Durty Butter

Illini - UNC 2005 Championship Game

2010-02-24T04:23:00.002-06:00

Alright, I got through 2 minutes of this game, and 1) I am already pissed, and 2) I think this would be an unbelievable running blog post. Now if you can't bear to relive this game (like most Illini fans can't), then by all means, stop reading right now. However, if you are like me, and you have gotten over the heartbreak, and realize that these 2 teams are probably 2 of the best basketball teams we have seen in the last decade, then follow along. Perhaps you might have been like me, and you were on a 4 day bender, and you don't even remember who was playing (just kidding, I waited until after the game to blackout.) Either way, this will be fun or therapeutic. I am warning you right now, mute this game when you watch it.

18:45 - Alright, so Deron buries a jumper to start the game, and Carolina races back down the floor, gets an offensive rebound and May eats Powell up inside. Off the bat, I can't believe that I forgot the Billy Packer kept calling Deron "DuhRon". We should all thank whomever we worship that we no longer have to listen to Billy!!

17:39 - Augustine picks up his first foul on a transition McCants drive in the lane. It was a foul. Also can you name a better top 6 than UNC had that year?? It was unbelievable. McCants, May, Felton, Williams, Manual, Jawad Williams, and Marvin Williams. They just fly down the floor. Carolina goes up 9-2. Also UNC knocked off Wisconsin, MSU and Illinois in that order in the Tourney.

15:55 - Dee Brown was the fastest player in the history of college basketball. You can't tell me different. He chases down a ball in the corner, saves it into a UNC player, runs across the floor to pick up his man, then flies down the floor on a long rebound to get a lay-in. All of this in about .4 seconds. Now it is 9-7 Illinois. Deron with 2 on a jumper, Dee with 5 on a lay-in and a 3.
Captain Jack then ties the game on a put back off of a Luther Head missed 3. As fast as the UNC guards were, the Illinois guards were all over the place on defense. When you think about that team, you obviously remember how balanced they were on offense, but all 3 guards were amazing defenders.

14:42 - Powell is really playing like a man possessed inside, but he is out of control. Luther is now 0-3 from the 3 point line. The early comparisons of Dominique Keller and Roger Powell(When Keller signed with Illinois and hadn't played yet) are close, but Powell was just a much greater athlete. Luther finally buries a 3 to give Illinois the lead. 12-9.

12:57 - Illinois scored on the first possession. UNC went on a 9-0 run, then Illinois went on a 10-0 run, Carolina answers with a 5-0 run. Unbelievable!! Deron drives and Felton picks up his second foul. Augustine has been on the bench for about 3 minutes, but he only has one foul. Deron misses both free throws, and May somehow outruns everyone (including Augustine who checked in) down the floor for a dunk. On a side note, under Deron's Major, it said Sports Management. It should have said NBA Badass!! Rich McBride also came into the game, we should have known we were going to lose. (I make this comment because no Illinois player has infuriated me more than Rich McBride, except maybe Brian Randle)
Luther misses another open 3, but Powell is there for the putback. UNC is up 16-14, but Powell comes back and buries a 3 to give Illinois the lead.

11:14 - The Sean May birthday present is starting to be unwrapped. He just levels Powell for a lay-in. We have our first Warren Carter sighting. I'm not gonna start bitching about how he should have red-shirted, but every player should use him as an example when they are undersized for a 4, but can't shoot good enough to be a 3 yet. Augustine picks up his second foul on a charge, that was iffy, but it had to be called.

8:05 - Luther Head misses another 3. Warren Carter also missed a 3. UNC is playing a zone in order to save Felton from getting his 3rd foul. Up to this point, Carolina is just hitting more open looks than Illinois, but Illinois is staying in the game because Ingram and Powell are crashing the offensive glass. Has there been a more unsung player for Illinois than Jack Ingram? Illinois already has 7 offensive rebounds. And now we have our first Nick Smith sighting. Has there ever been a player on Illinois who didn't want to play basketball more than Nick Smith? I feel like he had to play basketball because he was so damn tall. He would have much rather been an accountant and played World of Warcraft when he got home. Carolina on another 7-0 run, score is 23-17 UNC.

6:45 - Luther hits his second 3 which makes him 2-7. Nick Smith gets used by May in the post, and then throws the ball away, and Bruce goes to the bench, Ingram is back in. Deron misses another 3. Can't believe that Billy hasn't lost his mind yet, or mentioned that when a 3 pointer is short, it means that your legs are tired. That was Billy's go to comment. Right now the score is 25-20 UNC and Illinois is shooting 31% to Carolina's 53%. God please stop shooting 3's!! (Unfortunately, you and I both know that won't happen.) Illinois gets a 3 on 1 break with Dee, Deron and Luther, and for some reason Luther runs out to the 3 point line and Dee gives him the ball for another miss. What the hell are we doing?? Is John Beilein coaching this team?? Captain Jack buries a 3, and Illinois is now 5 of 16 from behind the line. Marvin Williams comes down and hits a inside shot that could have been an And 1. Carolina up 27-23.

5:04 - Augustine comes back in the game with his two fouls. Bruce did what he could with Powell, Ingram, Smith and Carter, but he needed to give Powell a rest. Manual picks up his 3rd foul, and realistically, this game has been really evenly called so far. Ingram goes to the line and hits 2. He now has 7 points and 4 boards. Great half for Ingram. On a side note, you can see the 100 year anniversary patch on the Illini jersey. All season long I thought the stars were aligned for Illinois to win a National Championship because it was their 100 year anniversary. Just like I thought the Cubs would win it on their 100 year Anniversary. Too bad real life isn't a Disney movie. Felton comes down and hits another tough 3. Carolina up 30-25. Dee shoots a terrible 3 to try and answer. I'm pretty sure Illinois hasn't tried to drive since Felton got his second foul.

3:31 - Jawad Williams hits another 3 for Carolina, his second. It is amazing that pretty much at all times, at least 9 players on the floor could hit an open 3. Powell gets 2 offensive rebounds and gets hacked. Really the first missed call of the game. UNC now up 33-25 at the TV timeout. McCants gets a lay-in for the second time on an inbound play, Billy Packer reacts like Illinois just sacrificed his first born child. Illinois is now shooting 29% for the game. Carolina on an 8-0 run. 35-25. Luther throws the ball away. Bless Luther Head because he was a great player for Illinois, but I can't believe I forgot how bad of a first half he had.

2:04 - Ingram misses an open 3 from the corner, but Luther gets the long rebound. Luther finds Deron on the baseline for a little jumper, and this has to be Illinois first inside bucket since the Ingram putback. Dee misses another 3, Ingram gets the rebound, and May blocks him from behind. He then leads the break, and McCants hits an open 3 in transition. 40-27 UNC. They are now on a 13-2 run. Illinois runs the clock down with 40 seconds left. May hedges on Deron, fouls him, but there is no call, and Illinois gets a shot clock violation. Horrible end to the half.

Second Half

18:55 - Augustine fades away on the first shot of the second half, and then May seals him off for an easy bucket. Luther comes down and hits a jumper. Billy Packer does what he does best and uses hindsight to make it seem like he is the smartest basketball analyst of all-time. He says that a wide-open baseline jumper is not the shot you want from Augustine, instead a contested jumper from Luther Head (who was 2-8 at that point) is a much better shot. Nice work Billy. Augustine gets his 3rd foul on a reach on a drive. Now the video is pretty small, so I can't tell if it was actually a foul, but that is not a smart play by James, plain and simple. He gets his 4th foul 5 seconds later on another stupid reach!!! I can excuse reaching on the 3rd foul, but when you do the exact same thing 5 SECONDS LATER, what are you thinking?? I bet if Bruce could do anything over again, he would have taken him out after the 3rd one.

18:29 - The score is 44-29, and then Dee hits an open 3. The next 3 minutes are absolutely crazy, and it was the epitome of the Illini that year. Illinois gets shafted on a loose ball that goes out of bounds. Felton hits a 3 to push it back to 15. Luther answers with another 3. May gets an offensive rebound and dunks it home hard. Right now the entire crowd is going crazy. Deron comes down and hits a mid-range jumper. Luther picks up a foul on what looked like a push off, but was probably a good call and he goes crazy!! First he probably should have gotten a technical foul for that, but second and more importantly, it fired Luther up!! Luther gets a long rebound, and goes coast to coast for a reverse lay-up. 49-39 Illinois. Felton takes the inbound and takes a bad jumper, Deron with the rebound, he finds Luther trailing the play, and he buries a 3!! Illinois fans are going crazy. Illinois scores 13 points in 2 minutes. 8 from Luther.

15:46 - There is a timeout because Noel gets hit in the face. Dee should have gotten a foul there as he not only hit Noel in the face, he also slapped the hell out of his arm. Luther gets another rebound, and then Deron hits a 3 in the corner. Illinois has hit its last 6 shots, and the score is now 49-45. Marvin Williams stops the bleeding on a hard drive, and he should have gotten an And 1. Manual picks up his 4th foul with 14 minutes left. Deron hits a 3 after Luther missed one and WARCAT gets the offensive rebound. Screw the redshirt! 52-49 UNC. After going 2 for 7000 in the first half from behind the arc, Illinois is now 5-6 in the second half. May pushes the hell out of Powell on a free throw rebound, May gets called for a foul and Packer can't believe it!! If I ever meet Billy Packer, after I nut-punch him for ruining every college basketball game I have ever watched that he did, I want to ask him if he ever watched a replay in his life. Thank God we now have announcers that will admit when they are wrong after watching a replay.

11:40 - Carolina gets up 57-50 based on May getting solid position inside and bullying his way to the hoop. I can't blame the refs for not calling anything, if Illinois wanted fouls, they should have started flopping like Duke would have done. Deron hits a 3 to cut it 57-53. Illinois is now 11-28 from 3. May is taking over with an assist for a 3, and then a shot and a foul, but he misses his free throw. May gets the ball inside again and gets fouled hard. Ingram misses a 3. Do you see a recurring theme here? Either somebody makes a 3 or misses a 3. May gets another foul on Ingram.

8:50 - It is 65-55 UNC right now, and it has been all Sean May. UNC is in the bonus now. Deron gets a steal and gets it ahead to Dee for a lay-in, and it is the first turnover for either team in the second half. Ingram hits a jumper to pull Illinois within 6. Ingram had a monster game!! Augustine comes back in with 7:12 left in the game. And he fouls out with 6:49 in the game fighting for position with Marvin Williams. I don't even want to talk about whether or not it was a foul. I want to stop watching because I feel so bad for James. What a terrible night in the biggest game he was ever in. Billy chimes in by saying the "HE" doesn't think that Augustine should have been in the game. God I hate Billy Packer soooooo much!! Powell gets the make-up call on Marvin after Luther hit a floater in the lane. 65-61 UNC.

5:48 - Ingram hits another jumper to pull Illinois within 2. Dee gets fouled and gets to the line on Felton's 4th foul. Dee ties the game!! Felton buries a huge 3 when Dee and Deron are both on him. Deron hits a jumper to pull Illinois back to 1. May hits 2 free throws to give Carolina a 70- 67 lead with 4 to play

2:35 - Luther Head ties the game at 70-70!! Right here, I thought we would win this game, and I have had nightmares about these next few possessions. For the record (before I burst into tears), this was one hell of a game!! Illinois comes back from 15 down to tie, and we got to watch a great last 5 minutes.

2:01 - Deron misses a good look at a 3 after Marvin Williams missed a tough jumper.

1:23 - McCants drives and throws up a terrible shot in the lane, but Marvin Williams is there to tip it in.

1:07 - Luther gets a wide open look for a three because his man fell down. Billy decides this is the point to scream as loud as he can that Illinois is setting illegal screens (he mentions this about 39 more times in 1 minute). Way to stay impartial Billy, you stay professional! Illinois gets the rebound, and Bruce calls a timeout. 72-20 UNC

:50 - Deron misses another 3, the ball goes out of bounds to Illinois. Bruce had some color to his hair in this game. The 2007-2008 season took care of that. 72-70 UNC

:30 - Luther turns the ball over. It was Illinois' first turnover of the second half. Illinois has to foul Felton misses the first, and hits the second. 73-70 UNC

:26 - Luther misses the last shot of the game basically, and it looked good. I have replayed that over and over in my head. I thought that this would be fine to watch after 5 years, but it still sucks. It was a hell of a run, and a hell of a game.

Greatest Website Ever!!

2010-02-24T04:12:00.002-06:00

I just saw this posted on Scout.com from a poster named oldschoolorangeandblue. It has all of the NCAA tournament games from the sweet sixteen on to the championship game from 2000 to 2005. I will now watch the Illini National Championship game again for the first time since I watched the last 5 minutes over and over on my buddy Guymon's couch at 4 in the morning after we lost. I was not sober (by any stretch), but it did introduce my new girlfriend to my neurotic sports obsession. Shockingly, we are still together.

here is the link

if that doesn't get you there, it is ncaa.vault.com

Illini Michigan Recap

2010-02-24T01:27:00.003-06:00

Don't lie to me, with about 6 minutes left in the first half, you thought that is could turn out to be a 30 something output for the Illini just like Minnesota and Penn State last year. I was thinking it. Neither team could shoot, and Illinios was turning the ball over at an alarming rate. They gutted the game out, and pulled off their 5th road win in the Big Ten this season. Here are some quick thoughts from the game:

- How many times have I bitched about Michigan's offense on this blog?? Basically every time I talk about them, right? Well tonight was a perfect example of I hate John Beilein's offense. I don't care how many 3's you shoot, more often than not, you are not going to shoot a good percentage. Beilein has 4 one dimensional guards on his roster (that one dimension being shooting 3's), and their back up post player can only shoot from outside. When they slump, which they all have done all season, they can't do anything else. That leaves you with only 2 scoring options, and one of them is also a bad 3 point shooter. That is how a team that was ranked 15th in the nation in preseason polls ends up 13-14 through 27 games. People are going to argue that if they shot better, they would have won. My rebuttal is when the shit have they shot well all season? They are the worst 3 point shooting team in the Big Ten at 30%.

- The Illinois offense looked bad and stagnant for one reason: Michigan was playing 4 guards, which means that Mike Davis had Zack Novak on him pretty much all game. The game plan especially in the second half was to run pick and roll with McCamey and Tisdale, and then have a high-low with Davis posting up. Tisdale could never get him the ball. Illinois was just sloppy all night. Illinois should have put this game away in the first half, but they didn't take care of the ball. When you look back on this season, you have to thank god that Illinois some what learned from their losses early to Utah, Bradley and Georgia. They still took shitty teams lightly, like Indiana, Penn State, Iowa and Michigan, but at least they didn't have a horrific late season loss. Bad losses early in the season aren't nearly as meaningful in the eyes of the selection committee as late season shitty losses are.

- Manny Harris hates playing on this team. He was suspended for a game earlier this season because there was an altercation after practice one night. During this game, he was upset on the floor during the first half, and then gave up on Mike Davis' dunk at the end of the half. Don't be surprised if he goes pro, even it means he has to play in Europe. Him and Beilein have not seen eye to eye for 3 years now, and Harris isn't getting any better. He has tuned his coach out, and when he looks back on this season, what would make him want to come back?

If you think about it, what is the difference between Evan Turner and Manny Harris? They both can get to the hoop whenever they want because of their size and athleticism. They can both handle the ball, and they both dish it really well. The only thing that Turner does better is rebound, but that is only because this season he has to due to OSU's lack of size inside. Compare their stats:

Evan Turner: 19.5 ppg, 54.1% FG, 26% 3 FG, 72% FT, 9 REB, 6 Assists, 4 TO, 2 Steals
Manny Harris: 18.4 ppg, 42% FG, 31% 3 FG, 77% FT, 6.5 REB, 4 Assists, 2 TO, 2 Steals

Their FG% jumps out at you, but Turner has only shot 31 three's, where Manny has shot 135. If you take away Manny's 3's he is shooting 49% which is very respectable for a guard. Evan Turner has more assists, but that is because the offense revolves around him, that is also why he has more turnovers. Last season they were the exact same player:

Evan Turner: 17.3 PPG, 50% FG, 44% 3 FG, 79% FT, 7.1 REB, 4 Assists, 3.5 TO, 2 Steals
Manny Harris: 16.9 PPG, 42% FG, 33% 3 FG, 86% FT, 6.8 REB, 4.4 Assists, 3.1 TO, 1 Steal

Again, last season Evan Turner only shot 25 3's where Manny shot 159. If you take away Manny's 3's, he shot 47%.

So my point is that, John Beilein basically misused a player who, had he progressed like he should have, he would be a first round draft pick. OSU's entire offense revolves around Evan Turner, and they are a Top 15 team. As far as I can tell Michigan's offense is take the first 3 you see until we get down, and then let Manny Harris take over when we are screwed. Beilein will never get another talent like Manny Harris... EVER!! No elite guard will want to play for him. He has one fluke Elite 8 run, where West Virginia was a 7 seed. They barely beat Creighton in the First Round by blocking a 3 and then scoring a lay-up at the buzzer to win by 2. In the next round they beat #2 Wake Forest 111-105 in double overtime. Then finally they beat #6 Texas Tech to go to the Elite 8. In 18 seasons he has taken 5 teams to the NCAA tournament, so good luck Michigan. Alright enough of my Beilein rant, back to the game.

- Bill Cole is short on every 3 he misses. I can't tell if it is because he doesn't step into his shot, or because he is short arming everything, but he needs to fix that, because McCamey gets him 3-4 open looks a game. Brandon Paul hits every 3 he shoots when he follows through and holds his release. When he snaps his hand back, he always misses, you can tell a miss or a make as soon as it leaves his hand.

- McCamey did a poor job of running the pick and roll early. He was looking to hit Tisdale on the pop almost every time. He should have gone to the hoop more often, which hopefully he does against Minnesota this weekend. I love that he has turned into a pass first guard this season, and he has done an amazing job reading the pick, but this game he made some poor decisions.

- Bruce has really killed his rotation, which is something that I was imploring him to do earlier in the season. He still played 9 people tonight, but the bench only got 23 out of 200 minutes. McCamey has to be in amazing shape, because he is playing at least 36 minutes a game since getting benched early. If watch closely, Bruce always takes McCamey out in between 12 and 8 minutes to go in the first half every game. He will sit him on the bench for 2-3 offensive possessions, then sub him back in, and then he gets another break at the under 8 timeout. He pulled him at 11 minutes, he was at the scorers table with 10 minutes, and got back into the game at 9, and there was a TV timeout at 7:50. Great way to steal minutes while not having Demitri sit for too many possessions. They did the same thing in the second half for one possession. Against Purdue, he played the entire game.

- So everyone has been bashing the Illini defense so far this season, but they are the only team who is holding their opponents to less than 40% from the floor this season. It would help if they could rebound, but their man-to-man is pretty solid. The only game where it was suspect was OSU, but they shot lights out in the first 8 minutes.

- There was a closet skinny cheerleader for Michigan. By closet skinny chick, I mean that she looked thick when you saw her face and arms, but when they panned away, she actually wasn't chubby. Unfortunately for her, you can tell that she is keeping the weight off because she is a cheerleader. As soon as that ends, its all downhill for her, and there is nothing wrong with that. I just thought about it during the game.

- Musberger cannot help but mention gambling in every broadcast he does. It must be a nod to his former TV partner Jimmy the Greek. He mentioned during the game that he couldn't believe that Illinois was an under dog in this game. Then after the game, when Musberger and Lavin were interviewing Demitri, Lavin mentioned that Brent wanted to take McCamey to Vegas because he has a hot hand. Also Musberger thinks that everyone in the Big Ten will play in the NBA. According to him, Tisdale, McCamey, Harris and Simms will all play at the next level.

- Having Mike Davis playing well completely changes this team. When he is playing hard and rebounding, it always leads to him running the floor and getting dunks. These last 2 games, he has shown up, and it greatly helped us in both games. Plain and simple, there are things that Davis can do that Griffey can't. Having back to back good games is a blessing going into the last 3 games Illinois has to play. Davis got benched after 1:30 in the second half, obviously got a talking to by Wayne McClain and then was right back in the game, and he played hard from that point on.

- How clutch is DJ Richardson at the end of games shooting free throws? The only other player I would rather have on the line at the end of games would be Mike Tisdale. They both are icing close games for us. Tonight DJ had McCamey open ahead of him, but instead he kept the ball and waited to get fouled. He is a really smart player and does not make very many mistakes. Before the season started, Bruce was constantly asked who was going to step up and be a leader on the floor and take over for Chester Frazier. Bruce had no idea, but he mentioned that down the road it would be DJ. After watching DJ so far this season, you can see what it was that Bruce saw in DJ. By his Junior year he is going to be one of the best players Illinois has had in a very long time.

That's it for now. Have a good week.

Big Ten Breakdown Part 2

2010-02-19T01:15:00.002-06:00

Hopefully you guys enjoyed the running blog during the OSU - Purdue game. To be honest, I really like doing them, it makes the game much more interesting to watch, and I remember a lot more of what I just saw when I right it down. Maybe I should have taken notes in college. Here we go with the 5-11 spots in our Big Ten breakdown.

5) Illinois 9-4 (previous record 6-3) (prediction 11-7)

Well the Illini shocked everyone by beating MSU at home and then beating Wisco on the road. Demitri McCamey came back to earth a little bit shooting the ball against OSU last week, but he really didn't get any help from anyone else on the team. It also didn't help that we played no defense in the first 15 minutes. Like I have said all year, Illinois needs 3 people to play well to win. It starts with Demitri, and it really doesn't matter who the other 2 are, as long as it is 2 of them. Illinois is getting better on defense, even though the OSU game might not seem like it. Here is what they have left:

@ Purdue
@ Michigan
Minnesota
@ Ohio State
Wisconsin

Illinois CAN win at Purdue this weekend. This is a good match-up for Illinois at every position. Tisdale, Davis and Griffey have to play well against Johnson. If that happens, then Purdue turns into a strictly jump shooting team, but if you let Johnson get some baskets early, then all of the sudden he starts popping 18 foot jumpers and he will drop over 20. Michigan will be a huge Brandon Paul game, because he has to learn how to close out and not help too much, otherwise Michigan's Division II players (the guys who can do nothing but shoot) will shoot Illinois out of the building. Minnesota will crash the boards like crazy against Illinois, just like they did against Wisconsin tonight, but only Hoffarber and Westbrook are good shooters. At OSU will be a better game than the game at Illinois. Illinois will not shoot as bad as they did, and they will kill the zone with Demitri running the show. Wisco is another great match-up for Illinois, even with Leuer back. All Leuer does is take minutes and shots away from some of the younger players. He is still not a real offensive presence, and he did not want to rebound at all tonight. Over the last 5 games I think Illinois will go 3-2.

Final Record: 12-6

6) Minnesota 6-7 (previous record 4-5) (prediction 8-10)

Minnesota pulled off a great win tonight against Wisconsin by just beating the shit out of them inside. Not only did they exploit what Illinois did by showing that Wisconsin has no idea how to guard a pick and roll, they also ran a high low with Damien Johnson and Paul Carter inside a lot on a smaller guard. Hell Blake Hoffarber had 9 rebounds. Tonight's game showed what is really good about Minny, but the problem that they have is that they have a lot of bad to go with it. Their zone is not good at all, and they are terrible on the road only winning at PSU and Iowa. They really have too many players that could be good if they got the shots, but they don't because 9 different people could start for them. Losing Al Nolen because he didn't go to class for a semester really hurts also because Devoe Joseph has to play point for them at times even though he is a much better 2 guard. If they impose their size inside, they could really do some damage, but do you really expect them to figure that out this late in the season? Here is what they have left:

Indiana
Purdue
@ Illinois
@ Michigan
Iowa

Indiana and Iowa at home will be easy wins because that old ass gym is a bitch to play in. Purdue has the size and shooters to beat them no matter where they play, and I really think that they will probably not win at Illinois or Michigan. The scheduling has killed this team every year. They play nobody in the non-conference unless it is at a Thanksgiving tournament. Butler and Texas A&M are the only 2 ranked teams they played outside of the Big Ten, and that was at a tournament. They have no idea how to win on the road, and they play no high profile games to learn what it takes to win in those situations. They will go 2-3 down the stretch.

Final Record: 8-10

7) Michigan 6-7 (previous record 4-5) (prediction 8-10)

Michigan is such a bad team that it really bothers me. They should be so much better, and I blame it all on John Beilein. I have bitched about his offensive system so much, that I can't do it anymore, just believe me when I tell you that Beilein will never have a top 10 team or go to a Final Four. Michigan has 4 point guards who think that they are shooting guards, and only one inside player who also thinks he is a shooting guard. They don't have one good win. UCONN is not a good win anymore because they have gone into the shitter, and they caught OSU without Evan Turner, which was hard for OSU because they only play 6 people with him. If you want to be a solid team, you can't lose 4 home games with 3 left. Here is what they have left:

Penn State
Illinois
@ OSU
Minnesota
@ Michigan State

If you don't think that the home game against Penn State has upset written all over it you are crazy!! Penn State beat Northwestern on the road which is a pretty hard thing to do. Add to that that Northwestern and Michigan like to do similar things on defense and you have an upset. If they get by PSU, I think that the only other win that they have on their schedule is Minnesota. They will probably go 2-3 down the stretch.

Final record: 8-10

8) Northwestern 6-8 (previous record 3-6) (prediction 8-10)

It was fun while it lasted for Northwestern. Yes, they are no longer the laughing stock of the Big Ten, but that doesn't mean that they aren't still the laughing stock of the NCAA. They made a good run at the tournament, until they got into the heart of the Big Ten season. They are a really fun team to watch if you enjoy watching basketball played at a circa 1960 style. They give up way too many points, and still don't have a go to scorer. Losing to Iowa on the road just killed this team. Had they won that game, they still might be in the NCAA talk. Now with losses to Iowa and then losing to winless PSU at home, they are done. At least they will get tourney experience in the NIT. Here is what they have left:

@ Wisconsin
Iowa
@ PSU
Chicago State
@ Indiana

Their schedule was made for them to make a run at the tournament!! Had they won the 2 games they should have against Iowa and PSU, they were poised to go 6-2 at worst. They also ruined my dream that they would be in the Tournament, and then somehow blow their home game against Chicago State. I know that sounds mean, but you know what, I hate those arrogant pricks almost as much as I hate "Michigan Men" and dick bags from Notre Dame. They could go 4-1 or 1-4. I will give them 4-1, although that is only 3-1 in the Big Ten, and 1-0 vs. a glorified Junior College.

Final record: 9-9

9) Indiana 3-10 (previous record 3-5) (prediction 5-13)

You have no idea how much I love to watch Indiana try sooooo hard and still play soooo shitty!!! Here is a little nugget of knowledge that you probably don't know: Verdell Jones said that Demitri McCamey's jumper is garbage. Well his jumper might be garbage but his floater when the game is tied and the clock is running down is pretty good you scrawny, lanky, d-bag!! Indiana has lost 7 straight games. 5 out of 7 by double digits. You want to know what is shocking and actually complete bullshit, Indiana is 3rd in the Big Ten in Free Throws attempted. They are only 3 behind Purdue and MSU. Verdell Jones leads the league in free throw attempts!! He has shot 96, and JuJuan Johnson is second with 76. I will never understand why this kid gets bailed out so much? I watched the MSU game, and I wanted to kill a puppy I was so outraged. I guess it isn't good for the Big Ten to watch a team that can't shoot, or finish. You don't want them to lose by 30 every game. Alright enough of that. Here is what they have left:

@ Minnesota
Wisconsin
@ Iowa
@ Purdue
Northwestern

I'm gonna take a large leap here and say that they will win one more game. I don't know where it will be because I'm not sure which game the refs are going to give them. Just kidding, but they might beat Iowa or Northwestern. They will end with a 1-4 stretch.

Final Record: 4-14

10) Iowa 3-11 (previous record 2-7) (prediction 3-15)

I do feel bad for Iowa, because they have players transferring or getting kicked off the team constantly. They just don't really have the talent to compete, but they still play pretty hard at home. Matt Gatens is a really solid player, and Devin Bawinkel is a great shooter. Aaron Fuller is playing much better inside, and it seems like Iowa is starting to come together as a team. Here is a crazy stat that Pat Forde tossed out at ESPN the other day. Devin Bawinkel has shot 79 3's this year...... and he has shot 0 2's. He has not shot one shot inside the arc this year, and he plays 15 minutes a game. In 3 seasons, he has shot 263 shots, and only 16 have been inside the 3 point line. That is astounding!! Anyway, here is what they have left:

@ Northwestern
Indiana
@ Wisconsin
@ Minnesota

I think they will beat Indiana since they crushed them on the road, but who the hell knows, and who the hell really cares. 1-3 over their last 4.

Final Record: 4-14

11) Penn state 1-12 (previous record 0-9) (prediction 2-16)

Like I said before, Penn State has way too much talent to be the worst team in the Big Ten. I love Talor Battle, and it sucks that nobody else on this team can step up and help him. They did play great at Northwestern the other night, and I still see them winning at least one more game. Also don't sleep on them in the Big Ten Tournament. Minnesota, Michigan or Northewestern would be screwed to get the 6 seed and play PSU in the first round. Here is what they have left:

@ Michigan
OSU
Northwestern
@ MSU
Purdue

That is a brutal schedule for them to finish. Again I have no idea where they will get their next win and I really don't care, but they will get one.

Final Record: 2-16

Ohio State vs. Purdue Running Blog

2010-02-17T17:25:00.002-06:00

The best game of the year is about to start, and here are some notes. John Diebler has his right hand wrapped up because he hurt his thumb. OSU is 15-0 at home this year and shooting 53% there. Purdue has never won at Value City Arena, Here we go.

- Purdue picks up an offensive foul on Dallas and already got a lay up against the feared OSU 1-3-1 zone. OSU looks bad on offense to start. Moore buries an open 3. 3 possessions for Purdue, 2 real good shots, and one strip. Missed 3 by Lighty and OSU is now out of the zone.

- After being down 7-0, Evan Turner scores the next 4 points. I think his offensive rebounding goes really unnoticed when people talk about his game. He usually gets 4-6 points a game on rebounds and put backs. JuJuan Johnson has 6 points to lead Purdue, he is a cruising. Another jumper from him. 8 points now, and look for Purdue to try to get him the ball inside to get the second foul on Lauderdale. Purdue is playing really tough defense, just waiting for the refs to start calling fouls on reaches to bring this back in.

- Purdue hasn't missed a shot, but really all of them have been easy jumpers. Now they have missed two back to back contested shots by Hummel and Johnson. Here are some surprising stats from the first match-up against these 2 teams, Purdue was up 12 at half, and Robbie Hummel had 29 points in the first half!!! Turner followed that up with 23 in the second half while Hummel only had 6. 16-9 Purdue right now.

- Kramer just threw a 120 foot inbound pass, the problem is that the court is only 94 feet. 18-9 right now, and OSU looks terrible on offense, kinda how Illinois came out against them on Sunday. Turner with a drive and 1. Really makes you feel like you can never put OSU away because Turner can score at will. You have to make him a jump shooter. Keaton Grant hits a 3 and gets a foul on Diebler. If you look closely, you can call a foul on a ton of 3 point shots because the defender will always hit the shooter on their follow through. 26-14 after another Turner drive. He will be really good in the NBA.

- Only one substitution so far for OSU, this team has to get run down at the end of the season, they also now have 9 turnovers and only 14 points in 15 minutes. Dallas Lauderdale has not done anything yet, but on the bright side, he will qualify for Social Security next year when he turns 65.

- Evan Turner's go to move is to drive right to the top of the key and then spin back left into the lane and drive. He has done this 4 times so far and Purdue hasn't stopped them once. The half-time score in 36-23 Purdue at the half. The reason that Purdue is the best team in the Big Ten is because they are up 13 on the road, yet Hummel hasn't scored. E'twaun Moore isn't playing great, but Keaton Grant and Johnson are carrying Purdue. If Moore was 2 inches taller, he would be going pro right now. He can drive, and he can definitely shoot, but at 6'3 he is not quick enough.
Ohio State has only one assist in the first half, and Turner already has 13 and 5. He will get close to 30 tonight, because him driving to the hoop is the only offense that OSU has. Purdue is actually implementing Illinois' gameplan by letting Turner get to where he wants to go, but staying on the shooters. Buford, Diebler and Lighty are 3-10 collectively.

- The Evan Turner is now starting. He has dribbled into the lane and got fouled 2 times in a row. How the shit is this only the second sell out of the season for OSU?? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say when you have a National Player of the Year candidate that goes to a school that has 75,000 students in a town that does not have a pro team, if you don't come out and watch a RANKED team that is trying to win a BIG TEN CHAMPIONSHIP, you have terrible fans.

- The USA is up 6-5 against Switzerland in the 10th end with the hammer in their curling match. If you are up with the hammer in the 10th, you win 90% of the time, in case you were wondering. They really need this win.

- I love Moore's mid range jumpshot, it is fantastic. OSU's offense now consists of Turner driving the lane and getting fouled, but now he has 3 fouls. 6 point game now, as Turner just buried a 3. Where have you gone JuJuan Johnson?? The only knock I have on him is that he doesn't post hard, instead he tries to use angles to get easy lay-ins. This works really well when Purdue is moving the ball, but they need to get the ball inside, if you don't then all you do is move the ball around the perimeter and jack up a shitty shot as the shot clock runs out..... which just happened. Turner now has 22 points and has scored the 9 of their last 11 points.

- As soon as I bitched about it, Johnson gets the ball on the block and gets the shot and 1. I am now sending in my application for a Division 1 basketball coach, maybe I can take over for Ernie Kent at Oregon, because he needs to be fired. You don't need to recruit there with all of that Phil Knight Nike money pouring in. Turner another drive and lay-in he now has 24 of OSU's 39 points.. He might drop 40. Johnson answers with a jumper, he has 22. Purdue 48 - OSU 39 with 12 to go...

- Does wasting a timeout with 12 minutes left because you can't inbound the ball make sense?? Nope, I didn't think so either. Another foul on a 3 point attempt, this time by Purdue on Buford. Stop touching 3 point shooters!!!

- Robbie Hummel apparently could win an Oscar for Big Ten Player of the Year. No I didn't write that wrong, that is what the announcer just said. Does that mean that he does a great job of acting like he should be a good player?? No Clue.

- Purdue gets an offensive foul, and Buford buries a wide open 3, then Hummel turns the ball over. OSU within 4 now, 48-44. The terrible fans are now really into the game. This is a perfect time to call a timeout, but wait.... Purdue only has 2 left. Can't go 10 minutes on the road with only one timeout. Nice work d-bags!! Oh, and there was a foul on the turnover, now OSU is in the bonus. I'm calling it right now, OSU will win, and Turner will shoot at least 8 free throws down the stretch.

- Dallas not only hits Johnson's hand on a jump shot, but also runs him over, but there is no call because this occurs 30 times a game, Buford hits a long 2, and now Painter has to call a timeout. 48-44 Purdue, 10 to go, and Purdue has only scored 12 points in the second half. OSU is trapping full court now, and Purdue only has 1 timeout. Way too much one on one with Purdue right now, no ball movement on offense.

- OSU know turning into jump shooters. Why the hell do you not let Turner drive and create now? Lighty, Buford, and Diebler all took 3's without Turner even looking to drive. Why?? 52-46 Purdue with 6:30 to go.

- Turner hits a jumper, but he hasn't gone to the hoop in about 4 minutes now. Another jumpshot misses for Turner. And for the record, Jim Jackson and I are the exact same page with Evan Turner. OSU had all of the momentum in this game 5 minutes ago, but they were never able to take the lead. 6 missed jumpshots later, Purdue builds a 6 point lead. Turner missed another 3!!! What the hell is he doing???

- Chris Kramer gets a nice lay-in and then concusses himself. I was trying soooooooo hard not to talk about him, but dammit, know I have to. When players like him, Lucas Johnson and every other "hustle" player has an injury that gets so much attention it drives me crazy. They are not INJURIES, they are SELF-INFLICTED WOUNDS. When a person hangs himself, you don't say the rope murdered them do you?? Diving 7 rows into the crowd to save a ball on the opening tip is not great basketball, it is stupid. The reason that these players always risk injury is because they don't really mean a ton to the over-all game. You never saw Michael Jordan dive into the crowd did you?? Does that mean that Lucas or Kramer tried harder than Jordan, or that the game means more to them??

- Turner just picked up his 4th foul, but I can assure you that he could stab Robbie Hummel and they still wouldn't foul him out. It is now an 8 point lead for Purdue, 58-50 with 3 left. Buford takes another 3 and misses, and Lighty bails him out with the offensive rebound and foul.

- I don't understand what I am seeing, Turner has not gone to the hoop in about 8 minutes, the entire offense is drive and kick outs to Buford or Diebler. Does Matta not have any short term memory?? Did he forget that nobody on Purdue could guard Turner 1 on 1 and he was getting to the rim or the line every time he tried?? Now 60-53 Purdue with a minute. Turner gives the ball up again and Buford misses a floater, but Dallas bails them out with a put back. Those were his first points of the game. 5 point game, and Kramer is at the line with 58 seconds left.

- Turner finally goes to the hole, and guess what?? He scores!!!! Amazing!! It's almost like he could do that anytime he wants to. 3 point game and Turner gets a rebound 15 seconds left and all hell breaks loose. He passes ahead to Buford, who drives in for a layin that gets blocked. Diebler gets the loose ball and hands off to Lighty, who gives the ball back to Diebler and he dribbles to an open look, but misses a 3. I'm gonna guess that if Matta had his choice, he would have Diebler shoot the 3 to tie, but I really want to know if Matta had another time out? Any chance that OSU had was completely blown by Matta. OSU had all of the momentum and was in the Bonus with 10 minutes left and Evan Turner only went to the basket ONE TIME!!! They gave the game away.

- On a side note, while Painter was doing his post game interview with Charrisa Thompson, you clearly see a Purdue benchwarmer check out her ass as he walks by. You have to remember that these players are also college kids.

Big Ten Breakdown Part 1

2010-02-17T00:34:00.003-06:00

There is now basically only 4-5 games left for every Big Ten team, so we are going to take this time to look and see how everything is going and check to see how my predictions are holding up. This will be the first part of a 2 part series, as I am going to do a running diary of the OSU Purdue game.

1) Michigan State - 11-3 (previous record 9-0) (prediction 16-2)

I basically gave MSU the Durty kiss of death because as soon as I posted my predictions, MSU lost 3 straight. They were without Kalin Lucas in a loss to Illinois, and had him back without practicing at home against Purdue. The ankle injury to Lucas didn't lose the Wisconsin game, and realistically, it shouldn't have affected them as much in the Purdue game. I am guilty of giving them too much credit because their 9-0 start included 2 wins against Iowa, Northwestern, Minnesota, a road win against Michigan, and home wins against Illinois and Wisconsin. I am also guilty of not remembering my history which states that Tom Izzo teams are not great in February. So far this year in Feb, they are 2-3, in 2009 they were 5-2, in 2008 they were 3-4, in 2007 they were 4-3, and 2006 they were 3-4. February is by far MSU's worst month, I apologize for not realizing this.

