Andy

If you can unload Jones for crap and plug in some low-priced vets or guys from the minors for the last couple slots that makes ARod vaguely possible.

I would do B if I knew nothing on the subject and A if I did know something.

Patriots by double digits. The Colts are a very very good team, better than last year's and perhaps any Colts team before them, but the Patriots are playing in a league of their own.

D Howard, Pierce and Amare are my keepers. My team this year is named You Da Man Now Dog.

Come now, he's way better than David Eckstein in their respective sports. Eckstein would be that guard that doesn't score a lot but "plays good defense" and does "all the things that don't show up in the stat book." Chris Duhon? Bingo.

If I may just observe something, the fact that we're having separate rational discussions of Kobe and ARod coming to my favorite teams within a month of each other is about the hottest thing ever.

The first recruit in the Billy Taylor era at Ball State (a kid named Hubbard) is 6'6" - making him taller than anyone on the BSU roster.

Jake Hogue missed two chip-shot field goals, Brady Hoke sat on the ball at midfield with 30 seconds and all 3 timeouts left in the first half, Booker flat-out whiffed on a tackle that should've been made that turned into a 25 yard run for Juice, etc. etc. If these were things that UI might have caused I'd feel differently, but if the Cardinals simply didn't play (and coach) stupid there's a good chance things would've turned out differently. I'm certainly not saying UI played their best game, but you sure as hell didn't get Ball State's sharpest one either. BTW, I agree with whoever said to bench Juice. He's a good runner but my god the man can't throw to save his life.

Just out of curiosity, how come...is it so they can't go after any other FA's? He's a player in decline and I don't think he'll stick at SS (maybe fore 1 year). Going forward which do you think is more likely - 06 or 07 ARod? 06 ARod instead of Theriot at SS this year would've made the Cubs prohibitive favorites to win the pennant, if not the Series.

God, I hope ND beats Navy. They really should be able to - they have the better athletes and Navy's defense is so colossally bad that the Irish might manage 20 points on them. As for Ball State, frankly at this point there's no excuse not to beat IU. The Cardinals have already done well - and should have won - against two teams as good or better than the Hoosiers (Nebraska and Illinois) and it's about damn time we win one of these games against big conference teams. I want a win, especially since I'll be in Bloomington.

A team with a losing record against an unbeaten team, to me, is always a mismatch. But I'll move it if more people agree with you.

Games between ranked teams ----------------------------------- (3) LSU at (17) Alabama (5 pm, CBS) (6) Arizona State at (4) Oregon (6:45 pm) Good Top 25 games ----------------------- Wisconsin at (1) Ohio State (12 pm) Florida State at (2) Boston College (8 pm, ABC) Nebraska at (8) Kansas (12:30 pm) (9) Missouri at Colorado (6:30 pm) (11) Virginia Tech at Georgia Tech (7:30 pm Thursday, ESPN) Oregon State at (13) USC (8 pm, ABC) (14) Texas at Oklahoma State (3:30 pm, ABC) (15) Michigan at Michigan State (3:30 pm, ABC) Rutgers at (16) Connecticut (7 pm, ESPNU) Cincinnati at (20) South Florida (3:30 pm, ABC) (21) Wake Forest at Virginia (12 pm) (23) South Carolina at Arkansas (2 pm) Top 25 mismatches ---------------------- Texas A&M at (5) Oklahoma (8 pm, ABC) Troy at (10) Georgia (1 pm) Vanderbilt at (18) Florida (12:30 pm) Tennessee Tech at (19) Auburn (2:30 pm) San Jose State at (21) Boise State (3 pm) UL Lafayette at (24) Tennessee (4 pm) (25) Clemson at Duke (12 pm) Other games of interest --------------------------- Purdue at Penn State (12 pm, ESPN) Iowa at Northwestern (12 pm, ESPN2) Ball State at Indiana (12 pm, Big 10) Syracuse at Pittsburgh (12 pm) Kansas State at Iowa State (12:30 pm) Northwestern State at Ole Miss (2 pm) Navy at Notre Dame (2:30 pm, NBC) UCLA at Arizona (3:30 pm, ABC) Middle Tennessee at UL Monroe (7 pm) Illinois at Minnesota (8 pm, Big 10) Holy Cross at Fordham (1 pm) S. Illinois at W. Illinois (2 pm) N. Iowa at Missouri State (2 pm) UC Davis at Sacramento State (5 pm)

Hell, I would love if you got those three back. Start Thabo and give him an incredible scorer to pass to. Start Joe Smith at the 4 to go with Thabo, Kobe, Deng and Wallace and that team blasts the East out of the way.

Ball State would've probably won that game if not for their coach and their kicker. Why the hell do you sit on the ball at midfield, 30 seconds to go, all three timeouts left at the end of a half?? Why do you punt the ball away with 9 minutes to go down 2 possessions knowing full well your defense can't stop Mendenhall or Juice on the ground?? Why do you miss two chip-shot field goals to ruin great drives by the Cardinals??? Credit to the Illini fans. For an 11:00 am local time start it was a very raucous atmosphere.

