A ha!
This is it. Finally, after two months of being the Thursday columnist, I get the chance to come out on Tuesday.
No more checking to see what the other two have written.
No more sacrificing what I want to write about because they're writing about it earlier in the week.
That's right, no more scavenging through the literary scraps left by one Mr. Jed Williams and one Mr. Jim Reedy. This is Michael time and I plan to shine. This will be my opus. Sadly, this is my last column so I can't slowly feed you all of my sports insight over the course of the next few Mondays. It will all have to be today.
So, I present my random and definitive thoughts on sports. (This is also known as grab-bag, but let's not use that term.)
Saturday's Dave Matthews Band concert may represent the last time we see Scott Stadium filled to capacity any time soon. Excitement of the Al Groh era may wane if the possibility of a sub-.500 season arises. Something tells me though that the DMB show will not be the last time we see khakied, underage, drunk students in Scott Stadium.
I'll be at the games regardless, if only to see a Virginia football team with a strong secondary. We can go 0-12 for all I care if we stop giving up multitudes of 70-yard passes. While Michael Vick's departure will of course help in this respect, (He's always good for an off-balance 60-yard touchdown or two.) I've seen way too many arm tackles in the last few years.
My favorite Virginia defense of all time was the '94 squad - featuring future NFLers Percy Ellsworth and Ronde Barber in the secondary and Jamie Sharper and James Farrior at linebacker - that recorded a school-record 27 interceptions and was unmatched in swagger. Last year's squad was certainly full of swagger but also allowed a whole lot of touchdowns. Hopefully, Groh, a defensively minded coach, can bring the team back to that level.
There's a joke in Roanoke among Virginia fans that goes something like this:
First guy: Guess what? I just saw Michael Vick over at Carvin's Cove. [For you non-Roanokians, that's a local watering hole. Literally.]
Second guy: Really?
First guy: Yeah, he was walking on water.
Now, I don't know if Vick is, as The Washington Post's Leonard Shapiro puts it in his draft article, "the finest collegiate athlete ever to play the position." I doubt that he is. But the Chargers' recent reluctance to draft Vick proves to me that they will continue to be lame. Period. Drafting Vick represented a risk, but it was one the consistently lame team should have taken.
Sure, TCU tailback LaDainian Tomlinson might turn out to be good, but if there's one thing the Bengals are proving, it's that having an amazing running back is not enough to win games.
Sure, Vick played against some suspect competition at times, but have you ever seen TCU's schedule? The WAC is light years away from the Big East. And, sure, Vick only played two years of college ball, but last time I checked he went 20-1 as a starter, with one loss to Florida State. That includes two wins over us (quite convincingly I might add) and two wins over Clemson.
Tomlinson's TCU squad dropped a tough game last year to San Jose St. That's right. The Spartans. And not the good ones from East Lansing. I know so little about these Spartans that I thought their mascot was the Buffalo. Put Michael Vick on that field and it's no contest.
Well, that's it then. My last column. If I've proved one thing over my short time here, it's that I know nothing of non-revenue sports. I've definitely never ventured below the first tier.
At this point in my column, I originally had a tearful goodbye to all my loyal fans, but those pieces of poo poo at The Cav Daily edited it out.
I hate them. Good-bye.
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