Apparently February is not a good month for Raymar Morgan either. I'm not the only one who thinks he is an underachiever, as Tom Izzo called him out this week. In 5 games this month, he is averaging 7 points, 5 boards, and 1 assist a game. Durrell Summers is right their with him, averaging 7.5 a game, with 2.5 boards and 1 assist a game. Both of these upperclassman needed to pick up the slack with Lucas hurting, and they haven't. Also MSU has not been playing any defense what so ever lately, and collectively they are a bad 3 point shooting team. They are 19-64 in their last 5 games. Lucas is a decent outside shooter, and Chris Allen is a real good outside shooter, the rest of the team is garbage. Here is what they have left:

Ohio State
@ Purdue
Penn State
Michigan

The way they are playing right now, I will put them at 2-2 over those last 4 games. Nobody is playing better than Ohio State and Purdue right now. Purdue already crushed them at home, so what makes you think that they won't do it when MSU has to go on the road.

Final Record 13-5

Purdue - 9-3 (previous record 6-3) (Prediction 13-5)

I previously thought that Purdue would only lose 2 road games to MSU and OSU. Well they handled the hell out of MSU, but I still think that the Ohio State game will be a huge task for them. I think it will be a real close game tomorrow, but OSU just has a much better starting 5. Chris Kramer is going to annoy the shit out of Evan Turner, but he will still get his. Diebler, Buford, and Lighty are all really great shooters, and that will be too much for Purdue to overcome. JuJaun Johnson has been playing like a beast lately, and I think he will be able to get shots against the 1-3-1. Lew Jack gives them much needed help at the PG position, and Purdue is by far the deepest team in the Big Ten now. Moore and Hummel are very consistent. I think that Purdue is the best TEAM in the Big Ten, but that doesn't mean that they can overcome OSU who has the best 5 in the Big Ten. After the OSU game, Purdue doesn't have a lot of problems on the map that could really derail their season.

@ OSU
Illinois
@ Minnesota
MSU
Indiana
@ PSU

Now they have already beaten Illinois and Michigan State on the road, but at the same time, Illinois and MSU are 2 teams that can win anywhere. I think that Purdue will end up losing 2 games down the stretch because I find it very hard to believe that a team can go 12-1 at the end of the Big Ten schedule, especially with how talented yet disappointing some teams have been this year. Don't sleep on Penn State to end the season also, they can shock somebody. Purdue will finish 4-2 to end the season.

Final Record 13-5

Wisconsin - 9-4 (previous record 6-3) (prediction 12-6)

I know that everyone is all hot in their pants because Jon Leuer is coming back this week, but the guy hasn't played in over a month, and had a broken wrist, so color me skeptical. I really doubt that he will come back and shoot lights out like he had been before. It's not like he is a guard who just sits outside and shoots. He is inside banging for rebounds, and will get hacked a lot on his hand. Good luck with that. After going crazy for a few games, Keaton Nankivil has come back down to earth a little, averaging about 10 and 5 in his last 4 games. To be honest, I am not impressed with anyone that they have on offense. Even Trevon Hughes doesn't impress me. He doesn't dish the ball very well, and is only shooting 41% on the year. Wisconsin is exactly the same team that Illinois was last year with a little more depth on offense. They are bad on offense, but they make up for it by limiting possessions by the other team, and by playing amazing defense. Now that they are playing more road games, I still believe that they will have some bad losses down the stretch. Here is what they have left.

@ Minnesota
Northwestern
@ Indiana
Iowa
@ Illinois

The more I think about it, I think the Northwestern game might be a shock for Wisconsin. Northwestern did not turn the ball over against Wisco (only 6) but also did not shoot too many 3's. Northwestern led with 5 minutes left in that game before they choked, I can see them stealing the game at Wisco. I don't think they will win at Illinois at the end of the season. I think they will go 3-2 at the end.

Final Record 12-6

Ohio State - 10-3 (previous record 6-3) (prediction 13-5)

I am more excited for OSU vs. Purdue than any other game the rest of this season (except for any Illini game) Both teams are playing extremely well, but Evan Turner is so good that he can win games by himself. Only Talor Battle has shown that he can do that also. Turner can get to the rim whenever he wants, and really in the last 3 minutes of a tight game, he will just drive and score at will. The 1-3-1 zone they play really does a good job of keeping their starting 5 out of foul trouble, and also gives them a break on defense so they don't have to substitute as much. It is not a great defense because teams get a lot of open shots against it. They have to hope that they can stay out of foul trouble down the stretch. Dallas Lauderdale is really coming on lately, and I think that William Buford will be a leading candidate for Player of the Year next season when Evan Turner is not the first option. He has one of the best jump shots I have seen in basketball in a very long time. Everyone on this team is playing fantastic, you just have to hope that they didn't peak to early. There remaining schedule:

Purdue
@ Michigan State
@ PSU
Michigan
Illinois

The schedule is not easy by any stretch, but I see them going 4-1 down the stretch and winning the Big Ten. That is if they can play well on the road, which they really did at Illinois.

Final record: 14-4

Tale of 2 Illini

2010-02-15T23:50:00.003-06:00

For most Illinois basketball fans, what occurred last week was the epitome of what fans have come to love and loathe while watching Illinois for the past few seasons. Illinois continued their red hot shooting, and also continued to make strides on defense when they shocked Wisconsin at the Kohl Center. Any momentum that they might have created was obviously lost when Illinois got crushed at home by Ohio State. The lack of consistency this season is obviously worse than it has been in the past few years, however many people are getting very tired with Bruce Weber's teams playing great in big games, and then losing head scratching, TV breaking games. Last season, Illinois was a great defensive team that had many apparent shortcomings on offense, 2 years ago the Illini were just bad all season long. It seems like the days of losing 59-36 (@ Minnesota last year) and 38-33 (@ Assembly Hall) are over, so hopefully the consistency will come soon too.

A problem that many people thought had been solved, reared its pathetic head again. The problem? A complete lack of energy or urgency at different points in the game. Illinois has had 3 major areas that have directly led to their 9 losses. Those areas are: a terrible start to the game, a terrible start to the second half, or letting shitty teams hang around with them late instead of putting them away. Let's examine their losses and breakdown where all of this has happened.

Utah - Illinois led 32-16 at halftime!! In the first 15 minutes of the second half Illinois was outscored 35-18. Instead of coming out and putting a real bad team away (Utah is 11-13) they let them hang around and then hit a game winning lay-up. (Didn't put them away, terrible start to second half)

Bradley - After an embarrassing loss the night before Illinois came out completely emotionless and lost for the second time in 24 hours. Illinois was up 29-28 at half, and then after 7 minutes they were losing 47-38. Illinois came back to take a 5 point lead with a little over 3 minutes left, and then didn't finish and lost by 4 to another crap team (Bradley is 13-12). (Terrible start to the second half, then didn't put them away)

Georgia - After winning 4 games, Illinois took Georgia for granted. They played a bad first half and were tied at 32 at the break. Guess what they did to start the second half? That's right, they gave Georgia a 6 point lead in the first 3 minutes. The lead got up to 9 in after 5 minutes, and Illinois was toast. Even though they regained a 1 point lead with 35 seconds left, the game should have never been close, and Illinois deserved to lose. (Terrible start to second half)

Mizzou - Surprisingly, even though Illinois almost had a turnover a minute for the first 7 minutes of game, McCamey basically kept them in it as the score was tied 11-11 with 14 minutes left. The score was also tied at 26 with 7 minutes left, and then 2009-2010 Illini Turnover-Palooza began. 7 turnovers in 4 and a half minutes finished Illinois off as they went scoreless for 5:15. At least this didn't occur at the beginning of the game or second half, so now Illinois was finding a new way to lose. The lead was 7 at the half, and Mizzou pushed it to 13 after the first 8 minutes. Game over. (Terrible start to second half)

Gonzaga - I think being down by 21 in the first half constitutes a slow start, what do you think? I guess you have to give this team credit for fighting back in games like this one and against Clemson, but obviously, you lose more games than you win in situations like this. (Horrible start)

MSU - Really Illinois played a great first 17 minutes of this game. They were in it for pretty much the entire first half until MSU hit some shots late. They did end up down 7 at half, but the game didn't really seem to be out of grasp, that is until the second half started. Illinois waited 4 minutes to score their first point unlike MSU who decided that they would try to score as soon as the second half began. A 7 point lead became 14 within 4 minutes, and the game was over. (Terrible start to second half)

Purdue - Again a really good first half from Illinois. They got a lead early, played well with it, and then completely shit the bed as soon as the second half started. Illinois scored 7 points in the first 8:40, and even worse, in the first 4 minutes, Illinois was outscored 11-2, so a four point halftime lead was completely wasted. Game pretty much over in the first 5 minutes of the second half even though Illinois tried to bury 3's at the end to give them a shot. (Terrible start to the second half)

Northwestern - Probably the most frustrating loss of the season aside from losing a monster lead to Utah, on my damn birthday no less, when I was there to watch it. Illinois started the game playing like they were drunk, giving Northwestern a 13-2 lead in the first 6 minutes. They still managed to gain a 3 point lead at half once they sobered up. The second half was more of the same as Illinois only scored 12 points in the first 13 minutes. Here comes the frustrating part: Illinois actually built their lead to 7 during this stretch. That's right, somehow Northwestern managed to play even worse than Illinois. Actually, Illinois only scored 13 points in the first 16 minutes of the second half. Unfortunately, Northwestern decided that they didn't want to hand Illinois the game anymore, and they started to hit some shots. All around horrible performance for Illinois. (Trifecta of terrible)

After looking at this, and also looking at some of the wins that Illinois has had, I think the most important thing for this team is to come out hard to start the second half. They have overcome large amounts early and won some games, but in close games, they can't afford to sleepwalk into the second half. Basically, if Illinois is down 20 at half, I'm not nearly as worried as I am if Illinois gives up a lead in the first 4 minutes of the second half. You can see the life drain out of everyone but McCamey and DJ when Illinois plays bad to start the second half.

And finally on to the latest loss to OSU:

If you have been reading what has been written about this game, you will come away with the conclusion that OSU's 1-3-1 zone really caused problems for Illinois. That is total bullshit. OSU started in it, and Illinois got 2 lay-ins to start the game because McCamey was absolutely destroying the zone. The problem was Illinois was not nearly as precise as it was in its previous 2 big games. Tisdale got the ball on the block, but he travelled. Bill Cole stepped out of bounds, then missed a layup. The only bad play in the first 5 minutes was the first possession when DJ just threw the ball away. Davis hit a baseline jumper, but the score was 11-6 OSU because we played no defense on perimeter shooters. OSU started the game 5-7 including 3-4 from 3, and they also hit 5 free throws. At 11:48 left in the game, this game was over. It had nothing to do with the zone, it had to do with the fact that at this point, OSU was shooting 6-8 from the floor, 4-5 from 3, and 5-6 from the line. Illinois on the other hand was 5-13 from the field, 0-3 from 3, and had no free throws. After watching the game for the 4th time, none of the shots in the first 8 minutes were bad. They were all shots that Illinois normally hits, or at least had been hitting during their 5 game winning streak.

So the score is 13 to 8 with 13:05 left, and here is where it all went to shit. Davis switches on Lighty, he goes baseline, gets fouled by Paul (late on weakside help), and gives OSU a 7 point lead. McCamey hits Griffey on a cross court 30 footer for a lay-up to try to keep the game close. I just want to prepare all of you for this weeks Brandon Paul Tirade, because it might get brutal.

All week long Illinois talked about how Evan Turner would most likely get his, so don't let Buford and Diebler go off. Well Paul must not have been listening because he gets lost and Buford buries a 3 in his face. Actually I shouldn't say in his face, because Paul isn't close enough to him. Then, Paul doesn't close out enough on John Diebler (obviously because he is worried about Diebler's amazing And 1 crossover that no one has ever seen) so Diebler buries a three in what would have been Paul's face had he been close enough. Now it is 21-10. Now the next offensive possession is a jumble fuck because OSU is playing pretty good MAN defense. Paul gets a offensive rebound off a missed DJ putback and decides to throw a twisting over the shoulder shot off the backboard because for some reason he thought that he would either magically make it, or that he would get a call against the Big Ten leader in blocked shots Dallas (I look older than Greg Oden did in college) Lauderdale. Seriously, if I saw Lauderdale in public, I would probably call him sir because his bald spot alone makes him look like a 45 year old man. Back to the shot, Paul didn't even draw contact with Dallas, probably because the OSU scouting report said to let Paul shoot anything he wants in the lane because there isn't a chance in hell it's going in. Next offensive possession, Paul misses a wide open 3. At this point, I would just take him out of the game, because you know that he isn't going to contribute much. I hate to say it, because I think he will be a great player for us. 2 weeks ago when Illinois was on the verge of missing the tournament, I was all for letting these young guys play through their struggles, but now there is way too much that can be lost. Bill Cole sat on the bench for the first 2 seasons he was an Illini, so his legs should be fresh. Sorry if you thought I was done with Paul........ I'm not. Illinois gets a nice bucket on an in-bound play when McCamey finds Davis for a bunny. Buford hits a shot against Michael's son (I will now call Jeff Jordan Michael's son, so we all know why he is playing), and then Paul decides that it is his time to shine. He again drives into the lane for a contested floater that goes high off the glass and hits no rim at all, Evan Turner outlets to Lighty for a scary dunk that caused Gus Johnson to scream so loud his microphone exploded, and now it is 25-12 OSU. Finally Bruce stops the bleeding by putting Cole in with 9 minutes left. So the damage for Paul is 1 foul for 2 points, 2 3's by the man he was supposed to be guarding, a missed 3 attempt, and 2 terrible shots in the lane, one of which was so bad, it led to a run out for a dunk. For the record, if McCamey did this even last season, Bruce would have probably taken his scholarship away.

Now I don't want you to think that Illinois lost because of that stretch that I just recapped for you. It just frustrated the hell out of me, and I really had to vent. Honestly, nobody played good defense, or shot the ball well, so that doomed Illinois from the get go. OSU was shooting 75% to Illinois 28% when the score was 27-12 with 8 minutes left. This game occurs to everyone, pretty much every year. The tables were reversed at Wisconsin. Illinois went to Wisconsin after a 4 game winning streak, and they shot the hell out of the ball. McCamey was unconscious, and everyone else hit every open shot that they got. Well if there was a team playing better than Illinois in the Big Ten, it was OSU. They came in and shot the ball extremely well, and Illinois could not keep up. Had this game happened against Minnesota or Michigan, then I would be extremely worried. And Illinois did hold OSU to 9 points in the last 8 minutes of the first half, they just couldn't hit enough shots to cut the lead.

The only positives that you can carry with you right now is that Illinois seemed to have figured it out before this game. Demitri McCamey is still playing fantastic as a point guard, even though he had an off shooting night. DJ was able to bounce back from a terrible game against MSU early in the season to play well during the 5 game winning streak, so hopefully he will shoot better this weekend. Mike Tisdale is slowly becoming much more consistent, and he is picking up the slack that has been created by Mike Davis and Keller playing bad. Davis has been playing a little better, and it seems like he is gaining confidence in his jumper again. And last but not least, Griffey is giving Illinois very solid minutes off the bench. A win at Purdue is not out of the question, obviously because a we all thought that a win at Wisconsin was.

Huge Week For Illinois

2010-02-10T21:28:00.003-06:00

What many people thought was a must win for Illinois turned out to be a barn burner, and what many people thought was "no chance in hell" game turned out to be an unexpected great win. Let me start by saying that it doesn't matter to me that Kalin Lucas did not play for Michigan State, it is still a great win for Illinois. And let me also say that Dookie V is complete douche bag, but I will get to him later. All of the sudden Illinois went from fighting for their tournament life to fighting for a Big Ten championship. All of the sudden a much criticized Demitri McCamey is looking like a lock for Big Ten First Team, and finally playing like Bruce wanted him to play. Lets look at the first win.

First the Michigan State game:

I was in South Bend, Indiana for this game. I know what most of you are thinking: "Durty, don't you hate the state of Indiana? I thought the only school you hate more than Indiana is Notre Dame?" Before you start jumping to any rash conclusions, I was there for a wedding. Thank God the wedding was beautiful and a lot of fun, otherwise I might have cancelled the check before the Bride and Groom could cash it (not really). I wasn't the only person who was aching to watch this game, as pretty much every male under the age of 40 was huddled around my buddy Matt's IPhone watching the play by play while our wives/girlfriends danced by themselves. It was like a middle school dance and Matt brought a Gameboy. Alright, enough about my bullshit, lets get to the game.
From the get go you could tell the crowd was very amped/drunk! Just like the Krush used to be when I went to school. Bruce again went with the line-up of DMac, Tisdale, Griffey, DJ and Cole which I absolutley love to start games. I like it for two reason. The first is that it is a more stable line-up to start a game defensively. Cole knows that he is in the game to play defense and hustle. Tyler Griffey is the exact same way, he is out there to give solid minutes on the defensive end and rebound, something that Mike Davis and especially Dominique Keller were not doing. The second reason I like this line-up is because it allows Mike Tisdale to be the primary option on offense early. Illinois makes it a point to try to get him either posted up, or get him an easy pick and pop shot early. We all have seen how important it is to get Mike going early in games. When he is involved on offense, he is more likely to rebound on defense, and also less likely to commit stupid ticky tack fouls on defense. If your starting line-up included Davis and Paul instead of Cole and Griffey, then Tisdale becomes the 4th option, and possibly the 5th, and all of the sudden he is not getting shots until Illinois is down in the second half and Bruce is screaming at them to give him the ball. Having Tisdale be a fourth option means that you have to pray that Davis and Paul have a good game, and they are sporadic at best.
Illinois' first score came on a post up by Mike Tisdale, and then he kicked to Griffey for a jumper. Incidentally, Tisdale had more assists on that single play than Shaun Pruitt did in 4 years. Then the McCamey show started with a little Tisdale tip dunk in there somewhere. Illinois started the game 14-4, and they went for the Jugular very early by shooting 3 straight 3's with that lead. They missed all 3, and then Bruce called timeout. The reason Illinois jumped out to that lead wasn't so much their hot shooting as much as it was good defense. I don't think enough credit is being given to DJ Richardson for how hard he is working to defend the point. He caused 2 turnovers in the first 4 minutes. Bill Cole also caused another one, then had a block that led to Raymar Morgan shooting the ball off the side of the backboard on the rebound.

The next thing that I want to talk about is how we run the pick and roll with McCamey and Tisdale when the shot clock gets under 10 seconds. People do not understand how difficult it is to make the right read off of this. A perfect example was when Brandon Paul decided he would run it instead of McCamey. Paul ended up dribbling around for 7 seconds, then after spinning twice he finally gave the ball to Davis for a contested 19 footer. This not to bash Paul because I think he is starting to play much better than he has. Instead I mention this because McCamey has to handle this situation at least 10-12 times a game, and he maybe makes the wrong read on it 2 times. In the last 2 seasons, Demitri would use the pick in order to find space for a 3, or drive a little for a contested jumper. Now he not only reads the space for a 3, but he also reads when the defense is playing tight enough that he can get to the hoop. If the defense is rotating over to get a charge, he hits a floater in the lane. If the defense all collapses, then he hits Tisdale for an 18 footer, and if Tisdale dives, he is patient enough to wait for him to get a lay-in or a dunk. The next time you get upset when Illinois runs the offense down to 10 seconds and then McCamey pulls it out, think about how well he has ran this in the last 5 games. 5 straight games he has been great in the 2 man game, and now when someone else jumps it, you will have a jumpshooter (DJ Richardson) open in the corner. I don't know about you, but I feel pretty comfortable giving Demitri 6 different options when he has the ball in his hands.

Erin Andrews is Beautiful!!!

The rest of the first half consisted of really good basketball. DJ hit some big 3's and also continues to be clutch at line. Bill Cole proved to everyone that he can actually dunk, and Mike Davis finally hit some jumpers that used to be automatic for him. Illinois' defense finally showed up causing 11 turnover, and just like last season, they weere effecient and shared the basketball with 9 people scoring in the first half. The biggest moment of the second half occured with 13:30 left in the second half. That's when DMAC decided to go OFF!!

McCamey, with the shot clock winding down, ran a pick and roll, couldn't drive, so he created space and buried a 3 in Raymar Morgan/Brian Randle's face! As soon as he hit that 3, he got a little smirk on his face that basically said "You can try to guard me, but I will use the shit out of you!!" Then he comes down and buries another 3. Now give MSU a ton of credit because they hit a jumper in the lane and then 2 3's to match and actually take the lead, but McCamey was just getting started.

To get back to my Raymar Morgan/Brian Randle comparison, they are the exact same damn player. Both of them had a ton of potential coming out of high school, and they were supposed to be leaders that, by the time they were Seniors, should have been All-Big Ten players at the least. Both of them have been injury prone, and have under acheived. And the most glaring comparison is that both of them caved under the pressure of big games. The only difference is that while Illinois imploded during Randle's final season, MSU has way too much talent to allow that to happen this season. If anything, Morgan has been a bigger bust than Randle was. While Randle never averaged more than 9.4 points a game (his senior year), Morgan has averaged less his Junior and Senior year than he did as a Freshman (10.2, 10.6 vs. 11.7) During this game, he had only 8 points, and 4 of those were in the first 5 minutes. Don't get me started on him being a good defensive player, because McCamey buried 3 3's in his face, and foul trouble has plauged him his entire career. Vitale makes a crucial error like he always does by saying at the end of the game: "At least Morgan has been trying defensively, guarding McCamey!" Yep, Vitale is a fucking joke, and so is Raymar!

Had I watched the game live, I would have thought that the game was over with 9:00 left to play. Thats when Brandon Paul got a break away with a steal and dunked. Enough credit was not given to Paul for how amazing he played on defense in the second half. He had one terrible lapse when he let Summers hit a 3 at the end of the game, but you see flashes of how unbelievable he will be in the future. McCamey comes down and nails his 5th 3 of the game to make it a 62-57 game with 8 to play, and the Hall is going nuts!!! Then the best dunk I have seen all year happens.....

BP makes another great steal on the sideline and then he flips the ball ahead to DJ. DJ grabs the ball, plants, and takes off from an area on the court that a 6 foot guard should not take off from. The 2 handed dunk was reminescent of Luther Head taking off 5 years ago. It was amazing, and the Hall is going nuts!!!

For the first time all year, I started to see this team have fun!! Mike Davis hits a jumper and he starts pumping up the crowd, and then BP takes a charge, and Demitri stands for at least 10 seconds making the charge call for the officials and the crowd! When was the last time that Illinois did that at home??

Draymon Green had 12 points and 12 rebounds with 4 minutes left. He ended the game with 16 points and 17 rebounds. What a phenominal player!! I have to admit that I love everything about MSU (aside from Raymar Morgan.) They play basketball the way that everyone should play. No one ever gives them credit, yet Izzo has made made 5 Final Fours, 2 National Championship games, 1 National Championship, and he has taken MSU to the Sweet Sixteen 8 out of the last 12 years!!!! Are you kidding me??? Best coach in basketball, hands down!!!!! I will compare him to every other coach that the college basketball experts love to blow later.

Alright 3:30 left in the game, score is 66-65.... you wanna know who won this game for us?? Well I will tell you, it was MIKE DAVIS and BRANDON PAUL!! Mike hits 2 big free throws to give us a 3 point lead with 3 minutes to play. Then he jumps out on Summers and blocks his shot (Illinois ball with 2:47 left.) Game tied at 68 and BP makes a hell of a drive to the hoop (which normally is either blocked or defended) and he make the bucket but misses the free throw. Illinois 70-68. Next possesion, BP ties up....... Raymar Morgan!! And this is when I lost all love for Dookie V.

For the record, I really loved Vitale because he is one of the good guys in sports. All he wants to do is make money for the Jimmy V foundation for cancer research, and he usually hates everything that is dirty about college basketball (hence the reason he never talks about Calipari.) When you announce a game, you don't say the refs made a mistake. If you want to disagree with the refs, you better be right, especially when you have multiple angles in SLOW MOTION!!! Now I have watched the replay 35 million times, and Dickie only got to see it 4 times, yet he saw BP grabbing Morgan on the arm, yet there is nothing in ESPN's arsenal of camera's to back up his claim. So the only thing that we can assume from this is that Vitale and his 70 year old eyes, from 45 feet away, at an angle that a sharpshooter couldn't see from, is better than than the camera that ESPN had from 4 feet away. He needs to stop getting carried away because it has become a real turn off for fans, and probably already driven most fans away from liking him.

Back to the game..... McCamey buries another 3!!! Illinois hits some free throws by DJ, and then Mike Davis gets another block... the game is over, and DICK VITALE LOSES HIS MIND!!!

Now on to Dookie V. What a fucking hypocrite!! He loves to perpetuate a mad house, and crazy fans, but when 200 people rush the floor, he goes out of his mind. For the record if you watch the replay of the game, the people who rushed the floor didn't even encompass 2/3 of the court. And for the record, didn't Dookie V say that this was "A MUST WIN FOR ILLINOIS!!" So, Illinois has Gameday, the Orange Krush has been there for damn near 12 hours partying, but for them to run onto the floor to congragulate the team is somehow unsafe??? Get the fuck over yourself Vitale!! Here is another great fact... Vitale was doing a Big Ten game, which finally beat the ACC in the Big Ten Challenge, and you want to know how many times Vitale mentioned Duke and UNC? 7 Fucking times!!! Really you out of touch douche bag!!! During a Big Ten game, that was the focus of GAMEDAY on ESPN, Vitale talked about Duke and UNC 7 Fucking times. UNC isn't even going to make the NCAA this year, but Dookie V still has to love them, because they are the reason that he has a job. I pray for the day that he retires with Billy Packard in the college basketball hall of douchebags!! Up next, Wisconsin.

Iowa - Illinois Running Diary

2010-02-03T19:11:00.002-06:00

I always wanted to try this, so I will give it a shot with tonight's game. Basically I will give you guys a little insight into what it is like to watch an Illini game with me, and of course I will add all of the random text messages I get from all of my friends. Although to be honest, the same people who read this are the same people I text the entire time. Oh well!!
The starting line-up is supposed to be McCamey, Richardson, Tisdale, Cole and Griffey. Here is hoping that this is finally the game where Mike Davis wakes up and plays the way he is capable of playing.

Wayne Laravee just said that under Bruce Weber, Illinois is the "11th winningest program" in the Nation, but most of you are right, we should fire him! (I used the quote there because I'm pretty sure winningest is not a word)

McCamey is already owning this game. I love when the bigs run the floor, and realistically Cole, Davis and Keller should get at least 10 points a game in transition because they are more athletic than every other big man in the conference. Iowa's first 3 shots have been 3 pointers, they have missed them all, but they have been open.

Now Matt Gatens has hit 2 open 3's. Illinois needs to eventually learn to close out on shooters, or not get beat off the dribble. Story of the season has already shown up in the first 4 minutes. Offense looks good with solid ball movement. Brandon Paul was in the game for 6 seconds before he drove, got stuck and put up a bullshit shot.

Holy Shit! Lickliter's son is in the game, and man he is not a Division 1 basketball player. It is also awesome to hear the Krush chanting AIRBALL at Cully Payne even though the game is in Iowa. Laravee has already mentioned 3 times that 160 Krush members made the trip to Iowa. For all of Paul's terrible decisions on offense, he is getting much better at defense. Dominque Keller on the other hand is getting much worse on defense.

Somebody get a god damn rebound!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Iowa is shooting 35% yet they have hit 5 3's to stay in this game. Tisdale and Davis both look pretty active so far. They need to start owning the defensive glass though. The downside to having so many mid major coaches in the Big Ten now is that you know get mid major 3 point shooters. By that I mean a bunch of short white kids who only shoot from 25 feet away.

Not too many fouls called so far in this game, actually only 3 so far with 16 minutes gone in the first half. Just as I say that, McCamey picks up a foul against Bryant "Big Country" Reeves. I wonder what farm Lickliter found this hillbilly on?? I would like to see Demitri penetrate a little more in this game instead of settling for the 3, he is 1-4 right now, but he has 5 assists.

And as soon as I say it, McCamey starts getting in the lane and closes out the half on a great run. I will bet you anything that Iowa comes out and hits 2 3's to start the half and Illinois is only up by 2 before Bruce calls a timeout. Any takers?

Okay maybe I was wrong, Illinois is playing very hard to start the half. Shocking, but we need to make sure that there aren't any major lapses. Cully Payne with ANOTHER airball, dare I say he is rattled!! Lead is now 10.... Illinois really needs to push this to at least 15 and step on Iowa's throats, they have had too many damn games where they get a lead and then let a team back in. Northwestern springs to memory. On a lighter note, Chunk is back in the game for Iowa.

Now Illinois is going into their typical second half offense which consists of nobody screening, nobody posting, and then McCamey getting the ball with 10 seconds on the shot clock. McCamey just caught a hamhock from Chunk in the face....... I am really excited to see what type of player McCamey is when he is pissed off!!

For those of you who are wondering, Jeff Jordan is god damn terrible. It is funny to watch him play against Lil Lickliter, a battle of two people who are playing because of who their father is.

McCamey is on the bench, and nobody has scored for the last 3 hours. Actually Illinois hasn't scored for the last 7 minutes, and now it is a 5 point game. Back up to 9, Illinois runs nothing on offense, and then Jeff Jordan decides its his turn to airball a 3. Awesome!!

We need to just pound the ball inside. They are packing the lane against Tisdale, but the beauty of that is that Tisdale is never in the paint! He usually starts out posting there, but is pushed out by the 3 point line in about .4 seconds. Illinois has 12 points in 13+ minutes.

McCamey misses a dunk, Tisdale get s a foul, nothing about the way Illinois is playing is making me feel good, and right on cue, Payne hits a 3. Another Tisdale foul, and this game has just gotten a whole lot more interesting. We need McCamey right here.

Huge jumpshot by Griffey, that used to be the shot the was automatic for Mike Davis. Illinois up 5 with about 3 to play. Gotta love how Illinois can't put anyone away. Maybe they should just think that they are down by 10 and there is only :45 to play. Maybe then they will show a little fire.

Demitri McCamey made the worst play I have ever seen him make, even if it wasn't Bill Cole, nobody could have caught that ball. What the hell was he thinking?? Mike Davis with a huge jumper from the top of the key!! McCamey and Tisdale hit their free throws, and that is all she wrote folks. Pretty much exactly the same Illini game that we have become accustomed to watching. MSU on Saturday, that is going to be a damn dogfight!! I for one am praying that Kalin Lucas can't play because of his ankle, and then he comes back and destroys the rest of the Big Ten.

Big Ten Breakdown

2010-02-02T14:00:00.004-06:00

Now that the Big Ten season is half way done, I am going to look forward and predict what each team will do for the rest of the season. As of now, Lunardi in his infinite wisdom has 4 teams in from the Big Ten. Let me start of by saying that Bracketology is a crock of shit. Every year, people are astounded by how accurate Lunardi is when he picks his bracket. By the time the bracket is released, there are really only about 5 teams that are on the bubble, and it is usually for 3 spots. How hard is this?? A person who knows nothing about basketball can get this correct. It would be really impressive if he was ever correct on his seeding, but he never is. Anyway, I bet that the Big Ten gets at least 5 teams, if not 6. The 6th team will be determined on how Northwestern finishes.

Big Ten Teams:

MSU - 19-3 (9-0)

Izzo is the best coach in college basketball, hands down. He doesn't get nearly the talent that teams like UNC, Duke, Texas, and Kansas get, yet every year Michigan State is awesome. This season is no different, MSU has won 14 out of their last 15 games, and I guarentee that if they played UNC, Texas or Florida (their 3 losses) today they would beat them easily. Here is a look at their upcoming schedule
@ Wisconsin
@ Illinois
Purdue
@ Penn State
@ Indiana
Ohio State
@ Purdue
Penn State
Michigan
I don't think that MSU will run the table in the Big Ten. They should win tonight against Wisconsin because without Luerer they are not the same team. I think that they will lose one road game against Purdue or Illinois, not because I think that either team is better, but those games will mean more to Purdue and UI. MSU is pretty much a lock for a #2 seed in the NCAA's and they probably can't make a run at a #1 seed. They also might get shocked at home once.
Final Big Ten Record (16-2)

Purdue 18-3 (6-3)

If Purdue can get Lewis Jackson back up to speed in the next 3 games, then they will be scary for the rest of the season. The only thing that they were missing this season was the playmaking that Jackson brings at the point. Moore and Grant have done a great job handling the guard position while he has been out, but with him back, it allows those two to move back to the 2 guard spot without having to rely on Freshman handling the point. JaJuan Johnson had his "Mike Davis" moment for 3 games, but he found his game again. It is a funny coincidence that he found his game against Mike Davis and the Illini. Since playing only 17 minutes and scoring only 8 points in a loss to Northwestern, Johnson has averaged 18 points over his last 4 games. Purdue's remaining games:
@ Indiana
@ MSU
Iowa
@ OSU
Illinois
@ Minnesota
MSU
Indiana
@ Penn State
The two games that I think Purdue loses in @ MSU and @ OSU, both of those teams match up really well against Purdue, and they both have strong big men that will give Johnson problems. Also they each have guards that can match up with E'Twuan Moore and a SF that can match up with Robbie Hummel. Their home game against MSU will be an awesome game, other than that, they shouldn't lose a game unless they completely lay an egg on the road at Minnesota.
Final Record 13-5

Wisconsin 16-5 (6-3)

Every year I think Wisconsin will be crap, and every year I am shocked when they are good. It's like being surprised that it gets cold in Chicago during winter. How well they play the rest of the season depends on how long Jon Leuer is out. Hughes is a stud, and Bohannon is the typical Bo Ryan slappy white guard who can shoot from anywhere, but beyond that the scoring is very inconsistant. Jordan Taylor will be another great guard for them in the next 2 years but he is only shooting 36% from the field in Big Ten play, and he is not shy about jacking shitty shots up. Keaton Nankivil has gone off in his last 2 games, but he needs to do it for the rest of the year for Wisconsin to have a shot at the second spot in the Big Ten. Wisco's remaining Schedule:
MSU
@ Michigan
Illinois
Indiana
@ Minnesota
Northwestern
@ Indiana
Iowa
@ Illinois

As always, Wisconsin doesn't lose at home. Their only loss at home this year has been against Gonzaga. I think they will lose to MSU tonight, but then after that, they have no home losses left on their schedule. Even without Leuer, their home court advantage will help them take care of the rest of their schedule. I think they will lose to Minnesota and Illinois on the road though, and possibly Michigan. At home Wisconsin is great at controlling the tempo, but on the road, I think Michigan will speed things up.
Final Big Ten Record: 12-6

Ohio State 16-6 (6-3)
OSU is the most talented team in the Big Ten. That is of course when Evan Turner is on the floor. What they don't have is depth. Thad Matta has done a fantastic job of recruiting one and done players who give his program absolutley nothing. I'm not forgetting about the National Championship run that they made a few years ago, they were the exception. Also they had 3 freshman who went pro after one season. This season they finally have a team that has played together for longer than a summer. With Evan Turner this team is more than capable of making the Sweet Sixteen. Here is their schedule

PSU
Iowa
@ Indiana
@ Illinois
Purdue
@ MSU
@ PSU
Michigan
Illinois

Having 4 out of 5 games on the road could break this team. They are going to need much more than a consistent triple double from Evan Turner every game. If they can get out of that strecth with 2 or less losses, they will end up either 2nd or 3rd in the Big Ten. They win on the road at Purdue was a great win for them, and if they can sweep the series, they will be second easily.
Final Big Ten Record: 13-5

Illinois 14-8 (6-3)

Illinois had by far the easiest Big Ten schedule to start conference play. Losing at Northwestern really hurt them, and their inconsistent play is really hindering their chances of getting to the NCAA Tournament. Demitri McCamey has been carrying this team while someone else chips in occasionaly. What the Illini need is for 2 out of Mike Tisdale, Mike Davis, Bill Cole or DJ Richardson to consistently play well. If that happens, then they are as good as anyone in the Big Ten not named Michigan State. The odds of that happening is pretty slim though. Illini remaining schedule:
@ Iowa
MSU
@ Wisconsin
OSU
@ Purdue
@ Michigan
Minnesota
@ OSU
Wisconsin

This schedule is brutal, and really if Illinois can go 3-1 at home it will be a miricle. They need to steal the Michigan road game and hopefully one other game to get into the tournament. Since we talk about the Illini all damn day here, I won't waste any more space on them.
Final Big Ten record: 11-7

Minnesota 13-8 (4-5)

The Fighting Tubby's have had a pretty up and down year. They should have been much better than they are, and in some games they do play up to their potential. Beating OSU in Evan Turner's second game back is their best win of the year besides beating Butler early in the season. OSU got them back in a big way by crushing them by over 20. Tubby Smith played a cake non conference schedule last season, and the same thing happened this season. Once the Big Ten season rolls around Minnesota isn't nearly as ready as they should be. They are 4-5 right now, and they still have some big games coming up. Tubby's remaining schedule:

@ PSU
Michigan
@ Northwestern
Wisconsin
Indiana
Purdue
@ Illinois
@ Michigan
Iowa

Minnesota took a page out of Duke's scheduling playbook and only had one non-conference road game, which they lost to Miami. A 12 point road win at Iowa means absolutley nothing, but an overtime road loss to Indiana means a lot. They MIGHT beat PSU on the road, but I really doubt they beat Northwestern, Illinois or Michigan on the road. They need to win out at home, but they won't beat Purdue, and probably won't beat Wisconsin either, although playing at the Barn is difficult because no one can shoot in that abomination of a sporting venue.

