If Only I Could
If only I could buy season tickets and follow the process, including the step my wife added for me. Some day.
Sports
Congratulations Wisconsin Men’s Basketball
Congratulations to the University of Wisconsin’s Men’s Basketball team on their victory over Arizona to win the West Regional bracket and advance to the Final Four.
Tom Oates of the Wisconsin State Journal has an excellent article on what this means for Coach Bo Ryan.
The game was a nail biter, with the last 18 minutes of regulation being a one possession game before finally going into overtime and the Badgers pulling out a huge win. On to North Texas and a chance to play in the national championship.
Photo: Robert Hanashiro-USA TODAY Sports
It’s Gameday!
As a huge (American) football fan, it amuses me to no end how my children get into the excitement of game day. They know how much I love my football teams and want to know who the Packers (or Badgers) are playing each week, which other teams I want to win in the other games, and share my enthusiasm for the game. Jack’s knowledge of the players and the opposing teams is almost scary considering he is only 4 years old.
As a Wisconsin native living in Minnesota, they really get excited when the Green Bay Packers take on the Minnesota Vikings. (Though all real Packer fans know the real rivalry is with the Bears – a fact that Minnesotans just don’t understand. The Packer / Viking rivalry is nothing compared to that one – ask me about the time I went to a Packer / Bears game at Lambeau sometime).
So I was happy to see, that without any prompting from me, my two youngest pick out their own clothes this morning:
Now that brings a smile to my face. We’re just minutes from game time – go Pack go!
I have seen the future of TV
…and it is the ESPN app on the new Xbox 360 update that was released today.
I’ve been in the beta for the new Xbox 360 dashboard for the last month or so, and with its release today, the embargo on blogging about it has been lifted.
Since I cut the cord and got rid of cable TV last February, the one thing that has been missing is sports. I’ve been tied to whatever the four major networks want to shovel at me. And I’m a sports junkie. I’m a huge (American) football fan, cheering for both the University of Wisconsin Badgers and Green Bay packers, and as soon as football season ends I dive right into college basketball. Having been a DirecTV customer for ten years I would pay hundreds of dollars for the NFL Sunday ticket and the March Madness packages. I’ve also started getting back into MLB the last few years cheering for the Minnesota Twins. And this summer I could only watch them on Sunday afternoons – the only time they were available over the air.
The ESPN app on the Xbox 360 changes all of that. It’s amazing – especially for college football. Branding the app as “ESPN3”, it’s a repackaged version of ESPN360 with more content available live and on demand. If you have ESPN as a cable subscriber, you’ll get to watch the game they pick for you at 11am (CST) on Saturday. With ESPN3 on the 360 you have access to every game ESPN has rights to – 4 or 5 games at 11, and about the same at 2:30. Using my IP, they did blackout the 2:30 p.m. game if it was on ABC but I still had access to all the other games. And the best part was, you could choose to watch it live or you could start at the beginning if you were tuning in late. On the 360, ESPN3 offers full DVR functionality – you could pause, rewind and fast forward. A number of games are also archived for a few days and you can watch them on demand after the game was over. It was fantastic watching the Badgers beat the Buckeyes a week ago on ESPN3 – without having to pay for cable TV.
Other content available includes NBA games, a number of second tier college sports, and selected ESPN content. There is no NFL content, including Monday Night Football games – not a huge surprise, considering the draconian rules the NFL has to protect their brand. The available ESPN original content is the only thing I’m disappointed with. You only get some highlights and clips from SportsCenter – I didn’t expect the whole show, but I did expect more. But where it really lets me down is ESPN shows like Rome is Burning, Around the Horn, E:60 and PTI (especially PTI!) aren’t available. They might have one or two clips from each, though with the official launch today I can’t find PTI at all. I don’t know if it’s a rights issue that they don’t show these original shows as they features clips and highlights from the sports broadcasts themselves or why they’re not available, but I had hoped for more original content. And the updates too those clips, at least during the beta, weren’t very timely.
The only catch with ESPN3 on Xbox360 is you have to have a broadband provider who has partnered with Microsoft. I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing it has to be someone who offers TV service of some kind. My dashboard shows co-branding with Comcast as I have Comcast cable internet service.
As a college football fan, and general sports fan, this fixes the one major downside I had in cutting the cable. It’s an awesome experience. Live and on-demand content available at my fingertips. This is what the future will bring once the content providers figure out their new business models. If they do.
Oh, and the Netflix app in today’s update finally added the ability to search so you don’t have to use your PC to add titles to your Instant Queue. Finally!
What a weekend of football
What a weekend! First, the Packers take apart the Seahawks after a costly start, with a game to remember on the Frozen Tundra with the snow blowing. And then the Cowboys, the #1 seed, lose to the Giants at Texas stadium.
It’s somehow fitting that 10 years after the Packers won the Super Bowl after hosting the NFC Championship game, that they host another one.
Cross your fingers my playoff tickets come through!
Go Pack!
Packers vs. Bears (10/7/07)
I was at Lambeau Field this past Sunday to watch the Packers eventually beat themselves and lose to the Bears on national TV.
Having grown up in Wisconsin, and now living in Minnesota, the residents of Minnesota think they have a rivalry with the Bears, but any true Packer fan will tell you the only rivalry we have is with the Bears. It was my first Bears game, and the normally nice crowd was just mean when it came to the Bears.
