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  1. I don't normally respond to your posts like this, but this one is especially bad. It's so bad 6th street repped you. Think about that and then feel bad. @Tech - So let me get this straight. You think Charlie Strong, Tom Herman, and Garrett Gilbert can bumblefuck their way out of Lubbock with wins, but somehow this team with the most explosive offensive skill talent in decades is going to somehow shit the bed against a first year head coach inheriting a terrible roster? K OU - We were smoking their asses last year and the guy who came in off the bench and put on a superman cape to bring them back isn't on the roster anymore, nor are their best coaches, nor are many of their best players. Literally every position is downgraded from last season. It's a rivalry game so anything can happen, but we should go in knowing we are going to win. @OSU & @KSU - OSU will be a legitimate test, but our losses to them over the years has largely been due to us beating ourselves. I feel it is a winnable game, but if we do lose then it is what it is. KSU is the most puzzling fools gold of the offseason. They were the team that stopped our 6 game slide last year at our lowest possible morale moment and we beat them without a QB. We have run over, around, and past them since Kleimann has been there. So now they want to roll out Adrian Martinez and people think they are going to be 5 wins better this season in conference? A guy who has never thrown for more than 2800 yards, has not topped 2000 yards twice, and has thrown for close to 10 interceptions per season? That sounds delightful. @Kansas - This one is going to be a hate fucking. Their fan in the stands will seek shelter at Phogg Allen by the end of the third quarter. Sure we could lose 2 of these games, but we shouldn't. I will be disappointed if we aren't 4-1 against these teams.
  2. Whichever staff handles the distractions better can prepare better. I loved seeing Vince on TV yesterday. I don't know if Vince has 100% access to the team, but he sure can help the players stay focused, I believe. lm sure everyone here remembers Vince "Whoever wants to beat Ohio St. show up at xxx hour". Obviously I don't remember the exact quote but the Ohio St. victory and the Alabama victory this year are comparable. I am not personally in favor of any additions to play packages. I think the team changed when Brooks went down. I remember typing that when he went down we weren't going to win the Big12 without him. Did Sark really discover over the middle passes after Brooks went down? I have seen a few over the middle passes since Brooks. I think Washington will have trouble preparing for all we can do offensively. And Ewers hasn't run the ball, except for the one run yesterday, since getting injured, so with him 100% healthy that is another aspect Wash should prepare for. This team reminds me of possibly only two teams, the 2004 and 2008 teams. No team should ever be compared with the 2009 team, being held together by a dominant QB and one receiver on offense. I believe both the 2004 and '08 teams had a will to win and a next man up philosophy this team has. This team has improved vastly as the season went on much better than any of Mack's teams. I think this team is much more versatile on offense. This team has enough good RBs to run the wishbone, and enough really good receivers to run the run and shoot. Of course none of that matters. At this point, there are only three factors remaining. Luck, injuries, and the football gods. And we all know the football gods owe us big time for January 2010. It is payback time.
  3. This is probably the worst 2-game start we have had in recent memory, but there is reason to be hopeful this team improves over the year. The offense: Our OL play is much improved, Ingram looks solid, Sam is much improved at checking into the right play presnap. Duvernay is our best WR and looks like a stud. Actual TEs. Eagles sighting. We need to run the ball more. Multiple back looks would be nice, but if they aren't installed now that's a bit of a pipe dream. I believe it'd even benefit the passing game. When we put together a drive it is one first down at a time. Stop looking for a homerun on first down. Sam needs to be decisive with his options. We piddle when we don't stay in front of the chains. I like this team much more in 3rd&4 than 3rd&8. The defense: has sucked more than the offense, but it's been all on big plays and outside runs. Nelson looks every bit like Poona, and that's what worried me most going into the year. This won't ever happen because it's not his style, but Hager really needs to take on blocks and string out plays - there's no amount of TFLs that will make up for giving up easy big runs. I gave Wheeler a pass for being out half the Maryland game, but he really was slow to react in the Tulsa game. We need to play assignment football and stop looking for plays. Pass defense: Its been all bad coverage busts with some poor positioning from safeties who otherwise play great. Pressure has not been great. Thompson falling down is a "whatever" - it was a poor pass and he got turf monstered adjusting to it, it'll fix itself. Boyce just quit on the play he got beat on, he worries me. The offense fizzles quickly, but it has also put together drives that look better than anything we saw last year. If the defense can make the same leap that it did last year... "We are going to win." - Snacks And, yeah, that's a whole lot of sunshine. I'm geuinely concerned about 5-7, which looks really likely.
