Thanks Will

I don't know Will, but I thought this was a good motto to blog by. And I'm thankful for his time spent at Deadspin. 1 gabillionzillion cocktails to you sir.....

That's all we wanted Deadspin to be all along; a place where people could slip away from their life for a while, dig in, have some fun, then head back to the regular life, where bills must be paid, family must be attended to, jobs must be (slightly) acknowledged. You know: Kind of like sports themselves. Life is difficult. Life is scary. Diversions — real, palpable diversions, places where you can go away and frolic, and then return to the world the way you found it, for better or worse — are rare, and should be cherished. That's what sports are.

Oliver Luck to WVU Board of Governors

Thank Fucking God!

Now if we can just talk him into taking over the athletic department.

Luck, a member of the WVU Sports Hall of Fame, helped guide the Mountaineers to a 26-6 throttling of Florida in the
1981 Peach Bowl. His academic credentials included a magna cum laude degree in history and a law degree from the University of Texas.


While never professing interest in the position, Luck's name occasionally surfaces as a candidate for the athletic director's position at West Virginia. Current athletic director Ed Pastilong has announced a retirement date in 2010.

The Spread Offense Defined

I can't imagine what a world of blogging about the spread offense would be like. But there are people in this world that think it's a worth while adventure. More power to you. I'd rather stick to the potty humor and just watch the dairy goodness unfold on the field.

Brian @ MGOblog has a nice post put together on the Michigan Zone Stretch. Again, I can't imagine putting the time in on something like that. But people do, and hats off to anyone willing to do so. I think I got more film watching than I ever wanted when I played football, so now it just seems like a waste of precious time.

Yup, lazy has set in. I still have dreams of becoming and office linebacker, though.

Thursday Coal Tattoo

When you think to yourself, "Oh my God! I've been shot in the neck!" You might prefer a Coal Tattoo.

We stay away from basketball stuff around here until the season starts, just because that's generally the only time we really care about basketball. But since Joe Alexander had to go ahead and be fucking awesome, we thought some links were in order.

Joe could get more money if he is drafted by the Milwaukee Bucks? It's true! Given he speaks Mandarin and would be teammates with Yi Jianlian, he would stand to get a lot of fans in China. And endorsements, etc.

Joe giving Beilein fits is just one of the tales being told over at MSN, but one I can just imagine. Beilein was a teacher, one of the things I really liked about him. Too bad he couldn't teach anyone how to rebound.

But Mazzulla said it was former coach John Beilein that Alexander drove crazy. Beilein’s entire basketball mantra is based on IQ, jump shooting and precision.

Joe learned how to play basketball by playing video games. That just doesn’t translate to a guy like John Beilein. Two things could get John Beilein out of his chair: Joe Alexander and people calling his offense the Princeton offense.

“Everything had to be Beilein’s way,” Mazzulla recalled. “I remember one day he spent 20 minutes showing Joe the correct way to do a reverse lay-up. Joe just never got it. How does a kid who is a lottery pick not know how to do something as fundamental as a reverse lay-up?”

Four Mountaineer swimmers are headed to the Olympic trails. I don't know much about how you get invited, but that seems like a big number to come from a school that isn't well known for it's swimming prowess.

I know I'm way late to the table with this, but it seems Rich Rodriguez is going to have to show all the records of his negotiations with Michigan in order to find out if any mention was made of the buyout clause with West Virginia and who would have to pay it. Also, all his previous contracts for jobs and endorsements will be brought in as evidence to show that he has experience with signing contracts.

Written proposals between Rodriguez and the University of Michigan are now evidence in WVU's attempt to get the former coach to pay a $4 million buyout.

A Monongalia County judge also ruled that Rodriguez must turn over all employment and endorsement contracts he has ever signed, within fifteen days.

I'd rather this whole thing just went away and we could get back to thinking about Football and Rodriguez could get on with his life. But it's news and we just can't ignore it.

Lastly, corn is for eating, and with a good bit of holler knowhow, drinking!

A backlash is brewing. A consortium led by the Grocery Manufacturers Association is lobbying Congress to reverse course and stop raising the requirements for corn ethanol, which even some environmentalists admit is a poor source of "renewable" energy.

West Virginia's congressional delegation should back this return to sanity. Americans have far better uses for corn - say, as whiskey.

Thinning the Herd and Stuff

Sidebar Stuff

Some changes to the sidebar were way overdue! I'm not done, but I think I deleted most of the blogs that weren't staying up to date. Hit me if you want a link over there.

Dick Cheney is a Dick!

