Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

I was pleased as punch to come home last night to find the new Kings of Leon album “Aha Shake Heartbreak” in my mailbox.

If you don”t know the Kings, they are a band of brothers (and a cousin) who grew up in and around Memphis and traveled the South with their dad (Leon), who happened to be a Pentecostal preacher. The boys backed the musical preacher before discovering girls and booze in their teens. Now they preach the gospel of throwback Southern rock/blues.

But here”s the thing: I didn”t buy the new CD at amazon.com. I bought it at HVM.co.uk.

See, despite the Kings being a fine example of old-school, longhaired, red-state American rock-n-roll, their new album hasn”t been released in the U.S.

Yep, a record made by Tennessee boys in L.A. can”t create sufficient buzz in America. The Kings apparently have a huge following in the UK, but the reception in the States is such that they”ve released their new disc overseas first (supposedly it”ll come out in the U.S. next February).

How freaking pathetic is that? America, you suck.

OK, I”m not in the habit of posting entries that just link off to things I find amusing, but this kills me.

That Yellow Bastard and The Mexican on UGA football.

[editor"s note: This is the kind of blinding wit that fills our table at U-Joint Trivia and often keeps us from thinking enough about the questions.]

Man, I loved seeing Auburn spank Georgia yesterday (and of course I loved seeing LSU whack “Bama). And as an SEC West homer, I like that ESPN is now questioning whether Auburn should be ranked ahead of Oklahoma and get a shot at the Orange Bowl.

So, as a public service, I set out tonight to demonstrate why Auburn of the mighty SEC was more worthy than Oklahoma of the weak Big 12 - and perhaps even USC of the weak Pac 10 - to play for the National Championship.

And then a funny thing happened. I proved myself wrong.

What I”m not wrong about is that the human polls are garbage, driven by the politics of popularity and uninformed perceptions. And I sort of proved that, too.

[editor"s note: Ladies, if you haven"t stopped reading this yet, feel free to click on over to Grumpybunny at this point.]

OK, so with Auburn tearing up Georgia after beating LSU and Tennessee, I figured an objective analysis of their season would show that they are at least as strong as Oklahoma, if not USC as well.

But here are the facts:

Auburn has beaten three teams (ranked 11, 14, 15) in the current AP Top 25. USC has also beaten three (4, 15, 20). Oklahoma has beaten four (6, 22, 23, 25).

What ESPN has latched its pro-Auburn star to is the Tigers” and Sooners” performance against ranked teams. Against its three ranked opponents, Auburn has an average margin of victory of 14 points. Oklahoma”s average win margin is 10 points. USC”s is 18 points.

But where Auburn”s case falls apart is its overall schedule strength.

The 10 teams Auburn have played have a combined 48% winning percentage. USC”s have a 49% winning percentage, and Oklahoma”s have a whopping 57% winning percentage.

Auburn has beaten three 2-loss teams, two 5-loss teams, three 6-loss teams, a 7-loss team and an 8-loss team. USC has beaten one 1-loss team, two 2-loss teams, two 5-loss teams, three 6-loss teams, an 8-loss team and a 9-loss team. Oklahoma has beaten one 1-loss team, one 2-loss team, two 3-loss teams, one 4-loss team, two 5-loss teams, one 6-loss team and two 7-loss teams.

But how good are the teams everyone”s played? Looking at the all-school rankings of Sagarin and Massey (the two BCS services that have released [non-BCS] rankings so far this week), Auburn”s opponents have an average ranking is 84.1 (as in 1 = good). USC”s is 45.3 and Oklahoma”s is 42.4.

That last stat is the really shocking one. How can Auburn”s schedule be that much weaker than USC and Oklahoma?

Two words: The Citadel.

Well actually, ten words: Mississippi State, The University of Louisiana at Monroe, Kentucky, The Citadel. Each of those four teams are ranked below 100 in the composite Sagarin/Massey ratings above. And The Citadel is ranked 219. 219!.

USC played one team (Washington - 121) ranked below 100, as did Oklahoma (Houston - 108). And Auburn played four.