It didn’t help that the Packers had almost 100 yards of penalties, 6 turnovers, and didn’t rush the ball in the second half to eventually let a 10 point lead slip through their fingers.
I’ve added two sets of pictures from the game to my Flickr pages. I’m still having issues with focus on my DSLR when using my zoom lens in sports mode, I apologize if any are still blurry.
If you’re a Packer fan, join the Packer group on Flickr.
We were graced with the University of Wisconsin Marching Band before the game, during halftime, and during the second half doing their routine they also do at Camp Randall.
Here’s my favorite picture from the evening:
Are you ready for some football?
My favorite time of the year is quickly approaching, as we are just over a month away from the start of the college football season, and the NFL is now in full swing with training camps.
I’ve started to watch a few baseball games this year (especially when the Twins are on in HD), but nothing compares to football for me.
I was surprised to see last night that the newly formed Big Ten Network that launches Aug. 30th, will be included on the basic tier of DirecTV. And here I was already to shell out $10 / month for the sports package. I’m glad I don’t, as NFL Ticket just hit my bill. I’ll be interested to see how much HD bandwidth the Big Ten Network gets, as they keep talking about how they’re launching with the most HD content of any new TV channel. DirecTV’s new satellite doesn’t come online until October with more HD capacity, so this will be interesting to see.
In related news, I’ve gotten my hands on a few Packer tickets this year – I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see Favre play knowing this is probably his last year. (But we say that every year, don’t we?)
10 days until the first preseason game! Are you ready for some football?
Twins Game
For my first day of vacation, I took Alex and Zoe to the Twins game at the Metrodome. It was Alex’s first Twins game, and Zoe’s first baseball game as we watched the Twins take on the Blue Jays. We had the use of a suite, just to the left behind home plate, with a gorgeous view of the field:
Zoe and Alex seemed to have fun, Zoe enjoyed being able to run around the suite, and both kids enjoyed all the foods and snacks.
(My batteries were low, so I don’t think the flash worked).
After the baseball strike in the early 90’s, I swore off all baseball. It wasn’t until last year where I started to have an interest again, mostly due to the Twins being such a quality organization, both in management and the players. They play baseball as it was meant to be played, as a team, without ego, and truly appear to have fun. That has translated in to 4 AL Central Division championships in the last 5 years, and I’ve found myself watching a lot of games this year. It doesn’t change the fact the Metrodome is a terrible baseball experience – baseball should always be played outdoors!
The game started out rough, with Frank Thomas basting a 3 run homer in the first inning to give the Blue Jays a 4 – 0 lead. It was Frank Thomas’ 500th home run, as he became only the 21st player in MLB history to achieve that milestone, and the Twins fans rewarded him with a standing ovation. The Twins scraped an clawed led by Torii Hunter’s two home runs to take the lead with a nice come from behind win.
More photos (including Zoe’s new fake smile she’s using and the temporary tattoo we got at the game) in my Flickr set.
Welcome to Bloody Thursday
If you’re an NFL fan, Len Pasquarelli of ESPN.com has a must read article on what they’re calling today: Bloody Thursday. His follow-up article on what will go down to today is just as good.
With the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the Player’s Union and Owners set to expire tomorrow, teams must get under the salary cap – a cap number they still don’t know. Free Agency starts tomorrow, and 2007 will be an uncapped year, so teams will be reluctant to sign anyone, especially as they can only pro-rate contracts over 4 years instead of the typical 7, which drives a player’s salary cap number through the roof.
Will an 11th hour deal arrive and save the league? Are we a year away from no college draft? Will the owners lock the players out after next season?
In the next 36 hours, watch the drama unfold!
Playoff thoughts
I’m not sure why, but I was happy to see the Steelers win this afternoon.
The Colts have a coach who is well respected, with a rep he can’t win the big one, but who is supposed to be one of the nicest coaches you’ll ever meet. They have one of the best, if not the best, quarterback in the league. And yet I was rooting against them.
There’s something about Bill Cowher that makes me cheer for the man. He’s a pull no punches, tell like it is coach. I like the trick plays. I like the blue collar feel to the Steelers. I like that Cowher just wins – and his tenure in the league is as impressive as anything.
Jerome Bettis is pure class as he has accepted his role, and Big Ben, while tip-toeing the line of cockiness, is a hell of a leader on the feel. Troy Palamalu just makes plays – and he was robbed today.
Robbed! I don’t know what it was, but I thought the refs in both of today’s games were just off. From the non-call false start / off-sides in the Colt / Steelers game to the overturn of Palamalu’s interception, there were even a couple calls in the Bears / Panthers games that just seemed wrong.
Poor refs can’t ever catch a break.
I was sad to see the Patriots lose, but happy to see the Bears and Redskins lose. (Yes, I’m more happy for teams to lose than teams to win). The Bears is an easy call – I’m a Packer fan, and the true rivalry is with the team in Chicago. For the Seahawks – meh. I’m happy for them as it’s been 21 years since their last playoff win, and I respect Coach Holmgren – even if he is coaching the wrong team.
Next week’s picks: Steelers and Panthers win, and meet in Super Bowl XL.