What, this does not surprise you? Sure this has nothing to do with college football or sports for that matter. It's just something that I know, something I wanted to point out, and now seems like a good time. First the video of what he said:



Why couldn't she say something like, "Mr. Cheney, you've shown yourself to be the complete ass hat we all thought you were."

Then I came across this today from my friend Rudy @ Radio Free Charleston and Pop Cult, and felt like posting the two together would be a good thing.



Just plain stuff

Finally, sticking with the complete lack of sports coverage theme, Time.

Goodbye George

By now, you've watched the Carlin youtube at least five times. And like me you probably feel like saying Fuck! Cocksucker! Shitballs!....etc. Oh, I forgot to say cunt. There, that's better. George Carlin will be missed. Like him or not, he was relevant for a long ass time. Name another stand up that stayed in the picture as long as he did. Rodney Dangerfield? Yeah. Richard Pryor would have if he could have stayed healthy. I have no doubt about that.



RIP brother

Also, on a lesser scale but no less important, MZone is hanging it up. Given what has gone down over the last few months, why does a WV blog care about a Michigan blog? For a lot of reasons, MZone was one of the few blogs I made a point to check every day. Funny for sure! They gave me loads of ammo to hurl at my tOSU workmates. They were cool when I/we inadvertently stole a couple pictures from them for the FanHouse. And just cool in general. So here's hoping they pull a Johnny and get back to blogging in the near future. But if not, it was great while it lasted.

Thursday Coal Tattoo Has A Secret Secret

When moonshine and mountain dancing aren't enough, you get the coal tattoo. A coal tattoo is when a piece of slate breaks the skin leaving a dark mark like that of a tattoo under the skin.

For those of you holding out hope that Notre Dame might one day join the Big East in all sports, prepare to be disappointed. Surely the devil's work when a team so bad gets that kind of reward.

Flying way under the radar because we all know Pat White should be up for every award given to anyone in the 18-25 year old demographic, White is named to the Unitas list.

Good news for White and Slaton Devine (hard habit to break), Greg Isdaner seems to be recovering fine from off season surgery.

MariusJanulisForThree is counting down the top 10 Syracuse moments in movie history at Troy Nunes. I guess we still have October Sky, but for the last damn time, Deliverance was not shot nor set in West Virginia.

Rutgers is having a hell of an off season. Funny how that happens when your coach sticks around.

Finally, for those of you too cheap like me to buy the 2008 Fiesta Bowl DVD, you can watch it for free at Hulu.com.

Adam take us home....Hey! God Dammit! That's not Wildwood Flower!

The Party's Over

Following the Costas show on HBO, there seemed to be a "let cooler heads prevail" attitude among most bloggers and journalist. Outside of the kooks, we all looked at the situation as it is. A situation where bloggers and journalist could and should work together or at least understand that it is possible for the two sides to compliment each other.

Unfortunately, the memo didn't make it to the newspaper and news agency fat cats. Because now it seems we are back to square one with the AP going after bloggers that link to or quote AP stories. And now, in the mother of all dick moves, the Des Moines Register has threatened Black Heart Gold Pants to remove a video of the recent flooding in Iowa. Oops Pow makes fine points as to why this is such a dick move.

We shit you not. Consider the following facts:

1. The page on which
the video was originally posted provides code for blogs to embed said
video;
2. Nowhere on the page (or anywhere on the path from
DesMoinesRegister.com homepage to the destination page) is there listed any
terms of use, much less anything related to copyright infringement;
3. The
footage was being used to call for donations to charity in the wake of a local
natural disaster, in hopes that a visual representation would further stir the
emotions of viewers;
4. We linked back to the Register in the original
version of the article, well before the C&D letter arrived;
5. The
Register provided the embed code (Sorry, but it bears repeating).

Is this really where were going again? I mean, BHGP was trying to raise awareness to the suffering of his fellow Hawkeyes and, I'm sure, Cyclones. Linking back to the Register. There is a way to capitalize on all the internet traffic you get from a link, newspaper people. It will certainly be more lucrative than selling newspapers here in about 10 years when that form of media all but dies. Holding on to the past will get you stuck in the past if you don't watch it.

Quit being dicks!!! M'kay?

Update: Dicks Redacted!!!!1!

"This was a misunderstanding. I apologize on behalf of The Des Moines
Register. Simply an employee trying to do their job but not completely
understanding our new technology (we recently got embed code on our videos). I
take full responsibility for not making this clear to everyone on staff."

