Written by Brian McPeek

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I wasn’t about to waste another Sunday watching the Browns find new and torturous ways to lose football games. It was too nice a weekend and it’s deer season and a Sunday afternoon in the tree stand sounded a hell of a lot better than the inevitable so that’s where I was. But I was getting the play by play. Not from Jim Donovan or some network hack who’s so bad they give him Browns games, I was getting them from 12-year old daughter. So there’s that and a little love for the Buckeyes and Mentor Cardinals and a little hate for the Miami Marlins front office who somehow make the people who own our Cleveland teams look like humanitarians and geniuses.

It’s the Weekend Wrap.

Technology is Most Excellent

I got at least 80 texts from my youngest daughter, Kacie, on Sunday while I was sitting in a tree in Ashtabula County.

She gave me the details of Browns and Cowboys and it’s funny to look at the same, tired Browns loss (where someone will inevitably throw out some compliments for a ‘close loss’- Hurray!!! Participation medals for the entire roster!!!) through the eyes of a younger, less beaten down fan. Kacie gets my slant on things so she’s probably somewhat biased, but she steadfastly and furiously protects her team and the Browns are her team. My oldest, Danielle, is a true blue Tribe fan who doesn’t have the same passion for the Browns (one can only take so much horror) while Jessica, the 14 year old, would rather be playing volleyball (in any weather) or watching live sports. Jessica is detached enough to ask if the Browns won last night even on a Wednesday morning.

Anyway, throughout the afternoon I got such messages as “Awesome return by Cribbs!! The Browns start a little past the 50-yard line” followed later by “TOUCHDOWN!!!!!- Benjamin Watson! Awesome catch!”

Naturally, I had to ask how Brandon Weeden was looking. To that I got what’s probably as good a summation on Weeden as anyone can give: “Not the best but doing alright”

She was pretty high on the Browns defense so apparently they played well until they didn’t: “Sacked!!!!! 4^th and 22 and the Cowboys just punted. Sack by Parker”. I was then informed that Watson giveth and taketh away when she advised: “ Hardesty just carried and got a first down. Would have had another one but Watson just dropped it”

And that’s the way it went all afternoon as the Browns built a 13-0 lead. But Kacie has seen a couple Browns games. In the first half she astutely noted: “Shurmur challenging a Dallas 1^st down..he’s going to lose it” quickly followed by “He lost it. 1^st down Dallas”.

In the third quarter I got “Awesome throw by Weeden and awesome catch by Little..1^st and 10 at Dallas 40”. So naturally I told her that the Browns were just about in Phil Dawson FG range. Her next text was not a surprise: “4^th and 16..Weeden sacked”.

See? You can ‘watch’ a Browns game quite well in a tree. At least there were no deer to distract me. Anyway, having heard this song before Kacie was ready for the fall but before that I did get this gem: “Penalty called//Shurmur swearing like crazy...I’ll explain later” I haven’t asked for the explanation yet. No real interest.

I asked her about a 4^th and goal play the Browns apparently ran with under two minutes to play. Specifically I asked what play they tried and she responded, “The throw it over everyone’s head play…Terrible throw by Weeden”.

What scares me most is Kacie’s fear of the bottom falling out with the Browns. When the Browns got the ball back I got this: “ BORWN (sic) TOUCHDOWN!!!!!!!!!!!  Benjamin Watson…1:07” which was followed up less than 40 seconds later by: “20-17. This is scary. Dallas has too much time and a timeout left”.

Yep.

And then in OT: “Dallas is definitely in FG range now..This game is over even though it’s 3^rd & 2”.

And it was.

But it was my favorite game of the year and the best game I’ve never seen.

Bravo

On a day when Braxton Miller was bottled up and under heavy pressure the Buckeyes needed someone other than Miller to step up if they wanted to run their record to 11-0.

And John Simon, Carlos Hyde, Ryan Shazier and Philly Brown did just that to ruin Brett Bielema’s day (I love when I can write that) 21-14 in overtime.

Miller was pedestrian. He had a few Houdini acts and a few runs that were head-shaking in the regard that most humans can’t move like that, but overall the Badgers bottled him up. Miller rushed 23 times for just 48 yards and threw for less than 100 yards on the day. Had you told me those were going to be Braxton’s numbers I would have told you that Ohio State got run out of Camp Randall.

But Carlos Hyde picked up the offensive slack by carrying 15 times for 87 yards and two touchdowns, including the game winning TD run in OT. That 2-yard TD run followed a 12 yard run on the first play of that drive. Miller sandwiched a big run in between against a Wiscy defense that was gasping and barely touched a Buckeye runner on the drive.

But Hyde was the difference Saturday for OSU. The big back isn’t going to remind anyone of Reggie Bush or LaMichael James but he hits holes hard and chews up chunks of yards despite not truly being a home run threat.

Hyde scored two of the Buckeye TDs but Philly Brown’s 68-yard punt return for a TD late in the first quarter opened the scoring and was a huge momentum play for Ohio State. Brown took the punt at his 32-yd line and burst down the middle of the field before juking Badger punter Drew Meyer out of his drawers. That shut up a raucous Wisconsin crowd that can play hell on opposing teams and put the Badgers in catch-up mode for the entire night.

As for Simon, he was simply a filthy beast all day. He spent as much time in the Wisconsin backfield as most of the Badgers backs. I think he had 14 sacks and three passes batted down. That may be a bit of a stretch but Simon played probably his best game of the year Saturday. Shazier was all over the field too, knocking others and himself silly with big hits, none bigger than the fumble he caused with his back to the OSU goal line when he stoned Badger RB Montee Ball and caused the Wisconsin star to fumble when it looked certain Wiscy would tie the game then.