I was over by the stadium before, and walked by the set. They were broadcasting from there. I don't intend on being there tomarrow morning. I'll probably be sleeping. And I am really looking foward to the game. If we win, I'll go crazy, but at the same time will be avoiding the people who are setting things on fire and smashing property in celebration. I was at Gameday when they came to ND/USC in 2005. It was a freaking tremendous atmosphere. My advice would be to go. Go Nittany Lions.

Ball State plays, incredibly, six games out of conference more difficult than, in my estimation, the best non-league game other than Kansas State that Notre Dame has. Butler Georgetown @Valparaiso @Purdue @Indiana State Illinois State Stupid Kevin White.

Notre Dame - Big East - finished 4th in the conference, fell just one point short of beating Georgetown and getting a berth in the Big East title game. As it turned out it gave the selection committee the chance to screw us into traveling to Spokane as the 6 seed against the best double-digit seed (coming into the tournament). Then Winthrop beat the Irish in a terribly officiated game. Ok, I digress. Needless to say the Irish have a chip on their shoulder this season, one that won't be lightened any by being picked to finish an absurd 9th in the Big East this season. The team lost their two star seniors, Russell Carter and Colin Falls, but have a strong core coming back, including forward Rob Kurz, sophomore sensation PG Tory Jackson, and the long-awaited return of Kyle McAlarney from his absurd one-semester suspension from Notre Dame. The incompetent athletic director, Kevin White, is not happy with just trying to water down the Irish football schedule, but now has set his sights on making the basketball schedule as ridiculously unchallenging as possible. Kansas State is ND's only remotely challenging out of conference game, in NYC at the Jimmy V Classic. ND does not have a road non-conference game. There is frankly no excuse not to be 13-0 going into Big East play. Ball State - MAC - The Cardinals are at about as low a point as you can reach as a basketball program barring some Baylor fiasco. The Cards had their fewest wins and most losses in program history last year, then coach Ronny Thompson - a noted bigot who fired every white person in the basketball department upon arrival - decided to plant racist notes in his own offices to give himself an excuse to resign from the university, and not only that, but to resign in fricking July when it was already too late for a new coach to recruit. Billy Taylor is the new man, fresh from four years at Lehigh, one of which ended in an NCAA berth. Taylor is a Notre Dame man, having played and coached under John MacLeod, and has been the anti-Ronny since arriving, being open and welcoming to everyone, and best of all, is not telling anyone on the team not to trust white people, unlike Thompson. The Cardinals will not win many games this year. Their tallest player, as it stands right now, is 6'5" Anthony Newell. Four players have been kicked off or left the team since Taylor's arrival, at least three of which for drug or rule violation-related reasons. The team faces a fairly taxing out of conference schedule, including an opening game against Butler, who only went to the Sweet 16 last year, and most notably a home game against Georgetown, which might result in the most ridiculously over-the-top atmosphere in Ball State athletic history.

Who's your team? What'd they do last year? Where are they headed? Who are the key players?

theriot is good enough at ss if we improve a lot at rf and cf. In theory, Murton in RF instead of Cliff and Pie 2008 instead of Pie/Pagan/Jones 2007 SHOULD be a big improvement, but I have little confidence that a) the Cubs will be smart enough to do it and b) that Murton and Pie will be what they should be just because we're the Cubs.

Aaron Gray absolutely and totally sucks. Him being taken is probably the most pissed off I'll ever be about a completely random and pointless draft pick. And if he ever plays I will smack Skiles with a 2x4.

They can have anyone but Deng, but like Derwood said I don't think that would be enough. Hopefully his value keeps dropping.

Even more than the current Reds do?

http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071021/SPORTS13/710210332/1023/SPORTS13 I will genius, I will. Go Navy! I don't blame him. I wouldn't want to talk about this season either. If I was him I'd answer every remaining question with a 2008 or 2009-themed answer. I just hope this season teaches him that the NFL style of coaching only works with the guys mentally strong enough to handle it. Last year's senior class, given all the turmoil they faced at ND, was mentally strong enough, and this year's group of players most certainly aren't. Trying to install a one-week-only spread option attack against GT was nightmarishly stupid and set off a row of dominoes that resulted in what we have now.

I've mentioned this before but I'm sure this would be even higher if Ball State wasn't a much better road team than home team. BSU has covered the spread 13 of their last 17 road games, are 8-2 in road MAC games since 2004 and, of course, had the Nebraska and Michigan games. I don't know why that is, but I wish that Road Ball State had shown up to one of their two home losses this year, we might have a better record.

PSU +4 on madduxsports.com - seems low but OSU is non-dominant enough that things could turn in PSU's favor. Also of note, Ball State +13.5 against Illinois, which is right around what I expect the margin to be. how's your run defense? Pretty bad from what I've seen. I don't know how you've seen, but you are very correct. Our pass defense and run defense sort of take turns being the worse of the two defenses. This last week it was the run defense's turn. Mendenhall will probably romp all over us, the game will likely be decided by if we can keep up. Usually (Nebraska, Navy, Michigan) we do. But we'll see. Illinois's got a good enough defense that they could contain us. I predicted 37-30 Illinois on my radio show tonight, but realistically it'll be more like 10-20 points difference unless we really play well.