Final Big Ten Record: 8-10

Michigan 11-10 (4-5)

Like Minnesota, Michigan has only won one road game so far this season. I still think that DeShawn Simms and Manny Harris are two of the best players in the Big Ten. Considering Manny Harris leads the Big Ten in scoring and Simms is 5th, you would think Michigan would be much better than they are. They reason they suck is because Beilein has surrounded these two with a bunch of great white unathletic outside shooters who can't shoot for shit! This team is going to be garbage next season also when Simms and Harris are gone. They beauty of Michigan is that they can beat anyone when they get hot. The problem is they only shoot well once every 4 games. Their remaining schedule:

@ Northwestern
Wisconsin
@ Minnesota
@ Iowa
PSU
Illinois
@ OSU
Minnesota
@ MSU

I can't even begin to predict what Michigan will do. For all we know, they will lose at Iowa and PSU at home, but they will beat MSU, Wisconsin and OSU. If everything plays out the way it should though, they will beat PSU and Iowa and probably Minnesota. They also will have one other win somewhere, possibly tonight @ Northwestern.
Final Big Ten Record: 8-10

Indiana - 9-11 (3-5)
Indiana sucks! I hate Tom Crean, and don't understand why people think he is such an amazing coach? He went to the NCAA tournament 2 times with Dwayne Wade, who led him to a Final Four. The next 2 years he failed to win 20 games and made the NIT. Then he made the NCAA 3 times in a row winning only one game in 3 years. His career record is 205-132 with 83 of those wins coming with the best shooting guard in the NBA right now.
Indiana is a scrappy team, and they fight. Since they lost their best player though, this season is another complete and total loss for them. I hope Kelvin Sampson and Eric Gordon was worth it scumbags!! Their schedule

Purdue
@ Northwestern
OSU
@ Wisconsin
MSU
@ Minnesota
Wisconsin
@ Purdue
@ Iowa
Northwestern

I will give them 2 wins in this stretch. They might beat Iowa because they got embarrassed by them at home, and they could possibly beat Northwestern at home. I am being very nice here, and I'm not sure why, because realistically they shouldn't win any of these games.
Final Big Ten Record: 5-13

Northwestern 14-7 (3-6)

The stars were aligned for Northwestern as far as getting into the NCAA tournament this season. They had a ridiculously easy non-conference schedule, and they only had to play Purdue and MSU once. Then Kevin Coble (the ugliest man not only in the Big Ten, but all of college basketball) went down and everything looked like hell. They have played really well without him, and the system they run is perfect for the players they have. That being said, they are not a tournament team, and they won't make it. Their remaining schedule:

Michigan
Indiana
@ Iowa
Minnesota
PSU
@ Wisconsin
Iowa
@ PSU
Chicago State???
@ Indiana

They have by far the easiest road the rest of the way in the Big Ten. @ Wisconsin is their only remaining game against a ranked team. Like damn near everyone else in the Big Ten, they have only won one road game, but their road schedule is not that hard. I think they will lose 4-5 more games, and play in the NIT.
Final Big Ten Record: 8-10

Iowa 8-14 (2-7)

Iowa has no talent really at all on this team. They recruited talent, but they all either transferred once they realized that they had to live in Iowa, or they got suspended because they probably were hanging out with the football team. I don't know how Iowa turns things around, and I doubt they will with Lickliter as coach. Remaining Schedule:

Illinois
@OSU
Northwestern
@ Purdue
Michigan
@ Northwestern
Indiana
@ Wisconsin
@Minnesota

I really don't see Iowa winning any of these games although they did crush Indiana on the road, so maybe they can beat them at home. Really, who gives a shit. Maybe one more win.
Final Big Ten Record: 3-15

Penn State 8-13 (0-9)

Penn State is the wildcard in the Big Ten. There is no way that they should be this bad. Talor Battle is a stud, and I have a feeling that he will start to completely take over a couple games late in the season. They did lose a lot in the last 2 seasons, and the young players that they have are not stepping up. I just pray that Illinois does not get Penn State in the first round of the Big Ten tournament because they will beat Illinois. Here is their remaining schedule:

@OSU
Minnesota
MSU
@ Northwestern
@ Michigan
Ohio State
Northwestern
@ MSU
Purdue

If you are any of the top 3 Big Ten teams, you do not want to get Penn State at the end of the season. When a team with this much talent has nothing to play for, they get really dangerous.
I will give them 2 wins.
Final Big Ten Record: 2-16

Durty Is Back!!

2010-01-27T15:24:00.003-06:00

Durty is back from my Sebatical in India. I have taken the last week to absorb what has happened to the Illini over the last month and I finally have an answer for all of you. I know all of you want to know who to blame. Most of you would like to blame Bruce Weber, and you might be correct, he has done a terrible job working with this team. However, I think the blame can be placed more on the players than anyone. Let's dispell some myths before we delve further into why Illinois has played terrible this season, and make no mistake, this team should be 17-4 instead of 13-8.

Myth 1) Illinois needs to play more zone
I hate when people assume that a team can just switch up defenses. If you assume that when you don't play man well, you will play zone well, you are an idiot!! It is so much easier to get open shots against a zone defense than it is against man to man. Just think about the principles of each defense and you can figure this out. I heard a ton of people saying that the reason we lost to Northwestern was because we didn't play zone. If Illinois had played zone, Northwestern would have started burying 3's much sooner than 6:00 left in the game. The reason Illinois lost that game was because they scored 3 points in 10 minutes of play. Think about that!! 3 god damn points from 14:00 left in the game to 4:00 left in the game. In those 10 minutes they had 7 turnovers, and they missed 6 shots. When you have more turnovers than shots in a TEN MINUTE STRETCH then you will lose. Defense had nothing to do with it. The same can be said when Illinois played like shit to start the second half against Purdue. Sure Purdue came out and played really well, but did you really expect anything less from a veteran team like Purdue. Illinois scored 7 points in the first 9 minutes of the second half, in that time, Illinois missed 9 shots, had only 2 turnovers, and missed 3 of 6 free throws. Thats how you go from up 2 to down 9.
So whats my point? My point is that you lose games to Utah, Bradley, Georgia, Purdue, Northwestern because you get careless and don't play 40 minutes, and also because you are not mentally tough enough to fight back when things start going bad.

Myth 2) The Freshman need to play more
I love the upside that Griffey, Paul and Richardson bring to this program. That being said, only Richardson has proven that he deserves to start and play extended minutes. Brandon Paul shows flashes of being amazing, yet he still takes terrible shots, misses assignments on defense, and can't handle the ball at all. Griffey is really raw right now. Having Griffey play 10-15 minutes a game would be perfect. This is what should be expected of him if Mike Davis could be consistant and Dominique Keller could stop making stupid mistakes. If Illinois was consistantly good on defense like they have been in the past, then Weber would have the luxury of playing the Freshman more minutes because each offensive possesion would not be so crucial. Since they don't play any defense, you can't sit around and wait for the Freshman to start hitting shots.

Myth 3) Bruce Weber needs to stop bitching about his players and take the blame.
You can blame Weber all you want for not recruiting well after the Final Four season. There is no way you can argue against the fact that he did not use the momentum from that to season for recruiting. You can also make the claim the Bruce is not very good with post players, but how much blame can he take for the play on the floor? People bitch about the offense like Bruce is running some unorthodox never heard of scheme. The motion offense has been in existance well before Bruce Weber started coaching. It's not his fault that people don't screen well, and that Tisdale and Davis can't hold a post position.
What I blame Weber for right now is the fact that he has called out Demitri McCamey for 3 years trying to get him to be a better player, yet everyone else in that class has gotten a pass. I don't give a shit if Tisdale and Davis don't respond to criticism like McCamey can. They are Big Ten basketball players, if they can't handle the pressure or criticism then go play in the MAC. The theory was that if you coddle these players, then by the time they are upperclassmen, they will be consistant players. Well neither Davis or Tisdale are, and now after 3 years, Davis is finally catching some flack, and he isn't responding at all. Maybe last year was just a fluke, and Davis has peaked, or maybe Davis hasn't been pushed as hard as McCamey because of his fragile mind set, and now he isn't capable of taking his game to the next level. I alluded to this before with mental toughness. Whenever Illinois blows an early lead and are trailing in the second half, the entire team with the exception of DJ Richardson stand around and wait for Demitri to do something.

Now that I am done with telling uneducated Illini fans why they need to quit bitching about crap they obviously know nothing about, lets look forward.

In order to make the NCAA tounament, Illinois needs to finish in the top 5 in the Big Ten, and they have to steal at least one game from Michigan State or Purdue. This is their remaining schedule: @ Iowa, MSU, @ Wisconsin, OSU, @ Purdue, @ Michigan, Minnesota, @ OSU, and the end with Wisconsin at home.
Iowa, Michigan and Minnesota are must wins!!! I hate playing at Michigan because they can get hot at home, and realistically we have no one who can guard Manny Harris. If Beilein's bullshit offense actually works in that game, then we will be screwed because they will shoot us out of the gym. Minnesota at home shouldn't be too difficult, but with this team, everything is difficult. So after Iowa, I think the Illini need to go at the very least 4-4 to get in. That would mean a split with Wisco and OSU and wins against Minny and Michigan.
Right now their RPI is 80, but that is also because their strenght of schedule is 78th. That will change as soon as they play the rest of the Big Ten. Illinois has actually fallen in the RPI after wins against Penn State and Indiana. If they can win out at home, that will be wins against MSU, OSU, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, then they should be a lock. It is not impossible for this to happen. Illinois' only loss at home this season was against Purdue, and that was a very close game. MSU will probably beat us, which means we will need to steal a road win. Hang on, because the season isn't over just yet.

Durty's back!! Illinois

2010-01-27T15:19:00.003-06:00

Durty is officially back from my sebatical in India. I have waited a week to absorb everything that

Breaking Down the Illini

2009-12-23T00:44:00.002-06:00

Not many people thought that the Illini would be much better than 8-3 right now. After an atrocious football season, I'm sure most people were delusionally hopeful that the basketball team would be able to bring Illini fans some joy. While every one is disappointed with the Illini record right now, it isn't because of the loses, instead it is because of who the Illini have lost to. If Illinois was 8-3 with losses to Clemson, Vanderbilt and Oklahoma State this year, I think people would still be cautiously opptomistic about this season. Now that Illinois has lost to Utah (5-6), Bradley(5-5) and Georgia (5-4), the sky is falling and people wonder if the Illini will even make the NIT. Make no mistake, Illinois does have a very realistic chance of missing the NCAA tournament, and possibly playing in the NIT, which most people would agree would be a huge disappointment. However, this team still has a good chance of making the NCAA's, it's just that their seed will be horrible.

Like I stated before, Illinois was going to miss Chester Frazier more than anyone would have ever imagined. I know that eveyone wants to see offense. As soon as we saw that Brandon Paul and DJ Richardson could score 20 points a game with little effort, everyone forgot about Frazier and Meacham. However, if you ask any decent coach if they would rather have a great defensive team or a great offensive team, every one of them would take a defensive team. Hence the reason that I think John Beilein is a garbage coach at Michigan. The rational behind this is simple; you can have an off shooting night on any given day. On defense though, if that is what your bread and butter is, you never have off nights. It is all about position and effort on defense, where as offense is execution and touch. Ever person who has played basketball has had days where they have shot lights out, and also days where they couldn't hit shit. When was the last time you heard of a defensive team taking a game off?

If this team does not learn to want to play defense, then they will probably finish around .500 in the Big Ten and be a bubble team at best. Anybody can learn to play defense, it has nothing to do with athleticism. Trent Meacham was probably the least athletic guard Illinois has had in at least the last decade, yet he was 10 times the defender that the stable of athletic guards on Illinois are. Explain that to me.

Here are the Illini's defeciancies right now:

1) Defense - All across the board, Illinois is below average compared to what they used to be. Nobody can stop dribble penetration, and nobody fights over screens well. No one rotates well enough to help on dribble penetration. Illinois does not close out on shooters well, and the post defense is not great since we cannot guard a post player without double teaming him. Due to the fact that we can't guard the perimeter without giving up penetration, we cannot pressure the ball. This directly leads to bad post defense since any guard can enter the ball into the post without any ball pressure. These were all things that Illinois took pride in during previous seasons, and it also helped hide the weak post defense. Now Illinois is not going to turn into a great defensive team overnight, and they have shown flashes of playing good defense all year. In order for them to be a top tier Big Ten team, they are going to have to put forth more effort for longer periods of time.

2) Rebounding - Georgia exposed a glaring weakness in the Illini. Georgia crashed the boards with at least 3 players on every shot, and Illinois did not have the strength to stop them. After watching the game again, it wasn't so much that Illinois was out muscled, it was the fact that nobody boxed anyone out. Mike Davis is athletic enough to grab any rebound around him, and Tisdale is taller than everyone, so they get sloppy rebounding. Since they didn't box out, they were pushed out of the way so many times for rebounds, it was disgusting.

3) Ball Handling - Without McCamey, Illinois looks horrible on offense if a team plays any type of pressure defense. It takes so long for Illinois to get into their offense when Jeff Jordan is playing point that they might as well scrap the offense and give the ball to Paul and let him drive to the hoop. Mizzou scares the hell out of me because they play the exact same trapping defense as Clemson did. I almost want McCamey to stay on the offensive end so that he doesn't get into any foul trouble trying to play defense. None of the other 4 guards that we play look like they can dribble the ball at all.

4) Shot Selection - So far you have to be happy with DJ Richardson's 3 point shooting, and I have no problem with any of the ones that he takes. The only thing I would like to see more of is passing when the Freshman guards penetrate. Everyone on this team can shoot, so dribble penetration and kick outs should be a major part of the offense. I really would like to see Tisdale and Davis get the ball in the post more. Davis can shoot over anyone with unorthodox angles, and Tisdale has had a great hook all season long. As much as I love the Freshman, DJ is shooting 44% from the field and Paul is shooting 39%. I like all the 3's that they have taken, but they take a lot of poor shots on penetration.

5) Substitutions - Bruce Weber has been notorious for having a short bench and not getting a lot of people playing time. This season he has made a concious effort to play at least 9 people if not more. He needs to stop doing this immediately, and I am pretty sure that he will. The only reason that Alex Legion or Tyler Griffey need to play is if we are up 20, or if we have 2 guards or post players in foul trouble. I will never understand why people will scream for a player that they have never seen before to get more minutes as a Freshman. I wanted to see Legion get more minutes because he played pretty well as a Freshman for Kentucky, and last season his 3 best games came @ Purdue, @Michigan and @ Michigan State. He scored in double figures in all of those games and played well. This season he has clearly been outplayed by the Freshman and Bill Cole, so there is no reason to appease him by giving him 8 crap minutes a game. The rotation should be the starting five, and then Bill Cole and Dominique Keller for the posts, and Jeff Jordan coming in for a guard. If you need to go deeper than that for foul trouble, then you can play Legion or Griffey, but just to steal 3 minutes.

6) Screening - Nobody on this team will set a solid screen.... EVER!! Everyone is way too concerned with getting to the ball, and they don't wait for their screens, and the post players don't want to screen at times. If they were a little more patient on offense, then they would get better looks for sure!!

Now that I have dispatched with the unpleasentries, lets talk about the positives.

1) The Freshman - They have been playing much better than I ever expected. DJ Richardson has been shooting from long range better than he ever did in high school, and Brandon Paul can score from pretty much anywhere. The nice thing about the Freshman is that they have grasped the motion offense very quickly, and they also have shown improvement on defense. By their Junior year, they will be the best backcourt tandem in the Big Ten.

2) Demitri McCamey - All Illinois fans and Bruce Weber have asked of McCamey is to be consistant. Well he has played well in almost every game. He is shooting over 50% from the field, which only 2 other guards in the Big Ten Top 20 scorers are doing, and he is shooting 41% from 3. He is also second in the Big Ten in assists behind all world Evan Turner. If he could pick it up on the defensive end, he will be a lock for First Team Big Ten.

3) Bill Cole - Cole was the odd man out in the Junior class, but he has completely changed his style of play in order to get minutes. The knock on Cole was that he was a defensive liability on the floor. Well this season all he is doing is playing defense, and scraping for loose balls. He provides another spark off the bench just like Dominique Keller. It is apparent that Cole has realized that defense and rebounding, not offense will get him on the floor, something that Alex Legion hasn't grasped yet.

4) Style of Play - Illinois tries to run every chance they get, and it seems to work. Something that is completely overlooked is how well McCamey runs the secondary break. It is something that Deron Williams did extremely well, and McCamey is doing the exact same thing. He is extremely good at pushing the ball and finding open people, yet at the same time, pulling the ball out when nothing is there. Early on, he was trying to make ridiculous passes, but that was during blowout games. Everytime you see a long pass for a dunk by one of the post players, you can bet good money on the fact that the pass came from McCamey. If Illinois ran an offense where the point has the ball in his hands all of the time, then McCamey would average at least 4 more assists a game. The beauty of the motion offense is that everyone touches the ball, and with solid ball movement, you will get open shots all of the time. It doesn't need a playmaking point guard necessarily.

5) Depth - As much as I would like to see Bruce cut down his rotation, if the need becomes apparent, Bruce can bring in another 2-3 players and you they won't lose a game for you. Imagine if Joseph Bertrand was still healthy, and you had 6 guards that you could play if need be. Rich Semrau who hasn't played many meaningful minutes lately, but he has played them before in close games. Alex Legion can hit shots if need be, and during a grueling Big Ten season, you will have games where you will need some people off the bench to contribute when they haven't before.

Here are some things that have been driving me crazy this week:

1) We need bangers inside - When we went to the Final Four, we didn't have one player who was a major inside presence. Although when we did have a major presence inside (Shaun Pruitt) we had the worst year for an Illinois basketball team since Lou Henson's ball players went 13-15 in 1992. It will never cease to amaze me how dumb and delusional Illinois fans are. That is the reason why I chose to start a blog instead of get into a pissing match with moronic message board posters. Now people have decided to bitch about the fact that Tisdale and Davis aren't big post players, and why Bruce doesn't recruit those types of players. If you want Shaun Pruitt and Brian Randle back in the front court, you are a fucking idiot, and for the record, they were both higher ranked players coming out of high school than Davis and Tisdale!!

2) Bruce Weber is getting outcoached - How the shit is this happening?? Because his players are beating teams who are better than them, but losing to teams who are not as good?? So when Bruce coaches up a group of players without major talent and has them overachieve (last season and the final four season) he is an amazing coach, but when he has players who take games off he is being outcoached?? Shut the fuck up!!! People wanted Bruce gone 2 years ago because he couldn't recruit. When he started to recruit, people said that the players that he got commits from wouldn't sign. Well now he got them to sign, and now people say that he is getting out coached. I am starting to come to the conclusion that Illinois has one of the most delusional fan bases in the country. As much as I hate Indiana, I think they are better sports fans than Illinois is. I watched the entire Indiana vs. Loyola (MD) game today, and Indiana got the hell kicked out of them from the opening tip. They were down 15-0 to start the game, yet there were no fans booing! They were down 46-22 with a minute left, yet fans were cheering every made basket by Indiana.
If that were an Illinois home game, people would have started booing as soon as we were down 5-0. Bruce Weber said at the begining of last season that we had to win the fans back. Win them back from what? One bad season after we made the NCAA tournament for 7 straight years and had a national championship appearance in 2005?? Guess what, I came from Oregon to go to college at University of Illinois, and trust me, the rest of the country has no clue that Illinois even has a sports program. We are a flash in the pan every time we make it big, so get a fucking grip and realize that you are not North Carolina, Kansas, UCLA, or Kentucky in basketball. Neither are we USC, Florida, LSU, Ohio State or even Notre Dame in football. Nobody will give you credit until you win big consistantly, and Illinois has never done that!!! Be glad that you have competative teams year in and year out.

End of Decade Movie Review (2002)

2009-12-22T05:57:00.003-06:00

2002 was a pretty solid year for movies, and it also was the beginning of the end for great movies for the decade. While 2000 and 2001 had plenty of good movies to choose from, 2002 had some great movies to carry the year, but not after the top 10. It was another year that was dominated by the major movie series, with Spider Man, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and Harry Potter being the top 4 earners of the year. I hated every Spider Man movie, couldn't stay awake for all of the Lord of the Rings, but I do like Star Wars and Harry Potter. Here are the top 10 movies of 2002.

10) Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
- Chuck Barris was a damn looney tune. He claimed to be an assassin for the CIA, and really not much of the movie is really based on reality. Basically the movie is what a delusional Chuck Barris wishes his life was, even though he claims that everything is true. Sam Rockwell does a great job playing Barris, and really the movie is pretty entertaining. Basically this movie would be like me writing an autobiography saying that in my younger days, I was secretly Allen Iverson.

9) Van Wilder
- You guys can bash me all you want about having Van Wilder in my top 10, but I loved the return of a college comedy. At the time, no movies were being made that had that type of comedy. Ryan Reynolds was funny, Tara Reid was hot for the last time in her life, and it had an Indian in it. Pretty much all I need. Believe me, it was a down year for comedies. It was either this movie or Goldmember, and Goldmember was terrible. I can still watch this movie anytime it is on TV, no matter how many times I have watched it before.

8) Igby Goes Down
- Pretty sure none of you have ever watched this movie, but it was actually very good. It is a very weird story, but it is really well done. Kieran Culkin actually shows that he can act in the movie. Basically the story revolves around a rich teenager who is completely disinterested in his life and his lineage. At times the movie can be darkly funny, and also at times it can be pretty dramatic. I really enjoyed it, and Susan Sarandon as Igby's mother is fantastic. If you get the chance, check it out, everyone in the movie is a different type of crazy. Also I think that The Dandy Warhols "Bohemian Like You" has to be the record holder for times in a trailer. Either way, I love that song.

7) The Count of Monte Cristo
- I had to read the book in high school, and so when the movie came out I was actually excited to watch it, seeing as though it was the one book I read in high school that I enjoyed. It was one film that did a decent job of cutting out the needless fluff from a novel, yet still keep the integrity of it. I absolutely feel in love with the girl who played Mercedes. It really shocked me when I found out she played the tranny manager in Rock Star. The prison scenes are very good. This movie did a great job of being dramatic, but not over the top. In too many movies that are adaptations of novels, either they become too serious, or they become like Zorro and are made with mass appeal, but end up sucking.

The Count of Monte Cristo - Theatrical Trailer Movies & TV SPIKE.com

6) Minority Report
- This was the beginning of the end for Tom Cruise. Minority Report was fun to watch because the story is fantastic. Overall it was a really good movie from start to finish. Watching it over though, you see the over acting that made Tom Cruise famous. It is pretty funny to watch his movies now that I realize that he wasn't fantastic in Days of Thunder and Top Gun. I think it is safe to say that Tommy won't be up for any Best Actor Oscars in the near future. Even with him, this movie is very cool.

5) Road To Perdition
- Many of you will think that this movie is way too low on the list, and maybe it is, but for me it was too long. The story is fantastic, and the acting couldn't have been better. The only problem I had with the movie is there are too many scenes in it that don't really do anything to add to the film. There are countless scenes where there is no dialogue or any type of action. I am assuming that they didn't want the movie to be only 90 minutes, but realistically that is all the movie was. It always amazes me that Tom Hanks conquered every genre except for action hero. Seriously, he has done everything and he has done it well. He started in comedies like Dragnet, Big, and Bachelor Party. He did chick flicks like You've Got Mail, and Sleepless in Seattle, and then he moved on to dramatic roles. Hell, he was even a cartoon. He is a fantastic actor, but the only roles I don't like him in are the Dan Brown novels. I still think that there could have been someone better to play Robert Langdon.

4) Catch Me If You Can
- Loved every second of this movie. Leo, Tom Hanks, and Chris Walken are fantastic. It is really hard to imagine that most of this movie is true. Here are some amazing facts about Frank Abagnale Jr.
- forged 2.5 million worth of bad checks in five years, starting when he was 16!
- He flew over 1,000,000 miles acting as a Pan Am pilot between the ages of 16-18
- He was a Chief Resident of Pediatrics at a hospital in Georgia for almost a year
- Forged a Harvard Law degree and passes the bar in Louisiana after his 3rd try after studying for 8 weeks. He was 19.
- Escaped from police and prison custody twice.

The movie changes some of this around, but it is still amazing to watch.

3) Super Troopers
- One of my favorite comedies of all-time. From start to finish, this movie is hilarious. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I will either text friends lines from this movie, or receive lines from this movie. No matter what I am doing, or what mood I am in, it always makes me laugh. The repeater, counting how many times you can say meow, the Halloween costume, there are so many fantastic scenes that I would basically recapped the movie if I mentioned them all. The best Halloween costumes I have seen probably ever was when a group of guys in college dressed up like all of the Super Troopers. If this is not one of your favorite comedies of all-time, you need to re-evaluate you sense of humor.

2) Gangs of New York
- I think that this is probably the best movie that Leo DiCaprio has been in. Not because he was good, even though he was better than good. This movie is the best that he is in because of the cast around him and the story. The action and fight scenes in Gangs of New York was spectacular, and it really depicted a time that no one really knows about in American History. I actually even liked Cameron Diaz in this movie. I didn't love her, and realistically you could have placed anyone in the role, and all they had to do was not fall down all the time to be good. A very underrated actor out there is Daniel Day-Lewis. I'm sure a lot of you agree with me that he is fantastic, but he is never really mentioned when the Best Actors of our era are mentioned. I think that this can be attributed to the fact that all he does is work on movies. It is a common fact that he spends months if not years researching the next character that he is going to play. He then gets so involved with who he is playing, that he says that he usually needs 6 months to actually become normal again. Either way, having both of these guys in the same movie was fantastic.

1) Bourne Identity

- This movie was the best action movie of the decade, hands down! Normally a story about an assassin who lost his memory would have been pretty cliche, but the action and intrigue in this movie was amazing. Watching Jason Bourne trying to figure out who his is by figuring out he is a killing machine is really cool. You are figuring out who he is at the same time as him, and while he can't figure out who to trust, neither can you. You're not sure if he is a good guy, or actually a brutal killer gone rogue. Bourne Identity was as close to Memento as a movie can get without being crazy. Not only that, but the Bourne movies completely recreated the art of the car chase scene, and it was done by shooting most of the action from the car, and using crazy techno music. The final reason that I think this is the best action movie of the decade is the sole fact that somehow this movie made Matt Damon a badass. What part of Good Will Hunting or All the Pretty Horses made you believe that Damon was capable of pulling off this role? That was the exact mindset I had going into this film, and this movie made me change every preconceived notion I had of him. Have you ever wondered how many words that Damon actually says in this movie? I wonder that all of the time. I bet if you take all 3 of the Bourne movies and add up his dialogue, it would equal his dialogue in Good Will Hunting.

Movies that came close:
Red Dragon - This was a good movie, and it was a good follow up to Silence of the Lambs, but nothing could ever really top the original.
The Time Machine - I like how they adapted the movie from the book, but it was a little too crazy with the future being what it was. Really great premise though.

Durty's Guilty Pleasure:

The New Guy- Absolutely horrible movie, but again it has Eliza Dushku in it, so I will watch it every time it is on TV. Not only is she a cheerleader again in this movie, but there is also a scene where she is trying on about 5 different bikinis. It's awesome.

End of Decade Movie Review (2001)

2009-12-17T00:10:00.005-06:00

2001 was the year that started the snowball of big budget series rolling. The top 3 grossing movies of the year were Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Shrek. I enjoyed all three of these movies, and I have enjoyed the subsequent movies that have been made after the originals, but I feel that these movies have shifted film making away from solid scripts and good acting, and instead have pushed Hollywood into an era where they are looking to come up with the next money making saga.
I'm not sure if the reason I thought that there were so many good movies in this year can be attributed to the fact that I was in college and basically saw everything, or if in fact, they were actually really good movies. Either way, here is my list.

10) Snatch
- The follow up to Lock, Stock and 2 smoking barrels from Guy Ritche was really good. You can't understand a damn word Brad Pitt says, and it was funny. Americans found out that there are actually black people in England, and their accents are funny. Guy Ritchie's movie making style of combining multiple characters who have never met until one final ending is great, and it was funny. Total it all up and the movie is pretty damn hilarious. Tyrone the rally car driver is hands down my favorite person in the movie. The editing of the movie is really exceptional with random cut aways to explain backgrounds of people. All together it was a really good script that was well acted.

9) Training Day
- Denzel Washington playing a villain was awesome. If anyone else plays this role, this movie because a little above average, but because it was Denzel, you were mesmerized the entire movie. It would be like if you had just found out that instead of being wholesome, Tiger Woods was actually a cheating dirt-bag. Every scene that Ethan Hawke is in over his head you are gripped with suspense, like when he gave his gun to the Latino gang bangers. Also it is really difficult to base a movie on a single day, and that shouldn't be overlooked in this movie. I just wished that they had come up with a better line than "King Kong ain't got shit on me!" Such a great movie, and then you throw in such a middle school line. Seeing Eva Mendes completely naked is truly awesome, for that alone, this movie is rewatchable many times.

8) Black Hawk Down
- It seems like it would be really easy to make great movies based on wars and the military because there are so many stories that no person who has never been in combat would be shocked and moved by seeing. However, many movies that are made in this genre miss because they try to add too much to the story. Black Hawk Down is based on a book that was written about true events, and it is just gritty combat scenes. It is heart breaking and awesome at the same time. The mark of a good war movie is that when you finish watching the movie, you wish that you had half the balls of the people who actually were in that situation. There was nothing in the movie that didn't need to be there, and the combat scenes were really well done. For instance, if they had added some unrealistic scenes that showed Josh Hartnett being a total badass, then the movie would have been completely unbelievable, instead they just showed everyone being a soldier and doing what they are trained to do.

7) Zoolander
- I saw this movie for the first time in the theatre, and I absolutely hated it. It was weird, and seemed kinda stupid. Upon rewatching this movie about 400 hundred times in college, I gained a appreciation for how unbelievably dumb and hilarious this movie actually was. This was a perfect Will Ferrell role, which we wanted more of. Unfortunately in a 2 year stretch, Ferrell gave us more than we could handle, and now it has become boring. I actually witnessed a walk-off during an exam in college as a fraternity prank, and it was hilarious. In the middle of the exam, a guy pulls out a stereo, starts playing Michael Jackson and screams "It's a walk-off!!" Two guys jump out of their seats and start posing as they walk up and down the aisle. It was amazing. Makes me wish that we hazed more.

Ben Stiller should have to make at least 1 movie with his father every 2 years because Jerry Stiller is funny as shit. The cameos are perfect in this movie. If it weren't for Zoolander, then nobody would know who the shit Billy Zane is, and I'm pretty sure that Vince Vaughn never says a word as Derek's brother, yet he is fantastic. As good as all of that was, the movie is great based on the scene where Zoolander goes to Hansel's apartment. That scene was probably one of the best comedy scenes of the decade. Midgets, Spider Monkeys, bread baking, it had everything!!

6) Spy Game
- Spy Game was really good because it wasn't your typical spy movie where you have twists and turns that you try and figure out. In this movie, you are riding along with all of the twists and turns as the story is told to someone else. Movies like this make you believe that Brad Pitt is one of the Top 5 actors of our time. Has anyone ever other than Johnny Depp tried so hard not to be a sex symbol.

It is cool to see how spies actually operate, even though this movie might not be an accurate representation. I can watch this movie at anytime and still enjoy the shit out of it. The manipulation that you see in this movie makes you truly wonder if there are actually people out there that can get someone to sacrifice their life for your own motives (aside from terrorists). I'm sure this is true, and it freaks the hell out of me. On a side note, most movies don't ever live up to the trailer, but in this case, I think the trailer completely missed the mark. The movie was not about the action, it was more the intrigue. Trailer = Bad.

5) Ali
- Great movie about the greatest boxer of all-time. This movie accomplished one huge feat. It showed people who never watched the Jamie Foxx show that Foxx could act. Just kidding, the Jamie Foxx show was horrible, but Jamie is a great actor. As much as I don't like Will Smith, he did an amazing job not only playing Ali the fighter, but Ali the man. He truly lived an amazing life and this movie does an excellent job explaining everything. Like I said about The Legend of Bagger Vance, I think that they might have found somebody who could play this role better. I feel that because Denzel is getting older, Will Smith is the go to for a younger black actor, and that is a shame because there are much better actors out there. Not a whole lot to say about this movie, you can look up Ali and figure out the rest, or just watch this movie. On a side note, you should definately watch the ESPN 30 for 30 episode with Ali, it was fantastic.

4) Blow
- I love this movie!! I think this is Johnny Depp's best role. Somehow he makes one of the largest drug dealers in the history of the United States seem like a victim. Watching the rise and fall of George Jung is entertaining and frustrating at the same time. Every woman in this guy's life screws him over one way or another, except for the one that dies with Cancer. I'm sure the movie took some liberties as far as George's life actually goes, but it is fantastic from start to finish.

Before this movie, I'm pretty sure nobody our age could tell you who sang "Black Betty", but after this movie, every where you went, you heard it. Listening to Depp do the voice overs really adds to the movie, and the music in the movie is fantastic. Ted Demme made 3 of my favorite movies of all-time in Blow, Beautiful Girls, and The Ref, but sadly he died during a pick-up basketball game a few years after Blow. The irony of his death was that he had cocaine in his system when he died. Only a genius though could have a movie that had Pee-Wee Herman and Bobcat Goldthwait in it and not have the movie completely suck. I will never understand how people thought either of them were funny. This movie also introduced me to Jamie King who I have had a huge crush on ever since (Watch Sin City again). 5 things I learned from this movie.

1) Never make promises to your kid that you can't keep.
2) Never marry a Colombian girl, especially if she was already engaged to a Colombian drug dealer.
3) Don't ever tell your friends who your dealing connections are.
4) Don't sell drugs.
5) All male hairdressers are gay.

3) The Royal Tenenbaums
- A great follow-up to Bottle Rocket and Rushmore by Wes Anderson. The Royal Tenenbaums was the first comedy that I watched that was based solely on dialogue and story that I truly appreciated. Sure Best In Show was like this, but that had a ridiculous premise. This movie was bases solely on a disfunctional family that really had nothing overly entertaining about them. I love Wes Anderson because nothing about his movies would be funny in real life. He creates a completely unorthodox situation and the acting makes it funny. It is the opposite of slapstick. For instance when he shoots his son with the bb gun. In a normal comedy that would be funny based on it being an unusual situation and it would be physical comedy, but they make it a recurring joke based on the dialogue. Also Margo being adopted. This isn't funny except for the fact that Royal always refers to her as "My adopted daughter Margo Tenenbaum." With Wes Anderson it is funny because of how Gene Hackman interacts with each other person after the fact. Best line of the movie is " Hell of a damn grave......wish it was mine" No one in the history of movies could make looking at at a headstone funny except for Wes Anderson.
The severe lack of emotion from everyone, and then subsequent show of emotion from everyone is amazing. My favorite character is obviously Royal, that is besides Bagoda. I'll let you in on a little secret; Indian people love any other Indian that is in an American film. We will watch anything that has an Indian. I'm sure it is hard for most people to understand, except Yerk. I'm sure Yerk watches anything that has a Cuban in it who isn't portraying Fidel Castro.

2) A Beautiful Mind
- Movies that deal with different types of emotional or metal problems always make me uncomfortable. After I watch them, I always feel like I should be much more appreciative of the fact that I am not stricken with such as ailment. My worst problems are that I am obsessed with Illinois sports, and I might drink too much. At least I don't hallucinate. Anyways, A Beautiful Mind was extremely well done, and it is a very good story. A lot has been made of how the movie wasn't very accurate, but movies aren't supposed to be the exact same as real life. If they were, then people would have to pay to watch the news. Either way, the biggest inaccuracy was probably that no woman as hot as Jennifer Connelly would fall in love with such a dork. It's not like John Nash was a billionaire.
Russel Crowe was really good in this movie, and the movie did a fantastic job of not letting you know what was real and what was just a delusion of John Nash's mind. It was kinda like The Sixth Sense, but without the dead people and better acting. Actually I would really like to watch this movie again soon.

1) Memento
- I have to say, this is the coolest movie of the decade, and quite possibly the best movie I have ever seen. I can't even begin to fathom how someone could even come up with an idea like this. Whenever you ask someone what there Top 5 favorite movies of All-Time are, they never think of this movie. I never do, but I really think this is the most creative, clever movie I have ever seen. The fact that Christopher Nolan not only wrote and directed this, but also did Batman Begins and Dark Knight makes you believe that he is the best writer out there right now. The only problem with this movie is that you can't really watch it multiple time. I haven't seen this movies for at least 5 years, and as I am writing this, I am really dying to watch it again. Since I haven't watched it for such a long time, and really only watched it a couple times, I can't really write that much about it. All I know is that when I first saw this movie, I never thought that I would watch another movie that was so clever and well done. To date, I still really haven't.
You know how everyone has a couple things that they can't wait to expose their kids to when they have kids? Well this is one of them for me. Here are some others.
1) First Cubs game
2) Teaching them to throw a football, and then coverages and hot reads.
3) The history of Illinois sports, and why we hate Indiana, Duke, Bruce Pearl and Digger Phelps
4) How to make the perfect snowball
5) How to play craps
6) Teaching them everything there is to know about Michael Jordan
7) Watching Godfather 1 and 2, and then telling that Godfather 3 will just let them down.

Some things that mom is going to teach them about
1) How to use the toilet
2) Sex
3) How to study properly, because lord knows I have no clue

Now on to the near misses:

Oceans 11
- This could have been in the top 10, but it was a remake. I really did like the movie a lot though, and then the next 2 were terrible.

Vanilla Sky
- This movie was very strange, and had a really good concept, but it was over the top. It took crazy too far, but I really like the story a lot. I guess this was when people started realizing that Tom Cruise was an over-actor. When you do a movie that revolves around a person losing their mind, you don't need to over do it. People that act as crazy as Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz acted in this movie don't end up in an asylum, they end up begging for change on an on ramp of the Dan Ryan.

I Am Sam
- This was such a sad, depressing movie for pretty much the entire thing that I never wanted to watch it again. I saw this for the first time with my sister who is: 1) A Special Education teacher 2) A crier and 3) A movie talker. So needless to say, she was a god damn mess through out the entire movie. Between her sobbing uncontrollably, and her screaming at the TV while uncontrollably sobbing, I could barely watch the damn movie. It was extremely good, and Sean Penn was amazing. No matter how old Michelle Pfeiffer gets, she will still be in my all-time Top 5, so I will always like movies that she is in. As great as the acting was, I just couldn't put it in my top 10 of the year.

Guilty Pleasure Movie of 2001

Out Cold
- One of my favorite comedies of all-time. Since I was a little kid, I always loved ski movies, and this was the 2000's attempt at an old B movie set on the ski slopes. The only way that this movie fell short from the originals from the 80's was that there was no nudity, but besides that, this movie is hilarious. Most people now know about Zach Galifianakis because of The Hangover, but before that he was being hilarious in Out Cold. The pranks that him and his brother play on each other are great. This movie is nothing more than 90 minutes of entertainment, so don't bitch at me if its not funny enough for you. This is my guilty pleasure, not yours.

Coming up tommorow is 2002.

End of Decade Movie Review (2000)

2009-12-15T06:24:00.003-06:00

My 2 favorite things that are appropriate to discuss in such a public forum are sports and movies. I have discussed movies on here plenty of times, and so now do to the fact that the decade is coming to an end, I will pick out my favorite movies from each year of the 2000's. I will also throw in a couple of movies that could have been great, but missed somehow, and finally my guilty pleasure movie of the year. I will do this every day until Christmas, and then I will put together my top 10 of the decade. So here we go:

The Top 10

10) Requiem for a Dream
- Probably one of the weirdest movies of the decade. Extremely cool view of different people with vastly different drug addictions. This movie should have opened people's eyes to prescription drug abuse, except nobody watched it. The movie is completely worth it if you haven't watched it before. Jennifer Connelly makes this a must watch, TRUST ME!! Darren Aronofsky wrote and directed it, and after watching this you will never want to be alone in a room with him. If you really want to be freaked out by a movie he wrote and directed, watch Pi. If you really want to enjoy another movie he directed, watch The Wrestler.

9) American Psycho
- Another crazy movie. American Psycho was a movie based on the novel by Brett Easton Ellis and was extremely well done. The movie combined gruesome death scenes with dialogue and acting that made you spend every minute of the movie wondering what the shit was going on. When you watch this movie now, you have no idea how the hell Christian Bale became Batman. You also wonder how it took 7 years for Christian Bale to become a major actor, because he was phenomenal in this film. There are a lot of sex scenes in this movie, but they all make you feel really uncomfortable. My favorite parts of this movie revolve around the business cards, and also the musical references during the murder scenes. An interesting thing to consider; Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, Ed Norton and Leo DiCaprio were all rumored to play the lead role in the movie. Had any of them played Patrick Bateman, would the film have been better or worse?

Trailer is not safe for work

8) The Beach
- To be honest, I hadn't actually seen this movie all of the way through until 3 years ago. When I actually did watch it, I enjoyed everything about it. What is most appealing about this movie is that fact that I think everyone has fantasized about going off and living on an island somewhere, where the trappings of everyday normal life are completely lost on everyone. All and all it was a very cool movie, and it was pretty much the movie that helped launch Leo DiCaprio to the level he is at right now. Sure he was good in Titanic, but realistically, anyone could have been in that movie, and it still would have made a billion dollars. In The Beach, you actually saw DiCaprio carry a movie with his acting talent. It wasn't the story that carried the movie, it was the acting. What is great about this movie is that for an hour it seems to be a cool, feel good movie about a guy trying to find himself on a hidden island. All of the sudden, it takes some crazy turns that make the movie really enjoyable.