Monday Burns The Mountainlair, But Don't They All

Later today I'll be on Every Day Should Be Saturday doing the Visiting Lecturer series on West Virginia. So check back often. I'll fix the link when the post goes live. And as you will read, I have a problem with slate roofs. Particularly mine. I spent oodles of money turning this...

into this....

Or this if you're into full frontal Victorian beauty...

But we had a prayer meeting with the contractor today over a leak, so I'm a bit burnt about the whole thing. Anyhow, on to the links of the day.

Finally, a feel good story about West Virginia football.

But there's seemingly always a ray of darkness surrounding the WVU program.

"(Robon) went over the fact (Garrison) and Heather Bresch went to high school
together and that Mike had been a lobbyist for Mylan Pharmaceuticals, where
Heather Bresch is a CEO, and, of course, the EMBA issue," Flaherty said. "We let
him explore that completely and the president answered every question fully and
completely."

"One doesn't have anything to do with the other," he said.
"We have a pure contract case. That President Garrison has stepped down has
nothing to do with it. They've tried to make it an issue of Coach Rodriguez's
credibility versus President Garrison's, but we don't believe it'll come down to
that because it's an issue of law. If it does come down to that, we feel very
comfortable."

Back up quarterback Charlie Russell is giving up football. And that kind of make the depth chart shallow at West Virginia.

Lastly, in the no big surprise file, Marshall season ticket sales are down. The why is because many Mountaineer fans had to buy Marshall season tickets to go to the Coal Bowl last year in Huntington.

Thursday Coal Tattoo

We're Dancing Outlaws today folks! One more day until the weekend, starting off with The Limbs tomorrow night and then blissful rest and harmony the rest of the weekend!

Rich Rodriguez wants you to know that Bill Stewart wanted to come to Michigan with him. Kettle meet pot. Accusing anyone of anything after you had your attorney compare your buyout to enslavement or have your offensive coordinator make a baseless accusation that he wasn't hired because of race...ya see where I'm going here? Notice I'm not holding up the WVU administration in the best light because we are all seeing what was going on with the President of the University and the Governor of WV. Ya know, this was probably the best thing that could happen to both parties. The athletic department might start running the athletic department again, the Governor might start worrying a little more that a large percent of our population lives like Jesco White, and Rich Rod got his big name program. If you want to watch part of the interview of which I speak, click here. The full interview will be aired Saturday sometime about 9-11 am. It's in the video and you're going to watch it anyway. Right? Oh yeah, my google reader is flooded with the headline that two WVU players were kicked off the team. Really? I had no idea!

Adam Jacobi is killing it over at FanHouse with his JoPa thing. I know it probably upsets my Penn State friends, but man is it like crack to me.

Remember James Jett with me over at Daus House.

Yeah, things aren't looking to good for The Orange this year. And I'll probably say a lot of bad things later in the year about them. So I better say something nice now. I am looking forward to seeing this movie. Not too many Big East schools, or any schools for that matter, can boast the same history as Syracuse.

Nehlen Recovering After Heart Surgery Continued

I have a piece up at FanHouse about Don Nehlen having triple bypass surgery. It's been a crazy kind of day with lots of stuff floating around in my head. This story about Nehlen kind of brought it all together for me.

Make no mistake about it, I think the world of the man. As a coach and as a man. But one thing that has rubbed me wrong since his retirement has been his sponsorship with the Friends of Coal. I think I have a very unique view on the whole thing, so bare with me.

Coal is vital to this country. It provides half the nations energy. It provides West Virginians with good paying jobs they can't find anywhere else in this state. Coal mining has its benefits. But it also has a ton of negatives that I have discussed here from time to time. Namely the raping of West Virginia's mountains and wild life through strip mining, and the horrible effects it has on the health of the men and women that mine the coal.

My unique perspective? My grandfather died of Black Lung disease. Way, way too early. To be honest with you, I barely knew the man. The one thing I can tell you about the man is I hated to be around him because he smoked almost constantly. Beaten up by a hard life of mining coal, I think those cigarettes were probably the only thing that made him feel good.

As fate would have it, I work for the Federal Black Lung Program. My grandmother lived a long life until passing away in 2004. She still received benefits from my grandfathers black lung case until the day she died. I know this because when I returned to work from her funeral, her case found its way on my desk and I ended up being the one that terminated her case.

In my job, I talk with a lot of coal miners and their widows. So I think I have a pretty good idea of the kind of destruction black lung causes these families. It robs kids of their fathers and their mothers. And as much as I would like to tell you they are fairly compensated for their loss, that just isn't true. And really, no amount of money could ever make up for the loss of something so precious.