Catch up Wisconsin did with just eight seconds left in the 4^th quarter to force the OT, but Christian Bryant swatted away a 4^th down Wisconsin pass on their OT possession to clinch the ball game and ensure that OSU went into Michigan week at that perfect 11-0.

It’s Sunday night and Michigan still sucks, but you can bet your ass that they’d love nothing more than to walk into the ‘Shoe next Saturday and ruin Urban Meyer’s perfect year by beating OSU. Michigan is dangerous despite their injury situation and worse Michigan teams than this one have ruined better Buckeyes seasons so assume nothing and take nothing for granted.

I’ll be interested to see how Meyer handles his team during his first Michigan game as head coach. And despite all the upsets Saturday that might have allowed OSU to face Notre Dame in a BCS title game the Buckeyes could win, beating Michigan and going 12-0 in a year where there’s no bowl game might not be bad too bad to tolerate.

And thanks to a spirited effort by some of the Buckeyes biggest stars, Michigan week could mean perfection for Ohio State a week from now.

 

Hang ‘Em High

That’s my suggestion to Miami Marlin fans and Miami city officials who were played by the despicable human debris named Jeff Loria and David Samson.

Well, I can’t in good conscience allow the city officials the joy of stringing up human shit like Loria and Sampson when they were as dumb and gullible as Loria and Samson were deceitful and greedy. The city officials should reap what they sow but I can’t help but feel for the fans of the team who had the rug pulled out from under them again. Yes, the fans down there can land softly on the pleasant memories of two World Series titles, but no one should have to endure the near criminal way that Loria and Samson have operated the team the past couple years.

Those two flaming assholes held a city and region hostage, bilked hundreds of millions of public dollars for their new stadium, hired a guy who would pull at the city’s Latino population heartstrings in Ozzie Guillen, signed a bunch of high-priced players for their inaugural season in the new park to further entice people to show up, only to see virtually every single move blow up in their face.

The team sucked, Guillen hailed the exploits of Fidel Castro and alienated fans, many of whom had family killed by Castro and/or who had fled Castro’s Cuba and ended up in South Florida as a result and the season spiraled out of control.

So did Miami management take their share of the blame and steadfastly vow to put a team and a manger on the field that South Florida could be proud of?

No. That’s not Loria’s style. And Samson is a worm and a joke and wouldn’t a solid baseball team from the cast of Victor Victoria. These two instead destroyed the team for the umpteenth time in an attempt to gut it of payroll and make a bigger profit from revenue sharing and a potential sale of the club. They gave away Jose Reyes and Josh Johnson as well as Mark Buehrle and others, to the Toronto Blue Jays in exchange for shit.

What the Marlins got back didn’t matter to Loria and Samson. What they got rid of did. They unloaded $160million of future salary obligations in exchange for that northern package of shit.

Why? Because without that future debt of big player contracts hanging over the team, and with a still sparkling new ballpark in the bag, they just maximized the value of the franchise. This isn’t new with MLB and it certainly isn’t new with Loria. Loria has crapped all over plenty of franchises plenty of times. He ran the Expos like they were a sponge to be wrung for every nickel and he’s melted down the Marlins before too.

MLB just sits silently by, watching brand new stadiums basically hold a market captive until the next city wishing for baseball promises an even newer stadium and the next team on the ‘trouble list’ plays that against the public to bilk more money from somewhere. That might actually be the MLB business plan that doesn’t get publicly shared. Sure, in NYC and LA you don’t to pit two smaller market teams and promises of publicly funded stadiums against each other in a steel cage match. But where interest was low, in a place like Miami, a criminal like Loria could float the threats of leaving if his needs for a new park weren’t met.

What’s left for Miami? Well, they have a stadium that isn’t even a year old that no one will want to go to given the fact that aren’t many major league players left playing there. And there aren’t too many elite major league players in their prime who are going to want to go down there and play for a couple criminals like Bonnie & Clyde. So what will likely happen is what happened in Montreal. Loria will probably sell the team he just stripped bare while MLB sits idly by and watches him profit and probably puts his name at the top of the list as an ownership partner in the next market that make a play for a team. What do they care what Loria does to one market and one fan base when he’s able to build palaces on the backs of the public and continue making tons of money for MLB?

The answer is they don’t care. Not a bit. The trade Bud Selig is reviewing right now will go through. Then the owners and the commissioner alike can sit there, noses pinched, and count their blood money.

Wow

Congratulations to the Mentor Cardinals as they head to the state semi-finals after knocking of the top two teams in the state in consecutive weeks. Mentor beat #1 St. Ed’s last week in what I thought was a game that couldn’t topped. They beat St. Ed’s 63-56 in the final seconds after being down 56-35 with just over five minutes left in the third quarter.

But Saturday night may have been better. The Cardinals topped Ignatius 57-56 in triple-OT when the Cardinals gambled and went for two after their TD in that third OT. Mentor QB Mitch Trubisky, as he has all year, made a great throw and Mentor WR Brandon Fritts, as he has all year, made a terrific catch in the end zone to shock the Wildcats.

All Trubisky did the last two weeks in knocking off two of the most storied programs in the state was hit on nearly 70% of his 88 passes for nearly 900 yards and six TDs.

Mentor will play undefeated Toledo Whitmer next weekend and it might be time to stop considering Trubisky and Mentor as underdogs to anyone.

Mentor coach Steve Trivisonno took a huge risk going for two, given how effectively Mentor was scoring all night, but with Trubisky and Fritts nearly impossible to stop that risk was calculated. Had the attempt failed all of Lake County would be wondering why Trivisonno went for two but the Mentor coach saw an advantage he could press and the Cardinals are headed to Division 1’s Final Four.

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