This photo kind of works for everything in the column, but it's of Star Anna. Read on.
Let's argue about paying college players. I'm serious. Let's roll up the sleeves and get at it. Or continue getting at it, because we've been getting at it pretty good for a while now as is. You bring the ragged old sweatshirt you wore in college. I'll bring the budget sheets. We'll weigh nostalgia against a obscene pile of money -- and that's just the head coach's salary.
Last week, Arian Foster said he took money while at Tennessee. "I don't know if this will throw us into a NCAA investigation," he said, and how could he. The NCAA doesn't know.
Susan Orlean outed @horse_ebooks as performance art piece and very much human. I'm waiting for Jonathan Franzen to pull back the curtain on the NCAA and find out it's graphing calculator being strangled by Hello Kitty stickers.
The day after the Foster news broke players around the country scribbled "APU" on various pieces of tape and equipment. It stands for All Players United. Deadspin summed it up pretty well, calling it a move in "solidarity for the idea of getting paid for working their asses off." You'll see at that link where Iowa State's athletic director trolled the APU membership, and was then trolled himself.
Nothing compared to Dick Vitale, who essentially called Arian Foster a prostitute. It was quickly pointed out to Vitale that he'd made a fortune thanks to thousands of athletes like Foster, and that maybe Vitale could kindly shut up. Vitale said he was sorry.
Solidarity amongst the current playing ranks is nice, but what if more players followed Foster's lead? What if All Alumni United picked a day to call up their nearest reporter and talk about what they got in school? "I don't know if this will throw us into a NCAA investigation" would quickly turn into "Ha ha ha ha ha! They can't investigate EVERYONE."
And we could accept that amateurism is a sham and work from there.
For more on this particular topic, follow Patrick Hruby on Twitter.
P.S. ESPN is reporting that EA Sports is going to pay out to athletes for stealing their images and using them in video games. They won't get enough to buy a video game system, but they'll get something.
BUT THEY ALREADY GET A SCHOLARSHIP! Yes they do and Jesus I don't want to be here all day. Go follow Hruby.
EXCEPT. Wait. If you've ever used the "the biology/English/geography/whatever department doesn't generate money or attention" argument to justify anything an athletic department has done, you don't get to argue "scholarship is payment enough," because you don't actually care about academics.
I wrote about the new Star Anna record for the Portland Mercury. She went through hell to make Go To Hell, and it's bold and bad and she sings her ass off. On the title track, a Nina Simone cover, she sounds like a gospel singer backed by a band of serial killers. She's at Al's Den for a week starting on Sunday.
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TaleG8: F--- your circumstances; go see Ray Wylie Hubbard on Sunday
I used to have this little column in the sports section of a local publication. We called it the Tailgate. It was fun. As I clack away this Springsteen book, I thought it'd be fun to give myself something to do outside of raiding Bruce's work. I also worry the local publication might have the rights to Tailgate. So this isn't that. It's the TaleG8, which works because it's on the Internet and everything on the Internet has a stupid name. I'll try and do this each Friday. A little sports. A little music. A little whatever.
Nebraska fans are a proud people and you can't just say "fuck you" to them. You can't even say you'd like to say "fuck you" to them. At least not if you're the coach at Nebraska and coming off a loss. Mostly you shouldn't come off a loss.
Deadspin unearthed a two-year-old tape of a pissed of Bo Pelini (is there any other kind?), and he does indeed say he'd like to say "fuck you" to the fans. But he began by saying he wanted to tell a member of the media, "Get the fuck away from me. I'm done with you, motherfucker."
Which must have thrilled the fans. Fans love it when Coach puts the media in their place. To follow such a high with the realization that he thinks the same thing of some of the fans? Well that's ... pretty funny, actually. It sort of makes me love Pelini even more than I already do, and I love him a lot because his Rage Monster is an all star Rage Monster.
I'd pay for a channel that showed me nothing bot Pelini's rage and Lane Kiffin's confusion, Kiffin perpetually stuck with the look of the kid at the frat who thought he'd bought dope and instead got a bag of grass clippings.
Pelini's crime was specificity. In Eugene, Mark Helfrich was too vague. Helfrich told reporters tight end Colt Lyerla missed last week's game because of "circumstances."
"Circumstances is extremely specific," he told reporters, grinning.
Lyerla wasn't too pleased, and he told the Oregonian's Jason Quick just that. Naturally, everyone got mad at Quick, because the media's just trying to bring down the home team, yaknow? (No it's not.)
Secrecy is important these days. Not so much for a competitive edge, but because lord help us if the world discovers these state employees are paid seven figures to teach people to shove each other around. That's still all football is.
Three games into his head coaching career, Helfrich is undefeated, so he can say whatever he wants, I suppose. But "circumstances" is a bad word. You rarely hear "circumstances" and think good things.
Circumstances being what they are ... you probably shouldn't return to your home until all the snakes are accounted for.
Given the circumstances ... it'd be impossible to remove the umbrella without causing more damage. Sorry. You'll just have to live with it.
Circumstances have changed ... you'll want to call your lawyer.
Anyhow, it was pointed out in more than one place this was all much ado about nothing. Which is true. Pretty much all the time.
Ray Wylie Hubbard at Mississippi Studios on Sunday
It's not my job to tell you what you should go see, but if it were my job, I'd be urging you to go see Ray Wylie Hubbard at Mississippi Studios on Sunday night. [Tickets]
Ray's all kinds of cool, and he was one of my favorite interviews last year. "I write what I know about," he said, and what he knows about is all kinds of cool shit. Cool guitars. Cool amplifiers. Cool cars. Cool books. Cool grooves. And a whole bunch of cool places some of us might drive right past, or be terrified to walk into.
Live it's like going for a ride with all those things through a dark Texas night.