There”s not much Auburn can do about the rankings of SEC foes Mississippi State and Kentucky, but putting two sub-100 teams on the non-conference schedule is just asking for trouble.

If last year”s BCS formula were in effect, Auburn would be getting clobbered on its computer average, strength of schedule and lack of quality win points. But this ain”t your grandfather”s BCS.

The BCS is now driven by the human polls. And the human poll voters are starting to love Auburn. “They beat Georgia 24-6! Oklahoma didn”t beat Texas A&M by that much!”. And thus Auburn is tied for second in the AP and just two points behind in the coaches” poll.

And this, of course, is why the BCS worked better before. Chris Fowler talking up Auburn on GameDay to get more No. 2 votes for the Tigers didn”t have that big of an impact on the ratings. And I”m sure AP voters are more likely to change a vote now that they control 33% of the BCS formula. Did you notice the story about Tommy Tuberville playing politics in the press box after the game? Smart on his part, but there should be no such lobbying needed.

Of course, if the AP voters and coaches spent a few minutes digging into the actual facts (doing a computer-type analysis, you might say), then perhaps human polls would be fairly accurate.

But they are not. Congrats on the Orange Bowl bid, Auburn. And Coach Stoops, don”t forget to send goodie baskets to AP voters next year.

One of my Baton Rouge operatives tipped me to an article in the LSU Reveille this morning about the Student Senate being unhappy with Jessica Pivik”s column.

It seems the SGA is questioning their funding of The Reveille because of Jessica.

This is apparently the latest in a flurry of debate down at LSU about whether Jessica”s “shocking” column has a place in a campus newspaper.

It absolutely doesn”t, but not because of what it deals with. Jessica Pivik”s column has no place in The Reveille because it”s bad. Very bad. She”s a horrible writer, and her pieces are little more than lifted snippets of Google searches.

But the Jessica Pivik “controversy” isn”t what I want to focus on here, because this article brings to the surface the one thing at LSU that”s even more ridiculous than Jessica.

Student government.

LSU”s SGA - like those at pretty much any high school or college - is a pointless exercise that does little more than pad the resumes of the people involved.

[editor"s note: For those of you who may feel that things such as "Student Senate - Arts & Sciences College" make an impression on a resume, you"re wrong. Get a job that"s related to what you want to do. That"s what matters. No employer gives a damn whether you were involved in student government, 4H, Meals on Wheels or anything like that. It just makes you look like an untalented suck-up.]

LSU held its student government elections last month, and the SGA types were thrilled that turnout was up 350 percent! Of course, with 4,700 out of 31,500 students voting, that”s still just 15% of students giving a damn, but I guess it beats the regular 3% turnout.

I could go through all the things that make student government so ridiculous (pointless resolutions about things that won”t change, etc.), but instead, let”s have some fun with the LSU SGA.

First off, I love that the SGA has “Executive”, “Legislative” AND “Judicial” branches. Did you know that Roe v. Wade originated as a case heard by the LSU SGA Supreme Court? No? That”s because it didn”t.

Second, they feel the need to have an Executive Staff. Like it”s The West Wing or something. “Chief of Staff”? Give me a break. And click on that link above and scroll down to the very bottom. Check out the “Minority Affairs” dude. Crawford Leavoy? That”s the whitest boy I”ve ever seen.

Third, check out the rundown of The Student Senate. a) thanks for showing up at picture day, everybody! b) notice how the seats in Graduate School and the Veterinary School are essentially unfilled. Serious students have better things to do.

And finally - let”s give it up for Tiger “Pride”, Indeed!. Daniel is the kid who apparently helps Coach Saban recruit gay players. And now he”s won a “half seat” (whatever that is) in the Senate. Good to see the Republicans didn”t get a clean sweep on that whole “anti gay” platform.

In researching current events for last night”s U-Joint Trivia match (we led going in to the final question but ended up in second because somebody knew too much about presidents - we think they were cheating), I decided to learn more about Yasser Arafat.

One question I thought might come up was “what does Yasser mean?”, so I started searching around for that. The site that popped up first at Google amused me to no end, so I figure I”ll share.