Not that I needed another reason to be thankful for my father, but I can't tell you how happy I am that my father got an education and got out and made something of himself away from the mines. For all the Saturdays he was able to take me to Morgantown to watch Don Nehlen's football teams without a cough or having to stop every 20 steps of the stadium stairs to catch his breath, I'm thankful. For every conversation we have and the seemingly millions of times he helps me, I'm so thankful he never had to set one foot in those mines.

I didn't intend this to be a Father's Day post when I started, but considering everything above I don't know how I couldn't. So Happy Father's Day dad, and thank you.

To get a good look at the life miners live, head over to Hulu.com and check out the 30Days Morgan Spurlock did on mining.

Big East Face of the Program

It's just too good not to steal! EDSBS has a thing up about ESPN calling for the face of the program and we thought we would steal the idea and take a look at the Big East through the eyes of the Mountainlair.

Starting off with our own just so you don't think we're being biased or anything.



Rutgers, we really do love you....but....well...we couldn't find a picture of a guy in a Camero with a jean jacket so we just went with this.



UConn in one picture? Oh yeah.....



Now that Brian Brohm, Bobby Pertino, etc. have moved on we're looking at you Hunter Cantwell.


South Florida really hasn't been around long enough to develop much of a reputation so we went with something close to Florida but with a twist.

Syracuse has fallen on hard times. The once proud program could point to countless all-pro footballers. But these days....


Like South Florida, Cincinnati hasn't really developed a reputation yet, so...




And finally, whether this was a serious post on a joke there's only one face of Pitt football

Garrison Resigns! WV Bloggers Rejoice

The man to the right, soon to be ex WVU president Mike Garrison announced today that he will step down from his position in September. If you thought Mardi Gras was a big deal, you should really stop by my house tonight and help me celebrate! There will be strippers, of course! Much White Russians! And stuff! You know, wink wink say no more.

Today has been a real shitty day to this point. But that frown just turned upside down! And I think I'm not alone in that sentiment.

WBGV likens it to the resignation of Nixon. Agreed!

BSPM is pushing for Ms. Chokesondick to be the replacement. Fine, just don't raise you hands up in the air like you just don't care Ms. C! Because I do.

Fifth Column is just.....yeah! I have to steal that picture!

MG the 8th indeed!

Thursday Coal Tattoo

The Coal Tattoo is a lazy attempt to post something through whiskey soaked eyes. It's not that we don't care. We just have other things to think about.


The big news of the day is that Big East Commissioner Mike Tranghese is going to retire in 2009. My first thought is hell yea!!! Just because he's the guy in charge. And when life isn't perfect, we hang the boss. Right? But the truth is that he's done an incredible job. Whether you like him or not, he's held this conference together when it was on the verge of collapse. Yeah, it didn't hurt that a certain team went on an apeshit crazy tear over the last three years in football. But still, he deserves our thanks. He's leaving the conference in the best shape it's ever been in. With the conference almost sure to split after 2010, there are still a lot of questions. A lot more than I want to bring up in a linking post, anyway.

If you last name is Rodriguez, you must leave Morgantown. I'm a lot of things, but woman beater isn't one of them, and I have no respect for anyone that does.

I rarely think about any other sports besides football or basketball, but freshman Jedd Gyorko has been named to the Louisville Slugger all freshman baseball team.

Might want to get your horse and carriage out of the barn, and get ready to pay more at the concession stand. Rising fuel costs are going to roll down hill at you from a lot of different directions. One of those directions will be from your favorite teams athletic department.

If you ever doubted that Orson was the greatest thing to hit the college football blogospher, shame on you. Here's another reason for your shame.

Lastly, I want to give a big hat tip to blogging friend and all around swell guy, Brian Sakowski from In The Bleachers for getting one of his posts on Fox Sports. Congrats pal! He's made quite a few changes over on his blog and brought in Adam Nittina to help with the posting. Bookmark those guys or get them on your Google reader. But you really should start reading them if you don't already!

Pugh Gets The Stink Eye, Then The Boot

Grrrrr! Old white men can not be bested at stink eye gazes.

It's official, Bill Stewart has kicked Charles Pugh off the Mountaineer football team for living up to his name. The conversation between Stewart and Pugh went something like this:

Pugh! You stink! You're moist, and you smell funny! In my book, that's three strikes. You're out of here!

And that might be the shortest conversation Bill Stewart has ever had. Even if it was made up. In other news relating to this, our old pal Chuck Landon has chimed in. Why I'm not exactly sure. The last time I saw anything he wrote was about the time I started this blog in 2005. Going off what my high school coach said one day, "Men, don't listen to a %&*#!@# word Chuck says. He played tennis at Marshall for Christ's Sake!" And that's all we needed to hear. Anyway, read this if you must.