7) Traffic
- A really good movie that looked at basically every aspect of drug trafficking. The movie encapsulated smuggling, using, the DEA and fighting drug use by kids. The only problem I had with the film was that it was so damn long. The movie basically introduced free-basing to the masses, and the fact that rich kids use drugs just as much as poor kids. This was a really good movie to watch once, but I could really never watch it again. The movie did a great job of showing the aspects of drug movies that normally get overlooked. Every other drug movie revolves around cops and drug dealers on the streets. This movie takes a much larger view of it. Instead of just dealers and cops, they throw in the government, moles, witnesses and the families of everyone. Basically every aspect of drugs is explored and it is very well done, it just could have been 20 minutes shorter.

6) Me, Myself, and Irene
-I normally don't like movies that star Jim Carrey, but god damn this movie was funny. The 3 sons are hilarious when they are making fun of each other. The Albino kid killed me, and Renee Zellweger was actually enjoyable in this movie. Why did Renee not change her last name? Everyone in Hollywood does it. I'm pretty sure that Vin Diesel was not the name that Vinny had on his birth certificate. Anyway, this movie has rewatchability, and it doesn't really get old. I could go on and on about different scenes that I love, but then I would be reciting the whole movie. This was a movie that was made for Jim Carrey because of all of the physical comedy that was involved. On a side note, I think that Will Ferrell has become the new Jim Carrey. Both of them started out on sketch comedy shows, both of them were extremely funny when they came out, they both tried to branch out into more serious roles but only Carrey pulled it out. Ferrell has become a one trick pony, and he is about 2 more flops away from taking a hiatous and then re-inventing himself after a couple of years.

As funny as the trailer is, the biggest laugh I got was that gas was $1.13 when this was shot.

5) Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
-This movie was unbelievably innovative. The fact that everyone could pretty much fly in this movie was phenomenal. The story was really good, but this is a great example of how creative camera work can make a movie amazing. This movie used what The Matrix did, and took it to another level. The fight scenes were artistic which really had never happened before. If anything, this movie ruined the Martial Arts genre because after this, in order to be cool, you had to do something amazing. Regular fight scenes using Karate became pretty average and boring after this film. If you get the chance, watch this movie again because everything about it was fantastic. 2 other reasons that this movie is in the top 5 is because Ang Lee who directed went to Illinois, and Zhang Ziyi is the hottest Asian woman I have ever seen!!

4) Best In Show
- Hilarious from start to finish, and it was such unconventional comedy. Nothing about the premise of this movie should have been funny, yet the dialogue and acting was so phenomenal that this has to be one of the most underrated comedies of our time. Everybody in this film was amazing, but Fred Willard stole this movie. "How much do you think I can bench press?" is one of the greatest lines in a comedy from the 2000's. Everything he said had to have been ad-libed because there is no way that could have been scripted and delivered that well. What I loved about this movie was that there were so many different story lines, but they all flowed well together. Almost every movie that tries to accomplish this many story lines fails miserably, but Best In Show pulled it off so well. If you are ever bored, just throw on the last 30 minutes of this movie and watch the amazingness that is Fred Willard, or just watch the trailer 15 times. Everything Willard says is priceless! I tried to think of which couple in the movie was my favorite, but that is like trying to decide which beer I would most like to drink...... it all depends on the mood I'm in.

3) High Fidelity
- I almost put High Fidelity at #1 because I have watched this movie probably 1000 times. I love that it takes place in Chicago. The music is fantastic. John Cusack was made for this role, and this was the best movie that Jack Black ever made. To be honest, I thought that this was one of the first acting roles that Black had. I knew that Tenacious D was in Bio-Dome, and I remember him in Enemy of the State, but I had no clue that he started acting in 1991. The only reason that I didn't put it higher was because I hated the girl who played Laura! It's not because she isn't the most attractive woman on the planet, because I thought that the movie was much more believable with a more average looking person playing the love interest. I just didn't think that she was that likable, and so I really didn't want Cusack to get back together with her. I know that the movie revolved around music, but they incorporated the music so well in this film. The music didn't overtake the story which happens a lot when movies have music as the main premise. Another reason that I love this movie is that the dialogue is so clever. Lately when you watch a movie, you only have about 10 seconds of dialogue before there is some sort of action. High Fidelity was basically dialogue and music and both were perfectly done. There isn't a boring moment in this film which is a danger when a movie is dialogue driven.
3 Things came from this movie:

1) "A Cosby Sweater" this line has been used for 9 years now

2) People fell in love with The Beta Band, and started hating Peter Frampton

3) Every guy thought it would be a good idea to track down their ex-girlfriends to find out why they got dumped

High Fidelity (UK Trailer)
by NakedBrotha2007

2) Gladiator
- Not a whole lot to say about Gladiator. It was a great movie from start to finish. The story was amazing, the fight scenes were awesome, and the villain was perfect. The only reason that this is not #1 is because this movie was made using the template already laid down by Braveheart. The movies are basically exactly the same except that they take place in different era's. Either way, the movie was really well done, and it deserves all the credit that it recieved. However, there are 2 things that bothered me about this film.

1) Even though Russell Crowe's character's name was Maximus, I couldn't help but think of Optimus Prime every time I heard his name spoken.

2) The CGI Tigers during the fight scenes were terrible. You can see it during the trailer. Every time I watch the movie, I hate watching that part.

1) Almost Famous

- The only movie that was made during 2000 that was perfect from start to finish. The music was amazing, every actor was perfectly cast, it was dramatic and funny at the same time. When I pictured what it would have been like to be in a rock band during that era, what happened in this movie is exactly how I picture it. 5 Best parts of the movie:

5) When the manager shows the band the shirts that were made

4) Any scene that involves Phillip Seymour Hoffman who by the way has to be one of the top 5 most underrated actors of our generation

3) Anytime Frances McDormand is on the phone, but especially when she is berating Russell Hammond

2) The airplane scene when they all think they are about to die

1) The party when Russell screams "I'm on drugs!!!" another all-time classic line.

The beauty of this movie as is the case in any all-time great movie is that each person has a completely different 5 best parts. Nobody had any clue who Kate Hudson was before this movie, but all it took was this phenomenal performance, and she became a star. If it weren't for her role in Almost Famous, Matthew McConaughey wouldn't have anyone to make shitty shirtless chick flicks with.

Movies that just missed:

Remember the Titans - I love this movie, but because it was a Disney Movie, it was cheesy as hell. I could have done without the dancing onto the field and also to Hero's girl being a complete psychotic in the stands. Petey being a total bitch was also a real big turnoff, everyone who played football got screamed at by their coach, nobody ever walked off the field in the middle of the game.

Road Trip - As a college student at the time, I loved this movie. However watching it now, it really wasn't over the top funny. Seeing Amy Smart naked was a huge plus, but it wasn't classically funny.

Proof of Life - A really good movie, but was missing something. I think it got a little dull while they were trying to find where the husband was and how to get him out. It was still entertaining, but Man on Fire did this premise much better. Russell Crowe should have been a much bigger badass, and they should have delved into why he was such a recluse more.

Legend of Bagger Vance - I love golf movies, but I hated Will Smith in this movie. Had Bagger Vance been played by an older person, then this movie would have been great. I had this argument with my buddy Josh this weekend and said that if Bagger had been played by Morgan Freeman, this movie would have been amazing. He countered by saying that pretty much every role is better when it is played by Freeman. Also, you are told that Junuh is depressed because everyone else in his battalion died in the war, but they didn't delve into it enough. It is hard to really want someone to succeed in movies when you don't completely know why they fail in the first place.

And now for my guilty pleasure movie of 2000:

Bring It On!!

- That's right I said it!! Bring It On is my guilty pleasure movie of 2000. Eliza Dushku is one of my Top 5 favorite actresses of this decade. I could care less that she isn't that good of an actress, I can't take my eyes off of her when she is on TV. Toss in the fact that you have a bunch of hot chicks in cheerleading outfits and bikinis the entire movie, and I am sold. As much as I would like you to believe that I have a sophisticated appreciation of movies (I do by the way), at the end of the day, I could just as well watch a terrible movie as long as hot chicks are wearing skimpy clothing.

This is pretty awesome

2009-12-14T05:43:00.002-06:00

I know I have a lot of time on my hands, but these guys take it to a completely different level.

I thought I had posted this before, but it looks like I forgot to.

When did Bubba Sparxx go to Iowa?

2009-12-11T10:53:00.004-06:00

This little gem was on Deadspin this morning, and oh baby is this the new hottness!!! We can only hope that Iowa's marching band plays this at halftime of their shitkicking of a bowl game.

Here is my critique.

1) When was the last time somebody used "Patna" in a rap? Maybe this was in homage to Musberger saying "Pardner" all the time?

2) "We get the job done, no need to be fancy" If by job you mean taking the fries out of the deep fryer when the timer starts beeping at McDonald's, then yes you have been getting the job done.

3) I actually paused it when he was fanning out his money, and it looks to be about 500 bucks, so it looks like autotitleloan.com just got a great 1987 Chevy Beretta if you are in the market.

4) It must have been cheaper to film this in Detroit than in Iowa City, kinda like how movies that take place in New York City are actually shot in Montreal.

5) "Head Coach on my block like I'm Kirk Ferentz" I can't mock that line, it was pure genius.

6) "Who said the only thing we got up in this state is corn!" According to this video, you have much more, such as terrible weather, broken down houses, and terrible cameramen who can't keep the floodlight and extension cords out of the shots.

7) I can't even begin to fathom who terrible the pit stains are on that White Tee he is banging.

8) I bet he graduated with a Marketing degree from Iowa.

9) At least there is no traffic in Iowa City

10) The guy points to the ground at least 10 times before the camera man gets it that he wants him to show all the money on the ground. In all seriousness though, do you know how much Meth you can buy with that love?

His name is NOTTI BOY!!! Seriously who are this assholes friends that let him do this and let him call himself that??

Big Ten Breakdown

2009-12-11T06:30:00.003-06:00

Now that we are about 1/4 of the way through the college basketball season, it is time to start breaking down Big Ten teams. I refrained from doing this before because their were too many variables to take into consideration. However, now that each team has played not only cupcakes, but also a few difficult games, it is much easier to tell how the Big Ten season will pan out. We will break down every team, except for Indiana because they are garbage, and I will also give you all of the players to watch for. Starting at the top:

1) Purdue

Easily the most balanced team in the Big Ten. Purdue has everything you want in a team. Starting with offense, they have a great scoring guard in E'Twaun Moore. Moore is capable of hitting 3's on the outside, and also penetrating and finishing at the hoop. He is listed at 6-4 which means his is 6-3 on a great day. If he were 2 inches taller he would be a lock for the NBA. Inside you have JaJuan Johnson, who can be an absolute beast when he wants to be, and then you have Robbie Hummel who can play both inside and out. The only thing that is keeping them from being one of the best offensive teams in the nation is the fact that Lewis Jackson is out all year, so they are lacking a true PG who can penetrate when he wants to.
On defense, not only do you have to put up with Chris Kramer constantly mugging you, but you also have to contend with his mom screaming at the top of her lungs only a few rows from the court. All and all Kramer and his mother are the toughest defensive duo to contend with in the Big Ten. Add to all of this a perfect Senior glue guy in Keaton Grant and a solid Freshman class that doesn't need to do anything outstanding for Purdue to win, and you have the best team in the Big Ten. Purdue is a very productive team that guards extremely well, and doesn't make too many mistakes.

2) Michigan State

Even though MSU has 2 losses already, they probably have the most talent at every position in the Big Ten. Don't let the early season losses to UNC and Florida fool you, this is the road map that Tom Izzo has used for over 14 years in East Lansing. He has 5 Final Fours, 1 runner-up and 1 National Championship. In all but one of those seasons, Michigan State lost at least 2 non-Big Ten games.

Last season they lost to Maryland and North Carolina to start the season 4-2.
2004 they lost to Duke and George Washington to start 3-2.
2000 they went undefeated in the non-conference
1999 they lost to Texas and Arizona to start 7-2
1998 they lost to Temple, Duke and UCONN to start 4-3

Izzo plays a brutal non-conference schedule early to break his team down, but the difference between Izzo and other coaches is that he knows how to get his team to learn from their losses. Look for MSU to roll through the rest of their non-conference and then be the toughest team during the Big Ten season, especially at home. Michigan State has a great group of veterans now with Raymar Morgan leading the way as a Senior. The real talent lies with the Junior class though. Kalin Lucas is the best point guard in the Big Ten, and with Chris Allen and Durrell Summers they have the best backcourt in not only the Big Ten, but maybe the nation. If Delvon Roe and Draymond Green play up to their potential in the front court, then MSU will be back in the Final Four.

3) Illinois

I had Ohio State here before Evan Turner broke his back, but now, Illinois gets the nod. Since I wax poetic about Illinois everyday on here, I will keep this short. Illinois has 6 juniors that have played decent minutes for him in the past, and the Freshman guards are playing out of their minds. If they learn how to play defense (which they will) they will be a really good team.

4) Wisconsin

The loss to Green Bay the other night was bad, but that was because of bad scheduling. Whenever you play an in state team on the road and you are the biggest program in that state, you are asking for trouble. That game was Green Bay's national championship. Beyond that, you should never be surprised that Bo Ryan has a good team when he doesn't have as much talent as other teams. Wisconsin always plays phenomenal defense and they have an enormous inside presence. To go along with Jon Leuer and Keaton Nankivil on the inside, you have 3 solid guards on the outside with Hughes, Bohannon, and Taylor. Travon Hughes has the talent to be a First Team All Big-Ten selection. He can not only shoot the ball, but he can handle it also when he needs to. The only problem with Wisconsin this season will be depth, beyond the starting 5 and really the first 7, you have absolutely nobody who has shown that they are dependable.

Wisconsin showed in the Duke game that they can not only force teams to play the way they want to, but with the 3 guards, they can also play up-tempo if need be. On top of that, the Kohl center is probably the hardest place to play in the Big Ten, which is probably a bigger factor than anything in Bo Ryan winning over 20 games a year every damn year. The 3 reasons that I think Wisconsin will finish 4th are:

1) The Kohl center: Last season they only lost 2 Big Ten games at home, which was abnormally high.
2) Travon Hughes and Jason Bohannon: If either of these guys get hot, you can pretty much forget about winning, they both can shoot lights out.
3) Tempo: Last season Wisco only gave up more than 70 points twice during Big Ten play. They will keep every game close.

5) Ohio State

Even with Evan Turner out for at least 2 months, Ohio State is still really talented. Basically now everyone else needs to pick up the slack, but Ohio State can do that. With Evan Turner, OSU is a top 3 team, but without, they still have the talent to be a top 5 team. Here is what needs to happen for the Buckeyes to stay competitive.

1) They need to run an offense: Evan Turner was a rare talent that allowed everyone else to sit around and watch. More importantly, in close games, OSU could just run pick and roll at the top of the key with Turner and anybody. Now that he is out, OSU will need to run a solid offense that gets shots for Buford and Diebler, and also get the ball inside to Lauderdale.

2) They need to live up to their hype: Diebler scored more points than anyone in Ohio high school history, and that includes LeBron James. Bufford was considered a one and done player coming in to college. Somehow Thad Matta of all people has recruited some of the best players in high school to come to OSU, it is about time he did something with them.

3) They need to play some defense: OSU never plays defense, it is a known fact. They have no real home court advantage to speak of, and they are one of the only Big Ten teams that play zone almost exclusively. If they want to weather the storm that they will face early on in the Big Ten, it will have to happen on defense first.

OSU probably will not finish 5th because they will get killed early on in the Big Ten without Turner. 4 of their first 5 Big Ten games are on the road. But if they can somehow come out of that with a 3-2 record, they will be fine by the end of the season.

6) Minnesota

Minnesota is scary deep, but that might not be the best thing. 9 players average over 5 points a game, but only 2 average more than 10. If the fighting Tubby's can be cut down to a solid 8 man rotation, then I think they can be extremely good, however I think based on their depth, nobody has really progressed from last season. Pretty much everyone else on the top of the Big Ten has 3 go to players, but Minnesota really only has one in Lawrence Westbrook. Al Nolen has been doing a decent job at distributing with almost 5 assists a game, but beyond that, nothing stands out at you. This season, Minnesota should have had one of the better front courts in the country. Sampson, Iverson, Johnson and Carter all played a ton of minutes last season, and at least 2 of them should have gotten better, but so far it seems like they digressed. They also added another forward in Rodney Williams who has been starting, yet they still are bad up front.

In their 3 losses, here are the shooting stats of their 5 post players.

Portland: 9-24
Texas A&M: 15-33
Miami: 8-22

In those games, the team only shot above 40% once. There is no way you can win games when your team revolves around your post players, and they are shooting well below 50%. In their best game of the season against #10 Butler, the post players shot 14-22. I am placing Minnesota here because I think Tubby can get this figured out, but if they continue to play like they have been, then Minny is NIT bound.

7) Northwestern

I think this might be the year. The geeks have only lost to #20 Butler and have beaten NC State. They should finish out the non-conference schedule without another loss, as long as they get by Stanford. Bill Carmody actually has athletes on this team. By athletes, I mean by Northwestern standards (these guys didn't play basketball so they had extra-curricular activities on their Ivy league transcripts). I will always contend that Carmody plays a gimmick offense, but it works for the Big Ten because when you don't have the talent to compete playing real basketball, you have to be tricky. The beauty of playing a 4 corners, back cutting Princeton offense is that people only see it once. Everyone else in basketball runs a form of motion, or high-low, so defenses are used to seeing it, but when you only have 3 days to prepare for Carmody's offense, you are bound to give up points. The problem that Northwestern will run into during the Big Ten season is that pretty much every team except for the shitty ones are lead by Juniors, so they have all seen Northwestern's gimmicks before.
As always, depth will end up plaguing this team. They really only go 7 deep, and that won't last during a brutal Big Ten season. It also hurts that pretty much every home game they have ends up being a neutral court game because Northwestern has the worst sports fans in college. This season really hinges on whether or not John Shurna and Michael (Fake Juice) Thompson can continue to get better. I really doubt that they can keep up their play, hence the reason they are not higher. If they had Kevin Coble and Jeremy Nash, then they would absolutely be in the the Top 5-6 of the Big Ten. On the bright side for Northwestern, they aren't the pushover that they used to be in the Big Ten.

8) Michigan

I know a lot of you will think that this is way too low for Michigan, but I am sorry, they are garbage!!! I have argued for 2 years now that John Beilein is a terrible coach, and his offense is bullshit. Last year he proved me right and this year he is doing an even better job. Guess what? On any other team in the Big Ten, Manny Harris and Deshawn Simms could be first round draft picks. What does Evan Turner have that Manny Harris doesn't? What does JuJaun Johnson have that Deshawn Simms doesn't?? The answer is an offense that tries to exploit their talents!!!! I will never understand why Michigan doesn't ever run a pick and roll with these 2? You want proof as to why I think John Beilein's offense is fucking terrible? Look at the 4 losses:

Marquette:
25-55 from the field
3-20 from 3

Alabama:
22-57 from the field
6-25 from 3

Boston College:
21-65 from the field
9-34 from 3

Utah:
17-50
7-22 from 3

In the 4 losses, that is a collective 25-101 from 3 point range!!!! Are you fucking kidding me?? On the season Michigan is shooting 29% from 3, yet they have been allowed to shoot over 205 of them in only 8 games. Imagine what is going to happen when they actually play teams that defend well. You want an even larger indictment on why John Beilien is a terrible coach? Look at DeShawn Simms' numbers in those losses:

Marquette: 3-10 FGs - 0-2 3's
Alabama: 6-14 FGs - 1-4 3's
Boston College: 2-7 FGs - 0-2 3's
Utah: 4-12 FGs - 2-7 3's

Why is a 6-8 235 Ilbs. beast shooting so many 3's? If you are a post player who averages 30% from 3 for your career, you should never shoot them! Yet Beilein lets him shoot 7 in a game? Are you kidding me? If your gameplan revolves around your blind hope that one of the best interior athletes in the Big Ten gets hot from 3 point range, you need to not only be fired, you should not be allowed to coach basketball on any level ever!!!!

The reason that Michigan started the season out ranked in the top 15 was because of the talent, and the reason that they are 4-4 right now is because of the god damn coach. The beauty of Beilein is that he will win games that he has no business winning because his offense has you shooting 300 3's a game, so if you get hot, no team can keep up. You might win 2 games like this, but the problem that you have is that the other 30 games you play, you will shoot average if not worse and lose. Anybody has a shot at beating Michigan based on their offense, hence the reason that they lost to Marquette, Alabama, Boston College and Utah. None of those teams will make the NCAA tournament, and unless Michigan goes 14-4 in the Big Ten, neither will they.

Michigan also has to play Kansas and UConn. I promise you that at least one of these game will be close, but for the love of god don't bet them because Michigan can have a fluke shooting night and cover the spread. Either way, Michigan will finish their non-conference with a 6-6 record, Manny Harris and DeShawn Simms will be gone next year, and Michigan will be fighting Iowa for the worst Big Ten basketball team.

9) Penn State

Penn State begins with Talor Battle. Unfortunately, it also ends with Talor Battle. I promise you that Talor Battle will lead the Big Ten in scoring this year, not because he is the best player, but because every team will let him get his as long as nobody else on the team does anything. Here is the rundown on Penn State:

1) Battle averages 17 points a game, nobody else averages over 10: Battle is the only offensive weapon, however he is shooting less than 40% on the year. He is trying to do everything by himself, which doesn't bode well for him when he gets into a defensive minded conference schedule.

2) They haven't played anybody: So far their best win is at a 4-4 Virginia team. They also have losses to UNC Willmington, Tulane and Temple. The Temple loss probably won't be as bad as it looks now, but their non-conference schedule was by far the easiest of the Big Ten teams and they did not do well.

3) They have no post players: Their 2 main post players are David Jackson and Andrew Jones, and between them, they average 14 points and 10 rebounds a game.

The last 2 seasons, Penn State had a very large inside presence, but that is lacking this season, so teams will play much tighter on the outside, and Talor Battle will see a lot more attention than he has seen in his first 2 years. He will get his points because he will shoot, but post players will have no problem leaving their man to help because their is no major threat to score by their man.

10) Indiana

They are terrible, and people can talk all they want about how young they are, and Creen is recruiting well, but so is MSU, OSU, Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisco is always good, so I don't see them doing anything for a long time. Sure they beat Pitt, but Pitt is not a very good team. They haven't beat anyone, and they will get crushed in the Big East this season. Indiana will lose by 25-30 against Kentucky tomorrow, and I will watch every second of it!! Indiana will not finish above .500 this season and not make the post season for the second straight year. I hope Eric Gordon and your first round flame out was worth it you pretentious pieces of shit!!!!

11) Iowa

They only thing that Iowa has going for them is that they won't be as bad as last seasons Indiana team..... maybe. I really doubt that Iowa wins a Big Ten game this season, although they have a couple of players that could put together 40 good minutes one time this season. If you can, never watch them play because they are just awful.

Durty Thoughts

2009-12-09T04:49:00.004-06:00

It isn't weekly like I thought it would be, but here we go again.

- I don't want to hear anymore about Tiger Woods. I don't think I can take it. I was almost sick to my stomach yesterday morning when the reports came out that someone was taken out of his house in an ambulance. These stories are reserved for the likes of Lindsey Lohan, not Tiger. It is sad to see someone who you respect have their life unravel before your very eyes. 2 Things are interesting about this. First does Michael Jordan's career and image turn out the same if he played during an era where the Internet is so prevalent? And second, will there ever be any accountability for a lot of these websites? 90% of the rumors you read on the Internet aren't true, yet does it matter when it seems that no one can be sued for liable? Radar Online reported that Tiger's wife had moved out, another website claimed that Tiger was paying everyone over 7 figures to keep them quiet, and now Tiger has sex with 2 porn stars? And I also don't believe the whole Ambien story. I took an Ambien once to try and win a bet. The bet was to see who could stand the longest, and then who could stay awake the longest. I couldn't stand up after 3 minutes, and I feel asleep in 7. The winners stats were 4 minutes and 9 minutes, but he fell asleep in the closet. You could do an 8-ball and have Megan Fox naked in your bed and an Ambien will still win.

Either way, I didn't like Tiger because I thought he was a great man, I loved Tiger because when he is playing in a Major, I am glued to the TV for 4 days waiting to see a ridiculous charge to destroy the field. It will be interesting to see how this effects his golf game. Also people who think his career is over need to remember Mike Vick and Kobe Bryant. Almost every athlete cheats on his wife. It is horrible to say, but it is pretty much true. Not every athlete has been charged with rape or went to prison for having a dog fighting ring in his backyard.

- I spent 5 minutes trying to figure out whether to use "who" or "whom" in the above paragraph, and I still don't think I did it right. Shouldn't words like this just be removed from the language?
There are only 7 people on the planet now who/whom know how to use this correctly.

- Just watched the new Scrubs. I gotta admit I like not having Carla or Elliot on the show, but I'm not sold on the whole med school story arc. ABC was really smart because they kept the name, but basically gave 3 of the best 5 characters a spin-off. If Dr. Kelso and the Janitor were on the show it would be perfect. Also how pissed is ABC that they cut out the Indian guy last year, and now he is the best part of Parks and Recreation. Here is Aziz on Letterman:

- As some of you know, train etiquette is one of my biggest pet peeves. I have finally found something that I find hilarious when I ride the train, and I'm sure some of you do this. I was standing next to a guy who was listening to his Ipod too loud. The funny part was that he was nodding his head to Kelly Clarkson's "Since you've been gone". It is awesome because people feel that when they have headphones on, they have some privacy. Nope, if you are not careful, everyone within a 5 foot radius of you will find out that you have the same music interest as a 24 year old single white girl.

- The new greatest show on TV is Jersey Shore on MTV. It is amazing!! Take every crazy Real World character, give them a terrible haircut, a Puerto Rican tan, and add 20-50 pounds and you have these nut jobs! Every week I can pretty much promise you that you will see somebody get punched in the face, some slutty girl getting naked in a hot tub, and at least one memorable quote. If you have time to waste on a Sunday afternoon, I suggest that you Tivo this show so you can watch it, you will not be disappointed. Watch it and tell me that "The Situation" will not go down in history as one of the Top 5 reality TV stars, and also one of the Top 5 nicknames in history. No one goes by their real name, its like watching an And 1 mixtape, but they replaced the basketball with competitive drinking and douchebagery. I want to come up with a scoring system for these shows. The stats could be blackouts, times getting punched, times getting slapped, Attempts at cheating on your girlfriend/boyfriend who is at home, times cheated, and then of course you will have a completion percentage. Getting blackout drunk then getting into a fight and getting arrested would be a reality show Triple Double. We could be on to something here.

- I'm pretty sure as soon as Jeff Jordan hit a 3 against Vandy last night, I saw Alex Legion walk over to Bruce Weber and tell him that he wants to transfer again. I have tried to think of every scenario possible where Legion could get Jordan's minutes. I will agree that Jeff played well on Tuesday, but I can't stand watching him on the floor, and I really want Alex to produce. Legion needs to drag DJ to the gym as much as possible to work on DJ's ball-handling so that Jordan doesn't have to be on the floor when Demitri sits. I was told that when Demitri was on the floor against Clemson, Illinois was +24, when Jordan was running the point, Illinois was -27. Not sure about those numbers, so maybe I will watch that game for a 7th time to get my own +/-.

- I don't think I will ever stop screaming "NO!!!!!!!" every time Keller jacks a 3, even though he usually buries it. After watching him nail 3's for 40 games now, I still doubt that their is one Illinois fan who feels comfortable when Keller shoots. His jump shot is like an unfolded lawn chair. That was for you Josh.

- In the last 4 months, I have watched "The Proposal", and "Definetly, Maybe", and I have come to the conclusion that I can watch any movie that Ryan Reynolds is in. Was either movie great? Not at all, but this is a great way to watch a chick flick with your significant other, and still get some enjoyment out of it. As long as Ryan makes one of these movies a year, you can buy yourself one amazing guys night out by suggesting a date night with your lady and seeing one of his movies. They will be so grateful that you want to take them to see a Sandra Bullock movie, they will look the other way when you stumble home drunk at 5:30 in the morning after spending all of your money at a "ballet" school.

- Why is there the unwritten rule that you have to be impartial on press row? Is it because the tickets are free? If you cover a team, and are also a fan, why does it matter that you are cheering for them? There are 2 types of writers that are good when it comes to sports; the ones that just give you the facts, and the ones that are passionate about the team they are writing about. Both are necessacry now in sports reporting, so why do the passionate ones have to adhere to the rules of the objective ones?

- I feel like the Orange Krush needs to have a coach. They need someone to show them old film of how the Krush was during the late 90's through the Final Four season. Now, it seems like all they do is bounce up and down during a few defensive possesions, and put their arms up when the offense shoots a 3. Krush members need to leave games exhausted. I want to see an amazing showing when ESPN Gameday comes to Champaign for the Michigan State game. Also if they don't boo the shit out of Digger Phelps, I will disown them, plain and simple. The Orange Krush needs to spend their Christmas break coming up with clever signs to hold up behind Digger and Hubert Davis that bash the shit out of them.

Weekly Pick'em

2009-12-04T15:23:00.002-06:00

Alright, this is the last regular season pick'em. Hopefully we will set up another Yahoo! Pick'em league for the Bowl Games. Anyways, as the college football season comes to a close, it seems as though not much has happened. At first I was kind of disappointed at the lack of drama this season, but then as I looked back on it, this was actually a very entertaining season. Here are some of the biggest stories of the season according to me:

1) LeGarrett Blount knocking out a douchebag from Boise State.
2) The Charlie Weis Enormously Large Hot Seat
3) How the NCAA is going to handle at least 3 undefeated teams at the end of the year.
4) Bobby Bowden Retiring
5) Iowa fans getting excited about an average football team
6) Michigan fans getting excited about a dogshit football team.
7) USC underachieving yet again
8) The horrible Death of UConn's Jasper Howard and the team during the aftermath.
9) Everyone giving the Heisman to Tebow or McCoy even though 3 other people deserve it.
10) Sam Bradford and Oklahoma getting "Tom Brady'd"

I'm sure I am missing at least 100 other things that made this season pretty exceptional to watch. Realistically, when Illinois is garbage like they were this season, I usually tune out most of the rest of the college football landscape, but this year I couldn't do it. Really fun year, and the Bowls should be great to watch. With that in mind, here is Durty Butter's Championship week Pick'em.

Illinois -3 at home against Fresno State

Since it is the last game for the Illini this season, I had to pick them. I love Juice Williams and Arrelious Benn, and it will be pretty sad to see them for the last time together on the field. As disappointed as most of you are with the way the team performed this year, make no mistake about how much both of these guys did to change the attitude of Illinois football. Even when Ron Turner was winning games, no one really gave a shit like they do now. While most people are going to remember the last 2 seasons in the short term, don't forget that Juice and Benn led us to our first victory over a #1 ranked team in 50 years, our first Rose Bowl in over 20 years, and back to back wins over Michigan for the first time in god knows how long. For all the bad, there was a whole hell of a lot of good, and it will be a sad day for Illinois sports when they walk off of the field on Saturday.
On Senior Day, you can usually throw out all of the bullshit that has happened during the year. Plain and simple, Illinois has more talent than Fresno State, and on Saturday, they actually have something to play for. You are going to see the offense step up, and hopefully you will see an inspired defense. I hope!

Pittsburgh +2 against Cincinnati

As much as I liked Cincinnati's offense last week, their defense was very average. Pitt has a better defense than Illinois does, so maybe they could actually stop Tony Pike a few times. Also I think that the Notre Dame rumors are going to be a bit of a distraction. Also I like the story of Cincinnati being undefeated coming into this game, everyone talking about how they want a playoff instead of the BCS, and then Cincinnati shits the bed and doesn't even make a BCS game. Usually the college football landscape seems to work its way out by the end of the season, and it most likely will this season too. Texas and Florida will be undefeated and play in the Championship game. TCU and Boise State will go undefeated, but it won't matter because people will still be able to say that neither of them play anyone good all season. The debate will rage on whether or not their should be a playoff, and trust me, their never will be. Teams, Conferences, and the NCAA make way too much money in the current system. Why change a system that makes you a ass load of money, especially when their is no imminent danger of that money going away? Are sponsors and football fans going to be so upset that Boise State can't play in a National Championship that they are going to boycott college football until there is a change? Hell no!! Even if people started doing this, do you realize how many people would have to give up on college football for it to even make a dent? It is impossible.

Florida -5.5 against Alabama

I know someone who is going to be really pissed about this pick, but Florida is just a better team. Alabama revolves around 3 people on offense. The QB, RB and 1 WR. Take any of them away, and Alabama becomes very, very average on offense. Florida has 38 running backs, and it seems like even their offensive lineman could play wide out if necessary. If Alabama can keep Florida's offense in check then they have a shot, but the offense looked good last week. The world wants to see Tebow vs. McCoy in the National Championship game, and it will happen.

Nebraska +14.5 against Texas

This game is too big to have such a large spread. Do I think Nebraska will win? Shit no! But they will put up a decent fight to try and stop Texas from getting to the National Championship game. Nebraska is not a great offensive team, but they do have a really good defense. Texas is not the Texas that they have been in the past 2 seasons. Colt McCoy is going to try to put up huge numbers to seal the Heisman, but really it is already sealed up. Nobody wants to give Tebow the Heisman again because he had a very average year compared to his last 2. They aren't going to give it to a running back, because football has become a pass happy sport, so the only way you are going to beat a QB is to put up Playstation numbers. McCoy would have to throw at least 4 picks, fumble once and shoot a puppy at midfield to lose the Heisman. Write it down.

New Mexico State +47.5 @ Boise State

New Mexico State is bad, make no mistake. I am making this pick for 2 reasons. First Pac-Man picked NMSU to cover a 44.5 point spread against Ohio State. The final was 45-0, absolutely brutal loss in an absolutely meaningless game. Second a lot of my friends live in Boise, and they can't stand all of this Bronco shit, or as we used to say in football camp there: "Fuck this blue turf bullshit!" I've always hated Boise State, and I always will. Anyways, there is no chance that they can jump 4 teams to get in the National Championship, so they will probably take their foot off of the pedal late in the game. Coach Peterson seems like a decent guy, and honestly, BSU could have blown a lot of the teams that they played out worse than they had. BSU hasn't beaten anyone by 48 points this year, and I doubt they start now, plus it is fun as hell to pick an enormous line and watch the points add up.

Well that is it, we will be back with a Bowl Pick'em, and an Illini recap on the season.

The Jay Cutler Experiment

2009-12-02T00:52:00.006-06:00

It has been 11 games into the Bears 2009 debacle and I for one have had about enough of the Jay Cutler experiment. I stated as soon as the Bears traded away their future for him that I didn't think that he had the stones to stand up to playing in Chicago. I think it is safe to say that Cutler has failed so far, and does anyone have any faith that he will be able to bounce back next season? As much as I hate to join a mob mentality, especially when that mentality is a person's belief that it is their god given right to blame a QB for every loss, I have to jump on this bandwagon like a virgin jumping on a drunk college chick. Let me list the reasons that I hate Jay Culter.

1) He is not a team player.

The only emotion that Cutler shows is when he is pissed off at a receiver for not reading his mind and changing his route while his back is to the quarterback. The Bears spent 6 seasons rallying behind Rex Grossman and Kyle Orton, especially the defense. When Orton and Grossman were throwing picks, fumbling, or going 3 and out consistently, you never heard the defense bitch that they had to go back out there without any rest. This season you had Brian Urlacher blasting Culter before they played a regular season game, and now he has decided to take it up a notch. When you have players asking to go to the way things were with Kyle Orton, you know you have a problem.

2) He has never won anywhere.

Vanderbilt is obviously not going to challenge for an SEC title probably ever, but you might be surprised to know that our current and future Golden Boy was pretty average as a 4 year starter at a shitty program. You want to know what his record was at Vanderbilt? 11-35. In 4 years he had 8,700 yards, 59 touchdowns and 36 interceptions. Not terrible stats, but is that really what you want out of a First Round draft pick? Fast forward to Denver:

In Denver for some reason, Mike Shanahan decided to bench Jake Plummer when the Broncos were 7-4 and still in the hunt for a wild card spot. Enter Jay Cutler. The Broncos proceed to go 2-3, with Jay throwing for 9 touchdowns and 5 interceptions and they miss the playoffs.

In his first season starting the Broncos went 7-9 and Cutler threw for 20 touchdowns and 14 interceptions. Its not like the Broncos were one dimensional. Like always, Shanahan had a great running game. The Broncos were ranked 9th in the NFL with almost 2000 yards on the ground.

In 2008, the Broncos went 8-8 with Cutler at the helm, and he was selected to go to the Pro-Bowl because Tom Brady and Carson Palmer only played 3 seconds of the season. He threw for 25 touchdowns and 18 picks while throwing for 4500 yards. Again the rushing game was there as they racked up 1800 yards and ranked 12th in the league. The defense was decimated by injuries and they were one of the worst in the league, which helped inflate Cutler's stats because they were playing from behind a ton.

Now having a bad defense obviously led to the Broncos not making the playoffs, but I think that playing against Kansas City and Oakland twice a year makes up for that. If you can't steal 5 wins out of 13 somewhere, especially when you have a balanced offense, then there is a problem.

3) He wants to run his offense.

Yerk told me a funny story about how Cutler told that Mayor that he is tired of running this high school offense under Ron Turner. I tend to agree with him that Turner's play calling is atrocious, but if he can't run a "High School" offense without turning the ball over every other throw, how the shit is he going to run a complex offense. Because of Jay Cutler, the Bears have basically forgot how to run the ball. You can blame the offensive line all you want, but last year as a ROOKIE, Matt Forte ran for over 12oo yards. He accomplished that feat with defenses knowing that the Bears were going to run the ball and never throw past 20 yards. Was the offense exciting? Hell no, but playing a ball control offense the last 3 years had led the Bears to a 29-19 record with a Super Bowl appearance. If it weren't for 3 horrific loses last season to Carolina, Tampa Bay and Atlanta early on, the Bears very easily could have been 12-4.

Now this Douchebag wants the Bears to completely change the offense and get him big play receivers. I have a better idea, why doesn't he stop throwing interceptions in the Red Zone. How many times have you seen Cutler over throw Devin Hester this season? How many times have you seen these so called "Second Tier" receivers adjust their bodies to make amazing catches for this asshole?

There are 13 teams who have more receiving yards than the Bears. Of those teams, I will agree that at least 9 have better receivers, but if you think the Ravens, Chargers, Cowboys and Giants have better receivers you are crazy!! Name one big play receiver on those teams that isn't directly related to the QB play? You can probably throw the Saints in there also because the leading receiver for them last season isn't even playing this season. Sidney Rice was garbage before Brett Farve came to Minnesota, Houston and the Colts have only one receiver you can name of the top of your head. Only the Patriots, Green Bay, Philadelphia and Arizona have more than one great receiver. Make no mistake, those teams have better passing numbers because of the Quarterbacks, not the Receivers. Here is a little history lesson for those of you who only have a short term memory: The Bears made the Superbowl with Muhsin Mohammad, Bernard Berrien, Rashied Davis at receiver and Rex Grossman at quarterback.