  4. You just regurgitate punditry you hear without educating yourself about the history of any of this. West Virginia Senate History 1990 D+37 1994 D+38 1996 D+53 2000 D+57 2002 D+27 2006 D+31 2008 D+27 (Byrd & Rockefeller dominating for decades) 2010 D+9 2012 D+24 2014 R+28 2018 D+3 2020 R+43 We are losing West Virginia because of the culture war. We aren't going to win West Virginia back through woke austerity we're going to win it back through an aggressive campaign of delivering economic results to the people of West Virginia and then telling them that's what we're doing (hence the need for a $10+M campaign demanding economic benefits for those people). The people whose punditry you regurgitate are woke austerity proponents, so to them West Virginia is an unwinnable hellhole. Obama gave them, "If you uhh like your plan... you can keep it! And uhhhhhhhh learn to code, coal miners!" and a bunch of woke signaling that the coasts and suburbs loved but WV doesn't care about. Horseshit. WV should be ours and we should go get it. Put checks in their hands and they will come along. Not letting Joe Manchin dictate the entirety of Democratic policy for the entire nation isn't telling him to go fuck himself. 63% of West Virginians want a $15 minimum wage. Manchin should be made to feel the pressure of the desires of his constituency. It's a profound weakness of Joe Biden's leadership that he has no inclination to utilize the bully pulpit to enact positive change because he loves his Senate buddies too much. It's a massive problem. When it is tried, it gets their attention. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Vice President Kamala Harris' West Virginia media appearances last week – in which she tried to sell the Biden administration's COVID-19 stimulus plan – didn't go over well with the red state's longtime Democratic senator, Joe Manchin. Manchin, whose moderate vote is enough to sink President Joe Biden's agenda in a Senate split 50-50, chided the administration for not giving him a heads up on the interviews, contending "That’s not a way of working together.” While Manchin and the White House made up, Harris' misstep with the powerful swing senator exemplifies how politically attuned the administration has to be to push through its legislation in a narrowly divided Senate with moderate pockets on both sides. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- How do we get to a point where we have the votes to do it?
  5. OK people, hear me out. We are going to win this game. Why, you ask? Well pull up a chair and listen to this truth serum. 1. Iowa State is a pretty good football team. They have good coaches, they have good schemes, but they do not have players that can really threaten us outside of maybe Jayden Higgens. Last year they survived on running the same pass route to the same guy over and over again in critical situations to move the chains. That guy is gone, the QB who threw those passes is in gamblers anonymous. The skill talent is not nearly as dangerous as last year, although they have two quality receivers. Rocco Becht has become a serviceable QB for them this season, but he is not a run threat, having run for a total of 81 yards all season. That means we get to play things a bit more honestly instead of selling out to stop the QB run like we did against Houston - which opened up all of those deep crossing routes. 2. They do not have an explosive run game. Their leading rusher has 460 yards on the season. I think we will shut that down very quickly and make them one dimensional. 3. Referees - What?! Fuck B12 Refs amirite? Yeah, you are right, except this. When we get late into the season and there is a B12 team in the running for the CFP or BCS, historically the refs tend to give some calls to the teams in the hunt. It means money for the conference, it means money for the schools, and they get to decide that maybe a missed PI or holding call will be soothed by a couple million dollars extra to the school that season. 4. You know who won't be soothed? Matt Campbell. I fully expect his head to explode off of his shoulders and shoot into space due to the blood pressure when we start beating their asses. Death of a coach on the field is always distracting for a team. 5. Sark has figured out the 3-3-5 flyover defense to an extent in the passing game. He spent a good portion of the game in trips sets, which forced the defense to come out of their shell and declare their coverage. Gundy did this earlier in the season and I think Sark caught on and used it against TCU. That is why we were getting those deep shots in the first half, and how we got 1 on 1 coverage to AD Mitchell on the crucial third down play late in the game. Ewers went for over 300 on Saturday against a team running exclusively 3-3-5. I think we do it again this week to clean up the reads for Quinn pre snap. 6. Iowa States top 3 leading tacklers are all DBs. That is a problem. Their top LB has 21 tackles on the year. That tells me that they have front 7 issues. If they want to keep those safeties back trying to confuse the pass game, we should have some room to run provided Sark doesn't get as predictable as he got last week. I was literally screaming for an RPO in the fourth quarter. I expect Iowa State to come out with their safeties deep and prove that we can run the ball before they break their shell. So long as Baxter and Blue run patiently and not up the backs of our linemen, I think we will see some quality rushing yards this week. To me that all adds up to a road W provided we don't run into some bullshit 40 MPH wind with a -5 windchill.