It”s entitled “It”s All in the Name” and found at a site called RaptureReady.com. Yes, a Jesus freak. I recommend a full read of the piece, which looks to draw pro- and anti-Jesus ties to people based on their names, when you have some spare time, but here are just a few highlights:

• Darwin (Dare win) promoted the Theory of Evil ution

• Saddam Hussein (Sad damned Huss ein–we refer to a hussy as a whore in the English language)

• Mohammed, also spelled Mohammad (Mo ham mad) Ham being unclean (Mohammed died from pneumonia and was allegedly married to a nine year old girl. He also murdered many people. Ironically, Muslims don”t eat pork, but their supposed prophet has the unclean name within his own name)

• Javier Solana: Foreign Minister for the EU. Solana means “sun” and he could very well be the counterfeit “Son” or the Antichrist. The “number of his name” being 666 could mean that his first, middle, and last names all have six letters. He is the only European leader whose first and last names have six characters and after an exhaustive research, I still haven”t been able to find out whether or not his middle name has six characters also.

[editor"s note: "exhaustive research" apparently ends after the second Google result, because the third will tell you that his full name is Javier Solana Madariaga - the number of his name is 669!]

• Elijah Cummings: (Coming) is a current Senator in the U.S. Does that mean Elijah is coming as one of the two witnesses?

• Britney Spears: Yes, this is her last name. I think she is a stumbling block of lust for many men. Recently kissed Madonna on MTV.

• Ellen DeGeneres (Degenerate): First person to outwardly express her lesbianism on national television.

Enjoy.

I find myself today considering the ridiculous; contemplating the absurd; evaluating the ludicrous; pondering the preposterous …

I”m thinking about getting cable TV.

Yep, cable. Ditching my Dish, as they say. Signing on to have Satan himself (as represented by any and all local monopoly cable companies) deliver my in-home visual entertainment.

I have a permanent hatred, you see, for cable TV companies that grew out of my experience with Cablevision in Baton Rouge.

I lived in 11 different places when I was in college, and therefore I had to visit the horrid old Cablevision office on Florida Boulevard at least two dozen times (factoring in all of the visits to replace their crappy equipment when it broke). Those of you who had the misfortune of dealing with Cablevision know that a trip to the DMV or pre-computerized LSU registration was more enjoyable.

When I moved to Atlanta, I was glad to be rid of Cablevision, but discovered the apartment I moved in to had some ridiculous “special” cable system on which you could only get about half of the regular cable channels. That lack of choice really pissed me off.

Then when I bought my first house, I signed up for MediaOne (the local cable monopoly), but ditched it ASAP for this weird wireless cable system BellSouth rolled out. It was called Americast and required me to get a little white disc attached about 100 feet up a pine tree in my backyard (BellSouth broadcast its wireless signal from the top of the NationsBank building in Midtown).

That was 1998. I”ve been off cable ever since.

Now, however, I”m faced with a grim reality. Dish Network gives me good service at good prices. I like their DVRs (I”ve owned about 10 of them, after all) and the fact that I don”t pay a monthly TiVo fee.

But in this modern world, there”s a lot Dish can”t give me. I have an HDTV now, but if I want DishHD, I either have to go without DVR for HD (not acceptable) or pay $1,000 for an HD DVR, which Dish makes really hard for me to buy anyway. Dish also hasn”t kept up with video-on-demand services, and having Dish instead of cable also forces me to have a home phone line because I need a DSL line.

Satan (Comcast), on the other hand, can give me a comparable digital TV package, an HD DVR, video-on-demand, broadband without a phone line and even local Weather Channel content, can save me about $50 a month when you factor in dumping home phone service and will apparently give me $400 for leaving Dish.

And thus I ponder a deal with the devil.

If Satan is to get my business, he”s going to have to earn it. Comcast is known for horrible customer service, so they”re going to have to show me otherwise. I”ve got an email in to them asking for some details of their HD DVR (they use a Motorola box, and Motorola offers single-tuner and dual-tuner versions). If they can give me a coherent and timely answer there, they”ve cleared the first hurdle.

We shall see.