4) All he needs to do is manage the game, but he can't.

Does Cutler have a better arm than Grossman or Orton? Absolutely, but that doesn't translate to wins. You can bash the defense all you want, and I agree that they have looked bad at times, but how about the games that they played great only to have Cutler blow the game for them?

-In the loss to Green Bay, the Bears only gave up 21 points, Cutler threw 4 interceptions and the Bears lost by 6.

-In the loss to Atlanta, the Bears gave up 21 points, Cutler threw 2 interceptions and the Bears lost by 7.

-In the loss to San Francisco, the Bears gave up 10 GOD DAMN points, Cutler threw 5 INTERCEPTIONS, and the Bears lost by 4.

-And finally against the Eagles, the Bears gave up 24 points, Cutler threw 1 interception and the Bears lost by 4. Add it up and that is 12 interceptions, 75 points, and a total loss of 21 points.

5 of those passes were intercepted while the Bears were in Field Goal range. The Bears had the ball on the 31, and 8 yard line against Green Bay. The Bears had the ball on the 12 against Atlanta, and the Bears had the ball on the 1 and 12 yard line against San Francisco. If I could tell Culter one thing, it would be this: Throw the God Damn ball away!!!

Feel free to blame the Bears defense for the losses against Minnesota, Cincinnati and Arizona, but you can't blame them for the other 4 losses.

5) Rex Grossman and Kyle Orton

This is my final nail for the Jay Cutler Coffin. In Rex Grossman's 4th season, he took Chicago to a Superbowl. In the Bears 3 losses, he was bad, throwing 3 interceptions in each game. In the other 14 games, he only threw 11. He did exactly what was asked of him and pretty much any other quarterback in the NFL not named Manning or Brady, and that is don't lose the game for us. With the same "High School" offense, Pro-Bowler Jay Cutler has thrown 20 interceptions in just 11 games. If that number doesn't jump to 30 by the end of the year, I'll be shocked. The Bears were only 15th in rushing that year, but they knew they had a great defense, so as long as Grossman managed the game on offense they were fine.

Lets' compare last season to this season because that is a much better comparison.

2008 Offense

14th in points: 375

26th in yards: 4700

27th in First Downs: 264

21st in Passing Yards

16th in Passing Touchdowns

15th in Interceptions

24th in Rushing Yards

14th in Rushing Touchdowns

15th in Rushing Attempts

2009 Offense

21st in Points: 216

23rd in Yards: 3450

26th in First Downs: 180

14th in Passing Yards

14th in Passing Touchdowns

31st in Interceptions

32nd in Rushing Yards

24th in Touchdowns

32nd in Rushing Attempts

2008 Defense

16th in Points: 350

21st in Yards: 5300

23rd in First Downs: 314

2nd in Turnovers: 36

2009 Defense

24th in Points: 261

18th in Yards: 3700

26th in First Downs: 220

12th in Turnovers: 19

Starting with the offense, obviously the first thing that jumps out at you is the turnovers. The Bears are 3 turnovers away from having as many as they did last season. Also even though they have more passing yards, they are on pace for about the same touchdowns. Hopefully playing Detroit and St. Louis will rectify this. Also this season, the Bears are 7th in the league in pass attempts. In 2008 they were 14th. It is pretty safe to say that the Bears have completely abandoned the running game that has been successful for them for their entire history in order to appease the Douche Bag.

On Defense the Bears are giving up less yards, and about the same in First Downs, but they are giving up more points. Again the points should even out when they play Detroit, St. Louis and Baltimore. They are behind in turnovers, but 12th is pretty good for a team that has major injuries everywhere. It is insane to ask the defense to constantly man up after all of these turnovers.

For those of you who are also on the bandwagon that the Bears offensive line is allowing Cutler to get sacked too often, in 2008 they gave up 29 sacks. This season they have given up 24 sacks. It seems like they are giving up a ton more this season, but in 2008 the Bears attempted 528 passes, this season in only 11 games, they have already thrown the ball 406 times.

So in 2008 the Bears gave up a sack 5.2% of the time they dropped back to pass. This season they are giving up a sack 5.6% of the time. Not to drastic of a change.

All of this information should lead you to this conclusion: Jay Cutler is an average QB at best. In his own words, it is a simple offense to run, yet he can't do it. Its not like he is a rookie trying to learn the ropes of playing in the NFL, he has basically played for 4 full years. Right now I can name at least 15 quarterbacks that I would rather have than him. Asking for a great offensive line and phenomenal receivers is the same argument that people in Michigan use to justify why Dick Rod is killing that program. Green Bay has one of the worst offensive lines I have seen and they have a better record than the Bears, and are passing better. I can't name a receiver for the Ravens or Chargers, yet they have much better passing stats.

Now we are stuck with Cutler for the next 4 seasons, and it is only gonna get worse. The only quarterback I can name who bounced back when a team and fanbase turned on him without switching teams is Vince Young. Eli Manning and Tony Romo were first time starters when New York and Dallas bashed them, and Jay Cutler does not have near the talent that either of them do.

Funny Stuff

2009-11-26T02:49:00.003-06:00

Here are a couple of things that I found this last week that I wanted to share with everyone. Have a Happy Thanksgiving

Shocked that Jimmy Fallon is actually funny in this. This almost makes me want to watch his show. Almost.

I just made a touchdown!

No Mas Presents: Dock Ellis & The LSD No-No by James Blagden Sports SPIKE.com

Curb Your Entusiasm

2009-11-25T02:12:00.002-06:00

After watching the Illini play tonight I think that I need to take the rose colored glasses off of all of you. As much as I would love to tell all of you that Brandon Paul and DJ Richardson are the saviors of this program, and they will take us back to the Final Four, they won't. Everyone was excited when Paul was averaging 20 points a game, and then Richardson dropped over 20, but we all need to realize that those scores were put up against sub-par competition. Just like everyone else, I love watching Illinois score over 80 points a game. Who wouldn't be excited by seeing players hit 3's all over the place, and also take the ball to the hole and be able to finish? Unfortunately after watching the way the freshman played tonight against an over matched opponent in Wofford, I honestly believe that Illinois will probably be about as good as last years team.

Now you can tell me that DJ Richardson carried us in the first half by hitting 4 shots from beyond the arc, and that he was the reason that we held of a very hot shooting team. I would tend to agree with you, except for the fact that the reason that Wofford shot so well from behind the arc was directly related to him and Brandon Paul playing pretty much ZERO defense at all. I would be more prone to think that the reason that Illinois stayed in the game early on was because the veterans of this team realized that there was an unbelievable mis-match inside and they decided to dump the ball down to Tisdale over and over.

Like I stated before, this team will miss Chester Frazier more than anyone will ever believe. The only problem that will occur is that most people are more willing to accept a 80-70 loss than they are willing to accept a 60-50 loss. It is much easier for a casual observer to see the shortcomings of a player on the offensive end than it is to see their weaknesses on the defensive end. If Chester scored 20 points against Ohio State last season, you wouldn't care if Evan Turner dropped 30 against us. Do any of you remember what happened last year when Chester (who is 6'2 at best) went head to head against a future NBA player who is 6'7? Turner had his worst game of his season, scoring only 4 points and Illinois won 67-49. They then won at Ohio State by 1. Evan Turner had 17 points, but he did it on 6-15 shooting. Now while all of you are falling in love with DJ and Brandon drilling 3's like JJ Reddick against South Central Carolina Community College, I ask you this...... Who is going to stop Evan Turner from dropping 30 this year? My fear is that we basically had an even trade off between offense and defense.

If you think that these freshman are going to carry us during a grueling Big Ten season then you are god damn delusional!!! Michigan State is not Wofford, and their post players can probably guard DJ and Paul outside. The reason that I am so worried about this season right now is because the Freshman are being allowed to make mistakes that prior players were never allowed to. Here are my problems right now with the 2 Freshman guards:

1) They play no defense!!!

Not only was the game close in the first half, but it was actually tied 50-50 with 13 minutes left in the game. Bruce finally went with a veteran line up with Jordan, Cole, Davis, Tisdale and McCamey. Keller subbed in for Tisdale, and Illinois picked up the defensive pressure. Wofford missed their next 4 shots, and Illinois went on an 8-0 run to take the lead and keep it, eventually getting up by 17. Their is absolutely no ball pressure at all with DJ and Paul. Not only do they allow dribble penetration pretty much anytime they are guarding somebody, but they also don't fight over screens, or deny entry passes. 3 things happen when a post player is allowed to get the ball on the block. He is either fouled, makes a shot, or passes out. It is really rare when a player misses a 5 foot shot, and you aren't doing your post players any favors by letting a guard pass inside whenever they want.

2) They never look inside

Illinois has never ran this much high-low since Bill Self left. The only way Tisdale gets the ball inside when DJ or Paul are in the game is if Davis or McCamey gives it to him. People have been bashing Tisdale this season so far because they seem to have expected more from him. You want to know what he is shooting so far? He is 15-22 from the floor!!!! Give him the GOD DAMN BALL!!! He is also perfect from the free throw line and has 8 blocks. Mike Davis is 20-35!!! Give him the GOD DAMN BALL!!! Combined they have shot 57 shots in 4 games this year. Brandon Paul has shot 42 by himself, and made only 18. Unless you want Tisdale and Davis to bring the ball up and create their own shots, then you should cut them some slack. If they are fed the ball like they should be, then they would be the ones averaging over 20 points a game, and they would most likely be more efficient doing it.

3) They can't handle the ball

Like we saw in the previous game, Illinois cannot handle pressure when Demitri is not in the game. Thank God Jeff Jordan is back because when Illinois tried to get into their offense without either of them on the floor, it was like watching a monkey trying to screw a football. If Illinois has less than 20 turnovers against Clemson and Mizzou this season it is because McCamey and Jordan play the entire game. I think you can pretty much chalk up a loss in the Clemson game at least, and possibly the Mizzou game because we will turn the ball over constantly. The nice thing about having a backcourt of Chester, Demitri and Trent last season was that they were all basically point guards. If you don't see Paul out of control at least 5 times next week against Clemson I will be shocked. His shot selection will most likely be terrible that game, and that game could get out of control in a hurry. We need the greatest game that Demitri has ever played against Clemson to have a shot of winning.

Like I mentioned before, it really pisses me off that DJ and Paul are allowed to continue to make these mistakes. Alex Legion and Bill Cole have spent the better part of a season on the bench because they don't defend well at times. Demitri McCamey has spent 2 years in Bruce Weber's dog house for numerous reasons. Yet DJ and Paul consistently play more minutes than anyone even though at times their shot selection is poor, their defense is below average at best, and their ball handling is awful. I really hope that Bruce holds these Freshman accountable, because when he has, he has proven that it will make them much better players.

Now that I am done bashing the Freshman for being Freshman, I think that things can be okay as long as they learn to be role players on this team. It is amazing to me that Tisdale, Davis and Keller are being so patient with them so far. However, if you continue to see games where Davis and Tisdale are only getting 6 shots a piece, then there will be problems.

On the bright side, I am overly impressed with the play of Cole and Legion. Yes Legion!! Tonight he played fantastic. He didn't allow any dribble penetration, and he ran the break well. Cole was amazing with his on the ball pressure and did another fantastic job crashing the offensive boards. If they keep it up, don't be surprised if you see Richardson and Paul on the bench in tight games. Granted they have been able to score a lot in these meaningless games, but lets not forget who is coaching this team. There is plenty of fire power on the court with Davis, Tisdale, McCamey, and Keller. They led us to an NCAA appearance last season, and right now they are playing at the same level if not better. Bruce is still a defensive coach, and I'm pretty sure that he doesn't think that he can outscore the likes of MSU and Purdue with 2 Freshman.

As excited as I am with the scoring ability of the Freshman so far this season, I would much rather see them learn how to play a little defense before the Big Ten season starts. If they can't then we will be exactly in the same position we were last year, except the games will be in the 80's instead of the 60's.

Durty Thoughts

2009-11-12T01:11:00.008-06:00

I am going to try out a new weekly installment here at Durty Butter. I would have done this sooner, but it took me a year and a half to come up with a clever name. Anyway, this is basically gonna be a post that deals with not only sports, but pretty much anything that I am thinking about at this very moment. It won't be everything that I am thinking of, because Porn already makes up 93% of the Internet. So let's get to it shall we.....

I watched pretty much the entire Bulls game last night and it was well worth it. I almost crapped myself when Brad Miller hit what I thought was a game winner with .3 seconds left in the game. Unfortunately, he didn't get it off in time. I was talking to Yerk after the game because he is one of 3 people I know that watches the Bull religiously and we had these thoughts.

- Yerk loves the way that Deng is rebounding. So how about a small line-up with him at the 4 for some minutes? I like the idea. With a PG like Derrick Rose, you can run the hell out of teams, it could work for 4 or so minutes a half. Basically the Knicks, but with talent.

- I am already tired of John Salmons. After today's game, he is now 34 for 111 shooting so far this season. If my math is correct, that is about Stop Shooting%. Although the trade off between him and Ben Gordon might be even, because even though he is in a slump, at least he can defend. Having Gordon defending was like having your mom make you let your little brother play with you and your friends.

- Joakim Noah is playing out of his mind!! He was on pace for 40 rebounds after the first quarter yesterday. And Taj Gibson might actually be a pretty decent big man. Sorry Aaron Gray.

ESPN's 30 for 30 is fantastic. I implore everyone of you to watch it on Tuesday nights. If you know nothing about sports, it will automatically make you seem like a sports savant. Believe me, if you can casually drop names like Jimmy the Greek and Len Bias into some sports conversation, you gain instant legitimacy. The only problem I have had with them is that they are so damn depressing. I like the fact that not everything in sports is Championships and groupies, but Jesus!! In 3 weeks I am either going to stop watching sports all together for fear of the worst, or I'm gonna start praying for a Brett Farve documentary.

I finally met someone who likes Chris Berman and thinks that he is hilarious. It made me question every conversation this person has ever had with me, and whether or not I should ask him another question..... ever! I automatically like them less.

I understand that giving George Lopez a late night talk show was geared towards gaining viewership from the Latino community, but is he ever going to have a show without a Latino on it? Don't be surprised in 2 months when he runs out of famous Latino people and Julio Lugo is his first guest. He had Larry David on, but that was after he had Eva Longoria and Marc Anthony. I think Lopez is really funny, and I would like to see him interview famous funny people like Larry David. Even Jennifer Lopez doesn't care about Marc Anthony.

I want to come up with a list of under rated actors who steal scenes in movies. My favorite right now is J.K. Simmons. Who is he you ask? Exactly. He is the dad in Juno, the boss in Spider-Man, the boss in Thank You For Smoking, and the C.I.A. Supervisor in Burn After Reading. Besides Spider Man, he is by far the best part of each of those movies, without trying, or having many scenes. Here is the best part of Juno, hands down. (he is not the best part of Spider Man because there are no good parts of Spider Man)

Breaking The News Movies & TV SPIKE.com

After the fallout of the Eric Gordon fiasco at Illinois, everyone and their Grandma were bashing Bruce Weber. Then he landed a high school Freshman by the name of Jereme Richmond that was basically a Top 10 player. Pretty much everyone said that it didn't matter because once the Coach K's and Bill Self's came calling, Richmond would bail. Well he didn't and today he along with Crandell Head and Meyers Leonard signed with Illinois. For those of you keeping score, this class is ranked in the top 5 nationally. It always amazes me how quick people are to bash someone when things are going bad, but when things are going great, you never hear about it. When Gordon decommitted and went to Hell instead, it was pretty much all over the place, but now Weber has back to back great classes and no one cares. Well I remember the assholes who jumped off the bandwagon and told me "see if he gets them to sign". Suck it d-bags.

Trailers are basically one of my favorite things in the whole world, so here are a couple that I think look really good.

I have been waiting for this damn movie for over a year, and I think it is finally about to come out. If you didn't like Super Troopers or Beerfest, then you are a pompous jackass who has no sense of humor. Sometimes it is a lot of fun to just laugh at weird outlandish comedy. Would any of this stuff ever happen, no, but who cares, he punches a damn swordfish!!

Here are 2 more cool trailers:

Avatar

Green Zone

Try to do a list of your Top Ten movies of the decade. It is actually a lot harder than it seems. Movies like Shawshank and The Big Lebowski would be out. If you can come up with 5 movies from the this decade that you would put in your Top Ten All-Time I would be surprised. Was it really that bad of a decade for movies. I personally think that there were some great movies, but all of them have flaws. And yes, Dark Knight is in my Top Ten All-Time. The problem with this decade was that it was dominated by 4 franchises. Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Spider Man and Batman. If you want to include Transformers, Shrek and Star Wars, you can. Basically it seemed like everyone was trying to make movies from cartoons and comic books, and no one was trying to make really good movies. I think the best franchise besides Batman wasn the Bourne movies, they were fantastic, from start to finish. Here is a short list of movies that I loved in the past few years, but I'm not sure any of them make the Top 10 All Time.

The Departed, There Will Be Blood, No Country For Old Men, The Wrestler, Sideways, The Aviator, Lost in Translation, Gangs of New York, Road to Predition, Ali, A Beautiful Mind, Gladiator, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.

Most of these movies were up for Best Picture, but do any of them really make your list. As far as comedies go, Maybe Old School. I'm not really an enormous fan of Jud Apatow movies because he basically flooded the market with the same movie, over and over again. Does The Hangover make it? Compile your list for the decade and All-Time and send them to us at
durtybutter@gmail.com I would like to see what you guys are thinking.

Weekly Pick'em

2009-11-11T23:27:00.005-06:00

Well color me shocked!! I went 1-4 last week, but it is okay because I did pick the upset of Iowa. Now we can all breath a sigh of relief that Iowa won't get murdered in the Rose Bowl and make the Big Ten look worse than it already looks. Everyone can say that losing Ricky Stanzi is the reason that Iowa lost, and maybe that is true. Or maybe the fact that Iowa isn't very good and they were riding a wave of unbelievable luck is true. Either way, without Stanzi, look for Iowa to lose their next 2 games and finish in a tie for third in the Big Ten.

I still can't believe that Oklahoma's offense is this terrible without Sam Bradford. It's not like he was playing for a MAC school, this is Oklahoma for god's sake. They are always in the top 10 in recruiting, and really they should be much better than this. Either way, stay away from them for the rest of the season.

Gotta love losing by a half a point 2 weeks ago, and then Houston not covering by a point this week. Their offense didn't disappoint, I just gave their defense way too much credit.

Ohio State exposed the same flaw that Iowa did against Penn State.... their offensive line. Just like the previous loss to Iowa, Penn State could not get a running game going, and then Daryl Clark looked like a very average QB. Terrell Pryor is finally doing what he did last season by sitting in the pocket for about .3 seconds and then out running everyone to the first down marker. I have never seen a QB run like him. Mike Vick was just plain fast and electrifying, and Vince Young picked his spots well, but Pryor is so smooth that he seems like he is floating. It is fun to watch when he is not doing it to Illini defenders. I have yet to see a defender take a correct pursuit angle when they are attempting to run him down.

The definition of crazy is doing the same thing you have done before, yet you expect a different outcome (not really, but it is my definition.) Well I am crazy, because I keep talking myself into picks based on how bad an opponent is. Colorado is terrible, and they have been for years now. Somehow, I thought that because Texas A&M had 2 good games, that there was not a chance in hell that the Buffs could beat them. Well that was crazy.

Oh well, I could have bet my unborn children on last weeks games, lost them, and I would still be happy. Want to know why? It is because we got the trifecta this weekend!! Notre Dame, Michigan, and Iowa all lost!!! I kept reminding myself of the Iowa and Michigan losses as I was watching Illinois self-destruct against Minnesota in the second half. I have not done a recap of the last two Illinois games and they have won, so I am not going to do it this week. You will all have to wait for my thoughts on Jacob Charest, but rest assured that I have plenty.

On to this weeks picks!!!

Wisconsin -8 vs. Michigan

Michigan is on the verge of not going to a bowl game for Back-to-Back seasons. Until last season, they had been to over 30 straight bowl games!! Wisconsin showed that they could still run the ball even without John Clay who was hurt in the second half of their game last week. Michigan continues to prove that they can't stop the run every week. I like the fact that Wisconsin will just pound the hell out of them until they crumble.

After watching the entire nation fall in love with Tate Forcier after only 2 games, it is nice to see him come back down to earth, and then proceed to dig himself half way to China. Everyone was enamored with the fact that he could run, the only problem is that he doesn't do it with the ball because he already fumbled it. This team is pretty much about to fold. It is a well known fact that many players can't stand Dick Rod, so I really don't see many of them rallying around him in order to save his job.

On a side note, many people blame Rich Rodriguez for Michigan's failure, and that is completely understandable, but what about the AD and the hire in the first place?? Lloyd Carr did not leave him with a bare team by any stretch of the imagination!! Sure he lost his QB, tailback and All-American tackle, but they had a fantastic freshman QB in Ryan Mallet, and still had a good defense, and solid recruits. Right now Mallet has 2500 yards and 18 touchdowns vs 3 INTs for Arkansas versus much stiffer competition in the SEC. Michigan had just come off of a great bowl win against Florida, and things seemed good. Instead of finding someone who could continue the success, they got Dick Rod, who wanted nothing but to run his system.

If I hear another commentator say that Dick Rod just doesn't have the athletes he wants in order to run his system I am gonna choke someone!!! No one other than USC, Florida, Texas and a handful of others have all the players they want. Quit making excuses for this guy. Don't try to make me feel sorry for this guy because he doesn't have Pat White and Steve Slaton at Michigan.

So now if you are Michigan you are completely screwed, and they deserve it!!! If you fire Dick Rod, you have 2 options: First is to find another person to run the spread with the players that he has recruited. This is completely out of the question, because as much as I hate him, Rich is the best spread coach in the country. He basically invented it at West Virginia. The second option is to go back to a coach who wants to run a pro-style offense, which means that you are another 2-3 years away from a decent season. If you think that either Forcier or Denard Robinson can become a pocket passer, than you might be crazier than I am. Either way, buckle in for at least 3 more years of a mediocre Michigan team.

Michigan State -3 @ Purdue

This should be a pretty even game. Both teams need this game to become bowl eligible, and honestly, I think that Michigan State has way more talent and are better coached than Purdue. Also, you can add Danny Hope to your list of asshole coaches. Apparently he blames Rich Rodriguez for getting one of his offensive linemen suspended earlier this season, so to rub in his victory a little more, he brought the offensive lineman with him to the post game hand shake. Not sure what was said, but they were definitely bitching at each other. Bing it. At the end of seasons, the better team usually wins in match-ups like this. College football has a way of weeding out the bad teams, and believe me, Purdue should not go to a bowl over MSU. I know their isn't much logic to this, its just a gut feeling.

Miami -3 @ North Carolina

This should be a really fun game to watch, because UNC has a great defense, and Miami has a really fun offense to watch. I think the difference in this game will be Miami's defense vs. a very average UNC offense. While Miami hasn't really shut anyone down, UNC just doesn't score. You can only rely on your defense to win you games for so long, and Miami has the ability to not only score on big plays, but their special teams can also put up points. If Miami can contain UNC's pass rush, they should win this by a touchdown. UNC does step up in big games, like their win against Virginia Tech, but they lost to an FSU team that is a shadow of what they used to be. They also lost to a terrible Virgina team and Georgia Tech, and in those games, they only scored 10 points. I always hate teams that take weaker opponents for granted, and they did that against Virginia and also a bad win against Duke. Hoping a team will show up doesn't bode well for betting on them. Never bet on a team when you talk yourself into it by saying "They could win if.."

Ohio State -17 vs. Iowa

In OSU's last 3 games they have given up 14 points. The defense is coming up big, and that was really surprising to me. Even before Ricky Stanzi got hurt, Iowa's offense was average, and they were able to overcome turnovers because their defense got stops. Now with no offense to speak of, do you really think that Iowa's defense can pitch a shutout against OSU? Yeah me neither. Even if the defense puts in a fantastic game like they did against Penn State, where are the points going to come from? Tressell is notorious for playing a very conservative game. He is going to wear down Iowa's defense and not allow Pryor to make any mistakes. Eventually OSU will impose their will and crush Iowa. Also lately he has been breaking out some trick plays, so look out for that against Iowa if the offense is failing to move the ball. The last thing is that they have a solid punt returner, and Iowa will punt a TON!!! It will come down to field position, and OSU will be on Iowa's side a lot with chances to score.

Louisville -7 vs. Syracuse

I can't believe that I haven't mentioned Syracuse yet!! They have one of my favorite college athletes to hate....... Greg Paulus!!! It was bad enough to watch him play point for Duke for 4 years, carrying out the legacy of Wojo by pounding the floor on defense and flopping on every other possession so that out-dated announcers could talk about how much of a warrior he was. Now we have to watch him scramble around and launch 6 yard bombs with his noodle arm. Make no mistake, him being terrible is probably the worst thing that has happened to ESPN in 15 years. The only thing that I can imagine that would be more frustrating for them would be if Brett Farve actually stayed retired!! There is thousands of hours of high school footage and in-depth garbage analysis of this beat off that is just wasting away at ESPN, and I love it. Paulus has thrown for 1500 yards and 11 touchdowns vs. 13 INT's this season. His terrible play begs a much larger question.... What the shit is going on at Syracuse where they have to play a basketball player who hasn't thrown a pass in a game for 4 years?? Is your recruiting that bad to where you can't find one QB who can be better than him?? It's not like Paulus gets 3 more years after this, and you are mortgaging your future on him. He only gets one shot!! You don't have another QB that you think could maybe help your program next year by playing this season over a All-American bench warmer in BASKETBALL!! Their coach should have been fired during summer camp!!

It has gotten so bad at Syracuse, that their best player who happened to be a receiver decided to leave the team in the middle of the season because he felt that NOT playing with Paulus and this garbage team might help his draft status!! That's like leaving medical school because you think watching House and reruns of Doogie Howser M.D. will give him a better chance of being a doctor.

Based solely on the fact that they are biggest joke in college sports right now is reason enough for me to bet against them!!

Have a good weekend, and don't forget that Illinois' first regular season basketball game is Friday.

Illini Basketball: The Freshmen and More

2009-11-10T01:52:00.004-06:00

The Illini basketball season is just around the corner with the first regular season game on Friday. After watching the Freshman play in the Orange and Blue scrimmage and also 2 exhibition games, you can see a little bit of the type of skills that each one of them bring to the table. Have no doubt that this Illini team will be much different from the teams that they have fielded the past 3 years.

The first thing that you everyone needs to do is to temper their expectations. I was just like everyone else, and couldn't wait for this recruiting class to get here because of their athleticism and high school ranking, but there Freshman are very raw. You see flashes from each on of them, but with the good, you also get a lot of bad.

Like I stated before, we are going to miss Chester Frazier and Trent Meacham more than anyone thought. The fact that Chester did a phenomenal job of not allowing opposing point guards to get their team into their offense was lost on a lot of people. His ball pressure defense was amazing. Be prepared to never see a ball-handler get a 5 second call against him with this team. Also dribble penetration is going to drive you crazy. 2 things are occurring right now that need to be rectified in a hurry. First, obviously is that ball handlers are getting way to deep into the Illini defense allowing open shots. Second, the post players for the Illini got a little spoiled with the guard defense last season, because right now they are not helping correctly. Either they are sitting back waiting for a backside block which isn't going to occur because the initial defender is not getting back into position, or they are too quick to help and they are leaving people wide open for easy jump shots. I think Bruce will get this worked out, but it will take some time.

Also this team is so young that they don't quite grasp where open shots are in the motion, and they are not patient enough to let the offense run. Pretty much every guard jacked up the first open 3 that they got. Many times this occurred on the first pass off of a screen during a possession. I think there will be a little leniency early on, but eventually if Legion, Paul and Richardson continue to throw up the first shot they get, you will see a lot of Jeff Jordan and Bill Cole. It took almost 6 minutes for Illinois to get the ball into the post on Sunday, but in those 6 minutes, they took 6 3's and hit only 1.

Here are 3 things to expect from the offense:

1) Illinois will throw up a ton of 3's - Legion, Paul and McCamey all love to shoot 3's. Richardson can shoot them and will, but so far I haven't seen him take a really bad one. Keller still thinks he is a guard, and will put up at least 2 a game, and the only thing I have ever seen Bill Cole do is shoot 3's. On a side note, I just don't understand why everyone feels the need for Bill Cole to play? In all the time I have followed Illinois basketball, I have never seen fans get behind a player this much. In 29 games here are his stats. 20 FG made in 46 attempts, 6 of 16 from 3, 30 rebounds, 6 assists, 9 turnovers, 5 steals, and 9 blocks. He has only played 157 minutes. He can't play defense, and he isn't a good rebounder. He hit a couple of 3's in games that we were really behind last season, that's about it. In over 2 years, I have never seen him on the floor and thought "Why the hell is Bruce not playing him more?" Yet for some reason everyone who is an Illini fan wants Bruce to change his coaching philosophy, and everyone else on the team to learn how to play zone so Cole can play. What the shit am I missing??? On the other hand, everyone is ready to crucify Alex Legion after he only played 1/2 of a season. If anything Legion has shown you that he can score in big games.

2) Illinois will look to run - Believe me, if Brandon Paul and DJ Richardson are in the game, then on every rebound, Illinois will look to get easy baskets. They both know how to finish, and they are fast. Illinois honestly has not had guards this athletic since 2004-2005. Along with the guards you have Davis and Keller who can also run, and their should be many more easy baskets.

3) Tisdale and Davis have to get the ball inside - It is amazing how much more smoothly Illinois' offense runs when these two get touches inside. Both of them are even better in the post than they were last season. The only problem will be if the guards get too jump shot happy. In the past, if Tisdale and Davis did not get off to good shots, they can disappear. It is imperative that McCamey gets them the ball early. Getting them scoring will only help the guards. Bruce Weber knows this, and even though the guards had their fun the last 2 games, Bruce knows that you dance with the one that brought you, and that is Mike Davis and Mike Tisdale.

Now on to the Freshman:

DJ Richardson:

Richardson has basically been the most consistent performer in the exhibition season. He can score from outside, and he can also get to the hoop and finish. Out of all of the Illini guards with the exception of McCamey, he is the most rounded. The only knock I have on him is that he isn't as good of a ball handler as I thought he was going to be. Sometimes he picks the ball up before he should, and pressure can get to him. Beyond that, everything else he does is in the flow of the offense, and he really waits for his shots to come to him. He is a much better outside shooter than I expected, but as I said before, he doesn't take bad 3's so he should shoot a really good percentage. I know a lot of you have read that he will be a great defender just like Chester Frazier, well I think that those predictions are very premature. He has the ability, he still gets beat off the dribble. Give it a little time.

Brandon Paul:

Paul is going to be Bruce Weber's new whipping boy. Demetri McCamey is now off the hook because a lot of what McCamey used to do is what I am now seeing from Paul. All of the potential and talent is there, but Paul takes a lot of ill advised shots, and that is probably Weber's biggest pet peeve. 4 of Illinois' first 8 shots were from Paul, and 2 of them were bad 3's. The fact that Paul has so much potential means that Weber is going to harp on everything he does. As soon as his shot selection gets better, he could be a force. As far as all the guards go, Paul is the worst ball handler, and he isn't great on the defensive end. He is amazing at getting to the hoop, he finishes really well, and he will get to the free throw line more than anyone else on the team. Write it down. I think Paul probably has the most potential out of the Freshman, but he is going to have to work hard at it. Be prepared for him to be a little inconsistent.

Joseph Bertrand:

Even though he didn't play in the last exhibition game, I was really impressed with the one game I did see him play. Shockingly I thought he handled the point best against full court pressure. He could end up being the one legitimate point guard out of this class, and that would be awesome because he is 6'5". He is the most raw out of the guards, but actually I think that if he will be healthy for a major part of the season, then he shouldn't red shirt. The only thing that I am afraid of with Bertrand is that if falls behind because of an injury, he will not get the playing time he will need to progress. As much as Bruce Weber says that his bench will be longer this season, I still don't believe it. Now with Jeff Jordan back, Bertrand is basically going to end up being the 5th guard, and that means little to no minutes.

Tyler Griffey:

To me it is much harder to evaluate post players than it is guards. I feel that way because so much of a post player depends on his size, and in a motion offense, post players can get lost in the mix. Griffey has shown that he has good range, he can hit baseline jumpers which are always abundant for post players in the motion, and he also moves well without the ball. I feel that he can be just like a James Augustine, but maybe a little bit bigger. I have yet to see post moves from Griffey, but as a Freshman, he does seem like he can give this team a few good minutes off the bench. Just like every other post player though, his time on the floor is tied to how well he defends and rebounds. He will most likely be a better scorer than Rich Semrau this season, but scoring shouldn't really be a problem this season, so he is going to have to do all the little things to see the floor. In my opinion, he is not going to start, and at best he will be the second post player off the bench after Keller. However, like I stated before, if somehow Cole or Semrau is able to defend and rebound better than him, he won't get many minutes. I really doubt that either of them beat him out, but stranger things have happened. The one thing that I have seen, is that Griffey seems much more comfortable in the offense than many Freshmen post players have at Illinois. He has no problem having the ball in his hands 20 feet away from the basket, and he can also put the ball on the deck for a couple dribbles if needed.

That it is, look for a Big Ten preview/prediction post later this week, along with our weekly pick'em. We are also working on a post about the most hated women in television or movie history. It will be up soon.

Weekly Pick'em

2009-11-06T09:17:00.004-06:00

We are back this week with another set of picks for you guys. Last week I was 2-3, but I still stand by my picks, because they were really good. Let's recap real fast before we move on to this week.

Oregon crushed USC and like I said their defense and offense were average, and their Freshman QB couldn't handle playing at Autzen. I would love for USC to lose one more game just so the dirtiest program in the NCAA might become a little less untouchable, but that will never happen. As long as there is not an NFL team in Los Angeles, USC will reign supreme, and be able to do whatever they want.

Michigan State absolutely screwed me!! I don't understand how Adam Weber can go from being the worst QB in the Big Ten, lose his best receiver, and then go out and have a career day!! It was just a terrible effort on the part of MSU's secondary.

Indiana was not only covering, but they were making me look like a genius for the first 3 quarters of the game, and then they realized that they were Indiana, and forgot how to play defense. I really wonder if a team has ever gotten 4 interceptions in a quarter and only gotten 3 points out of it? In their defense, the replay officials did mess up one of the 2 touchdown receptions that were reviewed, but blowing a 10 point lead a week after you blow a 25 point lead is atrocious!! Especially when Ricky Stanzi is turning the ball over basically every time he drops back to pass. Gotta love getting 17.5 points and losing by 18!

Cal was up 14-0 early, and it looked like they were going to roll against ASU, but give the Sun Devils credit, they somehow convinced Cal that Jahvid Best should only carry the ball 16 times. Like I have always been told, never bet based on how bad you think a team will be, because shitty teams with nothing to lose are the ones that get overlooked by opponents.

At least Illinois covered and more importantly won!! I have now watched that game as many times as I watched Illinois upset Ohio State in 2007. The best part of watching that game again is seeing Dick Rod self-implode on the sidelines all game long!! If you get the opportunity watch it again and keep a close eye on Rodriguez, you can basically see his career unfold after each 3 and out and subsequent touchdown by Illinois.

Alright, on to this weeks picks!!

Northwestern +16 @ Iowa -

Iowa is terrible!! They should be 4-5 right now, but they are getting lucky and also getting SEC treatment from the replay officials. This bet is contingent on Mike Kafka playing QB for Northwestern. After watching Iowa try and fail at running the ball last week, and Ricky Stanzi remembering that he is Ricky Stanzi by throwing 5 picks, I can't in good conscious bet Iowa. They are bound to lose one of these games that they are winning by the grace of God. Indiana was able to score on Iowa last week by spreading the defense and attacking one on one match-ups and also by running the ball with the QB. Northwestern is capable of doing both of those. Iowa will probably win this game, because Northwestern isn't very good, but again, I don't think they will be able to cover this spread.

Oklahoma -5 @ Nebraska -

I can't believe this line is so small. Absolutely nothing that Nebraska has done this season has been impressive. Their wins are against Florida Atlantic, Arkansas State, Louisiana LaFayette, Mizzou and Baylor. Losing to Texas Tech and Iowa State at home is not happy either. Even without Sam Bradford Oklahoma has more talent than pretty much 99% of the country, and I think now that they have gotten over the fact that Bradford isn't coming back, it should help them move forward. If Oklahoma wins by less than 10 I will be shocked.

Texas A&M -3 @ Colorado -

Texas A&M has actually been playing really well lately. They have back to back big wins against Iowa State and Texas Tech, so basically they are the opposite of Nebraska. Colorado on the other hand has little to no talent. When a head coach starts his son at QB and then has to bench him because he sucks that bad, you know your program is in trouble. Colorado is basically Illinois, but they don't have as much talent as the Illini. Tell me that isn't the perfect equation for betting against a team. It's like Vegas is trying to just give me money!!

Houston -2 @ Tulsa -

I am really surprised that people aren't lobbying more for Case Keenum as a Heisman candidate. Usually ESPN and every other major sports media outlet loves to be the "first" to jump on a bandwagon. How often have you seen a segment on TV where somebody is telling you about "someone you don't know, but you should"? Well Case Keenum is this guy this season. He has thrown for 3300 yards and 25 touchdowns with only 5 interceptions. He also is playing on a team that is ranked #13 in the country. Basically what is happening here is everyone has spent the last 4 years talking about how amazing Tim Tebow and Colt McCoy are. Is it beyond the realm of understanding that these players have peaked, or perhaps they are just having an off season. If you think coaches in sports have a hard time admitting that they were wrong, try to find a reporter or broadcaster who has ever admitted it.

Anyways, Houston has an offense that can't be stopped, so all Tulsa can hope for is to keep up like Southern Miss did last week. Tulsa however hasn't scored more than 27 points in the last month. Meanwhile, Houston has only scored less than 40 points 3 times in 8 games this year. The under of 67.5 points might also be a safe bet in this game. Take Houston and watch the fireworks.

Penn State -5 vs. Ohio State -

Both of these teams are very comparable, but the only problem for Ohio State is, is that Penn State is pretty much better in every area. Daryll Clark is much better than Tyrell Pryor right now at running the spread. Penn State is much better at running the football than Ohio State is, and Penn State's defense is much better than Ohio State's at pretty much everything. Realistically, Penn State is still in the running to get back to the Rose Bowl this season. Basically I don't see Ohio State being able to do anything on offense and their linebackers will be able to keep the running game under wraps, and Pryor is not a very good passer. Clark isn't exceptional, but he manages a game very well. I just think that PSU is better in every aspect. Also take into account that Ohio State's kicker is out for the season, and now they have a soccer player kicking field goals for them. Last week, they were 1 for 5 with a long of 29 yards. In a game that means a lot, either Tressel is going to have to take his chances with 2 bad kickers, or go for it on 4th down a lot. This bodes well for Penn State's defense.

See you Saturday!!