  6. those of you who were around might remember that i went to rehab in the summer of 2009. I don't need to tell you where Texas Athletics was at that point in time- we'd had TJ and Cat on the cover of SI in 2003 and nothing had changed since then- Texas was still the preeminent athletics program in college sports. well there was this nigerian guy working there named Victor Ike- no relation- and every morning i would read the sports page and talk to Victor about whatever i read. he was one of two people in there who helped me heal by being in tune with the sports that i loved- the other was a female doctor who was a huge USMNT fan and who was keeping me up to date with everything going on with the confed cup- i've always regretted not being able to tell her how important she was to me. but i digress. before i left rehab i made a bet with Victor- that Texas would win a national title in football, basketball, or baseball within 'x' amount of years- i don't remember the exact time frame. i do remember him laughing in my face, just so amused at how sure i was. it was like he knew he was taking candy from a baby (haven't seen him since then ergo i haven't paid him, suck it Victor). he was so sure that Texas wouldn't win a title, and that really irked me. i was *so* sure that major national titles were an inevitability that i couldn't believe that anyone else would think differently. well, we're now approaching the summer of 2023, and Texas has won a grand total of *checks notes* zero major national titles since then ("major" meaning the big 3 sports). this is what chris beard took from us. you cannot possibly convince me that we weren't going to win a title under beard. he was going to be here 25-30 years. i'd bet dollars to donuts that he was more likely to win multiple national titles at Texas than he was to never win it all. that's what this motherfucker took from all of us. that's why this is such a big deal. ou, hey, Terry is our coach, the players and recruits are happy, the vibes are immaculate. great. awesome. still wish Beard hadn't done what he did. i love rodney terry. always have, always will. he's still not half the head coach that chris beard is. he can't build a program like beard can. he doesn't have the pedigree that beard does. he doesn't have the vision for a program, he doesn't have the ability to engage the students/fan base, he isn't a fucking master of one side of the floor, he's not a foundational HC for a program gbat wants to win titles. he's just not. yeah, we're all happy right now, and we're all hoping for the best, but the truth is that rodney terry has a 0.0% chance of being as successful at Texas as chris beard was going to be. that's simple fact. Beard took the golden years of Texas Hoops from us. he made us happy with (thrilled with?) hiring a coach who honestly would never even be considered for the A&M job, forget this job. he's forced us to delude ourselves into believing that everything will be alright, because that's more palatable than admitting to ourselves that the best coach we probably could ever hope to hire went and self imploded in less than two full seasons and in the process royally fucked all of us. well fuck that, and fuck chris beard. i can hope all i want that he's going to fall flat on his face at ole miss, but deep down we all know that SLX is probably right- he'll probably turn that program around over night and end up winning the 2027 national title at kentucky. and where will we be? wondering what to do with rodney terrry, if i had to guess. god damn it chris beard. you fucked me. you fucked all of us. and you barely even have to pay. to paraphrase the enigmatic Tiger Joe, i will never emotionally recover from this. fuck you you fucking fuck. i hope shaka smart knocks you out of the tourney next year.
