if applicable) of our opponents.  I don't know if this is a predesigned widget from the SBN people or if John did it himself on the site, but if it's possible to modify it you could also include TV information.

Anyone else have anything they'd like to see on the site?

Anderson ran the Semi-Finals in 48.89, both second in the heat and second overall. Bershawn Jackson finished first with a time of 48.80 Anderson will run Today at the USA Track and Field Championship in Eugene, OR. The event will be on NBC at 1 PM, Anderson's race is scheduled for 1:05. The top three will advance to represent the USA at the 12th IAAF World Championship in August in Berlin. Go Jeshua! Go Cougs!

Source

Update: Anderson finished 5th with a time of 48.77. Bershawn Jackson finished 1st with the best time in the world this year, 48.03. Full results can be found here.

A fundraiser for Cory Mackay, the Cougar football player who was seriously injured in a car crash in May, will be held on July 19 from 12:00pm to 4:00pm at Gina Mary Hair Design in Issaquah.

Haircuts will be $20 with all proceeds contributing to the Cory Mackay Fund.

Gina Mary Hair Design is located at:

240 NW Gilman Blvd # 4

Issaquah, WA

In case you haven't heard, A new "Professional" football league has been created and will begin play this fall, directly opposing the NFL (UFL on Friday, NFL on Sunday). A league with this sound of a business model has to succeed! Anyway, The four team league had the "Premier" season draft a few nights ago and three cougars were drafted.

Note: The draft doesn't mean that the players will play for the team. It means that that team will have exclusive rights to the player should he decide to play in the UFL.

DB Wale Dada was drafted to the Las Vegas team, whose head coach is Jim Fassel. Nose Tackle Rien Long was drafted to the Orlando team, whose coach is Jim Hasslet. That team also has Larry Tripplett from the Purple Pups on it. And finally, Running Back Darrell Hutsona was drafted to the Dennis Green coached San Francisco team. I like the looks of that team, I think that I'm going to crown them, I just hope that we don't let them off the hook...

The draft is littered with Pac-10 players, I'd recommend you take a look here.

The league should be interesting... Their plan is to have teams in cities with out NFL teams, which makes SF seem like an odd choice. It will be interesting to see how competing during the same season as the NFL will work out too.

Reports say that both Casto and Thompson made the cut for the U19 team.  Congrats to both.  Here is the link

http://www.usabasketball.com/news.php?news_page=09_mu19_trials_roster_final

Go Cougs!

c

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