Illini Basketball Preview

2009-11-04T00:08:00.006-06:00

Many of you out there are anxiously awaiting the 2009-2010 Illini Basketball season like a 5 year old awaits Santa on Christmas morning. After watching the football team plod and plunder to a horrible 2-6 record, this season can't come soon enough.

Most people have anxiously waited for the arrival of Bruce Weber's best recruiting class yet at Illinois. We have all dreamed of what it would be like to have the athletes that other top tier programs have had the good fortune of seeing walk through their doors year after year. After waiting for 2 years, they are finally here. Brandon Paul, DJ Richardson, Joseph Bertrand and Tyler Griffey played their first game for the Illini last friday.

Like most of you, I thought that having these players would transform the Illini into a Big Ten contender overnight. Just like what happened in football, we all listened to how great these recruits were, and how well they have practiced in the off-season. Just like in football, we all drank the vodka laced Kool-aide, and got drunk off of the Illini recruiting hype machine. After watching them play (albeit one game) here is my honest opinion on how well they will hold up to an easy Non-conference schedule, and a brutal Big Ten conference season this year.

Right now I will breakdown the returning players for Illinios, after a couple games, we will look at the Freshman.

Centers

Mike Tisdale - Mike Tisdale made an enormous leap last year as far as productivity. The only player that was more surprising than Tisdale was Mike Davis. Tisdale averaged just over 10 points a game last season, but only 4 rebounds. We all now how many calories that Mike had to eat last season, and lets all collectively pray that we won't have to hear about it anymore. The problem is, is that Tisdale won't put on anymore weight. Based on his size and skill set, it is almost impossible to hope that he will make another giant leap this season. What we need to hope for is that his conditioning is better so that he can fight inside more for points and rebounds. McCamey caught a lot of flack last season for his inconsistant play, well Tisdale should have been right there with him. Tisdale was shut out twice last season, and scored less than 10 points 17 times!!! That cannot happen this season. Hopefully with an extra season to work on his post moves, he will be able to score inside more often, and also get to the free throw line where he is one of the better shooters on the Illini.

Richard Semrau- Semrau played pretty well in the non-conference last season coming off the bench. He gave the Illini what they lacked in Tisdale. Rich was able to body up bigger post players on defense, and also was pretty good at screening and rebounding. Even though he came into Illinois as a very good offensive player with a good mid-range shot, he has lost his confidence on the offensive end. Don't look for him to be a scoring threat, but with a team that will obviously be lacking on defense and on the glass, if he plays hard, he should get some productive minutes off the bench.

Stan Simpson - Stan is still a long way away from playing good minutes for the Illini. He is probably the most athletic out of the big men, but the motion offense that the Illini play is more conducive to post players who can shoot. Think of the difference between James Augustine, Captain Jack Ingram and Shaun Pruitt. In order to play, Simpson needs to be able to move and pass well. He could still become a great player for the Illini, but it probably won't be this season.

Forwards

Mike Davis - Mike Davis was the biggest surprise that the Illini have had since Warren Carter learned to shoot his senior season. His mid-range jumper is indefensible because of his athletic ability and the fact that he has a quick release from weird angles. Now that teams are aware of his ability from 10-18 feet, it is going to be harder for him to space to get his shot off. In the off-season he was working on his ball-handling, but that was side-tracked when he injured his leg. The biggest thing that the Illini need from Davis is offensive rebounds. With his athletic ability and skinny frame, he should be able to slide in and get some tip-ins this season. Although along with Tisdale, it all boils down to intensity inside with Davis. You can't expect him to shoot his jumpshot better than last season, but we need him to get more easy baskets.

Dominique Keller - In my eyes, Keller is probably the most important player for the Illini. He brings a level of intensity and aggresiveness that most of the other returning players don't have. Does he put up horrible shots? Absolutely, but he also does all of the little things on the floor. Keller is the spark off the bench that the Illini will need this season. He is going to fight for offensive rebounds, he is going to run the floor in transition, and he going to throw up playground junk that will somehow go in. Keller is the type of player that will get the crowd into the game with one crazy 3-pointer. Also, Keller understands that in order to play extensive minutes, he is going to have to defend and rebound. Make no mistake about it, even though he is a Junior College transfer and has only been in the system one year, Keller wants to be the leader of this team, and he wants to start. I think early in the season, Keller will probably play the best out of the Illini because he wants to earn his playing time.

Bill Cole - Many people have been calling for Cole to play more minutes since he first arrived at Illinois. If it weren't for an injury early in his Freshman year, Cole might have actually been in Mike Davis' place right now. Unfortulately for Cole, the make-up of the Illini does not bode well for his chances to become a standout player. Cole's biggest problems are his size and athleticism. Size wise, Cole would have to defend a power forward, yet he is not big enough to do that, nor can he rebound well because he lacks the jumping ability to make up for his skinny frame. He can't defend a 3, but this wouldn't be a major problem if he had other people on the team who help hide his lack of speed. There is just no way that he can play major minutes on this team without sacrificing scoring by the opposition. His offense will be welcomed off of the bench, but it will only happen in short spurts.

Guards

Demitri McCamey - McCamey has shown flashes his first 2 seasons of being another great guard in the Illini's long list of great guards. He and Bruce Weber have clashed so many times in the past that it seemed like he would probably fold instead of accepting the challenge and become an elite player. We this off season he lost weight, and has looked great. It has gone so far that Bruce is now praising his work ethic. Demitri is going to play a huge role in the Illini season this year, not because they will need him to score, but because he is the only real ball-handler coming back. McCamey will have to play more than 30 minutes a game this year, and in some games, many more minutes. Also he won't have luxury of taking plays off and allow Chester Frazier and Trent Meacham to handle the point. It is a blessing that he worked so hard in the off-season, because his conditioning needs to be amazing for him to play close to 40 minutes of basketball with little to no breaks. In the first game, he looked fantastic. Not only was he faster, but he did a much better job of letting the game come to him, and being patient. It will help him greatly to have so many scorers around him, but he will also need to penetrate more in order to himself some easy buckets.

Alex Legion - Legion is not a good ball handler, and really can't create shots for himself like the Freshman can. Legion's season will boil down to whether or not he can defend, and whether or not he can hit open jumpers when he gets them. Everyone has claimed that he is one of, if the not the hardest worker on the team. He probably practices his jumper more than anyone on the team, as it is said that he is the last one to leave the gym usually. The one bright spot to look at was the fact that his 3 best games last season came in road games at Purdue, Michigan and Michigan State. Look for Weber to be very patient with Legion because like it or not, he is going to have to play major minutes for this team because they are very thin at the guard spot. It will also help him to play in the non-conference this season because he will be able to carve out a niche for himself. If he shows that he can grasp the offense, and not be a liabilty on defense, he could have an unbelievable season. The Illini the past 3 seasons have lacked a spot up shooter. To see how well a catch and shoot player can be in this offense, all you have to do is look at how well Jamar Smith was his Freshman season. He average 8 points a game by strictly being a shooter, and with so many screens and movement in the motion offense, Legion will have open looks.

Jeff Jordan - Jordan chose the absolute worst time possible to take a 6 month break from basketball. In my opinion Jordan saw the talent that the Freshman class had a guard and decided that he would probably not play very much. Well if Jordan hadn't left, he would probably play at least 15-20 minutes a game early on, because the Illini desperatly need a guard who can defend and also handle the basketball. In my opinion, Jordan has just as much talent as Chester Frazier had. Now with a team that will obviously lack on the defensive end, they need Jordan more than ever. Taking time off will not help him at all, and instead of playing, look for Bruce to push the Freshman along even faster.

Now here is what you can expect from the Illini this season:

1) They will score much more than last season.
There are 3 reasons that the Illini will score more this season. First many of the teams in the Big Ten are guard heavy which should help out our post players scoring inside. Besides Minnesota, Illinois has the best front line in the conference. Next the freshman class will try to get to the hoop as much as possible, where as the last 2 seasons, we only had Chester Frazier, and he did not do it very well. Between Richardson, Paul and McCamey, you know have 3 guards who will look to penetrate. Finally to go along with attacking the basket, Illinois should shoot many more free throws than last season because all of the guards will look to attack. Also let's face it, Tisdale and Davis will get to the line much more. Now that they are upper-classmen, refs like Ed Hightower will give them the benefit of the doubt inside. Think about all of the times that Tisdale went up for a shot only to have it blocked. If you are 7 feet tall, a Junior or a Senior, and you go up relativly strong, Ed will bail you out. By the way, even though it was an exhibition game on Friday, Ed was in mid-season form. There were 52 fouls called during the game Friday night. Ed just wanted to make sure that we didn't forget about him during the off-season.

2) The Illini will be much worse on defense.
Bruce Weber is known as a defensive coach, so don't expect to see a horrible drop off from last season. Plain and simple, if you don't defend, then you don't play for Bruce Weber. The only problem is that for the first time in the Bruce Weber era, there is not a defensive stopper on this team. DJ Richardson will be a shut down defender eventually, but it is way to early to expect him to do it. The defense will have to rely heavily on the post players inside for help. Hopefully Tisdale and Davis can send back some shots this season, because a lot of guards will penetrate against us. The Big Ten is stacked with great guards this season, and in my opinion it is much harder to stop a good guard than it is to stop a good post player. Doubling a post player, or denying him the ball on the block is much easier than doubling a ball-handler or denying him the ball 30 feet away from the hoop. Don't be shocked when Evan Turner and Talor Battle drop 30 on us.

3) The Illini will try to press.
The beauty of having pretty much 10 players who can play significant minutes on this team is that it allows you the luxury of playing a pressure style defense. The Illini will not press much, but Mike Davis leading a 1-2-2 full court trap is a scary thing. It worked amazingly against Northwestern and Western Kentucky last season. I don't think you will see it unless Illinois is down late in a game this season, but it is something that they are capable of doing. Another thing to look for is Illinois using Davis or Keller to run and jump a guard bringing the ball up. They both have the athleticism to do it and then recover to their man.

4) The Illini will not play much zone.
Bruce said they might try it, and they will occasionally against mediocre teams that they will play in the non-conference, but it si much harder than people think to coach man to man, and then install a zone. If you can't play it effectivly, then there is no point in playing it. The thing that Weber hates most is uncontested shots, and that happens a ton in a poorly played zone. Also add to this the fact that it is much harder to rebound while playing a zone, and Illinois is not going to be a great rebounding team.

5) Illinois will terrible in a couple of games that they should easily handle.
There is no consistant player coming back for the Illini. McCamey, Tisdale, Davis, and Legion all have good games, and then also have terrible games. Unless they can all be consistant, Illinois will have some hiccups along the way. Another major problem is that there is only one true ball handler on this team. Look for teams that pressure a lot like Mizzou and Clemson to pose a ton of problems for the Illini. The Freshman guards will be a major factor in the success of this team because one of them will have to show that they can handle the ball without turning it over.

6) Illinois will run a lot more.
Chester Frazier tried to run at times, and so did Demitri. Trent Meacham was not a guard that could push the ball, but the new Freshman are very comfortable doing this. Also Illinois now has guards who are atheltic enough to finish. Tisdale is not great at running the floor, but Davis and Keller are. It helps a ton when you have fast post players that can beat opposing defenders down court.

7) Bruce will play a ton of people in the Non-conference, and then settle on a 8-9 man rotation.
Every year Bruce says that he will play more people, and then he settles on 8. This season he will be more patient early, but with a Big Ten conference that is so stacked at the top, he will not be willing to put up with mistakes when one loss can hurt your standings so much. These 7 people will play every game: McCamey, Davis, Tisdale, Keller, Legion, Richardson, and Paul. After that, Jordan, Cole, Semrau, Griffey, and Bertrand will pretty much fight it out for the next 2 spots. Don't be surprised if Cole and Semrau are the odd men out when the Big Ten season rolls around.

8) There will be some sort of adversity this season.
Last year, and the Final Four season, the Illini were blessed with little to no injuries or off the court problems (except for Chester's injury at the end of the season.) Cole and Semrau have been injured in the past, but that hasn't really mattered. If any one of the guards gets injured early, the Illini might be in trouble. In order to have a great season, you need to be really good, but you also have to be really lucky. Look at Ohio State, Iowa, Michigan State and Purdue last season. Ohio State lost Lightey who is solid, Iowa lost damn near their entire team, MSU lost Raymar Morgan for a long stretch, and Purdue started 0-2 in the Big Ten because Robbie Hummel was hurt. OSU and Iowa did not have enough talent to overcome the injuries and have the season they had expected, where as Purdue and MSU did. Does Illinois have the talent do withstand an injury to McCamey, Davis or Tisdale? If any of them are out for an extended period of time, Illinois could be in a little bit of trouble.

9) Alex Legion will have a good season.
I'm not gonna go crazy and say that he will live up to his All-American status coming out of High School, but I do believe that Legion will surprise some people this year. In a system that allowed an average athelete like Trent Meacham shoot at least 3 wide open 3's a game, Legion should get plenty of good looks. Like Meacham, Legion is a streaky shooter, but unlike Meacham, Legion has the size and ability to shoot mid-range jumpers. If he gets hot, strap in and enjoy the ride because he will hit shots from all over the gym. Good shooters can't be kept under wraps for too long, and now that he has had basically 2 years of working the motion offense, Legion should now understand how to get open. Also it will help that McCamey has a great grasp of the offense and will know when and where Legion will be open.

10) Demitri McCamey will start at least 15 games with a three.
This was one of my favorite things about last season. It is so fun that it should be a prop bet in Vegas. In more games than not, Demitri took the first shot of the game and it was a 3. This didn't change on Friday as McCamey jacked up the first semi-open look he got. I actually love it, because McCamey is the one player that we need to have a good start. Think about how well he came out against Missouri last season. If Demetri can get going early, then every part of his game comes together. He defends okay, he looks for his teammates, and he attacks on every possesion. Also look for McCamey to be among the leaders in assists this year in the Big Ten. He looked so smooth on Friday, and he has more offensive weapons around him this season.

Well, there it is. After the game on Sunday I will post about what I saw from the Freshman, and maybe even do a running blog about the game. Enjoy the Minnesota game on Saturday, hopefully the Fighting Zookers can give us more than just one weekend of smiles!!

Weekly Pick'em

2009-10-30T02:22:00.003-05:00

In the past, we at Durty Butter have posted a weekly pick'em weekly as the name of the post implies. Well you can chalk up another reason to hate Illinois football, it has taken the fun out of betting for me. Since I no longer like to wager on amateur football, it has made it difficult for me to choose games, but since I know you all love this, I am gonna give it another try. For the record, this is a horrible week to pick games. If you can find a line under 10 points, it is bound to be 2 teams you would be shocked to find out actually play football. If there is someone out there who knows enough about Louisiana Lafayette and Florida International to feel comfortable to bet on the 3 point spread, then they need a lot more help than me. I was about to say that they probably work for ESPN, but we all know that in order to work for them, all you need to know about is the Yankees, Red Sox, Lakers, Patriots, Brett Farve, Peyton Manning, Tim Tebow, and for some reason poker. Anyways, I have found some bets that seem logical.

Oregon +3 against USC

As soon as the Ducks lost to Boise State in the first game of the season and their running back LeGarrette Blount had a Vietnam flashback as he was leaving the field, everyone thought their season was over. Well now they are playing just about as well as anybody in the country. USC on the other hand has not. They have looked very average on offense and defense in wins over Notre Dame and Oregon State. Losing to Washington wasn't a shock, because that is what they always do. They also looked very average against Ohio State. Having a freshman QB and losing 42 first round draft picks on defense last year has left them a shell of team they usually are. Normally USC has more talent than anyone in the country, but instead of playing for a national championship, they shit the bed once against a terrible Pac-10 team, and then they beat the hell out of the best of the Big Ten in the Rose Bowl. Well this year, they don't have the best talent in the country, and they won't play in the Rose Bowl for 6th time in 7 seasons, because Oregon will beat them.

Playing in Autzen stadium is horrible. I played terrible when I played there, and there was about 300 people there. It's going to be raining in that game, and that helps Oregon out a ton. I think it will be close, but Oregon pulls it out by a field goal, and then the students of U of O will storm the field and smoke weed, because that is what they do their instead of riot.

Michigan State -4 @ Minnesota

Minnesota used to have a really good passing game, but this season they have been below average. If you think Juice Williams has regressed, just look at Adam Weber. Last season he threw for over 2700 yards and had 15 touchdowns and only 8 picks. This season he has 1400 yards, and 6 touchdowns with 11 interceptions. Those are Jake Delhomme numbers. Playing outdoors all the time does not agree with him.

Added on to Weber being horrible is the fact that Eric Decker, their All World receiver is injured for the rest of the year. Minnesota won't know what to do. Early in the season, they couldn't run the ball at all, and they will have to try against MSU. This won't happen of course, because MSU has a decent defense against the run. Look for them to put a lot of pressure on Weber, and look for him to make a lot of mistakes. When you are having a horrible season, the last thing that you need is to lose the only player that you are comfortable throwing to. Michigan State has been very consistent pretty much all season, and I don't expect anything to change in this game.

California -7 at Arizona State

This is a tough game to pick because Cal can look very good when Jahvid Best gets going. He ran all over Minnesota, and is still the best NFL prospect at running back. Shockingly, their QB Kevin Riley has played very well at times. He has 11 touchdowns and only 2 interceptions. Surprise Surprise!! Their 2 worst games were against Oregon and USC. If you take out those 2 games, both of these players have been amazing all year. Arizona State is about as average as you can be, especially in their last 3 games. Beating Washington and Washington State by only 14 points is like going to an all you can eat buffet and sticking to the salad bar. These are 2 teams going in different directions. ASU has Cal, USC and Oregon in the next 3 games, they didn't do well enough agaisnt the cupcakes of the Pac-10 to instill a lot of confidence. I think Cal's offense keeps up their good play against crappy teams, and I think ASU won't be able to keep up.

Indiana +17.5 at Iowa

Iowa is the luckiest team of the 2009 season. They could very easily be 4-4 instead of 8-0. They have won their 4 home games by only 16 points. That might seem like a worthless stat, until you find out that those 4 games were against Northern Iowa, Arizona, Arkansas State, and Michigan. Everyone who likes the Big Ten needs to pray that they lose 2 games, because if they get into the Rose Bowl, or heaven forbid the National Championship game, the Big Ten will be an even bigger laughing stock than it already is. There is no way this team should be a 17.5 favorite against anyone. Indiana is a bad team, and giving up a 25 point lead to Northwestern might have crushed their dreams of a bowl game, but stranger things have happened (Purdue beating the hell out of Ohio State.) Not only do I think that Indiana will cover this spread, but they might actually win this game. The beauty of college football is that normally teams that are riding a ridiculous wave of luck usually have that luck run out. At best Iowa wins by 10, because they are not an offense that puts up a ton of points.

Illinois +8.5 at home against Michigan

I'm not going to try to rationalize this one. Illinois is probably the worst all around football team I have seen in a long time. Their defense is garbage, and I have never seen such a dumb team on offense in my life. If the QB's aren't throwing interceptions, then they are fumbling. If the offensive line is not letting the defense kill their QB or running backs, then they are holding. I'm to the point where I almost want them to kneel 3 times and then punt, then we can all prey that the returner muffs the punt. Unfortunately, Jeff Cumberland will try to jump up and catch the ball before the return man can get to it.

The only reason I am picking this is because no self-respecting Illinois fan can ever bet Michigan. Trust me, I am almost out of self respect after watching this team, but my hatred for Dick Rod and every "Michigan Man" I have ever met will not let me fold. I will be dressed from head to toe in Illini gear and cheering my ass of for one more week out of spite!! If Michigan destroys us, then I am done. I will wait for the mass exodus of players that will surely occur, and probably has already started. I will watch in horror as Notre Dame and Front Butt take all of our good recruits, and I will anxiously await our first basketball game.

This is Amazing

2009-10-28T19:49:00.003-05:00

Everyone that watches sports knows about Tim Donaghy. He was the NBA official who was caught betting on games that he refereed, and then went to prison. Well he wrote a book, and it was supposed to be published later this month. Instead, the publisher has decided that they would scrap the book. Make no mistake about it, the NBA is probably the most powerful sports league in the States. Donaghy dished out dirt on tons of other refs, yet no one else was prosecuted, and now they killed his book. The refs themselves tried to hold out during the off-season, and they caved before the start of the season. They didn't really get much out of their hold out. Just wait until the old collective bargaining agreement runs out, because the NBA and owners are going to crush players. Bill Simmons has been writing about this for a while now, I will try to find some of his stuff and post it. Don't be surprised if you hear about Sports Guy getting beaten to death outside a Clippers game, Stern can make this happen.

Anyways, here is the link to the ESPN aricle about the book getting killed.

More importantly, here is the link to excerpts of the book. Deadspins excerpts of Donaghy's book. I'm sure that everyone has thought that this stuff goes on, but it is amazing to actually have a first hand account of it. Make no mistake, David Stern is one of the most powerful men in all of sports. He killed the book, and he rules over the NBA with an iron fist. He manipulates games in order to make the most money possible for the NBA, its kinda sad and revealing at the same time. Hopefully more of the book comes out. Oh and by the way, Steve Javie is a piece of crap, he hated Jordan just as much as Iverson, but Jordan created the league that we watch today, so his hands were tied.

Durty Butter Thoughts

2009-10-27T01:26:00.005-05:00

Since I can't recap an entire Illini Football game without banging my head on my keyboard for hours at a time, I am just going to throw out a few thoughts about the Illini, and a lot of other things.

- In order to get a penalty in Football don't you actually have to do what you are flagged for. Fred Sykes got a penalty for an illegal chop block, but on further review, Sykes didn't touch the player. Instead Sykes fell to the ground and the corner basically ran around him. We can't even play illegally right.

- If you are getting 2 illegal substitutions a game, should you maybe not rotate 8 receivers from play to play? And if you are going to refuse to pick-up the pace with a no huddle, why not just huddle, so you don't have those penalties?

- Even though Denver is 6-0, and Orton looks better than Cutler, I still wouldn't want Orton. I couldn't handle watching horrible offenses on both Saturday and Sunday. Call me crazy, but I don't think you are ever gonna hear the phrase "Kyle Orton; Super Bowl Champion" unless he ends his career as a back-up to a Manning. Denver still has to play Baltimore, The Giants, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia. The wheels will fall off.

- Todd McShay has Arrelious Benn in his top 20, while Mel Kiper has Jon Asamoah as his 25th player drafted. Just wanted to pour some salt on your wound also. If I am going to be miserable, so are the rest of you.

- If you didn't watch the Iowa - Michigan State game, you missed an unbelievable hit. Here is the link: Iowa receiver getting crushed

- When was the last time you remember this many bad NFL teams? St. Louis, Detroit, Cleveland, Oakland, Carolina, Miami, Tampa Bay, Tennessee and Kansas City are all terrible!! They aren't just bad, they are all TERRIBLE!! As always, to make all of you feel better, the next time you hate cheering for Illinois, remember this: You could be a Tennessee Titan fan! They were 13-3 last regular season, now they are 0-6. Cleveland, Tennessee, Oakland, Detroit, St. Louis and Tampa Bay are a combined 3-37. That is amazing!!!

- There is a new Boondock Saints movie coming out soon:

- Alex Legion scored 28 points in the Orange and Blue Scrimmage this Sunday. I'm not going to get excited about him until the Big Ten schedule starts. I have seen this movie before. Klee on the Orange and Blue scrimmage

- Is there anything more frustrating than losing a fantasy football week because you left somebody on your bench, and they had a career day? If you could have predicted Miles Austin would have 2 great weeks, then my hats off to you.

- You should start every morning watching this video, it will make you want to jump out of bed and head butt the world!!

- College Basketball has instituted a rule just like the NBA. You can no longer take charges underneath the hoop, it is now a block. Guess who is pissed off about the rule? That's right, Coach K and the DOOKIES hate this rule. Now they will actually have to play defense without flopping. However, there is no painted arc in the lane like the NBA. I know we all thought it wasn't possible, but now Coach K will be whining and bitching even more. I have watched probably hundreds of Duke games, and for the life of me, I can't remember seeing him ever get a Technical Foul. Just something to think about, and for the record, it is a great rule, but not having the area marked off is going to drive everyone crazy. They will paint it on by next season.
Coach K already working the refs

- Man am I glad that I went to the Rose Bowl. It was one of the greatest trips of my life, and it looks like I won't be going back anytime soon.

- For all of those people think that Jacob Charest looked good on Saturday, it has been a long time since you have seen good football. He was 4-8, and 3 of his incomplete passes should have been intercepted, including his first pass. He had one good drive that wasn't killed by his offensive line. They waited until Juice came in and handed off for a touchdown before they screwed up. And the reason that Juice came in was because Charest hadn't run any of the goalline plays since training camp.

- Ron Zook still has a chance to get fired this season. 1-11 will get him fired, write it down.

- I think that Illinois will miss Chester Frazier more than anyone would have ever imagined. We still don't have any proven scorers (Demitri McCamey could possibly be this player), and the only thing that kept us in games last season was tenacious defense. If we shoot cold for a while, Illinois could be in trouble in some road games during Big Ten play this season. They lost 4 of their last 5 games last season, including 2-3 without Frazier.

- When Pam Ward knows more about football than the other guy in the booth, it is time to go shopping for another Color Commentator. This is what the jackass during the Illinois game said verbatim: "Trying to help him out(Charest) and that is one thing that Coach Zook has said; that Juice is all about trying to win, and he wants to help the other guys. He helped Eddie McGee the week that he drew the start. But I tend to wonder myself are you too willing to help someone else, and is that showing that you don't want to be out there. Is your confidence that shot, that you just as soon watch somebody else do it and help them? I don't know the answer, only Juice does." I know the answer you idiot. You have no god damn clue what the hell you are talking about and you should be selling used cars to soccer moms somewhere.

So this moron thinks that Juice should pout, and ignore all the other players on the team because his feelings are hurt!! This is the antithesis of everything that we as a culture know about team sports. How are people like this employed in a workplace that I would kill for?? Shit like this keeps me awake at night, no bullshit! It was Ray Bentley, so if he is doing a game you are watching, you are better off muting it.

- Semi-Pro was a horrible movie. The first time I saw it, I didn't think it was that bad, but good God it is terrible on the re-watch. I think Will Ferrell is pretty much done.

- Hard Knocks is amazing every year, and Two-A-Days was probably the greatest show ever put on MTV. Everyone tells me the Friday Night Lights is one of the best shows on television, so shouldn't a channel like ESPN basically do a Two-A-Days rip off every year and follow around different high school team? Or maybe I am the only person who is tired of watching repeat episodes of Poker on ESPN2.

Thats all for today, back with more before Illinois' first exhibition basketball game on Friday.

A Man's Man Update

2009-10-27T01:23:00.003-05:00

It was brought to my attention that I left off one person from the list who should never have been left off. That man: Denzel Washington

This is why we at Durty Butter like feedback from our readers. Anyways, Denzel should be on the top of this list based solely for his roles in American Gangster, Man on Fire, and Training Day. So I apologize to Mr. Washington and also Youngblood for making this mistake.

A Man's Man

2009-10-21T20:04:00.010-05:00

Last weekend I had the pleasure of enjoying a few Bud Selects at Trace with the crew. The Crew consists of Sha Boi, Scheffki, myself, and whichever bartender has the honor of over serving us on that particular night (On this night Mike was bestowed that honor). While drinking the tasty beers, the topic of conversation usually goes in many directions. First we usually start discussing whatever sport is on television, and then discuss whichever team that we follow of that particular sport, and how they are taking away our will to live. Next we move on to music. This is usually done for 2 reasons: 1) The song that is playing is really good, and we want to know who is responsible for such a treat or 2) The song is terrible, seems like it will never end, and so we bash the singer unmercifully. Inevitably the conversation will roll around to something that we have either witnessed on TV, or are looking forward to seeing in the theatre. This week the conversation evolved into this great question: What ever happened to the "Man's Man"?

I'm sure that most of you know what I am talking about. It was actually a recurring theme in the Saprano's. Tony always asked his therapist what ever happened to Gary Cooper, the strong silent type. Now I have no damn clue who Gary Cooper was, but I know the mold. The examples that automatically pop into my head are Clint Eastwood, Frank Sinatra, Jack Nicholson, Mohammed Ali and so on. The example that was given to me when we started talking about this was Robert Mitchum. Again, I have really no clue who he is, but I'm pretty sure that if I lived while he did, I would say that he is a guy I would love to have a beer with. The problem that we now face as a society is that all of the "Man's Men" are either dead or about to be. You know who are "Man's Men" right now? The "Most Interesting Man In the World" from those Dos Equis commercials and Don Draper from Mad Men. Neither of them are real people, what the hell is going on?

Now before we delve into the question above, we need to lay out some ground rules for what makes a "Man's Man". The only caveat for being a "Man's Man" was that he was American born.
1) Guys want to be him, Ladies want to be with him.
This phrase was coined to describe the "Man's Man", so it is only fitting that it is the first rule

2) He must appeal to men of all ages and backgrounds
Whether you were old or young, rich or poor, from what I am told, you loved Clint Eastwood back in the day. Hell you still love him. A "Man's Man" is loved by all.

3) He seems unflappable. In any situation he is as cool as a cold beer on a hot summer day
By this I mean whenever you see him, whether in a movie, interview, or taking a leak, it seems like he is impervious to the outside world. It is his world, and the rest of us are just living in it.

4) As he gets older, his legend only grows. He doesn't look back, instead he evolves
Longevity is what ever person strives for in everything they do. We want to live longer, party later, eat more, have relations longer. Almost everyone looks at their past longingly wishing that it had lasted longer. Whether it be being a child, being in High School, College, or the time after college and before you got married and your children grew up and ruined your life. A "Man's Man" is always in the moment.

5) Somehow they have left there mark on pretty much everyone in a certain generation
This person has had such an impact on an entire generation or longer that they transcend age. A 25 year old can have a conversation about this person with a 65 year old and neither person will miss a beat. Both have the exact same opinion about them. Here is an example: If I try to have a conversation with my dad about how cool I think Josh Duhamel is, he will first ask me who that is, and then tell me to get him another scotch on the rocks as he flips through the channels. If I mention Ali or Eastwood, we can talk for hours until my mom yells at us for drinking too much and tells us to turn the TV off and go to bed because it is 2 in the morning.

So who are some people from our recent past that had a shot to be in this illustrious group? Well here is a list of them from the 80's and 90's.

1) Mel Gibson

I know what you are all thinking. Mel Gibson can't be on the list because he is Australian!!! Well here is a fun fact kids: Mel Gibson was born in New York!! That's right, he was ours first dammit!!! Anyways, here is his "Man's Man" resume:

1) Lethal Weapons - Even if 3 and 4 sucked, 1 and 2 were so good that he is forgiven for the rest. Plus Gary Busey was a bad guy in the first one
2) Braveheart - One of the best movies ever... Period
3) The Patriot and We Were Soldiers - Not fantastic movies, but they were still solid, and Mel was a bad ass in them
4) He is funny as hell - Anyone who has the balls to call a female police officer "Sugar Tits" has to have a hell of a sense of humor. He was always great during interviews.
5) Loves to drink and Smoke - Not sure if he still smokes, but he obviously still drinks. Always seemed cool doing it.

2) Harrison Ford

The man who made Archeology cool, Harrison Ford wasn't always the Bad Ass, but he was always smooth and cool. Here is his resume:

1) He was born in Chicago, automatically makes him cool as shit.
2) He is Han Solo. Not only was he pretty much the only Bad Ass guy in Star Wars besides Yoda, he wore a really homo-erotic costume in the movie, and no one seemed to care. You can't underestimate how Manly this is.
3) He is Indiana Jones. The only redeeming quality about Indiana is Harrison Ford. The Indiana state flag should just have a picture of Harrison Ford, their Capitol should be renamed Harrison, and everyone should have to drive a Ford. Not only would this help jump start the economy, it would also make Indiana less of a crap-hole
4) Blade Runner is cool as hell. If you haven't seen it watch it.
5) Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger, Air Force One, and the Fugitive. From 1989 to 1997 Harrison did not make a bad movie. That is a hell of a streak.
6) The Intense Face:

7) He has dated Carrie Fischer, Daryl Hannah, Lara Flynn Boyle, Minnie Driver, and Calista Flockheart. Not a bad stretch.

We just need a better comeback from Ford, because the last Indiana Jones movie made me want to poke my eyes out. Watch the South Park episode about it. Classic

3) Eddie Murphy

Eddie had it all going for him in the 80's. He was cool as hell, funny and smooth. He if anybody could have pulled off all of the rules that we stated above, yet he missed. His Resume:

1) SNL - He was a star from the get go. Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood, Stevie Wonder, Gumby, Buckwheat, the list goes on and on.
2) His Standup - His standup comedy is immortal, but more importantly, no one in the world could have pulled of the outfits that he wore in Raw and Delirious. Try and name one other person who you could take seriously wearing a purple leather jumpsuit. I dare you!
3) Beverly Hills Cop and 48 Hours - All of these movies proved that he could not only be funny, but also be cool as hell doing it.
4) His Laugh - Sure you would mock it, but it was part of his persona. How many people nowadays can take something like that and make it bankable?
5) His wife - She was probably one of the All-Time greatest looking women that you have never seen before.

The problem with Eddie was that he just started making bad movies. Plan and simple.

4) Robert DeNiro

If anyone could pull of the Gary Cooper mold of the strong silent type, it is DeNiro. He also fits the role of a new era Sinatra perfectly, except I imagine he can't sing for shit. Every time you look at the man, you can't help but be a little apprehensive. He has that look that makes you not want to say something stupid to him and look like a fool. His Resume:

1) His Movies - Although he plays the Italian mobster probably better than anyone ever could, it is his other roles that I absolutely love. Raging Bull, Taxi Driver, Cape Fear, these are the movies that make you realize that he is 100% Bad Ass!!
2) His Aura - The SNL skit where him and Joe Pesci come on and beat up the guys who are playing them on the show is fantastic, and it is not far fetched. What are the odds that if SNL hadn't come to them and said "Hey, wouldn't it be great if you guys came on and beat the hell out of Jim Brewer for a while?" that Pesci and DeNiro wouldn't have just come on the show anyways and probably really beat the hell out of Jim Brewer? I'm guessing pretty damn good.
3) His Image - Based purely on seeing him act and his personality here are a few things that I assume: He can win a Bar Fight. He can throw a football and baseball. He hates being made fun of. No woman has ever turned him down. He is probably a great shot with a gun. Now are any of these things true? Probably not, he probably throws like a 6 year old girl, and can't take a punch, but it doesn't matter. Until I see him throw like a girl, I will believe that he has a Nolan Ryan fastball.

Just like Murphy, he started doing crappy movies. He could very easily evolve into an Eastwood though, and we will all forget about Showtime and Righteous Kill.

DeNiro on SNL. Fast forward to the 6 minute mark if you are like me and can't stand Jim Brewer.

SNL - Joe Pesci Show with Robert De Niro
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Now that we have done away with the past, let's look ahead and see who could become our generations "Man's Man". Here is my short list:

1) Ed Norton

He is the perfect candidate. Not only does he seem like the strong, silent type, he proved to everyone that he is not a Sissy with American History X. That movie scared me right down to the bottom of my soul. He isn't overly good looking, but he can still pull some amazing tail. His Resume:

1) Acting - The only bad movie on his resume was Keeping the Faith. Beyond that, he has been pretty much perfect. When you do Rounders, American History X, and Fight Club back to back to back, you aren't lucky, you are an amazing actor
2) Salma Hayek - That's right folks, he was the one who was dating Salma Hayek when she was in her prime. Not a ton of people know that. Now if I was dating Salma Hayek, I would make sure that every person from here to Zimbabwe knew about it. But not Eddie, he could care less if people knew about it, and that my friends is Bad Ass!!
3) His Appearance - Ed looks like an accountant, yet he can pull of playing a white supremest on the cream and the clear, and date arguably one of the most gorgeous women of our era? That tells you that either he is really good at being a human being, or he has actually mastered the skills of a Jedi. Nothing about him screams "Look at Me!!" yet dammit, I really want to be him!!

2) Leo DiCaprio

Lucky Leo pretty much has it all. Great actor, good looking, and goes through supermodels like us Indians go through razor blades. The beauty of him, just like Norton is that you never really hear about them or see them. They show up every once and a while at a sporting event, and make you think "Damn I would love to be him for one day". He is not in your face at all. He hasn't had a defining moment in his career or life yet. Unlike Ed Norton, he doesn't have an American History X that everyone will remember him for. What he has is Titanic, and that might keep him from the list, John Wayne never screamed "I'm the king of the world" at the front of a ship. If he does get that moment, than you can put him on the big board with the greats. His resume:

1) Movies - Just ridiculous the run that Leo had: Gangs of New York, Catch Me If You Can, The Aviator, The Departed, Blood Diamond, and Body of Lies. All in a row.
2) The Women - I can't even name them all, so here is the link if you are interested. To name a few: Liv Tyler, Alicia Silverstone, Amber Valletta, Carmen Electra, Gisele, Heather Gramah and Bar Refaeli. If you don't know some of the people I have just named, I suggest you take some personal time and google them!!
3) Growing Pains - This might be a dumb reason, but I love the fact that he was on a TV show that I loved as a kid. He has really been a part of our lives for almost 3 decades now. Plus after seeing washed up child actor after washed up child actor, it kinda makes you appreciate him more.

3) Michael Jordan

Call me a homer if you want, I don't give a damn. Michael Jordan is a candidate for a "Man's Man" and you know it. Was there anyone else that you would have rather been when Michael was in his prime? I didn't think so, so shut up and keep reading. His Resume:

1) Sports - Not only was he the greatest basketball player of all-time, but he also decided that he would try to be a professional athlete in a sport that he hadn't played since high school!! Maybe he sucked at it, but he was still athletic enough to last hit 3 home runs, and have 51 RBI's in the minors.
2) Gambling - The only thing that Michael may have loved more than beating the hell out of people in sports was gambling. He was in Atlantic City the night before playing a playoff game against the Knicks in 1993 and is rumored to have lost 1.25 million dollars while playing a round of golf.
3) Hall of Fame - Say what you will about accepting the honor of going into the hall of fame with grace and humility, Jordan built the NBA and basketball into what it is. Also he played the game with grace and humility, so if he wants to take a couple jabs at Byron Russell, who gives a shit? The man has balls, and he doesn't care about what people think of him. He knows he is the greatest.

We just need to see what Michael will do next. Obviously being a part owner and GM of the Bobcats isn't really working out well. I want to see Michael join the Senior PGA in 10 years and dominate. Barring a complete meltdown in the next 5 years, Michael is a shoe-in

I'm going to lump the next 3 people together because I think they are almost the exact same.

4) Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp, and George Clooney

All three have had great careers as far as actors go. And all three bring something different to the argument, but all three are also lacking in a lot of areas. Pitt will always be a pretty boy. That is how he became famous, and really what he will always be known for. Depp is half crazy which is cool, but he lacks that edge that makes him a Bad Ass. Being artistically eccentric is not really being "Manly" eccentric, I think we all know the difference. Clooney I feel is trying to hard to be a "Manly' man. It's kinda like how Kobe Bryant studied everything that Michael Jordan ever did and mimicked everything right down to the way he talks. Well I feel like Clooney is trying to be a member of the Rat Pack by trying to every one of them.