  7. observations: •we expected three point shooting and FT shooting to be better this year, and both lived up to expectations tonight. FT shooting wasn't perfect, but the entire damn team has a good looking stroke. •turned defense into offense all night. many of those made threes came in transition. if you watch the video above, in one of the last clips you can hear me say, "speaking of which..." right before Ramey nails a three and the crowd goes wild. my dad and i were talking about all of the transition threes just as that transition three unfolded. •the team looked surprisingly comfortable and in sync. i don't care if we played Johnston HS tonight, these guys looked like they've all been playing together for 2-3 years. none of the expected hesitation, or second guessing. everything on both ends flowed smoothly all night (ew). •we won't have a true alpha dog, but this is the deepest Texas team since the 2010 team that had Doj, J'Covan, Damion James, Avery Bradley, Jordan Hamilton, Dexter Pittman, Gary Johnson, and Justin Mason. it's like that. it doesn't matter if one or two guys are having an off night, because we have five more guys who you still have to account for at all times. defending this team will be very difficult for most of the teams on our schedule. •my dad and i both noted how refreshing the tempo was. the last 4-5 years have featured so many half court sets that last 30 seconds, with so much standing around and so little off-ball movement; this game was not like that. the transition buckets were plentiful, and the half court offense ran more smoothly than any offense we've had since Shaka's first year (shouts out Isaiah Taylor) •best opening night crowd ever. i'm serious. the excitement is palpable. we were up by 30 in the second half and an HBU player would miss a FT and the entire crowd would go nuts. i was amazed, and just absolutely impressed with the noise level and enthusiasm of the crowd tonight. it was like a high school crowd the way everyone was so into the game. the FEC is going to be *rocking* come conference play. oh, and that game on January 29th will no doubt be one of the greatest atmospheres in FEC history, right up there with the Strollin' Nolan game. here's my wrap up: no doubt many of you will remember the events which directly followed the season opener for the 2016-17 season. i went to the game, and i came back to shaggy and said (in so many words) "it's bleak." you will remember this because a feisty and interminable argument started between myself and some other poster whose name i can't recall. he insisted that there was too much mystery surrounding the roster for anyone to definitively declare that the team was good, bad, or anything in between. i, however, was adamant that i had seen enough season openers in my life (20-something at that point) to be able to pass judgment. as you may have tried to forget, we went 11-22 that season and all started huffing gas. shit was, indeed, bleak. well, this is the anti-2016 season opener. ive been to at least a couple dozen of these things in my life, and i know a very good/possibly great team when i see one. i am telling you, this team should not be as aligned and in sync as it is. there just hasn't been enough time. and yet, they are. that's the biggest thing. that's the one question that every CBB fan/analyst has had: how long will it take for this team to jell, and can they come together enough to be title contenders? i'm here to tell you that the answer is 'yes'. i was told by someone who was at the U of H scrimmage that, "If Disu is healthy, this team can go all the way. If not, then maybe the Sweet 16 is more realistic." after what i saw tonight, that sounds right. i cannot explain the chemistry that i witnessed tonight, but it's there. hoopers gonna hoop i suppose. we are going to compete for the big xii regular season title, we are going to win 23-25 regular season games, barring an injury crisis we are going to be a 3 seed in the tourney at worst, and if this team can stay healthy, we are going to be ranked in the top 5-10 for the majority of this season, and we will be a highly favored team come March. this is a Chris Beard team on steroids. five guys between 6'3" and 6'9", all of whom can run, defend, and shoot, and all of whom are high level D-1 players. this team is exactly why Chris Beard came to Texas. get your tickets now. get season tickets if you can. if you can't, then be on the prowl for single game tickets vs KU, OU, BU, and oh yeah, Tennessee. we have a special team that will only be around for one year, and you need to see them in person. you need to experience the FEC when it has 16,000 people going apeshit on a Big Monday vs KU or OU. ive said this once before, and i'll say it again: the only experience in my life as a sports fan that reminds of this one is the 2016 Cubs- we get Theo Epstein, we get Joe Maddon, we go add Lester, Rossy, Heyward, Zobrist, Arrieta, Chapman, etc. it was like, my entire life i've been a fan of this team, and we've generally been terrible, only to have our hearts ripped out the one time we were good, and now all of a sudden, it's as if i'm personally writing the script. that's what this feels like to me. i'm not afraid to get my hopes up. i'm thrilled to be getting my hopes up, because it's based on some very very solid ground. we have the team; we have the coach; we have the support. we have everything required for this to be an all time special season. get crunk. we're doing this.