Whatever happens, look for Stewart to deal with it much differently than former coach Rich Rodriguez would have. Rodriguez would have looked the other way. He would have lifted the carpet. He would have winked.

Rodriguez proved that during the Pac-Man Jones and Chris Henry years.

Those days are gone, thank goodness.

Now, it's up to Stewart to clean up the lack of accountability that was left behind.

And he will.

Oooh! For someone that's been covering Marshall Football for the past however long, Chuck sure does have an ax to grind with Rod. The ruse will not work though. We know you Chuck. We know where you came from and where you've been. This will not gain you any favor with West Virginia fans.

Oh hey, was I talking about Pugh or my least favorite writer in the world? Sidetracked as usual. This is probably where I should talk about the impact this will have on the team. More often than not, if you weren't a regular starter before your senior year, you probably won't make much of a contribution your senior year. Out!

Pat White Owns Alabama.....Again

Sometimes I really wonder if we appreciate what a
special player Pat White is. It's become such a common thing to see him on the field leading West Virginia's whiskey bone (stole that name) offense, it almost seems like it's always been that way. This is the last go round with Chief. He's got a fine offense around him, and a quality backup. Offensively, there shouldn't be any question marks. Defensively......Shit! I'm going off on a tangent worrying about how the defense will play this year.

Anyhow, Pat White was named the Alabama Amateur Athlete of the Year for the second year in a row. As well as being named WV AAOTY for the second year in a row. I don't know, that just seems like some sort of record of importance. Too bad he won't get on this list because of where he is from. I'd put him up there around one or two. Notables from the 50 greatest West Virginia athletes:

Jerry West, Cheylan (Kanawha County)
All-American at WVU twice; led Los Angeles Lakers to 1972 NBA championship as player; as the current Lakers general manager, he helped build dynasty that won five NBA titles in the '80s.

Mary Lou Retton, Fairmont (Marion County)
Became first U.S. gymnast to win gold in women's all-around competition at 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. Scored perfect 10's, and became first female athlete on a Wheaties box.

Hal Greer, Huntington (Cabell County)
Scored 1,377 points for Marshall and averaged 19.2 points in 15 NBA seasons. Named to Top 50 NBA team.

Sam Huff, Farmington (Marion County)
NFL Hall of Famer. Five-time All-Pro linebacker with Giants and Redskins from 1956 to '70.

Hot Rod Hundley, Charleston (Kanawha County)
All-American guard at West Virginia University, and was No. 1 pick of 1957 NBA draft. Current Utah Jazz announcer.

Earle (Greasy) Neale, Parkersburg (Wood County)
Cincinnati Reds and Philadelphia A's baseball player from 1916 to '24; coached Philadelphia Eagles to '48 and '49 NFL titles.

Randy Moss, Rand (Kanawha County)
DuPont High football star was state high school basketball player of the year in 1994-95; 28 TD catches at Marshall in '97 tied NCAA record; '98 NFL Rookie of the Year with Vikings.

John Kruk, Charleston (Kanawha County)
Baseball and basketball star at Keyser High; three-time All-Star batted .300 in 10 major league seasons; played for 1993 NL champion Phillies.

Hmmmm, Greasy Neal. I like it! Anyhow, before we forget, thanks Pat!

The Coal Tattoo

The Coal Tattoo is a lazy attempt to post something through whiskey soaked eyes. It's not that we don't care. We just have other things to think about.

Mike Vanderjagt is back in Canada. Er, the CFL. At least he won't make Mountaineer fans cringe the next time he opens his...

Vanderjagt said his focus is to become the CFL's most accurate kicker and help solidify his case for inclusion in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Hall of Fame? Really? Let's see, Ray Guy is in. Right? Maybe a couple other kickers. I don't really follow pro ball too much anymore. So let's be generous. Ray, a couple others, and you. Yeah! You wait right there. I'm sure they'll be calling you to Canton real soon.


Joe Alexander looks to be leaving. Wish he wouldn't but I can't blame him. I'd have a whiskey water fountain installed first thing!

This thing about Rod's agent being involved in gambling might mean more to Michigan fans than West Virginia fans. Unless we find out that the Pitt game was rigged. Then there might be trouble.

Athlon has WV at #7 in their preseason poll. You know, it's not like I don't want them to be #7 or better, but fuck man, it just doesn't seem right with all the folks that left on defense from last year. Is it just me?