Sleeper "Man's Man":

Jamie Foxx

Not only did he start off as one of the funniest people on "In Living Color", but he has also turned into a really good actor. He is the current heir to the throne of Eddie Murphy in the "Man's Man" heirarchy. Does he have what it takes? I believe he could. His Resume:

1) Funny - Sure he had some misses with Booty Call and Bait, but he still has a lot of charisma, and is evolving. His standup is good, but not great, however on "In Living Color" he was fantastic.

2) Acting - He has had some great roles lately, and seems to be getting better. I wasn't a huge fan of Any Given Sunday, but you have to love "Steamin" Willie Beamin. He was fantastic in Ray, and also in Ali and Collateral. All three of thosee were solid movies, and he played the roles he had perfectly.

3) Balls - You wanna know what is crazy? Stepping into the ring with Mike Tyson when he was in his prime. You wanna know what is crazier than that? Doing an impression of Mike Tyson while he is in his prime and WHILE HE IS IN THE AUDIENCE!! Jamie did this, gotta love it.

4) Partying - It is a well documented fact that Jamie Foxx's house is like the Playboy Mansion without the tackiness and the corpses walking around in smoking jackets.

5) Interviews - He is one of the top 5 best people to be on a late night talk show. If you ever see that he is going to be on Conan or Letterman, Tivo it because it is going to be hilarious.

Foxx has already made the jump that Eddie Murphy hasn't made yet, he just needs the one really amazing moment to cement him in the "Man's Man" conversation.
I for one feel that we need a few new "Man's Men", but I'm not about to go grasping at the first person I see. We need someone to take us away from the reality TV shows, and stop us from listening to Cold Play and John Mayer. We need someone to remind us that women are the ones who get manicures, pedicures, waxed, and their eyebrows done. Dammit we need mustaches and chest hair again, so I want you to join me in a quest to find a new "Man's Man"!

So there it is. Please feel free to e-mail us at durtybutter@gmail.com or comment below if there is anyone you think I left out or somebody that should not be on the list.

Deron Williams Commercial

2009-10-19T23:10:00.002-05:00

Here is something to take your mind off of how horrible Illinois Football has been.

Stay tuned for Illinois basketball previews. It should give you something to look forward to that isn't an Illini Loss!!

Should Zook be let go?

2009-10-19T21:22:00.002-05:00

I missed the game this weekend thank god, but that doesn't mean that I didn't watch the game again. People tried to talk me out of it, but I wouldn't listen, I had to see the carnage with my own 2 eyes. To be honest I have never seen a team like this Illini team. It is a horrible combination of bad coaching, bad decisions, and terrible luck. Usually during a loss of any team that I follow, I have a couple of questions that I want answered (none of them can be of course).

1) How is it possible to let Indiana score 10 points in 55 seconds without there being a turnover involved?
2) How can you score a touchdown, and then get a fumble on the kickoff to get the ball back, and not score in the red zone?
3) How can you be a fourth year starter at QB in a spread offense and fumble at the 5 yard line?
4) How do you get a stop on 3rd down and then have a 5 yard punt hit your defensive tackle for a fumble?
5) How do you go down 20 points with 10 minutes left, and then have a drive that eats up 6 minutes to cut the lead to 13?
6) How do you finally make a good catch this season and then get an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty to take you out of field goal range?
7) How do you get the ball back into the Red Zone with about 1 minute left, and not try to score or use the 2 timeouts left so that maybe you can try an onside kick and maybe salvage your team's season, and also your career?
8) How do you actually allow your defense to finally play tight on receivers, and then drop 2 easy interceptions?

I have never in my long life of watching sports seen a coach literally give up on his team like Zook and company did with the Illini on Saturday. It was absolutely disgusting. I can handle the losing, I really can. I have witnessed so many Illinois Football losses since 1999 when I first attended an Illini game, that I have become numb to the disappointment. Getting excited about Illini basketball in the middle October is just like getting excited about Christmas after Thanksgiving for an Illini fan. We are all used to it. However I have never in the last 10 years witnessed a coach give up during a game. I hope all of you realize that this is what happened. There is no other explanation for what happened at the end of the game. Ron Zook took off his headset with over 30 seconds left, when the team that he is the leader of was still trying to score. You could tell that Zook realized at that moment that it was all over for him. Here is what killed me about this:

Jack Ramsey caught a ball at the 4 yard line with 20 seconds left. Instead of using one of the 2 timeouts left to stop the clock and throw in the end zone a couple of times, Illinois walks up to the line of scrimmage and then runs a zone read option, and Juice gets tackled outside of the end zone.

I understand that the odds of Illinois scoring a touchdown, getting the on-side kick, and then completing a hail mary to win the game are about 1 in a 1,000,000,000,000, but to not even try is absolutely disgusting!!! Every person who is attached to the Illini, whether they are players, fans, alumni, parents, whatever, deserve better.

There are a lot of programs out there that have fans and alumni who have this unwarranted sense of entitlement. For some reason, they feel that they are owed a winning program because they spent 4 years drinking beer and occasionally going to class at that institution. They feel that because they donate a few hundred or few thousand dollars to the athletic department, that they should win a national championship every year, and if that does not happen, they should be allowed to scream at the top of their lungs to get the coach fired. Illini Nation is not this type of fanbase. The delusional idiots that propagate these other rabid fanbases are the exception at Illinois, not the rule.

This is why I am so disheartened with what occurred Saturday night in Bloomington. All that I ask as an Illini fan is that we compete for 60 minutes. I want a team that no matter how bleak the outcome might seem, they will not give up. That is what I feel entitled to. That is why I chose to watch the game after I already knew we just lost probably the worst game in the Ron Zook era. So what happens now? I really am not interested to see how the players respond to this loss, or the last 4 losses for that matter. I really want to see how Zook responds.

I know pretty much everyone wants Ron Zook fired at this point, and I can only come up with one argument as to why he shouldn't be fired. Ron Zook is the best recruiter in the nation. Now follow along here because this is not an idea that can be easily accepted.

Illinois is a horrible program. It has been for as long as anyone can remember. No one can come in here and recruit players like Ron Zook can. Why do you think there was such an uproar when Arrelious Benn and Martez Wilson committed to the Illini? Everyone in the country accused Zook of paying off his recruits. How else could he land 2 Blue Chip recruits at Illinois? Illinois is not USC, Notre Dame, or Florida. Hell we aren't even Iowa. High School kids do not want to come here to play. Rashard Mendenhall was the best recruit that Ron Turner ever got, the list that Zook has gotten is star studded. If we lose Ron Zook, then we lose the pipelines to Florida, Washington D.C., and also even Ohio. Sure he had a great recruiter in Mike Locksley, and has a great recruiter in Reggie Mitchell, but make no mistake, Ron Zook is the Mariano Rivera of recruiting, he is a hall of fame closer.

What needs to happen at Illinois is all of the assistant coaches accept for Mitchell need to go. The two headed monster of Dan Disch and Curt Mallory at defensive coordinator is a bad experiment that keeps getting worse. I have already voiced my opinion on Schultz at offensive coordinator, and it is safe to say that the only coach who has done a worse job than Schultz is the offensive line coach.

Now getting rid of the assistants is only the first step. The most important thing to understand about Zook is that from all reports, he is a micro-manager. He needs to be told that if he wants to still be a coach, he needs to change his system, and allow his coordinators to have room to operate their system. What is more important than getting rid of the assistants is to hire a defensive coordinator who is accustomed to game planning against spread offenses. 3 years ago, there were only a handful of teams in the Big Ten who ran a spread offense. Now the only teams that don't run some type of spread are Iowa, Wisconsin and Michigan State. It has been said that Mallory and Disch are running the system that Ron wants, Zook needs to step back and realize that his philosophy on defense is completely flawed. How else do you explain how many quarterbacks and receivers have career bests against Illinois? If he hires an aggressive coordinator and accepts the fact that you need to put pressure on receivers and QB's to force them to make mistakes, then the defense can be salvaged.

If he wants to keep Schultz, that is fine, but he needs to realize in a god damn hurry that the Big Ten is not the Mountain West. Sure every year you might have a good team like Utah, but every week is a dog fight in the Big Ten. There aren't too many Wyomings, San Diego States, or New Mexicos on your conference schedule. And obviously 6 months was not enough time for him to learn what his offensive personnel was good at, so hopefully another year might help. Schultz was made for the Big Ten 10 years ago. 3 yards and a cloud of dust is over, and the sooner that Schultz realizes that, the better.

The only problem I see with firing Zook now is that there aren't too many people who will want this job. Sure Illinois just built a great new weight room and the facilities and resources are good, but with all of the jobs that open up in the SEC, ACC and Big 12 every year, I don't think Illinois is as attractive as most people believe. Coaches like Brian Kelly, and Mike Peterson aren't about to leave Cincinnati or Boise State for the likes of Illinois. For better, or more than likely worse, I think Illinois is stuck with Ron Zook.

Weekly Pick'em

2009-10-16T15:11:00.002-05:00

The Weekly pick'em was a main stay of Durty Butter last year, and I know a lot of you made a lot of money off of me. I get thousands of e-mails a day asking for my help again, so here it is. The Durty Butter Weekly pick'em is back and better than ever. Part of the reason that I haven't had a pick'em yet was because I needed a week where I thought that Illinois could cover. Well folks we finally have it. Before we get to the picks though, I have a few things that I would like to get off of my chest.

1) I have already talked at great length about how baseball is the dumbest sport in the world right? Well if you haven't heard my reasons, I'll go over a couple of them for you real fast. First, you have 2 different leagues that have separate rules. How damn dumb is that? There is no set rules for baseball. Second, the field of play is different. How the hell can you compare records, wins/loses, and batting stats when in one park you only have to hit the ball 320 feet down the line for a home run, or another one all you have to do is pull the ball to left field 250 feet and bounce the thing of a big frickin wall??? They might as well also be able to move the pitchers mounds too. The next point is based more on stupidity than anything. In April, it is generally still pretty damn cold in the northern part of the country and also rainy, yet in 3 weeks it will warm up and be sunshine and happiness all around. Even animals know this. It is inborn in them to move south until the weather warms up. Yet the MLB in the infinite stupidity will still schedule games in the northern part of the country for the first 2 weeks, and they are either rained out, or are so god damn cold that people feel like they are at a Bears game.

You know why people can stand cold weather at a football game, but not at a baseball game? Because baseball is boring as shit!!! Are you gonna stand up and cheer for every ground out to 2nd? Hell no. However at a football game, there are things to stand up and cheer for on pretty much every play. A sack, a big hit, 3rd down, a run over 5 yards, a pass that is over 20 yards, and every score and consequent kickoff, cheerleaders, a punt return of more than 10 yards, 4th down and either team is going for it, hot chicks dancing. Baseball you stand up when the guy next to you has to go take a leak because he just pounded his 17th Old Style.

I bring this up because right now I am watching a playoff game that started at 3 o'clock in the afternoon on a Friday! WHAT?? There are only 2 series going on right now. How the hell can you not schedule this for after 5? If this was the Cubs, or Sox, or Cardinals I would probably want to watch it because I have a vested interest in those teams, but screw you MLB, I'm not going to leave work or school 2 hours early for some horseshit game with 2 teams I don't care about because you are that conceited!! It's Friday night, people can stay up late to watch baseball. You have no problem having a 9:30 P.M. Central start on a god damn Tuesday night when the Cubs or Cards are in San Diego, forcing all of us that don't live in the hell hole known as California to stay up until 2 A.M. for a meaningless game. Yet for the Division series, you start it at 3 P.M. Central?? Does no one west of the Mississippi River work past noon on Fridays? Have we adopted the European tradition of a Siesta during the afternoon, and nobody remembered to tell the Midwest and East Coast? You couldn't start one of these games at 5 P.M. and then have the next one at 8 P.M.? Oh no, you couldn't do that because your games take for god damn ever to play!!! I'm actually surprised that this game didn't start at noon for fear that it might overlap with 8 P.M. start of the Yankees game. Screw you baseball!!!

One final thought. Every day when I turn on the TV, there is some type of NASCAR on. I thought that people who sat around for hours at a time and watched cars drive in circles over and over where absolutely batshit crazy. However I have found a group that has to be clinically insane...... People who watch the Time Trials!!!! At least when you are watching races, there are other cars around, and they are.. well... racing. But the people who are watching the Time Trials, holy crap!!! These people need to be in a padded room with a facemask on so they don't try and eat the door knob off. They literally watch a car drive in circles. That's it. And they watch a clock to see if that car did it faster than another car, because the other car already drove in circles by itself. ONE...............CAR.............AT..............A.............TIME!!! Absolutely blew my mind!!

On to my picks

OHIO STATE (-14) @ PURDUE

Ohio State like every year has a phenomenal defense. They have 2 pretty good running backs, and have a QB who can beat you with his legs and his arm. Terrell Pryor has digressed a little bit in passing this season, but that doesn't really matter too much because the rest of the team around him is solid. The only problem that OSU has had is really putting up huge numbers on Offense, but playing Purdue should change that. Now the 2 big time opponents that Purdue has played, they have actually had a shot to beat in Oregon and Notre Dame. The common factor with both those teams is that their defense was crap. If Purdue scores more than 2 touchdowns I will be shocked. Purdue hasn't been able to stop anyone, and Ohio State is going to run the ball down their throats. Just a little background. Ohio State shut out Illinois and Toledo (Toledo Crushed Colorado and dropped 31 on Purdue) and only gave up 18 to USC. Also last week Ohio State was a 14 point favorite against Undefeated Wisconsin and covered that spread easily. Purdue is not Wisconsin.

USC (-10) @ NOTRE DAME

Notre Dame is not good. You have obviously heard all of the talk about the great comeback wins that they have had, and how Front Butt is finally turning this program around and blah blah blah. They have given up 30 points in 3 of their last 4 games, and none of those teams were ranked. Only Michigan State was really any good. USC has the best defense in football. This is not Purdue, Jimmy Clausen is not going to be everyones dark horse Heisman Candidate after this one.
Washington pulled off the one PAC-10 upset that always happens every year to USC by winning 16-13. Ohio State managed 15 points against USC in a loss. Other than that USC has given up 4 field goals in 3 games. Notre Dame will rush for less than 50 yards, and Golden Boy Jimmy is gonna be scraped up off the turf a lot. The only thing that could possibly change this is if USC takes Notre Dame lightly, but that won't happen. Every year Pete Carroll and USC takes one team lightly, they lose, and then they run the score up on everyone else to try to get back into the National Championship. This is the year that it could actually happen, because Florida, Alabama, and Texas are the only legitimate teams that could go undefeated, but UF and Bama have to play each other. USC will look to get a good win on their resume, and even though Notre Dame isn't a good team, everyone treats them like a BCS bowl team, so USC will use that.

IOWA (+3) @ Wisconsin

Iowa has played great against good teams, and has let bad teams stay close to them. A shocking fact, Iowa's best games have come on the road, in wins at Iowa State and Penn State. Iowa is great against the run as always, and Wisconsin relies on the run way too much as always. Nothing that Wisconsin has done has impressed me. After watching Michigan State beat Illinois I realized that MSU is a very sloppy team. They should have destroyed Illinois after Zook gave them a 2 quarter head start. So beating them at home is not that great of a feat. Wisconsin should not be favored in this game at all. If you are looking for a game to tease, take Iowa +9. If Iowa somehow manages to lose this, it will be by less than 3, let alone 9. This should be a classic Big Ten football game. I don't see either team moving the ball very much, and it will come down to the defenses, and Iowa's is much better than Wisconsin's.

TEXAS (-3) vs. OKLAHOMA

The Red River Shootout!!! I love this game. I hate both teams, but I love watching this game. Defenses be damned, these games are legitimate shootouts!! Not so much that the score is always high because its not, it's just the atmosphere. Oklahoma has gotten the best of Texas winning 6 of the last 9. Last year, Texas beat Oklahoma, but still got screwed out of the National Championship game by a crazy tie-break system. Oklahoma has lost much more talent from last year than Texas has, and Sam Bradford did not look great coming off his injury last week, and by great I mean he is nowhere near where he was last season when he won the Heisman. Oklahoma went from a National Champion contender to having 2 losses already. You can't put those losses on losing Bradford, because if this team was as good as it was supposed to be, they should have found a way to beat BYU and Miami. They did lose by 2 points, but they still didn't win.
Texas hasn't looked great either, but they still have more talent, and they control their own destiny for a National Championship. Bradford and Tebow have gotten there, the only one that hasn't is McCoy. This year is tailor made for Texas to run the table and make it. I don't see them screwing it up now. Also just for fun, watch Jordan Shipley. He is the most exciting white receiver in the NCAA since Larry Fitzgerald. (I know Larry Fitzgerald is black, but that is the whitest name ever).

ILLINOIS (-3) @ INDIANA

I am picking this for a number of reasons. First I hate the entire state of Indiana. It is a hell hole that has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. If you are from Indiana and I have offended you, GOOD, you should take offense, and feel free to stop reading my blog, I could care less. Second, my hatred for Indiana basketball will 1) never die and 2) has now spilled over to football. Next, if we lose to Indiana, I might stop watching college football all together, and I really don't want to do that because I love college football. And finally when it comes to actual football: It doesn't matter how horrible our coaching is, and it doesn't really matter how many dumb mistakes we make, Indiana is just a dogshit football team, and we are more talented.
Illinois has lost to Mizzou who was ranked, Ohio State who is ranked, Penn State who is ranked, and Michigan State who is a decent football team.
Indiana beat Eastern Kentucky by 6, Western Michigan by 4, and Akron by 17. They should have beat a bad Michigan team, but instead shit the bed at the end of that game, and then got crushed by Virginia this last weekend, and Ohio State the weekend before. For the record the only BCS conference team that has been worse than Indiana in the recent past is Virginia!! They have 2 good defensive ends, and that's it.

I have always had the strategy that you should never bet a game based on how bad an opponent is, but instead on how good you think your team is. Well, screw that, because both of these teams are garbage. The only thing about this game, is that in the mind of the Illini football team, this game means much more. Illinois needs this win to get their season back on track. If they want to make a bowl game (they won't), they need to beat up on Indiana, Purdue and Northwestern. Also if Ron Zook doesn't think that this game will determine his future at Illinois, all he has to do is sit back and watch the fallout on Sunday if they blow this game.

Illinois spent a lot of money to redo Memorial Stadium, and if they think that people will come out to support a team that didn't make a bowl game 2 years in a row and had losses to the likes of Indiana the previous season, they also need to be in a padded room. No Juice Williams and no Arrelious Benn, the recruits that have committed are wavering, what is there to excite people for next season? Eddie McGee? We already played that hand, and we lost our ass. Make no mistake, anything short of a blowout for Illinois is detrimental to this team. This is the biggest game that Ron Zook has coached at Illinois, and he better know that.

Fixing the Illini

2009-10-13T19:33:00.002-05:00

Enough ranting, raving, and bitching. Now that the Illini are 1-4 and the season outlook seems really bleak. After listening to podcasts, and reading message boards and newspaper articles, it seems like everyone has a different person to blame for why Illinois is losing. I also have plenty of people to blame, but instead of doing just that, we at Durty Butter are going to tell you exactly what Illinois needs to do in order to maybe finish 6-6 and make a horrible bowl game.

1) Let Juice throw the ball/play.

Juice can't throw 5 yard outs, and he can't really throw bubble screens. In order for the Illini offense to be good, we need to have crossing routes and deeper routes where Juice is forced to either fire the ball in, or put a little touch on the ball. Juice's arm strength does not allow him to throw the ball with any touch inside of 10 yards. Beyond 10 yards, he has good touch, he makes great throws down the sidelines, its just that Fayson and Cumberland haven't been able to catch them. We have all seen the great throws that Juice has made in his 3+ years. If you don't agree, then you are an idiot and should start hitting yourself in the head with a tack hammer because your brain is useless anyways. Where Juice gets in trouble is short timing routes that make him lock on to a receiver. Eliminate those, and Isiah can be a solid QB.
Eddie McGee should only enter the game if Juice is hurt. And by hurt I mean that both of his arms are broken. I have been a Ron Zook apologist for the last 5 seasons, but last week I couldn't take it anymore. Feel free to go back and read my post about how terrible Eddie was going to be. I really love to say "I told you so", so Will, I told you so. If anyone still has any doubts about Ron Zook's coaching ability, you need to look no further than the fact that he has yet to say that Juice is starting this week. Both players are taking equal snaps in practice!! I am appalled, and if Eddie starts, or heaven forbid, even plays, I will never forgive Zook. Not making a bowl last season was bad enough, but becoming the BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT IN COLLEGE FOOTBALL is unforgivable. Which brings me to my next point.

2) Zook needs to swallow his pride a little bit

First example is the Eddie McGee fiasco. By benching Juice, Zook basically gave the Spartans a 2 quarter and 24 point head start. And according to him, it wasn't the fact that Eddie went 2-11 with a pick 6 and 60 yards of offense that led to him getting benched. No, it was the look on his face after the interception. Screw his look!!! Are you out of your god damn mind?! You have 60,000 people in the stadium, and thousands more at home that want to see the team win a god damn game, or at least compete in one!! Zook would rather see his players look like they are trying to perform, rather than perform. I for one am not going to pay 50 bucks to drive down to Champaign to watch this shit anymore, and there are a lot of other people who have joined me.

Second example is the defense. Zook will not allow his secondary to play tight on people until the game gets out of hand, and we know that the team plans on running the ball for 2 quarters. Zook isn't a god damn mind reader, and I have news for you, neither is Urban Meyer, Mack Brown, or Pete Carroll. You don't win a damn football game with the game plan you came up with on Monday morning!! Ohio State threw the ball 2 times in the first half of a down pour, yet Zook would not put 8 people in the box to stop the run. Mizzou never wanted to throw the ball past 10 yards, yet Zook didn't want to tighten his coverage. Penn State was content to run the ball, and also throw less than 10 yards, and Zook neither placed a safety in the box, or brought up his corners. How hard is it to try and take away what the other teams offense wants to do and make them change their gameplan?

The last example is Mike Schultz. Zook obviously does not want to admit that allowing Schultz to change the philosophy of the offense was a mistake, and that Schultz needs to adjust his play-calling in order to adapt to his players. After the first damn game every Illini fan saw the flaw in Schultz play-calling!!! We threw one pass over 20 yards when the strength of our offense was our receivers and a QB who can throw it deep. Yet now 5 games into the season, we still don't open up the playbook until the middle of the 3rd quarter when we are down by 3 touchdowns.

3) We need to pick up the pace on offense

I find it really humorous how the last 10 or so games that we have played, when Juice is getting drilled in the backfield or basically running for his life on every other play people don't really seem to care. However, all it takes is 2 quarters of Eddie McGee looking like shit and people are starting to realize that our offensive line is crap. You know why our line was good 3 years ago? It really didn't have a ton to do with the talent, it had a lot to do with the tempo that we ran our offense. Locksley loved to hurry up after a big pass or long run, it was his calling card. By doing this you catch everyone on the defense off guard, but especially the lineman. Here are 5 things that happen when you run a hurry up, or no-huddle when the other team doesn't expect it.

1) You don't allow the other team to substitute. Either they have to keep the same people on the field or call a timeout. Who does this hurt the most? The big ass defensive lineman.
2) The defensive lineman don't stunt at all. Basically all 4 of the them are coming straight at the offensive line, there are no tricks or surprises.
3) The defense can't call a blitz. If a blitz does come, it is very vanilla in the fact that it is usually just a linebacker.
4) You know exactly what personnel is on the field. If the team is set in a nickel, you can run the hell out of the ball, if they have a 4-3, you can assume that they will either be in man coverage, or 2 linebackers will be dropping out into a zone coverage.
5) Your team is reacting instead of thinking. You will limit the amount of dumbshit false starts and holding penalties that our O-Line loves to get because their assignments are basic.

You want to know why we could move the ball so well last season, but got bogged down inside the 20? It was because we could move when ever we wanted when we picked up the pace, but inside the 20 we slowed down, and then defenses were able to take advantage of our weaknesses. We didn't have a power back like Mendenhall, who could not only run it in, but could keep defenses honest with a play action fake. We were afraid to try and run the ball. We relied to heavily on the pass towards the end of the season, that teams would pin their ears back and take advantage of our 2 Freshman offensive tackles. Our line and QB got worn down, and we couldn't rely on Dufrene to carry the load, and we had 2 true freshman trying to help him out.

Here is the secret to our success in 2007: In a 13 game season we only had 17 touchdowns that were scored from 10 yards or less. 5 were scored from 10-20 yards out, and 18 were plays that were 20 or more yards. Think about that! We had less touchdowns within 10 yards as we did outside of 20. 8 of those were running plays, but 10 were still touchdown passes of over 20 yards. The sad thing is, is that isn't even in the game plan anymore. We were able to do this with a Sophomore QB who was coming off one of the worst seasons that an Illini QB has ever had throwing the football, and a receiving corps that was led by Freshman Arrelious Benn, Jacob Willis, Jeff Cumberland, Brian Gamble and Kyle Hudson. Not the most talented group, but we caught people off guard by our changing of the tempo.

4) We need to cause turnovers.

It has gotten to the point of the season where we can no longer sit back and watch other teams beat the shit out of our defense in the first 2 quarters of the game. I was asked last week why we don't have many turnovers. We actually get a decent amount of fumbles, but we don't get any picks for the 2nd straight year. Last season we had 6 (2 were courtesy of Eastern Illinois) this season so far we only have 3 (2 were courtesy of Illinois State). This is probably the most glaring deficiency of our team because it's not like the Big Ten is putting out quarterbacks in the First Round every year. Here is what needs to happen in this order:

1) We need to play tighter on the wide receivers and disguise our coverages more. If I see another corner playing a zone coverage in the flat not at least bump the receiver off his route before the guys flies past him, I'm going to kill somebody. This is not the corners fault, because this happens all of the time, so this has to be a Zook philosophy. Bumping the receiver throws the timing of the route off!!! And guess what, this is actually legal in the NCAA!! Why on God's lovely green earth would you rather have a receiver get a free release when bumping him is an option????

2) With the coverage tighter, it will take away quick routes that are consistently thrown and completed on us. Teams like Mizzou and Northwestern will no longer be able to complete slants, drags, 5 yard outs and 7 yard stops on us when ever they fell like it. When you take away quick routes, you allow your defensive line a chance to actually get a pass rush. With how quickly teams get rid of the ball against us, there could be 3rd grade girls playing on the offensive line, and the D-Line still wouldn't be able to get to the QB.

3) With pressure, QB's make poor decisions, and a scrambling QB is less accurate than one who can sit in the pocket. By actually playing man occasionally with safeties over the top, you no longer have QB's just throwing the ball to an open spot, and a receiver just running to that spot. You might actually have a defender there to make a play on the ball. In order to do this though, Garrett Edwards can not be in the game. He is the perfect safety for a loose cover 2, or cover 3 because he has enough speed to get to a receiver after he has caught the ball. In the current defense all he has to do is make sure that he is in position to make a tackle. Go back to Penn State and Michigan State and look at how many times the ball was thrown over the top of the corner and in front of Edwards. It is staggering. Bottom line, the idea that we don't want to give up big plays is useless, because instead of giving up big plays, we just allow teams to march on us and score a touchdown and use up 7 minutes of the game clock. It is time we played a little risk reward defense.

4) Stop using a delayed blitz. If teams are already getting rid of the ball as fast as they can, what the shit is sending your middle linebacker on a delayed blitz going to do? If you are going to continue to do this, then the corners have to be allowed to jump routes, otherwise all you are doing is opening up the middle of the field to a TE or a receiver slanting across the middle. If you are going to blitz, then time the damn thing right. Also perhaps a weak side blitz more often would be great. Ian Thomas almost killed Pryor from Ohio State, and we have brought the corner a couple of times, but not nearly enough.

That is basically it. A lack of pressure allows QB's to get comfortable and get into a rhythm. They don't have to make spectacular throws, because there is really no one there to defend the pass, and they don't have to do it on the run because they aren't holding on to the ball long enough to get rushed.

Here is the bottom line: I feel as though you can't really place too much blame on the players because they are not being placed in a position to maximize their potential. Plain and Simple, it is the coaches fault. Sure the defense misses tackles occasionally, but that is going to happen when you are running 10 yards to a spot and trying to make a play on a receiver that has already caught the ball and is turning up field. And really does it matter? What is the difference on 3rd and 5 if the receiver picks up 8 or 12 yards? You still conceded the first down when you lined up 7 yards off the ball, and your first move was to back peddle.
I even can't blame the offensive line for giving up so many sacks, because by the 3rd quarter even the lady selling nachos knows that the Illini are going to drop back and pass, so teams are blitzing the hell out of them.
I can't blame the running backs for not playing better because they each only get 7 carries, and everyone knows that they are either running a zone read in the middle, an off tackle zone read, or an option to the trips side of the field. Its like going on a blind date and bringing your friends and family along to tell stories about how you peed your pants in kindergarten, how you cried at the end of Titanic, and how you have probably spent more time in a strip club in the last 10 years than you have inside of a church. You don't really have a strippers chance in heaven do you?
I also can't blame the QB's or receivers, because you are running and throwing routes that you are not comfortable doing. No one on this team should have to try and catch a pass from Juice while running a 5 yard drag because no one can. (Rejus was actually the one who dropped this one, and even though the commentator got on Juice about it, the ball hit him in the hands, and was in front of him).
It has gotten to the point now with this team where no one has any confidence in any of their abilities. Not one person was put into a position to excel or succeed because they were going to be put in a position where their talents were enhanced (except maybe Garrett Edwards) The only thing that I can safely predict is that Donsay Hardemann will hit somebody hard against Indiana. Thats it. Other than that, all we can do is pray that Indiana is worse than we are.

Illini - Penn State recap

2009-10-05T23:15:00.003-05:00

While most people won't believe this, Illinois has been getting better. In St. Louis they played terrible the whole game. Against Ohio State, they played a very good first quarter except for a Juice Williams interception. Finally this last weekend, Illinois played about as good as they could have against Penn State for more than 2 quarters. All week long I tried to talk myself and whomever else would listen to me into believing that all the offense needed was one big play. A long touchdown pass or run, and this offense would be jump started. Well that didn't happen, and now we are moving on to back-up Eddie McGee (at least for 3 series).

Here is the bottom line: Before this season started everyone knew Illinois' defense wasn't going to shut anyone down. What we all expected though was that the offense would put up enough points that the short-comings in the defense wouldn't cost us games. Well almost the complete opposite has happened. The defense in the last 2 games has played well enough early to allow our offense to get going. The offense however has not accomplished this, and eventually our defense gets exposed and makes mistakes. Is Eddie McGee the answer? Hell no! Although, right now this is the only choice you can make as a coach since unlike the NFL, you can't fire assistants during the season.

For the most part I have to lay the blame with Mike Schultz who is the Illini's new offensive coordinator. He is to blame not because he is calling terrible games. Mike needs to accept blame here because he is trying to change what this team does well due to his play calling. Illinois ran the ball 35 times against Penn State. 20 times by Juice Williams. 6 of those were scrambles, 2 were sacks, 2 were option keepers, and 4 were Juice keeping the ball on the zone read option.

Out of the other 15 runs, 7 were zone reads, 3 were options, and 5 came out of regular or jumbo sets. The only complaints I have about running the ball is that when we run the option, on all but one play it was to the short side of the field with 3 receivers on that side. It worked in the first half, but then in the second half, Penn State was ready for it, and so Illinois went away from it. Would it be out of the question to run the option to the long side of the field, or away from the trips? I personally love the option because it causes the defense to play assignment football. If any of the defenders who are play side make a mistake or are out of position, a small gain can turn into a very big play. Also is it possible to run the ball a little more in sets that are not shotgun? Can we run the option with the QB under center? Our running plays are so predictable out of shotgun. Speed Option, Zone Read, QB draw. Thats it.

Where I have to question the play calling is when you don't try to pick up the pace and get the defense on their heels. I understand that at the end of the half and the end of the game, Penn State was trying to not give up a big play. However, the rest of the game Illinois played very methodically and did the same thing they have for 4 games, which was run the ball, and throw screens or have 5 yard routes.

Juice threw the ball 5 times in the first quarter and the first play of the second half. Only one of those was a pass past 5 yards. Juice did scramble 2 times on pass plays, but 7 passes out of 20, and only one past 5 yards is disgusting. I can't believe that Shultz doesn't believe that his offense is capable of stretching the field, but I can't come to any other conclusion. I am tired of seeing 5-10 screens a game. When you are either running the ball, or throwing short routes, who is a screen pass going to fool? Only after Illinois got down by a touchdown did Juice finally throw a deep pass, and it was for 50 yards to Benn to set up Illinois' field goal. When Illinois got the ball back with 1:31 left in the half at their own 2 yard line, we saw probably the best play call of the season from Schultz. A play action pass to Duvalt for 20 yards, and then Illinois sped up because they had to. On that drive, Juice did a great job of making good passes and moving the team. He completed passes of 20, 20, 10, 15 and ran for 8 on a draw, all in less than a minute. He was partly to blame for the intentional grounding, but Ryan Palmer didn't even touch the defensive end who got to Juice. Just like every other game, the offense, especially the offensive line, pulled out the shotgun and took direct aim at their foot. Even still, Illinois was only down 7-3.

In the second half, Illinois started by running 3 straight plays to the short side of the field, and shockingly they were plays that they ran a ton in the first half. A QB draw by Juice, an option to the short side (which was brought back by a hold on Ryan Palmer), and then a screen to Dufrene. Finally Juice got sacked on 3rd and 14.

After Penn State scored to get the game to 14-3, guess what Illinois ran when they got the ball back? First down was actually a pass that Juice threw incomplete terribly to Fayson, the on 2nd and 10 it was a 1 yard zone read to Dufrene (or Dushane if you are Mike Patrick), then a 2 yard screen to Dufrene on 3rd and 9.

After Penn State scored again to go up 21-3 can you guess what Illinois did? They actually tried to pass on first down again but Juice scrambled for 7 yards. So it is 2nd and 3, you have just gone 3 and out twice in a row, and now the game is getting away from you, so what do you call. Perhaps a run or draw to get the first down so your defense can get a little rest? A play action pass and perhaps take a shot down field, if it falls incomplete, you are still at 3rd and 3 or maybe juice can scramble for the first down? Nope, you run a wide receiver screen, and lose 8 yards. Now you have 3rd and 11, and Juice has to check down to Jason Ford for a 9 yards reception.

By the time that Illinois got the ball back, it didn't matter anymore, so now Illinois started to speed up and throw the ball downfield. By this point, Penn State really didn't care, and had a lot of back-ups in the game.

So here is my point: Illinois has gone from one of the most explosive offenses in the Big Ten the last 2 seasons, to being one of the most predictable and cautious offenses. Now last season I was screaming for a team that would run the ball. Now we have one, but it has come at the expense of the deep passing game. We are starting to see it, but only when we are behind. I understand that on pass plays that Juice scrambled on we might have had routes that were longer, but you have to believe that a Juice scramble has a much better chance of being successful than a wide receiver screen!! I feel like the coaches can't be on the same page, or they are completely delusional as to what their players are capable of. We probably saw the best game that our defense is going to play all season, and you have all figured out that the ball control offense is a terrible experiment. If you are going to run the ball, then run it and then maybe take a shot here or there on deeper routes, but stop throwing screens and 7 yards curls that your QB can't throw, and your receivers can't catch. You want a breakdown of what Illinois runs: Zone read option, QB draws, Speed option to the short side of the field, running back screen to trips side, wide receiver screen. As long as Illinois isn't in the 2 minute drill or behind by 70 points, these plays are going to be run 75% of the time. Hopefully playing a team other than the top 2 of the Big Ten will help this team out a little bit, but without Juice taking snaps we have to hope a guy who put up 210 total yards against ISU can lead us to a bowl game.

Eddie is QB, time to pack it in for 2010

2009-10-05T17:13:00.003-05:00

Well Ron Zook finally did something. Although instead of learning how to adjust at halftime, or going back to the basics that made your QB the all-time leader in yards, it was bench him. After 2 good quarters of football, and then 3 bad offensive series, Illinois was basically out of the game. And now it is Ron Zook's time to panic. Congrats Ron, because most of Illini Nation panicked as soon as Arrelious Benn injured his ankle during the Mizzou game. Although to be completely fair, this probably was not Zook's decision, it was Mike Schultz's. It is glaringly obvious that Juice Williams is not suited to run what Schultz wants him to. It is also glaringly obvious that Schultz has taken a QB who broke 3 stadium records last season and destroyed all of his talent, skill, and confidence.

If Shultz has his way, which it is obvious now that he will, Illinois will basically run the zone read, and throw screens to its running backs and receivers all day long. There will of course be 2-5 passes over 15 yards, but Eddie can't throw those. Be prepared for these things to occur on Saturday:
1) Eddie will botch at least 3 zone reads
2) Eddie will fumble at least 2 times
3) Eddie will throw an interception on one of the play action passes down the field
4) Eddie will run the ball at least 20 times because he hates to pitch or hand-off on the zone read and option.
5) Rejus will have 5 catches that will amount to either no gain, or at the most 5 yards because they are bubble screens
6) Illinois will go 3 and out at least 4 times in the first half and the defense will get tired just like it did against Penn State.
7) Michigan State is going to blitz the hell out of Eddie because they know that at the first sign of pressure, he is going to tuck the ball and run.
8) Illinois' offense is going to be even more horrific to watch because they are not going to want Eddie to make mistakes. If you thought the Mizzou game was boring to watch, this week will make that offense look like the Saints.

Here is the real question: Is this the same as 2007 when Juice was benched to get his head on straight? Will Zook actually pull Eddie as soon as he starts screwing up, or this a decision for the future? I personally can't imagine that Zook and Co. are giving up on this season, and hoping to get Eddie ready for starting next season. I also can't imagine that the Illinois coaches think that Eddie McGee is the QB who can turn this team around. Before you guys start screaming about how Eddie helped us beat ISU, remember that ISU isn't an FBS school. Also they are 2-3 themselves, and to be honest, Eddie looked completely average in that game. He was 13-17 for 164 yards, and ran 18 times for 55 yards... AGAINST AN FCS SCHOOL!!! Also both times he has gotten to play he threw an interception on his first series, both of which there wasn't a receiver in the area. This hurts the receivers more than anything. The only game that Rejus has played in where he didn't catch a ball was against ISU.

Basically what Illinois is trying to do now is play ball control offense and hope that the defense can keep them in the game. With Juice Williams at QB, every fan in the country was calling for Illinois to open up the playbook and let him throw the ball. That is not what Schultz wants to do at all, so instead of the half hearted attempts we have seen lately, they decided to take Juice out of the equation. They are hoping that Schultz's game plan of running and short passes will work. I for one am not going to hold my breath.

Greatest Fighters

2009-10-01T01:37:00.004-05:00

While we were preparing to watch the Illini get man-handled by Ohio State last Saturday, Pac-man and I started talking about Roy Jones Jr. Now before the invention of the Interweb and subsequently Youtube, when old timers like us would reminisce about things that have happened in our past, the arguments could never be settled. With the wonderful world of the 6% of the Internet that isn't porn, you can now look up these wonderful memories and prove to Pacman that you are right, and he has no clue what the hell he is talking about. The argument started for some unknown reason, but it revolved around the fact that Roy is coming out of retirement and Bernard Hopkins are fighting in 2010. The collective age of these 2 prize fighters? 84 years young.