  8. World Cup 2018: 'This is Harry Maguire's moment' - Rio Ferdinand column Harry Maguire's emergence as an integral part of the England team has been one of the stories of this World Cup, but I am not surprised it has happened for him here in Russia. Sometimes, the penny just drops for a player at a tournament, and it is the right time for you, in the right team. For me, that moment came at the 2002 World Cup. That was when I found my way, and developed a total and clear understanding of my position. It seems like Maguire, a ball-playing defender like me, is doing something similar. I had my reservations about his mobility at this level, because there have been times I have seen him exposed in the Premier League for Leicester. But some people are just made for the slower pace of international football and, on top of that, Maguire is thriving on the kind of football England play. We are a possession-based team now, who look to dictate play and hold on to the ball for long periods. That is completely different to how his club side play, but it gives him the chance to bring the ball out of defence, and he plays a vital role in the way England boss Gareth Southgate has set his side up. I had a frank discussion with Gareth about England's defence before this World Cup, when he laid out what he was trying to do. Gareth told me he did not have two centre-halves who had proved to him they were good enough to play together in a four, so he was going to go with three at the back. He also made it clear about how he wanted to play. He wanted England to set the pace and tempo of every game, and for that to happen he needed defenders whose main attribute is to be good on the ball. They need to be able to defend too, obviously, but they have to be comfortable in possession. The three he has gone with at the back - Maguire, John Stones and Kyle Walker - all fit that template, but they also all offer something a bit different, which gives us a bit of balance that is great to see. Stones will pass it through the lines into the attacking players, Maguire likes to come out with the ball, and Walker can run with it too. Walker has also got the pace to act as cover behind if we lose possession. I was sceptical about playing a full-back there, but it has turned out to be a great thing. What I like is that Gareth has not looked at the negatives of any of his centre-halves, and asked: 'What are they lacking?' Instead it is: 'What are they bringing to my team?' His thinking is, 'well, we are going to have to defend sometimes but, the majority of the time, we are going to have the ball, and I want players who can use it'. That is why Gareth left Chris Smalling out of his squad, and why Gary Cahill has not been starting games, and he has been proved right. He has switched the whole mindset of the defence, in terms of the role they play for the team - we are forward-thinking now, in every position on the pitch. If we had just one defender who could bring the ball out, then England would be easy to stop. The opposition could just sit on him, and stop him playing out from the back. But all three of our defenders are near the top of the rankings at this tournament for passes, passing accuracy and passes per minute, and they all take their turn in their own way. 2018 World Cup (rank) PlayerMost passesPasses per minutePassing accuracy John Stones339 (8th)70.1 (25th)94.2 (2nd) Harry Maguire322 (10th)66.6 (30th)87.3% (33rd) Kyle Walker317 (12th)74.5 (16th)91.8 % (14th) They know their role, individually and collectively, and so does everyone else. It's been a long time since we have been able to say that - probably since the time Glenn Hoddle was in charge - and it means no-one panics when things go wrong. Midfield movement is key to making Southgate's system work The whole point of bringing the ball out of defence is to draw the opposition players out. It's vital when you've got teams that are so well organised like at this World Cup. At previous tournaments, the opposition have been quite happy for us to have the ball, because we did not seem to know what to do with it. Now, we have a plan. If, say, Maguire comes out with the ball then Jordan Henderson drops in behind him There are opposition midfielders marking Jesse Lingard and Dele Alli but, at some point, one of them has to engage Maguire, and he will leave a lot of space behind him. That is the trigger for movement from Lingard or Alli, depending on which side of the pitch Maguire is on. They can find space, and create an overload with one of the full-backs where we have a two-versus-one situation, then suddenly they are free and facing the opposition defence. You need that initial movement, though, to make it work - because you have to give the defender options. You cannot just