So what was the argument you ask? Well unlike most arguments, it had nothing to do with my unshakable faith in Illini sports vs. Pacman's utter hatred and despair at the first sign of distress. This argument was basically whether or not Roy Jones Jr. in his prime was the best fighter we have ever seen. So after many minutes of heated debate and name calling, we finally went to Youtube. Below are some of the fighters that we discussed. Believe me, this is a fantastic way to kill a few minutes, and take your mind off of the ass kicking that is likely from Penn State this weekend.

Before we get to Roy here are a couple other fighters that I loved when boxing still existed. The videos are fine, but some of the music is not safe for work, so you might want to mute them.

1) Prince Naseem Hamed
Hamed was probably the only boxer who you could call an entertainer first, then a fighter. Most purists hated him because of his actions not only in the ring, but his ridiculous entrances. Some of my favorites: He came into the ring on a flying carpet. He danced behind a waterfall for about 3 minutes while a highlight reel played on the waterfall itself. The most famous things about Hamed were that he would flip into the ring, and he almost never put his hands up to block punches. He threw punches from ridiculously unorthodox angles, and he knocked the hell out of people.

Hamed finished his career at 36-1 with 31 knockouts. Unfortunately there aren't a lot of great videos of his knockouts. Trust me, he was one of the best knockout artists of all time. I had a lot of sports firsts with Naseem. He was the first fighter I ever bet on. Betting on him was the first time I stopped gambling, and consequently the first time I ever broke anything in a drunken rage.

2) Floyd Mayweather Junior
Floyd Money Mayweather is considered by many as the best pound for pound fighter out there right now. Mayweather does not have the knockout power that most of my favorites have, but he doesn't really have a weakness, and he pretty much dismantles anyone who steps into the ring with him.

For the record that is the worst soundtrack I have ever heard for a boxing highlight tape. Who knew that 16 year old Emo chicks are huge Money Mayweather fans?

Mayweather's record: 40-0 25 knockouts

3) Mike Tyson
Iron Mike Tyson is pretty much my favorite boxer of all-time, but towards the end of his career he became so dependant on the knockout that he would panic when the fight got into later rounds. He would then get sloppy and bite peoples ears off. Although not too many people talk about the fact that Holyfield's best punch in that fight was a head butt, and he used it many times. I know that Evander probably wasn't valedictorian at his high school, but you have to be a little smarter than that. When you are fighting a man who is basically clinically insane, who has been to prison, and was born punching people, getting your ear bitten off because you are head butting this man is probably the best case scenario for you. I have literally spent hours watching Mike Tyson's greatest hits on ESPN. I have actually cancelled plans and watched them over and over. I wonder that says about my psychological make up?

The video starts slow, and the white flashes is probably the dumbest thing I have ever seen. When your video revolves around Mike Tyson hitting people, it is probably the worst thing you can think of to flash the contact out. Anyways, Tyson was made from granite, and was faster than anyone he ever fought. I'm glad that he seems to be doing well these days.
Tyson's record: 50-6 with 44 knockouts. He won his first 19 fights by knockout. He was 37-0 before he lost to Buster Douglas, and then finally lost 5 of his last 12 fights.

4) Roy Jones Jr.
Like Tyson, Jones had the power, speed and defense in his prime. He is probably the fastest puncher I have ever seen. Watch for the 4 left hooks he throws in a row (2:30). It is scary that a human being could punch that hard that fast. He often toyed with his opponents, and since he wasn't a heavyweight, he had to change weight classes constantly in order to get Big-Name fights. My favorite knock-out by Roy is the body shot that he used to knockout Virgil Hill. He broke 2 ribs with that punch. You will see it in video (7:20). Also his knockout of Montell Griffin in the rematch is amazing. It is the last knockout.
A little back story about that fight. Jones was in a pretty good fight against Griffin, and finally scored a knockdown. While Griffin was on a knee, Jones punched him again and was disqualified for his first loss of his career. A rematch was scheduled, and Griffin decided to tell anyone that would listen that the reason that Jones hit him on the ground was because he was afraid that he was going to lose the fight. What did Roy do? Well he destroyed Griffin in 2 minutes and 31 seconds. The first knockdown is awesome, and continuing his track record of being an idiot, Griffin got up and gave us one of the greatest knockouts I have ever seen. Watching him try to get up is like watching an 8 year old try to get up after taking 3 Vicodin and drinking a keg of whiskey.

This is probably the best video out there as far as boxing goes.
Roy's Record: 54-5 with 40 knockouts. He lost 4 of his last 9 fights including 2 to Antonio Tarver whom he beat in their first fight.

Finally with all these knockouts, I would be a crime to not show you probably the best fight of our time. Arturo Gatti vs. Mickey Ward 1 was amazing. This video is pretty good, but it does jump around a little.

I wish I had the number of punches thrown and landed were, but I heard that Gatti averaged 70 punches a round in this fight. Either way, if this is ever on ESPN Classic, or any other channel, watch it. We will be back with an Illini preview for this week, and also we will be bringing back the weekly pick'em.

Martez Wilson Out for Season

2009-09-17T12:32:00.003-05:00

Martez Wilson who sat out the ISU game on Saturday with a neck injury is now out for the season according to pjstar.com

Martez is a Junior who moved to middle linebacker this season after playing his first 2 seasons at weak side linebacker.

Illini ISU recap

2009-09-17T11:18:00.002-05:00

In my last post I created a fantastic list of things that we as Illini Nation needed to see to in order to quell the urge to jump off the Illini football bandwagon, and jump right into a big bottle of scotch. Some of the fears that I had were in fact put to rest, and then a few new fears are now keeping me up at night. Although I like to be over critical, I along with my 7 readers need to all get a grip and realize that it is only the 3rd weekend of the season.

Now everyone has agreed that no matter what Illinois did against ISU, we weren't going to learn alot because the level of talent that ISU brought to Champaign would not give Indiana a game. However there are some things that you could see about the Illinois philosophy this season. Before we move past this game lets recap, and see exactly what areas Illinois improved in, and also where they failed miserably.

The 5 places that I wanted to see Illinois improve in were:
1) Pressure defense
2) Throw deeper routes
3) Substitute Better
4) Coach Better
5) Catch the DAMN BALL!!

1) Pressure defense
Illinois did a much better job of blitzing in this game. On the first series, we saw both a corner and linebacker blitz on the SAME PLAY!! Now this was obviously based on the fact that Illinois knew that ISU's line could not handle the pressure that would occur with a blitz, but it was still nice to see the coaches recognize that.

Also the defensive backs played much tighter in coverage. I know that they still gave up over 300 yards passing, but that is going to happen when when you are winning by 31 at half and the offense can't run the ball. Even on quick throws that were made in zones, the safeties did a much better job of being in position and delivering a big hit! What Illinois did early was negate the 5-7 yard passes on 1st and 2nd down, which allowed them to have more 3rd and longs. Was the secondary fantastic, not by any stretch, but they did actually break up a pass this game. I can live with giving up yards in a game that was decided in during the National Anthem, as long as players don't get lazy and play sloppy in the next game.

Now in the last post I made a comment about playing man against a 5 wide set. That was a completely stupid mistake on my part. There really is absolutely no way that you can play man in a situation like that. What every QB looks for when he drops back to pass is where the safeties are lined up. If you have no safety over the top, chances are the ball is going there. When I said Man-up, I meant to say that you need to play tighter underneath in order to take away quick routes. For the record, I am not admitting that I was wrong, I am admitting that I made a mistake.

2) Throw Deeper Routes
Illinois did try to run more vertical routes in this game. However watching Eddie McGee throw those deep routes made me wish that we used the Mizzou game-plan. The only good thing about having Eddie play in this game was that it put to rest all of the idiotic ranting over the last 2 seasons that Eddie should be our starting QB. Although now the crazies are going to want to have Jacob Charest as the back-up, even though 99% of them have never seen him throw a football.

3) Substitute better
The only receivers that played in the first half were Benn, Fayson, Duvalt, and Sykes for one play. Thank God!! It was first team offense and defense for basically the first 3 quarters of the game. And I'm pretty sure that you never saw a WR group that did not include anyone of the 3 starters.

4) Coach Better
The game plan was obviously much better offensively this game. Schultz wanted to run, then run, and finally run some more. Many of the passes were off of play action, and the receivers were open because the safeties were frozen by the threat of the run. The first play of the game was what I have wanted for 13 games now! I straight speed option, and it worked beautifully.
Defensively, the game plan will never change against a spread team. That is fine by me as long as we allow our secondary to play tighter, and send better blitzes, which did occur. Many of the longer plays that ISU had were due to missed tackles, not because our safeties were playing in the endzone. That is going to happen with a spread offense. It negates gang tackling, so you have to be sound in man on man open field tackling, or else you will get blown out. (See Mizzou 2007 and 2008)

This was not a game where you were going to see Ron Zook and Co. have to make many make or break decisions. The only thing I would have liked to have seen was to go for it on 4th and 2 on the 3rd possession. It didn't matter though because Anthony Santella got crushed on the punt, so Illinois got the ball back anyways. This turned out to be the best play that Santella had all game, but I will get to that later.

5) Catch the Damn Ball
I did not see any receivers drop any balls this game, which was nice. Illinois did not throw very much at all, so this helped the receivers in this category.

Now for the checklist:

1) Run more than we pass, over 200 yards.
Big time. Illinois rushed for 384 yards on 44 carries. For the record, Juice almost had more yards on one carry than Eddie did on 18.

2) At least 1 touchdown over 30 yards
Chris Duvalt 27 yard touchdown catch..... close enough

3) No interceptions or Fumbles
As soon as Eddie stepped on the field, this went out the window. Eddie really needs to take care of the ball on the option. If Juice gets hurt in a meaningful game, one fumble or botched snap could be a difference maker.

4) A touchdown on the first drive
2 plays, 50 yards...... I'll take it.

5) Donsay breaking up a pass with his hands
Had a couple chances, but was a step behind. I'm not giving up yet

6) At least 3 sacks by our DE's or linebackers
1 sack by a DE, and 2 by linebackers.

7) 50 points
45 points with a back-up QB. Close, but ever with Eddie at QB, we still should have scored more

8) Defense giving up less than 6
Epic Fail! Held ISU scoreless in the first half, and then fell asleep in the second half when they had the big lead.

9)No Mistakes in the redzone
The amount of holds in this game was disgusting, especially in the red zone. I will get to this later

10) 1 Interception
2 Interceptions, but none by the DB's

11) Less than 200 yards given up in the air
Epic Fail!! although based on our defense this was more of a dream than health care reform!!

12) No dropped passes!!!
None, thank god!!

Now that we have looked at that, lets actually look at the game. I only have a few points.

First, Juice Williams is our QB and will be until he leaves or gets hurt. I like Eddie McGee. He could be an okay QB next season, but I am so tired of seeing him fumble snaps and hand-offs. He has been running option out of shotgun for 4 years now, and it is the same thing every game. I don't care about how he throws a ball next season, his main goal before 2010 needs to be ball security.

Next, after having a pretty good game against Mizzou and being one of the only bright spots, the offensive line digressed completely. Illinois had 13 penalties, and I am pretty sure that at least 8 of those were holdings by the offensive line. I understand that holding can basically be called on every play, and the refs were really looking for it, but 3 or 4 holdings are too many!!

Finally, the defense needs to tackle better. It is getting redundant, but since the coverage is not going to be tight to break up passes, the defense has to tackle the ball carrier when they do inevitably catch the ball in front of them.

Like I said in the last post, no matter what happens in this game, we weren't going to learn much. Hopefully with a week off before Ohio State Illinois can learn to play like they did during their run to the Rose Bowl.

Things We Need to See

2009-09-10T15:29:00.003-05:00

It still stings! 5 days later it really still stings. I have watched this game more than I have watched Illinois-Ohio State from 2007. I watched the game so much that I'm pretty sure my DVR deleted it automatically because it was worried about me. So now that I have digested the game as much as possible here are some things that I need to see this weekend to give me a glimmer of hope.

1) Pressure Defense

Being not only an Illini fan, but also a Bears fan, watching 2 teams who love the "let them get into field goal range and pray they miss" defense is giving me an ulcer. Seriously. It is not always a cover 2, if we actually ran a cover 2 some of the plays this weekend wouldn't have happened. There were no cornerbacks in the flat, which is what cover 2 is, along with safeties over the top. Illinios plays almost a Cover 4/Prevent Cover 2. When the only people within 10 yards of the line of scrimmage is your 4 down lineman and 2 linebackers, you have a flaw in your defense.

What I want to see is corners no deeper than 5 yards one first and second down, and safeties making the right read and covering the right man in their zone. I can understand keeping players in front of you on 3rd and long, but I am really tired of seeing teams complete 3rd and 15 on us without a DB in sight!!
Also can we stop sending Martez Wilson on a delayed blitz. When was the last time you saw Martez get into the backfield when he blitzed after the ball was snapped? All this does is leave another zone open for a receiver to sit in.
The idea behind playing a "cover 2" is that you can get pressure on a QB fast enough to the point where underneath routes are all he has to throw, and if he does try to force something deeper, corners and safeties are there to make plays. This concept works in the NFL because you rarely see more than 3 receivers sets. So the QB really only has 1 or 2 routes that are short enough, but they are easier to cover because there are only 1 or 2.
When you have 5 wide receivers, and a QB who is getting rid of the ball on 7 yard routes, you have no pressure, and obviously there are holes where receivers are going to sit. Keeping everything in front of you and hoping the offense is going to make a mistake is a horrible way to play football. You don't force the opposing QB to make any decisions. At some point you are going to have to force your DB's to man up and defend. The QB's decision is already made based on where the hole is in a zone with 5 receivers, not based on which receiver has just beat his man. When was the last time you saw Illinois get a sack because a QB held the ball too long because nobody was open? 2001?
Also how is a defense going to show emotion on the field when their scheme is designed to give up yards? If a team throws less than they run against Illinois I will be shocked.

Remember in my last post how I mentioned that teams that run a spread kill Illinois. We should have beaten the last 4 teams that played this style. Mizzou this season, Northwestern, Western Michigan, and Minnesota last season. Here is a look at their leading receivers for those games:

Mizzou - Alexander - 10 rec 132 yards
Northwestern - Peterman - 8 rec 111 yards
W. Michigan - Simmons - 11 rec 174 yards
Minnesota - Decker- 9 rec 86 yards

These were not ranked teams that were in the BCS hunt, these were all games that we were favored. If I can figure this out sitting on my couch, I'm pretty sure Big Ten coaches will also figure this out. Here is how you beat Illinois: Spread the field, have your primary receiver run slants, drags or 7 yard ins, outs, or stops, and bleed them to death. No one should ever have less than 3 receivers on the field against us, ever!! Take Western Michigan for example: A solid QB is 28-40 for 301 yards and 2 touchdowns against us last season (7.5 yard average). Against Michigan last week he goes 22-38 260 yards 1 TD 2 INTS. Did Michigan's defense go from the worst in Wolverine histroy last season to Big Ten leader this year? Probably not, but they didn't allow Hiller to complete a pass everytime he dropped back, they actually tried to pressure him and didn't play passive coverages like Illinois does.

2) Throw deeper routes

I might be giving Big Ten coaches too much credit, because everyone and their Grandma in the Big 12 knew how to beat Mizzou last season (5-4), but after 5 years Illinois can't figure it out. Mike Schultz had turned what should be a high powered offense into a horse led wagon!! If I don't see more than 1 pass over 20 yards I will be e-mailing Guenther, Zook, the Chancellor and who ever else has a computer at that school to get rid of this guy. Here is how Illinois used to beat people: Belly Option, Sprint Option, QB draws, and then play action pass. Not 5 WR sets with only one route over 10 yards! Linebackers and safeties play up against us because we are an option team, and we have a running QB!! So why are our routes run right where defenses are????? And as much as I love Juice, I understand that his shortcoming as a QB are accuracy on short throws, this is not the time to rectify that. He had 3 years to learn how to do that, and he hasn't really improved, let's just stick to what he can do; run and rifle balls to receivers 15-30 yards downfield.

3) Substitute better

Really I should have called this "pull your heads out of your asses". This isn't pee-wee, coaches don't have to make sure everyone plays, and they damn sure don't have to do it on the first series!! I'm sorry, but I don't want my receivers to be Ramsey, Sykes, Cumberland and Jenkins on 3rd and 8 with Justin Green in the backfield!! I am kind off exaggerating, but it was pretty close to this in the first quarter. Our receivers never ran past 15 yards, so there is no way that they should have been tired!! Duvalt and Jenkins are not starting this game per Illini HQ, so that means that our receivers will be Benn, Fayson, Sykes, Scott, and James. The only other one who should play is Duvalt, because he only had 1 drop. If...IF we get up by 30 then you can play the rest of them and let them try to earn their playing time back. And I don't need to see Fayson and Benn carrying the ball anymore. We have enough running backs that don't get enough carries.

4) Coach Better

We don't need anymore make or break plays in the first quarter that will determine how well the team plays. Obviously this team is not one that can shrug off a momentum killer like the 4th down disaster. If it is 4th and 1 kick the god damn field goal. It's not like you have created a defense that can hold a team so you can play a field position game. Take the god damn points. If the coaching staff thought: "worst case scenario is we don't get the first down, but they have the ball in their own territory, so we make them punt and have good field goal position." then they are more delusional than I am. Best case scenario was they march down the field and kick a field goal!!!
Here is the realistic best case: they stop us, crush our will to not only play, but to live, drive down the field, use up all of the time on the clock and tack on 3 more points. Worst case was if the white freshman receiver didn't drop a pass that would have given them First and Goal! This for the record was the only time that Zook's defensive theory worked..... Mizzou made a mistake.

Also if you have timeouts.... USE THEM!!! Here is an idea: Mizzou is marching on you and your defense looks a little tired since they have been on the field the entire half. Why not call a timeout and regroup your defense, and save some clock for when they eventually score, or heaven forbid your defense bucks up and gets a stop. Maybe now you can open up the playbook a little and let your team run the offense that they run best. Although based on the offense that we saw, this wouldn't have happened. Schultz would have finally ran on first and second down.

5) Catch and hold on to the DAMN BALL!!!

Let me break down how easy it is to be a receiver. First, you know exactly where you are going, the defender has to guess. Second, you get to run there without getting touched after 5 yards. Its not like people are trying to trip you or grab a hold of you, nope all they can do is push you. Next, the Defense has to let you catch the ball!!! They can't tackle you or push you, all they can do is knock it away before you touch it. The people who normally tackle you play their position because they were too small to play yours. How many times do you see a 300 pound DT tackle a receiver? Exactly. Occasionally, you have to block, and by block I mean stand in the way of the guy in front of you, who by the way is still smaller than you.
All you have to do is catch the ball!! Hell you don't even have to run with it after you catch it most times. The next time you want to bitch about Juice or any QB throwing the ball too hard and its not a receivers fault, remember how god damn easy it is to be a receiver. They are one step up from kickers. Before you jump down my throat, let me tell you that I was a receiver.

So now that I have bitched, here is literally what I want to see:

1) Run the football more than we pass. Over 200 yards rushing
2) At least one touchdown over 30 yards
3) NO INTERCEPTIONS OR FUMBLES
4) A touchdown on the first drive, FG's are a failure in this game
5) Donsay Hardemann breaking up a pass with his hands, not by waiting to kill the receiver
6) At least 3 sacks by our DE's or Linebackers
7) 50 points
8) Defense giving up less than 10 (ISU lost to Eastern 31-6) if we give up a touchdown, this game is a failure
9) No mistakes in the Red Zone. We need to learn to finish drives again
10) At least 1 INTERCEPTION (it should be comical that we would be worried that this won't happen, but it is a stark possibility)
11) Less than 200 yards given up in the air ( Again against ISU we shouldn't be worried, yet we are)
12) No dropped passes!!

Even if all of these things happen, it won't really prove much, however if these things don't happen...... Then there is trouble in River City!! If less than 12 out of 12 happens, then you can all come to my living room, which I will rename "The Panic Room" and we will watch "A Season to Remember: The 04-05 Fighting Illini Mens Basketball Team" on an endless loop until Midnight Madness starts for basketball.

Illini Updates and Durty Butter Pick'em

2009-09-08T18:26:00.002-05:00

Well the hits just keep on coming. 3 days after being one of the only players who was worth a damn on Saturday, Mikel LeShoure was suspended for this weekends game for a violation of team rules. Along with him, red-shirt freshman Ashante Williams was also suspended. ESPN Chicago

There are also rumors that freshman Leon Hill who is an offensive lineman wants to transfer. So let the fallout begin. This Saturday cannot come fast enough, because no matter how bad Illinois actually might be, they will still beat the hell out of ISU.

Also Joseph Bertrand who is one of Illinois basketball's four freshman this season injured his knee. It is not known how long he will be out, but it looks to be at least until Midnight Madness next month. Illini HQ

Finally some good news: The official Durty Butter NFL Pick'em is now here!!!!! Instead of a confidence pick'em, we will be picking straight up against the spread Vegas style baby!!

Follow the link below and sign up.

Durty Butter NFL league

the ID number is: 54662
the password is: Bears

Our Nightmare was realized

2009-09-07T21:16:00.004-05:00

On Saturday, two of my biggest fears were realized. First that Rejus Benn would get hurt, and second, that I could possibly be wrong about the Illini this year. Now that I have had time to relax, rehydrate and bring my body back to equilibrium after drowning my sorrows in Amstel Lights and O Bombs, I am finally ready to tackle this post. Rest assured that I will in fact tackle this unlike the Illinois Secondary trying to tackle anything.

Now that I have dealt with the overwhelming sadness that comes from being wrong, lets figure out what I was wrong about and what we can expect for the rest of the season.

1) Our Offensive Coordinator

When we hired Mike Schultz I was so supremely happy. Namely because he was a coach who was dedicated to running the ball. I did not however suspect that he would bring back an offensive strategy that became extinct while football players were still wearing leather helmets. I have to go back and research this, but I'm pretty sure that TCU plays in a conference that does allow the forward pass. So I cannot explain why every route we ran was less than 5 yards. Last year Juice threw for over 450 yards and 5 touchdowns against Mizzou. They only brought back one player in their secondary, and Schultz says that they didn't want to throw the ball downfield????? I am all for balance, but I didn't think that we had just hired the Anti-Locksley. If Juice threw the ball over 20 yards I didn't see it. Now after this debacle that happened on Saturday Zook said that he will throw the ball downfield more, but the damage has already been done. Don't get me wrong, I am not asking for the Illini to throw the ball 40 times a game like last year, but please use the speed and size that you have at receiver. I did like who we ran a lot of option and Juice, Leshoure, and Pollard looked really good doing it, but it boggles my mind that after running, and throwing the ball 7 yards, how do you not run play action and take a shot deep when you are down by 2 touchdowns. I almost punched somebody when Juice got tripped up on the fourth down play. Why the hell are you not running a sneak on that play? Who cares if everyone knows that it is coming? For the record that play was not a run. Both Uh-oh and Graham released from the TE position and it was supposed to be a play action pass. I am almost glad that Juice got stepped on.

2) Our receivers

When Rejus went out, I wasn't completely worried because I felt as though we had enough depth behind him at receiver so that others could step up and make plays. The only person who stepped up was Jarred Fayson. He made a great catch to put us in the red zone, and overall played very well. Beyond him, nobody was exceptional, and Jeff Cumberland and AJ Jenkins should never see the field again. I am done with Cumberland. He is a senior this season, couldn't block as a TE so he was moved to receiver. He is bigger than everyone on the field, and probably one of the fastest players on the team, but it is now or never for him. The fumble is inexcusable, but at least he was trying to make a play. The next 2 dropped balls from him means he should be benched. He wasn't running a route, because obviously Schultz frowns upon that. No, Cumberland was standing by the sidelines 7 yards downfield, and tried to cradle one ball in his chest, and the second ball he tried to catch with his junk. Jenkins continued his stellar pass catching from last year by letting another ball fly right threw his hands for an interception. Jenkins actually is probably the one receiver that is hurting most by the conservative playcalling because at least when he runs a deep route and drops the ball, no one is there to pick it off. I absolutely hate bashing college players, but seeing the same mistakes for 2 seasons is making me take off the orange colored glasses. I can forgive interceptions when you are pressured, and I can forgive fumbles when the defender makes a great play. There is no excuse for dropping balls, just like there is no excuse for blowing coverages on defense.

3) The Athletes in the Secondary

Donsay Hardemann played one of the worst games I have seen an Illini safety play in a long time. He blew his coverage on the first touchdown, and then he leveled a receiver and got flagged on a play that would have 3rd and 13. At least he came back and made a stop to make Mizzou punt. Bellamy and Tavon Wilson are still lost, but it doesn't help when you are playing a weak cover 2. The linebackers played much better than anyone could have anticipated. By that I mean that they didn't let Washington run all over them like last season. However, the secondary blew so many 3rd downs that the front 7 had to get disheartened (which they did in the second half.) Like I mentioned in the previous post, the DT's played very well. Ian Thomas will be a force for the next 3 years for Illinois. He had 13 tackles in this game, and was one of the few bright spots for the Illini defense.

4) Overall coaching staff

I still don't understand our substitution patterns and also our personnel in general. I understand that you didn't have Dufrene and Ford got hurt early, but does true freshman Justin Green need to be in the backfield on the first series? Also why do you have Duvalt running the ball for you? Fayson is 30 pounds heavier. For that matter, why do you need to have a receiver running the ball at all? Going for it on 4th down in the second quarter, and then not running a QB sneak is appalling. Continuing to play Cumberland after the drops is stupid, and not opening up the playbook when you have no momentum or continuity and are down by more than 2 touchdowns is ridiculous. After watching this team fall apart last season, and seeing this game, I have to believe that when Illinois gets down now, they have no faith in their coaching staff. The only thing that really worked well for Illinois was the option, but of course we didn't figure that out until we were down 10. What the shit was Eddie McGee doing in at QB in the 2nd quarter when we still in the game? Hey, here's a great idea: Lets put Eddie in the game and run 2 terrible plays and give us 3rd and 15 when Juice actually moved the ball the last 2 series!!!!

The worst part about this game is that it seemed like an extension of the Northwestern game from last season. Before that game, you never saw Illinois give up, and you always knew that they would be able to get it going and score. This game Illinois was out of it half way through the 3rd quarter, and they stopped fighting. Giving up the last 2 games is what scares me more than anything else I saw on the field on Saturday.

Now that that is over, lets talk about some good things:

1) The front 7 looked good, especially Thomas and the DT's
Looking forward to our schedule, the only teams who might put an offense like Mizzou on the field is Minnesota and Northwestern. Playing against teams who want to run the ball will help out this defense. Lord knows what will help our secondary though. In our defenses defence, they did hold Mizzou to 3 field goals in the first half and kept Illinois in the game, the offense just didn't help them out at all.

2) Fayson is the real deal
He made some good catches and played hard, getting Benn back will only help the rest of the receivers

3) Pollard and LeShoure played extremely well
I was pleasantly surprised by how well LeShoure caught the ball, and now it seems like the coaching staff will be dedicated to not only running the ball, but also running the option again.

4) Juice made good decisions
I can handle Juice throwing a few balls high, I can't stand when he makes the wrong read and throws the ball into coverage. The only ball that Juice forced was on the first drive when he tried to fire the ball across the field to Duvalt on the sideline and it was knocked away. Other than that he completed 65% of his passes

5) Our special teams weren't terrible
We actually punted well, and more importantly covered punts and kickoffs really well. For the first time in a year, I didn't have to close my eyes when we kicked the ball.

6) The Offensive Line played very well
Juice didn't get sacked until the 4th quarter, and they did a very good job of not only giving him time to throw, but they also opened up a few holes in the middle. Illinois moved the ball very well. They had the ball at the 20 and then turned it over on 4th down. They had the ball at the 25 and Cumberland fumbled. The offensive line was not the reason for the offense looking horrible.

Getting Benn, Dufrene, and Ford back next week will help, and Illinois SHOULD handle ISU pretty easily, but they need to play flawless next week in order to give them a little confidence going into the murderous schedule they have to start out the Big Ten. Illinois will play OSU, Penn State and then Michigan State to start the Big Ten season. If they lose those 3 games, the season will be over, and it won't seem much better for next season.

Illini Start New Season

2009-09-04T00:43:00.005-05:00

Well it is finally here, the start of a new season for the Illini football team, and not a moment too soon. Just like the last few years, the Illini will open up their season in St. Louis against Mizzou. Unlike the last few years, Illinois is actually much better than Mizzou and are favored for this game. Going into this game Illinois is a 7 point favorite and I tend to agree with Vegas. So lets get on to the Durty Butter preveiw of the game. By the end of this I plan on having all of you whipped up into such a frenzy that you will probably run out to the parking lot and head butt a car window like Lattimer from The Program.

There are 5 reasons why I think that Illinois will win this game against Mizzou:

1) Illinois has a better QB

Like I have stated before most sports fans are morons and have the memory of an infant. The next time you hear an Illini fan bash Juice you automatically know 3 things about them. A) They are not true Illinois fans because if they were they would realize that Juice is Dan Marino compared to Tim Brasic, Jon Beutjer and Dustin Ward. They will not remember any of these names however because being the fair weather douche bags that they are, they were too busy playing beer pong with 14 guys and 2 girls who were remotely attractive after a case of Keystone. B) Instead of playing football or watching it in high school or college, they were too busy hanging out with their emo friends painting their finger nails black and listening to Rise Against. If they actually knew anything about football, they would realize that it is almost impossible to turn an option QB who threw the ball less than 10 times a game in high school into a pure pocket passer, hence the reason that Juice has been a work in progress for 3 years. C) Like I mentioned before they don't have a memory because it was Juice's 4 touchdown passes and him running the ball for 8 straight minutes that gave Illinois the greatest victory of all time against #1 Ohio State in Columbus (which I am watching right now). I know last year is on everyone's mind, but can we please remember that our now SENIOR quarterback led us to the Rose Bowl as a SOPHOMORE!!

Juice will probably become Illinois' total yardage leader after this game, and now that he has an offensive coordinator who is committed to running the ball with somebody other than Juice, it will make his job much easier. We all know that Juice can make every throw, but with talent in the backfield and at receiver, it will take all of the pressure off of him to carry this team. Juice did lead the Big Ten in passing yards last year and touchdowns. That should continue, and with one more year under his belt, the turnovers will go down.

2) Arrelious Benn is the best player on the field

Rejus is this years Jeremy Maclin. He is projected by pretty much everyone as the #2 reciever in this years draft, so now he has to come out and prove it. Mizzou had one of the worst pass defenses in the country last year, and it shouldn't be much better this year. There is no one who can cover Rejus one on one, and because of that expect a lot of zone coverage (also the fact that Illinois will still use the spread). With a zone coverage, and safeties worried about Rejus, you will see Uh-Oh underneath a lot, and Cumberland deep a lot with only a corner or a safety. Because Rejus is such a force, and him and Juice have been together for 3 years now, Illinois will find ways to get him the ball. As much as I hate bubble screens to receivers, Rejus is one guy who can make a lot happen with one. You will never see a corner take him down by himself, and this season you will see him break at least one for a big touchdown. What I would like to see more of this season is actual deep routes with Rejus. He had his 2 touchdowns last season against Penn State, and both of those were over 30 yards. If anything, having him run deeper routes will open up Fayson, Jenkins, Sykes, Duvalt and who ever else the Illini play at slot.

3) This is the best receiving corp ever at Illinois

I know a lot of people will want to argue that Lloyd, Young and Co. were better, but none of them had the talent of Benn. Cumberland is basically a wash with Young, and we will finally get introduced to Jarrod Fayson. For the record, Fayson was the 3rd ranked reciever coming out of high school just behind Percy Harvin. As a freshman at Florida, Fayson only had 12 catches, but 3 were for touchdowns. He will take of a lot of pressure off of the rest of the receivers, and he has played in much bigger games than anyone else on Illinois, like the 2007 National Championship game. Besides these 3 you have so much depth it is scary. The only person missing from last season is Will Judson, and 3 true freshman got some time last year, so there is experience on the second team. Look for Cordale Scott to also get some time in the Red Zone as he is 6-3 and 215 lbs. I am hoping that this group of recievers will help me forget forever the nightmare that was Kyle Hudson. Just for a comparison; Kyle Hudson was a starting reciever on our Rose Bowl team. Now Hudson would be the starting slot reciever on the scout team. I rest my case.

4) We have a new offensive coordinator

I loved Mike Locksley, but this last season he lost his damn mind. The breaking point for me was when Juice threw the ball 20 times in the fourth quarter against Western Michigan with only one designed running play. That wouldn't seem too far fetched except for the fact that Illinois was only down by one touchdown to a MAC team. To say that Locksley fell in love with the pass last season is about as big of an understatement as saying that Brett Favre loves attention. Illinois led the Big Ten in rushing in 2006, and 2007. All of the sudden they led the league in passing in 2008. With Mike Schultz at the healm of the offense this year, we will have a much more balanced team. Add to that fact that besides the great receivers, Illinois brings back all of its running backs from last year, and you have reason to believe that the Illini will become decicated to running the ball again. Remember this is the coach who is credited with turning Ladainian Tomlinson into such an amazing running back at TCU.

The talent on the offensive line is still very good, and with a running game it will keep defenses honest. Last season teams just pinned their ears back and tried to kill Juice because Illinois was a pass first team. It amazed me that Locksley went away from what got Illinois to the Rose Bowl. If you watch the OSU game again you will see that all of Juice's touchdown passes were off of play action. The safeties were so worried about Mendenhall and Williams running the ball that they bit on every fake. Now before you jump all over me and say "Well Illinois didn't have Mendenhall last season!" Look at 2006. Pierre Thomas, EB Halsey, Rashard Mendenhall and Juice were all in the mix that season. A spread option offense causes defenses to play assignment football, and gives running backs a lot of one on one match-ups. Last season Daniel Dufrene averaged 5.2 yards a carry!! Why would you not give him the ball more?

Last season with no running game, safeties just sat back and waited for the pass, and linebackers blitzed on damn near every down. It is crazy to expect your offensive line to protect a QB when a defense is bringing 5-7 guys on every pass down. If anything, this season Illinois should get back to having 3rd and short which is where having a QB like Juice is a major advantage. He can just lean his big head forward and the momentum from that is bound to get him 4 yards. This should also help in the red zone where Illinois was attrocious last season. You can throw 15-30 pass plays when the defense is in a zone because you are running a 4 wide spread. When you are at the 15 yard line, you have to be able to run the ball, and Illinois was not only terrible at that, but Locksley still thought he could pass all of the time from there. Rewatching games from last year, Illinois was amazing in between the 20's. In the red zone though, they absolutley fell apart, which is why we lost to Minnesota even though we outgained them by a large margin.

5) Our Defensive Line is much better than people think

Last season when we played Mizzou, we went into the game without either starter at defensive tackle. Sirod Williams was injured and lost for the season, and Josh Brent was out with an undisclosed issue. Now you ask any person who actually knows a damn thing about football and they will tell you that on defense it all starts with the defensive tackles. Brian Urlacher was the best linebacker in football when Ted Washington was commanding double teams in the middle, and Urlacher was free to tee off on running backs. Washington leaves and Urlacher is a bust. Tommie Harris comes in, and the Bears with a "rejuvanted" Urlacher go to a Superbowl. Tommie Harris gets hurt and Urlacher has a mediocere season. Do you see what I am getting at here? With Sirod Williams, Josh Brent (who could be a very high draft pick) and all-world Sophomore Corey Liuget ( A potential First Round Pick in 2 years) in the middle of that line, it will take a ton of pressure off of the Martez Wilson, Ian Thomas, and Russel Ellington at linebacker. Now Mizzou ran all over us with a make shift defensive line last year. This year, they should not be able to run up the middle, and without having their lineman being able to get up on our linebackers, we should be able to handle Washington running the ball. Our defensive ends are not nearly as good as last year, but for the most part they have experience, and they are athletic.

Here are a couple of people that you should look for in the game on Saturday:

1) Jarred Fayson WR #11
2) Tavon Wilson CB #3
3) Justin Green RB #26 (True freshman who is an absolute burner)
4) Ian Thomas LB #38
5) Russell Ellington LB #33
6) Corey Liuget DT #93

Now that we have gone through what PacMan likes to call "my delusional optimism" I will continue by debunking some of the knocks of this Illinois team.

1) The linebackers will be bad this season

At Middle Linebacker the last 2 seasons we have had Britt Miller and J Leman. They were phenomanal, but they lacked in atheleticism. You can bash Martez Wilson all you want, but how many true Freshman and Sophomores come in and set the world on fire? Especially when they were defensive ends in high school. Martez spent the last 2 seasons learing how to play linebacker, which is not easy to do. Russell Ellington is coming on strong as a Sophomore, and Ian Thomas has been impressive also according to reports. Why can these guys not step up and fill the shoes of Leman and Miller? They are more atheletic. They have better atheletes around them. Last season Illinois' defense led the Big Ten in tackles for loss!! What that tells you is that they were extemely talented, but they gave up plays because they were sloppy fundementally. You can learn how to tackle, pursue, and anticipate. You can't learn to be bigger, faster, stronger than everyone else.

2) The defense lacks experiance

Losing Vontae Davis, Britt Miller, Will Davis and others will obviously hurt this defense. However, you are not losing anything that cannot be replaced. Illinois still has plenty of experiance at positions that matter, and young talent that can fill in the gaps. Dere Hicks is a 3 year starter at cornerback. Martez Wilson was second on the team in tackles last season and will play the middle (which coincidentally is the exact same transition that Britt Miller made last season) Donsay Hardemann is recovered from a career threatening injury and will be back trying to kill recievers across the middle. I have already laid out the DT situation. Illinois has 2 seniors at DE with Doug Pilcher and Antonio James, both of whom have seen plenty of playing time for the defense. What should help you sleep at night is not who we have returning at these positions, but the fact that all of the recruits that we have gotten the last 4 years are now ready to play. In the past you knew you had 2 or 3 people you could rely on with the defense, but beyond that, you knew that Illinois was overmatched athletically at every other position. Now there is not a spot on the defense where Illinois does not have a solid player who might only lack in experiance and technique, which Zook promised that he addressed at Camp Rantoul compared to last year.

3) Athletes don't necessarily lead to wins.

Bullshit! Bullshit! Bullshit!
The most athletic teams almost always win. Last season Illinois lost to Mizzou, Penn State, and Ohio State. All three of those teams were better than Illinois. What lost the other games for Illinois was the fact that they had no desire or will to beat teams that were not better than them. 2007 was a perfect storm for Illinois where they had both talent and desire. Last season the players on the team felt that they were better and therefore they would win. The difference between a 8-3 season and a 5-6 season was heart and desire. The difference between a 1-10 team and an 8-3 team is athletes!! The point of this rant is this; Illinois has all of the pieces to be great. 5 years ago we weren't even capable of dreaming of this. At every position we have upgraded drastically from the horrific nightmares that were the end of the Ron Turner era and beginning of the Ron Zook era. Talent-wise, the only team that might have more skill than Illinois is Ohio State. With teams like OSU and PSU, they have a tradition of winning. At Illinois you don't have that. What we do have again is a chip on our shoulder. In 2007 it was proving that the Illini actually belonged with the top tier teams. Now the chip is proving that 2007 wasn't a fluke. Now Illinois is out to prove that they have the heart and desire to win games they should, and hopefully a few that people think they shouldn't.