rely on him being good on the ball - that is not enough on its own. Far too often in my England career, I would look up and have one or maybe two options to pass the ball - or just go long. In this England team, though, our centre-halves have got four or five players to look for. Our full-backs are always looking for the ball, and either Raheem Sterling or Harry Kane are dropping deep too. So at any one time we have got four players in that central area who are looking to get on the ball. We have a gameplan and we are going to stick with it, and we will do the same against Croatia in Wednesday's semi-final as we did in our win over Sweden on Saturday. All the successful sides I played for believed in the system the manager had implemented and this is what I see when I look at England - the players completely trust the way Southgate is asking them to play. Rewards outweigh risks of playing out from the back There are going to be times when a mistake is made, but it's been from England trying to do the right thing. Every time you see someone get in on our goal at this World Cup, it has stemmed from us trying to play. Walker made a mistake on the ball against Colombia. Maguire did it a couple of times in the group games and Stones has been caught out too. But I would never berate them for it, or change the way we are playing because of it. Of course, it might cost us a goal at this World Cup or in the future, but it will lead to us scoring many more than that. This is the way I want to see England play in the future, and the rewards far outweigh the risks. If we go on and win this World Cup then the roof will come off - it will be brilliant. But even if we don't, we will come out of this tournament now with a genuine philosophy of playing and an identity of our own. That is a massive achievement in itself. If I was a young player watching England now, I would be excited. Not just because I think we are going to win this World Cup, but simply because of the way we are playing. Long may it continue.
  9. sorry, but this is gonna be long (title of my sex tape).- i really suffered through the shaka years. it was seriously upsetting to watch the program that i love so much being run by such an inept, unqualified, buffoonish snake oil salesman. we recruited better than all but a handful of programs, and yet the product on the court was unwatchable, and the results at the end of the year were just a gut punch. here's how bad things got for me towards the end of shaka's reign of terror: from an older post of mine, re: Texas losing to ACU: the end of gbat game was a super surreal experience for me. the entire night vs ACU was just a miserable experience. it was so fucking frustrating to watch Shaka Smart's opus, the absolute zenith of his ass-backwards, incomprehensibly brain dead style of coaching. it was slamming your dick in the door for two hours. but then, with time running out, my favorite player of the Shaka Smart era, Andrew Jones, hit a clutch three to give Texas the lead...and my heart sank into the pit of my stomach. wtf?!? how in the fuck did we get to a point to where my favorite player hitting a go-ahead three with time running out to give Texas the lead in an NCAA tournament game MAKES ME ILL. it's not like it was a conscious decision- that three went in and my heart sank before the ball even hit the ground. that is how bad things were under Shaka. we were going to win the game, and i was devastated by that fact. i felt like a battered spouse who couldn't escape their abuser. it was absolutely fucking surreal, and not in any kind of positive way. i was crestfallen; disconsolate; inconsolable. i was having my heart ripped out because the team that i love so much and have loved for so long was about to win an NCAA tournament game. but then ACU got the ball, they got into the lane, they got fouled, and now they've got two shots at the line to beat my beloved Texas Longhorns, and here i am, sitting in my living room, praying to god that this kid from Abilene Christian sinks both FTs and beats the team that i love so much. and he did. and here we are, about to open the very next season in the top 5 of the polls, and Shaka is 1,000 miles away. just totally, completely surreal. Things were so hopelessly terrible under shaka that my inner most being, the core of who i am, wanted Texas to lose and to fail, no matter what it took, just to get rid of the cancer we had at head coach. as someone whose literal first memories are of loving Texas Basketball, that's a pain i don't wish on any sports fan, save sooners and aggies. to make it worse, my dream hire, chris beard, gad been given an extension at TTU only a year prior, meaning he was not a serious candidate to replace shaka. and then a miracle happened. from another recent post of mine: chris beard got to Texas, immediately signed the top transfer class, won the program's first tourney game in 8 years, got all eligible players from said transfer class to return, signed two 5 stars, and by week three of his second season had Texas in the top 5 and receiving first place votes. he did all of that in the 18 months immediately following shaka's loss to ACU. you wanna talk about surreal? to go from absolute anguish over the state of my oldest and first love, to then suddenly overnight seeing the program at the doorstep of being a top 5 national program year in and year out- it was like i had been brought back from the dead and was suddenly surrounded by victoria's secret angels whose only job was to give me sponge baths and feed me chicken wings. ab. so. lute. ly. surreal. from hell to heaven, in the blink of an eye. at least that's how it was up until two weeks ago. now it's as if i'm just waking up from a coma, and the entire chris beard era was nothing but a drug induced wet dream. now i'm waking up to find a fat, sweaty orderly telling me that all of my organs are failing and that unless i get a miracle transplant i'm going to die. the never ending future of limitless possibilities and chicken wing sponge baths was all just a dream, and now reality has smacked me awake and i'm right back where i was when Andrew Jones hit that three pointer: crestfallen; disconsolate; inconsolable. i am right there with slx and pancho in terms of what this program means to me, but unlike most here i could not give a shit less about UT football compared to Texas Hoops. Texas Basketball is my lifelong no.1 love, from as far back as i can remember, and nothing else really comes close for me. i grew up at practices, in the locker rooms, at all of the games. travis mays was the first person who i considered to be "my best friend", back when i was just four years old. fast forward a decade, and it's rick barnes's first practice at Texas, and i'm off to the side playing 1 on 1 with his son, Nick. my entire childhood was shaped by Texas Basketball, my first love, and that love has never waned- it's only caused me to feel great pain during our hard times, and unbridled joy during the good times. and to this day i still have countless relationships with people from the UT Basketball family, from the 80's all the way up to today. Texas Basketball has always been my life. i still can't believe this is happening. i took nearly a week off from posting when the news hit, because i was already grieving, and in no mood to be talking about basketball with anyone. now i'm back, and i'm just waiting for the final, official word that my dream, a dream that i actually got to live, is being crushed. without going into it too far, i'll just say that my mental health issues have led to some serious physical health issues for me, and things were not looking good for for a while there. i had to have some tough conversations with my loved ones about how much time i might have left. then suddenly we had a breakthrough, and i've been experiencing an unexpected good turn with my physical health, which happened to coincide with our fantastic start to the season.everything was coming up derka. and then the news hit. my mom came over that evening and i said to her, "this was the best thing i had going for me; this was keeping me alive." to which she solemnly replied, "i know." why am i writing all of this? perhaps it's an attempt at finding some catharsis? i don't even know. and that's really it- i can't even wrap my head and my emotions around this enough to find myself on stable footing in terms of how i feel or where i stand. i'm still in a daze from finding out that my waking fantasy had only been a dream. the thrilling present and the amazing, unlimited future have just been snatched from beneath me, and now i'm just dead inside all over again. i watched that k state game and felt absolutely nothing. my needle didn't move one iota. and that's because my heart is dead, and the only AED's that exist (donovan, wright, calipari) ain't showing up any time soon. to wrap this up, please allow me quote the late, great augie garrido: "you may have a lot in your life; i don't." i used to have a life, a career, and (somewhat) healthy mind and body. but with all of my health problems and my loss of employment years ago, now i have my mom, my failing health, and my sports teams. and all of those teams combined mean less to me than this UT Basketball program. this one really is an all-time hurter to the heart for me. i honestly may never feel the same way about UT Hoops ever again. this one may just too big of a blow for me to ever fully recover. this one really hurts.
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